Portrait of a Master

Much has been written about Philippe Dufour, his mastery of the craft of watchmaking, his insistence on perfection, his stubborn-ness to remain close to the art of his forebears, his open-ness to sharing with collectors and other watchmakers alike.

Dogonauts!!! Before there were manned missions to space, the way was paved by animals; cute, furry animals. Laika was the first cosmonaut, traveling in a low orbit around the earth, before dying of stress, in November, 1957. Later dogonauts Belka and Strelka fared better, not only returning to earth alive, but sending progeny to the Kennedy White House. more inside

Yabusame. Mounted archery then and mounted archery now. Lots 'o links. more inside

The Light and the Land

If you missed the last night's interview, here is a transcript and realplayer video of Q-and-A's interview with Jimmy Wales, the founder of Wikipedia. more inside

His shoe phone no longer rings.... RIP Don Adams, Maxwell Smart of "Get Smart", one of the funniest comedies i remember watching as a kid. "Noooo, not the Craw...the CRAAAWWW!"

NZ health politics are a little....overwrought, aren't they. Hey, just to prove the axis of the U's don't have a monopoly on people who say outrageous stuff. more inside

The World Solar Challenge participants will traverse more than 3,000km over the Australian continent - from tropical Darwin to balmy Adelaide, in cars powered by nothing more than the sun. more inside

Armed dolphins, trained by the US military to shoot terrorists and pinpoint spies underwater, may be missing. What could go wrong? via HuffPo

The Duplex Planet "Since the elderly are already thought of by what they have in common - that they're all old - I try to recast them as individuals. I quote and write about them in order to address the larger world. The audience/reader meets them and comes to feel the characters are familiar, people they might want to spend time with. The men and women whose individualities expose the myths of aging are not extraordinary. They are typical in their unique humanness." Mainly, though, it's about old people saying funny things. more inside

Hoverboy, AWAY! A comprehensive site for all things Hoverboy. more inside

Bentos. Cute as. [via]

Gerin oil (or Geriniol to give it its scientific name) is a powerful drug which acts directly on the central nervous system to produce a range of characteristic symptoms, often of an antisocial or self-damaging nature. Geriniol intoxication has been responsible for the most barbarous and violent events in history. Learn more about Gerin oil and how to avoid it's use.

Negotiating with terrorists works. Discuss.

Curious George: Best Meal of your life? Okay, I searched,and I can't find a thread for this... so I'll start it myself. Last weekend I was lucky enough to have two of the best meals of my life. I'll tell you about them in a second, please tell me about yours. more inside

unblokt Seems like something certain monkeys here would excel at. Insert a relevant sentence between two others; semicolons and hyphens optional. I searched as well as I could - don't flay me if it's a double!

Shades of Aldous Huxley! Apropos of the Anonymous George post below, women are giving up on sex as a method of procreation. Scientists believe it's entire possible to create a child with only X chromosomes and some scientists believe that men may become irrelevant. The question arises: in 10,000 yrs, will Simian XY be able to get any at all? More to the point: WTF? If one can't spend time doing the nasty, how can one expect to find time to clean up the crap?

Curious George - Downloads on Tiger with Mozilla Holla monos. I'm having trouble downloading files from websites. I double click on the file (usually a PDF) and my download window comes up. It shows the status bar and when the bar is all the way to the right, it hangs up and just stays there, not completing the download. I have to cancel the download and as a result the files that I want don't actually download. I've checked my prefs on Firefox (v1.0) and can't seem to crack this nut. Any suggestions?

Glenn Gould - his hat and scarf. It's his birthday today. One of the 20th century's greatest pianists, his recording of Bach's Well Tempered Clavier stands as a monumental musical achievement. The Prelude in C from that work was placed onboard Voyager 1. But along with being an extraordinary prodigy he also had a subversive sense of humor. So in honour of Glenn today, I present to you his hat and scarf.

Curious George: Mold Removal I need help removing mold from my bathroom carpet. more inside