You have to love it when somebody writes a book on grammar and then subsequently has its grammar torn apart by other grammar geeks. Link from Waxy’s Links.
Month: June 2004
$100 Million to Save Mouse That Doesn’t Even Exist
Land owners and government officials have spent $100-million dealing with an endangered mouse that doesn’t even really exist.
After six years of regulations and restrictions that have cost builders, local governments and landowners on the western fringe of the Great Plains as much as $100 million by some estimates, new research suggests the Preble’s mouse in fact never existed. It instead seems to be genetically identical to one of its cousins, the Bear Lodge meadow jumping mouse, which is considered common enough not to need protection.
The new research could lead to loss of the Preble’s “threatened” status and removal from Endangered Species Act protection. The U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service plans to decide that question in December.
Grizzles With The Munchies
Among an ornery bear’s exploits was his digesting of a camper’s weed stash. Full Story.
More Weird Amazon Crap
I’ve mentioned before a list of odd-ball Amazon crap, but nothing’s quite as odd as this: 9000 Ladybugs. And, Sadly, I’m thinking about ordering some as those bugs will eat some of the obnoxious little bastard aphids that are eating some of the flowers at my house. For $19.95, that ain’t too bad.
More Government Waste
The Pentagon has wasted $100-million of tax-payer dollars on unused airline tickets. And it gets better:
The department compounded the problem by reimbursing employee claims for tickets bought by the Pentagon, the investigators said.
[…]
A prior report, issued last November, found that the Pentagon bought 68,000 first-class or business-class airline seats for employees who should have flown coach.
Hackers Launch “Enhancement of Service” Attack
A group naming themselves The God Fearing Computer Hackers of Uzbekistan announced today that they were behind the Enhancement of Service Attack launched on the Microsoft.com web site, yesterday.
During the attack, which lasted 65 minutes, users were able to click straight through to the required page, without needing to wait for the page to load.
Engineers at Microsoft deny the attack took place, claiming it was the superiority of a new patch being tested which ‘did the trick’, but were unable to explain why the performance of the web site slowed to normal levels after the alleged attack took place.
Suicide Flash Game
When all you want to do is kill yourself, play Suicide Bob, and kill Bob instead. The object of the game? To successfully commit suicide and not be saved.
Wi-Fi hits Redmond Airport
If I actually flew as much as I used to, I’d be even happier about this, but I just got wind from Barney, who got a note from Carrie Novick, manager at Redmond’s airport, that the terminal has been outfitted with Wi-Fi access. She said that as soon as they got it up, people were using it at the airport.
Barney said he may not have time to write a story about it, but if he does, it will be linked here. Update: Barney got a story up about it.
Now all they need is some Wi-Fi Wallpaper to keep the network from wandering on to the run way.
Yummy
The Ukrainian love for eating pork fat with rye bread and raw garlic has taken on a new twist — dipping the fat in
chocolate. Full Story. Thanks Barney for the tip.