Read it.

Darwin Award.

Read it.

We have the technology.

Check it out.

Just when you thought it was safe to go back for a Big Mac….

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Somehow, this just says ‘America’ to me. Perhaps it’s the ketchup.

Read it.

I don’t care who you are, that’s funny.

Watch it.

Hey, I’m Orthodox. Cope.

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Read it.

Read it.

Let’s go surfin’ now
Everybody’s learnin’ how
Come on a safari with meeeeeeee…..

Read it.

You know you want one.

Read it.

Amazingly enough, the knife only weighs 8 ounces due to the rat-tail handle build and the Kraton grip. You could get a stronger knife in a heavier full-width tang — but with the Ka-Bar Bowie, there’s no reason to be concerned. Ka-Bar has been building prybar strong knives with rat-tail tangs for a very long time.

You know you want one.

Read it. And watch the videos, of course.

Read it.

We have the technology.

Lynn Viehl, prolific writer, argues with Chinese fortune cookies.

Well, she’s a writer. They do stuff like that.

Read it. And watch the video.

Read it.

You never know when an Iranian EMP attack will make all of your credit cards just so much plastic.

Read it.

Read it.

I am not making this up.

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Me want.

Read it.

German state constitutions require children to attend public or private schools, and parents can face fines or prison time if they do not comply.

Aren’t you glad you don’t live in Germany?

Read it.

Read it.

Dick Cavett, the SWPL reference standard, meets a Real American.

(Warning: Good friends have refused to believe a word of what I’m about to relate. Your credulity is about to be strained.)

Which tells you all you really need to know about Dick Cavett (disclaimer: He and I both went to Yale, the same physical Yale but not the same sociological Yale) and his friends — and his (assumed) readers.

(‘What’s your name?’ ‘Chan Wen.’ ‘John Wayne? That’s a terrible cowboy name.’)

Read it.

How often can people mash up the same Hitler-throws-a-tantrum scene? Let us count the ways….

Read it.

The guys who run the plant must not be from around here.

Read it.

We have the technology.

Read it.

The Amish have the undeserved reputation of being luddites, of people who refuse to employ new technology. It’s well known the strictest of them don’t use electricity, or automobiles, but rather farm with manual tools and ride in a horse and buggy.  In any debate about the merits of embracing new technology, the Amish stand out as offering an honorable alternative of refusal. Yet Amish lives are anything but anti-technological. In fact on my several visits with them, I have found them to be ingenious hackers and tinkers, the ultimate makers and do-it-yourselfers and surprisingly pro technology.

The Amish call this pneumatic system “Amish electricity.” At first pneumatics were devised for Amish workshops, but it was seen as so useful that air-power migrated to Amish households. In fact there is an entire cottage industry in retrofitting tools and appliances to Amish electricity. The retrofitters buy a heavy-duty blender, say, and yank out the electrical motor. They then substitute an air-powered motor of appropriate size, add pneumatic connectors, and bingo, your Amish mom now has a blender in her electrical-less kitchen. You can get a pneumatic sewing machine, and a pneumatic washer/dryer (with propane heat). In a display of pure steam-punk nerdiness, Amish hackers try to outdo each other in building pneumatic versions of electrified contraptions. Their mechanical skill is quite impressive, particularly since none went beyond the 8th grade. They love to show off this air-punk geekiness. And every tinkerer I met claimed that pneumatics were superior to electrical devices because air was more powerful and durable, outlasting motors which burned out after a few years hard labor. I don’t know if this is true, or just justification, but it was a constant refrain.

Read it.

These ships are just.so.cool.

Read it.

Read it.

Spare a thought for the modern thief. They have to face off against phones that can broadcast their location, laptops that lock themselves down, a LoJack service for iPods, and now a laser tripwire that can twitter pictures of unwanted visitors. It’s a decidedly DIY Arduino-based project, but unlike many similarly powered offerings that we hit, this one is described as being very easy — as far as Arduino-based projects go, anyway.

Read it.

Don’t say we never have useful stuff here.

Read it.

Read it.

You, too, can help destroy the language.

Read it.

Just in case you had some cash laying around idle after Christmas.

Read it.

This Cute Break is for my wife. Happy New Year, sweetie.

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A Tim Allen special. Arh, Arh, Arh.

Read it.

A US court has turned back an appeal of a 2008 ruling that declared that if you blow out your ears by listening to your iPod too loudly, it’s your own damn fault.

Common sense breaks out in the American legal system! Who saw that coming?

Read it.

The greatest strength of America is that people want to live there.

Read it.

White people can do powerful things with their eyes: casting judgment, indicating scorn, and obnoxiously rolling them when someone says something they don’t agree with. Yet in spite of these powers, they are not immune to the dangers of the sun. So white people must wear sunglasses. But what may surprise you is that while white people will spend upwards of three months finding a perfect pair of unique prescription glasses, they have no such requirement for sunglasses.

Read it. I guess they’ve decommissioned the carrier of that name.

I wish I were forty years younger so that I could serve on such a ship. The future is now.

More here, to the extent that Wikipedia can be trusted.

Read it.

Can I get a witness?

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Be the first on your block….

Read it.

This is why this is an exciting time to be alive.

Unfortunately, they only have versions for iPhone and Android. I guess Blackberry users don’t need to save money on stuff….

Read it.

I have a dozen pints of bacon lard in my freezer. Bring it on.

Steve Sailer is the personification of insouciance.

My impression after a half hour is that SuperFreakonomics is very competently done. I didn’t see anything implausible, in contrast to the way you can’t read Gladwell for 3 minutes without stumbling upon something that sounds just plain wrong. (SuperFreakonomics elicited much angry response because it expresses some skepticism about Climate Change dogma, but I don’t know anything about climate, so I skipped those parts.)

That sounds about right.

Watch it.

We report, you decide.

Check it out.

Sure, it’s a cliché, but it’s not as if I’m getting paid for this stuff….

Bo’s Cafe Life – check it out, over there on the right.

Read it.

1. There was a can of saved bacon grease in a cabinet, which they used to fry other stuff.

Mom used an old Crisco can. The irony was probably lost on her.

Read it.