I Will Survive

Via Facebook, Igudesman & Joo from their show "A Little Nightmare Music"

Art Clokey Has Died

Art Clokey? He was an animator, whose bendable creation Gumby became a pop culture phenomenon through decades of toys, revivals and satires. He died Friday. He was 88. More here.

And here's a Gumby TV short called Toy Crazy. As a kid I loved the way real toys were integrated into the Gumby stories. For example, dig Gumby's Jag XK-120.



RIP Art Clokey.

The Staggering Implications Of Vitamin D

More and more information is coming out describing the crucial importance of Vitamin D to human health. Vitamin D is the "sunshine" vitamin and those of us who live far away from the equator do not get nearly enough of either.

Patrick Cox is an economist who makes his living evaluating economic impacts of science. This requires him to read massive amounts of scientific research and reports. When it comes to Vitamin D, Cox has seen a clear pattern: We need to take more Vitamin D. A whole lot more.

The “scientific consensus” that has held sway for four decades regarding both exposure to the sun and vitamin D has collapsed. What has emerged in place of the old “settled science” is the knowledge that most people in America are seriously vitamin D deficient or insufficient. The same is true for Canada and Europe, and the implications are staggering.

Simply put, unless you are one of the few people with optimal serum D levels, such as lifeguards and roofers in South Florida, you can cut your risks from most major diseases by 50 to 80 percent [by supplementing with large doses of Vitamin D].

 How large?

...the maximum safe dosage of vitamin D3, the preferred dietary form, is currently 2000IU. This is extremely unfortunate because it takes about a hundred IU to raise serum blood levels by 1 ng/ml in a healthy adult. To get into the optimal range, 40 to 60 ng/ml, one would therefore have to take 4000 IU daily. It would take even more if you were obese, are taking certain medications, or have one of a number of medical conditions that degrade or prevent the creation of usable D. The evidence, incidentally, is that 10,000IU is entirely safe.

75 Reasons To Love Elvis

It's Elvis Presley's 75th birthday. From Entertainment Weekly, 75 reasons to love Elvis.

Plus, tons of photos at the New York Daily News.

Kissimmee Auction Oddities

At the big collector car auction run by Mecum International later this month at Kissimmee you can see these and much, much more:

 Lot F202: 1955 Dodge La Femme Coupe. I kid you not. 20-thousand miles plus "...documentation from Mrs. I. L. Peterson who purchased the La Femme from Shelby Motors in Champaign, Illinois on May 3, 1955." The La Femme came from the factory with a purse as standard equipment.

Lot S181: 1958 Pontiac Parisienne Convertible. A Canadian-spec Pontiac, thus all Chevy underneath. Lovely restoration. Like all of its contemporaries, remarkably and often inexplicably overstyled (I don't get so-called Continental kits).

Lot Z157: Neon Sign Pontiac. A classic '40s 10-footer. There are quite a few of these. Evidence all those ex-Pontiac dealers are clearing out the fixtures?

Lot Z642 Zombie Mannequin. How did this get in among the cars?

Lots more here.

The New Alternative Media

Yesterday Andrew Breitbart's BigJournalism launched. This coming Monday, former MSNBC and CNN host Tucker Carlson will launch his own conservative news site The Daily Caller “along the lines of The Huffington Post” with an ideology “not in sync with the current program.”

More from the Washington Independent.

Veterans of other new media start-ups are sold on what they’ve heard about the “HuffPo of the Right.” Conor Friedersdorf, a freelance journalist who worked for the short-lived site Culture11, contrasted Carlson’s focus on journalism with the much-praised, quick-hitting tactics of Breitbart’s Big Hollywood, Big Government, and Big Journalism.

“I hope that The Daily Caller aspires to produce writing that is as well written and professionally edited as the stuff that the talented Tucker Carlson writes for Esquire,” said Friedersdorf. “The alternative — the Andrew Breitbart model — is to publish poorly reasoned, atrociously edited screeds on the cheap, on the assumption that ideologically friendly readers will keep clicking anyway.”

Partisan opinion aside, isn't it interesting that even as the mainstream "dead tree" media are fading away, new media enterprises are seemingly healthy - and growing. Especially if they are, as Carlson says, "not in sync with the current program."

Breitbart's BigJournalism Debuts, Declares War

Leading new media journalist Andrew Breitbart has launched the latest outlet in his new media network. BigJournalism joins BigGovernment and BigHollywood.

In the midst of an account of his telephone conversation with ACORN organizer Bertha Lewis (who calls him a "bad, bad, bad journalist"), Breitbart says there is a new media war unfolding:

Big Journalism is staking the claim that media is now at war with one another: Big Media versus Small Media; Old Media versus New Media; Left Media Vs Right Media. You get the picture.  The practice of journalism will never be the same, and not the New York Times’s Pinch Sulzberger nor all the sniping children at Gawker and Media Matters can un-ring this bell – which, after all, tolls for them.

It seems for the first time in my life people who agree with my broad point of view are using the media to tell their truths, to go on the offensive, to act as checks and balances against entrenched media power. And to have a major effect.

I sleep well being part of this process of stratification. If the media isn’t going to take the large clues of losing subscribers, dwindling viewers, thriving alternatives – perhaps something more aggressive will instigate a change for the better.

Even if you’re one of those awful, biased old-media types we seek to destroy, welcome to Big Journalism, where the spirit of free inquiry lives on.

Maple Leaf Training Requirements 1962

What sort of conditioning was necessary to be a paid professional athlete in 1962? Here is an actual copy of a Toronto Maple Leaf training camp invitation sent by Leaf's general manager Punch Imlach, to winger Jim Pappin in 1962. Via PuckDoctors.com

Is that why the Leaf's haven't won a cup since ? Oh, that was '67. Darn those 30 knee-bends.

World Juniors: US 6 Canada 5

From the Globe and Mail:

The United States of America last night put an end to any Canadian hopes of a record sixth straight gold medal in the world junior hockey championship when the fleet, sometimes panicking young Americans pulled off an upset 6-5 overtime victory over the defending champions and pre-tournament favourites.

The win dampened an incredible Canadian comeback late in the third that saw Jordan Eberle, the clutch hero of last year's gold-medal victory in Ottawa, score twice to force the overtime.

Unfortunately, unlike a year ago, the Canadians could not finish the job, the game lost at 4:21 of overtime when the Americans broke up ice on a three-on-one and defenceman John Carlson scored on a hard shot that beat Canadian goaltender Martin Jones.

And from the Canadian Press, a report card on Canada's performance in the world junior's final, rated on a scale of one to 10.

The final goal at 4:21 in overtime here:

Michael Yon Arrested. In America.

Renowned American independent war correspondent Michael Yon has been arrested in Seattle. Not in Iraq. Not in Indonesia. Not in Afghanistan. Seattle.

Why? Because he refused to tell an airport security guard his annual income. From Yon's Facebook page:

Got arrested at the Seattle airport for refusing to say how much money I make. (The uniformed ones say I was not "arrested", but they definitely handcuffed me.) Their videos and audios should show that I was polite, but simply refused questions that had nothing to do with national security. Port authority police eventually came -- they were professionals -- and rescued me from the border bullies.

I have personally heard lots of anecdotal evidence over the years that the US border guards are possibly the rudest in the world. And I have first hand experience. Although I was not arrested, I was rudely interrogated by a US customs buffoon in San Francisco some years ago after I flew in from Ottawa for my job. He demanded I justify myself as a Canadian taking work away from someone in America. That I was working on a contract under NAFTA eluded him.

And going into Boston I have encountered one loutish security guard after another. I have never seen such treatment at any other border except the US.

Buffoons and louts at US customs. Yeah, that'll stop the terrorists. Helluva job there, boys.

Hidden Under The Rain Forest

National Geographic reports that what we once thought of as untouched, pristine Amazon rainforest was once home to teeming cities and monumental architecture. Once they were abandoned, that's when the rain forest took over.

Satellite images of the upper Amazon Basin taken since 1999 have revealed more than 200 geometric earthworks spanning a distance greater than 155 miles (250 kilometers).

Now researchers estimate that nearly ten times as many such structures—of unknown purpose—may exist undetected under the Amazon's forest cover.

Darwin Awards For 2009 Announced

The Darwin Awards are given to those "doing the most to improve the human gene pool by removing themselves from it".

The 2009 winners, among others, are two bank robbers who blew themselves up - and an entire bank building - trying to break open a cash machine.

Much more on the Darwin Awards - including all the 2009 nominees - here.

Rex Murphy On Time's Person Of The Year

TIME magazine has named Ben Bernanke, the chairman of the U.S. Federal Reserve, as its Person of the Year.

In the Globe and Mail Rex Murphy asks, why not Barack Obama?

I think Time went to the relatively faceless functionary Bernanke mainly not to name Barack Obama. Time, like a lot of its fellows in the wild world of the contemporary U.S. media, is in an awkward place with regards to Mr. Obama. Having devoted so much incense to his remarkable ascendancy, a great swath of his country's press is looking for a convenient and not too noticeable off-ramp while it – shall we say – recalibrates its enthusiasm.

Scary Snowplow Video

What happens when you set up your camera too close to the tracks as the snowplow train comes barreling through. I think the engineer is a wee bit annoyed on the approach.




OK, so the engine wasn't pushing a snow plow. Just a lot of snow. For snowplow train total coolness, this is off the "scale".