It was like shooting a sitting duck

Greetings, dear readers! Welcome to this weekend's post, which is chock-full of videos. It was that kind of a week. (Aside: What is a chock, and why is it full? Discuss.)

I'm writing this post at an ungodly hour, even for me, and basically pulling an all-nighter. Stupid, stupid idea. The dawn light is growing by the second, and I can hear birds chirping. Dear bird, it's 4:45 AM. Get a life.

As always, thanks for stopping by, and I hope you find some or all of these items interesting.

*Deep breath*... Let's go.

-   Do you remember playing Broken Telephone? Now you can play it online. Warning: Some of the entries that are randomly posted are predictably vulgar.

-   Have you ever wondered what 365 days worth of makeup looks like? A lot of goop, for one thing. Two Dutch artists performed a nine-hour experiment with a model and 365 layers of makeup for an experiment that I found both fascinating and disturbing. From the artists:

"We always wanted to do something with makeup. We're always amazed if we see a woman walking with too much makeup on. We're gay, so they're not our target group, but we just can't understand what straight guys like about girls with a pancake on their face," the pair wrote in an email to the Star. "It's this artificial scented layer in between when you start snogging (kissing)."


I'm no expert, but I can't recall seeing anyone with pancaked makeup since my high school days. Are people in the habit of over-applying? I assume skin can breathe through the applied layers. Right?

-   Good news for head-chopping barbarians, and bad news for fans of A Game of Thrones. A few days ago, someone at Amazon in Germany shipped 180 copies of A Dance with Dragons before the release date. Books with this level of anticipation get heavily embargoed by publishers, and--not to get wrapped up in the fine details--that's a pretty big deal in the book business. This could become a bit of a mess if other booksellers in the world decide to flout the rules to make a quick buck, using Amazon's screw-up as an excuse. It also seems that some of the people who got early copies are posting spoilers. George R. R. Martin was less than thrilled:

"I am not happy about this. My publishers are furious.
If we find out who is responsible, we will mount his head on a spike."

While the unfortunate Amazon employee runs for his life, the rest of us are left to ponder and decipher Martin's words. For example, isn't his suggested method reminiscent of the Lannisters? "Heads. Spikes. Walls." Why not just take a page out of Arya's book and stick them with the pointy end?

-   Speaking of GRRM and A Game of Thrones, the spoiler-free preview of A Dance with Dragons is now up on Tor.com. We are only DAYS away, people. (Although, I won't get to read it right away, so I'll be avoiding likely spoiler-filled websites a bit longer.)

-   On the heels of that epic book's release come the grand finale of the Harry Potter movies. Aww. This goodbye video from the final days of shooting features tears, hugging, and thank-yous. It's nice.


-   Question: How green is your internet? Answer: Not at all.
Sure, there are efforts to cut emissions, but with the world's internet use set to quadruple by 2014, the benefits are going to be negligible.


-   Get a load of this dust storm in Phoenix. That dust is about two miles high. It's kind of spooky as it advances. It's just slow and inevitable. People (me included) throw around the word awesome without thinking about what it really signifies, but I think it definitely applies in this case: the scale of this force of nature completely dwarfs most things humans ever have to encounter, leading to a feeling of powerlessness. So we are in awe. Or we should be.




-   For my money (and, really, there's no money involved, and there never is, so I'm not sure why this saying gets used at all), this is the best photo of Kate and Prince William that I've seen on their Canadian tour. Hockey, FTW!

-   Song of the Week: I went to concert this week and saw a couple of good rock and/or rollers. The headliner was The Black Keys, who have been featured on this blog before. The opener was Cage the Elephant, who might have made an appearance here before. (I'm too lazy to check.) These boys from Kentucky have several catchy songs, but here's one that I like in part because it's a tribute to Kurt Cobain. It's called Aberdeen, which is also the name of Kurt's hometown. (Aside: I need to get around to reading Heavier Than Heaven, even if it is the Courtney-Love-approved version of Kut's life.)


The album version sounds a bit better, in my opinion, but the basement shoot looked too nice not to post.

-Bonus Song of the Week: Yes, there's a bonus. Lucky you. I've had this song stuck in my head all week, and decided to share it with you. It's a little ditty called Lay All Your Love On Me, by Frida, Björn, Benny, and Agnetha, sometimes collectively referred to as ABBA. I first took an interest in this song because I couldn't tell if I was imagining the similarities between this and Knights of Cydonia, by Muse. That's only my favourite song by one of my favourite bands, and it might have been inspired by... ABBA? Strange. Whatever the case, baby I was stuck.


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Voila! That's a lot of videos. Next week I'll have stuff about travel destinations. Have a great weekend!