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The meal made the traffic worth fighting.

Marc and I went on another quest to the Digital Press store in Clifton, NJ yesterday.

What a fiasco - took 4 hours to get there. 287 was a parking lot from the Tappan Zee all the way back to the Merritt. 13 miles, 2 hours. Why? Not a clue. At least the water pump held up! Oh, and the advisory on Thruway Radio was posted at 1:30 PM (we hit the traffic at about 4:10), so it had been this bad for two and a half hours when we got to it.

We finally got in to Clifton around 7. Between us we ditched 4 boxes of old video games (the purpose of the trip). We had a bunch of commons, and putting them all on eBay is such a pain in the ass. At least they’ll find happy homes.

So, after hanging around, talking games, searching for pieces to fill in the holes in our collections, and general BS, we take off at about 8. Needing dinner, we stop at a little Italian restaurant.

Where I had the best food I’ve put in my mouth all year long.

Pasta e Fagioli made with a chicken stock instead of tomato. Very subtle, and delicious.

And the sauce on the gnocci was like a tomato and cheese sauce with cream. Rich enough to not need any additional cheese. Even the iced tea was better than any other I’ve had.

Sure, it was a bit expensive by my normal standards. But worth every penny.

La Riviera Trattoria on Piaget Ave in Clifton NJ. A block and a half from the Digital Press store.

Tags: Randomness by Brian Corbino
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Lessons learned on the River Housatonic

Those stories you hear about thick cloud cover obviating the need for sunscreen? Lies.

When the guy at the kayak place tells you “If you fall in the water in the rapids, DO NOT try to stand up” he knows of which he speaks.

Rocks are harder than flesh.

It is easier to attempt swimming (and that is all I can be said to do) when you decide to let go of the kayak and the oar, and let someone else corral that thing for you.

In case you hadn’t guessed, a bunch of us went kayaking on the Housatonic River in northwestern CT at Clarke Outdoors. It was a blast. Actually we used what they call “Sityaks”, which is kind of like a kayak, except you sit ON it instead of IN it. Whcih means when you capsize, you at least haven’t got a boat stuck to you. But it also means that you crush your knuckles on a rock when you fall over because you didn’t listen to the guy when he said “don’t stand up in the rapids”.

Tiring, but a lot of fun. And at least I wasn’t the only one to ditch.

Oh, and if you find Kevin’s glasses, please drop me a line.

Tags: Cool Stuff by Brian Corbino
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You will be judged by the company you keep…

And Ned Lamont might want to reconsider the company he keeps.

His buddies over at the Daily Kos (not linked because I don’t link to vermin) have gone into full-on anti-Jew mode.

These are the people that convinced Lamont to run, and the ones who advocate for him against Joseph Lieberman.

Which just demands the question be asked: What is their motive against Lieberman, really?

To listen to the Lamont radio ads, you’d think that he was running against George W. Bush. So, at least officially, the Lamont line is “Lieberman doesn’t hate Bush, I do. Vote for me.”

But read the rantings of the Kossacks and a new line emerges. Lieberman’s sin isn’t that he is insufficiently infected with BDS. It’s that he’s a Jew, and he supports Israel. And unless Lamont comes out strongly against his nutroots supporters (which will lose him the election for sure), he will be branded as another Pat Buchanan.

Looks like Mom was right again. You will be judged by the company you keep.

Tags: Politics by Brian Corbino
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This is the stupidest fucking spam ever.

OK, I understand all the dumbass tricks that scumbag spammers use to get their shit in my face.

But whoever came up with this is the dumbest motherfucker on the planet.

This is the entire message that I received - it’s pure HTML, for starters.
There are no image tags in it, no images at all.

<html><!DOCTYPE html PUBLIC “-//W3C//DTD XHTML 1.0 Transitional//EN”
<head></head>
<body bgcolor=#ffffff>
Hello. <br>
<font color=#fcfcfc>tents lambs enemy adage</font><br>
We have found your resume on Job web site, and would like to offer you
vacancy in our company. <br>
If you interests, more detailed information you can receive on ours web <br>
site: http://www.****.us/ ( please send us email for more information ) <br>
vacancymillermorgans@Alum.com <br>
<font color=#fcfcfc>groove season sandy juice</font><br>
We look forward to your reply. <br>
<font color=#fcfcfc>nerve urine 3333 kraut</font><br>
Thank you. <br>
Best regards, <br>
Miller & Morgans inc.<br>
<font color=#fcfcfc>glean tans micro janis</font><br>
</body>
</html>

Which, when rendered looks like this:

Hello.
tents lambs enemy adage
We have found your resume on Job web site, and would like to offer you
vacancy in our company.
If you interests, more detailed information you can receive on ours web
site: http://www.****.us/ ( please send us email for more information )
vacancymillermorgans@Alum.com
groove season sandy juice
We look forward to your reply.
nerve urine 3333 kraut
Thank you.
Best regards,
Miller & Morgans inc.
glean tans micro janis

That web address is exactly as it appears, no names have been changed to protect the ignorant.

I’ve gotten 5 of these already, and each one has a different “from” address, a different “name”, and a different email address in the body to send for “more information”.

I mean, who the hell would be dumb enough to fall for this? Especially when 4 of them arrive at the same instant, and all have these little inconsistencies.

Not to mention the horrid English, and from names like “Sify”. Yeah, I’m really gonna reply to a job offer from someone named “Sify” with an address like “dumbass@noplace.com”.

Note the stream of random words rendered in an invisible color (at least on the white background that the message was intended to be on, not the stylish black background you see here) - this is to fool the bayesian filters, I guess.

That’s my rant for tonight. It’s stupid shit like this that makes me wanna send a GBU-32 to the house of a spam king.

Tags: Computers by Brian Corbino
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Fuck Monday!

This day was fine, until about twenty past five this afternoon.

And my car decided “why not act all strange and make the temperature gauge jump from 190 to 260 and scare the shit out of Brian.” Mission Accomplished.

So I sit on the side of the highway trying to figure out what to do with the car. I’ve brought it to a dealer I know nothing about because it only cost me $100 to get it there, as opposed to about $300 to tow it home. And my car is half-way across the state.

Right, I’ve got the bike. And it’s gonna be almost 100 degrees tomorrow - which means that me on the bike == roasted Brian. And then there’s the inevitable thunderstorms. Talk about your tempering!

At least I learned that I can sit outside in 95 degree heat for 2 hours without dying. Unlike certain automobiles which shall remain nameless.

Tags: Randomness by Brian Corbino
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Forced Armageddon - or Endgame in Iran

I believe that Iran is setting a trap for Israel in Lebanon. I believe that they are doing this so that they can attack Israel directly without UN reprisals. And I believe that their attack will be nuclear.

Sound crazy? It isn’t.

Listen:

Iran could not hope to damage Israel with what the “experts” tell us is their military capacity. Their jets are aging, and they have no spare parts. They supposedly do not have a mature ballistic missile with sufficient range to hit Israel.

Yet “President” Ahmadinejad is promising to destroy Israel if they attack Syria. And this just after he hosted yet another anti-Israel conference in which he urged the Muslim world to strike Israel.

I know that I have argued that Ahmadinejad is not rational, at least not by Western standards. But he’s also not a complete buffoon. He wouldn’t make threats like that unless he thought he could back them up, would he?

We already know that Hezbollah is an organization funded by, supported by, armed by, and trained by Iran. We know that Iranian forces are in Lebanon assisting Hezbollah with missile attacks on IDF ships. We know that Syria (Iran’s proxy) is supplying rockets used in attacks on Israel.

Why would Hezbollah’s attack on Israel have conspicuous fingerprints from Iran and Syria all over it, unless the goal was to get Israel to attack Syria or even Iran?

Here’s how I see things playing out, or at least the way Ahmadinejad has planned it:

  • Syria continues to support Hezbollah in Lebanon, while thumbing their nose at Israel.
  • Israel attacks Damascus in an attempt to cut off the head of the Assad regime.
  • Iran attacks Israel with atomic bomb, claiming justification due to the Israeli attack on Syria

And then what?

Your guess is as good as mine.

Tags: Politics by Brian Corbino
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What’s the blog equivalent of “A closed mouth gathers no feet?”

Just when you thought that the self-loathing left couldn’t sink lower, they do.

Although this is probably a spoof (hell, can you think of a better way to get back at a professor?) the verifiable writings of South(west)paw Dr. Deb Frisch are quite repugnant on their own.

In her defense of Ward “Little Eichmanns” Churchill she attempts, in true psych-major fashion, to project his (and her) insanity onto the observers of their collective unhinged rantings. Her argument? We just misunderstood Ward. He wasn’t calling all the civilians that died in the WTC and all the firemen and policemen who died trying to rescue them “nazis that deserved to die”. Heavens no! They deserved to die for their “midless obedience to authority”.

Perhaps I’m not too bright, but I fail to understand how that’s any less revolting an accusation. I mean, is being a law-abiding citizen with a job so evil? Or is it that they worked in finance that honks her off? Maybe she got Hannah Arendt backwards, and is thinking of the “evil of banality”.

If nothing else, however, Dr. Deb manages to prove with a few well-placed rants something that we engineers have known forever - all psych majors are nuts.

Tags: Politics by Brian Corbino
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