1) Timely Tips - "Word Formats"
2) File Find! - "IE Booster"
3) Sites-Seeing - "How Much is Inside?\Origins of American Animation"
4) Email Funny- "Your Pilot Speaking, 2002"
5) They Said It - quotes to give one pause
6) Hodgepodge - that what fits no where else

Hi, and welcome back to The Basement, unless this is your first visit - then, just Welcome! In case you didn't know, all software reviewed in NFTB is known to be freeware and spyware-free at the time of publishing. If you come across something in the dark and cavernous ruins of The Basement that no longer fits that criteria, let me know and I'll remove the "offender" as promptly as possible.

Another small request...if you use an automated e-mail response of some type to notify people you've changed your e-mail address, PLEASE included your old address! Each week I get a couple notifications of changed addresses - but I don't know what to change them from! Thanks!

If you have a moment, drop me a comment on what you liked, disliked, or would like to see in the future! - Dave

In order to master the idiosyncrasies of formatting (changing the appearance of something) in Word, it's helpful to know that there are four categories of formats: Character, Paragraph, Document, and Section. Each category has certain characteristics, which dictate exactly what portion of text will be formatted, the formatting process, and where information about the applied formatting can be found.

Character formats affect blocks of text as small as a single character, up to the entire document--whatever you have selected. Examples of character formats are Bold, Italics, Font size and color.

Paragraph formats will affect a single paragraph, whichever your insertion point is positioned in, and will always affect the entire paragraph. Examples of paragraph formats are horizontal alignment, indents, and setting tab stops. Once you have set a paragraph format, it continues to the next paragraph whenever you tap the Enter key.

Document formats are just that--they affect they entire document! Examples would be setting margins, changing page orientation, and changing vertical alignment.

Finally, there are Section formats, which are Document formats applied to only a selected area of your document! Section formats have a few peculiar behaviors, which we'll take a look at next issue!

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2) File Find! - "IE Booster"

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"Throughout the ages, man has pondered the question, 'How much is inside?' With a few extra bucks, and a decent spot on the internet, we at cockeyed.com expose these long-hidden truths."--Intro to How Much is Inside?

This is beyond weird...This website is what happens when movie mad scientists come to life, and decide to act out their warped ideas. These nut cases just happen to be fixated on the topic of quantity. For example, you'll find a very detailed humorous explanation, with photos and drawings, (ALL of the "projects" on display here have very detailed, humorous explanations) of just how large a pile a million dollars would make; how many ketchup packets it takes to fill a ketchup bottle; how much Silly String is in a can; and best of all - How much of the yummy filling is in a package of Oreo cookies?

Enjoy the craziness at How Much is Inside?

You know, (or maybe you didn't)--animation didn't start with that famous mouse. The Library of Congress is offering for your viewing pleasure, a collection of 21 animated films and 2 fragments, which spans the years 1900 to 1921. Some have the homemade "riffle-book" look, others you might guess are the great-grandparents of Mr. Bill and Gumby. There's puppets on film, cut-out animation, and pen drawings. You might even recognize a few, like Keeping Up With the Joneses, Krazy Kat, and The Katzenjammer Kids. Protect your keyboard and grab some non-buttered popcorn, then click on over to the Origins of American Animation.

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Once upon a time, we would fly "the friendly skies." That was then, and this is quite a different time. Here's a bittersweet Email Funny, one with a hint of nostalgia heavily overlaid with an icing of reality:

Download "Your Pilot Speaking, 2002" here [709 KB\ZIPPED MPEG]

Soap Bubbles, Virtual Curling and a Penguin Arcade are all new in The Basement Games Room!Stop by after work and relax for a few games before battling the traffic!

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"Liberty has never come from the government. Liberty has always come from the subjects of the government. The history of liberty is the history of resistance. The history of liberty is a history of the limitation of governmental power, not the increase of it." - Woodrow Wilson

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< * > Wired has a pair of interesting article on the Nigerian E-mail Scam (see NFTB May 1, '02) - Meet the Nigerian E-mail Grifters and How a Bank Got E-mail Scammed < * > Dovetailing nicely with this issue's Email Funny..."Sorry, we can let in the flesh-eating dinosaur with the foot-long razor-sharp teeth, but not your scissors." < * > Long-time readers familiar with this editor's strange fascination with overly warmed, dry bread will rejoice with me at the discovery of Dr. Toast's Amazing World of Toast! still browning 'em Five years later! < * >

G'nite, and thanks for reading!

Dave Gretz

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