Wednesday, April 30, 2003
I've often railed against the sheer stupidity of the trend towards "political correctness" in this country, but this latest example is just too much. Fox News reports that the "textbook review process in California has changed or eliminated references to everything from the Founding Fathers to hot dogs, leaving many to charge the state with distorting history in the name of political correctness."
Why no pictures of hot dogs, you may ask? "That’s because...hot dogs, sodas, cakes, butter and other kinds of food that are not considered nutritious." Mount Rushmore will not be in any texbook, "because it appears to offend some American-Indian groups." Senior citizens are now "older persons," "jungle" is now "rain forest," and apparently the devil doesn't exist at all anymore.
This is by far the most ludicrous example of censorship in the name of avoiding even the appearance of offending someone. I think this passage is right on the money:
Why no pictures of hot dogs, you may ask? "That’s because...hot dogs, sodas, cakes, butter and other kinds of food that are not considered nutritious." Mount Rushmore will not be in any texbook, "because it appears to offend some American-Indian groups." Senior citizens are now "older persons," "jungle" is now "rain forest," and apparently the devil doesn't exist at all anymore.
This is by far the most ludicrous example of censorship in the name of avoiding even the appearance of offending someone. I think this passage is right on the money:
"It's outright censorship," said author Diane Ravitch, who has written extensively on the subject of how the nation's schools have dealt with the issue. "It dumbs down our textbooks, makes them bland, far less interesting than anything children might see in the movies -- even in G-rated movies or TV."It's quite obvious that California school officials are totally unaware of how ignorant this makes them look. I hope that someone gets their head out of their ass and reconsiders before a generation of children's minds are tainted with this stupidity.
According to this PBS page, Chorney is #38802. I actually expected lower...
Tuesday, April 29, 2003
Just for Shaft, I present Railroad Oddities & Curiosities, a page with a nice selection of unusual railroad concepts and endeavours.
LinkyDinky presents 35 Facts you were perfectly happy not knowing. I have to disagree with part of #11, though. Everyone knows that "nurple" rhymes with "purple!" Duh...
Dr. Sarah J. Greenwald of Appalachian State University and Dr. Andrew Nestler of Santa Monica College present simpsonsmath.com, a site that uses math from episodes of The Simpsons to engage students and introduce new mathematical concepts. Pretty fun...
Fark.com has another classic photoshop contest on its hands. The idea is to take a real movie title and create a new or modified poster that changes what the movie is about. My favorite is at the right.
In order to help its faculty better relate to new generations of students arriving on campus, Beloit College has been distributing Mindset Lists that serve as a "reminder that the world view of today's new college students is significantly different from the intellectual framework of those students who entered only a few years earlier." For example, this year's Class of 2006 Mindset List reminds us that:
Bruce Springsteen's new hit, Born in the USA, could have been played to celebrate their birth.These are just some of the examples, and the lists from only a few years earlier show just how differently "these kids" see things today. I feel old...
South Africa's official policy of apartheid has not existed during their lifetime.
A Southerner has always been President of the United States.
A "Hair Band" is some sort of fashion accessory.
Nicholas Cage, Daryll Hannah, Eddie Murphy, and John Malkovich made their first major film impressions the year they were born.
Vanessa Williams and Madonna are aging singers.
The "evil empire" has moved from Moscow to a setting in some distant galaxy.
"Big Brother" is merely a television show.
At Ben & Jerry's today and at Baskin-Robbins tomorrow. Too bad neither one has a location nearby... :-(
The National Cathedral in Washington D.C. recently held a nationwide "competition for children to design decorative sculpture for the Cathedral." The winner? A Darth Vader carved grotesque, or gargoyle. From the looks of the diagram showing its location, it's not that easy to see, but it would be pretty cool to find it next time I get up that way...
Monday, April 28, 2003
The Forbes Fictional Fifteen is a list of the world's richest fictional characters. Jolly Old Saint Nick tops the bunch, but some noted characters like Montgomery Burns and Thurston Howell III made the cut as well. Pretty fun...
Want a free subscription to Maxim magazine? Well, then just give them an e-mail address to send Spam to (because I can't see this working without them sending you all sorts of Spam) and you're all set.
It took me some time, but I persevered and finally beat the Scarabaeus game, which involves a mixture of Egyptian and Greek mythology, scatological movie trivia, and coleopterology (the study of beetles) questions. Good luck!
It looks like a copy of the old arcade game "Rampage," but Hulk Smash-up is kind of fun. I'm looking forward to the movie...
There are Friday, April 25, 2003
Jeff Russell's Starship Dimensions is an awesome site that admittedly borrows on the beatiful format of skyscrapers.com, but does for science fiction starships what that site does for architecture. Star Wars and Star Trek spacecraft get detailed coverage, but the site also includes ships from Babylon 5, Starship Troopers, and many other sources. Below is a really nice rendition of Battlestar Galactica's Columbia:
Thursday, April 24, 2003
The 1999 movie Three Kings centered around soldiers trying to smuggle out gold that was stolen from Kuwait during the first Gulf War. Well, it seems that life is imitating art, as the New York Post reports that four GIs that were "arrested and charged with stealing nearly $1 million in cash from money found hidden in Baghdad had intended to filch another $12 million" hidden in a cottage near the Tigris River. I really liked the movie, but in this case maybe those soldiers shouldn't have taken it as an example to aspire to. I mean, they're no George Clooneys...
A Penny Arcade comic strip spoof from last Monday (mirrored here) was removed after American Greetings objected to the use of Strawberry Shortcake characters. You can check out the pertinent Penny Arcade forum, Slashdot posting, or Metafilter discussion for more information, rants, etc. Personally, I think this a huge overreaction to what is obviously a parody that no one would mistake for the original. I didn't even think that Strawberry Shortcake was around anymore; the last I remember was my sister playing with the dolls in the mid-'80s. I know that there are protection of copyright issues, but there are also laws that protect the rights of parodies. American Greetings would do well to realize that it's only alienating itself here...
Yahoo reports on one of the coolest bits of movie information I've come across in a while: The Matrix: Reloaded and The Matrix: Revolutions will be released in IMAX theaters, with a two week delay for the second chapter but a simultaneous release for the third. I'm anxiously awaiting the movies, but I can only imagine how much better they will be in an IMAX theater...
According to The Onion, a new Fox reality show will determine the ruler of Iraq. I hope Ruben wins; he'd be a tough but cuddly leader who can also sing, sort of like Ronald Reagan. Or something.
The New York Times reveals "Why TiVo Owners Can't Shut Up."
Take a look at the new trailer for Terminator 3: Rise Of The Machines. It looks pretty cool...
Wednesday, April 23, 2003
O.J. Simpson is starring in a new 13-week reality TV show (different from the trial show that was on a few years back). It will supposedly be "Osbournes-esque" in nature. Maybe we'll get to see him solve the case, and find the real killer? I doubt it. I can't imagine why anybody would want to watch such a thing, but then I never understood what was so entertaining about the Osbournes or any of those other "scripted reality"-type shows.
I've discovered the joys of news aggregators, applications which automatically collect "feeds" from RSS-enabled sites at certain intervals, providing an up-to-date summary of changes to the site. There are a lot out there, but the one I'm working with right now is called AmphetaDesk. I'm still learning more about how RSS feeds work and the XML code behind it, but I figured it out well enough to get Blogger to generate DrikoLand in XML. If anyone has any problems, advice, or suggestions, please let me know, as it seems that this format has a lot of potential, and I'd like to learn more so that I can harness its full power.
"This website has 315 web pages with over 340 pictures. This website has 2 purposes: To give a pictorial overview of the solar system and to quiz you about these pictures." Pretty nice...
Neowin.net presents Micro$oft Windows History, with information and screen shots from Windows 1.0 on through Windows Server 2003. I started with 3.1 way back when and remember how crappy the desktop was; Norton Desktop was a must add-on to make it at all palatable, if I remember correctly. The earlier versions look a lot like the GEOS operating system on the Commodore 64; coincidence? Actually, the Macintosh is the granddaddy of all GUIs, something that Bill Gates is loath to admit, I'm sure.
The legend is that there was a dragon terrorizing a kingdom somewhere in Libya. The dragon ate two sheep per day, or when sheep were not available, young maidens. (How do these legends get started, anyway?) So good ol' George rode into town and killed the dragon with his lance, saving the king's daughter from being sacrificed. The king gave him a big reward, which he gave to the poor, and rode off into the sunset. He is the patron saint of cavalry (which is where the word chivalry comes from) and is a symbol to boy scouts in many countries, including England and Ukraine. For some reason, he is also the patron saint of herpes, syphilis, leprosy, and plague. Perhaps, in some parts of the world, this is considered a great honor?
Grand Illusions has some fun brain teasers, optical illusions, and more.
Tuesday, April 22, 2003
This is like, so 1998, but I don't care. Stare at the mesmerizing bananas. Love them. Live them.
Webster Christian Resources presents "parodeities," Christian-themed parodies of rock songs. Hear MP3 clips of most songs with MIDI accompaniment, including:
I hate to make fun of what is obviously quite a personal, spiritual project, especially when the author readily admits that he doesn't have the best voice and is doing this for a good cause, but some of these are pretty cheesy...
Adam Was Made From Dust (Another One Bites the Dust)
Christ's In The Manger (Cat’s in the Cradle)
Hip To Love God (Hip to be Square)
Obidiah (Ob-La-Di, Ob-La-Da)
Parable Wizard (Pinball Wizard)
Sweet Home Up in Heaven (Sweet Home Alabama)
and way too much more...
I hate to make fun of what is obviously quite a personal, spiritual project, especially when the author readily admits that he doesn't have the best voice and is doing this for a good cause, but some of these are pretty cheesy...
Terrafly is an awesome site that generates satellite imagery based on addresses and lets you "fly" (pan) through its images. I thought that MapQuest did this too, but not anymore, apparently. Terrafly has a limited map and points-of-interest overlay, but for precise mapping/directions, MapQuest is a better bet. However, for sheer eye candy, I haven't seen anything this nice, not even TerraServer.
I fully support the war in Iraq, a long overdue action to oust an insane megalomaniac (among other things). But enough about that. When I saw a link to a story about a Tim Robbins speech, I was prepared to read a stereotypically far-left anti-war screed. My knee-jerk impression was quite wrong, and although he makes no apologies for his anti-war stance, I must say that I agree with almost everything he has to say. Read this transcript of Tim Robbins' speech to the National Press Club and see what you think.
Oh, and Bill O'Reilly is an asshole who should not be allowed to represent the position of anyone, right or left.
Oh, and Bill O'Reilly is an asshole who should not be allowed to represent the position of anyone, right or left.
Friday, April 18, 2003
I'm Bronzescum The Twisted. Fear me.
Open this page in Internet Explorer only for a convenient place to put a refreshing beverage. Ordinarily, I would never endorse Internet Explorer by making anyone use it, but there's a method to my madness...
Medford, Oregon is replacing its Crown Victoria police cars with Saturns.
In other news Medford, Oregon named new illegal street race capital of the country.
Take a look at this page of stamps from former Soviet and Warsaw Pact countries commemorating dogs launched into space. The dog to the right is named Chernushka, which is a diminuitive form of my last name, Chorney, which means "black" in Ukrainian (and Russian). Kind of cool...
Scientific American has an intriguingly mind-bending article on the possibility of parallel universes and the different types of multiverses that would make them possible. It's kind of hard to wrap my brain around these concepts this early in the morning, but it's pretty cool to think of all the possibilities. Just thinking about thinking about it has set about a different set of parallel universes. Whoa. 
With airline revenues falling and maintenance costs of the Concorde rising, British Airways and Air France have announced that the last passenger flight of the Concorde will be at the end of October 2003. I believe that the Concorde never actually generated a profit for the airlines, although it was obviously a symbol of prestige and luxury. It's quite a shame to see it go, although when one considers that the aircraft design is 27 years old they've done quite a good job keeping it in service for as long as they have, recent incidents notwithstanding. I think that there will definitely be a market for supersonic passenger transports in the future, but the design will have to be more efficient to make it profitable enough for airlines to operate it. I'm definitely going to miss the Concorde; here's another page devoted to the Concorde, and here are some pictures of the beautiful aircraft.
The DVD that avid cinephiles have been waiting years for has finally arrived! Breakin' 2: Electric Boogaloo will be available on DVD next week, April 15, 2003. MGM has a description of this cinematic tour de force, although for some reason reviewers at IMDB have drastically underrated this classic. Granted, it can't possibly reach the stratospheric heights attained by its predecessor, Breakin', but the mere fact that it approaches the level of this unattainable classic speaks volumes for the series' staying power. Reserve your copy now! :-)
Acting on "extremely reliable," "time-sensitive" information, the U.S. attacked a residence thought to house Saddam Hussein and his sons with "a large amount of ordnance" (four 2,000 pound GBU-31 "bunker busters"; quite an understatement) dropped from a B-1B bomber
. Details at this time are sketchy, but officials believe that if Saddam was at that location there is little chance that he survived the attack. I for one hope that this time he finally got what was coming to him and that his fate in Hell is far worse than what was depicted in South Park.
"X-Entertainment celebrates THREE YEARS of mindless rambling" with lots of links and features. Check it out!
I will never forgive Fox Network for cancelling The Family Guy; I just hope they don't do the same to Andy Richter Saves The Universe. Much as it pains me to say it, The Family Guy is usually funnier than The Simpsons, perhaps with the exception of several of the early, "classic" seasons IMNSHO. The hilarious pop culture flashbacks and references alone make the show, but the characters and plots never fail to have me rolling on the floor in laughter. So it is with great pleasure that I report to you that The Cartoon Network will start airing The Family Guy on its Adult Swim Schedule starting April 20th. In addition, on April 15th, The Family Guy DVD of seasons 1 and 2 will be released; mine is already on order. And just to round out your Family Guy experience, here are some web sites for your viewing enjoyment. Tune in to the show, check out the sites, and/or buy the DVD if you haven't experienced the show; you won't regret it. :-)
In other M$ assimilation news, Micro$oft director of marketing recently said, "We do view Google more and more as a competitor. We believe that we can provide consumers with a better product and a better user experience. That's something that we're actively looking at doing." This is just ludicrous. Google is the best search engine out there, although I imagine that I don't need to tell that to most of you. Because Google has actually come up with a product that is technologically superior and profitable, Micro$oft has decided that it will extend its monopolistic pseudopods towards it in an attempt to envelop, dominate, and eventually suck the life out of the search engine market like it does with everything else it conquers. Well, I've got a message for M$: there's a reason why a Google search for "worst search engine" returns MSN as the first result. That's right, you suck and you should leave things well enough alone.
Slashdot reports that "Micro$oft announced it is bringing Windows Media 9 to 177 screens in Landmark Theaters." An appropriate slew of crashing movies and blue screen comments is present in the discussion, as are many questions about why the hell this is even necessary. Oh yeah, I know the answer. As the image I borrowed from Slashdot points out, Bill Gates and M$ really is like Star Trek's Borg, assimilating everything in its path with the goal of having complete control over everything. Why the Supreme Court didn't put a stop to this years ago is beyond me...
On the heels of it's latest alpha release (1.4), Mozilla has announced a major change in its development roadmap, deciding to replace the Mozilla suite of applications with the "soon-to-be-renamed stand-alone Phoenix browser and the Thunderbird mail and newsgroups client (also known as Minotaur)."
Although this could confuse prospective new users of Mozilla, I see this as a good thing. Despite its success as a more-than-viable open source competitor to Micro$oft's monopoly, the Mozilla project has been accused of trying to cram too much into the application, bloating what was once a streamlined browser. I've already tried Phoenix, and it seems to load much faster, and I can see that its memory footprint is much smaller. Minotaur is still in very early alpha release but builds on the current Mozilla mail client. Although there is something to be said for an integrated suite of applications, it forces everyone to deal with the bugs and bloat of a large suite. Right now I use Eudora for my e-mail needs, so Phoenix is really a better solution than Mozilla for me if all I want is the browser portion. However, I'm keeping an eye on Minotaur to see if it's worth switching to; its Bayesian Spam filter alone could be worth the switch. Like I said, I hope this doesn't confuse Mozilla's image, because I think that this development will help stabilize Mozilla in the long run.
Sorry; I couldn't resist. :-)
Today's color is cherry blossom pink. If you live in the greater Washington, D.C. metro area, this needs no description. If you live in a part of the world where cherry blossoms do not bloom, it is worth the trip to see them. I haven't been down to the Tidal Basin yet this year, but the trees are in bloom in my neighborhood.
Slashdot reports that Mozilla has turned five years old. I hadn't realized that it's been around for that long. As many of you have noticed, I've become quite the convert. If you haven't already become convinced, give it a try!
Medford, Oregon is replacing its Crown Victoria police cars with Saturns.
In other news Medford, Oregon named new illegal street race capital of the country.
Thursday, April 17, 2003
Take a look at these titles and judge for yourself. Here are some of my favorites:
Am I Double Parked by the Curbstone of Your Heart?
Billy Broke My Heart at Walgreens and I Cried All the Way to Sears
Get Your Tongue Out Of My Mouth, Because I'm Kissing You Goodbye. (the webmaster's favorite)
Hand Me the Pool Cue and Call Yourself an Ambulance
How Did You Get So Ugly Overnight?
I Changed Her Oil, She Changed My Life
I Don't Care if it Rains or Freezes 'Long as I Have My Plastic Jesus Sittin' on the Dashboard of my Car
I Got the Hungries for Your Love, and I'm Waitin In Your Welfare Line
If My Nose Were Full of Nickels, I'd Blow It All On You
She Offered Her Honor, He Honored Her Offer, and All Through the Night It Was Honor and Offer
There Ain't Enough Room in my Fruit Of The Looms to Hold All My Lovin' For You
Walk Out Backwards Slowly So I'll Think You're Walking In
Take a look at this page of stamps from former Soviet and Warsaw Pact countries commemorating dogs launched into space. The dog to the right is named Chernushka, which is a diminuitive form of my last name, Chorney, which means "black" in Ukrainian (and Russian). Kind of cool...
I've added a Guestmap to my site. I think it's cooler than a Guestbook, but I'm not totally sold on the idea. Let me know what you think...
Update: As you probably noticed, I got rid of the Guestmap. Not enough people were using it, and it somehow reset itself and got rid of those that did. Too much trouble, although it had potential...
Update: As you probably noticed, I got rid of the Guestmap. Not enough people were using it, and it somehow reset itself and got rid of those that did. Too much trouble, although it had potential...
The U.S. Army is celebrating Earth Day. Really. Whatever...
Michael Jordan's last game ended with the Wizards losing to the Sixers 107-87 and not making it to the playoffs, not quite a fitting ending to his legendary career. I'm not a real NBA fan, but Michael Jordan's amazing legacy transcends the boundaries of basketball. ESPN Page 2 also has a nice tribute to His Airness, and I think it's pretty cool that Nike is showing old Michael Jordan/Mars Blackman (AKA Spike Lee) commercials to commemorate his retirement.
Wednesday, April 16, 2003
Today's color is yellow (or yeller, depending where you're from). It's the color of an elevated security level, whatever that means. I'm sure we're all breathing a sigh of relief that Tom Ridge is tired of orange this week, though! "I'm not sure we're ever going to be able to say that because we raised it from yellow to orange...that it deterred a terrorist from acting," Ridge said. "But we feel very strongly that it is a very, very important part of how we prosecute domestically the war on terrorism." I think they should change it to puce. That would really deter the terrorists! Thanks to Driko for the suggestion.
Office Space Sound Board
eBaum's World has a new Office Space soundboard starring Bill Lumbergh (the clueless boss). I'm waiting for one of Milton...
Scientific American has an intriguingly mind-bending article on the possibility of parallel universes and the different types of multiverses that would make them possible. It's kind of hard to wrap my brain around these concepts this early in the morning, but it's pretty cool to think of all the possibilities. Just thinking about thinking about it has set about a different set of parallel universes. Whoa. Tuesday, April 15, 2003
This will only be good if David Hasselhoff stars. And even then, it will be bad. Unless he sings, in which case it will be very, very bad.
VWvortex has a very informative thread going through several methods to to dramatically increase the performance of your car without spending a dime. The before and after photos are especially telling...
If you haven't yet visited Honda's new Accord commercial site, you're missing out. According to The Telegraph and Slashdot, the astoundingly complex two-minute film/commercial "Cog" took 606 takes to get right. Apparently there is only one CGI cut; here is a summary of the shot, courtesy of a Slashdot contributor:
1. Transmission bearing rolls, hits second bearing.Simply amazing.
2. Second bearing rolls, hits third.
3. Third bearing rolls, hits contration to release cam shaft.
4. Cam shaft rolls, hits tailpipe.
5. Tailpipe spins, hits valve stem on hood.
6. Valve stem hits other valve stem.
7. Second valve stem hits third valve stem.
8. Valve stem falls off hood, hits something.
9. That something hits a spring loaded mechanism mounted to engine valve cover.
10. Spring loaded mechanism hits radiator.
11. Radiator falls, hits tire.
12. Tire hits weighted tire on ramp.
13. Tire rolls uphill, hits second weighted tire.
14. Second weighted tire rolls uphill, hits third weighted tire.
15. Third weighted tire rolls uphill, hits disc brake rotor(?).
16. Rotor falls on string, pulls seat back to it's full upright position.
17. Seat triggers release of windshield wiper mechanism.
18. Mecanism trips oil can.
19. Oil can pours onto platform, weighting one end down.
20. Platform tilts, releasing bearings(?) which roll into engine head.
21. Engine head on lever causes battery to rise.
22. Battery makes electrical connection, makes fan run.
23. Fan runs, which causes it to move. It moves forward, disconnects from power source, and runs into metal wire, releasing nut.
24. Nut drops, causes muffler to roll.
***CGI CUT***
25. Muffler rolls into strange contraption.
26. Strange contraption flings nut.
27. Nut hits tire on front end of car.
28. Tire rolls onto wire.
29. Wire sets into motion contraption made mostly of connecting rods.
30. Connecting rod starts metal cylinder rolling.
31. Metal cylinder hits connecting rod contraption and stops.
32. Potential energy stored in contraption causes rod to swing and kick off the metal cylinder.
33. Cylinder hits window, makes electical contact.
34. Electrical contact rolls down window.
35. Cylinder rolls again, past window onto new ramp, then off ramp onto "oh shit" handles.
36. Cylinder rolls off "oh shit" handles, onto battery, makes electrical contact.
37. Contact causes winshield squirters to spray water on windshield.
38. Windshield sensor detects "rain", turns on wipers.
39. Wipers crawl across floor, trip emergency brake.
40. Emergency brake sets window mobile in motion.
41. Window mobile causes wind, pushing over plastic panel.
42. Plastic panel has metal cylinder on top. Cylinder rolls into shock spring.
43. Shock spring has metal rod in it, which spins down.
44. Rod makes electrical contact, starts stereo.
45. Stereo connected to woofers under windshield.
46. Vibration causes spring to roll onto clutch pedal.
47. Depression of clutch pedal activates assembly which presses "hatch close" on door key.
48. Hatch closes, unbalancing platform.
49. Platform tilts, car rolls.
50. Car hits something that causes the Accord banner to unfurl.
Monday, April 14, 2003
Today's color is White Cloud. That's the toilet paper, not the water vapor in the sky. This commercial, apparently from the 60's, is basically SFW, but it will probably earn you a few strange looks from your coworkers.
CNN reports that Saddam's "love shack" has been discovered.
Retrocrush has posted its list of sexiest album covers. (probably NSFW)
Cecil Adams' Straight Dope addresses a question about W's questionable tenure in the Texas ANG. It seems that many strings were pulled to not only avoid active duty in Vietnam but also to avoid duty at home in the ANG. Adams' take on all of this? "Bush's enemies say all this proves he was a cowardly deserter. Nonsense. He was a pampered rich kid who took advantage. Why wasn't he called on it in a serious way during the 2000 election? Probably because Democrats figured they'd get Clinton's draft-dodging thing thrown back at them." I think it's a damn shame that this wasn't brought to light, especially when W hawks his ANG service like it actually existed and pretends to be a "regular guy."
According to this story from the Austin American-Statesman, 7-Eleven Inc. will stock its own private-label beer, called Santiago, starting this summer for $5.99 a six-pack. I never thought about it, but apparently "'7-Eleven is the 800-pound gorilla in the beer business. It's one of the largest sellers of beer in the country, somewhere in the top five with Wal-Mart and major grocery chains,' said Harry Schuhmacher, editor of Beer Business Daily." I think this will be the most highly anticipated new beer since Milwaukee's Best Ice! Not.
Here's the official link to the deck of cards depicting the "most wanted" Iraqi officials. 
(links directly to Adobe PDF file)
Update: Fimoculous' author has made a slideshow of the cards, and has found some interesting items on ebay. Go figure...
(links directly to Adobe PDF file)
Update: Fimoculous' author has made a slideshow of the cards, and has found some interesting items on ebay. Go figure...
Eason Jordan, chief news executive at CNN recalls some horrible stories about Iraq that CNN (and other news agencies) did not report for fear that its personnel in Iraq would suffer severe reprisal:
I felt awful having these stories bottled up inside me. Now that Saddam Hussein's regime is gone, I suspect we will hear many, many more gut-wrenching tales from Iraqis about the decades of torment. At last, these stories can be told freely.
Friday, April 11, 2003
Today's color is blue. Just plain blue. Apparently, according to a worldwide survey of over 30,000 people, most people chose it as their favorite color. You can take the survey yourself. It asks some interesting questions, like what color you associate with good luck, your local deity, etc. You are given a list of about 45 colors to choose from. My favorite color? Some variation of blue, depending on the day. Except when it's burgundy. Or black. Or clear.
Thursday, April 10, 2003
Yes, he is the new Chief Moose, with his own fan club web site. Best quotes:
"It has been rumored that we have fired scud missiles into Kuwait. I am here now to tell you, we do not have any scud missiles and I don't know why they were fired into Kuwait."
"They are superpower of villains. They are superpower of Al Capone."
Don't miss the M.S.S. Throughout History section, either!
"It has been rumored that we have fired scud missiles into Kuwait. I am here now to tell you, we do not have any scud missiles and I don't know why they were fired into Kuwait."
"They are superpower of villains. They are superpower of Al Capone."
Don't miss the M.S.S. Throughout History section, either!
Today's color is burned-out black & white. It's the color of Saddam's yacht al-Mansur (The Victor). According to the BBC, it was hit by at least 16 bombs and missiles, but it hasn't sunk. This is probably a good thing, because it's floating around in Basra's inner harbor, and I imagine a boat of that size could really get in the way of other shipping if it was sitting on the bottom. The yacht had a secret passage from Saddam's private cabin to a lower deck where he kept his escape submarine pod. It's too bad they'll never make a James Bond movie about the guy.
Last week I posted a geography quiz covering just the Middle and Near East. Today I came upon a much more comprehensive site with quizzes for each continent, including U.S. states and Canadian provinces. So far I did well with Europe (104/111) and Asia (81/84), only getting a couple of the former Yugoslavian republics and former Soviet republics confused, respectively. However, although I consider myself a geography and cartography buff, I'm wondering how much of the African republics I'll remember correctly...
With airline revenues falling and maintenance costs of the Concorde rising, British Airways and Air France have announced that the last passenger flight of the Concorde will be at the end of October 2003. I believe that the Concorde never actually generated a profit for the airlines, although it was obviously a symbol of prestige and luxury. It's quite a shame to see it go, although when one considers that the aircraft design is 27 years old they've done quite a good job keeping it in service for as long as they have, recent incidents notwithstanding. I think that there will definitely be a market for supersonic passenger transports in the future, but the design will have to be more efficient to make it profitable enough for airlines to operate it. I'm definitely going to miss the Concorde; here's another page devoted to the Concorde, and here are some pictures of the beautiful aircraft.
Wednesday, April 09, 2003
Today's color is spearmint green. Today's CotD is brought to you by Altoids, introducing the newest flavor in their lineup of curiously strong mints (TM). I'm a big fan of the new spearmint flavor - delicately sweet, with a little less bite than their other flavors. Ask for them at your local supermarket today. And they've really done some great ads over the years, all available on their website.
Anomalies Unlimited is chock full of unusual stories and images, ranging from interesting photos to paranoid conspiracy theories. Although a lot of the stories should probably be taken with a grain of salt, the sheer amount of things to look at will keep you occupied (and in many cases amused) for a while...
As much as I dislike Rush Limbaugh, I have to say that this is pretty funny. In a parody of Iraqi Information Minister Mohammed Saeed al-Sahhaf's (AKA Baghdad Bob) absurdly exaggerated denials of U.S. progress, Rush Limbaugh aired a story claiming that Baghdad Bob was reporting that Iraqi troops had taken Shea Stadium. Several extremely dimwitted viewers believed this report and telephoned news stations, asking why they hadn't reported this as well. I guess I shouldn't be too surprised considering who these people are listening to, but c'mon!
The DVD that avid cinephiles have been waiting years for has finally arrived! Breakin' 2: Electric Boogaloo will be available on DVD next week, April 15, 2003. MGM has a description of this cinematic tour de force, although for some reason reviewers at IMDB have drastically underrated this classic. Granted, it can't possibly reach the stratospheric heights attained by its predecessor, Breakin', but the mere fact that it approaches the level of this unattainable classic speaks volumes for the series' staying power. Reserve your copy now! :-)
In light of the recent SARS epidemic, I can think of few gaffes worse than a recent series of magazine ads telling readers a visit to Hong Kong will "take your breath away."
Tuesday, April 08, 2003
Today's color is brun et blanc. It's the color of le bratwurst and le sauerkraut. Apparently, the Germans are so offended by our renaming of french fries to freedom fries, they are replacing all the English words they use with French ones. Some examples are "driver" for "chauffeur", "playboy" for "bon vivant" and "okay" for "formidable". Les Allemands et les Français sont tous stupides.
April Winchell has collected a staggeringly large and varied amount of MP3 songs of various celebrities as well as unusual covers and other songs. "Celebrity" and "unusual" are meant in the worst possible sense, with categories like "TV Stars Who Insist On Singing," "ABBA covers in Hindi," "Learn Italian With Fabio," "Terrifying Christian Recordings," "Selections from Roger's library of excretia," and a lot more. I have yet to fully explore the depths of this site, but some of the songs are mesmerizingly bad... :-)
Monday, April 07, 2003
Acting on "extremely reliable," "time-sensitive" information, the U.S. attacked a residence thought to house Saddam Hussein and his sons with "a large amount of ordnance" (four 2,000 pound GBU-31 "bunker busters"; quite an understatement) dropped from a B-1B bomber
. Details at this time are sketchy, but officials believe that if Saddam was at that location there is little chance that he survived the attack. I for one hope that this time he finally got what was coming to him and that his fate in Hell is far worse than what was depicted in South Park.
Today's color is tax form black & white. I finally did my taxes, and I suggest you start thinking about it too, if you haven't already. I actually got back more from the gubmint than I gave them all year. Sounds great, until you realize it's because you hardly made any money. :-(
From CNN: "When Rumsfeld said in a press conference last Friday that Syria and Iran would be held accountable if they interfered in Iraq, [Jon] Stewart had material for a comedic rant. 'There is nothing like a cantankerous old man who takes a hey-you-kids-get-off-my-lawn approach to foreign policy,' he said. 'The guy's literally just like a drunk swinging a broken bottle at people. "Hey, Netherlands, you looking at me?"'"
Time Magazine has added an archive of all of their covers, from 1923 to the present, to their site.
"X-Entertainment celebrates THREE YEARS of mindless rambling" with lots of links and features. Check it out!
Retired Air Force Col. Gail Halvorsen is better known as "The Candy Bomber" for dropping parachutes of candy to German children in Berlin during World War II, almost getting court martialed for doing so without permission. However, after superiors gave their blessing , he and his unit ended up dropping 23 tons of candy over Germany. He reprised his role in 1994 over Bosnia and is hoping to make a candy drop over Baghdad once things settle down. Halvorsen is now 82 years old, but he says, "I'd give my right arm to do it...It would be a ray of hope, a symbol that somebody in America cares. That makes all the difference in the world on attitude." He's definitely right about that; I think this is one of the cooler things I've heard about in a while...
The third episode of The Animatrix is out. One more episode is to be released next month, just before The Matrix: Reloaded premieres.
As I'm watching Fox news broadcast live coverage of an Abrams tank blocking Saddam's front door, and a huge equestrian statue of him at the parade grounds being blown up by a tank shell, Baghdad Bob (the Iraqi information minister) holds a press conference of the roof of the Palestine hotel. He says there are no American tanks in Baghdad, 3/4 of the coalition troops have been slaughtered, and we're committing suicide at the city walls. I'll never understand how that guy, and Tariq Aziz before him, could just look at the camera and tell outright lies with such a straight face. Unbelievable. The Brits say they found what's left of Chemical Ali under a pile of rubble in Basra. I think the collapse will happen very quickly now. I just hope we're successful in leaving Iraq with a functional, effective democracy. That's the part I worry about, unfortunately. We act like we won the war in Afghanistan, but there is still no national government outside of Kabul. Just factions of warlords who do as they wish, not a stable, prosperous nation that will discourage terrorism.
Friday, April 04, 2003
Today's color is Microsoft blue, red, yellow, and green. For the final project in my editing class, I have to find a professional editor and interview them to get their advice about beginning a career in editing. So, I sent an email to a guy credited as an editor for one of my reference books. To make a long story short, I found myself being introduced to one of the senior technical editors at Microsoft, who said she would be happy to answer my questions. Unfortunately, I don't get a trip to WA out of it, just conducting the interview via email. Whether you like M$ or not, it's a pretty good score for a lowly college puke, if I say so myself. :-)
Try your hand at this map game where you identify countries in Northern Africa and the Middle/Near East. I got a couple of the former Soviet republics mixed up but otherwise did well, although I am an admitted cartography geek. ;-) I recently read a study in which it was revealed that most American children can barely identify U.S. geography, much less world geography. It's quite sad and frustrating to hear, especially in a time when anti-American sentiments can at least partially be blamed on the ignorance of our populace when it comes to foreign policy...
"Brick to slick" is a pretty good title for this Chicago Sun-Times article noting the 30th birthday of the cell phone. Motorola first unveiled its 30-ounce DynaTAC portable phone on April 3, 1973, a lot longer ago than I realized. We've come quite far since then...
OldComputers.net is a great site with lots of information on the history of personal computers. The site is organized around a timeline of computers, starting in 1975 with the MITS Altair 8800, ending in 1989 with the Macintosh portable, and covering everything in between. I used a lot of the computers mentioned on the site and still remember most of them fondly, so this was quite a blast from the past...
The Urban Legends References Pages explores the validity of a very, um, well-endowed C-3PO Star Wars trading card (sorta SFW). Although the status is listed as "undetermined," Topps apparently came out with an airbrushed "corrected" version to remove all doubts, so who knows...
Everybody close your eyes on January 29th, 2004: Oprah is posing nude to celebrate her upcoming 50th birthday. OK, fine, the photos aren't supposed to be published, but I'm still not opening my eyes until I'm assured of not seeing that display.
I will never forgive Fox Network for cancelling The Family Guy; I just hope they don't do the same to Andy Richter Saves The Universe. Much as it pains me to say it, The Family Guy is usually funnier than The Simpsons, perhaps with the exception of several of the early, "classic" seasons IMNSHO. The hilarious pop culture flashbacks and references alone make the show, but the characters and plots never fail to have me rolling on the floor in laughter. So it is with great pleasure that I report to you that The Cartoon Network will start airing The Family Guy on its Adult Swim Schedule starting April 20th. In addition, on April 15th, The Family Guy DVD of seasons 1 and 2 will be released; mine is already on order. And just to round out your Family Guy experience, here are some web sites for your viewing enjoyment. Tune in to the show, check out the sites, and/or buy the DVD if you haven't experienced the show; you won't regret it. :-)
In other M$ assimilation news, Micro$oft director of marketing recently said, "We do view Google more and more as a competitor. We believe that we can provide consumers with a better product and a better user experience. That's something that we're actively looking at doing." This is just ludicrous. Google is the best search engine out there, although I imagine that I don't need to tell that to most of you. Because Google has actually come up with a product that is technologically superior and profitable, Micro$oft has decided that it will extend its monopolistic pseudopods towards it in an attempt to envelop, dominate, and eventually suck the life out of the search engine market like it does with everything else it conquers. Well, I've got a message for M$: there's a reason why a Google search for "worst search engine" returns MSN as the first result. That's right, you suck and you should leave things well enough alone.
Slashdot reports that "Micro$oft announced it is bringing Windows Media 9 to 177 screens in Landmark Theaters." An appropriate slew of crashing movies and blue screen comments is present in the discussion, as are many questions about why the hell this is even necessary. Oh yeah, I know the answer. As the image I borrowed from Slashdot points out, Bill Gates and M$ really is like Star Trek's Borg, assimilating everything in its path with the goal of having complete control over everything. Why the Supreme Court didn't put a stop to this years ago is beyond me...
On the heels of it's latest alpha release (1.4), Mozilla has announced a major change in its development roadmap, deciding to replace the Mozilla suite of applications with the "soon-to-be-renamed stand-alone Phoenix browser and the Thunderbird mail and newsgroups client (also known as Minotaur)."
Although this could confuse prospective new users of Mozilla, I see this as a good thing. Despite its success as a more-than-viable open source competitor to Micro$oft's monopoly, the Mozilla project has been accused of trying to cram too much into the application, bloating what was once a streamlined browser. I've already tried Phoenix, and it seems to load much faster, and I can see that its memory footprint is much smaller. Minotaur is still in very early alpha release but builds on the current Mozilla mail client. Although there is something to be said for an integrated suite of applications, it forces everyone to deal with the bugs and bloat of a large suite. Right now I use Eudora for my e-mail needs, so Phoenix is really a better solution than Mozilla for me if all I want is the browser portion. However, I'm keeping an eye on Minotaur to see if it's worth switching to; its Bayesian Spam filter alone could be worth the switch. Like I said, I hope this doesn't confuse Mozilla's image, because I think that this development will help stabilize Mozilla in the long run.
Thursday, April 03, 2003
Sorry; I couldn't resist. :-)
If you have e-mail, chances are that you have received some sort of e-mail from Nigerian scam artists (or several other countries, actually) trying to tempt you with large amounts of money in exchange for your help laundering it. Of course, to facilitate the receipt of your sizable share of the money, they keep extracting more and more money out of you until finally it's obviously a hoax, but somehow a surprising number of people have been taken by this scheme. I've kept some of these in my "miscellaneous" inbox just for fun, but one person has taken it a step further. Visit Brad Christensen's exhibit of hilarious correspondences with various scam artists; I only wish I had the wit and patience to do something similar...
The 1st International Collection of Tongue Twisters has a large collection (currently 2337 in 102 languages), including one of my favorite lines from The Jerk: "I slit a sheet, a sheet I slit, and on that slitted sheet I sit." :-)
The Fine Art of Nosepicking explores the fascinating subject, examining a wide range of evidence from as early as the stone age to modern times.
Teevee.org makes fun of the genre with a hilarious page full of fake shows.
Slate features a heretofore unappreciated side to Donald Rumsfeld: his poetry. OK, so they're just taking excerpts from some of his more obtuse comments during press conferences, but it's still funny. Here's an example:
Very deep.
The UnknownAs we know,
There are known knowns.
There are things we know we know.
We also know
There are known unknowns.
That is to say
We know there are some things
We do not know.
But there are also unknown unknowns,
The ones we don't know
We don't know.
Very deep.
Today's color is the rainbow they use for test patterns on your television. Due to Czar's frantic attempt to finish his midterm exam by the deadline, he has not had time to produce his daily feature presentation. Geez, I'm starting to talk in the third person. My wireless professor must really be getting to me...
The Virtual Toy Chest is chock full of nostalgia from the '70s to the '90s, from The A Team to Zybots and everything in between. What fun!
Wednesday, April 02, 2003
Today's color is cherry blossom pink. If you live in the greater Washington, D.C. metro area, this needs no description. If you live in a part of the world where cherry blossoms do not bloom, it is worth the trip to see them. I haven't been down to the Tidal Basin yet this year, but the trees are in bloom in my neighborhood.
Fark has a great thread on Photoshopping porno versions of your favorite movies. Some are so-so, but there are quite a few gems... (sort of SFW unless otherwise noted on the page and remotely linked to)
Tuesday, April 01, 2003
This list is pretty damn hilarious! I had heard of a couple of these, but I obviously missed out on a lot of good ones...
Today's color is a strange metallic alloy unlike anything you've ever seen. According to Pravda (Russian for "Truth"), a UFO crashed in Iraq during either the Gulf War or Operation Desert Fox in 1998. Saddam has been letting the aliens stay in one of his palaces and his engineers are studying the spacecraft to achieve technological superiority over the U.S. This, of course, is the real reason for the invasion. We can't let this technology fall into the wrong hands! Pravda also says the CIA stole Noah's Ark. It's just amazing what the CIA can do. Finding a large ship buried in ice on a tall mountain, then bringing it from Turkey to the U.S. without anybody noticing. Pretty neat trick, that's all I can say. :-)
Citing possible security threats to Chicago, Mayor Daley ordered Meigs Field to be demolished last night. For a time, I was convinced that this was an elaborate April Fool's joke (especially because webcams of Meigs Field and RealVideo movies conveniently wouldn't load past my firewall :-p), but the level of effort involving newspapers, tv stations, the FAA, and several aviation organizations would truly have been an epic prank. Visit Friends Of Meigs Field for more information and how you can help. This is truly a sad day if it really occurred; I remember playing Flight Simulator about 15 years or so ago, and for the longest time Meigs Field was the default (and only) airport to fly out of...
This page has an excellent overview of mirages, especially concentrating on the different types and the technical aspects of the physical phenomena that create them. The page has many links to sites with photographs and further information; I have yet to completely explore it.
Slashdot reports that Mozilla has turned five years old. I hadn't realized that it's been around for that long. As many of you have noticed, I've become quite the convert. If you haven't already become convinced, give it a try!
Moving to further bolster its share of the weblog market after recently buying the blog publishing company Blogger, apparently Google has acquired Metafilter, one of the most popular collaborative blogs. What this means for Google's emerging status as a heavyweight in the search and blog sector has yet to be seen.
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