The Evil Eyebrow

Category: Random

  • Wool-less Sheep

    According to a story I read this morning, the cost of shearing sheep is going up while the price of wool is going down. Therefore, more and more sheep farmers are going to woolless sheep in order to avoid the expensive shear every year.

    I hazard three conclusions from this article:

    • Sheep are being grown more for meat than for wool, nowadays?
    • Shearing is a requirement every year for wooly sheep?
    • There’s a breed of sheep without wool? Weird.

    If #2 is true, how did sheep ever survive in the wild? Why can’t the farmers just not shear their sheep every year? This begs for further investigation.

    As a last note, I don’t believe that I would have picked the word “woolless” if given the option. It’s a mouthful. I would have gone with “woolfree” because, though it might sound funny, it’s catchy.

  • "The Breakup" a.k.a. "Crap"

    Given our recent experience with movies (see “Shooter” a.k.a. “Crap”) it looks like I should start a new category for sucky movies called A.K.A. Crap.

    We watched The Breakup last night. The only redeeming quality was that we received it through NetFlix and we didn’t pay for the NetFlix subscription.

    One of these days, Vince Vaughn is going to play a character that doesn’t talk all of the time. And he’s going to play a character that isn’t precisely alike to all other movies he’s in. The dude is a one trick pony.

    As for the movie: it was so filled with stereotypes and relationship conceits that I felt like I was in High School. The only part that I felt they did well were the fights between Brooke (Jennifer Anniston) and Gary (Vince Vaughn) while their relationship was imploding. They were a perfect example of things going a bit too far, over and over, until there’s a huge pileup.

    Overall: Suckage. Don’t see it. It’s not a comedy even though that’s how they advertised it.

  • Presidential Politics

    At some point in the next several months, I’m going to have to decide who to vote for in the 2008 US Presidential Elections. I am a citizen, and it is my right and duty to vote.

    Usually, I’ll weight the issues and the stances the various candidates have taken on them. Plus I’ll allow for basic quirkiness and head-up-assitude.

    Unfortunately, some issues outweigh others. I must now declare that Mitt Romney will not receive a vote from me if he is selected to be the Republican party candidate. Why? From the NY Times:

    …and when Mitt Romney revealed in an interview that L. Ron Hubbard’s “Battlefield Earth” was one of his favorite novels.

    It is an unforgivable sin to call that piece of rotting crap a “favorite novel”. Although it gives me great warmth to think that L.R.Hubbard is spinning in his grave to have a Mormon [gasp] liking his stuff.

  • Lottery = Tax?

    A friend of mine jokes that state and multi-state lotteries are taxes on people who are bad at math. Given the odds of winning, he’s right, if you plan to use the lottery as a retirement vehicle. However, I will occasionally buy a quick-pick lottery ticket, when the prize gets up there in zeroes, because “Hey, You never know.” It’s fun to have the ticket in your wallet and think about what you might do with the winnings.

    Then there are people who spend untold amounts on lottery scratch off’s, yet occasionally hit it big. Like Phillip Young, who recently won $1,000,000 on a scratch off ticket. I’m very happy for him, but what appalled me about the story was what the store clerk had to say.

    Steve Rahman, manager of the Citgo, said Young stops by the convenience store several times a week and buys $30 to $40 in lottery tickets during each visit.

    Even if we assume that the manager exaggerated Mr. Young purchases by double, that’s still $50 a week minimum in scratch offs. If you invested that at a conservative 7%, you’d have your million dollars in about 45 years! That kind of spending on lotteries is what gives them a bad name amongst the regressive tax people. Given my assumptions, plus 10 years of spending on scratchoffs, Mr. Young has lost $38,500.

    So, good for Mr. Young, but I hope he develops some better spending habits.

  • "Lies, Damn Lies, and Statistics"

    I was perusing my blog stats today and did something I’ve never done before: I checked the most popular search phrases that would land you here. This goes all the way back to the inception of the Evil Eyebrow.

    1 lost is crap
    2 kai ryssdal
    3 lost crap
    4 Jasper Forde
    5 eyebrow
    6 Harriet Klausner
    7 evil eyebrow
    8 computers internet blog
    9 freaky optical illusions
    10 evil eyebrows

    So there you have it. In a nutshell, my blog is about Lost and Kai Ryssdal. Who would have thunk it. I suppose it’s not coincidence that half of these search phrases land me in the top 10 google hits.

    Oh, and did you know that there is an Evil Eyebrows website? Me neither, but now I do. Unfortunately, there’s nothing there. Go Eyebrows!

  • TinyURL and Social Media

    TinyURL, the service that takes a long string URL such as http://www.amazon.com/Storm-Front-Dresden-Files-Book/dp/0451457811 and turns it into http://tinyurl.com/2kfq6x is useful for plugging into emails or twitters or other programs that dislike exceptionally long strings. It’s a great service, yes?

    Maybe. From the TinyURL website comes a quote that illustrates my issues with it.

    Hide your affiliate URLs:
    Are you posting something that you don’t want people to know what the URL is because it might give away that it’s an affiliate link? Then you can enter a URL into TinyURL, and your affiliate link will be hidden from the visitor, only the tinyurl.com address and the ending address will be visible to your visitors.

    This is a great service in social media expansion, but I am often hesitant to click on a TinyURL because you can’t see its underlying link! The final destination is, as it’s stated above, hidden. How do I know I’m going to something legitimate? Of course, I acknowledge that any URL can be redirected to something unsavory or evil, even www.cutekittens.com (which is an evil marketing website if there ever was one) could be redirected without your consent to www.cuteAND_EVILkittens.com (which hasn’t been registered yet, darn it). There’s no more actual safety in clicking on a URL you can see, any more than one that is hidden behind the TinyURL masking. Still, it is comforting, therefore of utility, to be able to see that you’re being linked to a cnn.com portal or that the url says www.bigbigbigbigbigbigOHMYGODITSBIG.com. I’ll probably click on the first one from an untrusted source, but definitely not the second.

    I would suggest that TinyURL have an option to leave in the base domain and then cipher out the miscellaneous garbage at the end, which nobody reads anyway.

  • Random Weblog

    I wish I could say that I have something meaningful to post. Unfortunately, I have something vapid and useless.

    For all Firefly, Serenity, or Stargate Atlantis (not me) fans! Jewel Staite has a blog. And the two images of here on the front page looks like she’s been clubbed over the head or just got finished licking a toad, or something.

  • Bad Luck

    Here’s something to go on the “List of Things That Suck.”

    A man was (accidentally, freakishly) killed one day before being released from jail.

    There must have been some serious karmic load on that guy.

  • Energy Policy

    I think that one of the most significant problems we (humanity) will face in the next 200 years is that of energy production, distribution, and consumption. I have a multitude of opinions, even the odd posting coming soon, but this particular post is about Iraq.

    Go to this link to compare the cost of Iraq with governement expenditures on alternative energy (“alternative” meaning non-oil). It’s a fascinating graph.

    I don’t see how the world is going to get out of the mess it’s in without significant investment in nuclear energy. More on that to follow at a later date, but feel free to tell me I’m wrong.

  • Meme Me Baby One More Time

    Through channels, I learned of an interesting meme. Use google image search to run your name and blog about the one that pops up. Unfortunately, when you have a thorough flickr presence and an unusual last name, you end up having all of your own images at the top of the list.

    Beer Glass

    I find it interesting that this beer glass has made such a name for itself. It’s popped up in several places.

    But, as I said, that’s boring. Let’s try my initials, WMR. Apparently WMR involves 2.59 grams of MAXI-MAG!

    That is also boring. Let’s try BR.

    Much better. Furries!