And by “difficult” I mean “impossible.”
I was going to say that Hardware Wars had generated some very strange stuff
Twenty sports fans rules. Especially #20:
20. If you hail from New York, you can’t root for the Yankees and the Mets. You have to choose between them. Repeat: You have to choose between them. Don’t give me this “As long as one of them is doing well, at least New York is winning” spiels. What is this, the sports fan’s version of bisexuality? How about making a choice? Any New Yorker who said the words “It’s the Yankees versus the Mets … I can’t lose!” during the 2000 World Series deserves to be tortured with a cattle prod.
For the record? Mets. That was my father’s team… and that’s pretty much that, damn your eyes.
I was reminded of this story (found in Bruce Sterling’s short story collection Globalhead
Big species are not the problem. Sure, in popular science fiction movies T.Rex or a Raptor rips apart a bunch of people. But big species make big targets for rifles and fishing harpoons. Plus, lots of guys would love to hunt down the genetically engineered dino that is terrorizing suburbs. It is the littler ones that are too numerous to easily control that pose the bigger threat. Genetically engineered species could really upend whole ecosystems by being very effective at outcompeting other species.
Scientists have discovered some of the genetic variations that make influenza strains more lethal and will in time identify genetic variations that make other pathogens more or less dangerous. Therefore another future threat comes in the form of a genetically engineered massive killer pandemic for humans. The same sort of threat exists for other species. Imagine a flu that would kill most sheep or cows or pigs. Or imagine some genetically engineered pathogen that would wipe out assorted wild species. This will probably become technically doable.
Probably, but it’s not what I worry about. Continue reading Our Neural Chernobyl, Revisited.
This is an appropriate final resting place, I think:
Star Trek Creator’s Ashes Headed for Space
The ashes of Gene Roddenberry, creator of “Star Trek,” and his late wife Majel Barrett Roddenberry are scheduled to be shot into space on a Celestis Memorial Spaceflight in about a year and a half. Part of Mr. Roddenberry’s remains were already shot into space, though they were only given the “Earth Orbit Service,” which starts at $2,495 according to the Celestis website. The other portion of his remains along with his wife’s will be upgrading to the very fitting “Voyager Service,” which starts at $12,500 and can run up to $37,500. This will launch their remains into deep space, never to return to Earth.
For my part, I pretty much assume that they’ll just go through my organs for anything useful and just bury the rest. Given the general lack of communication between this life and the next one, I doubt that I’m going to be able to make any complaints known to the corporeal authorities anyway.
Moe Lane
PS: The thought of having my body cremated and the ashes thrown into someone’s face is amusing, but it’s also kind of lame.
Guess it’s settled whether there’s money in that franchise, huh?
According to the Associated Press, a lawsuit was filed yesterday in a Manhattan federal court on behalf of four shareholders of Stan Lee Media, Inc. against Stan Lee, his partner Arthur Lieberman, his wife Joan Clayton, Marvel Entertainment, Inc. and producer Avi Arad. The four unnamed shareholders are seeking more then $750 million in profits from films based on Marvel characters, including “Spider-Man,” “X-Men” and “Iron Man.”
While details are still trickling in regarding specifics to the case, the AP reports that the lawsuit claims profits from Lee’s comic creations belong to the company after emerging from bankruptcy in 2006. The suit claims Lee and the others named in the proceedings ignored the company and shareholder’s interests.
I came across this while looking up Watchmen info – see Moe succumb to the Fanboy side of the Force! Succumb, Moe, succumb! – and while I figure that this will probably get settled it’s still a little interesting. I mean, sure, between the Spiderman
Moe Lane
PS: Watchmen comes out in March; Star Trek’s still up for May. And I don’t know what’s going to be the big summer must-see movies, yet.
It’s the last line of a good article on the decline of academic relationships inside the academy itself (via Ann Althouse, via Glenn Reynolds). The very short version? Professors and teachers in the same college don’t hang out any more, which makes them easy meat every time somebody with a chip on their shoulder decides to offer one of them up on the altar of insensitivity. And the people running the colleges don’t actually mind, because this works out for them in the long run: makes it easier for them to do the diversity hiring that keeps the chip-on-their-shoulder people quiet. Of course, hiring primarily for diversity makes it harder to develop personal academic relationships (which leads to hanging out), so…
This would all be Nasty Fun hysterical, with a double helping of schadenfreude, except for one thing: in about sixteen years I have to send my kid to one of these places for an education. Having them collectively remove their craniums from their rectums before then would be optimal.
Moe Lane
PS: It’s been years since high school Latin, sorry. I don’t even feel like looking up what those two plurals would be.
Crossposted at RedState.
It’s not doing its usual insane growth, but Mickey D’s isn’t losing money, either:
McDonald’s profit tops view, sales growth slows
NEW YORK/LOS ANGELES (Reuters) – McDonald’s Corp reported a quarterly profit that handily topped Wall Street estimates, but said it saw growth in some overseas markets soften as a U.S.-led recession went global.
Shares of the world’s largest hamburger chain were down 0.5 percent in afternoon trade after falling as much as 2.6 percent earlier in the session.
McDonald’s posted a 5.8 percent rise in worldwide December sales at restaurants open at least 13 months.
The results are still ahead of most other restaurant operators, but mark a slowdown from the company’s own November and October results, when McDonald’s said same-store sales rose 7.7 percent and 8.2 percent, respectively.
I don’t do Twitter.
There was a moment where Monty Python’s The Meaning of Life
Can you figure out when it was?
