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When a BSOD isn't enough: Dell laptop explodes at Japanese conference. With pics, one in mid-eruption, another of the flaming debris.
Jesus. For one, if you're planning to gun down your cohorts and educators, don't organize it on MySpace. For two, don't try to kill your classmates and teachers. It's passé. Still, thanks for putting Kansas back on the map and giving Phill Kline a reason to go on the air other than to demand details of underage sex. Wonder if Phill has a MySpace page....
Oh, speaking of passé, Star Trek movie to be helmed by JJ Abrams, to be set during the Kirk/Spock academy years. Gah, not this one. Okay, it's slightly more interesting than the pre-pre-prequel (after Enterprise, before TOS) movie, but am I the only person for whom JJ Abrams means "a million mysteries and a handful of payoffs"? Lost was great its first season, but the second season's really writing big-ass checks that it would take a Swiss bank account of credibility to cash, and I don't see a good payoff coming; I just see more questions, more puzzles and riddles, and I'm not sure that they've earned that latitude yet.
Tooth checkup: all good, all fine. Back at work, nobody's dead. It went better than I thought.
Oh, speaking of passé, Star Trek movie to be helmed by JJ Abrams, to be set during the Kirk/Spock academy years. Gah, not this one. Okay, it's slightly more interesting than the pre-pre-prequel (after Enterprise, before TOS) movie, but am I the only person for whom JJ Abrams means "a million mysteries and a handful of payoffs"? Lost was great its first season, but the second season's really writing big-ass checks that it would take a Swiss bank account of credibility to cash, and I don't see a good payoff coming; I just see more questions, more puzzles and riddles, and I'm not sure that they've earned that latitude yet.
Tooth checkup: all good, all fine. Back at work, nobody's dead. It went better than I thought.
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Just got back from seeing V for Vendetta, finally. I think this makes up for the latter two-thirds of the Matrix trilogy. And, since I rediscovered Peter's Friends the other night (and half the cast has gone on to do Harry Potter roles), it's unofficially Stephen Fry week. Should be a holiday.
Slashdot article on a talk by Ron Moore, BSG guru, transcribed by the least literate nerd in the world who originally spelled "Cylon" as "Psylon," but managed to make his "fixes" even worse:
Boomer, very little thought. An extension of family and a second family unit. The part where Boomer was a Pylon suggested by co-producer....
I must've missed that episode.
Also, I never heard of the Bath School Disaster before today -- thank you, Wikipedia. Man goes on very carefully-planned explosive rampage, blows up school, car -- kills 45, injures 58, most of them in grade school. Deadliest school violence in American history. And it happened in 1927. I blame the radio.
Boomer, very little thought. An extension of family and a second family unit. The part where Boomer was a Pylon suggested by co-producer....
I must've missed that episode.
Also, I never heard of the Bath School Disaster before today -- thank you, Wikipedia. Man goes on very carefully-planned explosive rampage, blows up school, car -- kills 45, injures 58, most of them in grade school. Deadliest school violence in American history. And it happened in 1927. I blame the radio.
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No, I'm not being facetious. What's the upside of getting the government that the people want if the people want to wage war with their neighbors?
In a stunning development ahead of official election results, Prime Minister Ahmed Qorei said Thursday he and others in the Palestinian Authority government will resign in the wake of Hamas' apparent parliamentary victory.
The announcement followed estimates from Wednesday's election that said Hamas had won a majority of seats in the 132-seat Palestinian Legislative Council, supplanting the ruling Fatah party.
In a stunning development ahead of official election results, Prime Minister Ahmed Qorei said Thursday he and others in the Palestinian Authority government will resign in the wake of Hamas' apparent parliamentary victory.
The announcement followed estimates from Wednesday's election that said Hamas had won a majority of seats in the 132-seat Palestinian Legislative Council, supplanting the ruling Fatah party.
...Well, the pigs are happy, there's coffee brewin'...still feels strange to be up before ten (or, honestly, noon) on a Saturday.
Chemistry amusement: WOODRUFF, S.C. -- An experiment gone awry in a Spartanburg County classroom caused some scary moments Thursday morning, reported WYFF-TV in Spartanburg, S.C.
Spartanburg District 4 Superintendent Rallie Liston said that an instructor at Woodruff High School was trying to demonstrate the creation of sodium hydroxide when the sodium and water exploded in a dish. Yes, sodium + H20 = ☠, people.
Copy-editing amusement, file under "Spunky": DANBURY, Conn. -- The News-Times has apologized and fired a copy editor who put an offensive caption on its Web page under a photo of a girls' high school soccer team.
The Immaculate High School girls' team was celebrating a goal scored in a championship-clinching win Nov. 5. The newspaper's Web site published a photograph of the jubilant team, but said it was celebrating a teammate's decision to "come out of the closet as a lesbian."
"It was a flagrant, awful violation of every journalistic principle," said Paul Steinmetz, the paper's editor. "It's just embarrassing to us and untenable."
The copy editor, who was not identified, was "goofing around" and didn't realize the caption had gone online, Steinmetz said.
The bogus caption stayed on the Web page for a few hours on Sunday and received a few hundred hits, Steinmetz said. "We couldn't get it off the Web site as fast as we wanted to," he said.
Oh, the stories I could tell. And I still have a few hundred copies of the Spunky issue. ("Who? Who's Willie Nelson?")
Chemistry amusement: WOODRUFF, S.C. -- An experiment gone awry in a Spartanburg County classroom caused some scary moments Thursday morning, reported WYFF-TV in Spartanburg, S.C.
Spartanburg District 4 Superintendent Rallie Liston said that an instructor at Woodruff High School was trying to demonstrate the creation of sodium hydroxide when the sodium and water exploded in a dish. Yes, sodium + H20 = ☠, people.
Copy-editing amusement, file under "Spunky": DANBURY, Conn. -- The News-Times has apologized and fired a copy editor who put an offensive caption on its Web page under a photo of a girls' high school soccer team.
The Immaculate High School girls' team was celebrating a goal scored in a championship-clinching win Nov. 5. The newspaper's Web site published a photograph of the jubilant team, but said it was celebrating a teammate's decision to "come out of the closet as a lesbian."
"It was a flagrant, awful violation of every journalistic principle," said Paul Steinmetz, the paper's editor. "It's just embarrassing to us and untenable."
The copy editor, who was not identified, was "goofing around" and didn't realize the caption had gone online, Steinmetz said.
The bogus caption stayed on the Web page for a few hours on Sunday and received a few hundred hits, Steinmetz said. "We couldn't get it off the Web site as fast as we wanted to," he said.
Oh, the stories I could tell. And I still have a few hundred copies of the Spunky issue. ("Who? Who's Willie Nelson?")
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I was gonna make a snide comment on the outcome of the KSU-OU game, but...the hell?
Police were investigating an explosion at the University of Oklahoma late Saturday that apparently killed one person outside a campus building.
Campus police Sgt. Gary Robinson said authorities believe the blast was caused by an explosive device.
"It was an explosive device with one fatality," he said.
Robinson did not know the identity or gender of the person whose body was found outside the university’s botany-microbiology building. He also did not know if there were other injuries or if the building was occupied.
Police cordoned off an area west of a packed Oklahoma Memorial Stadium, where the Oklahoma Sooners were playing a football game against Kansas State. Spectators reported hearing a loud boom just before the end of the first half, but no smoke or fire was seen.
Edit: More data here. Sounds like a "meh" more than a "WTF" now.
Also: I don't mind losing, guys. This is K-State. We invented losing. Or at least perfected it. All I ask is the next time we try to punt the ball, and we hike the ball, could someone, y'know, check to make sure there's actually a punter back there?
Police were investigating an explosion at the University of Oklahoma late Saturday that apparently killed one person outside a campus building.
Campus police Sgt. Gary Robinson said authorities believe the blast was caused by an explosive device.
"It was an explosive device with one fatality," he said.
Robinson did not know the identity or gender of the person whose body was found outside the university’s botany-microbiology building. He also did not know if there were other injuries or if the building was occupied.
Police cordoned off an area west of a packed Oklahoma Memorial Stadium, where the Oklahoma Sooners were playing a football game against Kansas State. Spectators reported hearing a loud boom just before the end of the first half, but no smoke or fire was seen.
Edit: More data here. Sounds like a "meh" more than a "WTF" now.
Also: I don't mind losing, guys. This is K-State. We invented losing. Or at least perfected it. All I ask is the next time we try to punt the ball, and we hike the ball, could someone, y'know, check to make sure there's actually a punter back there?
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On October 1, 2005, Florida becomes a more dangerous place. That's when the Shoot First Law goes into effect, giving the people of Florida the right to use deadly force as a first resort when they feel threatened, even in a public place. But the Shoot First doctrine isn't just staying in Florida — it's about to become a national disgrace.
And life takes another proud step toward Grand Theft Auto. Now if I could have cheat codes, I'd be set.
And life takes another proud step toward Grand Theft Auto. Now if I could have cheat codes, I'd be set.
Tags:
- boom,
- doom,
- evil,
- worldgonemad
Dolphin assassins menace Gulf of Mexico | The Register
Heavily-armed, frightened, and confused. No, we don't mean the Bush Administration, but a group of killer dolphins trained by the US Navy and lately washed into the Gulf of Mexico by Hurricane Katrina, if The Guardian is to be believed.
I know it's late, but it merits mentioning, perhaps even several times, if only for the subhed: Rogue cetacean death squad may be armed. Yes, a made-for-Sci-Fi-channel movie plays itself out in real life. And once more, the Onion has seen it coming.
Heavily-armed, frightened, and confused. No, we don't mean the Bush Administration, but a group of killer dolphins trained by the US Navy and lately washed into the Gulf of Mexico by Hurricane Katrina, if The Guardian is to be believed.
I know it's late, but it merits mentioning, perhaps even several times, if only for the subhed: Rogue cetacean death squad may be armed. Yes, a made-for-Sci-Fi-channel movie plays itself out in real life. And once more, the Onion has seen it coming.
The idea of this project was to create a fully-automated sentry gun, capable of picking out a human target and accurately tracking and shooting him or her in the heart. Really, the idea was to find a cool robotics project for the summer while I was working at an advertising agency, and I'd only ever seen sentry guns in movies (like Congo) and video games (Half-Life 1, Half-Life 2, Team Fortress Classic). I couldn't find any record of anyone building one, even the military, although it seems likely I just didn't look hard enough. It's a pretty simple technology. One of my friends did mention the Phalanx anti-missile gun, which is of similar design, but uses radar for tracking instead of an optical method. The Phalanx has been around since the early 80's. He was also quick to add that there are some pretty good reasons for not building an optical sentry gun, a big one being that it's generally a good idea to shoot down any missile headed in your direction, but that same philosophy may not be the best when applied to humans. If you're here just to see my little brother get shot with it, scroll to the bottom. :)
If you're killed by an act of terrorism, the newspapers and television stations will use whatever photo they can. From graduation... Your holiday snaps... Or if you're really unlucky, CCTV... None of these express the anger, the rage, even the disappointment your disembodied spirit will feel at having your life untimely snuffed out.
That's where YouBlewMeUpYouBastard.com comes in. We'll store a photo of you, giving it large at the terrorists what done you in, and in the event of your body being blown to bits by a suicide bomber, we'll supply your disgusted image to all news services.
That's where YouBlewMeUpYouBastard.com comes in. We'll store a photo of you, giving it large at the terrorists what done you in, and in the event of your body being blown to bits by a suicide bomber, we'll supply your disgusted image to all news services.
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foenix: Why are there no 52x CD-ROM drives? Because some CDs explode at that speed. Witness digital media's breaking points: PowerLabs High Speed Exploding CDs! The video is great -- especially the fishbowl.
foenix: Why are there no 52x CD-ROM drives? Because some CDs explode at that speed. Witness digital media's breaking points: PowerLabs High Speed Exploding CDs! The video is great -- especially the fishbowl.If you want to know what I was like in high school, well....
Like any red-blooded, masculine man of the male gender, I love PVC weaponry. You should too. If the concept of heading on down to the local Home Depot and transforming $100 worth of random pipe bits into a killing machine doesn’t appeal to you, you’re a frikkin' pansy. Also, you’re probably sane and will live significantly longer than I will. Nonetheless you disgust me, and I take comfort in the knowledge that your obituary will be nowhere near as humorous as mine. For those of you who laugh in the face of hypersonic shards of plastic puncturing your spleen, here’s an intimate look at how I’ve kept myself busy for the past week: building a PVC flamethrower.
Like any red-blooded, masculine man of the male gender, I love PVC weaponry. You should too. If the concept of heading on down to the local Home Depot and transforming $100 worth of random pipe bits into a killing machine doesn’t appeal to you, you’re a frikkin' pansy. Also, you’re probably sane and will live significantly longer than I will. Nonetheless you disgust me, and I take comfort in the knowledge that your obituary will be nowhere near as humorous as mine. For those of you who laugh in the face of hypersonic shards of plastic puncturing your spleen, here’s an intimate look at how I’ve kept myself busy for the past week: building a PVC flamethrower.
Lightning strikes airliner -- with animated .GIFs. Oh, good, because two of my favorite remaining anxieties needed to collide like this.
Here's hoping the Brits on my flist are all well and good after this morning. Take care, gang. Sound off, if y'all get the chance, too.
No pointless speculation on who/why from an intercontinental insomniac amateur analyst. Just best wishes.
No pointless speculation on who/why from an intercontinental insomniac amateur analyst. Just best wishes.
Tags:
- boom,
- doom,
- evil,
- worldgonemad
Yes, I'm a hopeless geek, watching NASA TV for live coverage of Deep Impact -- but it was a hoot. After the loss of the solar sail, it was pretty neat to be riding along with the winning team, so to speak. Great to hear the excitement build as they were dead on course, as the craft hit, as the first (spectacular) impact image came in, and the info that the craft sent back its last image 3.7 seconds before it hit (though since it was travelling at 6 miles a second, it was still a few miles away....)
Okay. Now I'm tired.
Okay. Now I'm tired.
Meteor, black hole, antimatter, whatever -- you're 10-15 megatons of enigma, 97 years old today, Tunguska event, and still perplexing.
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