Sebbylite

Skipping rocks on Lake Michigan.

My brother just sent me a text message, and I’m not sure if it is because it is my birthday soon or if there is an actual International Disadvantaged People Day, but this is what it said:

Today is International Disadvantaged People Day. Please send an encouraging message to a retarded friend just as I’ve done for you. Because I don’t care if you lick windows, screw farm animals, take the short bus, or occasionally shit on yourself. You hang in there Sunshine, you’re Special!

So consider this my forwarding of said text message. Because I know that the only people that actually find what I write amusing probably do ride the short bus. Or have to use sporks because they aren’t allowed to use forks for fear they might harm themselves. Or have to wear a helmet indoors to prevent injury. Or wear rec-specs when they play in athletic events. You know, Disadvantaged People.

On a side note, the 2009 Special Olympics World Winter Games will be held in Boise, and I’m pretty sure that my brother isn’t going to be able to take it. Because on the one hand, they are Olympians. But on the other hand, they are Special Olympians.

And now I’m pretty sure I’ve alienated half of my remaining readership (2 people). And I’m also pretty sure I’ll be going to Hell. So drop me a line sometime…

I still have no idea how to embed youtube videos into my blog, so I’ll just add this link here:

Craziest Night - Nerds.

I just remembered a bit of a dream I had last night, and I wanted to share it with y’all. Mostly because it was a pretty sweet dream, and I think it will make a good story to tell (and also because I’ve slightly been heckled into posting by someone who will remain nameless).

Basically the part I remember of the dream is that I was a member of a team of ninja assassin’s and we were trying to win a war against a bunch of Foot Clan-esque ninjas. You know, the kind that blunder around but call themselves ninjas because they wear a full purple pajama suit with mask and belt? Yeah, those guys. The problem for them is that me and my team were actual ninjas, and assassins, and were picking them off like ducks in Duck Hunt.

After going through this for a while (which was pretty sweet - usually my dreams are the “frustrating” kind, where I’m playing frisbee but wearing 25 pound shoes and everyone else has jet packs, that kind of thing. But in this dream it was the other way around, and I was kicking ass and taking names and they had no chance), the “Big Boss” showed up to try to take us out himself. It turns out that the Big Boss was Jimmy Chu, and he was actually taking out my teammates. I was still fighting ninja style so they hadn’t found me yet, and was making my way over to take Jimmy out, when all of a sudden his fiancee Kim walked in looking extremely pale. I left my cover and went over to grab her, because my mission was to get her away from Jimmy before they were married (kind of a like a Princess Bride-Man in Black-Prince Humperdink menage a trois, or maybe it was more of a Matthew Broderick-Rutger Hauer-Michelle Pfeiffer thing, I’m not sure). As I run up to grab her and get her out of there, she just looks blankly over at me and says “It’s too late.”

Of course I don’t believe her so I keep trying to convince her to come with me. She looks up at me, and then takes her hands away from her chest to show that they have been covering a bullethole in the center of her chest. When I see this I go into a blind rage and finish off the rest of the Duck Hunt/Foot Clan. And as is the way of dreams, just as I square off with Jimmy for an ultimate ninja style showdown, it’s wakey time.

Usually I don’t remember my dreams, so on the one hand it’s strange that actually did remember enough to write something down in a cohesive manner. On the second hand, it was a pretty sweet dream. Like I said before, I tend to have the frustrating type dreams, the ones where I seem to be running through sand or running uphill, where I can’t hit the broad side of a barn with a frisbee, etc, and the fact that in this dream I could do anything and everything I set my mind to, it was awesome.

Maybe tonight I’ll have more to share with y’all.

I wanted to write a quick post to let y’all know that I’m still around. Still alive and kickin’, still picking up what others are putting down, still smelling what I just stepped in, still here, just busy. Most of my blogging time has been taken up by the commute that I now have. Which is very unfortunate, since I still have quite a bit of stuff to write about, I just don’t write it.

And yes, I’ll try to get the comments fixed sometime soon. Tall mentioned that they aren’t accessible, which they shouldn’t be since I shut them off to keep from getting so much damn spam. Sadly enough, now that I’ve turned them off, no one can comment on my posts and yet I still get spam posts. How is that possible?

Finally, try to remember what the Holidays are about. No, not family and friends and good cheer, but consumerism. Wait, switch that last part around. The Holidays are about spending time with loved ones, friends, and even strangers in a forgiving and happy environment. So if that means you don’t flip off the guy at the mall that cut you off for that parking spot, so be it. If it means that you don’t mutter angrily under your breath as you are walking behind the 95 year old couple in the super market that they should be put in a home somewhere, so be it. And if it means that you skip that drink at the bar after work and go home to spend some time with the wife and kids, so be it.

Merry Christmas, Happy New Year, Happy Hanukkah, and enjoy every single other holiday that there is out there at this time of year.

Here’s a contest that sounds pretty cool. The X Prize Foundation is offering up a multi-million dollar prize amount to the company/group that can create a car that gets over 100 miles per gallon. I’m not sure how they are going to determine who gets the prize if more than one car hits that mark, as it already looks like quite a few have hit or exceeded that number, but it should be interesting to see what comes out of the contest.

Of course, the next contest will be the marketing contest, which offers a multi-million dollar prize to the company that can make people believe that they won’t be ridiculed for driving one of these cars. Technically I think that this second contest will be the tougher to complete. Read about the whole 100 mpg Car Contest here.

The penguins were amazing.

A flower that kills disease. Instead of spending millions/billions solving the symptoms, let’s just spend hundreds of thousands of dollars preventing the problem from occurring. Sounds like a bargain to me. It’s like spaying and neutering your pets instead of trying to find homes for all the puppies. Like using a condom instead of dropping out of school to get a job to pay for diapers. Like getting more sleep instead of relying on caffeine to get us through the day. Wait, not that last one…

The most common way of fighting diseases like malaria, dengue fever, and West Nile today is to try to wipe out the mosquitoes carrying them and treat those who have been infected. Now there’s an alternative on the horizon that promises to be safer and cheaper by zapping the germs while sparing the mosquitoes. The technology is hidden in an artificial flower designed to attract mosquitoes and treat them with pathogen-killing drugs that allow the insects to live and continue to perform important functions such as pollinating flowers and serving as food for animals and other insects.

Pretty interesting stuff, and exactly why I liked Biology in undergrad. Find the rest of the article here.

When “Dirty South” meets “Halloween Party”…

Boat Race Man Pr0n

I found this online today (of course I didn’t copy down where I got it, so I can’t give due where due is credit), and had to share it. Mostly because it sounds like something that I would think about doing, but chicken out because of the exact reason that actually happened. Does that mean I get a runner-up Darwin Award?

You all know about the Darwin Awards - It´s an annual honor given to the person who did the gene pool the biggest service by killing themselves in the most extraordinarily stupid way.

Last year´s winner was the fellow who was killed by a Coke machine which toppled over on top of him as he was attempting to tip a free soda out of it.

And this year´s nominee is:

The Arizona Highway Patrol came upon a pile of smoldering metal embedded into the side of a cliff rising above the road at the apex of a curve. The wreckage resembled the site of an airplane crash, but it was a car. The type of car was unidentifiable at the scene. The lab finally figured out what it was and what had happened.

It seems that a guy had somehow gotten hold of a JATO
unit (Jet Assisted Take Off - actually a solid fuel rocket) that is used to give heavy military transport planes an extra “push” for taking off from short airfields.

He had driven his Chevy Impala out into the desert and found a long, straight stretch of road. Then he attached the JATO unit to his car, jumped in, got up some speed and fired off the JATO!

The facts as best as could be determined are that the operator of the 1967 Impala hit the JATO ignition at a distance of approximately 3.0 miles from the crash site. This was established by the prominent scorched and melted asphalt at that location.

The JATO, if operating properly, would have reached maximum thrust within 5 seconds, causing the Chevy to reach speeds well in excess of 350 mph and continuing
at full power for an additional 20-25 seconds.

The driver, soon to be pilot, most likely would have experienced G-forces usually reserved for dog-fighting F-14 jocks under full afterburners, basically causing
him to become insignificant for the remainder of the event.

However, the automobile remained on the straight highway for about 2.5 miles (15-20 seconds) before the driver applied and completely melted the brakes, blowing the tires and leaving thick rubber marks on the road surface, then becoming airborne for an additional 1.4 miles and impacting the cliff face at a height of 125 feet leaving a blackened crater 3 feet deep in the rock.

Most of the driver´s remains were not recoverable; however, small fragments of bone, teeth and hair were extracted from the crater and fingernail and bone shards were removed from a piece of debris believed to be a portion of the steering wheel.

Epilog:

It has been calculated that this moron nearly reached Mach I, attaining a ground-speed of approximately 420 mph.

Just FYI, I’m tired of getting spamments (Spam Comments), so I’ve changed some options around for the whole commenting process. This might make it more difficult to post comments, but that shouldn’t post a problem for most of you. And by most of you, I mean the other 5 people that read this blog that don’t comment.

Things will sort themselves out soon.