I would do anything to pass this exam.

I got this joke from elbandmonkey’s Xanga:

A student comes to a young professor’s office hours. She glances down the hall, closes his door, and kneels pleadingly. “I would do anything to pass this exam.”

She leans closer to him, flips back her hair, gazes meaningfully into his eyes. “I mean,” she whispers, “I would do anything.”

He returns her gaze. “Anything?”

“Anything.”

His voice turns to a whisper. “Would you… study?”
————————————
Now if only my students had the same idea and I don’t mean studying…

Haha.

StarCraft 2

OMG! StarCraft 2 is coming out! *drools*

Check out the trailer and gameplay videos: Starcraft 2 Gameplay Videos & Cinematic Trailer. You can also download them directly off Blizzard or GameTrailers. I just realized that if you download via Blizzard, you’re actually downloading via Bittorrent. They download is an exe file that is a bittorrent client + the hash and tracker information. Interesting idea.

*drools* some more.

Random Crap:

Colbert Knows Why Pro-Torture Responses Got Loud Applause at GOP Debate (from Digg) – Colbert adds his two cents in as to why the GOP candidates’ answers on torture were so warmly received and slams McCain for being soft on torture “enhanced interrogation techniques.” My favorite part of this clip was when one mentioned of them mentioned, “I’m looking for Jack Bauer at that time.”

Speaking of Jack Bauer. 2 of the TV series I’m watching this season has aired their finale: Heroes and 24. 24 didn’t have much of a surprise, but you know his father’s still alive. What scary is the thought that he might still have the Russian component, and you know that’s going to come back to haunt them later. Why the heck didn’t Jack Bauer get the component back before leaving his father to die. It’s as if he was allowing him to escape WITH the component. But Keith Sutherland’s signed up for 2 more seasons of 24. We’ll see how that goes.

As for Hero’s finale, I thought it was okay. The final fight was disappointing, but I’ll let my comment on Ungsunghero’s blog described what I felt:

To be honest, “Save the cheerleader, save the world” came out of future Hiro’s mouth. After the episodes where Hiro meets future Hiro, those words really didn’t have any meaning anymore.

As you said, that phrase was meant to mean to keep Sylar from taking the healing ability. I wouldn’t think that Hiro had any underlying meaning to it. If Hiro was an oracle and offer tellings with ambiguous meanings, I may believe, but future Hiro himself was confused when Sylar was still alive.

Another interesting thing was the introduction of Simone’s father. Obviously he has some powers. Linderman mentioned about an old group of friends (himself, Mama Petrelli, Hiro’s father, and Simone’s father so far).

We know what Linderman’s power is, but the other 3 are still up for grabs. We know that either Mama Petrelli or Simone’s father has the power to dream the future and past (you might remember Peter’s dreams about him blowing up, or how he saw Nathan get into a car accident). I’m leaning towards Simone’s father, but I thought that was an interesting twist in the end by bringing him back.

RayAlome tells me that both Nathan and Peter got their contracts renewed for season 2. That doesn’t mean they don’t die (maybe one has only an episode or 2, or maybe only shows up in flashbacks), but we’ll see.

If heroes were going to die, I would think Parkman with 4 bullet wounds has a higher chance of dying than D.L., but maybe both will.

Speaking of Sylar, if 4 bullets doesn’t kill Parkman immediately, I don’t see how 1 stab would cause more damage. Honestly, I was mad at Hiro for celebrating that too early. I was expecting him to stab, then chop off Sylar’s head.

I was totally expecting dinosaurs too. Awhile back, a preview showed a painting of a guy with a sword fighting a dinosaur. My guess was that Hiro would be the one to transport the bomb out of New York back into the Jurassic age and kill off all the dinosaurs.

However, I guess they needed a way for Nathan to redeem himself.

And like you, I honestly thought the fight was weak and too few powers were used during their fight. I was totally expecting a fight like the future one that was about to happen when future Hiro got killed.

I’ll end this with a comic strip from Real Life.

15 Useless or Even Dangerous Eyesight Myths (from Digg) – It’s important to separate fact from fiction, especially when the topic is eyesight. And old wives’ tales abound about the eyes. Many of these have no basis in fact and, for that matter, can be dangerous if you followed the advice put forth. An interesting list and I’ve heard of quite a few on the list. I wonder if the masturbation would make you blind has ever deterred anyone away from *cough*.

Family Guy vs. Capcom (from Ungsunghero) – What button makes a random pop culture reference again? What if you had a fighting game which involved Family Guy and Capcom. This video shows a fight between Peter and Sakura. Really hilarious.

Hershey sues man who made pot candyThe Hershey Co. has sued Affolter, 40, for giving his marijuana goodies names like Stoney Rancher, Rasta Reese’s and Keef Kat. Each came in packaging similar to Hershey’s Jolly Rancher, Reese’s Peanut Butter Cups and Kit Kat candies, according to the Drug Enforcement Administration.

I saw this video awhile back: oc spoof-dear sister, however the title was a bit different before. It just said something along the lines of SNL Short – Dear Sister. I had no idea what it was spoofing and although I found it a bit amusing, I didn’t find it exactly funny. I finally found the origin: The source for the “Dear Sister” SNL spoof. Apparently it’s spoofing the season 2 finale of O.C.

Pac-Man’s skeleton (from Digg) – Ever wonder what Pac-Man’s skeleton would look like? Well apparently so did the artist that created this. What do you think, did he capture the spirit of the true Pac-Man or is it just a circle with teeth?

10 Reasons It Doesn’t Pay To Be “The Computer Guy” (from Ungsunghero) – I tried to for seven years. I’ve worked in the computer industry in various ways — help desk support, web design, consulting and sales, field technician, freelance computer specialist, and whatever other fancy name you want to give “the computer guy.” I stopped enjoying it. There were certainly times when I enjoyed myself, but most of those times were when my computer talents were still developing. Once I stopped learning new things on the job, I would become fidgety and want to move on to something else. My favorite reasons include: Reason #7 – Your Talents Are Forcibly Undervalued and Reason #5 – People Ask You To Perform Miracles. For #7, it’s not so much as monetary value as they take what I do for granted. You’ve probably heard similar phrases as, “Aw, come on. It shouldn’t take you too much time. You probably can do it with a hand tied behind your back.” Of course I may have exaggerated here, but helping people like that always gets on my nerve and I usually don’t repeat the mistake of ever helping them again. As for miracles, I’m guessing it’s because people don’t have an understanding of how computer works and assume everything is fixable and everything can be recovered.

Software Notebook: How does Gates shape up as a seer? (from Digg) – Interesting statements made by Bill Gates, but what really made it interesting was this:

What Gates didn’t predict: One quote frequently attributed to the Microsoft chairman is that “640K of memory should be enough for anybody.”

However, Gates has long denied ever saying it, and no evidence has ever surfaced to show that he did. In 1996, when Gates was writing a syndicated newspaper column, a reader asked about the quote, and he replied, “No one involved in computers would ever say that a certain amount of memory is enough for all time.”

“I’ve said some stupid things and some wrong things,” he wrote, “but not that.”

I had always thought he DID say that. Interesting…

Girl calls for police help over messy roomA nine-year-old German girl was so upset about having to tidy her room she put up a sign in her window urging passers-by to call police for help. Pedestrians in the central city of Braunschweig saw the girl crying in the window, holding up a sign up saying “Help! Please call the police!” Next to her sat a small boy.

Start school later in the morning, say sleepy teens (from Digg) – A survey of sleep-deprived teens finds they think that a later start time for school and tests given later in the school day would result in better grades. The survey was presented at the American Thoracic Society 2007 International Conference, on Sunday, May 20. The survey of 280 high school students confirmed what most parents with a teenager know: they are not getting enough sleep. More sleep would translate into improved academic performance, according to the teens questioned. They all attended Harriton High School in suburban Philadelphia, where the school day begins at 7:30 a.m. and ends at 2:25 p.m. Does starting the day later really change things? Assuming you still have the same amount of homework and allocate the time you spend playing and working, you’d still end up with the same amount of time to sleep. However, it is true, some people work better at night (i.e. me).

The Top of the Class – The complete list of the 1,200 top U.S. schools (from Digg) – Public schools are ranked according to a ratio devised by Jay Mathews: the number of Advanced Placement, Intl. Baccalaureate and/or Cambridge tests taken by all students at a school in 2006 divided by the number of graduating seniors. All of the schools on the list have an index of at least 1.000; they are in the top 5 percent of public schools measured this way. If you have 2006 data showing that your school should be on this list, please contact Mathews at challenge@washpost.com. For complete coverage, visit NEWSWEEK’s Top High Schools section. Another year, another list. Mark Keppel ranked 570 this year. What’s interesting is now they have a search function you can use to search the city, state, or school name. A lot easier than going through the entire list looking for your school.

“I Think We’re Dead.” (from Digg) – I like when news anchors break character. And snort. A recorded telephone call about a police officer and his wife getting high off eating brownies with marijuana. They reportedly claim that time was going really slow and he thinks they’re dying or dead.

‘He Looks Like A ‘Bob” Is True (from Digg) – For example, when people hear the name “Bob” they have in mind a larger, round face than when they hear a name such as “Tim” or “Andy.” Robin Thomas, associate professor of psychology, and colleagues not only show that this link exists, but they also show that if people try to learn face-name pairs that go against their expectations, they have a hard time doing it. I knew you always looked like a Robert!

You Know You’re in College When…

This list was taken from The Burning Biscuit (from Digg). I’m going to cheat on this entry and just make comments on ones I find interesting. The ones that have comments are in bold and my comments are placed between within the [].

  1. High school started before 8am, but now anything before noon is considered “early”. [It still is!!! You can ask my co-workers what time I get into work. ;p]
  2. You have more beer than food in your fridge.
  3. Weekends start on Thursday.
  4. 6am is when you go to sleep, not when you wake up. [ah… i still do this on the weekends]
  5. You know many different ways to cook ramen noodles or macaroni and cheese. [this I learnt from Liam]
  6. The health center gives out free condoms, and people take them… just in case.
  7. Instead of falling asleep in class, you stay in bed. [haha. so true! why go to class and fall asleep in an uncomfortable chair and risk being caught when I can stay in my warm comfy bed.]
  8. You know how late McDonald’s, Taco Bell, Qdoba, etc. are open.
  9. You think it’s the weekend on a Wednesday and you don’t know what month it is.
  10. You can’t remember the last time you washed your car.
  11. Your underwear/sock supply dictates your laundry schedule. [I did laundry every 2 weeks – which was the point when I ran out of underwear and socks. now that I have a job, I’ve upgraded to an extra week of socks and underwear so I only have to do laundry every 3 weeks!]
  12. You check Facebook/Myspace more than once a day.
  13. You get drunk dialed on any night of the week.
  14. You wash dishes in the bathroom sink.
  15. You’ve fallen off a loft bed.
  16. You talk about beer pong like it’s a sport.
  17. Finding random people in your house is perfectly normal, and you even sympathize with them… sometimes when you wake up you have no idea where you are.
  18. Your primary news sources are the Daily Show and the Colbert Report. [what’s wrong with getting our daily news from these 2 “reliable” and funny news sources?]
  19. You open a beer at 10 am and your roommate asks you if there’s more.
  20. The standard of meals per day falls to two, sometimes just one. [i woke up too late for breakfast, and since I had to rush to class, I’d miss lunch too, and usually end up eating only dinner]
  21. Your trash is overflowing and your bank account isn’t.
  22. You go to Target or Wal-Mart more than 3 times a week.
  23. You wear the same jeans for 13 days without washing them.
  24. Your breakfast consists of a coke or cereal bar on the way to class… anything with caffeine will do.
  25. Quarters are like gold. [always needed quarters for laundry]
  26. Your idea of feeding the poor is buying yourself some ramen noodles.
  27. You live in a house with three couches, none of which match.
  28. You try to study but seem to procrastinate by eating, going to study breaks, talking to people, etc…
  29. You talk to your roommate on instant messenger when you’re both home. [why waste energy yelling across the room?]
  30. You ask people what YOU did last night.
  31. Certain things are now deemed “Facebook worthy.” When friends take pictures of you, you wonder how long it will take them to post them.
  32. You’ve seen a hit and run involving a bicyclist/pedestrian.
  33. You see people you know you’ve met but can never remember their names or how you know them. [I thought I just had a bad memory!]
  34. You sleep more in class than in your room [this actually contradicts #7, and I’m a big follower of #7]
  35. Your idea of a square meal is a box of Pop-Tarts.
  36. You’ve traveled with bags of dirty clothes.
  37. You go home to do your laundry because you’re too poor to pay the $2… or too lazy to go to a change machine. [unfortunately I didn’t have this luxury as I only went back home 2 or 3x a year]
  38. You pay $100 for a book you don’t read once, return it four months later, and get $7. [these kids need to be taught a lesson on how to buy and resell books]
  39. More than 20% of your household furnishings are made from milk crates.
  40. You recognize the meat in the dorm soup as yesterday’s meatloaf, and thus decide to eat a nice bowl of cereal – a safe bet for any meal.
  41. You use words like “thus” (see #40).
  42. You throw out bowls and plates because you don’t feel like washing them.
  43. Your beer pong table is nicer than all your other tables.
  44. It takes preparation… and 3 people… to take out your garbage.
  45. Going to the library is a social event.
  46. You wear flip flops in the shower your freshman year… you know why.
  47. You start joining clubs because of the free food. [I didn’t join the clubs. I just went to their events. *whistles*]
  48. Visits home depend on how much money you have for gas. [as Ungsunghero said, they forgot to factor in the money they’ll be receiving when they get home.]
  49. You skip one class to write a paper for another. [Ah… I’ve done this before.]
  50. You have no idea where your tuition money is going… technology fees? I think not.
  51. Bicycles don’t seem as lame as they did in high school.
  52. You stay up late to finish homework then sleep through the class in which it was due.
  53. Girls: You’ve balanced your foot on a shampoo bottle to shave.
  54. Your backpack is giving you scoliosis.
  55. You’ve written a check for 45 cents or stopped to get $2.00 of gas.
  56. Your bill in the bookstore will be comparable to tuition.
  57. Going to the mailbox becomes an ego booster/breaker. [if you knew me, I had packages coming in almost every other day. I always liked finding surprises.]
  58. Most of your T.A.’s are foreign…what’s the deal?
  59. You never realized so many people are smarter than you.
  60. You never realized so many people are dumber than you. [I don’t know about smarter, but there were definitely a lot of dumb people]
  61. Western Europe could be wiped out by a terrible plague and you’d never know, but you can recite the last episode of your favorite show verbatim. [I actually slept through 9-11 and only woke up sometime after the 2nd crash. I thought some meteoroid had crashed landed (like Armageddon)]
  62. Care packages rank right up there with birthdays. [boooo! I never got a care package]
  63. You craft ways to make any game into a drinking/stripping game.
  64. You meet the type of people you thought only existed in movies.
  65. Printers break down only when you desperately need them.
  66. Anything can be cooked in a microwave. [you haven’t master the art of cooking as a college student if you can’t figure out how to cook everything with a microwave]
  67. Two words: bike cops.
  68. You have Safe Ride programmed into your phone.
  69. Old school Nintendo… and guitar hero… are pretty much the best things ever.
  70. Going to the grocery at midnight is completely normal. [I’ve gone to Safeway at 3am so many times]
  71. You call restaurants that deliver more than you call your own family. [fortunately for me, there were about 10 restaurants next to my apartment building]
  72. You’ve paid bills over $5… in coins.
  73. You can’t imagine life without your computer/cell phone/ i-pod. [I don’t really think this belongs in this list as so many people too are so reliant on electronics]
  74. Hoodies and sweatpants become the norm – jeans are considered “dressy” at certain occasions… like school.
  75. A canceled class is almost as exciting as Christmas. [Unfortunately, to find out that the class was canceled usually required waiting in the lecture hall for 15 minutes and deciding to leave when the professor didn’t show up.]
  76. Taking a nap in the library is perfectly acceptable.
  77. Your professors speak English… as a second language.
  78. Your teachers swear in class and no one cares.
  79. Candles in your dorm room are considered contraband, but cigarettes are ok.
  80. You take condiment packets and napkins from fast food restaurants – hey, they’re free.
  81. Betta fish are like your family.
  82. You bring back socks from the laundry room that may or may not be yours.
  83. You know what people carrying suspiciously heavy backpacks after dark are doing…
  84. The elevators take forever but you’ll wait 10 minutes just so you don’t have to climb stairs. [I never really got this. I lived on the 2nd floor and I always took the stairs. Stairs were always faster even if we started at the same time. I hate it when people take the elevator when only going up 1 floor. People still do that. The other day at work, some guy comes in and pushes the “2” button. He looks at me and explained and says that the stairs were too far away. I do have to admit that stairs should be conveniently placed next to the elevator which isn’t the case in my building, but the fact that he apologized or gave an explanation meant he knew it was just not socially acceptable to use the elevator to go up 1 floor.]
  85. Your roommate asks you to check the weather on your computer when they’re standing 5 feet away from the door.
  86. Showers become more of an issue.
  87. You press the automatic door opener instead of simply grabbing the handle when you approach a door. [They must be referring to the handicap buttons. I always found it useless as it took longer for the door to open, then if I had pushed it. And once you push the button, using force is no longer an option as the door pushes back against you.]
  88. Christmas lights seem to be acceptable all year round.
  89. Class size doubles on exam days. [Did I tell you for my Calculus class, I went on the 1st day, went for the mid-terms and went for the final. After the final, I asked my friend if the professor change his hair style. He tells me he’s had that hair style for the entire semester. Apparently my impression of what my professor looked like came from his website that he posted assignments to.]
  90. You donate plasma even though you know it’s pretty sketchy.
  91. You are no longer thankful that fire alarms are here to protect you. [those idiots in the dorms pulled the fire alarm during midterms and finals. it was annoying as heck. then there was once when popcorn was overcooked and smoke from the microwave set it off too.]
  92. You’ve bought Christmas presents from the book store and charged it to your student account so your parents pay for the gifts because you’re too broke.
  93. You begin to include ketchup on your list of acceptable vegetables.
  94. You stay on campus for hours in between classes when it’s too cold to walk home.
  95. People have to help you kick the vending machine just so you can get your 50 cent bag of chips.
  96. There’s always a “question kid” in at least one of your classes, and you really wish someone would just tell him/her to shut the hell up. [yes, the very annoying question kid. he should just stay after class or visit the professor during office hours.]
  97. You steal dishes from the cafeteria so you don’t have to wash your own.
  98. Laundry is an all-day event. [it’s not suppose to be? shoot, I must still be doing something wrong when I do laundry.]
  99. You no longer find it uncool to take naps. In fact, you quite enjoy them. [naps are AWESOME!!!]
  100. It’s illegal to drink in the dorms yet they sell an assortment of shot glasses, beer mugs, tankards, etc. in the bookstore.
  101. You find your list of acceptable napping places expanding daily to increasingly uncomfortable locations.
  102. You fill out credit card applications for the free food. [i got a free t-shirt once. I remembered it as the dumbest thing I did because I was contemplating if I should continue filling it out when I noticed it required my SSN, and I don’t really trust this guy giving out free t-shirts for credit card applications. I eventually did give him back the form and got my free t-shirt, and the Bank of America sends me a rejection letter months later.]
  103. You’ve eaten cereal out of a cup… with a fork. [Hey! There was no clean spoon! They were all dirty and piled in the sink.]
  104. Dressing up for Halloween becomes cool again.
  105. You know at least one person who has dropped his/her cell phone into a toilet.
  106. You hang multiple shirts on the same hanger to save space/money.
  107. You become increasingly annoyed with the “old” people in class – props to them for going back to college but they generally ask really, really annoying questions.
  108. You admire people’s alcohol bottle shrines.
  109. You set your clock 5-10 minutes ahead so you can potentially make it to class on time.
  110. You check ratemyprofessor.com (or something of the like) before choosing your class schedule. [I’m pretty sure each college had their own professor rating site.]
  111. You text faster than you type. [This is just sad…]
  112. You only find out a class is cancelled after you get there and sit for about ten minutes. [exactly what I said in #75]
  113. You actually start using coupons, especially those school coupon books. [I was more of a technology/online shopping coupon user]
  114. You open canned food and eat it… out of the can. [what’s wrong with eating out of a can? you save yourself from having to wash a bowl! I call that genius!]
  115. You run out of black ink and, instead of buying a new ink cartridge, decide blue is a nice substitute… adds a little flair. [Haha! I personally had a black and white laser printer, so there was only one color to begin with. But I did have people IM me when they ran out of ink asking how they can tell it to use a different color to print. Speaking of printers, I never bought replacement toner cartridges, as it was cheaper to look for a deal on a brand new laser printer and sell the existing one.]
  116. You have numbers in your phone with labels like “Sketchy Steve” and “Alcohol Guy.”
  117. The food in your fridge may or may not be older than your little brother. [I think this is still true for my fridge today… I’m sometimes to find stuff that’s been in there since the beginning.]
  118. You finish reading this and wonder how you can procrastinate next. [if I was still in college, this would definitely be true.]

Along with this entry, I’ll link you to this recent Little Gamers comic strip: Chocoate Dinner. Being grown up rocks!

Sherbert vs Sorbet

The other weekend at Bellevue Square, Stanman, Saran, Carolyn and I were discussing about ice cream, which ended up either Stanman or I bringing up ordering Rainbow Sherbet at Thrifty (before they got bought by Rite-Aid). Rainbow Sherbet has been and still is my favorite ice cream flavor (I think…). Anyway, we got to the point where we were debating how to pronounce sherbet and what sherbet really was.

When I was small, I called sherbet, well sher-bet or sher-bert, but then I learnt the word sorbet (pronounced sor-bay), so I thought, maybe that’s how you pronounce it (i.e. sher-bay). Others chimed in that sherbet was a derivation of sorbet (but pronounced differently) or that it was just another way of spelling sorbet and are in fact the same thing.

Then I mentioned that sherbet wasn’t really ice cream because it didn’t contain any milk (needed for the cream part of ice cream), but Stanman argued that it was an ice cream and does in fact contain milk. I’ve always associated sherbets with frozen fruit juices and they don’t really taste like they contain any type of milk in them. I mean when I get a “dream” smoothie from Jamba Juice, those taste like it has milk.

According to Merriam-Webster, the correct pronunciation is sher-bet, with a variant: sher-bert.

Anyway, thank god for Wikipedia: Sherbet (U.S.)

Sherbet (often pronounced and even occasionally spelled sherbert in American English) is a frozen dessert made from iced sweetened fruit juice or puree. Sherbets usually have more ingredients, such as milk, egg whites, or gelatin, than sorbets, which are generally made from iced fruit puree and other ingredients. Sherbet in the United States must have a milkfat content between 1% and 2%, and a slightly higher sweetener content than ice cream; else, it must be sold as ice cream if the fat content is higher or sweetener content lower, ice milk if milk or sweetener content is lower, or as sorbet if no milk is present at all. American sherbets have a minimum density of 6 lb/gal (720 g/L) and are flavored either with fruit or other ingredients.

There you have it. Sherbet does in fact contain milk, but is not ice cream due to the lower milkfat content and the higher sweetener content.

Random Crap:

Are You Smarter Than a 5th Grader – Larry pledge (from SueOn) – Contestant Larry gets confused on a 1st Grade Grammar question.

Mathematicians set Chinese testMaths enthusiasts are being challenged to answer a sample question from Chinese university entrance tests. The Chinese math entrance exam is actually quite difficult. I was able to solve i and ii, but iii has been giving me trouble. Plus my math skills are still rather rusty. On the other hand, the English Math test was a joke.

‘Kryptonite’ discovered in mine (from Digg) – Kryptonite is no longer just the stuff of fiction feared by caped superheroes. A new mineral matching its unique chemistry – as described in the film Superman Returns – has been identified in a mine in Serbia.

Police: Thief tries to trade stolen JeepA Bridgeport man has been arrested after he tried to trade in a Jeep to a car dealer, a month after allegedly stealing the same Jeep from that same dealer, police said.

Super Street Fighter II Turbo HD Sprite Comparison (from Digg) – Man, Ryu has never looked so slick! French website Gamekult has posted this “confidential” slide from a Capcom press conference showing a comparison between the original SSFII Ryu sprites scaled up to HD resolution and what the new HD sprites will look like. What a difference, eh? If the other characters and backgrounds look as good as this one (which one naturally assumes they will), this will be one of the must have games on XBLA and well worth the MS points to purchase it. The evolution of Ryu!

Exclusive Cakes You’ve Never Seen (from Digg) – “It is sweet miracle cake, a piece of childhood in a serious adult world. All you need is to blow out a candle and make a wish. Cakes are very different, but made with sincerity and therefore loved.” Enjoy. These custom cakes look awesome.

Man cuts off penis in restaurantA man cut off his penis with a knife in a packed London restaurant.

The Most Expensive Movies Ever Made (from Digg) – interesting list. Read the story here.

The Most Excruciatingly Painful, Yet Typical, Customer Service Call EverI was listening to a call recording from our Service Quality Tracker, and the call was so ordinary, yet pointless, that I was inspired to create some video commentary.

Suspected robber flushes money in toiletDeputies with a search warrant removed the toilet from its plumbing and found shredded U.S. currency in the toilet trap, Swanson said. I’m actually curious. Since it’s confirmed that the $50,000 stolen was shredded and flushed down the toilet, does the bank get the money back, in the form of new bills or depositing electronically into their account?

CalTV: UC Berkeley’s Online TV Station (from MS newsgroup) – sounds like the cal press has gone video.

WordPress Theme Generator (from Digg) – This online generator creates your own custom unique WordPress Theme. Without any need for HTML, JS, PHP, or CSS knowledge. Change the colors, settings, layout, preview live, click “save” and download your unique WordPress theme zip-file. Extract, upload, set, and you are done! If you have any questions or need additions email me. Interesting… I haven’t had time to play with it yet, but let me know what you think about it.

GH2 – Dead! – XBOX360 – Expert (8 Years Old) (from Digg) – Guitar Hero II – XBox 360 – Dead! – My high score is 259,820

Cities plagued by rodents, emergency declaredThe rodent population in six Peruvian regions has ballooned due to unusual weather patterns and the government declared a state of emergency on Tuesday to control the plague, including in the capital city, Lima.

University of Washington

So I took my mom to check out UW’s campus (also my 1st time there). I printed out the map and the self-guided walking tour brochure so at least I have an idea of where I’m going. I’ve been meaning to check out the campus for some time, but never really had a reason to yet. Then again, I haven’t even been up the space needle before. Hehe.

This also gave me a chance to test out my new Canon PowerShot SD1000.

The campus was actually really big (a lot bigger than Berkeley at least) and very pretty, especially on a semi-sunny day like today. Good thing it didn’t rain as I didn’t really look at the forecast beforehand.

Here are some of the pictures I took:
university of washingtonuniversity of washingtonuniversity of washingtonuniversity of washingtonuniversity of washingtonuniversity of washington

I didn’t take too many, but you can see the rest of them in the album: University of Washington Visit

They also had guided tours, but for Saturdays, it required arriving there by 10:30am. I got up today at 1:30pm. There’s more info on their website.

Random Crap

Experience the hardest Mario ever (no fluffing required!) (from Ungsunghero) – If you are ever in a situation where your little sister complains about a Mario game being too hard, please just slap her and show her this video. Created by a random somebody in Taiwan (my vote is for escaped mental patient), this Mario mod is like a sick work of art. Granted, I would most likely give up after about one minute, but the sadomasochist inside of me wants to play it to death until I complete it. I mean, seriously, beating this would give you the ultimate video game bragging rights. I don’t even think Lucas would stand a chance. This is the ultimate Super Mario Bros. level. You can also watch the version with commentary: Super Mario Bros: Frustration, which makes it a whole lot funnier. He does cuss a lot, so be warned. I love the hidden coin blocks which just so conveniently blocks many of his jumps causing Mario to fall to his death. Once you get to level 2, it starts getting really repetitive, so you might as well stop watching it. Both Ungsunghero and I noticed that he could have actually jumped to the top of the ceiling during one of tries. Ungsunghero theorizes that if he did it, it’d take him to the warp zone. I wonder if I could get ahold of this game and give it a try. I would however actually need to have quick state save.

Ipod saves Soldier’s Life (from MS newsgroup) – I have talked to Kevin and he has told me the real story of getting shot in the iPod. The Armor stopped the bullet. Kevin didn’t know he was shot. The iPod was how he found out. The full story: iPod tells soldier he was shot – the real story

Joke from MS newsgroup:

Two guys were speeding along in their beat up old pick-up. They approach a red light and the driver blasts right through. The passenger, startled, exclaims “that was a red light!” The driver turns to him and says, “don’t worry, my brother runs red lights all the time”. The passenger replies, “oh, okay”. They come up to the next light screeching to a halt. The passenger again startled exclaims “it is green, go!” The driver replies, “what are you crazy, my brother could be coming the other way”.

Someone replies: That’s not a joke, that’s driving in New Delhi 🙂

Cal Dining wins the Oscar of eateries (from MS newsgroup) – Chez Panisse, French Laundry, Spago, Charlie Trotters … and Cal Dining? That’s right. Berkeley’s campus dining service recently earned its place among these much-lauded establishments when it snagged (as the others have in the past) a prestigious Ivy Award. Given by the trade publication Restaurants & Institutions, Ivy Awards — the equivalent of Oscars for the food industry — recognize excellence in food service by restaurants, hotels, and institutions. Industry peers (and the previous year’s winners) submit nominations, a ballot is assembled, and the magazine’s 154,000 readers vote for their selections. What happened!?!?! The Dining Commons back when I was there was horrible!

Gates vs. Jobs (from Digg) – Bill Gates and Steve Jobs square off in the clean white virtual world of the iconic Mac ads. The voice of Bill Gates reminds me of Kermit the Frog.

spiderman 3 speed painting in photoshop 7 (from FuzzyWuzzy) – great paint session in photoshop 7! four hours in three minutes. music by Danny Elfman, spiderman’s sountrack composer. Wow! This drawing is amazing!

So I mentioned nightmares the other day to Ungsunghero and he replied back, don’t you mean daymares, which got me thinking what the etymology of the word nightmare is. I mean the word night is simple, since it just refers to it occurring at night (most people sleep at night and have nightmares I guess), but does mare (by itself refers to a female horse) mean bad dream? According to the Online Etymology Dictionary, mare refers to goblin that causes nightmares.

Jack Bauer, Dammit! (from Digg) – Students would like Bauer to run for president in ‘08 because first of all, he’s better than anyone else trying to get nominated, and second of all, he helps students relax. Every time he says, “Dammit,” someone lifts a brew in his honor. As proof, check out the Jack Bauer Dammit video, if you haven’t already. Haha! A 24 drinking.

13 Little Things That Make A Geek Happy (from Digg) – The list is pretty accurate. Things I totally agree with include:

  • Someone submits something I wrote to digg.
  • A new referrer pops up
  • Someone posts a real comment on one of my blog entries.
  • My code works perfectly on the first try.
  • Technorati and Alexa Ranking that increases each week.

Errol Morris: Commercials (from Consumerist) – a bunch of amusing Miller High Life commercials. Reminds me of the Real Men of Genius commercials from BudLight.

Gentlemen, rate yourselves: cucumber or banana?Singapore’s Society for Men’s Health and a pharmaceutical firm are proposing a four-point scale for erectile dysfunction, allowing men to rate their own hardness with four categories: cucumber, unpeeled banana, peeled banana and tofu (bean curd).

Random Crap

Jishaku – Telephone ClubJapanese comedy skit performed by the duo Jishaku (magnet). Taken from the TV show “Enta no Kamisama”. Subtitled in English for the benefit of foreign audiences. The translation notes can also be viewed on this page: ハッピー・エープリル・フールズ・デイ . A very hilarious skit revolves around a telephone club. A “Telephone Club” is a sort of telephone dating network. Guys pay to enter a booth and wait for who want to hook up to call in. Google “Telekura” for more details if you’re curious. You can also see it on YouTube: Japanese Comedy – 磁石 テレクラ (エンタの神様より、英語字幕あり)

lucky fish
China restaurant forks out $75,000 for lucky fishA Chinese restaurant has paid $75,000 for a giant golden-coloured tiger fish, a symbol of wealth and good fortune, state media said on Tuesday. The fish, weighing in at 48 kg (105 lb), was caught on Sunday off the coast of Zhanjiang in the booming southern province of Guangdong, the China News Service said.

The Male Brain vs The Female BrainSome interesting differences between men’s and women’s brains, collected from sources listed below. Read with a grain of salt, and further investigate the ones that get you riled up.

nullDC (New DreamCast Emulator) v1.0.0 Released! (from Digg) – Thanks to floopy for bringing attention that the first public beta for the latest and greatest Dreamcast emulator, nullDC, has been released. Here is what drkIIRaziel has to say at emuforums regarding the emulator:

After many months of coding, here is the first public beta of nullDC.
Read the ReadME before you ask anything.

Setup (includes all needed runtimes, recomended)
http://emudev.com/funstuff/nullDC_100b1_setup.rar

Plain files :
http://emudev.com/funstuff/nullDC_100b1.rar

oh, and happy april fool’s day (make sure to check Google’s jokes )

Enjoy

PS. Site/forums should be up within this week
PS2. This is rev 525-118

Americans are NOT stupid – WITH SUBTITLES (from Top 10 April Fool Pranks 2007) – So what if they don´t know how many sides a triangle have? Or who Tony Blair is? That is not fair…just because their president is as intelligent as a door, it doen´t mean they´re all like that…if you still think american people are stupi, watch this video and change your mind 🙂 Hilarious film, yet so sad…

Der Knut-Song! (from Digg) der knut-song – The really cute baby polar bear is back! With its own song. If you’re getting access denied because you’re not in Germany, just reload the page and it should work. clipfish.de has been started to giving me the access denied constantly, so I’m linking to a different website that doesn’t have the Germany requirement. Along the way, I also found these extra videos: Knut der kleine Eisbär – www.knutlied.de and Knut der kleine Eisbär Kitty & Knut Video. Apparently this polar bear already has a song about him.

PIXELATOR (from Digg) –

Pixelator is an unauthorized on-going video art performance collaboration with the New York City Metropolitan Transit Authority, Clear Channel Communications, and its selected artists.

Since 2003, the MTA has made available for exhibition purposes 80 LED screens located at subway entrances across New York City. Unfortunately, the high cost of exhibiting (an estimated $274,000 per month per screen) prevents most artists from having access to these facilities. While the MTA’s effort to create more opportunities for video art exhibition in public spaces is to be commended, selected works remain wholly fixated on commercial goods and media conglomerate events, a short-sighted curatorial choice that regrettably ignores the full potential of these promising exhibition spaces.

In an attempt to broaden the scope of MTA’s video art series, Pixelator takes video pieces currently on display and diffuses them into a pleasant array of 45 blinking, color-changing squares. Since the project is an anonymous collaboration, the resulting video is almost entirely unplanned and unanticipated, with the original artists helping to create new works of art without any knowledge of their participation.

(Translation: Pixelator turns those ugly, blinding video billboard ads into art.)

Add Compact Flash to almost any iPod (from Digg) – Well, Mark Hoekstra is back with a new CF card modding picnic that works with any 1/2/3/4G iPod. The mod works (eventually, anyway) by installing a CF adapter of Hoekstra’s design. No need to solder all 88 connections yourself!

97 – Where (and How) Evolution Is Taught In the US (from Digg) – Scientists generally accept the theory of evolution as the back-story of how animal species (including humans) came into being over a period of several billion years. Religious literalists maintain their belief in creation, as laid down in the Bible: God made the earth and all that is on it (including humans, after His own image) in one week, a couple of thousand years ago. This has a map of what different parts of America is teaching the kids today.

On the same line: School Bans Pokemon Games for Promoting Evolution (from Digg) – The Kansas State School Board has banned all things Pokemon from its schools–not because it’s keeping kids from doing their schoolwork, but because they claim it promotes evolution. Oh, but wait, it gets better. Teachers will now have to search the students before each class to make sure they’re not in possession of any of eighty bazillion different Pokemon games; if they are, the game will be confiscated permanently and the student will face punishment that could range from simple suspension to expulsion from school. Kicked out of school. For Pokemon.

One of the keywords that Amazon’s script has highlighted was Monterey Park, which returned this book: The First Suburban Chinatown: The Remaking of Monterey Park, California. I didn’t know there was a book on Monterey Park!

Richards says father comment a jokeThe 63-year-old rocker caused an international uproar on Tuesday when newspaper New Musical Express quoted him as saying: “The strangest thing I’ve tried to snort? My father. I snorted my father. He was cremated and I couldn’t resist grinding him up with a little bit of blow … . It went down pretty well, and I’m still alive.

Why the long face? Rio’s obese treated like horsesRio de Janeiro hospitals have been sending obese people to share medical test equipment with horses at the local race track, drawing complaints from activists who say the practice is humiliating.

Porn swap sparks Japan defence leak furore -reportThree Japanese naval officers who swapped pornography on their computers triggered a scandal over a possible leak of sensitive data linked to Japan’s missile defence system, a newspaper said on Thursday. … The officer told police he accidentally copied the confidential data onto his computer’s hard disk when copying porn from a computer belonging to a crew member from another destroyer, the Yomiuri newspaper reported.

Man to Live Underwater for 2 Weeks (from Digg) – Marine biologist Lloyd Godson is attempting a brave experiment to investigate sustainable living. He’s going to live in a sealed box for two weeks, which will be placed underwater. The experiment is taking place near Albury-Wodonga, in Australia. Godson will be cultivating algae both as a food source, and to produce oxygen. He will also have electricity via a stationary bike that he’s using as a generator.

Random Crap

Forgot to wish Tekman HAPPY BDAY!

I’ve added 2 new categories: Food and Comics

I found this bumper sticker and found the slogan hilarious: My kid has a cooler job than your kid. – Microsoft College
my kid has a cooler job than you - microsoft  college

Otters holding hands (from Esca) – Vancouver Aquarium: two sea otters float around, napping, holding hands. SO CUTE! You know, I haven’t visited Vancouver Aquarium yet.

I know it’s way past April Fool’s day, but it appears that after you graduate from college, people just forget about April Fool’s day. I got so many people IMing asking me if this was real: Google TiSP and when I mention it was April 1st / April Fool, they go, “Oh yah! I forgot about it.” Another Google joke was GMail Paper.

Along the same topic, there was Ten of the best April Fool’s Day hoaxes: US museum (from Digg) – Here were the ones I liked:

  • In 1957, a BBC television show announced that thanks to a mild winter and the virtual elimination of the spaghetti weevil, Swiss farmers were enjoying a bumper spaghetti crop. Footage of Swiss farmers pulling strands of spaghetti from trees prompted a barrage of calls from people wanting to know how to grow their own spaghetti at home.
  • In 1996, American fast-food chain Taco Bell announced that it had bought Philadelphia’s Liberty Bell, a historic symbol of American independence, from the federal government and was renaming it the Taco Liberty Bell. Outraged citizens called to express their anger before Taco Bell revealed the hoax. Then-White House press secretary Mike McCurry was asked about the sale and said the Lincoln Memorial in Washington had also been sold and was to be renamed the Ford Lincoln Mercury Memorial after the automotive giant.
  • Burger King, another American fast-food chain, published a full-page advertisement in USA Today in 1998 announcing the introduction of the “Left-Handed Whopper,” specially designed for the 32 million left-handed Americans. According to the advertisement, the new burger included the same ingredients as the original, but the condiments were rotated 180 degrees. The chain said it received thousands of requests for the new burger, as well as orders for the original “right-handed” version.
  • Noted British astronomer Patrick Moore announced on the radio in 1976 that at 9:47 am, a once-in-a-lifetime astronomical event, in which Pluto would pass behind Jupiter, would cause a gravitational alignment that would reduce the Earth’s gravity. Moore told listeners that if they jumped in the air at the exact moment of the planetary alignment, they would experience a floating sensation. Hundreds of people called in to report feeling the sensation.

Bulgaria goes into debt to buy fleet of Porsche Cayenne ambulances (from Digg) – There’s few things that could make one turn away from the blue light at the end of the tunnel and return to the land of the living, but a ride in a Porsche Cayenne ambulance just might do the trick. Apparently Bulgaria agrees, as the cash-strapped country’s health ministry is using a loan from the World Bank to buy a fleet 32 Cayenne’s destined for ambulance duty (a Russian Porsche Cayenne police vehicle is shown above). Maybe I should work as an ambulance driver for the Bulgarians.

Don’t buy an HDTV without reading this first (from Digg) – Forking out a few thousand dollars or even just a few hundred is a serious investment, and the last thing you want to do is buy an HDTV with lousy color rendition. Navigating the minefield in consumer electronics is a confusing proposition even for the seasoned gadget geeks, so I created this survival guide to help you make a wise decision. I’ll explain the various types of HDTVs as well as cabling and testing the color depth of your display. I think this guy does a rather good explanation of the difference between the types of HDTVs and all those random specs one usually has no idea what they’re talking about.

MPAA names its Top 25 movie piracy schoolsThe MPAA may be gearing up for an RIAA-inspired assault on US colleges and universities. Last week the group announced its support for the “Curb Illegal Downloading on College Campuses Act (2007),” and MPAA head Dan Glickman said that his organization would work with school administrators to put an end to movie piracy on campuses, which Glickman says costs the industry $500 million annually. Stanford and Berkeley rank 24 and 25 respectively.

HostTracker (from Digg) – website monitoring service. I’ve been using InternetSeer, but this one looks good too.

tapefailure (from Digg) – tapefailure lets you record your users’ browsing sessions and play them back, just like a tape, as well as view numerous useful statistics about your users. Really sounds like a neat feature when it gets released.

Panama co. says brews world’s biggest cup of coffeePanama’s top coffee producer said it believes it has set a new record for the world’s biggest cup of coffee, after brewing 750 gallons (2,840 litres) in a giant mug on Sunday.

bowling dental insurance ad
Very Clever Marketing Campaign (from Clip Haven)
However, if I was bowling in this alley, I’d sort of be creeped out.

Random Crap

Humor in church: the rite stuff?Fight truth decay” is a favorite. “Come in for a free faith lift,” is another — two examples of the toe-curling puns plastered across so many notice boards outside British churches. … Among the classics she cited were “Chxxch — Have you guessed what’s missing.UR!” and “God, you’re great!”

The Wisdom of Children (from Digg) – A Conversation at the Grownup Table, as Imagined at the Kids’ Table:

MOM: Pass the wine, please. I want to become crazy.
DAD: O.K.
GRANDMOTHER: Did you see the politics? It made me angry.
DAD: Me, too. When it was over, I had sex.
UNCLE: I’m having sex right now.
DAD: We all are.
MOM: Let’s talk about which kid I like the best.
DAD: (laughing) You know, but you won’t tell.
MOM: If they ask me again, I might tell.
FRIEND FROM WORK: Hey, guess what! My voice is pretty loud!
DAD: (laughing) There are actual monsters in the world, but when my kids ask I pretend like there aren’t.
MOM: I’m angry! I’m angry all of a sudden!
DAD: I’m angry, too! We’re angry at each other!
MOM: Now everything is fine.
DAD: We just saw the PG-13 movie. It was so good.
MOM: There was a big sex.
FRIEND FROM WORK: I am the loudest! I am the loudest!
(Everybody laughs.)
MOM: I had a lot of wine, and now I’m crazy!
GRANDFATHER: Hey, do you guys know what God looks like?
ALL: Yes.
GRANDFATHER: Don’t tell the kids.

No sex please, we’re daddy’s little girlsIt has all the ingredients of a wedding. The proud tuxedo-clad father, the frosted white cake, the limousines and an exchange of vows. But there is no groom and the girl in the long gown is no bride. She’s daddy’s little girl, there to take a vow of chastity.

Best of Car Talk Letters – Response to MIT’s invitation letterGentlemen: Given your recent reading of the college application essay and your ties to that other (lesser) institution in Cambridge, I thought you might enjoy this. Yours sincerely, Stan McGee. MIT certainly has a reputation to be proud of, but its admissions department went a little over-board, I think. The first letter is an honest-to-goodness mailing from MIT, the second is one prospective student’s reply.

IRS Urges E-Filing — But by Vendors Only, PleaseThe IRS recommends that taxpayers file electronically — e-filing saves the government time and money, and is more accurate than IRS employees who type in the data from paper returns. But the IRS refuses to set up its own Web portal to receive the filings. Instead, most Americans have no choice but to e-file through private companies like Intuit (Turbo Tax) and HR Block (Tax Cut). There is something very very wrong with this system. E-Filing should be free if not have an extra discount. I mean, how much man hours are we saving them by having all our tax documents and numbers in digital formats which they can simply import it into their database. But no, instead, they decide to outsource it to other companies which charge a fee to save IRS some time. Sigh…

The Cure for Insomnia (from Tera) – The Cure for Insomnia, directed by John Henry Timmis IV, is officially the world’s longest movie, according to Guinness World Records, as of its release in 1987. Running 5220 minutes (87 hours) in length, the movie has no plot, instead consisting of artist L. D. Groban reading his lengthy poem “A Cure for Insomnia” over the course of three and a half days, spliced with occasional clips from heavy metal and pornographic videos.

pSX emulator (from Angelus) – This emulator fully emulates the Sony Playstation. Compatibility is fairly high, most games I’ve tried work well. An R3000 debugger is contained which may be of interest to people working on translations. Check out the screenshots.

TomTom PLUS services – I get this email a few weeks back saying apparently I can download new voices for my TomTom GO 700 (for a price of course) and they were advertising Mr. T. Check out what he sounds like when giving directions.

popuri.us (from Digg) – A tool to check at-a-glance the link popularity of any site based on its ranking (Google PageRank, Alexa Rank, Technorati etc.), social bookmarks (del.icio.us, etc), subscribers (Bloglines, etc) and more!

How do you prove photography to a blind man?That was the question I was asked: how would you prove to a blind man, that photography exists? A very interesting article.

Couple tie knot in ‘moving’ ceremonyBecause the bride is a snowboard instructor, her guests rode snowboards. The bridegroom is a ski instructor, and his guests were on skis. The Rev. Mike Boucher skied backward to face the crowd, wore a helmet camera during the ceremony and had a ski-mounted lectern that housed a public-address system.

People banned from SNLSaturday Night Live’s producers, especially Lorne Michaels, have famously and dramatically banned for life several celebrities from ever appearing on the television show. Reasons for these bans vary, as sometimes they can be seen as a rational response to a star’s grossly innappropriate on-stage behavior, while at other times the reasons are harder to understand as they stem from far more mild, or even superficial transgressions.

Eddie Griffin Crashes Ferrari Enzo (from Derek) – While practicing for a charity race to promote his new movie Redline, comedian Eddie Griffin crashed a rare $1.5 million Ferrari Enzo. I guess the Undercover Brother never learned how to drive a stick. How many Enzos have crashed? Isn’t there a limited number of them?

2 Chinese Boys Sing Jessica Simpson “A Public Affair” The two Chinese Boys who did Back Str… The two Chinese Boys who did Back Street Boys are ack doing Jessica Simpson’s new single “A Public Affair!” You get to see their roommate in the background, and you wonder how he can stand this. ;p

Random Crap

First of all, I apologize for the lack of posting. It’s been a busy week at work and I haven’t been getting that much sleep, coming home around 11pm-1am. Even had to go into work today for a few hours to finish testing some stuff.

NYC couple hail cab for 2,400-mile rideBetty and Bob Matas have retired and are moving to Arizona, but like many New Yorkers they don’t drive, and they don’t want their cats to travel all that way in an airliner cargo hold.

Swimmer’s life at risk after record Amazon tripSlovenian Martin Strel, after braving crocodiles, piranhas, disease and the threat of an imminent heart attack, on Sunday completed a record-setting 66-day, 3,274-mile (5,268 km) swim down the Amazon River and was taken to a hospital.

Jesus drinking Coca-Cola? Not this EasterAn Italian film showing Jesus Christ drinking Coca-Cola sparked such strong protest from the soft-drinks giant that it blocked the film’s Easter weekend premiere, the film makers said.

Captured Lightning: 2.2 million volt Lichtenberg Figure (from Digg) – The interior of an 18″ square x 1″ piece of Plexiglas was charged to 2.2 million volts (MV) using a 5 MV particle accelerator. A layer of excess electrons become trapped deep inside, When discharged, the excess charge escaped with a bright flash and a loud bang. The hot, lightning-like discharge created thousands of microscopic fractures inside the acrylic, resulting in a branching “Captured Lightning” sculpture (or Lichtenberg Figure). Read more about how these beautiful objects are made at:
http://lichdesc.teslamania.com

Debunking myths about the “Third World” (Amazing graphics) (from Krrkb) – With the drama and urgency of a sportscaster, Prof. Hans Rosling uses software from Gapminder debunks a few myths about the “developing” world. This global health visionary has discovered a powerful new way to communicate complex data about the world; his remarkable interactive graphs help deliver profound insights about global trends and will change forever the way you think about “us” and “them.” Rosling is professor of international health at Sweden’s Karolinska Institute, and founder of Gapminder, a nonprofit that brings vital global data to life. (Recorded February 2006 in Monterey, CA.) More TEDTalks at www.TED.com

Take a Peep at This StoryAmericans eat enough peeps before Easter to circle the equator — twice. Interesting video about those Easter marshmallow candy.

Today’s realistic video: GTA IV trailer in real life (from Digg) – While its not a down-to-the-finite-details replica of the Grand Theft Auto IV trailer, it’s pretty darned spot-on. If you factor in that he made it using only clips that he could find on YouTube, it’s even more amazing. When they cut to that one shot of the actor … you’ll be wondering if they used that for the actual game trailer. Compare that to the real trailer of Grand Theft Auto IV.

Puff Piece – Harvard tells Hollywood to ban cigarettes from kids’ movies.Stanton Glantz, professor of medicine at U.C. San Francisco and creator of the Smoke Free Movies campaign, says Glickman probably expected Harvard to come up with a limp education campaign and leave it at that. But Harvard got tough. In recommendations presented to the industry last month and made public this week, Harvard said the studios should eliminate smoking altogether from films “accessible to children and youth.”

Uganda scraps “sexist” adultery lawUganda’s Constitutional Court ordered the changes to the Penal Code, under which it was legal for a married man to have an affair with an unmarried woman but against the law for a married woman to have an affair with an unmarried man.

Photo in the News: Century-Old Fish Caught in AlaskaCommercial fishers in the Bering Sea recently hauled in the female shortraker rockfish seen above, which scientists say was between 90 and 115 years old. Researchers at the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) used growth rings in the fish’s ear bone, or otolith, to make their age estimate.

century old fish

Badass origami stuffSome REALLY amazing origami art here.

dragon origami

360’s Guitar Hero II guitar works in Windows, Frets on FireThe USB-equipped X-plorer guitar that ships with the just-released Guitar Hero II for Xbox 360 has some interesting tricks up its nonexistant but metaphorically convenient sleeve. No, we’re not talking about breaking or shape-shifting (sheesh) — we’re talking about things like effects pedals and oh, what’s this, Windows support? Randy tipped us off that the guitar controller works in Windows Vista, but we had to check for ourself. The above image was captured in Windows XP. The five frets control the first five buttons, Back and Start control buttons 7 and 8, the d-pad and strummer control the Point of View Hat, the whammy bar controls the X Rotation, Star Power controls the Y Rotation, and the Z Axis sorta just wiggles when you move the guitar. The X Axis / Y Axis does nothing (gotta save something for that effects pedal, no?). Sweet! I can’t wait for the wireless version to come out now so I can play Frets on Fire with a wireless guitar on my Vista box.

Wrapped in Subway Logos, Free City Condom Is a HitIn just a month, the city gave away five million of its new subway-themed condoms, officials said yesterday. Lest you read past that number unimpressed, consider that that was about two condoms for every man living in the city — more than the city distributed in all of 2003.

Online hoax ad strips home of everythingAn online ad offering everything in the house for free left one landlord with quite a shock. By the time she realized what was going on, the house had been stripped of its light fixtures, hot water heater — even the kitchen sink. … “In the ad, it said come and take what you want. Everything is free,” she said. “Please help yourself to anything on the property.”

Sub loses job over pinchy punishmentFour boys said spring-type clothespins were placed over their upper or lower lips for talking too much in class, Amanda-Clearcreek Primary School principal Mike Johnsen wrote in a letter to parents this week.

Girl had suspected ‘boyfriend’ was womanA 14-year-old girl authorities allege was sexually abused by a 30-year-old woman who posed as a teenage boy said she didn’t know about the ruse but eventually suspected it.