2006 - the year in review

It's that time of the year again. Yes, the last day of the year, the day when you just wanna look forward and say "screw this year, next year's gonna be way better because I will keep my resolution next year". Always happens to me. And guess what? The next year is always as sucky as the previous year for me.

So this year I'm gonna ditch the ritual of looking forwards to avoid looking backwards, this year I'm gonna look backwards to look forwards. I am gonna celebrate
what I have achieved this year and, in some cases, haven't achieved. How can you define success if you don't know what failure is?

So here goes 2006


2006 - Memorial events

Some general 2006 events first. Do you know that 2006 is supposed to be the year of birth of Motoko Kusanagi? In case you're wondering who the heck that is, she is only the main character in Ghost in the Shell, the best freaking anime series ever.

Yes, I know, that's extremely exciting. Let's get on with what actually happened this year. Well let's see, there were a few exciting moments like when the North Koreans shot those long range missiles into the sea and scare the shit out of the neighbouring countries and then they went ahead with that nuclear test. That was exciting for a while and then as suddenly as it started, it ended. I was hoping the US would really put the "weapon of mass destruction" ploy into actually use this time. There's no need for intelligence of any kind to tell that North Korea has "weapon of massive destruction" (it's not "mass" anymore, it has to be massive, you can't recycle reasons to go to war). Let me just spell this out in case somebody still insists on not enough "intelligence": NUCLEAR WEAPONS KILL MORE PEOPLE THAN NORMAL WEAPON. Maybe a picture's gonna bring the point home?


Not that I'm condoning war or anything, it just doesn't make sense. The US went to war in Iraq without any kind of hard evidence that there actually were "weapons of mass destruction". Actually they went to war because the Bush administration claimed to have intelligence that there were "weapons of mass destruction". Guess what? 2 years later and we haven't seen any such weapons. And now we have proofs that North Korea possesses real "weapons of mass destruction" and the US hasn't move any troops to invade NK. What's the deal with that? Oh yeah, last time I check, North Korea doesn't have as much oil as Iraq even though they're suffering under a dictator much worse than Saddam Hussein. As we're talking about Saddam Hussein I think this is the moment to bring up the topic of his execution. I don't know about you but the moment he was caught back in whenever in that hole in the ground I thought "this guy is dead meat". I don't think any kind of trial can have the outcome of Saddam missing the death penalty.

Other memorable events
Pope Benedict XVI quotes a criticism of the Islam faith, sparking mass protest.
John Kerry accidentally insulted the intelligence of George W. Bush.
The death of Steve Irwin
Beaconsfield
FIFA World Cup
Agassi's retirement
Google bought Youtube and began deleting pirated videos
Xbox 360, PS3, Wii

The North Korean hiatus isn't as bad as the renewed violence between Lebanon and Israel. That was ugly. Has it stopped yet? I know that's terrible of me but it just went on and on and on forever and I kinda lost interest after 2 weeks of bloodbaths. Let's just hope the 2006 Miss Universe Zuleyka Rivera will bring world peace at last.

It's not all bad news however, on November 7 the Democrats kicked the Republicans' collective asses and won control of both houses. Hopefully, something good's gonna come out of this.

Let's get on with the tragedy that's closer to home (ie. Australia) shall we? On March 18 tropical cyclone Larry hit Queensland and since then banana prices has gone ... um bananas in Australia. It's a real tragedy let me tell you, not only for those farmers who lost their livelihood but also for us poor consumers since now we have to put up with the extortion that is banana prices. Not such a tragedy for me though. I don't like bananas and I avoid them especially since fundies can use bananas to prove that God exists.

The most interesting thing from the political front in Australia this year is the near cat-fight between John Howard and Peter Costello. The outcome? Looks like Johnny's running for another election. At least we've got a new Opposition leader that doesn't look like a big bully.

2006 - personal events
Ok, this should be short. Let's see in January I got the uni offer and the scholarship. As it turned out, the scholarship was a heap of headache and worries. I reckon I wouldn't be as stressed out at around exam periods if I don't have the scholarship. However, it does help with never having to borrow HECS so I guess it's a good thing. What I need in the future is better planning so that I won't have to be stressed.
One year of uni has made me realised that uni sucks. Not as much as high school but it sucks. I like how you can pretty much do what you feel like in uni but seriously it just encourages me to slack off. Hence the crazy cramming sessions when exams come calling.
I started this year with 2 simple targets in mind:
- Keep the scholarship
- Read 200 fiction books
And I'm proud to say, I've achieved all 2 of my targets, yay! Actually, I overachieved a bit. I read 229 books this year. Most of them are crap and I think I'm having a kind of reading block right now. I can't concentrate on any books and I can't read anything but blogs and internet boards now. Maybe I read a bit too much this year. One thing is for sure though, no more crazy reading frenzy next year.


2006 - a year of blog posts

Blog statistics
Number of posts: 183 (including this one)
Number of visitors: 3000+

It's really strange but out of my 183 posts, the most popular one is this one all because of the "how to be positive" tag. The most searched phrase that leads to my blog is also "how to be positive". Looks like all those poor people being drowned by their own negativity didn't find much help from me. However, I'm researching on the subject. Really I'm actually finding books on the subject and maybe I'm gonna share my journey to positivity one in the very near future.

My blog's got some really strange links from searched terms. Here're some of them: "hairy cate winslet", "ziggy switkowski profile", "blogs with czech childrens pictures and bio" (wtf?), "straight sex videos", "www.do santa have a daughter?.com". See, these terms are just stranger than strange. How the heck does "czech childrens" have anything to do with my blog?

I suppose this is the best time to thank my readers for... um reading my blog. My dear readers, you know who I'm talking about. I can't possibly list all your names coz I don't know it. However, here're the names of some regular comment leavers in no particular order: Nhan, Bert, Bob, several-anonymous-persons-which-I-assumed-to-be-one-person, thanks for taking your time to read my little blog I know this is weird but I feel I should thank Chuck too. He's providing some traffic for the blog anyway.

Comment of the week

I'm being flooded with comments guys, it's unhandle-able and unbelievable, I've never thought I'll live to see a day when I actually receive a comment.

Ok, I've switched off the sarcastic mode now everything's back to normal so we can actually talk about the "comment of the week".


Today I received this comment from Chuck:

Dude, Chuck Norris is gonna kick your ignorant ass.

Mr. Norris' Christmas Message.

Anyone that took on Bruce Lee knows what they are talking about.

It's no wonder why this earn the weekly award for "most stupid comment of the week" which I reduced to just "comment of the week" for promotional reasons. Also, the author of said comment has made it to my list of "people who should be penciled down for a random visit by the Grim Ripper", alright, I'm being a bit too harsh here so I'm gonna rename the above list to "morons who ought to step onto dog shit every time they go for a walk". Happy?

This Chuck is going down for the following reasons:

1. Calling me an ignorant ass. I am not an ass and even if I'll be an ass in the future I will be a freethinking, authority-questioning ass. Ignorant is what you use for people who believe for the sake of believing. Ignorant is what you use to describe people who never spend a second of their lives asking themselves about the logic of their religions. Ignorant is what you use to describe sheep. So never, NEVER make the mistake of calling me ignorant.

2. Nobody can kick my ass let alone my alleged "ignorant ass". Ass kicking is for people who are compensated for their lack of brain tissues with muscle tissues, probably by their alleged God. You're probably thinking that this post is going to be a pompous reply to a comment I didn't want and I'm probably doing it to make my bruised, fragile ego feels better. You are so wrong. I can easily do that by just deleting said comment and never think about it again, but I won't do that. I will even give you the link to the post Chuck commented. How can an "ignorant ass" pass up on the opportunity so show oh-so-wise Chuck more of my "ignorance"?

3. Who the frak is Chuck Norris? Of course I know who Chuck Norris is, I watch movies too. What I meant was: who the frak do you think Chuck Norris is? The intellectual of the universe? A freaking scientist? No. Last time I checked he's an actor. Why should anyone in their right mind take what an actor said about evolution as evidence to refute reputable scientific studies? After reading the article that Chuck gave me I understand why.

Alleged Chuck Norris Fact: "There is no theory of evolution. Just a list of creatures Chuck Norris has allowed to live." It's funny. It's cute. But here's what I really think about the theory of evolution: It's not real. It is not the way we got here. In fact, the life you see on this planet is really just a list of creatures God has allowed to live. We are not creations of random chance. We are not accidents. There is a God, a Creator, who made you and me. We were made in His image, which separates us from all other creatures.

By the way, without him, I don't have any power. But with Him, the Bible tells me, I really can do all things – and so can you.

Yes, I see the errors of my way now. Evolution is a lie because there is a God who made us in his image and who we can't see but we have to believe in his existence just because a book, which allegedly is his words, says so. How convenient. Everything makes sense. What do you think about Chimpanzees, Chuck? They're are so similar to humans in their genetic codes. Maybe they're God's failed human experiment?

Also, there is a God because Chuck Norris was created by him, just like you and me. And without God, Chuck Norris wouldn't be Chuck Norris coz he wouldn't "have any power". What power does Chuck Norris have anyway? X-ray vision? Invisibility? Any amazing superhuman ability that's inborn? Oh, you're referring to his martial arts. Correct me if I'm wrong but was he born knowing all about martial arts or did he learn it along the way? If there is a God, Chuck Norris would have been born knowing every single freaking martial art moves in the world.

What I'm talking about here is credibilities. The fact that Chuck Norris kicked Bruce Lee's ass doesn't have any relevance to evolution. Don't bring up Chuck Norris until he wins a debate against Richard Dawkins on evolution. (Yeah right, like that's gonna happen). Still on the topic of credibilities, whose words would you trust:
This ridiculous guy who obviously has no concept of evolution theory:


Or a world renowned ethologist, evolutionary biologist and popular science writer who holds the Charles Simonyi Chair for the Public Understanding of Science at Oxford University?


I suppose I can rest my case here but I'll present one more argument. Some people usually use something along the line of: "I prayed to God for (such and such) and I got it so God must exist". What is so wrong with this argument? I used to pray to God too and I didn't get anything. True I might have asked some very trivial things like a million dollars for my birthday present or please let me pass the end of year exams or something like that but people ask for trivial things all the time and some of them get their wishes. I did ask for world peace once and as you know nothing yet. People in other religions ask their Gods for things too and it all comes to this ratio: 50:50. 50% of all the people who prayed for something get what they want, the rest don't. It doesn't matter which deity you prayed to, it's all 50:50. How about this Chuck, try praying to Chuck Norris for a sunny day tomorrow. You might get your wish, you might not. However, praying to Chuck Norris does have an advantage over praying to God though. You actually know Chuck Norris exists.

The fantasy movie of the year!

If you know me, I like fantasy. Books, movies, TV shows. I like them all. Well not actually all of them. I hate Eragon both the movie and the book. The book is full of fantasy clichés and a movie made out of a book full of clichés has got to be bad. Add wooden acting and horrible castings you'll get something like Eragon. The main character is supposed to be a young boy, not a guy who looks like he's at least 25 years old. I've gone to the conclusion that Eragon is the movie I will definitely miss the first time I saw the trailer. John Malkovich or not there's no way I'll see it and judging from the reviews the movie got so far, I decided right.

Ok, let's get on with the best fantasy movie of the year rather than lose ourselves in, possibly, the worst fantasy movie of the year.


So you're probably dying to know what it is? Well it's this little movie called "Pan's Labyrinth" from writer/director Guillermo del Toro. The movie is set in fascist Spain in 1944. Ofelia (Ivana Baquero) has to moved into the house of her tyrannical stepfather who is trying to snuff out the rebel forces in the region. Ofelia hates her new life and becomes immersed in the magical world of the surrounding forest where she encounters fairies and a faun who tells her that she is the long-lost princess they have been waiting for.

I know the synopsis doesn't sound that good but the movie is so much more than what I've written above. It's a mix of history, fantasy, horror, suspense and drama. It is as original as "Spirited Away" was in 2002. Forget those boring movie based on popular fantasy books. This movie is so stunningly made and so imaginative that it hurts.

The cinematography is great, the special effects are topnotch (not so surprising since it comes from the director of Hell Boy). The score? It's so simple, in the form of a lullaby, both sweet and sinister at the same time. The acting leaves the wooden actor from Eragon eating the dirt. I'm not kidding here. All of the actors in the movie are so good. I think I've found the worst villain ever. Forget Sauron or Voldemort, the villain of the year is Captain Vidal.

One thing though, this movie is definitely not for kids. It's more like a fairy tale for adult. There's blood and gore and terrifying characters, which are what you should expect from a movie with a civil war backdrop.

"Pan's Labyrinth" has been nominated for quite a few awards and I wouldn't be surprised if it's nominated for one or two Oscars. In fact, I'm gonna be very disappointed if it doesn't make it to the nominations list. We'll have to wait and see then. In the mean time, here's the trailer. Enjoy!

various ways to explain evolution to the masses

Let's see, there's the fundie way to explain evolution that went something like this:

EVOLUTION DIDN'T HAPPEN, GOD CREATED THE UNIVERSE AND EVERYTHING ELSE WITH A SNAP OF HIS FINGERS. DON'T THINK, DON'T ASK QUESTIONS JUST BELIEVE ELSE YOU'LL GO TO HELL.


That's quite a short, easy and boring way that explains NOTHING. Of course various year 12 text books can actually be more accurate and informative on the subject that that's also boring and I'm not here to bore you with text books.

So if you're looking for a non-boring way to explain evolution, you can always look at South Park. I'm not gonna guarantee that it's very informative and accurate though at least it's better than what fundies say.



If you don't like that explanation (what's wrong with you? that was funny!). You can always try The Family Guy's take on the subject. Again, I'm not guarantee anything but fun. If you don't find this funny, I have nothing else to say but "your sense of humour sucks"

everything about the bible sucks

I know I kinda said that before, somewhere, in my mini-jungle of blog posts in one way or another. Mostly by pulling out ridiculous quotes from the Bible.

So you're probably wondering if I'm gonna do it again today. The answer is "NO", thankfully. I'm having this huge headache (from listening to music nonstop since morning with my brand-spanking-new, ass-kicking-cool headphones) and frankly bible quotes just make my head hurts more.

No, I'm not gonna pull out quotes, I'm pulling out a video. I used "everything about the bible sucks" as the title because, really it does suck but video games based on Bible stories, man they suck even worse.



Maybe the motivation behind this video is because JamesNintendoNerd hates ripoff games but hell, I'm gonna use this for the Atheist cause anyhow.

Boxing day

Do you know what's the best thing about Christmas? Boxing day.

I'm not one of those shopaholics. In fact, I hate shopping and I usually spend the least amount of time possible to shop. I love online shopping though since you don't have to spend that much energy finding things. My approach to normal shopping in 3 easy steps is:

Step 1: walk around. This is the most time consuming steps and I hate it but it's an essential step since the rest of my shopping are based on this.
Step 2: pick what you like. This might include try whatever it is on to see if it fits.
Step 3: pay for it. That's it, just pay and get out of there.

Please note, there's no thinking involved in here. I hate going shopping with people who think too much and just keep changing their mind, before you know it, half the day is over and they're still in the same shop agonizing over what to buy.

Boxing day is the best time to shop really. You can't stay anywhere long enough since people will actually PUSH you out of their way. It's a wonder the Myer building in Melbourne City didn't crumble to dirt today with so many people flocking into it. I almost became the victim of a stampede by a horde crazy girls trying to find the shortest route to the reduced price table. I really should give credits to those girl, they did figure out the shortest route to that table: over my body. Too bad I succeed in getting out of their way in the nick of time by stepping onto some old lady's foot. It seems that the new fashion this summer is stripy t-shirts. I expect I'll see hordes of girls wearing those. Why would you wear something that make you look like a zebra? Albeit a very weird zebra considering the colour combinations like green and red, blue and gray, orange and white stripes.

Apart from that incident in Myer, my shopping trip went relatively incident-less. I got myself a late-Christmas present: a pair of kick-ass headphones. It actually blocked out everything. I really appreciate not having to listen to some girl bragging about a pair of G-strings she got for a song from some adult shop, thank you very much. People just talk about all sort of weird things on trains.

Christmas Day (yawn...)

I know I should be more excited on Christmas day but I'm not. There's no presents to be opened (they're already opened about 2 days before Christmas day and no they're not from my parents or anyone else, they're from myself and I).


I found that people don't usually give you something useful or something that you want for Christmas. Let's get a run through with 2 brilliant Christmas present ideas I've encountered:

1. Candles. This is the present that wins my "most sarcastically practical present of the year award". What possible use can you have for candles in this century? Please don't tell me they're relaxing because every time I have to light up a candle scented or not it's because there's something wrong with the electricity line and the power is cut right when I'm doing something important on my laptop. So every time I light up a candle I'm stressed about losing what I was typing. And that's not the only thing I have to worry about. Do you know how easy it is for houses to be on fire especially in Australia in summer? The damn candle can fall, set the carpet on fire and then the whole house's gonna be on fire. I can really do without these worries. Scented candles are worse and nowadays people only give scented candles. Not only I have to worry about losing data and setting the house on fire, I have to deal with the nauseating, supposedly "relaxing" scents. Relaxing my ass, they set my sinuses on fire and give me sneezing fits.

2. Bath stuffs. You know the, again, scented bath stuffs like bath salts, bath oil, etc... Again, they're supposed to be relaxing and again their purpose just fails me completely. I don't take baths. It takes at least 20 L of water to fill the bath and frankly that's a waste of water.

Those are the big no-no when it comes to buying Christmas presents for me and luckily I didn't get any of those this Christmas. Maybe you're wondering what I got. My family are a practical bunch and we don't usually give presents. If we do it's usually money or gift cards so people can get what they want themselves. It saves time and energy. You don't believe me? First you have to have an idea about what to buy, then you have to go buy it and it doesn't stop there, you have to wrap it in preferably Christmas wrapping papers, which are sold at heavily inflated prices. With gift cards, you just have to buy them and then pop them into an envelop and Voila! a present to please anyone, albeit a very lazy present.

Ok, back to my family, we don't usually give presents. Birthdays: definitely, Luna new year: definitely, Christmas: nah. There you have it, I don't get any presents from my family. It's not that devastating anyhow. I've never gotten anything on Christmas and I don't expect to get anything. This year however, I decided to start a new tradition. I got myself presents and am I happy. So these are what I bought:

1. Books. I bought Sam Harris' "The End of Faith" and Richard Dawkins' "The God Delusion". I've been looking for them in Australian book stores for a while and they're actually available at Christmas. From what the bookstore cashier told me, many people bought them as Christmas presents for their friends. That's actually a good idea. I might even do that next year.

2. An USB flash drive. It's not just any USB flash drive. It's one of those new released Toshiba flash drive. It was quite a stressed experience buying flash drives from eBay. After I paid for the drive and was waiting for it to arrive by mail, I found this article: "Beware of fake flash drive on ebay". While reading that I did a mental check list: Toshiba - common counterfeit brands on eBay: check; misleading slogan - new product not yet available in your country: check; high capacity flash drive: check; low price: check. So chances are I bought a fake and I was worried coz I paid more than a hundred bucks for that USB flash drive. The drive arrived 2 days before Christmas and it wasn't fake. I'm just too lucky, aren't I? From now on I'm not gonna buy USB drive from ebay.

3. Battlestar Galactica pins. These are also bought from eBay. I think I'm gonna start a collection of these, they're quite rare maybe one day I'll sell them for ten times what I paid.

Yup, that's it I think. May be I bought a new Xbox game but I can't really remember now, I think I did. It's really quite hard typing a post off the top of your head while you're still recovering from a mini-hangover. I'm still recovering from my Christmas Eve dinner. I think I drank too much beer + wine. Anyhow, Merry Christmas everyone, maybe I should say Merry fictional character's birthday, that's more fitting.

For the atheists out there, here are 2 links I think you would enjoy if you haven't stumbled upon them already:
10 ways to qualify your atheism this christmas
Religion does more harm than good - poll

So long big-ass apps!

It has recently come to my attention that my tinkering with the template has made it impossible to load my blog on the blasted Internet Explorer. This is, of course, unacceptable. After all, 90% of my readers use IE to read this blog. So after some more tinkering the blog is now compatible with IE again.

From as long as I can remember, I've hated IE. It's one of those big-ass applications that eat resources for snacks, another one of those is Acrobat Reader. Opera used to be my favourite alternative to IE until I discovered Firefox. I think Opera was the first browser to come up with tabbed browsing and it's a better browser than Firefox.

So you might ask why did I switch to Firefox? Well, first Opera is slightly bigger than Firefox, it's got an integrated off-line mail client which I don't need. Secondly, back when I still used it, I couldn't get Java or Flash to work properly with Opera even though I installed the version with Java built-in. And then there's the big attraction with the totally FREE Firefox. Opera was free too but back then the free version got this huge ad panel that just irritated me.

I think everybody's into tabbed browsing at the moment. Don't you just love tabs? Anyhow, I think everybody loves it so much that even Microsoft has to integrate that into the new version of IE. Sneaky bastard went behind my back to install IE7 on my computer when I used Windows Update. It even updated WMP to version 11. The result? It took half and hour for my laptop to start up after Windows Update rebooted without my permission while I was typing a post. I was able to salvage the post all thanks to Blogger auto save function. No more automated Windows Updates from now on for me. Everything has got to go through me first!

I must say the new IE is a complete ripoff of Firefox. New features in IE7? Not so new if you ask me. Tabbed browsing and search box built in? They've got Firefox stamped all over them. Granted the original skin of Firefox doesn't look as attractive as the new IE but you can choose from a wide range of skins for Firefox. I would love to remove IE completely but sadly, I need it for Windows Update.

The other famous infamous big-ass program in my book is Acrobat Reader (AR). Just download the installer is exhausting (especially when you have to do it on a dial-up connection). 70MB? That's just too frakking big for something you can't use all the features. I've got to restart my laptop so many times because AR crashed it while opening a file that's got way too many pictures. I don't have to tell you how much I hate AR do I? I hate it so much that when I found an alternative to it I kicked its ass out of my laptop.

The alternative and, might I add, much much smaller and better program is Foxit Reader which is available FREE of charge and full of features AR charged you a fortune for. Yup, I'm talking about annotating right on the pdf file. If you're a uni-student who's, like me, too stingy to print out all the lecture notes you can bring your laptop to lectures and type notes right on the lecture notes. Here's a screenshot of Foxit in action.

I'm just terribly confused!

It's not everyday that you catch me terribly confused. I can be mildly confused on a regular basis when it comes to statistics calculations or whether I have to use the mortar and pestle or a beaker when mixing solids and semi-solids or when it comes to paradoxes like "I always lie".
Anyhow I found myself terribly confused today all thanks to a fundie.


Since getting broadband internet Youtube's become my favourite site, true you can find weird stuff on Youtube like this Japanese game show.

But then you can also find quality stuff like the entire Jonathan Miller's Atheism series from BBC4. And let's not forget my favourite ABC show at the moment: "The Chaser's War on Everything". Yay, Youtube rules.

Ok, I think I've gone off the topic considerably. I was terribly confused about this. Back when I was still a Catholic I've always take comfort from the fact that "God loves everybody". Really, that particular fact was instilled in my mind since forever. I think if you ask any Christian they'll tell you that. What get me confused is how someone, who's a self-proclaimed Pastor,can say with absolute certainty that God hates everybody (with the exception of said pastor and his family).

The pastor I'm talking about is Fred Phelps of the Westboro Baptist Church. My "terrible confusion" started when I saw this Chaser segment a while back.


At the time it just seemed funny coz that's what the Chaser gang do, they make fun of politics, religions and everything else especially Naomi Robson hence the name of the show: "The Chaser's War on Everything". So strictly speaking my "confusion" didn't start then, it started when I read a post from Deep Thoughts featuring an awesome interview with Shirley Phelphs Roper.

Yup, that was the exact moment when it started. What do you mean "god hates everybody"? So all those Catholic nuns were lying to me when they told me that God love everybody including me and especially me if I make it to confession at least once every month and say at least 50 Hail Mary's every night? My goodness! My childhood teachings from the nuns are lies. Who could have known?!

So to resolve my confusion, I researched this extraordinary claim made by the Phelphs. Where could I go? Where else but their own website Godhatesfags.com. I'm gonna be completely unbiased here and say this, the site is one of the worst badly designed site I've ever seen. If you know anything about the web it's that graphics attract. That site is just full of words, it's just a big turn-off. And that is before I even read the contents of what's actually there.

So what is on that site? A lot of bullshit of course. Take "God loves everybody - the greatest lie ever told" for example. While I was reading it I couldn't help but wondering is this guy nuts? All he succeeds in doing is presenting a picture of a malevolence God who hates everyone except for the members of the Westboro Baptist Church. Seriously, I thought the "good" pastor was trying to persuade people away from God. And I must say, he's quite persuasive. If I was a Catholic still I would have renounced the Christian God after I read the first 5 pages of the file. Who can believe that such ghastly individual can claim to be a Christian? Ok, I know, bad rhetorical question. It's not like every Christian is a peace-loving person, the majority of them are anyhow.

Fred Phelphs picks a fight with everyone not just "fags". Let's see, his other websites include GodHatesAmerica.com, GodHatesSweden.com, GodHatesCanada.com and coming up very soon GodHatesEveryoneButMeAndMyFamily.com. I'm just wondering why he hasn't pick a fight with Muslims yet maybe he did learn something from September 11. Something like the cause of 9/11 isn't "the wrath of God on a perverted country" but it's just a plain simple hate crime on a massive scale. Here's Fred Phelphs picking a fight with televangelists.

I must say here, he's quite right to some very small extent though. Televangelists and faith healers are just ridiculous. How can giving money to someone who's already rich get you into heaven? And what's with the touchy feely stuff to cure people of incurable diseases? I'd say it's ridiculous anyone would believe that but I wouldn't go as far as to say "you're pastor is a whore" though.

Fred Phelphs isn't the only one who's sprouting bullshit like this. All of the people from his "church" are like this. It's quite understandable really since there are only 70-something people in this so-called church, it's more like a hate inciting club than a church if you ask me, and I suspect they're all his family. See, the thing is the "good" pastor has 13 children, 54 grandchildren (to date) and 5 great grandchildren (to date). Yeesh, 13 children! Have these people heard of birth control? You know the plastic thingy you slip on so that your wife doesn't have to get pregnant every year?
So 13+54+5 = 72. Wow, I don't know why he bothers calling it a church. It's a family, why not call it a "family"? How do I know there are 70-something people in his church? Well, I got it right from the horse's mouth, or in this case from the horse's daughter's mouth.



That video is just too damn funny. What else is better than people yelling over other people? the whole time I was watching that I was hoping for a cat fight, wouldn't it be fun watching 4 women fight it out on TV? I myself wanna strangle that Phelphs woman. I would have if I was the host. Ok, I'm getting serious now. That video is just sad. I feel sad for the daughters. They said it themselves, they don't have friends outside of their "church" which consists of their psycho grandfather, their equally psycho mother and their various uncles, aunts and cousins.

So there I think I've resolved my "confusion". God doesn't hate everybody, so everybody who believes there's a god can relax now. It's just a psycho family inciting hate. For the atheists out there, I don't suppose it would make any difference if god does or does not hate everybody. What I get out of this is frustration. How can people stand by and let psychotic fundies like these terrorising grieving families of dead individuals? I don't have to tell you how pleased I was when I watch the guy from the Chaser gang flirting with Fred Phelps' son. We need a round of applause for that performance even though it's original purpose is to make fun of weird people.
If you're not from Australia or you've never heard of the Chaser, Micheal Moore took on Fred Phelphs too and I must say it's really really REALLY satisfying to watch this video.

geeky gifts for the devoted

Fresh out of ideas about what to buy for your slightly geeky fundie friends? No worry, you've come to the right place.




Let's go with the really cheap stuff first. Let me introduce you to the iBelieve. It's a replacement cap and lanyard for your iPod shuffle. This thing will turn your sucky gum pack iPod shuffle (old version) into a still sucky iPod shuffle that looks like a cross. Woohoo, we can bring our shuffles into churches and listen to them instead of the service now.
The next item is a real cross-shaped mp3 player. And it even comes in glossy black and chrome plated. I wonder if it comes with preloaded Hillsong songs or an unabridged audiobook version of the Bible? Even better, they should make the Bible audiobook non-removable so that people have to sit through the whole bible before they can listen to their music. That should make the thing much more appealing to the fundie population.

Have this ever happen to you? You download a big-ass 20-something-MB file on a dialup connection, cut and paste the file to your USB drive then your computer refuses to eject the drive safely. Since you refuse to accept that the stupid computer refuses to eject your USB drive, you just pluck the drive out. The result? You have to reformat our USB drive and lose everything. Now you don't have to worry about it anymore, there's a new type of USB drive with a fool-proof plan to prevent just that. Behold, the Virgin USB

See? With just one sentence "oh Maria keep my data safe" you can throw your worries away.
I haven't any luck trying to find this particular USB drive on eBay but if I can get my hands on this I'm gonna try to remove it unsafely to see if I'm gonna lose any data.

sick and tired

Today was one of those days when I'm sick and tired of EVERYTHING. And I mean everything. Here's a short list of "everything": stupid shopping centres with Christmas music on 24/7, public transport with seats that smell like piss, bittorrent downloads with slower than dialup speed, media coverage of the bush fires, more media coverage of the bush fires, Iraq "civil war", books (*shock*, me? sick of books?), this blog...
So, what did I do? I set out to bring peace to the world.

Sadly, before my noble thought of changing the world was put into action, said thought was abandoned. Firsly, it wouldn't suit the image of a True Evil Genius I've been created this past year. My aim should be world domination not world peace. Secondly, how can someone succeed at something countless Miss Universe winners had attempted and failed before?

However, I couldn't afford to do nothing so instead of changing the world (which, in truth, is out of my reach) I changed my blog template. Now, before you start laughing at me, let me tell you that was no easy feat.

Template tweaks
lable cloudlink, Peekaboo postslink,

I've been thinking for a while now that my blog is a bit bland. I haven't really tried to muck around with it much. Last year I spent a week mucking around with the old Blogger template and Photoshop and produced something that just barely worked. When I changed from Blogger to Blogger Beta I made myself a promise that I would never ever poke my head into those CSS codes again.

Like my other promises I made to myself, e.g. stop reading books, stop spending too much money,..., I didn't keep that promise. Well I did, until I got sick of the template that is. If you're in my shoes you would be sick of my template too. The Labels side-bar was overflowing (all thanks to me inventing too many labels), the blog roll and links list are in a shamble. The combination of all of those made my side-bar way longer than my posts.

So I did a bit of Google-ing and came up with the codes to make Label clouds. If you don't know what that is, take a look at my labels on the right side-bar. Isn't it awesome?

Hearten by my success with the Label cloud, I declared a pox on the no-mucking-around-with-the-template rule and did a mini overhaul of it. The result? 3-column blog! However, putting in the second side-bar literally squeezed my posts. Now the posts are longer than the bars!

No matter! After some more google-ing, I came up with the peekaboo post thingy. Now everything is taken care of. I don't hate my blog template any more. One thing's still bugging me though. I should bring the banner back, maybe a new banner?

Irony

Yup, Irony is definitely the theme of this week for me. Why else would things like this happen to me?
1. I received a 20% discount voucher AFTER I bought the last book I'm gonna buy this year
2. I keep running into blogs by pastors when I use the damn "next blog" button
3. I stumbled upon a blog by a person who claimed to an "evil genius". The irony is Barb is a Lutheran. So much for the "evil" part

Blasphemous Santa

Don't bash Santa

Kelly Ryan

December 08, 2006 11:00pm

Article from:

A PASTOR has slammed Santa as a counterfeit God who teaches children to be greedy and selfish.

New Life Christian Church's Pastor Steve McNeilly has accused Santa of being a blasphemous stand-in for God who makes liars of parents and causes confusion among children.

The Santa story creates commercial rivalry and encourages materialism and selfishness in children's hearts, he said.

"Santa has usurped the love and devotion and faith of little children," the Warrnambool pastor added.

Mr McNeilly's comments have sparked a storm of protest.

Senior church leaders and a child psychologist described the attack on Father Christmas as absurd and undeserved.

The Catholic Church's Monsegnieur Les Tomlinson said Christmas was a time for parents to teach children the joys of gift-giving.

"What we are celebrating in the birth of Jesus is the manifestation of the infinite love of all humans which is reflected in our concern for the needy and the sharing with others," Monsegnieur Tomlinson said.

Psychologist Michael Carr-Gregg said Santa was a crucial part of a child's Christmas celebration.

"These claims are an absolute outrage for the vast majority of children who are healthier and happier because of their vast memories of Christmas," he said.

But Pastor McNeilly said Santa detracted from the "true message of Christmas that God sent his son to save us from our sins".

Remember my post on how Christians should boycott Christmas tree? I think Pastor Steve McNeilly is either reading and taking the Bible literally or is being nagged to buy a 1000-buck Playstation 3 package for his kids (if he has any that is). The latter reason is, certainly, more understandable to me. I have this problem with Christmas, ok, make that 2 problems. First, Christmas music. They're ok in small doses but every Christmas I get this massive dose of Christmas music everywhere I go and on every channel on TV. There's just so much Christmas music you can take. Second, presents. I'm fine with buying presents and shopping in general. However, I tend to buy more presents for myself than for anyone else. Maybe it's a combination of boredom (from having nothing to do since Christmas coincides summer holiday in Australia) and the urge to spend for Christmas.

What's not so understandable is the fact that the pastor can say with absolute certainty that Santa Claus doesn't exist and God does. I mean, Santa Claus is just as real as god himself. In some aspects, Santa rocks the socks of god. You see, there's no "words of Santa", Santa doesn't tell you to go and kill all those people who don't believe in his existence, there's no Santa's hell and he lives on the same planet as us. What makes him so certain? True god was invented before Santa but that doesn't constitute existence!

I also have to disagree with Monsegnieur Les Tomlinson.

The Catholic Church's Monsegnieur Les Tomlinson said Christmas was a time for parents to teach children the joys of gift-giving.

I suppose children do learn a joy during Christmas but it's not the joy of gift-giving. It's more like the joy of being on the receiving end of gift-giving.

Guess who's back? Back again? Pauline's back, tell a friend

So I've got the shock of the week today when I heard that Pauline Hanson's gonna come back to politics. I was eating (what do you call a meal that's like the equivalent of brunch but instead of between breakfast and lunch it's between lunch and dinner? - Linner?) when the 4.30 news came on on channel 7 and I almost choked to death. Ms Hanson really does have a plan for a come back. This time not as a member of the One Nation party though. She's gonna be an independent member. Hell, she might even found a new party. I wonder what's it gonna be called? One Colour? One Race? One Religion? All are quite possible.

Last time she's got anti-immigration policy and this time she's bringing in fresh new ideas on, guess what?, more anti-immigration policies. Last time she waged a war agains Asian immigrants, this time it's against Africans and Muslim. Why no Muslim has planted a bomb in her fish and chips shop I have no idea. What people learn after 9/11 in one very short sentence is "don't frack with Muslim", granted not all Muslims are fundamentalists, it just pays to not be on their bad side.

I can't stand the woman. She's not only ignorant, she doesn't want to learn. Take a look at her remarks:

"We're bringing in people from South Africa at the moment, there's a huge amount coming into Australia, who have diseases, they've got AIDS," Ms Hanson said.

"They are of no benefit to this country whatsoever, they'll never be able to work.

"And what my main concern is, is the diseases that they're bringing in and yet no one is saying or doing anything about it."

Ms. Hanson, you really should take a look at the Australian Immigration policies. Before anyone can get into the country they have to go through at least 2 health screenings. It doesn't matter which country they come from, EVERYBODY has to have health checks and I'm sure as hell no one who's got AIDS or any transmissible disease can get in. Hell, even those Japanese horses got monitored and checked before they get into the country for Melbourne Cup.

What diseases are you talking about Ms Hanson? The disease of having the skin colour other than that of yours? The disease of having a religion other than that of yours? Maybe you're the one that's diseased. You have a disease that's called Racism.

What's more dangerous than a racist trying to get into parliament is an ignorant racist.

holy banana or how to prove God exists with a banana

Yes, fundies can prove that God exists with nothing but a banana. Bear with me, this is a very short video and it's worth it, not like the pseudoscience crap I had on yesterday.



Gee, I think I'm gonna have nightmares which are gonna feature bananas exclusively from now on. To tell you the truth, I've never liked the taste of bananas. I don't suppose God create banana to suit everybody's taste then. And how about this, the stupid banana fits in the hand of monkeys and chimpanzees too. Are you sure we're God's intended recipients of bananas?

An update for "6000 year-old earth"

Remember that boring post I did a few days ago about people believing that Earth and the Universe was created 6000 years ago and all the proofs are provided by the Bible?
Well here are some more proofs that the Earth is created 6000 years ago and they don't all come from the Bible. It's one long video so I suggest you find something salty to eat while watching. You seriously need more than a pinch of salt with this. Maybe a ton of salt should be just enough.

I suppose you're probably bored out of your mind by the pseudoscience-sprouting, lab coat-wearing, self-appointed "scientist". Here's a shorter, funnier video. No it's not gonna turn you into an atheist, it's just gonna try to persuade those creationists out there that they're more or less idiots. Try to incorporate some science into religion if you don't want a massive amount of followers to start asking logical and legitimate questions about your dogma.

brutish, foolish and vain

That's what you are if you're a Christian and you have a Christmas tree in your house.
Hey don't go leaving hate remarks for this post, that didn't come from me. That's the "word of God" taken right out of the Bible.

Jeremiah 10:2-8
Thus saith the Lord, Learn not the way of the heathen, and be not dismayed at the signs of heaven; for the heathen are dismayed at them. For the customs of the people are vain: for one cutteth a tree out of the forest, the work of the hands of the workman, with the axe. They deck it with silver and with gold; they fasten it with nails and with hammers, that it move not.... They are altogether brutish and foolish.

Christians should boycott Christmas tree since having one in their house is against the will of God already. However I suppose no one takes the Bible that seriously.

There's a good reason for my absence...

...and a few not so good reasons. They're the usual reasons, they mostly have something to do with books or DVDs. I've just found the best non-fiction book of the year, the best documentary I've seen this year and possibly the best TV show ever and they all have something to do with Atheism. However, this post is about why I've been non communicado for 4 days when I don't have anything to do.

Well, it was because my laptop, my beloved laptop, decided that the feeling isn't mutual and wanted to die.

OK, I overstated that a bit. It didn't decide to commit suicide or anything remotely like that. It did acted up and I felt like strangling it with its power cord. All I did was trying to clean up the hard drive and permanently delete some junk then all of the sudden Norton Internet Security crashed and wouldn't work again. Hence operation "clean up hard drive" turned into operation "get rid of Norton Internet Security".

Now that's not the end of the problem. Since I was without any proper protection from virus and adwares I decided to install a newer version of NIS. Everything went well until NIS interfered with my bittorrent download. No matter how many times I told it to allow all activities it wouldn't do what I told it to and just crashed my laptop almost every time I started a bittorrent download. When it didn't crash the laptop, which was quite rare, the download went at dial-up speed.

So out went NIS and my laptop was alright again, albeit without Antivirus and internet security. The stupid built in firewall in Windows SP2 doesn't provide enough protection so I have to find an alternative to NIS. And I found it. From now on I'm gonna stick with McAfee Internet Security Suite. It's good and it's fast. Plus it works fine with bittorrent. Now I have to get back to operation: clean up laptop hard drive.

Holy shit! I pass. Again.

Now this is becoming an annoying tradition. Last semester it was a real relief when I found out that I passed all my exams. This semester, well I'm kinda pissed off. Stupid exam results don't reflect anything. The subject I spent the least amount of time on got the highest score. The subject I spent most of my time studying got a near fail. What the hell?
Well, at least I can actually go and tear all my notes to shreds now that I'm sure I don't have to resit any exams. So long sucky notes!

What's a fundie?

Definitions for fundamentalist (source: Google):

• a supporter of fundamentalism
• of or relating to or tending toward fundamentalism
• In comparative religion, fundamentalism refers to anti-modernist movements in various religions.

After visiting this site, fundamentalism is starting to make sense to me. To be a fundamentalist, first you have to be mental. In fact being mental is the first requirement to be a fundaMENTAList. Don't believe me? Read all these quotes from fundies, these people really should be committed to a mental hospital.

Hat tip to Legal Alien for the link to the funniest website of the year!

"DEMOCRACY ORIGINATED IN THE MIND OF A RATIONAL BEING WHO HAS THE DEEPEST HATRED FOR GOD."

---Robert T. Lee, TEN COMMANDMENTS

"God hates therefore I hate. God only cares about the Adamic white race therefore I only care for the Adamic white race, bastard."

---AryanaAquillia, Black Exodus

"I honestly don't care about your rights. If it were up to me, all Atheists would be burnt at the stake and or cast into a river with weights tied to their ankles and or placed before the firing squad, etc etc etc."
---Apologist, IIDB

"There are a lot of things I have concluded to be wrong, without studying them in-depth. Evolution is one of them. The fact that I don't know that much about it does not bother me in the least."

---AV1611VET, Christian Forums

"[Explaining how "rape" is a fictional crime created by the minions of Political Correctness]

Not a subject I would normally associate with political correctness but after the extraordinary new policy statement from the PC Brigade's feminist-in-chief Ms Harriet Harman, I felt it was worthy of a page in itself!

According to Ms Harman, The Solicitor General (has a certain ring about that title - perhaps it's too much like Witchfinder General) one in twenty women has been raped. Not only that, apparently too many men are getting away with it!

Like all members of the PC Brigade, Ms Harman's common sense was surgically removed when she joined. If that figure was true, we would be constantly hearing of women raped locally and it would be the major news item on TV each day. When one dissects her dodgy statistics, it turns out that most of the 7,000 women involved in a survey didn't say they had been raped at all. Most said 'they had sexual intercourse against their will' which is a totally different thing. Most men if asked would probably say that they 'go shopping against their will' or 'visit the Mother-in-law against their will' - when they would rather perhaps watch the match on TV. All of these things are just emotional blackmail or 'give and take' within a relationship."

---Politically Incorrect Guy, Politically Correctness - the awful truth

6000 year old Earth or what happens when fantatics go scientific

Who needs to go visit joke websites when you can read entertaining "scientific" truths as this?

We need to know that all things that called science, is not science. Sometimes it's simply men’s opinions. We need to learn that all true science is in agreement with the Bible. The Bible is not a science book, but because the Bible contains all truth, all true science will be in agreement with the Bible.

We need to know that the Bible is our guide in this life. In all things, we need to follow the Bible. If there is any question, the Bible has the answer; even in the area of Science. God has not left out what he wants us to believe concerning the creation of this world. He has given us everything we need for time and eternity; therefore, we know he has also given us all the facts we need about the creation of this world.

Yes, the website offer simple and easy proof that the Earth is only 6000 years old. Forget all those carbon dating, star gazing craps real scientists use to date anything. Just get out your bible and in 5 (yes, FIVE) steps you can determine the age of the Earth.

1. Genesis 5. These genealogies cover 10 generations, from Adam to Noah, and reveals that Noah died when the earth was 2006 years old. Click here to view a table created from Genesis 5.

2. Gen. 11:10-32. These genealogies cover 9 generations, from Shem (the son of Noah) to the death of Terah (Abraham’s dad). This genealogy will give you the age of the earth at the death of Terah, who is the father of Abraham, as 2081. It is very interesting to note that Terah died the very year Abraham received the promise of God in Genesis 12:1-4. It is very true that we will not receive any of the promises of God until we obey the conditions of those promises. God had told Abraham to depart from: (1) his country, (2) his kindred, and (3) his father’s house. Abraham did not receive any of the promises of God until he obeyed completely. We, like Abraham, will receive none of the promises of God until we obey completely. Click here to view a table created from Genesis 11:10-32.

It is interesting to note that Abraham was born the same year Noah died, when the world was 2006 years old. According to Genesis 12:4, Abraham was 75 years old when he received the promises of God. Add 2006 to 75 and we discover the world was 2081 years old when the promise was given to Abraham concerning the coming Saviour and the blessings of God upon the nation of Israel.

3. Galatians 3:16,17 declares, "Now to Abraham and his seed were the promises made. He saith not, And to seeds, as of many; but as of one, And to thy seed, which is Christ. 17 And this I say, that the covenant, that was confirmed before of God in Christ, the law, which was four hundred and thirty years after, cannot disannul, that it should make the promise of none effect." Abraham received the promise when the world was 2081 years old. Now, add the 430 years spoken of in Galatians 3:16,17 to 2081, and we discover the world was 2511 years old when the law (the Ten Commandments) was given.

Also read Exodus 12:40,41. "Now the sojourning of the children of Israel, who dwelt in Egypt, was four hundred and thirty years. 41 And it came to pass at the end of the four hundred and thirty years, even the selfsame day it came to pass, that all the hosts of the LORD went out from the land of Egypt."

The sojourning of the children of Israel (in Canaan: during the lifetime of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob: in Egypt (see Exodus 6:16-20) during the life of Levi, Kohath, Amram, and Moses.

4. I Kings 6:1. This verse will bring us up to the fourth year of Solomon's reign.

I Kings 6:1 states, "And it came to pass in the four hundred and eightieth year after the children of Israel were come out of the land of Egypt, in the fourth year of Solomon's reign over Israel, in the month Zif, which is the second month, that he began to build the house of the LORD."

Now we can add another 480 years to 2511 and we get find it is 2991 years from creation to the fourth year of Solomon’s reign.

5. Using any secular history, look up the date when Solomon reigned. This will be in the area of 1015-975 b. c. If you like, you can go through the books of I and II Kings and prove that Israel went into bondage to the Assyrians in 722 B. C. and Judah went into bondage to Babylon in 606 B. C.

Because we know from secular history that Solomon reigned about 1,000 years before Christ, we can add 1,000 years to 2,991 (the age of the earth when Solomon began to reign) and you get 3991 (the approximate age of the earth when Christ was born.)

I think everybody knows it is approximately 2000 years the time of Christ until now. So add 2000 years to 3991 and you get 5991. That is pretty close to 6,000 years.

It is very clear, is it not, that the Bible proves the age of the universe to be approximately 6,000 years old.

For a graphical representative of the above explanation click here.

I just realised that article even go as far as to claim that the universe is approximately 6000 years old. Well, at least the guy who wrote this is consistent with the bible. So what happened is God created the universe then Earth exactly 6000 years ago.

If there is a bigger pile of crap I would really want to know. Ok, bad rhetorical question, of course there are bigger piles of crap most of which come from some dude named Bush; however, let's not get political now. While reading the article I was wondering if the author was doing this:

Let's just disregard all those fossilised dinosaur bones that clearly indicated that the Earth is at least a few hundred thousands years old and assume that the Earth is 6000 years old. There is no way anyone can claim that the universe is the same age as the Earth. Take a look at this picture:

This picture is known as the Hubble Ultra Deep Field. Every white dots on that picture is a galaxy and all those spirals are galaxies that are closed to Earth. By closed I mean they're only a few billion light years away. In other words, that picture is the picture of how they look a few billion years ago. So even if we disregard the real age of the Earth and assume that it's 6000 years old, the age of the universe should not be the same as the age of the Earth.

Then again, it's only typical of religious fanatics to ignore scientific facts, is it not? I don't really mind religions as long as they don't incite violence and blatantly lie. At least have the decency of integrating real science into religion for the new century to make yourself look less like an idiot. Take Islam for example, they claim that Allah is responsible for the Big Bang, now that's integrating science into mainstream religion.

Footnote: for you information, the real age of the Earth is approximately 4.5 billion years, the age of the universe is, depending on what methods you use to determine, approximately 12.8 Gyr (giga years?)

Sources:

6000 year old Earth

The Age of the Earth

the Age of the Universe

stupid frakking moron!

Great! A moron made my day. Anyone would think that by staying at home and not going out would keep me away from morons. And that is dead wrong. This might not be news to anyone but there are MORONS on the net. I just met one today, one computer reboot ago.

Who would be so stupid as to put their entire blog archive on one single page? Who would be so stupid as to put their entire blog archive full of video clips from Youtube on one single page? Who would be so stupid as to put an entire blog archive full of automatically loading video clips on one single page?

The answer to all 3 questions is: a stupid frakking moron.

Came across the moron by the stupid "next blog" button. My laptop froze solid because of that stupid blog and I was reading some good stuff when it froze too. Stupid frakking moron!

useless, FUN, time-wasting tid bits (children, please keep out!)

I recently found out that an old friend of mine is married. My first thought when I heard that is 'wow', my second thought is 'what the heck, you're too young to be married!'. It's quite disturbing for me to imagine anyone who is as old as me, or in this case as young as me, would want to get married and have children. Maybe it's just me but I think the best time to be married is after 25. Why 25? I don't know, not too old to have children but old enough to have enjoyed single life I guess.

What's more disturbing is that I know the 2 of them would get straight down to the business of making children since they're hardcore Christians. No siree, we don't want anything unnatural about sex, not those plastic thingies.

If you're wondering what the heck the title of this post is about, well I'm a responsible person most of the time so I like to give out warnings when I feel like it. This post is definitely MA rated and the stuff above is nothing compared to the stuff I'm gonna put below here. There's gonna be a song list full of songs (duh! what else can a song-list list?) about the same topic, there's gonna be 2 minute of snogging video and last of all there's gonna be a huge comic page of R rated nature. There, that's warning enough, that's responsible enough of me.

Ok, let's get down to the list. A few months ago I found a strangely funny list on Wikipedia. It's a list of songs about masturbation. 'Strange? Why strange?' you may ask. Well, strange because someone would write much less sing about such topic and stranger still, someone would compile a list of those songs. Now these songs can have pretty straight forward titles such as "I touch myself", "Touch of my hand" or "ode to masturbation" or highly cryptic titles such as "communist daughter" or "weenie in a bottle".
Please don't ask me how I come across this list. I might have been researching STDs and a link piqued my curiosity. One thing I'm sure, I wasn't looking for them in the first place.
Now that I've finished defending my questionable character, here's the link to the list. I'm sure you'll have a laugh at some of those title.

Alright, next on the list, 2 minute of snogging. I'm sure you've seen people kiss before. I see it all the time on the train. However, I've never seen 2 girls do it on a train. Why I wonder.

Again, I innocently came across this. What do you think? I go searching for lesbian kissing videos? Purlease give me a break! I'm not the 3vil p3v3rt3d g3nius thank you very much. This video popped up on one of those comics websites I have links for.

I did save the best bits for last. Have you ever wonder what phrase atheists use for instead of "oh God" when they're doing it? This comics with very explicit contents tried to answer that. Here's the original site: Deist on top (by Jeff Swenson)








Ok, back to the part about my friend got married. After I read the comic strips, every time I think about my friend I got weirded out. It's one thing reading about other people having sex, it's another thing entirely when you imagine your friend doing it with her husband.

in which I stumbled upon an interesting book and found out that I'm heading for hell

Of course there is no way to verify all the contents of this book. After all, only Jesus has ever come back from the dead and he couldn't have gone to hell could he?

I stumbled upon this title while looking for new fantasy titles on amazon. That should tell you something about the validity of this. It isn't exactly endorsed by the Vatican or anything so please don't take it seriously.

So what exactly is in this book? I can't tell you really since I haven't read it. Trust me, I want to read this book but my local library doesn't offer much choices when it comes to anything that's nonfiction and is gonna remotely undermine any popular religions, Muslim included. Illegal ebook channels are worse, they don't have anything that has anything to do with religion except some old essays from the 19th century. However, from what I can scrape off half-hearted reviews, this book is a collection of "facts" about hell from different religions.

So what's going down in hell? Nothing much really, just some presents for the bad kids. Some dismemberments, some snake pits (I'm just wondering, since they're inventing these up, couldn't they put a bit more imagination into it and make it dragon pits or dinosaur pits?), some huge warm boiling bathtub cauldron full of relaxing oil. No biggie.

And the presents are pretty specific to the type of bad kids too. For example, all the 7 deadly sins have customised punishments (source: Wikipedia).

Sin	Punishment in Hell
Pride	Broken on the Wheel.
Envy	Placed in freezing water.
Wrath	Dismembered Alive.
Sloth	Thrown in Snake Pits.
Greed	Put in pots of boiling oil.
Gluttony	Forced to eat rats, toads, and snakes.
Lust	Smothered in Fire and Brimstone.

Some of these punishments, may I say, are unjust. Take Gluttony for example, why would you want to punish someone who like to eat with more food? Don't you know that toads, rats and snakes are delicacies in some other cultures? Foreign cultures' delicacies all you can eat for free in hell? That is no punishment, the guy would be enjoying it. The just punishment, may I suggest, should be starving for all eternity. And what's with the punishment for wrath? Anyone who has reached hell, assuming there is such a place, is dead already. How can you dismember anyone alive when they're dead? Besides, when people are dead and their soul traveled to this supposedly parallel plane, they wouldn't have a body to be dismembered alive or dead. Stop contradicting and confusing yourself and while you're at it, make up you mind about hell too!

Worried about life after dead? Worried that you're heading for hell? Don't be because there is a simple pain-free test to determine your destination after life that you can take here. It's pain-free enough else I wouldn't be here to tell you about it would I? Seriously, there's been only 8 questions and with only that you can know if you're heading towards the light or eternal damnation. (If you ask me, that's too little information to damn anyone to anything.) Anyhow, I got through the questions easily enough until I reached this:

I was thinking 'holy shit, what's the first commandment again? it has something about me being banned from doing 10 somethings but I can remember what the heck they are' and then I saw that life-saving link. Now, I couldn't really determine if I've broken the rule about not talking about fight club, oops, I mean the rule about not worshiping any other god. Really, I didn't go and worship some other god. I just stop worshiping any god at all so technically I didn't break the first commandment right? Anyhow, I answered yes.

I bet you're all wanting to see my score so here it is:

Oh man, these guys aren't judgmental at all! So I just have to judge myself huh? Being the comedian that I am I clicked on innocent.

Was I saying something about not being judgmental? Remind me later about never count my chickens before they hatch! By the time I saw this I was thinking 'you judgmental bastard, can't you just come out and tell me I'll go to hell instead of asking me politely to click on the answer?'. Still being the comedian I clicked on heaven and got this:

These guys, apart from being judgmental, are actually funny! I was cracking myself up reading this. Does it concern me that I'm heading for a fictional plane of existence? Of course no.

By this time, I was reeealy scared out of my wits with the prospect of heading for hell, lots of sarcasm intended. So I wondered what would have been if I had clicked on 'guilty' instead of 'innocent' so many steps away? So I used the magic of the back button and find out this:

What?! No praise for choosing the correct answer? How about I answer correctly 2 times in a row?

Oh man, screw this, these people have no appreciation for my honesty. I've been answering all their ridiculous questions honestly and I still go to hell? I'm out of here.

The best frackkin' show ever!

No I am not one of those sci-fi freaks. I don't normally watch sci-fi at all and I hate any scifi show and that includes Stargate, star trek and even star wars. So yeah, I hate any show that has 'star' in it especially 'dancing with the stars'. However, Battlestar Galactica is an extraordinary exception. What attracts me is not the sci-fi elements of the show, it's the drama and the show's outlook on some current issues like religious fanaticisms and the Iraq war.

Don't believe me? (It's not that surprising anyway coz judging from my dismal marks in persuasive writing in high school, my chances of making it big as a politician or even a salesperson is practically 0). Then let someone else change your mind about BSG.

Source: The Arizona Republic

Found in space

Bill Goodykoontz
The Arizona Republic
Nov. 18, 2006 12:00 AM

OK, OK, already: Battlestar Galactica is a great frakkin' show.

Sorry, got carried away there. Me, a newbie, using Battlestar lingo. Won't happen again. No real fan would stand for it.

Because, like any good genre show worth its salt, the updated tale of war between humans and Cylons inspires intense loyalty among its fans. Which is a polite way of saying that sci-fi freaks are nastily protective of their show.

And in this case, they deserve to be.

Battlestar Galactica, much to my delight, turns out to be less a traditional sci-fi TV show and very much more a character-driven drama, thick with political allegory, moral ambiguity and only the occasional spaceship battle. It transcends genre in much the same way Buffy the Vampire Slayer did. Where that show used metaphor to shine a light on the horrors of high school, Battlestar goes for bigger game, using conventional sci-fi to examine, among other things, the war in Iraq, its costs and consequences.

It's a show that deserves, even demands, to be seen by anyone who loves good television. And I was late to the party - a glaring omission.

"I'm on board," said Peter Lehman, the director of the Center for Film and Media Research at Arizona State University. "I just think on a lot of different levels it's a very thoughtful and engaging series. . . . I like Battlestar Galactica better than Star Wars. I think it's better than Star Wars."

Heresy? No way.

As for my late start, there are excuses (someone else wanted to write about the show when it debuted, only so many hours in the day, failed attempt at having a life outside of watching TV nonstop), but they don't really matter. What does matter is that after a Battlestar marathon and a chat with one of the executive producers, I'm on board. And if you're not, you should be. The only question I had after hours of episodes was a simple one: Exactly who am I supposed to be rooting for here?

"Who told you you needed to be told who to root for?" asked David Eick, a Phoenix native and one of the show's executive producers. "That's just a convention you've grown accustomed to. That's a convention of the times we're in. That's never necessarily been the case in drama or good storytelling."

And Battlestar is that.

To recap the entire story would take far too long - it's complicated, but not so much so that you should let it prevent you from diving in - but here's the short version: Cylons were created by humans and eventually rose up against them. They evolved over time, so that they now look like people, some of them, and not just chrome-plated kitchen utensils.

Naturally, they want to wipe out the creatures who created them, and they did a pretty good job of it, managing to kill all but a few more than 50,000 humans in a surprise attack. Those survivors, led by Adm. William Adama (Edward James Olmos) and Laura Roslin (Mary McDonnell), a former secretary of education elevated to the presidency after the attack, took to a battleship named Galactica and headed off for a planet that may be just a myth: Earth.

Of course, the Cylons are in hot pursuit, their single-minded purpose driven by - metaphor alert - religious fanaticism.

As the second season ended, humans thought they'd found safe haven on New Caprica, but the Cylons followed them. Rather than kill everyone, they decided to allow the humans to live under occupation (the humans have since fled).

Any parallels you want to draw to the U.S. invasion of Iraq, feel free. And note: the Cylons, not the humans, are the ones doing the occupying.

"Clearly we knew we were going to do a story that was going to evoke what was going on on CNN," Eick said. "Once those seeds were planted, it was a very natural thing."

No choices are easy. The humans strained under the yoke of the increasingly brutal Cylons and resorted to savage tactics, including, at the beginning of the third season, the use of suicide bombings. How human is that?

When Col. Saul Tigh (Michael Hogan), the drunken former second-in-command on Galactica and a leader of the insurgency on New Caprica, found out that his wife, Ellen (Kate Vernon), betrayed his comrades in an effort to save him, he killed her. How far are we willing to go in service to a cause, noble or otherwise?

Those kinds of questions lie at the heart of Battlestar. Other hot-button issues have included genocide and stem-cell research (or at least a reasonable stand-in). This is heady stuff for a television show to tackle, much less a genre show, yet it's the smartest Iraq portrayal out there, in any media. In this case, the genre format is a blessing; a straight-on take - a lightly disguised, traditional fictional account of the war, say - would be too tough to stomach, particularly with both sides being so morally slippery. The sci-fi trappings allow the show to take aim at difficult targets in a more palatable way. Which isn't to say the violence - and more importantly, the choices about when and how to use it - is anything less than teeth-kicking in its intensity.

When plotting out the new version of the show, Eick said, the producers decided, "If we're going to do this, let's try to make it feel real. Once you say it's a society that's been devastated by a holocaust, it leaves you very little wiggle room to say, 'Hey, let's do the casino planet,' which is what they do in the original Battlestar."

Oh yeah, that. The 1978 version was a campy affair - Lorne Green in space, no less. The current edition retains some basic plot elements from the original, but it's obviously a much darker show.

The Sci-Fi Channel occasionally suggests a somewhat lighter touch, Eick said, but none of the attempts seems to work out that way. The episodes in which they try to lighten up become their most depraved. He pointed to an episode in the first season that was going to be a laugh riot, ha-ha, but by the time Olmos stepped behind the camera to direct, things had taken a different turn. The episode included Ellen Tigh "swinging from the rafters with her legs wrapped around Tigh's neck, thrusting her pelvis in his face.

"It's just not in our destiny to do the light or the morally deliberate episode," Eick said.

Sounds like. And that's a good thing.

After escaping the Cylon occupation on New Caprica, the humans are once again searching for Earth. But now so are the Cylons, who have decided they want to make the planet, if it exists, their home. Gaius Baltar (James Callis), a genius who manages to get himself into some incredibly stupid trouble - he allowed his Cylon lover access to defense secrets that led to the attack that nearly annihilated the human race, oops - is trying to prove his worth to the Cylons so that they won't kill him. (Baltar is perhaps the show's most intriguing character, at least when he's acting crazy. He's somewhat wasted negotiating for his life trapped on a Cylon ship.)

Of course, proving his worth involves putting his fellow humans in jeopardy - old hat to Baltar, and typical of the dilemmas the show's characters face (though most struggle with them a little more than he does).

"We win this particular battle, but there's a cost," Eick said of the consequences of what seems like everything that happens on the show. "We win, but there is an ethical compromise."

That doesn't sound like science fiction. That sounds like real life.

And that's what makes Battlestar Galactica frakkin' great.