Links from last week: Links from the recent past version

Oh, yeah, links!

• Photojojo shares some tips on photographing kids
• Can you believe that this is made of sprinkles?!
• Gretchen at The Happiness Project (LOVE!) shares how to not overeat during the holidays.
• Aren't these cookies adorable?!
• Some songs are banned for really silly reasons.
• I think I'll finish it off with a what? wow.

In other news, has anyone else noticed that Martha Stewart Living writers seem to be getting a lot of their ideas from Pinterest lately?

Links from last week: Thanksgiving edition

I haven't done as much web surfing this week but I still came up with what I think is a pretty good list of links for you to read. These pages are mostly Thanksgiving themed, with a little Christmas in there.

• I bookmarked this Babble post on DIY Christmas tree skirts for myself. I don't have a skirt for my tree, poor girl went bottomless last year, it was cold too. I just couldn't find one I really liked. This year I did find one at Hobby Lobby but it was a little pricey, maybe with 21 to choose from here, and my new sewing machine, I can make one?
• Inflation jokes aside, here's a good read on how balloons get chosen for the Macy's Thanksgiving Day Parade. I'll give you a hint: money.
• Here's another Thanksgiving Parade related post from Mental_Floss. Did you know there used to be an agreement that stores wouldn't put out there Christmas fare until Santa arrived (at the end of the parade, that is)?
• Before you stomp down some 80 year old woman to get the last dancing Elmo, you may want to read this return policy guide. Useful stuff there folks.
• This one's not holiday related, but I think it's especially useful this time of year when you may be more likely to have family and friends over to your house and need to tidy up a bit. Or maybe you need to find a place in your home for new items you get for Christmas.
• And then there's this. Don't do this people, just don't.

I hope you enjoy these links and have a great Thanksgiving. Will you be watching the parade tomorrow? Or stocking up on sleep to hit those black Friday sales?

Notebook?

I love this!

Noteboek from Evelien Lohbeck on Vimeo.

Christmas Photo Essays

Check out these Christmas photo essays from TIME.

Crazy Christmas Traditions - Photo Essays - TIME.

It Happened on Christmas Day - Photo Essays - TIME.

An Asthmatic Christmas

Check out Asthmatic Kitty's Christmas page.



It has Christmas goodies from Sufjan and others including an e-card, games, ornaments to color, videos, and 8-bit (Nintendoesque) Sufjan Christmas ring tones.

Multimedia Monday: Me in a mask

I don't remember where I came across this site, and sure there are other similar sites out there, but there's something special about FaceYourManga.com. First of all, I can't decide if the title even makes sense, "FakeYourManga.com | Shake Yourself!" Um, okay! The rest of the site follows suit. It appears that they've used good ol' babelfish for their translation into English instead of a professional. Not that that's a bad thing, it's an appealing quirk that I find quite amusing.

FaceYourManga lets you create your own manga style avatar which you can then purchase for what I think comes out to be less than $3US. Right now the only size I see is 15cm x 15cm that you print yourself, but it makes it sound like there will be other sizes available. You can also view avatars created by others on the site and there is a voting system that currently seems to serve absolutely no function. I gave myself 5 stars 3 times on the same avatar, there were no fireworks. Maybe once the "Community" and "MyFace" portions of the site are running voting will have some significance. It's still fun for now though.

It's also amusing that a cat is the only mask, the males should at least get a dog mask. I mean, come on. It's very Holly Golightly though, don't you think:


And why do only males get the thumbs up? I don't know, but they sure seem to like using it, just check the gallery.

If you make one, show it to me! Either upload it online somewhere and post the link in the comments or you can email it to me (AvantReeseATgmailDOTcom) and I'll upload it for you.

Multimedia Monday: Shark Week!

You should already be aware that this year's "Shark Week" on Discovery channel started yesterday. In honor of this great event (yes, I love Shark Week!) I'll be posting a few times this week about the shows that air. This multimedia Monday is all about the Shark Week website, it has videos, games, pictures, interactive guides; let's just say this post is very geeky but very awesome nonetheless.

Anyone living in Florida, or even someone that visits it often has to be somewhat interested in sharks. I mean, how could you not be given the stats?
I'm a little disappointed this chart doesn't have 2007. While 2007 was supposedly a low year for shark attacks, Florida had 32, highest in the world, followed by Hawai'i, which had seven. That's a big difference.

While I don't play many online games, Discovery keeps advertising their "critically acclaimed" Shark Runners game so I had to play it to see what all the hype was about. The goal is to track down sharks and collect data on them, but the cool thing is is that it is using real sharks and their real movements, taking advantage of GPS tracking. But then when I got to the part of the site where I realize that the game is going on all the time and it's going to email me alerts giving a certain amount of time for me to log back in a do something, I decided this was something I didn't want to get into. If you want to try it out, let us know what you think in the comments.

I did try some other games, though some of them aren't really games, like voting for the coolest shark? I guess voting is a game for some people...I actually prefer other games on discovery.com that are not part of Shark Week, like Life or Death: Lost at Sea. Basically you're given sets of three items to choose from and you have to choose the right items that will keep you alive, it's tricky.

While Discovery does have great pictures on the site, like this one:

if you want something high enough resolution for a wallpaper or if you want a shark screensaver, NationalGeographic is your best bet.

The best parts of the website are the interactive features, like the dive, and the pictures. But really, I think the site could have been better. I especially don't like that they don't have an option to embed their videos (though the videos are great), and the commercials before them are extremely loud compared to the actual video.

As for the shows though, what I've seen so far is awesome. I love MythBusters anyway and the Shark Week Special that aired last night was not to be missed (if you didn't see it, it airs again Wednesday). See a clip of the robotic shark they created here.

I'm also looking forward to Dirty Jobs tomorrow night. Mike thinks they should have monkey week.

For more Shark Week, see the official Discovery.com site.

What a Deal!

[caption id="attachment_234" align="alignnone" width="131" caption="Good job Gap."][/caption]Too bad they're out of my size, I hate to pass up a deal this good. Nice try Gap, but I don't think it's going to work.

Who Knew? Benjamin Button

Am I completely behind in knowing that there is a movie in production based on F. Scott Fitzgerald's short story "The Curious Case of Benjamin Button"?

I was browsing a few websites, looking for new books to review and found a new edition of Fitzgerald stories is being released in August and it's because there is a movie based on "The Curious Case of Benjamin Button" coming out this Christmas starring Brad Pitt and Cate Blanchett.

For those not familiar with the story, it is one of Fitzgerald's less common fantasy stories. The idea for the story originated from a comment that Mark Twain once made about it being a shame that the best part of life was at the beginning and the worst part the end. So the story is part joke, yet melodramatic as it tells the story of a man who is born old and grows younger and younger. He falls in love but while she ages normally, he continues to get younger.

Enough chit-chat, here's the trailer.


I think it's going to be strange, creepy, and fascinating. More than that, I think it's a great opportunity for those less familiar with Fitzgerald's work to give the new edition of short stories a chance. While I was searching for the trailer I even found a website where you can read the story (and other stories from Tales of the Jazz Age) in it's entirety.

What do you think? Will it be good, bad? Maybe you don't care; what movie are you looking forward to?

Tower Jumping

Who's up for it?


(Video from International Herald Tribune)

Multimedia Monday: Parkour

Parkour or l'art du déplacement, translated as "the art of displacement" is an activity in which participants or "traceurs" perform daring moves to get from one place to another. They use a combination of gymnastics and martial arts in what often resembles the stunts in chase scenes of action movies. Now that description may make it hard to view parkour as a form of art, which is why you have to see it.


There's something special about viewing these stunts as still images as opposed to live action; I think it adds a certain tranquility and really shows that it is an art. Check out the rest of this photo essay from TIME. You can see that the traceurs take their art seriously planning out the moves and noting precautions they need to take.

Of course there is also some pretty awesome live action videos of parkour online.

parkour from dave keissar on Vimeo.

Though do be aware when searching for these videos that you will find some pretty lame ones as well. Actually, you'll find mostly lame ones on video sharing sites, but do a google and you'll find some good parkour sites like American Parkour.

More info about parkour on Wikipedia.

I used to be into freestyle walking, which is somewhat related to parkour, anyone remember that craze?

Multimedia Monday: You, Me, Dancing

Where the Hell is Matt? (2008) from Matthew Harding on Vimeo.

Watch this, then go to WheretheHellisMatt.com for more videos and to read the story behind them. (I must thank Joshua Longbrake for bringing Matt back to my attention.)

I would love to do something like this. Come to think of it, I would do pretty much anything involving travel if someone paid my expenses. Anyone need an experienced writer to travel the world writing, photographing, and videographing her experiences?

Now the song this makes me think of, Los Campesinos - You! Me! Dancing


There's no way I could have a "dancing" post without mentioning Brandtson's "Nobody Dances Anymore," which spawned many fan-created videos.

What gets you dancing?

Voicemail 101

I get wrong number calls all the time, I've got to where I don't answer the phone if I don't recognize the number, unless I'm expecting an important call. This will, of course, cause the caller to be send to voicemail, the sly culprit. It may be the last thing you suspect, but it is the reason many people you may not even know will laugh at you behind your back. I know it's provided me laughs on many occasions. Why don't those people who put out the "for Dummies" books write one on leaving voicemails? There's definitely a need for one.

Here's a tip on voicemail:
Before you leave a voicemail message take two seconds to make sure you have the right number. Otherwise you may be telling the world your girlfriend calls you 'cooter' or letting your boss know that when you call in sick it's really because you're so drunk you can't dial a phone.
Also, don't leave anyone's personal medical information on voicemail. Sure, it may not be your own information, but as a medical professional you are responsible for keeping it private (an "I'm sorry to hear about that" goes out to Sidney in Ft. Walton, I didn't listen to the whole message, no worries).

Let me close this out by saying I cannot fix your pipes, car, boat, or unlock your door. I will not pick you up from Stetsun's, I am not up for a "booty call," I do not have directions to the hotel, I do not know where your baby's daddy is, and no, I do not have that ::ahem:: medication you were asking about.

In my head

Sometimes when some new thing comes about, be it a movie, band, tv show, or in this case a book, and everyone is talking about how great it is supposed to be I tend to ignore it. I can't really explain why, and it isn't with everything; I haven't pinpointed the filter in my brain quite yet, but it needs to stop.

I'm currently reading a book I should have read when it first came out, Freakonomics. If you ever wonder why I'm not as talkative as everyone else you know, this is the answer. Questions like the ones presented in this book are going through my head constantly; this is how I think, I just don't have the hard data that they did to come to a definitive answer.

I think a major problem people who want to read non-fiction books face when they actually set out to do it is that while the facts may be interesting, the author(s) doesn't present them in an interesting way. Freakonomics does not have that problem, it is the epitome of interestingness. For example, "Why do crack dealers still live with their moms?" this is a question everyone thinks about and the authors of Freakonomics step up to answer it. If you haven't read this book yet you're missing out.

Multimedia Mondays-The Beginning

Like most normal people, I don't care for Mondays much. Being that I work a job with fairly flexible hours I usually give myself Mondays off, I try to make them relaxing and/or do something I enjoy. Many bloggers do a fun post to close out the week with, be it through lists, or funny videos from youtube, or whatever else, but I decided to do a fun post every Monday. Let's face it, they need it.

So here starts Multimedia Mondays, every Monday I'll post some sort of multimedia, it could be a video, song, game, photo, slide show, or all of the above. You might have seen it before, you might never see it again.



Today's multimedia comes from The New York Times. Visit their site for interactive fold-ins from MAD magazine created by Al Jaffee from the 1960s onward.

Wanted: Secret Agent Photographer

I've probably mentioned before how I don't photograph well, it's like the camera makes me nervous and I end up making a weird face or looking completely frightened. In fact, last fall, in order to get a decent head shot (or mug shot as we call them) for the The Gull's Cry, I had to take the camera with me to the bathroom so I could look at myself in the mirror while I took the picture. While the bathroom method does work sometimes, I get some pretty strange looks coming out of the ladies room with a Nikon D50 in my hand. If I were in New York this would not be a problem, I could just contact MethodIzaz.com and have him (them?) take my picture covert ops style.

From the site:

Using information provided earlier about their weekly routine, the photographer will arrive on the scene, and unseen, take shots of the subject. The subject will be photographed walking through the streets, going about their daily business. Without posing and artifice, the camera captures only the natural beauty of the person.

How awesome is that. Who knows though, even that might not work for me, it's possibly that I make even stranger expression when I'm not being (knowingly) photographed. I'll just have to settle for telling people "I'm really incredibly good-looking, honest!" Or, "Here, watch me look at my own reflection. See, hott (with two ts!), huh?"

Yeah, okay, I'm done now.

On Magazines

Fact: Magazines are expensive. Solution: Don't pay for them.
No, I'm not encouraging thievery of magazines, or to give them up. Actually, we should all be reading more of them. The answer is the public library. Not nearly enough people take advantage of the magazine rack at the library—not nearly enough people take advantage of the library at all for that matter.

A while back I read a post on Russell Davies' blog on "How to be Interesting," one of the tips was to read a new magazine every week. At first this sounded a bit ridiculous to me, I mean magazines are expensive. The Life magazine I posted about, for example, $11.99, that's a bit above average, but still magazines are not cheap. Being a full-time student with just a part-time job, I can't refuse to spend $7 each week on a magazine, not matter how interesting it will make me. But then I got to thinking, every time I have some extra time between classes why not go to the library and read a magazine.

So I started doing just that. Last week I read an issue of Time which had a great article about the Dali Lama, and whether it made me more interesting or not, I definitely have knowledge now that I lacked before, and I found interest in something I would have passed over normally. Another good thing about reading magazines in the library is that they also have back issues so you can even catch-up on events or topics that you've missed.

While it's good to read a variety of different magazines (sure, I may be female but I can still expand my personal bank of information and be entertained by Esquire), news magazines are about the best for this. They have current events, culture, politics, editorials, and entertainment all in one magazine. Sure the stories may be brief and not give a full picture of the topic, but there's 20 more magazines right there to give you the other side, and maybe even a specialty magazine with an in-depth look.

Knowing a lot about a few things is always good, but also knowing at least a little about everything else is even better. I think that is how this should work, it makes you interesting by increasing your knowledge and widening the scope of topics you know about. Perhaps the best part of reading more magazines is that it increases your ability to have something to talk about with just about anyone, which means a lot less of those awkward, silent moments when you can't find any topic you and the other party (or parties) are interested in talking about.