Heaven is a little more gonzo now

Hunter S. Thompson killed himself on sunday. He was an extordinarily interesting person, and a UK basketball fan to boot. Here's an article that he wrote after Kentucky lost in the second round to UAB that foreshadows Sunday's event. Before that artcle he had written one that predicted Kentucky to win it all, but Google isn't providing it for me right now. Here is his obit in the NY Times. I don't mean to define his life as someone that was just a UK fan. Surely he was much more than that. However, it's one of the funny little pieces of his personalty that I really enjoy. (Edit: here is an even better obit from Jacson Specific.)

There was an incredibly interesting story in The Guardian recently about an autistic savant that can actually describe what goes on in his mind when he's "savanting" (I just made that word up). It is worth the read, so read it. He said that he sees numbers as shapes in his head, and they form new shapes when he multiplies them. Craziness. I wish I could do that. There's a paragraph on some of the other feats of savants that is mindblowing. I wonder if the trade off of being socially retarded is worth it...

April seems to have survived the recent convention of the Episcopal Diocese of Lexington, but not without having to live through a little bit of drama. Everything seems to have worked out though. The bishop's address is here and is excellent. I recommend reading it even if you're not Episcopalian (or even Christian). Maybe you won't find it interesting at all, but I did.

Here's some links I've collected over the past weeks that are interesting (to me):

Ecstacy to be tested on US soldiers as theraputic cure to PTSD
Recent galactic flash - could have destroyed life on earth if the star causing it was closer
Microsoft's guide to l337$p3@k - Actually it's an article about it, but there's a link
I want this thing. - Frigging cool.
Love coupons from The Onion. I know Valentine's Day is over, but that doesn't make these any less funny.
The Collected Works of Bloodninja. If you haven't read these, you must. Great stuff.

And to finish things out, here's the result of my personality test. It's a quick test that seems pretty accurate, so do with that what you will....

Cattell's 16 Factor Test Results Warmth |||||||||||||||||| 54% Intellect |||||||||||||||||||||||| 78% Emotional Stability |||||||||||||||||||||||||||| 82% Aggressiveness |||||||||||||||||| 54% Liveliness |||||||||||||||||| 58% Dutifulness ||||||||||||||| 46% Social Assertiveness |||||||||||||||||||||||| 74% Sensitivity ||||||||||||||| 42% Paranoia ||||||||| 30% Abstractness ||||||||||||||||||||| 70% Introversion ||||||||||||||| 46% Anxiety ||||||||||||||| 46% Openmindedness |||||||||||||||||||||||||||| 86% Independence ||||||||||||||| 50% Perfectionism ||||||||||||||||||||| 62% Tension ||||||||| 30%

Take Cattell 16 Factor Test (similar to 16pf)
personality tests by similarminds.com

Free these guys. Yeah!

Linky

I am incredibly busy

I have lots of great pictures to post, so you're going to have to deal with it. I will try to cleverly disperse them throughout the blog.

First off, I have to respond to the guy who made a comment on my last post. Much to my surprise, someone is reading this blog. He pointed out that RSS Bandit does allow a type of synchronization between multiple computers so one can tell what they've read. I'm really impressed with this feature, to be honest. Unfortunately bloglines is just too easy to use, and it's current no matter where I access it from. I'll probably just stick with it.

Although none of them read this blog, I know about fifty people who are having birthdays. So, Happy Birthday to Lauren, Natalie, Jeff, Jenny, Jennifer, Levi, and Kell. Sheesh!

I got an email from my old job that an "official" looking letter had arrived for me. I told them to go ahead an open it, and they emailed back and said I was supposed to call a 1-800 number to claim a one million dollar prize. I knew this is some kind of scam (which I confirmed by googling the sender, NME/Pat Haynes), but it definitely lead to a little jackpot fantasizing. It's really fun to think about all the stuff I'd buy if I had a million bucks. I won't go into great detail, but it includes a helluva lot of computer stuff and music. That probably explains why engadget is one of my favorite sites.

I decided to volunteer for Tubby Smith's Clubhouse/Dell's TechKnow program, and have been going for the last two weeks. It's been really fun so far. They take middle school students and teach them all about the parts of a computer (by disassembling and reassembling) as well as installing an operating system. When the class is over, they get to keep the computer they've set up. I'm just there to help with little stuff, but it's a lot of fun. I feel like I'm using my knowledge for something worthwhile.

So the General Convention of the Episcopal Diocese of Lexington starts this evening with a Eucharist at Christ Church. I am possibly carrying the banner for our new church, All Saints. I am also a bar tender/punch server for the following reception. We're going to a fancy dinner friday night at the Marriot, too. April is a delegate. She has to be there all day Friday and Saturday, and she will be voting on all the resolutions and budget. This big resolution is obviously this one, the Tabled Resolution Regarding Sacramental Marriage. It's a bit strange as it assumes that we're all for marrying gay people. I don't really think that's what we're trying to do. First off, the church can't marry anyone unless the government says it's okay. All the church does is bless the legal union, and in a way the priest acts as an official of the state by signing a paper that makes the marriage legal. So the church could want to marry all the gay people in Kentucky, but until the state government says we can, it doesn't matter. Regardless, I don't think that's the intention of the bishop or the diocese. I don't think most people have a problem with blessing a same sex union, but that's not a marriage. It's all very fuzzy, I guess. We'll see what happens.

  

I have to say something about the basketball team. The last two games have sucked. We really need to get our shit together for Mississippi State this weekend. We're talented, but young, and some of the players are starting to rest on their non-existant laurels. I'm sure Tubby will whip them in to shape, but c'mon. Lets pick it up, Cats.

I know it's a scam and will add loads of spam to your inbox (so use gmail or get a spam filter), but someone please, please complete an offer so I can get a free iPod. I only need two more people to do it. I'll be your best friend forever, I promise. Here's the link: http://www.freeiPods.com/?r=8102907. PUH-LEASE.

All time blogging blunders

So I pulled off one of classic stupid moves. I wrote 99% of my blog entry, didn't save it, and turned off the computer. And boy, it was long and funny. Now I have to recreate it. I will do my best, but I've really lost my motivation at this point. If I have one suggestion for the creators of w.bloggar (the program I use to write these entries), it is: autosave.

I ran across this site last week. It's one of the funniest damn things I've seen a while. The "yearbook" pictures at the bottom of the page are hilarious. The reason I find it so funny is because there was a time in my life, probably about 5th grade, when everyone that was "cool" also thought that Iron Maiden was "cool". I can remember buying a copy of Somewhere in Time on vinyl. It had awesome artwork, as you can see here and here. Here is a list of "hidden messages" in the artwork. One of the neatest parts is that there are many references to Blade Runner, which is my favorite movie. At the time, I hadn't even seen it. Really, I just bought the album because it looked cool. If you want a good synopsis of the band's history, check out their wikipedia page. I never would have known that I was listening to "intelligent metal" at the time, but thinking back on it, that's exactly what it was. All they did was sing about historical events and weird shit. Not really your run of the mill metal band. I think I'm going to have to spend some time going back and listening to their albums.

I've been using RSS Bandit as my news aggregator. It works really well - it is a little buggy sometimes, but I like it for the most part. The fundamental flaw is that it can only keep track of what you've read on one computer. I have it loaded on my computer at work, since that's the computer I'm in front of most of the time. Unfortuantely, I only have a little time to go over news, so it all ends up piling up. I heard about feedster, but I could never get it to import all my feeds from RSS Bandit. I tried over and over, even emailed their support. No response. Piece-o-crap. Eventually I stumbled onto Bloglines, and it friggin rocks. It does exactly what I want it to. It even has a few advantages over RSS Bandit. So I recommend using it if you use a news aggregator. You can see all my feeds here, and can even export them if you'd like to use my list as a starting point for your own. Apparently there is another online news aggrigator, Rojo, but it's invite only. I've requested an invitation, so we'll see if that ever comes through.

I'm thoroughly intrigued by the technorati tags, although I can't really figure out a good way to use them. Blogger doesn't really "support" them, and I don't feel like classifying all my hyperlinks. I really like how they incorporate flickr, del.icio.us, and technorati - all 3 services that I use. If anyone knows an effective way to use tags, please let me know.

I want to take this opportunity to point out that I have a wonderful and beautiful wife. She says I don't write enough about her in my blog, so I'm doing something to rectify that. Really, I'm afraid to write much because I know I'm just going to get myself into trouble. I'll just end with: April, you are the light of my life ;).

Things at Apostles are really looking up. We had a good turn out this morning, and we're having our big organizational meeting this afternoon at 2:00. If anyone like to come, it's at 1321 Trend Blvd (map). It's an odd time for the diocese because it seems like everyone is pissed off about something. Hopefully we can take a step back and ignore some of the useless politics, and do what we're supposed to do as a church. I'm going to suggest that we start a congregational blog once things gets going. Apparently at lot of the criticism about Stacy and the diocese has come from blogs, so maybe we can counteract that a bit.

this blog is boring. go away.

I love those weird little random instant messages that are waiting for me when I get back to my computer. Dunno what prompted this. Only think I can guess is this blog.

(20:47:53) SpIk3daMan: wow can you be any more boring
(20:47:53) silent : Sorry, I ran out for a bit!
(22:18:54) silent: who the fuck are you?
(22:18:55) Unable to send message: Not logged in

At least have the balls to stay around and wait for a reply. Oh well. Splk3daMan, if you're out there, READ A DIFFERENT BLOG. This is not for you. It's purley for me. In fact, you're not allowed to read it any more. So kiss my hairy bean bag.

By the way, my new computer is the shiz-nickety-it. What do you have to say to that, Mr. Splk3daMan?