So while the Tomb of the Unknowns has become many things to many people, all of them valid and important and deeply felt, originally the Tomb of the Unknown Soldier was erected in memory to all those men that didn't just give up their lives but gave up their very identities in a terrible, terrible war. The remains of the soldier inside the tomb are a symbolic reference to the tens of thousands of soldiers who will never, can never be buried. We don't identify those remains because they're a symbol of all the ones that won't, can't, ever be identified. We guard those remains because we want to express that such a sacrifice is supreme beyond all others, and therefore requires the most supreme honors we can bestow. -- May 26, 2002

It's a musical reference. Go look it up. Bah, probably not even a cherry tree. Whaddayagonnado?

The advantage of taking Metro during a weekend, and just missing your train... an empty station who's manager doesn't mind you setting up a tripod. Three exposures, one of which was 20 seconds, and I still got quite clear signage.

We did a "family day" out to Arlington Cemetery. This was just a test shot to sort out my new remote. More to come.

Mark gets a no-prize that will make him pay if he says it's hormonal for bringing us news of a PMS drug, for The Rest of Us.

The reason I'm convinced homosexuality is not a choice is because if it was, the human race would've gone extinct hundreds of thousands of years ago. Only the biological imperative is enough to make us put up with each other.

Hopefully you all will believe me now when I say OM can chug across a room!

"GET OFF MY LAWN!"

Ron gets a left-handed no-prize for bringing us the top 100 April Fool's day hoaxes of all time. I've only got through the first page, and already it's pretty amusing.

The best part is, this stuff is actually funnier than SNL. Well, at least the SNL I used to watch. Far as I can tell it's all SFW, if not for comprehension.

Japanese sketch comedy at it's, well... it's definitely something. Benni-u Hillsan!

I mean, of course peanut butter disproves evolution. Didn't everyone already know that? What, are you all morons or something?!?

One day algae could be our main source of fuel. The potential yields are so great they're predicting profitability in the next 3 years and talking openly about competing with fossil fuels in 5-10 years.

I, for one, welcome our green single-celled overlords!

Astronaut Sunita Williams will be running the Boston Marathon this April. The catch? She's doing it on a treadmill on the ISS. Hopefully that whole "peeing on the go" thing that Amber sees when she ran marathons won't be required up there. That would be kinda messy.

Check out step 20. Google's got an interesting sense of humor, eh?

Yeah no. I won't go to these lengths for one of my favorite sandwiches.

It's nice to know Olivia's not the only one with parents creating future difficulties for them. At least Bigwig's (so far) only put up one such picture. We haven't even finished posting up The Spaghetti Incident II.

Scientists are reporting that, just as with single-star systems, planets appear to be quite common around multi-star systems as well. The orbital mechanics of such a thing must be enough to make any astrophysicist's eyes water.

I hear it all the time, "if you're such a big damned supporter of the war, why don't you send (yourself | your children | your next-of-kin)? Eh? Hypocrite!"

I just found a nice counterpoint:

But you can't [claim to stand for freedom and human rights and then attack everything America has done and tried to do in Iraq over the last four years]. Indeed, by declaring the whole thing illegitimate, all you're doing is siding with the Islamophobes of the world who claim the Muslims and the Arabs are far too savage, backward, and primitive to respect things like democracy and human rights. Indeed, you're implicitly siding the the Jihadwatch crowd.

It's high time someone told you people this, whether you're Muslims or not.

The sad thing is I've had private conversations during which people actually do admit to believing such things about Arabs. Racism isn't just about hating blacks, you know.

Via Instapundit.

Making the rounds: Results from a new study seem to indicate that mammalian evolution did not experience "explosions" of diversity after mass extinction events. While some species did diversify after, for example, the famous K-T event, for whatever reason they did not survive. It seems all (or perhaps nearly all) current mammal species evolved much earlier, and simply survived each catastrophe.

Sometimes investigative reports discover things work. Of course, we would never have heard about a reporter failing to breach hospital security if she'd not been arrested. That's just not good news.

Too funny not to post!

Well if you have kids this is funny!

Not in "my" freezer!

Just don't call them weapons of mass destruction. Because, you know, it's only a chemical weapon when it's loaded in the barrel of a gun, yes? Via Instapundit.

One in ten people in the world live less than ten meters above sea level. One in eight city dwellers do the same.

... and? They live there now because coasts enable trade, and trade enables growth, and growth is what lifts people out of poverty. It's only when people are no longer poor that they will begin to care about the environment*, and growth is the only thing that will improve the infrastructure to the point it becomes possible to live on higher ground.

So of course one of the things mentioned as a "problem" is "continuing economic growth." It just won't do to have all these brown people working their way toward wealth and happiness. We must lead them to the correct behaviors! Start massive building projects! Take corporate profits to pay for them! Just because it's never worked before doesn't mean we can't try again!

Maybe I should put a watermelon category up. You know, just to emphasize the reality of the situation.

----
* From memory, this is actually a low number, a per-capita wage of about $8500.

Even more obscure reference: Paging Georgia Lass, white courtesy phone please. No-prize to the first one to recognize it. And no Googling!

Mike J. gets a no prize with a knit cap on for bringing us this hilarious interpretive dance on the pop song Torn. Special props go to Natalie Imbruglia, both for her excellent live performance and for being such a good sport about the whole thing.

Jeff gets a sad, broken no-prize for bringing us news of yet another Ferrari Enzo's demise. There are so many people who're going to get a proctological exam by this production's insurance company it's making me a little dizzy.

Ron gets a no-prize he can pick up at the weirdest confectionery shop in London for bringing us news of the capture of a monster toad in Australia. Big as a damned football! Unfortunately if the implications of the article are followed to their logical conclusion, Mr. Monster Toad is likely frozen stiff awaiting transformation into fertilizer.

No, Ellen, you can't have one.

Doctors have announced the discovery of a third sort of twin birth. Termed "semi-identical," it's thought they form when two fused sperm fertilize a single egg. This type of twin had been hypothesized by biologists before, but no proof of their existence had been found until now.

280 mph motorcycle, anyone? I get jittery when my bicycle gets above 40 mph. I think I'll give this one a pass.

Scientists are now reporting the creation of a sheep that's 40% human on the cellular level. The goal is to create animals that will provide perfect transplant organs for patients. While the "Frankenstein-in-fleece" creep factor looms large, I think the real concern will be for cross-species disease transfer. Critics are already bringing this up, but considering the value of a transplanted organ, it would seem to me an engineering problem to create an environment which would keep these sorts of sheep completely disease-free.

Baa!

Not all wealthy people spend their money on bling. If government policies created more incentives to give and fewer taxes to take, we'd see a helluva lot more of this. And such money would be far more effective too, since people are much more interested in how their money is spent than government officials ever would be.

Keep that in mind next time you see an article bemoaning how rich the wealthy are, and how only government policy can change it.

We love you!

Speaking of OLD kid shows that Scott talks about. Here is my favorite!

You can even check in to see what they have been up to all of these years.

I nearly wet my pants when I saw them on YouTube!

Ellen, if you do nothing else tonight, view entry #4.

I've been trying to get across to her how completely freakazoid kid's shows were in the 70s for years now. All she does is look at me, cock her head sideways, and say, "Pica?!?*" Now, for once, she will finally understand...

No kidding, man. They used to have "preview" shows on the networks each (Fall? Summer?) season that'd showcase the latest kid shows premiering that Saturday. I remember losing sleep waiting for Captain Kool and the Kongs to premiere Saturday morning. I also remember being completely flabbergasted that dad would come watch Electro Woman and Dyna Girl with us (just like he did with the contemporary Wonder Woman). Now, well, I pretty much understand. Both of them.

And you people wonder why I'm so weird.

----
* Ellen's bankshot reference, translated, roughly, to "I've spent all day with this quite-obviously-well-but-kept-home-to-keep-daycare-from-being-quarantined child." I'm getting ready to sacrifice a cat to the Wonderpets. Or you. Now, what was it you were asking me again?

So, I would imagine, says Conan the bacterium, a critter that can withstand ionizing radiation thousands of times beyond what would quickly kill a human. The secret? Not DNA, as previously thought, but rather the number of manganese ions in its repair protein sequences. The discovery has implications in the methods used to prevent radiation sickness in, for example, space travelers.

If bible school was more like this, I probably would've gone a few more times. Something tells me the older parishoners wouldn't appreciate it as much.

Language is a bit "blue," and contains a few goofy but non-explicit drawings of nekkedness. If that'll get you in trouble, consider it NSFW.

Broward County Medical Examiner Joshua Perper said Smith died of "combined drug intoxication" with the sleeping medication chloral hydrate as the major factor.

Read the entire surprising article here.

So today is the first day of the rest of my (programmer) life. I just now created my very first "for real" web project. Sorta feels like those first moments of a real mission after you've gone through a new shooter's training scenario. You know where all the buttons are and what they do, but dammit someone's shooting and which one fired the grenade again?!?

But hey, everyone has to start somewhere. I'm starting here. It should be fun to see where it all leads.

Who would've thought selling aerospace junk would be profitable? While it'd be neat to own a full Apollo command module engine, as I recall it's about as big as a car. Meh, I got garage space!

Ron gets a no-prize that'll look snazzy in a Tuxedo for bringing us yet another example of advertising disguising itself as journalism. I never did get much into magazines like Esquire precisely because the stuff they recommended was always so ridiculously overpriced. $750 for a pair of brown wing-tips sure does put my high-zoot bicycling shoes into perspective.

uh...no Olivia. We already have a giant pony in the house. We do not need more of a zoo. Daddy will kill me if I buy it. Put back the giraffe and Mommy won't get hurt...

One more...

I may have a few more from this weekend. To be posted soon!

I get paid to do this.

Not to miss!

A very...err...sloppy NO-PRIZE to Ron!

From the Pet Expo we went to this weekend.

"We are also aware that her most famous attributes may require special treatment, so we are planning on using the best quality marble only."

...move my body all nightlong.

WTF? Samantha Fox as a town statue?

Looks like the A380 visit to Dulles won't be much of an event (for the general public) after all:

The aircraft is expected to arrive at Dulles some time after 9 p.m. on Sunday, March 25 and depart some time after 9 p.m. on Monday, March 26. The organizers of this event have not made arrangements for the general public to view the aircraft, its takeoffs or landings. Public areas of the airport do not offer a good view of the A380 when it is parked on the airfield.

Ah well.

That sound you're hearing is my head, ringing like a bell that's been given a bloody great whack with a fifteen pound sledge. We just covered "design by interface," which, from the comments, is quite familiar to at least some of you but was a concept I literally could not get my head around reading about it in books. I think I tried to teach myself Java and C# at least five times in ten years, and foundered every time on this concept. It would finally seem that, with the help of a harbor master, I have managed to steer clear of those rocks.

I now know what a nineteenth century shipwright must've felt the first time he ever saw a steamship under way.

You have to scroll down to really get the idea on just how BIG this place is!

It's the parsnip from hell!

...are not good enough!

The controversy has raged over whether the device, which has fish-like teeth that attach to the head and shaft of the penis, is a medieval device built on a hatred of men or whether it is an easy-to-use invention that could free millions of South African women from fear of rape.

NO! MEANS NO! OK?

Editor: No Ellen, You can't have one.

...that will shut them up!

"Hand-rearing a polar bear is not appropriate and is a serious violation of animal rights," Bild newspaper quoted animal rights campaigner Frank Albrecht as saying.

"In fact, the cub should have been killed," he added.

Like I said, we can solve the problem easily.

All men rejoice!

"I strongly believe that the Hooters concept is something that Israelis are looking for," Ofer Ahiraz, who bought the Hooters franchise for Israel, told Reuters Monday. "Hooters can suit the Israeli entertainment culture."

At Hooters, waitresses the company calls Hooters Girls serve spicy chicken wings, sandwiches, seafood and drinks.

Ahiraz said a specific location in Tel Aviv, Israel's most cosmopolitan city, had yet to be chosen, but he said it would not open restaurants near large religious populations, and they would not be kosher.

Right...they are worried about kosher.

So far, it's definitely worth the price. The instructor knows most of the people who created the language (C#) personally, and even made a few minor contributions himself. My lab partner is very smart but gets lost in different areas, and so far we're working together well. My aborted attempt to teach myself the language has stood me well... so far it's mostly a matter of remembering rather than learning. That will change, but hopefully I'll have much more confidence when it does.

I'm glad I have an hour to go soak my head.

Ok, not really. Today marks the start of the first of my nearly-week-long computer programming classes. Since the Philistines that run the place don't connect the classroom computers to the internet (attention? Distraction? Speak not of these things!) posting will be rather light. Hell they don't even have chairs in the "internet room!" This represents an innovation I will surely be exploring for the staff computer room come convention time. It may prevent the limpet-like behavior most of them exhibit when they're able to sit down in front of a computer.

Jerred tried luring the cat.

"Here, kitty, kitty," Black said.

The cat fidgeted, but even chicken wings didn't do the trick.

Then, someone suggested grabbing a chain saw.

Chuck headed to the truck. Michael moved down the ladder, grabbed the chain saw and cranked it up. He handed it to Jerred.

Black handed out cans of Sierra Mist soda to the workers and her family.

It's not what you think! Read the whole story!

I never said she was "normal."

Could we finally be seeing the results of an emphasis on humint (human intelligence) in our secret services? The article was linked from Fark, so your mileage may indeed vary, but it is definitely an interesting development.

Reading main stream reviews of 300, I began to suspect that it wasn't the movie the critics didn't like, rather it was its politics. If Neal Stephenson's op-ed is any indication, my hunch was bang-on. And if a Greek anthropologist likes it, it can't be all that bad. Since my motto is "if it gets mixed reviews and looks interesting, it goes on the list," this one has definitely been moved to "on."

Getting it moved onto Ellen's list, well, that's a whole different ballgame.

Via Siflay.

Because if you do, they might mistake your thumb for lunch. This one takes awhile to unfold, but it works because for once you know one of these geniuses is going to get exactly what he deserved.

The Airbus A380 will be making a tour of the US next week, including a March 25th stop at Dulles. On a Sunday. Next to my house. Woot!

Is there nothing safe from George Lucas's promotion machine? Co-opting a cereal box is one thing, but turning government property into an advertisement is something else entirely.

Ah well. It is Star Wars after all. If a couple hundred mail boxes get slapped with R2D2 stickers, no biggie.

Now if they start trying to turn fire hydrants into mini Jar-Jars, well, we'll have to have a conversation about that.

Seems like some caterpillars use warning noises instead of warning colors to alert predators that they're nowhere near as tasty as they look. I wonder if that could be leveraged into some sort of widget to shoo birds away from garden plants?

"Excuse me sir, would you like soda, juice, coffee, or a corpse?"

Having a flight crew load a dead body next to your first-class seat sounds like something out of a black comedy. Knowing how original Hollywood is, it most likely will be made into one soon.

Skippy on a walk at the goose pond. Notice the ferocity of this cat! GRR!! I say! GRR!!

Slinky eating a hopper.

We are surprised Ron is not naked and humping the star.

More to come...daily though. There is only so much pasta I can take!

Get rid of it now and contact the company.

Recall Information 1-866-895-2708

• Americas Choice, Preferred Pets
• Authority *
• Best Choice
• Companion
• Compliments
• Demoulas Market Basket
• Eukanuba *
• Fine Feline Cat
• Food Lion *
• Foodtown *
• Giant Companion *
• Hannaford
• Hill Country Fare
• Hy-Vee
• Iams *
• Laura Lynn
• Li'l Red
• Loving Meals
• Meijer's Main Choice
• Nutriplan
• Nutro Max Gourmet Classics *
• Nutro Natural Choice *
• Paws
• Pet Pride *
• Presidents Choice
• Price Chopper *
• Priority *
• Save-A-Lot
• Schnucks
• Science Diet Feline Savory Cuts Cans *
• Sophistacat *
• Special Kitty Canada
• Special Kitty US
• Springfield Prize
• Sprout
• Total Pet
• Wegmans *
• Western Family
• White Rose
• Winn Dixie

*=cat food that is found easily in PetsMart and Petco

Aviation Week's latest cover story details UAV operations in Iraq and Afghanistan. It's a helluva lot more complicated than I thought it would be, and that's saying something.

It does a body good! I've seen some real Japanese advertising on various specials. This isn't too far off the mark.

SFW!

NASA recently calibrated its new STEREO-B solar observation satellite, and unlike most calibrations the results were most definitely worth a look. I can't wait for the 3-D movies of sun storms to start coming out.

Ron gets a no-prize with a surprisingly authentic grunt for bringing us news of ringtones based on the calls of endangered species. It's bad enough Ellen's phone detonates with this blaring trumpet fandango from who knows where. Now she can actually have it roar like a tiger? Just what I always wanted.

Scientists have discovered a massive amount of water ice buried under the south pole of Mars. Supposedly they've found enough to cover the whole planet to a depth of 30 feet. Strangely, this huge amount isn't large enough to explain many of the geological signs of water that have been found. However, this would appear to be only the first dataset from the last-to-be-deployed MARSIS radar probe installed on the Mars Express orbiter. Scientists will next try to measure the north pole, and then as much of the rest of the planet as they can. Who knows? It may all still be there.

Fark linked up this interesting look at the peculiar Amish practice of "Rumspringa," the custom of letting young Amish adults do whatever they want in the modern world without fear of shunning until they formally join the Amish church. As usual, the real thing is more sophisticated than it's portrayed on TV.

Slime: check. Bizarre shape: check. Weirdly made up model: check. That settles it, it's definitely high fashion.

DO! NOT! WANT!

I'm such a non-fan of basketball someone else had to tell me the Razorbacks made it to the tournament and have a decent shot at making it to the next round. The line seems to be USC by 2.5, which to me sounds like it could be anybody's game. Pig! Sooey!

Ron making the obvious comment in 3... 2... 1...

Scientists have discovered even more evidence of liquids on the surface of Titan. This time the bodies of what are presumed to be liquid methane are near the poles and as big as Lake Superior. There's still no direct evidence that they are in fact filled with liquid, but no other likely explanation seems to have been proposed.

A 13 year old monster from a small town near Columbus, Ohio who's managed to rack up 128 felonies in a single year. There's a really grim, ugly story somewhere in this kid's life, and while I'd like to think the Juvenile system will rehabilitate him, I can't say I'm holding out much hope.

Mark gets an old-but-good no-prize for reminding us the end of the world can be damned amusing. At least now all our friends will understand what the hell we're talking about when we sigh the line in the title.

Fark (of course) linked up news of a family promoting their own daughter's career in porn. Promoting it all the way to lobbying Real Doll to make a copy of her. Definitely the gold-standard story for the sheer number of skeeve factors.

Proof no matter how stable you try to make it, it's just about impossible to get three perfectly motionless hand-held shots in low light conditions. Each of the three elements was sharp, but I couldn't help moving the camera between them.

While the answer to the question, "how historically accurate is the movie 300?" is rather predictable, the author still provides a good look at what Sparta was really like during classical times. Expecting a film based on a comic book graphic novel to even vaguely represent an historical event is rather like expecting Ann Coulter and John Edwards to elope to the Bahamas, but if it gets people interested in the classics and finding out what really happened, I call that a Good Thing.

Spend thousands of hours, tens of thousands of dollars, crash and burn anyway. 16 foot of jet-powered R/C airplane, reduced to flinders in a moment. Hey, at least he got a divorce out of it!

No, really, radioactive stockings! If it means mo' bettah' space probes, I'm all for it!

... every day you see one of those funky dental picks incorporated into a bird's nest. The strange things you see on the way to buy a sandwich for lunch!

Mark gets a no-prize that'll use a pen in a creative way for bringing us a public service announcement all men will pay attention to. Women, maybe not so much.

Mark your calendars: Thursday is the fifth-annual "Eat a Tasty Animal for PETA (IEATAPETA) Day." While I quite respect the vegans I actually know, I've always found PETA to be grating, puerile, and counterproductive. If poking a fork in a steak will poke a fork in their eye, I'm all for it.

A vegan might counter that celebrating death as a way of annoying an idiotic organization is a bit like dancing around a burning building because I think Scientology's headquarters is tacky. To which I can only say, "gotta match?"

Via TBIOFC

Yet another drug has been found that promises significant and sudden improvement in quality of life for brain damaged people. This time it's a drug originally developed to fight insomnia. The findings seem to be very preliminary (they seem to only have evidence for it working on a single individual), but any progress is a good thing, I suppose.

Taken at the museum outing this past weekend.

Olivia, being Olivia, kept trying to boss her cousin JT around as we wandered the museum. Every time he ignored her and swirled off on his own tangent, she'd put her hands on her hips and yell out in a very exasperated tone, "Jaayymes!"

She is, after all, her mother's child.

No-prize to Jeff for sharing with us pictures taken with his snazzy new camera!

Is there nothing environmentalists won't try to ruin? European automakers only started to pay attention to environmental controls on automobiles when German scientists linked damage to Germany's Black Forest to auto emissions back in the early 80s. As noted in the article, congestion has forced speed limits to be imposed in many sections of the Autobahn, and obviates the lack of a speed limit in many others. Setting a mandated speed limit may be just a formality. More's the pity.

I'm not particularly surprised scientists who doubt that global warming is caused by human activity are being threatened. They are, after all, going after one of the most sacred of leftist cows. What is interesting is how widely these sorts of things are being reported. Could it be that, after Al Gore's triumph, the media have decided in their famously contrary way to foment a backlash? Could it simply be that those of us who have our doubts are now officially sick and tired of it, and are not taking it anymore? Are the cow-eyed idealistic college students who drove most of this finally becoming grizzled, disappointed cynics like the rest of us?

All the world wonders...

Don’t move that rock. You’ll kill the fairies! If nothing else, we now have definitive proof that the Luddites in Northern Virginia have not in fact tried everything under the sun to stop developers.

Me, Olivia, and my nephew, James at the Udvay-Hazy museum this past weekend.

Olivia already pitches fits when her princess dresses are in the wash. I can't imagine what she'd be like if a real wedding dress were available. From previous experience, it won't much matter. Women go bananas preparing for a wedding, no matter what the dress is like. Seems to be a valued part of the experience, far as I can tell.

Today's mysterious quiet has been brought to you by: Microsoft, who's decision to make the time zone patch a "roll-up" instead of a critical update resulted in none of my users getting the thing automatically sent to them last month. You see, in the Land of Microsoft critical updates are the best-tested, most-important updates. All others (including fruit security roll-ups) tend to have things like "new features" (bugs) or "new software" (beta tests) included in them, so I never bothered to select those categories for download, let alone automatic install.

Discovering why, exactly, the automated install hadn't actually automated or installed, when the auto update widget had been steaming along happily for the past 18 months, took about four hours. Implementing the fix took about 2 more, and now I'm chasing down the broken or somewhat schizoid computers which won't take the update at all.

This time I really do blame the Bush administration, along with busybody congress critters who quite clearly need to be kept much more busy than they are at present.

Next...

Keep in mind my only tripod was a very flexy bit of plastic about six inches tall. There aren't too many tabletops in the museum, so composition was a bit of a challenge.

The most polished aircraft I've ever seen. I'm sure there's a story behind that finish, I just have to discover the person to ask.

There's a whole story behind this aircraft's restoration (last paragraph). You'll find quite a few pictures of this display if you Google "Fw 190 Smithsonian." These provide a nice insight into what HDR allows you to do.

We LOVE Vegas! We went to Vegas ONCE! ONCE I say! It was a nightmare to get there, but we had a great time!

I have decided I want to move to the desert. Nice and sunny all the time. Humming birds... tacky city... yadda yadda yadda...

Then I came across this this.

An interesting day to day blog. Informative on what being a cocktail waitress is really like. TIP THOSE GALS DAMMIT!

Ok, and she has an adorable baby to boot!

Take a read. It's quite fun!

In all honesty, I don't know the story behind this one. It was just a neat plane with cool lighting.

From memory: Boeing employees in the late 80s got together and restored the only surviving 307 Stratoliner (a pre-war B-17 civilian variant) to flying condition, including the ever-so-rare interior. On its second, maybe third flight (say, 1996), something went very wrong with the fuel system, and to save their lives the crew bellied her into a lake off the end of a runway, ruining said restoration. The fished her out, re-did it all again, and then flew her straight to Dulles, where she remains parked to this day.

I only wish they could figure out a way to tour the inside.

Family outing to the Air and Space Annex today. This one is (so far) Ellen's favorite, reminding her of a swirl of airplanes.

No-PRIZE to Amber for sending us this little ditty.Posted by Ellen at 09:45 AM | Comments (1)