Their slogan is "Make life creative." For anyone with an interest in photography, architecture, design, music, etc, I encourage you to see what's coming up and clear some room on your DVR.

Here's an example of what they're showing in just the next 48 hours:

• All six episodes of the BBC series "Genius of Photography"
• The documentary "Cindi Sherman: Nobody's Here But Me"
• A profile of German photomontage artist John Heartfield
• Documentaries about architects I.M. Pei and Mies Van Der Rohe
• A concert by pianist Lang Lang
• A profile of Piet Mondrian
• An episode of their original series "Close Up: Photographers at Work."

And that's just the tip of the iceberg. Then there's the Ovation TV website, which features TV schedules you can view by either date or subject matter, as well as interactive features like "art or not?" plus community and video sections that I look forward to exploring.

I wish I had enough time to watch it all. I could dedicate an entire DVR to the programming on their station. You can use the widget on their site to find out what channel it's on in your area. Now if they would just upgrade to High Def I'd be in creative heaven.

The following photos come via Google Street View:

1600 Pennsylvania Ave in Baltimore, MD

1600 Pennsylvania Ave in Glendora, CA

1600 Pennsylvania Ave in Wilmington, DE

1600 Pennsylvania Ave in Bremerton, WA

1600 Pennsylvania Ave in Savannah, GA

1600 Pennsylvania Ave in Terre Haute, IN

1600 Pennsylvania Ave in West Mifflin, PA

1600 Pennsylvania Ave in Los Angeles, CA

1600 Pennsylvania Ave in Croydon, PA

1600 Pennsylvania Ave in Brooklyn, NY

1600 Pennsylvania Ave in Des Moines, IA

1600 Pennsylvania Ave in Oreland, PA

1600 Pennsylvania Ave in Prospect Park, PA

1600 Pennsylvania Ave in Colton, CA

1600 Pennsylvania Ave in Dallas, TX

Note: For my British readers, here's where else you can find Number 10 Downing Street

Murder in the Hundred Acre Wood

CHAPTER ONE.
In Which Owl Is Killed.

   It was a wintry Wednesday in the Hundred Acre Wood, and Roo was stuck indoors. He knew it was a Wednesday because he smelled banana bread baking in the kitchen. His mother only baked banana bread on Wednesdays. He knew it was wintry out because his mother made him wear a sweater. And a scarf. And mittens. His mother only made him wear mittens when it was wintry. And she would not let him go to Owl's to play.
   "Please, mom," pleaded Roo as he hopped into the kitchen.
   "Now, Roo," Kanga said to her son, "it is far too cold outside to go bouncing over to Owl's house." She gracefully jumped about the room, doing motherly things. "You can go over to play tomorrow."
   "But I'm bored," Roo whined. "I wanna go over to Owl's. You promised." Roo bounced around the kitchen, knocked over a sack of flour with his tail, and hopped into his mother's pouch.
   Kanga sighed. When she and Roo moved to the Hundred Acre Wood, she did not know what a hard time Roo would have finding playmates his own age. She was forced to move out of Oscar's Fields so quickly that she had little time for planning and looking into such things. She picked up what belongings she could carry and moved with her son to the Hundred Acre Wood, a place where she could start over.
   Of course, being a single mother, and moving into a forest where she was the only woman around, word quickly spread about the new neighbor and her son. As she settled in and began making her new home cozy, her neighbors stopped by to meet Kanga and Roo, and deliver housewarming gifts and salutations.
   She got a jar of honey from the odd little Bear who lived just down the creek (rather, the jar looked like it once contained honey, but it was empty upon delivery). His stuttering roommate Piglet offered flowers to "b-b-b-b-brighten up" the new home. Noticing the way Piglet flung his pink scarf over his shoulder, and the tender way the Bear took his roommate’s hand as they walked away, Kanga wondered whether or not there were more to the roommates' relationship than meets the eye.
   When the Rabbit down the road came to meet the newcomers, the only thing he brought with him was a lecherous stare and a warning: "If I catch your son playing in my garden, I won't be held responsible for whatever happens next."
   But when Tigger pounced into their home for the very first time, that's when Kanga knew that her boy would have at least one playmate. The black and orange striped creature seemed to have springs in his tail. He bounced around happily, a bit too hyper for Kanga's taste, but just right for her little boy. Roo, still learning to hop on his own, was eager to play with Tigger. The two quickly became friends, and hopped together nearly every day. Kanga noticed that in recent weeks Tigger seemed to be leaving the Hundred Acre Wood quite regularly, often for days at a time. As far as she knew, Tigger had no job or relatives to speak of, so where was he always going? She asked him once, but he didn't want to talk about it.

   And then there was Owl. Kanga and Roo had been living in the Hundred Acre Wood for about a month before they met Owl. Owl lived in a house at the bottom of the Wood, across the creek, and over a hill. Kanga first heard mention of him from Christopher Robin, the polite boy who lived behind the door at the top of the Wood, and understood that Owl was old and wise.
   "He is very old and very wise, I think," Christopher Robin had said. "If he hasn't yet come to introduce himself, I'm certain it is with very good reason."
   "Just how old is he?" Kanga asked.
   "I would say at least a year older than I am," said Christopher Robin.
   "What does wise mean?" Roo asked.
   "Wise," Christopher Robin explained, "means that he can spell a great many words."
   That very evening, Owl came knocking at the door of Kanga and Roo's new home.
   Roo opened the door and found himself staring at the sharpest Talons he'd ever seen (Roo had certainly never seen Talons so close before). Gazing upwards, Roo was fascinated by the colorful feathers, the sharp beak, and wide eyes of the wise old (and unbelievably tall) Owl.
   Owl looked down at Roo and said, "Hello. Is your mother home?"
   "Mom!" shouted Roo. Kanga came bouncing to the door.
   Owl removed his top hat and pulled from it a bottle of wine. "I apologize for not coming to welcome you sooner to the Hundred Acre Wood," he said, offering the wine. "I assure you I would have come previously, but I have been counseling a very depressed ass and have nearly reached a breakthrough point in his therapy. It is very time consuming. But now that I see just how beautiful you are, I regret that I did not come on your first day here."
   Kanga blushed. She was used to men complimenting her, but somehow Owl seemed more sincere than most. It might have been his age (which Kanga couldn't quite figure), or his accent (which Kanga couldn't quite place) or the tender manner with which he put his wing on her shoulder when he talked, but she took an instant liking to him. She was sure that if he had lips, Owl would have a friendly smile.
   "Come inside," Kanga said. "We've just finished dinner, but I can offer you some banana bread I've made for dessert" (it was a Wednesday).
   "I'm afraid I cannot stay," Owl replied. "I really must get back home to finish my report on the ass. But far too much time had passed already since you moved in, and I did not want to be a stranger." Owl felt Roo tugging at his feathers. He looked down at the young boy.
   "Mr. Owl?" Roo asked.
   "Just Owl," Owl replied.
   "Mr. Owl," Roo repeated, "why are you so wise?" Roo still wasn't sure what that meant.
   "I am so wise," Owl replied, "because I have eyes on the back of my head." Owl spun his head all the way around so it was resting backwards on his shoulders.
   "Wow!" Roo stared, his eyes almost as big as Owl's.
   Facing forward again, Owl picked up Roo in his wings. "If you think that was neat, have your mother bring you over soon and I will show you some more of my tricks." Owl winked at Roo and put him down again.
   The next day, Kanga did bring Roo to visit Owl. And many days after that, too. Kanga was happy to see her son get along so well with the wise old bird, and figured that Owl would be a good role model for her son. An obvious scholar, counselor, and learned bird would have a lot to teach a little boy. And even though Roo eventually stopped being amazed by the head spinning, Owl seemed to always have a new trick up his sleeve.
   Eventually, Roo began going over to Owl's without his mother. He would come home with fascinating stories that Owl had told, tales of what it was like growing up a young scavenger bird, hunting for his meals by night and educating himself by day. Roo spent almost as much time with Owl as he spent with Tigger (even more so in recent weeks, with Tigger out of town so much). Which brings us to this particular wintry Wednesday, when Kanga wouldn’t let Roo go over to Owl’s to play.

   Across the creek and over a hill from Kanga and Roo's home was Owl's treehouse. Owl sat in his den, in a chair by a window, reading a book on tracking prey and wondering if Roo would be coming over that day. Roo came to visit most days when Tigger was out of town, and Owl quite enjoyed the visits. But being such a wintry day Owl suspected that Kanga might not be letting her boy out to play.
   The daylight through Owl's window dimmed as heavy clouds blocked the sunlight and blanketed the Hundred Acre Wood. Owl moved his chair to the desk and turned on a lamp to continue his reading. He was slightly distracted by the sound of raindrops on his roof, but quickly blocked out the noise and focused on reviewing the best places to find worms after a winter rain.
   Owl didn't hear the Intruder climb up his tree.
   Owl didn't notice when the door behind him opened and the Intruder entered the den.
   Owl was thinking to himself, "I wonder if Roo would like to learn to catch worms," when the Intruder brought the brick bluntly down on Owl's skull.
   Owl's scream was muffled by a crack of thunder. He dropped the book and his body tensed. His talons curled and he flapped his wings in pain. The Intruder jumped back to avoid being hit by the long feathers, then jumped forward and brought the brick down again.
   This time, Owl's skull split. His body fell to the ground, landing on one of his wings with its weight. From his head, blood ran across the den floor. His beak opened and closed, gasping for air. Milky fluid ran from his nostrils, mixing with the blood. His eyes glazed over as every last bit of wisdom left his body. His talons unclenched.
   And the next day, when Roo came over to play, that's exactly how he found him.

Now there's another Terminator movie in the works. I've seen the trailer. I can't say I'm very excited about it.

Why does Skynet keep sending Terminators after Sarah Connor? Or even John Connor, for that matter? Why not go back a hundred years, or two hundred years, and kill her great grandparents? Now that would make an interesting show (or movie, or comic book, or novel).

Future John Connor would surely send a human into the past to stop the Terminator from killing his great great grandparents. So how does this person fight against a robot killer in an age when technology is so primitive, using his knowledge from the future? And how does the Terminator blend in? What materials does he use to repair himself when he's been damaged? Over time, as he gets more and more damaged, does he go from glistening machine to steampunk hodgepodge of parts?

I think there's a lot of potential for period Terminator stories. Maybe there's an 18th Century Ireland Terminator trying to kill Johnny O'Connor before he comes to America. Or a Dark Ages Terminator who's trying to kill Sarah the bar wench. Primordial Ooze Terminator could have a heck of a time figuring out which slime mold eventual produces offspring that evolves into the Connor line.

The possibilities are endless. So why are they limiting themselves to telling the same old story the same old way time after time?

Update: It's too late to add any more options without messing up the results, but I want to mention that all your suggestions have been great. I wish I had thought to include the following: 451 (for the literary crowd), 1.4 2 2.8 4 (for the photographers), 4/4 (for the musicians out there), and #000000 (for the graphic designers). I hope you were all able to find a choice that suits you anyway.

I'm pleased to announce that t-shirts and posters based on the Luke Skywalker "HOPE" design I posted recently are once again available! They were inspired by Shepard Fairey's famous Obama "HOPE" poster, so be sure to check out his site www.obeygiant.com.

Posters and T-shirts are available for purchase at Zazzle.com.

Click on the Poster or Shirt below for available sizes and apparel styles:

Also available: The Imperial Party T-shirts and Posters requested by many of you:

There's still time to get yours before election day!

The new blog is called DFP:BLOG, and its launch coincides with the redesign of my photography portfolio site.

Currently on the blog, you can see some of the people I've photographed for my ongoing series of inventor portraits, like Tony Pagoto, seen below in his living room, who invented a gadget for keeping the wires under your desk tidy.

And, from my archives, I've posted a seldom seen photo essay I shot in a denim factory in Kentucky. If you've ever wondered who the people are who put the holes in pre-distressed jeans, this will answer the question.

I haven't yet figured out what the frequency of posts will be at DFP:BLOG, but when I do, expect to see more work along these lines, as well as occasional one-offs, and links to other work that inspires me.

(And don't worry -- Ironic Sans isn't going anywhere).

On the right, the logo for Omni Consumer Products, the megacorporation from the Robocop movies that seeks to make money privatizing government agencies.

The Congressional Budget Office is supposed to be nonpartisan, but I think I get a whiff of corporate interest.

A long time ago, in a political campaign far, far away, this poster was hanging in campaign offices across the galaxy...

...and these logos were on bumper stickers from Alderaan to Yavin:

If you know someone whose blog features a lot of light text on a dark background, you can forward this link to the visual offender. It's a special page demonstrating just how much of an eye strain it can be. Maybe we can eradicate this practice one blogspot site at a time.

For now, I'll be using this bookmarklet which automatically changes any website into black-on-white in your browser. Drag it to your bookmark toolbar to keep it handy. (found here)

(Hint: One of them is actually a lesson from a field trip, not a classroom).

SUBJECT: MATH

1) "Parenthesis means multiply. Every time you see this, you multiply. A negative times a negative equals a positive. A negative times a negative equals a positive. Say it. A negative times a negative equals a positive. Say it!"

SUBJECT: SCIENCE

2) "The parts of a flower are so constructed that very, very often the wind will cause pollination. If not, then a bee or any other nectar-gathering creature can create the same situation. Yes, anything that gets the pollen to the pistil's right on the list. I'll try to make it crystal clear. A flower's insatiable passion turns its life into a circus of debauchery! Now you see just how the stamen gets its lusty dust on to the stigma and why this frenzied chlorophyllous orgy starts each spring is no enigma. We call this quest for satisfaction a what, class?"

3) "Archeology is the search for fact. Not truth. If it's truth you're interested in, Doctor Tyree's Philosophy class is right down the hall. So forget any ideas you've got about lost cities, exotic travel, and digging up the world. We do not follow maps to buried treasure and X never, ever, marks the spot. Seventy percent of all archaeology is done in the library. Research. Reading."

4) "For many days before the end of our Earth, people will look into the night sky and notice a star, increasingly bright and increasingly near. As this star approaches us, the weather will change. The great polar fields of the north and south will rot and divide, and the seas will turn warmer."

SUBJECT: HISTORY

5) "You remember that thing we had about 30 years ago called the Korean conflict? And how we failed to achieve victory? How come we didn't cross the 38th parallel and push those rice-eaters back to the Great Wall of China then take the fucking wall apart brick by brick and nuke them back into the fucking stone age forever? Tell me why! How come? Say it! Say it!"

6) "Three weeks we've been talking about the Platt Amendment. What are you people? On dope? A piece of legislation was introduced into Congress by Senator John Platt. It was passed in 1906. This amendment to our Constitution has a profound impact upon all of our daily lives."

7) "In 1930, the Republican-controlled House of Representatives, in an effort to alleviate the effects of the... Anyone? Anyone?... the Great Depression, passed the... Anyone? Anyone? The tariff bill? The Hawley-Smoot Tariff Act? Which, anyone? Raised or lowered?... raised tariffs, in an effort to collect more revenue for the federal government. Did it work? Anyone? Anyone know the effects? It did not work, and the United States sank deeper into the Great Depression."

SUBJECT: MUSIC

8) "In this life, you can't win. Yeah, you can try, but in the end you're just gonna lose, big time, because the world is run by the Man. The Man, oh, you don't know the Man. He's everywhere. In the White House... down the hall... Ms. Mullins, she's the Man. And the Man ruined the ozone, he's burning down the Amazon, and he kidnapped Shamu and put her in a chlorine tank! And there used to be a way to stick it to the Man. It was called rock 'n roll, but guess what, oh no, the Man ruined that, too, with a little thing called MTV! So don't waste your time trying to make anything cool or pure or awesome 'cause the Man is just gonna call you a fat washed up loser and crush your soul. So do yourselves a favor and just GIVE UP!"

9) "You're quite correct, you can't dance to Mr. Beethoven. Can you tell me why, Mr. Manfield? Because the Beethoven piece doesn't use a constant rhythm or tempo. Madonna is 4/4 time all the way through. The melody changes but the rhythm is constant. So you can dance to it. The quartet changes both melodically and rhythmically. I'm going to play them again. Listen for this."

SUBJECT: LITERATURE

10) "Excrement. That's what I think of Mr. J. Evans Pritchard. We're not laying pipe, we're talking about poetry. I mean, how can you describe poetry like American Bandstand? I like Byron, I give him a 42, but I can't dance to it. Now I want you rip out that page. Go on, rip out the entire page. You heard me, rip it out. Rip it out!"

EXTRA CREDIT: PLAYTIME

11) "Now we're going to do something extremely fun. We're going to play a game called 'Who is my daddy and what does he do?'"

Okay, pencils down. Trade answer sheets with your neighbor. Here are the answers:

1) Stand and Deliver; 2) Grease 2; 3) Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade 4) Rebel Without A Cause; 5) Back to School; 6) Fast Times at Ridgemont High; 7) Ferris Bueller's Day Off; 8) School of Rock; 9) Running on Empty; 10) Dead Poets Society; 11) Kindergarten Cop

Remainder Idea #5: TypOs Cerael

There are a lot of "O"s cereal names out there: Cheerios, Toasty-Os, etc. I had this idea that there should be a Typos Cereal. It would be made of all the letters of the alphabet, like Alpha Bits cereal, but you wouldn't spell anything correctly with it. I only got as far as this rough illustration before I remembered that "O"s cereals don't use the whole alphabet. They only use the letter O. Then I considered a soup called "Type O" Soup. It's tomato soup with alphabet noodles. But that's just too many layers of wordplay.

Remainder Idea #4: "Dear Juno"

At the end of the movie Juno (spoiler alert), Juno gives her baby up for adoption. I found myself wondering what will happen, fourteen years later, when that little girl decides she wants to know more about her birth mother. Her mom will say, "I guess you're old enough to know that shortly after you were born, some people made a movie about how you came to be with me. The movie is called Juno, which is your birth mother's name." So the kid watches the movie, and then goes through the proper channels to get Juno's mailing address. She sits down and writes a letter to her birth mother where she says she has so many questions now that she's seen the movie. Questions like, "If your hamburger phone worked so poorly, why didn't you just get a normal phone?"

Remainder Idea #3: Unsuccessful Children's Books

I once doodled a drawing of Clifford the Big Red Log. I figured that must be the most dull children's book ever. Then I began imagining other unsuccessful children's books like Charlie and the Chalk Factory, Reverend Horton Heat Hears The Who, and The Berenstein Bears (about a family of burly gay men).

Remainder Idea #2: An Armored Bear Rug

Did you see The Golden Compass? I don't advocate killing animals to decorate your home, but I couldn't help imagining that those Armored Bears would make great rugs. Throw a cushion on the big helmeted head and you've got a nice seat, too.

Remainder Idea #1: The other Six Degrees of Separation

We've all heard the theory that every person on this planet is separated by every other person by six degrees. But one day I realized that something else is separated by six degrees. Every minute on a clock face is separated from the previous and next minute by six degrees. I think there might be something interesting that an be done with that concept. I tried coming up with a clock design incorporating the idea, playing with the six on the bottom of the clock in the designs, but I wasn't crazy about anything I came up with.

Bonus Remainder Idea: Blabacus, the Blogging Abacus

I have no idea what I was thinking when I wrote down "Blabacus, the Blogging Abacus." I must have though it was a good enough idea to write it down, but now I just stare at it wondering what I could have possibly been thinking of. Blabacus the Blogging Abacus. Is that an Abacus that has a blog? Is that an Abacus that is used as a tool for blogging? I have no idea.

Now that I've had a chance to play with the iPhone for a while, I've come up with my own proposal. I don't know how to make a working demo, so I've made some screenshots to help explain my concept. I think it feels natural, while being simple and unobtrusive.

Let's start with some text so we have something to work with:

Holding your finger on a word currently brings up a Magnifying Glass that helps you place a cursor where you want it. My suggestion: Whenever you go into Magnify mode, the bottom row of the keyboard is replaced by one large "Hold to Select" button.

Using this button to select text should feel familiar because the action is the same as selecting text on a Macbook's Trackpad. I normally use one hand with a Trackpad, but I find using two hands with the iPhone feels surprisingly natural because my thumb is already in a good position to press the button:

If you only move the cursor without pressing the "Hold to Select" button, the bottom row returns to normal when you let go. But if you do select text, then the "Hold to Select" button is replaced by four new buttons: Cut, Copy, Paste, and Cancel.

After you make your choice, the action is carried out and the bottom row returns to normal. I've selected "Cut" in this example.

When I'm ready to paste, I once again use the Magnifying Glass to place the cursor. The "Hold to Select" button comes up again but I'm not going to press it this time (although if you want to replace text, you can select a whole block of words to paste over).

If I I had nothing in my clipboard, then the bottom row would go back to normal when I release the Magnifying Glass since I didn't select any text. But I do have something in the clipboard, so I my options are shown again.

I select "Paste" and the word in my clipboard is inserted at the cursor. The keyboard bottom row returns to normal.

In the preferences, I can decide when I want the clipboard to be cleared out. I think it makes sense to empty your clipboard every time you paste, but other options are useful in case you need to paste the same text multiple times.

This method of cut and paste also works with non-editable text where you don't have a keyboard. If you want to copy text from Safari, for example, you hold your finger in one spot until the magnifying glass comes up. The "Hold to Select" button slides into place from below [animated gif], temporarily covering the navigation bar. Because the text is not editable, the paste and cut buttons will be inactive.

That's the best cut/paste implementation I could think of. It doesn't change the iPhone's current behavior and it doesn't get in the way. It's clear and easy to use. What do you think?

Previously: I See AT-AT Walkers

Above is a photo of the Bunge Grain complex in Quebec City. The complex is made up of 81 individual silos 30 meters tall. In celebration of Quebec's 400th Anniversary, artist Robert Lepage used the complex as a screen for an incredible site-specific motion picture called The Image Mill. The film tells the story of Quebec's 400 years through video, pictures, and sound. I expected a cheesy patriotic movie. But what I saw was subtle and elegant.

The below video, which shows 10 minutes of the 40 minute film, gives a good idea of what the movie was like. It shows how Lepage made innovative use of the contours of the silos, turning them into bullets, candles, a printing press, cigarettes, etc, and how he turned the entire complex into other kinds of buildings completely, such as a factory and an airport.

You can also watch a behind-the-scenes video at Lepage's website where he explains some of the technical issues that went into making the movie.

I would recommend that you fly to Quebec to see it, but unfortunately the movie's 66-night run has just ended.

According to Lepage's website, the movie is playing every night until August 24.

However, I recently saw these container cranes in Quebec that look even more like AT-ATs than those do. Maybe I can get a new rumor started.

Previously: I see the Death Star

There could even be a down side to taking drugs. Maybe your player gets great strength for a while but eventually gets liver damage and becomes weaker than when he started.

Of course, the video game company would need some sort of plausible deniability once the parental outrage begins. Maybe the game doesn't feature "drugs" at all, but thinly metaphoric "Power Potions." Then you can say, "Power Potions are not supposed to represent performance enhancing drugs, and any similarity is completely coincidental." If all else fails, you can claim "This baseball game is marketed for adults and is not intended for children."

Meanwhile kids can argue over whether or not "Steroid Mode" scores should be counted on the same High Scores list as Standard Mode scores. Maybe they can compromise by being on the same list, but with an asterisk.