I heard a radio program about this, and most shopkeepers/bigger businesses do have backup generators and pay plenty for them. But without, they run the risk of losing their entire inventory. Ten years ago, when this area was accustomed to 3-4 hour outages each day, it was idiotic to make that gamble. One shopkeeper I heard interviewed hit the nail on the head when he said (paraphrasing), "They say we are a developed country, but is that really true?" Sure, you can take calls and McDonald's orders from around the world, but keeping the lights on is pretty basic for "developed" countries.

Link's Awakening at work? Challenge accepted.

Finally, I can quickly change all voice over dialogue to my bad Sean Connery impression.

So this is where Woot.com gets all their crap?

They do, Elmo will teach them the beauty of sharing.

And FTA, he's got no funding. I don't see why venture capitalists or those 99%-ers give to stuff like this. Vaccines are nice and all, but getting people enough food to live and not killing the world would be much more beneficial. I've been dreaming of these quivering walls of meat for years -- I even wrote about it in a science-fiction class -- but I don't see it happening before I die, and I'm not even 30. This kind of thing is just like genetically modified crops, it's just to strange for some people to get their heads around. I wish they would wake up and see that what they are eating is a horrific Mengelesque monstrosity borne from greed, and worse than any lab-grown chow could ever be.

I for one welcome our new Chinese overlords, ni hao.

Ugh, site got /.-ed anyone have a link to the cached version?

That's no planet, it's a space station!

I tried this in Google Reader and successfully crashed my work computer. That and trying -- unsuccessfully -- to think of something witty for Slashdot has put me really far behind.

"She's got the Jimmy legs!" Frank Costanza

Where do I sign the petition to get Wii Fit out of every single old folks home.