I knew nothing then

That was a long time ago and now I know that
I knew nothing then, and if I had I wouldn’t
have gone on.

--Irene McKinney, “At 24″

Actual Terrible Movie

Mental Floss challenges worthy readers to identify movie titles as "Troy McClure films" or "actual terrible movies." You may remember Troy McClure as the character on the Simpsons who was always reminding people of his tenuous claim to B-movie celebrity while hawking products. Here's the quiz:

http://www.mentalfloss.com/quiz/quiz.php

I scored 73% (11 out of 15). Hey -- better than random chance (and better than the 66% averaged by test takers so far). Yay, me.

Make your own ringtone

More cool technology to pimp your life courtesy of Patrick:

Make Your Own Ringtone.

It's fun and it's free and I now have, as my ringtone, Darth Vader's Theme played on ukulele. Yessssss!

Hack your Comcast remote to skip commercials

Thanks to Patrick, I now know that you can hack your Comcast remote to skip ahead 30 seconds -- handy for something like, oh, I don't know -- skipping commercials, maybe? :-) It never occurred to me that I wanted -- needed! -- to do this and as soon as I found out about it I couldn't wait to Google for the instructions. I found 'em! Here they are! I totally copied 'em from this guy (but of course I couldn't resist making a few edits -- occupational hazard, you know):

1. Choose an unused or unneeded button on the “silver” remote to be the 30-second skip command. (Patrick recommends the red "Help" button, as there is no Comcast "Help" feature).

2. Press the “Cable” button at the top of the remote to put it into Cable Box Control mode.

3. Hold the “Setup” button until the “Cable” button blinks twice.

4. Type in the code 994. The “Cable” button will blink twice.

5. Press (do not hold) the “Setup” button.

6. Type in the code 00173.

7. Press whatever button you want to use for the 30-second skip command.

Congratulations! You have just stuck it to The Man.

Does whatever a spider can

Yesterday was World Environment Day. Alain Robert, France's "Spiderman," draws attention to climate change by scaling the New York Times building (as documented in the linked slideshow by the New York Times):

http://thesolutionissimple.org/

When he reached the top, the New York City po po promptly arrested him, which doesn't dilute the truth of his message but probably gratified everybody who was stuck in rush hour because of this stunt.

Right on, Alain!

I Am Cayenne Pepper

You Are Cayenne Pepper

You are very over the top and a bit overwhelming. You have a fiery personality, and you can give anyone a good jolt. You can easily take things up a couple notches, no matter what crowd you're running with.

What Spice Are You?