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And I Quote

"the worst moment for the atheist is when he is really thankful and has nobody to thank."

dante gabriel rossetti
quotationspage.com

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Thursday May 01 2003

talented rabbit

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ever wanted to see a rabbit with a tomato on his head? how bout a pancake? well you can see that and much much more here.

past diet program

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this would definitely work.

single ladies

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looking for a date?

fox scores 1

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among the networks fox is definitely on the lowest rung of morality. having come out with such quality programming as "married with children", "who wants to marry a millionaire?" and "joe millionaire" ( my personal favorite ) they've shown themselves to be happy to offer the high shock and sex for your viewing pleasure. only the adult cable channels and possibly mtv are better than fox at that.

fox isn't without its good points though. fox news channel has proven to be one of the most balanced and accurate news sources on cable. they have many talking heads whose views range from right to left and everywhere in between. if anything fox news could be accused of being "conservative". kind of surprising coming from the network that brought us "temptation island".

monday night fox scored a point with me. i'm a fan of the show "boston public". the show is set at winslow high in inner city boston, mass. the main characters are the faculty of the school with a few teenage dramas thrown in every now and then. they handle some pretty tough issues but also have the usual suspects like adultery and the dating relationship of marla and a little person ( mini me ).

the most recent teen drama involves marcie, the office worker, getting pregnant. marcie doesn't know what to do. her parents aren't supportive of her keeping the baby and the father's attitude is "whatever you want to do." she seeks advice from the two vice-principals, one a male and the other a female. here's the cool part. never once was the option of abortion mentioned. both of the vice-principals gave her the pros and cons of her two choices: keeping the baby or giving him away for adoption. abortion is an apparent non-issue. as it should be.

one of the final scenes of the show is marcie meeting with a young couple in the vice-principal's office. it's an interview of sorts, as it seems marcie is planning to give her baby up for adoption.

i think it's great that fox took this route with the show. maybe whoever is making the decisions for their news channel is having some effect on their prime time programming. whatever the case, i hope the message got through. their are alternatives to abortion...and all of them are better.

Wednesday April 30 2003

"pastor brad simmons"

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i got an email just now and it is addressed to "pastor brad simmons". i've been called "brother brad", but just for fun. pastor..nah..scary huh?!

game consoles going on sale

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if you're thinking of getting a ps2, xbox or gamecube wait a couple of weeks.

The ever more vicious rounds of skirmishing between the top three names is interesting. According to the news piece, and as we reported earlier this month, the Xbox is due to drop to $149 in the US. Sony will also be pitching its PS2 at that price. Meanwhile, Nintendo will be dropping the Gamecube down to $99.

theinquirer.net

Tuesday April 29 2003

manly tips for bachelor living

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if you're a bachelor, or if you plan to marry one this might be a good site for you to check out. for the guys, it'll help you with those tough bachelor-type tasks. for the ladies, it'll give you an idea of what you're gonna have to put up with.

my personal favorite, from "laundry, the manly way"

It is a little-known fact that any item of clothing, no matter how filthy, will be clean again if you just leave it alone for two weeks.

how true.

coming to a urinal near you

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those folks a mit have come up with a revolutionary idea that will change the way you view urinals. for guys anyway.

The You're In Control system uses computation to enhance the act of urination. Sensors in the back of a urinal detect the position of a stream of urine, enabling people to play interactive games on a screen mounted above the urinal.

In an age when few people question that computers are changing social codes, You're In Control questions how technology can both challenge and enforce social mores. On one hand, You're In Control questions a basic social code of privacy by assuming that (even simulated) public urination is acceptable if the participant is playing a computer game. On the other hand, You're In Control proposes the application of technology to positively enforce social codes of sanitation.

mit.edu

check out the site for pictures and video.

new 25 letter alphabet

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i'm up for dropping a couple of letters from the english alphabet.

"The letter 'C' is 95% bad," states Nielsen's latest bi-weekly newsletter which is entitled "Stop Being Stupid."

"As I sat down to re-evaluate the English language, I was struck by the letter 'C' and its basic lack of function in the language," writes Nielsen. "The sheer uselessness of a letter which just mimics the sound of not one but two different consonants is staggering. It only causes confusion and is probably costing companies millions every year."

news.unclesharky.com

college basketball coach joins the party

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definitely "poor judgment"

Iowa State University men's basketball coach Larry Eustachy, the state's highest-paid public employee, told the school's president and athletic director that he used "poor judgment" and made "bad decisions" at an after-hours party in late January near the University of Missouri campus.

Bruce Van De Velde, Iowa State's athletic director, said Eustachy came to him and university President Gregory Geoffroy this month after learning that a student at the party had provided photographs of Eustachy to The Des Moines Register.

The 12 photographs show Eustachy during the early hours of Jan. 23, with beer, and in several photos embracing and kissing women on the cheek or being kissed on the cheek.

demoinesregister.com

here are the photos.

not a good day for donuts

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A Franklin man stepped on the gas pedal instead of the brake yesterday and his car slammed through the glass-paneled front of a Concord Street Dunkin' Donuts, police said.

Douglas Fitzpatrick, 59, of 3 Rayhill Road told officers he stepped on the wrong pedal of his Toyota Avalon when he attempted to pull into the Rte. 126 doughnut shop at about 2:05 p.m., Lt. Lou Griffith said.

"I don't think there was much damage (to the car) to make it inoperable," said Griffith. "I think the guy was a little shook up - startled that it happened."

metrowestdailynews.com

and in related news...

A Northwest Side doughnut-shop customer believed he had been given oversweetened coffee and shot the 29-year-old server to death last week, police said Monday.

Bond was set at $3 million on Monday for Alfredo Natal, 48, who cleans CTA buses. Natal thought the clerk, Sukhdev Dave, an immigrant whose wife was pregnant, was pouring too much sugar in his coffee in retaliation for an earlier service dispute, Grand Central Cmdr. Lee Epplen said.

chicagotribune.com

the moral of the story : "donuts, they're more dangerous than we thought"

a likely story

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The naked man told police his abduction tale, in which he was forced to shed his clothes, then climb into an air duct at Westown Shopping Center, where he stayed for three days.

The colorful story lacked details — such as where he was abducted, who the men were and what kind of car they drove — but the man's previous burglary convictions have given police a different scenario.

daytondailynews.com

sounds perfectly logical to me.

german squirrels

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apparently german squirrels don't take kindly to squirrel fishing.

Firemen in Germany had to rescue a terrified 10-year-old girl after she was chased up a tree by a squirrel.

Lisa Fremmel climbed on to one of the lower branches of a pine tree at Krumbach in Germany when the squirrel appeared below her and tried to bite her shoe.

The squirrel made so much noise and was so aggressive the 10-year-old climbed further up the tree to try and get away, but the squirrel followed her.

ananova.com

Monday April 28 2003

compact atari

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how cool is this. again, i'll provide my shipping address to anyone interested in purchasing for me.

i scream you scream

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alright ice cream fans it's your lucky week. baskin-robbins and ben & jerry's are giving away free scoops of ice cream this week. ben & jerry's free cone day is tuesday, april 29 from noon - 8 and baskin-robbins is wednesday, april 30. check their websites to find local stores.

unfortunately neither one of them are near me...dangit. welp enjoy.

france briefed iraq on war

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just one more reason why the french have been basically useless since the revolutionary war.

FRANCE gave Saddam Hussein's regime regular reports on its dealings with US officials, The Sunday Times reported, quoting files it had found in the wreckage of the Iraqi foreign ministry.

The conservative British weekly said the information kept Saddam abreast of every development in US planning and may have helped him to prepare for war.

news.com.au

bush will be a write-in

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this is crazy.

First came the news that officials in Alabama may have to put President Bush on the ballot as a write-in candidate. It turns out Alabama isn't the only state scrambling to figure out what it needs to do to ensure that the president's name will appear on the state ballot next year.

The GOP's unusually late nominating convention -- it does not begin until Aug. 30 -- is the problem. Bush is not scheduled to accept his party's nomination until Sept. 2, 2004. That falls after the deadline for certifying presidential candidates not only in Alabama, but also in California, the District of Columbia and West Virginia. There are bills in the Alabama legislature to move its deadline from Aug. 31 to Sept. 5. But if, for some reason, they don't pass, the president would be forced to run there as a write-in candidate.

washingtonpost.com

bush needs to just accept the nomination earlier and then do whatever hooplah he wanted to do on sept 2 then.

saddam's banjo

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i really hate that i missed out on the opportunity to own this fine piece of history.

1 pixel per meter

permalink | cm(0) | tb(0) | weird web

this guy has even more time on his hands than emotional eric. there's graphics of everything from king kong to the eiffel tower to star wars and star trek ships and my personal favorite, the star wars space slug. everything represented in the scale of 1 pixel per meter. if you're using internet explorer you can drag the graphics around to see how things measure up.

Sunday April 27 2003

telemarketer tricks revealed

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more reasons to just hang up when you get calls from telemarketers. the more time you spend on the phone with them the better chance something like this will happen to you.

The phone rings in the middle of a busy day. "I just want to verify some information for your yellow page listing," says a voice on the other end of the line. It's your business, so you agree to the chat. Name. Address. Phone number. You reply with a simple "yes" to eight or nine rapid-fire questions. A month later, there's a $29.95 charge on your phone bill for a service you don't remember ordering. You've been crammed, another victim of fast-talking telemarketers who are skirting the edges of telecommunications law to create a multimillion industry.

msnbc.com


wicket the wonderdog

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i got a dog. don't worry. the people at the store said he would be much harder to kill than a fish. his name is wicket. he's a westie terrier, lhasa apso mix. he looks more like a cairn terrier right now. he's fun and jamie jo loves him he loves jamie jo.

real names

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did you know kirstie alley's real name is gladys leeman? queen latifah's is dana owens? and tom cruise is thomas cruise mapother? there's more at famousnamechanges.com.

good thing it's not possible

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i got a call a few minutes ago. as soon as i answered with "hello?" i heard the voice of a 9 or 10 year old girl respond excitedly, "daddy?". she had the wrong number.