Category: junk thought

Shocking Fashion

Ladies, have you ever thought to yourself, “I need to electrocute another human being from at least ten feet away, but my current anti-personnel solution just isn’t feminine enough?”

Well, the Taser C2 has you covered.
Pink Taser C2
Package includes a built in tactical flash light, laser sight, and one TASER cartridge!

Although, please note:

However, an electrostatic discharge can come from many sources. When an electrostatic discharge, regardless of the source, contacts the front of a TASER Cartridge, it is possible for the cartridge to discharge. Therefore, avoid contact between static electricity and the TASER Cartridge because static electricity can cause unexpected discharge. – Taser C2 Manual

So, be sure not to have any other static creating items in your purse, and be doubly sure not to rub it against any balloons*!

(*Despite the concern, I’m sure the C2 is still a lot of fun at children’s birthday parties!)

Horror Express

Horror Express Poster I haven’t been writing reviews of all the films I’ve watched so far for the October 31, although I’ll probably go back and chat them up when I have more of an opportunity – still, I wanted to take a moment to mark the watching of Horror Express, (aka Panic in the Trans-Siberian Train,) as it certainly deserves a bit of the spotlight.

The movie features two of my favourite actors, Peter Cushing and Christopher Lee, as a pair of scientists traveling back from Siberia, where Lee has recently made a fantastic discovery. Inevitably the find, basically the corpse of something akin to the abominable snowman, almost immediately jumps up and begins murderizing folks.
Horror Express Peekaboo

Filming began very soon after the death of Cushing’s wife, a blow he never entirely recovered from, and the lore is that he only stayed on the set because of the warmth Christopher Lee’s family showed him, and the swapping of stories from previous productions with Mr Lee himself. Lee certainly takes the helm for intensity in this film, although Cushing often gets the best lines, including: “Us? Monsters? We’re BRITISH.”

The cast also includes a Robert Deniro-lookalike as a guy who, wink-wink, nudge-nudge, isn’t at all based on the famous Russian mad monk Rasputin.
Horror Express: Evil Monk

Despite all this fantastic ridiculousness, my favourite part of the film is the barely explained entrance of Telly Savalas in the final act. Kojak comes riding in as a supposed Cossack, spouting barely comprehensible lines and beating people senseless without provocation.
Telly Savalas In Horror Express
The first time I saw this film I thought the director was looking for a Deus Ex Machina to defeat the monster – an American hero to step up and quash the beast – but instead Telly ends up on the floor, dead, no more than fifteen minutes after his appearance.

Terminator Eyes from Horror Express

Who actually quells the menace? Well – I don’t want to give away any spoilers, but the truth is that it’s basically defeated by Russian bureaucracy.

You can find the full film on Youtube, if you don’t have the five dollars to fish it out of a Walmart bargain bin – I’ve certainly left enough of the surprises intact to make it worth your time.

[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=efYZoHd93DM]

Naughty Lizzie Borden

I realize that fetishizing murderers is a long standing tradition in some circles, but this Lizzie Borden figurine, which I came across while looking for a picture of the axe-murderess, really bugs me:
Lizzie Borden Figurine
From the wikipedia article:

The two daughters, well past marriage age, gladly entered the modern world whenever they visited friends. Emma and Lizzie had no marketable skills, and their father did not seem concerned about their future.

Borden was a woman on the verge of spinster-hood who lived with her parents, she wasn’t some sort of naughtily corseted sex-kitten.

An actual picture of Lizzie:

Lizzie in 1893

“Hey baby, the fact that I’m missing my teeth just means that there’s more room for your tongue.” (- link)

The New CPR

CPR Training Manikin from http://www.made-in-china.com

Have you heard about the new CPR, CCC?

Consider this Skinner.FM’s yearly Public Service Announcement:

[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EcbgpiKyUbs]

This does take a lot of the juvenile/romantic comedy aspect out of it, however.

[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7kmfsiOYsbo]

Tomorrow's Buildings/Today's Heat Rays

This is a fantastic little story about an accident of engineering that I couldn’t pass up, despite the fact that it’s making the rounds pretty vigorously.

Vdara Death Ray

Among the victims is one Bill Pintas, whose tale of woe was recently printed in the Las Vegas Review-Journal:

[A]fter a brief dip in the hotel pool, he was sunning on a recliner. He was on his stomach, relaxed, eyes closed. But suddenly, the lawyer became so uncomfortably hot that he leaped up to move. He tried to put on his flip-flop sandals but, inexplicably, they were too hot to touch. So he ran barefoot to the shade. “I was effectively being cooked,” Pintas said. “I started running as fast as I could without looking like a lunatic.” Then he smelled an odor, and realized it was coming from his head, where a bit of hair had been scorched. (Via my friend Anycheese, Via engadget, Via BoingBoing)

Never mind that any comic book fan will tell you this is a heat ray and not a death ray, this is exactly the kind of thing we need to be considering as design technology becomes increasingly flexible in its usage.

Who has to live in the shadow of a space elevator? Who  gets to live next to the genetically-modified-animal MegaZoo? How much polution does a floating city put out, and where does it go?

Personally, I’d like to see some of these proposed Choi & Shine Architects’ electrical towers roaming the landscape.
Choi + Shine Architects' Power Pylons

Spaceballs 2

Schwartz Fight

This is an odd note, but: Do you remember the sequel to Spaceballs?

I recall as a kid really wondering if the fourth wall breaking gag that Yogurt made near the end of the movie – “Spaceballs 2: The Search For More Money” – would ever actually happen.

For one nation, it sort of did.

From Wikipedia:

In September 2004, news about a sequel, parodying the Star Wars prequel trilogy, appeared on the internet. It was rumored that there was going to be a sequel entitled Spaceballs 3: The Search for Spaceballs 2, but the sequel turned out to be a hoax.
[…]
In 1989, the movie Martians Go Home was distributed in the Italian market as Balle Spaziali 2 – La vendetta (Balle Spaziali being the localized title of Spaceballs). – article

I can find no evidence of the original Martians Go Home, nor its Italian variant, on youtube. The cast listing on imdb is a hodge-podge of B-actors of the period, as well as some low-end stand up comedians.

Martians Go Home

My one hope is that, with a title like “Space Balls 2: The Vendetta”, it ends with Randy Quaid’s character beaten by Martian felons.

[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oFWbwW9RU6I]

The Art Of The Deal

Listen, I’m no genius – as evidenced by the fact that I went to McDonald’s for food yesterday – but I’m fairly sure this sign could just as easily say “pick any 254 for $505.46” and it would be just as useful. 

I mean, it would make sense to me if it was pick any 2 for $3.50, or even $3.97, but, as it stands, it’s just a suggestion for those who are really terrible at math.

My TV Idea

It seems to me the age of Seasonal DVDs has killed water cooler chat.
Battlestar GalacticaSomeone needs to create an ‘Old Show Forum’, broken down by series and episode.

That way, people running through something on DVD like LOST, or Battlestar Galactica, or Babylon 5, (or whatever,) can visit and chat up the episode they’ve just watched, without running the spoiler risk that any sort of discussion of a completed television show holds.