G N A R L Y S T U F F

The Private Islands blog has a story about Roger Lextrait, who lived practically alone on a small island in the South Pacific atoll of Palmyra for eight years.

Each day he woke promptly at 5AM, to the calling of a hundred thousand birds. Nowhere else on the planet do these creatures gather in such numbers. After fixing himself a Palmyra Cocktail (1 part Rum, 1 part Red Wine, 1 part Tang), he called up his radio contacts in Tahiti and Honolulu. A shower on the beach in his makeshift bathing system and he was ready for the day. The bath and latrine systems Roger built are still used today by the current research teams that visit the atoll for brief expeditions.

Roger had a variety of things to keep him busy. Not least of which were his 3 dogs TouTou, Blackie, and Padou. He trained them to hunt sharks, helping to keep the predators population under control. Always near were his 2 cats Tiger and DouDouche, and the 2 birds he raised from hatchlings, lovingly named Felix and Oscar.
Experience made him an excellent fisherman, using only a diving knife, fishing net, and spear gun. This was dangerous work as the reef contained a number of less than friendly creatures. Roger had his share of run-ins with everything from sharks to stingrays, but never suffered any serious injuries.
Singing, playing his guitar, and drumming on an old wheel barrel helped him pass the time and keep the loneliness at bay. Despite his best efforts, Roger still describes experiencing intense feelings of depression and despair. “It (Palmyra) is so secluded, so isolate,” he says.

Link

Denver International Airport is in the middle of nowhere. It’s been dubbed “America’s Most Inconvenient Airport.” It’s also the airport of choice for conspiracies theorists, who say that deep beneath the airport exists a massive complex of buildings six stories underground designed to house a cultish shadow government and the super-rich elite in case of natural or man-made disaster.

The airport’s colorful and undeniably creepy diptych murals depicting things such as a gas-mask wearing Gestapo officer impaling a dove with his saber, and three dead women in coffins, don’t help quell the rumors that DIA is some kind of grand mystic lodge for the reptilian overlords who secretly run everything.

The latest issue of Westword has a long article about DIA and the many competing conspiracies surrounding it.

And not all these theorists are Unabomber-like crackpots uploading their hallucinations from basement lairs. Former BBC media personality David Icke, for example, has written twenty books in his quest to prove that the world is controlled by an elite group of reptilian aliens known as the Babylonian Brotherhood, whose ranks include George W. Bush, Queen Elizabeth II, the Jews and Kris Kristofferson. In various writings, lectures and interviews, he has long argued that DIA is one of many home bases for the otherworldly creatures, a fact revealed in the lizard/alien-faced military figure shown in Tanguma’s murals.

“Denver is scheduled to be the Western headquarters of the US New World Order during martial law take over,” Icke wrote in his 1999 book, The Biggest Secret. “Other contacts who have been underground at the Denver Airport claim that there are large numbers of human slaves, many of them children, working there under the control of the reptilians.”
Link

Hide your skin but show some bones with the “Anatomically Correct Bone Socks”.

Link - via Nerd Approved

Not only is there a national air guitar championship, there’s also a pretty great documentary about its birth and the hardcore instrument-less rockers who come to compete. Air Guitar Nation…
Visit Uncrate for the full post.

“Bendable Interior Objects,” or BIO, are office products, designed by Swedish (duh) studio Form Us With Love, that are constructed almost entirely out of folded aluminum. While some of the products like the trash can come pre-assembled, several of the smaller items such as this desk set ship on a single sheet of aluminum.

You’ll pay a stiff premium for clever design, though—the desk set is 33 Euro.

Catalog Page [Werf.se via Yanko]

deucer: Grabbing some Famous Pizza (via Twitter / deucer)

deucer: 2-0 for the fall soccer league. 7-5 the score of this game. One goal for me. (via Twitter / deucer)

deucer: Sitting in line for the atm (via Twitter / deucer)

Surface Tension makes stylish arcade-table/coffee-tables. These are a cross between a designer piece of furniture and the Pac Man table at your local pizza joint, circa 1987. Comes with MAME so it plays all the games, along with Windows XP so it is susceptible to all the virii and exploits (I recommend wiping it and installing Ubuntu and MAME). It also serves as a wireless iTunes repeater, and has a nice set of built-in speakers. Link (via Cribcandy)

When we saw that Lafuma had won another award for their Eco 40 Rucksack we knew it was time to dig around the notes we’ve had gathering dust since this product was released. During 2007 it has scored two gongs. First, the French Etoile de l’Observeur du Design and just last month the Ispo Performance Award for Eco-responsibility. The awards jury concluded that “Lafuma submitted the most convincing product with the Eco 40 Backpack in the Eco Responsibility category. Company philosophy, planning, manufacturing and recycling of the products are all in line with sustainability. To reduce any harm to the environment to a minimum, Lafuma uses natural materials in product processing, for ex…

Possibly takes several months, but the payoff would be great.

I honestly thought this Star Wars/Simpsons mashup was from the TV show, but it was done by animator Rich Cando (who also did Star Dudes). You get to hear Darth Vader say “D’oh!” Link -via YesButNoButYes

Filed under: New Releases, New Line, Movie Marketing, Posters

Just a few days from the Toronto International Film Festival, and the posters are coming out of the woodwork. Picturehouse was kind enough to provide us with an exclusive first peek at the spandy-new poster (click the image for a bigger view) for former Friend David Schwimmer’s feature directorial debut (he has quite a bit of TV stuff under his belt), Run, Fatboy, Run. The film stars Simon Pegg as Dennis, a chunky, uninspired loser who gets cold feet and dumps his hot girlfriend, Libby (Thandie Newton) on their wedding day — and then spends the next five years regretting it. He finally decides to win Libby back from her new, wealthy and handsome love, Whit (Hank Azaria), but first he has to get in shape and win a marathon to prove to Libby that he’s a changed man.

Sounds like a great date flick to me. Like Knocked Up and 40 Year Old Virgin, it has the appeal of an average-looking Everyguy with a very attractive woman — guys like to cheer for guys like that, and women clearly find them appealing as well, if Seth Rogen and Judd Apatow are any indication. The geek factor could definitely give the film a box office edge, especially if there’s good buzz at TIFF. I’ve always like Schwimmer as an actor, and I’m really curious to see how he directs this film. What do you think of the poster? The film opens in the US on October 26; until then, you’ll have to satisfy your curiousity with the film’s official website, which has a trailer for the film, and

Permalink | Email this | Comments

I’m a big fan of Moleskine journals, both the full-size and the small cahiers. I usually end up writing in them in both directions, with one collection of content, say daily thoughts, ideas, artwork, and work-related miscellany, going from front to back and another type, say brainstorming for a book, going from back to to front. And then I usually have a couple of other though clusters tossed somewhere in the middle. I’ve tried conventional tabs, but I hate the little flappy things. So I might try this idea I bumped into on a new site for “tiny inventions,” called Inventoids. Cut “innie” tabs. I think I’ll try it. You can always use color marker bands on the edges, but I think this looks cooler. It’s an interesting option, anyway. YMMV.

Moleskine indexing hack tool - Link

From the pages of CRAFT:

Journal-Art Memoirs. Make a scrapbook the Moleskine way. Read this article in our print magazine, CRAFT 02: Creative Clones, Page 127. To get CRAFT, subscribe today. Subscribers—read this article now in your digital edition!

[Read this article] [Comment on this article]

Interesting read about a change in the way we get our meats and veggies from farmers. Getting rid of the wholesalers and the big box stores.

Continue reading Michael Scott’s summer vacation - VIDEO

Filed under: Video, The Office

NBC has released a 3-minute promo for the next season of The Office. First of all, it’s great to see the cast again and I am now feeling very impatient for season 4 to begin (Sept. 27).

The video is like that old elementary school essay: What I Did Last Summer. The cast—supporting and main players—all talk about what their summers were like. Some of them even seem to tie up a few loose ends, especially Karen’s testimonial, which is a little… bitter. We also get to see Ryan at his new job and Kelly’s reaction to him is priceless.

Video after the jump and I’ve also embedded a great promo for Chuck with NBC’s promo guy:

Read | Permalink | Email this | | Comments

Looking for a useful, affordable gift? These new Nalgene Kit Bottles ($18-$25) are great for giving, thanks to their combination of a 32oz. Nalgene bottle stuffed with goodies for several…
Visit Uncrate for the full post.

I’m loving the nerdy stick-figure antics over at XKCD. They satisfy the wannabe code-poet in me.

XKCD was just featured as a notable webcomic in PC Magazine’s Top 100 Undiscovered Websites.

deuce: Little late to work today (via Twitter / deuce)