8.01.2015

Walking your phone

Study: Humans are adapting to walk and text - CSMonitor.com

"Meanwhile, pranksters in New York found another solution for phone-distracted pedestrians. Wearing jackets labeled 'Seeing Eye People,' they used leashes to guide people who were engrossed in their cell phones."

Windows 10 arrives

7.31.2015

Swim faster, Bunky, they're gaining

Brazil data: Olympic water 'unfit' for triathletes to swim

"The AP study showed that the spot where athletes were entering the water on Copacabana Beach on Friday had a minimal reading of over 2 million human adenovirus per liter — that's 2,000 times the reading that water experts in the U.S. say would be considering highly alarming if seen on beaches in the U.S. or Europe."

On social engineering

Chris Hadnagy on the Def Con hackers posing as your coworkers - CSMonitor.com

“…while tech vulnerabilities may make headlines, exploiting people's trust is actually one the most common way [sic] people and companies are hacked."

Nothing worth hacking where I live


Oh oh, this is gonna screw up the PC-o-meter big time

Kardashians still call Caitlyn ‘Bruce’ | Page Six

Plus, for extra credit…

Cirque du Chrissy: Teigen balances chicken wings on her butt | Page Six

Got that right

Stakes for Donald Trump in First G.O.P. Debate (in a Word): Huge - The New York Times

“No matter how well I do,” he said, “everyone will say I lost.”

7.29.2015

The difference

Sanders Statement on Planned Parenthood - Senator Bernie Sanders of Vermont

Hillary Clinton: Planned Parenthood videos 'disturbing' - Eliza Collins - POLITICO

 

What?

We don't believe in "feels like"

It's pretty warm out there, but only 83º indoors. Although the wet meter is pegged. Hey, it's July.

And vice versa

"Tricky Hillary" doesn't have quite the same ring, but it comes to mind

The Missing Hillary Emails No One Can Explain - The Daily Beast

"Among the approximately 2,000 emails that former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton has released from her private account, there is a conspicuous two-month gap. There are no emails between Clinton and her State Department staff during May and June 2012, a period of escalating violence in Libya leading up to the September 11 attack on the U.S. consulate in Benghazi that left four Americans dead."

[For the young-uns, I’m referring to “Tricky Dick” Nixon.]

When new records are set…

Bernie Sanders Builds a People’s Army - The Daily Beast

"Every year since 2000, Tyson Manker has voted for the winning presidential candidate."

…we sorta hope they’re more impressive than that.

Where's your imagination, dude?

PETA Wants Lion-Hunting Dentist Killed | TIME

"He needs to be extradited, charged, and, preferably, hanged"

You’ve never seen Marathon Man?

Well, yeah, that's a point

Jon Stewart’s secret Obama meetings reveal he’s a partisan hack | New York Post

"'The Daily Show' isn’t enduring political satire. It’s more like sports talk radio for liberals. Liberals watch it not to be informed but to get caught up in team spirit, a big part of which is simply mindlessly razzing the other team."

And 15 months to go

Bill Hammond: Gun zealots shooting blanks - NY Daily News

"It was a no-brainer statement in support of a no-brainer policy that’s widely popular, even among gun owners.

Yet it qualifies Jindal as the brave exception in a GOP pack that shakes in its boots at the thought of crossing the National Rifle Association."

Would you click on this ad?


Really?

Don't worry. It's not clickable (above), but it is on the New York Times and, I presume, many other places it's running this morning.

Maybe it's just me, but if this Clinton campaign gets any spookier I'm getting myself a tinfoil hat.

7.28.2015

Brady sacked for four

Tom Brady's four-game suspension upheld by Roger Goodell | Shutdown Corner - Yahoo Sports

"Brady destroying his cell phone before he met with investigator Ted Wells was the crux of Goodall’s ruling."

Tossed that one off in a hurry

I am hooked on the New York Times crossword app. Can’t keep my hands off the thing. You can buy puzzles for it for what works out to be about ten cents per puzzle, or subscribe to the current puzzles for eight bucks a month or $40 per year (this is the entertainment bargain of the century).

Just be sure you have time to spare.

A perfect summer shower

It's in the mid-80s this afternoon. I took a quick walk downtown and was halfway home when it started—big, fat, splashy drops, a perfect rain for walking in. And no more than half a mile to go.

After I got home it started to rain a little harder.




Wait, what?

San Francisco is using pee-repellant paint on walls - NY Daily News

Panic much?

GOP boss asks presidential candidates to stay loyal to party | New York Post

"'Our candidates should pledge not to run as a third-party candidate,' Priebus said on NBC’s ‘Today' show.'

Yep, it's gonna be a Noel Coward kind of day

NOEL COWARD - MAD DOGS & ENGLISHMEN LYRICS

"The natives grieve
When the white men leave
Their huts
Because they're obviously
Definitely nuts

"Mad Dogs & Englishmen
Go out in the midday sun"

Me too, of course, although today, if the morning so far is any indication, it’s more likely to be midday haze. Hot and humid is the forecast.

Which reminds me. If the humidity gets to 100 percent do we need a boat?

7.27.2015

Ooops

A mere kid, this wabbit

Bugs Bunny at 75: Watch the First-Ever ‘What’s Up, Doc?’ Moment | TIME

[Bugs’s first movie is here. Runs about 12 minutes. The thing you have to remember if you watch it is, there was no computer animation 75 years ago. The whole thing was done with hand-drawn cels.]

Let us not even think of the events

Aphrodisiacs derived from toads are poisonous, not sexy.

“[Toad toxins] led to an Indian man’s weeklong hospitalization in 2011, after he ate five to six toads over the course of 'an eventful morning.’"

Supply, supply, supply

How did armies keep their archers supplied with arrows while fighting?

"In 1418, Henry V's government purchased 150,000 arrows; in 1421, it acquired nearly 500,000. Several years' supply would be stockpiled for a major campaign. Half a century earlier in 1360, Edward III's accounts reveal that 566,400 arrows (and 11,000 bows) were stored in the Tower of London alone."

Some guy in…wait for it…India…doesn't approve of the Donald

Donald Trump: What it means for U.S. image (Opinion) - CNN.com

"A Colombian columnist called Donald Trump a "lab rat," for testing the U.S. tolerance of toxic political debate. In India, a commentator writes dismissively that the "self-declared 'greatest' democracy is descending into a farce.""

Let's not set that bar too high

Turkey and U.S. Plan to Create Syria ‘Safe Zone’ Free of ISIS - The New York Times

"The plan would create what officials from both countries are calling an Islamic State-free zone controlled by relatively moderate Syrian insurgents"