beautiful

The Channelled Scablands

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Last weekend my wife, son and I drove out of the city (in a rented car! Luxury!) to see a natural formation that’s unique in the world: The Channelled scablands of central Washington. Great name, huh? For those of you who don’t know about the scablands, Dry Falls and Lake Missoula, here’s a quick ‘n’ dirty explanation: Thirteen thousand years ago during the end of the last ice age, much of Montana was covered by a body of water we now call Lake Missoula. Ice dammed a river valley in Idaho, creating a body of fresh water larger than several of the Great Lakes.

You won’t be surprised to hear that eventually, the ice melted, the water broke through the dam, and the largest flood ever in the history of our planet was unleashed. Over the course of three days, a 300-ft-deep flood raced across Idaho, Washington and into Oregon as it raced to the sea. The effects of this flood are still most prevalent in the central Washington area near Grand Coulee. There was a Nova program that covered this: Mystery of the Megaflood, but it doesn’t appear to be one of the shows they offer for free online. Maybe you can borrow it from the library, like we did.

What this means is that, out in the desert of central WA, are the effects of floods of water writ large. You know the ripples you see in sand when waves flow over them? Well, look at the land formation above this small town:

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Those gigantic humps are marks of the flood. Crazy, isn’t it?

More below the cut, including Dry Falls, an ice age waterfall ten times larger than Niagra Falls. Continue reading

Randomness for 8/8

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1) The alphabet, carved on the tips of pencils.

2) Kanye West Tweets combined with New Yorker cartoons. It’s not exactly Nietzsche Family Circus, but, um…

3) I don’t even know what to say about this news story. My initial shock at reading it has lessened as I realize this sort of thing isn’t unusual. It wouldn’t be newsworthy at all if not for the Facebook connection.

4) What a bestseller’s marketing push looks like. Someday, this will be me.

5) Amazing Lego Animation. Not for some technical razzle dazzle, but because it is so simply shot and effective. Video

6) It’s hard to believe this isn’t partly cgi in post, but this is a 3D projection onto a building, and it’s mindblowing. Video.

7) “But now, I have successfully shown that I was the best slave.” A New York high school valedictorian delivers a controversial speech against the public school system in which she excelled.

Randomness for 7/28

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1) Mom creates tableaus to illustrate what she imagines her sleeping baby is dreaming.

2) Via Sherwood Smith: Jane Austen’s Fight Club. (added later: Yeah, this has been going around for the past couple of days, but I’m not going to yank it just in case someone here still hasn’t had a chance to check it out.)

3) Introverts unite! (quietly).

4) Poppy Z. Brite, Tim Wildmon, and The Home Depot. I’m so tempted to send (anonymously) a copy of CoF to the AFA so they can boycott me, too. I could use the publicity.

5) Random House and Andrew Wylie clash over ebook publication.

6) How self-absorbed people behave: political columnist writes open letter to his ex on her wedding day and reacts badly when he’s criticized for it.

7) And we mourn the end of an era: No more blowing up Michael Jackson zombies with your cornapult.

“Step into my cage:” thoughts on Sorcerer’s Apprentice (plus bonus family stuff)

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Yesterday we planned to go to the beach, hit the library and head downtown to watch SORCERER’S APPRENTICE. The weather report promised us that the day would be mostly cloudy, leading to a drizzle at the end of the day. Being Seattle-ites, we headed to the beach anyway. Being Seattle, the day turned clear and beautiful. And me without my sunscreen.

We played Frisbee golf (more like Frisbee putt putt), built driftwood shelters on the beach, took photographs at low tide, (Oh, look! a bald eagle in flight!:
One of the park's eagles. Wish I could have zoomed in farther.

The full but rather small set is on flickr here. ) ate a picnic, dropped off and picked up books at the library, then… the movie!

Non-spoiler version: Fun but unsatisfying. Nic Cage was better than he’s been in a big-budget film in a while and Jay Baruchel really sells the nerdy hero character he’s signed up for. But while individual scenes and sequences are a lot of fun, the movie as a whole doesn’t add up. Like too many films that involve stopping bad guys from casting a world-ending spell, it feels like watching a game of Calvinball where everyone goes home before the end.

SPOILER VERSION: Sorry, but this got long Continue reading

Randomness for 7/16

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1) Letters written to fictional characters by actual people. I like this one, this one, this one and this one. And now I can’t help but wonder what letter I would write.

2) Proving there’s a niche blog for everything (until someone creates a niche blog you never even thought of before): Handsome Men Who Are Now Dead.

3) Prank rollercoaster photos. Maybe not entirely safe for work, but not too bad.

4) via Steve Barr: Ferris Beuller is Tyler Durdin!. And now in video form (which I can’t watch at work.)

5) If movie titles were honest. The funny ones make up for the dumb ones.

6) The 100 Best places to appreciate art online.

7) How to ask Thomas Pynchon for an author blurb.

Randomness for 7/10

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1) Ever wonder why the left protests G8 and G20 meetings? It’s because of this sort of thing.

2) Rick Riordan goes from adult midlist mystery writer to bestselling kids author. How sad is it that I didn’t even *know* the dude wrote mysteries for adults?

3) Furniture designed for small spaces. These designs are fantastic.

4) Lady Gaga in everyday situations.

5) And you thought authors got a small cut: How much do musicians really make?

6) This randomness collection is more political than most: Friedrich Hayek’s The Road to Serfdom in comic book form, which first appeared in 1945. BTW, did you know that Hayek thought we should have universal health care?

7) Quote of the day: “…it’s an easy, quick read, suitable for wallowing in decadence for a day on the beach and then entirely forgetting about afterward. Alternatively, one can forget about it ahead of time — and that’s what I recommend.” Andrew Wheeler, reviewing Bret Easton Ellis’s Imperial Bedrooms.

Randomness for 6/17

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I sure am posting a lot of these lately.

1) How to save lives.

2) How to clean oil off a pelican.

3) How to tell a completely believable story.

4) How to make crappy Hollywood movies.

5) How to plot a novel, Glenn Beck style

6) How to unveil a secret place in the middle of a city.

7) How to write a bad query (with true-life examples!)

Randomness for 6/8

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1) Ever wonder what happened to the Star Wars Kid?

2) Corpse flower blooms in Pasadena.

3) Examining the economic struggles of the publishing industry, graph-style. Part one. Part Two. Part Three. Part Four. Part Five.

4) I guess the PMRC didn’t take up all her time. I especially like the glacier and portrait portfolios.

5) Line art and the brain. I’m going to show this to my wife when she gets a quiet moment.

6) Do YOU want to help a legendary high school funk band play a live show when the documentary about their time together in the ’70’s and their modern day reunion plays at the LA Film Festival? They’re asking for donations to cover travel costs. There’s swag, too.

7) How sad am I that this is only photoshopped? Considering that I’m laughing like an idiot over it, only a little sad. I wonder if Patrick Stewart has made peace with the fact this sort of thing is going to dog him for the rest of his days?

Randomness for 6/4

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1) When someone says “Don’t touch me,” you should stop touching them.

2) Mole man’s borer misses the Baxter Building by quite a bit. Article.

3) My brother-in-law is curating and art exhibit. If you’re in NYC, check it out.

4) Diana Comet Presents…75 Years of Fabulous Writers via Sandra McDonald.

5) How did Ulysses S. Grant become a charicature? A fascinating take on a part of history that was written by the losers.

6) I don’t usually link to the Freakonomics blog (those guys sometimes seem to value iconoclasty over accuracy) but this is someone else’s research: The Visible Hand, how a presenter’s skin color affects online sales. Nothing surprising there, but it’s interesting information. Don’t read the comments.

7) Sixteen truly Geeky workstations. Personally, I’ve wanted a walkstation for a while. Also, I’d only pay 40 grand for a computer chair if it came inside a Mercedes.

Randomness for 5/28

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1) Cut paper art.

2) Dawn’s Wedding Chapel.

3) Subtitles for the Asian DVD release of THE TWO TOWERS

4) Everyone loves looking at creepy dolls, right?

5) Seasonal Cake Wrecks.

6) Why the bad guys in River City Ransom say “BARF!”

7) All of today’s links came from Sherwood Smith’s Birthday thread. There are many, many more wonderful things there, including a bunch of videos that I can’t check out and can’t link to. Wish Sherwood a happy birthday (and treat yourself to one of her books, if you haven’t before), check out the other wonderful links, and maybe you can offer something yourself.