Hit Him Again Welcomes IE6
Throughout this site, you may notice that certain headings and titles are stylized and not simple html text. This is by virtue of a flash/javascript solution going by the name of sIFR that is integrated throughout. This was causing problems in IE6 due to 6’s quixotic implementation of padding and margins that does not interface well with <embed> objects. The root of the problem was that the whitespace surrounding title words such as “Archives” and “Comments” were 25 pixels wider in IE6, causing the right sidebar with the primary title of “Recent Posts” to be pushed to the very bottom of the page when the increased width resulted in rollover. To resolve this issue, I wrote up some quick javascript to detect IE6 browsers and lop off the extra 25 pixels from all of these flash elements. You can ‘view source’ and inspect the javascript solution for yourself, as it can be found at the end of the html code.
I have also noticed that IE6 will improperly unload these objects, causing a ‘flicker’ or ‘momentary hanging’ effect when moving from one page to another. This is an unavoidable drawback of using IE6, and, if you can, I recommend you upgrade to IE7 - or, better yet, start using Firefox.
Update: Couric IS Actually Totally Ripped
I received some ‘blowback’ surrounding my picture of Katie Couric, expressing disbelief that she is actually that ripped. The picture is not a photoshop or fabrication, but a screenshot of her actual appearance on the Jay Leno show. Behold: Couric Flexing.
Preston Brooks: The Undergraduate
This site being styled in part based on my interest in Preston Brooks, a historical figure and former congressman from South Carolina, I have been putting some effort into researching his background. I know much, but there is much to learn.
I pinpointed a citation to an article devoted in its entirety to the man and his image: Preston Smith Brooks: The Man And His Image, South Carolina Historical Magazine, 79 (Oct. 1978), p. 296-303. I was able to pull this from the campus library, and it has some humorous insight into his time spent at the University of South Carolina.
As a student at South Carolina College, Brooks caused the administration great consternation by maintaining an acceptable academic record while frequently missing classes to visit the taverns in Columbia. . . . Only his capable scholarship apparently saved him from being abruptly dismissed from college on several occasions. . . . As a student . . . he engaged in a scuffle with a fellow student after a petty dispute over the outcome of a school election. The brief confrontation, which occurred when Brooks adamently [sic.] refused to duel, led to expulsion for his adversary, but only temporary suspension for him. Another imprudent episode took place just before his graduation, when he heard an exaggerated account of his brother being subjected to ‘ignominious treatment’ in the Columbia jail. Brooks, impulsively waving a brace of pistols, rushed to the jail where he was quickly disarmed without incident. The exasperated faculty used this latter event, which came after they had developed a repugnance for Brooks’s truancy and his relaxed academic attitude, to withhold his degree from the college.
I have requested the works cited in this paragraph in hopes of finding out the nature of the school election, and other particulars about his misdeeds before he failed to graduate. I am also following up with the Archives at the University of South Carolina to see what materials are available.
Defeat of the No-Decal Parking Ticket
Two things that you WILL take away with you after graduation from a university: a diploma and a parking ticket. I can confidently say that parking enforcement is out of control at campuses nationwide. Most everyone who gets a ticket for illegal parking feels aggrieved in some way: they were only stopping to drop something off at an area with no parking, it’s summer and there are millions of available spots, they build lecture halls and student centers without building parking, etc. Piling on, parking is usually exorbitantly expensive and mandatory for practical reasons - not to mention the latest “progressive” (aka socialist) schemes sprouting up, whereby faculty earning more also pay more to park. Absolute power has corrupted absolutely.
Yet, after my latest ticket I beat the system - the very thought of which invokes the envy, ire, awe, and/or fascination of my peers.
I will begin with an email that I sent to the head of Parking Services, as it describes everything in full.
Word Du Jour: ’sputum’
A noun, pronounced SPEW-tem, meaning:
Matter coughed up and usually ejected from the mouth, including saliva, foreign material, and substances such as mucus or phlegm, from the respiratory tract.
This word recently lead to the drubbing of Jerry Cipriano at the hands of Katie Couric.
During the tuberculosis story in June, Couric got angry with news editor Jerry Cipriano for using a word she detested— ’sputum’ —and the staff grew tense when she began slapping him ‘over and over and over again’ on the arm . . .
Though accounts of the attack seem exaggerated, I think this signals the end of the Couric era at CBS - not because she slapped someone on the arm in what “seemed like a joke at first,” but rather because she’s becoming the victim of slant. For political reasons, CBS is
apparently incapable of dispatching the first female anchor based solely on her poor ratings performance, unless it should be coupled with the perception that she is erratic and disagreeable.
The situation is helped none by the fact that Katie Couric is totally ripped.