I never had much interest in science-fiction until I read Slaughterhouse Five. It grabbed me, shook me up, made me laugh, and wouldn't let me put it down. I went from cover to cover in one three-hour sitting. I'm hard pressed to think of any book I've read that comes close to how much it affected. I'm surprised no one has mentioned it yet (outside of a few references to Vonnegut in general).

I recently re-watched Holy Grail and followed it up with Life of Brian, and I noticed that while both are funny, they're funny in very different ways.

Holy Grail is mostly a light-hearted parody of Arthurian legend. They took the framework of the quest for the Holy Grail, and injected it with the kind of surreal humor they're best remembered for. The closest thing to social satire in it is the oft-quoted scene where Arthur and the peasant argue over how he came to power, and that's more funny because it's totally absurd than because it's making any kind of statement.

Life of Brian, on the other hand, is very heavy on biting social satire. It's critical of beaurocracy and religion, chiefly. Most of the humor comes from mocking the people's way of being more concerned with being followers of the messiah than listening to the messiah's message, the way the Judean People's Front is a committee mired in bylaws, not really acting, most frequently infighting with the JPF, PFJ, Judean Populist Front, et al. The scenes you quote "It says 'Romans Go Home'" "No it doesn't!" are exceptions to the rule for Life of Brian.

This is surprisingly true. About 6 years ago, when I was still in high school, my brother, father and I built a computer and saved a collosal amount of money for a gaming rig that lasted about four or five years. A few months ago, my computer was starting to go, so I looked into putting together a new machine, and much to my dismay, it was cheaper to buy the same parts all assembled from Alienware than to build it myself. I wish I had a time machine so I could see the look on Past Me's face when I tell him that someday buying it from the high end boutique-ey maker would be cheaper than building it. I'd also like to tell Past Me to ease up on the Hawaiian shirts, but that's another story...

Well, they intended it to be big, but the designers got the signs for feet and inches mixed up.

If we really want to trot out a "Founding Fathers" thing, why bicker over the ideology vs. political expediency of slavery? Just cite the fact that they didn't allow women to vote.

The correct phrasing is, "I'm not dead yet!"

Tupperware: Hard to open and full of food that was new a long time ago.

Windows: Slow to open and full of stuff that was new a long time ago (on Macs).

So pretty much true, exept without the freshness.

Why do you qualify 20, 30 and 40 as positive, but not 10?

No, that's the white mice.

Gay Zombie Turing would be fantastically impressed by the rights homosexuals have today, but he would sadly be the victim of much descrimination as a zombie, since prejudice against them is still wide-spread and well-rooted.

I'd never give up paper books, but Kindle has it's uses...

http://xkcd.com/548/

Just because it was developed in Japan for the disabled and for soldiers in America doesn't mean that you won't see it on Japanese soldiers or American disabled someday.

"Security Questions" can be, for lack of a better word, prefectly secure if you use them right. The simple solution is to give a non-sequiter answer to the question. Anyone trying to get through with publicly available information will be stopped dead in their tracks. The added benefit is you also don't forget the answer because it's so bizarre. Anyone who's serious about cracking your account won't let that stop them, but it's more secure than letting anyone who knows what high school you went to/ what car you drive/ who your first kiss was have access to your account.

Also consider that it's much easier to get your hands on a replica gun than a real gun. You can just order it on the internet rather than buying a traceable gun legally or taking the risk of buying one illegally.

Also, the following quote from Snatch. seems appropriate to the situation...

"The fact that you've got "Replica" written down the side of your guns and the fact that I've got "Desert Eagle point five O" written down the side of mine should precipitate your balls into shrinking, along with your presence. Now... Fuck off! "

The problem isn't with instant content, it's in the implementation. I'm 22, and I went through school just about the time computers became ubiquitis in them. The people that were teaching me had been raised on books, they had no problem with attention span. But they gave us kids (who just naturally have a shorter attention span which needs to be shaped and molded into something better) a tool that enabled us to change focus even faster. The problem isn't books vs. computers, it's teaching people to focus on whatever medium they're paying attention to and to think critically about it.