Ah, Canada, that frozen wonderland to the north, with its lush, rolling fields of moose, beer waterfalls, and socialized medicine. Truly, it is a snow covered Eden. This week’s Saturday Morning Cartoons is (mostly) presented by Canada, featuring animators (mostly) from Canada, or films distributed (mostly) by The National Film Board of Canada. If you are so inclined (and you should be) all of these videos, with the exception of the first, can be viewed in a higher resolution on YouTube.

• The Cat Came Back: From Cordell Barker. Mr. Johnson has a yellow cat, which he is desperately trying to rid himself of. His efforts prove…unsuccessful.

• Last Time in Clerkenwell: Russian animator Alex Budovsky’s follow-up to Bathtime in Clerkenwell featuring more mind bending flash animation and infectious music.

• The Danish Poet: Torill Kove’s 2007 Oscar winning mediation on her birth, and the serendipitous events which led to it. Simple, clean lines lend this one a children’s book aesthetic which works perfectly.

• Ryan: Directed by Chris Landreth, Ryan is an animated tribute to Canadian animator Ryan Larkin. Thirty years ago, at the National Film Board of Canada, Ryan produced some of the most influential animated films of his time. Winner of an Oscar in 2005, it’s a film whose visuals tell just as much of its story as its dialogue does.

• How Wings Are Attached to the Backs of Angels: Craig Welch’s fantastic, creepy, surreal, Gorey-esque little film about a scientist’s quest for knowledge that is, perhaps, reserved for beings other than mere mortals. Cross hatching should be used more often in animation.

• Yellow Sticky Notes: Nine years worth of Jeff Chiba Stearns’s To-Do lists, written on sticky notes, animated with, well, sticky notes. Trust me, it works.

• Harvey Krumpet: I’m a big fan of Australian animator Adam Elliot’s work, having first seen his shorts Brother, Uncle, and Cousin through The Animation Show. Harvey Krumpet, narrated by Geoffrey Rush, continues the tradition of Elliot’s intimate storytelling; detailing the life of Harvey Krumpet, from his birth in Poland to the end of his life in Australia.

Saturday Morning Cartoons XXXIX: Oh Canada (Mostly) [YouTube]

Krazmo attempts to dispel any attempt to discern an over-arching narrative for Don’t Cry sweet potatoes:

I don’t think the theme of the label really has much to do with the type of produce inside. As evidence, I cite the following gallery full of such lovely, obsolete art.

Comment by Krazmo — May 1, 2008 @ 12:55 pm

However, based on the image above it would seem that not all produce imagery is without cohesive thematic intentions. Less can be said for the likes of, say, Gay Johnny Texas Vegetables.

A massive collection of beautiful, Japanese anatomical charts, among other ephemera. I love how they flow from one to the next, creating chains of imagery. The second photo shown above is only a small part of a much longer chain.

Anatomical Charts [Kano Collection, Tohoku University Library] : Morbid Anatomy

Gentlemen, I am outraged.

Your gross negligence in assuming I am ashamed of any of my musical predilections is noted, and will be revenged. There is absolutely no reason to assume, self-righteous pricks that you are, that the carmine creeping up my collar is anything other than stoic pride, a touch of the ol’ toxoplasma gondii, and perhaps a brief spike in my everyday, baseline feelings of discomfort.

Listen you, I was enjoying the Ruski pop nymphets way back, before any hoity-toity English remixes got loose, much less actual American album releases. This shit was edgy and inaccessible. Hell, it still is! I would get home from my live-action Vampire the Masquerade roleplaying session at the local college campus (back when I was a ginger-curled nymphet myself), maybe boot up a game of Fallout 2, invite my BFF Steve over, and we’d watch these videos, on repeat, in silent awe. Why, I thought to myself, did I not have a dark pixie of a partner, an eternal semi-succubus, someone to cling to during the long nights of crippling self-doubt, someone to share my pants and lipgloss, someone to hold my hair while I purged, someone with whom to ghost ride the whip? I mean, someone besides Steve?

Now, emerald-haired, naked in a wooden trunk, chugging Red Bull and typing on a keyboard for which I cannot see the screen, I ask myself: if I had found her, this dark unicorn, would things have turned out better?

But then I think: how could they?

My father and I have long maintained a correspondence of epic intellectual proportions. Usually these take the form of discussions on science and science fiction, Rick Gauger being an award-winning science fiction author, and all-around life of the party.

Recently I sent him a link to a collection of cartoons on the fashion wars of the early 1800s, which were as vicious as they were short-lived. Men and women abandoned the stiff, straight-laced wardrobes of the 1700s and briefly adopted a more modern, flowy, comfortable look. This was the famous Regency era, in which Jane Austen lived and wrote. Unfortunately for fashion, it was quickly destroyed by the severe repression of the Victorian age’s corsets, high heels, and silly hats. Dad, armchair fashion historian, elaborates [with my notes appended, thusly]:

Yes, I’ve always thought it odd that women went out of, and back into corsets in the early 19th Century. In our own time, the 60s got over in a hurry, as women went back to makeup and hairdos in the early 70s. In my century [Dad is 64], I think that the corporations panicked as they saw hair styles, makeup and tailored clothing apparently becoming obsolete, and they put on a major propaganda offensive. The majority of people (including women) never understood the 60s anyway, so they were ready to buy into it. We had a last hurrah of big cars, just at the moment when we should’ve been changing our ways.

Another reason for the quick loss of those styles was that a woman really has to be very good-looking [such as my mother, 54, who to this day refuses to learn how to use an eyelash curler, probably because she’s too busy beating men away from her door with a stout stick] to be able to go without makeup and tailoring. There were a couple of girls among the grad students of 1965 that made me froth at the mouth; most others, however smart and sweet they might be, just didn’t have what it took. One of them was the girl who welcomed me back from my first tour in Vietnam. She came out in a nightie that made her look like a joke. I would have rather died than hurt her feelings at that moment.

Continue Reading…

Found only on the islands of Oahu, Molokai, Maui, and Hawaii, the happy face spider, such as this one guarding its eggs on a leaf in Maui, is known for the unique patterns that decorate its pale abdomen. Scientists believe Theridion grallator may have developed its distinctive markings to discourage birds from eating it.

Yeah, who’d eat such a happy looking guy?

Spider Guarding Eggs, Maui, Hawaii, 2001 [National Geographic] : Pavlov : Coisas : Spluch

This video (and stupidly enjoyable track) must have cost at least a cool million, but the Backstreet Boys didn’t care. They were riding high on Lou Perlman’s buggery adoration, they had legions of teenage girls at their beck and call, and it was the nineties, so nobody bothered telling them (to their faces) how stupid they looked, acted, and sounded.

When you’re that rich, that vaunted, and that young, what can you do? Why, a Thriller rip-off that will live in infamy for a chosen few, of course. Namely, me and the rest of the malcontents who were impressionable youth during that cursed era.

And by impressionable, I mean we thought backflipping werewolves were pretty much the golden apex of comedy. We still think that.

Why am I posting this on Cthursday? Pay attention to the gangly gentleman in the deceptively intellectual glasses, with the briefcase and the obsession with staring away from the camera at exactly a ninety-degree angle. I assume he’s supposed to be some sort of Jekyll/Hyde manifestation, but his bifurcation is less monstrous than it is piscean. My hypothesis is that some concept artist snuck that one past the board, giggling into his dog-eared copy of the Compleat Works of Lovecraft the while.

But I don’t think backflipping werewolves had to be snuck past anyone.

For when your kielbasa must be served steamed. Reduces waist, tummy, hips and thighs, not to mention sperm count.

Wonder Sauna Hot Pants [Boing Boing Gadgets]

In 1908, a blast one thousand times the size of the one that hit Hiroshima vaporized 770 square miles of forest in Siberia. The chap-faced Tungu natives of the bleak Siberian landscape described a sky splitting in two and filling with lakes of holocaustal fire. It is known in scientific circles as the Tunguska Event.

Scientifically, the explanation has always been that a large comet or meteor was to blame, but since no crater was ever found, the assumption has always been that it exploded six or ten miles up in the air. A team of scientists, though, have recently hypothesized that Lake Cheko — previously discarded as the crater site because of silt residue on the bottom of the lake — is the impact crater, quickly filled with melted permafrost from the heat of the blast.

Interesting fun fact: if the asteroid that caused the Tunguska Event had entered the atmosphere a mere four hours and forty seven minutes later, it would have obliterated St. Petersburg. Time to start building those orbital laser cannons.

Crater From 1908 Russian Space Impact Found, Team Says [National Geographic]

It is, after all, only seven weeks away according to the sign I recently saw in a store. It seems to me that Cthulumas begins earlier every year. I mean, the Squid Festival is not even upon us yet and already the newspaper is filled with holiday circulars advertising Cthulhumas sales. It’s depressing to think of how commercialized the holiday has become. People have forgotten its true meaning: madness, death, and the swallowing of souls.

It is, then, with a sense of urgency, nay, impending doom that I submit to you this selection of Cthulumas carols from the H.P. Lovecraft Historical Society. Featuring the Dagon Tabernacle Choir, the Dunwich Children’s Choir, and the Arkham Carolers performing such classics as “Do You Fear What I Fear”, “It’s Beginning To Look A Lot Like Fishmen”, “Oh, Cthulhu”, and Many More!

Along with their respective song books and sheet music, you too can celebrate the spirit of the season, at home with your family or at your cult’s place of worship.

A Very Scary Solstice and An Even Scarier Solstice [H.P. Lovecraft Historical Society]

Behold, beloved Ectomites, the future of sport! Witness the vicious blood feud between Man and Machine; the brutal ballet of Masters of The Sweet Science within the Squared Circle! Thrill as Gladiators with Guts of Gears do battle against the best biological brawlers our species has to offer, the pinnacle of pugilistic perfection! You can’t afford to miss this never in a lifetime event! Free alluvion of alliteration when you mention this post!

Tickets at the door or order by Broca implant.

“I Can Whip Any Mechanical Robot” by Jack Dempsey (Apr, 1934) [Modern Mechanix]

I am constantly reminded of just how difficult a woman’s life is. I am well versed in the entire catalog of Harrowing Tales of Female Oppression. My other has so well indoctrinated in me the canon of Vaginal Unfairness that she no longer even has to keep my testicles in a jar. I am well trained and, therefore, can be trusted with them. With that in mind, I submit this article from a January, 1937 issue of Modern Mechanix entitled “Proving Women Also Have Ideas”.

“Queen of women inventors is Miss Beulah Louise Henry of New York, above. She has earned the title of ‘Lady Edison’ with 43 patents in the past decade for inventions ranging from dolls to sewing machines. One of her most unusual products is a snap-on parasol which permits a woman to have an umbrella to match each frock. She also has devised many things for the aid of office workers.”

Woe to you, the naysayers! Here, now, is irrefutable proof! Had you any doubts, the accomplishments of Miss Henry will surely have laid them to rest.

Proving Women Also Have Ideas [Modern Mechanix]

Cube Skull Teapot: Tea, Blood and Opium, Yixing Series and Heart Teapot: Hostage/Metamorphosis IV

Richard Notkin has an impressive series of ceramic pieces based on the theme of teapots that would look great in any Ectomite’s drawing room. Too bad then that most appear to be quite non-functional, I would have much enjoyed entertaining guests for afternoon tea with one of these. Now if I only had a drawing room.

Richard Notkin [who killed bambi?]

No, that is not a Fabergé egg. As we all know, Fabergé eggs are beautifully-bejewelled eggs. What you see above is a carved eggshell. Dark Roasted Blend (my favorite picture-blog of all) has a decadent gallery of such extraordinarily beautiful, delicate carvings (which are done, incidentally, with the use of high-precision lasers), so be sure to check out the rest!

Eggshells + lasers = Pure Awesomeness(tm).

Exquisite Eggshell Carvings [Dark Roasted Blend]

The Space Negroes Do Generic Ethnic Muzak Versions Of All Your Favorite Punk / Psychedelic Songs From The Sixties by, of course, the eponymous Space Negroes themselves. An album that really needs to be in everyone’s iTunes collection. You can download the entire thing here.

The Space Negroes [Schadenfreudian Therapy] : PCL Linkdump