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Chris Poole (@chrispoolemusic) plays The Osmonds' "Crazy Horses" slowed down from 45 to 33 rpm for a good-natured Donny Osmond, so Donny can hear what he would have sounded like in his alternate career as a heavy metal singer.And in reverse: Rick Astley's "Never Gonna Give You Up" sped up from 33 to 45 rpm: "Is it going to sound like Kylie Minogue?" (Not...

In 1907 Julius Neubronner had an idea to figure out where his pharmaceutical delivery pigeons were going: aerial photography. He'd strap a camera to his delivery pigeons and see what they were seeing.Previously.

As people watched the fall of Saigon on television, they were dressed in clothes from the Sears 1975 Spring Summer Catalog.

The Functional Melancholic delivers a slow, quiet essay, The Death of Intelligence: Why Modern Society Celebrates Stupidity, in a 23 minute video about the seemingly constant drive in American culture into the stupid. His simple and straightforward talk really sums it up well. And, yes, he does mention Idiocracy, describing Mike Judge, now standing and chain smoking on a balcony, saying, "Don't you realize,...

I'm just trying to get my seven bucks an hour. I didn't sign up to stare into the abyss. from Hot Glazed Now by Kate Durbin [The Baffler]

Ruth Buzzi has left us If you grew up in a certain time, you watched her a lot on Laugh-In She was good... .

Dry conditions draw emu mobs from outback to city streets. A wildlife rescuer is urging people to take caution as drought conditions force emus to migrate from their usual outback habitat into Broken Hill in search of refuge and water. (Mob is the collective noun for a group of emus, an "emu mob" does not necessarily imply any particular type of behaviour.)

Under the fold, Ottawa small presses The BumblePuppy Press, shreeking violet press, and Wyrdsmyth Press.Here's the fifth in a series of Canadian small press roundups, this time focusing on Ottawa. Ottawa's The BumblePuppy Press publishes a small amount of fiction and poetry, recently Skipping Stones, poetry by Marie-Andrée Auclair and Adrienne Stevenson. Ottawa's shreeking violet press publishes chapbooks and broadsides like Poems for the...

Four years ago, the pop culture blog(ger) Holy Bee of Ephesus covered the entire history of Monty Python's sound recordings in four extensive blog posts, which anyone who knows only the shows and films owes it to themselves to read. (Then track down the albums themselves, and then the books.)If you, like me, knew the records—and the books—long before the BBC series was released...

Like a flatpack extendable Curta Roons is a fully mechanical portable computer (just don't lose your marbles!), and a very fun learning thing (too useful to call it a toy).via Hackernews where there's discussion with the maker.

When it was first created, in 1963, the Munich Security Conference brought together German military officials with their U.S. and NATO counterparts to discuss countering the USSR. Typically, a few dozen people attended. This year, some 450 CEOs, generals, and politicians participated in what is often called "Davos with guns." Caitlin L. Chandler was among them, and wrote that although officials like U.S. Vice...

A sad alien comes to Earth in search of Fun Kitai Furai Dei (slyt music video).Jazz Emu (real name Archie Henderson) is an English comedian and musician; "Fun Kitai Furai Dei" appears on his new visual album, Ego Death. More Jazz Emu songs: Dear English Language (previously on mefi; also performed as a guest on Countdown) Still Waiting How to Socialise Eggerson Keaveney

Starting with a debut album in 1990, Jill Sobule gained prominence and respect as a singer-songwriter, perhaps most remembered for the 1995 tunes, "I Kissed a Girl", and "Supermodel". Though not hugely successful as a recording artist, she managed to write tunes for TV, movies, and stage, with songs that were often ironic, humorous, personal, story-driven, and observational. Sobule died in a house fire...

Unlike patents, which are owned, licensed, bought, and sold, standards are developed collaboratively and published by SDOs on "reasonable and non-discriminatory" terms, ensuring that they are widely available. Even Friedrich Hayek, in "The Use of Knowledge in Society," practically the ur-text of free market fundamentalism, notes that the free market needs a process by which knowledge is constantly communicated and acquired. from The Anti-Capitalist...

The Texas County Where 'Everybody Has Somebody In Their Family' With Dementia (slAtlantic)Diverting away from posting about Canada for today with a story that is painfully close to my heart. My own mother, a Hispanic woman, has dementia (Alzheimer's) and my maternal grandmother does too.

It's the semi-regular LGBTQIA+ News Post. I'm including news people added to my last post, and I will credit them with giving me that information. A little delay today because of some last-minute addition to the bad news.Dear friends, today's song is "The Light" by Disturbed, because it talks about how in the deepest darkness you can find the light; in the depths of...

While the internet debates who would win in a fight between 100 men vs 1 gorilla, the real question is why fight the gorilla? Yes, they're powerful, but they're also known for being gentle with strong family bonds.Besides, ants are the real problem.

"Beyond the Black and White: Female Domestic Servants, Dress and Identity in France and Britain, 1900-1939" Urbanisation and industrialisation contributed to a public anxiety concerned with the difficulty of distinguishing people according to their rank in the anonymous crowd of the city. In this context, the uniform was used to create a distinction between the mistress and her maid, to underline who was inferior...

A City Drowned in God's Black Tears (bandcamp) - an album by Infinity Knives and Brian EnnalsWhere to start with, if you want: Rage Against the Machine on Gaza: track 1, The Iron Wall Head-bopping and relatable: track 7, Sometimes, Papi Chulo or track 8, Everyone I love is Depressed Hilarious whiplash from the opening line: track 4, BAGGY Via FD Signifier's Can Hip...

Under the fold, Canadian small presses Anvil Press, Talonbooks, and the Ville-Marie Literature Group.Here's the fourth in a series of Canadian small press roundups. Vancouver's Anvil Press publishes "contemporary Canadian literature with a distinctly urban twist." Recent titles include: 10 Women, a short fiction collection by George Bowering (whose New Star Books novel Burning Water won the 1980 Governor General's award for fiction), the...

Maclunkey Treasure Island - An All-Star Live Reading of Star Wars Episode IV: A New Hope (SLYT) On March 15th The Star Wars Minute Podcast and The George Lucas Talk Show staged a live reading of the original screenplay to 1977's Star Wars, with a cast including Laraine Newman, D'Arcy Carden, Tatiana Maslany and more.

Lolita seduces us with language, and insists, in the intense pleasure of its verbal play, on being read. Whether we pay attention to what Humbert is actually saying is, of course, up to each reader. To turn away from the novel without reading it—to hide the book, and spare ourselves, with the problematic veil—bespeaks a dangerous, even immoral, incuriosity. To insist upon our own...

RFK Jr. Goes Full Tinfoil, Pledges to Stop Chemtrails in Latest Dr. Phil Interview.RFK Jr. also continued spreading misinformation about vaccine safety, particularly the measles, mumps, and rubella (MMR) vaccine. He repeated the debunked claim that autism is an epidemic (though this time he stopped short of suggesting children with autism have no future.) And alleged that teenage boys today have half the testosterone...