Here's a math problem with some bite: how long would it take for vampires to eat up the world, as it were? Flea picked up an intriguing bite bit.
You know, The Count - the Sesame Street vampire who never seems to use his fangs - is great with sequential addition, but really ought to concentrate on more sophisticated formulae.
Can you guess which movie this frame comes from? Shouldn't be hard ... it is, after all, No. 1 on this list of the 100 scariest movie moments. (The Shining, which offers several scenes to the list, evidently causes skin to scrawl at the author's home.)
What movie and/or scene do you consider scariest?
"The superstitious man is to the rascal what the slave is to the tyrant."
- Voltaire
On. Oct. 31, 1984, Indian prime minister Indira Gandhi was assassinated near her residence in New Delhi. She was replaced immediately by her son, Rajiv, who would himself be the victim of assassination in 1991.
[Surf's Up, as published in the St. John's Telegram on Thursday, Oct. 26, 2006. Click here to read more columns.]
When did Halloween become such a big deal - commercially, that is? Decorations now seem to take up more shelf space than candy, and costumes seem aimed toward grown-ups moreso than kids.
And am I the only one to raise eyebrows when Halloween greeting cards show up in drugstores each year? I love my family and all, but giving them a card to wish them an, um, awful Halloween seems like a waste of money.
That said …
Custom pumpkin carving
You can send a greeting by e-mail that's customized … and free, for that matter … by clicking on this fun-to-use British site. Start with your pumpkin and carve out any phrase you wish. (You can start again if your hand slips or if you carve out a typo.) In fact, you don't even have to make a message; a scary or funny face will do just fine, too. When you're done, you can save your image and then send it off on its way. Speaking of pumpkins …
Pumpkin Gutter
Extreme Pumpkins 
Most of us who carve pumpkins use simple knives and those little kits with flimsy tools that the stores stock at this time of year. The hardcore carvers are more ambitious. They use their lathes, carpentry tools and other instruments to turn their vegetables (well, pumpkins are fruit, biologically) into works of art. Pumpkin Gutter features the work of a single carver who creates trolls, ghouls and things that could have passed as extras in the Lord of the Rings. There's also, for what it's worth, a pretty good pass at George W. Bush. [That's Wallace & Gromit to the above right; click on it to see the detail ... and the cheese.)
Extreme Pumpkins lives up to its name - and it's not for kids. Entries come from all over; in fact, there's an annual competition. Things can get pretty tasteless, although if you have a black sense of humour - and I do - it also gets hilarious. I howled at the clever use of simple materials to fashion a guillotine, complete with a second pumpkin (draped in a black cowl) off to the side as the laughing executioner.
Pumpkin math
For a more educational pumpkin-related exercise, try this: an opportunity to slice up a pumpkin while doing a little math along the way. I would think the kids will figure out that this exercise is about more than just fun, but hopefully they'll play along, as it were. That said, using "string" from inside the pumpkin to fashion a graph seems to be a wee bit of a stretch on a kid's patience…
Elsewhere this week
Rex Goudie Video Podcast
Rex Goudie on MySpace 
Faced with a fragmenting market and soft sales, music labels are figuring out how to make web technology work for them, not against them. Sony BMG will no doubt be putting on a big PR push for Rex Goudie's second album when it's released in early December. In the meantime, it's been building online buzz by adding a video podcast through Goudie's official site. The video segments run a few minutes each and put his hometown of Burlington on the map (indeed, the opening shot is of a map showing just where Burlington is). It's not all fluffy; in one segment, Goudie and others talk about the declining population in rural Newfoundland and the dire implications of what the future may have in store. Goudie's MySpace page, meanwhile, follows the MySpace template: teasers with new tunes, a bit of news and gossip, and a prompt for fans to request a new single on local radio.
Movie Review Query Engine
Not sure about an old movie that's on TV tonight? Doubtful about which choice to make at the multiplex? You can find plenty of movie reviews and opinion all over the web, but you might want to save some time and head straight to Movie Review Query Engine, which streamline things very nicely. Tap in the name of the movie, and then browse through what's on offer. Expect to see plenty of hits for new(ish) material; for golden oldies, the pickings will likely be fewer, but still should be helpful.
John Gushue is a news writer for CBC.ca in St. John's. Site suggestions always welcome at surf at thetelegram.com.
On Oct. 30, 1938, CBS Radio aired the Mercury Theatre production of The War of the Worlds. Orson Welles adapted news techniques of the day - bulletins, alerts and on-the-scene reportage, all of it part of the golden age of radio - to give immediacy to the drama; famously, some listeners were taken in and thought Earth was being invaded (although certainly not in the exaggerated claims made thereafter). You can listen to War of the Worlds (and many other Mercury Theatre productions) right here.
"Why is propaganda so much more successful when it stirs up hatred than when it tries to stir up friendly feeling?"
- Bertrand Russell
"Raising kids is part joy and part guerrilla warfare."
- Ed Asner
"They say that if the Swiss had designed these mountains, they'd be rather flatter."
- Paul Theroux
Above & Beyond, a four-hour miniseries on the ferry command that flew aircraft from Gander to U.K. in secrecy and at incredible risk in 1940, begins Sunday night. The companion site is up and running, and well worth checking out. (A colleague worked on it.)
I came across this chart on Tod Maffin's Inside the CBC ... nothing to do with the Corp., but (in the off-topic spirit with which it was posted) I'm struck by this. Who knew people in Nfld and Lab chowed down so comparatively infrequently on nachos? (Hat tip to one of GB Trudeau's books for the spark for this posting's title, We're Eating More Beets!, which was about USA Today's obsession with factoids.)
[Surf's Up, as published in the St. John's Telegram on Thursday, Oct. 19, 2006. Click here to read more columns.]
Every so often, I get a letter (well, an e-mail, almost always) from a reader wanting to pick my brain about what computer they should buy. My response is usually the same. Boiled down, and to be a bit blunt, it goes like this: beats me, pal.
I may spend most of my waking hours attached to a computer, but that doesn't make me an expert on what's good under the hood. After all, I don't buy computers all that often (thank goodness). Moreover, the computers I've used at work have all been picked out by someone else.
Nonetheless, the question arises frequently enough that I thought I would devote this week's column to it.
I mainly have used PCs, but I've used Macs twice in my career, and I admit I like them more. I've consistently used PCs at home - not so much by choice, but by necessity. Because of the work that I and my wife do, we've needed to use Microsoft products. More recently, Apple has caught with the compatibility problem, which has led to a doubling of sales of their elegant little laptops.
I've done pretty well with my PC purchases. In a nutshell, here's what I've learned:
Stick to well-known brands. Spend a bit more to outfit your computer with the right tools, even though it will drive up your cost. Ask around, and get your friends' feedback on their experiences. If your employer has an IT department, pay them a visit.
Think carefully about your needs. If you're into e-mail and not much more, choose a simple model (likely at bargain rates). If you live for video, computer games and cutting-edge apps, research the high-end lines thoroughly. If you're not sure where you fit in, I'd skew toward the higher end, too; after all, your computer is going to be around for a few years, and you can be sure that software advances (and their demands on speed and memory) will continue to roll right along.
As for when, there's a cliché that the best time to buy a computer is next week. The joke goes that retailers will slash prices right after your credit card is swiped. There's some truth to this, as computer prices have declined as power has increased.
In the industry, June is considered the cheap season for computers, as retailers empty inventories and await the big upgrades, which tend to come out in the late summer and early fall.
Which makes this time of year a good time to see what's on the market. And yes, you'll see good sales as Christmas approaches. (You'll also likely see discounts after Christmas, too.) As for the latest-and-greatest, some manufacturers plan upgrades pretty much every three or four months, so the fall is not necessarily the time for the biggest computer punch.
On a related point, if you choose a PC, you may want to wait for Microsoft to get on with it and release its much, much-delayed Vista operating system, which has been in the works for a couple of years. A year ago, Microsoft had been planning a winter release; now, it's not likely to be available for ordinary consumers until next January. (Business clients should be able to buy upgrades next month.) If you buy now, make sure you can upgrade the operating system with ease.
As well, if you're replacing an older computer, don't chuck anything in the garbage just yet. Peter H. Lewis called this "the Tarzan Principle" and put it like this: Don't let go of the first vine until the next one is firmly in your grasp."
With a new computer, of course, you can hang on to your old PC and start thinking "network" at home. Wireless routers are cheaper than ever, and not too difficult to use. I do have one lesson from experience: I hired a friend of mine who's expert with this stuff to set up our wireless network (and some other things), and it turned out to be money well spent. An unknown issue with the construction of our house (steel infrastructure at one juncture, we're thinking) made getting a signal around the house to be more difficult than I would have thought.
Finally, one point. A reader asked me recently what equipment I would concentrate on above all other. That's easy: a good printer. We bought an excellent printer in 1992, and it lasted until last year, believe or not (although getting replacement cartridges turned into a real challenge).
Many printers today may be inexpensive, but don't seem designed to last, or for heavy use. They strike me as loss leaders to draw in consumers; the money seems to be made from cartridge sales later on. In any event, a good, durable printer is easily worth the extra investment.
Those are my two cents. Before you plunk down your hard-earned money on some new gear, make sure you collect some more opinions and advice.
John Gushue is a news writer for CBC.ca in St. John's. Site suggestions always welcome at surf at thetelegram.com.
If you have a) a minute to kill; b) a mouse in good operating order; and c) even the vaguest knowledge of the Mona Lisa, you may get a kick out of this interactive bit of fun.
On Oct. 26, 1958, a Boeing 707 flying on behalf of Pan American Airways made its first trip from New York to Paris. I can't help but think that the trip (which took the better part of nine hours) helped herald the loss of prominence of Gander's airport, which was such an important fuelling stop that it wore its "crossroads of the world" tag with pride.
"Every revolutionary ends up by becoming either an oppressor or a heretic."
- Albert Camus
My wife snapped this this morning, amid heavy winds that had already knocked off most of the leaves off this tree, in our front yard. I suspect the tree will be bare within a day or two.
Sounds like a journalist taking the gonzo thing a bit too seriously ... but, alas, I was disappointed to read it's only an entry on a list of worst video game titles of all time. (Hat tip to BoingBoing.)
On Oct. 25, 1415, the Battle of Agincourt was waged, with England - though greatly outnumbered by French soldiers - prevailing with a small number of casualties. The battle is likely well known to many because it is the centrepiece of Shakespeare's Henry V, and the "we happy few" speech resonated especially during the Second World War and its aftermath, when Laurence Olivier adapted it.
"I've never been in a horror film - on purpose."
- Peter O'Toole
On Oct. 24, 1978, Rolling Stones guitarist Keith Richards was ordered by a Toronto judge to play a charity concert as a penalty for being caught in possession of heroin. Click here for a National report from the day.
"In writing a novel, when in doubt, have two guys come through the door with guns."
- Raymond Chandler
Rattling Books is getting in the Halloween spirit, so to speak, with a half-off discount and a tip o' the hat to some of the deceased authors whose works they carry ... specifically, Wilfred Grenfell, Dillon Wallace and Bob Bartlett. More here.
Want to feel inferior as you take hand to pumpkin for a little carving? Check out this and dozens of dazzling other examples of seasonal carvings at Pumpkin Gutter. I took my son Sunday afternoon to the annual workplace Halloween party, which was - as always - a gas ... pumpkin seeds everywhere, as the kids all carved their own thing.
Speaking of kids ... keep them away from Extreme Pumpkin, which collects novelty carvings of a grownup variety (the violence is more realistic than cartoonish, let's say). Amazing what you can do with a lathe, some carpentry tools and a little ingenuity (a black sense of humour seems to help, too.) Here's an example from last year's contest:
Ugh. And this is a milder one. Directions are included on the site for entering this year's contest.
On Oct. 23, 1996 - 10 years ago today - the civil trial of O.J. Simpson opened in Los Angeles. Simpson had beat a murder conviction; he would not be so lucky at the civil trial. The transcript of the first day of testimony can be read here.
I am a journalist with CBC News in St. John's, Newfoundland and Labrador, Canada. I'm taller than I look. This blog has been running quietly since 2004.
Recent Comments