1990 mercedes c11

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CLASSIC SICKNESS

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Every once in a great while, I like to have a profound philosophical insight that changes the way I think about the world and how I see my place in it. In today's insight, however, it was perhaps the way I see Speedriven's place in the world that's changed.

That said, I won't share exactly what that insight was; but I will hint at it.

Watch and learn.

go ask alice

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For the uninitiated, that's Alice.

Alice was far and away the most incredible plot-point of the second Transformers movie, for one simple reason: Any red-blooded American male between the ages of 15 and 35 would betray friends, family, country, and planet for a few minutes alone with Alice.

MEGATRON: Tell you what, kid. You tell me where the secret weapon is, I give you Alice.
SAM: OK, deal (pauses) but I want some kind of extended warranty or service agreement or something, because I am gonna break it.
ROLL CREDITS
AUDIENCE: This movie is much more believable than the first one.

SO, why am I talking about a movie that hit theaters months ago? Revenge of the Fallen concept artist Ben Procter just released a number of previously-unseen design drawings for some of the movie's most memorable characters, including Devastator, the Doctor, and more. What caught my eye, however, was the early Alice concept art, below.

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PHOTOSHOP IS KICKASS

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CLICK HERE to jump to Ben Procter's TFW2005 art gallery, and see for yourself what enviable artistic talents and geeky interests nets you.

The stills at the top of this post are from this great Gizmodo article covering all the CGI work involved in turning Isabel Lucas into Decepticon Pretender Alice - easily one of the most intense (and expensive!) 2 seconds in movie history.

Enjoy!

my website sucks ... so does yours

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No matter who you are, you must admit that Michael Bay's Transformers movies have hit upon a winning formula. That being:

BOOBIES + EXPLOSIONS = AWESOME

With that, I give you the best website ever: Explosions and Boobs.

Really.

Thank you, Geekologie.

the death of gm

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Despite all the silliness I usually post on this blog, I feel that it would be inappropriate to let today slink past without some comment on this young century's biggest story: the bankruptcy of General Motors.

For over 100 years, the American economy has been synonymous with GM - and what is good for GM, the saying goes, is good for America.

The prevailing attitude seems to be that GM's owners and officers abandoned their customers long ago, and that bankruptcy is their punishment. Others might tell you that it was the looters running (and joining!) the unions who felled the giant, sucking it dry with the full and dirty Truth of what they were doing at the very forefront of their small and ugly minds - justifying their greed and wanton disregard for the welfare of the company that provided whatever standard of living they decided to deserve for screwing in a bolt almost as efficiently as a $9 robot from Korea with some smug bromide akin to "by the time GM goes under, we'll be dead."

Well, not enough of those union cockholes can die quickly enough to ever make me feel at peace with a labor a system that's been as corrupt as it's been irrelevant since the 1930's ... and not enough of the bastards died quickly enough to save GM, I think.

Still, that's not what I came here to Say tonight.

Nope. Not me.

Instead, I am going to ponder the phrase "What's good for GM, is good for America," and ask myself if America, like GM, needs some restructuring.

In fact, I'm going to go a step further and insist that it does ... tonight, boys and girls, I am going to say something that I have not said in quite a while: Michael Moore is right.

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That's right: him.

In his latest rant, Mikey Moore makes some good points about turning "the new GM" into the servant of the people who now own it.

Namely: us, teh peepol.

Sure, it's a rotten pinko sentiment; but he's dead-nuts-on, regardless.

I came to realize this when I asked myself a simple question: "Does America need more American cars?"

The answer is simple: no.

America has never NEEDED more vehicles than Ford or even Honda was capable of providing. What America needs - f*ck it - what I need is more MOTORS. Motors to drive fast and efficient and economical transit systems that can get me from my job in Ohio to my son Chicago in under two (2) hours.

Think about it.

If I want to go see my son in Chicago, I basically have 2 choices. I can:

a. drive from Oberlin to Chicago, which takes about 4.5 hours each way and costs me about $100 in gas at current prices.

OR

b. drive to CLE (.5 hours) and arrive an hour prior to departure (1 hour) fly to Chicago (1 hour) then de-plane and catch a shuttle (.5 hours) to rent a car (.5 hours) then drive to my boy (1 hour), which takes 4.5 hours each way and costs a shittonofmoney I do not have.

No matter how you slice it, I am 4.5 hours - and lots of dollars and hydrocarbons - away from my boy.

All of this, of course, brings me back to Michael Moore (above). If Moore gets his way, President Obama's task force will push GM to produce a series of efficient, economical high-speed bullet trains that will connect major cities to one another with unprecedented (in America) ease ... and I love Love LOVE this idea!

Now, lest you think I've lost my shit entirely, consider that public transport CAN be oh-so-sexy, and almost every bit as wicked slikk as Godzilla himself.

Witness.

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Ho-HO! Forgot about that terrifying beastie, did you?

Indeed, on a 200 mph train/billion-dollar titanium pecker like this, the trip from Chicago to Cleveland would take about 90 minutes ... which is actually a doable commute!

Far from ideal, of course, but a system like that would go a long way towards making sure I don't miss out on too much more of my boy's life. I've missed too much already.

Here's hoping the looters in Washington get the message - and see you soon, boy!