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Site Seeing
By JULES ALLEN Fell free to browse Tower of FunElectronic language translation will always be a nonstarter until some very smart computer nerds come up with a way to detect nuance and context. And the languages themselves play a small part in royally messing things up. Sometimes there is no direct translation for words or phrases. Even my editor will question some things I write. What seems logical to me seems dreadfully foreign to him; theoretically, we both speak English. Mix it up, put it on the Web, and you've got a laugh-a-minute way to kill at least 15 minutes. This site takes an English phrase and runs it through Altavista's Babelfish translator a few times. Brilliant. If it's broken, you can always do it manually using the second address above, which is more work and lacks the instant gratification. Rumble, rumbleHere's a good midmorning one to peek at if you've skipped breakfast. It should have you fishing questionably edible items out of your desk drawers or even the crack in the back of your chair. This site is about food, glorious food. Being a person of extremes, I'm spending as much time as I can in the north of this wonderful country this winter and plan on spending more time in Florida during the summer. So the winter recipes, such as the delicious looking Curried Butternut Squash Soup, are a winner in my house. Nodding offRegardless of deity or the currency you worship, pray you'll never get stuck in an elevator with anybody featured on this site. At least try to avoid those mentioned in the the Most Boring Celebrities of the Year section, a tour de force of overexposed dross from yesterday's People magazine parade. The information presented here, though, does have a serious side: It touches on depression, rising crime rates in the suburbs (go see Bowling for Columbine at the theater for more information on that subject) and generally wasting your life away. It's more serious than fun, but worth the read. Homemade lava lampsWhy can't we shake this obsession with the '70s? The '80s parachute pants will never be back, and growing one's hair out, hippy style, is too hard. I'd be willing to say it's just me noticing this stuff, but I'm not blind. I see the flared trousers your offspring wears to Baywalk, and you, you reckless parent, do nothing to curb your spawn's sartorial transgressions. I suppose you continue to indulge this retro view by buying them lava lamps and even -- gasp! -- encouraging them to make their own. It's a shock to see that this kind of information is available on the Internet. Network delightThere are a few minor things that are uncomfortable with Mac OS X, and the built-in FTP (file transfer protocol) client is one of them. FTP is a method of moving files around on the Internet. If you do nothing but download files, you probably won't be interested in RBrowser. But if your job or play involves putting files on a remote machine, you should give this one a glance. My favorite feature is a Secure Shell method of file transfer in the Pro version. This means your passwords and data are encrypted as they move over the Internet or any other untrusted network. It's just one more way to foil a hacker, and for a mere $29.
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From Tech Times
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