Poo Poo Point

May 27, 2012

The Year We Loved The Spurs
The kicker: The Thunder, for all their chaos-sowing and trans-positional weirdness, are in many ways based on the Spurs template. Symbolically, their brilliant young GM Sam Presti came up in the Spurs organization. His career took off when he urged the team to target Tony Parker and was proved very, very right. Durant and Duncan are very different players, but both are superstars brought to town via the draft, big dudes with many dimensions to their game, and quiet leaders who dominate games without making a show of it. Westbrook is like Parker if the already feisty Frenchman mainlined an entire candy factory. Harden, whose pro role was unclear when Presti nabbed him in the draft, has emerged as nothing less than Manu Ginobili's lone heir. Manu is a truly idiosyncratic player but the Thunder have locked Harde into that same role: part-scorer, part-facilitator, and equally discreet and aggressive. Oh, and he comes off the bench when his talent level would seem to demand otherwise. Thabo is Bruce Bowen's Revenge. Perkins is the largely functional centers that San Antonio for years carried next to Duncan.

Today's Photos:

Poo Poo Point

Yes, that's what it's really called.

Josh Radnor skyping about his movie "Liberal Arts"
(It doesn't have a trailer yet, but it was really good.)

K! K! K! K! K! K! K!

May 26, 2012

50 Best Streaming Movies on Netflix Instant
It's almost impossible to be bored anymore.

Live Tweeting Everest
Sandra Leduc is an attorney from Canada who quite literally just finished scaling the world's highest mountain. She also live-tweeted her ascent.

Her tweets are a mix of pure joy and determination and the numbing rawness one would expect from tens of thousands of feet above sea level. She experienced many setbacks and saw things that sound absolutely terrifying and disturbing, but she also kept upbeat—making jokes about Snickers bars, watching Indiana Jones and fantasizing about the creature comforts once she was done.

Northwest Pinball and Arcade Show - June 8-10
The 2012 NW Pinball and Arcade Show takes place June 8th-10th at the Seattle Center! The show is a family friendly event that will feature over 300 pinball and arcade games all set on free play! Over the weekend there will be guest speakers and personalities from the world of pinball and video games, from designers and manufacturers to world record high score holders. The show includes vendors, tournaments, contests and give a ways. Enter for your chance to win a full-sized pinball and arcade game, along with hundreds of other game related items, t-shirts, posters and more!

Ridgetop Red Pub Crawl - July 14

Join us for our 2nd Anual Mariner's/Ridgetop Red Pub crawl! Saturday July 14th, we will meet in Pioneer Square in Front of Swannies at 2:30 pm to kick off the crawl at 3pm. Tickets are $25 (plus service fees) and include the following.
- Ticket to the Seattle Mariners vs. The Texas Rangers, 6:10 pm game time
- 1 Silver City Ridgetop Red Shirt (To be proudly adorned during the pub crawl \& the game)
- Ridgetop Red special pricing at the participating Pioneer Square Pubs
- Chances to win great prizes from the poker run
~ collect poker cards at each "Ridgetop Red" bar (minimum of 5 cards to qualify) best 10 hands win a prize. Prizing to be done in the stadium during the first inning.
- A map of each participating bar will be supplied at the Swannie's rally point.

Secrets of Mental Math

I fell asleep on the couch tonight.  When I woke up, this ad was on tv.  Still half asleep, I thought this sounded awesome.  "I could multiply really big numbers in my head!" I could totally see myself buying this over the summer and locking myself in a room for a few days.

Today's Photos:

From the Retro, 50's, Rainiers, King's Court:

Rainstorm Runners

May 25, 2012

Best Celebrity Commencement Speeches
I have commenced several times.

I don't remember a thing the speakers said.

Why not get a celebrity and at least make it fun?

Jennifer Egan's Sci-Fi Twitter Story

When fiction writer Jennifer Egan takes to Twitter this evening, she won’t be tweeting about the latest headlines or her favorite nightspot. Instead, she’ll be doling out her new short story “Black Box” at the rate of one tweet a minute.

The story will begin at 8 p.m. Eastern Thursday, emanating from The New Yorker’s Twitter feed (@NYerFiction) and continuing for one hour. The same thing will happen over the next 10 days, as the 8,500-word story unfolds.

Empire Of The Sun

Australian pop band.

This is their least crazy video.

Today's Photo:

On the patio at happy hour.
When rain falls, you don't leave your drink like these folks.
A little rainstorm does not deter the stout of heart.  

A Park With No Fields

May 24, 2012

Penn and Teller on Jimmy Fallon

Today's Photo:

At the cricket pitch in Jefferson Park.
I searched for 30 minutes but could not find our soccer field.
Turns out, the field is at the middle school, not in the park. 

And Boost celebrated multiple birthdays.

Stand-by Not Guaranteed

May 23, 2012

End Of Your Life Book Club

The book that got our club started, Stegner’s “Crossing to Safety,” prompted one of our most important discussions. When Mom said that she was pretty sure that the husband of a character who was dying of cancer would be O.K. after her death, she wasn’t just talking about that character’s husband — she was, I suspected, talking about my dad as well.

The book club also offered us a chance to travel far beyond the walls of the outpatient care center, even as Mom was stuck there for hours at a time. When we got absorbed by novels like “Man Gone Down,” by Michael Thomas, or “The Price of Salt,” by Patricia Highsmith, or even stories by P. G. Wodehouse, we discovered that while we were reading, we weren’t a sick person and a well person, but a mother and son sharing a journey together.

I privately dubbed our club “The End of Your Life Book Club,” not to remind myself that Mom was dying, but so I would remember that we all are — that you never know what book or conversation will be your last.

Science Expo Day - June 2 at Seattle Center
This science celebration held at Seattle Center is a FREE event and features more than 150 family-friendly, hands-on experiments, exhibits, demonstrations, interactive activities, games and live performances. With over 130 exhibitors and two live science stages, there is something for the whole family to enjoy.

We invite you to download our Seattle Science Festival program (4 MB PDF) that incudes a detailed map of the Seattle Center grounds with the location of each exhibitor and performance stages as well as a schedule. Or you may download and install our free Science Festival app for your iPhone or Android device which incudes even more information.

Sleepwalk With Me

Great movie from Mike Birbiglia about his start in stand-up and his sleepwalking.  Watch some of his stand-up here.
The name of the special is:
"What I Should Have Said Was Nothing"
That bit starts at 32:00.


Today's Photo:

"Safety Not Guaranteed" was so packed, they didn't admit ANY standby.  
Lame. 

Remodel

May 22, 2012

Annular Solar Eclipse

Video made from 700 still photos.

Prole Drift in International District

The show received this press in the Stranger:
“There is a show at a tiny gallery in the ID called Prole Drift by an artist named Buddy Bunting. IT WILL BREAK YOUR HEART. YOU MUST SEE IT. It involves prisons, basketball courts, landscapes, and hotel rooms. It is made of one gigantic painting, several small paintings, and a video. I just thought I would tell you this because it will make your life better.”
(I went.  Eh.)

Honk Fest West

Friday evening, June 1st, we’ll be back taking Georgetown by storm in or around the intersection of 12th Ave. S. and S. Vale St. from 6–10 pm, and continuing at The Mix till midnight.http://g.co/maps/r8xmf

After midnight, who knows what might happen?

Georgetown Carnival - June 9
I don't understand half the schedule.

What exactly are "power tool races"?

I will learn so much.

Today's Photo:

My parents are remodeling their kitchen.
More accurately, they are paying someone else to do it.

SIFF in Renton (RIFF?)

May 21, 2012

Austin City Limits Lineup
There are at least 30 bands that I'm psyched to see.

There are probably 30 more bands I've never heard of that will be great.

Queen of Versailles

Two rich people build the biggest house in America.  

Before they can finish, the economy tanks.

Overheard 2

The guys that made "Infernal Affairs" (the movie they remade into "The Departed") made this cops and crooks movie about the Hong Kong financial markets.  There will probably be an American remake in 2-4 years.

Today's Photo:

Trikes

May 20, 2012

How To Enjoy Going To The Movies Again

by Alexander Huls on New York Times

The thing to understand about the ruckus of a midnight screening is that, unlike the usual noise you have to filter out at a movie theater, it never feels disruptive, because it’s never disrespectful. The noise isn’t about people distracting others (and themselves) from the movie. It’s directed at the movie. It comes from an irrepressible desire to celebrate what’s being seen. It comes, at its heart, from the greatest emotion a movie can give you: Joy.

That joy also ensures that you will never, ever see a cellphone light up or hear anything but deathly stillness during scenes that don’t merit enthusiastic responses. In fact, midnight movies — when they’re quiet — are some of the most reverent movie experiences I’ve ever had. People will literally shush you one second into the movie. What more could anyone ask from a moviegoing experience than an audience that actually both quietly respects and vocally worships the movie you’re collectively seeing? Being surrounded by that always swells my movie-buff heart as I think, This is why I go to the movies.

Battleship

Summer means seeing "blockbusters".

If it was 105 degrees outside, and you needed to be in a place with air conditioning for a few hours, you would not be offended if you saw this movie.

Neil Gaiman Shares Everything He Knows About Being An Artist

Ira Glass Gives Commencement Address

Robot and Frank

Frank is a ex-cat burgler with alzheimers.

His new robot butler sparks new adventures.

Today's Photos:

From the "Trike For Beer" event.

It's actually a fundraiser.

Street Fair Art

May 19, 2012
Ryno Cycle

Mariners Refuse to Abuse 5k

It's a 5k in Safeco Field.  It looks like you run throughout the concourses and even make some laps around the outfield. 

Sounds AWESOME!

Oh, and it's limited to 1,000 participants.

But registration is still open now.

Today's Photos:

From Universtiy Street Fair

Ticket To Ride.

Great board game this is also available on iOS.

You can watch an episode of "Tabletop", where they explain and play Ticket To Ride here.

Basement Arcade

May 18, 2012

The Intouchables

Have I ever recommended something to you?

Didn't you like that thing I told you about?

I hope you've come to trust my recommendations.

I only want what is best for you.

PLEASE SEE THIS MOVIE!!

I know it's in French and you'll have to read subtitles, 

but it's so worth it.

Add-A-Ball

I'm the blue car.
Eat my dust, nerds.

Ready To Play

May 17, 2012

Mt St Helen's

I know the anniversary is tomorrow.  

But we watched the movie today.

The Game - Puzzle Hunt 
The way the Game works is simple enough. You rent a van with a bunch of your friends. You drive from place to place in a given area, solving puzzles created by Game Control, a group of your peers. If you haven’t solved a puzzle after a certain number of minutes, you can request a hint from Game Control. If you solve the current puzzle, you can move on to the next one.

Today's Photo:

Stocked with everything a terrible soccer player might need.

Tiny Tower

May 16, 2012

Seattle Mariners Successfully Play Entire Baseball Game

And that is an achievement.

Please Don't Call It "Ping-Pong"
by Michael Weinreb on Grantland

Confidence often stems from repetition, from practicing the same shots over and over again, and this is the reason the Chinese have an edge, says USA Table Tennis high-performance director Doru Gheorghe: "It's not easy to learn. It's boring." In China, children who show promise are pulled from phys-ed classes at a young age and shipped off to academies. In America, no child wants to learn Ping-Pong that way, largely because the game has no serious cultural currency other than as a social tool. There are exceptions in every generation, like Reed and like Landers, but what's the point of spending meticulous hours indoors among adult coaches, getting really good at something that, compared to other more potentially lucrative activities, will never pay off?

And so the gulf between the Americans and the Chinese, Gheorghe says, "is like the Atlantic Ocean." All weekend long, the American women struggled with a Chinese Canadian immigrant named Chris Xu, who was 25 years their senior. Xu played a style known as "chopping," a defensive tactic meant to capitalize on the impatience of the gang of American teenagers. The most promising American, Ariel Hsing, wrote the words "4 Steps" on her arm so she'd remember to take extra time (she normally takes three steps) before her returns — eventually, exhausted and frustrated, she eked out a victory and won an Olympic spot. This was all she'd hoped for; the odds of her actually medaling in London are astronomical.

The Proxy Marriage

by Malie Meloy on New Yorker

Fiction about young people who stand in as "Proxies" for other people's marriages.  Simple, heartbreaking, and sweet.

Neon Trees - Everybody Talks

I don't know why this song doesn't have more traction.  Seems like a catchy, summery song to me.  I think the video is fun, but you could describe it as creepy too.

The Comedian Comedians Were Affraid Of

Profile of Patrice O'Neal

He next bestows his approval on a black man’s date: Congratulations to you, my friend! he says. Look at that white woman you’re with! He invites the audience to consider this fine specimen: Black women get mad at that. But that is top-shelf white woman right there. He’s arranging and rearranging members of the audience on various sides of an argument that they don’t quite know they’re in yet.

You know how you tell how pretty a white woman is? The value? he asks. You look at her and then wonder how long they would look for her if she was missing. He points to the evidence already at hand: C’mon, take a look. Take a look! Look at this! Look! Everyone is laughing, but you can hear uneasiness. He appeases it by enlisting a black woman to exploit the prejudices he’s now juggling. I saw you look mad, sweetie, he says as if he’s talking only to her. If you was missing, how long you think they would look? He reports back to the crowd, mimicking her mournful shrug. He lets the sorry truth land: White woman’s life is valuable. He then asks the audience to help him remember the point he was originally getting at: What’s his name Joran van der Sloot? We find out he was a serial kill man, he kills women, that’s what he do, he says. What’s the girl in Aruba?

Natalee Holloway! people shout out.

But the one he just killed the girl in Peru, what’s her name?

Silence.

Exactly! he says. The audience cracks up and breaks into applause, simultaneously chagrined and excited to have sprung that trap he’s set for them.

Today's Photo:

Tiny Tower.  Free iOS game.

Start Building.

Shepard Saves The Galaxy

May 15, 2012

Where To Go Play Golf

Seattle Met shares this list of places to play regardless of your ability level.  I like the short courses and the frisbee golf at crystal mountain.  However, they neglected my favorite course, Wii Sports.

Comparing Different Versions of Sandman

Sandman is a fantastic comic by Neil Gaiman.  It is so beloved that several versions have come out over the years.  I'm collecting the fully recolored edition. (I'm not at the stage where I can drop hundreds for the complete annotated version. I wish I were that cool!)

Seattle Cheese Festival This Weekend
It's at Pike Place Market.  There are about 50 different types of cheeses and you can sample them until you're stuffed.  It's totaly free, but you might want to buy a wheel or two to support the dairies.

Kids Re-enact "Sabotage"

Today's Photo:

Jack Sheppard brings the fight back to Earth at the end of

Mass Effect 3.  I actually thought the ending was pretty good.

Night and Day in the Morning

May 14, 2012

Start A Blog!

by Mariana Tabares on Hello Giggles

First, tell yourself that your blog is your own space. You cannot let yourself worry about what others will think of what you post. You’re allowed to say whatever it is you want to say and eventually you will attract like-minded individuals and find yourself in a community. I usually just encourage people to be honest and to share things in very basic, clear sentences. The hardest part is getting started, but you’ve gotta start somewhere, right?

You can start your blog with a specific idea in mind but it’s likely that you will see it evolve as you continue to add content. Sometimes these things take a shape of their own and you might even find yourself posting videos and getting really media savvy with it.

Whatever path you choose, just make sure you’re enjoying it.

How Government Spending Helps Kids

So far, I’ve been telling you about programs that have been widely recognized. Here’s what’s new: research has begun to demonstrate the importance for their development of connecting children with caring adults. We’ve come to understand that these relationships are critical for helping children overcome adversity—they can actually alter how a child’s brain changes. Over the past 40 years, the number of programs in this category, such as Big Brother and Big Sister, Boys and Girls Clubs, and other after-school programs, has grown enormously. Efforts like these are rarely cataloged, let alone evaluated, so researchers are cautious in making broad claims about impact. But the importance of adult-child connections supports government spending on a range of programs that foster them. There’s no magic-bullet program. But it’s also wrong to blast the government for throwing money at a problem it can’t solve. We’ve been making wise investments, and we’ve been getting results.

Lonely Island 100th Digital Short

A bit too crass to post the video here.

But I do celebrate their ENTIRE catalog.

Today's Photo:

These shots are from the same run this morning.

Mjolnir

May 13, 2012

Recreating The Most Exciting Day In The History Of Soccer

(And Maybe Sports, Period)

Video that reconstructs the roller coaster that decided the English Premier League.  Newcastle finished fifth, which grants them entry to Europa Cup.  One of the few times when you can really celebrate finishing fifth.

Foam Race (June 30) and Timber Town 10k (July 8)

I get super excited at the thought of never having to buy another t-shirt ever again.

Kia Optima - Sandman

They have been running the short version of this ad throughout the NBA playoffs.  The short version stinks.  The short version is about a guy who like supermodels, explosions, and fine Kia automobiles. This guy is an idiot, you can almost hear him chuckle to himself, "Huh huh huh. Look at all those boobies" .

This man represents the worst piece of all of us, where rational thought stops and our basest desires rule.

This man is an idiot.

The long version is a heartwarming story about a guy who loves manly things (giant sandwiches, lumberjacks, exploding mma fighters), but is also madly in love with his wife and will find ways to be with her even in his dreams.  Even in the middle of "everything he wants", he realizes he is missing the thing he wants the most, his wife.

This story shows two people who, even in their wildest dreams, want to share the adventure together. 

This version is at time ridiculous (of all the dream bands you could see, Motley Crue?) and incredibly sweet.

Death Cab for Cutie with Magik Magik Orchestra

Thank you Matt for having an extra ticket.  This show was great.  The review linked above is relatively gushing but did not mention opening act Youth Lagoon, a band which is now playing on repeat in my car. 

Vertigo

Mom loves murder mysteries.  So for Mother's day we watched this Hitchcock classic.  Thank goodness she didn't want to watch "Psycho".  That's really messed up for Mother's Day.

Turn Off This Song And Go Outside

 A Summer Jam from last year is still a Summer Jam.

 

Today's Photo:

As Thor weilds Mjolnir, so do I weild this sledgehammer, to knock down this old fence my mommy wanted destroyed.

Hobbes helped too.

Economic Stimulus

May 12, 2012

Bubble Soccer On Jimmy Fallon


My Zombie Sweetheart
(My gut reaction is to smack this guy.  This article comes off as completely patronizing.)  
("I'm sorry we took your team and everything, but like, what is a team anyway?")

So … yeah. We recognize that sports teams are mostly dumb corporations that don't care about us, which is why our outrage at their corporate-like behavior tends to be inconsistently applied and limited to specific cases. (Otherwise we'd have to be angry all the time.) In a way, it's weird to be just FURIOUS about the Zombie Sonics and totally at peace with the Zombie Lakers or the Zombie Dodgers or the Zombie Every Other Team That Abandoned Its Original Fan Base for Money. Yes, what happened to you, Seattleite, was somewhat worse, because of how it all went down, than what's happened to millions of other fans, but it wasn't a different kind of thing. Just a bigger fish from the same bad pond.

What I'm saying here is, it's disingenuous to live in the world of product and branding and @KingJames six days a week and then get mad about loyalty and community on Sundays. But it's as if we need the occasional issue on which to vent our subliminal resentment toward the Nike model just to remind ourselves that there is a loyalty-and-community dimension here, even if it mostly exists in memory and fantasy. Because if there isn't, then what the hell is a sports team? Which is the question I keep coming back to, now that I've got one.

The Truth Radio Drama Podcast
Described as "Movies for your Ears", It's like "This American Life" only fictional.

What Secret Could Ruin Your Life If It Came Out?

One of the darkest reddit streams imaginable.

Re-examining the Role of Digital Death

We have moved beyond games about trying to not die.

20 Great Documentaries on Netflix Instant
With the invention of the internet, we can never be bored.

Today's Photo:

Mother's Day Preparations.