I was watching G4 channel's coverage of the 2007 Comic-Con and they showed a
special announcement by the principal cast and director of the new Indiana Jones
movie. This was broadcast to the Comic-Con audience and featured Spielberg, Ford
and others. I liked it when Spielberg was muted when he said the title of the
new film (I'm sure a lip reader catched it and it will soon be spoiled all over
the internet).
But then Spielberg did something that could only appeal to the hardcore Raiders
fans: he brought out a chair with the name "Marion Ravenwood", followed shortly
thereafter by Karen Allen. Pretty cool if you ask me. Marion was one of my all
time favorite female characters of any movie. The fans always wondered why she
disappeared from the two sequels and now Spielberg has made things right. I just
hope he makes the movie right. There are those who will go nameless who are
opposed to this new sequel (kkktookmybabyaway) and they have a point. Last
Crusade was a fitting ending and Ford is a senior citizen at this point, etc. I
don't know, it's to big of an event for me to ignore it. I'll be seeing it in
the theatres for sure.
I tried the new Miller beer product called "Chill". You've probably seen the
commericals. It has lime and salt and is a Mexican recipe going way back. Last
week I was walking through Biggs and there was a lady handing out little plastic
cups of Chill along with chips and salsa. They were 25 cents to try so I gave it
a shot. It was good and the typical beer after-taste is non-existent. Works for
me, way to go Miller. PLus I love those Miller High Life commericals with the
guy removing Miller beer from places that have expensive prices, so Miller good
with me. Besides, Budweiser has George Clooney as a spokesperson, so I'll not be
drinking a Budweiser anytime soon.
The new sitcom based on the Geico Caveman commericals is making news. It seems
the producers/network suits/whomever have seen fit to announce that the show "IS
NOT A RACIAL ALLEGORY". Liberals everywhere must be saddened, I'm sure they were
looking forward to seeing race themes on the show as whites abused the poor
cavemen. Now I'm very skeptical of this show's success because only one of the
three actors from the commercial are going to be in series. Big Mistake.
Wednesday's new South Park was off the charts. If you didn't see it, it was the 2nd part of a 2 part episode, featuring Cartman trying to stop an episode of "Family Guy" from running. In the episode, Family Guy is going to show Mohammed, sparking a worldwide controversy. Cartman pretends to be concerned about the showing of an image of Mohammed, but really just wants Family Guy off the air because he just doesn't like the humor in the show.
Kyle, on the other hand, wants to get the network to air the show, and succeeds at the last minute. So we see the scene play out in Family Guy, but Mohammed is censored...by Comedy Central. They wouldn't let an image of Mohammed appear on South Park. Then they show an Al Qaida cartoon featuring Jesus and Pres. Bush crapping on each other, no censoring. Absolutely brilliant.
A Comedy Central executive was quoted as saying: (paraphrase) "In light of recent events, we feel we made the right decision (to censor the image of Mohammed)". He offered no further comment. Phil Hendrie had a great comment on this executive: "He had no further comment because he doesn't have the intelligence to back up his comments".
Speaking of Al Qaida, people seem to be split on whether they want Zaccarius Moussaui to get the death penalty. Those that don't argue that death is what he wants so that he may be rewarded by Allah, etc. So therefore let him rot in a cell for the rest of his life. Deny him what he wants. I kind of agree with this. Life in cell would be worse than death for this guy. Unless there really is a Hell where people like him go...in that case, send him there, do not pass Go.
Piggybacking on kkk's story about an eyeglass coupon and the fine print, I recently had a coupon/discount offer that went awry.
I have this tracfone thing, which is a cell phone without any contracts, you just have to buy airtime every few months. I got this offer in the mail for a free reconditioned phone if you buy 60 minutes of airtime. I was due in a few weeks to buy airtime anyway, so I decided to do it. The ad said that the offer was only available at the website or by calling. The ad featured the main website URL and nothing else. Since I avoid these kinds of 800 numbers at all costs, I just went to the website, which I had used many times before to buy airtime. There was nothing on the main page about this offer. So I went to "buy airtime". Still didn't see anything, but I went ahead and bought the airtime, thinking maybe something would come up during the procedure. Still nothing. So I braced myself and called the 800 number. This number had the mother of all bullcrap menu option loops. There was no option to speak directly with someone and none of the options covered the topic I was calling about. I just started picking stuff and kept getting sent to automated responses. Finally I found something that would get me to a live person and the real fun began. He started off by telling me that the offer was only good if you called and bought airtime. I pointed out to him that the ad had clearly stated that you could go to the web site. Then he told me you had to click on "buy phone" from the main web page in order to get the offer. I said there was nothing that directed me to that link, and I had already bought the airtime. He kept telling me I have to go to the "buy phone" link, but that would involve buying another 60 minutes.
Talk about misleading bullcrap. The ad said nothing about that and the web page didn't direct you to that link. To have the offer hidden under "buy phone" is nuts. Yeah, I know I should have called before going ahead with the purchase, but I followed the ad's instructions.
James Brown had to be embarrassed as a black man when he pimped the 60 minutes segment on Vince Young and had to lead in to a clip featuring a Young quote. Young, eschewing the time-honored double negative preferred by ignorami for centuries, passed go and went straight for the triple negative. In responding to a question regarding being told by critics (and presumably coaches) that he should be less reckless he said "Can't nobody tell me nothing." Now, trying to glean any meaning from the grammar of that sentence would probably produce a confused look similar no doubt to the look on the face of the scholar who was first presented with Egyptian heiroglyphics and asked "what does this mean?" But it certainly has a lot of street cred, I guess.
"Timeout" is the latest fad for "correcting" children (and utterly bullshit) but now we have a situation in football where the adults are getting hip to timeouts--and the refs are enabling them.
On Sunday during the Florida v. Auburn game the Florida coach was allowed to call a timeout during his opponents field goal attempt in such a way so that the kicker was forced to go through with the kick but it wouldn't count. So he had to kick it again. This is effing bs. It would be awesome though, if a coach tried this and the kicker missed the 1st attempt, and because of the timeout, kicked it again and made it. Ouch.
Many years ago Marge Schott, then owner of the Cincinnati Reds, made a remark about Adolf Hitler that got her in hot water and made the national news. She was roundly criticized as a racist. She said that Hitler, in the beginning of his rise to power in Germany "was not that bad" and that only later on did he become "bad" and go a little nuts.
Fast forward to 2007 and an NPR essayist and Huffington blog columnist Peter Mehlman, says essentially the same thing. "Hitler meant well for the people of Germany" while he was going about trying to murder every jewish human on the planet. His point while saying this is that George Bush is worse than Hitler because George Bush doesn't mean well and Hitler at least did mean well.
To use Mr. Mehlman's very hip and with-it writing style: Hmm. Ok. Umm. Yeah. At. Least. You. Wrote. For. Seinfeld.
Well, I don't expect a media fire storm because this guy is essentially nobody. But imagine a Clear Channel essayist saying something similar about Clinton, Edwards or whoever. BTW, NPR officially describes him as an "essayist", not a liberal essayist, just an essayist. Yeah, he's very reasonable and level-headed.
Conservatives think that Liberals are wrong. Liberals think that Conservatives are evil.
Ohio has followed in the "progressive" footsteps of other parts of the country and has completely banned indoor smoking. This includes such niche establishments as cigar bars. That's right, a place that is deliberating catering to smokers now has to ban it and put up a silly little sign that says No Smoking and has a hotline phone number on the sign to call to report violators. Yes, the narcissistic ninnies have made sure that whiners and tattle-tales can call a number to tell on smokers. Like running to mommy to tell on your classmate for doing something wrong. There was a case where a useless ninny called to complain about "Anthony's", a local cigar bar. This person, when queried, had never been to Anthony's and has no intention of ever going, she just heard that people were still smoking cigars there even though the ban had just gone into affect (or effect?) that day.
Thankfully, the ban so far does not include plays being performed at the Aronoff Center, plays which include the character's smoking on stage. They did have signs at every entrance explaining that there will be lit cigarettes used during the production. But fear not, I do not doubt for one second that this too will eventually be banned, as it is in New York City for Broadway plays.
I've noticed that the FOX show "Drive" hasn't been on in a few weeks. Maybe it's been cancelled or just put a hiatus. It's not that great, but I mark out for a 1970 Dodge Challenger with a Hemi 426 being featured in a primetime network show.
Most radio side kicks don't bother me at all. But I listen to the Dennis Miller show and I have to say that his side kick "Sal" is the worst presence on radio that I've ever heard. This guy is HORRIBLE. Dennis seems to have a blind spot concerning this guy. He actually thinks Sal is hilarious. Sal will say the dumbest, most vapid, boring comment you've ever heard and Dennis will laugh like crazy.
Here's an example of Sal's brilliant comedy: Dennis was making a reference to Mr. Miagi from "Karate Kid", talking about how Southern California needs to prune back some of the foilage to prevent fires, like Mr. Miagi pruning the Bonsai to let it breathe. As they go into commercial break Sal chimes in with "Wax on Wax Off!". Oh God.
California Lieutenant Governor John Garamendi took the opportunity to trash Bush while being interviewed by Chris Matthews about the fires.
Graham Nash and Bonnie Raitt are on Capitol Hill fighting AGAINST the building of nuclear power plants. Nash called such plants "monsters". Huh? Good God, get over it people. Why don't you read up on France. They seem to be doing well with it.
Eli Roth, director of "Cabin Fever", and "Hostel", was on with Neil Cavuto talking about the recent popularity of horror movies. He says it is a reaction to the terror that people see on TV in these times and they need a place to vent. He said horror movies were on the decline during the Clinton years because it was a period of calm. He said that anger over Bush, Cheney and Rumsfeld, and the fact that "the government did nothing" in the aftermath of Katrina is causing people to want to vent and scream during a horror movie. Uh, yeah right.
The host was taken aback by these comments, and brought up Psycho and asked Roth whether that had anything to do with a reaction to the Kennedy administration. Roth said no, it was merely a reaction to [1950s serial killer] Ed Gein. He's right, but I guess he momentarily forgot about his theory of Clinton/Bush. He later said horror movies declined in the late 80s because they had become a joke, lots of sequels, nothing new. I guess he forgot that it was because of the calm of the Clinton administration.
Roth has always seemed like an intelligent guy to me in the interviews I've seen. Check that, he is smart, that is obvious when you listen to him. But he lives in a very insular, provincial-minded world that leads to the nonsense of his comments on Cavuto's show.
Two Duke lacrosse players have been arrested and will face rape charges. Sorry, don't have a clue, I thought lacrosse was a new car model by Buick.
Whatever happened to the word "doesn't"? Nobody says this word anymore. These days, it's all about "dudn't". I hear professional broadcasters on the radio say "dudn't" all the time. Even the freakin president has used it, although in his case it is not that shocking when you hear his other syntaxtical malformations. Is the word "dudn't" a reflection of our need to speed everything up? It seems "dudn't" is a quicker way to say "doesn't". Also, some people avoid "doesn't" because it sounds pretentious, like you're some jackass trying to sound educated.
"Hey, do you believe this idiot on TV, look at him"!
"Dudn't bother me."
Barry Bonds hit home run No. 715, surpassing the legendary Babe Ruth. Don't care, I'm more interested in the fan who caught the now famous ball. He was standing in line for some peanuts and a beer while Bonds came up to bat and the ball pretty much just fell into his hand. I LOVE this. The dude doesn't even stay in his seat to see the at-bat and winds up with I guess a ball that is worth a few hundred grand. I happened to see Hank Aaron hit No. 714 in Cincinnati. My aunt was in the lady's room. And I might just have to start liking Bonds after he made the comment that he hopes the guy sells the ball and makes as much money as he can get.
And now, a brand new segment on Triple Black. The weekly Top Gear car review!!
I mentioned the British TV show Top Gear in a previous post. It's a great show, very well produced. The only thing I don't like about it is the insessant America-bashing. I mean these guys go way out of their way to rip on the USA. Yet I still watch, because when it comes to cars, the hosts and I are on the same page.
So without further ado, here is the car review, plus a bonus review in celebration of the first segment ever.
1) 2006 Corvette Z06
This is the high performance version of the normal Corvette. Jeremy Clarkson did the review and like with all things American, in a real shocker, he didn't like it. Oh, he admitted it was very fast, but he objected to the cheap interior and the little bugs that went wrong. He also said it would be horrible as a daily driver because it was so uncomfortable. Now, if you can afford the $70,000 price tag, I'm sure you can mix in a Camry to drive to work. But, that's Clarkson for you. And of course the interior doesn't have the high quality of a Ferrari or Aston Martin--it's 10s of thousands of dollars LESS than those 6-figure cars. He did however express astonishment over a car that is the equal (in terms of speed) of a $160,000 Ferrari can be bought for Chevrolet's price. So basically he loved it as a track car but did not recommend it for driving on the road.
2) 2007 Jaguar XK
Clarkson tested this completely redesigned model as well, and loved it...as long as one kept the car under 130 mph. He noticed a significant front end lift and lightness in the steering at speeds over 130. Not safe at all. This is due to the poorly designed rear spoiler, which causes too much downforce at the rear of the car, with no compensation at the front. He also criticized the antenna (looks like it came from a 1981 Ford) the lack of a new engine (same engine as the old model) and the lack of any new gadgets in the interior. He did however love the styling, and it is a truly gorgeous car. At one point he said he was torn on whether to drive it or to get an easel and start painting it. And while he bitched about the interior gadgetry, he did like the restyling of it, felt it was modern and crisp, all the old school wood trimming gone. Bottom line, he loved driving it and could put up with the nitpicking.
HBO is making a movie about the 2000 presidential election in Florida. So what's the over/under on how many days this will be premiered before the presidential election between Hillary and Guliani/Romney/Thompson?
Savage is trying to set differentiate himself from other Conservative radio hosts by taking the side of the U of Florida student who was tazed by the campus police at a John Kerry speech. He wants to be the "renegade independent Conservative" don't you know. In explaining his position he told a few untruths. Maybe he thought what he was saying was true, but I doubt it. That would make him a liar. Oh well, if the shoe fits. Here's what he said.
1. The kid was hand-cuffed when he was tased.
Wrong. They could not handcuff him due to his squirming and resisting.
2. The female officer tased him without warning.
Wrong. They warned him, telling him to stop resisting.
3. "They" cut off the mike during his allotted time because tase-boy was asking Kerry unsettling questions about Skull and Bones.
Wrong. The Q&A had been declared over and tase-boy interrupted and strated giving a speech and not obeying the rules of the Q&A. He would not stop yelling.
By the way, tase-boy's yelling "help! help me! they're arresting me!" during the event is eerily, hilariously, similar to a scene in Monty Python and the Holy Grail. When King Arthur is riding along among a bunch of serfs and he drags Michael Palin off, who is protesting the fact that Arthur has declared himself King of the Britains because some "aquatic tart" handed him a sword. Palin yells out "Help! Help! I'm being oppressed! See the repression!"
Cincinnati Reds manager Jerry Narron made a move in yesterday's afternoon game against the Oakland As that was just downright silly. Here's what happened: The Reds were behind by 2 runs (5 to 3) and Josh Hamilton was due up with nobody on base (it was the 8th or 9th inning). Hamilton has been a good player--he was the No. 1 draft pick several years ago and then had problems with drugs and now has gotten back on the straight and narrow. He is being called "The Natural" around Cincinnati because he excels in all 5 areas of the traditional baseball tools and because he kind of showed up after being off the map for several years, like the Roy Hobbs character.
So we have Hamilton due up and Narron decides to pull him in favor of Juan Castro. Castro is hitting .167 and Hamilton had homered earlier in the game. Part of the rationale was that Castro had success against the pitcher. What success? He was 1 for 1. Seven years ago.
Another thing Narron said was that Hamilton hitting a home run still left you down a run and he wanted Castro to get a hit and be a spark plug. Yeah, god forbid Hamilton hits a home run.
Now I'm not going to freak out and call for him to be immediately fired, but that was just weird logic in my opinion.
So I was having dinner at my wife's parents and her twin sister was there, the one who is a lawyer who works for the Ohio Supreme Court. For some unknown reason, my wife made a comment about global warming, not a political for-or-against comment, but a flippant comment about it hopefully being warm when we go to Cape May, NJ in June. Well, this started a mild shitstorm between her parents and her sister. Her sister believes Al Gore, the whole deal, a true believer. Her parents are evil conservatives, listen to Rush, and generally don't like Al Gore. I wanted to speak up during their debate, but I just didn't want to argue with Lora, she's a nice person. I know, I made a mistake. Just misinformed, thanks to the media. It isn't her fault. With few exceptions (the NYT did in fact run an article weeks ago about the mistakes in Al Gore's film), the mainstream media treats Al Gore's version of global warming--at least the man'made part--as gospel. And the only place you consistently get news of scientists who are debating this stuff is through Conservative outlets--and I know damn well she doesn't listen/read any of these (she really went off on Rush and Bill O'Reilly at one point). And it didn't help that her parents were not exactly doing a thorough job of presenting the other side. Oh well, next time I'll try and speak up, hopefully she'll respect my opinion.
A Cincinnati restaurant owner, Jeff Ruby, told O.J. Simpson to get out of his place in Louisville during the kentucky Derby weekend. Ruby's steakhouse in Cincinnati, The Precinct, is first-class, the absolute best meat you will ever put in your mouth. Simpson's lawyer is calling Ruby a racist and is sueing him. The case kind of falls apart, because of a couple things:
1. Michael Jordan was seated at the table shortly after Simpson left.
2. Ruby has pictures of himself...with O.J. at his restaurants in Cincinnati back in the day, before the Juice offed two people. O.J. was smiling.
Top Gear is a television show broadcast in England on BBC2. It features three men who drive and review cars, mainly high performance cars. They also inject a lot of humor into their shows. It is well produced and very funny.
Last year they filmed an episode, which just aired on February 9th, where they travel to America and drive from Florida to New Orleans. This could have been a great episode. The southerners love their cars and it would have been great to see the hosts interact with them on this shared interest.
Instead they chose to delibrately provoke and insult the people they encountered, and presented an entire show with the messsage that "America is a horrible place and the people who live there are the worst people on Earth". They always behaved in a condescending way toward everyone they encountered. They drove around with bumper stickers that read "Nascar Sucks", "Man love is OK", "I'm Bi", "Hillary for President". Now 3 of those are fine, but why provoke people with "Nascar Sucks"? Three British snobs putting down a popular sport right in the heart of the south is asking for trouble.
Their attitude right from the start was "we are so much better than these scum and we'll act accordingly". There was an incident at a gas station in Alabama where some guys were threatening them. Some say this was staged by the Top Gear producers--it could have been, I don't know. One of the hosts wrote a blog entry about it and did not allude to any fakery.
And of course a lot of Brits are posting on the Top Gear about how great it was, how "scary" Alabama is, how great it is to see the U.S. deservedly trashed, etc.
I guess I could go to London, drive around with a bumper sticker that says "Soccer is a trash sport" or "Formula 1 Sucks", act like a holier-than-thou jerk and get it on video. Then I could edit it to keep in all the angry Brits' reactions in and show it on American TV and call the people of England all kinds of fun names and talk about how awful they are.
People in bank lines have no sense of people around them. In short, they suck. I was at the bank location inside the local Kroger by my home. The line starts in the middle as you approach the counter. It is roped off, with exits to the left and right. So I'm standing there, next up to go to the counter, 2 sets of people being helped in front of me. The first set finishes and instead of walking to the left or right, they walk towards me and push their way past with what little room there is. Then the second set finishes and they too turn around and wedge past me. It would never occur to me to do this when I'm done at the bank counter. I simply walk off to the right and don't bother the people waiting. What is the deal with the people? They're just oblivious I guess.
Phil did not make bad decisions yesterday on the 18th hole of the U.S. Open. If you pay attention to golf, you're probably hearing from the media about how he screwed up, it's back to the old reckless Phil, he should've hit the 4-wood on 18, and on and on. I can't wait to laugh tonight at the dopes on ATH and PTI rip him a new one for making poor shot making choices. Poor is the word alright, but it was poor shots, not poor decisions that caused the double bogey on 18 that lost the Open for Phil.
Phil said that the fairways were ridiculously firm and that he had hit perfect tee
shots that rolled off the fairway earlier in the round. In fact, a couple of these shots were struck with irons, not his driver. In light of this, he chose
the driver on 18 rather than the 4-wood (he did not have a 3-wood in his bag) with
the thinking being that a 4-wood in the rough would leave him with very long yardage.
Driver in the rough, he's much closer. I know, how about not driving in the rough?
Well, again, he said it was very difficult to keep it in the fairway even with a
decent tee shot.
And the second shot. We never saw the shot he had. NBC never showed the view from
behind him. It turns out it wasn't that difficult, he just needed a fade shot just
like the one he made on 17 to get a par. He hit a bad shot, bottom line, he admitted
as much.
Oh, and Jeff Ogilvy did NOT back into the win. He had a great chip-in at 17 and a difficult, pressure packed slightly downhill putt on 18. Had he made those shots behind Phil and Monty instead of in front of them, there would be no talk of backing into it.
Meredith Vieira went on a rant about gasoline prices on "The View". Curiously, she has been picked to be co-host of the Today Show on NBC.
"We've been putting up with this for 5 years"
"This is ridiculous"
"I paid $60 to fill my SUV"
"Why isn't Bush doing anything about this"
Fix it, Bush, fix it. Fix it. Fix it. Fix it. Fix it. Fix it. FIX IT!!
Snoop Dog went on an airport rampage in London and has been arrested. He and his crew were denied entry to a first class lounge, so naturally they got violent. Cries of racism to come shortly.
Neil Young has released a new CD, Living with War, containing a song, "Let's Impeach the President". I couldn't find the lyrics to post here, but I just heard them. Uh, yeah. I knew jaded kids in the 8th grade that could write better lyrics than this.
Sweden has decided not to participate in a peace-keeping exercise in Italy out of protest. They are angry that Israel is also participating. And Sweden remains a lovely geographic place to visit.
Classic Heavy Metal band Iron Maiden's Steve Harris has a daughter who is embarking on a singing career. No story here, just an excuse to check out a smokin hot babe.
May is Heavy Metal month on VH1. I keep missing programming because there is VH1 and VH1 classic. And I never know which channel the Metal shows are going to be on (I've seen some on both channels) and I keep forgetting what channel VH1 classic is. Dammit, VH1, just put all the Metal programming on one f'ing channel.
I did see some of the "Heavy: The Story of Metal" last night. Part of it featured Dee Snider (lead singer of Twisted Sister) battling Congress over explicit lyrics labels. Snider talked about the "Conservative oppression" of the 1980s. He didn't mention that Tipper Gore was the wife of a Democrat. I guess she was being "controlled" by Conservatives, perhaps an early iteration of the Vast Right Wing Conspiracy. At one point in the hearings he was being questioned by Al Gore.
Oddly, later they showed him performing at a campaign rally in California for Arnold.
And when it comes to Metallica, I'm afraid I'm going to have to fall on the side of them being a sell-out. Ian Scott of Anthrax says he would fight anyone who says they're a sell-out. Well, let's take a look at this. When Metallica was starting out, their whole philosophy was "Fuck the Hair Metal/Glam Metal", we're just going to play hardcore thrash and we don't care how we look, etc. Then in the 90s, there they are, at the Grammys, Kirk Hammet wearing makeup, earrings, and a jive-ass burgundy sport jacket. Whatever you want to call it, they made a conscious decision to change the music and jump into the mainstream pop culture pool.
Al Pacino and Robert DeNiro are going to star in an upcoming movie. Now, I have an interest in this, should be a good flick and all that but I don't think it quite rises to the importance that this guy thinks it does.
An event in world history? Jeez, fella, take it easy. I'll tell you what, get Charlton Heston and Sean Penn to co-star in your next movie and I'll agree with you.
Glenn Beck is starting Hate University. Geraldo Rivera said Beck was a "hate cheerleader". Rivera also said anyone who disagreed with the new immigration bill was only doing so because they must be "afraid of the brown tide." Well, let me know when the admissions office opens I guess.
Having no choice of cable provider sucks. My cable company in Cincinnati, Time Warner, has a standard tier of programs and then a few digital tiers. The digital tiers promise a better picture and more channel choices. One of the big selling points for the satellite providers is that ALL of their channels are digital. I received a letter last summer from Time Warner that stated that they were going to make all of their channels digital, in an effort to keep up with satellite. Well, I never heard another thing about it for months and decided to ask them about it. The response I got was a vague statement that all of the channels are digital. Huh? There has been no difference in the picture quality of the standard tier channels. Also, if all the channels are digital then why do they have a separate digital tier? God, I want to move to satellite, but I don't want to have to deal with outages due to weather.
Borders and Waldenbooks are not going to allow the latest issue of Free Inquiry on their shelves. The secular humanist magazine is publishing the cartoons of Muhammed that have angered Muslims around the world. No word yet on whether Barnes & Noble will do same. Something tells me Borders carrys plenty of Mapplethorpe books. Actually, I'll have to cut Borders some slack. Their stated reason for not carrying the mag is the safety and security of their employees. That's reasonable and understandable, as opposed to not wanting to offend anyone.
NYU did not allow a student group to show the cartoons as part of a discussion centering around the controversy. Academic freedom? Nah, none here. We all know the reason why they had blank easels instead of the cartoons. They don't want to offend Muslims on campus, who spoke out about them. However, there is no doubt they would show the famous piece of art with the crucifix in urine if that subject were discussed--and they should, as they should show the cartoons. But they don't worry about or fear Christians.
Very soon Roger Federer will compete to try and win the French Open with hopes of keeping alive his chance to win the Grand Slam for 2006 (he has already won the Australian Open). Paris in springtime and all that. But the pleasantries surrounding Paris will be far from Federer's mind. The French Open is a grueling, tough tournament that has denied glory to some one of the game's great players. Pete Sampras--who has more grand slam titles than anyone--never conquered the clay at Rolland Garros. McEnroe came within 1 game, but failed to pull it off in an agonizing defeat to Ivan Lendl.
Of course the Australian Rod Laver did win the French Open and did win the Grand Slam--twice (1962, 1969). Since 1969, only Steffi Graf has won the Grand Slam (1988). Can Federer pull this off? Doubtful. There are too many Euros who grow up on clay and do nothing but play claycourt tennis. They dominate hard court and all-court players on clay. He's got about a 30% chance to win and I'm going to predict a victory. At this point, I believe his confidence and amazing ability will overcome the claycourt specialists. As dominant as Sampras was in his prime, the clay-courters knew they had a good chance against him on the red clay. I believe the clay-courters of today look across the net at Federer and aren't too sure they can actually win. That will be the difference.
Fox News has given Michael Moore's new film "Sicko" a very positive, glowing review . Another example of liberal media bias.
I tuned in to MSNBC the other day and there was Charles McCord and Lou Ruffino, two regulars on Imus in the Morning. WTF? Bernard McGirk was fired along with Imus, but these two are still there? Now, I didn't think any of them should have been fired, but how does MSNBC keep these two? Charles laughed specifically at the nappy-headed ho commment and Lou might have as well, I don't remember, but he certainly didn't protest to Imus or make any comment expressing his disapproval.
Speaking of MSNBC, it appears that Joe Scarborough has changed his tune and is now pretty much a liberal on MSNBC. I'm pretty sure he was a typical Conservative on his former evening show. I heard him apologize to Hillary Clinton and suck up to her.
7:50pm More road nonsense
kkk always seems to have an asshole driver story...don't we all.
A couple days ago I was at a light waiting to turn left--waiting for an opening in the stream of cars coming the other way. A truck comes up behind me after I had been there already. Finally there is an opening and apparently I didn't accelerate fast enough because this guy was nearly touching my rear bumper. So I speed up and we come up to the 4 way stop at an intersection. This intersection is weird in that it has 2 lanes. The lane on the right ends not far up ahead. So I know what this guy is going to do--I'm in the left lane, the correct lane to eventually continue. He gets in the right lane and doesn't really stop at the stop sign, he wants to fake a stop and get ahead of me. I, seeing this coming a mile away, give him a taste of his own medicine. I mimic his "rolling stop" and take off just as he is taking off (there was no other cars at the other 3 stop signs) staying ahead of him. Now, there is a car ahead of us, in my lane. This guy decides to gun it and barely gets ahead of the car in front of me. I had to slow down because the car in front was going a normal, slowish speed. But at least he didn't cut me off and if the car wasn't there, he would've had to get back in my lane behind me.
Wow, our Navy is really evil. Check this out.
This building has existed since 1967 and now thanks to Google Earth, some people are outraged. Due to complaints the Navy will spend $600,000 of your dollars to fix something that is completely meaningless and doesn't affect anybody.
The U.S. women's soccer team has been pummeled by Brazil, 4-0 in the World Cup semi-final. For this game, the goalie that had played in all the games of the World Cup was benched in favor of a veteran goalie who had played well against Brazil earlier in the summer. Not since whats-his-name (Red Sox manager) left Pedro in the game one inning too long in 2003 and the Sox blew their 3-0 lead in the playoffs has a player change been this controversial. Well, maybe not, since no one is paying the least bit attention to this.
Another example of the Left's tolerance and willingness to support the right of someone expressing their views, even if those views differ from theirs.
Watched "Heroes" and the season finale of "The Unit" last night, which I recorded on the High Def DVR. Heroes is just getting on my nerves. It's not as good as the hype surrounding it. The storyline with the blonde chick with the violent alter-ego and her husband and their child is painfully boring. The cheerleader is very annoying. The Unit, however is first class. David Mamet, you can't go wrong. The show almost never attempts to dumb-down to the audience--often I have to rewind to pick up on something that is happening.
D.E. Jr is bolting from DEI, though he still owns 51% of the company. When he switches car numbers, it's going to be a problem for the diehard fans who have 8 all over their house, yard, vehicles, some even with tattoes. Their was a commercial a while back where Dale Jr made an announcement that he was changing car numbers and all these people were going nuts tearing down all the 8s they had, only for Jr to say "just kidding." Well, not anymore.
Al Sharpton cracked on Mormons. Then he was on Paula Zahn's show demonstrating ingorance of the Mormon faith. Then he was on Glenn Beck still demonstrating ignorance of the Mormon fatih. He apologized to all Mormons....except Mitt Romney. Hilarious. He's expecting Mormons to accept his apology, although he certainly did not accept Imus' apology. Now, I think the stuff Mormons believe is damn near right up there with Scientologists on the weirdness scale, but so what. They aren't hurting anybody and I couldn't care less what they believe.
And apparently 60 Minutes is grilling Romney on whether or not he had premarital sex. What a bunch a little babies. They're trying to play gotcha with the Mittster. Now, Bapists believe premarital sex is a sin, Bill Clinton said he was a Bapist, did this come up then? Oh.
The right-hand turn on a red light, is, as even anti-American TV host Jeremy Clarkson has said, a great contribution to civilization by America. It kicks ass to able to turn right at a red light, knowing all the while poor saps all over Europe are not able to do this simple task. Yet sometimes it can become the source of road rage. You see, some people regard this traffic rule as meaning you do not have to actually stop, you can just roll through your turn. Not so. You do in fact have to stop, just as you would at a stop sign, and then you can be on your merry way.
The following happens to me on a regular basis. I'll come to a stop light in a right hand turn lane, and let's say there's no traffic around. I'll still come to a stop, because, well, that's the traffic law. And yet, about 75%-90% of the time, if there is someone behind me that person will go "Bakersfield Chimp". (That was the chimpanze that mauled the living hell out of his former owner in Bakersfield, California a few years ago.) They'll act as those I just raped their child, get all pissed off, tailgate, etc, etc. Fuck these people. They are just another segment of society that needs to be thinned out.
I mentioned a situation in kkk's blog about installing a ceiling fan/light in our bedroom at the behest of my wife. Well, there was no existing hole in the ceiling and in addition to not knowing what is needed to hang a ceiling fan where no hole existed, I also knew nothing about how to do the wiring. So enter my brother-in-law, who my wife recruited to do it. I have no idea if he volunteered or is my wife asked, don't know, don't care, I wasn't present when it was decided that he would do this. Of course, it was understood that I would be helping him. First, a quick background on this brother-in-law. He's married to my wife's older sister and has a 2 year old child. Early this fall we all went to Florida on vacation, where we stayed at a rental house. This guy was detached the whole time, didn't seem to interested in his family at all. One day we were at the beach and he volunteered to go back to the house and bring back some snacks for everyone. So he took off, and I found out later that he drove off to a burger place and had himself a meal before he ever bothered to come back to the beach. (Food seems to be this guy's main motivation in life--the entire vacation to him was getting to the next meal.) Then on the second to last day of the trip, we all went out to a nice restaurant overlooking the ocean. Before the dinner he had gone out and bought a fifth of Jim Beam and proceeded to get blind drunk. He got up during the meal and never returned. I went to go look for him (while his wife is sitting there embarrassed and mortified). I find him in a parking lot throwing up all over the place. His wife comes down, slaps his ass and comes back up to finish the meal. He wanders off while we drive back to the house. He shows up several hours later, etc, and it was awkward for the rest of the time.
So now they are apparently OK and life goes on. However, they were in a fight while this guy is over with me putting this damn ceiling light in. He is acting like a complete ass, taking out all this on me. I like to do tasks in a calm, patient manner, while he is the definition of impatience and it was only compounded by this fight he's in with his wife. Like I give a fuck about his problems, make your marriage better and quit acting like an ass. So on the last day of the "installation" he leaves without finishing the job, and I'm left to attached and wire the thing to the ceiling by myself, which should be a two-man job due to the weight of the thing.
And my wife wants to get THREE more lighting fixtures for the kitchen, the area between the kitchen and the living room, and the dining room.
Beck is right, take Z's body and wrap it in bacon and put a ham hat on. Maybe a pigskin suit would be better.
And now....the Top Gear car review!!
BMW Z4 M series
Richard Hammond says: BMW have stripped the car of the usual technological gadgets and created a raw performance car. A normal, basic manual transmission as opposed to the 2-in-1 automatic/manual paddle shift transmission that are now popular on high-end sports cars. Fun on the track, pedestrian in everyday life.
