h2g2 The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy: Earth Edition

Brilliant! Well, there's today gone.

(Actually, not an issue as I'm at a work stoppage due to software license issues anyway. )

I was really thrilled when I got to the HHGttG review: http://leasthelpful.com/post/68460117549/basically-the-satanic-bible-for-mice

Yeah, for quite some time I couldn't stop reading it. It's fascinating - or at least, some of it is. Not the people who are trying to be ridiculous on purpose, or who are simply stupid ('"Dracula" is nothing like "Twilight", jeez!') but the people who are taking themselves so terribly seriously. And yeah, there are the typical bible-thumpers and conspiracy-theorists, but really, they come from all sides of the spectrum.
'This book is horrible liberal claptrap!'
'This book is disgusting bourgeoise propaganda!'
'This book is unfir for children because it includes witches and sourcery, which are wrong and evil things!'
'This book portrays witches incorrectly and offends me as a wiccan!'

...Etc. etc.


Eventually, Nuke reminded me that I have more important things to do than read reviews of reviews, and I managed to tear myself away, but yeah, it's rather addictive.

*unfit

BWAHAHA!


Nigerian Pastor Tries To Walk On Water Like Jesus, Then Drowns In Front Of His Congregation
http://www.reportghananews.com/nigerian-pastor-tries-to-walk-on-water-like-jesus-then-drowns-in-front-of-his-congregation/

I especially like the schadenfreude I get from the story about the Daniel and the Lions story.

Nice to see Darwin in action

I normally have a bit of respect for the Local News teams in Houston. Houston is one of the largest broadcast markets in the nation and the 4 local network affiliates can hire from the best news personnel out there. Heck, Dan Rather got his start in Houston among others.

Now, it's still local news so you always can expect a bit of lax reporting and slipshod fact checking. But when they run a credulous story on a chupacabra, that's just pathetic.

http://www.h2g2.com/dna/h2g2/brunel/F105207?showthread=7512008

I agree, that it may not be a hairless coyote. But I'm certain that it is a hairless dog. This poor dog needs help. It does NOT need to be fear-mongered on broadcast television.

Chupacabras aren't real? Well, I've lived here for more than 14 years and I'm still learning things about Texas. Next you'll be telling me there's no such thing as a jackalope

Well, of course there is a jackalope. Shonen Knife sang about it. It lives somewhere in Texas.


http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dKzRrwDz_Hk


*(No, I do not know why that image.)

And then there's http://quirkytravelguy.com/wp-content/uploads/2011/12/jackalope.jpg It lives somewhere in Austin

The stupid, it burns!


This is from an actual text book published mostly for home schooled children ages 9 and up.

http://i.imgur.com/f9yrGyy.png

The book is titled, "Science 4 for Christian Schools".

Good grief

To be fair, they're right about something. My dad (an electrician) always told me that you can't see it, touch or hear it (although what makes that humming noise ) but it can kill you.

But yeah. That anyone in this day and age should be teaching stuff like that is truly, utterly, mind boggingly unfathomable.

Sure you can hear it. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Z6Km49gm7GI

Tesla>Edison.

I had a good idea what that was going to be but I clicked on it anyway because those things are just so damned

And, strictly speaking, that wasn't the Star Wars theme, that was the Imperial March

Yea, I know. I looked at a couple of clips before I chose that one. I definitely wanted the Imperial March and that one had a sign on the wall about Austin. Another I looked at with a proper title was just from someone's cell phone and it just had a couple of drunken/stoned fools from the audience dancing in a square faraday cage.

Dammit! Our local news reported yet another "chupacabra" story. Not only that, they dumbed it even further down than the original story from another news report.

Here's the fairly dumb original. Be sure to watch the clip.

http://doubtfulnews.com/2014/02/mangey-coyote-makes-headlines-as-chupacabra-in-texas/

Our Houston channel 2 took out every reference to it being a coyote or dog. They left it where it was called an "animal" and about the only thing they didn't cut from what was said by the expert was the mention of mange.

The click2houston website doesn't have their version up on their page yet, but here's their story about "bigfoot" from Monday.

http://www.click2houston.com/news/big-foot-body-on-display-in-houston-monday/-/1735978/24650528/-/70k11jz/-/index.html

Because a couple of people on our contract have tripped in recent weeks, we have received an edict from our manager that we are not to walk across a specific patch of grass beside a neighboring building to get to the parking lot on the other side of that building.

Yep, we've now been told it's too dangerous to trust us to walk in the grass.


I could easily accept and would have welcomed a simple caution message, but this comes with an implied threat to our employment. I park beside this patch of grass regularly and this would mean an extra 100 steps or so to get to my car. Oh, I should point out that in this grassy area, there's a picnic table and trash barrel. This edict applies only to people on this contract, who work in this building and park in that particular parking lot. My supervisor argued against this, but he might as well have argued with a wall.


I've seen silly "safety" issues like this before. Elsewhere on site, there is a paved path between buildings. Most buildings on site are elevated a couple of feet above the surrounding ground level with the turf landscaped up to a fringe around them. These two buildings are relatively close together so the path has steeper than normal ramps down and back up again. A few years ago a worker was riding a bicycle along the path and had a fall. I have to assume they tried to slow themselves while going down a ramp and grabbed the front brake too tightly and toppled over. Rather than issue a warning, they put up signs prohibiting riding bicycles on these ramps. Now most riders ride their bikes through the grass up and down the much steeper slope.




I'm a very safety conscious person, but silly like this really irks me. Where's Wonko's Outside-the-Asylum again? Malibu? Malibu is nice.

Oh dear Bob

It actually got a bit more head-smacky later yesterday afternoon. Our department had a small all-hands meeting. During the safety section of the meeting, we were informed of another incident that happened elsewhere on-site. Someone had a minor accident that wasn't reported up the chain of command. Apparently someone had what seemed like a minor fall and didn't report it but it resulted in some sort of internal injury that resulted in fatal complications. Now what makes this even worse is that OSHA (our federal Occupational Safety and Health Administration) did an investigation and our Center Director, Ellen Ochoa, found out only when OSHA showed up on-site. So, there is now an emphasis on reporting all accidents no matter how minor or even if they're not work related.

OK... so, we're being encouraged to report all accidents no matter how minor at the same time as we're being tacitly warned about how accidents affect our contract score. I know that if I have an accident that's not spurting blood everywhere, I'm not reporting it.

In my 17 years there, I've only had one accident and it wasn't work related. I cut myself with my own pocket knife. I was spurting a bit of blood on that one. I discovered that the first aid kit in our break room was seriously depleted of supplies as I couldn't even find a band-aid. I had to wrap my finger in a paper towel and tape, sneak out of the office and get some bandages from the drugstore across the road. I now keep my own personal supply in my office.

Management just doesn't understand that no matter how much they promote safety, they negate all of that with their threats and actions.

I know of one incident where an employee was reprimanded for having an accident. He was accused of misusing a tool. He was using a flat blade screwdriver to pry on a piece of photographic processing equipment. The thing that management ignored was that the manufacturer's instructions advised using a screwdriver to do this. (It slipped and he got a serious laceration needing stitches.) After seeing how he was treated, there was no way I was going to report my cut.

Heck, there was even one incident where a worker was struck by lightning and management suggested that he was at fault. (They insisted that he didn't follow the "30/30" rule: If it takes less than 30 seconds to hear thunder after seeing the flash, lightning is near enough to pose a threat; after the storm ends, wait 30 minutes before resuming outdoor activities.) He hadn't heard any thunder and when he walked outside, there weren't any clouds directly overhead. This guy is just a walking lightning rod. When he lived in Florida, he was apparently struck twice before.

I did find out that the grassy area they were talking about wasn't the one I was thinking of. I cross on the other side of the building and go to another parking lot. The one they were concerned with has a well used path across it where someone decades ago placed stepping stones. Someone probably tripped on these. However, the path I use isn't as well used, has some rather uneven ground with hidden holes and I also step onto and off a loading ramp. Nope, I'll just keep this to myself.

In any other article on any other subject, I'd overlook these minor errors.

But this is personal.

http://mashable.com/2014/03/11/hitchhikers-guide-to-the-galaxy-game/

I know I'm picking on the simple, but still.

"Originally published by Infocom, Adams' game was a text adventure — meaning the online way to interact with it was by typing in commands such as "open door," or "turn the light on."

30 years ago, there was no such thing as "online". We sat at a Commodore64, we loaded the game from a cassette, and there were no graphics. AND WE LIKED IT! It was a TEXT ADVENTURE! Yeah, there were graphical games back then, there was pong and asteroids, and they sucked in comparison to the "graphics" we got in the surround sound theatre of teh MIND!

Ok, Ok. Ok... calm down, Rob.


" The revamped, online version of the game does have some visuals and sound effects, which should make the experience a bit more easier for those unaccustomed to the harsh world of text adventures."




"More easier".

Idiot!

[edit]
Maybe the "writer's" phone autocorrected "Only" to "online"...
Nah, either way, he's still an idiot.