We haven’t talked much about Alex Chiu recently…probably because we’ve exhausted most of what could be talked about.
I did run across this clip of him (allegedly) singing. The resolution is bad, so it could be some kind of imposter.
I’m not sure how prevalent the survivalist movement is outside the United States. “Survivalists” or “preppers” focus heavily on being self-sufficient in case of the inability of society to function as normal. They will focus on preparing by storing massive amounts of supplies, being able to grow or hunt food, and other useful skills.
Naturally, they need to be good with a gun. How else will they can defend their stuff from the hordes of people who are starving because they didn’t prepare for Apocalypse?
Much like any group of people, survivalists are targeted by various companies, salesmen, or hucksters who think they can make some money off them.
From the plausible (“You can buy heirloom seeds from us”) to the dubious (“Dollars will be worthless after the apocalypse. You can use our gold coins to trade for stuff!”), there are any number of angles used to pitch to survivalists.
And then there’s Jason Richards.
Do not pay attention to the “6 minutes” he mentions in the second sentence of his video (which you can’t rewind). It must be more than half an hour. I did not bother to finish the whole thing and I am still unclear as to exactly what he’s selling and how much it will cost.
He is excellent at making assertions and calling it proof.
He believes the United States imports 1/3 of its food because it can’t grow enough food.
He thinks supermarkets were cleared of supplies after Harold Camping’s failed Tribulation predictions.
He asserts that having to share a half-empty supermarket with 600,000 people is a plausible scenario in the near future.
His grasp of spelling and grammar is also shaky…food was not “rationalized” during World War 2, it was “rationed”.
Just to be safe, though, if you don’t want to get in a violent bloodbath with your neighbors over the last scrap of bread, buy this guy’s stuff.
Lesson 2: A vital part of commentating on sports is to criticize the playcalling with the benefit of hindsight. You should ignore the fact that even good coaching decisions have a chance to fail.
This is especially effective when you point out that you agreed with the initial call, making you a hypocrite.
Let’s look at ESPN’s Pat Yasinskas’ blog to give us a perfect example:
When Mike Smith first decided to go for it on fourth-and-inches in overtime, I liked the call. I thought it was gutsy and ambitious. After watching Michael Turner get stuffed, I changed my mind. Smith should have punted and taken his chances with his defense.
Hey, no one said sports commentary had to make any sense.
So I did not dress as Tim Tebow. It was really Natasha Fatale from Rocky & Bullwinkle:
Unfortunately, I do not have more pictures or a video at this time, which would have showed off my heels and sexy legs.
I donned this costume over two weekends. The first time had the additional benefit of make-up. A couple people were actually fooled enough to very briefly mistake me for a female.
A few females also expressed dismay that my legs were better than theirs, and it didn’t seem like they were completely joking. I don’t know whether to be flattered or not.
For those of you that have been living under a rock (meme-wise), a scene from the movie Downfall has been endlessly parodied on the Interwebs.
Here’s my unnecessary chess-related contribution to the babble. Just in time for the June Chess Carnival, which will be hosted by resurrected chess blogger Robert Pearson (aka, the chess personality formerly known as Wahrheit)
ERROR: Your password must be between eight and twelve characters in length and must begin with a numeric character and contain one of the following special characters: “~”, “!”, “@”, “#”, “$”, “%”, “^”, “&”, “*”, “(“, “)”, “-”, “_”, “+”, “=”, “{“, “}”, “[", "]“, “”, “|”, “;”, “:”, “/”, “?”, “.”. No character can be repeated consecutively more than two times.
The sad part is that I use multiple passwords that are considered “strong” by anyone’s algorithm and was going to use one of them. But none would pass this.
Perhaps I’m not up on my Bible reading. But if anyone can remind me what part of the Bible involved getting attacked by carrots, french fries, and salad dressing, that would be much appreciated.
I knew I should have been suspicious of Donnie’s new girlfriend. Not only has he stopped blogging, but the top-secret ESN (Espionage Spy Network) has caught them in the most heinous criminal activity.
My suspicions were confirmed recently when Katrushka (that’s that so-called “girlfriend”, more like “girlfiend”) suggested eating boiled eggs on their picnic. Donnie, who should know better, was all like “OK, dear”, probably he wanted to get in her pants instead of sticking to moral principles.
The ESN captured the following pictures of their wanton, abject cruelty (WARNING: these images are disturbing, violent, and heartbreaking)
The World Court at the Yolkgue has already ordered their arrest on charges of “Eggnic Cleansing”. If you see them, please beat them up and capture them until the Eggish Police and the Cyber Police can drag their sorry butts to court. Thank you.
It’s said that we dream every night, but simply don’t remember them. I don’t know how true that is, but last night I had two dreams that I could easily recall. Whether that’s because of going to bed 2 hours earlier than normal, or reading the Tel’aran’rhiod chapter in the Dragon Reborn (it’s about a World of Dreams), who knows.
Anyway, here they are:
Dream #1
In a classroom, there were about 25 of us listening to a lecture by Martin Gardner, who was well-known for his recreational mathematics writing.
The topic had something to do with finding certain types of solids that could have integral values for their sides, akin to finding integral solutions to the Pythagorean equation. At some juncture, I pointed out some error he made while using an irregular solid as an example. He thanked me and I felt rather proud (even though the error was trivial).
During the lecture, somehow I realized it was February 1979, so I must have traveled back in time.
After the lecture, most the students gathered in a circle and started chatting. I had a suspicion that some of them were also time travelers, but didn’t want to tip off non-time travelers in case that had dire consequences. So I simply asked if anyone else was a “Traveler” (about 8 or 10 people raised their hands).
Someone also brought up World of Warcraft and talked about the first expansion. Not the actual first expansion, but some expansion invented in the dream, which had a Final Fantasy 5 Bomb pictured on the CD cover (?????)
Eventually, everyone packed up to leave. But I realized I didn’t know how to get back to my own time, and was hoping to tag along with the others. But they all left quickly and it took me FOREVER to pack. Fortunately, Gardner realized that I was a time traveler. He told me I just needed to keep going and I’d find the right guide, or something like that. I didn’t understand and tried to ask for clarification, but whenever I looked at him, he faded further into a brown mist and grew fainter. There was no choice but to move on.
Wandering through a hall, I couldn’t find the guide Gardner was talking about, and eventually wandered into a supermarket. I started to think about what would happen if I were stuck in this time period. My ATM card wouldn’t work. The cash I did have was from the 21st century, so that was bad. I thought about going to see my parents, which would include my dad in an afro. But I didn’t even know what state I was in, so that wasn’t an option.
Then I woke up.
Dream #2
If you don’t want to experience a somewhat disturbing mental image, please stop reading now.
Understand this is really for the 4 or 5 readers who are entertained by this kind of thing.
You probably aren’t one of them.
OK, I warned you.
The scene starts at the Griffins’ house. As in, the Griffin family from Family Guy. Lois and I start making out in the kitchen. Peter ambles by, and doesn’t seem to care in the least. Even so, I tell Lois we should go back to my place. Which is a house next door that we are teleported into.
From the inside, it seems to be a one-room log cabin with a bed and sparse furnishings. She climbs on top of me, and we start having sex. I look up, and Stewie is there in a blue diaper, yelling and all ticked off. I get up and tell Lois we really need to do this somewhere else, but she doesn’t seem aware of the danger.
A “Burqa King” franchise of stores would be the perfect way to introduce Afghanis to the benefits of a free market system.
Yes. I’m sorry. So, so sorry.
(In case you’re truly aren’t aware, this is a take-off of the Burger King logo.)
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