On The Importance of not Becoming the Monsters One is Fighting
First let me say that I condemn and disavow those who stupidly decided yesterday to get in touch with their inner Antifatard and charge the Capitol building.
This was stupid.
This was foul.
This was wrong.
The purpose of the exercise is to oppose the left, not BE the left.
These idiots are jus as bad as Antifa, BLM and all the other thugs we suffered from last year.
And that is an important component of trying to understand how we got here.
( Note to the linguistically impaired: Understanding is not endorsing, or defending. These actions are indefensible.)
For some time people have had the following explained to them in the most sanctimonious and arrogant way possible.
And anyone who disagreed was called everything but a child of God.
None of this excuses the vile shit that went down at the Capitol yesterday, but it does put it into context.
I and many other conservatives are denouncing these fuckwits in exactly the same way we denounced the riots of last summer... and while it's good to FINALLY have a bipartisan denunciation of political violence, in stark contrast to the previous situation, if AOC and her co-religionists can't disavow their previous statements in favor of insurrectionists, they only make the problem worse.
Because the message that the riots, and the election sent is that only those who violently protest will be taken seriously.
Trump is a carnival barker and a narcisist. But Trump did not do this. He sure as fuck could have chosen his words better, but he did not start this riot. The rioters are people, with agency, and they chose to be little shits.
Furthermore, the left has spent a year normalizing political violence.
This does not excuse the vile actions that took place yesterday. It makes them even more reprehensible, because those stupid actions served to malign the hundreds of thousands of protestors who were there to peacefully protest and it deprives the public at large of any hope that either side denounces violence.
I have seen it noted on other blogs that this wasn't any different from the many times that lefty loons broke into the Capitol during hearings, votes or state of the union speeches except that the capitol police did not shoot any of those protestors to death....
Outside the Supreme Court 2018
...which almost seems like a fair point until you realize that our side is the one that is supposed to stand against this darkness. Another fact frequently noted is that aside from the broken windows, this was a remarkably sedate riot, with little looting or burning, and while that is, indeed true, the riot was still a damned RIOT. Furthermore, the sacred nature of the venue rather negates that argument.
There is one big caveat however.
This is not a defense of this indefensible action but a fact and a warning.
If riots are the rules by which the political game is to be played going forward, both sides are eventually going to follow those rules. The only thing that had kept conservatives from responding in kind ( Instead famously leaving protest areas cleaner than when they showed up) was a faith that the system could work for them, the bourgeoisie values that were the key to their standard of living and a sense of civics. All of these have been under constant attack, especially in schools to the point that the younger generations are starting to see those cultural checks as indicators of gullibility.
This is a dangerous place we are in, and if the nation goes over the precipice, a fair amount of the blood spilled will be on the hands of those who acted so stupidly yesterday. And on those who have unimaginable cultural influence and have so normalized this sort of behavior when it was their allies doing it.
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I think we might have reached the tipping point, not because of the riots, but because of the purges that have already begun that coincided with the riots.
I never thought I would live to see the day the Cultural Revolution came to the US. I had hope that it would stay as a bad memory for people I know who saw it.
It looks like I am wrong.
Posted by: cxt217 at Fri Jan 8 23:05:27 2021 (4i7w0)
On the Solarwinds Hack
InRange TV is a fireams channel, and a pretty good one. However, the channels proprietor, Karl Kasarda works in IT security and is involved to some extent in the hacking community.
He's decided to go off format in this instance to clear up what he sees as some misreporting on the recently disclosed IT breach that has been in the news of late.
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A lot of the SolarWinds stuff was caused by people doing things that were obviously, blatantly wrong, because it was easier that way. Every organisation needs some grumpy old bastard in charge of their network who constantly says "No, we can't just do X. That's retarded."
Posted by: Pixy Misa at Thu Dec 31 09:02:28 2020 (PiXy!)
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Sadly, they've had to fire all those people because you can't say "retarded".
Posted by: The Brickmuppet at Thu Dec 31 11:25:05 2020 (5iiQK)
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When I moved to Austin, it came as a rather unpleasant surprise how infested the local tech area was by "security" folks. They dominate the meetups, although these days their dominance came under attack by so-called "data scientists". I'm not at all surprised that SolarWinds has sprouted from this petri dish.
I met a guy once who founded a company that made firewalls that capped the hop counts of the IP packets. He took out several patents for the technique, and promoted it as an alternative to actual firewalls. You can see the attraction: no matter what, your internal systems cannot talk to anything beyond the DMZ. The downsides are pretty obvious too. What struck me the most was the attempt to become rich off a half-baked, counter-productive idea. He focused on Windows customers, too.
Posted by: Pete Zaitcev at Thu Dec 31 16:38:51 2020 (LZ7Bg)
A Solution to the Gawr-Gura Conundrum Gawr-Gura is an English language V-Tuber associated with Hololive. Gawr-Gura is a little unusual in a manner distinct from her just being little and unusual. She embraces the conceit of many female V-Tubers being some variety of fantasy trope animal girl, but instead of being a catgirl, foxgirl or bunny-girl, she's half-carcharadon, you know, a great white shark.
There's lore, I'm sure.
While other demi-human damsels have cute animal ears coming out of their heads Gawr-Gura's hybrid nature is denoted by an art-deco hoodie and a shark tail.
Now, if you're anything like me, you're looking at that and wondering how she goes to the bathroom.
"Whatever setbacks I have had in my life, I can at least always be secure in the knowledge that I am not anything like you."
Anyway, Hololive is a Japanese company, and over there, a few Gundam toilets notwithstanding, they have lots of squat toilets, so, problem solved.
The toilet in the maison I lodged at for a month in Nerima; better suited to shark-girls than honkey-boys. .
Today's Lesson for Engineers is 'Sand in the Gears'
A couple of Danish Architects have developed a tent for use on Luna and/or Mars. LUNARK is a very interesting concept that folds up into a compact package that is covered in solar panels, and, using cutting edge origami technology, expands 560 percent to become an airtight habitat with an algae based air recycling system!
The two Nordic nerds recently went LARPING around northern Greenland and set up their airtight tent on a volcanic outcropping that is very close in temperature and terrain to the temperate zones on Mars. They then set it up, sealed the thing, and because they are awesome and take their design they entered and exited thru the airlock and went outside in self contained breathing apparatus. They also did a fair number of actual experiments relating to the project.
The two month experiment was a success which encountered no major issues except for the polar bear which is a matter of limited concern on the moon or Mars. The success of the air recycling system is quite a feat.
However, I have 2 concerns.
The airlock appears to be the toilet/shower, which makes sense, and is an inspired solution on one level as the airlock needs to be a decontamination station. However, this could lead to issues if one is outside, running low on air, while someone is in the airlock having a disagreement with their algae burgers.
The other concern is more integral, so much so that I think I should ask one of the Brickmuppet's Crack Team of Science Babes for a second opinion before I use the deep width and breadth of insight that a history degree gives someone commenting on architectural and engineering matters...
"Oh God, what Moon dust will do to that."
YES! All those expanding joints look like they are inherently exposed to dust. This is not an issue on the Greenland icecap, but lunar dust is ubiquitous, abrasive and electrically charged, Martian dust is less abrasive but it is also ubiquitous and corrosive and we've seen on Earth what can happen to relatively sealed mechanisms like firearms actions when exposed to sand, even good ones.
Maybe put the whole thing in a big bag?
Despite being called a 'tent' by the Daily Mail, this thing is not man-portable. It weighs 1738 kilos (3400 pounds) (which is a remarkable achievement for a habitat capable of sustaining 2 people with food water and air for 2 months). 1738 kilos translates roughly to 290 kilos on the Moon and 660 kilos on Mars. This is more of a camper.
None of this is to detract from the skill and verve of the inventors. It's a prototype, they are testing it in the field and braving polar bears to do it.
So Kudos to SAGA Space Architects! Any bugs can be worked out and as fundamental an issue as the dust problem seems to be, there are probably mitigation measures that can be taken...like a big bag. We've seen with Elon Musk's cornucopia of 'splodies that the way to get to space is to test things to destruction and find out what needs to be fixed. They are doing that with this and have done their math so well that they haven't had a failure yet.
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I have visions of astronauts on the Moon or Mars fighting some articulated joint while one of them puzzles over an elaborate assembly manual. Also, they only have *exactly* the number of screws needed to finish, and one of them is lost under a rock somewhere.
Posted by: madrocketsci at Tue Dec 29 13:10:20 2020 (hRoyQ)
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Silly thing. The TransHab module was invented specifically as a lunar base module back in the 90s in part (IIRC) to avoid the dust issue. As an inflatable structure it had no joints that could be infiltrated. Plus its internal volume when inflated would be much larger than this thing, so what's the point?
Posted by: jabrwok at Tue Dec 29 20:08:57 2020 (T4WaI)
Citations for Civilizations End
Rod Dreher has an article current events, current trends, and future prospects that is eye opening and a bit scary. Unless you are very easily offended, I urge you to read the whole thing.
Dreher is a good and insightful writer, but he's a doctrinare conservative and a bit of a stick-in the-mud generally opposed to any whimsy on principle, so it is quite unexpected that he allowed a Naruto reference in his addenda.
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I think the other part of this is this: We don't breed in captivity. What we've had for the past few decades isn't freedom. Our societies have become regimented, and the demands of work on our time have increased to the point where very few of us have time for a life.
Posted by: madrocketsci at Tue Dec 29 11:32:42 2020 (hRoyQ)
Seriously, there was speculation on both sides of the political divide that whoever set off the massive explosion in Nashville was motivated by politics. The theories have included, but not been limited to, Trump voters, Bernie Bros, BLM, Antifa, Anti Government Militias on the Libertarian Right, Anti Government Militias on the Anarchist Left, people upset at AT&T, or a false flag operation by one of the above to frame another of the above, and all of the aforementioned scenarios were presented as a long stride down the dark path towards civil war.
Hence, the lack of coverage here* as there was not merely a lack of knowledge, but the actual opposite of knowledge. The information beyond the facts of the blast itself actually went into in the negative as the day progressed.
NOW THERE'S A LEAD.
And we fully acknowledge that said lead might itself might be bullshit**, but it appears the police have a suspect.
This bit of Cray-Cray is far outside the realm of politics, and more importantly, seems, while very fringe, to be bi-partisan, nay, international stupidity.
So, on this one issue, we can all come together in a brief moment of national unity, the likes of which is normally reserved for furries.
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The 5G thing has become a core QAnon and Q-adjacent belief, which means it has insinuated itself in a *certain* segment of right-wing voters. It's the next line-item under believing the military is about to intervene in the "stolen" election, now that Obama and Hillary have been arrested and replaced with look-alikes, Biden wears a house-arrest tag, and the FBI has seized/will be seizing Dominion voting machines to stop/start the Great Reset led by JFK, Jr.
Posted by: Ben at Mon Dec 28 02:11:30 2020 (9Wcjc)
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I've seen the COVID / 5G thing mentioned by whackaloons on the left too. It's a useful indicator, kind of like adjacent red and yellow stripes on a snake, it means "DANGER!". This is distinct from some wacky notions believed by Q and even some weird things disseminated on the left, which are theoretically reasonable notions carried to an extreme.
For example: There probably is a group of powerful people involved in child trafficking. Jeffery Epstein* was selling or pimping those girls to somebody, and they were people of means....However, the notion that the kids are being held in the server room of a Pizza joint before being locked in armoires and shipped by Wayfair is, frankly, whacked. 5-G causing COVID is JUST insane, all stop the end. When one hears this theory and it's not in jest or mockery, there is no question of "Is he/she one of the crazy ones?" only "YES. RUN!" because the base premise is a hard break from reality.
This is useful to find out early.
*Who did not kill himself.
Posted by: The Brickmuppet at Mon Dec 28 03:32:24 2020 (5iiQK)
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A mad bomber what bombs at midnight was the best explanation here, given all the weird factors surrounding the event.
Posted by: Pixy Misa at Tue Dec 29 01:09:10 2020 (PiXy!)
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Practicality or fun? I mean, if you were really practical, you'd be crunching through the snow off the side of the driveway. But the skating delivery was very fun!
Posted by: Suburbanbanshee at Sat Dec 26 11:20:08 2020 (sF8WE)
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Yeah, I had an experience like that. I walked along an iced over path in a forest and some gopniks wanted to take off my fancy imported jacket. I caught a kick, but other guy did me a hook to the face. That threw me off, but I hit a tree trunk, which arrested my fall. I turned and ran along the path in the snow. The assailants were slipping on the ice and could not catch me. When I got home, I wrung the blood out of my scarf and patted down the blood spots with ice water (do not use hot water for blood removal).
Posted by: Pete Zaitcev at Sat Dec 26 14:01:24 2020 (LZ7Bg)
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People appreciate you more than you know.
Might want to check out the "Bob and Brad" channel on YouTube, etc. They're physical therapists from MN who belong to a school of thought that patients should learn simple exercises and practices to do at home, that will relieve pain and help muscle strain. (Obviously I should have brought this up earlier....) They have stuff about rotator cuffs.
Posted by: Suburbanbanshee at Sat Dec 26 11:23:55 2020 (sF8WE)
Mr. Kellgren: QUICK! Get it to Market Before January 20th!
I don't know if this is a joke or not.
It's not on KelTec's website as I type this.
But it seems to be a new development, and given that it's allegedly a Kel-Tec product, it's a more plausible notion than it would otherwise be from less whimsical manufacturers.
But if this is real, and there's really a pistol coming out in 5.7x28 NATO, one that uses the 50 shot P-90 mags, well, I'm afraid my cashflow is likely to take a hit.
Posted by: J Greely at Wed Dec 23 18:01:57 2020 (ZlYZd)
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That does look like a lot of fun. I might have to get the .22lr version just to be able to use it for the local rimfire challenge meets. The 5.7x28 version seems like a good way to defend yourself from the zombie mink apocalypse that is no doubt scheduled for 2021....
Posted by: David at Wed Dec 23 20:03:27 2020 (jdGUg)
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I actually wondered if something like this, albeit with a smaller magazine, might be a better PDW than the P-90. Although the P-90 is compact, it is still too large to fit into a hip holster, and so would be getting in your way much too often. A good PDW, in my opinion, is one that you can always have with you need it, and not something that you stored somewhere else because it was too bulky to carry around all the time.
Posted by: Siergen at Thu Dec 24 13:07:14 2020 (jIT9h)
4@Siergen P-90 magazines are available, and in a military context are in the NATO logistics system
Brügger & Thomet makes something like what you're talking about, it also comes, in less compact form, in full auto. The Coast Guard and Army have kits for their Sigs that do much the same thing.
The magazine for the P-90 is about 10 inches long so this KEL-TEC beast is probably about 13-14 inches long. Assuming good balance (and its balance is going to shift a lot as the magazine empties), that is probably at the very limit of a wieldable pistol, but it also means that a folding or retractable stock will have sufficient length of pull to be practical, though such a feature would make it an SBR in the U.S. civilian market.
All of this assumes that this picture is not a joke by someone on 4-chan's /k/ board.
Posted by: The Brickmuppet at Thu Dec 24 13:39:54 2020 (5iiQK)
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Kel-Tec does not currently have a P50 pistol but they did trademark the name P50 in February.
Posted by: Rick C at Thu Dec 24 23:29:52 2020 (eqaFC)
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They should've adapted RDB for P90 magazines instead of this.
Posted by: Pete Zaitcev at Fri Dec 25 00:42:57 2020 (LZ7Bg)
Posted by: Pixy Misa at Sun Jan 3 17:52:30 2021 (PiXy!)
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I flipped through the "magazine" in a bookstore. Not a fan of the loading procedure for the P50. The interview with George Kellgren was okay, but omitted what I would've asked: why no update to P-3AT, etc.
Posted by: Pete Zaitcev at Sun Jan 3 19:55:38 2021 (LZ7Bg)
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Bad optics!
OTOH, remnants of the Empire outlasted the Republic by a 1000 years. And technically Making America Great Again isn't saying anything about Republic.
Posted by: Pete Zaitcev at Sat Dec 19 01:11:21 2020 (LZ7Bg)
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I doubt there is a single elected federal (or state) representative or member of any former, current, or incoming administration who does not believe
a) The Rubicon has been crossed and we're already in a Civil War
b) The Rubicon is TRYING to be crossed and we need to get rid of the people trying to stop it.
c) The Rubicon has yet to be crossed, and I'M THE ONE TO DO IT
d) Don't care; how can I profit from the current situation
And every single one of them supports their position by claiming everyone else WANTS to cross The Rubicon and THEY ARE THE ONES TO STOP IT.
Posted by: Ben at Sat Dec 19 12:25:23 2020 (9Wcjc)
The Ramifications of a Faux-Pas in Current Year
Monday morning, I was at work, and had been at work about 45 minutes, 2 of my kidney stones are about to leave and go explore the world, and they were particularly impatient that day. Well, 45 minutes into the shift I comitted a terrible Faux-Pas. I left my position and went to the bathroom, where I rather loudly vomited.
In the current environment, this is a dreadful faux-pas.
So I got sent home and naturally could not come back until I got a certification of cleanliness from a state approved source.
The last time this happened I was out for nearly two weeks, because the test took 4 days to schedule and 6 days to get results from. The current estimate is longer, however, there are a limited number of 15 minute test facilities in Virginia, and I was able to secure an appointment with one of them for Thursday. The assumption being that the aggregate time lost would be less.
There was a little trepidation on my part since I have been under the weather this week since Monday, and my symptoms have included a splitting headache (but no fever to speak of).
Thursday I got up and drove across bridges, through tunnels and far away to make my appointment which was 40 minutes late because they are swamped. I got my most unpleasant test and waited for my 15 minute results which were ready in an hour.
The phone call said I was free of any association with that Chi-Com harridan Coronachan.
"My bat soup brings all the boys to the yard."
Yay!.
I noted on my phone the email that had the printed version of my cleanliness certification, and went home, did some laundry, slept, watched some Twitcheranians play Cyberpunk 2077 and called work to get the email I needed to mail the results to.
When I opened the email, I got this:
And I was all like:
And no I couldn't go to work, which was particularly annoying since every day I miss this time of year is a ridiculous amount of money lost.
Today, I spent almost two hours on the phone trying to resolve this matter and dealing with the downside of patient privacy laws....but I finally got a certification of cleanliness and can start working again tomorrow.
I suspect my illness was a reaction to the pain and having just gotten a flu shot since I don't want to be tag-teamed by CoronaChan and Influ-Enza.
I've had three days off now, which I've mostly spent in bed and doing some house cleaning, and making notes and outlines for posts that get overtaken by events.
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Eh, good and bad. On the plus side I'm about to get a fair amount of time off after spending the last year getting (simultaneously) two major ($M) transformational tech projects off the ground and just started in implementation. On the minus the timing wasn't exactly my choice and I'll be spending a chunk of it looking for new employment as my position was moved to another state without me.
Posted by: StargazerA5 at Thu Dec 10 15:32:03 2020 (j9NNa)
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I'm retiring at the end of the month. Being driven around the bend trying to finish up projects before leaving ("Why don't we add three more project goals and try to finish even earlier?"), and training other people in the software that I use. Getting no help from our IT:
Me: "hey IT, I need to get the software updated on our Training PC's."
Silence.
"Hey guys, seriously, I need the software updated."
Second hand to one of the prospective students: "you just need it on your own system and can follow along via Teams."
Me: "Guys, this is in-person instruction in the classroom. It's hands-on stuff, and it needs to be in a controlled classroom environment."
Silence.
Second hand again: "We'll push the update the morning of the class."
Me: "guys, didn't you just spend two hours yesterday trying to get it running bug-free on one student's computer, despite it being installed three weeks ago? Didn't it take a week to get it done last time, WITH vendor support?"
Silence....
Posted by: Ubu at Fri Dec 11 06:13:55 2020 (UlsdO)
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I am actually one of those people who have been doing pretty well despite the Wuhan flu. Work has been been handing out overtime and I have been hauling more pay home this year than ever. If anything, the lockdowns that will come if the likely scenario of ol' Joe taking office happens will just keep me busy at work.
But we live in 2020, when anything can and will happen.
Posted by: cxt217 at Fri Dec 11 23:26:50 2020 (4i7w0)
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The first time I got kidney stones, my reaction after a bathroom break was basically Welp, I'm dying.
The second time I got kidney stones I instituted a police of always having a bottle of diet soda on my desk, which I'm lucky enough to be able to do working from home. Haven't had them bad since then.
Posted by: Pixy Misa at Sat Dec 12 22:03:02 2020 (PiXy!)
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Approximately 96% successful. Just that little 4% at the end. And the engines dying from a lack of fuel pressure. And the final one eating itself. But holy crap, that was AMAZING.
Really, that is a successful test. The hard part was everything BUT the landing.
Posted by: Wonderduck at Wed Dec 9 18:49:32 2020 (Bkp4m)
Hobby Space News of the commercial space industry A Babe In The Universe Rather Eclectic Cosmology Encyclopedia Astronautica Superb spacecraft resource The Unwanted Blog Scott Lowther blogs about forgotten aerospace projects and sells amazingly informative articles on the same. Also, there are cats. Transterrestrial Musings Commentary on Infinity...and beyond! Colony WorldsSpace colonization news! The Alternate Energy Blog It's a blog about alternate energy (DUH!) Next Big Future Brian Wang: Tracking our progress to the FUTURE. Nuclear Green Charles Barton, who seems to be either a cool curmudgeon, or a rational hippy, talks about energy policy and the terrible environmental consequences of not going nuclear Energy From Thorium Focuses on the merits of thorium cycle nuclear reactors WizBang Current events commentary...with a wiz and a bang The Gates of Vienna Tenaciously studying a very old war The Anchoress insightful blogging, presumably from the catacombs Murdoc Online"Howling Mad Murdoc" has a millblog...golly! EaglespeakMaritime security matters Commander Salamander Fullbore blackshoe blogging! Belmont Club Richard Fernandez blogs on current events BaldilocksUnderstated and interesting blog on current events The Dissident Frogman French bi-lingual current events blog The "Moderate" VoiceI don't think that word means what they think it does....but this lefty blog is a worthy read nonetheless. Meryl Yourish News, Jews and Meryls' Views Classical Values Eric Scheie blogs about the culture war and its incompatibility with our republic. Jerry Pournell: Chaos ManorOne of Science fictions greats blogs on futurism, current events, technology and wisdom A Distant Soil The website of Colleen Dorans' superb fantasy comic, includes a blog focused on the comic industry, creator issues and human rights. John C. Wright The Sci-Fi/ Fantasy writer muses on a wide range of topics. Now Read This! The founder of the UK Comics Creators Guild blogs on comics past and present. The Rambling Rebuilder Charity, relief work, roleplaying games Rats NestThe Art and rantings of Vince Riley Gorilla Daze Allan Harvey, UK based cartoonist and comics historian has a comicophillic blog! Pulpjunkie Tim Driscoll reviews old movies, silents and talkies, classics and clunkers. Suburban Banshee Just like a suburban Leprechaun....but taller, more dangerous and a certified genius. Satharn's Musings Through TimeThe Crazy Catlady of The Barony of Tir Ysgithr アニ・ノート(Ani-Nouto) Thoughtful, curmudgeonly, otakuism that pulls no punches and suffers no fools. Chizumatic Stephen Den Beste analyzes anime...with a microscope, a slide rule and a tricorder. Wonderduck Anime, Formula One Racing, Sad Girls in Snow...Duck Triumphalism Beta Waffle What will likely be the most thoroughly tested waffle evah! Zoopraxiscope Too In this thrilling sequel to Zoopraxiscope, Don, Middle American Man of Mystery, keeps tabs on anime, orchids, and absurdities. Mahou Meido MeganekkoUbu blogs on Anime, computer games and other non-vital interests Twentysided More geekery than you can shake a stick at Shoplifting in the Marketplace of Ideas Sounds like Plaigarism...but isn't Ambient IronyAll Meenuvians Praise the lathe of the maker! Hail Pixy!!