A BBC article about how Tropic Thunder’s language is causing some concern teaches me that Alf Garnett is Archie Bunker.

I loved the Bell Labs Text to Speech synthesizer demo ten years ago, but the bookmark got misrouted in the Lucent spin-out. Fortunately, Google works; so I was able to make synthesized voices say arbitrary things again, and you can, too.

News item 1: RiffTrax blog good
Comment on news item 2: New Yorker caption competition, maybe not for me
News item 3: there is a home game
Thought: Home game equivalent with friends sounds totally awesome
Thought: No need to buy home game, but old issues of New Yorker and scissors
Love: adding more relevant themes (turtles) to cartoons.

Granted, it’s from the frequently flaky health section of the BBC website, but it looks like Flu shots that do the right thing are on the horizon.

Twelve people in Baltimore called 911 a LOT, so some agencies got together to tackle those people with lots of (more appropriate) help. This is genius. This totally reflects my own experience with people using public services inappropriately.

But I have a question: the article says “An 88-year-old woman who said she called 911 because she was lonely is receiving daily visits from a case manager.” What agency is that case manager from? Is there an agency out there to deal with the lonely and possibly unlovable? Because they use a lot of resources. And that gal is unlikely to get better in any detectable way, pretty much the opposite of most managed social services’ models of treatment.

Do you want to start a service for the lonely? Staffed by people who have to do court appointed community service? Please do.

It’s not every day that I get access to a list of prohibited words, but it occurs to me on reading the one in front of me that you can probably learn a lot about an outfit by what words are prohibited. For one, a section of the document specifically mentions (and I’m quoting directly here, not editing) “f-word, s-word and n-word” (can you spot the missing biggie? And I’m not talking about “crap”), but also refers to an appendix that lists those three (with a number of spelling variants) and quite a variety of others. For another, enforcement of the list would prohibit me from saying “I was there when the swallows returned to Capistrano,” or “My nephew graduated cum laude,” but not “Her shapely vulva excited me.”

The United Way of King County has a handy list of languages spoken at home by students with limited English proficiency in the various area school districts, divided by region. South King County has the highest language count, with 117 languages (unsurprising, as it’s where there is more affordable housing for new immigrants). Take a look at the list (links added to the ones I was unfamiliar with):

Continue reading →

Finally, a somewhat scholarly examination of Bob Marley and the Banana Splits. The latter are returning, apparently.

Barfblog mentions the possible regulatory implications of fish-based pedicures. Do read to find what Mr. Ho finds hilarious.

My favoritest web comic (and podcast, and blog, and community forum– they really are full service there) is at a turning point. Here is a guy trying to live the dream, the dream of making a living off creating web happiness. A dream inspired by JoCo. Can’t you feel the dream? If not yet, go over there and read some comics, maybe listen to the (epic!) podcasts. And give. Maybe buy an avatar, maybe just drop some change (the foldey kind) on Joel. I did. And it was totally worth it.