Farcical Pestilence

Snow Crash Athens

2009-03-03T13:13:00.004-05:00

I took a few pictures around downtown Athens and north UGA campus. This is a tree down near Denmark Hall. Bus stop on Broad Street near the UGA arch. All that snow has been melted as refrozen and is lumpy ice now. It's in shadow most of the day and is not likely to melt for a few more days unless it gets a lot warmer. If you are not familiar with Athens, note that tall building in the right side of the frame... This Caddie is parked in the lot next to that tall building, and got clobbered by snow sliding off the roof. But it gets worse. FAIL. Speaking of FAIL, I am reminded of how abysmally shitty the Blogger editor is. EPIC FAIL.

Fried Chicken Quesadilla

2008-08-05T18:30:00.001-04:00

1 piece of leftover fried chicken
1 stale burrito-sized tortilla
2-4 pieces of American process cheese

Cut fried chicken meat off the bone with a pocket knife and place on one half of the tortilla. Cover with cheese, and fold over. Cook on the hood of your truck in the midday Georgia summer sun until crispy and the cheese oozes out. Cut into quarters if desired and serve.

Substitutions: You could use fried chicken tenders, or quality cheese, or a kitchen knife, or a Griddler, but then you wouldn't be allowed to pronounce it "kweez-ah-dill-ah".

Still not dead

2008-06-17T10:42:00.002-04:00

Bled the front brakes. Actually this is a story unto itself. I have one of these vacuum pumps for brake bleeding. I hook it up on the left caliper, open the master cylinder reservoir, removing both the top and a plastic thing. You know how there is a seal to help keep air out? That thing. So I pump some of the old, brown fluid out (the new stuff is clear and colorless), and it's getting firmer, and I'm not getting the clank. And I'm watching the fluid level and adding more. Then the brakes go completely soft. After staring at it awhile I realize the problem: The seal I removed? The thing that keeps the air out? That wasn't it. That was just a plastic spacer to keep the seal in place. The rubber seal was still in there, sucked all the way down to the bottom, and I was just pouring brake fluid in on top of it. Once I got that out, and refilled the master cylinder, and pumped it about, oh, two or three hundred times to get the air out of it, then I could start bleeding the calipers. I ended up going with the traditional method of holding the brake, opening and closing the bleed valve, and repeating until the fluid ran clear with no bubbles. This is impossible to do by yourself on a car, which is why I had the vacuum pump to begin with, but easy on a motorcycle. Now the front brake is nice and firm. The rear brake is a little soft, and I should change the fluid there too, but soft brakes on the back wheel is not such a bad thing. Went for a good 30-mile or so ride. A lot of the carburetor problems are clearing up, or are only an issue when it's cold. I've got some Gumout Regane in it now, which I bought, in part, because it was free after mail-in rebate at AutoZone. I got most of the way home and looked down and suddenly my speedometer wasn't working. Rode carefully the rest of the way home. The housing was kind of loose on the axle, looser than I thought it should be. I decide to pull the front wheel but discover that the front axle was not screwed in as tight as it should have been, and this is why there was extra play in the speedometer housing. This is actually a really good engineering design feature, because if your axle is getting unscrewed, your speedometer stops working before the front wheel actually falls off and you die. I'm pretty sure I didn't have it in far enough, rather than it loosening up due to loose clamp bolts or something, because that play was present when I had put it all back together. It didn't look right but it wasn't obvious what the problem was. I also decided to give Eagle One NanoWax Spray a try. It looks pretty watery when you spray it on, but as you wipe, it gets more... waxy. They recommend using a microfiber cloth to polish it, which I haven't done yet, but so far it looks pretty good. There's no dry, white stuff to wipe off either.

Back on the road, didn't crash

2008-06-16T12:03:00.003-04:00

It's only taken about 19 months (maybe longer) but the ZX-6 is up and running again. Took my new tires (which have been sitting in a closet for most of that time) in to be mounted and balanced and new valve stems installed. Reinstalled wheels. Install another new battery. Also had installed some months ago a K&N air filter. Good thing too as the original factory foam filter had rotted. Bike starts, not instantaneously, but it runs pretty good for having old gas in it. By now after working several hours on it, dark clouds are blowing in. I decide to up the ante and roll it onto the driveway and wash it. Rumbling begins. Right about the time I get it fully cleaned and start to dry it, the raindrops start. Roll it back until the carport for waxing. Took it back out after dark (while still wet) for a test ride (and to get fresh gas), and immediately found that the front brakes are quite soft. I decide they are good enough to get to the gas station. Filled up. It's sad that it costs almost US$20 to fill a motorcycle tank; I put in more than 4 gallons of 89 octane. Went for about an 8-mile ride. The gunk in the carburetor is killing acceleration below 4000 RPM until it warms up. It's good at 5000 RPM. At 6000 RPM, you start to feel the Spaceballs torque curve kick in (plaid is about 10-12,000 RPM), but on a wet road at night with some fog and soft brakes, I wasn't going to push any harder than that. Made it home and tested the front brake some more and discovered there's a "clank" sound when I release the front brake. Traced this to the left front caliper. Apparently there is too much clearance now between the pads and the rotor. Planning to replace the brake fluid as it is 10+ years old.

New Bike

2008-05-04T17:59:00.002-04:00

Meat engine not included.

Why must Blogger suck so hard?

2007-04-23T22:35:00.000-04:00

Seriously.

After two years, the editor is no better. Maybe it's worse. You basically can't get decent HTML out of it. OK, what you get is actually well-formed from an XML standpoint, but it's semantically bad.

Line endings generate  . Double line endings produce double  . To actually get real paragraphs, i.e. , your only choice seems to be to edit the HTML directly. Why can't two hard returns generate a ? It seems like a no-brainer. And the "Convert line breaks" option seems to make no difference whether it's "Yes" or "No"; I have it set to "No" and I still get line breaks inserted (but this only seems to be in the preview).

Plus, I've found that in Firefox, the easyGestures extension interacts disastrously with it: If you pop up the pie menu in the compose area, about a hundred lines of invisible crap HTML gets inserted.

So I've had it. From now on, I am writing everything in restructured text, converting it to HTML, and pasting that into the HTML editor. It sucks much, much less. I get some extra  and classes, but they don't hurt anything.

Tickle: Lies and also-lies

2007-04-23T21:31:00.000-04:00

In January 2005, I took some on-line IQ test from Tickle.com (not linking, no need to drive traffic there). Afterwards I got mailed a summary of the results:

Andy, you are a Word Warrior.
This means you have exceptional verbal skills. You can easily make sense of complex issues and take an unusually creative approach to solving problems. Your strengths also make you a visionary.

But to get the "detailed report", I had to sign up for some other crap and pay money -- something not revealed before taking the test -- so I never followed up on it.

One year later, Tickle wrote me that my "account will soon be deleted".

Because you haven't signed in or taken a test within the past year, your account has been marked as inactive. If it remains inactive for another 30 days, we'll need to delete it.

I did nothing.

One month later, I got another message from Tickle:

You took Tickle's Classic IQ Test a year ago! We want to celebrate by offering you an in-depth analysis of your IQ -- for FREE!

Not exactly the account deletion I had expected. But again, I did nothing.

One month ago, I got yet another message from Tickle, advising me that my "account will soon be deleted".

We haven't seen you in a while... our records show that you last signed in to Tickle on March 1, 2006.
Because you haven't signed in or taken a test within the past year, your account has been marked as inactive. If it remains inactive for another 30 days, we'll need to delete it.

Apparently, unsubscribing counts as signing in, because that's the only thing I might have done. (I can't remember exactly everything I might have done a year ago.)

Today, one month later, I have another message from Tickle. Has my account been deleted?

Tickle is excited to introduce member profiles.

I am not excited.

Tickle, kindly fuck off. Stop provoking my inner Word Warrior.

More Tickle hijinks.

Godless Money!

2007-03-09T10:10:00.000-05:00

I stumbled across one of these new bronze dollar coins, and it turned out to be one of the godless ones. W00t! UPDATE: It turns out its stamped on the outer rim. D'oh! That's a pretty weird place to put it, but at least it's not on the face. The real ones missing the markings are going for $50 or more on eBay.

Freezing on no tires

2006-12-12T22:50:00.000-05:00

A couple more weeks go by. It turns out bikebandit.com cancelled my backordered tire and never told me about it, or at least I never got an e-mail notification. Now I have a new front tire I don't need and can't use, and can't return, and it's mid-December. So much for 2006. I haven't decided whether I want to reorder with Bike Bandit or not. Dunlop workers are still on strike, so I guess I'll be ordering something else.

Freezing on scab tires

2006-11-22T12:51:00.000-05:00

Two weeks since the last post and still no word on my back tire. Contacted bikebandit.com. Turns out, Goodyear owns Dunlop, and Goodyear-Dunlop workers are on strike. Fortunately, they have hired replacement workers, so I'm sure in a few weeks (like, mid-December) I'll be tooling around on my scab-built Z-rated tire. Yay!

How I spent a week of sick days

2006-11-06T16:01:00.000-05:00

Aside from actually being sick, that is, which I was (and still am).

Monday

Decided I should try to get my bike (1997 Kawasaki ZX-6) running again. Last season about this time I developed a slow leak in the new rear tire and decided to park it. Washed bike. Battery dead. Put on charger.

Wednesday

Battery shows some signs of life, but only 12.2 V. Replace battery ($50).

Thursday

Bike starts, runs, despite the old gas. Added some Gumout (50 ml) to the tank. Inflated rear tire. Went for a short (6 mi) ride, and it seems to hold pressure.

Friday

Rear tire flat. Found out why after about 10 seconds of inspection: 2 inch long piece of metal (aluminum roofing staple, perhaps) embedded in tread. After about 30 minutes of poking and prodding, it comes out. Air soon follows. Added 8 oz of Slime, which seems to seal it.

Sunday

Tire still holding pressure. Take a short test ride. After less than one mile, a hornet stings me on the neck near the windpipe around the top of my jacket's zipper. Return home for meds. Ride for about 5 miles. Rear tire is flat. Decide to give up on patching and order new rear tire. Discover tire (Dunlop D205) is no longer in production, replaced with D220, so I have to order a new front tire as well.

Monday

Ordered new tires; total cost about $210 from BikeBandit.com. Mount and balance will be about another $70; must remember to insist on new valve stems this time.

Update: Tuesday

One of the new tires is back-ordered. Guess which one? Yes, the rear, the one I really need. ETA: 2 weeks. And the front has already shipped. Sigh.

Weird gear-driven steam locomotive

2006-10-30T11:06:00.000-05:00

I saw this Shay locomotive at the Hesston Steam Museum over the weekend. I had no idea these things existed. Instead of long connecting rods driving the wheels directly, the pistons drive a crankshaft like you might find in a typical internal combustion engine. The crankshaft connects to the drive wheels through driveshafts, universal joints, and a ring and pinion gear system, similar to an automotive rear-end gearset. Here are some more pictures, including some miniature steam locomotives.

Life imitates The Onion: Mike Tyson to fight women

2006-10-17T15:00:00.000-04:00

Tyson serious about fighting women on 'World Tour' vs. Wig-Wearing Mike Tyson Retires From Foxy-Boxing.

SCOwned!

2006-10-05T19:39:00.000-04:00

I saw an article come up on Groklaw today entitled, OpenLinux 3.1.1 Still Available, with the 2.4 kernel:

Guess what? I'm told you can still download Caldera's OpenLinux 3.1.1 from the Internet. Yup. OpenLinux is still marching on, thanks to that perfect license the GPL...

My initial reaction was, "So? Hasn't this been established for a long time?" Well, maybe not. Then I remembered a little item I have in a stack of old Linux CDs: If you can't see images for some reasons, these are two CDs labelled, "LINUX TECHNOLOGY PREVIEW FEATURING THE NEW LINUX 2.4 KERNEL PREVIEW", "© 2000, Caldera Systems, Inc. All Rights Reserved". The first CD is labelled "Installation Disk" and also has the note "GPL Source downloadable from: ftp.calderasystems.com/pub/LTP". (Incidentally, that directory is still there, and it has a SRPMS directory, but it's empty.) The second CD is labelled "Source Code". I popped in the Source CD and lookie lookie: Linux-2.4.0 source code, can it be? One of the files inside that RPM is linux-2.4.0-test3.tar.bz2. You can also find this file on the kernel.org archives and the accompanying PGP/GPG signature matches which proves it's the same file:

gpg: Signature made Tue 10 Oct 2000 02:39:32 AM EDT using DSA key ID 517D0F0E
gpg: Good signature from "Linux Kernel Archives Verification Key "

So here is a standing offer to IBM: If you want to borrow these CDs for your case against SCO, you are more than welcome to have them free-of-charge, although when it's all over, I'd like them back so I can frame them and hang them on my wall and laugh. I won't object if you frame them for me or put them in a nice display case, but this is not a requirement. Owned.

Spider-blog, spider-blog

2006-09-27T19:12:00.000-04:00

The one on the left is actually a new one, but I think thie same species as the other brown one from previous days. The yellow and black garden spider below is still the same one, still in the same spot. I finally figured out how to get a decent shot of it that isn't so blurry. In case you are wondering, I'm using an Olympus Stylus 410 camera. with a Mag-Lite as the light source (one of the 3-D cell one). Yeah, flashlight.

You should see the ones I threw away. I kept this really blurry one because it's actually a little creepier.

More spider porn!

SSDD (Same Spiders, Different Day)

2006-09-26T19:50:00.000-04:00

Spiders

2006-09-25T23:59:00.000-04:00

ShopperSavingCenter = cockgobblers

2006-09-19T12:20:00.000-04:00

Just for fun, I clicked on one of those ads that say "You've won a free 42" plasma TV", just so I could see what happens. Of course, there are "Terms and Conditions":

4. Eligibility for Receiving a Free Item for Referral-based websites
(a) For this particular website, users must do the following to be eligible to get approval to receive their free product:

i. You must successfully complete the following sponsored offers: two (2) offers from Silver Offers, two (2) offers from Gold Offers, and eight (8) offers on Platinum Offers.

ii. Refer at least two (2) unique person (s) who join(s) and also correctly complete(s) the same offer requirements listed above.

(b) After a user signs up with our website and successfully completes an offer, they must get two (2) person(s) to also sign up with our website and successfully complete the same offer requirements to get their free item. In order to connect these referrals to the original user, we issue this user a unique link to our offer site, which they must then distribute to the intended parties. Thus, the user is entirely responsible for all communications regarding our offer sites. At no point during the offer process does ShoppersSavingCenter.com send out any communications on the user's behalf to encourage such signups to occur.

(c) A user may complete more than required offers and may refer more than two (2) referrals, but cannot earn more than 1 free product with their account. Any additional referrals or offer completions will not result in any additional free items.

(d) Referrals completing multiple offers will only count once towards referral accruement for the referrer.

(e) We will only give out credit for referrals who join by clicking on your referral link code. Anyone who does not click this URL or type it into their web browser exactly cannot be tracked, and thus, cannot be connected to your account. Note that some applications can remove the tracking part of this URL. Users assume the risk of not getting credit for some referrals when using our site(s).

(f) Users may only receive 1 free item per account.

(g) A user must have a valid email address and a valid shipping address in the United States. The user should also note that some products cannot be shipped to PO Boxes. We only allow one account per shipping address.

(h) Users must be residents of the United States, and there can only be one account per shipping address.

(i) This offer expires 60 days from the date you register on the site. If at the end of the 60 day period, you have successfully completed the required number sponsored offers but have not referred two (2) unique households who have successfully completed the required number sponsored offers, you will not be eligible to receive the free promotional item; but as a consolation for participating, you will automatically receive a complementary $50 gift card.

In other words, you've got to buy 12 other things (exactly what is not known until you sign up), get two other suckers to sign up, and your suckers have to each buy the 12 mystery crap items, all within 60 days. Your basic pyramid scheme.

Suck it.

Logical exclusive-or in Python

2006-09-13T16:30:00.000-04:00

Python has and, or, and not logical operators, and it has & (and), | (or), ~ (not), and ^ (xor) bitwise operators, but no logical xor. However, since you can pass any object to bool() and get back a boolean (True, False), and booleans are automatically convertable to integers (1, 0), the bitwise operators work on booleans as well:

>>> True ^ True
False
>>> True ^ False
True
>>> False ^ False
False
>>>

However, if testing things that are not actually booleans or integers, you need to wrap them in bool() first:

>>> "foo" ^ None
Traceback (most recent call last):
File "", line 1, in ?
TypeError: unsupported operand type(s) for ^: 'str' and 'NoneType'
>>> bool("foo") ^ bool(None)
True

Updated 2006-09-14. I realized you could also use is not with booleans to get an xor operator:

>>> True is not True
False
>>> True is not False
True
>>> False is not False
False

This seems more Pythonic. As with ^, non-booleans must be wrapped with bool():

>>> bool("foo") is not bool(None)
True
>>> bool("foo") is not bool("bar")
False

del.icio.us links for 2006-09-06

2006-09-06T19:59:00.000-04:00

Bush: CIA kept terror suspects in secret prisons: President Bush on Wednesday for the first time acknowledged the use of secret CIA prisons outside U.S. borders to hold top suspects captured in the war on terrorism; detainees will get rights under the Geneva Convention. (bush cia evil terrorism war iraq us politics news liberty security)
NYC Unveils 9/11 Memorial Hole | The Onion - America's Finest News Source: Days before the fifth anniversary of the destruction of New York's World Trade Center by terrorists, city officials gathered on the site where the Twin Towers once stood to dedicate the newly completed 9/11 Memorial Hole. (9/11nyc newyork us terrorism news humor theonion)

del.icio.us links for 2006-09-05

2006-09-05T19:59:00.000-04:00

Schneier on Security: Scorecard from the War on Terror: Most "terrorism" arrests are not for actual terrorism; they're for other things. (crime law security terrorism war)
Caltech Physicists Successfully Split The Bill | The Onion - America's Finest News Source: Sequestered in a private booth at a Pasadena-area Cheesecake Factory for nearly 25 minutes, a party of eight California Institute Of Technology physicists emerged exhausted but visibly excited Friday evening after successfully splitting the bill. (physics science mathematics humor us california news theonion)
Ubuntu Christian Edition: Coming soon: Jubuntu (Jewish Edition), Mubuntu (Islamic Edition), and Wiccubuntu (Wiccan Edition, includes WiccaWiki). (culture funny weird ubuntu religion linux)

del.icio.us links for 2006-09-04

2006-09-04T19:59:00.000-04:00

Australia's "Crocodile Hunter" Irwin dies: Queensland state government sources quoted by Australian Associated Press (AAP) said Steve Irwin, 44, whose television show "The Crocodile Hunter" won international acclaim and popularized the phrase "Crikey," was believed to have been killed by a stingra (australia news weird)

del.icio.us links for 2006-09-03

2006-09-03T19:59:00.000-04:00

Katrina rescuer is sued by boat owner: A Broadmoor man who said he rescued more than 200 residents after commandeering a boat during the flood after Hurricane Katrina is being sued by the boat's owner for taking it "without receiving permission." What a dick. (boingboing news us katrina evil lawsuit)
Bomb Or Not? Training For Government Agents!: (bomb humor politics security terrorism travel tsa)

del.icio.us links for 2006-09-01

2006-09-01T19:59:00.000-04:00

How To Eat A Zebra In 40 Minutes Photo Gallery by Chris Hillman at pbase.com: Bring a dozen of your friends. (lion zebra photo biology ecology)
[adult swim] | Metalocalypse: Metal. (metal rock music humor cartoon)

del.icio.us links for 2006-08-31

2006-08-31T19:59:00.000-04:00

Bloggermann: Feeling morally, intellectually confused?: Dissent and disagreement with government is the life’s blood of human freedom; and not merely because it is the first roadblock against the kind of tyranny the men Mr. Rumsfeld likes to think of as “his” troops still fight, this very evening, in Ira (media news politics rant war iraq)
eWeek | Django: Python on a Plane: Where is Samuel L. Jackson when you need him? (django python web programming framework)
udk: oood.py - a simple daemon for OpenOffice.org: oood.py is a daemon, which controls a pool of 'anonymous' office instances (workers). The workers can be used as backend for Java/python/C++ batch processes for document conversion, mail merges, etc. (openoffice python)
Python isn't just Java without the compile | 2006-08-30 | BitWorking: One of the advantages of a dynamic language is the ability to drop the compile from the edit/compile/run cycle, but there is much more to it than that. (python java django productivity programming)
ACTION COMICS NO. 1: The original golden age comic. Interesting if only for some of the techniques. Even then, Superman was kind of a dick, pretending to be a pussy. (art comic history design superman)
anders.com: djbdns / tinydns Record Builder: Some newer data types such as SRV and NAPTR records aren't nativly supported by tinydns but can be represented through the generic record syntax. These tools create standard djbdns records for these record types. (djb dns tool web tinydns djbdns spf)

del.icio.us links for 2006-08-26

2006-08-26T19:59:00.000-04:00

freenigma gmbh: freenigma adds privacy technology (with strong e-mail encryption) to your favourite webmail service. (web2.0 google firefox privacy security cryptography email)

del.icio.us links for 2006-08-25

2006-08-25T19:59:00.000-04:00

LDAP Authentication In Linux | HowtoForge - Linux Howtos and Tutorials: This howto will show you howto store your users in LDAP and authenticate some of the services against it. (authentication howto linux security pam ldap)
Nude teens raise eyebrows | Oddly Enough | Reuters.com: Some have appeared naked in a downtown parking lot. Others rode their bicycles or simply strolled the streets in the nude. Teenagers in the quaint Vermont town of Brattleboro are raising eyebrows this summer with brazen displays of nudity. (us vermont news weird nude)
Field & Stream - Photo Gallery - Make a Survival Kit out of an Altoids Tin: This is ideal for anyone who wants to have the essential survival gear along each time they head into the field. Everything fits in the Altoids tin. It fulfills all the component groups except for shelter and protection. (cool howto reference travel altoids survival)
List of ethnic slurs - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia: Ethic slurs from 51st-Stater to Zulu. (culture reference howto insult funny weird)
Offensive terms per nationality - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia: How to insult people from nearly any country. (racism insult howto reference funny)
New And Improved: Enable XGL/Compiz On Ubuntu Dapper Drake: Still trying to figure out how to get gdm to start the Xgl server automatically. (linux ubuntu opengl xgl X)

del.icio.us links for 2006-08-24

2006-08-24T19:59:00.000-04:00

Swastika - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia: The swastika is a sacred symbol in Hinduism and Jainism. However, in the Western world, it is most widely known and used as a symbol of Nazism. (anthropology culture history india reference religion germany nazi politics media)
Under fire, Indian eatery drops Hitler from name | Oddly Enough | Reuters.com: A restaurant in India's financial hub has agreed to change its name from "Hitler's Cross" following strong protests. "Our intention was not to glorify Hitler or his atrocities or ideology in any way and we regret the anguish caused by the use of this name (india hitler history nazi germany restaurant weird news politics)
CNN.com - Pluto gets the boot - Aug 24, 2006: Leading astronomers declared Thursday that Pluto is no longer a planet under historic new guidelines that downsize the solar system from nine planets to eight. Instead, it will be reclassified in a new category of "dwarf planets". (Let's blow it up, just (news astronomy pluto)

del.icio.us links for 2006-08-23

2006-08-23T19:59:00.000-04:00

Is the United States Bankrupt?: Many would scoff at this notion. Others would argue that financial implosion is just around the corner. This paper explores these views from both partial and general equilibrium perspectives. (us economics politics)
CSS cheat sheet: (css reference design web)

del.icio.us links for 2006-08-22

2006-08-22T19:59:00.000-04:00

The Secret Effort to Influence the US Public to enter WW2: Staring at what they thought was an imminent invasion, and needing the US assistance, the UK embarked on a massive spy operation, one that used psyops in a big way and media manipulation in order to try and change public opinion in the US. (wwii history propaganda uk us nazi germany)

del.icio.us links for 2006-08-21

2006-08-21T19:59:00.000-04:00

Newly Reclassified Top Secret Well-Known Public Information: The Bush administration has taken to re-classifying as secret very well-known and public information about the number of nuclear weapons and historical facts about the development of the U.S. nuclear program. (bush security evil dod)
Wired 14.08: Batteries Included: The world's first lithium-ion supercar is here. Zero emissions never looked so hot. (car cool environment energy)
Sebastian the cat gets 'grilled' - Yahoo! News: If that isn't the face of evil, I don't know what is. (evil cat photo culture)

del.icio.us links for 2006-08-19

2006-08-19T19:59:00.000-04:00

Joel Johnson: Wally Wood's 22 Panels That Always Work: Unlimited Edition: (art comic cool design drawing howto illustration layout reference)

del.icio.us links for 2006-08-18

2006-08-18T19:59:00.000-04:00

Oh My God It’s Django!: Guido just pronounced: Django is *the* web framework. (django python web framework)
The Onion | Kitten Thinks Of Nothing But Murder All Day: (humor cute kitten photo murder theonion)
The FBI's Upgrade That Wasn't: $170 Million Bought an Unusable Computer System (fbi us news disaster software evil)

del.icio.us links for 2006-08-17

2006-08-17T19:59:00.000-04:00

How To Make Firefox Over 40% Faster: Or at least, 40% faster on Ubuntu by changing your CPU frequency scalling governor. (firefox howto linux ubuntu)

del.icio.us links for 2006-08-16

2006-08-16T19:59:00.000-04:00

Cromartie High School - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia: This might be my favorite anime series. (anime japan weird funny humor)
loc.alize.us - Explore your world through everyone's eyes: A smart way to browse and locate Flickr images on large map of the world. Filter photos by selecting a specific tag or searching for your buddy's user name. All navigation is done without any page refresh. An app that may save your boring afternoons. (ajax flickr google del.icio.us culture photography social web2.0 web mashup)
Sploid: Goodbye Forever: I am very sorry to see Sploid going away, as they were one of my main sources of hard-hitting, crazy bullshit. What will I post about now? (sploid)
U.S. Dedicates $64 Billion To Undermining Gates Foundation Efforts | The Onion - America's Finest News Source: The Bush Administration unveiled a new $64 billion spending package Monday for a joint CIA–Pentagon program aimed at neutralizing the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation's global humanitarian network. (bush evil cia pentagon disaster health africa microsoft humor us news theonion)

del.icio.us links for 2006-08-15

2006-08-15T19:59:00.000-04:00

ACME product catalog - a photoset on Flickr: DVD screen captures of ACME (and other) products as seen in the Looney Tunes "Golden Collection" (cartoon funny history)
Iron Systems, Inc.: Inexpensive rack-mount servers (Intel and AMD) with pre-installed Linux (several distros). (amd bsd centos debian fedora freebsd gentoo hardware intel linux netbsd openbsd redhat suse)

del.icio.us links for 2006-08-14

2006-08-14T19:59:00.000-04:00

Sploid: 'Lock up everybody!': Michael Chertoff -- who many say looks just like an undead version of Soviet dictator Vladimir Lenin -- says the United States needs more constant surveillance of everybody so he can lock up more "possible terrorists." (dhs evil liberty news security surveillance terrorism us)
US accused of jumping the gun in blaming al-Qaeda - Britain - Times Online: There is suspicion that the speed with which the US linked al-Qaeda to the plot was motivated by political considerations because, before the November mid-term Congressional elections. (airline bush evil fraud liberty news security terrorism uk us)

del.icio.us links for 2006-08-12

2006-08-12T19:59:00.000-04:00

Free Menu Designs - e-lusion.com: Need a block menu fast? Some simple CSS menu designs for you to download and use any way you see fit. (css design free html menu)
Stu Nicholls | CSSplay | A css only dropdown menu: The ULTIMATE CSS only drop-down menu (css design html menu)
Suckerfish Dropdowns - HTML Dog: (css design html javascript menu)
August 22: Does Iran have something in store?: Good news everyone! Christians and Muslims have something in common: They're both hoping for the End of the World by nuclear apocalypse so they can go to heaven! Wait, that's not good news. That's not good news at all. (evil iran israel nuke religion war weird)

Bats, man!

2006-08-12T00:50:00.000-04:00

My house seems to attract all sorts of strange critters. I count at least four in this picture, but the actual number is closer to 20. Guess I should put up that bat house that's been sitting on my workbench for too long to mention.

del.icio.us links for 2006-08-11

2006-08-11T19:59:00.000-04:00

Whiplash: Cowboy Monkey: Whiplash the Cowboy monkey is truly a fan favorite, he is an international star and a true cowboy. He is an 18 yr old Capuchin Monkey and he is one of the biggest little monkeys in the world. Whiplash has been riding since he was two yrs old. (cowboy dog funny monkey weird)

del.icio.us links for 2006-08-10

2006-08-10T19:59:00.000-04:00

Seymour Cray -- An Appreciation: Engineers marvelled at Cray's uncanny ability to hold every tiny detail of a computer design in his head.He also got technical assistance from elves who lived in the tunnels that he dug underneath his house. (design hardware history weird)

del.icio.us links for 2006-08-09

2006-08-09T19:59:00.000-04:00

For some evangelicals, Mideast war stirs hope: Believing the Mideast conflict is a sign that Christ will return soon, some evangelical groups have cheered Israel's military actions. (evil news religion sploid war weird)
Sploid: Nature's Monsters: From coast to coast, a savage enemy is attacking Americans again and again ... from within. The menace is the common otter, a monstrous killer in the innocuous guise of a cute, harmless water critter. (animal cute florida news otter sploid terrorism us weird)
Condoleezza Rice Holds Bathtime Talks With Undersea Representatives | The Onion - America's Finest News Source: Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice called developments "encouraging" on the first day of diplomatic talks with representatives from the underwater kingdom of Rubba Dubdub, which were held in the spacious bathtub of Rice's private D.C. residence on Monday (humor news photo politics theonion us washingtondc)
New Oliver Stone 9/11 Film Introduces 'Single Plane' Theory | The Onion - America's Finest News Source: Academy Award-winning director Oliver Stone said Monday that his new film World Trade Center unveils "compelling and controversial" new evidence that a single plane was responsible for all four collisions in New York, Washington, D.C., and Pennsylvania on (9/11 humor movie news theonion us)

del.icio.us links for 2006-08-08

2006-08-08T19:59:00.000-04:00

the Figure Drawing LAB: This site is devoted to better understanding of the elements that make up the human figure and how to better portray them. It is intended as a resource for artists and art students who work with the human form. (art drawing howto reference)
OSSEC HIDS - Open Source Security: OSSEC HIDS is an Open Source Host-based Intrusion Detection System. It performs log analysis, integrity checking, rootkit detection, time-based alerting and active response. (administration gpl linux security software unix windows)

del.icio.us links for 2006-08-07

2006-08-07T19:59:00.000-04:00

Boing Boing: Only traitors try to make us afraid of terrorists: The point of terrorism is to create terror, and by cynically convincing us that our very countries are at risk from terrorism, our politicians have delivered utter victory to the terrorists: we are terrified. (boingboing liberty politics rant security terrorism us)
George W. Bush's Weekly Radio Address: Apocalypse Update (audio bush mp3 news oil politics scifi theonion war)
Prohibitively High Rocket-Fuel Prices Bring Mideast Crisis To Standstill | The Onion - America's Finest News Source: As the cost of rocket fuel soared to $630 per gallon Monday, Middle Easterners who depend on the non-renewable propellant to power 10-kilogram rockets have been forced to severely restrict their daily bombing routines. (funny humor israel news politics theonion war)

del.icio.us links for 2006-08-06

2006-08-06T19:59:00.000-04:00

Mel Gibson Launches Rocket Attack Into Israel: (audio humor israel melgibson mp3 news theonion war)

del.icio.us links for 2006-08-04

2006-08-04T19:59:00.000-04:00

SCIFI.COM | The Amazing Screw-On Head: H.P. Lovecraft meets steampunk meets Abraham Lincoln. (cartoon humor scifi video weird)

del.icio.us links for 2006-08-03

2006-08-03T19:59:00.000-04:00

Historic Preservation Ordinance - Bad Or Good?: One set of rules for government, another for citizens. (athensga georgia politics rant)
Boing Boing: Steampunk cartoon from SciFi channel: Amazing Screw-On Head: SciFi.com is hosting the entire pilot of a proposed new animated steampunk toon called "The Amazing Screw-On Head," based on the comics of the same name. Mirrored on You Tube (sciffi is slammed). (boingboing cartoon cool scifi weird)
Sploid: U.S. heroes bombed their gov't!: As World War II veterans returned home to Athens, TN,, shamelessly corrupt sleazebags ran the local "political machine." When the election of August 1946 was stolen, the tough veterans launched a mini-American Revolution and won. (crime evil history liberty politics tennessee us)

del.icio.us links for 2006-08-02

2006-08-02T19:59:00.000-04:00

XP's No-Reformat, Nondestructive Total-Rebuild Option: how to completely rebuild, repair, or refresh an existing XP installation without losing data, and without having to reinstall user software, reformat, or otherwise destructively alter the setup. (administration howto recovery reference windows)

del.icio.us links for 2006-08-01

2006-08-01T19:59:00.000-04:00

Who Needs Congress or Courts With Bush?: The Congress writes the laws. The president executes them. The courts decide whether they violate the Constitution. When a president claims he can rewrite a law before executing it, he is acting as all three branches. (bush congress evil law politics rant us)
Bush Grants Self Permission To Grant More Power To Self | The Onion - America's Finest News Source: Bush: "I promise the American people that I will not abuse this new power, unless it becomes necessary to grant myself the power to do so at a later time." (bush evil humor news politics theonion us)

del.icio.us links for 2006-07-28

2006-07-28T19:59:00.000-04:00

Userscripts.org: HTTP-to-HTTPS redirector: Greasemonkey script: Replace http:// with https:// in the address bar, to make sure you're using the SSL-encrypted version of a page. Only enable for pages that you know are SSL enabled. Good for GMail and SourceForge and others. (firefox greasemonkey javascript security software)

del.icio.us links for 2006-07-27

2006-07-27T19:59:00.000-04:00

Wikipedia Celebrates 750 Years Of American Independence | The Onion - America's Finest News Source: "According to our database, that's 212 years older than the Eiffel Tower, 347 years older than the earliest-known woolly-mammoth fossil, and a full 493 years older than the microwave oven." (funny history humor internet news theonion us wiki)

del.icio.us links for 2006-07-26

2006-07-26T19:59:00.000-04:00

CNN.com - Lance Bass: I'm gay - Jul 26, 2006: 'N Sync singer worried he would harm group. In other news, scientists discover water is wet. (gay music news)
CNN.com - Dobbs: Why is the president ignoring our laws? - Jul 26, 2006: Lou Dobbs argues that President Bush has been flouting the Constitution by picking and choosing which laws he enforces. (bush congress evil politics rant us)
YouTube - Owl / 貓頭鷹 / mao tou ying / cat / bird: How to frighten owls, and the unexpected result. (funny japan owl video weird)

del.icio.us links for 2006-07-25

2006-07-25T19:59:00.000-04:00

Myths, Lies, and Truths about the Linux kernel: World domination is proceeding as planned. (design linux presentation programming rant)

del.icio.us links for 2006-07-24

2006-07-24T19:59:00.000-04:00

How to Avoid Going to Jail under 18 U.S.C. Section 1001 for Lying to Government Agents: Rule #1: Insist on having counsel present. Rule #2. *Insist* on having counsel present. (crime howto law politics privacy reference security us)
FBI plans new Net-tapping push - CNET News.com: New legislation, seen by News.com, would force ISPs and net gear makers to build in Big Brother. (calea congress evil internet law liberty nsa politics privacy security surveillance terrorism us)
The 'terrorist' batting average - The Boston Globe: Since 2001, federal officials have carried out wave after wave of arrests and crackdowns on alleged terrorist financing. But none of those apprehended in the United States have been linked to Al Qaeda. (declan evil politics security terrorism tsa us)
CNN.com - Inquiry: Secret bills aided Cunningham - Jul 23, 2006: Cunningham's case has put a stark spotlight on the oversight of classified -- or "black" -- budgets. Unlike legislation dealing with social and economic issues, intelligence bills and parts of defense bills are written in private, in the name of national (cia congress crime evil politics security us)

del.icio.us links for 2006-07-14

2006-07-14T19:59:00.000-04:00

Framework Performance in Ruby on Rails: Django beats Ruby on Rails and Symfony (PHP) by a good margin. (apache benchmarking django framework php python rails ruby)
Sploid: Idiot clown crime wave: Traditional evil clowns acted alone -- if confronted by one of the face-painted monsters, you at least had a chance of escaping. No longer; the creeps have organized into trailer-trash gangs and are terrorizing towns across America. (clown crime evil news rap sploid us weird)

del.icio.us links for 2006-07-13

2006-07-13T19:59:00.000-04:00

Fuck Everything, We're Doing Five Blades | The Onion - America's Finest News Source: Added for it's prophesy value, since Gillette introducted their 5-blade razor (Fusion) in early 2006, two years after this article originally came out. (business humor rant theonion)

del.icio.us links for 2006-07-12

2006-07-12T19:59:00.000-04:00

The Gentle People: Impressed by their piety, courts have permitted the Amish to live outside the law. But in some places, the group's ethic of forgive and forget has produced a plague of incest—and let many perpetrators go unpunished. (amish crime culture evil news religion sex technology us weird)
U.N. Orders Wonka To Submit To Chocolate Factory Inspections | The Onion - America's Finest News Source: The chocolate-making capabilities of Wonka's heavily fortified compound have long been a source of speculation. Wonka, defying international calls for full disclosure, has maintained his silence regarding his factory's suspected capacity to manufacture co (bush chocolate cia humor news theonion un)

del.icio.us links for 2006-07-11

2006-07-11T19:59:00.000-04:00

Tricks for remembering names: (howto productivity reference)

del.icio.us links for 2006-07-07

2006-07-07T19:59:00.000-04:00

On July 14th, one del.icio.us user will win $100. Enter this contest.: One randomly-selected del.icio.us user who bookmarks this page will win $100. (del.icio.us greed network social weird)
'Breast ironing' to stunt girls' growth widespread: "Breast ironing" -- the use of hard or heated objects or other substances to try to stunt breast growth in girls to lessen their sexual attractiveness -- is a traditional practice in West Africa, experts say. (africa boobs culture evil news weird)
New Scientist Features - 13 things that do not make sense: 1 The placebo effect.2 The horizon problem.3 Ultra-energetic cosmic rays. 4 Belfast homeopathy results.5 Dark matter. 6 Viking's methane. 7 Tetraneutrons. 8 The Pioneer anomaly. 9 Dark energy. 10 The Kuiper cliff. 11 The Wow signal. 12 Not-so-constant con (medicine physics science space weird)

del.icio.us links for 2006-07-05

2006-07-05T19:59:00.000-04:00

Fake agency offers ads on hookers' thighs: Prospective customers phoning his fake agency are kept on hold and bombarded with sales pitches until they give up. (advertising funny news weird)
16 Elements You Must Include in Your Site Design: (css design howto layout reference search web)

This is so wrong

2006-07-03T20:38:00.000-04:00

And on so many levels.

del.icio.us links for 2006-07-03

2006-07-03T19:59:00.001-04:00

:: system76 :: Linux Laptops, Linux Desktops, Linux Servers ::: Preloaded with Ubuntu. (hardware linux shop ubuntu)

del.icio.us links for 2006-06-30

2006-06-30T19:59:00.000-04:00

Alex Jones' Infowars.com :: Because There is a War on For Your Mind: (9/11 bush conspiracy evil fema illuminati internet liberty media news nwo politics propaganda protest religion war)
Sploid: La Familia De Bush: Jenna Bush is headed to Latin America as the latest member of the Bush Dynasty ordered to "become Hispanic." Is the New World Order being forged by marriage like in the days of kings? (bush evil mexico news nwo sploid us weird)
ZK - Ajax but no JavaScript: ZK is an open-source Ajax Web framework that enables rich UI for Web applications with no JavaScript and little programming. (ajax api framework javascript programming web web2.0 xhtml)

del.icio.us links for 2006-06-26

2006-06-26T19:59:00.000-04:00

How to write good: (howto humor writing)

del.icio.us links for 2006-06-21

2006-06-21T19:59:00.000-04:00

Constitution of the Confederate States of America- what was changed?: Overall, the CSA constitution does not radically alter the federal system that was set up under the United States constitution. It is thus very debatable as to whether the CSA is significantly more pro "states' rights" (as supporters claim) in any meaning (education history law reference us)
The Morning News Gallery - Files Are Not for Sharing, by Matthew Baldwin & Goopymart: How you might explain file sharing to impressionable youngsters if you were the RIAA/MPAA. (cartoon copyright culture humor mpaa p2p riaa)

del.icio.us links for 2006-06-20

2006-06-20T19:59:00.000-04:00

Boing Boing: How do homosexual animals evolve?: Joan Roughgarden, a transgendered professor of biology at Stanford University, has penned a fascinating-sounding book on the evolutionary role of homosexuality called Evolution's Rainbow. (biology boingboing evolution gay japan science weird)
CNN.com - Lewis the cat gets home detention - Jun 20, 2006: Judge spares accused serial-scratcher, owner on probation (cat connecticut crime news us weird)
CNN.com - Georgia governor threatens to sue Army Corps of Engineers - Jun 20, 2006: The Corps acknowledged over the weekend that a faulty gauge at Lake Lanier had allowed 22 billion gallons of water to be released by mistake. The amount of water mistakenly drained would have been enough to support the city of Atlanta for 118 days. (atlanta ga news us)

del.icio.us links for 2006-06-15

2006-06-15T19:59:00.000-04:00

ASIFA-Hollywood Animation Archive Project Blog: Meta: The $100,000 Animation Drawing Course- Lesson 1: How would you like to learn to draw for animation from one of the greatest cartoonists of the golden age, and one of the greatest current cartoonists? Here's your chance... (art blog cartoon cool design education free howto illustration johnk reference)
ASIFA-Hollywood Animation Archive Project Blog: Media: Willard Mullin on Animals: Mullin was not only the greatest sports cartoonist of his day, he was also one of the most talented artists ever to work in newspaper comics. (animal cartoon history howto illustration racism reference)
Wolf Park: Wolf Park is a nonprofit education and research facility, open to the general public from May through November and Saturday evening for Howl Nights. The park is home to several packs of gray wolves, plus foxes and bison. (animal bison education fox research wolf)

del.icio.us links for 2006-06-11

2006-06-11T19:59:00.000-04:00

noob.us - Howtos and Tutorials » Family Guy Voice Actor - Seth MacFarlane’s Harvard Class Day Speech 2006: (cartoon college humor video)

del.icio.us links for 2006-06-09

2006-06-09T19:59:00.000-04:00

Before Prohibition: Images from the preprohibition era: The prohibition of psychoactive substances has evolved gradually in the United States and in Europe. Morphine, cocaine, and even heroin were seen as miracle cures when they were first discovered. (advertising art culture drugs health history image law media photo politics reference)
Avoiding attacking suspected terrorist mastermind: Long before the war the Bush administration had several chances to wipe out his terrorist operation and perhaps kill Zarqawi himself — but never pulled the trigger. (boingboing bush evil iraq news politics terrorism war)

del.icio.us links for 2006-06-08

2006-06-08T19:59:00.000-04:00

DIY Bush Impeachment: Impeach for Peace, a Minnesota-based impeachment group, has researched a method for impeaching the president using a little known and rarely used part of the Rules of the House of Representatives. This document actually empowers individual citizens to ini (bush cool howto impeachment politics reference)
Pirate Party of the United States: The Pirate Party of the United States is this country's version of the Piratpartiet, a Swedish political party that wants to "fundamentally reform copyright law, get rid of the patent system, and ensure that citizens' rights to privacy are respected." (cool copyright media music pirate politics uga us)
Sploid: 'Let's just give Iran nukes!': Unique problems call for unique solutions, so today the White House decided to give nuclear technology to Iran. Yes, Iran. The same Iran the White House has been planning to bomb for months ... because Iran is developing nuclear-power technology. (bush evil iran news nuke politics sploid us weird)
Sploid: The other lost war: With all the horror in Iraq, most Americans have forgotten about that other U.S. failure in the wake of 9/11: the war in Afghanistan. Not only are the Taliban undefeated, U.S. forces in Afghanistan are now flying far more combat missions there than in Ira (afghanistan iraq news politics sploid terrorism us war)
Mavericks To Incorporate Machetes Into Hack-A-Shaq Defense | The Onion - America's Finest News Source: In what the Dallas Mavericks hope will be an effective variation on the "Hack-A-Shaq" defense, the Mavericks will equip their players with custom-made, razor-sharp machetes for this year's NBA Finals. (basketball humor nba news sport theonion us)

del.icio.us links for 2006-06-07

2006-06-07T19:59:00.000-04:00

Strategies for Reducing Procrastination: Try them tomorrow. (howto management productivity)

del.icio.us links for 2006-06-06

2006-06-06T19:59:00.000-04:00

Techdirt: Another Court Recognizes Site Owners Aren't Liable For Site Comments: 47 U.S.C. § 230 (the only good bit in the Communications Decency Act) saves the day for Tucker Max. The court ruling is definitely worth reading. You're not responsible for what users write on your website, even if you moderate comments. (cda internet law media web)
Sploid: Crazed deer takes down pit bull: All across the nation, the deer population has been wreaking havoc as never before. Whether terrorizing college campuses or attacking politicians, it seems their tyranny knows no bounds. Now they've graduated to home invasion. (deer dog news sploid us weird wisconsin)
Sploid: Enemy of Islam: The latest target of the Islamic religious fanatics who now control the streets of Baghdad -- thanks America! -- is the humble falafel sandwich. (food iraq news religion sploid war weird)
NSA Wiretap Reveals Subject May Be Paying Too Much For Long-Distance | The Onion - America's Finest News Source: "Bear in mind that this is a man who earns only $43,220 a year. With both a Dodge minivan in desperate need of repair and the upcoming vasectomy to pay for, he should be more concerned about these expenses." (humor news nsa surveillance telephony theonion us)

del.icio.us links for 2006-06-02

2006-06-02T19:59:00.000-04:00

Rolling Stone : Was the 2004 Election Stolen?: Of course it was. Republicans prevented more than 350,000 voters in Ohio from casting ballots or having their votes counted -- enough to have put John Kerry in the White House. (bush crime diebold evil fraud impeachment media news ohio)

del.icio.us links for 2006-06-01

2006-06-01T19:59:00.000-04:00

Manage Apache Download Speed And Traffic Limits With mod_cband | HowtoForge - Linux Howtos and Tutorials: mod_cband is an Apache 2 module which provides bandwidth quota and throttling. It solves the problem of limiting users' and virtualhosts' bandwidth usage. (apache howto network software web)
The Blog | Philip Slater: THE GREAT FUNDAMENTALIST HOAX | The Huffington Post: Why do fundamentalist Christians so seldom quote from the New Testament but prefer citing the Torah and Old Testament prophets? One reason is that the Old Testament is full of murder, vindictiveness, and genocide -- all supposedly ordered by God. (politics rant religion)
Sploid: 'Sorry guys - but I'm gay!': A new superhero is protecting Gotham City, and the leather-clad public protector is not just resurrected - she's coming out of the proverbial batcave, with the revelation that she is a lesbian. (batman comic gay news sploid weird)
Why Haditha Matters: That the Marines institutionally covered up Haditha until Time magazine raised questions with the Corps suggests that the moral damage from the Iraq War is broader than a single debased unit. (bush evil iraq politics rant us war)
Japan is proud home of Christ's tomb - World - Times Online: For two millennia the farming village of Shingo claims to have protected a tradition that Jesus spent most of his life in Japan. Funny thing is, there is a Lupin III episode from the 1970's that makes reference to this. (anime japan news religion sploid weird)

del.icio.us links for 2006-05-31

2006-05-31T19:59:00.000-04:00

Boing Boing: Legal implications of the word "fuck": The Ohio State University's Christopher M Fairman has published a scholarly paper called "Fuck". (boingboing culture law ohio sex social us)

del.icio.us links for 2006-05-26

2006-05-26T19:59:00.000-04:00

Opinion: Why NSA spying puts the U.S. in danger: Best quote: We have snakes in our midst, yet we are chasing a mythical beast with completely unreliable evidence. (bush congress evil fisa liberty nsa privacy security surveillance terrorism)
EZTrip.com: discount hotels, motels, hotel reservations, car rentals, airline tickets and vacation packages (airline tool travel)
FeralChildren.com | Feral children: isolated, confined, wild and wolf children: Feral children, also known as wild children or wolf children, are children who've grown up with minimal human contact, or even none at all. They may have been raised by animals (often wolves) or somehow survived on their own. (anthropology culture history reference social weird wolf)
Sneak Out of Work Right Now - Forbes.com: In order to contemplate and enjoy life as art, people need time to be lazy. (funny productivity rant)
Sploid: Treasury dept. ends Spanish-American War!: In 1898, under pressure following the sinking of the S.S. Maine, the United States Congress declared war on Spain. Today that war was ended by the Treasury Department, just 108 years later, with the decision that we can finally stop paying for it. (history lawsuit news politics spain tax telephony us war weird)
Archaeological Dig Uncovers Ancient Race Of Skeleton People | The Onion - America's Finest News Source: A team of British and Egyptian archaeologists made a stunning discovery Monday, unearthing several intact specimens of "skeleton people"—skinless, organless humans who populated the Nile delta region an estimated 6,000 years ago. (archeology funny history news science theonion)
Great Indy 500 Moments | The Onion - America's Finest News Source: 1935: The Borg-Warner Trophy is unveiled; from this year on, souls of the winners are trapped on the sides of the obscenely malevolent chalice for all eternity. (car funny image indiana indianapolis sport theonion us)
The Smoking Gun: The Lascivious 'Louie Louie': What are the real lyrics to "Louie Louie"? Inquiring assholes want to know. (fbi history music politics rock)

del.icio.us links for 2006-05-25

2006-05-25T19:59:00.000-04:00

Solving Every Sudoku Puzzle: Constraint-based Sudoku puzzle solver written in 100 lines of Python. (python sudoku)
AdSense Expensive Keyword Alert at FreeAlerts.org: There's a big difference between "expensive" and "profitable" keywords. "selling structured settlements" is most expensive, but earns basically nothing (no clicks), while "insurance" is relatively cheap but gets lots of clicks. (google)
New Scientist Breaking News - Rhythm method criticised as a killer of embryos: “Even a policy of practising condom usage and having an abortion in case of failure would cause less embryonic deaths than the rhythm method,” writes Luc Bovens, of the London School of Economics, in the Journal of Medical Ethics. (abortion biology irony news science sex)
New Scientist Breaking News - Artificial penis allows rabbits to mate normally: In a “landmark development” researchers have created an “artificial penis” that has allowed rabbits with damaged penises to successfully mate. The urologists say that the procedure might one day help treat men with severe erectile dysfunction. (biology health news penis rabbit science sex weird)
Japanese Sound effects and what they mean: (boingboing comic japan manga reference writing)
Sploid: All dressed up and he's got no prom to go to: After years of struggling with his sexual identity, Kevin Logan, 18, finally started going to school in drag. He attended school every day of his senior year dressed like a girl, but was not allowed into the prom wearing a dress. (education gary gay indiana liberty news sploid us)
Tabblo.beta: Meet the next generation of photosharing online (cool design django photography python social web web2.0)

del.icio.us links for 2006-05-24

2006-05-24T19:59:00.000-04:00

The New Yorker: The Talk of the Town: LISTENING IN: “What the companies are doing is worse than turning over records. They’re providing [to the NSA] total access to all the data.” (bush evil law liberty news nsa politics privacy security surveillance telephony terrorism us)
Passengers Bravely Take Down Plane Showing Big Momma's House 2 | The Onion - America's Finest News Source: United Airlines Flight 43, which crashed outside Parkersburg, WV last Thursday, was in fact brought down by passengers who voluntarily sacrificed their lives in order to prevent the screening of the in-flight movie selection, Big Momma's House 2. (9/11 airline humor movie news terrorism theonion us westvirginia)
TMBG ringtone: "Call connected through the NSA": "Call connected through the NSA/Complete transmission through the NSA/Suspending your rights through the duration of the permanent war" (boingboing mp3 music nsa politics tmbg war)

del.icio.us links for 2006-05-23

2006-05-23T19:59:00.000-04:00

President Bush Invokes Presidential Super Powers: (audio bush humor mp3 news politics theonion us)

del.icio.us links for 2006-05-22

2006-05-22T19:59:00.000-04:00

Sushi Otaku: Sushi Tips – How to Eat Sushi (or Expected Etiquette): While there really are no absolute requirements, other than general politeness, there are certain behaviours that may make your dining experience more pleasant, and the staff more attentive and interested in you. (culture food japan sushi)
YouTube - 10 Things I Hate About Commandments: 10 Commandments vs. teen comedies in general (humor mashup movie religion video)

del.icio.us links for 2006-05-11

2006-05-11T19:59:00.000-04:00

FreeNAS: The Free NAS Server - Home: FreeNAS is a free NAS (Network-Attached Storage) server, supporting: CIFS (samba), FTP, NFS, RSYNC protocols, local user authentication, Software RAID (0,1,5) with a Full WEB configuration interface. (appliance cifs freebsd ftp nas network nfs php raid samba software)
New 'Anti-Abortion Pill' Kills Mother, Leaves Fetus Alive | The Onion - America's Finest News Source: Pro-life advocates celebrated approval of the new anti-abortion drug UR-86 by the Food and Drug Administration Tuesday, calling it a "safe and effective method" for terminating pregnant women while leaving their unborn children unharmed. (abortion humor news politics theonion us)
USATODAY.com - NSA has massive database of Americans' phone calls: The National Security Agency has been secretly collecting the phone call records of tens of millions of Americans, using data provided by AT&T, Verizon and BellSouth. Qwest refused to without a court order. (bush crime database evil fisa impeachment law liberty media nsa politics privacy security surveillance)

del.icio.us links for 2006-05-10

2006-05-10T19:59:00.000-04:00

CNN.com - Dobbs to President: Do you take us for fools? - May 10, 2006: Lou Dobbs tears W a new one. (bush evil immigration politics rant us)
Sploid: Grandpa Bush violated Geronimo's skull: One of the Bush family's most macabre crimes is squirming in the light again, thanks to an 88-year-old letter discovered in the bowels of Yale University. In 1918, Prescott Bush reportedly raided the actual grave of Apache warrior Geronimo. (bush evil history news politics sex sploid us weird)

del.icio.us links for 2006-05-09

2006-05-09T19:59:00.000-04:00

Airline Pilot Central - FedEx arrivals during Thunderstorms: Watch the radar image of over a hunderd FedEx jets landing in Memphis with the approach of a big thunderstorm. They scatter around like roaches. A couple of them look like they have to divert to other airports. (airline funny video)

del.icio.us links for 2006-05-05

2006-05-05T19:59:00.000-04:00

YouTube - They are made out of meat: Based on Terry Bisson's short story. (alien humor meat scifi video)

del.icio.us links for 2006-05-04

2006-05-04T19:59:00.000-04:00

Drunk Men Work Here - On Bots - Fresh Zero Content for Compulsive Clickers: What happens when you build a two billion page web site and let search engines crawl it? Surprisingly little. (google science search spam web)
Wig-Wearing Mike Tyson Retires From Foxy-Boxing | The Onion - America's Finest News Source: Mike Tyson, his bikini straps slipping from his shoulders, his makeup running, and his long blonde wig in disarray following a fourth-round knockout, announced Tuesday night that he is retiring from foxy-boxing with a career WFBA record of 1-6. (boxing humor news sports theonion)
Wired News: Everyone Wants to 'Own' Your PC: Do you own your computer, or does it own you? Perils of DRM and malicious software vendors. (boingboing business drm evil microsoft schneier security web)

del.icio.us links for 2006-05-03

2006-05-03T19:59:00.000-04:00

NASA Announces Plan To Launch $700 Million Into Space | The Onion - America's Finest News Source: Officials at the Kennedy Space Center announced Tuesday that they have set Aug. 6 as the date for launching $700 million from the Denarius IV spacecraft, the largest and most expensive mission to date in NASA's unmanned monetary-ejection program. (humor nasa news space theonion us)
Illegal Immigrants Returning To Mexico For American Jobs | The Onion - America's Finest News Source: As major corporations continue to move their manufacturing operations to Mexico, waves of job-seeking Mexican immigrants to the U.S. have begun making the journey back across the border in search of better-paying Mexican-based American jobs. (humor immigration mexico news theonion us)

del.icio.us links for 2006-05-02

2006-05-02T19:59:00.000-04:00

Sploid: Happy Birthday, Illuminati!: On May 1, 1776, a Bavarian professor named Johann Adam Weishaupt started an anti-government and anti-religious secret group called the Illuminati. The goal? Wipe out the popes, kings and nations. (evil history illuminati sploid war weird)
Sploid: Our national anthem: In Spanish since 1919: Senator Lamar Alexander's press release stated "at least 389 different versions of our anthem have been produced over the years ... never before has it been rendered in another language." Except the U.S. Bureau of Education already did it, in 1919. (history immigration mexico news sploid us)
New Bill Will Send Illegal Immigrants To Iraq: (audio humor immigration iraq mexico mp3 news politics theonion us war)

del.icio.us links for 2006-05-01

2006-05-01T19:59:00.000-04:00

Sploid: Foreclosure nightmare: Rising interest rates, outrageous energy costs and a sputtering housing market are all blamed on a massive 72% increase in home foreclosures compared to the same period last year. (california colorado economics florida georgia indiana nevada news sploid texas us)

del.icio.us links for 2006-04-27

2006-04-27T19:59:00.000-04:00

Sploid: Brave new world for U.S. spooks: If the current House version of the 2007 intelligence authorization bill passes, CIA & NSA goons can arrest anybody, anywhere; spies who leak will pay, journalists too (cia evil news nsa politics sploid terrorism us)
Sploid: Russian Goatsucker: As if life in Russia wasn't already bad enough, villagers are now reporting a hideous blood-sucking predator is feasting on their livestock. The creature appears to be similar to the one known in the Americas as El Chupacabra. (animal chupacabra news russia sploid weird)
Sploid: The horrifying truth about hyena lovin': Among mammals the spotted hyena is one of the few species where the female is more muscular and aggressive. It's a good thing, too, because there may be nothing harder than giving birth to another hyena. (animal biology hyena science sex sploid weird)
Wired 14.04: The Culture War: Past and present corruptors of the youth (according to various shitheads throughout the ages): Novels, the indecent Waltz, moving pictures, the home-wrecking telephone, comic books, Rock and/or Roll, video games. What, no Internet? (boingboing censorship comic culture gaming history media music news politics rock tv violence writing)

del.icio.us links for 2006-04-26

2006-04-26T19:59:00.000-04:00

eG Forums -> Knife Maintenance and Sharpening: Everything you could possibly want to know about sharpening knives. (boingboing food howto knife reference)

del.icio.us links for 2006-04-25

2006-04-25T19:59:00.000-04:00

Tempest in a D-cup as bust sizes grow | Reuters.com: Bra producers have been forced to offer bigger cup-sizes in China because improved nutrition is busting all previous chest measurement records. (boobs china funny news weird)

del.icio.us links for 2006-04-24

2006-04-24T19:59:00.000-04:00

BBC NEWS | Europe | Wildlife defies Chernobyl radiation: As humans were evacuated from the area 20 years ago, animals moved in. Existing populations multiplied and species not seen for decades, such as the lynx and eagle owl, began to return. (animal bear biology disaster environment health news nuke science ukraine wolf)
Congress readies new digital copyright bill | CNET News.com: For the last few years, a coalition of technology companies, academics and computer programmers has been trying to persuade Congress to scale back the Digital Millennium Copyright Act. Now Congress is preparing to do precisely the opposite. (bush congress copyright declan dmca drm law politics riaa us)

del.icio.us links for 2006-04-23

2006-04-23T19:59:00.000-04:00

Ferrari 275 GTB driven by Formula 1 driver through Paris at 140MPH (video) - Automotoportal.com: On an August morning in 1978, French filmmaker Claude Lelouch mounted a gyro-stabilized camera to the bumper of a Ferrari 275 GTB and had a friend, a professional Formula 1 racer, drive at breakneck speed through the heart of Paris. (car cool ferrari france history paris video)

del.icio.us links for 2006-04-22

2006-04-22T19:59:00.000-04:00

FindLaw's Writ - Dean: If Past Is Prologue, George Bush Is Becoming An Increasingly Dangerous President: Currently, President Bush is busy reshuffling his staff to reinvigorate his presidency. But if Dr. Barber's work holds true for this president -- as it has for others - the hiring and firing of subordinates will not touch the core problems that have plagu (bush congress disaster evil iran iraq politics terrorism us)

Synchronize Google Calendar to iPod with wget

2006-04-21T10:32:00.000-04:00

It's ridiculously simple to download your Google Calendar to your iPod, at least if you have wget.

#!/bin/bash
dest='/media/ipod/Calendars'
name='my-google-calendar'
url='http://www.google.com/calendar/ical/.../.../basic'
[ -d "${dest}" ] && wget -q -r -P "${dest}" -O "${name}" "${dest}" "${url}"

Set dest to the location of your iPod's Calendars directory (when it is mounted as a USB disk) and url to the location of your Google Calendar iCal calendar. To get this URL, click the Manage calendars link, then Share this calendar, Calendar details, and then the ICAL link (either public or private, depending on your settings).

Then run the script periodically, like with cron. If the iPod is not mounted, it'll bail out and not try to syncronize.

If you don't have wgtet, you can substitute curl or lynx or some other command-line web tool.

del.icio.us links for 2006-04-19

2006-04-19T19:59:00.000-04:00

Sploid: Rape of Babylon: For three long years, U.S. troops have wrecked what little remained of the ancient city of Babylon. (evil history iraq news religion sploid us war)
Area Islamic Militant All Talk: (audio humor mp3 news religion terrorism theonion)
Beaver Overthinking Dam | The Onion - America's Finest News Source: Local beaver Dennis Messner is spending an inordinate amount of time and effort in the planning and construction phases of building his dam, according to neighbors close to the project. (architecture beaver canada design humor news theonion)

del.icio.us links for 2006-04-13

2006-04-13T19:59:00.000-04:00

Sploid: Death from above: A monstrous dog-eating owl has escaped its Scottish captors and is now terrorizing suburbs of Edinburgh, the Scotsman reports today. (monster news owl scotland sploid uk weirds)
Condoleezza + Watermelon = Trouble - April 13, 2006: Outrage over conjuctural abuse of a watermelon in a physics/algebra problem on an exam. But seriously, lots of people eat watermelon, including people with big gaps between their front teeth. So maybe a seed gets stuck there sometimes, so what? (college food news racism us washington watermelon weird)

del.icio.us links for 2006-04-12

2006-04-12T19:59:00.000-04:00

Sploid: ATF goons take down campus ninja: The University of Georgia was lucky Alcohol, Tobacco and Firearm agents were on hand Tuesday. Who knows what sort of havoc the runaway ninja might have cause if the ninja hadn't been apprehended by the overzealous goons. (atf athenga georgia news ninja pirate security uga us weird)
MIT Fraternity Accused Of Robot Hazing | The Onion - America's Finest News Source: Several members of the MIT chapter of the Theta Tau fraternity are in campus-police custody today following a brutal hazing incident in which one robot remains missing and two others are in critical condition with extensive circuitry and servo-motor injur (humor law mit news robot theonion us)
Texas Oil Buffoon Pumping 8,000 Barrels Of Oil Into Ground Every Day | The Onion - America's Finest News Source: Known far and wide as "the biggest oil buffoon in Texas," T. Ludlow Banks, in his most unorthodox move to date, has imported custom-built Italian machinery to pump more than 8,000 barrels of high-grade oil right back into the ground each day. (humor news oil texas theonion us)

del.icio.us links for 2006-04-09

2006-04-09T19:59:00.000-04:00

THE IRAN PLANS: Would President Bush go to war to stop Tehran from getting the bomb? Report on the uncoming nuclear war with Iran. (bush energy evil history iran iraq news nuke oil politics religion security us war)
Sploid: Rabbit thug on the loose: A savage bunny with feet the size of deer hooves is rampaging through the gardens of Northumberland, and now locals are taking action. They've hired two armed guards to look after their public vegetable patch. Instructions: shoot to kill. (news rabbit sploid uk weird)

del.icio.us links for 2006-04-08

2006-04-08T19:59:00.000-04:00

Sploid: DHS goons cuff guy for directing school bus: "If this is Homeland Security, I think we ought to be a little afraid." (dhs evil florida liberty news security sploid terrorism us)