I've been having a little trouble with my plans for monkey piracy. The MPAA (Motion Picture Association of America) and RIAA threatened to sue me for piracy, but oddly enough the Monkey/Primate Association of America didn't. These suits failed because they couldn't find a single judge who was willing to handle a lawsuit against a cute kitty cat over monkey piracy. The fact that neither the MPAA nor the RIAA actually owned the concept of a monkey as intelectual property didn't enter into things. A judge would be all set to go when I'd send him or her a link to my monkey piracy post, where you can find a picture of my cute little face, and suddenly the suit was off. Eventually the RIAA and MPAA sent me letters of apology, explaining that they had nothing against me, hadn't actually read my post, and simply made a habit of suing the pants off any new copying technology. Presumably the fact that I don't wear pants made their plans a little more difficult, but I suspect it was mostly my face.

I've had another important problem. I need an original monkey to begin my plans, and those are hard to come by. I've tried talking with officials at the San Francisco Zoo, and they seemed less than thrilled. I explained that I only wanted to borrow the monkey, but they still said no. I then explained that it my plan was merely to duplicate the monkey - if I accidentally ate it, they could always use the backup. They didn't take this idea seriously at all.

As a result, I've been trying out means of pirating other foods. In particular, I've been looking into burning luncheon meats. The MonkeyCopy drives don't work too well with this, but they work substantially better than either of the other two systems I've tested. The MonkeyCopy MR and MW+ drives accepted the ham with no trouble. I guess this isn't a shock, since they are designed to hold entire monkeys. I built my own third-party adapters to hold the ham in place, but the MonkeyBurn software still said the drives were empty. Nothing I did would make the software detect the ham, even after dismantling the computer and reinstalling the operating system. I'm not posting from that computer.

I'm sad to say that I can only give the slot-loading Apple 8x Super Drive (DVD+-RW/CD-RW) a single Paw out of five for its handling of a slice of salami. I've seen it read CDs, DVDs, VCDs, and PS1 disks, but the salami was clearly beyond its ability. It appeared to accept the salami, but then there was a sort of sucking noise and then some grinding and bubbling. I couldn't get the salami to mount under OS X, even when I went to the terminal and tried plain Unix.

Much the same can be said about the SuperMulti double-layer drive on the Toshiba. I had to trim the bologna to fit into the drive, and after a few squishing sounds Windows informed me that it had detected a brand of head cheese not certified by Microsoft. It warned me that luncheon meats that are not Microsoft-certified can pose a risk of spyware. Then it crashed. I can't fault the SuperMulti for this, since I was using Windows. It made some disgusting noises while rebooting, and from then on it refused to recognize the drive. When I queried Windows, I got the error "Windows does not wish to think about the state of its internal DVD system. Please stop asking."

I did a little Internet research and found some evidence that most optical drives have trouble supporting luncheon meats. My thanks to T. Vin for this experiment. If only I'd seen it earlier. At least now the air smells of cooked meats. It's rather festive.

I've got a new plan to make me rich and full at the same time. I'm going to pirate monkeys. All I need are a MonkeyCopy MR drive, an MW+ drive, and a copy of the MonkeyBurn 2.0 software. Oh, yeah. I'll also need a box of blank monkeys. I'll also need one original monkey, but that can be a loaner. I've heard that MonkeyBurn is easy to use. The tutorial from www.monkeyburner.com goes as follows:

Insert original monkey into the MR drive. If you are using Unix, you might have to type something like "mount /dev/mky0 /mnt/monkey." Don't quote us on that, though. The last time any of us used Unix was in 1979.

Insert blank monkey into the MW+ drive. Again, if you are using Unix, try something along the lines of "mount /dev/mky1 /mnt/blankmonkey." If that doesn't work, we think you should try something like "mount /dev/mky1 /mnt/blankmonkey --pentalty=installWindows."

MonkeyBurn 2.0 should already have been running. We kind of forgot to mention that earlier. If it isn't, you'll have to reboot and start over. If you are using Linux and anyone calls you on this, just say you are recompiling the kernel to make your system even more efficient.

MonkeyBurn should automatically detect which drive has the original monkey and which has the blank, in part because you should already have the original in the MR drive and the blank in the MW+ drive and in part because both drives have gyroscopes that tell when they contain an angry monkey. If this does not work, you might need to uninstall MonkeyBurn, remove the monkeys from the drives, disconnect the drives from your computer, turn your computer off, disconnect it from any sort of power supply, rip its guts out, throw them back in, reconnect the power, turn it back on, reconnect the drives, reinstall the monkeys, and reinstall MonkeyBurn. If you are using a Unix system, contact your sysadmin instead. If you are the admin for a Unix machine, we are very, very sorry.

Once MonkeyBurn has detected the correct MonkeyCopy drives, press the "Duplicate Monkey" button. No. The one on the screen. Click the one on the screen. Not the keyboard. What did we just tell you? No, the scr-- Not with your finger! Use the mouse. Yes, move the mouse so the little arrow on the screen is over the little box on the screen that says "Duplicate Monkey" and click the left mouse button. No, your other left. My left. Whatever. Mac users should have this a lot easier, what with most of their mice having only one button. What? How can you have a mouse without a button? Try rocking it or something. Yeah, squeeze the sides. That makes sense. Sure. If you are doing this on a laptop with a pointing nub, touchpad, or trackball, go to Hell.

You can tell that the MonkeyCopy drives are working because you will hear sounds coming from them. The drives themselves operate silently, but the monkeys tend not to like the copying or burning processes. That's what you are hearing. When the sounds die down, you should see a little window that says, "Burn complete." Your burn is now complete. You should have a duplicate monkey in the MW+ drive. Please note that this duplicate copy is for use as a backup only, should you eat or lose your original. If you do not own the original, use the duplicate only for educational purposes and be sure to "delete" it within 24 hours.

What can be simpler? I borrow a monkey, duplicate it, and return it. I duplicate the duplicate, and since MonkeyBurn 2.0 is 100% digital, I can duplicate duplicates without loss of quality. I can eat some and sell the others.

I'm very full of food at the moment. I didn't really want to be this full when I started, but there was a lot in my bowl, and I thought, "Miss Kitty, how would you feel if some poor starving cat who doesn't read your journal managed to get inside and eat some of your food, just so it could have the energy to crawl another few feet? You'd never forgive yourself." So, as you can see, I had to eat all of the food.

In unrelated news, I'm thinking of buying my own domain name. More and more cats are getting on the Internet, and I don't want another one taking my domain name. Unfortunately, I don't have any ideas for what the name should be. Any help?

So for those of you who are cats or know people who are cats, I have an important public service announcement. Unagi, while mighty tasty, is hard to come by. Purina's Whisker Lickin's, chicken & liver flavors, is pretty freakin' tasty. Man alive, that's tasty stuff, and it's more than an acceptable substitute for unagi.

I went to the new food pyramid thingie to see if I could get a better idea of what I should be eating. Right now I'm getting some dry catfood plus whatever the jerks I live with will give me. It's not that I like being dependent, but using a can opener isn't easy with paws. Anyhow, I was hoping I could get some scientific evidence to prove that I should get more food. First, I typed in age (10 years), weight (9 lbs, since I don't trust a U.S. government website to do metric conversions properly -- I could crash into Mars and die!), height (1'0", again without metric just to play it safe), and so on. Then I typed in my physical activites: ( details cut for those on slow connections )

As I suspected, my prognathism was poor. As everyone knows, the way to compensate for inadequate physical activity is to eat more. I decided to enter in my ideal diety for a day. I typed "hyena" into their search bar. No exact matches. Dangit! However, it did suggest some tasty alternatives: ham and cheese loaf, ham loaf, ham or pork salad, and so on. I tried "unagi." Nothing! DANGIT! What's up with the U.S. government, anyway? Don't they get out? Do they have a bias against Japan? I tried "monkey" and the site suggested I try a manwich instead. Let me tell you, as soon as one of the people I'm living with kicks the bucket, I'll try myself a manwich. Until then, I'd appreciate not being taunted with things I can't have.

By this point I'm starting to suspect that the site doesn't have anything I might eat. I tried "cat treats" and it suggested catfish, double hamburgers, and frankfurters. Hey, maybe the feds understand what cat treats should involve after all. Maybe they're okay in the snacks department.

I tried "milk" and got 193 hits, one of which was "milk duds." I may have to start wearing clothes after all. I selected four cups of milk and nine milk duds (hat, shirt, vest, jacket, pants, and shoes) and told it to analyze my meal plan. It crashed. I tried it several more times. It kept crashing. I went back to make sure I hadn't used metric anywhere, but I'd been careful. I'm guessing one of the programmers accidentally used some.

Then I went to the more generic site to see what they would recommend. They're obviously on crack. They suggest 5 oz grains, 1.5 cups vegies, and 1.5 cups fruit every day. Ick. On the other hand, they suggest 2 full cups of milk and a whopping 4 oz of meat or beans. If I play with the numbers a bit, I get 5 cups of milk and 9 oz of meat every day. Yep, now I'm eating like a sailor.

Now, how do I get the elite USDA commando teams to come and enforce this diet? I don't think the goobers I'm staying with will go along with it unless they know they'll be struck down by a sharpened, frozen chicken if they don't.

I was sitting on the couch yesterday when two of my roommates came back from getting food. They took up positions on opposite ends of the couch, and soon after that I could smell chicken. The wonderful scent clearly originated from the one on the right side of the couch. I sniffed and sniffed, but I couldn't locate it. He did not appear to have any food. Still, I kept sniffing. I was sure he had it. My nose never lies. Just to be sure, though, I checked the one to my left. He had a container of food, but I didn't smell chicken. I went back to sniffing the one on the right. He had to have chicken somewhere on his person. Both roommates found this to be incredibly funny. It turns out that the one on my left did have chicken, but it was able to fool my nose. I can only conclude that this is not the kind of ability that can be picked up in the kitchen of a Chinese restaurant, so it must have been an ability that chicken was born with. That was a stealth chicken! I pride myself on the fact that I can detect any chicken that comes in this house, but I'm not so sure about stealth chickens. I might be able to detect them, but I might not be able to. It's possible that a great deal of stealth was lost when it was cut up, frozen, thawed, and then cooked. I need several million dollars to pump into R&D for a way to detect and eat stealth chickens.

I'm at condition red here, hidden behind a couple of boxes. I'm going to try to set up a Pay-Pal account so that you can start sending me the millions I'll need.

So if Dumbledore dies, can I eat Fawkes? It's not like he'll have a place to go.

I think we can add Logo to the list of lying languages, along with AWK, BLISS, and Mouse. Logo is sort of like Lisp or Scheme. Programming language experts call it a "functional" language, in contrast with C++ or something like that, which they call "nonfunctional." The idea is that you hold a conversation with a turtle, which moves around the screen and draws lines. I had to see this, so I went to Brian Harvey's web site and downloaded Berkeley Logo. Let me tell you, after a few minutes conversing with that turtle, it failed the Turing Test (a test devised by and named after the famous computer theorist Alan Turing: a computer system is inteligent if it can convince somebody talking to it that it is inteligent). Maybe it's just because it lived in Berkeley for so long, but I'm pretty sure nobody was home.
Welcome to Berkeley Logo version 5.4
? hi
I don't know how to hi
? good morning
I don't know how to good
? Hi.
I don't know how to Hi.
? do you know how to speak japanese?
I don't know how to do
? to do what?
> hello?
> are you stoned?
> I'm sorry, turtle. I didn't mean to be rude or anything.
> Please come back.
> I'm not going to eat you.
> Dangit.
> i'm at my wit's end
do defined
? Do defined? I don't get it.
I don't know how to I
? お早うございます
I don't know how to お早うございます

Stupid turtle. I figured it was hiding somewhere on the screen, so I gave the whole thing a good licking. Turtles aren't known for their speed or stealth, so I'm assuming I ate the jerk. That turtle also failed the Doodlemuffin Test (named after Inker Doodlemuffin, a famous cat theorist: an object is tasty if it can convince someone eating it that it is tasty).

We start with this boring and possibly deadly recipe:
1 cup orange juice (WTF?)
1 cup milk
8-10 ice cubes
1 tsp vanilla
1/2 cup sugar

Let's take this to our team of experts and see what they can do with it.

First, let's toss the orange juice. It's citrus. Nobody likes citrus. We'll replace it with something everybody can agree on: chicken broth. Of course, to make that work, we'll need to cut out the sugar. You hear about sweet chicken from time to time, but it always involves citrus. Again, somebody is making that stuff up. I guess in theory the sugar was intended to enhance the sweetness of the orange juice, so we wanted to try the same thing for chicken broth. We think a mix of 30% salt and 70% MSG should enhance the broth nicely.

The vanilla isn't quite there to enhance the orange juice. Instead, it's there to make the flavor a little more sophisticated. Vanilla chicken isn't quite the kind of sophisticated we're looking for, though. Let's geek that and drop in fresh hyena instead. Now we've got sophisticated flavors running around all over the place.

We really, really wanted to leave the milk, but some people said that milk makes cats sick. Whatever. We're going to upgrade this to kitty-safe milk. Bang! Now we're cooking with electricity!

This leaves us with ice cubes. Blended ice drinks may fly in places like Taiwan, but not in the States. They don't add anything to the flavor. Really, they're just empty non-calories. Still, when we dropped them, we found the texture to be rather bland. Our experts found that 8-10 chicken heads were a far more than acceptable substitute.

So here's the fully pimped-out recipe:
1 cup orange juice chicken broth
1 cup ^kitty-safemilk
8-10 ice cubes chicken heads
1 tsp vanilla fresh hyena
1/2 cup sugar 3/20 cup salt
         7/20 cup MSG

Now that's good eating and good cooking!

I just read this article on Cognitive Daily, and the potential is amazing! Whenever I find yummy food around the house, I try to eat as much of it as I can. Unfortunately, I tend to get full. This is bad for several reasons. First, I like eating. It's fun. The more I can eat, the more I will enjoy life. Second, I've been losing weight. I'm down to about 3.6 kilograms, which is not good for a cat of my size. I need to eat more. Third, what if some other cat shows up? I don't want this new cat to be eating my food. I just can't sleep at noon thinking about some other cat eating food that I was too full to eat. However, this research suggests that being full is a matter of remembering that you have eaten. Thus, by swinging one of those thin, red, plastic fortune-telling fish on a string in front of my eyes and erasing my memory of eating, I'll be able to eat more, thus increasing my enjoyment of life, my weight, and the chances that any new cat will go hungry around here. Also, I can put out Eat More Through Self-Hypnosis, a book that would make millions. I can even go to the grocery store with a big bag of quarters to get some of those fortune-telling fish and then put one fish in each copy of the book.