The Russians are selling one of their space shuttles for $6 million. That sounds really cheap. I wonder if there\’s anything wrong with it. It was probably in an accident. If I had the money I\’d buy it and fly to the space station just to spite NASA.
[ From Slashdot ]

If you live in LA and you\’ve tried to find the ramp from the 110 freeway to the 5 in downtown, you know it\’s pretty confusing. After getting lost a couple times LA artist Richard Ankrom decided to do something about it. He meticulously planned out and installed an addition to a freeway sign, a simple \”North 5\” above an arrow. Caltrans didn\’t notice the addition until someone told them about it.

\”The experts are saying that Mr. Ankrom did a fantastic job,\” conceded Caltrans spokeswoman Jeanne Bonfilio. \”They thought it was an internal job.\”

When he installed the sign he even wore a reflective vest and hardhat. I guess you can call this constructive vandalism?

The Adrenaline Vault has the first SimCity 4 screenshots.

GI Photo Joe has neat pictures of GI Joe dolls photoshopped into famous World War II photos. I\’m impressed, they\’re very convincing. He also provides tips for making your own photochops.
[ From Boing Boing ]

Even better news for geeks everywhere: Nationwide Boom in Tech Hiring Predicted This Year

But for 2002, hiring managers at both high-tech and non-tech companies said they expect to have more than 1.1 million technology jobs available. And they predict they won\’t be able to fill almost 600,000 of those jobs because they won\’t be able to find qualified applicants.

Of course, you\’ll probably have to move to Buttfuck, Nebraska to find some of these unfilled jobs.
[ From Ben Sullivan\’s Tech Blog ]

Good news for geeks everywhere: Time writes about the upcoming Matrix Reloaded. There\’s also a production photo of Neo kicking ass. Both sequels are being shot at the same time in Australia. We\’ll have to wait till 2003, but the good thing is both movies will be released just months apart.

CNN has an article about the printer/ink scam. You know, pay $50 for a printer and $40 for the ink cartridges. The article talks about the refill industry that has sprung up. The printer companies don\’t like it and they\’re implementing new technology to prevent refills. If I didn\’t care about the environment I\’d just buy a new printer each time I run out of ink and throw out the old one.

Star Wars Sick Days Will Cost $300m

Chicago-based recruitment firm Challenger, Gray and Christmas projects as many as 2.6m workers will take the day off work on May 16 to see the latest instalment of George Lucas\’s sci-fi series.
…
Challenger told Reuters that technology firms were likely to be hit harder than most because of the high proportion of geeks among staff, who were likely to be Star Wars aficionados.

Geeks rule.

I got my tax refund check today. A whopping $38. Woohoo. Jackpot. Ding ding ding. Now I can finally get that operation to remove my brain tumor.

A new 2 disc set of Memento is due in May (finally. Though that\’s probably bad news for those of you who bought the previous no-frills release last year.) DVD File has a quick interview with director Christopher Nolan:

There are no alternate endings or deleted scenes because there were none. We had to shoot very fast and in a very specific manner. You referred to the film as nonlinear but in fact it\’s very linear just in reversed chronology. Because of the way the film is presented you really can\’t remove any scenes. The challenge of editing the film was to make it move as quickly as possible without having to take away entire scenes.