Words for the wise from the mouth of a fool.
|
The weblog of Seth Johnson -------------- INKSLINGER.ORG -------------- OD ARCHIVES -------------- FEEDS Posts:  Shared Items:
|
Saturday, March 29, 2003
Two great links from the same MeFi comment:
First, an article on Economics in Science Fiction, which sagely notes "Interest rates are the penalty we pay for our inability to travel backward through time."
Following quick on that link's heels, the pointer to a brilliant career overview of "the Ed Wood of mystery novelists", Harry Stephen Keeler. What's better than a story called "The Man with the Magic Eardrums"? The description of the story: "A disgruntled phone company employee calls every man in Minneapolis, telling him the morning papers will name him as the secret husband of convicted murderess Jemimah Cobb, who runs a whorehouse specializing in women with physical abnormalities."
(A shoutout to MFDistilled; I might have missed these links otherwise.)
I heard a fascinating story about the Army's Millennium Challenge 02 on the radio last fall, and now it resurfaces in a Slate story on non-playbook tactics in warfare--and why one retired general thinks the military is fooling itself into believing that its prepared for them.
Friday, March 28, 2003
Dog Island: Ripped from my childhood nightmares, or Japanese video game? Proof for the former: self-evident if you knew me when I was young. Proof for the latter: area names like "Tiny Dogs Island", "Huge Dogs Island" and "Mega Dogs Island". (via Mefi, where they're debating whether or not it's a real place.)
Woo hoo! One of our projects at work has finally been announced! No longer do I have to say "stuff..." when you ask what I'm working on! Unless, of course, you ask about our Top Secret Project X...
UPDATE: The official announcement from our publisher.
Via MeFi's Mediareport, an excellent introduction to the Urban Operations Journal and what can be found within. Should be useful reading in the coming days...
Thursday, March 27, 2003
And yea, he gave of himself that we might continue down the autobahn...
The Michelin Man has a name? He was a gladitorial pit-fighter? When was he in drag? And what happened to the rest of his race of people? Find out all this and more on the Bibendum website. (via Lore)
Thanks to Lisa Rein and via boingboing, the Daily Show on the contract awarded this week to Halliburton: "Greedrageous...backstabtastic...."
Wednesday, March 26, 2003
Find out which show had a staff of "professional villains" in this collection of game show ads from TV Guide (via Stan Chin.)
Just one of the things they don't teach in library school:
"How to explain that no, there is no way a cat could have gotten into the building, crawled into the front desk bookdrop, opened her plastic bag, urinated on her books, closed the plastic bag, and escaped, sight unseen."
(As a single-reader aside, JP should note the use of the word "smacktard" about halfway down the page, as well as the 473 results in a Google search.)
"I'm the first one to say I'm highly opinionated and totally uninformed, but I watch the news in different countries around the world and I try to stay on top of it."
You want to know who said that, right?
Reason #72014 that CNN Headline News ticker writers are idiots
Just seen on the Headline News ticker:
"Mystery Flu Death toll at 31,792 infected in China."
Step 1: Calm down.
Step 2: Re-read the headline, pretending that you're a moron.
Idiots.
For anyone tired of online ads, here's a great introduction to Hosts files and how they work for those who don't use them already.
Tuesday, March 25, 2003
A gallery of satellite photos of Iraq (via BuzzMachine via Angela Gunn, who's keeping the USA Today warblog.)
Bezzy passes along the link to a great little game: "Defeat autocreated huge battleships. Shootem up game, 'rRootage'." Sorry to my Mac friends; it appears to be Windows only.
Just received via ICQ:
The colledge for "problem childs" need funds for reconstruction after fire. Whole Library and computer classes are
destroyed in devastating flame. Some of childrens has been died in fire.Will you help ?
OH NOS! THE CHILDRENS!
Many people I know try to avoid being spidered by Google and other web crawlers. But today Gawker reveals how hard the NYPress website works to attract search engine results.
Yeah, yeah, a post saying I'm not posting war-related material...followed by two war-related posts. But at least they're funny posts, right? Because the Conversatron's been on an enormous roll today and it would be a shame if you missed out on these. For the optimal effect, turn on your speakers (it's work-safe, don't worry.)
You can either click on "1" and 'next thread' through to the end, or (since I'm not certain how the Tron's archive works) you can follow these links: 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, 11, 12, 13, 14, 15, 16, 17, 18, 19.
A masterpiece of the Q-and-A form, if you ask me. Bravo, all!
Monday, March 24, 2003
Thanks to everyone sending me war-related links. Unless I come up with a thought I don't think has been said better elsewhere, I probably won't be posting much about it. But that doesn't mean I'm not a complete news junkie lately--even moreso than usual. I've posted a few of my main online sources in a new category to the left. If anyone passes along any other particularly good sources, I'll add them in the coming days.
I noticed Dave Barry's name in the writing credits for the Oscars last night, and today Barry writes about writing for (and with) Steve Martin. (via Gawker)
DefenseTech reports on the crazy security tech that was in play at the Oscars last night. Must resist wag's impulse about tracking tagged stars permanently...
So busy, and not just watching the news and voraciously absorbing online warblogging--I just got a new, quick turnaround writing assignment that (while fun) isn't going to help things. LuckilyI have plenty of links to pass along that I've been saving for just such an occasion.
Here's an interesting file, the Army's Law Enforcement Investigations manual, just part of the endlessly fascinating Training and Doctrine Digital Library.
Oh, and:
| www.flickr.com |
Photo archive
Random art from OD