Mayor Mike Makes A Mis-step

New York City Mayor Michael Bloomberg has likened a teachers' union to the NRA:

Of all the polarizing things Mayor Michael R. Bloomberg has said and done over the years, from banning large sugary drinks to supporting congestion pricing, few have generated the sort of viral backlash that has unexpectedly mounted after his weekly radio show on Friday.

The mayor had embarked on a lengthy stream of consciousness on the need to negotiate a new teacher evaluation plan with the United Federation of Teachers. Toward the end, Mr. Bloomberg, almost as an aside, likened the teachers’ union to groups like the National Rifle Association and others in which he said a few leaders were out of sync with large numbers of rank-and-file members. 

NYT.

This is the same union that was once headed by Albert Shanker. He attained immortality when he was the butt of a famous joke in Woody Allen's movie Sleeper. The hero is transported into a dystopian future. When he asks what happened to the world as he knew it, he is told, "Our history books tell us that the old world was destroyed when a man named Albert Shanker got hold of a nuclear warhead."

For his part, Shanker is said to have loved the joke.

Atomic Dueling Pistols

Retronaut.

Marines vs. Rome, The Movie

It's the 35th MEU against the Roman Legions. My money's on the Jarheads.

From Boing-boing.

These Are Not The Droids...

Steampunk R2-D2.

From Neatorama.

The Velvet Geek

The coolest black velvet paintings you will ever see.

H.P. Lovecraft Box Lunch

Boing-Boing.

New Book

I read the first three chapters here. It's pretty good.

h/t boing-boing.

Obi-Wan Kenobi Is Dead, Vader Says

Outstanding NYT parody with impeccable attention to detail.

You can see the original here:

Producer of "Soylent Green" Still At Work

Walter Seltzer is dead at the age of 96.

BBC.

Discworld Amigurumi

via Neatorama.

Little Golden Books

Movie shockers, done "Little Golden Books" style. AWESOME!

Here's another:

Han Solo Visits Firefly

See it?

More here.

See also: Carbonisierter Han Solo in jeder Folge von Firefly

Sexy Sci-fi Covers

From boing-boing.

Top Ten Bookstore Cats

This is #6, Asimov. He lives at Seek Books in West Roxbury, Mass. The store specializes in science fiction, fantasy and horror.

Mentalfloss via Neatorama.

Retirement Planning Using Time Travel

Neatorama.

Top Ten Post-Apocalyptic Novels

The Road
The Stand
Y: The Last Man
A Canticle for Leibowitz
The Drowned World
The Passage
World War Z
The World Without Us
The Day of the Triffids
The Last Man

From Time Magazine.

The Road was about the darkest ride I've ever had in a book. Every ten pages or so I had to put it down and go to the front door, just to make sure that everything was OK. Whew!

But they missed Alas, Babylon by Pat Frank and Pulling Through by Dean Ing, plus Lucifer's Hammer, On The Beach and Level 7.

The New Age Of Blimps

A hybrid airship that could be used to intercept slower lighter-than-air-craft.

"Guns" by Victoria Jackson

Victoria Jackson is a comedian and actress who used to appear on Saturday Night Live. Her specialty was playing "the ditzy blonde". In this essay, she begins:

I have a gun. It has never shot anyone. Not even people I’m mad at. It just lies there, like it’s sleeping.

I bought it in 1986 when Richard Ramirez was on a killing spree in Los Angeles and I had a new baby. You know, the guy who used his victim’s blood to paint pentagrams on their walls? They said he liked yellow houses. I lived in a yellow house in Laurel Canyon. It was hidden in the trees far away from other houses so no one would even hear us scream.

So, I bought a gun to protect my daughter.

Click on the picture to read the whole thing. She continues:

My husband Paul shot and killed a man. Paul is a cop. Actually, it happened to be the night he was flying from Miami to NY to see me at Saturday Night Live for his first time. We were dating long distance. Maybe he was anxious to see me or something. He had to stay up all night filling out paperwork and getting counseling, because I guess that’s what happens when you shoot someone. He finally got to SNL and I was on the stage getting out of an alien space ship with eyeballs on my nipples because we were doing a sketch about a planet where women’s eyes have mutated to their nipples because men stared at women’s chests for so long. Kirstie Alley was our leader. I said, “Paul this must be so surreal for you…to kill someone… and stay up all night…and see me in a spaceship.”

Paul said, “It is.”

When I introduced him to the cast, Mike Meyers said, “Hey, you got any war stories? Ha, ha!”

Paul said, “I killed a man last night.” Silence.

I realized our worlds were completely opposite. But we do have some things in common.

1) We both like donuts

2) We both could die, him for real and me onstage, and they’re equally painful, and

3) We both get rewarded for a big bust!

Funny stuff!

h/t Frank W. James.

Robert T. McCall

Visionary space artist dies at age 90. He did some amazing work, including the famous poster for the movie "2001 - A Space Odyssey" showing a sleek spaceship docking with an enormous wheel-shaped space station.

Obit in the NYT.

European & Soviet Retro Sci-Fi Art

Very, very cool!

h/t New Jovian Thunderbolt.