I hope so

Can hearing voices in your head be a good thing?

Psychologists have launched a study to find out why some people who hear voices in their head consider it a positive experience while others find it distressing.

Nifty new things from Apple

Click here to buy a new one of the new iPods! If you purchase from Amazon through this link, the Western Syndicate receives a referral bonus that helps fund the operation of our network. And I thought I'd never be in sales. Hah.

And these are really cool iPods. As a fan of the iPod shuffle, I'm just ... well, speechless over the new Shuffle. But really, if they make it any smaller than that I won't be able to see it...

The product I'm really looking forward to is the wireless Apple set-top box (I was just wishing last night that I could have a device that worked that way, before I knew that Apple was going to announce it.) Unfortunately you can't buy one at that Amazon link (yet) -- the product won't be available till next year, apparently.

Lots of information up at the Apple web site.

Reborn

We have always been told there is no recovery from persistent vegetative state - doctors can only make a sufferer's last days as painless as possible. But is that really the truth? (The Guardian)

I thought it was a telephone wire

I knew a guy like this in high school.

Vietnam's Electric Man electrocuted

HANOI (Reuters) - A Vietnamese man who once appeared on national television to demonstrate his ability to resist electric shocks has been electrocuted while repairing a generator, an official said on Tuesday.

(Yahoo!)

Not a contest

I will not do a contest about this.

HOWEVER. My new desktop computer is arriving tomorrow afternoon. It is replacing a trusty dual 1Ghz PowerMac G4 with mirrored drive doors (and the loudest fan ever to ship from Apple, I think.)

The old machine is named Quaoar, and a particularly nifty name it has been indeed. I am kicking around a couple of new machine name ideas but haven't decided yet. What should I call the new one?

More information about Quaoar here.

Rogue Amoeba shirts

Rogue Amoeba T-shirts are now available here. In case you're interested in that sort of thing.

Good thing he never met my parrot

"The only animals I'm not comfortable with are parrots, but I'm learning as I go. I'm getting better and better at 'em. I really am. "

-- Steve Irwin

"Yeah, for some reason parrots have to bite me. That's their job. I don't know why that is. They've nearly torn my nose off. I've had some really bad parrot bites."

-- Steve Irwin

How do I get on this list?

John da Fiesole reviews a book that sounds really interesting to me: Saints Behaving Badly: The Cutthroats, Crooks, Trollops, Con Men, and Devil-Worshippers Who Became Saints. Not that I'm necessarily any of those things. I'm also definitely sure I'm not a saint, so there you are.

Anyway check out his review for a full list of the saints, to give you some idea of why I don't expect to be able to resist picking up a copy.

Impossible

There is no legal obligation to perform impossibilities.

-- Publius Celsus

Current Boom

A dramatic graph showing the scale of the current real estate bubble. (The Galvin Opinion).