Peter sent me this link to a very charming animation:
(Sorry, it’s Flash again.)
[tags]anime, animation, humor, sweet[/tags]
Over at Kittenbreak.com, things are looking cute…
But some things are rather broken.
May a kindly Providence guard us from the day when we need an adoption lawyer to take home a kitten….
Meanwhile, we keep our use of AdSense to a minimum until we’re sure it can be controlled. 
[tags]Google AdSense, Google, whoops[/tags]
The International Eating Etiquette Test.
The question comes up once again, as the one-cent piece now costs more to produce than it’s worth.
…The U.S. Mint could lose a mint, or $43.5 million, producing the coin this year, according to at least one expert.
…The Mint is also losing a pretty penny on the nickel. The agency, which plans to produce 1.7 billion of them this year, shells out 6.4 cents for each five-cent piece. Yet, there has been far less hoo-ha over the nickel.
“There is more sentimentality associated with the penny,” said Anthony Zito, 53, former president of the Massapequa Coin Club and avid penny collector. “It has a beloved president on it and has inspired a host of sayings, such as ‘penny-wise and pound-foolish,’ ‘a penny saved is a penny earned’ and ‘a penny for your thoughts.’ It is more ingrained in our culture than any other currency.”
Well, the “pound-foolish” saying would have come from the British side of things, or at least the pre-dollar side.
Another take on the situation from further on in the article:
Another penny advocate, Mark Weller, executive director of Americans for Common Cents, an advocacy group, argues that the elimination of the penny would hurt consumers and many charities, which rely on penny drives as part of their donation collections.
Most convenience stores would round up instead of round down, costing consumers $600 million, said Weller, citing a study by Raymond Lombra, a Penn State University economist.
Weller added that Kolbe is pushing the legislation because Arizona is a copper-producing state. The elimination of the penny would force the Mint to make more nickels, which are mostly composed of copper, he said.
“This is special interest legislation at it worst,” Weller said.
…There was a lot of noise, I seem to remember, when the euro was first being structured, as to whether or not there should be a one-cent coin. I can’t now recall all the justifications for the “yea” or “nay” positions. Whatever: we’ve got it now.
Meanwhile, it’ll be interesting to see if our cent outlasts the US one…
[tags]money, penny, US Mint[/tags]
I thought this had been removed from YouTube. So happy to be wrong. 🙂
He spent all yesterday writing an entry about the hunting wasps who’ve been setting up housekeeping in our upstairs bathroom. He thinks he’s going to post this on my weblog.
Bwaaaahahahahahaaaaa.
Watch this space and I’ll have the address for his new LJ for everybody as soon as it’s ready. (About a zillion comments would be appreciated, guys: he needs to realize that blogging is a Good Thing.)
It’s not that I haven’t been annoyed enough by events in the Middle East these past couple weeks. But now it turns out that, as if it all wasn’t bad enough to begin with, someone I really like (regardless of never having met him) is stuck in the middle of it.
“we are currently shooting an episode of NR in Lebanon–and it should be video gold. Those kookie-krazy kids from Hezbollah were popping off their weapons today(shooting in the air, I gather)–and Israel has been bombing and mobilizing a division in the South with reported land and sea strikes… (See today’s news–and quotes from Israeli PM). While the party continues in Beirut–there’s a lot of concern that the Israelis will follow up with strikes on infrastructure (like the power grid). And we were due to head to the Bekka Valley tomorrow. BTW..this town is Party Central!”
Keep your head down, Tony…
[tags]Bourdain, Anthony Bourdain, No Reservations, Lebanon[/tags]
A proud title, and one I don’t much like to see in the obits column…especially in this case.
Mickey Spillane has died at the age of 88.
Spillane had no pretensions about his writing, going about it with the philosophy that “If the public likes you, you’re good.”
(The New York Times article title — subscription-blocked, unfortunately — reads, “Critic-Proof Writer of Pulpy Mike Hammer Novels”. Ah, to be critic-proof…)
[tags]Mickey Spillane, pulp[/tags]
No sooner do I find out that they did a fifth season of the animated Teen Titans — which our SkyPlus box seems to hate, as it keeps dropping scheduled recordings — but now this:
Looks like there’s an anime version of the Powerpuff Girls. (Henshin sequence here on an episode guide page.)
…I confess I kind of like Buttercup’s giant hammer. (But then I’ve always been more simpatico with Buttercup: our management styles are similar.) Bubbles’ giant bubble-blowing thing is predictable: not sure what to make of Blossom’s magic yoyo.
[tags]Powerpuff Girls, Powerpuff Girls Z, Anime[/tags]
Or it’s corny this year, anyway. From Reuters:
A British fan of the cult TV show “Star Trek” has boldly gone where no man has gone before and created a giant maize maze dedicated to the program.
…I foresee many, many such strange things happening this year to celebrate the 40th anniversary of Trek. (Such as the last of the Rihannsu books coming out.)
Now playing: Christopher Cross – Ride Like The Wind