Morning Linakge (Oct 4)

Transportation

Over at WebUrbanist, Steve Levenstein gives us a heav­i­ly illus­trat­ed overview of the con­stant­ly chang­ing art on the cars at the Cadillac Ranch. I did­n’t know just how inten­tion­al the invi­ta­tion to pass­ing graf­fi­ti artists was.

DiscoveryHD brings us a 2 part doc­u­men­tary on the Cafe Racer sub-culture. Airing Oct 13 and 14. Fire up the Betamax Ethel.

For all I know this web page is adver­tis­ing bogus “like a tiger” nos­trums. It’s in Japanese, I don’t feel like deal­ing with the trans­la­tor. I just want you to see the pic­ture of the 70’s era wall of death rid­ers.

Okay I lied, I did trans­late it and it’s the web page for Din Tai Fung Speed Stunt Troupe. There’s a few more pic­tures here.

Science

The total­ly awe­some adven­ture of two guys, a lit­tle video cam­era, and a heli­um filled weath­er bal­loon. Not quite to infin­i­ty and beyond, but to the edge of space and back.  The footage from the flight will make you feel both small com­pared to the vast­ness just out of our reach and proud to be a mem­ber of such a curi­ous species.

Somewhat spe­cial­ized and tech­ni­cal, but of inter­est to the pho­tog­ra­phers and web geeks in the group. Google has pro­posed, demo’d, and open sourced for pub­lic use, the exper­i­men­tal new image com­pres­sion tech­nique WebP as an alter­na­tive to the com­mon­ly used jpeg com­pres­sion tech­niques. Your opin­ion on the qual­i­ty of the com­pressed images?

Art, Images, and Design

A new wall por­trait by Vhils for the Nuart show in Norway. Created by cut­ting, (drilling, punch­ing, and pound­ing) into the lay­ers of fin­ish on a wall. More infor­ma­tion on Alexandre Farto (aka Vhils) and more walls.

Object of desire — but unavail­able at this moment. Pint Size has a water bot­tle. Pint size appears — inex­plic­a­bly — in the com­ic Questionable Content.

Practicality-stretching design exer­cis­es are all over the inter­net. Beds that do origa­mi to hide away dur­ing the day, cof­fee tables with inter­est­ing shapes but no place to put a cup or a mag­a­zine, it’s goes on and on. Most of these exist only in ren­der­ing files but once in a while… A swing set like din­ing table and chairs. Um, no drink­ing at this din­ner par­ty, okay?

Two min­utes of Monday humor. If it’s rain­ing on you too this morn­ing I hope you find a big guy with an umbrel­la.  Manfred. (Animation — 2:00)

keep calm and car­ry on,

Morning Linkage (Sep 30)

Transportation

Probably the largest num­ber of GT2000s you’ll ever see together.

The Southsiders ride Basque coun­try. Excellent pic­to­r­i­al, fab scenery, and a desktop-worthy image of three Commandos.

And a lit­tle wrench­mon­kee love. #24, built for some lucky guy named Mark.

Food

The dire­ness of the need for cof­fee in the morn­ing increas­es with the dis­tance from your home cof­fee pot. Serious Eats pro­vides a list of on-line  resources for find­ing a bet­ter cup of joe than what’s on offer at the break­fast bar in the Holiday Inn. I par­tic­u­lar­ly like Barista Exchange.

The haz­ards of the entre­pre­neur­ial spir­it. Death Buy Lemonade. Chuckling will begin in 3… 2… (ani­ma­tion)

Art, Images, and Design

A round-up of Roman water works. 15 still stand­ing (more or less) aque­ducts in Europe, North Africa and the Middle East.

Rampant con­sumerism gets a design edge. Pantone brand­ed (and col­ored) VISA cards. Must have.

You should prob­a­bly save this one up for nap time. Animalarium does Night Life.  Happy, sleepy crit­ters and the usu­al high standards.

got­ta run… be nice to each oth­er, m’kay?

Morning Linkage (Sep 28)

Transportation

Six cir­cu­lar saw motors, half a go-cart chas­sis, and a weird sense of humor. I give you the Bolt Lightening dragster.

So many of us like look­ing at bike (and car) pics. Maybe it’s time to add a few of your own? Pipeburn gives you a quick two lessons in bike pho­tog­ra­phy for begin­ners. (Follow the links in Part I but only after you’ve put down the cof­fee and maybe had a cou­ple of Advil.)

I love this lit­tle XL250. Even though I should hate it — all the bits are just vague­ly wrong.

I don’t think there’s any bet­ter proof of true love than this 1962 C100 scoot­er restoration.

Science

Titanium foam as a bone growth matrix. Fascinating bio-medical appli­ca­tion of mate­ri­als sci­ence with the now oblig­a­tory Wolverine reference.

Yay for bio­lu­mi­nes­cence. Yay for comb jel­lies. Yay for CreatureCast. (Sorry about the east coast ori­en­ta­tion — but there’s no good sin­gle site for Puget Sound bio­lu­mi­nes­cent species. — sigh)

Food

Apparently the most irre­sistible food on earth is… toast. Um, I already knew that. Some of the oth­er choic­es are pret­ty good too. (The fun is in the comments.)

Art, Images, and Design

Random pho­tos from the “Good Design Expo”  Some are sil­ly, some are clever, and a num­ber are just plain puz­zling. I like the ele­phant tape dis­penser and the toma­to grow bag.

A tiny bit of street art on a pad­lock. Nicely done. (And if you like Seattle and good pho­tos you might want to add Seattle dai­ly Photo to your RSS reader.)

Items for a Tim Burton set design. Exotic leather fur­nish­ings that  belong in a some movie described as “tense” and “fraught with sub­text” or maybe just “creepy”. Wanna start a British men’s club with a bizarre sense of humor.

Oops — inter­we­bz goin’ down in 3… 2…

Morning Linkage (Sep 27)

Transportation

Beginning with a bit of a mys­tery. Searching for infor­ma­tion on this sub­tly won­der­ful BWM custom.

No mys­tery to this inten­tion­al­ly not per­fect TX650. Keeping the orig­i­nal tank and head­light buck­et as the design touch­stones for a rat bike I’d give shop space.

For a gig­gle, 52 Rossi hel­met graph­ics. In his next life he’s going to be an art direc­tor for DC Comics. Clearly.

Science (more or less)

“hydro­dy­nam­i­cal­ly silent feed­ing cur­rent” Or how the comb jel­ly, which as you know is my favorite marine odd­i­ty, eats well. Read the com­ments they are as enlight­en­ing as the article.

Dark Roast Blends brings you Man Eating Plants. Okay — insect eat­ing plants. (Following the image cred­its will sup­ply an after­noon of visu­al bliss.)

Art, Images, and Design

From the pier side. A lit­tle guy goes div­ing. Like the com­menter says — pos­si­bly Os Gemeos, but I can’t find a sol­id attribution.

An unusu­al look for They Draw, They Cook. Tatiana Dorokhina’s recipe for a hot kicked-up cider. The con­tin­u­a­tion of the direc­tions in the guy’s trib­al tat­too is sweet.

Ms. Dorokhina’s illus­tra­tion blog is worth a look as well. (Occassionally NSFW)

American made and so damned beau­ti­ful. The RGM Pennsylvania Tourbillon. Watch pr0n at it’s most beguil­ing. It’s the sec­ond video you want to spend time with.

El Mac — hagio­graph­ic por­trai­ture. The time-lapse vids are good. Nicely curat­ed by koikoikoi.  (IC)

Vacation is over and it’s time to get back to work. Happy Monday y’all