Tumblr is what I’d call a miniblogging platform = multimedia-enhanced microblogs (like Twitter). It’s designed for short blog posts of text with a link, a photo, an audio clip or a video. I haven’t actually used it, but I’d recommend you check it out if you want to publicly post your photos or stuff you find around the web (remember when “blog” was short for “weblog”?). Tumblr is the hot platform of the moment for online humour.

Two of the biggest Tumblr blogs are conceptual political humour: Kim Jong-Il Looking at Things and Uncomfortable Moments with Putin. Their brilliance unfolds by looking at posts in series; I’ll quote this cross-over even though it won’t make much sense:

The two leaders laughed awkwardly at Putin’s suggestion of a blog called ‘Uncomfortable Moments with Putin Looking at Kim Jong-Il Looking at Putin’.

Alison turned me on to Unhappy Hipsters, which adds mocking captions to photos from architecture and interior design magazines; eg:

To break free from the tedium of her own cliche—that was her Christmas wish.

The other Tumblr blog I’ve really been enjoying is Fuck Yeah Dementia (obviously questionable for work). It posts the best of 4chan macros (especially NSFW), lolcats, animated GIFs and other visual nonsense. (I’ve spent hours trapped in the infinite scrolling thumbnail archive.)

The future is blogs that aggregate blogs that aggregate blogs, all the way down. And when they feature humour objects, it makes me feel like I’m going insane, but in a funny way.

I have no interest in the World Cup. But it turns out that the vuvuzela horns are a particularly good meme. Here are some of the best images:

And some combos with other memes:

This Is Sparta

Dramatic Chipmunk

Kanye Interrupts

Insanity Wolf (NSFW)

I had breakfast at Mo:Lé today, but first stopped off at city hall. The Chinatown area is decorated with paper lanterns for New Year, and there’s a fun one in the mayor’s foyer: an actual, literal paper tiger.

Adrienne showed me this machinima video satirizing CrossFit:

The video has some non-sequiturs but definitely hits some pressure points from what I know of CrossFit. It also pokes fun at reading-People-on-the-elliptical gym bunnies.

I don’t do CrossFit, my workout routine is Starting Strength, which is basically beginner powerlifting. I find this video about back squats and milk funnier:

Caption: Now let’s go. I have to piddle.

Caption: So I combined the two!

Caption: and all my wil wheaton podcasts! gone!

Caption: and progress and the future.

Caption: He was much better at this.

Caption: Happy 40th, Stonewall Riots!

Caption: You do good work.

Caption: More importantly, who is your favourite Muppet?

When Republican Congressman Pete Hoekstra read about the struggle of Iranians desperate to let the outside world know what was going on, it resonated with him in particular. He was involved in a desperate fight the previous year when Republicans posted things on blogs after the House was adjourned before an important vote. He tweeted this:

Iranian twitter activity similar to what we did in House last year when Republicans were shut down in the House.

In honour of his remarkable ability to compare important, world-changing events with his mundane daily activities in the most clueless way possible, a meme was born:

Back in undergrad, my friend Mark turned me on to this computer game magazine called PC Accelerator. Throughout its short life, I read it religiously, even though I didn’t play any computer games. See, PCXL (as it was called) was written with a lot more humor than other game magazines. So you only needed to know enough about the games to get the jokes. And the best content they produced was negative reviews.

I don’t know about you, but I greatly enjoy humorous negative reviews of anything and everything. An example I came across today is Roger Ebert’s 2-star review of X-Men 4: Not Quite Last Stand: Origins: Wolverine. It includes this gem:

Their story starts in “1840 — the Northwest Territories of Canada,” a neat trick, since Canada was formed in 1867, and its Northwest Territories in 1870. But you didn’t come here for a history lesson. Or maybe you did, if you need to know that Logan and Victor became Americans (still before they could be Canadians)…

Having won the War on Mental Illness, psychologists decided that virtue ethics would benefit from some modernism and invented “positive psychology”. Their primary result so far has been to determine that Hope is not one of the Seven Cardinal Virtues. They then went and analyzed the Six Cardinal Virtues into sub-virtues.

This book Positive Psychology at the Movies lists movies that illustrate each sub-virtue:

8 Mile

if you mock people’s mothers with enough Wisdom-Creativity, you can escape from post-apocalyptic Detroit

Sideways

if you have enough Wisdom-Curiosity to drink merlot, you can pick up chicks

25th Hour

if you don’t have Wisdom-Open-mindedness, you won’t imagine how everyone is out to get you

The Karate Kid

with the right Wisdom-Perspective, waxing Mr Miyagi’s truck is not child-abuse

Silence of the Lambs

nothing says Courage-Bravery like giving them the hose again

Kissing Jessica Stein

it takes great Courage-Integrity to admit you were lying about being a lesbian

The Sound of Music

the hills have Courage-Vitality/with the songs they have sung for over 9000 years

A Space Odyssey

Courage-Persistence, or drugs, is what it takes to get to the end of this movie

The New World

there is no Humanity-Love so pure as between a grown man and a thirteen-year-old girl

Equilibrium

gun-kata actually requires a surprising amount of Humanity-Social Intelligence

V for Vendetta

blowing stuff up is a good way to show Justice-Fairness

Ben-Hur, Lawrence of Arabia, The Matrix and Spartacus

are all great examples of Justice-Leadership in the fight for sexual-orientation equality

Super Size Me

because nothing says Temperance-Self-Regulation like eating junk food

Grizzly Man

Transcendence-Beauty is om nom nom

The New World

“oh Father, allow me to express my Transcendence-Gratitude for giving this continent to the Europeans”

Hustle and Flow

“[I Transcendence-Hope] to get rich ‘fore I leave up out this bitch”

Half Nelson

you know what’s full of Transcendence-Humor? crack addiction

The Tao of Steve

the right Transcendence-Spirituality will get you laid

Given Oak Bay‘s proximity to downtown and especially the University of Victoria, it has some of the highest pressure in the region for residential development. But the council practices very conservative zoning. I have heard Victoria politicians say that Oak Bay is not “doing its share” to accommodate the region’s growth.

So I’m not sure I get exactly what it means, but this poster is definitely amusing: