Silflay Hraka

5/16/2003


Teaching Combat to the French

In this photo, director of policy planning at the U.S. State Department Richard N. Haas tries to explain to the French what needs to occur in order to be victorious during a combat situation. The French representive was heard to reply, "Sacre Bleu!!! Usually by then we have started waving our government issued white flag."


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"Blowing" JFK's Image?

Of course we have known for years that JFK enjoyed pookie from a number of people, not just his wife. But this lady we had not heard of before, which brings up a couple of important questions. Do you think that JFK smoked cigars, and why can't I get a job with interns?


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Gay Rights, Who Really Cares?

Should gay people have rights? Damn right, especially the right to vote. At least this seems to be the game plan of some Democratic candidates.

At a dinner in Atlanta last weekend, U.S. Senator John Edwards suggested that he believes that gay parents should have the right to adopt children. Does he really give a rat’s ass whether gays are able to adopt children, or is this just one demographic that has yet to be adequately tapped in terms of votes? My guess is that John Edwards does not stay awake at night hoping for the day when gay people can take children into their homes by the same adoption guidelines that straight people follow. Who can blame him? Isn’t this what candidates do? Apparently he isn’t alone in this attempt. Other candidates for the Democratic presidential nomination are following this line of reasoning.

There are several indications that this will be a consistent theme during the upcoming election. Former Vermont Governor Howard Dean has boasted of a law he signed which allows civil unions for gays and lesbians. Furthermore, U.S. Senator John Kerry of Massachusetts, who is a decorated Vietnam veteran, has stated that gays should be allowed to serve in the military.

I know the conservative response to this manner of courting votes. It will sound something like, “I am appalled that our country’s morals will be abandoned during this election in an effort to bolster supporters,” or “This is just another example of the Demoncrats (not a misspelling) sinking below what should be acceptable in our society in order to gain political leverage.” I shudder at having to hear this crap, from both sides, for the next year and a half. The funny thing is that this is the same thing Republicans do, but I’m sure none of them will admit to having anything in common with this tactic by the Democrats.

Is it not true that ALL candidates act in a manner that will be well received by the majority of their supporters? Don’t all of them do things to gain votes and please those who can put them into office? Why do you think Bush is accused so often of bending policies to benefit big business………probably because “Big Business” is traditionally in the camp of the Republicans.

Having said this, I don’t think that the Democrats are on a higher plane, spending their days and nights hoping for the well-being of all mankind. Instead, it is just a fact that gays traditionally lean toward the Democrat party, and the party will ride that cart until the wheels fall off. Does Howard Dean really want gays and lesbians to have civil unions? Doubtful. I bet he could care less (notice he did not sign a bill that would recognize legal gay marriages). And I will not believe that Edwards passionately believes that gay parents should be able to adopt children until I see him in drag and coming out of the closet himself. Still, I hate that I will be hearing one side blast the other at their “reprehensible campaign strategies.”

I find it hard to believe that people in public office can ever hold their heads up after running a campaign. It is a dirty business and each side is quick to throw the first stone at the other. I wish both sides would connect with just one of those rocks. I guess we should just be thankful that animals don’t have the right to vote…….yet. Now that could get ugly.


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Apologies To Mr. Lovett

If I had a boat
I'd go out on the ocean
And if I had a monkey
I'd ride him on my boat
And we could all together
Go out on the ocean
Me and my new monkey on my boat


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For The Children. Won't Someone Please Think Of The Children?

Must. Build. Backyard. Rollercoaster.

Don't forget the video.


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Twenty -Seven Cents More Than They're Worth

You can now buy Silflay Hraka blogshares for twenty-seven cents each.

I've heard there are ways to drive up the vaulation, but I'm damned if I have the time.


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American Idolatry

Ngnat and the Sainted Wife spend an hour in the big bed every Tuesday night, cuddling up under the blankets to watch American Idol, or as Ngnat calls them "The Singers." I usually escape to the computer/library/guest bedroom for most of the program, but sadly I know enough about the shoe that when the Raleigh N&O and the Birmingham News each came up with ten reasons to vote for Clay or Reuben, many of them made sense to me.

Top 10 reasons to vote for Clay

10 - Clay transformed from bespectacled geek to suburban love god in four short months. Ruben? He has only changed the color of his football jerseys.
9 - Clay handles the judges' critiques with grace and humor. Ruben looks as if he's about to be sent to his room.
8 - Clay never lets them see him sweat. Ruben could use a mop.
7 - Ruben's dimples can't compare to Clay's wiggles.
6 - According to Paula, Clay's spirit can dance.
5 - Football player vs. special education teacher. Who's the real American idol?
4 - Clay hails from a city with a little more to offer than an area code that can be attractively displayed.
3 - Americans love people who can overcome challenges. Clay has triumphed over that eye flutter.
2 - Perpetually grumpy Simon called Clay's performance of "To Love Somebody" the best of any American Idol competition.
1 - Barry White is still around. Clay is an original.

Top 10 reasons to vote for Ruben

10 - Ruben doesn't need makeup.
9 - Critics say Ruben could be the next Luther Vandross. They say Clay would be perfect playing a singing fork in Broadway's "Beauty and the Beast."
8 - Since Ruben started a national fashion trend with his colorful jerseys, everybody knows that Birmingham's area code is 205. Even hard-core "Idol" watchers (outside of Raleigh) wouldn't know Clay's area code from his waist size.
7 - Onstage, Ruben oozes Southern charm and warmth. Onstage, Clay twitches and winks when he hits the high notes.
6 - Ruben's fans use several affectionate nicknames, including the Velvet Teddy Bear and the Round Mound of Sound. Clay's fans know him by, uh, Clay.
5 - Ruben thrilled fans with his version of "Sweet Home, Alabama." Clay has yet to mention his home state in song, though his voice is perfect for "Nothing could be finer than to be in ..."
4 - In a celebrity boxing match, Clay would be a mosquito on the big man's arm.
3 - How could you not vote for a guy whose favorite foods are chicken wings and fried green tomatoes?
2 - Simon has never, ever said to Ruben, "That was horrible."
1 - One word: "Grease."


Many made sense, not all, thank God. No idea what the Grease reference is, for instance.

Please don't enlighten me.

If someone must win, my preferred outcome being the earth opening up and swallowing them all, or at least Paula Abdul, whole, I'd like it to be Reuben. Not because Clay annoys me endlessly with that Barry Manilow as a geek impression, though he does, but because it would prove Salon wrong.

And it's always nice to prove people who look at America and see only race wrong.

Zod: So what you're saying here is "Vote for Rueben, 'cause he's black."
Certainly not. My preference would be that no one vote.


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This Just In

Has the New York Times reversed its seemingly inevitable drift to the left with a stunning pro-gun ownership statement, in a story ostensibly about Saudi terror attack?

How else does one explain this statement?

As their father describes the attack, Fahd and his younger brother Faisal, 25, tear up. With the sadness comes anger about security lapses. Fahd said the owners asked for more security for the front gate but the government provided only one armed man in a jeep — the government holding a monopoly on carrying guns. (emphasis mine, as if you didn't know)

Surely you don't think Howell let this slip by because he's been, um, distracted?


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In This Time Of Troubles, Can't We All Just Agree To Hate The French?

Turns out I'm not the only designer of anti-Frog graphics on campus. One of the expat British programmers also dabbles a bit in the area. He's produced two worthy efforts that I know of.

1.) A liberal catchphrase for 1944, and
2.) Welcome to Carrboro, The Vichy of the Piedmont.

When it comes to derisive hoots and catcalls, France is the gift that keeps on giving.


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Driving Logic

If Anika Sorenstam doesn't doesn't finish dead last at the Colonial next week, a number of people are going to be upset. There's the sexist Vijay Singh, of course, the man who thinks "PGA" stands for "Male Professional Golfer's Association." Note the "Male". If there was a masculine equivalent of the LPGA, it would be the GPGA, and Singh by his actions has already shown he wouldn't qualify for that tour. Singh* claims to care about the quality of the competition, but somehow I think his protests wouldn't be quite as voluble if Sorenstam's exemption had been given to a male duffer who will finish 40 shots off the pace on Sunday.

But Vijay isn't the only one. Martha Burk, of all people, doesn't approve.

"But in the broader sense, I am not an advocate of integrating sports. It would destroy women's sports. What's the point of putting women at a natural disadvantage? We're not idiots, we know there are physical differences between men and women."

It's a stupid argument from a nationally known stupid person, and Orlando sports columnist Mike Bianchi does himself a great disservice by buying it hook line and sinker. Odds are Anika can't beat Tiger Woods. Sadly, odds are that she can't even beat Vijay Singh, who deserves a good thrashing at the hands of a woman. But the odds are great that she can beat a number of PGA tour members, and if she beats just one come the Colonial, then she'll have made an excellent argument that women belong on the PGA tour, as she'll have been demonstrably better than at least one male member of that tour.

If the top five players on the LPGA are better than the bottom five players on the PGA, the the women belong in the PGA and the men don't. Including them will make the tour more competitive, not less, even if they never win tournament one. It's simple logic. Come Sunday at the Colonial, let's hope Sorenstam teaches a lesson in it.

*Singh's is an interesting attitude, given what appears to be his Sikh roots. He was born in Lautoka, Fiji, a stronghold for Sikhs in that country, and has the typical last name of followers of that religion. The official Sikh position on the women's equality is that rights are not gender specific, that God created men and women equal to one another

"In a woman man is conceived,
From a woman he is born,
With a woman he is betrothed and married,
With a woman he contracts friendship.
Why denounce her, the one from whom even kings are born ?
From a woman a woman is born,
None may exist without a woman."


I haven't seen Vijay playing in a turban, the wearing of which is required by followers of that religion, so apparently Mr. Singh is now apostate. It's too bad; the PGA could use a bit of color, and Vijay would be well served by a bit more wisdom.

Update: No doubt feeling somewhat chastened by our editorial voice, Vijay has commenced a frantic backpedaling.


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5/15/2003


Buffalo of the Sea
Git along, little dogies

Not that I'm disputing the study, but what exactly does a white square mean? No fish, or no data?


graphic via yahoo

I suspect no data, not that such a conclusion necessarily undermines the conclusions of the study. Great swathes of the ocean are considered biological desert, so trawling in those areas would be a waste of time and money, though that does not explain why many of the white squares are so near land. Coastal waters are often among the most productive fisheries.

The problems with the study, even if it is essentially correct, are that

A.) It's the latest in a long line of environmental pronouncements of doom, of which Paul Ehrlich is best example. Like the boy who cried wolf, each successive pronouncement eventually turns out to be false, or overstated, reducing the amount of attention paid to the next one. One day such a pronouncement may indeed be correct, yet totally ignored.

and

B.) The conclusion drawn is that the only action that can be taken is to prevent a total collapse of fish stocks is to "reduce fishing in a very large-scale manner". This is perhaps unsurprising, given that the money for the study came from the Pew Charitable Trusts, a major funding source for the environmental movement. When faced with an imbalance in supply and demand, the inevitable choice of the environmental movement is to somehow legislate a reduction in demand, rather than work to increase supply. It's also understandable given the internal logic of the environmental movement: "People bad." Increasing supply would mean human manipulation of natural processes, and a movement that would rather see people starve than feed them genetically altered foodstuffs will raise all kinds of hell at "unnatural" attempts at growing fish stocks.

Though success is not always assured, large scale reductions in fishing have previously worked, but only for specific geographic regions and populations of a single species, affecting comparatively small numbers of people. A demand that commercial fishing the world over be reduced by fifty to sixty percent is so unprecedented and severe in its impact on the global population that the the answer is essentially going to be "No." It's not a question of whether such a drastric measure will work from a scientific viewpoint, though that question is certainly unanswered, it's that politically it won't be allowed. A ban on global fishing will have even less of an effect upon the world's fishing fleets than the ban on whaling has had on Japan and Norway, both of which thumb their noses at the International Whaling Commission on a yearly basis.

The last time there was a situation approximating the current state of the world's fisheries was in 1880, when the overhunting of the American buffalo nearly caused that species to go extinct. Numerous bands of hunters and skinners roamed the Great Plains,* often killing animals at the rate of up to 100 an hour. The buffalo were only saved from extinction because a rancher, Buffalo Jones, began to breed them in attempt to replace his range cattle, thousands of which froze to death each winter. A reduction in hunting didn't save the buffalo, and environmentalists didn't save the buffalo. Market forces saved the buffalo.

Market forces will save the oceanic fisheries as well, if they are allowed to. The problem isn't that the fish in the ocean are vanishing, it's that they are free for the taking. The solution to the declining fish stocks lies not in reducing demand, but by making it worth someone's while to increase supply. No one is going to be interested in providing more of a resource if they can't make money doing it. They'll be happy to harvest that resource until there's nothing left, which is why current fisheries are ostensibly in such a mess. Fortunately, the example of Buffalo Jones provides a nice methodology on how to turn an endangered free resource into a common costed one.

Cattle comes from a cattle rancher. The buffalo meat at my grocery store comes from a buffalo rancher. Why can't tuna come from Tuna ranchers?

Technically there's a couple of issues. Fish aren't cows, and pleasurable as the idea may be, we won't see young wiry guys on porpoises rounding up the herring herd to drive it to market, not that they'll need to. On the ocean the market can come to you. The problem is how to make sure the fish stay around long enough for the market to arrive , a problem solved with a few handfuls of powdered iron.

Experiments have also shown that in at least some areas, plankton blooms will start growing almost immediately even if iron is simply sprinkled into seawater from the stern of a ship.

The blooms typically last a few weeks. That's long enough, say some experts, for large quantities of the gooey green stuff to be consumed by tiny marine organisms. Small fish eat those little critters, providing in turn a food source for declining populations of larger, overfished species such as swordfish, cod, haddock, monkfish and Chilean sea bass. Provide more food for diminishing populations of fish, the reasoning goes, and they should mount a comeback. At the very least, say backers of this idea, more fish would start growing in places where they can't grow now.

Several companies have already patented various iron formulations they claim is best suited to the task. One such group, GreenSea Venture Inc., based in Springfield, Va., estimates that "farming" a 3 million-square-mile patch of the ocean, a bit less than the area of the United States, would produce 50 million tons of additional fish annually, or roughly 40 percent of the fish caught each year. Given that the demand for fish is expected to more than double over the next 100 years, say ocean-fertilization advocates, the only way to keep fish on the plates of the world's hungry consumers without depleting supplies entirely is by finding ways to restore the oceans to a more productive state.


A school of fish is not going to leave a food source, especially if the food source is surrounded on all sides by thousands of miles of relative desert. A GPS stabilized platform that seeds iron into many of the little white squares above will eventually produce immense shoals of fish, while providing a known location for the world's fishing fleets to come to. And there wouldn't be just one platform, there would be dozens, or hundreds. There will be as many as the market will bear, until sashimi grade tuna is as inexpensive as fish sticks. Depending on the size or position of the fish on the food chain, it might even be possible to skip the platform altogether and seed the ocean directly from an industrial fishing vessel. There will be more fish in the sea than there are........fish in the sea.

Heh.

Some in the environmental movement will cry "Pollution!" at the very thought of iron seeding, as if a few pounds of iron dust would upset the balance of an ecosystem primarily characterized by the a lack of life. Presumably they would do the same should someone have the gall to water parts of the Sahara. It's because the environmental movement as a whole isn't interested in solving environmental problems. The environmental movement as a whole is interested in using those problems to promote the power of the environmental movement.**

*aka "Sea of Grass" for those of you who like your metaphors overdone. Google as I might, though, I unable to find any reference to the buffalo as the "Tuna of the Plains."

**As always, when I say "environmental movement", I am excluding the Nature Conservancy. Give the Nature Conservancy your money, and give the rest of them your finger.


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Fortunately, The Unstable Molecules In My Costume Prevented Me From Bursting Into Flames

I spanked the monkey at 190 miles an hour.

Link via the Dissident Frogman


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People Pay Attention To You When You've Won An Election To Name A Ferret

For those of you who might not have seen it yet, researchers at the University of Tennessee and Southern Illinois are conducting an academic survey of blogdom. In another indication that either perception in the blogosphere is easily skewed, or SH punches way above its weight, they sent us a letter asking that we direct our voluminous flow of readers their way.

So both of you, scoot.

Update: But my God, does it take forever to fill out.


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Grasping At Ego Straws

There’s no one like Sid. Not even in Washington. I’m still immensely fond of him, although it’s quite clear by now that, in some respects, he is completely out of his mind. Those jokes that no one else in the universe got; those pauses at the end of anecdotes, while he grinned and puffed and waited for you to assent to his latest impenetrable concoction; the sweet-natured way in which he assassinated characters who violated his sense of manifest destiny and the tenets of his secular religion: Nope, there is no one quite like Sid.

--from Andrew Sullivan's review of The Clinton Wars, by Sidney Blumenthal, chosen for reasons I shan't reveal here but should be nonetheless obvious to many, most of whom are shaking their heads and wondering if there is a level to which I would not descend.


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mmmmmmm, Doughnuts.

Rumor has it that Krispy Kreme is moving into the old First Union building on Franklin Street in Chapel Hill.

Zod: HotdamnHotdamnHotdamnHotdamnHotdamnHotdamnHotdamnHotdamn

There is nothing in the world that compares with a warm Krispy Kreme just off the line. It's round, sugar glazed crack.

Now if I can just get one in RTP.


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Killing People with SARS

Travel Alert: If you have SARS, DO NOT go to China.

This article reports that China has threatened to execute people who deliberately try to spread the SARS virus by not adhering to their quarantines. The scary part about this is that I'm sure they mean it. What is also scary is who will decide if the person was "deliberately" trying to spread the virus? Obviously a subjective decision, I am frightened to think that members of the Chinese government (who are not known for their kindness towards their citizens) will be deciding this. While I am doubtful that it would come to this, I could see the Chinese government using this in the same manner as McCarthy's witch hunt for communists in our own country's history. Who will be able to argue with them? If the government accuses someone of intentionally spreading SARS, they can then execute him/her without question. Seems like a great way to get rid of those who are giving you trouble. Of course, some innocent people will have to die as well so that it isn't completely obvious, but what do a few lives matter when the greater good of China is concerned?


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Weeping Radish Weizen

Beer of the night, and the beer with the most head per ounce poured that I have ever seen. It was frikkin' annoying, waiting for the head to die down. I actually started in on the Weizen a couple of nights ago, and found the amount of foam so unbelievable that I put off posting about it, as I assumed that the first beer or two were not necessarily representative of the brew as a whole. The more fool me. I'm on number 6, and irregardless of the glass shape or pour method, this sucker foams up like a rabid Lassie. It's a decent enough brew once the foam dies away, but I prefer not having to wait 15 bloody minutes before I can drink my beer. So I drank a Baron while I waited, and all was well.

No idea what the beer of tomorrow night will be. I'm fresh out of unmentioned alcohol, unless one counts the Michelob Light, and I don't. It's there for houseguests with an uneducated palate, not for me. Ngnat and I looked for a likely candidate for BOTN while we were at Food Lion tonight, but that store's idea of an exotic beer is Yuengling. 10 year ago they would have been correct, or at least more correct than they are now. Not that there's anything wrong with Yuengling. It's an excellent beer, you should drink some. But when I go out looking for beer, I'm most interested in new to me, not new to N.C.

We were at Food Lion because I had developed a craving for massive amounts of garlic, and Food Lion was right next to the Italian restaurant I had chosen to satisfy the craving, Pulcinella's. While my takeout Spaghetti alla BellaDonna was being prepared, Ngnat and I filled the skimpy grocery list the Sainted Wife had filled out.

I love the Spaghetti alla BellaDonna, if it's got less than 3 cloves of sauteed garlic in it then I'll eat.....another clove of garlic to make up the difference. The portion was kind of small though, so I suspect next time I'll attempt to make it myself. It appears to be garlic sauteed in olive oil, with pine nuts, raisins and Gaeta olives added at some point, poured over al dente spaghetti and garnished with fresh parmesan. Shouldn't take more than 15 minutes, tops.

I'll may have to make something different for the wife; I can't remember if she can't eat garlic ever, or if she can't eat garlic now because she's pregnant. She's not quite the fan I am of it in any case. Ngnat decimated the portion I gave her tonight, so at least one other member of the family can stink along with dad.

She had her bath tonight, so stink along time was necessarily brief. She's gotten to the point in the tub where we feel we can leave her for limited amounts of time. Not for long, as drowning is still the leading cause of death for kids under 5, but long enough for the wife and I to take care of sundry tasks, such as email and litter boxes.

Yes, we know about pregnant women and little boxes. Just one other reason for me to glare at the cats.

One of us eventually bathes her, and by one of us I mean not me. I don't get her clean enough, or so I am told, despite singing

I'm going to wash that man right out of my hair.
I'm going to wash that man right out of my hair.
I'm going to wash that man right out of my hair,
And send him on his wa-ay!


in an off-key falsetto as I shampoo the locks and tresses with the toddler-approved purple shampoo. Not the green shampoo; never the green shampoo. That shampoo has been cast into the outer darkness, where it resides with the Blue's Clues toothpaste.

So the Sainted Wife bathes Ngnat, and I dry and brush her hair, then Sainted Wife dresses her torso and brushes her teeth. Then I read books, then SW reads books, then bedtime is come, at least on a normal night. Tonight Ngnat slipped on the linoleum on the way out of the bathroom and cracked her head on the door.

No blood, many tears, assuaged only by my presentation to her of a beach towel printed in puppies, which she wrapped herself in before watching American Idol in the big bed with Mommy and Daddy. We agreed, she and I, that Tamyra Gray's phrasing on "Somewhere over the Rainbow" sucked ass, and that Justin had funny hair. SW said we shouldn't say "suck ass", and so we didn't.

At least I didn't.


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5/14/2003


Women are from One, Men are from Zeros

Women Explained. Men Explained.

An addition to each.

A woman's log files are never deleted, and scanned daily for items of relevance to current traffic.
A man's log files are deleted vigilantly.


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Slut For It

No wonder I'm married. Apparently anything above the level of sentience of a bag of potatos could be my soulmate

Your probability coefficient: 0.289378444009965.
You have to meet 3 heterosexual females who are between 24 and 35 years old who are living in your state or are willing to move there.


Link via Dustbury, who is in somewhat more difficult circumstances.


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PC Polling

In your honest opinion, which parts of the following statement are racist?

Guns don't kill people, African Americans and Latinos kill people.

If you have decided that the latter phrase is indeed racist, why?


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iTunes Music Store Sales Decline

Not that it is spun that way, of course, and two data points aren't enough evidence to draw a conclusion from.

Now if Apple doesn't sell its third million until May 25th or 26th, then that's a trend.


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Suffer The Little Children To Come Unto Me, That I May Taste Their Tonsils


photo via yahoo

Shi'ite cleric Mohammed Baqir al-Hakim with a young admirer in Najaf.

In related news, Pope John Paul has called for closer relations between the Catholic church and Shi'ite Muslims.

"Mmdnolskd sosidnfop! K sprns slm soens. MOPLUELSID!" commented the Pope upon seeing the picture above. Spokesmen for the elderly pontiff later claimed that the Pope was merely excited about a possible new altar boy source of supply, one that he hoped might assuage the current shortage, and released a corrected written copy of John Paul's remarks:

Mmdnolskd sosidnfop! K sprns slm soens. MOBLUELSIP!"

Former Boston archdiocese Cardinal Bernard Law was unavailable for comment. He was last seen sprinting for a Baghdad-bound EgyptAir flight.


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Old Enough To Settle Down

The 34th edition of the Carnival of the Vanities is at The Inscrutable American this week, featuring a strip from Chris Muir, cartoonist to the blogosphere. Good catch, Inscrutable.

Upcoming Carnival stops include;

May 21st Cut On The Bias
May 28th Dean's World
June 4th Drumwaster's Rants
June 11th Overtaken by Events
June 18th Real Women Online
June 25th Single Southern Guy
July 2nd Amish Tech Support
July 9th Winds Of Change -- The 42nd spot, coveted by hitchhikers across the galaxy.
July 16th Caerdroia
July 23rd DaGoddess
July 30th Lies, Damn Lies, and Statistics

If you'd like to host the Carnival, drop us a line. Information on how to join the Carnival can be found here.


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Fool Me Twice, Shame On Me

15 of the 19, and now 15 of the 15. How long is it going to take the Democratic presidential candidates to start pointing out that the Arab country whose citizens have killed more Americans in the last two years than any other is still untouched by the American War on Terrorirism?

My guess? Never. Either they feel the Democratic primary process won't reward a candidate who campaigns on protecting the American people, or Saudi money has gotten its hooks to deep into them for anyone to point out inconvenient facts, or they're just plain stupid. I't feels like a mixture of all three to me, heavy on the stupidity and light on the money.

That leaves you, Johnny.


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Mr. Stinky

I've got you unbranched inflorescence right here, baby.


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Swan Song?

Chong to Throng: Bongs Wrong!


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Inheriting the Earth

If there is anything one can be sure of about the immediate future, it's this. It will posses an inordinate fondness for buttons. Take the new Nokia, for instance


photo via yahoo

It's a phone, a radio and a game deck. I count 25 buttons minimum, which sounds like a lot, but is actually a triumph of design. My two year old and thus incredibly obsolete Startac has 23, and all it does is call people. Once I upgrade, I can play games, listen to the radio and maybe even call people on the same device for a mere extra two buttons. Ten to one I'll be able to surf the net and IM as well. One might think that this would reduce the overall number of number of buttons in my life, but one would be assuming that I would be tossing a perfectly good radio in order to listen to a one speaker phone. One would also be assuming that I would be playing video games on a screen slightly smaller than a Saltine cracker, which is insane. Those two buttons are just two more buttons in my life, buttons that may as well be located in my left nostril for all the use they will be.

Actually, they'd probably get pressed more there. "No, I'm not picking my nose," I could tell the wife. I'm playing Tony Hawks Pro Skater!"

My new universal remote has over 50 buttons. My pager has 36, almost all of which perform multiple tasks depending on what other buttons are pressed. I have no idea what to do with most of them, of course. It's not that I lack the ability to understand what all the functions of each device, rather I lack the inclination. I have better things to do with my time than to learn how to make my universal remote send email. I know it can, it has a little email icon on it. I hate the little icon. I am surrounded all day by things that can send email, and should I feel the desire to send email from something other than a computer, I'll use my cell phone. Or my wife's cell phone, if she can find it in the black hole that is her handbag. Or my pager.

On day soon, every device on the planet will be able to perform all the functions of every other device on the planet, just not as well, or as conveniently, which means that everyone will have multiple universal devices.

All with buttons. Lots of buttons. Buttons that do things and buttons that make those buttons do different things. Ergonomists will go take to bed with migraines every night. It will be a m.u.d., m.u.d, m.u.d, m.u.d world. A future wag will say "People are just a button's way of making more buttons."* Most of these buttons, just like the buttons of today, will cry out to be used. That cry will go unheard, for most people, just like today, will find pushing the more functionally obvious buttons on another machine a more efficient use of their time than learning the ways of the less functionally obvious buttons on the device at hand. Yes, I'll be able to surf the web from my blender, but why would I want to?

But this too, should pass. It is the immediate future I'm talking about, not the day after that. Ergonomics will march on, and eventually voice recognition will be as ubiquitous as buttons, and your heartmonitor will be smart enough to email instructions to the blender the moment "strawberry daiquiri" passes your lips.

What if the software fails, or the microphone on the heart monitor breaks? Never fear. In case of a failure in the voice recognition system, one can just use the buttons.


*And others will say "That wasn't funny the first time."


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Nudge Your Coworkers From Time to Time

I cannot guarantee the legitimacy of this article that is supposedly from the New York Times (I will look for a link when I have more time), but if this is true it proves that we spend too much time working without getting to know the people we work with. This came to me in an email.
New York Times 4-22-03

Bosses of a publishing firm are trying to work out why no one noticed that one of their employees had been sitting dead at his desk for FIVE DAYS before anyone asked if he was feeling okay.

George Turklebaum, 51, who had been employed as a proof-reader at a New York firm for 30 years, had a heart attack in the open-plan office he shared with 23 other workers. He passed away on Monday, but nobody noticed until Saturday morning when an office cleaner asked why he was still working during the weekend.

His boss, Elliot Wachiaski said: "George was always the first guy in each morning and the last to leave at night, so no one found it unusual that he was in the same position all that time and didn't say anything. He was always absorbed in his work and kept much to himself."

A post mortem examination revealed that he had been dead for five days after suffering a coronary. Ironically, George was proofreading manuscripts of medical textbooks when he died. You may want to give your co-workers a nudge occasionally.

The moral of the story: Don't work too hard, nobody notices anyway.


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Next Stop, Crossfire

In a stunning display of power and influence, we have managed to successfully win a poll to name a ferret. Take that, Instapundit.


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5/13/2003


Reach Out and Touch Someone

If you'd like to share your opinion about nuisance lawsuits in general, or about the Oreo lawsuit filed Monday against Kraft Foods in particular with the attorney who filed it, here's his contact information;

Law Offices of Stephen L. Joseph
Stephen Joseph
3701 Sacramento Street #500
San Francisco, CA 94118

Phone: 415-577-6660
Fax..: 415-869-5380
Email: sljoseph@earthlink.net

Attorney Joseph has also published a website dealing with the lawsuit, Ban Trans Fats. The contact listed for that site is bantf@earthlink.net. I'll add contact information for the others listed if I think it warranted.

Update: I tried calling Dr. Mary Enig, listed at Ban Trans Fats as a consultant, but she wasn't in. I did speak to her husband, Dr. Jules Enig, who was nice enough to chat for a bit. Mary performed a good deal of the research linking trans-fatty acids to cancer back in 1978. Neither are a party to the lawsuit.

Just to be clear, I don't question the research on trans-fatty acids. In fact, I refer to it every time the wife attempts to force margarine onto my biscuit. What I, and I think most people, have a problem with is the potential infringement on freedom cases like this represent, not to mention the inappropriate use of the court system as a forum for this kind of thing.


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Tetley's English Ale

Beer of the night, and a repeat if I'm not missing my guess. And lo, I am not. Much as I would like to have a new beer of the night 365 days a year, it's not possible. Not because there aren't enough beers out there. There are. Cutting edge beer thinking puts the number at about 5000 on any particular day, with new and old brews arriving and departing each day. At one a day, the supply is essentially infinite. But the closer we get to the due date, the less fallow the wallet field is.

I may be reduced to drinking Anheuser-Busch products soon. < shudder >. Or there will come a week in June or July when the beer of the night is the same for six, or more likely three, nights in a row. Perhaps I'll have a pledge week, ala Andrew Sullivan, but in lieu of money I'll just beg for people to mail me beer.

Just out of curiosity, does anyone live near H.C. Berger?

I'm not sure if we have done any actual economizing, or have just talked about economizing. I'm not in charge of the money, thank god. We have a very Japanese arrangement, in that the wife is in charge of the money. She is, after all, an accountant. She pays the bills. I install the software and make the Monty Python references. It's a fair distribution of labor; you wouldn't want an amateur making the Python references. That way lies madness.

Fauna. I'm also in charge of dealing with fauna. Can't forget that, especially as the weekend was chock full of it. And by fauna, I don't mean cats, though sadly I am in charge of them as well. By fauna I mean things that don't make horrible loud noises playing in the litterbox come two in the morning.

By fauna, I mean Eastern Box Turtles, Garter Snakes and Black Rat snakes, all of whom graced us with their presence this weekend. The Turtle we took to show and tell; all the three-year-olds were entranced. Meeting the Black Rat was the most exciting encounter, as indeed almost any meeting would be if one party was not only nearly five feet in length, but also almost trodden on by a heavily pregnant woman within 8 feet of her back door.

Despite its rather formidable appearance, the black rat is one of the most docile species of snake around. Out of dozens of encounters with rat snakes, I think I've been bitten once. I made sure this snake wasn't bound and determined to be the second, then presented her to Ngnat, who touched the scales and nodded solemnly as I instructed her to "Come get Daddy if you see a snake." This was a lesson she'd heard before; we'd run across the garter snakes mating the previous day. It's the second law of the outdoors that I have hopefully pounded into her head, the first being "Stay away from shiny black spiders."

She's parroted both back to me at times, so I think they've taken. Not that it will stop me reiterating either of them back to her until she's.....twenty-something, probably.



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5/12/2003


The Fate of The World Could Depend On It.

Go here. Vote for Eli. It's important, I tell you.


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Dodging Rexella

Cable companies are taking the first few slow, reluctant steps towards giving consumers a choice in the cable channels they receive.

We have a DVR now, so actually watching a live broadcast has become increasingly rare in our house, but we'd be a happier family just knowing that the following channels were banished for all time from our television;

Home Buyers Channel, Home Shopping Network, and QVC, ShopNBC - If I want useless crap, I can buy it locally.
BET - All programs filmed in Technicolor PimpVision
WGN - I don't care what happens in Chicago.
PAXTV, Inspirational Network - If Jesus wanted television to save souls, he'd have a sit-com, produced by Aaron Sorkin.
SoapNet - Makes TNN look like Masterpiece Theatre.
Golf Channel - Soporific would be an improvement.
Univision - If you're not shouting "GOOOOOOOOOOAAAAAALLLLL!", go the hell away.
MTV - BET white. Oh, and shut up and play some damn music videos.

If some sort of pay-per-channel plan is eventually adopted, there's a load more channels that will join the list if they cost more that a buck or two a month. Trio and Odyssey, for example. There's at least a chance they might program something I'd watch, thought I doubt I'd pay more than a buck a month for either.

This of course gives the cable company the heebie-jeebies. The idea that people should be able to pick and choose what gets piped into their homes! Next they'll be wanting an adequate level of customer service!

I'm perfectly willing to cut a deal, though. I'll pay the same rates I pay now, just give me the ability to skip the channels above entirely, to treat them as if they never existed. No guide entry, no scrambled picture, nothing. I want my television to act like they don't exist. I want the half second it takes me to surf over them to never happen, because my cable box knows to skip over that channel.

Hell, I'll pay extra.


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Oral History

Bill Clinton. More Kennedyesque than we realized.


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mmmmm.....Lawsuits.

Thailand's finance minister nearly died today after his BMW's computer operating system crashed.

Suchart Jaovisidha and his driver were trapped inside the BMW limo for more than 10 minutes before guards broke a window. All doors and windows locked automatically when the computer crashed, and the air conditioning stopped, officials said.

Nothing like that fabulous German engineering to ensure that your ride becomes your tomb if the electronics fail. And, speaking of fabulous engineering, since I'm using my snidest of tones, what operating system in particular do you suppose the BMW was running?

That's right, Windows, and just in time for "leaving baby in the car seat season." Somewhere, lawyers are salivating like Homer at a doughnut store.

I wonder how one goes about patching a car's operating system. Bound to be a pain in the rear, no matter what. In the meantime, Series 7 drivers might want to get themselves one of these.


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Mr. Nature Man Answers Your Questions

Or, if questions are unavailable, obsessively searches the Internet for tiny nuggets of error to correct. Case in point, Lileks

Gnat watched two movies. She watched “Stuart Little 2” sixty-seven times, and Sunday she went with Mom to a cinema grill to watch “Jungle Book 2.” She sat through the entire show. When she got home I asked her about the plot, which could be boiled down to “scary tiger.” Was there a monkey? I asked her. Uh-huh. Was there a boy? Uh-huh. I remembered seeing the original movie as a ten-year old, and how I enjoyed Baloo, so I asked “Was there a bear?” Uh-huh.

And then I asked my wife the question that had never occurred to me before that moment: what was a bear doing in the jungle?


Living there, of course.

Habitat & Range: The Sloth Bear is found in India, Sri Lanka, Bangladesh, Nepal and Bhutan. This bear likes to live in the low country by forests and in low rocky places.

Behavior: The Sloth Bear often lives by itself unless it is a mother with cubs. The Sloth Bear uses sounds and facial expressions to communicate with others. They have been known to attack people when scared or startled. They have very poor eye sight and their sense of smell is not that keen either. Sloth Bear cubs will ride on their mother's back, the Sloth Bear is the only bear to do this. The Sloth Bears are very good climbers. The Sloth Bear is generally nocturnal, but can be seen during the day eating or drinking. Sloth Bears are usually seen at dusk or right after dawn.


Not that Baloo is necessarily a Sloth Bear. Brown bears are also found in India, though they are not nearly as common. No mention of which species of the Indian bear population are more apt to be misogynistic jazz aficionados in the literature, so that's no help in narrowing down Baloo's species. He's certainly lazy, which is a point in favor of Sloth Bear status, but he's also fairly well groomed, and your average sloth bear appears to have hat head of the entire body. Kipling habitually refers to Baloo as a "brown bear" in his Mowgli stories; presumably they were more common in his time.

“There--there! That was worth a little bruise,” said the Brown Bear, tenderly. “Some day thou wilt remember me.” Then he turned aside to tell Bagheera how he had begged the Master Words from Hathi, the Wild Elephant, who knows all about these things, and how Hathi had taken Mowgli down to a pool to get the and how Mowgli was now reasonably safe against all accidents Snake Word from a water-snake, because Baloo could not pronounce it, in the jungle, because neither snake, bird, nor beast would hurt him.

One wonders why Kipling would go to the trouble of capitalizing "Brown" if the word was merely serving an adjectival role rather than as a species name, but he does the same thing with "Wild Elephant" in the next sentence, so perhaps the Indian Heat made him Capital Happy.

Species aside, there are indisputedly bears in India, so Disney was accurate on that score. Not that the company has much of a track record when it comes to an accurate portrayal of nature. This is the same bunch that hurled lemmings off cliffs, mind you, and made the execrable Pocahontas, which among its many, many other sins, inserts mountain and giant redwoods into Tidewater Virginia. Never have so many hoped so much for the appearance of a few smallpox blankets than during that movie.

In the Jungle Book, Disney stayed fairy close to Kipling's original source material, if by "fairly close" one means "kept most of the main characters and threw everything else away," but that at least ensured that most of the species portrayed are those actually found on the subcontinent, with one glaring error, a character created for the movie by Disney, and one who does not appear in the original stories.

Care to guess which animal it is?


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5/11/2003


Red Seal Ale

Red Seal is brewed in California, and available in North Carolina primarily because the head brewer has roots in the state. Goes well with Alsatian Munster, apparently. Beer of the night. Beers of the night were I to have my druthers, but apparently the Sainted wife's cervix could let go at any time, so I am forbidden the fruit of the hops and grain above a certain level of intake. I tried explaining to her the anecdotal value a buzzed husband in the delivery room would have, not only for me, but for the doctors and nurses as well, but she heard me not. Hardly fair, I think. She's going to have a veritable cocktail of chemicals pumped into her, and I have to face the ordeal with my wits unclouded?

I wasn't sober when this journey started, don't see why I should be when it finishes.

Mother's day went well, cards aplenty, and I not only steamed cleaned the carpet, upstairs and down the day before but presented the wife with a tulip vase in our wedding china formal pattern. I was the one who picked that pattern out, 5 or 6 years ago. It was long ago, and those days are hazy now. Also, I don't have to remember how long ago it was until the next wedding anniversary in..............January. I do remember picking that specific pattern primarily because it was the only one featuring accurate depictions of insects that I could find in the housewares section at Belk. You'd think that market would have a lot of competition, but no.

A word to the prospective groom. The formal wedding china is your friend. No couple on the planet outside of European royalty and South Carolina debutantes gets a full set of their formal china, so whenever one of the Hallmark invented holidays pops up and you can't think of what in god's name to get the missus, you can present her with that. It even looks like you gave it some thought.

If for some reason you were unlucky enough to marry into European royalty or South Carolina debutante society, you have my condolences. But all is not lost. Two words, my friend: Christmas China.

As far as steam cleaning goes, cover the carpet once with the soap in the machine, and once with just water. Else you'll leave soap residue on the fibers. Soap residue is sticky. Sticky things attract dirt, and dirt attracts women who thinks things should be steam cleaned. Claw your way out of the vicious cycle with a rinse cycle. Ideally you should do two rinses; one to clean up and one to make sure, but that requires a Lileks level of OCD that I do not possess.


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Chaotic World

This has been going around in an email. I'm not sure of the author but I will be glad to give credit if anyone knows where it came from. Here is clear evidence that the world is in chaos:

1. The best golfer in the world is black.
2. The number one rapper is white.
3. The tallest guy in the NBA is Chinese, and
4. Germany doesn't want to go to war


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Patriotic? Maybe. But the squirrel is clearly in distress.


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