Read that again?

[NEOWatcher]

I often scoff at the "not guilty" pleas to obvious crimes too; but as SeanF says, it can make sense. And legally, you're not necessarily saying you didn't do the crime -- you're saying you didn't do the particular crime you're being accused of (e.g., maybe you robbed someone, but they're charging you with "aggravated robbery" and you're claiming you didn't have or imply you had a weapon, and thus are only guilty of "robbery").

It can come into the sentencing phase too. The trial allows the accused to reveal thier evidence that the crime does not warrent extreme punishment.
We just had a local cop killer who pled not guilty and openly admitted he did it during the trial. His goal was to get a life sentence instead of a death penalty. (It didn't work)

[Gillianren]

My dad, who was a cop, said never plead guilty. And if they offer you a plea bargain, it means they probably think they can't prove either the bigger charge or the smaller one they're offering to let you plead.

Not entirely true. Here, in traffic court, they just want to avoid the time and expense of trial. For all parties. Odds are pretty good they'll get you for it if it does end up going to court, but they'd really rather it didn't. So they'll let you plea to something else which will cost you a lot less and won't take your time and their money.

[NEOWatcher]

Car oil contaminating Carlsbad Caverns

Cars, as you see around you will leak off various fluids, and those eventually can get washed off in rain water down into the drains, and therefore into the groundwater

Shouldn't that be the rain water that doesn't make it to the drains?

[Gillianren]

Around here, it doesn't tend to end up in the sewer system. It ends up in the Sound.

[NEOWatcher]

Hey manly men, have a cupcake

Lawyer loses his job and decides to open a cupcake business aimed at men because most cupcakes are "very feminine and pink. A lot of them are frilly with jelly beans and sprinkles."

The result?

Arrick said up to 95 percent of the people buying his $4.25 cupcakes are women.

But; this is the one that stuck in my mind to put it here.

Since opening in November 2009, Arrick said business has grown about 500 percent, despite the U.S. economic turmoil.

If you are opening the business, then isn't that business starting from zero?
(of course we don't know what they measure "business"... Sales, staff, square feet...)

[Gillianren]

I don't get the current cupcake fad, but hey. And if you start from zero, isn't five hundred percent of that still zero?

[Jeff Root]

There is a "current cupcake fad"??

-- Jeff, in Minneapolis

[Fazor]

There is a "current cupcake fad"??

-- Jeff, in Minneapolis

Seems to be, from what I've seen on Food Network anyway. Looks like specialty cupcake botiques are one of the 'hip fads' among big-city foodies. I'm not a big cake eater, cup or otherwise.

[Gillianren]

There's a cupcake store up in Bellevue or something, near where a friend lives. Whereas to me, the idea that a store would just sell cupcakes is a little weird. You can also get "giant cupcake pans," which are, let's face it, a cake in the shape of a cupcake. Since to me at least, one of the defining characteristics of a cupcake is that it's small. You know, cup-sized.

[Extravoice]

You know, cup-sized.

How many milliliters is that? Opps, wrong thread.

BTW: I heard a story on NPR a while back about a guy and his wife who set up a cupcake truck business (think ice-cream truck). They do a lot of "social networking" to try to drum up business and pick locations to park the truck. They also solicit new flavor ideas. The biggest flavor request?
.
.
.
Bacon! (ewwwwww).

[Tobin Dax]

There must be a fad. TLC has a new "cake boss"-type show for a cupcake store.

[Jeff Root]

So the fad is scheduled to end when the new TV season begins?

-- Jeff, in Minneapolis

[jamesabrown]

I don't know how to eat cupcakes. They are usually taller than my open mouth, so I can't just start from one side and eat my way across the diameter. Best I can do is come at if from an odd angle, either from the bottom or the top, which means that I'm eating either cake only, or frosting only, rather than a mix of both with every bite, as I'd prefer. And I've never seen anyone eat a cupcake with a fork, like I would with a regular slice of regular cake.

They don't teach this stuff in school.

[Gillianren]

We had cupcakes in school on a pretty regular basis, which--when you're dealing with third-graders--tends to involve a lot of frosting getting all over kids' faces.

[NEOWatcher]

I wasn't sure where to put this one, but since the contrasting comment to the headline hit me first , I put it here.

The end of the desktop PC (seriously)

Sales of smartphones and tablets are on the rise, pushed by companies like [...] that say the newer devices can displace computers, but PC sales also keep on booming.

So the death is determined because sales are booming?

The article talks about how versital the portible devices are. I agree, but there are just some things that work much better on a PC (which I think includes laptops in thier context).

The reporter mentions word processing in passing, but that might only because that's how he writes his story.

I just don't see (at least not yet) how a portable device can be a means of churning through data, creating documents, processing/editing pictures and other documents.
Maybe when there is ample advancements in user input there may be some change. But; even with that, there's going to be a need for high capacity processing and viewing.

[GeorgeLeRoyTirebiter]

That's it exactly: those newer portable devices can consume content, but they can't effectively be used to create content. In that regard, a smartphone or tablet has more in common with a television than it does with a computer.

You can listen to music, watch videos, and take snapshots, but you can't run professional sound, video, or image editors (or pro software to create them from scratch). You can read e-books, but can't run desktop publishing or font editing software. You can use GPS navigation, but can't perform spatial analysis or manage a GIS database. You can't do anything involving CAD/CAM. Worst of all, you can buy and download new apps, but can't program and compile your own (on the device itself).

I don't expect that to change anytime soon, either, as most of those jobs simply can't be performed as efficiently on a device with a tiny screen and no physical mouse and keyboard (or a teeny thumb keyboard). They could, I suppose, make a portable computing device with a full-sized screen and keyboard, perhaps separating the two with a hinge...

[Fazor]

This one was funny. The article is about a "101 year old company that had to close it's doors for good." Okay, so that's not funny. But tucked into the article, between paragraph breaks, is a link to a video. And the title of that link?

Customer Sad To See Company Fold

No wonder they're closing, if only one of thier customers is sad to see them go! Or maybe they only had one customer? Either way doesn't really support a healthy business.

[Gillianren]

It reminds me of that scene in Reality Bites where Janeane Garofalo is teaching Winona Ryder how to fold a sweater to exact Gap specifications.

[Extravoice]

I've never seen the movie, but my daughter worked at Old Navy* one summer, and can now fold shirts several different (Old Navy-approved) ways.

* a Gap-owned company

[Fazor]

It reminds me of that scene in Reality Bites where Janeane Garofalo is teaching Winona Ryder how to fold a sweater to exact Gap specifications.

Heh, I haven't seen the movie, but I do recall the scene (so Tara probably watched it at one point).

[Gillianren]

It was the movie a film class I was in suggested our teachers use should they, in later iterations of the class, want to choose a movie to represent the '90s.

[NEOWatcher]

Want to call aliens? Keep it simple, scientists say

The Benfords also said that instead of gazing at stars within 500 or so light-years, as most SETI efforts have done for decades, observers should point more toward our galaxy's center to distances up to 1,000 light-years from Earth, where 90 percent of the galaxy's stars are clustered.

And then they go on to talk about the galactic center without stating the conditions of the 1000LY radius.
Either:
- Too much information in a single sentence.
- Reporter not understanding what the person is talking about.
- Intentionally stated to make it sound like we would get 90% of the galaxy with a 1000LY search. (sounds good to get more funding)

"For an analogy, you wouldn't want to hang out in Times Square all the time, but if you live in New Jersey it's obvious that Manhattan is the place to look for the action."

How about, if you lived in LA, you wouldn't want to search all around from Hawaii to New York, but you will concentrate in the direction of New York perhaps as far as Nevada.

[Extravoice]

I was sitting in my car outside the local convenience store while my daughter ran inside when I noticed several window posters advertising cigarette prices. One large poster listed the price for a particular brand with big letters announcing "lowest price allowed by law." Nearby were some other posters for different brands at slightly lower prices.

I'm not quite sure how that works, but I don't think "the law" specifies minimum price based on brand name.

[NEOWatcher]

I'm not quite sure how that works, but I don't think "the law" specifies minimum price based on brand name.

Pack size?

[Extravoice]

Apparently I was wrong, and New Jersey sets the minimum price for cigarettes based on the brand:

link to spreadsheet

[NEOWatcher]

Apparently I was wrong, and New Jersey sets the minimum price for cigarettes based on the brand:

Indirectly maybe, but it looks like it's related to wholesale price.

[Extravoice]

Indirectly maybe, but it looks like it's related to wholesale price.

Yup. It is intesting to note the large difference in "mfg price". I thought cigarettes were pretty-much all the same (said the non-smoker).

[Tog]

When I worked in the grocery store, I spent a few years in the lobby department. That's the section that dealt with candy bars, cigarettes, film, and movies. We used three retail price points.
Brand names were all the same. (18.00/carton at the time).
Low price brand names were about 15.00/carton
Generics were about 12.00/carton.
This was in about 1993. I think I had moved on to the graveyard shift by the time they broke 20 bucks. We never lowered the prices on any of them unless it was end of the quarter and we needed to boost sales. When that happened, we'd run the generics for 10/carton. I don't recall ever hearing anything about a minimum price in Utah, but we never had the freedom to set our own prices. Even the generic sales came down from the office.

[DonM435]

I found this advert in a recent issue of Chess Life:

DISNEY'S CHESS GUIDE
This unique guide, written by World Chess Champion Grandmaster Anatoly Karpov, will teach you how to play chess using an exciting method based on Checkmate. With his help you will learn to play and win right from the start. All your favorite Disney® characters …

A chess method based on checkmate, eh? If I told you I had a bowling strategy based upon knocking down pins, or a boxing strategy based upon punching the other fellow, would you be impressed? Or would you say "Uhh, is there any other way?"

I am not setting a trap here. I am well aware that checkmates almost never happen in top level play. Heck, I'm sure there hasn't been an actual checkmate in the 130-plus year history of the World's Championship chess matches. That's because any player with a decent grasp of the game will resign once his or her game reaches an irretrievably bad position. Indeed, the players will agree to a draw as soon as neither has any constructive possibilities.

Now, Anatoly Karpov -- who's supposed to be teaching you here an exciting strategy based upon checkmate – probably hasn't checkmated one of his peers since he got out of high school. Oh, he probably checkmates lots of wide-eyed amateurs in those thirty-board simultaneous exhibitions he gives. However, you can bet that all of his serious games that aren't drawn will end in resignation, usually the other fellow's resignation.

But it's the threat of a potential checkmate far down the road that prompts the resignation. If you aren't playing with checkmate in mind, there's no way that you can force the other player to give up. If the reigning world champion loses a pawn to Karpov and sees no way of exploiting the situation or of regaining the pawn, he's going to give up at that point.

In an attempt to be charitable, I'll guess that what the original author of what evolved into that blurb meant to say was that this book would teach you a strategy based upon direct attack, and wouldn't burden you with concerns such as defense or positional play. That's quite reasonable for a start

[Jeff Root]

Don,

I have only won two or three games of chess in my life.
I've only played about fifteen or so. I don't think I've ever
seen an en passant move in an actual game. So you know
I don't know much about chess, and certainly don't read
magazines about it.

However...

It appears that your quote correctly capitalized "Checkmate",
but failed to put an exclamation mark at the end. The title of
Karpov's earlier book for beginners is "Checkmate!", and the
Disney book is based on it.

:-)

-- Jeff, in Minneapolis