Last Chance Cafe

Maybe it's me, but from the first day I haven't been able to easily figure out the Olympic TV viewing schedule on NBC. Which events are recorded, which are live, which NBC 'channel.' I've just spent 30 minutes trying to figure out when and where to watch the Men's basketball gold match live. This is what nbcolympics.com tells me, after digging through a bunch of crap to the results and schedules page:

08/24 14:30PM
Men's Gold-Medal Game - Game 76
Spain vs United States
Alert me
Preview
Scheduled

Yeah, no kidding it's scheduled. But that is China time, how about a little help for back here in the good old US of A? So counting backwards I get 11:30 PM the night before (tonight 08/23) Los Angeles time. And what is it about 14:30 PM? Is there such a thing as 14:30 AM? In case the rocket scientists at NBC missed it you can either say 14:30, or 2:30 PM.

Now, considering this is the NBC web site how about a little info on which channel, eh? So jumping through the hoops punching in my zip code and satellite provider, then to which sport, and then to which event, I get this:

Men's Basketball
Gold-medal game: USA vs. Spain.
9:00p - 9:00a (8/24)

OK, so sometime between 9PM on the 23rd and 9AM on the twenty fourth there will be a game in there. But this is listed on the 'Basketball Channel', not the local NBC affiliate. For that station I find this:

9AM to 3PM
Daytime
Women's basketball gold-medal game: USA vs. Australia (LIVE ET/CT). Also, gold-medal finals in individual rhythmic gymnastics, team synchronized swimming, boxing and flatwater canoe/kayak.

For CNBC I get this:

9PM- 11PM
Men's Basketball
Bronze-medal game: Argentina vs. Lithuania (LIVE ET/CT).

Why all the complications Pete? Why don't you just go to the TV Guide on the web where you usually go? OK, but I tried that back at the beginning of the Olympic coverage and found it so frustrating that I just gave up until today when I really want to watch the basketball thing like every other person in the world.

11:30PM
Olympics: Men's basketball, boxing, mountain biking, table tennis.

Get that? And that schedule runs to 4AM. Now, if you click on the listing:

Kobe Bryant faces Los Angeles Lakers teammate Pau Gasol as the U.S. "Redeem Team" meets Spain in the men's basketball final. Also: medals are awarded in boxing; track and field (men's javelin); men's table tennis; and men's mountain biking.

One might forgive my naiveté in assuming that at 11:30PM (remember my earlier math) I would turn on the TV to find the US men's basketball team, but nowhere does it tell me in the listing that the game is 'live.' This might be an important bit of information, especially considering that the other listings note (LIVE ET/CT).

So, is NBC going to screw us again like they did during the opening ceremonies? That is where my money is going. It would be a delight if they prove me wrong.

Update: 11:44PM- All is forgiven. Great game so far.

Posted by petefredbob at 01:41 PM | Permalink

Update to my olympics post if you missed it.

Posted by petefredbob at 07:55 PM | Permalink

By pure serendipity I turned on the tube at almost exactly eight o'clock to see the start of the opening ceremonies of the Olympics. OMFG.

But please, I know this thing was recorded earlier so why oh fucking why couldn't they edit the idiotic commentary? I am embarrassed for them. They are not from my tribe. I haven't yelled at the TV so much since I stopped watching CNN.

Update: I'll stick with my original assessment except to paraphrase one of the announcers at the end, 'has the olympic coverage always been so crappy?' There was a dedication to Jim McKay at the end, who I remember pretty well, so no, it hasn't always been. NBC did the bare minimum here and just didn't 'get' where and when this is. A certifiable historic moment and they blew it.

Update 13 August: It's even worse than I thought. Via Deceiver here is TV Barn:

The invasion of Georgia was broken by the AP mid-Friday afternoon in the U.S. With the 13-hour time difference between Kansas and China, that would mean the reports were received in Beijing around 4 a.m. Saturday — hours after the ceremony was over.

So how did Lauer get a mention in? As with everything that emanated from NBC on Friday night, it was all done with voiceovers after the fact. Think "DVD commentary track" and you're not too far off — two guys in a room commenting on pre-edited video ... and cutting to commercial right on cue. Indeed, the opening ceremony that took place in 50 minutes of real time was magically elongated to 1 hours 17 minutes on NBC. (Of course, no such luxury was afforded the Parade of Nations, which was speeded up.)

You'll notice that Costas spent almost as much time discussing doping issues with the Russian team as Lauer did discussing a military battle with "significant casualties." I think the doping talk could have waited. I think NBC could have cut away for a brief update from Brian Williams or Tom Brokaw. This was an OK cover, but given the gap between the parade and the actual broadcast, NBC could have and should have done more.

Posted by petefredbob at 11:20 PM | Permalink

I'm lazing around in my underwear (again) and I hear a knock at the door downstairs. I lift the shade and look down to see two semi-attractive young women at the door. The first thought is maybe they heard that I'm trying to open a place here (I've already interviewed one bartender) and are looking for work. Not motivated. Then the thought occurs, "they are semi-reasonably hot." I grab my clothes.

Poke my head out and they ask if they can talk to me, and wave a slick Watchtower type tract on glossy paper at me. Thanks but no thanks as I have my own very well thought out views on God and religion and the whole bit- and the type of organization that these chickadees belong to. I don't like scientology either. The silent one (there always seems to be the 'talker' and the 'watcher') had a look on her face which was a cross between horror and sorrow, though for me or her own self I couldn't tell. The talker kept her glazy smile throughout.

Before I even shut the door and started to piss about how they made me put on my pants for nothing, the thought occurred that 'Christ it must have cost a pretty penny to print that shit.' A whole pile of Indians could eat on that, and statistic-wise there was a 90% chance that knocking on my door, in this country, would reveal a Catholic of some stripe. They're trying to convert Catholics? I'd like to see numbers on the conversion rate for that one.

Posted by petefredbob at 10:50 AM | Permalink

Just a link to a Cold Fury rant. War-politics-defeat; if you like that kind of thing. Mike asks if he's correct in his assessment of the 'pattern.' Regrettably, I think he is.

Posted by petefredbob at 10:27 AM | Permalink

I like comments. I don't get many and I'm pretty loose about what I let stand. But idiot off-topic comments that are only meant to degrade or mock people will be deleted, especially people I know and like.

I'm pretty liberal in the 'live and let live' category, I don't care if you're a prostitute or a stripper, a gay soldier or make a living selling pot. It takes all kinds and I've spent many an evening partying with most of them.

As far as telling tales out of school, I try to reserve that for actors, politicians and 'holy rollers' as they 'usually' deserve it, or at least encourage it. Don’t be a bigger asshole than I am, and your comments will stand the test of time.

Posted by petefredbob at 05:46 PM | Permalink

People are talking about flags. My brother, born and bred in New Jersey, flies a Confederate flag on his pickup truck, and as a kid had one hanging on his bedroom wall. He still has it somewhere. Why does he do it? He's a rebel. He loves NASCAR. He goes fishing in South Carolina. He also goes fishing in Canada.

Each unit in the military has their own flags- see some here:

These are called 'colors.' If each military unit has a flag does that mean we have to worry about them deserting en masse or declaring war on each other? I think not.

The term applies to the Crips and the Bloods, though with them their colors are displayed on their fancy kerchiefs. They may or may not be model citizens. You may also notice the back of a Hell's Angel's motorcycle jacket. Colors.

It's normal to 'not like' someone else's colors. That's because colors are personal. Think about the phrase 'rally around the flag.' The colors of the United States of America aren't displayed on everybody's front lawn. Something has to happen- like 9/11- to wake people up to remember they 'have' colors. As a matter of fact there's always a 'news' story when needed about somebody's condo association refusing to let grandma fly Old Glory. These colors don't run, buddy. At least for this news cycle.

Police units have colors. And what do you think all those bagpipes and kilts at funerals are all about?

Where is everybody's head at with this stuff?

Ace at Ace of Spades flies the Jolly Roger with a Mencken quote that in more polite society may be viewed as an incitement to violence. Do we pull the plug on his site?

Some people do use colors to incite; it's the nature of colors. Any colors. See? My group's better than yours. It's something those stupid 'tribal' hippies never get, at least not consciously. Let my freak flag fly.

Hillary says she wants the State of South Carolina to remove the Confederate Flag from the Statehouse grounds.

"I think about how many South Carolinians have served in our military and who are serving today under our flag and I believe that we should have one flag that we all pay honor to, as I know that most people in South Carolina do every single day"...

Glenn Reynolds agrees with her. What's next, Jack Murtha sponsoring a Democratic bill requiring everyone to recite the pledge of allegiance at basketball games?

Posted by petefredbob at 10:50 AM | Permalink

Sometimes you enjoy things you really shouldn't. About ten minutes ago I got off the phone with a rep from the local Coca Cola distributor wherein I told him why he wasn't getting my business. It was quite satisfying. Two weeks ago my better half called on Coke to order one of their machines for our new soda (Spanish for 'little food stand') and got nothing but grief.

We want a machine like you see at McDonalds or Burger King, one that dispenses ice and soda. They said they wanted to give us a small refrigerator to stock with cans or bottles. Our setup is an assembly line deal selling chilidogs where you follow down the line to choose what kind of toppings you want. At the end we have the cash register where the employee will ask pointedly "which kind of drink does the customer care for?" Every time.

Continue reading "Coke V. Pepsi" »

Posted by petefredbob at 12:22 PM | Permalink

What happens when you ingnore your website for three months? 2400 spam comments, that's what. I've just spent the day over at Scam-O-Matic deleting spam and closing comments. I hadn't noticed them before because for some reason I had the email notice turned off, and they never actually made it to the public page. But they were all waiting to be approved.

I said no.

Posted by petefredbob at 07:34 PM | Permalink

Up early this morning to get a jump on the day. On Friday I was allowed to see the household goods sent on a container from the US. Only one painting-on-glass was damaged so far. Though it was a favorite it wasn't terribly expensive, and I count myself lucky on damage.

The process is excruciating and the waiting sucks. The incompetence of my shipper and my packing 'expert' has me boiling mad, but it also boils down to whether customs decides to use my valuations, who the guy with the stamp is, and what kind of mood he's in when it's time to use it. I've already paid more than the items are worth just to get them here.

I get to watch for another couple of hours today as they go through my things box by box asking me what L' ectric Shave and the like is (no, they don't have anything like it here), and why doesn't my crock-pot have a serial number. This is before the government gets to it for a second time (first time was to see if there were drugs).

As we're coming up on week seven (two of which were because of over-booking by my shipper that cost me another 200 bucks for extra handling and storage in the US) my gringo patience is wearing thin. The common knowledge is that it takes so long because someone (everyone) is looking for a bribe to grease the skids. However, my landlord is connected and has taken a shine to me, so any undue monkey business won't buy baby a new pair of shoes, but a stiff talking-to and a sleepless night or two for some poor bastard.

Posted by petefredbob at 06:46 AM | Permalink

It's OK to eat eggs; a couple of times a week anyway, but don't get too nutty with them. I found that out because I saw a TV commercial some years ago that said so. It was sponsored by some government-supported group so I know it's trustworthy. Of course for the prior ten years the government had been telling me that eggs have cholesterol and that they were no good for me because they would harden my arteries and then of course I wouldn't be able to move about so freely as they got harder until I was frozen like an iceberg. I think. That was a long time ago in my mind.

And then there was the 'got milk?' campaign that said it was OK to drink milk. I don't remember exactly why it was originally 'not OK,' but I think it had something to do with fat and milk sugar or lactic acid or something. I'm guessing fat now because the anti-milk campaign spawned the amazing variety of everything on the gaddam shelf that had different percentages of fat except real milk which it took me at least an extra minute in the supermarket to find until I figured out it was always the 'red' container.

Then there was the 'Beef. It's what's for dinner,' campaign. This one seemed different to me because it didn't take the mealy-mouthed maybe a couple is ok approach as the egg campaign. Well, one or two won't kill you. And then there was the messy hog wild get it all over your face approach for milk. Janet Reno with a milk mustache physically made me retch the first time I saw it. I was for the first time at that moment sorry that I had ever heard of pornography, never mind seen it. It still makes me queasy just writing this.

Beef. It's dinner. Eat it. Don't swallow the whole cow ferchrissakes. I vaguely remember Bo Derrick doing a spot. As beef has both fat and cholesterol it had taken a beating worse than eggs and milk, but there's not much of a substitute like eggbeaters or skim milk. Chicken? What do you have after chicken, pork? Trichinosis laden pork? (Pork: the other white meat. Which reminds me of another campaign, which seemed to be taking advantage of beef by kicking it while it was down) The campaign seemed to come from the people that had taken a hit, the beef-producing people. There was a kind of in your face "I don't care what the government says, I'm gonna eat whatever I want. And I want to eat a big greasy burger washed down with a T-bone and a beer. So there."

The campaign wasn't backtracking by the government with no explanation why they screwed up in the first place; it was taking back the initiative. At least it seemed that way. Turns out no. It was a government program, and the government doesn't want to give it up. It even went to the Supreme Court the other day, which amazingly ruled for the government and is requiring the cattle industry to keep paying for it when they don’t want to. What is wrong with this picture?

In a related question, have you seen the new government food pyramid? What the hell are you supposed to do with that? Hire a nutritionist or an archeologist to interpret it?

Anyway, if you're interested here is the AdAge link that started this rant explaining why we'll have to continue to pay for the government to keep telling us to eat meat. As well as drink milk, and of course the eggs and the pork, because left to our own devices we'd eat mercury contaminated fish or something. You might have to register.

Posted by petefredbob at 11:55 PM | Permalink

Not that I'm reaching a vast audience here, but one does what one can. On the right is a new graphic with a link to The Mccain-Feingold Insurrection. Now I am a member simply by posting this. If I remember to send them a link.

As Groucho once remarked about clubs, or was that W.C. Fields, I don't remember, if you join a club and nobody wants you…wait, they, uh, we declare that our blogs are sacred and that you can pry them from our cold dead fingers. Or something.

The point is that I'm not going to stop blogging if they pass some stupid law. Here is a link to an online letter/petition to the Commissioner of the FEC that you can sign. If you are here reading this I suggest that you do.

Posted by petefredbob at 11:00 PM | Permalink

Filing my taxes as we speak. "Please wait-we are calculating your return." That's not exactly true I think because they already sent me the PDF file and they're supposed to be transmitting the damned thing to the Feds and State. They've been 'calculating' for about five minutes now and I'm fully expecting to get a message that says, "sorry, we've lost all of your information in a black hole and you must redo everything."

The Feds sent me a form that I could have used for filing over the phone (kind of a backwards thing considering other electronic options), but it didn't jibe with filing the State forms. Great! They are now performing 'system maintenance' and I should try again later. Yeah, I'm toast. No record of having requested my return be transmitted, and another routine maintenance message. I'll try later.

Posted by petefredbob at 07:37 PM | Permalink

I know I said that I hoped I'd be through with politics for a while, but this one on David Brock was written months ago for the Spectator and was rejected. I hate rejection. But this wasn't so bad as they had just published a book review on Brock's "Republican Noise Machine" in the print magazine, and running this would make them seem like they had an obsession with him. At least that's what they told me. They were kind. In editing the piece today I find I was too clever by half.

Cut to today's 'Morning Brief' email from the WSJ, which has an item from Ad Age noting that Staples has pulled advertising from Sinclair Broadcasting, mainly due to a campaign from Brock's Media Matters for America web site. This is quite the feather in Brock's cap, though small potatoes compared with losing the election. Sinclair stations had run an anti-Kerry documentary just prior to the election.

The Cliff Notes for those still reading: Brock was a "right-wing hit man" for the Spectator and broke the Troopergate story, including the outing of Paula Jones; wrote puff book on Hillary Clinton, the gist of which was she was a victim of Bill. After said book's lukewarm reception he came out of the closet, left the Spectator and wrote the anti-right polemic- Blinded by the Right -where he claimed that he lied his ass off while toiling for the Spectator. He then ceremoniously joined the left and started Media Matters.

My article under the flap:

Continue reading "Media Matters" »

Posted by petefredbob at 08:00 PM | Permalink

Tony Pierce is says I'm predictable as a Bush supporter (see comments and scroll). I guess that's true if I'm expected to notice what I believe is spin on something he's quoting to refute a point. Tony says Dick Cheney's assertion during the debate that he didn't 'suggest' a connection between Iraq and 9/11 is a lie. He quotes Cheney from an appearance last year on Meet the Press:

If we’re successful in Iraq, if we can stand up a good representative government in Iraq, that secures the region so that it never again becomes a threat to its neighbors or to the United States, so it’s not pursuing weapons of mass destruction, so that it’s not a safe haven for terrorists, now we will have struck a major blow right at the heart of the base, if you will, the geographic base of the terrorists who have had us under assault now for many years, but most especially on 9/11.

I responded in his comments:

You quote Dick as saying if we are successful in Iraq we will strike a "major blow right at the heart of the base, if you will, the geographic base of the terrorists," and 'terrorists' were responsible for 9/11. I'll concede the point. You may infer that he meant 'those particular terrorists' enjoying a 'haven' in Iraq were part of the plan, though he was talking about terrorists in general, "who have had us under assault for many years."

Edwards was 'suggesting' last night that Dick claimed there was a verifiable link between 'those terrorists' and 9/11. I would 'suggest' that there is no verifiable refutation there was not. I'm pretty sure the terrorists are 'all' out to kill us.

The reason I think Cheney mopped the floor with Edwards is because Edwards seemed like 'talking points boy.' Undecideds have already heard the talking points. They were supposed to get meat, not thin gruel.

To which Tony said:

bush defenders are so predictable. when dems talk about issues theyre accused for sticking to "talking points".

both gentlemen last night were heavy on issues/talking points.

but cheney flat out lied, hid, mumbled into his mic, and continued to have no plan for getting out of iraq.

sorry, you cannot claim victory of a debate when your guy refuses to admit that we are not winning this thing in iraq, and when he backs down from further discussing a constitutional amendment.

you cant "win" like that

I have nothing against talking points, and as Tony points out, Cheney had them also. It's that he didn't come across as having 'only' talking points, which to me, Edwards did. I think he was pretty slick in coming back to them repeatedly when Cheney or Ifill rattled him, but he repeated himself too often instead of moving the debate forward. For that tiny slice of Bush leaning undecideds that are looking for adult supervision at the White House, Cheney gave it to them. Bush has to follow up hard on this, and it's not apparent that he can do so.

I'm doing my best to not see the debates through the eyes of a partisan, but as to how an undecided voter may view them. I commented on Tony's Cheney quote because it was parsing, and not particularly relevant to the outcome of the debate except for partisans like us.

My take on the Bush/Kerry debate is that Kerry probably won his undecided leaners, and I said so. I alluded to it in my VP post below by saying that I hoped Bush was watching and learning from this debate. I didn't say it specifically at the time, but I don't think Bush got his leaners. I read a few right wing blogs that had Bush beating Kerry, or calling the debate a draw. But they, like Tony and me, are not the audience.

I don't think the main thrust of either the Kerry or Bush debate team is worrying about us decideds looking for reassurance that our side is still on point or the other side is still evil. It's fun, but not useful for moving or handicapping an otherwise pretty even race.

I highly recommend Tony's entertaining and excellent blog.

Posted by petefredbob at 01:56 PM | Permalink

I think FOX is going out of their way to be fair to the Dems and tone down any perceived rightward spin. Tonight's consensus that Edwards won the second half of the debate is, at the very least, generous. I want to hear what Susan Estrich has to say, perhaps for the first time in my life.

During the prior Bush/Kerry debate I decided that reading about it instead of condemning myself to the entire 90 minutes was the proper course. Tonight I found myself glued to my seat not only for the whole thing, but long enough to hear the FOX folks say that they thought people would have tuned out halfway through. Check that Kool-Aid pitcher on the set. Then I repaired to my favorite coffee bar to read the bloggy reaction. Hmm, wonder if Pierce has anything. Nah, just a pre-debate anti-Bush rant with a pretty cool Time Magazine cover graphic.

If Bush had managed to pull off a third of Cheney's cool last week Kerry would be out 'coon hunting in camo gear to prove his manhood. As it is, all one can hope for is that W watched and learned tonight.

Posted by petefredbob at 10:27 PM | Permalink

Been sitting here reading the various takes on tonight's debate and I'm about as nonplussed as I was when I decided to stop watching the tube and repair to my favorite coffee bar. Both candidates behaved as best they could with what they had. I didn't like Bush's scowl, or whatever look he had at the beginning while I was watching, and I just have to live with the fact that he's not smoove.

Kerry was doing Kerry, probably the best I've seen him do it. Definitely not veering toward the unhinged, and his staff and supporters must be happy with that. The big question is, who is still sitting on the fence and why?

The Kerry leaners were probably satisfied tonight, unless they were reading the tea leaves like us political knuckleheads on the innernut. He didn't say anything different than what he's already said (and has been hashed and rehashed online for months), but he said it well, I suppose. But if you got into the meat, and were looking for dedication to stick with Iraq and the wider WOT, there wasn't much there except summits, talks, and exit strategies. Oh, and a "global test." For those who aren't so sure the Iraq war was a good thing in the first place (like the nice fellow I sat next to on the airplane today--Hey Leo!) this was their first real chance to see if they can live with this guy.

Kerry seemed confident, authoritative, and Presidential; a very important thing at this point. Sounding like you can do the job, and offering a plan to do it are different. The people that can't discern this from tonight's offering are likely going to walk into the polls (if they go at all) and vote how they feel that day anyway. It wasn't so long ago that I couldn't figure out what all these politicians were going on about myself, so that's not a disrespectful remark.

I'm going to try and watch the other debates (or at least start them), where I expect Kerry to do better on domestic issues. His staff didn't allow him to make too many gaffes tonight, which means he was well prepared and followed advice, and he'll be attacking on the economy. It shouldn't work, but many people don't care about the war so much as their paychecks, and economics is extremely local.

Posted by petefredbob at 09:19 PM | Permalink

I like to keep up on national news about the town where I live, and see what is being written about our City Councilman, Van Tran, who is running for the California State Assembly. I interviewed Tran for an article I wrote for the Spectator in late August. Yesterday I noticed a New York Times article (picked up now in the Long Beach Press Telegram) that resembles the one I wrote, sort of. The gist of both is about the attitude of Vietnamese-Americans in our local Little Saigon about current Presidential candidate John Kerry. The two could hardly be more different.

I wrote that the Vietnamese-Americans in this country have been more than a little dissatisfied with the Senator, mostly stemming from his opposition to the Vietnam Human Rights Act. His long ago Senate testimony was known among the hard-core anti-communists here, but of late, everybody knows. "Mister Jane Fonda" is his nickname in these parts. That he's now running for President has gotten the locals interested in helping to make sure that doesn't happen.

The Times takes a different approach. They quote Van Tran, "There is a sense of Vietnam fatigue 30 years after the fact. But here we are 30 years later, and we have two candidates for the highest office talking about what they did in Vietnam or what the other guy didn't do."

Jane Fonda makes an appearance. "I know he came back against the war, he didn't like the war," Mr. Chau said. "I heard and read the newspaper that he gave back his medals, that he was like Jane Fonda. I think he didn't know very much about the Communists." Chau went on to say that the US should stay in Iraq and finish the job.

A third person, a Mr. Do of a local Viet language newspaper said, "The Vietnamese are not really interested in this discussion. They want to look forward and not look back into the past." Another person, a writer and founder of a support group for Vietnamese women said, "John Kerry is a hero to me." The last person, an ethnic Chinese, said, "When you go to war, people die." She also expected a reinstatement of the draft because of the "grinding insurgency" (the writer's words) in Iraq.

I give the writer, John Broder, props for quoting more people in his article than I did in mine, but I believe he is soft-peddling a bit. Were I to have quoted more people "on the street" instead of two local politicians choosing their words for publication, the article would have come off as a fire-breathing and unprintable diatribe against Kerry, which I believe is closer to the truth not only in Little Saigon, but also in the Viet-Am community at large.

Broder makes no mention of Kerry's activities stymieing the Vietnam Human Rights Act that originally had these people fired up. His anti-war take is that it's all about a thirty year-old conflict that everybody is tired of. The Vietnamese are not really interested in the discussion, war is bad, the draft is coming, the Communists fooled Kerry, and to at least one person John Kerry is a personal hero. That doesn't sound like where I live.

The Vietnamese community is not one hundred percent behind the President, and is equally not uniformly against Senator Kerry. But tired as they may be of this old war, they certainly don't want one of the key figures that helped lose it, and caused so many Vietnamese to either flee on rickety boats or be slaughtered, to be in charge in their new home.

Posted by petefredbob at 09:33 PM | Permalink

It's been a funny time for me during this election. I'm a partisan this time around, and have been before, but I would like to think that were a Democrat to present a better platform than the Republican candidate, I could overcome ideology and vote for him/her/it. After all, I cut my teeth on Libertarian politics, which don't necessarily celebrate either of the major parties, and more than anything else I come from the PJ O'Rourke wing of the party.

But I'm heartened this time around. I meet new Republicans in the strangest places. Today I was at the service for my dear departed Grandmother (she liked Bush too). I met family that I hadn't seen since I was a teenager, family friends that I had forgotten, and a couple of the kids I grew up with. These kids, now adults, inquired after me and I told them I was trying my hand at writing. "Published?" "Where?"

I braced for what I thought was the inevitable response, in Democratic New Jersey, from a long-time union man and his wife. They must have braced themselves too because after all I live in Liberal California. There was real relief on their faces when I told them that I had written for a conservative publication and supported the President. We had a nice talk, and when everyone was leaving, my friend's wife said I made a better impression on her today than when I threw a firecracker under her chair during some long forgotten Fourth of July cookout.

Last year I had given a political talk to the oldsters at Granny's assisted living home. It was in response to the bi-weekly moveon.org advertisement that old Sid would deliver. Sid's a good guy, but there was no balance to his Bush bashing, and some folks were hungering for another flavor. I asked Stephen Den Beste if I could crib notes from a couple of his essays and he graciously agreed. The talk was a success, and Sid was very encouraging. At his next talk that I attended, he joked with the regulars that it was their mission to convert me.

The one person in the place that did not hear my talk at the time was the head nurse. I ran into her the other day and it came up in conversation. She asked what persuasion my politics were. To be Jewish in New Jersey almost requires Democratic credentials, and I was about to tell this lovely Jewish lady, who had taken great care of my precious Granny, that I represented the dark side. What do you know? She hates Sid's politics and can't stand his lectures. What's more, she's voting for Bush.

I've heard the premise that moveon.org has done more to help reelect the President than John Kerry himself. I think they've both done an excellent job, and Mr. Soros has spent his money well, if in fact he really is a Karl Rove plant.

Before I became a Clinton hater, I had been a mere Clinton criticizer. What floored me was the vehement response I would get from Democrats when I dared to question any of his policies. There was no discussion, just insults and accusations. It was very similar to the "He's questioning my patriotism" shtick we've heard recently. It's a straw man thrown up to avoid actual discussion of the issues. Point being, it's not agreeable to mention your being a Republican in mixed company today unless you're ready to really mix it up. This is the reason that I think the polls are wrongly weighted in Kerry's favor. My guess is that the secret internals tell a different story.

Nixon had the silent majority and Reagan had the moral majority. I think we're experiencing a silent and moral majority having finally learned its lesson from the Vietnam War, with a reminder from the fanatics of 9/11.

Posted by petefredbob at 10:59 PM | Permalink

Years ago I had the Quixotic idea (I have made a career out of Quixotic ideas) that if only enough people could see through the obvious, and admitted, lies of the people making a fortune off of the anti-smoking crusade, they would accept reasonable restrictions on smoking and abandon their plans for prohibition. I was wrong. I won't bore you with the details of the t-shirts, city council meetings, trips to South Carolina to meet with the growers and industry people, other to say that I lost my ass. Other than that, yes, I do smoke.

During the course of my ill-fated counter crusade, I came across some interesting facts. Notably, the fact that the discredited EPA study, since retracted, concerning second hand smoke is still used to justify takings of property; and that numerous scientific studies about the benefits of 'scourge nicotine' in relation to Alzheimer's and Parkinson's prevention were suppressed. Another study that measured comprehension rates of students at UCLA was also actively suppressed. In the case an early Parkinson's and Alzheimer's study, the researchers added a disclaimer about smoking, though the findings showed a direct correlation between how much an at risk individual smoked and the onset and severity of the disease(s).

In recent years, moneys that could have helped further research in these areas have been hard to come by because of the political element involved, and, I suspect that the money sucking lawyers and politicians wanted to get their faces in the trough first. What am I going on about? FOX News just aired a segment that says 'new' studies show a link between nicotine and Alzheimer's and Parkinson's. Not only that, but attention deficit disorder, short term memory loss and depression. Go figure.

Let's tackle the word 'New.' According to this 2001 study from the archives of the National Institute of Health (NIH):

An inverse association between cigarette smoking and idiopathic Parkinson's disease has been reported in several retrospective studies....In both cohorts, the strength of the association decreased with time since quitting (among past smokers), increased with number of cigarettes per day (among current smokers), and increased with pack-years of smoking. These prospective findings confirm that an inverse association between smoking and the incidence of Parkinson's disease exists in both men and women.

In 2002 World Health Net reported on Parkinson's:

Analysis of more than 60 studies revealed that current smokers were roughly 60% less likely to develop the neurodegenerative condition, and coffee drinkers had a 30% lower risk of developing the disease.

Of course that was followed by exhortations that smoking is really bad and it causes everything from warts to spontaneous hysterectomies. On 8 May 1999 Professor Niall Quinn addressed the Parkinson's Disease Society of the United Kingdom referencing an almost 20 year old study:

An early 1980s study of Parkinson patients, who were identical twins, found a very low prevalence of Parkinson's in the other twin (ie. a low concordance rate). Some years later however the data and the twins were re-examined with up-to-date technology. PET scans of the clinically unaffected twins showed that many had pre-clinical signs of Parkinson's, thus reviving the idea of a genetic basis for the disease....

From all the studies linking environmental factors with Parkinson's only one consistent indication emerges - the link with non-smoking. The conclusion that tobacco smoking could be neuroprotective is difficult to accept: one alternative explanation is that people with pre-symptomatic Parkinson's may just be less likely to smoke.

Twenty years later this guy "finds it hard to accept" that some tiny little thing good could come out of smoking. According to the Neuroscience Information Center:

"For 30 years, various studies have turned up an association between smoking and lower risk of Parkinson's disease, according to the authors of the new study. But a biological explanation has remained elusive, and some have suggested that smoking itself is not protective. Rather, some genetic characteristics may underlie both Parkinson's and the tendency to smoke."

For thirty years amid dozens of studies educated people have known that smoking has beneficial side effects, as well as not so beneficial ones. Yet people that expect to have any future standing in the scientific or medical community, or have any hope of ever getting money for future research are scared shitless to come right out and say so. It falls to knuckleheads like these guys to round up the information, and then present it like a commercial for miracle hair grow lotion.

It's been ten years since I gave up on trying to talk sense to people about legal precedents and deals with the devil/government/extortionists, such deals that the airline industry as well as the tobacco and restaurant industries have made. All three industries have been further victimized by the government and/or sue happy lawyers. Show weakness once, and you invite further abuse.

So the moral of the story is: who the fuck knows? I'm crawling back into my bunker for a smoke.

Posted by petefredbob at 07:35 PM | Permalink

I’ve been sick and virtually bedridden the past two days, and being bored, I finally turned on the tube. Switching through the channels I came across a station showing pictures of Haiti, and the voiceover was French. The announcer was pretty hot looking, and hot looking chicks speaking French used to do it for me, so I watched a minute, reading the subtitles.

She throws it to our intrepid reporter in Port Au Prince with this, “I hear that there were some funny stories about how Aristide ‘resigned’.” A smirk crosses the face of our man on the scene who goes on to talk about how the US kidnapped Aristide. The less and less hot French-speaking announcer then immediately says, as if scripted, “We just now have a report that the US State Department denies this.” Reporter Jacque chuckles and says, “Of course they would.” Then goes on to describe how the DEA presented Aristide with a dossier showing him evidence of his complicity in drug trafficking and that the game was up, had him sign his resignation, and tossed him onto an airplane.

Now, I kid about the French, and in the big world of politics, I criticize them pretty well. But those are the big leagues, and the US pulls off some maneuvers from time to time that I’m sure pisses them off. But this was akin to Dan Rather winking and nodding, “Of course the French would deny fucking their poodles.” In other words, it’s in their nature.

But even then, they want some of the credit. The reporter in Haiti says as an aside that France was the first to call for Aristide to step down, “the US finished the job.”

If I had any wavering doubts about ever wanting to visit France, these two assholes made up my mind for me; unless I get Jerry Lewis famous somehow and I go there to piss on the Eiffel tower while on French TV. [Jerry Lewis? Wtf? Ed.] [Sorry, come to think of it, they would probably pay to see Jerry piss on anything, the poodle-fucking bastards, P.]

Posted by petefredbob at 06:43 PM | Permalink

(United Press International's "Outside View" commentaries are written by outside contributors who specialize in a variety of issues. The views expressed do not necessarily reflect those of United Press International. In the interests of creating an open forum, original submissions are invited.)

(Vanessa Yeo is a student in journalism at FIS Education Center in Singapore.)

The above lines appear at the end of a United Press International release that purports to criticize America for forcing democracy down the throats of people that don’t want it. I’m not sure what issues Vanessa Yeo specializes in, but she sure doesn’t give the “apes” in the Middle East much credit.

“To take such high-sounding abstract concepts about democracy to one-time desert Arabs is somewhat akin to getting an ape to appreciate a diamond. In any case, if the ape does not swallow that diamond -- though in many cases it would -- getting peoples without democratic traditions is like asking people to organize their lives all over again to suit the image of someone else.”

This is an embarrassing piece, that I picked up on Google News no less, that shows the lengths some people will go to show that GWB as naïve about international affairs. You see, he doesn’t really understand other “peoples.” The best part of this is that if Ms. Yeo were to attempt to publish this thesis in her native Singapore, (where gum chewing and public displays of attention are frowned upon), directing her criticism toward her own president, she would likely find herself in jail and her publisher fined or banned from publishing further in the city state.

Now, I don’t think Ms. Yeo should be punished with anything other than having people laugh at her, but UPI, where the insipid writing of this “journalism student,” seems to pass muster, should be held accountable for spreading her racist comments. Here’s more from the incisive mind of Yeo on Russian democracy:

If democracy is of "life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness," the closest mirror image of that serene state in Russia, existed ironically during the era of Stalin and Khrushchev

Russia may not be a paragon of virtue at the moment, but anyone that has read beyond the level of a seventh grade textbook knows that America was not an overnight success either. To long for the days of Stalin is…. I don’t have the words, you fill them in.

The Japanese seem to fare better at democratizing in her eyes, in that: [their] “capitulation during World War II was ordered not by invading U.S. troops, but by the emperor.” Thus in lockstep the country embraced democracy by innate obedience to the Emperor (?) They also had, “key institutions, like the civil service, established along Western lines [which] were not only the toast of the world but also arguably one of the best.” In other words, they were already used to having the “round eye ways” around, despite a program of deliberate isolation from the west for hundreds of years.

I’m impressed. Ms. Yeo has created an article that would also feel right at home at Reuters or Al Jazeera, if not necessarily the New York Times, but she has potential. This resume boost might just land her in a scholarship program at Columbia, in the interest of creating an open forum, of course.

If the link above is broken click below for the whole thing.

Continue reading "Just Special" »

Posted by petefredbob at 10:10 AM | Permalink

It’s tough to write about the war and the politics involved init, mainly because most of the sites that I read do such a better job of it. But, soldier on I will. In the comments to my last post, and partly in response to a question about Saddam’s newly minted POW status, JP sends a William Safire article from the NY Times that ends on the note;

…our decision to lead the world's war against terror makes the case that what we have been doing is strategically sound as well as morally right.

This is the bottom line for me, as well as it seems for most people in the country. It is why the Democrats won’t win in the next general election. In contrast, Joe Conason writes in Salon (article is free if you click through the advertisements) that even Bush’s proposal to go to the moon will benefit Haliburton. Hat tip: Instapundit). With this kind of green cheese mindset, the Dems are not doing themselves any favors. As did the proverbial Chicken Little or the boy who cried ‘wolf’, they will reap their rewards at the polls.

For more years than I’ve been alive, defenders of the defunct Soviet Union made respectable hay in the press and other print. They still occasionally do, but most folks understand that the place was not only a mess, but the government killed all sorts of common folk in the process. They (the Soviets) also threatened to convert our country into the utopian dreamland all of our blinkered fifth columnists believed in. There are still people here that wish for and work for that, some at our finest universities. Even though Russia is still somewhat of a basket case, we can call our strategy a success because we are not staring them down over ICBM’s. This took a long time.

Whereas a gun is not imminently dangerous without an idea to pick it up and use it, neither is an airliner without the idea to crash it into a building full of people. It is the idea that is dangerous. The pen is mightier than the sword doesn’t mean that you won’t get your hand chopped off. It means that the written word is capable of inciting people to war. To paraphrase Monty Python, “No one expects the Muslim Inquisition!” Of course, this works both ways. The Mad Mullah’s in Iran, (original home of the phrase, “America is the Mighty Satan!”), are facing the idea of the end of their rule.

As the world turns, we are facing the end of the old axiom that ‘politics end at the water’s edge.’ Safire rightly notes that the reason to go to war was, and is, “to reverse the tide of global terror that incubated in the Middle East.” The reason for that incubation was the bastardization of a religion that has stifled human progress in the Middle East for hundreds of years, nurtured by the European colonization of the region that treated the former flower of civilization as an unruly child in need of stern guidance. We’re hip to that, we were an unruly colonial child once. But instead of taking the risk of helping our Middle Eastern cousins break the yoke and enter the age of Enlightenment, privileged sibling brownnosers sitting in the front row of French Lit class, tattle to instructor Chirac that George is in it for the oooiilll!

That is our boon and our bane. As we are rightfully foresworn to not crush dissent, even pigheaded dissent for disingenuous reasons, half-assed knuckleheads like me are driven to concoct rebuttals to highly paid, trained journalists, at the expense of mixing metaphors, mangling the language in run on sentences and appearing as foolish as they are. But we chicken hawks do need to take part in this war of pen and sword, even at ridiculously low risk, to support our brothers in real harm’s way.

Posted by petefredbob at 06:23 AM | Permalink

Maybe it's just me. There's a new kerfluffle on the insta-net over the following fantasy post, of which I will now re-post the offending portion:

"WASHINGTON-January 6, 2004. A paramilitary organization calling itself the Christian Liberation Front changed the balance of power in Washington by a pair of brutal attacks this afternoon. A force estimated at about 200 CLF commandos stormed the Supreme Court building, killing 35 people, including five Supreme Court Justices. At the same time, a contingent of 1,000 CLF paramilitaries attacked the Hart Senate Office Building, where a Senate Democratic Caucus meeting was being held. Approximately 50 people were killed in the attack. Once the commandos had seized the building, they systematically killed Democratic senators from states with Republican governors. Here is a list of the 21 senators killed:

[If you want the list of Senators go to the original here.]

Joe Lieberman was campaigning in South Carolina, and missed the assassins. The attackers turned themselves in to police, and are proudly confessing their crimes, cooperating with authorities.

If the governors appoint Republican replacements, there will be 72 Republicans in the US Senate until replacement elections can be held. Even if a few Democrats are named, there will be likely at least 60 votes to vote for cloture and appoint replacements for the slain Supreme Court justices, changing the balance of power on the court."

Even Glenn Reynolds calls the offender Mark Byron drunk and says that he should be ashamed. The comments have gone kerflooey. People that should know better, including my favorite (no, really) professor, seem to be ignoring some basic tenets of writing, thinking, psychology, and criticism.

The poster says immediately before, and after the above, that he does not think the scenario is proper, correct, or even a good idea. He admits that he has dark thoughts. These dark thoughts, psychologically speaking, are a part of EVERYONE'S makeup. Jung refers to them as part of the Shadow. When one denies these thoughts or urges, they become repressed, and have a tendency to come out unwanted in certain unbidden actions. These form our collective neurosis. The way to deal with them is to recognize them, admit them, and denounce them. This is what the poster does. The reactions speak more to the commenter's repressed thoughts than they do to Byron's.

I'm especially confused by Glenn's comparison of Byron to Ted Rall. Mr. Rall doesn't qualify his rantings, nor invite criticism. In fact he seems to revel in his own dark thoughts and encourage others to think just like he does, and when criticism is leveled, gets pretty nasty. (Sorry, not gonna link to his stuff-Google "Free Dirty Danny" if you're interested). Mostly, as a college professor close up and personal with PC think, and popular campus attitudes toward conservative or religious exposition, methinks he came down hard on Mr. Byron.

I suppose the timing of this flap has something to do with my thoughts. Last night my roommate watched 'Enemy of the State,' a good film with Gene Hackman and Will Smith. This 'fantasy scenario' had a Republican Senator assassinated by the NSA because he broke with his party to vote against a Republican bill allowing Republicans to spy on ordinary American citizens. The whole premise of the film was 'Republicans want to spy on you and take away your privacy using war and terrorism as an excuse.' Enemy was chockablock full of anti-Replublican stuff, including a Larry King snippet.

I daresay that this 'fantasy scenario' is the common wisdom of way too many people, and, it seems, film makers. When a thoughtful blogger brings out into the open thoughts, which, to me, are an ordinary emotional response to the barrage of decades of cultural attacks, and then says that even though he has these thoughts, disavows them, they should be discussed, not dismissed as drunken rantings. No one is pure, and very few writers can express complicated emotions to the point of clarity to all (or even most) readers. Witness my convoluted prose herein.

As the culture wars heat to a rolling boil, I would encourage both sides to examine their inner dialogue. I have no doubt there are others that share the occasional dark thought about realigning the Senate during these filibustering times, or even the Court, with Justices citing precedent from European law instead of our own. After all, our country was founded by a bunch of lawyers that turned Continental law inside out and on its ear to form our own version of jurisprudence.

Plus, I gotta have a space to flesh out and publish my own inner demons.

Posted by petefredbob at 08:19 AM | Permalink

I’d actually started writing two different entries in the past few days that have been digitally crumpled up and thrown in the proverbial trash. I got pretty far along on the second one until I realized that I could not sustain it. It made absolutely no sense. Now, this is not abnormal in a flowing conversation, I’m willing to be swayed by argument, admit that I’m full of baloney, as long as you’re willing to make the argument. But to loose a logical argument to myself is an embarrassing situation.

So it’s Sunday night, and I’m sitting here listening to the oom-pa Mexican music from the neighbors around the block. The doors are open and it’s still stifling. I can picture myself in Rosarito, same heat, same music, same noisy cars rattling past the door going down the street. The neighbors across the street are Vietnamese. We are the only “white” household on the block, but it feels normal. It might say something about my socioeconomic situation, and how used to it I’ve become. My attempt to attain Jasperwood status is staring you right in the face, and it ain’t pretty.

The past few weeks have been a whirlwind of investigating new business opportunities. What sounded like a sure thing three weeks ago has turned into smoke, and is being transmuted before my eyes into wild thrashing about to find something that fits. In other words: nothing. My main business partner, with limited capital, has gone nearly into depression mode. We had a third partner with more substantial resources, that when the time came to start throwing down, he started talking about recouping his investment within the first two months. Pie in the sky, my friend, pie in the sky. I know this is America and all that, but the Internet bubble has burst, the eighties are long gone, and the lottery is still a buck. Anybody that knows of a sure thing out there that pays off as soon as you invest, please, let me know, I’m ready.

In the meantime, I’ve managed to hack this far along on the keyboard.

Posted by petefredbob at 10:40 PM | Permalink

Crap. That didn’t go well. It seems that I missed a few days. The trip went well enough, I made it home, and I saw many good things. Everyone should do this, this cross-country trip thing. In like, a car or something that moves slower than an airplane. Trains are nice, but they’re expensive, and you can’t get off whenever you want to, and you can’t smoke.

Smoking. I’m really starting to feel like I’m having fewer and fewer friends because of this smoking thing. It’s fascinating. It’s like you’re married to someone for 20 years and you wake up one morning and they tell you that they never really liked you. It was an infatuation that got out of hand, the kids happened, and now, they’re out of the house it’s time to move on. This has never happened to me, mind you, but I’ve had my strange marriage moment. Something about her wanting my children but not me. And we didn’t have kids at the time. Thank God we never did.

There have always been people who didn’t smoke. If you were a smoker, you either didn’t know who they were, because they didn’t hang around with you, or you never even noticed that they didn’t smoke, because they for one reason or another never made an issue out of your smoking. They were just regular people. Like smokers.

There have always been places where you couldn’t smoke. Like Aunt Edna’s house where Uncle Eddie was in an iron lung or there were plastic slipcovers or they spoke in phrases from the Bible. The Natural History Museum, Church, places where it just wasn’t proper to smoke. Everybody (well, most everybody) knew where these places were. Now smoking is just assumed to be a crime wherever you are. I have come to know people who smoke that won’t smoke in their own houses and cars. This is normal now.

I’ve seen more than one marriage predictably fall apart partly because one person purposely married another with opposite smoking habits; each one assuming that the other would be reasonable. The smoking partner inevitably made the compromises, and endured unending sniping for the duration.

The presumptuousness of the post-modern American occasionally throws me off. The presumption of the culture is that if you smoke, there is not only something wrong with you, but you are fair game for rudeness. The reasoning is that simply by smoking, the smoker is being rude. Tit for tat. This inner certainty of the acceptable debasement of smokers today is notably new. Oftentimes nowadays it is because of self-loathing.

We are all familiar with the reformed smoker. The zealot that loudly and insistently denounces his former smelly compatriots. But there is a new breed. One that smokes occasionally, or one who has fallen off the wagon and feels sin burning in their lungs with every drag. These are the compromisers. The ones in shame with themselves who put abstract limits on their filthy habit, and wish to impose those limits on others, so that they also may share in the shame. This furtive sinning and subsequent proselytizing is akin to the backsliding preacher, who with his pants down tells the deflowered parishioner that, “It’s OK to do this with me this time because I’m a man of God, but you should never do this with anyone else until you’re married.” The compromiser says, “Hey, I smoke too, but you shouldn’t smoke (insert the time or place) because I don’t.”

The reasons are many and varied. It will stink up the car and I won’t be able to sell it. Ditto for the house. Hey. Get some fucking air freshener and clean it once in a while. You’re supposed to paint the house once every couple of years anyway if you bought it to turn it over. Open the windows. Clean the ashtray. Live a little. Or quit and shut up. The non-smokers at least have a point. They don’t smoke. It’s people like you that give up just that little bit of freedom and comfort (read pursuit of happiness) that costs the rest of us, and you, down the road.

Posted by petefredbob at 11:50 PM | Permalink

Lakers can start planning their parade This may not make sense to some people, but I've suffered as a Lakers fan. I actually thought this year that they would win the championship, but only because they took their style of "we'll play in the second half" type of play, to its logical conclusion of "we'll play in the second half of the season," and regretably, to "we'll play in the second half of the playoffs." Somebody should have told them they couldn't do that. Maybe somebody did, probably Phil, but Kobe talked Shaq into it anyway. Now it's just plain unfair.

If you click through the above article you will find that The Mailman and The Glove are coming to L.A. I thought that Tony Pierce was bullshitting when I read something about this on his bus blog where 'nothing in here is true,' but not having a TV and being in the hinterlands of the east coast where Jason Kidd is the only thing on the news, something made me click on the Lakers web site. There is nothing there of course, but that's only because it's not official. They technically can't sign until next week. Then, on a whim, I hit SI->NBA. Jaw hits floor.

Anything can happen between now and the ink drying on the paper, and then between that and the start of the season; but I feel for the rest of the league if this happens. I only hope that the Lakers current superstar guard makes it to the boards this fall.

Posted by petefredbob at 10:40 PM | Permalink

The WSJ this morning (Link for subscribers only) announced that Microsoft is not going to be making its Explorer browser for Apple anymore. Is it just me, or does Bill Gates strive daily towards the robber baron image? After squashing the competition (MS Explorer has 90% of the market) in the browser wars and reducing other computer software (and hardware) providers to babbling idiots, it is yanking the rug out from under its smallest market. Full disclosure: Yes, I am one of those wacky Apple users.

It was with great reluctance that I gave up on Netscape after it went off the deep end trying to keep up with Microsoft's never ending hide and seek game by trying to become Explorer, and failed badly. I've tried Opera (works great with Windows, sucks for Apple), I just deleted Mozzila's new build (with their penchant for public humiliation they should get a blog) because I'm not a programmer and it sucks; and after two or three outings with Safari, Apple's browser, I unceremoniously chucked the alias (short-cut for you windows users) into the trash (recycle) bin. There is no other viable browser for Mac.

I'm waiting to see how Ben and Jerry... I mean, Steve Jobs reacts to his share price taking the expected dump today. A bold move would be to go ahead and spin off Safari into a separate entity to compete head-to-head with Explorer. OS X is already running on a Unix platform, it would be easy to market to all the Red Hat and Irix users. Marketing to disaffected MS users might piss off old Bill, but why wait for the other shoe to drop? It's only a matter of time before the next screwing.

Posted by petefredbob at 07:39 AM | Permalink

With all the Jerseyites in FLA you'd figure that you could get a good, thin-crust pie. But no. I've found a couple of places in L.A., my favorite being the Casa Bianca in Eagle Rock, but it's slim pickin's for the most part. So I get here to Clifton and go to the 'Any Corner Pizza in Town' and get a tasty thin crust pizza. Simple. And some little garlic roll thingys. What could be so hard about this that the rest of the country can't get it? New York, New Jersey, Philadelphia, thin crust-24 hours. Anywhere else? Nada.

So, I'm smoking up the house. I thought that I could get a long telephone cord and go sit on the stoop so that my little bro' could breathe the sweet air of gunpowder and dirty socks like he's used to. I'm so addicted. Speaking of gunpowder, I found the 9 mil, by accident while I was trying to find a place to put my clothes, but now I can't find the clip. A lot of good that does me. Maybe we can fit in a day at the range this time.

I'm kinda groovin' on the MT here. I need to figure out how exactly I can move this page around. These CSS dohickies are just a little different than the old bloggo. I did find the place where the links go (there was a little thing that said "Links go here" or something like that), which brings me to a dilemma. (I better spell check this thing, hard).

Who goes on the blog-roll? All the big guys don't need it. Reynolds, Lileks (though I think I'll put him there anyway), Sullivan, why bother? Steyn? And then there is the bi-coastal crew, LA Examinerers on one side and the Gawkerers on the other. I don't know. Somebody give me some suggestions. The two guys that are on the roll now, Pieter and Jim, I met them once and I'm a big fan. Pieter even has a record or two out, but I actually saw Jim knock himself out on a mike stand once in a tiny recording studio in Spotswood, NJ back in the 80's. Now he just writes a lot.

Posted by petefredbob at 08:17 PM | Permalink