Ubuntu 8 thumbs up

I just installed Ubuntu 8 on a laptop headed for Costa Rica. I'm figuring that if I put Windows on there I'd be asking for it because out in Mal Pais the bandwidth is crap so it wouldn't be updated and XP would be hacked in minutes without updates.

I didn't want a Mac because it's too pricey so I got an old hand me down Dell laptop and threw on Ubuntu 8.04.

All I can say is WOW is it ever cool, very fast, functional and so far in the past couple of hours it's been totally headache free.

If somebody can put an AOL-esque shell on it, it would save hundreds of millions of old computers from the trash. I think I'm in love, sweet.

Download it, run it from CD to try it out and then put it on some old hardware - you won't be sorry.

Find it here.

BMW X6

On my way out of a dental appointment yesterday I saw the first new BMW X6 on the back of the delivery truck being unloaded at the BMW dealer. Very sweet wheels. Looks like a 6 series with 19 inch wheels.

Off for a couple of weeks

I'm off to Costa Rica for a couple of weeks on a working vacation and then back in time for 10 more roadtrips in the next 3 months. Such is the price for that that I asked.

I haven't been updating this blog much probably because I haven't had a hell of a lot of inspiration outside of my work (which in itself has been hair-raising and exciting). I'm not sure if I'll continue this blog or just let it wither as it does from time to time.

I'm actually thinking about starting a cutting edge technical group blog related to my profession with a few other posters, lets see how that goes.

Maybe I'll just drink some tequila and go fishing for the next couple of weeks and say fuck it.

CNN T-Shirts

CNN have this strange but cool feature where you can order any one of their headlines as a T-Shirt. How cool is this?

One pint of piss and three shots of peroxide

I was having a couple of brews with some friends on Sat nite and one fellow who works in a health food store told me about some secret cure for almost every ailment known to mankind. He tells me that gargling, inhaling and drinking hydrogen peroxide will kill most germs and viruses in your mouth, lungs and gut and it's a proven fact that your immune system uses peroxide to kill bacteria and viruses.


Hold on a sec, last time I checked there was a poison label on peroxide bottles and it says clearly on the side "not for internal use".


So I called him a nutbag more or less and forgot about this story until yesterday. You see yesterday I had to go in for some dental surgery so I googled peroxide mouthwash and did some research on ozonated water and found something startling. First off, peroxide is regularly used as a mouthwash and can be found in all the off the shelf mouthwashes with opaque bottles including Crest super white. Just check the ingredients (I did). Second, the FDA approves the peroxide up to 3% (10 vol) as a mouthwash (not ingested). Third, the Time magazine product of the year for 2006 was the Lotus sanitizer which uses something similar in the form of ozonated water. And finally, the EPA approves peroxide as a sanitizer.

Here's what got me really curious, I found hidden in a report on the Tersano (lotus mfg) site that shows that 3% peroxide is seriously more effective than ozone-water or even Lysol!



So finally I go to see my dental surgeon and ask him what he thinks about peroxide mouthwash. He says its excellent and he recommends it for his periodontal patients but it's overkill for most people.

Seems like a pretty good treatment for throat, mouth and sinus infections when gargled but deadly when ingested in a concentrated form (i.e. over 10%). I've tried gargling it and it tastes and feels horrible but seems to work because my mouth is pretty fresh and my teeth are extra clean. I'm not going to use it regularly but I'll probably start buying the Crest mouthwash with peroxide.

Here's a relatively accurate article from truthorfiction.com.

As for the piss, some other people drink it for medicinal purposes. Personally, I'd probably be dying before I'd consider drinking pee.