A painting of me
  • This Is Your Life by (Toronto's) Ivor Tossell. 

    It comes as more of a surprise that the new format is also curiously beautiful. It’s the story of your life, artfully told: the friend you made in April 2011, the passing remarks you left on a pal’s photos in September 2010, the website you recommended the month before, the happy banter you shared in 2008 with the partner you later left.

    I’m guessing having Nicholas Feltron working on your site’s design can’t hurt.

    (via Alex) #
  • Our Men in Iran? by Seymour M. Hersh. 

    During the Bush Administration the US government was apparently training members of Mujahideen-e-Khalq in Nevada, despite the fact the group is listed as a foreign terrorist organization by the US State Department.

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  • I Am Beyoncé. 

    Beyoncé has a Tumblr blog, and it’s mostly just pictures of Beyoncé. She’s won the internet.

    (via Dave) #

Scotch Tasting

   5 April 2012, early morning

In the middle of the winter I ended up a MetaFilter meet up that took place in a bar at the edge of Scarborough called The Feathers. It was a strange spot for a meetup, neither central or transit accessible. The bar made up for these two short comings with its scotch selection. I’m not aware of another bar in the city with a bigger collection than The Feathers. (Though I suppose I haven’t been looking very hard.)

The Feathers is home to hundreds of Single Malt scotches. They probably have anything from Scotland you want to try. If you aren’t sure what you want —like myself—you can sample scotches in pre-selected flights. I wasn’t sure when I’d have a chance to drink 30 year old scotch again I opted for there flashiest flight, The Feathers Flight:

  • Aucentoshan 21 Years cask strength
  • Brora 18 Years Cask Strength Laing
  • Coleburn 1983 Signatory
  • Ardberg 27 years Cask Strength Laing
  • Port Ellen 1980 Signatory

The Port Ellen is as old as me. That’s some serious-ass scotch. It was so very good. The strangest of the bunch was the Coleburn, which was very fruity tasting. I don’t think i’d want a bottle of the stuff, but it was definitely one of the more interesting scotches I’ve tried in quite some time. The other scotches were all quite good, but I don’t remember any of them really standing out. They were all delicious old scotches, of varying smokiness.

This bar is worth well worth the trip to Scarborough—as if you needed another reason to go.

Comment [1] |  

Thor

   4 April 2012, early morning

Netflix continues to step up its game. I watched Thor over the weekend. The film is a sort of origin story for the character, explaining how he ends up on Earth fighting bad guys. The story jumps between Earth and Asgard, his mythic Norse homeland. The film has a several excellent actors, presumably slumming it in a superhero film. (Anthony Hopkins plays Odin, Renne Russo is his wife; Idris Elba—what?!—plays Hiemdall; Stellan SkarsgÃ¥rd plays some random Norwegian scientist; Natalie Portman is the sexy physicist love-interest.) The film was directed by Kenneth Branaugh, and he does a good job with all the fantasy and Shakespearean-style pomp. He seems like an odd choice to direct an action film, and at the end of the day Thor really was your typical action film. (It’s no Iron Man or X-Men 2.) I think it’s still worth watching, but don’t expect too much.

The official Thor website.

Comment [1]  

  • Sun - An Online Portfolio Theme. 

    This also strikes me as some interesting marketing. 4ormat are pushing the fact they have this awesome theme front and centre, and the fact it’s for (and exclusive to) 4ormat is the follow-up message. Normally your fancy themes might be a bullet point for your feature set. In this case the fancy portfolio site is a bullet point for your theme’s features.

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  • Well.ca's Virtual Store. 

    This is a cute idea. Well.ca is an (amazing!) online shop. They’ve taken your typical vinyl subway advert and turned it into another way you can buy stuff from them. Their adverts are actually just aisles of goods. You can use your smart phone to scan the items you want to buy, and Well.ca will bill you and ship everything off.

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