Sunday, July 22, 2012

May The Saints Preserve Us

Italian artist called Igor Scalisi Palminteri reinterprets the pantheon of saints by repainting religious statuettes as superheroes.

Friday, July 20, 2012

Marvelous


Three Wise Men once battled the Sinister Six and that Lazarus had a mutant healing factor.

Friday, July 06, 2012

Continuing the Work of Jesus

Now, the Plain Scarf Sneetches
Had black and white scarves.
The Progressive Sneetches
Had rainbows upon thars.

Those scarves weren't so big. They were really so small
You might think such a thing wouldn't matter at all.

But, because of their scarves, all the Plain Scarf Sneetches
Would brag, "We're the best kind of Sneetch on the beaches."
With their snoots in the air, they would sniff and they'd snort
"We'll have nothing to do with the Progressive sort!"
And whenever they met some, when they were out walking
They'd hike right on past them without even talking.

When the Plain Scarf children went out to play ball,
Could a Progressive get in the game...? Not at all.
You only could play if you have simple scarves
And the Progressive children had rainbows on thars.

When the Plain Scarf Sneetches had frankfurter roasts
Or picnics or parties or marshmallow toasts,
They never invited the Progressive Sneetches.
They left them out cold, in the dark of the beaches.
They kept them away. Never let them come near.
And that's how they treated them year after year.

Then one day, it seems ... while the Progressive Sneetches
Were moping and doping alone on the beaches,
just sitting there wishing they had different scarves ...
A stranger zipped up in the strangest of cars!

"My friends," he announced in a voice clear and keen,
My name is Sylvester McReconciliation McBean.
I've heard of your troubles. I've heard you're unhappy.
But I can fix that. I'm the Fix-it-Up Chappie.
I've come here to help you. I have what you need.
And my prices are low. And I work at great speed.
And my work is one hundred per cent guaranteed!"

Then, quickly Sylvester McReconciliation McBean
Put together a very peculiar machine.
And he said, "You want scarves like a Plain Scarf Sneetch...
My friends, you can have them for three dollars each!"

"Just pay me your money and hop right aboard!"
So they clambered inside. Then the big machine roared
And it klonked. And it bonked. And it jerked. And it berked
And it bopped them about. But the thing really worked!
When the Progressive Sneetches popped out, they had simple scarves!
They actually did. They had no colors on thars!

Then they yelled at the ones who had no scarves at the start,
"We're exactly like you! You can't tell us apart.
We're just the same, now, you snooty old smarties!
And now we can go to your frankfurter parties."

"Good grief!" groaned the ones who had no scarves at the first.
"We're still the best Sneetches and they are the worst.
But, now, how in the world will we know," they all frowned,
"If which kind is what, or the other way round?"

Then up came McBean with a very sly wink
And he said, "Things are not quite as bad as you think.
So you don't know who's who. That is perfectly true.
But come with me, friends. Do you know what I'll do?
I'll make you, again, the best Sneetches on beaches
And all it will cost you is ten dollars eaches."

Simple scarves are no longer in style," said McBean.
"What you need is a trip through my Rainbow Machine.
This wondrous contraption will color your scarves
So you won't look like Sneetches who have none on thars."
And that handy machine
Working very precisely
It colored their scarves and it did so quite nicely.

Then, with snoots in the air, they paraded about
And they opened their beaks and they let out a shout,
"We know who is who! Now there isn't a doubt.
The colorful Sneetches are the best ones about!"

Then, of course, those with plain scarves all got frightfully mad.
To be wearing a plain scarf now was frightfully bad.
Then, of course, old Sylvester McReconciliation McBean
Invited them into his Rainbow Machine.

Then of course from THEN on, as you probably guess,
Things really got into a horrible mess.

All the rest of that day, on those wild screaming beaches
The Fix-It-Up Chappie kept fixing up Sneetches.
Off again! On again!!
In again! Out again!
Through the machines they raced round and about again,
Changing their scarves every minute or two.
They kept paying money. They kept running through
Until neither the Plain nor the Rainbow ones knew
Whether this one was that one... or that one was this one
Or which one was what one... or what one was who.

Then, when every last cent
Of their money was spent,
The Fix-It-Up Chappie packed up
And he went.

And he laughed as he drove
In his car up the beach,
"They never will learn,
No. You can't teach a Sneetch!"

But McBean was quite wrong. I'm quite happy to say
That the Sneetches got really quite smart on that day,
The day they decided that Sneetches are Sneetches
And no kind of Sneetch is the best on the beaches.
That day, all the Sneetches forgot about scarves
And whether or not they had rainbows upon thars.

Wednesday, July 04, 2012

Sniffle

Web wanderers are more likely to get a computer virus by visiting a religious website than by peering at porn.

“Drive-by attacks” in which hackers booby-trap legitimate websites with malicious code continue to be a bane, the US-based anti-virus vendor Symantec said in its Internet Security Threat Report.

Websites with religious or ideological themes were found to have triple the average number of “threats” that those featuring adult content, according to Symantec.

As recently as just four or five years ago, white males made up the vast majority of Internet users, with white women and then minorities following behind. Today though, nearly two out of every three Internet users is Asian, either from China, India, or the United States. And of Internet travelers in the United States, women are now as represented as men, which the newswire says, accounts for the increasing likelihood of hacker attacks on religious sites, which are predominately visited by women.