News from the madhouse

I recently got a new job for free, meaning I'm doing the job of two persons for the price of one (the lowest price, of course) on top of teaching Parkour classes and commuting 3h a day. So while the madness slowly subsides, blogging is going to be slow in part because there is not much happening to me besides. I'll try to keep updating once a week, see how it goes.

So for this week, yet another silly and entertaining webcomic: FeyWinds, a good-old dungeon fantasy story that doesn't take itself too seriously. The updates are once a week, but there's already a good archive, so that should keep you occupied till next week!

Ze Easter Bell

So apparently in the US all you got for Easter is a rabbit running around with a basket of eggs... In France, we have the Easter Bell, flying through the skies and showering the countryside with delicious Easter Eggs. I shouldn't brag, but it's a bit fancier, as demonstrated by this Scary Go Round excellent story. I have to mention that this webcomic might be my favorite webcomic of all times, which is quite a recommendation given that I've read a lot of those. The author has since then decided to move toward more traditional stories with much less zombies, robot diplomats, mystical creatures, and more young teenagers. Still good, but not quite the same. But dig in his archive, there is a lot of stories, probably enough to get you through the Easter egg hunt while everyone else is looking for that one last missing egg.

Harp rocks

I usually enjoy weird, atypical music, but Joanna Newsom definitely stretched my limits, in a very good way. Her second album, Ys, is pretty much her and the harp, singing 10 minute songs about meteorites, bear and monkey stories, and many things that appear to have no connection whatsoever. And changing tune, mixing in a full orchestral outburst for a few moments, ignoring all standards of usual songwriting is not a problem either here.. but the result is really mesmerizing, and difficult to shake off. With her new album, Have one on me, the only big change is the appearance of many instruments, contrasting with the former sparsity of the harp and voice only. And yet, the album spans 3 cds, talks about spiders and other apparently random things, changes at every turn of every 10 minute song. Oh, and there is also a few harp and voice songs, to comfort the Ys fans. And the magic happens again: even though there is not a single song you can move your head to, it's hard to stop listening... so have a try, courtesy of NPR as usual (you can hear the album or a recent concert), see how atypical you can handle and actually enjoy!!

The mystical arts of Callus Shaving

Here's one of the weird things Parkour brought to my life: a callus shaver. At first, I was all proud of the thick calluses building up on my hands from all the QMs and climbing, thinking that the thicker they were, the better my hands would cope with various surfaces.

Until one of them broke off.

After cleaning up the embarrassing amounts of blood and waiting for the hole in my hand to heal, I started shaving my calluses religiously. A callus shaver is basically a bent razor blade on a stick, and you gently scrape the hardened skin off with it. The most usual spot for calluses is the place you grip things with at the base of the digits. With time, they also appear at the base of the palm (heel of the hand), on a straight line around the middle (lower part of the ball of the hand), and along the first phalanges. So far. I end up shaving the larger ones 2-3 times a month, the smaller ones on occasion, whenever I start feeling them while exercising. It's kind of a weird habit, but it beats having bloody gashes in your hand anytime!!

Monkey family

I had the chance to check out the new exhibit on Human Evolution at the Smithsonian in the company of anthropologists, and I can say I was very impressed with the result. A lot of information, from the high level brush strokes to details coming from freshly published research, a complete wall of casts to make you appreciate the variety and homogeneity of human ancestors and relatives, and some striking artist reconstructions of our family tree, full of life. Oh, and some of the actual remains from Cro-Magnon and other famous places, displayed publicly for the first time. Definitely worth a look!!

Strawberry-Pecan pancakes

What is better than fresh, homemade pancakes, mm? fresh, homemade Strawberry-Pecan pancakes, that's what! And, wait for it... with heavy cream and maple syrup sauce, it's even better!! Proof is, that all that was left when I managed to put down the fork long enough to take a picture. The recipe is basically your good-old pancakes, with bits of strawberry and pecans thrown in before cooking them. Eaaasy. And for the cream and syrup sauce, guess what? yeah, just pour some heavy cream, some syrup, and eat until you can't!

Ia Ia Parkour Fhtagn!!

I got this idea from Eugene wanting a shirt with Happy Elder Gods on the front and 'not amused' Elder Gods on the back. But Elder Gods are always having fun (because they can), so it made more sense for them to be jamming and showing their best Parkour moves to drive us insane. Or something like that.

And yes, I made a T-shirt out of it.