Things that make you go hmmmm....

Last week, I was thinking through the upcoming election and realized there is a slogan that we can ALL agree on:

Dems in '08 - The Great Obama Nation!

If somebody finds or wants to design a shirt for the convention, I would be happy to buy one. (Please note: I can't buy one from everybody, but I would like to have one.)

Of course any time to come up with something cute and quippy, you can search the internet and realize that it is not a unique idea, but oh well....

Today in History

1966 John Lennon says "We (Beatles) are more popular than Jesus"

Ironically nobody has to ask, "Jesus who?"

1950: Walt Disney's feature-length animated motion picture Cinderella is released.

She doesn't look a day over 20.

Common sense?

ICYC - bubble gum and beards don't mix. Funny what you don't think of after 15 to 20 years of not chewing gum....

Scams and Viruses

I received the following scam alert yesterday and knew that I needed to make sure that everyone had heard it! (As a bonus, I also attached a virus alert that you need to pay attention to in case you haven't heard about it yet!)

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I hate it when people forward bogus warnings, and I have even done it myself a couple times unintentionally... but this one is real, and it's important. So please send this warning to everyone on your e-mail list.

If someone comes to your front door saying they are checking for ticks due to the warm weather and asks you to take your clothes off and dance around with your arms up, DO NOT DO IT!! THIS IS A SCAM!! They only want to see you naked.

I wish I'd gotten this yesterday. I feel so stupid.

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If you receive an e-mail with a subject of Badtimes, delete it immediately WITHOUT READING IT. This is the most DANGEROUS e-mail virus ever.

It will rewrite your hard drive and scramble any disks that are even close to your computer. It will recalibrate your freezer's coolness setting so all your ice cream melts. It will demagnetize the strips on all your credit cards, screw up the tracking on your VCR, and use subspace field harmonics to render any CDs you try to play unreadable.

It will give your ex-boy/girlfriend/ex-husband/wife your new phone number. It will mix antifreeze into your fishtank. It will drink all your beer and leave its socks out on the coffee table when company comes over. It will put a kitten in the back pocket of your good suit and hide your car keys when you are late for work.

Badtimes will make you fall in love with a penguin. It will give you nightmares about circus midgets. It will pour sugar in your gas tank and shave off both your eyebrows while dating your current boy/girlfriend behind your back and billing the dinner and hotel room to your Visa card.
It moves your car randomly around parking lots so you can't find it. It will tease your dog. It will leave strange messages on your boss's voicemail in your voice. It is insidious and subtle. It is dangerous and terrifying to behold. It is also a rather interesting shade of mauve.

Badtimes will give you Dutch Elm disease. It will leave the toilet seat up. It will make a batch of methamphetamine in your bathtub and leave bacon cooking on the stove while it goes out to chase high school kids with your snowblower.

These are just a few of the signs. Be very, very afraid!

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Consider yourself warned. And be careful out there!

Some of you may appreciate this....

I was sent to watch this in August and I'm still laughing at it, so I guess that I need to post it.



I realize that it makes very little sense to the non-classical-musically minded among us, but to somebody who once played Pachelbel's canon on tuba (the tuba part for the band is the same as the cello part for orchestra), I can very much appreciate this.

I love going to weddings and hearing the brides who are so excited about how they chose Pachelbel's Canon in D instead of something more traditional. I think I've heard Pachelbel at every wedding I've been to but my own.... (At least at the reception...)

This morning in worship, we sang Brad Kilman's "We are Hungry". I started laughing so hard, I almost had to leave the room.

Adding Insult to Injury

Over the weekend, my sweet bride shared with several people that I was injured and made up this really neat story of how I fell into a ravine. So, now as people are asking me about my huge injury, I get to explain that the "ravine" was about an inch, maybe two, high. Basically, I tripped and it laid me up for 2 days.

So, a geek walks into an REI...

Ya know... Certain people just don't "fit" certain stores. A guy just can't walk into a Victoria's Secret. And a chubby, white-n-nerdy just can't walk into an REI. You could just see everybody looking at me placing their bets - is he going to get a gift card or is he going for the GPS area?

Anyway, I'm now the proud owner of an eTrex Legend.

Merry Christmas to me! And thanks dad....

[sic]

I received a letter today from a local restaurant. I have removed the restaurant's name to protect the stupid.

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Congratulations.....YOU'RE ARE ALWAYS WINNER...at XYZ!
.
.
.
To redeem this offer, simply present this letter,(not to exceed $3.99) your server when you order at your local XYZ.
.
.
.

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The General Manager of the restaurant even bothered to hand sign it. All in all, it was a very professional looking letter. Do I highlight it when I return it? Do I add proper proof reading notation?

My Song....

Hey look - somebody wrote me a song! (All except the bubblewrap part...)

Filler...

MR frogs
MR not
OSAR CDEDBDIs
LIB MR frogs

How about that weather....

Yeah - it was pretty miserable... Luckily, it was raining... ya know, cooling things off a bit.... (I like the "+", just in case you weren't sure it wasn't that COLD....)

See? I wasn't kidding!

Elizabeth, CO - August 26, 2006

My New Favorite Quote

"I use humor to keep from killing people."

-Dr. Bertice Berry

So, what do you do...

when the tech guy's computer's hard drive fails? should his computer be a higher priority?

Dilbert Quotes in corporate America

A magazine recently ran a "Dilbert Quotes" contest. They were looking for people to submit quotes from their real-life Dilbert-type managers. These were voted the top ten quotes in corporate America:

1. "As of tomorrow, employees will only be able to access the building using individual security cards. Pictures will be taken next Wednesday, and employees will receive their cards in two weeks."
   (This was the winning quote from Fred Dales, Microsoft Corp. in Redmond WA)
   
2. "What I need is an exact list of specific unknown problems we might encounter."
   (Lykes Lines Shipping)
   
3. "E-mail is not to be used to pass on information or data. It should be used only for company business."
   (Accounting manager, Electric Boat Company)
   
4. "This project is so important we can't let things that are more important interfere with it."
   (Advertising/Marketing manager, United Parcel Service)
   
5. "Doing it right is no excuse for not meeting the schedule."
   (Plant Manager, Delco Corporation)
   
6. "No one will believe you solved this problem in one day! We've been working on it for months. Now go act busy for a few weeks and I'll let you know when it's time to tell them."
   (R&D supervisor, Minnesota Mining and Manufacturing/3M Corp.)
   
7. My Boss spent the entire weekend retyping a 25-page proposal that only needed corrections. She claims the disk I gave her was damaged and she couldn't edit it. The disk I gave her was write-protected.
   (CIO of Dell Computers)
   
8. Quote from the Boss: "Teamwork is a lot of people doing what I say."
   (Marketing executive, Citrix Corporation)
   
9. My sister passed away and her funeral was scheduled for Monday. When I told my Boss, he said she died on purpose so that I would have to miss work on the busiest day of the year. He then asked if we could change her burial to Friday. He said, "That would be better for me."
   (Shipping executive, FTD Florists)
   
10. "We know that communication is a problem, but the company is not going to discuss it with the employees."
    (Switching supervisor, AT&T Long Lines Division)

The joys of teaching...

Look what I just found!

The guys at ThinkGeek.com appear to be ahead of the game this year!

Red vs Blue

Simmons: Do you ever wonder why we're here?
Grif: One of life's great mysteries isn't it? Why are we here? I mean, are we the product of some cosmic coincidence? Or is there really a God, watching everything. You know, with a plan for us and stuff. I don't know man, but it keeps me up at night.
Simmons: What? I mean why are we out here, in this canyon.
Grif: Uh... Oh... Yeah...
Simmons: What's all this stuff about God?
Grif: Uh... um... Nothing.
Simmons: Seriously, though. Why are we out here? As far as I can tell, it's just a box canyon in the middle of nowhere. No way in or out.
Grif: Mm-hm.
Simmons: The only reason that we set up a Red base here is 'cause they have a Blue base over there. And the only reason they have a Blue base over there is 'cause we have a Red base here.
Grif: Yeah. That's because we're fighting each other
Simmons: No, but I mean, even if we were to pull out today, and they were to come take our base, they would have two bases in the middle of a box canyon. Whoop-dee-@$&#* doo.

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Simmons: His armour is PINK.
Church: Pink? I wouldn't say pink. More of a... slightly less red.
Simmons: It's pink, okay? I know pink when I see it!

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O'Malley: I agree! Except, replace the word "non" with "extremely".

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Sarge: May I introduce the our new light reconnaissance vehicle! It has four-inch armour plating, mag bumper suspension, a mounted machine gunner position, and total seating for three. Gentlemen, this is the M12LRV! I like to call it the Warthog.
Simmons: Why Warthog, sir?
Sarge: Because "M12LRV' is too hard to say in conversation, son.
Grif: No, but... Why Warthog? I mean, it doesn't really look like a pig.
Sarge: Say that again.
Grif: I think it looks more like a puma.
Sarge: What in Sam Hell is a puma?
Simmons: You mean like the shoe company?
Grif: No. Like a puma. It's a big cat. Like a lion.
Sarge: You're makin' that up.
Grif: I'm telling you, it's a real animal.
Sarge: Simmons, I want you to poison Grif's next meal.
Simmons: Yes, sir!
Sarge: [Points at front of the Warthog] Look, see these two tailhooks? They look like tusks. And what kind of animal has tusks?
Grif: A walrus.
Sarge: Didn't I just tell you to stop makin' up animals?

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Sarge: Simmons, Grif, we're out of luck. Get ready to open fire. Today is a good day to die.
Grif: Wait! I think today is actually a good day to RETREAT. Can't we push dying to a week from Friday?
Simmons: Yeah... let's all take dying as an open-action item, and come back with suggestions next meeting.

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Caboose: [Trying to calm Andy down, to stop him from exploding] Come on Andy, think of a happy place. What makes you feel happy?
Andy The Bomb: ...being in the middle of big explosion!
Church: Less happy place, less happy!

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Simmons: A good password should contain at least one letter and one number. For example, your password would be '2dumb2live'.

Did he just say what I think he said?

(warning: more tech humor)

Today in class I had a student that was asking me about XML and how it differs from HTML. He noticed that the tags in his XML didn't look anything like the HTML tags that he had used before. I explained that each XML page has a schema that defines what each tag means in an XML document. So XML is "Extensible" (what the X stands for) where HTML is more well defined. So, after his "ah-ha" moment he looked at the XML that he was looking over, chose a tag at random and clarified with me: "So might mean something totally different in a different context?!" Hm - yeah - it might.....

What are you trying to imply?

So, I did it. Yesterday I bought an Xbox360. (I'm sure I'll post later about why I bought the core system instead of waiting for a complete system.) Well, you know how stores like to give out special coupons at checkout? At Kmart, my checkout coupon was a 3-month guest membership to Bally.

So, the question is: Does Kmart give these to, say, every tenth customer, did buying the XBox trigger the exercise coupon, or did my cashier look at me and think, "This guy needs to get out more," and push a special button on the register?

Since the cashier wasn't exactly the brightest blue-light in the box, I'm going with option three.

What's in a name...

In college one of my college professors was Dr. Igor Szczyrba (hyperlinked as evidence that there is a poor soul with that last name). He was (obviously) of some Eastern European background. I often made comments to my friends like, "Can I buy another vowel?" and "What kind of last name has eight letters and only one vowel?"

Only later in life (something like five years after the fact), I'm still joking around with my friends about this unfortunate soul's last name - and it hits me: How many vowels are in "McKnight"?

Well, last week I had a meeting with Bruce Caughey, director of communication for the school district. And again, I find myself saying "How do you get 'Coy' from 'Caughey'? There's all these random silent letters!"

Today it hits me that there are a few silent letters in the last name of somebody else I know.

So, do me a favor and call me Row-ger MicKanigit from time to time to remind me how stupid my name is. Thanks!