Last one, I promise
Something a little different today.
Well, I’ve had fun. I hope you’ve had fun. Bitch makes so many goofy faces, I could do this for the rest of my life.
But I won’t. I promise.
Meet you back here next week for Xmas Countdown…! Good weekend, y’all!
December 16, 2016 — 9:48 pm
Comments: 14
I call this one ‘tragicomic’
Once again, the big version required no Photoshopping at all. The picture was knicked from this article in Politico. I recommend it. It’s schadenfreudelicious!
We went to the office Christmas party tonight. Read: room full of elderly academics drinking wine and reading poetry aloud. It was a strange and wonderful thing.
December 15, 2016 — 10:58 pm
Comments: 13
Wednesday’s Hillary is full of woe
Sadly, the big color version is not very big or very sharp. The original image was soft. But I liked her face. You know…in a horrible, mocking way.
I did a little P’shop on this one. Believe it or don’t, the first two this week were not ‘shopped in any way.
She is just. That. Haggard.
December 14, 2016 — 9:12 pm
Comments: 10
Aw, let’s do this again
The big version isn’t very big on this one, but I loved the look on her face.
Contrary to some of my cherished commenters, I’m confident in saying this woman will never, ever be president. Any chicanery big enough to put her in office would probably result in a civil war.
It’s like when people ask me if I’m comfortable taking dual citizenship. And the answer is — I realize it’s possible the US and the UK would go to war with each other and I might have to make an unpleasant choice, but the conditions necessary to make that happen within my lifetime would be so catastrophic and huge that I probably wouldn’t survive them anyway.
There, now. I’d better get busy. I brought some work home with me, and it’s not even fun work — it’s proofreading an Honour Roll of the local WWI dead. The most horrible of horrible wars, I hate everything about that one.
December 13, 2016 — 8:42 pm
Comments: 13
I will never get tired of this
Click this bit right here to see the whole thing.
I will never get tired of this.
If you have emailed me in the past few days, I probably missed it. Our host moved our various domains to a different server, and British Telecom decided all that email coming from a single source had to be spam and bounced it all. For, like, four days. I think we have it sorted now. Our mail is mostly going into the spam bucket, but at least it’s reaching us first.
If you haven’t had a reply, hit me up again.
December 12, 2016 — 9:17 pm
Comments: 17
Dead Pool Round 92: like flies, I tell ya!
John Glenn, perhaps getting a more interesting and yet more cosmic view of the Earth today. Congratulations to RimrockR!
The dicks are falling thick and fast. Who will be next? If I knew that, I’d be down the betting shop.
Let us begin.
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.
December 9, 2016 — 6:00 pm
Comments: 74
Be part of a crowd (maybe)
This came across my desk today. It’s a map of the 1,100 known wrecks along the South Coast of England between 1914 and 1918.
Whoa.
It speaks to the brutal efficacy of the u-boat blockade that very nearly starved Britain in the Great War.
The Maritime Archaeology Trust has gotten a grant to work with diving clubs to crowd-research identifying some of these wrecks from the bzillions of artefacts they’ve brought up. I haven’t looked at the particulars, so I don’t know if it’s something a Yank might be permitted to join from the comfort of his favorite armchair.
The project’s main website is here (the site is well worth a browse even if you don’t want to participate).
If you just want to look at cool pictures, the Maritime Archaeology Trust’s Sketchfab site is here. Sketchfab is for 3D, so you can make their models go ’round and ’round.
RimrockR wins the dick! John Glenn dead at 95. What say ye — is there time to queue up another Dead Pool for tomorrow, or would you feel rushed?
The ‘ayes’ have it — new Dead Pool Round 92. Tomorrow. 6WBT. Be here!
December 8, 2016 — 8:50 pm
Comments: 18
Heh.
Spotted on the bulletin board of a local store earlier today.
Bought our tree. Haven’t put it up yet.
Chickens really, really not happy with quarantine.
That is all.
December 7, 2016 — 9:42 pm
Comments: 4
QUARANTINE!
Well, hell. It’s not going to be a very Merry Christmas for my girls, looks like. DEFRA (Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs) has today issued a 30-day no-free-range order across England (other parts of the UK have their own separate governing bodies).
The Government Chief Vet has declared a Prevention Zone introducing enhanced biosecurity requirements for poultry and captive birds, helping protect them from a strain of avian flu circulating in mainland Europe. The zone covers England and will remain in place for 30 days.
Keepers of poultry and other captive birds are now required to keep their birds indoors, or take appropriate steps to keep them separate from wild birds.
Outbreaks of Highly Pathogenic Avian Influenza (H5N8) have been confirmed in poultry and wild birds in several countries across Europe. No cases of H5N8 have been found in the UK and this order is a precautionary measure to help prevent potential infection from wild birds.
There’s no keeping ours inside, and it’s impossible to keep them entirely separate from wild birds. We live in an incredibly birdy area — by design. We’re a designated habitat for all sorts of birds, particularly ground-nesting waterfowl. They pay the farmers around here to make conditions hospitable (and when you pay a farmer for a thing, you’re bound to get a hell of a lot of it). But I’ll have to put a crimp in their free ranging for a miserable month. Poor little pecker-heads.
If you want to know more from DEFRA about the outbreak, click the link above or here.
Anybody know where I can get some xylophones?
December 6, 2016 — 9:56 pm
Comments: 11
So this is a thing, apparently
I found this while looking for something else. There ought to be a word for finding something when you’re looking for something else online, but I can’t think of a good one.
Zeus tattoos. The style is called gray and black, I gather. There’s a lot of it out there. When it’s good, it’s at least interesting. When it’s bad, it’s pretty awful. Have a browse.
This particular example is by an artist called Chico Morbene. I can’t get over the subject had a little gray fuzzy cloud tattoo’d on his right nipple. Dude, the composition would have been just fine without that. Ow.
I tried to work out what led to such a surge of interest in Zeus allofasudden among muscle guys. Turns out, I was way overthinking it. It means “Greek god” and there are plenty of Mercuries and Herculeses.
Though (surely in a case of hilariously mistaken identity) several of them are recognizably Michelangelo’s Moses, horns and all.
Guys, guys — I don’t think Moses is the dude you want all over your naked body.
December 5, 2016 — 9:37 pm
Comments: 19