From a discussion in the comments at TSO’s place:

>Reminds me of my System/360 days when we had to suggest to the programmers that rather than ask the operator at the console to type “1 for Yes, 2 for No”, the program should request “Y for Yes, N for No”.

>And what’s wrong with “1″ for Yes and “2″ for No exactly?

>One for yes and two for no is great if you have at least one position to the right of the decimal point.

>”And what’s wrong with ‘1′ for Yes and ‘2′ for No exactly?” 1thing.

These are some of the daffodils near my front steps as they were on this early February afternoon today. If winter doesn’t abruptly return, they could very well bloom within a week.

During an archaeological dig in my office today, I unearthed some relics from prehistoric times.

Remember when floppies were floppy? (Remember floppies?) And eight inches in diameter?

(more…)

Here’s the most bizarre video I’ve seen recently. (Patience is required; it takes forever to load.)

There are more sponges and other three-dimensional fractals here, here and here.

Addendum: For sheer trippiness, nothing beats the Mandelbrot set. Here’s the classic fractal video, “Nothing but Zooms,” presented in four parts. Unfortunately, the image quality is low, even for YouTube.

Part one
Part two
Part three
Part four

Here are some more videos of varying degrees of gimmickiness featuring the ultimate paisley.

This one
That one
This other one

What’s the Mandelbrot set? Let Jonathan Coulton explain. (N.B.: naughty words.)

Askimet informs me that it has blocked 666 spam comments here. Meanwhile, at my other weblog there are 404 valid comments.

(These aren’t my photographs (or cats, either).)

And a picture exemplifying a different kind of cuteness.

40 Signs of the Mike World Order:

27. New TV show: Pundit Deathmatch! Reigning champion – Ann Coulter!

How to identfy the Antichrist.

The upsides to an event earlier this month (you may need to scroll down a bit):

#7: Conservatism is inherently a tradition of complicity, satire, internal conflict, and cynicism. So with the Messiah as our next president, we’re in like Patricia Quinn!

A couple of jokes, one mathematical, one theological (the latter via René’s Apple).

Snape paper dolls to download and print. You can play with them while you read Joseph Bottum’s suggestions for revising the canon of children’s literature.

Don’t click here if you have work to do.

Update: These were disappointingly easy, and there were only eighteen of them. Here’s a more interesting set.

She’s everywhere.

(Via Chizumatic.)

A. To punish the legitimate user.

Not only is Sarah Palin more than a match for Chuck Norris — “We don’t know who would win in a Chuck Norris – Sarah Palin cage match because they’ve never invented a cage that can hold Sarah Palin” — but she’s a meganekko, too.

(Via Chizumatic.)

I heard yesterday that one of the great progressive rock bands, Gryphon, has reunited to record a new album and perhaps give some concerts after disbanding more than thirty years ago. I just did a little searching to verify that. While the main Gryphon fansite does announce their reunion, their MySpace page states that it’s been suspended. Grrr.

Here’s an example of the sort of music I’d been hoping to hear more of, their “Glastonbury Carol”:

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If you have things to do and have absolutely no time to spare, don’t click here. (My best so far is 466 528 576 pounds of fish, plus logs, boots and cell phones.) (Via Dale.)

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Kids, be your favorite martyr for Halloween. (Via large furry animals.)

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Warmth. (Via a small furry animal.)

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To put the Democratic convention in perspective, read Dave Barry. His coverage begins here.

Postcards from CERN. (Via Aziz.)

The inhabitants of the moon never see an earthrise or earthset. However, spacecraft orbiting the moon, e.g., the Kaguya, do. Here is the earth rising and setting, as recorded in HD. (Via Aziz.)

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Speed Racer is probably worth skipping (though I might listen to Racer X). If you’re looking for an exciting race story, I recommend instead the Kuricorder Quartet’s take on “Highway Star”:

Here’s the quartet again with some tunes you might recognize.

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Understatement of the week:

Something tells me the commenter hasn’t met all that many nuns.

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Give peas a chance:

(Via Blackadder.)

Fun with juxtaposed pictures: