March 31, 2005
Talk about Female Empowerment
Just goes to show how far women have come over the past 100 years. They are now that much closer to being men. I wonder if this is Freudian? We may never know. What we do know is that women now have the ability, with the aid of this device, to pee standing up. Hooray, and pass the urinals!!!
Posted by Ripley at 04:14 AM | Comments (1)
Now that's what I call entertainment.....(If you are French) Part Deux
I wish I could make this stuff up. I am just not that creative. After our last visit to French "culture" I didn't really think they could have a more embarrassing figure in the public eye. Boy was I wrong.
Posted by Ripley at 01:44 AM | Comments (1)
March 30, 2005
The cycle of violence
I stabbed myself with a pencil today. Not one of my finest moments and at the same time not exactly surprising. See, I've stabbed myself with pencils in the past, and always for the same reason. I bought a new science book this week. I like books about physics and especially books about conceptual physics that leave out most of the math. Whenever I read one of these books I get it in my head that I could really understand physics. Later I get the idea that I could really understand physics if I learned the math that generated the concepts I read about. So I start in. And quickly stop. Just about all modern physics is based on calculus, about which I know close to nothing. So I take it back a notch, I determine to review my trig so I can learn calculus so I can learn physics. That also grinds to a screeching halt in about 10 minutes. Whenever I try to review my trig I discover that my algebra skills could really use some polish. After a morning spent searching through piles of boxes I usually end up with one minor laceration and my old algebra text book. I can do the algebra, it flows well, after a little while I remember how it works and I'm back in it. Then I go to work and don't take the book with me. I start to doodle simple equations on the edge of whatever paper I have in front of me just to fill my mind. Then they get more complex and it still works. Then I decide I'll try some of the trig. This is a mistake I always make. I don't know it well enough to do it without an aid and I just frustrate myself. And then I ignore my job and try to think my way through the math. Never try that. Then I usually decide to put it away, get in a huff about the failure, and manage to stab myself with a pencil. Sadly, my finest hour. One that gets repeated about once a year for the last five. So I guess the moral to this rambling diatribe is "don't try to learn too quickly and forget about sharp objects." Or maybe, "physics is evil."
The book, by the way, is called "Why Things Break" and is about quantum chemistry and marbles in about equal proportions.
Posted by DjDuk at 01:03 AM | Comments (2)
March 24, 2005
200th Post
This marks 200 posts here at DJ Duk's. At this milestone I'd like to take a brief look back at all the good we've done in the world...
That didn't take long.
Posted by DjDuk at 11:44 AM | Comments (2)
March 23, 2005
A vast conspiracy
Item One: Rudy Giuliani, famed mayor of New York City, announces his run for the U.S. senate.
Item Two: Hillary Clinton announces her run for the same job.
Item Three: Giuliani looks to be ahead in an increasingly less and less close race.
Item Four: Giuliani gets cancer and has to drop out of the race.
Now let's play, "If I were Oliver Stone."
First off, if I were O.S. there would have to be some sort of conspiracy involving the CIA. It's just a given. Secondly, any previous accusation made, no matter how silly, can be used as evidence in support of a new accusation. Finally, if the technical data doesn't fit, make some up.
That brings us this gem worthy of a 3 hour Kevin Costner movie. When Clinton saw Giuliani pulling ahead she knew she had to take action. Murdering people to get ahead in politics is old hat for Clinton who was once implicated in the mysterious "suicide" of Vince Foster. Using her husband's influence as POTUS (that's President of the United States, Bailey) she pressured the CIA into allowing her to use their secret weapon, the "Cancer Gun." This machine, although not yet perfected, when used against somebody causes a serious cancerus tumor to develop. The CIA had been developing it as a way to assassinate difficult world leaders quietly. Using the gun on Giuliani she removed the only obstacle to her Senate campaign and now serves on several powerful committees where she regularly increases CIA funding. Quid pro quo at it's best.
On a last note I doubt the Clintons have access to a cancer gun because if they did the number of D.C. cancer patients would have started at Ken Starr and gone around the block. Twice.
Posted by DjDuk at 01:58 AM | Comments (3)
March 22, 2005
Now that's what I call entertainment.....(If you are French)
Its telling that this appeared on a very popular French TV station TV5 and that the audience is eating it up.
Posted by Ripley at 02:10 AM | Comments (5)
March 21, 2005
A common entertainment
You can't go to school today without hearing somebody gush over how wonderful Shakespeare is. I've tried. It's wholly unavoidable. Today Shakespeare is synonymous with romance, literature, class, and education. And it's all bullshit. Shakespeare snobbishness is perhaps one of academia's most annoying characteristics. He mostly got famous writing bawdy stories of cross-dressing merchants and suicidal teenagers. He really hit it off with the rediscovery that graphic violence gets ratings. Shakespeare wrote plays mocking the gentry and exalting the values of the common man. Primarily lust, greed, and avarice are highly visible.
Take a second and think of where we have that in today's culture. That's right; Shakespeare was his day's equivalent of the WWE. The WWE essentially cloaks a melodramatic story in a shroud of violence. They have their forbidden loves, tawdry trysts, greedy men selling each other out for a better cut, and constant testosterone fueled "duel's of honor" where the only thing that you can count on is a cheat. The only real difference is that the WWE traded its wardrobe budget for a bunch on shiny special effects.
Tomorrow's Prospero is named Vince McMahan. Its Romeo and Juliet both wear nothing but a thong in public and pledge their undying love from the balcony of a TV studio. Its Tybalt and Mercutio duel twice a week (once only on cable) and their names change but their rivalry never dies.
Posted by DjDuk at 11:44 AM | Comments (2)
March 20, 2005
Super Absorbent
One of the more amazing attributes of Ripley's dog is that it's super absorbent. This dog can trap about four times its own weight in water in its fur. Which makes sense since it's clearly not a dog, but an escaped, handless mop. The dog most resembles a dirty mop that, in a desperate bid for freedom, shucked off its handle and learned to bark.
Posted by DjDuk at 11:44 AM | Comments (298)
March 19, 2005
Wet nose grenade
One of the many "tricks" Ripley's dog has learned. The dog simply waits until I'm relaxed, unmoving, and not paying attention. Then, out of nowhere the damn things moist proboscis butts up against me. Usually somewhere sensitive, like the palm of the hand. The physiological effect cannot be understated. The sudden combination of "What the Hell was that?" and "Eww!" really dumps the adrenaline into the bloodstream. The dog then adds insult to injury by waiting for me to come down from the ceiling where I've inevitably leaped and then peering at me through its mop of hair to beg for positive attention. This is clearly the dog equivalent of a school shooting. Desperate for attention the damn thing wrecks havoc, in this case on my nervous system, and then wants to be admired for it.
Posted by DjDuk at 11:44 AM | Comments (3)
March 18, 2005
Spite
The act of doing something just to hurt somebody else without possible personal gain. I like spite. I'm a spiteful person, the feeling I get from seeing others suffer, while evil, is rather refreshing. Doing things for spite and spite alone is a noble occupation I wholly endorse. That being said, I don't like it when people are spiteful towards me. Also, I have probably the stupidest example of spite directed at me in history.
When I was in high school I noticed that all of the really successful conquerors were either almost universally loved or universally hated. Most historians assume the conquerors behavior while ruling the world determines how they are remembered. I had a theory that any sufficient amount of love or hate toward a person might simply get them elevated to the status of world conqueror. Wanting to test the theory and under no illusions about how lovable I am I set out to make the world hate me. It failed almost immediately when one of the people I knew refused to hate me out of spite. She decided that she would be nothing but pleasant and nice to me. God, how I hated her for that. Unfortunately she was also far too cute to smite. Seeing her success at flouting my evil design it soon became the fashion amongst the people I knew to deny me hatred to spite me. No matter how long I argued that refusing to hate out of spite should count as hatred these people stood firm and my first ever plan for world domination petered out.
Posted by DjDuk at 11:44 AM | Comments (6)
March 17, 2005
Bailey - Elvis
Even decades after his death the faithful refuse to believe that the King of Rock and Roll is dead. I'm starting to agree. Because what if Bailey is just the perfect disguise for Elvis. First off, and the primary point to recommend it, is that Bailey is nothing like the King. The King was a musical man, who would dance, sign, and play the guitar. Bailey does none of these things, and what better way for Elvis to hide. The King was a child of the South, steeped in Gospel music and bizarre foods like "Chitlin's." Bailey occasionally fails to bake a good loaf of bread, and what better way for the King to hide. The King was opulently wealthy and gave away Cadillacs as a whim. Bailey will hound you for five bucks you borrowed for lunch for eighteen months, and what better way for the king to hide.
This is too silly, even for Grand Mix Master, DJ Funky Duk. Clearly Bailey is not Elvis.
Posted by DjDuk at 11:44 AM | Comments (5)
March 10, 2005
Meat Eater
A carnivore or omnivore, any type of creature that eats, and doesn't limit itself to plant life. Any creature that lives by eating the flesh of other creatures. Meat eaters are distinct from herbivores, which eat only plants.
While Omnivores, which can eat just about anything, are clearly the superior way to go the world owes a debt of gratitude to the pure carnivore. The one common distinction held by all herbivores is stupidity. There is not a smart herbivore. And why should there be? All a herbivore needs to do to get a meal is to outwit a tree. I'm not the brightest omnivore around but I can certainly beat an average tree in whatever game of wits you'd like to see.
If one accepts the idea of evolution, something I find a bit shaky, he reason is clear. Herbivores never develop active defenses; in large part they've bred themselves into camouflaged distance runners. The one really good mechanism that carnivores have developed that allows any carnivore a shot and eating another creature is intelligence. The carnivore is always the smarter creature. Carnivores are curious, they learn, they explore, they understand, they develop new strategies, and then they eat. Omnivores get the best of both worlds and usually end up even smarter.
Typically it's the herbivore that adapts to the world around him and the carnivore that changes the world to suit his needs.
Generally this also applies to people. Those people who choose to be herbivores turn themselves into docile, leaf-munching, cattle-people. Meanwhile the meat eater is polishing off his cheeseburger and building an interstate highway system to help make beef cheaper.
Posted by DjDuk at 02:03 AM | Comments (3)
March 08, 2005
Jedi Mind Trick
A way for a Jedi (from the movie Star Wars, for those of you way out of the loop) to influence the weak minded and impose his will upon them. The classic wave of the hand and very soft "These are not the droids you're looking for." Despite repeated efforts the Jedi mind trick does not work in real life.
According to Ripley there is a similar ability. Hardly infallible but with a much greater success rate than getting a goofy robe and talking to passersby about droids. Ripley considers it the single most persuasive utterance. Ever. He's advised me that a well place "C'mon" can sway hearts and minds and wholly dictate the course of events. When I first heard about this tactic I was a bit dubious. I have since seen Ripley demonstrate "C'mon's" awesome might. It's not all it's cracked up to be. It does have a significantly higher success rate than waving one's hand while commanding an action however. I guess the moral of the story is if you want to influence somebody's opinion the tried and true Viking method of, "smash all who disagree with an axe." still reigns supreme.
Posted by DjDuk at 03:24 AM | Comments (3)