Am I the only person that gets (violently) ill every 3-4 weeks? It only lasts for a day or so but I'm personally keeping the makers of my bootleg NyQuil (real NyQuil takes a back seat because they took the Pseudoephedrine out of the formula, what's the point of NyQuil without it?)
So, that's what I did yesterday (Monday). Trying to watch my stolen Royal Rumble (in a word: shit) I had to get up (or lean over the trash can) every 5-10 minutes. I wish I knew why the dogs tried to pick up the tissues afterwards, that's weird right?
I wish I could say this was only a winter thing and I'm just really good at catching a cold, but it's a summer thing too.
I dunno, it's weird.
That's it.
| The check's in the mail, and I'll see you in church, and don't you ever change. -- Posted by BalconyDive on Thursday, January 26 2006 | ||||||||||||||
 Another day, another job interview for a job I have no confidence I'll get. How'd it go no one asks? Actually fairly well, the two guys I talked to a) were cool when I called them saying I was lost and 2) even cooler in person. The main thing about their coolness? I think they may have been John Flansburgh and John Linnell in disguise. It was weird. One big guy with glasses who seemed to be running the show and a smaller guy who was (probably) the smarter of the two (the other guy kept deferring to him). If They Might Be Giants were broke(ish) and running an IT firm this would be them. Uh, they'd also have to have change their name to Mark & Nick I guess. Maybe, who cares. So, yeah, two cool guys who were impressed by things I said, didn't mind that I still haven't bothered to get my license yet (though I promised them I'm working on it). They were unphased by the crutches and I made them laugh more often than not. Small office (6 desks or so seperated by a cubicle wall) nice guys, work I like the idea of, good times. A shame I probably won't be hired. In other news, Penn & Teller Bullshit is going to rock with two whole new seasons and to celebrate I went out and found a torrent of The Unpleasent World Of Penn & Teller from way back in 1994 way over in England. It's some great stuff thus far. Stephen Frye freaks out (or at least seems to) when they crush his watch and they do the gravity defying trick (because no one in England knows who they are, they say they can attract real celebrities and do tricks we all know over here). Sadly the limeys are all giggles and guffaws half way through it and almost give it away. ARE WE LIVE? 
|
| -- Posted by OtterVomit on Tuesday, January 24 2006 | ||||||||||||
MYSPACE TREK! So I'm strolling along on my usual daily net routine and I come to MySpace. Now let me tell you about MySpace: its some pointless shit. And its packed to the brim with emo kids showing pictures of their latest cut wounds. Now with that said, somehow I've managed to locate many long-lost friends with this thing. Aside from being packed to the brim with emo kids, MySpace is also packed to the brim with fantasy-proned individuals with little grasp of reality, which equates to some highly active Star Trek forums, which in turn equates to me visiting those forums. And thus we come to the point in my story where I do my daily thing and enter the Star Trek forum. MySpace is interesting as most people you talk to there you get to see a picture (often the best picture ever taken of said person which absolutely in no way resembles them in any other picture). So I stroll on in to Trek Forum and low and behold:  Wow! Those sure are some nice looking Trekkies/Trekkers! We as a band of male nerds have finally had our prayers answered! Nevermind that these girls also popped up in every other group on MySpace and their profiles were simply advertisements to pages where you can see them nude for a moderate fee! No, these facts are irrelavent. Clearly these gals are hardcore Trek babes! And as hardcore Trek babes, they were surely ripe to engage in intellectual conversation! I decided to make contact:  All of them recieved an identical message. Hot damn, I was going to talk temporal mechanics with some hot sci-fi babes! I passed some time by playing Civ 4, completely owning Japan in a test of naval warfare, and then returned to see that I had new messages! Excellent! 2 replies out of three messages sent! I can live with those numbers. So I pull up reply number 1 and see:  What?? How could this be?? You would think she didn't care about Star Trek at all, and that I had just sent her a bunch of geek babble! Surely this was a fluke and reply number 2 would be more forthcoming with the intellect. With great anticipation I clicked:  Well now that's a bit harsh don't you think??? Obviously, the aura of Jim Kirk was not with me on this little adventure. Oh well. Perhaps I'll refine my approach and attempt to discuss structural integrity field theories and Riker's beard instead of temporal inconsistencies and mirror Spock.
|
| I R GUD WEBMASTR -- Posted by OtterVomit on Wednesday, January 18 2006 | ||||||||||
 STUFFAbout a year and a half ago, I said "Hey I should put a forum on this site so I can talk to all 3 of my viewers on there! Radical!" And thus I went and downloaded a few message board scripts and then said "Eh I'll do it later." Well later finally arrived and there's a board up that nobody will use and serves no purpose. I also started converting old pages to conform to this front pages layout. Expect this to be completed in 3 years time, at which point the front page will have a totally different layout and all other pages will look woefully out of place. SULU, CHECKOV, RAND AND TRIBBLES RETURNING - STAR TREK ALUMNI COME TOGETHER TO HELP TREK LIVE AGAIN Not that any of our 3 readers will care, but the studs (see: geeks) over at Star Trek: New Voyages have secured quite a heap of the original Star Trek actors to appear in their future fan-film episodes. The most noteworthy of which is George Takei who played the deep-voiced helmsman Hikaru Sulu. Also actor Walter Koenig who played the torpedo firing Russian Pavol Chekov, the character famous for not being able to pronounce "nuclear vessels." Chekov will reprise his role in an upcoming New Voyages episode. This episode was written by Star Trek legend Dorothy "D.C." Fontana who has written many Star Trek episodes for all series, and was Gene Roddenberry's #1 assistant for over 30 years. Also on board for a future episode is actress Grace Lee Whitney who played the long-legged, coffee-fetching Yoeman Janice Rand. As if this wasn't enough, 3 other legendary Star Trek writers have joined the team. Marc Scott Zicree & Michael Reaves both have over 100 Star Trek scripts to their credit and are on board to write for New Voyages. David Gerrold who wrote what may be the most famous original series episode, "The Trouble with Tribbles" is back to pen a sequel. He also promises a script which he wrote for The Next Generation but said it was rejected for being too contraversial (dealt with homosexuality, apparently). Needless to say, Star Trek New Voyages is not simply another fan-film series. It has become the rallying point of everyone who loves Star Trek and wants to see it live on. This is a very special project which has accomplished way more than it should have been able to. With the seal of approval from Gene Roddenberry Jr, to so many of the original actors and writers so eager to jump on board to a project that isn't even allowed to earn a profit or even accept donations, it truly shows that Star Trek is very special to a great many people. EMAIL FROM...THE FUTURE...OR NOT.... So I checked my email today and there it was: An email from JOHN TITOR! An email from a time traveler! Surely this is the break I've been waiting for! What could it be?? Advice from the future on stocks??? The location of sunken Spanish dabloons?? News of a future Rangers Stanley Cup?? I opened the mail with great anticipation of these things to find: Good day to you sir, Give yourself constant reliefa with amazing meidiecations! Our 0n line Farm aacy offers a safe and convenient way to get all.. Niagra S0u ft are a pleasant tasting alternative to for people going throu= gh treatment of impotency and $ 1.89 per piall Froee delivery and unique packaging. NOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOoooooooooooooooooooooooo!! How could this happen?? Why has Titor forsaken me??
|
| -- Posted by OtterVomit on Friday, January 13 2006 | ||||||||
   FOREVER THE CAPTAIN
|
| -- Posted by OtterVomit on Wednesday, January 11 2006 | ||||||
EBAUMSWORLD JUST FLAT OUT SUCKS Some of you may know (but most of you probably don't) that my homeskillets at YTMND have been involved in what is described as an "internet war" with the notorious content pirates known as ebaumsworld. Basically eBaums stole a popular YTMND involving Lindsay Lohan and her never-changing face. Ebaums did its usual and snatched the image, stuck their watermark on it and put it on their site. This caused the YTMND population to erupt in anger and launch the insipid "internet war" which I've noticed has consisted of everything from 24/7 forum raids to DDOS attacks to people actually showing up at Eric Bauman's house. I have no real interest in any of this activity and only a mild interest in the issue at hand really (eBaum's stealing shit is nothing new), but what really got my attention was eBaum's response. The folks that run eBaum's world are grown men, but that didn't keep the following emails from arriving in the inbox of merciful master Max, overlord of YTMND who by the way had nothing to do with this silliness to begin with, and has been trying to stop this "internet war" from the start at great cost to him in time and effort. This is some of the most childish and unprofessional posturing I have ever seen from an adult: From: "Neil Bauman" neil@ebaumsworld.com To: legal@ytmnd.com Subject: Cease and Desist Date: Tue, 10 Jan 2006 16:01:53 -0500 To Whom It May Concern: Please be advised that several of your forum soldiers have decided to personally visit our corporate offices. The pictures they took while trespassing on our property were proudly posted on your site. In addition some of the postings on your forum literally threatened murdering Eric Bauman. You have now officially crossed the line. You can consider this formal notification that we have initiated a criminal complaint with several agencies including the FBI Cyber Terrorism Unit. I realize that most of your entire website is comprised of pathetic, pimply-faced maladjusted pre-teens whose parents don't love them, and their best Saturday night date takes AA batteries. Be that as it may, you have now become a criminal threat. There a lot of people now monitoring your site. I strongly suggest that there are no more unauthorized "visits" to our office. There will be severe penalties for failure to heed this warning. The forum banter on your site means nothing to us or anyone in the world for that matter, but your threats of bodily harm and property damage cannot be ignored. I was afraid that the FBI and police departments would not be responsive. I was pleasantly surprised to find the contrary. Interestingly, no individual or corporate entity has approached us with any question or problem regarding the content in question. This is true lunacy! There is this big dispute over a piece of content that we received a signed release for. Do you have any idea how foolish and immature you look through this? Of course I am referring to the real three dimensional world where real people live and work. You and your forum obviously live in very dark places where they don't teach spelling, grammar, logic, reasoning…etc. Well, that being said, we don't care how you advertise your stupidity, but eBaum's World Inc lives in the real world, and we are very tolerant and sensitive to the underprivileged and the mentally challenged. We will however use any and all legal remedies to ensure our safety. The police and FBI are taking this very seriously. I will leave you with this challenge, if any member of your forum or anyone any where wants to challenge our policy, simply come out from under your rock and call me on the phone, or schedule an appointment. I would be happy to discuss any problem with any credible individual. Of course I am assuming that these "kids" are capable of meaningful dialogue. We have received hundreds of calls, but alas, zero meaningful dialogue, only weak pranks. Judging from the posts I have read from your site I am confident that no one possesses the aforementioned skills necessary to pull that off. The first guy you sent in here probably soiled his pants when he couldn't answer the simplest question and literally ran out the door…LOL. I don't think he is a candidate for Mission Impossible. The police have already contacted him and our lawyers will have fun with Ben and his parents. The invitation stands. BTW, the FBI told me that the operators and facilitators of your site are more liable than they think; they also assured me that nobody from your site would come out from under their rock to talk. They likened your forum to terrorists who always stay under ground. Is that the way you envisioned your forum at its inception? How pathetic. I look forward to your reply. Neil J. Bauman Executive Vice President eBaum's World Inc. neil@ebaumsworld.com Office:585-292-0069 Fax: 585-292-0722 ===== Upon receiving this little gem, Max called the eBaum office expecting this email to be a fake. It wasn't. Unable to reach anyone at the eBaum office (right), Max left a voicemail. He was rewarded with yet another email, ripe with more insults and even an anti-semetic barb: From: "Neil Bauman" neil@ebaumsworld.com To: support@ytmnd.com Cc: "'Eric Bauman'" ebaum@ebaumsworld.com, "'Jason Martorana'" jason@ebaumsworld.com, wlevinson@culleymarks.com Subject: Phone Message Dear Max, My assistant informed me that you called our corporate office to verify the correspondence titled Cease and Desist was in fact sent by me.it was. I would like to have any kind of meaningful communication with you or anyone representing your site. As stated in my earlier note, we have never been formally contacted by anyone regarding the questioned content. I am easily accessible during normal business hours. Feel free to contact me if you are capable of exhibiting a nominal use of some professionalism. I have had a great deal of contact from several of your loyal followers. That contact was far from meaningful or professional. In a short time you will be held accountable for the deeds and threats that were aimed at our site and our people. Obviously you have lost possession of your Yiddish cup. We are not about to be physically threatened by you or anyone else. If you thought this was a joke, you are very misguided. I am not one to be trifled with. How dare you and your brethren make death threats against our personnel? There is no veiled threat here, just your wake up call. You had the ability to stop this early in the game and choose not to. That strategy will prove to be a serious mistake in judgment on your part. Soon you will be contacted by Federal Investigators. Have a great day. Neil J. Bauman Executive Vice President eBaum's World Inc. neil@ebaumsworld.com Office: 585-292-0069 Fax: 585-292-0722 He even CC'd his lawyer. You would think a lawyer would tell his clients that isn't in their best interest to write such emails in the first place. Maybe it would be different if Max had encouraged any of this, but quite the contrary, he has been insistant upon squelching this whole thing from the start, which has caused he himself to become the targets of the very same attacks from his own users. Dearest Neil, I appreciate every email I get, but yours holds a special place in my heart! If you had been paying attention, for the last three days I have been deleting hundreds of users, sites and posts with pieces of your personal information. I'm done. I don't think you understand the extent of this situation. People have been attacking me and my ISP just for making public statements NOT to attack you. You obviously overestimate my involvement, but I guess you have to be paranoid when you are so widely hated. These users who are attacking you are doing so on their own accord. You may think that because you steal your content via "submissions" you hold no liability to the content you host. The fact is, I run my website as a hobby. I have a full time job so I can pay my rent, I can't pay moderators. I generally try not to be involved in sleazy practices, both in business and in my personal life. It amazes me with the history of your site and the massive amount of internet users that can barely spit your name out in disgust without following it with an expletive that you still don't get it. I am not a part of this. I run a website where (some) people spend a lot of time and effort CREATING things to entertain others. You run a site where you TAKE and REBRAND things to host them without citing credit. How long do you think you can hide behind your "submission" technique? I think we both know there is no possible way the majority of the content owners from which you steal can beat you on the civil level. This is due to the fact that you are a sleazy businessman that practices underhanded techniques and has a team of lawyers, while the people who are creating the "crazy" content you so masterfully profit off of have NOTHING. These people don't have lawyers, they probably earn very little if nothing off their works. Do you think if this Lohan issue went to court either side would win? No, we both know it would go nowhere, and this is why you still have it up. These kids don't want your money, they want the general respect any person should give. When someone spends the time to create something, regardless of their content sources, they just want to be cited. Fuck, is it really that much of a big deal? Ebaumsworld Inc has a notorious reputation for being non-responsive and trying to make everything an uphill battle every step of the way. Last night I spent an hour on the phone with your hosting company, explaining the steps I was taking to try and prevent further damage from happening and explaining that I was willing to help out however I could. This morning I received a phone call from your office about a content issue on forums.ytmnd.com and how someone had posted your addresses. I explained that I had already deleted the posting earlier that morning. As a webmaster I can understand the major privacy invasion this entails and as I told your host, I want nothing to do with it. Let this be an example of how angry the community (and not just on my website) is at your practices. I didn't put these kids up to these charades, they choose to do it on their own free will. I made public statements warning people of the legality of these issues and how it just isn't worth it to harass people in this way, and they still visited you. Do you really think so many users of my website would be so angry if someone from this community HADN'T spent the time to make that image? Do you seriously think these people are delusional enough to actually make this big of a deal over nothing? I'm not sure of your legal background, but in my experience sending a letter degrading and demeaning the very community you steal and profit from isn't a valid way to send a legal notice, nor is using "LOL" in a sentence. This is not the way the "executive vice president" of a company acts. You sent a cease and desist but never explain what it is you want me to cease or desist doing? I will help the FBI and local authorities out any way I can and I will provide them with any possible information they could need. I'm even willing to take a lie detector test, how about you? I have no quarrel with eBaumsworld. That being said, here is my challenge to you: How about you stop hiding behind the money and privilege of a legal team paid for by PartyPoker popups and admit you and your employees are engaging in profiting from theft and purposefully going out of your way to make sure content creators don't get credited for their work? Who is the person that claims they made the work in question. If they signed a consent and release form why not make the information public? I tried to be amiable. I tried to offer you my help in ending the entire thing and you did nothing but insult me, when I think it's obvious I have had nothing to do with this. I'm done with you. I will continue deleting things that break my terms of service, but beyond that, expect nothing. Here is my final offer: tomorrow at midnight I will delete anything with the term "eBaum". I offer to do this for you if you remove lohanfacial.html from your website. Lovingly, -Max Sole proprietor, YTMND.COM All that needs to be said is that eBaumsworld has really surprised me with their unprofessional and immature handling of this whole situation. It is easy to see why sites like ebaumsworldsucks.com exist now. And although I still will not involve myself in any sort of time-wasting "internet war," you can rest assure that Mr. Bauman's site will not be suggested viewing material by me any time in the forseeable future.
|
| -- Posted by OtterVomit on Monday, January 9 2006 | ||||
 BEEEEYOOOND THE RIM OF THE STARLIGHT....The U.S. government is reportedly investigating the possibility of developing a hyperspace engine to make interstellar space travel possible - a theoretical version of a warp drive. "I have been working on propulsion systems for quite a while and it would be the most amazing thing. The benefits would be almost unlimited," said German scientist Jochem Hauser, a professor of physics who spoke to Scotsman.com. "But this thing is not around the corner; we first have to prove the basic science is correct." The device would be based on a controversial theory using intense magnetic fields to create thrust for a spacecraft. In principle, a large enough field would allow the ship to slip into a dimension where the speed of light is faster. Hypothetically, this would enable a spaceship to travel to Mars in three hours or reach a star light years away in about 80 days, according to New Scientist magazine, which noted that the US Air Force has expressed an interest in testing the concept. Reportedly, the US Department of Energy may use its Z Machine to try to generate the sort of magnetic fields required. Hauser, who said that NASA had contacted him, said it was possible that a device could be tested as soon as five years from now, but added, "It's our job to prove we are right." He added that if the theory for Star Trek style travel proves to be correct, "then this is not science fiction, it is science fact." Engage!
|
| Patient's not responding! -- Posted by BalconyDive on Wednesday, January 4 2006 | ||
After having taken advantage of OiNKs neat holiday offer of "nothing counts on your download stats" I now have a whole host of music that I need to burn to DVDs and put in a pile where I'll never listen to it again. Hoarding is fun, even when it's for no good reason. I can't even tell you how many DVDs I've netflixed and then only watched once. There's a slightly smaller number of ones I never watched. Even smaller for ones I'm not even sure why I have, but even as the numbers get smaller they're still pretty signifigant. It's almost 10 now. I'd be futsing around with Animal Crossing right now except that I put the DS down to go try to calm the baby (he's sick for the first time in his three months, it's making him very angry and very loud) and when I came back picked it up and immediatley (as in without looking because I was watching the worst most formulaic television show ever, which I am sadly addicted to as long as I can watch without commercials) hit the power button trying to turn it on. Since it was already on, this action turned it off killing the previous hours work (one built Snowman, a couple purchases and sales, some cash on the mortgage and letters with gifts to everyone) and now I'm very angry at the game. Not only is that work gone but now I have to deal with that fucking Mole when I finally do turn it on. I hate that cocksucker. I seriously need some people to put in my friends list so I can hit their towns and invite them over to poke my ball return and watch the green ball bounce into the black ball then dissapear, but only one person I know has a DS, and she doesn't have Animal Crossing (yet). I seriously need to...socialize. But that involves not only other people but probably even leaving the house. It's a Catch 22 and it sucks. Thus I invite both of you reading this to go buy a DS and Aniaml Crossing so we can play. Especially Vomit. I want to stroll through your town and look at the dead weeds and see how much yout NPCs hate you. I still need a job, I still have no faith I'll find one, and I still hate my life, but that's an emo update for another day (which I won't be making). These stream of conciousness entrys are fun. Go vote for Vomits stuff on YTMND and meet me back here...some other time.
|
| Always Something There To Remind Me... -- Posted by BalconyDive on Sunday, January 1 2006 |
So it's 20 minutes to midnight and what am I doing? Watching the You Got Served episode of South Park (Randy Marsh brings the funny) and walking around Pey·Town in Animal Crossing: Wild World. Who rules? Why, it's me obviously. On the plus side, Animal Crossing is seriously addictive...which is weird considering you don't really do anything.
|