Peter Shortland: March 2006

26 Mar 2006

'99 Red Balloons' Video to Air for an Hour

NEW YORK (AP) - They're kidding, right? VH1 Classic will present a full hour of the English and German music videos for the 1984 hit "99 Luftballons," aka "99 Red Balloons," by German rock group Nena.The music video presentation, to air Sunday (2 p.m. EST), caps off the cable channel's "Pay to Play for Hurricane Katrina Relief," which raised over $200,000 for Mercy Corps, a humanitarian relief organization.Viewers could request one video to be played on VH1 Classic for every $25 donation. For a $35,000 donation, they could select an hour's worth of music videos from the 1960s through the early 1990s.However, one viewer chose something different for his allotted hour, requesting continuous playing of "99 Luftballons," said VH1 spokeswoman Maura Wozniak."99 Luftballons" is a Cold-War era protest song that tells the story of 99 red balloons floating into the air, triggering an apocalypse when the military sends planes to intercept them.

23 Mar 2006

Free printable cardboard lens hoods

This site contains PDF documents that can be printed and cut out to make lens hoods for a variety of 35mm and digital SLR camera lenses. Lens hoods give better quality photographs by reducing flare caused by nonimageforming light.

22 Mar 2006

Wily coyote caught in New York's Central Park - Yahoo! News

NEW YORK (Reuters) - A coyote that came to New York to dine on duck in Central Park was caught on Wednesday after leading police and park rangers on a two-day chase.The coyote, a year-old, tawny-colored male, which is thought to have made its way to the city from the countryside to the north, was tracked down near 79th Street inside the 843-acre (341-hectare) park, officials said

20 Mar 2006

Neil Gaiman - Good Omens

First published in 1990, Neil Gaiman and Terry Pratchett’s brilliantly dark, screamingly funny take on the last judgment of humankind has in the past sixteen years grown from cult favorite to contemporary classic, a book adored by fans of both of these enormously talented and successful authors. This new publication of GOOD OMENS is made even more special by the use of two different black and white dust jackets portraying the book’s central characters, the “demon” Crowley and the “angel” Aziraphale. Included with the original text is a foreword by the authors, the authors’ answers to “Frequently Asked Questions” about the book, and a piece by Gaiman regarding Pratchett, and one by Pratchett speaking of Gaiman.

18 Mar 2006

How to Cover Your Book with FlapArt

FlapArt measures about 22 inches in length and about 9 1/4 inches in height and fits most standard sized hardcover books. If your book is a little thicker, there is room on both ends to accommodate this. If your book is less than 9 1/4 inches in height, FlapArt can be folded up to an inch on the top and then another inch on the bottom to allow for a better fit. Simply take your current cover off of your hardcover book and fold the FlapArt to fit your book. You can use the cover you took off to make sure the folds are exact. Don't worry if your folding is a little off! People will be too busy laughing to even notice!

book binding yourself with instruction & techniques from the art of bookbinding

Book binding carries us back to the time when leaden tablets with inscribed hieroglyphics were fastened together with rings, which formed what to us would be the binding of the volumes. We might go even still further back, when tiles of baked clay with cuneiform characters were encased one within the other, so that if the cover of one were broken or otherwise damaged there still remained another, and yet another covering ; by which care history has been handed down from generation to generation. The binding in the former would consist of the rings which bound the leaden tablets together, and in the latter, the simple covering formed the binding which preserved the contents.Read more at www.aboutbookbinding.com

17 Mar 2006

Flying Cow Leaves Two Police Cars in Flames

A cow came flying out of its trailer, sent DPS and police scrambling, and left two police cars going up in flames.Talk about a wild night near Seguin."It was almost hard to believe," said Detective Sergeant Maureen Watson. She has been in law enforcement for 15 years, and says she "never had a day like this. I mean the best way to characterize this it, is it's bizarre. It's really really strange."It's strange be

Build a Better Leprechaun Trap

Ready for a little St. Patrick's Day magic? It turns out that your kids aren't the biggest mischief-makers around. This time of year, some other little people are thought to be stirring up trouble – and fun.

12 Mar 2006

How to tear Phone Books

If you ask around, the chances are pretty good that someone has seen a phone book 'being ripped in half' or knows of someone who does it, although it remains a feat of strength that almost seems superhuman. The purpose of this article is to de-mystify the tearing of a phone book and show you just how easy it can be.

9 Mar 2006

Trapped in cubicles

NEW YORK (FORTUNE Magazine) - Robert Oppenheimer agonized over building the A-bomb. Alfred Nobel got queasy about creating dynamite. Robert Propst invented nothing so destructive. Yet before he died in 2000, he lamented his unwitting contribution to what he called "monolithic insanity."Propst is the father of the cubicle. More than 30 years after he unleashed it on the world, we are still trying to get out of the box. The cubicle has been called many things in its long and terrible reign. But what it has lacked in beauty and amenity, it has made up for in crabgrass-like persistence.NEW YORK (FORTUNE Magazine) - Robert Oppenheimer agonized over building the A-bomb. Alfred Nobel got queasy about creating dynamite. Robert Propst invented nothing so destructive. Yet before he died in 2000, he lamented his unwitting contribution to what he called "monolithic insanity."Propst is the father of the cubicle. More than 30 years after he unleashed it on the world, we are still trying to get out of the box. The cubicle has been called many things in its long and terrible reign. But what it has lacked in beauty and amenity, it has made up for in crabgrass-like persistence.

6 Mar 2006

A fowl tale

A fowl taleSomebody in Roslindale is deeply offended by the bikini-clad rubber-chicken doggie chew toys in the window of Pet Cabaret on Washington Street. Lisa Di Pietro, one of the pet supply store's owners, reports on her Pet Talk at Pet Cabaret about a phone call from an irate man:''He asks how he is supposed to walk his children by our store and explain to them why there are naked chickens in the window."The other owner, Lisa Schlossberg, ''explained to him that all chickens are naked, they usually don't wear clothes." And the chicken ''was wearing a purple polka-dot bikini, and so was not naked.''He remained unconvinced. He threatened to call the mayor's office and report us. (I am not sure which department of Mayor Menino's office deals with rubber chickens.)"

Space station to be completed in 2010, just in time to spot the giant monoliths

The heads of the five space agencies in charge of the International Space Station (ISS) have held talks on the future of the facility.The agency chiefs from Canada, Russia, the US, Europe and Japan met at Nasa's Kennedy Space Center in Florida.

Peter Shortland