Well, folks, I've typed up a little rambling and, I hope, entertaining explaination of the difference in meaning between "agnostic" and "atheist". Feedback is appreciated. Here goes...

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Alright, I've got some crazy sounding things to tell you... Unicorns are real. Yup, I've seen them. They are a dying species, very near extinction.

It's because of their food supply. They eat only oats mixed with gold flakes. Since they are rather shy, certain steps must be taken to attract unicorn in order to feed them. First you must find a tree that has been struck and killed by lightning. You have to fell the tree and build a split-rail fence out of it in a forest clearing (preferrably sun-dappled.)

On the night of a full moon, sprinkle your oat and gold mixture (20 parts to 1 by weight is best) on the tops of the fence posts. If any unicorns are in the area, they will be attracted by the oats and put at ease by the fence and you should be able to get a good view and feel good for helping these amazing creatures.

Here's the deal: if you thought what I was saying was untrue, you are being skeptical and would probably like some proof about the existence of unicorns. Are you going to flat out state that unicorns don't exist? Anywhere? Not even somewhere we might have missed checking for unicorns? On another planet? If you can't say for certain that unicorns don't exist, then you are agnostic with respect to unicorns. Agnostic and gnostic (lowercase G, not the early Christian tradition) refer to knowledge, "knowing" or "not knowing".

Now, if you weren't sure about whether or not unicorns exist, are you going to act as if my statements are true? Are you going to head out into the woods and start searching for a tree that has been killed by lightning so you can get started on your fence? If not, then you are a-unicornist (with respect to my claims).

So, if you aren't going to make any claims to know for sure about the unicorns I've described and you aren't going to act like they are true, then you would be an agnostic a-unicornist.

If someone walks up to me and says "god is real and he wants you to wear a bowl of ice cream on your head!", I would, reasonably enough, expect more evidence. He says "I've got it on this sacred text!" and I respond "That's a napkin from that dinner and it's written with crayon..." Either way, I'm not going to make any claims about a god in response and thus be agnostic (maybe a god really does exists who wants people to wear bowls of ice cream on their head, I can't say for sure) but I'm not going to act as though his statements are true and head straight for my local ice cream parlor for a dish of chocolate chip mint (risking persecution at the hands of the Vanilla-ites). So, with regards to his claims about god, I am an atheist; I'm not going to behave as if his claims are fact.