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Kids These Days…

Thursday, August 20th, 2009

Well, it’s “Back to School” time again, which means it’s time for Beloit College to publish it’s annual mindset list, reflecting the perspective of the incoming freshman class (the Class of 2013).

For some reason, this year’s list wasn’t as amazing to me as it has been in past years, but there were a few items that I found worthy of note:

Most students entering college for the first time this fall were born in 1991. For these students…

6. Salsa has always outsold ketchup.
7. Earvin “Magic” Johnson has always been HIV-positive.
23. The European Union has always existed.
34. They have always been able to read books on an electronic screen.
35. Women have always outnumbered men in college.
44. There have always been flat screen televisions.
50. Everyone has always known what the evening news was before the Evening News came on.
51. Britney Spears has always been heard on classic rock stations.
53. Someone has always been asking:

Categories: Random Acts of Blogging | 2 Comments »

Random Acts of Blogging – 8/18/09

Tuesday, August 18th, 2009

A few quick items I found interesting or humorous:

First it was an epidemic, then it was a global pandemic, and now the Swine Flu is a video game! The game is free, and can be found at http://www.thegreatflu.com. Heck, if the latest Harry Potter movie can be a video game, why not swine flu, right?

Next, there’s this post from BoingBoing, which explains that you can get G-mail to stop putting advertisements on your e-mails, simply by putting words or phrases like “9/11” and “suicide” in the mails. You see, G-mail doesn’t want to appear insensitive by putting ads on e-mails about such serious topics, so if you fool it into thinking that your e-mail refers to such subjects, then you can be ad free. Here’s my favorite line from the article:

Questions remain [such as] How do you avoid scaring the people who receive your emails with your seemingly pointless references to incest and gang rape?

Classic.

Moving on, we have Elsie Poncher. Elsie’s late husband, Richard, bought two tombs in a Los Angeles mausoleum (for him and his wife) from Joe DiMaggio in 1954. When Mr. Poncher passed away in 1986, he was laid to rest in one of them, which wound up being directly above DiMaggio’s ex-wife, Marilyn Monroe. Fast forward to today, where Elsie wants to pay off the $1.6 million mortgage on her Beverly Hills home.

So, she’s put her husband’s grave on eBay. Her plan, you see, is to move him to her spot, and have herself cremated. Sound crazy? Well, the starting bid was $500,000, and as of yesterday, the bidding had reached $2.5 million. It seems Ms. Poncher will pay off the mortgage and have some money to spare. My favorite part? The text of her ad:

“Here is a once in a lifetime and into eternity opportunity to spend your eternal days directly above Marilyn Monroe. In fact the person occupying the address right now is looking face down on her.”

Does that make this a “tomb with a view?” (Ba dum! I’m here all week! Don’t forget to tip your waitresses…)

UPDATE: Final bid: $4.6 million.

UPDATE #2: Sanity returns to the world. Unidentified $4.6 million bidder pulls out. A second auction, with reserve price starting at $500,000 closed with zero bids.

And finally, there is the somewhat sad news that the venerable magazine, Reader’s Digest has declared bankruptcy. There are details available in the link, but for some reason, I feel the need to tell you about this in a short, summarized paragraph.

That’s all for now folks. Hope you enjoyed the show. Have a great day…

Categories: Random Acts of Blogging | 5 Comments »

The Ultimate Reality Show

Thursday, August 6th, 2009

Sorry I’ve been away so long – its been a combination of being busy with non-blog things, a dearth of short, pithy things to say, and a host of longer, meatier topics that I’d like to discuss, but haven’t had the time to write about. I’ll try to strike a better balance going forward…

So, while I’ve got a few minutes today, I thought I’d flesh out an idea that I had a while back when I walked by an advertisement for Dance Your Ass Off, a TV reality show that seems to combine Dancing with the Stars and The World’s Biggest Loser. Apparently, this new reality show has contestants performing dances, after which they are judged not just on how well they dance, but on how effectively all that dancing makes them lose weight.

Brilliant! If we combine these shows together, then there can be less of them, right? And then we’d be able to avoid them more easily, right? Certainly, this is an idea worth pursuing. And so, ladies and gentlemen, I present you my idea for. . . (cue theme music) . . .

The Ultimate Reality Show

One hundred overweight men, one hundred super-models and one hundred aspiring chefs are simultaneously stranded on a remote island just off the coast of Africa.

Read the rest of this entry »

Categories: Primetime TV, Random Acts of Blogging | 2 Comments »

Summing up the Fourth…

Sunday, July 5th, 2009

I hope everyone had a wonderful Fourth of July.

Categories: Random Acts of Blogging | 3 Comments »

What do you think of when you see this bird?

Sunday, June 28th, 2009

When you see the picture on the right, what do you think of? Recent polling suggests that if you were born in:

…the 1940’s or 1950’s, you think: Woodstock – 3 Days of Peace & Music

…the 1960’s or 1970’s, you think: The Partridge Family – Come on, Get Happy!

…the 1980’s or 1990’s, you think: Twitter for Guitar?

(NOTE: This post inspired by a certain cousin of mine, who shall, at least for now, remain nameless…)
 

Categories: Primetime TV, Random Acts of Blogging, Words about Music | 2 Comments »

John Hodgman Geeks Out for President Obama

Monday, June 22nd, 2009

This is just unbelievably awesome:

(Hat tip: Andy Winston)
 

Categories: Political Rantings, Primetime TV, Random Acts of Blogging | Comments Off on John Hodgman Geeks Out for President Obama

Blogging for a Rainy Day…

Thursday, June 18th, 2009

Someone in my office, originally from Boston, having just been through a wet and lousy commute, commented that New Yorkers seem to get 30% dumber when they get wet.

Looks like we’re in for a pretty stupid week and a half:

Ugh…

Categories: New York, New York, Random Acts of Blogging | 2 Comments »

Follow-Up Graph

Wednesday, June 10th, 2009

As a follow-up to this, we have this:

(Hat tip: Jeff Porten)
 

Categories: Random Acts of Blogging | 1 Comment »

Drinking Game

Friday, June 5th, 2009

By now, just about everyone has seen the put Mentos into Diet Coke so it explodes bit in one form or another. But this takes it to a whole new level.

To summarize:

  1. Fill an ice tray halway with water & freeze
  2. Put a mentos candy in each compartment, fill the rest of the way with water and freeze again (now you have ice cubes with mentos in the middle
  3. Mix an drink that contains both diet coke and these ice cubes (the link says Manhattan’s, even though they don’t have diet coke in them. I’m thinking Rum & Coke? Anyway…whatever you fancy)

When you’re done, what you basically have is a drink that’s also a ticking time bomb. If the person can drink down the diet coke before the ice melts, he/she is fine. If he/she waits too long, though, ka-blooey!!!

(Hat tip: Willow Gross)
 

Categories: Random Acts of Blogging | 2 Comments »

Unfortunate Icons

Thursday, June 4th, 2009

The Calendar view in Microsoft Outlook 2007 uses a clever set of icons to give the user key information about his/her meetings without opening each one. Recurring meetings, for instance, show up with curved arrows in the lower-right corner. If you modify a single instance of a recurring meeting, it puts a diagonal line through the arrows, which gives the unfortunate impression of a script “x”. Hence, you get meeting descriptions like this:

I assure you that opening the appointment is not nearly as exciting as the message above implies.

Categories: Random Acts of Blogging, Tech Talk | Comments Off on Unfortunate Icons

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