The iPod has become a target for theft. So how can you take your iPod out of your home without fear?     Hide-a-pod!

Posted at 06:54 AM in Humor, Web/Tech | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBack

"Markets can remain irrational longer than you can remain solvent."
— John Maynard Keynes

"The only thing that can console one for being poor is extravagance."
— Oscar Wilde

"It is pretty hard to tell what does bring happiness; poverty and wealth have both failed."
— Kin Hubbard

"The key to making money in stocks is not to get scared out of them."
— Peter Lynch

"If you owe the bank $100 that's your problem. If you owe the bank $100 million, that's the bank's problem."
— JP Getty

"You try to be greedy when others are fearful, and fearful when others are greedy."
— Warren Buffett

"A cynic is a man who knows the price of everything, and the value of nothing."
— Oscar Wilde

"Do you know the only thing that gives me pleasure? It is to see my dividends coming in."
— John D. Rockefeller

"A gold miner is a liar standing beside a hole in the ground."
— Mark Twain

"There was a time when a fool and his money were soon parted, but now it happens to everybody."
— Adlai Stevenson

"It is generally agreed that casinos should, in the public interest, be inaccessible and expensive. And perhaps the same is true of Stock Exchanges."
— John Maynard Keynes

"The safe way to double your money is to fold it over once and put it in your pocket. "
— Frank Hubbard

"Save a little money each month and at the end of the year you'll be surprised at how little you have."
— Ernest Haskins

Posted at 06:04 AM | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBack

Revolution

Posted at 08:52 AM in Music, The Beatles, Video | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBack

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Amusing:

Posted at 06:39 AM in Humor, Television | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBack

The meaning behind the lyrics of Don McLean's American Pie. Janis Joplin, The Beatles, Bob Dylan, War & Peace, drugs, murder, Hell's Angels and the Rolling Stones. And, of course Buddy Holly, Ritchie Valens and The Big Bopper.

'American Pie' Was A Long, Long Time Ago

In 1971 Don McLean was a struggling 25-year-old folk singer when he picked up his guitar to write a song for his second album.

"I was up in a— in a — in a little bedroom of a little house that I had, and I started singing, 'A long, long time ago,'" he told Early Show co-anchor Russ Mitchell. "And I started writing it down. 'Oh, that sounds good. I like that,' you know. And then I — I started going with it and started — the — the — the memory of the death of Buddy Holly came — came along, and I — you know, but I didn't want to say that. So I — you know, I said, 'February made me shiver.' I just really went back in time to when I was a paperboy."

He was a 13-year-old paperboy on February 3, 1959, when he delivered the news that three pioneers of rock 'n' roll — Ritchie Valens, the Big Bopper and Buddy Holly — had died in a plane crash.

"I was always interested in the — in — in the American experience. And I suddenly, in my little head, I realized that I could use rock 'n' roll and the story of rock 'n' roll and forward-moving lyrics, starting with the death of Buddy Holly, to tell the story of America," he said.

Posted at 05:42 AM in Music | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBack

Very cool idea, via WSJ:

Mitchell Friedman drives a German-made Audi S4, designed to go 150 miles per hour or more for long stretches. But the 48-year-old New Jersey businessman has never come close to pushing the needle that far.

Although he's fascinated with fast cars, Mr. Friedman confesses to being "a bit scared. Besides, I've got two young children, and my wife won't let me drive fast."

He and other U.S. drivers fearful that their cars' capabilities exceed their own have another option on the horizon: touring, a deceptively sedate name for a pastime that strives to preserve the pulse-pounding speed of competitive racing but eliminate its spectacular smash-ups.

Originated in Europe, the concept is being introduced in the U.S., with one of the first touring tracks under construction in Monticello, N.Y. At an expected cost of $50 million, it's scheduled to open next year.

Tourers typically drive fast on wide, specially paved private racetracks with plenty of room for error. An instructor usually sits in the passenger seat telling drivers how fast or slow to go as they negotiate straightaways, the quick-succession of left-right turns in chicanes and the abrupt change of direction in hairpins. Cars on the course stay out of sight of each other -- often up to a half-mile apart. Passing isn't allowed. Speeds can reach up to 200 mph, instructor permitting.

This racing concept may have originated in Europe,  but its coming to America:

"Michael Kaplan, a former mergers-and-acquisitions attorney who is leading the investor group behind the Drive & Race Club, says he wasn't interested in building a track where amateurs can race each other; there's already about three dozen of those. The track is not for someone "looking to be next to some crazy kid who's trying to beat him," he says, but for "someone who wants to be with guys with fast cars who are just as scared as he is."

Nestled in the Catskill Mountains foothills about 80 miles northwest of New York City, the facility is being built at a time when well-heeled baby boomers have been buying expensive, high-performance automobiles capable of race-car speeds.

Their appetite is stoked by advances in aerodynamics, fuel-injection systems and carbon-fiber bodies that have made possible lightweight cars that can exceed 230 mph. "If you drive through any number of upscale neighborhoods with a keen eye, you'll see all these shiny new cars just sitting in garages," Mr. Kaplan says.

In the New York area -- where bankers and brokers have been enriched by a bullish stock market -- the demand is so great that the wait for a Lamborghini can be about a year and about two years for a Ferrari, several local dealers say.

The initiation fee at the Monticello track will be up to $100,000, with annual dues of up to $7,500 depending on how often members will use the track. Mr. Kaplan says membership will be limited to 750 and he has signed up about 100, with a goal of reaching 200 by the time of the facility's opening next spring.

And its coming to a newly built track near you:

After sifting through motor-vehicle records, Mr. Kaplan says he found that the Northeast -- especially New York, New Jersey, Connecticut, Pennsylvania and Massachusetts -- had the highest concentration of fast-car owners in the nation.

Experts say that car owners in other metro areas -- Los Angeles, Chicago, San Francisco and Phoenix -- have expressed interest in touring tracks. Several are on the drawing board, including ones in Pennsylvania and New Hampshire.

"If these tracks can be built with an element of safety to them," says Elliot Johnston, a California-based racing instructor, "I can see these types of clubs really taking off."

Building a high-speed course for amateurs, especially for drivers protective of their expensive sports cars, isn't an easy task. To construct the Monticello course, Mr. Kaplan has turned to former racers and engineers at Rutgers University and the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. Factors to be considered: the gravitational forces on the driver that can equal those on a fighter-jet pilot and the difficulty of stopping at high speeds.

"When you're going at 180 mph and you put the brakes on, it feels like you have no brakes at all," says Brian Redman, a 70-year-old former British racing champion and a Monticello consultant. At about 3.5 miles, the Monticello track will be one of the longest in the sport. Straightaways are twice the width of a U.S. highway lane. Around corners, they will be triple the normal width.

Special "high-friction" surfaces will be installed on the bends and other tricky spots to keep the stray Porsche from skittering off the track. The outer fringes will be laid with two types of surfaces: coarse asphalt for greater tire grip and a rubber composite for bringing the car to a faster stop.

The course meanders through 225 acres of rolling hills. At its straightest point, it stretches for about a mile -- great for high speeds. The rest of the course is broken up by hairpin turns, corkscrews and bends.

The club has hired an MIT researcher to set up cameras on the track, in cars and at the clubhouse to film members as they wind their way around the course. Analyses of the footage can help drivers improve their performance. MIT's AgeLab views the club as a rare opportunity to study the reflexes of aging baby-boomers behind the wheel.

Very, very cool.

Source:
A Not-So-Crash Course
An Auto Touring Track Offers The Fast and the Timorous
A Safer Way to Race Hot Cars
By JOSEPH PEREIRA
July 3, 2007; Page A7
http://online.wsj.com/article/SB118342731765056191.html

Posted at 06:59 AM in Automobiles | Permalink | Comments (1) | TrackBack

ight o9f

Tom Toles via Yahoo!

Posted at 05:46 AM in Humor, Idiot!, Politics, War/Defense | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBack

One of my favorite track cars gets even better:

You can pretty much sum up all of the accolades in a quick factoid from Gerhard Richter, vice president of BMW M Power, who said in Motor Trend that the V8-powered M3 clocked 3.4 seconds faster on the Nürburgring Nordschleife than the V10 M5. That’s 8:10 a lap. He added: “I could do that while talking to you as I drive.”

But there’s another side to that story. In the same Motor Trend review, Angus Mackenzie, the magazine’s editor in chief, called the E92 M3 “a pussycat around town.” And he wasn’t the only one.

What Car? said it was “comfortable and well equipped, and is as eminently suitable as an everyday car as it is at home on racetracks.” AutoWeek said it was “not quite as tactile in its actions, perhaps, as the car it replaces.” And Car thought that “in trying to hit so many targets, the E92 leaves purists wanting.”

Kind of sounds like the bean counters have turned the M3 into an AMG: all big engine and great numbers and a drive that’s too refined.

Very cool.

>

Source:
Is the BMW M3 Too Perfect?
Richard S. Chang
NYT, July 12, 2007,  10:50 am
http://wheels.blogs.nytimes.com/2007/07/12/is-the-bmw-m3-too-perfect/

Posted at 06:13 AM in Automobiles | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBack

Another nice live version:

Posted at 07:26 AM in Music | Permalink | Comments (1) | TrackBack

Zack Kim plays the Simpsons Theme on two guitars simultaneously

Posted at 05:32 PM in Music | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBack

Nice to know!

$3775.00The Cadaver Calculator - Find out how much your body is worth

Mingle² - Online Dating

Posted at 07:39 AM | Permalink | Comments (2) | TrackBack

This is too funny. Why don't we have more things like this today?

Part II

Posted at 06:37 AM in Humor, Television | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBack

"When a person with money meets a person with experience, the person with the experience winds up with the money and the person with the money winds up with the experience."
— Harvey MacKay

"Riches do not consist in the possession of treasures but in the use made of them."
— Napolean Bonaparte

"Money isn't the most important thing in life, but it's reasonably close to oxygen on the "gotta have it" scale."
— Zig Ziglar

"Pennies do not come from heaven. They have to be earned here on earth."
— Margaret Thatcher

"Whoever said money can't buy happiness simply didn't know where to go shopping."
— Bo Derek

"I am opposed to millionaires, but it would be dangerous to offer me the position."
— Mark Twain

"Money was invented so we could know exactly how much we owe."
— Cullen Hightower

"Money was never a big motivation for me, except as a way to keep score. The real excitement is playing the game."
— Donald Trump

"Money is of value for what it buys, and in love it buys time, place, intimacy, comfort, and a private corner alone."
— Mae West

"There are people who have money and people who are rich."
— Coco Chanel

"When a fellow says it ain't about the money but the principle of the thing, it's the money."
— Kin Hubbard

"Money can't buy friends. But you can afford a better class of enemy."
— Lord Mancroft

"Money's only important when you don't have any."
— Sting

"Money is better than poverty, if only for financial reasons."
— Woody Allen

"A billion here and a billion there, and pretty soon you're talking real money."
— Everett Dirksen

"True, you can't take it with you, but then, that's not where it comes in handy."
—Brendan Francis

"I believe that sex is one of the most beautiful, natural, wholesome things that money can buy."
— Steve Martin

"Money is to my social existence what health is to my body."
— Mason Cooley

"We all need money, but there are degrees of desperation."
— Anthony Burgess

"Women prefer men who have something tender about them - especially the legal kind."
— Kay Ingram

"If you can count your money, you don't have a billion dollars."
— John Paul Getty

"The two most beautiful words in the English language are: "Check enclosed."
—Dorothy Parker

"Money is power, & you ought to be reasonably ambitious to have it."
— Russell H. Conwell, Temple Univ, 1877

"Money often cost too much."
— Ralph Waldo Emerson

"Money frees you from doing things you dislike. Since I dislike doing nearly, everything, money is handy."
— Groucho Marx

"I'd like to live as a poor man with lots of money."
— Pablo Picasso

"A nickel ain't worth a dime anymore."
— Yogi Berra

"Inflation hasn't ruined everything. A dime can still be used as a screwdriver"
—Quoted in P.S. I Love You, compiled by H. Jackson Brown, Jr.

"Money and women. They're two of the strongest things in the world. The things you do for a woman you wouldn't do for anything else. Same with money."
— Satchel Paige

"People are living longer than ever before, a phenomenon undoubtedly made necessary by the 30-year mortgage."
— Doug Larson

"Adults are just children who earn money."
— Kenneth Branaugh (actor)

"The entire essence of America is the hope to first make money--then make money with money--then make lots of money with lots of money."
— Paul Erdman

"When I was young I thought money was the most important thing in life. Now that I'm old--I know it is."
— Oscar Wilde

"Change is good, but dollars are better."
— Anonymous

Posted at 06:29 AM | Permalink | Comments (1) | TrackBack

The Beatles performing Girl. John Lennon considered this one of his finest.

Posted at 03:36 PM in Music, The Beatles, Video | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBack

Sadly true:

Does your politician suffer from Chronic Re-Election Paranoia (CREEP)? Do you think our nation has an Incarcerex dependence? Tell your elected officials to give up the quick fix and create a new bottom line for the war on drugs.

Posted at 06:24 AM in Current Affairs, Humor, Idiot!, Politics | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBack

Tonite's guest host for FNJ is a music insider. Although he is known better for many of the newer acts he represents, he is, surprisngly enough, a closet jazz aficionado, and therefore must remain anonymous.

Here's his take on the O-man:

Oscar Peterson has been recording and performing for over half a century. He may also be the most recorded of all piano players. (And he's from Canada).

Oscar bridged the swing and bop eras, rooting himself in a style that was at the same time stunningly complex yet elegant and soulful.  Nobody used more notes to swing! Oscar is sometimes dismissed because he wasn't groundbreaking in the way that many of his contemporaries were. But the range of expression he achieved on the piano, and his technical prowess, is hardly rivaled in mainstream jazz.

Many consider his solo recordings of the late 60s and early 70s to be his most outstanding work, but I was always partial to his trio recordings both with Ray Brown and Ed Thigpen and later with Joe Pass and Niels-Henning Orsted Pederson. The live album "The Trio" from 1973 (not to be confused with a Verve release of the same title) is a great recording of Oscar with Pass and Pederson and shows Oscar at his most virtuosic. Check out the Brown Thigpen work live here.

For a compendium of his 60s work in both trio and solo settings, the excellent box set "Exclusively for My Friends" will keep you entertained for years. Of course, there are the standard "songbook" albums (George Gershwin, Cole Porter, etc.) and the duets with greats like Ella Fitzgerald, Count Basie, Clark Terry and Dizzy Gillespie.

But if I had to pick one place to start, and on a Friday night with your favorite Bordeaux, it would be the 1962 album "Night Train" with Ray Brown and Ed Thigpen

It showcases Oscar at his best on both ballads and uptempo numbers and he really shows his blues chops. In particular, note the title track, Bags' Groove (one the great jazz classics), Moten Swing and Elllington's great C-Jam Blues. The bonus tracks added to the reissue aren't particularly special, but don't diminish Peterson's brilliance on this record.

Enjoy!

>

(videos after the jump)

>

X

Oscar Peterson Trio Live at Newport

Soft Winds Oscar Peterson Quartet, featuring Joe Pass

~~~~

• 

  Night Train

• 

  Satch and Josh

• 

  Ella and Oscar

• 

  Exclusively for My Friends

• 

  The Trio

• 

  Oscar Peterson & Dizzy Gillespie

• 

  Live at the Blue Note

• 

  Oscar Peterson & Clark Terry

• 

  The Giants

• 

  Oscar Peterson Plays the Cole Porter Songbook

• 

  Oscar Peterson Plays The George Gershwin Songbook

• 

  The Very Tall Band: Live at the Blue Note

• 

  Stan Getz and the Oscar Peterson Trio

Posted at 06:44 AM in Music | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBack

From last week's NYT:

"Of course, stoking demand with limited production doesn’t make sense unless the demand is there in the first place. With all the hoopla over this car, you’d think it would be nearly impossible for it to live up to expectations. But the F430 manages to deliver, despite the baggage inherent in its status as the It Car of the prancing-horse brand.

This car plays in the realm where performance numbers are everything, and on that front it duly hangs with the Porsche 911 Turbos and Corvette Z06s of the world (as well it should, considering its price).

But the F430 is more than a cold-blooded G-force generator. It’s a total experience, one that dopes every pleasure receptor in your brain with automotive giddiness. Achieving that abstract goal is always trickier than hitting hard performance targets — call it the alchemy of desirability.

You get the impression that in designing the F430, Ferrari’s every decision was framed by the question, “How can we make this more like a Formula One car?”

So the 4.3-liter, 479-horsepower V-8 got a motor with a high-pitched, hard-edged wail that’s unlike anything else you’ll hear from a car with license plates. That high-strung motor is mounted behind the passenger compartment and ahead of the rear axles, just like a Formula One car.

The F1 sequential manual transmission does away with a clutch pedal, instead giving the driver shift paddles on either side of the steering column, just like a Formula One car (although traditionalists can still order a six-speed manual). The steering wheel features Ferrari’s “mannetino,” a small rotary switch with six settings to tailor the car’s electronic aggressiveness, from a snow-and-ice mode (as if!) to race, to the position beyond race that Ferrari’s people politely asked me not to engage, as it disables all traction and stability control . . .

Source:
Machine Is a Dream. Wait Is a Nightmare.
EZRA DYER
NYT, July 1, 2007   
http://www.nytimes.com/2007/07/01/automobiles/autoreviews/01AUTO.html

Posted at 06:24 AM in Automobiles | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBack

These did not withstand the test of time:

(Fag is what the English call cigarettes)

Yes, Women LOVE that!

Hmmmmm, Sanitzed!

Posted at 07:36 AM in Humor | Permalink | Comments (2) | TrackBack

"Shallow men believe in luck. Strong me believe in cause and effect."
— Ralph Waldo Emerson

"Before you speak, listen. Before you write, think. Before you spend, earn. Before you invest, investigate. Before you criticize, wait. Before you pray, forgive. Before you quit, try. Before you retire, save. Before you die, give."
— William A. Ward

"You are never given a wish without also being given the power to make it come true. You may have to work for it, however."   
— Richard Bach

"Eighty percent of success is showing up."   
— Woody Allen

"Success is a state of mind. If you want success, start thinking of yourself as a success."
— Dr. Joyce Brothers

"When you get to the end of your rope, tie a knot and hang on."
— Franklin D. Roosevelt

"Empty pockets never held anyone back. Only empty heads and empty hearts can do that."
— Norman Vincent Peale

"Nothing in the world can take the place of persistence. Talent will not; nothing is more common than unsuccessful men with talent. Genius will not; unrewarded genius is almost a proverb. Education will not the world is full of educated derelicts. Persistence and determination alone are omnipotent. The slogan, 'Press on,' has solved and always will solve the problems of the human race."
— Calvin Coolidge

"You cannot motivate the best people with money. Money is just a way to keep score. The best people in any field are motivated by passion."
— Eric S. Raymond

"People are always blaming their circumstances for what they are. I don't believe in circumstances. The people who get on in this world are the people who get up and look for the circumstances they want, and, if they can't find them, make them."
— George Bernard Shaw

"If you work just for money, you'll never make it, but if you love what you're doing and you always put the customer first, success will be yours."
— Ray Kroc — Founder McDonalds Corp.

"You know you are on the road to success if you would do your job, and not be paid for it."
— Oprah Winfrey

"To fulfill a dream, to be allowed to sweat over lonely labor, to be given a chance to create, is the meat and potatoes of life. The money is the gravy."
— Bette Davis

"My formula for success is rise early, work late and strike oil."
— John Paul Getty

"If money is your hope for independence you will never have it. The only real security that a man will have in this world is a reserve of knowledge, experience, and ability."
— Henry Ford

Posted at 06:40 AM in Philosophy | Permalink | Comments (1) | TrackBack

Hypocrisy abounds:

Pat Oliphant via Yahoo!

Posted at 06:29 AM in Current Affairs, Humor, Idiot!, Politics | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBack

Another Lennon classic:

Another truth teller/dreamer. Naturally, he had to be stopped.

Posted at 06:02 AM in Music | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBack

Mark Morford:

"So there you have it. Bush shrugs and smirks and then commutes the easy soft-focus sit-on-your-ass-all-day-and-knit white-collar prison sentence of a hollow political lackey who, in turn, took a bullet for his sneering mafia thug of a boss, Dick Cheney, who in turn was complicit (along with lead flying monkey Karl Rove) in the appallingly illegal outing of a CIA operative, which itself was a tiny but particularly nasty link in the giant chain of lies and deceptions undertaken to lead our wary and tattered nation into an unwinnable impossible costly brutally violent war that will now last, if current estimates are correct, until the goddamn sun explodes."

>

Source:
Scooter Libby In Hell
Mark Morford
SF Gate, July 4, 2007
http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/g/a/2007/07/04/notes070407.DTL&feed=rss.mmorford

Posted at 06:16 AM in Politics | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBack

Its all about the Liberty!

Tom Toles via Yahoo!

Pat Oliphant via Yahoo!

Posted at 06:12 AM in Humor, Idiot!, Politics | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBack

Quite amusing:  SarcasticGamer.com presents a twisted take on one of Microsoft's latest and greatest announcements. Truth be told, We actually WANT a Surface Computer, but since we can't afford one, we thought it might be fun to make fun of it . . .

Posted at 06:03 AM in Design, Humor, Television, Web/Tech | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBack

click for larger version (PDF)

courtesy of WSJ

After a certain amount of time spent wallowing in burgers, you inevitably begin to see complexity where most people just see a simple dish. But a fellow who is about to announce his choice for the WGB (World's Greatest Burger) should have an aesthetic, a set of standards that guide his judgments in burger court. So here is mine.

First, the burger is more than the sum of its parts. You take a bite of all of it at once -- the meat, the bun, the condiments and any other additions such as raw tomato, lettuce, fruit, nuts. At the hallowed Primanti's on Pittsburgh's gritty 18th Street, they put the fries inside the burger. And it's pretty good.

If you are any good at burger degustation, you should be able to add all those sensations up in your debauched little sensorium and then, and only then, try to sort out what went into it. It should start with beef, the humble ground chuck -- not the pricier ground sirloin or any other variant. Chuck has the Goldilocks amount of fat, not too lean nor too much like hand cream. Chuck also has the right mouth feel; it gives the teeth something to do. You also want a patty thick enough so that it can be charred yet remain moist within. I like mine medium rare, because I want the fat in the meat to get hot enough to melt and spread its flavor. The patty should be seasoned with salt and pepper, at the very least.

The bun is a crucial component of the dish. Toasted bread is not bad for a change-up, but a bun is better, gives better grip and more al dente contrast to the meat. The best bun is a sesame bun, lightly toasted and warm. There is nothing wrong with the braided pretzel bun at the Rosebud in Chicago, but the raised pattern is an eccentric distraction and the bun too doughy, in my view.

From there on, individual preference rules.

X

Source:
The Best Burger
The beef patty on a bun is America's contribution to world cuisine. Our food critic takes a cross-country -- and artery-clogging -- journey to find burger perfection.
RAYMOND SOKOLOV
WSJ, March 10, 2007
http://online.wsj.com/article/SB117348069193432668.html

Posted at 07:05 AM in Food and Drink | Permalink | Comments (2) | TrackBack

How cool is this? 

MIT's Technology Review: Mapping the Internet.

According to a novel study mapping the structure of the Internet, the increased use of peer-to-peer communications could "improve the overall capacity of the Internet and make it run much more smoothly."

Bandwidth and throughput issues aside, what really makes the study interesting is the visualizations they did on what the internet looks like: Its a tangled web of hierarchical structures, based on the connections between individual nodes (such as service providers).
>

The Internet: Your speed may vary
(I don't see any tubes...)

>

The Inner core of highly connected nodes
Still no tubes . . .

>

The outer periphery of isolated networks
Is that a . . . ? No, I guess not.

>

Source:
Mapping the Internet
Duncan Graham-Rowe
MIT Technology Review, Tuesday, June 19, 2007
http://www.technologyreview.com/Infotech/18944/

Posted at 06:36 AM in Design, Web/Tech | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBack

Very amusing:

iPhone: Simple to use.
Paris Hilton: Simple.

iPhone: Well-protected against viruses.
Paris Hilton: Has herpes.

iPhone: Critics complained battery life too short.
Paris Hilton: Critics complained prison life too short.

iPhone: Provides driving directions.
Paris Hilton: Knows how to drive. (Sort of.)

iPhone: Responds to touch from multiple fingers at once.
Paris Hilton: Responds to touch from multiple fingers at once.

iPhone: Wants to be held by everyone.
Paris Hilton: Wants to be held by her mother.

iPhone: Sexy footage leaked onto the net.
Paris Hilton: Sexy footage leaked onto the net.

iPhone: Appeared in multi-million ad campaign.
Paris Hilton: Appeared in "House of Wax."

iPhone: Everyone wants what's in the box.
Paris Hilton: Everyone knows what's in the box.

Source:
Hype Smackdown: iPhone v. Paris Hilton
By Jeff Diehl
June 28th, 2007
http://www.10zenmonkeys.com/2007/06/28/hype-smackdown-iphone-v-paris-hilton/

Posted at 06:07 AM in Current Affairs, Humor, Web/Tech | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBack

Good advice for new graduates (and nearly everyone else) from NYT columnist Damon Darlin:

"Over the last two years I’ve been dispensing advice in this space about how to spend and save more wisely. This will be my last column for a spell as I am taking on editing duties that give me little time for reporting. But before I go, I want to remind the young graduates, their parents who scrimped and saved to get them there, and anyone else who stuck with me this far that are a few other rules of life worth considering."

Among them are the following.

• Never pay a real estate agent a 6 percent commission.

• Buy used things, except maybe used tires.

• Get on the do-not-call list and other do-not-solicit lists so you can’t be tempted.

• Watch infomercials for their entertainment value only.

• Know what your credit reports say, but don’t pay for that knowledge: go to annualcreditreport.com to get them.

• Consolidate your cable, phone and Internet service to get the best deal.

• Resist the lunacy of buying premium products like $2,000-a-pound chocolates.

• Lose weight. Carrying extra pounds costs tens of thousands of dollars over a lifetime.

• Do not use your home as a piggy bank if home prices are flat or going down or if interest rates are rising.

• Enroll in a 401(k) at work immediately.

• Find a partner and stay together. Study after study show that two can live more cheaply together than each alone and that divorce is the great destroyer of wealth.

• Postpone buying high-tech products like PCs, digital cameras and high-definition TVs for as long as possible. And then buy after the selling season or buy older technology just as a new technology comes along.

• And, I’m sorry, I’m really serious about this last one: make your own coffee.

I have violated most of these -- and regret doing so.

>

At the original column, there are links to just about every item.

>

Source:
More Advice Graduates Don’t Want to Hear
DAMON DARLIN
NYT, June 2, 2007
http://www.nytimes.com/2007/06/02/business/02money.html

Posted at 06:00 PM in Finance | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBack

John lennon Live in the New York City 1972:

way cool

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