I recently ran across a design by the artist Nathan Pyle on a T-Shirt at Threadless. Which, in turn, led me to his other works...which are very fun and creative. Here's four of them (with more over at his site). Enjoy.

Knock Knock

Pillows Are Creeps

Where Cursors Come From

An Unfortunate Genetic Inheritance

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Just incredible.

Designed by Richard Fonteneau (lexlogo.com & twitter.com/lexlogo)

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Despite having been a choir-geek from high school through college, I have not seen an episode of Glee yet. I did, however, run across this clip of the University of Oregon Men's a capella group - On the Rocks - doing Lady Gaga's 'Bad Romance'.

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This is the body of David Morales Colón. Instead of a standard viewing coffin/wake scenario, his family, apparently, opted for the lifestyle burial option. I think it's funny that he's STILL not wearing a helmet. I mean, c'mon...what kind of message does this send the kids at the wake?

You know, for years now I have always believed in cremation. But this is a game changer. I'm now thinking me and naked Herzogovenian female aerialists, a barrel full of monkeys (NOT the kids game) and this song playing in a loop.

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I love architecture.

I especially love "green" architecture.

This guy really has it going on. 

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So...exactly how hard is it to even earn minimum wage as a recording artist? Really hard.

London-based information artist/data journalist David McCandless knows...and it ain't pretty.

(originally seen on Mashable)

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Everyone who knows me knows that it takes very little to make me all teary-eyed. I get swept up easily. The James Earl Jones speech about baseball from Field of Dreams ("...The one constant through all the years, Ray, has been baseball..It reminds us of all that once was good, and it could be again...") and that humans-reunited-with-lion-they-raised-from-a-cub video with all of that Whitney Houston music and...<sniff>...

But there's an audio clip I've listened to a dozen times or more that continues to choke me up. This morning, a friend of mine sent me this clip - which he knew I liked - re-edited into a video/image montage. Please enjoy the clip...but listen to the words (I've included them in their entirety below). Here's the incomparable Carl Sagan (by the way, it's from his book, "Pale Blue Dot: A Vision of the Human Future in Space," available here, at Amazon).

The spacecraft was a long way from home.

I thought it would be a good idea, just after Saturn, to have them take one last glance homeward. From Saturn, the Earth would appear too small for Voyager to make out any detail. Our planet would be just a point of light, a lonely pixel hardly distinguishable from the other points of light Voyager would see: nearby planets, far off suns. But precisely because of the obscurity of our world thus revealed, such a picture might be worth having.

It had been well understood by the scientists and philosophers of classical antiquity that the Earth was a mere point in a vast, encompassing cosmos—but no one had ever seen it as such. Here was our first chance, and perhaps also our last for decades to come.

So, here they are: a mosaic of squares laid down on top of the planets in a background smattering of more distant stars. Because of the reflection of sunlight off the spacecraft, the Earth seems to be sitting in a beam of light, as if there were some special significance to this small world; but it's just an accident of geometry and optics. There is no sign of humans in this picture: not our reworking of the Earth's surface; not our machines; not ourselves. From this vantage point, our obsession with nationalisms is nowhere in evidence. We are too small. On the scale of worlds, humans are inconsequential: a thin film of life on an obscure and solitary lump of rock and metal.

Consider again that dot. That's here. That's home. That's us. On it, everyone you love, everyone you know, everyone you've ever heard of, every human being who ever was lived out their lives. The aggregate of all our joys and sufferings; thousands of confident religions, ideologies and economic doctrines; every hunter and forager; every hero and coward; every creator and destroyer of civilizations; every king and peasant, every young couple in love; every mother and father; hopeful child; inventor and explorer; every teacher of morals; every corrupt politician; every supreme leader; every superstar; every saint and sinner in the history of our species, lived there—on a mote of dust suspended in a sunbeam.

The Earth is a very small stage in a vast cosmic arena.

Think of the endless cruelties visited by the inhabitants of one corner of this pixel on the scarcely distinguishable inhabitants of some other corner. How frequent their misunderstandings; how eager they are to kill one another; how fervent their hatreds. Think of the rivers of blood spilled by all those generals and emperors so that in glory and triumph they could become the momentary masters of a fraction of a dot. Our posturings, our imagined self-importance, the delusion that we have some privileged position in the universe, are challenged by this point of pale light.

Our planet is a lonely speck in the great enveloping cosmic dark. In our obscurity—in all this vastness—there is no hint that help will come from elsewhere to save us from ourselves. Like it or not, for the moment, the Earth is where we make our stand.

It has been said that astronomy is a humbling and character-building experience. There is perhaps no better demonstration of the folly of human conceits than this distant image of our tiny world. It underscores our responsibility to deal more kindly with one another, and to preserve and cherish the only home we've ever known.

The pale blue dot.

(P.S. - Dan, thanks for sending the clip along. I hadn't watched for awhile.)

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I'm sure that many of you have already seem both of these. So pardon me if I'm being repetitive. I recently stumbled upon them again and thought they needed a re-post...

K.

- - -

First, the beautiful...

and the shocking...

Special mention needs to go to the Victoria (Australia) Transport Accident Commission. For 20+ years, they've been producing shockingly realistic, real-life road safety ads. In that time, the number of accidents has been reduced by more than 50%. Here's one of them:

Here's where you can see the rest:
http://www.youtube.com/TACVictoria

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My children have not been to McDonalds in 6 years. They refused to go after after watching Morgan Spurlock's documentary, Super Size Me.

In case they were wavering in their decision, this should help cement things.

Via: Online Schools

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(Click on the photo to see more fantastic staircases at Toxel.com) 

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                                                              (OK...I'm LMFAO)

I have enjoyed these for quite some time...and now someone went and put them in a collection just for me (and now for you).

Enjoy them as I have...and before you become just a little more dead inside.

Click here to visit the Flickr Set in all its glory.

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                                      (see more over at iwantoneofthose.com)

• The Pad-Dock turns your iPhone into an iPad!
• The magnifying touch-screen enlarges your iPhone screen and keeps all the features.
• Enlarges iPhone screen to exact iPad screen dimensions.
• iPhone slots into the back panel where it's magnified.
• Ergonomically designed to be cradled in your hand.
• Watch movies, check your emails or do anything else your iPhone does, but on a bigger screen.
• Charges via USB or standard wall plug (cable and adapter included).
• Battery lasts 22 hours with a full charge.
• Suitable for ages 12 years +
•  Size: 25 x 19 x 2.5 cm.

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This kid has some mad skills. Enjoy

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Having trouble keeping up with The Joneses? Never fear. Instead of buying a new car in 2010, use this full-size photo tarp to show off your brand new Beamer (note: more impressively, those stinkin' Joneses will marvel at how unbelievably clean your garage is...suck that Joneses).

What, a new BMW not impressive enough? Then park one of these bad boys in your garage. It not only says "My-SUV-Will-Crush-Your-SUV" and "Worrying-About-The-Environment-Is-For-Obama-Loving-Socialist-Treehuggers," but it will drive them crazy trying to figure out how you got it in there in the first place.

(click on the pictures to visit the originating site, toolmonger.com)

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Google facts & figures (Pingdom)

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This couldn't be any simpler.

First - Pick the four places you go most often...Gmail...Facebook...you get the drill. Next - set it as your homepage. Now you're always one click away from the sites that take up the majority of your time. You're welcome.

(Click on the image to go to the site)

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I bet all the really smart kids in math class started out this way.

           (Click on the image to got to the site)

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(As seen at ohnodoom.com. Click on image to go to site)

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