CVS uses a robo call to alert customers when a prescription is ready, if they don't go and pick it up within a few days of when they asked for it to be ready. I find this service to be helpful, and don't have a problem with an automated call handling it. I actually prefer it... it feels less judgmental than the local pharma-assistant calling, complaining that they have too many filled scripts on their shelves.

In another matter... should I include the calls from my alma mater's (UMass Lowell) alumni association? They employ students (not necessarily UML students) to call over and over and over and over and over and over and over.* I suspect these kids are mere robots, if not in actual flesh vs. inanimate material, then at least in terms of autonomic function.

Any ideas on how to stop this would be welcome, especially if from another UML alum. Yeah, I've tried all the usual means, just shy of tactical thermonuclear weapons.

I tired of flipping through the questions and keeping track on my own of my score, while laughing at the auto-text that said I picked this or that when clearly I could not pick a damn thing without a frakkin radio button to poke, so I wrote a script to take the test for me, consulting wikipedia and (proud of this one!) the RFC library for answers. Eventually, I edited the script to filter out all future references to infoworld from my slashdot feed, and to extend a robot arm and hand from my monitor and slap me in the face if ever I decide to similarly waste my time again.
Does that mean I pass?

... and am still waiting to get my power back, you insensitive clod!

Then why waste time on these small programs and go after the military?

One could easily make the case that voting is no longer nearly as functional (read: effective) as it once was nor should be.

Indeed! Great to see the return of the CN option. I very nearly voted it. But then the understanding of the actual choice's words overrode the joy of the presence of the words Cowboy Neal within them, and I shivered and backed slowly away from the mouse. Even Zombies take a pass on Cowboy Neal Brain.

Why should he fit into the system? Or more importantly, why should the system be made to be a fit for him?

Roger.

Give it time.... Natural Selection is a slow process.
Think of human population as a bubble waiting to burst, artificially out of balance.
It's an interesting question, though, whether or not our increased rate of knowledge will always stay ahead of "our enemies'" learning curve. If natural selection can't adjust to our ever-increasing ability to cheat it, then we are indeed Gods.
My gut says otherwise.

source, please?
Saying things like "reportedly, some local authorities, for people who refused to leave, were demanding them to provide their names and social security numbers" in a story which lambasts the government for making people afraid without a justifiable reason just pegged my irony-o-meter.

- I'm voting from space now, you insensitive clod!
- I'll wait, but I'll send my wife up as soon as possible.
- There's a universe in all of us...
- "when" tourise space flight begins? It's already started!
- can we send Cowboy Neal up first?

and what... wait for the next one to come out?

They are not offering the ultimate sacrifice at all. In fact, they are making the choice to help based partially on the understanding that they will suffer no ill effects at all from the radiation they will experience.

That said, I applaud them. Loudly. Theirs is an example we should all hold high. sjames replied to my comment as well, saying "I suppose the bravery is in willingly betting your life that you are right and the gibbering morons in the media are all wrong." I think that sums it up better than I could have. That's the example we should commend them for, not the heroism of risking their lives to cancer when it is mathematically near to impossible for them to get it.

Stories of the "heroism" of the workers at the plant have confounded Americans, it seems.
While I am sure there is plenty of actual heroism going on, I start to think part of it is just a matter of being level-headed about it.

It reminds me of the idea that to the uneducated, science seems like magic. Similarly, it seems that belief in science to the uneducated seems heroic.
These citizens should be applauded, not for their heroism - for in reality they are risking nothing - but for their willingness to conclude that they are risking nothing, and therefore can save others and improve their world with knowledge and intelligence instead of give in to fear and commercially driven FUD at the detriment of society.

News Flash from Japan: Brave, Brave souls make smart decisions based on facts instead of media FUD! Pictures (You Gotta see these pictures!) at 11!