A Bunch of Random Shit, vol. I

My friend Jason refers to his own ‘random stuff’ posts (which I intend to mimic here) as RCIMT, or “Random Crap In My Tabs”. Most of what I intend to put into this post is from tabs currently open in one of my browsers. Some of those tabs have been open for weeks, waiting for me to get up off my ass and post something about them. Some of them I just found today.

No rhyme or reason here, as this stuff runs the gamut. [All the other color display and print junkies will know that word, others will simply have heard it.]

The House I Grew Up In Makes the News

I grew up in Lafayette, Indiana. Specifically, I grew up on the corner of Summerfield Drive and Ottawa Drive. We lived there from 1967 to 1983. I was sent a message today letting me know that there had been a fatal shooting at the old homestead, so I checked the Lafayette Journal & Courier to see what had happened.

According to the article I read, Lafayette Police responded to the house at 1:37 p.m. on Thursday, 8 April 2010. A 21-year-old resident of the house was found dead, having been shot. Initially regarded as suspicious, the death is now being treated as a homicide. It seems very strange to think about that sort of thing happening in a place you once knew so well.

Steampunk Artistry

The Steampunk Workshop has an article about a Victorian Organ Command Desk which is simply amazing. It’s not quite my style, but the detail in the construction is something to be admired. The partially finished project looks like this:

Victorian computer command center organ cockpit desk thingy

Victorian computer command center organ cockpit desk thingy

If I had the time and space necessary, I would really love to tackle a project like that. Simply beautiful.

Christians Often Have Faulty Memories, Notably Those Memories Enshrined In Their Bible

You know the story: Noah was supposed to build the ark out of gopher wood, and it was supposed to be so many cubits long, wide, and high. It seems that the Babylonians remembered it all differently. Tablets from 1700 BCE inform us that Noah’s Ark was a circular raft made of reeds.

Dr. Irving Finkel, Assistant Keeper of Ancient Mesopotamian script, languages and cultures at the British Museum, said of the traditional interpretation of the ark compared to that referenced by the tablet, “But the ark didn’t have to go anywhere, it just had to float, and the instructions are for a type of craft which they knew very well. It’s still sometimes used in Iran and Iraq today, a type of round coracle which they would have known exactly how to use to transport animals across a river or floods.”

That makes a lot more sense to me. Of course, I don’t believe in the story of a global flood occurring within the past 6000 years. However, the mythological interpretation of actual large-scale flooding in the Mesopotamian region is better explained by techniques and technology of the period in my opinion.

Some People Deserve To Be Slapped Down

You know the kind of people I’m talking about. I’m talking about the “I’m better than everybody else so whatever I’m doing is much more important than what anyone else is doing” type of person. They piss me off. People like this tend to bring me closer to physical violence than nearly any others. One of these people (if he acted as alleged), a hedge-fund manager, allegedly threw a little hissy fit and was arrested by the Boston Police. The police photo is priceless. You don’t have to be an ultra-rich bastard like this guy (A 10-room, $4.5 million mauve Tudor manse in the shadow of Harvard University?!!?! Give me a fucking break!) in order to be an egotistical shit, either, but it seems to help.

Irony Is Truly Lost On Some People

The irony and the hypocrisy of the photo in an article about the future of language made me nearly feel sorry for the people involved because of their unabashed ignorance. Nearly. Personally, I think people like that should be allowed to have their voice, but never able to legislate any of their desired restrictions. You can protest all you want, and I will fight for your right to do so, but don’t you dare try to tell me that I can’t call Mohammed a two-bit goatherd turned child-rapist, or publish a picture illustrating my opinion. Once you try to force me to abide by your religious rules, you give up all rights to not be thrown in jail.

An Islamic protest outside the Danish Embassy in London. Photograph: David Levene

An Islamic protest outside the Danish Embassy in London. Photograph: David Levene

Chopra Continues To Defy Description

How can one man be so egotistical, so self-centered, so full of shit, and such a snake-oil salesman? This guy actually had the gall to blame the 7.2 earthquake of 4 April 2010 along the U.S.-Mexico border on his own meditation. This guy is such a fucking con man that it goes beyond the pale! How the fuck can anyone actually take this charlatan seriously?!?!?!!?

Enough for Now

That’s the best random shit I have at the moment. I’m sure I’ll be able to come up with much more at some later date. If I feel like it, I may even try to do it on a semi-regular basis.

5 comments

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    • dmabus on 2010/04/10 at 17:13
    • Reply

    DEATH TRAP

    ******************************************

    http://abcnews.go.com/Nightline/FaceOff/
    *****************************************

    THE REAL QUESTION:

    DOES ATHEISM HAVE A FUTURE?

    AND THE ANSWER – NO!

    Atheists

    GET OUT OF MY UNIVERSE…

    you little liars do nothing but antagonize…

    and you try to eliminate all the dreams and hopes of humanity…

    but you LOST…

    THE DEATH OF ATH*ISM – SCIENTIFIC PROOF OF GOD

    http://engforum.pravda.ru/showthread.php?t=280780

    Einstein puts the final nail in the coffin of atheism…

    *************************************

    http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=V7vpw4AH8QQ

    *************************************

    atheists deny their own life element…

    LIGHT OR DEATH, ATHEISTS?

    ********************************
    ***************************LIGHT*********
    ************************************

    or do you want to meet our BUDDY….

    http://www.darkart.cz/artworks/tezcatlipoca_700_by_hunter.jpg

    • chaosagent on 2010/04/21 at 18:00
    • Reply

    Bwahahahahahahahahahahah! If only… if only I could use greentext here.

    All I have to say is: >implying

    AND: Pravda is not a source of information anymore than FOX News is. Fail. Nail in the coffin of atheism? Where? I see nothing but crazy. CRAZY! BATSHIT FUCKING INSANE CRAZY!

  1. Awww. I’d gotten so used to never seeing updates at your place that I got out of the habit of checking back several months ago. You managed to get some Mabus spam. In all my blogging about stuff right up his hate-alley, I still haven’t managed that. Sigh. That’s one Achievement I’ve yet to unlock. Bet it’s worth a bunch of points, too.

  2. This, um, only just sent a pingback to my blog now. Delayed reaction much?

    1. I had just edited the post to replace the images with new versions that weren’t from the old subdomain. Very odd. I notice another did, as well.

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