to i google you. my favorite lines:
And I’m pleased your name is practically unique
it’s only you and
a would-be PhD in Chesapeake
who writes papers on
the structure of the sun
I’ve read each one
and you can see amanda palmer performing the song on youtube.
paradise city (gnr)
abracadabra (steve miller)
the wall (pink floyd)
in the shadows (the rasmus)
stairway to heaven (led zeppelin)
nope. not the playlist of an odd retro dance party. the music that andreas helgstrand chose for his grand prix dressage freestyle routine. and it’s awesome. so watch it. (it’s up on nbcolympics.com at the 20 minute mark on the rewind: dressage freestyle video.)
the APA task force on mental health and abortion found that there was
“no evidence sufficient to support the claim that an observed association between abortion history and mental health was caused by the abortion per se, as opposed to other factors.”
but try telling that to these people, who can’t even interpret this study properly.
here’s an amusing question, though, from freakonomics: does depression lower abortion rates? (note: i think their attempt to draw correlations between the two things are misguided, at best - if anything, depression would lower abortion rates because so many antidepressants have nasty sexual side effects.1 and not “nasty” in a good way.)
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1 which is unfortunate, as some studies suggest depressed people have more sex than their non-depressed counterparts. although the argument may be made that they’re not having good sex, they’re having desperate sex.
okay, that’s not ducks. but these are.
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new lens + cs3 + county fair = time to play with high dynamic range stuff. so first: the original two photos. the top was metered for the shadows, the bottom, for the peaches in the sun.
then, the two get combined, and voila! high dynamic range. it’s my first attempt, so there are definite issues (like the woman who appears twice), but i think i’ll keep playing around with it.
chupa chup, a holsteiner gelding ridden by brasilian bernardo alvez. too bad his tail’s been banged.
clear round, too.
looks like hollywood is up to its usual brain-dead imitation hijinks. college has already been done: it was called PCU, and had jeremy piven. PCU is the superior movie - because it had jeremy piven. (no, i haven’t seen college. but trust me on this. jeremy piven, like tiger balm, makes everything better. and no, that isn’t a strange comparison. i’m sure jeremy piven would feel great rubbed into my back and thighs. because they’re sore from workouts. right.)
and now i see a new flick coming over the horizon: sex drive. the blurb i received describes it thusly:
Loveable underdog IAN (Josh Zuckerman) is the last American virgin. At least that’s how it feels to him now that he’s 18, about to go to college, and losing girls to his 14-year-old brother. Ian’s always been the nice guy, the best friend … never the boyfriend. But his luck finally seems to be changing when he meets DANIELLE. She’s everything he’s ever wanted in a girlfriend – fun, sexy, and she really likes him. There’s just one problem. She lives in Knoxville . And he lives in Chicago . And she thinks he’s the Brad Pitt-lookalike he’s pretending to be on Facebook. At the urging of his best friend, LANCE (Clark Duke), Ian decides to confront his fear of rejection when Danielle makes him the offer of a lifetime: “If you drive all the way for me, I’ll go all the way for you.”
In the spirit of such classics as AMERICAN PIE, THE SURE THING and SUPERBAD, this wild romp follows Ian, Lance and their third musketeer, the spunky and gorgeous tomboy, FELICIA (Amanda Crew), as they set out in Ian’s older brother’s beloved ’69 GTO. Despite many hilarious setbacks on the road, including a stop-off at an Amish rave (who knew the Amish could party?), Ian finally meets his dream girl … but things don’t turn out quite as planned. Along the way, Ian discovers that while he’s prepared to go the distance for sex, there might be something even better a little closer to home.
apparently “in the spirit of” now means “blatantly ripping off.” the sure thing was a thing of beauty (and not just in a pre-plastic-surgery-nicollette-sheridan kind of way). and john cusack. brilliance. (john cusack and jeremy piven have apparently been in 10 movies together, but perfection was really attained only in the brief shining moment of grosse pointe blank.)
i honestly can’t think of anything worse than an american pie/the sure thing mashup.
wait, yes, i can. the intersection between bacon-flavored dental floss and personal lube.
how bacon-flavored dental floss and ky yours & mine personal lubricants are related goods (scroll down to the bottom of the page to see what i mean)?
on second thought, maybe i don’t want to know.
if i were riding in the dressage competition, i’d be really annoyed with the constant drone of airplanes taking off and landing.
no, that’s not true. if i were riding in the dressage competition, i’d probably be so focused on what i was doing that i wouldn’t even notice the constant drone of airplanes taking off and landing. in fact, if i were riding in the dressage competition, i’d probably be so focused that an airplane could crash into the stands and i wouldn’t notice it unless flaming bits of fuselage, cargo and human remains began to litter the ring around me. and even then, it would probably take me a few moments to move from “damn stuff in my way” to “what the…” to “aw, crap. will they let me start the routine again?”
judging from the amount of sweat pouring off riders and horses, the humidity in HK must be nearly unbearable. that notwithstanding, the skill level in the compulsories is phenomenal. i just wish i could find the routine online somewhere.
belarussian iryna lis is aboard the super-mouthy gelding redford, who finally calmed down about halfway through the routine (possibly because he’s more comfortable through the extended gaits). he kicked at her spurs during the piaffe, though.
oceano do top has quite possibly the prettiest rear-leg action i’ve seen in the competitors, but the lusitano stallion has a habit of resting his rear hooves during the piaffe - points off for that.
american courtney king, aboard dutch warmblood gelding mythilus, had a fantastic ride. gorgeous transition from collected to extended trot, smooth half-passes, and just the smallest bobble in one pirouette.
and i find it inordinately funny that german rider heike kemmer is aboard a gelding named bonaparte.
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1 i couldn’t figure out where else to put this footnote, so the post title seemed as good a place as any. watching the dressage competition is triggering some really strong muscle memory: as i watch the binomio go through the set routine, i’m experiencing sympathetic muscle twitches in my hands, back, quads, and calves. i just wish most of the riders didn’t make such big shoulder and lower-leg movements through the flying lead changes; they should be able to guide the horse through the transitions with their seats (this seems to be predominantly a european problem).
i’ll get back to work in a moment.
my thoughts on NBC’s coverage of the equestrian sports: it sucks. even online, you can’t watch the full competition unless you do so live - and that means 7:15 wednesday morning for the dressage competition. NBC’s prerecorded video feed for the dressage portion of the 3-day event seems limited to two or three highlighted riders.
pff.
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