AN ONLINE JOURNAL_
by Clake and Klake
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MORE: Randy the Cat
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Tuesday, January 30, 2007
Shopping List
posted by clake at 8:00 AM (0) comments
- Long underpants
- Long underpants
- Long underpants
- Holy crap, long underpants
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Monday, January 29, 2007
Scientists Create Liquid Metal, are Looking for Sarah Connor
posted by clake at 8:23 AM (1) comments
I just came across this video, via the Scientific American blog, demonstrating just how much elastic energy is retained by a special metallic-glass alloy created by a research team at the California Institute of Technology. I seem to recall from a past conversation that Joe worked in the lab that developed this stuff, so maybe you can ask him for more information. In the meantime, you can just watch the little liquid metal ball bounce, then turn into an amorphous blob and kill some dude in a helicopter. Human race, surrender now.
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Saturday, January 27, 2007
Pod... Cast?
posted by clake at 12:37 AM (0) comments
New podcast man check it out! This episode is just me introducing music and talking with my mouth. (mp3 here)
Also, the should be a new Randy the Cat comic strip up.
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Friday, January 26, 2007
Speaking of Of Montreal
posted by clake at 10:41 PM (0) comments
Check out their latest video here. I really do like it.
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Thursday, January 25, 2007
Diggin' Diggin' Diggin
posted by clake at 7:37 PM (1) comments
So here it is, full-on digital video of the rabbit digging in the snow:
Penelope's pretty cute. Editing by me. Music by Of Montreal.
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Finally: The Dealio with Milio's
posted by clake at 1:40 PM (1) comments
I really always thought I liked sandwich restaurant Milio's (formerly Big Mike's Super Subs), but I've only just now realized this is not the case. The revelation came when Klake and I decided to get dinner at Subway. We stood at the end of a very long line of patrons, watching sandwiches being prepared one at a time by the one and only guy who appeared to be working there. I imagine one or two people had called in sick. Klake far preferred Subway to Milio's, but we were hungry and neither of us wanted to wait the amount of time it was going to take to get our food, so we went across the street.
This is when it all clicked for me. Seeing the Milio's menu immediately after reading the menu at Subway suddenly made the connections in my mind that allowed me to see that Milio's really sucks. Their selection is pretty bad, and any customization of your sandwich is almost unheard of. Meanwhile, Subway sets up their operation around the idea that you deserve to determine exactly what goes on your sandwich and should have a lot of fun sauces and toppings to pick from and no, that isn't picky at all and they're happy to do it for you. At Milio's, you walk in take a moment to look at the menu for a couple of seconds and are immediately bothered by one or two employees who seem to be under the impression that you work there and it is your job to order as fast as possible and not have any unexpected requests.
It's too bad, because I like to support businesses that are more "local". However, I won't shop locally simply for the sake of shopping locally. If the quality of your product and customer service suck (Hamburg Inn) then I'm not going to support you. However, if your product is good and your establishment is pleasant to do business with (Whitey's Ice Cream), then I will absolutely choose you over your national chain competition (Cold Stone Creamery). Does anyone else dislike Cold Stone? Their business model is gimmicky and their product is expensive and not terribly good.
So you finally did it, Milio's. You got a bad review on my blog. You will never recover from this. Do you know how much clout I have with people who eat sandwiches? Everyone I KNOW eats sandwiches!
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Sunday, January 21, 2007
The Girl with the Little Blue Shovel
posted by clake at 9:08 PM (2) comments
Klake and I brought in a box of snow from outside for Penny to play with this morning.
It seems pretty simple, just dump some snow in a box and let the rabbit play. But of course you know what a perfectionist Klake is - she had to micromanage the whole affair.
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Saturday, January 20, 2007
Nintendo Gameboy
posted by clake at 10:48 PM (0) comments
As promised, here is a picture of the Gameboy.
Also, enjoy an image of a lovely dinner prepared by Klake.
"Hungarian beef soup" with garlic bread.
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Comedians of Comedy
posted by clake at 8:39 AM (0) comments
Netflix now lets customers stream selected titles directly to their computers. I think this is still a Beta thing, but if you can see a "Watch Now" tab at the top of your homepage you have access to it. Last night I spent a mirthful evening with The Comedians of Comedy Live at the Del Rey. Among other things, this caused me to remember that Patton Oswalt's standup is hilariously dark. The clip below is not from the show I saw last night, but rather something of his I found on YouTube. Please enjoy Bush and Cheney as the Dukes of Hazzard:
Also, last night was when I realized just how dirty some of Brian Posehn's comedy is (the "weird guy" character on the sitcom Just Shoot Me).
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Friday, January 19, 2007
Hey Man Like It's Friday
posted by clake at 8:12 AM (2) comments
The weeks just go by and very little internet work is getting done. Not that internet "work" makes a single dime for me, so I don't even know if I can call it work. I guess if I specify that it is non-profit work, that is more accurate. I am CEO of Making the World a Better Place Through Cat Comics and Unsolicited Yakkity-Yakkin'. We just made a huge gift of $0 to the Celebrity Reporter Trust for New Initiatives. With a new baby on the way in May, you can probably assume that the patchy updating of my various web farms will continue as such. But maybe I'll be proven wrong. Maybe random internet content is one of those hobbies that you are able to keep up with a baby around, since it is something small that you do from your house. Maybe when the kid gets older we will make some sort of odd puppet video blog together. "Get your stuffed animals together, we're gonna make a puppet show. What should Danny Bear's next adventure be? Danny Bear finds a dinosaur? That sounds good, son. Remember what I told you about three-point lighting technique."
Just this past weekend, Klake and I were browsing for baby clothes and other gear at one of those consignment superstores (like a pawn shop, but the size of a Goodwill store and without the cramped spaces and rows of guns). I, of course, took some time to wander toward the cabinet of old video game crap and look at N64 cartridges. I was thinking it would be fantastic to find one of the Mario Party series of games and buy a couple of extra controllers, but that did not pan out. But then I spotted something awesome. A Gameboy in excellent condition, with a Tetris cartridge inside, all for about $11. You KNOW I was all about this.
(An aside: In college I bought a Gameboy Color and a Tetris cartridge and it was pretty much awesome. Within the first year after graduating college, though, I sold it on eBay so I could buy a used Palm III. This was during "the lean years" when any purchase of an unnecessary electronic item had to be offset by selling something else. Now, we live in better times when I simply have to have Christmas money or cash earned by participating in research studies.)
The cool thing about this Gameboy is that it is of the original design for the system. This is the Nintendo Gameboy as it was unleashed upon the world in 1989, not the later miniturizations of the technology that made it more portable. This is a solid brick of electronics and plastic. The screen is one of those green, LCD dealies with simple greyscale graphics. What is remarkable is the great condition it is in. Not only does it work, but the plastic casing is unmarked. It isn't even stained or discolored in that way that old plastic gets. I'm still using it on the batteries that were in it when I bought it: Energizers from the era when they came with built-in meters that tell you if they still have any juice left when you touch two green dots. I'm kind of hoping to wear these out and replace them relatively soon - probably with rechargables - just because it creeps my out how old they are.
I have a few additional games on the way, acquired from a half.com seller at super-cheap prices. These are Super Mario Land 2, Kirby's Dreamland, and (for the unbeatable price of $1.50) F-1 Racing.
One of the great innovations that this brings to my personal entertainment is that now a husband can actually sit on the couch next to his wife while she watches American Idol:
"Wow, this guy sucks." (DOOT DOOT DOOT) "Oh man, that is mean. That is hard to watch, right there." (DOOT BLEEP DOOT DOOT) "Tetris!" (BLING!)
(It's a good idea to wear headphones for this to work best.)
This isn't the last you've heard about me and my dork-brick. I'll be posting a picture soon. And I'll probably be reviewing some games in the near future. I don't think I will review Tetris, though. At this point, that game is critic-proof. "I wonder if I should go out and buy Tetris. I wish someone would write a review so I knew something about whether Tetris is the sort of thing I would enjoy." You already know whether or not you would enjoy playing Tetris. Either you've already played it, or you were born after the 1980's, in which case the answer is written into your genes.*
When Tetris starts up, one of the copyright notices on the opening screen is (c)1989 by Elorg. Elorg is not a company, but rather an office of the communist government in the Soviet Union, which employed brilliant Russians to do computery stuff, and where computer scientist Alexey Pajitnov coded a puzzle game with falling shapes for the enjoyment of himself and his coworkers.
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*Not how genetics actually works
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Monday, January 15, 2007
Rabbit Luxury Condos
posted by clake at 5:48 PM (1) comments
Yesterday, friends J and R came over to build a custom rabbit cage for our bunny Penelope, in the style of the cage J built for their own rabbit Tinka. Above, J and Klake construct the door in our living room.
Here we see the finished cage, two stories of bunny luxury. Later, we added some inexpensive mats for traction, as well as Penny's litter box, toys, and other accessories.
Penelope next to Klake's knee, looking particularly fuzzy. Behind her, you can see what I believe to be the first significant snowfall in our area this winter.
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Thursday, January 04, 2007
One Line from a Long Argument
posted by clake at 7:57 AM (0) comments
"Did you ever think about how when you transform into a car and drive around, you're called an 'Autobot'. But when my people do the same thing, we are labelled 'Decepticons'."
I think it's obvious that what I'm really trying to do with this post is get the "Happy Xmas" headline off the top of the page. Mishun akomplished!
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