BagOfNothing.com

Archive for July, 2009

Third time is a charm . . .

Homeless Man Leaves Behind Surprise: $4 Million

Every day on NPR, listeners hear funding credits — or, in other words, very short, simple commercials.

A few weeks ago, a new one made it to air: “Support for NPR comes from the estate of Richard Leroy Walters, whose life was enriched by NPR, and whose bequest seeks to encourage others to discover public radio.”

NPR’s Robert Siegel wondered who Walters was. So Siegel Googled him.

An article in the online newsletter of a Catholic mission in Phoenix revealed that Walters died two years ago at the age of 76. He left an estate worth about $4 million. Along with the money he left for NPR, Walters also left money for the mission.

But something distinguished Walters from any number of solvent, well-to-do Americans with seven-figure estates: He was homeless.

Full Article

[Thanks, Chris!]

• WifeGeeding’s post-op appointment went splendidly.  So well in fact, the doctor didn’t even charge us.
• Today it’s off to the ocularist to have her old eye adjusted to fit over her new implant.  Yeah, I know, it can all get a bit confusing if you aren’t familiar with this kind of stuff.
• When I get together with a lot of my closest friends, we like to quote movies, and often we will quote Kip Dynamite from Napoleon Dynamite – “Like anyone can even know that.”
• That line came to mind when I was researching my home town on the Internets.  Supposedly the inventor of the paper clip built a house  in Mineral Wells, TX.
• I couldn’t find any information in the Internets to back that claim, which sounds just as funny as Dr Evil when he said his father claimed to have invented the question mark.
• And it appears that Mike Modano of the Dallas Stars was in a dunking booth in Mineral Wells.  That would seem extremely generous of him to travel to such a remote and small town to do such a thing.  But perhaps the booth was in Dallas and was  sponsored by the Crazy Water company from Mineral Wells, that would probably make more sense.
• But then again, Mineral Wells is a hotbed of hockey talent.
• Actually, it’s not.
• I remember as a kid when we use to eat out at the old K-Bobs every one in a while, and I thought that was fancy dining.  That K-Bobs is now a bank oddly enough.
• There was a big old country wagon turned into a salad bar that caught my attention.  And there was a barrel of cracks next to it.  While we waited for our food, I always use to dig in there trying to find all the rectangular townhouse crackers since they tasted better than the square saltine crackers.
• I miss K-Bobs.  I wonder if there are any that are still around, I would probably eat there just to try to bring back some old memories.
• An Aggie friend of mine brought up that TAMU was looking for a new president and needed someone who was conservative.  I mentioned that Sarah Palin no longer has a job.  He cringed.
• The soup and cracker mug is a heck of an idea.
• I hear a disc jokey reader of mine is giving me a shout out on the air in Kansas City this morning.  I posted a video of that laughing weather man, and now he’s booked on my reader’s radio show.
• What happens when you combine Full Metal Jacket with Star Wars.  Link
• The name “Sanyo” means “three oceans” in Japanese.   The founder of the company’s wanted to sell his products across the Indian, Atlantic and Pacific oceans.
• A stage group in Austin is putting together a Saved By The Bell skit about Jessie’s pill problem episode.  Link
  
• I bought a safety razor yesterday to kick things old school, wish my face luck.
• Speaking of face, has Marie Osmond got some work done on her face?  The skin underneath her eyes look stretched.
• As a Cowboys fan, I’m suppose to have a strong dislike for the Eagles.  But I have nothing but respect and admiration, and was extremely envious of the defenses that Jim Johnson put together.  He was one heck of a coach, and will be missed.  Skin cancer is nothing to scoff at.
• Grace
  

LONDON — The Church of England is offering couples a two-for-one service — marriage for them and baptisms for their children.

The church is recognizing the changing reality of British families, it said Thursday. Statistics show that 44% of children in Britain are born to unmarried women, and the church’s own research found that one in five couples seeking a church wedding already had children either together or from a previous relationship.

New guidelines sent to the Church of England’s 16,000 parish churches encourage services that combine a wedding with a christening or a service of thanksgiving for the birth of a child.

Some clergy welcomed the latest move, but others argued it undermined Anglican teaching about the sanctity of marriage.

Full Article

Here are some that caught my attention from Wired Magazine:

• Inserting a VHS tape into a VCR to watch a movie or to record something.
• The number of TV channels being a single digit.
• Rotary dial televisions with no remote control.
• High-speed dubbing.
• The scream of a modem connecting.
• The buzz of a dot-matrix printer
• Screens being just green (or orange) on black.
• Blowing the dust out of a NES cartridge in the hopes that it’ll load this time.
• Finding out information from an encyclopedia.
• Putting film in your camera
• Answering machines.
• Pay phones
• Remembering someone’s phone number.
• Hershey bars in silver wrappers.
• Having to manually unlock a car door.
• Writing a check.
• Looking out the window during a long drive.

The Manhattan Airport Foundation is a land-use constituency committed to the immediate development of a viable and centrally-located international air transportation hub in New York City for the benefit of all New Yorkers.

www.manhattanairport.org

Christian Charity Raising Money To Feed Non-Gay Famine Victims

www.insanewiches.com

Financial Times Confirms Apple Tablet for September

The Apple tablet rumors are coming so thick and fast now that the big surprise would be for Apple not to announce one. The austere and reliable Financial Times has just thrown into the game with an article that confirms a September release for the new oversized iPod Touch, a timing that ties in nicely to Apple’s yearly September iPod announcements.

The device will probably have a 10-inch screen and come without a cell connection.

Full Wired.com Post

1983 animation test by Disney, directed by John Lasseter (who went on to direct and produce most of the Pixar films, including Toy Story). Back then Disney owned the film rights to the Where The Wild Things Are books… they didn’t use them, though, so they lost them. Check out this amazing test, which combined traditional hand-drawn, 2D animation with then-state-of-the-art 3D computer animation!

• I find it a bit puzzling when I hear someone who is a fan of the not all the time sports talk radio station 1310 The Ticket complains that Peter King’s MMQB column in Sports Illustrated isn’t always about football.
• I hear the radio team of the Dallas Cowboys will also be the TV team for the pre-season.  That sounds cool.
• I learned how to write in cursive in the second grade, and recall thinking the cursive “z” – in particular the capitalized one, just didn’t seem to fit.  I was reminded about that experience reading this Time article.
• I wonder if there is anyone that strictly writes in cursive.  I think most folks combine it with the printed letter or some other kind of self-invented penmanship.
• Staple City is pretty impressive.
• Grandma’s Desktop
• Start A Lie
• Madonna’s arms continue to freak me out
• Sleepwalkers Video Project
• Movie Monster Comparison Chart
• WifeGeeding wanted me to find the lyrics to the Big Bang Theory theme song.  But I prefer seeing the lyrics with the music.
• It must be an interesting feeling living off people’s donations and tithes.  I bet my spending habbits would change drastically.
• For the first time, I ate something at Whataburger other than a taquito or a cheesburger.  The grilled chicken sandwich was pretty good.
• I’ve been in the doldrums for the last couple of days.  I’m trying to find a way out of the funk.
• Someone asked me if I would give an update on my thoughts on the Pre after having it for a while.
• It’s not an iPhone killer, it’s just different.  But I really prefer having a real keyboard.
• Batterlife should be much better.
• I wish the camera had a zoom, but I think the quality of the pictures are nice.
• Official applications – there aren’t many, and by now I would have expected more.  However, there are a lot of unofficial ones out there when you do a simply Google search.
• Apple updated iTunes so that the Pre could no longer synch with it, then Palm came out with an update that allows synch.  It’s an interesting cat and mouse game.
• The cut and paste feature is nice, but a little cumberson.
• I wish it could turn into a light saber.  A blue one.
• The quick search feature is awesome.
• Maybe it does this and I just don’t know how, but I wish email would update instantly.  If I delete an email, then go online to check it, it’s still there.  The tester in me makes me check these things.
• I like how it feels, weighs, and fits in my pocket like smooth river stone.
• If the keyboard is slided out and you are on a call, and you slide it shut, that should end the call, but it doesn’t.  That should at least be a feature.
• Overall I love the phone, especially from my old Treo.  If I were to pick between it and the iPhone, I would probably pick the iPhone only because of the number of applications, but like I said, I like having a real keyboard.  Not to mention, there’s no way I’m every willingly going to give ATT any of my money ever again.
• When I tie my shoes, I still use the bunny ears.
• Grace

Saudi beauty queen Aya Ali Al Mulla trounced 274 rivals to win a crown, jewellery, cash and a trip to Malaysia, and all without showing her face, Saudi media reported on Friday.

With her face and body completely covered by the black head-to-toe abaya mandatory in the conservative Muslim kingdom, 18-year-old Mullah was named “Queen of Beautiful Morals” late on Thursday, newspapers said.

There was none of the swimsuit and evening gown competitions and heavy media coverage of beauty pageants elsewhere when the contest was decided in the eastern city of Safwa.

Full Article

Too bad Miss Teen South Carolina 2007 didn’t have a chance to enter the competition.

JERUSALEM — Judaism’s holiest prayer site has entered the Twitter age.

The Western Wall can now be accessed through the networking service, allowing believers anywhere to have their prayers placed between its 2,000-year-old-stones without leaving home.

Full Article

www.tweetyourprayers.info

One of the most artful property-tax tricks in the history of Illinois — a sham of near biblical proportions — has finally been exorcised.

This is the story of Chicago banker George Michael, who lives in a gorgeous $3 million mansion in Lake Bluff. Being a man of logic and finance, he didn’t much like his $80,000 yearly property-tax bill.

So he found an Internet outfit called the Church of Spiritual Humanism. According to the church’s Web site, it’s not big on faith, but it’s all about reason:

“If you agree that Religion must be based on Reason, you can be ordained right now for free, and be still able to practice your own religious traditions by simply clicking the button below:

“ORDAIN ME.”

And lo, Michael clicked “Ordain Me,” and it was done.

Michael submitted evidence to the Illinois Department of Revenue that his mansion wasn’t really a mansion. It was a church and therefore exempt from the burden of $80,000 a year in property taxes.

The article goes on, but this is the part that cracked me up:

Michael’s evidence that his mansion was a church included a copy of his snazzy Internet clergy ID card, which authorizes him to “perform all duties of the clergy including marriages, baby namings, invocations and all manner of religious ceremonies.”

He also included a photograph of the home depicting a suspicious-looking cross on the exterior wall of the mansion. The photo appeared a tad askew.

“This equal-sided cross was drawn on the photograph with a marker and did not physically exist at the time the photo was taken,” Galvin wrote in his order.

Full Article