You know what’s up.

The weekly photographic episode is ready to go.

Week two is up.

Brand-new, often unshiny photo project featuring Josh Monk and myself here. Join us for fifty-two weeks of pixels galore.

I have no idea where this came from originally, but this little video seems to be making the rounds at the moment on Facebook. There are some titles in Turkish, but I’m pretty sure you’ll understand what’s going on even if you can’t read the words.

Thanks for all your well-wishes on every social network everywhere— I’m pleased to announce that my ear has settled down as a result of truly superb Turkish medical care (honestly, best ENT treatment experience ever), and I’m feeling much better and just about ready to roll. Expect regular posting again as of Monday.

In the meantime, here are some of my favourite video links from this week, guaranteed to waste at least five minutes (okay, maybe three):

• If you haven’t heard of George Watsky, get ready for the next big viral.
• Always remember to take your birth control pills. In fact, just eat the whole pack.
• Friends don’t let friends text and walk.
• Sometimes people don’t suck as much as usual.
• Cat tries to talk some much-needed sense into the human race.

About ten years ago I was diagnosed with Ménière’s disease. You probably didn’t know this because I don’t talk about it much, and the reason I don’t talk about it is because, as with most illnesses, there is a psychological aspect that doesn’t benefit from dwelling. The more you advertise any illness to other people, the more opportunities they have to say, “oh, that’s terrible,” and the more inclined you are to respond with, “actually, yes, it is terrible,” and then next thing you know you start to get brainwashed with the thing you keep saying and hearing over and over, and then one morning you wake up wondering why you feel so terrible all the time. It is especially important to avoid negative self-talk with diseases like Ménière’s, because there is no cure, so the best you can do is just suck it up, live the best life you can, and try not to wallow.

I’ve been lucky in that my Ménière’s episodes have been few and far between; even though I have a constant low-level tinnitus and minor ear fullness, I’ve learned to ignore both, and the big flare-ups usually only happen a few times a year, and never last more than a day or two. However, I’ve recently been experiencing a flare-up that has gone on for longer than a week, and it seems to be getting worse, so I’m headed to the doctor even though I know he’s likely to tell me, “you have Ménière’s and you know that already, so get over it and wait it out.” I’m hoping that maybe it’s a bacterial infection that just happens to be in my affected ear, and maybe antibiotics can sort it out. You never know. We’ll see what the ENT says.

So to make up for what has been erratic posting over the past week or so, and will probably continue to be erratic posting over the next few days, here are a few links I found interesting. No theme here other than my personal interest— enjoy.

• Bored at work? Got a couple of lighters? Try this.
• This man got shot in the head, but then sneezed out the bullet like it was nothing. He’s expected to make a full recovery.
• No matter how much you think your life sucks, it really, really doesn’t.
• Memo for Lars Ulrich: embracing potential fans works a lot better in the long run than calling them dirty criminals and trying to prosecute them. Just saying.
• It was brought to my attention last week that there are still a handful of people on earth who are not familiar with Maru. When you fall in love with him, be sure to check out his other videos.

For those who haven’t been around long enough to remember the first time I posted about this, I’d like to remind everyone about Festive Lights. It’s a free Dashboard widget for Mac users that allows you to put, well, festive lights on your dashboard or desktop. I fire it up around this time every year, and it really does help lend holiday spirit to my day. Link

Continuing on from yesterday’s vintage find, here’s another post featuring photos of soldiers in times of war. The series is telling, poignant, and sometimes even heartbreaking. Link

A friend of mine pointed out this very insightful blog post featuring vintage photos of people along with their handwritten, self-deprecating comments. We like to think that body hatred was invented five minutes ago and that people in the good ol’ days knew how to appreciate a woman with curves, but given some of the women in these photos who describe themselves disparagingly as “fat,” I think things are actually getting better these days in terms of body acceptance. Link