Whoa folks, seems like someone took the time to use macrophotography on Oscar Meyer salami and the results are kinda sick. While I prefer the Boar’s Head brand myself these photos may be changing my world view on processed meats. This is terrible because I really like a good processed meat product. I have not included any photos because I am pretty sure the salami lawyers wll be pretty pissed when they see this. Check it out here!

The snow is melting in Greenland and some huge object appears to be making an appearance. This sorta looks like something out of John Carpenter’s ‘The Thing’. Prepare for the alien invasion suckers. Youtube video link

We have been off on an extended holiday and are coming back with a special treat just for you. The World’s smallest fire breathing woman is hot! Youtube video link

We don’t usually cover political stuff here on Miniature Brainwave, but this is too good to be true. Leslie Powers, a Brooklyn native, has used her incredible net sleuthing skills to find Osama and tip off the F.B.I.. How did she do it you wonder…she found his Myspace profile! According to Powers the F.B.I. had been looking in the wrong place, Afghanistan, while she narrowed her focus to Brooklyn and caught him red-handed. Unfortunately for us all, this life-changing event has been suddenly covered up by the F.B.I., most likely at the behest of the shadow government.

…then sometime during the next day or so, something disturbing happened. After a brief time of being treated like a hero and being called a gifted researcher and being thanked repeatedly for my tips, the plug was pulled. When I had been calling in the tips before, I would announce that I was the one calling in the Brooklyn tips and they would always put me straight through to whoever was in charge. Two days after Osama’s arrest, I called and mentioned Brooklyn and they acted like they didn’t know what I was talking about.

You are probably thinking that this stinks, so help Leslie out and spread the news far and wide.

Leslie’s Myspace page telling the whole story

The purported Myspace page of Osama Bin Laden

Simon Racheli is an artist who makes ordinary household items that look like raw meat. Pretty cool, but give me the old Marilyn Manson ‘meat helmet’ any day. View Mr. Racheli’s work at his gallery site via Notcot

You might not want to be buried in a pet cemetary, but you may very well be dining at one. Soylent Green in the house. This is mind-blowingly twisted if it is true.

All of the dead animals in California are added to the feed of chicken, fish, beef, shrimp, etc., which we humans eat every day. Virtually all of the animals killed in shelters and veterinary clinics, road kill, medical laboratories, feed lots, deceased wildlife, etc., are sent to one company, West Coast Rendering in Vernon, CA, where they are piled up and left to decompose for days before being “rendered” into a saleable product.

Read all about it at the DELTA (Dedication & Everlating Love To Animals) Rescue website

“I played D&D for the CIA”

In the process of researching my book, I came across myriad stories, some of them completely believable, a few of them verifiable, many of them outlandish. One of the strangest stories that I found believable was from a man who claimed that, in the early to mid 80s, he had been involved in a CIA plot to infiltrate a Dungeons and Dragons campaign at Cal Tech.

This was back in the old days, long before the idea of “geek chic” had crossed the minds of marketers and scriptwriters. Playing D&D meant sitting in a basement or a dorm room full of almost exclusively male nerdlings, driven by the will to power, sexual frustration and Jolt! Cola by the gallon. This was also when rumors started to circulate about “waves of D&D related suicides” and about people who became convinced they really *were* their characters and murdered people or went to live in the sewers brandishing wooden swords and insisting poker chips were gold pieces. (Note: As far as I can tell, there was exactly one D&D related suicide, which was committed by a boy named Dallas Egbert who had way more problems than his spellcaster failing to advance a level. )

The CIA was aware of these rumors and they wanted to know what was going on. Anything that seemed so effective at causing people to dissociate or take on new identities was of interest. So they sent an asset to infiltrate a game at Cal Tech, one of the hotbeds of nerd activity.

This poor agent spent three months playing a human ranger with (almost exclusively male) physics and chem students in some dude’s dorm room. The reports he filed made extensive use of such phrases as “hapless” “inept” “pointless” and “bizarrely obsessive”. Though he witnessed several slapfights, a number of 19 and 20 year old men crying and innumerable dodecahderal dice flying through the air all in the names of dungeonmaster unfairness or rules violations, he saw nothing of real value to conditioing or dissociating personalities.

The story was, to me, amusing. I enjoy the fact that the CIA was involved in a conspiracy to infiltrate and subvert a D&D campaign. It’s also illustrative of the power that urban myths (the waves of D&D suicides, promulgated at that time by parent groups, Christian fundamentalists and Jack Chick) have even over the intelligence community.


Authorship: “peabody; a member of AboveTopSecret.com”

Title: “I played D&D for the CIA”

URL: http://www.abovetopsecret.com/forum/thread300668/pg1#pid3482985.

When I first saw Terry Gilliam’s movie Brazil I marvelled at the preposterous view of the future he presented. The notion that it was prepostorous has changed recently with a few news items I have come across. First there was an article on giving your loved ones medical gift cards for the upcoming holiday season. If you saw the movie you will remember when Sam’s mother gave him medical gift tokens for the holidays. Today I see an article on perscription medication vending machines, which reminds me of the vending machine that dispenses fresh air. I have also been thinking about the future bans on LCD flat panels as they are energy hogs and I wonder if we would be using small screens with magnifying lenses over them in the name of saving the earth? I am almost 100% positive this is just around the corner. You don’t need a psychic to tell you the future, just watch the movie.

Linda Stein, former manager of the Ramones, was brutally murdered in her New York apartment. When I went to check out the news story, this is how the page looked. Rather unfortunate placement of the random (I hope) slideshow links.

Miniature Brainwave loves things in a jar, and the good people at Mad Haus Creative have created a real winner. This head in a jar uses an innovative technique and it is freakin’ me out. Check out their complete tutorial and get started on your own.
Head In A Jar tutorial