Pug’s Place

Among the things I’m thinking of doing sometime is incorporating: creating a business entity to do software development consulting. Obviously I’ll need a name for this corporation, one which has an available domain name. I’m thinking I’ll just have to break out my Latin dictionary and see what I come up with, but do you guys have any ideas?

And no, I’m not thinking much of “PugCorp”, nor the GoDaddy.com-suggested alternative, “NoPugForYou”. (Really, how did they come up with that from an idea search for “Pug”???)

Hehe… If I do this, I’ll get to be a CEO of a one-person company!

Give us an R! Arrr!

Give us an R! Arrrrr!

Give us another R! Arrrrrrr!

What does that spell? ARRRRRRRRRR!

Enjoy the day, mateys!

Sometimes Findory finds articles I really do want to read. That’s why I keep going back there for my random news. Like this article, “Pa. County School Board Cuts IB Program“. It’s brief (sadly) but contains a truly remarkable excerpt expressing the Zeitgeist for those of us in the audience who are intimately familiar with the IB program.

This remarkable excerpt is (emphasis mine):

The Upper St. Clair school board voted 5-4 Monday to cut the International Baccalaureate Programme, whose curriculum some school board members have alleged is liberal and anti-American.

Looking for more information I found the Pittsburgh Tribune Review’s discussion last week on the matter to be more enlightening (emphasis mine):

“We support students learning about the rest of the world. We object to the focus on global citizenship,” [Julie] Quist said. “Unfortunately, international education has come to mean global citizenship. That undermines American citizenship and that sense of sovereignty.”

Anyway, last night they did vote to give IB the axe with the motion argument that “IB programs clearly violate local control.” On the plus side, it appears enough parents in their district are up-in-arms to cause a tremendous ruckous. At least the IB program there didn’t die to thunderous applause.

April and I (with James as a witness) batted around ideas for another Star Wars-inspired Fan Film last weekend, much narrower in scope than Pizza Delivery Jedi. My working title is “William, your neighborhood Sith Lord”. The idea is to make a short about a day (or so) in the life of the guy down the street who happens to be a Dark Lord of the Sith.

I have in my mind his house appearing to be a normal every-day sort of one story house, but when you enter the back yard you find a giant Massassi step-temple being constructed.

I’m imagining short clips where William uses the Power of the Dark Side for personal gain. Like:

• Force Lightning
  • Using Force Lightning to recharge a camera battery
  • Using Force Lightning to power A/C (or a TV, or something) after a hurricane
  • “Rock, Paper, Scissors… FORCE LIGHTNING!”
• Telekinesis
  • Force throw/choke/grip to rescue/remove a cat from a tree
  • Force Pull to acquire a beverage (too obvious, methinks)
  • Modify the roll of dice in D&D
• Other Powers(?)
  • Life drain to LARP Vampire: The Masquerade in very… authentic ways

Consider this my solicitation for further suggestions. If things start looking entertaining enough, hell… who knows, maybe I’ll actually film it. I’m crazy, man, crazy!

Everybody’s favorite alternative Intelligent Design theory, Flying Spaghetti Monsterism, is soon to have its gospel published. Yes, boys and girls, you can pre-order The Gospel of the Flying Spaghetti Monster from Amazon. All profits from book sales will, apparently, go to purchasing a missionary pirate ship (complete with cannon).

Who else is amazed?

I saw today something remarkable, though its name is misleading: The Ultimate Star Trek Collection on DVD. This is a 212 DVD set of everything Star Trek except The Animated Series. A question: if it’s missing The Animated Series, is it really the Ultimate Trek set? Perhaps next year they’ll release the Über Star Trek Collection?
Anyway, this $3,908.99 MSRP DVD set contains:

• Star Trek The Original Series: The Complete Seasons 1-3
• Star Trek The Next Generation: The Complete Seasons 1-7
• Star Trek Deep Space Nine: The Complete Seasons 1-7
• Star Trek Voyager: The Complete Seasons 1-7
• Star Trek Enterprise: The Complete Seasons 1-4
• The 10 Star Trek feature films in two-disc special editions
• The newly restored, director’s edition of Star Trek: The Motion Picture
• Extended 116-minute director’s edition of Star Trek II: The Wrath of Khan

It seems like they should leave out ‘The Motionless Picture’ (as Peter David said at the Star Trek Authors’ Cavalcade at Dragon*Con this year) in order to have Ultimate Trek, but I digress…

It seems like a reasonably good deal, since they charge ~$110 a season for boxed sets.

Thoughts?

The United Nations Children’s Fund (UNICEF) has taken war to a new level, ordering air strikes against the Smurf kingdom of Smurfferdam. Live reports suggest that there are seven casualties, including Smurfette, and up to 60% of the kingdom is MIA. Strafing runs performed by the bombers after the initial assault claimed most of the dead. U.S. President George W. Bush has declared that UNICEF is now a part of the Axis of Just As Evil. International reaction to Bush’s Axis of Just As Evil declaration was swift, as within minutes, France surrendered.

Tune in at 11 for more coverage as this story unfolds.

There is a disturbingly amusing Bad Science column in The Guardian this week titled Don’t Dumb Me Down. I doubt this column will surprise any of my readers, but you may find it amusing at least. Especially the last half.

Liz, E. and April collaborated (in a weird way) to find 50 Things I Am Not Allowed To Do At Hogwarts, which is a list that sounds like one the CSC and I would come up with in our years at Hogwarts, mostly from trial-and-error.
Wonderful.

40 comments in one day? How can that be? Oh, it’s Elf and she’s insane! elfhawk: Random chaos of the day.

*blushes*

By the way, gals, I’ve been trying to get Katie to go skydiving with me for a few years now. Bungee jumping is for wusses. I continue to plan on joining the University of Florida Falling Gators!