karl rove...upwards not backwards! leftwards not downwards! and always twirling, twirling towards freedom!
i havent laughed like this since that puking pit bull!
Saturday, March 31, 2007
Thursday, March 29, 2007
Wednesday, March 28, 2007
saturn's mysterious hexagon
the imagery reminds me of something from Doom:
i don't know enough about saturn's planetary mechanics to critique, but the explanation of a "pole-encircling planetary wave that extends deep into the atmosphere" is hard to understand, much less swallow. assuming it is a wave, what is causing the wave to adopt this structure? since the wave front is stationary, it could only adopt this formation through interaction/collision with another wave front (or 6 or more wave fronts), otherwise there would be no front to speak of. if there wasn't any contact with another wave, our front would presumably continue to propagate from its center and the front wouldn't remain stationary. really fascinating stuff... Sphere: Related ContentBizarre hexagon circles Saturn's north pole
A deep, hexagon-shaped feature lies above Saturn's north pole, newly released images from the Cassini spacecraft reveal. The strange structure appears to be nearly stationary and may be a wave that stretches deep into the giant planet's atmosphere.
NASA's Voyager 1 and 2 spacecraft glimpsed parts of the feature nearly 30 years ago, but because of their viewing angle, they were not able to see the whole thing. Now, Cassini's visual and infrared mapping spectrometer has captured the entire hexagon for the first time, thanks to a series of infrared images it took as the spacecraft flew over the pole in October and November 2006 (see Cassini snaps Saturn from a dizzying height).
The hexagon spans nearly 25,000 kilometres – the width of two Earths – and appears to be a clearing in the clouds that extends at least 75 km below the planet's visible cloudtops. Watch a movie of clouds whipping around Saturn's strange hexagon (4.2 MB, gif).
"This is a very strange feature, lying in a precise geometric fashion with six nearly equally straight sides," says team member Kevin Baines of NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory in Pasadena, California, US. "We've never seen anything like this on any other planet."
Striking differences
In a statement, NASA says the feature may be "an unusually strong pole-encircling planetary wave that extends deep into the atmosphere".
Saturn's south pole also boasts a dramatic feature – a hurricane-like storm two-thirds as wide as the Earth (scroll down for image and see Spectacular storm rages on Saturn's south pole).
"It's amazing to see such striking differences on opposite ends of Saturn's poles," says Bob Brown, leader of the Cassini visual and infrared mapping spectrometer at the University of Arizona in Tucson, US. "At the south pole, we have what appears to be a hurricane with a giant eye, and at the north pole of Saturn we have this geometric feature, which is completely different."
Currently, the hexagon can only be detected at infrared wavelengths because it is winter in the northern hemisphere – a 15-year-long season in which sunlight does not fall on the pole. As spring begins to dawn in the region over the next two years, astronomers will search for the feature at visible wavelengths.
Tuesday, March 27, 2007
BBC: Military operations in Gulf no small "Peanuts"
"You can't fly missions over Afghanistan from the Gulf because you'd have to fly over Iran," explained Lieutenant-Commander Charlie Brown.
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/europe/6499605.stm
Friday, March 23, 2007
Bush vs. Tricky Dick
This puts my previous post in perspective...
One of the last e-mail messages before this period was sent by D. Kyle Sampson, then chief of staff to Attorney General Alberto R. Gonzales, to Harriet E. Miers, then the White House counsel, and includes a request that the White House approve the plan. “We’ll stand by for a green light from you,” said the Nov. 15 e-mail message.Sphere: Related ContentA little more than a half-hour later, Ms. Miers replied: “Not sure whether this will be determined to require the boss’s attention. If it does, he just left last night so would not be able to accomplish that for some time.”
It is not known whether Ms. Miers was referring to Mr. Bush.
White House travel records show that Mr. Bush was traveling for most of the next two weeks. Mr. Sampson did not receive authorization for the firings until Dec. 4.
An e-mail message that day to Mr. Sampson from Ms. Miers’s office said: “We’re a go for the US Atty plan. WH leg, political, and communications have signed off and acknowledge that we have to be committed to following through once the pressure comes.”
Press secretary says too much, for once.
Mr. Snow said members of Congress could gain all the facts they needed in private interviews, but he objected to anything resembling a trial. “What you’re trying to do is create a courtroom atmosphere,” the exasperated press secretary finally exclaimed, “which is exactly what we’re trying ...” He cut himself off before finishing the sentence.http://www.nytimes.com/2007/03/22/washington/22bush.html?th&emc=th
Teehee.
Sphere: Related Content
Wednesday, March 21, 2007
with threshing oar
our only goal will be the western shore
(note the "xiu xiu" on the shirt written in peasant blood...)
it's called "vibing it up"
i don't know what's happening here, but i think it's awesome. it's an amazing story, in song format, of the american dream of rock and roll à la bad company's "guitar hero"
Tuesday, March 20, 2007
its like a sauna in here...
Excerpt:
"“Laughter seems to be an automatic response to your situation rather than a conscious strategy,” says Tyler F. Stillman, who did the experiments along with Roy Baumeister and Nathan DeWall. “When I tell the muffin joke to my undergraduate classes, they laugh out loud.”
Mr. Stillman says he got so used to the laughs that he wasn’t quite prepared for the response at a conference in January, although he realizes he should have expected it.
“It was a small conference attended by some of the most senior researchers in the field,” he recalls. “When they heard me, a lowly graduate student, tell the muffin joke, there was a really uncomfortable silence. You could hear crickets.”"
link to new york times article...
http://www.nytimes.com/2007/03/13/science/13tier.html?ex=1174622400&en=6f210e72f22e37f4&ei=5070
chris ware's contribution to 'this american life' on showtime
really cool chris ware video, originally from this place
Sphere: Related Contentokay okay okay
some poverty-stricken elderly might be of the opinion that this song is a little difficult to listen to at first, but once you're past the initial pain, it feels nice. and the deeper it seeps in to your ears, the better it feels.
it is a good idea to put your ear inside the phonograph's horn when listening to this song.
such forethought will ensure that you will be the first in the room to hear it.
"blood's in the bloodstream, coming from the badlands"
(the holy smokes <- members of hella, pinback, the advantage, & the flying luttenbachers >> from the album, "talk to your kids about gangs" >> from the song, "don't squab on god's tracks")
20 worst cover songs of all time from cracked mag
found this through another blog...gotta check it out. its great for those who want to see the other side of things, the pukey side.
brainstorming visualization
bubbl.us is "a new visual mind mapping, or "idea visualization" interface that supports brainstorming & organizing ideas online. as in traditional brainstorming, or “mind mapping”, this website allows for a central idea to branch of in circles with new branches containing new ideas, creating a free form diagram," from a great blog, information aesthetics
Sunday, March 18, 2007
unknowing spokesmodel
this is one of the coolest image appropriations that i've seen, done by the uk band pre
Saturday, March 17, 2007
witch killer
check my friend's album... i think it's awesome. especially 'heat wave' and 'doctors and dealers'
and i've been watching this coco rosie video a couple times a day lately:
7 year old arrested
Excerpt from AP story...
"Police arrested a 7-year-old boy, handcuffed him and hauled him down to the station house on a charge of riding a motorized dirt bike on a sidewalk.
Then, according to his mother, Gerard Mungo Jr. was handcuffed to a bench and interrogated before being released to his parents.
"They scared me," Gerard told The Baltimore Examiner before breaking down in tears."
punk kids, keep those lil terrorists under control!
link...
Bill Viola video artist
I was privileged to hear Bill Viola speak on thursday. he was a remarkably interesting speaker. all of the artist series talks that i had seen to that point were good but there was so much focus on the individuals work. His talk was much different, instead he showed only three of his pieces and mainly spoke to his concerns about the direction he sees our world heading in. he spoke about so much of what has been on my mind lately it was scary. i.e. communication and its increasing relevance in the world, both negatively and positively, how technology is not the danger it is the intent that is dangerous, he spoke for over two hours so condesnsing it here would be silly...moreover it was a fascinating talk and for all of his accolades and recognitions he was very humble and generous with his time going well over his time with questions etc. anyways below is one of his more well known pieces…
Friday, March 16, 2007
Thursday, March 15, 2007
Malthusian Dilemma
reading about Neo-Malthusian thought tonight- pretty prescient stuff. From Wikipedia:
Sphere: Related ContentAt the time Malthus wrote, and for 150 years thereafter, most societies had populations at or beyond their agricultural limits. After World War II, the growth rate of the world's population accelerated rapidly, resulting in predictions by Paul Ehrlich and many others of an imminent Malthusian catastrophe. However, the so-called Green Revolution produced a contemporaneous exponential increase in the world's food supply, and the date of the predicted Malthusian collapse had been temporarily forestalled, until the peaking of agricultural production began to occur in the 1990s in several world regions.
Pimentel and Nielsen, working independently, found that the human population has passed the numerical point where all can live in comfort, and that we have entered a stage where many of the world's citizens and future generations are trapped in misery [2]. There is evidence that a catastrophe is underway as of at least the 1990s; for example, by the year 2000, children in developing countries were dying at the rate of approximately 11,000,000 per annum from strictly preventable diseases. [1] [2] This data suggests that by the standard of misery, the catastrophe is underway. The term 'misery' can generally be construed as: high infant mortality, low standards of sanitation, malnutrition, inadequate drinking water, new and widespread diseases (e.g. HIV), war, political unrest.
Regarding famines, data demonstrates the world's food production has peaked in some of the very regions where food is needed the most. For example in South Asia, approximately half of the land has been degraded such that it no longer has the capacity for food production. [2] In China there has been a 27% irreversible loss of land for agriculture, and continues to lose arable land at the rate of 2,500 square kilometres per year. [3] In Madagascar, at least 30% of the land previously regarded as arable is irreversibly barren. On the other hand, recent data shows the number of overweight people in the world now outnumbers the number of malnourished, and the rising tide of obesity continues to expand in both rich and poor countries.[4]
Wednesday, March 14, 2007
Clowns and the elderly...what would jesus do?
wow is there is a god...tube that is. yes god tube is sharing its fundamentalist fervor with the world at large. they have chosen to better inform the clowns of tomorrow how to interact with old people who apparetnly like to be touched.
"Clowns can look rather intimidating if you see a lot of them in one place."
Top aides at it again!
I'm sick of government officials' top aides! They're always making their own unauthorized decisions:
With Democrats vowing to get to the bottom of who ordered the dismissals and why, the White House scrambled to explain the matter by releasing a stream of e-mail messages detailing how Ms. Miers had corresponded with D. Kyle Sampson, the top aide to Mr. Gonzales who drafted the list of those to be dismissed.
Mr. Sampson resigned Monday. On Tuesday afternoon, at a news conference in an ornate chamber adjacent to his office, Mr. Gonzales promised to “find out what
went wrong here,” even as he insisted he had had no direct knowledge of
how his staff had decided on the dismissals.
http://www.nytimes.com/2007/03/14/washington/14attorneys.html?oref=login
Sphere: Related ContentTuesday, March 13, 2007
Monday, March 12, 2007
"Men" only? -or- my continuing discontent with public restrooms
allow me to let you in on a secret that i keep in my left back pocket: i often become uncomfortable going no. 2 in public restrooms when there's a chance that someone i know is in the bathroom with me and is aware of my toil in the stall. it's not all the time, and it's never the case when i'm alone, but if the situation is right, i can get a little hesitant to do my business. such was the setting this morning in the bathroom down the hall from my office.
as i walked into the men's room, i took a quick glance in the mirror out of the corner of my eye. "good," i thought. "all the stalls look empty. true, all the doors are closed, but they're not latched shut. surely they're resting at their natural equilibrium state of being partially closed but partially open. i should have no trouble taking a shit in this public bathroom this morning."
i selected my stall, the wheelchair accessible stall farthest from the door that faced the urinals, stepped inside, closed and latched the door, and began to undo my pants. i was looking forward to reading the etched sayings on the stall walls, musing at "'such and such' is gay" statements, and having a relaxing, personally fulfilling moment before i began my busy day. i was looking forward to "me" time, basically. the momentary tranquility dissipated when i heard another bathroom patron come through the door.
their entrance was an almost reflexory event, the timing was so precise- as if me getting ready to shit prompted their arrival. my belt buckle had barely ceased clanking as it settled on the ground by the time "he" came in. to make things worse, i was in the handicapped stall. "if this is a retard, i'm fucked," i said under my breath. thankfully, the sound of feet shuffling across the tiled floor betrayed his natural walking ability.
my reaction time was too slow to catch a glimpse of his face through the crack of the door frame on his stroll to the urinal. from my vantage point seated on the toilet, i couldn't see anything except for a large mirror and sink near the door. i knew that i couldn't relieve myself just yet because this visitor might have been a friend of mine and might have noticed my shoes under the stall door. "what if he hears weird noises coming out of my butt? he'll know it's me and he'll tell everyone in the department and i'll never get a date again." it was clear that i had to keep the turds in until he had left the bathroom, or until i could be confident that it was a perfect stranger who, tomorrow, wouldn't be able to know that i was defecating ten feet behind him the day prior.
he began to pee and i sat, waiting. for a moment, i was jealous of his freedom. he urinated so carelessly, so effortlessly... all the week's stresses and tension flowed out of him in a golden stream. meanwhile i rested with an arched back doing my best to sound non-existent.
he finished, zipped up, and walked to the sink to wash and dry his hands. it was then that i saw his face. it was matt. matt from down the hall. a matt johnson who could have become matt "jamon makes weird noises in the bathroom" johnson if i hadn't kept my cool and my bowels this morning.
Saturday, March 10, 2007
Some reporting proves otherwise.
Now a month old, but important.
Excerpt:
The Feith operation dates to shortly after the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks, when the Pentagon established a small team of civilians to sift through existing intelligence with the aim of finding possible links between terror networks and governments. Bush administration officials contended that intelligence agencies were ignoring reports of collaboration between Iraq and Al Qaeda.
By the summer of 2002, the group, whose membership evolved over time, was aimed at identifying links between Al Qaeda and Saddam Hussein’s government in Iraq.
http://www.nytimes.com/2007/02/09/washington/09feith.html?ex=1328677200&en=29181d121fce0c29&ei=5088&partner=rssnyt&emc=rss Sphere: Related ContentThe inspector general’s report criticizes a July 25, 2002, memo, written by an intelligence analyst detailed to Mr. Feith’s office, titled, "Iraq and al-Qaida: Making the Case."
The memo said that, while 'some analysts have argued' that Osama bin Laden would not cooperate with secular Arab entities like Iraq, "reporting indicates otherwise."
Wednesday, March 07, 2007
Re: Ann Coulter calling J Edwards a faggot.
"in fact, you would think we're handing out free condoms every time she comes to speak because there are so many people that want to hear her."
Monday, March 05, 2007
security a la total recall
In an article on slate.com by William Saletan entitled "Invasion of the Naked Body Scanners" it seems that just around the bend is a human xray machine designed to penetrate clothing and to effectively see people nekkid...no more drug running for me!
excerpt:
"This is no joke. The government needs to look under your clothes. Ceramic knives, plastic guns, and liquid explosives have made metal detectors obsolete. Carry-on bags are X-rayed, so the safest place to hide a weapon is on your body. Puffer machines can detect explosives on you, but only if you're sloppy. Backscatters are different. They can scan your whole surface, locating and identifying anything of unusual density—not just metals, which have high atomic numbers, but drugs and explosives, which have low ones."
Below is a picture of then director of the TSA Susan Hallowell some time ago...posing for a trial run of the device.
link to the article
http://www.slate.com/id/2160977?GT1=9231
find an mp3 blog downloader... head explodes**
peel is awesome. tell it which mp3 blogs you want to keep tabs on and peel will find all the new mp3's on that blog and allow you to listen or download to the mp3's.
i've wanted something like this for years! (mac only)
Sunday, March 04, 2007
Fonzie's Rule
I saw this on another blog...it's the fonz and henry winkler together at last! and they're protecting our nations' children.
"I, scapegoater" by Lt. Col. David Accetta
“We regret the death of innocent Afghan citizens as a result of the Taliban extremists’ cowardly act,” Lt. Col. David Accetta, a military spokesman, said in the statement. “Once again the terrorists demonstrated their blatant disregard for human life by attacking coalition forces in a populated area, knowing full well that innocent Afghans would be killed and wounded in the attack.”
New York Times Sphere: Related Content
New York Times Sphere: Related Content
hump the pump
this morning i saw this ad display which was set on top of a gas pump. feel the love? i know she's excited about the rebates that bp can offer her, but does she have to dry hump the gas pump? Sphere: Related Content
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