Monday, December 29, 2008

Cosmic Beauty

As we all know, the Hubble Space Telescope has unlocked the cosmos for human eyes to behold. Never before have humans been able to see so deep into space in such a clear, beautiful way. This is best demonstrated in the following pictures of the Eagle Nebula. The columns are pillars of hydrogen gas acting as incubators for new stars. They're artificially colored, but they're still awesome pictures. Even though they look like "artist's renditions," they're the real thing. The top image is the entire nebula, and the bottom image is closer up. Imagine how other things in our great universe would look. Just...beautiful.



Wednesday, December 24, 2008

Run!!! Run Awaaaaaay!!!

Haven't you always just wanted to drop a snowball down a hill and watch it grow and eat up everything in its path? Well, now you can, and you even get points for it!
This is a game I found on AddictingGames, and the great thing about it is you're put into a group with other players and try to break each other's records. And rolling over little kids with a two-ton snowball and listening to the resulting crunch is oh so satisfying. I've spent hours on this beautifully simple game!
Here you go:

Snowball 2008

My personal best is currently 5800 pounds. Beat that!

Monday, December 22, 2008

Is it this card? Or that card...?

All right, here's a sweet magic trick called "This'n'That." I watched it like 10 times trying to figure out how he did it. And I still couldn't see it.



If you want, the explanation is here. Even after knowing how it's done and learning the trick, I'm still amazed at how well nicepaul does it here.

Sunday, December 21, 2008

Download Online Videos!

We all have seen a video online that we want so bad, but there's no way do download it. Like, say, if you wanted to put one of the YouTube videos I showed you on your iPod, what would you do?

Well, here's the answer: You'd put the URL into the blue bar at the top of the page of Keepvid.com. The awesome thing about Keepvid is that it automatically converts the video into a number of formats, including MP4, which is compatible with most portable video players. Finally, something that makes it easy to download all the best videos online!

Tuesday, December 16, 2008

But it Looks so Real...

Hey, guys. Me again.

Here's another great video on YouTube, this one credited for its extreme realism. It is meant to imitate the silent-film style and feel of the 1920s, and it does so beautifully. It's an amazing piece of video editing:

My favorite scene is the last one, with the fat manager. Love the music!
Until next time...Fire

Saturday, December 13, 2008

It Breathes Just Like We Do!

Until recently, gas was upwards of $4 a gallon. People were going nuts about buying hybrids, smaller cars, and walking or riding bikes. Now that the economy's committed sucicide, however, that recently changed, but oil is sure to go up again sometime. And when it does...MDI will be there.
Check this out. MDI, a French company, has developed a motor capable of what a normal internal-combustion engine can do, that runs on compressed air.
Yes, you read that right.
Compressed air! Imagine pulling into your garage after a day at work, pulling an extension cord out of your glove compartment, and plugging it into the wall outlet of your garage. You come out the next day and the air tank is full and ready to go. You take out the cord, and off to work you go. And this fantasy is only a year or two from now.
In 2009, MDI plans to release the CityFlowAIR, the first in a line of cars that run on a mix of a tiny amount of fuel of some kind (many are available) and a lot of compressed air. It will be sold for around $17,000. Not bad for a car you don't need gas for.

Below are two pictures, courtesy of MDI, that show these new cars.

Personally, I can't wait for these to come out and am deeply interested in them. See more info and more pictures at MDI's website.

Friday, December 12, 2008

Boot to the Head

For those of you unfamiliar with Phoenix Wright (like myself), it's a courtroom-lawyer-stuff game for the Nintendo DS where you are a lawyer and defend people in court cases. It's a visual-novel-type adventure game, where you gather evidence and then use it to defend people in court (Wikipedia, God praise thee).
Now that you're aware of the game, let me present you another awesome (and this time, funny) installment of my YouTube series: Boot to the Head.



Kinda speaks for itself, doesn't it?

Until next time...umm...bye?

Sunday, December 7, 2008

Everything--Answered

Have you ever had a really strange question that you can't seem to find the answer to anywhere? I recently discovered Yahoo! Answers, a site where Yahoo! members can ask any question they want and the answer is up, often in minutes, but by a day you'll have the answer you're looking for. All answers are written by other Yahoo! members. It's a great place to find the answer to your question or to share your knowledge (because we all know how fun that is) with someone else. You can ask questions on anything, too, and it's all well organized. It's a pretty cool place. Try it out sometime.

Tuesday, December 2, 2008

The Wonders of YouTube

YouTube is a great source for tons of cool junk on the internet. The problem is that it can be quite hard to find. The solution to the problem is me (drastic exaggeration here). Whenever I see something awesome on YouTube, I'll post it here next chance I get. If you find something crazy cool on YouTube and want me to see it or post it here, go ahead and feel free to email it to me (firemastrr@gmail.com) or post a reply to this topic or any other topic with YouTube videos. If it's good enough, I'll post it.

If you don't really feel like buying tons of soda and breath mints and making some crazy chain reaction (or cleaning up the resulting mess), then here's an experiment to try at home. It's reletively easy and inexpensive. Make your Mountain Dew glow!




Check back periodically for more YouTube coolness!

Oh, by the way, if you like this blog but don't want to spend every day looking at it to see if I wrote more wisdom for you guys to read, consider making a Google account and following this blog using the "Follow this blog" link on the top of the right-hand column of the page after signing in to Blogger with your Google account. It really supports the blog and shows me that you're reading this! Thanks!