Haha. This cat has two heads… seriously though, I’m not a cat person but a two headed cat would be an awesome pet. What would happen if you simultaneously tugged the left hand face’s left whisker and the right hand face’s right whisker. Cat chaos. Brilliant.
I’m a gmail ninja… themes are cool
i’m looking for the quintessential colour of coffee (RGB or Hex). There are so many colours of coffee – roasted, ground, brewed, plunged…
is it just me who thinks taking emails away from POTUS is counterproductive? In a literal sense
Attention console owners and video gamers you are killing the planet.* I hope you leave your conscience at the door when you turn your machine on.
The Natural Resources Defense Council has released an American study that found gamers in the US are filling the air with toxic carbon emissions and killing the polar bears.**
“NRDC and Ecos Consulting performed the first ever comprehensive study on the energy use of video game consoles and found that they consumed an estimated 16 billion kilowatt-hours per year — roughly equal to the annual electricity use of the city of San Diego. Through the incorporation of more user-friendly power management features, we could save approximately 11 billion kWh of electricity per year, cut our nation’s electricity bill by more than $1 billion per year, and avoid emissions of more than 7 million tons of CO2 each year.”
The news is not all bad for me – as I still don’t own a new generation console. I am an eco-friendly gamer with my Super Nintendo and Nintendo 64 faring best in a tabled comparison of power usage.
For those of you who are visual thinkers, here’s the graph:
You can read the whole report here (PDF). A Playstation 3 ($160) will set you back 16 times the price of a Wii ($10) in energy costs over a year if both devices are left on, and five times the price if both are turned off – $3 and $15 respectively. More video game energy factoids can be found here (another PDF).
Climate Friendly’s carbon calculator says the Playstation 3 user who leaves their console on all year round uses an appropriate 1337 kWh per year – which produces 1.4 tonnes of carbon – offsetting that via the aforementioned company will cost you $95 a year.Year round use of the Xbox 360 uses 1031 kWh per year, produces 1.1 tonnes of carbon and costs $75 to offset.
My coffee machine uses 2190 kWh per year (estimated), produces 2.3 tonnes of carbon emissions and would cost $156 to offset. Luckily the Nintendo 64 doesn’t even register on the calculator in terms of its annual carbon emissions so I’ve got a fair bit of credit up my sleeve through my environmentally friendly gaming strategies. Come to think of it, I’ve been an eco-savvy gamer since way back when playing Eco-Saurus (aka Zug’s Adventures on Eco Island). A game so obviously ahead of its time.
*In a literal, physical sense not in the actual game you’re playing.
** Killing polar bears would be another fun game – Polar Bear Hunter the long awaited sequel to Deer Hunter…
The guy behind the spider drawing – David Thorne – has a website full of funny anecdotes, emails and characters who have sent him things. It comes with a language warning – but this is a particularly ingenius account from his own life:
My Confession
When I was in year ten, I would wag school to catch the bus into the city. I would hide the contents of my schoolbag and go to a christian book store called the 'Open Book', covering two levels and a second hand section in the basement. I would go in with my empty bag, select expensive theological volumes, and fill my bag with several hundred dollars worth. I would then use the toilets to remove any price tags before going downstairs to the basement where they would buy my books for half the retail price. I did this twice a week. I figured that if they caught me I would cry and ask for their forgiveness and as christians they would have let me go but they never caught on. I remember one person buying the entire Amy Grant tape collection when it had been on the shelves not ten minutes before. I was saving for a motorbike and bought a Suzuki Katana. The 'Open Book' went broke a year later so it worked out well for everyone.
"After the exchange hit inboxes, the “original” drawing was put up for sale on eBay by a Swedish man.
"David Thorne was … kind enough to give the spider to me," eBay user “Andreas” says.
"However, this spider is driving me nuts. Also he's lacking a leg and thus is useless to me."
The listing shows there were 18 bids for the drawing, with a starting price of $233.95, and that it was sold for US$10,000 ($15,000)."
This is a stupid story. I was smacked as a child. Sometimes hard enough to leave a mark. I have nothing but respect for my parents for the way they disciplined me. I think I'm a better person for it. What is a father to do? His seven year old son wandered off at night and he found him in a park – so he smacked him, telling him not to do it again. And he gets arrested thanks to a "concerned onlooker" – the boy clearly deserved a smack on the bum – so obviously do the legislators and police force who perpetuate this nanny state – Supernanny would be all for smacking that kid…
My hatred of emoticons knows no bounds and has been documented previously. They are bad. They are for lazy writers – they are an exclamation mark taken to a new low. So the idea of a USB keyboard dedicated to emoticons just makes me feel empty inside. Those who are interested may like to know that they can be removed from the keyboard and worn as jewelry.
Bajca’s (the company) designer says:
Bajca’s idea arise from connecting deeply the virtual with the real life. Bajca is the instrument that ” make real” the emotion- a digital translation of every sensation- telling the story of everyday life; spoken, touched and wearn every day.
I say :(. No word yet on how much these will set you back financially – socially they’ll be crippling.
Thank you for your message. People often write to us about words they have devised, and I am afraid our response is very dull. Before we can even think about drafting a dicttionary entry for a new word, we need a large body of published evidence showing that it has been in widespread and sustained use over a period of at least five years. We are slow to add words to the full Oxford English Dictionary Online, because once added they are never deleted.
You can read more about what is involved at http://www.askoxford.com/asktheexperts/faq (see ‘Will you put in my new word?’ in the Dictionaries section). I shall certainly record your contribution in our files, but cannot promise that it will result in an entry.
Margot Charlton
Oxford English Dictionary
Interesting fact – while importing my blog into WordPress (I’m still toying with making the move but am thinking it needs to be done properly to a wordpress.org site rather than a wordpress.com blog) I noticed that today I hit 300 posts, and 2000 comments. My comment to post ratio is still reasonably good – but most of them are from posts a while ago. That seems worthy of some sort of celebration. I think I’ll go home and play some Bomberman on the N64 which arrived in the mail today from eBay.
It turns out urbandictionary.com already has a “walldrop” which is a backdrop featuring a wall. The only way to guarantee my much better definition is for you all to go here and vote down this definition.
I am so taken with my new word that I’ve submitted it to the Oxford English Dictionary… my chances of success are less than good.
Here is the email I sent:
Dear Oxford English Dictionary Editor (or whomever reads this correspondence),
I wish to submit a new word for your consideration.
The rise of Facebook and other social networking hubs has, I believe, created a new sphere of voyeurism whereby readers are able to secretly observe the conversations of their friends via the Facebook element known as “the wall”. As “eavesdropping” was so named for listening to the conversations of others through the “eaves”, I submit the following word and definition:
Walldrop:
intr.v., -dropped, -drop·ping, -drops.To read the conversations of others on Facebook
Etymology – derived from eavesdrop
Best regards,
Nathan Campbell
Corporate Communications Executive
I included my title because it makes me sound impressively wordy.
Just to ensure some modicum of success I also submitted my word to urbandictionary.com which goes as close to guaranteeing inclusion as possible. I’ll let you know how the campaign goes.
Walldrop:
intr.v., -dropped, -drop·ping, -drops.
1. To read the conversations of others on Facebook
2. To fall off a wall eg – Humpty Dumpty
I don’t know about you – but Facebook awakens my inner voyeur – I think walldropping is a good new word to describe using the “wall to wall” link to peer into other people’s conversations.
You heard it here first people. Remember that. I don’t think you get royalties for coining new words. Coining is therefore an inappropriate word to describe the creation of new words.
Stop Press. BBC News is reporting on the 20 most annoying conversational cliches – coming soon to a Prime Minister’s address near you…