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September 28, 2008
Suspension of disbelief
I have decided to suspend any blogging activities on grow-a-brain until further notice so that I can adequately ponder the implications of the economic bailout program...
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October 9 Update: So did Marc Ambinder...
Meanwhile you can visit more than five years of archive posts here
September 28, 2008 in Website News | Permalink | Comments (22) | TrackBack
Red Mark of Death
Amsterdam, Antwerp, Athens, Berlin, Cairo, Dresden, Dublin, Geneva, Lisbon, London, Marseilles, Milan, Moscow, Rome, Seville, Toronto, and Warsaw … are all towns in Ohio
Red Mark of Death - Marks on condemned buildings throughout Buffalo, left by government workers. (Thank you, Tom Geller)
Grand Prismatic spring in Yellowstone National Park
Knitta please is a tag crew of anonymous rogue knitters who leave graffiti on monuments, utility poles, and other public items. Unlike traditional taggers, Knitta uses non-damaging materials, such as yarn and cloth.[1] The crew's mission is to make street art "a little more warm and fuzzy"
Sikh-Americans by Fiona Aboud
A guide to inexpensive Motels of Tucson, Arizona
Fried food at The LA County Fair
A Huge Depository of Unusual Stories about America Here
September 28, 2008 in Americana | Permalink | Comments (1) | TrackBack
Running the extra mile
…The sun was rising behind the hills over Crystal Springs reservoir this morning at 6:20am, but you couldn’t see it yet. There was just enough light to brighten the overcast sky and to make the threaded wisps of mist rising off the slate-dark water stand out clearly. But the day hadn’t properly begun, and all was quiet, unmoving, cool. I looked to my right and thought I saw a hawk soaring low out of the trees, just above head level and about 20 feet off the path. It was brown and black and had barred wings. But as I looked, I realized that it had a blunt, flat face and a downward-curving beak: An owl!
It glided silently on behind me and out of sight.
I’d been running for fifty minutes, and was about five miles away from my house…
Running the extra mile by Dylan F. Tweney
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(Photo above by Thomas Hawk)
A Huge Depository of Unusual Things To Do With Your Life Here
September 28, 2008 in Do Something with your Life | Permalink | Comments (1) | TrackBack
Pickelhaube Helmets
The wrong trousers and other sets of Teams on flicker
The German Pickelhaube was a spiked helmet worn in the 19th and 20th centuries by German military, firefighters, and police. It is most closely associated with the Prussian army. Also, German Helmet Decals
78 People Who Tattooed Celebrities Onto Their Bodies
A Huge Depository of Unusual Fashion Trends As Well As Growabrain T-shirt Closet Collection Here
September 28, 2008 in Fashion | Permalink | Comments (1) | TrackBack
Moose lips sink ships
A slideshow of Barack's side at the Debate in Oxford yesterday
Statler & Waldorf now doing the OpEd on the NYT
Dick Cheney called; he wants his suit back. (From a blog by Karl Rove)
(Becket poster above from composer Matthew Guerrieri)
Many more unusual links about Obama. Much more about the 2008 Election. Also, the 2004 Election and other Political Posts Here
September 28, 2008 in Americana - Barack Obama | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBack
September 25, 2008
Never mind I found one
Have you heard the one about the actress who was late for an audition? She’s driving around and around and there is no parking anywhere. She says aloud, “dear all powerful and merciful God please find me a place to park, I’ll do anything for you.” As she finishes praying, a space opens up and she says, “never mind I found one”...
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...From the introduction to some anecdotes, the first about an art show by Jeff Koons, and another about a painting titled Bad Boy by Eric Fischl, found as a comment on the “About page” of the new shelton wet/dry blog, where the origin of its name is explained...
A Huge Depository of Unusual Art and Artists Here
September 25, 2008 in Modern Art | Permalink | Comments (2) | TrackBack
Mmmm… Sardines
Sardine King - The largest collection of vintage California sardine can labels on the internet. Sardineking specializes in old Cannery Row, Monterey, California sardine can labels from the 1920-1940s. Here you can find photo galleries of old California sardine, pilchards, mackerel, squid and tuna can labels from the old canneries and fishing fleets of Monterey, San Francisco, Oakland, Oxnard and Los Angeles
Watermelons are everywhere. (From Blort)
Kobe Beef - It's What's for Dinner
A Huge Depository of Unusual Meat and Vegetable Links Here
September 25, 2008 in Food - Meat & Vegetables | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBack
White space
Typographic illustrations from web designer Takashi Okada
Rotating Grid Illusion by David O'Reilly
Demonstrating the Effectiveness of White Space. (Not safe for kids under 10)
A Huge Depository of Digital Eye Candy Here
September 25, 2008 in Digital Art | Permalink | Comments (1) | TrackBack
King Marries Bishop
Wedding announcements: Unfortunate name combinations
If you can read this, my cardigan fell off, by Natalie Dee
Unfortunate World Trade Center Old Ads. From the NYT: The Twin Towers are still around
Ginger Anyhow's embroidered text messages
Sorry we closed - we out of meet
How to solve a maze puzzle using Photoshop
A growing number of women in Britain have become fascinated with lifelike baby dolls known as Reborns. These dolls have beating hearts: they are dressed like real babies and even have their diapers changed, as their “moms” take them on outings and cuddle with them. My Fake Baby
Seen everywhere: A nasty tenant
Huge Depositories of Unusual Oddities and Crazy linkage Here
September 25, 2008 in Odds & Ends | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBack
Phone-atone
(From Jewish Robot. Thank you, Jeff Abbit)
(I told a friend of mine a few weeks ago that I doubt McCain will make it to November. It seemed that the whole enterprise is just too much for him. Now it looks like he may just 'drop out'. How sad for him. Also, why would anybody wants the job of the next president? Cleaning up the mess behind the current one can't be a challenge a sane person will strive for)
A Huge Depository of Unusual Holiday Links Here
September 25, 2008 in Holidays | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBack
Sorted Books
The Sorted Books project began in 1993 years ago and is ongoing. The project has taken place in many different places over the years, ranging form private homes to specialized public book collections. The process is the same in every case: culling through a collection of books, pulling particular titles, and eventually grouping the books into clusters so that the titles can be read in sequence, from top to bottom.
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Bastard chairs by Michael Wolf
A Huge Depository of Unusual Projects Here
September 25, 2008 in Projects | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBack
The illuminati games
Illuminati Card Game was invented in 1990 by Steven Jackson. The ‘game’ he had created ruffled quite a few feathers as he was promptly visited by the Secret Service who tried to shut him down and prevent the cards from being released. (From Anarchaia)
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Computer games invented by Jon Stewart for the 2008 election
Update: See comment by Allen Varney about Steve Jackson below.
A Huge Depository of Unusual Games and Toys Here
September 25, 2008 in Games | Permalink | Comments (3) | TrackBack
No sheep allowed
Through summer's sweltering heat, through the monsoon season's torrential downpours and even after the city's recent accumulation of air-conditioned shopping malls, Sandhya Tiwary, 20, and her friends remain loyal to their afternoon strolls through the crowded, muddy lanes of College Street, long known as India's "neighborhood of books."
It's 3 p.m., just after their university classes. On a bustling street corner, Tiwary and her friends eat a quick lunch of Kolkata's favorite street food: steaming, egg-dipped chicken Kathi rolls -- with a side of freshly churned yogurt served in a salmon-colored earthen pot. Then, the group takes off to browse the secondhand -- and sometimes third- or fourth-hand -- books.
The 1,200 dilapidated bookstore kiosks create a maze of roadside cubbyholes stacked with dusty dictionaries in Hindi, underlined chemistry textbooks in Urdu and dozens of worn copies of a three-volume "History of West Bengal." Nearby are piles of "Mars and Venus in the Bedroom."
Kolkata's 'Neighborhood of Books'
Huge Depositories of Unusual Bookstores and other Unusual Literary Links Here
September 25, 2008 in Bookstores | Permalink | Comments (1) | TrackBack
The Fly
Dog bra by Welcome To The Doghouse
Animal Trap Quiz Answers. Also there, 23 uncommon hammers
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Moose are the most sought after big game animal in Alaska. Hunters report harvesting over 7,000 of Alaska's estimated 175,000 moose each year. Going out to “get a moose” is a fall ritual for tens of thousands of Alaskans. An Introduction to Moose Hunting in Alaska. (From Ezra Klein)
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(.gif of fly above from Electron Microscope site by MicroAngela)
Re-post: Recursive. (Originally by Andrew Lipson)
A Huge Depository of Unusual Animal Stories Here
September 25, 2008 in Animals | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBack
Auguste D.
El Apóstol (The Apostle) is a 1917 Argentine animated cartoon, and also the world's first animated feature film. It was written and directed by Quirino Cristiani, and consisted of a total of 58,000 frames played over the course of 70 minutes. The film is believed to have been well-received by audiences at the time. Despite this, no known copies of the film have survived
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Auguste D., the first person diagnosed with Alzheimer's Disease (1901)
Ronald Reagan & Charlton Heston , 1981
A Huge Depository of Unusual ‘First Ever’ Stories Here
September 25, 2008 in First Ever | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBack