Oh, Good Grief !

.
.
Some kids in our neighborhood got an early start to Mischief Night.
 
We have a tiny tree in our front yard, and they TP'd it... but they only used a single TP streamer.
 
My friend Peter West said it reminded him of Charley Brown's pathetic Christmas tree, so this must be what Charley Brown's Mischief Night looks like.
 
 
 

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6 Truths of Life:

6 Truths of Life:

 
1.  You cannot touch all of your top teeth with your tongue.
 
 
 
 
2.  All idiots, after reading the first truth, will try it
 
 
3.  And discover that the first truth is a lie, and feel superior because they can do it.
 
 
4.  You're smiling now because you're an idiot.
 

5.  You soon will forward this to another idiot.
 
 
6.  There's still a stupid smile on your face.
 
 

I apologize about this.
I'm an idiot, and needed company.

 

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Beer. Is there nothing it can't do ?

Beer Summit Continues Without Obama

Harvard professor Henry Louis Gates and police officer James Crowley were seen together at a bar in Cambridge on Wednesday, local news sources report.
 
The men set off a national debate about race last summer when Crowley arrested Gates for disorderly conduct while Gates was trying to enter his own home. The incident culminated in an invitation to the White House—the so-called "Beer Summit"—where the men discussed race and drank beer with President Obama.
 
According to Boston's WBZ news station, Gates and Crowley were seen at the "River Gods" pub earlier this week, where they reportedly talked for about an hour. As of now, it's unclear what they were drinking.
 
 

Read original story in WBZ TV | Thursday, Oct. 29, 2009

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"SPAMford" Wallace and FB

 
Facebook gets $711 million damages in anti-spam case
 
Reuters) - Social networking website Facebook was awarded $711.2 million in damages relating to an anti-spam case against Internet marketer Sanford Wallace, court documents show.
 
Wallace did not oppose the motion or appear at the hearing on September 18, 2009, according to a filing on Thursday in a San Jose, California federal court.
 
The site filed an anti-spamming case against Wallace in February for accessing people's Facebook accounts without their permission and sending phony mail and posts to the individuals' public message wall, the company said in a blog post.
 
"While we don't expect to receive the vast majority of the award, we hope that this will act as a continued deterrent," Facebook said in a blog post.
 
Wallace did not immediately respond to a Reuters email seeking comment. His email address was obtained from the court documents.
 
http://www.reuters.com/article/internetNews/idUSTRE59T0U520091030
 


 

 

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two digital photography articles you may find interesting

The Making of a Mind-Blowing Space Photo 
http://www.wired.com/wiredscience/2009/10/making-space-photo/

 

 

Researchers sharpen photographs by capturing multiple low-quality images
http://www.physorg.com/news173541725.html#firstCmt

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Phillies humor from 'the Onion'

 
Phillies Hope To End 364-Day World Series Drought
 
PHILADELPHIA—The last time the Philadelphia Phillies brought a World Series title back to the City of Brotherly Love, the nation's financial sector was in complete ruin, the cost of a gallon of milk was only $2.74, fans watched the Fall Classic while huddled around their slightly-less-streamlined high-definition television sets, and Philadelphia slugger Ryan Howard was just 28 years old.
 
This week Howard, 29, hopes to lead the Phillies to their first World Series championship in more than 360 long days and end a title drought that has been punctuated by several embarrassing losses, including a 2009 opening-day defeat by the Atlanta Braves and a June loss to the Atlanta Braves. During its infamous dry spell, the team has also come up short twice, winning both an NLDS and an NLCS title but having absolutely no World Series ring to show for it.
 
To put into perspective just how long the Phillies have gone without a championship, the earth has almost made one full orbit of the sun since the franchise last paraded through downtown Philadelphia holding the famed Commissioner's Trophy.
 
"We have a good group of guys this year, and if we block out all the stuff about how we haven't won a World Series in more than 5,000 waking hours, we'll be fine." Howard said. "Frankly, I'm tired of all that talk. Yes, I know Michael Jackson was still alive the last time we won, and I know Boston Legal was gearing up for its final episode. But look, when the umpire says 'Play ball,' none of that matters."
 
"After 364 days of constantly coming up short, I think this is finally our year," Howard added.
 
According to Phillies manager Charlie Manuel, if his players get wrapped up in the fact that they haven't raised a World Series banner since April 5, 2009, they'll never be able to play to the maximum of their ability against the New York Yankees. The veteran manager admitted, however, that going nearly 52 straight weeks without a championship is bound to shake any team's confidence.
 
"The bottom line is we're a pretty inexperienced team, and for many of these young players, this will be the first time they've been to the World Series in a year." Manuel said. "A lot has changed in that time. If you would have told me last October that this country would elect a black president before the Philadelphia Phillies made it back to the World Series, I would have laughed in your face."
 
While Philadelphia players admitted the 11-month championship-winless streak has been difficult for them personally, most agreed that it's the fans who've suffered most, enduring more than 500,000 minutes without a World Series victory.
 
"Our fans are incredible," said left fielder Raul Ibanez, who was brought to the Phillies during the offseason in the hopes that he could help Philadelphia finally get back on the winning track. "If I were them, I would have given up on us weeks ago, after we lost our 69th game and failed to win the National League East by more than 10 [games]. But they stuck with us."
 
Though the Philly faithful are understandably disappointed with their team's title drought, many believe this will be the season when the team breaks the so-called Curse of 1981—the year in which the Phillies failed to follow up their 1980 championship season with a World Series victory.
 
"I guess part of me feels like the long wait will make a title all the more special," season-ticket holder Mike Oliver said. "And even though I don't like to compare teams, this Philly squad feels similar to the one who beat the Rays back in the day. They had guys like Jimmy Rollins, Chase Utley, Cole Hamels, Jamie Moyer—guys who could really play the game and knew how to win; not like today's players."
 
"Man, whatever happened to Jamie Moyer?" Oliver added. "He's got to be dead by now."
 
"Truthfully, I never thought I would live to see the Phillies get to another World Series," longtime fan David Oswald said. "When I was diagnosed with pancreatic cancer last November, the doctor only gave me eight months."
 
http://www.theonion.com/content/news/phillies_hope_to_end_364_day_world?utm_source=onion_rss_daily
 
 
 
 

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"Hasta la vista, baby!"

 
California Govenor Arnold Schwarzenegger vetoed a bill that would have helped the Port of San Francisco.  He sent a letter to the California State Assembly to explain his decision.
 
The letter doesn't flow very well, and is somewhat confusing... until you read the first letter of each sentence.

http://www.sfbg.com/blogs/politics/2009/10/arnold_to_sf_fuck_you.html
 http://gov.ca.gov/pdf/press/2009bills/AB1176_Ammiano_Veto_Message.pdf

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A warning to all egg-laying hens:

 

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WWII Escape Tunnel @ Stalag III Diagram

 I am sure that you have heard of the WW II "Great Escape" but probably have never seen the actual project.
 
In 1943 work had begun on 'Harry', the tunnel that allowed over 70 men to escape from the German POW camp, 'Stalag III', during World War II.
 
This was the same tunnel made famous by the movie 'The Great Escape'.   The URL below takes you to a site where one of the men, after the War, drew a diagram with explanations of each of the sections.
 
The link below clearly gives you an idea as to how creative and daring the prisoners were. When graphics appear, move cursor over the number (no need to click) to display an explanation of activity. Be sure to click on "next" after you view each section. The last number to 'roll over' is 16.  
   
(the person who runs the website snatched that video from PBS's NOVA website. It seems the video itself made a great escape <g>).
 
www.kerman94.com/tunnelharry.html
 
 

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Security Alert: Malicious Facebook Password Spam

 Websense® Security Labs ThreatSeeker Network has discovered a new wave of malicious email attacks claiming to be a password reset confirmation from Facebook.
 
The From: address on the messages is spoofed using support@facebook.com to make the messages believable to recipients. The messages contain a .zip file attachment with an .exe file inside.
 
The .exe file currently has a detection rate of about 30 percent on VirusTotal.
Our ThreatSeeker Network has seen up to 90,000 of these messages sent out so far today.

To view the details of this alert Click here

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GeoCities and xkcd

sent Mon, Oct 26
 
 
If you haven't seen xkcd today, you gotta see their site now.
 
In honor of GeoCities shutting down, xkcd's been redesigned... into an god-awful mess.

 http://www.xkcd.com

 

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DARPA meets GEICO ?

   DARPA meets GEICO ?

   "I always feel like somebody's watching me..."

 

 

 from Wired.com

 

Shapeshifting Robot Peeps from Under the Door
 
Remember B.O.B, the shape-shifting blob from Monsters vs. Aliens?  B.O.B may soon have a real-life counterpart.

 

Robotics company iRobot has developed a soft robot that can roll around and change its shape so it can move through small spaces, such as holes and under the doors, as easily as it can on flat ground.

 

The robot called chembot or chemical robot was shown last week at a conference on intelligent robots and systems.

 

iRobot is no stranger to creating practical yet interesting automatons.  iRobot has sold more than 5 million robotic vacuum cleaners and mops, known as the Roomba and the Scooba.  The company also supplies robots to the U.S. military.

 

Chembot seems to be a machine designed for military use.  At first glance, the chembot looks like a rather ugly balloon.  The robot's skin is made of off-the-shelf silicone, says IEEE Spectrum. The flexible skin encloses air and loosely packed particles.  When air is removed, the particles shift to fill the void left and this results in a slightly different shape.  By controlling the inflation and deflation, the robot can be made to roll around.

 

It's a neat idea and researchers are now reportedly working to include sensors and even connect different blobs together.  DARPA, which is funding the project, is expected to use the robot for surveillance.

 

http://www.wired.com/gadgetlab/2009/10/irobot-shape-shifting-robot/

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I can name that tune in three data points...

 

How does the music-identifying app Shazam work its magic?

 http://www.slate.com/id/2232914/pagenum/all/#p2

 

 

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from xkcd: more accurate

 
Ya know how I'm always slagging science fiction movies that feature bi-pedal robots, and how that's such a stupid design?
 
xkcd agrees with me.

 

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Oh, this is gooooood.

Talk show host Glenn Beck is pursuing the owner of the domain name glennbeckrapedandmurderedayounggirlin1990.com, charging trademark violations and claiming rights to the domain. Now, the anonymous owner responds, telling an arbiter that "only an abject imbecile" could mistake the site for one of Beck's own.

Glennbeckrapedandmurderedayounggirlin1990.com turns out to be run by one Isaac Eiland-Hall. Eiland-Hall had discovered a Fark thread in which commenters picked up on a Gilbert Gottfried routine about Bob Saget raping and murdering a teenaged girl. 

They adapted it for Beck to highlight what they perceived as his habit of forcing people to explain away completely baseless charges—as when Beck interviewed Muslim Congressman Keith Ellison (D-MN) and opened with this gem: 

"And I have to tell you, I have been nervous about this interview because what I feel like saying is, sir, prove to me that you are not working with our enemies. And I know you're not. I'm not accusing you of being an enemy. But that's the way I feel, and I think a lot of Americans will feel that way."

How better to give Beck a taste of his own medicine than by wondering publicly why he has never addressed the rumor that he raped and murdered a young girl in 1990? No one's saying that Beck really did it… but if he has nothing to hide, why won't he deny the tale?

http://arstechnica.com/tech-policy/news/2009/09/memes-strike-back-gerbils-gay-blood-elves-and-glenn-beck.ars

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Instant Sadness

Glenn Beck EXPOSED - Crying On Cue Using Vicks under His Eyes.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Kj4I2f0ZO6g

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Neck Therapy for Office Workers

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RE: "Hello? Anybody out there?"

 
 

Have you ever read the Terry Bisson sci-fi short story, "They're made out of meat."
 
If not, you must --you MUST-- read it.   It's not very long.  Only 2 pages.
 
http://www.eastoftheweb.com/short-stories/UBooks/TheyMade.shtml
   

 

 

 

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The Fall of the Maya: 'They Did it to Themselves'

http://www.physorg.com/news174152911.html

The Fall of the Maya: 'They Did it to Themselves'

October 7th, 2009

 Mayan ruins in Guatemala. Photo copyright Tom Sever.
 
 

For 1200 years, the Maya dominated Central America. At their peak around 900 A.D., Maya cities teemed with more than 2,000 people per square mile -- comparable to modern Los Angeles County. Even in rural areas the Maya numbered 200 to 400 people per square mile. But suddenly, all was quiet. And the profound silence testified to one of the greatest demographic disasters in human prehistory -- the demise of the once vibrant Maya society.

 

What happened? Some NASA-funded researchers think they have a pretty good idea.
 
"They did it to themselves," says veteran archeologist Tom Sever.
 
"The Maya are often depicted as people who lived in complete harmony with their environment,' says PhD student Robert Griffin. "But like many other cultures before and after them, they ended up deforesting and destroying their landscape in efforts to eke out a living in hard times."
 
A major drought occurred about the time the Maya began to disappear. And at the time of their collapse, the Maya had cut down most of the trees across large swaths of the land to clear fields for growing corn to feed their burgeoning population. They also cut trees for firewood and for making building materials.
 
"They had to burn 20 trees to heat the limestone for making just 1 square meter of the lime plaster they used to build their tremendous temples, reservoirs, and monuments," explains Sever.
 
He and his team used computer simulations to reconstruct how the deforestation could have played a role in worsening the drought. They isolated the effects of deforestation using a pair of proven computer climate models: the PSU/NCAR mesoscale atmospheric circulation model, known as MM5, and the Community Climate System Model, or CCSM.
 
"We modeled the worst and best case scenarios: 100 percent deforestation in the Maya area and no deforestation," says Sever. "The results were eye opening. Loss of all the trees caused a 3-5 degree rise in temperature and a 20-30 percent decrease in rainfall."
 
The results are telling, but more research is needed to completely explain the mechanisms of Mayan decline. Archeological records reveal that while some Maya city-states did fall during drought periods, some survived and even thrived.
 
"We believe that drought was realized differently in different areas," explains Griffin. "We propose that increases in temperature and decreases in rainfall brought on by localized deforestation caused serious enough problems to push some but not all city-states over the edge."

 

 

A deadly cycle of drought, warming and deforestation may have doomed the Maya.

 

The Maya deforested through the use of slash-and-burn agriculture - a method still used in their old stomping grounds today, so the researchers understand how it works.

 

"We know that for every 1 to 3 years you farm a piece of land, you need to let it lay fallow for 15 years to recover. In that time, trees and vegetation can grow back there while you slash and burn another area to plant in."
But what if you don't let the land lay fallow long enough to replenish itself? And what if you clear more and more fields to meet growing demands for food?
 
"We believe that's what happened," says Griffin. "The Maya stripped large areas of their landscape bare by over-farming."
 
Not only did drought make it difficult to grow enough food, it also would have been harder for the Maya to store enough water to survive the dry season.
 
"The cities tried to keep an 18-month supply of water in their reservoirs," says Sever. "For example, in Tikal there was a system of reservoirs that held millions of gallons of water. Without sufficient rain, the reservoirs ran dry." Thirst and famine don't do much for keeping a populace happy. The rest, as the saying goes, is history.
"In some of the Maya city-states, mass graves have been found containing groups of skeletons with jade inlays in their teeth - something they reserved for Maya elites - perhaps in this case murdered aristocracy," he speculates.
No single factor brings a civilization to its knees, but the deforestation that helped bring on drought could easily have exacerbated other problems such as civil unrest, war, starvation and disease.
 
Many of these insights are a result of space-based imaging, notes Sever. "By interpreting infrared satellite data, we've located hundreds of old and abandoned cities not previously known to exist. The Maya used lime plaster as foundations to build their great cities filled with ornate temples, observatories, and pyramids. Over hundreds of years, the lime seeped into the soil. As a result, the vegetation around the ruins looks distinctive in infrared to this day."
 
"Space technology is revolutionizing archeology," he concludes. "We're using it to learn about the plight of ancients in order to avoid a similar fate today."
 
Source: Science@NASA, by Dauna Coulter

http://www.physorg.com/news174152911.html

 

 

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in case you haven't seen this one yet...

 

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Elmer Fudd would be very happy... part 2

 

from the Der Spiegel article:

 

"The practice of killing rabbits and incinerating has been criticized by Sweden's Society for the Protection of Wild Rabbits. "
 

 

 well, Duh!

 

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Elmer Fudd would be very happy...

 The Swedes, those latter-day descendants of bloodthirsty Vikings, have found a new use for rabbits: heating fuel.

 

According to Der Spiegel, stray rabbits in Stockholm are being shot, frozen and then shipped to a heating plant to be incinerated.

In the Swedes' defense, the bunnies are a menace; a plague of wild and stray pet rabbits is devouring the city's parks.

 

full @
http://www.scientificamerican.com/blog/post.cfm?id=burning-bunnies-for-biofuel-2009-10-14

 

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faux fall foliage

 

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"Hello? Anybody out there?"

 "Sometimes I think the surest sign that intelligent life exists elsewhere in the universe is that none of it has tried to contact us."

  -- Bill Watterson,  cartoonist, "Calvin and Hobbes"

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The 10 Most Idiotic iPhone Apps

The 10 Most Idiotic iPhone Apps

http://tech.msn.com/products/slideshow.aspx?cp-documentid=22105981&GT1=40000

 

 

my fave:

 

#6. HangTime

Flying into first place for the most asinine app of the bunch, HangTime measures just how high you can throw your fancy AT&T phone. That's right: You toss the iPhone up in the air, and the program lets you know how far it goes and how long it takes to come crashing down.

HangTime runs 99 cents, plus the cost of buying a new iPhone when yours inevitably shatters on the ground.
 
 

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Humor from 'The Onion'

  http://www.theonion.com/content/news/majority_of_parents_abuse_children

Majority Of Parents Abuse Children, Children Report

APRIL 13, 2007 | ISSUE 43•15

LOS ANGELES—A chilling national poll of U.S. children ages 3 through 12 estimated that nearly 75 million youngsters suffer both physical and psychological abuse at the hands of their parents on a daily basis.

ENLARGE IMAGE

An abused child awaits her single allotted hour of television per day.

The poll, whose findings are part of a 700-page report released Tuesday by a coalition of child abuse monitoring and prevention organizations, indicts nearly 95 percent of American parents. It documents abuses ranging from less severe offenses, such as children being denied snacks just before dinner, to more egregious, long-term cases of neglect, such as never ever getting what they want, ever.

"My parents always tell me that I have to finish all my math homework or I won't be allowed to watch TV," said study participant and abuse victim "Derek," 10, who told researchers that some of his earliest memories were of this kind of mistreatment. "They're so mean. I hate them."

"I hate them, I hate them, I hate them," he added.

Encouraged to speak freely and confidentially about their home lives, subjects shocked even seasoned child welfare advocates with tales of systematic deprival and gratuitous cruelty. One Illinois boy told of being forced to linger with his mother in fabric stores and later leaving a Toys "R" Us empty-handed, even though the store sold a water gun he really wanted. An Arkansas 9-year-old said he spent all of third grade carrying a boring brown backpack instead of a super-cool Spider-Man one like a friend, whose parents love him, had. And a 6-year-old girl from Wisconsin was forced to sit at a dining room table for nearly two hours until she finished her canned green beans, a food widely considered by poll respondents to be disgusting and suitable only for adults.

"To hear the sadness in these kids' voices when they talk about how they are scared—literally scared—to bring home poor report cards, is heartbreaking," said Dr. Deirdre Fulton, child psychologist and director of the Nationwide Coalition to End Child Abuse, who co-authored the study. "Some of the children we interviewed even wished they were dead so their parents would feel guilty at their funerals."

"No child should ever wish to die," Fulton added.

According to pollsters, most victims were surprisingly open, even eager, to discuss their abuse, although some were less forthcoming about traumatic experiences that involved inappropriate touching.

"It's so embarrassing, and everybody sees it," said 7-year-old "Harry," whose mother hugs and kisses him goodbye in front of the school bus every day. "When it's happening, I close my eyes and wish it would stop, but it just goes on forever."

Other victims recounted similar forms of privacy invasion, such as being asked if they were wearing clean underwear, and being stripped naked and made to bathe, even after clearly stating that they did not need a bath.

Hair is another focus of unseemly pathological fixations, many children allege: Six out of 10 girls interviewed said that their mothers routinely and painfully pull, twist, and tug their hair into "stupid" hairstyles like pigtails, and some boys said that their mothers go so far as to use saliva to paste their hair into place.

According to the report, a shocking 100 percent of children who claimed to have been abused said their parents repeatedly answered "maybe" to a request, and then withheld from them a definitive answer for hours or, in some cases, days.

In addition to those who admitted to being touched inappropriately, 93 percent of children said they have, at one point or another, been subject to various types of physical abuse.

"My parents make me practice the piano for like 20 hours a day," said 8-year-old "Lacy," adding that sometimes she will hide in her closet to avoid rehearsal. "They told me if I hate it so much I can quit when I'm in seventh grade. That's like 40 years from now."

Some children, mostly boys, have even been pressed into brutal physical labor by their fathers, who demand their sons help them in the yard on Saturdays—one of only two days off for children who spend an average of 600 hours a week at school.

"He treats me like a slave," 12-year-old "Michael" said. "It's like it's my fault that my dad decided to buy a house with a lawn. And then when I do help, he says I shouldn't have had a bad attitude about it."

"Mom just sits there and lets the entire thing happen," "Michael" added.

In some of the more disturbing cases of abuse, parents reportedly take a domineering interest in their children's social lives, often threatening severe but undefined punishment for not being home by dark. Some children said their parents attempt to cut them off completely from the outside world, making many websites and television channels inaccessible and never letting them hang out with their friends.

The National Parents Association declined to comment on the overwhelming levels of abuse. When asked why they wouldn't comment, the NPA released a tersely worded statement: "Because we said so."

 

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FW: "I thought they smelled bad from the outside."

   from my friend Harry Jackson:
 
 

"...but it'll keep you warm kid."

http://gear.ign.com/articles/103/1034466p1.html

 

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O'Reilly Falafel Suit Turns Five

 
OCTOBER 13 -- Happy anniversary, Bill O'Reilly!

On this date five years ago, the Fox News Channel host was named in a sexual harassment lawsuit brimming with lurid details about vibrators, phone sex, threesomes, masturbation, Caribbean shower fantasies, a Thai sex show, falafel, stewardess trysts, vehicular coupling, and Al Franken.

full story at:
 http://www.thesmokinggun.com/archive/years/2009/1013091oreilly1.html


 

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Is this a "D'oh" or a "Woo-hoo" ?

 

 Marge Simpson makes cover of Playboy 

 

  

Reuters – Marge Simpson is seen on the cover of the November issue of Playboy magazine in this handout released …

 

 Sat Oct 10, 1:07 pm ET

LOS ANGELES (Reuters) – "D'oh!" doesn't even start to cover it. Marge Simpson -- the blue beehived matriarch of America's most loved dysfunctional family - is Playboy magazine's November cover, the magazine said on Friday.
 
Simpson, tastefully concealing her assets behind a signature Playboy Bunny chair, is the first cartoon character ever to front the glossy adult magazine, joining the ranks of sex symbols like Marilyn Monroe and Cindy Crawford.
 
Playboy said the cover and a three-page picture spread inside was a celebration of the 20th anniversary of the "The Simpsons" and part of a plan to appeal to a younger generation of readers.
 
Scott Flanders, the recently-hired chief executive of Playboy Enterprises, told the Chicago Sun-Times in an interview that the Marge Simpson cover and centerfold was "somewhat tongue-in-cheek."
 
"It had never been done, and we thought it would be kind of hip, cool and unusual," Flanders told the newspaper. He said the magazine hoped to attract readers in their 20s compared to the average Playboy reader's age of 35.
 
Playboy also promises a story inside called "The Devil in Marge Simpson". The issue arrives on newsstands on October 16.
 
Playboy magazine's circulation has slipped in recent years in the face of competition from the Internet, which offers free and plentiful pictures of naked women online.
 
The magazine's circulation fell 9 percent as of the end of June 2009, according to figures from the Audit Bureau of Circulations.
 
But Flanders told Reuters earlier this week that there were no plans to close the print edition. "Over my dead body will we quit producing the magazine in print," he said.
Homer, Marge, Bart, Lisa and Maggie have already been honored this year with a set of U.S. postal stamps marking the 20th anniversary of the longest-running comedy series on U.S. television.
 
Animated series "The Simpsons" debuted in December 1989 with a Christmas-themed episode called "Simpsons Roasting on an Open Fire." It has won 24 primetime Emmys and was renewed by Fox television earlier this year for two more seasons.
 
(Reporting by Jill Serjeant: Editing by Alex Dobuzinskis) 
 
 http://news.yahoo.com/s/nm/20091010/od_nm/us_simpson_4

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For all of your nonsense needs:

 
The Surrealist Compliment Generator

 http://www.madsci.org/cgi-bin/cgiwrap/~lynn/jardin/SCG

 

Your dainty nostrils flare with the humblest grandiosity of an ant swallowing a water buffalo.

 

and

 

May you always have stables of horses to service your needs.

  

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FW: NY TImes: How Nonsense Sharpens the Intellect

 from my friend Johm Durkin:

 

Follow-up to the NY Times article:

 

http://drboli.wordpress.com/2009/10/10/dr-bolis-press-clipping-bureau-19/

 

 

  ===== 

NY Times: How Nonsense Sharpens the Intellect
http://www.nytimes.com/2009/10/06/health/06mind.html

 

 

Q: What's the difference between a duck ?
A: Half his feet are both the same.
 
Feeling smarter yet?

 

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Prawo Jazdy: mystery motorist who bamboozled Irish traffic police

 
Irish cops have finally uncovered the identity of one of the Emerald Isle's "most reckless drivers" - a Pole who had by June 2007 clocked up over 50 speeding fines and parking tickets on the Garda Pulse computer system without once being convicted of a crime against motoring.
 
The penny finally droppped when a Garda traffic division operative discovered that Prawo Jazdy "is actually the Polish for 'driving licence' and not the first and surname on the licence".

 

http://www.theregister.co.uk/2009/02/19/prawo_jazdy/

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Booze news you can use.

science article:
 

 Are full or empty beer bottles sturdier and does their fracture-threshold suffice to break the human skull?

Journal of Forensic and Legal Medicine
Volume 16, Issue 3, April 2009, Pages 138-142

Stephan A. Bolliger MD, a, , Senior Forensic Pathologist, Steffen Ross MD, Radiologist, Lars Oesterhelweg MD, Forensic Pathologist, Michael J. Thali MDa, Professor, Director, Forensic Pathologist and Beat P. Kneubuehl PhD, Physicist
 
Centre for Forensic Imaging and Virtopsy, Institute of Forensic Medicine, University of Bern, IRM, Buehlstrasse 20, CH-3012 Bern, Switzerland

Abstract

Beer bottles are often used in physical disputes. If the bottles break, they may give rise to sharp trauma. However, if the bottles remain intact, they may cause blunt injuries. In order to investigate whether full or empty standard half-litre beer bottles are sturdier and if the necessary breaking energy surpasses the minimum fracture-threshold of the human skull, we tested the fracture properties of such beer bottles in a drop-tower.
 
Full bottles broke at 30 J impact energy, empty bottles at 40 J. These breaking energies surpass the minimum fracture-threshold of the human neurocranium. Beer bottles may therefore fracture the human skull and therefore serve as dangerous instruments in a physical dispute.
 
 

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Museum of Unintended Use

 Museum of Unintended Use

      http://unintendeduse.blogspot.com/


sample entry:
  
What does a neurosurgeon do if he needs to practice a new technique?
 
He orders a loose head at the anatomical lab.
 
Heads with soft blood vessels are best, because they resemble living heads.
 
At Utrecht University, the man managing the bodies donated to science found a way to soften the vessels.   He flushes them with... fabric softener!
 
"It even smells nice, now," he told the curator with a smile.

 http://unintendeduse.blogspot.com/2009/09/fabric-softener.html

 

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Museum of Unintended Use

sample entry:
 
 
What does a neurosurgeon do if he needs to practice a new technique?
 
He orders a loose head at the anatomical lab.
 
Heads with soft blood vessels are best, because they resemble living heads.
 
At Utrecht University, the man managing the bodies donated to science found a way to soften the vessels.   He flushes them with... fabric softener!
 
"It even smells nice, now," he told the curator with a smile.

 http://unintendeduse.blogspot.com/2009/09/fabric-softener.html

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Inside of a Dog mp3 d/l

WHYY RADIO TIMES
 Wednesday 10/7/2009;  Hour Two

When you bend down for your dog's kisses, is your dog happy to see you or happy that you may regurgitate some food?  Probably the former, but our guest, ALEXANDRA HOROWITZ finds it took dogs a long time to evolve from wild creatures to kissing companions.
 
Horowitz is a cognitive scientist who believes we must understand our dogs' surroundings before we understand our dogs. She has been studying the play of people and dogs and her new book is called, "Inside of a Dog: What Dogs See, Smell and Know."

Listen to the mp3
http://www.whyy.org/podcast/100709_110630.mp3

 
 


 

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article in Huffington Post

 
A friend of mine, Andy Meyer, has an excellent short article at the Huffington Post called:

 Why Is the Government the Health Care Boogeyman?"
 
He even did the cartoon.
 
 Click on:
 http://www.huffingtonpost.com/andy-myer/why-is-the-government-the_b_307220.html
 
 Enjoy!
 

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NY TImes: How Nonsense Sharpens the Intellect

 

NY Times: How Nonsense Sharpens the Intellect
http://www.nytimes.com/2009/10/06/health/06mind.html

 

 

Q: What's the difference between a duck ?
A: Half his feet are both the same.
 
Feeling smarter yet?

 
 

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One in three kids believe Google measures truthiness

 
Almost one third of British secondary school children believe Google ranks search results in order of their truthfulness, according to new research by Ofcom.
 
The statistic - great news for Wikipedians, terrifying for the rest of us - was reported in the communications regulator's annual report on children's "media literacy", out today.
 
Only a slightly larger proportion - 37 per cent - believe results are ranked on their usefulness or relevance. The next generation of cynics - 14 per cent of 12 to 15-year-olds - said websites pay money for the top spots.

full @
http://www.theregister.co.uk/2009/10/06/google_rank_ofcom/
 
 
 
 
 

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GE Shows Off 1TB DVD-Sized Disks at the Emerging Tech Conference

 
At the September '09 Emerging Tech Conference in Boston, GE announced it has been developing a 1TB DVD size disk that can be read by a modified Blu-ray player.
 
http://www.physorg.com/news173550252.html
 
=====
 
We continue to store more and more on less and less.
How long until we can store everything on nothing ?
 
 

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for Tacie

 

 http://www.theonion.com/content/news/cat_congress_mired_in_sunbeam

 

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Article by my friend Michael on Amazing Randi's website

 

Go to www.randi.org and check out the article called "Trying Another Approach".

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from the article (about a man who claims he can summon extraterrestrials by telepathy):

 

"he holds seminars for the scientifically illiterate to pay $175 each to attend.  Not only is this a singularly ineffective way to get the word out, it is scientifically immoral.  Scientists do not charge each other for access to their data,"

  

Charging people to learn the "Truth".

That's one small step for Science, one giant leap towards $cientology.

 

 

from his website:

"Steven M. Greer, MD. As the founder of CSETI (Center for the Study of Extraterrestrial Intelligence)..."

 

That's rather close to the well-known project SETI.

Coincidence?  I think not.

also from the CSETI website:
"Over the years CSETI has consistently held Ambassador to the Universe trainings with 30-50 people."
 
 

I'm so relieved that they're consistently training people.

It would be an immense faux pas if Aliens showed up on our doorstep, and there was nobody with the proper diplomatic skills to greet them.

       

 

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The Year of Living Biblically

I am currently reading a book called

"The Year of Living Biblically; One Man's Humble Quest to Follow the Bible as Literally as Possible "
by A.J. Jacobs

http://www.amazon.com/Year-Living-Biblically-Literally-Possible/dp/0743291484

From Publishers Weekly:
Starred Review.

What would it require for a person to live all the commandments of the Bible for an entire year? That is the question that animates this hilarious, quixotic, thought-provoking memoir from Jacobs (The Know-It-All).

He didn't just keep the Bible's better-known moral laws (being honest, tithing to charity and trying to curb his lust), but also the obscure and unfathomable ones: not mixing wool with linen in his clothing; calling the days of the week by their ordinal numbers to avoid voicing the names of pagan gods; trying his hand at a 10-string harp; growing a ZZ Top beard; eating crickets; and paying the babysitter in cash at the end of each work day. (He considered some rules, such as killing magicians, too legally questionable to uphold.)

In his attempts at living the Bible to the letter, Jacobs hits the road in highly entertaining fashion to meet other literalists, including Samaritans in Israel, snake handlers in Appalachia, Amish in Lancaster County, Pa., and biblical creationists in Kentucky. Throughout his journey, Jacobs comes across as a generous and thoughtful (and, yes, slightly neurotic) participant observer, lacing his story with absurdly funny cultural commentary as well as nuanced insights into the impossible task of biblical literalism.

Halloween: What to wear ?

Mechanically Separated Chicken would make a great Halloween costume!

Dress in pink, wear a screen on your chest, and glue feathers and bones to the front of it !

http://www.fooducate.com/blog/2009/08/03/guess-whats-in-the-picture-foodlike-substance/

Slim Jim: parts is parts

OK, so if you really want to see what mechanically separated chicken looks like...

http://www.fooducate.com/blog/2009/08/03/guess-whats-in-the-picture-foodlike-substance/

and now enjoy your breakfast...

What's Inside a Slim Jim?

 
What's Inside a Slim Jim?
 
"Mechanically Separated Chicken"
    ...you don't want to know.

http://www.wired.com/science/discoveries/magazine/17-09/st_whatsinside

 

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RE: Take this job and shove it... Literally

   
 I thought you'd enjoy this email volley of wit with John, a co-worker of mine.
 
Remember, I sent out an article about a guy who shoved a bomb up his ass.

 
John quoted from the article and replied:
"While keistering an IED is a novel tactic... "   Oooh, nice gerund.
  
I replied: "Abdul, your bombs are too large. They need to be assified."
 
He replied: "Al Qolon: Your Source for Rectum-Ready IEDs"
 
I replied: Gives new meaning to the term "Explosive Diarrhea"

 

Oh, the fun we have!

   

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