He's not a freak of nature, rather just a common simpleton.

This isn't the first time this has happened... It's not a medical mystery any more than a chick that hangs out in the sun too long will assuredly get really haggy (if not cancer-riddled).

Where are Marshall Pétain and Pierre Laval?
heh heh heh...

The little stoner got what he deserved. Kudos for the old man for profiting on his son's loss.

accidently hit 'submit'...
What I was getting at in the prior post is that maybe this Nordic Battlegroup needs more Finns and fewer Swedes. Finland has some pretty liberal gun laws -- their citizenry is armed and not afraid to protect itself from aggression. Just a thought...

I dunno ... the basic image strikes me as bogus. The naughty bits look like an afterthought added by a 14 year old with Photoshop. The story smells of phoniness.

That said, a fighting force primarily composed of Swedes doesn't instill a bunch of confidence in me. Sweden seriously wussied out during WWII, maintaining an official policy of neutrality, yet in reality generally collaborating with the Nazis a lot. They sold them tons of critical ballbearing & raw materials and also permitted the Wehrmacht to use their roads and railways to move troops back and forth between forcibly occupied Norway and Finland. The Finns for their part had some nominal alliance with the Germans, but it was really only to help fend off the communist Russians (Finland was pretty good on its own at this though!), who had serious design on Finland's territory and were the more imminent threat.

Those are awesome. Just the thing to put right under the "equipped with Windows Vista" sticker on the PCs at Best Buy.

@Slippy-
When you ran the diesel system dry you entrained air in the fuel system. That is the problem from which you are apparently still suffering, not crud in the system or anything that needs "cleaning" or "treating". System cleanings and the like indicate your mechanic is either a quack or a crook -- you need to have the system properly bled.

@everybody else-
The trait the blog post refers to is in industry typically called "reserve" or "empty reserve". Essentially, they purposely miscalibrate the fuel level senders to protect stupid people from running out of gas. How much a miscalibration depends upon the manufacturer, but it's all very intentional and all based on buyers like #5, who rate a car higher if it goes a long way when it is supposedly out of fuel.

The same tricks are pulled for a full tank (except it's called "full reserve" there). A lot of buyers like that they can fill the tank and then drive around for a week with the gauge still above "F". Of course, suddenly it starts dropping really fast, but a lot of people don't get the connection, that it is a purposely miscalibrated gauge. My mother-in-law is *convinced* her car gets better fuel economy when the tank is full. Ugh...

In a perfect world (for me), when the tank is truly full (usable volume) it would read "F" and when the gauge reads "E" it's about to sputter. It'll never happen because cars are now designed for idiots.

European Court of Justice huh? Sounds like where the Superfriends hang out when they are on holiday.

This was a rage at that time, not only in the US, but also Britain. A bunch of period titles on it are availble free at book.google.com... Enter in (no quotes) [simplified spelling] and you'll find a bunch.

Here's a good one:
http://books.google.com/books?id=yxlMAAAAMAAJ&printsec=frontcover&dq=simplified+spelling

Reminds me much of the "computing center" at my alma mater:
http://www.rpi.edu/about/campustour/vcc/index.html

It had formerly been a large stone chapel when that part of the campus was part of an adjacent seminary. It always struck me a bit ironic that the geeks at a technical school now "pay worship" to the computer housed therein.

6'5" Arabs living in the mountains bordering Pakistan & Afghanistan best not leave their caves too often.

I can't resist an immediate followup... I need to buy the book myself just to get more info on the "homebuilt field-burner" they have shown on this page:
http://www.farmshow.com/store/encyclopedia.asp

Rednecks from British Columbia? Probably not too many. I checked out their website and I think I'd paint them techno-hippy-geeks. Everyone needs a label of course, but theirs isn't redneck.

If anyone does want to see creations of real rednecks, I wholeheartedly endorse "Farm Show Magazine" (www.farmshow.com). Every issue is chock full of crazy things Rufus and Vern welded up from old tractor bits and angleiron out in the barn while they were waiting for the corn to grow. Some of the stuff looks clever and useful, but a lot is truly off the wall. Lots of dangerous devices waiting to rip the arms off the operator or his children. On the link, Farm Show They are now selling a compendium book of past "Made it Myself" ideas for $10. It's mighty entertainin' for the buck.

@stevie, et al-
Time for some lesson in scientific reasoning. Yes, whether an X or a Y chromosome is supplied by the fertilizing spermatazoön determines sex. That does NOT prove that the male is completely responsible for sex selection, though.

Establish a couple of counter-examples: Suppose a women puts out eggs that (for whatever reason) are only receptive (or more strongly receptive) to X chromosome sperm? Or that environmental conditions (perhaps related to what the chick eats or just her own genetics) in the vaginal canal give a mobility DISadvantage to Y chromosome spermatazoa? In both those cases, the guy's X:Y carrying sperm ratio could favor a male child, but after the maternal factors applied, a female child is more likely. Other alternative models easily could be developed. In order to say that "the male chooses sex" all these have to be DISPROVEN, which is pretty tough. I don't think that has happened, and in contrast, there is some evidence suggesting a (not well understood yet) maternal role.

This isn't my line of expertise. Maybe the effect is very small or it's not present entirely, but the point is that the presence of the X/Y chromosome in the male gamete, doesn't completely preclude some female involvement in sex selection. You need to think a little more logically.

We'll see how it looks in 10 years after the ink fades. Nice wife-beater shirt, though.