Airbrushed Beauty

/ Shane / 2 Comments

We’ve all seen a million pictures of celebrities without their makeup, etc.  But even still, I think we are all a little fooled by the magic of modeling.  Sure, anybody would look good with better wardrobe / hair / makeup, but they have to have a good base to work with, right?  Well, kind of.  

Check out some of these images to see how much they really change via “airbrushing” or photoshop.  It is absolutely amazing.  I’m not surprised that they do this stuff, but I figured it would just be a little touch up here or there.  They practically draw a new picture.

Follow the link and then, once the image is loaded, mouse over it to see the original picture before touch ups.  Also, there are a few little images on the right hand side that you can click on which will bring you a close-up of a particular area that was heavily modified.

Another good one is this bikini chick. Also (so as not to be called sexist)(again) here is a male model.  There are a few more on the right of the page.

Link via PlanetDan

Weasel Puke Coffee

/ Shane / Leave a comment

Once again, ThinkGeek comes up with a stellar product.  In this case, it is Weasel Puke Coffee, and it is no joke!  Basically, these weasels eat the best beans off the plant, but the beans irritate their stomach causing them to vomit.  Somehow their stomach acid affects the beans which are harvested by Vietnamese people and brewed into a drink which is treated as a delicacy.

 

There are weirder symbiotic relationships in nature.  I suppose they probably could have come up with a better name that is a little less descriptive.  Maybe it is lost in translation or something.

Update:

After posting this story, many people have mentioned to me that there is also Weasle Poop Coffee, which is definitely more disguting but, unfortunately, not for sale.

Face Transformer

/ Shane / 3 Comments

And not the kind who wage their battles to destroy the evil forces of the Decepticons.

Check out this webpage which allows you to upload a picture and then choose from a variety of styles to change your appearance.  From caucasian to black to asian and even a couple of styles that show you how you would have been painted by a certain artist.

face_transform_me

A couple of tips: You can select a picture with multiple people and crop it down in step two.  Also, it works much better if your mouth is closed (i.e. smiling without showing your teeth) and if you are looking directly at the camera.  And the webpage is very flaky, so you may have to try multiple times.

face_transform_sara_2

I can’t stop staring at the Sara-as-a-man one, it is very disturbing.  There are many other styles to choose from.  Unfortunately it didn’t work very well with Evie’s picture.

Link courtesy Planet Dan.

Time Out

/ Shane / 1 Comment

About a month ago we began giving Evie “time out” as a punishment.  This was usually only for things that she does to intentionally push boundaries, like when you tell her not to throw something and she looks at you with a twinkle in her eye (like so)

picks up the object, slowly raises it above her head and says, “No throwing!” before throwing it.  

So, when she does something like that, we put her in a certain location in the hallway and make her sit there until we count to 10.  At first this seemed like such a small penalty that we kind of thought it would be pointless.  Not so!  The first couple of times she would try to get up, but after she realized it restarted the countdown, she usually just sat and cried.  After maybe 3 times of doing it, just saying, “Evie, do you want a time out?” was usually enough to make her cease and desist immediately and sometimes even make her run to the other parent for “protection”.

So we were kind of surprised and pleased at how effective it was.  Was being the operative word.

The other day she had a time out for opening the stove door after she was told not to.  After sitting and smiling through the 20 count (we upped it from 10) she asked for “more time out” and “again time out”.  When Sara refused to give her another time out she tried just going back and sitting in the time out area.  That wasn’t authentic enough though, so she came and got Sara and started tugging on her hand to pull her back to the time out area.  Finally, when that didn’t work, she intentionally opened the stove again and then marched back to time out and sat down.  Needless to say, this is not going as planned.

This morning she gave herself a time out after doing something naughty.  Afterwards, Sara asked her if she had learned her lesson.  I think it is safe to say no.

I guess it must be winter time

/ Shane / 1 Comment

Because my commute home took THREE HOURS!!

THREE HOURS!!