Wednesday, April 30, 2003

Never Enough Desperate Druggies Department

Rich kids in India are now paying up to US$7 to get stung by scorpions, because the venom produces a floaty feeling once the initial pain fades. Yeah, and poor kids in this country whack hornet nests for the same reason--but don't tell their parents. So Mom chalks it up to youthful indiscretion, and youngsters get a cheap buzz--pun intended. But the really hardcore people go for rattlesnakes. The rest of you are just lightweights. Feh. Go get bitten--you'll like it.


Tuesday, April 29, 2003

Never Enough Causes For Celebration Department

A restaurant in Paris has celebrated its one-millionth dish of roast caneton--which is a duckling that is "carefully strangled and ritually cooked in its own blood." Man, you gotta LOVE dedication to dishes like that.


Friday, April 25, 2003

Never Enough Badly Needed Updates Department

First, Cynthia pointed out that I didn't have our wedding pictures linked here. That's fixed.

Second, I had overlooked the trans-comic T-Gina--that's fixed.

Third, nobody buys me CDs even though I have a link for 'em. I figure that's in part due to the fact that they're all new CDs, and in part due to the general pseudo-satanic themes of blackmetal.com. So now I have a link for Django's instead. Now fix me up!!!


Monday, April 21, 2003

Never Enough Grave Warnings Department

There's a Christian spacecraft entered into the X-Prize--Micro-Space's Crusader-X.

Pardon me while I shiver. Christians in space... AIEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEE!!!!


Friday, April 18, 2003

Never Enough Dyke Comics Department

OK, I'm going for that dykish Blog*Spot banner ad now--I just added Alison Bechdel's classic strip Dykes To Watch Out For and Joan Hilty's Bitter Girl. They can't ignore our market segment community much longer!


Thursday, April 17, 2003

Never Enough History Rants Department

Another reason why I like the Arab press--they are willing to post articles that combine full-blown rants about the inability for Americans to think, anti-Bush rants, and an exposé on how Lincoln went through similar scandals over the Civil War as Bush is encountering with the Iraq war, such as a weak Presidental election, massive anti-war protests, and worries of opportunism. It makes me tingle, it does.


Wednesday, April 16, 2003

Never Enough Kiwi Dykes Department

OK, it's not gender-bending smut, but it's a start....

According to a study by the Otago School of Medicine, one out of four women have been attracted to another woman at some point in their life, with 17% (that's one out of every six) of all 26-year-old women "currently" attracted to another woman. It is conjectured that, since New Zealand has an older feminist tradition, perhaps Kiwi women are more empowered and better able to shrug off same-sex stigmas.

All I know is, New Zealand is sounding more and more like a lovely place to live.


Tuesday, April 15, 2003

Never Enough Banner Hilarity Department

I don't know if you've paid attention to the banners that are appearing since I switched temporarily to Blog*Spot, but I think they're funny. One moment, there's a banner for the American Red Cross, and the next, an ad for a cheap copy of the Pungent Stench CD Praise The Names Of The Musical Assassins. And yet--no queer- or tranny-oriented ads yet! I guess I need to be posting more gender-bending smut or something. Hee!


Never Enough Costume Changes Department

So now Iraqis are looting priceless artifacts, destroying those they don't steal, and burning down libraries full of irreplaceable ancient texts. About looting and violence in general, Donald Rumsfield--who has quickly become the most powerful man in the Cabinet--glibly states that "Free people are free to make mistakes and commit crimes and do bad things." (Guess that means we Americans aren't free anymore.) And the Bush Administration is rattling its sabers again, this time towards Syria.

In many political cartoons, Dubya has been portrayed as a cowboy à la John Wayne. I think he should now be portrayed by a different John Wayne character--Attila The Hun.


Sunday, April 13, 2003

Never Enough Chances At Rebuttal Department

After not having enough chances to speak her mind when she read something about her on my weblog, my partner Cynthia has finally set up her own blog. Go check it out, I think you'll find her insights to be quite worthy.

Friday, April 11, 2003

Never Enough Blunt Arabs Department

Lately I've been checking out ArabNews.com for updates on the Iraqi war, mainly because the articles cover a much more impressive spectrum--from support to outrage--than US media coverage, even if you include progressive news venues. And this editorial is but one example why I appreciate it.


Wednesday, April 09, 2003

Never Enough Compression Fun Department

New Scientist has recently reported that using the Bzip file compression program, scientists have found themselves capable of automatically sorting music not just by genre but by composer as well. Since this strategy is purely algorithmic and doesn't rely on abstractions such as harmony or rhythm, it might be helpful to identify the composer for a work where not much is known about its origin. A similar strategy has also been used to find out whether two sound files containing speech are spoken in the same language.

Interestingly enough, Space.com recently reported that a similar compression program, Gzip, may be used to identify whether microscopic structures within rocks are stromatolites--structures created by microbes--or stromato-like structures created through a chemical process. To wit, the smaller the compressed file, the more orderly the structure, and thus the more likely the structure is a stromatolite. If the process stands up to further study, we may have a ready means to analyze Martian rocks for signs that life once lived on Mars.

I have a feeling that compression programs--once created back when drive space was much more expensive--will be used more and more often to analyze elements of structure in complex data sets. Indeed, I am already wondering if, for example, compression programs can be used to determine authors of texts. Imagine being able to compare the works of Shakespeare and Bacon with an off-the-shelf compression program. Perhaps compression software can also be used to compare images--say, to help differentiate between authentic Van Goghs and forgeries. I'm sure there are dozens, maybe hundreds, of possible applications.

Maybe this is the time to invest in Aladdin Systems, maker of the Stuffit compression suite. Does WinZip have public stock? Or will the use of gzip continue, encouraging the Open Source movement to create new scientific analysis tools with basic compression algorithms at their core? I don't know, but I have seen the future, and it is zipped.




Never Enough Chilling Prophesies Department

We may congratulate ourselves that this cruel war is nearing its end. It has cost a vast amount of treasure and blood. . . . It has indeed been a trying hour for the Republic; but I see in the near future a crisis approaching that unnerves me and causes me to tremble for the safety of my country. As a result of the war, corporations have been enthroned and an era of corruption in high places will follow, and the money power of the country will endeavor to prolong its reign by working upon the prejudices of the people until all wealth is aggregated in a few hands and the Republic is destroyed. I feel at this moment more anxiety for the safety of my country than ever before, even in the midst of war. God grant that my suspicions may prove groundless.

--Abraham Lincoln, letter to Col. William F. Elkins, Nov. 21, 1864, as quoted on the ratical.com site

Brrrrrrrrrrrrrrr.


Monday, April 07, 2003

Never Enough Patriotic Responses Department

Edited from a post to the Transgender Headbangers group:

I'm not just an American, I'm a patriot.

I'm the kind of patriot who would rather burn Old Glory than let some redneck throw beer cans out his truck onto our American roads.

I'm the kind of patriot who doesn't like it when the US administration treats the rest of the world with arrogance, scorn, domination, and cruelty.

I'm the kind of patriot who hates the fact that her nation has become sheeplike, oblivious to the abattoir at the end of the path of gluttony and ignorance.

I'm the kind of patriot who doesn't appreciate having a cokehead President who hasn't even bothered to travel outside the US, who throws his weight around, disregards international law and diplomacy, and turns a $200 billion surplus into a $600 billion deficit in a single year.

I'm the kind of patriot who'd rather fix her own neighborhood than meddle in the affairs of others, and wishes her government were wise enough to do the same.

I'm the kind of patriot who is wary of binary dichotomies, especially in politics, and thinks a two-party political system is only marginally better than a one-party system.

I'm the kind of patriot who thinks all media is inherently biased, but therefore reads Arab and American news alike in search of balance and truth.

I'm the kind of patriot who'd rather be outspoken than silenced by neoconservative fundamentalist lunatics.

I'm the kind of patriot who thinks freedom isn't inhereted, but earned, and that every generation must stand up to attempts at restricting rights or else lose them irrevocably.

I'm the kind of patriot who knows America not as a body of land, a system of government, a nation of people, but as a set of ideals to which all Americans should aspire. That includes the President, by the way.

So I hope that explains where I'm coming from.


Never Enough Truth In Editing Department

I wonder if MSNBC intended this article to read as such:

In the heart of the city, American soldiers who reached the gold-and-blue-domed palace used the toilets, rifled through documents in the bombed-out compound, and helped themselves to ashtrays, pillows, gold-painted Arab glassware and other souvenirs.

�I hope this makes it clear to the Iraqi people that this (regime) is over and that they can now enjoy their new freedom,� said U.S. brigade commander Col. David Perkins.

The freedom to steal ashtrays--ah, what giddy carefree days should follow! Especially given how quickly the Iraqi people caught on to stealing bigger, fancier items. God bless America!