Thursday, December 27, 2001

Saturday, December 22, 2001

Twibright Labs : Ronja - a build-it-yourself Open Source optical network link .5 to 1 km.

I got this today....

Date: Sat, 22 Dec 2001 01:53:34 -0800 (PST)
From: "Sani Usman" | Block Address | Add to Address Book
Subject: Urgent And Confidential
To: saniusman2001@{MAILBOXDELETED}




FROM DR. SANI USMAN
TEL/FAX: (DELETED)
PRIVATE EMAIL: {DELETED}


Dear sir,

First, I must solicit your confidence in this transaction, this
is by virtue if its nature as being utterly CONFIDENTIAL and TOP
SECRET. Though I know that a transaction of this magnitude will
make any one apprehensive and worried, but I am assuring you that
all will be well at the end of the day. We have decided to contact
you due to the urgency of this transaction, as we have been reliably
informed of your discreteness and ability in transactions of this nature.

Let me start by first introducing myself properly to you. DR. SANI
USMAN,a manager with the EQUITORIAL TRUST BANK LTD
Lagos. I came to know of you in my private search for a
reliable and reputable person to handle this confidential transaction which
involves the transfer of a huge sum of money to a foreign account
requiring maximum confidence.

THE PROPOSITION:

A foreigner, Late Engineer Johnson Creek, an Oil Merchant/Contractor
with the Federal Government of Nigeria, until his death five years
ago in a ghastly air crash, banked with us here at EQUITORIAL TRUST
BANK LTD. Lagos, and had a closing balance of US$9.260M (Nine Million,
Two Hundred and Sixty Thousand United States Dollars) which the
bank now unquestionably expects it to be claimed by any available
foreign next-of-kin of the Late beneficiary or alternatively be
donated to a discredited trust fund for arms and ammunition at a
military war college here in Nigeria. Fervent valuable efforts are
being made by the EQUITORIAL TRUST BANK LTD to get in
touch with any of the Creek family or relatives but proved to no
avail.

It is because of the perceived possibility of not being able to
locate any of Late Engr. Johnson Creeks next-of-kin (he had no known
wife and children) that the management under the influence of our
chairman and member of the board of directors, retired Major General
Kalu Uke Kalu, that an arrangement be made for the funds to be declared
UNCLAIMABLE and subsequently be donated to the Trust Fund for Arms
and Ammunition to further enhance the course of war in Africa and the world in general.

In order to avert this negative development, some of my trusted
colleagues and I now seek your permission to have you stand as a
next-of-kin to Late Engr. Johnson Creek so that the funds US$9.260M
would be released and paid into your bank account as the beneficiary
next-of-kin. All documents and proves to enable you get this fund
will be carefully worked out and more so we are assuring you of
a 100% risk free involvement. Your share stays while the rest would
be for myself and my colleagues for investment purposes in your country.

We have agreed that, the funds will be shared thus, after it has
been transferred into your account

1. 15% of the money will go to you for acting as the
beneficiary of the funds.

2. 5% will be set aside for reimbursement to both
parties for any incidental expenses that may be incurred in the course
of the transfer.

3. 80% to us the originators of the transaction.

If this proposal is OK by you and you do not wish to take undue
advantage of the trust, we hope to bestow on you and your company,
then kindly get to me immediately via my private Email:saniusman@{MAILBOXDELETED}
or fax No. {DELETED} for security reason. Furnishing me with
your most confidential telephone, fax number and
exclusive bank particulars so that I can use these information to
apply for the release and subsequent transfer of the funds in your
favour.

Thank you in advance for your anticipated
co-operation.

Yours faithfully,

DR. SANI USMAN
(EQUITORIAL TRUST BANK LTD.)



Here's the official Secret Service web page: (http://www.ustreas.gov/usss)

Nigerian Advance Fee Fraud Overview
The perpetrators of Advance Fee Fraud (AFF), known internationally as "4-1-9" fraud after the section of the Nigerian penal code which addresses fraud schemes, are often very creative and innovative.

Unfortunately, there is a perception that no one is prone to enter into such an obviously suspicious relationship. However, a large number of victims are enticed into believing they have been singled out from the masses to share in multi-million dollar windfall profits for doing absolutely nothing. It is also a misconception that the victim's bank account is requested so the culprit can plunder it -- this is not the primary reason for the account request -- merely a signal they have hooked another victim.

In almost every case there is a sense of urgency;
The victim is enticed to travel to Nigeria or a border country;
There are many forged official looking documents;
Most of the correspondence is handled by fax or through the mail;
Blank letterheads and invoices are requested from the victim along with the banking particulars;
Any number of Nigerian fees are requested for processing the transaction with each fee purported to be the last required;
The confidential nature of the transaction is emphasized;
There are usually claims of strong ties to Nigerian officials;
A Nigerian residing in the U.S., London or other foreign venue may claim to be a clearing house bank for the Central Bank of Nigeria;
Offices in legitimate government buildings appear to have been used by impostors posing as the real occupants or officials.
The most common forms of these fraudulent business proposals fall into seven main categories:

Disbursement of money from wills
Contract fraud (C.O.D. of goods or services)
Purchase of real estate
Conversion of hard currency
Transfer of funds from over invoiced contracts
Sale of crude oil at below market prices
The most prevalent and successful cases of Advance Fee Fraud is the fund transfer scam. In this scheme, a company or individual will typically receive an unsolicited letter by mail from a Nigerian claiming to be a senior civil servant. In the letter, the Nigerian will inform the recipient that he is seeking a reputable foreign company or individual into whose account he can deposit funds ranging from $10-$60 million that the Nigerian government overpaid on some procurement contract.

The criminals obtain the names of potential victims from a variety of sources including trade journals, professional directories, newspapers, and commercial libraries. They do not target a single company, but rather send out mailings en masse. The sender declares that he is a senior civil servant in one of the Nigerian Ministries, usually the Nigerian National Petroleum Corporation (NNPC). The letters refer to investigations of previous contracts awarded by prior regimes alleging that many contracts were over invoiced. Rather than return the money to the government, they desire to transfer the money to a foreign account. The sums to be transferred average between $10,000,000 to $60,000,000 and the recipient is usually offered a commission up to 30 percent for assisting in the transfer.

Initially, the intended victim is instructed to provide company letterheads and pro forma invoicing that will be used to show completion of the contract. One of the reasons is to use the victim's letterhead to forge letters of recommendation to other victim companies and to seek out a travel visa from the American Embassy in Lagos. The victim is told that the completed contracts will be submitted for approval to the Central Bank of Nigeria. Upon approval, the funds will be remitted to an account supplied by the intended victim.

The goal of the criminal is to delude the target into thinking that he is being drawn into a very lucrative, albeit questionable, arrangement. The intended victim must be reassured and confident of the potential success of the deal. He will become the primary supporter of the scheme and willingly contribute a large amount of money when the deal is threatened. The term "when" is used because the con-within-the-con is the scheme will be threatened in order to persuade the victim to provide a large sum of money to save the venture.

The letter, while appearing transparent and even ridiculous to most, unfortunately is growing in its effectiveness. It sets the stage and is the opening round of a two-layered scheme or scheme within a scheme. The fraudster will eventually reach someone who, while skeptical, desperately wants the deal to be genuine.

Victims are almost always requested to travel to Nigeria or a border country to complete a transaction. Individuals are often told that a visa will not be necessary to enter the country. The Nigerian con artists may then bribe airport officials to pass the victims through Immigration and Customs. Because it is a serious offense in Nigeria to enter without a valid visa, the victim's illegal entry may be used by the fraudsters as leverage to coerce the victims into releasing funds. Violence and threats of physical harm may be employed to further pressure victims. In June of 1995, an American was murdered in Lagos, Nigeria, while pursuing a 4-1-9 scam, and numerous other foreign nationals have been reported as missing.

Victims are often convinced of the authenticity of Advance Fee Fraud schemes by the forged or false documents bearing apparently official Nigerian government letterhead, seals, as well as false letters of credit, payment schedules and bank drafts. The fraudster may establish the credibility of his contacts, and thereby his influence, by arranging a meeting between the victim and "government officials" in real or fake government offices.

In the next stage some alleged problem concerning the "inside man" will suddenly arise. An official will demand an up-front bribe or an unforeseen tax or fee to the Nigerian government will have to be paid before the money can be transferred. These can include licensing fees, registration fees, and various forms of taxes and attorney fees. Normally each fee paid is described as the very last fee required. Invariably, oversights and errors in the deal are discovered by the Nigerians, necessitating additional payments and allowing the scheme to be stretched out over many months.

Several reasons have been submitted why Nigerian Advance Fee Fraud has undergone a dramatic increase in recent years. The explanations are as diverse as the types of schemes. The Nigerian Government blames the growing problem on mass unemployment, extended family systems, a get rich quick syndrome, and, especially, the greed of foreigners.

Indications are that Advance Fee Fraud grosses hundreds of millions of dollars annually and the losses are continuing to escalate. In all likelihood, there are victims who do not report their losses to authorities due to either fear or embarrassment.

In response to this growing epidemic, the United States Secret Service established "Operation 4-1-9" designed to target Nigerian Advance Fee Fraud on an international basis. The Financial Crimes Division of the Secret Service receives approximately 100 telephone calls from victims/potential victims and 300-500 pieces of related correspondence per day.

Secret Service agents have been assigned on a temporary basis to the American Embassy in Lagos to address the problem in that arena. Agents have established liaison with Nigerian officials, briefed other embassies on the widespread problem, and have assisted in the extrication of U.S. citizens in distress.

If you have been victimized by one of these schemes, please forward appropriate written documentation to the United States Secret Service, Financial Crimes Division, 950 H Street, NW, Washington, D.C. 20001, or telephone (202) 406-5850, or contact by e-mail.

If you have received a letter, but have not lost any monies to this scheme, please fax a copy of that letter to (202) 406-5031.
The Funniest Joke in the World?

Sherlock Holmes and Dr Watson are going camping. They pitch their tent under the stars and go to sleep. Sometime in the middle of the night Holmes wakes Watson up.

"Watson, look up at the stars, and tell me what you deduce."

Watson says, "I see millions of stars, and if there are millions of stars, and if even a few of those have planets, it’s quite likely there are some planets like Earth, and if there are a few planets like Earth out there, there might also be life."

Holmes replied: "Watson, you idiot, somebody stole our tent!"

SkyscraperPage.com Forum - "Israeli art students" deported

Friday, December 21, 2001

Wednesday, December 12, 2001

Error messages within Linux - from http://unattached.i-no.de/english/linux.php

* Nobody will ever see this message :-) */
panic("Cannot initialize video hardware\n");
2.0.38 /usr/src/linux/arch/m68k/atari/atafb.c

panic("bad_user_access_length executed (not cool, dude)");
2.0.38 /usr/src/linux/kernel/panic.c

if (user_specified)
/* Didn't work, but the user is convinced this is the
* place. */
2.4.0-test2 /usr/src/linux/drivers/parport/parport_pc.c

panic("Lucy in the sky....");
2.2.16 /usr/src/linux/arch/sparc64/kernel/starfire.c

printk("HPFS: Grrrr... Kernel memory corrupted ... going on, but
it'll crash very soon :-(\n");
2.4.3 linux/fs/hpfs/super.c


panic("mother...");
2.2.16 /usr/src/linux/drivers/block/cpqarray.c

#define BB_STAT2_TMP_INTR 0x10 /* My Penguins are burning.
Are you able to smell it? */
2.2.16 /usr/src/linux/include/asm-sparc/obio.h

# Basic IBM dingbats, some of which will never have a purpose clear
# to mankind
2.4.0 linux/drivers/char/cp437.uni



/*
* For moronic filesystems that do not allow holes in file.
* We may have to extend the file.
*/
2.4.0-test2 /usr/src/linux/fs/buffer.c


printk("Illegal format on cdrom. Pester manufacturer.\n");
2.2.16 /usr/src/linux/fs/isofs/inode.c


panic("IRQ, you lose...");
2.2.16 /usr/src/linux/arch/mips/sgi/kernel/indy_int.c

prom_printf("Detected PenguinPages, getting out of here.\n");
2.0.38 /usr/src/linux/arch/sparc/mm/srmmu.c

printk("autofs: Out of inode numbers -- what the heck did you do??\n");
2.0.38 /usr/src/linux/fs/autofs/root.c


/* vsprintf.c -- Lars Wirzenius & Linus Torvalds. */
*
* Wirzenius wrote this portably, Torvalds fucked it up :-)
*/
2.2.16 /usr/src/linux/lib/vsprintf.c

/* Fuck. The f-word is here so you can grep for it :-) */
2.4.3 linux/include/asm-mips/mmu_context.h
Slight Overloading problem...

Thursday, November 29, 2001

"The ritual consists of interested humans arriving at a predetermined Wal-Mart at 12 noon on the first Sunday of every month and proceeding to push empty shopping carts slowly and silently through the aisles."
whirlmart_statement
isn't it cute? A giant condom surrounded by asian models....
Yahoo! News - Reuters Photo
Blitzkrieg Toyz in New York City has just shipped 3,000 "El Comandante Fidel Castro" action figures to retailers. The 12-inch, hand-painted dolls are available in two styles: Revolutionary Fidel with jet black hair and beard, and salt-and-pepper Modern Fidel. Blitzkrieg offers the figures to retailers for $45; on shelves, they sell for $65. A recent auction on eBay fetched more than $100.

Revolutions in doll making - 2001-11-05 - South Florida Business Journal
eNormicom: Welcome to eNormicom!
37signals > Design Not Found > Real World Examples of Good and Bad Contingency Design
The Boxin' Sumo Robot Kit at the Robot Store
Obiturary: Rosemary Brown - from The Times (UK) "She went shopping with Liszt"

I find that this helps, too...

Wednesday, November 21, 2001

Go to http://www.touristguy.com and click on "Origin" to see the first
faked photo that appeared shortly after 9/11.

Then go to the Gallery and see everything else.

Finish up with a visit to the News section and click on "ALL YOUR BASE ARE BELONG TO US"
Red Hat proposes alternative in Microsoft settlement

Linux vendor Red Hat Inc. has sprung an alternative settlement to resolve
class-action lawsuits against Microsoft. It says Microsoft should pay for more
hardware, not software that could extend its reach.

http://computerworld.com/nlt/0%2C3590%2CNAV47_STO65972_NLTAM%2C00.html
The True History of Thanksgiving



"The first Thanksgiving did not occur in 1621 when the pilgrim survivors of the first winter sat down to dinner with their Indian friends. The first official day of thanksgiving and feasting in Massachusetts was proclaimed by Gov. Winthrop of the Massachusetts Bay Colony in 1637. He did this to give thanks for the safe return of men from the colony who had gone to what is now Mystic, Connecticut to participate in themassacre of over 700 Pequot men, women and children.

"What happened in October of 1621 may have been a harvest home, but the Indians who attended were not even invited by the Pilgrims, who considered our people to be devils. No turkey, cranberry sauce, or pumpkin pie was served. Just days before this alleged thanksgiving communion, a company of pilgrims led by Myles Standish actively sought the head of a local chief. The pilgrims deliberately caused a rivalry between two friendly Indians, pitting one against the other in the classic European method of divide and conquer. An 11 foot high wall was erected around the entire Plymouth settlement for the purpose of keeping the Indians out."


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. . .from the speech by Moonanum James, Co-Leader of United American Indians of New England at the 29th National Day of Mourning, November 26, 1998
Samuel L. Jackson!!! (thanks, Robert)
Bill Gates: "You owe me one, Linus..." ???


I, Cringely | The Pulpit
Remember Microsoft BOB?
Remember Bob the programming language?

What About Bob?

Leonid Pics!

Leonids 2001 Meteor Gallery
Furbeowulf Cluster Computing - build your own supercomputer!

Thursday, November 15, 2001

note the date...




8-Jun-84 10:29:10-MDT,646;000000000000
Return-Path:
Received: from AMSAA by SIMTEL20.ARPA with TCP; Fri 8 Jun 84 10:29:06-MDT
Received: From jpl-vlsi.arpa.ARPA by AMSAA via smtp; 8 Jun 84 12:00 EDT
Date: 8 Jun 1984 0853 PDT
From: Jeff Skaletsky
Subject: USR Password Production halt?
To: info-cpm@Amsaa.ARPA
Reply-To: JEFF@JPL-VLSI.ARPA

Anyone with information on the production halt of the US Robotics
Password modem? Is this a discontinuation, a temporary QC problem,
or a lawsuit? Also, I'd appreciate any comments on the Promethius
Modem as an alternative.

Thanks,
Jeff Skaletsky
A blast from the past... first BETA of gcc??? I feel old...

Geocrawler.com - a2ps - GCC: Anyone working on a port?

Friday, November 09, 2001

NEW YORK (Reuters) - IBM Corp. (NYSE:IBM - news) said on Friday it will build a supercomputer that is smaller and 15 times speedier than the current fastest computer, enabling users to solve complex questions more quickly and opening the door for its commercial use.

The new computer is expected to be used for everything from weather modeling to studying genomics data and running commercial database applications, IBM said.

It is the second computer planned as part of an expanding five-year, $100 million project called Blue Gene which IBM began in 1999 with the intention of studying proteins.
http://dailynews.yahoo.com/h/nm/20011109/tc/tech_ibm_supercomputer_dc_1.html

Monday, November 05, 2001

Sunday, November 04, 2001

Ananova - CIA put transmitter in cat and used tail as antenna to get Kremlin secrets
Headlines for root.skaletsky.org, Too Tired to be Root...

World: CIA put transmitter in cat and used tail as antenna to get Kremlin secrets. 02:51 ET - Ananova [NewsBlip.com]
3:13:54 AM
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Australian tax dollars at work. The Australian government has put together The National Public Toilet Map. As the name suggests, it is an interactive map of every public toilet in the country. [kuro5hin.org]
3:12:27 AM
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HP Calculator Department is Closing [Slashdot]
1:31:58 AM
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Does this mean that Microsoft can call anything it wants part of Windows??? I think the fix is in...
Did Brett Glass find the "killer clause"? [Scripting News]
1:09:35 AM
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Cisco.com: The Charlie Rose Interview: Linus Torvalds [Linux Today]
1:03:55 AM
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Wow... Unix is 30. This is a great timeline; I got on board at SunOS 3.0, I think. I don't see Venix, which I remember working with at JPL...

UNIX hits the Big Three-Oh [Slashdot]
12:17:46 AM
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Saturday, November 03, 2001
BOFHs to blame for LAN downtime after all. Guns don't kill people - routers do [The Register]
2:07:16 AM
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InfoWorld says WinXP much slower than Win2K [Slashdot]
2:05:49 AM
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Friday, November 02, 2001
Intel Chips For The Near- And Semi-Near Future [Slashdot]
1:27:18 AM
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Thursday, November 01, 2001
Doc Searles (Linux Journal Senior Editor) reports on the Geek Cruise with RMS (Richard Stallman), Steve "Wordy" Roberts (I used to subscribe to TechNomads a long time ago), and others...
11:29:45 PM
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Interview With the Creators of CRUX and ROOTLinux. 1 Nov 2001: Linux is much more than (the highly marketed) Red Hat or Mandrake. Assuming you got the skills required, a Linux distribution can be created, distributed or sold by anyone. This is what Free Software is all about anyway. Two Sweedish Linux coders are offering their own, home-brewed Linux distros for some months now (with newer versions on the way). Per Lidén has put together CRUX from scratch, while John Eriksson has evolved a lightweight Slackware version to his own ROOTLinux. OSNews inter [RootPrompt.org -- Nothing but Unix]
1:10:39 AM
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WIRED: Windows XP: EXtra Proprietary (Red Hat's Michael Tiemann says "Boycott the Monopolist") [Linux Today]
1:09:47 AM
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Interactive Fiction Competition 2001 [Slashdot]
1:09:12 AM
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John Robb: "Is the US Post Office worth saving?" [Scripting News]
12:30:22 AM
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Pentagon Has a 3-D View to a Kill. The U.S. military is using high-resolution 3-D maps so troops can view battlefields before a mission. By Wired News' Declan McCullagh. [Wired News]
12:28:17 AM
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The Lighter Side of CPAN. Alex Gough takes us on a whirlwind tour around the more esoteric and entertaining areas of the Comprehensive Perl Archive Network, and makes some serious points about Perl programming at the same time. [Perl.com Perl.com]
12:27:01 AM
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Jerry Pournelle rolled his truck in Death Valley in 1998 and had to walk out. [Scripting News]
12:26:43 AM
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Mine is, so's my wife and kids...Forget about your birthday ... is your name in pi? [Memepool]
12:22:38 AM
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This is a hoot. ...list of dangerous terrorists. [Scobleizer]
12:16:57 AM
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Business: Sun Micro CEO: Ready for Economic Storm. 20:31 ET - Reuters [NewsBlip.com]
12:15:16 AM
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Wednesday, October 31, 2001
Happy Halloween!!! Here's hoping you have a great day..
Just in case someone wants to have the candy X-Rayed: http://www.snopes2.com/horrors/mayhem/needles.htm
12:06:02 AM

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The Register: Win-XP vs Red Hat 7.2 [Linux Today]
12:02:01 AM
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Tuesday, October 30, 2001
BE CAREFUL - this food is da bomb...?
Reuters: U.S. warns Afghans of yellow cluster bomblets [Robot Wisdom]
11:59:49 PM

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ArabNews: ObL's cave located by pure deduction? [Robot Wisdom]
11:54:09 PM
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Gawd, I miss this... it was pretty cool for it's time.
http://catalog.com/hopkins/images/pizzatool.gif
11:34:25 PM

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Follow the links to catalog.com where you can read Don Hopkins' (Sims/Simcity designer) complaints about X-Windows!!!
PLUS:

The database client/server model (the server machine stores all the data, and the clients beseech it for data) makes sense. The computation client/server model (where the server is a very expensive or experimental supercomputer, and the client is a desktop workstation or portable computer) makes sense. But a graphical client/server model that slies the interface down some arbitrary middle is like Solomon following through with his child-sharing strategy. The legs, heart, and left eye end up on the server, the arms and lungs go to the client, the head is left rolling around on the floor, and blood spurts everywhere.

- The X-Windows Disaster; by Don Hopkins: "This is Chapter 7 of the UNIX-HATERS Handbook. The X-Windows Disaster chapter was written by Don Hopkins." How to make a 50-MIPS Workstation Run Like a 4.77MHz IBM PC


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This is what started this - this article on Slashdot: Maxis Developer on Linux Game Porting [Slashdot]
11:13:14 PM
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NeuStar to Manage .US Registry [Slashdot]
10:34:47 PM
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MS-DOS is Dead??? No, sorry, that's wrong.
9:05:36 PM
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User shows up at tech support pilot fish's cube, complaining about an error message he gets on boot-up. "What does the error message say?" fish asks. "I don't know," user answers.... for the rest - click here at computerworld
9:05:35 PM
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What Do You Know About Databases And XML? [Slashdot]
12:50:03 AM
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The Internet Reached It's Peak Today. The Internet reached it's peak today. Well, not as much today as within a few weeks or months of today, but the idea is there. Windows XP, lousy broadband, the RIAA, sites failing due to lack of funds: everything seems to be going downhill. Perhaps this is the natural evolution of things. [kuro5hin.org]
12:43:20 AM
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Scary stuff...
CounterPunch: Neo-Nazi Wm Pierce predicted many details [Robot Wisdom]
12:36:28 AM

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Monday, October 29, 2001
HDTV On Your PC And Hard Drive [Slashdot]
9:15:57 AM
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It's probably a good thing that someone is doing this....
1:51:18 AM
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Remember when the slogan was "Coke ADDS Life?"
The New Threat: Coca-Cola. From the site cokemachineaccidents.com:This site is dedicated to our dear son and brother Kevin Mackle, who was found dead in his Residence at Keuhner Hall, Bishop's University, Lennoxville Quebec on December 13th 1998, a day of sorrow for us, his family. A toppled Vendo Model Coca-Cola machine which was put in place, unsecured, by the Beaver Foods Company crushed him. [kuro5hin.org]
1:47:33 AM

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UK Telegraph: In case of war, steal (Pakistan's) nukes [Robot Wisdom]
1:45:08 AM
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Report on Shashdot about AMD chips frying with no heatsink; AMD disputes it.
The Report of My Thermal Death Have Been... [Slashdot]
12:25:20 AM

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Robert Scoble writes: Harry Potter Legos. I'm one too, but my son is totally nuts about Harry Potter. He's quite proud of the fact that he's the first kid in his class to get some Harry Potter Legos. (My wife works at Valley Fair Mall and got some of these highly-prized treasures. Already they are the hottest things for putting under the Christmas tree and extremely hard to find -- when I picked up my son from school two parents asked "where did you find those Harry Potter Legos?") [Scobleizer]
Okay, if I've seen this before, they will be featured on various TV shows this week (Rosie O'Donnell or Oprah will GUARANTEE this is a hit).
12:18:55 AM

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© 2001 Jeff S




Saturday, November 03, 2001

From Doc Searle's weblog:

Speaking as one, are the spleenless among us safe from Anthrax? Nubbin: In translating Der Spiegel into English via Babelfish, I discovered that "anthrax" translates to "spleen fire."
Thanks to Kottke for introducing us to Nubbin, BTW. It's an A-1 blog by Ariana French.

Monday, October 15, 2001

from SlashDot (click here for article)

(about the Polaroid Bankruptcy)

(by "neema")

Never! (Score:5, Funny)
by neema on Sunday October 14, @12:03PM (#2427413)
(User #170845 Info | http://neema.redhive.com)
Digital cameras lack something real cameras have. Take the classic blackmail example:

Me: TAKE A LOOK AT THESE SENATOR!
*Neema throws down photos on desk*
Senator: *GASP*
Me: That's right. You. Dancing with the forbidden monkey. Dancing the forbidden dance with the forbidden monkey!
Senator: Please... if these get out, I'll never get reelected. And if I don't get reelected, I can't get the Senator's discount at Ben and Jerry's!
Me: And don't even think of ripping these up! I have copies at home! But, I think we can work something out...
*Senator pulls out check book*

But now, with these god damn digital cameras:

Me: TAKE A LOOK AT THESE SENATOR!
*Neema gently places digital camera on desk, so it doesn't break*
Senator: Yeah, my daughter has one of these.
Me: No, no, no. Argh. It turned off. It does that. Turns off automatically after 3 minutes... ok... gimme that...
*Neema turns on camera, places on desk again*
Me: OK, TAKE A LOOK AT THESE SENATOR!
Senator: It's a dog.
Me: Oh yeah, that's my dog Scruffy. Argh. Yeah, press the right arrow. Get past those pictures. Yep, that's Aunt Sally. Come on, a bit faster. ARGH, JUST GIVE IT TO ME!
*Grabs camera, scrolls to incriminating pictures*
Me: THERE YOU ARE! YOU, DANCING THE FORBIDDEN DANCE WITH THE FORBIDDEN MONKEY!
Senator: Please... if these get out, I'll never get reelected. And if I don't get reelected, I can't get the Senator's discount at Ben and Jerry's!
Me: Yeah, well, I'm going to stop by staples to get glossy photo paper and I'll be printing out a bunch of these!
*Senator pulls out check book*

I still like the first situation better.
[ Reply to This | Parent ]

Re:Never! by addaon (Score:2) Sunday October 14, @12:25PM
Re:Never! by torklugnutz (Score:1) Sunday October 14, @12:46PM
Re:Never! (Score:5, Insightful)
by Stanza (stanza23&hotmail,com) on Sunday October 14, @12:38PM (#2427572)
(User #35421 Info | http://stanza.techfocus.net/)
No no no. Your first part is correct, but the second part is all wrong:

Me: TAKE A LOOK AT THESE SENATOR!
*Neema gently places digital camera on desk, so it doesn't break*
Senator: Yeah, my daughter has one of these.

*Grabs camera, scrolls to incriminating pictures*
Me: THERE YOU ARE! YOU, DANCING THE FORBIDDEN DANCE WITH THE FORBIDDEN MONKEY!
Senator: That looks like something my daughter did with Photoshop.
Me: Yeah, well, I'm going to stop by staples to get glossy photo paper and I'll be printing out a bunch of these!
*Senator looks dubious*

Monday, October 01, 2001

From Robert Cringely's InfoWorld column:

"If you bought $1,000 worth of Nortel
stock one year ago, it would now be worth $72. If
you bought $1,000 worth of Budweiser (the beer,
not the stock) one year ago, drank all the beer,
and traded in the cans for the nickel deposit,
you would have $79."

Sunday, June 24, 2001

Here's how to get rid of the X10 ads (the spy cam pages that appear behind the web pages you're viewing...


click - HERE -> http://www.x10.com/x10ads.htm

SURVEY: MAJORITY OF WEB USERS ARE
FBI AGENTS POSING AS TEENAGE GIRLS



http://www.satirewire.com/news/0008/satire-fbiteens.shtml

Survey Shows Evolving Web No Longer Dominated by Male Techies

NEW YORK, N.Y. (SatireWire.com) — The Internet reached a demographic milestone this week as a new study revealed that for the first time, the majority of U.S. Internet users are FBI agents posing as teenage girls.

The report, by research firm Media Metrix, marks the first time the demographic group known as "males" has not been in the majority.


According to the survey, which tracked online usage from January through July, 50.4 percent of U.S. Web users -- or nearly 38 million -- are FBI agents posing as teenage girls. That's still below the percentage of FBI agents posing as teenage girls in the overall population, which according to U.S. Census figures is 55.7 percent. However, the report noted that FBI agents posing as teenage girls represent the fastest growing segment of Web users, increasing 185 percent in the past 12 months.

"This study reveals that the Internet has come of age as a practical medium and is no longer dominated by the male techie crowd," said Randall Stinson, editor of American Demographics magazine. `These newcomers are saying, 'The Internet is about more than being a geek. It's about shopping and staying in touch with family and posing as a little girl to apprehend geeks.'"

Web sites catering to teenage girls corroborated the findings. "At least half" of Gurl.com's 1.3 million unique monthly visitors are FBI agents posing as teenage girls, said Gurl.com spokesperson Helen Kattrall. "It's easy to tell the difference," she said. "Real teens chat with each other about boys and school and celebrities. But FBI agents posing as teenage girls are never interested in girl-talk. They tend to write things like, 'Hi, I'm Emily. I'm almost 13, and I'm looking for a father figure willing to cross state lines.'"

In a statement, the FBI disputed the study's findings and insisted its agents are not working on that many cases. However, the bureau conceded it cannot rule out the possibility that some agents are posing as teenage girls in their free time.

In other survey findings:

¤ More than 60 percent of female respondents say cybersex is equivalent to infidelity, but a staggering 92 percent of FBI agents posing as teenage girls approve of cybersex as long as it leads to an arrest and conviction.

¤ Nearly one third of pedophiles say they actually go to teen sites in hopes of meeting FBI agents.

¤ Four out of five men say they watch women's gymnastics and figure skating for the athleticism. Nine out of ten women say they are lying.

RECOMMEND
THIS PAGE
Copyright © 2000-2001, SatireWire.

Wednesday, June 13, 2001

Clueless

from the pages of Computerworld's Shark Tank

User's nine-track tape drive is failing, but it tests out fine with tech support pilot fish's test tape. User's tape is another story - it's so worn, fish can almost see through the mylar. How about some new tapes, fish suggests. "I've been using these tapes every night for 10 years, and they've always worked," grumbles user. "Why should I have to buy new tapes now?"


IT shop receives shipment from remote office with a note: "We found this server in our trailer. It's been sitting there for a year or two. Is it usable or fixable?" Inside, pilot fish finds the "server" - a fully functional uninterruptible power supply.


Investment firm is approaching the go-live date for its new Web site, but the hosting company stalls whenever pilot fish asks to do load testing. Finally, four days before showtime, the hosting vendor says OK, with one restriction: Limit the number of testers. Fish finds out why: "If more than four people are logged in to the server," she reports, "it will crash!"


Clueless with cables I Help desk gets call from exec: His dial-up Internet connection worked fine on Friday, but it's not working now. Pilot fish finds the modem phone line dangling from the back of the laptop. "Oh, I couldn't get that line removed Friday to take my laptop home," exec explains. "So I cut it."


Clueless with cables Ii Upset user calls help desk, complaining he can't access anything on the network. Pilot fish quickly pinpoints the problem: Overly tidy user not wanting network cable cluttering up the floor has tacked it onto a corkboard behind his desk - with a push pin.

Unix Humor?


barely.

Friday, June 01, 2001

Thursday, May 17, 2001

Walking through San Francisco's Chinatown, a tourist is fascinated with
all the Chinese restaurants, shops, signs and banners. He turns a corner
and sees a building with the sign, "Saul Dumbrowski's Chinese Laundry."
"Saul Dumbrowski?" he muses. "How the heck does that fit in here?"
So he walks into the shop and sees an old Chinese gentleman behind the
counter.

The tourist asks, "How did this place get a name like "Saul Dumbrowski's
Chinese Laundry?"

The old man answers, "Is name of owner."

The tourist asks, "Well, who and where is the owner?"

"Me, is right here," replies the old man.

"You? How did you ever get a name like Saul Dumbrowski?"

"Is simple," says the old man. "Many, many year ago when come to this
country, was stand in line at Documentation Center. Man in front is
Jewish gentleman from Poland. Lady look at him and go, 'What your
name?' He say, 'Saul Dumbrowski.' Then she look at me and go, 'What
your name?'

I say, 'Sem Ting."

Saturday, May 12, 2001

British Author Douglas Adams Dies

By DANNY POLLOCK, Associated Press Writer

LOS ANGELES (AP) - Douglas Adams, whose cult science fiction comedy ``The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy'' drew millions of fans and spawned a mini-industry, has died at age 49.

The British-born Adams died Friday of an apparent heart attack in Santa Barbara, Calif., a family friend, Elizabeth Gibson, said Saturday. She said Adams collapsed while working out at a gym.

``He was not ill,'' Gibson said. ``This was completely unexpected.''

The ``Hitchhiker's Guide,'' which began as a British Broadcasting Corp. radio series in 1978, is a satirical adventure about a group of interplanetary travelers; it opens with the Earth being destroyed to make way for an intergalactic highway.

It was turned into a book, which sold 14 million copies around the world, and later into a television series.

The book was followed by several sequels, including ``The Restaurant at the End of the Universe,'' ``Life, the Universe and Everything'' and ``So Long, and Thanks For All the Fish.''

The books blended satire, memorably named characters such as Zaphod Beeblebrox and Marvin the Paranoid Android, and witty philosophy, at one point supplying the answer to ``the ultimate question of life, the universe and everything.'' The answer was 42.

Adams later recalled how he first thought of the book during a teen-age trip around Europe.

``I was hitchhiking around Europe in 1971, when I was 18, with this copy of 'A Hitchhiker's Guide to Europe,''' he said.

``At one point I found myself lying in the middle of a field, a little bit drunk, when it occurred to me that somebody should write a Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy. It didn't occur to me that it might actually be me years later.''

Geoffrey Perkins, the BBC's head of comedy, called Adams ``absolutely one of the most creative geniuses to ever work in radio comedy.''

``He probably wrote one of the greatest radio comedy series ever, certainly the most imaginative,'' he added.

Born in Cambridge, England, in 1952 and educated at Cambridge University, Adams began his career as a writer and script editor at the BBC.

He followed the ``Hitchhiker's Guide'' with several books about ``holistic detective'' Dirk Gently; ``Last Chance to See,'' a book about endangered species; and, with John Lloyd, the hilarious alternative dictionary ``The Meaning of Liff.''

He also founded a multimedia company, Digital Village, which produced the ``Starship Titanic'' computer game and an online travel guide inspired by the ``Hitchhiker's Guide.''

A frequent radio broadcaster on science and technology, Adams had been working for several years on a screenplay for an oft-delayed ``Hitchhiker's Guide'' movie.

In August 1996, he told a technology conference in New Orleans that the main problem in adapting the series for film was not special effects.

``It's the nature of the story, which is picaresque, which translates to one damn thing after another, and another, and another.

``It's very hard to translate that to a 100-minute feature film,'' he said. ``Every script has a beginning and a middle and an end.''

Adams married Jane Belson, a lawyer, in 1991. The couple, who had lived in Santa Barbara since 1999, had a 6-year-old daughter, Polly. Adams is also survived by his mother, Jan Thrift of England.

-

Associated Press Writer Jill Lawless, in London, contributed to this report.

Tuesday, April 17, 2001

Courtesy of Farmboy11 on f---edcompany.com

Prostitute Or A Consultant?



From http://www.contractoruk.co.uk/humour8.html


1. You work very odd hours.

2. You are paid a lot of money to keep your client happy.

3. You are paid well but your pimp gets most of the money.

4. You spend a majority of your time in a hotel room.

5. You charge by the hour but your time can be extended for the right price.

6. You are not proud of what you do.

7. Creating fantasies for your clients is rewarded.

8. It's difficult to have a family.

9. You have no job satisfaction.

10. If a client beats you up, the pimp just sends you to another client.

11. You are embarrassed to tell people what you do for a living.

12. People ask you, "What do you do?" and you can't explain it.

13. Your family hardly recognizes you at reunions (at least the reunions you attend.)

14. Your friends have distanced themselves from you and you're left hanging with only other "professionals."

15. Your client pays for your hotel room plus your hourly rate.

16. Your client always wants to know how much you charge and what they get for the money.

17. Your pimp drives nice cars like Mercedes or BMWs.

18. Your pimp encourages drinking and you become addicted to drugs to ease the pain of it all.

19. You know the pimp is charging more than you are worth but if the client is foolish enough to pay it's not your problem.

20. When you leave to go see a client, you look great,but return looking like hell (compare your appearance on Monday AM to Friday PM).

21. You are rated on your "performance" in an excruciating ordeal.

22. Even though you get paid the big bucks, it's the client who walks
away smiling.

23. The client always thinks your "cut" of your billing rate is higher than it actually is, and in turn, expects miracles from you.

24. When you deduct your "take" from your billing rate, you constantly wonder if you could get a better deal with another pimp.

25. Everyday you wake up and tell yourself, "I'm not going to be doing this stuff the rest of my life."

Monday, April 16, 2001

Clippy Says, "All your base are belong to us!"



To: all

I can't believe it! Those geeks at Microsoft have made me obsolete. That means you won't be seeing much of me, your favorite Office Assistant, in the new Office XP. Your friend JS thought you'd want to hear my side of the story. Check it out at www.officeclippy.com, where you can see videos starring me and hear my new blues song, "It Looks Like You're Writing a Letter."

By the way, do you know anyone looking to hire a hard-working paper clip?

--Clippy

From: Yahoo! Hong Kong - Technology News


click here for The Original Article

Sunday, April 15 6:05 PM SGT
You know I gotta put in the big bold "Weekly World News" headline -pm

Russia hails breakthrough in building artificial brain


MOSCOW, April 15 (AFP) -
Russian scientists claimed Sunday to have developed the first artificial brain, a "neuro-computer" with the same intellectual potential as its human counterpart, Interfax reported.

The new Russian computer is based on the brain cell, or neuron, and outstrips previous brain models by using state-of-the-art findings in neurophysiology and neuromorphology to produce a truly thinking machine, scientist Vitaly Valtsev said.

But he warned of the potential hazards of the scientific breakthrough, saying the brand new brain could turn into a Frankenstein's monster if it was mistreated.

"This machine needs to be trained like a newborn child. It's extremely important for us to make it a friend, not a criminal or an enemy," Valtsev said.

Valtsev, a member of the International Academy of Information Science, told Interfax that Russian scientists succeeded where others had failed because they used a model of the neuron of the brain in building the computer.

Earlier attempts to create an artificial intelligence had failed because scientists had tried to create a smart machine using a model of the neuron of the spinal cord developed back in the 1940s.


--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Sunday, April 15, 2001


www.i-resign.com


Dear R,

I Resign! I’ve written my last ever exclusive for this worthless rag, and you’ve stolen your last story from me.

My first story – "Stallone Paparazzi KO" – was a bit of a shock. Not only did he hit me pretty hard (it took months before I got the cast off my chin) but I was surprised to find that you had taken the credit for the whole story … including the injuries. I was more surprised that the judge awarded you the million-dollar payout in the civil suit that followed. Your fake bruises were very convincing but by no stretch of the imagination are you a woman!

You were a lucky sonofabitch when you stole the "Hilary Clinton Drug Romp" scoop from me. How could nobody have noticed that you were at the Tabloid Editors Annual Dinner Gala giving the "Best Obituary" award that night?

There have been countless others, but now I’ve had enough. Obviously you hadn’t read past paragraph three of "Prince William Love-Child Shock" when you decided it was a story worth putting your name against. I went through six minor Lords, a dozen bodyguards, nine months of pregnancy and a 32-hour labour for that story … and Wills had nothing to do with it! Well, you can keep it. You can keep the baby too - I’ve Fedexed him to your house. Enclosed is the birth certificate. To save time for you I’ve left the mother’s name blank!

Yours,

J K.

Courtesy of PVAC

According to a book I'm reading, one day some years ago a scientist
studying hyenas in Africa made an important discovery. He leapt into
his land rover and raced through the herds of migrating wildebeests to
tell the scientist studying baboons what he had found. "Hey. Did you
know that 'gnu dung' is a palindrome?"

Wednesday, April 11, 2001

From the "Shark Tank", Computerworld

WEDNESDAY, APRIL 11, 2001

BY SHARKY
Talk to the Hand

Called into the boss's office "for yet another brainstorming session." IT pilot fish is then kept cooling his heels while the boss continues working.

"I'm sitting there for at least five or 10 minutes while he finishes dictating a memo into a recorder or something," fish grouses.

"Finally, he finishes and gives me his attention. That's when I notice that the recorder is no recorder at all -- it's a PalmPilot.

"High-tech guru as I am, I become curious, so I ask my boss about his new toy."

"After listening to him bolster his ego for a few minutes (something about him being on the bleeding edge of technology and such)," says fish, "I ask him point blank, 'So, you can dictate into the Palm now, huh?' "

Boss pauses while the seeds of doubt grow, and a puzzled look creeps over his face. "Well, I sure hope so ...," he says, trailing off.

"Made my day," says fish.


This summary is not available. Please click here to view the post.

Sunday, April 08, 2001

This is an old story,
One day, this frantic call comes in. I need help. But whoever comes can't tell anyone what they see. It's classified! What's the problem? Can't tell you. Where are you? Whispered discussion follows in background. I'm in XYZ, the second floor. Ok. So I head over there, wondering about the dire consequences of having to examine the system to see what was wrong without looking at the system, and ready to get yelled at for having to look at the system.

I arrive and find four senior members of the company staff huddled around this system. Panic is on their faces. They ask, "Can you fix it?". "What happened?" is my reply. Another whispered conference. "There is something wrong with the software, the system won't start". I flip the power switch on. The OS messages start appearing, then the screen goes blank. Ok. "Has anyone installed anything recently on the system". Another hushed conference. "Well, yes". Ok, I could see this was going places fast. So I booted the system again, this time as a minimal setup. Looked at the configuation. Not the latest, but not ancient. Looked at the startup script. What the he??! I remove the offending line and reboot the system. It boots up. Cheers erupt from the conspirators.

The problem? They had wanted to suprise their boss on April 1. So they wanted to put in a "special graphic". Since one of them was "always working on computers" they let that person enter the name of the graphic into the startup script. That's right. Not a program, just the name of the graphic. Then rebooted the system to see their handiwork. Oops, no screen. They thought VIRUS. I thought STUPID.

I asked if they wanted to insert a program to display the graphic. They said no.
I sent a bill for double my regular fee for that one.

Saturday, March 31, 2001

Click here for the original article

March 18 2001 BUSINESS NEWS






Coke chief's latest Daft idea - a cola tap in every house

by Rupert Steiner

IT may be just a pipe dream, but Douglas Daft, the chief executive of Coca-Cola, is planning to compete with water by channelling Coke through taps in customers' homes.

He has sunk venture-capital funding into an innovations unit based in New York that has created a system to mix carbonated water with Coke's secret syrup and pipe it around houses. It would be mixed inside homes rather than pumped in from an external source.

Daft does not see Pepsi as his main competitor and will be happy only when people are turning on taps in their homes to drink Coke rather than water.

In an exclusive Sunday Times interview he reveals his idea but says it is not yet ready to be launched. "Yes, we have developed a prototype," he said.

"You would have water mixing automatically with the concentrate and then connect it all up so that when you turn on your tap you have Coke at home. There's a lot more to it than that to ensure quality and it has to be a sealed unit so people can't alter the formula to destroy the value of the brand," he said.

Businesses already have closed systems. Pubs and branches of McDonald's, the burger chain, have stored the raw materials in basements and produced Coke on the spot for years.

But Daft is keen to take the product a step further when the time is right. "There's not a market yet," he said. "People still like to physically go and buy things, but one day, yes, this will be a reality."

He has also sunk £500,000 into an innovations unit that is trying to develop something called "Coke space" - an area where teenagers can hang out.

"It is being funded and developed in Europe," he said. "The unit is trying to define what a 'Coke space' means to a teenager, so we can provide something that a teenager would want to come to."

The project began with the idea that teenagers like to hang out by standing beside telephone boxes because there is nowhere else for them to go where they feel comfortable.

Daft says: "Teenagers do like to sit down and chat about intelligent things and they need to have somewhere to do that, so it came from that idea.

"We believe it will make a material difference to our revenues at least indirectly because it will make us a better brand. There is a chance that it may even add a revenue stream."

Tuesday, March 27, 2001

Gee, look what I missed out on...
THIRD ROUND OF CUTS AT CREATIVE PLANET SLICES 70, LEAVING 150
Tuesday, March 27 07:55 p.m.

For the third time in seven months, entertainment industry production software provider Creative Planet has laid off a sizeable chunk of staff in an effort to streamline spending and reach profitability. A total of 70 employees were let go today, leaving just more than 150 on board. Company CEO Allen DeBevoise said in a statement that the "need to preserve a strong capital position is paramount" in light of financial hard times and an impending strike in Hollywood. The statement indicates that terminated employees get pay through the week and four weeks of severance and health benefits. In August, just after closing a $38 million round from Times Mirror Chandler Trusts, Creative Planet laid off 30, and in December, after closing a $30 million round from United News & Media, 72 people were cut. DeBevoise said at the time of the December cut that it was the last for the foreseeable future.
Thanks to Richard J.:

A major network is planning the show "Survivor 2"
this winter. In response, Texas is planning "Survivor, Texas Style."
The contestants will start in Dallas, travel through Waco, Austin, San
Antonio, over to Houston, and down to Brownsville. They will proceed up to Del
Rio,on to El Paso, then to Midland/Odessa, Lubbock, and Amarillo. From there,
they proceed to Abilene, and on to Ft. Worth and back to Dallas. Each
will be driving a pink Volvo with a bumper sticker that reads, "I'm a
cross-dresser, I voted for Al Gore, and I'm here to confiscate your guns."
The first one to make it back to Dallas wins.
Via Don Barrett's LARADIO.COM from Monday's issue:

Tom Leykis Shocks His Fans and Friends
With Announcement of Split with His Wife


(March 26, 2001) Tom Leykis, with no fanfare or tease, told his loyal KLSX and syndicated afternoon drive audience on Friday that he and his wife Susan have separated. The surprise announcement even caught his colleagues off guard. "I didn't know about it until Tom told me at lunch on Friday," said KLSX pd Jack Silver. Not that one thing has anything to do with the other, KLSX morning driver Howard Stern separated from his wife recently.

This is the full text of Tom's statement Friday afternoon:

"Now before we do anything else, I want to say something here and you will note that I did not promote this in advance. I have not teased it, and I have tried not to exploit this in any way because some things are, I think above that.

You may wonder, do I have a line? Where do I draw it? Well, now you are seeing where at least the line might be drawn. What I am about to say, not only did I not promote it to you, it is something personal and a number of my friends don't know anything about it and they are about to find it out the first time as well, about me.

You will find out as I tell it to you over the next few minutes why my friends don't know about it. Why nobody knows about it. And, why I haven't made a big deal about it. And as a matter of fact, the reason I am doing this on a Friday is because I had no intention of turning it into a topic. I have no intention of going on the air and many times things have happened to me and I have made lemons into lemonade.

I have come on the air and used things that have happened. Arguments I have had with people. Arguments I have had with ex-wives or girl friends or whatever. I have used that stuff as show material and I must tell you that this time around I am not doing that.

Because it is personal and it is serious and I am going to say this one time and I am not going to repeat it....again....at all. So, if you are listening now, you are hearing this and if you are not listening now fine, so be it.

So, it is something personal that I have been... I'll be honest with you...I've been dreading talking about it, but I am going to talk about it now.

And here it is.... My wife Susan and I have separated. We have actually been separated for several months now. It happened back before the holidays. And I have not talked about it on the air, number one because Susan is a private person and I did not want to go on the air to use this as an opportunity to hype or to play with it.

She is a private person and this was very hard on both of us and especially on her because I am a public person. I have been divorced 3 times. I know how hard that is and it must be hard, probably much harder for her in that she has never been through this before and she is married to a public figure.

I know you'll have a lot of questions about this. So I am going to try to head some of them off at the pass by saying the following: Yes, I know I am the professor. Yes, I know I teach Leykis 101, I have always been very careful to tell you I don't teach a course on how to stay married.

I teach a course on how to get laid, so those of you who are going to call and go “who do you think you are”, well guess what dear, this has nothing to do with it. That is number one. OK?

Number two, I mean, have we worked on this? For the longest time, oh yes, Yes, but I want you to know, as much as we talk to guys and tell them to dump that bitch and all that stuff, I want to make something really clear here, OK?

My wife Susan is no bitch. She is the smartest person I have even known. She is the wittiest person I know. She and I have a lot in common and we have known each other for 10 years. We have a lot of history, and this has nothing to do with the show.

It has nothing to do with rack signing. It has nothing to do with her being quote unquote a bitch. It ain’t true, she is anything but. And I want you to know that. I am going a step further here. The reasons for it I am not going onto on the air. Why? Because I am a public person. Susan is a private person. And I am under no legal obligation to not talk about this. No one has told me.

Susan and I are completely friendly and amicable. Susan and I have seen each other many times. I have been to her place. She has her own place. She has moved into a place in Los Angeles. There is no anger, no animosity, no bitterness. And the result of that is there will be no nasty comments by me or by you about her on the air.

Because I have nothing bad to say about her at all. We have a prenuptial agreement. But as I have always said, I have been good to my word. I have been helping Susan in every possible way....financially, emotionally and I will continue to do that....and we continue to be very close friends.

And we continue to spend time talking and we see each other and we have worked on this a lot. So I just want you to know that. I have generally been honest about my life. And, I generally talk about stuff as it happens. But in this particular case, being that we broke up around the holidays...it is very emotional and I am trying to be sensitive to the fact that Susan is a private person.

And, where it is very easy for me to come on the air and talk about myself, it isn't necessarily easy for her to hear about herself on the radio. She knows I am talking about it today. She told me this week she is ready for this. I am doing it with her approval and I am only doing it now because she is ready to hear it.

She is ready for me to do it now. We have talked about this for a long time. What will it be like? What will people say? What will people think? And the last thing I want anybody to think is that there is anything negative about Susan because there is nothing. This is no dirt here. There is nothing nasty to say.

This is the only time I am going to make a statement about it. It won't be repeated, unless KLSX runs this tape, and I don't know about it, which happens from time to time. I am not going to say it again, but I wanted you to know about it and I wanted you to be prepared, because I know we will get calls.

I've told all the guys here we will get calls about this. One thing that will be off limits is attacking Susan. You want to attack me, fine, that is OK. but Susan, I am not going to attack...at all, period, because she is a good person.

And she has been a big part of my life. And frankly, she has helped me an awful lot over the years with giving me feedback about my work. And she has tolerated my work. She has tolerated the rack signing and she has been just as good as gold with all that. So, understand where I am coming from.

There is nothing nasty to be said and its already been almost four months since we split. But I was not going to do this until she was ready. She is ready now, and I think that is good and to all my friends who did not know that this happened, I apologize to all of you. But understand that this is very trying. because we are in public and people see us.

And I did not want people gossiping about it. I wanted to talk about it when we were ready, both Susan and myself. So I have very close friends who did not know this and that is the reason I didn't talk about it.

Because I wanted Susan to get to her new place...to get set up...to get over some of the emotion and some of the difficulty of a split. And I did not want her to have to deal with my talking about it on the air while it was all going on.

So we are not divorced. We are separated. That is the deal. And now there it is, I've said it. OK? So, I've gotten it out. It is four month old news. But a lot of people didn't know it and now you know it all right. Now, we have a show. We are going to do it. And that is that and that is all I have to say about that. It is wide open telephones. And here we go babe." Bumper Music into break #1 Time: 9:20
(Bart Reed has contributed to this article. He is a Sylmar based media and marketing specialist. He is currently executive director of The Transit Coalition.)

Wednesday, March 21, 2001

Not funny, but very interesting, courtesy of F---edCompany.
This is the actual Toronto newspaper ad for the guy who smuggled Marijuana for a living.

I'd heard about this somewhere, and then Richard J. sent it to me...

Check it out HERE

Thursday, March 15, 2001

Don F in NYC sent this one...

qantas.jpg
Thanks to Richard J. for this one...


The European Commission has just announced an agreement whereby English
will be the official language of the EU rather than German which was the
other possibility. As part of the negotiations, Her Majesty's Government
conceded that English spelling had some room for improvement and has
accepted a 5 year phase-in plan that would be known as "Euro-English".

In the first year, "s" will replace the soft "c". Sertainly, this will make
the sivil servants jump with joy. The hard "c" will be dropped in favour of
the"k". This should klear up konfusion and keyboards kan have 1 less
letter.

There will be growing publik enthusiasm in the sekond year, when the
troublesome "ph" will be replaced with "f". This will make words like
"fotograf" 20% shorter.

In the 3rd year, publik akseptanse of the new spelling kan be ekspekted to
reach the stage where more komplikated changes are possible. Governments
will enkorage the removal of double letters, which have always ben a
deterent to akurate speling. Also, al wil agre that the horible mes of the
silent "e"s in the language is disgraseful, and they should go away.

By the fourth year, peopl wil be reseptiv to steps such as replasing "th"
with "z" and "w" with "v". During ze fifz year, ze unesesary "o" kan be
dropd from vords kontaining "ou" and similar changes vud of kors be aplid
to ozer kombinations of leters.

After zis fifz yer, ve vil hav a reli sensibl riten styl. Zer vil be no mor
trubl or difikultis and evrivun vil find it ezi to understand ech ozer. Ze
drem vil finali kum tru! And zen ve vil tak over ze world!


Wednesday, March 14, 2001

Ray: I know how to please a woman.
Blonde: Then please leave me alone.
Ray: I guess you're pretty good at pleasing yourself, then.

Ray: Your hair color is fabulous.
Blonde: Thank you. It's on aisle three at the corner drug
store.
Ray: Really? Is that where you got your eyelashes and
colored contacts?

Ray: Is this seat empty?
Blonde: Yes, and this one will be, too, if you sit down.
Ray: [Looking away] Honey, there's two here!

Ray: Your body is like a temple.
Blonde: Sorry, there are no services today.
Ray: Here's a donation to restore the exterior.

Ray: I want to give myself to you.
Blonde: Sorry, I don't accept cheap gifts.
Ray: Oh, just cheap perfume then?

Ray: Haven't I seen you someplace before?
Blonde: Yeah, that's why I don't go there anymore.
Ray: Well, I guess you really don't belong in the men's room,
anyway.

Ray: What's it like being the most beautiful girl in the bar?
Blonde: What's it like being the biggest liar in the world?
Ray: You're right. I was lying.

Hi, I'm new here. Is there anything I can do to get off on the wrong foot?

Tuesday, March 13, 2001







This is my brother's car dealership! - no, he's not the owner.. well, some day :)
Hey, Western Bagel (Los Angeles) is taking orders for GREEN Bagels; geez, I can make those myself, right on my kitchen counter, specially when
I've left them out a while...!
"I want to take a bubble bath, but I need OLIVE OIL" - I like the new Webvan commercials.
Somebody Set Us Up the Bomb.Check out the commercials at Ad Critic.
Warm everything-cheese bagels from Western Bagel are pretty good...!


ComputerWorld's Sharky (the Shark Tank) tells some pretty funny real-life stories about war in the computer biz (IT) trenches...


Monday, March 12, 2001

See yesterday's Foxtrot comic:

All your Base Are Belong to US!



In case it's not clear, this is kind of a "Grafitti Wall" at the moment. Eventually I'll figure out what I wanna do with the site, and perhaps create more "BLOG" areas for fun and/or information. For now, feel free to contribute if you're on the "team"

Sunday, March 11, 2001

"got his butt" apparently means being "made", officially inducted into "This Thing of Ours"...
Good show tonight - Chistopher's got his butt, as Tony said ("Ain't Got NO SPLEEN, Gene!")... Check out SopranoLand, a New Jersey fan site... Soprano's Sue's sightings are great!
Nine minutes until the next Sopranos episode...
what's wrong with the clocks?
Thousand cranes decend upon the universe
All YOUR BASE ARE BELONG TO US!
See Am I All Your Base Or Not?
Be sure to watch the video and read the history....
If anyone has $800 million, I'd like to prove a point....
Cheese doodles. Fun we are having now.