The First Day of Duckmas 2012

There is only one way to begin the annual event known as the Twelve Days of Duckmas, and that's with the traditional "duckie in a fir tree"!

This is the fourth year running that I've used this particular duckie for the picture.  There's a really good reason for that, too: he's cute and easy to work with! 

Tune in every day between now and December 25th for a new entry in the Twelve Days of Duckmas!

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Gashapon In The Post

There are days where I love blogging, and days that I hate it.  Then there are days like today, where I'm terribly, terribly conflicted about the whole thing.  Sometime last week, I got an e-mail from fellow blogginator Ben from the mysteriously monikered Midnight Tease, saying that he's got something to send me and asking for my shipping address.  Being the trusting duck I am, I provided it, and a few days later I got another e-mail saying that he'd sent me a package and that he was "sorry". 

As one can imagine, I was both perplexed and terrified by this, and when a small box at the Duck U Bookstore with my name on it, I contemplated calling the campus bomb squad.  Saner heads prevailed, however, as it was pointed out to me that Duck U doesn't actually have a bomb squad.  Resigned to a box full of spring-loaded custard pie, I retreated to my office and opened it.

What was inside was worse than I imagined.

more...

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Ben-To Ep03

Well.  It HAS been a while, hasn't it?  Nearly three months since I did the last episode, I'm back with Ep03 of Ben-To!  For those of you who've forgotten just what this series is about, and I can hardly blame you considering how much time has passed, the first episode writeup is here, the Ep02 missive can be found at this link, and here's sixty pounds of bacon on a counter.  Now that you've gotten yourself caught up on our little martial-arts-meets-prepackaged-food series, let's get onto some new content: Episode 03!

As you may remember, in Ep02 Our Hero officially joined the Half-Pricers Club, learned the rules of bento battlin', and took home a miso-mackerel bento for his first victory.  Right, that's where we stand.  Let's see what wonders the show shall bring us next, shall we?

Oh, this can't be good.  The school incinerator, surrounded by police tape and guarded?  What, did Dale Sveum walk by and decide to end it all or something?  Yes, it's a Chicago Cubs reference, even though it's December.  At the time I wrote it, it was interesting and topical... or at least topical.

Oh god, no, it's worse than the Cubs' 2012 record.  Our hero comes charging out of the school dressed only in his skivvies for reasons we're... apparently not going to be let in on, because suddenly the credit sequence begins. 

Well.  Okay then.  If that's the way you want to play it, Ben-To, fine.  I'm game.  And while I'm at it, camouflage boxers?  What, are there Vietcong in your shorts?  Is that what kids are calling it these days?  "What were you and Jill doing, Bob?"  "I had Vietcong in my shorts."  So wacky, these kids.  Next you're going to tell me that somewhere there's a recipe for White Castle Sliders Stuffing... but I'm cheating, because I knew about that one already.  Maybe not as good as 60 pounds of bacon, but it still sounds pretty tasty.

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That Wasn't So Hard...

As the long-time readers amongst you may remember, a year ago today I had a tooth pulled.  The extraction was nice and easy, it was the recovery that didn't go all that well.  "Great, Wonderduck," I hear you saying which is weird since I'm alone in Pond Central, "but what does that have to do with the price of tea in China?"  Which is approximately 1.5 yuan/gram, by the way.

Well, nothing.  Except tangentially, because something else happened one year ago today.  One year ago today was the last time I had a cigarette.  It was surprisingly easy to quit, to be honest.  It only took about six months for the urge to kill everybody I laid eyes on to fade.

However, this past Friday afternoon proved to be the toughest test of my anti-smoking resolve, and it happened completely by accident.  I was just standing outside the Duck U Bookstore, enjoying the crisp and cool December air, when one of my friends joined me.  We discussed football, as we always do, and she casually lit up a smoke.

Oh my, but it smelled goooooooooood.  So good, in fact, I had to leave immediately.  For a half-hour or so, it took everything I had NOT to go back outside and light one up myself... the worst urge I've had in months.  But I didn't.  It was close, but I didn't.  Yay me.

One year down, the rest of my life to go.

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Merry Christmas From Kimi Raikkonen!

Lotus F1 posted this today.

If you didn't know why I transcribe all his interviews as "mrmrnnbdbfmrlkmlbb mmlrlrbrlrmrrl mrlrmrmrbrlr," you do now.  That first ringtone... that was my main alarm on my last cellphone; freaked me right the heck out.

Merry Christmas, Kimi.

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71 Years

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R.I.P. (In 5/4 Time)

After 91 years of insane time signatures, legendary jazz musician Dave Brubeck took five today.

He wasn't the first jazz artist I was a fan of.  Heck, he wasn't even the second or third, and to be honest, while I loved "Take Five", both the single and the album, I thought he was a gimmick.  "Oh, hey, watch me play songs in a completely bizarre time that nobody other than beatniks and jazz critics can comprehend."

If you needed proof that I was an idiot when I was young, too, there you go.  Yeah, he could follow beats that would make strong musicians weak and weak musicians want to be somewhere else in a hurry, but on top of that was always a masterful melody.

It's hard to believe that "Take Five" hit #25 on the Billboard Top 100 in 1961.  Times have changed so much... musical talent isn't much appreciated anymore.  But I'll tell you this: guitar god Chet Atkins decided to take a shot at the song and declared it the most difficult piece of music he'd ever played.

...and the most entertaining. 

Dave Brubeck.  He was an artist, a pioneer.

He'll be missed.

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Bad Timing, I Guess

I have an ick.  I've had this particular ick since last Thursday, and it just will not go away.  It's the worst type of ick, in that it's a non-specific ick which just makes me feel icky.  Gatorade is my friend right now, that and generic tylenol.  About half of the building the Duck U Bookstore has the same non-specific ick, and is probably about to start a round of ping-pong with the other half.  Just in time for Finals week to begin in a few days, and you know what that means!  If it's Finals week, that means it's BUYBACK WEEK AT THE DUCK U BOOKSTORE YAYYYYYYYY!

Posting might be a little bit light for a while whilst I deickify myself.

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Ducks In Anime: Bubble Bubble...

-Hidamari Sketch x Honeycomb, Ep09

Looks like SHAFT discovered the special effects filters in their copy of Premiere.

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It's A Streetlight!

There are times where I'll just get remarkably lucky when I point my camera at things.  Like this:

There is no photomanipulation of any sort involved, other than reducing the size to fit The Pond's formatting.  This is exactly how it came out of the camera.  Go ahead, try and figure out what it is.  Good luck at that!

UPDATE: Here's the great reveal...

It's the reflector from a non-functional Infocus LitePro 550 projector, sitting on an eight-LED flashlight.

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Well, THAT'S Just Creepy...

Yesterday, as I took a break at the Duck U Bookstore, I happened to glance at a copy of the local newspaper... and promptly my bill hit the floor.  Gathering it up, I read the article again... and felt my feathery heart sink.

For much of the past month or so, there's been a terrible story coming out about a young woman who was murdered and her body dumped in the local river.  Of course, the husband was suspected... they always are... but from what I'd been able to glean, the police didn't have enough proof to file charges.

Well, the other day the police DID charge the young woman's husband with first degree murder.  The newspaper put his picture on the front page... which is why my bill hit the floor.

I knew him.

Heck, I worked with him for a year.  It's been maybe 15 years since I last saw the guy, when I walked out of RadioShanty to take over my bookstore, but I spent plenty of time at work with him before that.  And he was just a regular guy.

To say that I was more than a little weirded out is an understatement.  Still am, truth be told.  15 years changes a person, to be sure... I'm not the same duck I was when I was 29, after all... but one never expects to hear that someone you knew may be a murderer.

Here's something to get that thought out of your head: Nori-chan in a cow suit!

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Too Cool For Stu

Over at Steven's place, his recovery is coming along well.  However, there was something interesting in his comments today, where he said:

Stu the Alpaca is going around visiting those who wish to be visited (not me).

There Steven goes again, being too cool for the room.  He probably thought that it'd go against his image as a grumpy grump what grumps grumpily to be alpacafied.  Well, we here at Wonderduck's Pond are nothing if not willing to help Steven out!  It's ALPACATIME!!!

D'awwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwww!  If that isn't enough alpaca for ya, here's more!

But wait, that's not all!  There's also this:

There.  Now Steven's all alpacacized!  Y'know, I wasn't sure what I was gonna write about tonight...

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Name This Mystery Plane XXI

Well, the F1 season is over, which means I'll have more time to do other things here on The Pond... but until then, here's a new Mystery Ship Plane!

Since I suspect this is gonna be easy, there's no prize this time.  In this case, being first is its own reward, eh?  I've been fond of this one ever since I first found out about it some 20+ years ago.  Now, I can't stop you from cheating, but you're just losing any joy and thrill you might have gotten from winning clean.  So just don't do it, 'k?  K.  Have fun, and GUESS THAT MYSTERY SHIP PLANE!

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F1 Update!: 2012 Grand Prix of Brazil

As the field formed up on the grid behind polesitter Shiv Hamilton, the skies above Autodromo Jose Carlos Pace were... confused.  Grey, leaden clouds predominated, umbrellas popping up in the grandstands, while at the same time there were desperate glimpses of blue sky.  Despite the greasy conditions, the entire Thundering Herd was on dry tires for this final race of the season... the race that would decide the World Driver's Championship.  Would Ferrari's HWMNBN come back after leading in the points for much of the season, or would Red Bull's Seb Vettel join elite company with his third consecutive championship?  THIS is your F1 Update! for the 2012 Grand Prix of Brazil!

*LIGHTS OUT:  When the lights go out on a F1 race, it can sometimes be difficult to figure out what's going on.  24 cars, V8 engines screaming at 18000 rpm, all trying to slot themselves into a narrow band of asphalt can occasionally make for action-packed confusion.  And then you have starts like this one.  The two McLarens on the front row got away clean, but both Red Bulls experienced Mark Webber Lousy Start^©s, letting both Ferraris do terrible things to them.  Hometown boy Felipe Massa jumped up to second, and title contender HWMNBN got ahead of rival Vettel to take fifth, while Force India's Nico Hulkenberg was a surprise sixth with Vettel on his diffuser as the field headed into Turn 4.  So far, so good... busy, but not too bad. 

*LOOK OUT!!!:  As the bunched-up field of cars began to enter Turn 4, there was a sudden billow of tire smoke as someone discovered that they'd missed their braking point.  That someone was Seb Vettel.  Kimi Raikkonen was forced to dive offtrack to avoid plowing into the back of the wallowing RB8, which then maneuvered into Turn 4.  At the same time, the Williams of Brazilian Bruno Senna, passing two cars in the turn, pulled next to Vettel who appeared not to see the Williams.  The coming-together sent Senna careening into the Sauber of Sergio Perez, ending both drivers' races.  But what of Vettel?  This is the view he had after the contact.

By luck and skilled driving, nobody else slammed into the backwards-rolling leader.  After the remaining cars swept by, Vettel righted his ship and rejoined the race, albeit in 22nd and last place.  The Williams launching itself off his left side managed to damage the RB8's sidepod and floor, doing unrepairable damage.  And then, it began to rain.

*THAT WAS ONE LAP!:   ...and Brazil is a short track, to boot.  By the end of Turn 1 on Lap 2, HWMNBN had jumped to third place, behind Shiv Hamilton and Jenson Button, and was on-pace to win the Driver's Championship.  Of course, there were 70 laps to go, but one got the feeling that back in Maranello, there were people in the belltowers, polishing their clappers to give a perfect tone.

*THE RAIN:  As those things go, the rain wasn't much of a much.  However, it doesn't take much wet to make a F1 car skittish, and what was on the track was just worst type of rain possible: there was enough to make the asphalt slippery, but not enough to consider changing to intermediate tires.  HWMNBN lost third place to Nico Hulkenberg when he slipped off-course, but managed to stay ahead of the closely pursuing Mark Webber.  Two laps later, the Aussie wound up spinning off, just moments after the Lotus of Lettuce Grosjean ended up in the wall, recording a reading of 7.2 g in the process.  Oh, and the McLaren teammates were trading the lead between themselves and Seb Vettel had made it up to 7th place.  Yep, it was going to be that sort of race.  Eventually, teams began to wise up to the fact that the track was begging to have intermediate rain tires on it and drivers began to pile in.

*MEANWHILE:  Not everybody, however.  Jenson Button stayed out, as did Nico Hulkenberg, who moved into second place and was rapidly catching the McLaren up.  One might be excused for thinking that's an odd result, but remember: two years ago in qualifying, in exactly the same conditions as these, Hulkenberg earned an out-of-nowhere pole here at Brazil.  There are certain drivers who like certain tracks in certain conditions, and it appears that Hulkenberg at Brazil in light rain is one of those great combinations.  Throw in a set-up dialed in for these conditions by the team, and suddenly it's not so far-fetched.  The pass for the lead finally happened on Lap 19, and a Force India was legitimately leading a race.

*HUH?:  Then something really odd happened.  While everybody else was pitting for intermediate tires, Red Bull decided to do something they didn't need to do: gamble with Vettel's tires.  He pitted on Lap 20, rejoining with the dry-weather prime (hard compound) tires on his steed.  The benefits of this choice were not readily apparent to either the F1U! team or the Legendary Announce Team.  Fortunately for him and his title hopes, he wouldn't have to worry about them for very long.

*SAFETY CAR:  On Lap 22, HWMNBN called his pits to report a lot of debris on the track, and he wasn't wrong.  Through various contacts, lost noses, damaged endplates and the like, there was probably enough spare parts on the circuit to build a new car.  Charlie Whiting apparently agreed, and called out Berndt Maylander.  Nico Hulkenberg and Jenson Button, who had opened a 45 second lead on Shiv Hamilton in third, had to have been beside themselves.  When the Safety Car left the Thundering Herd to its own devices on Lap 30, the order was Nico Hulkenberg, Jenson Button, Shiv Hamilton, HWMNBN, and Seb Vettel, who was under investigation for passing Gandalf Kobayashi under yellow flag conditions back around Lap 16 (he was cleared).  And then the rain stopped and the track began to dry.

*CONFUSED YET?:  Now you know how we here at F1U! feel.

*DRY MEANS... SLOW?:  All week long, Ferrari had been performing rain dances, thinking that was their best chance to get HWMNBN his championship.  Ironically, as things dried out Seb Vettel began to slow down.  The aerodynamic damage from his Lap 1 accident wasn't much of a hindrance in the wet, but as speeds began to build, it proved to make things quite difficult for the young German.  From fifth place, he began to lose contact and drift back, eventually falling down to 10th place after pitting for medium tires on Lap 53.  Meanwhile, the undamaged Ferrari could do nothing against the three cars ahead of him.

*AWWWWWWW... SHHHHHUCKS.:  Eventually, all good things must come to an end, and Shiv Hamilton managed to get past the Force India of Nico Hulkenberg as the returning rain caused Hulkenberg to lose just enough grip to nearly lose it on Lap 49.  The German kept in contact with the Brit, however, and on Lap 55 saw an opportunity to retake the lead as Heikki Kovaleinninninnie's Caterham came into view at Turn 1.  A momentary loss of traction made the Force India fishtail... right into the side of the McLaren.

Hamilton's front suspension folded itself like origami, ending his McLaren career on the spot.  The Force India bounced a couple of times, but suffered no obvious damage and, after recovering from the spin, continued on in second place, having seen Jenson Button get past.  This also had the effect of promoting HWMNBN to third place, the bare minimum he needed to have any chance of winning the driver's championship.

*RAIN FALLS:  Then around Lap 60, the skies opened up.  Nico Hulkenberg, obviously having some ill effects of the Hamilton contact, had slumped to 5th place, with Button leading Massa, HWMNBN (who had pitted for inters), Mark Webber, Slappy Schumacher in 6th place, then Seb Vettel.  Unsurprisingly, HWMNBN got to sweep by his teammate for second, which cut Vettel's championship lead to merely one point. 

*ENDGAME:  Unfortunately, there was nothing that HWMNBN could do against the McLaren ahead of him, so he had to hope for the Red Bull behind him to make a mistake or have a late-race failure.  This was not an impossibility; the sidepod damage that Vettel's RB8 had suffered included a crushed exhaust outlet, which if it cracked open would set the car ablaze.  The young German had also had a radio failure, perhaps the first indication of an electrical failure.  Or maybe Slappy Schumacher, in the last race of his career, would take offense to being passed by a young upstart and hipcheck him to Belo Horizonte.  None of these things occurred... indeed, Slappy was passed by Vettel for 6th on Lap 65.  At this point, Red Bull was on the radio, on the off-chance that their driver could hear them, telling him to "just keep it on the black part."  With darkness falling and the rain coming down even harder, this was becoming more and more difficult to accomplish, until it all became moot.  On Lap 70, Paul di Resta, in the other Force India, lost control and clouted the wall halfway between Turns 13 and 14, then slid all the way up to 14, leaving pieces of the car behind as it went.  A Safety Car was called for, and all positions were locked in.  Jenson Button had won his third race of the year, HWMNBN led his teammate home in second and third, respectively... and Seb Vettel finished in sixth place, winning the World Driver's Championship by 3 points after an extraordinary race.

*AND THEN...:  HWMNBN climbed from his car and... just stood there, seemingly for an hour, all sorts of emotions visible in his eyes.

Eventually, he made his way to the gathered Ferrari mechanics and thanked them, but in a way that made it clear, he wasn't happy at all with the way things had worked out.  Meanwhile, a few yards down the pit lane, a whole different emotion was on display.

Almost as soon as he was out of his RB8, Slappy Schumacher was there to congratulate Seb Vettel, a lad who had grown up idolizing the older man. 

*DRIVER OF THE RACE:  Jenson Button.  HWMNBN did everything he needed to do to win, but couldn't come close to either McLaren.  Button never put himself in a position where he could be taken out by a poorly-placed Force India, managed his car brilliantly on a wet track with dry tires, and all-in-all owned this race.  Well-deserved.

*TEAM OF THE RACE:  They couldn't get their man the championship, but they still brought home a 2-3 finish and locked up second place in the constructor's championship.  Not bad for a car that was pretty much average all year.  Honorable Mention to Caterham for finishing in 11th today and therefore finishing the Constructor's Championship in 10th, therefore taking home a big check and probably bringing back Heikki Kovaleinninninnie in the process.

*MOVE OF THE RACE:  We here at F1U! have a rule against awarding MotR or MooootR to anything that occurs on Lap 1.  Lap 2, however, is fair game, and HWMNBN announced that he wanted this championship badly.  As Lap 1 came to an end, he was in 5th place, behind Webber in 4th and Massa in 3rd.

As they raced down the front straight, HWMNBN slipstreamed behind both cars, then dodged inside.

Obviously Massa wasn't going to be putting up much of a fight, but Webber was a different story.

As they raced into Turn 1, HWMNBN kept the inside line, braked a smidge later and picked up both places in one swoop, despite some serious efforts from the Red Bull driver to prevent it.  Well done, HWMNBN, and while it's no replacement for the championship, it's still something.

*MOOOOOO-OOOOVE OF THE RACE:  This was just weird.  On Lap 54, Kimi Raikkonen got bit by the dampening track and wound up going off at Turn 1.  Fortunately for him, there's a lot of run-off area there now... enough that he found himself on an access road behind the grass near Turns 1 and 2.  Instead of cutting across the grass, he followed the road, obviously thinking yes, this will take me back to the track.

Instead, it took him onto the OLD Interlagos circuit, and henceforth to a dead end.  He was obliged to do a U-turn and come back the way he came... one can only imagine a GPS device screaming "recalculating" furiously at him as he tried to figure out where he was.  Thanks, Kimi, for the comedy relief!  Here's your Moooo!

*SELECTED DRIVER QUOTES OF THE RACE:

more...

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F1 Quals: Brazil 2012

So, just like the weather forecasters predicted, it didn't start to rain until after the session ended... they just got the session wrong!  Rain began to fall after P3, and didn't stop until a few minutes into Q1.  So what sort of mischief did that cause to Quals?  Let's take a look at the provisional grid for the 2012 Grand Prix of Brazil:

P	Driver	Team	Q1	Q2	Q3
1	Shiv Hamilton	McLaren-Mercedes	1:15.075	1:13.398	1:12.458
2	Jenson Button	McLaren-Mercedes	1:15.456	1:13.515	1:12.513
3	Mark Webber	Red Bull Racing-Renault	1:16.180	1:13.667	1:12.581
4	Sebastian Vettel	Red Bull Racing-Renault	1:15.644	1:13.209	1:12.760
5	Felipe Massa	Ferrari	1:16.263	1:14.048	1:12.987
6	Pai-de-santo Maldonado	Williams-Renault	1:16.266	1:13.698	1:13.174
7	Nico Hulkenberg	Force India-Mercedes	1:15.536	1:13.704	1:13.206
8	HWMNBN	Ferrari	1:16.097	1:13.856	1:13.253
9	Kimi Räikkönen	Lotus-Renault	1:16.432	1:13.698	1:13.298
10	Nico Rosberg	Mercedes	1:15.929	1:13.848	1:13.489
11	Paul di Resta	Force India-Mercedes	1:15.901	1:14.121
12	Bruno Senna	Williams-Renault	1:15.333	1:14.219
13	Sergio Perez	Sauber-Ferrari	1:15.974	1:14.234
14	Slappy Schumacher	Mercedes	1:16.005	1:14.334
15	Gandalf Kobayashi	Sauber-Ferrari	1:16.400	1:14.380
16	Daniel Ricciardo	STR-Ferrari	1:16.744	1:14.574
17	Jules Vergne	STR-Ferrari	1:16.722	1:14.619
18	Lettuce Grosjean	Lotus-Renault	1:16.967
19	The Red Menace	Caterham-Renault	1:17.073
20	Heikki Kovalaineninnie	Caterham-Renault	1:17.086
21	Tim O'Glockenspiel	Marussia-Cosworth	1:17.508
22	Charles ToothPic	Marussia-Cosworth	1:18.104
23	Narain Kittylitter	HRT-Cosworth	1:19.576
24	Pete Rose	HRT-Cosworth	1:19.699
	Q1 107% Time		1:20.330

Well, in the long run, not much at all.  The two McLarens had been fast all weekend, with Button leading the way in P3 earlier; there is some question as to just how much wing they're running, however.  This could be massively important, as the forecast for Sunday remains a race aquatic.  If they're running a dry setup, it only figures they'd be faster than a car prepared for a wet race... and they'll drown come Sunday.  If, however, the McLarens are this fast without compromising a wet setup... well.

It's no surprise to see the two Red Bulls up towards the top of the sheet, obviously.  It IS a little surprising to see HWMNBN so far down, but we don't know how heavy the team went with the weather setup.  He might be in the best shape of the bunch if they've really cranked on the wing.  We just won't know until the race begins... assuming it rains.  And every red-blooded F1 fan has gotta be hoping for rain.  You know that Ferrari has mechanics behind their pit stalls making carbon-fiber rain turtles.

One still has to give Vettel the advantage at the moment, though.  We will see tomorrow, won't we?  The race is in the morning, F1U! thereafter.  See ya then!

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Too Ornery To Go For Long

Steven's back, and he's responding very well to therapy!

What a relief!

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F1 Practice: Brazil 2012

The last Friday of the 2012 F1 season brought us what might well be the last sunny day of the weekend; the forecast for Saturday is for rain which might hold off long enough to get Quals in the books.  Sunday, on the other hand, calls for a grumpy old man (Bernie?) with a long beard (not Bernie) building an ark in the infield section of Interlagos.  Probably because Ferrari is sending the team jets over São Paolo every half-hour, dumping oil drums of silver iodide into the clouds.  Hey, anything to help HWMNBN, right? 

It turns out that there's a lot of lasts happening this Sunday.  It's the last time the Legendary Announce Team will be together on SPEED.  I've already gone over my views of that tragedy, so I won't rehash them here, but I will point out that they were reminiscing something fierce during the P2 broadcast and were incredibly funny in the process.  If you've watched a few races in the past, Quals might be worth watching for that alone.

It's also the last race Shiv Hamilton will be driving for McLaren.  Fresh off his victory last weekend here in the good ole U-S-of-A, he's apparently trying to go out in style; he was the fastest in both P1 and P2.  He's already admitted that he doesn't expect to be competing for victories next year with Mercedes, so this might be the last chance he has for a win in a while.  There's also the shot to play spoiler in the great HWMNBN vs Sebby V battle, can't forget that.

Sunday is also probably going to be the last time we see HRT ever.  They've been running on the proverbial shoestring for the past three seasons, and reports are that everybody who isn't on the team's flyaway crew has been pink-slipped.  The race team will get their termination notices upon return to the factory in Spain after Sunday.  At this point, I'm seriously rooting for them to earn a point on Sunday... the influx of cash from the TV revenue they'd earn might be enough to keep 'em alive.  Otherwise, we'll probably have another SuperAguri situation, where bits and pieces go up for auction.  That'd be a flat-out shame... they gave it a good shot and deserved some small success, instead of being a constant laughing-stock.

Then finally, this is also the final weekend for one of the greats of the sport.  It just won't be the same without Gandalf Kobayashi, who seems to have lost his seat at Sauber in 2013 Michael "Slappy" Schumacher.  Consider this: if either Vettel or HWMNBN win the championship, it'll be the third of their career.  Schumacher has SEVEN, including five in a row (2000-2004).  He has more wins than many of the drivers in the field has starts.  He has over 300 starts, 68 poles, 77 fast laps, and on and on.  The past three years have not been kind to his legacy, but he should still go down in history as arguably the greatest F1 driver of all time (and if not, one of the top three for sure).  I'm not going to say that I like him, because that'd be a flat-out lie, but one can't be a F1 fan without acknowledging his level of excellence.  His helmet this week bears a legend: "Life is about passions.  Thank you for sharing mine."  That about sums it up.

Quals in the morning.

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Thanksgiving 2012

^{Clearly inspired by friend GreyDuck's Quacked Panes.}

Posted by: Wonderduck at 08:35 AM | Comments (1) | Add Comment
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Ducks In Anime: Art School Called

-Hidamari Sketch x Honeycomb Ep07

I'm noting a distinct whiff of "artsy-fartsy" coming from HSxH these days.  I can hear you now: "Wonderduck," you say, "it's an anime about students at an art school... what did you expect?"  And you're right, of course.  You then continue, "Plus, it's animated by SHAFT, the reigning monarchs of artsy-fartsy anime."  And I can't disagree.

What can I say?  I'm a simple duck.  I like my ducks in anime to be simple.  But HSxH has been pulling out the odd camera angles of late and that scares and confuses me. 

The newbies are disappointed.

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COTA Swag

I dragged myself into the Duck U Bookstore today, the way anybody who's in the middle of a really short work week does.  All in all, just a 'meh' sort of day, y'know?  Yeah, you know exactly what I'm talking about.  Where was I?  Oh, right, right, dragged myself into work, expecting I'd just be doing another day of entering textbook adoptions, getting ready for end-of-semester buyback, that sort of thing, when Our Man Dan walks in.  Dan, you may remember, was brought in by the Foodservice company that serves the Circuit of the Americas to help with the 2012 United States Grand Prix.  He was also supposed to bring back some souvenirs of the circuit for me... and in this, he succeeded beyond my realistic dreams!

Here's the whole thing; click on the picture for a larger version.  What we've got is the CotA ballcap with the 2012 USGP logo on one side, and the trackmap on the other, the official CotA schedule/map, a couple of pins, a CotA Event Staff lanyard, a regular CotA lanyard with a staff parking pass, and of course the pennant in back.  Baby!  I was just blown away by it all this morning.  It turns out he wasn't stationed at Turn 19, as they had originally planned, which is why he didn't bring me in any carbonfiber shards.  No, instead he was all over the circuit, and apparently has already been told that he'll be back next year.  And so will I... I've already made the decision, I'm gonna be there in 2013.

Here's a closeup of the pins.  Dan was amazed at how loud the cars were, even though I warned him.  I think we may have a budding fan in the making, actually...

Posted by: Wonderduck at 09:06 PM | Comments (4) | Add Comment
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