“No crime is so great as daring to excel.” — Winston Churchill
A little detective work traced the problem to default date format
conversions and floating-point format conversions in the very useful
Excel program package. The date conversions affect at least 30 gene
names; the floating-point conversions affect at least 2,000 if Riken
identifiers are included. These conversions are irreversible; the original gene names cannot be recovered.
Yet another reason not to use Excel as your “database”.
Share this:
Amycakes
This is a reposting of my old Office Managers email and ICQ messages to my coworkers.
 |
Amy Vs. The Booger Bandit |
|
I’ve been informed that someone has been wiping snot on the walls of the This message is intended for whoever is doing this and I am hoping that it’s Now I hope I made the person feel really bad about what they’re doing and Thanks, Amy Johnson |
|
Smokey the bear rides again |
|
This is intended for the people that smoke in here. Someone decided to dump The person should have known this would happen but apparently they’ve never So to all the smokers, please don’t dump ashtrays into garbages after you Thanks, Amy Johnson |
|
Amy Vs. The Brown Bomber |
|
This is another message for those people in here who don’t have any common I’m hoping I don’t have to keep doing this but it seems to be getting worse Thanks, Amy Johnson |
|
Amy The Holiday Girl |
|
For all of you that keep telling me that Monday is a stat holiday, I called the province of New Brunswick like I’ve done all the other years I’ve worked here to ask them about this holiday. It’s considered a stat holiday but not a paid Stat holiday so it’s up to the employer whether to have us work or not. New Brunswick only has 6 paid public holidays while other provinces have more or some have less. Do, DON”T icq me about this again. Here’s a link you can look at for NB: http://www.info-galaxy.com/Holiday/Holidays_in_Canada/holidays_in_canada.html Amy Johnson |
|
Amy Poops on Another Party |
|
Before you start asking where the chips are, we will not be getting anymore chips, pop/bottled water from now on. The reason being is it has become too expensive and some people have been taking advantage of it by eating/drinking too much too fast. DON’T respond to this icq please. Amy Johnson |
|
Amy Tackles the Floaters |
| I’ve been informed that some people arn’t flushing the toilets in the men’s washroom, please flush after each time you use it. It’s discusting for other people to have to do it for you. Once again, more common sense that has to be mentioned. Amy Johnson |
|
Amy Wields her Plunger in Anger |
| I am hoping this is going to be the last message I have to send to you guys. When taking a shit, FLUSH THE DAMN TOILET or don’t use an entire roll of toilet paper to wipe your ass. No wonder the toilet gets clogged so often. If you notice it’s clogged, don’t leave until it’s fixed because I’m sick of going in there, trying to hold back the puke and fixing it myself. This is not a damn elementary school. Amy Johnson |
|
Amy and the logistics of pooping, pt. I |
| There is no running water at the moment, we’re trying to figure out what happened. Please do not flush the toilet when you use it until I let you know it’s fixed so NO SHITTING!! We don’t need another plugged toilet Amy Johnson |
|
Amy and the logistics of pooping, pt. II |
| Paul just told me the water is working fine so you may poop freely!!
Amy Johnson |
|
Amy combats Chairjacking |
| There has been a person(s) taking chairs from other people. Everyone has a chair so there’s no reason to be taking chairs from other people. If you have a problem with your chair, come talk to me and I can get you a new one but please don’t be taking someone else’s chair from now on. Amy Johnson |
|
I. P. Freely |
| People have been telling me that when they’ve gone to the bathroom there’s been piss all over the seat and/or floor. Now this isn’t the mall bathroom where you don’t care whether or not someone after you sits in your piss, these are your co-workers so you should have the decency to wipe up after yourself. If you are not coordinated enough to make it in the toilet without dribbling all over it maybe you should practice at home on your own toilet. Amy Johnson |
|
A picture really is worth 1,000 words |
 |
|
Amy gets pissed off |
| I’ve been getting complaints yet again about people pissing on the toilet seat. It is mostly in the bathroom by the CS room so whoever uses that bathroom please aim more carefully or wipe up the mess afterwards so others don’t have to. If you can’t even pee properly I don’t even want to imagine you trying to do anything else with it. Amy Johnson |
|
Amy don’t take no shit |
| Here’s another message about the CS bathroom and some disgusting employee.
Apparently pissing on the seat wasn’t enough so now someone has decided Amy Johnson |
|
Smoking doesn’t kill people… Amy kills people. |
|
Even thought you’ve been told many many times there is still people smoking in the bathrooms. Would you please just grow up and respect the rules of your workplace and your co-workers. Andrew has been nice enough to buy a bus for you to smoke in, yet you are too lazy to go outside and use it so you’ll do what you’ve probably done since junior high and that is hide out in the bathroom and smoke your cigarette. You’re pathetic. Just go outside like everyone else and stop thinking you’re somehow special because you’re not. Amy Johnson |
|
Amy dishes out the Christmas cheer… |
|
There has been a change of plans for the christmas party. Because we have some ungrateful whiners in here who can’t appreciate anything that is a little different than our usual christmas party activity we will now be having dinner at Pizza Delight and that’s it. Curling has been cancelled because apparently some of you think it’s such a stupid idea and felt the need to have to complain. I don’t know how you thought by complaining about it would do any good but now the ones that have have ruined it for everyone else. SO HERE’S A BIG THANK YOU! Hope you’re pleased with yourselves. Amy Johnson |
Share this:
Webcam – Test
Share this:
When RobDurdle.com just wont do…
You used to be able to ask Edward Tufte questions on his website.
He disabled the new questions part a few years ago so only a topic or
two a month comes out now. But the old topics form years long
conversations running to tens of thousands of words, generally polite
and insightful. Here are some excellent threads: recommendations for graphing software, Book design: advice and examples, Medical information exchange: The patient, doctor, computer triangle, Evidence and assumptions in tree diagrams, Airport maps, Lists, Advice for effective analytical reasoning, a celebration of Megan Jaegerman’s news graphics, Design of causal diagrams, the merits of ISO paper sizes.
Share this:
99 Things To See on the Internet
From Time.com
I remember my first viral video. The year was 2001 and I was a
fresh-faced teenager with my first high-speed Internet connection.
Someone showed me a Flash animation featuring 1980s Japanese video game
images repurposed into a techno music montage. Or something. I’m not
really sure. I didn’t understand “All Your Base Are Belong To Us”
then and I don’t understand it now, but I can’t deny its Internet
significance. All I remember is that people wouldn’t stop saying
“Someone set up us the bomb” for at least a week.Since then, I have become thoroughly entrenched in Internet pop
culture (I’m pretty sure that half of my workday is spent exchanging
YouTube videos with coworkers, but don’t tell anyone). There was the Star Wars Kid (2002); Homestar Runner (which I saw in 2003-4) and Tom Cruise’s Scientology video (2008). When a friend refused to stop singing “Peanut Butter Jelly Time,”
I didn’t speak to her for three days because whenever I did she would
sing it, and the song would get stuck in my head. But that was in 2002,
and I haven’t seen the video since. That is, until now.Advertising copywriter Greg Rutter has compiled everything great about the Internet and put it on one web page. Youshouldhaveseenthis.com is a list of 99 videos and websites that any self-respecting Internet addict needs to see — and probably already has.
So if you have a lot of free time, here are the best things the Internet has to offer:
• Number of animal videos: 11
• Number of animal videos that should come with a warning because they’re too adorable and will make you cry at work: 1
• People who injure themselves: 6
• People who injure other people: 3
• Children who will grow to resent their parents for putting embarrassing footage of them on the Internet: 9
• Things that are funny because they’re from the 80s: 6
• Home shopping TV screw-ups: 2
• Sports videos: 2
• Acts of bad journalism: 9
• Reminders that OK Go are better at making music videos than they are at making music: 1
• Inaccurate portrayals of American history: 1
• Fat people: 4
• Angry Germans: 2
• Transvestite midgets: 1
• Videos longer than 5 minutes: 5
• Videos shorter than 30 seconds: 12
• Celebrity videos: 7
• Wedding videos: 2
• Videos of people dancing: 9
• Ads for an office product that seems oddly sexual: 1
• Performances inspired by Star Wars: 3
• Freaky Tom Cruise moments: 2
• Things from Japan: 4
• People with too much time on their hands: 37
• Grown men who may never know the love of a woman: 12
• Bonus NSFW links hidden at the bottom of the page that should not be viewed in public, or even at all: 4
• Number of links I clicked on at work anyway: 4
• Level of awkwardness when my boss walked by: high to very high
That’s it. You’ve now seen everything that’s on the Internet. There’s nothing left to do now except check Facebook.
Share this:
Welcome to the Khan Academy…. KHAN!!!!
Sal Khan likes explaining things, and he’s really good at it. Here he is on CNN giving an excellent explanation of the financial crisis. And here’s a great explanation of Newton’s Law of Gravitation. His YouTube channel has over 700 lectures and you leave understanding everything he talks about no matter the subject.
Share this:
Levar Burton sings Reading Rainbow.
One
of the highlights of the show was that LeVar Burton, star of Roots,
host of Reading Rainbow and “Geordi LaForge” on Star Trek: The Next
Generation, came out to watch the show and even came on stage for an
impromptu performance of the Reading Rainbow theme song! If you missed
it, you can check it out here
Share this:
v2 = (0 m/s)2 + 2 (9.81 m/s2) (200 m) = 63 m/s
What is the force Superman exerts to stop a plane from crashing into the ground, or the speed and mass of Vince Vaughn’s winning Dodgeball shot? What’s the force exerted by a Dominique Wilkins windmill slam dunk, or the speed of a retired Charles Barkley? What’s the frequency of a cat’s purr? …the mass of a snowflake? …the pressure inside a can of soda? ..the reaction time of the human fingertip?
The Physics Factbook, via hypertextbook.com, is “an encyclopedia of scientific essays written by high school students that can be used by anybody,” containing over 800 entries and special topics.
Also from hypertextbook.com: E-world (which hosts a cool reloadable mosaic of a ton of NYC traffic video cameras), the Physics Hypertextbook and the Chaos Hypertextbook.
Share this:
So long, Farewell, Auf Wiedersehen, Goodbye… get out.
Dear President Bush, Thanks for the memories. You will be missed. Thanks for making people care. And don’t let the door hit you in the ass on the way out. Wishing you all the best, A Citizen.
I started high school the year you went into Office, and now, eight
years later, I am frankly amazed. Under your Administration, I have
watched my liberties evaporate, my friends get shipped off to one of
the most dangerous corners of the world, my money become less valuable,
and my prospects of getting a good job out of college dwindle.And for what?
You lied to me, you disrespected me, you robbed me, and you violated my human rights.
What do you have to show for that?
The world went from loving us (or at least tolerating us) to
loathing us. Our money went from being the preferred international
currency to less than that of Canada’s. Our schools are languishing
under the burden of your asinine No Child Left Behind Act. New Orleans
still has not entirely recovered from Hurricane Katrina. The NSA, FBI,
CIA, and local police can look at my mail, listen to my phone
conversations, or go through my online history at a whim. The economy
frankly sucks, thanks in part to you and your lust for deregulation and
profit margins.Where is Osama bin Laden? When will the Mission really be Accomplished? What have you actually accomplished?
I am ashamed of my country, we were the shining white knight of the
world, gave more international aid and support than other countries
combined, but now we are known as liars, profiteers, torturers, and
murderers. We went from having the greatest level of international
approval and support following 9/11/2001 to being absolutely reviled.
So far it seems that the only people who got ahead in these past eight
years were your friends and business partners whose interests you
looked out for.With all that in mind, I now say to you: Good bye and Good Riddance.
Now get the fuck out of my government,
Kyle Martin
Share this:
Police seek blow-up doll sex bandit
A Cairns, Australia gentleman burglarized three adult shops, stealing
blow-up sex dolls called “Jungle Jane” and having sex with them in an
alley. Police have collected evidence, including DNA. From Reuters:
“It’s totally bizarre. It’s a real concern that someone
like that is out on the street,” said one of the owners of the adult
sex shops in Cairns in northern Queensland state.“He has been taking the dolls out the back and blowing them up
and using the dolls and leaving them in the alley,” the owner, who gave
the name of Vogue, told the Cairns Post newspaper.
Share this:
Pink & Blue
Pink is still the colour where little girls are concerned, no matter where they grow up – some think propensity for pink is hardwired into girls. For a stark depiction of how many pink things a five-year-old could possibly own, a Korean photographer photographed boys and girls with their possessions arranged according to colour.
Share this:
My Desktop… so sexy
http://backend.deviantart.com/embed/view.swf
Enigma by ~Kaelri on deviantART
Share this:
Don’t hit the books; craft with them
So, you have some old books lying around you don’t read and that you’re
pretty sure no one else will ever read because they have pages missing
or they’re hopelessly outdated technical manuals or they never should
have been published in the first place. What to do? As always, crafting
is an option. You can make a wrist cuff, or a purse. Book covers can be made into clocks, or photo frames, or photo and card stands. They can become CD and DVD cases, or a hiding place for valuables or necessary contraband, Shawshank Redemption-style.
You can make yourself a diary, notecards, envelopes, or gift tags. If you’re feeling more artistic than practical, some people use the pages from a book as a canvas. Artist Su Blackwell brings scenes from her books to life: check out Alice’s Tea Party, or this scene from The Snow Queen. Personally I feel strangely drawn to this piece. Noriko Ambe sculpts with his books; Stefano Arienti created this installation, and Brian Dettmer took a scalpel to his and did some “Book Autopsies”. There are more ideas for things to be done with books to be found here and here.
And will you die-hard book lovers kindly stop screaming. It’s not like I wrote a post on how to craft with your mother. Yet.
Share this:
It’s Dede: The “Tree Man”
Dede, aka “Tree Man”, is an Indonesian fisherman who has been slowly changing from a human into a tree… or at least that is what it appears.
After cutting his knee as a teenager, Dede began to grow tree like warts that have baffled local doctors and medical experts for over 20 years. .
Share this:
Mythbusters takes on the Moon Hoax!
Has man really set foot on the moon? There have certainly been a lot of
claims that the whole Apollo missions were one giant hoax. Adam and Jamie at Mythbusters examine the claims of the Hoax Believers one by one. Did they use a wire rig or slow down the film to simulate the 1/6 moon gravity? What would it look like in real 1/6 G? Would a footprint in the lunar regolith have maintained it’s shape even if there was no moisture to keep the material together? Why was the flag waving so much if there was no wind on the moon? Why are the shadows on the moon not parallel
if they are coming from a single light source? Why can we see the
astronauts when they are in shadows if there isn’t a second light
source? To finish it all off they shoot a laser at the moon to see if the reflector they supposedly left there is actually there.
Share this:
On a Clear Day, I Can See Mumbai but Not Dick Cheney’s House
What a month for Google Earth. Its breathtaking updated 3D New York City skyline features textured photos of hundreds of buildings. It has doubled its US coverage and expanded Street View imagery by 22 times. But it also became the subject of a failed legal petition in India demanding it blur sensitive areas in the country. Supposedly, it had agreed to do this nearly two years before the Mumbai attack. Despite the bad timing, an Indian rival plans to sharpen the competition. Google Maps and Earth allegedly blur sensitive sites and a few questionably sensitive landmarks. However, as yet undeterred by security and privacy controversy, Google is adding GeoEye’s satellite imagery to Google Earth next month.
Share this:
Dog Hunt!
Unlike robots with no emotions
I was always pissed when ever that dog popped up from behind that bush.
Every duck you missed there he was mocking you. Every duck you shot
there he was taking the credit, but now I can finally get revenge on that damn dog!
Share this:
“It’s all caviar and ballons until someone backhands a cop!”
The Cliche-o-Matic: Never be at a loss for banal words again!
Share this:
How Opium Can Save Afghanistan
Poppy For Medicine. “America’s drug war in Afghanistan has been a miserable failure. So why not legalize opium production and let Afghanistan become the Saudi Arabia of morphine?”
Share this:
Paper. Rock. Scissors.
In 1986, most gamers who were lucky enough to own a new video game system at home were playing the original Nintendo. It’s launch in 1985, a year before the Sega Master System was launched in the states, allowed it plenty of time become the most popular console in the market, and the game Super Mario Bros. quickly became the best-selling video game of all time (a title it continues to hold, having sold over 40 million copies to date). However, even though Nintendo commanded 95% of the North American video game market at the time and the CEO of Sega made little effort to promote and market it, some people still bought and gave the Sega Master System a chance. Perhaps it was the 3-D glasses or it’s unique ability to read multiple media inputs… or perhaps that the original version of the system had a secret game built right into it (and it was unbeatable!).
Although the system was an underdog, it underwent several redesigns and mascot changes, ranging from Alex Kidd to, finally, Sonic
in the end. When the system was redesigned around 1990, Sega finally
tried to market it aggressively, but it was too late. By 1992, sales
were nearly non-existent in North America (although it should be noted
the console was very popular in Europe and several other countries where Nintendo did not sell consoles). Which is all too bad, because there were many brilliant, brilliant games for the SMS.
For those of us lucky enough to have owned a SMS, we can delight in the
nostalgia brought about by the mere mention of games such as Zillion, Alex the Kid in Miracle World, Choplifter, Ys, After Burner, Altered Beast, Phantasy Star, Hang On/Safari Hunt, and Shinobi.
Share this:
Go Grease Your Friends.
Need a side of bacon on your web site? Everything is better with a little bacon added to it.
Keep up to date with what’s cooking at the Bacolicio.us blog.
Share this:
Games people play… for free
95 Old School Games You Can Play Online:
Every game is reviewed and rated. Includes a link to every game on the
list, a visual and mini description and how each one is played.
RobDurdle.com 
You must be logged in to post a comment.