Today, heliologue.com turns one year old. I first registered the domain on Black Friday 2003, after an unsuccessful attempt to get a cheap LCD monitor from Best Buy. It’s already seen a lot of reincarnations, though since the beginning of 2004, I’ve had a blog of some sort fairly consistently.
Firstly, here’s props to my host, Fuitadnet, a cheap and reliable Linux webhost. Secondly, here’s props to WordPress, my blogging software.
Abou gaped at Hardee’s new Monster Burger. I say, is 2/3lb of beef all you can muster, Hardees?
On the day of the year when Americans give thanks for having the luxury of eating themselves further into the rest of obesity (the ones that can afford it, anyway), I think it’s only fitting to talk about the true testament to our culinary excess: novelty burgers.
The Messenger-Inquirer (motto: So good, we needed two nouns) writes about the burger to end all burgers.
If you’re a big eater — and have the appetite of a termite — you need to head up to Denny’s Beer Barrel Pub in Clearfield, Pa., and order Ye Olde 96er.
Take along plenty of cash because Ye Olde 96er doesn’t come cheap. This cheeseburger retails for $23.95. What makes it so special? The size. You see, 96er refers to the weight of the thing. That’s 96 ounces. Six pounds of meat.
When you add the fixins, the weight of this thing goes up to nine pounds.
…
See, the fixins include a large onion, two whole tomatoes, a half a head of lettuce, 1 1/4 pounds (12 slices) of American cheese, buns, a cup each of mayonnaise, ketchup, mustard, relish, banana peppers and some pickles.
…
But I found a Web site where some health nut did the calculations. I have no idea if this is correct, but here’s the guesstimation:
Calories, 11,818; fat, 760 grams; saturated fat, 274 grams; polyunsaturated fat, 143 grams; monounsaturated fat, 273 grams; carbs, 487 grams; fiber, 41 grams; and protein, 752 grams.
Mmm…. 12’000 calories…..
Because I’m extremely busy and don’t have time for any long dissertations, I’ll comment briefly upon today’s articles on CNN.
Women make up nearly half of the 37.2 million adults living with HIV and in sub-Saharan Africa the proportion rises to almost 60 percent, according to a U.N. report released on Tuesday. [link]
What? Why is this surprising? Women account for a little over half of the world’s population. It’s a surprise that they aren’t disproportionately affected by a sexually transmitted disease?
A woman with a history of postpartum depression cut the arms off her baby girl who later died, authorities said.
…
“Exactly what happened?” the 911 operator asked.
“I cut her arms off,” Schlosser replied, as the hymn “He Touched Me” played in the background. [link]
“He touched me, Oh He touched me,
And oh the joy that floods my soul!
Something happened and now I know,
He touched me and made me whole.”
A woman who said her 10-year-old grilled cheese sandwich bore the image of the Virgin Mary will be getting a lot more bread after the item sold for $28,000 on eBay.
GoldenPalace.com, an online casino, confirmed that it placed the winning bid, and company executives said they were willing to spend “as much as it took” to own the 10-year-old half-sandwich with a bite out of it. [link]
I’m honestly surprised. I figured it’d go to some hardcore Catholic with screwdriver stigmata. Personally, I think it would be funny if somebody ate the sandwhich. “Mmm, that’s good mother of God.”
On the eve of the release of its new album, the rock band U2 surprised fans Monday with performances throughout New York City, culminating in a 45-minute concert in Brooklyn in the late afternoon. [link]
My brother would hate me for saying this, but Bono needs to stop making such mediocre music and parading around like Mother Theresa because he likes world peace. Go back to Ireland, you off-key bastard!
Microsoft Corp. Chief Executive Officer Steve Ballmer on Thursday warned Asian governments that they could face intellectual rights-infringement lawsuits for using rival open-source operating platforms such as Linux.
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Ballmer, speaking in Singapore at Microsoft’s Asian Government Leaders Forum, said that Linux violated more than 228 patents. He did not provide any detail on the alleged violations, which the Linux community disputes. [CNN, November 19th, 2004]
The man is a big sweaty ape sowing lies about alternative software. While consistently espousing that Linux isn’t a threat to Windows, Microsoft continues to stave off Linux encroachment in the server and corporate workstation market with misleading ads and bogus claims about security.
The truth is, Linux is a very potent threat to Microsoft’s enterprise market.
Ballmer, meanwhile, can’t make up his mind.
“I think you have to rate competitors that threaten your core higher than you rate competitors where you’re trying to take from them,” Ballmer said. “It puts the Linux phenomenon and the Unix phenomenon at the top of the list. I’d put the Linux phenomenon really as threat No. 1.”
“There is no appreciable amount of Linux on the client anywhere in the world,” Ballmer said in response to questions from Gartner analysts.
The last one is, of course, a lie. In Austalia and NZ, for instance, usage of Linux servers between 1999 and 2002 grew from 17.2% to 32.4%.
If Linux was no threat, then Microsoft wouldn’t feel the need to wave the Jolly Roger of litigation above the heads of customers making or contemplating the switch to a *nix platform. While I am the first to admit that Linux isn’t particularly ready for the desktop, it is a very viable alternative in the server and corporate/government enterprise market. No amount of bogus TCO studies will change that fact.
Not because it’s surprising or necessarily compelling, but it’s entertaining at least.
