Memetician

MMA, Hawaiian style

2009-06-30T17:03:00.000-04:00

Remember that superb line in Napoleon Dynamite when his cousin Kip says with a straight face, "Besides, we both know I'm training to be a cage fighter." Of course you do.

I got an email last week accompanied by the above picture. My friend Jeff on Oahu writes,

Hey Jenn, too bad you weren’t in Hawai'i with NOTHING to do on a Saturday nite. You could slum it at the Blaisdell (Exhibition Hall) and watch the fights. Should be fun!

"Should be fun" to me means should be fun to watch.

"Should be fun" to Jeff obviously meant something completely different, as I learned today when I received a followup email with more pics. I knew he was training in MMA, but this?

Hi Jenn,

First round was mostly striking with both of us trading. The first time down he caught me in a guillotine but I was safe by moving to side and we got stood up. At the end of the first round I mounted him in my corner and caught him in a deep kata gatame. I heard the ten second clack and hopped to side and cranked but it wasn’t enough time, needed another five seconds and he might have tapped. Second round he was pissed and came out swinging, we traded and I took him down about half way through the round. I think he injured his shoulder on the take down and I was able to slip the rear naked choke in without hooks.. so much fun! CHEEHOO!

Say what?! Although written in a strange boy language in which I'm hardly fluent, I can translate enough to realize my man kicked some ass. Holy shit, my friend is a bona fide badass. Way to go, Jeff! Next stop, the pro tour!

President Obama is not the Marlboro Man

2009-06-28T18:10:00.004-04:00

circa 1980 (photo by Lisa Jack)

"Was it really wise to try to arrest the economy's free fall, bring peace to the Middle East, fix healthcare, save GM, save Wall Street, stop global warming AND quit smoking? Most of my friends can't do any ONE of those things. He should go ahead and smoke."
~some blogger named Sam, as quoted in the L.A. Times last week, on President Obama's attempt at quitting smoking last fall.

If we hear one more incident of the media making a big, stinking deal about President Obama's smoking, will we need to reach for a cigarette? Probably.

Last Monday, Obama signed the Family Smoking Prevention and Tobacco Control Act, which makes illegal the vile practice by tobacco companies of targeting kids as customers. Very cool. However at a press conference the next day, instead of asking questions relevant to the bill, the press bombarded him with questions about his own smoking.

McClatchy's Margaret Talev asked him how many cigarettes he smokes daily and whether he does it in front of anyone. The nerve! What's next, asking whether he wears boxers or briefs? The look on his face while being asked these inane questions is priceless. He probably wished he had a cigarette to ash on her head. He smoothly shot her down, making it obvious that journalistic nosiness in the guise of political reporting was not appreciated.

"You just think it's neat to ask me about my smoking, as opposed to [your question] being relevant to my new law. I constantly struggle with it. Have I fallen off the wagon sometimes? Yes. Am I a daily smoker, a constant smoker? No. I don't do it in front of my kids, I don't do it in front of my family, and I would say that I am 95% cured, but there are times where . . . I mess up."

When I worked for the Dean of the Harvard School of Public Health, he told me that nicotine is the most addictive alkaloid (chemical compound) known to man. "More addictive than heroin, or cocaine?" I asked him. "Yes," he replied definitively. Who knew?

President Obama has what's probably the most stressful job in the world. Whether he sneaks an occasional cigarette behind the organic garden or he's sucking down a pack of Marlboros each night when he walks Bo under the cover of darkness, is it any of our business? Besides, smoking while ruling the world seems to have worked out okay in the past (whereas Hitler and Mussolini were adamant non-smokers, go figure).

Sri Lankan astrologer arrested for his prediction!

2009-06-26T09:52:00.010-04:00

The dangerous subversive himself, Chandrasiri Bandara

Now this is a story you don't see very often, at least not outside of the Weekly World News. Last week, a popular Sri Lankan astrologer predicted that the current president of his country would be ousted on September 9th, and the opposition party would take over ruling the country. The astrologer writes a column for a lefty-leaning paper there, and the government didn't take kindly to it. So a couple of days ago, they arrested the poor guy! I wanted to read his article, but can't find an English version. So I ran the chart for that day and found some heavy aspects going on. If you're into astrology, click on the graphic to enlarge it.

Revolution

Two major things stand out right away. Mars, which rules rebellion, opposes Pluto, a "dark lord" sort of planet that rules the underworld and illegal activities. An opposition is considered a difficult aspect and occurs when two planets are 180 degrees apart from each other across the sky. This is a destructive, dangerous placement. Moreover, with Mars in the 8th house of death, and Pluto occupying the first house of self, which happens to be ruled by a fire sign (Sagittarius), I wouldn't be surprised if someone dies during a potentially violent rebellion.

The second aspect that forebodes heavy shit going down September 9 are more oppositions, this time between Uranus opposing the Sun and Saturn. Uranus rules innovative change, Saturn rules the conservative "status quo." This aspect lasts two years, and occurs only once every forty or forty-five years. Saturn in Virgo is an unstable placement, but Uranus in water sign Pisces is a strong one. There has been a definite "washing away" of the stodgy status quo, from the U.S. electing Obama to Iran's activist protests, and probably Sri Lanka's future political overthrow as well.

The opposition comes from the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE) who've been fighting with the government for twenty-six years over their lack of education, employment, and treatment as inferior citizens.

Uranus also opposes Sun, and this signifies a big rebellion (Uranus) against the established order (Sun). With Uranus in the fourth house of the home, I wonder if the rebellion doesn't have supporters from within the government (the president's "home") itself who will aid in the rebellion.

Censorship

Mercury, the planet governing communication, is in the 10th house of career at a difficult 90-degree square to both Pluto and Mars on September 9th. I believe that political activists and the media will be heavily censorsed in attempts to quell the spread of the rebellion. But this isn't surprising given the fact that Sri Lanka ranks 165th among 173 countries in a worldwide press freedom index (Reporters Without Borders). Nice.

Is the President in Physical Danger?

Interestingly, the president's own chart is a little foreboding when it comes to the transiting planets over his natal planets this fall. Without an exact birth time, it's tough to predict, but according to one astrologer who ran his chart,

Mars and Saturn combination in the 4th house indicates the strong resolve to fight militancy. However, this conjunction also indicates that there can be safety concerns for him. Mars and Saturn combination in 4th house does give danger from conveyance.

So with Saturn opposing the president's natal Saturn's 4th house placement, while transiting Uranus joining his natal Mars and Saturn there, whatever happens is probably going to be far from pretty.

Watch your back, buddy.

Sun: a rarity in New England this summer

2009-06-25T17:00:00.003-04:00

Lurking around Newport on call for freelance yacht crew gigs, I've been spending time in Rhode Island and on Cape Cod, both awesome places to be during summer. However, in the past few weeks we've had only two count'em two days of sun. In celebration of the glowing orb in the sky, here are some pics from last Wednesday, the first of the two nice days. My nephew Alex and I commandoed the family boat and sped full throttle south to Cuttyhunk Island.

The island is halfway between Wesport Harbor and the Vineyard. It took us 15 or 20 minutes to get there. Here's the entrance to Cuttyhunk Harbor.

Cuttyhunk has a population of about 400 in summer and 50 year rounders. It's the striped bass fisherman's mecca if you're into that kind of thing. It's a half mile long and half of it is a nature preserve. Its highest point is 154 feet. The school has one teacher and three students. It is probably the most boring place on earth to grow up as a teenager, but it's nice to visit by boat. There's not much to do except tie up and hang out.

I've never seen a rainbow cloud before. Realistically, it was just a reminder that shitty weather wasn't far away, but it looked pretty. Sure enough, it rained the following eight days. But today, day nine, it is sunny again.

Now on the Cape, I took a bike ride to West Dennis Beach, a mile-long south-facing beach.

I biked to the mouth of the Bass River at the western tip of the beach, and took the below pic, looking south to Nantucket Sound. If you're looking for a good deserted beach to frolic like it's your own private island, this is the one for you because more than half the parking lot is closed due to Piping Plovers. The only way to get to this spot is to bike or walk.

Might as well soak it up, it's going to rain again tomorrow.

The dead whale in Little Compton

2009-06-23T14:31:00.010-04:00

You know you're sick of being stuck indoors on the endless rainy days when going to check out a whale carcass seems like a decent way to pass the time.

Two dead whales washed ashore in the town of Little Compton, Rhode Island, where I've been staying for the past week. One of them, a humpback, landed on the private beach to which my sister and her family belong. The Providence Journal reports today:

. . . on Saturday workers on Briggs Beach spent the day burying the 30-foot-long, 2-ton humpback that washed ashore last week. But some problems arose there on the wet sand.

With the weekend’s pounding surf, a backhoe operator was able to dig down only about four feet before waves started filling the hole, said beach manager Ron Bogle. Then there was the issue of bloating.

The very backhoe

Staff from the aquarium suggested the backhoe operator first use the bucket’s teeth to pop a few holes in the bulging blubber to allow some buoyant gases to escape.

“He banged on that thing with the claw several times but it didn’t make a dent,” Bogle said. “That old saying, ‘As tough as nails’? Well for me it’s now as tough as whale.”

Someone suggested using a chain saw “but no one volunteered to get that close to it,” Bogle said. It smells pretty bad.

The end result come Sunday morning was that with the pounding waves and the ever more buoyant humpback, “the whale is right there on the beach and it looks like we never even dug a hole.”

The plan now, said Bogle, is to wait a couple of days in the hopes that the new-moon tide may lift the whale higher onto the beach. Then once the tide levels recede workers will dig a deeper hole higher up on the sand.

In the meantime, Bogle said he would be speaking with the local police to see if they might shoot some holes in the whale.

Bogle has already ruled out, however, any explosives such as dynamite used once in Oregon to dislodge a similar beached whale.

So my nephew and I checked it out today, being careful to stay upwind, although it didn't smell as bad as we were expecting. I think they shot it because even though it's been dead for a week, fresh blood was dripping from several holes, which was surprising.

Here's what can happen when the decomposition gases build up to the point of no return:

This 60-ton sperm whale was on it's way to a necropsy in Taiwan when it exploded en route. And while on the topic of exploding whales, this video of the detonation of the 1970 Oregon whale is wild. This shows why using a half ton of dynamite to get rid of a dead whale isn't a good idea.

"The blast blasted blubber beyond all believable bounds," as the newscaster put it.

"The Hangover" made me cry

2009-06-12T11:09:00.003-04:00

I have not laughed this hard in a very long time. I was crying laughing. Here's the dirty trailer they can't show on TV.

Nurse Jackie: Sharper than a new scalpel

2009-06-10T20:36:00.008-04:00

I'm bummed I no longer have Showtime, given the greatness of "Weeds" and "The Tudors," but now that they're putting some of their premieres on YouTube with just a minimally irritating commercial at the beginning of the show, I'm really jonesing for Showtime.

"Nurse Jackie" premiered this week and it is amazing. You can watch the whole thing here.

Carmela from "The Sopranos" finally got her day in the sun -- and she finally got to hook up with Father Phil, this time in the hospital pharmacy with Paul Schulze channeling her doctor lover. Edie Falco did her own post-Sopranos thing on Broadway, and now the TV-viewing public gets to enjoy her phenomenal acting talent on HBO's rival. Set at a fictitious Catholic Manhattan hospital on Third Avenue, "Nurse Jackie" features Falco playing a bitchy, brilliant nurse with a good heart and a smart mouth, who just so happens to have a little addiction to Oxy, due to a bad back. The flawed heroine's character shines through razor sharp dialogue, thanks to top-notch writing. One part "Six Feet Under," one part "Sopranos," one part "House." With lots of swearing, true to New York fashion.

To give you an idea of the script, here's a scene where she diagnoses a bike messenger who's just had an accident. The cocky young doctor "Coop" ignores Nurse Jackie's plea to have his brained scanned for glucose levels to rule out that the cerebrospinal fluid cushioning his brain isn't screwed up, which would in turn cause a brain hemmorage, as she suspects is the case. The doctor, however, ignores her, wrongly believing that the patient's injuries are relegated to his banged-up leg. And the bike messenger dies on the operating table.

After altruistically and illegally signing the dead kid off as an organ donor, she approaches the incompetent doctor who's washing up. He acts all nonchalant, asking her what he can do for her.

NURSE JACKIE: What you can do for me is this. You can stay the fuck out of my way, that's what you can do for me.

DOCTOR COOPER: Do you need to use the sink?

NURSE JACKIE: No, what I need for you to know is that I know you. I've seen hundred of you jerkoffs blow through these doors. You graduated what, top ten, five percent of your class, right? Test scores through the roof but a total fucking retard when it comes to actual patients? I know you! I just had to sit there and look that kid's mother in the eye and tell her we did everything we could, you dumb shit! That was my patient. I told you he was slipping and he was. If I tell you to order a scan then you order a goddamned scan because if you don't I'll just go to the next doctor, and the next doctor after that, and that kid died, and it is all on you.

Stupid-ass Scrubs this ain't. Go Showtime.

File under "Who gives a shit?"

2009-06-10T06:24:00.003-04:00

I am scrolling through the Google news headlines just now and I cannot believe what I see. There are 336 separate articles about this "story."

Miley Cyrus breaks up with boyfriend Justin Gaston

Chicago Tribune - ‎3 hours ago‎

Disney Channel star Miley Cyrus has broken up with her boyfriend of almost nine months and is tweeting about it. According to E! News, the 16-year-old ended her relationship last week with underwear model and aspiring singer Justin Gaston, 20, ...

They said it: Miley Cyrus The Star-Ledger - NJ.com

Miley Cyrus calls it quits with Justin Gaston Boston Herald

People Magazine - MTV.com - FOXNews - New York Daily News

all 336 news articles »

What has become of real reporting? As someone who studied journalism as an undergrad, stories about Disney starlets breaking up with underwear models make me nauseous. There is so much important news occurring worldwide, yet we never hear about most of it. Our country is growing STOOPIDER by the month, I swear.

Obama orders Stephen Colbert's head to be shaved

2009-06-09T07:48:00.004-04:00

Wearing a custom-made Brooks Brothers camouflage suit, Stephen Colbert began his weeklong broadcast from Baghdad yesterday in a show of support for the troops. He is doing these shows to help the U.S.O. in its mission to "provide morale, welfare and recreation-type services to uniformed military personnel." You have to love this guy.

Attending bootcamp wasn't quite enough, however, and President Obama beamed in to order the shaving of his head! Yowza.

The Colbert Report

Mon - Thurs 11:30pm / 10:30c

Obama Orders Stephen's Haircut - Ray Odierno

colbertnation.com

Colbert Report Full Episodes

Political Humor

Keyboard Cat

Cheap employers suck

2009-06-08T15:06:00.006-04:00

Have you ever worked at a job where the more hours you work, the less you get paid?

Get this story. I started working at a huge estate several weeks ago. Very fancy pants place on over a hundred acres. I'm thinking this gig is too good to be true. At first I was stoked to work with this talented albeit moody French chef whose culinary creations are outstanding every meal. I'm learning so much about haute cuisine -- without even having to enroll in culinary school. Cool.

However, I got my first paycheck recently. It was way less than it should have been. I call the payroll department lady and tell her there's a mistake. I was hired as an independent contractor, so no taxes were supposed to be taken out, yet there were taxes taken out. She says, "Oh we decided you weren't really an independent contractor." Oh, really.

Even worse, the more hours I work, the less my hourly wage is. They take my weekly salary and divide it by the number of hours worked that week. Last week I worked sixty hours. So my hourly rate was less than it would have been had I worked thirty or forty hours. Say what?

Oh and there's the overtime problem. Instead of paying me time-and-a-half, they pay me half my regular hourly rate for any hours I work over forty. I tell her, "But you just explained to me that I don't even have an hourly rate! It depends on how many hours I work."

"That's right," she says. She is talking in doublespeak!

So I say to the payroll lady, "You're telling me that the more hours I work, the less money I'll make?"

Yes, she admits that this feat of mathmatical genius is true.

Fuck. That. Shit. I quit!

And to think I turned down a cooking gig on a Newport racing yacht last week because I was already working this estate job. Kill me now.

Goodbye, Bill

2009-06-04T21:55:00.003-04:00

Maui vog

2009-06-02T06:55:00.012-04:00

Maui's down there. Somewhere.

I got an email yesterday from a Maui friend. They write:

We've been having a terrible problem from vog this year. Last March, there was an earthquake on the Big Island, and it opened a new vent in the volcano, so since then, it has been spewing sulphuric dioxide gas and if the trade winds aren't howling, it drifts over here. It is so thick that you can't see Lanai, Molokini, or Wailea (from Maalaea). It really kicks up my asthma, makes my eyes burn (and my skin, too), and is generally very unpleasant. What is weird is that there is nothing to do about it. Pele is just not happy, and she has no compunction about letting us know.

Vog is the nickname for volcano fog. The tradewinds blow from the northeast, so usually it bypasses Maui to the south. But in the summer, the tradewinds mellow and Kona winds can kick up, blowing the grey haze right up and over to the Valley Isle. During the few years when I lived there, I only saw vog a couple of times, thankfully. What a bummer that vog is ruining the island. I have a sweet offer to housesit in Kihei during the whole month of July, but now I'm not sure if I even want to go. Sounds pretty gross.

Sunrise on Maui through the vog. Nice.

"I do not like the cone of shame" says Dug

2009-05-29T18:26:00.000-04:00

Today was my day off, so I went to the movie theater to see what was playing. I had already seen everything except for two, and I wasn't about to plunk down money for Drag Me to Hell, although it sounds like fairly good camp according to Kurt Loder's hilarious review. So Disney-Pixar's Up in 3D was about the best choice, and I started to walk away, poo-pooing it as a kid's movie. Then I turned around and thought, oh what the hell, how bad can it be.

The theater manager assured me it was good, and that I would cry. I paid the extra four bucks for my nerdy little 3D glasses and although I didn't believe him, he was right on both counts. This movie is absolutely great. I was shocked how much I loved it. I even felt guilty for being such a grump and almost not having given it a chance. I deserved the Cone of Shame.

Here are some excerpts from reviews of Up.

Up is a breathtaking ride into the realm of pure imagination. Up shames the pap that now passes for family entertainment (yes, Night at the Museum 2, I'm talking to you). ~Rolling Stone

How much do I love this movie? If it were mathematically possible, I'd give it five stars out of four. ~Philadelphia Inquirer

Rarely has any film, let alone an animated one powered by the logic of dream and fantasy, been able to move so successfully -- and so effortlessly -- through so many different kinds of cinematic territory. ~L.A. Times

To watch Up with any attention is to be moved and astonished by the economy with which specific visuals are invested with emotion throughout. ~San Francisco Chronicle

An exquisite work of cinematic art that also happens to be the funniest, most touching, most exciting and most entertaining movie released so far this year. ~New York Post

As in their finest work, the Pixar filmmakers have created thrilling cinema simply by rifling through its history. ~New York Times

It feels nervy and adventurous and a little messy, the result of formidable creators and genuine wits working on an enormous budget, enormously well-spent. ~Chicago Tribune

Everything about Up is an up, in the most visceral and poetic ways. ~Baltimore Sun

Scipps National Spelling Bee's gastronomic words

2009-05-28T21:38:00.009-04:00

I am watching the annual Scripps National Spelling Bee and wow, talk about channeling my inner geek. I am so entranced with this show I cannot tear myself away. There are just a handful of kids left as I type. Here are some of the foodie words I should have known but would totally have bombed:

Neufchâtel (as in the cheese)
Caerphilly (as in another cheese, what's with the cheese thing?)
tagliatelle, pronounced "tallatelly" (as in the pasta)
palatschinken (jam-filled pancakes)

That last one tripped up my favorite kid, Kenyi. Bummer.

Speaking of food, I'm currently working with a French chef of international renown who's been written up in The Atlantic, New York Times, been featured on television, etc. and am gaining more gastronomic education about haute cuisine than people in chef school, but unfortunately my job leaves me no time to blog about my new foodie repertoire. One job perk is the geusioleptic aromas wafting in the kitchen. I just learned that word tonight courtesy of the spelling bee.

Below is the French-made oven the chef cooks with. Isn't it amazing? It's "The Chateau" model by La Cornue. I didn't know that forty-thousand-dollar ovens even existed. Surprise!

Terminator Salvation's nude Arnold body double scene

2009-05-21T21:22:00.002-04:00

Good lord, what a letdown. If you are looking for a way to kill some time and need an excuse to go out for movie popcorn, then fine. It's not painful to watch, but it would better suffice as a Netflix rental.

However.

There is one scene that is totally worth seeing for it's comic value. A door blows open with spectacular force. You see someone's feet and big muscular calves and then the camera pans up to show big muscular quads and suddenly there's this mist, or fog, or the smoke machine on the set has gone off by accident because why is there smoke who knows, and so the boy parts are enshrouded with opacity, and then the camera pans up to a major six pack and huge pecs and biceps and upwards we go and it's . . .

Arnold!

But is it? This body belongs to someone who is in Mr. Universe shape, and let's face it. Arnold is more like in Mr. Middle-Aged Average Joe shape these days. Obviously it can't be his body.

And as it turns out, it's not. It's this body double guy - Austrian bodybuilder Roland Kickinger.

Mr. Triceps himself even played Arnold in the 2005 A&E biopic "See Arnold Run."

Back to the point, which is what is this naked Arnold Terminator doing in the scene? Who knows. It's never explained. He simply goes after Christian Bale and slams him around a bit. Bale escapes. We see Arnold's shadow coming around the corner and . . .

POOF. That's the end of Arnold for the rest of the film. Where did he go? To find some clothes? To find the men's room? To find a good Cuban cigar? We never know. What was he doing there? Don't know that either. He simply appears out of the mist/fog/smoke, and then disappears -- much like the plot and continuity.

Maureen Dowd's plagiarism excuse

2009-05-18T07:05:00.005-04:00

Harvard Crimson/Alexandra P. Kass

You'd think a Pulitzer Prize-winning writer could come up with something better than the PR equivalent to "the dog ate my homework."

"josh is right. I didn't read his blog last week, and didn't have any idea he had made that point until you informed me just now. i was talking to a friend of mine Friday about what I was writing who suggested I make this point, expressing it in a cogent -- and I assumed spontaneous -- way and I wanted to weave the idea into my column. but, clearly, my friend must have read josh marshall without mentioning that to me. we're fixing it on the web, to give josh credit, and will include a note, as well as a formal correction tomorrow."

This is what Maureen Dowd told the The NYTPicker.

She lifted material from a blog published last Thursday on the Talking Points Memo (TPM) website. Here's the original post by Josh Marshall:

"More and more the timeline is raising the question of why, if the torture was to prevent terrorist attacks, it seemed to happen mainly during the period when we were looking for what was essentially political information to justify the invasion of Iraq."

Now here's Dowd's from yesterday's New York Times:

"More and more the timeline is raising the question of why, if the torture was to prevent terrorist attacks, it seemed to happen mainly during the period when the Bush crowd was looking for what was essentially political information to justify the invasion of Iraq."

And this is the woman who blasted Joe Biden for plagiarism in one of his speeches. I wonder what repercussions she's going to face from the editors. What they should do is publish an op-ed about the incident, titled, "An Echo from a Blog."

The Big Bang Theory's tribute to Leonard Nimoy

2009-05-16T10:22:00.001-04:00

Seeing Leonard Nimoy in Star Trek made me wonder how all the Trekkies are handling their flames of geek passion seeing him in action again. Which made me think of this episode of the Big Bang Theory, one of my favorite shows.

Star Trek: a gathering of actors from great TV and films

2009-05-15T18:04:00.003-04:00

Mitch Yost has gotten back in the game.

The new Star Trek is so good! I love the fact that they cast Bruce Greenwood as Captain Christopher Pike. If you were a fan of HBO's short-lived "John From Cincinnati," you'd remember him as the cool, not-yet-over-the-hill surfer Mitch Yost.

Then there's White Castle Harold as Sulu, played by John Cho. He put on a pretty impressive, very un-Haroldish sword-wielding fight scene.

And of course Sylar, I mean Zachary Quinto, who is perfect as a young Spock. I still was half-expecting him to finger-saw Romulan skull, though.

I had a frustrating "who-IS-that-I-know-I've-seen-him-before" moment when trying to figure out the actor playing Kirk. I racked my brain before remembering him as . . .

. . . wild-child oenophile Bo Barrett in the wonderful film Bottle Shock that came out last fall. Chris Pine is more smoking in Star Trek without that heinous wig, channeling a young Brad Pitt on the Enterprise.

The sexiest character (and my sister who saw the movie with me concurs) was Romulan villain Nero, played by Eric Bana. Remember him starring in Troy and Munich years ago?

Not me. I didn't recognize him at all, and had to cheat by visiting IMDB for that "aha" moment.

Besides the great talent, the film as a whole is fantastic, especially the editing and special effects. It not surprising that it's full of time travel and discussion of quantum mechanics, as it's directed by J.J. Abrams, who produced "Lost." Definitely one of the best Star Trek films, and worth seeing on the big screen. And supposedly the actors have signed on for two sequels, the first of which is planned for a 2011 release, which will probably bring back William Shatner.

The stuck-in-the-dungeon riddle

2009-05-14T13:36:00.000-04:00

Okay, smarty pants.

You are stuck in a dungeon with two doors. One leads to freedom, the other to death. You may ask just one single question of the two guards standing by the doors in order to escape. One of the men always lies and the other always tells the truth, but you can't differentiate the liar from the truth-teller.

What one question can you ask that will guarantee your exit through the right door?

Give it some thought before you scroll down to the answer . . .

you are so cheating . . .

Give up? By the way I wonder if the dungeon has rats . . .

. . . or Iron Maidens. Haha. Okay here's the answer:

The question you'd ask either guard is, "If I had asked you if this was the door to freedom, would your answer have been 'yes'?" If it was the honest guard, it's a no brainer. If it was the liar guard, he'd have to lie about what his original answer would have been. Voila.

I love that riddle.

Abstinence-only sex ed: hopefully a thing of the past

2009-05-08T12:12:00.002-04:00

Here's baby mama Bristol Palin in February 2009 telling Fox News that teen abstinence is not "realistic at all." Now, she's done a 180 and is being promoted as the poster child for abstinence by the Candie's Foundation. This abstinence-promoting foundation is, ironically, the philanthropic branch of the Candie's clothing and shoe brand which advertises its "just-say-no" philosophy like this:

Girls, do dress and act a whore, but don't have sex!

What I'd like to know is how much Candie's is paying Bristol Palin. According to Anderson Cooper's 360 show, the Candie's Foundation compensated the teen mom for her "time" and travel expenses but she is not a paid employee. Here is the Foundation's founder and Candie's C.E.O. Neil Cole with his two teenage spokeswomen, Hayden Panettiere and Palin.

I can't believe the continued prevalence of moronic abstinence-only sex ed in this country! Why don't people like Cole do their research before touting a philosophy that does not work on teenagers and ends up misleading them, and allowing them to get STDs and pregnant because they were not properly educated on how to protect themselves? It's sad and preventable.

Since 1996, the United States government has poured more than 1.3 billion dollars into ineffective abstinence-only sex ed programs. Thankfully, President Obama decided to put an end to this idiocy and will use federal money for a more balanced and realistic sex ed program. The PDF version of his sex-ed budget is here, beginning on page 39.

"It's about time that evidence-based management - and sanity - return to family planning programs," said Rep. Carolyn Maloney (D-Manhattan).

In January, an article was posted on OpenEducation.net titled "Abstinence-Only Sex Education Statistics - Final Nail in the Coffin." The piece references three separate independent studies on the effectiveness of abstinence-only sex education. And the results of the three were all the same: abstinence-only sex ed does not work.

The Cochrane Collaboration was the first to do a study. Then the Mathematic Policy Research Inc.'s published its findings, a pdf version of which is online here. I blogged about this study a couple of years ago when I first heard about "purity rings."

One group had been part of the Christian brainwashing program, and the other group had been spared. Yet both groups of kids behaved exactly the same sexually: 23% in both groups had sex in the previous year and always used a condom, 17% had sex only sometimes using a condom; and 4% had sex never using one. About a quarter of each group had had sex with three or more partners.

Finally, a researcher at Johns Hopkins wrote about her results, available here in the American Journal of Public Health. A summary from OpenEducation.net about the last study states:

. . . youngsters who took the virginity pledge were not only just as likely to have intercourse, they ultimately were more likely to take part in sex in an unsafe manner. This has led experts to conclude that the lessons students take from their abstinence-only education programs is a negative and/or faulty view of contraception.

It will be interesting to see if teen pregnancies will diminish from the 750,000 per year in the U.S. that occur now. I'm sure once kids learn the facts about contraception instead of being brainwashed by Christians that they must wait until marriage, there will be a lot less unwanted newborns being birthed by children.

Tying it up is a recent South Park's take on Purity Rings. Great stuff.

The wingnuts' Poupongate: new lows of desperation

2009-05-07T22:42:00.005-04:00

The hilarity of the hoopla that ensued after this burger video came out earlier in the week is mindboggling. All I see is a cool guy buying a round of burgers and leaving a nice tip in the jar.

I could not believe my eyes when I saw this clip of Fox News' Sean Hannity dredging up old Grey Poupon commercials. How dare the President order an elitist European condiment? The nerve. You know when all you've got on the President is spicy mustard versus yellow mustard, you may want to rethink your job as a political critic.

How do people this asinine get news shows? Can you imagine the graphic artist who came up with the President Poupon graphic? Did he think it was cool? Did he want to kill himself from the shame? Does everyone have their head up their ass at Fox? It's all too pathetic. No wonder the Republicans are wandering out in the wilderness.

Kindle 2: a good way to save money on college textbooks

2009-05-07T08:47:00.005-04:00

(Amazon)

Amazon yesterday introduced the bigger, better, and more expensive Kindle 2. Retailing at $489, it seems a bit pricy, right? But if you're a college student, you will actually save money if you buy the Kindle 2 and download electronic textbooks instead of buying physical textbooks.

According to NPR:

For students, the biggest advantage [of buying the Kindle 2] could be the lower cost of electronic textbooks. Reading material on the Kindle is consistently less expensive than printed versions, with new releases of mass-market books typically costing $10, for example.
A 2005 Government Accountability Office report said the average [textbook] cost is $900 per year for students at four-year public colleges, though the textbook industry argues the figure is closer to $625. Typically the prices are high because publishers are trying to capture as many sales as possible in the first year of release, before students can buy used versions.
Though Amazon currently sells physical textbooks, Bezos says he believes electronic versions will eventually dominate. "It just makes so much sense," he said.

Jeff Bezos, Amazon's C.E.O., unveiled the Kindle 2 at Pace University. The New York Times writes:

Geoffrey Brackett, the provost of Pace, said the university would distribute the new Kindles to about 50 students and compare them with 50 studying the same material using traditional textbooks, to see differences in how the two groups learn.
Mr. Brackett said he expected the university to split the cost of the Kindles with Amazon but said whether the students would get the devices on loan or as a gift had not been determined.

The new version has a screen more than twice as big as the original Kindle. It will be available sometime this summer.

Funky spring veggies: Fiddlehead ferns

2009-05-06T12:00:00.000-04:00

I went for a walk in the Amherst woods yesterday while the rain took a break for a few hours. It was so green! There are great hiking trails here at the seven mile-wide Mount Holyoke Range State Park.

Fiddlehead ferns are in season now here in New England, but they're around for only a few weeks. They grow near water and are ready for harvesting around the first week in May. Fiddleheads aren't a specific type of fern - the name refers to the shape of the budding unfurled fronds.

My sister laughed at me, foraging for fiddleheads in the woods like some crazy backwoods mountain person. I'd never eaten them before and found some recipes online. I sauteed mine with garlic and butter and was surprised how good they are. Kind of like asparagus. I plan on harvesting more of these little delicacies to freeze and use later in cream-based soup.

Fiddleheads are great with Hollandaise sauce. You can also use them in quiche. Here's a recipe that Emeril Lagasse made up:

Morel Mushroom and Fiddlehead Fern Ragout

Ingredients

1 1/2 pounds fiddlehead ferns
2 shallots, minced
4 tablespoons unsalted butter
2 sprigs fresh thyme
1/2 pound fresh morels, trimmed and rinsed well
2 cloves garlic, minced
3/4 cup chicken stock
1/2 cup heavy cream
1 tablespoon chopped chives
1 tablespoon chopped parsley
Salt and pepper
Parmesan curls, for garnish

DIRECTIONS

In a saucepan, bring 1 1/2 quarts of salted water to a boil. Add fiddleheads and return to a boil. Using a slotted spoon, transfer fiddleheads to an ice bath and chill. Drain and pat dry, removing as much of the outer brown, tissue-like membrane as possible.

In a skillet saute shallots in butter until softened, about 2 minutes. Add thyme, morels, and garlic and continue to cook until morels have softened and given up their liquid, about 3 minutes. Continue to cook until almost all liquid is evaporated, about 2 more minutes. Add chicken stock and cook until reduced by half. Add fiddleheads and cook 2 minutes, add cream, chives, and parsley, and season with salt and freshly ground black pepper, to taste. Serve immediately, garnished with Parmesan curls.

The X-Rated Job Interview

2009-05-05T13:07:00.003-04:00

It was cracked, alright.

Yesterday I had an job interview at a sprawling, just-built private estate. I was sitting at a table with the Estate Manager in a room that housed a pool table and a beautiful fireplace. I guess one could call it the den, although it was more like a hall. Above the mantle mounted on the wall was huge flat-screen TV, about six feet wide. CNN was on, muted. My seat faced the windows looking out onto the sprawling, manicured grounds. The Estate Manager sat across from me, facing toward the TV.

As the interview progressed, I noticed the TV was off. I figured one of the housekeepers who'd been passing in and out may have shut it off.

Suddenly, the Estate Manager stops talking mid-sentence with a horrified look on her face. "Oh my God!" she says, looking above my head at the screen behind me. I turn around to see what she's watching.

PORN is on the television. Nasty, dirty, hardcore, hetero porn with lots of closeups of the anal sex that is being vigorously performed by two adult film stars. Close-up shots + a six-foot screen = much more detail than I needed to know. I think my jaw dropped onto the table. At least the system was still on mute and there weren't any squeals and grunts to accompany the visuals!

"Oh my God!" the estate manager says again, as she jumps up and hustles across the room and grabs the touch-screen universal remote off of its charger. And because it's a brand new home with a brand new AV system, she doesn't know how to work the remote. Have you ever seen one of these things? So crazy! It probably cost more than I've had in my savings account in the past year.

She yells for the French chef, who is nearby in the kitchen. He enters the room, unaware of the chaos onscreen. "Turn off the TV!" the Estate Manager says to him as she jams the remote into his hands. He fumbles with it too, looks up at the TV, sees the anal show, his eyes widen, he exclaims in a thich French accent "Ooh Monsieur!" and continues to randomly push the buttons.

Finally, the TV goes off. I cover my mouth and try not to burst out laughing. We all start laughing. The chef returns to cooking. The Estate Manager apologizes profusely. We get back to business, but there's palpable change in the air. The incident seems to have leveled the field, and I'm actually glad the porn mishap occurred. My future employer got to see that I am not uptight and don't get flustered, and I got to see that she's human and mistakes happen.

I assume the "Mister" of the estate was sequestered in his master bedroom somewhere in one of the home's many wings, enjoying what he thought was some quality private time watching one of his plethora of televisions. Hopefully he might read up on the operation of his audiovisual system before hunkering down next time on "Anal Alley."

More cowbell

2009-05-03T11:32:00.003-04:00

Last night my nephew's band The Young Flyers opened for a band called Living Things who are touring the East Coast. When Living Things were playing, nephew drummer Andrew came marching through the crowd up to the stage playing a cowbell high over his head. Andrew is six feet six inches, so you couldn't miss the cowbell spectacle eight feet up in the air. The frontman gave him the nod, and up he jumped on stage for a minute or two, rocking out with his cowbell. I was dying laughing, and if you haven't seen the Saturday Night Live skit "More Cowbell" starring Will Ferrell and Christopher Walken, you are missing out on some seriously funny cowbell humor.

By the way, Living Things is a great rock band and are playing Tuesday night at the Bowery Ballroom in NYC. If you're around, they are well worth checking out. They're also at Lollapalooza this August. Here they are on Jimmy Kimmel a few months ago.

Conservatives, Steven Colbert is laughing AT you, not with you!

2009-05-02T18:03:00.000-04:00

Last year I dated a Russian guy with broken English who was surprised that I was such a huge Stephen Colbert fan. I said, "You do know he's joking, right? He's not really a Republican. It's satire!"

He looked confused. Did I burst his bubble? Maybe he didn't know what the English word satire meant?

"Are you sure about that?" he asked me. Before presuming his idiocy, I decided that his confusion instead had to be the result of his not understanding English well. Then again, this was a guy who made lots of dough working at Goldman Sachs, most likely a very conservative conservative. Obviously I was channeling Cleopatra, the Queen of da Nile.

Lo and behold, HuffPo uncovered a story about an Ohio State researcher's study called "The Irony of Satire" revealing that conservatives don't know Colbert is joking.

. . . there was no significant differencebetween the groups in thinking Colbert was funny, but conservativeswere more likely to report that Colbert only pretends to bejoking and genuinely meant what he said while liberals weremore likely to report that Colbert used satire and was not seriouswhen offering political statements. Conservatism also significantlypredicted perceptions that Colbert disliked liberalism. Finally,a post hoc analysis revealed that perceptions of Colbert's politicalopinions fully mediated the relationship between political ideologyand individual-level opinion.

This doesn't surprise me in the least. I just wonder what explanation they have for Colbert's 2006 roast of Bush at the White House Press Correspondents Dinner. Some of my favorite gems:

"Everybody asks for personnel changes. So the White House has personnel changes. Then you write, "Oh, they're just rearranging the deck chairs on the Titanic." First of all, that is a terrible metaphor. This administration is not sinking. This administration is soaring. If anything, they are rearranging the deck chairs on the Hindenburg!"

"We're not so different, [Bush] and I. We get it. We're not brainiacs on the nerd patrol. We're not members of the factinista. We go straight from the gut, right sir? That's where the truth lies, right down here in the gut. Do you know you have more nerve endings in your gut than you have in your head? You can look it up. I know some of you are going to say 'I did look it up, and that's not true.' That's 'cause you looked it up in a book."

100 days of Obama's Facebook wall

2009-04-30T20:49:00.004-04:00

Slate posted this hilarious faux Facebook page of Barack Obama's first 100 days. Love it.

The silver-tongued smoothness of today's youth

2009-04-28T10:21:00.005-04:00

Overheard in New York yesterday on the bus:

Ganster Wannabe-Attired Teen (on cellphone): I love you.

PAUSE

GWAT: Yeah, well even if you had big long-ass teeth and muthafuckin' baggy pants, I'd still say the same damn thing.

Spike TV's "Deadliest Warrior" show

2009-04-26T21:22:00.007-04:00

I am somewhat embarrassed to admit this, but I love the new show "Deadliest Warrior" on Spike TV. Yes, the Man Channel. Manchel?

The premise is that they test the weaponry of two types of warriors on each show and decide whose weaponry is the deadliest. The first was Gladiator vs. Apache. Then there was Viking against Samurai. Today's repeat that I caught was Spartan battling Ninja. And I was enthralled with the violence.

On their website are lots of fun videos showing the tests. They rig up a dummy like the one in the above picture getting intimate with a Morning Star. It's constructed from ballistic gel to be similar to human flesh and bone. They also test on pig carcasses. In fact they cut one almost in half with a ninja sword today. Nice. They bring in experts in those particular styles of fighting and they talk trash to each other. The guys get all technical with computer calibrations and speed measuring devices and so on. Finally, they gather all the data and have the computer run 1,000 fights and it decides who would be the deadliest.

Here's the link to the above video of the dummy being brained by a Morning Star. I'm telling you, the slow motion replay is just addicting. I don't know if I can look at Lifetime for Women the same any more.

I just met Woody Allen

2009-04-24T18:19:00.004-04:00

I was walking my friend's dog Whiskey on 70th between Park and Lex just now, and he was sniffing and sniffing so as I was standing there waiting for him to finish sniffing, I noticed Woody Allen and Soon-Yi also standing around. They were checking out a townhouse across the street that is under construction and noticed me noticing them. As we passed each other I couldn't resist. I said, "I thought I recognized you guys, looking at both of them, and then I told him, "I love your work, it's so great, thank you," and he was so gracious and he smiled and said, "Thanks!" with what sounded like genuine appreciation, not with a God-I-hear-this-all-the-time-and-it's-so-tiring-to-say-thanks tone. Which made me feel good, little film-appreciating plebian that I am.

They are super teeny-tiny and he was dressed in one of his fishing hats and a khaki jacket. They looked like a happy couple.

New York City's fake beaches

2009-04-24T16:25:00.003-04:00

Why one should never live in New York City if one is a beach bum . . .

Water Taxi Beach to open outposts at South Street Seaport, Governors Island
By Jason Fink

New Yorkers looking for a day at the beach this summer will have two new options: Lower Manhattan and Governors Island.

New York Water Taxi, which created the seasonal 44,000-square-foot “beach” in Long Island City in 2005, will open smaller replicas, at South Street Seaport on Memorial Day weekend and at the north end of Governors Island on July 4.

The beach in Queens, which features trucked-in sand, picnic tables, a volleyball court, food and a bar, will also open on Memorial Day weekend.

The 18,000-square-foot beach at the seaport, on the north side of Pier 17, will have a mini golf course in addition to food and drink concessions.

The Governors Island beach - a converted parking lot - will have a basketball court, live music on weekends, and will be accessible by ferry from the Battery Maritime Building and New York Water Taxi.

Swimming is prohibited at all the beaches.

What about the Geneva Conventions, Mr. President?

2009-04-18T18:25:00.001-04:00

"Guantanamo Bay Prisoner" by Banksy

"You asked me once," said O'Brien, "what was in Room 101. I told you that you knew the answer already. Everyone knows it. The thing that is in Room 101 is the worst thing in the world."

"The worst thing in the world," said O'Brien, "varies from individual to individual. It may be burial alive, or death by fire, or by drowning, or by impalement, or fifty other deaths. There are cases where it is some quite trivial thing, not even fatal."
~
George Orwell, 1984

The ACLU got its wish and Obama released the Bush administration's "torture memos" to the public. These detail the sick tactics used at Abu Ghraib, Gulag Guantanamo and elsewhere that had Cheney and Rumsfeld licking their chops with excitement.

Former CIA inspector general Fred Hitz told Voice of America, "I was appalled. When you read through it it's sort of like it's a memo out of some science fiction movie. It's like you're reading a manual that would have been more appropriate during the Nazi era than in the United States of America."

Although I am a big fan of Obama, I am disappointed that he's letting the CIA torture team off the hook. 95 year-old Nazis are still hauled into court. Pol Pot's regime used waterboarding. Yet our President wants to simply "reflect?" on illegal torture? Shiny surfaces reflect. If you want to uphold something, Mr. President, put down the mirror and pick up a copy of the Geneva Conventions. Uphold those.

It states in the third Convention against Torture, and basic precepts of customary international law—each country has the obligation to investigate and prosecute persons alleged to have committed torture and other violations of the laws of war.

Anderson Cooper had a great segment last night on this topic. Very much worth watching.

COOPER: Well, we've seen the pictures from Abu Ghraib, of course, when we've heard the stories of brutality and abuse. And while we can't confirm the numbers, an AP report says at least 108 detainees held by U.S. forces in Iraq and Afghanistan have died in American custody; most reportedly died violently.
A quarter of those deaths were investigated as a result of possible abuse by U.S. personnel. That report was from 2005. We don't have numbers after that.

And as we told you before the break, the Justice Department released the memos detailing interrogation techniques endorsed by the Bush administration from the very top. CIA operatives though, who carried out those techniques will not face prosecution.

In a statement released today, President Obama said, quote, "This is a time for reflection, not retribution. Nothing will be gained by spending our time and energy laying blame for the past."

Um, yes it would. That something to be gained is justice. As in the Department that authorized the torture to begin with. We need to hold accountable those responsible for the war crimes they committed, starting with that schmucky, torture-loving Alberto Gonzales -- who's now enjoying what looks like a really successful lecture circuit.

No, Cougar, that wasn't Shakespeare

2009-04-16T16:59:00.005-04:00

"A pool boy! A pool boy! Haha, watching it online . . . I love how they call her the cougar. And one of the guys is unemployed!"
~ Text message received just now from a girlfriend after discussing with her last night how stupid this show would probably be. And we were right!

I saw this poster a couple of weeks ago in the Times Square subway station. It was so bad it was good, both the poster and the show's debut last night. My brother-in-law came back from the gym halfway through the episode and as he walked past the TV, he thought the 40 year-old cougar was hot. After watching the show for a few minutes, brother-in-law decided that Coogs, although hot, was "dumb." Uh-yuh.

And I felt the same about the 20 year-old cubs, and as much as I like the youngins . . . meh. Most were dorky, prepubescent, and sort of dull. Not what I'd call any great cougar hunters. There are a couple that don't seem bad, but out of twenty potential mates, that's not saying much. One was drunkenly belligerent and almost started a fight with another guy. And yeah, there's the obligatory pool boy, snowboard instructor, personal trainer, martial arts instructor, and a slew of bartenders. The usual reality show XY chromosome fare.

The best moment of the evening, as hard as it is to narrow them all down, was when a guy named Colt (for real, Colt) whips out his acoustic guitar at the very first introduction to Coogs. Accompanying his strumming, he sings some atrociously bad albeit rhyming poetry he's written just for her. The Cougar's response:

"Was that Shakespeare?"

The CNN newscaster without pupils. WTF?

2009-04-15T17:56:00.009-04:00

Instead of reading the New York Times this morning as usual, I watched CNN for a change of pace. I had never seen this newscaster before. Her name is Heidi Collins. What the hell is wrong with her eyeballs? The woman has no pupils! Even in my groggy, pre-caffeinated state, I dug for the camera because this was just too weird.

Even on her CNN web page photo, her pupils are bizarre. But instead of glowing weirdly white, they are zombielike dead black. I'm truly baffled by this ocular mystery.

The reason Somali fishermen became pirates

2009-04-15T10:05:00.003-04:00

(photo: AP)

“Somebody is dumping nuclear material here. There is also lead, and heavy metals such as cadmium and mercury - you name it.” ~Ahmedou Ould-Abdallah, the UN envoy to Somalia

There are two sides to every story, but the cause of Somalia's piracy problem is barely discussed in the media. In January, Kenyan analyst Mohamed Abshir Waldo wrote a paper entitled “The Two Piracies in Somalia: Why the World Ignores the Other?” That is a very good question.

I decided to write this blog when I received an email yesterday from a yachtie friend who'd gone ashore in Djbouti, just north of Somalia.

She writes:

Personally, I have a certain amount of sympathy for the Somalian "Robin Hood's." After finishing a job on an expedition boat I got off in Djibouti to see the country and maybe go into Ethiopia. I hitched a lift with a group of French navy pilots going up to Lac Abby. It was an amazing adventure! They were the crew of the new French spy plane that is permanently patrolling those waters. They know everything that is going on! Information that could be used to avoid piracy situations? They found the 4 French "tourists" that were kidnapped in the Yemen. Orwell's "Newspeak" is found here. I think this is a power play whose main player is not yet clear.

There is a perversity in protecting the very commercial interests that have driven a country into abject poverty. Orwell's "doublethink" is found here. There are two refugee camps in Djibouti, that are the largest in the world, both cardboard cities are dependent on just two stand pipes and charity, supplemented by the prostitution of the women to the servicemen who are station there.

The connection is our humanity.....or our gradually increasing detachment from it!

In a nutshell, other countries have been illegally fishing Somali waters, taking crab, lobster, and fish that the Somali fishermen exclusively used to gather. Even worse, there is proof that European toxic waste is being dumped, much of which washed ashore after the 2005 tsunami, sickening livestock and people, and killing three hundred. Yet the U.N. does nothing.

Here are some excerpts from Mohamed Abshir Waldo's paper:

. . . massive illegal foreign fishing piracy [has] been poaching and destroying the Somali marine resources for the last 18 years following the collapse of the Somali regime in 1991. With its usual double standards when such matters concern Africa, the “international community” comes out in force . . . against the Somali fishermen pirates while discreetly protecting the numerous Illegal, Unreported and Unregulated (IUU) fishing fleets there from Europe, Arabia and the Far East.

The countries engaged include practically all of southern Europe, France, Spain, Greece, UK. Nowadays I hear even Norway. There were not many Scandinavians before, but Norwegian fishing now is involved in this, you know, very profitable fishing business. So, there are others, of course. There are Russian. There are Taiwanese. There are Philippines. There are Koreans. There are Chinese. You know, it’s a free-for-all coast.

One report estimated that more than $300 million dollars-worth of tuna, shrimp, and lobster are being stolen every year by illegal trawlers. The local fishermen are now starving.

“IUU fishing is detrimental to the wider marine ecosystem because it flouts rules designed to protect the marine environment which includes restrictions to harvest juveniles, closed spawning grounds and gear modification designed to minimize by-catch on non-target species….In so doing they steal an invaluable protein source from some of the world’s poorest people and ruin the livelihoods of some legitimate fishermen; incursions by trawlers into the inshore areas reserved for artisanal [as opposed to commercial] fishing can result in collision with local fishing boats, destruction of fishing gear and deaths of fishermen” says the High Seas Task Force (HSTF). In its report, Closing the Net: Stopping Illegal Fishing on the High Seas, HSTF puts worldwide value of IUU catches at $4 to $9 billion, large part of it from Sub-Sahara Africa, particularly Somalia.

Not only are other countries pillaging Somalia's waters, they are dumping toxic waste. This excerpt comes from a columnist for the London Independent:

As soon as the government was gone, mysterious European ships started appearing off the coast of Somalia, dumping vast barrels into the ocean. The coastal population began to sicken. At first they suffered strange rashes, nausea and malformed babies. Then, after the 2005 tsunami, hundreds of the dumped and leaking barrels washed up on shore. People began to suffer from radiation sickness, and more than 300 died. Ahmedou Ould-Abdallah, the UN envoy to Somalia, tells me: "Somebody is dumping nuclear material here. There is also lead, and heavy metals such as cadmium and mercury - you name it." Much of it can be traced back to European hospitals and factories, who seem to be passing it on to the Italian mafia to "dispose" of cheaply. When I asked Ould-Abdallah what European governments were doing about it, he said with a sigh: "Nothing. There has been no clean-up, no compensation, and no prevention."

It seems that piracy will continue as long as the plundering of Somalia's waters is tolerated.

Mohamed Abshir Waldo concludes:

In their current operations, the Somali fishermen pirates genuinely believe that they are protecting their fishing grounds (both 12-mile territorial and EEZ waters). They also feel that they exacting justice and compensation for the marine resources stolen and the destroyed ecosystem by the IUUs. And their thinking is shared and fully supported by the coastal communities, whose protectors and providers they became.

Reagan was part of McCarthyism?

2009-04-14T11:23:00.008-04:00

In the late 1940s or early 1950s during the height of the "Red Scare," Reagan ratted on fellow actors whom he believed were Communist sympathizers. From a 2001 Time Magazine article, via Digg:

It was revealed last week that the future President [was] a secret FBI informant, code name T-10. According to an article published in the San Jose Mercury News, documents obtained through the Freedom of Information Act indicate that Reagan and his first wife, Actress Jane Wyman, provided federal agents with the names of actors they believed were Communist sympathizers.
The FBI papers report that despite his work as an informant, Reagan disagreed with some of the tactics of organizations like the House Un- American Activities Committee. In one FBI interview, Reagan takes issue with a group of actors and producers attempting to fire any alleged Reds. Protests Reagan: "Do they expect us to constitute ourselves as a little FBI of our own and determine just who is a Commie and who isn't?"

What a hypocrite. Then again, this comes from a man who later categorized ketchup as a vegetable so public schools could serve it as such.

DEVGRU / Navy SEAL Team SIX save the day

2009-04-12T23:14:00.003-04:00

U.S.S. Bainbridge, today's most popular vessel

"The world has become a much more dangerous place, and it's a problem that is getting worse all the time. We're all keenly aware that the ante has been upped."

~Joseph Murphy, who teaches anti-piracy tactics in his maritime security class at Massachusetts Maritime Academy, and -- ironically -- whose own son is first mate to Captain Richard Philips

With all the insanity off the coast of Somalia, it worries me a bit that my nephew is about to major in Marine Transportation at Massachusetts Maritime Academy this autumn. But it's reassuring to know that if something were to happen to him while he's in the middle of the ocean "towing shit," as he so eloquently refers to his future profession, the U.S. military has this kid's back.

Today, with President Obama's permission on the condition that the captain's life was in danger, the Navy took care of business sniper-style by killing three of the four pirates holding hostage Captain Richard Philips, who also learned the captaining ropes at Mass Maritime. According to Fox News,

They established clear head shots on all three pirates: one was visible through the front window, and the other two were revealing their heads through the top hatch, presumably to get fresh air. It would be their last breath.

President Obama later called several military officials, including Vice Admiral William McRaven, Commander of Joint Special Operations Command (JSOC). The Joint Special Ops commander overseas the Army's Delta Force, the Air Force's Intelligence Support Activity (ISA), other secret teams that have yet to be disclosed -- and the Navy SEALTeam SIX. Which means that these SEALS are today's badass heroes.

SEAL Team SIX is also known as DEVGRU, for Special Warfare Development Group. It was founded in 1980 by Dick Marcinko. His website says:

Marcinko sold the idea and was eventually tasked with creating and commanding SEAL Team SIX, the Navy’s first and only counter-terrorist command. SEAL Team SIX engaged in highly classified missions from Central America to the Middle East, the North Sea to Africa and beyond, and established itself as the world’s foremost counter-terrorism unit.

These pics are of Mr. Marcinko. Think he's gotten into a few fights in his special ops lifetime? His poor nose sure seems to alude to that.

I'm glad these guys were there for Captain Philips. There's a lot of info about DEVGRU here in case you want to learn a bit more about them.

Chia Obama

2009-04-09T17:53:00.008-04:00

Look at it, in all its sprouting animated glory. I know.

Saw this on BoingBoing today. So there's a story behind this. Walgreen's decided to drop Chia Obama, and when they told the 76 year-old Chia Pet creator, Joe Pedott, he was bummed.

As reported here,

"I'm sick about it," Pedott, 76, said, disputing any suggestion that Chia Obama's Chia hair was mocking the Afro hairstyle.
"Obama had an Afro -- does that make him racist?" Pedott said. "So how the hell do you get racist out of it? And number one, you can give him a haircut."
Pedott said he is a Republican, but he voted for Obama and was just trying to do right by the new president.
"It's Americana," Pedott said. "I thought I would take the good name of Chia and support the good things that he's trying to do. ... That was a labor of love."
Pedott said he was so confident the Chia Obama was not offensive he even asked the Rev. Jesse Jackson to screen it when he ran into him recently at a Chicago eatery.
"He said, quote, 'I think this is a fine product,' end quote -- I have three witnesses," Pedott said.

Hey, he's got three witnesses. Personally I don't find Chia Obama racist. Doesn't anyone remember these?

Kumar Goes to White House

2009-04-08T23:28:00.002-04:00

“…I’m going to be the associate director in the White House office of public liaison. They do outreach with the American public and with different organizations. They take out all of the red tape that falls between the general public and the White House.”

~Actor Kal Penn, a.k.a. Kumar

For real, Kumar, as in Goes to White Castle and Escapes from Guantanamo Bay, is now working for President Obama. I love this country.

Entertainment Weekly got the scoop first.

Variety writes:

Essentially, Penn will be working to forge alliances with the Asian-American and Pacific Islander communities and the arts community, mirroring some of his efforts as a relentless campaigner for Barack Obama before the election.

Little Pies and Sunshiney Days

2009-04-06T22:52:00.000-04:00

The "Check Engine" light came on while I was borrowing my sister's car last week. Although she believes I was four-wheel driving through giant potholes while doing 70 miles an hour, I assured her I did nothing wrong. AutoZone provides free diagnostic to find out what the supposed "Check Engine" problem is, instead of spending thirty bucks at a mechanic who will then tell you, "Thank God you brought it in immediately, this is serious!" and then charges you thousands of dollars to change a light bulb or a fuse.

So she drives in the pouring rain to AutoZone today, and at this part of the story is where she takes over. Guest Blogger Amy writes:

I called first to make sure they really did the code check for free, and the guy who answered said Sure, yes, it is free, and we're open til 11pm. Now, it has been thundering and raining on and off in NYC all day, and when I walked in and inquired, the 2 workers at the counter asked whether I had been the one who called earlier. I agreed that indeed it had been me. The first worker inhaled like a comedian about to deliver a deadpan punchline and said with all seriousness,

"Well, we do do it for free, but not when it's raining," and I laughed at his jocularity. The second worker chimed in on the joke, "And we don't diagnose the codes when it's nighttime, either."

I chuckled again. And paused, waiting for the the expressions on their faces to change and one of them to retrieve the handheld, plug-in scanner machine hanging behind them on the wall. I realized in that split second that they weren't kidding. After questioning them, I got a bit peeved and I asked why they had not cautioned me over the phone earlier to wait for a clear day. When the first clerk replied that it wasn't raining when I called, all three of us looked toward the plate glass windows and looked at the rain pouring down. I said, "It's been raining off and on all day." His response was priceless.

"Listen, just go home, cuddle up, and make yourself a little pie. Come back tomorrow when it's sunshiney."

Coffee and cigarettes: now a luxury in NYC

2009-04-02T14:00:00.001-04:00

Last night I was in midtown and went into a convenience store off of Madison and bought a cup of coffee (a small) and a pack of American Spirits.

The total was THIRTEEN DOLLARS.

Last June, a state tax hike increased the price of smokes by a whopping $1.25, making New York's cigarettes the most expensive in the U.S. And yesterday, the federal cigarette tax increased to $1.01. New Yorkers are now paying $5.26 in government fees for each pack of smokes! Like it's not expensive enough living in NYC.

I don't smoke like a fiend, in fact a pack will last me about three to four days. I enjoy an occasional cigarette, especially with a cup of coffee. . .

(a very cool film, by the way)

. . . and don't plan on being one of the three percent of smokers expected to quit due to the latest price hike.

I am now going to purchase my cigarettes directly from one of those online Native American reservation distributors. The government has gone a bit too far with their fervent smoker taxes. Enough is enough already. Instead of costing about $12 a pack, my smokes will instead set me back about five.

If you too want to try online purchasing, keep a few things in mind.

First, make sure the smokes are manufactured here in the U.S. Many of these online companies are not only not Native American, they are not even located in the states. Russian tobacco is the absolute shittiest, and the Euro stuff is pretty bad too.

Second, make sure the online company does not supply customers' purchasing info to the state, or you will get hit with a state tax bill. This could arrive in the mail months or even years after your online purchase, so beware. Verify the facts before you buy. And of course, pay with a credit card so if you do get stiffed -- which is known to happen with these online ciggie companies -- you have some recourse.

One company that seems legit is Smokes-Spirits. It is operated by an enrolled member of the Seneca Nation, and I called to verify that their cigarettes are all made in the U.S., that they are located here in America (in Salamanca, New York, actually), and that they do not report purchasing info to the state (which is not illegal, by the way).

Shocker: Dick Cheney has spies in Obama's administration

2009-04-01T08:10:00.000-04:00

"[Cheney]’s much more formidable than people think. Got a rap clap memory. Understands bureaucracy much better, he’s been around forever, has had every job."
~Seymour Hersh

NPR's Terry Gross asked revered investigative journalist Seymour Hersh yesterday if more of Bush's people who are still working in Washington were coming forward with the truth about the terrible goings-on from that administration, now that the evil ones are no longer in power.

HERSCH: A a lot of people that had told me in the last year of Bush, “call me next, next February.” And, so far, even people who are out are still cherry because, you know, not so much Bush, but Cheney really is…he’s really smart..

NPR: Are you saying that you think Vice President Cheney is still having a chilling effect on people who might otherwise be coming forward?

HERSCH: HERSH: I’ll make it worse. I think he’s put people left. He’s put people back. They call it a stay behind. It’s sort of an intelligence term of art. When you leave a country and, you know, you’ve driven out the, you know, you’ve lost the war. You leave people behind. It’s a stay behind that you can continue to contacts with, to do sabotage, whatever you want to do. Cheney’s left a stay behind. He’s got people in a lot of agencies that still tell him what’s going on. Particularly in defense, obviously. Also in the NSA, there’s still people that talk to him. He still knows what’s going on. Can he still control policy up to a point? Probably up to a point, a minor point. But he’s still there. He’s still a presence. And again, because of the problems this administration’s having filling jobs, a lot of people who served in the Bush Cheney government, particularly even in the White House people on most sophisticated staffs are still there. You simply can’t get rid of everybody, you may not even want to. Some are professional people. But Cheney is, I would never call it admiration, but, you know, formidable, yeah, this guy. This guy is the real McCoy.

Here's the audio transcipt.

The Candy Man

2009-03-29T21:53:00.003-04:00

I remember this candy store, and his brother Joey who I met there when he was working the counter. Aww. Great little clip from The Hollywood Reporter from Oscar time.

Skate softly and carry a big stick

2009-03-26T10:47:00.000-04:00

I saw this photo of Matthew McConaughey (loving that he's not only barefoot, but a goofy), and wondered what this skateboarding "aid" was all about. I thought he may have rigged up a stand-up paddle with wheels, but what for? Balance? Is he that lame of a skateboarder? This didn't seem likely, given that he's a decent surfer and stand-up paddler. So I Googled down the rabbit hole and found out that it is a real product.

Behold the $150 "ultimate land paddle." Turns out, it doesn't have wheels. They are round stationary rubber thingies that grip the pavement.

You use this paddle to mimic the motion of stand-up paddling on your longboard. But you can also use the stick for balance. It's endorsed by Buttons Kaluhiokalani, which is a pretty heavy plug, but it still is kinda like a crutch for old-man riders. I don't think younger kids are going to use it that much. But I, being old, totally would.

Stand-up Paddle Magazine did a review of the Kahuna Big Stick here. The editor says:

I was honestly surprised how identical the stroke felt compared to a stand up paddle surf stroke. I thought it would be different, however, it wasn’t. Although I was only using the equipment for no more than half an hour, the stroke pattern and the muscle groups used felt the same as those used on a stand up paddle surfboard. The Big Stick seems to be a great way to train and stay in shape for stand up paddle surfing when the waves are down or when you just can’t make it to the ocean.

Giant rooftop penis

2009-03-25T09:08:00.000-04:00

After watching a documentary about Google Earth, 18 year-old Rory McInnes of Berkshire, England painted this giant sixty-foot penis on the roof of his parents 2 million-dollar house. For the past year he kept it secret, but a helicopter pilot noticed it recently and swooped down lower so his passengers could take pictures.

The Herald Sun reports that Rory's dad "confronted his four children, finding his answers when he reached Rory over the phone in Brazil. Part-way through gap-year travels, Rory could not hold back his laughter as he confessed: 'Oh, so you've found it then.' ''

His mom's reaction was the best. She said, "We don't want any more children, so the idea of sleeping under a giant fertility symbol is rather worrying.''

2009 Burton U.S. Open

2009-03-23T10:51:00.004-04:00

This Finnish kid Peetu Piiroinen is the new world champion. What an amazing run. This video is from yesterday at Stratton Mountain in Vermont, the final stop on the worldwide snowboard tour. The U.S. Open is held every year at Stratton, the best place to ride on the East Coast. Woo!

Poor Shaun White has been bumped to seventh in the world. Aww.

Death in Queens

2009-03-22T08:40:00.000-04:00

I took this from the Brooklyn Queens Expressway at the Kosciuszko Bridge. There's an expression that says you go to Brooklyn to get married and go to Queens to die. Brooklyn has a lot of churches, and Queens has a lot of cemeteries. Twenty nine, to be exact. And five million people are buried in them.

This one, Calvary Cemetery, is the biggest cemetery I've ever seen. It's managed by Saint Patrick's Cathedral. Wikipedia says that in the mid-1800s, half the people being buried there were the "Irish poor" under seven years old, due to a cholera epedimic in New York. There are now three million people buried at Calvary Cemetery. They're going to have to turn to cremation pretty soon if they want to fit anyone else in here.

Michelle Obama's organic garden

2009-03-19T21:46:00.011-04:00

"Almost the entire Obama family, including the president, will pull weeds, 'whether they like it or not,' Mrs. Obama said laughing." ~ New York Times

Did you know that one-third of Amercian kids (ages 2-19) are obese? That is scary -- and completely avoidable.

I think it's so cool that Michelle Obama is going to plant a big organic garden on the South Lawn. For only two hundred dollars in startup costs that include the seedlings and mulch, the garden will be a tad bit bigger than fifty feet long by fifty feet wide. It will include an impressive variety of food including herbs, veggies, and berries. There will be five varieties of lettuce, sugar snap peas, spinach, broccoli, radishes, rhubarb, shallots, onions, tomatillos, hot peppers, chard, shell peas, carrots, kale, and collards. Then there's the mint, cilanro, sorrel, thyme, oregano, sage, rosemary, chammomile, garlic chives, anise hyssop, and Thai basil. Oh and don't forget the bee hives for honey.

The Times reports,

Mrs. Obama, who said that she never had a vegetable garden before, said the idea
for it came from her experiences as a working mother trying to feed her
daughters, Malia and Sasha, a good diet. Eating out three times a week, ordering a pizza, having a sandwich for dinner took it’s toll. The children’s pediatrician told her she needed to be thinking about nutrition.
“He raised a flag for us,” she said, and within months the children lost weight.

Sexy People

2009-03-18T23:50:00.000-04:00

Tears. From crying. From laughing so hard. Maybe you will cry too. Go see Sexy People for yourself.

"Shipping Up to Boston"

2009-03-17T11:35:00.003-04:00

Oh yeah, Happy Saint Patrick's. Harr ti tarr. Here's the Dropkick Murphys live from their European tour last summer.

I'm a sailor peg
And I lost my leg
Climbing up the top sails
I lost my leg!

I'm shipping up to Boston ... wayy-yooo!
I'm shipping up to Boston ... wayyyyyy-yo!
I'm shipping up to Boston ... wayy-yooo!
I'm shipping off ... to find my wooden leg!

Penis extenders actually work?!

2009-03-17T11:08:00.006-04:00

Weirdest news of the month: researchers at the hospital at the University of Turin in Italy have proven that penis extenders work! They tested one stretcher in particular, the Andropenis Enlarger. I can barely type that without laughing. It sounds like alien porn cartoon character. Andropenis! Ha.

Anyway, guys found that it lengthened by 2 centimeters. No such luck with the girth, though. Here's the extended story from Science Daily. Get it? Extended? Ha.

Dave Grohl, Taylor Hawkins, Jimmy Page and John Paul Jones

2009-03-16T13:13:00.005-04:00

I was watching a Foo Fighters concert this morning on Palladia, the Viacom-owned high definition concert channel. The show was filmed last June at Wembley Arena in London. For an encore, Jimmy Page and John Paul Jones joined them on stage for "Rock and Roll." How did I miss this news for nine whole months? Amazing. Luckily, Dave Grohl gave up the mic to the always-smiling-and-happiest-drummer-in-rock-and-roll, Taylor Hawkins. And come to find out, Mr. Adorable's got some pretty good pipes. If you ever saw the video of Dave doing his best Robert Plant impersonation, you'll know why it's probably best he sticks to drums for Led Zep covers. If not, watch it below. It's hilarious.

Jim Kramer on The Daily Show

2009-03-13T09:56:00.005-04:00

Unless you're living in a pop-cultureless cave devoid of all media, you've probably heard of the battle going on between Jon Stewart and Jim Kramer of CNBC's "Mad Money." Jon threw a pie at the financial network, and although the pie was aimed more at Rick Santelli for calling foreclosed homeowners "losers," Jim Kramer responded. Back and forth, back and forth, and finally last night was the big showdown on The Daily Show. But it was not the circus I was expecting.

Wow. I was impressed by both Jon and Jim. Jon probed with hard-hitting, extremely relevant questions but did it in a way that was to the point, not over-the-top. Although he did lecture Jim, he could have made an ass out of his guest but he took the higher road, which was very gracious. Jim answered without bullshitting and was a lot classier than I was expecting. He didn't pull out any ridiculous business-major finance speak to make Jon look ignorant, nor did he try to back-pedal his way out of culpability. Kudos to both, and hopefully an (eleventh) Emmy for Jon.

The Daily Show With Jon StewartM - Th 11p / 10c

Jim Cramer Interview Outtake Pt. 1

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The Daily Show With Jon StewartM - Th 11p / 10c

Jim Cramer Interview Outtake Pt. 2

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Jim Cramer Interview Outtake Pt. 3

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Jim Cramer

You can now major in stem cells at Harvard

2009-03-12T13:04:00.001-04:00

"Today, with the executive order I am about to sign, we will bring the change that so many scientists and researchers, doctors and innovators, patients and loved ones have hoped for, and fought for, these past eight years: We will lift the ban on federal funding for promising embryonic stem cell research."
~ President Obama, March 9

Christopher Reeve would want to jump for joy. Just one day after President Obama lifted Bush's asinine, religious-based ban on the federal funding of human embryonic stem cell research, Harvard's undergrad college, the Faculty of Arts and Sciences, announced that FAS had late Tuesday voted to approve a new concentration (Harvard-speak for "major"). The new Human Developmental and Regenerative Biology (whose website is so new it's actually still blank) will be available through the Department of Stem Cell and Regenerative Biology which was formed in 2007. FAS reports:

One of the first of its kind in the nation, the new program will be available this fall to students starting with current freshman, the Class of 2012. The concentration will focus on human development, disease, and aging, and will provide “hands on” science education from the first semester.

According to the department's website,

The department's subject area is the study of the development, maintenance and repair of vertebrate tissues. How organisms, including humans, develop from a fertilized egg, maintain tissues in the adult body and repair dysfunctional or damaged tissue is a broad subject to be addressed using the approaches of developmental biology, regenerative medicine and aspects of tissue engineering. Emphasis will be placed on using these aspects of biology to inform the understanding of human diseases.

This is pretty exciting news, thanks to Obama! As he said regarding this issue, "medical miracles do not happen simply by accident."

For a more in-depth discussion about stem cell research, CBS has a nice little summary here.

April Vanity Fair's "The Pretty Young Things"

2009-03-11T19:46:00.007-04:00

Of course I had to immediately scoop up the new Vanity Fair. Love these guys! But even better than the cover . . .

. . . is this photo. Paul Rudd's expression is sublime, as are Jonah Hill's panty lines. The whole composition is so funny, but on the other hand I was like, "Whaaaaah?"

Oh, yeah, I remember!

Online at V.F. is this caption for Annie Leibovitz's parody of her own photo via the four funnymen:

JONAH HILL, PAUL RUDD, SETH ROGEN, and JASON SEGEL,

The Pretty Young Things
After appearing in Knocked Up and/or The 40-Year-Old Virgin, this quartet can now be considered summa cum laude graduates of the Judd Apatow school of comedy. Unlike so many comedy stars of the last two decades, they—and the other funny people depicted on the following pages—seem at their best when they work not as soloists but as part of a tightly knit ensemble. Say good-bye to the laughter of alienation and hello to a brand of comedy that fosters a feeling of community. Rather than dominate a crowd, they conspire with the people in the audience. Their strength lies in their charm. Even Rogen. Photographed by Annie Leibovitz (in tribute to her own March 2006 cover shot) on Stage 28 at Paramount Pictures Studio Lot, Los Angeles.

And we can't forget Russel Brand!

The Cape Cod Animal Hospital burns down

2009-03-10T19:42:00.002-04:00

Ron Schloerb/Cape Cod Times

Last night, there was a gas explosion at the Cape Cod Animal Hospital which is only a few miles away. Before it became an inferno, I used to work there as a vet assistant and in the boarding kennel feeding the doggies, grooming them, and slipping their meds into little treats, so this awful news story was especially sad to see.

Each morning I'd pull up on my bike and the sound of the stones crunching in the driveway under my tires would send the dogs into a barking frenzy. Not that they were excited to see me, per se. It was the fact that crunching stones + her = breakfast! You've never heard anything quite as cacophonous as thirty dogs barking at once in a concrete echo chamber known as a kennel. It was almost as painfully loud as standing in front of a Marshall Stack at a rock show must be.

Thankfully, the hospital's owner Dr. Scott Munson lives on the property. The Cape Cod Times reports,

He and a neighbor Ken Lacasse ran to the building and around to the back, where they used a cinder block to break down the door. Once inside the very smoky building, they rushed to open the cages with about a dozen dogs inside.
"All of the animals were very afraid," he said. "You're just in automatic mode, just trying to get the animals out. ... Just get them out, even if they run away."

Amazingly, only two cats perished, and one doggie is still on the loose. Hopefully they'll find him before he becomes coyote food. The story has spread to news services nationwide, but there's a slide show of nineteen photos here at the Cape Cod Times. It's eerie seeing all those cages empty. I used to love working here.

Ron Schloerb/Cape Cod Times

I hope Dr. Munson can rebuild soon.

If you want to donate money to the hospital, a fund has been set up at Bank North in the name of Cape Cod Animal Hospital Fire Fund. Their number is (508) 428-5700.

Ron Schloerb/Cape Cod Times

New England Clam Chowder, from ocean to bowl

2009-03-08T21:31:00.001-04:00

This is my my Dad (on the right) with his friend Harvey. These two old salts go shellfishing all the time here on Old Cape Cod. Saturday was quahog day. They belong to the Barnstable Association for Recreational Shellfishing, a non-profit that advocates for good water quality and shellfish propagation in town.

Yes, I realize the sexiness factor is probably more than you can bear. Surprisingly, even though the ocean temp was only 36 degrees, I became hot in these waders. Clamming is a damn good workout!

So what do you do with all these happy little mollusks? You make clam chowder. I followed the official recipe from Legal Sea Food's cookbook for their famous New England Clam Chowder and it came out amazing.

Legal's, as they're known, is a Boston restaurant chain that offers the best seafood dining in the city. They have locations in ten states now.

Whether it's littlenecks, clams, or quahogs, they open up after about seven minutes. Quickly remove them from the pot once they've opened because this is when they are tender. Like calamari, mollusks get tough when overcooked. Don't cook them beforehand and make the chowder the next day, or freeze them once they've cooked. This too will make them gross and chewy.

The Legal Sea Foods recipe calls for two ounces of "salt pork." I didn't even know what this was. It kind of looks like bacon and is sold in one-pound packs.

You render it for the liquid fat, in which you fry the diced onions. Cook until clear, 5-7 minutes, and then add your clam broth and some fish stock along with the cubed potatoes.

This is what it looks like right before you add cream and the chopped clams. Between the harvesting and the cooking, producing clam chowder is a lot of work, and now I know why this stuff sells for $48 a gallon, and $17 a quart.

But it's worth it! A most delicious chowder. Don't forget the oyster crackers. If you want to try the recipe, it's online here.

Mickey Rourke's bitchin sneakers

2009-03-06T12:03:00.003-05:00

I saw this picture of Mickey Rourke carrying his new travel companion, Jaws. Cuter than the dog are his slip-ons. What are those? At first I thought they were Vans, but after a little digging down the Google rabbit hole, I found out they are two hundred-dollar Dolce & Gabbanas. Nice couture kicks!

Let's name the new NASA nodule after Stephen Colbert

2009-03-04T20:59:00.003-05:00

The Colbert ReportMon - Thurs 11:30pm / 10:30c

Name the NASA Module After Stephen

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Stephen Colbert announced on last night's Report that he wants everyone to help convince NASA to name their latest baby after him. NASA's website declares:

NASA wants your opinion in naming the International Space Station’s Node 3 – a connecting module and its cupola – before the two segments travel to space and are installed on the orbiting laboratory. The name should reflect the spirit of exploration and cooperation embodied by the space station, and follow in the tradition set by Node 1- Unity- and Node 2- Harmony.

They have four different (lame) names from which to pick, but they also have a "write in your own" category.

Nation, go vote! You have until March 20th. Here's the website. And you may want use another browser if you usually use Firefox, as it doesn't seem to work.

And lo and behold, guess what's the top pick so far?

Top 10 Suggestions

COLBERT

XENU

BUDDY

TRANQUILITY

SYNERGY

VISION

VISTA

HORIZON

HOPE

ENTERPRISE

Poor Melinda, Bill won't let her have an iPhone.

2009-03-04T08:20:00.001-05:00

The new Vogue has an interview called "Gates of Heaven" with Melinda Gates. I found it somewhat amusing, but kind of shitty on Bill's part, that he won't allow her or the kids - Jennifer, 13, Rory, 10 and Phoebe, 7 - to enjoy Apple products. I guess she won't be downloading the new U2 album No Line on the Horizon released today from iTunes, either.

“There are very few things that are on the banned list in our household,” Gates tells me. “But iPods and iPhones are two things we don’t get for our kids.” Harsh, perhaps, but understandable. After all, it’s hard to walk around tethered to merchandise made by your father’s most famous competitor. Still, Gates acknowledges the inevitable lure of forbidden fruit. “Every now and then I look at my friends and say, ‘Ooh, I wouldn’t mind having that iPhone.’”

Newt as profiled by Matt Bai in the NYT Magazine

2009-03-02T13:28:00.007-05:00

Below is my favorite excerpt from yesterday's New York Times Magazine piece on the Republicans' great white hope. It's an interesting profile piece worth reading, written by Matt Bai. You can read the article in its entirety here.

Interviewing Gingrich, as I did on three occasions recently, is like stopping by the office of your thesis adviser when your thesis adviser has better things to do with his time. Polite but impatient, Gingrich answers most questions pedagogically, with impromptu seminars on history or social theory. It seems important to him that you know how much he knows — which, truth be told, is quite a lot.

There are moments when this routine can verge on the absurd, like something out of a Ricky Gervais sketch. At one point, I asked Gingrich, now a healthful-looking 65, about his sudden exit from Congress in 1998. “First of all, in the Toynbeean sense, I believe in departure and return,” he told me.

“In the what sense?” I asked.

“Arnold Toynbee,” he replied matter-of-factly, as if no one would walk into his office without having read “Lectures on the Industrial Revolution in England.” “I believe in the sense that, you know, De Gaulle had to go to Colombey-les-Deux-Églises for 11 years.”

“I’m sorry?”

“Departure and return. And someone once said to me, if you don’t leave, you can’t come back, because you’ve never left.”

I was still trying to process this nugget when the slouching Gingrich, now onto a point about steel plants closing, jolted upright. “The 1913 Girl Scouts manual!” he said, or at least that’s what it sounded like. “Which I should get a copy of.” He punched a button on his phone and dialed his assistant.

“Yes, sir?”

“Can you get me about four copies of the 1913 Girl Scouts manual, ‘How Girls Can Help Their Country’?” Gingrich asked. There was a long pause on the other end.

“O.K.”

“I think it’s on Amazon,” Gingrich said helpfully. He leaned back and proceeded to explain to me that the Girl Scouts manual contained a recommendation that every girl learn to perform two jobs, just in case one of them went away. What we needed, apparently, were more steelworkers who belonged to the Girl Scouts.

Bill Maher and America's favorite "giant bib"

2009-03-01T18:30:00.000-05:00

Thank God Bill Maher has returned from hiatus, and that there are people like him (not to mention Stephen Colbert and Jon Stewart) reminding us of what's truly important.

Did you know that decades after what's been described as an oil-dependence emergency, America has developed zero alternative-energy vehicles but has marketed the ShamWow!, the Flowbee, the BeDazzler, Crocs, sweat pants that say "Juicy" across the derriere, botox, Ginsu knives, Pinkberry, Dane Cook and the George Foreman grill?

In World War II, President Franklin Roosevelt and Congress agreed: It's crisis time, and they ordered Detroit to switch over and only make tanks and planes. And they did. Detroit got out of the car business altogether—on purpose, not the way they're doing it now. We haven't gotten it through our thick skulls: Party time is over. No more stretch Humvee with a hot tub. No more space tourism. No more cloning the cat. No more ordering the thing from TV that cuts onions with a vacuum.

We're worse than Michael Jackson. It's been 25 years since we had a hit and we still think we can live at the ranch. But the booze cruise has hit the iceberg. In fact, at the Vanity Fair Oscar party on Sunday, I felt like I was on the Titanic—everyone in their tuxedos and gowns sipping champagne . . . . not to mention Kate Winslet was standing right there —even as the ship had hit the iceberg.

There's one big difference, which is that, even though we have definitely hit the iceberg, it doesn't have to sink us. But we have to get serious. The engines have stopped, the boilers have exploded, the compartments are flooding. This is not a drill, this is the real thing. This is the moment, that moment where we all must steel our resolve, reach through our blankets' sleeves, grab our farting phones, and send off a mighty Twitter saying, "We have to get involved and learn how to do things and make things again!"

The power of Regenerist, perhaps?

2009-02-27T16:12:00.007-05:00

I blog from The Oyster Bar at the Providence airport. I was already on the plane when the captain announces that we're not leaving for another two hours due to a crazy windy rainstorm in Philadelphia. So I disembarked and found myself thirsty. The waitress just came over.

WAITRESS: Hello, what can I get for you?

ME: A pint of Bass please.

WAITRESS: May I see your I.D.?

ME: You cannot be serious.

WAITRESS (all pissy and serious): Yes ma'am, I am.

This happened last night, too.

ME: Hi, American Spirit Mediums, box please.

CONVENIENCE STORE CLERK: Sure, wait can I see your I.D.?

ME: Are you kidding me?

CONVENIENCE STORE GUY: We have to card anyone who looks under thirty, sorry.

ME: Ha! I'm old enough to be your mother! But hey, you just made my night.

As if that's not enough to make me laugh, a seventeen year-old guy hit on me last summer. Swear.

So. About this Benjamin Buttonesque anti-aging trip I seem to be on? I think it's my skin care regimen. That and drinking lots and lots of water. I've been using Olay Regenerist products for years now. Ladies, I'm telling you, this stuff is like the fountain of youth. Check out the Daily Regenerating Serum which goes on light and gel-like, and the lovely-scented, fluffy mousse-like Micro-sculpting cream. Love them.

Bobby Jindal IS Kenneth Parcell

2009-02-26T18:34:00.001-05:00

Here is NBC's response to bloggers' response to the Republicans' response to Obama. Brilliant promo, NBC.

Chris Matthews mutters "Oh God" over Jindal's appearance

2009-02-26T07:34:00.003-05:00

Chris Matthews, meh, I can take him or leave him. But this clip of him muttering "Oh God" as Louisiana's Governor Jindal comes out to make his retort to Obama's speech? Wow. So great.

What is with the antebellum background? Are they trying to be serious? It looks like Scarlett O'Hara might come sliding down that curvy banister any second.

And who knew Governor Jindall fathered a love child named Kenneth Parcell who works as an NBC page!

"Bill Maher's Life After W."

2009-02-25T10:31:00.001-05:00

Unfortunately, the interview with Bill Maher in the new (March 5) Rolling Stone by Sean Woods isn't online, because it's a good one. Here's an excerpt from page 36.

"The Republicans are geniuses at picking very small issues and making them giant issues. We've already seen it: Obama wants a more informal White House,
which has a lot of the conservatives enraged. In the Bush years, a jacket and a
tie were required to enter the Oval Office -- not to mention a strictly
enforced two-drink minimum. But Obama has said, 'We're gonna keep it a little
more laid-back,' and people are acting like he's going to cover the Oval Office
with black-light posters of Pam Grier, for God's sake. It's not like he's
showing up in cornrows with a neck tattoo. He's just taking his jacket off. And
by the way, you fucking clown posse, you may have forgotten, but when people are
working, that's what they do: They take their jacket off."

Dog sitting

2009-02-24T20:19:00.004-05:00

I'm dog sitting for this lovely girl, a ten year-old Belgian Shepherd. What a sweet doggie. She is very sad that her owner is gone, though. Most dogs don't mope as much as this breed, but when I researched it, I learned that they have to be with "their human." This breed tends to bond to one person, and they don't do well when left alone. To cheer her up I bought her Snausages and have been taking her everywhere I go. She loves the beach more than anything.

There's something about this shot that reminds me of one of Andrew Wyeth's melancholy and wintery paintings. She seems to be wondering, "Where is my dad and why did he leave me?"

Into the light.

"Angels" by Flight of the Conchords

2009-02-24T18:23:00.004-05:00

Catching up today on TV shows I've missed with HBO On Demand, I found this song from Flight of the Conchords Season 2, Episode 1 pretty damn funny. And if you can play A, E, F#, and B on your guitar, you can play this. Here's "Angels."

Calvin Klein soft core porn

2009-02-24T13:17:00.003-05:00

I got my new Rolling Stone today and in it was this very "comin' atchya" Calvin Klein Jeans two-page photo spread. My first thoughts were 1. they are all jail bait, 2. those man-children are way too good looking to be straight, and 3. although this is kinda hot and hell, I wouldn't kick these three waxed, chiseled male models out of anywhere for eating crackers, is this kind of risque or am I getting old?

Turns out this is a still from a new ad campaign. The video full on reminds me of soft core porn and looks like it was shot in 8mm for a Basic Filmmaking 101 class. And it's already been banned in the U.S. (go figure). You can watch it here. We sure as hell didn't have ads like this in the 80s. Back then, people were freaking out over a picture of Brook Shields just sitting there in her Calvins because the ad copy read, "Nothing comes between me and my Calvins." How things have changed.

Mickey Rourke's speech at the Independent Spirit Awards

2009-02-23T13:39:00.005-05:00

Last night on the red carpet, Mickey Rourke said "I'm going to clap my ass off" for Sean Penn if he won for his role as Harvey Milk. And it happened just like that. But Rourke's acceptance speech from Saturday night when he won Best Male Lead at the Independent Spirit Awards in Santa Monica, well, you've never heard anything like this. How great it would have been to hear this kind of stuff at the Oscar ceremony. Damn, this guy is just too cool.

And if the Nazi cougar wins . . .

2009-02-22T18:34:00.003-05:00

It's pretty feasible that Kate Winslet will be toting an Oscar statue to the Vanity Fair afterparty tonight (which she fully deserves). This most likely will result in even more Americans' shock and disapproval of The Reader portraying a hot sexual relationship between a 36 year-old woman and a fifteen year-old high school student in 1958 Germany. One critic even posed this issue to Winslet, which resulted in one pissed-off Oscar nominee. She responded:

I'm so sorry, "statutory rape"? I've got to tell you, I'm so offended by that. I genuinely am. To me, that is absolutely not this story at all. That boy knows exactly what he's doing. For a start, Hanna Schmitz thinks that he's seventeen, not fifteen, you know? She's not doing anything wrong. They enter that relationship on absolutely equal footing. Statutory rape – really please, don't use that phrase. I do genuinely find it offensive actually. This is a beautiful and very genuine love story and that is always how I saw it.

For the record, the age of consent in Germany at that time was (and still is) fourteen. But the scandalously-younger-man-with-cougar aspect of the film is the least of its worries.

The Reader has gotten flack from people claiming it's a Holocaust apology, and, incredibly, a Holocaust denial.

Elie Wiesel, a Holocaust survivor and Nobel Peace Prize winner (whom I've had the honor of meeting as a staff photographer for my university newspaper), has praised The Reader as “a film that deals powerfully with Germany’s reconciliation with its past.” He said that “it is not about the Holocaust; it is about what Germany did to itself and its future generations.” He called it “a faithful adaptation of an important book, that is still relevant today as genocide continues to be practiced around the world.”

Holocaust survivor Abe Foxman, the Anti-Defamation League's National Director, agrees with Mr. Wiesel. "As we move further away from the Holocaust we must continue to tell the story of the Shoah in ways that will reach and touch new generations."

If you haven't seen the film, spoilers follow.

Although I haven't yet read the novel, the film version makes it pretty clear during the courtroom scene that Winslet's character Hanna Schmitz is a non-questioning, non-thinking, non-pondering sheep. She is no enlightened liberal, just a simple, uneducated working class loner. When asked by the judge why she accepted her duties as an SS guard, she asks him, "What would you have done?" She's not being a wiseass, she is genuinely baffled by his question. It never occurred to her to defy orders from headquarters. When asked why she let three hundred people burn to death, she flips out and screams about how she couldn't afford to lose control over her prisoners, banging her hand on the desk in anger. She just doesn't get it, and it will be many more years before she finally does.

Another "hit you over the head" moment in the film occurs when Michael's law-school classmate argues that all Germans, like Hanna, should have known better. "Everyone knew. The question is, how could you let this happen? Why did you not kill yourself when you found out?"

Bernhard Schlink, the author of the novel upon which the film is based, met with Charlie Rose in December. They had a poignant, frank discussion you can watch online here about his coming to terms with learning that people close to him had done some horrible things during the Holocaust, and how it affected his relationships. He also explains the situation in terms of generations in an interview with NPR:

[The Reader] is about "the problem of what does it mean to us [and] how do we cope with the fact that someone we love, admire [and] respect turns out to have committed an awful crime?"
Speaking as a member of Germany's "second generation" — the generation that came after World War II — Schlink explains: "It's an unsolvable problem — the second generation can't just expel the parent generation from its love and solidarity."
And yet, he says, not breaking from the guilty often means that the second generation becomes entangled in that guilt. For Schlink, the conflict came to light when he learned that one of his favorite teachers had denounced people to the Gestapo during World War II.
Schlink hopes that his fiction will help the generations to come:
"The second generation finally wasn't and isn't silenced by revulsion, shame and guilt," he says. "We all tried ... to make that past speak out for our [generation] and — even more so — the next generations."

Mickey Rourke should win

2009-02-21T08:46:00.000-05:00

Yesterday in an effort to catch up on my Oscar homework, I sat in the theater for an ass-numbing six and a half hours watching The Wrestler, followed by Frost/Nixon, and ending with The Reader. I've already seen Slumdog and The Visitor, but not Benjamin Button and Milk.

I'm hoping that Mickey Rourke will win Best Actor. He has had some amazing roles in his day and has been unfairly underrated. I met him and his brother Joey when they co-owned a little boutiqueyish candy store in Beverly Hills called Mickey and Joey's (sadly, Joey died of lung cancer in 2004). This was back in 1989 when I was dating a friend of theirs when they were all bad-boy biker types peeling around L.A. in custom Harleys. Mickey had just finished playing Charles Bukowski in Barfly (1987) and I was in awe. He was handsome and charismatic and dangerously badass and a brilliant Method acting weirdo and I was, like all women back then, a little bit smitten. Regardless of his je ne sais quoi, the guy always was a great actor and it's cool to see him back in the saddle. He deserves this win.

About his face . . .

. . . which seems to be the hot topic du jour. Why he looks so ravaged and different is because he was a professional boxer for five or six years back in the 90s, and his face got pummeled. He needed multiple reconstructive surgeries -- five on his nose and one on his cheek -- and consecutive plastic surgeries to correct damage. Yeah he looks different, but give him a break. And he's 56 years old now.

If you don't know too much about Mr. Rourke, The Onion's A.V. Club has a great little Mickey Rourke 101 Primer .

Go tanning, angry people of New England!

2009-02-20T08:20:00.008-05:00

Yet another crazy anger-management story in the news this morning. This time, in a suburb of Boston, a guy was at a Dunkin Donuts waiting for his coffee. It was taking too long for his patience level so he left, but probably in a huff, letting the Dunkin Donuts guy know that he was pissed. The two got into an argument, and the Dunkin Donuts guy followed the customer out to his Jeep and in a show of over-the-top fuck-youness, slashed all four tires with a pocket knife.

I think I know why New England people (not to mention the crazy chimpanzee in Connecticut who ripped the face off his owner's friend) are flipping their pancakes. It's this brutal shitty weather!

When we don’t get enough exposure to sunlight our moods suffer. More specifically, serotonin levels, a hormone associated with elevating your mood, rise when you’re exposed to sunlight. Studies like this one show that exposure to UVA rays really does make you feel better. So if Old Man Winter is a little devil on your shoulder encouraging you to beat someone with a driver or slash their radials, perhaps you might want to look into a visit to your local tanning salon to warm up and chill the hell out.

He got the sarcasm beaten right out of him

2009-02-18T09:30:00.005-05:00

Today's best Cape Cod Times story recounts an altercation between two grown men -- over rude manners -- resulting in one man beating the other, in classic Cape Cod fashion, with his golf club. I'm with the door-holder guy. What he should have said was, "You're welcome, your highness. I'll be sure to sprinkle rose petals in your path the next time, too."

Man allegedly clubbed by teed-off Falmouth golfer
By Aaron Gouveia

agouveia@capecodonline.com

February 18, 2009

FALMOUTH — An alleged lack of manners at a Sandwich Road gas station led a local man to beat another man with a golf club, the police said.
Police officers were called to the Hess gas station at the corner of Sandwich Road and Route 151 at 6:45 a.m. Monday following an altercation between two customers. The incident began with one man not saying "thank you" to another man as he held the door open for him, police said.

When he was exiting the gas station, police said, a 50-year-old East Falmouth man held the door open for Carlos Navarro, 38, of Falmouth. When Navarro allegedly failed to thank the man for opening the door, the 50-year-old man allegedly uttered a sarcastic "thank you" to Navarro, police said.

Navarro told police he believed he had been disparaged, which led to a heated argument. Navarro then went to his car and retrieved a golf club — a wood not an iron — and struck the alleged victim several times in the stomach and legs, police said.

Police said the alleged victim suffered minor injuries in the incident.

Navarro was charged with assault and battery with a dangerous weapon in Falmouth District Court yesterday and was ordered to stay away from the alleged victim. Navarro faces a pretrial hearing March 31.

My Dad's handkerchief mouse

2009-02-16T21:06:00.005-05:00

I was at my parents' house today and my babysitter Jimmy from back in the day (as in the 70s!) who is also a dear friend of our whole family happened to stop by with his wife and kids. We got my Dad to do his "handkerchief mouse" which he's been doing for probably fifty years now, at least. It never ceases to entertain little kids and give us old farts a good laugh, too.

Are you a Grand Titan of the KKK? No? Oh, just chilly then!

2009-02-16T08:29:00.013-05:00

What does bat-shit-crazy "Da Vinci Code" monk Silas have in common with . . .

Scary KKKish crucifix-bearing parade marchers . . .

who look like the underground orgy-digging "Eyes Wide Shut" club . . .

who closely resemble old school Trekkies . . .

who spawned the Next Generation of desperately-in-need-of-girlfriends Jedi wannabe fanboy guys.

So what do all these people have in common?

A lot . . . with infomercial believing, thermostat-wary, TV-addicted Americans.

Can we just talk about this phenomena? First of all, Snuggies are so damn lowbrow trailerpark UGLY. Second, they are $28 including the shipping, which is a ridiculous price to pay for something this stupid. Third, and scariest of all, over 4 million of these things have been sold.

What is wrong with a bathrobe, the lazy man's classic attire of choice? Do we really need to look like we're channeling a Grand Titan of the Ku Klux Klan? People of America! Get a grip! Who would you rather resemble?

A pill to erase bad memories

2009-02-16T07:52:00.000-05:00

"Removing bad memories . . . will change our personal identity since who we are is linked to our memories. It may perhaps be beneficial in some cases, but before eradicating memories, we must reflect on the effects that this will have on individuals, society and our sense of humanity."

~Dr Daniel Sokol, lecturer in Medical Ethics at St George's, University of London

The BBC reports that Dutch scientists have discovered that the beta blocker propranolol has another effect besides helping heart health. It erases bad memories. Now everyone, it seems, will be able to experience their very own Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind. I wonder if this will become the next ridiculously overpriced street drug like Oxycontin.

Read the story of this bizarre discovery for yourself.

The Obama Mashups have landed

2009-02-13T08:22:00.002-05:00

He barely finished recording the audio version of his memoir Dreams From My Father, and already the club mixes are spreading throughout YouTube Land. Although he's just quoting his friend Ray, it's pretty funny hearing Obama say
“There are white folks, and then there are ignorant motherfuckers like you,” and “You know that guy ain’t shit. Sorry-ass motherfucker ain’t got nothing on me.”

The Young Flyers

2009-02-12T20:24:00.011-05:00

So I came to Western Mass to see my nephew bang the skins in the Battle of the Bands at a club called the Elevens in Northampton. His band, The Young Flyers, won (WOO!) and proceed to the finals this Sunday night. Right on. I'm really proud of the kid. Nice job Andrew, Matt, Chris, Ben, and Jay!

Bass player Jay and Zildjian Boy Setting up.

Here's Andrew getting plugged in. Ha! I had to laugh when I saw this pic of the patch cord happening to position itself hilariously just as I snapped the photo.

Why Ben wears a Day of the Dead mask whenever he plays, I don't know. One of the judges wrote on his official sheet, "Vocals is hot, and looks French." Um, Matt's from Kansas.

My niece Kate, my sister Debby, and Andrew post-performance. The band rocked, as Andrew's expression shows.

I love this pic of Andrew chilling after their set with his awesome girlfriend Rebecca. I finally got to meet her this weekend and she is such a lovely person. They are a great team.

The smoking Chinese toddler

2009-02-12T09:51:00.003-05:00

I'm not sure which is more disturbing - the smoking, or the fact that he's perched on the motorcycle, and without a helmet, no less. Nice parenting.

Stop Pouting: A message to Republicans

2009-02-12T08:46:00.003-05:00

Closet blogger friend/smarty pants Harvard guy Bob sent out the following well-researched, most excellent essay this morning. Kudos to him for clarifying Rush's misconceptions. He writes:

Stop Pouting

Although a final House/Senate has not been finalized, both Houses have agreed to some form of a stimulus bill. For six years, Republicans controlled the House, the Senate, and the White House. During that time, they squandered the largest budget surplus in American history and swiftly converted it into the largest deficit in American history. They gave us the worst economic times since the Great Depression.

The Republicans’ AM radio spokesperson, drug addict Rush Limbaugh, has stated that he hopes that Obama fails as President. He and Republicans predict that the stimulus bill will fail because the New Deal did not solve the Great Depression—World War II solved it. According to the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics, the unemployment rate was 25% in 1933 when the New Deal was introduced but by 1937 the New Deal brought it down to 14.3%. Due to pressure from the opposition party, some of the New Deal programs were modified. As a result, unemployment swiftly rose to 19% in 1938 and we entered a new recession. Corrective actions were taken and by 1941 the unemployment rate was down to 9.9%. The numbers quoted by I-get-a-Rush-from-drugs-Limbaugh and Fox News are false. Moreover, WW II was the largest government employment plan in our history and the Depression was solved by government stimulus programs.

The Republicans’ only idea is to reduce taxes. In 2002, a tax rebate was issued. Many economists agreed that a fast infusion of cash would spark the economy. Based on economic theory and free market history, it was a good plan. Unfortunately, it didn’t work. In spite of that experience, they reduced taxes—but mostly for the wealthy. It didn’t work. They tried it again in early 2008—it didn’t work! Why do they think what failed three times will suddenly work this time? It won’t, and their insistence verifies that they have no new ideas and all they can do is complain about FDR. They are mad that they lost the White House and both chambers, so they are pouting. Well, they lost for good reasons.

Monday at the Moan and Dove

2009-02-09T21:49:00.005-05:00

This is the Moan and Dove in Amherst, one of my favorite bars. It's a warm, cozy oasis of great alternative music, flickering pillar candles, cool art, and a huge selection of great imports and microbrews. It's fun to be back in town for a visit.

My sister Debby, my nephew and drummer extraordinairre Andrew, and me.

Old Jews Telling Jokes

2009-02-08T08:26:00.000-05:00

Old Jews Telling Jokes is a great new website. Here's an excerpt from it:

Some of the best [jokes] provide a window to the culture of a bygone era. They can reveal the concerns of a generation or even the generation before. Anxieties of coming to a new country, of prospering, of assimilating, of having families, of fearing and worrying about, well, everything. Humor was and is the ultimate anti-depressant.

My father gathered twenty of his friends to share their favorite jokes. We set three rules for the production: the joke-tellers were to be Jewish, at least sixty years of age and they were to tell their favorite joke – the one that always kills.

Here, you will find them, Old Jews Telling Jokes.

-- Sam Hoffman

Posted On January 22, 2009

A self-indulgent, proud-Auntie blog

2009-02-06T16:46:00.002-05:00

This is my nephew Alex who's graduating from high school this year. Auntie is proud he doesn't suck at basketball. Unlike him, I usually missed my free throws.

Bill Gates unleashes hungry mosquitoes at TED conference

2009-02-04T19:50:00.006-05:00

(pic: TED / James Duncan Davidson)

This is so great. Bill Gates, who's retired from software and has since turned his attention to other matters, was speaking at the TED conference. TED, which stands for Technology, Entertainment and Design, is an organization that has this annual conference in Long Beach during which, according to TED's website, "now brings together the world's most fascinating thinkers and doers, who are challenged to give the talk of their lives (in 18 minutes)."

One of Bill's passions is to stop malaria (the other is to improve our dismal educational system). He and his wife's foundation has spent over a billion dollars fighting the disease, but perhaps he didn't think that the audience was taking it seriously enough. So he opens a jar of mosquitoes and says, "Not only poor people should experience this."

Who'd have thought Gates had such a great sense of humor? He should have his own "Punk'd" show. I can't wait to see the video of his TEDTalk, which is supposed to be online in 24 hours. Check here to see if it is.

I went to the Gates Foundation website, specifically the section about malaria, and found out that 800,000 people die from malaria each year. In Africa, 2,000 kids die from it each day. Jesus! His foundation is working to develop malaria drugs, a vaccine, to improve mosquito control, to develop public awareness, and ultimately to eradicate the disease.

Quahogging in the blizzard?

2009-02-03T22:54:00.004-05:00

It's been snowing like mad all day today on the Cape. It's supposed to snow through tomorrow. The wind is howling at 30 miles an hour. And it's really cold. My dad and I had planned on going clamming tomorrow for quahogs, which entails wetsuits and waders and the whole cold-water winter protection thing and standing up to your waist in the 35-degree Atlantic with a pitchfork digging in the sand for your mollusks. Which I was kind of psyched to do, before the blizzard hit. Earlier tonight he says:

DAD: It looks like it won't be too bad to go quahogging tomorrow.

ME: Oh yeah?

DAD: Yup it's going to be warmer. It's supposed to be 29 degrees. That will be pleasant.

Pleasant! That is the exact adjective he used. I'm trying to be one of these hardy New England Yankee Cape Codder types, but come on now. Seriously.

Who cares if Michael Phelps sucks down bong hits? Really.

2009-02-03T22:30:00.005-05:00

I've always found Michael Phelps totally dorky. But when I saw the notorious pic of his lips smushed into the top of that bong, I actually had more respect for him than previously. "Gee maybe he's not such a big doofus after all," was pretty much what my thought bubble said as I mentally criticized the backwards-baseball-hat-a-la-frat-boy. Anyhow, he's twenty-three years old! Who doesn't toke up at a college party when they're twenty-three?

Here to back up dolphin-boy and to validate that he is not the scum-sucking, child-disappointing criminal drug addict that the media is making him out to be, let's keep things in perspective by highlighting some of our more beloved tokers.

Willie Nelson. The guy is seventy-five years old, tours 200 days a year and he smokes every single day. Enough said.

Academy Award winner/High Times cover girl (05/03) Frances McDormand. Go Marge Gunderson!

Big brain Carl Sagan. "I am convinced that . . . the devastating insights achieved when high are real insights; the main problem is putting these insights in a form acceptable to the quite different self that we are when we're down the next day." Now that's really contemplating the cosmos.

Bigger brain and 1965 Nobel Prize winning physicist Richard Feynman, who figured out the whole quantum electrodynamics thing. He started smoking in his fifties when hanging out with fellow smarty pants scientist John Lilly. His Harvard colleague Lester Grinspoon writes, "Feynman, by courageously acknowledging his ongoing use of marijuana, won the respect and appreciation of many and the enmity of others."

Bill Maher, one of television's brightest, big-picture thinking talk show hosts. He has the best lines.

“I’m getting tired of being treated like a criminal or a second class citizen by people who, through their preference for liquor or pills for mood alteration, show not a superiority of taste but an inferiority.”
"The Partnership For a Drug-Free America really isn't for a drug-free America. It's a lobbying arm for the liquor and prescription drug industries."
"The most interesting place you can ever travel is inside your own head. And if you've never even tried any drugs, then you're always staying home."

Jon Stewart. Probably the most brilliant mind straddling the pop culture/political divide. Who can forget his righteous roles in films like Half Baked and Death to Smoochy? I bet he wishes he could.

Bill Murray was arrested in 1970 trying to smuggle 9 pounds of herb through customs at Chicago O'Hare Airport. Whoops.

Pierce Brosnan had his picture taken at Malibu head shop Dementia as he purchased a $1000 bong in 2003. Star published the photos. That's a seriously pricey piece of equipment, Bond.

Matt Stone, co-creator of South Park. Supposedly Towelie came to him during one of his high times.

Emmy winner, Oscar nominee and cannibus activist Woody Harrelson, and stoner bro, the perpetually shirtless Matthew McConaughney, who was busted in 1999 for possession in Austin. While playing the bongos. Naked. Read the hilarious police detail here.

Seth Rogan and James Franco, whose Pineapple Express was the best pot-smoking movie to come along since the Cheech and Chong days. Was this a real joint they sparked up at the MTV Move Awards last year? Who knows. My Magic 8-Ball says

Jack Black! Sugar Buds!

Drew Barrymore and Cameron Diaz. Here are the party girls enjoying some Hawaiian da kine bud. The website even had Big Brotherish closeups of the roach.

Grammy winner Justin Timberlake was stoned when Aston Kutcher Punk'd him back in the day. When asked if he were high by Entertainment Weekly, he said, "Incredibly. Yeah, that was a trippy experience. That was why I was completely glassy-eyed." And Justin supposedly has gotten baked with his mom. His mom?!

Snoop Dogg and MILF Weed afficianado. This Weeds special guest appearance is so great.

Other dabblers in the greenery include:

Dan Aykroyd
Candy Barr
John Belushi
Lewis Black
Michael Bloomberg
Paul Bowles
Bill Bradley
Richard Branson
Pierce Brosnan
Christopher Buckley
Lord Buckley
William F. Buckley
Bush Family
Aaron Carter
Jack Carter
Fidel Castro
Neal Cassady
Bing Crosby
David Crosby
Macaulay Culkin
Matt Damon
Rodney Dangerfield
Bob Denver
John Denver
Alexandre Dumas
Melissa Etheridge
Walker Evans
Richard Feynman
Ford family
Errol Flynn
Morgan Freeman
Art Garfunkel
Ringo Garza
Will Geer
Gilberto Gil
Newt Gingrich
Alan Ginsberg
Jackie Gleason
Larry Hagman
Gary Hall
Woody Harrelson
Ed Harris
John Hay
Daryl Hannah
Paris Hilton
David Hockney
Whitney Houston
Victor Hugo
Chrissie Hynde
Jefferson Airplane
John F. Kennedy
John Kerry Queen Latifah
Heath Ledger
Phil Lesh
John Lennon
Lindsay Lohan
Jack London
Courtney Love
Norman Mailer
Bob Marley
Groucho Marx
Matthew McConaughey
Margaret Mead
Mezz Mezzrow
Paul McCartney
Frances McDormand
George Michael
John Stuart Mill
Robert Mitchum
Randy Moss
Willie Nelson
Jack Nicholson
Peggy Noonan
M. Scott Peck
Pablo Picasso
Popeye the Sailorman
Francois Rabelais
Ross Rebagliati
Arthur Rimbaud
Diego Rivera
Carl Sagan
Susan Sarandon
Arnold Schwarzenegger
William Shakespeare
Donna Shalala
Sarah Silverman
Robert Smith
Aaron Sorkin
Sting
Oliver Stone
Charlize Theron
Margaret Trudeau
Pierre Elliot Trudeau
John Trudell
Ted Turner
Oliver Twist
Queen Victoria
Pancho Villa
Prince Harry
Ricky Williams
William Butler Yeats

and Michael Phelps.

Bruce Springsteen's epic testicle-smashing power slide

2009-02-02T11:34:00.002-05:00

Funniest moment of the Superbowl.

Cape Cod cop is "wicked pissah." Literally.

2009-01-29T13:05:00.005-05:00

Perpetrator/Officer Joseph Houston

It’s not even February yet, but already we’ve found our favorite headline of 2009 in the Cape Cod Times: "Brewster Man Accused of Urinating on Metallica Fan." ~RollingStone.com

There is never anything good in the Cape Cod Times, except for this story which caused me to wonder for a second if I weren't actually reading News of the Weird instead. Here's the whole thing, because it's just too good not to share in its entirety.

By Doug Fraser

dfraser@capecodonline.com

January 26, 2009

BREWSTER – A Brewster police officer is on paid administrative leave after allegedly urinating on a fellow music-lover at a Metallica concert in Boston and then refusing to leave TD Banknorth Garden when security guards ejected him for disorderly conduct.
A Massachusetts Bay Transportation Authority Transit Police report from that night identifies Brewster Police Officer Joseph Houston, 29, as being thrown out of the Jan. 18 rock concert by security guards at around 10 p.m.
Although he has been charged only with trespassing, Houston appeared to be drunk, flashed his badge in an attempt to get back into the concert, called a black MBTA officer “Obama,” and had been asked to leave the concert after he allegedly urinated on another patron, according to the report.
Citing an ongoing departmental investigation, Brewster Police Chief Richard Koch would not confirm the officer’s identity but did confirm the incident happened. He got word that Sunday night that an officer had been arrested, went to Boston the next day, on Monday, and immediately placed the officer on leave, he said.
Houston earned $50,456.35 including overtime and detail pay, in 2008, according to town records.
Boston attorney Thomas Drechsler, who, according to court records, is representing Houston in this case, did not return two phone requests for comment today.
Houston’s Brewster phone number is unlisted and he was not at home this evening.
A Boston Police spokesperson said there was no record of any charges filed by her department against Houston. Suffolk County District Attorney’s office spokesman Jake Wark said there were no charges filed against Houston beyond trespassing, which carries a maximum $100 fine and/or 30 days in jail. Houston is due back in court on Feb. 5 on that charge, Wark said.
But Wark said the victim could file charges at Boston Municipal Court where a clerk magistrate hearing would determine the need for a trial. Those charges would not be public until after the hearing.

Rolling Stone writes:

The Cape Cod Times doesn’t elaborate on the details, but we’re assuming it went down like this: An obviously drunk Houston really had to go to the bathroom, but rather than miss even one note of “All Nightmare Long,” he reasoned that the appropriate thing to do was to use the poor guy standing in front of him as his own private urinal. Whatever happened, Houston was booted from the venue by 10 p.m., well before Metallica were finished performing, so maybe actually running to use the restroom would have been the better move.

Send Dick Cheney fan mail at his real home address!

2009-01-28T09:26:00.001-05:00

(AP Photo/The Wyoming Tribune Eagle, Michael Smith)

Cheney in Wyoming last week, sitting in the wheelchair he stole from a pediatric terminal cancer patient, after throwing the child out of the chair and into a cold ditch.

Wonkette reports that the Vice Presidential residence is no longer shrouded in pixelly secrecy when viewed on Google Maps. In fact, the image miraculously turned lucid the day Rollerdevil Cheney moved out and the Bidens moved in. Behold the before and afters:

I was curious where the Evildoer doth dwell now. I know he's got digs in Jackson Hole, a place to which I almost moved eight years ago due to its amazing dumps of fresh powder (I even had been offered a job at the National Museum of Wildlife Art which included an all-mountain ski pass). Anyhow, I did a little digging down the Google Rabbit Hole, and voila. Click on the image to enlarge.

Granted this PDF document is circa 2000, but unless they've sold their place at the Teton Pines Resort and Country Club, then this is where to find him should you want to send a fan letter or a phone call of congratulatory kudos for such a Vice Presidential job well done. Or should you want to bring a pan of brownies by, my guess is it's the one surrounded by the moat, which is probably filled with hungry alligators.

Russell Brand gets laid good when the telly is bad

2009-01-25T20:38:00.007-05:00

Russell working his magic on the Queen Mum

~ Guache, philandering, yet completely hot sex maniac Russell Brand, on why so many women want to have sex with him, as told to GQ:

“Well, I don’t know—I’m sure there are as many reasons as there are women—but I think if there is a consistency, I think that there’s something that’s very truthful in it. I’m completely honest, I completely love them, and I’m completely in alignment with something that’s truthful. If I was going up to women and going, ‘Oh, all right darling, you’ve got lovely hair, do you want to come back to my place, I’ve got a Jacuzzi’—all of which is true—I don’t think it would work. But honestly, the thirst is so powerful: ‘Oh, my God, you’re so beautiful, how can you not come with me now, it’s going to be brilliant. Why would you not? What are you doing? What’s on the telly? What are you going to do instead?’ I’m not a [real] estate agent with a Porsche key ring on my thumb. The thing I’m offering I can deliver.”

The Amherst Police Report

2009-01-25T12:55:00.004-05:00

It's that time again. My sister Debby is visiting from Amherst (MA) and brought my favorite reading material along with her -- the Amherst Bulletin's Police Report. These gems are from the January 23rd edition.

ACCIDENTS

Vroom vroom.
A vehicle went off Bay Road into a snowbank, police said. The vehicle was able to leave under its own power, police said.

Accident adjustment
6:27 p.m. One driver said she would check with her chiropractor following a minor two-car accident on College Street, police said.

ANIMAL COMPLAINTS

How ya doin'? Need some more Snausages? Is that hay in your doghouse soft enough? Got some bitches comin' over later tonight? Good, glad to hear it.
11:00 a.m. Police checked the well-being of a husky mix dog on Cottage Street.

Moooove it.
1:53 p.m. Two small cows in the middle of South East Street were moved from the road by their owner.

Lookin' for a kitty snack?
8:48 A coyote in the parking lot of Hampshire Veterinary was not located by police.

What's with the bovine confinement issues?
6:12 p.m. A cow loose on North East Street was not found by police.

Cesar Milan, Dog Whisperer and Honorary Amherst Police Department Member.
10:05 a.m. Police located a dog at Puffer's Pond barking at people in an aggressive manner. The owner was advised to train the dog to do less barking and not let it run loose.

CITIZEN ASSISTANCE

Dumbest waste of Amherst taxpayers' money yet
6:52 p.m. Police provided information to a woman who came to the police station seeking advice about subletting her apartment for the next semester.

DISTURBANCES

What kind of payment arrangement with the contractor did she have, exactly?
5:50 p.m. A North Amherst woman called police with concerns that a contractor she is having work on a new house might tell her husband about the project if she doesn't pay him. The woman was advised to call back if any threats are made against her by the contractor.

The pain-in-the-ass drunk guy that nobody wants to hang out with anymore.
12:12 a.m. A man causing problems outside the downtown bars after being removed from one was sent on his way with a responsible person.

FIGHTS

Twenty?
2:22 a.m. Police kept the peace at a fight involving 20 people on Philips Street.

LARCENY

Just needed to go to the convenience store for a cup of coffee, thanks!
6:43 a.m. A vehicle stolen from Rolling Green Drive while it was being warmed up was returned a short time later. The suspect got out of the car, ran from the scene and was not located.

SUSPICIOUS ACTIVITY

The Facebook narc.
3:13 p.m. A teenage girl who came to the police station said she was concerned her classmates at the high school might think she was responsible for the recent release of Facebook pictures showing Amherst students drinking alcohol and in possession of marijuana.

Peep peep!
5:49 p.m. A man who has been going onto decks at Village Park and peering into windows was not located by police.

Have you taken your meds today, ma'am?
4:10 p.m. Police spoke to an Amherst woman concerned her neighbors might be plotting to harm her.

TRAFFIC

Ice problems (no not crystal meth kind of ice, the cold kind of ice).
7:56 a.m. Ice built up on Main Street near South Whitney street was determined to have been caused by melting snow run off and was not placed there deliberately.

Thrilling.
7:46 a.m. A vehicle that tried to pass a school bus on Sand Hill Road at State Street went out of control and into a snowbank, police said.
The vehicle was gone when police got there.

More thrilling.
5:36 p.m. A man walking in the middle of East Hadley Road was advised to stay on the sidewalk for his own safety.

Also a thriller.
8:26 p.m. A Christmas tree abandoned in the middle of Hallock Street was removed by police.

Most thrillingest ever.
9:13 a.m. A large piece of cardboard in the middle of College Road was removed from the road.

View the Inauguration with a "Fullscreen Gigapan Viewer"

2009-01-23T21:30:00.008-05:00

A photographer named David Bergman took a 1,474 megapixel picture of Obama's inauguration. I have never seen anything like this. You can zoom and zoom and keep zooming in to bizzarely close details. I've been examining the photo for twenty minutes, playing "Where's Waldo" with the politicos -- "There's Rollerdevil Cheney! My, Bush looks pissed. There's pre-seizure Teddy! Look at Hillary giving Bill a look! There's Aretha in her giant bow hat! Is Clarence Thomas sleeping?"

Hey there's not much to do on a frigid January night in the boonies on Cape Cod, and this is pretty entertaining.

Learn how Bergman made this impressive image here at his website. Here's an excerpt:

I made a panoramic image showing the nearly two million people who watched President Obama’s inaugural address. To do so, I clamped a Gigapan Imager to the railing on the north media platform about six feet from my photo position. The Gigapan is a robotic camera mount that allows me to take multiple images and stitch them together, creating a massive image file.

My final photo is made up of 220 Canon G10 images and the file is 59,783 X 24,658 pixels or 1,474 megapixels. It took more than six and a half hours for the Gigapan software to put together all of the images on my Macbook Pro and the completed TIF file is almost 2 gigabytes.

Best moments of the Inauguration

2009-01-21T23:22:00.002-05:00

In addition to the speech, the millions of people, the tears, the bizarre mix of politicians and rock stars, and the more obvious amazing Inaugural festivities, I've also been relishing in . . .

#1. Rollerdevil!

HAHA. What a fitting end to this diabolical douchebag. Thank God we are finally rid of Cheney once and for all. He reminds me of a cross between

and

#2. Bedazzlers Unite!

Aretha's headgear was so kickassly fitting for the woman whose rock-star peers recently voted her the Greatest Singer Of All Time. What an awesome crazy hat. This is the guy who designed it, for $179 in the Motor City itself.

I wonder if he used this:

#3: Teddy Kennedy channeling Prohibition-era gangsters.

Perhaps not as bedazzling as Aretha's hat, but damn, doesn't he look dapper in his fedora? Maybe it was a tip of the hat (literally) to the old style of his father, Joe Kennedy Senior, who really was a Prohibition-era bootlegging Irish gangster.

#5. Old Bush's dead bunny hat.

Yet one more excellent hat moment. Between the fashion cacophony of the hat, the yellow turtleneck and the purple scarf, he looks like he lives in the West Village. I'm digging the look. And I have this same crazy Russian-y fur hat. It is the warmest thing that has ever and will ever sit on my head.

#6: The Oath Thing. More to this flub than meets the eye. Did Chief Justice John Roberts do this accidentally on purpose? President Obama was one of 22 senators who voted against putting Roberts on the Supreme Court in 2005. Makes you wonder if he was trying to prevent our man from becoming The Man in the House.

#7. The unbelievable adorableness of these two munchkins.

#8. The first official Presidential shaka in U.S. history!

This was when the Punaho School marching band passed by. Punaho's his alma mater.

#9. Presidential Daughter Shaka-ing the Punaho kids.

#10: Relief. See ya!

#11. Awe. Nobody was immune to the awesomeness, even these serious-type Marine guys at the Commander-in-Chief's Ball.

#12. Romance and sexiness return to the White House!

Snow! Woo hoo!

2009-01-15T11:49:00.002-05:00

The view here at my sister's home in Little Compton, Rhode Island. Talk about a drastic change!

"Not all inheritences are good"

2009-01-15T07:29:00.005-05:00

My friend Bob is a closet blogger, eschewing a website for emailing his essays instead. Here's one he sent today that I really liked. Thank God we've only got a week left of the jackass who seems to be taking forever to exit the White House.

Not All Inheritences Are Good
As President-elect Obama prepares to take office, he can review the many situations that he will inherit from President Bush. Although Bush promised in 2000 to create 20 million jobs, unemployment grew during 2008 to its highest rate since 1945. The present rate of 7.2% is the highest since--the last month of Bush’s father’s Presidential term. Bush assured us in 2000 that he would never allow a deficit, but he set many new records for creating the greatest deficits in our history. He stated that he believed in small government, then he increased the size of our government at a rate that was more than double the rate of any Democratic or Republican President in the past 40 years. Bush stated that he would “grow the economy,” but now we are in the worst economic situation since the Great Depression.

Obama will inherit the most complex international situation that any President has inherited in our history. Bush stated in 2003 that major military actions in Iraq were over, but that remark was followed by the deaths of tens of thousands of Iraqis and thousands of American soldiers and an unending war. Bush stated in 2000 that he would decrease our military presence in other nations and that our foreign policy would be a humble one. Then, he ordered our first attack on a sovereign nation; this was a war that he wanted to fight, it was not one we needed to fight. To avoid drawing attention to the massive funds that he was allocating for the Iraq war, he never identified the costs or placed funds into our budget. He ran the war as an overrun so that we could not see the expenditures in advance. In 2003, when he was questioned about the intelligence he had used to justify attacking Iraq he stated, “The intelligence I get is darn good intelligence.” Now, even Bush acknowledges that the “intelligence” was wrong.

Earlier this week, Bush stated that his plan to privatize Social Security failed, not because it was a bad idea, but because “legislature branches tend to be risk-averse.” If he had passed this bill, many Americans would not only have lost significant value in their personal retirement accounts, but also in their Social Security accounts. During the same press conference, he stated that there was constant job growth during most of his time in office. Job growth during his eight years was the lowest rate of growth of any eight-year period since the government began to collect records many decades ago.

Twice, Bush vetoed the children's’ health insurance plan, he eliminated a retraining program for workers who had been laid-off due after their companies took advantage of a Bush tax cut and moved overseas, he reduced home heating assistance for the elderly and disabled during a year when fuel prices were rising, he eliminated a college awareness program for high school students in poor areas who were trying to obtain a better education, he decreased the number of coal mine safety inspectors and the number of mining accidents increased, and many other programs.George W. Bush was the most out-of-touch President since Herbert Hoover, the most incompetent since Warren Harding, and many of his policies were the most mean-spirited since—well, I cannot think another of President like him.