so the dispute about who owns the North Pole has been in the news lately - the Russians sent a sub under the ice to symbolically claim it, while other countries objected - Canada says they own it, and Norway and the US are getting into the act. Everybody has different reasons - we're closer, our continental shelf goes there, etc.

I've noticed that Canada's maps are reflecting their claim, like this one from a government website, which shows the territory extended into the ocean all the way to to pole. However, most non-Canadian maps only show the land itself, not the claimed or economic zone or anything (like the CIA World Factbook one, for example).

Maps and things are always political, like this article shows. Other examples are maps made by China which show Taiwan as part of China, maps by Argentina including the Falklands, etc. It's kind of an interesting method of information warfare. For example, Wikipedia has the map of Canada that shows the border to the North Pole, which I assume was added by a Canadian.

I guess this might happen in Antarctica if they discover minerals there. I hope there aren't any Hoth type battles or killer Arctic space monsters though.

so this is amazing. A guy in prison sued Michael Vick for "$63,000,000,000,00 billion" (sic) dollars, which if I'm not mistaken is $6,300,000,000,000,000,000,000. He says Michael Vick stole his dogs, sold them on eBay, and used the proceeds to buy missiles from Iran. He also says Vick used drugs in school zones and subjected him to microwave testing, and on and on and on. And that Vick violated a bunch of constitutional amendments.

Here's the article and the absolutely hilarious lawsuit itself (hand written on looseleaf paper).

so here's today's weather report.



This guy is awesome

So I finally got a new housemate, and he has a Wii. It's pretty sweet. Both my arms are a little sore from playing, mainly Wii Sports and mainly the baseball game.

Wario Ware is fun too, it's just a bunch of totally random weird minigames that last about 3 seconds each - pulling hair out of a nose, shooing a fly, etc. It's a good party type game, as we found one Friday night.

Anyway, I recommend it. It's kind of a workout too, though you don't have to make big motions if you don't want to.

And this Japanese safety manual for it is funny. Don't hit your friend in the face, knocking his glasses off. Don't pour orange Gatorade on your Wii. Don't stick a clover in it. Don't let a snowman attack it.

so for my 750th post, here's "Chocolate Rain." It's a dumb/weird/bizarrely hypnotizing song that is stuck in my head now. It's even got a Wikipedia article.



I also like the take-off.



And there's this one.

So the Nationals beat the Giants yesterday. Austin Kearns, Felipe Lopez, and Brian Schneider all hit home runs and Washington scored four in the 8th to win it. Nothing else interesting happened in the game.

so I just saw that movie "Smokey and the Bandit." It was pretty bad.

It was obviously made to capitalize on the trucker/CB radio thing that was pretty popular for awhile (like CW McCall's "Convoy" song). For the first part of the movie, Burt Reynolds and Sally Field (who is surprisingly good looking) are funny together, and the other guy, Jerry Reed (who also played the bad coach in "Waterboy") was pretty funny. Unfortunately, the rest is corny.

Lots of things happen for no reason at all - a Japanese guy crashes into a car, they're suddenly in the forest, random people show up, it's weird. It's almost like the story parts of the movie were cut out, leaving only double entendres and car chases. And they mentioned Coors beer about 100 times. It had to have been one of the first big time product placement movies. And the music is all about what's happening in the movie, which is also lame.

So anyway, not that people are really clamoring to see this, but if it's On Demand or something, steer clear.

so there's a lot of these videos floating around the YouTubes - "NFL Fantasy File," NFL players doing amazing stuff. However, I think most, if not all, are fake.

For example, this one of Jason Campbell throwing two passes and having them bounce off each other.



For one, the sound of the balls hitting seems fake. Then the bounce doesn't seem real, the physics seems wrong. And the angle of the balls doesn't seem right when they come back in the screen. I'm not buying it.

UPDATE: see, i'm not crazy. Dan Steinberg from the Post thinks it's fake and interviewed Jason Campbell, who didn't give him a straight answer. Signs point to fake city USA.

so this movie looks absolutely terrible

so I've heard a fair amount about this guy Patrick Wolf. People mention him on their Myspaces and Facebooks and blogs and whatnot. I listened to a couple songs and they didn't do anything for me, kind of boring. But then I saw his picture and decided I'd never listen to him. Look at this clown.

This guy's the definition of "tries too hard." "Hey, I'll get ridiculous poofy hair and sit on a carousel. That will be witty and clever. Then I will get a tattoo of a unicorn (?!?!) above my skinny boob." Every picture is like "I am so sad and vulnerable, :(" It's just lame. And anyway, his name is Patrick Wolf. Dumb.