Archives for posts with tag: Devin
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Literally Profane

By Devin
August 31, 2010 //
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My dear friend Michael ruined my night the other day by pointing out to me how Google’s automatic definition giver tackles the word “literally.”

lit·er·al·ly/ˈlitərəlē/Adverb

1. In a literal manner or sense; exactly: “the driver took it literally when asked to go straight over the traffic circle”.

2. Used to acknowledge that something is not literally true but is used for emphasis or to express strong feeling.

What the hell, Google. You are literally killing me with this horseshit second definition business.

In other news, I find it a little uncomfortable to tick off “the power of America’s example” in a list of our virtues literally minutes after expounding on the oft-neglected qualities of George W. Bush. Oy gevalt.

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I Didn’t Say “That One Ugly Girl”…

By Devin
August 29, 2010 //
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I said “Tracey Ullman.”

Speaking of satire, I really hate in any way noticing his existence, but I was disheartened to notice in this article about Glenn Beck’s Sunday-after attacks on Obama’s “liberation theology” a mention of Republican concern that all this aggressive rhetoric could backfire. I would always sooner prefer these sorts of people rush headlong into disaster without tarrying to check for it up ahead. Quotes like this

You see, it’s all about victims and victimhood; oppressors and the oppressed; reparations, not repentance; collectivism, not individual salvation… It’s a perversion of the gospel of Jesus Christ as most Christians know it.

and his March rant against any church that dare promote “social justice” strike me as pretty astoundingly out of touch with the basic tenets of, I don’t know, Christianity. Oh well— I know better than to expect Americans to notice pretty much anything that isn’t blinking and neon. At least the Tea Party is still good for rib-ticklers like that in the last thirty or so seconds in this Morning Edition piece.

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Ocean Pout

By Devin
August 26, 2010 //
1

A quick note in treehugger news— a coworker said something about genetically engineered salmon this morning, and I just looked it up. Sure enough, the FDA is holding hearings on both the permissibility of and potential labeling for genetically engineered salmon.

I went looking for some more and found this:

Unlike ordinary salmon, AquaBounty’s genetically modified fish grows during the winter as well as the summer, so it reaches an 8-pound market weight in 18 months instead of 36. That’s accomplished by inserting part of a gene from an eel-like creature called the ocean pout into the growth gene of a Chinook salmon, then injecting the blended genetic material into the fertilized eggs of a North Atlantic salmon.

Here’s an ocean pout for reference.

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Categories sciencenews

Heteronormative Honeymoon Post

By Devin
August 26, 2010 //
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We got an underwater camera in a gift bag from a dear family friend during our wedding. We almost forgot the gift bag at my house but were able to coordinate a handoff at SeaTac the next morning with a different dear family friend.

Most the pictures turned out pretty blurry and indistinct (like this attempt to capture the awesome transverse tidal dunes).

Some (an extreme minority) turned out really well.

A select few are cute beyond words.

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Party Organ

By Devin
August 23, 2010 //
0

With a title that sexy, you knew it had to be something boring.

I was really glad the Citizens United thing didn’t take me by surprise (thanks, Warren). Between the initial comments on the Burlington Coat Factory Mosque and the willingness here to call Citizens United the big stinking pile of shit it is, I’m happy to see that the Fierce Advocacy of Every Now and Again isn’t getting buried on the way to midterms.

Speaking of which— my folks didn’t sound too down about the recent primary, but it was a fair sight scarier everywhere but Seattle. Round these parts, our incumbent D (and chair of the State’s Ways and Means Committee) is advancing in second place, while Rick Larsen looks vulnerable to ultraconservative John Koster, a no-abortion-even-for-rape-and-incest sort with really irritating deficit hawk-baiting signs peppering I-5. I’d say I hope more folks read sentences like the below between now and the election but, well, clearly, it didn’t help Stan Rumbaugh.

John Koster physically flinches when asked about the prospect of two gay men kissing at the altar.

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Yeast Extract Is In Everything That Ever Is

By Devin
August 21, 2010 //
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…or at least it’s starting to feel that way. I swear it crops up in at least half the products I’ve obnoxiously checked since being tipped off by Mom. I did a little research on how they manufacture it; in some versions, yeast cells are exposed to a sodium chloride (salt) bath, which causes the poor little things to start pushing out all their water in a sort of extreme reverse osmosis. They blow themselves out— it’s called plasmoysis and looks a little like this:

I really hoped there’d be a decent informational yeast extract piece I could link to, but I got really disheartened from searching when the top thing on YouTube was a toast speed-painter’s tribute to Vegemite.

I sure do hate the Internet sometimes.

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Categories life

On Being A Criminal

By Devin
August 15, 2010 //
0

It was with great humor, a few months ago, that I received my first official ban from a government. It was for this iPhoto slideshow I made “for” a friend of mine three years ago:

I think I made it as a joke on how ubiquitous his name was on the Internet. It hasn’t kept him from getting any jobs at any rate (that I’m aware of).

Anyway, I noticed earlier this year, via YouTube, that the presence of Tina Turner had gotten the clip banned in Germany— copyright WMG, Sony Music Entertainment, Warner Chappell, and Warner Chappell, apparently. The Volcano Syzygy video I put up yesterday had an Aphex Twin clip in the background and it seems they move faster these days; I got an email within an hour letting me know the audio would be muted to the public.

I just re-uploaded it with me whamming on the old CTK-515 instead so, hey, at least the Copyright Cops tricked me into spending my time creatively. Now if only I could keep a beat on my smartphone drum pad…

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Categories technology
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