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Memory Palace Comic! “A Gas Gas Gas”

Memory Palace Comic! “A Gas Gas Gas” published on No Comments on Memory Palace Comic! “A Gas Gas Gas”

I love history and legend in comic form, so the post:  Memory Palace Comic! “A Gas Gas Gas” at Boing Boing completely captivated me.  Wouldn’t you know, it’s based on a podcast:   the memory palace.

I have danced around podcasts.  For the most part, I don’t save any part of my day for audio entertainment that actually requires concentration (music is easy).  I never cared for talk radio and podcasts just seemed like more of the same.  Yet, I am contrarily attracted to old radio shows.  And more and more I am encountering podcasts that I might just have to listen to.  I’ll probably do a list sometime.  Would you like a list?

Oh hey, I forgot

Oh hey, I forgot published on

wooden dolls

It was the Bean’s 7th blogiversary yesterday!  Did I even have it on my calendar?  So, lets take a trip back in time with some posts from long ago. In the beginning I was talking about Crafting Out Loud, a craft fair that I joined for three or four events:

13 December 2006 11:59 EST | Posted by LeEMS

Too little talked about Crafting Out Loud
Although the Bay Area has had Mainsail to showcase local artists, the new and alternative craft movement that has been a-washing the country has not yet saturated this part of Florida. Enter Crafting Out Loud, happening in Tampa once to twice monthly. Crafting Out Loud fills a gap that artisans, crafters, and DIYers all appreciate. Still aspiring to the renown of shows like the Bizarre Bazaar, Renegade Craft fair, and various Alternative Craft Fairs, COL has not yet proved to the non-crafting community that its home-made goods fill a hole created by mainstream consumerism.

Even with a write up in the Best of the Bay, courtesy of Creative Loafing Magazine previously known as The Weekly Planet, the main customers at any COL event seem to be the crafters themselves. Surely its worth the sometimes overcrowded (strangely by people not buying) and always small event locations to happen upon the amazing goodies that local artisans have come up with. I encourage everyone to elbow through the loafers and do some buying already!

Crafting Out Loud has since evolved from a crafting fair to an educational venue.  By 2007 I was oogling couch design and home furnishings.  In 2008 I was talking comics.  In 2009:

Wednesday, 23 December 2009

Blast from the Past
More past than I am actually.

“Doesn’t
Kiss you
Like she useter?
Perhaps she’s seen
A smoother rooster!!
Burma-Shave”

More slogans here.  Why can’t advertising be this comfortably corny today?

In 2010 I was at the tail end of a massive project to move theleemsmachine and the bean to a new web platform and begin publishing comics online.  And the rest is saved right here on the Bean.  Happy Friday the 13th everybody!

unicorn

unicorn published on No Comments on unicorn

unicorn026So, a unicorn is a mythical single horned horse, or, if you are familiar with Gone in 60 Seconds, which I admit to seeing way too many times, a unicorn is that un-obtainable thing that you are always chasing after.

Right now, I feel as if my unicorn (re Gone in 60 Seconds) is feeling completely normal.  This is the entirety of my boo-hoo:  chicken pox as an adult sucks.

Okay, on to other updates:  I did not complete the NaNoWriMo challenge of 50,000 words in November, but I did get a start on what will be the most complex and character heavy novel I have ever thought up.  I have no reason not to finish it, so it will be finished.  Finishing it may even create a comprehensive character guide, ’cause I like them all so much.

I am working on new pages for Levi Levi and am looking forward to sending him to the past (not just in a flashback).  Apologies again for the long silence there.

And I am flexing my web design muscles on a business site, pro bono.  Do ya’ll know of any code/design widgetty thingy that creates forms based on a grid system and has awesome logic that will add/subtract fields based on previous choices?

Animated Atlas of American History

Animated Atlas of American History published on No Comments on Animated Atlas of American History
usblm-small
From the United States Digital Map Library (http://usgwarchives.net/maps/maps.html)

I don’t know if this is true for everyone, but I have found that searching out my family’s genealogy invariably leads me to questions of obscure history.  I want to know why so many branches of family were migrating from Vermont to Pennsylvania in the same three decades.

My genealogy experience also lead me to another slightly crazy, if I do say so myself, project trying to trace the history and popularity of the name LeEtta.  I mapped it out with publicly available census’ and did the math to find that no, the increase in LeEttas was not simply in line with the general population increase.  All of this lead me, again, to the question: why are these people and cultures migrating the way that they do.

I can’t say that I’ve got the whole answer (regarding my Vermont ancestors or the LeEttas), but I did find a fabulous resource along the way.  The Animated Atlas of American History does a lot to clarify some of the why and how, and it moves and speaks to me, which I really like.  It reminds me of junior high and history timelines and bright colors.

Image searches in different languages

Image searches in different languages published on No Comments on Image searches in different languages

On Tofugu (awesome blog by the way) there’s a recent post about how Google Images searches vary in Japanese versus English.  I have used the differences between English and other languages in web searches when I am tracking down some information or publications, but I had never played around with the image search.

Anyway, the article at Tofugu got me wondering about German versus English, so here goes.  I grabbed the top results from each search; German pictures come first.  First up, Katzen vs. cats, because this is what the internet is for:Continue reading Image searches in different languages

George Washington, October 3, 1789, Thanksgiving

George Washington, October 3, 1789, Thanksgiving published on No Comments on George Washington, October 3, 1789, Thanksgiving

Thanksgiving has always felt important to me, though I could never really articulate why.  It means more and more to me as I get older.  It is like all harvest celebrations, where historically we have been grateful for food enough to live the winter.  Our circumstances have changed for the most part, but pausing to give thanks, to any and all powers you believe are responsible, is beautiful.  A nation doing it together is beautiful.

Lately, I think we and our government need to be reminded of the great ideals our country was built upon.  So here:

Now therefore I do recommend and assign Thursday the 26th. day of November next to be devoted by the People of these States to the service of that great and glorious Being, who is the beneficent Author of all the good that was, that is, or that will be. That we may then all unite in rendering unto him our sincere and humble thanks, for his kind care and protection of the People of this country previous to their becoming a Nation, for the signal and manifold mercies, and the favorable interpositions of his providence, which we experienced in the course and conclusion of the late war, for the great degree of tranquillity, union, and plenty, which we have since enjoyed, for the peaceable and rational manner in which we have been enabled to establish constitutions of government for our safety and happiness, and particularly the national One now lately instituted, for the civil and religious liberty with which we are blessed, and the means we have of acquiring and diffusing useful knowledge and in general for all the great and various favors which he hath been pleased to confer upon us.

And also that we may then unite in most humbly offering our prayers and supplications to the great Lord and Ruler of Nations and beseech him to pardon our national and other transgressions, to enable us all, whether in public or private stations, to perform our several and relative duties properly and punctually, to render our national government a blessing to all the People, by constantly being a government of wise, just and constitutional laws, discreetly and faithfully executed and obeyed, to protect and guide all Sovereigns and Nations (especially such as have shown kindness unto us) and to bless them with good government, peace, and concord. To promote the knowledge and practice of true religion and virtue, and the encrease of science among them and Us, and generally to grant unto all Mankind such a degree of temporal prosperity as he alone knows to be best.79

– George Washington, October 3, 1789, Thanksgiving proclamation at the Library of Congress.

topsy turvy

topsy turvy published on No Comments on topsy turvy

falling

Amazing comic: OUT OF SKIN

Amazing comic: OUT OF SKIN published on No Comments on Amazing comic: OUT OF SKIN

OUT OF SKIN by Emily Carroll is a beautiful and haunting online comic.  Go see it please and check out the many more comics on her site.

drawing characters

drawing characters published on No Comments on drawing characters

Jack&Will001 Crisco004

I’m starting to get reacquainted with some characters.  While considering the finished chapters I already have I went back through Unlikely Bedfellows.  It has not suffered from being drawn a couple years ago (not like the very beginning of Levi Levi which I find very clunky and awkward looking).  But, the pic on the left isn’t the final incarnation of Will and Jack from UB.

Aaaand…color makes me happier with this sketch of Crisco.

The Adventures of Shakespeare and Watson

The Adventures of Shakespeare and Watson published on No Comments on The Adventures of Shakespeare and Watson

Do you want to see something hilarious?  Something playing on both historical and modern adaptations of beloved characters?  Something irreverent?   Then go see The Adventures of Shakespeare and Watson.

pattern

pattern published on No Comments on pattern

fashioninrestaurant

Kill The Apostrophe

Kill The Apostrophe published on No Comments on Kill The Apostrophe

When I talked about my enjoyment reading a master of language talk about language, I was not actually ascribing to the strange and overly picky arguments that erupt when someone publishes a grammatical error on the web.  I kind of ignore all those because they seem pompous even if there are careers and jobs based around them, and they could eventually affect how kids learn language in school.  They happen often online and with vehemence, rage and extensive arguments.  Sometimes they even result in movements like Kill The Apostrophe.

Do we need an apostrophe?  Would getting rid of it simply make more our language more complex by making contractions into words of their own right that would evolve separately from their root?  Usually changes to language don’t affect the people or understanding of people living during the change, but what about one hundred years from now?  Two hundred?  Whatever grammar, spelling, and definition changes may happen in my life time, none of them even approach the magnitude of downgrading Pluto’s classification.  Pluto, you are still a planet to me.

FSI Language Courses – Home

FSI Language Courses – Home published on No Comments on FSI Language Courses – Home

It’s been a while since I was immersing myself in language education.  I feel bad to have not mastered a language other than English, especially because I find the process of learning another language so fascinating.

On the old Bean (nothing but an archive in my home computer now) I wrote up an entire post testing the merits of a handful of online language learning sites.  I imagine that most of the information is obsolete now, even though many of the sites still operate and send me news emails regularly.

Anyway, enough boo hooing and reminiscing.  FSI Language Courses has texts and mp3s of the language programs developed by the Foreign Service Institute.  If you want to learn a language, why not learn the way military and diplomats have before?  And do it for free.

I am going to brush up on some stuff right after NaNoWriMo.  I promise.

TPP = bad government

TPP = bad government published on No Comments on TPP = bad government

If you want a rundown on why TPP is bad and why fast tracking it through Congress is bad then read:  The Most Nefarious Part Of The TPP Proposal: Making Copyright Reform Impossible | Techdirt.

If you want more information on what’s wrong with TPP then look here:  EFF:  Trans-Pacific Partnership Agreement.

The TPP is being written completely in secret so fast tracking it through Congress will mean our representatives could be agreeing to things they have not had the chance to discuss and the people have not had the chance to consider.  Wikileaks has pieces of this agreement if you want to double check the people telling you to question the people telling you it is good.

If you want to contribute your voice to those apposing Fast Track and the TPP:  EFF can help you.

John McWhorter and the Grumpy Grammarian

John McWhorter and the Grumpy Grammarian published on No Comments on John McWhorter and the Grumpy Grammarian

I feel free.  John McWhorter has just released my mind from an ingrained belief that I couldn’t end a sentence with a preposition in his essay: Grumpy Grammarian: The Dangling Preposition Myth | New Republic..  You who were schooled around the time I was, when cursive was still graded for its style and clarity, will understand.  Certain rules of grammar were pounded into me.

Later, during my studies of great literature, I was able to let go of some elements of proper grammar for the purpose of conveying feeling and character.  If I don’t need it when I am speaking with others in life then neither do the folks I write about.  I break tons of rules while writing fiction, but when writing professional articles and organizational reports, that last edit for acceptable language always leaves me with dangling prepositions to clean up.  Now, I will try not to worry so much about them.

Oh, and John McWhorter is a fabulous master of language who talks about the idiosyncrasies and ridiculousness of language and people’s reaction to it.  If you love to read like masters dissect their art as much as I do, and you have not heard of him, go go and read.

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