oy

i'm starting to agree with jim gaffigan about hot pockets:

it's more than just the way you say it

as defined by Jim Cannon of wenatchee valley college:

"Naked is when you have no clothes on. Nekkid is when you have no clothes on and you're up to something."

hahaha!

Al Jazeera got WTF pwn3d.

**update**
wow, the comics that people have written on that article are... interesting. it's amazing to me, a) how little people actually know about the various groups they're writing about, and b) how pitiful the grammar/spelling is. that may seem a little odd coming from someone who types almost exclusively in lower case letters, but i'm actually a fairly good writer when i put my mind to it. those comments are just plain sad.

Groundhog Day Press Conference

Reporter #1: So Phil, let me get this straight: you voted for a longer winter, before you voted against it?

Punxsutawney Phil: That is correct. See, I really enjoy snowboarding—that is, as long as some son of a bitch isn’t busy knocking me over and making me look bad in front of reporters—so I figured a longer winter would be great. But then I saw Al Gore on TV and remembered global warming—which, by the way, happens to be caused by humans—which would obviously cause the snow to melt off sooner than usual, leading to an early spring. Not wanting to look like an idiot, I changed my tune.

Reporter #2: Some folks have noticed that you’ve done this sort of thing in the past, Phil. How do you explain your flip-flopping?

Phil: I prefer to think that I’m being nuanced.

Reporter #1: Prominent black leaders Jesse Jackson and Al Sharpton have also come out in favor of the early spring position, claiming that winter lacks diversity. Snow, they argue, only comes in white, and is thus inherently racist. While Jackson has admitted that yellow snow “could possibly represent Asians,” and snow that has been blackened by exhaust, while “more like an Oreo” and “not as good as chocolate snow,” could potentially “represent people of African descent,” they are sticking to their position. It has also recently been espoused by none other than the “first mainstream… articulate, and bright and clean and… nice-looking” African-American, Mr. Barak Obama. What’s your take on this argument?

Phil: I agree completely. Just like the white man, winter has oppressed the colored people—or, in this case, the colors—of the world. It’s long past time for the workers of spring to rise up and show their true beauty, casting off the oppression of the West. I mean winter. Because let’s face it: if you study hard, and apply yourself, you can find yourself surrounded by flowers, rainbows, and happiness. And if not, you end up stuck in a snowbank.

~~~~

There was originally going to be more to it than that, but somewhere between the fact that I started writing it at about 09:00 this morning during a slow moment at work (after which it got put off until now), and the rum & coke I had a little while ago, I kind of lost track of where I was going with it.

i love math

well, not really. because i usually manage to find the hardest method for solving any problem, which means i'll get the answer, it just takes about five times as long as it should. but every now and then, math proves itself to be quite useful: an indian economist has proven that putting down the toilet seat is inefficient.

at home, i usually use slightly different arguments, but i think we agree in principle:

1) look before you leap. i have to look to make sure the seat is up before i begin urinating; why is it so hard for you to see if it's down before you start?

2) majority rule. when everybody is home, the "balance of forces," as it were, stands at 5 guys to 1 girl. said girl should either: a) put the seat up when she's done, in consideration of the five guys who would have to do so, or b) at least not complain when we leave it up. in case of a tie, the advantage should go to the female, out of politeness.

i've said it before

and i'll say it again: unions are bad for the economy. especially, as should be obvious, in the auto industry. read the full article here, and/or see a breakdown of it here.

multipurpose

not only is it a fairly accurate picture of what's running through the dems heads, it also doubles as a surrender flag!

not so bad after all

after reading this article, guiliani actually looks like a pretty decent choice for 2008. definitely not perfect, but up to the point where i could vote for him as a little bit of good, rather than the lesser of two evils.

h/t powerline

sad, but true

the difference between the "palestinians" and the israelis:


h/t say anything

man, i'm glad i don't live in romania

because in my opinion, it's really not cool when a doctor, who had been "suffering from stress at the time," flips out and does the following:

Grabbing a scalpel, he sliced off the penis in front of shocked nursing staff, and then placed it on the operating table where he chopped it into small pieces before storming out of the operating theatre at Bucharest hospital.

he later claimed it was a "temporary loss of judgment due to personal problems." which it might have been, but still... doesn't that seem just a little bit overboard?

h/t dave barry

Congratulations!

To my friend Emily, who just got engaged. I haven't met Brent yet, but he sounds like a great guy, and Emily usually has pretty good taste, so I think they'll be quite happy together.

who knew?

i knew you could buy anything on ebay, but i didn't realize that they literally meant everything:


for some reason, say anything has taken to highlighting random words in the posts (generally "north dakota") and turning them into external links. rob may have mentioned something about it earlier, but i haven't seen an explanation yet, so it may just be something funky on my end.

fun: it does exist!

just spent a weekend in spokane, and it was definitely fun. even when the brits and americans (the russians died off early) were getting our asses handed to us in axis & allies. through a combination of a few bad moves and a lot of bad rolls on our part, the forces of fascism controlled the globe. oh well.

it was good getting to hang out with ben again after his semester in europe, drinking good beer and attending "classes" in brno. it was also good to see clayton again, even if he was playing as the japanese. i also discovered that most of my friends still there (ben and clayton, as well as paul, liz, and jess) have no souls, at least while playing apples to apples.

and, perhaps most importantly, i was able to pick up a few cases of bawls before leaving spokane, since i can't find it anywhere in my area.

damn that global warming

it was negative 4 degrees when i left my house at 7:00 this morning, and according to the weather channel, it's currently about positive 4 degrees right now. which, let's face it... that's just a little bit chilly.

who knew?

no longer content with describing the bush administration as nazis or the anti-Christ, one democrat has come up with a new title: klingons. faux klingons, to be precise.




h/t say anything

is it wrong...

...that i find this shirt absolutely hilarious?

have you ever had one of those days...

...when, over the course of nine hours at work, you help nine customers? i just did. unless you enjoy being bored, i would recommend against it.

hero of the day

wesley autrey, for jumping onto the subway tracks to save a man who fell onto them after having a seizure.

proud to be a majority

thanks to the fine folks at howmanyofme.com, i now know the following:

1) There are 1,468,346 people in the U.S. with the first name Daniel.
2) [Daniel is] Statistically the 16th most popular first name.
3) 99.49 percent of people with the first name Daniel are male.

of course, they also say that there are zero (0) people in the US with the name Daniel Bareither, including me.

google, on the other hand, seems to think that there are at least two of me, one of them being myself, the other a doctor with an MS and a PhD in human anatomy.

there comes a time...

...when, despite all your previous protests to the contrary, you must finally break down and start playing WoW. i never denied that it was a good game, i just always felt that the $15/month could be spent better elsewhere. but no more. my little brother got the game for christmas, and i'm hooked. i'm currently working on the 10-day free trial that came with it, and i'm headed into town this weekend to pick up the full version.

right now, here are my characters:

*Menoichius: Human Paladin, level 15. I believe the server is Eltrigg, or something like that. But that's on my little brother's account, so I'm going to be re-creating him in Boulderfist.

*Klavicus: Undead Warlock, level 6. Just started this guy tonight, on the Hakkar(?) server. I know, I really should pay more attention to the server names. But he's not going to be my primary character, and it was the first "recommended" one that didn't have a queue.