Keelhauling: December 2004

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December 30, 2004

Haggis-On-Whey

Dr. Doris Haggis-On-Whey has seventeen degrees from eighteen institutions of higher learning. She is a world-renowned and much-feared expert on just about everything. With her husband Benny, she has traveled the world many times over, and has learned about all aspects of life, including outer space and food, first-hand. She has written or will soon write over 147 books.

Benny is the husband of Dr. Doris Haggis-On-Whey, and enjoys putting on his socks.

I highly recommend reading about the giraffes. They control the mirrors, after all, so this affects just about everybody.

Posted by John at 08:07 AM | Comments (0)

Blather

Blather is stream-of-consciousness blogging, where every word is another link. Click on the word blather in the introduction, and start following the links. You'll get the idea.

This site is funny to me because it resonates - I can sort of see thought patterns in the link chains. Kind of like the way my mind works. I conduct this inner audit of my own thoughts, and especially my speech, all the time. Every sentence that I utter goes through an average of 10 or so on-the-fly revisions, with every word unconsciously analyzed for alternate meanings and possible misinterpretations. It's just habit. It has some unfortunate side effects, such as a propensity for bad puns.

I'm not sure blather works as a blog, but it definitely works as an intellectual artform.

Posted by John at 07:50 AM | Comments (0)

AstroMeeting

It is amazing what one guy with dedication can do. Stefan Seip, sitting in his backyard in Stuttgart, Germany with a 6" telescope and a CCD camera, has taken some breathtaking photos of objects in our universe both near and far. As we roll up on to the end of the year, it's good to get a little perspective on things. I recommend starting with the links at the top left to "TheLatest" and "BestOf". Each picture has some helpful and interesting notes to accompany it.

Posted by John at 07:37 AM | Comments (0)

December 29, 2004

Theory of gravity disproved

It appears our theory of gravity might be a little off base. Turns out the Pioneer spacecraft are off the course predicted by the math by 250,000 miles or so, and none of the scientists working on tracking the satellites mentioned it. In fact,

Anderson, ever the cautious scientist, didn't tell anyone what he was seeing for a decade.

You've got to love that. "Um, guys, ten years or so ago I found this anomoly and I haven't been able to explain it. Now it's getting worse. Can you maybe take a look?" What are the scientists suggesting as possible explanations for the divergence in the planned path?

-- One possibility is that invisible, so-called dark matter is holding the spacecraft back.
-- Another possibility, even more fanciful, is that invisible dimensions of space are tugging at the Pioneers.
-- A third possibility is that gravity has been hiding secrets that three centuries of research have failed to uncover.

Posted by John at 12:01 AM | Comments (0)

December 28, 2004

Dear Christopher

Letters to Christopher Walken.

I'm not vouching for the authenticity of these letters, but it really doesn't matter. They are hilarious nonetheless.

As noted here before, Walken is genius. You just don't get that many interesting psychopaths anymore.

Posted by John at 10:24 AM | Comments (0)

Fannie Mae Malfeasance

You want the small investor back in the stock market? Step one is "stop things like this from happening". Fannie Mae is FNMA, the Federal National Mortgage Association, a quasi-governmental agency that guarantees mortgage loans in the nation's secondary markets, effectively turning them into Treasury bonds. This guarantee means there is no credit risk in investing in FNMA certificates, which in turn means mortgages get financed at a lower rate.

After the SEC cracked down on Fannie Mae's aggressive accounting policies instituted under the watch of CEO Franklin Raines, the company's auditors are recommending a restatement of earnings back to 2001 that will erase $9 billion of profit. That's not just an accounting inconsistency, that's malfeasance.

Raines' reward for his stellar leadership? Deferred compensation of $8.7 million to be paid out through 2020, more than $5.5 million in the company's stock, and a monthly pension payment of $114,393. For life. And this is not even strictly a private company, but a quasi-governmental agency.

Posted by John at 07:29 AM | Comments (0)

Automatic Enkoder

Having my email address on the web site exposed it to search engines deployed by the evil, evil spammers, and my Inbox exploded. So I took it off the site. Since then, emails have dropped to a more reasonable 100 or so per day, most of them legitimate. But there's been no email to contact me on this site for over a year.

Problem solved.

Automatic Enkoder, a free utility, converts links or email addresses on the web to javascript and renders it incomprehensible to search robots. Now if you look at the bottom of the column on the right, you'll see my email address. Search engines spidering the site, however, see this:

Sweet.

Posted by John at 06:33 AM | Comments (0)

December 27, 2004

Sin City, April 2005

I just saw the trailer for Sin City, and, well... damn.

Frank Miller makes his directoral debut with this film. Frank is the author of the Marvel series "Daredevil", as well as two spinoffs about the character Electra (IMHO, the toughest female comic book character, ever). Frank is best known for his DC Comics character Batman. In 1986, his most notable comic-book work, the groundbreaking "Batman: The Dark Knight Returns", an alternate history story about Batman in a grim future, was published by DC. Miller also co-created the Robocop character. He wrote the major motion pictures "Robocop 2" and "Robocop 3".

Frank is co-directing with Robert Rodriguez. Robert's camera work on the 'Spy Kids' movies was excellent - not my favorite movies, but well executed. And of course, the budget 'El Mariachi' was a masterpiece. His most recent major picture, 'Once upon a Time in Mexico', was a dreadful mish-mash of a film, but I'm willing to chalk that up to a weak story line. Similarly, I don't consider the most recent Dark Knight stuff to be Miller's best work, so I *hope* we're not combining two superlative talents at the ebb of their respective careers. The potential is awesome and what you can see in the trailer looks very, very good.

The movie also stars the incredible Jessica "looks-great-in-leather" Alba, probably best known as Max Guevera ("X5-452") from Dark Angel. Here, however, not so dark, since she shows up as a blonde(!).

April 2005.

Posted by John at 04:35 PM | Comments (0)

What's Next for Google

In this analysis of Google's position as the dominant search engine on the web, with Microsoft clearly taking aim at Google's space, you'll find dozens of pithy quotes and interesting dotcomboom parallels pointing out the perils that lie ahead. Great read.

Posted by John at 07:17 AM | Comments (0)

December 26, 2004

Speeding up Mozilla Firefox

If you finally got tired of the IE security flaws and attendant risks, maybe you're using Mozilla Firefox. Maybe you're also using DSL or cable or other broadband. In which case, you'll be interested in speeding it up quite dramatically like this:

1.Type "about:config" into the address bar and hit return. Scroll down.

2. Alter the entries as follows:

Set "network.http.pipelining" to "true" (by double-clicking on it)
Set "network.http.proxy.pipelining" to "true" (by double-clicking on it)
Set "network.http.pipelining.maxrequests" to 20 (by double-clicking on it and entering "20")

3. Lastly right-click anywhere and select New-> Integer. Name it "nglayout.initialpaint.delay" and set its value to "0".

What you're doing is allowing your browser to "pipeline", or submit multiple requests at once rather than single-streaming them. You're also eliminating the delay before the browser acts on any new information. On a broadband connection, you'll see a significant overall speed gain.

These tips courtesy of FreeRepublic.

Posted by John at 11:33 PM | Comments (0)

December 22, 2004

Worst Product of the Year

Everybody's got lists of great gifts, how about something a little different? PC Magazine offers Ten To Avoid: The Worst Products of the Year. Even if you weren't in the market for any of these, it would still be worth a read. Very funny!

You'd think that with a name like "GigaFast," the WF717-APR router would deliver a great performance, but you'd be GigaWrong. Buy this one and you'll end up GigaSad in no time.

Posted by John at 06:40 PM | Comments (0)

New York, New York

When Travis saw the map of "Bush's America" showing the overwhelming red areas, he showed it to a liberal friend of his who commented (I'm paraphrasing something second hand here, but you'll get the idea): "It's like one of those photographs from space where the lights show areas of civilization."

Yeah, well, New York was one of those lights, and apparently they were not even able to successfully cast their electoral college votes for Senator John F. Kerry. Check out the New York Certificate of Vote. Bright lights, indeed.

Posted by John at 06:33 PM | Comments (0)

Michael Moore: Farked

Fark is a community website (sort of like a lowbrow MetaFilter), whose best feature by far is the PhotoShop contests they run from time to time as readers post pictures and invite the talented - and not-so-talented - graphic artists to modify to their hearts' content.

One of the funniest I've seen lately is the contest behind the headline:
Theme: Michael Moore working on his latest project. Link goes to easy-to-photoshop pic of a rootin' tootin' shotgun-totin' Mike

Posted by John at 06:25 PM | Comments (0)

December 21, 2004

Yahoo Maps Traffic

Yahoo Maps now has traffic conditions. Really helpful for getting to the airport on time! Brilliant, if they are reasonably accurate.

Next step - integrate the traffic conditions with the "Expected Travel Time" on the Directions.

Posted by John at 09:59 PM | Comments (0)

Overheard

Overheard in New York is a great idea for a website. Little snippets of conversation overhead in public places, like finding coins in the gutter. Very funny stuff there.

Posted by John at 09:39 PM | Comments (0)

December 18, 2004

Restricting Muslim Americas' Freedoms

The article, in a pretty blatent attempt to inflame readers, is titled Survey finds support for restricting Muslim-Americans' freedoms. Cornell student researchers polled 715 people nationwide with a series of questions, and 44 percent favored at least some restrictions on the civil liberties of Muslim Americans.

The easy first reaction is "that's terrible", and everyone I know would pretty much agree. But I suspect that the question is more difficult, and that the questions the researchers asked did not delve deep enough. The article cites four specific conclusions:

_27 percent of respondents said all Muslim Americans should be required to register their location with the federal government.
_26 percent said mosques should be closely monitored by U.S. law enforcement agencies.
_29 percent agreed undercover law enforcement agents should infiltrate Muslim civic and volunteer organizations to keep tabs on their activities and fund raising.
_22 percent said the federal government should profile citizens as potential threats based on the fact they are Muslim or have Middle Eastern heritage.

In a similar vein, I noted an email that I received shortly after 9/11 when "profiling" became such an issue. Clearly a disproportionate share of terrorist activities are originating from groups that cite Muslim fundamentalism as one of their founding principals, or indeed their primary cause. If we are going to be effective in stopping acts of terror - even if you take the political insurgent actions out of the equation and simply address the need to protect innocent civilians - then ignoring the ties to Muslim religion is inexcusably stupid.

On the other hand the United States, as an icon of freedom and liberty with the eyes of the world closely watching our every move, clearly cannot persecute an entire class of people based on race or religion. So the hard question is how do we do both? How do we acknowledge and factor in the correlation between terrorist activities and Muslim fundmentalism, without impinging the rights of the majority of Muslims who are law-abiding, caring and responsible citizens?

Revisiting the four points above in this light, I would argue the following positions:

Registration is out of the question. It is penalizing the entire class of people for the misbehavior of the few. Plus it has extremely uncomfortable correlations with the treatment of Jews by the Nazis.

Mosques should not be singled out for monitoring, unless known or suspected terrorists are associated with the mosque, or suspicious activities are reported. The minute the terror alert is escalated for suspected terrorist activity, mosques in the area should - in prudent law enforcement - be monitored as a likely meeting place for Muslim fundamentalists.

Undercover law enforcement agents should defintely infiltrate Muslim civic and volunteer organizations, but not "to keep tabs on their activities and fund raising." Instead, the goal should be to insert law enforcement officers into areas where terrorists are likely to function. Properly conducted, this violates the rights of no one.

The federal government should selectively profile citizens as potential threats based on the fact they are Muslim or have Middle Eastern heritage, in specific areas where known or suspected terror activites are reported. Again, it has nothing to do with Muslim as a religion, or even with the majority of law-abiding Muslims. It has everything to do with the fact that if an act of terror is suspected - based on evidence such as telephone or email traffic analysis - then there is a high probability that a young Muslim male is involved.

So, count me among the 44%, I guess. This is a difficult area, and we have responsibilities to our citizens - Muslim and non-Muslim alike - to fulfill.

Posted by John at 12:10 PM | Comments (2)

I am so entering next year...

For those whose attention spans are inadequate to the task of wading through the annual Bulwer-Lytton Fiction Contest, we have the Little Lytton contest. [link via Fark] 25 words or less, for the worst opening to a hypothetical novel you can imagine.

These are just hilarious. I think my most favorite is the 2002 winner:

The pain wouldn't stop, and Vern still had three cats left.
A. Davis

Posted by John at 01:18 AM | Comments (0)

December 17, 2004

Oh, Davey...

Davey and Goliath, the Gumby cousins from TV in my youth (aka "days of yore"), are coming back. �Davey & Goliath�s Snowboard Christmas,� on the Hallmark Channel Dec. 19. It airs at noon, and again on Dec. 26th. Thirty years ago, it had a strong Christian values message, and it looks like that is being toned down in the new edition. It was produced by the Lutheran Church. The opening song was the hymn "A Mighty Fortress Is Our God".

The children's stop-motion 3D-animated television show was conceived by Art Clokey, creator of Gumby, in the mid-1960s. Parents embraced the show as a welcome alternative to the "violent" children's programs and cartoons of the times. In the later years, Davey had some new friends, Jonathon Reen and Cisco, a black and an Hispanic, which helped the show teach racial tolerance. What set Davey and Goliath apart from the rest was believable characters, state-of-the-art animation, and familiar situations that taught children the importance of forgiveness, acceptance, acknowledging differences, patience, and hope.

Now that a lot of little atheists are all grown up, they're bitter about the Christian message that was behind every episode. They feel like it was Christian subliminal advertising, and are positively vitriolic in their hatred of the show. Google "Davey and Goliath" and read some of the commentary. To me, even as a kid, the show was simple and the message was love and understanding, it had a talking dog, and the claymation was interesting. What's not to like? I used to marvel at how much work must have gone into every episode.

Posted by John at 06:14 AM | Comments (0)

December 13, 2004

Best Travel Sites

Note to self: According to Forbes, some of the newer, smaller websites are doing a better job of ferreting out low airfares, not to mention spidering sites like Southwest and JetBlue that aren't covered by the big boys Expedia, Orbitz and Travelocity.

Sites to check include Mobissimo, CheapFlights, and Qixo. (Sidestep was also mentioned but requires a download, and who needs that?) Another site mentioned in the comments on this MeFi thread was Kayak.

And, on a related note, if you're traveling Europe, you might do better with a European website.

Posted by John at 05:25 PM | Comments (8)

December 10, 2004

New photos up

Big redesign of the Photo Albums page, much new content as I get my digital life organized.

On a related note, we took a quick trip down to San Diego last month to see an old high school buddy of mine and his two kids. Julie forgot the camera, so I took a few with the camera in my cell phone, and they came out OK.

Funny thing happened while we were walking around La Jolla. David's kids are pretty young, and as we were walking down the sidewalk some pigeons came swooping in all around us. They screamed and covered their heads. I almost said, "OK, guys, don't get all worked up. Those birds are very maneuverable, and faster than you, so they're not going to hit you." But they aren't my kids, so I didn't.

Two minutes later, here comes another flock of pigeons. I decided to lead by example, and just keep on walking straight ahead as if the birds weren't even there. WHAM! A pigeon slammed into shoulder and fell on to the sidewalk where he flopped around for about 20 seconds before launching himself into the air again.

I am SO glad I kept my mouth shut.

Posted by John at 05:13 PM | Comments (0)

Apartment Dweller to Car Alarm: SHUT UP!

You've thought about it. You've wished you could do it. Maybe even thought about how you could get away with it. Well, these guys did it.

"People drop sink down on car to shut the alarm up"

Posted by John at 07:48 AM | Comments (2)

Mainstream Press "Discovers" Anime

The Associated Press brings on their cutting edge reporting in "Japanese Animation Catching on in U.S.". It all seems very confusing to this reporter, who discovers that Japanese "manga" comics and animation, known as "anime," are very popular with American kids.

I feel like I've personally had to endure every episode of YuGiOh! and DragonballZ every made, courtesy of my four boys.

Not that I can blame them, however, since from the ages of 5-10, I was hooked on Astro-Boy (and note that was the Americanized version of Tetsuwan Atom, created in Japan in 1951!). It was Pinocchio with a robot instead of a puppet. Astro was made to replace a dead boy but rejected by his "father" because he could not grow up like a real boy. Paving the way for popular shows such as Star Trek, the series explored issues of racism, racial discrimination, prejudice, and loss. It always freaked me out that his steps squeaked when he walked down the hall (complete with a nice echo effect), and that his feet were somehow truncated and the toes disappeared when the rockets came out of his boots. I remember there was an Astro-Girl there for awhile, too. So maybe it's genetic, and I have unwittingly cursed my children. I feel pretty confident that Julie had no fascination with manga or anime as a young girl.

Also popular with me and my friends at that time were "Gigantor" and "T.O.B.O.R. the 8th Man" ("ROBOT" spelled backwards - clever, eh?). But hey, that was only... 1963 or so. It's worth noting that it was only this year that Astro-Boy got inducted into the Robot Hall of Fame. [Of course, the Robot Hall of Fame was only created last year!] Anyway, I'm glad the Associated Press finally caught on to the trend!

Posted by John at 07:23 AM | Comments (0)

December 06, 2004

Cows with guns

Sometimes somebody sends you a funny link, and you follow it to find a hilarious Flash movie. "Cows with guns" - you think, ha ha, very cute, a ballad of bovine revolution. Gives new meaning to the concept of "mad cow", doesn't it? Then you discover that they have their own website, including a CowsWithGuns poster. And there's not just the CowsWithGuns CD (now available in Australia, and Ireland!), there's the Cow Pie Nation Compilation CD as well! And the CowsWithGuns book, and the CowsWithGuns biker tee shirt (Go Ahead, Rake My Hay). Wow, where was I? I missed the whole thing...

(On the same website, unrelated to any armed bovines, is this tee shirt, which I think is pretty clever.)

Anyway, have fun. This thing is like Animal Farm on acid.

Posted by John at 05:00 PM | Comments (0)

My life as a migrant farm worker

Julie and Nick and Colin and I all went up to Napa Valley Saturday morning to pick olives for Gilead House, a transitional home for single mothers in need. (In days of yore, we used to call them "battered women's shelters", but I guess that's become non-PC terminology these days.) Anyway, 60 degrees and sunny, nice day, beautiful country. Pictures here. We picked a lot of olives. I hope they make a lot of money selling the olive oil.

Posted by John at 04:21 PM | Comments (0)

December 01, 2004

Debating religion

A couple of days ago someone on MetaFilter posted a link to a nifty little Bible research tool call the Online Parallel Bible, which puts two dozen translations of any given verse on the screen, side-by-side. The comments, however, immediately descended into Bible-bashing, mostly finding fault with it for certain old Testament laws about homosexuality. This would typically quickly become Christian-bashing (MetaFilter users are generally quite well-educated and informed, but suffer from intellectual elitism, true products of our liberal higher education system).

So I jumped in and tried to clarify things. ~~150~~ ~~175~~ 200 comments later, in all likelihood no one changed their opinions, but hopefully I was able to engender a little respect for the Christian position. I hope that any impressions that Christians are weak-minded - grasping at straws of blind faith for some reassurance that they aren't alone in the big, bad world - might have been changed. But who knows?

Posted by John at 05:54 PM | Comments (0)

World History Blog

This is a "Blog that features all aspects of world history."

It's good to have ambition.

But, since Miland Brown is a dedicated historian and a fellow at the World History Research Institute, I'm betting this site just gets richer and better and more comprehensive over time. At the end of this month, he'll have been at it for one year. Make a note to go visit him and leave a nice comment on 12/28.

Posted by John at 05:37 PM | Comments (0)

The Power of Purpose

The 2004 "Power of Purpose" Essay Contest is over, and the winners' works are published here. I've only had time to read the grand prize winning essay, and I'll just say this: having read that one, I now plan to read all the rest, as well. Very powerful, very moving and very eloquent.

Posted by John at 05:10 PM | Comments (0)

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