Apparently, I am a closet opium junkie

Yes, you read that right. I didn't know it myself, but it just might be true. Where do I get my opium? Well, acorrding to this article my body makes it.

It looks like it is possible that a person's "thirst for knowlege" may be the result of the brain's craving of opium-like chemicals that are released as a reward. Interesting if true... ...it would explain a lot.....

From the "He's going to feel that one in the morning" department

I never would have thought it was possible to survive a decapitation. That is until I saw this boy named Ricky on TV. How did he survive? Well, he suffered a rare, and usually fatal, form of decapitation known as "internal decapitation." From what I can gather, this means that while his head was not detached from his body, his skull and ligaments holding the skull to his neck were. All that was left holding his head on was flesh and nerves. Surgery was needed to bolt his skull back where it needed to be. With such an injury usually comes some loss of control over one's body. But Ricky is talking the talk and walking the walk. One arm is still useless but he is determined to get it to work again.

In my search for articles about Ricky on the Web I came across a bassoonist who has survived the same injury. As of last year she, unfortunately, was unable to play her bassoon. You know, perhaps that explains a lot about me......

Data crunching in the key of C#

While searching for a job I have noticed that there are quite a few job openings involving the C# programming language and the .NET platform-- both from Microsoft. Thus, in the last couple of days I downloaded MS Visual C# 2005 Express and dove into Learning C# 2005.

So far, it's been pretty easy to pick up and I'm already on chapter five of nineteen. It helps quite a lot that I am familiar with C and C++ of which C# is a descendant of. I also have the Mono implementation of .Net on my iBook. It's kinda strange compiling and executing .exe files directly on a Mac....

One poll you won't hear in the news

The Gallup Poll recently came out with their yearly poll that gauges the public's confidence in various institutions. The results are indeed interesting. One can be 95% sure that the results are within +/-3%. The military is on top with a 73% confidence rating, despite the efforts of some people who wish to lower such a rating. The police follow at 58%. Third and fourth goes to the Church/organized religion (52%) and banks (49%) -- both at a statistical tie. The more liberal strongholds listed are thrown around the range below 40% along with some moderate and conservative strongholds.

While it is sad to see most institutions scoring rather low, there is definitely one thing that's clear: Men and women of the military, your country is behind you!

Switching to Macs: the good and bad

As many of you know, I very much enjoy using a Mac for my everyday computing needs. It truly is a fantastic platform to work with. Of course Macs have their drawbacks. If one is a heavy gamer, then you would want to stick to running Windows. Building a server? Try Linux or BSD instead. Use the tool that best fits the job. The reason why I probably come across as a big time Mac fan is that I think it is the best tool for the most visible job: the typical desktop or laptop user. I'm hardly going to talk to a typical user about how OpenBSD is the best OS for a web server that need to be secure and most heavy gamers are already using Windows.

Anyways, I present to you a list of the good and the bad about switching to a Mac for the average user. Even if you don't like Macs, it is worth a read.