TOURBUS: Thursday, November 7, 1996

DRIVER: Patrick Crispin

TODAY'S TOURBUS STOP:
The Centre for the Easily Amused


Hi, kids!

I think winter is finally descending upon Alabama.  I can tell because one
day it is 75 degrees (F), the next day it is 30, the next day it is 75, the
next day it is 30, etc.  I have, however, found a really ingenious way to
beat this viscous Alabama weather cycle:  every day I wear both a
sweatshirt and a pair of khaki shorts.  That way, only half of me is hot
and the other half of me is cold.  :)

Actually, now that the University of Alabama has decided to offer me a
temporary job until I graduate -- or, as my mother so kindly pointed out,
the temporary job is pretty much the same thing as a permanent job since I
am *NEVER* going to graduate (I am the only student at the University
paying into the University's retirement system) -- I think I might actually
celebrate my new employment by putting all of my sweatshirts away and
buying myself a REAL Timberland jacket.

By the way, if you have never seen a Timberland jacket, you *MUST* pay a
visit to Aardwulf to see what all the fuss is about!  If you think
Timberland makes great leather boots, just wait until you see their
jackets!  :)
+--------------------------------------------------------------------+
      Feeling the chill? Try Timberland's guaranteed waterproof
        leather bomber jacket from Aardwulf Apparel Company.
+--------------------( http://www.aardwulf.com )---------------------+

Since Bob and I have focused our last couple of TOURBUS posts on some of
the darkest subjects on the Internet -- spamming and viruses -- I think we
should pull our little bus of Internet happiness into a FUN site this week.
Before we do that, though, I have four quick things that I need to tell
you (these four things are not Earth-shattering, but they may help you win
a game of Trivial Pursuit):


In my October 10th post (SQUIRRELS and INFOSEEK) I told you
        how I had a "squirrel tart" in Canada that tasted an awful lot
        like peanut butter.  An alert Canadian reader recently
        informed me that "Squirrel" is a brand of peanut butter.
        ("Honey, can you get me another squirrel and jelly sandwich?")

    
In my October 24th post (THE AFTERMATH OF THE CHILD PORN SPAM)
        I told you that Mark Trevino had found a 92 Kb file at NCSA
        that has nothing but e-mail addresses.  "NCSA" stands for the
        National Center for Supercomputer Applications, and they were
        the folks who created the first graphical Web browser
        ("Mosaic").

     
Since so many of you are interested in learning more about
        Netscape "cookies" (which we also talked about on October
        24th), I plan to write a TOURBUS post on the subject in the
        weeks to come.  In the interim, if you want a really cool
        chocolate chip cookie recipe -- which has absolutely NOTHING
        to do with Netscape cookies, but I thought you'd like the
        recipe anyway -- check out my own chocolate chip cookie recipe
        at http://ua1vm.ua.edu/~crispen/cookie.html

Finally, I just want to give everyone a little advanced
        warning that my post on Thanksgiving day (Thursday, November
        28) will be a repeat of last Thanksgiving's "spam" post.
        Since the holiday season is a BIG time for unsolicited e-mail,
        I am reposting last year's post to make sure that everyone on
        the Bus knows the truth behind some of the Net's biggest spams
        and urban legends.

Now for the fun stuff.

THE CENTRE FOR THE EASILY AMUSED
Most of the sites that we have visited in the past year have been either
extremely useful or very informative.  I am happy to report that today's
TOURBUS stop -- The Centre for the Easily Amused (C*E*A) -- is neither.

The C*E*A is pretty much a Yahoo-sized directory for all of the most
absolutely useless, and incredibly silly, Web pages in the world.  The
folks at the C*E*A say that they "been exploring the Internet since long
before it was trendy in their search for the Ultimate Guide to Wasting
Time" and that the C*E*A's motto is that "life's too short to take
seriously."

So, if you are looking for a good way to kill a lot of time, you can find
the Centre for the Easily Amused on the Web at http://www.amused.com/

     You'll have to scroll down the C*E*A homepage a bit to find this -- the top
of the C*E*A's homepage is full of awards and other stuff -- but the C*E*A
has 9 major directories.  After exploring the site thoroughly, I can safely
say that you'll only want to visit the following 3 directories:


RANDOM SILLINESS.  You'll probably want to start here.  This
       page has links to such wonderful sites as "The One and Only Q-
       Tips Homepage", "1001 Uses
       for Duct Tape", and, my personal favorite, ."Bad Teen Angst Poetry"
      
    
SITES THAT DO STUFF.  This page has links to Web pages that
       allow you to see stuff using Web cameras in some very weird
       locations, to use your Web browser to play a whole bunch of
       silly games, and to participate in a myriad of other time-
       wasting activities.  My absolute favorite link here is the
       Virtual Bubble Wrap which lets you pop wrapping bubbles with your mouse!

    
SHORT ATTENTION SPAN SITE.  As best I can guess, this is sort
       of a collection of "useless sites of the week" for people who
       don't have the time to look through the "Random Silliness" and
       "Sites That Do Stuff" pages. An example of one of the previous
       sites of the week is the "Evil Little Brother Excuse Generator" which is a Mad-Libs-type program that generates excuses for everything from late
       homework to torched houses.


That's it for this week.  Today's TOURBUS may seem to be a tad bit short,
but once you actually visit the Centre for the Easily Amused, I think you
will discover that today's TOURBUS stop has the distinct possibly of eating
up a vast amount of your otherwise productive time.  :)

--------------------------------
TODAY'S SOUTHERN WORD OF THE DAY
--------------------------------

UART (phrase) - To be bound or obliged.
Usage: "UART to listen to yore momma."

(Special thanks goes to Steve Creasy for today's wurd.)

YOU CAN FIND ALL OF THE OLD SOUTHERN WORDS OF THE DAY ON THE SOUTHERN WORD
HOMEPAGE AT http://ua1vm.ua.edu/~crispen/word.html