Wednesday, August 26, 2009

幸せな光沢がある猿マジック時間*

Happy Shiny Monkey Magic Time!

(*Happiness the monkey magic time which has gloss)



I have to confess to an obsession with strange Japanese game shows.

Remember this is from a culture who think little kids fighting a zombie is funny.

I do think Pan-Kun, the chimp, comes out better than the magician. Or it could be the pro-chimp bias of the Japanese media.



**Update: evidently, there are a host of Pan-Kun videos. Look here and here. He's quite the celebrity.


***Update-update: since I seem to be in cute video mode, here's a video a couple did of a picture every day for their son's first year :


and Joseph Gordon-Levitt and Zooey Deschanel, the likable young leads from 500 Days of Summer dancing and being utterly charming:

Saturday, August 22, 2009

Clouds








































I was up at dawn this morning and saw the most amazing cloud formations in between thunder storms. Like cloud volcanos...

Tuesday, August 11, 2009

A politcal moment

I don't usually get political on this blog as I find discussions on politics can be as personal and as emotion rousing as ones on religion. Persons wishing to remain in polite society should avoid both.

Yet, the recent uptick of insurance industry supported scream fests of the tea bagger conservatives with incorrect facts loudly disrupting townhall meetings with cries of "take back our country!!!" (From what exactly? From the democratically elected black guy running it?) "death panels!!" and the painting of health care reformers as wanting to control the world are, ironically, frighteningly parallel to Hitler's strong armed seizures of government meetings in Bavaria in the 1920s.

From wikipedia:

On 14 September 1921, Hitler and a substantial number of SA members and other Nazi party adherents disrupted a meeting at the Lowenbraukeller of the Bavarian League. This federalist organization objected to the centralism of the Weimar Constitution, but accepted its social program. The League was led by Otto Ballerstedt, an engineer whom Hitler regarded as "my most dangerous opponent." One Nazi, Hermann Esser, climbed upon a chair and shouted that the Jews were to blame for the misfortunes of Bavaria, and the Nazis shouted demands that Ballerstedt yield the floor to Hitler. [26]

The Nazis beat up Ballerstedt and shoved him off the stage into the audience. Both Hitler and Esser were arrested, and Hitler commented notoriously to the police commissioner, "It's all right. We got what we wanted. Ballerstedt did not speak." [27] Hitler was eventually sentenced to 3 months imprisonment and ended up serving only a little over one month.

Fear and lies are powerful weapons. It's with this concern that I post the following video:



Now, you may not like Keith Olbermann (especially if you are a right winger) but of the major partisan commentators, he has never called for someone's injury and has never rallied his viewers to violence or fear, just to a sense of injustice and exasperation. Try to find someone like that on Fox.

Monday, August 10, 2009

Haiku Update

Not writing. Reading
books on the Spanish Flu while
sick. Chasing bullfrogs.