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http://www.physorg.com/news183231468.html

I’m pushing for the black circle in the top left.  That looks like a good one.

That’s the picture that hangs above my laptop.  I stare into it as a I write.  I am not quite sure what made me decide to write about it, but I suppose it’s only natural.  I’ve had it for maybe six months now.  Most people know of Gérôme (if they know of Gérôme) from his depiction of gladiators, which is most famous for the thumbs down symbol.

I actually came to learn of Gérôme from some random bit of historical reading I was doing at the time.  Gérôme did a depiction of the Grand Conde, who was a famous French general during the Thirty-Years war (and one of the great generals in history.)

Sometime later I searched out the artist and found Gerome.  His historical works are my favorite, but history seems to have preferred his orientalist undertakings.  In researching this article I found this gallery, which is rather extensive.   Or this one, which has everything (but with more annoying pagination).  Enjoy!

I like Bond films (usually). I also like the music. I found these on youtube a few days. Enjoy!

A few months ago I went on some rant about scam charities.  Recent news is reporting that some of the Haiti charities are less than admirable.

Allow me to post about GuideStar, a website that lets you review the publicly released documents of nonprofit companies. It requires registration, but it’s free and worth the time if you’re out to throw some money around.  My paranoia toward everything lends me to wonder what GuideStar gets out of the deal and I find the testimonial data beyond useless, but I enjoy reading the financial statements.  It seems to be a damn good deal: now why can’t everything be regulated similarly?  If we put a tenth of what we put into any given project making sure the other 90% was spent correctly, I’m convinced the country, the world, the everything, would come out of the deal twice as well as they do now.  Alas, I wax depressive, but keep GuideStar in mind the next time you’ve got a nagging urge to donate…

Final rant: GuideStar has a short list of reasons why they might not have the 990 Form from a particular nonprofit.  The last one refers to religious organizations that aren’t required to file.  I can be convinced sometimes that there is a valid and compelling reason for religious organizations to not be taxed (freedom of religious and that bag), but what exactly frees them from reporting standards?  What makes a religion different in the world of honest financial governship?  History, I suppose.  Phooey.

How many months ago did Watchmen come out?

Don’t know. Here’s Alan Moore reading Rorschach’s journal.

You don’t hear author’s reading their works all that often. Occasionally at readings, occasionally audiobooks. Conferences will have parts of that.

As for Comic Book writers, hmm? Has Frank Miller ever read Batman outloud?

Enjoy the weekend!

Your season is over. Yesterday’s loss to the Cardinals drops you out of playoff contention. It was a hard fought game, but you let Warner throw all over the field. It’s been a rough season. Time to go back to the drawing board and try to have as good an offseason as we had last year.

Almost lost to the Lions! At home!? Terrible. They won and so they’re managed to actually be tied for second in the division. It’s farcical that they’re still have a competitive chance, but the team is abysmal. Hasselback, hate to say it, but he’s just not good enough. Don’t get me wrong, he can be a good quarterback, but he throws too many interceptions and always at the worst times. If a team can’t keep the Lions from scoring less than 20 points than there’s just not much point in playing the game. Can’t we just fast-forward to the end, grab some decent draft picks, and try this all again next year. Sigh and double sigh. Only bright spot is a win. One mroe to tie last year and two to show some improvement. How sad is that?

Ugh.  Fake punt pass.  Only good thing to come out of yesterday.  Seahawks = Sunk.  Time to retool the whole machine.

Batman: The Animated Series, some of the best television ever made.  The stories, the artwork, the music.  I’m convinced it was perfect in nearly every way.  For years I pined away for the soundtrack to be released.  Sometime last year it finally was, although it sadly lacked a few choice themes like The Legend of Gray Ghost (Cameo by Adam West) and Catwoman’s theme.  I managed to pick up a copy off of Amazon not to long ago (the original release is sound out, but it can be found.)

For those lacking an immediate copy, allow me to point you here.  This is Shirley Walking explaning the Batman theme.  Pretty incredible, eh?

Music of the Bat 101

It’s a friday.  Blow off some steam (or drive yourself crazy).  Splitter 2 is a fun little flash puzzle game.  I’ve gotten about halfway through.

(I’ll try to have something better for next week.)