Monday, July 24, 2006

I'm not 100% sure about this


(Sorry for the crappy picture quality, but I only had the cell phone with me.)

So I was at Target today, and I noticed these bottles of juice in the "impulse buy" area (up by the registers, next to the $7.99 Kevin Costner DVDs). When I looked at this bottle, the words "100% JUICE" were what caught my attention. Then I noticed that below those words, it reads "from concentrate with added ingredients".

Look, math major, it's a simple rule: If there are ingredients added to the original ingredient, then the main ingredient cannot be 100% of the total makeup of the product. Maybe it's in the high 90 percent range, but it can't be 100%. Therefore, this isn't 100% juice.

Think of it this way. If you add a tablespoon of dirt to a glass of clean water, it ceases to be 100% clean water, right?

Am I missing something?

3 Talked Back:

At July 24, 2006 at 9:39:00 PM CDT, Anonymous Anonymous said...

You are SO very right...

 

At July 26, 2006 at 9:45:00 PM CDT, Blogger Di said...

ha ha, that cracks me up. What would be the added ingredients? I totally agree. Next they will be giving 110% juice. (I never understood how you give a 110% either)!

 

At July 31, 2006 at 10:19:00 AM CDT, Anonymous Anonymous said...

Maybe it's 100% juice, just not 100% Pineapple juice. Juice can mean many things...tricky advertising.

 

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Friday, July 21, 2006

It gives new meaning to the words "wheel bearing"


When I saw this, I did a double-take, then a triple-take. Was this a real product, or was it my imagination? Then I realized that I live in Portland, where many people's bumper stickers proudly proclaim, "KEEP PORTLAND WEIRD". So yeah, at that point, it didn't surprise me.

If I ever had to drive a car with bear-shaped wheel covers, I would probably have to scrape them along the curb for twenty-five solid minutes every day.

Update: By the way, I forgot to mention that I saw this car in the parking lot of an auto parts store, where I was actually buying wheel bearings!

2 Talked Back:

At July 21, 2006 at 3:57:00 PM CDT, Blogger Scott said...

I have also seen these up here, and always woundered why anyone would put these on their car?

 

At July 21, 2006 at 9:36:00 PM CDT, Blogger Katie said...

So wrong! Were there are bunch of beanie baby bears in the front dash and back window? And maybe a cheesy license plate cover? That would fit.

 

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Monday, July 17, 2006

Here's another good one

Wednesday, July 12, 2006

Smile! You're on Candid Camera (and you owe us 150 bucks)

The City of Portland has been using photo radar for the last decade or so to catch more speeders in trouble areas around town. They drive a van or another vehicle, or sometimes pull a trailer, to a location, position the camera and the radar gun, then leave it alone for a few hours to rack up the revenue. The photos are reviewed by the department and matched to DMV records, then tickets are signed by the reviewing officer and mailed to the offenders. Some of the vans have a large, digital display that tells drivers how fast they're going - ostensibly to give them a "chance" to slow down before being nabbed...

This particular van was parked on a 35 mph street, but cars were conspicuously driving faster than that limit. It was then that I saw that the readout said 1 and didn't change. I'm guessing that there weren't too many tickets issued that day.

4 Talked Back:

At July 12, 2006 at 5:18:00 PM CDT, Blogger Scott said...

Man, I remember those! Do they still have them along Hwy 99 (MLK) on the poles for the intersections?

 

At July 12, 2006 at 5:29:00 PM CDT, Blogger stan said...

Yep. Absolutely. Gotta be careful not to run a red.

 

At July 12, 2006 at 7:42:00 PM CDT, Blogger Jim said...

that's how the Internet was invented

 

At July 13, 2006 at 12:45:00 AM CDT, Blogger Katie said...

Oh my word, that is AWESOME! Of course that would never be my luck.

 

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Sunday, July 09, 2006

Listen up

I do have some good news regarding something I wrote last week. However, I won't be able to share it (or what I wrote) until I have the accompanying external link to go along with it, which I am hoping will be created soon. So, watch this space!

4 Talked Back:

At July 9, 2006 at 1:40:00 PM CDT, Blogger Jim said...

huh?

 

At July 9, 2006 at 11:41:00 PM CDT, Blogger meagan said...

excitement!!

 

At July 16, 2006 at 9:12:00 PM CDT, Anonymous Anonymous said...

One week and we're still waiting for the "good news"

:)

 

At July 17, 2006 at 8:13:00 AM CDT, Blogger stan said...

I know. Sorry about that. I'm still waiting for it, too. Something I wrote is supposed to be published soon, but it hasn't yet posted on another site; until it does, I don't think I can post it here. Trust me, we're checking several times every day. :)

 

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Saturday, July 08, 2006

Puzzled...

As some of you may know, I am kind of a word puzzle junkie. I love to buy those magazines that contain "variety" puzzles rather than just crossword books, because I like the...well...variety of many different types of word and number puzzles.

Blame my mother. She was also buying and working these puzzle books as far back as I can remember, and I know that I was quite young when I expressed an interest in first watching, then helping, then doing the puzzles myself. Over the years of my youth, then young adulthood, I had other interests that kept me from always wanting to spend my time engaging my brain with these fun word challenges, but now, as I am just beginning to approach the middle years of my adult life, I am finding that working on puzzles (not just word, but also jigsaws, and other similar types of games) is not only enjoyable, but serves to keep my mind sharp.

We haven't yet gotten to the "observational" part of this post. Indulge me for a little bit longer.

One of the puzzles that I started working on as a kid is known as a Cross Sums. It's a grid of squares with blocks laid out in a crossword fashion (usually, but not always, diagonally symmetrical); rather than words, however, the squares are filled with a unique arrangement of digits. These digits are determined by using the provided numbers embedded in the black squares, which represent the sums of their respective rows or columns. The rules are that there are no zeroes, and there are no repeated digits in any row or column.



So, there might be a black square containing a 23 adjacent to a row of three squares. There is only one combination of three unique digits that will total 23 - 6-8-9 - but there are six different permutations of these three: 689, 698, 869, 896, 968, 986. Where each digit is placed depends upon the solutions to the connecting columns, which are determined by other connecting rows, etc.

Now that I've thoroughly bored you with that description (maybe I should have let Wikipedia do the talking), let me get to one of the observations that I've made. It seems that only in the last few months have people been referring to Cross Sums as Kakuro. Since when was this puzzle a Japanese invention? I mean, if it is, then that's fine, but then why didn't the puzzle book producers call it Kakuro rather than Cross Sums? And why, all of a sudden, are they the new hottest craze behind Sudoku?

And another thing. I have also been doing Sudoku puzzles for most of my life, and they, too, were suddenly invented by the Japanese. Only then did they become a huge, out-of-control craze that people cannot get enough of. Where was the Number Place love in the 80s and 90s? Fact: Sudoku was invented by Howard Gams in Indianapolis in 1979, based upon ancient Latin squares. In 1986, Japanese publisher Nikoli began printing the puzzles in their magazines, and they didn't really achieve worldwide popularity until last year. All that to say, I'm gonna keep calling them Number Place, thank you very much.

Now, here's the real reason why I began this post. It isn't about Cross Sums, Sudoku or any other word puzzles at all. It's all about laughing at someone's misspelling of a very ironic word. Today, as I was looking up Cross Sums on the Internet, I ran across a page that referenced them, and that page had several links to other related games and topics. Here's the links box (red emphasis mine):


Doesn't it seem that, if there was any word in one's vocabulary that should be spelled correctly, that "education" should be it? Perhaps this person suffers from mkriobes. It boggles the mind.

No, wait. It puzzles the mind.

2 Talked Back:

At July 8, 2006 at 9:46:00 PM CDT, Blogger KB said...

I recently got a resume from someone bragging about their "attenttion" to detail. Seriously.

 

At July 8, 2006 at 11:41:00 PM CDT, Blogger Jim said...

huh?

 

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Wednesday, July 05, 2006

I don't think they should have been testing for liver damage


Another case of Right Story, Wrong Headline:


(click the image to see the story, before they fix it)

2 Talked Back:

At July 5, 2006 at 8:24:00 PM CDT, Blogger meagan said...

Ohh, I would have really like to read the gnome story, much more than the tylenol story. Gnomes are great.

 

At July 5, 2006 at 9:45:00 PM CDT, Blogger Coley said...

That's exactly what I was thinking, Meagan! The gnome story sounds much more interesting!

 

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Monday, July 03, 2006

Coming to you live, from beautiful downtown 1987ville

The words "smooth jazz" will always be associated in my mind with the banal saxophone stylings of Kenny G. Mr. G was popular in the late 1980s with all-sax hits such as "Song Bird", "Free Bird", "Free as a Bird in Song", and "Robo-Sax Death Hacksaw", and never really warmed anyone's hearts at all. Nevertheless, some non-creative radio executives somewhere decided that there should be entire radio stations devoted to this style of lackadaisical horn squirting.


And apparently, judging by the design of this billboard, these marketers of Kenny G-style smooth jazz (read: laxative) dreck still believe it's the late 1980s. Which is to their detriment, because the smooth jazz stations here in Portland never seem to last longer than two changes of underwear.

So, good luck with that. Squirrrrrrrttt.

3 Talked Back:

At July 4, 2006 at 12:57:00 AM CDT, Blogger Jim said...

so, that means it'll last 6 months

 

At July 4, 2006 at 11:52:00 AM CDT, Blogger KB said...

I lived in Texas in the 1980s and I believe that sign was over Central Expressway until last week when they moved it to Portland. Enjoy!

 

At July 4, 2006 at 12:04:00 PM CDT, Blogger stan said...

Jim - considering the laxative effect of smooth jazz, two changes can occur the same day.

 

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Saturday, July 01, 2006

The sign probably said "VERY SKINNY CAR PARKING ONLY"



(And yes, that's my Subaru.)

3 Talked Back:

At July 1, 2006 at 6:54:00 PM CDT, Blogger Jim said...

for the Chrysler Smart Car perhaps?

 

At July 2, 2006 at 9:20:00 AM CDT, Blogger Scott said...

This looks like somewhere in SE Portland.

 

At July 4, 2006 at 5:35:00 AM CDT, Anonymous Anonymous said...

Or it may have said "reserved parking for little kid who drove in his toy carall the way across town." :D

 

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