Back in 2007, Michael Winterbottom filmed parts of a movie in and around Austin. The film was "A Mighty Heart," in which Angelina Jolie plays the wife of kidnapped journalist Daniel Pearl, and the Austin American-Statesman co-stars as a Wall Street Journal bureau. Us Statesfolk were reminiscing about this last week, and I thought y'all... Continue Reading →
[Disclaimer: This is NOT official medical, legal or any-other-al advice and I'm not any kind of expert. See full disclaimer below.] What to do when a compact fluorescent bulb breaks? CFLs contain mercury and other bad stuff, and I'd heard everything from "It's no big deal" to "Evacuate and quarantine immediately!" When one fell out... Continue Reading →
Here is U2 launching into the song they believed might actually spark violence if it were misunderstood: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jYnnmQ9x5tQ And here is a John Wayne movie's anachronistic but stirring delivery of an actual rebel song: http://youtu.be/MGiDiMXLbWI Back in the heyday of MTV, when I was a budding little pre-teen U2 fan, I heard Bono say something... Continue Reading →
Thanks to the website Jezebel.com, which I highly recommend unless you dislike occasional comic vulgarity, twice recently I've come across the term "gaslighting." In reading up on it, I've decided that it's a term that should be known to everybody who's ever heard, and everybody who's ever said, "You're too sensitive. You're overreacting. You're just... Continue Reading →
This whole talk is great, but at 6:24 you'll see the holy-schnapps moment: Taking a photo with your fingers. http://youtu.be/YrtANPtnhyg?t=6m24s That's Pranav Mistry in 2009 explaining how his invention "sees" your gestures through a camera and uses a little LED projector to give you a "screen" to work on. Because the talk is two years... Continue Reading →
Had another wonderful evening at Gruene Hall last night. Stepped out on the street just to get the view my crazy talented friend Bill Harrison captured here. (Well I was a bit more vertical maybe.) The hall was built in 1878 and has a rich history. The original sign over the bar read "Den feinsten... Continue Reading →
Sometimes I really can't believe I was here. A couple thousand years ago, if you wanted to meet up with a friend in Ostia, you could say, "I'll meet you at that bar, you know, the one on Diana Street just off Main." They have bar food, too, and a beer garden out back --... Continue Reading →
Disclaimer: I'm no music critic; we've got brilliant people like Joe Gross for that (hi Joe). But sometimes I just blab a lot about stuff that strikes me (this guy's neon artwork, my old car dying, a photo of Mark Twain when he was 13). Thank you for hanging with me. And thank you Jim... Continue Reading →
This method/kit just struck me as a really genius way to make a difficult task very easy. Three difficult tasks, in fact, because -- Stretching canvas evenly is hard -- it puckers -- Wrapping canvas around corners is hard -- you get those annoying thick wodgy triangles of fabric, and your nice neat corners suddenly... Continue Reading →
Update, November 2017: Todd has made several more of these signs (they're now priced at $8,500 apiece, dammit), and one has popped up in my new hometown! The Stella Hotel in Bryan opened in April 2017, and up on the wall in its Campfire restaurant blinks one of the pretty "Fireflies" signs that I love... Continue Reading →
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