Dojo Info 4/29/05

1. XXX, on a small screen near you
   If you thought it was hard to keep pr0n from your kids now, just wait until Playboy and the rest start sending it to their cell phones.
2. Place the State
   I love these things! Score: 94%, Average Error: 12miles, Time: 316 seconds. Would have been darn-near perfect if it weren’t for Iowa. [via Not Exactly Rocket Science]
3. Place the State (Advanced)
   Much tougher but I didn’t do too shabby. Score: 80%, Average Error: 23miles, Time: 322 seconds. [via NERS]
4. Pub chef bitten by deadly spider
   See honey? Yet another reason to by a camara-phone.
5. Saddam is My B*tch
   Apparently one of the U.S. translators got a little out of hand when got to meet Saddam coming out of his hole.
6. Miller leads Indy’s 17-3 run in the fourth
   One day after The Sports Guy says Reggie Miller is “no superstar”, Miller rolls the Celts almost single-handedly.

Survivor: Week 10

Tally ho! I’m back on top in Tribe66486. Does that mean there’s at least 6,600,000 people playing? Surely not. Anyway, it’s good to be the Biscuits.

Wow, was I right about predicting intrigue last week? Stephanie’s performance at Tribal Council was the kind of thing that Kasparov would be proud of. Janu’s pout-fest only thwarted her own tribe, but perhaps that’s why she did it—leaving on her terms. She could thumb her nose at Tom and the rest. She knew she was next out anyway, so good for her.

With only 7 survivors left, I think the writing is on the wall for Stephanie, I’m sad to say. She’s been perhaps the most memorable Survivor cast-away of all time. She’d have made Jimmy “Never Give Up” V proud.

There’s always the chance that the Tom-led alliance will see the Gregg/Jennifer combo as a bigger problem than Stephie. The safe choice would be to go with Tom, Ian, Katie and Caryn. But who says I like to be safe? I’m letting it ride, baby!

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Night of a Thousand Sounds

My Dad is great. He knew his first-born son would be out-of-town on business during his birthday so he flew down to surprise him. Not too many fathers would book a last-minute flight and those atrocious rates just to spend some time with his boy.

So after work yesterday, I picked him up from the airport and we scouted the restaurant scene. We selected a truly marvelous place called Trulucks. Both my steak and his salmon were exquisite. No wonder all the walls were covered with autographed pictures of celebrities. Then we followed it up with Oceans 12, a fun romp through Italy where the quips and dry humor literally stole the show.

After birthday cards and phone calls, we got settled for bed. I needed to be up by 7, so with midnight rapidly approaching, it was sack time. I feel asleep quickly.

The Torture Begins
Around 1:15 I was awakened to a strange noise. Long moments later I realized my father was snoring. It sounded like a janitor pulling a heavy, metal filing cabinet across some brick pathway. And it wasn’t a regular tempo, *pause* *pause* *scrape* it was a more random, *pause* *scrape* *pause* *pause* *scrape*.

At 1:18 I scavenged my earplugs from my travel bag. Largely ineffective I sympathized with my Mom who’s been living with the sound machine for many long years. My wife says I snore, “Yeah right.”

By 1:58 I had the second pillow over the side of my head like a sandwich. With only a small air hole, I persevered.

It’s 2:14. The fitful attempts at sleep are playing tricks on my mind. What day is it? How long have I been in this prison? What piece of information do I have that they’re willing to stoop to this most inhuman practice of torture!?!

Now at 2:20 or so (I’m not sure really, it was all a hideous blur.) I slipped from delirium and started to consider my options. The bathtub? Possibly… but what if the showerhead starts dripping on me. The car? Scratch that. My little econo-box would render me so cramped, my Old Man’s Back (OMB) would return and there I’d be. The only option left open to me was to rent another room.

The Remedy
At 2:32 I presented myself to the night-watch clerk. Clearly he had sympathy for me; such was my disarray.

“Can I get another room on the 2nd floor? My Dad’s snoring is like the German’s blitzkrieg.” I said.
He replied, “You’re in luck. We have one room left.”

As I made my way to room 327 I thanked God for His mercies. In silent recognition of all those snore-abused spouses who press on in the face, rather, the blare of unrelenting noise, I laid my head on a new, cool pillow and was quickly asleep.

The 7 o’clock wake-up call came mere moments later. I picked up my bill for the new room, already passed under the door and scrambled back to our room. “75 bucks?! Ha! Small price to pay for sanity,” I muttered.

When I opened the door to our room, I was met with a miracle. After the nightlong marathon of snoring expertise, the room was silent. Quickly to the shower, lest my cursing raise the still slumbering relative.

I don’t really know the moral of this story. Perhaps, it’s that everyone should have a blog? Where else can I transform a night of the purest pain, into a laughable occasion at my expense. It’s a price easily paid.

Internet Usage in Ukraine

Today I received an email from one of the Yahoo! groups in which I am a member. It came from someone who lives in the Ukraine. I’ve not seen it reported in the mainstream media but in less than half a year Internet usage has grown by 60% in that country. Any idea what’s driving it? You guessed it, politics, in particular the Orange Revolution.

Much like our own country experienced a jump in the number of bloggers during our elections, the Ukraine has been experiencing a growth of almost 15% a month due to the people’s mistrust of the country’s regime controlled media sources. It’s a small world after all.

All Speech is Definitely Not Free

Were you taught that because of the 1st Amendment you were allowed to say anything you want? If so, your teacher should be sent back a grade, or two. There are limits to free speech. The popular example is that you can’t yell “Fire!” in a crowded movie theater, but there are many more.

Today on Bill O’Reilly’s show, he was talking about how an American-Muslim Ali al-Timimi was convicted of inciting others towards acts of violence towards Americans. His second example is even more grotesque.

In 1997, two men, Salvatore Sicari and Charles Jaynes, kidnapped, raped and murdered a 10-year-old boy in Massachustetts. They were convicted and are now in prison.

In 2001, the boy’s parents filed a lawsuit against North American Man Boy Love Association (NAMBLA) for contributing to the unlawful death.

The American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) is defending NAMBLA. And they’re doing it for free.

“There is room in this country for people who believe man-boy love is okay. There is room for people who believe, who say it, but not who do it,” ACLU attorney Harvey Silvergate said.

Now, they won’t promote this case on their site but did include a Q&A in their Frequently Asked Questions. (Apparently a lot of people are questioning their motives on this one.)

More people need to become aware of just how misguided the ACLU has become over the years. Like most things, when the organization began it was in response to a real need, namely violence on blacks and women not being able to vote.

Now the core beliefs of the ACLU run counter to what most Americans believe. They’ve become a fringe group, but one with very deep pockets. This could be because most financial supporters don’t thoroughly know the extent to which the ACLU pushes its almost Socialist agenda. Everyone should keep a mental scorecard. When a court case comes up and the ACLU is involved, see which side they’re fighting for.

The greatest trick of a magician is misdirection. The ACLU tells us they are protecting our human rights, but usually it’s only the rights of the humans on their “approved” list.

Dojo Info (formerly Link Dump) 4/27/05

1. Aerial taxis about to take flight
   One step closer to The Jetsons.
2. Oregon proposes local cell phone tax
   Leave it to Oregon to be on the leading-edge of all things taxing. It’s not like there aren’t already 5 kinds of taxes attached to a phone bill. Sheesh.
3. Is the Pope Catholic?
   “Yes, of course. And critics are disappointed and annoyed that he is.”
4. Michael Moore Will Pay You To Defy School Administration
   No kidding.
5. Planned Parenthood’s Teenwire and its encouragement of adolescent sexual behavior
   “Of all the contradictions of this age of moral relativism, surely one of the strangest is that those who don’t believe in objective truth hold that it is impossible for good people to disagree.”
   Wisdom.

Thoughts on Franken

While heading to lunch, eating and then traveling back I had the opportunity to listen to the Al Franken show on Air America. I never thought Franken was funny back on SNL and with some of the extreme things he’s been saying lately, I can’t say I’m a fan, but I wanted to give him a fair shake and listen to an hour before formulatting an opinion.

After listening, here are some thoughts:

• I can understand why liberals hate Limbaugh. He comes off quite hateful. It’s likely the same for the conservatives who hate Franken. Most of what both say is devisive. There’s almost no attempt at seeking the truth of any given topic, but rather poking or prodding at the position or person who holds the opposite opinion. It really raises my opinion of Dennis Prager who appears to be consistently sincere.
• Franken isn’t funny. At least, not to me. I gave him the benefit of the doubt but didn’t get even a single chuckle. To be fair, his topics during the hour were a bit on the heavy side.
• Franken showed genuine love when talking about his father who recently passed away. It reminded me that he’s human and I appreciated that.
• The whole idea of separation of church and state, in my opinion, is being dishonestly promoted. When someone goes back and reads the original documents and not some recent (most likely liberal) interpretation of them, it’s very clear that the Founding Fathers did not want to remove all aspects of religion from our nation’s government. A very good book on the topic is David Barton’s—America’s Godly Heritage. At only $3.95 it’s a wonderful value as well.

The Damned of the West (Part 3)

Here’s the final piece of an interview with hostage Roy Hallum’s family. This is a follow-up to last weeks post regarding Part 1 & 2. It’s truly a tragedy that the MSM gives so little airtime to issues like these.

Breakin’ It Down, Dojo Style

If you’ve never been to TheOnion.com, go now. Why are you still here?!? Wha…? I said, if you haven’t been, then you should go. Off with you! Begone! Huh? You’ve been? Oh, ok, let’s move on.

Each issue of TheOnion has it’s share of lame articles but I’ll be tarred-and-feathered if there’s not a gem in there too. The best this time around was Fifth-Grade Science Paper Doesn’t Stand Up To Peer Review. (Try to ignore the ads for one moment.)

The premise is taking totally irrelavant daily occurances and then treating them like they’re actually newsworthy. You know, kinda like CNN does with Martha Stewart.

What’s so hilarious is that TheOnion writers have truly learned how to come off sounding like regular people. Here, listen to this piece that’s supposedly coming from a 10-year-old boy named Duane:

“Otters are so boring, I fell asleep for a thousand years and woke up with a long beard covered in ice,” LaMott said. “I had to defrost myself.”

That’s gold Jerry, gold! And another:

“Yes, sea lions do have gigantic claws,” LaMott said. “If you don’t believe me, look it up. Sea lions have very long claws. They would tear an otter to shreds in, like, two seconds. Seriously.”

Brilliant. I wonder if Jon Stewart got his show idea from TheOnion. It just goes to show, not everything from Wisconsin stinks of cheese.

Pope v265 Installed

Pope version 265, code named Benedict XVI, was formally installed today outside St. Peter’s Basilica. I didn’t know that’s how they did it. Hopefully, everything went well, no nasty calls to tech support or anything. I wonder how many discs it took?

All I’m saying is it’s important to have a guy in charge who’ll honestly interpret the Bible rather than twist it towards their own agenda. You know, kinda like this Bishop who says that Jesus was a homosexual.

Star Wars: Revelations

Amatuer filmmaker Shane Felux, with some help from his friends, has produced one of the most ambitious pieces of film ever developed buy “some regular guys.” Star Wars: Revelations is a 40-minute film that, well, maybe I shouldn’t spoil it for you.

The special effects and production values are very good. My only complaint the quality of acting, but remember, these people had a ridiculously small budget. Great job guys, good luck to your future projects.

Link Dump 4/23/2005

1. Blogging With Clippy
   WuzzaDem is hilarious. Check it.
2. A Good Laugh
   Everyone needs a good laugh every now and then.
3. Translation From PR-Speak to English of Selected Portions of Adobe’s ‘FAQ’ Regarding Their Acquisition of Macromedia
   Like usual, Daring Fireball is spot on.
4. Socialism Debunked In… The New York Times?!?
   How many socialist congressmen does it take to screw in a lightbulb?
5. How Did It Go In?
   Did a force more powerful than Nike help Tiger win the Masters?

Addictive Google Game

There are fun games, and then there are fun, addictive games. I might need to call-in sick tomorrow because Guess-the-Google has me in its powerful grasp.

The game is simple. Just try to guess the keyword that matches all 20 of the images in the montage. But it’s harder than it looks. Plus the clock is ticking! Oh my, I need to go back and try and beat my high score. [via Coudal]

Update: Unfortunately, they don’t have enough different answers so you’ll end up with the sames ones over time. Then it’s too easy. Anyway, my scores went:

1. 171
2. 191
3. 361

before I called it a day.

Redemptive Stories

How can you not like Redemptive Stories? They’re all about the underdog, the against-all-odds story where a regular person defies all obstacles to do something spectacular.

We all get too much in the way of crisis, tragedy and calamity, so my hat is off to Steve Hartman and CBS for putting some effort behind these positive stories.

Giant Battle Monsters

ACLU is a Giant Lizard that emits Clouds of Inky Smoke, dissolves in Water, has a single Horn on its Forehead, controls Human Thought, and can Generate Electricity.

When attacking:

Strength: 10
Agility: 5
Intelligence: 2

Electricity Attack!

21st Century Paladin is a Giant Moth that has a Terrible Roar, projects a Purple Forcefield, and controls Human Thought.

When defending against ACLU:-

Strength: 8
Agility: 5
Intelligence: 6

21st Century Paladin wins!

I just whooped up on the ACLU (who’ve been whooping up on the chronic). Anybody want a piece of me?