Twitterlee-Dee

All right, if you have not heard of it there exists these days an interesting micro-blog site called Twitter. You have 140 characters to post about whatever. Usually it winds up being posts about what that person happens to be doing. If you were consistent about it, at the end of your life you might have an interesting, stacatto autobiography.

But what is perhaps more fascinating is Twittervision. On Twittervision you get a globe and the latest Twitter posts pop up from the geographic locations they were made. It's incredible. The majority of the posts are from the United States, with Europe and it's myriad languages, Mexico and Spanish and the rest of the world following behind. I've only seen one post from Japan and one post from the South Pacific apart from that. I was alerted to the existence of Twittervision by an article that suggested "a savvy journalist might watch Twittervision to look for interviews on current crises."

If I had my way, I'd have a projector running Twittervision against a wall in my house 24/7.

Anyway, I expect this blog will be updated momentarily with news of my joining Twitter and a link to my feed.

I had no idea...

Huh! 86 years of misleading people!
Vomitoria were no place for vomiting, it would seem.
Take THAT 7th grade Latin teacher. Sorta. She barely taught us Latin.

Anyway, interesting to note!

clipped from dictionary.reference.com Main Entry: vomitorium Part of Speech: n Definition: 1754, "passage or opening in an ancient amphitheater, leading to or from the seats," from L. (Macrobius, Sat., VI.iv); see vomit. Erroneous meaning "place where ancient Romans (allegedly) deliberately vomited during feasts" is attested from 1923. Etymology: Latin vomitorius, alluding to the path's discharging of the spectators Usage: plural vomitoria

Haha, what?

This is pretty great. It's a livejournal post!

Oh man, it's great, though.

So is dinner. But you know what isn't? Grading. And unfortunately I'm about to trade the former for the latter.

LAME.

Also Even llamas do it

The Modern Age

I feel like this service is extremely important in the world of Web 2.0.

Free Education on the Internet

The fact that such a service is available tickles me to my very core. Charging people to take a hold of their own education is the goal of the education system as a whole, I think. Or at least it should be. Unfortunately, such a simple mission is one of the hardest to achieve.

The ready access of cheap (free!) information available for everyone to use as needed, to update and to modify and to contribute their own expertise is one of the greatest contributions folks have made for the advancement of humanity. And it is a practice that goes back to the dawn of humans. From people simply asking how to hunt or make bread, to libraries to the internet the availability of information seems to be one of the most important aspects of a free society.

Anyway, I think it's cool.

Also, this Scientist, Richard Lindzen, almost makes an interesting point about Global Warming here. And then he's full of shit. There might not be an ideal temperature for the planet, but there is most certainly an ideal temperature for humans.

Also, people have been complaining about the upcoming regulations that will be made on Carbon Dioxide as a greenhouse gas. Arguing that since it is a naturally occurring substance, one that we ourselves release with every exhalation, it is illogical to regulate it. On that ground, it would be just as illogical to regulate marijuana, food or any just about any other drug. The fact of the matter is that there are any number of "naturally occurring" chemicals, compounds and whatnot that we produce in unnaturally large quantities. Carbon Dioxide is just one of them. Plutonium is another. I don't think it's a bad idea to regulate these chemicals. They're dangerous.

And people running around with free reign on releasing these chemicals amplify that danger to a great degree.

I believe

I believe in peace in Iraq. I believe that means withdrawing the troops. There is no peace in violence.

I believe in peace in Iraq. I believe that means letting Iraqis find their way. There is no peace is forcing a system on people.

I believe I signed up for this blog thing. One Million Blogs for Peace. I believe that means I support peace. Well, that doesn't mean it. But it represents my belief in it.

Stay Classy, America

[2021 EDIT. I AM ASHAMED BY THIS POST. I WAS YOUNG AND DUMB AND TOOK JOY IN HARMFUL LANGUAGE AND ATTITUDES].

A little solidarity, please

So, the amusing fact of google's ability to map the drive from the U.S. to certain European cities is balanced that it apparently can't figure out how to cross the Pacific. As if some little switch in the machine was saying, "Swim across the Pacific? Ridiculous!"

I have swum the Atlantic, incidentally, and made the trip in record time because a big ol' Gulper Eel led the way, eating everything in my path.

The Reaping

Anyone else think the trailers for The Reaping are hilarious?

The movie looks like it's going to be utter trash that pretends to be deep and religiously philosophical while cashing in on cheap scares. But the funniest part for me is toward the end when the screen flashes "What hath God wrought?" And that title card is immediately followed by "Hillary Swank."

God hath wrought Hillary Swank.

Also worth noting (or nothing) is the fact that "What hath God wrought?" is the first message sent via telegraph by Samuel Morse. That happened May, 24th 1844.

Shit IN luck

Pretty god damn lucky if you ask me. Choice between death/mutilation and being covered in 9 inches of crap isn't a choice at all. I'm fairly certain we all have showers of some sort.

clipped from news.sky.com A woman survived a fall from a sixth floor balcony when a pile of poo broke her fall. The lucky - or unlucky - escape happened when the woman was hanging out her laundry. She suffered only slight injuries in the incident in Nanjing, China. "She landed in a 20cm thick heap of excrement," the Kuaibao tabloid newspaper gleefully reported.

Backup

In reference to that allegation about the U.S. supporting a Pakistani terrorist group, I offer this source, an ABC News Blog.

And it is significantly worse than the image I had painted briefly last entry. Not only is it a terrorist group, it's a fucking Al-Qaeda terrorist group. This kind of report needs more coverage.