Due to America’s generalized penchant for wanton, evil greed and eventual financial worldwide crises, news today of Greece’s financial troubles some sort of ridiculous trading error in Proctor and Gable stock caused the stock market to launch into an unprecedented freefall and rebound – the likes of which the world has seldom seen. The upside to all of this? Hilarious online videos of people flipping out about it, of course! Check out this daytrader’s personal hell which kicks into awesome mode right around 1:40.

May 1st marked a number of occasions in Baltimore: the first hotter than shit day of the year, International Worker’s Day, and the 10th annual Baltimore Kinetic Sculpture Race. I got to experience all three at once at the American Visionary Art Museum on Saturday, where I attended the finale of the race, watched a play by a worker’s group opposed to Martin O’Malley’s plan to spend $300 million rebuilding juvenile detention centers, and sweated profusely in hotter than shit weather. These photos illustrate two of those things!

BONUS FREEBIRD:

HEY! Do you have a television? Do you have an Xbox, PS3, or a Wii? Are you connected to the internet (which seems like an idiot question if you’re reading this)? Then guess what! You can watch Hulu, CBS, Comedy Central, Youtube – pretty much any streaming content on the internet – on your TV. It’s the greatest thing since sliced bread and until Microsoft gets its shit together (in my case, at least) and implements these streaming options into the 360′s dashboard, you should give Play On a shot.

The drop-dead easy to set up client installs on your PC, and within literally 30 seconds you’re watch practically every bit of streaming media available on the internet on your television, including Youtube videos of dogs sniffing iPads. The software is free for 14 days to try out and $39.99 to register, with a bevvy of preinstalled options and 3rd party plugins to add additional “channels” – i.e. other media sources (PBS and Adult Swim, for instance) to your list. Seems to me like a fairly great idea and a good value to boot, considering it’s practically a viable alternative to having cable television at all.

The only real drawback to the software is that it depends on the power of the PC running it, due to the nature of the processing of the media streams. So depending on your internet connection and your computer, there may be some hiccups in what you’re watching. Additionally, HD options are very limited. But then again if you’re like me, you don’t care and it’s awesome and you should try it. Now.

MEGA EDIT

@bhawk988 pointed out Boxee, another client-based media TV enabler that operates without the use of a gaming console. It works essentially the exact same way as PlayOn, but requires a physical connection to the television in order to stream video. On the upside, there are versions of the software available for PC, Mac, Apple TV and Linux and the interface is very user friendly. AND they’re coming out with their own “Boxee Box” (much like a Tivo) which eliminates the need for a PC later this year. Give it a look!

Having read today’s totally amazing blogoentry by Sam Sessa featuring a promo video for the defunct Hammerjack’s, I find my brainstrings stretching far and wide enough to remember another club that was sadly not long for this world: Steeltown. Steeltown was a gargantuan, 32,000 square foot bar/restaurant/concert venue with an industrial theme, presumably an homage to Bethlehem Steel, Sparrow’s Point, that sort of thing. I remember eating there once after playing Laser Tag – er, sorry – PHOTON at a shopping center in Dundalk. It was bizarre, since the actual restaurant portion of the place was called The Bomber Cafe, and it had airplanes hanging from the ceiling. Even as a child I asked “What does this have to do with steel?” Then there’s the stage area, known as THE BLAST FURNACE. Awwwww yeah you just KNOW shit’s gonna get awesome in there!! 98 Rock would plug the ever loving crap out of the place constantly – I swear I must have heard at least a thousand times on the way to school how Great Train Robbery or Laughing Colors were playing there pretty much every week. At any rate, Steeltown didn’t make the long haul and shuttered a few years later, and today I’m pretty sure it’s a Walmart or something.

I couldn’t find anything nearly as awesome as Hammerjack’s video, but here’s a video featuring the Funk Junkies at Steeltown, with bonus guy-playing-a-guitar-with-a-chicken goodness!