My partner and I worked all day to fix open queries throughout all of our code with cfqueryparam tags. We restored the DB and after only a short while they were able to infiltrate it again. So we double checked the site and added of code that intercepts injection attacks and restored the DB again.

This time it took longer, but they eventually hit us again! Finally, after nearly 24 hours of messing with code I think we are holding them off... but they are continually hammering pages on the site attempting the injection.

Their constant page requests from random IPs is killing our site response time. Is there any way to stop all the mal-traffic? I friggin hate jerks that do this crap and I wish there was a way to just punch them directly in the face.

The general idea is that they are trying to insert a string of code that serves a javascript file on our site from some remote site. It's horrible because it immediately prompts a visitor to our site to download a nasty ActiveX control.

They lied to us, and they still are.

Search Google for "magic of compound interest" and look at all those wonderful web sites expounding the wonders of compound interest. Invest only $100 and month and after 30 years you will have $150,129.52! Really? Sign me up!

Well I did sign up. 20 years ago. I've been investing about $300 a month for 20 years in my Magic of Compound Interest account. According to this calulator I should have $179,320.80 in my account. In reality, I have half of that amount. And for your information, $300 * 240 months = $72,000. Where the freak is the magic?

The moral of the story is that reality sucks and people are overly optimistic about expected returns. Everyone says, "But it will be okay if you invest for the Long Term." Excuse me, but with a life expectancy of 80 years, I'd say 20 years so far is pretty freakin' long term. Obviously the Magic of Compound Interest will not make us all millionaires as we were (and still are) promised. I've only got another 25 years or so until I really need this money.

And I feel rather strange about the whole thing. It wasn't good but it wasn't horrible. But it was just... different from the other Indy movies. Different in a bad way.

The action sequences in the movie are incredibly forced and contrived, which is the crux of the problem. In the other Indy movies, the big headliner action sequences were by-products of the main goal of the movie. Indy HAD to go along with it... or else. He was forced into action and needed luck and improvisation to make it out alive.

In Crystal Skull, it seems that everyone wants to create a big Akshun Seekwence(tm) just because they can. The scene that highlights this the most is the idiotic Jungle Highway High-Speed Chase. For some unexplained reason, we find the Russians (who look and feel exactly like Germans whenever they are not talking) want to fly through the jungle in trucks and cars at 70mph.

They have a big machine, that is briefly displayed and never explained, that chops the jungle down ahead of the convoy. Strangely, Indy destroys this machine and THEN the high speed chase begins. If there are long stretches of open highway in the jungle, why did they need the machine in the first place?

Indy (and his entourage) capture a truck (in exactly the same way he did it in Raiders), move up the convoy, and try to reclaim the Crystal Skull. The thing is... THEY DO THIS. They get the Skull, yet they continue to drive along side the Nazis Russians for another 5 minutes to facilitate a ridiculous sword fight scene spanning two side by side cars. I thought, for a moment, that I was watching the worst scene of the Pirates of the Caribbean franchise.

At multiple times during the chase, Team Indy(tm) could have simply stepped on the brakes.

And THEN... don't get me started... comes the infamous monkey scene. I simply can't believe that an entire team of production people got together and said, "Yeah, this will be awesome! Let's put it in the movie!". It's so stupid that I hate even recalling it. The Mutt character gets separated from the high speed chase convoy and ends up stuck in some vines with some monkeys. Apparently he bonds with them in 10 seconds and they all become Magikal Frendz(tm). Mutt then proceeds to Tarzan Swing (yes, that's right) through the jungle (because everyone knows that jungles have a network of vines just primed for someone to Tarzan swing on them) to catch up to the convoy. You read that correctly. But that's not even the worst part.

He actually times his swinging to land back onto his car of choice. His Magikal Monkee Frendz(tm) FOLLOW him out of the jungle in order to attack the bad guys... and ONLY the bad guys. And of course, "no monkeys or other small animals fabricated in CGI were harmed during the making of this movie". You will understand what that means when you see the film.

As outrageous as this seems, a couple of the other scenes in this movie are even m0rE eXtREmE Do0d! The waterfall scene comes to mind. Absolutely ridiculous and stupid. So unbelievable that it makes you feel like an idiot for having to watch it. And you have to watch it three times! We all KNOW they are not going to die at the bottom of the falls like they should... so why do we have to watch them fall 3 times? It's not even funny.

Another scene that has this quality... the Nuke the Fridge scene. Sigh...

And then there are the Native Temple Protektors(tm) who have nothing better to do than lie in wait inside the walls of ancient temples waiting for infidels to come Tomb Raiding. I can imagine them going to work in the morning, punching into a time clock. "Hey Frank, what are you up to today?" "Same old same old. I'm going to brick myself up in a tiny hole in the old temple and wait for an Adventurer to come walking by so I can jump out and be all spooky."

Yes, this happens. Team Indy enter tombs where real people burst from bricked up hiding spaces, evoking the aliens emerging from the hive in the movie Aliens. The difference being, in Aliens IT MAKES SENSE! In Indy, it's just stupid. You know they included this for one and only one reason... it's supposed to be Kewl and eXtREmE!

The sad fact is that Indy 4 didn't NEED any of that extreme-ness. It just needed to be a neat tomb raiding movie. That's the stuff that people want to see.

Oh, and I just realized that I completely forgot about the snake and the quicksand scene. UGH!

Even though the Magic Jack Terms of Service refers to an uninstall option within Add/Remove programs, you will find that it does not exist. Stuff like this frustrates me to no end and makes me instantly and irrevocably suspicious. Programs and devices that do not provide a user-friendly method for removal project an attitude of laziness, disrespect, and fly-by-night onto the company that provides them.

Here is what to do if you want to remove MagicJack from your computer forever. I assume you are running Windows XP.

1) Unplug the Magic Jack device from your computer. This should remove the virtual devices that MagicJack installs:

1. Disk Drive: YMax MagicJack USB Device
2. CD Drive: YMax MagicJack USB Device
3. USB: TigerJet USB Composite Device
4. USB: Generic USB Hub
5. USB: USB Mass Storage Device

2) Delete the "mjusbsp" directory from the following location: C:\Documents and Settings\[YourUserProfileName]\Application Data

3) Delete any MagicJack directories from the following location: C:\Documents and Settings\[YourUserProfileName]\Local Settings\Application Data

4) Delete any desktop icons

5a) Clean up your registry using a registry cleaning tool. I highly recommend TuneUp Utilities 2008. Among many other features, it will keep your registry sparkling clean.

5b) Clean up your registry manually. Use regedit to locate the HKEY Current User > Talk4Free entries and Delete the Talk4Free Key and all Subkeys.

6) Reboot and you should be all set.

** UPDATES ** - mostly from user posting in the comments

How to uninstall from Windows Vista:

"To uninstall from vista, simply go to the search bar and look up "mjusbsp". Right click and open explorer. Delete whole folder. Use CCleaner (free) to clean rest up. That easy. Vista isn't perfect, but things like the search function rock."

Are there no more American bidders on eBay?

Why do I constantly get foreign bidders on my items when I clearly state that I will only ship to the United States? Are we in a recession? Is the dollar so weak against foreign currency that Europeans are bargain hunting?

The past two items I sold were sent to German bidders simply because I can't get Americans to bid on my stuff. I hate shipping internationally, but lately that's all I've been doing. The current item I have up has 1 bid and a question from a person from Holland ("Will you ship to Holland?"). UGH.

Why do I hate shipping internationally? Because it's a lot more work.

Domestic shipping:

1) print a label
2) stick it on package
3) request carrier pickup
4) stick package outside at my front door

International shipping:

1) calculate shipping for person who wants you to ship to Holland even though your auction says you don't
2) receive email instructions about how they want to fill out the customs forms
3) print postage
4) cut out collate the 4-page customs form
5) take package and forms to Post Office
6) wait in line
7) explain that I don't need postage because I printed it at home
8) wait while flustered Postal Employee actually figures out what is going on
9) pray that the form isn't missing any information
10) receive multiple emails from person asking for a tracking number
11) receive more emails from person as to why tracking information says the package has "attempted deliver", but that nobody actually delivered the package yet
12) receive more emails from person asking if I can help them receive their package

sigh...

Well, with the new year I am sifting through all of my accounts, investments, important things...etc. So I come across my UPromise.com account. I log in. I see that in 5 years of membership I have received a whopping $130 towards my kids' college education.

I have provided UPromise.com with the most intimate detailed information about my purchases over the past 5 years and they have rewarded me with $130 in virtual money. I say virtual because I can't even ask for or receive that money. I can only actually get it if I link it to a 529 College Savings Plan. But here's the thing, they don't offer a linkage into the plan that I've had running for my kids for the past 5 years. So the money is absolutely unavailable to me.

So screw you UPromise. I've gone in and removed all of my credit cards and other shopping cards. Although I have no idea if you actually *will* remove them from your database, I no longer intend to willingly feed your demographic engine with absolutely no compensation.

What a waste. I feel violated.

I never thought I could hate a movie more than Independence Day or Armageddon. But I do. And that movie is Transformers.

HOLY CRAP THAT MOVIE SUCKED!!!!!!

Words cannot express how horrible that movie was. It was a 90 minute cliche. And for most of it, I had no idea what was going on, why the characters were at certain locations, why they couldn't simply do X instead of the extremely complicated Y.

I have absolutely no idea why Sam had to run the cube to the top of the white building... the event that drove that final 20 minutes of the movie. What the hell was supposed to happen? Why couldn't he just give the cube to an Autobot? Why did they want the cube in the first place? Why was giving the cube to "the military" established as the thing they were all trying to accomplish? What was the whole deal with that girl pausing in an alley before randomly driving backwards a mile back into a battle? There were plenty of Autobots around... where were they? Why even HAVE giant, powerful robots when a stupid little cell phone-sized one basically accomplishes every evil task in the movie with extreme ease? Why did the NSA feel the need to tell everyone in the world exactly what was going on via a television broadcast? Why did they feel the need to recruit "signal analysts" from high school? How could a high school girl with an Australian accent possibly know intimate details of Chinese and Korean military encryption? I love how that token fat black guy had NSA software running on his bedroom PC. Everyone has that. I love how the government hired guys to manually spray MBE1 with cryogenic gas from hand held sprayers for the last 80 years. I love how that battle worn voluptuous beauty kneeling in the middle of the street in a slow-mo scream as a robot flew over her was all smudged with black soot on her skin while her bright blue dress was absolutely pristine. I love how nobody in the movie could hear all of the robotic sounds from sneaking giant robots... but we all could. I love how you can pick up short wave radios from Radio Shack and call military F-22s flying above the city... and have them launch missiles at any target you desire. I love how you can pick up a cell phone in a foreign country, talk to a customer service rep, and get connected to the Pentagon. I love how the communcation OF THE ENTIRE WORLD "goes down" thanks to a virus in the "military network". I love how the NSA leader says that they need to work on restoring WORLD COMMUNICATION immediately. I love how there was magically a Decepticon onboard Air Force One disguised as a radio casually shoved under a seat. I love how that Decepticon, an alien being, knew exactly how to "download the entire military network" in just a few easy keystrokes. I can do that too.

Just an absolutely horrid, horrid movie. Only see it if you want to see a catalog of every possible Hollywood cliche and a remarkable exhibition of logical laziness.

And I'm not the only one.

Damn, I hate that movie. I feel all dirty.

Are SIM cards supposed to make our lives easier or something? What are they good for? Does anybody know?

I've had a couple of cell phones in my life so far, and never once have I been able to take the Contact List from one phone, stick it on a SIM card, and load it into the new phone.

Is there any consumer-oriented use for them?

Okay, "hate" is a little strong, so let me see if there's another way to put it... hmmm... nope. That's about right. Nailed it.

These are technologies that I don't use because I find them to be one or more of the following:

• Annoying
• Completely Extraneous
• Painfully Annoying
• Frivolous

Yeah, some of those items are redundant. On purpose. Alright, so here's the list.

1) MySpace - Don't get me started. Probably the worst most successful ColdFusion application ever created. I love apps that yell at me when I click a link titled "log in" saying, "You Must Be Logged-In to do That!". Um, okay jackhole, that's what I'm trying to do.

2) Twitter - Friggin' why? The only word that comes to mind is "dumb". As if we weren't connected too much already. Just try to make any sense out of the Titter front page and tell me that it's worthwhile.

3) Skype - I'm really not sure why people use Skype. I personally have no need. Don't you people have cell phones or VOIP that allows you to make unlimited long distance calls? Wow, I guess I'm just super-advanced.

4) del.icio.us - With a domain name that makes me want to puke whenever I see it, this service is completely pointless. A site that still, after many years, defines the term "uber cryptic"... and defies all those who actually attempt to type the URL into a browser. Of course, I don't need it as I completely rule with SiteBar. Don't know what that is? Too bad for you, delelieicoicous user.

5) Tag Clouds (scroll down) - I wonder if it's possible for someone to devise a less useful navigation device.

6) Any other Instant Messaging service other than MSN or AOL. Just give it up already. Go home Yahoo, nobody uses you. ICQ, though wise, you certainly are ancient and completely bloated. (perhaps you are Buddha) IRC, does anyone besides l33t uber geeks user IRC anymore? Relay is one of the oldest Internet technologies. It has been surpassed, my little friends. The only reason to use IRC is if you want to seem cool, like me, but really aren't.

7) Podcasts - You know how I feel. Horrible way to deliver current news and information. Occasionally they can be worth while.

8) Virtually any Social Networking site like Friendster or Facebook - Maybe I'd like them if I were 13 years old.

9) Any Photo Sharing site that's not related to Google and Picasa. Seriously, how many of these do we need. Google's is the best so let's just leave it at that.

10) Any map site that isn't Google Maps. Does MapQuest still exist?

11) Any app that isn't made by Google. Wait, what?

Just found this quote on another site that is meant to help newbies:

What are Podcasts?

"Podcasts are like magazines. You subscribe to a magazine you want to read and whenever a new issue is printed it is delivered to your doorstep."

Um, no. A podcast is like a magazine if, when you opened a magazine, you were forced to begin at page 1 and read every single word on each page in order. And if you were to return to that magazine later, you would be forced to begin reading again at the first word of page 1, or at the exact spot you were at when you left, or at some semi-random location within the rest of the magazine.

Podcasts remain an incredibly inefficient vehicle for the delivery of information.