The Friday Link for 12/27/24

 Hi all, and welcome to the final Friday Link for 2024! 

To begin with, we have two Christmas carryovers.  On an earlier Link, I posted the now classic Nate Bargatze SNL bit of George Washington trying to explain the future of America to his troops.  Well, Nate outdid himself with a new version of it, this time as an angel trying to explain what Christmas will become to Joseph and Mary as they have baby Jesus in Bethlehem.  

Shout out to Mikey Day for carrying over his participation from SNL, and Darrius Rucker shows up!

Speaking of Saturday Night Live, it's time for the annual Weekend Update joke swap with Colin Jost and Michael Che. Word of warning: this is VERY adult!  Jost's fairly famous wife, Scarlett, shows up for the...I can't believe she knew what she signed up for. 

And finally tonight, two of my favorite YouTube channels.  First up is True Facts: Rays! 

And Tasting History with Max Miller has a Depression-era Christmas dessert that actually looks REALLY awesome! 

Stay alert.  2025 will be a really rough year, but we'll get through it together. 

Please make sure you stay up to date on your vaccinations! 

Happy New Year everyone.

The Friday Link for 12/20/24

Howdy, all. I hope everyone has a nice holiday week, no matter what you do or don't celebrate! If you are traveling, travel safe.

Short and sweet tonight. With it being the Friday before Christmas, here is The Late Show with Stephen Colbert's latest holiday special, "It's a Worm-deful Life."  It does warm the heart to see them get after Elon and Trump. 

Also tonight, a modern Christmas song I love.  I am stunned this hasn't become a bigger hit during the holidays.  Rosie Thomas with a fun upbeat Christmas banger! 

Like I said, short and sweet.

I hope everyone has a nice holiday week. All my best.

Please stay up to date on all your vaccinations. 

The Firday Link for 12/13/24

Howdy all!

Let's start this week with a movie from the 1990s I LOVED but was a massive flop at the box office.  The Phantom is an old comic book that was turned into an early popular radio series.  In the 1990s, after the popularity of Michael Keaton's Batman, Hollywood ran back to old comic books and tried to find gold.  

I remember when this movie flopped, but it should've done a lot better.  I think it popped up on a cable channel, so I watched it. It was sensational! Billy Zane was so good as the title character, but it was Treat Williams who played the villain perfectly. 

The Shadow with Alec Baldwin was another of the comic book revival movies in the 1990s, and I also thought it was good, but The Phantom deserves some love. The YouTube poster Giant Freaking Robot agrees. 

How about some holiday videos!  Let's start with Deadpool! 

You read that right.  Ryan Renolds is helping out the Sick Kids Foundation with help from KidPool and Lynda Carter (!?!).  This is pretty funny and quick!

Next up, what the heck are Sugar Plums??? Tasting History explains what they are and why they were only something you did during the holidays of yore! They are a pain in the tuckus to make! 

And finally this week, a realization.  Potter won in 2024.  George Bailey was the far better, far more humane, far more sane, far less pro-billionaire agenda candidate, but he lost because Potter convinced idiots he was on their side.

Well if the Democrats start campaigning like George Bailey, maybe they can save America in 2026. 

Have a great weekend!

Make sure you stay up to date on all of your vaccinations and shots!  I want you healthy!

 

The Friday Link for 12/6/24

Howdy all!

We are going to have an all science-y edition of the Friday Link this week.  The YouTube algorithms have been giving me some great things to watch, that have nothing to do with politics. For that I am grateful.

Let's start with a fascinating video from the British Museum, their Curator's Corner.  Irving Finkle looks like an extra in an Indiana Jones movie.  He's a curator in the museum from the Middle East department. 

The feature of this curator's segment focuses on a clay tablet which happens to be the oldest map of the world to exist. On top of that, there is a fascinating part of this video that talks about how the map was unable to be deciphered until a volunteer found a very small but important piece of the tablet in the museum's files. I found this video an absolute gem. 

Next up this week is a fun video from ZeFrank, but instead of talking about a perverse animal species, he talks about being asked to join an advisory board of the Senckenberg Museum in Frankfort, where they are working to identify and name multiple species. This is actually a cool look at how science approaches new animals. 

Next up is a great video from PBS Eons, where they talk about how weird the Amazon used to be. Not only did the Amazon used to flow backward, but then eventually, as the Andes Mountains began to form, it just pooled up and made a South American version of Minnesota (minus the tropical theme).

We talked about ancient maps, naming new species, and the earth of long ago, but our final science destination is space and Proxima Centauri.  What would life be like if humans eventually made it to that star system?  This video does a good job hypothesizing the young community there, and (although it uses some crud AI images) puts together a positive picture of what life would actually look like, populating another planet, far away from any help. 

That does it this week. Have a wonderful weekend!

Please make sure to stay up to date on your vaccinations!