A new KC area bike/pedestrian blog, including contributions from yours truly…

bikefriendlykc.blogspot.com 

The computer-generated Cylons on the new Battlestar series are very cool and very creepy, but they have left the old Cylons unemployed…

Sir Vinegar has a great explaination of the Jayhawk hating phenomenon.  For the record, I don’t really care enough about KU basketball to be bothered with hating. I just like to marvel at the Mizzou and KSU diehards choose locate right in the middle of KU country, because there really is nothing more bizarre than an SUV with JO license plates and a MU bumper sticker.

This weekend we checked out C.S.A.: Confederate States of America. It’s a new movie from right here in the KC area that explores what 21st century America would be like if the South had won the Civil War and slavery was still legal today. It was a very well-done mockumentary complete with commercial breaks and ads for products like an electronic slave shackle and the Home Slave Shopping Network.

The film has received lots of critical praise, including an appearance at the 2004 Sundance Film Festival. Right now it’s playing at the Screenland Theater in the Crossroads District of downtown KCMO. Here are the movie web site and the IMDb info.

Thanks to Laurie for sharing this sweet bike rack.

Another great find courtesy of Day of the Deadly. Anyone else remember this from their childhood? The romance of a dot and line, 40 years laters it’s still better than most of the animated crap on the TV today.

The Dot and The Line: A romance in lower mathematics.

Also, a live-action version of The Simpsons opening scene from the UK.

www.plan59.com has a great a selection of mid-20th centurty illustration. Things like cars, trains, ships, people, advertisements, etc. Prints can be had a reasonable prices. In a few weeks it might look like this web site has thrown up all over the insides of my house.

First there was santorum, now there is napoli…  South Dakota’s new abortion ban includes an exemption for the mother’s life, but even that exception has some pretty out there criteria.

BILL NAPOLI: A real-life description to me would be a rape victim, brutally raped, savaged. The girl was a virgin. She was religious. She planned on saving her virginity until she was married. She was brutalized and raped, sodomized as bad as you can possibly make it, and is impregnated. [PBS NewsHour]

Hat tip to Day of the Deadly. Link to http://www.smartbitchestrashybooks.com/billnapoli and help get it to the top of Google’s search resuls. Background info here.

While it’s very nice that most libraries allow you to access your account online to do things requesting books, renewing books, etc. - the one thing most don’t do you is notify you when something is due.  Mine will email me if it’s been overdue for too long, but not until after I’ve racked up some fines.

Elf is a new service that adds email alerts to your library account, so you can get a reminder before the book is overdue.  It also goes the extra mile with SMS alerts to your mobile phone or an RSS feed for your new aggregator.  Elf can also monitor multiple accounts in one interface, in case you have cards from multiple libraries.  Here in KC, Elf currently works with the KCMO and Johnson County, KS libraries.

Special bonus: These guys are in O’Canada, beyond the reach of the Patriot Act’s domestic spying.

Last night we did the First Friday thing, taking in some photography and a surpise chair exhibit…  The photoraphy included Rafael Garcia at Studio Salvador (923 W. 17th), student work from the KC Art Institute’s Crossroads Gallery (18th & Main), and a huge exhibition of the works of Mexican photographer Manuel Alvarez Bravo.  The last one was at the Belger Arts Center, an interesting venue where the art shares space with the original industrial tenant instead of the usual KC M.O. of rehabbing an abandoned warehouse.

Also at the Belger was a surprising exhibit of chairs and 20th century chair design, curated by Retro Inferno’s Rod Parks. It featured some really cool pieces by the likes of van der Rohe, Breuer, and Saarinen.  I went to a university with lots of Saarinen and van der Rohe buildings, and didn’t realize they also designed furniture.