January 31, 2006

…and seventeen minutes of applause

“The speech is about 36 minutes in length without applause right now. Factoring in those interruptions, the speech should be comparable in length to last year’s address, which ran 53 minutes.”

This is in reference to the President’s upcoming state of the union address. Apparently they invited the United States fighting 109th applause squad, as headed by the Supreme court, almost half of which has been directly appointed by the Bush family.

January 22, 2006

kick ass

Murderball is the best sports movie that has ever been made.

I will stand by that, I don’t care what you throw at me; It’s better than Bull Durham, Rocky, and Field of Dreams combined. I just wish I knew what I could say that would make every person reading this go rent this film right now.

January 18, 2006

bucket of lies

“One interesting gender difference observed by Koch (1994) is that when dealing with computers, girls blame their own inexperience and lack of ability if something goes wrong, hence decreasing their self-confidence level, while boys tend to blame the program or the computer system if something goes astray.”

There was a big explanation here a moment ago, but my computer ate it.

January 17, 2006

funny stuff

I was innocently reading Luis Villa’s blog on planet gnome when I discovered what appears to be the Best Blonde Joke Ever.

January 16, 2006

tenaciously gallant incestuous fraternities

Kels: do you remember TGIF?
Kels: and they had that contest where people were suppose to send in what they though TGIF stood for?

Me: sorta

Kels: and in the commercial the guy from Teen Angel was like I think it means Turkish Guys in Feathers

Me: haha I remember that
Me: it was a horrible show

Kels: come on! he died from eating a hamburger that was under his best friend’s bed. How is that not GENIUS!

Me: Teen Angel is the most morbid concept ever
Me: man dies young, hilarity ensues!

January 14, 2006

my favorite day

It was friday.

The 13th.

And it was a full moon.

And I won a trip to Vegas at Lauren’s company’s new year party.

January 13, 2006

get your priorities crooked

Me: How was class
Me: Did he announce the midterm?

Captain Anon: i missed it too… my gf is in town from NY… plus my car broke down yesterday… tons of crap

Me: I hate it when my gf comes across the country to visit me
Me: pisses me off. Some people are just selfish.

Captain Anon: seriously… “hello, i’m trying to study here”

January 10, 2006

siryessir

I always hang up on callers that do not introduce themselves and call me “sir”. The quickest possible way you could empirically express that I am nothing to you but a few characters of text on a piece of paper is to call me sir.

Nobody calls me sir. Do I look like a Knight to you Mr. Telephone man? Does my voice bear a similarity to that of a Drill Seargent (SIR NO SIR)? Are you trying to date my teenage daughter? Holy Moses, I hope not.

In fact, I’d probably stay on the phone longer if I heard a string of curse words coming through the horn. I’d be confused, but I might say something like, “Jesse, is that you? You need a ride man?”.

Telemarketers should use this scheme, confusion buys time. They’d have to improvise a bit, but maybe when I offer a ride, they accept, and when I arrive at Mothers Tavern (a local bar) I find, instead of my inebriated friend, a man offering me a 3 day trip to Las Vegas for only $99!

brilliant.

quote of the moment

About me:
i bruise easily.
oh, and i hate having fun. that sums it up

Lindsey K.

January 9, 2006

just one boing

Fox buys myspace, and begins censoring customers from listing competitors’ sites (such as youtube) in their personal profiles.

What happens when two rich guys get bored with the American Dream(TM)? They ride across the country, not on Harleys like normal people having a mid-life crisis, but on Segways.

January 8, 2006

Smart People Are a Dime a Dozen

“At MIT, everyone is bright, and some are super-bright. Some super-bright people are total jerks, and some are the nicest you’ll ever meet.

I had one famous computer scientist as an instructor who bore down on a student for not knowing how to solve a digital signal processing problem – after she protested that she didn’t know the complex algebra required, he said, “come to me after class, and I’ll teach you complex algebra.” And then, after class, he told her, “I don’t have time.”

In contrast, I had an equally famed materials science instructor who set aside office hours to meet with any of his dozens of students who needed help on their homework, even though he had plenty of teaching assistants.

* So when I join a company and hear how smart the people there are – I’m not impressed. Unless they’re also good people to work with. That’s a lot harder to find.”

From Phillip Chu’s What I Learned at MIT.

January 4, 2006

some foosball talk fo’ bobby

The triple overtime game at Penn St. vs FSU last night had some of the worst kicking that has ever been seen, and though i have not heard it discussed, I think a record was set in football last night.

FSU Seminoles kicker Gary Cismesia had no less than three entirely separate and unique opportunities to win the football game with kicks from less than 40 yards. One of them was an extra point. You couldn’t have paid anyone to do that badly.

And the kicker (pun righteously intended): If he hadn’t made a 48 yard field goal with 4 minutes remaining in regular time, FSU wouldn’t have even made it to overtime and he would have been unable to humiliate himself so thoroughly. Talk about your missed opportunities.

On a separate note, USC is playing Texas tonight. Should be a fantastic game. Go LenDale.

January 2, 2006

content is for the weak

Everyone claims to have the answers. Dr. Phil tells us our relationships are falling apart, Michael Moore claims to have moral superiority on every issue, Pat Robertson knows who the government should assassinate, and Bill O’Reilly is waking us up to the War on Christmas.

It seems to me shows that have have “Truth” or “No-Spin” in the title are the ones you have to be most leary of; This isn’t necessarily because the message that’s being peddled is inherently incorrect, but most of the time what is actually being delivered is an opinion, which is the definition of Spin and by presenting itself with a false title, ambiguates the Truth.

But the “Joke Documentary” format avoids telling you what to think by presenting you with something that’s obviously false, or shows you that everything you know isn’t exactly the way you thought it was. I believe this leaves much more room for individuals to think about the issues and form their own opinion, instead of regurgitating talking points.

Given the previous, my motivation for being a big fan of Pen & Teller’s show Bullshit! should be fairly clear; even the title lets you know not to take the show at face value. With a show called bullshit, you do not expect to hear the One True Way something is meant to be. They’re presenting you with information and you decide what to do with it. So what should you actually expect from the show? On the first show I watched (about PETA), Penn presented this excellent example of bullshit:

Everyone is pro-choice and pro-life, it’s for or against abortion that your group is about.”

-Penn Jillette

I highly suggest you check out some of the promos available.  The War On Drugs I find especially fun.

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