Focus on Hallucinogens: This is a little gem I've held onto since my friends Ken and Glen mailed it to me as part of a care package when I was working in Alaska after high school. It's from 1991 and out of print but still in near-perfect condition. I wrote children's science books for two years but never wrote one as fun or useful as this. It explains to 9-year-olds everything from neurons to shamans. Rad!
Everything I need to know about the internets I learned from Gabe and Max.
After using the program advertised above, though, I still had one burning question: "Exactly how many internets are there? Which one works best with Binary?" I guess that's 10 questions.
Anywho, Gabe and Max were nice enough to provide an answer: five.
To complete the Mad Max effect, Burning Man has its own Thunderdome. Two people dangle from the top via bungee cords and go at each other with padded bats.
This year the Billion Bunny March descended upon the ‘dome and claimed it as their own. I was not there to witness the event, but legend has it that the following was uttered: "Two bunnies enter, 40 bunnies leave."
Last month my colleague Jay Dixit added the following LOLcat to the oeuvre:
Today Congressman Dennis Hastert prepared the following response:
He could, of course, have borrowed Jay’s caption verbatim, but that would have set a deadly example for his lolstituents (see number 3.)
(I can’t take credit for the underlying feline photohack.)
I can has ur planet? I can has your planet?
Did you realize this stuff was on the market? Newman’s Own raunch ranch flavored personal lubricant, "for tossing salads when your first course is intercourse."
From: "Steve" <redacted@glis.net>
To: <matt@silverjacket.com>
Subject: Is it a secret code?
Date: Mon, 2 Apr 2007 20:00:34 -0400If it is, I guess I’m fucked.
I really shouldn’t care why you can’t seem to spell "skills" correctly – but it seems such a singular error. You don’t misspell "nut-crunching" (although one might argue that a deliberate error, such as "nut-krunching" might convey the agony [the "aggh-oh-neeee"?] more effectively; James Rand had a grandfather who though that "crinkled" should be spelled "krinkled") and you don’t even misspell "dies". "Skills" is the only word you misspell – and you do it absolutely consistently.
So what in Hell is the reason?
Or must I read all preceding installments of the blog? If so, go ahead, look strange.
Once upon a time, I was gratuitously different. Then I grew up.
Eric C. Sanders
tired old fart – who finds the Empathy Theory of Yawn Contagion very persuasive.using the boss’s e-mail address
When I read the above email last night I assumed it was spam–you know that crazy surreal spam spewed onto the nets only to confuse filters–until I got about halfway through, and realized he was referring to something I posted on my blog 15 months ago. (The post described how mirror neurons might engender our "theory of mind skillz" and "empathy skillz" (but less so in people with autism, who must settle for "mad card counting skillz," if they’re lucky.)) So I replied:
Hi Steve,
Please pass the following on to Mr. Sanders. Much obliged.
Eric,
Thanks for reading my weblog. Nope, no secret code. Just a bit of bloggy irreverence. Skillz is a common rapper and hacker spelling of skills. (See http://www.urbandictionary.com/define.php?term=skillz.) As it’s often applied to rhyming and fragging (performing well at the rap game or the video games), I found it mildly amusing to apply it to theory of mind and empathy, capacities not advanced through practice, nor thought to enhance street cred(ibility.) In fact, quite the opposite, as wasting fools with style often requires a certain blithe bravado. Well, maybe a rep(utation) for strong theory of mind skillz can garner props (proper respect), as it’s pretty cool to say you’re all up in your opponent’s head, psyching him out, but the use of cog sci terminology still renders the linguistic juxtaposition subtly farcical. And as for autistics with "mad [=significant] card counting skillz," some autistics–the idiot savants– might have stupendous skills, but, god bless em, they’ll never have skillz.
I admit, adding quirk to one’s prose can make one look strange, but that’s how I roll.
Take care,
MattP.S. Are you from Roseville, MI?
No reply today but I’ll keep you posted.
Part of my job is skimming tons of science journals and separating the Easter eggs from the chaff. And some of those eggs smell kinda funny. Here are the top 10 paper titles I've encountered in the last six months.
10. "Reinforcing effects of smoked methamphetamine in rhesus monkeys" (Psychopharmacology)
Where the hell does one find monkeys who know how to smoke meth? Oh, from the abstract: "Materials and methods Four rhesus monkeys were trained to smoke cocaine (COC)… Upon observing stable levels of self-administration, METH was substituted for COC". Not. Cool.
In 2005 I posted hyperbolic praise for Nicholas Negroponte’s $100 laptop program that revealed my idealistic side. A more pragmatic response would be Bill Gates’ "Be a Hero, Feed Your Family" program, in which the Gates Foundation offers poor hungry laptop recipients $100 in hard cash or food or vaccines for their colorful gadgets. ("…The ‘Be a Hero’ program will offer you valuable goods in exchange for your wonderful toy. As much as one hundred dollars, Abdul! Think! That is more than your Papa earned all last year!…")
The apocryphal plan reminds me of one of my favorite Sarah Silverman gags (as quoted in the NYer):
I, this past summer, sent fifteen really fun cowl-neck sweaters to this village in Africa, in really fun colors—expecting nothing, by the way—and they culled their money together, whatever they call it, and bought a stamp and sent me a postcard thanking me, and it said thank you and that they had enough sweaters for every single member of the village to get one and that they were delicious.
(P.S. Holly, I hope you do your yarn activities with the Tanzanian orphans *after* lunch.)
