We’ve been trying to have a baby for six months…

★ This was just too funny to not post. Enjoy.

★ Ashlee Vance, reporting for the NYT:

The Oracle Corporation, the technology information company, announced Monday that it would acquire a rival, Sun Microsystems, for $9.50 a share, or about $7.4 billion. […]

The deal immediately disrupts the traditional relationships formed between some of the technology industry’s largest players and thrusts Oracle into the hardware business. Oracle, for example, has long-standing partnerships with Sun’s rivals, including Hewlett-Packard and Dell.

Since just about every project I work on uses MySQL in someway, this is slightly disturbing news. Nobody nows exactly what Oracles plans for MySQL are, but I’m hoping that they don’t neglect it in favor of Oracle’s own DB. We can only wait and see.

★ Tinyarro.ws is a URL shortening service like bit.ly or tinyurl.com with a twist. It uses Unicode characters (➡ ★ ☆) in the URL. This makes a very tiny url.

These all point to the brokenparadigmlabs blog

➡.ws/★bpl
➡.ws/✪bpl
www.brokenparadigmlabs.com/blog

★ Read this on TPM this morning. The New York Times hit the nail on the head.

Louisiana has gotten $130 billion in post-Katrina aid. How is it that the stars of the Republican austerity movement come from the states that suck up the most federal money? Taxpayers in New York send way more to Washington than they get back so more can go to places like Alaska and Louisiana. Which is fine, as long as we don’t have to hear their governors bragging about how the folks who elected them want to keep their tax money to themselves. Of course they do! That’s because they’re living off ours.

Read the full article here.

★ This story out of china really got my attention as it came across my RSS this morning.

A 14-year-old boy in China was killed when his chair exploded, sending chunks of metal into his rectum. The bleeding this caused killed him.

I’m writing this at my desk while sitting on a chair very similar to this. This is very disturbing to me.

You can see more about this at Gizmodo.

★ Seriously, how does this happen? This was the plot of two low-budget movies last year (Stuck and Hit and Run). Is this life imitating art?

A pedestrian was struck by a sport utility vehicle on a street in Corona, Queens, on Wednesday morning, then immediately struck again by a cargo van that dragged the victim 17 miles through a web of city highways and to Coney Island in Brooklyn, the police said. The pedestrian, apparently a male, was killed.

– The New York Times cityroom blog

★ From the opening line of the BBC show ‘Being Human’ (s01e03). I thought it sounded very poetic.

love should be the opposite of death. It should be our biggest reason for wanting to be here.

★ And the hits keep on coming with another CollegeHummor Original

★ ONN does it again. It’s gonna be Legend-wait for it-Dairy.

★ Mr. Chi-City AKA Mr. Goodbar

★ I love that blue/red Obama poster by street artist Shepard Fairey. Here’s my take on it. 

★ It was a historic day for the country.

Today I say to you that the challenges we face are real. They are serious and they are many. They will not be met easily or in a short span of time. But know this, America — they will be met.
On this day, we gather because we have chosen hope over fear, unity of purpose over conflict and discord.
On this day, we come to proclaim an end to the petty grievances and false promises, the recriminations and worn out dogmas, that for far too long have strangled our politics.

In reaffirming the greatness of our nation, we understand that greatness is never a given. It must be earned. Our journey has never been one of shortcuts or settling for less. It has not been the path for the faint-hearted — for those who prefer leisure over work, or seek only the pleasures of riches and fame. Rather, it has been the risk-takers, the doers, the makers of things — some celebrated but more often men and women obscure in their labor, who have carried us up the long, rugged path towards prosperity and freedom.

Our challenges may be new. The instruments with which we meet them may be new. But those values upon which our success depends — hard work and honesty, courage and fair play, tolerance and curiosity, loyalty and patriotism — these things are old. These things are true. They have been the quiet force of progress throughout our history. What is demanded then is a return to these truths.

– President Barack Obama

I’ve heard that Obama writes his own speeches. Thats impressive, because I know that it’s his own words and his own feelings.

Full text of Obama’s speech

★ CH does it again.

★ Steve Jobs’ memo to his ‘Team’:

Team,

I am sure all of you saw my letter last week sharing something very personal with the Apple community. Unfortunately, the curiosity over my personal health continues to be a distraction not only for me and my family, but everyone else at Apple as well. In addition, during the past week I have learned that my health-related issues are more complex than I originally thought.

In order to take myself out of the limelight and focus on my health, and to allow everyone at Apple to focus on delivering extraordinary products, I have decided to take a medical leave of absence until the end of June.

I have asked Tim Cook to be responsible for Apple’s day to day operations, and I know he and the rest of the executive management team will do a great job. As CEO, I plan to remain involved in major strategic decisions while I am out. Our board of directors fully supports this plan.

I look forward to seeing all of you this summer.

Steve

It’s unfortunate that his person business has to be so public like this. I hope everything works out for Steve.

★ Are we really surprised. This is just the natural progression in the “Rick-Rolling” phenomenon. If you pay attention you can see this trend all over the internets.

★ “Closure” defined.

★ A wise person once said

Low self-esteem is a gift that keeps on giving.

- Kevin Pereira

This is very true, as I experienced this phenomenon first hand during the great Oahu Blackout of ’08.

★ Take what we’ve learned from the economy and apply it to other areas.

★ I’m clearly not patient enough to work with idiots.

That is all.

★ This is how my friday feels.