The Testing Ground |
|
Archives
E-Mail: JohnnyTest or Tim X! AIM: JohnnyTest00 Remember to sign the Guest Book!
Daily Rounds *bwana* *chaotic christ* *delphi forums* *diepunyhumans* *internsthecomic* *laurennmccubbin.com* *lynch-walker scattershot* *mack white* *meme23* *newsmap* *the persistant illusion of reality* *starchy* *technorati profile* *tribe.net* *view from a broad* ~Reading List~Finished: This is the way the world ends Working on: The King in Yellow Condensed Chaos Sound Stuffs:
|
Thursday, July 31
FLCL 
Now, I've been avoiding watching this Japanese Anime for quite some time. I'd heard a lot of good things about it, but once people tell me to watch something I get turned off. Whatever, I'm a baby. Anyway! I saw a commercial for it while watching 'The Big O' (without sound) on Adult Swim. Looked good. Looked great, as a matter of fact. So I acquired a few episodes via my close personal friend named Kazaa and I watched them. FLCL, how to explain it? Imagine a japanese school-boy's imagination vomiting into the world of animation. The main protagonist is a school boy who has robots that burst out of his head once per episode. He is befriended by a sadistic moped riding alien rock star who likes to bash things with her electric guitar. She fights the robots. It's cool. She also becomes his housemaid. And the first robot who burst from his skull becomes a butler of sorts named TV Boy. I'm not to sure what the hell is going on most of the time, but the animation is incredible. It is one of the few Anime I've seen that truly pushes the medium, contextually as well as narratively. It blends comic book style with warped animation "bullet-time" effects. It even has a coming of age story slammed in there as well. Check it out. If you understand it, let me know what it's about. Tuesday, July 29
Monday, July 28
Nessie Does Not Exist, Experts Say The Loch Ness monster does not exist, according to a team of scientists who have taken a sonar and satellite survey of the loch. The team, commissioned by the British Broadcasting Corp. to scour the loch for Nessie, began its search convinced it would find evidence of Scotland's legendary monster, according to the BBC's Web site. Recently, a Scottish man found the fossil vertebrae of a plesiosaur on the shores of the loch. Using 600 separate sonar beams and satellite navigation technology to make sure that none of the loch was missed, the BBC team surveyed the waters, looking for telltale signs of the air in Nessie's lungs to distort the sonar signals. But it found nothing. "We went from shoreline to shoreline, top to bottom on this one, we have covered everything in this loch and we saw no signs of any large living animal in the loch," said Ian Florence, one of the experts commissioned by the BBC. His colleague Hugh MacKay told the BBC: "We got some good clear data of the loch, steep sided, flat bottomed — nothing unusual I'm afraid." Why must science persist in smashing my dreams? Wednesday, July 23
AMERICANS TO TEST SUPERGUN IN SCOTLAND 7500mph shell can kill five miles away AMERICA is to test a new secret supergun at a defence base in Scotland. The electromagnetic gun (EM gun) will be tested at an experimental weapons range in Dumfriesshire. The US Department of Defense believes the range at Dundrennan, near Kirkcudbright, is the only suitable location to test the new supergun. The EM gun is seen as a halfway measure before the US can perfect laser weapons. Powerful magnetised coils create an electric pulse which can fire a shell at 7500mph - around two miles a second - and kill a target more than five miles away. It's more than double the speed of shells fired by British and American tanks in the Gulf - regarded as the world's most effective - whose shells travel at around 3000mph. A 'designer baby', has been confirmed as a perfect genetic match with the brother his stem cells could save. Baby Jamie Whitaker was born in June after his embryo was genetically selected in the hope that it would be a match for his four-year-old brother Charlie. Charlie has the life-threatening blood disorder Diamond Blackfan Anaemia, and a stem cell transplant is his only hope of a cure. Blood tests have now shown that month-old Jamie is a match, so stem cells from his umbilical cord can be used to treat Charlie. Monday, July 21
Just got back today from the Comic Con International in San Diego. I'm a little tired, a lot jet-lagged, and just need to decompress, and chronicle my adventures in that city. The purpose of the trip was to feel around the comics industry, to see how viable an actual comic writing career would be for lil ol me. My findings: It's gonna be a rough road. I had prepared, edited, finished up, and printed out numerous copies of a few scripts. I packed three short stories, and one full script. Actually had a duffel bag packed with copies of my scripts. I clipped them together and put them in little blue folders with my business cards on them. So cute. Not too sure why I went through all the trouble considering I am well aware that most creators are legally not allowed to read unsolicited work, and that most editors want to see a finished work, art and all, before they'll consider you. But I did it, and ended up tossing the bulk of them upon leaving. Now, on to the meat. This is the stuff I bought: Optic Nerve issues 1, 2, 3 (Signed) A Brian Froud Print (Signed) The Absolute Edition of The League of Extraordinary Gentlemen An Alan Moore issue of Comic Artist Magazine The Extraordinary Works of Alan Moore (sense the trend yet?) Heros and Monsters (A guide to the world of The League of Extraordinary Gentlemen) Badlands Sky Ape Scurvy Dogs 1, 2 Switchblade Honey Torso (Signed) Brian Bendis' Total Sellout (Signed) Corpus Monstrum (Signed) Pro's I talked to: Brian Michael Bendis (Every Marvel Book, Powers) Adrian Tomine (Optic Nerve) Larry Young (AiT/PlanetLar) Ryan Yount (Scurvy Dogs) Steven T. Seagle (House of Secrets) Brian Froud (Labyrinth) E-Merl (Mr. Nile) Eddie Campbell (From Hell) Arvid Nelson (Rex Mundi) Eric J (Rex Mundi) Breehn Burns (Artist of Gloom Cookie, creator of Dr. Tran) Andy Lee (Spider-Man Vs. Kung-Fu...hah Kurt) Pro's I gawked at: Grant Morrison (Everything worth reading) Jill Thompson (Scary GodMother) Kevin O'Neil (The League of Extraordinary Gentlemen) Matt Fraction (Rex Mantooth, Last of the Independants) Kelly-Sue DeConnick (MLF) Laurenn McCubbin (Kitchen Sink, Live Nude Girls) Highlights: How damned nice Brian Bendis was. How friendly most of the creators were. Becoming friend-like with Brehn Burns, a few guys from ShaneGlines.net, Ben Caldwell (Rising star at Dark Horse comics). Attending a party with Jill Thompson, Grant Morrison, Erik Larsen, Fraction, Kelly-Sue...and Bizarro Superman.....seriously. Attending a second party, that same night, at the "Marvel Suite", already drunk from the "DC party" (as mentioned above). Laughing as a newly found friend made a call to the front desk in the worst Stan Lee voice I have ever heard, trying to get them to send up hookers and coke. My brother and I are working on a comic, I writing and He drawing. He put together a little teaser booklet, which was little more than character bio's, no real context. Here are the sketches. We were able to give them out to some pretty major players. I even got Bendis to take one, as well as Ryan Yount, in lieu of Larry Young of AiT/PlanetLar, Slave Labor has one, and Ben (who is doing a Clone Wars comic for Dark Horse) has one, as well as a script. Here are some pics from the event. Now all we have to do is keep sluggin'. Tuesday, July 15
Cats and humans have similar brains. They're so similar, in fact, that more cats have been used for neurological studies than any other animal. The big difference is that human brains have a neocortex and cat brains do not. The neocortex functions as our center for speech and memory associations. Apart from that, however, our more primitive underlying brain structures are just about the same. Cats' brains are wired to be sensory, Caras writes. So what does that mean? Caras defines a sense as something that alerts a cat to changes in its environment--changes that will ideally be handled so that the cat comes out on top. They rely on whiskers and noses and other tools to feel and perceive the world around them. Most of all, they observe and respond. Monday, July 14
Chilean experts say beached ''blob'' a sperm whale Chilean scientists said on Friday their study of a huge blob of flesh found on a Pacific beach about three weeks ago concluded it was the carcass of a sperm whale, ending speculation of a giant octopus. Must science always step in and spoil my fun? Friday, July 11
Astronomers have discovered the oldest known planet, a primeval world 12.7 billion years old that will force them to reconsider how and when planets form. The discovery raises the prospect that life may have begun far sooner than most scientists ever imagined. The ancient world is well more than twice the age of Earth and all other known planets. It is nearly as old as the universe itself. And it has had an incredibly wild ride through time. 
The world formed when the universe was just a billion years old, researchers said at a NASA press conference today. It began its travels around a fairly normal star much like our Sun. The next 10 billion years were fairly routine. The planet exists in an unlikely place. Astronomers assumed the gravitational interactions in a globular cluster -- M4 contains 100,000 tightly packed stars -- would rip planetary systems apart. "This is tremendously encouraging that planets are probably abundant in globular star clusters," said study team member Harvey Richer of the University of British Columbia. Don't worry now, it's all under control... "If the people really cared about their fellow man, they would control their appetites (greed, procreation, etc.) so that they would not have to operate on a credit or welfare social system which steals from the worker to satisfy the bum. Since most of the general public will not exercise restraint, there are only two alternatives to reduce the economic inductance of the system. (1) Let the populace bludgeon each other to death in war, which will only result in a total destruction of the living earth. (2) Take control of the world by the use of economic "silent weapons" in a form of "quiet warfare" and reduce the economic inductance of the world to a safe level by a process of benevolent slavery and genocide. The latter option has been taken as the obviously better option. At this point it should be crystal clear to the reader why absolute secrecy about the silent weapons is necessary. The general public refuses to improve its own mentality and its faith in its fellow man. It had become a herd of proliferating barbarians, and, so to speak, a blight upon the face of the earth. They do not care enough about economic science to learn why they have not been able to avoid war despite religious morality, and their religious or self-gratifying refusal to deal with earthly problems renders the solution of earthly problems unreachable by them. It is left to those who are truly willing to think and survive as the fittest to survive, to solve the problem for themselves as the few who really care. Otherwise, exposure of the silent weapon would destroy our only hope of preserving the seed of future true humanity." -Excerpt from a much longer essay, titled "Silent Weapons For A Quiet War" supposedly found in an IBM copier that was sold as surplus by the US Military. It is insanely insightful to see human behaviour broken down into simple economics. You can find it, and more maddening conspiracies, in the book Behold A Pale Horse by William Cooper. Something has occured to me, and it deals with the messed up nature of the country we live in. Now, don't go telling me that if I don't like it here I should leave, because I do like it here. I love America, even though it is supremely fucked most of the time. I just know that it can be better, and we all want it to be better don't we? It occured to me that we live in a country where it is mandatory (as far as I know) to have insurance for your car, but not for your health. How messed up is that? This country has such a hard-on for automobiles that it's disgusting. The government cares more about cars than its citizenry. Think about it for a second. America was built on the ideals of freedom and independance, something that was capitalized on by the car companies. New York was basically redesigned by Robert Moses to accomodate the burgeoning auto-industry. Car related mishaps cause something like 42,000 casualties a year. In France (I know, how un-American of me) if one of its citizens gets sick, the government foots the bill. Most of the bill anyway, I think the citizens have to pay something like 20 bucks. Canada has a similar system, as does England, and most of Europe. So why no social health plan for America? You tell me. THE SECOND COMING Turning and turning in the widening gyre The falcon cannot hear the falconer; Things fall apart; the centre cannot hold; Mere anarchy is loosed upon the world, The blood-dimmed tide is loosed, and everywhere The ceremony of innocence is drowned; The best lack all conviction, while the worst Are full of passionate intensity. Surely some revelation is at hand; Surely the Second Coming is at hand. The Second Coming! Hardly are those words out When a vast image out of Spiritus Mundi Troubles my sight: somewhere in sands of the desert A shape with lion body and the head of a man, A gaze blank and pitiless as the sun, Is moving its slow thighs, while all about it Reel shadows of the indignant desert birds. The darkness drops again; but now I know That twenty centuries of stony sleep Were vexed to nightmare by a rocking cradle, And what rough beast, its hour come round at last, Slouches towards Bethlehem to be born? William Butler Yeats. Irish. 1865-1939 A timely bit of poetry care of W.B. Yeats. God-damn if that doesn't stir me everytime (especially lines 7 & 8)! Wednesday, July 9
News Flash! Giant Sea Blob appears to be just that! 
“It may be an unknown species of marine animal. It might be part of the stomach of a whale. I can’t confirm anything until tests are done,” 
Tuesday, July 8
Cabbie Dave Groh last week lost his appeal of a $60 fine for violating the dress-code for taxi drivers, but says he's determined to continue his lighthearted salute to the King from behind the wheel. Groh has given up his red Elvis outfit and has returned to black pants and blue shirt, but says he's going to continue to wear his Elvis-style cape. "When you've got something going on that people love and feel strongly about, it's easy to get caught up in their passion," he said of the Elvis shtick. "It's almost an obligation I feel to do this now." Groh bought three Elvis costumes and he started reading up on his alter ego, the better to answer questions. He makes a lot more in tips than he ever did as an ordinary cabbie. But the costume violated the city's cabdriver uniform policy. Now, he says, he'll comply with the letter of the law but he's going to stick with the cape. "The cape's attached to a black jacket with a wide collar. They don't have any regulations about capes in there." And people say Elvis is dead. Thursday, July 3
Reaching Through the Net to Touch Researchers at the University at Buffalo, New York, announced last week they have developed a system that lets one person experience the sense of touch felt by another. They said they could transmit the sensation across the Internet. In about five years, people may use the system to feel the force and pressure Tiger Woods experiences every time he wallops a golf ball. It could be used in e-commerce, enabling buyers to feel fabrics before they buy. Or students could feel the precise pressure applied by brain surgeons as they remove tumors. They could potentially palpate the tumor, or any other organ, for themselves. What's more, the sensory data can be saved, allowing one sensation to be accessed indefinitely. So in 30 years' time, golfers could still train with Tiger Woods in his prime.... Touch is not the only sense available across the Internet. Smell, too, can be transmitted, with a device that uses a potpourri of chemicals to produce a variety of odors. One can imagine that taste might be transmitted too, given that the human sense of taste comes down to five types of receptors that record bitter, sweet, sour, salty and "umami," a Japanese word meaning deliciousness. Mystery Ape-Like Beast Spotted in China 
An investigation has begun after sightings of a legendary "ape-like" beast in the forests of central China, state press said Monday. The mythical creature was apparently seen by six people, including a journalist, in the Shennongjia Nature Reserve in China's Hubei province Sunday afternoon, the Xinhua news agency reported. Several years ago, China's state press said scientists had unearthed hundreds of fossilized teeth of giant apes in the area, with some speculating that Bigfoot could be a descendant of such primates. The latest sighting was described as a grayish "mythical ape-like animal", 1.65-meters (5.4 feet) tall with shoulder-length black hair. One of the witnesses, Shang Zhengmin, a local reporter on the way back to Songbai town from an interview in Muyu town with five local people, said they saw the beast when they took a left turn along a mountain road. He said the "ape-like" animal was moving fast on the road and by the time the vehicle finished the turn, the animal had disappeared. He said the passengers got out of the vehicle and found several 30 centimeter-long (12 inches) footprints and newly broken branches in the jungle near the road. They also claimed to have discovered a three-meter-long (9.9 feet) patch of "foul smelling urine-like liquid" on the road where the creature was seen. Solar system similar to ours found RESEARCHERS WITH the Anglo-Australian Telescope (AAT) in New South Wales, Australia detected a large planet orbiting HD 70642, a sun-like star situated 90 light-years from Earth out toward the Puppis constellation. The planetary find was announced Thursday in Paris at the “Extrasolar Planets: Today and Tomorrow” conference. “It’s absolutely wonderful,” Alan Penny, of Britain’s Rutherford Appleton Laboratory, told SPACE.com . “Up to now we’ve seen a whole menagerie of planet orbiting their stars. But when it comes to finding another Jupiter at a Jupiter-like distance from its star, this is the first one.” Wednesday, July 2
Giant sea specimen baffles scientists A huge, gelatinous sea creature found washed up on Chile’s coast has stumped scientists, who have sent samples to a specialist in France for help in identifying the mystery specimen. The blob was mistaken for a beached whale when first reported last week, but experts who went to see it said the 40-foot-long mass of decomposing lumpy gray flesh apparently was an invertebrate. 
“WE’D NEVER before seen such a strange specimen, we don’t know if it might be a giant octopus that is missing some of its parts or maybe it’s a new species,” said Elsa Cabrera, director of the Center for Cetacean Conservation in Santiago. The round substance looks like a mammoth jelly fish and is about as long as a school bus. Giant octopus live at a depth of up to 9,500 feet and only rise to the surface when they die. Specimens have been known to be as long as 30 feet. Scientists create human ‘she-males’ Researchers combine male and female cells into one embryo Scientists in the United States have created hybrid human “she-males,” mixing male and female cells in the same embryo, in a move that has outraged fertility experts and anti-abortionists. Dr. Norbert Gleicher of the Foundation for Reproductive Medicine in Chicago and a colleague injected male cells into female embryos in research which they believe could lead to better treatments or cures for single gene disorders. |
