Friday Ephemera
Tinkles is a big boy. || Surprises down below. (h/t, Damian) || He does this better than you do. || Old-school bugging device. || What’s in the box? || Wobble of note. || Smart diapers detect dampness. || Critical Drinker recaps Picard. || It passes the time. || Determined soap dispenser. || Jumping Frenchmen of Maine Syndrome. || Film criticism. (h/t, Dicentra) || It’s a fixer-upper, only $495,000. (h/t, Things) || It fires toilet paper and now you want one. || Clash of the titans. || Turtle of terror. || Asteroids size comparison. || A comprehensive archive of Mark Zuckerberg’s hairstyles. || It’s all in the ankles. || He’s not sure what you are, either. || Forbidden love. || And finally, you may wince when ready.
Film criticism.
The Statue of Liberty scene appears only in the Hollywood film. In the original French novel (Pierre Boulle) the Planet of the Apes is not Earth and has not been devastated by a nuclear war but has an advanced ape civilization. The human astronaut escapes the Planet of the Apes, returns to Earth, lands in a recognizable Paris, and is shocked to be greeted by a gorilla.
Newtonian.
I think I just hurt my forehead on my desk …
https://www.dailymail.co.uk/home/event/article-7999701/Emma-review-good-jarring-note-hit-lack-ethnic-diversity.html
For all your coloring needs and a sample page, if you think it may not be for you.
He might do this better than you do too.
@Darleen – and the Daily Mail is considered a conservative newspaper. The UK’s leading rightish broadsheet, the Daily Telegraph, is full of similar nonsense. My theory is they refuse to recruit from outside London or pay decent wages, so even conservative newspapers are staffed by midwit woke Millennials.
In other UK news, we are banning log fires: https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2020/02/21/coal-wood-fires-banned-fight-cut-emissions/
For all your coloring needs
The cold embrace of the grave gets more attractive every day.
Critical Drinker recaps Picard.
STRONG DIVERSE FEMALE CHARACTER!
He has billions, but can’t get his hair to look like anything other than a too tight toupee.
Morning, all.
STRONG DIVERSE FEMALE CHARACTER!
He does, I think, poke at most of the show’s faults. Its odd priorities.
As someone observes in the YouTube comments, it’s worth spelling out the basic plot. Picard is supposedly on a desperate mission, a race against time, to find a young woman, a female android, or clone or whatever – the writers can’t seem to remember which – before the Romulans discover her and do something terrible that we aren’t at all clear about, and about which it’s therefore difficult to care. And yet, not only is Picard taking his sweet bloody time and endless detours – generally to be berated at length by women and people with browner skin – but we see, from the very start, that the Romulans already know who and where this young woman is, because she’s somehow working on a Romulan-occupied Borg cube, surrounded by Romulans, and is sleeping with a Romulan spy.
In terms of suspense, and like so much else, it doesn’t really work.
And finally, you may wince when ready.
One question. How?
‘A female serial offender with 390 previous convictions and a man with 291 previous convictions were spared jail sentences last year, official figures have revealed. The woman was given a sentence of one-day detention and the male offender was given an absolute discharge’.
https://www.telegraph.co.uk/politics/2020/02/20/offender-390-previous-convictions-spared-jail-prosecutions/
Honk!
A female serial offender with 390 previous convictions…
Not entirely unrelated.
And in happier news.
Via Dicentra.
Nobody said there would be a test.
Have at it, the jokes, they write themselves…
He does this better than you do.
And in happier news.
Turtle of terror.
If only we had banned plastic straws sooner…
It’s all in the ankles.
Holy heck – that was amazing!!! I did not know they played with their feet, too. Thanks, David, you sent me down a rabbit hole there – went through some of that guy’s videos. He even plays Ride of the Valkyries on one of those beasts.
But that’s all composed, built, played by evil western white men, and so all that awesomeness and beauty is wrong and bad and should be destroyed.
I don’t understand why we can’t have western lit and civ and music, and also explore other cultures’ lit and civ and music. Don’t have to like it, but at least be aware of it? Learn some of it? Isn’t that what Liberal Arts was supposed to be – well-rounded?
I guess the regrooving didn’t take.
You and what army?
Have at it, the jokes, they write themselves…
You will note that it is Unionista Lorena Gonzalez, the legislative critter behind AB5 (ban freelancing) that wrote THIS bill, too. If you’re not a state approved employer, you’re an employee. As Lorena says “there will be no 3rd classification of workers”.
IOW: All your income are belong to us.
In other UK news, we are banning log fires: “>https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2020/02/21/coal-wood-fires-banned-fight-cut-emissions/
I wonder if that applies to the wood pellets they’re burning to generate electricity. It ony supplies 5.3% of electricity. I’m sure that won’t be missed.
Nobody said there would be a test.
I’d love to see the WHMIS training for that.
All your income are belong to us.
The sooner the general population – including centrists and conservatives – understands that modern socialists are not well-meaning (but misguided), or that they “just want to help” some people, or are simply ignorant about basic economics, but rather are power-mad pieces of human garbage, the better.
Bernie Sanders isn’t flip-flopping on prior positions, he isn’t “genuine” but weak, he isn’t an idealist who’s followers have gone too far…no, he is a slimy, craven weasel who wants power and money for himself, moreso than your average pol even.
Don’t bother explaining taxing billionaires will pay for only __ % of the Green New Deal, or that supply and demand still exists within healthcare transactions, or that such-and-such initiative resulted in misery and death when tried elsewhere…a no-sh!t socialists does not care. They don’t want your income, your 401(k), your house, your children – they want ALL OF IT.
/unexpected rant over, if you made it this far please follow the link for your free cookie.
Forbidden love.
Isn’t that how we got the corona virus?
Dissonance detected.
In terms of suspense, and like so much else, it doesn’t really work.
That. I’ve given up on it.
I’ve given up on it.
Maybe episode five, which I’ll watch tomorrow, will be better. Though at this stage I can’t muster much enthusiasm. Thing is, if you want to generate intrigue and suspense – if you want to make your drama series dramatic and keep people watching – then you generally have to define the stakes, with a countdown or deadline of some kind, and thereby a sense of urgency. There has to be some narrative momentum. Picard hasn’t yet come close to doing any of this.
Instead, the protagonists’ objective is fuzzy and unclear, with the plotting often feeling both inert and convoluted. The nature of the threat and the villains’ intentions are also unclear, making no real impression. And as noted previously, the two main threads of the plot – Picard’s slow-motion ‘quest’ and whatever’s meant to be happening on the Borg cube (very, very slowly) don’t seem to interact in any obvious way. Events in one thread of the story should ideally have bearing on the other – a new complication or some added urgency. But instead we get Harry Treadaway, our effete emo-Romulan, sliding down corridors in his socks.
And if you’re going to do away with the franchise’s traditional feelgood tone, its cheesy optimism, and instead give everything an air of sourness, recrimination and failure, then you need to at least make the story exciting. But I don’t think anyone could honestly say that the series is gripping.
Attention, everyone! California Governor Gavin Newsom has solved homelessness.
Nobel Prize in the works.
Maybe episode five, which I’ll watch tomorrow, will be better.
Don’t count on it
..no, he is a slimy, craven weasel who wants power and money for himself, moreso than your average pol even.
Why would you ever think that ?
Related…
Related…
Looks like he(?) fell asleep and got summercamp’d at the Renaissance Fair. Poor kid, though “POPS” here will surely drive xer to be a lifelong Republican.
…Gavin Newsom has solved homelessness.
Well, where I come from, it only takes two docs to sign off on a commitment order, so that is pretty much the same thing, not that I have anyone in mind, of course.
I think I just hurt my forehead on my desk…
Heh. A Jane Austen novel that’s full of rich white people? The deuce you say!
Nobel Prize in the works.
I was thinking more like a trip to “the barber”.
Madame Dufarge wouldn’t put up with that merde.
I was on a Portuguese Airlines flight last week, picked up the inflight magazine and opened it on this article.
I don’t think that inflight magazines do satire intentionally.
http://upmagazine-tap.com/en/#rita-sobral-sao-paulo-eng
(I didn’t read any more- why ruin the start of a short holiday?)
Via Brian Micklethwait something that may be better than F1
(I enjoyed it more with the sound off – I don’t think it needs a commentator)
It ony supplies 5.3% of electricity. I’m sure that won’t be missed.
You know who needs electricity and heat? Old people, and babies.
Well, have we got a solution to the former for you:
https://www.americanthinker.com/blog/2020/02/britains_health_services_will_not_give_nonemergency_care_to_nonwoke_people.html
*Defarge* not *Dufarge*
Was typing and making dinner at the same time.
Come on baby light me on fire: McDonald’s to sell ‘Quarter Pounder’ scented candles
Because the human condition isn’t harrowing enough
Well done, sir.
Heaven’s, a button. I wonder what it does…
Hal: “Because the human condition isn’t harrowing enough”
Gwyneth Paltrow could not be reached for comment…
I wonder what it does…
Bless you, sir. May you be spared the routine aggravations of pretty much any Microsoft Windows update.
Well, allrighty, then.
So much pandering, so little time.
Maybe episode five, which I’ll watch tomorrow, will be better.
*Narrator voice* It did not get better.
*Narrator voice* It did not get better.
You’re now the fourth person to tell me that. I may have to recalibrate my expectations downwards again.
*Narrator voice* It did not get better.
A YouTuber named The Script Doctor has pointed out how the unseen backstory – the destruction of Romulus, the question of whether to help rivals, worlds threatening to leave the Federation, an android uprising, etc – sounds more interesting, and more ripe with potential, than anything in the actual story being offered to us. (He also has several videos in which he briskly explains how to rewrite the existing episodes to be better paced, more coherent and generally less meh.)
In other UK news, we are banning log fires
Key quote: “The government is keen to be seen at the forefront of global efforts to tackle climate change and air pollution.”
Much of what our Betters do is about image and to hell with what really matters.
Oopsie.
Oopsie.
Classy gal.
Much of what our Betters do is about image and to hell with what really matters.
https://legalinsurrection.com/2020/02/under-new-law-cambridge-ma-police-cant-arrest-illegal-immigrants-for-driving-without-a-license/
Oopsie.
A YouTuber named The Script Doctor has pointed out how the unseen backstory . . . .
An educated guess is of the storytelling complications of when to reveal that the more ditzy than thou doctor is a member of Section 31, which has been chasing the Tal Shiar ever since the latter targeted the androids on Mars by way of double agents in Starfleet . . .
. . . . and an overall thought is that while the pacing is indeed being on the level of Le Carre, he quite prolly would have handled the storytelling a bit better. Mebbe.
The real reason I’d buy a missile silo in Benson, Arizona
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0j-MzxDad2c
more interesting, and more ripe with potential, than anything in the actual story being offered
They’re not offering you a story, they’re offering you an agenda. The story’s just the carrier, and therefore less important.
They’re not offering you a story, they’re offering you an agenda. The story’s just the carrier, and therefore less important.
That might explain the apparent indifference to things not being done half as well as they could be.
[ Watches Picard episode five. ]
Something happened, at last. But, no, it did not get better.