The geographic center of North America.

Source: UHaul Truck, then Here

If you’ve been in a cave, or maybe under the sea, then you haven’t yet heard that a Killer Whale killed its trainer at Sea World the other day.

So, some fun (or not so fun?) facts about killer whales:

• Killer Whales aren’t whales at all.  They are relatives to dolphins.
• Both whales and dolphins are mammals, not fish.
• In the wild, Killer Whales hunt in packs, like wolves.
• The name Killer Whale is thought to come from Spanish sailors, who saw the animal hunting larger whales.
• Killer Whales are at the top of the food chain.  They have no natural predators in the sea.
• Some Killer Whales hunt sharks and large whales.  Others just eat fish and birds.
• Killer Whales are also sometimes called Orcas.

Source: wiki

It’s easy to create a link to a YouTube video that starts the video at a specific time.  Useful if you are linking to a video that has a bunch of filler at the beginning.

If you’re linking to YouTube:

Add an anchor tag to the end of the URL that specifies the number of minutes and seconds to skip.  The example below starts the video 1 minute and 50 seconds in.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=buNcHofCrAZyCrAP#t=01m50s

If you’re embedding the video

Add a url parameter to the querystring in the code.  You have to do this in 2 places.  Oh, and this time you have to indicate the number of seconds to skip, so our 1 m, 50s becomes 110.

<param name=”movie” value=”http://www.youtube-nocookie.com/v/buNcHofCrAZyCrAP&hl=en&fs=1&rel=0&start=110“>

<embed src=”http://www.youtube-nocookie.com/v/buNcHofCrAZyCrAP&hl=en&fs=1&rel=0&start=110”

Easy stuff that will save your viewers precious seconds.  Like when they watch this.

Found here.

In the near future, you might not even have to visit a bank or an ATM to deposit a check. You’ll simply snap a couple of photos of it with your cell phone.

Applications to do just that are already available for Apple’s iPhone and other gadgets from USAA, a company that provides insurance and banking mainly for military veterans. Chase, Bank of America and Citibank are among the banks planning to release similar applications this year.

From the words that you hear in conversation but rarely write department: Segue.

It means to transition from one topic to another, and is pronounced Seg-Way.

This was yet another reminder that the internets are great and all, but are useless as a reverse dictionary.  If you don’t have the vaguest idea how to spell something, it’s a little tough to get anywhere.

And in an allegation that, if true, has an undeniable Orwellian quality, Blake Robbins, a 15-year old at Harriton High School and his parents, accuse an assistant principal of showing Robins a photo obtained by the webcam on his school-issued laptop, a picture the school official said indicated he was “engaged in improper behavior in his home,” according to Robbins’ lawsuit.

The New York Times reports that public schools across 8 states will launch a program next year that will allow students who pass a variety of proficiency exams to receive their high school diploma after 10th grade, and immediately enroll in community college.

(It seems that if you want to go to a regular (non-community) college, you can’t do that.  Instead you have to stay at the high school and go the regular route.)

The program is supposedly designed to decrease the number of people who have to take remedial level classes when they get to college, though I think the logic behind that rationale is kid of odd.

Its backers say the new system would reduce the need for community colleges to offer remedial courses because the passing score for the 10th-grade tests would be set at the level necessary to succeed in first-year college courses. Failure would provide 10th graders with an early warning system about the knowledge and skills they need to master in high school before seeking to enroll in college.

Currently, many high school graduates enrolling in community colleges are stunned to find that they cannot pass the math and English exams those colleges use to determine who need remediation.

Not sure why the same couldn’t be achieved by just administering proficiency tests, or by increasing standards in public high schools, but that’s beside the point.

As a gut reaction, I like this idea.  What I like most is that it gives kids who are achieving an early out.  They don’t have to waste the last 2 years of high school being dragged down by their less successful peers. They also get out of the destructive public school system, although they will just end up in the public college system.  Still, I’d take the college system over high school any day.

I attended community college during high school under a different program. My experience at the community college was less than stellar.  The quality of the instruction was a joke, and the non-selective nature of admissions made the whole thing feel a lot like an extension of the high school.

However, I did have a significant advantage, in that I acquired quite a few college credits before I had even graduated high school.  In this new program, the students would already have their diploma, and they would be able to have a college degree by the time their peers were graduating.  That gets people into the work force much earlier, and that is a great thing.

But while my initial reaction is to cheer this new idea, the fact that it’s supported by the teachers unions makes me skeptical.  So what am I missing here?  Can I really agree with the NEA on a school reform idea?

One of the high ranking members of Hamas was assassinated in Dubai the other day.  The hit squad that killed him is widely believed to be Mossad (Israeli intelligence).  They used fake passports that identified them as British and Irish citizens.

They broke into his hotel room, electrocuted him with the lamp to try to make it look like he had a heart attack, and when that didn’t work they smothered him with a pillow.  Before they left the room they somehow managed to lock the door, from the inside.

The whole thing reads like a movie plot, but it’s real life.

This article gives a good, if disorganized, account of the event and the facts that are known so far.

Crazy stuff.  In the end, there’s one less terrorist out there, and that’s a good thing.

The insurgent sniper hit him first. The Casper, Wyo., native was kneeling on the roof of the one-story outpost, looking for targets.

He was reaching back to his left for his rifle when the sniper’s round slammed into his helmet.

The impact knocked him onto his back.

“I’m hit,” he yelled to his buddy, Lance Cpl. Scott Gabrian, a 21-year-old from St. Louis.

Lance Cpl. Gabrian belly-crawled along the rooftop to his friend’s side. He patted Lance Cpl. Koenig’s body, looking for wounds.

Then he noticed that the plate that usually secures night-vision goggles to the front of Lance Cpl. Koenig’s helmet was missing. In its place was a thumb-deep dent in the hard Kevlar shell.

Lance Cpl. Gabrian slid his hands under his friend’s helmet, looking for an entry wound. “You’re not bleeding,” he assured Lance Cpl. Koenig. “You’re going to be OK.”