Tighten Up the Tinfoil, Boys; We're Goin' In!

By now everyone's probably heard about the American B-52 that accidentally flew from North Dakota to Louisiana with nuclear warheads on board.

As can be expected, this has got the conspiracy folks champing away at the bit.  Though there are numerous theories and conspiracies, the current one that I've been seeing the most of is this bit of drivel (snipped from one site, though I'm sure there are other wordings):

"Since the Minot story broke a week ago about the missing nukeclandestine operation from Minot, we have the following (for those who are paying attention):

1. All six people listed below are from Minot Airforce base
2. All were directly involved as loaders or as pilots
3. All are now dead
4. All within the last 7 days in 'accidents'"

Silly me, seeing more than there is to this story. I guess this is just another coincidence.

But no doubt now that there will be more coincidences in the near future because as I have stated before, you need about fourteen signatures to get an armed nuke onto a B-52, and they may have told their wives and friends."

Included with this, as evidence, is a set of 6 links to stories about air force personnel who died.  Since I love conspiracies, I'm going to spend a moment or two debunk or at least severely question their main points.  Click on, if you're actually interested in this type of stuff.

 Continue reading Tighten Up the Tinfoil, Boys; We're Goin' In!

No Sleep Means No Title

If you had money on Robert Jordan never finishing the The Wheel of Time series before his death, then kindly pick up your winnings.

Me, I never read the things (not my type of fantasy), but I know some people like him, so…

Angst Ahead (But No Clove Cigarettes)

As I spend yet another day, sitting around waiting to see if any changes to a dynamic file generation routine have resulted in noticeable speedups, I'm left wondering whether this is really what I wanted to do with my life.  (On the plus side, the file generation code isn't mine — so I'm not on the hook if complaints come back about how long it takes to generate the file.  Currently it's at 20 minutes between when the user requests the file and when it's available for download.)  It's not that the problems aren't engaging (occasionally hair-pullingly so), but it seems I spend more time sitting around waiting for the user requirements so that I can start working than I actually spend implementing them.

Combine this general malaise with the sight of back to school students, and I've been thinking: if I were just going into my undergrad again, what would I take?  The answer, as of late, has been more and more arts-related.  Screw "preparation for the real world," screw "useful life skills," and all the other things that proponents of the "hard" disciplines like to trot out.  More and more I also feel like retreating into academia and never returning.  At least that way I'd be enjoying myself.

On the other hand, maybe I wouldn't.  Maybe all I need is a change of scenery and I'd enjoy myself more.

Finally, on a more humourous note: I don't even like Football, but I still found this hilarious.

For the record, what I'd take if I had to do it all over again would be either folk lore, or a combination of history and Russian literature.

Colourful Language

Dove Gray with occasional Verdun Green and Madras, on a background of White Rock fading upwards through Sisal and Mongoose (among others) to Donkey Brown.  All overlayed on an alternating background of Silver Chalice (fading to Gray Nickel) and Green White, with Golden Dream sidebars.

Okay, so I've been playing around with Name That Color a bit more than I should have as of late.  Though it may lack the prestige of something like "argent a chevron between three hearts fussways in chief gules joined and pierced by a chain azure and in base a branch of laurel proper with a sword disposed salterwise of the third hilted and pommelled or," it's still fun to play with and see what the closest named colour is to something that you're using.

The only problem with it being that there's a much wider variety of colours possible using the standard RGB hex values than are named, resulting in different shades sharing the same name.  For example: Derek's favourite shades of blue are both technically Navy Blue.

Here, Under Protest, Is "Beef Burgers"

I know that I've posted the infamous Orson Welles frozen peas spot before.  I may even have even mentioned that voice actor Maurice LaMarche based the voice of The Brain, from Pinky and The Brain, on an Orson Welles impression that was supposedly derived from it.

That, of course, is what makes this all the more amusing:

I never saw it when it first aired, and I doubt I would have gotten it had I.  Of course, now I find it absolutely hilarious.