Tuesday rapid fire

• Inventor's 2020 vision: to help 1bn of the world's poorest see better
• Bleeding Heart Tightwads - the right gives more to charity than the left
• Burger King launches beef-scented body spray
• The neurotypicals conspire against us with homeopathic remedies

The line of last night...

(Woman I was talking to referring to band on stage)

"The singer sounds like he's hitting a baby with a cat"

Something funny

From this Wikipedia page on Melungeons

On the other hand, in the tensions about race and slavery leading up to the Civil War, several Melungeon men were tried in Hawkins County, Tennessee, in 1846 for "illegal voting", under suspicion of being black.

It brings to mind the Dick Gregory joke

"I'd rather be black than gay because you never have to tell your parents you're black."

Link clearing roundup

Thoughts on the recent events soon, here we are just to clear off some tabs

• Walmart is going to carry the G1
• The coming liberal area will be funny
• Fun Alaskan secessionists
  
• One of the weirdest ads ever

Weird news from the Motherland

82-year-old traded drugs for sex, Kentucky cops say - in Berea no less!

Loner Updates

Sorry for all the light blogging - I've been in a frenzy building the new company/web application. I also installed (with a friend) a new carrying beam in the basement - the house is far more stable and level now.

In the meantime - check out the following links

• British Health Services uses private doctors for their own people. It's a lot like American public school teachers sending their own kids to private school. It's a dramatic lack of faith in the system, but I suppose the government knows best, just like they say.
• In Nebraska, the safe haven laws, usually intended for infants, can be used for children up to age 18. People have been coming in from out of state to abandon their teenagers.
  

When white people talk for a long time

The author of "Stuff White People Like"


And http://stuffaspergerpeoplelike.com/ like is eerily similar to my life.

Saturday link clearing roundup

• Visual thinking from the 1960s
• Schelling and the Nuclear Taboo
• Mexican cartels running pot farms in U.S. national forest - who says no one makes things in America anymore!
• The Pill makes women pick bad mates
• 'Peter Pan', 'Snow White' busted at Disneyland - People and their free time...
  

Least surprising headline ever

Report: Crack users with HIV engage in unprotected sex

Only in Atlanta

I went to the all night convenience store last night on a beer run after we ran out at the recording studio. Ahead of me in line was an obvious heroin addict (lots of track marks) wearing pajamas. Behind and to the side of me was was an attractive debutante type having a loud conversation on her cell phone. The heroin addict is having a loud conversation with the clerk about her kids (apparently it's a lot of work but they're worth it); the debutante is having a loud conversation on her cell phone that ended with "Some people have NO MANNERS!".

I savored the irony for an hour or so.

Link clearing blog post

• Garet Garrett - an early libertarian writer, I just added his Atlas Shrugged precursor novel to my amazon.com wish list
• This story about a black widow who has just recently been revealed

Jeff Carstensen was spooked when he learned his grandmother planned to buy him a $100,000 life insurance policy -- and name herself the beneficiary.


"She told me that people of our stature have insurance policies on each other," he said. "That way, if something happens to you, you take care of me, and if something happens to me, I take care of you. It was all too suspicious. So I got out of there any way I could, as soon as I could."

Saturday reading

• From George Will -

  America says to foreign producers: We prefer not to pump our oil, so please pump more of yours, thereby lowering its value, for our benefit. Let it not be said that America has no energy policy.

• Wilkerson on Global Warming
• Joel Splolsky on Architecture Astronauts - worth reading, especially in conjunction with John Robb.
• This is weird
• Inventions by year
  

Homeless James Bond

Via Soob, check out Homeless James Bond

Advances in child management

A wonderful technical acheivement

Conflict follows device that drives away teen loiterers
A wall-mounted gadget designed to drive away loiterers with a shrill, piercing noise audible only to teens and young adults is infuriating civil liberties groups and tormenting young people after being introduced into the United States.

Such wonderful times we live in.

Signs that democracy has run it's course

The candidates are appearing on wrestling shows.

The best graffitti ever

See it here. Just imagine the preparation involved...

The pink horse of the gold digger Apocalypse

Check out SugarDaddyForMe.com. It's where attractive young women meet wealthy men, online! It has the notable quote

Men want the younger and more attractive women. And, women, want the man with the bigger and more sheltered cave.

Just in time for Valentines day!

From this article from The Atlantic

Now, though, I realize that if I don’t want to be alone for the rest of my life, I’m at the age where I’ll likely need to settle for someone who is settling for me.

Tuesday links

• Iraq vets take lemons and make.... something.
• Delphine LaLurie - very creepy
• Time management
• I do believe I'll be building these bookshelves
• Ron Paul - comic book president
• Putting Bush on Mt Rushmore - be sure to read this one from Scott Adams
  

Me and MasterChief

My visit to MicroSoft was interesting.