Halloween Tricks You Can Play on Someone

Tell them it’s their baby.

Kidnap their family. And their pets.

Say that you’ll be at their party, no question. Then don’t show up.

Tell someone they look ugly. “Oh, come on, I was just kidding. But not really.”

Invite them to a movie. Then take them to one they don’t want to see.

Ignore them for no reason. When they confront you about it, pretend like you don’t know what they’re talking about. Then keep doing it.

Steal things from them.

If they go to an ice cream store every week, find out what their favorite flavor is. Then, right before they go there, buy all their favorite flavor up and throw it away. They won’t get any ice cream!

If something is wrong, and they ask, “Is something wrong?” Say “No.” Then, if they ask, “Really? It seems like something is wrong,” say “No. Everything’s fine.”

Kick them at inappropriate times.

Eat the last cookie, even if they haven’t had one yet.

When you’re going out to pick up lunch, don’t ask them if they want anything. If they see you bring lunch back and mention that they wanted something, don’t apologize. Just say you couldn’t find them earlier, even though you could.

Slap them in the face. When they confront you about it, pretend like you don’t know what they’re talking about. Then keep doing it.

Ask them, in passing, what their social security number is. When they tell you (you may have to earn their trust), use it to empty their bank account and buy a ticket to the Caymans. Suckers. They should have given you some candy.

Sometime within the next few days, political analysts are predicting that Karl Rove will be “frog-marched” out of the White House.

Hehe, “frog-marched.”

Other Things Karl Rove Deserves to Have Done To Him

Kangaroo-dragged

Hippo-chaired

Mouse-holed

Alligator-rubbed

Raccoon-scavenged

Skunk-sprayed

Cow-milked

Chicken-scratched

Bush-whacked

After a little wrangling, I now have what for a long time was only a dream for me.

I have set up my Powerbook, and my PC to run… AT THE SAME TIME.

It’s a joyous day, and so instead of writing something here, I’ve decided to take the time and enjoy my new setup. Of course, it’ll be a little longer before I get a mouse for my Powerbook, or a new keyboard for my PC (it needs one), or until my new wireless router arrives so that they can both be online at the same time.

But I’m sure, beyond a shadow of a doubt, that when those things all arrive, I will have reached computer perfection. There is no way, I repeat no way, that I will ever want anything else after that.

Oh, except an iPod.

And maybe, just maybe, an Xbox 360.

But that’s it.

Probably.

Go White Sox!*

*Don’t worry. I’m still a Cards fan. But, you know, they lost, so…

It’s looking more and more like rap hack “Cam’ron” is ready to use his shooting to his own advantage, even if he doesn’t necessarily have darker intentions. Not only is he bragging about his shooting and his new album, apparently his rhymes suck. As much as mine do.

Cam’ron A&R Meeting

Record Exec: Listen, Cam’ron, we’ve got to do something about this new album.

Cam’ron: No, you listen, RE. Cam’ron drops mad beats that are straight off the streets. Homies buy that album in flocks, no need to put the glock to their heads, heard what I said?

RE: What’s that? Glocks? Hey, wait a minute! I got an idea!

Cam’ron: An idea in your head? That’s what I said, yo. Don’t leap to Cam’ron, or you’ll get stepped on. Holla!

RE: No, listen. Let’s get someone to pull a gat on you! Shootings worked wonders for 50 Cent, and he’s talentless! You’re worse than he is, but at least you can finally get some attention, since right now no one’s ever even heard of you!

Cam’ron: They all heard of Cam, all the crackheads on the lam. They plays my jam, in a boat or on a tram! Tramizzle!

RE: Wow, that’s terrible. Now, listen, let’s just get some dude to shoot you– heck, I could do it. Nothing fatal, maybe just a shot in your arm or something. No, wait, let’s do it through both arms! Two wounds for the price of one!

Cam’ron: Two for one– Just like buns in the ov-un! Huh!

RE: Holy crap, that’s the worst rhyme I ever heard. Why did I ever give you a deal in the first place? Anyway, that’s over now. All we have to do is shoot you. Make sure during every interview you mention your album, and sell yourself as an egotistical hack. Oh wait, you do that fine by yourself.

Cam’ron: Talentless and wack, that’s Cam’ron from the back! Lay it down on the track because Cam’s got your back, and if you think that ain’t fly I’ll take you out the sky, don’t think I won’t do it, you quack!

RE: I can’t take any more of this. *shoots Cam’ron*

Cam’ron: OW!

RE: Oh my gosh, are you ok?

Cam’ron: Ow, like pow, what I did to your cow in the hayfield, lay field, I roll up the green on the scene, whether dirty or clean I’m in between your lady and your new limosine…

RE: Oh, just make it stop! *shoots Cam’ron again*

Using Flock

Here are my collected impressions of the new Flock browser (I’ve been messing around with the developer version all weekend).

-I love the fact that you can import favorites from del.icio.us. Being that I regularly browse the internet from about three different computers, it’s GOLD, Jerry, GOLD! for me to be able to take my favorites wherever I need to go. However, I could use a little easier access to them from within the browser– right now, I either have to add them to a collection and go link by link or open the favorites manager and double click from there. Ideally, I would be able to simply make seperate collections from each of my delicious tags, and browse by tag on the toolbar. I passed this into Flock’s feedback system already, hopefully better features in this vein are on the way.

(Oops – I just logged into del.icio.us, and all my handmade tags have magically disappeared. Which sucks because I had a lot of them, but that’s what I get for using such an early version of Flock. I’m guessing it won’t automatically delete all your tags in the future.)

-As for actual browsing, right now it seems to work about like Firefox, which is pretty darn well. Thank you, Flock, for finally implementing moveable tabs! I’ve been waiting for years to organize my tabs that way. However, since it’s 2005, do you think that maybe we could get mouse gestures finally built into a browser? Sure, there’s plugins for IE, Firefox, and Safari, but maybe you could be the first to finally make them standard!

-It’s a little slower than Firefox over all (or at least FasterFirefox, which is what I normally use), but I’m not sure how much of this is a problem with the early version, and how much is the actual browser. It will get faster, I’m sure.

-The other big feature is the blog editing tool. I like it overall. There’s a nicely done system that automatically plugs into your blog’s api from just the web address, and it works just fine (I’ve done a few miniblog posts from within flock). The only real problem I see is that there’s no clear way to edit categories. The few posts I’ve made from Flock have allowed me to make posts quickly and easily just fine, but I have to log back into Wordpress to change the categories to my liking. The “topbar” is a neat little RSS (I’m guessing) driven thingy, but I’m not super sure what it’s for. I guess you could use it to drag flickr photos into your posts, but I’ve never done that on my own blog.

-And then there’s the Shelf, basically a glorified clipboard. I didn’t use it much, because I don’t do a lot of “quote” blogging, obviously, but I can see how it would have its uses, once you actually got used to realizing it was there and how it worked. One problem I’ve seen with it is that it seems to copy text wholeheatedly, with formatting and everything. With a thrown together blog that may not matter, but with a more professional blog (such as this one, ahem), I’d want everything to be pretty format free whenever I posted it in.

-And speaking of cleanliness, I’m not thrilled that the blog and shelf windows open in their own panes. For someone like me (I have two monitors coming off my Powerbook), space isn’t really a problem, but I’d guess most people usually browse fullscreen, and it would be a pain to switch around everywhere. I’d like to see those implemented within the browser window– maybe shelf across the bottom and blog entry on the sidebar. That, I think, would make the workspace a little more organized.

I wish I knew how close this thing was to actually flying, but I’m guessing not very. There’s a lot of good ideas here, and they’re getting closer and closer to making blogging not only easy, but transparent, in the same way that apps like Quicksilver (and for some people, Photoshop) are– if you think of something you’d like to do, it’s a few keystrokes away from being done. See a photo that would be perfect for that blog post? Put it on the shelf. Go grab a few more quotes, open up the editor, copy and hit Publish and it’s up. Flock hasn’t completely got it down yet (despite the fact that they’re apparently working around the clock over there), but they have a really good chance here at doing something very right.

I Got Your Back, Mediabistro

From: Laurel Touby | mediabistro.com
Sent: Friday, October 21, 2005 1:01pm
To: Mike Schramm [mailto:mike@retardedjimmy.com]
Subject: Re: hello from Laurel

Thanks, Mike.

 

Laurel Touby
founder & cyberhostess

LaurelT@mediabistro.com
494 Broadway, 4th FL
NY, NY 10012
tel: 212-929-2588, 324

mediabistro.com | *jobs *parties *people

 

—–Original Message—–
From: Mike Schramm
[mailto:mike@retardedjimmy.com]
Sent: Tuesday, October 18, 2005 9:23 PM
To: Laurel Touby | mediabistro.com
Subject: Re: hello from Laurel

Hey Laurel,

Found anybody to fill Spiers’ position yet? I’m totally in if you need me.

Let me know,

Mike Schramm

style="WORD-SPACING: 0px; FONT: 12px Helvetica; TEXT-TRANSFORM: none; COLOR: rgb(0,0,0); TEXT-INDENT: 0px; WHITE-SPACE: normal; LETTER-SPACING: normal; BORDER-COLLAPSE: separate; border-spacing: 0px 0px; khtml-text-decorations-in-effect: none; apple-text-size-adjust: auto; orphans: 2; widows: 2">
 

I went to see a sneak preview of Doom tonight. Oh boy. Spoilers are probably here, if you care about that sort of thing. Actually, with Doom, even if you do, you shouldn’t.

How Not To Make a Movie Based on a Videogame

-Completely ignore the premise of the videogame the movie is based on. Actually, no– even better, make sly references to the game’s premise, but also make it very clear that any actual comparisons were written out of the script entirely. That way, fans will know you know the real story, and that you’re not bothering to show it.

-Speaking of writing the script, do it about 29 or 30 times. Make sure a different person does it every time. This will ensure that none of the plotlines are actually related to each other, or even have a beginning or an end.

-During those 29 versions of the script, don’t bother coming up with a better one-liner than “Oh, s***.”

-Make sure you hire the Rock. He’s good at one-liners, so he will probably make something out of that line, though, so give him another later. Random cursing will be fine as well.

-Make it completely unclear as to what’s happening when. This can be easily accomplished by using backgrounds straight from the game, but without any relation to the characters or story at all. Fans of the game will recognize the backgrounds and be delighted. It probably won’t matter to them that the sets fit with the movie at all, they’ll just have fun recognizing things from the game.

-Speaking of recognizing things, make sure you put one (and only one) sequence in the view that the game is known for. You don’t need any other reasons than that, because fans will instantly recognize this game– sorry, movie– as something they know, and they will enjoy it. Sure, it may not tie in with the rest of the movie, and it may be as boring as, well, watching someone play a videogame, but even putting it in there will show that you, at the very least, watched videos of the game for maybe half an hour.

-Make the “hero” unrecognizable and without any appealing or interesting characteristics. If possible, make him even less appealing than the original hero of the videogame. Hopefully, the hero of the game will have shown more expressions in a little box on the bottom of the screen than the “hero” does all movie.

-Make the female lead attractive. Then make her the hero’s sister– gamers get uncomfortable around sexuality.

-We mean it about the one liners. “Holy s***” will be fine. Don’t need to be any more creative than that.

-Put lots of winking references in the movie that it’s based on a game– things like “game on,” “game time,” and “put on your game face,” will do nicely. Gamers aren’t usually intelligent, and they often don’t have long attention spans, so they may at times forget that the movie is based on a game. Remind them. Often. Patronize them, if possible. After all, they’re only gamers.

Civ IV has gone gold.

Things That, While Addictive, Are Still Less Addictive Than Civ

Smoking

Gambling

Crack cocaine

Heroin

Pringles

Hagen Daas

Various type of Chocolate

Dogs

Love

Alcohol

Thrills

World of Warcraft

Bill O’Reilly says he’s gotten “as famous as I need to be.” He says he feels sorry for people like Lindsay Lohan, and knows what their life is like because, just like Lohan, he’s stalked by “stealth papparazi” and “can’t leave the house without some idiot doing something.”

Comments from the Yahoo! Movies Lindsay Lohan Message Board, That, Slightly Edited, Might Be From the Bill O’Reilly Message Board

“I have to agree he looks now looks like he is on drugs or something. Guess those dumb producers are filling his head that he needs to be a skeleton to get a part in a movie.”

“Hi Bill you probably wont ever read this but I just wanted to tell you ive seen all of your movies and cant wait to see the Oreilly factor and if you acually do read this i would really appriciate if you emaild me at donox@sanfranmail.com”

“Hey Bill my names Will Herbert im 15 and one of your biggest fans. I have read all your books and i love them all including you. I also love your rant about freeloading poor people. I think you are really really BEAUTIFUL. I just started trying to be a right-wing hoodlum and i hope i could work at Fox like you and maybe meet you. If you ever read this could you send me an e-mail wherb61@hotmail.com. I would just love it.thx. :)”

“I don’t quite understand why all of you like Bill. You obviously don’t know him at all. Don’t give him any respect because he defintely does not given any respect to anyone else. He is very selfish and extremely conceited. He acts like a spolied brat and believes everyone should look up at him. So, please find someone else to idolize.”

“SEAN HANNITY IZ WAY PRETTIER THAN BILL!!!=]”

“Bill is a great commentator! I’ve read a lot of interviews about him and this is what I think of him: he’s sincere, he’s smart, he’s a role model and a great friend to his friends.”

“bill is so pretty. I wish he would get his nose pierced. It would look so good on him.”

“i waz up dude i saw your show it’s cool u look good in the black dress so if you could e-mail me at jbthug2003 iight holla cause i want to get to no you better iight peace baby

holla luv you ”

“Wow…i heard the radio show a looong time ago…and wasnt interested at all…but i saw fox news and its the same as me and my mom! the garage band he hates, stepfather i dont want…wow!.. bill i think you are the most beautifull talking head in the entire galaxy…wish i could go out with someone like you…kisses and hugs…”

“u are f**king crazy. Are u blind or something. Sean Hannity is not fat. I saw MTV’s making of his vidoes and he was wearing a tight top and looked hott. SO JUST SHUT UP AND MAYBE BUY SOME GLASSES.”

“my eyesights perfect he is fat. and i don’t care what he was on and how he looked but hes still fat”

“I think that you are totally right! I mean he is only 55(56 by September 10). He is ruining his cureer. If he does not impress our youth than he should just go ahead and start looking for a new job. One day our youth will become the worlds population. He would have been much better off with his old image!”

“He was n the bathroom for such a long time because he was sniffing some, *Coke &/or Methamphetamine*. He will go down soon and you will all see his motives, get a reality check hes trying to make fools out of everyone.”

“He is souless people, if he cared at all about himself or anyone he would have been himself, hes a lost cause all that money is eating him.”

“he’s the best commentator i’ve ever seen!!!
His show is cool and awesome. I’ve never imagined that a little boy in the No-Spin Zone will grow to be a cool and rock right-winger! Keep Rockin’!!!”

If I Was the Lead Singer of a Big Rock and Roll Band, and We Played in a Stadium, This is What It Would Sound Like

Hello Boston!

Wait, what? Charlotte? Oh crap, where am I? Hello, uh, hello Charlotte!! Sorry about that!

It’s great to be here! We’re going to play some old songs, and some new songs. Mostly new ones. Off of our new album! Exciting, right? Well, I know you guys don’t know them, but you’ll love them. We hope.

Boy, you guys are a great crowd. Thank you!

How about that opening band, huh? Aren’t they great? What’s that? They’re not? Oh, well, they’re our bassist’s little brother’s band, so, you know, we kind of had to bring them along. They’re not bad, though, right? I mean, I don’t know. It’s Jerry’s fault.

Hey, so I heard while I’m here I’m supposed to eat some clam chowda! I said clam chowDA! How about that! Eh? Oh, crap. Right. What do they eat in Charlotte? Junebugs?

Hey, can we have the monitors on stage turned up a little bit? We can’t? Oh, maybe just a little bit though? Hey Joe? We just can’t hear the music up here. Not real well, anyway. Just a bit? Well, ok then, I guess we’ll live. It’ll be fine, don’t worry about it.

You’re really great, you all. Thank you! Thanks very much. I appreciate it. Jerry appreciates it too. I heard him say he did earlier.

But hey, listen, we have to go. Yeah, we only learned three songs– you know, We Love Katamari just came out, so we’ve been busy working on other things. But hey, if we ever make it back to Boston, we’ll have to party! See you later, Bostonites!

Oh, right. Charlotties? Charletites? Later, I guess.

Hey, any girls want to like meet up backstage? And play Katamari or something? Nobody? Ok then, later.

One is the loneliest number that you’ll ever do.

Two can be as bad as one.
It’s the loneliest number since the number one.

Three is pretty lonely,
especially for one of the three.

Four isn’t all that lonely.

Seven is fairly cordial. Depends on what you’re doing.

Ten is a good size for classes. Lots of viewpoints, lots of discussion.

Twelve is a nice round number. Try a paired exercise– because it’s even, you won’t leave anyone out.

Thirty seven is quite a crowd. Good for you!

Two hundred is a good concert. No one’s really lonely there, unless it’s a Cure show. Then everyone is.

Three thousand is way too many people for a barbeque. I thought you were going to try to keep things small.

Five million is like a country. Or Minneapolis. People can get lonely there, but they shouldn’t.

Two hundred and ninety five million, seven hundred and thirty four thousand, one hundred and thirty four can be as bad as two. It’s the loneliest number since the number two.

Six billion is a lot. A lot a lot. Wow. Like, it’s really a lot.

A gajillion? Social. But way too much.

But the loneliest number? Still one.

I’m watching through Joss Whedon’s Firefly before I go see Serenity. It’s a western.. in space!

Other Things That Would Be Better… IN SPACE!

Cars.. IN SPACE

Love.. IN SPACE

Cats of SPACE

SPACE Presidents

Foreign SPACE Languages

Armadillos FROM SPACE

SPACE Superman

SPACE pirates fighting SPACE ninjas!

Cardboard SPACE boxes

Parking SPACES

Most of the World of Warcraft jokes I’ve posted here I’ve attempted to make understandable for a larger audience. Today’s joke is so geek it’s impossible. Non-Azerothians, I’ll see you tomorrow.

Computer Gaming World’s lead editor let it leak that Blizzard’s new expansion pack for World of Warcraft will feature two new playable races. All of these guesses are legitimate ones my friend and I came up with.

Races That Might Be Playable in the New WoW Expansion

Gnomes

Murlocs

Robots

“Day” Elves

The Gray Orcs

Treants

Zerg

Protoss

Drow

Twi’leks

Demons

Morlocs (and Eloi)

Chicago Marathon (maybe we’re going about this all wrong)

Good lord. Will someone please, please, stop Uwe Boll? From MTV news:

The film version of the video game “Dungeon Siege” has changed its name to “In the Name of the King: A Dungeon Siege Tale,” which director Uwe Boll insists will better reflect the film’s variance from game interpretation to “Lord of the Rings”-type epic drama. Boll is also considering taking the movie (currently filming in Vancouver with stars Jason Statham and Leelee Sobieski) and dividing its near four hours of material into two movies, similar to the move Quentin Tarantino made with his “Kill Bill” films. …

I just sat through the whole of Alone in the Dark the other day (don’t ask), and so I can’t even imagine how bad Boll’s Dungeon Siege “epic” would be. Oh wait, yes I can.

The Last Scene of ‘In the Name of The King: A Four Hour Long Dungeon Siege Tale’

cast:
Jason Statham…. Howard
Leelee Sobieski.. Claire

Howard: We’ve done it, Claire. We’ve killed the dragon.

Claire: Yes, Howard, we have. I’m so happy.

Howard: And I too am happy, Claire. This dragon, that terrorized the dragon-terrorized land has been now terrorized by us. Let us take his head back to the villages, and share with them the many spoils of our adventures.

Claire: I will always remember this, Howard. All of the dragon’s meaningless but well-rendered digital minions. And the many, many predictable plot twists we had to endure.

Howard: Yes, Claire, none of us could have predicted that you were the princess, or that the dragon was let loose by your father’s ill doing!

Claire: And you, Howard– we all thought you were just a peasant with surprisingly good looks. No one could have guessed that it was your destiny to save the world from a dragon that was planning to– what was he planning to do again, Howard?

Howard: I’m not sure, Claire, but he’ll never be able to do it now. I think. We stopped him, didn’t we?

Claire: I wish this would just stop. I was in Eyes Wide Shut!

Howard: And I was the Transporter! At any rate, let’s go home.

[they walk down the path to the village, as the camera raises above them]

Howard [voiceover]: The dragon attacked us, but we attacked back. In a way, there is really a dragon in all of us. And its his job to slay us, but it’s really us slaying us from inside. We may have found loot, but there was still loot left to find. The loot of knowledge. Of the dragon.

[credits]