Above LA: A Top-Down Timelapse View of the Great Megacity

in Random | July 26th, 2014

Chris Pritchard tells us: “Above LA show­cas­es the often unseen beau­ty of Los Ange­les from above. It was shot on hill­tops, moun­tains, and high-rise rooftops around the city and fea­tures a num­ber of day to night tran­si­tions and rare weath­er. My goal was to cap­ture the depth, beau­ty, and move­ment of a vast and bustling megac­i­ty from a new angle, and encour­age peo­ple to get out and expe­ri­ence their envi­ron­ments in new ways. I nev­er thought I’d appre­ci­ate this city so much until I spent count­less hours star­ing at it from high above.” You can learn more about Above LA over at Chris’ blog here.

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Learn to Make Buttons with Filmmaker Miranda July

in Comedy, K-12, Random, Technology | May 26th, 2014

We humans have relied on the decep­tive­ly hum­ble but­ton since its first appear­ance in the Indus Val­ley some 5000 years ago.

In the pre-zip­per era, what bet­ter way to show off your shape­ly arms or calves than a row of gor­geous and func­tion­al but­tons?

Need to pay a debt, or bestow a love token on a fetch­ing suit­or? Pluck a but­ton from your gar­ment, and con­sid­er the mat­ter closed.

The first cam­paign but­tons? Actu­al but­tons! Thanks, George Wash­ing­ton!

It is, as Charles Dick­ens not­ed, fol­low­ing a vis­it to a Birm­ing­ham but­ton fac­to­ry, “a seri­ous thing to attempt to learn about but­tons.” It should come as no sur­prise that the great cham­pi­on of the oppressed not only did his home­work, but wound up hav­ing rather a lot to say on the sub­ject.

Judg­ing by his account of what he wit­nessed in Birm­ing­ham, most would assume that the but­ton-mak­ing process requires spe­cial­ized machin­ery, a num­ber of spe­cial­ized mate­ri­als, and a large, nim­ble-fin­gered work­force.

Not so, as film­mak­er Miran­da July demon­strates in the extreme­ly illu­mi­nat­ing how-to video, above.

Yes, cer­tain steps will require a high degree of con­cen­tra­tion. Don’t expect to suc­cess­ful­ly Fer­ber­ize—or in lay­man’s terms, put holes in—your but­tons on the first attempt. Stick with it, though. Even an expe­ri­enced fab­ri­cant de bou­ton like July will occa­sion­al­ly have trou­ble with things like gran­u­lar com­pounds and high volt­age hard­en­ers.

As a new­com­er to the excit­ing world of but­ton-mak­ing, I real­ly appre­ci­at­ed July’s clear, step-by-step instruc­tion, as well as her encour­ag­ing vibe. The project requires a degree of skill and patience that may elude younger view­ers, but I can attest that my 13-year-old son was absolute­ly riv­et­ed through­out. He may nev­er pro­duce any but­tons, but he can’t wait to share his new­found knowl­edge with all his friends!

In clos­ing, let us revis­it Dick­ens, whose enthu­si­asm lives on in July, a fel­low writer and Aquar­i­an, 162 years his junior:

It is won­der­ful, is it not? that on that small piv­ot turns the for­tune of such mul­ti­tudes of men, women, and chil­dren, in so many parts of the world; that such indus­try, and so many fine fac­ul­ties, should be brought out and exer­cised by so small a thing as the But­ton.

Relat­ed Con­tent:

Watch Miran­da July’s Short Film on Avoid­ing the Pit­falls of Pro­cras­ti­na­tion

David Sedaris Reads You a Sto­ry By Miran­da July

Ayun Hal­l­i­day is the author of sev­en books, and cre­ator of the award win­ning East Vil­lage Inky zine. Fol­low her @AyunHalliday

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Neil deGrasse Tyson Puts Bill Gates’ Wealth into Funny Perspective

in Business, Random | May 22nd, 2014

Astro­physi­cist Neil deGrasse Tyson has a way of putting things into per­spec­tive. Usu­al­ly he’s look­ing at where we — our plan­et, our civ­i­liza­tion — sit in rela­tion­ship to the larg­er cos­mos. But, in this clip record­ed at the Uni­ver­si­ty of Wash­ing­ton in 2011, he’s help­ing us wrap our head around some­thing equal­ly unfath­omable and seem­ing­ly infi­nite: Bill Gates’ big pile of mon­ey.

via Red­dit

Relat­ed Con­tent:

Neil deGrasse Tyson Lists 8 (Free) Books Every Intel­li­gent Per­son Should Read

Carl Sagan Writes a Let­ter to 17-Year-Old Neil deGrasse Tyson (1975)

Neil deGrasse Tyson Explains Why He’s Uncom­fort­able Being Labeled an ‘Athe­ist’

Free Online Physics Cours­es

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The Lonely Photo of Michel Foucault with a Full Head of Hair

in Philosophy, Random | April 22nd, 2014

Foucault with Hair

When you think of Michel Fou­cault, it’s hard not to think of the bald head that’s so part of his per­sona. Do a Google image search for Fou­cault, and you’ll find a “pro­fu­sion of pic­tures of Fou­cault’s gleam­ing bald head” (as Jef­frey Wein­stock calls it in an arti­cle enti­tled “This is Not Fou­cault’s Head”). But, among those many images, you will find one lone­ly pho­to of Fou­cault with a full(ish) head of hair. It’s hard to put a date on the pic­ture. Very like­ly, it was tak­en dur­ing the mid 1950s, right around when Fou­cault was 30 years old. The look he’s sport­ing there is very dif­fer­ent than what we see in 1965, when he sits down to talk with Alain Badiou. Or 1971, when he debates Noam Chom­sky on Dutch TV. By those lat­er dates, Fou­cault had the look that became so endur­ing.

Relat­ed Con­tent:

Michel Foucault’s Con­tro­ver­sial Life and Phi­los­o­phy Explored in a Reveal­ing 1993 Doc­u­men­tary

Michel Fou­cault: Free Lec­tures on Truth, Dis­course & The Self

John Sear­le on Fou­cault and the Obscu­ran­tism in French Phi­los­o­phy

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Sir Patrick Stewart & Sir Ian McKellen Play The Newlywed Game

in Comedy, Random | April 21st, 2014

I’m gonna go out on a limb and guess that this is the first time two knight­ed cul­tur­al fig­ures have played The New­ly­wed Game — a ver­sion of that wince (and nos­tal­gia) ‑induc­ing game show that ran from the 1960s through the 1990s. Although Stew­art and McK­ellen aren’t mar­ried, they know each oth­er plen­ty well. They’ve worked togeth­er on stage (in a pro­duc­tion of Wait­ing for Godot) and in film (they’ll be appear­ing togeth­er in an upcom­ing X‑Men movie.) And suf­fice it to say, they’ve formed a tight friend­ship. When Stew­art mar­ried Sun­ny Ozell last year, McK­ellen offi­ci­at­ed at the wed­ding cer­e­mo­ny.

This lit­tle bit took place at a Buz­zFeed Brews event back in Feb­ru­ary. You can watch their full 48 minute appear­ance here. Also find the two in a deep­er con­ver­sa­tion record­ed at the Screen Actors Guild Foun­da­tion just last month.

Relat­ed Con­tent:

Sir Patrick Stew­art Demon­strates How Cows Moo in Dif­fer­ent Eng­lish Accents

Sir Ian McK­ellen Reads Man­u­al for Chang­ing Tires in Dra­mat­ic Voice

Patrick Stew­art Talks Can­did­ly About Domes­tic Vio­lence in a Poignant Q&A Ses­sion at Comic­palooza

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Short Film Shows What Happens When a Letter from World War II Finally Gets Delivered 69 Years Later

in History, Letters, Life, Random | December 20th, 2013

A few years ago, I stum­bled upon a nev­er-sent let­ter writ­ten to a friend when we were both in col­lege. The con­tents weren’t heavy. Dis­or­ga­ni­za­tion is the most like­ly expla­na­tion for why it nev­er went in the mail. I cracked the enve­lope and had a look.

It was a time cap­sule, for sure, a cringe-induc­ing one. It was­n’t so much the life I was report­ing on as how I framed it, self-aggran­dize­ment strain­ing to pass as non­cha­lance. For­tu­nate­ly, an artist acquain­tance hap­pened to be run­ning a project— send her your shred­d­a­ble doc­u­ments, and even­tu­al­ly, she’d send you a few sheets of hand­made paper in which your mulched data min­gled with that of oth­ers. Tru­ly a beau­ti­ful way to dis­pose of the evi­dence.

But what hap­pens when nei­ther the writer, nor the intend­ed recip­i­ent, is the find­er of the lost let­ter? In Feb­ru­ary 2013, some mail post­ed by Lt. Joseph O. Matthews, a sol­dier sta­tioned at a mil­i­tary train­ing facil­i­ty in Jack­sonville, North Car­oli­na, found its way to Abbi Jacob­son, an actress (and col­or­ing book author!) rent­ing an apart­ment on Mac­Dou­gal Street in New York City. Addressed to Matthew’s wife, the can­cel­la­tion mark was dat­ed Decem­ber 2, 1944.

Jacob­son opened the let­ter, the con­di­tion of the enve­lope hav­ing sug­gest­ed that she would not be the first to breach its con­tents dur­ing the 69 years it had spent wan­der­ing in the wilder­ness. The words inside were roman­tic, a young offi­cer inform­ing the bride he’d left back home that he’d soon be ship­ping out to Oki­nawa. Eager to pull an Amélie by reunit­ing the let­ter with those to whom it would mean the most, Jacob­son enlist­ed the help of her friend, doc­u­men­tary film­mak­er Todd Bieber. Togeth­er they searched records at City Hall, look­ing for clues. When that approach proved fruit­less, they cre­at­ed the Lost Let­ter Project, a web por­tal that invit­ed the pub­lic to join in the search.

An avalanche of tweets, Face­book updates, and human inter­est pieces ensued. In no time at all, they had their man, or rather his descen­dants, Lt. Matthews hav­ing passed away in 1999, crush­ing Jacob­son’s dreams of hand deliv­er­ing the let­ter to “a lit­tle old man and a lit­tle old lady.” (I’m will­ing to bet Jacob­son will one day wish there was a giant blender capa­ble of turn­ing dig­i­tal state­ments like how cute would that be, my god, right? I love old peo­ple into hand­made paper.)

Bieber’s video reveals what became of Lt. Matthews and his wife. Even more inter­est­ing is how the let­ter res­onates with his grown chil­dren, par­tic­u­lar­ly a cer­tain the­o­log­i­cal ref­er­ence at odds with the man they thought they knew.

Relat­ed Con­tent:

In Touch­ing Video, Artist Mari­na Abramović & For­mer Lover Ulay Reunite After 22 Years Apart

“Noth­ing Good Gets Away”: John Stein­beck Offers Love Advice in a Let­ter to His Son (1958)

Stephen King Writes A Let­ter to His 16-Year-Old Self: “Stay Away from Recre­ation­al Drugs”

Ayun Hal­l­i­day is all for stuff­ing your stock­ing with a hol­i­day gift sub­scrip­tion to the East Vil­lage Inky, her award win­ning hand-illus­trat­ed zine. Fol­low her @AyunHalliday

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“Get Data”: UCSD Neuroscience Grad Students Create Parody Video to Tune of Daft Punk’s ‘Get Lucky’

in Random, Science | December 8th, 2013

Last month, the UCSD Neu­ro­sciences Grad­u­ate Pro­gram held a lit­tle par­ty at a local bar, and the invi­ta­tion (above) came in the form of a video based on Daft Punk’s pop­u­lar video/song “Get Lucky” (below). Writes a local San Diego news­pa­per: “In sweet, fun­ny and saucy ways, [the video] shows the stress and mad­ness grad stu­dents go through in try­ing to come up with new data for sci­en­tif­ic stud­ies. The stu­dents released the video to coin­cide with this week’s Soci­ety of Neu­ro­science meet­ing at the San Diego Con­ven­tion Cen­ter.” Enjoy the clip and find more grad school odd­i­ties below.

via Sci­en­tif­ic Amer­i­can

Relat­ed Con­tent:

Phys­i­cal Attrac­tion: Mar­riage Pro­pos­al Comes in the Form of a Physics Paper

Grad­u­ate School Bar­bie: A New Gift Idea for The Demor­al­ized Grad Stu­dent in Your Life

The Illus­trat­ed Guide to a Ph.D.

Ser­i­al Entre­pre­neur Damon Horowitz Says “Quit Your Tech Job and Get a Ph.D. in the Human­i­ties”

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Lyndon Johnson Orders New Pants on the Phone and Requests More Room for His … Johnson (1964)

in Animation, History, Random | November 26th, 2013

“Lyn­don John­son was indeed .… a being of Shake­speare­an dimensions—a hulk­ing, bush-coun­try colos­sus, gar­gan­tu­an of ego and ener­gy, of self-delu­sions and glooms and para­noias, crass cru­el­ties and ram­pant vul­gar­i­ties, but gar­gan­tu­an also in his benev­o­lent ambi­tions.” So begins Mar­shall Frady’s review of Robert Caro’s 2002 polit­i­cal biog­ra­phy, Mas­ter Of The Sen­ate: The Years of Lyn­don John­son. The review then pro­ceeds to describe John­son’s uncouth behav­ior, which some­how always seemed to involve his John­son:

He ear­ly became fabled for a Rabelaisian earth­i­ness, uri­nat­ing in the park­ing lot of the House Office Build­ing as the urge took him; if a col­league came into a Capi­tol bath­room as he was fin­ish­ing at the uri­nal there, he would some­times swing around still hold­ing his mem­ber, which he liked to call “Jum­bo,” hoot­ing once, “Have you ever seen any­thing as big as this?,” and shak­ing it in almost a bran­dish­ing man­ner as he began dis­cours­ing about some pend­ing leg­is­la­tion. At the same time, he would oblige aides to take dic­ta­tion stand­ing in the door of his office bath­room while he went about emp­ty­ing his bow­els, as if in some alpha-male rit­u­al asser­tion of his pri­ma­cy. Even on the floors of the House and Sen­ate, he would extrav­a­gant­ly rum­mage away at his groin, some­times reach­ing his hand through a pock­et and lean­ing with half-lift­ed leg for more thor­ough access.

Above, we have a record­ing of anoth­er col­or­ful episode from the John­son era. On August 9, 1964, the pres­i­dent called the Hag­gar cloth­ing com­pa­ny to order some cus­tom-made pants. It was seem­ing­ly an innocu­ous call, a call you could­n’t imag­ine a pres­i­dent mak­ing today. But it sud­den­ly took a bizarre turn when LBJ asked for more room in the crotch, in the area “where the nuts hang.” That, before let­ting out a short, unapolo­getic belch. It’s clas­sic John­son.

Lis­ten to the famous call play out above, and find a tran­script of the exchange here.

Relat­ed Con­tent:

Dizzy Gille­spie Runs for US Pres­i­dent, 1964. Promis­es to Make Miles Davis Head of the CIA

The Exis­ten­tial­ism Files: How the FBI Tar­get­ed Camus, and Then Sartre After the JFK Assas­si­na­tion

Actress Grace Kel­ly Reflects on the Life & Lega­cy of JFK in an Art­ful­ly Ani­mat­ed Video

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