Geekable.com

Get your Nipon

Today I ran into my friend Terry Peake in the parking lot -- his car would not start, and he needed to go get his suit & tie because his piano piece was being debuted at Wayne State tonight. I ran him up to his house, and got a chance to preview some of the new stuff Terry's been writing for his band Nipon's upcoming album. (Note: The previous link sends you to a review of their last album.) It sounds pretty damned good!

P.S. I forgot to mention that the name "Nipon" may be changing. I'll keep you informed as soon as I hear any news.

Driving in Detroit

Thank you to Joanna for sending this to me (and she's right -- every one of these rules is absolutely true):

For Those Planning to Visit Detroit

• You must learn to pronounce the city name. It's Di-troit. NOT DEE-troit. If you pronounce it DEE-Troit then we will assume you are from Toledo and here for the Country Music Hoe-Down.   (Note from Jeff: This is slightly misleading. "Detroit" is pronounced deh-TROIT.)
• Forget the traffic rules you learned elsewhere. Detroit has its own version of traffic rules... Hold on and pray!
• The morning rush hour is from 6:00am to 10:00am.   The evening rush hour is from 3:00pm to 7:00pm.   Friday's rush hour starts Thursday morning.   Weekends are open game.
• If you actually stop at a yellow light, you will be rear-ended, cussed out and possibly shot.   If you're first off the starting line when the light turns green, count to five before going.   This will avoid getting in the way of cross-traffic who just ran their yellow light to keep from getting shot.
• Schoenherr Road can ONLY be properly pronounced by a native of the Detroit metro area. That goes for Gratiot too.
• Construction and renovation on I-94, I-96, I-75 and I-275 is a way of life. Just deal with it.
• If someone actually has their turn signal on, it is probably a factory defect or they are "out-of-towners."
• All old men with white hair wearing a hat have total right-of-way.
• The minimum acceptable speed on I-696 is 85 regardless of the posted speeds. Anything less is considered downright SISSY. (Note from Jeff: How true....) Oh, and don't even think of allowing more than one car length between cars!
• The attractive wrought iron on the windows and doors in Detroit is NOT ornamental. "DO NOT get out of your car"
• Never stare at the driver of the car with the bumper sticker that says "Keep honking, I'm reloading."
• If you are in the left lane, and only going 70 in a 60 mph zone, people are not waving 'because they are so friendly in Detroit.' I would suggest you duck.
• I-275/I-696 is our daily version of NASCAR.
• It's not M-10, it's "the Lodge."
• That's not a lake, it's a pothole.
• If someone tells you it's on Outer Drive, you better hope you have a map.
• The left turn is simple. If you want to turn left, go a 1/4 of a mile past your turn, get to the left, then make a left, then make a right. NOW you have gone left.

Enjoy Your Trip To Detroit!

Returning to the earth

This guy stole my idea! I decided many years ago that if I was old and terminally ill, I would get on a skydiving plane, take my first and last dose of LSD, and jump out of the plane without a parachute. The old man in this story neglected to take the LSD -- but he got all the other parts right.

The Invasion

Neal Pollack is back! Show him some love!

The Bible is out-of-bounds

Now:

ST. LOUIS (AP) -- John Kerry cited a Bible verse to criticize leaders who have "faith but has no deeds," prompting President Bush's spokesman to accuse Kerry of exploiting Scripture for a political attack.

...

"The Scriptures say, what does it profit, my brother, if someone says he has faith but does not have works?" Kerry said. "When we look at what is happening in America today, where are the works of compassion?"

Bush campaign spokesman Steve Schmidt said Kerry's comment "was beyond the bounds of acceptable discourse and a sad exploitation of Scripture for a political attack." (emphasis added by Jeffrey)

Then:

Mr. Bush also urged, however, that America remain a "welcoming country" - not polarized on the issue of homosexuality.

"I am mindful that we're all sinners, and I caution those who may try to take the speck out of the neighbor's eye when they got a log in their own," he said, invoking a biblical passage from the Gospel of St. Matthew.

"I think it is important for our society to respect each individual, to welcome those with good hearts," the president said. But, he added, "That does not mean that someone like me needs to compromise on the issue of marriage."

I'm a packrat

As much as I hate to admit it, I am a packrat. This became blindingly obvious as I sorted through some of my piles today -- why did I ever think I'd look at certain crap again? Sigh. I need to become much more proactive about throwing shit out.

Although, my habit did provide a nice little surprise -- I found a movie clip from three years ago that I thought was lost. It was on an old CD compilation hiding in my desk. Awesome!

Cheating at Final Fantasy 2

Today on Snarkmarket, Matt mentions that Final Fantasy 2 was the last game in a dozen years to emotionally move him. Well, what a coincidence -- that was one of the games I successfully cheated at during spring break! Thanks to modern emulator technology, you can play all your favorite video games from childhood on your home PC. I use an emulator called SNES9X Custom, which allows me to edit the emulated SNES' memory locations in real time. With some helpful background info from GameFAQs, some searching skill, and a familiarity with hexadecimal notation, you too can give yourself unfair amounts of gold, experience, and items.

In order to inspire you to try cheating yourself, I've posted some images of my experiments. Right now I'm at the point in the game where I need to go visit the Sealed Cave, so keep that in mind when you see my wicked levels. :)

My main menu -- I gave everyone about 3 million experience points, thus everyone's almost at level 70.
Cecil's equipment -- Yes, I've got the Crystal sword and Adamant armor, and I haven't even visited the moon yet!

Shattered glass

If you have iTunes installed, then you are privileged indeed: you can listen to "Sneak-Peek Pre-Release Tracks!" from William Hung, the failed American Idol contestant.

If I had more winning Pepsi bottlecaps, I might just buy the songs! (Indeed, Mr. Hung is lucky these songs were released during a free-song promotion, because no one in their right mind would ever spend real money on his music.)

Children's Corner

Thanks to my mother's good friend Barb, here's a bit of background information about Golliwogg's Cake-Walk, which I recommended back in November.

Did you know that Debussy (Barb's favorite composer) wrote that piece in part to poke fun of Wagner? One of the recurring motifs is a play on the famous chord from Tristan and Isolde. Debussy initally loved Wagner, but eventually grew to detest him. He felt that Wagner's music was dangerous to the complex and subtle sensibility of French music.

Insert your own joke here about the French or about Wagner & Hitler.

Answer to 'Past the decimal point'

[Click here to read the question.]

As you may have deduced from the MathWorld article I referenced, the answer is almost an integer, but not quite. Thus the answer '163' is incorrect.

Here's the catch: even though a quick look at the expression hints that the answer is not an integer (or even rational), most calculators and computers will tell you that the answer is 163. This should have raised a red flag in your mind, and led to more careful analysis/computation. Here's the answer to 35 decimal places, as generated by Mathematica:

163.00000000000000000000000000002322

As you can see, this number doesn't diverge from 163 until after the 30th decimal place. If you're not careful, even Mathematica will incorrectly give you 163. For this post, I had to explicitly tell Mathematica how much precision I needed. For the morbidly curious, here's the answer to 200 decimal places:

163.0000000000000000000000000000232167779424533410679
7849303647979599552603958882248257256551353136720534
306763983716241556818691116559260618916795700533302
716713392783181506705567740276991223717742914

The pitch

As I walked towards my car this evening, a panhandler followed me on his bicycle and asked me these questions:

Q: What's the greatest nation on earth?
A: Donation.

Q: What's the greatest city on earth?
A: Generosity.

I gave him the change in my pocket -- it was too cute.

Winer pissing in the wind

Scripting.com, Saturday, March 20, 2004:

Questions for SixApart re their upcoming authentication system.

Scripting.com, Sunday, March 21, 2004:

The questions I asked yesterday are unanswered.

Preview of Scripting.com, Tuesday, March 23, 2004:

You insolent little swine! How dare you propose a centralized online authentication system to combat weblog comment spam? And even worse, how dare you refuse to consult with the great Dave Winer? When I ask you questions, I do not invite a reply -- I demand it! Don't you know who I am? I am the finest software developer on the planet! But you mock my authority and release a competing content management system! I warn you now: if you do not begin to pay the proper respect to me, I will smite your pathetic little company with my thunder weapons!

Now begone!

Past the decimal point

Here's a fun exercise from the textbook Numerical Mathematics and Computing, Fifth Edition by Cheney & Kincaid.

Compute in double or extended precision the following number:

Here's my hint: x does not equal 163.

Spring break blues

Well, that was a mediocre spring break! Not only did I get sick and spend half the break in bed, but I just received a booty call instant message -- unfortunately, I was not the intended recipient.

And I have school again in less than twelve hours. Damn.

Help me with email, Omar

Omar's latest post about Outlook plugins is all fine and dandy, but I just realized that Omar works for the Mac Business Unit at Microsoft, yet he didn't mention any plugins for Entourage (which, as you know, I love). Can you recommend anything for a product you actually manage?

Come back anytime

Well, we already know that Dennis Miller has to pay people to be part of his studio audience. But he sunk to new lows this week in his treatment of Eric Alterman. On Alterman's blog, he tells his story of being on Miller's show.

Anyway, what was so weird about it was how professional it seemed until I finally sat down with Miller.  It was set up long in advance by the book’s publicists.  The car came on time.  In my dressing room, which was pretty elaborate as such things go, I met with a series of staff members who informed me that Dennis would be wanting to discuss topics such as George Soros and the funding of 527s; whether Bush was exploiting the 9/11 families, and I forget what else, just like a real talk show.  Then I go out there and what?  I’m talking to a stoned teenager, who can’t be bothered to say more than, “Whoh, man, you are so totally screwed up.  Like, you really believe that stuff, dude?”  I paraphrase, but really, Dennis did not say much more than that.  Everyone on staff was extremely apologetic afterward and the word “unprofessional” was used over and over.

I try to avoid most of these guys, though I’ve been on O’Reilly, and Scarborough and Michael Medved’s silly radio program a couple of times but never have I encountered a guy who could not be bothered to make his own case on his own show.  Really, what can CNBC be thinking with this guy?...

Some guy provided an excerpt of the appearance in QuickTime form, but I don't know how long it will be available, so I transcribed some of the more interesting parts. (If you're a close, personal friend and want the QuickTime file, I'll send it to you.)

Alterman: ...I'm not here working for Dean. He can defend himself. I don't believe [Bush knew about 9/11 beforehand].
Miller: Alright, what are you here to talk about? [paid audience laughs]
Alterman: They didn't tell me...
Miller: I'm so pissed off, I don't even know what to say! You're looking at me like, you're just sitting here like, [does exaggerated impression of Alterman] Give me a question, and I'll ask you a question! What do you want to talk about?

First, what talentless hack asks his guest to come up with questions to ask? A good interviewer has plenty of questions ready. Second, Miller's whiny outburst was totally unprovoked -- the tone of the interview leading up to "What are you here to talk about?" was very matter-of-fact with no raised voices. As far as I can tell, the only reason for Miller getting pissed off was because he disagreed with Alterman -- a poor justification.

Anyways, Alterman comes up with a question that Miller can ask him, and then answers it for several minutes, with a couple of Miller questions in between. Then near the end of the interview, Miller starts to interrupt (his justification is "I've been letting you talk so much"), and we get this:

Alterman: ...I'll just finish this thought.
Miller: Let's finish this [expletive] segment.

And at the very end, Miller has the gall to say,

Miller: Alright, you've been great. Come back anytime.

Now I know who Jay Mohr's conservative commentator caricature on the West Wing comes from! After all, you can be as rude as you like during the interview, as long as you say "You've been great. Come back anytime."

Dumbfuck.

The beginning of any great story

Quote of the day:

It all started with our giant vagina.

[Via the Obscure Store]

Nerd reserve

Ok, I'll admit the only reason I blogged this article was because I came up with a cute entry title.

The government is taking the first steps toward a targeted military draft of Americans with special skills in computers and foreign languages.

Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld is adamant that he will not ask Congress to authorize a draft, and officials at the Selective Service System, the independent federal agency that would organize any conscription, stress that the possibility of a so-called "special skills draft" is remote.

Nonetheless, the agency has begun the process of creating the procedures and policies to conduct such a targeted draft in case military officials ask Congress to authorize it and the lawmakers agree to such a request.

...

Flahavan said Selective Service planning for a possible draft of linguists and computer experts began last fall after Pentagon personnel officials said the military needed more people with skills in those areas.

Remember, Mr. Rumsfeld, it's not a good idea to require a physical when you're drafting computer hackers. Just something to keep in mind when creating your procedures and policies.

Open-source consensus

In an attempt to explain why software still stinks, Salon provides a humorous (and telling) anecdote:

[Hertzfeld's] comment underscored something that's frequently misunderstood about the open-source approach, which is often wrongly stereotyped as loopily communal and out-of-touch with business reality. There's an essential pragmatism to the notion that programmers work best when they can share, and learn from, one another's work. After all, every other field of human endeavor works that way.

Bricklin sent waves of laughter through the auditorium by reading a passage from Lammers' interview with Bill Gates in which the young Microsoft founder explained that his work on different versions of Microsoft's BASIC compiler was shaped by looking at how other programmers had gone about the same task. Gates went on to say that young programmers don't need computer science degrees: "The best way to prepare is to write programs, and to study great programs that other people have written. In my case, I went to the garbage cans at the Computer Science Center and I fished out listings of their operating systems."

Bricklin finished reading Gates' words and announced, with an impish smile, "This is where Gates and [Richard] Stallman agree!"

Don't they know that Bill Gates recently tried to give back to the programming community? :)

The most important television program ever

Yay! My favorite show, the Daily Show, has renewed Jon Stewart as its anchor for several more years. Here's a choice quote from the AP article, talking about last night's show:

But "The Daily Show" pokes fun at nothing more than itself.

Earlier this week the program cried foul upon learning that the Bush administration had released simulated news features to TV stations that promoted certain Bush policies.

How, wailed "Daily Show" senior media ethicist Rob Corddry, could a little show like his hope to compete with the federal government in producing fake news?

I think the Daily Show will do just fine.

Oh, do go on, Mr. Bremer!

Wha-uh?

In a morning meeting on Wednesday, Mr. Bremer warned the Iraqi leaders that they risked isolating themselves and their country if they continued to snub the United Nations.

Urrrrrgh! The hypocrisy is killing me inside!

Because we have priorities

Dread

I've had a mild sore throat all day. I suspect when I wake up tomorrow, I'll have full-blown strep throat. Boo.

Spam stalking

This is one of the subject lines from the many pieces of spam I received today:

Im sure you there

How does "Aurora Blount" know I'm here? Did she see my car in the street? Did she squint through the window? Is that why she suspects I need penis pills? I need a restraining order!

The first rule of journalism? Follow the metadata

Thank you Microsoft! The hidden features you leave turned on by default help journalists reveal the influence of money in politics.

A draft letter purportedly circulated by Bill Lockyer to fellow state attorneys general characterizes P2P software as a "dangerous product" and describes the failure of technology makers to warn consumers of those dangers as a deceptive trade practice.

...

However, the metadata associated with the Microsoft Word document indicates it was either drafted or reviewed by a senior vice president of the Motion Picture Association of America. According to this metadata (automatically generated by the Word application), the document's author or editor is "stevensonv." (The metadata of a document is viewable through the File menu under Properties.)

Sources tell Wired News that the draft letter's authorship is attributed to Vans Stevenson, the MPAA's senior vice president for state legislative affairs. MPAA representatives have issued similar criticisms of P2P technology in the past. Stevenson could not be reached for comment.

Unfortunately, computer illiteracy also ends up compromising our national interests:

A classified 1954 CIA file recently released on the web in redacted form by the New York Times, is being re-released by a noted cypherpunk archivist with the names of foreign agents restored, courtesy of a blunder in the method the newspaper used to conceal that information.

...

Tim Sullivan, CEO of activePDF, a maker of server side PDF tools, analyzed a page of the original file at SecurityFocus.com's request. "The application that created it was Adobe Photoshop for the Mac," said Sullivan. "They created another layer in Photoshop, and drew a black box over it. And so what's happening is you have one layer that's the content, which is the scanned-in page, and then another layer that's overlaid on top. On a slow machine, you see it displayed."

Someone using a binary editor could modify the document to prevent the opaque black lines and boxes from appearing at all, said Sullivan, and an Adobe plug-in might allow someone to simply slide the black boxes away. "They [the Times] should have used the eraser tool to erase all the pixels, and then draw the box over it," said Sullivan, "or merged the two layers."

Knock one out of the park

From the reliable Borowitz Report:

Detroit Tigers Exempted From Steroid Ban
Steroids Called 'Mandatory' for Cellar-dwelling Club

Major League Baseball reversed its longstanding anti-steroid policy today, permitting the Detroit Tigers to take the performance-enhancing drugs for the duration of the 2004 baseball season.

“By permitting the Tigers to take steroids, we are taking an important step to level the playing field,” MLB Commissioner Bud Selig told reporters.

Under the new policy, which Mr. Selig called “a work in progress,” the lowly Tigers will not only be permitted to take steroids, “they will be forced to do so.”

Major League Baseball will administer mandatory daily drug tests to confirm that the Detroit team is taking its steroids every day as dictated by the new policy.

Mr. Selig hinted that if the steroid exemption results in more wins for the cellar-dwelling Tigers, it could eventually be extended to such other perennial horsehide doormats as the Tampa Bay Devil Rays and the Cleveland Indians.

But in their first day out on the diamond with the formerly taboo drugs coursing through their veins, the Tigers had an inauspicious showing, grinding out a discouraging series of weak grounders and pop-ups in a 7-1 loss to the Baltimore Orioles.

After the game, a concerned Mr. Selig told reporters, “If we determine that the Tigers were not taking their steroids as ordered, there will be serious consequences.”

Bring it, bitch

The Kerry campaign made a great strategic move today:

QUINCY, Ill. (Reuters) - Democratic presidential candidate John Kerry, visiting the site of one of the most famous political debates in U.S. history, challenged President Bush on Saturday to a "real discussion about America's future" in monthly debates.

Kerry, already engaged in a running exchange of negative ads with Bush before the November election, said, "America shouldn't have to put up with eight months of sniping."

"I believe the American people are hungry for a genuine conversation about the fundamental questions before us," Kerry said in Quincy, Illinois, site of one of the seven historic Abraham Lincoln-Stephen Douglas debates.

...

"Surely, if the attack ads can start now at least we can agree to start a real discussion about America's future," Kerry said, trying to take the high road early in a campaign already marked by bitter charges and counterattacks.

This is a brilliant idea -- if the Bush administration declines, then Kerry can accuse the Bush campaign of being negative and afraid to tackle the issues. If they agree to monthly debates, then Bush (a poor public speaker with or without a script) will have to face Kerry, a seasoned debater. Either way, this is a great thing.

One Rule to bind them all

It comes to my understanding that one of the "Rules" is: Let him take the lead. Two comments: one, I know for a fact that this is a bad strategy when it comes to me, and will probably backfire on many single men. Second, doesn't this sound like a Rule written by a woman who wants as many men freed up for her as possible? It's the plan of an evil genius: sabotaging tons of blossoming relationships so you can have the pick of the litter!

Live by the quote...

TruthOut just published a list of great quotations to remember. Here are a couple of my favorites:

"Victory means exit strategy, and it's important for the President to explain to us what the exit strategy is."
-George W. Bush, discussing Kosovo, Houston Chronicle, 04-09-99

And who can forget this gem from Rush:

"When you strip it all away, Jerry Garcia destroyed his life on drugs. And yet he's being honored, like some godlike figure. Our priorities are out of whack, folks."
-Rush Limbaugh, on the death of Jerry Garcia, 08-20-95.

However, I think the following quotation is unfair, because Bill O'Reilly actually did own up and apologize (well, sort of) for believing Bush.

"I said on my program, if, if the Americans go in and overthrow Saddam Hussein and it's clean, he has nothing, I will apologize to the nation, and I will not trust the Bush administration again."
-Bill O'Reilly, on ABC's Good Morning America, 03-18-03

Absolute corruption, continued

I've re-translated Dave Winer, and my new translation is much more concise:

I'm Rick James, bitch!

If this went over your head, perhaps this link will help.

Absolute corruption

Here's a brief translation of Dave Winer's latest rant:

Mwa ha ha ha! I am all-powerful! You cannot stop me and my RSS 2.0 data format! Bow down, Atom, before the awesome Winer! If you do not obey, Pilgrim, Ruby, and Ito, I will crush your insolent mortal pig-faces! Now, go, re-publish your content in a more pleasing format, and spare yourselves from my merciless fury!

Now would be a great time to mention that geekable.com is syndicated in several formats, including Atom and RSS 2.0.

Pick a pundit to pummel!

This article from the L.A. Weekly is very schizophrenic -- it can't decide if it wants to be a pro-Dennis-Miller fluff piece or a vicious anti-Daily-Show attack editorial. We get strange shifts, almost like an editor went in after the fact and rewrote the second half of the article. This is why you get sentences like these:

Ably abetted by the analyses and reports of hilariously self-important correspondents like Stephen Colbert, Stewart has managed to turn the traditional news show on its head while delivering a bracingly strong shot of Onion-esque alternative news at the same time. And he's done it with such elegance and panache as to make his rivals — Bill Maher, Colin Quinn and now [Dennis] Miller — look like inebriated peasants trying out a few dance moves while standing next to Fred Astaire.

...which are then followed by paragraphs like these:

When satirizing the media, The Daily Show is brilliant, but when it comes to Osama bin Laden et al., Stewart just can't wrap his head around the idea of an enemy, particularly a Third World one. Simply thinking about it makes him queasy, uncomfortable, and challenges his most deeply held belief, which is that it's unseemly to get ticked off at anyone who isn't rich, Caucasian and, hopefully, Republican. The municipal authorities of his own city may be working around the clock to prepare for the possibility of a nuclear attack, but Stewart can't find it in his heart to resent the people who make those preparations necessary. Deep down, he'd prefer to think it's all Dick Cheney's fault: If we hadn't invaded Iraq, 9/11 would never have happened.

This last paragraph must have been written by a partisan hack who's never seen the Daily Show. Jon Stewart reserves his nastiest curse words for Osama and Saddam, and lets them fly whenever he can. As a regular, faithful viewer, I don't see Stewart exclusively attacking "rich Caucasians" -- he'll attack anyone who'll get a laugh. As it should be.

As for partisan hacks, tune in to the Daily Show tonight to see Ed Gillespie, chairman of the Republican National Committee!

P.S. My feelings about Mr. Miller can be found here.

Sully continues to Kerry on

WARNING: The following post relies on several stereotypes in an attempt to be funny, and politically correct types may be offended. However, it's about Andrew Sullivan, and I know he'd do the exact same thing towards me, so let's cheapen the discourse, shall we?

Today, Andrew Sullivan has stopped flirting with the idea of voting for a Democrat in 2004:

However mad I am at Bush, just a few minutes reading John Kerry's foreign policy and cultural perspective makes me want to ... well, it just spoiled my breakfast. Read this foreign policy discussion. Now imagine 9/11 had never happened. It isn't hard. Al Qaeda is mentioned once. I repeat: al Qaeda is mentioned once. My stomach lurches at the thought of another terror attack while Kerry is president. What would be his first response: reach for a dog-eared copy of the early Sartre? Look, Eliot is a spectacular poet. I've read him year after year after year. I dramatized the "Four Quartets" at Harvard. But that's not a qualification for the presidency. Then there's this classic line of pretentiousness and self-regard: "I remember flying once; I was looking out at the desert and I wrote a poem about the barren desolation of the desert. I wrote a poem once about a great encounter I had with a deer early in the morning that was very moving." Oh God. Four years of this?

Yes, you read correctly: A homosexual Gap model from Britain is too manly to support a candidate who writes poetry.

Those who can, do

As I once mentioned before, I used to work for an incompetent professor at Wayne State. My job was to handle the accounting of a particular project he was in charge of. Unfortunately, my job was incredibly micro-managed.

Because this project was funded federally, we had to keep good expense records in case of an audit. He insisted that every expense transaction be recorded in an enormous Excel spreadsheet. There were custom two-digit codes for the type of expense, different colors for whether the expense was paid or not, etc. This would have been an adequate solution, had I not been required to run reports against this data set on a regular basis. The professor had specially-constructed instructions for creating reports -- I had to sort the rows of the spreadsheet by three different criteria, then go down and insert three rows in between each criterion block, then calculate the summation of three columns within each block, paste the sum values into a specially crafted report template, yada yada yada, I wanted to kill myself.

The funny part (not ha-ha funny, but looking-back-at-my-murderous-rage funny) was that this computer science professor should have known that a database was the ideal tool to solve his problem, and not a spreadsheet. He could store all of the data in a table, design a form for data entry, build some queries for common tasks, and design a monthly report which would run a query, calculate all the necessary figures, and format everything the way he liked it. But try telling this to a tenured professor who thinks he knows everything -- he'll tell you that his way has worked for twenty years, so why change it?

It's that particular type of thinking that shows up in this brilliant little cartoon. Oh, and if you're reading this, Mr. Professor, sorry for trying to move your cheese.

I approve this message

Here's a link to a political advertisement I'd like to see on television.

Honeymoon

Courtesy of Wonkette, here's a very amusing unintentional double-entendre headline.

The tides of March

The tide continues to turn against Dubya. Recent polls among registered voters show Kerry leading Bush 48 to 44, and then there's this piece of positive news: Howard Stern is becoming more and more anti-Bush.

Stern's loyal listeners, Clear Channel foes and many Bush administration critics immediately reached the same conclusion: The notorious jock was yanked off the air because he had recently begun trashing Bush, and Bush-friendly Clear Channel used the guise of "indecency" to shut him up. That the content of Stern's crude show hadn't suddenly changed, but his stance on Bush had, gave the theory more heft. That, plus his being pulled off the air in key electoral swing states such as Florida and Pennsylvania.

This week, Stern himself went on the warpath, weaving in among his familiar monologues about breasts and porn actresses accusations that Texas-based Clear Channel -- whose Republican CEO, Lowry Mays, is extremely close to both George W. Bush and Bush's father -- canned him because he deviated from the company's pro-Bush line. "I gotta tell you something," Stern told his listeners. "There's a lot of people saying that the second that I started saying, 'I think we gotta get Bush out of the presidency,' that's when Clear Channel banged my ass outta here. Then I find out that Clear Channel is such a big contributor to President Bush, and in bed with the whole Bush administration, I'm going, 'Maybe that's why I was thrown off: because I don't like the way the country is leaning too much to the religious right.' And then, bam! Let's get rid of Stern. I used to think, 'Oh, I can't believe that.' But that's it! That's what's going on here! I know it! I know it!"

...

Stern's political conversion came on Monday, Feb. 23, when he returned to the show after a week's vacation and announced he'd read Al Franken's anti-Bush book, "Lies and the Lying Liars Who Tell Them: A Fair and Balanced Look at the Right." That morning Stern, who had strongly backed Bush during the war on Iraq, told listeners, "If you read this book, you will never vote for George W. Bush. I think this guy is a religious fanatic and a Jesus freak, and he is just hell-bent on getting some sort of bizzaro agenda through -- like a country-club agenda -- so that his father will finally be proud of him ... I don't know much about Kerry, but I think I'm one of those 'Anybody but Bush' guys now. I don't think G.W. is going to win. What do you think about that?"

Three days later, on the morning of Feb. 26, Stern was suspended from all six Clear Channel stations that aired his wake-up program. Company executives pointed to the Tuesday show as the reason for the suspension. During that program Stern interviewed Rick Solomon, who had starred in a sex tape with Paris Hilton. The conversation was graphic (Stern: "I can't believe you banged her. Did you get anal?"), and one caller used a racial slur that was broadcast. But Stern's shows are filled with such language and have been for years.

Of course, Howard Stern is not the best role-model for the Kerry campaign. But like it or not, Stern is a very influential pundit, and his dwindling lack of support for Bush is a good sign.

Yet another good sign is wacko Andrew Sullivan's commentary. He's very outraged over the Bush administration's support for an amendment banning gay marriages and civil unions. Here's an interesting quote:

...Bush's religious right amendment has also united Democrats behind this issue in ways they never were before. Attacking the amendment is now an applause line in John Kerry's election speech - and he will get every gay vote and every vote from their families and friends. Meanwhile, key Republicans, like Arnold Schwarzenegger, have come out and opposed this unnecessary meddling with the Constitution. Even the vice-president cannot manage to explicitly endorse such graffiti on the founding document of this country. What the religious right amendment is doing is splitting the Republican coalition and uniting the Democrats. What the religious right did to destroy the Republican party in a state like California, they are now trying to do across the country as a whole. They are not only on the wrong side of history; and on the wrong side of morality; they are putting the Republican party on the losing side of politics. They must and will be stopped.

Hmm! Even more interesting:

The combination of Bill Clinton and a Republican Congress was great for the country's fiscal standing.

WHAT?! A conservative pundit putting the words "Clinton" and "great" in the same sentence? I can't help but become more optimistic about November every single day.

My horoscope(s)

Two of the Onion's horoscopes apply to me today. First off, Virgo:

Your search for deep meaning in a trite and mundane workaday world continues. Meanwhile, 3,000 people worldwide die of malaria every day, you simp.

I also sympathize with Pisces:

Years from now, you still won't be able to figure out why the love of your life left you for a nicer, smarter, better-looking person.

Too bad I'm actually a Cancer.

Colliding news and anti-news

This is an actual wire story:

Elton John Has No Plans to Wed Partner

NEW YORK - Don't start shopping for a wedding gift for Elton John (news) just yet. The singer said that while he supports same-sex marriage, reports are untrue that he plans to wed his longtime partner, David Furnish.

"David and I are in favor of gay marriage but have no plans to get married," John said in a statement Wednesday.

Who cares?!?! I have no plans to get married anytime soon, but you don't see the Associated Press reporting on that! They should be ashamed!

Anyways, the best take on gay marriage I've seen lately is this This Modern World comic.

How to enjoy Robert Scoble

Do you like to read Robert Scoble's weblog, but occasionally find yourself concerned that you may be reading pure Microsoft marketing propaganda? Do you often find yourself believing that Microsoft has your best interests at heart, and wants to make their products the best and most secure they can be? Do you own a SPOT watch?

Well, snap out of it! You're supposed to detach yourself from the content, and not drink the Kool-Aid. The best way to stay on top of things is laugh while you're reading it. Here's how:

As you read, imagine Scoble dressed up in a big blue butterfly outfit.

(If you're reading this, Mr. Scoble, I really do like your blog. Please don't send Ballmer after me.)

This is not a LiveJournal

Travelling with the Booty Nomad

Today Nerve posted an interview with Scott Mebus, author of the novel Booty Nomad. The interview provides good insights into the minds of meek male geeks and the minds of modern females. For example,

I think women do [separate love and sex], yes. I think women are taught, from birth, to disassociate the two: Love is more pure than sex. I dated this one girl who kept saying to me, "Would you still love me if we never had sex again?" And this was really important to her. It's like asking me, "Can you breathe underwater?" It makes no sense to me. They go hand in hand. Women are taught to expect certain concessions just because they're owed it. Because of the way sex is used, they expect us to approach it with such reverence and thankfulness that we're being allowed to have it. It's so one-sided. If there's at all an issue with sex, it's our job to deal with it, and not their job to look at it and say, What's our role in this?

Another choice quotation:

I know this makes me a turncoat to the male gender, but I'm finding that sex with women I don't know is becoming less satisfying. I turned down sex, a few months ago with an extremely beautiful woman, just because I valued her friendship. It's just not worth it.

I know the feeling -- I guess that means I'm too sensitive!

Naughty social networking

Jussi from Finland informed me today that in the Finnish language, "orkut" is a slang term for "orgasm". Perhaps the creator of the service, who is named Orkut, is engaged in a bit of wishful thinking. :)

I wanna be a fireman

Recently I've been spending more time considering what I want to do 'when I grow up' or when I get my bachelors' degree, whichever comes first. (The degree is a safe bet.) I really wish I had an answer, because the question comes up all the time. People seem programmed to ask that whenever I mention my mathematics major.

Possibilities include: professor (I'll need a masters' degree for that), schoolteacher (ditto), operations researcher (what a great job title), NSA analyst (fat chance), actuary (absolutely not), and software engineer (great job, if you can get it).

I'm really concerned that with the continuing economic decline and the increasing trend of outsourcing high-paying analytical work to low-salaried foreign workers, that I'll be working in retail when I graduate. Let's hope that if that happens, I'll work for a company I love.

Another issue I'm contemplating is where I'll live once I graduate. Even though I should stay in Michigan and create 'cool cities', I kind of want to get the hell out of here. Both the Pacific northwest and the New England area seem really attractive.

Any suggestions on either of these points? Even better, does anyone want to guarantee me a great job out of college? My email is on the sidebar.

So sorry to bother you

I like to think of myself as a laid-back guy, tough to offend, but tonight someone offended me so much via IM that I removed their site from my links list in the sidebar. To the young lady whom this blog post concerns: fuck you and your hipper-than-thou attitude.