The Huddle

[Benelli Nova]

That's a lot

[optid]

That's a lot

It reminds me of an incident form the early months of Pop Rocks and Coke. Sassy, who was both an admin and a diary manager at the time, started a thread in PRC to tell the owners that they had two many stickies. You guessed it: that thread was also a sticky.
Stickies

[RambleR]

Sticky can sometimes be a good thing.

[optid]

Sticky can sometimes be a good thing.

I've become increasingly attached to duct tape for its many uses.

[RambleR]

[RambleR]

This kind of bullshit pisses me off.

Fans unleash racial garbage at Joel Ward
By Dan Steinberg

Just when you think sports are about fun and happiness and escaping the real world, along comes the Internet to remind you that no, you’re crazy.

I can’t really repeat much of the racial garbage that was tossed in Ward’s direction after he scored that dramatic game-winning goal Wednesday night, but suffice it to say there was a whole lot of vile stuff going on, in multiple platforms, on multiple sites.

If you have a stronger stomach than I, you can read some of the horrific comments that have been collected at Capitals Outsider, or at SB Nation, or at Chirpstory, or at Black Sports Online, or I’m sure dozens of other places.

Here are just two of the vile things turned up by Caps Outsider late Wednesday night:
* “The only reason Joel ward is playing hockey is because he got cut from the basketball team in high school #gorilla”

* “Warning to Joel Ward. Your one of three black guys in Canada. I will find you…and I will kill you.”

And those are on the mild side, if you can believe that.

Hard to turn all those smiles into a depressing moment. Well done, awful people. Yuck.

Fans unleash racial garbage at Joel Ward - DC Sports Bog - The Washington Post

[optid]

This kind of bullshit pisses me off.

The comments sections at many media sites are poorly moderated. Though I suspect that many such outlets just don't want to moderate those comments because they see any activity as good for their revenue stream. So they tacitly provide a platform for bigotry and hatred.

[optid]

World War I unexploded ordnance is still killing and maiming people 98 years after that war started. Every so often there's a news story about it and the main points are similar.

BBC 1998

Eighty years after the guns fell silent the bomb disposal squad from this area is still finding and then defusing or destroying hundreds of tonnes of unexploded ammunition every year.

It sometimes seems that the shadow this Great War cast over this unhappy ground will never lift.

As the shell cases begin to rot, toxic chemicals begin to poison The soil and seep, slowly into the water supply.

Ask how long this work might last and you get a shrug, "Three, four hundred years, hard to say."

At first you are surprised but then you remember that for every square metre of land in this vast region it is said that a ton of explosives fell during World War I and one shell in every four failed to go off.

BBC 2006

So many live bombs are unearthed by farmers, there are designated spots where they are left for collection by the military.

• Every year more than 30 people are killed on the battlefields of Europe after disturbing or picking up unexploded bombs and shells.

• It's estimated that three Titanics worth of unexploded bombs still litter the fields of France and Belgium, left over from World War 1.

• Some of these shells contain deadly Mustard Gas and Phosgene. Chemical shells left over from World War 1 that are still as deadly as the day they were fired.

• The Belgian Bomb Disposal Team brings back two lorry loads of unexploded bombs every day for safe destruction.

• Inside the high security chemical warfare lab, bomb teams work four hour shifts inside special chemical suits as they take the gas shells apart and destroy the chemicals.

NPR 2007

"People here have grown up with these shells," says Michel Colling, who works with a demining team in the northern city of Amiens. "[Residents] find them all the time and so it's banal for them and they have the tendency to see them as harmless."

Colling's team in Amiens is working near the spot where the Battle of the Somme was fought in 1916. Colling says he always takes a gas mask with him because the mustard gas can be lethal — even 91 years later. He is constantly reminding the local population of the danger.

"These shells are charged and still active," says Colling. "We can't forget that these are weapons that were made to kill people — and they still do."

Two of Colling's colleagues were killed on the job this year when a stockpile of shells exploded.

[ ... ]

About 1.5 billion shells were fired during the war here on the Western Front. Colling and his colleagues bring in between 50,000 and 75,000 tons of them a year. At that rate, they'll have enough work to keep them busy for the next 500 years.

Christian Science Monitor 2011

Since the war, 630 French "démineurs" – those who find and detonate unexploded shells – have died in blasts, The Atlantic reported in a 2004 book review.

So be careful if you're anywhere near the red line on this map.

[RambleR]

[optid]

That's closer to reality than you think. I already occasionally see people who are beginning to resemble the Borg who are using a smart phone, iPod, and iPad all at the same time.

[bcm835]

That's closer to reality than you think. I already occasionally see people who are beginning to resemble the Borg who are using a smart phone, iPod, and iPad all at the same time.

I read a guy went through a procedure to make his thumbs thinner so he could use his iPhone better

The North Denver News reports that Thomas Martel, 28, of Bonnie Brae, Colorado recently underwent “whittling” thumb surgery to better enable him to use the iPhone.

Thomas Martel, 28, of Bonnie Brae is a big guy. So he has a hard time using the features on ever-shrinking user interfaces on devices like his new iPhone. At least, he did, until he had his thumbs surgically altered in a revolutionary new surgical technique known as “whittling.”

“From my old Treo, to my Blackberry, to this new iPhone, I had a hard time hitting the right buttons, and I always lost those little styluses,” Martel tells reporter James Bently. “Sure, the procedure was expensive, but when I think of all the time I save by being able to use modern handhelds so much faster, I really think the surgery will pay for itself in ten to fifteen years. And what it’s saving me in frustration - that’s priceless.”

Well OK, Tom.

“This is really, on the edge sort of stuff,” explains Dr. Robert Fox Spars, who worked on developing the procedure. “We’re turning plastic surgery from something that people use in service of vanity, to a real tool for improving workplace efficiency.”

As Bently describes it, “the procedure involved making a small incision into both thumbs and shaving down the bones, followed by careful muscular alteration and modification of the fingernails.

While Martel’s new thumbs now appear small and effeminate in comparison to his otherwise very large hands, he says he can still lift “pretty much anything I could lift before the surgery - though opening spaghetti sauce jars has been a problem. That was a big surprise.”

So now, Martel feels iPhone empowered.

But he’s not the only one to struggle with opening spaghetti sauce jars. Push down and twist? Yea, right.

Man endures thumb surgery to better enable iPhone use | ZDNet

[Benelli Nova]

So lame lol. I wish I had another joint in my arm in between my elbow and wrist though for working on cars/trucks/tractors.

[optid]

I read a guy went through a procedure to make his thumbs thinner so he could use his iPhone better

The thing is that technology is changing so quickly that he may need additional operations to keep up. The iPod dates back to 2001. The iPhone goes back to 2007 and the iPad to just 2010.

[optid]

[RambleR]

This is sooo true