Wonkybusker

Trains on the Track

Stop Virgin Media!

It looks like it's time to boycott Virgin in order to protect Net Neutrality.  This link has a very convincing argument.  Virgin is saying it will limit users' Internet access for commercial ends.  So you can watch videos they want you to see quickly while loading your favorite YouTube video will take forever, or it won't load at all.  This will only affect people who have Virgin as an Internet provider currently, but I'm sure if this succeeds, more will follow.  Verizon must be frothing at the mouth, waiting to see if this works.  So while I don't use Virgin for my Internet access, I can boycott their other business ventures.  This is the first I've heard of it, so I'll do a bit more research and get back to you with the full story.

Sustainable Seafood Choices

Should you try to get Atlantic or Pacific Halibut?  Can we continue to eat shrimp ethically?  Salon.com has a great article today addressing these questions.  And the Monterey Bay Aquarium keeps up a database of which seafood is alright and which we should avoid so that 50 years from now we still have seafood to eat.

Some advice from the article:

• Don't buy albacore tuna; look for skipjack tuna instead.
• Avoid Atlantic salmon because wild Atlantic salmon are commercially extinct and farmed salmon spread fish diseases, contributing to the problem.
• Not all farmed fish is harmful.  Farmed tilapia, trout, and pollock (as long as it isn't shipped all the way from China) is pretty eco-friendly.

Anyway, I found the article very helpful and I thought I'd pass the info along.

Thou elvish-mark'd, abortive, rooting hog!

This reminds me of the workshop I had at the Globe Theater.

Shakespearean Insulter

Boycott Beijing

For months now, Chris has been discussing the possibility of starting a movement trying to convince people to turn off the Olympics this year in protest of China's rule of Tibet.  It looks like now, with the recent violence, he isn't the only one who holds this view.

http://tibetanbuddhism.tribe.net/photos/6207efe6-09b9-4936-b6b1-0f1a89ec7c46

http://www.slate.com/id/2187280/

As much as I like the Olympics, I am joining the boycott. 

By not watching, we hurt ratings, which in turn affects advertising.  If there is no money to be had, it will be hard for countries like China (with awful human rights records) to win an Olympic bid.  And that in turn will add just a little more pressure for them to re-evaluate their position.  It's a long shot, but change needs to start somewhere, right?

Bacon Lollipop?

Okay, in the long list of random things found on the Internet, I'd like the share the very latest.  I came across this e-store selling lollipops.  So far, it's not that weird.  But here's the thing, the flavors are absinthe and bacon.  It's not artificial flavoring...they are made of real absinthe and real bacon. 

It reminds me of those Thanksgiving meal flavored sodas.  Interesting for shock value, but does anyone actually like them?  I actually do have bacon flavored toothpicks, but bacon flavored lollipops might be pushing it.

Wine-O Forever

I don't claim to know much about wines, but a drinkable bottle of wine for under $10 is a winner in my book.  Therefore, I was very excited to find this guide of the best cheap wines.  I don't think I've tried any that he mentioned, but I will.  And I will have to find myself some Malbec wine....perhaps in France.

In the Beginning...

Everyone had brown eyes.  Then, at some point, there was a mutation that turned off that particular gene.  The result was that the body's ability to produce the right kind of protein for the eye was limited, changing the color from the dominant brown to a more muted blue.  If two parents both pass down this mutation, their kid has blue eyes, but if one parent passes down the original gene, allowing the protein to be made, then the kid's eyes are brown.  Hence, blue eyes are a recessive trait.  I'm unclear about where other eye colors like green and hazel come in, but they may have to due with varying amounts of protein being made.  I digress.  The point is that one small mutation in one person a long time ago caused all the blue eyes we see today and everyone with blue eyes is in fact related to that one person.  Pretty cool, right?

Stop and Don't Shop

This Saturday is International Buy Nothing Day!

The Minesweeper Movie

Don't you hate it when they take a great computer game or video game and turn it into an awful movie?  Not anymore.  I give you the trailer to Minesweeper: The Movie.  It is a must see for anyone who has ever played minesweeper.  So basically, everyone.

"Why are you here soldier?"
"Because I'm bored!"
"And don't you forget that."