From Tikld.com, pointed out to me by awesome fellow author, Sean Ellis.
20 Jokes That Only Intellectuals Will Understand.
10th March 2014
Category Archives: Humor and Observations
Future Results Not Guaranteed
If you have heard that phrase along with an add or prospectus, it is good to remember. Here is one of the things I learned in undergrad Economics long ago…
A man receives a letter providing “free” advice on an investment. He reads it and throws it away, but notices it was correct later. He receives another letter with more free advice. He ignores it, but it turns out true as well. The third letter comes, he invests, it pays off. The fourth, the fifth, all the same. The sixth letter arrives while the man is getting rich off this seemingly Nostradamus like advice on finances. It says, the first five were free. To continue, please pay me $5,000 per letter. This goes on for some time, and the man is very happy.
Eventually, a few letters are wrong, and after awhile, the man stops paying for them.
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I decide to make some money. I write 10,000 letters to strangers. Half recommend to do something, half the opposite. I send out 5,000 letters to those I was correct with and repeat the process. Then 2,500, then 1,250, then 625 finally 312. Those 312 people then pay me $5,000 for my brilliant advice, after all, I have never been wrong. I continue until at last, I have been wrong enough they stop paying. I retire rich.
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The shrewdest advisors on Wall Street might just be the ones out of the first 10,000 that were randomly right. You don’t hear about the failures, only the successes. In that way, past experience really is NOT a guarantee of future results. Strange when you think it through, but it is VERY true.
Filed under Humor and Observations
Historians unravel mystery behind cryptic Lincoln note
Historians unravel mystery behind cryptic Lincoln note
Published March 09, 2014
Associated Press
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This photo provided by Papers of Abraham Lincoln project shows a note written by Abraham Lincoln. (AP)
SPRINGFIELD, Ill. – The cryptic note penned by Abraham Lincoln identifies its recipient only as “my dear Sir” and has a small section carefully clipped out.
Who was he writing to and why was a key piece of information later removed so meticulously?
Historians believe they have unraveled the mystery and uncovered a bit of political intrigue in the process.
Researchers at the Papers of Abraham Lincoln project concluded Lincoln was writing to an ally to ask him to maintain a secret relationship with a political insider during the 1860 election campaign.
Lincoln asked his cohort to “keep up a correspondence” with the person, a phrase that gave researchers their best clue. They ran it through a searchable database of Lincoln’s papers and found several matches.
One was in a letter to Lincoln from fellow attorney and Republican Leonard Swett of Bloomington, Ill.
The two men, it turns out, were conspiring to keep tabs on a New York political figure. The mystery note was Lincoln’s response to Swett’s letter, the researchers surmised.
“If you can keep up a correspondence with him without much effort, it will be well enough,” Lincoln wrote to Swett. “I like to know his views occasionally.”
Swett’s earlier letter also had a clue about who the political insider was. It referred to “our friend TW of Albany,” who researchers concluded was Thurlow Weed, a Republican newspaper editor and political boss of New York state.
Lincoln was seeking Weed’s support in New York, even though Weed had been backing front-runner William H. Seward for the Republican presidential nomination. Lincoln got his way, ultimately winning Weed’s support. Seward later became his secretary of state.
But Lincoln couldn’t be seen as close to Weed during the campaign so he recruited Swett to be a secret go-between. That also explains why Swett clipped Tweed’s name from Lincoln’s note.
A New York City manuscript dealer recently contacted the Papers of Abraham Lincoln for help solving the riddle.
The group of researchers is trying to identify, transcribe and publish all documents written by or to Lincoln. Project Director Daniel Stowell said Saturday that solving the mystery behind the note points to the project’s value.
“To be able to identify the date, recipient and subject of such a brief letter is a remarkable achievement,” he said.
Filed under Humor and Observations
Cute Dog Humor for Your Monday Blues
In this edition, I put in dog humor. Please pardon me that some of the language is profane.
Filed under Animals, Humor and Observations
Daylight Savings Time…
You might think that Daylight Savings Time DST is a recent invention. However, this excerpt from Wikipedia gives some background:
The modern idea of daylight saving was first proposed in 1895 by George Vernon Hudson[2] and it was first implemented by Germany and Austria-Hungary starting on 30 April 1916. Many countries have used it at various times since then, most consistently since the energy crises of the 1970s.
The practice has been both praised and criticized.[1] Adding daylight to evenings benefits retailing, sports, and other activities that exploit sunlight after working hours,[3] but can cause problems for evening entertainment and other occupations tied to the sun (such as farming) or to darkness (such as firework shows).[4][5] Although an early goal of DST was to reduce evening use of incandescent lighting (formerly a primary use of electricity[6]), modern heating and cooling usage patterns differ greatly, and research about how DST currently affects energy use is limited or contradictory.[7]
Other problems sometimes caused by DST clock shifts are: They complicate timekeeping, and can disrupt meetings, travel, billing, record keeping, medical devices, heavy equipment,[8] and sleep patterns.[9] Software can often adjust computer clocks automatically, but this can be limited and error-prone, particularly when DST dates are changed.[
The basic idea for DST is that it let’s people have a longer amount of daylight for activities. This keeps people from driving to or from work in the dark, reduces lighting, heating and cooling needs during work hours, and when proposed, produced overall savings. In hot areas, extra sunlight time during work is actually counter-productive, for instance increasing cooling costs for us Arizonans by having our workplaces and schools open during the hottest part of the day. As a result, Arizona does not participate in DST. Neither did Hawaii, my last home state, for the same reason. The problem this created in both Hawaii and Arizona is that part of the year we are on one time zone and part the other. Arizona is Mountain Standard Time, but sometimes we go to Pacific Standard Time, and I never know when, having spent most of my life without DST.
This map shows blue for areas that use DST, orange for those that did at one time but don’t now, and red for those that never have.
Personally, I think DST should be done away with. In our modern economy, sunlight is less a factor in determining the work day. Global business is conducted 24 hours per day. Increasingly, work is performed from home or local areas through electronics. My one voice might not mean much, but enough with the fall back, spring forward, or whatever it is I am supposed to remember, even though I live in a state that doesn’t do it.
Filed under Humor and Observations
Awesome Painting with Fingers
Unbelivable Zaria Forman Artworks
February 3, 2014 by SHRE Design™
The inspiration for Zaria’s drawings began in early childhood when she traveled with her family throughout several of the world’s most remote landscapes, which were the subject of her mother’s fine art photography. Her work exhibits extensively in galleries and venues throughout the United States and overseas.
In addition to exhibitions, recent projects include a series of drawings that served as the set design for the classic ballet Giselle, which premiered in October 2012 at the Grand Theatre of Geneva, Switzerland. Ten of her drawings were also used in the set design for House of Cards, a Netflix TV series directed by David Fincher and starring Kevin Spacey.
In August 2012 she led Chasing the Light, an expedition sailing up the NW coast of Greenland, retracing the 1869 journey of American painter William Bradford and documenting the rapidly changing arctic landscape. Continuing to address climate change in her work, she spent September 2013 in the Maldives, the lowest-lying country in the world, and arguably the most vulnerable to rising sea levels.
Filed under Humor and Observations, Uncategorized
Ukraine computers targeted by aggressive ‘Snake’ virus
Ukraine computers targeted by aggressive ‘Snake’ virus
Published March 09, 2014
FoxNews.com
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Reuters
Dozens of Ukrainian computer networks, including those run by the Kiev government, have been infected by an aggressive virus known as “Snake” or “Ouroboros,” and experts say that there’s every chance that Russia is behind it.
The Financial Times
reported that the virus has been deployed aggressively since the start of 2013. The paper cited information from British defense and security firm BAE Systems, which recorded 22 infections of Ukrainian computer systems by “Snake” since the start of 2013. Of those, 14 have occurred since the start of 2014, while protests raged against President Viktor Yanukovych’s government. In all, 56 computer systems around the world have been infected by “Snake” since 2010. Almost all of the incidents have taken place since the beginning of last year.
The Financial Times reported that the virus not only allows its employer access to computer networks for surveillance purposes, but can also act as a “digital beachhead” for software that can disrupt vital computer networks, such as those that control power supplies for banking operations.
Identifying where a computer virus specifically originated from is difficult to do, but the Financial Times reported that “Snake” appears to have been developed somewhere in the GMT +4 time zone, which encompasses Moscow. The paper also reported that parts of the code contain Russian text.
David Garfield, managing director of cyber security at BAE, told the paper that the recorded instances were likely “the tip of the iceberg.” Garfield also said that the complexity of the “Snake” program ruled out a rogue hacker, saying “Whoever made it really is a very professional outfit.”
Nigel Inkster, a former director of intelligence and operations for MI6, Britain’s international intelligence agency, was more specific with his suspicions, telling the paper, “If you look at it in probabilistic terms – who benefits and who has the resources – then the list of suspects boils down to one … Until recently the Russians have kept a low profile, but there’s no doubt in my mind that they can do the full scope of cyber attacks, from denial of service to the very, very sophisticated.”
Filed under Humor and Observations
Cosplay Pictures for Your Saturday
Cosplay pictures for your Saturday enjoyment!
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- Nicole Marie Jean
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- Big Brother and Little Sister from Bio Shock
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- Dark Side
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- Cara Nicole
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- Mortal Kombat
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- Mad Moxie
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- Poison Ivy
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- Very cool
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- Batgirl
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- Harley Quinn
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- Mystique
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- Khal Darling
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- Dog cosplaying Michonne from Walking Dead
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- Mike Syfrit with Toni Darling as Lady Death
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- Kawaii
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- Superman and Supergirl
Filed under Humor and Observations
Cool Packaging
Cool packaging for your enjoyment.
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- Pizza slice holder
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- Extended Bed Ford Truck
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- Love this one.
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- The Traveling Baguette
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- Great juice boxes
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- These lunch bags are great to reduce theft, as long as someone doesn’t throw them away
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- Our politicians should drink this to get some spines
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- No one will steal your data…
Filed under Humor and Observations
Michael Bradley - Time Traveler 