Nate Edel's blog
WASHINGTON (AP) — Two outer rings, one red, the other blue, have been observed around the distant planet Uranus.
While Uranus had been known to have inner rings of neutral color, the newly discovered outer rings show color contrasts that researchers think are caused by light reflected off particles that differ in size from one ring to the other.
via Pryor on DBA.
Tonight, shortly after 1:00am, the time and date will be: 01:02:03 04/05/06
From a coworker… (although in fairness, two-digit years are evil, unless we’re restarting the count from 2000)
Via MSNBC Argentine president to country: Eat less beef
As prices rise carnivores endanger Nestor Kirchner’s anti-inflation fight
Updated: 7:28 a.m. ET March 16, 2006
BUENOS AIRES, Argentina – Argentines rank among the world’s biggest meat-eaters. But President Nestor Kirchner has told his carnivorous compatriots it’s time to consume less if beef prices continue to rise and threaten his campaign against inflation.But isn’t that like shunning the tango or telling a soccer-mad nation to skip the World Cup?
Somehow this reminds me of Shrubbo’s “addicted to oil” comment.
On an side note, I’ve wanted to visit Argentina for a while now, and the cuisine – including excellent, relatively affordable beef – is a big part of that.
From MSNBC:
Norway, where beer flows instead of water
Woman pleasantly surprised when alcohol comes through kitchen faucet
REUTERS Updated: 6:36 p.m. ET March 13, 2006OSLO, Norway – A woman thought she was in heaven when beer instead of water flowed from the faucets in her apartment in west Norway.
“I turned on the tap to clean some knives and forks and beer came out,†Haldis Gundersen told Reuters from her home in Kristiansund, in west Norway. “We thought we were in heaven.â€
[…]
It turned out that a worker in a bar two floors below had mixed up the pipes on Saturday evening, wrongly connecting a new barrel to a water pipe leading to Gundersen’s apartment. The bar got water in its beer taps.
Definitely one to file under “News of the Weird.”
The character of Lazlo Hollyfeld in the film Real Genius may have been loosely based on a real person:
Chuck claims to be a fairly normal inventor at a large audio equipment manufacturer. But in 1972, Chuck lived in the tunnels beneath Caltech’s student dormitories. Soon thereafter, he moved into the misty realm of Caltech legend, where he apparently still lives today.
His legend played a central role in a recent movie about Caltech, called “Real Genius”. The movie was directed by Martha Coolidge and starred Val Kilmer. In the movie, a burned-out misfit named Lazlo Hollyfeld lives in the tunnels beneath a student dorm, easily recognized as Dabney House.
Found via google, looking for something else entirely.
Sometimes I get reminded that being in a fraternity in college was not just about having a supportive bunch of guys around to look after me when I was drinking, and a nice spot to crash on the couch and watch a very large TV set.
Sometimes, like Peter’s wedding, it involves genuinely being reminded of the strength of the friendships I developed there. And sometimes, it involves REALLY funny emails that I’d never have gotten if I’d just hung out with other geeks and Comp. Sci. majors.
I got forwarded a series of emails which apparantly are the legal community’s next answer to Craig Shergold. And apparantly, they’re real.:
The email that roared
The strange tale of a much-forwarded email chain describing “Lawyers behaving badly.”
By David L. Yas
Sadly, when Abdala typed those three syllables of gibberish, she made an electronic record of her own impetuousness, a record that may haunt her for quite some time.
How do I know? Because I was one of roughly seven zillion people who received a copy of the email this week. Thanks to an unstoppable phalanx of forwarders, the brief exchange has made its way to a countless number of attorneys after Korman shared it with a friend and allowed him to share it with a few others.
Fueled by attorneys’ curiosity that a young attorney would fire away at a would-be employee with so much vigor, the email chain made its way from firm to firm with the speed and recklessness of Apolo Ohno after six caffe lattes. It went to Rindler Morgan and Gadsby Hannah, to Mintz Levin and Sally & Fitch, to Nixon Peabody and Wilmer Hale.
It’s been across the state and out of state. And to Europe. Seriously.
And now to my house alumni mailing list, and likely heading to an inbox near you.
I have no idea if it’s legitimate to repost the email forward in its entirety, and to be on the safe side I’m not going to do so here. I am surprised to see that it’s NOT readily available on google yet. Suffice it to say that once someone DOES put it on the web, you’ve got all the keywords you need to find it in the Mass law article. And it’s funny as heck, and funnier still with the context the article provides.
Not that techies are immune to our own brand of idiocy, but I do like to think that the BOFH is fiction.
Sounds like a bad comic book, right?
But via BoingBoing.net, we find that they’re stars of the NSA children’s outreach site.
They have comments on changes to the site, but in general, I’m just baffled and astounded(*); that they HAVE a ridiculous comicky children’s site to begin with.
(* I was going to say “hornswoggled” but I’m informed that means “fooled.”)
The Onion
U.S. Holds Going-Out-Of-Business Sale
January 17, 2006 | Issue 42•03
WASHINGTON, DC—In an address broadcast on late-night television Tuesday, President Bush announced that the federal government will liquidate its holdings in a going-out-of-business sale scheduled to begin Friday.
After 200-plus years of service, the U.S. government is closing its doors.
“The U.S. government, America’s place for law and order since 1776, has lost its lease, and everything must go, go, go,” Bush said. “But our loss is your gain, and make no mistake: You, the people, would be crazy to miss out on these amazing closeout bargains.”The Washington-based government, which hasn’t shown a profit in five years and carries the highest debt in its history, was ultimately driven out of business by costly overhead and cheap foreign competitors. As a result, Bush said, everything—from flag stands and Capitol cafeteria flatware to legislation dating from the early days of the republic—will be marked down 30 to 90 percent.
Go, read the rest. The Onion is hitting a little too close to home these days.
From today’s Presidential Press Conference:
Q Thank you, Mr. President. I wonder if you can tell us today, sir, what, if any, limits you believe there are or should be on the powers of a President during a war, at wartime? And if the global war on terror is going to last for decades, as has been forecast, does that mean that we’re going to see, therefore, a more or less permanent expansion of the unchecked power of the executive in American society?
THE PRESIDENT: First of all, I disagree with your assertion of “unchecked power.”
Q Well —
THE PRESIDENT: Hold on a second, please. There is the check of people being sworn to uphold the law, for starters. There is oversight. We’re talking to Congress all the time, and on this program, to suggest there’s unchecked power is not listening to what I’m telling you. I’m telling you, we have briefed the United States Congress on this program a dozen times.
This is an awesome responsibility to make decisions on behalf of the American people, and I understand that, Peter. And we’ll continue to work with the Congress, as well as people within our own administration, to constantly monitor programs such as the one I described to you, to make sure that we’re protecting the civil liberties of the United States. To say “unchecked power” basically is ascribing some kind of dictatorial position to the President, which I strongly reject.
Q What limits do you —
THE PRESIDENT: I just described limits on this particular program, Peter. And that’s what’s important for the American people to understand. I am doing what you expect me to do, and at the same time, safeguarding the civil liberties of the country.
(resisting the urge to correct “The President” to “El Shrubbito”)
John on AMERICAblog summarizes it nicely:
Q: Are there any limits on the power of a president during war time. And if the war on terror will last for decades does that mean we’re going to see a permanent expansion of the unchecked power of the executive during wartime.
A: I disagree with the phrase unchecked power. blah blah blah. I am not a dictator. [paraphrase]
[THE PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES JUST HAD TO DENY BEING A DICTATOR]
This reminds me of what my college buddy Mearls used to say “PS I am not a crackpot!”
Police mistakenly impound driver with car
TORONTO (Reuters) – An 85-year-old Canadian man spent hours inside his impounded car in freezing temperatures after his vehicle was ticketed for illegal parking and then towed to a police compound, police said on Thursday.
[…]
“They accessed the vehicle and sure enough there was an elderly man inside. He was disoriented but he was not unconscious.”
[…]
Lammi said police were unsure what stopped the man from driving his car away.
Check out the article on 52 Pickup, on Wikipedia.
The joke may be gone soon, but it will likely be just edited out – look for the one in the history dated 14:21, 30 November 2005 by anonymous @ 161.112.232.22
Old news, but funny enough that when I saw it, I had to post it…
Brits steal carloads of F**king Austrian roadsigns
By Lester Haines
Published Monday 15th August 2005 13:06 GMT
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An Austrian village called Fucking will not change its name despite sniggering Brits making off with its roadsigns.Mayor Siegfried Hauppl has asked visitors to lay off the signs which began to attract outside attention after British and US soldiers passing through in 1945 illuminated the locals as to the English meaning of Fucking, Ananova reports.
Hauppl explained: “We had a vote last year on whether to rename the town, but decided to keep it as it is. After all, Fucking has existed for 800 years, probably when a Mr Fuck or the Fuck family moved into the area. The ‘ing’ was added as a word for settlement.”
Also mentioned on Snopes