Happy Festivus

I almost forgot.

PapaJohns.com Bowl

I just noticed this game was on, and I couldn't help but wonder, why not just the Papa John's Bowl? Why do they need to stick the .com on there? I can understand if it was an internet company, like some of the recent bowls. And I can understand that Papa John's is apparently trying to push their web site. But frankly, if there is someone out there who wants Papa John's pizza, and doesn't realize that PapaJohns.com is their website, then they're probably too stupid to order pizza online anyway.

Anniversary Cruise Day 6

Today's our last sea day and our last day of the cruise. I think 5 nights is just enough. I really enjoyed the one 7 nighter we took, but those are more expensive and harder to plan the time off. It's not too hard to look forward to the end anyway, as I still have 6 days off. Here's what's going on today so far -


- We did the morning bingo because they had the drawing for a free cruise after the second game and we had 30 tickets. OF course, we didn't have to buy the $109 worth of cards, but what the hell. Let me tell you, being on a cruise skews my sense of what's cheap and what's expensive. And after that, just let me say that I fucking hate bingo. After years of playing, I've won one $25 game. I was on for three numbers today, but of course I lost. However, Michelline's mother won a $280 jackpot. Needless to say, she'll have to find another way home. Bingo players are sore losers, since one person's win is everyone else's loss.

- I'm off to round 2 of beer tasting in about 30 minutes. Of course, I'll be posting a picture of the beers here as well as the trivia questions. Wish me luck!

Beer tasting round 2! You see the lineup above. This time, I'll give my impressions in order.

• Sam Adams Boston Lager - It's good, everyone knows that. The flavor has a depth you don't find in run of the mill american beers.
• McEwans IPA - I've had McEwan's Scotch Ale, but never the IPA. I generally don't like IPA's as I don't care for the overly hoppy bitterness, but I was pleasantly surprised by this one. It was not overly bitter at all. It was smooth with a nice mild flavor.
• Franziskaner hefe-Weisbier - The only heffenweizen in the group. This was very good, with a fruity taste in front that I couldn't quite identify. I was thinking banana, but that wasn't quite it.
• Celebrator double bock - This was my favorite of the bunch. Strong and full-bodied.
• Beamish Irish stout - Another canned beer with a nitrogen widget. Just like the Guinness and Boddington's from Monday, this seemed very weak and thin. I'd try it again from the tap, but I'm going to stay away from these cans.

This time I was smarter and made sure I had an empty stomach, so by the time we were finished, I had a nice little buzz (helped out by the Samuel Smiths nut brown ale I had right afterward). Ok, now for the trivia. For some reason he started off with three gimmes -

• What beer is called the king of beers?
• What do you use to keep the beer from sticking to the napkin?
• What's the larget brewery in the US?
• In what country is beer considered a food staple?
• How do you make a redeye?
• Give the city and year of the first American brewery.
• What vitamin complex does beer provide?
• What European beer uses a red star in it's marketing?
• What US state has the most breweries?
• What's the term for a collector of beer mats?
• What's the term for a collector of beer bottles?

Anniversary Cruise Day 5 - D-Day

It's the big day. As of today we've been married for 15 years. It's been great so far and I'm looking forward to 50 or 60 more. We'll be one of those couples in their 80's on their 37th cruise getting free champagne. A few thoughts from today -

- One thing new this cruise has been cell phone service onboard. The ship has a satellite relay for the major carriers. We noticed this after checking our phones and seeing several missed calls. If you don't have an international plan, you have to pay international roaming rates, so I'll just keep missing calls, I think.


- This was our first time in Grand Cayman and we liked it a lot. We were scheduled to do a tour, but we decided to skip that and just walk around the port area. We both thought it reminded us a lot of Key West. In that it seemed a lot more first world than third. Nobody following us around trying to sell us stuff, no crazy jerry-rigged wiring arrangements, no noticeable abject poverty. In Mexico, Central America and the Bahamas, you seem to see all these I've heard the Virgin Islands are more like this as well.

- This weak dollar may be good for exports, but it sucks ass for traveling. Pesos are about 10.5 to the dollar and the Cayman Islands dollar is .8 to the US dollar. I'll bet it was reversed 5 years ago.

Anniversary Cruise Day 4

Today was our first port, Cozumel. Nothing too exciting here. We wanted to shop for some Mexican art for the area in the backyard by the pool. You can also do tours to some Mayan ruins in the area, but that's a 7-hour deal, and we saw some neat Mayan ruins at Altun Ha in Belize in 2005. You can also do the beachy stuff, like snorkeling or swimming, but we're not beach people and besides, we could do that at home. Random stuff from today -



- Signs you're in a foreign country. As I was taking a picture of the mess of wires, a guy walked by and said he was an electrician. He said he saw some guys on a job down the street using garden hose for conduit.


- If you're ever in Cozumel, I recommend going to Pancho's backyard cafe. These fishbowl margaritas were good, and strong. After a light breakfast and one of these, I was feeling mighty happy.

- The crew had a talent show today and I was surprised at how much I enjoyed it. There were 5 or 6 acts, all singing. Everyone was really good, but a few stood out. One guy did a great rendition of U2's "With or Without You". Then a lady came out and they announced she would be singing something by Evanescence. Sure enough, it was "My Immortal". I was very wary because it would be so easy to butcher that song, but she was great, even with the Filipino accent.

- And I almost forgot, I actually exercised today! I stopped by the gym to see what it looked like and it's large and very well-appointed(I need to take a picture). Each machine has its own TV with a headset. Anyway, I generally run somewhere between 2.5 and 3 miles at 6.5 mph. I set it to 6.5 and I'm thinking this is way too slow. Then I notice it's set on kilometers per hour. I couldn't remember the exact conversion, so I bumped it up to 11 kph. You would think, though, that on a ship with 2200 Americans out of 2400 passengers, the equipment would be set to miles and pounds, no?

The Road

So, a while ago, I saw a post about this book over at Tart's blog, and made a note to myself to check it out sometime since I like reading post-apocalyptic type fiction. So I picked it up one day along with The Golden Compass, which I had to read after getting an email at work about how we should avoid the movie because it was going to turn our kids into little heathens or something. Anyway, I almost didn't get it when I saw it was an Oprah's Book Club book, but then I decided that was pretty closed minded. Anyway, I'm about a third of the way through it, and normally I wouldn't post anything until I'm done reading a book, but I might not even be able to finish this one. Not that it isn't good, because it is, but holy shit, it might be the most depressing thing I've ever read or even heard of. Maybe it wouldn't seem so bad if I didn't have a young son, but fuck this is really getting to me. And it's even worse because I can see what's coming. Well, I hope I can't, actually. Anyway, movies and books don't usually get to me too much, but if what I think might happen happens in this book, I'll probably cry like a little baby.

Oh, and I found nothing whatsoever that was controversial in any way in The Golden Compass.

Anniversary cruise - Day 3

It's day 3 of our anniversary cruise, and our second day on board. Today is a sea day as we cruise toward a Cozumel landing about 7 AM tomorrow. Right now we're heading west just a few miles north of Cuba. . Random thoughts from today -


- We played bingo this morning. Bingo is big on cruise ships, as is any and all forms of gambling. Anything to part us from our money. We bought the $69 package (heh, heh) which came with a sheet of paper cards, 12 raffle tickets, 20 pull-tab card and this electronic bingo machine loaded with 48 cards. This is what bingo has come to - you give them your money, the machine plays for you and it tells you lost, and you don't even have to listen to the numbers. We didn't win any bingo, but we did get $54 on the pull-tabs, so we nearly broke even and had some fun along the way.

- I'm connecting to the internet through the ship's satellite connection. Cruise ships are very slowly starting to realize that this internet thing is here to stay, and that hey, some people use the internet for leisure. I've been on 8 cruises and the advances have been painfully slow.

• First cruise 1998 - no internet
• 2000 through 2004 - A small area set up as an afterthought with 4 or 5 PCs called the internet cafe
• 2005 - Wireless arrives at the internet cafe! But only if you're actually in the cafe. And it's painfully slow
• 2007 - On the Jewel, the first advance since wireless - ethernet connections in every stateroom! And wireless in the public areas of the ship. Not bad. Of course, the internet cafe is still 6 PCs in a hallway and they have one guy who has to answer all the questions/complaints, and he's swamped.

Now that they've finally got the access nearly up to snuff, they really have to work on pricing and speed. I'm paying 0.40/minute to connect and to get that rate you have to drop $100 for 250 minutes. Needless to say, I'm composing this offline. And I swear the entire ship has one internet satellite. It's not dial-up, but it's definitely reminiscent. Fortunately, I'm somewhat savvy, so I've connected my laptop to the ethernet connection and set up a secured wireless adhoc connection with mine as the gateway. So for the same amount of minutes, we can have Michelline and her parents on too. Speed is about the same since the bottleneck isn't the 100mbps ethernet connection, it's the internet connection itself. Ok, I'm off to a beer tasting.


- I signed up for the beer tasting at the beer bar, Maltings. We had a little fun at the beginning when they dragged a very heavy, blind drunk guy off his barstool onto the floor. Eventually they brought a wheelchair and rolled him away. Luckily he wasn't belligerent. He was very pleasant but unhelpful as they were manhandling him into the chair. You can see the offerings above. I found both the Boddington's and Gunniess in the can to be quite bland. The Guinness didn't seem like the same thing I had gotten on tap. The lagers were ok. I'm really not much of a lager person. The Newcastle was the best, but I've always liked Newcastle. Along with the beer, they had trivia. There were 7 questions, but we only got three. Three teams got five right and they had a chug-off to name the winner. Damn, the winner drained a tall beer glass in about 4 seconds. Had to be about 20 oz. For your enjoyment, here are the questions -

• What's the oldest brewery in the US?
• What's the first foreign beer, an American brand, ever imported into Germany?
• What's the national beer of Jamaica?
• What country has the most varieties of beer (starts with a b)?
• What brand was the first light beer, in the 70's?
• How many years did prohibition last in the US?
• What's the strongest beer, ABV, sold in the us at 17%?
• What's the most expensive beer in the world and where does it come from?

The answers may not be accurate, but as the cruise guy said, it was his game. All-in-all, a lot of fun. I'm going to do it again on Thursday.


- This is something new on this cruise for us. These things are everywhere. They're automated hand sanitizer dispensers. The cruise lines have gotten a real black eye over all the cruise ships that have come down with Norwalk or some other stomach virus. I don't know how effective it is, but I've been using them. Better safe than sorry.

Anniversary cruise - Day 2

Embarkation day! Today we boarded the Norwegian Jewel, our third time on NCL. Also with us are Michelline's parents. We gave her mom a cruise for her 50th birthday last year, but this is the first time we could get it scheduled. Random stuff from today -

- After getting to the cruise terminal and boarding the ship, Pete, Michelline's stepfather, realized he didn't have his credit card. We decided to check the truck. This meant going upstream and getting off the ship. If you haven't been on a cruise before, the security is similar to an airport, but not quite so tight. And when the ship is boarding, everything is designed to get people onto the ship, not off. So we're crossing under ropes, cutting around barriers and we get to an unmarked, unmanned door leading out to the baggage area. We exit and are almost to the parking lot when a guy stops us and says we're not allowed to be there. He says we have to go back through the building. So we go back to the unmarked door which now, of course, is manned and locked. Fortunately, we were able to scoot past the security guard while he was confused. It turned out that Pete did, in fact, leave his card in the truck so all was well. On the way back in, we saw the baggage area guy. He said that we could have been arrested for being in that area. Maybe he was exaggerating, but what a shitty day that would have been.

- Norwegian does what they call freestyle cruising. This means that instead of having a set time and assigned table for dinner, which is customary, you just go when you want. We don't really like this - it's fun to go to dinner with the same people every night and have the same waiters. But this ship is designed for freestyle, so they have 10 specialty restaurants. Tonight we ate in their teppanyaki room. The food was good, but probably not worth the $20 cover. Tomorrow we're trying the Italian place, which has no cover.

- Guinness Stout is good beer, even at $4.50 a bottle. I got 6 for the price of 5 and I have 3 left. One of the problems with cruising is you want to eat like a pig, but you also want to get heavily buzzed (or wasted). You really have to work a schedule if you want to do both without getting sick. I had a liquid lunch which left me pleasantly glowing until dinner. I think I may go see what kind of buzz I can work up now that dinner has settled.

- Unless Michelline's downstairs winning right now, we're down $160 in the casino. If we win any big jackpots (like my $700 slot win 2 years ago), I'll be sure to let everyone know.

- Looks like it was a bad day for all the couch regulars except for nightshift. How do the Redskins and the Eagles beat the Cowboys and the Giants on the same day? And why is the station that just finished showing the Redskins-Giants showing Sportscenter from the UK? Anyone want the score of the Liverpool-Man United game?


- We have a balcony for the first time in our 8 cruises. So I'm wondering what kind of interesting stuff we can do out there without getting kicked off the ship :).

Anniversary Cruise - Day 1

We started off on our third vacation in the last 3 weeks today, this one being a cruise commemorating our 15th wedding anniversary, which is coming up on December 19. We're leaving tomorrow on the Norwegian Jewel for a 5-night cruise to Cozumel, where we've been twice before, and Grand Cayman, where we've never been. We decided to drive down to Miami today rather than getting up at the crack of dawn tomorrow. That way we get to start our vacation a day earlier, we don't have to rush, and we have a cushion just in case anything happens (flat tire, locking your keys in the car and waiting 2 hours for a fucking locksmith as the ship is filling up, no of course I've never done that). Some random things from day 1.

- Last year we finally got tired of the sluggishness and grainy quality of the pictures our Pentax Optio was taking, so we bought our first SLR, the Nikon D40. Now this is a great camera and it takes great pictures. In fact, many of you know that we had our original stolen in London this year and bought a second one as soon as we got back. The one drawback is the size. It's not the kind of camera you can strap on and forget about. We decided we needed a pocket-sized camera to get the shots when we didn't want to lug the Nikon around. After much research we decided on the Sony Cybershot DSCW55. Out of all the sub-$200 cameras we researched, this one got universally great reviews for features, price and picture quality. We went to Circuit City to get it and found this, the DSCW80 as an open-box special for $119 instead of the normal $199! The picture above was taken with our new camera.

- We went to the Bayside Marketplace to do a little shopping and eat dinner. It's in a great location, smack in the middle of Downtown Miami, on the bay, next to the Arena where the Heat play and in front of the Port of Miami. So we're looking for a place to park, it's $20 to park in the damn garage!, This is just for the privilege of shopping in the fine stores of Bayside, such as Brookstone, Claire's and FYE, among others. After aborting the approach to the garage with sticker shock, we find a sign pointing to self-metered parking. We get down there and find a spot and it's a $10 flat rate. It's pretty bad when you feel like $10 is a bargain to park at what's basically a mall.

- Driving in downtown Miami sucks. Leaving Bayside, I head back west toward 95, as we're the next exit north. I find the onramp, and see our exit is next, a left-exit, all the way across the road, blocked by a fucking cement median. So I head north and look for an exit where I can turn around. I get off on 112 West, which goes to the airport. This is good because our hotel is next to the airport. Well, it's not so good because you can't get back on 95 South from this goddamn exit. So we head west all the way down some scary-looking streets to 57 ave, only to find that the entire fucking airport lies between us and our hotel, and there's no going through. We head back east, and get back to the original 95N exit we started from. At this point tempers are flaring and I head West again, this time farther south of the airport. Finally, we get to our hotel, about 90 minutes after leaving Bayside. This should have been a 15-minute trip. And the shitty thing was, we knew exactly where we were in relation to the hotel the entire time, but the fucked-up streets in Miami wouldn't take us where we needed to go. And let's not even get started on the damn toll-roads that they spring on you just before the toll plaza.

- Overall, outside of a tense few minutes, we've had a very nice day. We'll be getting to the port tomorrow at around 11, and we should be setting sail about 4.

Carrie

So, I noticed this movie was OnDemand and realized that I hadn't ever seen it, so I thought I'd check it out. I have to say that I didn't really expect to see so much full frontal nudity in the first two minutes of the movie. And isn't there some kind of law against showing naked girls, even when they're of age, if they're portraying underage girls? Oh, and crap, if you add up all the pubic hair I've seen in movies and porn for the last 10 years or so, there's no way it even comes close to being as much as what even one of those girls had going on. Also, Sissy Spacek is horribly unattractive.

Yes, Everyone has rights!

In the car today I caught some of today's Talk of the Nation. The segment I heard was about the latest Supreme Court case concerning the rights of detainees in Guantanamo. I only heard about 5 minutes or so, but it was enough to make me start yelling at the radio.

This guy calls, and he's clearly got the winger talking points memorized. He says -

• Why are we worried about giving rights to people who would slash our throats in a heartbeat? Why worry about protecting people who aren't even Americans?
  
• Why are we wasting time arguing about the rights of criminals when we have other problems in this country?
  
• What about all the reams of vital intelligence we've got from Guantanamo?
  

A woman answered him, I assume it was Gitanjali Gutierrez, and she was far too nice to him. She took the approach of explaining that American citizens have been detained as enemy combatants and that whatever intelligence we might have gained from Guantanamo has come at far too high a price, and has cost us the ability to gather more meaningful intelligence in the region with the cooperation of people we have now alienated. She also mentioned that we already have a system in place to deal with criminals and we should use that system.

She was followed by David Rivkin an attorney and a member of the UN Sub-Commission on the Promotion and Protection of Human Rights, who argues that the legal system is not appropriate for the detainees and that, in fact, if tried through the system, that most would go free. He claims that most of the detainees are Al Qaeda fighters.

Let's be clear about what's being said here -

• Non-citizens don't have inalienable rights. The only rights they have are those we deign to grant them.
  
• To win the war on terror, these guys are prepared to pick up and imprison innocent men along with the guilty. There is no other reasonable conclusion to draw if they're unwilling to grant them the right to challenge their detention and to force the government to meet a minimum burden of proof. So Rivkin is a lawyer and a member of a human rights commission who believes neither in basic human rights nor basic legal protections

One thing I find encouraging about the possibility of a Democrat in office, any Democrat, is that I think this system is going to change. If the nutjob Giuliani gets in, this will only get worse. Hearing the Democratic candidates talk about addressing the roots of the distrust of America by Muslims, restoring our image and restoring habeas corpus is so refreshing after 7 years of these idiots in power.

Broadcasters piss me off - Alternate Reality Edition

During the FSU-UF game, one of the morons in the booth came up with this bit of stupidity:

If Florida State can't slow down these Florida athletes, then who can?

Even if I ignore the ridiculous implication there that Florida State is somehow a good team, there is the issue that Florida has lost three games this year. So apparently someone has been able to stop them.

Broadcasters piss me off - Direct Snap Edition

This football season, I've noticed several announcers, particularly at CBS, harping on the direct snap, whenever anyone other than the quarterback takes the snap. This would be fine, except they do it even when the player actually lines up at quarterback. With McFadden lining up at QB so much today against LSU, they used it so much that they kept saying it even when the normal QB was in there. And while any snap is technically a direct snap, when it's to the QB, even when the QB is someone who normally plays somewhere else, it's redundant and annoying, and takes away from the term when it's used properly to describe a snap that goes directly to another player, like a running back or wide receiver. Also, earlier this season, one of these morons was going on and on about how someone on the field in that particular game popularized the direct snap, despite the fact that FSU (and probably many others) have been using the play for years.

Christmas Decorations

I figured I should put up some pictures of our Christmas decorations. The link shows pictures of all the rooms we decorated. I'll put up the outside decorations tomorrow. One thing you can't see is that we replaced all of our normal dishes with Christmas dishes.

It's funny, the house is much more decorated for Christmas than it is the other times of the year.

You can also see our honey wheat color on the walls in the kitchen.

Tasers are not safe

Another story about someone dying after being tasered, on the heels of that Polish guy who died in Canada.

I think the problem is that a lot of these officers aren't really trained correctly. Tasers should be thought of as an alternative to deadly force. If you can use a taser, where you would have used a gun, that's good. To me, these stories generally seem to be about officers who used the taser in place of physically subduing an unarmed person. I know that it can be dangerous, but that's the job. If you've got one unarmed Polish guy and several RCMPs, your training really ought to be enough to take him down safely.

In these two cases, what would the officers have done before tasers were available? Would they have pulled their guns? If the answer is no, they should leave the tasers in the holster.

24: The Unaired 1994 Pilot

I saw this the other day, it's pretty funny.

Shaving Meme

Toast put this little meme together.

At what age did you start shaving? I can't remember. I'll guess 14.
How ofen do you shave? Maybe twice a week. My facial hair grows fast, but I only shave around the beard when it gets really shaggy or I'm meeting people.
Last time you shaved? Friday.
What's the longest you can go without shaving? Probably about 2 weeks on the face before it started bothering me. About 1 week in other places.
What kind of razor do you use? Gillette Mach 3.
How often do you change blades? I don't know. To paraphrase Chemist, when the blade no longer cuts, but pulls.
Ever use an electric razor? I used one for quite a while back in my Senior year of high school, but you really have to grind the hell out of your face to get it close. Maybe they've gotten better.
Ever use a straight razor? No, but I have had a barber use one on my neck. Feels pretty good.
Do you own/use a facial hair trimmer? Yes. I use a trimmer to trim my beard and head hair once a week. While I can go without shaving for weeks, I can't go without trimming for longer than a week. Long, shaggy beard hair drives me insane.
Do you own/use a nose hair trimmer? Yes, and it's good for those pesky ear hairs too.
What shaving substance do you apply? None.
And what balm, if any, do you use afterwards? None.
What do you shave? Cheeks and neck around the beard, top of the head and back of my neck.
With the grain or against? With first, then against. Also sideways op top of the head.
Ever shave your genital hair? Yes.
Place you hate shaving the most? Back of my neck.
Ever use chemical hair removal treatments? No. Never seemed any easier than shaving.
Best part of shaving? The clean, neat feeling.
Worst part of shaving? Razor burn. I don't really get that anymore with the beard.
Worst shave you've ever had? I don't recall exactly, but some cheap disposable thing. Unlike Toast, though, the disposables I buy now to use at the gym on occasion do a fine job.

The Minnesota Vikings suck

I just heard this story on the radio this morning. Here's the gist -

The Minnesota Vikings have docked wide receiver Troy Williamson one game check for missing last Sunday's game against the San Diego Chargers to attend the Monday funeral of his maternal grandmother.

My feelings on bereavement time in any organization are that when and whether to attend the funeral of family members should be left entirely up to the employee. I also dislike bereavement policies that differentiate between family members. So I don't think that Williamson's relationship with his grandmother is any of the Vikings' business, but let's pretend that it was.

Williamson's maternal grandmother, who helped to raise him and with whom he was very close, died last week and he returned to South Carolina, where he played a large role in arranging her funeral. He also had to make travel arrangements for several of his siblings, some of whom are in the armed services.

The coach had this to say -

Coach Brad Childress told Twin Cities-area media following Thursday's practice that the decision was on a "business principle" of the Vikings organization
....
Childress cited the cases of two players, Minnesota defensive tackle Pat Williams and Indianapolis wide receiver Reggie Wayne, who appeared in games shortly after the deaths of family members.

I'm nearly speechless. So because Reggie Wayne played shortly after a death in his family, Williamson should too? Screwing over your employees who have their priorities straight is a "business principle" of the Vikings organization? WTF?

I realize that the NFL is not like a regular company, but this is patently ridiculous. In any organization, family-friendly policies foster a better working environment. In the NFL, it's especially important that the organization as a whole, including players, coaches, front office and ownership are all working together. This is a bad PR move, a bad move for team unity, and just a bad way to treat a person.

Belated Blogiversary*

I just realized that as of October 20th, this blog has been limping along for three years. That's kind of hard to believe. Oh well, I just thought it shouldn't pass without any comment.

* This is a made up word that I can't stand, but it does fit well, so I'm forced to use it.

Another sign of approaching old age

Overheard in the locker room this morning, after ESPN ran a story about OJ not being welcome in some hotels-

"Hey I heard that OJ used to be really good at football, is that right?"

Car wrecks suck

I was in my first auto accident of any significance this week. We were stopped at a light, far back, and I heard the car behind us stop a bit suddenly. I looked up and behind that car, I saw the car behind them flying(actually doing between 20 and 30) just a few feet away. Then, the crunch. Michelline says I said "Oh Sh..". Oddly enough, I was very calm, even just after it happened. Michelline, unfortunately, was carrying a glass punch bowl on her lap full of glass punch cups. So we ended up with broken punch glasses all over. The bowl did survive.

In all, there were four cars involved, the car in front of us, ours, and two behind us. The car directly behind us was the worst by far, and the only one not drivable. Everyone was uninjured. I tried to get a camera to get a picture of us all locked together, but we didn't have one in the car.

Now we have to go through all the red tape. We're still waiting to find out of the guy who hit us all had insurance. We have a rental car and still don't know if we're totaled or not. Even if the guy does have insurance, he may be fucked if his policy limits are too low. With the four cars, it's probably over $25k in damage.

It does make you realize how precarious things can be on the road even when you do everything right. This accident made me think back to the one other time I was nearly in a serious accident. I was driving a Toyota Sequoia on a windy, hilly two-lane road in Southern Missouri. I had my family, my parents and my niece in the car with me. We were just cresting a small hill and there was a car passing us in the other lane, going the other way. And suddenly, there was a red sports car coming directly at us, trying to pass the guy on our left. I don't remember exactly what went through my mind, but I jerked hard to the right onto a wide, grassy shoulder. We bounced to a stop and checked everything out. We were all fine. The asshole in the red car didn't even come back to check on us, although the guy he was passing did.

I often wonder what would have happened if he had swerved also, or if there hadn't been a shoulder at all. As we left the scene, there were a lot of stretches with no shoulder at all, or what there was had light poles or other obstructions. A Sequoia and a car hitting head on at about 50 mph. I imagine it would have been very bad, possibly fatal. I hope that idiot stopped trying to pass people on hills.

The Swamp: Rep. Stark apologizes for sharp anti-Bush remark

Am I the only one who thinks that Congress could get a lot more done if they stopped wasting time crafting resolutions to commend, condemn, and censure people and offering pointless apologies? Whether it's Rush Limbaugh, or MoveOn.org, or Pete Stark, I don't give a crap about official condemnation of their words, or about silly apologies* they were forced to give. You have more fucking important things to do. Especially with this week being Islamo-Facism Awareness Week.


* Seriously, he apologized to the troops? For what exactly? None of his comments in any way disparaged the troops.

It's Islamo-Fascism Awareness Week!

Don't forget that it's Islamo-Fascism Awareness Week this week. How did we ever manage before Islamo-Fascism Awareness Week? I remember those dark times, when Islamo-Fascism was hiding around every corner, wreaking havoc. But no more, because now, we're aware of it. It's finally safe to live in America again. Personally, I've been trying to be extra aware of Islamo-Fascism this week. I almost thought I saw some Islamo-Fascism at Wal-Mart the other day, but it turned out to just be a trick of the light. That Islamo-Fascism is some sneaky shit. I think every week should be Islamo-Fascism Awareness week. After all, they are trying to kill us. I can't imagine how many people we lost to Islamo-Fascism last week, before people were paying attention. I'll bet it was a lot. Sneaky Islamo-Fascist bastards. They need to go back to Islamia or wherever they come from.

Racist propaganda

We've received the following email from three different family members now -

CHRISTMAS STAMP
How ironic is this??!! They don't even believe in Christ and they're getting
their own Christmas stamp, but don't dream of posting the ten commandments on federal property?

USPS New Stamp (REVISED) original was issued in 2001

This one is impossible to believe. Scroll down for the text.


If there is only one thing you forward today......let it be this!

REMEMBER the MUSLIM bombing
of Pan Am Flight 103!

REMEMBER the MUSLIM bombing of
the World Trade Center in 1993!

REMEMBER the MUSLIM
bombing of the Marine Barracks in Lebanon!

REMEMBER
the MUSLIM bombing of the military Barracks in Saudi Arabia!


REMEMBER the MUSLIM bombing of the American
Embassies in Africa!

REMEMBER the MUSLIM bombing of
the USS COLE!

REMEMBER the MUSLIM attack on
9/11/2001!

REMEMBER all the AMERICAN lives that were
lost in those vicious MUSLIM attacks!

Now the United States Postal Service REMEMBERS and HONORS the EID MUSLIM holiday season with a commemorative first class Holiday postage stamp. Bull!

REMEMBER
to adamantly and vocally BOYCOTT this stamp

When purchasing your stamps at the post office. To use this stamp would be a slap
in the face to all those AMERICANS who died at the hands of those whom this stamp honors.

REMEMBER to pass this along to every patriotic AMERICAN you know!!!

The email is not only terribly misinformed (big surprise there), it's also very offensive. I don't offend easily, but earnestly forwarding around racist nonsense like this does it.

As I've mentioned before, all of Michelline's family are conservative, but they're not an uneducated bunch. What can you make of this? What do you do? They all know we're liberal and they still forward us this crap, and I think they really expect us to nod our heads and say 'Oh, yeah, that's terrible. Those damn Muslims'. Well Michelline decided she'd had enough and sent this back -

By forwarding this on, you're saying that you feel ALL Muslims are responsible for the atrocities mentioned in this email. That's wrong. The vast majority of Muslims are peaceful and respectful of human life. If we hold all Muslims to blame for these atrocities, then perhaps we should hold all Christians to blame for the Irish unrest. Let's hold ALL Christians to blame for the Crusades. Let's hold all Christians to blame for the Holocaust. Unless we are going to call Christians to task for these atrocities, we cannot hold the vast majority of Muslims responsible for the cruelties and misdeeds of a few.

I would ask that you do not forward racist emails such as these to me. I find them highly offensive and so should you. For by perpetuating this nonsense, you are stating quite categorically that you feel that the only valid American Citizen is a Christian one.

Thank you for demonstrating such wonderful "Christian" ideals and virtues.

I think she's right that allowing this stuff to spread without comment is not acceptable. She normally just deletes this crap, but this one sent her over the edge. She's a little apprehensive about what some of the people may say, but I told her not to worry, she's firmly on the right side on this.

The media are stupid

Warning - Cowboy fan introspection and wankery follow. If you don't like it, too bad.

The Cowboys are 5-1 and barring key injuries or some other catastrophe, appear to be headed for the playoffs for sure, and have as good a shot as any at the division title and home field. None of that changed yesterday. Looking at it practically, I'm sure the team is unhappy with the loss, but realize that it was only a couple of plays from being a different game. But, damn it, I like to listen to sports radio and read sports websites, and from that selfish perspective, the final score yesterday has ruined this week for me.

I've only listened to about 10 minutes of radio this morning, and I've already heard it expressed that between the Buffalo game and the "blowout" yesterday, maybe the Cowboys aren't as good as advertised. That's what a lot of the media are going to take out of the game yesterday. Not that the Cowboys came back from a 14-0 deficit to take the lead in the third quarter, but that the Patriots ran us off the field. Yes, a 21 point victory is a blowout, but what kind? Not the kind where the Patriots came in and never looked back. The game wasn't over until the Patriots kicked a FG to go up 14 with about 4 minutes left.

Imagine this scenario - the Cowboys, after that FG, take the ball and drive down to score a TD. Then the Patriots get the ball and run out the clock. Then it's 41-34 and we hear about how the Cowboys played them tough all the way. But essentially, it's the same game - barring a miracle comeback, it was over after the FG. That's why that stupid garbage time TD pissed me off so much.

One last thing about the defense. I'm sure we're going to hear about this all year, but I've watched every game, and I'm not worried about the defense. Sure I'd rather have a great defense, but what we have is good enough. The defense made a couple of key plays yesterday that kept us in it.

Again, the analysis makes no difference to the actual success of the Cowboys. But perception matters to fans, because that's how we experience the game. The analysis and discussion are where a lot of the fun lies. So I guess I'll have to grit my teeth this week, and hope that we take care of Minnesota Sunday so that this week is a distant memory for the media.

StupidFilter

If they can seriously get this thing working, it will eliminate most of the complaints I have with using the internets. It will be a great day when I get get online without seeing any 1337 speak or LOL or emoticons.

Clash of the Titans (or New England at Dallas)

Here it comes, the matchup of two 5-0 teams for just the fifth time in NFL history and the third in the past 84 years. The media's fascination with the drama of the Cowboy's improbable win on Monday is starting to wear off and the hype for the game on Sunday is building. I love the hype. It's really a no lose situation for a fan.

1. They say the Cowboys haven't played anybody. First, you can only play who's on the schedule. Second, just about any NFL team can beat another; it's always hard to win in the NFL. If it's so easy to go 5-0 in the NFL, teams ought to be doing it all the time, right? I remember the last time someone shot a 59 on a PGA course, some pundits complained that it was an easy course. Umm, maybe so, but where were the rest of the 59's? Anyway, the Cowboys schedule hasn't been a gauntlet so far to be sure. But neither has the Patriot's schedule. Here are their opponents with their records -

Cowboys
vs NY Giants 3-2
@ Miami 0-5
@ Chicago 2-3
vs St Louis 0-5
@ Buffalo 1-4
Total 6-19

Patriots
@ NY Jets 1-4
vs San Diego 2-3
vs Buffalo 1-4
@ Cincinnati 1-3
vs Cleveland 2-3
Total 7-17

2. They say the Cowboys have a bad defense. It's true, the defense didn't look great against the Giants. But how are things shaping up overall? Right now, including the Buffalo game, the Cowboys rank 8th in yards per game allowed with 285.4 and 13th in total points allowed with 96. The Patriots definitely have the edge here. They're 2nd in YPG allowed with 251.4 and 6th in total points allowed with 65. But the edge isn't enormous.

3. They say Tony Romo is overrated. No question that some of the praise heaped on him, especially in Monday night's pregame show was overly effusive. But he's got enough experience under his belt for us to make a decent assessment of his talent level. He's pretty damn good. With 15 career starts, he has 4411 yards, 63.2% passes completed, 32 TDs and 21 interceptions (which includes his 5 from Monday) and 94.7 rating. I've watched every snap of every game, and he's had a couple of bad games. But the stretch run where we lost 3 of 4 last year was mainly due to defensive breakdowns. I think there are quite a few NFL teams who would take Tony Romo in a heartbeat right now. As a fan, you get a sense of certain players. I never trusted Bledsoe or Quincy Carter to lead us down the field. Romo feels like a leader to me, a guy who'll shrug off the bad stuff and do what it takes to win. Realistically, the only things I see that can stop him from succeeding going forward will be injuries or some Rick Ankiel-like meltdown.

4. Finally, I heard Chris Mortensen on a radio show this morning. I'm starting not to like him much. He repeated one of the things that's been making the rounds the last couple of days - that Buffalo's coverage scheme confused Romo, and that Belichick would see this and go to town. Buffalo's scheme was pretty good, but at least 3 of those int's were all Romo. Belichick's obviously a great technical coach, but Jason Garrett is no slouch on offense. He also fell back on the old conference disparity saw. He said that looking the Buffalo-Dallas game and the Indy-Tampa Bay games made him think it was a factor. That's just crap. Did he say the same thing when Arizona beat Pittsburgh the week before? Or when Green Bay beat San Diego? It's really too early to tell how this year will go with the conference matchups. Right now, the AFC is 12-10 vs the NFC. The AFC clearly has the top 2 or 2 of the top 3 teams. After that it's a crapshoot. And it really doesn't matter when you're looking at an individual game. I think Mortensen is just lazy.

So, all that said, I'd still pick the Patriots if I leave my heart out of it. They haven't shown any weaknesses so far. I think Dallas' offense is nearly equal to theirs, but they do have a defensive edge. But I don't think it's the foregone conclusion that most of the Pats fans seem to think, and I don't think a blowout is likely. Possible, sure. New Orleans took us to the shed last year, but I don't think they were that much better. Damn, though, I would love to read Simmon's column if the Patriots do lose. (and BTW, did I mention how great NFL.com is lately).

RIAA - Evil soul-sucking bastards

This is terrible.

A single mother who took a stand against America’s biggest record companies over music piracy was fined $220,000 (£108,000) yesterday.

Jammie Thomas, a Native American from Minnesota, is one of 26,000 people whom the Recording Industry Association of America (RIAA) has sued over the past four years for alleged use of music “file-sharing” software.

The 30-year-old made legal history after refusing to pay an out-of-court settlement, as all others challenged over their behaviour before her had done, but her failure to carry the case is likely further to embolden the music industry in its attempts to protect copyright.

A federal jury sitting in Duluth, Minnesota, ordered Ms Thomas, who has two children aged 11 and 13, to pay the six record companies that sued her $9,250 for each of 24 songs they focused on in the case.

The sum is equivalent to about five times her annual salary.

This is getting ridiculous. This has nothing to do with protecting artists. This case focused on 24 songs, how the hell so they get $9250 for each of them? The RIAA didn't prove, nor were they legally required to, how many times the songs were downloaded.

Cary Sherman, president of the RIAA, which co-ordinates the lawsuits, said after the verdict: “We think we’re in for a long haul in terms of establishing that music has value, that music is property, and that property has to be respected.

Nobody doubts that music has value, but these lawsuits, coupled with ridiculous ineffective DRM, only alienate customers and make more people want to stick it to the man. Ruining a woman's life for sharing a few songs just proves that the people running the RIAA are heartless, greedy, evil bastards.

What a night...

The first official teeball game was tonight. Libby got a hit on her first swing, but unfortunately stepped off the bag after arriving at first and got tagged out. She did get an RBI, though.

It rained off an on and they finally called the game in the top of the 5th with us winning 7-6. Our Mets played much better than their major league counterparts. We only gave up 4 in the first and got them all back. So we left soaked from the game-ending downpour, but happy.

We stopped at McDonald's to get a quick dinner. But after a mixup with our order which included two managers and a refund, not to mention them forgetting to give us our food, we were there for 30 minutes.

As we left we all noticed a thumping sound in the car. I stopped and checked the tires but they all looked good. We took off and it continued, so I stopped again. I felt the tires this time and found a big screw sticking out of one. It would probably have held, but considering how rainy it was and the fact that we have to cross a huge suspension bridge to get home, I decided to change it.

As I'm finishing that up, Libby tells me she has to go #2 and she can't hold it. I finish up with the donut and whip across the street to the Citgo where we wait for 10 minutes while she does her business.

Finally, at nearly 10 PM, we get home. Then we have to clean out the mess in the car from getting the spare out, start the laundry, make lunches and shower.

Our next game is on Thursday. I hope it's a little less eventful

The River City Showdown

Alabama and Florida State came to town today for one of those games rare for two reasons - it was a neutral field, and it was two upper level programs playing each other out of conference. It was a great game, not least because we(Florida State) won. There were some annoying things that happened in and around the game, though.

I decided to get tickets on Wednesday, and the game has been sold out for a while. I went to StubHub.com, which you will have heard of if you listen to sports radio at all. They're a ticket reselling marketplace. Sellers place their tickets and buyers either bid in auction or just buy for a fixed price. Kind of an Ebay for tickets only. There were hundreds available so I bought 4 of them. What happens is you tell StubHub you want them, they tell the seller who then mails them and you get notified.

After I waited a day and a half, on Thursday night, I called to find out when my tickets would be mailed. After holding for a long time, I was told the seller no longer has those tickets. So this asshole put his tickets up for sale, and then sold them offline. StubHub apologized and gave me a $75 coupon towards my next purchase. I still didn't have ticktes though and the handful left on StubHub were too expensive.

So we went to Ebay and found 4 good seats for $100 each. The online ticket market was really tight, and we had to buy 4 even though we only needed 3. This leads to the next thing that pissed me off.

All week on TV, on the radio, we've been hearing what a big game this is. That even thought the teams were both down a bit historically, that it was a tough ticket and had been sold out for months. This seemed to be borne out by our online experience. So we figure we'll go to the game and sell the 4th ticket before we go in. As we arrive we realize there are hundreds, if not thousands of tickets for sale all around the stadium. It was such a buyer's market, that we could have come down ticketless and got 3 seats for probably $15 to $20 each. As it was, we sold our 4th for $20 right before we went in, and that was just pure luck. So the upshot is that unless it's a 1 vs 2 or something like that, I'm never buying resold tickets on the internet again to a game in Jax.

Finally, a little thing. We went down right before the end of the half to get Tori some Outback cheese fries. The Outback line was probably 10 registers wide and maybe 15 deep. I figured we had just enough time to get to the front and get back before the start of the 3rd. I was right, but when we got to the front, the guy said they were out of fries, they didn't order enough. Even with maybe 200 people in line, they couldn't manage to put up a handwritten sign? I know we weren't the only ones waiting for cheese fries. Well, fuck you Outback - I missed the our first TD because I had to go wait in the nacho line(much shorter, but slow) because Tori was dying for some food.

Even though we overspent for the tickets, we had a really good time. The weather was great, the crowd was pretty electric. Half Alabama and half Florida State, sold out and very loud. College games are just so much better than pro for atmosphere. The game itself had a lot of excitement, after a slow first half. The 21-14 final was all second half. It's a great Saturday of football, what with our winning, Colorado, whom we beat 2 weeks ago knocking of top 5 Oklahoma, and the Gators losing to Auburn. Now on to the NFL, where the Cowboys host the Rams to try to get to 4-0.

0

That's how many games the Mets lead by in the NL East. But I guess that's what happens when you don't show up for the final three weeks of the season. Maybe they'll be able to outplay the Phillies for the last three games of the year and somehow crawl (not limp, they haven't been able to stand for a week) into the playoffs, but what the fuck good is that going to do when they're playing like this?

Shut the Fuck Up

It's amazing, but of course not surprising, that people in such high positions can continue to make such basic, stupid mistakes. Peter Pace, the Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff once again showed his ignorance of how representative democracy is supposed to work -

"We need to be very precise then, about what I said wearing my stars and being very conscious of it," he added. "And that is, very simply, that we should respect those who want to serve the nation but not through the law of the land, condone activity that, in my upbringing, is counter to God's law."

It's just not that hard. Peter Pace, private citizen, is free to hold the belief that homosexuality is immoral under "God's law". That makes him a bigot, but he's free to think what he wants. But then to posit this idea that the government should be in the business of condoning or condemning behavior that is based on his religious principles is nuts. Once again, behavior that has no impact on the rights of others is out of bounds for the government. Yes, I know that half of our country doesn't agree, but it's disheartening that someone who is supposed to uphold our freedoms clearly doesn't even have a basic understanding of what he's defending.

Tee Ball

A friend of mine is coaching tee ball this year and asked if Libby, my 8-year old daughter wanted to play. She did, so now I'm the assistant coach of a tee ball team. The ages run from 5 to 9, with 8 and 9 year olds only allowed if they haven't played ball before. It's fun and frustrating at the same time.

We've had several practices and the kids are getting better at hitting and throwing, but holy crap, they can't field worth a damn. Watching them try to run down a fast grounder is like watching the the keystone cops. It goes under the shortstop and whizzes right by the left and left center fielders and the second baseman who decided to run out and go after the ball instead of covering the bag. Then they throw back to the pitcher (actually a kid playing a position called the circle, as the coaches pitch in tee ball). Play stops when the ball gets into the circle. But most every time it flies right by the kid in the circle and ends up near the dugout.

I look at these kids, nearly all who have never played and I know they're mostly having fun, and they really only signed up to hit the ball anyway; fielding is the price they have to pay to get up to bat. But it's a funny sight. And of course, while the ball is flying around the field, four or five coaches are yelling instructions at the same time to kids who really aren't listening to them.

Our first game is Monday. Libby is pretty excited. As long as everyone has fun, it'll be worth it. But it would be nice to see someone get thrown out at first.

The Good, the Bad and the Tattooed

This sounds like another front in the clash between the old(er) and the young. Gilbert and Melissa Carrillo were turned down for an upscale apartment complex in San Antonio due to Gilbert's tattoos.

We contacted one of the owners of the apartments: A southern California doctor named Edward Frankel.

Frankel e-mailed us a statement saying his apartment complexes do, in fact, "reject prospective tenants who have... tattoos exposed on the neck, head, hands and wrists, or large tattoos that cover over 40% of the lower or upper arm."

Frankel says, "We do not discriminate. The above applies to persons of any race, color, gender, etc."

Frankel, and his partners, have purchased numerous upscale apartment complexes in San Antonio and Dallas, where they've also banned pierced eyebrows and tongues. Tenants can't have more than one nose piercing, or more than five earrings.

I get what they're trying to do. They want to cater to a certain clientèle, and they think that excluding the tattooed and pierced will keep out the undesirables. They may be allowed to do this as a private business, but it's just stupid in practice. Lack of tattoos doesn't indicate that someone is respectable or conservative, just as being tattooed doesn't indicate and lack of class. Personally, I think that Gilbert's tattoos look pretty trashy, but that doesn't mean I wouldn't want to live next door to him. Michelline's uncle, an IT professional making in the 6 figures got some sort of tattoo bug several years ago and now he's got most of his non-exposed body covered.

The days when tattoos and weird piercings meant someone was likely a gang member or something are long gone. Based on random links from Google (hey, I don't have time to research this stuff in depth), as many as 40% of people under 40 have tattoos. The time is fast approaching when tattoos and even those disgusting-looking eyebrow and lip piercings are ok in the corporate workplace. The kinds of policies like those above are dinosaurs.

QB thoughts

A quick look at the NFL standings shows 5 undefeated teams after 3 weeks. We have the Patriots, Colts and Steelers in the AFC, and the Cowboys and Packers in the NFC. I think this just reinforces once again the importance of the QB. On those 5 teams, you have the two best QBs in the game in Manning and Brady, a veteran hall-of-fame QB in Favre, a recent Super Bowl winner in Roethlisberger, and up-and-comer Romo. All 5 are playing very well so far. If you look at the top 10 QBs by rating, only Chad Pennington at #2 with a 121.4 rating has a losing record. I think their record has to do more with playing the Patriots week 1 and losing Chad to injury in week 2.

This just shows why even when the Cowboys were showing improvement under Bill Parcells, I was never really optimistic about their chances - the Cowboys haven't had a decent QB since Aikman. Until Romo came in last year, I knew that no matter how good our running game or defense got to be, a mediocre QB would ruin everything. Hell, I think Testaverde and Bledsoe single-handedly lost 5 or 6 winnable games, if not more.

I know you can pick out your Dilfers and Grossmans who led teams to the Super Bowl, but those are anomalies. I'm much happier as a fan of a team with a good QB and offense and a suspect defense, than I would be if we had a great defense and a mediocre QB.

By the way, if you haven't checked out the revamped NFL.com, you should. That stats are incredible. Instant sortable stats in all categories going back to the 30's.

Small Town Life

As a follow up to my other post, I saw the same truck today (again, at Wal-Mart), so this time I took a picture.

Fall TV Preview

These days, I'm looking forward to the new TV season nearly as much as I was the football season. As someone said earier this year, we're living in a golden age of TV right now. You can have the 50's, I'll take the current slate, and I don't even have HBO. Here's a rundown of what I plan to watch this TV season.

Heroes - What a great show. It's shows like this that make me nervous about dismissing any new stuff. I almost didn't Tivo this one last year. I have to say I wasn't wowed by the finale, but the quality of the scripts and characters would have to drop quite a ways before I would stop watching. The previews for the new season look great.

CSI:Crime Scene Investigation - The original. Still a great show. Good characters and plots. They still come up with new twists, e.g last season's miniature killer. Hard to believe the Europeans like CSI:Miami better. I watched quite a few of those, but I couldn't stand David Caruso and his head tilt and sunglasses anymore.

Numb3rs - Yes, I know the spelling is stupid. But this is a good show that has risen above it's gimmick. I started watching it because the premise sounded interesting - applying math to crime. They've done a really good job with that, but the show, like all good shows, has blossomed because it has good characters. The relationship between Charlie, Don and their Dad is believable and compelling. The supporting cast is good too, particularly Peter MacNichol as Larry. If you haven't watched this in the past, I would recommend watching it on DVD.

My Name is Earl - Jason Lee plays the white trash good-hearted Earl perfectly. He looks like a completely different person with his mustache. Jaime Pressley nearly steals the show as Joy.

The Office - I haven't seen all the British episodes, but from what I have seen, I like this one better. I'm really looking forward to this season, but I'm a little concerned about where the Jim/Pam thing goes from here. Michael is funny, but I cringe a lot watching him. I watch more for the rest of the cast than for Steve Carrell.

Scrubs - One of my 3 or 4 favorite sitcoms of all time. I've seen every episode multiple times (they're great to watch while working out) and I love them every time. The gags are funny and clever, the characters are interesting, and I love the fact that there's no laugh track. It doesn't get the ratings it deserves.

Family Guy - This is a really fucked up show, but I do really like it. It's definitely show that people love or hate. Look for some Family Guy threads on google and you'll see what I mean. I'm amazed that it's now in syndication in the evenings. I'm pretty lax and I won't let my kids watch it.

South Park - I used to think this show was great. I've started to get a little tired of it, but they still have a few gems every season.

The Simpsons - The word has been for several years has been that The Simpsons has lost a step, if they haven't jumped the shark completely. I think there's some truth to that. It's not as consistent as it once was. Some of that is just nostalgia and familiarity though. And I think the movie showed that they still have a lot of life left in them.

Unfortunately, my two favorite shows, Battlestar Galactica and Lost, don't come back until January.

That's it for returning shows. I've set up my DVR for a crop of new shows which I'll just run down - Bionic Woman (this one looks like it could be really good), Back to You (I've always liked Kelsey Grammer), Journeyman, Reaper (I'm taking a look at this one because of Kevin Smith), Chuck, Pushing Daisies and The Sarah Silverman Show (I know this isn't new, but I wanted to watch it. She's funny and nice to look at).

Some of these will certainly either lose my interest(Prison Break)or be canceled(Studio 60), but hopefully a couple of them will be good enough to make the rotation. So what are you watching this year?

Hey sea dogs an' land lubbers! `Tis talk like a shipmate day!

As a good pastafarian, I couldna let one o' our high holy days pass without comment. This may cost me me postin' priveleges, but if I become a martyr fer th' noodly one, so be 't.

So who has earned th' wrath o' his noodliness today? Why that be Joe Lieberman!!

But in comments Tuesday Lieberman signaled he would vote against habeas rights for enemy combatants.

“Look, we’ve got to remember that these are not normal criminal defendants being brought into a federal court in the United States,” Lieberman told reporters. “These are people seized in a war, the war against terrorism.”

Let me make this clear - ere who opposes habeas corpus fer ere on th' horkin' planet be scum. They's un-American an' vile, descpicable swabbies. Especially th' senators, who ortin' ta know better.



The views, opinions, conclusions and other information expressed in this post belong solely to the author and do not necessarily represent those of the host.

KSK

I have mixed feelings about the guys over at Kissing Suzy Kolber. On the one hand they're homophobic and misogynistic, on the other hand they're funny as hell, case in point this post -

Dear NFL Defenders,

You see this?

That’s a crisp, clean $20 bill. And it can be yours. All yours. All you have to do is one very simple thing: take out the knees of Patriots quarterback Tom Brady, shown here with knees that are far too functional for my taste.

...

This is not a joke. If you successfully take out Brady’s knees, I will really send you a $20 bill. American. Not counterfeit. Lest you think $20 isn’t a lot of money, consider what you can buy with $20:

-Many peanuts
-Bottle of Popov
-Blowjob (inner city)
-1/10th of a blowjob (suburbs)
-Top shelf KSK merchandise
-Two Cosi sandwiches
-Two months of Netflix
-Multiple discount rack DVD’s of fine films like “Jack the Bear”, “The Avengers”, and “A Fine Mess”
-100% syrup Squishie

There's plenty more where that came from. You've got to go, just to see the examples he's put up of other athletes' knees breaking.

:-) vs :)

Apparently the original emoticon - :-) turns 25 today. Nothing special about the article, but I did find it a little odd that nowhere does it mention that the mainstream smiley these days doesn't have a hyphen.

Bill Simmons is going insane

I just read this Bill Simmons column about Sunday's Pats/Chargers game. So how do you think he's feeling? Cheating aside, he's got to be pretty happy that is team looks like a juggernaut again, right? Well, not exactly -

No, NBC was too determined to blow out CameraGate. Before the game, Andrea Kramer reported Turner was taking precautions from a secrecy standpoint, refusing to allow any Patriots personnel into his locker room and even handing his players the first 15 plays Sunday morning instead of Saturday night. Her appropriate reaction should have been, "Wow, making your players paranoid isn't the best way to prepare for a big game, no wonder Norv has been such an underachieving loser for his entire coaching career." But Kramer was treating the topic so seriously and breathlessly, you would have thought she was standing in Iraq with missiles going off behind her.

Yeah, that's right, he spent a whole column whining about how the poor Patriots weren't getting their proper respect because his coach was caught cheating in one of the biggest NFL scandals in years. Not only that, he's clearly driving himself crazy even as he tries to dismiss it as no big deal -

Lemme ask you two questions:
Isn't there a chance that Belichick thought Eric Mangini and the Jets had gained an unfair advantage?
1. Is there a chance -- just a chance -- Belichick has gotten a little paranoid in his old age, and since an undermanned Jets team played them closely in all three Pats-Jets games last season, he spent the spring and summer wondering if Mangini had figured out a way to steal their signals, so he decided to tape their coaches in Week 1 to see if that was true? And then he got caught?

2. Is there a chance Roger Goodell is doing the "I'm leaving no stone unturned" routine because he's so determined to show everyone there's a new sheriff in town (shades of Reggie Hammond at Torchy's), and because it's becoming more and more obvious the previous administration was asleep at the wheel on anything and everything except the next TV deal?

Let me take those, Bill. That would be No, there's no chance.

I really like Simmons' writing. I can read all the way through his 10 million word columns because he's funny, well-versed in pop culture, and generally insightful. But he was a better NFL writer when the Patriots still sucked. I really don't mind a national sports guy being a homer - I hate the aloof objectivity of a lot of the pundits. But come on, you have to have a little perspective. Between his Pats blinders and his ridiculous A-Rod hate, he's hard to read sometimes.

So how about it Bill? Why not just take your 3 Super Bowl wins and be happy, and stop all the bitching?

OJ Outrage

I have to say, I don't really understand the outrage about this. When OJ was getting a cut, that I understood. By describing the murders and then getting paid for it, he was certainly profitting off others' misery. Now that OJ isn't getting anything out of it, I'm ok with it.

I think the Goldmans' publishing this book does a couple of things. First, it takes money away from OJ and helps to settle the judgment he owes. But more importantly, this is his confession. Talk about hypotheticals all you want, but all of us without blinders know he did it. This book will just seal his fate down through the years. I don't see how a public confession of his horrendous acts in any way betrays the memories of Ron and Nicole.

Nicole's sister, Denise Brown, complains, "It’s the Goldmans who have changed their tune. It’s all about money. How much money is it going to take to make you guys happy? It’s not going to bring Nicole back.” She knows them better than I do. But I've never seen the Goldmans as opportunistic. They've been pretty squarely centered on justice, or even vengance. I can't say I blame them. It's one thing to move on with your life when the killer is in jail. When he's out playing golf it's quite another.

So go ahead and buy the book, if you want to. I'll probably just read it over in the bookstore. I don't think you need to beat yourself up - the book's publication is only hurting OJ, both financially and figuratively.

Sex toys are great

(Yes, another sex post. Get your pizza delivery man and pornstache jokes ready.)

I ran across this article on MSNBC. The thrust (hee, hee) of the article is men's feelings of inadequacy when confronted with dildos and vibrators -

Walking around the display halls, I realized that it is impossible for a man to feel good about himself when confronted with a few thousand wall-mounted penis replicas...

Combine the explosion of sex toy mania that has de-stigmatized novelties (putting electrical accoutrements in the hands of millions of women) and research showing that only 30 percent of ladies reach orgasm with intercourse alone, and it’s no wonder some men may find themselves battling vibrator envy.

Joy Davidson, a sex therapist, author and host of the DVD series “Couples Guide to Sexual Pleasure,” says that clients and the merely curious have asked her hundreds of times about the issue of men becoming, shall we say, a bit jealous of their wives’ or girlfriends’ mechanical helpers.

Ok, I hate to be insensitive, but if you're feeling jealous of your wife/girlfriend's vibrator, you're an idiot. If she's using the vibrator in lieu of sex, you've got bigger problems than vibrator-envy.

Look, women aren't like men. The more they use vibrators, the more you're going to get laid. It's not an either/or proposition. With women (in my experience) it's a snowball effect. Sex toys are only going to help you. And, as the article does mention further down, these toys aren't necessarily solitary devices. Women who are comfortable enough to use these things are probably more likely to be comfortable with other sexual activities.

So if you're a man (or woman) with vibrator-envy, stop being ridiculous, and stock up in rechargeable batteries.

Small Town Life

Having recently moved from Jacksonville to Palatka, I'm still adjusting to small town life. I certainly don't expect everything to be the same here, but I have to say I was a little surprised when leaving Wal-Mart (yes, I shop at Wal-Mart, and yes, I realize that you think that makes me a horrible person) to see a truck (a hand-painted camouflage truck to be exact) with a NAAWP sticker on it. I've always realized there were people who think like that, and not just in small towns, but the flaunting of it like that caught me a little off guard.

People are stupid

Ok, so this dumbass assistant principal makes a ridiculous rule that bans 911 calls from the school. This is an obviously a stupid policy that anyone with half a brain would realize isn't going to do any good, since once you've endangered the health and well being of your students, your crime statistics, or whatever bullshit you were trying to hide suddenly become a much lower priority. But my biggest problem is not with this idiot assistant principal, it's with the morons who were actually around when this girl had a stroke. In a situation like that, how could it possibly be your first priority to follow some obviously moronic policy? Even if you're a selfish prick afraid of losing your job, you'd have to be an idiot not to realize that you can't possibly be fired for violating a policy which is this stupid. I wish I could say that I find it hard to believe that people could be such stupid sheep that they would follow a policy like this even when a young girl's life is in jeopardy, but unfortunately, I can't.

PSA

Let's say your office has a coffee maker with 3 pots, 2 regular and one decaf. It's 11:00 and you pour yourself a cup of regular and you finish the pot. At this point what is the proper action? No, don't reach for that switch - turning the burner off and leaving makes you an asshole. If you want to be a responsible member of coffee-drinking society you make a new pot. Yes, even if you're late for a meeting. Maybe you should have thought of that before you decided to empty the pot, you leech.

Apple beats Microsoft

OK, I know it's not big news, but I'm kind of ticked. This story talks about the new iPod lineup, including the iPhone-based iPod Touch -

Apple now sells four different types of iPod: the Touch, Shuffle, Nano and the original model, which Jobs christened the Classic on Wednesday

....

As for the iPod Touch, Apple watchers had speculated for days that Apple would unveil an iPod similar to its new mobile phone. Though slimmer than the iPhone, the iPod Touch features a similar multitouch interface, built-in Wi-Fi and the Safari Internet browser.

Like the iPhone, the iPod Touch can play YouTube videos. It will retail for $299 or $399, depending on the memory installed.

I've always been in the middle of this Apple/Microsoft debate. I don't think Microsoft is evil or that all their products suck, and not every Apple product fell from heaven. But here's a case where Microsoft had a small window to grab some spotlight from Apple and now it's gone.

The two big areas where the Zune could have stepped out in front of the iPod a bit were with the wifi and the FM radio. The Zune is perfectly capable on the hardware side of connecting to the internet and time-shifting radio but the software doesn't exist. If the Zune had come out with the ability out of the box to sync through wifi, connect to the Marketplace to download songs over wifi, and timeshift radio, I really think the positive buzz would have outweighed the negative. As I mentioned in my review, it's a nice player with good audio and video quality, but its great potential for more is crippled.

I've heard that later this year the Zune 2.0 will come out and that a lot of the big feature upgrades Zune owners have been expecting will finally be available. But with the touchscreen, internet, wifi capability and widescreen, the iPod Touch has beat Microsoft again, and they're playing catch up.

The one area where the iPod Touch falls down is that it's not a hard drive based player. The largest, according to reports, is the 16GB model. That seems a little small for a widescreen video player. I understand why the phone may not have a hard drive, but I'm not sure why the player doesn't. I imagine it's beacause technically, he Touch is just and iPhone without the phone. Adding a hard drive would have meant too much reengineering, I guess.

But if Microsoft doesn't get on the ball soon, I'll be selling my Zune (if I can), and getting an iPod like everyone else.

How shallow are we?

Another study comes out and the mainstream news sites jump all over it. This one's about what men and women say they're looking for in a partner, and what they actually choose.

Participants ranged in age from 26 to their early 40s and took part in "speed dating," short meetings of three to seven minutes in which people chat, then move on to meet another dater. Afterward, participants check off the people they'd like to meet again, and dates can be arranged between pairs who select one another.

Speed dating let researchers look at a lot of mate choices in a short time, Todd said.

In the study, participants were asked before the session to fill out a questionnaire about what they were looking for in a mate, listing such categories as wealth and status, family commitment, physical appearance, healthiness and attractiveness.

After the session, the researchers compared what the participants said they were looking for with the people they actually chose to ask for another date.

Men's choices did not reflect their stated preferences, the researchers concluded. Instead, men appeared to base their decisions mostly on the women's physical attractiveness.

The men also appeared to be much less choosy. Men tended to select nearly every woman above a certain minimum attractiveness threshold, Todd said.

...

"Women made offers to men who had overall qualities that were on a par with the women's self-rated attractiveness. They didn't greatly overshoot their attractiveness," Todd said, "because part of the goal for women is to choose men who would stay with them"

But, he added, "they didn't go lower. They knew what they could get and aimed for that level."

This is only mildly interesting and not really very surprising, and I think it's of limited use. Reading through the coverage, it seems there's a tendency to make bold statements like "Looks are everything". Was there even a question that people are initially interested in people they find more physically attractive? It's nice to have confirming evidence, but it doesn't answer any questions outside of superficial initial attraction.

Speed dating isn't a microcosm of the process of building a relationship. It's more like a meat market. Sure, there's a little conversation, but you can't get any kind of sense of a person in 3 minutes, especially when they're on stage, so to speak.

What I've found in my own experience, and seen in others, is that the better I know a woman, the more my estimation of her attractiveness changes. And I don't mean that I see two discrete qualities - looks and personality - but that they kind of merge and I have a new mental picture of the person as a whole. I've known several women who I didn't find particularly good-looking at first, but as I got to know them, I found them more and more attractive (and vice versa). I know that the same process has happened with my wife, we've discussed it before. You can even see it at work in public - there's no doubt that aesthetically, a lot of people find Brittany Spears to be attractive, but now you hear a lot about how gross or skanky she is, that's due to her behavior more than anything.

And how do people meet their mates or longer-term partners? I think the circumstances in many cases allow people to get to know each other before they start dating. If you date someone at work, church, school etc... you get a chance to decide on more than your first 3 minute impression. In those cases looks are just one piece of the equation. It's clearly important that people who are together be attracted to each other, but attractiveness is more complex than an initial impression.

So I don't think people in general are quite as shallow over the long term as they appear to be from studies like this.

The gay/straight divide

No surprise, everyone's talking about Larry Craig these days. In all the coverage, I find it interesting that everyone assumes they know what makes Larry Craig tick. He was looking for sex with men, therefore he's a closeted homosexual. Now I think they're probably mostly right, because I can't think of another reason why someone in his position would risk so much for a chance same-sex encounter. But nobody even seems to question the notion that he's either telling the truth and he's all hetero or he's lying and he's all gay.

It may be a shocking thought to some, but a guy can actually suck a dick (or want to) and not be gay. In the media especially, male homosexuality is treated like the old one drop rule for blackness - any sexual contact with any man at any time makes you all gay. This is clearly nonsense. Anone who's thought about it a little bit will realize that sexuality is a continuum. Not only that, but I think you have to consider physical sexuality and emotional sexuality as two different things. There are guys who will fool around with other guys, but have no interest in actually dating a guy. And this is even more clearly the case with women. And there are women who will sleep with men, but have relationships with women. There are even people who can actually go both ways romantically and sexually, although I would bet these are fairly rare. Sexuality isn't nearly as one dimensional as it's made out to be in the media.

A conservative senator, trolling men's rooms for anonymous sex with strangers, is probably not just an incidental homosexual. There has to be more behind that desire. But it doesn't necessarily mean his marriage is a sham either. Clearly, if he falls anywhere but 0 on Kinsey's scale, he's a self-loathing hypocrite, deserving of whatever publicity he gets. But the way our country handles questions of sexuality is just juvenile. It's like we're a nation of 10 year old boys ("Ooh, that's so gay.")

Update: A couple of comments made me want to clarify my points. First, I'm not trying to defend Craig. He's absolutely a hypocrite, whether he's all gay or not. I'm just using Craig to point out the media's portrayal of sexuality as black or white.

Second, I do have personal experience of the continuum of human sexuality (I'm not just extrapolating from porn), but anecdotal evidence is unconvincing is isolation. The important thing to look to is statistics like Kinsey's, which show a sizeable segment of the population identifies as neither all gay or straight.

The Mortgage Crisis

I just read this story at CNN. Pretty typical of the kinds of stories we're hearing now, unfortunately. There was one quote that kind of pissed me off though -

David Downs, a professor of real estate at Virginia Commonwealth University, believes blame for the current quagmire falls on all involved. But he says the consumer should be held accountable first.

The consumer? I agree that the consumer bears some blame. We should all be very careful what we sign up for, especially when the stakes are so high. But David Downs, professor or not, sounds like a typical blame-the-victim asshole. Look, these lenders knew they were making bad loans. They didn't care because they were selling the loans anyway, so it was good, quick profit. Who cares about next year, right? In many of these cases, if there wasn't outright fraud, there was definitely very shady activity designed to cover up the inherent instability of the loan. The lenders are the experts on this, not the consumers. Mortgages are complex, and consumers trust people that are supposed to know better.

This seems very similar to the consumer financing industry as a whole. The banks give out money like candy to bad risks left and right, and then, thanks in large part to our asshole president and his party, aren't held accountable at all. So the consumer bears all the blame when money was almost forced into his hand. The banks just write it off because they expect a certain amount of default anyway. This doesn't even get into the borderline fraudulent practices they practice on servicing credit card accounts.

Anyway, to David Downs and all his ilk, fuck you.

Billy Joel - Uncool?

This morning I was listening to a little bit of Whad'ya know? on NPR. It was a repeat of a 2005 show where Michael was talking to Chuck Klosterman. At one point Michael asks Chuck something like "So you like Billy Joel?", but with a smirk in his voice like he was asking about Barry Manilow. Then after Chuck talked about an interview he did with him, Michael asks "Since you like Billy Joel, what about Neil Diamond?"

I'm confused. It's not that I care what people think about Billy Joel, but I've never heard of any kind of uncool easy listening type stigma attached to him in pop culture. Obviously, everyone's familiar with the jokes about Barry Manilow, and I guess Neil Diamond has a kind of easy-listening vibe going which some people think is uncool. But Billy Joel? His catalog is pretty mainstream pop-rock, and he has at least one all-time great song in "Piano Man". It just struck me as odd. So wha's up here? Am I missing something, or was Michael Feldman just trying too hard to be funny?

Dumbasses in the news

Ok, I'm using the word dumbass a lot today, but it's just so appropriate. My wife forwarded me this link. I'm sorry but all I can say is C.T. Martin is a dumbass -

Baggy pants that show boxer shorts or thongs would be illegal under a proposed amendment to Atlanta's indecency laws.

The amendment, sponsored by city councilman C.T. Martin, states that sagging pants are an "epidemic" that is becoming a "major concern" around the country.

"Little children see it and want to adopt it, thinking it's the in thing," Martin said Wednesday. "I don't want young people thinking that half-dressing is the way to go. I want them to think about their future."

The proposed ordinance would also bar women from showing the strap of a thong beneath their pants. They would also be prohibited from wearing jogging bras in public or show a bra strap, said Debbie Seagraves, executive director of the American Civil Liberties Union of Georgia.

The proposed ordinance states that "the indecent exposure of his or her undergarments" would be unlawful in a public place. It would go in the same portion of the city code that outlaws sex in public and the exposure or fondling of genitals.

The penalty would be a fine in an amount to be determined, Martin said.

Not only is it virtually unenforceable and unconstitutional, it's idiotic. Hey, some people can't dress themselves. We should make this illegal? If you don't want your kids showing their underwear, then address it at home. It may look ridiculous when people's pants are around their knees (does it ever), but who's it hurting? It's not the government's job to enforce fashion. There's absolutely nothing indecent about any of the stated examples. I swear, these idiots really want to live in some dictatorship controlled by their own personal morality. I have an idea, Mr Martin, why don't you take care of your morality, and I'll handle mine and my kids'. Keep your fucking nose out of it.

The Dresden Dolls

I was looking through the Zune Marketplace (see below) and noticed that they listed the Dresden Dolls as similar to Gogol Bordello. Angleos had a post with one of their videos a few weeks ago and I liked it. So I thought I'd return the favor and post The Dresden Dolls best song (among many that I like), "Girl Anachronism". If you like this I would highly recommend getting their two albums.

Subscription services, DRM and record company dumbasses

As some of you know, I got a Zune for Christmas. In short, the software blows, the very high potential of this device is unrealized by baffling decisions by Microsoft, but it's a very good music and video player nonetheless. So I've been watching a lot of tv shows on it at the gym, and I have my whole music library on it, with much room to spare.

I've been thinking for a while that I really want to try to find new music, but I don't have lots of time and money to invest. So I checked out the Zune Marketplace. Their music catalog seems to be pretty thorough, not quite up to iTunes level, but not too far off. I decided to try their $14.99 monthly all-you-can-eat plan, figuring that would be a good way to try stuff without paying a bunch of money. I'm not into subscription plans as a final solution. I want to have full control over my music, and I don't want to worry that I can't listen anymore if I don't pay an ongoing fee. But as a means to try new stuff, it seems ideal.

First up, I decide to try Kid Rock's Devil Without a Cause, based on Toast's opinion of it as the second best album ever. I locate it and open it up and there are a total of two songs available for download. WTF? What do these record company dumbasses think - that because I can't listen to them and see if I like them that I'm going to buy them outright? Fuck that, faced with the fact that they've blocked them from my subscription, I'll probably either a)never hear them at all b)listen to a friend's copy, and probably just copy theirs, or c)download it from Sharezaa just to stick it to the greedy bastards. In no case will they get money from me now. However, if I had listened to the album and decided I liked it, it's highly likely I would have ordered the CD off Amazon (DRM free, of course).

Second, I look to see what Beastie Boys they have, because I lost my copy of Licensed to Ill. I find it and now look, not only can't I download anything from the album, I can't even buy the crippled DRM versions they sell through the marketplace. Now, I already know I like this album, but treating me like this does not make me want to buy the album (again). I was able to download Solid Gold Hits but not the more comprehensive The Sounds of Silence.

Finally, I decide to see what they've got for Sarah Brightman. I already own all her albums but I was interested in seeing what they had. I noticed they had a CD single with a new song released this month. Of course, it's the only one of all her songs that's not available for download. So now, I can't see if I like it, which means I'll never spring for the single. I may get it someday if it's on a future album.

The marketplace does have a pretty good catalog, and there are a lot of songs you can access through their subscription service, but there's enough shit like the examples above to make it more annoying than satisfying. Who are these morons running the record companies? Between their unfathomable support of a technology that doesn't work and actually alienates their own consumers and their reactionary stance on the availability of digital music, it's amazing that these guys are still in business. Hopefully, the recent softening of EMI toward DRM will become a trend. I think there are a lot of people like me out here, who are willing and able to pay for our music, but on our own terms.