Maury Povich is a Dick

If you've ever even doubted for a minute about whether Maury Povich is a low-life white trash host (á la Jerry Springer et al), check out his pickle episode. Supposedly, this girl has a strange phobia about pickles of all things and she breaks into hysteria when Povich finally has his crew bring out plates of huge dill pickles. If it wasn't so ridiculously mean, it would be funny!

Commercial of the Year from Guinness

This past December, Guinness won the equivalent of an Oscar in the Ad World's AEAF Awards for the Year's Best Commercial. This is their Noitulove commercial (Evolution spelled backwards as you will soon see). An incredible journey through time in reverse. This is what a great commercial looks like!

Cool Animated Disaster Simulation

Only from Japan: an animated short depicting the what-if scenario of a gigantic meteor hitting the earth at full impact. It's all narrated in Japanese and I think there's a shorter literal translation (in other words: not-too-good) on the YouTube page that accompanies this video. This is truly an awesome video to be watched a couple of times.

Like I Keep Saying: DON'T BUY A DELL, DUDE!

Many years ago, I ended up on a road trip to do a demo using a Dell notebook to run the software. Following our company policy of testing everything out before your meeting, I set everything up the night before only to find that my Dell notebook was DOA. I immediately got on the phone with Dell and requested a replacement based on their 24/7 replacement policy that was purchased with that model. Of course, the support technician argued that it would take a couple of days to process and ship a unit to me and even tried to insist that they ship it back to my home office where I didn't need it. I wanted that sucker waiting for me at my hotel in another city by the next morning. After wasting well over a half hour arguing with the Dell idiot about the semantics of the Dell Service Warranty, I requested that he make a notation in my file using caps: "I WILL NEVER BUY A DELL COMPUTER AGAIN AND I WILL TAKE EVERY OPPORTUNITY TO TELL MY FRIENDS TO NEVER BUY DELL. EVER! PERIOD!"

If you've ever wondered how and why Dell manages to be the low-cost producer of PC's and notebooks, you have to look at how they order and assemble your "custom-made Dell computer." Dell employs teams of buyers who shop daily for the best prices in all the various parts and chips they need. Often, they'll purchase huge lots at even more aggrssive prices (like memory). If they happen to find a video card from some cheap manufacturer in Taiwan this week, tha't ll probably end up in your computer. And don't forget: they collect the money from their customers in advance so they're sitting on your dough well before they ship as well as getting the best terms from their vendors. Now their model may have changed somewhat in recent years but this is what I found a few years back.

I promptly went out and bought a new Sony VAIO notebook for myself and all of my businesses have stuck with Sony notebooks ever since. They cost a little more but they've never given me any major problems. Any time, anywhere. (And some of the extra features are a bonus.)

Imagine my surprise (sarcasm here) when I ran across this little article on The Inquirer about another Dell notebook exploding and bursting into flames at a Japanese conference. Recently, Dell was flamed for making their Tech Support phone numbers unavailable on their support pages for the longest time.


FRIENDS DON'T LET FRIENDS BUY DELL!

Driving in India

You think traffic is bad in your city? Ha! Try driving overeas in India or China. A friend of mine sent me this YouTube video of traffic at just one intersection somethere in India. Absolutely NO traffic lights or traffic cops, that's for sure (they're too busy handling outsource work for us over here!).

I still remember one of my trips to China a few years back. We were being driven into the mainland to visit my Grandparents' house back in the old village. As we went through one small city along the way, I actually saw this maintenance guy precariously balanced up on the very top of a 10-foot ladder, calmly changing a traffic signal light as hundreds of cars streamed around him trying to dodge his ladder without slowing down. I kept watching him out the back window of our minibus as long as I could and he actually managed to stay untouched. Just when you think traffic's really bad here...

The Last Word on Aliens (?)

And for all the UFO afficianados out there, there's an Aliens the Truth site for all the latest scoop on our silent invaders.

Firefox and Retarded Browsers Commercial

I've been using Mozilla and then graduated to Firefox the day it came out. And I evangelize it to everyone I can. IE sucks. The new Firefox and Retarded Browsers commercial says it all...

Japanese Noodle Machine Gone Wild

You all know that I love gadgets and gizmos. Here's a Rube Goldberg-type noodle machine from some Japanese gadget lovers as pisted on YouTube.

Twisted Father's Day Cards

Just in time for all you slackers out there... from OfficePirates.

Oh Man! Father's Day This Sunday...

Well, another Father's Day is coming up this Sunday. And the usual Father's Day crap is on sale everywhere once again. Bad neckties, ugly shirts, useless gadgetsl -- you've seen it all too! (Thankfully, my kids never gave me bad stuff over the years.) T-Shirt Humor has created some special Father's Day t-shirts; some of their other shirts are among the funniest I've seen in years.

Ballsy Music

In the finest Rube Goldberg tradition, Pipe Dreams presents this incredible animation from their first Animusic DVD on Google Videos. Simply enlightening!

A YouTube Video for the Geeks

Especially the science geeks! Mix up some corn starch and water, toss in a lab mixer and you can see holes sitting in liquid in this YouTube video (another cool upload). Some potential applications?

New Road Signs

You've seen all those retouched road signs that keep recycling themselves in your e-mail Inbox. The folks at b3ta sponsored a new challenge for road signs and they've posted up some refreshingly original ones.

Fresh 3-Year Old Bread

A small Japanese company that employs disabled workers has figured out how to bake bread that stays fresh for up to 3 years (news story here). The bread -- called Pan Desuyo! (This is Bread! in English) -- is baked in three flavors: chocolate chip, coffee cake and raisin. It's made with absolutely no preservatives and additives. Each loaf is canned immediately after it comes out of the oven, using a secret process that allows the loaves to stay fresh and moist for up to 3 years. Check out the Japanese website here. Check out the link in the lower right side -- yep, you guessed it! -- a special braille button for the visually imparied (?!!).

Help Richard Green Get His Threesome!

So this guy in the UK wanted to have a threesome with his girlfriend. And she said, "Yes, but..." The "But..." says that he has to get 5 million hits on his new website. (Here's a copy of their contract letter.) So guys, we need to do our duty and help a poor guy out. I know, I know. It's really immature but hey -- we're guys! Visit his site at Please Make This Work! (I like his domain name too.)

What the hell -- the Internet can't be serious ALL the time. It's one of those I-wish-I'd-Thought-of-That ideas (for guys anyway!).

Grandfather's Laundry

I was just writing to a friend about the Chinese Exclusion Act in Canada during the late 1800's to early 1900's. I sent her a copy of Price List from my Grandfather's hand laundry which he owned with several partners back in Halifax, Nova Scotia. Despite the incredible Head Tax that was levied against Chinese workers at that time -- as much as $500 a person -- they still managed to come in large numbers to seek their fortunes in North America. $500 represented two years wages at that time so it was no small feat to save up that much money to pay for the opportunity to come to Gim Sun (Chinese for The Gold Mountain; the Gold Rush was so legendary in China it was rumored that even the streets were lined with gold.)

There is a growing dissent among the Chinese descendants of immigrant Chinese in Canada that the government should pay compensation for their very racist policies of the time. I for one had been very much against such types of payments as I believe that the past is gone and we should simply move on. However, my brother made a good point: The Canadian Government not only made it difficult for Chinese men to immigrate but also managed to exclude women and children and families from coming with them. Our Mother would likely have come over earlier and my brothers and I would have been born earlier, allowing us more time to spend with them as they got old. As it is, my own children barely remember Grandpa and Grandma at all as they passed away in the early 90's. While all of that is water under the bridge, the fact of the matter is that the Government took in something like $25 million in Head Tax, most of which was pure profit and levied only against Chinese immigrants. In today's dollars, that translates into something like $1.3 billion (without interest!)! Maybe a simple refund of the Head Tax to the direct descendants in today's dollars would be in order? The Canadian Government has so far refused to address this issue.

Anyway, I digress... Check out this price list for the Sam Wah Laundry, note that the prices are in cents NOT dollars. Men's Shirts were 15¢ and Dresses ranged from 15 - 35¢ apiece. What was more remarkable was that Granddad and his partners all still managed to save enough money to retire back to China as wealthy men. Granddad actually owned a huge mansion back in the family village along with the local general store and stable as well as another house in a town nearby. All this despite the fact that they stacked the odds against him when he arrived in Canada. Unfortunately, when the Communists took over, Granddad and his family had everything confiscated and they were literally tossed out into the street with nothing more than the clothes on their backs.

Fear of Flying

If I ever had fantasies of flying, this video on YouTube pretty much kills it for me. Superman I ain't!

This French skydiver wears a special suit (kind of like a flying squirrel) and a helmet cam so you can see what he sees. What a ride!

Tattoo Remova.. from SNL

A great spoof commercial from Saturday Night Live. They've been steadily going downhill over the years but once in a while, they come up with a decent one.

Fruity Appliances

Just what everyone wants and needs! Large format magnetic graphics that you can trim and cover all your appliances with. Orange fridges, lemon washing machines, coffee bean dishwashers!!! Check it out (around $100 -- $200 apiece).