I'm a connoisseur of leisurely things. | Theories, Predictions, Opinions, & Other Nonsense

January 23, 2006February 14, 2006

IT Department Trickery

Every day when I come into work, I sit down at my desk, logon to my computer, and bring up my essential programs: internal web applications, Legacy, Outlook, etc. I also check the news and weather right away too. After a quick glance at CNN, MSNBC, & BroadbandReports, I get to work.

About once an our (in between all my work), I pop back on CNN and MSNBC to check the news or read stories I didn’t have time to read before. A day last week, like any day before it, I was checking MSNBC at about 11:45 AM, reading up on how Bush continues to break the law and display utter contempt for the Constitution. At 12:15PM, right before I went to lunch, I went back to MSNBC to finish the story, and instead of getting the page I requested, I instead got this:



Screen Capture #1

Screen Capture #2

Well, look what I get there. 🙂 I get an animated icon of a guy mooning me, and then flipping me off. (I couldn’t reproduce the animated icon here, which is why there are two screen captures.) Immediately, I thought MSNBC was hacked. I called home instantly, had my father check it from home, but his MSNBC page loaded fine. I knew something was amuck, so I had some coworkers try it, but they too were brought to a page of an icon telling them to flip off.

I even asked for help/confirmation at a site I frequent.

As it turns out, this is either something the IT guys at my job setup (intentially or not), or it’s some larger conspiracy that I don’t know about. 🙂 All I wanted was the news, and instead I got a guy giving me the middle finger. 🙂

For the geeks that might read this, a quick drop to a “cmd” prompt shell from XP and then typing “ipconfig /flushdns” then resulted in MSNBC.com displaying properly. Bye bye middle finger guy. 😉

January 22, 2006April 28, 2007

U.S. Police Department Vehicles

2006 Dodge Charger, Police Interceptor Edition

Today, CNN has an article about U.S. police cars, and how they are all domestic maker vehicles. For years, police departments have used the Ford Crown Victoria due to it’s space, power, and drive train. (Big truck, big front seat, large V8, rear wheel drive). In the last few years, police departments have shifted over to the Chevrolet Impala (smaller, V6, front-wheel drive).

For 2006, they tested two new RWD cars; The Dodge Magnum and Dodge Charger. Both can be purchased with rear wheel drive, and both are very quick, with 5.8L V8’s producing 400+ hp. The problem is the trunk isn’t as big as in the Crown Victoria, and the “interior ergonomics” aren’t as good as the Crown Vic.

This all being said, aside from massive cultural resistance and backlash, what is the reasoning for using American cars? Surely it isn’t repair recordm build quality, or predominance of rear-wheel drive vehicles.

Most Japanese sedans are front-wheel drive, so we’ll leave the Japanese out of this.

Most German sedans are rear-wheel drive, or all wheel drive. Arguably, AWD is more expensive to maintain, so let’s reluctantly throw Audi out of the picture. That leaves BMW and MB producing large, spacious, rear wheel drive, powerful sedans.

Let’s do a little side by side comparison here. To keep things consistent, the source of the data will be Edmunds, and all prices will be based from invoice price. (Arguably, a police department buying 50-100 cars might get a decent discount straight from the factory.)

2006 Ford Crown Victoria:
Invoice: $28,282
Build Location: Canada
Weight: 4,129 lbs
Front Legroom (cubic inches): 42.50
Rear Legroom (cubic inches): 39.60
Engine/Drive-train: 4.6L V8 239hp, RWD

2006 BMW 550i:
Invoice: $52,415
Build Location: Germany
Weight: 3,803 lbs
Front Legroom (cubic inches): 41.50
Rear Legroom (cubic inches): 36.00
Engine/Drive-train: 4.8L V8 360hp, RWD

2006 Mercedes-Benz E500:
Invoice: $65,000 (approx)
Build Location: Germany
Weight: unknown
Front Legroom (cubic inches): 41.90
Rear Legroom (cubic inches): 35.60
Engine/Drive-train: 5.0L V8 302hp, RWD

So, why don’t US Police Departments buy a BMW or Mercedes? It looks like it’s due to price and room, for starters. The American car, which would be cheaper to buy and repair, is bigger and substantially cheaper. No Autobahns here in the U.S., but rarely does a criminal need to be tailed at 130+mph.

January 20, 2006January 22, 2006

Bin Ladin is Back, Baby

This asshole is back. I’m so tired of the news sites putting his picture up on the net, or the news puts his image on my TV. I know what the fucking guy looks like, don’t remind me. The next picture of him I want to see is one with a bullet in his head.

I’m not a fan of the Bush Administration, but I’m glad they basically told Osama to go fuck himself in regards to the “truce”. Flip him the bird, and find the son of a bitch already.

And to top that off, just today, Al Zwahiri, Osama’s second in command, released some poetry. What the hell is that about?

A terrorist and poetry. You would think those are mutually exclusive events.

January 14, 2006January 23, 2006

Jethro Tull

I like these guys. Not exactly sure why, but I think all the brass instruments and some classical roots might have a factor in it. The lead singer (Ian Anderson) is a bit whacky, but he seems really into the music. Until I did a search on these guys recently, I wasn’t sure what songs they created (that I might have heard). Of couse, this was followed by me saying “oh, they sing that? That too?”. You know how that goes. 🙂

Talk about being 45 years late to the party. 🙂 Below are three movie clips, one of which is from 1970, and thus it’s 2006 right now, that puts me like I said, about 45 years late to the party. 🙂

I’m debating whether or not this guy is – or was – on drugs. What do you think?

I’m going to say that he might have been on drugs for the making of this video – may be a just-lower-than-lethal brew of coke, acid and shrooms. However, in concert, I don’t think it’s possible for a human being to be that heavily medicated and be that good at playing all sorts of various instruments.

Here are the three video clips. Note: These are stored locally here, so please do not link to my website and use my bandwith. Instead, (on an x86 machine – thats a machine that runs Windows for all you non-geeks) right-click, “save as” to your own machine. Thanks!

Aqualung
Witches
Thick as a Brick

For more information on Jethro Tull, visit the Official Jethro Tull Website, and the Unofficial Jethro Tull website might be a good visit as well.

January 11, 2006January 11, 2006

Albert Hofmann Turns 100

Albert Hofmann is not Matt Hoffman’s father. He’s not into BMX racing, but rather another 3-letter acronym, LSD. Albert Hofman is the creator of LSD, and today, he turned 100 years old.



Picture yourself in a boat on a river,

With tangerine trees and marmalade skies

Somebody calls you, you answer quite slowly,

A girl with kaleidoscope eyes.

Cellophane flowers of yellow and green,

Towering over your head.

Look for the girl with the sun in her eyes,

And sheâ€™s gone.

Lucy in the sky with diamonds.

Follow her down to a bridge by a fountain

Where rocking horse people eat marshmellow pies,

Everyone smiles as you drift past the flowers,

That grow so incredibly high.

Newspaper taxis appear on the shore,

Waiting to take you away.

Climb in the back with your head in the clouds,

And youâ€™re gone.

Lucy in the sky with diamonds,

Picture yourself on a train in a station,

With plasticine porters with looking glass ties,

Suddenly someone is there at the turnstyle,

The girl with the kaleidoscope eyes.

While a young Swiss chemist, he discovered LSD in 1938 while studying fungi at what is now known as Novartis Pharmaceuticals. (In an obviously PC direct move, Novartis declined to comment on Hofmann or LSD.)

What’s great about this guy – other than the medicinal value of his 1938 discovery – is that he still researches, still speaks, and still tries to get U.S. and other countries laws changed in order for LSD to be legalized once again, as it was before 1966.

Even more impressive than being 100 years young today (and a very happy birthday to him), he’s still married to his wife of 70 years. Seventy years, my god.

While I don’t doubt that any drug can be abused in a recreational environment, I do believe that all illegal drugs (especially ecstacy and LSD) do have legitimate medicinal value, either for PTSD or Schitzophrenia. While in college, I did spend time with many people who were on LSD while I drank a few beers. Every single time they were perfectly happy, perfectly content, and completely non-violent. Only one time did I ever witness a “bad trip” that someone had. (A girl from my dorm in 1994 had ran outside in the middle of the night, started screaming that she was being raped. Naturally, we all ran out to find her outside by herself, fighting off invisible rapists. Needless to say, she was taken away in a straight jacket, and I hope she learned to take a break from LSD for a while.)

Click on this CNN article for more information on Mr. Hofmann, and his current plans.

January 10, 2006January 22, 2006

Iran Rips Up Nuclear Deal with the West

Mr Ahmadinejad claims Iran's nuclear programme is â€˜peacefulâ€™

It’s not often when I comment about the political scene in the world, but I figure today is a good day. Today, Iran has decided that it is resuming nuclear fuel enrichment, which could be used to make nuclear weapons. Understandibly, along with Iran’s extensive missle program, a “nuclear Iran” is not something the West (specifically Europe and the United States, much less Israel) would even tolerate.

Let’s detail a little bit why today, Iran made a stunningly important political move:

First and foremost, this is the perfect time to provoke the US into another large disaster. The U.S., still reeling from natural disasters from the Fall of 2005 & current political scandles, is a bit weak at the moment. The Iranians are not stupid – they beat Iraq in the 1980s even when the United States was giving Iraq weapons and support, including WMDs. The Iranians can see that public support the U.S. operations in Afghanistan and Iraq are dwindling. Public support for future operations in the Middle East will be next to impossible to garnish public support for, much less win.

The EU is in now way prepared to fight Iran without U.S. help, and Iran knows this.

Israel, with the current lack of leadership given Sharon’s recent illness, is in a weakened state. Iran sees this, and is taking advantage.

Now, North Korea has decided that unless the U.S. lifts the current economic sanctions against the country, there is no point in addressing their nuke issues with the U.S.

Indeed, an interesting day, and the coming days will be even more interesting, as we’ll see how the U.S. and the EU handle Iran’s latest incident.

Hopefully, Israel won’t premptively strike Iran’s reactors, like they did in Iraq in the early 1980’s.