A Whole Lotta Nothing

links for 2005-09-30

• Chewie pitches the first ball
  (you gotta do the chewbacca yell as you look at it)
  (tags: baseball starwars)

links for 2005-09-29

• Derek's Rantings and Musings: U-Haul: The New Bane Of My Existence
  When I moved to Oregon, I had pretty much the exact same experience -- u-haul's website doesn't remotely resemble the reality of their local offices
  (tags: uhaul badcompanies moving)

links for 2005-09-28

• indietits.com- these birds are hipper than you
  the archives are great -- my new favorite web comic
  (tags: blogs comics)
• flickrbackup
  automated way to pull your photos off flickr -- lets you use flickr as an offsite hard drive for photos
  (tags: apple flickr java photos)
• Furdlog » Fallout from “Open Sourcing” the Weather
  Santorum and Accuweather, still gaming the system for their own benefit
  (tags: jerks santorum domains)

links for 2005-09-27

• Disneydirect.com: Disneyland 50th Commemorative Desk Set
  monorail stapler!
  (tags: wishlist disney office)

links for 2005-09-26

• dumpsantorum.com
  I can get behind this.
  (tags: santorum politics GOP religiousright)
• Target : Men’s Purple Reign Costume
  Nothing says "beat me up and take my candy please" like this
  (tags: prince anil purplerain halloween)
• usdebt1.gif (GIF Image, 771x526 pixels)
  wow. just...wow.
  (tags: debt taxes politics bush)

Slashdot PT Cruiser on Highway 24, pt. 3

(Slashdot PT Cruiser on Highway 24, pt. 3, originally uploaded by allaboutgeorge)

Maybe someday someone will catch the MetaFilter Yugo on the freeway when it's out of the shop (custom license plate: JRUN ERR)

links for 2005-09-23

• eBay: Donnie Darko Frank The Bunny Halloween Costume + Mask (item 7547683307 end time Sep-25-05 18:10:23 PDT)
  Give yourself nightmares for life by owning this
  (tags: movies donniedarko ebay)

links for 2005-09-22

• Treehugger: BlueSkyMod Prefab Cabin
  Awesome design
  (tags: modernhomes moderndesign architecture)
• The Anaheim Flood of 1938 | MetaFilter
  heh
  (tags: hurricane politics bush)

links for 2005-09-21

• Where can I see "lyrical" dance being performed? | Ask MetaFilter
  Great answer explaining modern dance and pointing out a few good touring dance companies.
  (tags: dance culture entertainment)
• You Have Been Banned From Deleteme on Flickr - Photo Sharing!
  It's weird to watch the same community problems crop up in every new community
  (tags: flickr communityproblems community)
• AG : The Authors Guild : News : Authors Guild Sues Google, Citing "Massive Copyright Infringement"
  Guess what dumbasses: searchability inside books SELLS MORE BOOKS
  (tags: shootingthemselvesinthefoot perpetualcopyright copyfight books)

links for 2005-09-20

• Freakonomics: Acne
  experimentation reveals many things
  (tags: acne data freakonomics)

Shark jumping pirates

It's Talk Like A Pirate Day but I have no enthusiasm for it anymore. After several years, pirates just aren't that funny anymore. I think they ran their course.

Now zombies on the other hand, now you're talking. As of summer 2005, zombies are the new pirates. Someone needs to start a "Eat Brains Like a Zombie Day" to replace this pirate one. A passing of the meme torch, if you will.

links for 2005-09-19

• Kenyan Blogs Webring Members' Blogs [Kenya Unlimited]
  Kenyan blogosphere
  (tags: via:allaboutgeorge blogs africa)
• Dictionary.com/Word of the Day: defenestrate
  Reminder to self: this is the most pointless, little-used word in the English language
  (tags: language words)
• Custom Bookcases/Bookshelves Solid Wood Bookcase/Bookshelf by Ballard Bookcase Company
  Fine work. I wish these guys were local.
  (tags: bookcases hometheater seattle)

links for 2005-09-18

• Installing a Plasma Television
  How to run hidden cabling. You'd be surprised how hard it is to find pictures of these installations
  (tags: tv diy hometheater)
• Wiretracks(tm) - iCove
  in-wall iPod mounts. Could look pretty sweet near a stereo setup
  (tags: diy hometheater ipod)

links for 2005-09-17

• Inflatable Pub | Uncrate
  awesome.
  (tags: beerbeerbeer)
• honk! on Flickr - Photo Sharing!
  This looks like a bad Super Bowl halftime show, circa 1978
  (tags: starwars photos flickr)
• bandwidth speed test
  handy thing to have around, runs in java
  (tags: bandwidth utilities)

Talk about bumcakes, my girl's got 'em

Derek's post about robust footers at the ends of pages highlights a brilliant change he recently made during a site redesign. As peterme noted last year, Flickr was one of the first sites to use this seemingly forgotten space for useful things (in flickr's case, a sitemap, in derek's a sorta sitemap/intro to his other projects).

It's weird to think we've all been building sites for 10+ years and "putting useful stuff at the end of a page" is a breakthrough but it really does feel like the first new layout idea in quite some time. I've toyed with the idea of it on the Creative Commons site since I saw the flickr implementation, but I think I'm going to test it out on my personal sites first.

links for 2005-09-15

• soup du jour of the day - My brush with fame and broadband
  I heard about this story from the other end.
  (tags: comedy family smallworld)
• Infinite Loop: It's official, Apple is planning a video store
  Can't wait to see how this works. Will the airport express get s-video out?
  (tags: movies apple itunes)
• Comedy Central - Shows - The Daily Show - Extras
  Kurt Vonnegut's list of LIBERAL CRAP I NEVER WANT TO HEAR AGAIN
  (tags: comedy cynicaloldmen vonnegut)

links for 2005-09-14

• Play: home
  new ajaxy online board game
  (tags: games ajax)
• The German Car Blog: VW: Get connected!
  Awesome, simple way to transport tunes: a USB key
  (tags: audio car mp3 vw)
• Google Blog Search Help
  So long Technorati, been nice knowing you...
  (tags: blogs search google)
• QDN: FEMA return-to-sender
  FEMA's mail server is non-existent. Real fine organization you got there.
  (tags: disaster fema govt)

links for 2005-09-13

• Bobby: dog skiing
  It looks like the dog is really enjoying it.
  (tags: silly video dogs snow)
• Del.icio.us and MyWeb Combo Bookmarklet :: Off the Top :: vanderwal.net
  sweet! I can't believe I missed this.
  (tags: bookmarklets utilities javascript)

links for 2005-09-11

• Maeda's SIMPLICITY: Yahoogle!
  a visual timeline
  (tags: yahoo google waybackmachine archive.org)

Incredible

This slideshow (via mefi) is one of the most amazing accounts I've seen of the hurricane, before, during, and after. It contains photos from familiar landmarks and areas of the city and shows pretty clearly why people that stayed behind didn't think it was going to be that bad, and as it progressed, just how bad it would get. When the story gets to the lines awaiting buses you can feel the helplessness of the people left behind.

Looking at these photos knowing what we know now, I can't help but remember looking through a 9/11/2001 set of photographer's photos that told a similar story of a major event: calm followed by surprise and confusion and later untold devistation.

Nothing I've seen on TV or online comes close to the complete story this gallery of images gives. It's worth sitting through every caption and following along. Chilling stuff.

links for 2005-09-10

• « oddfellow : sometimes daily »
  peanuts and the nuts that love them
  (tags: stories comedy austin)

links for 2005-09-09

• The Raw Story | Republicans block efforts to amend relief bill, hold vote without providing copy of bill
  "No one has even seen a copy of the bill"
  (tags: congress politics)
• Vinton Cerf, Internet Pioneer, Joins Google - New York Times
  It's like hiring Jesus to help out at your soup kitchen.
  (tags: google news internetmessagingprocessor)

links for 2005-09-08

• Oregon DMV - Online Change of Address Login
  saving for later
  (tags: utilities moving dmv oregon)
• GirlHacker's Random Log
  holy crap, Kepler's Bookstore went out of business?!
  (tags: books stores bayarea)
• Blogger Buzz: Flag Day!
  my Flag Day got picked up by Blogger -- cool.
  (tags: blogs spam blogspot)

links for 2005-09-07

• ReadyMade: Feature - Slide Lamp
  sweet.
  (tags: lights diy photos projects todo)

links for 2005-09-06

• Brodart - Library Supply
  If you ever needed to order book checkout cards/pockets for your own books at home
  (tags: library borrowing nostalgia)
• Astrodome - a photoset on Flickr
  Incredible set of photos from someone working as a volunteer at the Astrodome
  (tags: photos flickr katrina)
• Saigon Added to HBO's "Entourage" : Daily Hip-Hop News : SOHH.com
  huh, Saigon is a real rapper/actor.
  (tags: entourage hbo TheRapMusic)

links for 2005-09-04

• Treehugger: Leggero Shopper: Max Flexibility
  ecodorky looking, but extremely simple and clever product
  (tags: clever design cycling environment)
• The Truth? You Can't Handle the Truth: Jalopnik Reviewer Makes Waves in SF - Jalopnik
  Post a bad review of a new car, get fired from the newspaper that likely receives lots of advertising from same car company
  (tags: cars ethics journalism blogs)

Another way to help

I've watched a week of non-stop Katrina news and I'm still in a daze at what has happened. There's nothing to say really.

Aside from giving to the Red Cross, Modest Needs is another great charity doing everything it can to help those in the wake of this disaster, and in a very simple and direct way. Do pitch in over there if you can.

links for 2005-09-03

• The Washington Monthly
  a FEMA timeline
  (tags: katrina disaster fema)
• FUDD CALLS FOR "ASSASSINATION" OF BUGS BUNNY
  "Additional reporting for this story was provided by Chuck Jones."
  (tags: comedy patrobertson assassination)

links for 2005-09-02

• pbwiki - flagday: FrontPage
  flag day is apparently next saturday, pass it on
  (tags: blogspot spamblogs)
• Kerkove suspended for forum comments
  Whoa, a bike racer is suspended from a race series due to comments on the promoter's site
  (tags: cycling controversy community)

Flag day

Someone should organize an international blogspot flagging day (all about flagging blogspot sites). We could pick a day, say, a saturday in September, then collectively cruise blogspot through the "next blog" button, flagging all the spam blogs that contain 10 links to a single site in every post, loaded up with keywords.

I've been spending a futile 30 minutes each night flagging spamblogs this week, and last night I hit a site I had previously flagged days earlier, and was kind of dismayed to see it still around clogging blogspot and google. I bet a movement of bloggers flagging obvious abuses at blogspot would work just like a "clean up your local park" day might.

links for 2005-09-01

• codefetch{
  awesome new service that searches all code samples from books on programming languages.
  (tags: coldfusion programming search)
• Decisive Moments: A two of a kind
  Competitive poker and competitive cycling: many similarities
• QDN: Holy lack of empathy, Globat!
  That's some compassionate salesfolks you got there at Globat.
  (tags: wtf webhosting evil)
• rebecca blood :: bloggers on blogging :: heather armstrong (dooce), august 2005
  The dooce interview
• Beautiful Silk Plants by Template Title
  Someone forgot to enter their TEMPLATE TITLE into their spamblog software
  (tags: nofollow blogspot spamblogs)
• Welcome to truedoc.com
  Remember embedded fonts in Netscape 4? Well, they're going away forever next week.
  (tags: fonts webdev netscape)
• deleteTheBorder.org | towards a global network of movements against borders
  globalization through the use of border:none;
  (tags: globalization racism nationalism)