Month: November 2005

COCC Cascade Winds Band Concerts This Weekend

I know I have mentioned the Cascade Winds several times on this site already , but I’m going to mention them again. Why? Because we have concerts coming up this weekend.

Though I’ve yet to see any of you other than Simone actually show up to one of these things <shaking finger>, you’ll need to trust me that this is going to be a great show. The concerts are on Sunday at 2:00PM and Monday at 7:30PM at the COCC Pinckney Center for the Arts. Both shows are free, though seats are on a first come, first serve basis.

Never been to one of these concerts before? This isn’t your typical High School marching band, nor is it the “put you to sleep” crap the local symphony occassionally plays (of which I’m a member, too, so I can say that). Everybody I know who has gone to one has had a great time and never realized the talent that we have around here. The director of the group is very entertaining, as well.

And if you want to see me act more like a spazz, it’ll be worth the trip, as a couple of the pieces I’m playing I’m covering the parts of three percussionists (that’s drummers for you folks who don’t know the terminology).

So what the heck are we playing? A bunch of great wind ensemple pieces, including “Carnival Overture” by Antonin Dvorak, Georges Bizet’s “L’Arlesienne Suite No. 2”, “Prelude on an Old English Hymn” by Robert Sheldon, “Tales of a Traveler” by Sousa and by David Holsinger “One Day, in a Small Town . . .” . It’ll be a great show, and be sure to say “Hi” to me during intermission!

November 30, 2005

Anybody Up For A Bend Blogger Holiday Party?

Originally, Shannon floated the idea, and now that December is here, it’s starting to get a little more steam. We were all thinking Saturday, December 10th. Any of you Bend Bloggers game? Comment here or over on Jon’s entry. The current idea is to hit up one of the local bowling resorts (I vote for Sun Mountain, despite their hideously ugly site) so that everybody will have something to do.

This is the first major organized meet up we’ve done in a quite a while (we’ve done a few smaller get-togethers, but nothing really big), so let’s see if we can make it worthwhile.

And Snarky, I expect you to be there. And Dane, displaced Bend-blogger emeritus, you’re welcome, too.

November 30, 2005

Just Because Everybody and Their Dog Has Already Mentioned This Today And I Didn’t Want To Feel Left Out

Firefox 1.5 was released.

November 30, 2005

Liberial Bias In The Media?

I don’t know what you’re talking about! Just check out this column by Modest Bee Managing Editor Dan Day, who took a look at his appointment book where he shows you he has no media bias:

Monday

8:30 a.m. — Take dogs Lyndon, Johnson to vet

10 a.m. — Assign negative stories about Modesto

11 a.m. — News meeting

Noon — Newsroom lunch-hour tai chi

2:30 p.m.– Search wires for negative stories about American military

4 p.m.– News meeting

5 p.m. — Copy desk training: twisting headlines

7 p.m.– MJC Marxist Faculty Bowling League (Opponents: Engel’s Bengals)

Link via Romenesko.

November 28, 2005

It’s Snowing Hard

If you look outside my office, you’ll see it’s a frickin’ mess. It’s been snowing since I got here this morning, snowed about four inches so far, and it looks like it’s only going to get worse. My drive home is going to be a mess, but it still looks better than it does on the Santiam Pass where it looks really ugly.

November 28, 2005

The AOL Idiots Keep Coming

I’ve mentioned before that this site got a New York Times mention because of the idiots AOLers who keep commenting on this site. So far, that entry has gotten 177 comments, mostly from folks thinking I can cancel their AOL account (as much as I’d like to).

Occasionally I get little one-line comments through my e-mail form on the right side of this page to the affect of “cancel my aol acct, plz” or something similar. But I had one today that just floored me (parts of it removed for obvious reasons):

please cancel my aol account username [removed]

pasword [removed]

thanks

Just for giggles, I logged it using the user/pass the guy sent me into AOL Mail, and sure enough, the user/pass works and the guy has 213 unread messages, and apparently this guy sent this message to some body else, as he has a message in his inbox from AOL saying that “You recently changed the Parental Controls setting for one of the Screen Names on your account to give it Master Screen Name capabilities.” meaning that somebody is going to have some fun with the account.

I logged the hell out as soon as I saw that, but I’m just totally floored how stupid some people can be.

November 28, 2005

The Anti-Rape Condom

While I can’t ever see a woman wearing one of these all the time comfortably for it to be useful, the idea of it reducing rape is an interesting one (and I encourage anything that tortures the bastards that try it).

A South African inventor unveiled a new anti-rape female condom on Wednesday that hooks onto an attacker’s penis and aims to cut one of the highest rates of sexual assault in the world.

[…]

The device, made of latex and held firm by shafts of sharp barbs, can only be removed from the man through surgery which will alert hospital staff, and ultimately, the police, she said.

Personally, I’m all for something that just chops the rapist’s Johnson off, but this is a start. Link via b3ta.

November 27, 2005

How Does He Do This?

This is about the freakiest thing I’ve ever seen. It’s a video of Criss Angel going through a window, and not leaving a mark on the thing.

(more…)

November 27, 2005

A Note To Conspiracy Theorists

Those tin foil hats you’re wearing? They don’t work and actually may increase the signal strength of those mind control rays. Links via memepool.

November 27, 2005

Easily Download Embedded Videos and Flash

Some of the multimedia stuff I plan on linking to ends up going down before I have a chance to post it (like and earlier example), so I’ll always do my best to get a copy of the file so I can post it locally if that happens. This Firefox extension makes it’s much easier to download those types of videos and flash files with a simple right click (instead of having to dig through the source code and manually digging it up).

November 27, 2005