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April 30, 2004
Hey Crackhead
Another weirdo posting from on Craigslist found it's way to my inbox this morning. These and similar entries on eBay have lately become the bread and butter of my nine to five. Now I code web sites for Nestle brands in between reading blindingly uninformed and suspiciously misl=placed political commentary, ads for vintage air guitars and pictures of a husky dude in his ex-wife's wedding gown (which, at the time of this entry, has reached $4000 and made the seller a celebrity).
Well, we have a new favorite. A young engineer has had his motorcycle vandalized twice by someone stealing sparkplugs for crackpipes. He has written him an open letter in the only appropriate forum.
And since nothing this good can last for long, and I'm sure craigslist will delete this posting asap, I have taken the liberty of reposting the contents of the letter right here.
April 27, 2004
Bra!d Reunion Tour
Killing A Camera in 2004
This is big. Bra!d was one of my favorite bands as a teenager. They were one of the huge influences in my musical development as I stopped listening to bad hardcore/punk and progressive rock and started listening to college/indie rock. With all the rumors surrounding their various projects (none of which have really been up to snuff), and around their bizarre breakup... I didn't expect a reunion.
Release:
"In celebration of the May 11 release of the Braid film "Killing a Camera" the Urbana, IL band will be hitting the road for a 60 date US/Canadian tour on May 26th. More information can be found at the official Braid Tour 2004 website (www.braidtour2004.com) or at www.bifocalmedia.com.The DVD release of Killing a Camera features the original film (a documentary on their last 5 shows as a band in 1999) as well as an hour long retrospective film with new interviews and never before seen footage of the final days of Braid. An audio commentary track with all four Braid members has also been added to the original film. Bifocal Media is shipping signed copies to all who pre-order the DVD in March."
Check out the web site for more info:
http://www.braidtour2004.com
April 26, 2004
Geez... someone should really tell them...
I received a link today for www.powergenitalia.com. I sat for a moment, wondering if I should open it at work. Soon I remembered that I really and truly don't give a shit, and I popped the fucker open. "Maybe I can make another addition to my Wish List," I thought.
I was greeted by a rather retro looking logo for PowerGen Industries. The white background, broken links and html text made me almost as wary as the bezelled/embossed/gradated/dropshadowed and otherwise filtered-all-to-hell logo. I really wasn't sure what I was looking at.
Soonenough, I noticed some Italian text and a link beneath. Using my superior power of deduction and whatever the opposite of being an idiot is, I was able to conclude that the text was indicating that the site had moved... to www.batterychargerpowergen.it. Then I got it.
I knew who they were, what they did, and why they found themselves a new URL.
Oh, I laughed and I laughed. I tell you. Hoowee! A harty laugh. A belly laugh. Sometimes I think I'm still laughing.
April 22, 2004
For Sale: Time Travelling Dolorian
http://cgi.ebay.com/ebaymotors/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewItem&item=2475019485#ebayphotohosting
April 14, 2004
The Nuclear Outlaw
We have found a new kind of bad-ass:
The Nuclear Outlaw
Armed only with a Kawasaki Ninja and her father's credentials, this girl periodically tools around in the uninhabitable dead zone surrounding Chernobyl and keeps an online journal to tell us about it. Amidst Felicity-style eastern epitaphs and self-congratulatory declarations of her own untamable nature, there are some fascinating amateur photos and enough plainly written and carefully chosen information to really drive home the gravity of the Chernobyl disaster.
http://www.angelfire.com/extreme4/kiddofspeed/
In case you don't know:
At 1:23am the reactions taking place in reactor 4 went awry and caused a massive steam explosion which blew off the reactor's 1000 ton steel and concrete cap. Some of the 211 control rods melted and then a second explosion, whose cause is still the subject of disagreement among experts, threw out fragments of the burning radioactive fuel core and allowed air to rush in - igniting several tons of graphite insulating blocks. Once graphite starts to burn, its almost impossible to extinguish. It took 9 days and 5000 tons of sand, boron, dolomite, clay and lead dropped from helicopters to put it out.
The Chernobyl accident killed more than 30 people immediately, and as a result of the high radiation levels in the surrounding 20-mile radius, 135000 people had to be evacuated.
Wishlist addition
I must have this air guitar!
http://losangeles.craigslist.org/msg/28789038.html
The Chicken Dance
Well, Burger King's subservient Chicken campaign has spread through the nerdy underground like wildfire. This is probably the biggest corporate meme since Levi's Super Greg phenomanon in '99. Unless we find out Nabisco hired the Star Wars Kid, that is.
Anyhoo, I was all set to let the thing fizzle out until I stumbled across the television ad featuring the chicken in question... and my friend Sean. We were fast-forwarding through the ads interrupting the West Wing last night when a frame of Sean's face caught Micki's attention. Pulling the TiVo to a screeching halt, we backtracked to Sean's face only to find that it, and indeed the rest of him, was sitting in the Subservient Chicken's living room -- telling it to do things and licking his lips. It was fucking freaky!
So... Take from that what you like.
In other subservient Chicken news, here's the list of actions the development team had in mind when implementing.. the Chicken.
http://www.xeni.net/images/bb/clipData.html
And here's a wiki featuring some of the more creative requests the chicken's gotten:
April 13, 2004
Nickelback gets stoned
Like, in the biblical sense.
Perhaps fearing Nickelback would be unable to 'bring the rock'... as it were... umm... That's no good. Let me start again.
Ahem...
Apparently, Portugal doesn't like Nickelback.
At least, several people in Portugal don't like Nickelback. Several of those people who are in Portugal and who don't like Nickelback recently found themselves with some spare time and some extra rocks. "What to do?" they must have wondered. Being the efficient and industrious people that the Portuguese are, they decided to combine their surplus time and spare rocks with their extra aggression, superfluous descent, and extraneous distaste for American radio-rock, and used them to try to kill Nickelback.
Thanks to Jesse.
April 12, 2004
Hold Music
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April 08, 2004
Subserviant Chicken
If ya don't know, now ya know.
April 07, 2004
Gotcha
Every year on April 1st the internet is inundated with fake products, fictional mergers, and fraudulent screenshots. Certain sites such as Waxy and Urgo compile a yearly list of the best and the brightest of internet pranks. I always think that I've caught the top pranks on my own, until those lists come out and I realize that I've only seen the tip.
My favorite this year was actually on the radio -- NPR's "All Things Considered" of all places. NPR's Andrea Seabrook reported that the U.S. Postal Service plans to launch a national "Portable Zip Codes" program called "Go Postal." Under the program, Americans would be able to keep their current zip codes no matter where they moved, "whether across the country or across town." The story was replete with sound bites from various citizens, Assistant Postmaster General Lester Crandall, and Sen. Phil Spigel of Arkansas. Amazing.
Click here to hear or read it.
Also topping the list were:
the Video iPod
First Annual March for Web Standards
ThinkGeek's new products
RIAA Sues Google; Internet Doomed
Check out a more thorough list at Urgo.
PS -- Believe it or not, I've been assured this is not a hoax. Photo here.
April 06, 2004
The Gift is in the Giving
(Of gifts... to me...)
As Micki keeps reminding me, my birthday is coming up. (May 27th.)
I decided to spend a few minutes updating my Amazon Wish List. After all the slandering of Amazon's name that I've done over the past few weeks, they are still the best online resource for... well, almost anything. Now that I've said that, they should buy me something off my list as well. (The TV.)
Anyhoo... Wish List.
April 03, 2004
Good Bye, Lenin
The movie looks good. The site is amazing.
April 01, 2004
Simpsons on Strike?!
The unthinkable has finally happened.
This is the headline at MSNBC:
'Simpsons' stars on strike for more D'oh
Voices of characters stop working to force contract settlement
Stupid and chilling.