McCain Sees Red...Lipstick...in the Mirror

This is just ridiculous of the McCain campaign. They are starting to look like immature middle schoolers. "It's because I'm Swedish, that's why you gave me a bad grade!" Back when I was teaching middle school, I had a student say this to me once (actually twice). It was one of those days and my response came right out of the sarcastic bad teacher playbook, "You know, you're right. If you were Norwegian then that would be fine but Sweden...just doesn't fly." That shut him up. I guess the equivalent response here would be to say to McCain, "You know, you're right. I should have said dog (ergo Pitbull). You can put lipstick on a dog but it's still a dog."

More Food for Healthy Eating: Kimchi

Sustainable Architecture aka Healthy Homes

This is how homes should be built... Living Homes definitely fit my philosophy of life.

The ironic thing is that, while the houses in the videos are quite expensive, if this was how most homes were built then construction of homes in general would be much more affordable and more people would hopefully be able to own their own places. Not only that but everyone living inside would be healthier for the significant decrease or absence of synthetic chemicals and our healthcare costs (remember, it's all about the money) as a nation would drop significantly because people would suffer less from, among other things, various types of allergies and even cancer. Those FEMA trailers were really very concentrated (sick) examples of what we do to ourselves in real houses over a more protracted period.

Meanwhile, I'm regularly hit with a barrage of chemicals everyday in the form of paint fumes from renovation at work, second hand smoke outside my building and in town, exhaust from cars when I go for a walk, and pesticides in the grass I walk through...just to name a few. It's hard to know sometimes whether it's even safe to breathe.

* I did get the treadmill by the way. Not sure when they will be able to deliver it but I'm finally going to have a Nordictrack C2155. Now I just need some 3/4" plywood to build the table.

Question: If I breathe in more chemicals when I exercise than I do otherwise then is it healthier to go ahead and exercise anyway or stay inside (on my bum) with an air cleaner running?

Healthy Delicious

Vegetarians are Sexier

"I am Alicia Silverstone and I am a Vegetarian."


No Fish and Chips for this Brit.


I've met Forest Whitaker. He's not only an amazing actor but a really nice person and a good father...

Dear Mr. President,

TwoCrows posted this on her blog and I love it so much that I'm posting it here.

Addicted to Colbert: An Autobiography Part II

This one had me in stitches.

Addicted to Colbert: An Autobiography

We're All Busy People :-)

Hook a Canuck: Courtesy of Michael Moore

I just saw Sicko (finally)! I want to leave this country so bad. Or let us all lead mass demonstrations in the street for healthcare. Else, what's the point? A lot of the time, it seems you tell Americans they are getting screwed and they nod and go back to work. Did everyone else already visit hook-a-canuck.com? Here's the video from the website.

Ducttape Your Windows: An Atmosphere of Fear

Don't Judge a Woman by Her Cover?

Haha, this video made me laugh...and that's a good thing.

Yahya! Love the Swedes!

This commercial shows some of the true beauty of the world. Wish more companies were willing to break with the status quo.

Classic, Man, Classic

How to Draw Eyes

Some of the not so hidden potential of sites like YouTube is as an open university online, like so much of the internet, where people are sharing knowledge in new and really exciting ways. Maybe I should make videos of me solving math equations with some simlarly cool musical soundtracks. :-)

Graphic Novels, Comics, and Society

As some of you know already, I am working on producing a graphic novel this year. Therefore, a lot of my "free" time is spent researching whose shoulders I am attempting to clamber up on. The history of comic books it turns out, is really very interesting, especially as a lense through which to understand more about United States history. Well, perhaps lense is the wrong word but the history of comic books is indelibly linked to that of the country in which they were largely created and the politics of the society from which hail its writers.

In watching this documentary on comic books from the history channel, I found it particularly interesting that, during WWII, comic books were full of hyper-patriotic propoganda where the superheroes ran around beating up the enemies of America, the Nazis in particular...but they were (as they mention in the video) themselves representative of a Nazi ideal, that physically superior aryan male specimen of fantasy that dominates everyone else. This is of course not surprising given the ultra-racist dominant culture of United States itself. The writers of the comic books themselves had ended up writing those magazines of comics in the first place because they couldn't get a job writing comic strips in the respected newspaper business because they were Jewish. So the superheroes could go beat up the Nazis but mentioning that the holocaust was taking place was not going to happen and neither was demonizing the racist philosophies of the Nazis because, after all, our country shared many of the same beliefs.

Also of interest, that even when comic books have deeper storylines (like contemporary comics that question American policy surrounding the Iraq war and that would even go so far as compare the destruction of 9-11 to attacks carried out by the American Government on say...Dresden) none of that is translated to movies and other pop culture media through which those of us who don't actually read comic books on a regular basis understand who these comic book creations are. The layers are almost entirely lost in translation. However, since the essence of X-Men is it's message about bigotry, perhaps it was harder to make this more superficial or maybe its simply because in that case the original creators of the characters were involved in the development of the screenplay/movie.

Black Sheep - Movie Trailer

28 Sheep Later? This is particularly amusing if you take into account that there are at least 10 sheep for every person in New Zealand.

Fuzzy Math Lesson

I looooove this! I've got to show my kids. A fabulous opening to a conversation on place value.

Human Devolution

There's a reason The Simpsons has been on for such a long time. While it can (of course) also be really dumb, it's often also "right-on". Here's a example of the kind of Simpsons humor I love. Note: Like a lot of television, I don't actually watch it regularly or basically ever...but when I have seen it, I've generally been very amused.

Things You Shouldn't Do on the Beach

..if you want lucrative corporate sponsorship from anyone other than the adult film industry, then don't do what Ronaldo's ex did...with her boyfriend...on the beach.