Okay, I can see the appeal in a story where law enforcement officers used World of Warcraft to solve a real life crime. Obviously, though, that’s not why the criminals in this case were caught. Instead, it had to do with one of the sheriff’s officer’s on the case:

With the help of sheriff’s major Steve Rogers, Roberson began gathering information on Hightower through a number of sources. That is how they discovered that their suspect was a World of Warcraft fan.

Captain America’s a sheriff’s major?! Why are we bothering making a show about Steven Seagal, then?

Simon mentions that sending an e-mail to flag@whitehouse.gov ^[a] will cause your IP address to be added to a “permanent file”. Not to worry, though, he’s found a nice response to that plan (originating from Cuffy Meigs).

The basic gist of the plan is that the more often flag@whitehouse.gov appears in links or in plaintext (flag@whitehouse.gov) on the internet, the more often that spambots will find it and send out the messages. That’s fair, enough, I guess, but I see a more sinister motive for flag@whitehouse.gov. I believe that the idea is not so much to collect the IP addresses of those who e-mail flag@whitehouse.gov, but to collect the e-mail addresses. Once they’ve collected a large number of e-mail addresses that have mailed flag@whitehouse.gov, the administration can then raise money to pay for its health care plan simply by selling contact information of everyone who’s sent a message to flag@whitehouse.gov. I’m not saying that’s definitely the plan, but President Obama has been sucking up to the the current Iranian regime and legally ousted President Zelaya of Honduras pretty heavily; why not go whole hog and get in bed with spammers?

1. In case you aren’t aware, flag@whitehouse.gov is the e-mail address that’s been created to allow citizens to report dissidents “fishy” statements about the health care plan. As if the health care “plan” isn’t fishy enough on its own, what with senators saying that reading it would be impossible, how can they expect us to support it? [↩]

I was sitting in my office yesterday, and one of the ladies from the office comes back carrying a big gift basket filled with snack food — candy bars, chips, peanuts, etc.

I was completely befuddled as to who might’ve purchased such a thing for me until I read the card. “Thanks,” it read, “for referring your wife.”

Who sent me all this snack food?

My dentist^[a].

1. Despite the cynicism that one might read into the title of this post, I really did appreciate the gesture. It was very sweet (pardon the pun), and I am always pleased to get free snacks at work. If anyone in the Charleston, WV area is looking for a dentist, let me know — I’ll be more than happy to refer you to mine. All selfish motives aside, he’s probably the best dentist I’ve ever had. [↩]

Having trouble with your taxes? Thankfully, Iowahawk has Tax Guys to help you out:

Dear Tax Guys:

I’ve had a lot on my mind lately, and when I was going through some old receipt boxes in my filing cabinet I suddenly realized I haven’t paid my income taxes for the past 8 years. Am I in trouble? Please help!

Forgetful in Fort Worth

Dear Forgetful:

Here at the IRS, we realize that many well-meaning taxpayers like you can be distracted by various family illnesses, baseball pennant races, political campaigns, and so on. The rules for late filing can be surprisingly flexible if you have the right qualifying circumstances. According to IRS guidelines, you are eligible for the 306(b)(19) “I Forgot” amnesty if the following applies:

(1) Your total adjusted gross income in the “I Forgot” years was equal to or greater than $8,528,000; and
(2) You are a nominee to head a cabinet-level federal agency.

If you answered “yes” to (2), or both (1) and (2), then you are in the clear. If you answered “yes” to (1) but “no” to (2), mail 10% of the total to the Democratic National Committee and request a cabinet appointment. If you answered “no” to both, then I’m afraid you are shit out of luck. Turn yourself into your local IRS authorities, who will assist you in computing appropriate penalties, interest, and parole terms.

Tim

PS – If you have any money left, buy a few jars of that ‘Ginkgo Biloba’ supplement from Walgreens. I hear it really helps with memory problems!

More letters with great advice at Iowahawk’s site!

I’ve been ripped off!

Over at Town Hall, Kevin McCullough warns everyone about the evil that is Mass Effect:

It’s called “Mass Effect” and it allows its players – universally male no doubt – to engage in the most realistic sex acts ever conceived. One can custom design the shape, form, bodies, race, hair style, breast size of the images they wish to “engage” and then watch in crystal clear, LCD, 54 inch screen, HD clarity as the video game “persons” hump in every form, format, multiple, gender-oriented possibility they can think of.

Not counting the times I’ve died and restarted (which would be time that isn’t counted in the total on my save game), I have spent 22 hours and 51 minutes playing Mass Effect. Probably 18 hours of that has been spent killing enemies who are allied with a machine race that wants to wipe out all sentient life in the galaxy. Another three and a half hours were spent talking to NPCs in the interest of investigating said machine race’s allies and/or other criminals. An hour and twenty minutes has been spent managing my inventory^[a]. Perhaps a full minute (and I’m being very generous here) was spent on a “sex scene”, which involved a blue-skinned, genderless alien leaning forward and whispering in my character’s ear, and then a shot of her naked arm against what appeared to be an alien headboard.

Also, my character customization options at the beginning of the game consisted of being able to change the basic look of my character’s face. I even tried creating a female character, and I don’t remember any options for “breast size” anywhere on the menu. Removing warts and such? Trust me, the thing does not get that detailed. The best you can do is an option to add a scar, presumably to add realism to your character’s backstory as a soldier.

As should have become clear to you by now, I have been ripped off. I got a fun science fiction/adventure RPG, and what I should’ve gotten was a game that allowed me to make “the most realistic sex acts ever conceived” — more realistic than any sex act that any person has ever even thought of, much less had. Fun science fiction or not, I’m feeling let down by Mass Effect now.

Xbox Live has been having some issues lately, and some brain trust decided they should sue Microsoft for five million dollars because their lives were ruined by not being able to play video games or somesuch nonsense^[b]. Isn’t it obvious that this is grounds for a bigger suit? I demand that Microsoft refund my Mass Effect money and pay me for emotional damages. I think four quadrillion dollars sounds like a good amount, don’t you?

1. Why does the weapon upgrade menu jump to the top every time I turn an upgrade to omni-gel, when the other items that I also wish to turn to omni-gel are at the bottom of the list, because they’re oldest? [↩]
2. Believe me, I’m as much a video game addict as the next person — just ask my girlfriend; if she sees my DS come out of my pocket while I’m waiting for her to do something that will take thirty seconds one more time, she’ll probably snap — but that’s utterly insane. When Xbox Live doesn’t work, they should do what a normal person does: play something offline. If it doesn’t work enough that you’re dissatisfied with the service, cancel your account. Boom. Problem solved. [↩]