Star Trek meets Monty Python

Please help yourself to some old slices of Lemon Harangue Pie while I'm on vacation. Enjoy!

Star Trek meets Monty Python
(originally posted 10/31/2008)

There's a fly in my urinal

Please help yourself to some old slices of Lemon Harangue Pie while I'm on vacation. Enjoy!

There's a fly in my urinal
(originally posted 04/29/2008)

If you visit the Amsterdam Airport Schiphol, and if you're a guy (or maybe that doesn't even matter -- I mean, it is Amsterdam after all), you may notice a fly in each of the urinals in the bathroom. Yes, in the urinals. These "targets" are etched into the porcelain in an effort to improve aim and prevent excess spillage.

Richard H. Thaler and Cass R. Sunstein of The New Republic address this important issue:

As all women who have ever shared a toilet with a man can attest, men can be especially spacey when it comes to their, er, aim. In the privacy of a home, that may be a mere annoyance. But, in a busy airport restroom used by throngs of travelers each day, the unpleasant effects of bad aim can add up rather quickly. Enter an ingenious economist who worked for Schiphol International Airport in Amsterdam. His idea was to etch an image of a black house fly onto the bowls of the airport's urinals, just to the left of the drain. The result: Spillage declined 80 percent. It turns out that, if you give men a target, they can't help but aim at it. In the grand sweep of global affairs, dirty bathrooms may be a relatively minor problem. But, by placing fly images on its urinals, the Amsterdam airport was using a technique with broad applications in the world of business and even politics. We call that technique "choice architecture." A choice architect is anyone who influences the context in which people choose -- say, by deciding what order to put menu items in, or what path to encourage shoppers to take through a supermarket, or what information to give investors about their retirement savings options, or what to tell patients deciding how to deal with a medical problem. Because seemingly tiny changes in the environment can influence behavior, choice architects wield immense power. Theirs is a gentle power, since they merely nudge rather than coerce. But their nudges can have major effects.

Some men may need more than a nudge, but this certainly is a start.

Now THAT'S what I call conceal-carry!

Please help yourself to some old slices of Lemon Harangue Pie while I'm on vacation. Enjoy!

Now THAT'S what I call conceal-carry!
(originally posted 03/05/2008)

SwissMiniGun introduces the C1ST, the smallest revolver in the world:

It's total length does not exceed 5.5 cm.

It shoots 2.34 mm calibre rim fire ammunition which we have developed for it and which is the smallest rim fire ammunition in the World.

This miniature is a double action revolver and has all the same features as are found on a real size gun.

The manufacture of this exceptional miniature revolver has only been possible by exploiting the incomparable expertise and latest technologies of the Swiss Watch and Jewellery Industry, upon which its worldwide reputation is built.

Our revolver and its ammunition are 100% Swiss Made.

SwissMiniGun is a fully authorized and licenced gunsmith company in Switzerland.

Naturally, this weapon of mass destruction, with an astronomical range of nearly 370 feet, is banned from being imported into the Land of the Free. Why? Because the "barrel is less than three inches, meaning it is deemed too small to qualify for sporting purposes."

I guess that makes sense. After all, when the Founding Fathers sought to keep the federal government from infringing upon the right to keep and bear arms, they were only thinking about guns used for sporting purposes.

The C1ST in action:

Wife-saving technique for husbands

Please help yourself to some old slices of Lemon Harangue Pie while I'm on vacation. Enjoy!

Wife-saving technique for husbands
(originally posted on 02/22/2008)

We've all had basic CPR and first aid training in junior high. But here's a life-saving (or, more accurately, "wife-saving") technique they don't teach you in school.

According to a report in the Daily Mail, a 28-year-old wife and mother was awakened from a two-week coma when her husband gave her "a bloody good rollicking." When he was told by doctors that they may have to switch off his wife's life-support, he started nagging her to wake up, saying later that she "never liked getting told off."

"You start fighting, don't you dare give up on me now," he said. "I've had enough, stop mucking around and start breathing. Come back to me." She started breathing on her own just two hour later, and within five days, her ventilator was able to be shut off.

Husbands everywhere, take note. You should practice this wife-saving technique often. Don't wait until your lovely bride is at death's door. Start practicing today. Sure, she may not understand. She may even get angry. Just explain that you're only thinking of her, and that your harsh words and brusque tone are for her own good.

(By the way, wives, this technique will not work on husbands. For all husbands, comatose or not, the sense of hearing is the first sense to go.)

All in the family

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All in the family
(originally posted 01/11/2008)

File this in the "Unbelievable but True" category:

Twins separated at birth have married each other without realizing they were brother and sister, it has been revealed.

The British couple's marriage has now been annulled by the High Court after judges ruled the marriage had never validly existed.

The identities of the brother and sister and details of how they fell in love and married are being kept secret. Soon after they were born they were separated and adopted by different families.

You've probably noticed that when a couple has been married a long time they start to look like each other. If, however, they look like each other right off the bat...well...that should probably raise a red flag.

No chip clip? No problem

Please help yourself to some old slices of Lemon Harangue Pie while I'm on vacation. Enjoy!

No chip clip? No problem
(originally posted 06/01/2007)

I love chips. Potato, corn, poker, I love all kinds. (Buffalo? Well, okay, maybe not all kinds.) And if there's anything I hate, it's stale chips. But I really don't like using those Chip Clips. They're expensive, hard to keep track of, and if I do happen to find one after digging through four or five disorganized kitchen drawers for 20 minutes, it's either too big or too small. There has to be a better way!

Thankfully, someone out there heard my cry for help.

This short instructional video will show you how to keep your chips fresh without having to use clips, tape, twisty ties, glue, or those expensive food sealers you see on Saturday morning infomercials:



Voila! It's that simple!

The importance of fire drills at work

Please help yourself to some old slices of Lemon Harangue Pie while I'm on vacation. Enjoy!

The importance of fire drills at work
(originally posted 05/03/2007)

We just had a fire drill at work -- and I'm happy to say that it came off without a hitch. I am now confident that should a small, slow-moving fire start in a remote corner of this huge building of over 5,000 employees, my coworkers and I would be able to make it to safety with relative ease.

I think these drills are important because they simulate the conditions of a real fire. We all know that in real life, people tend to remain calm and engage in idle chit-chat as they casually saunter down the stairs to the parking lot outside, with little more on their minds than what they're going to have for lunch that day. All the smoke, flames, heat, screaming, and stampeding normally associated with burning buildings are nothing but Hollywood inventions designed to make fires in movies more entertaining.

If your office doesn't have fire drills, you should talk to someone and get them implemented as soon as possible. You'll be glad you did -- because we all need to stretch our legs and get a breath of fresh air every few months.

The unknown wonders of creation

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The unknown wonders of creation
(originally posted 12/14/2006)

NewScientist.com has a fascinating article entitled "13 Things that Do Not Make Sense." You will definitely want to read the full article, but here are some brief excerpts:

1. The placebo effect
   Don't try this at home. Several times a day, for several days, you induce pain in someone. You control the pain with morphine until the final day of the experiment, when you replace the morphine with saline solution. Guess what? The saline takes the pain away.
   
   
2. The horizon problem
   Our universe appears to be unfathomably uniform. Look across space from one edge of the visible universe to the other, and you'll see that the microwave background radiation filling the cosmos is at the same temperature everywhere. That may not seem surprising until you consider that the two edges are nearly 28 billion light years apart and our universe is only 14 billion years old.
   
   Nothing can travel faster than the speed of light, so there is no way heat radiation could have travelled between the two horizons to even out the hot and cold spots created in the big bang and leave the thermal equilibrium we see now.
   
   
3. Ultra-energetic cosmic rays
   For more than a decade, physicists in Japan have been seeing cosmic rays that should not exist. Cosmic rays are particles - mostly protons but sometimes heavy atomic nuclei - that travel through the universe at close to the speed of light. Some cosmic rays detected on Earth are produced in violent events such as supernovae, but we still don't know the origins of the highest-energy particles, which are the most energetic particles ever seen in nature. But that's not the real mystery.
   
   
4. Belfast homeopathy results
   Madeleine Ennis, a pharmacologist at Queen's University, Belfast, was the scourge of homeopathy. She railed against its claims that a chemical remedy could be diluted to the point where a sample was unlikely to contain a single molecule of anything but water, and yet still have a healing effect. Until, that is, she set out to prove once and for all that homeopathy was bunkum.
   
   
5. Dark matter
   Take our best understanding of gravity, apply it to the way galaxies spin, and you'll quickly see the problem: the galaxies should be falling apart. Galactic matter orbits around a central point because its mutual gravitational attraction creates centripetal forces. But there is not enough mass in the galaxies to produce the observed spin.
   
   
6. Viking's methane
   July 20, 1976. Gilbert Levin is on the edge of his seat. Millions of kilometres away on Mars, the Viking landers have scooped up some soil and mixed it with carbon-14-labelled nutrients. The mission's scientists have all agreed that if Levin's instruments on board the landers detect emissions of carbon-14-containing methane from the soil, then there must be life on Mars.
   
   Viking reports a positive result. Something is ingesting the nutrients, metabolising them, and then belching out gas laced with carbon-14.
   
   
7. Tetraneutrons
   Four years ago, a particle accelerator in France detected six particles that should not exist. They are called tetraneutrons: four neutrons that are bound together in a way that defies the laws of physics.
   
   
8. The Pioneer anomaly
   This is a tale of two spacecraft. Pioneer 10 was launched in 1972; Pioneer 11 a year later. By now both craft should be drifting off into deep space with no one watching. However, their trajectories have proved far too fascinating to ignore.
   
   That's because something has been pulling - or pushing - on them, causing them to speed up. The resulting acceleration is tiny, less than a nanometre per second per second. That's equivalent to just one ten-billionth of the gravity at Earth's surface, but it is enough to have shifted Pioneer 10 some 400,000 kilometres off track. NASA lost touch with Pioneer 11 in 1995, but up to that point it was experiencing exactly the same deviation as its sister probe. So what is causing it?
   
   
9. Dark energy
   It is one of the most famous, and most embarrassing, problems in physics. In 1998, astronomers discovered that the universe is expanding at ever faster speeds. It's an effect still searching for a cause - until then, everyone thought the universe's expansion was slowing down after the big bang. "Theorists are still floundering around, looking for a sensible explanation," says cosmologist Katherine Freese of the University of Michigan, Ann Arbor. "We're all hoping that upcoming observations of supernovae, of clusters of galaxies and so on will give us more clues."
   
   
10. The Kuiper cliff
    If you travel out to the far edge of the solar system, into the frigid wastes beyond Pluto, you'll see something strange. Suddenly, after passing through the Kuiper belt, a region of space teeming with icy rocks, there's nothing.
    
    Astronomers call this boundary the Kuiper cliff, because the density of space rocks drops off so steeply. What caused it? The only answer seems to be a 10th planet. We're not talking about Quaoar or Sedna: this is a massive object, as big as Earth or Mars, that has swept the area clean of debris.
    
    
11. The Wow signal
    It was 37 seconds long and came from outer space. On 15 August 1977 it caused astronomer Jerry Ehman, then of Ohio State University in Columbus, to scrawl "Wow!" on the printout from Big Ear, Ohio State's radio telescope in Delaware. And 28 years later no one knows what created the signal. "I am still waiting for a definitive explanation that makes sense," Ehman says.
    
    Coming from the direction of Sagittarius, the pulse of radiation was confined to a narrow range of radio frequencies around 1420 megahertz. This frequency is in a part of the radio spectrum in which all transmissions are prohibited by international agreement. Natural sources of radiation, such as the thermal emissions from planets, usually cover a much broader sweep of frequencies. So what caused it?
    
    
12. Not-so-constant constants
    In 1997 astronomer John Webb and his team at the University of New South Wales in Sydney analysed the light reaching Earth from distant quasars. On its 12-billion-year journey, the light had passed through interstellar clouds of metals such as iron, nickel and chromium, and the researchers found these atoms had absorbed some of the photons of quasar light - but not the ones they were expecting.
    
    If the observations are correct, the only vaguely reasonable explanation is that a constant of physics called the fine structure constant, or alpha, had a different value at the time the light passed through the clouds.
    
    But that's heresy. Alpha is an extremely important constant that determines how light interacts with matter - and it shouldn't be able to change. Its value depends on, among other things, the charge on the electron, the speed of light and Planck's constant. Could one of these really have changed?
    
    
13. Cold fusion
    After 16 years, it's back. In fact, cold fusion never really went away. Over a 10-year period from 1989, US navy labs ran more than 200 experiments to investigate whether nuclear reactions generating more energy than they consume - supposedly only possible inside stars - can occur at room temperature. Numerous researchers have since pronounced themselves believers.

Again, take time to read the entire article. I'm sure you will find it just as interesting as I did. But what I find most interesting of all is that while scientists admit there are things they just don't know, they will readily assert that there is no God - that the universe in which we live came about purely by chance. If anything, this list serves as an example of man's finite mind. The more we learn, the more we learn how much we really have yet to learn. And if we are pursuing knowledge for selfish reasons (i.e., for reasons other than glorifying the Creator of all things), then it is as King Solomon said: "I have seen everything that is done under the sun, and behold, all is vanity and a striving after wind. For in much wisdom is much vexation, and he who increases knowledge increases sorrow" (Ecclesiastes 1:14, 18).

King Pong

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King Pong
(originally posted 11/28/2006)

Now that people are trampling each other to get their hands on the new Playstation 3, I thought we should take a look back at the world's first home video game. From Pong-Story.com:

The video game history started in a strange and complicated way and it is important to avoid confusions with what happened in the 1950s and 1960s. The real video game history started with Ralph Baer as early as 1951. One very important thing to remember is how the video game has been defined in the 1960s before modern tehnologies allowed video games to be played on computers.

A video game is defined as an appartus that displays games using RASTER VIDEO equipment: a television set, a monitor, etc. In the 1950s and 1960s, computers were not only exceedingly expensive, but used a technology that could not allow integrating them into a video game system. Only mainframes could allow playing a few games. These games qualified as COMPUTER games, not VIDEO games. ...

... In 1966, Ralph Baer worked again on his 1951 TV game idea and designed a series of seven prototypes that played several video games. The first playable video game was a Chase Game: two squares chasing each other. The last prototype built in 1968 (also known as Brown Box) played Ball & Paddle games, Target Shooting games, and more. After several demonstrations to TV manufacturers, Magnavox signed an agreement in 1971 and the first video game system was released in May 1972: Odyssey. The history of PONG games and derivates just started, would spread all over the globe, and die in the early 1980s.

In the USA, it started on May 1972 with the Magnavox Odyssey (first home video game) and Atari in November 1972 (their first PONG arcade game). Atari's game was quickly copied and improved in 1973. Later in 1975, home video games became popular and were sold by numerous companies. Some like Executive Games started from a five-student MIT project. Others like First Dimension ran a poor business and did not survive the strong competition from Atari, Sears, Coleco, Magnavox and others.

I'm not that old, but I certainly don't have any childhood memories of people camping out in front of a store for three weeks to purchase a Pong game. I guess we were either smarter then or just had better things to do with our lives.

My favorite Star Trek quote

Please help yourself to some old slices of Lemon Harangue Pie while I'm on vacation. Enjoy!

My favorite Star Trek quote
(originally posted 11/19/2006)



"Khaaaaaaan!"

Chuck Norris vs. Chuck Norris

Please help yourself to some old slices of Lemon Harangue Pie while I'm on vacation. Enjoy!

Chuck Norris vs. Chuck Norris
(originally posted 11/14/2006)

You are probably aware of the Chuck Norris fad sweeping the Net. If not, here are some of the interesting "facts" you might have missed:

• Guns don't kill people. Chuck Norris kills People.
  
• It takes Chuck Norris 20 minutes to watch 60 Minutes.
  
• Chuck Norris once kicked a horse in the chin. Its decendants are known today as Giraffes.
  
• When Chuck Norris does a pushup, he isn't lifting himself up; he's pushing the Earth down.
  
• When Bruce Banner gets mad, he turns into the Hulk. When the Hulk gets mad, he turns into Chuck Norris.
  
• When the Boogeyman goes to sleep every night, he checks his closet for Chuck Norris.
  
• Chuck Norris makes onions cry.
  
• When Chuck Norris plays Monopoly, it affects the actual world economy.
  
• Chuck Norris has two speeds: Walk and Kill.
  
• There is no chin under Chuck Norris' Beard. There is only another fist.
  
• Chuck Norris once ate an entire bottle of sleeping pills. They made him blink.
  
• Chuck Norris' hand is the only hand that can beat a Royal Flush.
  
• Contrary to popular belief, America is not a democracy; it is a Chucktatorship.

And there are plenty more. But what does Chuck Norris the Man think about Chuck Norris the Phenomenon? As a columnist for WorldNetDaily, he addressed the issue in a recent article:

I've got a bulletin for you, folks. I am no superman. I realize that now, but I didn't always. As six-time world karate champion and then a movie star, I put too much trust in who I was, what I could do and what I acquired. I forgot how much I needed others and especially God. Whether we are famous or not, we all need God. We also need other people. If your whole life is spent trying to make money and you neglect the people important in your life, you will create an emptiness deep in your heart and soul. I know. I fell into that trap. I dedicated my whole life to fame and fortune. I had a huge hole in my heart and was miserable until I met my wife, Gena, who brought me back to the Lord. ... ... I'm flattered and amazed by the way I've become a fascinating public figure for a whole new generation of young people around the world. But I am not the characters I play. And even the toughest characters I have played could never measure up to the real power in this universe.

Despite all of the fascinating "facts" out there, I gotta side with Chuck Norris the Man.

It sucks to be a vampire

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It sucks to be a vampire
(originally posted 10/30/2006)

I hate to be the one to say this to any vampire readers of this blog, but you don't exist. LiveScience.com reports that you are a mathematical impossibility:

University of Central Florida physics professor Costas Efthimiou's work debunks pseudoscientific ideas, such as vampires and zombies, in an attempt to enhance public literacy. Not only does the public believe in such topics, but the percentages are at dangerously high level, Efthimiou told LiveScience.

Legend has it that vampires feed on human blood and once bitten a person turns into a vampire and starts feasting on the blood of others.

Efthimiou's debunking logic: On Jan 1, 1600, the human population was 536,870,911. If the first vampire came into existence that day and bit one person a month, there would have been two vampires by Feb. 1, 1600. A month later there would have been four, and so on. In just two-and-a-half years the original human population would all have become vampires with nobody left to feed on.

And here I always thought that math wouldn't have any practical application in life.

Of course, this could all be part of a conspiracy to get us to let our guard down. After all, one of the most popular mathematicians in the world is himself a vampire...

Cat Head Theatre

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Cat Head Theatre
(originally posted 10/12/2006)

Kids just wanna have fun; don't let them

While I'm on vacation, please help yourself to some old slices of Lemon Harangue Pie.

Kids just wanna have fun; don't let them
(originally posted 10/09/2006)

When I was a kid, I had these:



...and my sister had this:



What's funny is that those three toys, packaged and in mint condition, could fetch over $1,000. The same goes for toys like these:



And I had a lot of 'em!

Of course, being kids, we didn't see the big picture. We just had to play with these valuable collectibles. We didn't even save the boxes they came in. Boy, were we stupid!

So, if you are contemplating buying dolls or action figures for your kids, go ahead. But whatever you do, don't let them have any fun. Keep the toys in their boxes, safely tucked away where they can't be found. Your kids will only render them worthless.

Should language-butchering be outlawed?

While I'm on vacation, please help yourself to some old slices of Lemon Harangue Pie.

Should language-butchering be outlawed?
(originally posted 10/06/2006)

It looks like some government officials in Malaysia must have read my "If I Were in Charge..." article and taken it seriously:

Malaysia to Levy Fines for Poor Speech

Malaysia will levy fines on those incorrectly using the national language, and will set up a specialized division to weed out offenders who mix Malay with English, news reports said Thursday.

Culture, Arts and Heritage Minister Rais Yatim said fines of up to 1,000 ringgit ($271) can be imposed on displays with any wrong or mutated form of Malay, the Star newspaper reported.

The move was to ensure "the national language was not sidelined in any way," Rais said, according to The Star.

Poor speech, bad spelling, and horrible grammar have always been pet peeves of mine. But do we really want linguistic laziness to be against the law? Isn't that going a bit too far?

Hmmmmm...let's see.

I'm now imagining an America where people are fined for saying "reeluhtor" instead of "realtor," "supposably" instead of "supposedly," and for using non-existent words like "irregardless."

I'm also picturing how a law like this could affect (note how I used "affect" instead of "effect") cyberspace. Its (note the correct way to not use an apostrophe) effect (note how I used "effect" instead of "affect") could be positive. Truth be told, I wouldn't mind running across a blogger who actually knew to type "definitely" rather than "definately." It's (note the correct way to use an apostrophe) always good to avoid misspelling (note the correct spelling of "misspelling") words, and following Malaysia's lead might be the answer.

I can see a world in which poorly, constructed run-on sentences, riddled with, unnecessary puctuation!!! SCREAMING AT ME IN ALL CAPITAL LETTERS are replaced with crisp, clean sentences that get right to the point and don't ramble on incessantly without actually saying anything, but just making it seem as if the author is trying to meet some sort of word quota so that it looks like he knows what he's talking about, but in reality is just a pompous, cynical jackass who thinks he's better than everybody else because he has discovered the world of blogging and has nothing better to do with his time than to just sit at his desk and type until he's pulled away from his computer screen by a rerun of Seinfeld that he's already seen 37 times.

Sorry. What was I saying?

Oh, yes: banning desecration of the English language. Now that just might be a totalitarian policy I can get behind!

Authors: Van Gogh died in a shooting accident

Vincent van Gogh died in an shooting accident and not as the result of suicide. That is the claim made by Pulitzer-winning authors Steven Naifeh and Gregory White Smith in an upcoming biography of the artist.

The book, Van Gogh: The Life, is the result of 10 years of research. Relying on previously untranslated letters belonging to Van Gogh's family, it also features dozens of new photographs. It is set to be published in Britain today.

There is nothing noble or virtuous in suicide, so this is good news for Van Gogh fans.

An undeniable truth (10/15/2011)

Vacations exist to help us recover from the stress and chaos of preparing for vacations.

Exploding house art

Not quite as awesome as it sounds, but still pretty cool. From the Daily Mail:

At first glance, these houses looks like they could have been the victim of a dramatic gas explosion.

But the beat-up homes in Houston, Texas, are in fact an elaborate traffic-stopping work of art using the homes' own wood siding.

Artists Dan Havel and Dean Ruck smashed the interior walls of the homes, before nailing the wooden planking at strange angles to complete their project.

Featuring several horizontal and vertical vortices which appear to 'rip' through the interior of the first house, the designs offer a unique view out of each of the buildings.

(via Now That's Nifty)

Women discuss nagging, circa 50 BCP (Before Cell Phones)

(via Go Comics)

Soccer player scores on his own goal

Defender Valeri Aleksanyan of Armenia got a little caught up in the action and scored a goal for Ireland in the Euro 2012 qualifier on Tuesday. Armenia ended up losing to Ireland 2-1.

Family gets lost in a corn maze, calls 911 for help

The impenetrable maze of maize.

Having lived in the country for many years, I know a little something about corn. Sure, it can grow pretty tall, but I can honestly say that I have never been lost in a corn field. Now, take a family of city slickers and plant them in the middle of a corn maze. You might as well drop them in the middle of the Gobi Desert.

On Monday, a couple and their two children stopped by Connors Farm in Danvers, Massachusetts, and ventured into the corn maze. That was the last anyone ever heard from them...until 6:32 pm, when the family called 911 to report that they were lost.

An officer arrived on the scene and joined the farm's manager to search for the family. They were found in less than 10 minutes, only 25 feet from the street.

So far the police have not released the name of the family. I'm sure they appreciate that.

Rolling Stone readers pick the 10 worst songs of the 1980s

Rolling Stone readers voted recently on what they considered to be the 10 worst songs of the 1980s. Assistant Editor Andy Greene wants to make it perfectly clear that it wasn't the Rolling Stone editors who picked these songs.

10. "Never Gonna Give You Up" - Rick Astley
Sure, it's a cheesy love song, but it would be impossible to Rickroll someone without it.



9. "Puttin' On The Ritz" - Taco
A slam against this song is a slam against Irving Berlin. I'm just saying. And hey, synthpop was cool at the time.



8. "Mickey" - Toni Basil
I was never really a fan of this song, but it was a party favorite, and everyone would always sing along with it.



7. "Don't Worry, Be Happy" - Bobby McFerrin
Really? This song had a positive message. And Bobby McFerrin was and is an a cappella vocal master. I would actually consider this one of the best songs of the '80s.



6. "Rock Me Amadeus" - Falco
Come on, admit it. Whether you liked it or not, you would find yourself singing and tapping your foot along with everyone else.



5. "The Safety Dance" - Men Without Hats
Granted, this song makes even less sense than it did in 29 years ago (yes, it's been that long), but this bizarre little tune, along with its even more bizarre video, became an indelible part of '80s pop culture.



4. "Wake Me Up (Before You Go Go)" - Wham!
OK, I'll go along with this choice. I was sick of this song the first time I heard it. The only good thing about it was that it made George Michael's subsequent songs sound much better by comparison.



3. "Lady In Red" - Chris de Burgh
As far as ballads go, this wasn't that bad. Berlin's "Take My Breath Away" was much, much more annoying.



2. "The Final Countdown" - Europe
Kind of corny, but what rock anthems by '80s hair bands weren't? Besides, this song has actually found redemption in an awesome Wax Audio mash-up with Nirvana's "Smells Like Teen Spirit."



1. "We Built This City" - Starship
Not one of my favorites, but nowhere near being in my list of top 10 worst '80s songs. Starship's "Nothing's Gonna Stop Us Now" is worse by a long shot.

The craziest sport in the world?

Most sports are pretty crazy when you think about them, but Bo-Taoshi has to be one of the craziest. It can be found in (where else?) Japan.


The game is played predominantly by military cadets, and is essentially a version of capture-the-flag or king-of-the-hill. Two teams push, punch, and kick each other for control of a large wooden pole. And that's pretty much all there is to it.

Each team is split into two groups of 75 defenders and 75 attackers. The defenders gather around their own pole, while the attackers launch an assault against the opposing team's pole. The first team to pull the pole of the opposing team down to an angle of at least 30 degrees wins.

Somehow I doubt this will catch on in the U.S.



(via Oddity Central)

So long, Steve

Here is the statement released from Apple:

Apple has lost a visionary and creative genius, and the world has lost an amazing human being. Those of us who have been fortunate enough to know and work with Steve have lost a dear friend and an inspiring mentor. Steve leaves behind a company that only he could have built, and his spirit will forever be the foundation of Apple.

It's hard to think of anything to add. He was one of the world's greatest entrepreneurs who inspired many others, and he will be missed.

Darth Vader hair dryer

(from Tembolat, via Gizmodo)

You go, girl!

Of all the things available to make life easier for women, I'm not sure a device allowing women to pee standing up would be at the top of the list. Would it?

Helpful flowchart guide to NPR's top 100 sci-fi and fantasy books

Were you a little intimidated by NPR's list of top 100 science fiction and fantasy books? Wanted to dive right in, but didn't know where to start? Well, the folks at SF Signal have developed a very useful tool to help you decide: "This flowchart is designed to help you follow your tastes, provide context, and fulfill (indeed exceed!) any need for pithy commentary you might harbor."

(click image for larger version)

You can utilize an interactive version of the chart here.