Cuppacafe

As it turns out, end-of-the-world flick aren't all that new, as you can see from this list of the Top 10 End of the World Movies have been something of a "thing" for quite some time.

To be sure, while this list comprises just 10, there have been many, many more (and I've seen all but two on this list, and quite a few of the others)

10. 28 Days Later (2002)
9. Night of the Comet (1984)
8. Miracle Mile (1988)
7. Children of Men (2006)
6. The Day After (1983)
5. The Road Warrior (1981)
4. The Terminator (1984)
3. Dawn of the Dead Remake (2004)
2. I am Legend (2007)
1. 12 monkeys (1995)

Not entirely sure my top 10 list would hole all of these films (Personally I prefer the original versions of the Dawn of the Dead films to the remakes).

Anyway, these are all very cool flicks, especially these three minutes of pure horror...

(more...)

So, as I understand Seppuku, it is the Japanese form of ritual suicide by disembowelment. it is part of the samurai honor code that was used voluntarily by samurai warriors so that they could die with honor rather than fall into the hands of their enemies. It was alternately used as a form of capital punishment for samurai who have committed serious offenses, or performed for other reasons that have brought shame to them.

Now I know what you are going to say, that this is perhaps a bit barbaric, but, well, given the massive social, economic, and environmental screw-up that BP did in the gulf, I'm not so sure that it wouldn't be such a bad idea to bring it back as a form of deterrent to prevent future CEOs from being so dismissive about their own responsibilities.

Still, since this is Cuppa, well, we still need to mock someone, and well, we have no compunctions about who we "borrow" from to do it. Hence the following (very, very funny) Lady Ga Ga remix...

Yeah, that was pretty funny, and if you weren't a Lady Ga Ga fan before, this should make you one, eh?

Oh yeah, and then there is this:

The Perfessor

If you saw my last post, you saw a little bit about my weekend, but apparently there were other things going on as well, first up the Obama administration is sending Lawyers into the BP/Gulf situation. While I say it's about time, I'm still, not sure if stuffing the pipe with lawyers is going to plug it up any better than stuffing it with golf balls. (Unavoidable aside, what do you call 100 lawyers at bottom of the Gulf of Mexico...a good start!).

Walt sent me a link to the camera feed that is cutting the pipe so that they can seal it off and re-route the flow of oil into a tanker (apparently I can't hot-link it, but if you cut out the link (mms://a261.l9789246260.c97892.g.lm.akamaistream.net/D/261/97892/v0001/reflector:46260), paste it in your windows media player Open File URL, you will get to see a live feed). Walt says there is a site that does allow fro a hotlink, but he had to go to work, sio I'm guessing that he'll post it later.

Oh yeah, and there was apparently a sinkhole that abruptly opened up in Guatemala. Yeah, you heard that right, a sinkhole (that looks eerily like something the Silver Surfer did in FF #2 or the Predators did in AVP #1, or even the Horta from the original Star Trek TV show.

So I'm figuring the end of the world is a tad sooner than the Mayans would have had us believe...Me? I'm preparing for the Zombie Apocalypse.

The Perfessor

I know that this announcement is going to come of something of a shock to folks living in the Bible Belt, but, (gasp) it turns that there might have been some inter-species hanky-panky going on between Human and Neanderthal men (and women). That's right, according to some scientists who are examining the Human and Neanderthal genomes, it appears that there are some interesting, ah, crossovers between the two that were going on so half a billion years or so...

Modern humans, meet the relatives: Neanderthals. It turns out, based on a new fossil analysis out Thursday, that people of European and Asian descent inherited a small amount, an average 1% to 4% of their genes, from the extinct species.

Humans and Neanderthals likely interbred 50,000 to 80,000 years ago in the Near East, concludes the international genetics team's pair of studies in the new issue of the journal Science. The research was led by German genome researcher Svante Paabo of the Max-Plank Institute for Evolutionary Anthropology. The finding splits the difference in a long-running scholarly debate over whether people are solely African in origin, or spring from "multiregional" interbreeding of early human species.

I hear that Larry Flynt is already planning a movie about the subject...

The Perfessor

They say that history is written by the winners, well, you have to hand it to those wily right-wing conservative Texan Republicans, who are about to prove that old adage is no longer true. As a small far-right faction of the Texas State Board of Education has recently proven when they succeeded in injecting uber-conservative ideals into (of all places) the social studies, history, and economics lessons that will be taught to millions of students across the state, and (ironically, throughout the country)for the next decade.

Teachers in Texas will be required to cover the Judeo-Christian influences of the nation's Founding Fathers, but not highlight the philosophical rationale for the separation of church and state. Curriculum standards also will describe the U.S. government as a "constitutional republic," rather than "democratic," and students will be required to study the decline in value of the U.S. dollar, including the abandonment of the gold standard.

Yep, the Texas State Board of Education has proposed some 120 pages of changes to the state’s history and social studies curriculum. The Board, which is composed of 10 conservatives and 5 "liberals," voted down party lines to literally gut numerous historical references to America’s mistakes (because we apparently can't ever admit that we ever did anything wrong — hey did you want those pesky Indians and buffalo living in the middle of the country and mucking up your lawn?) and to inject their throw-back, neanderthal, crypto-conservative values and beliefs into the history of America’s cultural development. Needless to say, the result of this end-run around intellectualism and education means that the facts no longer matter and shoved into the back-seat to ultracon perspective (talk about having someone's agenda being shoved down your throat).

Now, to present our version of dueling talking heads, we present our two favorite pundits, Stephen Colbert:

And now, we give you Jon Stewart's take on this fubar.

Don't you just love it when someone puts things into perspective for you?

The Perfessor

So you might have heard about this 50-car pile up in Shelton, CT today, due to “black ice” but considering that the info came from Fox News that has consistently made mistakes in their recent reporting.

SHELTON, Conn. — Police say at least 50 cars crashed in a chain-reaction collision on a wet Connecticut road that was turning icy, and 46 people reported minor injuries.

Shelton police Detective Sgt. Kevin Ahern says six people were taken to hospitals from the wreck that happened shortly after noon Sunday on state route 110. None of the injuries were life-threatening.

WFSB says the southwestern Connecticut road has been closed for more than five hours so authorities can continue investigating the accident. Police expected it to reopen early Sunday evening.

However, I have it on good authority that the scene looked more like this...

What? Too soon?

The Perfessor