Just some pics on my hard drive

Some cute, some creepy. (click to enlarge)

From the mailbag (kind of)

On the seldom occasion when I receive email from a reader asking “Dear Hydralisk, with all the human rights abuses going on in the world, what can I, an ordinary underwear-ing citizen do to help?” (it hasn’t happened yet, but that counts as seldom, doesn’t it?) I of course refer them to Panties for Peace.

Our act of delivering our underwear to the Burmese foreign missions across the globe is of immense importance and symbolic in protest of Myanmar junta’s violent crackdown of monks-led rallies in Yangon last month, and to oust the generals ruling the country from power…

One of the main reasons for which we are encouraging people to send out their panties to Burma’s foreign missions is because the generals ruling Myanmar are superstitious and they believe that touching panties or the traditional women’s outfit sarong will eliminate their powers…

Will you be my friend? Tackling the problem of (un)popularity

Friends. Everyone needs them. No one understands our need for friends more than the people who we need as friends, as one former US ambassador explains.

You wrote a commentary in Britain’s Guardian newspaper in which you suggested that Europeans and the rest of the world should let the Americans know who they want for US president. Can world public opinion and the global media really influence the US elections?

They have already influenced the elections very strongly, by voicing concern over the way the [Bush administration] has conducted itself in the past eight years. You look at all the polls. America’s standing in the world had never ever been so low. These figures have registered everywhere in the United States. I hear this again and again from Americans — “our standing in the world is so low” — and that in turn has influenced American public opinion of the Bush administration’s policies.

Kornblum grasps what many of his fellow Yankees are perhaps just beginning to–that the right to elect a President of the United States ought to be, along with freedom of speech, free medical care, and habeas corpus, a universal right for all citizens of the world.

But are we acting too late? Can we regain the trust of the world by correcting this one injustice, or is a more extreme measure required lest our image becomes unsalvageable? The percentage of people around the world who view American influence favorably has risen slightly above the percentage who view North Korea favorably, but has not surpassed an abyssmal 35%. With numbers like that, Pig-pen has better chances of being invited to the ball.

Back when world opinion polls revealed that China is more popular than the United States, I fear we may have missed a golden opportunity…to become like China. Granted, our inexperience in central economic planning, our abnormal distaste of government persecution of religion, our reluctance to engage in activities like harvesting organs from unwilling subjects, and our total lack of imagination in the area of law enforcement are obstacles that would have to be overcome, but I am sure that with a positive “can-do” attitude that America is supposed to be famous for, we could adapt. At any rate, I think it is accurate to say that the United States would have an easier time adapting to Chinese-style rule of law than Iraq is having adapting to Western-style democracy.

There is another option I have not seen discussed, and it seems glaringly obvious once you think of it. A certain geographically close neighbor exists, the citizens of which hold a continually sinking opinion of the United States, and who can be assumed to be winning many friends, lovers, acquaintances, invitations to balls, etc. Yes, I’m speaking of Canada.

Should the United States apply to become a province of Canada?

It’s a hard question for many Americans to consider. I think we would find on balance many advantages of such an arrangement. Most importantly, world opinion of the United States, not to mention Canadian opinion of the United States, would surely improve by leaps and bounds. The idea is worth examination.

Gotta cram for this

…37% , doh.

37% is not gonna cut it. A 37% is yourself lying face up on the ground with most of your face missing, two hours into the first day.

Will retry until I can get at least a 68%. A 68% is barely getting the car to start as the glass of the driver’s seat window shatters, giving way to a half-decayed groping hand, which you frantically lop off with a rusty hacksaw. Steering with your other hand, you bang your way past other cars stalled on the road, trying your best to ignore the screams coming from within, swerve once abruptly to shake off a putrid body that was still clinging onto the hood, and make for the main road towards the nearest gas station. You may or may not still be breathing when dawn breaks, but you know you’ve got a fighting chance.

Sam Harris claims God’s all-powerful powers for himself

Consider the second commandment “Thou shalt not erect any graven images”. Is this really the second most important thing upon which to admonish all future generations of human beings? Is this as good as it gets ethically and spiritually? ….

The truth is that almost any precept we would put in place of the second commandment would improve the wisdom of the Bible. How about “Don’t mistreat children”? How about “Don’t pretend to know things you do not know”? Or what about just “Try not to deep fry all of your food”? Could we live with the resulting proliferation of graven images?

Ah but Sam, you miss the point. The second commandment was inscribed in stone by the divine finger of God Almighty! You CAN’T change it, so that defeats your whole argument!

Dr. Strangelove

One of the benefits of age is that you know what the good movies are and can pass on your wisdom to the younger generation, which includes me.

Dr. Strangelove or : How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Love the Bomb was my type of film. Why didn’t anyone tell me about this film? Do you think I have the time and eyepower to sift through the acres of grubby dunghills Hollywood excretes to find nuggets like these? No! That’s your job.

Don’t give me the excuse that it has a popular ranking of blah blah blah on some film website blah blah blah. I may lack wisdom and experience, but if experience has granted me any wisdom, it is that popular rankings on film websites are as likely as not to turn up false positives. (That I downloaded and sat all the way through the high-ranking tour de tedium American Beauty without receiving any monetary compensation from the people who made it goes down as one of my life’s greatest regrets)

If anyone else out there who calls himself a friend is withholding movie recommendations, let’s have them out.

A fun fact about how this hamburger was made:

George C. Scott had some really difficult experiences with the director. George was headstrong by nature. It is what fueled his particular talent. Stanley was very much the same kind of man.The irresistible force met the immovable object when Stanley asked George to do over-the-top performances of his lines. He said it would help George to warm up for his satiric takes. George hated this idea. He said it was unprofessional and made him feel silly. George eventually agreed to do his scenes over-the-top when Stanley promised that his performance would never be seen by anyone but himself and the cast and crew. But Kubrick ultimately used many of these “warm-ups” in the final cut. George felt used and manipulated by Stanley and swore he would never work with him again.

Willingness to throw out traditional standards of ethics for the sake of the art is a sure sign of genius.