Now there's a blade called the WASP that injects compressed gas into whatever it's stuck in. Maybe a good concept if you have to defend yourself against a shark or maybe an alligator but for special forces stealthy operations - doubtful although the manufacturer's website says otherwise - so what do I know. WASP systems says their knife is a multi-shot gas injection weapon that is devastating to any living creature and will drop some of the largest mammals in a single stab. This easy-to-use, easy-to-reload weapon delivers up to a 24g shot of compressed gas at 800 psi. on land or underwater. It is silent when used and deadly to our enemies. No need to take a chance that the enemy can come back to attack you.

The WASP is ideally suited for:

• Special Op's Troops (Land or Sea)
• Downed Pilots Stranded In Open Water or Remote Forests
• Military Survival Kits
• S.W.A.T. and Special Police
• Security Guards (Special Protective Services, Air Marshals, etc.)

Let's see what what else this knife can do: The WASP knife is said to be more lethal than any other. Created for hunting dangerous animals, it kills on impact by injecting a frozen jet of compressed gas into the body of the prey, exploding the organs of the animal. Available to buy online, the British police are worried about the implications the weapon could have if it falls into the wrong hands.

As you can see in this video, which was published by its manufacturers, the WASP knife injects a frozen ball of compressed gas into the body at 800psi, which, once released, swells to the size of a basketball. The effects of this injection will drop many of the world's largest land predators. The effects of the compressed gas not only cause over-inflation during ascent when used underwater, but also freezes all tissues and organs surrounding the point of injection on land or at sea. When used underwater, the injected gas carries the predator to the surface BEFORE blood is released into the water. Thus giving a diver added protection by diverting other potential predators to the surface.

The UK's West Midlands Metropolitan Police has already received instructions to prevent the circulation of the knife. A difficult task, seeing as it can be bought online.

Instead of merely getting rid of wasps, a man from Fardal in Western Norway, ended up burning down the garage with his car inside. The wasps are gone, but so is the garage and car.

The senior citizen poured lighter fluid on a rag and lit it. He failed to notice that the woodpile containing the wasp's nest also caught fire. By the time fire fighters arrived, both the garage and the man's car were smouldering wrecks, writes daily newspaper Sogn Avis

I found a Ruby-tailed wasp. It was climbing up the cobwebby window of the storeroom, avoiding the spidertraps. The iridescent blue-green and red of its jewelled body shone in the sunlight - I'd never seen anything like it. So I enticed it into an empty jam-jar, half-disbelieving that something so beautiful could exist in my urban ghetto. I didn't have a clue what it was, it walked like a wasp - tapping its antennae. So I Googled for "Wasps of Britain" and finally found it - the Ruby-tailed wasp, aka Jewel Wasp. Apparently 'tis a rare species in Britain, classified as 'vulnerable'.

Unfortunately, the little beauty is a predatory parasite. It lays its eggs in the nests of other wasps and its young hatch and proceed to eat the other species' larvae - ick. But it is just so terribly pretty you have to overlook its exploitative, free-loading lifestyle.

Although the wasp was remarkably patient during the ensuing photography session, I wasn't too happy with the results of all that fiddling about with the macro. If you'd like a closer look, there are a couple of v. nice pix here: http://www.bwars.com/Chrysis_ignita_agg.htm

And the moral of the story? There is beauty to be found in unexpected places -we have only to look past the cobwebs. At least I think that's what it is. Do feel free to draw your own conclusions.

Någonstans efter frukost hördes det lite distade toner från stora scenen och Afrikanska Kobus gick på. Dock var mitt intresse lite lågt så jag tog mig inte dit förens i slutet. Bandet var helt okej faktiskt men mer intresserad var jag faktiskt av Stormwarrior som lirade efter. Tyvärr hade de inte med sig Kai Hansen som de gjort på Sweden Rock Festival utan det blev ett fattigare framträdande. Men Stormwarrior fick vi se mer av i nästa band, Burning Star, där bl a Lars (stormwarrior) är medlem. Bandet i sig tillhör före detta Virgin Steel gitarristen Jack Starr.

Hade gärna velat stanna kvar längre p området men jag var tvungen att röra mig till backstagen och gå på presskonferens. Inga problem än så länge men vi fick tyvärr inte fota det hela. Sedan var det väl ganska klumpigt av arrangemanget att göra en "vi-tar-alla-band-vi-hittar"- konferens. Så vid ett bord sitter Doro, Holyhell, Manowar, Majesty och Titanium Black inpressade tillsammans medans Manowar är de enda som får några frågor.
Väl tillbaka på området ser spanar jag in Doro och smyger mig ned i fotodiket (vilket jag inte har pass till) och stannar även där under W.A.S.P's framträdande. På Gotthard slänger dock vakterna ut mig och jag rör mig tillbaka till campet för att slicka såren tills dess att Manowar ska spela.

När tiden sedan börjar närma sig deras framträdande är vi en skara fans som rör oss mot scenen. Precis innan kommer det en regnskur och gissa vad... vi får en regnbåge. Till råga på allt kommer det en till skur och plötsligt har vi två regnbågar ovanför varandra! Sedan drar Manowar igång och konserten är helt underbar fram tills dess att bassisten Joey öppnar sin stora käft och förstör hela kvällen. Eftersom Whitesnake och Def leppard har ställt in fanns möjligheten att få sitt band klippt och pengarna tillbaka och visst var det några som gjorde det. Det är ju festival så alla lär ju inte komma för Manowar... Men Joey går på om vilka "fuckheads" de 30 pers är som lämnat tillbaka bandet och att det minsann är Manowar som delar ut gratisöl m.m. Det visar sig senare att 2 av dem åkt ända från Brasilien för att se Whitesnake.. Efter denna attack mot fansen känns plötsligt resten av konserten inte lika kul och det är nästan med glädje jag tar mig tillbaka till campingen för att gå och lägga mig.
//Cecilia Wemgård

Peace, love and hippie grease!

We have been waiting for this moment for so long. Our community suffered the bill 69, then later the bill 101, and we have lost so many competent and great bodies who flew to other provinces. Now it is time for us to have our revenge and to make sure that those Quebecers will be able to serve us in our own language, in English, the imperial language of the international-all-hollywood-continent-to-continent world.

Cultural diversity is a non-sense; why attach ourselves to old culture and traditions? Let's embrace English as the only language in the world and let's destroy all other culture and languages as fast as possible!

In the past, we tried to anglicize them, but only their elites would dare to speak our language. The core of their people would continue to speak their inferior French "joual" so we weren't successful to assimilate them. But thanks to the Young Liberals of Quebec, now we can hope to assimilate them because not only the elites will talk to us in english, but every one of those retarded! Even the mecanician in his small town far from Montreal will have to speak to us in English. Now we finally have the upper hand in this war!

Let's face it: our culture is superior, and trying to protect a dead poutine "culture" by making sure that people in Quebec can continue to speak french is a waste of time. Quebec culture is an horror and we must do everything we can to destroy it. They lost the war in 1760; they have to learn to live with this fact and understand that this continent is ours and they have no right to exist here. They can consider themselves lucky if we let them speak their dirty old dead language at home, but the public language, the only language that will be understood by everyone in Quebec, is English.

Accordingly, the Young Liberals did the first step; if each and every Quebecer is bilingual, and considering that we are 300 millions and they are only 6 millions, sooner or later they will be assimilated. They will think in English, they will work in English, they will go on the net in English, they will watch the television in English, they will listen to songs in english and even singers from their cities will sing to them in English. When a minority gets completely bilingual, then it disappears because the language of the majority takes control. This is good news, but not enough.

The Young Liberals should go further. French should be forbidden in primary schools. Why wasting our children's precious time with this dead language that will not be of any utility in tomorrow's world? If everyone speaks english, why would they need french? Help them to speak a better english by forcing them to go at school in english.

Next step, of course, would be to destroy that awful bill 101, and change the official language of Quebec to English, because english will be the only language that every citizen in Quebec can understand (immigrants will speak english only and the Quebecers will speak both english and french, so whenever there will be an interaction between immigrants and Quebecers, english will rule).

Finally, we should eliminate any kind of subvention to french music or culture, this border that protect french dead language from our great anglo-saxon culture. They should starve to dead and if they can't sell their things, well they can die. And if their boring songs can't play at the radio, then let our great songs play!

It is time for us to take back that country, to speak english everywhere, to be proud to reject that old bastard language and to make sure that this once-great people called "french-canadians" who are now "Quebecers" will soon be as scarce on their territory as Amerindians. Then, we could build them some reserves and let them trade illegaly their poutine.

Thank you, Young Liberals of Quebec, now English has a bright future in Quebec and we can see - once again - the day when french in North America will only be History.

- A proud English Quebecer who will soon be able to live here without having to speak one word of French.

Alice Cooper (vero nome Vincent Furnier, classe 1948) rimane senza ombra di dubbio uno dei protagonisti più eclettici e discussi della scena rock di tutti i tempi; celebri il suo trucco facciale e i concerti dove le liriche horror si fondono a situazioni teatrali dando vita a spettacoli di rara bellezza e atmosfera, la medesima formula adottata e riproposta in seguito (in alcuni casi scopiazzata) da molte band horror rock che proprio a Cooper dovranno il loro taglio 'spettacolare' (vedi Marylin Manson, suo grande fan da sempre). Tra le bands debitrici: Rob Zombie, W.A.S.P., Lizzy Borden, King Diamond, Twisted Sister e Motley Crue e altri.
Una brillante carriera iniziata a metà degli anni '60 e maturata grazie all'aiuto di Frank Zappa, tra polemiche, diverbi, accuse da parte delle associazioni più puritane e oltranziste degli USA, urtate (e non poco) dalla componente "grand guignolesca” a base di forche, serpenti, ghigliottine, maschere dei suoi show, lo consacrerà definitivamente come icona/simbolo del Rock più eclettico e spettacolare.
Cooper è certamente un artista complicato dalle mille sfaccettature e risvolti (Salvador Dalì lo ritrarrà addirittura in una sua celebre opera d'arte olografica...). Fervente seguace della religione cristiana e sostenitore di Bush, negli anni settanta appoggerà la guerra del Vietnam distinguendosi da molti altri artisti dell'epoca che assumeranno posizione nettamente opposta...

La discografia come potrete immaginare è sterminata e copre un arco di tempo lunghissimo, per questa vi rimando alla documentazione ufficiale abbondante ed esaustiva.

Di seguito invece una selezione dei suoi lavori in studio più importanti:

1971 - Love It to Death
1971 - Killer
1972 - School's Out
1973 - Billion Dollar Babies
1975 - Welcome to My Nightmare
1989 - Trash
1991 - Hey Stoopid

Curiosità:

Esistono varie leggende sull'origine del suo nome d'arte; Qualcuno sostiene fosse uscito da una tavola Ouija e appartenente ad una strega del 17esimo secolo... Stronzate, Vincent dichiarò in un'intervista che lo scelse soltanto perché... 'suonava bene'!

For those of you not in the know, this is a Preview Review, wherein I find the unlettered preview pages offered online for an upcoming comic (that I really have no intention of buying), and write a review of the issue based entirely on my perceptions of what is going on.

Despite the shortage of unlettered pages being offered for preview (a conspiracy, I maintain, directly against this here blog), I, your humble host have manage to procure some pages from the forthcoming Spider-Man Loves Mary Jane #1.  Wait... #1?  Hasn't this series been going on for a while?  I thought it was up to, like, issue 20 or so.  Oh, wait... now I get it.  New writer, and Marvel decided to cash in by slapping a #1 on the cover.  I see right through you, Marvel.  Can't fool me.

Anyway, Spider-Man Loves Mary Jane is the heart-wrenching story of Peter Parker, caught in the grip of drug addiction, desperately trying to --

What?

Not about drugs?  A teenage girl in love?

Huh.  Okay.  I could be wrong.  Or am I?  (Just a note - I probably am.)

As I was saying, today we look at Spider-Man Loves Mary Jane, written by Terry Moore, art duties by Craig Rousseau, with a cover by Terry Moore and Adrian Alphona.

Let's see that cover, shall we?

Oh, wow... its so... symmetrical?  Yep.  Main subject posted front and center, grass on both sides, a tree on each side, background pretty sterile.  Hold on a minute - that lampost is only on one side. 

That's daring. 

Moving of from the general composition of the image, we can take note that New York is filled with actual ivory towers, broken up by only the occasional line or square.  Most folks that don't live in New York don't know that.  I can already tell that this comic will be very informative.

And there stands Mary Jane.  Young, innocent, completely unaware that in the future, she will make a deal with the devil and completely screw up Spider-Man's continuity.

Let's open the book.

Splash page!  Alrighty, on this first page, we have... well, it look like M.J. is laying on a big canvas on which someone has pencilled a few faces.  And, it also looks like she's rubbing out some of the images.

You know, that's irritating.  I mean, someone sets up a canvas, pencils in some light drawings to get ready to paint, and along comes Lil' Miss "Spider-Man-Loves-Me-I-Can-Do-Anything-I-Want," who decides to just lay down on the canvass.

Anyway, what else is going on here?  Well, M.J. has a lot of hair.  Don't get me wrong - very shiny and well maintained (she probably buys some really expensive conditioner), but she could do with a little trim. 

I just realized - that hair is probably why she is lying down.  The weight of it exhausted her.  Now I feel kinda bad for judging her too quickly.  Sorry, M.J.

Aw, she has a cute little Spider-Man doll.  You know, I can't decide if it is a good thing or a bad thing that Spidey can give a doll of himself to a girlfriend.  I mean, it is neat that those things exist, but it seems a little creepy, maybe a little controlling, for a guy to give a doll of himself to his girl.  I mean, you don't think that Mario Lopez gives out those Slater dolls to girlfriends, do you?

Let's just go to the next page.

Splash page!  This comic is going to be a really quick read if this keeps up.  Twenty-two glorious single image pages!  Thirty seconds of entertainment for only $2.99!  What a deal!

On this page, we get to see that Spidey also has a doll of M.J.  I guess that's okay, kinda like a reciprocal gift of young love.  You know, like when you see boyfriends and girlfriends wearing identical shirts... which is actually kinda nauseating.  But, they are young and in love and do stupid things like that.

I'm not certain why Spidey is crushing one of his model airplanes, though.  Maybe we'll find out on the next page.

Hold it right there!  That M.J. doll is emoting in this first panel!  Unless that is one incredibly expensive doll, I'm guessing it isn't a doll at all.  It is Janet Van Dyne, a.k.a., the Wasp!  And, she appears to be dressed up in some sort of Mary Jane costume!  Oh, no... I don't like where this is headed.

Panel 2, Spidey looks back at Janet.  Say it ain't so, Spidey!

Then, in the third panel, their eyes meet.  I can't believe you would do this to M.J., Spidey.  Have you no shame?  Cheating on her, making the Wasp dress up like her... oh, man... this is wrong AND creepy.

The next panel, Janet moves in for the kiss.  I can't watch this.  It is just so wrong!

Last panel on the page - a reprieve from the creepy, as someone fires a bazooka at Spidey!  He appears to be the same size as the Wasp... which means it must be her husband, Hank Pym, a.k.a., Ant-Man.  How will the superhero community survive all of this?  Hero against hero?  All for what?  The creepy desires of Peter Parker.  It is just disgusting.  Move on to the next page.

Oh... well, that is a startling change of pace.  We are now in what appears to be a classroom, where M.J. is blissfully unaware of the two-timing activities of her love.  We also learn another previously unknown to most people fact - Mary Jane's arms.  They are gorilla-long.

Seriously, why is she passing that note to the blonde girl to pass to that sulky kid?  I'm pretty sure if she fully extended that arm, she could open the window.

And why is she passing a note to the sulky kid, anyway?  Oh - maybe it is a friendly note to try to cheer up sulky kid.  It really is a nice gesture on her part.

In the following panel, M.J. looks on happily as the blonde girl gives the note to the sulky kid.  She is likely thinking on the coming appreciative smile from sulky kid.

By the next panel, M.J. has returned to her studies, and... a wadded up tissue floats in the air near her head?  Or is it orbiting her head?  I must admit... I'm a bit confused here.  Maybe the next panel will explain things a bit.

Nope, no help at all.  The wadded up tissue has now crashed into the side of her head, irritating M.J., as well it should.  On a quick sidenote - are those walls behind her made of marble?  What kinda budget do New York schools have?

Next page, please.

Okay, it is 11:12 p.m.  (Thanks for the time update, Craig Rousseau!)  In the next panel, we see a tuckered-out M.J., asleep in her clothes among her school books as the TV plays in the background.

Moving down to the next panel - Aghgh!  A mysterious hand on the window!  M.J. is going to get attacked in her sleep!  Quick, move to the next panel!

Uh oh... aw, man... say it ain't so, Spidey!  Seriously?  You are a Peeping Tom now?  First, giving a doll of yourself to M.J., then having the Wasp dress up as M.J. for your creepy little encounter, and now this?  Man, I haven't been this skeeved-out about a superhero stalker since I watched Superman Returns.  Ugh!

In the last two panels, we see Mary Jane, completely oblivious to the invasion of privacy, and then Spidey slips away, fearful of being caught.

Thank goodness that's over!  The entire creepy context of this issue really threw me off.  As such, I can only give it 138 stars out of 15,933 stars.  I like my Spider-Man less stalker-y and more devoted to M.J.

Here's to hoping the next Preview Review is less icky!

EG, signing off.

"A imprensa politicamente correta e os movimentos antiamericanos mundo afora já elegeram Barack Obama porque vêem nele — e isto nem é justo — o "anti-EUA". Trata-se de uma besteira gigantesca. Basta analisar, como já destaquei aqui, o voto do democrata no tal pacote agrícola, que estabelece um teto de US$ 48 bilhões para subsídios e a taxação do etanol brasileiro, e o voto do republicano. McCain é que saiu em defesa dos pobres. Ah, mas Obama tem, para os antiamericanos, um cheirinho de humilhação do império. Santa cretinice! Se eleito, só lhe restará o caminho de ser ainda mais "realista" e "durão" do que seria um wasp qualquer." (Texto completo aqui)

And for those of you who are too lazy, the list is:

6. Spider-Man

5. Hulk

4. Cyclops

3. Hawkeye

2. Yellowjacket

1. Mr. Fantastic!

It should no longer be used just for sports brawls to downplay the seriousness of 6'7 black guys throwing haymakers in baggy tanktops.  No I think if you come home with a black eye and your wife asks what happened.

(to be read in WASPy accent) I just got in a little skirmish over Noam Chomsky vs. Wittgenstein and he slapped me with his blackjack.

• A bad Product Manager never listens. And there are many of these floating around in the software industry. I happened to sit next to one such from Honeywell. This lady was returning from one of those Roman outpost visits that are common with MNCs and flaunting pictures of a trip to Mysore to her colleagues. "This is me in front of the palace", she squealed. Pat came the question - "Whose palace is it?". A moment's pause is broken with "Aah...some Sultan's must be. You know, they were guys with all the money". She was obviously not paying attention during the conducted tour. "And you know, then they took us to some Moslem tomb...". Our Senior Product Manager (as revealed by the sticker on her laptop) was clearly in no mood to listen that day.

• A bad American never changes. Waiting at the TV area in the Business Lounge at the Frankfurt airport it is rather difficult not to notice that Berlin was reeling with Obamania. He was omnipresent - on the LCD screens to the cover of USA Today. The old American - a WASP - next to me picks up his paper and loudly wails out the headline - "Obama promised a humble America" - for his friend. "How much more, Dan? Invite Germany for a repeat of Pearl Harbor"? Poor Americans - they never figured out the difference between weakness and humility.

No Conversation for Hummingbird and Wasp at Table

Here at my country home, I've come to know the differences in quiet.

Sometimes, it seems noisy here:
the mockingbird carrying on

the incessant cicadeas

a squawling momma cat protecting her kittens from an eager tomcat

a coyote family howling at dusk
and the dogs chiming in

a flock of chattering blackbirds passing through
or a flock of geese flying over

the wind on a rampage
or whistling through the window screens.

Then there is a quieter time:
the mere chirp of a barn swallow
the hum of a wasp
the whir of hummingbird wings
the breeze in the pine tree...

Then there is silence:
when cats sit without a sound and watch the kittens
chase a leaf
and pounce lightly, silently, on the little leaf

when flowers grow and bloom without a peep

when a spider spins a web

when the milky way appears in the dark blue
or the full moon shimmers on the pond.

Enter a pasture in the morning and you hear a few birds
but you can actually feel the deep quiet penetrating the soul.

And I realize:
the natural world is pretty quiet -
except for the racket we human beings create.

Why is that?

]]> http://postulatesandpasttimes.wordpress.com/2008/07/24/uptight-american-parents/ Thu, 24 Jul 2008 11:58:40 +0000 dobeman http://postulatesandpasttimes.wordpress.com/2008/07/24/uptight-american-parents/ Our gym has an outdoor pool. It's one of those beach entry affairs whereas it gradually slopes down towards a moderately deep four feet at its maximum depth. The reason for this is so that young ones can play in the water without their parents having to hold them the entire time (while being mauled to death by the growing finger and toenails of their excited child!).

I took the boys there yesterday after CareerMom got home. She worked out while I frolicked in the pool. At first, it was innocent enough; MLE was hesitant at first and so I held him as MLI floated around in the deeper section. But soon, MLE got a bit more brave and decided that stepping off the side into the deeper section was waaay more fun than being held by daddy.

So I let him.

And, after disregarding my admonishments to "Sit on your booty and slide in," which he completely understands, I started letting him fall in and go underwater. The first couple of times when I pulled him back up, he gasped for air and his eyes went all wide and he looked at me as if to say, "What the hell? You ALWAYS catch me!"

Now, in a moment like this, I think it's natural for a parent to look around to gauge the reaction of other parents...you know...just to see. It's also natural for a parent to automatically try and push the blame back on the child, and so I said, "Uh huh, see. I told you to sit on your booty," and I said it in a loud enough voice so that the trophy mom with the two kids and the killer abs who was giving me the evil eye heard me over the din of the waterfall thingy.

Interestingly, it's the WASP parents who seem the most uptight about this sort of thing. While we're all fawning over our child's every laugh, and giving hugs whenever our child stubs his toe, your average minority mom is stretched out on the lounger grabbing some rays while her four kids of all ages are having a good old time playing by themselves.

Part of me wants to say, "Hey, what if your kids were drowning over there?"

And the other part of me wants to say, "Good for you! I mean, there ARE 20-year old stud lifeguards at all four corners of the pool. What's the worst that could happen?"

Anyway, after the first couple of dunkings, MLE decided that stepping off the deep end and going underwater was about the coolest thing he'd ever done before and anyway...daddy will always be there to pull him out.

Yep my little man, I always will be. Have fun!

"Os W.A.S.P. lamentam ter de anunciar derivado a problemas logisticos e de comunicação que os próximos shows marcados para Espanha dia 25 e 26 Julho em Lorca e Bilbao respectivamente foram cancelados.. Originalmente nós fomos anunciados para actuar no dia 26 em Portugal no Lagoa Festival. Um anúncio foi feito pelo festival a dizer que nós junto com outros saímos do calendário sem darem explicações... isso não é verdade! Os fãs de Espanha e Portugal apoiaram desde o principio a banda e nós vos amámos! Voltaremos em breve para tocar para vocês!"

Blackie vem então contrariar a versão dada pela direcção do Lagoa Burning Festival que tinha anunciado que os W.A.S.P. juntamente com outras bandas tinham cancelado a sua participação, bem antes do sucedido com o recinto e inutilização do mesmo para os dias em que estava marcado o evento. Esperamos por informações e/ou explicações concretas pela organização do festival algarvio que ficou ainda de divulgar fotos sobre o estado em que ficou recinto e equipamentos, algo que até à data desta notícia ainda não aconteceu.

Moises, a magna cum laude student, is of mixed-race heritage, being Mexican, Chinese, Thai, German, and French.   Moises is no stranger to hardship.  His Mexican-Chinese-Thai father was almost deported when the local councilman mistook him for a gardener at his own five-million-dollar, 7,000 square-foot home in Greenwich, Connecticut.  Luckily, Moises’s German-French mother, an accomplished lawyer and quite the stone-cold blonde, blue-eyed recessive gene fox, successfully litigated his father’s deportation hearing.  The long nights together, huddled over legal arcana, sparked an intense romance.  Moises’s mother fondly recalled her spouse’s “exotic Joan Miró collection,” while Moises’s father, wiping a tear, wistfully remembered falling in love with her “well-starched J. Crew shirts.”

Though he was elected to the prestigious position of Articles Editor, Moises privately lamented his loss:  “With the way things are going now, when I run for president [of the United States] in 2032 I’ll likely go up against Harold Kwon-Smith-Schlossberg-Tomoko-Mbekwe-Jenkins, the outgoing President [of the Harvard Law Review], and I just won’t be able to compete with that.”  Crying the first bitter tears of disappointment in a wildly successful young life since that debacle five years ago when he only received a Marshall Scholarship instead of a Rhodes, Moises worried that he’ll “have to settle for Governor of New York.”  “You know—I have worked so hard to be President of the Harvard Law Review.  Really, academic excellence is like armed combat.  You have to go out there and beat everyone else.  You have to win.  Do you know how many countless nights I spent in the law library studying Evidence instead of putting the moves on floozy Boston University girls at bars?  It’s a war out there.  I’m a soldier!”

John McCain, the Republican candidate for President of the United States in 2008, who was standing on a fighter jet when it and several other planes on the aircraft carrier U.S.S. Forrestal detonated, killing 34 sailors and injuring 161; who ejected from his 4-AE Skyhawk after it was hit by a missile, breaking both arms and a leg; and who was tortured by his captors as a P.O.W., was unavailable for comment.

After graduation, Moises will work as an associate for the law firm Wachtell, Lipton, Rosen & Katz in Manhattan, with the starting annual salary of $320,000.

The Internet is a scary place. In it you can find all manner of freaks, perverts, terrorists, pederasts, goobers, morons, deviates, degenerates, assholes, cornholes, dillholes, Pujols, and dregs.

Most of us deal with the horrors of the Internet by remaining calm and accepting that the medium itself is a funhouse mirror in which the things that frighten us are often distorted or amplified.

The rest of us become cops and politicians.

Like in England, where the cops now cower in fear of the WASP knife -- the shark-inflating diving knife we told you about last month. Even though none of the knives has been used in an attack, the cops done read about it on the old computer and now say it's only a matter of time before we're all stab-popped by hooligans:

"This knife will almost certainly kill and the Met must have intelligence that they are in circulation. I think it is only a matter of time before one of these is used because the internet makes it much easier to find and buy weapons like this."

That was a source within the police department, apparently. And here's a local politician doing what they do best -- exploiting irrational fears for their own advancement:

Labour MP for Perry Barr in Birmingham, Khalid Mahmood, said: "Weapons like this are absolutely disgraceful and there is no reason at all why people should be walking around the streets with them.

"There should be high-profile operations and high-profile arrests against anybody caught with them. The way to tackle the wider issue of knife crime is with effective community policing, which the West Midlands force does very well.

I agree. Thus far, the West Midlands po-po has a 100% success rate against shark-inflating diving knives, liquid nitrogen vapo-ray guns, and the deadly ACME-made sledgehammer bike that Wile E. Coyote chased the Road Runner with. So I guess they're doing something right.

Britain on alert for deadly new knife with exploding tip that freezes victims' organs [Daily Mail]

Official site: WASPKnife.com

First Shot:

Focusing takes some getting used to as the Canon MP e 65 did.

Because Super Macro lenses have a very narrow depth of field. Which means only one section of the photo will be in focus and the rest will have a blur (the out of focus areas) which is called Bokeh. The aim is to use Bokeh artistically. As expected this lens attachment doesn't have as smooth of a bokeh as the Canon MP e 65, but then it doesn't cost $850.oo either. It only cost between $54 and $59 depending on where you buy it. The other plus for me is how lighweight it is! It attaches to the end of your existing lens with a clip on adapter. The Canon MP e 65 is a heavy lens and with my disabilities in my hands I simply can't hold it up any more. So this little Raynox is the happy solution. The images are razor sharp within the area of focus. It is working well with my zoom lens.

The gesture of holding up one hand, signaling a person to stop speaking.

If you've ever had this done to you, I'm sure you felt pretty frustrated or even insulted at the audacity of the person doing the stopping. Right? It's like saying, "you don't need to finish what you are saying, because what you are saying has no importance, regardless of the subject matter." It's the subtle middle finger of the WASPS. No offense to the humble, waspy people.

Do not do it. Please. If you are arguing with someone, and you need them to breathe, two hands is sufficient. It means 'slow down', or, 'I'm not carrying a weapon' (hey man it's cool). When you hold up that single hand, you're claiming superiority. And that's not cool.