#lostinthedream @ Starbucks https://t.co/hhslPh1JHA

"Far and away the best prize that life has to offer is the chance to work hard at work worth doing." T Roosevelt, before new car was option

An Alternate Reality for Startups. @roidrage nails it. http://t.co/g6XxYGjNOp

Still life tribal sun belly button tattoo with stretch mark. #percypriest #lake #pontoon

Is the Mad Max guitar-flamethrower guy winning Eurovision or what

when u find out every 2016 republican presidential candidate took a selfie with josh duggar http://t.co/u1kO5v9UE3

I'm off to Salem, MA this weekend to check out some witch stuff with my lady and enjoy the long weekend. If you have any suggestions, drop me a line. Enjoy this long list of distractions - you earned it simply by reading this.

• Mad Men Series Finale Alternative Ending - no, this has nothing to do with the GIF above. And, yes, spoilers within if you haven't seen the finale yet.
• Redrawing Taylor Swift - Shake it Off Rotoscoped - 49 students were given 52 frames of Shake It Off and redrew it in whatever style they wanted. Results are compelling just for the ADD nature of it all.
• Maya Rudolph Commencement - a bit of an endurance challenge but the funny moments are pretty absurdly on point.
• Bloodsport Mentos Commercial - I'll be honest, I've never seen Bloodsport and if you showed me this and told me it was an honest-to-god Mentos commercial, I'd believe you without hesitation. via Lee.
• What is Dropbox? - yes, you know what Dropbox is but this is a nice new ad from them. Apparently worked on by some familiar faces.
• Golden Age of Knowledge 2013 - this is a seven-minute commercial for a series of books. It's slow at first but it gets continuously more absurd. How is this real? How is it seven minutes?! via John
• SHEER MAG - Fan The Flames - I've listened to this song a good 20 times this week. The distorted vocals are just fascinating to my ears.. and the visuals are unexpected and delightful.
• Final Letterman Top Ten - Letterman's final show was the end of an era and it's good to see him going out on a nice high note.
• Letterman's Final Thank You - to me, it's rare to see honest outpouring of emotions on TV. It's not exactly a medium designed for authenticity, so it's good to take in these moments. Letterman wasn't a big part of my life or leaving a hole in television / Internet viewing but I applaud him for all he's done.

If you still need more mindless entertainment, please point your browser to this mashup of Transformers ruining classic movies.

A few weeks back I watched a movie described as The First Iranian Vampire Western - A Girl Walks Home Alone At Night. I was floored by it. Absolutely loved it. To describe it, a black-and-white, Farsi language, innocent and honorable vampire love affair - really sounds like it could live at the fringe of pompous indie filmmaking. But it's accessible, relatable and just the right amount of creepy and gripping. It's also sweet and beautiful in its own way.

The film has been receiving plenty of press over the last few months and is available on Netflix now but I waited to write about it until it was available on VHX. Why wait? Because I enjoyed the movie so much I wanted to own it. I'm promoting the Deluxe Edition but, honestly, see it however you can. It's gorgeously shot, compelling acting and a fascinating balance of teenage emotion and sexual budding mixed with classic horror tropes.

Surprise, surprise: the new @tinybop app looks amazing. http://t.co/Lr22CQPjKx https://t.co/QQvkKV59nk

I bet this $10,000 bag of cheez-its is so good http://t.co/pOcv071ZNF

Is there a word yet for that increasingly-common feeling of seeing a developing technology that's equal parts exciting and terrifying?

OMFG

Call me old-fashioned but I just don't think people should tweet when they're happy

Oh hey. @MysteryShow comes out tomorrow. The world will not be the same. https://t.co/4tJAmoau5n

.@dbox nashville's smallest-er art gallery? http://t.co/SlD9VvGy5h

Chris Crofton is many things - comedian, musician, curmudgeon and advice columnist among them. His ongoing series Advice King is always filled with just the right balance of vitriol and humor. The latest, Dad Bod is particularly great. The basic gist is how every news story seems to carry the same weight, however unfortunately. It's a little crass but that's what makes it work:

Remember when those children from South America were invading the United States? Remember the Malaysian Airlines plane? REMEMBER THE FUCKING ICE BUCKET CHALLENGE?? Every story is given the same amount of attention for the same amount of time, because the news has turned into Internet pornography. Not titillated by Ferguson anymore? Let's talk about Sony being hacked! When that's boring, let's talk about the Star Wars trailer! A black stormtrooper?! Wind up Wolf Blitzer and put the memory card in the slot in his back - that little fucker will talk about anything, from Taylor Swift to Boko Haram, with the same intensity level.

Maybe it's not for everyone but I'm a fan of his skewering as it often hits perfectly on the nose.

I've been a fan of Simon Pegg since he unleashed Spaced into the world. His immersion since then into nerdy culture is rivaled by few others. So, when he spouts off on the state of "infantalizing consumers as a means of non-aggressive control" via popular culture, I tend to respect it a bit more. He's speaking from inside the machine, rather than outside looking in. This recent spouting off; entitled Big Mouth Strikes Again, seems best summed up when he's talking about "French philosopher and cultural theorist Jean Baudrillard" and his book 'America':

Put simply, this is the idea that as a society, we are kept in a state of arrested development by dominant forces in order to keep us more pliant. We are made passionate about the things that occupied us as children as a means of drawing our attentions away from the things we really should be invested in, inequality, corruption, economic injustice etc. It makes sense that when faced with the awfulness of the world, the harsh realities that surround us, our instinct is to seek comfort, and where else were the majority of us most comfortable than our youth? A time when we were shielded from painful truths by our recreational passions, the toys we played with, the games we played, the comics we read. There was probably more discussion on Twitter about the The Force Awakens and the Batman vs Superman trailers than there was about the Nepalese earthquake or the British general election.

Yes, it's wordy but really take that in. We are made passionate about the things that occupied us as children as a means of drawing our attentions away from the things we really should be invested in... That's a hard point to argue with.

Is the Internet creating a culture of meaningless passion? I don't think it's a black-and-white argument or should be boiled down to blanket statements about being Good or being Bad but I am intrigued by the idea that we keep ourselves in a perpetual state of childhood in order to avoid having to grow up. Thanks for the thoughts Mr. Pegg.

I can't quite put a finger on what it is but the tattoo work of Jenna Bouma, aka slowerblack, is fascinating to me. The designs are simple and evoke a strange nostalgic feeling, to a time that I did not exist in. The work is also all "hand poked", meaning:

I don’t use a machine to tattoo, I do it by hand. No electricity, no power supply. Its similar to tebori and hand tapped tattoos. I hold my tool which has a needle on it, I use pressure and break the skin, the ink goes in, and then I repeat that thousands of times until you have a nice tattoo. ta da.

I don't think it's any one single aspect to it - the simplicity, the retro-ish style, the abundance of nudie lady depictions or badass snakes and knives. It really feels like what a tattoo should feel like. I've none myself but I can't stop looking.

Follow on Instagram and Tumblr.

Just by happenstance, I've encountered two pretty fascinating war stories courtesy of 99% Invisible.

The first, Show of Force, tells the story of World War II artists that were recruited specifically to build a "false army" that would trick the opposition into thinking more troops and weaponry were present than in reality. Inflatable tanks is not something you typically think of when pondering warfare.

The second, Razzle Dazzle, explores the alternate camouflage techniques used for warships - painting them with zebra-like patterns, opposing blocks of black and white or just sea-like discolorations. At the very least, it makes for some fascinating looking mockups.

I'd heard of both of these before but the podcast really dives in a bit deeper and reveals some more relevant history and personal backstories to them both. So, even if these are old news to you, might be worth a listen.

Very recently I posted about these Electronic Items from Guillaume Kurkdjian and haven't been able to stop browsing his portfolio. It's overflowing with animations and illustrations worth having a look at. This Evoke Solutions piece is barely the tip of the iceberg. Look at this adorable house monster or Le Tank animated icons or these awesome isometric scenes. The list goes on and on. Just carve out some time and dive deep.