Cat Expansion

The cat easily transforms from the relaxed, compact "closed" position to the more intimidating "open" position. 

I'll get right on that

A friend of mine took this picture of a sign in Nepal. The English part says,"God, pig and snack whicn are not cooperative stop it." 

Festival

In Japan, there's always something big going on. It's Kanamara Matsuri. (From Schoolgirl Sophistry)

Peony With Hidden Snake

Peony from my garden. I took this photo a few minutes ago. I like the way this turned out; it is overcast here with a light misting of rain, which made the background very dark. 

The middle of this image looks kind of like a snake sticking out its tongue. I didn't notice that while taking the photo, but now it seems to jump out at me.

Evolution of a word

When I was younger, we called the type of sandals that keep falling off because they are designed really badly "thongs." But a thong now usually means one of these, so those sandals get called flip flops to avoid confusion. But Gucci makes flip flops and calls them thongs. I'm so confused. The worst part is that I actually think the Gucci flip flops look cool. I must be going mad.

The Online Etymology Dictionary (via Debbie) says:

thong - O.E. þwong "thong," from P.Gmc. *thwangaz, from a root meaning "to restrain." As a kind of sandal, first attested 1967; as a kind of bikini briefs, 1990s.

Blogger Comments

I'm switching to the Blogger commenting system instead of the external system I was using before. The drawback is that the old comments will no longer be visible, but the page will load faster.

Has anyone ever won a war on terror?

Has there ever been a country, anywhere in the world, at any time in history, that won a war on terror? I mean a country that could legitimately say, "yes, we had a big problem with terrorists, but we fought them, and we won, and the terrorist threat went away."

If so, what did they do? How did they win?

If not, then . . . uh . . . drat.

Fight Club Jr. should be a South Park episode.

Poppy from my garden by the front door. 

More "flower porn": a rose from my garden. 

My first iMix

Agent Bond, James Bond

Today's New York Times article about Abu Ghraib prison abuses explains a rather odd incident:

The memorandum criticizing the practice of keeping prisoners off the roster was signed by Col. Thomas M. Pappas, commander of the 205th Military Intelligence Brigade, and a James Bond, who is identified as "SOS, Agent in Charge." Military and intelligence officials said that they did not know of a Mr. Bond who had been assigned to Abu Ghraib, and that it was possible that the name was an alias.

An intelligence official said Monday that he could not confirm the authenticity of the document, and that neither "SOS" or "Agent in Charge" was terminology that the C.I.A. or any other American intelligence agency would use. A military official said he believed that the document was authentic and was issued on or about Jan. 12, two days before abuses at Abu Ghraib involving military police were brought to the attention of Army investigators.

Let me get this straight . . . military and intelligence officials somehow suspect that "Agent James Bond" might be an alias? And who figured that out, Colonel Ben Dover? Quick, get this guy on the case!

Portland motorcycle police on SW Broadway, across the street from the Benson, providing security for John Kerry's visit. 

This is the Iron Monkey blog. There is also an Iron Monkey Movie.

Elsewhere there is Drunken Monkey Style Blogging. And a Drunken Monkey Movie.

I wrote a new review of the graphic novel Cats Don't Exist over at LHLS.

The return of MP3.com

MP3.com is finally back, but if you liked the old site, you may be confused at first by the new version. If you want free downloads of tracks by independent artists, you really want to go to music.download.com instead of the main mp3.com page.

Recommended

Rap: RIP Family
Alt Country: Manda Clair
Rock: The Travoltas
Rock: theSTART

"Tiny," one of my two cats. 

Iron Monkey's Rules of Qualifiers

1. In public statements, if a qualifying phrase could have multiple possible meanings, it almost always has the meaning least favorable to the speaker.

When someone says he finished "in the top ten," this technically could mean he finished #1, but it doesn't. If a car manufacturer says the car is the best "in its class" at something, the class in question could be "the class of all cars," but it isn't. A product that costs "under $1000" could cost $19.95, but it doesn't.

2. In public statements, qualifying phrases never occur by chance, but only by necessity.

He who says "I have never been an accessory to murder . . . on a weekday" must have had an interesting weekend.

Stanislav Petrov, the Guy Who Didn't Push the Button

It's right out of a movie trailer. The deep, booming voice-over intones: "The only thing that can prevent the end of civilization . . . is one man!" Unrealistic? Sure. Except for this one guy: Lt. Col. Stanislav Petrov. In 1983, he saw an alarm that said the U.S. had launched a nuclear missile at the U.S.S.R.

Colonel Petrov recalls that fateful night when alarms went off and the early warning computer screens were showing a nuclear attack launched by the United States. "I felt as if I'd been punched in my nervous system. There was a huge map of the States with a U.S. base lit up, showing that the missiles had been launched."

For several minutes Petrov held a phone in one hand and an intercom in the other as alarms continued blaring, red lights blinking, and the computers reporting that U.S. missiles were on their way. In the midst of this horrific chaos and terror, the prospect of the end of civilization itself, Petrov made an historic decision not to alert higher authorities, believing in his gut and hoping with all that is sacred, that contrary to what all the sophisticated equipment was reporting, this alarm was an error.

And since it was in fact a false alarm, he prevented a real nuclear war from starting. Thanks!

Wait a minute . . . "thanks?" That's it? There should be a statue of this guy in every city that is still standing because of him. His face should be on our coins! There should be a Ford Petrov S.U.V., and a Mt. Petrov. He saved the world and got what? Nothing? We don't even know his name? Wow . . . so much for how it works in the movies.

(story via Exclamation Mark)

PG- 13 Graffiti

What if you really want to deface public property with graffiti, but on the other hand you don't want to offend people with off-color language? I guess the result might be something like this creation that I saw downtown today.