Guess when Windows 8 is dropping?

Sometime in 2012. And Windows 7 just dropped last October. Glad I don't have to worry about that shit.

Audie Murphy

Audie Murphy was the most decorated U.S. soldier of WWII. He received 33 citations and awards, including the Medal of Honor, and personally killed at least 240 enemy soldiers and destroyed six tanks. Murphy also appeared in 44 films and tried his hand at country music.

Origins of the Zionist movement

From The Battle for God: A History of Fundamentalism by Karen Armstrong (p. 150):

For the secular Zionists were quite blatant about their rejection of religion. Their movement was indeed a rebellion against Judaism. Many of them were atheists, socialists, Marxists. Very few of them observed the commandments of the Torah. Some of them positively hated religion, which they thought had failed the Jewish people by encouraging them to sit back passively and wait for the Messiah. Instead of helping them to struggle against persecution and oppression, religion had inspired Jews to retreat from the world in strange mystical exercises or the study of arcane texts. The spectacle of Jews weeping and clinging to the stones of the Western Wall in Jerusalem, the last relic of the ancient Temple, filled many Zionists with dismay. This apparently craven dependence upon the supernatural was the obverse of everything that they were trying to achieve. The Zionists wanted to create a fresh Jewish identity, a New Jew, liberated from the unhealthy, confining life of the ghetto. The New Jew would be autonomous, the controller of his own destiny in his own land. But this quest for roots and self-respect amounted to a declaration of independence from Jewish religion.

The island rule

Last November I learned that Homo floresiensis was a distinct species, and that possibly an earlier species migrated to the island of Flores and shrunk in size. But why do animals either shrink or grow once they inhabit a lonely island? This answer lies in what biologists call the island rule. In essence, small animals become larger because they don't have as many natural predators, and large ones dwarf because they don't have as many resources as they once did on the mainland. Less food on the island would mean that the smaller young would have a better chance of surviving. That is probably what happed to the Flores hobbit.

Bromidic

Bromidic means "commonplace; trite."

Does heat cause suntanning?

In short, no. Only the sun's rays can cause tanning. Even people in cold climates can get tanned or sunburned if they expose themselves to the sun.

Cuyahoga River Fire of 1969

On June 22, 1969, an oil slick caught on fire in the Cuyahoga River, which runs through Cleveland, OH. No one knows for sure what caused it. It wasn't the first time the river was set ablaze; it happened in 1868, 1883, 1887, 1912, 1922, 1936, 1941, 1948, and 1952. But the 1969 incident helped trigger environmental awareness across the country, which brought about the passage of the Clean Water Act in 1972.

Mine-detecting rats

There are really no words to describe how cool this is. Click here for the video.

McChrystal voted for Obama

Plus, all the other neat stuff you'll find out in the Rolling Stone article.

Why do we call it "soccer"?

In 1863, a group called the Football Association met to decide the fate of the sport, after which rugby broke from football. Since the nickname was already soccer, from the term "assocciation football," we stole the term, and the rest of the world adopted the word football.

Krubera Cave

The Krubera Cave is the world's deepest cave, at 7,188 feet. It's located in the country of Georgia. James Tabor mentions Krubera in his new book Blind Descent: The Quest to Discover the Deepest Place on Earth.

Roofies

Roofies are used as a really strong sedative, hypnotic (for short-term treatment of severe insomniacs who don't respond to other hypnotics), and skeletal muscle relaxant. It's known as a date rape drug, although studies have shown that it contributes to a very small percentage of reported date rape instances.

I got it from The Hangover.

Ruppell's Vulture

The Ruppell's Vulture is believed to be the world's highest flying bird, commonly soaring at 19,700 feet above sea level. One day in 1973, an airplane gobbled up a Ruppell's Vulture gliding at 36,100 feet. That was the record.

Dubuque, IA

Videojug pages

Look what I got in my inbox today:

Hello,

Apologies for emailing you out of the blue but i recently came across your blog and wanted to get in touch.

I am the editor of videojug.com, the world’s leading ‘how to’ website. We’re about to get bigger and better and we're looking for some skilled writers & bloggers to become Founder Members our new service which is called Videojug Pages - you can see it here - http://pages.videojug.com

Essentially Videojug Pages is knowledge-sharing website where people with specific interests, passions and know-how can share their knowledge with our users, meet like-minded who share their passions and earn money through our revenue-sharing scheme.

If you want to know exactly how this works you can watch our 2 minute video here - http://pages.videojug.com/148-video-all-about-Videojug-Pages

As a Founding Member you will be able to help shape how the site develops and establish yourself as font of knowledge on the subjects you know and love.

There are some great benefits to being a Founder member and i'm building up a list of those who want to be involved. If you're interested in finding out more then please let me know. You can reply to this email (it’s come from a real person!) and I will email you more information and a start-up pack.

Looking forward to hearing from you.

Best wishes,

Harriet

Harriet Hungerford
Editor

Should I believe this shit? The video looks real, but the fact that some person emailed me for no reason, not to mention the bad grammar, seems peculiar.

Virga

Virga is precipitation that evaporates before hitting the ground.

Cairo Metro

The Cairo Metro is currently the only full-fledged metro system in Africa. It carries 700 million passengers a year, 2 million daily.

Beat LA!

The Boston Celtics chant "Beat LA!" started in Game 7 of the 1982 Eastern Conference Finals when the Philadelphia 76ers were getting done beating Boston. With 26 seconds to go in the game, fans started chanting the now-famous phrase, in hopes that Philly would beat the hated Lakers in the NBA Finals. The Sixers would go on to lose in 6.

But seriously, though... beat LA.

If It Was My Home

Check out how big the BP oil spill would be if it was located in your state.

Summing hours in Excel that exceed 24 hours...

To automatically format times that when added together exceed 24 hours, 60 minutes, or 60 seconds, you can use the following custom number formats and the SUM function in Excel:

* Hours = [h]:mm:ss
* Minutes = [m]:ss
* Seconds = [ss]

If you have OpenOffice, you don't have to worry about this because it automatically does it for you.

International Pun Contest

The International Pun Contest is a gathering where losers see who can make the lamest puns.

Green thumb

Someone with a green thumb is said to have a talent for gardening and growing plants.

Implicit Association Test

The Implicit Association Test is a tool used to probe one's ability to pair two words as fast as possible, so that the shorter the selection time the more it's ingrained in your memory. The most known IAT test is the one on race. That, however, has been hotly debated by other scientists.

Take any of the tests and see.

Zoot Suit Riots

I guess you can read the Wikipedia article, or you can watch this great vid from an AP U.S. History student.

The riots ended on this day in 1943.

Oxford comma

An Oxford comma is a comma that precedes the words and or or, when those conjunctions come before the final item in a list of three or more words. Confusing? Here's an example:

Teams that suck: Cowboys, Mavs, and Rangers.

The Oxford comma is the one right after Mavs. Some people would choose to write it like this:

Teams that suck: Cowboys, Mavs and Rangers.

These two sentences aren't so hard to understand, but take a look at this one:

...Nelson Mandela, an 800-year-old demigod and a dildo collector.

The writer of this piece meant to say that there were three people involved, but the unsuspecting reader would think that the writer was being a jackass in saying that Mandela is an ancient deity who likes to stick things up his vagina (don't judge). It would be easier if the writer had just inserted a comma after the word demigod. That may not eliminate all potential confusion, however. If the sentence were:

...Nelson Mandela, an 800-year-old demigod, and a dildo collector.

then one might suppose that the writer thinks Mandela is an 800-year-old demigod, although he would be excluded from the possibility of being a dildo collector.

My take: use the fucking Oxford comma. It saves so much trouble. Even in the last example, who the hell would seriously believe that the author wants to say that Mandela is a demigod? It just gets to common sense when small ambiguities like that occur.

What exactly is self-respect?

And how is it different from self-esteem? Basically, self-respect is when you like yourself no matter if you win or lose. Self-esteem involves self-evaluation where your main goal is to win. For instance, I may know I have a horrible singing voice but I still have fun at the karaoke. People with self-respect don't care if they're good or not.

Read the article. It's pretty damn informative.

"White America" music video

Eminem has a music video for his hit "White America," off his 2002 album The Eminem Show. But it's one of those low-budget cartoon videos that was probably created way after the fact. It's a shame because this song was my favorite off the album.

Fun fact: The Eminem Show was released on this day eight years ago. Ahh, I sure remember those times.

Flag etiquette when a speaker arrives

12. When displayed from a staff in a church or public auditorium on or off a podium, the flag of the United States of America should hold the position of superior prominence, in advance of the audience, and in the position of honor at the clergyman's or speaker's right as he faces the audience. Any other flag so displayed should be placed on the left of the clergyman or speaker (to the right of the audience).

Brian Peppers

Brian Peppers is a registered sex offender in Ohio. He was 37 years old at the time this picture was taken, and yes that's real.

What exactly is a Swiss bank account?

They're not just for VIPs or the deposed prince of Zamunda. Anyone, as long as you're 18 years old or older and relatively well-off, can have an account. You don't have to personally go to Switzerland to open one; many banks let you mail or fax your information. But most require you have a minimum balance, ranging from a few thousand to the millions.

Neither the bank officers or employees can give away any of your personal data, not even to the Swiss government, except when drug trafficking or the like is associated with the account. Breaking this law results in very steep penalties. This idea was reinforced when Hitler declared that any German holding money in foreign banks would die. Swiss bankers became even more secretive.

Plus, Switzerland's economy doesn't have the dramatic, emotional whirlwind, we-got-three-minutes-to-live, GET TO DA CHOPPA structure that some other countries (right here) do. Other than being really stable, they haven't gone to war since 1505. So they're also really boring. In the event of a bank failure, you're guaranteed all your money, thanks to the Depositor Protection Agreement governed by the Swiss Bankers Association. It's like the FDIC on steroids.

There's a whole lot of other interesting shit. Click the link.