27 July 2006
[comics] Ghosts Of Stone — comics scans of Grant Morrison and Curt Swan’s origin of the Base of the J.L.A.
26 July 2006
[london] The Hunt for the Killer Hairballs — great article about the men who flush out the sewers of London …
‘Fat is the bane of flushers’ lives. Millions of litres, from half-eaten breakfast dishes, chip-laden frying pans or fast-food joints, are tipped into sinks each day. Eventually they find their way into the sewers. They represent the effluence of affluence. They are the graffiti that the contemporary leisurepolis scrawls on subterranean environments. Thirty years ago the Thames, unloved and abandoned, created few problems for flushers; now, the river’s banks are congested with clubs, boozy eateries and art-complex gallery cafés, all of them disgorging fat. 25 July 2006
[comics] Hicksville — the blog of Dylan Horrocks.
[comics] Up, Up and Away, Indeed — Wired News on Academics examining Comics … ‘Conference co-founder Coogan acknowledged that academia can be a fun-buster. “You have this dog and you love it, and you want to find out why you love it. You dissect it, and you’re left with this dead bloody dog on the table,” he said.’
24 July 2006
[property] Apartment for Sale, Manchester — an attempt to sell a flat using the blog format … ‘Looking for a stylish, contemporary apartment in Manchester City Centre? Interested in cutting out the middleman and going for a quick, private sale? You’re in the right place then!’ [via Feeling Listless]
[apple] The Secret Diary of Steve Jobs, Aged 51 1/2 … ‘Dude, I invented the friggin iPod, okay? Have you heard of it?’ [thanks Phil]
23 July 2006
[morrison] Video of Grant Morrison at Disinfo.Con 2000 … ‘WOOOOOOOOOW! Here we are! Right! Fuck man, I tell you when I was a kid I read Robert Anton Wilson and all this shit and here we are, we’re standing here, talking about this shit and it’s real! OK, I’m pissed and in half an hour I’m gonna come up on drugs, so watch for it!’
22 July 2006
[food] Pepto-Bismol Ice Cream — Blogjam creates a unique hangover cure … ‘I revisit the Pepto-Bismol website, where are glance at the FAQ section reveals a previously unheralded paragraph: “Some people feel refrigerating makes the dose more pleasing to take, and that’s OK. However, you shouldn’t freeze the product.” Whoa! Waddya mean no freezing? I’ve just made ice-cream!’
21 July 2006
[funny] A New Pope — a great viral video from Adam Buxton … ‘Coverage Of A Sci-Fi Ceremony In A Galaxy Far, Far Away…’ [via jwz]
20 July 2006
[london] The Winner or Sinner Man’s MySpace Profile … ‘Most of my days are spent on Oxford Street with my friend the Megaphone (we are inseperable!)’ [via Diamond Geezer]
19 July 2006
18 July 2006
[books] Mickey Spillane Obituary … ‘As an author of pulp, Spillane’s guiding principle was that “violence will outsell sex every time”, but combined they will outsell everything. As part of the promotion for his novels he adopted a Hammeresque persona which was transparently an act. He once informed a British interviewer, “I always say never hit a woman when you can kick her.” When asked “is that the treatment you give Mrs Spillane?”, Spillane primly replied, “we’re talking about fiction.” There were three Mrs Spillanes…’
[comics] Joe Matt Returns! — the Drawn and Quarterly blog on Peep Show #14 … ‘Last week we received the cover for Peepshow #14, and he promises that the rest of the issue will be here in a couple of weeks…’ [via Pete’s Linklog]
17 July 2006
[google] Resource-Intensive Google Queries — Google OS Blog wonders if you can find search queries that slow Google down… ‘In 1999, the average search took approximately 3 seconds. Now most of the searches take less than 0.4 seconds.’
16 July 2006
[comics] Fan Response to News Of Tom Frame’s Death: Judge Dredd – Speechless.
[comics] Rest in Peace Tom Frame — I’m very sad to hear news about the death of Judge Dredd’s Letterer. Mike Collins On Frame: ‘Tom’s no-nonsense, finely spaced, tall text is as much a part of Mega City One’s environment as Dredd’s helmet or badge.’
15 July 2006
[blogs] Why doesn’t Google invest anything in Blogger? — interesting post on Google’s lack of interest in updating Blogger … ‘Have they essentially decided to allow Blogger to atrophy and die? Are there no, actual, people at Google who really get (or have ideas for) blogging?’
[comics] Rogues’ Gallery Runoff — a list of villians unlikely to turn up in future Superman movies … On ‘Capitalism’ as a Superman villian: ‘…the blatantly leftist political sympathies of Superman creators Jerry Siegel and Joe Shuster have faded as Superman has become less of a rage-filled activist and more of a benevolent caretaker.’ [thanks Stuart]
14 July 2006
[games] Pac-Man Guide — advice and games patterns for playing Pac-Man … ‘Pac-Man is the game which represents everything that’s good about gaming (any kind of gaming) and nothing that is bad. It’s easy to grasp but hard to master. Addictive and stuffed with pure unadulterated gameplay. Frustrating but always having you come back for more. Never boring and always tense, even for the best players. Always giving you the impression that you can master it but never quite letting you get there.’ [via Do You Feel Loved?]
13 July 2006
[blogs] Meg on blogging and flying ants: ‘I’ve found the real point of blogging, the only real reason for keeping and maintaining a blog regularly over all these years. And you know what it is? The point of blogging is so I can keep tabs on when the flying ants come out in London every summer.’
12 July 2006
[music] Javis Cocker’s MySpace … ‘Welcome friends, to my humble little corner of the Internet. As you can see from the photo over there I have been computing to my heart’s content for some time & now I want to share the experience with you.’
[comics] Long Roundtable Watchmen Interview with Alan Moore and Dave Gibbons soon after Watchmen was released …
Alan Moore: ‘…if we have any optimism in [Watchmen] it’ll be valid optimism because it won’t simply be based on ignoring the nasty facts of life. To me, just in that last panel, in Godfrey’s last line “I leave it entirely in your hands” – that’s talking to the reader as well… I leave it entirely in your hands, how do we sort out this Gordian Knot? If the question is who makes the world? then if there’s an answer it is that everybody does. Yeah, there’s people that seem to be in more immediate power than others but really the world is an elaborate series of accidents, coincidences and unbelievable synchronicities that people appear to be in control of but… well, think about the events in your own life, the things that have made really dramatic changes in you can be traced back to deciding to pick up a ballpoint pen or not pick it up.’ 11 July 2006
[books] The Myth Maker — a profile of H. P. Lovecraft by Michel Houellebecq … ‘Few beings have ever been so impregnated, pierced to the core, by the conviction of the absolute futility of human aspiration. The universe is nothing but a furtive arrangement of elementary particles. A figure in transition toward chaos. That is what will finally prevail. The human race will disappear. Other races in turn will appear and disappear. The skies will be glacial and empty, traversed by the feeble light of half-dead stars. These too will disappear. Everything will disappear. And human actions are as free and as stripped of meaning as the unfettered movement of the elementary particles. Good, evil, morality, sentiments? Pure “Victorian fictions”. All that exists is egotism. Cold, intact and radiant.’
[bb] Meanwhile, in the Big Brother House… ‘After winning the tennis task, the house is furnished with lots of alcohol and a small sense of drunken bonhomie fills the air. “I know!” shouts Mikey, “Let’s play Truth or Dare!” “Yes! What a great idea!” shouts everyone else. There must be a box on the Big Brother application form that says: “Despite being over the age of 12, do you still think it’s a really good idea to play any drinking game with a title like Spin the Bottle/Ten Minutes in the Closet/Bap-Grope/Touch the Snake, or any other party game that will no doubt result in someone needing 72-hour emergency contraception? Tick yes or no.”‘
10 July 2006
[comics] Review of Lost Girls — Blogcritics.org reviews a preview copy of Lost Girls … ‘Much of Moore’s work involves a critical transformative event that breaks the border between worlds, such as the genocidal concentration camp that creates his “V” in V For Vendetta, or the murders of Jack the Ripper seen as a kind of invocation for the 20th century in From Hell. In Lost Girls, the telling of sexual histories by his girls is a chance for them to escape old hurts, embrace old pains and enjoy their sexuality unashamed. Wendy, from Peter Pan, is a tightly wound Victorian prude when we first see her, but gradually opens to embrace her lusty past with Moore’s sexaholic Pan.’
[comics] Cape Fear — The Guardian asks if Superman is still necessary? … ‘Superman seems to thrive – at least in the movies – in periods of political conservatism or backlash. This is true of many superheroes, but particularly of Superman, who is not usually considered a rebellious figure.’
[comics] Steve Bell’s cover to The British CB Book from 1981 …
![]() 9 July 2006
[art] Create your own Jackson Pollock … fun, simple flash app. [via Robot Wisdom]
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