Correcting misinformation (6)
I have an unnatural and almost maniacal need to correct factually incorrect information.  Some of my family members witnessed this once again today as I replied to a forwarded email that contained misinformation.  It's not that I'm full of myself and so feel the need to always be right (though I am, in fact, full of myself; also, I'm always right).  And it's not that I'm a jerk who just needs to prove people wrong (though I am, in fact, a jerk; also, people are often wrong).  And it's also not that I like arguing or proving my point or getting everyone to adopt the same opinions as my own. 
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It's just that certain pieces of information are facts while other are not.  The sky is blue; the grass is green.  You can't argue with these pieces of information because they're facts.  They're not up for interpretation or for forming opinions about.  They are black and white facts.  So to allow misinformation to not only remain uncorrected but also continuing spreading, I feel like I'm doing a disservice.  I'm assisting in the spreading of misinformation. 

So this is why I often ashamedly respond to emails to tell people they're hoaxes.  Sorry, people, it's nothing personal.  Except that you're spreading lies.  Other than that, we're cool. #psychology

Four-stroke vs. two-stroke engines
What's the difference between a four-stroke engine and a two-stroke engine?  This topic seems to come up every once in a while, so I'll record the answer for posterity: 

Four-stroke engines are in pretty much all cars and trucks driving on the road, whether gas or diesel or sporty or work-y or anything else.  The "four-stroke" refers to the four parts of a cycle:  Intake, compression, combustion, exhaust.  HowStuffWorks has a great article with an animation. 

Two-stroke engines are generally in lawn mowers, leaf blowers, chain saws, and dirt bikes.  The "two-stroke" refers to the two parts of a cycle:  Compression and combustion.  Again, HowStuffWorks has a great article with an animation. 

Why use either one?  Two-stroke engines produce more power and weigh less, but they're also louder, require a mixture of oil and gas, don't last as long, aren't as fuel-efficient, and produce more pollution than four-stroke engines.  The reason they're used is because of their power and weight properties. #science

User-contributed search results
I've found in recent months that search results from Google (and probably other search engines) contain a lot of links to user-contributed answer sites like Yahoo Answers, WikiAnswers, Answerbag, and Amazon's Askville.  To be fair, some of these user-contributed sites have good content.  The hard part is deciphering between the good content and the bad content.  Good content normally cites sources, uses relatively good spelling and grammar, and doesn't seek to insult or defame anyone in the process.  The bad content is obviously the opposite, but it's often confusingly mixed in with the good content.  As a general rule of thumb, I don't trust stuff from user-contributed sites like this until I find a reason to convince me otherwise. 

A few weeks ago at work, my co-worker was trying to convince everyone that the phrase "robbing the cradle" (dating/marrying someone younger) has an antonym in the phrase "robbing the grave".  We all tried to convince him that "robbing the grave" is not only not a commonly-used phrase to describe dating/marrying someone older, but it's actually a really bad thing (i.e. do not, under any circumstances, profess to be a grave robber).  He got on his computer, Googled it, and came up with some results that mentioned the phrase in the context of a relationship.  I accepted his explanation and moved on, because I'm a firm believer in the idea that if it's on the internet, it must be true.  On a whim, I Googled the phrase myself and noticed that his "sources" were Urban Dictionary and Yahoo Answers.  Urban Dictionary is a great site full of user-contributed definitions for slang and uncommon lingo, but it's certainly not a site you can reference as a reliable source.  Such is the case with most user-generated content.  Be forewarned.  Or be thoroughly mocked at work. #technology

Weather.com's TruPoint sucks (3)
Weather.com recently changed some portions of their website, making things worse and at times, unusable.  I'm a fan of the hourly forecast because it gives a good indication of when certain weather events will start or stop.  Up until recently, I could search for a zip code and click the "Hour-by-Hour" link to get weather predictions for the next several hours.  But apparently when I wasn't looking, this thing called TruPoint stepped into the picture, creating not only an "Overview" section that shows a graph of hourly weather conditions (cool but not what I want) but also a "Details" section that reports weather in 15 minute intervals.  I don't want weather updates in 15 minute intervals.  It's stupid.  Weather conditions generally don't change that fast, and weather predictions are usually wrong anyway.  Of course there's no easy way to disable this "feature" except by clicking some poorly-placed links that merely collapse the 15-minute intervals for the selected hour.  Weather.com, if you're listening, please know that TruPoint sucks.  Thank you. #technology

Chinese cops on Segways
Boston.com's The Big Picture has this photo in their best of 2008 collection: 
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A rogue band of Chinese cops on Segways firing itty-bitty guns in an anti-terrorism drill.  Or as Reddit said, "Pew Pew Pew....Pew".  I don't know if I've ever seen a more ridiculous picture in all my life. #travel

Punishing email forwarders
A certain member of my extended family (most likely no one reading this) has a habit of forwarding emails.  And not even good or funny stuff.  Just total crap.  The stuff from 1998 about the children and the puppies and the angels and all that garbage.  Not to be a cynic ... ok, since I'm a cynic, I don't want to read that stuff any more.  I don't want to receive it in my inbox.  I don't want to hear about it.  Email was invented as a means of communication.  It spent many years in the crapper as simply a way to spread misinformation and stupid jokes, but it has since made a comeback and continues to serve as a viable alternative to phone calls and face-to-face meetings. 

I thought about simply emailing the person and kindly asking them to only email me personal correspondence, but I've read that there's no way to actually do this without hurting the person's feelings.  Some people actually send out a form letter every year to remind people that their inbox is a precious resource that must not be wasted.  And there's even a website that "politely and anonymously" asks people to stop sending forwards -- the epitome of passive aggressiveness.  But hey, what other kind of aggressive is there? 

For the less-than-moral, I came up with two options, both of which involve lying.  You can either tell the person that your email address is only for business or professional use, so personal emails really shouldn't be sent there.  Or you can reply with one of those error messages from "Mail Delivery Subsystem" that says something like "Mail delivery failed: returning message to sender".  You could even include a little computer-generated-sounding imperative like, "Please remove this email address from all personal address books." 

The thing is, not all forwards are evil.  I receive some forwards that I'm genuinely thankful for.  They're usually addressed solely to me, or to a small group of people that have previously expressed interest in a certain topic (e.g. "To all cat people").  Sometimes I'll receive something I've already seen, but I'll appreciate the sender thinking the message would fall under my unusual brand of humor. 

In the end, the solution I'm going with is actually quite simple.  I'm blocking the sender.  I can either mark the message as spam, or set up a rule that automatically deletes anything from the sender.  That way, I'll never be able to receive actual communication from that person in the future, which I think is a fitting punishment for abusing the system.  Hopefully people will start to learn that the more garbage you spew, the less people will want to listen.  Perhaps kind of like this website. #technology

Slowly consuming media
Sometimes I deliberately play certain video games and read certain books slower than I normally would because I want them to last longer.  The Halo series, Half-Life 2, and more recently, Far Cry Instincts are good examples of this.  I would slowly and deliberately make my way through the game, cautiously checking around corners and looking behind every closed door.  This feeling hasn't happened as much with books, but I definitely enjoyed reading Chuck Liddell's biography and Freakonomics (I have unusual tastes in books), and I wouldn't have minded them lasting longer. #entertainment

Censored M&M's
The candy company M&M Mars can print custom lettering and designs on their M&M's, for a price of course.  The one caveat is that you can't print any obscenities or objectionable content.  One might ask, "What's the point of custom printing if you can't print obscenities?"  But Mars is a wholesome company, and as their hard-to-find Do's and Dont's page says:  "We don't want to leave a bad taste in anyone's mouth."  Apparently they're ok with bad jokes. 

I happen to know someone on the inside, and the unofficial word is that the company employs three old ladies as obscenity checkers.  Sometimes they catch things before they're printed, other times they don't.  This was one of the things that was deemed unwholesome, but before the entire batch was dumped in a pit of bubbling sulfuric acid, a few found their way into my hands. 

#food

More long talkers
Many moons ago, I wrote about the idea of the long talker:  A person who takes a long time to say a simple thing, often reiterating several points along the way, likely because they enjoy talking and/or like to hear themselves talk.  Two additions to that include the following: 
  1. Long story teller - A person who starts off with the statement, "I have a funny story about Thanksgiving," making you think, "Hey, I like funny things, and I like Thanksgiving; surely I'll like a funny story about Thanksgiving," only to leave listeners so incredibly overwhelmed by the vivid and meaningless details of the plot and setting ("It was raining outside.  Actually it started raining an hour after dinner.  Or was it already raining by dinner?  Either way that's not important.  It was after dinner.  Yeah.") that everyone loses interest until about 15 minutes into the story when some kind soul blurts out, "So what's your funny story?"
  2. Life story giver - This is the person who tells their life story on a regular basis.  This just happened to me last weekend.  I asked a guy a simple question about the church he went to, and he quite literally told me the entire story of his life, starting from when his father was 17.  You know it'll be a long one when it begins before the teller was even born.
A common occurrence when listening to long talkers is the thought of "How do I get this person to stop talking?"  I have to give the long story teller credit.  He/she knows how to command the attention of a group of people and not let go.  But with the life story giver, I had just finished a long day of helping someone move, and I just wanted to go home and relax.  I waited and waited for an opportunity to end the conversation, and when it was finally there, I took it and ran. #psychology

Beer adjuncts
It was brought to my attention today that some beers use ingredients other than the standard mix of barley, hops, yeast, and water.  These mash additives are called adjuncts, and they're usually other grains like corn, rice, oats, and wheat.  We've all heard of wheat beers before (Blue Moon ... you saw me standing alone ...), but has anyone ever heard of rice beers other than Sake?  Ever hear of Budweiser?  Rice is what they use to give a "characteristic lightness, crispness and refreshing taste."  Or it's just cheaper than barley.  And Miller Lite supposedly uses corn syrup, though it's pretty much impossible to prove because alcohol producers aren't required to list their ingredients. #food

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