Wednesday, November 01, 2006

Best Links Ever

Seriously, some of the best links I've ever received are in this bunch.

First off, from Stephen Tessier, a link to an article about "face blindness." Here's an excerpt:
BILL CHOISSER WAS 48 when he first recognized himself. He was standing in his bathroom, looking in the mirror when it happened. A strand of hair fell down – he had been growing it out for the first time. The strand draped toward a nose. He understood that it was a nose, but then it hit him forcefully that it was his nose. He looked a little higher, stared into his own eyes, and saw … himself.

For most of his childhood, Choisser thought he was normal. He just assumed that nobody saw faces. But slowly, it dawned on him that he was different. Other people recognized their mothers on the street. He did not. During the 1970s, as a small-town lawyer in the Illinois Ozarks, he struggled to convince clients that he was competent even though he couldn't find them in court. He never greeted the judges when he passed them on the street – everyone looked similarly blank to him – and he developed a reputation for arrogance. His father, also a lawyer, told him to pay more attention. His mother grew distant from him. He felt like he lived in a ghost world. Not being able to see his own face left him feeling hollow.

It's one of the most remarkable and fascinating articles I've read in a long time, and you can read it here.

And did I say it was one of the most remarkable articles I've read in a long time?

My friend Frank Taylor sent me a link to a a Scientific American article from 1995--on the trebuchet. That's right, it's all about the trebuchet, and it kicks major ass. Terrific article, and you can read it here.

From Fredrik Skarstedt comes a link to "The Sinking of the Lusitania," a 1918 film created by Winsor McCay (who the film notes as the "originator and inventor of Animated Cartoons"). The film is absolutely stunning, both as a piece of animation and as wartime propaganda. Here's the link.

From Joe Garcia, a link to another hilarious article in The Onion, this one titled
Mars Rover Beginning To Hate Mars
Unmanned Vehicle 'Bored Out Of Its Mind'

It's laugh-out-loud funny, and you can read it here. Oh, and if you go to the front page, you'll see this headline: DNA Evidence Frees Man After 15 Years of Marriage.

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