Come for the politics, stay for the snark.

I am pretty sure these ‘journalists’ were not always such a bootlicking sycophants.

When I was faster i was always behind.

A democracy can’t function when people can’t distinguish facts from lies.

With all due respect and assumptions of good faith, please fuck off into the sun.

If you voted for Trump, you don’t get to speak about ethics, morals, or rule of law.

The way to stop violence is to stop manufacturing the hatred that fuels it.

Bark louder, little dog.

Compromise? There is no middle ground between a firefighter and an arsonist.

This really is a full service blog.

Donald Trump found guilty as fuck – May 30, 2024!

This has so much WTF written all over it that it is hard to comprehend.

It’s all just conspiracy shit beamed down from the mothership.

If you thought you’d already seen people saying the stupidest things possible on the internet, prepare yourselves.

Beware of advice from anyone for whom Democrats are “they” and not “we.”

I’d like to think you all would remain faithful to me if i ever tried to have some of you killed.

In after Baud. Damn.

Oh FFS you might as well trust a 6-year-old with a flamethrower.

It is not hopeless, and we are not helpless.

The party of Reagan has become the party of Putin.

I really should read my own blog.

There are consequences to being an arrogant, sullen prick.

Dear elected officials: Trump is temporary, dishonor is forever.

Proof that we need a blogger ethics panel.

This country desperately needs a functioning fourth estate.

You are here: Home / Open Threads / Open Thread

Reader Interactions

49Comments

  1. 1.

    LGRooney

    Okay, I’ll bite on the open thread.

    Video games!! I’m just now getting into my son’s XBox with FIFA 2011, after having been stuck on Battlefield 1943 for the past year. I am a huge fan of the Unreal series but not so adept at working a controller as I was at a keyboard.

    Suggestions please on games for me. I tried Assassin’s Creed and found it repetitive and dull. Prince of Persia felt too lonely. I like Battlefield in that I am actually playing against real people. Same for FIFA 2011, I can play with real people.

    Ideas?

  2. 2.

    hildebrand

    I just noted (on a site that should go unnamed (more out of my shame for having visited said site than anything) an article entitled, “21 Reasons Bloomberg can win in 2012” penned by Ralph ‘The Wonder Llama’ Nader.

    I decided not to read it.

  5. 5.

    zmulls

    The Black Phoenix Alchemy Lab, a purveyor of artisan hand-blended ethically-sourced perfume oils, has a scent called “The Antikythera Mechanism” in their Phoenix Steamworks line. It’s a mix of vanilla, tobacco and wood scents.

    It’s actually one of my BPAL favorites and I was wearing it just a couple of days ago.

  6. 6.

    Scott de B.

    I am a classical archaeologist and this is the coolest thing I’ve seen all year. I’m sending it around to my Greek and Roman art class.

  7. 7.

    Scott de B.

    I like Battlefield in that I am actually playing against real people.

    Try Battlefield 2: Bad Company. The multi-player aspect is just like Battlefield 1943 only much better.

    The Left 4 Dead series is also a lot of fun, if you’re into zombies.

  9. 9.

    Corner Stone

    @LGRooney: I’ve been thinking about getting an Xbox and buying the more blood and guts type games. Currently we just have the Wii with age appropriate games for my 6 yr old to play.
    Not sure I’d have the time to use it though so I’m hoping others can respond to your games request so I can check them out further.

  10. 10.

    R-Jud

    I’ve just realized that I attended college with the guy who filmed Tim’s link up there.

    I feel so useless now.

  12. 12.

    Sko Hayes

    Is the site acting hinky again for anyone today? At home this morning, every time I tried to get on the site, IE (nevermind the chiding, I know!) would close the page and I’d get the “IE has stopped working, blah blah blah”.
    Just now, the front page won’t load all the way for me (no pics, no ads, nothing but text) though I see more when I go into individual threads.

  14. 14.

    PaulW

    my biggest problem with job hunting? I have to keep filling out different application forms with EACH. DAMN. COMPANY. or Civil Office. And my hand cramps up with using pens. Damn you, mad keyboarding skills! I can’t ever go back to analog!

    my second biggest problem with job hunting? I’m competing against 150 other librarians at any given entry, even for a part-time job for god’s sake. It used to be 5-20 max. Nowadays?! I’ll be lucky if anybody reads my resume long enough to recognize I use Flareserif as a font…

  16. 16.

    LGRooney

    @Scott de B.: No zombies lest my wife and I get invaded at night by a scared 7 y.o. who can’t stay away from zombie games, laughs hysterically at them on the screen, but can’t sleep after he’s played or seen them.

    I’ve thought about Bad Company but am still wavering. In all honesty, it is because of my good war- bad war feelings that I haven’t bought the game. I know, I know, it’s just a game and I used to nuke Korea relentlessly when I flew my Hornet on my old Mac ~15 years ago but, alas, I am older now.

  17. 17.

    Catsy

    @Bill E Pilgrim:

    Funny, I never realized that “Legos” was a Greek word, but now that I do it makes sense.

    The name of the LEGO company comes from the Danish phrase “leg godt”, meaning to “play well”. In the adult Lego enthusiast community “Play Well” is a common catchphrase.

  18. 18.

    Crashman

    @LGRooney: If we’re talking about PC games, World in Conflict is pretty good and really fun. It’s real time strategy, but with no basebuilding. Not a genre I’m typically a fan of, but it was really entertaining. You play both sides of a Soviet invasion of Washington state in the 1980s. Totally ridiculous but fun and enjoyable. Probably pretty cheap by now too, if you get it on STEAM.

    Mass Effect 2 is a must if you haven’t played it yet. Also probably discounted nicely at this point.

  19. 19.

    Catsy

    @Jay in Oregon:

    God dammit, every time I think I’ve gotten over the urge to spend ludicrous amounts of money buying Legos, some new video or photo gallery comes out.

    Ah yes, that would be the Starfighters set of the legendary Peter Morris. He’s one of the most prolific and talented contributors to the Lego Starfighers group on Flickr, and as you can see he has a very distinctive style that consists of demonstrating just how much diversity you can get with variations on a theme.

    If you like that, you might also like the Vic Vipers, Classic Space, and SHIPs groups. SHIP, in the AFOL community, is a tongue-in-cheek acronym for Seriously Huge Investment in Parts, one of the most famous creators of which is Mark Kelso, who is currently working on a simply massive rendition of the Halo capital ship Spirit of Fire.

    Edit: FYWP, counting links to catch spam = epic lazy programming fail.

  24. 24.

    PurpleGirl

    Geeks Rule! They come up with the coolest ideas. Really, recreating an ancient device in Legos…. waaaaaay coooool.

    Say it loud, say it proud…. Geeks Rule!

  25. 25.

    Emily L. Hauser/ellaesther

    @Catsy: I like this new information less than I might have if I hadn’t already been swept away with enthusiasm for the “Legos comes from Greek” theory. Oh well. Facts are nice, too. Especially if they’re cute facts.

    @WereBear: I squeed so hard it was actually a snort of laughter. I want to go to there, frankly.

  30. 30.

    Alex S.

    The Antikythera device is my favorite piece of “what if…”. The Greeks were so close to starting an industrial revolution. All they needed was a competitor on the same level, like the european nations in the 17th century. They had the knowledge to develop the steam machine and mechanical devices. The Roman empire would have ensured the spread of their knowledge.
    Imagine they had invented an early railroad. The romans would have had no problem to defend their borders. Or gunpowder… but instead, Greeks and Romans fell into a very slow decline that rendered them unable to even realize their world was falling apart, because when they did it was too late. And so we had at least 700 years of darkness.

  31. 31.

    Amir_Khalid

    I’m not sure if anyone saw this, which I posted late in the high-school wrestling thread:

    One thing bothers me about how the story was reported. I figure ABC, like news organizations the world over, has a policy of not reporting the names of victims of (alleged or confirmed) sexual assault, to protect them from the humiliation — and worse — that such victims are often subjected to. Presumably this is why the injured boy is not named.

    However, ABC did identify him: it tells us that he is the 15-year-old son of a man it does name, one Ross Rice of Fresno, California, and that Rice Jr. goes to Buchanan High School.

    The newspaper where I worked used to do this when reporting on (for instance) fathers accused of raping their daughters, until a reporter raised this point.

  32. 32.

    EFroh

    @LGRooney:

    I prefer single-player, but all the games I list below (that I’ve played and enjoyed) have well-received single-player and multi-player components:

    Xbox 360 exclusives

    -Gears of War 1 and 2
    -Halo Reach, ODST, Halo 3

    PS3 exclusives

    -Uncharted 2
    -Demon’s Souls

    360/PS3/PC

    -Assassin’s Creed Brotherhood (AC II is also a great game, but has no multiplayer. ACII and Brotherhood are MUCH better than the first game)
    -Red Dead Redemption (what GTA IV should have been)
    -Dead Rising 2
    -Left for Dead 1 and 2
    -Red Faction Guerilla

    Games I’ve enjoyed in 2010 (single-player only)

    -Mass Effect 2 (360 exclusive, PS3 version coming out next month, PC version might already be out)
    -Infamous (PS3 only)
    -Castlevania: Lords of Shadow (360/PS3)
    -Batman: Arkham Asylum (360/PS3)
    -Dragon Age Origins (360/PS3/PC)
    -Fallout 3 (360/PS3/PC)
    -Fallout New Vegas (360/PS3/PC)

  33. 33.

    Catsy

    @Culture of Truth:

    I thought “lego” was danish for “pain in foot”

    HAH! You have no idea how true that rings. It has become a running joke in our household just how many different inappropriate places Lego parts can turn up. They get tracked everywhere and they like to hide in carpet and ambush unsuspecting feet.

    I actually just gave a blood sacrifice to a build I was working on last night — I was trying to pull a Lego bar out of a 1×1 plate with clip light, which is a snug fit. It came loose abruptly and I raked the knuckle of my index finger across a sharp corner. Not the first time I’ve bled for this hobby.

    Edit: FYWP.

    Edit x2: WTFWP. I fixed the fucking double hyphen you’re apparently incapable of parsing correctly. WTF is with preserving the below text that isn’t even in the fucking editor anymore?

  35. 35.

    Martin

    @Catsy: Nice! My kid (12) is into Lego stop-motion. He’s getting pretty good at it, but is limited by equipment – looking to solve that in 15 days. The hobby is made somewhat easier that Legoland is less than an hour away and they have a store there where you can bulk-buy. Need 5,000 axels? Just fill up a bag. Pay by the pound. I think the kid lives in Bricklink though.

    The Antikythera device is too fucking cool. I might have to break down and build that with him as a permanent item in the house.

  36. 36.

    Catsy

    @WereBear: Thanks! The Mass Effect Citadel got picked up by Kotaku, Reddit, and even got tweets from EA. In terms of page views it’s probably my most popular creation.

    My personal favorite, though, is probably Bird’s Eye. It won first place in the Blood in the Snow contest in the ApocaLego group, and it was the first time I really felt like I was doing art with my photography, rather than just stenographically recording the things I build. It’s how I justified picking up a real camera.

    Oh, and the cute from that kitten BURNS.

  38. 38.

    WereBear

    @Catsy: Made up landscapes which you then photograph. That’s a lot of layers of wonderful.

    And thanks for kitty compliments; he’s something special. And so is his backstory; one day I will get that to Anne Laurie.

  39. 39.

    Moonbatman

    Stupid whining Wingnut Butthurt against the woman who bravely recanted the true story of her rape after being swiftboated with illegal wiretapped video and should not be named for pity and sisterhood against the rape culture.

    Prosecutors decided it was time to reveal to Ndonye the possible existence of the video. The moment they did, her story collapsed under the weight of her prevarications and the truth came cascading out. Madeline Singas, the county’s chief sex crimes prosecutor, said to her: “If there is a video, and I get that video, it’s going to show me that what you’re saying is true?” Ndonye sat silent for several long moments, Singas said. Then Ndonye admitted that sex with the young men had been consensual. She made up the twisted tale because she didn’t want her schoolmates — particularly her new boyfriend — to think she was “easy.”

  40. 40.

    DBrown

    The Greeks were so close to starting an industrial revolution.

    Not really (but they were very close to creating real science as we use it) but the romans came very close – yet slavery really prevented both from getting to the key level for take-off.

  41. 41.

    Catsy

    @WereBear: My talents in the realm of photographing made-up landscapes pale by comparison to someone like Avanaut, who has got this thing down to a science (literally).

    One of these days I need to get around to writing up my own cat’s rescue story.

  43. 43.

    M. Carey

    The problem for the Romans was- that their equivalent of the Repubs won out, and their culture lost interest in science. They remained pretty good in Civil Engineering (aqueducts and large buildings) for several hundred additional years, and then gradually list interest in that too.

    As Gibbon said “the triumph of Christianity and Barbarism. “

  44. 44.

    SectarianSofa

    Maybe in two million years the cat people will do that with my iPod.

    Yes, but it wouldn’t work, because of the DRM.

    (This is actually true — I’ve been to the future and it’s just like that. Recreating proprietary content protection schemes will get you a quick date with a firing squad.)

  45. 45.

    Sweet Fanny Adams

    @Catsy: The text that goes with that great creation, where’s it from? Did you write it, and if so, where’s the rest of it?!?! It’s really, really good and I would love to read more of it…

  46. 46.

    Catsy

    @Sweet Fanny Adams: I’m very flattered! The ApocaLego group on Flickr held a contest called Blood in the Snow, the premise of which was to depict life after civilization ends in an ice age. I’d had builder’s block (so to speak) for some time and that broke it. I had the visual I wanted of the guy on top of the roof, and I just made the story up to go with the diorama. I ended up liking it enough to continue it in a second scene, and had a WIP of a third, but I got distracted by other ideas and have been meaning to revisit the world–which I sort of unofficially call The Great Chill.

    These are just little vignettes, but someday I might try to write a short story set in this world.

    On a more sci-fi bent, there’s also the Belter Rebellion universe in which I’ve been building spaceships, but it’s far too derivative of too many different things and is really just an excuse to wrap story around models. If anything it’s inspired by the Terran Trade Authority books.

  47. 47.

    SectarianSofa

    @Catsy:

    OK, that’s very cool.
    My kids are actually quite into building very strange things out of legos, which is quite cool in itself. I’ve just started looking through your flickr pages. Inspiring.
    I see more legos in our future.

  48. 48.

    PanurgeATL

    Love the Antikythera device, but I just gotta say: It’s now official–minimalism as we know it has ruined music, at least background music (which is now too annoyingly simplistic to remain in the background). Note to career musicians: The Power Of One Note is not absolute or all-encompassing. It’s possible to take out too much. (In fact, you can’t take it out if you don’t put it in in the first place so you can make the decision to take it out.)

    There, rant over.

  49. 49.

    dan

    I can’t wait for the eclipse in 2024. The Palinites, Teabaggers, end-timers and Left Behinders will think it’s the end of the world. They’ll run outside, screaming and crying and wait to be lifted to heaven.

    Should be a fun show.

Comments are closed.