RIP, Monopoly money?

This is wrong on more levels than I can articulate.

While Monopoly is the paragon of good 'ole fashioned board game fun, the "old fashioned" part had to go. Parker Brothers is phasing out the cash-based version's funmoney and replacing it with an "Electronic Banking" flavor that could leave Mr. Moneybags turning his pockets inside out as his stash is replaced by a magnetic strip. New kits are completely devoid of the famous multi-colored bills; instead, you'll find phoney Visa debit cards and a calculator / reader which keeps a running tabulation of your riches -- or lack thereof. A deal was struck with Visa to design the mock cards and readers, presumably after surveys showed that 70% of adults used cash less often now than they did a decade ago (no surprise there). When asked about the dramatic change, Parker said replacing cash with plastic "showed the game was moving with the times."

Yet another cultural metaphor of my youth going down the tubes. Is nothing sacred?

Via Fighting Jay Lee (none more surly than he), who notes that the old-fogey cash-enabled game will still be available "while supplies last". Get 'em while you can, kids.

Posted by Charles Kuffner to Society and cultcha

Can one person make a difference?

The Plan: Target one or more people for today's quest.

1. How can I make this person's day? Plan it.
2. Execute your plan
3. Write back here and let us in on the results using the comments section.
4. Reward yourself for making a difference.

Ideas:
1. Drop them a line and encourage them.
2. Help out a stranger.
3. Compliment someone you don't like and be sincere.
4. Buy a card and mail it.
5. Send an arrangement or flowers.

Good fortune and God bless!

Idea from: Baytown Bert's Blog and Thoughts

Bad Penny?

To make a penny, it costs the U.S. Mint 1.4 cents. Multiply that by 7 or 8 billion pennies made each year and it comes to a $20 million loss. Since the mint is a money-making operation (it made a $730 million profit in 2005), rising copper prices have Congress considering scrapping the penny altogether. That would force retailers to round prices to the nearest nickel. But the price of nickel is going up, too. What's your solution?

Source: WorldViews blog

Bush - This is our President

Really.

The man has acted like a drunken frat president / cheerleader all of his life.

He's not changing. If his mother couldn't teach him any manners, if turning 60 hasn't given him any temperance, then really nothing will.

Hat tip to Brains & Eggs for the pics.

Crashing the Ken Lay funeral?

Overall, the Houston Chronicle's coverage of the Enron case has been excellent. But was it really necessary for the hometown newspaper to have society columnist Shelby Hodge attempt to crash the funeral of Ken Lay in Aspen on Sunday?

hat tip to: Tom of Houston Clear thinkers

Quotable

"Detective Bart Lasiter was in his office studying the light from his one small window falling on his super burrito when the door swung open to reveal a woman whose body said you've had your last burrito for a while, whose face said angels did exist, and whose eyes said she could make you dig your own grave and lick the shovel clean."

--Jim Guigli's award-winning sentence, which took top honors in San Jose State University's annual Bulwer-Lytton Fiction Contest for bad writing.

hat tip to: Joe Carter on WorldViews

It's official: Google's a verb

Here's a geek-culture milestone.

Google has been added to the Merriam-Webster's Collegiate Dictionary as a verb.

Respectful of the trademark, Merriam-Webster lowercases the entry but maintains the capitalization while explaining that the verb means "to use the Google search engine" to retrieve online information.

"We're defining a trademark as a verb, just like we did with the word xerox," [Merriam-Webster President John] Morse said.

The entry has already been added to the online version, along with newcomers bling, bird flu and biodiesel, as well as my personal favorite: mouse potato.

Source: Dwight siverman - TechBlog

Maek speling eezy

"It's a very difficult thing to get something accepted like this," says Alan Mole, president of the American Literacy Council, an organization which favors an end to "illogical spelling." The group says English has 42 sounds spelled in a bewildering 400 ways and believes that simplified spelling would help children learn faster and lead to reductions in illiteracy rates. Some advocates of “simplified spelling” even picket the national spelling bee finals, held every year in Washington, costumed as bumble bees and hoisting signs that say "Enuf is enuf but enough is too much" or "I'm thru with through."

Source: WorldViews

The $50,000 Laptop

So some bloke just walks into their local FBI office, and they cut him/her a check for 50 grand?

"[Veterans Affairs Secretary Jim] Nicholson said the laptop and hard drive were turned in Wednesday to the FBI by an unidentified person in response to the $50,000 reward offer. No suspects were in custody."

This could be a good story-line for one of those VISA commercials...

- Total earned panhandling today: $3.20
- Price of hammer to bust into car and steal a laptop to pawn: $1.25
- Giving stolen item back to owner for 50,000 dollars: Priceless

Source: Laurence Martin