Hot from the inbox: Fellow blogger, I am sending this message to the bloggers on my blogroll (and a few other folks) in the hopes that some of you will print this, or at least find it interesting enough for comment. I’m not usually the type to distribute such messages, but I felt this was important enough to risk disturbing you. As some of you may already know, a wing of the South Korean government, the Ministry of Information and Culture (MIC), is currently clamping down on a variety of blogging service providers and other websites. The government is attempting to control access to video of the recent Kim Sun-il…

Fox News Channel To Sign Off In Japan This was inevitable I think. When they changed to paid subscription in the aftermath of the their first announcement of quitting in 2001, I was happy because the option was there to add the channel to my SkyPerfect TV (satellite broadcaster) plan. The thing is, I half think that they must have wanted an excuse (low subscription numbers) to bail entirely, because the monthly fee was set at 1,000 yen. Not a reasonable amount when you consider that CNN and BBC international editions (in English and Japanese) are free with most basic plans. So I bookmarked channel 740 as a favorite and…

Until today, I had always been under the impression that there were no civilian casualties as a result of Japanese attack on the US mainland during WWII. Wrong: http://slate.msn.com/id/2102499/ Sure, I’d heard of the largely ineffective shelling of oil fields in Santa Barbara, a telegraph station in Vancouver (Canada), and Fort Stevens in Oregon by Japanese submarines, as well as forest fires caused by incendiary bombing done by a sub-launched plane (which were fought by the predecessor of modern smoke jumper batallions, the 555th Parachute Infantry Battalion). I’d also read about the balloon bomb project fugo launched on the emperor’s birthday in 1944. However, most of the reports I had…

Using piranhas for bait!: Fishing for vampires. Via Fishing, Drinking, Stinking, the best fishing blog I have ever seen.

How about the ever-popular *hugs* ? (>_< )( >_< ) My intellectual offering for today is a short story written exclusively in the *hugs* format (as in, "You broke up with Brandon? You poor thing! *hugs*”): *wakes* *wipes shit out of eyes* *hungers* *stir fries kitten with soy sauce* *savors* *eructates* *breaks wind* *soils pants* *grins*

I may have gone to university with this guy… Jeff, is it really you?

Will pay $300 for portable ion cannon in good, serviceable condition. I’m pretty handy with a melder so older wiring is acceptable, but guidance rod must be in good condition as I plan for medium- to long-range use. All these irritating motherfuckers around me must die…

This is really, really disgusting and definitely sounds like a job for KIKKOMAN: By producing soy sauce from such raw materials, the producers were said able to cut costs by half. Workers employed at the plants, however, never bought soy sauce marked as “blended” on the packaging, because that usually meant that human hair was the basic material in the sauce. Chinese cost reduction at its best. Read the whole article. I, for one, love locally produced shoyu. I just bought a big sake bottle full of home-brewed stuff they sell at a local market. Cosmic Chowhound tip of the day: Keep soy sauce in the fridge as it prevents…

Aoccdrnig to a rscheearch at Cmabrigde Uinervtisy, it deosn’t mttaer in waht oredr the ltteers in a wrod are, the olny iprmoatnt tihng is taht the frist and lsat ltteer be in the rghit pclae. The rset can be a taotl mses and you can sitll raed it wouthit porbelm. Tihs is bcuseae the huamn mnid deos not raed ervey lteter by istlef, but the wrod as a wlohe. (Hat tip to my dad for the e-mail)

Dude. This is my greatest accomplishment in years. I inadvertently stumbled onto two Neal Stephenson short stories YOU NEVER EVEN KNEW EXISTED. Spew is on the WIRED site, but I guess I just never found it until now. I am posting the entirety of the Great Simoleon Caper in the extended entry of this post for posterity, because I can’t find it on a server I trust to keep it up forever.