Favorite Links
Man Stuck In Elevator Video
A time-lapse video of a man trapped in an elevator for 41 hours has become something of an Internet sensation after surveillance camera footage emerged after nearly a decade. "After a certain period of time I knew that I was in pretty big trouble because it was the weekend," Nicholas White said Monday on ABC-TV's "Good Morning America." Video of his 1999, ordeal in an elevator in New York's McGraw-Hill building was posted online to accompany an article in the April 21 edition of The New Yorker. It can be seen on the magazine's Web site and had been viewed more than 280,000 times on YouTube by yesterday morning. See video.
YouTube Divorce
A high-profile divorce is being taken to YouTube. An estranged wife has posted a video on the website that airs considerable dirty laundry in the way of accusations about her estranged husband and his family. Tricia Walsh-Smith says her husband is wrongfully ending their sexless marriage and wrongfully "evicting" her from their Park Avenue apartment in New York City. She says 25-years-older Philip Smith is worth 60-million-dollars. Philip is president of the Shubert Organization, the largest theatre owner on Broadway. See video.
You Can Star in "Thriller"
To help celebrate the release of Epic/Legancy Recordings' 25th anniversary of Michael Jackson's "Thriller," the company has set up a web site that lets YOU star in the music video as MJ himself. All you need to do is take three close-up photos with your digital camer and upload them to the site. Then follow the simply instructions and you're ready to rock! Click here for more details.
Movies that Make Men Cry
So, maybe he didn’t shed a tear during Steel Magnolias or Beaches, but that doesn’t mean he’s hard-hearted. There's a brand new list of 20 tearjerkers darn near guaranteed (well, okay, not really...) to have even the most macho man reaching for his hankie. The list comes to use from E-Harmony, the online relationship people. Click here for details!
Feeling a Little Nosey?
The West Virginia State Auditor's office has released the 2007 salaries for state employees, and the website offers new search features. The listing is now searchable by name -- and allows you to sort salaries by department. There are records listed for 66,075 state employees, totaling $1,509,774,134.79. You'll want to keep in mind that the salaries are pre-tax -- so it's not actually what the employees take home. Click here to search the database.
Candy (Sorta) Hearts Online
Make your own virtual valentine heart candies with the ACME Heart Maker site. Customize them with your own message, send to a friend. The program accepts letters, digits, ".+-/:*#!$", space, and a few special characters. Up to four characters per line, either one or two lines. You can't eat them, but they're fun just the same. Click here to try it!
OK, It's Not Exactly Free Love...
Imagine having a wife who is always glad to see you, never cheats or stays out all night, and who rocks your world twice a month with a pent-up vengeance you haven't felt since college. She never takes your credit cards, doesn't spend all day talking to her mother, and never knows if you're out with friends or sleeping around. It's all part of the world of Conjugal Harmony. For almost a decade they've connected honest, background-cleared non-prisoners with passionate, needy and loyal lovers on the inside.
Paintball Your Favorite Candidate
A popular online game offers kids the opportunity to assume the identity of a leading presidential contender and then paintball their political opponents in a series of armed confrontations in the White House. The game, "Presidential Paintball," features six candidates in the crosshairs: Barack Obama; Hillary Clinton; John Edwards; Mitt Romney; John McCain; and Rudy Giuliani. If a candidate wins a head-to-head confrontation, he/she advances to a new shootout, which occurs in various White House settings, including outside the Oval Office. To check it out, click here.
Is She Into You? David Wygant, on special assignment to Yahoo! Personals, says he gets so many emails from men asking, "How do I know if she is attracted to me on date?" that he's decided to devote an entire column to the subject. And now we have his SEVEN INDISPUTABLE SIGNS SHE’S INTO YOU! Click here to check it out. Watch carefully, guys. If she does these things at the holiday party, you’re in!
9 Worst Jobs in America -- Mama, don't let your babies grow up to be ... Slime line workers ... or Farriers ... or Proctologists. Yep, it's time to be thankful for NOT having one of the jobs listed in a new poll of the nine worst jobs in America. Curious, aren'tcha? Click here for the list.
How to Shake Hands. Have you ever shaken someone's hand and in the same instant, felt every bone in your fingers and palm shatter? Or, even worse, felt like you were shaking the fin on a dead fish? The time has come to find out if your grip is powerful, pathetic or just plain bad.
The Kiss List... As with driving, cooking, and cage fighting, kissing is a skill that requires practice. Most women like to think they’ve come a long way since locking braces with their high-school sweetheart. And they have! But still, there’s plenty more they could learn. Writing for MSN.com, Matt Christensen provides some tales of woe, and some tales of woah for women wanting to take notes on the dos and don’ts of kissing a man. Click here for the scoop on the smooch!
Borrow that Bag! Ever had the desire to buy one of those really pricey handbags like Dooney and Burke, Coach or Louis Vuitton. Yep, I can't afford them either. But let's say you'd like to test-drive one before you buy it. Two websites let you rent a bag and it seems women are embracing this idea. agBorrowOrSteal.com and From BagsToRiches.com are believed to be renting thousands of handbags to women all over the country. Designers say it's not about ownership, it's about the experience of having a designer bag for even a brief period of time.
Funny Face! If you can't keep your hands off your nephew's Mr. Potato Head, you might enjoy playing with monoface from the PR firm mono (lowercase "m" intentional). It's a Flash-based application that allows you to mix and match various facial features from a number of real-life people to make interesting and sometimes hilarious results. The blending between the various features is mostly fantastic, with only the occasional face that ends up looking like a real cut-and-paste job.
Getting Out of Traffic Tickets. AOL users share stories on how they got out of a traffic ticket after being pulled over on the road. Not surprisingly, honesty and respect for the cop worked wonders. While nothing will guarantee you'll get out of a ticket after a cop sees a violation, there are things you can do to better your chances. Click here for the AOL suggestions.
Easystreet, the street sign generator! Just write your text and click Make Sign to make your own street sign that you then can download and use. Click here for the site.
The Year's Top Toys Announced. Toy
Wishes, an industry magazine, released today its list of 12 toys expected to be at the top of wish lists for this holiday shopping season.
Jim Silver, editor and chief of Toy
Wishes magazine, said this year's list is dominated by technology. Seven
out of the 12 items work with a TV or computer such as
Tech2Go's American Idol Talent Challenge -- which allows users to compete
in asimulated American Idol
competition.Anotherhot trend this year: toys
that make children get up and go. Mattel'sSmart Cycle,
which lets children play games on a TV while peddling on a bike, made the
list along with Nerf N-Strike Disk Shot. Click
here to see a complete list.
How well do YOU know TV? We have a great collection of TV-trivia true and false questions, with some classics from the 1950s and '60s, especially. Click here to check 'em out.
Your
Costume Awaits! Johnny Depp and Halle Berry have something in common
this Halloween: their 
characters
(in the "Pirates of the Caribbean" series and "Catwoman,"
respectively) are the fans' top inspirations for movie-related Halloween
costumes, according to a recent survey by Fandango,
the nation's leading moviegoer destination. Fandango asked thousands of
movie fans to rank the costumes they're most likely to
wear this year, and the results are surprising. Click
here for the top 10 movie-themed costumes.
Mom's
Rant. American comedienne Anita Renfroe does a
2007 version of the "William Tell" overture. She sings a 2-minute
and 55-second song about what a mom would say in a 24-hour
period.To see this way-too-funny video on YouTube, click
here.
Own
Your Own Submarine. Luxury retailer Neiman
Marcus has unveiled this year's Christmas catalog full of over-the-top
gifts -- including a $1.4 million submarine. Also
available are a $73,000 diamond-encrusted cell phone and
a robot that can carry on a conversation for $75,000. For
those looking to impress their friends, there's also a private concert
with the Kirov Orchestra for about $1.6 million. Neiman Marcus, celebrating
its 100th anniversary, kicks off its holiday shopping season with the catalog
that offers products for $25 up to $2.3 million. Read
more.
Rottenness Revealed. A San Diego man has started a Web site called RottenNeighbor.com that allows visitors to vent their frustrations about those who live around them. Brant Walker said his online project has yielded thousands of posts and more than 250,000 visits since it went live eight weeks ago. "It's going to be a tool for real-estate developers and potential home buyers," Walker said. "People have the right to know if their neighbors are going to be bad," he said. "Why spend a million dollars and find out the next day you have horrible neighbors and made a bad decision?" The site allows users top check for complaints in their own neighborhoods by punching in a Zip code and clicking on the red balloons that mark spots on a map where complaints have been made.
Worst Pickup Lines. “What’s your sign?” It's the epitome of cheese, this line, which has been around since the Beatles came to America, ranks as the very worst line in dating history. The fact that it’s still in use says a lot about the decay of our society’s standards and the glaring desperation of some singles. But it's not the ONLY cheesy line out there, as eligible young ladies everywhere can testify. Wants to see more in the world of cluelessness? Sure, why not! Click here for the 10 Pickup Lines to Avoid!
Throughout the 1980s, every rock song seemed be be required to have a sax solo. Some worked out, but lots of them were ... were just bad sax. And a wonderful site called Web Bandit explores the not-always-wonderful world of rock saxophone. Its 80's Sax Solos page not only collects audio of some of the most egregiously bad eighties sax solos, but spells out exactly what went wrong in each case. There are even helpful pictograms for each musical violation. Click here to check it out.
A New York woman has come up with a symbolic way to deal with the symbol of marriage when a marriage dies -- a wedding ring coffin. 
Jill Testa, 49, says she needed closure after her 20-year marriage ended last year, even though she and her husband split up their possessions "mutually and amicably," The Star Tribune in Minneapolis reported Saturday. The answer came to her at a funeral -- little coffins for wedding rings. Testa and her brother, Steve, set up weddingringcoffin.com, where for $30 to $35 you can buy miniature, solid-wood coffins with a mahogany finish, velvet interior and a lid allowing for an open or closed casket. The coffins also come with an engraved brass plaque with such messages as: "Bury the past and move on" or "Six feet isn't deep enough!"
The Face Transformer, an intriguing
site that instantly transforms your photo into a piece of Japanese animation, a Botticelli painting, a baby, an "apeman" or several other options. Face of the Future is an EPSRC funded public engagement project aimed at exploring the latest advances in facial computer vision and graphics, and what they mean for society. The project has developed a number of standalone interactive exhibits, online demos and a lecture presentation aimed at engaging the public with the technology and the social implications of the technology. Click here to reach the site.
Clothes From Dog Hair? A German Woman has started a business making clothes for customers from the hair of their pet dogs. Bettina Menkhoff, 50, from Stoetze in Germany makes scarves, gloves and other clothes and sells them over the internet at www.jolly-fellows.de. She said: "I got the idea after I bought a pair of socks made from Bobtail-wool. I have four Beardie-Collies myself and started to yarn their hair. It only works when the hair is longer than four centimeters though. "I regularly brush my dogs and keep the hair for processing. It's warmer than sheep wool." She added: "The best business though is from customers who send me the hair of their dogs to make clothes for them.”
The
Baconator. If you get really bored later today, you may want to try
the "Baconator," 
a strange tool on ThisIsMyBurger.com,
a Wendy's website. The game/contest lets users create songs using samples
that sound like fast food: straws being blown, burgers being flipped, a
fryer beeping, a bun doing, well, something. It's all very bizarre, but,
then, the
upside is the best Baconator-created song could win "$5,000, studio
time to prepare the master work for the masses, and guaranteed radio play."
Five grand could definitely buy us a lot of Frostys
...
Like
Games? Jay Is Games (A.K.A.
Casual Gameplay) is a regularly updated site that features hundreds
of links to casual games that fit into many categories deemed "Jayisgames
worthy," meaning that they are of high enough quality to be reviewed
on the site. Unlike most websites of the type, this one bears a personal
touch. Jay himself, along with his team of personally-picked game reviewers
always read over the comments section, and often comment themselves, usually
in an attempt to help a player with the reviewed game in some way. To check
it out, click here.
NBC has launched a new Bionic Assessment Test online to gauge your physical and mental agility to determine if you'd be an appropriate candidate for bionics. The site also, of course, promotes NBC's new Bionic Woman, which premieres Sept. 26. It's great fun finding out if you'd be tapped for the clandestine forces that will be featured on the show. Check it out at Bionic Assessment Test.
Is there an event or meeting that you must go to for one reason or another, but dread having to attend? Schedule a call with Popularity Dialer to call your mobile phone at a pre-appointed time. The free service will call you and a recorded voice will engage you in a conversation, cueing you to converse in a natural manner. When the conversation is over, you can close your phone, stand up, and politely excuse yourself. Once outside, why not dance a little jig to celebrate the sweet feeling of newfound liberty? Click here for details!
Kool Kleenex! Handle the tears that come with some of life's happiest moments -- weddings, anniversaries, births -- with some style and personalized tissue boxes from Kleenex. The combination of e-mail and digital cameras has made personalization a snap. You can design your own facial-tissue carton by uploading a favorite photo, writing text and picking a lid. About $4.99, plus shipping. Visit www.mykleenextissue.com.
With strings attached. Need a cool gift for a music fan? These bracelets are made from the strings of your favorite guitarists, including Carlos Santana, John Mayer, Pete Townshend and others. The proceeds go to charity, and the bracelets come in men's and women's sizes. Prices vary, depending on the musician. A Ben Lee bracelet, for example, will set you back $75, while a Tenacious D one goes for a whopping $450. (That's more than Santana and Townshend!) The site offers a wide varity of artists, so check out "Wear Your Music."
Ten Crazy Excuses for Being Late to Work. It's been one of those mornings. You overslept, spilled coffee on your shirt, the kids wouldn't wake up, and you left your gym bag at home. Late for work and need an excuse? You're not alone.
Sixteen percent of workers say they arrive late to work at least once a week, according to a recent CareerBuilder.com survey. One-in-four of all workers (25 percent) admit to making up phony excuses to explain their tardiness.
Here are the top 10 examples of the most unusual excuses employees offered their managers for arriving late to work:
1. Someone was following me, and I drove all around town trying to lose them.
2. My dog dialed 911, and the police wanted to question me about what "really" happened.
3. My girlfriend got mad and destroyed all of my undergarments.
4. I woke up and thought I was temporarily deaf.
5. I just wasn't "feelin' it" this morning.
6. I was up all night arguing with God.
7. A raccoon stole my work shoe off my porch.
8. I super-glued my eye thinking it was contact solution.
9. I was putting lotion on my face when my finger went up my nose causing a nose bleed.
10. A prostitute climbed into my car at a stop light, and I was afraid my wife would see her and think I was messing around... so I got out of the car
Put an icon on your head. Magic listener Karen E. sent us a link to HeadHoods, a Brooklyn-based company that prints images on hoodies. Apparently, they do a pretty big business; right now you can choose from hoodies with pictures of Elvis, Audrey Hepburn, a gorilla, a scary clown and more. The company says to check back to see new styles. If you're willing to pay, they also do custom designs. Click for more details.
Newspaper Links: Major newspapers around the world have their own -- often wonderful -- web sites. Here are some of our favorites, for your exploration.
(Note: Each link belows opens its own separate browser window.) click for details. Click for the list.
Books on the Cheap! Check out www.mypublisher.com. For an incredibly cheap price, they produce
hardbound books with your pictures and text. What an incredible way to
give a gift to the family or friends for holidays, etc. The books are around $30 apiece! Dude!
MILK, EGGS, VODKA: Grocery Lists Lost and Found. A book collection of
discarded grocery lists.
- Milk, eggs, and vodka rank as the three most common list items.
- For most people, mayonnaise is very, very difficult to spell.
Book info: http://www.grocerylists.org/book
web site: www.grocerylists.org
No More Killer High Heels --
Do your feet hurt after wearing heels all day at work or at a wedding? Well, Magic's Virginia West found this website that has found a solution
to curing the pain of killer high heels!! Click here to go directly to
the website.
Cheap Gas --
Magic 97.9 JB Miller found this website for people who are looking for
the best price for gasoline both locally and wherever they travel this
summer. Click here to reach it. GasBuddy.com is a network of more than 179+ gas price information web sites that helps you find low 
gasoline prices. Click for the site.
Your birthday song! Do you know the #1 song on the day you were born? Here's a web site that will tell you in a flash. Josh Hosler presents a weekly updated #1 SONG ON THIS DATE IN HISTORY database. Click to check it out.
Just For Fun! A.C. Carter couldnt help but share some of his favorite sites with you, including Cool Site Of The Day, David Letterman/Top 10 Page, The Dilbert Zone and Quotes Of The Day.
