Saturday, May 29, 2010

Ortiz Sets New Record for 2010's Slowest HR Trot

David Ortiz broke out of his April slump in a big way, and he seems more than willing to enjoy the glow of is returning home run prowess -- to the tune of four home run trots that have lasted at least 28.95 seconds.

According to a website that tracks such things, David Ortiz home run trot last Monday night lasted 30.59 seconds, slowest in the majors this season.

But Ortiz has earned the right to strut. Including his two-run double last night, he's batting .359 with 21 RBI and a .781 slugging percentage this month.

Boston Herald

Ray Stung By Stingray

07:19 AM ET 05.27 |

Ah, the irony. Infielder Sean Rodriguez earned a painful distinction this week he could do without: the first Ray to be stung by a stingray.

Rodriguez was on the beach Monday morning behind his Redington Beach rental condo when he took his 2-year-old daughter, Sofia, a couple of feet into the water for a closer look at some dolphins.

A few steps (and a stingray shuffle or two) later, he saw something flash through the water and felt something on his right heel. "I actually thought it was a catfish at first, that it grazed me. I didn't think much of it," Rodriguez said.

"And then I got out of the water, and I was like whoooaaaa."


St. Petersburg Times

Friday, May 28, 2010

The Olympus PEN Giant Stop-Motion Photography Video



I'm not a big gadget guy, but I found this video at The Chive. According to the original post, the video consists of 355 photos taken with the Olympus Pen. The pictures were printed in billboard size and then re-shot.

Wednesday, May 26, 2010

Tuesday, May 25, 2010

7x13=28


One of my all time favorites. Growing up, we used to get WPIX 11 out of New York. They played SOOOO much Abbott and Costello on Sundays.

Monday, May 24, 2010

If Empire Came Out In The 50s.....



I think that this has already appeared all over the place, but I found it in my Google Reader and finally watched it.

Jim Smash wrote:
Star Wars was inspired by the Sci-Fi Serials of the 30s, 40s & 50s....
The circle is now complete.


About a million people sent me this trailer for a '50s-style Empire Strikes Back, because it is that awesome. Youtube user Whoiseyevan used dozens of sci-fi movies from the '40s and '50s -- and even a few lines from the ESB radio drama -- to make this astounding video. The level of detail is what kills me; I mean, finding clips of two dudes in a Snowspeeder-like spaceship must have been difficult, but this guy found clips where the dudes are wearing helmets that look eerily like the Rebel pilot helmets of Star Wars, and that's only one of many things that are uncannily accurate.

Sunday, May 23, 2010

Total Recall: The Musical



I was just brainstorming a list of some of the best movies by genre with Lee after Haley asked us what each of us felt was our favorite movie. Lots of Schwarzenegger made the lists....

Wednesday, May 19, 2010

Vlad completes trip around bases, Majors


(from mlb.com)

Vladimir Guerrero joined some select company when he hit a home run in the fourth inning of the Rangers' game against the Angels.

Guerrero, facing his former team, led off the fourth with his eighth home run of the season and the first of his career against the Angels. Guerrero played for the Angels from 2004-09 and they were the only franchise that he had not hit a home run against.

So Guerrero now becomes the 32nd player in Major League history to hit a home run against all 30 teams.

"I didn't know that," he said. "I played two games against them in Puerto Rico when I was with the Expos and don't remember what happened. So that is surprising."

Guerrero also has 415 home runs in his career, ranking him 42nd all-time. He was tied with Darrell Evans going into the game.

Saturday, May 15, 2010

When It Rains....

While we did not buy our house because it had a pool, it has turned out to be a HUGE plus. We took the pool cover off last weekend in anticipation of the Pool Guy coming on Tuesday to open it up for us for the season. After he left, Nan spent the afternoon cleaning it. Later that night, she said it looked like the water level had dropped. We watched it for a couple of days and noticed that the water level was indeed dropping.

Well, the Pool Guy returned on Friday and confirmed that Nan must have accidentally torn the liner at a critical juncture near the stairs in the low end. He is not hopeful for a patch to work and believes that if we wish to keep the pool, we are looking at a total liner replacement.


I am trying to view this as just one more thing on our plate, but man....


Thursday, May 13, 2010

Spider-Man, 5/4/10

(click to embiggen)

Super-heroics update! While the sinister Sabretooth disarmed a police officer and fled, our hero nestled his face into his wife’s ample bosom and muttered semi-coherent nonsense. THE AMAZING SPIDER-MAN, EVERYBODY!


via joshreads.com

Tuesday, May 11, 2010

This Day In History


(via Iconic Photos)

McMinnville, Oregon. 7:30 pm. May 11, 1950. Evelyn Trent was walking back to her farmhouse after feeding rabbits on her farm while she saw an unidentified flying object in the sky. She called out to her husband, Paul, who took the above picture. At the urging of a friend, they later submitted the photo to the local newspaper the Telephone-Register, which put it on the front page on June 9th. The Oregonian published the photographs the next day, and within a month they were published in LIFE magazine (June 26 1950).

LIFE subsequently misplaced the negatives and they were through to be lost for 17 years. Since its rediscovery, the photograph had since been subjected to intense scrutiny involving computer analysis and sophisticated scanning and stretching procedures. The Trents’ background was also thoroughly checked. Some thought they hanged an object from the power lines. Some measured the shadows and assumed it was ’staged’ in the morning time. Others insist the Trents’ original resistance to publish the photo was a testament to their honesty. It has never been satisfactorily explained, and some believe it is the best (if not only) authentic UFO photograph. The affair led to a “UFO Festival” being held in McMinnville each year, which is the biggest such gathering apart from Roswell, New Mexico’s.

Monday, May 10, 2010

The family-friendly trailer for The Shining....



This trailer is pitch perfect! It looks like any of those "Dad-works-too-hard-loses-his-way-and-his-family-and-they-take-a-vacation-and-find-themselves!" type of movies. Great choice for music, voice over and scenes.

(found on Armin's site via a "like" by Oran Parker)

Monday, May 3, 2010

This day In History

Gary Thuerk was the world’s first e-mail spammer. He wrote the first ever spam email which was sent out on May 3, 1978 to a network of government and university computers.

In total, 600 unwilling people received his email, which was publicizing open houses in Los Angeles and San Mateo. The reaction from the net community to the email was fiercely negative, but Thuerk’s spam did generate some sales. In fact, Thuerk estimates it led to $12 million in sales.

Since then, spam emails have grown in numbers, with 90% of all e-mails sent today considered as spam. Estimates suggest that as many as 200 billion spam messages are sent daily, and it’s all thanks to Gary Thuerk.


(via Pig Jockey)

Saturday, May 1, 2010

'Embrace Life' safe-driving PSA



Not to get all maudlin on you, but I saw this commercial not a week before our accident and sort of dismissed it, though now it chokes me up. And now after my father dying, it reminds me that he never wore a seatbelt, as he said he wanted to be thrown clear of any accident. That being said, I always expected a call telling me he had died in a car crash. I'm glad that wasn't the case.


I also can't figure out why all my videos are pushed off to the right.

Local boy with cancer turns into a superhero for a day


Originally published April 29, 2010 at 9:39 PM by The Seattle Times

Thursday was shaping up to be just another school day for 13-year-old Erik Martin, but then something extraordinary happened: Spider-Man called.

Spider-Man happens to be one of the few people who knows that Erik, too, has a secret identity — he's Electron Boy, a superhero who fights the powers of evil with light.

And Spider-Man needed Erik's help.

Erik, who is living with liver cancer, has always wanted to be a superhero. On Thursday, the regional chapter of the Make-A-Wish Foundation granted him that wish with an elaborate event that involved hundreds of volunteers in Bellevue and Seattle.

The local chapter, which serves four states, grants more than 300 wishes every year to children with life-threatening medical conditions, but only a few of them involve so many participants.

Pulling off a wish like this one required a big story, and a lot of heart. And so, with a note of panic in his voice, Spider-Man explained the dilemma: "Dr. Dark" and "Blackout Boy" had imprisoned the Seattle Sounders in a locker room at Qwest Field. Only Electron Boy could free them.

Erik got into his red-and-blue superhero costume, and called on the powers of Moonshine Maid, who owns a DeLorean sports car. For good measure, more than 20 motorcycle officers from the Bellevue Police Department and King County and Snohomish sheriff's offices escorted Electron Boy to Seattle.

"They shut down 405 — they shut down I-90," marveled Moonshine Maid, aka Misty Peterson. "I thought it would just be me, in the car."

At Qwest Field, Electron Boy was directed by frantic fans to the Sounders locker room, where the entire team was shouting for help behind jammed doors. With a little help from Lightning Lad, the alter ego of local actor Rob Burgess, Erik opened the door with his lightning rod. The Sounders cheered.

"Thank you, Electron Boy," said defender Taylor Graham.

"You saved us!" exclaimed forward Nate Jaqua.

"Good job, big man," said defender Tyrone Marshall. And forward Steve Zakuani mutely bowed his thanks.

Electron Boy seemed a little dazed by his powers. Out on Qwest Field, the Sounders gave Erik a hero's congratulations, posed for pictures and gave him a jersey and autographed ball.

Everyone was startled when, overhead, the Jumbotron crackled to life.

"Electron Boy, I am Dr. Dark and this is Blackout Boy," sneered an evil voice, as the villain — Edgar Hansen, and his sidekick Jake Anderson, both of Discovery Channel's "Deadliest Catch" — taunted the young superhero. "We are here to take over Seattle and make it dark!"

On the Jumbotron, a video showed a Puget Sound Electric employee Jim Hutchinson trapped in the top of his bucket truck in front of PSE's Bellevue headquarters. Only Electron Boy could save him.

As Electron Boy's motorcade — the DeLorean, the 25 motorcycle officers and a white limo — rolled through downtown Bellevue, pedestrians stopped in their tracks and pulled out their cameras to take pictures. Clearly, somebody famous was in town. But who could it be?

"It's Electron Boy," Erik's older sister, Charlotte Foote, shouted out the window of the limousine.

More than 250 PSE employees gathered outside the company's headquarters and cheered as Electron Boy freed the trapped worker. "It was so loud, people in office buildings were looking out the window," said Make-A-Wish communications director Jeannette Tarcha.

But Dr. Dark and Blackout Boy were still at large. Electron Boy got a tip that the evil duo were at the Space Needle, where they had disabled the elevator and trapped people on the observation deck. Racing back to Seattle, Electron Boy stepped out of the DeLorean to a cheering crowd of dozens of admirers, and confronted his nemesis.

"How did you find us, Electron Boy?" Dr. Dark demanded.

Erik wordlessly leapt at Dr. Dark with his lightning rod, freezing the villain. Then he unlocked the elevator and freed the people trapped upstairs.

Bellevue police Officer Curtis McIvor snapped handcuffs on Dr. Dark and Blackout Boy, who couldn't resist some last words: "How can we thank you for saving our souls?"

A tiny smile played around Electron Boy's mouth. Just for good measure, he held his lightning sword to Blackout Boy's throat again. The crowd went wild. "Hip-hip, hooray!"

Seattle City Councilwoman Sally Bagshaw stepped forward with a key to the city and a proclamation that Thursday was Electron Boy Day. Afterward, Erik posed for the TV cameras, flexed his muscles and spent some time astride a Bellevue police motorcycle.

"He's over the moon," said Foote. "This is definitely beyond anything we thought it would be."

Watching her son run across the plaza in front of the Space Needle, mom Judy Martin said Erik goes to school when he's able, but is often too tired. "He hasn't had this much energy in a long time," she said. "They called it the power of the wish, and they're right."

Like any good superhero, Electron Boy kept his innermost thoughts to himself. But he did have one important thing to say:

"This is the best day of my life."

Katherine Long: 206-464-2219 or klong@seattletimes.com

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