Valentine Lunar New Year

If you choose not to take part in the Halmark Card Day, take a moment to celebrate the Lunar New Year and welcome the Year of the Tiger. Here's a New Year wish from Cheap Cheap Real Estate (in Philadelphia) -- it made me smile:




And if you are pondering romantic love, here's Matt Damon, singing My Funny Valentine, from one of my favourite films, The Talented Mr. Ripley:



Finally, to my American readers, may you find a good mattress sale tomorrow, on President's Day. ;)

contrary logic.and random thoughts

Apparently, I had PeGeStuDoMo all wrong. I shouldn't have told anyone what I was doing and that is why I failed. (Actually, I figure I failed because I am a gold medalist** in procrastination)

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Kiddo has requested all vegetarian meals this week --perfectly doable but it's making me crave steak and click on every link that mentions food -- which meant I found this curiosity (that would be great if I liked peppermint lattes) and this wonderful tale of determination not to waste food.

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Finally, just for fun, here's a great ad from LG -- more or less a PSA asking people to think before they text, "Give it a ponder." There is a whole series of these. They make me smile.



**hey, here's hoping VanOC doesn't come after me for saying "gold medalist."

What is it about Gorilla Suits?

I was looking for the song about the "lime in the coconut" -- and now I know it's a Harry Nilsson song called Coconut. It's one of those songs that gets stuck in your head, possibly because (according to Wikipedia), "the entire song is played using one chord, C 7th." (weird). Anyway, I found this video of a performance of it from 1971... in gorilla suits.



Gorilla suits always make me think of the end of Trading Places -- my favourite non-Christmas Christmas movie. :)

Kudos...

... to the New Zealand Book Council for this effective (and lovely stop-motion) ad:

Work and other interruptions.

Have I mentioned that work has been crazy busy of late? One of the digitization projects that has been coasting for ... well a long while ... has been bumped up to top priority, and with the stepped up timeline come a whole lot of staff who need to be trained to do (part of) what I do.

Last night, we went out to see Jann Arden in concert. I enjoyed the music (especially the songs off her new album, even if I don't think that "Free" was the best choice for a title) but really, truly wanted to take the teeny folding chairs we perched on and launch them into the sun.

This evening, as the wind and rain rattles the house -- enough of a worry that I brought out the candles and lanterns "just in case" -- I have been getting stuff done that got snugged in between the stuff I was supposed to be doing this month. Sigh. I was also watching CBS detective dramas (Criminal Minds and CSI NY) that were distractingly entertaining this week.

Speaking of distractingly entertaining....

Just watch it.

If you liked the Incredibles, you will love this short film. Totally worth the 6 minutes.

Almost got sucked in....

I just managed to lose about a half an hour on YouTube... I got distracted looking at 80s ads then classic LEGO ads then I found this:



We had a good number of those sets (my brother now has them -- I got to keep the "town" LEGO sets). By the way, if you are in Victoria, did you know you can buy LEGO bits in bulk at Cherry Bomb Toys? They let you pick through bins and tuck the pieces into a plastic cup for $7. I got some nifty pieces last week....

The Weekend Cometh.

This week has had an elastic quality. Monday and Tuesday seemed to take forever, slowly stretching well into Wednesday but sometime yesterday everything seemed to snap back to normal and now it's Friday.

It was pointed out to me that my banner up there includes a typo and though I promised to fix it, I keep forgetting to do so. I will fix it this weekend. Really. If I don't, you have my permission to flood my inbox with comments to remind me.

Anyway, here's some fun/interesting stuff out there in the world:

A new digital collection at the University of Buffalo features pulp fiction book covers -- over 500 of the library's collection of 30,000 pulp fiction books and magazines. Browse the collection for some great eye candy.

I'm sure after reading about the return of textile coffins, someone out there will try to knit or quilt their own. It's an interesting idea but a green/natural burial is still the ideal as far as biodegradability goes.

For the zombie film-makers in the audience, there is a zombie short film festival coming up in Toronto later this year (tentatively October 30th) -- there is a $20 entry fee, films need to run under 20 min and be submitted on DVD by October 1st.

Although I didn't think I would start to grow bored of zombies, I realized I am already looking for the next trend -- monsters? Maybe, if Where the Wild Things Are doesn't tank at the box office. ...

Smashing!

Regular readers will know I am a fan of Cakewrecks and also of destruction so it shouldn't be a surprise that for my birthday, I asked for and got this:

But it still surprised most of the guests -- aside from my unbridled laughter and Hubby's crazy-guy noises, there was a moment of stunned silence. I think a few people thought Hubby had finally lost it. Instead, it was carefully planned right down to where we bought the cake (Costco -- we HATE their cakes. Eww icky, eww) but Hubby didn't tell me exactly what he would do. Unfortunately, it did scare one of our youngest guests (my sincere apologies to her and her parents -- we really didn't expect her to have a front row seat to the craziness). In the end, we enjoyed a very yummy Ben & Jerry's ice cream cake, some cheesecake, and other yummy treats.

But I think it will be a while before I get the last of the marischino cherries out of the lawn...

Local media tailspin.

We learned recently that CHEK 6, a local TV station for around 50 years, is in jeopardy. Thanks to media convergence, so is the Times Colonist -- a newspaper that has survived 150 years of volatile BC politics and public opinion. Today, we heard that our beloved morning show on "A" (f.k.a. A-Channel, f.k.a. The New VI) is being cancelled. Again.*

Poor Kiddo didn't believe me but then Hudson Mack announced it on air. She was brought to tears -- first sad, then angry. So, we asked her if she wanted to make a video about how she felt. She did. Hubby edited her response in with a spot she did last year during A-Channel's open house:



Honestly, I am stunned by all of this. It really looks like we might have a completely upended media landscape before the end of summer. What will remain? If we are lucky, we will still have one local television station. I suspect Monday Magazine can survive, too, and maybe the other Black Press papers but I do think the Times Colonist may fade into the history books. Radio, too is in danger. C-FAX and KOOL-FM are both owned by the same company that laid off 18 staff from the morning show. C-FAX has been a cornerstone of the community for years -- frequently breaking news -- I cannot imagine it suddenly folding. KOOL-FM on the other hand... meh. Q-100 has a large following and JACK-FM is already run by computer, so both of them will probably survive this downturn, too.

So who will take up the slack? Vibrant Victoria? Maybe. Or the Tyee, perhaps (though it's not local). Or will something new evolve? I'm sure I'll adjust either way. In the meantime, there's slim pickings on TV in the morning and it just got slimmer.


*(In 2006 they pulled the plug just as abruptly)

Earworm of the day...

Flickr Flap

Earlier this week, Flickr launched video capability, albeit limited (only Pro users may upload videos and only up to 90 seconds each), but a large part of the community doesn't seem to want it there at all:





There are, of course, groups: We Say NO to Videos on Flickr and NO VIDEO ON FLICKR!!

Personally, as much as I love Flickr, I am ambivalent about this move. I probably won't use it, since I already use YouTube, and when my Flickr Pro account comes up for renewal this month, I will pull out my credit card and ante up as usual.

Happy Easter!

Two Acronyms and a Little Glimpse into my Psyche

As Valentine's Day looks to be derailed yet again in our household (this year it's sickness, just like last year but thankfully not quite as intense -- past years have also included post-op surgery watch and finding out someone close had died. Really I think we might have had one "good" Valentine's Day out of the last half dozen...) I give you instead a wee rant and some humour to temper said rant.

1. (The rant) Exactly when did our society decide it was acceptable to refer to Valentine's Day as VD?? I'm sorry but to me VD stands for venereal disease. Yes, I know the more up-to-date acronym is STD or sexually transmitted disease but nonetheless VD brings to mind nasty thoughts of itching and burning below the belt. This year, more than ever before, I have seen banner ads, etsy crafts, and countless other references to VD and it's starting to get under my skin. I can only guess it's the IM/txt generation getting it's way by boiling everything down to the lowest common denominator. Please be assured that if you see the letters V and D capitalized and adjacent to one another in this blog, I am referring to a disease and not the 14th of February.

2. (The humour) OK, so this is only somewhat funny... but it made me smile only after I realized that Singles' Awareness Day was abbreviated as SAD... (and that, following the above rant, should give you a window into the infinite patience Hubby requires on a daily basis in decoding my lexicon of what makes me laugh and what makes me growl). So anyway, here's a video:

What Marketers Get for their Millions...

Thank goodness for YouTube. Without it, I used to have to watch all the entertainment news shows the day after the Super Bowl just hoping they'd show the funniest commercials. Now, they are on YouTube within hours of airing.

I also really liked the Justin Timberlake PepsiStuff ad, the Bridgestone "Scream" ad (the other Bridgestone ad, with Richard Simmons, was funny... but oddly not as effective), and the fire-breathing Bud Light ad (I'm a sucker for the hazzards of fire-breath though, I also like the DQ Flamethrower Chicken Sandwich ad).

There's a great roundup on USA Today showing the ad meter results for all the Super Bowl ads.

What to do with that gingerbread house....

If you're anything like us, you'll give it a feature role in a youtube video...

On a lighter note...

.. much lighter....



This SNL skit, featuring Pete Schwetty (Alec Baldwin), the owner of Season's Eatings, is one of my favourites. The best part about it being on YouTube is that you can actually listen to it in the background, as if you were listening to NPR, and the jokes are just that much funnier.