Kirstie Alley's Bikini Shock

I'm not sure I really understand the audience reaction here. I think she looks very good. She's certainly lost a lot of weight.

To the Victor go the Spoils

Just a thought, Sadam Hussein has now come to the end of his trial on the charges of Crimes Against Humanity for the brutal killing of political and religious opponents. For the record I believe he was likely guilty of mass murder although for whatever reason this most incredibly important trial since Nuremburg was covered very little by CNN. Bear in mind there was gavel to gavel coverage of O.J. Simpson and Michael Jackson trials. Every piece of evidence examined by talking heads. With Sadam, we're expected to simply believe what the U.S. administration has to say. After all, they haven't lied to the world in the past. (Notice incidentally he has NOT been charged with any responsibility for terror attacks on the Excited States of America even though that was given as the secondary reason for the invasion of Iraq once WMDs were proven not to exist) Now then, if this were a fair fight in the playground sense, and somehow the Iraqui's won and successfully captured the U.S. leaders, is there doubt in anyones mind that George W. Bush and his cronies would be tried on the same charge of Crimes Against Humanity for the thousands of combatants and innocents killed in the Iraq invasion? Also, what about the numerous incidents of torture carried out and still occuring to this day? As I say, just a thought.

Weird Al Canadian Idiot

This is Weird Al's cover of American Idiot by Green Day, and a rather good slide show to go with it. Here are the lyrics by the way: Weird Al Yankovic Canadian Idiot Lyrics

Don’t want to be a Canadian idiot

Dont want to be some beer swillin’ hockey nut
and do I look like some frost bitten hosehead
I never learned my alphabet from A to zed

They all live on donuts and moose meat
and they leave the house without packin’ heat
never even bring their guns to the mall
and you know what else is too funny
their stupid monopoly money
can’t take ‘em seriously at all

Well maple syrup and snow’s what they export
they treat curling just like it’s a real sport
they think their silly accent is so cute
can’t understand a thing they’re talking aboot

sure they got their national health care
cheaper meds for prime rates and clean air
then again well they got celine dion
eat their weight in kraft macaroni
and dream of driving a zamboni
all over saskatchewan

Don’t want to be a Canadian idiot

We’ll figure out their temperature in Celcius
see the map they’re hovering right over us
tell you the truth it makes me kinda nervous

always hear the same kind of story
break your nose and they’ll just say sorry
tell me what kind of freaks are that polite
It’s gotta mean they’re all up to something
so quick before they see it coming
time for a pre-emptive strike

In the Jungle

In the Jungle, Very impressed with this dogs dancing ability.

Halloween

20 Things the Average Person Doesn't Know about XP

This is an interesting article. Contains a few bits of useful information.

IE7 Looks Pretty Good to Me

I must say I'm quite impressed with IE7. The tab feature works extremely well and it integrated all of my existing settings such as my Google toolbar with ease. I haven't experimented with the improved RSS function but understand the detection capabilities are impressive. I've also read the search function using multiple engines is something I need to try but let's face it, I really am a Google fan. There certainly doesn't seem to be any downside to upgrading from 6 if you have the requisite OS. Apparently IE7 will only work with WinXP SR2 and the upcoming Vista. It seems IE7 relies on the security provided by the XP operating system.

Western researcher develops HIV AIDS vaccine

This is the good news. "A pioneering HIV/AIDS vaccine developed by a virology professor at The University of Western Ontario is being readied for clinical trial.
The vaccine developed by Dr. Yong Kang, of the Schulich School of Medicine & Dentistry could be available for therapeutic use within three years and for use as a preventive vaccine within the next six years." They do some really fine science at the UWO here in London Ontario.

IQ - Genetic ?

On the other hand ....

The University of Western Ontario is also the academic home of Phillipe Rushton. Yes, the same Phillipe Rushton who devined physical, intellectual and anatomical differences between the races. Now he reports: "Men are smarter than women, according to a controversial new study that adds another cinder to the fiery debate over whether gender impacts general inetelligence". I have to say in defence of Rushton, I honestly believe he analyzed available data and produced a report. Well probably not him but one of his research assistants who happens to be quite proficient in database programming. Is it wrong to say for example that on average, people of African heritage tend to have skin several shades darker than the average Caucasian? Also to be fair the difference is only 3.6 percentage points.

Outside The Box

Mental Health Hotline

CLICK if you need help.

Off the Couch All You Slugs

This one goes out especially to Joan. One of her favourite songs.

Dubya Impression

This guy definitely does the best George W Bush impressions. Funny stuff. Thanks JibJab .

Compilments of: The Bob and Tom Show

"I am trying to learn Spanish so that I can start Text-Mexing people."
- Heywood Banks

"I won't tell you how many times my dad has been married, but if they were sandwiches, his next one would be free."
- Jimmy Pardo

"Using it as a suppository seems to take all of the romance out of heroin."
- Tom Griswold

"In my twenties I was anal about my birth control. Literally."
- Laurie Kilmartin

"Some day I want to hold your hand and run across the rainbow little fluff-puff."
- Harland Williams to Frank Caliendo as George W. Bush

"I feel like a dog listening to a card trick."
- Chick McGee while listening to Don McMillan's tech joke

Guardian Unlimited reports: "Security at the Prime Minister's residence is under review after an intruder armed with a large kitchen knife managed to climb into a secure area outside Downing Street." Thank goodness someone was watching the back door. It's certainly safer at Downing than at the Canadian PMs home at Sussex Drive. Mind you that was back in 1995. Hopefully it's a little more secure now.

CHEAT SHEET

J-Walk pointed me to this very interesting pdf file that contains a lot of Google functions I wasn't aware of. I can see it will come in quite handy. Things like define:phrase or word retrieves definitions fast and easy.

The Works of Pablo Picasso

The Works of Pablo Picasso

I've always been fascinated with Picasso's work. The Online Picasso Project has an extensive archive of his works. I had know idea just how prolific an artist he was. This site containes 11,133 catalogued artworks. I've saved a number of these images and use them as a slide show screen saver. I've heard that Picasso was known to draw small artistic representations on scraps of paper and napkins to pay his bar tab on occasion. I certainly wish someone would accept a chart of a database structure from me in payment of my tab. I'd sign it of course.

Deep Thoughts

ON DEEP THOUGHTS
A day without sunshine is like night.

ON HIGHER EDUCATION
College is a fountain of knowledge...and most of the students are there to drink.

ON MATHEMATICAL TRANSFORMS
A polar bear is a rectangular bear after a coordinate transform.

ON COMMON SENSE
Never pet a burning dog.

ON PROBLEM SOLVING
When the only tool you own is a hammer, every problem begins to resemble a nail.
-- Abraham Maslow

ON MATERIALISM
He who dies with the most toys, is, nonetheless, still dead.

ON ECONOMICS
The cost of living hasn't affected its popularity.

ON PUBLISHING OR PERISHING
I am returning this otherwise good typing paper to you because someone has printed gibberish all over it and put your name at the top.
-- English Professor, Ohio University

ON DATING
When aiming for the common denominator, be prepared for the occasional division by zero.

ON LAMENTATION
Of all the things I've lost, I miss my mind the most.

ON POETIC LOVE
When you're swimmin' in the creek,
And an eel bites your cheek,
That's a Moray!
-- Fabulous Furry Freak Brothers

ON EXTINCTION
Save the whales. Collect the whole set.

ON HUMILITY
To err is human, to moo bovine.

ON EXPLANATION OF THE END
"... one of the main causes of the fall of the Roman Empire was that, lacking zero, they had no way to indicate successful termination of their C programs."
-- Robert Firth

ON PROPHECY
The meek shall inherit the earth--- for they are too weak to refuse.

ON WORLD POLITICS
Diplomacy is the art of saying "nice doggy" until you can find a rock.

AND FINALLY, ON DRUGS AND DEVELOPMENT
There are two major products to come out of Berkeley: LSD and UNIX. We don't believe this to be a coincidence.

THE PAEOMNEHAL PWEOR OF THE HMUAN MNID

Ignor the jumbled nature of the following paragraph and just read it:

Aoccdrnig to a rscheearch at Cmabrigde Uinervtisy, it deosn't mttaer in waht oredr the ltteers in a wrod are, the olny iprmoatnt tihng is taht the frist and lsat ltteer be in the rghit pclae. The rset can be a taotl mses and you can sitll raed it wouthit porbelm. Tihs is bcuseae the huamn mnid deos not raed ervey lteter by istlef, but the wrod as a wlohe.

Flybar 800 Flip Variations

This is kind of cool.

Furgler Hardware Summer Video

The previous post about Camel Toe reminded me I hadn't been to the Bob & Tom site in quite some time. Now, I know today is Labour Day the official end of summer, but this is still too good to pass up. From the boys at Bob & Tom , they take a call from Furgler Hardware who apparently has a summer instruction in house video. It's a radio show so listen to the soundtrack here.

Blooper Stargate SG1

Although I was never a McGyver fan, I can still appreciate the humour.

Crocodile Hunter Dead at 44

From Australia Broadcasting Network. After all those years of handling crocodiles and venomous snakes, he apparently was killed by a sting ray. "His producer and close friend John Stainton says he was swimming above a stingray on Batt Reef when it suddenly pierced his heart with the barb on its tail. Very sad, I thought he was a very interesting and entertaining guy.

Moosehead now Largest Canadian Owned Brewery

According to CBC News , Moosehead is now officially the largest Canadian owned brewery. How sad is that? "With the impending sale of yet another major brewery to foreign interests - this time Ontario-based Sleeman Breweries (TSX:ALE) to Sapporo of Japan - the Canadian brewing industry is all but dead." My own beloved brand Molson Canadian has been spirited away by Coors. Does this mean that in Smoky and the Bandit IX Burt Reynolds will be doing a beer run to Montreal. "Mon Dieu!"

Camel Toe

I know, this is old but it just cracks me up. From the Tom and Bob show : Get the lyrics and wmv file here .

Not to be confused by the way with Camel "Toads " apparently found at public swimming pools.

Bubba and the Boys pick the Wrong BMer

I was directed to this video by A Welsh View . I'm not sure if it's real or not. If it isn't it should be.

Cult or Religion ?

(In the two years since Jeffs has been a fugitive from justice, he has built three compounds from scratch in Colorado, South Dakota and Texas, the latter including a huge white temple.)

You tell me, the Las Vegas Sun reports: Warren Jeffs was captured in Las Vegas today. He was wanted by authorites on charges of polygamy 80 or so wives and according to the SanAntonio Current 'It's also possible that he has raped dozens of children. Jeffs is wanted for sex with a minor, conspiracy to have sex with a minor and rape as an accomplice (of a minor).' You just know he is going to quote scripture at his trial. Jeff's of course is a Mormon and don't kid yourself one of the four books they use to dictate doctrine is the good old King James bible. Religion, the true root of all evil.

Is Canada Facing a Quagmire in Afghanistan?

Likely not in the classic sense of the U.S. rut in Viet Nam (1950? - 1975 ) or the U.S.S.R. when they took on the Afghan rebels (1978 - 1982). But, if we're truly under the direction of the United States in this effort to tame the untameable there may be reason to take pause. Afghanistan is currently on the political back burner in the U.S. however, a case can certainly be made for the need to continue the policing of the country by NATO and coalition forces. The next president of the United States will undoubtedly still have both files on his desk when he first takes his seat in the oval office. The current Canadian government is striving to prove itself to the U.S. as a true ally and Canadian soldiers are paying the price for this reconciliation. To be fair, I felt a limited strike in Afghanistan to close the terrorist training bases and track down and capture Osama Bin Laden was more than justified but this turned out to be a rehearsal for the Iraqui invasion. Nothing short of regime change would suffice.

History tells us this region is best left alone. The British found out in the 1800s and Rudyard Kipling states it best in his poem "The Young British Soldier "

'When you're wounded and left on Afghanistan's plains,
And the women come out to cut up what remains,
Jest roll to your rifle and blow out your brains
An' go to your Gawd like a soldier.'

Things in Afghanistan haven't changed much since 1839 and we may as well learn from history now, sooner than later we will have to leave this land to the people who live there.

Time for Sensible Profiling Perhaps

According to news reports , passengers are becoming increasingly alarmed by fellow passengers based on their prejudice:

British holidaymakers staged an unprecedented mutiny - refusing to allow their flight to take off until two men they feared were terrorists were forcibly removed.

The extraordinary scenes happened after some of the 150 passengers on a Malaga-Manchester flight overheard two men of Asian appearance apparently talking Arabic.

Passengers told cabin crew they feared for their safety and demanded police action.

In my opinion, this sort of irrationality can be resolved if airport screeners around the world were allowed to use sensible profiling and in depth screening of passengers. This of course will only work in conjunction with a concerted effort to assure the flying public that such efforts are being made and safety is thereby assured.

Are You Pretty Enough?

Remembering the Laci Peterson case and with the return to the U.S. of John Karr the 41 year old school teacher who has confessed to the kidnap murder of 6 year old JonBenet Ramsey in Colorado Christmas of 1996, I once again question the conscience and morality of the average U.S. citizen. It seems the only victims worthy of media interest are white, beautiful and at the very least middle to upper middle class.

What Of the Faceless Victims?

I confess I haven't broken down the statistics but I'm certain the week JonBenet disappeared there were hundreds of black, Hispanic and poor white children abused, kidnapped and/or murdered in the United States. The simple fact the FBI in its 1996 Uniform Crime Reports , lists a shocking 19,645 occurrences of Murders and Nonnegligent Manslaughter that year must give one pause. How many of these murder victims do you remember? How many of these murders were reported on CNN? Ask yourself, was there anything particularly outstanding about the murder of JonBenet other than her status and its occurrence during Christmas. Such holidays seem to bring as much aggression and depression to the surface as joy to the world. If anything the statistics for that week would have been considerably higher than other times of the year. When time permits I intend to explore the statistics in more detail in a future post.

Media Must Make Money

How many of the disenfranchised victims made it to the front page? Very few I suspect and none got the overwhelming T.V. coverage that a 6 year old beauty princess did. Don't even get me started on the horrid exploitation of these little girls by their twisted parents projecting some displaced narcissism on their children.

Face the Problem

What is the matter with the good Christian people of the God Blessed America that they care more about one blond blue eyed victim than the large number of daily victims of poverty, drugs and sexual deviancy. Concentrating on the inherent sickness of a society caused by it's social blinders surely is more important than solving a ten year old murder mystery.

I admire the tabloid This Week With George Stephanopoulos for closing every episode with a listing of U.S. service men and women who lost their lives that week. It brings the tragedy of the war in Iraq to the attention of the American citizen in a graphic sense. What a tremendous value it would be for CNN to end each segment with a listing of those Americans murdered that day (approximately 60) name, age, gender and city.

In all sincerity, my heart goes out to those who loved and cherished JonBenet. No child should ever experience such a death in this world, and no loved one should ever be faced with this sort of wrenching loss.

Writely Revitalizes BLOG

Well! I am impressed. Writely, the new Google offering that is attempting to allow on-line collaboration using a word processor, much like the excel offering Google presented not long ago, WORKS. Yes it does, and most importantly it makes BLOG posting so much more simple. Alright, watch this blog, I'll now be using it much more due to this incredibly simple means of posting. Try it, you'll like it.

The Tax Man Cometh

Well it's 5 days until the deadline for filing. We're allowed until June 15th. to submit the first business income tax return and to be honest my procrastination tendancies are showing. The amount of paperwork is daunting to say the least. Hopefully if I get everything right, there won't be a huge tax bill but, we'll need to see.
Usual Saturday. Full breakfast, a little relaxation. England plays in the world cup today and although I'm not a football fan, I am genetically disposed to things English. After that, a little grocery shopping and if I feel like it, a long overdue haircut and some shopping for odds and ends for my friend Joan.
I'll check back later and report whether any of the above was done.

Susie and the Gender Benders

This is Susie. The old Susie when she was evil and annoying as hell.

Susie came to me as a gift from a client who found her as a stray some time ago. Cute little thing. Quite small for her age (the vet says she's likely 2 years old).

Anyhow, shortly after receiving this little bundle of joy, I came to discover just how demonic a female cat in heat can be. The noises are the horrid utterances one would expect to hear rising from the bowels of hell.
In addition, this little 2 lb. writhing fur ball of sexual energy seemed to want to constantly mate with an imaginary tom cat that somehow was growing out of my shoulder. Night and day made no difference. Ignoring her would cause this creature to break any rules previously laid out and agreed to simply in order to attract my attention. Climbing on the entertainment console, scurrying up drapes, batting paperwork and equipment from the desk, nothing was taboo any longer.
Well, we fixed that! Or I should say the vet fixed that. After uncerimoniously stuffing Susie into her carrier she was swept away to the clinic and returned home the same day a changed creature.
I suspect we now have a cat that will live like other of her species. Totally ignoring me. No longer crawling onto my lap at all times and nudging my ankles while I make the rounds of my lodgings.
But the peace. The sweet, sweet peaceful nights. Worth it? YES I say YES !
Update: August 21, 2006. What a sweetie, she's completely reformed and I'm happy to say is an absolute joy to live with. Mind you, her appetite has increased and she's gaining weight.
Suzie today:

In the beginning ...

There was a blog. A blog much like many other blogs and yet, somehow unique. I intend over the next days and weeks to put down my thoughts much in the way of a diary. By doing this I hope to gain an insight into myself. Introspection if you will. Something I don't seem to do enough of.
In addition this may be the beginnings of a journal of the banal and insightful.
Time will tell. Now let's begin ...