DECEMBER

My monthly run down of what I enjoyed online continues!

1) Macaulay Culkin Eating a Slice of Pizza

If you didn’t know, Macaulay Culkin has a coverband called The Pizza Underground and they rewrite Velvet Underground songs to make them about pizza. In a weird way, it’s kind of genius.

As most people know, Andy Warhol was heavily involved in The Velvet Underground so to honour this Macaulay has immitated Warhol’s “eating a burger” video and eats a pizza. It’s a second-by-second remake and to prove it here is a side-by-side video.

Listen, I know this is probably the dumbest thing you’ll see in your life but it’s 4 minutes of Kevin McAllister from Home Alone eating a pizza. Dare you not watch it?

2) Christian Bale Sings the Powerpuff Girls Theme

The interviewer is quite possibly the dumbest, most awkward person that exists in this universe but his idiocy has led to the wonderful moment of Batman singing the theme song for The Powerpuff Girls so I guess that’s a win.

3) Cardboard Box Office

Two very creative (and most likely very bored) parents have undertaken the project of re-creating classic movie scenes with their baby and whatever is lying around the house.

You can see all of their barmy creations at their site http://cardboardboxoffice.com

4) 11 year old Aidan Fisher with Steel Panther

Young Aidan fancies himself as a bit guitar maestro, he’s made a career out of going to gigs and challenging guitarists to a solo. 80s hair-metal revivalists Steel Panther take the kid on during one of their concerts and the result is a rather epic time performance of “Eruption” by Van Halen and “You Really Got Me” by The Kinks.

5) Molly Lewis

To play us out: Friend of FRED and all-round awesome person Molly Lewis finally returns to YouTube with a brand new song. It’s from Joseph Scrimshaw’s fantabulous Flaw Fest and is a song about karate chopping people in the butt while playing Goldeneye.

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And that’s it! My favourite things of the last month.

– Aaron Fever is the creator of the Lemsip/7up coctail. He is also more accurately an internet whore and rarely leaves the house. If you like what you read here check out his blog http://www.aaronfever.com

NOVEMBER

Once again I try to give you My Favourite Things from around the web in the last month.

1) Loki

Tom Hiddleston is in danger of becoming a regular feature in this column. He has appeared far too often at this point with his exploits. He is clearly having far too much fun.

Recently he featured in some short clips on Comedy Central to promote Thor: The Dark World. Watch with glee as he tries to get the upper-hand over a bunch of small kids.

2) Batkid

The Make-A-Wish Foundation is wonderful and provides real service to millions of young children who are fighting for their lives against server and often terminal illnesses. This particular wish got a lot of attention online last month and for good reasons.

Young Miles is only 5 years old and has been battling leukaemia since he was 20 months old. When he asked if he could be Batman for a day, the response was strong and heartwarming.

You know, sometimes, just sometimes, the world can be alright.

3) Alan Moore: The Lo-Budget Biopic

On November 18th, noted comic book writer and all-round mad bloke Alan Moore celebrated his 60th birthday. Singer/songwriter and cartoonist Jeffrey Lewis decided to pay homage to Moore with this illustrated song. It’s rather sweet and pretty cool.

4) Aningaaq

I genuinely believe Gravity will be looked back on as being similarly cinematically influential as 2001: A Space Odyssey. I got to see it in November and was really blown away.

Do you remember when Sandra Bullock is trying to communicate with Earth but only gets a strange man, his dog, and a baby? Well, there is a short film of his end of the conversation. It’s made by Gravity director Alfonso Cuaron’s son Jonas.

5) The Five(ish) Doctors

We here at FRED love both Doctor Who and Sylvester McCoy with all out hearts. Just to prove a point, here is me with Mr. McCoy from a couple years ago:

Any excuse to show people that…

Anyway, with the big 50th anniversary this past month, Mr McCoy and some of his fellow Doctor cohorts decided to do their own big reunion show. It’s written/directed by Peter Davison himself and features pretty much everyone you can think of from the Doctor Who universe.

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And that’s it! My favourite things of the last month.

– Aaron Fever is the creator of the phrase “Tardistance”. He is also more accurately an internet whore and rarely leaves the house. If you like what you read here check out his blog http://www.aaronfever.com

OCTOBER

I’m back to give you more of my favourite stuff online. The videos aren’t necessarily from the last month, but that’s when I found them so it’s good enough for me!

1) We Are Brothers

Two brothers (with the decidedly mad names Baddy Paris and Rufus Starlight) set out to give the most memorable best-man speech at a wedding and I think they gave it one hell of a shot. Here is a snippet of their description:

“At his wedding we pleaded for our brother not to leave us, in the only way we knew how to say it; through the medium of 80s music and video. We thought we’d done ok, but he left us anyway”.

It has no right to be as good as it is.

2) Political Apathy

Russell Brand recently was interviewed by Jeremy Paxman about his political beliefs. It was a slightly heated but eloquent debate about apathy in the modern political system. You can watch a large portion of it here:

It has sparked lots of conversation online with people both agreeing and disagreeing with Brand’s viewpoints. Comedian and friend of FRED Rufus Hound share’s Brand’s thoughts and even spoke about it a couple years ago on his comedy special. Check it out below, it’s pretty hilarious and scarily accurate:

3) Beetlejuice: A Minecraft Rollercoaster

I have never played Minecraft. I think I’m just too old to get it. But, those who do play it have made some excellent things. Example A: This rollercoaster created in homage to Tim Burton’s best film (that’s right, I said it). It features recreated scenes and designs based on the film and it has a great tune playing too.

4) Lip Sync Battle

Once again proving that Jimmy Fallon has stolen the life I should be living, this little video is inordinately smile inducing. Jimmy, Joseph Gordon Levitt, and Stephen Merchant play a game of lip synching to popular songs.

Who knew Stephen Merchant could move so well?

5) Hipster or a Hobo

To play us out this month, The Rubberbandits are back with their first new material since their double album “Serious About Men”. It’s a slower r’n’b song about the thin line in current fashion trends.

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And that’s it! My favourite things of the last month.

– Aaron Fever is the creator of cry-singing to “Girls Just Wanna Have Fun”. He is also more accurately an internet whore and rarely leaves the house. If you like what you read here check out his blog http://www.aaronfever.com

AUGUST / SEPTEMBER

I’m so ashamed. I actually missed a month. After two years of doing this thing I have failed you. I suppose it was inevitable. It was due to conventions (plural) and live shows a-go-go. As a result this one spreads over two months, and I’ve picked my very favourite stuff I’ve seen online in that time.

1) Guitar Smash

As mentioned above, I was at a few conventions in the past couple months. One of which was Dragon Con in Atlanta, Georgia. On Saturday night FRED hosted a concert with tons of great people including Paul & Storm, Molly Lewis, Joseph Scrimshaw, and more. But we opened the show with this little ditty featuring Mike Phirman and Adam Savage. I was backstage while it happened but luckily Adam’s crew got it all on tape. I hope you enjoy it.

2) The Fox

The following music video is from a Norwegian talk show, apparently. It became viral for reasons that nobody yet has been able to understand. It’s a song about the noises that animals make. Somewhere, old MacDonald is spinning in his grave. Well worth a listen, or twelve.

3) Fly Like An Eagle

Make the video full screen and yourself comfortable. For a minute and a half you can preted you’re an eagle flying over mountains and valleys. Or, if your imagination is limited, you can imagine you’re a tiny cameraman on it’s back.

4) Get Shaun

When The World’s End was released recently it was proceeded by a media blitz by the stars and creators. As a result, two of my favourite things features them.

Listen as Nick Frost and Simon Pegg sing their own cover of Daft Punk’s “Get Lucky”.

5) Cornetto Bowling

I’m a bit of a fan of the Nerdist’s YouTube show All Star Celebrity Bowling. You wouldn’t think a show where you watch people bowl would be fun to watch but it really is. They’ve had some great guests in the past with the cast of Breaking Bad, The Walking Dead, and Mad Men.

This recent one features the team of Nick Frost, Simon Pegg, and Edgar wright from the Cornetto Trilogy films. They’re joined by The Sex Pistols member Steve Jones because… sure, why not?

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And that’s it! My favourite things of the last month.

– Aaron Fever is the creator of twerking. He is also more accurately an internet whore and rarely leaves the house. If you like what you read here check out his blog http://www.aaronfever.com

JULY

Things are picking up now as Con season is in full swing and preparations for Dragon Con next month begin. If you follow me on Twitter, then all I will say is “expect cursing”.

1) Dustin Hoffman Gets It

I love the Hoff. He’s a great actor and from all the interviews I’ve seen he seems to be a genuinely good guy to boot. Enforcing this belief is a recent interview he did with the AFI about his time on the film Tootsie where he plays a man dressing as a woman.

Hoffman had a revelation while preparing for the role and he gained a little understanding as to just how hard women have it in this world. Things get a little emotional, so grab a tissue before watching.

2) Castletown Donkey Derby 1994

Words will be difficult to find in an attempt to describe what follows. It is quite possibly the funniest, unintentionally funny, video about rural Ireland in the 90s. You’ll soon realise that Father Ted was more of a documentary than most of us would like to admit.

Welcome to the Castletown Donkey Derby. It’s as batshit insane as you’d imagine.

3) Wolverine – The Musical!

I love the guys at gloveandboots, they do some great videos. With The Wolverine out this month, they jumped at the chance to create a musical based on Hugh Jackman’s… love of musicals.

It’s pretty awesome and features cameos from Jamie Madrox, Hulk and Spider-man.

4) The Walking Dead Season 4

The TV series has been divisive to say the least. Fans of the comic and those completely unaware all have a love/hate relationship with the show. Personally, I’ve found it enjoyable but inconsistent.

Comic Con recently premiered a big four and a half minute trailer for the new season and I have to say, it looks pretty bad-ass. Check it out.

5) Tom Hiddleston

Speaking of Comic Con, here is the perfect example of an actor who is having the time of his life.

Tom Hiddleston, during a Marvel movie panel, crashed proceedings in his full Loki costume and while in character decided to “have fun”. He may be playing an evil trickster but you can tell that smile is legit.

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And that’s it! My favourite things of the last month.

– Aaron Fever is the creator of con-crud. He is also more accurately an internet whore and rarely leaves the house. If you like what you read here check out his blog http://www.aaronfever.com

JUNE

It’s summer! Right? Hello, weather, it’s summer! C’mon!

1) Bitter Orange

We love James Urbaniak here at FRED so we were delighted to see a short film he has a part in pop up online. It’s written and directed by Hope Larson and stars Brie Larson who most of you may recognise as Envy Adams from Scott Pilgrim.

It’s a noir style 1920s caper and is full of sass, moxy, and guff. Well worth a watch.

2) Game of Thrones Art

I’m a big fan of the Game of Thrones TV show (no, I haven’t read the books, I know, I’m sorry). When I found this wonderful fan-art by Mike Wrobel I was in love. He has taken the characters from the show and re-invented them into some 80s and 90s styles. I’ve posted two favourites of mine here but if you’d like to see more check out his Tumblr http://moshi-kun.tumblr.com/

3) Chris O’Dowd versus The Fly

The Graham Norton Show has featured on here a few times. It seems when three great celebrities are on a couch something magical happens. I wouldn’t necessarily call this magical but it is something to behold.

Steve Carell, Kristen Wiig, and Chris O’Dowd spot a fly on set buzzing around their heads. Chris takes it down but not it a way he would have wanted…

4) Lego Movie

I wasn’t really aware of this until the trailer came out but this is a geniune movie from LEGO about… LEGO. It seems to have some great people involved too; Morgan Freeman, Chris Pratt, Will Arnett, Elizabeth Banks, Will Ferrell, Liam Neeson, and tons more.

Check out the trailer and get excited.

5) GPOY

As stated above, I’m a big fan of GoT so when this opportunity popped up, well, it made my month.

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And that’s it! My favourite things of the last month.

– Aaron Fever is the creator of the velcro bra. He is also more accurately an internet whore and rarely leaves the house. If you like what you read here check out his blog http://www.aaronfever.com

MAY

I’m writing this on a train. The future is now, kids!

1) Commander Chris Hadfield

The video has had (at last count) 15 million views so the chances of this being new to your are slim-to-none but Commander Hadfield has been such an endless delight online since he started his mission on the International Space Station that I would be remiss in celebrating his return to Earth and sharing his wonderful music video. He has inspired a new generation of kids to explore space via his Twitter and YouTube accounts, and quite a number of adults too.

It is, to my mind, the only music video made in space. That’s pretty damn cool. We salute you, sir!

2) Speed Kills

What happens when you let a homicidal maniac go speed dating? Why, this short film by Alan Rogers, of course! It’s based on an Irish comic written by Derrick Domican. I’ve worked with Alan before and he’s a great talent so it’s well worth a watch, but be warned; some NSFW images.

3) Will Smith attempts to break the internet

Will Smith and his son recently guested on The Graham Norton Show in the UK. The last time he featured on the show we performed his Fresh Prince of Bel Air theme which got 8 million views. Will, as always, wanted to outperform himself so decides to take it up a notch. The man doesn’t do things by half…

(At last check, this has gotten 14 million views)

4) 8-Bit Iron Man

I won’t talk about Iron Man 3 as I did enough of that elsewhere but I will share this rather delightful video that Norwood Cheek and David Dutton made which is an 8-Bit video game version of the first Iron Man film. It was made for the Cinefix’s 60 second(ish) challenge which gets film-makers to create minute long remix’s of some famous films.

5) Doctors

This month saw the season finale of Doctor Who air but not without a hitch. The BBC accidentally shipped over 200 blu-ray copies of the final episode early to people who had pre-ordered them. Worried that they might leak the details of the episode online, Steven Moffat said that if everyone kept the secret he would release an exclusive video of Matt Smith and David Tennant as a reward. Wonderfully everyone kept quiet and you can watch that video HERE.

So I shall leave you with this image from it.

Roll on the 50th Anniversary special.

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And that’s it! My favourite things of the last month.

– Aaron Fever is the creator of the velcro bra. He is also more accurately an internet whore and rarely leaves the house. If you like what you read here check out his blog http://www.aaronfever.com

APRIL

It’s the first of May. Our friend Jonathan Coulton is no doubt receiving an endless amount of bad jokes on Twitter today. I however have decided to instead dedicate my time to bringing you my favourite things from last month. You know, because I’m awesome like that.

1) Thumb Snatchers From The Moon Cocoon

This is a rather mental short film from Bradley Schaffer. It a hand-made stop-motion story of a Texan Sheriff taking on a bungling alien invasion. It has deservedly won a ton of awards, maybe not specifically for being bat-shit insane but I’m sure that is a big part of it. Think Axe Cop meets Mars Attacks and you’re half way there.

2) Patton Oswalt’s Star Wars Filibuster

No doubt you’re already aware of this. It has already become legendary. Parks & Recreation had comedian Patton Oswalt as a guest star for a couple of episodes. In the following scene the producers of the show asked him to come up with his own words for the filibuster he had to act. What Patton comes up with is nothing short of inspired and completely crazy. I mean, Moon Knight is a Marvel A-lister? C’mon!

3) And on that note…

Harrison Ford appeared on Jimmy Kimmel’s talk show and questions of the new Star Wars movie came up. What happened was rather wonderful. He hasn’t lost a step!

By the way, any video where Harrison Ford says “You Wookie sack of shit” will always get a showing in this column.

4) Goalunited

I’ve been obsessed for a number of weeks with this online football management simulator. It’s a real-time game so unlike most football games, you can’t skip to the next match. League games are Wednesdays and Saturdays and unless you’re playing in a cup competition or have arranged a friendly, you have to wait for Wednesday and Saturday for your next match. But fret not, there are loads of things to be doing in the mean time like organising training, scouting youth players, trading on the transfer market and negotiating sponsorships.

The Stadium complex I’ve built up so far.

In fact, the game is so in-depth you even pick what products to manufacture in your club shop and have to arrange for production! Of course a lot of these features aren’t available at first, as you have to build up your experience but it doesn’t take long for things to become unlocked.

Not bragging but I totally won this match.

I’m completely in love with my team (Phoenix Park Tuesday) and managed to win my league in my first season! But now that I’ve been promoted to a higher league I’m getting my ass handed to me on a regular basis. It’s a serious challenge.

To get your team and start playing go to goalunited.org and register. It’s free, so why not?

5) Delta Gamma Zod

Michael Shannon giving an acting master class with the infamous Delta Gamma sorority letter. I think that’s all the intro you need.

Oh, and it’s NSFW if you weren’t aware as it features phrases like “cunt-punt”. Enjoy!

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And that’s it! My favourite things of the last month.

– Aaron Fever is the creator of double ended arrows. He is also more accurately an internet whore and rarely leaves the house. If you like what you read here check out his blog http://www.aaronfever.com

MARCH

Three. It’s a magic number, so I’m told. This is also the number of months that we’ve all survived in 2013. And man, let me tell you, March has also felt three times longer than the average month. Maybe that’s just me but I’m glad we’re finally at the end of it. Phew! Despite my own personal misgivings it has still been a great month for cool stuff online. Here are my favourite ones:

1) Sweded Iron Man 3

For anyone who doesn’t know what “Sweded” means (and obviously, you’ve never seen the Michel Gondry movie Be Kind Rewind) here is the urban dictionary definition:

The summarized recreation of popular pop-culture films using limited budgets and a camcorder. The process is called sweding. Upon completion the film has been Sweded.

The fine folks of Cinefix have done a shot-for-shot remake of the Iron Man 3 trailer using not much more than some flashlights and cardboard. It’s immensely satisfying.

2) The Venture Bros. Preview

As is well documented, we’re big admirers on this site of the dynamic duo Doc Hammer and Jackson Publik. So you can well imagine just how excited we are to get our grubby mitts on Season 5 of The Venture Bros. We’re not there quite yet but [adult swim] have released a 5 minute preview and that will have to do for now.

3) Good Parenting

In another example of parents doing it right, I’ll let YouTuber Mike Mika speak for himself:

My three year old daughter and I play a lot of old games together. Her favorite is Donkey Kong. Two days ago, she asked me if she could play as the girl and save Mario. She’s played as Princess Toadstool in Super Mario Bros. 2 and naturally just assumed she could do the same in Donkey Kong. I told her we couldn’t in that particular Mario game, she seemed really bummed out by that. So what else am I supposed to do? Now I’m up at midnight hacking the ROM, replacing Mario with Pauline.

*Stands up and applauds*

4) The Making of Mormon

The Book of Mormon has won endless awards and is seemingly a hit with both audiences and critics. So considering everyone loves it, then everyone should also love this hour long documentary on how the show was made featuring interviews from the cast and creators. Enjoy!

5) Le Sexoflex

I played Le Sexoflex‘s first album “Le MiXXXtape: Invagine the Pussibilities” an inordinate amount of times. It’s my go-to party starter. It’s been a long time coming (huh) but their second album “The Naughty Contest” is now available to download. CLICK HERE to do so. For a taster (so to speak) check out the video for “Suck Dick, Eat Cheetos”.

Oh, and if everything in the above paragraph didn’t give it away already, it’s NSFW.

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And that’s it! My favourite things of the last month.

– Aaron Poole is the creator of finger-only gloves. He is also more accurately an internet whore and rarely leaves the house. If you like what you read here check out his blog http://aaronfever.blogspot.com

FEBRUARY

February is the shortest month of the year but it felt like the busiest I’ve ever been. Crazy month. Hence why I’m a couple days late with this. But thankfully there has still been lots of cool things online to share with you.

1) Drive-Thru Prank

This is one of the more childish things I’ve ever posted here but it gave me a good hearty chuckle. As explained at the start of the video, the driver of the car will be hidden and appear invisible to the drive-thru attendants. Normally I would roll my eyes at such things but the reaction of the staff is genuinely amusing.

Fast-food employees of the world, I salute you.

2) Venture Fortress

I love the Venture Bros. We all do here at FRED. And it appears YouTuber JackMuu does too as he has perfectly recaptured one of my favourite scenes using the Team Fortress software.

Check out the henchmen suiting up in the clip below.

3) Between Two Ferns: Oscar Buzz Edition

Zach Galifianakis has been doing these mock-interviews on Funny or Die for a long time now but I think his recent Oscar special is my favourite. Jennifer Lawrence and Anne Hathaway steal it for me, especially with some rockin’ drunk acting from the latter.

4) Adam Hills

I really hate fat jokes. They’re the lowest form of comedy outside of fart jokes. It’s lazy and cruel and really pisses me off.

It appears I have an ally in this cause with Adam Hills. On his show he had this rant about what Joan Rivers said of the singer Adele after the Oscars.

Be warned, very NSFW language.

5) Comic Relief

This one is more of a plea than a recommendation. Three years ago I took part in Red Nose Net, a 24 hour webcast with Widgett Walls and Ken Plume to help raise money for the very worthy charity Comic Relief.

This year Ken did a 25 hour webcast on his own as part of the 25th anniversary of Comic Relief and has re-released the charity single from 2010.

The single features such luminaries as:
Paul and Storm, Jonathan Coulton, Dave Hill, J. Elvis Weinstein, Bill Corbett, Phill Jupitus, Kevin Murphy, Mike Phirman, Jackson Publick, Doc Hammer, John Roderick, Molly Lewis, MC Frontalot, Hank Green, James Urbaniak, David Mitchell, Joe “Covenant” Lamb, John “Widgett” Robinson, and myself somewhere in the background at the end.

Every bit of money helps so please, if you have 99 cents handy, download the song and listen while knowing you’ve done something good today. You can do so by CLICKING HERE for all the details.

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And that’s it! My favourite things of the last month.

– Aaron Poole is the creator of jive turkeys. He is also more accurately an internet whore and rarely leaves the house. If you like what you read here check out his blog http://aaronfever.blogspot.com

JANUARY

Well, that’s the first month of the year done and dusted. I’ve been broke as hell, just like everyone else I’m sure. The weather has been brutal. It’s been a typical January, pretty much.

Thank god it’s over.

1) Light On Their Feet

I love puns… Where was I? Oh yes, the following video was submitted to me by the lovely JJ Hawkins who was super impressed by this dance show with a twist. I have to say I must agree with him as the choreography mixed with the timing of the lights produces something rather cool.

Although you may want to throttle the kid screaming beside the camera before the end.

2) The Death Star Petition

It’s been a somewhat controversial thing but The White House’s petition website has, if nothing else, offered a few laughs. People have been petitioning for anything between deporting Piers Morgan or secession from the union. By a mile, my favourite so far has been the request to build a Death Star.

If these petitions get enough signatures The White House has to give a formal response and gloriously the Death Star request did. The response is nothing short of inspired. This is how it starts…

… to read the full thing, and you really should read it all, CLICK THIS LINK.

3) Maximus Thor

If I’m honest, I have no idea what’s going on at the Maximus Thor YouTube channel but I can tell you that I find it hilarious and awesome.

Maximus Thor is a young child with the voice of and old man who talks smack and gets into odd situations. That’s as much as I can tell you. Seriously, after that, I’m lost. Here’s an example:

Yeah. Go watch all the videos. They’re great.

4) Learning Town

Paul & Storm are wonderful friends of our site (well, Storm is) and we were super excited to see them get their own YouTube show on the Geek & Sundry channel. It’s called Learning Town and is the type of musical comedy you’d expect from the duo. So far three episodes have been released and you can watch the first one below.

5) Finding Your Religion

I’m a big fan of R.E.M.. I’ve been lucky enough to see them in concert a number of times and even held hands with Michael Stipe (the story is much less interesting than the statement). Everyone knows their song Losing My Religion but thanks to the wonderful techno nerds of the internet someone has gone to the trouble of changing all the minor notes in the song to major ones, including Stipe’s vocals.

The result is nothing short of hypnotic as an old familiar friends is suddenly transformed. It becomes a rather uplifting, positive song despite itself. Check it out.

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And that’s it! My favourite things of the last month.

– Aaron Poole is the creator of jive turkeys. He is also more accurately an internet whore and rarely leaves the house. If you like what you read here check out his blog http://aaronfever.blogspot.com

DECEMBER

Hello 2013! Nice to meet you. But before we get ourselves acquainted, I have a little bit of unfinished business with 2012. Let me share my favourite things from the last month of last year!

1) LEGO Helm’s Deep

A production team called Brotherhood Workshop made this rather amazing LEGO animation piece for the Machinima Interactive Film Festival. It’s a slightly different take on the Helm’s Deep battle sequence as you’ll see (Legolas goes on a quest to find a box for Gimli) but definitely worth your time. Twice.

2) Isaac Newton vs. Rube Goldberg

2dphotography made what is a pretty mind blowing machine. If you don’t know what a Rube Goldberg machine is, just think of the OK Go video for “This Too Shall Pass”.

This one, while not as large as OK Go’s, is even more impressive. Why? Gravity. Trust me, when you see it, you’ll freak out.

3) The Best Astronomy Images of 2012

Phil Plait is a friend of the site here. I got to meet him at Dragon*Con this past year and he’s the nicest guy you can meet. Add to that, he’s a fricken astronomy genius, and you have someone who I can listen to talk about space for hours.

As I’ve mentioned here previously, I love some space photography and Phil has gathered his favourite astronomy images of the year together in a great article on Slate.com.

You can read that article by CLICKING HERE. But to give you a taste here is the first picture and his description:

“On Aug. 31, 2012, the Sun had a major hissy fit: A vast arch of material was lifted up off the surface by the Sun’s powerful magnetic field. Sometimes these arches collapse back down, but this one erupted, blasting literally hundreds of millions of tons of superheated plasma into space at a speed of 1,400 kilometers per second (900 miles per second) – over a thousand times faster than a rifle bullet. The scale of this is crushing – the arch was 300,000 kilometers (200,000) miles) across, 25 times larger than the Earth. As we near the peak of the Sun’s magnetic cycle, we’ll be seeing even more activity like this in the coming months.”

Pretty cool huh? And that’s just the first one.

4) Break The Wall Down

A team of mad scones called Sinners Domino Production attempted, and completed, a Guinness world record breaking 30m long, 31,405 domino wall last July in Germany.

The video below shows the whole domino set, which features flags from around the world, but the particular record breaking wall will not be hard to miss. It’s huge!

The whole thing (not just the wall) involved 128,000 dominoes, of which 127,141 toppled. There is even a massive pyramid in there too, just for laughs.

I was a massive fan of these growing up and it’s still bloody impressive when you think of the time and patience it takes to set something like this up.

5) Doctor Who Puppet Adventures

Alisa Stern is the master of a rather wonderful Matt Smith Doctor Who puppet. She runs a tumblr, blogging his exploits. Recently she made a stop motion video for Christmas and it turned out uncannily similar to the new BBC Christmas special (in some aspects at least).

Here is her description:

“A few months ago I decided to go a step further and create a Doctor Who stop motion Christmas special in my free time. I wrote the script and made the snowman puppet weeks the BBC announced that the official Christmas special would be called “The Snowmen.” I promise that no real TARDIS was used during production.”

It’s only a very short video, but it’s quite sweet and I think young Who fans will especially love it.

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And that’s it! My favourite things of the last month.

– Aaron Poole is the creator of pretzel spoons. He is also more accurately an internet whore and rarely leaves the house. If you like what you read here check out his blog http://aaronfever.blogspot.com

NOVEMBER

Hello! The holiday season is almost upon us, or it already is, depending on your point of view. But before Santa comes to teach capitalism to the baby Jesus (I think that’s what happens) there is still enough time for me to share with you my list of favourite things from November.

1) The M In MTV

A comedy duo named Brian & Maria have created a funny (and scarily accurate) sketch called “Ask A Network Head” which asks the question “Why doesn’t MTV play music videos anymore?”. The answer is not only dead-on but also damn hilarious.

It’s time to hear the truth, folks. Even if it is from a comedy sketch writer and not the actual horse’s mouth.

2) A**hole For Hire

Admittedly, this video is not new. It’s been around for approximately 2 years. But I saw it for the first time this month and it made me laugh so it makes the list. When you start your own column you get to decide what goes in it.

James Van Der Beek helps you keep your girl by making you look good.

JVDB needs to get more work. I will not rest until he is on a different TV show every night.

3) Lego. Still Kicking Butt After All These Years

Carrying on from last month’s example of great PR from Bodyform, Lego have once again shown why they were the best toys of my childhood.

A young boy wrote a letter (with a bit of help from his parents, I would argue) to the company letting them know about how dissapointed he was that a Lego set he was saving up for was no longer available on the market.

Lego responded and the boy’s father recorded the result. Say what you want about corporations being evil, sometimes the people that work at them are a little bit wonderful.

4) It’s Pronounced GOOSE-BUMPS

There are a lot of reasons for me not to like this song. I have never understood the “Err Mah Gurrrd” meme since it’s inception and it has been around long enough now to go from amusing to annoying.

However, with a cameo from The Swedish Chef and a ridiculously catchy tune it manages to be worthy of repeat viewing. I just hope this is the last we see of the meme.

5) Me!

Yesterday was my birthday. At the start of the month I acted in a play for the first time in my life.

I’ve been doing this column consistently since May 2011 but just this once, I’m gonna give myself a pat on the back and say, hey, good work buddy.

Happy Birthday to me, you guys

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And that’s it! My favourite things of the last month.

– Aaron Poole is the creator of red eyes. He is also more accurately an internet whore and rarely leaves the house. If you like what you read here check out his blog http://aaronfever.blogspot.com

OCTOBER

I will refuse to use phrases like Rocktober. October does not deserve such a title. It is merely an OK month for me. Folktober might be more accurate.

Despite my apathy for the month, some rocking things did happen. Let us look at my favourites.

1) SPACE!

I like space stuff. By the sheer fact that I refer to it as “space stuff” you can probably tell that I’m not very knowledgeable about any of it. But you know who are? NASA. They’ve got a website called Astro Pic Of The Day and it gives you an awesome picture like this:

And an easy to read description of what it’s all about. Apparently this is the remnants of a star, just like our Sun, that ran out of hyrdrogen. At the very center you can see a white dot which is what remains, a blue-hot white dwarf star. Cool, huh?

As the title suggests they give a new picture everyday and you can follow on Twitter too which is pretty handy.

2) The Ohio State University Marching Band

As many of you may know, the OSU Marching Band is famous for being pretty bad-ass and for a long time now have been putting on awesome shows at half-time. How awesome you ask?

Yes, you did just see Pikachu and yes you did just see Mario jumping on the flag. I know, I told you it was awesome. It was from the 6th of this month during a game against Nebraska.

And marching band people are not considered cool over there? You Americans are crazy.

3) Felix Baumgartner

There are times when I think we, as a species, should give ourselves a pat on the back. Curiosity rover on Mars was one moment this year. Another is a dude dropping from the edge of space and walking away from it like a boss.

Felix, I salute you, you crazy diamond. Here is a short video from Red Bull, who sponsored the whole thing, documenting the event. Makes me want to stand up and chant “HU-MAN RACE! HU-MAN RACE! HU-MAN RACE!”.

4) PR Done Right

The internet has been awash lately with companies handling their online public relations all wrong: Managers of restaurants attacking people for negative reviews on sites. Online product sellers abusing clients for returning products. Et cetera.

One company that has it’s head screwed on however is Bodyform. For those who don’t know, Bodyform is a tampon/sanitary pad company who have been famous over the years for their advertisements such as this little beauty showing women in various different situations enjoying themselves.

A man by the name of Richard Neill posted this comment on their facebook page on the 8th of October:

“Hi , as a man I must ask why you have lied to us for all these years . As a child I watched your advertisements with interest as to how at this wonderful time of the month that the female gets to enjoy so many things ,I felt a little jealous. I mean bike riding , rollercoasters, dancing, parachuting, why couldn’t I get to enjoy this time of joy and ‘blue water’ and wings !! Dam my penis!! Then I got a girlfriend, was so happy and couldn’t wait for this joyous adventurous time of the month to happen …..you lied !! There was no joy , no extreme sports , no blue water spilling over wings and no rocking soundtrack oh no no no. Instead I had to fight against every male urge I had to resist screaming wooaaahhhhh bodddyyyyyyfooorrrmmm bodyformed for youuuuuuu as my lady changed from the loving , gentle, normal skin coloured lady to the little girl from the exorcist with added venom and extra 360 degree head spin. Thanks for setting me up for a fall bodyform , you crafty bugger“.

Not ones to be outdone with a bit of comedy at their own expense, the guys and girls at Bodyform crafted this response. It is, I think you’ll agree, brilliant.

5) Stay Safe

And finally, as the east coast of America gets hit by a pretty nasty storm all our thoughts here at FRED are with our friends and family out there. Hope everyone makes through it OK.

As inspiration, here is a shirtless horse-headed man running through the streets of the storm. You can do it, guys. Let him be your spirit animal.

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And that’s it! My favourite things of the last month.

– Aaron Poole is the creator of chocolate keyboards. He is also more accurately an internet whore and rarely leaves the house. If you like what you read here check out his blog http://aaronfever.blogspot.com

SEPTEMBER

Phew! September has been a wild one. I’ve been running around like a headless chicken for the majority of this month. But, I’ve been lucky enough to perform on stage in front of hundreds of geeks at Dragon*Con and will soon be in a play in Dublin so it’s all a good sort of stress.

Don’t worry, I know you didn’t come here to hear about my life, you want internet fun things! My list for this month starts…… NOW!

1) Feel Inside (And Stuff Like That)

For fans of Flight Of The Conchords the New Zealand Red Nose Day this year was an extra special event as it saw the semi-return of the band. They have been very quiet lately, with them both doing seperate projects, but they decided to help the charity event by contributing a song. The lyrics of which, were crowdsourced from some very cute kids.

You can see the song, plus the damn funny creation of it, by watching the video below.

I particularly love the awkward moment when the new Muppets movie comes up in conversation.

2) Whose Line Online

One of my favourite comedy things ever is the improv comedy show Whose Line Is It Anyway? The show was in the UK for a number of years before Drew Carey took up the show in the States and I lapped it up like milk. Colin Mochrie, Greg Proops, Ryan Stiles, and Tony Slattery were comedy uncles to me.

I was recently pointed towards the rather wonderful whoselineonline.org which has archived all the shows from both sides of the Atlantic. But, surprisingly for me, it also contains the pre-TV show radio shows. That’s right, like all good comedy shows, it started on BBC radio first. Starring such wonderful people as Stephen Fry, Hugh Laurie, Dawn French, Griff Rhys Jones, and tons more.

So check it out by CLICKING HERE.

3) Zombocalypse

This game is as addictive as the title is ridiculous. It’s a simple premise, shoot zombies in the head and keep shooting zombies in the head until you die. You start off with a machete and can pick up weapons as you go.

There are power ups and special weapons like helicopter attacks that you can utilise. I find the dual pistols particularly satisfying.

It’s a great time killer so if you want to kill some, along with zombies, CLICK THIS LINK.

4) Dragon*Con

Look, there is no way to fully express my feelings for Dragon*Con. This year was my 5th outing and as always it was an amazing time. The 4 days of the Con often feels like 4 weeks but as soon as it’s over I miss it.

One of the best thing about Dragon*Con, and one of the things I think it does better than any other Con, is all the awesome cosplayers. How could I give you even a glimpse into some of the 52 thousand maniacs who attend? Well, why not put them all into a Gangnam Style parody video.

That’s what Minh Nhat Bui did and what a great job they did of it too. So check out the video below. It’s the closest thing to being there I could find.

And because it deserves to be done:

5) Ben Folds Fraggles Five

In further evidence that Chris Hardwick is somehow living the life I was meant to be living, his Nerdist channel has taken the hands of fate to unite Ben Folds Five and Fraggle Rock in one music video.

If I’m honest, it’s not the best BFF song I’ve ever heard (I say this, yet two days later and I’m still singing the song to myself) but I’m glad to see the band back together and it’s just damn fun to see the Fraggles running around causing mayhem as is their wont.

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And that’s it! My favourite things of the last month.

– Aaron Poole is the creator of #FringeFriday. He is also more accurately an internet whore and rarely leaves the house. If you like what you read here check out his blog http://aaronfever.blogspot.com

AUGUST

Hello my lovelies. I’m in particularly good form at the moment as I’m about to travel to Atlanta for my 5th Dragon*Con. Both myself and Ken will be there regaling you with panels and such so do please join us.

In the meantime, why not take a perusal at the things that particularly tickled me this month online.

1) Bad Song Made Good

Listen, we’re all sick of Carly Rae Jepsen’s “Call Me Maybe”. Even if the internet didn’t manage to kill it with memes and parodies, the amount of radio play it received alone would have made it the ear-worm to make you commit suicide.

But you know what? Bad things can get better. And if you get The Roots and Jimmy Fallon together with a bunch of classroom instruments to cover the song, it just becomes amazing, no matter how bad it originally was. So here, enjoy the best version of this song you’ll ever hear.

2) JG Thirlwell In A Record Store

JG Thirlwell is the genius behind the music of The Venture Bros TV show. He creates some classic soundtracks so when he is asked to shop in a record store and tell us about his picks… well, you know you’re in for a treat.

No, I hadn’t heard of any of them either.

3) Life On Mars

This is not just my favourite thing, but it should be humanity’s favourite thing this month. Yeah, motherfucker, we landed a big-ass rover on Mars. Recognise.

Would you like to see a 360 degree image of Mars? Of course you would. The above image is just a small part of the awesome full picture that you can see by CLICKING THIS LINK.

What I really love about it is that it’s interactive so you can look anywhere around, even at the rover itself! And if you don’t view it in fullscreen you’re wasting all of our time.

4) You’re Doomed At Dragon*Con

As I said earlier, I will be at the biggest fan-run convention in the world very soon and as it is now less than a week away I thought I would share this little guide to the convention I did last year with JJ Hawkins. It’s the best guide out there for any newbie to the Con and I’m not just saying that because I’m awesome, but it is partly because of it.

5) Oh My Dayum

Daym Drops is a YouTuber of glorious bliss. He eats food in his car for your viewing pleasure (and his eating pleasure). For some reason it’s incredibly entertaining to watch him go nuts for the fast food he is consuming.

As with anything great on YouTube, the auto-tune-the-news folks have gotten their hands on it and turned it into a musical wonder. I think it’s worth leaving you on this month. Enjoy.

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And that’s it! My favourite things of the last month.

– Aaron Poole is the creator of tongue blisters, it seems. He is also more accurately an internet whore and rarely leaves the house. If you like what you read here check out his blog http://aaronfever.blogspot.com

JULY

Hello! Can you believer the 7th month of the year is nearly over? Man, how time flies. Next month sees the long road to Dragon*Con come to a conclusion and I’ll be including lots of stuff from D*C years past as part of the hype but for now this month was jam-packed with great things too.

1) A Conversation With My 12-Year-Old Self

This has gone viral since the start of the month and for very good reason. Jeremiah McDonald is an actor and comedian. As a 12 year old kid he decided to film himself asking questions to his future self. You know, because that sort of thing feels like time-travel when you’re 12. Well twenty years later, Jeremiah has decided to record his response to his 12 year old self’s questions.

It makes more sense in the video, trust me. It’s also absolute genius film making.

2) Speakeasy: With Paul F Tompkins

We love Paul F. Tompkins here at FRED. The mustachioed man is not only constantly sharply dressed by also naturally sharp witted. He has a great series on YouTube called Speakeasy in which every week he has a short interview with a celebrity over drinks.

Sure, the show is heavily sponsored but it also features lots of great folks like Nathan Fillion, Al Yankovic, Chris Hardwick, and as you can see below Clark Gregg.

The series is well worth your subscription as new interviews appear regularly.

3) Gary Oldman, R-Kelly. Together At Last

Jimmy Kimmel has created some many great moments. This will no doubt be remembered as one of them as Gary Oldman reads a passage from R-Kelly’s autobiography “Soula Coaster”.

You haven’t lived until you’ve heard Oldman say “what up, baby?”.

4) Thank You Hater!

Single handedly one of the worst things about the internet is trolls. Hateful, childish, assholes who only live to spew hate towards people. And the worst kind of troll? YouTube commenters. They can be racist, misogynistic, abusive freaks. Far too often their bullshit is targeted at specifically women online, with comments about raping them being just the tip of their hate-iceberg. If my language is strong here, it’s because I genuinely would like to have these people wiped off the face of the earth. They’re just stealing air from the rest of us.

Isabel Fay is also mad and she’s not going to take it anymore! Her revenge? A catchy number full of sweetness… It works better than it sounds. In fact, it’s above and beyond my favourite thing from the past month. It even features an appearance from Misery Bear! Give it a go, although be warned it’s probably NSFW.

5) Robert Downey Jr. = Rock Star

To try and end on a less ranty note: Have you seen RDJ’s entrance to his San Diego Comic Con panel? Of course you have, but lets watch it again. It’s a thing of beauty.

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And that’s it! My favourite things of the last month.

– Aaron Poole is the creator of Vandrossing. He is also more accurately an internet whore and rarely leaves the house. If you like what you read here check out his blog http://aaronfever.blogspot.com

JUNE

Hey guys! This month saw me take my first real vacation in about 3 years. I was actually away for 15 days of this month so my internet time was exactly halved. As a result, this month’s list is slightly shorter than usual. But I think I still found three nuggets of gold for your eye holes so take a look and know that I’ll be back to my usual length next month… ladies.

1) Bill Murray’s Hall of Fame Speech

I’m not a baseball fan. As an Irishman I guess it’s just not in my blood. But I am a Bill Murray fan. It doesn’t matter where you’re from, you should be able to love Bill Murray.

What you may not have known about him is that he actually owns a baseball team. He co-owns the Charleston RiverDogs and due to his long service to baseball he has recently been inducted into the South Atlantic League Hall of Fame. And as he says in the video, he’s never been inducted into a Hall of Fame before so he had to accept.

Murray is a genius of the highest order so if you give him a podium to make a speech, you know it’s going to be good. He didn’t write anything for it, he just got up and spoke about how much he loves baseball and it’s every bit as good as you think it would be. Take a look.

2) Paul & Storm – Write Like The Wind (George R. R. Martin)

We here at FRED love Paul & Storm.

Well… we love Storm.

They have just released what is to my mind their first proper music video. Hopefully the first of many more to come. The song is about the agony of waiting for the next Game of Thrones book and the video is as ridiculous as you might expect from the duo.

3) Super Mario Street Art

This is a really cool time-lapse video which shows how artist Chris Carlson creates a 3D looking image on the sidewalk with just chalk and a ruler. Two bonus cool points go to the art being of an 8bit Mario and the awesome music added to the video.

After seeing how he does it, I almost feel like I could give it a go too but I know that it would just look like a 5 year old attempted it.

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And that’s it! My favourite things of the last month.

– Aaron Poole is the creator of Polish pole polish. He is also more accurately an internet whore and rarely leaves the house. If you like what you read here check out his blog http://aaronfever.blogspot.com

MAY

Wow, it’s been a whole year since I started this column. Kind of amazing. I usually get distracted by something shiny at this point. But I guess, since this column is dedicated to the shiny things I was distracted by each month, it probably helps with doing this!

Well, let me show you the things that caught my attention in May.

1) JoCo Cruise Crazy

I’ve mentioned before how we here at FRED are very jealous of the sea monkeys who get to experience the Jonathan Coulton cruise. Booking for next year’s cruise has opened up and to coincide with that they’ve been releasing videos of this year’s one.

These videos are great. You can find them all on Coulton’s YouTube page HERE but my favourite has to be this one entitled “Quitting”. More than just an advertisement, it’s a very inspirational video about doing what you love.

2) Spicy News

This is just a very bizarre but ingenious concept. Each week a different comedian comes into the studio, eats a habanera pepper whole, and then gives a comedy rendition of the recent news headlines. They’re not allowed to drink anything or take anything that might help with the burning sensation in their mouth until they’ve finished their broadcast. This leads to some rather panicked presenting.

They put a new one up every Monday. Check out their channel HERE. To whet your appetite, so to speak, here is my favourite one, starring Stephanie Purtle.

Props to JJ Hawkins for introducing me to this.

3) Pop Corn Slow-Mo

Ok, so this one is just plain silly. It’s super slow-mo’d, high definition, close-up footage of popcorn popping on an open pan. It’s cool, it’s pointless, it’s almost a complete embodiment of the internet.

Just try to ignore the annoying guys talking.

4) Scott Pilgrim Wedding

This is a cute video that has been making the rounds on the internet, and for good reason. It’s a wedding present for a couple with very inventive friends. They took the Scott Pilgrim game and inserted the newlyweds as they fight ninjas and zombies on their way to coupledom.

5) 8-Bit Radiohead

My Cabin Fever friend Brian pointed me towards this article. A brave and intrepid person has taken Radiohead’s OK Computer and completely redone it in 8-bit format. And it’s AMAZING. You can listen to the whole thing below.

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And that’s it! My favourite things of the last month.

– Aaron Poole is the creator of carpal tunnels. He is also more accurately an internet whore and rarely leaves the house. If you like what you read here check out his blog http://aaronfever.blogspot.com

APRIL

This month I’ve spent most of my time watching YouTube channels. Exciting, I know. As a result, you’ll see a lot of YouTube videos in my list. It’s a simple system I work here at MFT but I feel it suits me. So lets get started.

1) Rear Window Timelapse

Rear Window is one of my favourite movies ever. I love a simple idea that is executed perfectly and that’s exactly what Rear Window is. It has been parodied a million times by every TV series from The Simpsons to That 70s Show.

What I like about this is that it has been put together to play all the parts of the scenery at once. I feel like I’m not explaining that correctly but luckily the video is self explanatory so watch and enjoy!

UPDATE 3rd of May 2012: Awwww, they took it down. That’s lame

2) Shia Labeouf

No, not the charisma free actor of robot movies. Instead it’s a rather strange song by Rob Cantor. It’s about the robot movie actor but it’s also about escaping the clutches of the canibal murderer robot movie actor.

Again I dont think I’m explaining this one well. Have a listen.

Thanks to JJ Hawkins of Mars Needs Podcasts for the heads up on that one.

3) My Drunk Kitchen

Another one that was brought to my attention by the lovely JJ Hawkins. I had somehow avoided this series until this month. The infectious MyHarto and her My Drunk Kitchen show.

Luckily, with all my problems describing shows, this one needs very little decription. She gets drunk and cooks in her kitchen. Easy! And funny as hell. Watch, and then notice how 8 hours have gone by from watching all of them.

4) Botchamania

Here is something that is far from new also. And I’ve been well aware of it from a long time too. But this month it has kind of been my comfort food viewing.

The brain child of Maffew who edits together all the mess ups in wrestling you never thought you needed to see. Botch is what wrestlers call messing up a move or a promo. And just like the bloopers real for a comedy, it’s more fun than the actual shows.

5) Play us out Riz…

British rap group playing an acoustic performance on the streets of Paris in the middle of the night? I’m in.

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And that’s it! My favourite things of the last month.

– Aaron Poole is the creator of the whales. He is also more accurately an internet whore and rarely leaves the house. If you like what you read here check out his blog http://aaronfever.blogspot.com