http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/world/asia/article4286721.ece

Yeah... and my biggest personality flaw is that, at times, I have too much integrity.

You sanctimonious son of a bitch!  What legendary gall!

Everything costs more than it ever has, our own government is farther up our collective assholes than ever, and he's gone out of his way to make it happen.

Don't blame me, I voted for Kodos.

...or robot porn?




Yeah, girl.... you like that don't you...


http://gas2.org/2008/06/26/low-cost-gas-engine-innovation-doubles-fuel-economy/

I want a sweet "MODERATOR" button by my avatar.  To be clear, I don't want to have any new rights or responsibilities.  I'm just feeling left out.  If you could make it say something more awesome than MODERATOR, like PIMPMOBILE, that would be swell too.

I have had Jesus Camp on the DVR for probably six or eight months now, and I just now got around to watching it.  I imagine it is much like seeing a UFO or a ghost - you're glad you did, but maybe in some ways you wish you wouldn't have.
Maybe I'll have a more measured feeling about it in a day or two, but for now, this is the saddest, scariest, most horrifying thing I have ever seen, and I've seen Mr. Belvedere naked.

I think we all know that there are kooky adults out there, and we also probably all know that they teach there kids kooky things.  There is still something profoundly disturbing to see kids believing it, crying over it, and regurgitating the horseshit they've been fed, all completely sincerely.

There is a scene where dozens of kids and some adult minders all pray and lay hands on a cardboard cutout of W like there is a Songs 4 Worship CD playing or something, and they then proceed to pray that Bush receives the diving provenance that will give him the strength to pick a good, holy judge (to replace O'Connor I think), followed by chants of "righteous judges!" from the kids and adults.  I think that's all that really needs to be said.

New year, new forum, and most importantly, new Fantasy Football season!
I am down with running it this year, since it needs to be done properly!

Please reply if you want to be a part of TehGeekeryOMFGLOL!!~! Fantasy Football Season 1!
I am thinking we could take up to 12 players.

Ready... Fight!

So it turns out that last night I accidentally proved the existence of God, and I thought you guys would like to know.  It's very scientific to get peer review.

I wanted to watch Team America, which is overdue as I have not seen it in months, so I popped in the disc.  All is well up until the "I promise I will never die" scene, at which point it just hangs.  Shit! (This is not the part that proves God is real). 
It becomes clear I am not going to be able to watch the best movie ever, so I go back to the TV.  Flipping through the channels I get to Comedy Central, and what is on, but Team America!  Not only that, but it is on the Secret Stash, which means the only part that is censored is the Girls Gone Wild commercials.  And not only not only that, but it is at the exact part where I left off!
One thing I did notice, though, is that for all that He isn't omnipotent.  It was in full screen, after all.  And you would think he could either uncensor the GGW commercials or get rid of them.  And he doesn't care for the poop scene I guess.  But still, A-, way to go.

If I posted this before, I don't remember it, therefore it never happened.

I am having a weird issue.  I can connect and login just fine.  When I do transfers, eventually it will stall with the message-

"150 File status okay; about to open data connection
Received 0 bytes in 120 secs, (0.00 Bps), transfer succeeded
421 Service not available, closing control connection.

This is the message in WS FTP, it does the same thing in Filezilla or any other client I have tried. 

What's weirder is that it only happens with files that are larger than ~7MB or so.  For files smaller than that, it seems to take the 120 seconds and then go ahead and transfer, which makes me think there is some sort of caching or timeout going on, but I haven't been able to find a setting for that either in the client or the server.  Also, this only occurs outside the server-side firewall.  On the local network files transfer perfectly.  Server is proftpd in Ubuntu.

How do I love thee? Let me count the ways.
I love thee to the depth and talent of bench
My soul rejoiced when seeds were clenched.
For hipchecking Nash into hardwood floor
I love thee, Horry, like Cheney loves war.
Now with Shaq slowing fast-break
I love thee freely, as dogs love steak.
I love thee purely, as Eva loves Parker.
I love that there are no neck tattoos
That look like they were applied with permanent marker.
I love thee because Phoenix will lose.
With my lost 'Boys, --- I love thee with the glee,
Nachos, beers, of my leisure time! --- and, as Wife choose,
I shall but love thee as long as it's free.

Or
 
Listen To Joe Sound Like A High School Drama Queen


Dramatis Personae (C'mon, you know when I start a thread it's not gonna be light reading):
Not real names, of course.

Joe - That's me. (A) I run workflow through the lab (for 11 people), all in the US, AND (B) am the liaison for new internal projects that need work done in our lab, AND (C) I scrub and track all of the issues generated by my lab for both internal and external customers.  And (D) whatever else everyone else thinks they don't have time for or don't know how to do or can't be trusted with.
Needless to say I'm not properly compensated for all of this at this point.

Victor - My boss.  Good guy, has no direct power to take care of the compensation issue, but realizes he'd be boned if I left so he does what he can. 

Julio - A supervisor who basically has no day to day duties.  Also, basically a cockbag.

Dick - A liaison for a certain segment of external customers.

Kenny - A liaison for a different segment of external customers.

Luigi - Dick and Kenny's manager.

Richard - Victor's boss, and therefore my boss's boss.  Also realizes the potential for complete boneage, and assures me it's in the works.  $$ I mean.  Not boneage.  OR IS IT???

So recently, Richard got a little promotion.  This led to a few other minor changes in the org chart, the result being that Julio is now directly reporting to Victor, whereas before he was reporting to... well, I'm not sure.  Richard I guess.  Whatever the case we didn't have the same direct manager.
Well, Victor is a manager after my own heart, and he'll be damned if he has someone on his team with the Supervisor job title and no damn responsibilities.  I should have mentioned earlier that I do not have the title, nor do I make the $$ that Julio does.

So we sat down one day and mapped out the New World Order.

Julio takes over (A) and (C), as described above, which are basically the most tedious, time consuming, and overall shittiest parts of my job.  This leaves me with (B) and in all likelihood (D).  This may sound like a bad sign to you as a casual observer, but it still leaves me with a full time job and more to do that Dick and Kenny.
Now, as I said, Julio is a fucking dick, and we honestly have no faith in him being able to keep the lab running as smoothly as I have and have things complete within the timeframes I have established without totally pissing off all the guys that do the actual work in there.  As part of the reorg, I do get a title change, to match up with Kenny, who also has a better job title as far as the corporate ladder crap goes.
So it would seem at this point that it is going to work out well for me either way.  I get a bump up and don't have to the parts of my job that piss me off anymore, not to mention only having to do about half of the work as I used to.  Also, if Julio pulls a world class epic FAIL, then I will take back over, save the day, and get that better title as well.  I don't know about you, but I'm thinking Beast Rabban/Feyd-Rautha here.  Naturally, I'm Feyd-Rautha. 
One more thing - it's a fact of life that the whole shebang could be shipped off to be done in Asia at any time.  This move would insulate me from that, as the braintrust here will still need a liaison to the lab, no matter where it is.  Julio would be made vulnerable to that possibility.

This was all supposed to take place over a matter of a couple months.  However, as The Dude would say, new shit has come to light, which means we have to push it up to two weeks. 
A consequence of this new shit is that Dick will no longer be with us.  Also, Kenny has been fed up for months and has his resume all over Monster, so he could be gone at any time as well.  When that happens, I know exactly how it will play out.  Luigi won't have enough people to take care of his customers, so I will have to pick up some of it.  He will try and most likely succeed in having me join his team officially, effectively consolidating ALL customers under him, not just external ones.  This would leave Victor with no pipeline into internal customers, and therefore just as vulnerable to outsourcing as Julio is. 

So who is about to get cornholed?  The obvious answer is Julio. It also seems to me that someone is trying to set Victor up for redundancy, at least if a certain sequence of events come to fruition.  However, there is another alternative, and that is that I am the one who's going down.  After all, I am losing, at least temporarily as it was presented to me, the parts of my job that require the most skill.  I think that's exceedingly unlikely, based on past reviews, and for other reasons.  But one cannot help but be a little paranoid, especially after that ganj I just burned.

I had to go pay a ticket, which was $169.  I whip out $170 and place it in the little slot.  As I wait expectantly for her to accept my money, she says she needs exact change.

I tell she can just keep the dollar, to which she replies "sorry, we can't do that". 
I offer to donate it to Texas Childrens' Health Plan, or the Presidential campaigns, like when I do my taxes.  She denies all attempts for me to give my dollar to the State of Texas, or the United States of America, or any agent thereof.
She says I can try this other window, maybe they will have change for my 10.  No joy.

When I come back, she says "you can just mail in a money order." 

IT COSTS MORE THAN A DOLLAR FOR A MONEY ORDER AND A STAMP.

I had a little car trouble this morning, so I had to hike back home before the wife left to drop the kid off at school.  We went the back way so we could pick up a couple things from the car.  Here is a transcript:

Little Maddie Sixpack: We're going the wrong way.  This isn't the way to school.  This is the way to grandma's house.

Me:  We are going to school.  This is just the back way.

LMS:  No it's not, this is the way to grandma's.

Me:  We're going to school.

LMS:  Are you sure?

Me:  Of course!  Trust me!

LMS: ... Mama?

Some of you may know this already, but by getting married, I acquired a complete extended family who reside in the Land of 10,000 (3 foot deep) Lakes.  We go up there every 2 years or so, and every time it is 5 days of partying.  They drink with their meals, they drink when they party, they party for any reason at all, and then they drink in the morning to feel better from the night of drinking.  Last time was for a wedding, and there were at least 40 cases of beer, and something like 10 kegs, not counting the cash bar at the reception.  I calculated the keggage after the fact, so take that for what it's worth.  It was really a blur.   

Now, they SAY that it's not always like that, and we just happen to come on occasions that call for a week of shitfacery, but I know that at least a few of you people are from there, so I want the real story.  What's it like when I'm not around?