WiiKitty

Noka Chocolate Expose

With that said, the least charitable approach in assessing the value of Noka's chocolates would be to focus on the 4-piece "Vintages Collection" in the "Signature Box." For those who are curious, the price for that is $39. That's $9.75 per piece. Each chocolate tablet weighs approximately seventy-five one-thousandths of an ounce. (They're no longer than a quarter's diameter and no wider than a nickel's, as you can see here.) So, at that rate, one pound of Noka's chocolate tablets would cost about $2,080.

The most charitable approach would be to look solely at the 96-piece "Vintages Collection" in the "Encore Box." That'll run you $139, or $1.45 per piece. Each piece weighs approximately seventy-five one-thousandths of an ounce. So the cheapest retail rate you're going to get for Noka chocolates is about $309 per pound.

Explanation of the climax scene in "Trading Places"

With the authentic orange crop report indicating a good harvest of fresh oranges, frozen concentrated orange juice (FCOJ) would be less important to food producers and so would be likely to drop in price once traders heard the news. However, by way of a fraudulent report, the Duke brothers are led to believe that the orange harvest would be less successful, necessitating greater demand for stockpiled FCOJ in orange products in the coming year, thereby driving the price up. By capitalizing on this knowledge (and the Duke brothers' missteps), the protagonists are able to profit by manipulating the futures market as follows:

Russian Wooden Highscraper

This one is really strange. It is a wooden multi-stored building. It looks like a real skyscraper in Arkhangelsk city. All the houses in the town are mainly two- three- stored and here it stands - a twelve stored wooden tower, more than 120 ft high (38 metres).

There is not elevator and you can reach the top of the building climbing by a carved wooden stairs.

The building can be seen from all the town. The city authorities claim that the building spoils the town view and demand to reduce it by… 10 stores. But he refuses. He really likes his creation and most of the local people think that it looks nice.

WiiRoomba

People have come up with numerous ways to control their Roombas -- USB, Bluetooth, MacBook tilt sensors, and even a MIDI keyboard -- and now that the Wiimote has been hacked to operate several non-Wii devices -- computers, home automation systems, and even an RC truck -- it's no surprise that some clever modder would make these two great tastes taste great together. And sure enough, a gentleman named Chris Hughes has just completed a script that merges Tod Kurt's Roomba control software with the recently released DarwinRemote, resulting in a little slavebot that scoots around using just a flick of your wrist.

Gerald Ford 1913-2006

The 20 Strangest Gadgets of 2006

19. Zaporozhye, the musical condom. Has mini-speakers that play music louder and faster as your bumping'n'grinding becomes more frantic.

Steve's Weird House

Stephen resides in a Victorian home that is a cluttered combination of museum, library and art gallery, decorated with that old-world Addam's Family charm. Not only is every inch of every wall covered with art, but all the ceilings are also decorated.

Stephen is of course always looking for more oddities or unusual artifacts to add to his museum. He is particularly looking for a perfectly weird woman (artistic, outrageous) to share his weird world with!

Exploring Google's Hidden Features

Google is a great search engine, but it's also more than that. Google has tons of hidden features, some of which are quite fun and most of which are extremely useful— if you know about them. How do you discover all these hidden features within the Google site? Read on to learn more.

Nintendo Wii Controlled Smarthome

FBI Considered "It's A Wonderful Life" Communist Propaganda

There is submitted herewith the running memorandum concerning Communist infiltration of the motion picture industry which has been brought up to date as of May 26, 1947....

With regard to the picture "It's a Wonderful Life", [redacted] stated in substance that the film represented rather obvious attempts to discredit bankers by casting Lionel Barrymore as a "scrooge-type" so that he would be the most hated man in the picture. This, according to these sources, is a common trick used by Communists.

In addition, [redacted] stated that, in his opinion, this picture deliberately maligned the upper class, attempting to show the people who had money were mean and despicable characters. [redacted] related that if he made this picture portraying the banker, he would have shown this individual to have been following the rules as laid down by the State Bank Examiner in connection with making loans. Further, [redacted] stated that the scene wouldn't have "suffered at all" in portraying the banker as a man who was protecting funds put in his care by private individuals and adhering to the rules governing the loan of that money rather than portraying the part as it was shown. In summary, [redacted] stated that it was not necessary to make the banker such a mean character and "I would never have done it that way."

Wii Have a Problem

Yet again another baseball accident, my mate had just stated playing when I told him to "get in side the game", so he stepped up to the plate, with his entire mite he began swinging the Wii mote when the strap broke and the controller broke loss and at almost point blank range smashed the fireplace surroundings.

Playing the Wii in a Movie Theater

Christmas' Pagan Origins

No one knows what day Jesus Christ was born on. From the biblical description, most historians believe that his birth probably occurred in September, approximately six months after Passover. One thing they agree on is that it is very unlikely that Jesus was born in December, since the bible records shepherds tending their sheep in the fields on that night. This is quite unlikely to have happened during a cold Judean winter. So why do we celebrate Christ’s birthday as Christmas, on December the 25th?

The answer lies in the pagan origins of Christmas. In ancient Babylon, the feast of the Son of Isis (Goddess of Nature) was celebrated on December 25. Raucous partying, gluttonous eating and drinking, and gift-giving were traditions of this feast.

In Rome, the Winter Solstice was celebrated many years before the birth of Christ. The Romans called their winter holiday Saturnalia, honoring Saturn, the God of Agriculture. In January, they observed the Kalends of January, which represented the triumph of life over death. This whole season was called Dies Natalis Invicti Solis, the Birthday of the Unconquered Sun. The festival season was marked by much merrymaking. It is in ancient Rome that the tradition of the Mummers was born. The Mummers were groups of costumed singers and dancers who traveled from house to house entertaining their neighbors. From this, the Christmas tradition of caroling was born.

Silent Star Wars

50 Greatest Cartoons

Found a cool list of The 50 Greatest Cartoons as voted on by the animation industry in 1994. As a holiday present to our readers we've put together a link to an online video for each one below! (we found a video for all but 6.) So many wonderful, funny and trippy cartoons spanning the decades (including some that were banned.)

Christian Mars

The Red Planet is a symbol of the blood of Christ, which represents the substitutionary Spiritual death of Jesus Christ on the Cross. The blood of animal sacrifices foreshadowed the Cross (Hebrews 9:12-14). The color of the Red Planet is a reminder of blood of Christ, which is the single most important event in history after the re-Creation during the Appeal Trial of Satan. The Red Planet is a reminder to man and angels of the sacrifice of Jesus Christ for mankind.

The name, Mars, came from Satan. It refers to Satan as the god of war, who was defeated when Jesus Christ paid for the sins of the world on the Cross. The name, Mars, is blasphemy. The Romans, who were hoodwinked by the devil, named the planet; and scientists, who are no smarter, have continued the deception. This is just another lie of Satan, the master of deceit, in an attempt to hide the truth of the Cross.

The Red Planet has two sides, front and back. The two sides represent the front and back of Jesus Christ on the Cross. The front represents acceptance and the back represents rejection. Salvation is a matter of personal choice. The planet is pock marked with craters and volcanoes, which represent wounds of the Lord Jesus Christ who was battered, bruised, punctured with nails and thorns, and stabbed with a spear.

Can Tossing

(Why) Christmas is the Most Atheistic Holiday of All

Mind you, I don't mean that odd little religious holiday of the same name--the one with Baby Jesus and Three Kings and Manger scenes.

I mean the one that tends to be celebrated: The obvious parody of the Chrisatian holiday. Instead of Jesus, we have Santa Claus, who could be described as "What God would be like if he had a sense of proportion." He brings gifts instead of eternal life and coal instead of eternal hellfire. He has magical powers as ridiculous as those of Jesus, like the ability to climb chimneys and make ruminants fly, which are much more useful than Jesus' 'casting out demons into pigs' kind of thing.

He's a clearly what Jesus would be if he was real. Nobody would ever consider nailing this omnibenevolent deity to anything, would they? Nor does he hold anything against you longer than a year.

Of course, only the very young or foolish actually believe he exists. And a mark of maturity is the admission that he doesn't. People who believe are ridiculed...just as it should be. All it takes is a critical look at the evidence. That's the purpose of 'Fat Man + Chimney' after all: to make the impossibility more obvious for children.

Bush Plans to Expand Military

President Bush acknowledged for the first time yesterday that the United States is not winning the war in Iraq and said he plans to expand the overall size of the "stressed" U.S. armed forces to meet the challenges of a long-term global struggle against terrorists.

As he searches for a new strategy for Iraq, Bush has now adopted the formula advanced by his top military adviser to describe the situation. "We're not winning, we're not losing," Bush said in an interview with The Washington Post. The assessment was a striking reversal for a president who, days before the November elections, declared, "Absolutely, we're winning."

In another turnaround, Bush said he has ordered Defense Secretary Robert M. Gates to develop a plan to increase the troop strength of the Army and Marine Corps, heeding warnings from the Pentagon and Capitol Hill that multiple deployments in Iraq and Afghanistan are stretching the armed forces toward the breaking point. "We need to reset our military," said Bush, whose administration had opposed increasing force levels as recently as this summer.

My Miserable Christmas

When I was twelve years old, my grandfather choked to death on a piece of ham at our family's Christmas dinner. My dad unsuccessfully tried to dislodge the meat from Grandpa's throat with his fingers, then a spoon, but by the time the paramedics arrived, Grandpa was dead. My entire family was running around the house, screaming and crying, and my grandmother fainted. (We momentarily thought she had died, too.) Merry Christmas, indeed.

Scientific Republican Magazine

Jon Stewart vs. Bill Kristol

You Park Like an Asshole

Sick of a car taking up two spaces on the street? How about a car too close to yours? What about the car at the mall parked diagonally? Now you can do something about it. Simply download a notice and place it on the car's windshield. The owner of the vehicle will be informed of their asshole staus as well as the proper tips to improve their poor parking techniques. It's time to put an end to asshole parking, or at least to make fun of it.

My Little Cthulu

History of Religion

How has the geography of religion evolved over the centuries, and where has it sparked wars? Our map gives us a brief history of the world's most well-known religions: Christianity, Islam, Hinduism, Buddhism, and Judaism. Selected periods of inter-religious bloodshed are also highlighted. Want to see 5,000 years of religion in 90 seconds? Ready, Set, Go!

Ali G and Andy Rooney

Andy Rooney On The New Craze Sweeping the Nation

Leopard Kills Baboon And Attempts to Save Baby Baboon

"It was as if nature had turned on its head completely," says Dereck Joubert, a filmmaker who followed Legadema for three-and-a-half years in her natural habitat, the Okavango Delta of Botswana - the verdant flood plains known as Africa's Garden of Eden.

"She had killed the mother primate, but then found this live new-born on the ground. The little baboon called out, and we thought we were going to hear a major crunch and the leopard smacking its lips, but instead the baby baboon put its paws out and walked towards the young leopard.

"Legadema paused for a moment, apparently not knowing what to do. Then she gently picked it up in her mouth, holding it by the scruff of its neck and carrying the infant up a tree to keep it safe."

Light-O-Rama Customer Videos

The Waste of Christmas Presents

We all know that bad gifts inflict a cost—just think of the rigid smiles that greet an unwanted floral tie or Josh Rouse CD—but it’s surprising how big that cost can be. Since the early nineteen-nineties, Joel Waldfogel, an economist at the University of Pennsylvania, has been doing a series of studies in which college students are asked to put a value on the presents they receive. Waldfogel’s main finding is that, in general, people spend a lot more on presents than they’re worth to those who receive them, a phenomenon that he calls "the deadweight loss of Christmas." A deadweight loss is created when you spend eighty dollars to give me a sweater that I would spend only sixty-five dollars to buy myself. Waldfogel estimates that somewhere between ten and eighteen per cent of seasonal spending becomes deadweight loss, which means that billions of dollars a year is now going to waste.

Dawkins Speaks at Fair Hills Kindergarten Regarding Santa Claus

My goal in all of this is that, as children, you should be raised only on truth, reason, fact, and intellect. Together we should be working toward a point in the not-so-distant future where the words "Santa Claus" or "Kris Kringle" or "Father Christmas" create the same response as fingernails on a chalkboard. There is nothing wrong with disbelief in Santa. I can see that the topic makes many of you uncomfortable. However, this should not be viewed as a bad thing. You may weep now, but your tears are a positive, not a negative. You are now facing the truth, which comes in many forms and is not always comfortable. This is a fact that you will be exposed to again and again throughout your lives. If you wish to live a life that contains only comfortable information and not necessarily the truth, then yours will be a highly deluded existence. Your intellectual maturity depends on whether or not you are capable of accepting the truth at this early age. That is why there is no better place to begin than with the absurdity that is Santa Claus and Christmas Magic.

How To Fake Your Own Death

On January 18, 2006, a 58-year-old man from Alabama named Johnny Sterling Martin was arrested by local authorities for failure to pay child support. What made the arrest noteworthy was the chilling fact that Martin wasn’t even supposed to be alive. That’s because the deadbeat dad faked his own death 25 years prior by having a relative call the family court and report that he was killed during a bar fight. While Martin’s case may seem ludicrous, it’s far from isolated.

Every year hundreds of Americans just like Martin drop off the face of the earth by pretending to pass away. Some do it to avoid bills, some do it to avoid responsibilities and some do it simply to avoid paying their late fees at Blockbuster. Sound like fun? You bet it is! Find out how to get a piece of the action in our comprehensive primer on how to fake your own death.

Vintage Russian New Year Postcards

These New Year postcards are back from the Soviet times.

Religion was banned in Soviet Russia so there was not a Christmas celebrated but a New Year was the main winter holiday.

It was always a special holiday, same as Christmas in Europe or USA.

Even 20 years after democratic changes started in Russia people still celebrate New Year more willingly than any other holidays.

Border Fence Firm Snared for Hiring Illegal Workers

A fence-building company in Southern California agrees to pay nearly $5 million in fines for hiring illegal immigrants. Two executives from the company may also serve jail time. The Golden State Fence Company's work includes some of the border fence between San Diego and Mexico.

After an immigration check in 1999 found undocumented workers on its payroll, Golden State promised to clean house. But when followup checks were made in 2004 and 2005, some of those same illegal workers were still on the job. In fact, U-S Attorney Carol Lam says as many as a third of the company's 750 workers may have been in the country illegally.

Golden State Fence built millions of dollars' worth of fencing around homes, offices, and military bases. Its president and one of its Southern California managers will pay fines totaling $300,000. The government is also recommending jail time for Melvin Kay and Michael McLaughlin, probably about six months.

The Salty Napkin Trick

The inherent problem with this oft used coaster replacement is that as the condensation forms on the outside of your glass, it eventually follows the laws of gravity and inevitably, the napkin ends up stuck to the bottom of your glass as you are toasting to your friends.

Solution: As soon as your drink is served, lift your drink off of the napkin and grab the nearest salt shaker. Sprinkle the napkin lightly with salt (roughly 3-4 shakes per average salt shaker) and replace your beverage back on your napkin. No more sticky napkin even as it gets saturated from

Things People Say in Restaurants

A pizza-and-sub takeout recently opened near me. When I got the menu, I decided that I would try the hamburger sub that was listed, so I called.

Me: "I'd like to place an order for pickup."
Him: "Certainly, sir. What would you like to have?"
Me: "I'd like the hamburger sub, please."
Him: "Excuse me, the HAMburger sub?"
Me: "Yes."
Him: "I'm sorry, but we don't have HAMburger."
Me: "It's right here on the menu."
* Him: "We don't have HAMburger."

This went on a few times, until finally I asked for a cheeseburger sub without the cheese. He was happy to sell me that.

The Top 10 Creepiest Fast Food Mascots

So without further ado, I present to you my list of the 10 creepiest fast food mascots [note: I'm limiting the list to characters peddling goods for fast food outlets - I realize that the Kool Aid Man and Count Chocula are also disturbing, but that's for another list]:

Flying Spaghetti Monster Christmas Lights

The eyes blink back and forth from red to green. It looks pretty cool. I tried to be as noodletomically correct as possible. In order to make more noodle ends where there weren't rope terminations, I used electrical tape to block out the light.

Ingredients: 63 feet of lighted rope, a few hundred cable ties, a string of 140 mini-lights, and two spools of 9 gauge wire and some smaller wire.

David Sklansky's $50,000 Challenge

This is an open challenge to any American citizen who passes a lie detector test that I will specify in a moment.

We will both take the math SAT or GRE (aptidude test). Your choice. We will both have only half the normally allotted time to lessen the chances of a perfect score. Lower score pays higher score $50,000.

To qualify you must take a reputable polygraph that proclaims you are truthful when you state that:

1. You are at least 95% sure that Jesus Christ came back from the dead.

AND

2. You are at least 95% sure that adults who die with the specific belief that Jesus probably wasn't ressurected will not go to heaven.

If you pass the polygraph you can bet me on the SAT or GRE. Again this is open to ANY one of the 300 million Americans.

Also, for those who think I am being disengenuous because I would make the offer to anyone at all, you are wrong. I am now so rusty that at least one in 5000 Americans are favored over me and I would pass on a bet with them. That's 60,000 people. If the number of people who would pass that polygraph is between 10 and 30 million, which I think it is, that means that at least 2000 of these types of Christians are smart enough to be favored over me. Given such Christian's intelligence is distributed like other American's are.

But I'm betting fifty grand they are not. Their beliefs make them relatively stupid (or uninterested in learning). Or only relatively stupid people can come to such beliefs. One or the other. That is my contention. And this challenge might help demonstrate that.

Happy Friday

Review of the "Left Behind" Videogame

As you wander around in the first missions, learning how to buy buildings and convert followers, you'll notice how bland the game looks. This would have been great looking about five or six years ago, but right now it just comes across as boring. There are a lot of bad guys running around, denoted by red bars over their heads, and they will shoot red balls at you. These balls sap your "spirit," which is like mana, and you have to pray to get it back. In the first mission I spent a lot of time running away from big gangs of people who were shooting these anti-God balls at me, and that got old quickly. Run and pray, run and pray. It was a lot like being at Wal-Mart on Black Friday.

10 Most Dangerous Toys of All Time

In 1951, A.C. Gilbert introduced his U-238 Atomic Energy Lab, a radioactive learning set we can only assume was fun for the whole math club. Gilbert, who Americanmemorabilia claims was "often compared to Walt Disney for his creative genius," had a dream that nuclear power could capture the imaginations of children everywhere. For a mere $49.50, the kit came complete with three "very low-level" radioactive sources, a Geiger-Mueller radiation counter, a Wilson Cloud Chamber (to see paths of alpha particles), a Spinthariscope (to see "live" radioactive disintegration), four samples of Uranium-bearing ores, and an Electroscope to measure radioactivity.

Top 10 Christian Tourist Traps

What better says family fun than an attraction that translates to “Hill of Skulls” in the original Aramaic? The first nine holes offers such old testament highjinks as the Garden of Eden and Moses parting the Red Sea while the back nine concentrate on the miracles of the new testament. Various angel statues dot the landscape while Christ himself stands watch at the 18th hole…talk about pressure to perform!

It’s evident that the owners were short of funds when creating the park since many of the scenes are recreated with whatever ornaments could easily be found. Small plastic statues of armadillos and poodles are lined up to enter a shoddily constructed ark and elves from the Wal-Mart garden department helpfully stand in for various religious icons. I never knew St. Peter wore lederhosen!

FL Cops Dressing in Drag to Catch Traffic Violators

Officer Delicious, aka West Palm Beach police officer Terry Golden, stands at Okeechobee Boulevard and Jog Road on Wednesday morning as he watches for cars running red lights and alerts nearby fellow officers. "I've seen people drive by eating food and when they see me, the food just falls out of their mouth" Golden said of his outfit.

Hungry For a Month

For the month of November, I’m only spending $30 on food. The only exception will be things that are freely available to the average person (salt taken from restaurants, sauce packets from Taco Bell, free coffee from an office). Buying in advance is fine, but at the end of the month, it all has to add up to $30 or less.

Benny Hinn Extreme

7 Wonders of Each State in the U.S.

What Happens To Your Body If You Drink A Coke Right Now?

In The First 10 minutes: 10 teaspoons of sugar hit your system. (100% of your recommended daily intake.) You don’t immediately vomit from the overwhelming sweetness because phosphoric acid cuts the flavor allowing you to keep it down.

20 minutes: Your blood sugar spikes, causing an insulin burst. Your liver responds to this by turning any sugar it can get its hands on into fat. (There’s plenty of that at this particular moment)

40 minutes: Caffeine absorption is complete. Your pupils dialate, your blood pressure rises, as a response your livers dumps more sugar into your bloodstream. The adenosine receptors in your brain are now blocked preventing drowsiness.

I Must Have Spent Too Much Time in Vegas

How to Calculate Pi by Throwing Frozen Hot Dogs

Believe it or not, of all the countless ways to approximate the most prolific irrational number in the universe, there are none quite as interesting or as surprisingly satisfying as throwing perfectly good food around your kitchen. In fewer steps than it takes to circumscribe your house in a circle of baguettes, you, too, can easily add a slice of pi into your dinner menu tonight. The best part is...it really works!

Balloon Sculptures

Oliver Stone Gets Fined for Cuba Visit

According to a tersely-worded Department of Treasury document released Dec. 1, the IXTLAN Corp. of Santa Monica, Ca. — Stone’s production company — will pay $6,322.20 to “resolve allegations of violations of the Cuban embargo.” The violations occurred between Feb. 2002 and May 2003.

The report continues: “OFAC alleged that IXTLAN and four individuals dealt in services in which the government of Cuba or a Cuban national has an interest incident to the making of a documentary film. The matter was not voluntarily disclosed to OFAC.”

Good Morning in More Than 250 Languages

The Ultimate Swiss Army Knife

The new Swiss Army knife contains 85 devices, weighs 2lb and costs nearly £500. But can you actually use it for anything? Andrew Martin puts the ultimate tool to the test

Soy Makes Kids Gay

I have nothing against an occasional soy snack. Soy is nutritious and contains lots of good things. Unfortunately, when you eat or drink a lot of soy stuff, you're also getting substantial quantities of estrogens. Estrogens are female hormones. If you're a woman, you're flooding your system with a substance it can't handle in surplus. If you're a man, you're suppressing your masculinity and stimulating your "female side," physically and mentally. In fetal development, the default is being female. All humans (even in old age) tend toward femininity. The main thing that keeps men from diverging into the female pattern is testosterone, and testosterone is suppressed by an excess of estrogen...

...Soy is feminizing, and commonly leads to a decrease in the size of the penis, sexual confusion and homosexuality. That's why most of the medical (not socio-spiritual) blame for today's rise in homosexuality must fall upon the rise in soy formula and other soy products. (Most babies are bottle-fed during some part of their infancy, and one-fourth of them are getting soy milk!) Homosexuals often argue that their homosexuality is inborn because "I can't remember a time when I wasn't homosexual." No, homosexuality is always deviant. But now many of them can truthfully say that they can't remember a time when excess estrogen wasn't influencing them.

Best Books of 2006

Last Night in Vegas

Friday Cat Blogging on Tuesday

Vacation

The Post-Rapture Post

Do you know someone who is in danger of being "left behind" because of a sinful life? Imagine if you could write a letter to a friend or loved one after the Great Day of Reckoning. Maybe a message to your family telling them to trust in God, and that everything will be okay. Perhaps you would leave instructions to care for your pets after your departure. It could be that your message is the light that opens a sinner's eyes to the Glory of God and allows them entrance to Heaven during the trials before the Second Coming. This is where the Post-Rapture Post comes in.

Just write your letter and it will be hand-delivered immediately following the exodus of the pure from the Earth. But you must be thinking to yourself, "How can the letters be delivered after the Rapture?" The answer is simple. The creators of this site are Atheists. That's right, we don't believe in God. How else would we be able to deliver your correspondence after the Rapture?

Octopus escaping through a 1 inch hole

85 years of life in just 40 sec

Tony vs. Paul

When a Human Body is Exposed to the Vacuum of Outer Space

In the absence of atmospheric pressure water will spontaneously convert into vapor, which would cause the moisture in a victim's mouth and eyes to quickly boil away. The same effect would cause water in the muscles and soft tissues of the body to evaporate, prompting some parts of the body to swell to twice their usual size after a few moments. This bloating may result in some superficial bruising due to broken capillaries, but it would not be sufficient to break the skin.

Within seconds the reduced pressure would cause the nitrogen which is dissolved in the blood to form gaseous bubbles, a painful condition known to divers as "the bends." Direct exposure to the sun's ultraviolet radiation would also cause a severe sunburn to any unprotected skin. Heat does not transfer out of the body very rapidly in the absence of a medium such as air or water, so freezing to death is not an immediate risk in outer space despite the extreme cold.

MyCrimeSpace