** assuming you've seen both, and if you haven't... what rock have you been living under?

Pick up lines, chat up lines, whatever you call them, we've all heard at least a few. There are some that will invariably send women running for the hills, and others for which you can only hope the lucky girl is very, very drunk when you let them fly. The bottom line is there is a very negative stigma surrounding these sleazy attempts at starting a conversation that will end in fornication. However, there are some lines that deserve mention and merit a list in such a fashion as we've created. These are lines that are good enough to fool a women into thinking you are clever and creative enough to continue talking to you beyond a "yes" or "no" response. While we do not claim to be Mystery AKA the Pickup Artist, we do know that a solid intro is the first step in impressing your potential mate. Here are some of the finest one, two or ten-liners that you are sure to bring success at the bar.

1. How much does a polar bear weigh? Enough to break the ice. My name is _________.

2. Hi, can I buy you several drinks?

3. Inheriting 80 million bucks doesn't mean much when you have a weak heart!

4. You might as well come home with me because I'm going to tell everyone you did anyway.

5. You look like my second wife, and I've only been married once.

6. Excuse me, I think you have something in your eye. Oh never mind, it's just a sparkle.

7. Your place or mine? Tell you what? I'll flip a coin. Head at my place, tail at yours.

8. My boys over there bet that I wouldn't be able to start a conversation with the most beautiful girl in the room. Want to buy some drinks with their money?

9. Get your coat, you've pulled.

10. I can sense that you're a terrific lover, and it intimidates me a little.

i'm not even sure i've ever used a pickup line i read online and had it work for me... though i remember telling one that i saw online and got a nice laugh from it --- went something along the lines of "damn girl, are your parents from Iraq?" ..."No, why?" ..."Because you're the bomb, baby!"

On August 15th, 2008 we will begin phasing out support for Internet Explorer 6 across all 37signals products. In order to continue using the products without any hiccups, Internet Explorer 6 users should upgrade to a newer browser:

Download Internet Explorer 7
Download Firefox
Download Safari

The Internet Explorer 6 browser was released back in 2001, and Internet Explorer 7, the replacement, was released nearly two years ago in 2006. Modern web browsers such as IE 7, Firefox, and Safari provide significantly better online experiences. Since IE 6 usage has finally dipped below a small minority threshold of our customers, it's time to finally move beyond IE 6.

What are the implications of this transition?
As of August 15th, 2008, future features and any improvements made to existing features may not work with IE 6. If you are using IE 7, Firefox 2 or 3, or Safari, you don't have to do anything — everything will continue as is for you. However, if you are using IE 6, and you want to make sure everything works, you will need to upgrade your browser to either IE 7, Firefox, or Safari. All of these browsers are free and all of them will deliver a much better overall experience. The web will be a lot better for you.

wow... dude, that's fucking awesome -- though it only makes me wish, and nearly wimper at the thought, of doing just that on clearspring. *sigh*

g'damn i hate IE6.

One way to envision the McCain-Obama presidential race is as a boxing match — particularly like the famous Mohammed Ali championship fights.

The deliberate McCain is like a Sonny Liston or George Foreman trying to cut the ring in half and force his lighter-footed opponent onto the ropes. For McCain, this comes in the form of numerous proposed town-hall debates, where he hopes that face-to-face questions and answers will fall on his less-seasoned opponent like sudden haymakers.

In turn, Obama is like Ali; his style is to keep moving — and stay out of reach of his opponent. Obama does this through rhetorically masterful addresses to large, adoring crowds. He knows that the more McCain is forced to spar at a distance via set speeches in front of a teleprompter, the more he wears down the elder senator, who appears outclassed on the evening news.

Or maybe the better analogy is Aesop's fable of the tortoise and the hare. At 71, a slower McCain keeps plodding along at a steady pace, hoping that an overconfident, dashing Obama will rest on his wide lead in many polls, coast, make some more gaffes, and then let him crawl on by. Something like that happened in the Republican primary when the once dead-last, written-off McCain eventually walked past all his front-running rivals.

Pundits talk a lot about Obama's current 12-15 point lead in the recent L.A. Times/Bloomberg and Newsweek polls. Less noticed is that the two are dead even in the venerable Gallup survey — not to mention that we have more than four months to go until election.

At some point, the steady McCain hopes crowds will tire of the glitzy "hope and change" rallies and demand that the soaring Obama comes down to earth to focus on more mundane, detailed positions that will alienate part of the electorate and so cut down his lead.

McCain must also feel like the mythical Menelaus, who tried to wrestle with the malleable Proteus, the sea god who turned into all sorts of different creatures to evade capture. Each time McCain thinks he can catch hold of Obama, the agile senator changes shape and slips away.

The embarrassing Rev. Jeremiah Wright? Obama has evolved from "I can no more disown him" to going well beyond that by quitting Trinity United Church of Christ altogether.

fuck... i was just about to go ahead and order a tee, and then realized it wasn't in USD currency... aaaarrrrgggghhhhhhhhhhhhhhh.

maybe i'll just make one for myself.

i have to say, the PS3 really has kinda grown on me over the last two months or so that i've had it... even though i really use it to watch blu-rays on for the most part... hopefully i can grab one of those new MGS4 bundles, since it comes with the game and DS3 controller... i checked my local BestBuy and they were sold out, which kinda surprised me.

p.s. PS3 2.40 Update Problems and Solutions

was also looking around at Flash video players again, and stumbled across a new one i haven't seen before -- though this one is more geared towards another video component for your flash projects...

another cool t-shirt project that perked my curiosity... wish i had the time to "play" around with some ideas and submit them, but alas... you know how it goes. *shrugs*

that reminds me, i'd love to hunt down that cool "helvetica" t-shirt i remember seeing online ages ago... but never got around to ordering it... hmmmmmm.

p.s. 32 Sci-Fi Novels You Should Read

even though it looked pretty cool in the trailers that i saw, i guess i figured it was more of a "wait till it comes out on blu-ray" type of movie for whatever reason.

sidenote: can't wait to go see Hancock with my son this weekend!

p.s. the world's sexiest weather women!

classic from the onion: Somebody Should Do Something About All the Problems

I hear jabber-jabbering about the discovery of new subatomic particles. What good is a quark to me? Three and a half minutes it takes to cook a bag of microwave popcorn.

Three and a half minutes! Someone is spending a billion dollars a minute to send radio messages into space, and I have to choke down a bag of Pop-Secret kernels that are only half buttered, some not even popped to full puff. God, I pray for a future when the inventor is the friend of mankind.

DNA fingerprinting -- that's what they're doing now. And still strawberries at Bergmann's are $2.99 a quart. It's ludicrous. It's as if we live in the Dark Ages.

all hail the mighty onion.

AT&T retail stores will be open at 8AM local time on July 11th, so be "iReady!" Existing customers who don’t qualify for an upgrade will have to shell out $399 and $499 for the corresponding iP3G model.

Customers who don't want to extend their current contract will pay $599 for the 8GB and $699 for the 16GB model. Current AT&T customers who want to upgrade to the iPhone 3G from whatever else they have will have to pay an $18 activation fee while new AT&T customers will pay $36. Voice and unlimited data plans (e-mail and Web) range from $69.99 to $129.99. $199 my foot. Maybe we should all move to Hong Kong.

i still really want to get an iPhone... actually, i want one pretty damn bad at the moment, though i'm still going to hold out for another 6 months or so until my verizon plan expires -- patience has never been one of my virtues, so it's killing me a little. *deep breath*