Geek Chic

Wow.  The Huffingtonpost just noted how boneheaded a recent anti-Obama McCain ad was.

Have a look for yourself:

I don’t think I’ve ever seen a political ad that made me want to vote for the other guy as much as this one does.  It’s hilarious.  The tone is so somber and dull, and the bits in the background (ie. Obama) look pretty damned interesting. And what is their argument exactly?  ‘Don’t vote for this guy.  He’s popular.  And popular people are incapable of making good decisions.’ ?

It’d make me wonder what I was doing following the lame horse.  If I had been doing that in the first place.

Equally vapid was a commercial pointed out by the Daily Show last night where the McCain team makes the point that Obama didn’t visit the troops in Germany.  They drive the point home by showing a video in the background of Obama playing basketball … with the troops. (!!!)

It’s like he’s got The Muppets running his campaign.  Or if not, maybe he shoud try that.  Maybe they’d do a better job.

More commentary on HuffingtonPost

This is pretty amazing — notable draft cards from World War I, including such personalities as Groucho Marx, W. C. Fields, Babe Ruth and T. S. Eliot among many others.

This is Al Capone’s:

via the National Archives

… notice how he lists his occupation as ‘Paper Cutter’ …

For the complete set, visit the National Archives

via Photobasement

This one speaks for itself:

Correction - via photobasement.com

From Photobasement

This is a leftover from awhile ago — a blog of photos taken at ‘just the right time.’  There are a bunch there.

Photo from 'Pictures Taken at Just the Right Time'

Enjoy.

via FFFFound

I read an article last week about sleep myths — mainly how our conceptions of our need for sleep are slightly off-base.

The most interesting part of the article (I found) talks about the myth that humans need eight continuous hours of sleep a night.  This is not necessarily the case.  In fact, the author notes that until the Industrial Revolution, Western Europeans actually divided the night into two periods of “First Sleep” and “Second Sleep.”  The article notes that:

They’d go to bed soon after dark, sleep for four hours then wake for an hour or two during which they’d write, pray, smoke, reflect on dreams they’d had, have sex or even visit neighbors. In fact, there’s some evidence to suggest that this sleep pattern may be the one most in tune with our inherent circadian rhythms.

Wild huh?

Read the full article on Newsweek

Wow.  This guy’s photos are amazing.  And according to the artist, none of his photos are photoshopped — all are done using wires, mirrors, scaffolding and brute force.

'Love at the high place 1' by Lei Wei

You can see more of his photos on liweiart.com

And read more about him on VSL and Hemmy.net

via VSL

In honor of Michael Caine’s 75th birthday (belated, I guess — his birthday was in March).

This guy is such a chameleon.

Michael Caine via Best Week Ever

Check out Best Week Ever’s top 13 Michael Caine Pics