Dvorak Uncensored » Bill Gates for President?!

I'd vote if they'd let me:
Dvorak Uncensored » Bill Gates for President?!

The Goodbye Effect

Absolutely freaky: the US government has approved an "Active Denial System" which is essentially a gun that shoots enough radiation to cause excruciating pain, but not enough to be dangerous.
Wired News: Say Hello to the Goodbye Weapon

Kasey

Not really sure why I'm maintaining this blog anymore, but finally there's something VERY IMPORTANT to report: I have a puppy! His name is Kasey.

More importantly, he's got a blog (care of my girl). You can see it right here:
http://kaseytheboxer.blogspot.com/

Ref kicks ass

Wild video of the REF getting into the fight and kicking a boxer's a$$:
Dvorak Uncensored

Getting a new paddle - the fiasco

All I wanted was a new paddle for dragonboating. I have no idea why I was so tolerant with these people, but the story was so wild I felt compelled to blog it on our team's website:
100% Juiced: Getting a new paddle - the fiasco

Bad, bad support

I have what is supposed to be a top of the line mouse. I paid over $100 for the unit. Its A MOUSE. I'm almost embarassed to admit what I paid.

Usually its fine but recently the mouse has been acting up.

So I ask the folks that support this thing for some help and I get this response:

"Please try the mouse on another machine, if it works fine, try formating your PC."

Unbelievable. I don't have another machine to experiment with. What kind of user is going to reformat their PC in order to make a MOUSE work?!

Remember, I paid $100 for a MOUSE and these guys are suggesting I reformat my PC to get it to work. Sigh.

Just so you know what to avoid, I'm using a Razer Copperhead mouse and this appears to be the level of suport we receive.

Lucky Louie

This has to be one of the funniest interviews I've ever seen. TOTALLY makes me want to hurry up and have kids.

Click here to see it

Consumerist - AOL

If you have 4 minutes, do yourself a favor and check out the MP3 that this page links to.
Its a recording of a guy trying to cancel his AOL account and its incredible he never yelled once.
I'd have gone ballistic if it were me.

Consumerist - Army

And people wonder why I get annoyed when I'm supposed to provide my SIN on a form.
This article is scary, scary, scary.

Backing Winds: May 26th chase

I love a good storm - too bad we don't get too many out here.
If you want to see some incredible pics someone took chasing storms in the mid-west (where they apparently get some doozy's), check this out.

I splurged

My brother talked me into playing GRAW. The game requires some nice hardware to play nicely, specifically a good GPU. My old one (nVidia 6600GT 128M) was lacking in memory so I wanted to upgrade. My current system only supports AGP and all the nice new cards are PCIe. This, of course, means upgrading my mobo, memory, etc. I ended up having to buy a whole new system just to upgrade my video card. Sigh.

I kind of went hog-wild hoping this new one lasts more than two years. Here's what I've got now:

• Athlon X2 3800 64-bit dualcore CPU running on an ASUS A8N32 SLI Deluxe mobo
• 2G of DDR PC3200 RAM
• Asus Geforce EN7900GTX 512MB DDR3 PCIe video card (and down the line I'll add a second)
• Creative Labs Audigy2 soundcard
• 520W power supply
• C: 36G Western Digital Raptor SATA HD (10,000RPM!)
• D: 250G WD HD (7,200 RPM)
• E: LG 16x DVD-RW (dual layer) (GSA-H10N)
• No floppy drive!

Interestingly, I'm still running Windows XP Pro 32-bit as it apparently runs faster 'cause the drivers for the 64-bit version simply aren't up to speed yet.

Who needs traffic lights?

When I saw this video my mouth was literally hanging open the entire time. This is unbelievable. Its a video of traffic in Sri Lanka:

Skype - The whole world can talk for free.

Skype is software that you can use to turn your computer into a phone. There's been a rather significant development recently:

Calling people on Skype is totally free. It's also free to call landlines and
mobiles within the US and Canada until the end of the year.

I'm signing up as soon as I get home.

Ricky Gervais on XFM

Ricky Gervais, Steve Merchant and Karl Pilkington used to host a show on XFM before their world famous podcost. Since I'm such a swell guy I downloaded a shitload of ~5 minute episodes for you, zipped them up into a single archive and uploaded to box.net.

There are 42 episodes in this 102MB file, so the download will take some time, but its worth it!

10,000th Shoplifter Gets Parade

This is priceless: a store celebrates their 10,000th shoplifter. Wish we could have seen her face.

Light's Most Exotic Trick Yet: So Fast it Goes ... Backwards?

Fascinating - a month or two ago I read an article about scientists slowing the speed of light using some wild techniques. Today comes an article about scientists at the University of Rochester speeding light up so much that it actually travels backwards!

The beginnings of time travel?

Google Maps - MOBILE!

I LOVE Google. I'm pretty sure I've mentioned that before. One of the first services they offered (other than search) that blew me away was Google Maps. I can't count the number of times that I've wished I had Google Maps with me as I'm trying to navigate Victoria with my girlfriend, or can't remember where a place is here in town.

WELL. My buddy Tim pointed me to Google Maps for Mobile! I can now use the service on my Blackberry and you can too, on your cell phone. Unbelievable.

Deep Quote

Quite often I want to direct someone to a website where I've read something and I have to hope that they find the portion of the page I'm referring to. Deep Quote makes this much easier. I enter the quote, then provide the page I found it on and the service gives me a link I can provide that dramatically highlights the quote.

See for yourself

Spinnakers

I had some extra time and $$ this weekend so I decided to upgrade my PC a little.
Click the pic below for a larger image.


So, clearly I'm kidding. But Anne-Marie and I went to Spinnakers in Victoria for a little overnight get-away. It was the best overnighter we've ever had.

They greeted us with big smiles and a free upgrade (to a garden suite), we had some fantastic beer and appies, took a nice walk around the harbor, had an unbelievable dinner at their restaurant and ended up sleeping soundly in a giant bed with big fluffy pillows. Slept in, enjoyed a "breakfast basket" in bed, had a jacuzzi with too many bubbles and left the place feeling like we'd been at a spa all weekend.
I can't recommend Spinnakers enough.

Box.net

Very cool - I just signed up for 1G (one gigabyte) of online storage for free.
Box.net allows me to easily upload files, share them, link to them, etc etc. Its a terrific service, actually, especially if I'm without my pen drive.

Click the box to sign-up

Is Lost a Repeat?

I'm a big fan of the show Lost, on ABC.
This season has been pretty disappointing, though. I haven't found the story near as compelling, but what's really ruining it for me is all of the damn re-runs!

That's why this site is helpful:
http://www.islostarepeat.com/

shiFTBASE - The Ricky Gervais Show Podcast Mirror

I can't get enough of Ricky Gervais. I've started re-listening to his first season's podcast again and I've been walking around the house all day laughing out loud with my iPod on.

What's silly is that his first season was free to begin with. Now that its done, if you want to get it, iTunes and Audible.com are both charging for it.

Fortunately for you, I found it available for free right here:
http://www.shiftbase.com/

I've just been listening to Episode 3 and can barely contain myself - way, way too funny.

Monkey with a deathwish

I just uploaded a video to YouTube showing a monkey taunting some lions. Seriously, you've got to see it to believe it.

Code Monkey

A friend of mine recently sent me a song in email. We're both developers so maybe that's why we think the song is so funny. I thought I'd check out YouTube and sure enough there's a video for it already. Enjoy!

Beeplet: timed alerts

A couple years ago I reminded a coworker (in fact a really good friend that I am about to rib) that something he was responsible for needed to be done. He asked me to remind him again that night. This was somewhere around the millionth time he asked me to remind him about something, despite the Outlook calendar on his computer, the notebook in his hand, the head on his shoulders and the cell phone on his hip.

Being the spiteful jerk I can be I took the 10 minutes it required to build a small program to send him 1,500 emails to his home address "reminding him".

That was before I learned about this new service called Beeplet:

Beelplet offers a great way for creating, organizing, and receiving reminders with notifications through Email, RSS, and soon to be SMS and Instant Messengers.

Help Win This Bet

Here's an explanation from Dan's website:

So, here's the story... I said to my girlfriend that any stupid website could
get tons of hits, simply because people are bored all the time. She said that I
was an idiot and couldn’t make a website that could get tons of hits if I wanted
to. After a long argument (mostly centered around the fact that she called me an
idiot) we made a bet

If he wins she's supposedly granting him a threesome.

Help out a brutha right here.

If these words were people, I would embrace their genocide.

This guy:
1) could kick my ass
2) makes me feel about an inch tall
3) probably smells like cheese.

His main site is here.

Thanks to Dan in Arkansas for pointing this site out. I'd link to Dan's blog, but he's clearly above that and isn't near the narcissist I am.

Solution Watch

Talk about a valuable resource! This guy is doing pretty much exactly what I intended with my blog. He finds useful or interesting stuff "out there" and lets us know about it. An internet clipboard, tricks for taking notes in a paperless environment, etc. Check it out!

copyranter

It turns out my link to a review for the Fusion razor gave credit to The Consumerist, not the original author who is now one of my favorites: Copyranter.
Check out his article about Flower, a $15,700 watch. And I quote:

Or, for about $15,699 less, you could eat a bag of skittles®, stick your finger down your
throat, throw up on your wrist, stick your cheap Timex® piece in the goo, and
wait for the project to harden.

Euro-English

The European Commission has just announced an agreement whereby English will be the official language of the European Union rather than German, which was the other possibility.
As part of the negotiations, the British Government conceded that English spelling had some room for improvement and has accepted a 5-year phase-in plan that would become known as “Euro-English”.

In the first year, “S” will replace the soft “c”. Sertainly, this will make the sivil servants jump with joy.

The hard “c” will be dropped in favour of “k”. This should klear up konfusion, and keyboards kan have one less letter.

There will be growing publik enthusiasm in the sekond year when the troublesome “ph” will be replaced with “f” This will make words like fotograf 20% shorter.

In the 3rd year, publik akseptanse of the new spelling kan be expekted to reach the stage where more komplikated changes are possible. Governments will enkourage the removal of double letters which have always ben a deterent to akurate speling.

Also, al wil agre that the horibl mes of the silent “e” in the languag is disgrasful and it should go away.

By the 4th yer people wil be reseptiv to steps such as replasing “th” with “z” and “w” with “v”.
During ze fifz yer, ze unesesary “O” kan be dropd from vords kontaining “ou” and after ziz fifz yer, ve vil hav a reil sensibl riten styl.

Zer vil be no mor t rubl or difikultis and evrivun vil find it ezi TU understand ech oza. Ze drem of a united urop vil finali kum tru.

Und efter ze fifz yer, ve vil al be speking German like zey vunted in ze forst plas.

I've been blogged

Years ago I received a voicemail from a customer service representative that was of such horrible quality I promptly recorded it and saved it for future giggles.

Recently I've been subscribing to the RSS feed of a site called The Consumerist. As a lark I decided to email them that recording and just today they posted it as an article called Customer Service from Mumble Land.

I previously referenced their site in this posting. That was likely the funniest product review I've ever read.

Search Engine Optimization

Ever wonder what it takes to get your site appear sooner in search results? The topic is "Search Engine Optimization" and its discussed here.

Office Pranks

Its been quite a while since I've pulled any sort of prank at the office. Here are a few that are inspiring.

Remember The Milk

Yet another free online service in Beta: Remember The Milk. Its a way for you to maintain a to-do list online and have it remind you via email, text message to your cell phone, via your IM software, etc.

Doesn't do a lot for me as I've got a Blackberry and use Outlook, but for those of you without either this could be pretty helpful.

Bizarre Court Ruling

Ruling from the Province Newspaper - Vancouver, Canada (AP)

A seven year old boy was at the center of a Vancouver courtroom drama yesterday when he challenged a court ruling over who should have custody of him.

The boy has a history of being beaten by his parents and the judge initially awarded custody to his aunt, in keeping with the child custody law and regulations requiring that family unity be maintained to the degree possible.

The boy surprised the court when he proclaimed that his aunt beat him more than his parents and he adamantly refused to live with her. When the judge suggested that he live with his grandparents, the boy cried out that they also beat him.

After considering the remainder of the immediate family and learning that domestic violence was apparently a way of life among them, the judge took the unprecedented step of allowing the boy to propose who should have custody of him.

After two recesses to check legal references and confer with child welfare officials, the judge granted temporary custody to the Vancouver Canucks, whom the boy firmly believes are not capable of beating anyone.

While we're on the topic, here's something hilarious.

Cyanide and Happiness Comic

A buddy of mine (thanks Greg) sent me some hilarious comics a couple weeks ago. Within minutes I'd found their site on the web and had subscribed to their RSS feed.

I found one in the archive that was particularly funny. Click the image for the full size, or you can view it on their website.

More Ricky Gervais

• I had no idea this existed, but it turns out Ricky Gervais has a music video from 1984. In this interview he clearly wasn't expecting the video to be shown and its unusual to see HIM squirm so much.
• I'm still poking around on youtube.com and found this classic from The Office (the original BBC version, of course). One of the greatest dance numbers I've ever seen. I still use a couple of these moves in public to embarass my girlfriend.
• Ricky on Letterman!
• This is a clip from his show Extra's where he's talking with Patrick Stewart (a favorite actor of mine)
• The second video podcast from the Ricky Gervais Show talking the new book about Karl
• A cat hiding from his singing!!!!
• His David Brent character discussing "the handicapped"
• Karl discusses his fridge

Ricky Gervais & Karl Pilkington - Nature Of Infinity

I simply can't get enough of the Ricky Gervais podcasts, and I just stumbled across this gem. Its a video of Ricky and Karl talking about the nature of infinity.

Wired News: The Time Is 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6

123 seconds after 1:00am tonight it will be 01:02:03 04/05/06.
More here after the jump.

YouTube - secretary slap

This was funny enough that I had to link to it.
Hilarious video of a guy distracted by a coworker and then paying the price for it.

Hell Hath no Fury Like a Dell Scorned

Get this: a lady calls Dell to order some PCs. She also needs to "link" them so instead of including a cable to connect them, they send a server. She calls back confused and they refuse to refund.
Check out the Consumerist for a better explanation.

Anne-Marie

IMG_1047
Originally uploaded by ironman_pjt.

The other day someone asked why I didn't have any pictures of Anne-Marie on line. I was like: "hmm, I don't know". So I posted one today and, I swear, within 60 seconds the picture received a one word comment: "Beautiful".

Couldn't have said it better myself.

Its the best candid photo of Anne that I've taken and I liked it enough to put on my corkboard at work.
There's a whole lot that could be better about the photo, but I absolutely love the peaceful look on her face.

Keyboard rage

I spend most of my day at a keyboard, usually writing code or combing through tens of thousands of lines of code looking for a problem.
When I saw this animation I laughed so hard I thought an eyeball might pop out of my head:

Bill Gates in a very difficult position

This is a pretty wild video of Bill Gates being "interviewed" by the DOJ in 1998. Amazing how autistic he seems.

UPDATE:
Speaking of akward, can you believe this guy is Microsoft's CEO? What a freak.

My FeedBurner feed thingy

I had a quick conversation with a friend (check out his blog) about why we blog anything. For me its usually a mechanism to remember where I've been and where I find interesting "stuff" on the web. There's another optimistic side of me that hopes one day I'll have enough traffic that I can actually generate some revenue from this site. Doubtful, but its good to have a dream.

ANYHOW, I just started reading about FeedBurner and have signed myself up. It'll be interesting to see what kind of statistics their site will generate for me.

First Steps Toward Artificial Gravity

Oh for goodness sake! This article explains that scientists have essentially created artificial gravity!

Dude, Get A Dell... For Porn

This video has been floating around for a while so I figured I'd check it out - what a riot!

Oktoberfest

I went to Munich, Germany in 2003 for Oktoberfest. I took a ton of photo's and videos and, now that I'm experimenting with YouTube I thought I'd upload some good clips of what its like to be at a party with 10,000+ people in a tent, all drinking & eating & singing & generally being merry.
There's a vid here and here.

Guinness Surger

My buddy Jeff forwarded this to me knowing I'm a Guinness drinker. Its the new Guinness Surger, though unfortunately, it might only be available in the UK.

UFCats

Oh, my stomach is still hurting from laughing so hard.
Many of you may know that I'm a big fan of the UFC, and I like a good cat fight, so you'll understand why I find this video so hilarious.

Pentagon plans cyber-insect army

OMG, speaking of robots and such, here's an article that discusses how the pentagon is planning on creating cyborg insects, too. This is crazy!

U.S. Army Robots Break Asimov's First Law

I got a shiver reading this.
What a freaky concept!

Amazing photo

Apparently a real photo from the North Pole.
A larger size here at my Flickr page.

Crybaby NTP Finally Settles Blackberry Patent Dispute

Its old news by now, but NTP and Blackberry settled the dispute. I post this because its my favorite explanation of the deal to date.

NTP, weeping the tears of martyrs all the way to the bank, have gone on
record as stating they aren’t happy with the settlement but will stoically cry
themselves to sleep on beds made of money for the good of the nation.

Package Tracking With Google Maps

I don't have any packages to track, but this tool sounds really cool.

Boiling to frozen in .5

On a nice day in Saskatchewan (-40 degrees) a guy throws some boiling water into the air and this is what happens. Now how cool is that?

Autistic Basketball Player Scores 20

This is a story of a an autistic kid that loves basketball. He helps get water for the team, grabs towels and has been watching from the sidelines for years. Then late one game coach decides to let him play. A great, great story.

"Smiling Bob" Penis Pill Scammers Nailed

Remember this guy from those annoying "penile enhancement" commercials? I could never understand how a company could get away with such blatant false advertizing.
Well, it turns out they can't:
"Smiling Bob" Penis Pill Scammers Nailed - Consumerist

Tikibar uses Sun-Rype juice!

My hawkeyed friend Jan found a Sun-Rype Product placement on Tikibar.tv

Here's how Wikipedia describes Tikibar.
Here's a link to the episode (12) where they use some Rio Red.

YouTube - Fishing with Bill Dance

I just signed up on YouTube.com and uploaded my first video.
This guy is HILARIOUS - such a klutz its a wonder he's still alive.

Will Ferrell

This guy is so damn funny - my ribs are killing me from laughing so hard:
Will Ferrell, fall down funny - Screenhead

Hockey Fight

We've all seen hockey fights, but I can't say I've ever seen one this big.

Top 10 Strangest iPod Accessories

A couple didn't seem like a bad idea (a bed that I could dock my iPod in), but some of the iPod accessories on this site are hilarious.

AFV Babies

One of the cutest videos I've ever seen:
YouTube - AFV Babies

Two hilarious ads

Both with the theme that "debt follows you around everywhere".
One here, and the other here.

Gilette’s Fusion Razor

Possibly the greatest review EVER. How can you top a review that includes gems like this?

“This must be what it felt like to be caressed by Aphrodite. God must now
include the Fusion in your orientation kit when you ascend to heaven. After
shaving this morning, I grabbed 3 random downtown Supermodels and kissed them.
All three are now under my desk taking turns gently and lovingly servicing me.
The five-blade Fusion—well worth the $109.99 price tag.”

Gilette’s Fusion Razor Review With Built-In Laser-Ion Cannon - Consumerist

Virtually Vista : Before We Begin: Setting up your Virtual Hard Disk

Here's a really important article if you're going to try and install Windows Vista on a new virtual machine.
It turns out you have to prepare/partition the virtual drive first then the install will proceed.

Google Page Creator

UPDATE:
After posting this entry I tried logging into the service and got this message:

Google Page Creator has experienced extremely strong demand, and, as a result,
we have temporarily limited the number of new signups as we increase capacity.
We will notify you as soon as we are ready to add new accounts. Thank you for
your patience.

---

What a terrific idea - I haven't tried it yet and apparently there's a bit of a "capacity problem" right now, but Google has released a beta of a web-based web page creator.
Make it easier for lay people to create web pages - its about time.
Google Page Creator

Cyber Snipa Game Pad

Some of the guys I know that play FPS games are likely going to drool over this keyboard.

The Human Clock™

Oh, this is fantastic! This site has a picture for every minute of the day, in 12 or 24 hr format, digital or analog, etc etc.

Podcasting Goes Pay-to-Play

Oh no, say it isn't so!!! My favorite podcast is moving to a subscription based model and will be charging $7/month. Its crazy, but the show is so damn funny I just might pay for it.
Slashdot Podcasting Goes Pay-to-Play

Dilbert - Telecommuting

Learning a lesson

If this doesn't prove a point, what will?

Flexible body armor

It'd be great to suit up in some of this instead of the bulky gear I wear playing hockey.

Apple to buy Blockbuster?

What an idea. Apple is trying to be the one place we go for digital media. I'm already sold on the iPod and iTunes and podcasts, etc.
I'm not sold on watching a movie on an iPod, though. I can't understand why Apple is trying to get more and more people to watch video on a teensy weensy screen. What up with dat?

Anyhow, this site as a good read about why Apple might buy Blockbuster to help "build a video distribution empire to match its existing music distribution empire"
PBS I, Cringely . February 16, 2006 - BYOB

Ready for a StarTrek car?

How cool is THIS?!
Thanks for sharing, Jan.

StreetWars

Oh, this is rich! I'm already fantasizing about starting a Streetwar here in Kelowna, if only for me and a bunch of people I know. Though, it'd clearly be more exciting with strangers.

Oprah vs Tom

There's a lot of sarcastic and hilarious talk on the web about the authenticity of Tom Cruise's relationship to Katie Holmes.

Someone did some terrific editing and we end up with this gem

Apple to 'Switch' to Windows?

What a wild concept!
Slashdot Apple to 'Switch' to Windows?

Vicious Dog!

I was at a co-workers desk and saw her the desktop wallpaper she was using and had to gently insist that she send me the picture so I could post it here:

(you can click for a larger version.)

Thanks, Deb!

Reminds me of an earlier posting of mine

Moshzilla

In the beginning it was a hilarious photo of a girl at a dance really letting loose.
Case in point:


And, as often happens on the Internet, some Photoshoppers got their hands on the picture and it became a phenomenom - now known as MOSHZILLA!!!!!

Check out the different versions at this site, or better still, search Google Images for Moshzilla or "mosh girl".

There's more here:
http://alternachips.free.fr/public/the_mosh_girl/
http://www.miscproject.com/mosh/

Photograph of near fatal lightning strike

My buddy Jan has a photo on his blog that you've got to see. Don't forget to click on the photo to see a larger version. Really, its unbelievable.

Dog Prank

My buddy Jeff wants a dog. I'm guessing its in part because he would love to do things like this.

Google Maps <-> Google Earth Automatic Conversion

You can use Google Maps to find a place, with satellite imagery, then create a URL link that you can paste in to an email and send to someone. For example, click here to view "the boneyard".

Well, I use Google Earth a lot and have always wondered what it takes to create a Google Maps URL out of what I'm seeing on Google Earth's screen.

The dude at GOUILLOU.COM below has it all figured out!
GOUILLOU.COM: Google Maps <-> Google Earth Automatic Conversion

Handy Shirt Folding Video

I'm way, WAY too domesticated. I'm actually looking forward to trying this when I get home.
La-hooo, sa-her.
Dvorak Uncensored » Handy Shirt Folding Video

The World of Smartboards

I've been saying for years that the mouse is a horrible input device for a computer, which is why I generally stay with the keyboard. But even the keyboard is feeling archaic to me these days.
I just watched the video at this site and have an idea of what I'd like to see more of!

Markus Nikolai - Bushes (Norman Cook remix)

One of the most original music videos I've ever seen:
Markus Nikolai - Bushes (Norman Cook remix)

This is pretty original, but maybe too racy for some of you?
http://www.ifilm.com/ifilmdetail/2676623

Great line

I just read this and thought it was so good I had to share:

“If I were a mad-scientist, commissioned by the government to create the
perfect woman, I would pocket the grant money, and just place you on the steps
of the Pentagon.”

Virtually Torino

A terrific idea! You can use Google Earth to see all of the sites in Torino during the Olympics.
Check it out!
Official Google Blog: Virtually Torino

Giant rabbit

Yes, a giant rabbit. Maybe the "biggest bunny". There's an even larger picture after the jump.

CBBC Newsround Herman could be 'biggest bunny'

Official Google Blog: New on your Desktop

UPDATE: Feb 13, 2006
Yikes, this one kind of blew up in Google's face. Not only was the feature not exciting to me, but the EFF is advising against installing this version!
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Speaking of new releases, there's apparently ANOTHER new version of Google Desktop (v3), but for the first time I'm not really compelled.
Official Google Blog: New on your Desktop

SharpReader RSS Aggregator

There's a new version of the RSS reader that I use:
SharpReader RSS Aggregator

RIM Announces Workaround in NTP Case

Looks like there's a workaround for our Blackberry's if RIM loses the case. I'm almost dissapointed 'cause I was starting to think a lot about camera phones, much less a cell phone that's COMFORTABLE to talk on, unlike the blackberry.
Slashdot RIM Announces Workaround in NTP Case

Contact lenses from Nike!

Isn't THIS something?! It'd be pretty freaky competing against someone that stares you down with EVIL RED EYES

The lenses come in amber for sports like baseball and tennis where the wearer
must separate fast moving objects from the background, and grey-green for sports
like golf, where the background environment is what’s visually important. Both
colors filter out a significant amount of overall light, but they also sharpen
and improve contrast, so they have a brightening effect, says Alan Reichow, who
invented the lenses and is a sports vision consultant for Nike.

The amber lenses also turn the wearer's eye's an unsettling shade of red. But when Nike
asked players if they'd like to create a version that created less of an evil
eye, the answer was an overwhelming "no."

Wired News: Sharper Image, Better Performance

Cure for AIDS?

I wonder, is it wise to publish a report like this? Granted, if its true then this is some of the best news I've heard in years, but if not...

What studies to date show is a compound that attacks HIV at its molecular
membrane level, disrupting the virus from interacting with their primary
targets, the "T-helper" class white blood cells that comprise and direct the
human immune system. Further, CSAs appear to be deadly to all known strains of
HIV

Salt Lake Tribune

Microsoft OneCare

OneCare Live as desribed by Microsoft:

Microsoft describes OneCare Live as a PC health service that runs continually in the background on a PC, providing round-the-clock protection and maintenance capabilities. The product includes a virus scanner and a two-way firewall, performs various system tune-ups, and has a data backup feature. Later this year, Microsoft will also integrate OneCare Live with Windows Defender, the company's antispyware solution.

John Dvorak has this great quote about OneCare:

Does Microsoft think it is going to get away with charging real money for any sort of add-on, service, or new product that protects clients against flaws in its own operating system? Does the existence of this not constitute an incredible conflict of interest? Why improve the base code when you can sell “protection”? Is Frank Nitti the new CEO?

There's more here: http://www.tonybove.com/getoffmicrosoft/blog/?p=27

Britney Spears is completely unfit

What a total cow

Super Bowl XL Commercials

Finally a site that hosts the commercials with fast load times and you don' t have to sit through the website's own ads (like AOL, for example:
Super Bowl XL Commercials on Google Video

UUUHHHGGG-rrrr!

My new favorite site!!!
And to all my friends: UUUHHHGGG-rrrr!

"Marcia Brady-style" - hee hee hee

And I quote:

"O.K., I'm not saying violence is funny and I'm not saying that Star Jones is rather difficult to like, but even her producer on 'The View' admits that he can't get enough of seeing her hit in the puss with a football, Marcia Brady-style. Enjoy, people!"

See it here

The Empire Tumbles 4 Ya!

Hilarious and hurtful all at the same time! This article was too funny not to link to:
The Empire Tumbles 4 Ya! - Defamer

IE 7 bugs abound

There's an article on CNET News.com talking about a bunch of problems with the Beta of IE7 that I blogged about.

If you listen real carefully you can hear Jan laughing (and it sounds a little smug if you ask me)

Spell with flickr

How cool is this?! Look for the "Entry Form" link on this page and you can produce your very own ransom note!

Too much money to tax

You know you're rich when:

the tax office in the US has to store his financial data on a special computer because his fortune is so vast

Read more about Bill Gates and how he has too much dough.

FHM - Top 100

Entirely for the boys (and maybe a couple girls I know) - after the jump you'll find FHM's Top 100 Women. Some are debatable (Teri Hatcher comes to mind), but its still a nice way to spend 10 minutes...

Start your phun here

Internet Explorer 7: Beta 2

Microsoft has just released the 2nd Beta of the new Internet Explorer 7. I've been waiting for this for a while because I want to check out the RSS features, and its supposed to be more secure and adhere to Internet standards much better.

Jan is rolling his eyes right now. Get over it, bud. ;-)

You can check out its new features and download the Beta here.
Oh! By the way:

Internet Explorer 7 Beta 2 Preview will only run on Windows® XP Service Pack 2 (SP2) systems

Gallery of the Absurd

This picture was so funny I just had to share: Celebrity Endorsement Idea No. 312

Google Toolbar Beta

The Google Toolbar is a key tool for me - I use it all day, every day. It appears to have just gotten better! There's a new Beta to try out and here's a bit of what Google has to say about it:

Now you can make your Toolbar as unique as you are. You can add buttons and bookmarks; get instant search suggestions; share web pages with friends; and enjoy the Toolbar's pop-up blocker, web form filler, and spellchecker.

Google Toolbar Beta

A new way to view London: from a toilet

Sometimes people joke about getting "stage fright" in the bathroom. I think this toilet would bring a whole new meaning to the idea.

a usable public toilet enclosed in one-way mirrored glass situated on a sidewalk near the River Thames

Parachute Pyramid

Its certainly not every day that you see something like this. Even my sky-diving buddy Brian is likely to be pretty awed by this video.

James Lipton recites Kevin Federline's PopoZao

The moron married to Brittney Spears is releasing (has released? really, who cares?) his own album. Rap I think, but again, who cares?

The point is, his lyrics are hilarious. I've read some and couldn't really make sense of them. That's where James Lipton (of the Actor's Guild) comes in. Thanks to The Superficial for providing us the link.

Adult Diapers All The Rage Among Chinese Travellers

OMG - this is another reason I'm in absolutely no hurry to travel to the orient:

Alongside food and fire crackers, Chinese are adding a new item to their
lunar New Year shopping: Adult diapers. Sales have soared ahead of the holiday as travelers prepare for long trips home aboard trains so crowded that even the toilets are jammed with people, newspapers said Tuesday.

Its a flying dog!!!!

Found at: Hedonistica

U.S. Supreme Court rejects RIM's appeal

I'm already jonesing a little! What ever will I do without my Blackberry? Oh, I know: get a camera phone.

A U.S. shutdown of Blackberry service looks imminent as an appeal in a patent infringement case from RIM is rejected.

Doctor: New lips not made for smoking

This is absurd - what kind of idiot ....
CNN.com - Doctor: New lips not made for smoking - Jan 18, 2006

Funny Vintage T-Shirts

It'd be so great to have a closet full of these:
NoiseBot.com - Funny Vintage T-Shirts ( funny vintage tshirts, funny vintage tees, funny vintage shirts )

Rooftops used for advertising

Here's an idea:
Google releases Google Earth. Google pays us to put their ads on our site.
How about Google Adsense on my roof?
Rooftops used for advertising News.blog CNET News.com

Happy anniversary, Brain

It was 20 years ago that the first computer virus appeared (Brain). Read on:
Slashdot 20 Years of Computer Viruses

iPod Alarm Clock

This is it! The next great reason to own one of these great little devices.
Instead of waking up to one of our somewhat lame radio stations in town, I wake up to a podcast instead!
Check it out: http://www.codepoetry.net/archives/2004/08/01/ipod_alarm_clock.php

Keyboards Are Disgusting

This article is exactly why I have a bottle of Purell at my desk:
Slashdot Keyboards Are Disgusting

TextArc.org Home

I don't even know where to start - this site is absolutely astounding.

I found it on a link from this equally impressive site:
http://www.visualcomplexity.com/vc/

The brain is so amazing

Isn't it amazing that we can actually read this?

Can you read this?? Olny srmat poelpe can.? I cdnuolt blveiee taht I cluod aulaclty uesdnatnrd waht I was rdanieg. The phaonmneal pweor of the hmuan mnid, aoccdrnig to a rscheearch at Cmabrigde Uinervtisy, it deosn’t mttaer in waht oredr the ltteers in a wrod are, the olny iprmoatnt tihng is taht the frist and lsat ltteer be in the rghit pclae. The rset can be a taotl mses and you can sitll raed it wouthit a porbelm. Tihs is bcuseae the huamn mnid deos not raed ervey lteter by istlef, but the wrod as a wlohe. Amzanig huh? yaeh and I awlyas tghuhot slpeling was ipmorantt!? If you can raed tihs psas it on

Bash

Speaking of great quotes:

"The problem with America is stupidity. I'm not saying there should be a capital punishment for stupidity, but why don't we just take the safety labels off of everything and let the problem solve itself?"

I found that on http://bash.org

The Quotations Page

I found a great site of quotations. For example:

"In all large corporations, there is a pervasive fear that someone, somewhere is having fun with a computer on company time. Networks help alleviate that fear.", John C. Dvorak

Shaw Throttling Bit Torrent?

I finally decided to try Bit Torrent and see how it peforms now that my connection to the Internet is so much faster.

I fought with it for about an hour, read some FAQs and then remembered a friend suggesting that Shaw was blocking Bit Torrent packets. I tried a quick search and found this article.

What a freaking shame - but it seems like a necessary evil as Reuters claims Bit Torrent accounts for 35% of all Internet activity!

Urban Dictionary

You can't not laugh at some of the stuff on this site.

Castanet.net - B.C. News

This story disgusted me so much I feel compelled to ask anyone seeing this to please sign the petition mentioned at the end of the story.

I'm so ashamed of our justice system right now...

Nick Burns Your Company's Computer Guy!

Somehow my blog dropped a previous posting I made to this website showing some great Nick Burns clips. Hopefully this one will stay.

Dee @ Shaw ROCKS

Nice! I finally had a good experience calling my Internet provider (Shaw Cable Systems). I've been waiting for ages (okay, a couple months but it FEELS like foreever) to find out why I haven't been transferred to a higher speed connection as I requested back in November. After 4 unanswered emails I decided to call and wait for tech support to call me back.

When I hear from Shaw I'm used to "professional", stale, boring, faceless, corporate personalities on the other end.

This time I was lucky enough to speak with Dee. She was unprofessional, easy to speak with, hilarious, personable, a little quirky and SHE TOTALLY MADE A BAD THING GOOD.

As of NOW my Internet connection is almost 3x faster than it was before speaking with Dee. Turns out one of her (less qualified, less personable) co-workers put me on an enhanced telephone service instead of an enhanced Internet service. Easy mistake? I'm guessing not.

Dee. I encourage you to send the link to this blog to your boss to let him/her know how much I appreciate your help tonight. You were one of the most helpful, well spoken and personable tech support people I've ever spoken with. For real. I think that says a lot since I've been in the computer industry for nearly 15 years (like you).

Thanks a bunch, Dee. You made my day.

The Sith Sense

A beautiful piece of programming - care of Burger King?!
The Sith Sense

Vader actually got my first one (an orange) but "a woman" apparently stumped him. Maybe the burn torched his privates a bit too much?

Redwire DLX

This site suggests that Levi's will be making a new line of jeans that

will include an iPod cradle sewn into a pocket on the hip

and more...
Who's going to be the first to get me a pair!?

Einstein's 'spooky action' seen on a chip

Wow. We're living in a science fiction movie.

New Scientist Breaking News - Einstein's 'spooky action' seen on a chip

What ... a ... retard

David Hasslehoff singing Hooked on a feeling.
Has he no shame?

Wild Ride

50 Fun Things To Do With Your iPod

Some great ideas! I'm still chuckling about piPod.

50 Fun Things To Do With Your iPod (kottke.org)

One Lucky Deer Video

This guy is the worst hunter EVER.

FM Tuner for the iPod

About time! Didn't I write about this earlier?

Ah yes, I did

Burned CDs Last 5 years Max

This isn't good news - I could have sworn I read that they might last as long as 10 years a while back.

Quick Laugh

I felt the need to share a quote my Dad just sent me:

When a woman wears leather clothing
A man's heart beats quicker,
his throat gets dry,
he goes weak in the knees,
and he begins to think irrationally.

Ever wonder why?

Because she smells like a new truck.

Want a Cool and Quiet PC?

Dunk it in Oil

(complete with video)

Let them sing it for you

My buddy Jeff sent me a link to this cool site.
Click here and when you arrive, you can type in some words and the site will play them back for you.
You'll see what I mean...

Google Pack

Now THIS (Google Pack) could have saved me a lot of time while configuring a new machine.
Its still a bit green, but I LOVE the idea. It'd be great if we could customize the software in the package.
This kind of thing would convince me to blow away and re-install Windows more than once every year or so.
I know my buddy Jan is gasping at that 'cause he apparently does it every couple of WEEKS.

SharpReader RSS Aggregator

My good buddy Jeff asked me a good question tonight: "What do you use for an RSS client?" For what its worth, I'm using SharpReader RSS Aggregator. Does everything I want.

Now that we're on the topic, here are some good feeds:

• Official Google Blog
  Speaks for itself, so I'm not sure why I'm adding this...
• IronSpace
  Do you need to ask?
• Joel on Software
  Smart, smart guy running this site. Sharing his experience working in our industry
• Twit
  GREAT podcasts
• PeekJ's Blank Blatherings
  A buddy of mine runs this site - he knows his stuff and finds GREAT stuff out there
• Snicker
  Something for the boys
• Bastardly
  Hilarious write-ups about stuff happening in the entertainment world
• Dvorak
  One of the most well known tech-writers today (and for a while now)
  (also a contributor to the TWIT podcasts I mention above)
• Wired
  Really interesting science articles from this site
• CNet News
  See above
• Slashdot
  More hi-tech, but still great articles to help keep us up to speed with our fast moving industry

WMF Vulnerbility

UPDATE:
Microsoft (wisely) released a patch for this vulnerbility 5 days ahead of schedule so don't bother what's below.
Why are you reading this? Didn't you just hear what I said? Eeesh.

---

If you're running Windows and you're reading this before January 10, your computer is potentially at risk for a creepy new attack on the Internet.

You really should read this article.

Attack of the Rat Monster

This is the best prank I've seen ... EVER.

Poker chip tricks

I'm going to have to learn some of these before our next game.

March of the Penguins

This was an absolutely fantastic film. Some of the most amazing cinematrography I've ever seen.