I kind of went off on tangents when discussing a couple recent TV ads for McDonalds. One shows pop auto-tuned singer Austin Mahone (I’d never heard of him before either) auto-tuned singing his way through some song when he’s distracted by his hangers-on having McDonalds’ breakfasts. I pointed out that his speaking voice should also be auto-tuned. For accuracy.
The other ad has a retired woman telling a busily working fellow to sit back and enjoy his McDonalds’ coffee. Well, that’s easy for her to say. She’s retired.
Here is where I learned about this and you can learn a bunch of other stuff there as well. It’s the College of Curiosity and it is really cool.
The second thing I mentioned is that we call rubber bands binders. That one seems less unusual than goose. Goose? Really?
I had talked about this before, but with a spate of celebrities kicking it lately I thought I’d go over the celebrity deaths in threes fallacy. They really don’t die in threes. They just die. We tend to notice in threes if we happen to be predisposed to do so. I listed off 14 celebrities who had died in February only.
There are a couple factors go into this whole thing. What constitutes a celebrity? How much time has to pass between deaths? It really just comes down to how we tend to notice the deaths.
Madame Kitty Mervine of the Yankee Skeptic blog asked me to write about my favorite topic: Me. Well, me and Dimland Radio. I wrote about how it started and about an early dust up with a “psychic” who shall remain unnamed. It posted Thursday and Kitty tells me it has been getting a few hits. Who would have thought people would be interested?
Kitty has asked me to write more. It’s nice to be asked for more.
Sort of a companion piece to the movies I recommended last week (The Bat & The Bat Whispers – Both considered influences on the creation of Batman), this week I recommend the movie that inspired the look of The Joker. The Man Who Laughs is a silent film that was released in the transition period between silents and talkies. And, as such, it does feature a score and some sound effects. It is also surprisingly bawdy. There are a few saucy moments with one of the female supporting actors.
Not exactly a horror film, it is pretty creepy and Conrad Veidt’s lead character looks awfully scary, especially when in white face make-up. You can find the movie on YouTube. It’s in ten minute segments, but you’ll want to watch those as they have the original soundtrack.
Second ad break bumpers: ‘Take It Away‘ by Paul McCartney & ‘Epic‘ by Faith No More
Closing song: ‘Angler’s Treble Hook’ by $5 Fiddle
Dimland Radio 