Way more fun than it oughta be.

Best mugshot of 2005.

Tomorrow I'm going to do this to K-Mart.

Missed a Darwin Award by [ ] THAT much!

They say that necessity is the mother of invention. Well, perhaps this guy is a little too close to that mother.

I'm not sure if posting on Reprobates qualifies as type "a" or type "b" procrastination, but I'm pretty certain it's not type "c".

"It is difficult to make predictions, especially about the future", as many people have allegedly said. Not Dr. Mysterian though.

Can anyone read Japanese - I reeeaaallly need to know what these are actually for...

At last, the truth about the rather curious speech habits of Dubya - it's all carefully scripted.

You want a War on Christmas? I've got your "War on Christmas" right fucking HERE, buddy!

Every once in a while you come across an image that on its face is quite innocuous, but upon reflection is just deeply disturbing.

I consider this image to be in that category.

Real-time flight tracking and a whole lot more - here.

Can you say issues? Maybe this will lead to a whole slew of chicks having silicone replicas made of something so they can have them implanted in their chests, like, say, one of these.

Bugatti Veyron

Can any production road car exceed 250mph? The Bugatti Veyron is a brute vying to.

Windy?

This is what I need: A job where I get to break stuff in unimaginable ways, and get paid lots of money to do it. I especially love the last line:

"It's a service we provide"...

I've said it before, and I'll say it again. When the writers at the Onion are on, damn, they are on. Below I present a prime example from the current edition, and I have to say the way they have combined the themes of Bush's ignorance and religious fervor with Cheney's Machiavellian conniving is, to my mind, nothing short of flawless:

"Voice of God" Revealed To Be Cheney On Intercom

I mean, you know, "Jokes? I get jokes!" and all that, and I've made a few people laugh in my time, but once in a while you're confronted with a line like that and ... wow. That's comic genius. The mental imagery it conjures up - man, I'd kill to be able to come up with one like that.

They say comedians are some of the hardest people in the world to make laugh. You tell 'em a great joke, and they sit there, just analyzing it, trying to see how it works, and then they discuss it, earnestly, picking it to pieces. If that's the price of being one of the comedy greats, then I'm actually happy just being regular Joe Schmuck, laughing his ass off at funny shit.

The hills are alive, with the sound of ... jackboots?

Desperate Airlines

I flew with 2 turkeys from IAD to LAX last week. Details here.

Shoot the lock off

Stuck down an alleyway behind a locked gate? Bad guys coming up fast? Why not shoot the lock off? Because it's hard, that's why.

In these days of high(ish) gas prices many people are considering ways of using less fuel while commuting. With some obvious exceptions a Diesel gets better mileage than a gas motor and motorcycles are some of the most efficient vehicles of all. What was that? What were to happen if were to combine those two ideas?

Someone crazier than you already did it. Nice try, Edison.

Presenting Sin Destroyers - the world's Christianest rock band.

The very best kind of satire is that which takes something that's just begging to be parodied and tweaks it slightly. By this measure, The Onion once again delivers in spades.

Educate-Yourself.org is a free educational forum dedicated to the dissemination of accurate information in the use of natural, non-pharmaceutical medicines and alternative healing therapies in the treatment of disease conditions. Free Energy, Earth Changes, and the growing reality of Big Brother are also explored since survival itself in the very near future may well depend on self acquired skills to face the growing threats of bioterrorism, emerging diseases, and the continuing abridgement of constitutional libertie

The ironically-named "educate yourself" website aims to be the one-stop portal-slash-clearinghouse for all your crackpot nonsense needs. And, by estimation, it succeeds. It's an odd mixture of stuff, to be sure, combining, as it does, such diverse craptacular subjects as UFOs, "chemtrails", colloidal silver (the substance that turned Montana Libertarian US Senate candidate Stan Jones blue), the New World Order and many more.

In this regard, it seems some parts of the site seem to bear the hallmark of the particular kind of weak-mindedness and doughy-headed "thinking" called New Age, other parts seem to embrace the paranoic ramblings of the John Birch Society, and still other parts engage in the messianic spoutings of Christian fundamentalism. All-in-all, it is an interesting - in a clinical sense - study of the machinations of people outside the "reality-based community".

So now they have a formula to calculate the prescription strength of beer googles. Perhaps they can use the same kind of thinking to figure out how fast you can travel on your beer scooter.

I love you...

...you love me! Let's all get together and sing about Biggie!

Green DayDean Gray presents American IdiotEdit. - a mash-up not to be missed.

Xtreeeeme paper models.

Babar? Is that you?

Unhealthy glow

Guy: Yo, that Hamburgler's a scary motherfucker, 'cause you never know what that nigga be sayin'. He be all "robble robble robble robble" and shit!

People say the damnedest things (Example comes from the first link)

And now from Penis Land...

Poorly choosen domain names.

Most. Disturbing. Themesong.

Evar!

Presenting, for your consideration:

The Adventures of Dr McNinja

and

Things To Do When You're Bored

Panexa - it's good for what ails ya.

Confessions of a Crypto-creative Geek

As a dedicated Mac guy and inveterate iLife and Photoshop Elements hacker, I sometimes like to engage my right brain and "do stuff" with the audio, video and music capabilities of those products.

Recently for example, I've been playing with the so-called "artistic filters" in Photoshop and I've been particularly enamored with the "cutout" and "watercolor" filters. The effect of both filters are easier to demonstrate than to describe:





Pretty cool, huh?

I've also turned videotapes of the kids into DVDs, complete with navigation menus, transitions, effects, music and so on. I volunteered my services at work the other day to produce some company-internal videos. The guy I was talking to said "How are you going to do that?" I told him I'd bring in my DV camcorder, shoot some video, then edit it at home. "Oh," he said, "Mac guy, huh?".

Last of all, and, for those who know me, most improbably, I've been dinking with GarageBand and Rax. GarageBand is the now-legendary easy-to-use studio application that comes with iLife, and Rax, a "virtual audio rack" that you plug software instruments and effects into. When we first got the Mac, we bought the kids an M-Audio Keystation 49e MIDI controller to play with, so I used that and "composed" a little four-note jingle to use on company podcasts (if you think four notes does not a jingle make, David Dundas and Channel Four might have something to say about that), and overlaid it with my voice which I recorded with a cheap Shure 8900 mic and a Griffin iMic USB audio adapter.

When I was trying to come up with a jingle, I just waited until I sort of "heard" the kind of thing I was after in my head, and, not really knowing the first thing about music, just sort of poked keys on the Keystation until I got it approximately right. Then I used the stave editor in GarageBand to slide the notes around until it sounded good. Over that, I looped a beat and added a final high note that fades out gently to sort of bring the thing to a close. I'm actually quite proud of it.

Audio logo

I figured I might also want some stripped-down versions to use as bumpers in between segments on a podcast. GarageBand's software instruments are really nice. Check out the modulation on the final note in the acoustic guitar version, or the audible key "thump" on the grand piano.

Acoustic guitar
Upright jazz bass
Vibraphone
Grand piano

Anyone who's ever played the game with me that involves mashing-up band names to come up with things like "Grateful Dead Kennedys" (and their best-known song, "Sugar Magnolia Fuck Off") will surely find this site instantly comprehensible and very funny.

If only they'd been around back then

If Faux News had been around through history some of its top stories might have gone a little something like this.

PS: While dutifully researching this blog entry I came across an interesting image of our fair president. [full story] Is that a microphone shadow over your crotch or were you scared pissless by your latest poll numbers?

It sure isn't pornography any more, but is it art?

Nice to know my home town in the news, even if it is firmly in the "oops!" category. Sig Sauer don't actually make a 9mm automatic pistol, only a semi-automatic, but never mind ...

The latest iPod - 60GB, 15,000 songs, cup size DD.

So when are we going to create regime change within the oppressive dictatorship of Wal-Martistan? Oop, never mind, nothing to see here.

Lost for words?

Never again, with the ProfaniWiki! Needs some work, so get contributing, you badger wanking sons of sultans!

A cautionary tail

NSFW, and also NSFlunch either. How *not* to go about first-time anal.

This actually sounds like it could make being in church tolerable. Until they have to go and spoil the fun with all that religious crap, anyway. Perhaps they're just trying to invent Church 2.0 - maybe they should ask this guy for some pointers.

Programming language inventor or serial killer? (Thanks John)

OMFG! (thanks, Chris)

The sooner we can proceed without DeLay, the better for the whole country.

High-speed photography and video, here, here and here.

Washing away again in 'Ritaville

Elderly terr'ists to blame for bus explosion? Oxygen canisters - not the same type that brought down KiluJet flight 592 - are apparently to blame here. But you can never be too sure - I've got $5 betting some of these wrinklies had been illegally buying their prescription meds from Canada, thus making themselves enemies of Big Pharmathe State so I don't think it's too much of a stretch to suggest they were, in fact, terr'ists.

I think it's also interesting to note that they can't even get the evacuation right in Bush's (adoptive) home state of Tex-ass. It's even in Republican Majority leader and former exterminator Tom DeLay's home district ferchrissake. And the fact that people are getting stranded in their "big" (because everything's big in Texass) 'merican-built dumbass SUVs because they're - get this - running out of fuel sitting in 103-degree heat on the gridlocked roads with t he A/C running - comedy gold.

Oh, and the 9th Ward of New Orleans is getting a good soaking again as water once again pours over the top of the levees. But no-one could have predicted that. And remember folks, none of this has anything to do with global warming.

Two great tastes that taste great together

Rev. Michael Hinton has spent two years cutting the Bible down to something that will consume only 100 minutes of your time. I can beat that by two years and 100 minutes.

Avian grief

A touching story of a swallow pining for a dead companion.

Although the first comment kinda spoils the mood.

Hey, God - like praying, only with more swear words.

More FSM goodness

He hath touched us with his noodly appendage so that we might enjoyeth his game!

He also hath created a T-Shirt in his noodly image. Check out the details from Boing Boing.

Signage for Jeeeesus

Endless hours of fun! Generate your own church signs, like this:



or this:



or even this:

Head To Christ

Ex-KoRn rocker Brian 'Head' Welch finds God. Uggh. If there's one thing worse than Nu Metal, it's Godbothering Nu Metal. Where are the nice heartwarming stories of young, teenage Bible-belters finding riches and salvation in honest, wholesome sex, drugs and rock and roll? Post! Post!

Internet vs. Real Life

Every now and then you turn over a rock and find someone not well-acquainted with the Internet. Finally: a for them.

Captain Canuck is on his way!

Wow - talk about friendly neighbours! The entire Canadian Navy (yes, we actually have a navy) is on its way to Nawlins to help provide disaster relief in the wake of Katrina and the Waves.

One more wow: In an eerie sense of foreshadowing, Popular Mechanics predicted the New Orleans disaster with remarkable accuracy, back in 2001. Even more ironic? The story was published on Sept 11. Yes, THE Sept 11.

Looking for the perfect gift for a loved one?

Why not give something decorative you made yourself? Say, right after breakfast?

If y'all haven't seen the transcript of the WWL radio interview with the mayor of New Orleans, y'all should. This guy kicks ass. Also, and this is something I've been waiting to see - before and after aerial pictures of New Orleans.

Daniel Dennett's reivew of Intelligent Design

Daniel Dennett has always been a favorite writer of mine. He put together a great review of lack of there-ness in the Intelligent Design argument.

Crack in my windshield

Driving down the 270 in Maryland, minding my own business, when all of a sudden, there's a crack in my winshield!

You heard it here first:

Q) Which pop group devastated New Orleans?

A) Katrina and the Waves

Q) And what song will they be covering next?

A) When The Levee Breaks

Post-modern advertising (Thanks, Nick!)

Places Reprobates live

This is a great list of Reprobate-friendly towns to live in... and it is brought to you by Scunthorpe.

Remember the phoenix personal submarine? Nice, but no good without an evil underwater lair. Now, the sub is $78m, the lair is $2.5m - I have about £20 and change in my wallet. Who's in? Muahaahahahahaaaa!

Great inline ad

Read the article - then look at what you can buy on the same topic..

Chicks dig candles. Guys dig auto racing. So how do you sell candles to guys?

Complete this sentence using one of the word pairs listed below:

"Squeezing X into the Y is a somewhat messy job"

a) X = jam, Y = donuts
b) X = Vetustodermis, Y = mollusca
c) X = fake cum, Y = porn star's cunt

Correct answer here.

The scene: a coffeeshop in Amsterdam, summer of 2003
Bob McDonald: Duuuude, this is some awesome Noorder Licht
Friend 1: Whoa, no shit
Friend 2: I'm soooo waaaaasted. Let's get some ice cream!
(They get ice cream)
Bob: Hey! Hey! Look at the crazy sticks these ice creams came on! I've got a great idea!
Friends 1 and 2: Yeah?
Bob: Let's build something with them!

This just in - the rapper formerly known as Sean Combs to join aging Liverpool comic Ken Dodd's troop of comedy midgets.

This soon-to-be in - the rapper formerly known as Diddy to change his name one final time, dropping the initial "D" and the terminal "dy", and appending the letters "iot".

Variously billed as "one of my favorite internet videos of all time" and "the greatest video in the history of the internet", this movie is indeed, pretty frickin' awesome. Yeee-haw!

Ladies and gentlem... who am I kidding? You're all reprobates. That's why you're here. Anyway, we have our first piece of comment spam - look at the comments for Monday's entry on Pentaho. However, when you are looking at the comments, kindly overlook the fact that I misspelled shit.

Chris' and my theory is that someone has compiled an index of all Blogger-hosted sites with an Atom or RSS feed, aggregated those feeds and put a bot on the trail of certain keywords. Scum-sucking weasels.

I flew on this very helicopter, June 13th, 2004. Probably won't be doing that again any time soon. Picture goodness here (that's it on the pad in Tallinn).

A couple of weeks back, I commented on the unfortunate qualities of the name Siliquent. This week, I bring you an even more bafflingly bad name - Pentaho. What is that exactly? A five-sided hooker? A quintet of prostitutes? Or just the kind of woman who'll only go down on a boat powered by Volvo marine engines?

George W. Bush does not exist.

Idiotwatch: Kate Hudson, bubbleheaded actress and daughter of arch-bimbo Goldie Hawn, recently blathered the following piece of nonsense -

"Almost Famous" actress Kate Hudson is making a habit of splashing water over herself to ward off bad Hollywood vibes. Hudson, 26, is so scared of attracting bad karma that she wears crystals to protect herself, according to World Entertainment News Network.

"When I'm around people who have bad energy," she says, "I usually carry some water and I just kind of, like, put it on myself. It's not like a holy water, just something to cleanse myself if someone's really negative. And I carry around crystals, too. I feel it's important to protect yourself."

Hmm. I'm thinking she could be persuaded that other, aah, liquids would be equally beneficial. Can anyone say bukkake? Yeah, I thought so.

Question: would a 14-year-old understand why this is funny? And if they did, would they still buy Nacho Cheesier® Dorito™-brand corn snacks? And wash them down with AMP® Mountain Dew™-brand soda?

"violent, confrontive prayer"

That little line comes from the linked article in Harper's on the New Life Church. Specifically, Pastor Ted is referring to how Christians can reclaim the cities of America... through "violent, confrontive prayer." I can't help but think that is thinly veiled code for racial/ethnic/religious-based ass-whoopings. This is in the same vein as "I'm gonna load up this here gun and meet that new non-Christian immigrant family's mailbox with violent, confrontive prayer, and possibly a burning cross as well."

The author describes the dining habits of the flock of New Life in Colorado Springs with the following:

It is not so much the large populations, with their uneasy mix of sinner and saved, that make Christian conservatives leery of urban areas. Even downtown Colorado Springs, presumably as godly as any big town in America, struck the New Lifers I met as unclean. Whenever I asked where to eat, they would warn me away from downtown’s neat little grid of cafes and ethnic joints. Stick to Academy, they’d tell me, referring to the vein of superstores and prepackaged eateries —P. F. Chang’s, California Pizza Kitchen, et al. —that bypasses the city. Downtown, they said, is “confusing.”

Ah, yes... confusing. Yeah, it's tough having choices. Like what to eat, or what to wear, or whom to vote for. It's hard having those tough tough choices. I guess it's best to cede control and let someone else tell you what to do. It's so much less confusing.

Well, speaking as one of those confused City dwellers, I say, stick to the exurbs, it's safer for you there. And when you do come to my town for some religious themed vacation, I'll be sure to give you excellent direction to food and entertainment.

(And now thanks to the wonder of Google the New Life Church, us Reprobates, Ben's Chili Bowl, and a directory of DC"s strip clubs are all linked together. I can't wait to see what ads we all have in common.)

There seems to be a definite theme going here - by complete coincidence, a friend (hi, Jeremy!) sent me a video clip today that illustrates a corollary to yesterday's post.

Here's the setup: "Imagine this... You just came to Texas Tech University as a freshman... You get the opportunity to make it big time as the football team's 'BELL RINGER' during their games... Your whole family, all of your friends, and about 10-15 million ESPN viewers will see you on a Saturday telecast ringing the team's bell.... "

Video goodness here.

Best. Sports headline. Evar.

Thanks are due to Ian for pointing out this interesting location in Google maps.

Small ads.

Ill-advised company names #147: Siliquent. There's a $1M prize(*) for the first example of this name in print without the "e" in it.

* - If you believe there is really a $1M prize for this, then you are a sili qunt.

What's wrong with being drunk? Ask a £42,500 bottle of water.

Carlsberg: Probably the best FUCK in the world.

Hot for teacher.

I can't explain why after having not posted for a very long time I am suddenly moved to post multiple links to interesting data visualization "projects". In any case, that is what I am up to this morning, particularly since I am five days away from my last day working for Lockheed Martin. Long story, nobody likely cares. So, with a bit of the STS (Short Timer's Syndrome), I am surfing all the blogs I know and love and bringing back the finds that most interest me for all of you to enjoy.

A bit sobering this time around. Many folks have found interesting ways to use Google Maps, like finding the cheapest gas in your area or sex offenders in Texas. Well, how about mapping out, over time, the hometowns of American casualties in Iraq?

Tube efficiencies or lack thereof. Well, just an neat QT movie that illustrates the overall inefficiencies of the London Underground. Sharing for those folks who use it and for those who love interesting data visualization.

Cybernetic parrot sausage. Also, Gefilte Fuck. No connection. OR IS THERE?!?! Dan-dan-daaa!

Airline pilots are eligible for Darwin Awards too. Good thing. Added goodness: the NTSB report.

Pop quiz. Take a look at this photo:



Quick like a bunny - was he arrested for:

1) Drugs
2) Vagrancy
3) Being the mastermind of a sophisticated international counterfeiting operation

Answer here.

Meet Ted Jesus Christ GOD.

When they made this film, I'm not sure this is what they had in mind.

Search and destroy. That is all.

Predictably, the new pope is not exactly a big fan of gay marriage. However, in denouncing the notion, he manages to tie himself into rhetorical knots that make a Fire Island game of Naked Twister (NSFW duh) look like a choir practice session. Wait, that's not a good contrast ... oh well. Damn those gays! How dare they desire to commit themselves to each other in a loving life-long relationship! Damn them all to Hell!

"Creationism: God's gift to the ignorant".

No surprise: that the author of this excellent article is Richard Dawkins
Surprise: that the article appeared in a Rupert Murdoch paper. Congratulations to the editors of The Times for having evolved a pair. But don't hold your breath waiting for it to show up on Fox News.

Reprobates presents: the proper etiquette for addressing people with surnames of the form de Something.

I love it when dumb, illiterate people misuse a big word and then try to explain to other people what the word means. Case in point - "43", aka Dubya, who's not exactly the sharpest spoon in the drawer, has been criticized on numerous occasions for his piss-poor vocabulary, inability to form a coherent sentence, total lack of intellect and so on, and has taken the criticism to heart. So, in an effort to speak at a level greater than fourth grade, he has presumably goaded his speechwriters into inserting a few Grown Up Words in his speeches. Hilarity, predictably, ensues.

From the BBC News website comes this gem:

Mr Bush said its accusations therefore stemmed from 
"people who hate America, people that have been trained 
in some instances to disassemble, that means not tell the truth".

Err ... no.

dissemble verb [intransitive]
conceal one's true motives, feelings, or beliefs : an honest, sincere person with no need to dissemble

disassemble verb [transitive] (often be disassembled)
take (something) to pieces : the piston can be disassembled for transport

Even more infuriating though is the usual elements of thought-control that have been woven into the propaganda that spews forth from the Bush Politburo. Examples:

accusations therefore stemmed from "people who hate America"

Deflect attention from the issue at hand, attack the credibility of Amnesty International (this is Amnesty fucking International we're talking about here, folks), and distract his pea-brained followers with some handwaving. Now, perhaps Amnesty International isn't exactly thrilled about America's current foreign policy, but this is not the same thing. However, this kind of simple-minded conflation plays well in the Midwest and the South, where most everyone is seriously fucking stupid, and, not entirely coincidentally, votes Repuglican.

Here's another beaut, from Satan himself this time (aka Richard B. Cheney):

"I think the fact of the matter is the United States has done 
more to advance the cause of freedom, has liberated more people 
from tyranny over the course of the 20th century and up to the 
present day than any other nation in the history of the world," 
said the vice president.

Now, for ten points, can anyone spot the logical fallacy here? Yes! You got it! America's historical record of advancing the cause of freedom has what to do with the record or intention of the present administration?

Fuck all! That's how much!

Once again, though, what this proves is - although Bush may be dumb (and dumb he is), he's still smarter than the people who voted for him.

Fly-powered airplane kit.

Well, what else is he going to say? "I was cleaning it when it went off accidentally"?

The classification of very small objects

You'll go blind ...

What do you get when you cross the blind hatred of Fred Phelps, the over-the-top rabid right-wing jingoistic rhetoric of Ann Coulter, the prose composition skills of a chimp, the batshit looniness of the TimeCube, a site design based on the ever-popular "laundry list" and a bitter, twisted, narrow-minded squareheaded ex-soldier?

You get this. Here's a hint - take the advice given by the domain name.

Wisdom, it is said, is something we receive just after we really needed it most. I bring this up because it seems the Repugnican dolt who pushed for French fries to be renamed freedom fries in the US Capitol cafeteria has had a change of heart about that whole invading-Iraq-on-a-political-whim thing.

So, French fries were petulantly renamed "freedom fries" when France - still an independent, sovereign nation of free people last time I checked - did not endorse Dubya's hamfisted and ill-advised attempt to take part in the Great Game. Should we now be clamoring to rename North Carolina as North Freedonia? Or maybe NC's twin cities should now become the tripartite of Raleigh-Durham-Baghdad? How about Research Sunni Triangle Park?

Corporate logos that look like cocks.

Darwin awards contestants: the geek division. Or maybe "not geeky enough to know better".

"In the Bay, they pile into their cars and, instead of driving normally, they'll hit the gas, then quickly hit the brake; hit the gas, hit the brake; hit the gas, hit the brake. And when they really want to get into it, they open all the doors on the vehicle, turn the music to its loudest possible volume and …"

Pointless debate results in amicable compromise. Sounds like an Onion headline, don't you think? Well, I guess the good news here is that after 500 years, two divisions of the Christian church that are almost indistinguishable to many people, have finally agreed on a compromise position and that "Catholic beliefs about Mary, revered as the Blessed Virgin, are compatible with Anglican traditions and that division over doctrine could end".

Heady stuff, no? With this kind of healing power, surely a solution to the rifts between Christianity and Islam can be found, oh, within the next 6,000 years or so.

Fictionology, for those who find Scientology a bit too "reality-based".

A face only a mother could love. Or not.

The qi stands alone

I have to admit up front, I don't have a lot of time for "alternative" medicine, especially the sort described in hushed, reverential tones as "traditional Chinese medicine" or, more accurately, as "pre-scientific hokum":

Me: My foot is broken
Practitioner of Traditional Chinese Medicine: Ah! Then you must cleanse your spleen! Take this ... decroded piece of crap and make tea from it. Drink the tea three times a day for six weeks and your spleen will be cleansed!
Me: But my foot is broken
PTCM: Foot is not broken. Body is not broken. Mind is broken.
Me: I can see bits of bone poking through the skin
PTCM: Your skin you say? Your qi is out of balance, we must recalibrate your blood.
Me: Talking of blood, I seem to be losing quite a bit of it here, I wonder if we couldn't maybe apply a tourniquet?
PTCM: Here! This is powdered gonads of rare, endangered Chinese koala ...
Me: Koalas? There aren't any koalas in China!
PTCM: I told you they were endangered. Now, you must make a paste from this powder with your own urine and ...
Me: I'm getting woozy ... going to ... faint ...
PTCM: See? The koala testicle powder is working already!

So anyway, I saw an interesting article today that seems to demonstrate that acupuncture works. But here's the interesting part - it doesn't matter if you the person sticking the needles in you is trained in the ancient arts of Traditional Chinese Medicine, can find (and discourse upon) the pathways by which qi or chi or, for that matter, cheese travels through the body, and describe the seventy-three healing herbs and sticks and disgusting bits of animals used in TCM ... or not.

From the Gallery of Regrettable User Interfaces, I bring you entry #37: the Flash-based epileptic-fit-and-motion-sickness inducing website of prepress software company Dalim Software. And if you're going to spew, spew into this.

The sooner this country can move forward without DeLay, the better.

This must be that "man date" he's been yakking on about since last November. Nice bit of layout editing, too, over there at the Dallas Morning News - big ups. Way up.

I don't really know why, but when I read this story I heard Yosemite Sam's voice in my head, saying "Hold still, varmint! I'm-a blastin' ye!"

Oh, and while I'm here, who thinks this little girl is likely to grow up to be an aid worker in Africa?

Now what they don't show you is how you hold the mouse still. NSFW, btw.

Here we go again (again). Next step: Microsoft to admit its software - Windows, Word, the whole shebang - simply is one big trojan/virus/zombie/spambot/worm, but not to worry, because it was all done to "improve the user experience". Happy, happy! Joy, joy!

Downloadable rock videos, by the shovelful. Get 'em while they're, err, there.

Those of you with children should be sure they're not being subject to subversive racist messages.

Submitted for your approval: the king of the stupid criminals.

I suggest we remove his feeding tube.

Skin. We've all seen it. Bags. We all need them. Skinbags?

Big in Japan

Best. Rock video. Evar.

Not what it seems

Despite the word "adult", and the multiple X's, it's safe for work. And, it's not what it seems...

Can't find yo shizzle on the interneezy? Don' sell out and ask the man (aka: Honkey McGee). Find it where cool kizzle be'z at. Fo sheezy.

Bad Name

"Ladies and gentlemen of the jury, my client, Mr. Slaughter in no way slaughtered those people..."

The concept of brain fingerprinting got my eye, but the guy's name was even better.

Which is the chimp?

chimp
Originally uploaded by iglazer.

Choose carefully.

I was looking at an article on Reuters and found the combo of the image and the New York Times ad funny.

Looks like something from Chicken Run

The video has to be watched. Truly something the Tweedy's would have been proud of...

Tastes like ...

Memo to controversial auteur Lars von Trier: Drop the Dead Donkey.

Because you just never know when this kind of thing might come in handy.

A couple of interesting tests designed to probe beyond the false dichotomy of "left/right" politics: The Moral Matrix and The Political Compass.

For those who are interested, my co-ordinates on the first chart are (-2, -1.5), which makes me a fellow-traveler of John Kerry (who knew? I was never able to figure out his position on anything) and on the second, (-0.63, -4.05), putting me closest to the Dalai Lama, but otherwise a pretty long way from any of the social/political figures listed.

Me and the Dalai Lama. Just ... wow.

BaconWhores

Every now and then when your life gets complicated and the weasels start
closing in, the only cure is to load up on heinous chemicals and then drive
like a bastard from Hollywood to Las Vegas ... with the music at top volume
and at least a pint of ether.
-- H.S. Thompson, "Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas"

RIP, Hunter S. Thompson, we hardly knew ye.

This is a very cool idea - using particles with enormous energies, generated when cosmic rays from deep space strike the upper atmosphere, to look through solid objects here on Earth.

Neato.

The Germans, as we all know, are very fond of potty humo(u)r, so it comes as no surprise that the meticulous engineers of Germany would bring us this. On the other hand, the Belgians are no slouches when it comes to toilet chuckles either, so when the creative types put together the popular kids' show "Pig and Betsy" ("Big en Betsy" in Flemish), they made sure to capitalize on the pig flatulence possibilities. For comparison, here's a live-action clip, and an animated segment.

Finally, then, we come to what appears to be an Anglo-Swedish collaboration about, ahh, Margaret Thatcher, a huge lo-res London-eating rabbit, some intercontinental ballistic fish and ... OK, I'm totally lost. I have no idea what this is about. But it rocks.

Ever wondered about the origins of such useful inventions as stairs, or how poetry came to be? Wonder no more.

It's not that I am very concerned that an airport screener missed the butcher's knife in a woman's purse. I'm sure that happens fairly frequently. What really scares me, is why the knife was there at all...

This is probably SFW, as long as you don't work at RadioShack

All true wisdom is found on T-shirts, bumper stickers, and clothing labels.

Those wily Japanese. Not content with using their own pictographic writing systems, now they're getting inventive with ASCII. I thought I'd seen all the emoticons (starting with the Piltdown smiley :-) through the more advanced XD and the pre-Cambrian variants such as >_< and O_o) but there's a whole new genus based on alphanumeric DNA rather than the punctuation-derived underpinnings of its predecessors.

The canonical type exemplar is "orz", although variants include "JTO", "STO" and so on.

Confused? Hornswoggled? Clicky for enlightenment. Then clicky to visit the sculpture garden.

I'm so proud of my home state. Having solved all the other problems facing society, they are taking the time to try and outlaw baggy trousers (no, not those Baggy Trousers) and make sure gay marriage never happens in Virginia.

On the other hand, a bill to ban protect people from second-hand smoke in bars and restaurants was defeated.

"Freedom", "liberty". Yay.

oops.

Truth in advertising.

Dick Cheney tells it like it is (transcript available here)

Worst. Weather report. Evar.

Are you happy with the terms "system crash" and "blue screen of death"? Enjoy driving your overpriced Toyota, er, I mean Lexus? Maybe you shouldn't look over here.

Blind man goes on shooting rampage at old-age home.

Sound like a bad movie? You wish.

I've always liked words that sound innocent or that have both innocent and very guilty meanings depending on context. Examples include: sounds (definition, examples) and wands (definition, examples).

The best thing about these words is the in-joke character of them - in other words, to be offended by them, you have to know what they mean, and if you know what they mean, you're probably not going to be offended by them. Example: do a demo/presentation for a prospect. Create a new record of a person in your system. Enter their employer's name as "Acme Stuffed Toy Co." and their profession as "fluffer". See if anyone notices.

For advanced students: if someone does notice, and they're of the appropriate gender, and they giggle - ask them for a date.

I have a sneaking suspicion that reprobates has been infiltrated by HACKERS!

Need a new mobile phone? For your dog? Bling!

I saw the Pixies at DC's Constitution Hall on December 8 (bonus - check out their "leet" spelling of the band name); they rocked. What rocks even harder though, is a little outfit by the name of CDBaby.com. You see, the Pixies decided to cash in on all the aging hipsters' disposable incomemake the last 12 gigs in the tour available on CD (including the one I attended) and the orders were handled by CDBaby.com. When I first placed my order, they immediately sent me an email that looked like this:

From:   CDBaby Loves Ken <orders@cdbaby.com>

Subject: CD Baby Order #686634 - CONFIRMATION

Date: December 9, 2004 10:13:39 AM EST

To:   kcds@xxxxx.com

Reply-To:   orders@cdbaby.com



Ken -



Thanks for your order with CD Baby!



This is just a happy automated email to let you know a real person

will email you as soon as your package is sent, and you will also

receive a paper receipt with  your order in the mail.

... so that was cute, but then today, when the order actually shipped, I received this:

Your CD has been gently taken from our CD Baby shelves with

sterilized contamination-free gloves and placed onto a satin pillow.



A team of 50 employees inspected your CD and polished it to make sure

it was in the best possible condition before mailing.



Our packing specialist from Japan lit a candle and a hush fell over

the crowd as he put your CD into the finest gold-lined box that money

can buy.



We all had a wonderful celebration afterwards and the whole party

marched down the street to the post office where the entire town of

Portland waved 'Bon Voyage!' to your package, on its way to you, in

our private CD Baby jet on this day, Friday, January 21st.



I hope you had a wonderful time shopping at CD Baby.  We sure did. 

Your picture is on our wall as 'Customer of the Year'.  We're all

exhausted but can't wait for you to come back to CDBABY.COM!!

Yeah, yeah, the wonders of mail merge. But still ...

I'm ready to swear in President Bush. Here we go:

You fucking cunt. You fucking worthless shitheel. You stupid, murderous, arrogant, duplicitous, smug pig-headed moronic bastard. I fucking hate you and all your shitbag cronies stand for. I hope you fucking rot in that asinine "Hell" you and your retarded Christian fundamentalist turdbrained cretin friends believe in. Fuck you, and the stupid fake-cowboy horse you rode in on.

How was that?

Number 857 in an occasional series: Fun With Keyword-Driven Advertising, seen on a page about style sheets:



This is actually great news. I had a bunch of old style sheets I wasn't planning to use any more, and I would have just left them out at the curb with the rest of the trash, but someone told me the EPA won't let us just dump them in the landfills any more because of all the toxic chemicals in them, and so I was figuring I was going to have to call a specialist recycling firm and pay them a bunch of money but here it sounds like I can just sell them on eBay. Hey, where there's muck there's brass, right?

I suppose I have my parents to blame. After all, growing up, I was the only kid I knew whose parents had a kerosene-powered flame thrower in the shed (OK, so when you use it properly, it's supposed to work like a flame torch, but if you turn on the main supply without going through the pre-heating ritual, it shoots a burning jet of kerosene a good five to ten feet. More if you over-pressurize the beastie :-) In case you're wondering, it was used for weed control or, occasionally, to completely fuck the yard.

So now I have two torches of my own - a little Bernz-O-Matic propane torch for the kitchen (perfect for caramelizing the sugar on a crème brulée) and the larger Mr. Heater for outdoor use (or for making really big crèmes brulées).

I can't find any figures (Bernz-O-Matic are curiously mum on the topic) but the little torch probably delivers no more than a couple thousand BTU/hr. By comparison, the big burners on my gas cooktop produce 15,000 BTU/hr. Mr. Heater delivers a rather more manly 500,000 BTU/hr.

However, for really REALLY big heating jobs (or, perhaps, to caramelize a crème brulée the size of a tennis court), it's nice to know one could turn to the Akron Turbine Group for one of their trailer-mounted modified jet engine rigs that deliver up to 20,000,000 BTU/hr.

Mucho. Bueno. Pronto.

April 2004 - James Cantalupo, CEO of McDonalds, dies of a heart attack, after 28 years with the company, aged 60.

January 2005 - Charlie Bell, CEO of McDonalds, dies of colorectal cancer, after 29 years with the company, aged 44.

At this rate, the next CEO will be 28 years old, will have worked for McDonald's his entire life, and will choke to death on his hamburger in October of this year.

MSN clearly don't think driving in Norway is a good idea.

Does your WAP feel left out when you rock out? What about your microwave oven or your garage door opener? Your tweeter is no good to them, even if it's a supertweeter. No, you need an Ultratweeter!.

CD's not sounding quite right? Fix them once and for all with an Intelligent Chip.

Or maybe you should check out the other offerings from these audio wizards. No home entertainment system is complete otherwise!

While checking my memory on the origin of the term "Winchester Drive" I came across a definition that makes a rather interesting parallel at the end.

Soon to be heard in a porn movie near you: "Hey baby, what are ya gunna do with that Winchester on?"

Man, I'm sure glad the Bush administration has shaken up the intelligence community. Now, from the people who brought you the "slam-dunk" for WMDs in Iraq - this amazing piece of prognostication. Wow, these guys really think outside the box. I say they're well worth the $30B a year!

Also, not wanting to be outdone by the spooks, it seems the US Army has its own brand of top boffins on the case. Or at least, they did over a decade ago.

Clever, witty, sometimes laugh-out-loud funny - here is a collection of art that I really get. Does that mean maybe it's not really art?

Ah, the glamour of the sex industry.

Behold - the website advertising the services, and the shift diary of the associated back-office operation.

So exotic, yet so mundane.

Small brain + large magnet = things you shouldn't do with an MRI.

In case anyone is still labo(u)ring under the misconception that the "Hummer" H2 has anything in common with the original Hummer H1 - this should help clear things up. (Hint: It's a Chevy Tahoe with a body kit)

OMFG!!!11 ROFLMFAO11!!!eleven!!!

You can read the article here, or, if you don't have time, here's the synopsis: Use Internet Explorer, and your computer will catch fire, fall over, and sink into the swamp (or as Farkers say "your computer will a splode").

Seriously, you know something is mighty f'ed up when the security firm reporting the problem has to invent a new category of super-ultra-mega-critical alert.

The Republican party, looking for votes, started a number of years ago to court Christian fundamentalists, who had, up to that point, largely disengaged from American politics for various reasons, primary among them being the Government's role in the legalization of abortion, and what they viewed as the Government's betrayal of their right to free speech by banning prayer in public schools (never mind that these are arguably two sides of the same piece of legislation, namely the First Amendment to the US Constitution)

As a free thinker and atheist with an aversion to nutcases, then, I have naturally gravitated towards the Democrats - not that the Democratic Party is always correct in everything it does, but at least the Dems don't seem to suffer from the same blinkered "we shall brook no dissent" groupthink that seems to come from the Repubs.

Now, however, more than ever, it seems that the Republican Party has a problem that it largely brought on itself in the shape of the demagoguery and outright fascism and statism espoused by its more devoutly religious adherents. Lew Rockwell, Libertarian and big thinker, has more here.

My own analogy is that the Republicans' search for votes has been like that of a body-builder looking for ways to "bulk up" and get muscle mass. The Repubs, in courting the Christian religious conservatives, opted to give themselves small, fast-growing tumors in strategic places - in their biceps and triceps, delts and glutes - to make themselves "bigger" and "win" the contest aka the election. Well guess what - the tumors have metastasized, and I'm not sure there will now be much of a body left once the cancer is excised. Even supposing that surgery is even an option any more.

Annie, get your gun.

H. David Dalquist, creator of the alumin(i)um Bundt cake pan, has died, aged 86. Why should Reprobates give a shit about this? One reason, and one reason only: the popularity of this cake pan took off only after it was used by a Texas housewife in her contest-winning entry to the 1966 Pillsbury Bake-Off, and this was her recipe.

It's been said that an infinite number of monkeys using an infinite number of typewriters will eventually type out the entire works of Shakespeare. Usenet and chatrooms have made that pretty obvious, but if you want to see real proof of the power of random character generators just turn to the lowly Cabbage Patch Doll.

Sometimes the stories just write themselves: Go to Argos' web site, and search on the word "chav".

Followup: The result of the above search is the display of some goldie lookin' chains; in fact, since the first item is priced at a thousand quid, and is still only 9 carat, I'd guess it's more than just goldie-lookin'. Anyway, this now enables me to talk about the band Goldie Lookin' Chain, the best white suburban rappers stuck in a 1983 time warp ever to come out of South Wales. I just got their Greatest Hits, and, man, they are funny as shit.

Coxsuckers

Courtesy of a those crazy Swedes there's now a handy place to store your gaseous emissions while you work on them. Finally!

I'm proud to say I live only a short 30 minute drive from the place where this incident occurred.

WTF?

More joy of keyword-driven ad placement:

Someone keeps stealing my letters ...

Hypercube visualizer. Ouch. Now, if only I could find something to make sense of the Timecube.