Super-gold

I present Jenna Bush's asscrack.

Gold

1) I throught Bob Dole's hand was useless?
2) What the hell is he trying to do to Barbara?



3) One of the daughters claimed George and Laura called each other "bushie" around the house.

Republican Convention

Have another smoke, Jenna.

Lookin' good, Barbara.

I'm writing in old man Bush. I could go for a little kinder gentler America these days.

W did a live remote to introduce Laura's speech. A giant picture of him, Chairman Mao style, above Laura. Very eerie.

Signify

http://nyc.indymedia.org/newswire/display/108291/index.php

I proclaim it good

Diet Barq's Root Beer.

Irony!

There's plenty of irony in the name of this organization/website.

If only they had this in the late '70's

Polyester dick lube! Sorry, I mean disk lube. Go Orange, Muck Fishigan!

Finally, as both disk and disc are pronounced the same, I submit 'dicc' as a third word that can be similarly pronounced. First c is soft, second is hard.

Confusing language with a passion,
Renton Furniture

Depressing

I can't even remember the last time I was at a party where there was a girl who wasn't married to someone I know. Or married to someone I don't know.

I'm freaking out a little about that.

[EDIT: That's not to take away from the friendship of the various married women I know, it's just that being married reduces their ability to date freely. That's all I meant.]

Interesting

From the Sun Times' religion writer: a review of the movie "What the #$*! Do We Know?"

Fry's

Went to the Illinois location of Fry's Electronics yesterday. I proclaim it nerd paradise. Remember the smell you used to get going into the Silo for some stereo equipment, that electronic "cabinet" sort of smell? Got it. They have everything there: resisters, toys, computers, big-screen TVs, phones, cat5 cables. Think Radioshack, but literally (LITERALLY!) 50 times the size. You could fit four Best Buys inside this place. There is a cafeteria in the middle. Good location as the crow flies, it's a little hard to get to. ("Irv's")

Downside: I see no way they can survive. Too much real estate. Also, the employees were a little too well dressed. The grunts were wearing the standard ill-fitting khakis and polo shirts. But the management types looked exactly like pit bosses, complete with the hyperness and gum chewing.

I note from their site that each location sports a unique theme. I predict the Downer's Grove location will be deemed the "bank" location. That's the feeling I got when I walked in the door.

Cutting edge

I'm currently testing using the open source browser and email clients from Mozilla. Firefox, the browser; and Thunderbird, the email/news client. Or wherever they're from. I downloaded Netscape a while back and absolutely hated it. Pure piss. Popups, weird rendering and purposefully not the look and feel of Explorer.

Firefox, however, as an open source adventure, is able to both differentiate from AND improve upon Internet Explorer at the same time. (where Explorer can only improve and other commercial concerns can only differentiate) At this point, I declare that Open Source has matured enough to be an option for almost everyone. Install couldn't have been easier, and the basic set-up was good enough for horseshoes. Or however that goes.

In other news, I am having trouble typing today and have been very clumsy lately. Monday I dropped and nearly destroyed a $4000 tape drive. I almost turned tail and ran.

Interesting read

Over on janegalt.com. This post here. I am neither agreeing nor disagreeing, but I think this is a subject that deserves exploration.

Do as I say

Not as I do.

This is really, really, really creepy. Does it seem to anyone else that we're (society) running screaming and kicking from anything genuine, authentic or real?

I prefer my child receive a small amount of pain from my hand of love than to encounter a lot more pain in life," she said.

If that were really true, she'd just whack them one and be done with it. No, doing things like this (or the hairbrush or the wooden spoon) is so mom can sleep at night safe in the knowledge that *I* didn't hurt my child, the inanimate object did. I'm still a good mommy.

Let's just keep doing whatever we can to avoid actually interacting with our fellow humans.

(he says from a keyboard) (shut up)

He's Regis, dammit!

Friday's broadcast of "Live With Regis and Kelly" gave the talk-show host the Guinness World Record for most hours on camera. He passes broadcaster Hugh Downs for the record, as calculated by Guinness World Records researcher Stuart Claxton.

[...]

Meanwhile, Philbin will be the "roastmaster" at the New York Friars Club's October 15 roast of real estate mogul Donald Trump, now a TV star with his hit reality show "The Apprentice."

"Given the size of Trump's ego, we will be lucky to be done by Christmas," said Friars Club dean Freddie Roman.

"Hey, no charge for that one," he should have added.

Deux deux

I've got the fancy new phone, and it doesn't 'ring'. It only 'songs' at me. So I paid $10 to join a service that had a ringtone that actually sounds like a cell phone ringing. Huzzah! Now all I have to do is get the text message tone to be ear piercingly loud and I'll be able to ditch the crappy, piece of shit pager the company has provided me. They can use text/sms to send the stuff they need to send me, but the noise maker on the phone isn't loud enough to wake me when I'm on call. Actually, I think I will keep the pager. After busy or difficult weeks, it is nice to be able to turn the pager off and ignore it for a couple days. Huzzah again!

I was supposed to tape the Disco Demolition 25th anniversary thing last night. Due to some phone calls, I completely forgot about it, and I didn't remember until about 4am last night. I came completely unglued- I was disappointed in myself, angry at the world for inconveniencing me (I had rearranged my day to be home in time)- just melted down.

My suspected terrorist upstairs neighbor is moving out, I think. (I call him that only because I suspect his motivations in life, not because I actually have seen anything.) Finally, the only half-running piece of shit cars in the parking lot will be mine.

Had to call animal control (*) yesterday because a dog had gone insane in our yard there. It picked a spot on the fence and was pacing in front of it. 10 steps up, ten steps back, every time. It was like it had some kind of compulsion disorder. I know dogs' instincts are pretty similar to ours, and can't understand what was making this dog do what it was doing. I even tried to scare/chase it away- it sort of cowered, and then it returned to the exact same area of pacing. Very weird. The two cops rounded the dog up with the loop-stick and what appeared to be a Glock, and took it away in the back of a squad car. Alive- the gun was only a precaution. The two cops, who were undoubtedly younger than me, did a fine job. Kenny-boy (a former police chief of wide renoun) built a fine police force.

I'm watching the Olympics, and this girl Mahini Tarwaj (or something like that) did something I've never seen in a floor exercise routine: she actually timed it to the music and hit every 'post' like she meant it. I'm talking jumping up in the air, flipping around a bit and then landing on the mat to the next beat of the song. Very well done. I'm not used to seeing that (the every four years or so I watch gymnastics, of course), the music always seems to be an afterthought. Also, are we calling 73 pound 14 year olds "women" now?

Finally, I had another sort of meltdown today. I was working at a site today, and saw someone in a wheelchair. A female, cute someone in a wheelchair. I could not figure out whether it was appropriate to be attracted to her. Obviously, it is. Unless it was because of the wheelchair (it wasn't), but was it pity attraction? I don't know. It was very confusing. Luckily, I was 10 miles away by the time I finally settled on the answer that it's ok.

The McDonald's Chicken Selects chicken strips? The strips themselves are nothing special, Popeye's and KFC do strips far better, but the Buffalo Sauce it great. That reminds me- when's the last time they did Mighty Wings? Those things were great. And I say that as the guy who had to clean the fryer that cooked them back in the day. I just remembered my schedule back during college [September, October, November, 1993]- Friday, Saturday, Sunday and Monday, 5:00 am to 1:00 pm. Weds, 4:30 pm to Midnight. Looking at it now, it doesn't seems too bad. But that Wednesday night close killed me. For $5.75 an hour. Shit, I make almost twice that now.


Signed,
Willie Maize, Corn King of Decatur

* - Animal control defined here as, the local cop currently in possesion of the stick with the loop at the end of it.

Conspiracy!

A bizarre mixture of homeland cheers, a few boos and whistles and a curious Greek indifference greeted the Americans...

Jay Mariotti claims the American delegation was booed at the Opening Ceremony. Except that on my TV, it sounded like the place went up- second only to the Greek team.

Who is lying- Mariotti or the rest of the world?

Detrius

I went to "Swap-o-Rama", the local flea market, today for the first time. There are three types of vendors here:

Old man selling used ashtrays and pliers.

Urban person selling stolen merchandise.

Alcoholic/downtrodden redneck selling his tools.

Asian person selling cheap "imported" goods.

Yeah that's four, which only serves to show how bizarre this bazzar is. One guy was actually selling used Sawzall blades. I also noticed that much of the stuff was priced very high, especially anything electronic. I'm not sure what the deal with that is.

A couple useful things that I found you can purchase there: professional antenna cables like the cable-tv installers use that you cannot purchase anywhere else and some restaurant-quality food equipment. I found a brand new steak weight (bacon press) for $8.

From the Asian "imported" goods, I purchased a 4" magnifying glass with a surprisingly good lens, a bamboo back scratcher and a small pair of cheapo binoculars. Each thing was $1. The binoculars have rubber grips and eyepieces on them, and the rubber actually smells like gasoline. Say, that's environmentally friendly!

Most of the indoor sellers were permanant, with a variety of terrifying structures built up in their allotted spaces. I assume if you pay ahead, you keep your spot. Otherwise it's completely transient, the outdoor sellers pull their bitchin' van/truck/car to the spot and either sell right out of it or set up tables and such.

I've never been to such a place, and I am fascinated by it.

Her goose is cooked now

That was awful. I'm sorry, God! Julia Child dead at 91. Her show was on Channel 11 (PBS-Chicago) right after, or close to right after the kids shows were on in the mornings, and I used to watch it when I was very young. Probably the first time I remember discovering something funny on my own was seeing (a rerun, I'm sure) John Candy's ridiculous characterization of her on SNL. I might have made that up, though, as I write it I'm not remembering it as well. Let it become yet another apocryphal story!

Signed,
The Concertmaster

Olympics!

Watched [most of] the opening ceremonies. Beautifully done- I'll even go as far as saying that it was inspiring. Yes, it was inspiring.

Minor artistic quibble- why fake the pregnant girl, and then go E.T. with the lit belly? Having an actual pregnant woman would have been, to me, better, especially in keeping with the theme earlier begun with the nearly naked couple doing that kind of Eros frolic. There was a very natural, basic feel to most of it, and that seemed, I guess, contrived.

And it's always fun to hear what the little countries are calling themselves. It'll always be Burma to me.

Finally, the USA had the ugliest uniforms ever. AWFUL. The whole thing was full of nations in shirts and ties, nice sarongs and kilts and sportcoats and serapes-- and we go with "Tracksuit Formal"? Nations who haven't known a moment's peace are dressed to the nines, and we're in pajamas.



And, to all those who are mourning and/or recovering: God bless, etc.

Depressing

The weather is broken here in Chicago, I don't think it's gone over 65 all week. Today's high was 62, and the clouds look like November.

And now there's Bears Football on my television.


On the other hand, Lovie Smith and Rex Grossman will save us. I find it hilarious and awful that the talking heads (correct nearly 51% of the time!) are already proclaiming that the Bears will win no more than 4 games this year. Probably 1 or 2.

Senate Talk

Some nut tried to auction a sweat drenched napkin. An Alan Keyes sweat drenched napkin! Sadly, the auction has been removed. But two others remain in homage. Hnyah and hnyah.

As he was attacking Obama's views, Keyes scrambled to set up a campaign apparatus and move his official residence from Maryland to a Calumet City two-flat apartment in order to run for Senate.

Cal City, huh? Sweet. (Carl, gimme a one-liner in the comments that will explain Calumet City to the uninitiated.) Excuse me, Mr. Ambassador, don't let me get in the way of your trying to out-Black the competition.

Is it time to cue the "end-game" music in the soundtrack?

[thinking]

No. Whenever I think the world is going to end, I think of R. Bud Dwyer and realize that chaos REIGNS as always.

Stinking up the Joint!

Gross. That'll teach you to be a tourist.

EDIT: Don't blame Dave Matthews!

Et cetera...

Installed Service Pack 2 for Windows XP today, at the svelte download size of 266 MB. It's got a popup blocker that works too good. We'll see how long that lasts. SP2 has a number of other features that I haven't yet discovered.

XP users ought to check out Microsoft's Power Tools collection. Go to microsoft.com, go to downloads, etc.

Bought a new cell phone from att wireless. I ordered it Friday night, it was at my house at 10:30 today. Fantastic. It's the Samsung x426. As I said somewhere, my old phone is 3 years old and from Sprint. It had none of the fancy features the kids these days are using, and this new phone has most of them. With the ring tones and the text messages and the color screen and the sim cards and the beepity beep beep beep. I also think it was free.

That said, I'm confused. What is the difference between SMS and text messaging? Why does every website that remotely involves this subject attempt to extract money from me? (Which is just like PalmOS sites, I've found) And who are these people who care about their crappy cell phones?!

Trader Joe's

Picked up some McCann's Steel Cut Oats (Oatmeal?) and some Mesquite Honey. De-fucking-licious. I never had the steel cut ones before. I like them better. And just a little bit-o the honey makes it yummier. I've been trying to health it up a little, and this helps. And thus my vow: once a week, I'll eschew the short stack, 1/4 pound of bacon and three egg omlette and eat a quart of oatmeal.

Carl, you ignorant slut.

I just wanted to say that. I don't even mean it, I mostly agree. In response to this:

What of the giant majority of people (at least that I run into here in flyover country/outside the beltway) who don't seem to care what they are buying politically, as long as "their side" wins? Black Gay Hitler could wrap himself in the flag, brandish shotguns and open the NASCAR season, and he'd instantly get 35% of the popular vote.

One of the main points, that there is no huge ideological difference between the parties (besides Branding®) is mostly corrrect- especially given the performance since, oh, the Ford Administration. Reagan for sure.

The jerk writing that column, though, is playing the same partisan game, except that it's the 3,500 Libertarians against the whole stupid world. Also, someone ought to compare and contrast that piece to Barak Obama's speech of a week or so ago. I'm just sayin'...

When you can't provide a solution, provide an enemy.

Hunger and peace cannot coexist for too long.

Follow the spin.

PBS!

If you get a chance, watch PBS' Soundstage with Cyndi Lauper. Her voice is as good as ever, if not better. Of course, I'm sort of a pop-whore, so I don't know what I'm talking about.



Criticism: Soundstage kinda sucks. FRENETIC video editing. Every. Three. Seconds. For an hour. And a bad sense of pacing overall. The 'shoot' might take 4-6 hours, but the show is an hour. I can't have the artist humping the piano 5 minutes into the show! Soundstage used to be this hippie, unplugged thing. Very intimate, and I think almost unedited (as in, the artist puts on a 1 hour show and it's broadcast like that). Like (dare I betray my age) MTV Unplugged sort of lost the unplugged part, now it's a giant production. On the plus side, it's done in HDTV and WTTW has fantastic facilities and it shows.

More food talk

So I'm wandering through the mayonnaise aisle, and I stumble upon [drumroll...] Best Foods mayonnaise. That's not allowed. Everyone knows, and in fact it says it right on the label, it's supposed to be Hellman's East of the Rockies. Nonetheless, it was fun to see. I suspect these regional oddities are a disappearing breed.

Also note the Mayonnaise with Lime. I made some of that here at the house, for some fish I think, and it was delicious. For a nice Mexican Chicken Sandwich maybe?

The First Annual Potato Chip Taste Test

Greetings ladies and, well, we know what the rest of you are, and welcome to the action. Palette cleansing water at hand, let's get right down to it:

Martin's Kettle Cook'd Bar-B-Q Hand Cooked Potato Chips

This was the first entry, and a fine specimen they are. If a barbecue potato chip can be subtle, this is it. It had that kettle cooked crunch that you want, but the flavor sneaks up on you. An excellent choice, especially with, say, a nice sandwich.

Gibble's Krinkle Kut Bar-B-Q

These are pure gold. Brash, sweet and salty like a proper barbecue chip ought to be. I cannot improve upon what they put on the label:

WHEN GEORGE CRUM, A NATIVE AMERICAN CHEF, SERVED THE FIRST POTATO CHIPS TO COMMODORE CORNELIUS VANDERBILT IN 1853, HE USED THE ANIMAL FATS AVAILABLE IN HIS DAY TO PRODUCE HIS NEW PRODUCT.

TODAY, WITH ALL THE VARIOUS OILS ON THE MARKET, GIBBLE'S STILL USES LARD - AN ANIMAL FAT - TO MAKE THEIR POTATO CHIPS. WHY? BECAUSE WE BELIEVE THAT SIMPLE AND NATURAL IS BEST.

DO YOU REALIZE THAT, COMMONLY, TO PRODUCE VEGETABLE OIL, SEEDS MUST BE ROASTED, STEEL ROLLED, AND FLOODED WITH HEXANE SOLVENT TO EXTRACT THE OIL, WHICH IS THEN TREATED WITH LYE, NEUTRALIZED WITH HYDROCHLORIC ACID, FILTERED THROUGH DIATOMACEOUS EARTH AND DEODORIZED UNDER HIGH TEMPERATURE?

LARD IS A RICH, NATURALLY STABLE FAT, RENDERED FROM PORK THAT PROVIDES THE TRUE HOME STYLE FLAVOR MOST PEOPLE PREFER. PURE ENERGY. SIMPLE AND DELICIOUS.

Martin's Bar-B-Q Waffle Potato Chips

This was my favorite chip. It had a hint of smoke in the flavor, which instantly reminded me of backyard barbecues with the family. Oscar Meyer hot dogs, burnt/raw hamburgers, ketchup on Ruffles and so on. One of the best potato chips I have ever had.

Thanks to JAG for the impetus and supplies. Delicious!

Fast fun fact: "Tallow" is beef lard.

Worrysome

From the Washington Post:

But if a programmer or an engineer with a bright idea has to go to Washington, hat in hand and lawyers in tow, to request permission to sell a better product -- and is then told "just wait awhile" -- we are on our way to suffocating innovation in this country.

True 'dat. On the other hand, I think this country's history shows that anything new will be regulated until it isn't new any more.

Shocking

"People are fascinated by scandal," Bremner said. "Love somehow made her do things that led to complete catastrophe. Then there's the side of watching a train wreck -- you can't look away even if you want to." [emphasis mine]

I can't believe they printed this. The kid was 12!!! Reverse the sexes and let some lawyer say that about a 34 year old male who rapes a 12 year old girl. They'd be strung up in the town square.

What a bunch of pluckers...

On Bluegrass radio. I was mistaken on some comments, it is a service of WAMU, not the actual signal of WAMU. Nonetheless, I can't get enough of it.

Overanalysis: Like the blues, it cheers you up with tales of woe. But it seems a little more authentic and less pretentious than the blues has become. On the other hand, this all seems to be "oldies"; I have no idea of the current state of bluegrass.

Prevarication of the week

Dear Michael Moore,
Hey buddy, how's it going? Are the checks still rolling in? Can you finally afford a decent haircut?

Of course you can, you're the white Jesse Jackson.

See, you claim to be a documentary filmmaker. "I just reflect truth through the prism of my experiences," you might say piously. But you can't just make stuff up in a documentary. And these people say you did.

Yeah, I know it's downstate Illinois, the bread-basket of the vast right-wing conspiracy. But I'm putting my money on the newspaper.

Really, how could you do it? It was more important to get the truth- I guess it's a 'message' now- out there than it was to be completely accurate? They printed it, you just made it look pretty? Or, as I bet the explanation will be, some junior editor did it and you are shocked and horrified and for sure that guy won't work on the next $100,000,000 'documentary'.

For a hamburger today, you would gladly pay on Tuesday?

Alumni Newsletter

I'm reading the MHS newsletter, and they speak of the library remodeling. And it struck me that I don't believe I ever used that library. I was in there a couple times (detention, Xerox machine), I think. Am I remembering incorrectly?

Hey, and congrats to Big Al for winning the "Laetare" award. Whatever the hell that is.

I also believe I saw a very fat, balding Bro. Gordon in Dominick's this evening.