vedana.net

Bluegrass tonight: Sam Bush, San Francisco Great American Music Hall.

Been on a bit of a Grisman kick lately, so this is quite agreeable.

Jason Kottke:

"Dear New Yorker, New York Times, San Francisco Chronicle, Washington Post and others,"

"Please stop using the term "web log" to refer to a chronologically-ordered frequently-updated website. The correct term is "weblog". Furthermore, "blog" is not short for "web log", it is short for "weblog"."

Damien Barrett: "I certainly think it's more appropriate to spend $1billion dollars a week on the health care of our citizens than to spend it 'nation-building' in the Middle East."

Slashdot: Brazilian Government Continues Push For Free Software

Goldtoe, suckers!

Opted for this (from here) instead of this, and even *gasp* had a glass of this. A new low, evidently. But it was really all about the company.

The Random DigiCam Picture Finder: "All this thing does is create a random number and slap it into a filename that has the structure used by default in a few different digital cameras."

[via JWZ]

Dan Gillmor: "The global economy lost billions of dollars in wasted time, downed servers and other problems during the past few days, and shoddy products from a monopolist that has $50 billion in the bank share at least some of the responsibility."

Jamie Zawinsky: "Evite (owned by TicketBastard) are address-harvesting web-bug-using spamming cocksuckers, and I'd like to never receive mail from their service. Preferably, in such a way that whichever acquaintance of mine who is foolishly using their service gets a bounce, so that they know I didn't get evite's email."

Christopher Locke, The New Bricolage: Repurposing Spam:

"And so it was that, in a blinding flash of insight, I realized I could deflect, divert and coopt the nefarious purposes behind the very phenomenon I had come so much to despise. I could learn to love spam, especially that naive Korean spam, and begin to embrace and study it, searching for images that could be bent to my own ends (as soon as I discover what these are)."

Daring Fireball: "Microsoft’s Outlook has been exploited by virus authors so frequently and so effectively that I dare anyone to dispute that it’s the worst email client ever, anywhere. The worst. But yet it is also the most popular... It’s not good for the world at large, as witnessed the problems caused by each Outlook virus outbreak. (Perhaps Outbreak would be a better name for the product, in fact.)"

The Guardian, Scientists Discover Secret That Keeps French Slim:

"Scientists have another solution for the notorious "French paradox" - the riddle of how a nation of alcohol-quaffing, croissant-munching gourmands stays healthy and slim, while a disproportionate number of health-obsessed Americans are obese and at cardiovascular risk."

"The answer, after methodical study of brasseries, eateries, pizza parlours, Chinese restaurants and Hard Rock cafes in both countries, is simple: the French eat less of everything. And they eat less because they are served smaller portions."

Duh.

[via Kottke]

Christopher Baskind:

“So who are these folks, Moses?” Moore looks a bit confused. Moses is biting contentedly into a lush purple grape the size of a softball.

“These are the Jews—-and the Muslims. All the peoples of the Holy Land. And this is their land of milk and honey. Here, try some hummus.”

ChicksDigBooks: "We want men to know reading is NOT nerdy...it's actually SEXY...And to the man who is proud to say he's a reader...WE SALUTE YOU!"

Heh!

Erik Benson: "doo-bee-doo."

Now this would be fun...

[via BoingBoing]

Five and a half hours left of Atlas Shrugged, it's been occupying my commute for just shy of 2 months. Goldman warned me of its infectiousness, and indeed it is. But the last 2.5 hours have been exclusively John Galt's soliloquy; I get it John, communism = bad, capitalism = good. Sheesh.

I'm curious what Rand would think, however, of these cabrónes, who've taken capitalism to its vilest extremes. Or her opinion of Vipassana & Theravada Buddhism, with which Objectivism has many striking similarities. There's more good stuff on this subject on Joshua Zader's blog:

"One of the passages in your book that stuck with me is that, at root, Buddhism is neither a religion nor a philosophy, but rather a set of practices. And to the extent that this is true, the abstract ideas behind the practices are secondary; what is primary is that the practices work to foster personal development and cultivate more fulfilling life experiences."

Tony Pierce, threats from the first black president: "you want to talk about terrorism? you should see my in box."

The man is brilliant.

Marketwatch, Google's Founder Sizes Up Rivals, Weighs IPO Prospects:

An IPO "is something we debate periodically," along with the trade-offs of being publicly or privately held, he said. For instance, an IPO would bring "some degree of currency to do acquisitions."

But on the downside, he suggested that going public would be a management distraction and that unless a company established a well-grounded culture, an event could alter that culture adversely.

As some of you may already know, I spent January in Burma, on a meditation pilgrimage. The original catalyst for my deciding to go was Jarrod Newell, one of my best mates from NZ last year. Jarrod, John and a few other Kiwi friends were making the journey to Asia, so when I left NZ we all agreed to rendezvous in Bangkok in late December to make the final hop to Burma together.

Groove Salad: "A nicely chilled plate of ambient beats and grooves. Takes the edge off work."

Yesss...

The Onion, "Bush Diagnosed With Attention-To-Deficit Disorder:"

"The president exhibits all the symptoms of ATDD: impulsiveness, restlessness, inability to focus on mounting U.S. debt likely to reach $400 billion by the year's end," Dr. Terrence Spellman said.

Christopher Baskind: The Buddha On Peace

Sutter's [blog's] back:

Good times were had (some of the best), but it was reaching the end of a line.

It feels good to begin a new one, holding hands.

Ward Sutton: The President Is Having a Lovely Vacation

A fax machine from these cabrónes is apparently mis-programmed and automatically dialing my mobile phone every few minutes. It's quite annoying. I called them to inquire about it, and their operator informed me that the number, 650-494-0166, is a default number through which all their outgoing faxes are routed. So there's no way to track it down. Harrumph.

SteveD: "Tacos and a movie, anyone?"

¡Llamame, güey!

To-do.

Willo O'Brien: "MT here I come."

Oh boy...

Blogstop: "Some eunuchs never sense all the indiscribable otacoustic new sonatinas."

Phew, almost missed out on Fair And Balanced Friday: "Tell Fox News to take its Fair And Balanced slogan and shove it up its Fair And Balanced hole." Indeed!

[Memes rock- thanks BoingBoing]

Excellent, dictionary.com interfaces with acronymfinder. Example: gtfo

Why isn't Bob Cringely blogging yet?

Tony Pierce: "The Day President Bush Got Impeached" (be sure to click the images).

Mike Sieburg: "When I lived in Hanoi two years ago, power outtages were a norm. I can remember writing papers in the internet cafes and having the power cut so often it almost seemed a conspiracy to prevent me from finishing. I became accustomed to saving my documents religiously, waiting and expecting for the power to go out, heading to the bar next door when it did, and then returning to finish my paper when the power returned."

I think I just found the female counterpart to Tony Pierce's busblog: thedetox.com

Heh, leave a comment here if you have power! (nytimes | worldnetdaily | asia.reuters | internetnews )

Jeremy Hedley: "The diet is defintely changing in Japan, and people will pay the price in a generation when heart disease and other ‘Western ailments’ (aka diseases of affluence) start to skyrocket."

For you Windows/IE users, there's a new Google Toolbar available. Go consume it...

Jonas Voss: "But we flew Ryan Air, how important a business person can you be when you fly Ryan Air?"

The Onion, "Monk Gloats Over Yoga Championship:" "'I am the serenest!' Bikram shouted to the estimated crowd of 20,000 yoga fans, vigorously pumping his fists... Bikram averaged 1.89 breaths a minute during the two-hour competition, nearly .3 fewer than his nearest competitor, second-place finisher and two-time champion Sri Salil 'The Hammer' Gupta."

[via SteveD]

No, not here. There.

Real-Life Hipster Bingo, as inspired. I've definitely been playing, just not documenting. Perhaps I should...

[via BoingBoing]

Dom's weekend-long bachelor party (hereafter dubbed "DomFest"), which took place in a 32-acre plot of undeveloped forest 5 miles from Big Basin in the Santa Cruz Mountains, was a trip in the truest sense of the word. Things I witnessed:

• Two long-hairs tossing six juggling pins
• Carnivorous glory bbq'ing all day in a raspberry marinate
• A tie-died top hat atop a rotating disco ball
• A chick in a bikini top shooting a rifle at a 6-pack of Budweiser
• A guy in Hostess Twinkie pants throwing acorns
• A cell phone antenna mounted on a hardhat called "Phildo"
• A donut in a coffee cup filled with fresh whipped cream from a homebrew canister
• White Russian-flavored homemade whipped cream being consumed straight from said canister
• The "Brazil" episode of The Simpsons, over which there was a bit of a to-do
• 5 Pugs, all related

CSM: "Perhaps the horrifying primitive killings are a result of the fact that poverty-stricken West Africans often use old-fashioned weaponry, like knives and machetes, which involves getting close to their victims; that they lack the West's "civilized" methods of killing great numbers from a distance of thousands of miles."

The first line from this article amused me for some reason:

"The United States might have scored an overwhelming victory in Iraq, but some people think it still needs more aircraft carriers."

Went down to Dom 'n Mer's place Wednesday night to help celebrate Mer's birthday (I gave her a schwag-alicious girly-t). In my book they get, without a doubt, the cutest couple in the world award. Their wedding, to which I've been invited, is at Mer's grandparent's place August 23rd up in Napa. When I mentioned this to Christine at work today she replied, "Now you'll have to find some arm candy!" (or maybe this one's more appropriate)

Any takers?

Anyway, in the middle of gift-opening Dom busted out a rockin' surprise gift for moi! He works on the Dreamweaver q/a team at Macromedia, and apparently won it for his bug-squashing prowess. Thanks brah!

So I'm "heading for the hills" momentarily, for Dom's weekend-long, offline bachelor party. Expect media...

So she finally has her blog search up and running, over there. As much as I giddily delight in seeing her name appear in my inbox every hour, I'm glad it's finally sorted. <grin>

"Talking Shit About A Pretty Sunset"

(in Ev's tradition of linking to random Blogger blogs with unique taglines)

Environmental News Network:

"A federal judge whose ruling opened up nearly a third of U.S. national forests to timber cutting and other development owns stock or royalty interests in 15 oil and gas companies, two activist groups contended Tuesday in an appeals court complaint."

...

"Among companies in Brimmer's portfolio were British Petroleum, Exxon-Mobil, Chevron-Texaco, Merit Energy Co. and Marathon Oil. Some or all of the companies stand to benefit if oil and gas exploration is allowed in roadless areas, the complaint said."

Brazilian linkage, apparently; the blog's in Portugenglish.

Jason "eBags" Goldman is sporting a new domain. Evidently he's going head to head with the sock people. Gutsy.

Biz Stone, Genius: "Biz Stone has reserved this space at the very top of his blog for unknown reasons."

Google-Watch-Watch: "Being ranked highly in search engines is more about what people think of you than what you think of yourself."

[via Ev]

Chuck D, being interviewed by Fox News:

On being asked why rap is always blaring from a boom car he said, "Is your problem with rap or the technology that created the big speakers and giant amps in the car? Take that up with the people who invented the technology. I'm a rapper not a business man in a suit selling stereos."

On why rap seems so vulgar, "Ask the men in suits who control the radio playlists - ask them why they only are interested in the lowest common denominator. Where are the story tellers? There's lots of story tellers with good stories to tell in rap and hip hop. Where are they on MTV?"

On whether or not rap is making young people coarse, "Rock and roll is acceptable today but in the 1950's television commentators said rock and roll would reduce the white man to the level of the Negro. Has that happened yet?"

Read the rest... [via Anil]

Megnut: "After brief discussion, it has been determined that the adjective "foxy" is not used enough. It will be added into the adjective rotation and henceforth, work discussions will take advantage of its saucy, crafty, and animalistic meanings."

I'm in full agreement; I've been an avid user of foxy since hanging with Jarrod last year in NZed. For my purposes (usually the animalistic ones to which Meg referred) it's simply a more accurate conveyor than the standard adjectives (hot, attractive, etc.)

Here I come, baby!

Preach on, sister!

Tonight: The Roots