Shruggle

Over at Fat Planet I found this blurb about this icelander singer named Emiliana Torrini. I like the sound of her voice and the simplicity of the instrumentals in the songs. There are two sample songs there so give it a bit of a peek. In fact, I think the two mp3s are from some live performance and I think this makes them sound a little richer and rawer than the more polished album songs.

That site seems to talk about a diverse array of music.

Recently seeing a picture on the internet of a bunch of lions attacking a hippo I was curious to know if this was photoshopped or not. I came across this page that shows a few pictures of such an event. It has a surprising ending.

Somehow or other I also came across this page of hunters posing with their African animal kills. Share in their courageous victory as they grotesquely hug a leopard, or cheerily smile behind a baby antelope. Elephants and hippos are good for a few laughs. Felling left out because you are a girl? Well don't fret! There's room for young women on these trips too!

Every now and then you rent a movie that you expect to really suck, and yet it ends up being quite good. If I had a mind that was sharp I would be able to bring up some examples of this happening.. maybe next time. I know it has happened before though. Anyways I saw the movie Doom today and I was pleasantly surprised. I had totally written this movie off from reviews including Ebert and Roeper. Now, first of all, as a warning, this movie has some gorey bits, most notabley at the start where a limb is dismembered.

Overall the movie is pretty good, especially considering the genre. There are some light weight horror aspects to it and lots of action. Although it is loosely based on a computer game, this pretty much just boils down to a few references here and there. Sure, there aren't demon's from Hell, instead they are genetic mutationy things, but I think this was handled pretty well. There is also a surprising twist that I won't go into, but it is handled in a funny way. Anyways if you are looking for an actiony entertaining movie with a script that doesn't make you want to curl up and die (aside from a few cheesy lines from The Rock's character) then I suggest you give Doom a try.

I have been looking for something interesting for a while but nothing has really struck me as worthwhile. So you get this.

I enjoy the banjo. If I was a more bohemian type of person I would perhaps learn how to play one. I have at least two modern songs that I am fond of that make use of this instrument. First of all here is this Dinosaur Jr song, it is unusual. Secondly there is another Tegan and Sara song.

Apparently the Ricky Gervais' podcasts are now going to start costing a bit of money or something (after the original twelve.) I wonder how profitable that is going to be for them. Can't say I consider them worth paying for, but I imagine they will be easy to get through other means for industrious people.

Ricky Gervais is on Definitely Not The Opera today(cbc radio) and should be interesting. Hopefully I remember to listen to it. I have mentioned him in earlier posts here and here.

In other news the second period just ended and Switzerland is beating Canada 2-0 in men's hockey! This is baffling, (I just saw the last seconds of the period).

Update: t_t 2-0 result. They also beat the Czech Republic a couple days ago (with a different goalie too). It is round robin though so Canada will probably still make the quarter finals, or however they have that set up.

Today there were two surprising results for US female competitors. First of all the Swedish hockey team beat the US in a shootout in the semi-final. This is a pretty massive upset because generally Canada and the US massively outclass everyone else, but I guess their goalie was phenomenal. Sweden will play Canada in the final, who will likely crush them.

Another story that is somewhat amusing is in snowboardcross event that featured two Canadians in the final. An American led for basically the entire race, a racing in which two Canadians fell badly, but near the end of the race she tried to do a minor trick, ended up wiping out and the person far behind her passed her and she ended up with silver.

Once upon a time I mused about how Skeleton Girls Are Cute. Well now I have to upgrade that to say they are hot. The Canadian bronze medallist Mellisa Hollingsworth is on the left and she is smoking! I got these pictures from the official site here. There are a few interesting action shots in the gallery too, including one of a Canadian jumping down onto the sled.

Here is Steve Martin's thought provoking take on the Cheney shooting. In other news, I would advise you don't see the Pink Panther movie unless you are 14 or under. It looks dreadful to me, and reviews seem to agree with me.

From the looks of it the post I painstakingly made that had all the songs linked in it got erased or something... (now 'deleted?' link on the side) Seems fishy, but I will have to look into it another time.

I am a fan of Cat Power AKA Chan Mathers. Recently I read a little thing about her new album in Time Magazine. The author said how much superiour the new album was to her older work because she went down to Memphis and got it more produced and blahbity blah. Anyways I was intrigued but after listening to the album I was disappointed that it felt lifeless in comparison to her older works that I am fond of. (Now keep in mind that I have seen her earlier stuff categorized as 'slowcore' so some of the songs are pretty subdued) Anyways I am presenting two songs for a bit of comparison.

First of all here is one from an earlier album that I like. It is called 'Cross Bones Style' and if I have made you a mixed CD in the past you may be familiar with it. Secondly here is a song from the new CD. Now I don't mind the CD all that much and it is growing on me a bit. This song is probably my favourite from the new CD and is quite simple. So there you go.

Tip of the Day - Eating a whole three dollar container of sour gummy bears in two days is possible, but maybe not advisable.

Update: It seems like the site I upload the songs to have some annoying advertisements. *frown* Anyone had problems with these?

A towering ginger man, who happens to be married to one of my sisters, has started his own web log called studiosavant. Looks like other artists might make posts on it in the future too. So check it out if you want to read about arty stuff, seafaring puns, coffee and whatever else pops up. This post shows some of his sculptures.

Update: I had forgotten to hyperlink ginger.

I have seen this commercial only once on TV before, but it is random, amusing, features a catchy song, and is short. This link to it that I have found is fairly poor quality-wise though. I even like the commercial despite a few faults that would usually disqualify it. First of all it stars Jimmy Fallon. Second of all it is a Pepsi Commercial. There might be a longer version out there.

Now, you probably don't really care -or know about even- the Much Music VJ Search TV show but I am going to talk about it briefly anyways. Also, as a side note it appears that you can watch every single show (after they air) on their website. Regardless of the quality of the show this is a nice and convenient. In any case the task at hand is to add a second bad thing to The List.

And I despise this person so much that I had to share it. There is this guy on the show that just gets under my skin. The best way to witness this is to watch the show, but since that isn't likely to occur I will try to elaborate. His name is Erik, and it probably isn't a coincidence that you can move ahead one letter of the alphabet for one of the letters and change it around a bit and you get 'jerk.' There is just something about his very essence that rubs me the wrong the way. The way he presents himself and talks to people is what really irks me I suppose. For example, he interviews Our Lady Peace and starts the interview with some ridiculous statement about how they are the greatest band ever (well I don't remember what he said exactly, but this is how it struck me.) Another instance of him being a dick is him dealing with a housemate. (Yes they live in a house together of course.) Anyways, some girl spazzed out or something and he was just kept drilling her about it, always prefacing his attacks with some BS comment like 'Ok, well I don't want to cause more drama, and I am all over it, and it is cool, but..." and then he proceeds to just harp into the problem and rake it across the coals. He can be very condescending. Anyways... I don't like him. Overall the TV show has a lot of crappy aspects to it, but certain things interest me and I will probably watch it again.

Update2 : They have little journal entries on that website and they have zero comments so far. I might try and make one for giggles.

- They had 2 comments altogether actually, and I posted my own here on a journey entry he did. I tried to be a little more constructive. Well, sorta.

Well check out Cute Overload then. Here are some samples that will test your resistance to such things. Also I have added it to the links and I have made a blog to hold my eventual list of stuff. This is also on the sidebar under 'songs.'

What is a mashup you say? Well basically it is when some guy combines different songs to form one unified song. Today I saw this over at BB. It seems pretty interesting so far, I don't really know the Beatles songs too much, but some of the Beastie Boys songs are familiar and they make an interesting blend. So if you don't mind the Beastie Boys you might like this and I suggest you give it a try.

Here is a little update on the Conan O'Brien - Finland connection that I mentioned before. Apparently he is going to demand a cabinet position from the Prime Minister. Would be funny to see footage of it, but don't bother trying the video link on that site, I don't think it has anything Conan related. It does have unskippable commercials that you might enjoy though!

Best Yogurt - The best yogurt is the kind with fruit on the bottom and delicious white [unflavoured?] yogurt on the top. First of all this is much more asthetically pleasing than your machine mixed concoction of fruit and who knows what else? Secondly it gives you a choice, and when it comes to yogurt I am Pro-Choice. Do you want to mix it anyways? Well go ahead! Maybe some days if you are feeling peckish you will want to save the fruit for last. I for one prefer to eat the two entities apart. Burrowing through the tasty white surface till you eventually reach the deposit of fruity goodness in the bottom is a pleasant termination to any eating session.

Worst Musical Instrument - This one is easy. I mean, come on, could there even be any debate on this topic? The worst musical instrument is the saxophone. First of all this is hands down the cheesiest sounding thing on the planet. Now, I am not saying that it can't be used for the power of good, and I am no musical instrument expert, but from my experience it is a terrifying tool of tympanic torture. The worst encounter possible one could find oneself engaged with this insidious metal monster is the sax solo. Most often it is a gratiutous, self-indulgent, masturbatory exercise of 'Look at me I'm awesome!' Unfortunately for anyone with over forty percent of their sanity it is not a pleasant experience.

I might compile a list of different wonderful and horrible things. It will be so informative! You can thank me later.

In an attempt to show that he is not totally right-wing in his beliefs Vice-President Dick Cheney shot a hunter yesterday. It is thought that his new PETA connections might have led him to this act of vigilante justice. See here for the details. It should be fun to see how the Daily Show and the Colbert Report work with this.

Update: I have been panning the beginning of the 580 comments (thus far) from Fark about the subject and some are pretty funny. I will just copy some of the more amusing ones here.

-'Not surprising. His aim was off on the Iraq thing too.'
-'I told Libby not to go on that trip.'
- 'It was a lawyer, No big deal.'
- 'He has so much blood on his hands anyway, what's the problem with shooting an old man?'

Update2: This link is kinda funny, showing a 'handy identification chart for Vice-Presidential hunting trips'.

V-day is approaching and here is a place where some people made cute and silly Star Wars themed valentines.

First of all this link goes to place where there might be ads on the side that are porny, so consider this NSFW (Not Safe For Work). Anyways I saw this on Fark and thought it was pretty amusing. It is a little segment where they bleep out words to make it sound like the people from the clips are swearing, this is the Super Bowl edition. As a result there is implied bawdiness, so you are warned.

Another funny link that I just saw on Fark is this story about a photoshopped image of the lame mascots from the Olympics that a newspaper obviously didn't look at very closely before publishing it.

A few days ago I decided to purchase myself a Nintendo DS on a spur of the moment whim. Basically just think of it as being about as big as a cheque book, it unfolds to reveal two screens, the bottom one being a touch screen. So anyways after checking out some stores I determined that the best deal was to get a bundle that packaged the system with Mario Kart. Unfortunately this bundle deal also meant that the system had to be this ridiculous racing red colour. I just decided to grit my teeth and get the hideously overcoloured thing for the savings. So after buying it and driving all the way home and messing around with it for a while I notice that it has a dead pixel on top of the screen. What this means is that basically a tiny piece of one of the screens is stuck on a certain colour and would always be like that. Compare it to a black piece of tape on a TV screen that is impossible to get rid of. I couldn't handle that, especially on something I just bought. It has to be perfect. So, I package it back up and return to Future Shop. So after some time with customer service I get a replacement, have to get another receipt and sign that one too. I take it to my car and test it out and guess what? This one has a dead pixel too! Anyways, repeat this process two more times due to dead pixels on every single one and I am getting a little miffed. (I have gone through 4 different ones by this point) The manager guy says they aren't going to do it again because they only have one left or something and the rest are being sent back as defective, so I get them to give me a silver, non-bundle, one instead. Lo' and behold it works, and if I had followed my gut instinct to avoid the repulsive red monster it would have been smooth sailing.


In political news here is a little article about that weasel MP Emerson that switched parties that I mentioned before. On TV I have seen hypocritical comments that he has made within the last year, including calling a woman that switched parties before the election a prostitute, and saying that the Conservatives were going to take the country on a road to hell -or something like that. And then as the article says on being asked to return the 90,000$ that was raised for him during the election he had the following to say, "I think these people ought to give their head a shake and ask themselves how much of that money would have even come to the Liberal party if I hadn't been there." This guy is obviously interested in moral gymnastics while at the same time being a moron for his lack of thought over what he tells the media.
*Not a winning combination in politics*

Just like falling in love with a terminally ill person Monte Solberg's first new post on his blog says he probably isn't posting anymore.

I have had it for a while and I have decided that I like it. I wasn't sure at the beginning but after a few listens there are a few songs that really grab me. Like this one for example. It is an usual sounding song that sort of undulates if you will.

I saw John Mcain on the TV show 24 yesterday. Kind of amusing.

Today Stephen Harper (Conservative) officially took the office of the Prime Minister of Canada and announced his cabinet. There are a few strange things going on. First of all the elections were like what, 2-3 weeks ago? Some guy named Emerson who was a Liberal cabinet minister won his riding, and now today he jumps parties and is in the Conservative cabinet! Just imagine how the his constituents feel having voted him in as a Liberal so recently. I would be at his office like a Muslim at a Danish embassy.

The local Conservative MP, the mighty Monte Solberg, who has been the shadow finance critic for eons got a slap in the face and stuck with the cabinet post for Citizenship and Immigration. But at least he didn't get Ablonczied (see: not a member of cabinet). I was preparing to go into how this is a ridiculous post for him taking into account that Medicine Hat is probably whiter than Sweden but first I had to do some fact checking. As I suspected, including in his riding is the town of Brooks which is a Mecca for immigrants because we need a lot of desperate people to cut up our cows in the massive, smelly meat packing plant.


A surprising find in my research unveiled Monte Solberg's Blog that is tragically more amusing and irreverant irreverent than my own. I plan on consistantly going back to this, and I am sure he will talk about his cabinet position in a short while. I haven't read a great deal but here are a few exerpts from it.

I have even napped in church. I think of this as an especially reverent form of worship because it speaks to a real level of comfort with God, don't you agree?

To add insult to injury the Bruins won tonight in their bear jerseys. The bear on the jersey looks about as ferocious as my golden retriever. He actually looks like he's smiling, like maybe he knows something about you and he's lording it over you. Or maybe he's a Narnia bear. No, he's a care bear! How it must hurt the Habs to lose to a group of guys who wear a jersey that features a smiling bear.

Sure parks are great. We all support parks. But when I go to a park I just become even more determined to have my own private park where I can walk the dog in my pyjamas if I choose to (no I don't mean the dog is walking inside of my pyjamas)

And lastly here is a poem he wrote that I believe reflects his heartbreak at his cabinet position. It also makes me think that he isn't married, but I am pretty sure that he is.

Thank goodness for cat and dog
Featured so often on this blog
On the canal we often walk
Where I listen while they talk
And from their furry faces say
That God made them in their way
To encourage us when life ain't fun
Like when life throws us the high hard one

Maybe he is having a nervous breakdown.

Tip of the Day - This font is hard to read in italics

Mleh

Tip of the Day - In the Future Ugly People are Extinct

Ricky Gervais, who I talked about earlier here, has been doing halfhour podcasts for a while now, and is pretty popular. He and his two friends have done 9 so far and they are doing 12 in this series before taking a break. If you want to check it out go here. Unfortunately they are only having 4 podcasts up at a time so the older ones seem to be unavailable, so if you know where to get episodes 1-4 let me know. They are a little hit and miss, but I think the most amusing one that I have heard is #7 so give that a gander. I think this picture, sent in by a fan, is mentioned in the seventh podcast.
*Update - There is graphic language in the podcasts if that bugs you.

In related news, I would say that the NBC version of The Office is really hitting it's stride, both quality-wise and ratings-wise.

The sneak attack really seems to infuriate the man. Thanks go to Flayer the Netherlander for throwing the gif up on his space for me. (I wonder why this became bold?)

Today a giant man who's name ryhmes with 'peat' told me to look up a funny movie called Fear of Girls on the internet. It is around eleven minutes long and is a faux documentry look at two old losers that play Dungeons and Dragons and LARPing. LARPing is dressing up like fantasy characters like these cool dudes.