2 Things That Made Me Smile

The first was this cover of a Bananas magazine. I used to read them in grade school. Don't think I had this issue. The one I do remember had J.J. Walker on the cover with the "dyn-o-mite" in large letters. Of course.

The second was this Photochop of Bob Ross in the most famous M.C. Escher drawing.

And really, what the hell do Kiss, Elton John, and Elvis have in common that they listed them on the front cover? Not many 10-year old Elvis fans in 1976, except Jim Tinnes.

iPhone Voice Band

This is a fantastic idea for musicians who get inspirations in weird places, like riding their bike or sitting on the can. As long as nobody does it around other people. That would be annoying.

Spock and Kirk Albums

Need some Nimoy and Shatner mp3's? Who doesn't. (Shatner's is a lot more listenable, because it's totally tongue–in–cheek and schlocky.) But what fewer people need are Mary Lou Retton records.

And since it's not at all obvious, the links are the name/title lines at the top of each of those pages.

Snow Screw Tractor

Here's a neat way to propel a tractor across snow and ice. Although it would suck when you hit a patch of dry pavement (not a lot of that in 1929). Fordson; that's what Mr. Douglas' Hoyt–Clagwell was really.

Ram Yamahauler

I thought I'd better paint the Ram the same color as my own, then added something extra, inspired by the Yamahauler van of the early '70s.

My god! It's full of stripes!

7th grade science teacher Mr. Wright had a Rabbit. He gave me a ride home once. I dug the golf ball shift knob (cuz they were always a Golf in Europe). The Forza boys even put in the dome light and sun visors.

The Shorpy Time Machine

This is cool. This Shorpy post features a photo of a little girl in the window (view the full size image), watching the photographer in 1926. In the comments below (on Shorpy, not here) is a photo taken of her in front of the house in 2009, as well as a message from her.

Updated Vette

I always liked the John Greenwood Corvettes raced at Sebring, Le Mans, and Daytona endurance races in the early '70s. I had a newish Vette sitting around that I needed to use, so I gave it some decent paint. The hardest part was doing the black pinstripe around the side graphics.

I Told You They Were Weird

Take a look at the letterhead used by the Church of Scientology of California circa 1976. It's horrible, horrible, horrible. Interesting site, though. Some of the letterheads are perfect (20th Century–Fox, Lawrence Welk, etc), obviously designed by someone who knows design and layout rather than by a brainwashed freak.

Mediacom's New Web Sites Suck

Mediacom has been redoing its entire internet system, it seems. First mail was hosed for some customers for a few weeks. Now they've switched to some new web page system that is horrible. I don't know why they couldn't just leave our old sites alone. Nope. They had to move them—breaking them in the process—and then really didn't explain anything. There are new Personal Web Page publishing/editing tools available online, but they are the most annoying, ugly, hard–to–understand pieces of shit I've ever seen. They look like they were designed by Hadji in India. Nothing makes sense. Few things work. It's ugly as hell. They don't support Safari, and that's complete bullshit. It's a total failure.

So I re–uploaded my sites to their server, but I still don't see my stuff when I visit it. Then noticed they moved my old files to a folder named "public". So I downloaded the site so I could move the real stuff into that folder, delete it from the old location, and upload it again, but it keeps puking when it gets to one of their folders named "img". Why? Because some genius decided to name files bgGrey.jpg and bggrey.jpg. That's legal on most Unixes, but not on any other OS that uses the far more friendly case–insensitive naming convention.

So fuck Mediacom. I'm no longer going to use their servers. I'll stick them on my iDisk and retain control without all the bullshit that some Mediacom idiot thought was a great idea.

Pro-jectile

I built this '72 Camaro model when I was a kid. It was a pro stock drag racing car named Pro–jectile.



I won a new Camaro at some point in Forza 3, so I painted it purple just like I did my model. Too bad you can't add giant hood scoops.

Jerky and Weird

This blog posts nothing but 3–frame GIFs. Each one is 3 consecutive seemingly random frames from a movie or TV show. The results are odd and compelling. They're even better if you have music going—something fast like Ramones or the Les Baxter song called I Dig that's on right now. I especially like the ones from Jan 4 and 5 and Dec 20. Nov 24 is also pretty outa sight.

Ewwww

Man, Richard Simmons keeps getting creepier and creepier looking. It's time to rethink the wardrobe and the hair. It's also time to can the so-gay-but-I'm-not-gay act. And he certainly didn't have anything to be upset about. Shatner's comment was completely in the spirit of the little gay act they were doing.

L&M Porsche

Did one of my old favorites paint jobs on this Porsche. These open cockpit cars are a bitch to paint in Forza, because the areas wrap around, using different parts of the texture map. So the stripes that go down the top on each side are actually in 2 pieces.

Stay Alive

Heh. I totally remember this entire commercial. And I still hate the blonde kid and the way he says all his lines, especially "thee survival game".

Spock's Car

Spock drove a cool car back then.

Knockoff

They certainly did include a lot of detail in Forza 3, both in the 3D models and bitmaps. Here's a closeup of 1957 Ferrari Testa Rossa wheel.

Hamm's

Being a lifelong fan of Hamm's beer logos, scrolling ripple signs, and TV commercials, I decided they needed to sponsor one of my racing cars. While an old rice burner ain't exactly what one thinks of when one says Hamm's, but it looks cool. And it's all hopped up, as you can see by it passing a GT–40.

Who Let Them Out?

Who was the dumbass that decided to let prisoners out of Guantánamo Bay? Now they're back to being terrorists. And who wouldn't, being promised "a car, job and a nice wife"? Only an idiot would let them go, and only an idiot would want to shut down the GB prison by January 22. Thanks, Odumba.

New Rule for Newscasters

You're no longer allowed to make puns. This genius made about, I dunno, 17 pop–related puns during her report on a pop machine theft and chase.

Oh, and I'd like another new rule instated: No southerners can be in positions of authority or education. You sound like idiots when you speak that way.

Pull the Plug

Here's something funny. It's our old guitarist's new band. It's like Margie from Fargo is singing. Their version of Long Tall Sally is about as straight as it can get—Lawrence Welk could rock this harder. The one that really hurts the brain is this song. And it's over 7 minutes long. I'll give you a cookie if you can make it all the way through. Jack's solo starts at 3:56. You'll recognize his playing instantly if you've ever heard us when he was with us. Look out, EVH!

The bar is where we used to play a lot, but, mysteriously, we can no longer get booked there. It's proof that talent is not what a bar owner wants to book. They'd rather get bands who say they can draw a large crowd.

Voxmoghini

My Lamborghini Miura concept needed some neat paint. What's neater than the old Voxmobile? OK, so it didn't work out as cool as I thought it would. But what the hell. Woulda been cooler if Forza let you add some compression drivers to the hood and an organ in the trunk.

Fonz Was in the Monkees?

Leave it to model companies to cash in on one generation's trend and market it to another generation. This is the Monkeemobile sold as a Fonzie car. That's as bad as the way record companies do business.

What the Wtf?

I went onto Mediacom's web site to pay my bill. It asked me to enter my "Pin Number". Stupid sons of sobs. We've all heard people say "pin number", but I've never seen anyone stupid enough to actually type it out that way.

Badman

One of my favorite models was Monogram's Badman '55 Chevy gasser. Forza 3 has no '55 Chevy's, so I had to settle for an Aston Martin. I always liked the lettering on the backside and the red tinted windows and matching hood scoop. I wish they'd let you put stickers on the windows.