« June 2005 | Main | August 2005 »

July 28, 2005

Plain Chicken

Bored Burger King employees?

Posted by eric at 07:57 PM | Comments (2)

July 27, 2005

"How much time would you say you spend..."

The tiles on the Space Shuttle are collectively known as the "Thermal Protection System" or TPS. Coincidence?

Posted by eric at 04:30 PM | Comments (5)

July 25, 2005

The UFO Hacker

Here's a BBC World Service interview with Gary McKinnon, the British "UFO Hacker". (Don't know how long the file will be up.)

He hits all the high points: Anti-gravity propulsion, zero-point 'vacuum' 'free' energy, Windows (in)security, official airbrushings of UFOs from NASA satellite imagery, 9/11 conspiracies, non-terrestrial officers, fleets of space ships.

While the technical details of what he did fit, the evidence for the unusual things he found is still quite weak. Even if he DID get copies of everything he said he saw his believability at this point, well into a criminal prosecution, is suspect.

Supposition: He's desperate for publicity so he invents some fantastic stories about what he found while hacking. He gets the sympathy of the UFO/Conspiracy Believers and those distrustful of the government (American & British) generally.

Supposition: He really did see what he says he saw, but what he saw was there on purpose. Really. Here's a famous story from WW2 about preparations for an impending Japanese attack illustrating what I mean.

The commander of the US Navy's Combat Intelligence Unit (Station Hypo) at Hawaii, Commander Joseph J. Rochefort, noticed that the code reference "AF" was increasingly appearing in Japanese Navy signal traffic as a destination. Rochefort and his team of code-breakers began to concentrate their efforts on identifying the location of AF. It was recalled that two Japanese flying boats had made an abortive attack on Pearl Harbor in March 1942. The flying boats had refuelled from a submarine at French Frigate Shoals, a tiny atoll lying between Pearl Harbor and Japanese-occupied Wake Island and south-east of Midway. An intercepted signal from the flying boats mentioned that they had passed near AF. The only significant land feature in that area was Midway Atoll, and Rochefort was now convinced that AF referred to Midway. He was also convinced that Midway was the target of the impending Japanese naval offensive.

Some of Rochefort's superiors in Washington doubted the correctness of his conclusion that AF referred to Midway. Around 10 May 1942, Rochefort came up with a plan that he felt could identify AF beyond all reasonable doubt. Admiral Nimitz approved what was to become one of the most famous ruses of the Pacific War. Midway was instructed by undersea cable to transmit by radio in plain English a false message to the effect that the atoll's machinery for producing fresh water had broken down and that Midway was short of fresh water. Midway sent the fake message. It was picked up by a Japanese signal unit on a Pacific island, and the message was passed on by radio to Tokyo. The Japanese signal reported "AF is short of water". Rochefort now had his proof beyond reasonable doubt.

How far did he penetrate into secure systems? (A question of some importance in the prosecutation of the case.) Well, what did he say he saw?

Best interview question: "Do you have friends?"

From slashdot, with an amusing comment thread.

Technorati Tags: ufo, hacker, non-terrestrial

Posted by eric at 10:18 AM | Comments (0)

Happy Monday Cool Off

It's supposed to be only 72F here tomorrow, which, after a string of days in the mid/upper 90s is bound to feel pretty good. If I'm looking for a serious mental cooldown I can always visit the new MSN weather site and hit the "Celsius" viewing option.

The option still needs some tweaking -- temperatures are converted in the 'Forecast' column but not the 'Description' column text.

It gets better when the system isn't annotated in the description text:

I can think of a few simple solutions to this problem, but none that would make the text writers' lives easier. (If the text is automatically generated, that's a different story.)

Technorati Tags: msn, weather, thisisbroken

Posted by eric at 09:40 AM | Comments (0)

July 23, 2005

Countdown to Armageddon

Got this great "documentary" off bittorrent. There's something oddly zen-like about a film from 10 years ago claiming the world is ending NOW. The host is a stern-looking guy with a British accent, which I guess does add some authority to the whole topic. (The accent, that is.) You can try to find it here if you're so inclined.

Next up: A film on HAARP. Then, a film about "dating" with what appears to be Venn diagrams. SWEET. Venn diagrams.

I'll probably get more out of the HAARP film.

Posted by eric at 10:52 AM | Comments (0)

July 22, 2005

Posted by eric at 09:52 PM | Comments (2)

Only .4% off, too.

Happy Pi Aproximation Day. 22/7/2005. Get it?

I was already yelled at once today for mentioning this.

Posted by eric at 04:17 PM | Comments (0)

Windows Whhaaaa?

95, NT, 98, 98SE, 2000, ME, XP, 2003, Vista. One of these things is not like the other. Be warned, though, that link provides absolutely no details. No excitement. Just a graphic and a "check back".

Similarities between Vista and OS X? I'm sure that some Mac fanboi will gleefully point out that Microsoft is ripping off Apple again: "Vista" has the same number of letters as "Tiger".

Posted by eric at 10:13 AM | Comments (0)

Non-terrestrial nonsense

I love StatCounter to death but I do have a minor quibble about their recent redesign. For some reason, the default statistics that are shown when you select a project are "Last Month"'s. Not the last 30 days, that's a different setting. You have to select "Save as default" on whichever view you'd like or it will keep defaulting to "Last Month"'s stats.

This isn't really a bad design, it's just a (not-immediately-obvious) change in the default behaviour.

---

No, I do not have any p*ctures of Lisa G. Berzins passed out on the floor of the gas station.

If I did, don't you think I would have posted them by now? Also, if you're wondering what the '*' is for, let's just say I learned my lesson about parroting popular search text after the "Napoleon Dynamite is Dead" debacle.

Posted by eric at 09:38 AM | Comments (0)

July 19, 2005

Watch what you click

So I'm signing up for this mobile phone (SMS) notification thing because a friend (apparently) asked if I'd like to. I'm clicking away through some web dialogs. Username, settings, import contacts.

As I'm clicking next on the "import hotmail contacts" screen I read the little text blurb that says "will send invitations to all hotmail contacts". Stop, Stop, Back. Whoops.

No big deal, I think, my hotmail contacts list is like 4 long, right? I go in and look and it's basically everyone I've ever sent a message to. Whoops again. Lots of people I've haven't said anything to in a very long time, and some I never meant to sent anything to ever again.

So if you got a thing from a mobile yada-yada-yada messaging web site from EricB, delete it. Thanks.

Sigh.

You know what? I feel like spreading a little bit of a beat around, so in spite of my better judgement, I'm going to post a music file here. Chew up my bandwidth if you please, it's one I enjoy, taste be damned. I am going to take the dubious step of not naming it. If you want to know the artist/title, mail me.

(Skip to 3:10, it gets better.)

Posted by eric at 10:57 PM | Comments (4)

Hyperdimensional Web-Statistics

My post about the "Non-terrestrial officers" seems to have drawn a wave of google-ushered visitors down these hallowed halls.

Which reminds me: My favorite researcher of all time evar has started blogging. Richard C. Hoagland rants from the Captain's Chair.

In the 1980's, to the endless amusement of the pundits and the press (those folks again ...), Mr. Bush had the misfortune to refer to some of his political problems as "getting into deep doo doo ...." The press have never let him forget it .... Nor has Dana Carvey, of "Saturday Night Live."

As I write this, NASA seems to have found some of George Bush's left over "doo doo" ... flying around its recently "completed" Deep Impact Mission to Comet Tempel 1.

The "doo doo" is now getting noticably deep ....

You shouldn't miss his coverage of the recent comet mission. Really.

Posted by eric at 02:22 PM | Comments (0)

Clicky-clicky?

Is this just me? The links I've been clicking lately have been a fickle bunch. I'll click and things are partially loaded or don't get loaded at all. I have to sit and click 'refresh' a few times. There could be all sorts of explanations for this. Maybe I'm just impatient.

At any rate, I'm dumping DSL for cable. 12 times the speed for just a little more money.

Posted by eric at 09:10 AM | Comments (0)

July 18, 2005

Battlefield 2

Having played a great deal of BF2 the last month, I've mentally drawn up a list of observations:

• People don't know how to play the game correctly.

  Case in point: Each team is divided into seperate "squads" which you can join and leave freely provided there is space. These squads allow you to spawn near your squad leader should you need to -- the advantage of having a mobile spawn point as well as one that is near to a current battle should be obvious. That said, many people don't bother to join squads. Some that do don't bother to follow the squad leader.

  You can also play as a team 'Commander' (one per team) that has control over scan functions, artillery, and other valuable assets. Often, no one will play as commander. Many commanders are morons, but teams will not bother to vote them out because...

• Nobody votes. Have an obvious team killer? Good luck getting rid of him, it's very difficult to get enough people to vote (by pressing "page up"). The thresholds are too high and voter participation is too low.

• Players drive off in vehicles without picking up teammates. Often times, battles are happening on the other side of the map. The only way to get there in a timely fashion is to hitch a ride. Some people don't pay any attention to the "Need Pickup!" shout. Others drive by you quite purposefully.

• Players run over their teammate's land mines and blow themselves up. This might be excusable if the mines weren't visibly boxed with a warning icon with an additional icon on your HUD. If you run over a teammate's mine, it is your own fault. You should never punish because of it. I had a guy fly an attack helicopter into a warehouse building to get some capture points. The problem was that I'd just mined the point because enemy armor was inbound. The helicopter managed to detonate the mines, killing the pilot, gunner, and a third guy on the ground. All 3 punished me.

• Players don't watch for artillery. There is an audible announcement and a highly visible icon on the minimap. If you don't get out of the way or take cover, it's your own fault. Do not punish the commander unless it is a completely egregious misuse of artillery.

• Connection times need to be drastically shortened. My computer can load all the resources needed to start playing in about 15 seconds. It takes almost two minutes to start playing thereafter because of "Verifying Client Data..."

  Wow, that all sucks. But still, it's great fun.

• The battles are (almost always) constantly in motion. While this can be quite frustrating at times, it also gives the rounds a sense of narrative and direction. That said...

• It's a hoot to pin down and decimate the enemy. Maybe this will get me labeled a camper, but I think it's great fun to take control points that back the enemy into a corner. They have to find a creative way out of their predicament. (I do not camp uncapturable spawns. Dirty, dirty.)

• You really have to work together. Since capturing a control point takes much much longer when you're by yourself, you must recruit teammates to help take them. Two anti-tank players are also much better than one. Medics are invaluable, especially when you're "critically injured" and will die unless they come revive you. Engineers are essential for keeping tanks alive in hotspots.

• Unlockable weapons are something to work for. They really can pack more of a punch that the defaults, provided you choose wisely.

• I have squashed people with helicopters. I have driven cars off of high bridges and then parachuted to safety. I have shot down fully-laden Black Hawks from 500+ meters with a tank round. I've single-handed turned losing rounds into winning ones with well placed artillery barrages. I've stolen tanks from enemy engineers when they hopped out to repair, then I've run them over with their own fresh treads. I've run down the full count of an entire team with a ground defense gun. In a row.

Good times. I've become a gaming hermit, but I get the feeling I wasn't missing out on much to begin with.

Posted by eric at 04:21 PM | Comments (0)

Babelfish needs "English" to "Ebonics"

Ebonics suggested for district

SAN BERNARDINO Incorporating Ebonics into a new school policy that targets black students, the lowest-achieving group in the San Bernardino City Unified School District, may provide students a more well-rounded curriculum, said a local sociologist. ... Texeira suggested that including Ebonics in the program would be beneficial for students. Ebonics, a dialect of American English that is spoken by many blacks throughout the country, was recognized as a separate language in 1996 by the Oakland school board.

"Ebonics is a different language, it's not slang as many believe,' Texeira said. "For many of these students Ebonics is their language, and it should be considered a foreign language. These students should be taught like other students who speak a foreign language.'

Frankly, I would LOVE to see the Ebonics edition of Oxford English.

Posted by eric at 02:25 PM | Comments (5)

July 17, 2005

(Got a new table.)

Posted by eric at 07:12 PM | Comments (2)

What I Got

It's not that "I got nothing" but more "The stuff I've got would bore you to tears." Have a good weekend!

Posted by eric at 12:49 AM | Comments (0)

July 15, 2005

Some Windows Developer Humor

Been busy. Want this shirt.

Posted by eric at 08:28 AM | Comments (0)

July 13, 2005

AN UPDATE

As an addendum to that last post, I'm informed that you merely have to hold the can right side up and only the gas comes out. My family always had tubs of Cool Whip, so my befuddlement should be understandable.

Posted by eric at 11:43 PM | Comments (0)

Contents Under Pressure

Although I'm aware of a wide variety of substances people commonly ram up their noses looking for some relief from their miserable lives, I wasn't aware of this one: Expert on eating disorders arrested for allegedly inhaling from whipped cream cans

WEST HARTFORD, Conn. -— A psychologist who has spoken out on eating disorders and other issues was arrested after she collapsed in a supermarket, allegedly after inhaling propellant from whipped cream cans.

Lisa G. Berzins, who has been interviewed on television and in newspapers and successfully lobbied for a state law regulating claims by weight loss businesses, was arrested on a warrant Friday charging her in the May 29 incident.

According to the arrest warrant affidavit, West Hartford police were called to the Farmington Avenue Stop & Shop and found Berzins lying on the floor and bleeding from her head. Berzins, the affidavit says, told police she did not know what happened.

Investigators concluded that Berzins inhaled from three cans of whipped cream containing nitrous oxide, known as laughing gas, the affidavit said.

If you wait until you get home to start snorting whipped cream propellant, then you've merely got problems. If you do it right in the aisle of the store, you're crying for help. (Though I suppose she could be so far gone she just didn't care.)

It seems like there might be some issues with getting whipped cream in your nose, but what do I know?

Posted by eric at 11:16 AM | Comments (1)

July 12, 2005

Something to Aspire To

June 30, 2005, adventurers Bear Grylls, 30 and Lieutenant Commander Alan Veal, 34, are the diners enjoying a dinner party suspended from a balloon at a height of nearly 24,262 ft flying over Somerset, England. The pair were making a successful attempt to break the world record for the highest formal dinner party.

I don't know what's gotten into me today. I can't stop whoring out entries. Like the Cat Lady Of The Week: Elderly woman in U.S. hoards more than 300 cats

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - About 300 cats, nearly a third of them dead, were removed from an elderly woman's Virginia home after neighbors complained of a stench coming from the house, police said on Tuesday.

"Cats were coming out of the cabinets and drawers and were inside the walls. There were hundreds of them," Fairfax County Police officer Richard Henry told Reuters.

Posted by eric at 11:22 PM | Comments (1)

CRASH BONSAI!

Please note that CrashBonsai models are not just for bonsai alone. They look great on coffee tables, kitchen counters, smashing into lamps and toasters.

If you can't appreciate it right away, you'll probably never be able to appreciate it at all.

Posted by eric at 04:12 PM | Comments (0)

Eschatologitastic

An army of 200 million horse-like creatures will kill one-third of mankind (Rev 9:13-19).

...

Save up for yourself gold; gold has always had value as money and always will, even in a cashless society. Identify one of these profiteers and seek to purchase food and living supplies from him. However, don't ever disclose to him how much gold you have and where it is.

...

Therefore, since you have decided to reject Christ's offer to join in the rapture, your concern is how to maintain good health in the post rapture era. You must build a supply of multiple vitamins with particular emphasis on anti-oxidants such as C and E and minerals. It will also be necessary to have a supply of disinfectants, particularly one that can be added to water to make it potable.

Horse-like creatures? Maybe they'll be unicorns that gore people to death with their horns, proving my theory that "My Little Ponies" were a mass, end-times de-sensitization campaign.

Posted by eric at 03:09 PM | Comments (0)

Finally.

TomCruiseIsNuts.com

Ladies and gentlemen, Tom Cruise has tossed off the shackles of Hollywood oppression and is piloting his Scientology-fueled funny car straight towards you. The tires are smoking and he's screaming to the stands about Katie, psychiatry, sex, space aliens, and Brooke Shields. We invite you to grab some popcorn and watch for a few minutes before the crash...

Scientology-fueled funny car. I love it.

From the same guys who made welovetheiraqiinformationminister.com: "There are no American infidels in Baghdad. Never!"

Man, those were the days.

Posted by eric at 01:58 PM | Comments (1)

A Few Things That Need Clearing Up

I'll start with this: Yes, I'm aware that the tea I've been drinking lately instead of my usual thrilling water is about the same color as hobo urine. If you do see me with bottle in hand and feel the need to comment, I won't be mad. That said, I won't be impressed either. I know what color it is. But I also know that it tastes good and has just enough caffeine for me to feel but not enough to get worked up about.

Hmm... Maybe if I put my urinesque potable in an OPAQUE container I won't be harangued. Guess I finally found a use for the HP promo mug that's been hanging around my desk for months. Maybe I can scratch off the ugly "HP Pay per use for Imaging and Printing Service" text.

Next: I see SOMEONE could not leave well enough alone. We'll forgive him. This time. (Also, related, that is a PEEP on the cow's back, not a horrible, mutant, malignant zit.)

This site has some great images: Strange Science: Goof Gallery

As Frank Drebin of Police Squad says when the gig is up: "I love it!"

Posted by eric at 10:41 AM | Comments (2)

July 11, 2005

UFO Hacker

I love this story.

Gary McKinnon has been accused of committing the 'biggest military computer hack of all time', and if extradited to the US faces up to 70 years in jail... What Gary was hunting for, as he snooped around Nasa, and the Pentagon's network, was evidence of a UFO cover-up.

"What was the most exciting thing you saw?" I ask.

"I found a list of officers' names," he claims, "under the heading 'Non-Terrestrial Officers'."

"Non-Terrestrial Officers?" I say.

"Yeah, I looked it up," says Gary, "and it's nowhere. It doesn't mean little green men. What I think it means is not earth-based. I found a list of 'fleet-to-fleet transfers', and a list of ship names. I looked them up. They weren't US navy ships. What I saw made me believe they have some kind of spaceship, off-planet."

God bless you, Gary. Mulder would be proud.

Oh, then there's this:

"What were the ship names?"

"I can't remember," says Gary. "I was smoking a lot of dope at the time. Not good for the intellect."

Posted by eric at 07:06 PM | Comments (3)

Cap'n Cringe

Best not to ask.

Posted by eric at 06:30 PM | Comments (1)

And now for some Bulgarian humor:

Q: What's the difference between one dollar and one lev?

A: One dollar.

Can anyone give me a good American joke? (I would also accept Latvian jokes.)

Posted by eric at 09:04 AM | Comments (0)

July 10, 2005

Friendster Really Misses You

From :	 	Friendster 
Sent : 		Sunday, July 10, 2005 10:38 AM
To : 		eric_hcr80@hotmail.com
Subject : 	Friendster Really Misses You

Hi Eric, We've noticed that it's been a few months since you stopped by Friendster. And that's okay. We're not mad!

Since when is it okay for web services to treat you like negligent children?

Posted by eric at 11:06 AM | Comments (0)

July 09, 2005

Ol' Blue lights, flashing from behind

Have you ever rented a movie and after seeing credits roll wondered what could have possessed you to pick it off the rack and walk out the door with it? This effect is more acute with Netflix because of the huge lag time between adding a movie to your list and having it show up at the door (especially since my "queue" is usually 50 movies long).

I'm not even sure if I added this to my list.. I sure I hope I didn't. That said, I did watch it. Wow.

---

Last night I was driving down the highway, got passed by a car same make, model as mine. Nothing fancy but still a solid looking piece of hardware. Whoever was driving was just a little speedier than I was so as we approached this little town where cops are ALWAYS lurking I backed off and decided to let them run interference for me in case the fuzz was around.

No sooner had the smirk from that thought dropped off my face than lights started flashing in the oncoming lane. The cop swings around right behind me and comes flying up behind. I'm a little upset. Got that "cop in my rear-view" feeling in my stomach. I start to pull over and he goes zooming on by to nab the speedy gonzalez that had just passed me.

Sort of a crude out-of-body experience to drive "your car" on the shoulder just after you've been flashed and run down.

All you need to know about Madison Lake, Minnesota: Speed Trap.

Posted by eric at 11:55 PM | Comments (1)

July 08, 2005

Julie Chen, For Shame

Men are hairy. It's a fact of life. Cast in that light, I suppose it's appropriate that none of the guys on Big Brother 6 have any hair on them. They all look like steroidal 15-year olds. I wonder if it's contractual.

I can picture the scene now: BB's producers gather the male cast members in a small back room on the studio lot. A big, burly union grip enters hauling a bag full of shaving cream cans and razors. Just before the door slams shut we hear: "Trust us, this is what's best." Screaming ensues.

Not that I watch or pay any attention to Big Brother. It was okay for a season or two, but after 6 my reaction has dulled to "Back in the house again? Poor saps." Besides, there's Battlefield to be played.

Posted by eric at 09:31 AM | Comments (1)

July 07, 2005

Well Flay Me a Bear Suit...

From City Pages' "The Blotter":

MINNESOTA BLOG OF THE DAY

Photoblogging fun with a 20-something Minneapolitan at Digital Retrograde.

I do appreciate the gesture, really, but after reading that description I'm ready to fall asleep. I need to find something exciting. Something to get worked up about. OMG! WTF? ETC!

Posted by eric at 03:05 PM | Comments (2)

I keep meaning to post 'n stuff but work's got me down. Been banging my head on the wall with this same problem for quite a while now. Maybe some new leads, maybe not. Deadline's coming up.

Check out these "Best of" pictures from National Geographic. The one with the erupting volcano and the aurora is pretty sweet.

Sad to see:

Posted by eric at 01:32 PM | Comments (0)

July 06, 2005

WoTW < ID4

War Of The Worlds. That's right: mankind is too weak to fight back and bacteria does the dirty work for us. Thanks, Orson Wells.

The movie had its moments, but I just didn't get the same queasy feeling as I did from reading the novel (or listening to the radio broadcast for that matter).

That said, the sound was really spectacular and the alien foghorns (?) were really quite frightening. The best part is they served no purpose aside from scaring the pants off of hapless humans. What a bunch of pricks.

As I walked out of the theater there was an especially loud motorcycle driving by on the highway -- it sounded just exactly like one of those tripod horns. Talk about an odd feeling...

---

Hey Analog, why did I just receive my SEPTEMBER 05 issue? A month ahead I can understand, but 3?

---

I like dividers. Maybe I'll start using them more often. Start putting awesome stuff like this in them.

---

Time hole:

Posted by eric at 10:16 AM | Comments (0)

July 05, 2005

Nicolas Cage says: "You, there, yeah, you! Happy Tuesday!" (Still dumping those photos...)

Posted by eric at 09:22 AM | Comments (0)

July 04, 2005

My gallery generation system is broken, but I haven't made enough time to sit down and fix it.

Posted by eric at 11:42 AM | Comments (0)

Hippies on Bikes

Normally I avoid "I-did-this-and-this-and-this-today" type blogging, but yesterday was so jam-packed that it seems a shame to not at least point out the highlights. It basically started out at late church service and ended up downtown following around a group of queer chicks as they tried to steer us around clubbing for a friend's birthday. It also involved, in no specific order: hiding from gangstas, replacement of my car's front brakes, pub-hopping, panhandlers, disappointment and indy-racing at a chain restaurant, accidental demolition of street signs, a terrible live "industrial" band, discussion of complex protein isolation procedures, and lots of yellow lights.

There were also some hippies on bikes.

Happy birthday Professor. (And "Monkeywagon"??)

Posted by eric at 11:34 AM | Comments (1)

July 02, 2005

Love, Marriage, then what?

Friend got hitched, hence the light posting. I posted a gallery, so if wedding-related pictures are your thing there's some here.

Posted by eric at 01:58 PM | Comments (2)