The Revenge of the Spawn of the Somewhat Amusing News Thread Strikes Back Thread

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  • edited July 2007
    Reminds me of William Carlos William's poem, "The Red Wheelbarrow":

    so much depends
    upon

    a red wheel
    barrow

    glazed with rain
    water

    beside the white
    chickens.

    Yeah, that poem sucks donkey balls... The structure just annoys the hell out of me.
  • edited July 2007
    i do not know
    why..

    all that happened
    was just

    not

    right

    I just made a world-famous poem! Well not really, but I bet it would be if some famous guy made it.
  • edited July 2007
    I actually even like yours better than Williams' because the separated lines emphasize some kind of pause, which makes it seem more emotional, like you're really.....pissed....off.

    I'm going to be super-angry now if MrCheeze does not show up in Norton's next edition of the poetry anthology.
  • edited July 2007
    One of my favorite poems is a really simple one.

    A man said to the universe:
    "Sir, I exist!"
    "However," replied the universe,
    "The fact has not created in me
    A sense of obligation."
  • edited July 2007
    You get what you pay for -- and miracle machines cost way, way too much.
  • edited July 2007
    I think my favorite is number 4. It didn't do anything to solve the problem and is kinda offensive. I honostly don't see how it possibly could have solved unemployment, the idea is hilariously flawed.
  • godgod
    edited July 2007
    I wasn't quite sure which thread to put this in, but:
    Drunken Astronauts!
  • edited July 2007
    CNN has a tendency to crash my browser (something that happens WAY more than it should). What are the 5 projects?
  • edited July 2007
    Death is a cute, fuzzy kitten.
    Could hospital cat be angel of death? Discussion at PhysOrgForum
    He is a two-year-old cat and looks innocent enough. But at the nursing home where he lives in the US state of Rhode Island, Oscar has developed a reputation as an angel of death.
    Since being adopted as a kitten by staff at the advanced dementia unit of Providence's Steere House Nursing and Rehabilitation Center, Oscar has revealed a rather morbid tendency to pick which patient is going to die next.

    According to David Dosa, a geriatrician at Rhode Island Hospital in Providence, Oscar makes regular rounds, looking in on patients and giving them a quick sniff, before either moving on or settling down for a cuddle.

    So accurate have his predictions been, that as soon as the white and tabby harbinger of death curls up with one of the patients, staff immediately start summoning family and clergy to the soon-to-be deathbed.

    "No one dies on the third floor unless Oscar pays a visit and stays awhile," Dosa wrote in the New England Journal of Medicine.

    "His mere presence at the bedside is viewed by physicians and nursing home staff as an almost absolute indicator of impending death, allowing staff members to adequately notify families," he added.

    "Thus far, he has presided over the deaths of more than 25 residents."

    Dosa did not offer any explanation for Oscar's uncanny powers of prognostication, which patients were not yet believed to have spotted.
  • edited July 2007
    awww... the fact that a cute little kitten will cuddle up with you while you're dying almost makes up for the fact that you'll know for sure you're going to die soon!
  • edited July 2007
    Well, if I'm gonna go, I want to go cuddlin'.
  • edited August 2007
    He can smell the death on you!
  • edited August 2007
    Straight out of The Onion!

    Activision Reports Sluggish Sales For Sousaphone Hero

    sousaphone.jpg
    SANTA MONICA, CA—Despite a catchy 1890s soundtrack and realistic-feeling game play, Sousaphone Hero, the third installment of Activision's massively popular Guitar Hero video game franchise, sold a mere 52 copies in the United States in its opening week, the company reported Monday.

    Enlarge Image
    "In the wake of Guitar Hero's success, we thought the public was more than ready for additional popular American musical genres in a simulated-performance format, but people don't seem to be responding to marches as well as we had hoped," said Activision spokeswoman Melissa Hendleman, whose company spent an estimated $25 million developing the game for the PlayStation 3, Xbox 360, and Wii consoles.

    Sousaphone Hero offers two dozen public-domain marches, including 1893's "The Liberty Bell," 1896's "Stars and Stripes Forever," and 1897's "Entry of the Gladiators." The bulky sousaphone-shaped controller coils around the body, and players wear white spat-like foot coverings fitted with sensors that monitor synchronized marching steps. As with the fret buttons on Guitar Hero's guitar peripheral, the sousaphone controller's three valves are color-coded to match on-screen notes the player must hit.

    Players may also choose from 27 different fat-guy characters who can be customized with Alpine hats, epaulets, and a mustache editor with a wide array of options.

    Enlarge Image
    A gamer plays with a special wireless version of the sousaphone controller, meant to increase ease of play.
    Hendleman admitted that the $345 retail price might be a bit steep for many consumers. She also conceded that Activision may have erred by not releasing the game between Memorial Day and July 4, the prime parade season in the United States. Even so, she added, Sousaphone Hero contains "more than enough" features to keep gamers absorbed.

    "In the career mode, you can rise from playing in park gazebos for church picnics to performing in the halftime show of the Harvard-Yale game," Hendleman said. "If you score enough points, you can unlock the ultimate level: playing in the John Philip Sousa–led Marine Band at Grover Cleveland's inauguration."

    "And if you like multiplayer gaming, you're in luck," Hendleman continued. "In Sousaphone Hero's cooperative marching-band mode, as many as 135 of your friends can play simultaneously."

    Hendleman also emphasized the "fun" rewards players receive as they become more proficient. If they hit enough correct notes in a row, the on-screen crowd yells "huzzah" and "bully," and the sousaphone controller's spit valve will "drain." Flubbing notes, however, makes the controller "fill" with spit, preventing further play and causing the crowd to throw rotten eggs at the hapless on-screen sousaphonist. If characters earn enough bonus points in career mode, they can spend their Liberty-head nickels on a red, green, or blue "sock" for their sousaphone's bell, or an invigorating chunk of peanut brittle.

    Response to Sousaphone Hero on video-gaming message boards has been tepid at best.

    "That controller is like 100 pounds even though its [sic] only plastic," wrote mastagamer457, a moderator on one Sousaphone Hero message thread. "I think I screwed up my shoulder pretty bad."

    "I played the career mode for three hours and kept feeling like I was playing the same annoying circus tune over and over," kiLLlah_steVe of Columbus, OH wrote. "On one song, you're forced to play the same two notes back and forth for 96 measures."

    Others have complained that the third valve is used only at the expert level, that even proficient players only score a maximum of 60 points per song, and that the "oompah" meter stays the same shade of gray even if every note is hit. Some also reported that, if not cleaned regularly, the plastic mouthpiece gets crusty.

    Professional sousaphone player Eric Winkler of New Orleans called the game "laughably amateurish" and "nothing like" the actual sousaphone-playing experience. "The fingering's completely different, for starters," he said.

    Due to the poor response to Sousaphone Hero, Activision has halted development of spin-off games Cymbal Hero, Glockenspiel Hero, and Steam Calliope Hero.
  • godgod
    edited August 2007
    Oh, they better not cancel Flügelhorn Hero too.
  • edited August 2007
    Third installment? Clearly the Onion's fact checking department hasn't heard of Guitar Hero Rocks the 80's.
  • edited August 2007
    As a former Sousaphone player, this saddens me.
  • edited August 2007
    http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/south_asia/6932216.stm
    The suspect was fed 50 bananas on doctor's advice, after the X-ray dealt a blow to his denials.

    But only after a further meal did he yield the necklace, Calcutta police deputy commissioner Gyanwant Singh told AFP news agency.

    Also:

    http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/asia-pacific/6932801.stm

    Oh those crazy Asian countries.
  • edited August 2007
    Haha! Hello Kitty armbands!
  • edited August 2007
    Sexually suspect panda gives birth to twins
    BEIJING, China (Reuters) -- A panda once believed to be male and sent to Japan to breed with a female without success gave birth to twin cubs this week, state media reported on Thursday.

    The panda, "Jinzhu", gave birth to two female cubs on Monday at the Wolong Nature Reserve in the mountainous southwestern province of Sichuan, 11 years after being declared male at birth in 1996, Xinhua news agency said.

    "Jinzhu was believed to be male owing to her inconspicuous secondary sex characteristic and behavior," the agency quoted Wei Rongping, assistant director of the reserve's research center, as saying.

    Jinzhu was sent to Japan in 2000 to mate with a female, the report said.

    "When the pandas showed complete disinterest, experts decided to turn to artificial insemination, leading to the discovery that Jinzhu had no penis," it added.

    Jinzhu was sent back to China in 2002, with experts arguing the panda was either a hermaphrodite or had "undeveloped" sexual organs.

    "The penis of an adult panda is only about 3 centimeters (1.2 inches) long," Xinhua quoted Li Deshen, a panda expert, as saying, as a possible reason for the mix-up.

    It was not until 2005 that scientists discovered nine-year-old Jinzhu's ovaries were positioned in the wrong place, and gave her a two-hour operation to make her a "normal girl", Xinhua said.

    Jinzhu subsequently mated with a male in March 2007 and gave birth 142 days later, Xinhua said.

    The giant panda is one of the world's most endangered species and is found only in China. An estimated 1,600 wild pandas live in nature reserves in China's Sichuan, Gansu and Shaanxi provinces.
  • edited August 2007
    Who lives in the east under willow trees?

    Sexually Suspect...Panda!
  • edited August 2007
    Ya daaamn right.
  • edited August 2007
    Behemoth, this one's for you!

    Arcade arm-wrestling game pulled for arm wrecking
    TOKYO - Lose a game of chess to a computer, and you could bruise your ego. Lose an arm-wrestling match to a Japanese arcade machine, and you could break your arm.

    Distributor Atlus Co. said Tuesday it will remove all 150 "Arm Spirit" arm wrestling machines from Japanese arcades after three players broke their arms grappling with the machine's mechanized appendage.

    "The machine isn't that strong, much less so than a muscular man. Even women should be able to beat it," said Atlus spokeswoman Ayano Sakiyama, calling the recall "a precaution."

    "We think that maybe some players get overexcited and twist their arms in an unnatural way," she said. The company was investigating the incidents and checking the machines for any signs of malfunction.

    Players of "Arm Spirit" advance through 10 levels, battling a French maid, drunken martial arts master and a Chihuahua before reaching the final showdown with a professional wrestler.

    The arcade machine is not distributed overseas.

    Check the link to see the game.
  • edited August 2007
    that's hilarious! So is the story about the panda!
  • edited August 2007
    The arcade machine is not distributed overseas.

    &^*$!
  • edited August 2007
    There was an arm-wrestling arcade game years ago in the US. It had a robotic arm. It was too easy, though.
  • edited August 2007
    They have them at fairs, but I prefer the punchbag games.

    I kick them :D
  • edited August 2007
    What! Kick a punching machine? How absurd. What kind of weirdo would do something like that?
  • edited August 2007
    You.
  • edited August 2007
    Certainly not me. Nevermind that I wouldn't punch it either. I favor the idea of simply willing such a thing to go into a "punched" state. It hasn't happened just yet.