Drinking whiskey clear!
Hey everybody! I just thought I’d post a bunch of funny or interesting pics for a bit of Friday fun!
A few weeks ago, someone posted dozens of high-res historical pictures on \hr\ over at 4chan. One of them was this cool picture of Sting from the early 80s:
(WARNING: this pic is 2417×3670 and is 1.97MB)
Hard to believe the “Desert Rose” guy was once that cool!
As you may know, I got a new computer for Christmas. The new machine’s pretty boss, but came with a rather disappointing onboard graphics chipset. So I ordered a new video card for my birthday: a Sparkle GeForce 9400 GT from Newegg. My first PCIe card, the 9400GT has some pretty amazing specs, considering the less than $50 price tag.
I suppose the most amazing is the 1GB of onboard video RAM. I remember getting really excited when I doubled the amount of video RAM on my old Pentium II 350 from 8MB to 16MB. That was something… and here I am, years later, fawning over a video card with 1000MB RAM!
The new card really boosts my WEI rating, too. Here’s a screencap from before the upgrade:
I would say “only in Gaston County… but you know stuff like this happens elsewhere all the time… right?
Aggressive prostitution apparently led to a first-degree burglary charge Thursday against a 26-year-old Lincolnton woman.
Nicole Mary Scarpone of 122 Star Light Drive reportedly forced her way into an apartment on Pembroke Road, near Cox Road and I-85, and asked the three men inside to give her $10 in exchange for sex.
“Defendant stated that she was dropped off over there and had been there before and performed sexual acts, but stated that she was not invited over there tonight and indicated that she just showed up to make some quick money,” Officer B.H. Carr wrote in his warrant affidavit. “Ms. Scarpone asked all the male subjects in the apartment if they had $10 for sex.“
(Bolding mine)
This is bad news:
The National Football League has reached a four-year contract agreement with DirecTV for the leading satellite provider to remain the TV home for the Sunday Ticket package through 2014.
Announced during the NFL owners meeting in Dana Point, Calif., the pay-per-view pact, according to sources familiar with the negotiations, is valued at about $1 billion annually from 2011-2014. DirecTV currently pays some $700 million on its Sunday Ticket contract that expires after the 2010 season.
However, the agreement opens the door to a wider reach for the out-of-home package, which will become available to broadband subscribers that can’t receive DirecTV. This service is aimed at those who reside in multi-unit dwellings or satellite customers with poor sightlines to a satellite signal.
I had hoped that the NFL would finally allow cable operators to offer Sunday Ticket as a cable package (or, even better, games a la carte)… but no dice, at least until 2014. This sucks, but I guess $4 billion is nothing to sneeze at.
via NFL Scores With $4 Billion DirecTV Sunday Ticket Extension – Broadcasting & Cable.
Awwwwww… The poor Baltimore Ravens! It seems that the Browns Ravens don’t want to play at Pittsburgh in prime-time this year, and have petitioned the NFL to have any such games taken off their schedule:
There were rumors that the NFL would begin this season with Ravens-Steelers, a rematch of the AFC championship game, for its Thursday night game. But the Ravens asked not to be considered for a prime-time game at Heinz Field this season when they submitted their scheduling requests to the league, a team official told The Baltimore Sun.
Seriously? What, are you guys afraid to play the Steelers? Seriously? Don’t want to break the cycle of prime-time ass kickings (the Ravens have never beaten the Steelers in Pittsburgh in prime-time)? What is it, Bawlmerr? You guys too chicken to take on Steeltown after losing to us three times last year?
Random fact: the 2008 Steelers became the first team in NFL history to beat a team three times in three different uniforms in a single season: week 4 at home (throwbacks), week 15 in Baltimore (whites), and the AFC Championship in Pittsburgh (home black).
Read more here.
Windows NT (and Windows 2000, Windows XP and Windows Vista) has always had a “guest account”. In theory, you could enable the guest account to allow friends, family members or house guests to access your computer without messing things up too badly. Unfortunately, Microsoft has never made it quite clear (to home users) just what the “guest account” is, and how access rights operate under that user. So most people just don’t bother using it at all.
Windows 7 has a groovy new feature called “guest mode” that’s like the guest account on steroids. It can do this because it uses an improved version of another Microsoft tool – Windows SteadyState – to take a before and after “snapshot” of your PC. As soon as someone logs in under guest mode, a snapshot of your system is taken. The guest user will not be able to change system settings, install any software, or write anyone on the disk outside their own user profile folder. Once the user logs off, any changes made to the profile folder are discarded by SteadyState, and you’re presented with a shiny “new” guest account again. Also, drives can be “locked”, and users would not be able to change anything on a locked drive on your system.
It’s a cool feature, especially for folks like me that are too paranoid to let anyone else use their computers!
Read more about Guest Mode at Lifehacker here.
While the rest of us have been dealing with Hollywood’s stupid “DVD region system” for years, it’s only now that Tinseltown’s folly has hit the corridors of power. It seems that President Obama gave British PM Gordon Brown a basket of 25 “American classic” films during his recent visit to the US. Brown, not normally a film buff, was reportedly “touched” by the gesture… that is, until he actually tried to watch them. It seems that no one in the White House knew about regions, because when Brown popped one of the discs into his player he got the dreaded “Wrong Region” error message.
I find it hard to believe that no one in the White House knew about R1 vs. R2 (to say nothing about the NTSC\PAL thing). How hard would it have been to have someone order them from Amazon UK? Or have someone at the US embassy in London hit the nearest Virgin Megastore and Fedex them to 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue?
This is our technology president?
Amusingly, one British journalist wondered if Clueless might have been included with the film…
California corrections officials have released a new photograph of convicted mass murderer Charles Manson, who is now bald with a thick grey beard.
The photo of the 74-year-old Manson was taken yesterday as part of a routine update of files on inmates at Corcoran State Prison, where he is serving a life sentence for conspiring to murder seven people, said Seth Unger, spokesman for the California Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation.
You know the old saw in films and television about the little girl who gets into her mom’s makeup and tries on all her clothes? Little boys do that too (hopefully with their father’s stuff, though). I know I did.
When I was a little boy, my Dad’s vanity was a wonderland of colognes, balms, creams, combs, sideburn trimmers, and all kinds of exotica. More than once I played “Daddy getting ready for work”, and one thing I’ve always remembered about that was his Lectric Shave.
Lectric Shave is a “pre-shave balm” for people that use electric razors. It’s supposed to lube your face, making it easier for the razor to glide over your skin, and it supposedly makes your facial hairs “stand up” for easier cutting. It’s something that’s been around for years, but I hadn’t thought about it until I saw a commercial for it a few weeks ago. On a following trip to Wal Mart I saw a small bottle of the stuff and decided to give it a try.
Guess what? It works! After using it for a couple of weeks, I can absolutely say that I get a better shave using Lectric Shave then I do without… and with less effort, too! It really does lubricate your skin, and that really does make shaving easier.
NEW YORK – Natasha Richardson, a gifted and precocious heiress to acting royalty whose career highlights included the film “Patty Hearst” and a Tony-winning performance in a stage revival of “Cabaret,” died Wednesday at age 45 after suffering a head injury from a skiing accident.
Alan Nierob, the Los Angeles-based publicist for Richardson’s husband Liam Neeson, confirmed her death Tuesday night in a written statement.
“Liam Neeson, his sons, and the entire family are shocked and devastated by the tragic death of their beloved Natasha,” the statement said. “They are profoundly grateful for the support, love and prayers of everyone, and ask for privacy during this very difficult time.”
The statement did not give details on the cause of death for Richardson, who suffered a head injury when she fell on a beginner’s trail during a private ski lesson at the luxury Mont Tremblant ski resort in Quebec. She was hospitalized Tuesday in Montreal and later flown to a hospital in New York City.