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David: the Black Knight of Orble
For the first in this hysterical series, I think it apropos that we begin with the Black Knight himself, David.
Wikipedia's definition: A black knight is a soldier or knight who either is not bound to a specific liege or does not want his liege, or himself, to be identified and so does not bear any heraldic standards or has blackened them out.
When I first arrived here in 2006, I was intrigued by this mysterious writer who could literally pen a 2-line sentence and get 20 comments within minutes. That alone was enough to make me want to read his past postings; what was the man's secret?
All I can tell you is what I observed. I don't know what the secret was, but David had magnetism. Love, hate or totally fail to understand his stuff, you kept coming back.
David as a writer was witty, acerbic as hell, controversial, extremely well-read and not at all shy about speaking his mind. He turned some of his most loyal fans against himself doing that; he also won over some of his fiercest detractors for the same reason.
His battles with other Orblers were epic and hilarious; his razor-sharp wordplay was often lost on its target (while some of us laughed ourselves silly at the drubbing)
David's writing at his most popular blog (Mind Orgasms)covered emotional subjects; love, lust, longing, depression, rejection, anger, resentment. Many different people saw him in many different lights; misogynist, genius, pervert, sociopath, prophet, rock star. Whatever others' opinions of him were seemed to matter little to David. He just kept on being himself.
I lift my first pint to David, the Black Knight of Orble. Long may he write, wherever he writes now.
Even if it's only a logbook entry, I'm sure it's a good read.
Hi everyone, I'm posting this from a really crappy computer in a really crappy bandhouse in Upper Bumwad, Pennsylvania...yep, still on the road.
It's been ages since I've posted and I'm hoping this one goes through on this dinosaur circa Windows 95 P.O.S. computer.
Some of you webhounds have seen it, I'm sure, but tonight was my first view of it. Made for a very interesting and entertaining third set, with me trying to suppress hysterical laughter and snorting right into the microphone...over 40 and still laughing at farts, that's me.
Now, who can come up with some snappy dialogue for this priceless photo series??
-And who do you think was the responsible party??
Personally, my money's on Phillip as the perpetrator.
I miss Orble and will be back soon.....D. Armenta
The Royal Fart at biggeekdaddy.com!
The following is from CBC news Canada, with AP cited as resource, from December 2006.
There's a reason this doesn't happen in Oz anymore; seems to be some controversy about why though!!
Australia hasn't witnessed a single mass shooting since a massacre 10 years ago prompted nationwide gun law reforms, according to a study Thursday that linked the tough laws with a dramatic reduction in firearm deaths.
The federal and state governments agreed to ban semiautomatic and pump action shot guns and rifles days after a lone gunman went on a rampage at the Port Arthur tourist precinct in Tasmania state on April 28, 1996, killing 35 and wounding another 18.
The massacre was the 13th mass shooting in Australia in 15 years. Mass shootings had killed 104 victims and wounded another 52 since 1981, according to the University of Sydney report published Thursday in the journal Injury Prevention.
The federal government responded to the Port Arthur massacre by funding a gun buyback scheme. More than 700,000 guns were surrendered by Australia's adult population of 12 million.
The study found the buyback coincided with an end to mass shootings and dramatic decreases in shooting deaths in Australia.
"The Australian example provides evidence that removing large numbers of firearms from a community can be associated with a sudden and ongoing decline in mass shootings and http://www.polaccelerated declines in total firearms-related deaths, firearm homicides and firearm suicides," the report concluded.
The report said it could not directly comment on the association between the new gun laws and firearm death rates because of the observational nature of the available data.
Prime Minister John Howard welcomed the report as proof that his gun buyback had been a success.
"Gun-related deaths in Australia are still too high but this study shows that governments and the community can make a difference," Howard said in a statement.
Peter Whelan, president of the Australian lobby group Coalition of Law Abiding Sporting Shooters Inc., said that attributing the improved statistics to the buyback and tough laws was a "gross distortion."
The report ignored factors such as whether Australians were resorting to other methods to kill or commit suicide, he said.
"For example, suicide by hanging has increased dramatically," Whelan told Australian Broadcasting Corp. radio.
But the researchers, headed by Prof. Simon Chapman, a former member of the national anti-firearm lobby group Coalition for Gun Control, found there was no evidence of method substitution in homicides or suicides since guns became more restricted.
The report found that gun-related deaths per capita had been declining 3 per cent annually in the 18 years before the new gun laws were announced. That rate of decline doubled to 6 per cent in the seven years after the new laws were introduced.
The annual reduction in firearm homicides accelerated from 3 to 7.5 per cent annually and firearm suicides, from 3 to 7.4 per cent, the report found.
This post was prompted by this post
--So we know it works..could be a big personal rights/freedoms issue to some people, though.
The question is, how much can man be trusted to play nice till the government steps in and calls the shots?
What do you think?
The people of America love two things: stories of perseverance, and being offended… and over-eating. But while the latter of the two may be quite common, never, since the beginning of time, have both been intertwined in the same story. At least, that was the case before the beginning of time met The Regular Guys.
The Regular Guys show, referred to by Wikipedia as “the most important four hours of your day,” first brought happiness to Atlanta in 1998 after moving from Los Angeles. Hosts Larry Wachs and Eric Von Haessler insisted that they made the change purely due to their altruistic nature; given the lack of decent morning shows in Atlanta, and their history of charitable behavior, this line of reasoning seemed highly logical. However, to the educated listener, it was obvious that more than anything else, the move was made due to their desire to re-locate to an area without such a heavy Hispanic population
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"Leading ulema Maulana Kalbe Sadiq, vice-president of All India Muslim Personal Law Board and considered to be an authority on Islamic literature, is a globe-trotter and in constant touch with top Muslim clerics around the world. All of them agree, he said in an interview given to The Pioneer last week, that the Taliban have "disgraced Islam". "Taliban’s activities are anti-Islamic. It’s not a matter of Shia or Sunni. What the Taliban are doing is against the basic principles of Islam." It is for the first time that leading ulema is bluntly criticizing the Taliban. Islamic clerics in the United Arab Emirates, Bahrain, Kuwait, Iraq, Qatar, Oman and even in south east Asia, in Iran and Turkmenistan, are against the Taliban, Maulana Sadiq said. "It’s only a handful of fundamentalists in Saudi Arabia and Pakistan who are backing Taliban for their own interests", he said. Pakistan’s junta government may hope that Taliban could help them to reach the oil fields in Central Asia, but even in Pakistan the majority is against Taliban. "The Taliban militia is bound to collapse", Sadique said, "It’s a matter of time".
Source: The Rationalist International archives, The Pioneer
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Rockabilly music incorporates the fast fingerpicking guitar and "slap" standup or string bass style of white American "Hillbilly" (country) music with black (African-based) Blues riffs and changes, Swing tempos, and "jump" Jazz.
This happy fusion came about sometime in the mid-1940s in the southern U.S., with Western Swing bands such as Bob Wills and his Texas Playboys coming east to play gigs on the Southern circuit. These bands traded licks and jammed with white Country artists and black Blues artists, Gospel artists and Boogie-Woogie bands backstage at places like the "Saturday Night Jamboree" stage shows in Memphis, Tennessee. Unlike many other aspects of American culture at the time, most musicians had no "color barrier" between each other and were always looking for new techniques, riffs, and styles from one another. The combination of different sounds from different cultures proved to be a hit and soon the term "Rockabilly" was born to describe the new musical mixture
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Should a convicted killer serving a life sentence in jail be given a sex-change operation at the expense of taxpayers? Although the answer to this question seems obvious, some people actually disagree and think that no; he/she/whatever should not get the operation.
Convicted murderer Robert Kosilek, or “Michelle” as it is now called, has been part of an ongoing trial for over a year to determine whether or not the taxpayers should pay for it to become a woman. A U.S. District Judge ruled that Kosilek deserved treatment for gender identity disorder, but could not justify ordering the state to pay for a sex-change operation. Since then, Kosilek has been receiving laser hair removal and hormone supplements, and as a result “has developed larger breasts” since starting the treatment. A source inside the prison has confirmed that Kosilek was the most popular inmate at last year’s prison prom
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People keep asking me if I’ve made any New Years’ Resolutions this year. For the most part, this is a lame attempt by girls to strike up a conversation with me, but it really got me thinking about the whole idea of making a resolution for New Years’ in the first place. But to answer their question, yes I made resolutions. The first, which I made ten minutes ago (yes, I know its January 6th) was to not procrastinate. My second was to start writing articles in which I refrain from insinuating that girls throw themselves at me. So far I’m 0-for-2, but then again, making it to the 6h of January without breaking my resolutions is about 4 days longer than most people can go.
The great thing about the New Years’ resolution is that it allows us to acknowledge that we have something about us we should be attempting to fix, while simultaneously giving us an irrefutable reason to put off making that change. And even though we never expect anyone to keep up with their resolutions for more than a week, it still serves as a perfectly acceptable postponement of a commitment to improve one’s self. Take this classic example
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Recently I responded to a blog post by another Orbler, which rather escalated.
I fully admit that I did come in sarcastically; as an American contributor to an Australian-hosted blog site, I do get upset when another American contributor writes things that make us all look bad. We don't need any more help in that area right now! So yes--I may have come off too strongly in my response; that is what I request your opinion about
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A woman in Atlanta, Georgia has filed a lawsuit against the father of her child for neglecting to pay child support. Le’Shaniqua-isha Jones, who before her most recent child had given birth to three other children in as many years, each from a different baby’s daddy, decided that her next child would be on her own terms. What Jones didn’t know was that the most recent baby’s daddy would refuse to pay child support. Upon being reached for comment, the man told the New York Times that he “never agreed to pay child support” when he donated sperm twelve years ago. Jones claims that was not made clear to her by the clinic, and is considering a suit against them, as well.
Jones, 23, had not counted on being in this situation. “It seemed like as soon as I had a baby, a few months later I’d be knocked up again,” Le’Shaniqua-isha told a reporter for Fox’s local affiliate in Atlanta, “I would get me my body back and head to da club every night and all dat, but I just figured, you know, that there’s like a delay or somethin’ ‘fore you can get pregnant again, know wha I’m sayin
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