Nezahualcóyotl

from henceforth the tangential questions pretaining to the video will be answered now instead of a week later:
1. wait, wasn't Itzcoatl the leader of the Aztec Triple Alliance?
he ain't on no 100 peso bill

2. who's translation of the poem did you use? That's not quite the same as what the wikipedia says
I translated the Spanish on the 100 peso bill into English. No idea who translated Nezahualcóytl into Spanish from whatever language, but I translated the Spanish into English. And my translation is perfect. Suppose I should correct the errors on the wikipedia, but I just don't care. Not really all that big of a deal that folks completely changed all the punctuation from the original

3. wait, you have 110 kids?
no stupid, I am one of the few dudes who'll admit to enjoying being emasculated by the smell of flowers (lilacs are my favorite)

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first image that comes to mind when I think of Rodrigo Díaz de Vivar is Charleton Heston, but reckon each actor only gets to be one historical figure. Plus Ethpaña got plenty of ADW caliber statues of El Cid from which to obtain a thugged out profile pic

quite proud of the15th centurty warrior slash king slash poet reference to ಶ್ರೀ ಕೃಷ್ಣದೇವರಾಯ. Apparently the youtube was too, since they selected that as this video's thumbnail pic. Silly youtube thumbnail selection. Tried my darnedest to beat ém, but since I lost the versus, figure I might as well join 'em

this'll most likely be the last ADW of the year. Fell off pretty hard since leaving South Beach, but still managed to get in a few every month. India started off a bit slow, but once I get me some USB internet in January I'll make up for it. Jokes next week and then that'll be all for a while

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here go them paragraphs I promised in response to the previous ADW question:
wait, wasn't Issac Newton the first guy to do gravity?
nah, folks new 'bout gravity long before Newton's time. Aristotle had this whole Happy Gilmoresque theory of objects having a desire to return to their natural place, and while racist Europeans were content with that for a good 2000 years, other parts of the world decided not to partake in the ignorance. بیرونی translated last week's ADW thusly:

"All heavy things are attracted towards the center of the earth. [...] The earth on all its sides is the same; all people on earth stand upright, and all heavy things fall down to the earth by a law of nature, for it is the nature of the earth to attract and to keep things"

one of Dem موسى‎ Boyz foreshadowed Isaac's law of universal gravitation and ابن الهيثم was all 'bout centers of mass and magnitude of acceleration due to gravity. الخزيني‎ 'splained all 'bout force, mass, and weight and broke down the specific gravities of a bunch of stuff. Mikołaj Kopernik, Galileo, and Bobby Hooke were big into the gravity as well

ब्रह्मगुप्त

only one question this week, but promise I'll get y'all an answer several paragraphs long

1. wait, wasn't Issac Newton the first guy to tell everyone 'bout gravity?
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the google images didn't have any pictures, but the Hindi wikipedia came through. Might be the most sensual mathematician portrait ever. I didn't include his perfectly sculpted muscles in his official ADW ID, but if anyone wants to fantasize 'bout a 7th century underwear model with an IQ of 257, can't do much better than this guy. I don't think anyone will be able to compete with SRK as Ashoka, but ब्रह्मगुप्त overtakes بن خلدون as the sexiest ADW to date

. . .

not sure if all the Schoolhouse Rock cartoons sucked, but I would not recommend that you click here to watch the youtube of My Hero, Zero. Better to remain nostalgic and disagree with me based on your memories. Perhaps this clip was just a particularly uninspired one, but I can think of far better ways to waste 3 minutes of time. Like watching this followed by this. That there is a WAY more entertaining use of 3 minutes


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questions from last week regarding issues I avoided
1. wait, who was his father? Sure his mama didn't get knocked up by someone else?
oh, who cares. Just more proof that bastards and adoptees can grow up to do anything their lil' illegitimate hearts desire

2. why didn't you mention anything 'bout his ironic death? He had doctors making him immortality pills and wound up dying from mercury poisoning
get outta here. Stuff like 蓬莱山 has nothing to do with anything. Pretty much every megalomaniac dictator goes through a cheating death phase. Punchline here was that the folks he sent to get the elixir of life from 安期生 never returned because they knew they'd be killed

3. didn't he basically spend the last years of his life trying to find the elixir of life?
I already covered this in the answer to the previous question. Plus his empire continues to grow and expand and increase in awesomeness more than 2,000 years later. Let's not underestimate his legacy. HE MADE CHINA!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

秦始皇

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questions regarding issues I avoided
1. wait, who was his father? Sure his mama didn't get knocked up by someone else?

2. why didn't you mention anything 'bout his ironic death? He had doctors making him immortality pills and wound up dying from mercury posioning

3. didn't he basically spend the last years of his life trying to find the elixer of life?
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some things said he was born in Hendan, but couldn't confirm it to my satisfaction so I chose to err on the side of caution rather than error. Chose to err on the side of sloppy sound editing when I rerecording the last lil' bit because I didn't much care for the punchline I had in the original. ADW2.0 is all 'bout being a week late because you spent an excessive amout of time not publishing so you can tweak some minute detail. Someone needs some interns, STAT!!! Redid the ruloph pic. Made his nose redder and the names of the other deer a lil' clearer. Also had some burned alive pictures, but decided not to include them. Featured dead hookers in a previous one, but those were more comedic due to the pictures being of actresses pretending to be dead hookers and not actual dead hookers. These were actual people getting burned alive. Reckoned that while people don't mind hearing tales of death and destruction, some might be squimish at witnessing it in action. Didn't want the shock value to distract from the education, so I opted to leave out. Plenty of folks get burned alive though. We had a pretty famous one a few years back in Texas, and several hundred women have been burned alive in US occupied Iraq. North Korean military and South African mob violence and drug dealers in Rio too, but those tend to be isolated events, whereas more chicks have been burned alive under our watch in Iraq than were scholars under 秦始皇's reign


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answers to last week's angry questions from people whom I offended:

1. what do you mean he didn't convert people? He converted the King of Georgia at swordpoint
not like ბაგრატ V really converted to Islam, that was just a farce so he could get himself released
2. why didn't you say anything 'bout kurash 'rassling? It's not an Olympic event, but is kinda a big deal in the Asian games. He was a proponent, you shoulda shown this oft-overlooked sport some love
you're right. The video was running a bit long though, and I opted to emphasis his contributions to chess over 'rassling. Don't regret flashing a picture and telling a joke at the moment, but I might a few months from now. In which case I'll issue you an apology and promise to do a remix just like for ਗੁਰੂ ਨਾਨਕ ਦੇਵ

تیمور

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angry questions from people whom I offended:
1. what do you mean he didn't convert people? He converted the King of Georgia at swordpoint

2. why didn't you say anything 'bout kurash 'rassling? It's not an Olympic event, but is kinda a big deal in the Asian games. He was a proponent, you shoulda shown this oft-overlooked sport some love
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the original youtube of this clocked in at just under 5 minutes, making it by far the longest one yet. There were some parts I coulda cut, but I like one take and done. Been having major drama with my youtube thumbnails though, and after 5 uploadings (editing the length of the video to change the random images that youtube allows me to use as the thumbnail) I still couldn't get a resonable image. Certainly annoying, especially since such a high percentage of the video is his ADW ID

never re-edited or done a second take before, but reckoned it was time for that streak to come to an end. Been slacking on the ADWs as of late; couldn't finish 墨子 in Miami or Boston, and did Βελισάριος drunk, which turned out less than ideal. Figured since this was the first of the promised ones that came to fruition, it was high time to class the operation up a bit. Turns out that I had his dates wrong when I flashed him as a future ADW too. 1370 was when he founded his dynasty, not when he was born. I'm sure I've made lots of mistakes (mispronuncing the Kushan empire was on purpose), but this is the first embarassing one across which I've come

flawlessly spliced a few bits from the original recording into version 2.0. The camels versus elephants bit was more emotional and comedic the first time around, as were his warnings from beyond the grave so I used those. Reworded a few passages as well. Basically just tightened the whole thing up a bit. Still couldn't get the correct thumbnail picture though, even after a record-setting 17 edits and uploads. That is just ridiculous. The youtube proved even more stubborn than me though, so after 6 days of failure decided to settle for the chess board. Losing a week of productivity ain't really worth the satisfaction of having the correct thumbnail image appear when the video is embedded

. . .

the standard go to picture of wheel-chair dudes being hard-core is prolly a still from that movie Murderball, but I opted for something a lil' more personal. Other than me and Matthew McConehey, pretty much the only people who play on the myspace are aspiring rappers. I like the myspace infinitely better than I do the facebook, and in a futile attempt to prolong its relevance I approve of all friend requests from aspiring rappers. I get 'bout a half-dozen of 'em every week, and rarely do I bother clicking on their profile page as increasing their friends count fulfills the extent of my giving back to the virtual community. This one dude intrigued me though. In his thumbnail picture it appeared that he was smoking a blunt. You can't smoke blunts in myspace profile pictures. That is so bad-ass. I clicked on his profile to view the picture in a larger size, and in addition to his numerous tattoos (including facial) and ubiquitous shots of him posing with his boyz throwing up signs, he is proudly smoking a blunt. What a thug. He's also in a wheelchair. Needless to say, MAJE$TY DA $TREETKING has been my #1 friend on the myspace for a few weeks now

. . .

since this turned out to be the first ADW 2.0, appropriate that I old schooled it and used a picture from the very fist video . Also recycled a camel from a previous one. Emassing quite the collection of stock photos

. . .

obviously the poisoned tusked elephants were Elephas maximus and not Loxodonta africana, but the only raging Asian elephants I could find didn't have tusks. The ones that محمود الدین ناصر‎ had were also wearing chain mail. While my intention is to diseminate knowledge rather than ignroance, hopefully an unarmed stampede of the incorrect genus nonetheless served to illistrate the improvosational skills of تیمور

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zingers for the militants:
1. dropped tha ball on not big upping Thracian people. Sparticus, both emperors in your youtube, son of Ares, the Illiad, Herodotus ranking 'em #2 behind India in population, from Skudra to conquering Persia with Alex the Great, shoulda kinda mentioned some of that
less you got some kinda proof, I'ma say he was Illyrian. Born in Illyria = Illyrian 'til you gimme something better

2. um . . . Persians owned the Byzantines. What are you talking 'bout?
I totally mentioned that his military achievements came with lil' support. He was completely outmanned. No way he coulda won. Victory + stalemate = them settling for extracting tribute. If Palau played Brasil in futebol and beat 'em 1-0 in the home game and tied 'em 0-0 in São Paulo, that for sure counts as something their coach can put on his resume

Βελισάριος

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militant people who will get zingered in next week's mailbag responses:
1. dropped the ball on not big upping Thracian people. Spartacus, both emperors in your youtube, son of Ares, the Iliad, Herodotus ranking 'em #2 behind India in population, from Skudra to conquering Persia with Alex the Great, shoulda kinda mentioned some of that

2. um . . . Persians owned the Byzantines. What are you talking 'bout?


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I actually don't think they were chanting "Εν Τουτω Νικα" during the riots, but still. Can't nobody be mad at me for setting the Nika riots to this guy's soundtrack. Off by a dozen emperors and a coupla hundred years, but I doubt anyone else is gonna find a more appropriate heavy metal song and set it to rioting Simpsons

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last week's proverbial peanut gallery that wouldn't let me off the hook for avoiding these pressing issues in last week's video:
1) why didn't you mention something 'bout his father being from the शूद्र caste?
shut up
2) why didn't you mention something 'bout his father being from the ক্ষত্রিয় caste?
shut up
3) wait, why did you spell क्षत्रिय in Bengali?
shut up
4) weren't they Punjabi?
shut up
5) or descendants of sun-worship Persians?
shut up
6) enough with the ethnicity, I wanna know where you got your languages of the world rankings. Or did you just kinda make 'em up?
there are no accurate numbers on this, so any ranking is subjective. Since I am smarter than most of the people who make the rankings, I have no problem coming up with my own. Chinese is still #1, and while English is increasing (mostly amongst those who do not speak it as their primary language), most of the hundreds of millions who speak English as a second language are less fluent than are the hundreds of millions who speak Chinese as a first. The Spanish numbers are some of the most predictable, whereas the Hindi/Urdu ones are anybody's guess. Way more people in India/Pakistan that anyone wants to admit though, so they get the nod there. Russian below French and Portuguese since it is declining in population. France below Portuguese for the same reason. Folks in Africa, but no one else needs or cares 'bout it as a Lingua Franca. Still more relevant than German though, so Deutsch got bumped from the list
7) I appreciate your overview of Bengali highlights, but why didn't you mention something 'bout all the smoking hot women?
sounds like you need to get yourself on the mailing list
GOL Bengali people!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
8) wait, how is he responsible for mongroves and tigers?
the word is spelled mangroves

ধর্মপাল

the proverbial peanut gallery demands answers. I avoided these issues in the video, but some folks just love themselves some controversy:
1) why didn't you say something 'bout his father being from the शूद्र caste?
2) why didn't you say something 'bout his father being from the ক্ষত্রিয় caste?
3) wait, why did you spell क्षत्रिय in Bengali?
4) weren't they Punjabi?
5) or descendants of sun-worship Persians?
6) enough with the ethnicity, I wanna know where you got your languages of the world rankings. Or did you just kinda make 'em up?
7) I appreciate your overview of Bengali highlights, but why didn't you mention something 'bout all the smoking hot women?
8) wait, how is he responsible for mangroves and tigers?
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the wikipedia mentioned that after conquering the Pratiharas he boasted he was "Uttarapathasvamin or Lord of Northern India." I wanted to color in the map and write that bad-assed title on the new oval of purple Pala Empire that he conquered



getting that name in Bengali was a lil' difficult though. Had to Noah Webster it up a bit and learn me some Sanskrit and Hindi, but I got it. None of that easy clicking on hyperlinks or asking the google or the wiktionary. Old school internet and searching on sites of questionable legitimacy to get some answers. Plenty of bad/useless information out there, but after some thugged out brainstorming I got it. Then a few days later I got some of my people in India to confirm it. That's how I roll

Here go my winning sources:
1
2
3
4

much thanks to the Majumdar family as well

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Answers to last week's quiz
Shandong is the undisputed #1 source of Awesome Dudes of the Week, with twice the number of ADWs born there than anywhere else in the world. There is however, another state than can lay claim to birthing even more if future ADWs are taken into account. From whence comest a triumvirate of dudes?
Uzbekistan, which in addition to having the most Awesome Dudes, also has a ridiculously high ADW per capita (1 per 9 million current denizens)

墨子

quiz
Shandong is the undisputed #1 source of Awesome Dudes of the Week, with twice the number of ADWs born there than anywhere else in the world. There is however, another state than can lay claim to birthing even more if future ADWs are taken into account. From whence comest a triumvirate of dudes?


gotta admit that I was proud of myself for instantly relating Mohism's stance against fatalism to one of the main tenets of Terminatorism[1]. Most folks prolly wouldn't associate the works of James Cameron with any of the Hundred Schools of Thought from the Warring States Period, but fortunately for y'all I am way smarter than pretty much everyone on the planet. That I got John Connor telling Ahnold "There is no fate but what we make for ourselves" with Chinese subtitles is beyond even my own lofty expectations though. That is just insane. All hail the king of fusing ancient Chinese philosophy with early 90's pop culture. In your face Family Guy manatee jokes



notes

this guy made a Terminator monster ballad. Pure genius. The lyrics are all there if you click on the (more info) thing

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Answers to last week's quiz

1. with a picture shout-out this week, who ties بیرونی as the most referenced person in ADW history?
Κλαύδιος Πτολεμαίος. Reckon once you get your second recognition in another dude's video that qualifies you for future ADW status. The threshold for inclusion will likely increase in the future, but since two mentions at this points means you've appeared in over 15% the youtube bios, that is pretty darn impressive. Course, بیرونی caught his 2nd after only 5 vids, giving him an insane 40% appearance rate. Still though, congrats to Egypt for having a son rank amongst the most mentioned

بو علي، الحسن بن الحسن بن الهيثم

quiz
1. with a picture shout-out this week, who ties بیرونی as the most referenced person in ADW history?
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y'all almost caught jokes this week, but I punked out at the last minute and opted for the typical medieval Muslim scholar. Lots of interesting non-academics, but that whole racist propaganda of "The Dark Ages" followed by "The Scientific Revolution" just pisses me off. How you think things just magically jumped from Aristotle to 1543? Attila the Hun, the bubonic plague, and then the Renaissance? No one thinks there might be something missing there?

. . .

I wanted to see if I could find a pro 'rasslin'esque picture that would do the name "The Physicist" justice. Most people don't think of physicists as bringers of pain, but if there were a pro 'rassler named "The Physicist" I guarantee you he would be a bad guy who would just punish people. He'd be a really big nasty ogre who would pummel little guys using torque and centripetal force and all sorts of cool finishing moves. The google images gave me plenty of pictures of scientists, a bikini chick, some jokes, and finally an album cover for what looked like a heavy metal band. It was exactly the picture for which I was looking. The band's name was Devin Townsend, so I typed that into the google images. I don't know anything 'bout Devin Townsend, but I hope when I tell my 14-year-old son to turn down that music, he will be rocking something similar. What parent wouldn't be proud of their pimply lil' virgin for blasting this guy

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answer to last week's question

Mongols = "the most powerful empire in the history of the world" Really? Sure 'bout that one?

who you got? No one inspired fear like the Mongols. No one had a bigger empire. No one wrecked shop as quickly. No one cared less 'bout governing or converting people. They just straight thugged out and conquered. Plus they introduced the plague to Europe. Pax Mongoliana = the spread of the bubonic plague across the Eurasian landmass. What other empire spread disease like that? Spain smallpoxed the mess outta 'Merica, but they can't touch the Mongols. Alexander might be #1 of all time, but he was just a one hit wonder. Romans had some longevity, but they needed lots of campaigns and centuries to establish themselves. Plus they did sissy things like build aqueducts and have parades. The early days of Islam were pretty phenomenal, with Muhammad and them controlling Portugal to India, but they have that whole no booze and no swine thing working against them. You can't claim to be the baddest-asses ever if when offered a bacon double cheeseburger and a beer and you say "yeah, that sound delicious, but my religion kinda forbids those things"

Mongols win. How many Romans were in Bill & Ted's Excellent Adventure? You think there is an action figure of Julius Caesarplaying drums for the Wyld Stallyns?

Rayden Wijaya

Mongols = "the most powerful empire in the history of the world" Really? Sure 'bout that one?

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soooooooooo much drama trying to get a picture this week. There are no pictures of this guy. None. On a google image search for any of his names. There is some statue with lotsa arms, but that ain't dude. Pretty sure if he had bonus limbs that woulda been mentioned at some point. The best is of this kid's facebook profile. He likes pizza and Metalica and Ashley Tinsdale and Oreos and Ashton Kutcher and sleeping and Vin Disel and pizza and sleeping. Dislikes include mosquitoes, "battery low," and text messages comprised of single words. He came really to becoming the official ADW ID of his namesake, but then I found someone had posted these:



dude said he felt like the statue's eyes were always following him. It is an intense statue, which makes for a perfect ADW ID. Just had to figure out which of the two angles I liked better (the third picture was too dark) and choose my zoom setting. After careful deliberation, I went with straight ahead and extreme close-up. Someone else appreciated the pics and posted this:



I agree, mantab ini indeed. His lil' smiley dude does a cheers thing and blinks at you too


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Infrequently Asked Questions Answers
Q. did the non-Sri Lankan fourth Buddhist council really happen? Étienne Lamotte says it was just a legend
A. that 5th one ain't recognized either outside of Myanmar, but I kicked it with the largest book in the world when I was in Mandalay

Q. hold up, the Indo-Parthians weren't Buddhist, they were straight up Persian Zoroastrians
A. yeah, and the Indo-Greeks were white folks from Europe. What's your point? Lots of religious diversity and fusion of stuff, but don't tell me An Shigao and An Xuan and them weren't Parthians. What'd I say? "Basically if you're a Buddhist, Aryan, Indo-anything and your kingdom slash empire was located within greater metropolitan North West India, you'se from North West India". So shut up. Plus you are supposed to ask a question. I asked you two in an attempt to offset your failure to comply with establish ADW blog precedent

Κανηϸκι

Infrequently Asked Questions
1. did the non-Sri Lankan fourth Buddhist council really happen? Étienne Lamotte says it was just a legend

2. hold up, the Indo-Parthians weren't Buddhist, they were straight up Persian Zoroastrians


OTHER PEOPLE ACTUALLY MADE HOMEMADE YOUTUBE BIOGRAPHIES OF THIS GUY!!!!!!!!!!!!!
it's been a while since I had some peers/competition. Nothing like learning all 'bout a dude and encapsulating his life in a silly 3 minute video full of stolen and uncited pictures and then watching other people's versions of the same thing. The hippie kids over at opensourcebuddhism have 3 relevant videos (1, 2, 3). They all pronounced the name of the empire phonetically, obviously failing to realize the comedic potential of purposefully mispronouncing it. Betcha had they done one on Krishnadevaraya, they coulda said the name of his empire without giggling uncontrollably too

. . .

dude's lack of dates annoyed me a bit, but I've been doing lots of recording dead people's vital stats over on The Extended Fam Project and I've reluctantly had to settle for question marking decades. Sometimes the dates of birth and death aren't known, but usually you can get 'em circa within a few years. For rulers, often times their dates in power are easier to ascertain (kinda like how you can catch a floruit for normal people), but this guy's stats are pretty elusive. Comfortable question marking decades, but not centuries, so I had to punk out and list him as circa. Ain't hating on Harry Falk, but if Robert Bracey is skeptical[1] so am I

. . .

the North West India one is the first map I've made. If I felt like trying just a lil' harder, I'd take a screen shot from the google maps and shade in parts of it. I always ask the wikipedia for the modern names of historical places and then consult the google maps. If you use the "Get Directions" thing you can plot multiple points. Not sure if anyone other than me would ever ask, but the google maps could not calculate directions between Kucha, Mathura, and Balkh. My lil' North West India map ain't really based on much as I just decided to simultaneously be bold and blatantly disregardful of having any sort of evidence to back up my claims. Whatever, not like my non-Muslim youtube videos get more than 50 views anyways

. . .

wanna be made to feel really, really, really ignorant? I'd recommend taking a few of these Silk Road quizzes. I mixed up a coupla the European ex-USSR countries on the modern states one, but aced everything else. Them other quizzes kicked my butt. Never even heard of half the places. Don't laugh, half is impressive. If you wanna feel humbled, give these a go



notes

[1]Robert Bracey runs a website called kushan.org. He cares way more 'bout correct dates of things than I do. It took me a coupla these articles ere I stopped caring. How many can you get through?
1
2
3
4
5
6

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responses to the hecklers:

1. c'mon, like you've never had an opinion regarding something 'bout which you were only vaguely familiar?
didn't say couldn't have, said not entitled

2. why didn't you use the borrowing arrows with thatched boats and the empty fort stragegy stories to segue into them 36 stratagems?
c'mon now, these are whimsical lil' Awesome Dude of the Week youtubes. No way I can even proverbially scratch the proverbial surface of that. Plus it is beyond awesome and therefore outside the jurisdiction of this blog

諸葛亮

preemptive criticism from the proverbial peanut gallery:
1. c'mon, like you've never had an opinion regarding something 'bout which you were only vaguely familiar?

2. why didn't you use the borrowing arrows with thatched boats and the empty fort strategy stories to segue into them 36 stratagems?


more drama with choosing the official ADW pic. The one the committee liked best was lacking color, but after much consideration and several failed attempts to improve its faults, it was declared the winner. Here go the final four

. . .

not saying you actually gotta read the book (I know damn well you don't read books and prolly haven't even been to your local library in years), but at least familiarize yourself with some of the main characters. Don't have to read Shakespeare to know Romeo & Juliet or "to be or not to be." Even non-practitioners of Judaism-based religions should know 'bout Eve & the snake & the apple, Noah & the ark, Sampson & Delilah, Moses & his commandments and all that. If you have an education that qualifies you to work outside of the food service industry, you should at least know the names of Socrates, Plato, and Aristotle. Not telling you to put down the Stephen King/Danielle Steele, but if you watched that Matrix movie and thought anything other than "wow, they sure used a lotta special effects to tell a really bad version of Plato's cave simile" then you ain't smarter than the average bear

and don't hate on Keanu Reeves. He is a great actor. If you don't believe me, watch him in Bill & Ted or Steve Martin's Parenthood. Not saying he's Laurence Olivier, but he was the 2nd best California surfer dude actor of the late 80s/early 90s


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answers to last week's quiz

1. if there are slightly less than an extra 6 hours in a year, doesn't adding a leap day every 4 years still result in some discrepancy?
yup, that's why we add a leap day every 4 years 'cept when the year is divisible by 100 (1700, 1800, 1900) unless the year is divisible by 400 (1600, 2000). Could do a 128 year cycle thing or something with years divisible by 4000 to make it even better, but it's still a while off ere any discrepancies will arise

2. why wasn't Al-Biruni mentioned in the list of astronomers?
he already got shot outs in multiple other dudes' videos. The point was folks before and after, not an exhaustive list of everybody. Plus I left out Tycho Brahe and Kepler and a bunch of other people. The real reason though is because I'm racist and only recognize the contributions of Europeans. And people who I creatively interpret to be Europeans. Like Ptolemy was Greek. I don't care if he was from Egypt, Egyptian people still count as white Europeans. As do folks born in Turkey (Hipparchus). And Babylonians. Plus Uzbekistan used to be part of the Soviet Union so that totally makes Al-Biruni a white European too


3. week 1 = Persian Uzbeki, week 5 = African Berber whose family immigrated from Spain, week 9 = Turkish Sabian. Are we ever going to get an Arab ADW?
you're an idiot

البتاني

Quiz
1. if there are slightly less than an extra 6 hours in a year, won't adding a leap day every 4 years still result in some discrepancy?

2. why wasn't Al-Biruni mentioned in the list of astronomers?

3. week 1 = Persian Uzbeki, week 5 = African Berber whose family immigrated from Spain, week 9 = Turkish Sabian. Are we ever going to get an Arab ADW?


had an incredibly difficult time trying to find a suitable picture for his Official ADW ID. There are only two pictures of him on the google images (under any and all variations of his name in English and Arabic) and both of 'em suck



suppose they are alright, but certainly not worthy of iconic status. ADW is an exclusive organization and members are expected to maintain a standard of decorum. Since the only two pictures of him in existence are a coupla bad drawings, figured I'd just go 'head and make my own picture

based on all both representations of him, the look we were going for was husky dude with a beard and a turban. First thing that comes to mind when I think of husky dudes from back in the day with beards is Guan Yu. Now, no one would ever confuse a second century Chinese general with a ninth century Arab scholar, but I needed a husky dude with beard. Everyone knows that Guan Yu looks like this: . All I needed was that with slightly more pixels. Figured I'd just cut and paste a turban on a Guan Yu head and call it a day, but to my shock and disappointment, there weren't hardy any good pictures of Guan Yu on the google images (in English, Chinese or traditional Chinese). WTF!?!?!?

best I could find are these shots of 巴森扎布 from last year's John Woo movie (apparently 狄龍 went for a more metrosexual look in the other one)


the first one is too bloody, the second too surprised, and the third has an SUV in the background. That wasn't a problem though, since I was gonna cut and paste his head anyways. Found a good background and was starting to look for clothes, but by that point it kinda stopped being fun


while he is far and away the dumpiest Awesome Dude of the Week, I don't yet feel obliged to provide posterity with a better artistic rendition of him



____________________________
answers to last week's quiz

1. wait, how was he a mestizo? Doesn't Español + Castiza = Español?
c'mon, let that one slide. One of his youtubes said it perfectly: "1/4 indio de sangre pero 100% indio de corazón". Of course he is really more like 1/32 or 1/64, but still. If these people qualify as black under our one-drop rule, then he can certainly be claimed by whoever needs him to advance their cause



2. why isn't his name spelled Tupaq Amaru?
the answer to the first question is 'bout as far as I'll allow the truth to be stretched to comply with anyone's racist political agenda

Ocho = Túpac Amaru II

this week's quiz
1. wait, how was he a mestizo? Doesn't Español + Castiza = Español?

2. why isn't his name spelled Tupaq Amaru?


so this one is actually more 'bout other people/organizations that have the same name, but whatever. They are forever inextricably linked and do form a pretty bad-ass team. Ere this one evolved to include so many folks, had intended to flash some other same name duos,




but since they are only tag team partners, it wouldn't really be fair to pit 'em against the entire Túpac Amaru army

this week also marked the first time that I corrected dude's wikipedia page. Nothing major, and the articles are only Start-Class, but still. Just so happened that this coincided with my insane genealogy researching, so I rattled off a few citations.[1] Absolutely unnecessary and completely over-the-top, but whatever

the most monumental innovation this week was that I learned how to download and crop and insert youtube clips. Last week I learned how to do screen captures, and figured that would be sufficient, but apparently now I am capable of inserting humorous videos as well. Did a google image search for "rape and pillage" but surprisingly was unable to find anything comedic. "Pillage" "riot" "mob" "revolution" and all them resulted in similarly disappointing results. None of the Reginald Denny pics were really all that iconic either. Then I had the genius idea of using pre-reformed Bobcat Goldthwaith and his gang from the Police Academy movies. Still no google image results. Spent a bit of time substantiating my vague recollections of his character (who's name I learned was Zed) and realized that he didn't make an appearance 'til the first of the six sequels. Found a very appropriate clip from the original film though. I really like the Police Academy movies, and their cartoon used to be on DC20 weekday afternoons right before Ninja Turtles. Anywhoo . . . here is Jonesy's official website [2]

my encapsulation of T.A. Shakur's life is pretty good too. Don't mention the Panthers, but I got Baltimore School for the Arts, the inspiration for a coupla his roses that grew from concrete, his discovery in Marin City, C. Delorus Tucker, the lifestyle, and conspiracy theories regarding his death. Plus facial tattoo Mike Tyson to smirking Dick Chaney has gotta be best one of the best cuts in film editing history


notes

[1] also cited the same things on Túpac Amaru's page. Someone had actually changed the great-grandfather versus great-great-great-grandfather thing on II's page a few days prior to my correction

[2] was pretty sloppy drunk while reading Jonesy's official website, but the following nonetheless caught my attention:

"and featured in him in the famous EVENING AT THE IMPROV (witch we all known now as the Comedy Improve Clubs)"

using witch in lieu of which is phenomenal. Too, to, and two aren't nearly as funny. Neither are there, they're, or their. Lots of homophones, and it would be really, really, really, funny to purposely consistently use the incorrect one. Not sure I am diligent 'nuff to start doing that, but if I ever do, all credit goes to Jonesy

____________________________
answers to last week's quiz

1. Was he of Tulu, Telugu, or Kannada descent?
you know, I believe this is the first time that anyone has ever brought up the subject

2. How do you pronounce the name of the empire?
perhaps the reason he is not more well known is part of a vast conspiracy to keep 12 year old boys ignorant of this answer. There are an infinite number of jokes begging to be invented and told on school buses and around lunch tables

#7 = ಶ್ರೀ ಕೃಷ್ಣದೇವರಾಯ

1. Was he of Tulu, Telugu, or Kannada descent?

2. How do you pronounce the name of the empire?


if anyone ever wants to be a horrible parent, I suggest this site. Those have gotta be some of the worst stories ever. I just did a Ctrl F for Krishna Raya, but I wouldn't doubt that the others are equally awful. If you want some Tenali Rama, you're better off getting it from this guy (the Birbal ones are good too)

. . .

finally got the audio to record at a volume that I like. You wouldn't think that recording 3 minutes of dialogue would be very difficult, but that's because you underestimate how much of an idiot I am. Next time I'll be sure to record the entire thing without any words that begin with a "P" sound. My attempts to say "poet" and "apparently" and "pretty ignorant" were an utter disaster

I also shoulda said empire/emperor once or twice more. Thought I had a good mix of emperor versus king, but realized that the lesser king was more frequent. The internet provides fairly inconclusive data on this guy, and I had intended on keeping with the vagueness by alternating between titles. Unfortunately, from this video it seems as if I determined he was merely a king and not an emperor. The only time I say empire is in a sentence talking 'bout relations with Portugal, and that could easily be interpreted that the empire to which I was referring was the Portuguese and not the Vijayanagara. Totally thought I was being more inconsistent with regards to his regal status

. . .

from making this one I learned how to do a screen capture. I couldn't find all the stills from movies that I wanted on the google images. Searched and searched and searched, but couldn't seems like there are lots more iconic images in my brain than on the internet. Now I can just ask the youtube and then screen capture it. My screen captures are all out of focus and blurry, but whatever. It's the thought that counts

one of the pictures I most wanted was from this Korean movie Musa. Sweeping costume epic with a high body count = my kinda film. I had forgotten just how awesome it was though. So many slow motion shots of dudes making angry faces ere charging into certain death. I loved this movie when I saw it in the theater without subtitles, but unlike most action movies, it is actually better when you understand what they are saying!!!! Most of the time though it is either gratuitous violence or people staring intensely and preparing themselves to rock out in yet another display of gratuitous violence. Plenty of comic relief too. Everyone should see this movie[1]

. . .

abruptly ended this one with a shot of the aftermath of Dresden, just to remind everyone how destructive and often completely pointless war really is. Totally bad-ass and cool, but destructive and often completely pointless

. . .

had to take out the scene from Glory. That along with Musa was the impetus for learning how to take screen captures of youtubes, but Denzel and them marched into their inevitable death carrying guns. The Hindus didn't have any guns. The Muslims had guns, but I wanted a picture of the Hindus nobly strutting into certain death and had I used Denzel and them to represent the Hindus carrying guns that coulda confused folks. An even better non gun having march into inevitable death versus an army with guns was that movie Zulu. Unfortunately, there are no good screenshots of that battle. That part where both armies were singing was awesome though. Way better than the actual fight scene, which just didn't make any sense. The Zulu army ran 100 yards in .04 seconds and then stood there patiently while they slowly, slowly, slowly got picked off one-by-one by dudes who had to reload their guns after every shot and never ever ever didn't kill a Zulu with a single bullet. Rumor has it that back in 1964 the movie was seen as giving the Zulus a lot of respect, but white people during that era also thought that it was good manners to lynch negros



notes

[1]usually I get mines from the toudu, but I'll give y'all a youtube for this one. Decent film quality and no distracting Chinese subtitles. Kinda annoying in that it is in 13 parts, but if you watch it in playlist form it is pretty seamless. Always good to support folks uploading stuff to the youtube. Make sure you give it a 5 star rating and leave a comment too

________________________________________

Answers to last week's quiz

1. How could he invent paper if it had been been in use for hundreds of years before he was even born?
shut up, he invented paper

2. Couldn't origami and paper airplanes and what not be made out of papyrus too?
no, papyrus cracks if you fold it. You have to roll it in a scroll

3. You can make paper outta hemp, right?
yeah, but you're better off getting some of the indica and smoking it

#6 = 蔡伦

Quiz

1. How could he invent paper if it had been been in use for hundreds of years before he was even born?

2. Couldn't origami and paper airplanes and what not be made out of papyrus too?

3. You can make paper outta hemp, right?


once again I made the best youtube biography of a famous person. My favorite thing to do after uploading my video is to see what the Related Videos are. Then I do a search for my guy and see what other people have done.

this one has gotta be my favorite (fast forward to 1:06 for the biography part). This one is like a trailer for a movie or something. Maybe it is a commercial for a documentary. This one has the best music. Everyone else has cool background music in their videos. There are lots of youtubes 'bout papermaking, but this one has gotta be the best. Making paper is a lot of work. I mostly use the back of grocery store receipts when I need paper, and after watching these folks I'm not gonna start making my own any time soon

. . .

being a eunuch means that your parents castrated you so you had the opportunity to get a good job. Working for the emperor was pretty much the best job there was. Even mopping floors or cleaning the bathroom or whatever was way more lucrative than almost anything you could do outside of the palace. Lots of honor and respect to your family too. People were also castrated after being taken prisoner in wars and raids and stuff. Some transgender folks nowadays claim eunuchs as their own. Like they are the ancestor to all he/shes. Perhaps I just can't relate on account of my lack of gender identity issues, but that seems kinda silly to me

A dude without testicles is just an amputee. A 3-legged dog is still a dog and them guys from that Murderball movie were pretty hard-core. Having a glass eye or a pirate hook for a hand doesn't change anything. Not like losing his private parts made this guy any more docile. Implanting fake plastic boobs or getting a mastectomy doesn't make someone more or less of a woman. Plus childhood castration is like neonatal circumcision or being named Seymour in that it was a decision your parents made for you

. . .

at a mere two and a half minutes, this ADW is a bit shorter than most. Thought of adding in a paragraph 'bout how China managed to keep the process of paper-making a secret for a good half millennium, but I kinda like how this one jumps from aristocratic back-stabbing to the Cat in the Hat to porn. Seemed like introducing a bunch of history and geography woulda bogged it down as well as taking attention away from the dude we are supposed to be celebrating. Anywhoo . . . apparently paper ain't something you can reverse engineer very easily. The Koreans learned how to make it 500 years after the fact and they showed the Japanese. Muslims got it around 150 years later and went nuts. Lots and lots of paper mills and industrialization. They exported some to Europe, but Europe prefered to be racist and live in the self-imposed "Dark Ages." Good call there to resist Arabic influence. In 1221 some jack-ass king even went so far as to declare that all official documents written on paper were invalid. Finally, a few hundred years later, non-Muslim Europeans finally decided that paper was pretty cool. Here in 'Merica we had our own paper that we developed independently, but suppose all that got destroyed when them Eurotrash dudes came with their tight pants and smallpox in the name of God and the King

. . .

Answers to last week's quiz
1. Which country (unmentioned of course) had the most sons to which shout-outs were given this week?
Uzbekistan ( تیمور and ابوریحان محمد بن احمد بیرونی )

2. Which of the celebrity gangstas of our era has served the most jail time (Suge Knight, Tupac, Snoop, or Martha Stewart)?
Suge Knight = 5 and a half years
Tupac = 11 months for that rape charge, plus he got sentenced to 15 and 120 day stints for other stuff
Martha Stewart = 5 months in prison and another 5 months with that ankle tracking thing
Snoop = a coupla years for cocaine possession, but that was before he was famous. Spent a night in a London jail after an incident at Heathrow airport, but I don't think he has served any time since being a celebrity. Lots of probation and fines and posting of bail and was banished from England and Australia, but no hard time means he ranks behind Martha Stewart

ibn Khaldun might've actually not served more jail time than these 4 combined, I'm not sure. Still though, his thug credentials are pretty legit

#5 = ابن خلدون

ADW Quiz

1. Which country (unmentioned of course) had the most sons to which shout-outs were given this week?

2. Which of the celebrity gangstas of our era has served the most jail time (Suge Knight, Tupac, Snoop, or Martha Stewart)?


I love ibns so much. My sons are totally having ibn-something as one of their superfluous middle names. I just gotta think of a cool agnomen for myself of which they can be the ibn. Or maybe me and their mom will have a cool portmanteau like Brangelina. Knox Leon Jolie-Pitt is a pretty stupid name. Had they named him Knox Leon ibn Brangelina Jolie-Pitt, that woulda been way cooler

I promised to diversify the Awesome Dude of the Weeks and think I've done a pretty decent job of it thus far. Here go the first 5 with the places they've impacted. I didn't intentionally insult Inca people or West Africa or 75% of the population of Brazil, so I don't wanna get angry emails berating me for saying they don't have medicine of social sciences there



this video is the first to refer to a future dude of the week. Flashed pics of potential dudes before, but calling out a nameless person with his dates in an official ADW teaser is unprecedented. This also marks the second time that Biruni got himself a picture, making him the most revered person in the history of ADW

there was also a raging debate amongst the staff over which picture would be used for ibn Khaldun's official ADW ID. Initially the young, sexy one was prefered, but it was the wrong size. The old man pic of him fit perfectly, plus his selection as an ADW is due to the Muqaddimah[1], which he wrote during his white-bearded era, so it was more appropriate as well. A small yet vocal minority protested and resized the sexy pic. Even though the dates look cooler when written in white, ultimately the sexy picture was chosen instead of the old man one

not quite sure why I hate alchemy so much. Glad that Paracelsus has been forgotten and am confident that even if someone would look him up they would shake their head and wonder why he was ever taken seriously. Absolutely no question that Robert Boyle won that versus. We had us a Scopes Monkey Trial, but folks still get offended 'bout teaching children science in science class. Glad to see one of the previous millennium's smartest people nonchalantly mention evolution as if it were common sense[2]

was surprised to only find two similar biography things on the youtubes. This one and one in French. The French one also has a part 2. The youtube totally came through though when I typed "ADW" into its search engine. Mine come up if you type in "Awesome Dude of the Week," but I wondered who had dibs on the acronym. Turns out the answer is Dwayne Wayne!!!!!!


notes

[1] here go a translated version: http://www.muslimphilosophy.com/ik/Muqaddimah/

[2] here is an excerpt where he explains to Mike Huckabee and all the haters how evolution works (taken from http://www.muslimphilosophy.com/ik/Muqaddimah/Chapter1/Ch_1_06.htm). Scroll down 'bout a quarter of the way or just do a Ctrl F for "monkey"


One should then look at the world of creation. It started out from the minerals and progressed, in an ingenious, gradual manner, to plants and animals. The last stage of minerals is connected with the first stage of plants, such as herbs and seedless plants. The last stage of plants, such as palms and vines, is connected with the first stage of animals, such as snails and shellfish which have only the power of touch. The word "connection" with regard to these created things means that the last stage of each group is fully prepared to become the first stage of the next group.

The animal world then widens, its species become numerous, and, in a gradual process of creation, it finally leads to man, who is able to think and to reflect. The higher stage of man is reached from the world of the monkeys, in which both sagacity and perception are found, but which has not reached the stage of actual reflection and thinking. At this point we come to the first stage of man after (the world of monkeys). This is as far as our (physical) observation extends.

ADW #4 = Napoléon Bonaparte

there were a few people I had in mind for the first "other" dude (trying to rotate between 1/4 Persian/Arabs dudes, 1/4 Chinese dudes, 1/4 Indian dudes, and 1/4 "other" dudes). Had been kicking around the "Napoleon is responsible for the United States being awesome" theory for a while though, and this seemed like a good venue to express my extremely dubious claim. And it certainly legitimized my argument by tossing out obscure characters from the Ninja Turtles, Miss Universe stats, and unnecessarily insulting both Thomas Jefferson and Al Gore

still manage to drop some knowledge along with the ridiculousness though. Unless you grew up around there, there is absolutely no way you'd ever heard of the Pig War. Everyone knows the Cuban Missile Crisis, but this one was way closer to actually happening. And the story behind it is absolutely hilarious

best thing 'bout this one was that I got a ringer to pronounce Napoléon Bonaparte. Tired of flashing that rose by any other name pic, and this was an easy one. Couldn't quite get my over-the-top Pepé Le Peu accent right though. Recorded dozens of me exaggerating Maurice Chevalier, but then I had a stroke of genius and figured I could get a real French guy to say it. Took a surprising number of youtubes ere I found someone talking. Most of 'em were either just words flashing or music and re-enactments of battles and stuff. This was the first guy I got and the combination of his speed and those notes playing in the background were just too funny

ADW #3 = ਗੁਰੂ ਨਾਨਕ ਦੇਵ

this one might offend some people as it is 'bout the creator/founder of a major religion. Totally wasn't being rude at all though, just a light-hearted introduction to Sikhism for lots of folks. I accurately depict Sikhs as athletes and super-models and taxi drivers. Translated the 3 pillars in terms to which everyone can relate and respect. Don't tell me that "love God" ain't a succinct and non-confusing way to explain Naam Japna. Kirat Karni = "do things to make your grandma proud" is slightly more controversial, but is nonetheless pretty phenomenal. And Vand Chakna as "be a good neighbor" is perfect

Lots of bonus points for me for using a picture of Sonny and Preeti Caberwal too. Coulda chosen someone easy like the prime minister of India or a thug like Udham Singh, but the intention of this was more of the Sikh next door aspect. Which is also why I chose not to perv it up

I don't think Ruth Bader Ginsburg has ever ruled on kirpans (the "swords" that #10 Guru Gobind Singh made everybody get), but for sure she'd think they were totally cool. The Canadian Supreme Court thinks kirpans are fine, but I wasn't 'bout to use a picture of the Canadian Supreme Court. You'd think a country like Canadia would have something like a Supreme Court that isn't completely pathetic and embarrassing, but never ever ever underestimate the embarrassing patheticness of Canadia. Why am I so insulting of the Canadian Supreme Court? This ain't a comedy skit or a Christmas joke, THIS IS WHAT THE SUPREME COURT OF CANADIA ACTUALLY LOOKS LIKE!!!!!!. Just another reason that all their hockey teams deserve to be moved to places like Texas and Florida and Arizona

ADW #2 = 明成祖

by week two I was already finding it difficult to meet my loose quota of trying to maintain a balance between 1/4 Arab/Persian dudes, 1/4 Chinese dudes, 1/4 Indian dudes, and 1/4 other dudes. Originally had someone else in mind for the second installment, but I might've set the proverbial bar of awesomeness too high with the first one. The only other guys who seemed sufficiently cool enough to follow him were other ibns. Granted I got Euro-ibns and Afro-ibns and Arab-ibns and Central Asian ibns, but I can't make an exception and put two of 'em back-to-back this early in the game. Already have a few new youtube friends and I don't want them to get the wrong idea. There will be plenty more ADWs that will appeal to their particular interests, but I ain't limiting myself to any particular culture/religion/time period (although I gotta confess that them 10th-13th century ibns are my favorites)

had to dig deep and pull out one of the big guns for this one. Several GOAT emperor dudes from which to chose, but this guy has such an over-the-top resume of awesome feats that making a youtube for him was easy. Barely even did more than casually mention his accomplishments as well, since I didn't think there was really much need for elaboration. First 30 seconds are his name, then his dad gets the next minute or so, 45 seconds on dude himself, then it's just castration and dead hooker jokes

hadn't even realized it 'til I was already almost finished with the research, but I had written a story involving 明成祖 back in the day. When I wrote the blog 2 years ago, the Chinese wikipedia page to which I link at the end didn't have an English counterpart. It was a pretty hilarious punchline back in September '07. I assure you that when I wrote it, there was no way you could fact check it without knowing the story better than I did. Even now try asking the google keywords like "9 generations" "chinese emperor" "usurper" and hate me for not allowing you to verify my bedtime story. Dissemination of knowledge is a good thing, but the improvement of the internet does take some of the fun out of mischievous antiquated jokes

from a technical standpoint, this one was a vast improvement over last week's. Only one really sloppy sound goof, and it is only awkward for a few seconds. A coupla mistakes (whatever the oral equivalent of typos are), but no big deal. Soooooo much better than the other one as far as editing and all that. Recorded the entire thing in a single take and only cut-and-pasted in one other audio bit. This one took me a total of 2 days start-to-finish, which is a significant improvement over the month that it took me to do the first one. Lots more pictures too, although I'm still having trouble with the youtube video thumbnail thing [1]"


notes

[1] had thought that the still picture used to represent it was taken from the halfway point. Youtube gives you a choice of 3 frames, supposedly they are taken from the 1/4, 1/2, and 3/4 marks of the video, but from my experience that is not the case. Of the 7 videos I've uploaded to youtube, only 2 of them take the picture from the halfway mark and only 1 uses a picture from either the 1/4 or 3/4 point. So basically of the 21 thumbnail images I have, only 3 of them are from when they should be

Awesome Dude of the Week = Avicenna

I was having a lot of fun learning 'bout la gripe porcina/Mexican pig flu/the H1N1 outbreak when I came across the word epidemiology. Clicked on the link and pretty soon had a new favorite person

I had made my first video thing a few weeks earlier and was intrigued 'bout experimenting with a new medium in which to express my creativity. The Batman picking up girls thing was originally only going to be an audio track, but I couldn't figure out how to convert it. I just set my camera to video mode and talked into it. Figured it'd be really really easy to make that into an MP3 or whatever, but the google said I needed to download some program or something. Coulda just recorded directly into my computer microphone, but the sound quality on it isn't too good. Whenever I use the skype I have to hunch over the keyboard and yell into the thing from 2 inches away. I coulda prolly rigged up the Madonna head-set I have and spoken into that, but as I had already recorded a near-perfect (fumbled the words "evil supervillains[1]" a bit) version on the camera, figured I'd just go with that. Since the video was of my feet and the floor, I just grabbed some things off of the google images and slapped 'em up over the audio. The result was way cooler and far funnier than had I just used the audio track. Thus the dawning of a new era

this first Awesome Dude of the Week video took me an embarrassingly long time to finish. Completion of the script kept getting delayed on account of laziness and lots and lots and lots of distractions while doing fact-checking. I always seem to have at least 3 dozen open link in new tab windows open, almost all of which are tangential to something and contain multiple links to other stuff. My curiosity combined with a penchant for wasting time meant that I missed lots of self-imposed deadlines. If I were making a Hollywood movie I woulda been way behind schedule and way over budget. Fortunately for me I wasn't, so I had zero budget and no schedule. I reveled in this and gleefully procrastinated for weeks (ask me sometime 'bout that state quarters blog)

as far as the technical details go, this one kinda sucks. The audio was recorded in lots of segments, but most of the transitions are pretty seamless. That whole my voice getting really really quiet all of a sudden part is the most obvious and awful exception. Shoulda delayed a few of the pictures a bit too. Still though, for a first and worst video, it ain't that bad. Plenty of lessons learned too. The details are irrelevant, but in the future I'll do like I did for the Batman one: first get inspired, then write out a script, then record it, and finally add pictures and stuff. Of course I might get ideas for different aspects in a different order, but I can always save the images or videos or audio files or whatever and add them at the appropriate time. Which is after I finished recording the audio. Discovering this was a painstaking process that I do not intend on repeating

nonetheless, I had a lot of fun researching and goofing off and making this one. Obviously the first, and perhaps most subtle joke, is in the intro: "Today's awesome dude of the week . . . " That's funny. Not this week's awesome dude of the week, but today's awesome dude of the week. Ha ha ha, betcha no one woulda ever caught that either had I not just proverbially spilled the proverbial beans[2]. Flashing the quick picture of Sushruta, Charaka, and Galen was meant to confuse as was my subtle reference and verdict on who won the debate between him and ابوریحان محمد بن احمد بیرونی. Just trying remind everyone of their ignorance and fan the flames of the necessity for plenty more ADWs to come

tossed out some controversial nationalistic stuff too. Not so much a dig at Iran as it is a shout-out to the Soviet Union and approval of China's 中華民族. I'm not gonna lie or hide or stretch the truth, but I do reserve the right to say "Dude was born and raised in what is today Uzbekistan." and refer to him as a Persian Uzbeki


notes

[1] referring to someone as an evil supervillain might seem kinda redundant, but unless you are are a pretentious aristocratic the adjective is of the utmost importance. Evil means you are a bad guy. 'Mericans thinks terrorists are evil. Terrorists think 'Merica is evil[3]. Evil is all a matter of perception, but it is important to know to whom you think it refers when throwing up gang signs

while evil denotes which team you represent, villain or villein is merely an indicator of your social class.

villein
1 : a free common villager or village peasant of any of the feudal classes lower in rank than the thane
2 : a free peasant of a feudal class higher in rank than a cotter
3 : an unfree peasant standing as the slave of a feudal lord but free in legal relations with respect to all others

not sure exactly what a thane or a cotter is, but reckon a supervillain or supervillein would fall somewhere between Toussaint L'ouverture/Spartacus (born and raised in slavery) and Fidel Castro/Kevin Costner's Robin Hood (born and raised as wealthy landowners). Good examples of a supervillein or supervillain would be the real Robin Hood or Mel Gibson's Braveheart (the real Braveheart's daddy was rich as were his brothers). Those are good supervillains. Evil supervillains would be lower-middle class people who try to take over the world (Adolf Hitler is a perfect example of an evil supervillain or evil supervillein)

[2] spill the beans = http://www.phrases.org.uk/meanings/329900.html

[3] some terrorists don't care 'bout 'Merica and are in the IRA or ETA or various other things, but they are stupid. Any terrorist worth their salt [4]hates on 'Merica. What kinda supervillain/supervillein versus the local school board or the county zoning commission?

[4] worth one's salt = http://www.phrases.org.uk/meanings/worth-ones-salt.html

simple.es.tr.wikipedia

nothing too exciting happened on the Simple English wikipedia this month. Kinda uninspired since they canceled the tournament, plus I moved to Miami and was quite occupied with boozing it up in my new locale. Created the tallest building in the USA list and filled in a few of the blanks. Did some work with the skyscraper categories too. I'm thinking that April will be an ambitious month, especially if my real estate woes mean I have to curtail one or possibly even two of my highly anticipated out-of-the-country sojourns. Up next (after I finish the last of the USA skyscrapers) are lists for Hong Kong, Shanghai, and China. Not sure if all of that will be finished ere May rolls around, but we'll see. Hopefully I'll be off gallivanting in new places and have better things to do than play on the wikipedias

someone on the Spanish wikipedia wanted to delete another of my skyscraper stubs. They said it was too short and blah blah blah. Someone added a few sentences to it and it was spared from deletion. I think it is pretty funny that my entry for Millennium Tower was deemed unacceptable, while my dozens of other stubs like Key Tower, Aon Center (Los Angeles), and Park Tower are just fine. Even a wiki as developed as the Spanish is still pretty hurting in its inconsistency.

without question the most interesting thing that happened was my receiving of the following email:

Sayın Ianm1121,

Wikipedia'daki Kullanıcı mesaj:Ianm1121 başlıklı sayfa
00:41, 29 Mart 2009 tarihinde Vikiçizer tarafından yaratıldı. Geçerli
sürüme http://tr.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kullan%C4%B1c%C4%B1_mesaj:Ianm1121
adresinden ulaşabilirsiniz.

Yeni bir sayfa.

Açıklaması: Vikipedi'ye hoş geldiniz!

Sayfayı değiştiren kullanıcının erişim bilgileri:
e-posta:
http://tr.wikipedia.org/wiki/%C3%96zel:E-postalAt/Viki%C3%A7izer
Viki: http://tr.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kullan%C4%B1c%C4%B1:Viki%C3%A7izer

Bahsi geçen sayfayı ziyaret etmediğiniz sürece sayfayla ilgili
başka değişiklik uyarısı gönderilmeyecektir. Uyarı ayarlarını
izleme listenizdeki tüm sayfalar için değiştirebilirsiniz.

Wikipedia uyarı sistemi.

--
Ayarları değiştirmek için:
http://tr.wikipedia.org/wiki/%C3%96zel:Watchlist/edit

Yardım ve öneriler için:
http://tr.wikipedia.org/wiki/Yard%C4%B1m:Contents

how cool is that? Turkish wikipedia wants me to do something or help them or be their friend or something. I might be a skyscraper consultant. Pretty exciting stuff in the wikipedia universe

no more 2009 Wikicup Tournament of Champions

those silly guys over at the Simple English wikipedia couldn't even keep together the 2009 Wikipedia Tournament of Champions past the first round. I was leading my pool and would have advanced to the second round, but whatever

all I really did in February (other than partying and enjoying spending winter in the Caribbean and rocking out at Carnival) was create the list of tallest buildings in Chicago and fill in the top few. Getting the hang of the list creation and will do ones for Hong Kong, Shanghai, and Dubai. I'll prolly do ones for the United States and China too. That would get me most of the way done with the top 200, which was my original goal when I started on the wikipedia a year and a half ago. Still a long way to go, but the end is in sight. A few more and the Simple English will be in the top 5 of all language wikipedias as far as skyscrapers go. Not all that phenomenal an achievement in and of itslef, but if I can single-handedly versus all the languages of the world and come in behind only English, German, and French, then I'll take it. Plus I can rank up the Spanish and Portuguese ones whenever I want too. Or Italian or prolly a few others. I'm pretty much a one-man multilingual wikipedia skyscraper juggernaut. I've never been a juggernaut before, but it seems an apt title since the word derives from the Sanskrit Jagannātha, meaning master of the world

2009 Wikicup Tournament of Champions

2009 Wikicup Tournament of Champions
took me 'til the end of the month to start, but I created alist of the tallest buildings in New York City and filled in a few blanks that were on the top 200 page I made a while ago. Added a link to the new list on the other New York skyscraper pages too and edited the Empire State Building one a lil'. Not too productive, but enough to put me in 2nd place in my group. Not sure how they're counting though, they only gave me points for minor edits when I quite obviously created stubs that were over 300kB and a new article that was nearly 5000kB. Whatever

the Simple English wikipedia is really not very good. It's mostly just stubs and dead links. They have some articles, and a few editors, but anyone hard-core is on the English one or the one in their native language. Still though, I'ma keep on plugging away. Can't really complain since I'm not even a star on a hurting wiki. Yet . . .