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Boo!

Another year, another badly carved plumpkin.

Our clocks go back this weekend. Despite getting an extra hour’s sleep, I will piss and moan about this for weeks. Be glad you aren’t around to hear it in person.

Happy Hallowe’en, everyone!

October 29, 2021 — 6:33 pm
Comments: 9

Spot the robot

I’ve been watching a livestream about the Facebook Metaverse (it’s a livestream, I guess the link will work afterwards). If you can stand Twitter, there’s a short clip about it here. Near as I can figure it, it’s Skype plus Second Life on a VR headset.

I was super excited about this idea in 1990.

No, really. When I first met Uncle B in the 90s, I gabbled on about how we would soon have virtual reality chat rooms and how I was going to design custom 3D skins for it. Thirty years later and meh.

Whoever thought Zuckerberg was the charismatic personality to sell this idea…I suppose when you’re the multibillionaire CEO ain’t nobody tell you no. The good news is, he’s sinking a LOT of money into the idea. The bad news is, he could afford to lose the lot without breaking a sweat.

World’s fifth richest man, y’all.

Oh, holy shit – moments before I hit Publish, Facebook changes its name to Meta in major rebrand.

October 28, 2021 — 6:29 pm
Comments: 7

Miaou

Happy National Black Cat Day! Tempted to call it International Black Cat Day, because it also is in the US. Well, that makes two of us.

Charities in both places have told me that they have a hard time adopting out black cats, presumably because of superstition. I doubt that because I’ve repeatedly gone looking for a black cat to adopt with no luck.

The Cat Goddess is fickle and cruel, because of course she is.

Cats Protection (the first link) say it takes on average seven days longer to rehome a black or black-and-white cat. Well. I think the black-and-whites are because there are so gosh darn many of them. I don’t remember so many around when I was a kid. Also, they usually have messy paint jobs.

I wanted a jet black cat because they’re just, like, a cat silhouette with eyes, like this guy. Not specifically because of this guy, though the illustrator (Théophile-Alexandre Steinlen) was a famous drawer of cats and a favorite.

Dover (who else?) published a two volume set of Steinlen Cats that I loved growing up. I can’t find my copies since I moved.

Oh, but hey – look at that. I can buy a Kindle edition.

Weird choice for an art book.
 

 

October 27, 2021 — 6:08 pm
Comments: 9

Mon dieu!

I woke up this morning with the French word “bouche d’incendie” going around and around in my head. As the fog cleared, I remembered it meant “mouth of fire” – which I thought was a strange and super profound thing to wake up thinking. Prophetic, even. But what could it mean?

I looked it up. It’s the French term for “fire hydrant.” French, am I right? I knew it because I had to draw site plans labelled in multiple languages when I worked for that engineering company.

My favorite expression to write was “casa de bombas” which is the Portuguese term for pump house. Sounds spicy.

We’re up to Season 7 of that French cop show Spiral that I briefly posted about before. Only one more season to go, and we have it recorded. It’s been fun. Dark, gory fun.

Watching it has made fragments of my Tennessee high school French float to the surface.

The French title is actually Engrenages which means “gears” – but also cycles, like cycles of violence. Which is a pretty good name for a copy show. But I guess Spiral, as in spiral out of control, is pretty good too.

Mucho recommendo.

October 26, 2021 — 5:48 pm
Comments: 6

And it just got better from there

This morning, someone had left a note for me which read “a small boy put the kitchen roll in the toilet.” What a small boy was doing in our toilet over the weekend I have yet to discover, but I did indeed find a large new roll of industrial bathroom hand wipes in the bin.

It was sodden. Reckon it weighed 20 pounds.

Fortunately, I didn’t have to touch it and it was garbage day today and things got better after that.

Hahaha…no they didn’t. It rained and my electric bike conked out (fixable but annoying) and I’m just counting the minutes until it’s Gin O’Clock.

I was going to say “the sun is over the yardarm” but that’s because I was too ignorant to know it actually means daytime drinking:

A traditional nautical saying to indicate that it is time for a morning drink. It was generally assumed in northern latitudes the sun would show above the foreyard of a ship by 1100, which was about the time in many ships of the forenoon ‘stand-easy’, when many officers would slip below for their first drink of the day.

I should’ve joined the Royal Navy.

October 25, 2021 — 9:19 pm
Comments: 3

Dead Pool Round 146: here comes Fall!

Well! Looks like thefritz takes it with…Ruthie Tomson? I had no idea. 111 year old Disney animator.

She retired in 1975. Man, she must’ve cost the Disney pension fund a heap of dosh.

Right! Are we ready for what’s coming? Noooo…nobody is. But we can do the Dead Pool while we wait:

0. Rule Zero (AKA Steve’s Rule): your pick has to be living when picked. Also, nobody whose execution date is circled on the calendar. Also, please don’t kill anybody. Plus (Pupster’s Rule) no picking someone who’s only famous for being the oldest person alive.

1. Pick a celebrity. Any celebrity — though I reserve the right to nix picks I never heard of (I don’t generally follow the Dead Pool threads carefully, so if you’re unsure of your pick, call it to my attention).

2. We start from scratch every time. No matter who you had last time, or who you may have called between rounds, you have to turn up on this very thread and stake your claim.

3. Poaching and other dirty tricks positively encouraged.

4. Your first choice sticks. Don’t just blurt something out, m’kay? Also, make sure you have a correct spelling of your choice somewhere in your comment. These threads get longish and I use search to figure out if we have a winner.

5. It’s up to you to search the thread and make sure your choice is unique. I’m waayyyy too lazy to catch the dupes. Popular picks go fast.

6. The pool stays open until somebody on the list dies. Feel free to jump in any time. Noobs, strangers, drive-bys and one-comment-wonders — all are welcome.

7. If you want your fabulous prize, you have to entrust me with a mailing address. If you’ve won before, send me your address again. I don’t keep good records.

8. The new DeadPool will begin 6pm WBT (Weasel’s Blog Time) the Friday after the last round is concluded.

The winner, if the winner chooses to entrust me with a mailing address, will receive an Official Certificate of Dick Winning and a small original drawing on paper suffused with elephant shit particles. Because I’m fresh out of fairy shit particles.

October 22, 2021 — 6:00 pm
Comments: 67

Beeg spooder

Spotted at a local farm shop. That’s a roll of hay in the middle. It was in a tableaux between two rolls of hay painted like jack o’ lanterns and two scarecrows, but the arachnid in the middle was the star. Boy, did this guy have some pumpkins!

I have been reminded we have a Dead Pool winner. I’ll be perfectly honest – I have no idea who or with whom, but I vaguely remember it happening. I been a busy weasel this week!

I promise I’ll look it up before tomorrow – New Dead Pool. Tomorrow. 6WBT (a reminder that the blog is strictly GMT and does not observe British Summer Time, which is still in effect)

October 21, 2021 — 5:40 pm
Comments: 5

Copperstone?

Just finished attending the Prehistoric Society’s AGM and waiting for the lecture to begin. Lecture topic: Genetic change and relatedness in Chalcolithic and Early Bronze Age Britain.

‘Chalcolithic’ is a problematic term. It’s the Copper Age – a brief period after the Neolithic and before they figured out a little tin mixed into the copper made a much harder metal called bronze, hence the Bronze Age.

But Chalcolithic doesn’t translate to Copper Age, it translates to Copper Stoneage. Pff! Most historians just call it the end of the Stone Age.

Pic is a chalcolithic settlement from Wikipedia.

Oops! It’s starting.

October 20, 2021 — 5:45 pm
Comments: 10

I gave him my best Festus squint

Uncle B sent me a link to this video with a note that read: “… his accent has me in stitches. Extremely cool toy, mind you!”

People, that’s East Tennessee. That’s my native accent. It’s not even a particularly strong East Tennessee accent.

Mind you, Uncle B has never heard me speak my native tongue. I dropped it somewhere between Providence and London. I have to be very drunk or very angry or on the phone to family before it comes roaring back.

He’s in Pigeon Forge, by the way. Home of Dollywood. And, I’m astonished to see, a Museum of the Titanic built in the shape of…the Titanic. Nobody does tacky like Tennessee *beams*.

Of course when I was a kid, Pigeon Forge was just a little town you drove through to get to Gatlinburg. That’s where the real magic happened. And by magic, I mean tacky.

Oh. Video’s worth a look. He’s demoing a Kelly Kettle, one of those camping devices that puts out incredible heat from a handful of twigs. Pay attention; we may need us one of them before this year is over.

October 19, 2021 — 6:51 pm
Comments: 15

That’s why I keep really stupid chickens

From a site called Good Bear Comics. A few sensible chuckles.

It’s kind of fun to start at the beginning, four years ago, and watch him get better at it. Or is it just me? I like that kind of thing.

Oh, it’s Monday, isn’t it? Yes it is.

October 18, 2021 — 5:45 pm
Comments: 4