So I'm totally wasted, and I feel like writing something. I'm not drunk because it's New Year's, I'm drunk because I had to spend my New Year's Eve with in-laws and I find that I'm far more indifferent with some beer and liquor in me than I would be otherwise. That's only half of the reason though, the other half is that I've decided to be a drunk while read a giant tome of four Ernest Hemingway novels that I picked up at Barnes and Noble for a fucking pittance. The idea might be ridiculous or i
Has anyone read this? I just picked it up from the bookstore after wandering around for a good half hour. Supposedly aims to explain (and not just state obvious factors) why advanced civilization comes from the 'West', excluding Darwinian theories of genetic superiority, taking into account human pre-history.
Google agrees to China censorship.
Some of the censored topics:
Tiananmen Square Massacre
Taiwan's Democracy
The spread of evil is the symptom of a vacuum. whenever evil wins, it is only by default: by the moral failure of those who evade the fact that there can be no compromise on basic principles.
- Ayn Rand
Google's Motto: "Don't be evil."
After seeing a few of the funny/strange/impressive things that Vig has found on Google Video I decided to waste some time searching around and I found some excellent videos of some of my favorite music WEE!!!!
Porcupine Tree - Trains, Start of Something Beautiful, Blackest Eyes
Opeth - Closure, The Drapery Falls
In Flames - System
Depeche Mode - Precious
Meshuggah - New Millenium Cyanide Christ <<LMFAO!!!
The G20 moves the world a step closer to a global currency
This article reminded me of a CFR essay by Benn Steil titled The End of National Currency that I read a couple of years ago. Steil's essay is remarkably astute, not only for his understanding of national fiat currencies, but of the nature of gold as real money as determined by thousands of years of human interaction. While I would welcome the end of nationalistic currencies, I utterly detest the idea of a global 'paper' currency mani
I've been reading things here and there about the EU mandating, on penalty of an incredible fine, that Microsoft ship its own product Windows without Microsoft's own media player and to reveal parts of its programming code to rivals. Microsoft has already settled with the U.S. Justice Department, revealing code and allowing PC makers and conumsers to hide the bundled software. All this in the name of 'fair competition'.
This isn't just about Microsoft, it's about property rights. Personally
I was going to comment this in Ursus' blog post on decriminalization, but his slate has been wiped clean. It statistically documents the predictable benefits of Portugal's decriminalization of drug use.
http://www.scribd.com/doc/13784156/Drug-De...ato-White-Paper
http://www.fln.vcu.edu/struwwel/struwwel.html
I read this 19th century picture book (with these exact illustrations, but a different translation) when I was young, like my mother did and her parents did. What a trip...
I usually do not watch much television. The exeptions are a few shows on the Discovery/History/Science channels and the sitcom, 'The Office.' Recently, I was looking at the dazzling array of crap that I pay a monthly fee for, trying to somehow justify the cost other than just accepting that my wife watches more tv than I do. As I was skipping through, I stumbled upon a show that at first seemed documentary-ish but was actually some footage of three guys exploring miles of tunnels underneath Pari
Here's my recommendation to all the chocolate lovers:
Chocolove 61% Dark Chocolate Bar
This tops any other chocolate I've had, though I admittedly don't go out of my way to find new chocolate to taste. It's like crack.
http://www.chimay.com/en/chimay_blue_220.php
This is pricey, but it's worth buying every once in a while. It's a Trappist ale, which in my experience are usually near perfect beers.
Its sweet and malty with a little bit of spicy hops. Nice deep cloudy red color. Very mellow aroma, like bread. Its hard to tell that its 9% alcohol because its VERY smooth. I find that it tastes best when its cool/lukewarm. It has a certain typical 'Belgian' flavor that may be due to the yeast, but I'm not s
Sounds pretty sick, right? Actually, BigDump is a staggered MySQL dump importing script. Anyone who has loaded a large database backup, transported a large database to a new host, or made a mirror test database knows how challenging it can sometimes be if you administrate remotely without using shell access.
Fortunately, this script makes it a complete snap. Instead of breaking the SQL file into chunks that wouldn't cause a PHP timeout, then loading each one manually, I let this thing run wh
Sometimes when I reflect back on all the beer I drink I feel ashamed. Then I look into the glass and think about the workers in the brewery and all of their hopes and dreams. If I didn't drink this beer, they might be out of work and their dreams would be shattered. Then I say to myself, "It is better that I drink this beer and let their dreams come true than be selfish and worry about my liver."
-- Jack Handy
If you ever reach total enlightenment while drinking beer, I bet it makes beer
http://www.banksy.co.uk/
I just looked through the whole site at one sitting, and thought that some people here might enjoy some of it. Actually, the thing that I found most interesting wasn't any of the imagery, but one of the email responses:
Spoken like a 'true believer.' I might even be able to cut the irony with a knife.