Hi-5: Five Hottest Women Who Secretly Play Dungeons & Dragons - 5/16/2008

Hi-5: Five Hottest Women Who Secretly Play Dungeons & Dragons

Written by Benjamin Hedrick

Ever since man has been inventing activates to entertain him and his friend’s people have ridiculed each activity. Once enough people pick up that activity it loses it nerd status and becomes main stream. The two most recent activities that come to mind are poker and video games… not so much Dungeons & Dragons. Yet, 5.5 million people play every year. Certainly some of them have to be women, and some of those women have to be celebrities. Here are the five hottest candidates.

Natalie Portman

I know that I fell for Miss Portman when I saw her in Beautiful Girls; then Garden State put her over the top. Here is why I think she plays D&D: she is wicked smart. She graduated from Harvard and did graduate studies at Hebrew University of Jerusalem. She speaks Hebrew and has studied French, Japanese, German and Arabic. She has guest lectured at Columbia. There is no way that she has been around that many nerds and not gotten into a few heated games of D&D. I think her character class would be Erudite. The Erudite is an alternative to the standard psion class. It is a psionic character who follows a scholarly and self-reflective road to power, instead of a merely self-conscious path like the psion follows. This class fits her to a tee. She reportedly missed the premier of Episode I because she had to study for her high school finals.

Kristen Bell

She has been quoted as saying that “nerdy is the new cool.” Lets run down the list. Fanboys, a movie about Star Wars fans going to Skywalker ranch -- check. Forgetting Sarah Marshall a movie from the King of the Nerds, Judd Apatow -- check. Comic book style Heroes -- check. Voice of Gossip Girl (sure, you watch it... because your girlfriend makes you) -- no check, but I pity you. So, 3 out of 4 projects with nerds, by nerds, for nerds. Again, she can’t be around that many and not have stumbled upon some 20 sided dice. I think her character class would be the Monk, a martial artist whose unarmed strikes hit fast and hard, a master of exotic powers.

Zooey Deschanel

I know this is going to be the most debatedly hot chick on the list. I personally find her very sexy, and it is my list. I hate to admit this, but I remember falling for her in Almost Famous -- but I really became enamored with her in The New Guy. Yes, I am the one person who saw that movie. Then, in a move which cemented her in nerd lore, she played one of the title characters in the movie adaptation of The Hitchhikers Guide to the Galaxy. She always plays the quirky sidekick and is now in an indie band call She & He, so it is not a stretch to think that she is sneaking off to dusty basements, not to snort lines, but to progress her character through the situation the dungeon master has thought up. Since she has mastered being hot, acting and singing, I think her character class would be Bard; the Bard is a performer whose music works magic, a wanderer, a tale-teller and a jack of all trades.

Layla Kayleigh

She is a self-professed nerd. She reads "The Economist," she watches Bill Maher, she likes to bowl and she used to work for Al Gore on Current TV. Layla runs the Feed on G4TV’s "Attack of the Show." She is British. If we were betting on which of these five would be the first to step forward and say, “Yes, I constantly roll dice in a non-gambling atmosphere,” she would be the favorite. Layla and Kristen seem to be the most at home in their nerdiness. She has been living on her own since her mother left England for the US when she was 12, so she had to learn at an early age how to gather and process information on her own. Layla has said she was afraid to tell anyone her mother had left for fear that social services would take her away. I think her character class would be Rogue; the Rogue is a tricky, skillful scout and spy who wins battles by stealth rather than brute force.

Scarlett Johansson

Scarlet has come a long way since that slightly pudgy girl in ‘Lost in Translation’. She has gone on to top numerous lists, including Esquire’s Sexiest Woman Alive, and she is the new go-to girl for Woody Allen. She seems smart, or at least she gets cast that way. She is engaged to Van Wilder. She also has a reputation for being a diva, which is the main reason she is on this list. That, and it's a reason for me to stare at pictures of her while I am writing this article. We needed someone who always gets their way, who has to make every decision -- in short, we needed a dungeon master. Step back and think about how many people would be playing Dungeons and Dragons if Scarlett Johansson was their dungeon master. Take some time for the calculations.

R2-D2 Talking Ice Bucket With Han Solo Carbonite Ice Tray
Posted by Dustin on May 13, 2008 at 01:01 PM CST:
Check out this super cool R2-D2 ice bucket coming from Wesco that includes an ice tray featuring Han Solo in carbonite!

Daemon Aditi

Your PC Might Be...

Zombie PCs, unlike their human-based counterparts, don't drool blood, moan or feast on human flesh. The digital undead are far less obtrusive: If your PC has been hijacked with malware and becomes a member of a "botnet," it will silently send spam or join in distributed denial of service attacks that disable target sites with a flood of traffic. But here's the bad news: This kind of misbehavior is so well hidden that it's often impossible to detect, even while staring the culprit in the face--or using it to read an article on Forbes.com. A few clues, however, may help root out the zombie on your desktop.



Your computer seems preoccupied.
If your computer seems to be busy even when you're not, it may be living a secret life of crime. Slow performance, or blinking lights on your modem and a whirring hard drive when no visible programs are running, can mean that malware on your computer is sending out spam or worse, participating in a distributed denial of service attack that floods a site with information requests in order to disable it.


You've visited shady sites.
Today, just visiting a Web site can secretly hijack a computer with malware. Just before the Superbowl in February of this year, for instance, Dolphin Stadium's official Web site was hacked to infect thousands of visitors with a Trojan horse that allowed malware to be downloaded to the machines. But while no site is completely safe, the Internet's "bad neighborhoods"--like pornography and gambling sites--are far more likely to infect your computer with zombifying software.


You don't frequently scan.
Anti-virus scanning programs aren't guaranteed to catch every bug that could turn your computer into a spam-spewing zombie--today's most advanced malware mutates into a different form as often as every 30 minutes to avoid detection, according to Internet Security Systems' Josh Corman. But if you skip anti-virus scans or use an out-of-date scanner, you leave your computer vulnerable to a much wider variety of exploitation, and make it even more difficult for your scanner to catch quickly shifting threats.


You skip software updates.
Anti-virus software isn't the only program that has to be vigilantly maintained to keep your computer clean. Software like operating systems and Web browsers can also have vulnerabilities that are intermittently discovered and patched by software vendors. Skipping those updates leaves your computer with the flawed older version of the programs, and sometimes a wide open back door for malware infection.


You use common software.
Today's cybercriminals methodically seek to exploit the most computers in a given amount of time. That means they're more likely to target common programs and platforms. Since PCs have a far greater market share than their Apple counterparts, Apple machines' vulnerabilities are less targeted than those of PCs. Similarly, a commonly used Web browser like Internet Explorer is more likely to attract malware than a less common one like Firefox or Safari.



You have insecure e-mail practices.
Most e-mail users know better than to open attachments on e-mails from strangers, even ones that promise naked pictures of Britney Spears. But just clicking on a link embedded in a spam e-mail can lead your computer to a Web site that allows it to be infected. E-mail programs that automatically download images within an e-mail's body can also leave your computer vulnerable to exploitation whenever you open a message.



You've received a warning from your ISP.
Even if you can't tell that your computer has been zombified, the company that controls your access to the Internet often can. If your Internet service provider detects an inordinate amount of bulk e-mail coming from your account, it will sometimes send you a message warning that your computer may be sending spam. That could mean your teenage son has started an e-mail marketing company for hawking counterfeit Viagra. But more likely, your computer is a hardworking member of a lucrative spam botnet.

YouTube - Jeff Dunham Achmed's "Jingle Bombs"

Star Wars According To A Three Year Old

"Star Wars According To A Three Year Old

Posted By Dustin on February 25, 2008

We've gotten a few emails on this one today and I highly recommend you check it out and pass it along.

The video on YouTube.com is of a three year old describing Star Wars Episode IV : A New Hope.

Only two words describe this video, 'CUTE KID!'. With great lines such as 'The shiny guy always worries', and 'Don't talk back to Darth Vader', this is definitely an instant classic.

Check it out here!"

Han Solo carbonite desk

If you are looking for a new office desk and want something really special you could talk to Tom Spina Designs and let them produce a Han Solo in carbonite desk for you. They recently published some photos of their latest creation made for Mark Hall in the pop group Casting Crowns.

The stylish Star Wars desk is made out of metal and fiberglass construction with a 1/2″ thick glass on top. So, what do you think? Isn’t it one of the coolest desks you have ever seen? Here is some more info and another photo of the Han Solo carbonite desk.

(Via digg)