Monday, April 30, 2012

Montage

Tonight's video montage:

Sunday, April 29, 2012

Flying car

Tonight's flying car video:

Saturday, April 28, 2012

Black bike

Tonight's bike skills video - Andrew Dickey shows off his bike skills in Melbourne, Australia:

Thursday, April 26, 2012

Look Ma, no Hands!

Tonight's self-driving car:

Wednesday, April 25, 2012

Musical interlude

Tonight's musical interlude - Pomplamoose performs their rendition of Simon and Garfunkel's Mrs. Robinson:

Tuesday, April 24, 2012

Laser sword

Tonight's Star Wars parody:

Monday, April 23, 2012

Through a waterfall in a wingsuit

Tonight's wingsuit video - Jeb Corliss flies through a waterfall in the Swiss Alps:

From the video's description:
... Hurtling through the air at 85 miles an hour, daredevil adventurer Jeb Corliss becomes the first man to fly through a waterfall wearing a wingsuit. Flying through an exit point called 'The Ultimate' in the mountainous region of Lauterbrunnen in the Swiss Alps, 35-year old Jeb flies within five feet of the 2000 foot sheer cliff wall. Falling three feet for every one foot he moves forward, Jeb's precision flight enables him to travel through the two foot wide falls despite the turbulence hitting the water causes him. One year in the planning, Jeb practiced the flight eight times before nailing it on the ninth attempt. ...

Sunday, April 22, 2012

Some parking spots are better than others

Tonight's automotive parking video:

Saturday, April 21, 2012

The meaning of MPH

Tonight's blonde ruminations:

Friday, April 20, 2012

Musical interlude

Tonight's musical interlude - French actress/singer Nora Arnezeder does a rendition of Singin' in the Rain:

Thursday, April 19, 2012

Resupply

Tonight's time lapse video - off loading the supply ship at McMurdo Station in Antarctica [try watching full screen]. From the video's description:
Annual supply ship offload at McMurdo Station Antarctica, 2012.
Due to an unusually warm winter last year, the floating ice pier that is normally used to offload cargo melted badly this summer, making it unusable. A temporary floating pier had to be installed by the U.S. Army Transportation Corps.

Wednesday, April 18, 2012

Evidently, bobsledding's not his thing

Tonight's not-a-professional-bobsledder video - a man tries out the French ski area La Plagne's mono bobsled run:

Tuesday, April 17, 2012

Official spoiler rules

Tonight's spoiler etiquette:

Monday, April 16, 2012

Riding the booster

Tonight's space shuttle launch video - from the perspective of the solid rocket booster:

Sunday, April 15, 2012

Test of Fire

Tonight's election 2012 video:

Saturday, April 14, 2012

Musical interlude

Tonight's musical interlude - the Dies Irae (Day of Wrath), in the beautiful Latin:



The Latin text:
Dies irae, dies illa
solvet saeclum in favilla:
teste David cum Sibylla.

Quantus tremor est futurus,
quando judex est venturus,
cuncta stricte discussurus!

Tuba mirum spargens sonum
per sepulcra regionum,
coget omnes ante thronum.

Mors stupebit et natura,
cum resurget creatura,
judicanti responsura.

Liber scriptus proferetur,
in quo totum continetur,
unde mundus judicetur.

Judex ergo cum sedebit,
quidquid latet apparebit:
nil inultum remanebit.

Quid sum miser tunc dicturus?
Quem patronum rogaturus,
cum vix justus sit securus?

Rex tremendae majestatis,
qui salvandos salvas gratis,
salva me fons pietatis.

Recordare, Jesu pie,
quod sum causa tuae viae:
ne me perdas illa die.

Quaerens me, sedisti lassus:
redemisti Crucem passus:
tantus labor non sit cassus.

Juste judex ultionis,
donum fac remissionis
ante diem rationis.

Ingemisco, tamquam reus:
culpa rubet vultus meus:
supplicanti parce, Deus.

Qui Mariam absolvisti,
et latronem exaudisti,
mihi quoque spem dedisti.

Preces meae non sunt dignae:
sed tu bonus fac benigne,
ne perenni cremer igne.

Inter oves locum praesta,
et ab haedis me sequestra,
statuens in parte dextra.

Confutatis maledictis,
flammis acribus addictis:
voca me cum benedictis.

Oro supplex et acclinis,
cor contritum quasi cinis:
gere curam mei finis.

Lacrimosa dies illa,
qua resurget ex favilla
judicandus homo reus.

Huic ergo parce, Deus:
pie Jesu Domine,
dona eis requiem. Amen.

Friday, April 13, 2012

That's a long shot

Tonight's long-range pistol shot:

Thursday, April 12, 2012

Remember to breate

Tonight's Canadian travel tourism video, courtesy Travel Alberta (try watching full screen):

Wednesday, April 11, 2012

Perpetual ocean

Tonight's ocean currents video, courtesy NASA (try watching full screen):

From the video's description:
This visualization shows ocean surface currents around the world during the period from June 2005 through [December] 2007. The visualization does not include a narration or annotations; the goal was to use ocean flow data to create a simple, visceral experience.

This visualization was produced using NASA/JPL's computational model called Estimating the Circulation and Climate of the Ocean, Phase II or ECCO2.. ECCO2 is high resolution model of the global ocean and sea-ice. ECCO2 attempts to model the oceans and sea ice to increasingly accurate resolutions that begin to resolve ocean eddies and other narrow-current systems which transport heat and carbon in the oceans.The ECCO2 model simulates ocean flows at all depths, but only surface flows are used in this visualization. The dark patterns under the ocean represent the undersea bathymetry. Topographic land exaggeration is 20x and bathymetric exaggeration is 40x.

credit: NASA/Goddard Space Flight Center Scientific Visualization Studio

source: http://svs.gsfc.nasa.gov/goto?3827

Tuesday, April 10, 2012

A lesson in Vagina Economics

Today's economics lesson, from Finem Respice. A snippet:
... Even if Jezebel's editor were not terminally mathematically challenged (and this is putting the case very mildly) the basic premises that underlie the thrust (so to speak) of her utero-call-to-arms are patently absurd.

After listing out a litany of drugstore and prescription items ranging from cranberry juice to toilet paper our heroine tacks the annual expense for a pair of ovaries at between $2,663.02 and $4,228.02.

Taking this decidedly amateurish analysis at face value, by implication this puts the present value of my vagina's ten-year discounted cash flow at between -$17,949.96 and -$28,498.77, or about on par with a Chevy Volt.

With the 10 year treasury yielding 2.05%2 and an implied equity risk premium hovering around 5.85%3 I use a 7.90% discount rate for my vagina here. This is befitting my highly conservative valuation approach as one could easily make the case that cost of capital for a vagina far from the end of its useful life is extremely low given the exceedingly strong borrowing power one commands on the highly liquid (as it were) global vagina market.

Certainly, the beta for long maturity AAA, AA, or A rated vagina vis-a-via the S&P 500 would be under 1.00, but I use 1.00 here. One can verify the conservative nature of these figures simply by observing the fact that top quartile and 1SD vaginas are effectively "same as cash" in most global (meat) markets with friday and saturday trading days.

In addition, there are active vagina futures and options markets with high open interest (forgive the jargon), particularly around the contracts with January 1st and February 14th expiration dates and those that fall near investment bank bonus seasons. (Unfortunately, a discussion of the vagina swap market and vaginal rehypothecation is beyond the scope of this piece). ...
Go read the whole humorous thing here.

Monday, April 9, 2012

Musical interlude

Tonight's musical interlude - Perpetuum Jazzile performs a Bee Gees medley:

Sunday, April 8, 2012

Happy Easter

Wishing everyone a happy and blessed Easter as we celebrate the glorious Resurrection of our Blessed Lord Jesus Christ -- He is risen, Alleluia, Alleluia!

Below, a rendition of G.F. Handel's Hallelujah Choris, from Andre Rieu's "Live From Radio City Music Hall" in New York City 2004, with the Johann Strauss Orchestra and the Harlem Gospel Choir:

Wednesday, April 4, 2012

Musical interlude

Tonight's solemn musical interlude - The Deer's Cry, also known as the Lorica (Breastplate) of St. Patrick:

Tuesday, April 3, 2012

Way back home

Tonight's bike travel video - Danny MacAskill takes a trip from Edinburgh back to his hometown Dunvegan, in the Isle of Skye:

Monday, April 2, 2012

Let Calcutta surprise you

Tonight's hand-puppet video (try watching full screen):

Sunday, April 1, 2012

Cost saving

Tonight's cost-saving video, airline edition: