Outlook rant, drug prices, Half Life 2 mod

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So there I was, typing in Outlook like I do, oh, 10-20 times a day I guess, when my pinky slipped and I had entered the "smart quotes" zone -- double and single quotes had turned into their curly, foreign, evil replicant versions of themselves. The scary bit was that I didn't how to make it stop! I always use Plain Text, as I see anything fancier as being frivolous, and yet here they were, quotes that leaned, based on context. Trapped I was, doomed to forever send slightly arrogant replies, adorned as they were with alien characters.

Isn't it odd that whenever you read about drug busts in the news, the headline is always in dollars.. like "Ecstasy worth $7 million seized"? I mean, surely the value of ecstasy is non-constant, and is prone, nay, more than prone, to market shifts and location and all those other economical factors? Not to mention the fact that an illicit good like illegal drugs has questionable value, if any, after seizure. It all seems a bit silly. I realize it's just the media attempting to grab people's attention with the idea of large sums of money, but still!

Oh this wet cold weather, it does make the ride home less than completely pleasant. Soon perhaps I will have to resort to public transit, that endless people mover. Speaking of which, did you see that Half-Life 2 mod based on Toronto? Growl pointed it out to me the other day, as he'd seen it on MeFi, and I noticed it again today on blogTO. The subway images are truly surreal. Someone spent a lot of time getting these right. I approve! In fact, I'm going to download and try this mod right now!

Oh, and in case you were wondering, you can turn Smart Quotes on/off with Ctrl+Shift+DoubleQuote (").

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