mordant wit

Nicholas Negroponte, chairman and founder of the Massachusetts Institute of Technology Media Labs, has been outlining designs for a sub-$100 PC.

The laptop will be tough and foldable in different ways, with a hand crank for when there is no power supply.

Professor Negroponte came up with the idea for a cheap computer for all after visiting a Cambodian village.

His non-profit One Laptop Per Child group plans to have up to 15 million machines in production within a year.

A Patel family in gujarat was puzzled when the coffin of their dead mother arrived from the US. It was sent by one of the daughters. The dead body was very tightly squeezed inside the coffin, with no space left in it When they opened the lid , they found a letter on top addressed to her brothers and sisters:

Dear Chandrakantbhai, Arvindbhai, Smitaben and Varsha,

I am sending Ba's body to you,since it was her wish that she should be cremated in the compound of our ancestral home in GUJARAT. Sorry, I could not come along as all of my paid leave is consumed.

You will find inside the coffin, under Ba's body, 12 cans of cheese, 10 packets of Tobler chocolates and 8 packets of Badam. Please divide these among all of you. On Ba's feet you will find a new pair of Reebok shoes(size 10) for Mohan. There are also 2 pairs of shoes for Radha's and Lakshmi's sons. Hope the sizes are correct.

Ba is wearing 6 American T-Shirts. The large size is for Mohan. Just distribute the rest among yourselves. The 2 new Jeans that Ba's is wearing are for the boys. The Swiss watch that Reema wanted is on Ba's left wrist. Shanta masi, Ba is wearing the necklace, earrings and ring that
you asked for. Please take them off her.

The 6 white cotton socks that Ba is wearing must be divided among my nephews. Please distribute all these fairly.

Love Smita

PS : And if anything more required let me know soon as Bapuji is also not feeling too well nowadays...

A first-grade teacher was having trouble with one of her students. The teacher asked, "Harry what is your problem?"
Harry answered, "I'm too smart for the first-grade. My sister is in the third-grade and I'm smarter than she is! I think I should be in the third-grade too!"

The teacher had enough. She took Harry to the principal's office. While Harry waited in the outer office, the teacher explained to the principal what the situation was. The principal told the teacher he would give the boy a test and if he failed to answer any of his questions he was to go back to the first-grade and behave. The teacher agreed. Harry was Brought in and the conditions were explained to him and he agreed to take the test.

Principal: "What is 3 x 3?"
Harry: "9"
Principal: "What is 6 x 6?"
Harry: "36"

And so it went with every question the principal thought a third- grade should know. The principal looks at the teacher and tells her, "I think Harry can go to the third-grade."

The teacher says to the principal, "Let me ask him some questions?" The principal and Harry both agree.

Teacher: "What does a cow have four of that I have only two of?
Harry: "Legs"
Teacher: "What is in your pants that you have but I do not have?" (The
principal wondered, why does she ask such a question!)
Harry: "Pockets"
Teacher: "What does a dog do that a man steps into?"
Harry: "Pants"
Teacher: What's starts with a C and ends with a T, is hairy, oval, delicious and contains thin whitish liquid?" (The principal's eyes open really wide and before he could stop the answer...)
Harry: "Coconut"
Teacher: "What goes in hard and pink then comes out soft and sticky?"
Harry: "Bubblegum"
Teacher: "What does a man do standing up, a woman does sitting down and a dog does on three legs?" (The principal's eyes open really wide and before he could stop the answer...)
Harry: "Shake hands"
Teacher: "Now I will ask some "Who am I" sort of questions, okay?"
Harry: "Yup"
Teacher: "You stick your poles inside me. You tie me down to get me up. I get wet before you do"
Harry: "Tent"
Teacher: "A finger goes in me. You fiddle with me when you're bored. The best man always has me first" (Principal was looking restless and a bit tense)
Harry: "Wedding Ring"
Teacher: "I come in many sizes. When I'm not well, I drip. When you blow me, you feel good"
Harry: "Nose"
Teacher: "I have a stiff shaft. My tip penetrates. I come with a quiver"
Harry: "Arrow"
Teacher: "What word starts with an 'F' and ends in 'K' that means a lot of excitement?"
Harry: "Fire truck"

The principal breathed a sigh of relief and told the teacher, "Put his ass in the fifth-grade, I got the last ten questions wrong myself

To everybody who thinks that Hulk Hogan is still a super strong, ultra fit muscleman, I have to say this: he is not! He has lost his power. And I have proof of that. When he took his wife out to some celebrity gathering he showed the whole world he is not as strong as he used to be. He told his wife Lizzie Grubman to leave something at home, because she would be too heavy for him otherwise!

You have been working as an actress in the adult industry for 6 months now, which makes you a very experienced girl and doing a videoshoot with a girl is no problem for you. You love it all. But what to think of those cameramen, they need experience just as well, you cannot do the hot stuff with some rookie around.

Residents of a southwest Muncie neighborhood thought the 110-year-old former school with purple doors had been vacant these past 14 months. So neighbors were surprised to find out the building is home to one of Indiana's seven swingers clubs.

"I thought it was empty, to tell you the truth," Mary Neal, who rents a house across from the club, told The Star Press. "That shocks me. I'm just floored. There are a lot of kids that walk around here."

Swinging involves having social and sexual intercourse with someone other than a spouse, boyfriend or girlfriend. It primarily involves couples.

Local religious leaders are vowing to shut down the 7,3000-square-foot Klub Layden, saying it could bring crime into the community. And neighbors and city officials are debating whether the residential area is the proper location for a private club.

Yes, the narrow-minded people of the world are once again trying to set everybody back fifty years in history!

Some of you may have heard of the practice of “double bagging” – wearing two condoms during sex for extra protection (something not recommended by most condom manufacturers) . Taking this idea to its ultimate extreme, we set out to answer the question “How many condoms can you put on your dick?”

However, since we were unable to find anyone with a penis willing to undertake this assignment, we had to settle for answering the question “How many condoms can you put on a dildo?” The answer: a lot. Hundreds. Tons. Or at least a couple of pounds worth. See what happened as we layered on the latex.

First of all, you will not be able to solve a Rubik's Cube immediately after reading this page only once. It takes a lot of work to learn this method thouroughly. The time it takes to learn depends on your devotion. I have friends that every once and a while return to this page thinking they can learn the entire thing in the couple minutes of online time they have, and they have yet to solve a Rubik's Cube. On the other hand, I have friends that have learned the entire solution in about a day of intense memorizing. If you are serious about learning how to solve a cube, I suggest that you don't start learning until you know that you will have a lot of spare time in the near future to work on it. Print these pages out if you want to.

As early as May 1995, three months before Netscape Communications' initial public offering sparked the dot-com boom, Microsoft executives were worried that the nascent World Wide Web could one day become a significant threat to the Windows franchise.

In an extensive memo called "The Web is the Next Platform" that was introduced as evidence in Microsoft's antitrust trial five years ago, Microsoft engineer Ben Slivka described a "nightmare" scenario for the software giant.

"The Web...exists today as a collection of technologies that deliver some interesting solutions today, and will grow rapidly in the coming years into a full-fledged platform (underlined for emphasis in the original memo) that will rival--and even surpass--Microsoft's Windows," Slivka wrote.

A free program released Thursday, called Digital File Check, will uninstall or disable file-sharing programs on people's computers. The International Federation of the Phonographic Industry (IFPI), a London-based affiliate of the Recording Industry Association of America, helped develop the software with the Motion Picture Association of America (MPAA).

The groups are mainly aiming the program at parents and employers in Europe.

"Digital File Check is easy to use and can help people prevent their employees, children and others from illegally downloading and swapping movies," Dan Glickman, the president of the MPAA, said in a statement.

When New England inventor Philip French had his epiphany 15 years ago, he didn't dream it would lead to an invention that would be pressed into service in a top-secret government project, or spawn an epic court battle over the limits of executive power. He was just admiring a tennis ball.

The ball's seam, with its two symmetrical halves embracing each other in a graceful curve, intrigued him. "I thought, my god, I bet you can do something with that kind of shape," he recalls. He was right. French and two colleagues went on to design and patent a device now called the Crater Coupler, a simple, foolproof connector for linking one pipe or cable to another without nut threads or bolted flanges.

Office workers are baffled by computer jargon and make serious business blunders because they see 'IT speak' as a foreign language, a survey has revealed.

Among office workers 26% aren't sure what a firewall does and therefore have been tempted to turn it off. A firewall is a form of computer security that prevents unauthorised access from the internet and turning it off is the worst thing you can do.

A massive 61% don't understand the difference between gigabytes, kilobytes and megabytes and as a result have sent e-mails with huge attachments that have blocked clients' systems.

Internet maps reveal Roman villa

Latest technology proved an unexpected aid to unearthing the past when an Italian man decided to look at internet maps of his home.

Computer programmer Luca Mori found the remains of an ancient Roman villa when he browsed Google Earth maps showing satellite images of his local area.

His curiosity was sparked by unusual shading by his home in Sorbolo, Parma.

In C, you merely shoot yourself in the foot.

In C++, you accidentally create a dozen instances of yourself and shoot them all in the foot. Providing emergency medical care is impossible, because you can't tell which are bitwise copies and which are just pointing at others and saying, "That's me, over there."

If you continue to focus on the cross in the center of the image you
will notice that the violet circles will soon DISAPPEAR completely and you will see only the green spot (which is actually violet :P)

This is my kind of show car. The two-seat land yacht measures 232 inches from bow to stern, exceeding the stately Maybach 57 on which it is based by the length of a Davidoff stogie--if that's not overkill, I don't know what is. Equally outlandish is the engine, a frighteningly free-breathing, twin-turbocharged, 5.9-liter V-12 that coughs up max power of 691 hp and 752 lb-ft of very low-end torque.

And then there's the styling. Vulgar, over-the-top, and utterly beguiling, it's perfect transport for Darth Vader. It looks as if it eats parked cars for breakfast, parties with dinosaurs, and went to school with the Frankenstein monster's son. In the unlikely case that the stance and the proportions leave you cold, the sound effects will grab you by the eardrums. The two pornographic side pipes emit a thunderous, earth-shattering noise. Oh, and by the way, it does 218 mph.

Life should NOT be a journey to the grave with the intention of arriving safely in an attractive and well preserved body, but rather to skid in sideways, chocolate in one hand, martini in the other, body thoroughly used up, totally worn out and screaming, "WOO HOO what a ride!"

Spotted in a toilet of a London office:
TOILET OUT OF ORDER. PLEASE USE FLOOR BELOW

In a London Laundromat:
AUTOMATIC WASHING MACHINES: PLEASE REMOVE ALL YOUR CLOTHES WHEN THE LIGHT GOES OUT

In a London department store:
BARGAIN BASEMENT UPSTAIRS

In an London office:
AFTER TEA BREAK STAFF SHOULD EMPTY THE TEAPOT AND STAND UPSIDE DOWN ON THE DRAINING BOARD

Outside a London secondhand shop:
WE EXCHANGE ANYTHING - BICYCLES, WASHING MACHINES, ETC. WHY NOT BRING YOUR WIFE ALONG AND GET A WONDERFUL BARGAIN?

Notice in London health food shop window:
CLOSED DUE TO ILLNESS

Spotted in a safari park:
ELEPHANTS PLEASE STAY IN YOUR CAR

Seen during a London conference:
FOR ANYONE WHO HAS CHILDREN AND DOESN'T KNOW IT, THERE IS A DAY CARE ON THE FIRST FLOOR

Notice in a field:
THE FARMER ALLOWS WALKERS TO CROSS THE FIELD FOR FREE, BUT THE BULL CHARGES

Message on a leaflet:
IF YOU CANNOT READ, THIS LEAFLET WILL TELL YOU HOW TO GET
LESSONS

On a repair shop door:
WE CAN REPAIR ANYTHING. (PLEASE KNOCK HARD ON THE DOOR THE BELL DOESN'T WORK)

People in other countries sometimes go out of their way to communicate with their English-speaking tourists. Here is a list of signs seen around the world.

At a Budapest zoo:
PLEASE DO NOT FEED THE ANIMALS. IF YOU HAVE ANY SUITABLE FOOD, GIVE IT TO THE GUARD ON DUTY.

Doctors office, Rome:
SPECIALIST IN WOMEN AND OTHER DISEASES.

Hotel, Acapulco:
THE MANAGER HAS PERSONALLY PASSED ALL THE WATER SERVED HERE.

In a Nairobi restaurant:
CUSTOMERS WHO FIND OUR WAITRESSES RUDE SHOULD WAIT AND SEE THE MANAGER.

In a City restaurant:
OPEN SEVEN DAYS A WEEK, AND WEEKENDS TOO.

Grant me the serenity to accept the things I cannot change, the courage to change the things I cannot accept, and the wisdom to hide the bodies of those people I had to kill today because they pissed me off. And also, help me to be careful of the toes I step on today as they may be connected to the ass that I might have to kiss tomorrow.

"...Your past is your inalienable property, you cannot deny it, and, for better or for worse, it will shape the rest of your lives until death follows. In a sentimental moment, you may long for the lost innocence and bliss of ignorance, but that ignorance is lost forever: you are now Bachelors and you will have to carry the burden of your college education every waking hour of the rest of your lives, nay, even in your sleep you will be pressed to have dreams full of responsibility. A main purpose of this commencement speech is therefore to help you to live with your academic past: I'll try to give you some advice on how to remember your university...."

Edsger Dijkstra on universities on December 8, 1996 Edsger Dijkstra addressed the graduates of the College of Natural Sciences of the University of Texas at Austin.

Once upon a time, a guy asked a girl "Will you marry me?"

The girl said "No."

And the guy lived happily ever after and went drinking & golfing a lot.

THE END

Things were just getting cozy: Your toothbrush had taken up permanent residence in her medicine cabinet; he’d finally seen you without concealer on. Then, it happened. You developed a little lust in your heart for someone else and, understandably, you’re feeling a bit evil. Guilty? Panicked? All of the above? Relax. Just because your eye has wandered doesn’t necessarily mean your morals are down the drain.

Option 1: Keep it to yourself
Option 2: Come clean
Option 3: Vent to a friend
Option 4: Shrink the problem
Option 5: Get out

As extremists increasingly claim it is not, and attack Western values not only through rhetoric but acts of violence, many Muslims find themselves being forced to respond by re-examining their values.

Here two Britons, both born into the Muslim faith, explain why they have ended up following different paths as far as their religion is concerned.

What happens when the world changes around you and suddenly your face doesn't seem to fit? Tariq Ahmed, a British Muslim who changed his name to beat prejudice, tells his story.

Almost four years since 9/11 and it's still talked about like yesterday. That's four years in the spotlight for Muslims around the world, most of whom, like the rest of us may never have heard the name Osama bin Laden before the attack on America.

While many Muslims will tell you the name Osama has a beautiful ring in their culture (it means "like a lion") to many Western ears it is synonymous with terrorism.

The infection waits for the user to access a porn site, and then displays a quote from the Koran chastising the surfer.

A new Trojan monitors access to porn sites and then displays a quote from the Koran chastising the surfer for his or her sins, a security vendor said Tuesday.

Once it's installed, Yusufali.a -- called "Cager.a" by Trend Micro -- watches which sites Windows users visit by examining the browser's title bar. If the Trojan sees a word in its list -- such as "teen," "xx," "sex," or "penis" -- it minimizes the window and displays a quote from the Koran.

These pages demonstrate visual phenomena, called »optical illusions« or »visual illusions«. The latter is more appropriate, because most effects have their basis in the visual pathway, not in the optics of the eye. I selected these based on relative novelty and interactivity, and will expand the explanations when I find the time, to the degree that these phenomena are really understood. Any nice and thoughtful comment welcome.

Most visitors of this site are not vision scientists, so you might find the explanatory attempts too highbrow. That is not on purpose, but vision research just is not trivial, like any science. So, if the explanation sounds like rubbish, simply enjoy the phenomenon ;-).

Bugatti’s troubled EB16.4 Veyron supercar has finally lived up to its promise and broken through 250mph in a test session at Volkswagen’s Ehra Lessian test track.

An official figure of 252.95 mph was recorded as the two-way average in the car’s most recent high-speed test run.

The figures see the Veyron smash the recent 241mph claimed by Koenigsegg with its CCR and the McLaren F1’s long standing 240.1mph record set in 1998. It’s not only the top speed that’s sensational but also the Bugatti’s acceleration. The four turbo, four-wheel-drive supercar sprints to 62mph in just 2.5 seconds and reaches 300kph (186mph) in a scarcely believable 16.7 seconds. To put those figures into perspective a merely fast car like an Aston Martin DB9 would take over a minute longer to reach 300kmh and sprints to 62mph in 4.9 seconds. The Bugatti makes even Porsche’s Carrera GT look pedestrian; it takes 3.9 seconds to reach 62mph and tops out at ‘just’ 205mph.

A few weeks ago I had lunch with the now famous "Mark Jen". I never knew Mark while we were at Microsoft, even though we both worked in the same group. Funny how large groups at Microsoft can get...

...

I would argue that Microsoft used to know how to ship software, but the world has changed... The companies that "know how to ship software" are the ones to watch. They have embraced the network, deeply understand the concept of "software as a service", and know how to deliver incredible value to their customers efficiently and quickly.

Mark Lucovsky, a former Microsoft distinguished engineer, has quietly abandoned the Redmond ship for one of Microsoft's archrivals.

One of Microsoft's key Windows architects has defected to Google. But at least so far, no one is talking about what Marc Lucovsky's new role will be at one of Microsoft's major rivals.

A 16-year Microsoft veteran, Lucovsky was one of a handful of "Distinguished Engineers" at Microsoft. He is credited as one of the core dozen engineers that came from Digital Equipment Corp. to Microsoft and built the Windows NT operating system. He was charged with building the Windows NT executive, kernel, Win32 run-time and other key elements of the operating system. NT was the precursor to Windows Server.

Mark Lucovsky, a former Microsoft distinguished engineer, has quietly abandoned the Redmond ship for one of Microsoft's archrivals.

One of Microsoft's key Windows architects has defected to Google. But at least so far, no one is talking about what Marc Lucovsky's new role will be at one of Microsoft's major rivals.

A 16-year Microsoft veteran, Lucovsky was one of a handful of "Distinguished Engineers" at Microsoft. He is credited as one of the core dozen engineers that came from Digital Equipment Corp. to Microsoft and built the Windows NT operating system. He was charged with building the Windows NT executive, kernel, Win32 run-time and other key elements of the operating system. NT was the precursor to Windows Server.

"I wrote my curriculum vitae the other day," Elvedin told me over a glass of water at my flat in Sarajevo.

"From 1989 until 1992 I put 'waiting for the war to begin'.

"From 1996 until 2005 I put 'waiting for the next war to begin'."

A wry smile broke out across his face. This is the thinking among many Bosnians.

Elvedin Kominlija, a 35-year-old Muslim, is one of a generation of people who got caught up in the Bosnian war.

A decade after it ended, many still see no hope and no opportunity for the future.

"I fought for this country. I gave my blood. And what do I have to show for it? Nothing."

Science fiction writers—well, good science fiction writers—rarely make up their science out of whole cloth. One reason is that a surprisingly large percentage are scientists or engineers themselves, and even those who aren't tend to know a lot about this stuff. It was, after all, science fiction writer Arthur C. Clarke who wrote the first technical paper that suggested placing communications satellites in geosynchronous orbit—the altitude where satellites take exactly one day to circle Earth, staying stationary in relation to it.

The funeral of King Fahd, which was conducted in a simple manner in Riyadh earlier this month, has encouraged a well-known Christian priest in Italy to embrace Islam, press reports said.

The priest, who watched the late king’s funeral on satellite television, was impressed by the lack of pomp and pageantry in the royal funeral, Al-Riyadh Arabic daily reported without mentioning his name.

King Fahd was buried in Al-Oud graveyard the next day of his death after a solemn funeral ceremony attended by world leaders.

Mayor Ray Nagin ordered 1,500 police officers to leave their search-and-rescue mission Wednesday night and return to the streets of the beleaguered city to stop looting that has turned increasingly hostile.

“They are starting to get closer to heavily populated areas — hotels, hospitals and we’re going to stop it right now,” Nagin said in a statement to The Associated Press.

Looters used garbage cans and inflatable mattresses to float away with food, blue jeans, tennis shoes, TV sets — even guns. Outside one pharmacy, thieves commandeered a forklift and used it to push up the storm shutters and break through the glass. The driver of a nursing-home bus surrendered the vehicle to thugs after being threatened.


For a change it is interesting to note that it is not just another black thug doing all this! These are supposedly white law-abiding citizens. They are so pathetic that they resort to crime and stealing when there is no law & order. Gutless vermin!!!!

In the last three decades, the selling of great collector cars at auctions has flourished. More of the world's finest collectibles have found their way to the great auction houses, to be sold to the highest bidder.