After 665 days of searching for nonexistent WMD "we" have
given up. It's a good thing too, since
"we" are unable to keep enormous known explosive dumps out
of the hands of bad guys. Oh yea-and Bush Lied
Safety Warning. Not for use as a stroller. May contain parts. Manufactured in a facility where one or more of the following may be present: Peanuts, almonds, unfiltered water, oxygen, ultaviolet and infrared radiation, sunlight. Use only as directed by your legal counsel. Do not use during earthquakes, volcanic eruptions, flooding or presidential election years. Use of handles may promote RSI, see your doctor or therapist before opening. May be flammable when exposed to open flame. Not for use as a stepping stool or adult seat. May cause injury if dropped from a height. Does not enable user to fly. Do not eat.
If erection lasts for over 4 hours call friends and brag. Persons attempting to find a motive in this blog will be prosecuted; persons attempting to find a moral in it will be banished; persons attempting to find a plot in it will be shot. We don't need no stinkin' badges.
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The Reverend was one of the high points of Seattle Cable Access TV in the 90's.
He went through 3 stylistic phases: The slooooow vampiric talking head, then
the giddy "Buddy Love" featuring pastel backgrounds and his nervous dog, and
finally the dark cultish ranter complete with on-screen disciples. Many was the
time that an innocent dive bar was terrorized by my co-workers and I demanding
our friday night after-work fix of Bruce.
I think Ralph is wondering what his popsicle would taste like if he dipped
it in baking soda.
They were good Squishees, though I couldn't get one that was all syrup.
I also left the cup at work, so the pictures of Homer being chased by a
pig will have to wait.
Internet research ("so it must be true") suggests that the sign is part
of the conversion. I wasn't sure.
The detail is amazing. Comic guy is reading an Atomic Man comic, the
no-parking signs say "violators will be executed" and the chair for the
(real) security guard has a Kwik-E-Mart logo.
"Comcast Corp. plans to drop Microsoft Corp.'s television
software and on-screen program guide from its digital cable boxes in the
Seattle area and the rest of the software company's home
state."
This is good news. The new system has to be better than the current dreck.
One example of how fubar Microsoft's software is: "E-mail" from
Comcast is hidden under the "Settings" menu.
"A gunman opened fire early Saturday in a home, killing six young partygoers and critically injuring at least one other before committing suicide when confronted by police outside.
The heavily armed shooter, dressed in black, fired repeatedly as he made his way into the house, killing four men and two women, police said. He then went upstairs and tried to get into a locked bathroom where a young couple were hiding. Unable to enter, he fired through the door before leaving the pair unharmed.
...
...the shooter left the home briefly and returned with a handgun and a 12-gauge pistol-grip shotgun, which Kerlikowske described as "a weapon not designed for hunting purposes but for hunting people."
The gunman, identified only as a local man in his late 20s, also wore bandoliers of shells for the shotgun and carrying additional clips for the handgun, the chief said. In his truck, police found an assault rife and multiple "banana clips" carrying 30 bullets each.
As the gunman walked the half block from his truck to the house, he spray painted the word "NOW" in orange twice on the sidewalk and once on the steps of a neighbor's home, police said."
This is unsettling. I've been to parties just like this, though not usually till 7am, and
not on Capitol Hill. No angry voices, no fighting, no warning. The shooter doesn't sound like somebody who just lost it-he had stocked up. I wonder if we'll ever know what the orange "Now" was all about. Gunman Kills Six, Self in Seattle Home
"Attention citizens the Greater Seattle Metropolitan Area. As we have received 1/16th of an inch of show municipal code N-774290.4.c is now in effect, requiring all drivers currently on the roads to drive their vehicle into a ditch at the earliest convenient moment. If you are unable to do so because your nearest ditch is already filled with vehicles, you may instead precipitate either a rear-ender or a fender-bender. Your compliance will ensure that local news stations have no difficulty obtaining footage for their "BlizzardWatch '05!!" coverage, which will begin immediately and continue until the last sludgy lump of ice has melted from the median of I-5.
Residents should also be aware that all chit-chat, small talk, and informal shit shooting must, by law, be confined exclusively to weather-related topics for the next 48 hours. We thank you for your cooperation."
Great Sneezing Buddha, tell me about it. I had to drive around King
County all day today and people were driving like it was raining
blood and frogs. The snow was
melting as soon as it hit the ground (40 degree weather will
do that) so what we had today was a classic "Seattle Snow Panic"
only without the snow.
The Badhill route generator
(King County only) is intended for bicyclists, but I can see
putting it to use the next time Seattle suffers one of it's rare snowstorms.
Via robot wisdom weblog
Googling "seattle snow panic" revealed this gem:
"As soon as Seattlites see this unnatural white substance falling from the heavens, they shriek and gibber and panic and fear the wrath of their heathen gods. I can only conclude that Seattlites are a soft and weak people, ripe for conquest by the nomadic warrior tribes that stalk the frozen corn-tundra of my native Iowa.
They're called plows, people. They aren't rocket science. Jesus H. Balls!"
Absolutely true. One bright side is seeing all the expensive SUVs in automotively compromising
positions. 4-wheel-drive doesn't help you stop. Snowjob
" Comcast, the top U.S. cable TV network operator, is being sued by a Seattle-area woman for disclosing her name and contact information, court records showed Thursday.
In a lawsuit filed in King County, Wash., Dawnell Leadbetter said that she was contacted by a debt collection agency in January and told to pay a $4,500 for downloading copyright-protected music or face a lawsuit for hundreds of thousands of dollars.
Leadbetter, a mother of two teenage children, was a customer of Comcast's high-speed Internet access service.
The company, Settlement Support Center, based in Washington state, was using information that the Recording Industry of Association of America had obtained in a Philadelphia lawsuit over the illegal sharing of digital music files, said Lory Lybeck, the lawyer representing Leadbetter.
But no court authorized Comcast to release names and addresses of its customers, or notified his client that her information had been given to an outside party, Lybeck said.
"Comcast should respect the rights of privacy who pay them monthly bills," Lybeck said."
I'm no fan of the phone company, but I think I'll be choosing DSL when circumstances allow me
to get broadband. Link
Via Boing Boing
Winter begins in Western Washington state and that can only mean one thing: Flood alerts.
Every year we are treated to rivers with funny names running over their banks and TV reporters
in raincoats standing around in the dark looking worried. I'm just amazed that nobody
ever says "Hey, do these damn rivers have to flood year in and year out? Is there anything
we could be doing to stop or lessen all the damage these annual floods cause?". But no, the
subject never even comes up.
BELLEVUE (WA)-- Starting Monday, students are barred from wearing hats and hoods at Interlake High School, reinforcing a school prohibition against gang-related clothing.
The prohibition on headgear was announced to students Friday afternoon.
No gang incidents have occurred on the northeast Bellevue campus this year, but Assistant Principal Lynn Gill said Interlake is taking preventive measures to keep students focused on academics.
``There's stuff (about gangs) in the news, there's stuff in the community,'' Gill said. ``It's been an issue at other schools.''
I'm obviously a stone original gangsta, because I wear both hat and hood. Of course I belong to
the notorious Brotherhood of White Delivery Vans: We Are Everywhere. Why do we bother putting
people in jail when all we need to do is take away their hats and hoodies and presto-law abiding
citizen! Link
Via Metafilter
Here we have a buttmunch holding up about 5 cars while attempting to make an illegal
turn across 2 lanes of busy traffic into a line of 10 cars waiting for a light. I really
wish I was the car behind them so I could use my horn.
This is classic. Not 1, not 2, but 3 cars parked in a load/unload zone while they busily
load/unload what-lattes? Actually the last car in the line is parked in a bus stop.
One of the things I miss about my last job was the ability to have non-customers towed
out of our lot. The nicer the car, the better. This arrogant jerk hasn't even
fed the meter. Oh yea, I miss having cars towed.
I saw the damndest thing while driving today. I was on a long straight 4 lane road
and behind a car in the right hand lane. The car had it's right turn signal on, so
I thought they were going to turn. But after about a quarter of mile it was clear
that the driver had just forgotten to turn the signal off. No big deal, that can
happen to anybody. But then they turned off the signal and moved from the right lane
to the left, without a left signal. And then came the good part: the right turn
signal came back on and they kept driving, blinking away.
Documenting Chuckleheads
Here we are in Fremont (a neighborhood of Seattle) at about 4:20pm. Rush hour has
started and this street is very busy. And who is parked in a spot designed to be
clear at this time of day? Why, it's a BMW. Why am I not surprised?
Just who pays for the Seattle police to direct traffic for the downtown Honda dealership?
And why doesn't the dealership just switch the entrance and exit to avoid this problem?
I've noticed "All Who Wander Are Not Lost" bumper stickers almost
every day for the last couple of weeks. I don't know if they are
suddenly more popular or if I'm just more sensitive to them. I do
know that it's a Tolkien Quote
It's Seafair time again. This annual event brings many problems into
my life. The Blue Angels will be closing down the I-90 bridge right when
I need it on my busiest day. The Angels will also be violating every
local noise ordinance, all in the name of national security, with the
attendent terrorization of pets and the elderly. And my personal favorite: The U-district
parade, which never fails to gridlock my neighborhood and fill every available
parking space after a full day of work in insane heat. I have to agree with
Freedom to Fuck where
he quotes Sideshow Bob :
"Air show? Buzz-cut Alabamians spewing colored smoke from their whiz jets to
strains of Rock You Like A Hurricane?'what kind of countrified rube is still
impressed by that?"
RCW 70.93.100
Litter bags -- Design and distribution by department authorized -- Violations --
Penalties.
The department shall design and produce a litter bag bearing the statewide
anti-litter symbol and a statement of the penalties prescribed herein for
littering in this state. Such litter bags shall be distributed by the
department of licensing at no charge to the owner of every licensed vehicle in
this state at the time and place of license renewal. The department of ecology
shall make such litter bags available to the owners of water craft in this
state and shall also provide such litter bags at no charge at points of entry
into this state and at visitor centers to the operators of incoming vehicles
and watercraft. The owner of any vehicle or watercraft who fails to keep and
use a litter bag in his vehicle or watercraft shall be guilty of a violation of
this section and shall be subject to a fine as provided in this chapter.
[1981 c 260 § 15. Prior: 1979 c 158 § 219; 1979 c 94 § 6; 1971 ex.s. c 307 §
10.]
I couldn't quite believe this law existed, so I looked it up. Apparently it is
illegal in Washington State to have a messy car. What's next, a sock-wearing
requirement? Link
Seen out on deliveries today:
3 fighter jets coming in LOW over I-5 to land at Boeing field.
A 6-foot-plus bald black man in a beige cocktail dress and ripped
stockings.
The 2 kids walking their bikes with a live chicken standing on
on of the seats.
Since I drive for a living delivering books around Seattle I often depend
on traffic radio. I have been listening to KOMO1000. Their pitch is "traffic
on the fours, 24 hours a day, seven days a week". I like traffic reports every
10 minutes-it's very handy. Imagine my delight to discover their promise falls
flat on it's ass whenever they broadcast Mariner baseball. I listen to as much
"exciting" play-by-play as I can stomach and I still have yet to hear a traffic
report. And with what-200 games a season, each one lasting 10 hours or more-there
goes any hope of useful information when I need it. I'm just afraid the
next traffic station I find will be full of crank right-wing talk-shows.
I hate call-in talk-shows.
Those old sayings have a grain of truth in them. I actually saw someone
today who could not chew gum and walk at the same time. Oh, I suppose technically
he was walking, but his intense mastication so consumed his meager
brainpower that he was only taking a step every 2 seconds-try it
yourself-he was damn slow. I started to hope he would forget to breathe.
Why the fuck did you buy a Miata if you're going
to drive 58 in the express lanes?
You no signal, I no yield
Running red lights is bad, stupid. and dangerous. But I'll
take official attempts to crack down on it a lot more
seriously the minute I see a cop writing a city bus driver
a ticket.
My nightmare is being stuck behind an elderly tourist who's lost.
It's a right turn, not brain surgery.
My traffic mantra: go through the fucking light, go THROUGH the
fucking light....
Failing to sufficiently signal a left turn against traffic should
be grounds for impoundment, maybe impaling.