Zipperface

One of the things I'm having problems with in my makeup skills is smoothing the tissue. If I have to build up my tissue to build a welt or a claw or attach something to myself or just try to turn a lump of cotton back into something like skin I need to be able to smooth it out so it doesn't look like I'm masking a horrible rash. Generally, I'm making it look like I've got much bigger problems than a rash, but I want the rash gone. To practice, I decided to recreate something I saw online a few years ago that required attaching a zipper to my face. Here's the results.

I attached the zipper with spirit gum. I found out that I need to work on doing that, too.
I put a layer of latex on the zipper and face to help secure things and stick down edges.
The next layer held some tissue paper in place to try to build some tissue right away. But the tissue paper wrinkles no matter how hard I fight it.
The third layer of latex coated the tissue paper to hold it down.
The fourth, fifth, sixth, seventh, and eighth layers of latex were to build up the surface and smooth the transition from zipper fabric to face. Each layer takes forever to dry. If I'm doing 20 layers I need a life cast of my head to build it on before I transfer to myself.
I stopped there because it was getting late and I'd been working on this for 5-6 hours.
The red makeup was put on between layers 6 and 7 because I had time to kill. A bit of black was blended into the edges and a bit of white blended in on the tip of my nose and chin trying to make it look like there was some bone nearing the surface.
The flesh tone was applied after layer 8 was dry enough. I put some powder on first to make the latex a bit less sticky. The flesh coloring is just what seemed closest to my skin in my beginners kit.

I think I may put the next thing on a piece of glass and build it up there before transferring it to my face. That way I can build it up over several days. Maybe another zipper and I can work on making a Slitheen forehead zipper.

The removed zipper looks kinda dirty. My face makeup is still kinda creepy, though. 

Friday Links: August 15

Pictures of the abandoned Cincinnati subway tunnels. [link]

Matrix action sequence with 8-bit game audio.


There's a gun on the ISS and the Russians control it. [link]

"Muppet Thor" a short comic story. [link]

Authors coming to the Library of Congress Book Fest later this month. [link]

Doctors talk about their most oblivious patients. [link]

Quotes from Discworld books. [link]
The last one I've quoted here once or twice around Christmas.

A bunch of close calls.


Getting rid of lesbians in the Army could cause problems. [link]

Rate of un-vaccinated by state. [link]

Tennessee drug tests welfare applicants. So far only 1 out of 800 have tested positive. [link]

The evolution of scissors. [link]

Fetuses really are tumors. [link]
So we might get to the sci-fi world of all babies coming from vats because it's healthier for both fetus and woman. 

Frozen steak vs thawed steaks.


Robin Williams was suffering from the early stages of Parkinson's. [link]

Ambient sci-fi sounds. [link]

Movie PreReview: Avengers 2 - Age of Ultron

I was in the comic book store the other day and found the Age of Ultron graphic novel.  It's not an old storyline. The original comics came out in early 2013 which makes me wonder if the whole thing was written with the movie in mind. Then I have to slap down my own doubts when I see that the comic is not an Avengers comic. It spans much of the Marvel Universe. Major rewrites would have to be done since they can't use Spiderman, The Fantastic Four, or the X-Men in the Avengers movie. From what I've heard, they're even having to change who originally built Ultron from Hank Pym to Tony Stark since the Ant Man movie won't be coming out until after Avengers 2.

In the comics, Ultron is an AI created by Hank Pym (Ant Man) who various Marvel heroes, but mainly The Avengers, have been fighting since the late '60s. Destroyed again and again, he keeps coming back in new bodies. In this storyline, the body of a Spaceknight (not necessarily ROM's Spaceknights) is unearthed and Ultron wakes up inside it. He manages to elude the heroes. The comic then skips ahead to about six months after the Earth, the whole Earth, was attacked simultaneously and conquered in about eight and a half minutes. Most of the heroes are dead. Wolverine (X-Men) and Susan Storm Richards (Fantastic Four) go back in time and kill Hank Pym. When they return home they find that without Hank's help and without Ultron's creation, a robot Avenger named Vision, some key battles went poorly and the world is on the brink of being destroyed by the winner of the Asgard/Latveria (Thor/Dr Doom) War. So they have to go back and not-kill Hank Pym and figure out how to fix things.

As you can see, there's been very little mention of Hulk, Thor, Captain America, Iron Man, Hawkeye, Black Widow, Nick Fury, or Agent Coulson. In fact, it's been almost exclusively heroes yet to be introduced and heroes whose rights are in the hands of other studios. Our Avengers are there, just not major enough to be part of a one paragraph summary. So major rewrites were needed.

Honestly, this is not a must-read graphic novel. It's there for those unwilling to wait until 2015 for the movie. If you get it, you may also want to look for the Age of Ultron Companion. It collects other titles and tells their shorter stories about actions taken to fight back against the initial Ultron invasion.

note: It should be stated that the comics took place while Doctor Octopus's mind was still in the body of Spiderman. I didn't follow the storyline closely, but from what I've seen Doc Ock made for a good hero.

RIP Robin Williams

Robin Williams was not on my list of people I expected to die soon. I mean, I don't keep a formal list or anything, but we all have a mental one. He died yesterday at the age of 63.

Comedians tend to make the best dramatic actors. Comedy is hard and timing has to be perfect. If you can do that then you can do drama. Robin Williams was probably the greatest example of that. His stand up career got him Mork and Mindy, but after that he roamed freely among the genres doing whatever caught his fancy. That mindset was reflected in his comedy. One could get motion sickness trying to follow him on one of his improvisational tirades as he lept madly among impressions, voices, and subjects ranging from social, political, historic, religious, and "huh?" Often the challenge was trying to figure out what the reference was as much as where he pulled it out of. Much of the movie Aladdin was made by just letting Williams go off on a tirade and then animating around him.

One of my favorite stories about him is the one Christopher Reeves told.

Then, at an especially bleak moment, the door flew open and in hurried a squat fellow with a blue scrub hat and a yellow surgical gown and glasses, speaking in a Russian accent. He announced that he was my proctologist, and that he had to examine me immediately...it was Robin Williams...for the first time since the accident, I laughed. My old friend had helped me know that somehow I was going to be okay.

Robin spent a lot of time after Christopher's accident making him laugh. He did the same for Steven Spielberg during the filming of Schindler's List to help Steven fight off the depression the film brought on.

I was a fan of the original, British version of Whose Line is it Anyway. My friends and I would talk about how awesome it would be if they could get Robin Williams on. In season 3 of the American version, they did just that. And it was awesome. Although, would have sworn that he wore his Mork suspenders.


Watch Robin Williams in Whose Line is it anyway? in Comedy  |  View More Free Videos Online at Veoh.com

Meteor shower

I would have told you sooner, but I was just reminded, myself.

Why you don't date dryads

I took some stagecraft classes in high school, but was never happy with it. We worked with stage makeup that was supposed to work when flooded with light and viewed from mid-audience. So it looked downright comical up close. I'm more interested in stuff that can be viewed from a few feet. Something I can wear on Halloween. Monster makeup. I've watched some videos online over the years and found some interesting techniques that I've never been able to apply. Some stuff I'll need to make a life cast to build. And some simpler stuff.

My house is in OK shape, but needs work. Alas, the work is done in short bursts because it's too humid and stagnant to work seriously for long. And Halloween is in a few months. So I'm working on some makeup techniques to be ready for a costume since it doesn't require moving around and getting overheated.

In these pictures I'm trying a bark making technique I learned at a sci-fi convention a week ago. It involves applying Kleenex-type tissue to my skin using liquid latex, being sure to fold it and give it wrinkles and texture, going over it with more latex, and then painting it. So art class and and YouTube videos are more applicable to what I'm doing than the stage makeup class. This is not to discredit the years to reflect on what was done in that class.

While writing this I've got more latex drying to help make a blister. This will be followed by using cotton to build up some growths.

Friday Links: August 8

All Most Marvel Studios movie Easter Eggs pre-Guardians.

Get More: 

Music News

Native Americans bred corn to the form we know today. [link]

Peanut butter turned into diamonds as tech development to make metallic hydrogen continues. [link]

If you don't have a steamer trunk for your spare blankets, try a 55 gallon drum of Chanel. [link]

The first honest resume of a graphic designer. [link]

Frozen mummy is found to have relatives alive today. [link]

After the fraud that led to the Great Depression the Glass-Steagall law stopped that. It's repeal was key in the more recent Great Recession. [link]

An acre is the amount of land it takes a yoke of oxen to plow in one day. [link]

New wireless electricity tech uses sound instead of induction. [link]

Close up (only 130 km away) pictures of a comet. [link]

Video of sharks attacking the probe. [link]

A woman accused of animal cruelty was eaten by her dogs after she died. [link]

Help Grandpa remember about his photos. [link]

Play with a Koosh Ball brain. [link]

Playing a trombone for cows.

Movie Review: Guardians of the Galaxy

Viewing is mandatory for Guardians of the Galaxy. Yep. Absolutely required.

I was skeptical at first. The trailers suck. They don't really inspire you to want to see the movie at all. And nobody would say what the movie was about other than "It's part of the Marvel Universe". Now that I've seen it, I kind of understand why they were keeping mum.

The only things leading into this movie was the appearance of a shadowy silhouette at the end of The Avengers and Asgardians leaving something with a Collector in the end credits of Thor 2. While Hulk, Thor, Iron Man, and Captain America all got movies to build them up for The Avengers, this movie is to build up the known MacGuffin's frightful power and give us a bit more about a villain whose story lines will both probably climax in Avengers 3. 

But lets talk about the movie itself. In the first five minutes the movie brings the sadness. It's a cheap, manipulative trick, but it's more effective than "killing" Pepper Potts in Iron Man 3 or anything in Thor 2. It bonds you to our leading man more than we ever bonded with Jamie Foxx in Spiderman 2. Then it switches from that to light hearted and amusing and 22 years later. It manages to pretty effectively hold light hearted and amusing for the next 2 hours while still telling a solid story with plenty of action. This movie does what I thought The Fifth Element was going to do right up until they introduced Ruby Rod and screwed it all up. You'll find elements of Star Wars, The Chronicles of Riddick, The Fifth Element, The Avengers, The A-Team, and others while still being it's own movie. 

I'd recommend this movie even if it weren't part of the Marvel Universe. This is a good sci-fi movie even without the rest of the movies that go along with it. They got Glenn Close to do a superhero/sci-fi movie. They must have been doing something right.

If you're following the Marvel Universe movies, this movie is required viewing. If you've not seen any of the super hero movies but like a good sci-fi action flick, you're still going to love this movie.

And... about the clip at the end of the credits...
Remember, Disney now owns Marvel and all the Lucas Films properties.

p.s. - Try to guess who Karen (Amy Pond) Gillan is without checking IMDB.

p.p.s. - This movie gives me hope that they'll do Star Wars right. 

Friday Links: August 1

Pinky and The Brain return for their most hilarious bit ever. [link]
If you click no other links, you need to click this one. 

Congress less popular than Jar Jar Binks. [link]

Ebola infected person was busted out of hospital and went on the run. [link]

She was found and died in the ambulance on the way to the hospital. [link]

Virginia's teeth are so bad that health care expansion will mean literally buckets of pulled teeth. [link]

How the NSA defines terms. [link]

"Do you think I asked for a 12 inch pianist?" - The rest of the story. [link]

Malaysian Airlines Flight 17 according to Russia. [link]

Verizon accidentally admits to throttling NetFlix. [link]

"I Accidentally Started a Hoax." [link]

Mary Poppins quits. [link]

Some science fiction for women. [link]

Where's that one character that everyone seems to have, but me? [link]

The first video game song to win a Grammy. [link]

Is that air raid siren a hemi? [link]
Yes. Yes, it is. 

How to make spiders even creepier. [link]

The 32 things you need to know from San Diego Comic Con. [link]

I've wondered if this would work. You've wondered if this would work. Somebody did it. [link]

I SO need a Vader stove. [link]

The cat uprising is coming. [link]

So that's how they milk an almond. [link]

When to buy generic. [link]

Pictures if all the ice on Earth melted. [link]
Edinburgh Castle should be awesome.

Walmart's ice cream sandwich won't melt.


8 century old how-to books that are still useful. [link]

Cocoa bean farmer tastes chocolate for the first time.

Don't go there

Moving to a new city involves a period of learning where not to go. In DC that meant trying to check out a clock tower at night which led to being mistaken for a male prostitute, being offered drugs, walking a homeless woman to a bus stop who I used to avoid stopping for a very threatening thug. Driving in Baltimore, it threatened to draw me into my own personal version of Grand Theft Auto as I contemplated trying to rescue a prostitute on her first night out. Well, this new game on my phone has gotten me into inadvisable areas on not one, but two occasions recently.

The game is called Ingress. It's been going on for about two years. You have a map of the world and markers indicating the locations of energy portals. You pick a team and then go try to capture portals for your team. But to do this you must go to the real world location in which the portal is located.

My neighborhood has five portals within easy walking distance. As of now, I own three of them, my team owns the fourth, and the fifth is at the train station near my house, but is too powerful for me to mess with. But to get points and continue to level up I must find more. This was easier when I was fighting someone else for the local portals. So I had to travel a bit to access some others in the Cherry Hill neighborhood.

I walked along the water for a long ways and encountered four portals. The first was out of phone range, so I couldn't claim it. The second and third I claimed in the name of England. The fourth was too powerful to take, but I could gather the energy around it to power some of my other portals. Then I went deeper into the neighborhood toward a cluster of four portals. The road I was on was U shaped and would drop me off back near the beginning of my route. The first half was a bit run down and ghetto looking, but reasonably safe. I passed my accountant, talked to some random people, and generally had a nice walk. But beyond the cluster of portals things changed. The neighborhood looked much better, but felt much less safe. Two guys in their teens started following me. One of them was singing a tune that went something like "Yo, nigger, yo, nigger, yo, nigger, yo, nigger..." and on like that. And they were closing the distance between us. As they got close I stepped into a driveway, got a good look at them, and let them pass. They moved on and put some distance between us. About a block and a half later someone came across the street and attacked the both of them. And I mean he laid them out with a couple of punches. They got back up and ran off while the assailant went on his way. I would have dearly loved at taxi at that point.

The rest of the walk was pretty quiet. I found and ate some blackberries. I walked along quickly decaying sidewalk and around some ill placed trees, and went home. If I go back to those portals it will be with my car.

I mentioned gathering energy around enemy portals. I do that frequently to the portal at the train station. One time I tried it at 1:15 in the morning. In my pajamas. It had just stopped raining. I thought I was safe. Instead, three guys tried to corner me and make me pay a toll. I was supposed to be scared. I was more annoyed than anything.

First, two of them stayed back and the third came over to ask me for money. I told him I left my wallet at home and looked down at what I was wearing. He left. A minute later he came back and asked to borrow my phone. "Nope." This wasn't the answer he was expecting. He explained he wanted to call his mom in prison. "Can't." "Why not?" "Security reasons. It's a government phone. I'm not allowed to let anyone else use it. Spies and what not. You know." And I smiled at him. He just looked at me. I put the phone in my pocket and walked past him towards the two others. Yeah, I was surrounded at that point. Or, could be easily. As I approached the two others I had I different trick in mind. I kept smiling. And what's creepier at 1:20 AM? Three teenaged wanna-be thugs who can't stop giggling or one white guy in his pajamas walking among them with a grin? The two started telling me that if I wanted to come out here I had to cop to them. So I asked them to repeat that a couple of times. Then I asked "I have to ... cop? Comp?" They repeat it a few more times. "I'm not sure what that word is." And then. "Well, I gotta get on home. I'll talk to you later." as I got past them. One of them made a move like he was gonna hit me in my peripheral vision. I was supposed to jump. I didn't. I stopped. I turned and looked over my shoulder with more teeth showing than before and gleam in my eye. He stopped giggling and ran to catch up with his friends.

So that's another thing I won't be doing again.

Movie Review: Snowpiercer

I watched the independent sci-fi movie Snowpiercer last weekend. If you're lucky, it's showing in your local independent theater. If not, then Netflix plans to get the DVD once it comes out. You can look it up and save it now.

The planet has frozen. An experiment in stopping global warming has frozen everything. All but one long train full of people. It drives on a track that winds over the whole planet once a year and never, ever stops. In the back of the train is the vast unwashed masses crammed together for 18 years in such a way to make diesel submarines seem roomy. At the front of the train it's all obscene decadence, luxury, and anything you could want.

There have been revolts and revolutions before, but all have been put down brutally. But Captain America has a plan. He wants to take the next war all the way to the front of the train. 

The story is a familiar one. It could as easily be about the French Revolution or the fears of the 0.1% today or some of the Living Dead movies. The train makes the difference this time. It give it a hint of Masque of the Red Death (people hiding from death in a long string of rooms) as well as gives the audience a new world to explore.

This movie also would have gone well as a video game. At least then there'd be a good reason for progress to be on rails.

I'm still not sure if I'll get it on DVD, but it's been one of my favorite movies so far this year.

Gandolf quote

Is that right? I thought you were the bird. - Gandolf Greybird

Friday Links: July 25

Potty trained parrot.


David Copperfield once made muggers think he had nothing on him to steal. [link]

Diggy Diggy Hole - music video


Comic book character inspirations. [link]

Vegetables are any plant you eat. [link]

The only non-indian survivor of the 7th Cavalry at Little Bighorn. [link]

Finally, a good reason for disliking Jimmy Carter. [link]

Spot on Peter Griffin impersonator with iffy audio.


A penguin that goes to the shops. [link]

The Science of Doctor Who by Brian Cox. [link]

Some of Weird Al's new stuff. Word Crimes and Tacky. [more]




Harrier makes an emergency landing on a cargo ship.


Kid dies because school wouldn't let him carry his inhaler. [link]

Coyotes and badgers sometimes hunt together. [link]
This explains the holes my brother has been having to fill up in his fields.

Bird migration wasn't something people knew about until surprisingly recently. A crane with a spear through it's neck introduced the idea. [link]

Queen Elizabeth aging via money. [link]

3D print Barbie some armor. [link]

Game: Purrmageddon - play a cat in a giant mech suit smacking down the best defenses the planet can muster. [link]

Man vs TGIFriday's Endless Mozarella Sticks. Careful notes of a day spent choking down breaded cheese. [link]

Pictures of Hitler practicing his hand gestures. [link]

Ultra-black material invented. [link]

Thanks to anti-vaxxers, the immigrant children are better vaccinated than Texans. [link]

Stand your ground laws don't stop crime, do increase homicides. [link]

What happens when you decriminalize "indoor" prostitution? Rhode Island accidentally found out. [link]

A timeline of indian land loss. [link]

Bacteria that live solely on electricity. [link]

Sleeping in colder rooms helps you lose weight. [link]

Seaweed beer. [link]

14 fact about the child-migrant influx. [link]

Spray cake in a can. [link]

Video of the creation of a nuke-built lake. [link]

There's an airborne version of MRSA. [link]

Bye bye, Walgreens

So, I'd stopped in to my local Walgreens to pick up some medications and snacks when a rather hostile employee drove me out. I had a couple of plastic bags in the car, so I brought them in with me to reuse them. Hardly the first time I've done that in this or any other store. I'd gotten my meds, some snacks, and was getting some foot powder when someone shelving some stuff asked me what I was doing. Confused, I answered that I was picking up some foot powder. "You can't put that in a bag." Thinking she was joking I asked "What?" Her hostility increased. "You can't be putting stuff in a bag." "I can't use a bag to carry my groceries to checkout?" "No! You might be stealing!" I can kind of understand the thinking. Sure, there's security stuff on the meds to sound alarms as I leave and I'm pretty sure someone would object if I just walked out with bags of stuff. But, sure, I suppose. So I emptied the bag and handed it to her. I then started picking my stuff up. "YOU CAN'T DO THAT!" "I can't carry my groceries up to the register in my hands, either? You're really going to have an attitude about that?" I had a bit of attitude myself at this point. "You can't do that!" So I set everything back on the ground and said "Fine. I'll get them somewhere else." and started walking out. She followed me and called a code something or other. Presumably it meant shoplifter. I turned, pulled the other empty bag out of my pocket, "Here, you can have my other bag, too, if it'll make you feel better." and left the bag hanging there in the air. A few steps later I pulled out my wallet, took out my Walgreens card, and tossed it at her. "Here. You can have this, too. I won't be needing it after this." I then left, went to the CVS a mile up the road and spent $78 there.

I've e-mailed Walgreen's customer service about it. It's not really fair to stop doing business with someone and not tell them what happened to make you stop.

Friday excuses

I had family in town and work to do. So this got zeroth priority and you get no links.

Friday Links: July 11

Some vampires were staked through the legs. [link]

Monkeys and humans fight over water supply. [link]

How morning sickness helps the fetus. [link]

Chimp in a zoo shows advanced planning skills. [link]

Birth control for men that we can't get our hands on. [link]

Poor boys get PTSD when moving to better neighborhoods, but poor girls thrive. [link]

Hawaii's beaches are made of fish poop. [link]

The founding fathers were hard drinkin' men. [link]
"That's 54 bottles of Madeira, 60 bottles of claret, eight of whiskey, 22 of porter, eight of hard cider, 12 of beer, and seven bowls of alcoholic punch. And what will your friends be drinking this evening?"

We can't take pictures of the Milky Way from the outside, so what galaxy is it that's shown in pictures? [link]

NASA can take tax deductible donations. [link]

Goldman Sachs demands Google unsend an e-mail. [link]

August 23


More on the Stargate movie reboot. [link]

We let you carry your guns openly for one day, ONE DAY!, and you're already drawing on each other in the QwikEMart. [link]

Late night thought

Everybody should kill one person at some point. It's a once in their lifetime experience.

Neighborhood landscaping

This is my hood. You should be able to click to enlarge the picture. The street names have been removed to make it harder for my old university to find me.

Let me tell you what you're seeing.

The blue rectangles are properties I own at the moment. This will likely be added to, soon. If I had the money there'd be a lot of blue on this map.

The green rectangles are lawns that I've been caring for this summer. Four of them I've been taking care of all summer and they look great. Two others straight across from my house have only been taken on recently. One has a little old lady on oxygen whose son is worthless. As of this weekend I'm hopping her privacy fence and mowing her lawn and doing battle with the Virginia Creeper on both sides of the fence. The other is owned, but neglected. It houses many rats that you can hear dying at night. I'm committing lawn genocide and picking up the trash dumped in her yard. This weekend I started some flowers that bees like in pots so I can transplant them once the genocide is complete.

The red rectangle are yards that I took care of last summer. One was abandoned because the house was sold and is being repaired. Another was abandoned because of heavy dumping. All four had fences that were torn down.

The green line is the route that Gandolf and I walk on our Poison Ivy extermination walk. Last summer I only covered my block and the one north of it as well as weeds on sidewalks around those blocks. This year I started covering the full length of my alley. My alley still gets sprayed for all weeds, but the full alley was being targeted for Poison Ivy. I expanded to the next alley when I was looking at properties on that street and saw how horrible they were in the back. It was about a month before I could complete the circuit of the alley and get back home before the bottle ran empty. Any empty house's yard is a target. And stuff I can reach in occupied houses.  I just started doing the alley to the west in the last few weeks. I had probably half a bottle of spray left when I get home.

The black dots are points of particular interest.
First, you see my route take a little jog beside a building north of my block. That building was once 1/5 covered with Poison Ivy. Deformed versions of it continue to try to come back. I won't let it. Other stuff is moving in and I'm trying to be picky about what I allow.
Second, far to the north is an amorphous black blob. That's a field of Curly Leaf Dock. That weed was a major target of last year's genocidal campaign and is included in this years. I poked at the field a bit, but didn't do any serious damage. I may get serious now that the second growth of the summer is starting. One of my neighbors is going to get me some bamboo to plant over there to crowd out the dock and serve as a decorative sound barrier for the trains that pass on the far side.
Third, by the loop-de-loop, is the abandoned community garden. Ten foot fences surround it and are covered with honeysuckle, English Ivy, Virginia Creeper, and Poison Ivy. I was able to target the Poison Ivy fairly successfully. It was a daunting task, though.
Fourth is a batch growing along the side fence of a yard. I can only get what's near the alley.
Fifth is just a messy yard that I use to gauge weed behavior in the area. Poison Ivy moved in that yard this year. That yard also tells me when to watch out for more Curly Leaf Dock.
If I have some left when I get close to home I then cut over to
Six. Former nice landscaping for a back fence. It will be nice again once I get rid of this major infestation. I blew a quarter of my bottle on that last week.
Seventh is a row of bushes that were heavily infested. The more I kill the more I find.
Eighth is an alley that starts with a condemned house that's overgrown. I'm trying to kill the vine back enough that I can move in with limb nippers.
Then I come back and finish on the other side of the fence from dot number one.

Friday Links: July 4

NASA plans to put a greenhouse on [The Moon] and [Mars].

Starfish are an apex predator and they're turning to mush. [link]

How to calculate pi by dropping matches. [link]

Eli Roth showed the movie Cannibal Holocaust to an isolated tribe. They thought it was a comedy. [link]

An abandoned plane that landed itself. [link]

Understanding egg expiration date codes. [link]

I want this watch. [link]

The last jew in Afghanistan. [link]

Martian sunsets are blue. [video and explanation]

Paul McCartney did release a song under a pseudonym just to see if it'd still be a success. [link]

Heavy metal construction.

Book Review: Icehenge

"Icehenge" started life as three short stories in a sci-fi magazine in the early 80s. They were modified, apparently heavily, for this book. Man went to Mars and the asteroids, but not much further. Most everything is run by a corporation more intent on exploiting what and who they have than expanding and exploring. Change comes slow now that humans life for about 600 years.

The first story is about a woman on a ship that is supposed to be the last piece of a secret mission to build an interstellar space craft. They meet with two other space craft that have gone missing over the last decade and their ship is supposed to be incorporated into the new space ship. It'll take a long time to get where they want to be, but they have the time. What they don't have is a recycling system that will get them all the way there. They'll be short just a few years and they need her help to make it work. She does her best and returns to Mars where a brewing revolution will help distract those in charge from the ship fleeing the system. The revolution is put down brutally.

The second story comes decades later. An archaeologist who lived in a dome that was collapsed during the revolution finally has permission to investigate the ruins. He's old enough that he really shouldn't remember any of it anymore. While researching there, a ring of standing ice blocks is discovered on Pluto. It's much like Stonehenge or some similar structure on Earth. He discovered a crashed rover on Mars with papers that indicate the henge was built by a group escaping the star system using stolen ships and the involvement of the woman from the first story.

The third story comes later still. While there has been some reforms since the corporation was forced to admit it's brutality in the revolution, they're still pretty much in charge. Mankind has expanded on to Saturn and beyond, but still not out of the star system. The great grandson of the archaeologist in story two is a historian. He talked to someone at a New Year's bash who makes a believable claim about building the icehenge. This starts the historian on a mission to correct the history. If not the fleeing revolutionaries, then who?

Kim Stanley Robinson, the author, does good work, but often his books get bogged down and you have to wait until the last 100 pages for the story to pick up again. He's just lucky his books are so good. His Mars Trilogy pretty much eliminated the need for other Mars colonization books since he covered it so thoroughly. Since this book is three short stories that's not such a problem as it is with full novels. The first story goes pretty well. The second gets kind of tedious until the archaeologist goes on his one man quest across Mars. The third has places where you think the author has completely lost the thread and then he jumps into or out of a flashback and brings you back into the story.

Book Review: Triggers

You know how I am with Robert J Sawyer books. I'll grab every one that comes along. And that's what happened with "Triggers". I didn't need to know anything else.

You may recall that his book "Flashforward" was adapted into a TV series. The show departed radically from the book, but that's to be expected. I got the sense from this new book that he got a taste of Hollywood and wants to go back. I say this because the book starts like an episode of "24" or some manner of political suspense novel. Terrorist attacks across the country going on for a couple of years. Major landmarks destroyed. The President has a horrible secret plan to stop them for good. Then a conspiracy within the Secret Service puts a sniper's bullet in him while speaking on the steps of the Lincoln Memorial followed by blowing up the White House! dunt. Dunt! DUUUUUUUN! t.

This is a serious departure from Sawyer's normal fare. Typically he's more into copying brains into computers, reversing the aging process, mind swaps, that sort of thing. And as the book progresses you see the old Robert J Sawyer come out to play. The President is being treated at a hospital just one floor removed from an experiment to go into a soldier's head and fix his PTSD. The EMP resulting from the bomb at the White House causes the field enveloping the soldier's head to expand for a brief moment and cause 24 people within that field to be able to read the minds of another. As in person 1 reads the memories, but not the thoughts, of person 2. Person 2 reads the memories of person 3. Person 3 reads the thoughts of person 4. And on like that. And yes, that means someone can read the mind of the President of the United States. 

While the main plot continues, the story settles down into the lives of the connected. One guy can read the mind of a woman who was molested as a child even though she can't remember it herself. One black Secret Service agent can read the mind of a racist old woman. A doctor can read the mind of a nurse who has turned to drugs to escape her life with her abusive husband and secretly has a crush on the doctor. Two others end up in a relationship because she now knows what he likes in bed and can enjoy the memories of being him in bed. And the President getting an attack of PTSD because he's linked to the soldier who was the subject of the original experience.

Of course, eventually someone has to find out what the President has planned and it must be stopped before the book ends. 

If you're a James Patterson lover I think this book would be a good jumping point to Robert J Sawyer. Mind you, I haven't read any James Patterson so I'm going off of what I think James Patterson writes. This is definitely a good place if you're a fan of shows like "24".

So. Humid.

Atlantis didn't sink. It just got so humid that they thought it had.

Granite Flats

It's hard these days to find a good show that few have heard of. Netflix and Hulu and general internetiness mean we get to watch shows from Canada, England, and the last 40 plus years of the United States as well as find out about loads more that we might like. But there's a network out there that makes at least some of it's own quality original programming and keeps it to themselves. Brigham Young University TV is such a station. Being a college station you'd expect them to be mostly some PBS affiliate. Being a religious college you might expect it to be hyper religious. But, as near as I can tell, they're just trying to create mostly original programming. A quick scan of their listings shows a lot of marathons and reruns, but that seems unavoidable for a station their size.

Cartoonist Howard Taylor of Schlock Mercenary was invited to a screening of the season 2 pilot of Granite Flats and told his readers about it. It took me a few weeks to find the time to get through all of seasons 1 and 2, but I'm glad that I did.

Granite Flats is a series about a town of the same name located in Cold War era Colorado. The story follows several different groups within the town. The sheriff with a good heart, three kids playing investigators, a group of scientists doing secret mind control experiments for the government, a father with PTSD whose bully of a son has to be taken from him and cared for by a local nurse, and a KGB agent walking among them. Season two introduces Cary Elwes as a creepy CIA agent trying to take control of the secret project and Christopher Lloyd as a Shakespeare loving English teacher.

In season 1 a mysterious object passes over the area trailing a stream of strange metallic debris. The sheriff starts investigating damaged windows and bird baths, the kids start following the path of the strange light, and shadowy figures in dark cars are seen around the city. Then there's a huge explosion at the military base that starts casting suspicion everywhere.

It's actually a really good show. It's well written, well acted, and high production quality.

You can watch the whole series at http://graniteflats.com/. It's only 17 episodes long, so far, but I'll be looking forward to season 3.

Friday Links: June 27

A bad week for links.

Game: Tentacle Wars - fight other infections to dominate the level. [link]
Important tip, extend a tentacle and then cut it to send reinforcements in a hurry.

The effect of altering ingredients on cookies. [link]

Interview with a guinea pig. [link]

A device that might trick your body to think you're cooler or warmer than you are. [link]

First 3D printed presidential bust. [link]

Using a snow storm to see how air flows around wind turbines. [link]

First known photo of someone giving the camera the finger. [link]

Helen Mirren plays Queen Elizabeth II to fill a dying child's wish of having tea with the Queen. [link]

The Sahara used to have 3 rivers that may have provided a green trail for early man to migrate out of Africa and to the Middle East. [link]

An ex-con talks about problems with Orange is the New Black. [link]

Not actually a bumblebee rescuing a friend. [link]

Man has heart attack while running a race and finishes. [link]

Drill bit comparison

When I finally got to start assembling my ambitious shelving I needed some drill bits that could drill a large hole. I'd bought a single 7/8" version of the blue drill bits below and lost it. So I got a replace 7/8" and a 15/16". Almost all Home Depot had of this kind of drill bit were the blue ones.

Notice the tips of the drill bits. The silver ones have a pointy tip while the blue ones have a screw tip. I don't care that the company calls it a drill tip. It's a screw. And when used it screws itself into the wood until the flat of the bit hits the wood and then stops dead. I hoped it was just the weaker battery powered hand drill that was the issue. Brought the drill press up and put the bit in there. Exact same results. It screws in and stops. Which was a problem because the drill press doesn't have a reverse button. I had to unplug it and manually unscrew the bit. But not until after it pulled the spindle loose. I did get a different bit to drill a hole in the middle of my intended hole. Then the screw tip bit worked great. That little flare at the edges of the flat face really does help prevent splintering as it exits.

So I returned the blue bits that were still in their packaging and got a whole set of the silver dagger tip bits. They chewed right through the boards. It did jam a couple of times, but I just backed off and came in slower. Nowhere near the problems of the drill tips.

I was using them on plyboo which is a fairly hard wood. Results on other kinds of wood may differ.

I'm calling them screw tip bits.

I'm calling them dagger tip bits.

Movie review: Edge of Tomorrow

A popular theme in science fiction is the day that repeats until some goal is accomplished. The most well known example is "Groundhog Day" where Bill Murray has to keep reliving Groundhog Day until he can get Andie MacDowell to fall in love with him. Fans of Stargate: SG1 will remember the brilliant season 4 episode "Window of Opportunity". Taye Diggs had a series called Day Break where he had to solve who was setting him up for a major crime. It's also been seen in Star Trek: TNG, Buffy the Vampire Slayer, Angel, Eureka, Farscape, Fringe, Haven, Lois and Clark... oh, fuck it. Here, look it up yourself [link].

Edge of Tomorrow is a military sci-fi take on this idea. I'd compare it most to the Stargate episode. Not because of the military sci-fi aspect, but because it's funny. Both the movie and the Stargate episode make me laugh out loud.

There's a high speed montage at the beginning that gets the audience up to speed. Short version: Aliens came; Europe is lost. There's a big counter attack planned and they want Tom Cruise and a camera crew on the front lines to built something that will safe the asses of the commanders if the public turns on them later. Tom refuses to go and wakes up on a bag of luggage with his rank stripped away and deploying as a grunt instead of as a PR planner. As they reach shore they're attacked. The aliens knew they were coming. He's dropped in with no training on how to work the equipment, no combat experience, and a life of expectancy of less that it's taken you to read this far. But something happens in combat that resets his day, but only if he dies. He eventually finds someone who knows what's going on, can train him, and goes on to save the world. Along the way there's a series of humorous montages of him dying in funny and/or painful ways.

I think I will get this one on DVD. It's an old plot device, but well done and funny.

Movie Review: Maleficent

Shortly before moving to DC a girl suggested that I read "Wicked". It wasn't a book I normally would have picked up, because I'm from Kansas and years of overexposure mean that I think Dorothy should die in a fire. But I read it and liked it. I rather like the idea behind the books that the success of Wicked spawned even if I didn't like enough of the actual books to keep up on the series. So I was intrigued to see that Disney was giving the retelling treatment to their own Maleficent.

I was expecting a twisting of the Disney's Sleeping Beauty story (as opposed to everyone else's Sleeping Beauty story). Neil Gaiman's "Snow Glass Apples" figured prominently in my mind [part 1] [part 2]. Then, as I heard descriptions of the movie, I thought they were rewriting Shrek with Angelina Jolie playing the part of the tall, slim, and beautiful swamp troll. I can assure you, that's not what happens. Rather than twisting the story horribly they seem to have tried to tell the same story from a new viewpoint and include much that went on off camera.

I'll admit that it's been a long time since I've seen the original movie and I remember it less than perfectly, but there were scenes that felt disconnected from the rest of the movie. And I think that it was because they were reproducing scene and dialog lifted directly from the original movie. This required the camera to move differently than in the rest of the movie and the characters to be a bit more dramatic. I'd be interested in seeing the scenes played next to each other.

There were other things that had to be twisted. Maleficent doesn't turn into a dragon herself, but turns her lackey into a dragon. A few other tidbits like that. Nothing really altering the story.

I'm not likely to get it on DVD, but I'm glad that I saw the movie. I'd happily watch it again.

Ambitious shelving

This is my new bookshelf.

Almost. It needs a bit more work. I stopped here last night because the top shelf that you see needs to have an inch shaved off the right side since the wall is uneven. Then the pipe will go through the holes correctly. There will be one more shelf above that.

The bottom three shelves are 14" deep 128" long. The rest are 7" x 96". I had to extend the lower three to make them work the way I wanted. I used a good strong glue on the ends and a reinforcing rod hidden underneath.

Once they're assembled I'll still need to sand the ends of the boards to get rid of the burn marks from the saw. The pipes need to be painted black. And I'll need to touch up the walls where I've scarred them up assembling the shelves. And, of course, screw everything down.

Notice the weird bit of pipe out of the support to the right of the laptop. That's going to be a reading light before I'm done.

Before putting the shelves up, I put the pipes together to triple check that they'd fit. I brought Gandolf in to see my work. She hadn't seen the room since before the mudding was finished. Her reaction was pure surprise. It was a whole new room. She looked at the pipes standing on top of the assembled 14" shelves and asked hopefully, "perches?" I'll have to get her somewhere to hang out in this room, but I don't dare leave her in here. The books would prove too much temptation to chew on.

Friday Links: June 20

Star Trek shaking scenes stabilized. [link

And, if you're one of the two people who haven't seen this warp drive design in the last decade or so, here's NASA trying to test if it's even possible. [link]

MORTAL VIDEO GAME COMPANY EXECUTIVE COMBAT!!!

Saturo Iwata (Nintendo’s CEO) vs Reggie Fils (Nintendo’s COO)

Jazz version of the Game of Thrones theme.

Proper jazz with lots of brass.

By the end of this clip you'll be able to understand digital gibberish. [link]
That description is misleading.

WWI aerial warfare photos. [link]

Tesla releases it's patents into the wild. [link]

14 year old kids hack Canadian ATMs. [link]

The woman who invented Iraq. [link]

More about what I said the other day about ISIS and organized crime tactics. [link]

Who was the worst person in history before Hitler? [link]

The Illuminati were pretty good guys. [link]

Pictures from the new California Dust Bowl. [link]

Poor bald aminals. [link]

I can't even...

I hate the heat. I hate it so much. I can't even... I can't even tell you.

So, it's Friday night and I'm done with my paying work. I usually take this time to try to get some early work done on the house. Let me set the scene for you. The future library is full of crap. Along the front wall is scrap metal I've been wanting to send off with some scrap metal dealer. On top of that is some wood covered in lead paint with big ass nails sticking out. Long pieces of plyboo lean against this pile of crap. Across the middle of the room is a large plank of plyboo that I've been using as a level surface to piece together other plyboo into a shelf. Cans of paint and water and large batteries and anything heavy sits on top to help keep it flat. This blocks most of the entryway to the room. And other odds and ends like a coat rack and ladders and pipe litter the floor.

It's warm and still inside despite several days of rain and fans trying to blow the cool air into the house. Within 10 minutes of getting off the couch I am dripping sweat on everything. Sweat is supposed to be there to evaporate and cool us off, but it's failing that completely. It makes my clothes stick to me. The heat makes working my muscles require more energy and focus for the simplest task. And while some people think I have an unshakable temper, all that goes away when I'm hot. Since it's harder to move I'm more likely to make mistakes which causes the temper to explode.

I step over the boards to open the window and cool things off. As I'm stepping back I can't get my leg high enough and hit the paint can. It tips and dumps paint all over the floor. Obscenities fly. I grab a dust pan and start scooping the paint back into the can. Paint is everywhere. Most of it is on parts of the floor that still need scraping, but there's much that is in areas that are supposed to be cleaned. And it's getting between boards, which will never clean out. My best hope for much of it is that there's so much dust and debris that it'll clean off easily without excessively difficulty once dry. And where's the lid? Where's the LID?! WHERE'S THE [obscenities edited for length] PAINT CAN LID!!!!?! It's gone. Not really sure how that's even possible. It's not a large room. The boards are off the ground high enough that I could see the lid under there if it were there. It's just gone. Well, I'll use the lid off this other can that I refilled with water. It doesn't fit? HOW CAN IT NOT FIT?! It's the SAME paint from the SAME brand bought on the SAME &*$#@%^ DAY! Fine, I'll just let the paint dry out and throw the whole gallon away. I'm literally dripping sweat onto the paint from my eyes and nose and eyebrows and I'm trying not to start shrieking in rage and ... I'm getting the fan. Take off the paint covered shoes so I don't track paint across the filthy carpet. Get the fan and the extension cord which will try to knock over everything in the living room as I move it and somehow even knock over things upstairs which should be impossible since the cord doesn't even go up there. Why then? Because it's HOT and this shit happens when it's HOT! The extension cord isn't even this big of a problem in the living room when it's cooler. So I set up the fan and point it directly at me. Feels good, man. Until it falls over for no damn reason. Set it up. Back to the paint. New rag, wipe, toss, repeat every 5-10 seconds. This plastic caught some of the paint. Let's cut it off and throw it away. NO FAN! You can't tip over. I haven't even done it, yet! At least let me do something to cause you to fall over even though it shouldn't. Cut away the plastic. Try to pick it up without dumping paint on the ground or on the plyboo. No paint! If you go on the plyboo I will end you and all civilization! Do NOT EVEN THINK I AM KIDDING! Wow, I made paint move with the force of my rage. I am the Kwisatz Haderach. Maybe that's where he got his power. He was so fucking pissed to be trapped on a hot shit hole of a world like Dune. Paint in bag. Set fan back up. Wash hands a second time. Set fan back up. Mop up paint. Take tension straps off board. Set fan back up. Yes, there are feet on the fan. It's just trying to blow air that's extra dense because it's full of water. Let me put the fan in the window. But first, let's try to untangle the extension cord. Let's drag the wiring out in the rain where it's cooler and do it there. Bad idea, you say? IT'S COOLER! IDON'TCAREIFIDIE! Spend 10-15 minutes in the rain untwisting extension cord. Put fan in window pointed at me. Flip the shelf and sand away the excess glue. Stand before the fan. Should the sand paper get so hot after only six strokes that I need to set it down? I moved 6 inches to the right, gotta get back in front of the fan. That doesn't seem right. The board looks less than ideal, but the glue is gone and I can clean up the edge later. Be sure to stand in front of the fan. Let's get this debris in the car so I can take it to the dump in the morning. Hello to you too, strange drunk man. Nope, I'm not moving, just getting ready to go to the dump. Actually, do you know a scrap metal scavenger? Across the street? That's his truck? Ok, all my scrap metal goes in this pickup and nail filled lumber in my car. Trash bag covered in drying paint can come out in the morning. I get in my car and turn the AC as low as it will go. Literally five seconds later my breath manifests itself before my face. I love my car and it's AC. I sit there and reprogram the address book in my GPS while I bathe in the direct blasts of the air conditioner. My skin starts to crack and pull from the drying sweat. I finally get out of the car and the windows all fog up instantly. One more large piece of metal to put in the pickup. He thanks me and I thank him. New route is now open to the fan. I take it out of the window and lock up. I take a cold shower. Cold being a generous term.

It's not even that hot inside or out. I just can't cool down. I run very hot. My metabolism is high. But I can cool down if it's dry enough for sweat to evaporate. I need moving air. I designed my bedroom so I have a ceiling fan pointing right at me at night. I shouldn't need the AC in that room most of the time so long as the fan is running.

Anti-war folks

My spam account gets lots of e-mails from activist groups every day. Some want money, some provide news links, and some have petitions to sign. Over the last few days I've been getting petitions not to invade Iraq.

In the days after September 11 I went to some protests. I supported those who didn't want to invade Iraq. I mean every bit of evidence linking Iraq to AlQaeda was debunked as soon as it was created. Anyone paying attention could instantly discredit at least 60% of what Colon Powell said before the UN Security Council. Most of the rest might take a couple of hours. Anything else needed security clearance, but was easily questioned.

But those protesters and I were on opposite sides on the invasion of Afghanistan. Which was weird, because it wasn't long before that many of those people were supporting invading Afghanistan for women's rights causes. They were anti-war for any reason. It was wrong always and in all cases. While I saw that they were housing the real terrorists and that Saddam Hussein could be one of our greatest allies.

Syria is a tough call. Nasty evil brutal dictator on one hand and Muslim extremist terrorists on the other. If we could be sure the people who started the revolution were in control at the end it'd be great. But they've been pushed out by monsters.

More recently I've been watching the Russian invasion of The Ukraine. I don't want to invade and fight their war for them, but I do want to be asking "How can we help? Arms? Troops?"

Iraq is now being taken over by ISIS. While it may sound like a cartoon spy agency, ISIS is a terrorist group that makes AlQaeda look like moderate Muslims. Saddam would have been able to keep them out. He was brutal, but effective. Most of all he wasn't religious. Considering what he was fighting he had to be brutal. And we took him out and softened up the country for any future invaders. We tried to train them and hand control back to them, but clearly they're not ready for prime time, yet.

This is our fault. Remember how Afghanistan becoming a terrorist haven was because we walked away after helping them throw out the Soviets? Same thing here. We WILL have to take care of this eventually. Whether we do it when they're in Baghdad or not is the only real decision here. Believe me, I'm not thrilled about it. At least if we go in now we're working with the Iraq military instead of against the ISIS run Iraq military. We can send in supplemental forces instead of a whole damn army.

This is being branded a religious civil war. This is an invasion. They may not have a home country, but like every other conflict in the region, one side is manned with religious extremists coming in from outside the country. Some have been in country for a long time and infiltrated the cities to soften them up. That doesn't make them Iraqis. If this were internal it would have shown in the polls before now. It's a regional conflict acting as an internal struggle. These people are pulling arms, money, troops, and support from organized crime activities inside and outside of Iraq. Protection rackets and drugs and whatever else. We should at least be providing similar resources for Iraqis. And due to the corruption, we may need to provide people to keep the resources in the right hands. Maybe those smart guns that shop owners in the US are being threatened about if they dare sell them.

Friday Links: June 13

Logic gates illustrated with weights and pulleys. [link]

Cat give passing cyclist a high 4. [link]

This is how you play Dance Dance Revolution. [link]

The first manmade object in space was actually a manhole cover. [link]

Computer passes Turing test. [link]
Or doesn't. [link]

Bill Watterson returns... briefly. [link]

Synthahol invented! [link]

Damascus steel included carbon nanotubules. [link]

Hippos like licking crocodiles.


How anti-vaccine believers are causing the return of Polio in places it had been eradicated. [link]

Arc lighting towers from the 1800s are still in use in Austin, Texas. [link]

Eating ice is a diet plan. [link]

Detroit agate. [link]

Gun control laws of the wild, wild west. [link]

Combine Harvester. I might have to play this at my brother's eventual wedding.


You Are My Sunshine in a minor key.


A history of maps of the internet. [link]

Why are there so few conservative comedians? [link]
Because polluting rivers, starting wars, stealing the life savings of senior citizens, and gay bashing isn't funny. 

A dimetrodon (the dinosaur toy with a fin on it's back) is not a dinosaur.


Google admits that Google Plus was a bad idea. [link]

Salads without leaves. [link]

Chiquita is blocking a bill that would allow people to sue companies that fund terrorism. 3 guesses why. [link]

Sweden to experiment with 6 hour work day with 8 hour pay. [link]

Impressive hail storm damage. [link]

Pig the dog. [link]

Comments on a first viewing of Star Wars. [link]

Chimp playing a memory game.


Building an Inception hallway style room on the cheap. [link]
Gives you some idea how much practice they needed to walk in the hallway in the movie.

Atlas has to change to reflect new polar caps. [link]

The vanishing islands of Kiribati. [link]

Friday Links: June 6

I POSTED THIS! TWICE!

Winnie the Pooh and Darkwing Duck reading lines from Star Wars. [link]

It took me entirely too long to get around to watching this. The Five(ish) Doctors. Several of the original series Doctors plot a way to get involved with the 50th Anniversary Special and pull in a load of cameos along the way. [link]

Randall Munroe, creator of XKCD, talking about his What If page at TED. [link]

Everything wrong with "Gravity" with guest star Neil deGrasse Tyson.


Female named hurricanes kill more people than male named hurricanes because people don't respect the female hurricanes as much. [link]
Note: Hurricanes have only been named after men since 1979. I thought it was more recently than that. Hurricanes have had names since 1889.

This kid is going to kill a lot of people some day.


So... does she like him or not? [link]

More Stargate films! It's a reboot. [link]

“I need to put a sign here that says `white people only.” [link]

Library progress

I do a crap job with before and after pictures. Otherwise I could show you what I'm dealing with in this library I'm working on.

Let me lay out the room for you.
There's the front wall with two big windows.
Turn to your left and there's the side wall. It's plaster over brick.
Left again, and there's the main wall. Future home of bookshelves. On the other side are stairs.
Left once more and there's a big archway with the front door on the other side.

The front wall is a mess. I'm doing almost nothing with it because I eventually want it framed out and insulated.

Once I got under the wood panelling and wallpaper of the side wall I found that, for some reason, the plaster was popping away from the wall about chest high. And near the front wall was a big crack that let you see into the neighbor's house once the wallpaper was taken away. I knocked away the loose stuff and started packing the holes with drywall mud as well as giving the rest of the wall a skim just to fill tiny cracks and pits. This all helped, but the wall was still ... textured? It bowed and flexed and rippled. I took time to even it some, but there's only so much one can do. Finally, last night, I painted the wall. Mostly. There's a radiator near the bottom of the crack. I couldn't get all the wallpaper off or paint, completely. Once I find my edger I should be able to do more. I got some undrilled, featureless doors that I plan to put wallpaper on and hang on that wall to give it some character and cover up some of the other character.

The main wall I tore out completely and put up new drywall. It will have the bookshelves soon. Half inch black gas pipe supports with plyboo shelving. Three levels 14 inches deep and six more 7 inch deep shelves the rest of the way to the ceiling. The bottom three run all 11 ft across the room while the rest are 8 ft and alternate which wall they're touching. This leaves space to display larger things as well as making sure I don't have to extend the boards.

The arched wall I tried to punk out on, but in the end I still tore it down and put up new drywall. It's just a wall, but I should be able to hang some pictures on it.

I mention all this because I got to paint the room last night. I wanted to put up shelves several weeks ago, but I couldn't quite do it. Just a bit more to do, which turns into one-more-thing and then another-thing and then... well, you know how it works. I have 6 inch baseboards which I hope to install no later than next weekend. Hopefully, tonight or tomorrow. With them in place I can start putting up shelves, which gets my books out of the basement, and much of the rest of the house starts falling into place from there.