I guess I'm not the only one who hates Pat Robertson

As to be expected on the internets these days, someone has set up their own personal ode to hating Pat Robertson. When you say spout out hate-filled shit filling with a Christian candy coating on the sheer magnitude of Pat Robertson, it is all but inevitable that someone must start up ihatepatrobertson.com. Aside from the great name, it is a pretty good liberal political blog as well and a good way to embrace the procrastination.

Show me the Science, Bitch!

I just read a fantastic OP/ED contribution in the N.Y. Times on evolution. To say that Daniel C. Dennett, a professor of philosophy at Tufts University, puts an old fashion whoopin on Intelligent Design would be an understatement. He uses the example of human eye, a favorite of Intelligent Design proponents, to further his argument of evolution. I think this is one of the smartest articles I've read on the creation crap that is pervading America right now.

To date, the proponents of intelligent design have not produced anything like that. No experiments with results that challenge any mainstream biological understanding. No observations from the fossil record or genomics or biogeography or comparative anatomy that undermine standard evolutionary thinking.

Instead, the proponents of intelligent design use a ploy that works something like this. First you misuse or misdescribe some scientist's work. Then you get an angry rebuttal. Then, instead of dealing forthrightly with the charges leveled, you cite the rebuttal as evidence that there is a "controversy" to teach.

Potheads are the most wise of drug addicts

Do you have a burning question that you cannot find the answer to? Then why not Ask a Pothead. Where else can you get advice on such important matters as the Age of Consent and MILF's?

Mad props to the Recidivist for finding this site.

The obligatory preview of the site...

"Dear Pothead,

I am a 25 year old stoner who smokes every day. I go to work on-time each day. I make good money. I pay my rent on-time each month. I have realley good credit. I live in a nice neighborhood. I drive a fourty thousand dollar car. I am 6 feet1 and 200 pounds with blond hair and blue eyes. I'm not a bad looking man. I shower and shave daily. I dress nicely. I can't find a date to save my life. I can't talk to girls except for through the internet. I freeze. I make sounds that are not words and I smile akwardley. I had a girlfriend for 3 years but thats over now and I havent had any pussey for almost 1 year."
[...]

Guido The Don of the Stoners says: I will do you this favor. I will find you a woman. She will be beautiful with big hips that can bear you many sons. She will cook for you and clean your home. All I ask in exchange is that you're willing to do me a favor some time. I don't need any help now, but down the line I may call on you. Oh... and I would be honored if you would name me godfather of your first born.

A battle with the legend

This is funny. One man's battle with Ernest Hemmingway. Here's a preview...

The South African started to speak and Hemingway cut him off.

“Pour,” he said.

This is when my memory gets a little hazy. We went on with rum for a while, then suddenly there were all sorts of bottles at the table, his gang was drinking up a storm. Toasts were being raised and there was a lot of fooling around, but I tried to keep the focus in the eye of the storm, whatever Hemingway poured or was poured, I doggedly made sure I got the same. They came in a flurry, mostly foreign stuff — brandies, liqueurs and a lot of grappa.

My stomach started to roll a little and when I reached down to loosen my belt a notch I saw the old man grinning at me. I suddenly realized that the wily sonuvabitch had been working an angle. Like an old boxer who’d lost his knockout punch, he’d bulled in close and went to work on my midsection, he’d been working my body with weird liquors that didn’t mix well.

What uncanny accuracy

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Your personality type is SCUAI

You are social, calm, moderately unstructured, moderately accommodating, and intellectual, and may prefer a city which matches those traits.

The largest representation of your personality type can be found in the these U.S. cities: Providence, Austin, Denver, Salt Lake City, Charlotte, San Antonio, Albuquerque/Santa Fe, Indianapolis, Phoenix, Portland/Salem, Nashville, Louisville and these international countries/regions Turkey, Croatia, Slovenia, Caribbean, Puerto Rico, Iceland, Norway, Ukraine, Sweden, Denmark, Spain, Netherlands, Russia, Japan, India

What Places In The World Match Your Personality?
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19

The Truth About Killing

I watched one of the best documentaries that I have ever seen last night on National Geographic. The documentary is called "The Truth About Killing" and it stars journalist Grub Smith. Grub Smith was inspired to make this documentary when he heard a shocking fact about the soldiers of World War 2: According to an initial survey of soldiers after the war, it was determined that only 15-2o out of every 100 soldiers were shooting to kill.

The documentary found that more significant investigations into battlefield statistics revealed that only 2% of soldiers on the battlefield were killing the enemy. The other 98% were not cowards. Most were providing support and the few that did fire their guns were shooting wildly and inaccurately. Essentially, only 2% of the male population can bring themselves to consciously kill another human being. Of this 2%, half are psychopaths who feel no empathy for other people and often enjoy killing. The other half of the 2% are people who feel strong empathy with those men in their unit and their drive to protect their men allows them to kill the enemy.

The modern armies of the U.S., Britain, and a few other countries have now developed training techniques to overcome this natural instinct not to kill. Killing is now a reflex response(similar to a Pavlov Response) built into the training programs of infantry soldiers. This is one of the biggest reasons that the U.S. and British armies have had such higher kill rates than their opponents in situations of man to man combat. One example of this given was the U.S. soldiers in Somalia. While 18 American Soldiers died, nearly 360 Somali militia were killed by the American special forces.

I don't know if this documentary will be played in the U.S. If it is, then I think anyone who can should check it out.

Pat Robertson, American Psycho?

The following is my imaginary conversion with Pat Robertson**

Me: Hey Pat, how the commandmants treatin ya?
Pat: I like to dissect girls. Did you know I'm utterly insane?
Me: Whoa! Sounds like Commandmant number 6 isn't working so well for you.
Pat: I need to engage in homicidal behaviour on a massive scale. It can not be corrected but I have no other way to fulfill my needs.
Me: Uhhhhhhh... ok. Is that why you don't like Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez?
Pat: If he thinks we're trying to assassinate him, I think that we really ought to go ahead and do it
Me: Yeah, that's what you said on the "700 Club" the other night. Do you really think we should kill the leader of another country?
Pat: Well, he was probably a closet homosexual who did a lot of cocaine. That whole Yale thing.
Me: Yeah, and we all know how you feel about homosexuals! Did Chavez even go to Yale?
Pat: Do you like Huey Lewis and the news?
Me: Who? Ok whatever. So, would you like to retract your statement about Chavez?
Pat: I have to return some videotapes.
Me: Don't evade the question Mr. Robertson.
Pat: If you don't shut your fucking mouth, I will kill you.




**Not to be confused with Patrick Bateman

Evolution, the series

The New York Times is doing a special series on Evolution this week. Yesterday, the series had stories about the Discovery Institute and the creationist (oops I mean Intelligent Design) point of view. Today, the series features an article on the point of view of scientists. The article talked about why so many scientists are atheists or agnostics, and how those scientists who do believe in god reconcile their beliefs with their job. I've enjoyed the series so far, and highly recommend it to anyone who is interested in the current debate(even though there really is no true debate when one side is just flat out wrong).

My thought of the day:
Everyone is entitled to their own opinion. + There are alot of stupid people out there (particularly when it comes to science) = Creationism/Intelligent Design and every other douchebaggery pseudoscience piece of garbage out there.

Sail Amsterdam

This weekend, I went out for the annual Sail Amstedam festival. The festival has tons of boats from around Amsterdam and the various parts of the world. It had tons of ships, fire works, and of course the various shenanigans that go along with one of the biggest festivals of the year for Amsterdam. Here's a few pictures...

Here's Mikhail, a Russian Biochemist in the group I'm working with in Amsterdam, posing in front of the "Ice Maiden".
















That's me chilling with a sailor from the Oman Navy. Their uniforms are awesome.
















Here I am posing in front of all the ships after they turned on all their lights. It was pretty amazing how they lit up all the docks.




















Just chillin during the day in front of some of the ships.

Addiction, thy name is Bop It

As per usual in the lab, after lunch the whole group goes into the coffee room and we all start drinking coffee and tea. Then, an evil was unleashed upon the physicists and biochemists that their years of training could not prepare them for. This toy of darkness is known as Bop It. This stupid little toy plays a little techno beat and tests the speed of your responses to verbal instructions on various levers. It is insanely addictive. I'm sure those of you with little kids probably have seen this toy and stolen it from your kids so you can play it. Here it is pictured below...

well, I am BETTER than you

I've been noticing how all these nut-job zealots in the world are using religion as an excuse to their sense of self entitlement. Examples as follows:

Crazy Jews: "Settlers" who illegally live on occupied land. They think it is their mission from god to live on land that doesn't belong to them.

Crazy Muslims: Mickey Mouse pisses them off. White people piss them off. Shit, they are pissed off at everything. So, they feel that God will give them a shit load of virgins if they blow up themselves and some infidels.

Crazy Christians: They claim that god values single cells over human beings. I grant you, if that single cell happens to be E. coli, they don't care so much. Oh, and because this country has more Christians than anything else, we should teach the bible (oops, I mean intelligent design) in public school. Obviously, God thinks everyone should have to be think and live like Christians.

So, I kind of pissed off because I'm not getting anything. I feel left out of the nutcase entitlement factory. So, I realize my need to come up with some sort of religion so that I can just take whatever I want with a smug sense of entitlement.

Henceforth, I shall begin to worship barbeque ribs. And if I see barbeque ribs, I shall take them. I don't care who they belong to, if you paid for them or not, because they shall soon reside in my belly. Just look at them...

















Mmmmmmm. I shall called my new religion, "Carnivorism". If you'd like to join my new religion all you have to do is follow these 3 easy steps:
1) Drink beer
2) Eat ribs
3) Repeat steps 1) and 2) until heart attack or meat coma

Because I'd rather not talk about anything serious

Here is a post to this gem of a web magazine called Modern Drunkard Magazine. This magazine has everything for that guy/girl who wants to get wasted, or just wants to read about other people getting wasted. One of my particular favorites is the 86 Rules of Boozing. I think I may buy this in poster form for the apartment.

When I grow up...

I want to employ bullies and liars.
I want to mock grieving mothers.
I want to fly in a fighter plane to celebrate my premature ejaculation... whoops I meant subjugation.
I want to purposely mispronounce words like nook-you-lur.
I want to say things like "ya'll", "them folks", and "he's a piece of work" so that people don't realize that I'm filthy fucking rich Ivy League legacy.
I want to pander to some religious extremists and torture other religious extremists.
I want to take away money from old people.
I want to take 5 weeks vacations.

If you haven't guess it by now, when I grow up... I want to be the President of the United States.

I cannot escape it

I found an English language bookstore when I was walking around town on Sunday, so I decided to buy a few books to read during the evening. So, I bought Catch 22 since I haven't read it, and then I thought I should just pick a random fiction book. It was my goal to pick a book that was different from the usual books I read.

So, I see this book called Atomised. It's got a picture of a depressed girl in her underwear on the cover and it won some book award. I figure what the hell. Here's where our little friend irony comes in. One of the main characters of the book is a physicist (sigh), who goes into biology (that sounds familiar), and essentially brings an end to the human race(I hope I don't do that one). Needless to say, I manage to pick the one fiction book in the whole damn bookstore with a main character that has chosen a career path quite similar to my own.

The book itself is actually an excellent book, which is kind of a commentary on the latter half of the 20th century, sex, and the rise of science. The book's characters are pretty horrible people, with the physicist being a character who essentially has almost no human feeling whatsoever. I guess next time I'll just close my eyes, point at a random book, and maybe I'll have better luck in the "book that has no similarity to my life" category.

Swarming on Cindy Sheehan

Things that Cindy Sheehan did NOT do to threaten national security:

• Declare war on a country that did not attack the U.S.
• Lie about weapons of mass destruction
• Tell terrorists to "Bring it on"
• Reveal the identity of a C.I.A agent
  

Things that Cindy Sheehan did do to threaten national security:

• Non-violent political protest
• Never owned the Texas Rangers
• Hold administration accountable for their actions
  

Blogging the pride

So, I went to my first gay pride parade this last weekend. Aside from the schizophrenic weather, constantly switching between intense sunshine and pouring rain every 20 minutes, it was a great spectacle. A few thoughts that occurred to me before I post a few pictures...

• It's hard to enjoy a floats that have good looking women on them when you aren't sure whether or not the "woman" you are looking at is a female, tranny or cross dresser.
• People in Amsterdam really go nuts at this gay pride parade. And the lack of open container laws just kicks ass!
• Straight guys in Amsterdam are way to comfortable wearing pink.
• I have never seen a woman that fat wearing a bikini. The cross dressers on the parade floats are pointing and laughing at her. Wow.
  

Ok, on to the pictures...

Fucking Research

You spend two weeks designing and building a chamber on a Lathe/Mill/Drill Press Multi-tool machine that is a pain in the ass. You wash aforementioned chamber over and over again, and manage to burn your sinuses with chloroform because you are being stupid. You get all your shit together, and then get assigned to the one machine in the lab whose objective lens won't reach the window on the chamber. You then fuck around, yet AGAIN, with the worst Milling Machine in Europe to make a mount to fix this problem. If this doesn't work, I will kill someone.

The above paragraph is for anyone considering a career in science. Just say NO!! (Dammit, why didn't I major in Music)

MySpace gets eaten by Fox

In case you think that's a bad copy of a headline from The Onion, its actually a reference to this story that just came out on CNN. Newscorp, the same corporate behemoth that brought you Fox News and host of other right wing propaganda tools has just purchased MySpace. For anyone out there who doesn't know about MySpace, its a social website where you can whore yourself out all over the world to anyone else who has an account. It's kind of like friendster, but more customizable. For all you MySpace people out there, just remember who will be watching you from now on...

Recess was my favorite subject

And apparently, the same holds true for ole Georgie W. According to CNN, Bush has used a recess appointment to appoint John Bolton (pictured below) as the U.S. Ambassador to the U.N.

It's hard to argue with this appointment when he has such glowing performance assessments such as "a quintessential kiss-up, kick-down sort of guy" and a "serial abuser" of subordinates" as described by Carl Ford, the former chief of the State Department's Bureau of Intelligence and Research. I'm sure Bolton, our prince of peace, will do us proud at the U.N. with a fist in one hand and a hooker in the other. Go Team Republicans.

Reality Check

Something happened to me today. It has nothing to do with my trip here in Amsterdam. It was an epiphany. Now I can't get it off of my mind. I'm beginning to realize that I am a fucking idiot. Maybe no more of a dolt than anyone else, but a pillock in my own special way. I'm not sure if there is anything I can do to fix this problem. I'm not sure I have the guts/balls/testicular fortitude to really affect a change in who I am. Eh fuck it. I'm going to finish my work, and then get hammered/pissed/drunk off my ass. Perhaps the blissful state of inebriation will give me some answers. Until then, fuck George W. ( I'm angry at me. Perhaps now is not the best time to run off and play with chloroform. Oh well, fuck it)

Update: Ok, feeling a little better now. The one disadvantage of a foreign country is that all the people you normally bitch to are all thousands of miles away.

Bring on the random

Lets see, a few random thoughts for today...

I'm really tired of the airplanes that buzz my apartment at 7am every morning and then continually throughout the morning and afternoon.

I'm enjoying the relaxed style out here alot. Taking 3 hours to eat dinner is pretty nice actually.

Went out on the town a bit for the first time this weekend. Hooray Beer!

Riding on the back wire metal storage bracket of someone's bicycle, drunk at 3 in the morning, for an hour, going halfway across Amsterdam... really hurts your ass.

The Dutch really like fries. Every Dutch meal I've eaten has included a big plate of fries. But putting Mayo on your fries, I DON'T think so.