It’s been a while since I closed the various “book stuff” tabs, so let’s take a run through those, shall we? I came to this by the Lord Dunsany connection, but I don’t think you need to be on that page at all to enjoy H. E. Gowers’ HASCHISCH HALLUCINATIONS, posted over at the blog of master-designer-and-artist-of-the-eldritch John Coulthart. I’ve… Read more →
Tag: benevolent surrealism
Aside
Yes, I would buy a generic metal album, if the vocals (and narration?) were done by Christopher Lee. I find it quite warming to see yet another affirmation that (and I mean this in the most inclusive and positive sense possible) Lee is just a big ol’ geek.
Attn: Roach
For inside joke comedy reasons, I really want to bottle some beer (although I have no idea how to brew–as with fiction and music, I’m really excellent on audience, but not much on creator) just so I can label them something like this: Yeah, OK, I was just playing around with an online label designer from an Australian u-brew joint…… Read more →
What’s a “bricht chaulmer”?
Since moving to Ontario, I’ve been buying my comics at The Beguiling. This, obviously, means that from time to time I have to take a run into Toronto to actually, you know, pick up the comics. So far I’ve managed to work these trips either into other shopping outings I’m taking to the city, or to pick up a beer… Read more →
Thought For The Day
Aside
Dear Internet: please explain this. And I would like an explanation that makes more sense than “only in accordance with the instruction of children dancing, singing, arms breathe fire on the dreams of children“.
Friday Night Links
Collected from here and there about the networks, for your amusement or edification, I would really like to believe the story of Denny & Peach is a vignette that accurately captures a bit of the wonder of the world. But even if it’s a fiction, it’s a lovely little one. Also, SWORD CANE! Same thing with this “big catch” story.… Read more →
Metatextual Wonder
Alice at R’lyeh. You know you want to go look already Here’s a snippet of Lovecraft and Alice talking to convince you: “But this monster is merely the mask of what’s worse — “The faceless monstrosity of the cold universe! “The meaninglessness of our bleak situation “The smallness of Man amidst dark obfuscation!” “What you say,” ventured Alice, “may be… Read more →
Aside
I think I would title the story Swedish Surrealist Heli-Ninjas Commit Perfect Theft. But the writeup at The Punch is pretty good too. That’s caper movie material right there–“competence porn”. I love that it actually happened.
Was He The Last Ottoman?
I saw a story on Wikinews today about the death a couple of days ago, at age 97, of Ertuğrul Osman, who, according to the story was the last pretender to the throne of the Ottoman Empire. That lead to some fascinating reading about the Ottoman Dynasty (start here) who ran the Empire for more than 625 years until the… Read more →
Natal Day Link Post
Holiday Monday has kept me too busy to properly blog, so you get a bit of a tab-closing list instead. I’m not sure that it covers anything new, but the piece from More Intelligent Life (the quarterly from the Economist) about authors and drinking was a fun read anyway. I’ve seen some stories about tough people in the news, but… Read more →
De Gustibus
Normally you’d expect to visit an article titled 15 Ugliest Products Ever in order to have a bit of a drive-by laugh at what some people think is tasteful or interesting or whatever. Ugly is a subjective judgement, after all, but you do expect to be able to pretty well mock anything that someone is willing to put up as… Read more →
Notes From The Augmented Hobo Community
One of the things I’m interested in generally is the notion of augmented or mediated reality–everything from simple HUD overlays to the kind of stuff Karl Schroeder so excellent explored in Lady Of Mazes. Some of the ideas that were clearly science fiction just a little while ago are turning into real street level science fiction–you could be walking around… Read more →
Physical Culture and Self-Defence
Offered almost without comment: Both pages from Physical Culture And Self-Defence, one of the bazillion books at books.google.com. The internet keeps getting cooler. I note that you can download a PDF of the book for offline perusal. (Via Wondermark‘s David Malki!) Read more →
Aside
I just received the strangest phone call.
I answered and a recording told me that I had received a text message from a Rogers Wireless subscriber. Then recording then ended and a text-to-speech system read out the content of the message. Apparently Rogers hasn’t invested heavily in TTS, since the message sounded like SAM reading text on my Commodore in the 80s, but that only made the whole thing weirder.
The content of the message?
“The power of Christ compels you. The power of Christ compels you. The power of Christ compels you. The power of Christ compels you.”