China's where it's AT

Chinese couple tried to name baby "@"

BEIJING (Reuters) - A Chinese couple tried to name their baby "@", claiming the character used in e-mail addresses echoed their love for the child, an official trying to whip the national language into line said on Thursday.

The unusual name stands out especially in Chinese, which has no alphabet and instead uses tens of thousands of multi-stroke characters to represent words.

"The whole world uses it to write e-mail, and translated into Chinese it means 'love him'," the father explained, according to the deputy chief of the State Language Commission Li Yuming.

full story @ : http://uk.reuters.com/article/oddlyEnoughNews/idUKPEK36827920070816?feedType=RSS&feedName=oddlyEnoughNews

=====

I predicted something like this would happen!
See http://silent3.blogspot.com/2007/01/imwtk.html

"Help! Mom! There Are Liberals Under My Bed!"

LA Times:

Publisher aims to teach kids right from left

A Torrance executive says he sees too many children's books with liberal views. His titles aim to tilt the shelves the other way.

By Stephanie Simon, Times Staff Writer
June 1, 2007

PUBLISHING executive Eric Jackson's first foray into children's books was a cartoon tale of two brothers and a lemonade stand.

Hoping to earn money for a swing set, young Tommy and Lou squeeze lemons until their little hands ache. But they are thwarted by broccoli-pushing, camera-hogging, Jesus-hating liberals who pile on taxes and regulations and drive the boys out of business.

The book, "Help! Mom! There Are Liberals Under My Bed!," came out two years ago. Jackson said it sold nearly 30,000 copies, which in the publishing world made it a bona fide hit. That success reinforced Jackson's view that the nation's bookshelves had tilted way too far left and that a correction was in order.

Kindergartners these days can leaf through a picture book promoting the virtues of medical marijuana. They can read a fairy tale about two princes who get married — to each other.

But where are the children's books denouncing affirmative action? The fairy tales promoting gun rights?

full article: http://www.latimes.com/news/printedition/front/la-na-kidbooks1jun01,1,4368369,full.story?coll=la-headlines-frontpage&ctrack=3&cset=true

...and the Academy Orwell Award goes to...

News Item:

The Motion Picture Association of America announced that images of adults smoking will now be considered a factor when deciding what rating a movie should receive. Raters will now pay close attention to "depictions that glamorize smoking or movies that feature pervasive smoking outside of a historic or other mitigating context."

=====

Next step: Breakfast scenes with cholesterol-laden eggs and whole milk will be slapped with an "R" rating, too.

Golem!

Golem! (punk klezmer band)

"This is not your father's klezmer band... unless, of course, your father was Sid Vicious"
- Jewish Week

http://www.golemrocks.com/

"Warsaw Is Khelm" is thir new album's accordion-fueled, gypsy-punk gem.

Download MP3 at: http://www.spin.com/features/heythisisawesome/2006/07/060726_golem/

You, too, can look like a Spartan... maybe.

Here's an article about the workout that the actors and stuntmen did to get themselves into shape for the movie "300"

http://www.webmd.com/fitness-exercise/features/the-300-workout-can-you-handle-it?src=RSS_PUBLIC

excerpt:

Training for the actors required 90 minutes to two hours a day, five days a week, plus the same amount of time fight training. Stuntmen trained 90 minutes to two hours, five days a week, and another four to six hours fight training. Everyone was given just enough food to recover from the workout.

At the end of training, the following test was given:

• 25 pull-ups
• 50 deadlifts at 135 pounds
• 50 push-ups
• 50 box jumps with a 24-inch box
• 50 "floor wipers" (a core and shoulders exercise at 135 pounds)
• 50 "clean and press" at 36 pounds (a weight-lifting exercise)
• 25 more pull-ups -- for a total of 300 reps

There's no rest between movements and the score is based on total time

Pesach Pot

JERUSALEM (Reuters) - Marijuana is not kosher for Passover, a pro-cannabis advocacy group says, advising Jews who observe the week-long holiday's special dietary laws to take a break from smoking the weed.

The Green Leaf Party announced on Wednesday that products of the cannibis plant have been grouped by rabbis within a family of foods such as peas, beans and lentils that is off-limits to Jews of European descent during Passover.

The Green Leaf Party, which has made several unsuccessful attempts to win election to parliament on a platform urging marijuana's legalisation, said it was issuing its advisory as a service to Jews who don't want to break ritual law.

But it said the rabbinical ban for the holiday beginning at sunset on Monday, during which many Jews eat matzos, or unleavened bread, could be a blessing in disguise.

"Logic dictates that if the rabbis say cannabis is non-kosher for Passover, it is apparently kosher during the rest of the year," Michelle Levin, a spokeswoman for the party, told the YNet news web site.

http://uk.reuters.com/article/oddlyEnoughNews/idUKL2857645120070328?feedType=RSS

=====

So... how do you sell your marijuana Chametz to a non-Jew without getting busted for Dealing?

Then again, you *can* burn this kind of Chametz. Stand downwind at your own risk.

New Technology ... the "book"

Here's how people performed
Tech Support in the Middle Ages...

http://youtube.com/watch?v=LRBIVRwvUeE

"Hard Day's Night" in Yiddish

The Beatles' "Hard Day's Night" in Yiddish!

http://www.honestly-concerned.org/Temporary/SchverehTogedikeNakht.mp3

National Lampoon (hey, remember them?) once put out an issue devoted to a parody of The Beatles. One part of the magazine featured "the albums the Fab Four never released".

One album was a take-off on the Beatles' LP Rubber Soul. (The album actually was influenced by an encounter The Beatles had with Bob Dylan).

In the National Lampoon's version, Dylan converted them to Judiasm. The Beatles then released... "Rabbi Saul".

The album contained songs such as "The Shul on the Hill" ... "Your Mother Should Only Know" ... "If I Kvell" ... "Hey Juden" ... "This Goy" ...

Web 2.0 explained in video

from a friend:

This video is getting mention all over the place, so you've probably seen it already. It is an attempt to explain the Web 2.0 concept.

Since it is, itself, a user-contributed video to YouTube, it is probably a fine example of Web 2.0 anyway.

http://mediatedcultures.net/ksudigg/?page_id=54

Enough gift ideas for a lifetime

ABRACADABRA SUPERSTORE
http://www.abracadabrasuperstore.com/

If they had the internet when I was a kid, this place would have gotten ALL my allowance money...

IMWTK

Given the popularity of strange names for babies of celebrities, combined with the observation that the young generation sees email, the web and IM as a natural part of life...

How long before we start seeing baby names like...

LOL

LEET (or 1337)

or perhaps a name like "Colon Parenthesis Smith" ... which would be written as :) Smith