Consider Yourself Warned

The cuteness contained in the link below could actually be fatal. Please be prepared to fly into spasms of gushy-ness, not matter how rough and gruff your exterior.

Three, two, one...preciousness too powerful for humankind.

Okay, now it's over the line to ridiculous

By FAR the most disturbing and distressing news yet related to the Iraq war is being relayed by CNN.com this morning.

The military is skipping Iraq/desert specific training for troops in the surge because resources are stretched so thin.

As bad as things have been with well seasoned troops on the ground, I cannot imagine the hell that these ill-prepared troops will face. May whatever forces govern this universe see fit to shield them as best they can.

Why my lefty friends like HuffPo and AMERICABlog aren't on this like gravy on meat, I dunno.

The Weather Gods Take Their Revenge

(I had already posted this on F650.com, so it's got smileys in it for you. Awww...how nice)

So, the weather gods took their revenge this morning for all the b!#ching I've been doing about the weather and people who don't clear their sidewalks along my walk to work (everyone!). It's run in the 40's the last two days and it rained for several hours yesterday afternoon, so there's still snow, but a lot of it is melting.

However, it was 24 degrees when I left the house, so EVERYTHING was ice, most of it smooth as if it had just been zamboni'd.

So, my normally 10 minute walk to work took 25 minutes and even so I had one very scary moment.

As I got to the corner where campus starts, the pedestrian ramp was one sheet of ice leading to a 2' berm of snow before the road. Before I could start planning a trip through the grass, I was sliding down the ramp like an Olympic ski jumper with a car heading right where I'd be landing as I tripped over the berm.

Adrenaline flowed and I started backpedaling like a scared Hanna-Barbara cartoon character. Realizing this wasn't doing anything but making me look like a total dipstick, my football instincts kicked in and I spread my feet and dropped my butt precipitously toward earth (Thank you, Coach Schwartz!). This finally stopped my forward motion against the berm as the car went by.

I won't be needing caffeine for at LEAST another hour.

Reconnecting With the Spirtual Realm

My apartment is coming together slowly but surely. After several hours of putting away and organizing CDs and books, I was feeling melancholy. I figured it could be the weather. It could be lots of things.

But, having my altar set up for the first time in almost two years, I decided that it could be bad energy in the apartment and myself. So, I activated my altar and cleansed the house with sage. The smell brings an instant peace for me and the action of clearing out the negativity was very healing.

I can feel dormant feelings and connections in myself awakening every day now. I have totally neglected my spiritual self for a while now, and it's clearly taken a toll. But, I've taken the first step to healing and more than that, growing.

More on crime and punishment, NBA style

Many of you have, no doubt, by now heard about John Amaechi, the former NBA player who came out of the closet post-retirement. You've probably also heard about Tim Hardaway, the former NBA allstar, and his homophobic and hateful rant on a south Florida radio show. Now, the league has suspended Hardaway from the NBA Allstar Game, and rightfully so.

King Kaufman on Salon.com wrote a great piece on the issues around this just before Hardaway's rant. I feel the need to talk about it a little more now, with Hardaway's comments, and BS apology out there.

I can sum it up with one sentence, a question: What if Hardaway was a white player talking about blacks instead of gays?

The league's commissioner David Stern needs to take a stand here and now, as do the heads of the NFL, NHL and major league baseball. They need to address TRUE diversity NOW. Not later and not half-heartedly. If sports figures can't at least behave like human beings all the time (see any number of arrests this year) they can at least speak like them in public and treat their diverse teammates with respect.

The RIGHT punishment for crooked businessmen

So, how much did the CEO, CFO, the board, etc of Enron end up paying for their sins? Not a whole hell of a lot, if you followed the story. Same with World Com and all the others.

Flash forward to today in China.

Now, China has a human rights record that, I believe the technical term is, SUCKS. But, I figure if crooked corporate pirates had to actually pay a fair price for the human suffering they cause, maybe they'd think twice.

My VD morning in 500 words or less

My alarm went off at 6:45 am as usual. I didn't even snooze once. Having been rather grouchified about the whole weather situation, I went to bed early (for me) and got a decent night of sleep. I got up as normal and headed for the kitchen, as I reached around to turn on the kitchen light I thought "That's weird, I always leave the bathroom light on why is it..." (click) (click, click, click) AWESOME! No power!

So, I fumble into the living room (keep in mind I just moved so there's s#!t strewn everywhere) and grab my light and rechargeable battery out of my tool kit. I look at the thermostat. Gas heat rocks. Too effin bad the thermostat runs on electricity! It's colder than sixty degrees in here (I had begun to figure that one out on my own).

Call the power company. I'm the first call they've had(!?!). Within five minutes the power is back on. She must have just had to flip a friggin' switch. I heard my neighbors next door bitchin' before I called. Morons. One of them has to have a cel.

Proud of myself, I boot up Kompy and start assessing the situation. It's 12 degrees with a wind chill of -4 outside. Very nice. Hmmm....Miami's web site won't come up. I try calling the switchboard. No dice. Hmmmm....Well, I guess this qualifies for a non-emergency call to the campus cops.

"Hello, Miami Police department, dispatcher (name withheld). We have no power. How can I help you?"

Well, there's my answer pretty much right there. Turns out we're on plan B until 10 AM which means I get paid for two hours of farting around and generally doing nothing productive. Sweet!

So, daddy gets a big waffle and bacon breakfast and an additional twenty minutes nap before he even has to get ready to leave. I packed up, got out of the house and marched to Starf__ks.

Anyone who knows me knows this is significant. I hate Starf__ks. But, I was NOT going to face the day without hot coffee. Cold Diet Dew wasn't gonna cut it. Let me tell you, the extra two blocks up hill was plenty worth that hot Venti no fat mocha. Oh, and Starf__ks didn't open until 9:30 the weather was so bad!

Got to work right at 10:00 AM and no boss in site. YES! Not a bad start to mah VD.

The Evolution of the Kansan

"The Kansas Board of Education on Tuesday threw out science standards deemed hostile to evolution, undoing the work of Christian conservatives in the ongoing battle over what to teach U.S. public school students about the origins of life."

It's about time the backward-ass people of Kansas got up off their knuckles, stood upright and joined the rest of the human race.

I think the best part of the story is that there were still four knuckle-draggers who voted to keep the previous standards. Where DO they grow these people....well...Kansas, I guess, huh?

Happy Effing Monday

Happy Monday kids. Try to keep in mind that your Monday could, in fact, be much worse. You could be the folx in the office next door whose office got soaked in rusty, boiling hot water Friday after hours and are cleaning up all their copy paper, some files and supplies and their brand new copier, or these poor bastids.

Howie said it best "Getting laid off by e-mail is right up there with getting broken up by text message."

P.S. The maintenance crews at Miami appear to be prepping for World War Three. Looks like the eminent ice storm might be pretty nasty. Great news for those of us riding the sole train everywhere. Wheee!

In with the old, out with the new

Well, here I am in my new apartment. It's getting less gloomy by the moment. I've got the kitchen most of the way set up. DAMN, it's small. That's going to require some work. I bit the bullet and ordered a table and chairs (DOKSTA and JULES visitor chairs in white) from IKEA. It ate half my meager savings, but it was necessary. There's not enough counter space in the new kitchen for even my microwave, toaster and blender, let alone actual cooking.

The living room is still pretty much all rubber bins full of s#!t I don't have a place for. Hopefully I'll get some additional cubby shelving for my birthday and get some of that remedied. I'm also going to have to build an elevated bed frame, with the help of ACE Hardware in Oxford, to store stuff under.

I can get an idea of how it's going to work out at this point. It's just a matter of when and exactly how.

I've been a little less depressed and a little happier every day I've been here. It confirms that I did the right thing, but it's still weird. Very weird.

It's a little lonely, too. Not having another person in the house and pets everywhere all so suddenly is just really bizarre. The sudden absence of companionship has been the single biggest weight dragging on me. All my friends are on line and on the phone checking in and supporting me. But, it'd be nice just to have ONE good friend to sit in my place while I unpack stuff.

It's times like this that you REALLY appreciate the social nature of human beings. We're so much more social than our USA, rugged individual culture acknowledges.

Anyway, enough of trying to rejoin the collective via blogging, I've got The Who Ultimate Collection cranked and it's time to unpack a few more bins.

Best Response Ever

Okay kids,

Daddy's got some serious upheaval going on in his personal life, but he had to share this with you in case you haven't seen it. I'm sure all of you have been following, or at least know about the story of Joseph Biden of Delaware speaking about Barak Obama (the first black president of the United States, you heard it here first) when he said:

"I mean, you got the first mainstream African-American who is articulate and bright and clean and a nice-looking guy," Biden said. "I mean, that's a storybook, man."

But, to me, that's not the story. Another jackass white politico putting his foot so far in his mouth he could give himself a prostate exam with his toes is nothing new. You like that? I just came up with it. Thanks. Anyway...

The story this time is Al Sharpton's response:

"Mr. Sharpton said that when Mr. Biden called him to apologize, Mr. Sharpton started off the conversation reassuring Mr. Biden about his hygienic practices. 'I told him I take a bath every day,' Mr. Sharpton said"

Say whatever the hell you will about Al Sharpton, two things are indisputable. 1)He was James Brown's best friend 2)The man can TALK.