The End.

Hello all,

I believe its time to put this blog to rest. I'm going to pursue other writing projects. I appreciate all the feedback and banter and friends this blog has generated. I will be staying in touch with my "blog friends" despite halting posts on this web site.

I'm going to keep the site up, as at this point I can see folks are enjoying the archives and I still get comments from long-past posts that confirm this.

Enjoy,

Bp

[photo credit, Wiki Commons]

Little Dudes: Spotted Bat (Euderma maculatum)

Michael Durham Photography has a plethora of great wildlife photos posted on his blog, which I encourage you to check out. This post with the Spotted Bat really caught my attention.

Here are some of the photos, click here for the rest. Oh and remember you can click on the photos to get bigger versions.





Enjoy little spotted furry flying dudes,

Bp

[all picture credits at Michael Durham's site]

Saturday Morning Awesome: UK politico rips EU president

There is a trend happening in the Saturday Morning Awesome (SMA) -- that of badassery.

Nigel Farage (click HERE for the Wiki on him) was fined £2700 by the parliament for making the speech below. I have no idea if his accusations are correct, or if he's doing anything more than browbeating the EU president. But it's awesome. And Farage, in this moment at least, is a badass the likes of which I'd love to see in U.S. politics.

Ps: I am blatantly ripping this genius find from Faith in Honest Doubt's pages. Rock on Dale.



You go Nigel, you go,

Bp

My new favorite internet article -- ever: Lady Gaga, The Illuminati Puppet

This is why the internet rules. If there is 'something' out there in the public consciousness -- The Internet will grab it and turn it into something you never ever expected in a million years.

Here is an EXPOSE of Lada Gaga and her occult/illuminati connection from Vigilant Citizen. It's my new favorite thing.

I'm pretty sure we need a corollary to the Internet Rule 34 -- adding, 'and conspiracy connections made of it.'

Enjoy life,

Bp

[photo credit in linked article]

World's luckiest rail inspector

No idea of the history or validity of this video. But it's a hell of a view.



Enjoy someone else's good fortune, and reflexes,

Bp

[via Blame It on the Voices]

Sen. Al Franken (D-MN) humbles Hudson Institute dilettante over health care bankruptcies

I totally hijacked this from the Cynical-C blog -- nice catch sir.



Enjoy watchin a senator disputing think-tank bullshit and sticking to the facts at hand,

Bp

Saturday Morning Awesome: Grey Fox caught in a camera trap

There is a wonderful blog I follow called Camera Trap Codger, and I saw this post today that really shows the best of the best one can get using a camera trap. Hit this link to see the rest of the pictures. Not only great shots of a photogenic animal, but with a possible storyline/narrative as well.

This, of course, makes me want to run out and get one and set it up. That's what I need -- really, a new hobby. Yeah, with all that time I have.

Enjoy folks following their passions and creating great content for you to enjoy on the intartubes,

Bp

[photo credit Camera Trap Codger blog]

A shot from the Blogosphere -- Dooce and Adorability

There was a period, somewhat brief and before I had blogged much, when I thought Dooce was a lucky stiff. She was a lady who wrote a few witty posts at a time when folks were just getting turned on to blogging and then she was a celebrity. Poof. Like that. She captured the mommy audience -- bored moms at home with infants and an internet connection, just looking for people to make enormously powerful, like Oprah.

But, as I've mentioned before on this blog, this is no accident. She's talented, funny as hell, AND well positioned as a writer.

Today's post, called The House of Adorable, is a great example of her writing. She can take the most mundane events and make them the jumping off point for a scads of interesting tangents and side shows. As well as simply having a great sense of comedic timing.

And the subject matter today is the kind of thing that fills my life lately. So it's extra poignant.

My hat is off to you Mrs. Armstrong, you go.

Bp

Backwards Beekeeper shows how he harvests honey

I just stumbled across this video on Boing Boing, and am now intrigued. The video is a nice watch about how the "Backwards Beekeepers" harvest their honey. One gets the sense that they do much of their beekeeping in an unconventional, bee-friendly fashion.

Here is a link to the Backwards Beekeepers blog -- I've only just started researching their methods and philosophy and I do like it, and their attitude. Biologically, their philosophy of maximizing and propagating already-naturalized populations of bees makes perfect sense. I strongly suspect I'll have more to report after I've spent some more time with their information.



Enjoy folks using their heads, and making awesome local honey in the process,

Bp

Free books online, no joke

The Burgomeister's Books is a site where you can find scads of books for free.

The terms are completely reasonable. You can only download 5 books in a two week period. And when done, you nuke them from your hard-drive.

It's a free service, but the kind host does appreciate donations to keep it going.

Enjoy public access to goodies,

Bp

[via Canukistani Kate, illustration is The Librarian, by Guiseppe Arcimbolo, via Wiki Commons]

A Softer World hits again

A Softer World is a hip web comic that I keep up on. Occasionally, it hits and gives me a good laugh. Here is an example, remember you can click the image for a larger version:



Enjoy a good laugh when it presents itself,

Bp

Saturday Morning Awesome: ZeFrank is back

As long-time readers of this blog know, I'm a big fan of ZeFrank. This morning, ex-pat, Canunistani Uncle Ted sent me a link to a Time.com piece done by ZeFrank himself. Too awesome, I'm glad he found work.

I'll keep ya'll updated whenever I find him popping up again.

Enjoy underground artists getting paying jobs,

Bp

Apologies -- and a praying mantis eating a hummingbird

Sorry I've missed a couple posts here [in hindsight, I realized I only missed one post -- and this one is late]. We have house guests, in my computer room...

SO

Here is a radical story about a Praying Mantis eating a Hummingbird to keep you over until I get back. The pictures are a bit -- strong -- so I'm just providing the link and a g-rated wiki image.

Click at your own discretion.

Enjoy insects pulling off impressive carnivorous feats,

Bp

[article via Uncle Ted, mantis image via Wiki Commons]

Pink Dolphin spotted in Louisiana

In case you don't cruise the intartubes constantly, I thought I'd better post these pictures of the awesome Pink Dolphin spotted in Calcasieu Lake by Capt. Erik Rue. They've gone viral both on the internet and through email, but I had to jump on the band wagon, it's just too cool.

It is an albino dolphin, very rare but not completely unknown.

Here is a link directly to Captain Erik Rue's Calcasieu guide service page with all the photos he's posted. I just grabbed a few:




For more reading here is an article about the pictures and Captain on Hoaxslayer.com.

Enjoy notices of unicorn-level animules still trotting around this planet of ours,

Bp

[photo credits in linked article]

Luminescent Fungi in Japan (and elsewhere)

The Pink Tentacle blog has a great post about these awesome Japanese luminescent mushrooms (Mycena lux-coeli). Apparently, they grow on fallen Chinquapin trees.

These particular fungi are from deep in undisturbed woods, which are a pretty rare thing in Japan nowadays.

There are a few different varieties of mushies that will pull off this maneuver. We've observed some fungi in rotting wood in the woods on Mt. Hood that look like little glow worms. They were especially abundant on the path up to Angel's Rest in the Gorge, which is one of the reasons I used to like doing night hikes there.

Probably the largest specimen of glowing mushroom in the States is the Jack O' Lantern mushroom, Omphalotus olearius. As far as I know, they don't come this far north, but are pretty common in central and southern California.

Enjoy glowy things in nature that aren't ravers taking a night hike,

Bp

[via my faithful Canukistani operative "Yuri," photo credits at Rincon Del Misterio]

Saturday Morning Awesome -- tour a Ninja House in Japan

It has come to my attention that my blog is being used by the last generation to understand this and the next generation. As a rubric for "the youth" if you will. Well, if you want to understand these young folks, you best understand Ninjas (and pirates too, that will come later). The kids are crazy about 'em.


Amazing Ninja House In Japan!! - Funny videos are here

Enjoy learning more about today's youngins,

Bp

Shift Happens video, revised 2008 edition

A meditation on the exponential increase in novelty our world is presenting us. Some very interesting statistics here for your contemplation. [sorry about the "music" -- sometimes we have to make sacrifices to learn]



Enjoy even attempting to keep up to date,

Bp

[via my Mom]

The strange and unexpected connections made on the intarweb

I recently received one of those "out of the blue" emails that I occasionally get related to this blog. A nice lady from the American Association of Acupuncture & Oriental Medicine contacted me regarding my statement of "recovering electrician" in my Bio. She has electrician types in her family and wondered if there were interesting or hair raising stories associated with this phrase that I would be willing to relate.

It turns out that part of this lady's job is searching out any reference to oriental medicine or acupuncture on the web and checking out the content. My blog popped up in her search, and one thing led to another.

It is a trip to think that my few mentions of acupuncture in this blog tagged it in a way that it could possibly now be part of the national (or international) conversation about this subject. I'm sure you'd have to dig to find the blog, but this lady did, and did find me. The mind spins at how the intartubes are changing our societal discourse. I couldn't possibly imagine trying to catalog or quantify the amount of change and novelty that is being produced this way.

Here is part of my long-winded response to her query, for those of you who are interested:

So, the "recovering electrician" comment is a tongue-in-cheek statement, because I'm changing careers due to really not liking that job much.

However, there is more to the story, and since it seems you (look to be) a health care practitioner, I'll relate it.

When I still had awesome Union insurance, I went to a naturopath/acupuncturist here in Portland named Bernie Bayard. He's phenomenal. He used to joke that he was using me as a guinea pig for checking out the effects of multiple electrical shocks on the human system. Since I was primarily a service electrician, I almost always worked in inhabited houses -- doing repair and trouble shooting. That kind of work is almost always done hot, because it's less disruptive to the client and for troubleshooting, it's just way more informative. I got shocked as often as once a month. [for those of you concerned about this statement, know that it was almost always "small" and in my hand only, not big electrocutions going through my torso or anything]

Back in the day, in the 30's, electricians used to test circuits with their fingers. Even the national electrical code had instructions for how to do this. Many of these men ended their life with a severe palsey, because their nerves were literally fried. Since nerves are our electrical conductors in the body, I believe that's where the resistance is least and so when we get shocked they take the brunt of the force. That's my non-scientific opinion of course.

As for funny stories, I have so many that my wife wants me to write a book of short stories (named "Electrical Shorts" of course) about the bizarre, scary, and humorous events that happened during my career as a service electrician.

Enjoy the novel connections that seemingly harmless online activity can produce,

Bp


[image courtesy of wiki commons]

Continuing with the weekend levity: pink flamingo massacre

Via one of my guilty pleasures of the intartubes, I Can Haz Cheez Burger.




Enjoy a good laugh, even if it makes you cringe a bit,

Bp

Realm of the Totally random: whole site dedicated to owl tattoos

The intartubes are an amazing place. You can find anything and everything, and especially things you would never have thought to look for.

Such as a site with pages and pages of owl tattoos.

No joke.

Enjoy the utter randomness that human culture amped with synchronizing technology can produce,

Bp