Pyramid by Paypal.

The imagination of con artists knows no bounds. Today I received a spam e-mail with a link to this site. Its a variation on the classic pyramid scheme, only instead of sending money by mail you send it through Paypal accounts. It won't take too many fish to bite this hook for the original scammer to receive a lot of money. As with all pyramid schemes at some point they'll run out of suckers, and the last folks in will likely see zip in return. Of course if Paypal catches on quickly enough he'll probably never see most of the money. I suppose I should have forwarded the e-mail to Paypal, but its safe to bet that this one has already been reported by multiple folks.

Mr. Gueguen Answers Your Undergrads Questions.

Kinda. Sorta. Maybe.

Recently I've got a couple of hits from someone trying to find out whether Pete Williams is married to Jene Yeo. Well, dear searcher, as far as I can tell the answer to that question is no. Pete Williams is married to someone who worked on Undergrads. He hasn't said who. The unnamed Mrs. Williams is apparently Canadian, if I remember a comment I read someplace correctly. I've seen no indication Ms. Yeo is, so I think we can all do the math.

If you have any questions about the series feel free to ask me. But really, you should be asking Pete Williams instead. After all he reads and sometimes posts to the IMDB Undergrads board. He has a blog on Teletoon's Detour site, where he has already answered some of the questions you're likely to have. And he has a MySpace site as well, which is linked to that flashy banner I have at the top of the page. Yes folks, he's still interested in his baby.

While I'm at it I'll nag Canadian fans. If you haven't done so already go out and buy the DVD. Its now commonly available in Canada. Most places have it on sale for less than 20 bucks. That's for the whole series, people. If there's any chance of a revival of the project lots of fans buying the DVD will certainly increase that chance.

And hello to any of the Undergrads crew who might pass through. Thanks for entertaining me.

Splat!

If I ever needed confirmation of my practice of not walking under crows sitting on telephone and light poles I got it today. I was standing at an intersection, and a crow "dropped his cargo" about two feet from where I was standing. So I think I'll continue not walking under them.

Birds can also do cute things of course. An example of this is a duck that hatched its eggs in the courtyard of Walter Murray Collegiate here in Saskatoon. Too bad the accompaning picture doesn't look as cool as it did in the paper this morning.

Down the Hatch!

A pork chop for supper, a bag of white cheddar popcorn with a Coke for a snack during the Blue Jays game, and a couple of chocolate chip cookies was not the smartest combination for me to be eating tonight. Feeling a bit of heartburn coming on I just popped down a Pepcid Complete that came as a sample some time ago, and was probably going to sit there forever if I didn't use it. I'd rather not wake up in an hour or so with the horrible feeling of acid reflux in my throat. I suspect it would help if I lost ten or twenty pounds, but I can hardly do that in 15 minutes. Fortunately incidents like this only happen every few months for me, unlike folks who actually suffer from regular boughts of such problems.

Another Where's Willy Milestone.

Today I received my 300th Willy hit. I'm glad it was on a bill that travelled some distance, instead of one that travelled only a couple of kilometers. I'm also glad that 300th hit came before my 3rd anniversary of bill tracking, which is the 11th of June. You can see my user profile here.

Do Saskatoon Bloggers Take The Bus?

Thinking some more about the upcoming bus route changes today I decided to use Google's blog search engine to see what other Saskatoon area bloggers had to say about them. The answer is virtually nothing so far. I did find some posts discussing Saskatoon Transit, but nothing really about the upcoming changes. On the other hand a Buenos Aires based blogger has a post on our new buses. Very interesting. Technorati didn't produce much more. I suppose once the changes actually occur things we'll see more action.

The main page for Saskatoon Transit is here. A pdf file of the new routes is located here.

May Showers

April showers bring May flowers, so the saying goes. But what do May showers bring? In much of Saskatchewan I assume its irate farmers. The amount of rain we've received in the last few days can't be helpful in getting their crops seeded. Hopefully the forecast holds up and we get several sunny days starting Tuesday.

Graph Your Webpage

Here's a neat little page via Pharyngula. Its an applet that scans the HTML of your page and turns it into a multicolour graph. Here's mine. Its amazing how complicated it is. Of course that's because I have quite a few links on the page itself, as well as a varying number of links depending on what I've posted lately, along with the banners and so on.

Random Mix II

This morning I had a package of Munchies BBQ Peanuts. I don't know what was on them, whether it was chili powder, cayenne pepper, or what have you, but whatever it was it sure made my tongue hot. I actually left some in the bag because of the heat. They reminded me of a package of buffalo wing flavour Old Dutch potato chips I had a few years back. They made my tongue so hot I had to eat them in more than one sitting.

If I'd looked at the fat content on the peanut package I probably would have skipped them. Lots of fat in those little dears. I ate way too much today. Fortunately I'm going to eat a lot less, including less fat, tomorrow.

I got a look at one of the Saskatoon Transit Service's new diesel-electric hybrid buses today. There was a Saskatoon centennial event in front of City Hall today that included the bus. Inside it didn't look all that different from the current low floor buses, although the seats are cloth covered. 4 of these hybrid buses have been acquired, along with 13 new diesel buses. They'll be used as part of STS's new DART rapid transit service, to be introduced July 2nd. The 27 buses used on the DART routes will also have bike racks.

The hybrid buses aren't a huge surprise. STS has been experimenting with using biodiesel in several buses over the past few years.

July 2nd will see all bus routes change. From what I've seen so far I'm not entirely convinced. Where I live for example it will be easier to get downtown, but seems to be harder to get to the Centre at Circle and 8th, the nearest large mall and home to one of the city's primary bus transfer points. If I read the schedules correctly at times I may have to ride all the way downtown and transfer to another bus to get to a location the current bus route in my area goes directly to. Good luck to the bus drivers, as their stress levels are likely to be quite high the first month or two as they deal with confused and irate bus patrons asking how they get to various places, and complaining that they can't go to X the way they used to.

During the noon hour it was misting. It was interesting to walk through that instead of more substantial rain. I would imagine today's damp and cool conditions were a disappointment to organisers of today's centennial outdoor presentation.

From the Law and Order Files II

You're likely to be hearing a lot about this story in the next few days, if not weeks. A Nebraska judge has sentenced a child abuser to 10 years probation because she says he is too small to survive in prison. Richard W. Thompson is five foot one. Judge Kristine Cecava stated that although his crimes deserved a long sentence he would face too much risk being put into prison. Thompson will be electronically monitored for the first four months of his sentence, must not be with anyone under 18 alone, or get involved with a woman whose children are under 18, and must dispose of all his pornography.

The idea that simply because someone is short they are more at risk for being harmed in jail seems ridiculous. A five foot tall body builder is obviously more dangerous than a 7 foot tall person who sits around doing nothing all day but eating junk food. One can only wonder how short someone has to be for Judge Cecava to consider them at risk in prison. The world is full of tough little guys who are probably laughing their heads off at this nonsense, while hoping they someday end up being tried in Cheyenne County by Judge Cecava. Of course given the controversy this story will generate there's a good chance her judgeship is in jeopardy.

Bad Day?

Without getting into details I screwed up twice today, badly, before it was even 9 o'clock. Not a promising start to my day.

A Nigerian Scammer Speaks.

Via this post at Stupid Evil Bastard here's a CNN/Fortune article on Nigerian scammers. Akin is just one of dozens working for a Nigerian scam boss. What's scary is that he's 14 years old. His scam work, even with the 80% cut his boss and corrupt local cops get, is sufficient to provide for his family. His mother for example makes 30 bucks a month. Its conditions like this that ensure that Nigerian scams aren't going away anytime soon.

Feels Like Summer.

Boy, does it ever tonight. The temperature reached the low 30's Celcius today(that's the low 90's for you Farenheit folks), and the house hasn't cooled hugely. Its all hot and muggy in here. The digital thermometer on the thermostat reads 27.5 right now. I also saw my first lightning of the season tonight as some thundershowers passed the city. In fact I think I caught a lightning flash out of the corner of my eye as I write this.

Bah!

I actually decide to watch The Weekenders on the Family Channel, and instead they're playing a Recess marathon. Oh well, at least the Jays are back on TV after the Colorado-Toronto series wasn't broadcast. That might be just as well since the Jays lost 3 straight.

Bad TSN!

Playing NASCAR is unacceptable when it interferes with playing boxing.

Gor Gor Girls.

If you browsed the science fiction and fantasy section of your local bookstore in the '70s and '80s the name Gor might be vaguely familiar. The planet Gor was the setting for a series of fantasy novels written by John Norman starting in 1966. Gor was located in the exact opposite orbital position to the Sun as the Earth, so it was sometimes refered to as Counter Earth. On Gor men are men and women are slaves, or secretly want to be slaves. The books claimed that slavery is the true "natural state" of women, and that they instinctively realise this. Most of the books were told from the point of view of Tarl Cabot, a man from Earth transported to Gor, although several were told from the point of view of female slaves, also taken from Earth. The series has sometimes been compared to Edgar Rice Burroughs' John Carter of Mars books, but with a high level of bondage content.

The series was published by DAW in North America, who are a mainstream sci fi publisher. The last DAW Gor book, Magicians of Gor, was published in 1988. It has been suggested by the Gor crowd that DAW dropped the series because of growing political correctness, given both the content of the books and Norman's stance that the philosophy of the books applied in the real world. A much more likely suggestion is that people had gotten tired of a book series that was increasingly overrought and repetitive, and that this was reflected in dropping sales, so DAW decided to drop a weak product. In any case the books went out of print, although old copies can be found in many used book stores.

Many people have taken the books as an inspiration for their own lifestyles. A group of such people have found themselves attracting the attention of the police in the UK. Durham police raided a home after a friend of a Canadian woman contacted them, fearing she was being held against her will. This proved not to be the case, but Norman's creation is getting some unexpected, and I suspect unwanted, publicity.

I can understand the appeal of using such a scenario for the occasional bit of fun in the bedroom. But living in such a fashion full time is another thing. Its not just the Goreans who live like that, there are others who follow other sorts of BSDM relationships. But the Goreans seem just a little bit odder given that they think their lifestyle would be applicable to the majority of society given the chance.

Julia Gracen wrote an interesting piece on Goreans for Salon in 2000, which you can read here.

As for the title of this post you're probably a fan of '60s cult films if you know where it came from.

Yes, A Post About That Film.

Honestly, I'm not posting about The Da Vinci Code movie, coming to a theatre near you, to boost my hit count. Honest. But a few comments did come to mind.

I haven't read Dan Brown's book, and I won't be going to see the movie. I'm sure I did read Holy Blood, Holy Grail at some point. You may remember that its authors tried to sue Brown for plaigarism. I still wonder how you can sue a work of fiction for plaigarising a work of supposed non-fiction, barring it copying block paragraphs without attribution.

Ian McKellen, who appears as Sir Leigh Teabing in the movie, has said the Catholic Church should support the movie. After all it shows that Jesus wasn't gay, like some folks claim. McKellen is himself gay.

Roger Ebert gave the film a positive review. To me this phrase stuck out: "I know there are people who believe Brown's fantasies about the Holy Grail, the descendants of Jesus, the Knights Templar, Opus Dei, and the true story of Mary Magdalene. This has the advantage of distracting them from the theory that the Pentagon was not hit by an airplane." Ouch, Rog. That's a nasty one! Of course it probably is true with some folks.

Ebert seems to be in the minority however. Rotten Tomatoes currently has the film rated at a dismal 18 percent.

"Best Record In the Majors."

When was the last time this phrase was applied to the Detroit Tigers? They are currently 27-13, and have won 7 straight. This time last year they were a game under .500 at 19-20, and ended their season 71-91, 20 games under .500. They haven't had a winning season since 1993. Over the last two seasons we've seen both the Boston Red Sox and Chicago White Sox win the World Series after decades of bad luck. Could this season be Detroit's turn to take off? Of course its still early, and the White Sox are nipping at their heels only a game behind. Incidentally 1993 happened to be the year the Jays won their second World Series. Make of that what you will.

Will The Women In Combat Debate Be Revived?

Captain Nichola Goddard of the Canadian Armed Forces was not the first Canadian woman killed in the field. Female Canadian military personnel were killed in both World War One and World War Two. But she was the first Canadian woman killed in a combat role, which were opened up to women in 1990. I can't help but suspect her death will revive the debate on women in combat. I haven't heard anyone discussing the issue yet, but I can't imagine this continuing for very long. Some opponents of women in combat may see the current Conservative government as more sympathetic to their views, and think now is the time to try and bring the issue back into the spotlight. However it is probably too late to change things back to the way they were. Personally I have no problem with women in combat roles. If they can do the job, let them. A woman getting killed in battle is no more a tragedy than a man getting killed. Rather the tragedy is that people must go off to fight at all.

Guns and Cars.

With gun control once again in the news in Canada the thought came to mind of whether things would be different if a slight change was made to the concept. Treat guns like we do cars. After all you can own as many cars as you want without any sort of government involvement. It's only if you actually want to use them they get interested. So if you want a car sitting on your lawn to look at and maybe start the motor up on you're perfectly welcome to. But if you actually want to use it you need it both to be licenced and to have a valid operator's licence. Imagine guns were the same way. Want to have 2 dozen rifles in your basement? Go ahead. But if you want to actually shoot them you'll need them registered and you'll need a gun operator's permit. Hmmm, somehow I doubt it would prove any more popular than the current concept.

Many of the more hard core opponents of Canadian gun control are influenced by the situation south of the border and the 2nd Amendment of the US Constitution. In a way it surprises me that the idea of a "well regulated militia" included in that amendment was never interpreted in a way to justify certain forms of firearms controls. It could be argued that part of the operation of such a militia is the government knowing the location of firearms and who owns them, on the basis that adult males are members of the militia unless they indicate otherwise. So registration of private arms could possibly be justified even if bans on certain types of firearms and restrictions on things like concealed carry couldn't. At least to the best of my knowledge it has never been interpreted in such a fashion.