Intellectual Poison

Now playing: Alice Cooper - School's Out
via FoxyTunes

That is all.

Labels: music, vacation

I've had FireFox 3 installed for the last week or so (whichever day the new version was officially released and the record breaking attempt was started).

One of the truly best things about the browser is that it is completely extensible, customizable and malleable. Just this morning I was very happy to find out that my favorite (nay, only) theme has been updated to work with FireFox 3. Its called OldFactory Black and is only available on Alex's website for now, it should be added to the Mozilla add-ons page within a few days but I've posted the link the reviews on the FF2 version of the theme.

Among the other extensions that I've installed and love.
Twitterbar - easy updating your Twitter via the address bar.
FlashBlock - take control of Flash animations. This should be included in the default download of FireFox.
FoxyTunes - take control of music and sounds. Control your iTunes, control website music and more, all in the bottom bezel of your browser screen. Also allows easy addition of music into emails, blog posts and other places. Very cool!
PicLens - if you do anything with images, photos or graphics online, get and use PicLens. It makes viewing images cool and fast and awesome. Really. Integration with Flickr makes it absolutely fantastic. The newest version also supports videos too but I've not played around with that aspect so much.
FaviconizeTab - if you are like me and end up with more than a dozen tabs open at once then you'll get some utility out of FaviconizeTab. It reduces the tab to just the favicon giving you more space on your tab bar for more tabs.
Gspace - this lets you make use of all that free mail space you get with Gmail as online storage for video, photos, whatever you want.
Delicious Bookmarks - the official add-on for the online bookmark sharing site. Nicely integrated!

Other useful stuff. Type about:config into your address bar and you'll be asked if you are sure you want to proceed. Click yes and you'll be presented with an amazing assortment of options to adjust, speed up, expand and otherwise tweak your FireFox so that it is exactly what you want for your needs and bandwidth. Seriously, you can change just about every aspect of the application. I wouldn't recommend diving and changing settings willy-nilly, best to get yourself a guide before going crazy.

All of this is just scratching the surface of what FireFox can do and why it so absolutely smokes every other browser available. Got a favorite extension I don't know about? Leave a note in the comments and let me know.

----------------
Now playing: Joe Walsh - Life's Been Good
via FoxyTunes

Labels: extension, firefox, theme, utility

Today is the last day of my contract with the school for the year. Which means tomorrow is the first day of my summer vacation. Only it won't be much of a vacation because I will be either working on projects or watching the kids so my wife can work on projects.

I spent about ten minutes listing out some projects I'd like to tackle during this break and it quickly spanned the length of the page. Not all of them are things I can tackle, like the electrical and plumbing work, but the majority of them are going to be all on me. Which is totally fine.

But the list will have to wait until Thursday at the earliest as we are going up to the city tomorrow to do a zoo and Exploratorium day with the boys. It will be a good break to get away from the house, go do something fun as a family and I've heard nothing but fantastic things about the Exploratorium (with the exception of the fact that it gets crowded but everything does these days). We're also going to be staying at a cool hotel for the night which will be fun too. And I think there are some cable cars in the schedule as well.

It really has taken a huge load of my shoulders to know that I've got a contract for the fall. It doesn't necessarily mean I'll be working full-time but it means I have options open to me and I can pursue other avenues without the taint of desperation hanging over me (which makes any sell about ten times harder).

Not that I especially want to change jobs but I owe it to my family to keep an eye out for a better paying position back in my regular line of work. I am looking forward to possibly being able to sleep in a bit more as this whole getting up well before 7 got old after about two days (and yes, I know I could be setting myself up for an even earlier wake up time with a new job).

Labels: break, projects, summer, work

About a year ago, I was experimenting with different domains to create my photography site. I registered three, I think. And I always make for damned sure not to select anything that auto-renews the domain when it expires because I don't know if I'm going to use it.

I just got an email notifying me that one of the domains I registered has auto-renewed itself for $10. I did not authorize this, I did not want this domain anymore and the company needs to be making this right or I'll be disputing it with my credit card company.

I don't get why these companies think they can do whatever they want, change settings, bill credit cards and the like and they think nobody will notice or care. I noticed and I care.

I'll be giving them one chance to make it right and then I'm going to unload my digital fury on them. Assholes.

Labels: bad business

Fireworks Banned in Watsonville because of the extreme fire danger presented by them and the fact that we've already got 1000 wild fires presently burning in California.

We really don't need more fireworks making it worse.

Of course, there will still be a ton of illegal fireworks shot off over my town. But the volume should be way down, the police reaction should be way up and, hopefully, nobody's house will get burned down.

Plus my dog might not spend the entire night having conniptions because of the booms.

Today's Alliteration Alphabet will be the letter B.

Babes bicycling by beach boys bounce bodily building big boners.

Labels: alliteration

** Warning, scatological post ahead, veer off if poop or poop-chat scares or otherwise squigs you out. Or haikus for that matter. **
As is the norm, Ryan's blogThunderjournal has at least one post on the front page that deals with some aspect of poop. I happened to look at his banner of ads above the title and noticed a few that were poop-based so I clicked one and found this delightful breakdown of the seven stages of stools. Previously to this find, I'd pretty much called a turd a turd. But now I've been empowered (and so have you). Now I can reliably categorize my fecal activities according to the scale. Not that I expect anyone wants to know that I made a Type 4 verging on a Type 5 this morning. But it is nice to know that I can be more precise in describing my crap to others.

Some of the descriptions almost read like haikus. In fact, with just a little work, they could be!

Type 1
Separate hard lumps
Like nuts or rabbit droppings
Hard passage with grunts

Type 2
Sausage-shaped and rough
Lumpy but all in one piece
Elicits the Ahhhhh

Type 3
Like a sausage but
Cracked all over its surface
Call it Playdough poop

Type 4
Looks like a sausage
Or like a smooth and soft snake
Sphincter slithering

Type 5
Soft blobs of feces
With distinct edges and shapes
Passes easily

Type 6
Fluffy pieces with
Ragged edges of fecosity
A sad mushy stool

Type 7
Watery with no
Solid pieces to speak of
All liquid spatter

There now, has your day been enriched?

Labels: haiku, poop, stool

I've long held that fashion shows are just a way to ogle pretty people in hideous clothes. And, of course, fawn all over the designer who created those cutting edge experiments in completely useless clothing. Take our handsome boy on the left there in his chest thong. There is no way, no how that ridiculous looking piece of shit outfit is ever going to be adopted as daily wear.

I'm sure there's some message being conveyed by the black stripe descending into the fabric around his crotch but who cares? It looks uncomfortable and, more importantly, stupid.

Make the thong part into a bandoleer filled with shot glasses or slightly angled throwing knives and we'll talk. Not for long but longer than we would if you were trying to sell me on this stupid outfit. The corn rows aren't doing him any favors either.

I wonder if it comes with black socks and sandals too?

Labels: fashion, stupidity

Grammy Winner Joss Stone: Piracy Is Brilliant; I Love It

"Yeah, I love it. I think it's brilliant and I'll tell you why. Music should be shared. It's ok, if one person buys it, it's totally cool, burn it up, share it with your friends, I don't care. I don't care how you hear it as long as you hear it. As long as you come to my show, and have a great time listening to the live show it's totally cool. I don't mind. I’m happy that they hear it."

Quite a refreshing mindset but it really shouldn't be. Every musician should embrace potential fans by encouraging the sharing of music. It hurts no one, it helps the artists and it makes the fans not feel like criminals.

Prince, Metallica and Madonna could (and should) learn a lesson from Joss.

Prince Sues Musicians For Making A Tribute Album For His Birthday

Prince used to be one of those musicians who appeared to understand the changing landscape of music. He embraced digital distribution, he allowed downloads of his songs, he gave away an album.

And then something changed, maybe he started hanging out with the douchebags from Metallica or Madonna. Maybe someone whispered in his ear about how much money he was losing because of piracy. Maybe he's always been a grumpy little prick.

Either way, he's going the extra mile to scorch and burn his fans. This latest ridiculousness is to sue a bunch of Norwegian musicians making a tribute album for him. Which is to say, Prince is a seriously grumped out little prick.

Stupid move, Prince. Embrace the revolution, don't try to swim upstream because you'll just drown.

Without much fanfare yesterday afternoon I completed step one in a long project to consolidate and clean up and categorize and make the most of my iTunes libraries. I'd somehow gotten myself into an arrangement with multiple libraries with lots of crossover music but no one place where all of it resided together.

When I got my laptop back from Apple with a much larger hard drive I was given the opportunity to drag and drop four or five libraries into iTunes and then go through the slow process of removing duplicates. When I started I had more than 6000 duplicated songs, most were simple dupes but a good proportion were live versions of studio songs and not really things I wanted to get rid of.

I did a little bit here and there every few nights and, over the course of about a month, whittled down the duplicate list.

The next step has already begun, making sure all of an artist is listed in the same genre, adding ratings and re-categorizing songs in their own unique genre (I've got stuff like House Punk, Retro Dancehall, one just labeled cmz, Soft Rock and more).

The next consolidation project after the music one is to collect all of my photos (somewhere around 20,000 of them by now).

Labels: consolidation, itunes, music

Taking a page out of the Like Yoda You Must Talk playbook.... today's head scratcher spam:Confused yet?

Labels: spam

I am sure this has already been done and I even have a song that is basically this concept (Alphabet Aerobics by Blackalicious) but I like the idea and am going to run with it anyway. Every couple of days I will create a new alliteration (the repetition of the first consonant sound in a phrase).

Today is for the letter A:
All aggravated athletes added an active achievement after allaying adipose assets.

Fun, huh?

Labels: alliteration, meme

Women with long nails speak out against iPhone design because their chosen form of personal expression makes it hard for them to fully utilize the phone. Word on whether women with long nails have spoken out about other aspects of daily life that are made harder for them because they choose to keep long fingernails was not available.

One woman actually went so far as to call Apple misogynistic because they didn't design their phones to be usable by women with long nails. Which is, of course, totally insane.

Labels: design, iphone

You know what pisses me off? People who are jerks for no reason. Like the asshole who shot a father and two of his sons to death this week in San Francisco. Why? The guy was actually being polite and letting you merge into traffic so you shoot him and two of his kids to death? I hope you get caught and thrown in prison for good.

But it doesn't have to be anywhere near as extreme as triple homicide.

It can just be someone opting to not help you out. It can be a co-worker using a bureaucratic loophole to not be helpful. Like the guy at one of my schools who refused to let me into the office so I could get started working because I didn't have a pass which had to be issued by the workers in the office who weren't there or I wouldn't need to be let in.

Instead of just letting me in and moving on with his life, he got to exercise whatever shred of power he had and deny me entrance. Because he's a lazy jerkoff who does the absolute minimum amount of work possible to get his paycheck. This I know because I've discussed him in the past with some of the teachers. But, because of the academic bureaucracy, he is safe from getting fired without massive and annoying hoops to jump through. The school is diminished just that little bit more because it cannot slough off loser workers who couldn't care less about the school or how well they do their job. And his attitude discourages people who are on the fence about staying because I can't think of anyone who would like to work with a jerk.

I've worked for jerks before, I've worked with jerks before and I've managed jerks before. The reason most of them are jerks is because they think the world is out to get them. And it is, because they're jerks. They expect the world to break the cycle so they can stop being jerks but the world doesn't work that way and they are too hidebound by their attitude to approach their universe from any other perspective save the disgruntled one. They are caught in their own vicious cycle of jerkdom. Nobody likes being around a jerk, not even themselves.

If you're a jerk and you're reading this, stop. Stop being a jerk. Heck, make a concerted effort to stop being a jerk for a week or two weeks and see how much nicer the world is. You create your own reality and the reality you create is you being a jerk then quit complaining about it and change your reality to better suit your desires. Unless you like being a jerk and then maybe you should just go juggle cannonballs at the bottom of a lake.

Labels: jerks, perspective

Bloggers Get Obama Accuser Hauled Off in Handcuffs from the National Press Club where he was slandering Obama with unsubstantiated lies in an attempt to smear him.

The only trouble is that Larry Sinclair was wanted on some outstanding warrants. Oops.

Sinclair was the subject of a petition campaign to prevent his addressing the National Press Club with his complete fabrications dressed as fact about sex and drug use with Barack Obama. Allegations he could not substantiate and further failed a lie detector test about.

But that didn't stop the NPC from giving him a podium and an audience.

Which basically says that the National Press Club is uninterested in actual news, they just want the sizzle. The sizzle, in this instance, is their credibility burning up. As it should be. Giving exposure to such an obvious charlatan defies logic or any semblance of integrity.

Sinclair is a lone swift boater trying to knock Obama down. In a few months, his attempt will seem almost quaint when the GOP hate machine has spun up to full speed anger spewage (ding, ding, ding, we have a new word of the day alert!).

Labels: credibility, liar, smear

Don Imus, the shock jock who got thrown off the radio for his racist comments about some women basketball players six months ago, has made another round of shocking comments based on race. No surprise really. Its his bread and butter to ride the wave of indignation and outrage to more moneyland.

The thing of it is that Imus isn't very interesting to listen to on the radio and he looks like a cowboy's worn out saddlebag.

He stirs up these controversies because it helps build interest in his show and more listeners equals more money for Donny boy. Its blatant, its lame and its greed-based, not racist-based.

He's doing his schtick, his thing, his angle to insult and anger listeners so that they call up their pals and tell them to listen in and get outraged too. Howard Stern does this, or did before he went off onto satellite radio (which I doubt I'll ever subscribe to). Controversy = money. Too much controversy = no money since you can get thrown off the air.

I don't really care what Imus says, not when there are real hate mongers like Rush Limbaugh, Michael Savage, Bill O'Reilly and the other GOP drool patrol prodders out there doing nothing but lowering the level of discourse into gutter sniping. If you listen to these idiots then don't be surprised when you're treated like an idiot for doing so. Hate isn't entertainment, at least it shouldn't be.

Labels: racism, radio, shock jock

Tyrade - when Tyra Banks goes off on, yet another, one of her verbal assaults or monologues about how she loves her curvy body or whatever's on her brain. If you've watched her on TV for more then ten seconds then you've very likely already seen one of her tyrades.

Not to be confused with Tyra-ade - her branded electrolyte replacement/liquid finger in the throat to keep you thin diet drink. The bottle with her crazy eyes on it!

Labels: nwotd

I'm sure you've seen the uber-lameness that is The Naked Cowboy, Robert Burck, on display in New York's Time Square. The guy is basically an idiot who stands around in a cowboy hat, cowboy boots and an adult diaper playing a guitar (badly) and singing (badly) for tourist photos and cash.

He's a panhandler with a hook. A lame and falsely advertised one at that. Naked isn't an adult diaper. Naked is your cock fluttering in the breeze. And cowboys do not play guitars on street corners for handouts. They ride horses, chase down stray cattle and actually do things. They don't stand around looking like an idiot in their underwear playing the same incredibly tired one line song.

Would you like me to recreate The Naked Cowboy's entire music repertoire? Here ya go.
"Well, I'm the Naked Cowboy, coming to your town." Done. That's it. He strums his guitar and sings some variation of that one, tired and incredibly lame line.

The Naked Cowboy makes his money by posing for photos with idiot tourists who think he's actually some kind of celebrity in his diaper. The Naked Cowboy is also looking to cash in by suing Mars Candy for their unlicensed use of his trademarked image and brand (no shit). Just goes to show you that, if you keep doing one thing stupidly enough for long enough, someone will spoof it and you can try to cash in on it.

I'd like to suggest a new "game" to play with The Naked Cowboy. Its called "Kick Him in the Balls for YouTube" and the title is pretty much the whole game. Let's see videos of The Naked Cowboy getting kicked in the balls, I guess still photos would work to but he requests a donation for those.

Labels: false celebrity

The latest season of The Ultimate Fighter culminated in a fight between the finalist and the semi-finalist he'd already beaten coming back for another fight due to drunken rampage by the other finalist. If that didn't make sense then good, its not really supposed to.

The finalist who got booted, Jesse Taylor, will be back. He's a character, he's a really good fighter and now his return can be hyped up. If he does reasonably well then we'll likely see a rematch of the supposed to be finale of Amir against Jesse.

I have to say that I thought Amir took the fight-off and repeat of the semi-final in stride. I would have been pissed off about it really. He just beat CB and now CB gets another chance at winning the show even though he had been eliminated? Kind of bogus. But that's what has to happen when the unknown happens.

The finale was not the fight of the night. I'd have to give that one to Spencer Fisher against Jeremy Stevens. I have become a big fan of Spencer Fisher and his lightning punches. The guy is a great fighter and provides a good fight regardless of who's fighting against. I would have liked to have seen Matt Brown vs Matt Arroyo. And I did enjoy seeing Diego Sanchez kick some ass over Luigi Fiorvanti.

Next weekend is the Pay-Per-View light heavyweight championship fight between Quinton "Rampage" Jackson, the champ, and Forrest Griffin. I'd like to see the fight but I'm not seeing myself drop forty five or fifty bucks for it. Let's see who else is on the card. Okay, some Melvin Guillard, some Cole Miller (Jay's UFC twin), some Josh Koscheck, and some Tyson Griffin. Not a bad card at all and I'm sure some of these fights are going to be solid.

I'll be curious as to what the next season of TUF brings, I like how the show keeps evolving to improve itself and provide more balanced fights and less focus on the annoying house drama. Actually, my idea was to keep the current regular show format but add another half hour behind-the-scenes at the house show for the viewers who want more background (and their girlfriends/wives who get squeemed out by the fights themselves).

Amir is a different kind of Ultimate Fighter and I'm going to enjoy watching his future fights. I think he will be able to go as far as he chooses to go.

Labels: finale, the ultimate fighter, TUF, UFC, ultimate fighting

One of the first of the new generation of comedians, a guy with a great creative mind, a funny wit and, from all appearances, was a kickass guy to know.

Thanks for all the laughs, George.

Labels: death

Yeah, this is real. Just took the reading off the hot tub cover. And it isn't even noon yet.

I had to hang out at work for a couple of extra hours yesterday since somebody set a grassfire that go out of control really quickly and burned down at least 9 structures including some houses. The big smoke cloud photo was taken from my school some 8 or 9 miles away. The helicopter was one of two that was buzzing the highway on the way home and the CDF investigation team was set up on the median strip of the highway and watching the hillside slowly burn itself out.

And everything smells like a campfire this morning.

In a bit of potentially good news, there is some serious debate about whether or not to sell fireworks locally. This is one of the few places you can buy fireworks but, given the dryness of the area and the multiple fires we've already had, the authorities are giving some thought to not allowing any sales. And I'd be fine with that. I'm sure Nande would be too since she spends all night panting and freaked out by the illegal fireworks being set off.

Labels: fire, helicopter, photos

This has turned into a rather grim week. One of the people I've been playing Skyrates with for the last year or so passed away the other day. Another player's father passed away as well.

And I just got word that one of the people in my department died from a cardiac arrest while hiking in Big Sur in the last day or two.

Very sobering news indeed. And very sad for their families.

Labels: death

** Warning, religious smackdown ahead, veer off if you're going to get peeved. **

We atheists (or cynical agnostics on a good day) have long thought that believing in God is an indicator of IQ. That those who fervently believe are, generally and across populations, not as intelligent as those who do not believe. Part of the reasoning for this is because more intelligent people tend to be better educated and more likely to question faith.

Anecdotal evidence is everywhere. George Bush loves to thump the Bible (and has claimed that it is his guiding manual above the Constitution and Bill of Rights which he's SWORN to uphold) and he's an absolute fucking idiot.

Not to say that all people who have strong religious beliefs are sub-par intelligences. That would be rather stupid to presume. But, as London Metropolitan University's Dr. David Hardman says "...there is evidence from other domains that higher levels of intelligence are associated with a greater ability - or perhaps willingness - to question and overturn strongly felt intuitions."

In short, the stupid don't question, they believe. The intelligent question and, sometimes, discard religious thought as unnecessary foofery that explains nothing that can't be explained by science. It is still debatable about the tangental effects of strong beliefs, does a religious person have a more rigid moral code, a richer spiritual understanding of the universe

The problem in all of this is that it is hard to argue with a religious nut because, in addition to their foam-flecked faith, they're usually dumb. Not all but usually the loudest and most devout.

Labels: intelligence, IQ, religion

Not much explanation needed beyond the image. For the fine and funny folks over at the Kool-Aid Report who have a deep devotion to bacon.

Oh, and if you must buy some, here's a link to the store. Do come back and let us know how it is.

Labels: bacon, funny

Today's new word has probably been coined already since its so obvious but I'm publishing it as my own for now. Growing out of a recent story and legal proceedings arising from underage teenagers taking sexually explicit photos of themselves and texting them to their current boyfriends or girlfriends. The possession of these images is illegal as the "models" are under the age of 18. Things get more difficult when the kids break up and the dumpee puts those images on their MySpace page or somewhere online.

But all of that is beyond the original new word of the day.

Sexting - the transmission of sexually oriented text messages including pictures.

Labels: nwotd

I'm sure the Animated Message Bumper Sticker written up at GizMag is going to do nothing but soothe already aggravated drivers with the instant ability to flip the bird at an offending driver.

In reality, this is going to result in more people being shot to death in traffic. Because sometimes it is just the ability to ignore a pissed off road rager that keeps things from escalating. It'll be that much harder to ignore a glowing red middle finger in your face after some jackhole just cut you off. I hope and expect these are made illegal in LA quickly, they seem to be just a bad accident away from full-scale road rage riots as it is.

Labels: exascerbate, roadrage

Techdirt: Associated Press: Fair Use Limits You To Four Words; Five Words Costs $12.50

The Associated Press is operating with its head firmly planted between its butt cheeks and sniffing its own gaseous emissions.

They are trying to rewrite copyright law in order to generate revenue streams by charging bloggers and web-users for quoting AP stories. I'm sure this will go over almost as well as Larry Craig's toilet stall toe tap defense.

If you've gotten a bill from the AP then post a comment. I think the AP took an extra handful of stupid pills this month.

The AP's actions amount to nothing more than vigilante copyrightism. Much like the RIAA sending out threatening letters to thousands and thousands of people who may or may not have downloaded music. Both have no legal justification for it and they're merely hoping to scare people into compliance since most people cannot afford to fight a huge company on their own dime and its far cheaper to just send them their demanded payment. But paying them condones them and they are absolutely in the wrong.

Labels: fair use, rule of law

Last night was the special extended episode of The Ultimate Fighter before the big finale show that would see the coaches fight for the Light-Heavyweight title as well as the two show winners fighting for the show crown.

After the opening credits, the show jumped straight into one of the most anticipated matchups of the season, Amir against CB "He of the permanent smirk". I've got nothing against CB, he's been a good fighter, is big, strong, fast and dominated his fights. But Amir was the underdog and I just have a tendency to go for the underdog.

It was a great fight. Really. Two and a half rounds of back and forth fighting. Amir's stand-up was better than CB's and CB's ground game was just a little better than Amir's. But Amir impressed me throughout the fight, his flying knees, his combinations, his aggression and absolute iron jaw. Also, he was totally unfazed by a nasty gash under his eye and blood going everywhere.

CB, on the other hand, who'd looked so powerful in his previous fights, didn't look overwhelming, didn't strike fear into Amir's heart and, as the fight wore on, showed that his conditioning wasn't quite what it could have been. In other words, he gassed out and his pace of fighting slowed considerably. He was still throwing big punches but they were telegraphed and Amir was able to slip many of them without trouble.

In the end, Amir was able to catch CB in an arm bar and force him to tap out or risk getting his arm broken or ligaments torn. It was a great fight.

Plus, big props to the UFC for the way they showed the fight. The first two rounds of the fight were shown without a break, five minutes of fighting, a fade to black and then back to five minutes more of fighting for the second round. It was a great way to show the fight and I almost felt guilty using my 30 second advance on my Tivo to get right back to the action. Almost.

After CB's defeat, the show switched gears to what happened after the fighters were released from the house for a couple of days. Jesse Taylor, the other finalist and renowned nutter, partied too hard and his ego got too inflated. He kicked out a limo window and then freaked out a bunch of women in a bar. All of which might have been forgiven but when security showed up, he got aggressive and started shouting that he was a UFC fighter. Which, as anyone who's got a passing knowledge of UFC President Dana White, is a serious, serious breach of decorum. He ended up getting booted out off the show and out of the UFC.

Kind of a shame but he should have known better and should have kept his shit tight instead of getting drunk and stupid.

After Jesse's ejection, there was no one to fight Amir in the final so they brought back CB and Tim, who'd been beaten by Jesse to get to the final. They would fight to see who would advance to the final. What I thought was going to be a fairly one-sided match, with CB dominating Tim, turned out to be one of the best fights of the season. It went the full fifteen minutes and stayed mostly standing up where Tim demonstrated some surprisingly effective and quality striking. In the end, CB was able to eke out the victory and rematch with Amir for the final.

One hell of a great night of MMA! I'm looking forward to the finale not just for the CB and Amir rematch but because it'll also see Forrest and Rampage squaring off for the title. Rampage is a great show and a fantastic fighter, Forrest is almost always underestimated and always, always comes in to a fight in superb condition and has a great big heart. It should be a kickass fight too!

Labels: mma, the ultimate fighter, TUF, UFC

Keep an eye out for a well put together spam that appears to be from Google AdWords requesting you go and update your info so they can cut you a check.

It looks like Google sent it but if you check the link in the email, its got a .cn domain on the end. Dot CN is China, of course, and I recently read an article about a McAfee survey (i.e. take it with a big grain of salt) that claims 11% of all domains ending in cn are spam, hoax or otherwise dangerous to the general internet user. That's #2 behind sites ending in .hk which are dangerous nearly 20% of the time.

Anyway, keep your eyes out. And follow the basic rules of email, don't click links in email if you can just as easily go to the site in question directly.

Labels: attack, china, spam

The latest and greatest browser has been updated and released into the wilds. Today is Firefox 3 Download Day 2008 and the developers are trying to set a 24 hour downloading record.

Right now its been downloaded more than 3 million times worldwide. Do your part and download it today, you know you're going to do it eventually, why not do it today and take part in setting a new Guinness World Record?

My only concern is that my awesome steampunk theme, OldFactory Black, will not work in FF3, yet. I think I can live without it for a little while.

Head on over and get a copy before 11:16 am tomorrow morning pacific time and grab your little part of history in the making!

[Update: More than 8 million downloads in 24 hours! Well done, everyone. Including you 846 intrepid downloaders from Mongolia!]

Labels: download, firefox, world record

Yes, yes I do have a third grader's sense of humor sometimes. You got a problem with that? I'll shake my wang at ya!

Labels: baseball, funny

Fat Cyclist: Fight Cancer, Win a Dream Bike where a $5 donation to help the Fat Cyclist's wife fight her cancer also buys you a raffle ticket entry to win a super sweet and fully tricked out Ibis SilkSL.

I'm not a roadie but I am an Ibis guy and I have every confidence that the Silk is a fantastic bike. I did get a good close up look at the amazingly awesome MojoSL over the weekend and I can't think of a better way to spend $6400.

Plus, you'd be doing a good deed and that's never a bad thing. Also, Fat Cyclist is a pretty good website.

Cross posted to NorCal Bikers.

Labels: bike, cancer, Ibis, raffle

Fat Shark's first person RC racer with on-board camera and VR-glasses.

Oh friggin' yeah I want one!

Today's new word just came to while I was writing an email to an old friend from school. In our newsletter, she sent in a letter about an injury she suffered about a year and a half ago that left her completely blind. Yeah. Damn!

Anyway, rather than descend into bitterness and anger about her new lot in life, she's going back to school, giving motivational speeches and ascending. Which I find both inspirational and a declaration of her spirit, hence inspiriting or inspiritional.

Inspirite - inspired by spirit.

Labels: nwotd

Cheap Stingy Bargains has posted that, for today only, you can get a Free A&W Root Beer Float at A&W Restaurants between 2 and 8 pm.

Ain't nothing wrong with a free root beer float!

I did not get a nice long bike ride through Nisene Marks today which was one of my Father's Day wishes. But that's okay, I'm still cleaning out from this spring cold I had earlier this week and biking is a lot less enjoyable when you're horking out lung butter all the time. I will be bringing my bike to work this week though so I can get a ride in after hours.

Nope, instead we did some major damage on the mess that is our garage. Well, my wife actually did most of the work on the garage itself, I did a few projects, made a run to Orchard Supply with Grady and played with the boys.

My main project was removing the skanked fabric covers on the bunkbeds. The slats are all held together on a frame and that frame was covered in what was once a nice floral print. Those days were long gone though and it was nasty with stains and broken slats and worn out cardboard. I removed the million or so staples holding the fabric to the frame first with pliers and then with a screwdriver which made it about ten times faster and better since more of the staples pulled out.

After getting the two slat frames ready and figuring out how many replacement 1x4's I'd need, Grady and I went off to OSH. In addition to the boards, we got a cool coiled up hose that's see through so its like a 50 foot long crazy straw! And a spearmint plant so we can have some kickass mojitos whenever we want them. Which reminds me, I still need to get a dwarf lemon and a dwarf lime tree!

Getting the broken slats removed was really easy as they were basically stapled in with these big staples. I could just pull the broken stubs off, then I flipped the whole thing over and pounded them out with a hammer. The new boards got cut down to the right size and I screwed them into place. It was actually alot faster and easier than I was expecting which is always nice.

Not much more to go before the bunk beds are ready to put into the boy's room. We need a new mattress for Sully but then we'll be really close to being good to go. I'm excited about getting them!

After I was done with my stuff, I helped organize my bike and motorcycle stuff, designated some stuff for the upcoming yard sale, some for Ebay/Craigslist and called in an order from one of our favorite Mexican places. My wife got the vegetarian taco salad and I tried the Al Pastor Chimichanga which was full of win!

After dinner all four of us went for a hot tub, the boys had a ball swimming back and forth between us, jumping off the sides and just being the funny little guys they are.

When it came time to put Sully down for bed, I read a book to him, skipping pages as I could barely keep my eyes open. When the book was done, we closed our eyes together and I feel asleep half on and half off his bed. Not for a long time but fifteen or twenty minutes.

Now the house is quiet, save Nande's somewhat freaked out whuffles after each of the fireworks explosions goes off. Oh, did I not mention the idiots around here have been shooting off fireworks randomly for the last few days? Yeah, with the super dry conditions, the fires burning all over the state and these fools are still lighting them off.

When I checked in on my internet stuff, I came across a great deal! Two years of Wired for a shockingly great deal of $6! Today only and today's just about done. I am very, very pleased!

Time for this tired but happy poppa to call it a night. Tomorrow's the start of a good week, I hope. I hope all the dads out there had a great day, just like me!

Labels: cleaning, father, fireworks, projects

A new word to describe an old and self absorbed mentality combined with mendacity (a falsehood or lie). It is the act of willful ignorance and continuing to do whatever it is you want to do. An alternative spelling could be Mentalassity but the mendacity aspect gets harder to find.

It is the equivalent of trying to get a suntan on a boat that's sinking. A mentalicitious person is one that somehow justifies the use of a frozen ball of ice in a snowball fight. Mentalacity is the stupid jackasses in my town who are unable to connect the dots about fire danger (the recent one above town, the one burning right now near Davenport and the one up north in Butte County) and how unutterably stupid it is to shoot fireworks off.

Notwithstanding the fact that its illegal, its not even July yet and they're basically just drunk morons. All of that almost goes without saying.

Labels: fire, fireworks, idiots, nwotd

I'm not an overly superstitious fellow and Friday the 13th holds no special voodoo over me. But that doesn't mean I'm going to let my normal guard down and let some jackhole in his huge truck who's not paying attention to where his vehicle is going because he's looking 90 degrees to port run me down.

And yes, that did just happen. No, he didn't even see me after I'd scooted out of his inattentive dumbass way. Not even when I said, "Nice driving, jerk."

Some people are born oblivious and they pass through their entire lives without the remotest hint of a clue.

Anyway, I did get to work safely. Now to try and NOT electrocute myself, slice my finger off or fall down a well.

You should do the same. Be safe out there, the world's full of oblivions (a theoretical race of people who look exactly like us but couldn't buy a clue at Clues'R'Us with a fistful of hunddies).

Labels: obl, superstition

In response to Rick's "Meh" about Idiocracy in my movie review below, I've started to develop a way to gauge the relative suckitude of a movie that has current or former cast members from the once proud and damned funny Saturday Night Live. Note, I say once funny because I haven't found much on the show to laugh at aside from Ashlee Simpson's lip-syncing ridiculousness.

I'm sure others have arrived at this formula before.

There is an inverse relationship between the overall funniness of a movie and the number of SNL cast members in it. Or that should read the overall potential funniness of the movie. If there's just one then there's a good chance its going to be funny. Two means its still got a decent chance at being funny. Three means its getting close to being sympathy funny (if you run into the cast member or a member of their family you'll lie and tell them you loved it) but it has its moments. Four means it probably isn't funny and you'll go out of your way to avoid them. Five or more means it very likely sucks ass and you demanded your money back.

While this formula isn't fullproof and I'm sure there are exclusions and I can't really think of any off the top of my head, it is a reasonably good guideline when you're getting to rent a movie.

In Idiocracy's case, there's Maya Rudolph, David Herman and that's all I could find in the cast without spending more time than this post is worth on. I bet there's at least one or two other minor cast members in there which would put it at a three or four in the formula.

Labels: formula, movie, SNL

I had a meeting with the district HR department this afternoon. I figured I was either going to get in trouble for something or I was going to get good news about my job for the fall.

I got good news about my job for the fall. Due to some sites finding extra funds for my position, the layoffs in my department were being, effectively, rescinded. Not in so many words but that's the end result. I'm not sure about the other guy in my department yet but he may also escape the chop.

The funny thing is, earlier this week my buddy at one of my schools cornered the superintendent for our zone, he used to be the principal at the school and my pal has a good relationship with him. Well, he bent the supe's ear for a while and talked me up but good.

And then, a few days later, this news hits and I'm rehired into the district. Coincidence? Maybe but I kind of doubt it.

As of right now, my contract stands at 50% time but that'll increase as other schools re-up their site tech positions and more time becomes available. I can guarantee that I'll get one more school since that's the one where my buddy works and they won't fund the position unless they get me back. Which is a pretty strong endorsement if there ever were one.

I'm really pretty happy to be able to stay despite the financial concerns. I'll get a pay bump in July and will be eligible for another on in February. More so, my benefits aren't going to change and that's really good news for my whole family as they are excellent. Some of the other perks are also pretty darned nice too. Like the fact that I can choose which school in the district I want to send my children to. Oh yeah, and they don't get to take my delicious MacBook Pro back either!

Plus, I'll be back at my main school from the start of the school year which means I'll be able to get some student projects going early.

Labels: employment, school, work

Metallica really wants you to dislike them.

You cannot invite bloggers in to your recording session, have them write reviews (which universally panned their crappy old music) and then threaten those same bloggers with legal action in a bid to get them to remove the bad reviews. Oh, and in really stupid spin control mode, the band has claimed the songs the bloggers heard were "rough mixes" and not finished songs which begs the question of why the bloggers were invited in to listen to unfinished music.

The world doesn't work this way. If they wanted good reviews then perhaps they should produce some good music. And Metallica has sucked for decades now, they need to shut the hell up and go back to trying to sell overpriced CD's at Sam Goody's in flyover America.

I think all that loud music has permanently damaged any higher brain function these has-beens ever had.

Taking a cue from Courtney and her post about 19 songs from a couple of months ago, here is my list. Guaranteed to get your foot tapping and your head bobbing, unless you suck. Or something. If I were burning this to a disc for playback in the car I'd be reordering things some but I'll leave it as it is.

1. Life's Been Good - Joe Walsh
2. Breakdown - Handsome Boy Modeling School
3. Magical Colors (31 Flavors) - The Jon Spencer Blues Explosion
4. Get Over It - Ok Go!
5. 25 Miles - Edwin Starr
6. I Don't Want to Work (I Just Want to Bang on My Drums) - Todd Rundgren
7. Mirror in the Bathroom - English Beat
8. Our House - Madness
9. Side to Side - Blackalicious
10. Hotel California - The Eagles
11. Where'd You Go - The Mighty Mighty Bosstones
12. The Natives are Restless - Don Tiki
13. Baba O'Reilly - The Who
14. Your Latest Trick - Dire Straits
15. Everyday - Dave Matthews Band
16. War - Bob Marley and the Wailers
17. Tea in the Sahara - The Police
18. Blackbird - The Beatles
19. Imagine - John Lennon

I'm sure I could trade out every one of these songs for other great songs that I love but this is where I am right now.

Labels: meme, music

I don't think I ever saw an ad for Idiocracy in theatres. I can understand why. Not that its a bad movie, I rather thought it was pretty funny. But it isn't the kind of movie that does well in theatres, if that makes any sense.

Like Transformers is made for the huge screen, some movies are better rented.

Idiocracy is one of them. Its best enjoyed where you can pause, rewind and watch scenes again.

The storyline is a big stretch but that's alright. Any movie that includes people accidentally being frozen in time for 500 years is going to need some stretching. But Joe Average gets frozen along with a hooker since no other suitable woman was available. They awake 500 years in the future to a world of complete and utter fucking idiots.

The cut scene that explains what happens is pretty funny really, its a married couple with high IQ's talking about when they want to have a baby versus a redneck who screws everyone and makes dozens of kids while the smart people never do get around to making a kid. Over the course of time, this phenomenon breeds the brains right out of humans.

By the time Joe and Rita wake up, the world is a garish and retarded world of morons who's favorite show is "Ow, My Balls", Starbucks is where you go to get a blowjob and pretty much everyone can barely remember to breathe.

Of course, a world populated by morons is going to be in disarray. And in this future world, water has been replaced by Brawndo, a Gatorade like drink whose parent company bought the FDA so it could force everyone to drink it. And use it to water crops which, crazy enough, don't grow and led to dust storms through cities filled with trash.

It certainly isn't a high brow movie by any stretch. But it had its moments and themes, like instead of peace signs (index finger and middle finger extended as a V) everyone just used their middle finger. Fuddruckers, the burger place, had become, over the hundreds of years Buttfuckers (which any word geek saw coming). People were named after fast food or other junk (the President of the US's middle name is Mountain Dew) and everything being was either sex or insult based. The ad for smoking read something like "If you don't Smoke Tarleton's then FUCK YOU!"

Worth a watch if you like that kind of movie. I thought it was pretty funny and not a total waste of time. Call it one thumb up out of two.

Labels: movie review

Blogger or my host has decided to take the morning off as my posts are not going live. How annoying.

Senate Republicans block windfall taxes on Big Oil

If you had any doubts of where their allegiances truly lie, look to today's news that the Republicans are protecting their pals in Big Oil from taxes on their quarter after quarter record profits while the price of gas blasts right through $4 a gallon and is, at least locally, closing in on $5 a gallon.

Oh sure, they spin it as best they can but you can't punch someone in the gut and then pretend you gave them a kiss. It just doesn't work that way and its despicable.

I have not the tiniest bit of respect for these Republican oil company bitches and the elections cannot come soon enough. Absolutely ridiculous.

The Democrats need to keep pushing this again and again. If the Republicans keep knocking it down, they will continue to look like traitors to America as this makes it starkly apparent how little regard they have for real Americans struggling to stay afloat as they've destroyed the economy, sent jobs overseas and basically behaved like a bunch of douchebags for the last eight years.

Labels: gop, oil, oil profits, republican

Anybody who's used Twitter at all will have noticed that their RSS feeds have expired and now require an authentication to arrive in your chosen reader.

The only thing is, the greater majority of readers don't have the capacity to authenticate the feed. So Twitter feeds all over the world have gone dark as a result. And the majority of responses run something like "Twitter did what? Then to hell with Twitter."

Some of the reasons for this, apparently, is because the site needs to cut down on how easy it is to use and how widespread. Which is to say, they cut the RSS feeds to make the site harder to use, make feeds harder to follow and are effectively shooting themselves in the foot or chopped off their nose to spite their face.

Stupid, stupid, stupid move Twitter. You've just opened the door to other services who aren't going to make bad decisions like this and lock out users who can't access Twitter from behind the company firewall (like me). If I can't keep up to date on my Twitters then what's the point of the service at all?

[Update: There is, of course, a workaround! Subscribe to your feed again but insert your username and password after the http:// and before the twitter. It should look like this http://USERNAME:PASSWORD@twitter.com/statuses/friends_timeline/xxxxxxxx.rss. It does work, its annoying but I've got my Twitter feed back again. I love the internets because they are full of smart, smart people.]

Labels: dumb, twitter, workaround

If I can convince myself that these sniffles and the sore throat I've got aren't a cold, do you think my body will buy it?

No, neither do I.

I hate spring colds.

[Update: The one upside is that I found a site that figures out whether you've got a cold, flu or allergies. I wasn't sure whether I was having some allergies or whether it really is a cold. And yeah, its a cold. What fun! All I can say is this sucker better get gone fast!]

Labels: cold, sick

You know what grinds my gears? Websites that take a story of normal length and break up into six separate pages you have to click through to read.

Why do they do this?

Because each page is chock full of advertisements that they get paid for displaying and for getting your eyeballs to glance at, even if its just for a moment. More clicks = more money.

But they aren't getting that money from me. I just shut the stupid tab and go read the story somewhere else where they don't resort to limp tactics to drive ad clicks.

There is a way around this usually. Look for a print option and click it. This almost always brings the entire article into one page, without ads, and you can read it in one go.

Labels: gear grinder

It is the first day of summer break and some teachers are back on campus clearing out their classrooms. The giveaways are waaaay too numerous to even estimate much less count.

I've been able to score some pretty good stuff for my boys including a box of Big Legos, some excellent books, a stuffed dinosaur, a pop up sun shade, a beat box for drumming and a neat little crocodile guy.

I tells ya, if I didn't have a totally stuffed full garage, I'd probably load up the trunk of my car. Or not as I know my wife would be rather annoyed at a trunkload of stuff we don't need.

But we're going to have a yard sale in a few weeks and anything we decide not to keep can be parceled out there.

I've also gotten some ice cream cake, pizza, snack packs and a SpongeBob yogurt tube. This could be a really fun week if this keeps up!

Labels: free, school

My oh my, how the times and my attitude has changed. I remember many months ago when Rick was trying out Twitter and I commented that I could not understand the attraction to a severely limited pseudo-blogging engine.

But I was wrong, lawd! was I wrong. Twitter has actually changed how I internet. It is a fantastic way of keeping in touch and up to date on what my "connected" pals are up to. I know more about what my buddy Jay is up to these days because we Twitter it everyday (and yeah, I'm jealous he gets to go on those long rides all the time!).

But Twitter is also a really useful way to learn about popular culture. In particular, the latest extension of the data feeding into Twitter is called FlixPulse. Its a movie review site based on the number of positive, negative and indifferent posts about movies. Movies are then given a percentage score and a letter grade. Kung Fu Panda is an almost sure hit with an amazing 98% positive review rating. Zohan isn't such a good movie with a D rating and a mere 66% positive rating, the same as the latest Indiana Jones.

I've been lobbying my district to start making use of the system to push out server status updates, downtimes and other important messaging. Other organizations are already doing this like the LA Fire Department. For an easy to use means of getting word out, I don't think there's anything as good. It's also possible to get individual feeds delivered to your cell or email in-box (as in the case of emergency messaging).

There are an amazing and ever growing assortment of add-on services derived from Twitter's "pulse", the non-stop comments on everything. A good resource to check out in this regard is Frantic Industries: All Twitter Tools and Mashups in One Place (clever name, eh?).

My only complaint about Twitter is that it isn't especially stable and seems to go down randomly throughout the day. I can't get my RSS feeds to work properly anymore but part of this problem is due to the exploding popularity of the site and service. I hope they are adding servers and beefing up the system as it does not appear to be getting less popular at all, it's only going to get worse!

Along the same lines, I'm starting to make use of FriendFeed to keep on top of my other friends who are as addicted to the web as I am and are involved in numerous sites across the webosphere.

Funnily enough, Rick stopped using Twitter shortly after that post and I took it up a month or two later.

Labels: awesome, mashup, soc.net, twitter

I'm sitting in the computer lab at one of my schools on the Monday after school has let out for the summer. There are, by my count, four people on campus this morning. The calmness and quiet is pretty damned lovely.

And I'll be able to tear into the broken eMacs in the lab without distraction.

One of my teachers just stopped by, check that, one of my favorite teachers at this site just stopped by. She's finally getting a chance to catch up on all the stuff she can't do with a class full of wiggly kids.

Now I'm jamming some music (how's about a little Frankie Goes to Hollywood?), finishing up some breakfast and digging the new dawn. Soon it'll be time to dig into some broken computers, listen to some KNBR (when's the Giants' game on? dang, not 'til 4).

Oh well, plenty of fun to be had and I've got a couple of other posts to work on as well as keeping an eye on the job boards. But it sure is peaceful here now!

Labels: quiet, school

Publushed - published writings that make you blush from titillation or embarrassment or both.

Labels: nwotd

Nine of the top ten search terms on Google this morning deal with MySpace. The only other one is Gilroy Gardens though I'm not quite sure why since there doesn't appear to be any news about it.

Labels: obsession

Usually the flakes who populate Craigslist are a pain in the ass, they call and promise to come by a certain time. Sometimes they call again an hour or so after they were supposed to be there with a BS story. Sometimes they'll even call a day or so later to try and make another appointment (which they'll blow off or otherwise ignore). And if they do show up, they will usually offer less than half of the agreed upon price figuring you just want to get rid of the thing. At which point I generally tell them to piss off.

Usually the dance is annoying in the extreme.

But sometimes it works out in my favor.

Like today, I was able to finally sync my schedule with a guy who was giving away some bunk beds. The first guy who he'd tried to give them to was a total flake, called hours later and tried to reschedule. I was the second email he'd gotten, we talked, we talked some more and finally got together today.

The bunkbeds kick all kinds of ass though they need some work (yes, pictures are forthcoming), some paint and some TLC. But they are solid, they are nice and the boys will love them when we get them installed.

Sometimes Craigslist really does kick all kinds of ass!

Labels: bunkbeds, craigslist

My mother sent me this link, Patient Voices: A.D.H.D. which has interviews with people who have ADHD and how it has effected them over their lives. The interviews include parents with ADHD and their kids.

While all of the audio clips had something that I could relate to, the first one could have been me talking. Only I haven't gotten to the solution that he had.

If you have many competing voices in your head and find it very hard to stay focused on a single task for any period of time beyond a few minutes, you might have ADHD. I'm nearly positive I do and knowing that means I can be on the lookout for the signs in my two boys.

My next step, I think, will be to use some of my benefits before they run out and go get an actual diagnosis and figure out some potential ways to treat it.

Labels: adhd, diagnoses

I was able to finally get to the Post Office this morning to pick up my certified letter from the school district notifying me that I am, officially, being laid off at the end of the month.

It doesn't really make me all that sad to get the official news since I've known about it for months unofficially. I suppose the finality of it might depress me a little bit but it hasn't yet.

I've got too much work to do to get myself another job to stand around regretting the loss of this one. I will miss it though. With some luck I'll be able to do some freelance work for the schools in the fall which, oddly enough, will result in me getting paid more and costing the schools substantially less because of benefits, union dues and all the other foofery that came with the position.

Speaking of which, it is just about time for me to get to working on my resume and applying for all the jobs I've saved up over the week (with a big thank you to my sister Su for her help!).

PS. Happy 6/7/8 Day!

Labels: layoff

I was on Twitter just now and noticed I've got 44 people following me, many of whom I have no idea who they are or why.

One that I checked on is following, brace yourself, 57,000 people. I don't get how or why they would be interested in a twitter stream with that many people.

Can someone explain what's going on? And yes, they appear to be a real person, a rather cute German girl from her picture.

Labels: twitter, wtf

My school is letting out for the year and I thought it would be cool to send them off with a little Alice Cooper singing, what else, "School's Out" over the PA system.

It should have been louder but it did work with me holding my laptop up to the speaker and holding down the "All play" button on the PA system.

That and I got to play in the teachers vs 6th graders softball game. Went 1-2 with two hard hit balls. The hit was an RBI double that could have caused damage as it was a smoking line drive into a gaggle of kids.

But no harm done and I didn't annihilate any kids on the base paths, though one student did his best to get annihilated and then tried to call me out for not staying in the base path.

The last day of school is as much fun for the teachers and staff as it is for the students and that's exactly as it should be!

I will miss these people, I'll miss the teachers, the support staff and the students. This is a great environment to work in and I just wish it paid more and I wasn't being laid off. Maybe once I've sold my inventions for millions of dollars I'll be able to volunteer my time.

Labels: rock, school, softball

Today is a big day in the school district. Every kid and every teacher has been looking forward to it for weeks now.

It is, of course, the last day of school. This whole last week has been more like a party than a school with trips, games, events, plays and lots and lots of cleanup.

And pranks. I haven't heard about too many of them but there is one good one that took place at my school I'm at today. The students all showed up early and relocated the classroom from inside the room to the asphalt playground outside the room. Every desk, every chair including the teacher's desk which was adorned with an archway of blue and white (the school's colors) balloons.

And the kids? The kids are pretty darned proud of themselves for stirring up some fun, as they should be! The teacher thinks its really funny but is now at a loss as to what to do with her class today. And its going to be a hot, hot day here!

Kind of reminds me of the pranks that were pulled when I was in high school. One very famous one at my prep school was incredibly funny, hard to pull and just as difficult to undo. A bunch of seniors carried a teacher's VW Bug up a couple of sets of stairs and placed it on the stage in the assembly room where the entire school was going to meet up later that morning. Sadly though, I think they got some kind of disciplinary action because of it but my memory may be failing me a bit.

What are some pranks you've heard of, pulled or had pulled on you?

Labels: fun, prank, school

I'd like to be able to show a kid where he or she is going to be in 20 or 30 years given their current state and direction. Sort of a scared straight kind of thing.

I look at some of the kids I see everyday and can tell you where they are headed. Some are born into gang culture and have little chance, hope or even desire, to escape. Some are already being pulled in, even in elementary school. Which is pretty messed up.

Then there are the other kids who are on the fence between descent and ascent. A couple of students I have gotten to know pretty well are extremely bright but come from difficult circumstances and may never be able to achieve their full potential (though my inclination is to say that very, very few of us ever achieve full potential). Those kids could use a nudge upward, which I try to provide them when I can. I encourage, cajole and challenge those students I know aren't coming close to what they are capable of.

Some of these kids are really pretty freaking brilliant and it would be a huge disservice to not try and pull them upward as much as I possibly can during the little time I can. I will miss interacting with the kids everyday, the vast majority of them are sweet, good natured and curious. They are one of the main reasons I am pretty sad about this short chapter of my life coming to a, presumed, close.

Though there are still some possibilities that we're exploring. I should have a better handle on those things towards the end of the week, maybe.

Oh, and another school party on Friday! Woot! This time at a rather nice lunch place which means drinks and NO KIDS!

Labels: future, scared straight, school

I came across this ridiculous toy at Target earlier this week and had to wonder what kind of genius came up with it. The Hulk can leap miles at a time, why would he possibly want to ride a dinky little ATV?

Part of me loves stupid toys like this and the other part of me wants to smack the over-marketing stupidity that comes up with this garbage. Like the Human Torch atv when the Fantastic Four movies were in the theaters (for the whole week it was there).

Labels: dumb marketing

Skirtifiable - cleared to wear a skirt.

Labels: nwotd

There are three full days of school left in the school year here in my district. And then three and a half weeks of project work on-site before I become unemployed, again.

Each of my schools is a constant flurry of activity, cleaning desks, classrooms, events, graduation ceremonies, retirement parties, thank you parties and the frenzied attempts to wrap up projects before they fall apart until the fall.

From my own perspective, I can see how broken the system is, how badly the patches are holding to keep the entire school district from descending into chaos. It does not make me look forward to my own children entering this incredibly flawed and stumbling bureaucratic clusterfuck.

Don't misunderstand me, the people I've worked with, by and large, have been outstanding individuals toiling under difficult circumstances to deliver as much education to the children in the system as possible. It isn't the teachers, staff or support staff. Its the bureaucratic swamp they all have to toil in with ever shrinking budgets and ever growing classes.

I am of several minds in regards to my pending layoff. I'm seeing it as the closing of this chapter of my life, my short stint working in education and getting a close up look at how it works (or doesn't). I'm seeing it as an opportunity to go back into the private sector and make real money again with merit bonuses, raises and no ridiculous union rules keeping shitty workers on the books and forcing better but less senior workers out the door.

This week has been bittersweet and I expect it will continue until school lets out and everyone moves on to their summer schedule.

Labels: bureaucracy, layoff, school, work

Goincidence - a coincidental meeting with a friend that turns into a quickie. And a bow chicka bow bow to you too.

Labels: nwotd

Rock pioneer Bo Diddley dies at age 79 and will be missed by all who love music.

He first came onto my radar back when Bo Jackson was the absolute shiz-nizzle in baseball and football and, I think it was, Nike ran a series of commercials featuring Bo and Bo. And Bo Diddley's famous line, "You don't know Diddley, Bo" and then Jackson went and learned how to play the guitar so he could say he did know Diddley. Good stuff!

Fare thee well, Bo.

Labels: death

I got a spam in my work in-box that was sufficiently funny to warrant a click through to read it. It was another boner pill spam trying to sell generic viagra and other pills that make your pecker sproing to full attention.

The subject line was: Upgrade Your Penis

Maybe its just the tech in me but I laughed out loud. Got any funny spams lately? Share them in the comments.

Labels: humor, spam

The minicity I created at MyMiniCity needs your clicks!

The citizens are in need of industry by clicking on this Industry link or you can help draw in more people for the growing little city by clicking this Population link.

Your efforts to help build Sulgradistan into a boom metropolis are appreciated. And, if you've got your own MyMiniCity then let me know in the comments and I'll do my part to help build your city up as well.

Its pretty easy to do and mildly rewarding.

[Update: My minicity has become prosperous and is in need of transportation clicks as well as population and industry clicks. Oh, when will it ever end?]

Labels: diversions, myminicity

Teacher Dies Minutes After Retiring From 36-Year Career

Let's cut right to the chase.

I've got inventions that are good enough and need to be put into production. One is an almost sure big success just waiting to hit as its directed at over-worked parents. Another is a more niche oriented product that will appeal to environmentally conscious dog owners.

There are some others that are still in the rumination stage.

What I need is a backer. Someone who can invest in the concepts and help propel them into production and into the marketplace. Because of my own current financial difficulties, I am unable to make the capital investment to get the process underway or I would have done so already. So I am looking for a backer to underwrite the process. In exchange I will split any profits arising from this partnership, percentages to be determined later based on number of backers (I'm sure my door will be knocked down any moment) and amount invested.

Yes, I am quite serious.

If you are interested then send me an email (erik at intellectualpoison dot com), include your contact information and I'll send you an NDA so that we can discuss particulars. You can ask questions by email or in the comments below. Investments do not have to be huge, they can be almost any amount and still make a positive impact on the process.

It is time to shift this sucker into gear and start moving towards my future rather than waiting for it to come to me.

Labels: invention, investment, proposition