I sure am glad I went to college.

what.

2008-08-20T03:52:48Z

Watch the video that Jonathan posted first!

2008-05-05T12:18:58Z

Then watch this one...

2,4,6,8, I can't not procrastinate!

2008-04-13T16:51:24Z

I'm supposed to be working on an animation right now. I'm sort of doing this, but I decided to take an internet break. Check out the delicious breakfast I made for myself this morning:

That was another tool of procrastination. I started doing actual work soon after I ate and ended up completely forgetting about my coffee, which is now cold, but I'm drinking it anyway. I should probably get back to work now. But wait, before I do that, look how cute my dog is:

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(I guess that making-fun-of Jonathan format is a thing of the past. I'll be going back to rarely posting about pretty much nothing interesting.)

OMGOMGOMGOMGOMGOMG

2008-04-04T22:06:08Z

These are the New Kids on the Block. And they are back, motherfuckers. OH YEAH.

I AM SUCH A SLACKER!

2008-04-02T13:48:08Z

bad enough...

Some things are better left unexplained. But obvy, the Chihuahuas and the Yorkies are competing for creepiest-looking, tiniest dog in the world, with wrinkleface there holding it down for cute drunk breeds.

And just for good measure, the world's ugliest dog as of 2007, also a Chihuahua:

This is one of my favorite songs ever...

2008-03-31T01:45:33Z

...but the video is still totally weird and ridiculous. I believe, however, the band are dressed like the guy who inspired the song...the sick fuck. But yeah, that's pretty cool.

This fluffy little ball of stinky and indifferent love is Oryctolagus cuniculus, or the Netherland Dwarf rabbit. Don't you just want to stick your nose right into the axis of snorgling and go to town? I do! Netherland Dwarfs' heads and eyes are disproportionately large with respect to their bodies, and their ears are tiny and carried high on the head. Additionally, their faces are rounded and shortened. These features, a part of the animals' dwarfism, cause them to look infantile even into adulthood. Excellent!

ps- Sorry I missed yesterday. I know everyone is really upset about it, so here's a bonus video. This is for Melanie, in the event that she sees this. Check out that 'stache.

jacket on or off? can't decide!!!

2008-03-29T00:27:40Z

You really only need to watch about 15 seconds of this video to get the gist.

These adorable finger warmers are Callithrix (Cebuella) pygmaea, the smallest monkey in the world. These particular ones are actually babies, but LOOK HOW SMALL THEY ARE. I love the pygmy marmoset.

Also, on a side note, James Carville and Mary Matalin are going to be moving to New Orleans. I don't know if anyone else thinks this is pretty awesome, but I personally will be walking around with my copy of All's Fair just in case I happen to run into them on the street.

So, if you're going to make a video to serve as a scathing commentary on the record industry...

2008-03-27T20:02:13Z

...you really should try a little harder to come up with an idea. I picked this song mostly because it got stuck in my head at some point in the past day and I can't stop thinking about it.

That's Thumbelina. She is a dwarf miniature horse...that's a miniature horse with dwarfism. While I know this blog isn't about very specific exceptionally small animals, I feel like Thumbelina should get a nod. She is just so incredibly small at 17.5 inches tall and 57 lbs - not just the smallest living horse, but the smallest ever recorded in history. Her handler takes her around the country, in the Thumby-mobile, visiting schools and sick people...which is nice...but I really hope that they don't put any outfits on her. Am I the only person who thinks that she might be the smallest and saddest horse in the world?

make that 110%

2008-03-26T19:55:10Z

This is Homopus signatus, the world's smallest tortoise. They grow to be between 6 and 8 cm and are so small that even birds attack this little tortoise. That's quite small!

Yes, I recall...

2008-03-26T02:17:20Z

This is Sphaerodactylus ariasae, the world's smallest gecko and one of the two smallest known reptiles. This dwarf gecko measures 16mm from snout to tail and can fit on a quarter. That's insanely small!

not everything about 1993 was good...

2008-03-24T18:56:24Z

This is Glaucidium passerinum, which are widely referred to as "owlets" and are the smallest owl. There are many different species of pygmy owls, the one pictured being the Eurasian variety. Compare the bird-to-hand sizes. He's all, "I'm small? O RLY?" YA, you're RLY small!

unrelated bonus video that I 2/3 like because it's awesome/ridiculous and 1/3 like because the car in the video is the sedan version of my station wagon:

One for all, and...

2008-03-23T22:42:47Z

This is Craseonycteris thonglongyai, also known as the "bumblebee bat." It weighs as much as a dime. That's very small!

New format

2008-03-22T15:44:26Z

I've suddenly decided, completely out of the blue, to switch blog formats. This LiveJournal will from now on feature horrible 90's music videos accompanied by a picture of the smallest animal within a specific genus.

This is Hippocampus denise, the world's smallest seahorse. It measures in at less than 2 cm high. That's small!

A Grey Area south of the Bay Area

2008-03-10T20:37:01Z

http://www.ci.santa-ana.ca.us/pd/Graffiti.asp

And a Graffiti Task Force sponsored by the Art Institute of California and Target! What kind of art school can claim that no graffiti is ever art and still call themselves an art school? At any rate, check out the informative PDF displaying how to tell if your child is a tagger.

if you haven't seen it yet...

2008-02-28T17:15:53Z

Jimmy Kimmel's response to sarah silverman's "I'm fucking Matt Damon" video is at least 45x's funnier.

my neighbor is a moron

2008-02-27T15:36:23Z

6 AM. so, i'm peacefully sleeping, when i hear a man talking loudly for a while. i can't tell if it's on the other side of the wall (where noise usually emanates from, in the form of loud tv or electronic music) or in our house or outside. then, i get jolted awake by my doorbell ringing. not just ringing...RIIIIIINGIIIIIING. button held down for seriously a minute. so i'm like 'this has to be something important.' no one else got out of their rooms to go to the door, so i'm all fumbling around in the dark for my jacket. i head downstairs, and just as i'm getting to the door i think about home invasions and helen hill and all that stuff, so i'm like, maybe i should have let lester come down with me. i open the door very cautiously and it's this dude i've never seen before. i say "can i help you?" he's like, "i'm just trying to get into my house." (very obviously drunk and whatever) and i say "ok. but you rang OUR doorbell." keep in mind that i can barely see this dude because i'm half awake and completely out of it. he then says something about a grand conspiracy, so i shut the door in his face and go upstairs. i tried to go back to bed, but i hear this huge banging noise and something glass tumbling around. he's all talking to himself and yelling for his roommates and crap. i cannot sleep. i went downstairs to tell emily to watch out for him and take a shower, because i am so not getting back to sleep. this stupid motherfucker then spends the next hour or so...KICKING IN HIS LIVING ROOM WINDOW. seriously.

who wants to hear me talk about my mac dilemma some more?

2008-01-17T20:32:42Z

ok, so several of you have already been subjected to my frustrations with tuesday's keynote at the macworld expo. my beef is not so much in what WAS announced as what WASN'T. things that were announced: fluff for existing peripherals that i do not own because i am a poor person and/or do not need said things and a totally new notebook that is completely uninteresting and useless to me. DO NOT WANT. but on the other hand...

now, one would have expected there to be some sort of update on the macbook pro. SOMETHING. better chips, perhaps the fancy new trackpad that's being introduced on the new macbook air, or maybe even a price drop since they aren't doing a freaking thing with mbp's right now, but nooooooooo. the G4 is on it's way out and i'm going to need a replacement machine pretty soon. as in, probably within a couple of months...ideally right now. the people who i've talked to about this all insist that i should just get the mbp now, but my gut says "NO!" See, if I bought a mbp, say, today and a month or two down the line they introduce new features, the best of which is the new trackpad, i'll be a little peeved, but i could manage to avoid buyers remorse. now...if the best of the newest features includes new processors, well...i would be very pissed off. that's not something i'm ready to deal with. i know apple is always behind the game on processors, but if i'm dropping 3k of money that i don't even actually have on a new setup (to do some fairly heavy lifting with, taking into account the applications i use/will be using on my machine), i don't want to be surprised by something like that after the fact. it's just not going to be ok with me. as it is, if i were to buy a mbp today, i would drop the extra money on the 2.6 GHz.

i'm almost done boring you into a coma.

also, this may sound kind of ridiculous, but i'm also considering getting the 17" model instead of the 15.4". seriously. i don't foresee dropping a grand on a big, pretty LCD HD monitor anytime soon (though having one would be nice) and, for my purposes, it does make sense. but have you ever seen one in person? THEY ARE SO LARGE! and they weigh almost 7lbs. i'm not sure i could get that into my backpack.

any thoughts on that? even though i have a feeling i know what everyone is going to say already. at any rate, thanks for listening. here is your reward...puggles!

ps- what i REALLY wanted to be announced was a new macbook pro TABLET. that would have been so amazing. but who was i kidding...

Dr. Frank gets ripped off in a whole new way

2007-12-10T19:12:26Z

ok, i'm now going to basically just re-post dr. frank's blog from yesterday here, because it's two videos that are pretty funny and i think my readership of four will appreciate at least one of them. some of you will like both (just jane, actually).

video #1:

video #2 (i might have kant permanently adhered to my body, but that doesn't mean i like him):

saints on monday night football tonight. come over and watch it if you still give a shit about this season.

i really hope you like pictures of birds

2007-11-18T00:10:29Z

because i took an S LOAD of them earlier today on my camera phone. i was hanging out by the bird section at pet smart while i waited for the guitar tech next door and made a friend. we spent a good 20 minutes hanging out and i REALLY wish i could have taken him home...sigh.

also, for auralee:

this one appears to have no specific political affiliations...

speaking of animals with affiliations, lester finally got a new collar:

WHO DAT!

I got a gig and a half cooler...

2007-10-19T23:38:42Z

I upgraded my RAM! My PowerBook is now maxed out at 2 GB of sweet and beautiful, glorious random access memory. BOOYAH.

Next week....NEW MAC OPERATING SYSTEM!!!!!!!!!!!! It's like christmas for my compy!

my best bird friend

2007-09-15T23:22:27Z

My bird Sunny died today. If you've ever been to my parents' house, you've probably seen her, and maybe even had the opportunity to scratch her head. Small, pretty, yellow, and unbelievably sweet. She'd been sick and I had been telling my parents that she should go to the vet. Today, my dad brought her to the avian specialist, who told him that she was egg-holding and they would need to go in and operate on her to remove the egg and give her a hysterectomy so that it wouldn't happen again. This was going to be almost $500. My mother wasn't into that idea, so apparently they had her put down. I can tell my dad's pretty upset about it, he always loved that bird.

Honestly, if I had been told that they were going to put her down right now, I'd have put up the $500 myself. Not that I have it, but she's been a good friend for the past 14 years. This is a bird who was too little to eat when she came into my house back when I was in middle school. We would make warm bird formula for her and feed her with a big plastic syringe. This is also a bird who we were sure would have died in my parents' house after the hurricane, having no one around for weeks to give her fresh food or water. I remember being on the phone with my mom when they went back to their house and as they were walking through the door I could hear Sunny just screeching like she was so excited someone was finally home. We were all so glad she was alive.

Anyway, I guess it's just one of those weeks for pets. I miss my bird but I've got a lot of good memories...

my missed connection (part 2)

2007-08-24T18:18:55Z

http://neworleans.craigslist.org/mis/404911447.html

my missed connection

2007-08-08T14:44:05Z

http://neworleans.craigslist.org/mis/392093301.html

copyright melissa guion, dicks.

2007-06-27T15:42:33Z

ok, so i'm embarking on designing a series of new orleans trading cards. each card will represent one neighborhood in the city proper and feature a non-human representative brandishing a weapon. here are my ideas so far:

UPTOWN
roach with gun

MID-CITY
cat with crowbar

LAKEVIEW
yorkie with golf club

FRENCH QUARTER
rat with switchblade

CBD
pigeon with ???

N.O. EAST
swarm of crickets (darin's idea) with the sorts of weapons you use in a streetfight such as socks full of rocks and chains, etc*

9th WARD
pittbull with ???

i would like some input here. what other neighborhoods should be inlcuded? jane thinks i should do the westbank and their representative should be a nutria. *as far as the current idea for the east, since i'll be working within a fairly small frame, i'm not sure if i'm going to be able to get away with that much detail, though i do really like the idea of the cricket gang. N.B., i'm not trying to portray animals as having any human characteristics. i want them to appear themselves in their regular capacity as non-human residents of new orleans...but with weapons. this kind of rules out darin's awesome idea of having an SUV as one of the weapons (CBD). also, the design of the cards are going to be like portraits- possibly in a frame, but definitely having a solid background or minimally distracting pattern with a banner at the bottom for the name of the neighborhood. i'm starting preliminary sketches tonight. i'm hoping to have at least half of the characters drawn and in my digital workshop by next week.

ok. let me know what you think.

i'm in love with the pizza fairy and other fairly stupid tales

2007-06-21T20:03:12Z

earlier today, i was on the phone with a certain boyfriend of mine, who i jokingly asked to bring me a pizza. an hour later, he calls me saying he's on campus to print out some stuff and that he wants to say hi. when i go out to meet him, he points towards the bushes and says something about someone leaving something over there. lo and behold, there's a delicious pizza gazing up at me. a certain boyfriend of mine is awesome.

have you met pleo?

here's what the manufacturer's website says about this little dinobot, spliced with pictures of pleo that i think are either cute or absurd.

>>>THE WORLD'S FIRST LIFE FORM

Can a long-extinct species be resurrected? UGOBE designers and engineers studied the long extinct Camarasaurus, a dinosaur from the Jurassic period. Pleo, a UGOBE Life Form is the authentic recreation born from that study. UGOBE's designers and engineers recreated Pleo's physiology from the fossils of the original. His height and weight are consistent with that of a one-week old infant Camarasaurus.

Pleo is a 'designer species'. He incorporates all the basic traits of autonomous life. He is specifically engineered and enhanced to mimic life and relate to his owner on a personal level.

you and pleo can get drunk together

Pleo is equipped with senses for sight, sound, and touch. He learns as he explores his environment. He will exhibit genuine reactions to sensory stimuli. Every Pleo begins life with certain tendencies but, interaction with his environment has subtle effects on his behavior. Every Pleo eventually exhibits a unique personality.

Pleo is capable of expression. He can feel joy and sorrow, anger and annoyance. When Pleo is tired, he will become drowsy and go to sleep—even dream.

pleo is "sleeping"

Two or more Pleos will recognize one another. Be careful though. They can transmit colds to each other. Achoo! Pleo even sneezes!

that is fucking ridiculous.

FRIEND AND COMPANION

Pleo is a one-week old infant Camarasaurus from the Jurassic period. Camarasaurus were born and raised in giant fern forests. They evolved camouflage that allowed them to blend with their environment of ferns, moss and ruff, the detritus that littered the forest floor. The first Pleo created is a Fernback. His markings help him to survive by hiding among the giant fern fronds in his habitat.

Pleo is an authentic Life Form. Treat him gently like any other living thing.

like this

Your Pleo will let you know how he feels at any moment. That's because he is capable of actual emotions including joy, aggression, sorrow, and fear. He can also yawn, sigh, sniff, sniffle, snore, cough, hiccup, and sneeze.

Pleo wants to explore his environment.

your cat is going to hate pleo.

He will be cautious when he walks to the edge of a table. He may cry when he is frightened. Pleo will stretch when he first wakes up. He may stomp his foot for food when hungry.

whereupon he will attempt to eat you

When Pleo grows tired, lay him down and attach his 'dream cord' so he can sleep, dream, and gather energy for more exploration. <<<

this dude is going to cost something like $350 for the inevitable pending consumption of your body when this thing starts growing and becomes smarter than you. i think one gadget critic made a good point when he questioned the logic behind inviting, not only a robot, but also a dinosaur into your home. here's what i wonder: is it a good idea for people to form emotional bonds with a machine? i think not.

what do you think?