12 January 2009

Sunday smörgåsbord


A 13-yo girl sent 14,000 text messages in a month. "One every 2 minutes of every waking hour." Not as part of a contest, mind you. As part of (what she calls ) her life.

A prank is performed by recreating the Verizon network gang. The video seems so professionally done that I suspect this is an ad by Verizon masquerading as a video, but it is funny.

Oregon wants to tax drivers for mileage rather than for gasoline used, because more efficient cars use less gasoline. This would require installing GPS devices in cars and keeping track of where people drive.

Speaking of the debate over U.S. immigration, a famous person said "At one point in our history we had too many Jewish people and too many Italians." In view of the link host, this is not a misquote or a misunderestimation.

Lots of pictures this past week of record snowfalls across Europe. Pretty impressive to see snow on palm trees on the Mediterranean coast. Here's the Guardian photo album. Here's the one from Der Spiegel. And another one from Der Spiegel.

A man was shot in 1973. Now, 35 years later, when he dies, the police have to open up a murder inquiry. They admit the trail for the suspect will be a bit cold.

"Candle-fish" are smelt that have so much fish oil in the bodies that when dried they can be burned like a candle.

Some high-school and college students are dismayed that their parents and older relatives are joining Facebook and becoming their "friend," which they consider an invasion of privacy.

Virginity pledges aren't effective. Five years later pledgers have had the same number of sexual partners as non-pledgers.

George Foreman has five sons, all named George.

PETA wants to discourage people from eating fish. They have started a campaign to rename fish "sea kittens." No one would want to kill or eat something with such a cute name...

Venezuela will once again provide free home heating oil to poor Americans. Last year the program "saved about 180,000 U.S. households around $260 apiece."

A second compulsive hoarder has been killed by the collapse of stored belongings. Two in one week in separate events. This is a very strange (and a very real) psychologic disorder, probably worth a separate blog entry sometime.

In Ethiopia, donkey carts serve as bookmobiles.

The Washington Post featured a story on gifts given to U.S. officials by foreign governments. "Condoleeza Rice scored a $165,000 ruby and diamond necklace, earrings, bracelet and ring, along with a $170,000 flower petal motif necklace from the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia." The rules require that such gifts be passed on by the recipient to the General Services Administration. From there they go... where? I've not seen them on eBay.

150 online flash games. If you value your time, do not click on that link. (This means you, Brian.)

Certain government-backed investments are guaranteed by the Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation. The FDIC recently raised the insured level for savings accounts in banks to $250,000. This was widely publicized. But did you know that the law allows the FDIC up to ten years to return your money if the bank collapses?

Post office employees have been ordered to stop suggesting "first-class mail" status to customers, because they make more money selling Express Mail and Priority Mail.

image credit here

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