Star streaks

Do you see the cool stuff I could be doing with my camera if I would just buy it? No? Oh, well look here. I did actually stop at the Ritz next to CalTor during lunch today to look at it. They didn't have one. Talk about elusive. I'm going to stand by my decision not to buy one before I've had a chance to hold one and fool around with it a little.

oh gosh, the new civic

So I was never excited about the new civic like I was with the "new jetta" so I'm not nearly as disappointed with the result. (Have you see those jettas? They're terrible.) Anyway, the pics are out of the civic and the opinions are mixed. Here's mine:

Imagine a previa and an impala had a baby. That's roughly what I think the civic looks like.

Turning crap into, gold?

Ford's got a concept car called the 'Iosis'. It's actually pretty hot looking, especially for a Ford. Check out the 4 gull-wing doors. I'm a little confused by the shots they have of it. Here it looks like a scion, this says Lexus to me, and the back end looks like a Porsche. So I pretty much don't know what to think. Of course this is only a concept; what do you bet that nothing even close to this ever rolls out of Ford's stable?

On a side note, I like the new mustang better than the old one. Really they didn't have to do much to get that reaction, but I do like the retroish flare. However the rear end of it puzzles me. Maybe its ok, but they could have given it a little something other than that huge crest or whatever it is.

How to be an uncle

Well, the shortie dropped. Apparently he's a strapping lad, still yet to be named. Now I'm an 'uncle' with all its duties and obligations. If I can just figure out what those are I'll be set. I find this to be strangely like my 10th birthday. There was all this build up and then it happens and I look around and say "I don't feel any different." I spose that'll change when I actually see the 'spud' and I actually have a face to put to the name. (note, that pic is not the C-dawg)

Torch passing

So lets jump from the youngins to the oldins. Hendrikje van Andel-Schipper the world's oldest person died this morning. She was 115. She apparently had recieved an award for being a soccer team's oldest supporter; a feat that seems fairly simple, considering she was the oldest person. Anywhere. Anyway, it got me to thinkin that it must be rough to be the world's oldest living person. Seems like everyone is watching just to see when you're gonna kick it. Well, Elizabeth Bolden, you're up. Who's next in the on deck circle?

Son-of-a... School bus

Its funny how you miss some things when they're not around. Other things, I don't even notice are gone until they're back and pissing me off. I'm not even terribly inconvenienced by them, maybe it took me 3 minutes longer to get to work today. Its just the randomness of them. They're like big roaming traffic lights with no purpose but to indiscriminately stop traffic, not turn right on red, and disperse speed bumps. Before you get your panties in a bunch, I'm not saying that kids are like speed bumps in that my car goes 'thump thump' as I hurdle over them at 35 mph. Its more like I slam on my breaks when I see one headed anywhere near the street, cause god-knows where he's going. I think it was Dennis Leary who said having kids is like being around drunken midgets. I think that's very profound. I mean, I'm not worried about any normal looking adult jumping out in front of my car. Drunken midgets around, I think I'd be on the lookout.

Other times I think kids are like rodents. Damnit, will you let me explain? Cats, dogs, normal pets. You look at them and you can see the gears turning, they're trying to figure out something; its almost as if you know the internal dialogue. "How can I get that steak off the counter and eat it before anyone notices?" "How do you get these doors to open?" "What is this ass going to make me do next?" Very transparent. Now, on to pet rodents. Rabbits for example: I have no idea what's going on in that peanut up there. "I'm sitting still. I'm sitting still. I'M RUNNING!!!! I'm sitting still." There has to be more going on up there, but I'm not your guy if you need a rabbit-whisperer. Every once in a while I feel like I've got it, but then the thing will invariably freak out in some way and all my assertions are out the window.

Now, back to the shorties. I'm not as consistently baffled as with rodents, but sometimes its like there's no causation at all. I'm all for doing stupid things, but you have to have a reason. Even if it is stupid. And you also have to be able to survive the consequences. Even if they are stupid. Maybe some kids have dog brains and some got dealt a rodent. That would really would bring a bit of order to my world. But here's the real question: Can you tell who's going to grow up to be a moron? Cause lets face it, there are morons out there. And they had to come from somewhere.

Update
Ok, so rabbits aren't rodents. Now I know. But in my own defense, the article says that the families of lagomorpha are "commonly confused with rodents" and used to be classified as a superfamily under rodentia until 1912.

Oh 20D let me count the ways...

So I found a camera to fall in love with. It has everything a camera should have and more. Great features, nice body, well placed knobs, removable accessories. There's only one problem: her dad hates me. Oh, I mean, its really expensive. I found this pretty bangin offer on ebay for a whole package with lenses, tripod, cases; the whole thing. And at a good price for what you get too. Its still a lot of money though. Argh! Why are nice things always so costly? Ok, how about you give me some money to help supplement the purchase, and I'll take your portrait? Photograph your soccer game? Be your wedding photographer? *gulp* Boudoir photography? Come on, I'd diein' here!

Wow, now that's bad.

I found a list of the top 10 worst album covers of all time at "Pork Tornado" (I don't know, don't ask me) You should go read the searing commentaries on what I'll have to admit are the worst cover art I've ever seen.Link

Update
And read some of the other entries there too, Dusty is kinda like Steve, only single. He seems to have an amusing adventure nearly every day.

Fort
Razor
Bad day
Coffee

Strangely poignant

Soooooo... Sorry guys. Apparently placebos do have a physical effect on test subjects. All this time I thought the worst I could do was inflict psychological damage. My bad. Of course, I never made any claims that this site would alleviate any pain, so lets hope the extra endorphin release was kept to a minimum. You can read all about it at New Scientist, although it gets a little confusing at the end. Or maybe that was just the pills talkin.

What have you guys been doing?

Great news! Aston Martin, freshly acquired by the Ford Motor Company, expects to see a profit for the first time in 40 years. WHAT? You guys haven't made any money in 40 years? Wow talk about staying in it for the love of the game. The change comes from selling, oh, twice as many cars as last year moving the number up to 5,000. Hmmm, maybe I'll actually get to see a Vantage or a Vanquish on the road sometime. I won't hold my breath though. I spose I should be more into the db9(PDF), because of its roots, but it wasn't in GT3 so I don't really know how to tell it from a Vantage(PDF). Maybe they should give me one so I can study up. Read jalopnik's write up if you like, I particularly like the conclusion:

In other news, Jaguar was seen rocking in place, sucking its thumb and uttering "“bollocks, bollocks" under its breath.

Update

Ok, I did some research and got some profile views of the V8 Vantage and a convertible db9. I have to say I think I still prefer the Vantage. Although if I could get my hands on a dbr9(above) that'd be more than sweet cause that thing is friggin hot.("It's like my pool is tearing ass around the yard. Only it's standing still. Still waters run deep") I made some side-by-side wallpapers for dual monitors like this.

So stop asking me already!

Alright folks, there's a backdoor into gmail if you don't have any friends or aren't cool enough for your friends to spend invites on you. Hit this up and put your mobile number in to get an SMS invite. I don't know what the heck Google is going to do with your phone number so don't blame me when you start getting SMS spam asking if you're happy with your current car insurance rate. Actually, giving out gmail invites makes me feel pretty important with minimal effort on my part. Keep asking, and forget you read this.

Logical fallicy

Homer: Not a bear in sight. The "Bear Patrol" must be working like a charm!
Lisa: That's specious reasoning, Dad.
Homer: Thank you, dear.
Lisa: By your logic I could claim that this rock keeps tigers away.
Homer: Oh, how does it work?
Lisa: It doesn't work.
Homer: Uh-huh.
Lisa: It's just a stupid rock. But I don't see any tigers around, do you?
Homer: (pause) Lisa, I want to buy your rock.

cum hoc ergo propter hoc
What logical fallicies do you encounter everyday?
Oh, I'm thinking about this becuase of the temperature-pirate correlation on FSM.

Its so much work

Did eveyone else hear about this and I'm just doing a really bad job of paying attention again? 300 Bombs explode in Bangladesh and I hear nothing about it? Granted I don't watch the nightly news (mostly I can't stand it) but I didn't read about it anywhere either. There's just so much information to consider processing every day. I get overloaded and lose interest, then something happens that I might be interested in but I'm not attending to the media any more. We really need to devise advanced filtering methods other than massive assult to my brain. RSS is nice, but there are still so many entries from so many sources, and then there are the sources that don't have RSS yet. Uh, I gotta go rest my head.

The shack... of donkey

Hop over to the donkeyshack. Cause I said so. I'm the blogger you're the clicker. Get to Clickin.


Yes, I'm pimping you. I don't do it often, shut up.

Uh oh AIM

Well, it seems that Google is going to step into the instant messaging and voip(not true voip) worlds with Google Talk. Go here to get it. Add me to your list and we'll get to talkin. I believe some very smart person predicted this occurrence oh about 3 weeks ago. Also, does everyone still have the adds in gmail on the right that apply to the content of the email? I can't remember if I did something sneaky, but mine are gone.
Update
Oh, and i got the new Google desktop search yesterday (it takes about a day to full index) with the slider bar. Its kinda crazy. You can search for files like normal, but there are other modules too. Like:"web clips" (an rss reader),"news" from popular news sources,weather, frequently used, "what's hot", and mail. This isn't just gmail folks. Its all your mail. You supply your gmail info, so it goes and checks it. There's some kind of search interface with outlook so it knows what's there, and magically it knows about thunderbird and checks those accounts too. freaky. But nice.

If only Dave were around

We all know that Wendy's is open till the wee hours of the morning so we can "eat great, even late". This was always awesome in college, but I never found myself at a wendy's in-county with out a car, mostly cause you have to drive everywhere down there. However this weekend has brought a great inequity to my attention. What about those people who, in the wee hours of the morning, find themselves hungry but (for reasons outside of their own control) unable to operate a motor vehicle?

I myself was in this very situation on Saturday night since, in the interest of conservation and social awareness, I used the city's Metro system for transport. An acquaintance and I lined up at the fast food establishment in hopes of acquiring a delicious snack, however when we noticed that everyone else in line seemed to be riding in some sort of personal transport device we had to rethink our strategy.

In a fit of brilliance we managed to sweet talk a couple of ladies in one of these cars into purchasing the order for us, and of course we paid our share. While we were waiting next to the car, inching forward as the line progressed, we looked back to the rear of the line just in time to see another two people with our common affliction walk up and stand in line behind the last car. Needless to say this made us feel better, since we were not the only ones to attempt what seemed such a foolish task. With what can only be described as a sense of fellowship and good will we suggested to our carless cohorts that they too secure an arrangement with one of the cars in line.

This kinda makes me nostalgic for the days when hitchhiking was acceptable, if not encouraged for people with an adventurous spirit and a flare for conversation. Perhaps that is a lost art in this age of safety, security and suspicion. It seems like we could examine the institution of hitchhiking and try to extract the essence of it. So that maybe we can re-apply those concepts to a new paradigm, one that is acceptable in the 21st century. So when you find yourself at a latenight drive-thru, reach for your sense of community and buy that drunk kid standing in line next to your car a JbCb.

Frosted mini-cache

The little sons of bitches found my frosted mini wheats. I had noticed a fairly intense stream of workers headed behind my fridge, so I did a little investigating. Turns out they'd found a way up ontop of the fridge and into the box of mini wheats. I'm pretty sure the bloodbath that ensued when I caught them with their "hand in the mini wheat jar" will go down in the annals of ant history. I'm not sure how many ants are in this colony, or how fast they can produce new troops, but this was a serious loss on their part. Mostly I was pissed off cause I wanted a bowl of mini wheats, but instead I had to dump the rest of the box into a ziplock bag and throw it in the trash. That's it, I'm goin back to the store and buying the old kind of ant traps (the kind they liked) and anything else that says it might kill ants. I know the apartment management will take care of this, but at this point its more of a vendetta. Or maybe calling in reinforcements would be like admitting that I couldn't handle this minor threat to my kingdom. Anyway, I'm done messing arount with these fuckers. Its GO time.

Hydration solutions

So one of my errands yesterday was to head over to the L.L. Bean Store to get a Camelbak. I got a "Cloud Walker" and despite the borderline-prissy name I love it. Hell, I wish I was wearing it right now. I filled it up and wore it during dinner and some Aqua Teens (Oohh, I just ate an entire bathtub full of cherry cobbler.) and then I watched Sin City. It was a regular marathon. I will say this though: prepare to have to pee. A lot. Anyway, you should head over to the website and check out the various products, they're pretty money. (oh, and it was cheaper at the store than at the website, plus you get that ubiquitous L.L. Bean return policy.)

Bagel run

Have you ever spent 70 dollars at a Dunkin Donuts? Its kinda liberating. Especially when you know you'll get paid back. And also when you know you don't haveta eat all that on your own. They don't take AmEx though, bummer. I've been doing pretty well buying things on that card and getting reimbursed with cash, its a good way to work up to my 6 grand without spending too much. Although I guess for the scheme to work I'd have to use the cash to pay the bill, not on stupid shit like usually seems to happen when I have balls of cash in my pocket.

10 mph

So I finally caved and went to check out the trailer at 10mph today. Its actually very well done. Good camerawork, edited well, stunning photos, and well designed web page. These guys know what's up. It looks like there might actually be something insightful in the film after you get over the comedy of riding a segway across the country. Please don't let it become a numa numa.

Slick ad

I kinda remember this when it first came out, but you don't really see it any more. Its an Accord commercial where a bunch of parts interact in improbable ways. Apparently it took 606 takes to film correctly and 2 hand made Accords. Click for some more details.

Torn, I'm just torn

So I don't know whether this makes me feel better or worse about chicken nuggets. Apparently we've out-scienced our need for chickens. And honestly they're pretty messy, so that should be dynomite. But there's just something that gives me the jibblies about eating meat grown in a lab. Of course that just leads you down the dark path of wondering what's actually in chicken nuggets now. Whoa, here they come again... the jibbily-jibbliy.

"If it McComes from where I McThink it does, I don't want to McEat it!"

I told you not to glue horns to the roof of your mini

But seriously, this is awesome. Apparently lions have been attacking smart cars and minis because they're small enough to be Mistaken for prey. I can totally see this being the new thrill ride at Kings Dominion: "be an antelope, escape the lion pride!"

You do go blind!

So apparently shockingly hot pictures make your vision inoperable for a fifth of a second. At least that's what these poindexters have concluded from their study of showing people landscapes interspersed with steamy porn. I know I should give them the benefit of the doubt, but what about desensitization? Perhaps after hundreds of landscapes, the mind gets bored with landscape and finds naughty pieces a bit more interesting. I'd like to know if the same thing happens if you show some one hundreds of nudie pics and occasionally a landscape. That'd be worthwhile inquiry. Or maybe our brains are just innately more concerned about some things over others. When I have a nice steak, I'm not worried about trying to taste the fork.

A steaming hot cup of...

So I just pre-ordered myself up a steaming hot cup of scrubs. I really hope there aren't more shows that I really really like and have to buy on DVD months before they are actually released. Ha, what am I talking about? Of course there won't be good shows on tv, they cost money and no one watches them. Sweet, I think I'm in the clear.

Rankings, shmankings

So the Summer league rankings came out.

1 Edge 9 - 0
2 Fuzzy Naval 9 - 2
3 Dan's Flesh Hunters 9 - 1
4 Golden Shower 8 - 3
...Losers

My team is apparently now the 'flesh hunters' (we've had name problems all season). Anyway, I'm obviously not the guy who does this, and I don't want to be. But isn't there something off about this? The first three teams have 9 wins. Ok, fine we need some way to rank them, how about who lost the fewest games? Fine, but didn't we loose less than fuzzy navel? Lets say we'll base it on most games played (after most wins, so golden shower is still out.) that's fine too, fuzzy navel takes first but we still played more games than edge. All I'm saying is that I think we should be second, no matter how you organize it. Maybe we pissed off the wrong guy and humiliated his team with a sound ass thumping. Ah whatever, I just like bitchin.

Update
Oh, we're better than everyone.
Now we've got a plaque to prove it.

Holding back their tiny hair

Ah, the long awaited hangover gene. But seriously, how boring is your job if you're 1) stressing out fruit flies 2)getting them drunk and 3)waiting until they sober up again. How the hell do you tell if a fruit fly is sober anyway? For that matter how do you tell when they're intoxicated? Do you listen real close and wait for them to start saying "I love you, man"? Maybe they hold a tiny FST(field sobriety test) where they have to touch their palpus with their antennae while saying the alphabet backwards.

(Also worthy of noting; in Wikipedia a fruit fly is also "a heterosexual woman who consistently associates with homosexual males, also known as a "fag hag" or "flame dame." Maybe that's what they're doing this testing on.)

Dropping me into the 30th percentile

So I just got this one wrong on Peakaboom. Anyone? Come on!!! That's a Cheetah! How can I be held responsible for the misclassification of the training set data? You want a leopard, I'll find you one.

(oh and i don't mean to brag (yes i do) but i'm usually up in the 95-98th percentile)

could i be getting better and better?

Playing games builds minds

This is pretty cool stuff. I was all about 20Q.net when i first heard about it. You know, neural nets and all that jazz. This article talks about a similar type system that was designed at Carnagie Mellon called Peekaboom. It takes a similar idea as 20Q (users train the system for better accuracy) and applies it to a more useful end product. Instead of hard work generating a stupid game, a stupid game is used instead of hard work. The game is basically data collection for use with visual recognition programs. In the end it'll mean that search engines will actually examine the pictures they return, not just the text around them. Now we're getting into the utopian 21st century where our games are more productive than the hardwork of our forefathers. This just makes me happy. Oh, and the game is actually pretty fun, you should go play.

If I'm not smarter, at least I make more money

So the ants are making a run at my apartment. They found my stockpile of coughdrops in the kitchen. Luckily those are more of a cold season provision and I'll be able to secure replacements before winter hits. We have a pretty well coreographed guerilla warefare going on. They hit the kitchen with precision raids while I'm gone. I step on them and leave the corpses lying around for a while. If you were an ant and ventured out somwhere and saw 20 of your buddies lying twisted and deformed, would you mess around with going in there? I wouldn't. I'll tell you what else, those little guys don't like scrubbing bubbles. I dunno what the hell is in there but its pretty money. Makes me kinda think twice about getting too much on me. Of course, it might not be the chemical but the bubbles. As depicted in the commercial they spring into action like antibodies attacking soapscum. Perhaps they still get the job done with larger foes too. If those ants want this place so bad they're gonna have to come up with a better plan. I know! I should leave a little note on the ground in the kitchen just to let them know what the rent is. I'm pretty sure they'll want nothing to do with that and resign to living outside. Or, hey, maybe they'll cut me a check. Of all the types of insects out there, I could most easily see ants being loaded.

"I don't kill flies but I like to mess with their minds. I hold them above globes. They freak out and yell, 'Whoa, I'm way too high!' "
--Bruce Baum

Couldn't they just outsource some scheduling software?

Ah, yes, there's nothing quite like making fun of people. Particularly when they're different from us. Read the Onion's newest jab at terrorism in their standard style.

"I had a man last week get stuck in traffic while driving a car bomb to the Mendi Temple," al-Shimiri said. "When he arrived, he found it already on fire. We don't fill the cars up with enough gas to make two-way trips, so he was forced to blow up a nearby disco. This is madness."

I do like that way they rationally step back and examine situations to find a reasonable conclusion.

Speed me up, Scotty

I wonder if this works for cell phones too, cause honestly my wireless web is slow as molasses crossing the tundra. (and as we all know molasses is notorious for its poor sense of direction)

News to me

"Advocate groups are up in arms following a UK court’s decision not to revoke the driver’s license of Anna Walewska, a teenage race driver and Formula One hopeful — who was busted in the UK for driving 100mph in her Ferrari."

Wait. Wait. Wait. There are teenage girls racing around the UK in Ferraries? Why am I just finding out about this now?