I love this commercial from Toyota regarding Facebook. It makes me crack up every time. I keep asking my friends “Have you see that commerical with the girl trying to get her parents on Facebook?” They keep saying no, so… here it is.
The Copenhagen Philharmonic Orchestra assembles at Copenhagen’s Central Train Station and plays a little Ravel. Very cool:
Another video found at Power Line. It’s longer than most — about 12 minutes long — but worth it for me. And fascinating, as well. I have always loved stories told in the form of live-action drawings. That is, you get to watch the artist draw the illustrations before your eyes as the narrator tells the story. That’s the first element of “fascinating” for me.
The second is the brief history lesson documenting how all this Israeli-Palestinian conflict and controversy began and evolved. I have long believed the Israelis have every right to their Jerusalem, but what I did not really understand, and what this video depicts is how much the Israelis have bent over backward to give the Palestinians their own independent state (while neighboring Arab states have done anything but) and how frequently the Palestinians have said to their offers, “No! We don’t want two states. We want you gone and us in your place!” or, more succinctly (and this is closer to a direct quote): “We will only be satisfied by the extermination of Israel.”
I will add the caveat that I have not yet had the opportunity to research all the claims made on this video, but it’s a good place to begin.
My agent posted the following video on his blog last Friday. It made him laugh.
It made me laugh, too. And in the days that have followed I’ve found myself going back to it over and over. In some strange way it’s been inspiring me to write. I don’t know why exactly. I can definitely relate, though my reactions are a bit more dramatic than hers. In my office there is a lot of staring at the ceiling, then frantic typing, then more staring, then sighing, pushing away from the desk, more staring at the ceiling, more typing. Then the part where I bury my face in my hands and cover my eyes, so I can’t see the screen… I talk a lot more too… And not to Quigley, though he sometimes thinks I am.
Still, I think it’s the understatment in this one that makes it funny. Particularly in light of its title: The Excitement of the Writing Profession.
I especially like the “thinking” part. 🙂
UPDATE: Sadly, the creator of this video has changed the settings to “private” so it’s no longer viewable. I might just have to make my own…
Make my own????
DISTRACTION ALERT! DISTRACTION ALERT! DISTRACTION ALERT!
Perhaps you’ve seen this video on YouTube. I think it’s pretty funny. And since it gets funnier every time I look at it, I thought I’d post it. Laughter is good for the soul, like a medicine, after all. Yes the guy is arguing entirely in Spanish, but that just makes it funnier as far as I’m concerned.
I also think it’s a wonderful visual image to carry about in case you happen to encounter an argumentative person. Because, really, I think it’s not much different. Reminds me a lot of some liberal pundits and activists…
First thing in today’s post I want to say is thanks to all of you who commented on the Common Courtesy post. I appreciate your encouraging remarks and insights. Loved the analogy of the soccer player wandering into the middle of the baseball game. I started a post in response, but had to quit as it was too late and my brain stopped working before it got it to make any sense. Probably a good thing, since I’m not sure it’s worth posting anyway.
Then I watched the following video which my husband sent me the link to, a salute to veterans, I Fought for You by the Sound Tank. Strange title, I thought, and when it opened I wasn’t sure I was going to like it. But by th end it moved me deeply, so I’m sharing it.
I am sooo impressed by this guy, Chris Christie, governor of New Jersey, and have been for some time. Not only is he articulate and conservative, but he has courage and integrity and shows incredible leadership. Every time I hear him, my admiration increases.
In the video below, he responds to a reporter’s question about whether or not he’s going to fire the person responsible for a clerical error that caused the state to forfeit several hundreds of millions of federal education dollars. Some Obama administration bureaucrat denied the request because the wrong sheet of numbers was turned in amongst the mass of application documents. Conservative pundits are already wondering… is this because of “mindless worker-bee syndrome” or is it more insidious — punishment to Christie for being of the wrong party and for balancing the NJ state budget.
It’s not a long video, but the very best part, I think, is at the end, so watch it all the way through!
Okay, I admit, I’m weird. It’s probably a good thing I don’t live in the midwest because I’d be one of those tornado chasers. I just find them fascinating. I feel the same way about thunderstorms. I think what I like about them both, in addition to the beauty and hypnotic grace in the images, is the fact that they show God’s power. I can’t speak for personally watching a tornado, but I’ve watched scores of thunderstorms and even been out in them, lightning cracking around on every side (that was not by choice… the worst part is how hard the rain pelts you — so hard you can’t open your eyes). They are such awesome demonstrations of the power of God. Because His power goes way beyond a wimpy thunderstorm or tornado. That’s the cool part… here’s this manifestation of weather that completely humbles us. We can do nothing about it, nothing to stop it, nothing to control it… just get out of the way and pray.
And controlling a tornado is less than fingerwork for the one who actually holds all the universe together, keeps the sun in order, the planets, the galaxies, etc. I love considering those aspects of God. Because when you do, how can you worry about anything in life? He’s got it ALL under His control, everything chosen and incorporated into a plan that is not only holy and sovereign but wise and loving…
Anyway, all that to introduce this cool video of a tornado I just found:
And if you want to see some really still pictures of storms (accompanying an article on some British storm chasers in our own Tornado Alley) click here.
Remember the You Tube video I posted last week from the Flotilla Choir singing “We Con The World?” Well, seems it went viral since last Thursday when it was posted. Power Line blog, where I found it, says it’s already had over 3,000,000 views. So naturally, YouTube has pulled it. Apparently YouTube has a history of pulling things positive to Israel. Though Werner-Chapelle who owns the copyright to the hit fund-raising song “We Are the World” the choir used for their parody, and has claimed they’re in violation of copyright, many think this is not really the issue.
As an aside, I’ve always thought that song (ie, the original) was too dumb to listen to. I couldn’t stand the words and always left or turned the channel before I heard much of it. So it wasn’t until I found the Flotilla Choir parody that I actually heard the tune, which has been a true earworm for me… listen to the thing once and I’ve got the tune running through my head for the rest of the day. And maybe the next, too. It doesn’t help that the new lyrics crack me up. Particularly after I went and looked at the original lyrics.
I much prefer “We’re waving our own knives” to “We’re changing our own lives.” What an idiotic concept! But I’ll desist from my commentary on that, since this isn’t about that, but rather people trying to shut down Jewish voices.
Because apparently under the fair use doctrine US Copyright law does allow use of a tune for the purposes of parody. And in fact, there are allegedly several other parodies (including one on Barak Obama) using the same tune still up on YouTube. Caroline Glick, who is editor-in-chief of Latma TV and also contributing editor to the Jerusalem Post, discusses it on her blog here.
Today it’s gone to a new host, Daily Motion. So if you want to enjoy it again… click here.
I know I’ve not been posting much of late… the Las Vegas trip wiped me out. And after that I spent some time resting, being alone, refilling the well. Even started back to work on Sky, and then a bunch of stuff happened this week that I’ll post about later.
For now, I’ve been following the whole “botched raid” of the Israeli Defense Force on the “peace activist” Turkish Love Boat, coming only to break through the Israeli blockade in order to bring potatoes and dollies to the poor suffering Palestinians in Gaza (I saw an Al Jazeera video on that aspect). How the poor souls — nearly all men, that I could see — were so packed into the ship they had to sleep on deck in the open air, and the toilets couldn’t handle them all, and worse -AGH! — the kitchen on the ship was too small to service 600 people and some had to go 48 hours between hot meals. Oh, the suffering.
Anyway, one thing struck me as I watched and read and listened to it all (including video taken by the IDF of the actual operation, which shows clearly who the aggressors were), especially the instant reaction of the whole world in condemning Israel almost before anything went down. (One piece I read cited David Hazony of Commentary Magazine saying he’d spoken with a senior producer of a major news network in the US who said he’d received “a well-phrased press release from the office of [PA spokesman] Saeb Erekat,” one the producer received at 4:36 a.m Monday. Making it obvious the thing had been prepared beforehand. And illustrating the truth of the title of the piece, a quote from Churchill that “A lie gets halfway around the world before the truth gets a chance to put its pants on”) What struck me, though, was how clear it is to anyone who wants to see that Israel has a supernatural enemy.
I mean, what’s the deal about Israel? There are hundreds of millions of Arabs and multiple Arab states vs 7 million Jews and one Jewish state. The Arabs have vast oil resources from which they derive great wealth, whereas the Jews have none. Why, in the eyes of the UN, can Russia and China and North Korea commit all manner of atrocities and provocations and go almost unnoticed whereas Israel can hardly blink correctly? As Israeli Prime Minister Netanyahu said recently (today? Yesterday?) “Israel is guilty until proven guilty.” It goes beyond men and nations. It goes to the enemy of God, Satan himself.
But that’s not my subject here. Because tonight Power Line Blog put up a new video produced by the “Flotilla Choir” — a song routine called “We Con the World.” I think it’s hysterical. But I do have something of a frame of reference. They have interspersed actual video from journalists on the ship showing the “peace activists” readying their knives, sticks, pipes and sling shots and from the IDF (the one I mentioned earlier)
I’m not sure who the Flotilla Choir is, though I do know that Caroline Glick, cited as the editor, is the senior contributing editor of the Jerusalem Post and a senior fellow for Middle East Affairs at the Center for Security Policy… Ah, I just Googled “who is Flotilla Choir” and came up with the answer. It’s an Israeli TV show called Latma TV “like Saturday Night Live only funnier.” Yeah, I’d agree.