Luna's (Not So) Lunes Linkies - Round 48 (OMGDOWANT X-Mas Edition)

[the_perkygoff]

Oh my god. It's so late. I partly blame my "new" computer, which is getting returned ASAP, and partly blame Jonny Quest. Long story short is that I've had a long day, which was punctuated with ADD. In any case, today's links basically alternate between things that abuse the crap of my OMGWANT tag and vaguely holiday themed links (ratio of roughly 2:1 for most of this). Sorry for the delay. I have a ton of links and only an hour to post them:

To start... the classic Christmas viral video. Everyone's seen it. It's totally worth seeing again. (Also, Wizards of Winter came onto my playlist which reminded me of LOLWednesday.)

A link I found this morning: Kindly Elf Gives Away $13,000 to Los Angeles Homeless. From the article: "While car makers have their hands out to Congress, a kindly soul showed up in a car to deliver his own bailout to those on Skid Row."

Unlike most of the other things that I have listed below as "OMGWANTS," some of these may actually be obtainable. "10 Lamps I Want In My House" further assures that my future home will be adorn with ridiculous things that light up. And that are freakin' amazing.

This... this. Okay, first read about the John Taylor's "time eating" £1m clock (also dubbed the "strangest clock in the world" by some and the "most hoity toity awesome clock" by me), which was unveiled by Steven Hawking at Cambridge, and then watch this video and see it explained and in motion (what's better than an awesome clock? An awesome clock with a story). Do I want this? Oh fuck yes. (Though, I'll admit, the ticking would drive me slowly mad over time. But going mad next to that clock has got to be one of the great unexplored adventures of the world.)

Blastphemy? Pah. No matter what you celebrate, the Chocolate Deities will probably have your god of choice to nom-nom upon for the holidays. I am vaguely disappointed to see no crucified Jesus (though the cross almost makes up for it). Apparently they're pretty local (Hudson Valley) to boot for the majority of you guys who read this.

Who wouldn't want a speedboat shaped like a dolphin? Like seriously, I want a show of hands. Check the specs: "The Seabreacher can glide on top or below water at high speed - and it has enough power to soar out of the water and fly through the air and perform stunts."

I'd like to present to you all the most artsy (and impractical... but artsy) surge protector ever. I actually see now that it's somewhat flexible, so don't let the illusion of cast-iron fool you.

What my previous holiday links lacked in Christianity is more than made up by this linkL JESUS CHRIST COMIC IS BETTER THAN YOUR COMIC. What's better is that you can read it online.

Mmmm... yes. Cute Origami Yoda is, yes. Someone give me the instructions how to make that thing.

I have to say I would be proud to hang any of the surrealist photography of Rodney Smith in my home. I love almost everything in the particular gallery in the link (and I certainly encourage you to check out other galleries listed on the John Cleary Gallery website), though "Three Men with Shears, No. 1," "Skyline," "A.J. Chasing Airplane," "Bernadette Twirling," and "Trees" are some of my favorites.

While I'm on the topic of surreal art, here's some more art I wouldn't mind hanging in my home. Vladimir Kush is a relatively unknown artist to me but his stuff is fantastic in the truest sense of the world.

Okay, I'll admit, when I first came across this one, I didn't actually know what was going on. However, the image of ballerinas and guns took my breath away between it being a fantastic photographic and a great juxtaposition. It was enough to distract my attention away from the background, which indicates fairly well that this is a backstage photo from The Nutcracker.

Monster Hoodies.com is... well... aptly named. I wish I came across the link sooner, as I would have tipped a few of you guys who would be more personally interested in actually ordering something from them.

Oh yes. The interest is glorious for you can buy your own personal action figures from it. ...Action figures modeled after yourself, of course.

Walking in a incredibly well lit, Winter Wonderland. LEDs are like, the best thing ever.

RoboLamp is basically amazing. From the official website: "AUR is a robotic desk lamp, a collaborative lighting assistant. It serves as a non-anthropomorphic robotic platform as part of my Ph.D thesis on human-robot fluency, embodiment, and nonverbal behavior... [it] is aimed to evoke a personal relationship with the human partner without resorting to creature-like features such as eyes, limbs, or a mouth. By retaining the lamp's 'objectness', I hope to explore the relationship that can be maintained between a human and an object through abstract gestures and nonverbal behavior alone." From CollegeHumor: "My dream of living in a Pixar movie, one step closer to reality."

Full of science content but really really cool. "Drugs to Grow Your Brain" is an article that talks about a newly developed drug that is about to head to clinical trials, that may help encourage the growth of new neurons in the brain. New neurons that, for instance, could help with memory and learning. The purpose of the drug is to help alleviate anything from depression to Alzheimer's, though I personally would totally jump on board if it meant that I would stop forgetting random shit.

In the spirit of the first link, here's one that you might not have seen. Peanuts Christmas Lights is pretty much going to be on a loop in my house tomorrow.

Oh. My. Sweet Curly Bangs. This is NSFW? It might be. The Hilary Nutcracker (and Bill Corkscrew) are so brain-breakingly lulertastic though. And gawd, the placement. They would make fantastic gag gifts.

Live-Action Wall-E. Live action Wall-E!!! *Makes with the gimme motions* It's so farkin' cute, I could cry.

Robots must be inherently gimme-gimme-able. Yellow-Drum Machine (Let's Make Robots!) is a really awesome mini bot (that actually looks a bit like Wall-E/Johnny 5, now that I think about it). But what does it do? Check it out (abridged from site): it (1) navigates around, collecting data, and avoid obstacles, until it (2) finds something "worth playing on" (a single isolated object or a wide flat surface that it can find an angle onto). From there it (3) snakes into place, (4) plays some beats on what it have found, and samples them, checking it has a "good sound" and then (5) based on data collected in the area, and sample just made, composes a little rhythm, and plays this along with the sample. It's a robot... that makes it's own beats! There are three videos on the site, all of which are worth checking out.

And this was photographed pretty recently too: the Christmas Tree star Cluster is pretty as it is festive.

And to end, some pretty winter photos. They're quite stunning.

~*~

Awesome... this was posted just about ten minutes late (mostly due to a lacking internet here), so Merry Christmas.