Gadhra dot Com

I don’t know if this is real, but what the fuck?!

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What jackass would actually do this?

Are you telling me for real that people are willing to put all their DNA and biometrics on file for the government to completely fuck with? Do you think they would be willing to get a “small implant” or a barcode tattooed on their neck if it meant getting out of line 30 seconds earlier at McDonalds?

Yeah, me too.

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Just a head’s up – I’m going to be on a cruise, and you’re not. Rest assured I won’t be thinking of you while I smoke a cigar and drink my snifter of brandy out on the veranda of my palatial cabin, or while I’m dipping my tootsies in the “Splash Pool” on Deck 13. Nor will you cross my mind, even a little bit, while I dance in a tuxedo under the New York Harbor fireworks display with my ravishing wife. This will be the day of Ha Ha from me, and you will be reduced to snivelling wrecks of pudding in my mind if I bothered to think of you at all, which I’ve already stated that I wouldn’t. Think of you.

Of course, I return at 11am Monday and have to immediately go into work, and Anastasia flies to Chicago for the big annual meeting of whatever (she’ll be gone for a week). So it looks like it’ll be back to the Haha on me.

But until then – let a man enjoy himself.

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It was inevitable with all the MS security holes, but its finally come to pass – websites are infecting computers through holes in IE. “[I]nfectious Web sites are not just those of minor companies inhabiting the backwaters of the Web, but major companies, including some banks…” reads the article.

Microsoft hasn’t yet issued a patch for this security hole, but has advised its customers to set their security settings to “High”, which “…may cause some Web sites to work improperly.” You can, of course, unset this function when you go to another site. Or, you can download a real fucking browser and stop screwing around with half-assed bullshit.

( this is more or less a reprint of this slashdot story )

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I’ve been accused of being paranoid about my security, particularly in an electronoic medium. I am loathe to give out my email address, social security number, phone number, etc unless it’s to people I really know.

Even this backfires on me sometimes. I can count at least twice where a friend of mine has taken my e-mail address and signed me up for free movie tickets or somesuch, exposing my addy to spammers everywhere. I’ve been tempted to just use a
Sneak Email address with my friends, like I do with everyone else, but it seems so stupid and hard to bring to mind.

Anyway, back to “paranoia.” I’ve been told that I should just trust companies, that they aren’t out to hurt me, etc. Then shit like this happens.

I have no doubt that a “company” might not be after me; after all, I’m probably too small for them to even recognize. But, in the Internet Age, one individual has a great deal of power. It only takes on e-mail to expose how to crack DVDs ( for example ), or one FTP transfer to send 92 million e-mail addresses to spammers everywhere. You can’t necessarily trust a corporate entity to look out for your best interest, since that entity is made up of wildly disparate individuals.

The other thing is that once the snake is out of the bag, so to speak, you’re not going to be able to get him back in. AOL fired the man responsible for the theft and sale. But so-fucking-what? The damage is done. AOL didn’t manage its internal security, and now there’s absolutely nothing you can do about that. Think about this before you read your Social Security number over the phone to someone in Bangladesh – are you sure they’re going to keep it in a safe place?

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T Wrex has come through again!

I want to know – specifically, mind you – what these sword tricks actually are. I’m also curious if this dude actually lives in the forest, because that would be the best ever. He’d be like a German Musashi, all practicing his ancient sword technique on hikers.

I wonder if he’s hiring…

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My man T Wrex put me onto this, a story that made me laugh so hard that I think I temporarily passed out, because I woke up on the floor.

I know I shouldn’t laugh – that it’s a terrible thing, especially with the Tamil Tigers threatening more violence – but the line “Instead of soaring majestically into the air to symbolise the government’s commitment to peace and goodwill, the dove “dropped like a brick” on to the ground.” is too rich to pass up.

The best part for me is the pictures. They’ve got one pic of the guy holding the dove, another of it flapping madly out of his hands, but they don’t have the final pic that I really wanted, of a dove lying toe-up on the ground, maybe his tongue kind of hanging out his mouth because he’s so thirsty. That would have been some journalistic integrity, I can tell you

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Just a head’s up – my Jr. Developer Felix Zaslavskiy made up the term “Mad Bootleg” today, which we feel can be augmented by the addition of “Ghetto” in the middle.

Ghetto inherits “Mad Bootleg,” you see. It’s genius. I expect this term to catch on in the very near future. You heard it here first

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I regret to say that Ray Charles has passed away of liver disease.

I always get kind of down when an artist passes away. Times are tough for dreamers, they say, and to see one of the Army of Lovers leave this plane is always a dark thing. It’s even worse because they’re burying that asshole tomorrow. I don’t even want to say his name; I’m afraid my blog will be indexed and have that jerkoff of a president come up as one of the searches.

Anyway, we lost one of the Good and one of the Bad this week. I hope it balances out on some cosmic scale. I doubt it, but you never know.

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It looks like my parents have sold their house, about 9 minutes after they put it on the market. This came as a bit of a surprise to them, but not to me and my wife – we were shocked it didn’t take 5 minutes, or that my parents weren’t attacked by buyers the moment the first hammer-stroke fell on the For Sale sign out front.

Thing could still fall through, of course, but I kind of doubt it. The house is being purchased by a family down the street (very entrepeneurial of them, if I do say so myself), and I think they have about a hojillion dollars to put down, so I think they *might* get a mortgage (though the bank is still iffy on that – they normally hate giving out mortgages, even though they make even more money than you can possibly imagine of of them. Or I could possibly imagine, at any rate).

So, this means my parents are suddenly (in their minds, anyway) without a home. They’re going to rent something (obviously), but they have to figure out where. They want to stay in Danbury for the next year or so, since they’re going to continue commuting to Stamford until they retire in June 2005 – if you know of any places for rent (personally, not via the newspaper or the InterWeb), you should drop me a line and let me know.

We should have one last LAN party there. I’m going to make that happen…

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