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Every day, in every way, I'm amazed that you people voted for this man "The lessons of Katrina are important," Bush said. "We've learned a lot here at the federal level. We're much more ready this time than we were the last time." "Let's, first of all, pray there's no hurricanes," Bush said. "That would be, like, step one." That reads like some sort of joke, but it isn't. That's the President of the United States of America, and a total moron.
AskMe: Why was there no effort made to rescue those trapped on the upper floors of the World Trade Center with helicopters? There's an excellent reply that basically amounts to: the doors were locked for political reasons, so nobody could reach the roof.
Great essay at 2Blowhards on the food we eat: The Slaughterhouse and the Carrot. Almost makes me take the Miron anti-pork stance. Almost.
For Kris: Death's Acre: Inside the Legendary Forensic Lab 'The Body Farm' Where the Dead Do Tell Tales. That's an awful title, but the book looks intriguing, even to me. (And I'm not even a trained observer!) [via frykitty]
Looney Tunes hidden gags [via frykitty, and sure to appear soon on my comics blog]
Woman uses nail clippers in desert birth [via Dave]
Brain Port: "By routing signals from helmet-mounted cameras, sonar and other equipment through the tongue to the brain, [researchers] hope to give elite soldiers superhuman senses similar to owls, snakes and fish." It's like science fiction! [via Dave]
The Sci-Fi Channel will produce a Battlestar Galactica prequel called 'Caprica' [via Dave]
Why do we feel cold when we have a fever? Because our body's "setpoint" has been raised. The colder you feel, the greater the difference between your current temperature and the new set point. Shivering = fever is going to rise; sweating = fever is going to break. That means, for example, that when I'm shivering despite wearing many layers, despite sitting in a 75-degree room with two heaters trained directly on my, well, my temperature is going to rise. Crap. Doctor's appointment at two.
Awesome info for foodies: knife maintenance and sharpening
Rabbi the Kosher Kitty [via AmyJo]
Wes Anderson American Express ad — this makes me want to go watch Rushmore
Cat communication — a summary of cat postures and vocalizations that will allow you to "speak cat". (It's amazing how much of this a cat owner learns after a few years.)
Inconceivable! Josh and Paul are in a new band called The Revenge Business, which will play its first gig on May 6th.
Soviet underground submarine base — I love cool abandoned structures like this [via Dave]
Congress readies broad new digital copyright bill, including jail periods of up to ten years for willful copyright infringement. Because, you know, it's a worse crime than driving under the influence. [via Dave]
Funny stuff: I'm the Decider!
Fascinating reading for writers: How books make (or don't make) money
Wildlife defies Chernobyl radiation — this is a fascinating story of how the twenty-mile exclusion zone around the failed reactor has become something of a nature preserve
PXN8 is an online photo editor. Joel? Joel? Are you there? This might be useful for comic images.
Excellent post for those who are new to cooking: food-prep for newbies. Heck, some of it's even good for those of us who cook all the time. Who doesn't love Alton Brown?
Look! It's the first cross-post to one of my new blogs. (But it's worth it.) This Marvel Super Heroes Secret Wars Re-Enactment Society video is hilarious, even if you're not a comics geek. (But especially funny if you are.)
You guys are awesome. Lynn, remembering that my all-time favorite book is Charles Frazier's Cold Mountain, let me know that his second novel, Thirteen Moons, is due in the fall. (Though I'll admit the plot description makes me nervous that this is just a rehash.)
Greg sends word that the previous juggling video is held in contempt by real jugglers. Another guy made an in-your-face response using the same music but more difficult tricks.
Nicole sends along an amazing juggling video
The most patient cat in the world: ten puppies meet a housecat (video) [via frykitty, of course]
Sports Dignity! (Or, rather, the lack thereof.) Alas, sometimes our athletes are just too caught up in the moment to realize what they're doing. Sometimes unfortunate things happen. Sometimes they suffer great pain. (Ugh.) ~NSFW~
Dave has gone berserk. Look at all the stuff he sent me this morning: Man accused of euthanizing neighbor's cat (this is relevant because there's a similar thing going on now in Canby), New York is deploying 500 new security cameras, qsewing machine controlled by a Game Boy (why?), a 500-lb potato battery (double-why?), and info on becoming a certified financial planner (just for me...). Thanks, Dave!
AskMe: My long-lost father is trying to contact me. Should I bother? Awesome thread. Read it to the end, where the poster gives the results of the contact.
Scientology: a bedtime story is an hilarious video mocking/explaining the church's beliefs.
Where should the U.S. attack next? Pardon me if this just re-inforces my already-held opinions...
Two restaurants in San Francisco — Tomas Keller's The French Laundry and Alice Waters' Chez Panisse — are on the list of the world's fifty best restaurants. (The French Laundry is #4.) We're going to be in San Francisco in August. Damn straight, I'm eating at both places! [via kottke]
For Jeff: brown recluse spider bite (be sure to click through to the photos)
I hear a lot of people complaining that Portland (and Oregon) are conservative and religious. I just don't get it. Portland is generally liberal, and one of the least religious places in this nation. Take a gander at mapping religion in America, which provides all sorts of lovely maps detailing the breakdown of religious belief in this country.
Let me point again to Nicole's Bunny Guide. Thanks, Nik!
Matt asks: Name a controversy in politics in the last five years where the outrage of Democrats affected real change. I can't think of one. Can you?
Dungeon Escape! is frickin' awesome! (A stick-figure tribute to the old laser disc video games like Dragon's Lair.) [via waxy]
I find this Flight 93 hijack transcript incredibly disturbing despite (because of?) the mundanity.
This evolutionary timeline doesn't reveal any new info, and is probably familiar for many, but may be interesting for those with misconceptions...
This is not good stuff for me to be reading (I'm very death-phobic), but it's interesting nonetheless: stories of lucid decapitation, a list of top 25 craziest deaths (though surely there are crazier), and the strange deaths page [via lookit]
Titanic II: The Sequel. Fan-made trailers are pretty funny, and this is no exception, but the amateurish bits are, well, amateurish. Check out the glaring typo near the end of this one: "FOZEN MAN". [via waxy]
Hmmm. Could this dress be a birthday present for Kris? [via scrubbles]
By the way, did I mention that Denise made a post? Yay!
Bunny Guide! Bunny Guide! Nicole has kindly responded to my hounding and posted a guide about keeping rabbits as pets. Now I just need to convince Kris (and the cats) that this is a Good Idea.
Pimp My Snack, because who wouldn't love a giant Kit Kat? [via mefi]
Yo, baseball fans! Check out this amazing video: 1986 World Series game six re-enacted in RBI Baseball on the Nintendo. (This is the famous "Bill Buckner error" game in which the Red Sox pitching staff imploded.)
More stuff my wife should knit for me: cute knitted kittie kats. No, wait! This one! (More here.)
Big Fat Facts — the truth about fat, obesity, gastric bypass, and weight loss. "In the decade since Koop's alarmist moral panic, the freedom to live in bodies larger than contemporary culture deems proper has been increasingly threatened." [via frykitty]
The Incredible Machine — a series of elaborate Rube Goldberg-style machines that do nothing, but are simply amazing to watch [via frykitty]
Caring for your inner introvert — the habits and needs of a little-understood group [via rich]
AskMe: How do I stop surfing the internet at work? I'd like to lear
