Crip Memoir Resurrects Slain

Stanley Tookie Williams founded the Crips, killed some people, and got death row. Now Hollywood stars petition that he made amends by writing children's books. I went and looked up what amends actually means.

Ghostly Car Commercial

A forwarded email about a British car commercial supposedly shelved because a ghostly white mist appears beside the car, at the very spot where someone had died a year earlier. Is it a ghost or just mist? You decide.

Installing a JAR without a JAD

I got a new phone that runs little Java MIDlets, and I have one idea: a Sleep Mode that answers calls, announces itself, and lets the caller decide whether to actually wake me. For the cousin who smears spackle in her eyes at night, basically.

Concoctions of Caliginosity #1

I'm launching a new series in which I shamelessly substitute substance with grotesque imagery. First up: psychotic cat. Click, then just stare. It sees into your soul. Use only as directed.

Computer Programmer or Serial Killer?

Ten photos, one question: is this person a computer programmer or a serial killer? I got 8 out of 10, having apparently underestimated programmer hygiene. Twice.

Steam Powered Harleys

A Slashdot piece on BMW's new steam engine that reclaims energy from exhaust heat. The real treasure is the comments, which only land if you know the factions inside the biking community. Steam-engine performance for Harley owners, basically.

When in Doubt....

Everyone's heard about the air marshals who shot the man claiming to have a bomb. Investigators then spread the bags on the tarmac and blew up two of them. So much for the art of defusing; apparently the easiest way to neutralize a bomb is to detonate it.

Daimler Chrysler and the Java Crisis

Someone at Daimler Chrysler searched for how to convert an OutputStream to an InputStream and landed on my logs. My answer: GinormousBuffer, a FIFO that lives in RAM until a threshold, then pages out to disk, all behind one consistent interface.

The Super Secret InputStream

Some poor soul found my blog searching for "covert inputstream to string." Assuming they meant convert, here is how to do it in Java, along with all the reasons you probably shouldn't read an 8GB Titanic rip into memory.

They're Lucky We Allow Them To Exist

A collection from mediamatters.org of commentary on Canada, starting with some amusing Ann Coulter and building to a CNN segment that is entirely hysterical. Turn up the volume and listen carefully.