From JSOnline.com: Packers bikini girls ready for spotlight again

Here's a news story about the Green Bay Packer bikini girls that I blogged about earlier this year.

This year, they're going with pink bikinis for breast cancer awareness. The plan is to charge a few bucks to have a photo taken with the bikini girls, with the proceeds donated to fight the disease.

From Gizmodo.com: 30GB Zunes Failing Everywhere, All At Once

Right, so this is a weird one: we're getting tons of reports--tons--about failing Zune 30s. Apparently, the players began freezing at about midnight last night, becoming totally unresponsive and practically useless.

So, all the 30GB Zunes have decided to throw themselves on a beach to die.  What a hilarious way to start off 2009!

But seriously, how many people does this really effect?  I don't know of anyone who admits to owning a Zune.

I was struck by the flu this Christmas which caused me to spend Saturday on the couch sleeping and half watching three college bowl games- the Meineke Car Care Bowl, Champs Sports Bowl, and the Emerald Bowl. The Emerald Bowl is sponsored by Emerald which makes nuts and commercials that they think are funny but really aren't.  I wasn't planning on watching any of these games, but when you're sick, it's better than nothing.

During the Champs Sports Bowl between Florida State and Wisconsin I saw a profile on the FSU player Myron Rolle.  Impressive individual.  Very refreshing to see an exceptional scholar athlete.



From CNN.com: Scholarly Seminole: NFL prospect Rolle also has Rhodes aspirations

From the Failblog


see more pwn and owned pictures

With all the applications on the iTunes App Store, what's the number one paid application on December 23, 2008?  It's the iFart Mobile- Fart Machine for all ages.

iFart Mobile is a Digital Sound Machine and entertainment system which brings endless laughs and enjoyment to its users. Combined with more usefulness and functionality than some other popular applications, iFart has a built-in security system designed to surprise and discourage iPhone theft, as well as a "Sneak Attack" function ideal for pulling pranks on parents, children, friends, teachers, workmates and employers alike.

The reviews are pretty much what I'd expect...
(1 star) Super lame, don't sound real at al
(2 star) Waste of a dollar, machine generated sounds
(1 star) I tried and tried and this prank does not fool anyone. The fart sounds are way to fake.

As part of the Santa's gone Centro Palm campaign, you can text Claüs your holiday wish!  You might be granted your wish or a Palm Centro. 

I doubt I'll get mine, though. :)

From NYTimes.com: Bush v. Gore Set to Outlast Its Beneficiary

The Supreme Court's decision in Bush v. Gore, issued eight years ago this month, was widely understood to work like that tape recorder in "Mission: Impossible." It was meant to produce a president and then self-destruct.

"Our consideration is limited to the present circumstances," the majority famously said, "for the problem of equal protection in election processes generally presents many complexities."

This is an interesting article regarding the legacy of the Supreme Court decision of Bush v. Gore that helped decide the election in 2000.  While the decision was only meant for the specific case, it is currently being invoked in many other election cases.  Whenever the Supreme Court gets involved their words and decisions carry a great deal of weight.

"Whatever else Bush v. Gore may be," Judge Boyce F. Martin Jr. wrote for the majority, "it is first and foremost a decision of the Supreme Court of the United States and we are bound to adhere to it."

My friend Annie sent me this Obama themed Christmas Card!
Clever use of the "O" logo.  See the cards at Cafepress.com

One of my Procter & Gamble friends gave me a can of Pringles Extreme Screamin' Dill Pickle that came from her Christmas gift package from the company. 

I was going to write a review, but this one pretty much sums up what I think about Pringles Extreme Screamin' Dill Pickle.

I think that Palm is pretty much a dead duck, caught in the market between the iPhone and the Blackberry, but I do find the Santa's gone Centro ad campaign staring Claüs to be pretty amusing.


More Santa's gone Centro ads

I saw this iPod Touch "knockoff" on Buy.com.  It's the V-Touch 8GB MP3.

I love how "Calibrate" is one of the four prominent icons in the bottom row.  Maybe it's in a convenient, easy to find place because you'll be needing to calibrate this thing all the time.  Otherwise, I would have put it somewhere else like under "Tool" or "Settings".  Note, there is only one tool, not tools even the icon shows two of them.

A few weeks ago I wrote about the giant gummy bear on a stick.  One of my employees and I decided to go in on a few of the bears.  I needed one for a White Elephant gift exchange and she thought they'd make great gifts.  Well, the bears arrived and they didn't disappoint!


Get your own Giant Gummy Bear at VAT19.com

Snow on my brick parking pad.  Taken with my iPhone the other night, hence the massive amount of noise in the photo.  It's interesting that there was enough of a temperature difference between the brick and the sand between the bricks.

From Boston.com: Propaganda of the year


Barack Obama is Time Magazine's Person of the Year and for the cover they've chosen a new Shepard Fairey work.

"Our cover portrait is by the street artist Shepard Fairey, whose roots are in the skateboarding world and whose early poster of then Senator Obama became the great populist image of the campaign," editor Rick Stengel writes in his opening letter. "With this cover, Fairey has now created a new iconic image of the President-elect -- a rich, multilayered poster that echoes but then expands on his original."

The piece by the Boston Globe, Propaganda of the year, disagrees with the selection of Fairey's work for the cover saying:

Not only has Time abdicated a journalistic opportunity to freshly interpret Obama's significance in visual terms, but it outsourced the work to the campaign itself: the graphic equivalent of headlining an Obama profile "Change We Can Believe In."

I don't think we're missing a whole lot from Time's interpretation.  Most likely we'd have yet another photograph of Obama on the cover.  Time's already done that- Obama's picture has been on the cover of half of Time Magazine's covers this year!  The Shepard Fairey image captures the spirit of the campaign and the idealism behind the movement that put Obama in the White House.

Shepard Fairey created his original Hope work on his own without involvement of the campaign because he felt strongly about Obama and what he stood for.  This idea is mirrored by the many who volunteered and donated their time and their efforts to the Obama campaign.

I am a huge fan of Shepard Fairey's work which I found through his Obama posters.  I would love to add this print to my collection when it becomes available.  I think in many ways this new image is a more sophisticated, realistic portrait than the iconic Hope poster.

UPDATE 12/19: Added Time.com: Icon-maker Shepard Fairey

 

I was looking at the blog to see if my last article published correctly and I heard a really bad  sounding version "Jingle Bells" with a buzzing sound after every musical phrase.  I thought it must have been a pop up window from some other page, but no.  The offensive sound was coming from my blog.

It was the "Jeep" Google Adsense ad in the right column of my blog.  I am really annoyed with Google for having ads with sound and not giving you the option of turning the volume off.  There doesn't seem to be a way these ads without turning off all image ads.

I can see this annoying people to the extent that they stop visiting my blog.  And we can't be having that happen!

I've added some more of Amazon's free Holiday MP3's to my Things I like Store.

I definitely recommend Elf's Lament by Barenaked Ladies and Michael Buble.  Great song.

From NYTimes.com: Legal Hurdle in Blagojevich Case: A Crime, or Just Talk?

"This town is full of people who call themselves ambassadors, and all they did was pay $200,000 or $300,000 to the Republican or Democratic Party," said Mr. Bennett, referring to a passage in the criminal complaint filed against the governor suggesting that Mr. Blagojevich was interested in an ambassadorial appointment in return for the Senate seat. "You have to wonder, How much of this guy's problem was his language, rather than what he really did?"

It's an interesting question of when political donations crosses the line into political corruption.  Donors have influenced policy decisions and appointments for years.

From Huffingtonpost.com: Yankees Sign Iraqi Hurler

In their latest bid to beef up their pitching rotation for the 2009 season, the New York Yankees today signed Iraqi journalist Muntadar al-Zeidi to a three-year deal worth $32 million.

The right-handed al-Zeidi, 28, impressed the Yankee scouts with his performance in Baghdad yesterday when he threw both of his shoes at President George W. Bush.

While neither of the shoes hit their target, both throws "had great velocity and good movement," said Yankee owner Hank Steinbrenner.

From logodesignlove.com: Obama logo ideas that weren't chosen

An interesting look into some of the other Obama logo ideas that ended up not being chosen.  The logo they chose was in my opinion by far the strongest one.

Thanks to my friend Annie for sending this to me. 

I'm seriously impressed with President Bush's reflexes.  But where is the Secret Service?  You'd think that after the first throw, the Iraqi would be on the ground tied up in a pretzel, but no, he manages to get off a second pretty good throw.  And where's the agent that's supposed to jump in front of the President?  Does that only happen in the movies?

From dubailadiesmasters.com: Monke wins Sorenstam's final tournament by three shots in Dubai

I was reading the story about Annika Sorenstam's last tournament when I saw a small picture of the winner holding a trophy that looked like a giant thumb.

It turns out to be a sculpture of a woman wearing a burqa.  It's ironic that women in tiny skirts playing the Western game of golf wins a trophy of a woman who's face is totally covered and wouldn't have the opportunity to play the game of golf.

Sorenstam unveils Dubai Ladies Masters trophy

From CNN.com: Zakaria: There is a U.S. auto industry that works

CNN: So you are against the bailout?

Zakaria: No. But the reasons the CEOs of Ford, GM and Chrysler present -- that they will restructure, they are still competitive, they will change -- are bogus; they won't. The best argument for the bailout is that it is the most cost-effective jobs program that the government can run in the short term.

Spending on infrastructure to create jobs will take months, maybe years. However, keeping the Big Three afloat will keep hundreds of thousands of jobs in place quickly and easily. It's true the companies will eventually go bankrupt, but by then hopefully the economy can withstand it.

I think Zakaria has hit the nail on the head. 

I've been collecting Battlestar Galactica posters.  I'll have to find a space on my wall for this one. :)

The new Webisodes that lead into the second half of the final season begin today on Sci-Fi.com.

From CNN.com: Scientists baffled by mysterious acorn shortage

Up and down the East Coast, residents and naturalists alike have been scratching their heads this autumn over a simple question: Where are all the acorns?

Oak trees have shed their leaves, but the usual carpet of acorns is not crunching underfoot.

In far-flung pockets of northern Virginia, Maryland, Pennsylvania, West Virginia and other states, scientists have found no acorns whatsoever.

This sounds like the beginning of one of those bad science fiction disaster films that you find on the Sci-Fi Channel.  First something innocuous, like no acorns, and then everyone dies of a plague or overrun by giant squirrels. 

Humans have made such a huge impact on the environment that any time something different happens in nature, we always have to look to see if we're somehow the cause of it, from bees dying to trees not producing acorns.

From WashingtonPost.com: Nobel Physicist Chosen To Be Energy Secretary

President-elect Barack Obama has chosen Steven Chu, a Nobel Prize-winning physicist who heads the Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory, to be the next energy secretary, and he has picked veteran regulators from diverse backgrounds to fill three other key jobs on his environmental and climate-change team, Democratic sources said yesterday.
...

Chu, the son of Chinese immigrants, won the Nobel Prize for Physics in 1997 for his work in the "development of methods to cool and trap atoms with laser light." But, in an interview last year with The Washington Post, Chu said he began to turn his attention to energy and climate change several years ago. "I was following it just as a citizen and getting increasingly alarmed," he said. "Many of our best basic scientists [now] realize that this is getting down to a crisis situation."

I think that this is a bold choice for the future.  Obviously a smart guy in regards to alternative energy, but how will he manage the bureaucracy and the push back from the established energy industry?  Because he's not a big name like an Al Gore, Chu will probably be more of an ideas guy and lead the formation of the plan and President-elect Obama himself will be the hammer to push these ideas through.  It's interesting to have an actual scientist who knows about energy to be running the Energy Department instead of a lawyer or a bureaucrat.

UPDATE:
An analysis from the NYTimes.com: Energy Choice -- Nobelist With Climate Passion

From WSJ/NBC Poll (PDF)

How can 2% think that George W. Bush is one of the very best Presidents?  I don't think Bush himself even thinks that.

From MotorAuthority.com: 2011 Ford Fiesta U.S. features revealed

The Big Three Detroit carmakers are struggling right now, but their plans for the future are still bright - perhaps all the brighter thanks to the focusing nature of the current crisis. As part of the Blue Oval's future, the Fiesta small car will finally be making its way back to the U.S. as a 2011 model in 2010, and now Ford has revealed the key features of the car via the Fiesta's minisite.

This car would sell like hotcakes if Ford had it now.  Unfortunately for Ford, it won't arrive here until 2010 as a 2011 model.  GM and Ford actually make widely acclaimed small cars for the European market and haven't offered them to U.S. customers.

According to this NY Times article, Fast-Tracking Some Good Cars, it's the differences between American and European safety and emission standards and the recertification that's necessary that's causing a delay in the introduction of these cars to the U.S. market.  The writer suggests the suspension of U.S. requirements and accepting European standards for the next few years to allow American auto manufacturers to fast track the small cars into the U.S. market.
Related article:
MotorTrend.com: Gotta Have Cars: 2010 Ford Fiesta

From Yahoo.com: Angry Ford dealer in SC blasts imports in ads

SAVANNAH, Ga. - A Ford dealer angered over the proposed bailout of U.S. automakers blames the nation's sour economy on Congress and criticized buyers of Japanese cars, calling the vehicles "rice ready ... not road ready" in a radio ad.

O.C. Welch, who owns a dealership near Savannah in Hardeeville, S.C., began airing the minute-long ad on a dozen stations in the area over the weekend. The ad sounds more like a talk-radio tirade than a sales pitch.

"All you people that buy all your Toyotas and send that money to Japan, you know, when you don't have a job to make your Toyota car payment, don't come crying to me," Welch says in the ad. "All those cars are rice ready. They're not road ready."

Floyd Mori, executive director of the Japanese American Citizens League, said Welch's remarks evoke anti-Asian sentiments often aimed at Japanese and Chinese immigrants to the U.S. from the 1930s through World War II. He also noted many Japanese automakers' cars are manufactured in America.

"Rice Ready?  Ooooh, that's clever. Not road ready? Not according to families who flock to buy the Toyota Camry and Honda Accord.  People vote with their feet and their pocket books, it's the American way.

Spouting anti-Asian sentiment isn't going to turn around the auto industry.  I hear constantly that the American auto makers have closed the quality gap.  Well, that just isn't good enough anymore.  To win back customers with a damaged brand, you need to knock the consumer's socks off with a product that they can't get anywhere else. 

From CNN.com: How to enjoy a honeymoon spot without a honey

With portable board games, books, cards and an unlimited amount of iPod-fueled music, keeping busy in a honeymoon spot can seem a bit like summer camp (but with booze). Use the time a couple might spend in their room getting busy to work on your Scrabble skills, or catch up on all the new music you've downloaded but have yet to hear.

This is some great advice... how about recommending some Prozac take the edge of the depression on your vacation.

From Wired.com: Pilots Complain the A380 Is Too Quiet for Sleeping

The last thing you'd expect to hear from anyone who's flown recently is that planes are too quiet. But that's exactly what Airbus is hearing from pilots who say the A380 super-jumbo makes so little noise they're having trouble getting to sleep.

Emirates airline pilots say the four engines propelling the long-haul jets are so quiet they can hear every crying baby, snoring passenger and flushing toilet, making it all but impossible to nod off during their breaks. The problems are unique to the A380, which Airbus boasts is significantly quieter than anything else in the sky. We took a ride aboard Emirate's super-luxe A380, and it is indeed whisper-quiet. Emirates never expected that to be a problem.

"We're getting lots of complaints," Capt. Ed Davidson, the airline's senior vice president for fleets, told Flight Global. "On our other aircraft, the engines drown out the cabin noise. [On the A380] the pilots sleep with earplugs, but the cabin noise goes straight through them."

I don't think that being too quiet was a problem that engineers thought about when designing the A380.

For a limited time, Amazon's offering three Christmas MP3 downloads from Vince Guaraldi's "A Charlie Brown Christmas".  The songs are Greensleeves, Fur Elise, and O Tannenbaum. 

If you like jazz and Christmas music, you should have the complete album.  It's great Christmas party music!

Visit my Things I like Store for the free downloads.

Another "too cool" product from VAT19.com


It's Mini Gummy Bear soap!  You don't get how cool it is until you see it in a soap dish!  Probably not a good idea if you have kids!


From the description:

Your package features twenty-five Gummy Bear soaps that are the same size, shape, and smell as the real candy treat. You will receive five each of lime, cherry, lemon, orange, and pineapple-scented Gummy Bears. If you have the time, line them up in rows to create your very own little Gummy Bear army. Hey, we had fun doing it.

Buy it VAT19: Mini Gummy Bear Soap
See also- Giant Gummy Bear on a Stick

From The Washington Post: Obama or an Obama-Impersonator? Ros-Lehtinen Flubs the Call

Twice on Wednesday, President-elect Barack Obama tried to reach across the partisan divide with a phone call to Rep. Ileana Ros-Lehtinen, a Republican from Florida.

And twice, according to her office, she hung up on him.

She "thought it was a hoax," an aide to the congresswoman said.
...
A third party then sought to intervene. Rep. Howard Berman, chairman of the House Foreign Affairs Committee and someone Ros-Lehtinen knows well, called and told her he "needed to speak with her urgently." She got on the line -- but demanded that Berman recount a story "only both of them would know," which the congressman did.

He then told her what had just happened -- "that she had, indeed, hung up on the president-elect," according to her office statement.

An amusing story.

SI.com: Sportsman of the Year: Michael Phelps

Those seeking sustenance flocked to Phelps's favorite greasy spoon, Pete's Grille, where his traditional pretraining breakfast was offered during the Olympics as a $19.95 special: a three-egg omelet, a bowl of grits, three slices of French toast with powdered sugar, three chocolate-chip pancakes and three fried-egg sandwiches with cheese, lettuce, tomato, fried onions and mayo. "Usually it was a group of people who'd order it," says Dave Stahl, the owner of Pete's Grille. "The one guy who tried it by himself complained of pretty serious stomach pain."

Michael Phelps is a superstar but still manages to seem like a pretty normal person.

From NYTimes.com: Ford Says It Can Get By if Rivals Survive

If the company does access the loans, it said Mr. Mulally's salary, which amounted to $21 million last year, would be reduced to $1 a year. Last month, when he and the chief executives from G.M. and Chrysler were asked whether they would be willing to eliminate their own pay, Mr. Mulally had been the most resistant.

The three men also had been criticized for flying corporate jets to Washington to ask for financial assistance. This week, Mr. Mulally plans to drive a Ford Escape hybrid sport-utility vehicle to Washington to testify a second time before Congress, and Ford said in its submission that it now plans to sell all five of its corporate jets.

This totally misses the point of what the criticism was about.  If the CEO's are coming to Washington to beg for public money, they should show that they understand that it's not business as usual and show some frugality in their spending ways.  Driving to Washington is a total publicity stunt.

I guess if all three CEO's were carpooling in the same Ford Escape hybrid that might be a little better.

From the Wall Street Journal: America's Other Auto Industry

These are the 12 "foreign," or so-called transplant, producers making cars across America's South and Midwest. Toyota, BMW, Kia and others now make 54% of the cars Americans buy. The internationals also employ some 113,000 Americans, compared with 239,000 at U.S.-owned carmakers, and several times that number indirectly.

The international car makers aren't cheering for Detroit's collapse. Their own production would be hit if such large suppliers as the automotive interior maker Lear were to go down with a GM or Chrysler. They fear, as well, a protectionist backlash. But by the same token, a government lifeline for Detroit punishes these other companies and their American employees for making better business decisions.

The root of this other industry's success is no secret. In fact, Detroit has already adopted some of its efficiency and employment strategies, though not yet enough. To put it concisely, the transplants operate under conditions imposed by the free market. Detroit lives on Fantasy Island.

This what makes bailouts such a problematic issue.  Is it fair for the government to step in to help companies that have made bad decisions or have a poor business model? 

Saw this commercial while watching football this weekend.  It's a section of a road in California where you hear the Lone Ranger Theme Song from grooves that Honda cut into the road.  It was designed for the length of the Honda Civic, but it evidently worked for other cars.  It's since been paved over because of complaints of people who lived nearby.


From Wired: Hi Ho Honda! Civic Musical Road Plays Lone Ranger Theme Song