Rampaging Blog
The meat of our sandwich, the Rampaging Blog is dedicated to stories, research, and interviews. It may also contain rampant musings and uncontrollable tangents.
Rampaging Manifesto
Are you passionate about stories? Research? Facts? Are you interesting? Join the rampage! We have cards and secret handshakes and everything.
Writers and Storytellers
A list of all of our current authors, writers, researchers, and storytellers. For now.
Seattle Street Art
Seattle, have I told you recently how much I love your graffiti? I really think that this is one of my favorites. Well... I guess so... This mermaid is armed and dangerous.
Tramps, Vagrants and the Long Depression
It turns out that names are important. Everyone’s heard of the Great Depression, that worldwide economic trend covered so evocatively by Grapes of Wrath, Of Mice and Men, or To Kill a Mockingbird. But what about the Long Depression? No?Previously called...
More Seattle Street Art!
With the weather turning nicer I have even more excuse to go traversing Seattle looking for interesting street art. Here are some of my recent finds! First of all, there's apparently a pretty militant bike culture in Seattle... Two versions of gas mask cat!...
So we’re all still here…
To the surprise of very little people here in Seattle, the rapture didn't occur. But maybe that's because we're all just godless atheists. Certainly there are people who think so. At the same time Seattle is one of the few places where a poster like this could...
Randomness!
More later, but here's the alt text from today's XKCD: Wikipedia trivia: if you take any article, click on the first link in the article text not in parentheses or italics, and then repeat, you will eventually end up at "Philosophy". It works! Only took me...
The Original Portal to Hell- St. Patrick's Purgatory
Through me you pass into the city of woe:Through me you pass into eternal pain:Through me among the people lost for aye. Justice the founder of my fabric mov'd:To rear me was the task of power divine,Supremest wisdom, and primeval love. Before me things create were...
Writing quote
A great quote from Ira Glass from Artist, Mother, Teacher
Seattle Street Art!
And we start the weekend off with more Seattle street art and graffiti! I like this one in particular, because of the mixed mediums. Alas, metallic paint means that it's a little difficult to take a good picture. This one was on an abandoned fridge in a...
Hidden Message in Pixar films?
I just read the most amazing article looking at the hidden message of Pixar's films. It's well analyzed and written, but the best part is that- if you agree with Kyle Munkittrick- this is a great example of how art and stories can actually change the world. "The...
Fights with a twelve year old me, cheese cheese cheese
Every once in awhile I wonder what the twelve year old version of me would think of my current life. Would she be excited by where I’m living? What I’m doing? Would she think I was cool? If she had seen me this Sunday the answer, I know, would have...
Fun randomness!
(notes on) biology from ornana films on Vimeo. Pure and unadulterated awesomeness from orana films.
Lies my brain tells me
One of the most disconcerting things about reality is the idea that, just maybe, what we think is "real" actually isn't.The idea that we can't really tell whether what we perceive is true or not is something that every student of philosophy gets hung up about at one...
Pride and Prejudice come to life
After a bitter, hard-bitten fight with a piece of new technology (I thought it was too good for a free Zune to seemingly fall in my lap) I tuned into the internets to realize that I had yet to update this blog today! Woe is me. Things in Seattle have been...
A Mars landing, or, how science scoffs at the impossible.
As a bit of something different here's a requested article on the difficulties of landing on Mars. If you too have an idea for an article shoot me an email at comfyninja@gmail.com. I would love to research your questions, ideas, or random musings. ...
More adventures in travelling
I had been backpacking through Europe with my friends for a month and a bit and I was supposed to meet up with my family in Dublin. None of us had phones that worked abroad, so the only point of contact was this hotel I was supposed to meet them at in Temple Bar. So I...
Smile or Die
Longer update is on its way for later today (it was incredibly sunny this weekend, sorry all!) but here's an interesting view about the darker side of positive thinking:http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=u5um8QWWRvo
Memories from traveling
I was asked to share one of my most"entertaining" memories from traveling, the idea being that the more trouble something is at the time the better story it makes later. Well, I don't know how much of what I remember here is what actually happened, but thought I...
What season is this? Thoughts from a coffee shop window.
I haven't had time to adjust to the currents here, the motion that comes before the changing of the seasons, those scents and smells that usher in the parts of the year. It makes me lost. At home, those currents are burned into my brain. There is a smell that...
Pareidolia and Confirmation Bias: the fuel the internet runs on
It's amazing how little we need to recognize a face. Check out this great American Express commercial to see what I mean: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=m56F4EKN9hg Two dots and a line and we are convinced that there's a little representation of a human in front...
Just something I made…
I have finally conquered the heavens!
There is a perennial item on bucket lists throughout the multiverse; a thing that all peoples great and small aspire to, if only because it is potentially dangerous, very scary, and sounds really cool. (And perhaps because no one spends more than fifteen minutes...
Sorry for the delay all…
I've missed the last couple updates for my blogs, mostly because it's been a hell of a couple of weeks. Between the family coming to visit and some relationship drama I've been on a bit of a emotional roller coaster. But we're back on the horse...
Woooot!
I am incredibly excited because sometime tomorrow my brother and my father will be inhabiting the same metropolitan area as me!* So not only will I get to see my family (I really am a homebody at heart and the only bad thing about Seattle is just how far away I...
A placeholder…
Apologies that I'm a tad behind on updates this week, but here's a wonderful article on whether the color magenta even exists over at Null Hypothesis to tide you...
Big Five Personalities
Personality is such a big part of our lives that it's probably not that unusual that the psychological community redefines it every couple of years. Although sometimes the "new" personality definitions (complete with tests, quizzes, and classes ready to be put on at...
A reason to study languages
One of the great joys of the modern world is the ease with which we can explore other cultures. It's not unusual to spend the morning reading Rumi or Neruda, the afternoon enjoying Miyazaki or Morel. Or whatever this isBut this practice has also brought one...
Can’t wait for the future
One of these days I’m going to break down and buy a smart phone. It’s not that I don’t want one, every time I’m out with friends and one of them pulls up Where’s Your Bus or Open Table or- deus avertat- Angry Birds I look longingly at those smooth rectangles of...
How can we trust what we see?
The human brain is a strange organ. Simultaneously the seat of all those intangible things that make us human as well as a very physical organ, mankind has been hard at working trying to decode it since we first learned of its importance. But the more that we research...
Why don’t we celebrate Mardi Gras?
Okay, so I didn't do anything Tuesday night for Mardi Gras and didn't mind at all, at least not until I saw all of the pictures of carnival on MSNBC's photo website. Check out the slide show by clicking the image or here. Seriously, these parties are epic! Even...
And even more Seattle street art!
Here's the last batch of images I have from an outing a couple of weeks ago, some of which are more in the line of "Street Art" than graffiti. It's a palindrome person! I think this might be a band sticker, but the unicorns impressed me so I went ahead and...
I fought the malware and won! Barely.
There was a time when I was able to take pride in the fact that I had never had the need to pay for anti-virus software. I thought that good old safe internet practices, such as not downloading strange files or browsing questionable websites, would keep me safe...
Modern Mass Delusions, Seattle and the Windshield Pitting Epidemic
Occasionally history seems to echo Men In Black. Edwards: Why the big secret? People are smart. Kay: A person is smart. People are dumb, panicky dangerous animals and you know it. Of course, we tend to think that craziness is something that only far-off or...
More Seattle Street Art!
I like to think that the bottom sticker applies directly to me. Flying cow wearing a sombrero? Or is it a pig with cow spots? This one's stylish. This one not so much. I'm sure this is supposed to be someone...
A Very Bad Grain
In 1518, outside of Strasbourg, a married woman steps out of her house and begins to dance. She dances until she falls to the ground from exhaustion, only to get up and continue, her feet bruised and bloody. Soon other dancers join the streets, eventually...
Seattle Street Art!
And it's time for another session of Seattle street stickers and randomness. Brought to you care of my cell phone camera, straight from Capitol Hill to your computer. I wonder if this is supposed to be a commentary on milk and bones. I love the dinosaur...
Random Fun
This is hysterical. I've never noticed how drunk babies look before. Baby Trashes Bar in Las Palmas
Frozen in cumulative cage of bone, FOP
"For just at that moment the light came over the hill, and there was a mighty twitter in the branches. William never spoke for he stood turned to stone as he stooped; and Bert and Tom were stuck like rocks as they looked at him. And there they stand to this day,...
Freecycle jar cakes!
I have discovered a wonderful place on the interwebs. A place much like CraigsList, but where everything is free. That place, sirs and madams, is called Freecycle. Essentially a forum of stuff that people have and are eager to get rid of (or stuff that...
A meeting between cultures, cargo cults
Say sometime in the future we are contacted by a highly technologically advanced society (for the purposes of this discussion it doesn't really matter if they're mole people or extra-terrestrials). How would we react? How would our society change to the addition...
John Updike’s Rules for Reviewers
There's an interesting post by Harvey Freedenberg over at Beyond the Margins asking about whether book critics and authors can be friends. He eventually decides that they can be, but the part that drew my interest was when he discussed John Updike's rules for...
My room is finally coming together
Today was one of the few sunny days in Seattle, which meant one thing for me: I could put my top down on my Camaro. Which meant that I could finally go and pick up a loft bed from someone on Craigslist. Now, I need a loft bed because I have oodles of stuff...
Giants, the conclusion
We'll count Andre, but only because he's awesome.(This is the third part of a series, start reading here: Giants, big men, and traveler's tales) Even with all the evidence against giants, I still kind of like the idea of a race of giants hidden out in an exotic jungle...
The death of news? Hardly.
How is it that I find the neatest commentary on the current world not in the news sites that I frequent, but in the webcomics that I read? Joel Watson over at Hijinks Ensue has a great commentary today on the new digital newspaper (The Daily) being released by Apple...
Giants, evidence and belief
Part of the answer to the latter question from last week lies in the bible. Genesis 6 in the King James Version states “There were giants in the earth in those days; and also after that, when the sons of God came in unto the daughters of men, and they bare children to...
Recovering…
During the break a bunch of people came up to visit Seattle which meant that I not only got to see a group of great people that I don't usually get to see, I also got back in touch with some of the Seattlites who came out for the group get-togethers. It bothered...
Agreed.
If you're having a hard time reading it check it out here:
Giants, big men, and traveler's tales
Travelers to strange lands have always been expected to bring back exciting stories. A look at medieval bestiaries or the stories of Marco Polo's (supposed) journeys shows that western Europeans, at least, believed that just beyond their borders lay lands full of...
Internet and Egypt
So my Friday update for divergence is behind today, but I have an excuse this time. My roomie borrowed the internet by taking the modem and router to school, forgetting to tell the rest of us he was doing so. Unfortunately, he also forgot to bring them home so we are...
Graffiti!
Perhaps one of the more interesting things about living in Seattle is the sheer amount of graffiti that abounds. And I'm not just talking about tagging (which I feel is the juvenile middleschooler of the graffiti realm), I mean interesting art pieces. Drawings,...
Skinwalker Ranch continued
Picture by Peter TurosqLast week we introduced you to Skinwalker Ranch, a 480 acre ranch in Utah that has become synonymous with strange happenings. With the name comes an almost embarrassing number of theories on the cause, everything from Bigfoot enthusiasts to...