Friday February 10, 2012
In the middle of the last decade, when the economy was still strong, Dick Cheney was still fat and Derek Jeter could still play baseball well, we were all captivated by the resurgent phenomenon of the ninja. Ninjas were everywhere. I mean, you couldn't see them - they're ninjas - but they were everywhere. Then the ninja fad got kind of big and blown out, eventually finding its way in big Hollywood non-blockbusters like The Warrior's Way and Ninja Assassin, leading to an inevitable decline. But throughout it all, we've had the helpful advice of the classic web series/podcast Ask a Ninja. Maybe the herd has moved on to new stuff, like guidos and Gagas, but at least one Ninja is still there for those who call.
Image courtesy of Ask a Ninja
Monday February 6, 2012
Comics are a series of images that, when combined with text (placed in "bubbles"), create a narrative. Classic comics include "Superman", "X-Men", and "Andy Capp". These days, many comics appear on the internet, and among those, a few are about video games. Most of them are about two dudes, fictionalized stand-ins for the creator(s) only cooler and more likable. One of them is Ctrl+Alt+Del, in which the aforementioned stand-ins work in a video game store and make humorous comments about the games they sell and play. If you like video games, and sets of two dudes, you will probably enjoy Ctrl+Alt+Del.
Friday February 3, 2012
Watching TV is easy. According to this thing I saw on TV, Americans watch an average of 7,000 hours of TV a week. That's even more than we spend on the can. But apparently there's this other way of being entertained by stories, called "novels". A novel is a book (like a magazine but bigger) filled with words, and with those words a writer tells you a story. It sounds crazy, I know. I mean, I literally don't know how to write more than 150 words at a time. Tumblog Slaughterhouse 90210 uses quotations from these dead-tree things and applies them to our favorite TV characters and moments. And then, later on, you can say those quotes, and look smart. Nobody will know you're talking about Screech.
Monday January 30, 2012
Now, if you're like I was, in the past, you probably think of talking animals in two ways. One way is animals just bein' animals and then someone, maybe Bob Saget, says something in an "animaly" voice and we understand that this voice is supposed to represent the thoughts of the animal. The other is the super creepy computer-generated perfect lip syncing as seen in horrible movies like Beverly Hills Chihuahua. But Klaatu42's YouTube channel takes advantage of animals' natural jaw-flappin' and times excellent comedy bits to fit within them. Klaatu42 has the most convincing talking animals around, because these animals say things you would expect animals to say. Dumb things. Because they're animals.
Image courtesy of Klaatu42 via YouTube