Sport, the final frontier

I have a dirty secret. I've tried to hide it from my friends and family for years, but living the lie has taken its toll on my soul. I have to confess.... I hate sport. Don't like it, not interested in it, would not affect my life if all forms of organised sporting competition were stopped tomorrow.

Oh the shame I've felt when the topic arrises in the company of men. Christmas day, the males of my extended family are standing around a BBQ, beers in hand, when one of my Uncles will drop a "Kerno wasn't half bad at Subie last Sat was he?" What is he talking about? Football obviosuly, but what team? Subie? Subiaco? That's in Perth right? He's from South Australia so he wounldn't go for a Perth team, so it must be... Ah fuck it. "Yeah, wasn't he?" I mutter before downing the remainded of my beer so I have an excuse to leave. 

I know what will happen if I stay. The inevitiable question. Who's your team? It was somewhat manageable when South Australia had only one team in the national competition. I obviosuly went for the Crows. No problems. Then another SA team joined up and my usual answer wasn't good enough. Now I was either a Crow's man or a Port Man, and whichever one I picked would be taken as an open invitation to a debate about the intelligence, masculinity and penis size of supporters of one team versus the other. Who cares? I think they are equally stupid, or equally awesome if you want to be positive, but I honestly have much more interest in the protocols used in creating the team's respective websites than I will ever have in the game itself. 

Having my condition (I will not cheapen this post by using the suffix 'itis') can be quite debilitating sometimes. Depending on the company, I'm basically excluded from 25-75% of all male conversation. Well, not entirely excluded. I can stand there of course, and that works suprisingly well because along with actual recounting of sporting matches comes a wealth of statistics that would put the ABS to shame. This means conversations about sport can be participated in by dropping small and uncommital questions like "Is that a record for away-games?" or "who had that title before him?" which will start hours of idiot savant like recounting of sporting records while leaving everyone under the impression that I was a participant.  

But this must end. I'm an expat in Dubai now and need to make expat friends. Sport is a natural medium for strangers to converse. In between shelling each other I bet even Hamas and Israel have a quick chat about Man U. So I'm going to get into sport. Rugby sport to be precise. Expats here all seem to be into football (soccer) and Rugby. Soccer seemed a little too much to bite off as a first effort so I've gone with Rugby, more specifically Rugby Sevens, which is some offshoot sect of Oxthodox Rugby. 

Coming up in March in Dubai is some sort of Rugby competition and I have secured tickets. My goal between now and then is to swot up on the game to the point that I can converse sufficiently well with other spectators. Who knows, I might actually get into it. Stranger things have happened. 

Play ball!

Don't cry for me Wikipedia

News this week of another major disruption to the Middle East's Internet capacity. 

This one might look like just an accident, but I'm still not sure. How often do ships drag their anchors over cables in other parts of the world? I'm not going to check, so lets just say never. See, never!

Even if this one was an accident, the last disruption back in Feb was as fishy as the lunch menu at Uncle Hiroki's House of Sushi. 

Three cables in three days were 'damaged by ship anchors' effectively cutting off the internet for most of the region. If you had a sprinkler system installed in your front yard and three different pipes were damaged in a few days you'd probably think that someone was doing it on purpose wouldn't you? I would, and so would my dad who loves his front yard grass so much that that analogy would probably make him uncomfortable. But back to the international conspiracy to strategically disrupt the internet... well, I reckon it's an international conspiracy to strategically disrupt the internet. 

Current theories are: 

• It's the CIA and/or Mossad testing out the robustness of the Middle East link (possibly using robotic mini-subs, possibly with lasers attached) in preparation for an attack on Iran. They will shut down phone and internet communications so that we can't hear the screams of the innocent children as the bombs rain down on their kindergartens and the blood spills over into... Ahem, you get the idea. 

• It's the CIA planting advanced wiretapping equipment into the lines somewhere and they needed to cut them in order to install the gear. Robotic mini-sub may have been used here too. This is either part of the US's Echelon worldwide surveillance program or it is being run in parallel to it in the hope that Obama won't be told of it and the republican's (who have controlled network surveillance since '64) will can catch him getting a blow-job and they can get the US back into an old white-man's hands again. 

• It's Al Qaeda testing out their capacity for literal Internet terrorism as a precursor to instigating their much pursued Islamic fundamentalist overthrow of the government of Egypt and others in the region. They need to cut the cut the internet so that bloggers can't report what is going on and the local people will only have their 500 satellite channels to bring them news and confusion will reign. There is no evidence of mini-subs, but rumours indicated Suicide Divers may have been used (sorry). 
  

None of these are confirmed, but if they were, we would all have something to worry about. 

So what is my point here? Basically that last night the speed of my internet was slightly reduced because of either ships or international conspiracies and it is not acceptable. I am one of literally hundreds of people who have no television and rely solely on the internet for AV news and entertainment. I could barely stream the BBC World News last night, let alone download Battlestar Galactica while watching redtube porn. 

What ever the reason for this disruption I just want it to go away. I guess I should really hope for the second theory to be correct, because at least they would want it reconnected as soon as possible. An extended air campaign in Iran or the overthrow of the UAE government by violent Islamic extremists would probably mean an outage of months or possibly years. 

It goes to show that the real victim of unrest are not the ones you see on the news, but rather the unseen ones trying in vain to watch the news... over the internet. 

Hunting down Anonymous

P.E.

My first encounter with Anonymous happened in a grade 9 P.E gymnastics session. Half a dozen of us were lined up waiting to have a go at jumping over the horse. Just as I was making my approach some Anonymous bastard yelled out "Don't fuck up!", which made me lose my balance and crash headfirst into the horse. As I spat the dislodged foam from my mouth I turned around to face the culprit, only to see forty laughing faces looking back at me. I knew I had to track him down, but how? He had won this round, but the seeds he had unwittingly sewn would shape my life from that point on.

I had to out-think him, find his weakness. I knew the thrill of the last encounter would not be enough to quench his insatiable thirst for my humiliation so I decided to play along and bide my time. Sure enough, next appropriate gym encounter the same thing happened. I was distracted again mid maneuver and suffered the same humiliating fate but as I lay there on the floor I knew I could catch him. You see, he had used a different phrase this time. "Have a nice trip!". He was getting more confident, and I had a plan.

As a keen reader of Australian Computing and DSP World I had heard about the advances in Voice Recognition that were being made in parallel with the increasing power of the microprocessors of the day. While getting VR to the point of instantly recognising voices was years away, using the basics of frequency decomposition and Hidden Markov Model analysis it was relatively simple to create a crude voice recognition system capable of running on my home 486. Now all I needed was the input.

Using my father's Dictaphone and a lot of patience I was able to record Anonymous's gymnasium taunts as well as the roll call of the two combined P.E. classes. In less than a year I had obtained the necessary data to nail my nemesis. Revenge was my next challenge, and Pedro Lucas was my target.

Digging through the bins of the nearby newsagent I amassed a collection of hardcore homosexual fetish magazines. I then spent three months studying the handwriting of both Pedro and my uncaring, and in my eyes culpable, P.E. teacher Mr Parkinson. After writing a series of dated love letters with increasing levels of passion and explicitness I hid the forgeries and magazines in Mr Parkinson's desk and Pedro's school bag and locker.

The fuse to my wicked tinder keg of revenge was to leave a page of the explicit magazine hanging seemingly accidentally out of the locker. Recess came and within minutes a crowd had formed and was trying to prize the rest of the pages from Pedro's named locker. Teachers were called and the full force of my plan came into action.

From the perspective of the Police it was an open and shut case of homosexual infatuation and molestation. Mr Parkinson was charged with twelve counts of sexual assault. Pedro was given counseling for years due to his refusal to admit what had happened and, from the letters, the apparent ferocity of the abuse he endured. He attended a nearby school for a while but dropped out as soon as he was able. After a number of petty theft and assault charges he was kicked out by his parents and the last news I heard about what he was doing bore a surprising similarity to the acts of depravity I had forged in my letters.

The McDonald's Incident

The next tale of my battle with Anonymous brings us forward in time to 1998. I was in the third year of my degree and had taken a job at McDonald's a few years earlier to pay for my studies. By now I had risen the burger ranks to Assistant Manager and on ever increasing weeknights I had managerial control of the store. Taking my duties seriously I emptied out the suggestion box at the end of every night and read the responses, if any.

Usually the comments ranged from the constructive 'service too slow' types to the childish but harmless 'Mary on drive-thru is hot' or penis depiction types. Around March of that year though things began to change. A new note writer, an Anonymous note writer, had appeared and he was getting personal. I am paraphrasing the notes below but they give you an idea of what I encountered.

"Enjoy your McLife loser"

"Did Daddy touch you too much McLoser? Get a real job"

"Ninety percent of McDonald's managers use meth to dull the pain of their futile existence"

When I got the last one something snapped. This guy was deliberately aiming these at me. I asked around at the managers weekly meeting and no-one else had seen anything like this in their suggestion haul. It was clear he was attacking me, and in a few months it got clearer. The vitriolic attacks became more and more personal until there were comments on everything from my haircuts to my selection of badges. The rage I had not felt since high school suddenly reappeared and it was game on.

The suggestion box was located on the side wall and had openings both inside the store and in the drive-thru lane. Our camera system only covered the main areas so Anonymous was free to drop notes as he pleased. I mulled over my approach for weeks. Finally deciding that once again mathematics could come to my rescue.

Statistics more specifically. I started emptying the box three times a night and secretly copying the drive-thru order records. The notes were seemingly random in frequency but usually no more than two a week. By day I went to Uni, by night I worked and by early mornings I analysed my records. At first there was nothing, then slowly a weak pattern appeared. Banana milkshakes were 12% more likely to appear on nights a note was dropped. No pickle cheeseburgers were 26%. I was on to something, I just needed more data.

Then the unthinkable happened. The notes started dropping off. For a whole week there was nothing, then the next Monday a half hearted "You suck" appeared then nothing for another week. I started to panic. The patterns were getting clearer but my dataset was nowhere near large enough to make a positive match. Then I had an idea. I posted the following above the note slot the next night.

"Please make your comments constructive. Abusive notes are not appreciated"

It was like a red rag to a bull. The notes I was looking for reappeared, along with some other random abuse of course but by this stage I could recognise Anonymous' handwriting like it was my own. After a few months, and a few more carefully worded note-box messages, my dataset was ready.

I had worked out it was an 86% chance that if someone ordered a no-pickle cheeseburger and a Fanta between 6:30 and 8:30pm on a monday then it was my man. I was ready, now for the revenge.

Using my access to the University's medical training hospital I started collecting samples. Unfortunately, infectious pathogens are not as easy to get hold of as you may think and after two weeks I only had samples of Hepatitis C, Legionnaires' disease and Salmonella. It would have to do. Salmonella was the key here, because it would enable me to prove my selection process and determine if I had just infected an innocent person.

Monday came around and with it was an excitement I had not felt in years. My concoction of revenge was concealed in a small needleless syringe and it took every bit of my finesse not to look suspicious as I hung around the order monitors. Finally at quarter to eight the magical order came through. I spilled an unattended thick-shake on the floor and order a packer to clean it up while I dispensed the germs and handed the order to the drive-thru attendant.

It was a nervous few days while I waited to see if I had hit the right person, but sure enough, there were no notes that week. No notes the next week, and when I left a year later there was no sign of my Anonymous enemy. I sometimes wish I had looked in the window to catch a glimpse of my attacker, but I think it just makes the victory sweeter to let him remain Anonymous and beaten.

The Blogosphere

The final story brings us closer to the present. The blog age had appeared and I embraced it like a Irishman does a dawn whiskey. By 2006 I had carved out a decent niche in the political blog world and was receiving respectable praise from like minded politco-bloggers. Then he struck.

I suppose I left myself open to it by not requiring registration to post but my misguided love of free speech blinded me and I still had my un-jaded heart so I let them post. Nazis, Nationalists, Vegetarians, Christians, my blog was open to all and sundry, but then the posts from one particular commenter became less about what I had written and more an outright attack on my person.

Again the rage resurfaced. It had remained dormant for so long it was like a past life and I had almost forgotten about the lives I had ruined previously. I tried to fight my instincts, I tried to reason. It was for naught. Weeks and countless comments passed and I realised I had to act. Same old story, find Anonymous first and revenge will follow.

But I was facing a whole new medium here. This was a completely Anonymous internet commenter. How in the world could I find this man? The answer lay in patience... and the stalker's paradise that is Google. Egging the poster on I collected as many comments as I could in order to analyse the writing style. I then dropped subtle questions in order to elicit as much information as I could from Anonymous and gradually build up a profile of my attacker.

Months passed and I grew closer to my prey. A few phrases stood out and indicated this man was from the west coast of the US. Still not nearly enough to use. I then started a petty battle of insults that unwittingly tricked our man into revealing much more than he would have liked. It was the phrase "you cuntish dickwizard" that stood out the most. A quick Google turned out that it was a recent creation from a thread on the forum SomethingAwful and was posted no less than a week before he used it on my blog. I had a lead, and post style cross-matching lead me to forum user CrashTestDubya.

His profile gave me nothing but his post history lead me to a YouTube video he posted last year. The contents of the video are unimportant (a dog barking in time to Metallica) but the blurb of the video suggested this was his account, namely JacksonBollock. The user profile listed a myspace page under the name of Jack Boule. It was my man.

His myspace account was blocked to all but friends so I created an account using a suitable nerdy sexy girl pic from NerdySexyGirls.com and friended him. Knowing he was from the west coast I made my location San Francisco and wrote on his page. Soon I had his AIM and got his home city and name, then the whitepages gave me his address.

From there I accessed the sex-offender registry in his area and found some particularly nasty ex-cons who lived nearby. After finding a suitable candidate I tailored a craigslist add to the 'gentlemen's' preferences and added some photoshopped pics based on some photos from his flickr account. I then found Mr Prison-Rape's email and sent him the ad, BCC'ing Anonymous' girlfriend from his facebook. He responded immediately and within hours was on his way to Anonymous' house, a rapidly emptying bottle of tequila and a dildo the size of your forearm his reported only companions.


It was over, but something was wrong. I had spent months in my search for this man, yet, in the destruction of his relationship and possible arse virginity I had somehow lost my way. I had let it consume my life. It was almost like I had let him get to me. I vowed then and there to never take a hurtful troll seriously again. For the sake of my soul I have decided to let things go now instead of getting all worked up about them and trying to destroy others lives, because, let's face it, besides the lives of the half-dozen people I have mentioned, the only life I was really destroying was my own.

It's just not worth it.

Neurosmokology

I'm going to start a little philosophical today and talk about the body-mind problem. The age old debate about whether the brain and the mind/soul are the same thing, where the soul is located etc.

I was thinking about this because I have just finished listening to the fascinating second half of an ABC Radio National's All in the Mind podcast about neuroplasticity, and also because I just had a personal experience that is sure to crack this field of science wide open.

We'll get to my discovery later on, firstly I'll explain that word I did not just make up in the last sentence? Neuroplasticity is what the two part podcast is about. Basically plastic-brain, that our brains are not as rigid as we once thought. It's a fascinating exploration of how the brain learns and retains things. Check it out for download here: part1, part2.

An easy example they cover is how we all know that kids are great at learning languages, whereas it's bloody hard for us. Well that's just because the thought processes and the neural pathways they create and reinforce are greedy, and if nothing else seems to be using the language part of the brain except English then English will completely take over and use up all the space. Then when Spanish comes along and tries to get in there is no room left because English is so entrenched. But, if you stop listening to English and immerse yourself in the Spanish language then the English pathways gradually get eroded enough that the Spanish pathways can start to form, then Equipo Traductor you can speak Spanish!

This is not new of course. Everyone knows that the best way to learn a language is to immerse yourself in it. What is new is the way of thinking about the brain while it is doing this. It is actually changing, and the most amazing part is that you can make it change. They go on to talk about people with Obsessive Compulsive Disorder and other neuroses and how those symptoms are just defective pathways that are being accidentally fired to make the person feel like their hands are dirty or whatever. They then talk a little about the therapies they are working on where they explain the defective pathways thing to the patient and get them to realign their own brain.

Voila they say, the mind is acting upon and conscious of the physical workings of the brain. Dualism proved.

Or so you might think. But this morning I disproved it.

You see this morning I decided to give up smoking again because I was feeling particularly shit in the lungal area. While ironing my shirt I started thinking about how I should go about it. It was then I discovered that there is not just the physical brain and the spiritual mind, there is also another consciousness that can form in the brain. It is the consciousness of the addicted brain, and today I had a conversation with it. Observe.

Sam's Conscious Mind: Fuck cigarettes. I'm going to quit today.

Sam's Unconscious Brain: Need nicotine!

Sam's Conscious Mind: Shit, I have too many smoke packets lying around. I'll throw them all down the garbage chute this morning then I will have no temptation when I get home from work.

Sam's Unconscious Brain: Need nicotine!

Addicted Conscious Mind: Um, yeah dude. We should totally throw them all away and not smoke for a while

Sam's Conscious Mind: Yeah, no smoking for a week. That would be a good start

Addicted Conscious Mind: Yeah, that's great. A whole week is a long time though, we should probably just have one last one right now.

Sam's Conscious Mind: Yeah, good idea, better have one now... Wait a minute!

Motherfucker almost played me. Still it did prove the Triality of the body. Pretty good feeling to shatter the conventional knowledge of a field of science before breakfast. Better than finding out you're schizophrenic or something.

Requiem for a Pizza

The thing about drinking a lot is it gives you lots of stories. Sure, it also gives you cancer of the bowel, liver damage and bankruptcy but as you lie dying in your public hospital room you will surely have a lot of stories to tell. Here is one of mine that I was reminded of today.


The happened a few years ago when I was living in a little cottage house in Adelaide with my good mate Cam.

The house was in the south-west corner of the Adelaide city square. There were about a dozen pubs within walking distance and a bottle shop at the end of the alley out the back gate so we were in prime drinking territory. As you can image, we did not squander our fortune and were known to wet our whistles more than most.

The following took place somewhere between 1am and 4am on what was probably a Saturday night. We had been sinking piss for hours at one of the local public houses, as was the tradition of the time, and had either run out of money or hit the wall and decided to head home. On the walk back to the shack the topic of delicious pizza came up. Specifically how we should definitely order some as soon as we opened the door.

The problems with ordering pizza at 1am are twofold; there are only a few places that will deliver it, and it takes about an hour to arrive. There are two basic instincts that drive a drunken man’s brain at 1am, the first is food, and the second is sleep. Well, actually there are three but since the two of us were alone the third was obviously not an option. So basically it works like this, if the inebriated man does not find delicious pizza has materialised in front of him quickly, he will fall asleep. This had proven quite a problem for the Cam-Sam household.

My housemate had developed the habit of calling for pizza in the early hours of the morning then succumbing to his tiredness and falling asleep. This had the pleasant consequence of saving him $30 in the morning, but the unpleasant consequence of leaving the delivery guy banging in futility on the door at two in the morning and subsequently getting the household banned from the pizza house. This had happen on a few occasions recently and the thought of a complete ban from all establishments pizza must have shocked me enough that I vowed that it would not happen this night.

In the end, Cam ordered the pizza and fell asleep. This left me holding the bag, or at least the $30 in fives and coin. What to do? I was so tired but the thought of being blacklisted by our beloved San Giorgio’s was too much for me to go to bed. No, I must stay up for one hour. So I devised a plan.

As with many plans made at 1am on a gut full of Cooper’s Pale Ale this was a poor one. My plan was to sit by the door so that when the pizza guy arrived, if I had somehow fallen asleep then his knocking on the door would wake me. As I grabbed a pillow to soften the tiled floor and propped myself up besides the door I thought I had it all worked out. Wait an hour, pay pizza man, eat pizza, sleep. Simple.

...

I was woken some time later by an ambulance officer grabbing me by the shoulders and shaking me. As I open my bleary eyes I saw that behind him was another ambo and a policeman. A quick look around my surroundings confirmed that I was still in the hallway where I sat down, but it seemed that an Emergency Services squad had decided to conduct their yearly exercises there as well.

Behind the cop stood an equally bleary eyed Cam, freshly emerged from his nearby bedroom and wondering, quite understandably, what the fuck was going on. The ambo who didn’t have hold of me was looking urgently at Cam and shouting the phrase “What has he had?” over and over. I’ve woken up in some strange predicaments over the years but this was by far the strangest.

It seems my efforts to stay awake had not lasted as long as I had guessed and it looks like I had fallen asleep immediately. To get more comfortable I must have laid down a bit. This would have all been nobody’s business but that particular house had a frosted glass door at the front. To this day I blame that fucking door.

The sequence went like this; Pizza man comes to the door, sees me lying in a strange position in the hallway and not responding to his knocks and yells. Pizza man calls the cops. Cop shows up and sees an obvious drug overdose and call an ambulance. Ambos come while the cop jumps the back fence to get into the house. Ambo shakes me awake while the other one interrogates Cam about how much smack I’ve had.

In the end the situation worked out ok. The pizza man was still there after they woke me up so after I had explained everything to the cops and medicos I asked him how much the pizza was, paid for it and offered everyone a slice. There were no takers but no one was too angry. The pizza man was relieved I was ok and we thanked him for doing the right thing in trying to save someone’s life, the ambos were just glad they didn’t have to deal with another messy overdose and I think the cop just thought it was funny.

I woke up the next morning thinking I had had the strangest dream, but the empty pizza box never lies.

Shortest Penis Contest - Make yourself feel better

I know making a post about one link is a little cheap but this made me laugh like a drunken hyena so here we go.

From the consistently offensive and NWS Howard Stern radio show - The 1st Annual Small Penis Contest

I hope exposing themselves to the crudest of radio shock jock's and millions of people via the internet gave them renewed confidence, but I seriously doubt it.

This is why guys start those weird secluded cults and try to marry thirteen year olds. “Yeah baby, that’s about as big as they get, honest.”

Spirit Dwarf

This is awesome. I love the news.

Some pub in St Kilda is in trouble for having a promotion where a bare-chested dwarf walks up and down the bar pouring Jagermeister down your throat. Instead of being praised for being the booze pioneers that they are, these fine folk are being criticised for promoting binge drinking. For shame.

Pubs promote binge drinking? Really? Shit, I thought they were not-for-profit organisations trying to promote social cohesion. What makes this funnier is the quote from Mr Jagermeister;

“Jagermeister brand manager John Howells promised to investigate, saying the stunt was "not responsible service"”

This is Jagermeister right? The company that only became popular in Australia by a fad that involved dropping shots of their spirit into glasses of beer or Red Bull and skulling it? In other news, Phillip Morris pushes for more responsible smoking outside of airports.

I’ve got to mention it though, check out the bod on that little person. God damn, he’s cut.

This got me thinking. Over here in the UAE I can hire a live in housekeeper for 1000 Dirhams or about $300 a month. If I could hire a midget to pour spirits down my throat for a similar price then I’m afraid I just couldn’t turn that down.

Party at my place people. BYOM

Tiger’s Fang

I was talking to a Frenchmen the other day and he said that he thought that French was a better language than English because it has so many subtle nuances that seemed to be missing from English. I replied that English is as full of subtle nuances as Paris is of arrogant Frenchmen and that he didn’t notice them because his English wasn’t as good as he thought it was. Anyway, this got me thinking about the Queen's own and one of my favourite parts of it, rhyming slang.

I was reminded of a comment from Corey on my old post about swearing. "Just getting a beer out of the Jayden Lesky" which expanded to, "Just getting a couple of Britney Spears out of the Jayden Lesky, then I'd better hit the Frog and Toad before the Trouble and Strife gets on the Dog and Bone.” Which, if it’s not clean means I’m getting a couple of beers out of the esky then I’d better get going before my darling wife calls me.

As Corey noted, the Jayden Lesky one is getting a little dated. The Britney one, while recent, is timeless and will be with us long after she overdoses on Vicodin, but the rest are as old as the hills. It’s time to update them.

Couple of my old favourites first:

Persian Rugs : Drugs

“Had big night on the Persians last night.”

Jack and Jills : Pills

“You just on the Brittneys or are there any Jack and Jills floating around?”

Harry Secombe : Capsicum

“Get some tommies, some ‘rotts and a couple of Harries”

Judy Dench : Stench

“What’s that God Awful Judy Dench?”

So I tried to think up some new ones and realised that it’s really hard. I kind of got one for Google.

Google : Ramen Noodle

“I thought he was famous but a quick look on the old ramen noodle turned up squat”

I guess they have to evolve rather than be forced. Anyone got any good ones?

ImADisturbedFreakWithACreditCard.com

Quick post for shits and giggles. Ever wonder how many websites there are out there? Well, according to this site there are currently 100 million domain names registered. For the uninitiated, a domain name is the www.SamsHentaiPorn.com/japanesesschoolgirls.html part of an internet address. Underneath the domains are the kazillions of actual websites, but the domain names are the things that are more highly sought after because they are easier to remember and the popular ones are actually worth a lot of money.

So there are 100 million domains currently out there, but what is more interesting is that there are 325 million deleted or expired ones. To own a domain you need to register it with the Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers (don't they sound like a bunch of party animals). You pay a little bit of cash each year to keep ownership of the name, and if you forget to pay or don't want it anymore then it expires and someone else can come along and register it.

This site lists the staggering number of domains that have expired in the last month. Now anyone can make a webpage or blog on one of the billions of sites like blogger.com or geocities (check out my completely shit geocities website from eons ago) but it takes a little bit more effort to register a domain name. Presumably you have some kind of plan for what you want to do with the site. So that makes it all the more interesting when you have a look at the domains that people have registered.

So I've found a few gems. What the hell were these people thinking? And what stopped them from fulfilling their destiny?

HotChicks.com is probably a fairly valuable website, why not make a variant of that?

hotchickswhodatedouchebags.com - Are you a douchebag looking for that special someone?
hotchickswithsportspicks.com - Nothing gets me hotter than a women who picks all eight.


Hmm... How do I?

howdoibecomejewish.com - What?
howdoierectmypenis.com - When it happens, you'll know.
howdoifindmymugshot.com - ?
howdoihavemorecum.com - My secret shame.
howdoiknowifimpregant.com - Web 2.0 is amazing.
howdoimakefog.com - ?
howdoiputoilin.com - Very specific car maintenance site?
howdoirideabicycle.com - This site presumably went downhill due to lack of repeat business.
howdoishowthemlove.com - Them?
howdoitalianseat.com - Lika dis!
howdoithrowafrisbee.com - Come on. Seriously?
howdoitiemyselfup.com - ?


Worst Business name?

essentiallypainfree.com


The Internet, linking up people with bizarre fettishes since 1993...

eroticbeltbuckle.com
erotichypnosiscommunity.com
eroticmafia.com
eroticwhittling.com - Are splinters a problem?
sexyarabwomens.com - Suddenly more relevant to me.
sexybeggers.com
sexyblueprints.com
sexybusdrivers.com
sexyladyfarts.com - No, surely not.
sexyphysicist.com


Weird...

wherecanisellmygirlfriend.com
deathtowhitey.com
killthebroccoli.com
ihatetoeatvinegar.com
wherehaveallthebritishvirginsgone.com


Rate my pic is a successful site, how about its lesser known cousins.

ratemybabypoo.com
ratemycamelytoe.com
ratemygaskmask.com
ratemyinsides.com - That is quite creepy.


This site has potential

ihatemymother-in-law.com


Creepy...

ihatemysisteriwishshewasgone.com
iloveyouandimissyou.com


What is it with people named Sarah?

ihatesarahamilton.com
ihatesarahconnolie.com
ihatesarahgallagher.com
ihatesarahmalone.com
ihatesarahmarahall.com
ihatesarahmarashalls.com
ihatesarahmarchell.com
hatesarahmarsahall.com
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A chilling warning.

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Post any good ones you find.

A Letter to Australia, re: Valentines Day

Dear Australia,

This is just a routine letter to inform you of a slight change to the calendar year, nothing to worry about, just a small alteration to improve the happiness of you, our citizens. From here on in, February 14th will no longer be referred to as St Valentines day, but rather as St Breakups day.

The day will still be associated with gifts and cards, except they will be sent by single people to their coupled friends, with the intention of breaking up said couples and destroying the happiness they use daily to stab at our uncoupled hearts.

As per the former day, the exchange of cards can be as simple or as creative as you like. From a standard “Hey Davo, your chicks a slut man, I heard half of Brisbane has done her” to elaborate but entirely fictional stories complete with photoshopped images and youtube links.

So as not to upset the Florists Union, flowers will still play a prominent role in the day, except they will be sent by friends under the guise of imaginary lovers. Once again creativity is the key. Some suggestions are to include on the accompanying card a brief description of the last act of lovemaking, or an ultrasound photo of the bastard result of that lovemaking.

The reason for this change is that it has become clear that the coupled/non-coupled ration has remained stable for quite a number of years now, meaning that the chances of us singles hooking up while existing couples are still together is quite slim. The yearly relationship cull will serve the dual purpose of freeing up more single people for the existing lonely hearts, while also reducing the instances of SCS or Smug Couple Syndrome seen most prevalently around café’s and river walks.

I’m sure you will all agree that this change is long overdue and is made in the interest of all Australians. If you have any questions about the change or wish to exchange tips on particularly successful approaches to breaking up your friends please refer to our website,
www.GetYourFuckingHappinesOutOfMyFace.com.au.

Thank you.