.comment-link {margin-left:.6em;}

Just-Stam
things that just are

Monday, November 26, 2007

Mind the Gap, Crazy American

Tube announcer fired over spoof messages
Reuters

LONDON - An official announcer for London's Tube system has been sacked after making spoof messages mocking American tourists, peeping Toms and sweaty commuters.

Voiceover artist Emma Clarke, 36, recorded the announcements in the same smooth tones that have warned millions of passengers to "Mind The Gap" and posted them on her Web site.

The messages include:

* "We would like to remind our American tourist friends that you are almost certainly talking too loudly."

* "Would the passenger in the red shirt pretending to read the paper but who is actually staring at that woman's chest please stop. You are not fooling anyone, you filthy pervert."

* "Would passengers filling in answers on their Sudokus please accept that they are just crosswords for the unimaginative and are not in any way more impressive just because they contain numbers."

* "Here we are crammed again into a sweaty Tube carriage ... If you're female smile at the bloke next to you and make his day. He's probably not had sex for months."

Clarke said it was "just a bit of a laugh." But Tube operator Transport for London (TfL) failed to see the funny side and dropped her, after eight years.

"London Underground is sorry to have to announce that further contracts for Miss Clarke are experiencing severe delays," a TfL spokesman told the Evening Standard on Monday.

All the recordings are at: www.emmaclarke.com/fun/mind-the-gap/spoof-london-underground-announcements

Friday, September 07, 2007

Israelis do it again

Very cool image resizing technology demonstration. Very simple but very clever.

From Pogue's Posts

Thursday, September 06, 2007

Great Names

The winners of Freakonomics' Aptonym Contest have been announced. (An aptonym is a name that also describes what ones does). Paige Worthy, a magazine fact-checker, was the inspiration for the contest.
Continue reading...

Thursday, August 09, 2007

Wild

Amazing video of the wild
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LU8DDYz68kM

h/t nf

Thursday, July 26, 2007

Catch it while you can

Obesity is 'contagious,' study finds

Obesity can spread among a group of friends like a contagious disease, moving from one person to another in an epidemic of fat.

That's the finding of a novel study released Wednesday that reported that having close friends who are fat can nearly triple your risk of becoming obese.


Rest of article

Thursday, July 12, 2007

It's Electric

Burned jogger shows lightning, headphones don't mix

By Gene Emery

BOSTON (Reuters) - Here's a handy tip for joggers: If you think you might get caught in a thunderstorm, leave your music player at home.

Doctors at Vancouver General Hospital in Canada said a 37-year-old jogger wearing an iPod was burned on his chest, neck and face after the man and a nearby tree were struck by lightning in 2005. The burns traced the path of the earphones, they said.

Article

Wednesday, June 27, 2007

Google Predicted in 1964

Pretty cool prediction from 1964