We've finally made contact with aliens. At least that's what Godfrey Louis would like you to believe.

In April, Louis, a solid-state physicist at Mahatma Gandhi University, published a paper in the prestigious peer-reviewed journal Astrophysics and Space Science in which he hypothesizes that the samples -- water taken from the mysterious blood-colored showers that fell sporadically across Louis's home state of Kerala in the summer of 2001 -- contain microbes from outer space.

Specifically, Louis has isolated strange, thick-walled, red-tinted cell-like structures about 10 microns in size. Stranger still, dozens of his experiments suggest that the particles may lack DNA yet still reproduce plentifully, even in water superheated to nearly 600 degrees Fahrenheit . (The known upper limit for life in water is about 250 degrees Fahrenheit .)

So how to explain them? Louis speculates that the particles could be extraterrestrial bacteria adapted to the harsh conditions of space and that the microbes hitched a ride on a comet or meteorite that later broke apart in the upper atmosphere and mixed with rain clouds above India. If his theory proves correct, the cells would be the first confirmed evidence of alien life and, as such, could yield tantalizing new clues to the origins of life on Earth.

Other theories have implicated fungal spores, red dust swept up from the Arabian peninsula, even a fine mist of blood cells produced by a meteor striking a high-flying flock of bats. Louis and his colleagues dismiss all these theories, pointing to the fact that both algae and fungus possess DNA and that blood cells have thin walls and die quickly when exposed to water and air. More important, they argue, blood cells don't replicate. "We've already got some stunning pictures -- transmission electron micrographs -- of these cells sliced in the middle," Wickramasinghe says. "We see them budding, with little daughter cells inside the big cells."

Louis and Wickramasinghe are planning further experiments to test the cells for specific carbon isotopes. If the results fall outside the norms for life on Earth, it would be powerful new evidence for Louis's idea, of which even Louis himself remains skeptical.

If it's true, this is pretty cool.

HBO's Entourage is about to come back for its third season starting June 11th...if you haven't heard about it yet you've got to check it out. The cast is great, and Jeremy Piven stole the show at the end of last season.

One reason I love Entourage is that it is one of those shows you have to be introduced to. A friend or family member has to tell you just how cool the show is in order to get you to sit through the pilot episode; which is pretty great by the way. Before you know it you are watching Entourage re-runs every chance you get.

I have received so many emails asking about a confirmed date that I am hoping this will clear things up. If you still need convincing to watch Entourage, check out the synopsis below.

HBO presents Entourage, the hit comedy series executive produced by Mark Wahlberg that takes a look at the day-to-day life of Vincent (Vince) Chase, a hot young actor in modern-day Hollywood, and his entourage. He's brought with him from their hometown in Queens, NY: manager Eric, half-brother Drama, and friend Turtle. The series draws on the experiences of industry insiders to illustrate both the heady excesses of today's celebrity lifestyle, as well as the difficulty of finding love and success in the fast track of show biz. Now that the boys are getting used to the perks of stardom, Eric, along with superagent Ari, keep Vince's star rising while making sound decisions for a long-lasting career in a world of fleeting fame.

Season 2 was good early on, but it really got great at the very end. At some point I may go back to check out Season 1, in the hope that it's also great.

Dave had posted some of the great quotes over on his blog.

This past weekend I started looking through some drawers of papers I had. I got into this ridiculous habit of shoving anything and everything I get in the mail into a drawer. It could be some weekend sale, and I'll think to myself, "Well, this'll be useless in 5 days," and go ahead and shove it in the drawer anyways. But that's a different rant.

As I went through the papers, I realized I had an obnoxious number of "pre-approved" credit card offers. Apparently I am currently eligible for about threeve million credit cards. But I also saw that most were coming from just a select few companies.

Am Ex, what the hell? You're supposed to be my friend. I already have your freakin' card, why would I want 30 other variations of it? They've also got some other stupid "pay now, or pay later" program where you have two cards to select one of those options everytime you make a purchase. Of course the second card they're offering starts some $342 million annual fee after they rope you in.

However, I have to say that of all the offers I've gotten, Capital One takes the cake. They take the cake merely in sheer quantity. They have sent me literally dozens of offers. If I didn't want your card the first 3 times, why would I want it the next 324897238947 times? STOP SENDING ME CRAP.

But even more ridiculous is the packaging. Some marketing genius must have realized after the first 32847 offers, people probably just started throwing out any envelope with Capital One on the front. So they got creative. Some simple changes - they added a little colored plastic window at the top of the envelope to grab peoples' attention. They did the usual "TIME SENSITIVE!!! Super Urgent, open it or people will die and your car will explode!! RUSH!!" type of markings on the envelope. One envelope even came inside a larger, cardboard envelope as if it was some important document.

A while back I finally got fed up and found a way to opt-out of pre-approved credit card offers. There's a phone number on every app you get (I believe that's required by law), but that system is a pain in the ass and uses voice commands. It horrendously misspelled my name, and didn't offer a way for me to correct it. The better alternative was a website (TransUnion provides details here), http://www.optoutprescreen.com/. You can still get some junk mail until it kicks in.

Seriously, if I could pre-order it now, I would.

Ok, I admit it. Dave and I have been a little riddle crazy recently. Ever since playing the Da Vinci Code Quest on Google, we wanted to do something of our own. We have created the Amazing Web Race, an internet riddle that is challenging but not impossible. In the last few days, hundreds of people have attempted it, and only a small fraction of them were able to make it to the end (there's 10 riddles).

It's not technical so anyone can play! Are you up to the challenge? These people were.

What is with the winners of Survivor being idiots? First, Season One winner Richard Hatch somehow expected to get away with not paying taxes on his million dollar prize. He is facing jail time as a result (and for perjury about it). Now, Season Nine winner Chris Daugherty is in trouble with his employer for lying to get time off work to be on Survivor.

Chris Daugherty, 35, who won the ninth season of the CBS show, filed a false claim that he needed time off because he was under stress and suffering from depression, an Ohio Department of Transportation hearing officer ruled Thursday. He landed the $1 million prize in 2004 for "Survivor: Vanuatu -- Islands of Fire," but returned to his $34,000-a-year job with ODOT, working on roads in central Ohio.

"Daugherty's claim that he had an illness which just happened to coincide with his 'Survivor' tour is simply not credible," wrote ODOT chief investigator Les Reel. After his requests for time off were denied, he submitted a false doctor's excuse saying he was suffering from anxiety and depression and needed a month of medical leave, ODOT's investigation found. ODOT said Daugherty's initial requests were refused because he had already used all but 29 hours of his vacation days, sick leave and personal time. Officials said he even submitted a request for military leave -- despite never being in the armed services -- because the "Survivor" tour was scheduled to visit a military base in Germany.

ODOT officials said Daugherty acknowledged afterward to investigators that he used the time off to attend the CBS-sponsored "Survivor" tour in Germany and Italy last September 25 through October 8, for which he was paid $8,000. He took an additional two weeks off after the tour before returning to work, ODOT records show.

Yeah, they're probably not going to figure out what you were really up to, Chris. I mean, it's not like you were on A POPULAR TV SHOW ON NATIONAL TELEVISION. "Ummm...I need time off. I mean, I'm sick! I mean, I'm joining the army! No? Ok, I am flying to Portugal for a dentist's appointment because my dentist moved and he wouldn't let me cancel the appointment or he'll sue me for a million dollars...what do you mean you don't believe me?"

It's not everyday you hear about a car chase where the pursuing state trooper gets his car stuck in concrete and the fleeing driver drives into a truck. First, the trooper ran into wet concrete. Then, the escaping driver crashed the van he was in near a construction area. Some people came to help him, and he stole their car. But then he drove it into the path of a truck and is now in the hospital.

This picture is priceless:

One of the blogs I frequent, Inside Google, is looking to increase their viewership (and participation). They're doing that by starting DVD giveaways just for posting in the comments (obviously, no spam comments - add some value!). In order to keep it going though, people need to spread the word! So I figured I'd share the wealth, and get some extra points by doing it:

Okay, so, after asking around, today’s the day I start giving back to you guys. Today you can win a free DVD of "The Producers", starring Nathan Lane and Matthew Broderick, just by being a faithful reader. Everyone who comments between 7 am Eastern time Tuesday and the same time Wednesday will be assigned a number in a random drawing, and that person will get the movie in the mail.

Every time you comment, you’ll get one entry, so the more you comment, the more chances to win. And because I want to push more traffic to the other blogs, if you comment on InsideMicrosoft, Business Bits or Apple Watch, you get two entries. Obviously, I don’t want people to comment for no stupid reason, so if you say something pointless, like "Yeah" or "Here’s a comment so I win", that won’t count, but as long as you are adding to the conversation you’ll be fine.

Also, if anyone wants to link to this page or my review of the movie, I’ll even give them three entries, but only do it once. And if the link doesn’t show up in Technorati, it doesn’t count.

Pretty sweet, as I already liked that blog.

There's a law that was created a while back when companies would spam fax numbers with advertisements, causing annoyance, tying up the fax machine, and wasting toner. The law put harsh penalties on the practice - up to $1,500 per page received. Now, a lawyer is suing a sandwich shop manager for sending him such faxes:

A sandwich shop manager contends he was only trying to clear some old customers out of his fax machine's speed dial when he accidentally started sending his daily menu specials to a Tampa law office.

"I got tired of getting junk faxes," Tampa criminal lawyer William "Casey" Ebsary said Friday. "I was being inundated with faxes from all types of businesses." So this year, Ebsary said, he contacted a lawyer with expertise in a law that makes it illegal to fax business advertisements to anyone who is not a customer or has not given written permission to do so.

Thomas filed a lawsuit on behalf of Ebsary in February against the Twins Luncheon restaurant in Oldsmar. The lawsuit seeks between $5,000 and $15,000 in compensation for 34 unsolicited faxes sent to Ebsary's office, some after Twins Luncheon was notified by certified mail that the practice was illegal, according to court records. "They were on notice to stop doing it, and they kept doing it," Thomas said.

Ebsary could have asked for up to $51,000 in actual and punitive damages, but "he doesn't want to kill the guy, he doesn't want to own the restaurant," Thomas said. "Just give him reasonable compensation for what you've done."

Ok, so it seems like a pretty reasonable case so far. The guy's getting junk faxes and the person sending them ignored warnings to stop. But you know I wouldn't be posting about this if it were that simple:

Twins Luncheon manager Mike Palazzolo, and the owner, his uncle, Ron Palazzolo, said the $7,500 figure they were offered to settle the matter is anything but reasonable. Mike Palazzolo said he routinely faxes his daily special to regular customers. When a couple of them asked to be taken off his mailing list this year, the manager said he was unable to remove the numbers from his fax machine's speed dialer and instead entered a long series of identical digits in their place. He assumed those numbers would be meaningless, but they turned out to be Ebsary's fax number.

When Thomas sent the registered letter Feb. 16 warning of the impending lawsuit, Mike Palazzolo said he immediately called Thomas' law office to ask what number he should remove from the speed dialer. The number Palazzolo said he was given did not match anything on his machine. He said he finally figured out which number was Ebsary's about the time the lawsuit was filed Feb. 24. Ronald Palazzolo said a simple telephone call with the correct number would have resolved the matter the first day Ebsary received one of his nephew's faxes.

"If they had just given us the right number, we would have taken it off," the elder Palazzolo said. "Why do they have to make such a big production out of it? We are a small business. I was going to give them $3,000 out of my pocket just to get the guy off my back," he said. "I understand the law and I think it's a good law, but it was inadvertent ... He's the one that's taking advantage of us."

So the lawyer told the manager to stop faxing him, but couldn't even provide his number? And what kind of stupid fax machine doesn't let you remove numbers from its autodialer? Hell, for the price of the lawsuit the manager could have unplugged the current machine and bought a new one that wasn't a total piece of crap.

dave submitted an article from Media Matters about how FOX News' John Gibson says Americans need to have more babies.

On The Big Story, John Gibson urged viewers to "[d]o your duty. Make more babies," because he had found out, from a recently released report, that nearly half of all children under the age of five in the United States are minorities. Gibson added: "You know what that means? Twenty-five years and the majority of the population is Hispanic." Gibson later repeated: "To put it bluntly, we need more babies."

"Now, in this country, European ancestry people, white people, are having kids at the rate that does sustain the population. It grows a bit. That compares to Europe where the birth rate is in the negative zone. They are not having enough babies to sustain their population. Consequently, they are inviting in more and more immigrants every year to take care of things and those immigrants are having way more babies than the native population, hence Eurabia."

Hmmm...to sustain a population you need to have babies?!? Someone give this guy a medal for being the biggest genius on the planet.