Watch an amazing display of physical fitness in this movie clip. Here David Belle is looking like the new Jackie Chan with amazing and creative stunts in his movies. He’s taken his practice of the art (sport?) of Parkour and put it to use in the movies.
Month: June 2006
Wal*Mart taking over the world?
I found this anti-Wall*Mart movie through a link from one of Clark Howard’s newsletters.
Can anybody take a look at it and tell me what point I seem to be missing? It seems to be just a series of poorly edited clips of folks saying “Wal*Mart is bad”. As a tease or a trailer I didn’t find it very effective. I imagine that there are probably some legitimate issues with Wal*Mart’s astounding marketplace success. But this trailer hints at none of them as far as I can tell.
D-Link DI-524 dead now
*Update* Over the Christmas Holidays (December 2006) I replaced the unit that my mother purchased with a WRT54G as well. Her D-Link started exhibiting the same symptoms as did mine and was eventually too much of a nuisance to ignore. These things are junk. I highly recommend against buying them.
I’m back using my WRT54G router. The D-Link DI-524 started locking up on me more and more often. I couldn’t even get it to reset using the reset button (hold for 30 seconds and all that).
I’m pretty disappointed with the wireless routers I’ve seen in general. The technology is here to do WEP and MAC Filtering and not broadcasting SSID, but don’t try to do all that at once!
To be fair I think the D-Link was probably just a crap unit. It’s seizures were directly related to whenever I would bittorrent something for a long period of time (maybe overheated?). Anyway, in getting more and more creative in ways to “unseize” it, I eventually just physically broke the unit (the antenna isn’t as strong as I thought it was…).
Korean Street Fighter Salsa
Leave it to the Koreans to combine Anime and Salsa.
An amusing clip from CollegeHumor.com
The Lyrebird of Australia
When you first start to view this video clip (with David Attenborough) it almost looks like it’s going to be a skit from Monty Python. But keep watching, you’ll be amazed at the sounds this bird can mimic. Thanks to Phil Plait’s Bad Astronomy website for pointing me to this.
The 10 Greatest Countries in the History of the World
OK, just saw this on the Idea Grove blog (via Fark.com) and thought it was an interesting sum-up of the the 10 greatest countries in the history of the world.
I fully expected the US to be at the top of the list given its current status but we *are* pretty young compared to most of the others in there so I can’t say I disagree with the rankings.
GREAT Blue Angels Flight movie
One of the podcasts that I really enjoy is The PilotCast. If you enjoy hangar talk but can’t get to your local airport to hang out and chat with the locals, this is a great resource.
This movie looks to me like the most realistic portrayal of what you’ll experience riding along with the Blue Angels that I’ve ever seen. No fancy music, some editing to cut out the long spaces where nothing is really happening and the flight in all of its glory!
There is a lot of romance associated with fighter jet flying. And if you’re young and fit it’s probably all smooth sailing. This video confirms the numerous written accounts that I’ve read that you *really* don’t want to eat a hearty breakfast before you head out.
Even with the brief periods of unconsciousness and the possibility of needing to use an emesis bag. That would still be a small price to pay for that thrill of a lifetime.
America: from Freedom to Fascism
A little over the top? Sure. A little paranoid? Yep. But a lot to think about here. With the recent list of NSA local abuses and the Executive branch of the US Government trampling all over the Constitution the bleak, dystopian future being envisioned by this movie (at least what I’ve seen from the trailers) seems more and more likely.
Formerly pro-Bush I have to say that the absolutely insane future financial obligations that I and every other taxpayer are being committed to supporting for the rest of our lives has me wondering where we can turn to for representation? How amazing is it that the US Democratic party is the current best hope for more limited government and a quasi-balanced budget?
Why do we even need a congress anymore (well *maybe* the senate may still be useful as its original purpose of preventing the more populous states from trampling the less so)? Sure, when folks got around by horse and news took literally months to get from coast to coast maybe having your point of view “represented” by an elected official made sense. But we are now living in an age where every person in this country can participate directly in expressing their opinions and gaining access to information about the issues at hand.
To be sure, mob rule isn’t appealing either (although at least it would be the will of the majority which seems to have gone missing on every issue lately). But being able to voice your opinion on issues where you can demonstrate that you have competence and comprehension (I’m thinking more like e-bay’s system of other citizens vouching for your competence rather than having the government certify you BTW). That way, while I wouldn’t be expressing my opinions on every issue, I would at least be able to do so on the issues that I either am involved with or have taken care to learn about. Sure beats having a single individual represent all of us on all issues. After all, when your congressperson is elected it’s always a trade off of the issues on which you agree (and voted them into office for) and those that you don’t (and wouldn’t have..).
We do not need to have those compromises anymore. Of course you would still need a revised constitution to get rid of all those career politicians. We would still need the bureaucrats, of course, but the short-sighted “I’m just here for a couple of years” aspect needs to be gotten rid of.
Not to mention that most of the US Congress is pathetically ill-equipped to understand and even have an opinion on anything even remotely technological. This in an age defined by its technology and the seemingly never ending growth of such. How many of our congresspeople have ANY science in their background? We’re talking a bunch of Poli-Sci / History / Law majors trying to direct our country into the future with no tools at all for grasping the implications or the realities of our burgeoning technological / social milieu.
Instead their time is wasted on irrelevant social issues (who thinks the Constitution is the right document to enshrine the definition of the American family)? Its purpose is to limit the power of the Federal government. Anybody who cannot understand that fact shouldn’t be allowed into Washington D.C.
OK OK I’m done ranting for the moment. I just had to get that off of my chest. I’m not advocating anarchy, but I would really like to see some responsibility trickling down from the folks who are leading this country. Can someone find Ben Franklin and see if he’ll run for office? Please?