moonbuggy

Here’s a funny complaint letter someone sent regarding embedded images in HTML.

The tattoos on the face are a bit crazy. Others are kinda amusing. For example:

‘The United States and Russia have agreed on a plan to accelerate installation of radiation detection devices at 350 Russian border crossings so the system to prevent nuclear smuggling is fully operational by 2011, U.S. officials said on Friday.

“This announcement is a major cooperative step in counter-proliferation work in Russia,” which contains a major portion of the world’s nuclear material, said Will Tobey, deputy administrator for defense nuclear nonproliferation at the National Nuclear Security Administration, a part of the U.S. Energy Department.

“It will help us prevent smuggling into and out of the region,” he told Reuters in an interview.

Russia identified more than 480 cases of illicit trafficking of nuclear and radioactive material in 2006. While U.S. officials said these cases were not believed to involve weapons-grade nuclear material, the number of cases underscores the scope of the problem.’

Leaping through the air solves a lot of problems.

(845kB Flash video)

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‘A man has been shot dead by a security guard for singing out of tune in a Philippine karaoke bar.

Romy Baligula, 29, was halfway through his song on Tuesday night in a bar in San Mateo town, east of Manila, when 43-year-old security guard Robilito Ortega yelled that he was out of tune.

When Mr Baligula ignored his comments and continued singing, Ortega pulled out his revolver and shot him in the chest.

Senior Superintendent Felipe Rojas said Mr Baligula died instantly. [..]

Deaths and violence are not uncommon in Philippine karaoke bars.

The popular Frank Sinatra song My Way has been taken off many karaoke bars in Manila after it was found to be the cause of fights and even deaths when patrons sang out of tune.’

‘Researchers may have figured out what makes la vita so dolce in Rome. A report from Italy’s National Research Council released Thursday found that there are traces of cocaine and cannabis in the air of the Eternal City.

The institute made the discovery during a study of toxic substances in the air of Rome, Taranto, in the heel of boot-shaped Italy, as well as in Algiers. The results found that in Rome, there were traces of cocaine and cannabis – as well as nicotine, caffeine and benzopirene, which is commonly released in cigarette smoke and auto emissions.

“The highest concentrations of cocaine were found in the center of Rome and especially in the area of the University of La Sapienza,” said Dr. Angelo Cecinato, who led the investigation.’

‘President George W. Bush would like to see a lengthy U.S. troop presence in Iraq like the one in South Korea to provide stability but not in a frontline combat role, the White House said on Wednesday.

The United States has had thousands of U.S. troops in South Korea to guard against a North Korean invasion for 50 years.

Democrats in control of the U.S. Congress have been pressing Bush to agree to a timetable for pulling troops from Iraq, an idea firmly opposed by the president.

White House spokesman Tony Snow said Bush would like to see a U.S. role in Iraq ultimately similar to that in South Korea in which “you get to a point in the future where you want it to be a purely support model.”‘

‘One year on, the torrent of mud gushing out of a drilling site on Java island shows no signs of abating.

Toll roads, railway tracks and factories have been submerged and 15,000 people have fled from their homes since May last year when mud began flowing from a “mud volcano” following an oil-drilling accident in Sidoarjo, an industrial suburb near provincial capital Surabaya.

The mud volcano has put an area four times the size of Monaco under hot mud.

An embankment has been built in an unsuccessful attempt to stop the mudflow.’

Followup to Indonesia plans new tactic to curb massive mud flow.

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‘Nearly half of all men are unhappy with the size of their willies — for no good reason, a study claims.

Researchers say there is no need to worry as 85 per cent of women ARE satisfied with their partner’s penis proportions.

The study found girth matters more than length to 90 per cent of women. The 60-year worldwide research — led by Dr Kevan Wylie of the Royal Hallamshire Hospital in Sheffield — analysed 12,000 willies and quizzed 50,000 adults.

The average erect penis was 5.5ins to 6.2ins long (14cm-16cm) and 4.7ins to 5.1ins (12cm-13cm) in girth.’

‘In the most conspicuous sign yet of India’s unprecedented prosperity, the country’s richest man, Mukesh Ambani, is building a new home in the financial hub of Mumbai: a 60-storey palace with helipad, health club and six floors of car parking.

The building, named Antilla after a mythical island, will have a total floor area greater than Versailles and be home for Mr Ambani, his mother, wife, three children and 600 full-time staff.

Draped in hanging gardens, the building will have a floor for a home theatre, a glass-fronted apartment for guests, and a two-storey health club. As the ceilings are three times as high as a normal building’s, the 173m (570ft) tower will only have 27 floors.’

‘Director Mike Figgis spent longer at LAX airport than intended. He’d arrived in Los Angeles, along with half the acting and directing world, for what is known as ‘pilot season’, when the big studios try out new scripts, directors and actors in a two-week frenzy of auditions and career make-or-breaks. When Figgis was being grilled by airport immigration, he was asked the purpose of his visit. Unthinking and tired after a long flight, Mike replied: ‘I’m here to shoot a pilot.’ After five hours in an interrogation cell (yes, really), he finally made it into town.’

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‘Works to reopen the main road between Langholm and Lockerbie have been delayed by badgers.

The B7068 was closed before Christmas after a landslide at Scroggs Bridge and lengthy diversions put in place.

A council spokesman confirmed that work had ground to halt after a badger sett was found under the route of the works. [..]

“I appreciate that work was delayed because of the discovery of a badgers’ sett and land ownership issues,” he said.

“But from an initial indication that the road would be closed for weeks it has now been months and currently there is no end date in sight. [..]”‘

‘A Minnesota woman who was forced to the ground and handcuffed after a DirecTV dispatcher told police that an installer was being held hostage is suing.

“These are regular people. She’s a schoolteacher. … You shouldn’t have SWAT teams coming after someone if they know there’s not a crisis,” Marc Kurzman, a lawyer for Julie and Steven Pyle of Savage, Minn., told the St. Paul, Minn., Pioneer Press. The Pyles are seeking more than $75,000 in damages in a federal civil rights lawsuit against DirecTV, Savage police and Scott County enforcement dispatchers. [..]

Julie Pyle felt bad the job was taking the installers so long, so she baked them cookies, the lawsuit said.’

It’s one of those claw games, but instead of trying to grab stuffed toys, you’re after live lobsters.

‘Keep your fucking opinions to yourself you arsehole Australians. Don’t write me any more letters like that. That goes for the whole fucking world!’

(30meg Windows media)

see it here »

‘A 5-year-old panda who last year became the first to be released into the wild after being bred in captivity has died, China’s state-run Xinhua News Agency said Thursday.

The body of Xiang Xiang was found Feb. 19 in the forests of Sichuan province in China’s southwest, Xinhua said. He survived less than a year in the wild after nearly three years of training in survival techniques and defense tactics.

Xiang Xiang, who may have fallen from a high place while fighting with wild pandas, died of serious internal injuries, the report said, citing the Wolong Giant Panda Research Center in Sichuan.’

‘Just over one in 10 men do not volunteer to work with children because they are worried people will think they are a paedophile, a survey suggests.

Childrens’ charities NCH and Chance UK also say almost one in five men do not come forward because they would have to undertake a criminal records check. [..]

Work commitments were given as a reason by 59% of those who did not volunteer, and 68% said they did not have enough time.

In all, 13% of the men questioned said they would not choose to volunteer to work with children due to fear of being perceived as a paedophile.’

‘This weekend, learn how to hack your brain by making Mitch Altman’s Brain Machine! It flashes LEDs into your eyes and beeps sounds into your ears to make your brain waves sync up into beta, alpha, theta, and delta brainwaves!’

(1.0meg Flash video)

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‘They have been accused of sexually abusing staff during a drunken rampage through the first-class cabin of an international flight.

Now Sydney men Jeremy Snaith and William Sergeant are eating fermented camel meat inside the notorious al-Wathba prison outside Abu Dhabi. in the United Arab Emirates.

The food is the least of their worries as the wheels of justice grind slowly and Snaith and Sergeant contemplate up to 15 years in a desert prison where the temperatures soar above 50 degrees and punishment includes stonings, lashings, overcrowding and sleeping in lice-infested blankets on cement floors.’

‘As the out-of-control police cruiser hurtled toward them Wednesday night, Crystal Legrand grabbed her two youngest children and took cover behind a wall.

Legrand’s boyfriend snatched up her eldest, a 4-year-old boy named Daviay, trying to reach safety, too, but they couldn’t escape.

The patrol car struck them, killing Daviay Legrand and shattering the boyfriend’s legs. Furious residents later massed at the crash scene and threw bottles and rocks at police. [..]

Two officers – one a rookie, the other an eight-year veteran – had been responding to the same report of a man with a gun when their cruisers collided at a downtown intersection. One of the cruisers slid onto the sidewalk, just a half-block from Legrand’s home. [..]

Another witness, Crystal Spearman, said: “First you heard the sirens, then you heard the tires screech, then you heard the bang. The little boy was laying there, severed in half.”‘

‘The Loch Ness monster is back — and there’s video. A man has captured what Nessie watchers say is possible footage of the supposed mythical creature beneath Scotland’s most mysterious lake.

“I couldn’t believe my eyes when I saw this jet black thing, about 45 feet long, moving fairly fast in the water,” said Gordon Holmes, the 55-year-old a lab technician from Shipley, Yorkshire, who took the video Saturday.

Nessie watcher and marine biologist Adrian Shine viewed the video and hoped to properly analyze it in the coming months.’

I’ll post a copy of the video as soon as it surfaces, so to speak. :) Update: here it is..

see it here »

(1.5meg Windows media)

see it here »

‘Could it be that our soldiers died to enrich five or six International Oil Companies (Four of them American)? Or that possibly a million Iraqis suffered the same fate for the same reason? You might recall that President Bush claimed that one of the Benchmarks the Iraqi Government must meet is a deal to share the Oil revenues. What he didn’t say is with whom they, the Iraqis, will have to share. Seems like it’s not the Iraqis. [..]

Seems that those International Oil Companies (can you say EXXON, MOBILE, and BP for starters), stand to pluck the Iraqi people for about $21 Trillion. Folks that’s twenty one thousand BILLION. In perspective, that’s about double the United States current cash debt, and a little over 40% of the accrued National Debt of $50 Trillion. Figured another way, it’s about $70,000 for every American currently alive. And it will all go to about six Oil companies. Well not all, there’s the Congress to be bought off, actually it seems they already have, but they still need to get a little more of the harvest.’

‘Teenagers who identify as “evangelical” or “born again” are highly likely to sound like the girl at the bar; 80 percent think sex should be saved for marriage. But thinking is not the same as doing. Evangelical teens are actually more likely to have lost their virginity than either mainline Protestants or Catholics. They tend to lose their virginity at a slightly younger age–16.3, compared with 16.7 for the other two faiths. And they are much more likely to have had three or more sexual partners by age 17: Regnerus reports that 13.7 percent of evangelicals have, compared with 8.9 percent for mainline Protestants.’

‘A police marksman is under investigation after accidentally shooting a colleague in an extraordinary blunder.

The victim, a civilian employee, was seriously injured in the accident at a lecture room at the HQ of Thames Valley Police near Oxford.

He was apparently being shown the workings of a police Glock pistol when it went off, blasting him in the torso.

The victim, aged in his 50s, was left writhing in agony with blood pouring from the wound.

He underwent emergency surgery and his condition was described as serious but stable. [..]

One police source at the HQ said: “There are a lot of red faces about this. Why the hell was an experienced firearms officer demonstrating with a loaded pistol in an enclosed environment?

“Someone’s head will have to roll.”‘

‘What the fuck? I can’t see the runway.’

(1.0meg Flash video)

see it here »

‘Turkey’s top general said Thursday his army — which has been massing troops on the border with Iraq — was prepared to attack separatist Kurdish guerrillas in a cross-border offensive.

Gen. Yasar Buyukanit said the military was ready and awaiting government orders for an incursion, putting pressure on the government to support an offensive that risks straining ties with the United States and Europe and raising tensions with Iraqi Kurds.

“As soldiers, we are ready,” Buyukanit said at an international security conference in Istanbul.

Although the United States has branded the guerrillas a terrorist organization, Washington fears that Turkish military action could destabilize northern Iraq — the most stable part of the war-torn country. Washington is also concerned that supporting Turkey in an incursion could alienate the pro-American Iraqi Kurds.’

‘he man infected with potentially fatal tuberculosis is receiving treatment at a Denver, Colorado, hospital as federal health officials continue to track down airline passengers who may have been exposed to the illness.

The man has been identified by multiple medical and law enforcement sources as Andrew Speaker, 31, a lawyer from Atlanta, Georgia.

Speaker’s father-in-law works for the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention in Atlanta, an agency spokesman said Thursday.

The father-in-law, Robert C. Cooksey, is a microbiologist who has conducted research on tuberculosis for the National Center for Infectious Diseases, according to a CDC biography posted on the agency’s Web site.

CNN affiliate WSB-TV reported that Cooksey gave his son-in-law “fatherly advice” after he found out Speaker had contracted the infectious disease, but did not advise him in any official capacity.’

Followup to Man knew he had TB before flying to Europe.