Monthly Archives: November 2010

– Boxing: The Juan Manuel Marquez vs Michael Katsidis fight is worth watching if you see the replay on HBO or OnDemand.  Marquez gets dropped in the 3rd, but steadily beatsdown Katsidis until the ref (my boy Kenny Bayless!) stops it in the 9th.  Some experts think it’s the fight of the year.  On that undercard, Andre Berto knocks out Freddy Hernandez in the first round.  Solid punch.

– Mythbusters: If you are in a car and it hits the water and then turns over, you are fucked.  In order to open a door, you’ll need to wait until the car is filled with water.  Adam Savage recommends keeping a glass-breaker in your car.  Also, a gun will not ignite a kitchen full of methane gas, but it will blow the fuck out of a kitchen full of hydrogen.

– Weed map: Here’s a map showing the average price of weed by state.  It’s interactive.  It’s also based on anonymous submitters, who may or may not be lying.  Or just high.  (Wooten)

– Slo-mo: A camera at 210fps shoots from a train pulling into the station.  Then the footage gets played back at 30fps and you get this:  (The Daily What)

– We’re still cavemen: Apparently just looking at a cooked turkey “may promote caveman behavioral traits.”  The original theory was that we’d act more aggressively if we viewed pictures of meat.  To wit:

“I theorized that meat would elicit an aggressive response because it would be beneficial to our ancestor’s adaptation in that it would place our ancestors in a state optimal for hunting and co-opting meat resources, where aggression would be necessary,” project leader Frank Kachanoff told Discovery News.

“Fruits and vegetables would probably not require as much aggressive force to be acquired,” added Kachanoff, a McGill Department of Psychology researcher.

And what did he find after running experiments?  The exact opposite.  Subjects were more likely to be calmer after seeing picture of meat than after seeing pictures of geometric shapes.  Of course, Kachanoff can’t let it go that his theory was wrong.  The end of the article goes like this:

In the future, Kachanoff plans to rework his meat experiment by showing participants pictures of live animals most likely to have been hunted by our ancestors.

“Also, it would be interesting to have a condition in which the animal’s carcass would be shown,” he said. “I would predict that these conditions would elicit an aggressive response in participants relative to neutral stimuli.”

All in the name of science, I suppose.  (Discovery)

– Porn: 3-D porn channel is indeed hitting France.  It has 60 exclusive videos from director Mark Dorcel (you can check his IMDB page here), plus it’s OnDemand.  Us in the states will have to settle for Playboy’s 250GB hard drive, which includes every issue of the magazine.  (Gizmodo)

– Polar Ice: Spend about $33 on some ice.  You’re supposed to “preserve” it in your freezer.  I like to keep mine around my neck.  There’s a great over-the-top video on MyPolarIce.com, where it explains that the two artists went to the Arctic to do something about the “soon to be extinct” ice caps… by removing one.  (Core77)

– Speaking of global warming: Climate scientists met in Cancun (it’s OK, they all biked there) to discuss climate change.  Professor Anderson, Director of the Tyndall Centre for Climate Change Research, had a brilliant idea.  He wants to ration, especially in the rich countries:

“The Second World War and the concept of rationing is something we need to seriously consider if we are to address the scale of the problem we face,” he said.

He then follows that statement with this one: “I am not saying we have to go back to living in caves,” he said. “Our emissions were a lot less ten years ago and we got by OK then.”  I love when they gloss over the fact the “rich” countries they want to attack are the ones lowering their carbon output per capita.  OK, now everyone line up for their gallons of gasoline this week.  I don’t care if you live in farm country and drive 50 miles just to get to the store, you’ll get the same as everyone else.  (Dad)

– Sun tax: A Spanish woman has claimed ownership of the Sun and wants to charge us usage fees. (Google News)

– It’s not a wiki: “A wiki is a website that allows the easy creation and editing of any number of interlinked web pages via a web browser using a simplified markup language or a WYSIWYG text editor,” at least according to Wikipedia.  That’s why I don’t understand why that douche calls it Wikileaks.  Anyway, Not-A-Wikileaks had some big news for you all.  The people we’ve asked to go to other countries and report back on what is going on have been reporting back on what is going on.  Shocker.  Here are “The Top 5 Most Shocking Things About The [Not-a-]Wikileaks“:

1. Nearly every country in the Middle East wants us to attack Iran.
2. State Department officials ordered U.S. diplomats to spy on their foreign and UN counterparts.
3. North Korea supplied Iran with long-range missiles.
4. Iran used the auspices of the Red Crescent to smuggle spies and weapons into war zones.
5. U.S. foreign policy relies heavily on blog-ready gossip items.

So Iran is crazy and our diplomats are supposed to tell us what they’ve seen?  And this helps our foreign relations how, exactly?  I have no problem if they want to reveal a more accurate body count, but I have a huge problem with something so unworthy yet so damning getting released.  (There are some funny “gossip” items in the documents, though.)

– Whaddup Big Worm: Here’s a fantastic rundown of the computer virus that fucked over (is still fucking over?) Iran’s nuclear development.  Somehow someone planted a virus on computers that aren’t even connected to the Internet.  The virus specifically fucked with the centrifuges to make them spin too fast, but also changed the data so computer tests didn’t know the centrifuges spun too fast.  This has delayed Iran’s progress for over a year now.  Definitely worth the read.  It’s like a spy thriller, but for 2010.  (Dad)

– Jean Claude: Here’s Jean Claude Van Damme in Hard Target, except his motorcycle has been replaced:  (Montague)

– Chris Johnson’s clothing line: If you like this shirt:

You can go here to find other apparel to buy.  Considering Chris Johnson was the worst first pick in Moonti League history since Duante Culpepper, I will not be buying one.  If I somehow sneak into the Moonti playoffs and some good things happen, then perhaps I’ll be buying a shirt… or two.  (Chris Johnson’s Twitter)

– Stevie vs DeSean: One of my favorite things to do this year has been to send Mark Lee some of DeSean Jackson’s tweets.  Like this one:

MY FEET KICCED UP ON THIS PLANE … BOSS’D UP

Or this one:

#inhighschool MY SQUAD WAS JERK’n THA MOST… ALL THE FEMALES KNEW WAT WAS UP”” yeeeeeeah buddy

Maybe it’s just the way receivers write.  Here’s Stevie Johnson after dropping an easy touchdown in overtime:

I PLAY W/PASSION AND EMOTION! I HURT WEN I DNT MAKE A PLAY BKUZ iKNO THAT’S WHA MY TEAM,FAM,N MY CITIES WANT TO SEE! N THAS A WINs N PLAYS!

Even Jeff Palma is cringing.

– “You think this is funny?”: I can, in part, sympathize with Derek Anderson laughing on the sidelines during a blowout.  I once got indirectly yelled at in a locker room for the same thing.  Of course, that was high school and I wasn’t playing anyway.  I don’t remember what Pat O’Keefe and I were joking about, but as one assistant coach was screaming trying to figure out who it was, I subtly let Pat know not to say a fucking word.  However, I don’t think I sympathize with Anderson’s reaction during the press conference:

“That’s fine.  That’s fine.  That’s fine.”  And I’m out.  (Kissing Suzy Kolber)

– “I say more naked chicks”: Here, Andy.  Here:  (Fuck Yeah Brazilian Girls)

Her name is Mariana Kupfer

And since I don’t discriminate, this is Juliana Alves:

– The Marks’ Financial Update:

• MFL – A steady rise from $12.61 to close out the two-week period at $13.61.  A solid $1 gain for a guy who usually deals in cents.  Fantasy playoffs are approaching, so he has to like the recent movement of his stock here.
  
• MDH – Harter dropped two cents this time period, from $2.41 to $2.39.  He doesn’t quite have first place sewn up in the Moonti league (he needs to get by yours truly), but he does have the best record.  I’m hoping he pulls a Colts and rests his starters.  My dad wanted me to ask him to start Chatham’s QB and RB.  So, um, Harter, can you?
• MAB – A visit back to C-Town couldn’t stop Bunk’s slide from $14.60 to $14.03.  He spent 5 trading days below $14, but snapped out of it on Friday, so maybe it was the visit that helped.  Is it bad that I almost called him and Jaime “Junk”, ya know, because that’s what Jaime and Bunk would equal, if we were to give them a Bennifer moniker.  I’ll stop now.  Baime it is.  I’ll stop now, now.

– Notes on the site: So this is the 52nd Weekly Update.  How about that.  I first posted on this site on November 30th, 2009.  I really didn’t mean to post exactly one year from then, my laziness just made it so.  I’ve decided to share with you the first ever “Blake’s Update” that I sent via email to The Marks.  I have not edited the email nor checked to see if the links work.  I just copy/pasted.  How far I’ve come.  Enjoy:

You said you wanted updates on shit, so this is what I learned this week:

– Disposable diapers can hold up to 7 pounds of liquid, which lead me to think about being a “Man-baby” for Halloween, which in turn became “Man-baby Edward 40-Hands”.
– New website of the week: http://atdhe.net/ You can watch live TV, so if you aren’t getting a football game, it might show there.  Definitely worth checking.
– DJ Hero came out (you probably saw the commercial) but I saw it at Best Buy and asked one of the workers about it:
“Man… I’m sick of that game already.”
“People buying it though?”
“Oh hell yeah, people are playing it a lot and then buying it.”
What he was sick about is that each song is a mash up and you’re supposed to hit that slide thing to the right/left but no one playing it for the first time can figure it out.  Next time you see the Eminem/Jay-Z commercial, imagine listening to that commercial with no sound when Jay-Z comes on.
Images here: http://www.bing.com/images/search?q=dj+hero&FORM=BIFD

– Dorkiest thing: Xerox is finalizing research to print circuit boards. http://digital.venturebeat.com/2009/10/26/xerox-developers-a-silver-ink-that-can-be-used-to-wearable-or-throwaway-electronics/
“Xerox researchers have invented a kind of ink that can conduct electricity and be used to put electronic circuits on top of plastics, film, and textiles. That means in the coming years we’ll be able to wear or bend our electronics. You could even print out your electronic gadget on plastic sheets, as if you were printing a document.”

Google Reader – if you still haven’t tried this, I recommend checking it out.  Again, it works on something called a RSS Feed (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rss_feed).  You can add feeds from Reader, or go to the site you want and look for “RSS Feed” (usually an orange button shown on the Wiki page)

Twitter – Blake’s up to 11 followers.  No mentions this week nor RTs (re-tweet, lol! omg!!).  Twitter has a
– New “Listing” function which I found is reducing clutter but only works on the web.
– Echofon is the iphone app to go with (since Samsung flip phones are way more ballin’ than an iphone, no apps necessary).
Look – yes for a massive majority of users, Twitter is basically a message board for 13 year old girls.  Fine.  But when you can find the right people to follow, you find out news before articles are posted and have some good laughs.  Just saying.

Oh – and I witnessed my first Twitter-war.  Andre Berto and Sugar Shane Mosley went at it.  Berto said Shane talked shit about him in some interview, Shane said he was ready to fight Jan 30th but Berto hasn’t signed.  Berto said Shane’s an idiot and no one’s ever contacted him to fight.  Maybe they ink something, who knows.

MAB – Buyers were excited that Bunk hosted a weekend of debauchery, but quickly sold when news broke that the daybed (aah-ah-ahhhh) was no more.  Started the week around 13, got as 15.83, then dropped down and closed the week at $14.10:
http://finance.yahoo.com/echarts?s=MAB#chart4:symbol=mab;range=5d;indicator=volume;charttype=line;crosshair=on;ohlcvalues=0;logscale=on;source=undefined

MFL – $12.99 open, $12.84 close for the week.  Nothing could be more boring (except maybe this email).  In a week where the market tanked at the end, he at least didn’t crash.  Probably would have done better if he didn’t shank every drive on the golf course Saturday.  At least he’s still climbing from his Oct 17th low:
http://finance.yahoo.com/echarts?s=mfl#chart1:symbol=mfl;range=3m;indicator=volume;charttype=line;crosshair=on;ohlcvalues=0;logscale=on;source=undefined

MDH – Harter can’t seem to stop the slide that started in the beginning of October.  You can see from the chart he’s stopped his slides before, and I think it’s safe to say he’ll stop this one.  It starts with the Moonti league and goes from there:
http://finance.yahoo.com/echarts?s=mdh#chart5:symbol=mdh;range=3m;indicator=volume;charttype=line;crosshair=on;ohlcvalues=0;logscale=on;source=undefined

What we missed: “The League” started on Thursday after Always Sunny.  Come on, one of the promos showed two guys using real life in a trade (taking 5yrs for his client and giving up the #1 pick).  False.  No real life scenarios get factored into trades.  Come on.
What you missed: Heroes is making the Cheerleader gay.  I think… it seems they’re gonna lean that way since her college roommate is a lesbo and trying to get with her.
What I missed: Come on, I miss nothing.  Unless it was on Facebook, then I always miss it.

If you want this thing to continue, let me know.  If you want something added, tell me.  Time to get fucked up though, so here’s the Tweet of the week and it comes from Danny DeVito (danny_devito):
“Mischief night! Bitches stay safe . Get with your main squeeze. No drinking and driving. Drinking yes. Driving yes. Drinking & Driving NO!!!”

– blake

(Follow up: They never responded to the “if you want this thing to continue, let me know” part.  I just kept sending it.  Thanks to everyone who reads this, I really do enjoy putting this shit together.)

– Boxing: Paul Williams got knocked the fuck out on Saturday night by Sergio Martinez.  Watch it here on YouTube before it gets yanked by HBO.  Andre Berto fights this coming Saturday, the 27th, on the Juan Manuel Marquez vs Michael Katsidis undercard.  This was supposed to be back-to-back weekends of watching 2 of my top 3 favorite boxers win, but Paul kinda fucked that up.  Hopefully Berto doesn’t disappoint.

– TSA stands for Touchie… Susies… Authority, wait, don’t go with that: If you’re being a little bitch about the new full body scanners where even toothpick Angelina Jolie looks like a big fucking grey blob, then go to this site to buy fig leaf underwear that covers your junk even in x-ray.  (Discovery)

– Four Lokos homebrew: Don’t fret about this gem going away, just grab five (5) watermelon Jolly Ranchers, one (1) caffeine pill, one (1) can of Monster Energy Drink, one (1) can of Sprite, and one (1) 40-ounce bottle of St. Ides.  In one (and only?) study, 3 out of 5 preferred the homemade.  (The World’s Best Ever)

– Putting my art, and your kid’s art, to shame: Here’s a three-year-old’s finger paintings that are ridic (and cute!):  (Geekologie)

– Maybe Van Gogh was from space…: Here’s the overhead shot of Gotland, which clearly you know is a Swedish island in the Baltic Sea:

The picture is from 2005, and has this description from the folks at NASA:

In the style of Van Gogh’s painting “Starry Night,” massive congregations of greenish phytoplankton swirl in the dark water around Gotland, a Swedish island in the Baltic Sea. Phytoplankton are microscopic marine plants that form the first link in nearly all ocean food chains. Population explosions, or blooms, of phytoplankton, like the one shown here, occur when deep currents bring nutrients up to sunlit surface waters, fueling the growth and reproduction of these tiny plants.

I bet fishing was good there for days after.  (Gizmodo)

– And then there’s this: So plants look lovely until lava comes along.  Then they look like this:

This destruction is from the Merapi volcano in Indonesia.  (New Scientist)

– Chicks de futbol: Here’s the “10 Hottest Female Soccer Players On The Planet“, because fuck those chicks on the Moon.  Whenever you want to play in gravity, let us know.  Here’s the hottest chick:

And here’s the runner-up:

I’ll take the one already laying down.  Thanks.  (Ces)

– So self-conscience: According to a study, women are hardwired to worry about their body image.  Seriously, that shouldn’t be surprising when you think of us as just animals looking for the best mate.  Luckily, we aren’t just animals so don’t worry so much about that shit.  (I sent this link as an e-mail to myself with the subject “women”.)  (Discovery)

– Carrot bukkake: Kids these days:  (The World’s Best Ever)

– X-treme animals: Here’s PopSci’s list of “Twelve Extreme Animal Modifications,” including spider-goats (which you know about) to this little kitty:

But for some reason the list leaves out these male mosquitoes that were made sterile in order to reduce mosquitoes’ numbers.  (PopSci)

– Buying guides: With Black Friday days away, that means Christmas (or the other stuff you may believe in/celebrate) is right around the corner.  So if you are looking for tech ideas, here are Wired’s guides on what you need to know when buying HDTVs, digital cameras, media streamers, web-connected TVs, e-book readers, game consoles, tablet computers (iPads), 3-D TVs, and cellphones.  Personally, I wouldn’t waste your money on a 3-D TV just yet.  (Wired)

– Wi-Fi may not be so good for trees: It’s preliminary, but the Dutch did a study and according to PC World (well, according to Gizmodo, PC World said):

The study exposed 20 ash trees to various radiation sources for a period of three months. Trees placed closest to the Wi-Fi radio demonstrated a “lead-like shine” on their leaves that was caused by the dying of the upper and lower epidermis of the leaves. This would eventually result in the death of parts of the leaves. The study also found that Wi-Fi radiation could inhibit the growth of corn cobs.

The Dutch Antennebureau says to calm down though, for now at least.  (Hippies are having a terrible end of the year here.  First those crabby Republicans took their country, then wind farms started killing birds and bats, and now their precious internet may kill that which they love most.  You know, since hippies are treehuggers?)  (Gizmodo)

– Flip-book from a track: Some Canadians decided to line a track with drawings, then have a Subaru drive real fast to make a movie out of the wall.  Like so:

Learn how they did it all here.  (Core77)

– I miss the police blotter from college: I did two things with the Daily Wildcat: read the Police Beat and do the crossword.  Funny Or Die has a list of the funniest police blotters here.  (Ben)

– Bardon making moves: Andy got some of his work put onto Men’s Journal.  Go read about climbing Grand Teton in Wyoming.  (Andy Bardon)

– Chris Collinsworth a perv? I don’t know how young he is in this video (wait for it), but he says he prefers young girls, aged fourteen to eighteen.  (Ronzoni)

– “Zilla poop fart”: That’s the name of the following video my dad sent me with the subject “good one” (and he doesn’t mean the video is good):  (Dad)

– Photos: I think every site was linking to NatGeo’s Photography contest.  Here’s a dolphin proving the economy is coming back strong as he goes shopping:

Even though I must have seen a link to the contest everywhere I looked, Ben was the first to send it to me.  So congrats?  What everyone else fails to realize is that they have until November 30th to submit their own photo.  So get on that here.  (Ben)

– Happy Thanksgiving to you and yours: If you’re from the C-Town, then I’ll probably see you over the weekend.

Some milk with your turkey?

(WARNING: No naked chicks below.)

– First things first: The site has a new theme because WordPress hates the creator of the previous one, so they discontinued it.  As far as I can tell, the only difference is the font looks smaller.

– Boxing: Manny Pacquiao looked great against a guy 17 pounds heavier.  On the plus side, Margarito has a broken bone in his face, which is pretty fucking deserving of a guy who tried to commit murder in the ring.  Elsewhere:

• Guillermo Rigonbeaux looked like shit against a crappy fighter.  Not the best look for 2009’s Prospect of the Year.
• Saturday, HBO will replay the Pacquiao fight prior to the rematch of Sergio Martinez vs Paul Williams, which I highly recommend.
• Across ye olde pond, David Haye fought a bum for a bum’s title in a bum heavyweight division.  Our UK correspondent, Kes, gives this synopsis:

Haye circled around Harrison for the first two rounds and then knocked him down in the third. Why wait til the third? As Haye stated himself in the post-match interview, he could have done it in the first or second but he bet GBP100,000 on himself to knock Harrison down in the third.

Lovely.  Now if Haye would just get that sand out of his vagina and fight a Klitschko.

– Salt water antenna: Instead of a hunk of metal shooting up into the sky as an antenna, how about a water fountain?  It’s what the U.S. Navy would like to do.  (Core77)

– Water shucker: It’s called the Big Mother Shucker and it’s basically a water-filled compression chamber.  By submerging the lobsters for six to eight minutes in the water pressurized 60 times more than any known lobster habitat, the lobster’s skin will easily break away from its shell.  Yum.  (Wired)

– How to lie better spot fake smiles: The BBC ran a study to see how good people are spotting fake smiles.  It’s about a crap shoot for most people.  I got 14 out of 20, which is better than average.  You can take the test here, it doesn’t take long.  At the end they explain how a real smiles differ from fake smiles.  To wit:

Genuine smiles, on the other hand, are generated by the unconscious brain, so are automatic. When people feel pleasure, signals pass through the part of the brain that processes emotion. As well as making the mouth muscles move, the muscles that raise the cheeks – the orbicularis oculi and the pars orbitalis – also contract, making the eyes crease up, and the eyebrows dip slightly.

So there you go.  Next time I tell a bad joke, just remember to scrunch the eyes a little so it looks real.  (Boing Boing)

– Mythbusters: Keep your tires at the recommended air pressure for the best fuel efficiency.  You can rock a tux and scuba over to a party and show up dry.  A laptop can stop a 12 gauge shotgun, if the shot hits the laptop’s battery (otherwise you are fucked).  A hair weave, on the other hand, ain’t stopping a bullet.  Use your elbow to best capture your sneeze… you know, if you don’t mind loogies on your clothes.  Taking candy from a baby requires 25 times more strength than just picking up candy.  (If you want to see a bunch of babies cry, then watch last Wednesday’s episode.)

– 3D Printing: Made In Space is a start-up company seeking investors to help them start printing space stations in space.  That’s interesting, but we won’t see it for a while.  If you want to see some other cool “printing”, then how about this machine that prints out cobblestone streets:

Just keep feeding it bricks and it keeps laying down street.  (Space, PopSci; bricks, Gizmodo)

– Cleaner nail clipper: Don’t you hate how your nail clippings fly around when you clip your nails?  Actually, you probably hate your roommates nails flying everywhere.  Anyway, this new design puts the pressure on the nail to reduce shrapnel.  It’s called the Klhip:  (Core77)

– Use more biofuels, create more greenhouse gasses: The problem has to deal with the amount of land needed to produce the necessary fuel this world lives on.  Hint: it’s a lot.  (Gearlog)

– Illusions, Michael.  A trick is something a whore does for money: Here’s a compilation of some optical illusions, if you enjoy having your mind blown.  Here’s a creepy illusion where the dragon follows you:  (Gizmodo)

– Rangers new alternate: The Rangers unveiled a new uniform on Friday.  It’s a darker blue than usual, has “established 1926” on the inside collar, and has the retired numbers of Rangers along the hem:  (Uni Watch)

– College Basketball unis: Uni Watch comes through again, this time with a breakdown on changes in college hoops.  The biggest change this year is the allowing of manufacturers’ logos on the jersey (the Nike swoosh, for example, was only allowed on the shorts).  Some jerseys will look a little more cluttered with the NCAA logo, a brand, and a conference logo.  Most importantly, here is Arizona’s new basketball court:  (ESPN)

Personally, I still miss the cactus.

– Yankee Stadium football: If you were wondering how the Notre Dame vs Army game is going to be setup at Yankee Stadium, well look no further:  (Yankees PR Twitter)

– What’s that you say?  You’re a fan of archaeology? This is an 1,800-year-old multitool, used by the Romans sometime between A.D 201 to 300.  It’s got a lot going on, and I’d say the fork and spoon additions trump any Swiss Army Knife I’ve ever had:  (Heidi)

– The Marks’ Financial Update:

• MFL – Mark had a spark to start this period off, climbing to $14.23 on November 3rd, hung there for a day, then decided to slide on down to $13.32 to close out.  (I had to peek ahead to this current week, which is not included in this analysis, but worth noting that he was down on Monday, but investors bought him the fuck up today after Mike “Puppy Killer” Vick’s Monday Night performance for CHUCKYSCHILD.)
• MDH – The summary of Harter is that he opened at $2.48 and he closed at $2.51.  The story of Harter is that he eased to $2.44, bounced up to $2.53, held, made a “V” with a $2.52-$2.43-$2.51 out of Tuesday-Wednesday-Thursday, then ended right there at $2.51.
  
• MAB – While each Mark had a couple days of flat-lining, none had a longer run then Bunk.  He stayed at $15.23 from October 29th to November 5th.  He then “moved” down a penny the next day, only to collapse to $14.69, then, of course, held that price for two days to close out the week.  A very stubborn Bunk, if I may say so myself.