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Diet pills and second helpings

The revelry of Indigenous People's Day proved too much for me.

The revelry of Indigenous People's Day proved too much for me. My major finding for the weekend? Alcohol has nothing on triptophan, hangoverwise, and the two of them together are a deadly combination.

Since I'm sure many of you out there in rumorland are suffering from similar distress--gastric, gossipy, and otherwise--I'm serving up a diet portion this afternoon. Bon appetit, and remember what Julia Child said on television when she dropped the turkey on the floor: "Fortunately, when this happens there's usually no one else in the kitchen." So just dust off these morning-after tidbits and chow down.

As my favorite lesbian comic likes to say, marriage is a great institution--but who wants to be in an institution? Whether it wants to or not, Microsoft has wound up in L'Institut Smithsonian, where an exhibit on computer bugs features the 1995 book The Windows 95 Bug Collection. All those Mac fans who wish Windows were history just got their desire. But even those with more catholic interests will find this exhibit fascinating. Historical facts aren't rumors, of course, but I'll stoop to include some anyway: Didja know that Edison coined the term "bug" to describe machinery glitches? Or that those witty protogeeks up at Harvard included a bug in their 1947 computer log--a squashed moth found in the Mark 1 computer-- with the caption "first actual case of bug being found." Imagine if all it took to fix IE 4.0 were a decent flyswatter.

Like moths to a flame, Microsoft's enemies are now doing something really dangerous: singing. The sun has risen on a veritable geek chorus that's warbling the praises of CEO Scott against Big Bad Bill in the continuing saga of mudslinging Java warriors. All that's left to do is pray for a quick and peaceful resolution of the conflict before we're faced with Java! The Musical! (Or how about an Israeli version: Java Nagilah!) Meanwhile, the online tune link'd above may be write-once-run-anywhere, but on Vermel's Mac it sounds like a stylus grinding up singed moth guts.

Many of my readers apparently spent the weekend giving no thanks for subminimal service from their email providers. All that triptophan seems to have trickled down into AOL's newsgroups, which were reportedly inaccessible the day after the holiday. Steve Case should tell his minions to lay off the warm milk and turkey leftovers. Despite my extra 40 pounds and sluggish demeanor, I'm checking my email frequently. Send me your sauciest rumors, and you'll be gravy in my book.