These imbeciles are appealing their DaVinci Code Lawsuit! Why can’t they just quit while they’re…behind I guess? They already owe about $2 million of Randomhouse’s legal bills, plus their own! Face it dudes, you’re done! I wish I could find the page number where their book is clearly mentioned, and save the courts, the judge, and these poor fools a whole ton of time and money.
I Hope The Pay Is Good
No matter how hard I try, I can’t get my head around
this story.
I’ve been sitting here trying to write it up for about the last 10 minutes and I just can’t make it sound right, so I’ll let the story do the talking and throw in comments where I must.
LONDON (AP) – As a painter needs a canvas and a sculptor stone, Blane Dickinson needs a head.
Specifically, the 32-year-old tattoo artist from Wales needs a person willing to have their head tattooed. The subject? The iconic “full English” breakfast. Ideally, the image would contain fried eggs, bacon and sausages, but Dickinson is willing to accommodate personal taste and vegetarians. The breakfast typically also includes baked beans, fried tomatoes and toast.
“It’s such a striking and recognizable dish,” he said, “but I will gladly make changes to suit any taste or background.”
A knife and fork would be tattooed behind the subject’s ears, Dickinson said.
“I like to push the boundaries,” he said. “I like to make people think.”
What he doesn’t realize is that most people are probably thinking “hmmm, that fucker ain’t right.”
Dickinson hopes to display the finished work at tattoo shows in Britain, but said that, so far, he has been unable to persuade any friends to take part.
And this, for some reason, seems to come as a surprise to him. Don’t ask me why. No seriously, don’t ask me why, because I haven’t a clue.
Did You See That Thing with the Guy on the Show There?
Um, this is dumb. Dumb and doomed to fail. A coalition of agencies that fight for the protection of prostitutes in Vancouver is sending letters to the media saying that reporters shouldn’t use Robert Pickton’s name when they talk about him during his upcoming trial so that he doesn’t get some kind of celebrity status from the coverage. Instead they should only refer to the whole thing as “the trial in the case of the missing women. This is apparently so he won’t be motivated to do it again for more hype.
Ok, first, it’s highly unlikely that people aren’t going to know who it was who killed prostitutes on his pig farm and then spread their remains throughout the farm. It isn’t likely that people are going to get confused as to who they’re talking about. It’s not exactly an everyday occurrence. So, what’s the point of not using his name? Either you get a whole publication ban, or you cover something like normal. I don’t know what they’re hoping to accomplish by just referring to Pickton as “that guy.” It’s far, far too late to prevent people from knowing who he is. I mean, look at how the courtroom was packed when they scheduled his trial. And that was just for the scheduling of his trial. People know.
And second, I doubt he’ll be getting out to be able to do this again. He’s on trial for six women’s deaths so far. I know that prostitutes’ lives may not be given the value that they should, but he’s on trial for six murders. He’ll be in for a long, long time. Plus, when he goes to jail, I doubt he’ll survive his sentence because the other prisoners will probably be out to get him. He’s done. They caught him. He’s not going to do this again. This whole not saying his name is silliness.
I hope the media doesn’t cave and they look at the letter for what it is. Ridiculous! It made me laugh that in the letter itself, they used his name several times. Way to shoot yourself in the foot. What a waste of time.
Off I Go, Into the Wild Blue Yonder!
It looks like we finally got our winter. I woke up this morning to a hissing sound outside my window. That was a whole wack of ice pellets and snow smacking into the building. Yee ha, welcome to January. At least that seems more normal. Crappy, but seasonal. Maybe it’ll kill off the whole host of flus and colds that seem to be floating around, waiting to strike.
Well, after a lot of pondering and nashing of teeth, it seems that my epiphany was more than just a passing thing. I’ve been giving it a lot of thought, and I don’t know if I can emotionally handle being a counselor or doing social work stuff day in and day out. I don’t know if the rewards would outweigh the draining aspects of it, and I don’t know if I could keep my enthusiasm for the work at the level it should be in order to, well, do a good job. So I’m thinking about maybe…gulp…starting my own business.
What’s that sound? Me drowning in debt? Hopefully not. I was thinking about being a vendor of computers and other assistive technology, and hopefully being an ADP-registered vendor. There are so many scammers, scumbags and ripoff-artists that it’s hard to find one good vendor in your region. So I’d like to be another option. Now all I have to do is…everything. Set up a website, learn how to assemble computers, find out what is all involved in running this business, find suppliers, promote myself, hopefully get customers and hopefully do more than survive…if I can even get this idea off the ground. I’ve got a long road ahead, but maybe I can make it. Now why is my gut spinning? At least it’s a different spinning than the spinning and twisting of dread I was starting to feel about doing any kind of social service job. It’s the spinning that comes with the fear of the unknown.
My main fear is what if I’m not any good. In everything I try and do, I excel up to a certain point, and then I fall ker plop on my face. If I can’t do well, word will get around, and soon I will be screwed. Then my student loan will feel like a few cents compared to the debt I would have incurred. And then what will I do? It’s a huge risk, will I be able to do it? I guess only time will tell. Everything’s so unsure. And then of course there’s the waiting game to hear about when I’ll be taking off to guide dog school. I’m still waiting for that news. So…here’s hoping this next plan doesn’t fall to pieces like the last one.
Blinded Me with Science
Ok, this is just stupid. A 15-year-old boy apparently learned how to make a home-made bomb out of caustic soda and other common products from a children’s television science show, although that is under dispute, because the show’s producers can’t find record of that exact experiment. His plan of impressing all of his friends went horribly wrong when he took his exploding creation to school, through it down, it didn’t explode…and he went to pick it up…at which point, it exploded in his face!. He has permanent damage to one eye, and spent several days in the hospital. Now police are trying to tell retail stores not to sell certain products to young people because they’re dangerous, and writing to the show’s producers telling them that their show caused this tragedy.
No! This kid’s wanting to build a bomb caused this tragedy. If he hadn’t seen it on a show, he would have gone to find info on it somewhere. It would have been just a matter of time.
Even if he did see it on the show, every science show I’ve ever seen tells you to not try this at home if it’s even remotely dangerous. They tell you to protect your eyes, and get a big person to help you if you really want to try this at home.
And, finally, the kid was 15. At 15, I knew that I shouldn’t make things that go boom because I might go boom if things went wrong. If I had decided to do something crazy like that, I knew it would be my fault, not some show’s fault, if I got hurt. And that’s the part that pisses me off. We can’t make the world completely safe, because then there’s no risk and there’s no way for anyone to learn anything. And why, once again, is personal responsibility going out the window? Sure, it sucks that this kid got hurt. But that’s where it should stop. No letters to TV stations, no attempts to tell stores what to sell. Just a realization that he’ll probably never try anything that stupid again.
Spreading the Word
I got this in the mail today, and figured I could help spread the word. I remember how hard it was to get study participants. so hell, any way I can help someone else, I’d be glad to help.
Harvard Medical school is conducting a survey of legally blind women to see if the incidence of sleep disorders and cancer risk, among other health factors, is any different among blind women. If you want to participate, go to www.bvihealthsurvey.com. I don’t think I need to say this, but I guess I should. You have to be legally blind and a woman. You can do the survey on the web, or they have ways for you to contact the study’s director if you’d like to do the surveyin about 6 zillion other formats. They really want our input! So there it is, if you want to give them a hand.
Punched Out.
Ever since I heard about this story, I’ve wanted to say something about it, but I just couldn’t get my head around what happened.
In the small town of Erieau, Ontario, somebody died and 3 people got sick enough to be hospitalized from drinking punch laced with windshield wiper fluid. How did the windshield wiper fluid get in there? Did someone have dark and evil plans to kill someone at the party? No! Get ready for this. The punch was mixed in, and poured from, a windshield wiper fluid jug.
Ok, doesn’t everyone know that windshield wiper fluid, and other chemicals, are not good to drink? And, if they’re not good to drink, their containers are not safe storage places for things that we do drink? Or, doesn’t almost everybody know this? Apparently, no one at not one, but two parties in Erieau knew this, or spoke up to say, “Uh, chief, I don’t think that’s a good idea.”
An even worse thought is, did these people think the windshield wiper fluid would serve as alcohol for the punch? If so, they really need help.
In any case, now, one woman is dead, and two guys are partially blinded from this little bit of holiday cheer.
Holy crap. I just don’t understand how this happened. It’s amiracle that more people didn’t die or get really sick. It seems some people need a re-education about things that are good and bad for us. Hopefully next year, when Newyears comes around, people will ask a lot more questions if these people show up with their punch in a paint can.
Last Words on the TD Talking Bank Machines.
They talk all the way through! They even tell you to select your language, in multiple languages! At last, there is speech from the beginning to the end! They did it! Yea! Woo! Now I need to send that thank you letter out pronto.
I know I probably look nuts to sighties for getting excited over a talking bank machine. But to them, I say this. Just think about the number of questions you see on a bank machine. Now realize the only way I could use that machine if I didn’t want someone standing behind me telling me what to do every time I wanted some cash was to bug someone into helping me memorize the sequence of questions and buttons, and pray they didn’t change the machine. For once, I can go get money, and not memorize the questions. I can use a bank machine like you do now, just following the prompts. Now it’s as easy for me as for you!
Yeah, Uh-huh, Sure.
I saw a commercial that cracked me up today. It showed this girl getting a phone call. It was from a collection agency. He told her that he’d noticed some patterns in the way she’s been paying, or not paying, her debts. Then he told her that she should call this credit counselling firm and they could help her.
And that’s when you know you’re watching a commercial. If a company has sent out the collection hounds after you, they’re not nice about it. They assume that you’re not good for the cash, and they’ll get it out of you however they can. They don’t really want to talk to you at all. They just want the money. that’s the only thing that talks. Unfortunately, I met some of these collection hounds, and it wasn’t even my fault.
Years ago, I bought a little portable computer/braille display thingy. It needed repairs, so I was told by the guy I bought it from that he would arrange for it to be shipped back to the distributor in the states, but he would take care of all the shipping costs. I later found out he didn’t. I guess with some bigger items, you have to pay some kind of broker fee. I don’t get it, but there it is. So anyway, without telling me, the shipper used a third party company I’d never heard of to handle the fees. I think the guy who said he’d take care of all the shipping costs should have known about this, since he’s used this shipper for ten years. He didn’t tell me either.
Then I started getting letters from this company, but they didn’t have my name on them and they didn’t sound like any company I’d dealt with. So I threw them out without realizing they were bills. We’d been getting a lot of junk mail in envelopes from dating services at that time, so I thought that was all this was.
Then, oh then. I got an ugly letter from a collection agency that said I was to pay my delinquent account or go to court. Here I was thinking my identity had been stolen, thinking my credit card had been stolen, freaking out. After checking that nothing I knew about had been stolen, I called the agency whose number was on the bill. I was forwarded to the lady who wrote the letter. I left a message asking for her to call me back and we could talk about this. No reply. I called back the next day, same thing. Finally, about 2 minutes after I made the last call, since I really wanted these hounds off my tail, I called back and I asked the receptionist if she could physically see this lady in the office. She said yes. I asked if she could go get her, and lead her to the phone, because she can’t seem to find it. Only then did I get to talk to her, figure out where this was all coming from, and fix it. She never really explained why she was refusing to pick up the phone.
I’m pretty sure this is the norm and not the exception. I’ve heard about collection agencies coming after relatives of people who died, and not believing the person is dead until they see a death certificate because they’ve heard it all before. I don’t think they’re going to tell the person they’re after that they should seek credit counselling.
As an aside, here’s something that has always made me laugh. There’s an ad for a certain credit counselling service that goes, “Call us on the phone or see us on the net, 310-debt.” They love to talk about avoiding filing for bankrupcy in their commercials. If a person is so buried in debt that they’re thinking about going bankrupt to get away from it, do you think they’ll have a phone? Or the web? I know the phone call is free, thank god, or it would be histerical. But I thought it was funny that they didn’t just stick to telling them to look up where they’re located in the phone book, since it would probably be best for them to just drop in. Otherwise, they’d be phoning them for a private, or not so private, consultation, from a public payphone. But maybe I’m just weird.
And as a final aside, does it freak anyone else out that Moneymart, the ones giving out payday loans that can kill you with interest, is now handing out Mastercards? “Here, have some more debt, suckas!” That’s all I can think when I see those ads.
Where’d my point go? I guess some stuff in ads, when it comes to debt, is just goofy. Either they’re being super nice where they wouldn’t be, or super generous where they shouldn’t be. But I guess they caught my attention, so maybe their plan is working.
Rabbits Growl?
I learned something yesterday that still makes me laugh whenever I think about it. I learned that rabbits can growl! Now wouldn’t that be funny to hear? I looked for a while for recorded rabbit growls, but sadly, I can’t find any.
So here’s my question. Has anyone heard a rabbit growl? What does it sound like? Does it even sound remotely threatening? It makes me think of how Steve would get pissed off or frustrated at something and make this roaring noise. I’d try and imitate him and…well…it wouldn’t sound very much like a roar. More like an “Eeee”. I wonder who a rabbit’s growl would intimidate. The lettuce it was about to chew? I mean, being bitten by a rabbit isn’t fun, I’ve been nipped before. But I can’t imagine how a sound coming out of something that small could be perceived as remotely scary.
