Katrina

http://www.cnn.com/ and http://www.weather.com/index.html have good coverage of Hurricane Katrina right now.

I can't remember the last time a hurricane was supposed to be this devastating.

I guess this is why I don't want to live in the South. Besides, you know, the oppressive heat and high Miamian crime rates and the spooky Victorian mansions with ghosts in them and the KKK and Disney World and no big cities and the majority of the populace being ignorant.

it's hot

that is all

Today I was walking through my neighborhood and I heard someone playing Morcheeba's "The Sea" as they were housecleaning. That made me happy :-)

These past few days have been boring ones, so here's some news from Slashdot: Google might be planning to release its own version of an instant messenger. I, for one, would download it immediatement. AIM sucks and is populated mostly by angsty teens and spambots.

Yeah, okay, so this won't win "Best Post of the Year".

Spammers spamming spammers

One of my favorite features on Blogger is the Blogger NavBar, that thin tan strip you see at the top of this page. When you click on the Next Blog button, it randomly plucks a blog out of Blogger's listings and presents it for your viewing pleasure. Try it, it's free. Just be sure to click the Back button to come back here safe and sound.

However, I have begun to notice a disturbing trend when I use this feature. Increasingly frequently, the blogs are created by spam robots that serve only to increase their site in search engine rankings. These blogs are called spam blogs, or splogs for short, and they are becoming quite common. Fortunately, the addition of a Flag button to the NavBar should serve to assist Blogger in shutting down these "splogs" faster and more easily.

I just realized that sounded like it was straight out of a textbook.

Anywhat, this increase in splogs has also led to an increase in comments spam, also called "comments left by spammers". Fortunately (again), two wrongs do make a right, and these splogs have begun to receive a carpload [sic] of comments spam, as seen here and here.

This all is deliciously ironic and refreshingly amusing. Well, maybe not that, but nice all the same.

Today's post is. . . Internet humor

Most of the funny stuff on the Internet isn't funny. From ebaumsworld, a wasteland of stolen things inhabited mostly by mentally-crippled college students, to The Best Page in the Universe, which really isn't (SHOCKER!), to Weebl and Bob, who are two eggs with speech impediments, 99.2% of the World Wide Web's pages fail to make me laugh. Of course, 90% of those pages aren't supposed to. Even I don't think this blog is funny. That is, it's not supposed to be. Unless it's a at-you-not-with-you sort of thing that I don't know about.

Yuck

I was checking my old Yahoo! account just now to see how much spam had accumulated, okay? So I go to yahoo.com and click on the Mail button, when suddenly I am confronted with this unsightly sight:



My first reaction: "What is that?" My second reaction: "ew."

Who wants to see an ugly picture of someone pulling down their face to expose their inferior oblique muscles every time they try to check their email? I know I don't. Good thing I switched over to Gmail, because they don't show contorted faces just because I want to see today's Dilbert. Anyways, the whole thing reminds me of this. (WARNING: DON'T CLICK IF YOU ARE SQUEAMISH UPON VIEWING AN OBVIOUSLY FAKE PHOTOGRAPH OF SOMEONE PULLING THEIR EYEBALLS DOWN TO THEIR CHEEKBONES)

i'm out

I'm back on Google

huzzah!

Google, you fickle fiend.

Update: not any more :(

T-shirts!

What with my recent purchase of an Astaire t-shirt (which I really like, beeteedubya), I've been looking around for other t-shirts that I like. Here are a few:

• Blogger Ringnecked T. Since most teenagers use Xanga, the logo will be practically unrecognizable to everyone (except fellow Bloggers) you meet. Plus I like the subtle variation of browns.
• Surf Scandinavia. Scandinavia rocks. And I'm not just saying that to sound "different" (a pet peeve of mine, but that's another post). You want proof? Scandinavia is composed of five countries, Iceland, Norway, Sweden, Finland, and Denmark. Their capitals are Reykjavik, Oslo, Stockholm, Helsinki, and Copenhagen, respectively. The city of Lillehammer, Norway hosted the Olympics in the past. Stockholm and the surrounding area is built on an archipelago of more than 150 islands. Iceland is home to many waterfalls, including but not limited to Seljalandsfoss, Gulfoss, and Thorsmork. Helsinki also hosted the Olympics. And finally, Denmark is home to the island of Mons, on which you can find the steep white cliffs of Mons Klint. All off the top of my head. Oh yeah.
• Raft Kathmandu. Nepal doesn't rock as much as Scandinavia, but at least the shirt is a conversation piece.
• Holland Tee. "Not another geography-oriented tee," you groan. Sorry, but Holland tees are in right now.
• More to come?
  

This blog is gone from Google!

see for yourself

i think. . . im going 2 cry. . .

Pictures are up!

here

Going to Chicago today! (again)

be back tomorrow w/ pictures too

Today's grab bag of spam

Re: ...broadcasting to millions... something to think about...
Apparently you've already considered it.

MICROSOFT Planning to Purchase World's Largest Spyware Company to Spam 40,000,000+
Conspiracy theorists are so fun!

Thanks for being a good friend!
Sure thing, "Molly Dean"!

???????
So many questions. . . so little time.

She wants a better sex? All you need's here!
I dunno. . . I'm really not too comfortable with purchasing a "Transsexual Do-It-Yourself Kit".

spermatazoa flavour improvement
And I would know this how?

Bbe The First inn Seearch Engine!
There's already hotels.com.

it was you!
Well thanks for ruining the suspense!

Your Email Won The Loterij
Sorry, I don't speak Dutch.

large thlghs please go away
At least you asked nicely.

IF ONLY YOU UNDERSTAND ME
Pity.

Grin baby grin
Hi everyone! My name's David! What's yours?

nomad or nurtures
Yes please.

I LOOK FORWARD TO HEAR FROM YOU
Well don't hold your breath.

Whxctkdu
I don't speak Klingon either.

HelloGrjeslullr
Nor Icelandic. Grr.

Hi

:)

Buy shares of my blog

www.blogshares.com has an innovative idea -- make up an imaginary stock market using blogs as the different stocks! Unfortunately the idea is also sort of crap, but it does have that "innovative" thing going for it.

Let's take a look at the facts n' stuff for my blog, shall we?

URL	http://iheartspam.blogspot.com/
News feed	Syndic8.com
Valuation	B$1,068.75
Added	21:26 26 May 2005
Last Updated	22:40 18 Jul 2005
Status	Available to Trade.
Industries	None [Vote for which Industry this blog belongs to] [Who voted this blog's industries]

How charming. My blog is worth one oh six eight point seven five. It must have been all the Paris Hilton posts.

Or not, as scrolling down the page will reveal:

Incoming Links	1
Outgoing Links	2
Outgoing Link Value	B$584.38
Market Share	0.00001 %

Apparently my blog is only worth the extra $68.75 because another blog linked to mine. But which blog could it be? Call the Hardy Boys, we have a mystery on our hands.

Total Shares	5000
Public Held Shares	4000
Price	B$.20
P/E	0.94
Highest Price *	B$.00
Lowest Price *	B$.00
Trading Volume **	0
A.E.L. ***	75.75 %

I don't even know what this stuff means. I'm guessing that it means my blog is worthless :^(

As these charts exclusively reveal, my blog is boring and no one links to it.

MYSTERY SOLVED! At the bottom of the page:

Top 100 Incoming Links

This is a list of the most valuable incoming links at the time OTHER blogs are indexed. It is indicative of FUTURE value not CURRENT value.

1. Google Sitemap News (B$68.75)

Oh. How boring. I assume blogshares is referring to this post.

(To Michael: Keep the snappy one-liners coming!)

In other news about my blog, a Google search for "starbucks i love lucy" comes up with some teenager with capitalization problems (hint -- check her profile) and not much else.

AUGUST!