Beth Bartel’s iceblog! (original) comes to us straight from Antarctica, and how cool is that? See also Antarctica 2003 (which has wrapped up) and Life on the ice (original) (which has not). Felix Salmon’s sister, Rhian, is still blogging from down there — here’s a quick link to just her entries (original) — and I found 75 Degrees South (original) via Rhian. Plus Shackleton diaries (original). Man, Antarctica is a hotbed of blogging. (Props to Metafilter.)
This David Eyre’s Pancakes recipe is ripped whole from the pages of Kids Are Natural Cooks, a cookbook I remember fondly from my childhood. Despite the fact that my name is clearly written in ink on the inside front cover, the cookbook itself is lodged firmly in the hands of my mother. Well, it’s Christmas time, so I shaln’t steal it back. But I will transcribe the recipe. Preheat the oven to 425 degrees. Melt 4 tablespoons butter into a 10-12” skillet, and put the pan in the oven until the butter melts. In a bowl, combine: 1/2 cup flour 1 pinch of cinnamon or nutmeg, but Mom doesn’t use either 1/2 cup milk 2 eggs Stir until flour is mixed in, but leave some lumps in the batter. If you want, you can stir in some fruit, such as blueberries or chopped apples. When the butter has melted, pour the batter into the pan. Bake 15-20 minutes until golden brown. Take the pan out, and sprinkle on 3 teaspoons sugar. Bake for another 5 minutes. Squeeze the juice out of one lemon, take the pancake out of the oven, and pour the lemon juice over the top. ...
Nice little interview with David Twohy, regarding whom I am a staunch fanboy. It’s mostly about Below with a little news about the upcoming three-movie Chronicles of Riddick. (Vin Diesel was here.)
Speaking of maps, holy shit. That’s a lot of map links. (Via Making Light.)
Chris Corrigan’s Maps and Territories (original) is a translucently simple blog. Each entry contains a map, along with a bit of literature that relates to the map. Evocative and, for a map lover like me, irresistable.
I have a strict quota on links to Flash animations. This year, the coveted slot goes to The Elements, by Tom Lehrer. (Via Rick Jones.)
And Larry Niven thought you’d need teleportation to get flash crowds. The Washington Post ran an article about the crowd dynamic created by cell phones. Yet another example of the information revolution hitting us in ways we don’t expect.
Because when it comes to terrifying home exercise marketing material, nothing beats the Gazelle Power Plus (original). I don’t even know where to start with that picture, other than observing that it caused me to break my self-imposed restrictions on low humor. “You’ll believe a man can fly!”
Let’s wrap this puppy up, shall we? In my frenzy of Gen Con recapping, I missed two purchases. First off was Mechanical Dream, a product of my lust for weird French RPGs. Alas, Steam Logic Editions is actually from Quebec. However, that minor flaw doesn’t seem to have kept them from producing the sort of surrealistic dream of a roleplaying game that I expect from the French. It’s a bizarre industrial fantasy world without any humans at all; the social structure of the world is predicated on a specific kind of fruit. If you don’t eat one every week, you die. I have not yet penetrated deeper into the system than that. ...
If one feels so strongly (original) about premature comments, perhaps one should write one’s blog offline and only push it live at 10 PM? Just a thought.