how will the wolf survive?

Fun Facts and Activities
New 700 Mile Mexican Border Fence Edition!

Math Fun!

Q: If you own a car that can drive at 350 mph, how long will it take you to cross the fence?

A: About 30 minutes if you tunnel under it; approx. 2 minutes if you climb over it. Neither of these would involve your car. (It would take you two hours to drive the length of the fence.)
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Q: If the security wall weighs one ton for every ten square feet, how much heavier will the Earth be when it is completed?

A: 369,600 tons, but only if the wall is constructed of lunar concrete and meteorite rebar, as called for in the original design.

Good fences make good neighbors?
Did you know that Robert Frost's famous line from "Mending Walls" was intended to be ironic? He actually believed that fences created bad relationships between neighbors, just as he believed that taking the road less travelled made little to no difference.

History Hoopla!
This is not the first such border in history. The Great Wall of China, the Berlin Wall, and the New Orleans levees are some other great public works projects built to keep out unwanted intruders. Can you name more?

Trivia
Can you guess which of these is not the name of a rock band?
-700 Miles of Fence
-30 Odd Foot of Grunts
-10,000 Maniacs

Challenge!
Try repeating this spicy racist tongue twister three times fast, if you're not too busy taking a siesta:
"Mexican wrecks of men oversexed Texan friends; cross rivers, bras quiver, Chorizo sausage," Juan said.

Lost In Translation!
Unscramble these British terms to reveal a single border-related phrase:

007 limes offence



(Answer: 700 miles of fence)

tales of the not quite usual

A boy had the misfortune to be born with a swastika-shaped birthmark directly under his nose, resulting in years of shame and humiliation. When he was old enough, he grew a small square moustache to hide the offensive birthmark from view.

requiem or a dream

Joel Weisskopf, 54, Noted Movie Marquee Letter Thief, Dies

Joel Weisskopf, the self-styled street artist who stole single letters from movie marquees throughout the tri-state area, died Monday at his home in East Brunswick, New Jersey. He was 54.

Since the early 1970s, Weisskopf was widely known for his practice of stealing an individual letter from the title of a movie in a way that changed the meaning of the movie.

"Any hooligan with a ladder can steal letters," noted film scholar David Thomson once wrote of Weisskopf, "but Joel elevated it to an artform of transformation through creative absence."

Weisskopf's first notable work involved removing the "G" from Francis Ford Coppola's 1972 blockbuster "The Godfather," resulting in "The Odfather." Although it was spelled incorrectly, its commentary on the state of American parenting was obvious to all who saw it on the marquee at the East Orange Cinema, where it remained for two weeks before the company was able to find a replacement "G".

A few years later, Mr. Weisskopf initially denied responsibility for "The Texas Chainsaw Ass Acre," spotted near Times Square in 1974, claiming that the added space between "ass" and "acre" went against his principles. When police later found the missing "M" in his apartment, he admitted he had removed it from the marquee in question.

The late 1970s, which many consider to have been a golden age for American cinema, also proved to be a fertile ground for Mr. Weisskopf, who turned out a string of popular works such as "Tar Wars," "Men Streets," "California Spit," "Ashville," "Being Here," and ending with "Apocalpyse Ow" in 1979 and "Aging Bull" in 1980.

Critics dismissed his 1980s work, including "Back O The Future," and "A Mad Us," and he went into a period he termed his "artistic hibernation" which lasted until the late 1990s. During this time he worked as a computer programmer.

He always defined his art strictly - he would remove no more than letter from any title, and, after "Texas Chainsaw," he would not alter the remaining title in any way. He looked down on other vandals who would merely use the movie marquee letters to create new obscene phrases that bore little or no relation to the film titles they replaced.

He returned to the field he had created in 1997 with more minimalist works like "Tit Nic," which was followed in a similar vein by 2002's "Chic Go." Mr. Weisskopf's last major installation was 2004's "Rash."

He worked infrequently during this period, and the recent rise of digital marquee systems made Weisskopf's work difficult. He reportedly looked into reprogramming the L.E.D. signs used at theaters like the Union Square multiplex, but decided against it.

"He was sad about the disappearance of tangible letters," his sister Amy Weisskopf-Manwich said. "But he was still planning future projects."

Among the unrealized works in Mr. Weisskopf's notebook when he died was a removal of a "T" that would have resulted in Martin Scorsese's latest film being a suitable epiptaph for Mr. Weisskopf: "He Departed."

the interpreter maladies

The Washington Post, Oct. 11, 2006:
FBI AGENTS STILL LACKING ARABIC SKILLS: 33 of 12,000 Have Some Proficiency
Five years after Arab terrorists attacked the United States, only 33 FBI agents have even a limited proficiency in Arabic, and none of them work in the sections of the bureau that coordinate investigations of international terrorism, according to new FBI statistics.

An Interview with an FBI Arabic Specialist

Q: How did you get into translating Arabic?
A: You know that movie, Aladdin?

Q: The Disney movie?
A: Yes. That's the one. I saw that and really liked it and thought it would be interesting to learn more about that culture.

Q: So you've been interested in Arab culture from a young age?
A: No, no. This was last year. I have a two-year old and we got the DVD through Netflix.

Q: You weren't interested in Arabic before that?
A: Interested? I wasn't even aware it existed.

Q: Not even after September 11?
A: I mean, I knew Iraq existed. I knew about the Middle East. But I didn't know about, like Saudi Arabia and stuff.

Q: So after you saw Aladdin, you began to explore more Arab culture?
A: Yes. I rented The Return of Jafar and Aladdin and the King of Thieves, which were both disappointing. The first one didn't even have Robin Williams!

Q: What was your first experience with Arab culture that did not involve not animated films?
A: Ridley Scott's Kingdom of Heaven. That was really informative because it was, like, historical. It was about the Crusades, which was the first struggle against terrorism.

Q: I'm not sure that's the case.
A: Did you know Ed Norton was in it?

Q: No.
A: He played the guy with the f**ed up face.

Q: Moving back towards your interest in Arab culture...
A: Oh, so, yeah. I watched a lot of movies. Then I found out my superviser here, Agent [Name Removed], was looking for Arab translators. And I applied.

Q: At that point, you didn't speak any--
A: No, not a word.

Q: So how did you go about learning?
A: I ordered some of those CDs they sell in in-flight magazines, you know where they show that plain looking woman sitting at a cafe with earphones, learning some foreign language.

Q: Did you find the lessons helpful?
A: I'm not sure, they haven't arrived yet. They take like 6-8 weeks for delivery.

Q: So what are you doing in the meantime?
A: Well, and that's a good question, I've been looking over stuff anyway. We have documents we've seized overseas. My first idea was that I would do a frequency analysis.

Q: Could you explain that for our readers?
A: Sure, sure. You just flag certain words and look for how often they show up. Generally, we have computers to do that. For example, let's say somebody writes "Al Qaeda," "terror" and "bombs" in their blog a number of times. That sets off a flag on one of our computers, which is looking for those words used in connection with each other.

Q: So people should be careful when writing about "Al Qaeda," "terror" and "bombs" on the internet?
A: Well, they'd have to do it a number of times for it to set off alarms. That's where the frequency analysis comes in. I mean, if there's only one reference to "Al Qaeda," "terror" and "bombs," that's not too unusual. But if every other sentence is "Al Qaeda this, terror that, bombs bombs bombs..." then we're going to look into that more closely.

Q: Are there a lot of references to Al Qaeda, bombs, and terror on the internet?
A: More than you'd think.

Q: So you applied the frequency analysis to these Arab documents?
A: It wasn't as easy as that. Because they use some sort of different alphabet, so I didn't know where to start. I mean, I know what the words "Al Qaeda," "terror" and "bombs" look like in our alphabet, but not in theirs. So then I figured I'd check out the website for Al-Jazeera -- which by the way is another flagged word -- because I figured I might be able to figure out what it looks like when you write Al Qaeda in Arabic. And that site... man! Have you been there?

Q: Not recently.
A: It's like YouTube, but with more sh*t getting blown up! A whole bunch of videos of things exploding! Pretty cool, if you're into that sort of thing.

Q: How long do you estimate it will be until you are fluent in Arabic?
A: Whew. I'm not sure. I guess it depends how big the language is. I mean, I studied German for five years in middle school and high school, and can only speak a few sentences today.

Q: Do you currently speak any other languages besides English?
A: No. In addition to German, I took three semesters of French in college, but didn't learn that much. I guess I'm just not very good with languages. In some ways, you could say that learning Arabic for me is "a whole new world."

Q: I don't understand.
A: It's a song from Aladdin.

Q: Oh.
A: Anyways, thanks for interviewing me. It's certainly more fun than sitting at my desk looking for people who make too many references to Al Qaeda, bombs, and terror.

Q: It was nothing, really.

a college breakfast party

Coaltion to Stop the War in Iraq
******** College Chapter
2nd meeting , 1st semester
(October 5, 2006 - 10:30 am Brennan Lounge)

Attendance:
Harper, Leon, Ocean, Michael, Micheal, Colin, Theresa, "Names are a form of oppression"

Old business:
Reading of last week's minutes

• "Names are a form of oppression" asked that her name be removed from last week's minutes. Leon suggested that, at the time, "Names are a form of oppression" was known as Vanessa, so the minutes should accurately reflect that. Ocean added that it would be "like a Stalinist purge" to rewrite history in this manner. Micheal argued that the term "Stalinist purge" is overused by people who "totally don't get it" and asked if Ocean had even read "Das Kapital," because Ocean "totally did this summer." Micheal answered that "Das Kapital" was by Karl Marx, and Ocean should "get his facts straight." Ocean angrily asked "you won't be happy til everyone's straight, will you." Michael noticed that the secretary had written "Michael" instead of "Micheal" when recording the dialogue about Stalin and asked for the minutes to be corrected. "Names are a form of oppression" pointed out that this is why names are a form of oppression.

New business:

• Colin suggest a sit-in to bring attention to the ongoing war in Iraq. Theresa agreed with the idea and added "that will teach those pro-war scum." Michael asked if there actually were any pro-war people on campus. A brief silence ensued.

• Theresa asked if anyone had heard about Mark Foley. "Names are a form of oppression" said she had not. Harper gave a brief timeline of the scandal. Micheal said a guy who lived on her hall had been a page in high school. According to Micheal, the guy said he had never been the target of unwanted advances, adding, "but still."

• Leon discussed last night's episode of "Lost." Harper asked if Leon could send him an MPG of it. Leon agreed.

• Michael asked if anyone was planning to read Bob Woodward's State of Denial. Colin said he saw Woodward on "Larry King Live" last week and "he looked nothing like Roger Redford." Leon suggested that Colin meant "Robert Redford." "Names are a form of oppression" asked why it mattered since everybody knew who we were talking about. Ocean asked what "Roger or Robert Redford or whatever did anyway? Has anyone like even seen one of his movies?" Michael said he watched half of The Sting once.

• "Names are a form of oppression" asked to have a vote about whether we could change her name in the minutes of last week's meeting. Leon said the minutes had already been approved, and that this was the new business section of the meeting. "Names are a form of oppression" demanded a vote on whether we could revisit the minutes from last week.

• Vote On Motion To Determine Whether Minutes Should Be Revised: 6-2 against.

• "Democracy is a form of oppression" announced that she has changed her name from "Names are a form of oppression."

• Leon said he is from Pennsylvania and "that Amish school shooting is really [expletive] up." Furthermore, he suggested a bake sale to raise money for the victims' families.

• Vote On Motion To Hold Fundraising Bake Sale for the Amish: 7 in favor, 1 abstention.
  

• Ocean volunteered to head up a steering committee on the Bake Sale and report back at next week's meeting.

Harper adjourns meeting at 11:17 am.

daniel deronda

In which Mark Foley and George Allen believe each other to be 16-year-old boys in an online chatroom for Congressional pages.

Maf54 has entered the chat at 1:15:36 PM.

Maf54: where is everyone?
Nonjew27: dont know
Nonjew27: just me here
Nonjew27: probably black dude scared everyone away LOL
Maf54: what
Nonjew27: you know =)
Maf54: just came from the gym
Maf54: i'm all sweaty
Maf54: about to shower
Nonjew27: you have white skin, right?
Maf54: yes
Nonjew27: good
Maf54: now you know about my skin
Maf54: tell me what your skin feels like
Nonjew27: not sure what u mean
Nonjew27: feels like every other non-Jewish person's skin, i guess
Maf54: thats good. i like that.
Maf54: tell me about your package
Maf54: how big is it
Nonjew27: its regular size
Nonjew27: certainly not cut like it would be if i were Jewish, since i'm not
Maf54: tell me what you're doing
Nonjew27: im eating a sandwich. ham and cheese.
Nonjew27: i'm totally not a Jew...
Nonjew27: so i dont mind mixing meat and dairy products
Nonjew27: even though thats not kosher
Maf54: maybe you should come over and eat my sausage and cream
Nonjew27: not sure what you mean
Maf54: let's talk dirty
Nonjew27: like use the 'n' word?
Nonjew27: cool
Nonjew27: i'll start...
Maf54: no, i meant
Maf54: sexy talk dirty
Nonjew27: oh
Nonjew27: not so into that
Maf54: oh

Nonjew27 has exited the chat at 1:21:02 PM