Auto Tags for Muggles and Harry Potter Fans

MuggleNet has assembled a collection of auto tags feature Harry Potter and other characters. This is a great collection, and it's too bad you can only choose one for your vehicle. Some of my favorites include:

The Rationales Each Party Will Give If They Lose The Election

Republicans:

1. The black vote

2. Also, the youth vote

3. And the elderly

4. And the hispanics

5. And the gays and lesbians

6. And the women

7. And the early voters

8. Jesus, who did we have voting for us?

9. White dudes with Sarah Palin MILF fantasies? Really, that’s it?

10. Give me that gin. And that Ambien.

Democrats:

1. Racism.

2. Diebold.

3. Karl Rove. Somehow.

Libertarians

1. Dude, we’re Libertarians.

2. We never win.

3. We can’t win.

4. And frankly, if we did win, we’d probably all pee ourselves in terror.

5. And so would you.

6. Now, let’s smoke a bowl and watch some porn.

[Whatever]

The Way Keyboards Should Be Made

Happy Halloween

Happy Halloween, everyone. Go out there, have fun, and take lots of pics!

Eight Year Old Girl Tells It Like It Is

You know you have a good show going when an eight year old girl takes on Bill O'Reilly. I think she does a great job of explaining why people like Bill do more harm than rap music and video games. Would like to put in a personal request that everyone who views her video (below) go to YouTube and vote on the video (links at the bottom). Eight Year Old Girl Tells It Like It Is If anyone knows Bill O'Reilly, beat his stupid ass for me. I really can't stand this *explicative deleted* idiot. Bill O'Reilly Responds If you know this girl's parents and family, tell them they did a great job raising her. They should not be shamed - they should be congratulated for raising a well informed child who has valid (and valued) opinions. YouTube - The Coolest 8 Year Old In The World Talks About O'Reilly

The Best of Late Night

Yesterday in New York City, a woman gave birth to a baby at JFK airport. People at JFK were shocked because it was the first time in years they have seen an on-time arrival. -Conan O'Brien In an article in The Washington Post, medical experts say Joe Biden may have had Botox. You know how they could tell? His expression didn’t change when they asked him about his hair plugs. -Jay Leno Josh Brolin, who plays President Bush in the new movie “W.,” says at first he wasn’t sure he should take the role, because it would be such an acting challenge. Brolin says he prepared for the role by getting up every day, running five miles, and then bashing himself in the head with a hammer. -Conan O'Brien Tonight was the very last presidential debate . . . which means prayer does work. -Jay Leno Two big wildfires are burning in California. Emergency teams are trying to contain the fire. They are trying to drive them to homes that have already been foreclosed on. -Jimmy Kimmel A group linked to Democrats is now being investigated because they’ve been accused of falsifying voter registration forms, including one for Mickey Mouse. President Bush was furious when he heard this, because he thought Mickey Mouse was a Republican. -Conan O'Brien Today is Columbus Day, which is why all the banks are closed. At least I think that’s why all the banks are closed . . . -Jay Leno In a new interview, Nicole Richie said she has no plans to get married, but it could happen eventually. Then Richie said the same thing about lunch. -Conan O'Brien Well, the market went down over 700 points today. Oh, that reminds me. You know, we turn our clocks back soon. We're turning it back to 1929, I believe. -Jay Leno This economy is crazy. Are you with me on that one? This is what I saw today. I saw a Lehman Brothers executive walking around town wearing a sign that read, 'Will work for a seven-figure bonus.' -David Letterman

How Many Cigarettes Do You Smoke?

I quit smoking about ten years ago, but it still amazes me how many cigarettes I smoked (or could have smoked if I didn't quit). SmokeCount shows you, in a fun and entertaining way, how many cigarettes you've smoked (or could have smoked). It also has tools to help you quit smoking (or, if you want to continue to smoke, they have tools to help you do that, too ;) SmokeCount And remember, smoking could be good for the economy, because we all need to buy, buy, buy (hint, that was sarcasm).

The Best of Late Night

A new poll shows only 1 out of 4 people approve of the job President Bush is doing. That means when he’s having dinner with his wife and two daughters, he’s the only one at the table who thinks he’s doing a good job. -Jay Leno During the Sarah Plain interview with Katie Couric on CBS News, Sarah Palin could not remember the name of a newspaper or magazine that she reads. I was thinking, “Wow — possibly, a leader of the country who doesn’t read.” Then I thought, “Well hell, it’s worked pretty well for George Bush.” -David Letterman Economists are now claiming that our nation’s leaders didn’t properly explain the bailout plan to the public. After hearing this, President Bush said, "While you’re at it, someone should explain it to me.” -Conan O'Brien The vice presidential debate is tomorrow night. Joe Biden already gearing up: He went to the hair salon and told the guy to put a little more on top. -Jay Leno Last night during an interview on CBS, Sarah Palin said, "One of my best friends is a lesbian, and I love her dearly." After hearing this, Bill Clinton said, "Prove it.” -Conan O'Brien Congress voted against the bailout. They were told to vote their conscience. That totally confused them . . . they said, “What?!?” -Jay Leno New York’s Mayor Bloomberg, he’s been in office for two terms, wants to be mayor for three terms; and right now he’s trying to get around the term limits so he can run again. I bet he can — by God, he got around the height requirement. -David Letterman Yesterday, the Dow Jones dropped 777 points, which wiped out $1.2 trillion dollars in the stock market. Financial experts say the last time so much money disappeared in one day was when Oprah left her purse in a cab. -Conan O'Brien To give you an idea of how bad the economy is, over the weekend, I wrote a check and the bank bounced. -Jay Leno Yesterday at the White House, President Bush was visited by Jewish leaders, who wished him a happy Jewish New Year. The visit upset Bush, because now he thinks he missed Jewish Christmas. -Conan O'Brien The vice presidential debate is Thursday. Here’s what Sarah Palin should do: Let Joe Biden have the first question. He’ll take 90 minutes to answer . . . then say, “We’re out of time! Who could have seen that coming?” -Jay Leno Today, the House of Representatives voted against the Wall Street bailout plan, a plan which House Minority Leader John Boehner called "a crap sandwich." Congress hasn’t given up — they’re already working on a new plan they call "a crap sandwich with cheese.” -Conan O'Brien

Warioland - Shake It Up

I love how the Wii changes the way games are played. The tilt controllers, nun-chucks, etc really make you interact with the game. I watched a promotional video for Wario Land: Shake It! which really made me want to play it right now! If ever a full-body Wii controller could be used, this is the game to use it on. Wario Land: Shake It Promotional Video on YouTube

Geek Horoscope

Geek Horoscopes, brought to you by an overworked tech support worker (BBspot). My favorite is: Scorpio Oct 24 - Nov 21 You will find the source of your problems exist between the keyboard and the chair.

Free Gift For First Reader to Email Me

I recently managed to snag some extended length Netflix trial coupons. These coupons extend the regular 14 day trial out to 1 month (30 days). Here's what you get:

• 1 Free Month (no taxes, fees, nothing)
• No Due Dates
• No Late Fees
• Free Shipping Both Ways

I have one coupon left. It is valid until Oct 31, 2008. If you would like to advantage of this offer, please send me an email at: mj-netflix @ neaturl.net (remove the extra spaces). I'll give this to the first person who emails (based on when the email arrived on my mail server). Good luck to all.

Things Sarah Palin Can Name

That's right, there are a few things Sarah Palin can actually name, such as her favorite characters from "Top Gun" - Maverick. My favorite list: VP Candidates I Could Beat in a Debate

• Carrot Top
• Trig
• Ms. Teen South Carolina
• Stephen Hawking in a power outage
• Dan Quayle
• Joe Biden

Find these lists and more at Things Sarah Palin Can Name

New $1 Bill

The Treasury Department released a new one dollar bill, this morning:

World of Warcraft Credit Card

The World of Warcraft Blog brings news of a Visa credit for World of Warcraft players. First National Bank of Omaha is offering a Visa credit with a World of Warcraft background. Using the card will earn you extra game time in WoW.

The World of Warcraft Visa card is available to U.S. residents with a World of Warcraft game account, putting one percent of every dollar spent on “qualifying purchases” toward time in the game and giving cardholders a free month of play the first time they use the card. The cards are available in 13 different and very sexy designs, with detailed artwork featuring the game’s various races, including Night Elves, Tauren, Dwarves, Trolls and of course, Orcs and Humans.

It may seem like kind of a weird rewards program, but with 11 million subscribers, many of whom would leap at the chance to publicly declare their WoW allegiance - not to mention the potential for free play time - I think it’s a brilliant move. Even more importantly, it’s yet another sign that gamers are being recognized as adults, and taken seriously for the “cultural demographic” they represent. Of course, laying down your World of Warcraft Forsaken Visa may not get you taken seriously by the maître d’, but sometimes legitimacy has to come one step at a time.

TIVO new User Interface in testing, features Picture in Guide at last!

The DVD Rental Video Blog brings news that TiVo will soon feature some changes to its user interface, including Picture In Guide.

If I were to list one basic feature I’ve always wanted for my TIVO is an integrate User Interface with Picture in Guide (PIG). Little has changed with its interface over the years, picture is obstructed by grid-style onscreen guide while navigating though user menu to retrieve list of recording show or change settings. Competitors such as DirectTV, Dish Network and Cable service carriers have long offering DVR with PIG. That soon to change; Tivo is cooking up a user interface with a complete new look- Featuring PIG with ability to display picture while peruse user guide.

Read the full article at the DVD Rental Video Blog.

VOTE FOR MARTY

I generally shun musical videos on YouTube, but this one was too funny to pass up. I kinda wanna vote for him, now :)

Man In The Box - Union Gary

Something a little fun for ya'll:

Spore - First Impressions

Yesterday, I played Spore for about seven hours total, mostly straight through. I took an hour break about four hours into play to eat and do some household chores. Spore has five levels of evolution: Cellular, Creature, Tribal, Civilization, and Galaxy. Each level has a series of goals you must accomplish to reach the next level. I completed the first four levels, and played about five minutes in the Galaxy level before I had to quit. Spore is definitely a different game. I found it to be quite fun, and think this is one of those rare games that would interest both boys and girls. I especially enjoyed the creature creator, and having the ability to design and modify my creature. Below are my impressions of each level: Cellular - For me, this was one of the funnest levels, but also the shortest. I completed the cellular stage after about 25-30 minutes, and now that I know how to do it, could complete this much sooner, I think. This is unfortunate, because I thought the cellular level was very enjoyable. My only other complaint is that once you reach your evolutionary goal, you stop being able to collect DNA points. You can still hunt/eat and you can mate, but anything you kill or eat does not go to your DNA bank. However, this appears to only be true on the cellular level. Creature - Once I understood what needed to be done, this was fun, also. I spent about 10-15 minutes trying to understand how to make friends with other creatures. In this level, you either need to make friends with creatures or make them go extinct. As you progress in this stage, you gain intelligence. That increased intelligence allows you add one or more creatures to your party. These can be creatures from your nest or from the befriended creatures. My creatures were more specialized for combat, which made befriending other creatures a little difficult. I made a few friends early on, but afterwards my dancing/posing/charming skills weren't high enough. When you try to make friends, you have to repeat what the other creatures does. For example, the other creature might do a little dance, so you push the dance button. Each creature in your group does the dance, and the more who dance the better you impress the new creature. However, I noticed that as I progressed, the new creatures would call his nest-mates over to dance with him. This makes it more difficult to impress them, because you need a higher skill of dancing to impress 2, 3, or 4 creatures. Don't get me wrong, this level was a lot of fun. You definitely should explore the map, as I picked up a LOT of body parts. I played this level for about thirty minutes more after I reached my goals, just so I could find new body parts (and earn more DNA points). This is the last level you can modify the base creature, so you want to find everything you can to make him the best. Tribal - This is definitely the most difficult stage. You start with a tribe of five creatures. You must make peace with or exterminate five other tribes. You must also assign food gathering tasks to some of your tribesmen. Finally, you must construct buildings so your tribesmen can use weapons, musical instruments (for making peace), and fishing tools. The first time I tried to make peace with another tribe, I found the instructions VERY confusing. The in-game instructions really did not explain to me what I needed to do. To make peace, you need to construct buildings that make musical instruments (horns, marachas, and pipes). You bring the chief and at least one tribesman with an instrument (best to bring all three types) to the new tribe. The new tribe will tell you (with pictographs) what they want to hear. Once you understand how to do this, it's very easy - much easier than making friends at the creature stage. I befriended three tribes, but two tribes tried to steal my food, so I decided to wipe them out. This is a LOT more difficult than you think. Each tribe has basically the same number of people. When I started my war campaign, we all had 12 people. The problem for the warrior is that you must leave at least one person (two is best) to do fishing and food gathering, and at least one more to protect your food from wild creatures. So, now you are invasion of 9 (at best) against 12. I found two strategies that seem to work for this. The first one is send people, one at a time to raid the food of the rival tribe. You want to send a stream (like five), one after another (not all together). Expect the first one or two to die - they are the diversion anyway. Tribes need food to create new people and to buy/repair buildings. I also found that during combat, you can send someone to raid the food, and the raider will be successful 90% of the time. The second strategy is one of attrition. I created two groups of warriors. The first group being the largest (five or six). Send the first group to the edge of the tribe. When a tribesman comes near, begin the combat. You want your five or six to distract the tribe, so let them fight all the people. Next, send your remaining soldiers to attack a building (or raid the food). The goal is to destroy the chief's hut, but the hut is very strong. One tribe I fought, I had to destroy the secondary buildings first to wear down the tribe's food supply. When they were finally broke, I was able to destroy the chief's hut. Civilization - Once you get use to the camera controls, this stage is more like an RTS (real time strategy) game. I found this level to be very fun. I played it for quite a while, mostly to experience the different methods of taking over the other cities. For this stage, you must unite the planet, which is covered by your race. You can convert the city by religious, military, or economic means. Economic takes the most time, but works best because there is no damage done to the new city (and you earn more money in the process). Religious works second best (and was a lot of fun to watch in progress). Religious takes the same time (or maybe faster) than military. However, a religious vehicle cannot fight a military vehicle. So, if you keep military vehicles around your cities, you can ward off a religious attack. Also, religious attacks don't harm buildings, except for the entertainment structures. The military attack is your standard military campaign. Build five or six tanks, send them to bombard the next city. However, you destroy all the buildings in the city. Sometimes, you even destroy city land, which means less space available for your structures, when you take over the city. Once you take over all the cities on the planet, you advance to... Galaxy - I only had a few minutes on this level, so not many thoughts. I went through the ship flying tutorial and started on the tractor beam mission before I had to stop. Flying the ship is not as easy as it could be. You control the ship with the mouse, but to ascend/descend, you use either the scroll wheel or the +/- buttons (btw, + goes down, - goes up). Maybe I will understand the reasons for this as I progress into Galaxy, but for now I'm wondering why the ship can't be controlled like the flying mounts of WoW - mouse point up to ascend (or press jump). Overall, Spore is a great game and a lot of fun to play. I'm giving it a 4, out of 5. I'm wondering how re-playable this is (for adults) once you complete the galaxy stage. I may amend my score based on what I find. Read my follow up post - Spore: Day Two

Spore

Woot! Spore finally arrived! I'm driving my wife crazy talking about how I'm going to spend the weekend playing Spore. I installed Spore, this morning. Installation went very smooth. Took about twenty minutes. I did notice after the install that I had an icon on my desktop for the EA Downloader, but the icon for Spore was missing. Huh? I actually had to browse to the install folder and manually add the Spore icon to my desktop. Maybe it's just a problem in Vista? I know a lot of people have rated this 1 star on Amazon. If you read the posts, you'll find the reason is because of the draconian DRM. I agree that EA should never have DRM'd Spore. In doing so, they are actually inviting crackers to circumvent the DRM. I've heard that the DRM crack for Spore is now the #1 download on the Pirate Bay. Maybe other companies will take notice.

Cat Boxing with Casper and Toby

Casper and Toby putting on a little boxing show. Toby always cracks me up how he puts his paw on Casper's head to keep him at bay.