How the fuck are you today? Are you in the mood for some images, videos, and news items that are metal even though they’re not music? Well if so, you came to the right place. Here’s what I’ve got for you in this installment:

A human hovercraft, a skull flower (accompanied by a weird coincidence), a flight through the universe, cigarette magic, a tornado of fire, a musical prodigy from Hong Kong (okay, this one is music, but it’s not metal, except it’s metal), and Singapore “in miniature”.

ITEM ONE

A little over a week ago, the Lake Union Boats Afloat show started on — where else — Lake Union in Seattle, where I live. On the opening day of the show, a dude named Brandon Robinson put on a demonstration of a device called the “FlyBoard”. It’s a water-powered contraption that allows the “pilot” to hover 20-30 feet in the air and do assorted acrobatic tricks, with the propulsion supplied by a jet ski.

Our local paper ran an eye-catching series of photos of the demonstration, one of which you can see above. You can see a couple more of the pics at this location.

The FlyBoard was invented last year by two-time world champion jet skier Franky Zapata from France. After seeing these photos I had to see if I could find some video of this thing in action, and I succeeded. I found a promotional vid by Zapata’s company, which is selling these FlyBoards for $6,500. A lot of the video consists of Zapata and others speaking in French. I don’t understand French, but I sure as hell got a charge watching the parts of the video that show Zapata getting a workout on his invention. Watch it next . . . Continue reading »