World D

Here's another strange book I purchased but have not yet read. The real author is Joseph K. Heydon, using the pen-name of Hal Trevarthen. Time has swallowed up all details related to Heydon and his book, leaving us only with the text itself.


Here's the description from the amazingly ugly dustjacket.


Here's the title page, followed by a sample of the actual bafflegab inside.


Posted By: Paul - Thu Sep 11, 2008 - Comments (11)
Category: Aliens, Eccentrics, Government, Inventions, Literature, Books, Science Fiction, Writers, Nature, New Age, Paranormal, Pop Culture, Science, Psychology, Self-help Schemes, Foreign Customs, 1930s, Yesterday’s Tomorrows

Robot Suit Enters Production

This sounds pretty cool. Almost too cool to be true:


a) They chose to name it Robot Suit HAL (as in HAL, from 2001: A Space Odyssey).
b) They chose to name their company Cyberdyne, Inc. (as in Cyberdyne from the Terminator movies.)

So I'm going to need a little more evidence before I'm convinced this isn't a joke.

Posted By: Alex - Wed Sep 10, 2008 - Comments (3)
Category: Inventions, Technology

Harvey Comics

I loved reading Harvey Comics as a kid, and into "adulthood." (They're not published anymore, alas.) Their universe was quintessentially wacked and weird. As famed comics scribe Grant Morrison has remarked in an interview, sometimes the willed naivete of Silver Age writers following the Comics Code produced much stranger stuff than any consciously avant-garde writer could.

Take the two page strip to the right for instance, from an old digest-reprint of some Casper stuff. To parse it is to risk madness.

Is Nightmare indeed a mare, ie, female? if not, and even if so, is that the gayest hairdo ever, on horse or human? Why does a forest gnome like to hang out with a ghost horse? Why is playing human cowboys popular among the gnomes? Likewise riding an airplane. And finally, how demented does a ghost horse have to be, to stick planks up its butt and into its chest, and then purr like a cat, all in an effort to emulate a mechanical device so as to placate a gnome?

How I miss Harvey Comics! Thank goodness Dark Horse is reprinting some.....

Posted By: Paul - Tue Sep 09, 2008 - Comments (15)
Category: Animals, Art, Comics, Pop Art, Surrealism, Body Modifications, Drugs, Entertainment, Flight, Games, History, Inventions, Pets, Writers, Cartoons, Hair Styling

Follies of the Mad Men #25

Didn't you enjoy the vivacious and perkily sexy Tad Tadlock in yesterday's DESIGN FOR DREAMING? How could anyone resist a sequel?

Let's watch A TOUCH OF MAGIC.

Posted By: Paul - Mon Sep 08, 2008 - Comments (8)
Category: Business, Advertising, Products, Domestic, Marriage, Family, Husbands, Wives, Food, Futurism, History, Inventions, Movies, Pop Culture, Technology, Sex Symbols, 1960s, Dance, Cars, Yesterday’s Tomorrows

Giant Spider Roams Streets of Liverpool!

Posted By: Paul - Sun Sep 07, 2008 - Comments (0)
Category: Aliens, Art, Performance Art, Entertainment, Horror, Inventions, Parades and Festivals, Pets, Technology, Toys, Foreign Customs, Science Fiction

Follies of the Mad Men #24

And now, something different for this series: a video titled DESIGN FOR DREAMING.

Posted By: Paul - Sun Sep 07, 2008 - Comments (4)
Category: Business, Advertising, Products, Domestic, Fashion, Futurism, Inventions, Technology, Sex Symbols, 1950s, Cars

Worst. Crackers. Ever!

Posted By: Paul - Thu Aug 21, 2008 - Comments (20)
Category: Animals, Business, Products, Food, Inventions, Stupidity, 1960s

Poo-Pourri

There are no words for this.

Posted By: Paul - Wed Aug 20, 2008 - Comments (13)
Category: Business, Products, Domestic, Hygiene, Excrement, Inventions, Scatology

Dog Gas Masks

Gasmasks.net provides more information than you probably ever wanted to know about the development of dog gas masks. For instance, one problem the developers of the dog gas masks had, which wasn't encountered by their counterparts working on the human versions, was how to build in a "slobber drain."

Posted By: Alex - Wed Aug 20, 2008 - Comments (0)
Category: Animals, Inventions, Military

Atragon

Recently I watched the 1963 Japanese SF flick ATRAGON. I knew I was in true weirdo territory when the undersea empire of Mu turned out to be ruled by Cyndi Lauper.

Not really, but check out the gal in the pink wig in this trailer for the film.

Posted By: Paul - Sat Aug 16, 2008 - Comments (10)
Category: Boats, Explosives, Fashion, Hair Styling, Inventions, Movies, Science Fiction, 1960s