MadRegale

“There used to be a queer character on the Seattle ‘front that we used to call: “The Chief Mate”. About all he owned was an extensive collection of discarded ship’s officer’s caps, and he used to parade slowly up and down the board-walk in a different one every day. Likely as not, he’d wear them inside out, for variety. Nobody seemed to know where or how he lived. He never talked to anybody. But every once in a while he would scare the daylights out of a person by coming up behind them and suddenly yelling {Begin deleted text}”{End deleted text} Whrooo! {Begin deleted text}”{End deleted text}. Then he’d pass on without a word and without looking back to see the effect.”

[The Chief Mate]

Geoff Manaugh of BLDGBLOG reminded me of this incredible story with his post on Shanghai tunnels.

“The green-colored submarine, carrying what was believed to be cocaine, was about 32 feet long and appeared to be a makeshift or modified vessel. “The submarine traveled almost at the surface of the sea and when it came up we took advantage,” said Capt. Benjamin Mar, a navy spokesman. Special forces troops swooped on the submarine from a helicopter and subdued the crew of four, he said.”

Mexico captures submarine loaded with drugs | Oddly Enough | Reuters

Drug carrying submarines are one of my favorite topics.

“Natasha Mitchell: He even got to a point where he drank beer and smoked. Elizabeth Hess: Yes, it was the 70s so you know it wasn’t uncommon for Columbia students to be hanging around at night smoking pot, and Nim loved pot and eventually developed his own sign for give me a joint. You know chimps have the same vices that we have. Nim started the day for his entire life with a cup of coffee and as he grew older was often grumpy if he didn’t get it.”

Apes, legal personhood and the plight of Nim Chimpsky - Boing Boing

“Dwayne Spradlin, president and chief executive of InnoCentive, said in an interview that the company had solved 250 challenges, for prizes typically in the $10,000 to $25,000 range. According to the Web site (www.innocentive.com), the achievements include a compound for skin tanning, a method of preventing snack chip breakage and a mini-extruder in brick-making. “Odds are one or more products in your home has been innovated in our network,” Mr. Spradlin said. “Procter & Gamble has products that were innovated on the InnoCentive network.”

If You Have a Problem, Use Innocentive to Ask Everyone - NYTimes.com

“- Talk with some other Chinese professionals, whose business involves sending out a lot of instant text messages (SMS) on mobile phones. These short messages often seem to be China’s main communication systems. People rely far less on email than in America; I rarely see someone with a Blackberry; but everyone has a mobile phone, and sending messages is much cheaper than talking. As of tomorrow — I was told — new limits will apply on how many messages can be sent from each phone each hour. The limits are high enough that they won’t affect ordinary users but would make it harder to send a mass broadcast. I wondered what the reason could be. Trying to keep the airwaves free for important Olympic business? Saving the Chinese public from the “Google is making us stoopid” constant-distraction problem? Or something? Once they explained, it was obvious. Short messages are the main way people can react to news in a hurry — or organize actions in response. If you want to hold a meeting or rally or just get a lot of people to the same place at the same time, SMS is the way to go. So if you limit SMS, you’ve cut the main communication tool for individuals trying to act as a group.”

James Fallows (July 19, 2008) - Everything changes tomorrow (China)

It’s amazing the lengths that the Chinese government is willing to go to silencing people, when it’d be much easier to just drown them out with better entertainment.

“Speakers designed like rocks.”

Rockustics Pavorocci - Wired Summer Test 2008

“Fast forward to the 1970’s when the Mission Planning Council, the Mission Housing Development Corporation (MHDC) and the Open Space Committee were working together to identify possible sites for neighborhood parks. “It was a long gestation period,” says Toby Levine, unofficial neighborhood historian who lives across the street from Juri Commons. The MHDC in its 1974 report noted, “a park would serve that section of the Mission which has no park at all.” Securing funding for open space acquisition was a challenge, however, even with the support of Cesar Chavez who led a march to promote the open space ballot measure with the banner “SI on C.” Despite the nifty slogan, it failed. Two years later its replacement, Proposition J, passed and the old train yard became a park.”

Juri Commons | San Francisco Neighborhood Parks Council