NYCreepy, Part II

Admittedly, these are probably not as creepy as the last installment, but you go to war with the creepiness you have, not the creepiness you'd like to have...


Uh, kid? You might want to be careful about where you swing that thing. Just sayin'.


It just looks like something horrible happened here...


Here's me, right after I got the 1GB memory stick for my PSP.

Friday Quote & Cat Blogging

I gotta go with yet another Freaked quote this week:

"If I could just add one thing: those who oppose us will find themselves knee-deep in the blood of their own children."

What can I say, it's quotable.


And, of course, there'll be other people's cats...


Flory's kitty Cimarron is large and in charge.

UPDATE: Not flory's kitty. Other people's other people's cats. Owie.

NYCreepy, Part I

For those of you who liked Bananaman and the complimentary gift raping, I offer you still more unsettling weirdness from the streets of Noo Yawk, with the tantalizing promise of more to come.


Who put the Boop in the Boo-Boop-Be-Doo?


I, for one, welcome our cartoon rodent overlords...


All the real New York food conoisseurs know that you get the tastiest vittles at Chef Headwound McDuctTape's place.

NYC: Services Capitol Of The World

You really can get just about anything in New York...

Question For Conservatives

So, if you really believe that the government should do whatever is necessary to wage the WAR ON TERROR!!!™, no matter how sordid and awful... does that include raising taxes on the rich to beef up Homeland Security funding, or are some atrocities just beyond the pale of civilized behavior? Before you say no, just think of all the wiretaps and nipple clamps and genitalectrodes and doggy body armor they could buy with all that moola!

(Mmm... Nipple clamps...)

Or what about a draft drawn exclusively from you and your children, to beef up the military so it can invade and occupy Iran or whoever else might look at us crosseyed? I'm sure that deep down, you really want to support the war effort more directly, but you just need an excuse to tear yourselves away from your familes. Or vice versa.

No? No takers? Somehow, I thought not. No sacrifice too great for you to ask of others, no sacrifice small enough to ask of yourselves.

Exposed At Last: Secrets Of The Cuteness Scam

Jessie Cohen/Smithsonian National Zoo, via Reuters

I see right through ya, ya wee bastard!!!

Scientists who study the evolution of visual signaling have identified a wide and still expanding assortment of features and behaviors that make something look cute: bright forward-facing eyes set low on a big round face, a pair of big round ears, floppy limbs and a side-to-side, teeter-totter gait, among many others.

Cute cues are those that indicate extreme youth, vulnerability, harmlessness and need, scientists say, and attending to them closely makes good Darwinian sense. As a species whose youngest members are so pathetically helpless they can't lift their heads to suckle without adult supervision, human beings must be wired to respond quickly and gamely to any and all signs of infantile desire.

The human cuteness detector is set at such a low bar, researchers said, that it sweeps in and deems cute practically anything remotely resembling a human baby or a part thereof, and so ends up including the young of virtually every mammalian species, fuzzy-headed birds like Japanese cranes, woolly bear caterpillars, a bobbing balloon, a big round rock stacked on a smaller rock, a colon, a hyphen and a close parenthesis typed in succession.

The greater the number of cute cues that an animal or object happens to possess, or the more exaggerated the signals may be, the louder and more italicized are the squeals provoked.

Cuteness is distinct from beauty, researchers say, emphasizing rounded over sculptured, soft over refined, clumsy over quick. Beauty attracts admiration and demands a pedestal; cuteness attracts affection and demands a lap. Beauty is rare and brutal, despoiled by a single pimple. Cuteness is commonplace and generous, content on occasion to cosegregate with homeliness.

However, there can be a backlash against cute's insidious Dark Side:

"Cute cuts through all layers of meaning and says, Let's not worry about complexities, just love me," said Dr. Dutton, who is writing a book about Darwinian aesthetics. "That's where the sense of cheapness can come from, and the feeling of being manipulated or taken for a sucker that leads many to reject cuteness as low or shallow."

Oh, and babies aren't cute on purpose. Suuuuure.

Madison Avenue may adapt its strategies for maximal tweaking of our inherent baby radar, but babies themselves, evolutionary scientists say, did not really evolve to be cute. Instead, most of their salient qualities stem from the demands of human anatomy and the human brain, and became appealing to a potential caretaker's eye only because infants wouldn't survive otherwise.

Human babies have unusually large heads because humans have unusually large brains. Their heads are round because their brains continue to grow throughout the first months of life, and the plates of the skull stay flexible and unfused to accommodate the development. Baby eyes and ears are situated comparatively far down the face and skull, and only later migrate upward in proportion to the development of bones in the cheek and jaw areas.

Baby eyes are also notably forward-facing, the binocular vision a likely legacy of our tree-dwelling ancestry, and all our favorite Disney characters also sport forward-facing eyes, including the ducks and mice, species that in reality have eyes on the sides of their heads.

The cartilage tissue in an infant's nose is comparatively soft and undeveloped, which is why most babies have button noses. Baby skin sits relatively loose on the body, rather than being taut, the better to stretch for growth spurts to come... that lax packaging accentuates the overall roundness of form.

Baby movements are notably clumsy, an amusing combination of jerky and delayed, because learning to coordinate the body's many bilateral sets of large and fine muscle groups requires years of practice. On starting to walk, toddlers struggle continuously to balance themselves between left foot and right, and so the toddler gait consists as much of lateral movement as of any forward momentum.

Researchers who study animals beloved by the public appreciate the human impulse to nurture anything even remotely babylike, though they are at times taken aback by people's efforts to identify with their preferred species.

I don't really have a point with any of this - I just thought it was kinda cool, in a know-thy-enemy kind of way.

Time To Declare Reconstruction And Leave...

We're out:

The Bush administration does not intend to seek any new funds for Iraq reconstruction in the budget request going before Congress in February, officials say. The decision signals the winding down of an $18.4 billion U.S. rebuilding effort in which roughly half of the money was eaten away by the insurgency, a buildup of Iraq's criminal justice system and the investigation and trial of Saddam Hussein.

Just under 20 percent of the reconstruction package remains unallocated. When the last of the $18.4 billion is spent, U.S. officials in Baghdad have made clear, other foreign donors and the fledgling Iraqi government will have to take up what authorities say is tens of billions of dollars of work yet to be done merely to bring reliable electricity, water and other services to Iraq's 26 million people.

"The U.S. never intended to completely rebuild Iraq," Brig. Gen. William McCoy, the Army Corps of Engineers commander overseeing the work, told reporters at a recent news conference. In an interview this past week, McCoy said: "This was just supposed to be a jump-start."

Make no mistake, this isn't just the beginning of the end of the American reconstruction of Iraq, this is also the beginning of the end of the occupation itself. Just as the plan is to declare that the Iraqis are now capable of providing their own security and pull out our own troops, so too is the plan to declare that the Iraqis and "foreign donors" are now capable of finishing the job of fixing what we blew up.

Of course, they're not really capable of either, but the fact of our withdrawal from both enterprises, and the Iraqis' assumption of them by default, will be trumpeted as unassailable proof that the glorious fledgling Iraqi democracy is at last ready to stand on its own two feet; Mission Accomplished.

Of course, the image that comes to my mind is the moment when the cheesy faith healer knocks a cripple's crutches away, and everyone basks in the glow of the Holy Ghost Power for that thrilling half-second before the cripple collapses in an undignified heap, worse off than they were before. Hallefallujah.

New Year's Black & White NYC Blogging

A scene from the upcoming Japanese monster movie, Godzilla Vs. Revlon.


Tim 40-Curry does the 40-Rock...


Yeah, it's a hydrant. You got a problem widdat?

Happy New Year There-But-For-The-Grace-Of-God-Go-I Blogging

What better time than the New Year to reflect on life's blessings, and the shite jobs that I don't have? Well, okay, Thanksgiving probably, but you go to war with the holidays you have, not the holidays you'd like to have...


Hey, I remember when this was a quack fitness trend back in, what, the 40s or 50s? But now it's totally high-tech and it totally works, I swear! Would The Sharper Image lie to you?


To his credit, he seemed to be having a good time with it. Pity the same can't be said for the kiddies. Not to be confused with The Creepy Elvis Banana.

She's Got Huge... Tracts O' Land.

Am I the only one who finds this... kinda creepy?

YOUR real estate broker can find you the right home, the right buyer, the right mortgage broker, the right contractor and the right architect. But how about Mr. or Ms. Right?

Ali Kleeblatt would say yes. Her real estate agent, David Dubin of the Corcoran Group, introduced Ms. Kleeblatt, a 30-year-old psychologist, to her future fiancé, Brad Hoenig, in the spring of 2004.

And as things were heating up between the couple, Mr. Dubin also found Mr. Hoenig, who was his client, a 1,500-square-foot two-bedroom duplex at the top of the Paladin on the Upper East Side.

Mr. Hoenig, 31, an investment banker, closed on the apartment for $1.325 million in June, and the couple were engaged three months later.

"Its one-stop shopping," Ms. Kleeblatt said, surrounded by stunning northern, western and southern exposures in the couple's new dining room, which was graced by a framed line drawing of the late rocker Kurt Cobain done by Mr. Hoenig. "David knows us so well," she said. "He said Brad would fit in with my family, and it's so true."

Found in many cultures, traditional matchmakers were people who had encyclopedic knowledge of the eligible young people in a community along with their family backgrounds and social standings. Today's real estate agents and brokers, with huge rosters of single clients and intimate knowledge of their finances and lifestyles, would seem equally suited to take up that role.

And some of them are doing just that. Agents and brokers say they want to help out ambitious unattached professionals who have little time to seek out romance. Others say they handle real estate transactions for a large number of divorced or divorcing clients, who need to find a new home for their belongings and sometimes a new partner.

(snip)

Michael Wilens, 34, a lawyer, went to contract two months ago on a town house in the East 50's, and his broker, Ms. Forbes, felt that his investment in property demonstrated he was primed to make an investment in love. While a well-to-do bachelor seeking a loft downtown may not want to settle down, one seeking a town house with space for a family to grow may be contemplating change, Ms. Forbes said.

"He was always sort of a dater, but the day he signed the contract, I said to him, 'Now that you've found the house, I think you're ready for a wife.' He said fine, and I said, 'I have the perfect girl for you.' "

I think this was the cringey clincher for me:

Even when the matches fall short, some clients of real estate brokers say they are grateful for the service. The first woman Ms. Morgenstern presented to a 26-year-old client, Jamie Schweid, fell through romantically. Mr. Schweid has begun his second round of dating with another of Ms. Morgenstern's clients. Even if this match doesn't work, he said, he appreciates the efforts of his agent.

"If you trust a broker to look at your financials to do a board package, which is a very intrusive process, they can set you up with a girl," said Mr. Schweid, who is a vice president for a ground beef manufacturer.

It all sounds so... procure-y.

Thank You, I'll Be Here My Whole Life. Try The Veal.

You've heard of the Kings Of Comedy? Now get ready for the Justices Of Comedy! Ladies and germs, the comedy stylings of Nino and John!

Justice Antonin Scalia's wit is widely admired, and now it has been quantified. He is, a new study concludes, 19 times as funny as Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg.

(snip)

Justice Scalia was the funniest justice, at 77 "laughing episodes." On average, he was good for slightly more than one laugh - 1.027, to be precise - per argument.

Justice Stephen G. Breyer was next, at 45 laughs. Justice Ginsburg produced but four laughs. Justice Clarence Thomas, who rarely speaks during arguments, gave rise to no laughter at all.

Of course, what passes for humor at the Supreme Court would probably not kill at the local comedy club. Consider, for instance, the golden opportunity on Halloween this year when a light bulb in the courtroom's ceiling exploded during an argument.

It takes two justices, it turns out, to screw up a light bulb joke.

"It's a trick they play on new chief justices all the time," Chief Justice John G. Roberts Jr., who joined the court that month, said of the explosion.

"[Laughter.]"

"Happy Halloween," Justice Scalia retorted.

"[Laughter.]"

And then, the kicker. "We're even more in the dark now than before," Chief Justice Roberts said.

"[Laughter.]"

Please! Stop! No more! You're... killing... me!

Professor Wexler concedes that his methodology is imperfect. The court reporters who insert the notations may, for instance, be unreliable or biased.

The simple notation "[laughter]" does not, moreover, distinguish between "a series of small chuckles" and "a joke that brought the house down." Nor, Professor Wexler said, does it separate "the genuine laughter brought about by truly funny or clever humor and the anxious kind of laughter that arises when one feels nervous or uncomfortable or just plain scared for the nation's future."

(snip)

Sometimes, the laughter that apparently filled the courtroom is hard to comprehend. Chief Justice Roberts, for instance, got a laugh for this observation at an October argument on assisted suicide: "The relationship between the states and the federal government has changed a little since Gibbons v. Ogden," a landmark decision in 1824 about national regulation of the economy.

Gibbons v. Ogden! Oh, my stars! John, you irrepressible scamp, how you do carry on!

*wipes eyes*

Friday Quote & Lizard Blogging

This week's quote is from the book I've almost finished - Dead Lines, by Greg Bear, one of my favorite sci-fi authors:

I finally figured it out. This world is awful - it's bad art.... There's something underneath, something wonderful and full of color. It's happy and it makes sense. I can feel it. Some hifalutin, cruel god has painted over an ancient masterpiece filled with joy.

Hopefully I'll get around to blogging a little more on Dead Lines, but for now, suffice it to say that it's more supernatural than sci-fi, and it goes from aimlessly creepy to Holy Shit! in the span of about five pages.


And, of course, there'll be other people's lizards...


I'm pretty sure Spike doesn't like me. I know I've seen that glare before, but I just... can't... quite...


Ah. There it is. The look of someone who desperately wants me stopped.

Thursday Columbus Circle Blogging

Well, I'm almost on my way back home. I had a lovely time in NYC with flory, spork_incident, watertiger, The Kenosha Kid, steve simels, Thersites, NYMary, ronjazz, Mr. & Mrs. Gummo, and a bunch of others.

I also adequately fulfilled my goal of taking a whole bunch of NYC photos. Final tally somewhere in the vicinity of 420 to 430. It took me about 80 shots just to get out of Columbus Circle. Here's the first batch of photos from said aforementioned Circle.


Ceci n'est pas les pipes.


This one is pretty cool as long as you don't look closely enough to notice that none of it is actually in focus...


Remember the Maine? We do. It's kind of our job.

Quick Comment On The Hi-Def DVD Wars

So I was reading this NYT article about the battle for high-definition DVD supremacy between Blu-Ray (a consortium led by Sony) and HD-DVD (led by Toshiba, and endorsed by Microsoft and Intel), and how the longer it goes on, the worse it will be for the winner. And the thought that came to my mind was, When was the last time Sony ever picked a winner, format-wise? This is the company that backed Betamax, Minidisc, and Memory Stick, all of which became little niche technologies that are only used with Sony products. They're not necessarily bad or inferior, they just never caught on outside the Sonyverse.

So if you're placing bets or investments, my recommendation is to pick the team that has Microsoft and Intel on board.



I don't really have any other point to make here, I just wanted to bash Sony for their inability to create standards.

Boxing Day Lizardblogging

As promised, here is my Christmas roommate, Spike. I had never undressed in front of a lizard before; it made me feel all... funny.


How you doin'?


In other news, if you search Google in Turkish(?) for slavegirl gotta, my blog is the first result. Good to know.

Death To New Year's!!!

Surveillance photograph of my hated arch-enemy, moments before I unleashed my fearsome rocket-launcher barrage.



New Year's doesn't stand a chance. The old man and the baby? Toast!

Merry War On Christmas, Everybody!

And I'm off for Christmas festivities and general overeating.

Y'all behave yourselves... or not.

Whatever it is you're having, have a merry happy one!

Random I-Got-Nothin' Photoblogging

Can't really focus on anything long enough or well enough to post anything substantive, but I do have some photos from the past week that I've just finished processing...


It's a streetlight and a traffic light! I love multitasking!


I liked the the dappling of the light on the church thingy.


Near the Barnes & Noble where I do, well, pretty much all my Christmas shopping...

Random Airport Blogging

Well, I made it to the airport, with my giant 800-lb. bag full of books. Agggh. Next year everyone gets helium.

As the bus neared the airport, it passed a sign for the Pennsylvania Air National Guard. It occurred to me that PANG might even be a cooler Air National Guard abbreviation than TANG, which then got me to thinking about some of the other possibilities and permutations.

Cool states to be in the Air National Guard of:

Delaware (DANG)
Florida (FANG)
Kansas (KANG)

Uncool states to be in the Air National Guard of:

Hawaii (HANG)
South Anything (SANG)
Washington (WANG)

Hard to say/Depends on your state of mind:

Georgia (GANG)
Massachusetts (MANG)
Rhode Island (RANG)

Do the Bahamas have an Air National Guard?


Probably light blogging until I get back on the 30th, but who knows?

Friday Quote & Cat Blogging

This week's quote:

"I don't like you, I have never liked you. You are... obscurely evil."

From Mrs. Dalloway, which has the incomparable Vanessa Redgrave, and not much else.


And, of course, there'll be other people's cats...


Once again, Tiger, the cat my coworker found and her sister adopted.