Good websites to keep you "busy" at work.

http://www.angusoblong.net

Angus Oblong writes and illustrates excellent short stories and the website is quite entertaining as well. I've purchased several of the unpublished shorts, and all arrived signed--they make excellent gifts for anyone who enjoys dark humor. The website is a great way to waste some time at work!

http://movielens.umn.edu/

If you watch too many movies like I do, this site is a must. You rate movies you've seen and after you rate 15 or so it will start predicting how you will rate other movies. The more you rate the more accurate it tends to be. Be warned or two things, though. 1. It is very hard to stop once you start--you just want to keep going through the lists rating movies. 2. It may be upsetting to realize how many movies you've seen in your life (and that's just those you remember and that movielens has). So far I've rated 1002.

http://www.venganza.org/

There's not much to explain. Just read the whole letter and decide for yourself. The "store" items are a close second as good gifts, to Angus Oblong items. I think the focus of this letter is now mentioned in Wikipedia and www.boingboing.net has some interesting info on it in the August files.

How to Honor Veterans...In color!

So I think I have to explain these pictures and how they are related. Yes, you can already tell I'm going to ramble a bit but you should be used to that by now. The gigantic arch is a Civil War Memorial at the end of the big Brooklyn park. This enormous hunk of cement with its eerily lifelike figures atop sits right smack in the middle of a horribly confusing intersection. I have driven though it many times (with much trepidation) and walked in/around it many many times and still I do not know exactly how many streets are at this intersection. It's a free-for-all, every man for himself (in cars that is). Anyway this big war monument happens to be hollow, with many rickety, spiraling staircases leading to little pieces of floor on the way up to the top. What would you expect to see stored in such a place (if you didn't have the strange pictures to help you out)? Old Civil War documents, memorabilia? Nope. Maybe equipment for the farmers market that sets up in the park? Uh-uh, guess again. It's puppets. There are tons of large and colorful puppets hanging from the stairs and arranged in little scenes as you make you way to the top floor "stage". Here an assortment of chairs (old rockers, lawn chairs, etc.) face a make-shift stage where marionettes actually come to put on shows. Oh, and it's not just a puppet museum, but a puppet library. You can check them out, no fee, and use them in your puppet show! Isn't that strange? Personally, I want the arch to by my apartment--there's parking below and great skylights in the top, and who can beat the proximity to the park.

Kittens

Here are a few pictures of the kittens we are stuck with right now. The neighborhood stray had them in our backyard then slipped them into the apartment one day and I caved and let them stay. The gray pile is when they were under a porch and a couple of days old. I'm sure I'll post some more later since the kittens are my main entertainment at times.