Saving the planet without doing any work March 29, 2008
Posted by argotnavis in Humor, News.Tags: Dan, Google, green, John Hawks, slacktivism
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I just read this story from the BBC on this year's Earth Hour. For those who are unfamiliar with the event, it basically involves turning the lights off for one hour at night. Once a year. I, personally, think it's great that they're trying to build awareness for this, although I think doing things like turning off the lights one hour a year really reinforces the idea that we can continue living exactly the way we are and still save the planet by doing virtually nothing.
What got me about the article was this quote: “In its own contribution, the Google web search engine is putting a dark background on its homepage.” This made me laugh, of course, because of Blackle, the “energy saving” search engine that achieved mild internet fame last year. Dan blogged about it last year, and pointed out, rightly, that for LCD screens, it saves roughly no power at all. I decided to actually check out Google's page on Earth Hour, and found that they have this to say about it: “As to why we don't do this permanently – it saves no energy; modern displays use the same amount of power regardless of what they display.” Apparently the Official Google Blog had something to say about this last year, too. Good to know.
Also amusing was the fact that the second most read story on the BBC at the time I read the Earth Day story was this two-and-a-half year old story about that python that died after eating a gator. Why yes, someone did write a blog entry about that. Two men enter. No man leaves. Rated R.
There was an optics festival and I wasn't informed? March 19, 2008
Posted by argotnavis in Food, Life.Tags: Hostess, Tiger Tails, Alaska, Google, Chocodiles, California, X-Entertainment, mail order
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During the course of my random googling this evening, I stumbled upon this. According to their “About Us” page, they've been around since 2003, but this is certainly the first I've heard of them. Those who know me are probably aware of my enthusiasm for Hostess snack cakes, and Chocodiles are basically the best of the bunch. They, unfortunately, only exist on the West Coast these days, which makes them sort of difficult for me to obtain around these parts. I'll probably never end up ordering any of them, but it's exciting to know that I could get them if I wanted to. The next step for mail-order should, of course, be . . . well, you know.
I am somewhat disappointed in their selection of other Hostess cakes. Besides Chocodiles, they're mostly pretty common ones. It's sort of silly, but I'm always secretly hoping that I'll discover a supplier of Tiger Tails. During my year at UAF, I was exposed to the Tiger Tail for the first time, and I have not seen them since. I think Alaska is a strange choice for the last refuge of the Tiger Tail, but it certainly wouldn't be the only strange thing about Alaska. For those who don't know, a Tiger Tail is a Twinkie covered in raspberry jam swirls and coconut. I have some pictures of them around somewhere, but I don't know where. I really wish I did, because they're rare enough these days that I think a lot of people might have never even seen them.
All of this has me thinking, this could be a good opportunity for me. Buy In-n-Out and Tiger Tails. Dot Com.
