This is so awesome. If you haven’t been paying attention to the presidential race, this is pretty much all you need to know: Obama talks about himself, and McCain talks about…Obama. Word clouds are typically meaningless junk, but this is an extraordinarily meaningful application for them. ( via, via)

But these words are only taken from the posts on their blogs. Wouldn’t it be great if we could summarize what they’re actually saying?

Here are two more word clouds compiled from each Senators’ ten most recent speeches (in Obama’s case, the ten most recent that aren’t significantly similar to any other speeches he’s given). McCain’s is on the top, Obama’s on the bottom.

For your amusement, in his last ten speeches, McCain has said Obama’s name or some variation of it 48 times, compared to mentions of the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan collectively at 63 times (a 1:1.3 ratio). (He uttered his own name zero times.) On the other hand, Obama has mentioned McCain’s name 43 times, versus the wars at 141 times (1:3.3). (He said his own name once.) McCain has mentioned the issue of offshore drilling for oil 30 times, while Obama has said oil-associated words 77 times.

All in all, it seems that McCain is doing a whole lot of talking about Obama and not a whole lot of talking about ISSUES.

This is blowing my mind. Watch the part at the end, too.

Using Photographs to Enhance Videos of a Static Scene from pro on Vimeo.

Question of the day: Can you get a parking ticket for having an expired meter when there is no physical meter associated with your parking spot?

Follow-up question #1: Where, exactly, does one pay the fee to park in the spot associated with this phantom meter?

Follow-up question #2: Should you get a parking ticket if the parking ticket person cannot give you a reasonable answer for why he or she is dispensing such a ticket? (Note: Reasonable answers would include, “This is against the law. Look it up.” Or, “The law states that you are parked illegally because _____.” Unreasonable answers include, “I don’t have time for this,” or, “I’m going to walk away now and completely ignore that you’re talking to me because I don’t actually know what is illegal and what is not anymore.”)

Answers, respectively: “Yes, of course, welcome to Chicago;” “figure it out, and by the way, welcome to Chicago;” and, “screw you, you’re in Chicago now biatch, and we don’t need reasons for doing the things we do.”

Urban Dictionary is killing right now. Currently on the front page alone:

testosticross: v. The movie moment when every man in the theater crosses his legs and moans, right after someone’s groin has been pummelled onscreen.
Oh! DUDE! That was the worst testosticross moment EVAR!”

27/4: 27 seconds a day, 4 days a week, i.e. quite rare
Kev: Hey Boss, I work 27/4 for you.
Boss: You lazy bastard!

chairdrobe: The art of piling clothes on a chair to be used in place of a closet or dresser. If a chair is not available one can always defer to a floordrobe.
I searched through my chairdrobe to find my outfit for work.

flatuglance: The look that someone gives another person when they pass gas in public.
Dude, Rachael totally farted today during class, so I flatuglanced her.

I’m peeing all over.

+1

It does exactly what it says it’s going to do, which is basically brush the shit out of your dog…

As strongly as Heather Armstrong feels about her Furminator, she may have heavy competition to the east, although we lack pictures to demonstrate this.

Crazy Dog from nosugrefneb on Vimeo.

Some good friends of ours recently got us a Flip Mino as an early wedding present—way early. AND I LOVE IT.

Charles appreciates it too, but what he appreciates more is the opportunity to submerge himself in a baby pool every so often so he doesn’t have to lick his butthole from 1-5am inches away from our slumbering faces. We probably appreciate it more than he does, but still, I suspect there is some mutual appreciation there. We’d also appreciate it if he’d stop waking us up for breakfast at 4:30 as if he’d not just eaten an entire orchard of mushrooms six hours prior. Not sure how the baby pool could help us here…MAYBE AN EARLY-MORNING DROWNING?

A friend of mine recently started logging her thoughts on the series of tubes known as The Internet, an activity commonly called “blogging.” You should have a look.

As a teaser, here’s a sample of her writing.

Penguin courtship is varied and complex, but normally it includes loud vocalizations, and beak slapping. Once a penguin finds its mate, they learn to recognize each other, and later their children, simply by the sound of their “voice.” Overall, penguin males and females share their parental care duties, including incubation of the egg and conducting feeding-fasting cycles. One of the longest incubation and fasting shifts occurs in the Emperor penguin. During the Antarctic winter, the female Emperor penguin lays one egg then departs to feed at sea. The male fasts while incubating till the female returns at hatching time. Their time apart can span up to 60 days at a time.

This was part of her maid-of-honor speech at her sister’s wedding. I know.

Abbie: “I wish there were a job where someone picks up tennis balls when dogs drop them on walks.”

Me: “Hmm, that would be nice.”

Abbie: “I bet some rich person has hired someone like that.”

Me: “Honey, rich peoples’ dogs are smaller than tennis balls.”

I’m probably going to make a non-holy pilgrimage to see this piece of toast soon.

The woman next to me at Starbucks this morning, leaving a message:

“Hello Margot, this is Elizabeth, your stepmother. I’m calling you today because I’m in Madison for a meeting and I thought we could meet up since I know you’re living in Madison these days. Anyway, call me back please, Margot.”

Immediately after hanging up, she called back.

“Hello Margot, this is Elizabeth, your stepmother. I just left you a message but wanted to make sure you knew this was your stepmother, in case you confused me with one of your friends named Elizabeth or something. Anyway, it’s me, your stepmother, calling, not one of your Elizabeth-friends.”