moonbuggy

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`A Londonder made a tsnuami-relief donation using lynx — a text-based browser used by the blind, Unix-users and others — on Sun’s Solaris operating system. The site-operator decided that this “unusual” event in the system log indicated a hack-attempt, and the police broke down the donor’s door and arrested him.’

`The nitrogen (N2) laser produces intense extremely short (a few ns) intense (100 kW typical) pulses of light in the near UV portion of the E/M spectrum (337.1 nm). Despite this impressive capability, the N2 laser is among the easiest to construct [..]

Compared to all the other home-built lasers, the nitrogen laser also likely has the lowest risk of failure IFF you stay pretty close to the SciAm design, more below. No glass working, no mirrors, mirror mounts, or mirror alignment, minimal vacuum. Despite this, what you end up with isn’t substantially inferior to a commercial unit costing many kilobucks.’

`The bell certainly didn’t save two suspects in the case of a missing assault rifle.

A ringing cell phone was the downfall of the men, who insisted they had no knowledge of an AK-47 used in an October shooting. They continued to stand by their story under questioning.

Then their cell phones chimed in. As Detective Kevin Doran tried to silence the rings, he noticed one had interesting wallpaper – a picture of one of the suspects holding an AK-47.

“A picture truly is worth a thousand words,” said Capt. Joe Fair, the vice squad’s commander.’

`What you are looking at is Zil 135 Frog (Free Range Over Ground) – 7 short range Russian Missile launcher. This is definately not for the faint hearted, powered by TWO mighty big block V8 Ural Petrol Engines, it is best described as a monster truck. These are extremely rare, and most sort after by the US military for destroying. The Taliban had two of these and alot of Northern aliance and US special forces were used in tracking them down and destroying as they were a credible threat. These were commonly used by the Iraqi forces in the first Iraq war.’

`In its 183-year history, the august Oxford Union debating society has heard the wisdom of Winston Churchill, Ronald Reagan and Mother Teresa.

Now its members are to hear from Ron Jeremy, star of 1,700 adult films, including Bang Along With Ron.

“Ron is the biggest and apparently the best in the business, so I’m sure he’ll have some fascinating stories to tell,” said Oxford Union librarian Vladimir Bermant, who organised the event.

Jeremy, who claims to have slept with more than 4,000 women, will address the union on Wednesday, joining many British prime ministers, three US presidents and prominent figures from the Dalai Lama to Malcolm X in its archival guest list.’

`Some researchers say that men can have ‘women’s brains’ and that women can think more like men.

Find out more about ‘brain sex’ differences by taking the Sex ID test, a groundbreaking experiment designed by a team of top psychologists.’

`Finally, you can have tasty, sizzling bacon, without all the shopping, planning, and preparation. Just schedule your appointment at baconwhores.com, and our trained experts will come and prepare bacon for you, exactly the way you like it.’

`DartMail lets people physically shoot electronic information at others.

The head of the Dart contains an RFID tag. By waving the tag over the reader, the ‘shooter’ can attach a handle to any electronic file (located in a shared file system) to the dart. After being shot, the victim can pass the dart over his or her reader (although invariable this is a guy’s thing), and see the file on the screen.’

`some of these topics are extremely dangerous’

`This robot solves the 3x3x3 Rubik’s Cube®.

I started to think about this problem in about August of 2000. In Jan 2001 fellow Mindstorms forums user ‘agiecco’ announced his intention to work on a robotic solution and, simultaneously, I saw that Rubik’s Cubes were on sale at www.target.com. So I bought a couple of cubes and started getting down to business…

I produced a ‘late beta’ version in mid-April 2001 that was a little clunky. The final version (presented here) is smooth and fairly reliable.’

`These images are the result of 8 years in the retail computer industry – 8 years that are thankfully behind me. I used to work in the service department in a retail store of a very famous computer company (think cows…). During this time, I was able to observe (and preserve for posterity) the aftereffects of the – shall we say – “technology challenged” folks. My friends and relatives couldn’t believe the stories I told – thus this collection of photos.’

`A South Jordan burglary may make the list of Utah’s dumbest robberies. [..]

“He was attempting to make access via the internet, some pornography sites and also attempting to dial some 1-900 sexual service numbers. All evidence indicates he disrobed while he was there and that he donned some women’s clothing while he was on the property,” said Sgt. Dan Starks of the South Jordan Police Department.

Police arrested the 18-year old suspect at his home where they found the stolen items from the robbed home.’

`Russia and Iran signed a nuclear fuel supply deal long opposed by Washington today, paving the way for Tehran to start up its first atomic power plant next year, state media reported.

The agreement, signed by the two countries’ nuclear energy chiefs at the Bushehr atomic reactor in southern Iran, came as Tehran faced heightened pressure from the United States, which accuses it of secretly developing nuclear weapons.’

`Research into medieval Icelandic gender and sexuality has found that even the heroes of Viking Age sagas were troubled by the thought that size really does matter.

Dr Carl Phelpstead of Cardiff University’s School of English, Communication and Philosophy presented a paper: ‘Size Matters: Penile Problems in Sagas of Icelanders’ to the International Medieval Congress, held in Leeds last week.’

`A student is planning to carry out a crime spree by travelling across the United States and breaking weird local laws along the way.

Richard Smith, 23, will risk being arrested for falling asleep in a cheese factory in South Dakota and going whale-hunting in landlocked Utah. He intends to break about 40 strange state and town laws as he crosses America, starting from the notorious former prison island of Alcatraz in San Francisco Bay.

His 18,000-mile journey across the continent will end in Hartford, Connecticut, where it is illegal to cross the road while walking on your hands.’

`A woman forced her husband to have sex with a 13-year-old girl, threatening both with a spear, because of bad spirits, a Darwin court heard today.

Savonne Scrubby, 33, has pleaded guilty to a charge of rape in the Northern Territory Supreme Court, saying she was the principal offender.

With her plea, the prosecution dropped a charge of rape against the man.’

`This is not a guide for wusses whose aim is merely to wipe out humanity. I can in no way guarantee the complete extinction of the human race via any of these methods, real or imaginary. Humanity is wily and resourceful, and many of the methods outlined below will take many years to even become available, let alone implement, by which time mankind may well have spread to other planets; indeed, other star systems. If total human genocide is your ultimate goal, you are reading the wrong document. There are far more efficient ways of doing this, many which are available and feasible RIGHT NOW. Nor is this a guide for those wanting to annihilate everything from single-celled life upwards, render Earth uninhabitable or simply conquer it. These are trivial goals in comparison.

This is a guide for those who do not want the Earth to be there anymore.’

`Scott Ritter, appearing with journalist Dahr Jamail yesterday in Washington State, dropped two shocking bombshells in a talk delivered to a packed house in Olympia’s Capitol Theater. The ex-Marine turned UNSCOM weapons inspector said that George W. Bush has “signed off” on plans to bomb Iran in June 2005, and claimed the U.S. manipulated the results of the recent Jan. 30 elections in Iraq.’

Amusing clip from some game show.

(4.3meg shockwave)

`The world’s population will increase by 40 percent to 9.1 billion in 2050, but virtually all the growth will be in the developing world, especially in the 50 poorest countries, the U.N. Population Division said.

In a report Thursday, the division said the population in less developed countries is expected to swell from 5.3 billion today to 7.8 billion in 2050. By contrast, the population of richer developed countries will remain mostly unchanged, at 1.2 billion.’

`Two hunters are out in the woods when one of them collapses. He doesn’t seem to be breathing and his eyes are glazed. The other guy takes out his phone and calls the emergency services.

He gasps: “My friend is dead! What can I do?” The operator says: “Calm down, I can help. First, let’s make sure he’s dead.” There is a silence, then a gunshot is heard. Back on the phone, the guy says: “OK, now what?”‘

`The story begins in 1938. My grandmother’s uncle, Peter Traini was living in Italy. In the Ascola Piscena region (Boy I hope I spelled that right or my grandmother will kill me). Several years prior, his brother, Ferdinand Traini, left for America. One day Peter recieved a letter from Ferdinand telling him how wonderful and full of prosperity America was. So Peter decided to make the trip. He boarded a ship in Italy and came to the new and wonderful country Ferdinand had wrote to him about. With him Peter brought only the clothes on his back and this cheese, as a gift for Ferdinand. The cheese even passed through Ellis Island with Peter.’

`3M puts its money where its mouth is.

That’s great advertising (yes, that’s real money in there).’

`The widow of US writer Hunter S Thompson has said her husband killed himself while they were speaking to one another on the telephone. [..]

She said: “I was on the phone with him, he set the receiver down and did it.”

Mrs Thompson said her husband had asked her to come home from a health club so they could work on his weekly column, but instead of saying goodbye, he shot himself.’

`Gay men employ the same strategies for navigating as women – using landmarks to find their way around – a new study suggests.

But they also use the strategies typically used by straight men, such as using compass directions and distances. In contrast, gay women read maps just like straight women, reveals the study of 80 heterosexual and homosexual men and women.

“Gay men adopt male and female strategies. Therefore their brains are a sexual mosaic,” explains Qazi Rahman, a psychobiologist who led the study at the University of East London, UK. “It’s not simply that lesbians have men’s brains and gay men have women’s brains.”‘