Tim and the Tin Titan: 2003.11

Leave me alone
Apparently, here in Canada, we have our own version of the American's "do not call" list.

It's the CMA - Do Not Contact Service. It doesn't have has much bite as the american version, since it is a volontary compliance of the Canadian Marketer's Association, which 80% of the direct marketers are a members of, but it is a positive step for the industry.

Register you info here to get taken off the lists. They say it takes about 3 months to take full effect and lasts for 3 years.

Indiscretions can be quite funny at times, especially in the naratives:

Natalia: *calls Mo*
Mo: *doesn't pick up*
Natalia: *calls Khaled*
Mo: *screaming in the background* "Your girlfriend calld me first! Ahahahahahaha!"
Khaled: *threatens Natalia with rough sex/ritualistic beating/being sold to his friends for a camel, or just a pack of Camels*

Natalia, Anna, Mo, Khaled and Sarah: *congregate at Benetton and wait around while Natalia obnoxiously tries on clothes*
Natalia: "Does this sweater match my complexion? Suit my style? Make me look relaxed, yet classy? Sporty, yet sensual?"
Khaled: "Uh. Well. It makes your boobs stick out."
Benetton Register *ka-ching*

Wanna Bet?
CodeFellas is a nice little article about who is doing IT for the Mob. It's light on details (as would be expected in those circumstances) but an interesting read.

PMS Alert 1.0
Calm...normal...elevated...caution...panic | Metafilter:

From the comments:
Is this lesbian love something you'd have to have a vagina to know about?
posted by RustyBrooks at 1:02 PM PST on November 18

No, just an internet connection.
posted by Cyrano at 2:00 PM PST on November 18 "

What you are looking for
For the many (500+) of you who have come here looking for the DragRacer v2 game, here is all the info I have:

You can play it online at Newgrounds.com Presents: DragRacer v2

The official site of DragRacer v2 is dragraceronline.net You can download the beta but you have to register first (15$US by PayPal).

No, I don't know where you can get the game without paying for it, look on kazaa.

Too good to be true
1&1 Internet Inc. is offering 500 megs of hosting space, 5 gigs of monthly transfer, FTP, PHP, Perl, MySQL, CGI, SSH, Cron Jobs, 50 POP3 e-mail accounts, 500 e-mail forwarding accounts, Virus Scanning, and auto-responders for three years for free.

The guys over at AnandTech have been picking the offer apart for 9 screens of posts and there doesn't seem to be a catch yet other than it seem that 1and1 is very reluctant to point a domain you registered with them to someone else. That situation can easily be avoided by registering your domain name elsewhere and the pointing it to 1and1's name servers. EV1Servers.net (aka rackshack) is one of the domain name registration services that was recommended by the AnandTech forum.

I think I'll look into this, might be interesting. I'll let you know.

Tune In
For both the male and the female, listening to NPR sends a signal to a prospective mate: “Despite my current income, in a few years I will have a house in a neighborhood with good public schools, and I will drive a Volvo stationwagon.” Women are sending an additional signal: “I consider myself smart and sophisticated and if I get pregnant, I will have an abortion. I might consider a three-way.” Men signal back: “I won’t try to stop you from getting an abortion, but I’m not afraid to cry if you do. I don’t like guns, but I’m manly enough to camp and mountain-bike. I just love nature! A three-way sounds intriguing.”

Ask Brendan: The NPR One:

Up, Up, Down, Down...
GameFAQs is a nice community site where you can get strategy guides and walkthroughs for many console and pc games. There is no fee to download the guides and they are most often in .txt format, making them both light to download and application independent. I used it to get some help when I was stuck in Enter the Matrix and Splinter Cell.

How to be a Bible Apologist
An Eight-Step Guide to Bible Literalism through Christian Apologetics

Step One: Accept the divine, absolute, and literal truth of the Bible.
Step Two: Twist the definition of "literal" beyond all recognition.
Step Three: Ignore or re-interpret the last 600 years of scientific knowledge
Step Four: Learn to believe two or more contradictory ideas simultaneously.
Step Five: Acknowledge the hundreds of fulfilled prophecies contained in the Bible.
Step Six: Learn that moral relativism is not true.
Step Seven: Learn that absolute morals can change depending on the situation or society.
Step Eight: Become comfortable with your own insanity.

Congratulations! You are now well on your way to becoming a Bible apologist!

Christian Apologetics: How to be a Bible Apologist. A tutorial in Biblical literalism.

A funny and sarcastic look at bible thumpers. Brought to you by the Evil Atheist Conspiracy.

Helpful Tip:
To help combat doubts, try sticking your fingers in your ears and saying "La la la la la la" repeatedly.

Oh yes...
ABCNEWS.com : Ten Commandments Judge Removed From Bench. This is excellent news, finally someone in the US remembers that bit about the separation of church and state and does something about it. The fact that the committee unanimously imposed greatest penalty at their disposal sends a clear message.

How cats think
defective yeti's Attempts At Cryptic Camouflage, Graded

And in the eighth position
The 10 most overpaid jobs in the U.S.

Next year, West Coast dockworkers will earn an average of $112,000 for handling cargo, according to the Pacific Maritime Association, their employer. Office clerks who log shipping records into computers will earn $136,000. And unionized foremen who oversee the rank-and-file will pull down an average $177,000.

WHAT? 100K$US plus year to unload boats? This is why I dislike union. And these guys had the nerve to go on strike last year.

In early 2002, West Coast ports shut down as the longshoremen's union fought to preserve generous health-care benefits that would make most Americans drool. The union didn't demand much in wage hikes for good reason: Its members already were making a boatload of money.

The End
Matrix Revolutions: the Corporate Mofo Guide is a pretty good review/short essay [major spoilers if you have not seen it] and has funny captions for their pictures. Check it out.

No even trying anymore...
TransparentSmoke - Maxim should be Ashamed They are not even trying to make us belive that they don't modify the pictures anymore. I saw this in person in Eric's copy and it very blatant. Sad, at least keep some of the magic and pretend! :)

But it's my day off!
What if superheroes had real jobs?

Tax breaks for the little (rich) guy
Looks like the car dealerships are getting savy to the Bush tax loophole that basically gives rich americans free SUVs.
HoustonChronicle.com - Dealers, drivers riding high on SUV tax loophole

Seems she agrees with me
Former Iraq Captive Jessica Lynch: 'I'm No Hero'

"They used me as a way to symbolize all this stuff. It's wrong. ... I did not shoot, not a round, nothing. ... I don't look at myself as a hero. ... I am just a survivor."

That is very close to the words I used myself to describe the situation. It'll be interesting to see what spin the pentagon tries to put on this one.

Very Nice
OdeOda is the webpage of Waclaw Wantuch. He has some very nice pictures in his portfolio and even offers some large size originals once a month for your printing pleasure. The gallery of black and white nudes is particularly nice, I like the symmetry in some of the later shots.

The Sound of Words
Y0UNG-HAE CHANG HEAVY INDUSTRIES PRESENTS "We combine text with jazz to create Flash pieces. It's a simple technique that shuns interactivity, graphics, photos, illustrations, banners, colors, and all but the Monaco font, and at the same time cuts across the lines separating digital animation, motion graphics, experimental video, i-movies, and e-poetry. To us, though, it's Web art."

The ones I like the best so far are: SAMSUNG MEANS T0 C0ME, HALF BREED APACHE and CUNNILINGUS IN N0RTH K0REA. Definitely a no-no if you are epileptic otherwise very enjoyable (if you are a fast reader).

Failure is not an option
At the Metro station I use everyday, there are 4 escalators, one long set, one short set. Invariably, one of these four breaks down every week, as was the case yesterday. I then realized that escalators are one of the few machine or devices, that even when they completely fail, still perform the task of the device they replaced. If your word processor fails, you cannot use your computer as a typewriter. If your motorcycle breaks, you cannot use it as a bicycle. In fact I can't think of another device that has this "predecessor failover" mode, can you?

The sum of it's parts
The Brunching Shuttlecocks, a great comedy site, shut down a couple of months ago (the archive is still online) but 3 of the most interesting features have survived separately:

Lore Brand Comics Lore Sjoberg's sarcastic comic strip is just as good as ever and he pledges to give t-shirts away if he doesn't meet his weekly postings.

The Self-Made Critic is still alive but the most recent review is Finding Nemo.

The Book of Ratings has also survived and seem to be more prolific than the Critic.

Plug 'n' Pray
Do you need to change religion to grab the chance for a career outlook? Are you going to work abroad? Getting a new customized god is easy with Plug'n'Pray. A new spirituality and a new respectability can be yours at a mouse click. Getting converted has never been so easy!

Also check out the Uninstaller kit and the Switch kit, now with SMS/MMS. A funny parody of both Religion and Software packaging and sales.