Category: Random Links

Links that I’m reading/watching/listening to/thinking about

  • Bugsy Malone

    We watched the weirdest movie the other night: Bugsy Malone. The Snook deliberately TiFauxed it last week because he’d seen it as a kid. I was like, “Wait, what? It’s a gangster movie but they’re all played by little kids?” That’s not even the weird part. The bad guys shoot tommy guns loaded with whipped cream. The kids all dance and break into song but the songs are dubbed over with grownups’ voices. (And a lot of the voices sound like Bob Dylan.) A pre-pubescent Jodie Foster plays a gangster’s moll named Tallulah. And the weirdest bit of all? Scott Baio plays Bugsy. That’s right, CHACHI IS THE STAR. You can imagine how I rushed to Ebert’s site afterwards to see his no-doubt savage take on this cinematic stinker. But no, Uncle Rog gave it a full 3.5 stars. That means he thought it was as good as Annie Hall. The mind boggles.

  • Freedom Poncho Über Alles

    Man, Martha’s poncho is everywhere! Thank God she’s not popular in Australia, though. I have enough poncho requests as it is. (Links courtesy of Manda.)

  • Female genetic diversity

    Another good BBC story: “Female chromosome has X-factor.” It’s about the X chromosome and how new research has shown that females are much more genetically diverse than males. Pretty fascinating stuff. Oh, and there’s a picture of a lovely tortoiseshell cat!

  • Bill Bryson *hearts* Australia!

    Bill Bryson is still talking about how much he loves Australia. Seriously, if you haven’t read his Down Under, you really should. It’s not only hilarious; it also explains why most people who visit this country never want to leave.

  • Martha’s Poncho

    Oh, good grief. Knit Martha’s poncho. I am disgusted to admit we’re planning a poncho window display for the shop. (Link courtesy of Amy.)

  • MeFi Meetup

    Hoey alerted me that there’s going to be a Sydney MetaFilter Meetup on April 1st, if anybody’s interested. Unfortunately that’s our five year anniversary so I’ll have to miss this one…

  • Colorization Using Optimization

    Colorization Using Optimization. Wow. That sounds really boring and technical, but check it out anyway because it’s actually mind-blowingly cool. Those video clips at the end are so neat. (Link courtesy of Ernie’s mini-blog.)

  • ThinkSecret is no New York Times.

    John Gruber tells Think Secret: “You’re no New York Times.” And you know what? I agree with him. People are jumping all over this lawsuit as some sort of sky-is-falling, First Amendment, bloggers-versus-The-Man type of thing, when in reality it’s about a crappy gossip site publishing trade secrets and trying to claim it’s legitimate journalism. It’s laughable. I also don’t buy the argument that Think Secret’s “reporting” is good for Apple and that it doesn’t hurt the company. Gruber effectively debunked that myth for me a few months ago.

  • The end of mulesing?

    It seems that a rare sheep mutation may spell the end for “mulesing.” We chatted about this recently at the Tapestry Craft Stitch and Bitch. Mulesing is the process by which the wool and skin is physically torn off a sheep’s bum to prevent something known as “fly rot,” which is really gross and involves flies laying eggs in the sheep’s skin. So, yeah, mulesing is pretty harsh, but so’s having maggots breeding in living flesh, right? (As the resident dumb American, I wondered aloud to the group why the sheep would have this difficulty, as it seems like something that evolution would’ve selected against. Turns out it’s not the sheep’s fault; it’s because Australia has entirely the wrong climate to raise them. It’s hot and humid and infested with big nasty flies. So now you know.) Anyway, it’s good to know that there may be a genetic way around the issue. PETA has been agitating for some time for international wool buyers to boycott Aussie wool, and it’d be a shame to let the local industry die out over something that maybe can be fixed.