Month: December 2003

Arrest Yourself, save the police department trouble

Finally, a police department with a sense of humor.

A proposition has been announced recently to help reduce the deficit and to “Take A Bite Out Of Crime.” If you witness a crime, it is your civic duty to report the crime to the police. When a crime is committed, you have the right to make a “Citizen’s Arrest”. Thus, if YOU commit a crime, it would be extremely helpful for you to perform a Citizen’s Self-Arrest. Fill out the form, to complete your Citizen’s Self-Arrest.

The form is very entertaining, providing options to questions that are just hilarious. When it asks for your plea, you can select “Guilty, Not Guilty, No Contest, Too Drunk to Pick.” The also give you a microscopic bible to swear on, too.

December 21, 2003

The Year in Pictures

MSNBC won several industry awards for last year’s version of this, and I’m sure the 2003 version will garner a few as well. This is one of the best ways to take advantage of the online medium, and this is a wonderful slide show (with audio and text commentary as well).

December 21, 2003

Some holiday snowball Flash fun

Ever wanted to be that little bastard that ran around at a crowded outdoor shopping mall, pegging present-welding shoppers with snowballs? I know I always have. (Warning: Low Resolution monitors Need Not Apply, as the guy coded the thing for big screens. Why? I have no idea, but I could just see it all at 1024×768.)

December 21, 2003

A Marine’s Magic Words

Another joke sent via e-mail…

As the crowded airliner is about to take off, the peace is shattered by a five-year-old boy who picks that moment to throw a wild temper tantrum. No matter what his frustrated, embarrassed mother does to try to calm him down, the boy continues to scream furiously and kick the seats around him.

Suddenly, from the rear of the plane, a man in a Marine uniform is seen slowly walking up the aisle. Stopping the flustered mother with an upraised hand, the courtly, soft-spoken Marine leans down, motioning toward his chest, and whispers something into the boy’s ear.

Instantly, the boy calms down, gently takes his mother’s hand, and quietly fastens his seat belt. All the other passengers burst into spontaneous applause.

As the Marine slowly makes his way back to his seat, one of the cabin attendants touches his sleeve and asks quietly, “Excuse me, sir, but could I ask you what magic words you used on that little boy?”

The Marine smiles serenely and gently confides, “I showed him my pilot’s wings, service stars, and battle ribbons, and explained that they entitle me to throw one passenger out the plane door, on any flight I choose.”

December 21, 2003

Post Surgery Update

Hey again everybody.

I’m a bit more conscious today than yesterday, and I’ve got myself in a relatively comfortable position here in bed (boy, does that sentence read bad), so here’s the official update on things. Thanks to Barney for posting for me yesterday in my drugged up stupor. I was hoping he would’ve just translated it instead of quoting me verbatim, but oh well 😉

Since this is going to get rather lengthy (or it could be rather short, depending on how long my pain meds last), read on below…

(more…)

December 19, 2003

He came through OK, folks

An update, direct from Jake:

“Hey there…surgery went fine, still in pain in back but lrg feels great. have wireless setup in room so I’m sort of funtional, cant type very well, but wanted to lrt u know I was fine…just sleepy.”

Not bad, Mr. Ortman. Not sure what your “lrg” is but glad it feels great;-) I missed his IM of that, so I e-mailed a “drat” to him, and he responded, in part:

“My pain medication is knocking me out pretty good … I’m basically just going to put on a DVD and fall asleep :-)”

Wireless computer and DVD – in a HOSPITAL room? Goodness, I guess St. Charles has gotten pretty fancy (or Jake has some pull around there – heh heh;-) (Update: Whoops, that’s right, this was outpatient stuff, right? So he’s home? Then that makes more sense;-)

Anyway, keep those positive vibes coming his way, cuz I’m sure as the pain medication is turned down… he’ll be feelin’ it big time;-/

–Fill-in UB Blogger Barney

December 18, 2003

Tomorrow’s Surgery Update

OK, finally after making a pile of phone calls and having everybody blame everybody else, I’ve finally got some answers. I’m still having surgery on my back tomorrow. It’s schedule to happen at 4:15 (though I have to be there at 2:45). Despite what I said before, it will not be just a local pain killer — I’ll be put completely under. It’s going to cost more but I think I’d prefer it more than anything — I don’t think I want to be awake at all during it. I’ve got until midnight tonight to eat up like a horse. After that, it’s clear beverages until 10:15 tomorrow morning. After that, nothing. Basically, it’ll be 24 hours before I eat again, which is going to annoy the crap out of me.

As I mentioned before, I’m still taking donations, despite my gift, as things will still be expensive now that an anesthesiologist is in the picture, and I still have to pay off my MRI. If you don’t want to donate, I also have UtterlyBoring.com-themed t-shirts, bags, stickers, and stuff, you can buy.

This will be my last post until after the surgery unless something comes up. Wish my luck, and I’ve got my wireless access point setup and ready to go in my bedroom during my recovery.

December 16, 2003

My lifetime goal has been met

UtterlyBoring.com is now the number one result on Google for “Ortman“. Granted, I’m on page five for “Jake” but it’s better than it was. And I’m in the top ten now for “boring.”

On a side note, a trip through my server logs shows that Kster.com is taking my RSS feed and blasting it up on to their site as content. Hello to all the folks who are visiting from there! Be sure to stop by the actual site here so you’ll be able to make comments and such. Meanwhile, to whomever runs that site: Make it a little more obvious that the content on your site is from mine, would ya? Thanks 🙂

December 16, 2003

Google is indexing print media

Google’s branching out to search more than just Web sites. The Google Print FAQ explains that they’re experimenting with “publications” (what they mean by that, we don’t know, but it looks to be primarily books). They are, undoubtedly, using this to compete with Amazon’s full-text book search efforts, and become the one-stop-shop for searching everything.

They’ve already indexed thousands of books, including some popular ones. When you click on a book title, you’ll see information about the book: number of pages, excerpt, publication date, and its ISBN number. You even have the option to buy it at a few retailers (I could see Google add a referral code to those links to get them a bit of kick back — I know I would).

Interesting feature? Yes, indeed. With Google indexing IRC channels already, it won’t be long before they’ll be indexing everything. Now if they could just create a unified interfaces for all of their indexes.

December 16, 2003

It worked! Bush is officially a miserable failure

I posted a few days back about an attempt to make George W. Bush a “miserable failure” by tainting Google results. I’m happy to report that if you search for miserable failure on Google, it now shows the truth.

December 16, 2003