The Funker-Hearse. Dude...

There is an interesting discussion going on over at Debunkers, Is addiction a disease? I don't think it matters if addiction is a disease or not, but I'm kind of digging in my heels over the idea that curing addiction is just the addict choosing to stop partaking. Addiction may not be a disease, but it is a lot more than just someone getting sloppy.

Our company's wei ya is tonight. My psychic powers predict that there will be drinking involved.

Chess is still on for tomorrow night at Salut, after which I shall dispatch myself forthwith to IKEA and then to the foothills of Wufeng.

Doctrine of Laches:

Based on the maxim that equity aids the vigilant and not those who procrastinate regarding their rights; Neglect to assert a right or claim that, together with lapse of time and other circumstances, prejudices an adverse party. Neglecting to do what should or could, have been done to assert a claim or right for an unreasonable and unjustified time causing disadvantage to another.

Laches is similar to 'statute of limitations' except is equitable rather than statutory and is a common affirmative defense raised in civil actions.

Laches is derived from the French 'lecher' and is nearly synonymous with negligence.

In general, when a party has been guilty of laches in enforcing his right by great delay and lapse of time, this circumstance will at common law prejudice and sometimes operate in bar of a remedy which is discretionary for the court to afford. In courts of equity delay will also generally be prejudicial.

So exactly how much time are we talkin' about when we say "great delay and lapse of time"???

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Cash givaway from Chaon the Munificent:
That's right, I am giving away... Oh I don't know... maybe TENS of dollars to one lucky reader of this blog. All you have to do, is send me a published example of a traditional box wrench head, showing an annular groove on the inner periphery of the head, preferably with a C-ring or similar device installed in the groove. This could be from something like a patent, or a catalogue, or an advertisement, and... just to make it interesting, let's say that the sample must be published before, say, January 2004. And it cannot be a ratcheting wrench with a gear wheel. It's like a contest and game together! And you could win money! And I'll buy you many beers! We'll call it the... Great Anterior Works of Aesthetic Value Search! And don't forget, the winner gets REAL MONEY!

www.iownjoo.com is my image host. And they are crapping out big time. So like many boggers out there, I am playing with flickr.

Test Flickr Daily Zeitgeist:

There are occasional difficulties with being an extreme skeptic. Like when I see a site like this, I have difficulty discerning whether or not it is a hoax:

"The Rapture Index has two functions: one is to factor together a number of related end time components into a cohesive indicator, and the other is to standardize those components to eliminate the wide variance that currently exists with prophecy reporting."

Upon reading that sentence, the Woo-dar got into a heated argument with the Hoax-a-meter, the argument ending by the Woo-dar putting the hoax-a-meter into a hammerlock. Then I had to take some more aspirin.

So it's not a hoax. There is an index to measure events likely to precede Armageddon. One factor is apostasy. Another is Liberalism. Both Iran (Persia) and Russia (Gog? What the heck is a Gog?) are in the index. So I would assume that if a Russian or Iranian liberal experiences apostasy, then that is sort of a Rapture trifecta.

But I don't understand the inclusion of Oil Supply/Price and Arms Proliferation. Certainly I am no Bible scholar, but I've read the Bible and I don't remember reading anything like this:

And thus did Jebediah secure a mighty rate for his pots of oil. And Lo! Jebediah did approacheth the chariot of the Gog guy. And there did he (Jebediah, not the Gog guy) purchase many Kalishnikovs, and thus did he skirt the arms embargo of the confederated kings.

But I might of missed it. Right now I'm trying to figure out which of these factors I might be involved with. The occasional betelnut chomping might get me in on Drug abuse. My disrespect for things like the The Rapture Index may be seen as Anti-Christian (though I would prefer to get lumped in with the Ecumenism folks). But since a Google search turned up the existence of a group called the Adepts of Chaon, I'm going to aim high and go for The False Prophet. Aaron, I'll leave Financial unrest to you.

Two weeks ago I got an all-areas DVD player. (They are selling them at the DVD store across from Nova for NT$3600). So now I can buy DVD's on Amazon and watch them at home, as opposed to previously, when I would buy DVDs from Amazon and have them collect dust on the shelf as I gnashed my teeth in impotent Region 3 rage.

With my new DVD player I can conclude one thing for certain: Deckard is definitely a Replicant. No question about it.

Good links in from Aaron the last few days:

1) "I think we need to head on home and get a nice Federal job."
Cut-Rate Diplomas
How doubts about the government's own "Dr. Laura" exposed a résumé fraud scandal
Oh man. Here is the Hamilton University website. Here is the FION Fellowship with which Hamilton University is affiliated. I checked out the FION statement, but my woo-dar starting wailing so loudly I had to stop reading and go take some aspirin. Heck, I'd always assumed that I could not get a cushy Federal job because my degree is from a crappy state school. But if a $3600 Ph.D. from a Motel 6 gets you in, well then maybe I have a chance after all.

2) Chairman Kim's dissolving kingdom. Pretty sad stuff. I used to hang out with a bunch of North Koreans at Nankai University back in '88-'89. They were all pretty cool except for the political spook (I forget what his real title was). His job was to keep the North Korean students from doing things like drinking beer with Americans. The fact that one of the students was dating an American girl probably did not reflect well on the spook's ability to do his job. I always wondered if the American vixen-banging North Korean got in trouble when he went home.

3) On a local note- These are some reviews of PJs, the totalitarian anti-smoking establishment that is enduring the third week of my righteous economic sanctions. A reviewer named Henry says: "If you are not taste yet , you must be go to PJ's Cafe and feel his friendly!" Unless you are a woman, in which case it is more likely that PJ will try to feel your friendly....
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Over on the left there I link to The Ferrett. The Ferrett enjoys quite a 'net following, probably because he says things like this:

there is an objective reality that may have nothing to do with your current emotional state. If Kurt Cobain can think that he's untalented and unloved while Ashlee Simpson can think she's a good musician, then obviously there is no correlation. As humans, we are very lacking in the self-analysis department.

I don't put much stock in internet quizzes, but then I found this one:

Measure Your Chess Aggressiveness

My score:

Psycho. A danger to yourself and others. You don't play defenses, just offenses minus a tempo. You like lines with name like "the can opener", "the berserker" or "the long whip variation." At home you kill small animals or unrated players for fun.

From the LA Times: China and Taiwan-- Polls Apart
(Ganked from The Peking Duck)

And from EastSouthWestNorth Check out these Sprite ads. They are from Hong Kong, not China or Taiwan. Or if they have been used in Taiwan somewhere I haven't seen them.

In local news: My one man boycott of PJs is still in effect. If I wanted to go to bars where smoking is not allowed, I'd move to California. This does pose a problem, in that I don't know where else I can go to watch the Superbowl. Anybody know if The Londoner is showing it?