Fred Phelp's latest campaign

You may remember him as the "pastor" who organized protests at the funerals of various AIDS victims, Matthew Shepard and others. Now he is protesting at military funerals claiming that soldiers are dying in Iraq because God is punishing America for harboring homosexuals.

Last week, his group showed up at my family's former church in Anoka.

Get Out!

So the Fresno Bee's free weekly entertainment guide, Get Out!, lists me as the only out-of-town pick for the upcoming Rogue Festival. There are 70 acts over two weeks, mostly local, but there's a musician from London and a powerhouse monologuist from Minneapolis.

And I'm even quoted in the general article on the Festival, although my picture only runs in the print version, and for some reason the web editor decided to remove all traces of paragraph breaks, making it very difficult to read.

Charge it to the McGee Avenue account, please.

So.... what do these people do when their local housing market goes from boom to bust?

Why you should continue to date me

A series of graphs and charts. I especially like the Venn diagram.

I really hope this guy finds a suitably appreciative girlfriend.

Marimba Ponies

[Via BoingBoing]

Japanese kids ages four to twelve playing a kickass Sabre Dance.

Love the four year old on cymbal.

PressThink: The Press No Longer Matters

NYU prof Jay Rosen uses the microcosm of the Cheney/press notification hubbub to articulate a thesis he's been moving towards for years: that the Bush administration has walked away from the established concensus that the White House and the press have a relationship at all. They've unilaterally changed the game, and the press hasn't yet learned (and may never learn) to adapt.

Other White Houses had a “line of the day” they wanted to push. None had a spokesman like Scott McClellan who, no matter what the question, will mindlessly repeat the line of the day as a way of showing journalists that they have no rights to an answer. That isn’t “spin,” although it may superficially look like spin. That’s shutting down the podium and emptying out the briefing room without saying you’re doing it.

Valentine's Day Wrap Up

This morning, the day after Valentine's Day, Elizabeth's mom tells me knowlingly that everyone else in the class received a store-bought valentine, but Elizabeth insisted on hand-drawing one for Liam.

That's some rabbit you got there.

News of... um...
this rabbit, see. It's real big.
I mean really big.
His name is Herman.
He's German.

You probably don't need to see this,
but I mean, this rabbit...

Via the BBC.

(click on "Enlarge Image")

The Daily Show: Cheney Shoots a Guy

Don't know how I could have forgotten to tune in last night.
Thanks to Crooks and Liars for having our back on this.

Rob Corddry:

Hindsight is 20/20, John. As was, ironically, the shotgun the vice president used to shoot his friend, a 78-year-old man, in what can only be described as: his face.

Ten ways Dick Cheney can kill you

Via Boing Boing.
From back in March 2005, before he shot anyone
(that we know about).

The Buy-Nothing Year

The Compact: "About 50 teachers, engineers, executives and other professionals in the Bay Area have made a vow to not buy anything new in 2006 -- except food, health and safety items and underwear. "

Casualties of the War on Sanity

Snapshots of officials within the Bush Administration who at various times have stood up to the president and vice president as advocates for truth, reason, competence, the public interest, and the rule of law.

And who've mostly resigned or been fired since.

Third in a series that began with Richard Clarke and Paul O'Neill, and continued with Sibel Edmonds and John J. DiIulio.

This one leads off with Jack Goldsmith and James Comey, whose struggles against the NSA domestic spying initiative and the president's torture authority were recounted in a recent issue of Newsweek.

Ask A Ninja

Making its way up the iTunes podcast charts, and across the blogozoidosphere.

The concept is brilliant in its simplicity. No script, one backdrop, one costume. Guy in ninja suit improvs as many responses to an emailed question as possible, and an aggressive, machine-gun editing style keeps things moving quickly enough that the clunkers have no time to register.

The site is starting to fill up with "fan art", which will probably help accelerate its ultimate demise. Because one can only exhaust the finite supply of possible ninja jokes so many times.

Check out Question 9, "Ninja Love" for the best execution of the style.

But his eyebrows. The guy's got Nathan Lane eyebrows.

Proceedings of the Athanasius Kircher Society

Blog of curious objects, named for a 17th century Jesuit inventor, composer, geographer, naturalist, historian, and proprietor of a famous Wonder Cabinet (cf. Mr. Wilson's Cabinet of Wonder, re David Wilson of the Museum of Jurassic Technology, which is currently hosting an exhibit on Athanasius Kircher.)

Blogging: What it looks like

From Dadahead: "For a limited time only, a sneak-peak, behind-the-scenes look at the making of this blog."

I didn't mean to say we'd cut our OIL imports...

There is nothing in the history of absurdist fiction to compare to this administration.

One day after President Bush vowed to reduce America's dependence on Middle East oil by cutting imports from there 75 percent by 2025, his energy secretary and national economic adviser said Wednesday that the president didn't mean it literally.

Lenny Bruce played here.

So did Mort Sahl. The Kingston Trio. Richard Pryor. The Smothers Brothers.

Guess who just got invited to tell stories for their Friday night Variety show?

Mary Potter, Peckerwood, WV

I backed into this four-part video documentary about a rural artist, her work, and the creation of an iron chair, and in fact the episodes sat unwatched in my FireAnt queue for months.

This is not a portrait of an outsider hillbilly artist, nor does Potter engage in capital-a Art. She creates because it is what she does, inseparable from who she is, embedded in the objects and environment around her. She evokes for me memories of Christa's grandmother Edith in her garden, or of her aunt Jean making batch after batch of cookies and hard tack at holiday time, or of the new "angry pillow" Mom made for Ben this week.

The rhythm of the editing matches its subject, so set aside a half-hour to tag along as Potter collects wood in the forest, buys a case of beer for her alcoholic blacksmith, and gives a tour of her basement gallery (where "the cats pee").

Hosted on Deep Maps, a thematic exploration by videoblogger Will Luers (Taylor Street Studio) of video encounters with place.

Jon Carroll on Goose Poop

Living near the shores of Lake Merritt, we learned that what looks on the horizon like an endless lush green lawn around the lake is really a stinky squishy carpet of goose poop.

Flying Spaghetti Monster: Teacher's Valentine Card

Flying Spaghetti Monster: Teacher's Valentine Card
Originally uploaded by Buz Carter.

Flickr has a gallery of Flying Spaghetti Monster photos.

Which isn't surprising. They have a group for everything.

If you've never heard of the Flying Spaghetti Monster, click here first. (Another FSM Valentine available there, too!)


Ramen.