Randomness for 2/2

Standard

1) Darth Vader – James Earl Jones = David Prowse in a plastic mask reading Vader’s lines on set. I can’t help but laugh when I hear him say “I want those plans!” via Keith Calder

2) An officer shoots and kills a criminal, in the officer’s own words.

3) Every news report must be structured like this. via madrobins

4) Pat’s Fantasy Hotlist posts a promotional excerpt of a new GRRM story in an upcoming anthology, and the comments explode with butt-hurt Song of Ice and Fire fans complaining about the delay in the latest book. Normally I suggest skipping comments, but here the comments are delicious. I’m sure someone out there has already made a ASOIAF/DOWNFALL spoof, yeah?

5) The Scale of the Universe. It’s beautiful. It’s like church for atheists.

6) “Will they follow in the lusty steps of their forebears, the Golden Girls?” The nuttiest conservative Christian rant on gays I’ve seen in a while. The author, who apparently has a slight problem with gays who won’t read the articles he emails to them, thinks The Golden Girls sitcom turned a generation of young men into homosexuals, and it’s so wacky (and quotable! “Personally, I do not look forward to the day when we’re having moral debates about robot sex, gay jetpacks or houseplant marriage”) that there were points where I was sure it was satire. Or irrational hate. Or maybe satire again. No, that’s just more hate. Then I saw the link at the bottom to The Dark Underside of America’s Obsession with Cat Ownership and I swear I have no idea what to think (except: “Gay jetpacks?? I’ll take two!”) via Jay Lake.

7) More Macmillan vs. Amazon.com, discussed on Absolute Write. It’s an 8-page thread as of the time of this posting, but very informative. It’s also pretty easy to tell who are the knowledgeable voices and who aren’t. You even get to see an example of mansplaining with the wild (which is so incredibly rare, I know).