Funny

So I was looking at treadmills/ellipticals/stationary bikes today online and I came across one that looked strikingly familiar. Anyone else see the resemblance?

On an unrelated note, you should go download the Spore Creature Creator.
Spore is a game thats been in production since forever ago and will be released this September, save for any additional delays. (There have been many thus far)
Creature creator lets you build animals, which you'll be able to use in the game once the full fledged version comes out. The creator is one of the most intelligent and intuitive programs I think I've ever used. The sheer level of customization is amazing. Spore allows you to grow a life form from single-cell all the way to advanced inter-stellar species, and is the brain child of Sim City and The Sims creator Will Wright, so this game is destined to be a mega hit.

Stop Me If You've Heard This One...

Okay.

So, a Rabbi and a Priest walk into a, er AT&T store. The Rabbi, we'll call him Schmuel purchased a new cell phone just 8 months ago, but really fricking wants a new iPhone 3G, the iPhone data plan, the whole schmear.

How much is the Rabbi going to have to pay to get his chachka? Will it turn out to be more of an expensive toy if AT&T acts like a ganef?

I don't know the punch line, because apparently neither does AT&T. If you believe that I've got some unicorn farts to sell you.

Here is a list of the most likely price points for the new iPhone:

Come On AT&T. The cat's out of the bag already! Give us the frickin' deets!

I really want to know if the cost of getting an iPhone will be unacceptably high, or if it will be reasonable, but it seems no one at AT&T has a straight answer, though I've read several reports of reps saying about 5 different things. All this ambiguity about the finer details about the iPhone is leading to a lot of speculation and rumors.

Oh, and the Priest was eligible for a standard upgrade so he didn't have to worry about a thing.

Firefox: Do Not Want ?

So, firefox has been behaving like a real Turd Ferguson lately, which makes me sad.
I started using firefox regularly (At home) about a year ago when I started using a Mac at work.
The only real problem I've had with it is it's frequent loading of 'nothing' pages. In other words, you click a bookmark or click a link and it takes you to a blank page. After that, you cant go anywhere without exiting the program and re-opening. Sometimes, even that doesn't work and you have to reboot the computer. Annoying as piss, but forgivable as it doesn't happen with every use. I'd peg it at about 25% of the time.
Well, yesterday Firefox decided to pull a new rabbit out of it's hat. Now, when I open it, all of my bookmarks, all of my plugins, skins, etc. are gone and it loads the whole "Welcome to Firefox, First Time User!!!!" welcome page bullshit. The first time it did that, and I though I'd lost all of my bookmarks, I was pissed. I learned where to recover them from a temporary backup thing that firefox creates daily, and thankfully that worked, but now I have to go through this process every time I start the fucking program. I've got the latest version, and I hadn't changed anything when this little gem of a problem flared up. Anyone got any ideas?
I certainly don't want to have to start using IE again, since its basically crap. Has anyone used Safari for PC? Does it work well?
I got my new camera this week. There is a ton of features and crap to try to learn on it, and I've barely started. I have pretty much just kept it on manual and been playing around with the aperture/ISO/shutter speed/focus settings so that I can get better at understanding what settings work best in what conditions.
Below are a few shots I've taken. They aren't anything 'thought out' in regards to composition, just seeing how the manual controls work and testing out the color correctness.

Fujifilm FinePix S100FS, You're so Dreamy

I finally pulled the trigger on a camera tonight.
(Tony, this one may interest you if you are still undecided on what to get.)

I was torn between getting another Point & Shoot and a DSLR. I think I've kind of outgrown the whole P&S stuff, and have been learning about apertures and f-stops and composition and all that fun stuff, yet I didn't know if a DSLR was worth me investing in, simply because it might be more than what I need, and I certainly wouldn't be able to afford many lenses, nor would I want to lug them around.

I think I found the best of both worlds. The Fuji FinePix S100fs (Go ahead, say that 10 times fast)

This is a new camera on the market, and it's designed for people in just the dilemma I was in.
The body is very much modeled after a DSLR, and the lens is capable of a 28mm all the way to a whopping 400mm (14.3x) zoom. In DSLR terms, this is typically at least 2 separate lenses.

The 11.1 megapixel CCD sensor is different than regular point and shoots, being that it's much larger. Thats the big problem with P&S's, the small sensor gets crammed with megapixels and leads to high noise as you move up the ISO brackets, and can lead also to high artifacting in images. The S100fs has a sensor similar to DSLR's, and avoids this problem altogether.

This camera is equipped with full manual controls, as well as some presets, and has something unique to FujiFilm called 'film simulation'. These settings recreate images that mimic what you'd get using different types of film made by Fuji.

Some other key points are the ability to use the LCD or an optical(electronic) viewfinder, the LCD swivels for taking images at abstract angles, XD, SD, and SD-HC cards are supported, and RAW and JPEG image settings.

After reading a lot of reviews the only negative I could find is that images in bright sunlight with a dark contrasted subject can cause some noticeable chromatic aberrations (That purple outline between bright and dark contrast. CA is actually possible on any and all digital cameras, even the top tier DSLR's, but its easier for it to happen with the S100fs. Fortunately, should an image come out with this problem, there is a Lens Correction tool in photoshop which can fix it, as well as other dedicated CA touch up programs.

One other nifty toy I got to go along with it was a new SD-HC 8 gig card. That itself is not very cool, but the card has a slide out compact USB connector, so you can get photos on any computer with just the SD card. You can also use the SD card as a thumb drive.

Once I get the new gear and have a chance to play with it, I'll put up a review.

More on Religion

I want to write an addendum to my previous post, partly in response to Tony's reply, and partly because I'm not completely fucking infuriated like I was when I wrote it.
Indeed, re-reading it now it is no better than the vitriol spewed at me by religious extremists, and I can see that.

One quality I hope those who know me well enough would say I have is an incredible amount of tolerance and open mindedness for all things. I think being a minority such as myself kind of requires that. Another thing you likely know is that I keep most of my opinions to myself, and the last post was a rare slip you're not likely to see on here again.

What I said below was more of a venting, as I do have respect for religion, and even if I don't personally derive any usefulness from it, I understand that others do. It is simply my opinion that I think we'd be better off without religion. Concordantly, there's a huge chunk of religions that think the world would be better off without homosexuals. Yin and Yang and all that.

The main reason for my post was just a burst of anger. Anytime something about gay rights, no matter how momentous or how trivial come up. I'm subjected to religious fanatics decrying something that is built into the very fiber of my being as a sinful despicable vile thing that should be categorized with the worst and most twisted abnormalities of mankind. It's guaranteed. I've cried so many times reading what they have to say, but this time I felt like lashing out. Every time they say I am living in defiance of their gods wishes or that simply being who I am is destroying the world they twist their knife into my skin.

As unfortunate as it may be, I think my distaste in religion was brought on by what religion thinks of me.

And, though most of you know this already, I consider myself agnostic. I believe that no religion on earth is correct (They cant all be), but that doesn't mean I don't believe some of them may contain certain truths. I believe in spirituality and the afterlife and perhaps a form of god, and I think that can exist on a completely different plane than 'religion'.