Ridge Contemplating Retirement

Department of Homeland Security chief Tom Ridge is contemplating retiring in November regardless of the election outcome, CNN is reporting.

Why?

Because he needs to pay for college for his two teenage children. You know, because his government salary of $176,000 per year isn’t enough to put two kids through college and still live on.

Apparently, Ridge is also making mortgage payments on a $900,000 house. Did he not get the memo that government jobs don’t pay that well? Still, one would think a two-income family bringing in mid-six figures would be able to comfortably put about five kids through college.

Yet another example of the stellar talent Dubya is putting into positions of power.

posted on 31 July 2004 at 1205politix0 commentstrackback

Collect Calls from Prison Scam Hundreds

In a new(ish) variant of a scam that’s been around for ages, prisoners at a Dallas-area correctional facility have been calling numbers — collect, as all prison calls are — and getting their unsuspecting victims to hand over control of the phone by dialing *72. The prisoners then proceed to run up ridiculous charges on the victims’ phone bills.

The stupidity of the folks who fall for this is fairly impressive, but not nearly as impressive as what the corrections officials said when the scam was made known to them. I’m paraphrasing here, but it was something like, “Well, we have thousands of inmates, and one telephone, so it’s awfully difficult to know exactly who’s making these calls.”

Uhm…right.

Because there are no security cameras in a goddamn jail? Get serious. Put a camera right on the phone and log all calls. Synchronise the clock on the call log with the timestamp on the security videotape. DEAD SIMPLE. This isn’t complicated, nor is it expensive. The capability is already there. USE IT.

By the way, if anyone can find a news story on the WWW about this (I saw it on The Early Show on CBS this morning), please let me know. I’d like to link it.

For the people who fall for this scam:

Red FormanRed Forman Dumbass Rating: Eric (Dumbass) Eric (Dumbass)

For the corrections officials who won’t do anything about it:

Red FormanRed Forman Dumbass Rating: Eric (Dumbass) Eric (Dumbass) Eric (Dumbass) Eric (Dumbass)

posted on 31 July 2004 at 0946general1 commentstrackback

Scary Activity of the Week

I give you…

“Toothing.”

The Register’s explanation and Wikipedia’s should suffice.

Uh, yuck?

posted on 30 July 2004 at 2337humour0 commentstrackback

Rockin’ Google Trick

Thanks a bunch to “theluckyleper” on Slashdot for pointing this out (link):

Placing something impossible (like 8 Qs) in the “without the words” field on the Advanced Search [google.com] page combined with entering a site in the “Domain” field will get you a listing of ALL of the pages on that website!

Very cool.

posted on 29 July 2004 at 2045computing0 commentstrackback

Slashdot Humour of the Day

It’s a tie. I couldn’t decide between this thread about IBM Thinkpads and this story about the Segway revolutionising the game of polo. Yes, as in the “this device is going to change the world” two-wheeled electric scooter, and as in uppity British types with über-expensive horses and big wooden mallets and stuff.

posted on 29 July 2004 at 1548humour0 commentstrackback

Wikipedia Founder Interviewed

Jimmy Wales, founder and manager of Wikipedia, has been interviewed by Slashdot readers. The interview is fascinating.

Wikipedia rules!

posted on 28 July 2004 at 1456computing0 commentstrackback

Give Me Parody, or Give Me Lots of Money!

The JibJab video is making the current owners of Woody Guthrie’s song very very angry. Some excellent points have been made on the side of parody, in blogs at Blogspot, Corante, and Lessig. Of particular note is the comment by “bilge:”

A pity that the “framer’s intent” crowd are mute about copyright. Because originally, copyright was only for 14 years. Now, no work ever produced in my lifetime will enter the public domain before I die.

How much better would the world be if the public domain was actually allowed to take ownership of works that the public has already paid for? We’d have a culture that was actually ours, instead of locked up in perpetuity by corporate monoliths. We’d have more The Wind Done Gone and less Family Circus.

Now all we need is for someone to make a satire of the parody (or is it a parody of the satire?) where TRO and Jibjab sing these lyrics.

posted on 28 July 2004 at 0026politix0 commentstrackback

Holy Crap! Consistency!

I have now blogged four straight days.

The real reason for this post, however, is to say that I think the evil comment-spamming scum who hit the blog 350 times in the wee hours of this morning have met their match. It should be the first and only time that ever happens, since I did some upgrading of MT-Blacklist and have some really serious regular expressions in place now.

Eat that, spamming scum.

posted on 27 July 2004 at 2018meta0 commentstrackback

Political Humour of the Day

In honour of the start of the Democratic National Convention in Boston, I give you:

This Land, a parody of Woddy Guthrie’s famous folk song.

(3.7 MB, requires Flash to view.)

posted on 26 July 2004 at 1553politix0 commentstrackback

Gadget Envy

I’ve been wanting a SonyEricsson P900 for months now, but I’m not about to spend $800 on one and not get any benefits of a new cell fone plan. T-Mobile, which I otherwise love dearly, doesn’t offer the fone with a service plan, and has no plans to do so in the near future, according to service reps.

But with the HP iPAQ 6315 on the way this fall, why would they?

I detest Windows CE…I mean, PocketPC…I mean, Windows Mobile.

I really really detest it.

But the ability to get a cell fone/PDA combo with Bluetooth, 802.11b, and GSM/GPRS capability for $500 is extremely compelling.

The question now becomes — and I think it’s funny that I’m saying this, because I’m not what anyone would call a Linux geek — “Will it run Linux?”

Let’s hope so.

posted on 26 July 2004 at 1444computing1 commentstrackback

Best Insult Ever

In light of Lance Armstrong’s record sixth (and six consecutive) Tour de France title, the BBC is running an article highlighting the greatest individual sports feats of all time.

As per their usual practise, reader comments are solicited, which one wag has taken full advantage of in claiming, “Emile Heskey once controlled a ball, this achievement far outweighs any of the others you have mentioned!”

posted on 25 July 2004 at 2030humour0 commentstrackback

It’s the Economy, Stupid

Looks like John Kerry might get to resurrect Bill Clinton’s first-term campaign slogan.

And Dubya’s recent TV ads promising further tax cuts could turn out to be an eerie echo of his father’s infamous “Read my lips: no new taxes” blunder. How much did Dubya’s famous “tax cut for all Americans” save you last year? Three bucks? Twenty? Mmm-hmm. Think about it.

posted on 25 July 2004 at 1419politix0 commentstrackback

On This Day in History…

Seventy years ago yesterday, to quote the famous musical philosopher Rob Gordon, “John Dillinger was shot dead behind that theatre in a hail of FBI gunfire. You know who tipped ‘em off? His fucking girlfriend. And he just wanted to go to the movies.”

The New York Times is running a very interesting piece on the interest Dillinger still holds with the American public.

posted on 25 July 2004 at 1412general0 commentstrackback

Mmmm…Pissburgers

The US Army Soldier Systems Center has developed a new way of reconstituting dried food on the battlefield: just add dirty water or urine. The food is protected from bacteria and most toxic chemicals by an osmotic membrane that allows only water and other tiny molecules to pass whilst keeping bacteria, viruses, and particulate matter out.

The membrane is not, however, fine enough to filter out urea, which is present in urine and can cause kidney damage if ingested over long periods of time. Fortunately for soldiers’ stomachs and psyches, urine is suggested as an emergency-only reconstitution measure.

posted on 24 July 2004 at 1159general0 commentstrackback

Paging Google News

Feature request for Google News, please…

I would greatly appreciate it if, when the text-only version of Google News is selected, the redirect software was also smart enough to redirect you to a text-only version of the selected article, if available.

The reasoning behind this is simple: people select the text-only version for a reason, probably (like me) because they’re bandwidth-limited. Do you have any idea how long it takes to read three stories on a 9600 bps dialup connection? Well, my browsing would be greatly expedited if Google could automatically select a text-only version of the news story I click, rather than forcing me to wait for the entire graphics-laden version to load and then locate a text-only link on my own.

Am I the only one who thinks this would be a useful and desirable feature?

posted on 19 July 2004 at 2139computing0 commentstrackback

Movie Reviews of the Week

Since I seem to do nothing but watch movies any more now that I’m waiting to burn off the rest of my 85 hours of flight time, I figured I’d make something useful from it. Here goes.

King Arthur: imagine Braveheart meets The Patriot meets Gladiator, but without the best elements of any of them. This movie tries too hard to be all three, and not only manages to fail (perhaps unsurprisingly), but also nearly completely wastes Keira Knightley in her role as Guinevere, who wasn’t even introduced until halfway through the film and miraculously transforms from near-dead waif to ass-kicking grrrl in what seems like the space of a few days. I say “almost,” because the final battle scene with her little leather bikini top thing is as close as it gets to titillating. Out of five stars, this one gets two.

I, Robot: I have a confession to make. I really like Will Smith as an actor. Not so much that I would ever apologise for the abomination that was Wild Wild West, but I really enjoyed Independence Day, which bears some similarity to this surprisingly good piece of film, except the aliens are robots bent on taking over humanity. Shades of The Matrix trilogy abound, but this time, Neo is black and far more believable in his role. The movie didn’t really grab me and say, “You must see me again,” though, so this one gets three out of five stars.

Dodgeball: I have four words for you. “Christine Taylor in leather.” The Lance Armstrong cameo is hilarious, and Ben Stiller plays a wonderful sleazy fitness centre owner. Chuck Norris and William Shatner also have entertaining cameos in this one, which was fairly fast-paced and kept the laughs coming. This is definitely a movie that gets funnier the more you watch it, and will probably be the most-quoted movie of 2004 among the college crowd. Four out of five stars.

posted on 18 July 2004 at 2234entertainment2 commentstrackback

I Can Die Happy

Why can I die happy?

Because I have achieved the ultimate victory over the highest difficulty level of MacIago, a clone of the classic Iago/Othello/Reversi-type strategy game.

I didn’t even know this was possible, but I’ve now seen it with my own eyes. I hope you’re sitting down, readers, because this score will shock and awe you.

Sixty-four to nothing.

Words are entirely inadequate to describe just how much I now “pWn” MacIago.

posted on 16 July 2004 at 2338entertainment0 commentstrackback

Atlanta, Here I Come

The blog will be taking at least a day off whilst I fly up to Atlanta to deliver some computers tomorrow. No idea when I’ll be back, but it’s only a three-hour flight one way, so it should be well before dark.

posted on 13 July 2004 at 1611school0 commentstrackback

Fear the E-Ballot

If you aren’t very upset with the state of electronic voting in this country, you should be. Diebold is being sued again for their shoddy workmanship in building totally insecure, totally hackable electronic voting machines.

Will anything be done to solve this problem before the November elections? Worse, will anyone care if it isn’t?

At stake here is nothing less than the future of liberty. Spread the word.

posted on 13 July 2004 at 1608politix0 commentstrackback

Hi, I’m Chris, and I Fly Airplanes

Let the ladies take notice.

(Just kidding.)

But I did indeed pass my checkride with flying colours, so yours truly is now an FAA-certificated private pilot in single-engine land airplanes.

Due to an administrative mix-up, my instructor and I flew down to St. Augustine at 0715 yesterday and waited at the airport for the examiner to show up. At about 0815 he called his “home office” at the airport and said, “I’m up here in Jacksonville. Where are you guys?”

Whoops.

So we hopped back in the plane and beat feet back to Craig, and my checkride got started an hour late. But darnit, I coulda slept in!

Ironically enough, the one thing I wasn’t satisfied with on the checkride was my first simulated engine-out landing, which is the one thing I had never had problems with in training. Go figure.

posted on 12 July 2004 at 0959school0 commentstrackback

Lake City Shuttle Departing in 15 Minutes…

I have to burn 10 hours of solo cross-country time in the next five days. Well, I did before yesterday. Having completed three round trips from Craig (KCRG) to Lake City (KLCQ) in the last 36 hours, I’ve accounted for 4.9 hours of that time. Anyone want to fly over to Lake City again? I think I could about fly this route in my sleep now.

Oh, and cruising at 7500 feet is wicked fun. It just takes for freakin’ ever to get there!

Checkride next Friday…wish me luck…

posted on 03 July 2004 at 1339school0 commentstrackback