Random Walkings
"I'm short, I'm overweight, and I'm losing my hair." To heck with
Governor-- Cruz Bustamante for
President.
Butt Monkey Beer: it's not just for breakfast -- it's for governor.
Strawberry Banana Supreme: I want to make these on the playa!!!
PRESSTUBE: Nice flash animation that dad found.
Kim: Hello. I would like a nonagression pact.
US: That's not necessary. Let us reassure you of this by parading half of our massive Naval might in your general vicinity.
Kim: Oh, well now that is reassuring. I no longer feel the need for a nuclear deterrent.
US: Thank you.
Kim: Have you seen Gigli, by the way?
An old chestnut:
Bernard Lietaer on alternative currencies. Mentions good ole Ithaca Hours. All available information suggests that the Brooklyn Greenback is now a defunct currency; as far as I can reckon, it was run by the local Green party. Politically-aligned currencies suck ass, and the Greens should have known better.
You know, I was thinking, if this had happened in the 80's, there would have been widespread rioting and looting, but then, you know, I thought: but if this had happened in the 80's, there would have been breakdancing! So, you know, it's a different city now, for better or worse.
I was shamed Thursday night to discover that I'd forgotten what the constellations looked like. A refresher:
star chart,
mythology.
<irresponsible Parisian-baiting>
Several times, we tried to find a place to relieve ourselves en route to the Manhattan Bridge. We tried "L'Orange", in Soho. The French restaurateur or whatever refused to let us use the facilities, which was understandable, but then suggested that we "piss on the street. Everybody will be pissing in the street anyway."*
Well, for the record, we didn't (not that it wouldn't have been satisfying to piss on some overfunded Soho denzien's doorstep), and we didn't see anyone else doing so, either. It's one thing to drain the dragon on the curb when you've been guzzling Tecate for the past six hours, but another to do so in daylight while sober.
Anyway, another reason not to visit Paris, I guess.
*not approximated here: outrageous French accent.
</irresponsible Parisian-baiting>
"Mel Gibson vs 'The Jews'". Oddly, I want to see this movie.
Statistically, this is music. It's
almost Zion Dub:
Eigenradio makes its optimal music by analyzing in real time dozens of radio stations at once. When our bank of computers has heard enough music, it will go to work on making more just like it. [...] One song on Eigenradio is worth at least twenty songs on old radio.
And just in case you don't visit it every minute of every day,
Baloney.com really
is MAXIMUM SCIENCE, and deserves your support.
Aw shit. It appears the spectrometer on one of the outgoing Mars rovers is failing. However, guys with glasses assure us that they will do everything within their power to extract "maximum science" from the mission nevertheless.
MAXIMUM SCIENCE!
This is cool.
The MDI Air Car is a car that is powered by compressed air. It apparently has a range of 300km, and can hit speeds of 110km/hr.
Reagan-appointed
Justice Kennedy Speaks Out against draconian sentencing guidelines that last year kept 2.1 million Americans behind bars.
From the Gadget Covet dept:
Handspring Treo 600
G.T. Labs publishes comic books about scientists. Their forthcoming book
Suspended In Language, a comic-book biography of
Niels Bohr, could be interesting.
Register to vote in upcoming California gubinatorial "special" election:
California Secretary of State - Elections
Bjorn Lomborg is always worth listening to. His most recent article on global warming:
Telegraph | Opinion | Let's take a long, cool look at the dangers of global warming. His recent book,
The Skeptical Environmentalist, was roundedly smeared in such prestigous publications as
Nature. Love him or hate him, he at least has a good point about
the environmental movement being overrun by professional environmentalists who make their bread and butter selling
fanciful doomsday scenarios to the public.
The other day on NPR, I listened to an otherwise intelligent interview with Richard Ellis regarding his new book, The Empty Ocean. While I agree that declining fish stocks is one of the more pressing environmental problems facing us today, his interview was filled with exagerations and out-and-out lies (for example, Ellis claims that GM fish have already escaped from fish farms -- an impossibility, since GM fish farms are not yet operating). When confronted by a caller, Ellis admitted to fudging his facts to try and stress the importance of his issues to the reader.
Friends like Ellis, the environmental movement doesn't need.
The Losers Lounge: Oh no, it's de-vo!
Melanotan.org, a cure for the fat, limp-dicked white boy.
But haplodiploidy creates some bizarre family dynamics (see large image link). A mother's relatedness to her son is 0.5, but consider the same relationship from his perspective and r rises to 1.0. Sister-brother relationships are also unequal: from the sister's viewpoint, r is 0.25; from the brother's, it is 0.5. Mothers and daughters have a relatedness of 0.5, whichever way you look at it, and r for two sisters is always 0.75.
--
The (honey bee) police state
Baseball cap: check. Wife-beater: check. 40 of King Cobra: check.
Thank you, Modesto Bee. (
via)
arch Meets hello-world: more arch documentation. Hoo doggy, a complicated system.
All this Benazir Bhutto stuff is making me nostalgic. Remember when both Pakistan and India had Chicks In Charge? Then one got shot and the other got booted. Now they've both got the bomb. Shit happens.
An Introduction to the arch Version Control System, looks interesting. Change sets are yummy. Too bad it doesn't build cleanly in Solaris.
I was at an anime-themed rave last night, and the projectionist was showing clips from
Ying xiong (2002) ("Hero"). Holy shit, this film is the holy grail of asian action flicks.
I couldn't find a place that has the Honda EU1000 available for rental. But I did find a place that rents
Yamaha EF1000, yamaha's competing generator. At 58dB, it's a lil noisier than the honda, but it's still quiet enough. Quality Rental in SF (285-1123) rented it to me for $100/wk, $25/day, they're located at 1680 Evans Ave.
