: O

Still on blogging hiatus (more-or-less*) while I wrap up the final weeks of my postgrad course, but I absolutely had to share this:

OMFXZG people, freaking NINJA BEAR! Bear thinks it's Donatello!

awwwww yeeeeeaaaaaahhhhhhhhh

(via twitter@laura_hudson)

*full disclosure, re the "more" of "more-or-less": I have, in fact, lately begun miniblogging** over on Tumblr. Rather than writing full-on wordy wordfests like I do here on this blog, over at looktime.tumblr.com I've just been posting all sorts of interesting images & things, as a kind of record of my internet-image-discovery as I go along.

It's like scrapbooking, the way I see it; it's assembling and collaging, rather than creating content from scratch. Tumblr is built around the easy re-blogging of other people's content, so it's good for that sort of thing. And also, compared to real blogging, Tumblring takes pretty much no time at all! (It's the lack of vowels. And, uh, the general lack of words. And the fact that you can "generate" all your content just by copying stuff directly over from other people's Tumblrs, if you like...)

So, looktime! Please enjoy.

**In the olden times before the "personal computer" existed, the "minicomputer" was a type of computer just a bit bigger and more complex than a "microcomputer"; and so if Twitter is microblogging, then I figure Tumblr must definitely be "miniblogging". Please spread the word.

Saturday Morning Is Sometimes A Bear

Click to zoom in on the caption, which is so unnecessary it's mindblowing. Saturday Evening Post of 1952, hooray.

The picture is an illustration by Stan Galli – I picked it up from here. How great are the facial expressions? (Answer: "Quite")

It originally accompanied a short story. I'm a big fan of that story's spectacular title and headline:

What chance indeed?

Giddy!

You'd think that even a couple of "giddy women" would know better than to picnic at a place called Danger Canyon, though. It's like when people climb Mt Disappointment and they're surprised that the view isn't very good.

Also the bears are cool

Saturday Morning Is Sometimes A Bear

Is that really some kind of white whale, there? It looks more like an albino dugong to me, but I thought dugongs didn't live anywhere near bears. Unless there was an escape from a zoo? (Or... an escape from an aquarium? But that would be a rather complicated sort of escape, I figure. Yes.)

Whale or not, it's an awesome illustration, am I right?

Ah, hmm. To summarise: I think I am just not yet feeling completely with-it or properly awake this morning, no sir no indeed.

Also the bear is cool

Horsypocrisy?

Here's a question. Is it hypocritical to simultaneously hold the following two opinions?

1. HORSES ARE SCARY AND I DON'T LIKE THEM

Seriously. They're big – bigger than a human! – and they have big heavy hooves with which to kick. You can't trust an animal that you couldn't take one-on-one in a fight. (See also: bears). People try to use horses for transportation and they get kicked at or thrown off, all the time. If you're kicked or thrown off, you're likely to break your head. Horses are unpredictable, nasty, wild, flighty beasts which will hurt you as soon as look at you.

Also, they bite. They smell bad. They aren't very smart. And they leave crap everywhere.

2. HORSERACING IS CRUEL AND SHOULD NOT BE

Now, you take an animal and dress it up in bondage gear. You "break" it psychologically, because that's the only way it will accept another animal sitting on its back. You make it run around in circles, hitting it repeatedly. If it falls over and breaks its leg while you're doing this, you kill the animal, because it's cheaper to kill it than to let it heal and be lame. The justification for all of this? You can make money, by gambling on which horse will run fastest. (Not fastest in general, but fastest over a particular distance and under various unnatural conditions).

The usual reasons we do things to other animals – food for sustenance, clothing for warmth – are relatively justifiable, at least if you accept an essential superiority of human need. But horse racing? How is this not sickeningly cruel, unusual and unnecessary?

- Sunday Night Thoapsl

Great Concepts In Literature, Part I

Now this is some excellent cover design, right here. I haven't yet acquired a copy of this to actually read, but the cover is hypnotic. I really like the way the colours are balanced by the typography; it's a fantastic image. From the great cover to the intriguing title, does this not appear to be one of the coolest non-fiction books of all time? Cheers for this blog by Caleb Mozzocco for drawing attention to it for me. If nothing else, the cover is enough to sell me the motivation to go looking for the actual book, so score 1 for canny cover-design marketing towards the Literary Thoapsl...