This is perhaps not ironic, but certainly counterintuitive: the Free Willy Keiko Foundation, which campaigned for the (sadly late) orca movie star to be released into the ocean, has now successfully campaigned for him to be buried on land. In a very, very big hole. (Insert willy/hole joke here.)
What I want to know is, what do they think is going to happen to that six-ton body? If it's been embalmed, it's got to be filled with such a huge amount of chemicals that it can't possibly be good for the environment. And if not, I'm sorry, it's going to rot. They're going to have a 30-foot-long, 15-foot-deep hole full of ever-more-foul-smelling decomposing flesh. And either way, I am not going to visit that grave.
(Since it's in Norway, the freezing weather may preserve the body in a reasonably stench-free state for a long time; still, it seems like a remarkably bad thing to do with a corpse of that size, especially one belonging to an animal that—are you with me, Free Willy Keiko Foundation?—belongs to a sea creature. You were clear on that when he was alive; why did you change your minds, and your mindset, now that he's dead?)
Tuesday, December 16, 2003
Friday, December 12, 2003
Spam names
I've been keeping a list of the most bizarre or amusing fake names I'm getting spam from; today I noticed a trend away from the "Random Foreign Name" paradigm—which looks as if they chose a first name from a phone book in, say, Antwerp, and a last name from one in Ulan-Bator—to a new "Random Slightly Obscure English Word" one. Which is certainly amusing, but I'm a bit disappointed; what, you ran out of phone books and languages?
But anyway, here's what I've collected since December 4th:
But anyway, here's what I've collected since December 4th:
- almengor freiheit
- torset mcclafferty
- Lidia Guerra
- stiehm zacarias
- andrew niheu
- gammons birdine
- swoopes doop
- Curring L. Cessna
- Estelle Pham
- Porfirio Mccauley
- Abdul Swift
- Showman P. Scrawl
- Earline Joseph
- Foothold G. Heuristic
Another misreading of the day
D'ja ever quickly glance at several lines of text and have the words on two separate lines seem to converge? I looked at these headlines:and my mind registered it as "Halliburton Headquarters." Which isn't all that far from the truth anyway...
Wednesday, December 10, 2003
Imponderable
An imponderable that's not as flippant as it sounds: who do the Polish tell jokes about?
(Brought about by channel-surfing my way to "Polish Kaleidoscope," which was broadcasting some kind of concert featuring Polish rock groups, Polish rappers, and a Polish stand-up comedian. My pan-Slavic language exposure was just enough for me to not quite know what they were singing/saying: "Something about his girlfriend leaving him and he's pissed off, I think.")
(Polish rap is extremely amusing, by the way; the people doing it are very, very serious and very, very white. And not a bad-ass Eminem kind of white, either; an "I look like a lawnmower salesman from Ohio" kind of white.)
(Brought about by channel-surfing my way to "Polish Kaleidoscope," which was broadcasting some kind of concert featuring Polish rock groups, Polish rappers, and a Polish stand-up comedian. My pan-Slavic language exposure was just enough for me to not quite know what they were singing/saying: "Something about his girlfriend leaving him and he's pissed off, I think.")
(Polish rap is extremely amusing, by the way; the people doing it are very, very serious and very, very white. And not a bad-ass Eminem kind of white, either; an "I look like a lawnmower salesman from Ohio" kind of white.)
Fake headline of the day
From this week's Onion: "Report: Poor People Pretty Much Fucked." You could just about run that on the front page of the New York Times and be censured for vulgarity, but not inaccuracy.
Thursday, December 4, 2003
'Tisn't always better to give
I know everyone with anything to sell is trying to make the increasingly-extended holiday shopping season work for them, but really, you can't just repackage everything as a present. Case in point: I just received an e-mail with the title "Unique gift ideas from Equifax"—the consumer credit report agency.
I'm not saying people shouldn't get credit reports; it's just a really crappy gift. It's like giving someone a gift certificate for a Pap smear. You need it, but you don't necessarily want someone to tell you you need it, much less inflict it on you while everyone else is opening their computer games and gadgets and toys and jewelry.
(If you actually do want to inflict it on someone, go here: Equifax Personal Solutions.)
Giving an Equifax Gift Certificate is a unique way for you to empower friends and family to understand and manage their own credit standing. Share the importance of good credit health with those you care about!Yeah, "unique" is one word for it. It's also a unique way to make sure your friends and family never buy you anything again.
I'm not saying people shouldn't get credit reports; it's just a really crappy gift. It's like giving someone a gift certificate for a Pap smear. You need it, but you don't necessarily want someone to tell you you need it, much less inflict it on you while everyone else is opening their computer games and gadgets and toys and jewelry.
(If you actually do want to inflict it on someone, go here: Equifax Personal Solutions.)
Temperature, inside and out
So it's finally gotten around to being cold; which, regardless of your feelings about cold weather, at least has the advantage of being seasonable. It's just weird having 75° weather in November; and I was completely not in holiday-shopping mode. ("Christmas presents? Why? It doesn't feel like it's getting close to Christmas. Oh...twenty-eight days? Crap.")
Yesterday morning, outside: 18°. Yesterday afternoon, in our house: 60°—the heater was being uncooperative. J. fiddled with the heater and by bedtime it was up to an entirely acceptable 70°.
This morning, outside: 30°. This morning, in my office: 80°. Eighty? I'd almost prefer 30; I'd certainly prefer 60. At least when it's cold you can always put on more clothing; when it's hot, there's a limit to how much clothing you can take off, especially when you're at work. I wish I'd worn a t-shirt under my long-sleeved shirt and sweater and coat, so I wouldn't be sitting here feeling almost faint with the heat.
Just something in the middle would be fine. Really. The average of 60 and 80, the average of 30 and 80...just something bearable, not too extreme one way or the other. Haven't we reached a sufficiently advanced stage of technology that the weather inside doesn't have to be frightful?
Yesterday morning, outside: 18°. Yesterday afternoon, in our house: 60°—the heater was being uncooperative. J. fiddled with the heater and by bedtime it was up to an entirely acceptable 70°.
This morning, outside: 30°. This morning, in my office: 80°. Eighty? I'd almost prefer 30; I'd certainly prefer 60. At least when it's cold you can always put on more clothing; when it's hot, there's a limit to how much clothing you can take off, especially when you're at work. I wish I'd worn a t-shirt under my long-sleeved shirt and sweater and coat, so I wouldn't be sitting here feeling almost faint with the heat.
Just something in the middle would be fine. Really. The average of 60 and 80, the average of 30 and 80...just something bearable, not too extreme one way or the other. Haven't we reached a sufficiently advanced stage of technology that the weather inside doesn't have to be frightful?
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