The Gilahi Blog

OK, Really Quick

2009-12-30T11:22:00.004Z

It's entirely possible that I'll be away from my computer for some time to come, not that it would make any difference in the frequency of my posts. I just couldn't let that time go by without this acknowledgement.

I know it's been a month or so, but you may recall a feeling of goodwill and a general sense that things were better on November 30 of this year. That's because Bilbo and I managed to get together for some conversation, a couple of drinks, and some tuna sashimi. We're currently awaiting our Nobel prizes for solving all the world's problems during that two-hour session. I think the committee may not have my address right.

After we had satisfied ourselves that the world would be a better place if people just listened to us, Bilbo mentioned our meeting in his next day's blog post, and had this to say: "Since Gilahi hasn't mentioned this earth-shaking event on his blog yet, let me just say that I found the self-described 'aging hippie' to be a funny, erudite fellow with whom I have much in common ... particularly a sense of humor that appreciates the Marx Brothers, Steven Wright, and the immortal Red Skelton. Sadly, we only had two hours in which to solve the world's problems, which wasn't quite enough, so we've agreed to get together again and give it another shot. We can't do any worse than Congress."

I too particulary enjoyed our chat and found Bilbo to be engaging, funny, and a pretty great storyteller (queue "Mutual Admiration Society"). If you ever get a chance, get him to tell you how he met his wife.

I sort of felt bad after he posted the glowing compliments about me. I was just going to say that I felt that neither of us was as obnoxious in person as we appear to be in our blogs.

We plan to get together again, so when you get your big tax refund, all the soldiers come home from overseas, health care is free, the weather is warm, and you see a rainbow, you'll know who to thank.

Such a Deal!

2009-12-29T15:53:00.005Z

I know that I've used a lot of space here to talk about English abuse. It's a button of mine. Deal with it.

We've all seen and discussed less/fewer, lose/loose, there's no "a" in "definitely", everyday/every day, etc., but this one is just so incredibly ridiculous (no "e" in "ridiculous") that I must admit it never even occurred to me:

Having said that, if you've never visited oddlyspecific.com, I highly recommend it.

A Different Take On An Old Classic

2009-11-25T11:54:00.002Z

OK, since it's the day before a long holiday weekend and nobody's going to be reading this anyway, I thought I'd do something quick just to have something out there.

My daughter sent me this link, which I'd never seen, so I thought I'd pass it along in case there was anybody else out there that had missed it. Besides, how can you not love The Muppets?

"Oh. That's very different." - Emily Litella

2009-11-24T13:00:00.000Z

I was watching Food Network the other day. Despite the fact that I was slipping in and out of a nap, I was surprised by the political tone the network has taken on.

It seems that on nearly every show, the host was telling me to "cool it on Iraq". Now I don't know if they meant that we should be withdrawing troops or just being more patient with the whole ordeal, but I don't really believe that Food Network is the right venue for this sort of political posturing.

There seems to be some feeling among the stars of the network that some other countries may not be up to speed on the whole situation over there. Giada De Laurentiis was saying something about preparing Turkey on Iraq, while Bobby Flay was going a step further and suggesting that we actually "grill" Turkey on Iraq. Rachael Ray, being the cutesy, word-combining, muffin that she is, went so far as to suggest, I believe, that the two countries be combined into one. As she was cooking, she mentioned something called "Turkey-Raq". The countries do share a border, so maybe one big country might not be such a difficult thing to do.

What I don't understand, though, is how preparing (or even grilling) Turkey on Iraq will help us "cut back" on Greece, but that seemed to be an overriding concern. Apparently Greece is something to be avoided, but I understand that the coast there is beautiful.

Further in the political arena, Ina Garten is apparently pleased with President Obama's recent diplomatic forays, as she was going on and on about the benefits of sitting down to dinner with China. She's the only person I've ever heard refer to the country as "the good" China, though. Who knew that someone who lives and cooks in The Hamptons could be such a blatant commie?

The most disturbing thing I heard all afternoon was from the local network scientist, Alton Brown. As nearly as I could tell in my sleepy, dreamy state, he's very much in favor of keeping the nuclear option open, no matter what the conflict is. Despite the new openness in the banks, allowing The United States to collect billions in untapped tax revenues, Mr. Brown was insisting on how good it would be to have the Swiss charred.

I should really try to pay more attention, I guess.

"In... and out..." - Pink Floyd

2009-11-23T14:00:00.000Z

All right, folks. It's geek time again.

I'm currently on a medication that comes in inhaler form. Attached to each bottle is a multipage document that tells me all of the awful possible side-effects, how to use it, etc. The other day, however, I noticed this on the side of the box for the first time:

"outsert"?

Really?

I've gotta say that in all my years of doing word puzzles and being generally, if not justifiably, proud of my vocabulary and all that, I've never seen or heard the word "outsert".

So, I went to that source of all knowledge, the internet, and asked Google to "define: outsert". Much to my surprise, it came up with 3 definitions.

An outsert is a four page card wrapped around and attached to the outside of a magazine or other publication.
Any additional printed piece included in a polybag and mailed with the host publication
Printed material attached to the outside rather than inserted into a package. Also, package outsert.

Who knew!? So that makes me wonder about the etymology of the word "insert", of which "outsert" is obviously a variant. The online etymology dictionary tells me that the origin of "insert" is:

1529, from pp. of M.E. inseren, from L. inserere "to put in," from in- "in" + serere "join together" (see "series").

OK! So obviously an "outsert" must be from "outserere", which means "out" + "join togeth..."

Wait a minute. The only way this can possibly make any sense at all is if we assume that it's all right to take any word that begins with an "in-" and, if it doesn't quite work for us, substitute an "out-". I believe this may be an idea whose time has come.

I have to say that before I did all this research I was a bit confused by the word, but having looked it up, it has become downright outcomprehensible.

Over the years, I've been outvolved in many, sometimes outtense, conversations about the outtricacies of the English language. If you're of an outquisitive nature, just a little outvestigation can reveal a not outsubstantial number of outtimate, outvaluable details about words, usages, origins and outsights outto the language. It is outteresting to think that this outformation could help you in many ways, from communication to reading comprehension. You could really impress your future boss at an outterview. Imagine not having to struggle with the outdecision of being afraid of using the outcorrect word. You might even become less outhibited about speaking in public. Why, the possibilities are almost outconceivable!

So my pleasure in finding this was pretty much outdescribable. I have outserted a new word outto my vocabulary. One of the cool things about English is that new words can be outtroduced without being outvasive. Some words become accepted, others become downright outactive. This outdomitable language continues to outvite change. It outtercepts new ideas and outcorporates them. It outgests foreign terms. It outcreases daily. There is an outherent evolution to it.

Bear in mind however, and I don't mean to be outdelicate here, that no matter how much you may learn about English, no matter how big your vocabulary becomes, you're never outfallible.

All Right Already

2009-11-13T16:07:00.004Z

Thanks to all of you who keep asking me why I'm not posting. I'm very sorry, but once again there are things going on in my life that appear to be gagging my muse. And by gagging I mean "applying a gag to", and by "my muse" I mean my inspiration.

I think it says a lot about my readers that I felt the need to explain the phrase "gagging my muse".

Anyway, since J. M. Tewkesbury told me this morning that she was getting more and more disturbed by the giant bug that she sees every time she checks my blog (see previous entry), I just thought I'd pop something in here quickly for a change of pace.

I think the picture above brings a whole new meaning to the term "handicapped bathroom", and brings to mind the question of the day: Are handicapped stalls in public restrooms reserved for the handicapped, or are they simply there for the convenience of the handicapped?

Discuss.

"I've had enough bad news to last a lifetime" - Del Amitri

2009-10-06T13:33:00.006+01:00

OK, it's been a stressful couple of weeks for me. I'm going to try to write about it without getting into too many specifics because, well, you just don't need to know them.

In a nutshell, a two-week period a couple of weeks ago involved 3 different doctors, a dentist (just coincidental) and a blood test at the lab.

For the past two years, I've had an issue with some wee beasties swimming around in my bloodstream. They can check your blood for certain markers that indicate the evidence of said beasties. As I understand it, any numbers below 10 mean you don' t have the beasties, any numbers from 11 to 100 are inconclusive, and any numbers over 1oo indicate the positive presence of the beasties. My first blood test indicated markers over the 1,000 level. Now this isn't dangerous, but it's a little off-putting, if you know what I mean, to know that there are little wee beastie parties going on in your body. There's nothing to be done to evict the beasties except to wait for them to get tired of the neighborhood and decide to move on.

Anyway, every 6 months or so I'd get another blood test and every time, my numbers would actually increase. Apparently the beasties found my body a very attractive place to live. I mean, the temperature's a pretty constant 98.6 degrees F, food is provided daily, lots of entertainment opportunities, housing prices are low, the schools are good, nearby shopping, and so forth.

On my last doctor visit, he prescribed yet another blood test and explained to me that some people never get rid of the beasties and go on to live, and I love this phrase, perfectly normal lives. This is the same guy who would describe a truck full of Jell-O Pudding rolling over your chest as "a little pressure". Anyway, as I was about to leave, he asked if there were any other issues and, like the addle-pated idiot that I am, I mentioned a small development that had occurred recently. He immediately got the doctoral look of concern and demanded to check me out. He poked, he prodded, he actually inserted things into me. He then declared that I would probably need surgery and referred me to a surgeon.

So the next morning I go to the lab and get impaled for a blood test. A few days later, I go to see the surgeon. He poked, he prodded, he inserted things into me. He asked how old I was. When I told him that I was 52, he asked when I had my last colonoscopy. I told him that I'd never had a colonoscopy. He said that he wouldn't even consider operating on me until I had a pre-op colonoscopy and a pre-op checkup with my physician including an EKG. He then referred me to a gastroenterologist.

So a few days later I go to see the third doctor. I got a description which sounded to me like, "We move a full crew and lots of heavy machinery into your body, burn off anything that's in the way, snip off anything we don't like, and get lots of before-and-after photos. It's incredibly painful, but you'll be unconscious." You're damn straight I will.

I won't give you any information at all about the day-before preparation for the colonoscopy, except to say that I was very disappointed to learn that vodka does not count as a "clear liquid" for these purposes.

So I'm in for the procedure. I can tell that my body is in full retreat because they had to stab me 3 times before they found a vein. I'm wearing a T-shirt, socks, and a gown that's, shall we say, immodest. They had me roll over on my side and I watched as the doctor put the hypodermic into the IV drip (it was a clear liquid, I would've rather gone with the vodka). The last thing I remember seeing was the large television set on which my intestinal tract would soon be displayed in hi-def. This, folks, is reality TV.

Finally, we come to the good news. Six months ago, the markers for the wee beasties in my bloodstream had escalated to 3,435. In this last blood test, the number was down to 8. Remember that anything below 10 means no infection. Also, after the procedure, the gastroenterologist told me that everything looked good and that, to quote him, "Surgery is not indicated." Just as the three greatest words in the English language are "I love you", the 4 greatest words are "surgery is not indicated". Trust me.

Plus I got a whole folder full of pictures of my innards.

No, no matter how much you beg, I will not post them here.

I'm hale and healthy, folks. Also, next week starts two weeks' vacation for me, and I get to enjoy it knowing that I'm wee beastie-free and I don't have the prospect of surgery hanging over my head.

For all of these things, I am grateful.

Gone, gone at last, gone at last
Gone at last, gone at last
I had a long streak of that bad luck
But I'm prayin' it's gone at last
--Paul Simon

Unclear On The Concepts

2009-10-05T11:43:00.004+01:00

I don't know if it's me or if things around me have started changing. I find myself uttering the phrase, "You're kidding, right?" a whole lot more often than I used to.

We went to the movies yesterday (The Invention of Lying, a very funny concept that could have easily been condensed into a 5-minute Saturday Night Live skit but was a bit stretched for a 2-hour movie). Before going into the theater, we made the ritual stop at the concession counter.

If you've been to the movies lately, you know that a small popcorn comes in grocery sack and a small drink comes in a 55-gallon drum. A large popcorn is backed in on a flatbed truck and a large drink is delivered via fuel tanker. We ordered a small popcorn and a small Mr. Pibb. The guy behind the counter asked if we'd like to upgrade to a large and informed us that by doing so, we'd get free refills.

?

Is it just me? If I've ordered the smallest version of something that you offer, would I ever want to get the larger version if all that gets me is even more of what I've just ordered? Who came up with this marketing ploy? Does anybody ever accept this offer? If so, why?

I can see where this might work at, say, a bar. If I ordered a margarita and the waitperson told me that if I got a jumbo margarita then I could get free refills, I'd certainly go for it. But if I don't think I can even finish your smallest pork chop, don't try to sell me a whole pork loin by telling me that I have the option for free pigs.

And now, a brief word on conjunctions. Before the movie, our good friends at Sprint put a reminder on the screen that said, "Don't forget to silence your cell phone and enjoy the movie", which immediately prompted me to say, "Gosh, I remembered to silence my cell phone, but I forgot to enjoy the movie." You see, these were two different, unrelated concepts that they were trying to convey here. They didn't need the "and", and it changed the whole meaning of the sentence. What they wanted there was two sentences: "Don't forget to silence your cell phone. Enjoy the movie."

Yeah, yeah, I know. Trivial little English language peeve. Nobody except Bilbo and me cares. However conjunctions can make a difference in interpretation. Consider the following two sentences:

1) He's got long hair and he's brilliant.

2) He's got long hair but he's brilliant.

When using "and", the first clause is simply descriptive. When using "but", there's an implication that he's brilliant despite the fact that he has long hair, and therefore that long-haired guys are not, as a rule, particularly smart.

Not sure how I got off on this tangent when I was talking about popcorn.

"It was a stupid post and I read the whole thing."

"It was a stupid post but I read the whole thing."

Come to think of it, conjunctions may not necessarily make such a big difference after all.

He's kidding, right?

Good Day/Bad Day

2009-09-24T18:25:00.007+01:00

It's good to know that during these trying times, equal weight is being given to the important issues of our day.

Good day for: The other half, as federal prosecutors in New York said a review of Bernard Madoff's records showed that only about 50 percent of the jailed financier's customers had lost money -- the rest withdrew more money from their accounts than they deposited. Madoff is serving a 150-year prison sentence for cheating clients out of billions of dollars. (CNBC)

Bad day for: Inequality, as a British store, Debenhams, is launching a line of underpants for left-handed men. The underwear -- made by U.K.-based Hom -- will have a horizontal opening instead of a vertical slit accessed from the right-hand side. The innovation is supposed to help save time and embarrassment for those accessing the area from the left. "In our view," said Rob Faucherand of Debenhams, "this is a vital step toward equality for left-handed men." (Reuters)

And I loved this quote concerning the configuration of right-handed underwear from the Reuters article so much that I feel compelled to add it here:

Almost 10 percent of British men are believed to be left handed but men's Y-fronted underpants have traditionally had a right handed opening from the time they were invented in 1935.

"As a result," Debenhams said, "left handed men have to reach much further into their pants, performing a Z shaped maneuver through two 180 degree angles before achieving the result that right handed men perform with ease."

So any of you left-handed men out there who were lucky enough to make money from Mr. Madoff's schemes should get your hands out of your pants and stock up. Unless you just enjoy that kind of thing.

So where are the left-handed bras that have the hooks on the other side?

Another Flower Gone

2009-09-17T11:15:00.004+01:00

Mary Travers
1936 - 2009

In A Land Called Honalee

2009-09-09T18:09:00.007+01:00

We were heading back from lovely New Jersey (lovely in the sense that it could be seen in the rear-view mirror). We had received a very nice gift basket from my in-laws which contained, among other things, a large bar of Mandarin Orange and Bergamot Scented Soap. Given the length and scenic-ness of this drive, we will often discuss things, any things, just to pass the time.

Spouse: So what is soap, anyway? It's just lye and fat, right?
Me: Hmmm... do you know the chemical rule about "like dissolving like"?
Spouse: No.
Me: Well, certain compounds, like water which has two positive hydrogens on one side of the molecule and a negative oxygen on the other side are called "polar", and those compounds will only dissolve other polar compounds like salt, which has a positive sodium on one side of its molecule and a negative chlorine on the other side. Other compounds, like petroleum compounds, have their entire molecules surrounded by positive hydrogens and are called "non-polar". Those compounds can only dissolve or be dissolved by other non-polar compounds. When you boil a strong alkali like lye with fat, it forms chains of hugely long molecules that are in fact so long that they can be slightly polar on one end and slightly non-polar on the other, which is how soap can work by dissolving both.

Fascinating, no? Speaking as someone who once majored in chemistry, I can only tell you that any aspiring young chemist would have been riveted by this explanation. We're wild that way. Remind me to tell you about how Teflon was invented and how the Quaker Oats company made more money for several years from oat hulls than it made from the oats themselves.

At this point, you could literally hear her eyes roll up in her head. I had to grab the steering wheel and splash the remainder of my soft drink in her face to wake her up.

Spouse: When I ask you a question like that, I expect the answer to at least be entertaining.
Me: Oh.
Spouse: Even if you have to make something up.
Me: Oh. Um. Well.... Soap is actually dragon poop.
Spouse: There you go!
Me: The size of the bar of soap depends on the size of the dragon.
Spouse: I see.
Me: And the various scents come from what the dragon eats. Our new soap came from a breed of dragon whose diet consists largely of mandarin oranges and bergamot.
Spouse: Now that makes sense. Thanks for the explanation.

And thus our drive from New Jersey was made more pleasant. It was only later that I thought about adding some information on where liquid soap comes from, but I thought it best to leave that part out lest neither of us ever bathe again.

The Other Side of Being a Nice Guy

2009-09-08T16:49:00.002+01:00

It seems that a lot of my posts are inspired by other posts, and this one is no different. Having just read Restaurant Refugee's post about the kindness of Metro employees and doing the right thing, I thought I'd pass along a little experience of mine from the other side of the coin.

I dropped by World Market the other day to pick up a bag of my favorite coffee, Costa Rican Terrazzu, on which I've been hooked ever since my vacation in Costa Rica. I go out of my way to get that coffee there because A) they carry it, B) it's cheaper there than anywhere else I've found it, and C) they have a coffee club which gets me every 7th bag for free.

The total for my coffee came to $9.01. I handed the lady a twenty, she handed me my change, and I headed out the door. Now I'm one of these anal-retentive people who has to have all of my money in my wallet in a certain order. All bills facing forward, sorted from smallest to largest. Needless to say, my change is never handed to me this way and I spend a few seconds turning bills around and rearranging them before putting them into my wallet.

I was doing this as I was strolling out to my car when I realized that I had $19.00 in bills in my hand. I had already put away the 99 cents. I must admit that my first thought at this point was an evil one: Wow! A pound and half of coffee for a penny!

Then I started thinking. I know, that'll get you every time. This lady's cash register is going to be $9.00 short at the end of the day. At the very least, she'll probably have to make it up out of her own pocket. If she has a history of this sort of thing, the consequences might be even worse for her. And I'll just be damned if I'm going to screw up my karma for a lousy nine bucks.

I turned around, went back into the store, and got back in line. When I got to the register, I told her that she had given me way too much change for twenty. I showed her the receipt and the $19.00 I still had in my hand. She was completely perplexed and got out a calculator. I told her that the correct change from a twenty for $9.01 should have been $10.99 and that she had given me an extra $9.00. From the way she thanked me, I'm guessing that this is not her first offense.

So she may not be the best cashier in the world, but if she gets in trouble, it won't be because of me.

Not expecting a pat on the back here or anything, it was just the right thing to do. Just sharing a glimpse into an otherwise uneventful life.

A Rose By Any Other Name

2009-09-01T12:30:00.002+01:00

The three of you that still bother to read this space on those rare occasions that I'm inspired to post something will have probably realized by now that I have what I like to call "opinions" when it comes to rock & roll music. I like to call them "opinions" because others tend to call them "boneheaded ideas about trivial things that you insist on talking about even though no one cares a bit about them but you."

A couple of weeks ago, I found myself alone at home on a Friday night. I immediately lapsed into a behavior that has been performed by bachelors since the dawn of time: I picked up the remote and started surfing channels. Friday night programming being what it is, my eye was caught by one of those interminable "list" shows that are the programming mainstay of VH1. This one was a repeat of "The Top 100 Hard Rock Songs of All Time."

[Self-Awareness Caveat #1: I do realize that I am not VH1's target demographic.]

I figured that at the very least I'd probably get to hear a few good songs and see how much I agreed or disagreed with their list.

[Self-Awareness Caveat #2: I do realize that my taste in music is quite different from the people who voted for the songs on this list (See SAC #1, above).]

I really have no right to complain about anything on the list, since A) due to SAC #1 I was not even aware that I would have needed to go to VH1.com and vote and B) my vote would probably have not made one whit of difference in the results. Still, I have to wonder about some of the songs that ended up on this list.

Now at this point, you're probably asking yourself, "How can he possibly be critical of others when he's watching something as brainless as VH1?" My answer to that is to cite the argument that is so frequently and eloquently stated by my friend Urban Bohemian:

"Shut up. "

I was actually sailing along through this show, amazed and horrified at times that songs such as Rob Zombie's More Human Than Human and Rollins Band's I'm A Liar were included, but somewhat mollified that songs like Deep Purple's Smoke On The Water (one of the talking heads said, "This song has an opening riff that even your grandmother knows"), Lynyrd Skynyrd's Free Bird ("For the rest of your life, whenever you go to a concert, some idiot's gonna stand up with a lighter and yell, 'FREE BIRD' somewhere in the audience"), The Kinks' You Really Got Me, Led Zeppelin's Kashmir, The Who's Don't Get Fooled Again and Iron Butterfly's In-A-Gadda-Da-Vida were on the list. You have to take the bad with the good.

So you know how this works. They cover 20 songs in an hour and they show 5 hours in a row to cover all 100 items on the list. I came in somewhere in the 80's, so I watched over 3 hours of this stuff waiting to see what the voters at VH1 thought was the greatest hard rock song of all time. Quite frankly, I'm not sure that I could come up with a single song that I think is "the greatest hard rock song of all time." I'm not sure that I would even try to pigeonhole certain of these songs into the category "hard rock."

But I do know this: No song by Guns & Roses qualifies as the greatest hard rock song of all time, and certainly not Welcome To The Jungle. Heck, that's not even the greatest Guns & Roses song of all time, and I don't know that many Guns & Roses songs.

I had some stuff in here about my personal opinions of Axl Rose, but I decided that they probably had nothing to do with the music. I'll just toss this out as trivia to any who may not know: Mr. Rose chose his stage name only partially because his real last name is "Rose." The main reason was because it's an anagram for the words "oral sex." Guess he didn't want to be known as Earl Sox or Ax Loser.

There must be tens if not hundreds of thousands of songs that could qualify as "hard rock." Look at some of the giants of the genre: The Rolling Stones, Deep Purple, Aerosmith, The Who, Jimi Hendrix, Led Zeppelin, Pink Floyd... the list goes on and on. Groundbreaking is what most of these artists were.

Guns & Roses? Really?

Geek Humor

2009-08-14T18:48:00.005+01:00

Given Mike's recent post describing engineers, and given the brief discussion I had with LiLu and Lemmonex at the most recent happy hour about really enjoying bad jokes, I thought I'd take this opportunity to pass along a couple of geek jokes from my past.

Now you'll need to be something of a geek to get these, and at least one of them comes from days as a chemistry major. I feel compelled to tell you up front that these are not particularly good jokes, so if you groan, I'll know you got them. If you laugh, I'll suspect you're just being kind.

1) An engineer and a mathematician are interviewing for the same job. First to be interviewed is the engineer. The interviewer says, "I have a question that I like to ask in order to help determine problem-solving abilities. Suppose there's a fire in my trash can and there's a bucket of water on the chair next to you. What would you do?" The engineer says, "I'd pick up the bucket of water and pour it on the fire." The interviewer says, "Good, good. Now suppose the bucket of water is next to my desk and the trash can on fire is on the chair next to you. What would you do?" The engineer thinks this is sort of ridiculous, but says, "Why, I'd pick up the bucket of water and pour it on the fire." The interviewer says, "OK, good. You can go. We'll be in touch." Next up is the mathematician. The interviewer eventually asks him the same question, "Suppose there's a bucket of water next to you on the chair and the trash can beside my desk is on fire. What would you do?" The mathematician says, "I'd pick up the bucket of water and pour it on the fire." The interviewer says, "Good, good. Now suppose the trash can on fire is on the chair next to you and the bucket of water is next to my desk. What would you do?" The mathematician says, "I'd move the trash can to the side of your desk, move the bucket of water to the chair next to me, and that would reduce it to a problem I've already solved."

2) An engineer and a mathematician are converging on a pretty woman. The mathematician says, "You know we can never actually reach her." The engineer responds with, "Yeah, but we can get close enough!"

3) Werner Heisenberg and Rene Descartes are ordering lunch at McDonald's. The counter person asks Descartes, "Would you like a hot apple pie with that?" Descartes answers, "I think not" and he disappears! The counter person turns to Heisenberg and says, "Did you see that?" Heisenberg answers, "Maybe."

4) Three Native American women had children. The first gave birth to a little boy on a buffalo skin. The second gave birth to a little girl on a mountain lion skin. The third one gave birth to twins, a boy and a girl, on a hippopotamus skin. This just goes to prove that the squaw of the hippopotamus is equal to the sum of the squaws of the other two hides.

5) [For my finale, the only thing I learned from 3 semesters of calculus] What do you get when you cross an elephant with a rhinoceros? You get an elephant times a rhinoceros times the sine of theta. What do you get when you cross an elephant with a mountain climber? You can 't do that because a mountain climber is a scaler (scalar).

Please don't beat me up at the next happy hour.

Thanks for all the music, Mr. Paul

2009-08-13T18:11:00.004+01:00

Les Paul (1915 - 2009)

Making an Informed Decision

2009-08-13T17:00:00.000+01:00

I suppose it's possible that at some point in my life I will cease to be amazed at how some people get by in the world, but I'm beginning to lose hope. I'm just back from lunch and this is the conversation between a Subway employee and a customer just behind me:

Customer: How much is a 6-inch tuna?
Employee: [pointing at the menu just over her head] Four dollars.
Customer: How big is it?
Employee: How big is a 6-inch sandwich?
Customer: Yes.
Employee: Um... 6 inches?
Customer: You mean, like, onetwothreefourfivesix?
Employee: Yes.
Customer: Oh. In that case give me two foot-long Spicy Italians.

I think this might qualify for a page in one of my favorite blogs.

Try as I might, I simply cannot fathom the thought processes, if they can be called that, of the customer while this conversation was taking place.

Did she think she might confuse the employee into giving her two foot-long meat sandwiches for the price of one 6-inch tuna? Is there some form of "6" besides onetwothreefourfivesix that I'm not aware of? Does anyone really walk into a Subway thinking to themselves, "I'm gonna have either a 6-inch tuna or two feet of Spicy Italian"?

Isn't this like getting all the details for a one-way flight to Atlanta and then buying 2 round-trip tickets to Omaha?

It makes me wonder if she asks the person at Home Depot how tall their 8-foot stepladders are, or the person at the 7-11 how much a 32-ounce Big Gulp holds.

Life just shouldn't be this difficult, people. I'm only thankful that she was behind me and not in front of me.

No, I'm also thankful that I don't work in retail.

A Touch of Gray

2009-08-12T17:00:00.000+01:00

But I feel I'm growing older,
and the songs that I have sung
echo in the distance like the sound
of a windmill going 'round.

--Deep Purple

I find that as I'm getting older, the reminders that I'm getting older become more and more frequent. I'm not talking about aches and pains or the fact that I'm slowing down. I'm not talking about those little grunting sounds I make every time I sit or stand. I'm not talking about the fact that I don't dare eat pizza after 8:00 PM any more. I'm talking about simply having conversations with people

This actually came to mind after reading some of the comments on Shannon's blog in which she referred to the 1976 movie "Logan's Run". Some folks had no idea what the reference was all about, and that really surprised me since I saw that movie in the theater when it was initially released. It takes a while for it to settle into my brain that that was 33 years ago and that a very large percentage of the population wasn't even born then.

Frankly, not being much of a videophile, it was actually pure coincidence that Shannon came up with a movie that I had just happened to see. Typically when I think of pop culture, I think of music which I dearly love and love to talk about.

Here are a few things I've mentioned in recent years and the responses I've gotten to them:

ME: I have "In-A-Gadda-Da-Vida" on CD.
RESPONSE: Who are they?

ME: Thought I might plug in a little Billie Holiday.
RESPONSE: Who is Billie Holiday?

ME: I'm looking forward to seeing Johnny Mathis this weekend.
RESPONSE: I know that name....

ME: Man! I actually got to see Leon Russell in concert last weekend.
RESPONSE: [blank stare]

Part of the reason for this is that most people aren't very interested in the roots of the music they choose to listen to, if they choose to listen to music. Part of the reason for this is that a lot of folks, unlike me, don't have the benefit of having older siblings and the music they listened to. Part of the issue is that my taste in music tends to run to those artists that make the Top 100, but rarely if ever make the Top 40. But if I'm honest with myself, part of the reason is that I tend to cling to these things from my youth like cat hair on a sweater.

I suspect that I could easily list off the pop/rock groups from the past 25 years that have intrigued me enough to actually purchase some of their music: The Dave Matthews Band, Green Day, Counting Crows, David Gray, Ozric Tentacles (find them on YouTube, they're pretty amazing), Flogging Molly, Collective Soul, Crash Test Dummies, Del Amitri, Gin Blossoms, Hothouse Flowers, Indigo Girls, Sass Jordan, Matchbox 20. There may be others, but the list is small compared to what I own from the 30 years or so before that. I'm surprised that I came up with that many, but 25 years is a long time.

So in the interest of higher education, I'm including these 4 clips from the artists I first mentioned. This is a tiny, tiny sample of the sort of thing I'm talking about, and these wouldn't even qualify as my favorites. They're all just very, very good. Perhaps you can hear the echoes of some of your favorites in their music.

I hope you enjoy.

Possibly the apex of '60s psychedelic rock -

Smooth, smoky, the blues done right -

An incredibly smooth voice. 73 years old and he's still got it -

He can't sing, but he can write and he OWNS the piano -

"I'm not quite clear about what you just spoke" - Crash Test Dummies

2009-08-11T12:08:00.006+01:00

I would like to relate a conversation that occurred at last Friday's Blogger Happy Hour between Lemmonex, Malnurtured Snay, myself and another blogger whose name unfortunately escaped me. Bear in mind that there were a lot of people in a very small space and the music was thumping. I will try to relate this based on what I believe Lemmonex actually heard versus what was actually said:

Snay: This is [Blogger whose name I didn't get]. This is Lemmonex and this is Gilahi.
Blogger: [to Lemmonex] Oh! I read your blog all the time!
Lemmonex: Really! Thank you!
Snay: [to Lemmonex] You're fatter!
Lemmonex: [with a look that would have reduced a lesser man to ashes] I'm WHAT?
Snay: You're fatter!
Lemmonex: WHAT DID YOU SAY?
Me: [leaning in to Lemmonex's ear] You're fuh-LAT-er-DUH! You're flattered!
Lemmonex: Oh! Man, I was about to give you a lesson in what not to say to a woman.

And I believe she would have, too.

At least this is what I think Lemmonex heard, based entirely on her reaction. If I'm right, I think she showed admirable restraint.

It occurred to me afterward that there was no good way to mis-hear the word "flattered". Even if the "L" sound had come through, you definitely wanted to be sure that the "D" sound on the end was heard as well.

See what you miss by not attending these events? Not only was there music, good people, good conversation, and good booze, there was very nearly a murder as well.

So hey, let's be careful out there.

Random Bits & Pieces

2009-08-05T15:00:00.002+01:00

A few random thoughts from my list of blog ideas. None of them seem to lend themselves to complete posts, so I'll just list them here.

Just in case you read this, Mb, I haven't forgotten that you tagged me for a meme, nor am I ignoring it. I'm just having a hard time finding the keepsake I wanted to talk about. Some keepsake, huh? I'll get to it, I promise.

I've never been one to argue the relative benefits of animals, but I can't help but notice one thing: There are stores that successfully sell worms, leeches, and crickets, but people in front of the library have a hard time giving cats away.

University of Maryland University College - Is that the stupidest name for a school you ever heard of? For those of you outside of the DC area, this is a real school that advertises on TV constantly. I can't decide if this institution was founded by really forgetful people or stutterers. If they're going to reuse multiple synonyms in their name, they could have come up with a better acronym than UMUC: Maryland University Scholastic Institute College (MUSIC), Maryland Institute Scholastic College University for Education (MISCUE), Academic Scholastic School/Halls Of Learning and Education (ASSHOLE). You can see that the possibilities are endless. Why UMUC? They may as well have called it Maryland University University Maryland University University (MUUMUU).

You hear people say, "I couldn't believe my eyes/ears", but no one ever says, "I couldn't believe my nose!" Is your nose somehow more trustworthy than your other body parts? What about your spleen? Can you trust your spleen?

The best way to make the highest score you've ever had on any video game is to be playing it when your spouse/SO says, "OK, I'm ready to go now". And no matter how much you try to explain that it's your highest score ever and if you stop now you'll lose it and this is bigbigbigbig, it's somehow not as important to your spouse/SO as their sibling's wedding that you're already late for.

Didja ever notice that most people who talk about how much they LOVE New York City are the people who have left it? If it means that much to you, go back. The last thing we need here is yet another import telling us at every opportunity how the place they're from is better than the place they've chosen to be. And I don't care what you say, you always have choices. If it really means that much to you, you'll find some way to get back there. Otherwise, we just don't want to hear it.

Why are there no seedless lemons? There are seedless oranges, tangerines, watermelons (sort of), etc. We're always juicing lemons and having to pick out those slimy seeds. How hard could it be to come up with seedless lemons?

Really, on a purely objective level, how can you ever tell how contented a cow actually is? They pretty much look the same no matter what. How do we know the best milk comes from contented cows? Maybe the best milk comes from cows that are white hot with rage. We just don't know how to judge cow moods.

Geek Alert: If odometers were in binary instead of decimal, my car would have 63 miles on it. On the other hand, if they were in hexadecimal, my car would have 1,118,481 miles on it.

That's all. Any questions above are mostly rhetorical, but if you want to answer any of them in the comments, please feel free. Also, any more Maryland University College School Institution Maryland University University University University acronyms could be fun.

"Gimme a head with hair. Long, beautiful hair" - from "Hair"

2009-08-03T14:00:00.000+01:00

I got a haircut last week.

I've mentioned more than once in this space that I wear my hair long. If I happen to mention a haircut to someone, they often say, "You get your hair cut?"

No. I let it grow down between my shoulder blades and by sheer force of my indomitable will I make it stop right there.

But even before it was long, I got the response that every guy on the planet who has hair has gotten. Walk into the office, your local bar, school, church, AA, whatever, and someone will inevitably say, "You got a haircut!"

Really?

What is it that makes people want to tell you something about yourself that should be pretty obvious to you? I used to think that perhaps I could stop this activity with smart-ass rejoinders.

"I got 'em all cut."

"No, I washed it in very hot water and it shrank."

Didn't faze anybody. After spending an hour in a chair for a wash, cut, and blow-dry, then shelling out a month's salary for the privilege of smelling like a French brothel for the rest of the day, people still felt compelled to tell me just in case I hadn't noticed.

A couple of years ago, I lost my mind one night and shaved off my beard. Everyone I met the next day said, "You SHAVED!"

"No, I just decided to grow it inward for a while."

"You have an uncanny knack for grasping the obvious."

"What was your first clue, my total lack of chin or the IV I'm attached to because of the blood loss?"

What's the special thing about changing your hair or facial hair that makes people feel they need to tell you what you've done to yourself? Nobody ever says, "You put on deodorant!", "You took a bath!", "You finally flicked that thing out of your nose!" It's the failure to do these things that elicits comments, and then it's usually behind your back. I'm tempted to start every conversation from now on with "Your hair is exactly the same!"

Just stop it. Resist the urge. Guys know when they've done these things.

You read my blog!

"I Wanna Hold Your Hand" - The Beatles

2009-07-30T14:00:00.000+01:00

[Note: Despite the fact that today is Thursday, this post is TMI only in that it was an embarrassing event that happened to me. There is no content which is sexual, scatalogical, menstrual, involving vomit, or in any other way disgusting. You have been warned.]

When I was a teenager, the glaciers receded and left in their wake ice cream parlors, Pizza Hut, movie theaters, and other places to which teenagers could go relatively inexpensively for a date. I was out with my then girlfriend, Joy, to see a movie. I don't remember what the movie was, but it must have been hugely popular because there was an enormous throng of teenagers pressed tightly together in front of the concession stand before the feature started.

Now, as teenagers are wont to do, Joy and I were hanging all over each other. Conjoined twins are no closer together than she and I were. She was standing to my left. I had my left arm around her waist, she had her right arm around my waist, and I was holding her left hand in my right hand across the front of our bodies. Got the image? Take a moment to visualize it, because it's important.

We had been standing there for some time waiting for our shot at a barrel full of popcorn, a freight-car size box of Milk Duds, and a 55-gallon drum of Coke. All the while there's laughter, waist-squeezing, and hand-caressing going on. We were joking and talking and looking forward to a sugar-coma inducing, bladder-stretching couple of hours in a dark theater when I happened to glance over just in time to see Joy tuck a wisp of hair behind her ear.

With the hand that I was still holding.

A quick glance down confirmed that it was actually not Joy's hand that I was holding. Surprise. Leaning forward and looking to my left, I saw another teenage couple standing next to Joy. Remember how we were standing? This couple was standing in a mirror configuration to us. The girl was standing next to Joy and her date was standing to her left. Suprise squared.

For the past 10 minutes or so, I had been holding, squeezing, and sensually caressing the hand of a total stranger. A male total stranger. He and I both came to the realization of what was going on at the same instant, and pulled our hands away from each other so fast that we almost hit a few more total strangers.

Fortunately, we were all able to get a good laugh out of it. Joy never did let me live it down.

So Joy, if you're out there and happen to read this, the whole world now knows the truth.

You have man hands.

"Hello. Is there anybody in there?" - Pink Floyd

2009-07-29T21:02:00.005+01:00

(Pen & Ink sketch by Gilahi - 1993)

For those of you who see this, meaning you still monitor this space, thank you so much and I apologize for being away for so long. For those of you who do not see this... well... what's the point of saying anything to you anyway?

I'll try to do better. Things are happening in my life that have made blogging a bit of a back-burner activity, to say the least. I hope that I'm beginning to see glimmers of things that mean that I'm feeling a bit more human and may be getting back to my old crotchety self. No promises, but I miss you guys so I'll give it a shot.

Many Thanks (and a couple of suggestions)

2009-06-15T13:00:00.001+01:00

Dear Messrs. Clapton & Winwood,

Thank you for putting on one helluva show at the Verizon Center last Saturday.

Thank you for performing nearly the entire one-album catalog of Blind Faith songs, particularly for opening with a kick-ass version of I Had To Cry Today.

Thank you for reviving the Hammond B-3 organ, which took me back to such acts as Blind Faith, Strawberry Alarm Clock and Iron Butterfly.

Thank you for the little unexpected treats, such as Mr. Winwood's all-alone-on-the-stage rendition of Georgia On My Mind, which seemed so oddly out of place among all the psychedelia of the evening and yet worked so well.

I cannot begin to thank you enough for not subjecting your audience to any version of I Shot The Sheriff, which wasn't a particularly great song when Bob Marley first did it, but when performed by a middle-aged white guy from Surrey descends to the level of a "Weird Al" Yankovich parody.

Thanks also for not subjecting us to Wonderful Tonight or Tears In Heaven.

Thank you for not letting egos get in the way, thereby letting the two of you share the spotlight on songs that were originally done by one or the other. Ending the evening's songlist with Mr. Winwood's Dear Mr. Fantasy couldn't have been better chosen.

Thank you for that pretty incredible 10-minute rendition of Jimi Hendrix's Voodoo Chile.

Props to the stage directors who set up cameras for the Jumbotrons so that we could occasionally see fingers flying over fretboards and keyboards.

Thank you for the stunning acoustic rendition of Can't Find My Way Home.

Although it's still nearly a month away, thanks for making my birthday a special one (and thanks to my wife and my good friend for the tickets).

Thanks for dedicating the evening strictly to the music. Two and a half hours of one song after another with pretty much no talk in between them. As each song ended, I found myself anxiously awaiting the opening chords of the next one.

I only have a couple of cavils about the whole evening. First, what was with that row of spotlights on the back of the stage that were shining directly into the audience's eyes? When those lights went bright white, we couldn't see the stage at all. Please keep in mind that your audience largely no longer consists of teenagers with young ears and eyes. We're a bunch of ridiculous old people wearing tie-dye.

Also, with regard to the slow, acoustic version of Layla.... well, I'm not quite sure how to put this diplomatically.... It sucks, Eric. I can understand that you may need a second guitarist of the caliber of Duane Allman to do the song justice and you didn't have that for this performance, but I really can't understand why you would choose to do an elevator-music version of such a classic piece of rock while omitting such gems as Bell Bottom Blues, Lay Down Sally, Promises, or any Yardbirds, Spencer Davis Group or Traffic tunes at all. You had two virtuoso keyboardists there, either of whom could have done amazing jobs on that long piano interlude. I would have loved to have seen Steve Winwood performing that.

Finally, having mentioned the sharing of songs earlier, I was struck by the paucity of Steve Winwood songs (aside from the Blind Faith stuff). I would have loved to have heard I'm A Man, While You See A Chance, Higher Love, Roll With It, Arc Of A Diver, and/or Gimme Some Lovin'.

I do understand that between the two of you, the catalog of songs is enormous and a concert covering all of these would have taken hours, but heck, I was willing to sit for hours.

All in all, though, it was a very special evening which, as I had hoped, focused heavily on Blind Faith. I never thought that I'd get a chance to see (half of) such a seminal, influential rock group as that. Despite the couple of picky criticisms above, it was an incredible evening of incredible music from two rock & roll legends.

I appreciate it.

Sincerely,
Gilahi

To b or not to b

2009-05-26T13:08:00.006+01:00

I've written about this before. This is what I've sunk to. I'm writing a blog entry, and not for the first time, about not writing my blog.

I'm sure there are some of you for whom blogging is as easy as breathing. The words just flow and they're witty and urbane and people love to read your stuff. I envy you. I'm sure there are some of you on the other end of the spectrum who agonize over every adjective, semicolon, and apostrophe before you put your finished product out there for the world to see. Believe it or not, I envy you, too.

I find that, probably like most of you, I tend to fall somewhere in the middle.

If I write something just because I feel like I should or because I feel guilty about not writing for so long, then I'm rarely satisfied with the results. I believe I've written a few pretty good things, a few clunkers, and a lot of mediocre stuff. You have no idea how many things I've written in this space that you've never seen because I was so unhappy with what tripped off my fingertips that I didn't feel it was in any way salvageable. Those went into the bit-bucket. Times like these I think it might be a relief just to shut the thing down, but to continue to read and comment on all those blogs that I enjoy so much. I certainly don't want blogging to become a chore.

On the other hand, I'm loathe to let go. Occasionally someone tosses a pole-dancing bear or an extremely funny Joe Cocker video my way, and I'd like to be able to share those. On rarer occasions, I'm inspired to write about such things as cause-and-effect or medical procedures or even painting a ceiling or a hallway, which people seem to enjoy. This last one was so well received that a blogger who visited my home demanded to see the results of the effort. But even with these, I've never written more than 13 entries in a single month. I've been doing this for over a year now and, if I've read things right, this is my 102nd post.

Not exactly setting the blog world on fire here.

There's also the consideration of all the great people I've met just by writing a few little things down and putting them out there. I've had a grand time with some folks, a few of whom I would even consider friends at this point, that I would in all likelihood never have even met if it wasn't for blogging. Would that fade away if I stopped? Are there great friends out there that I haven't met yet and will never meet if I stop doing this occasionally?

I'm torn.

So which is better? A) Blogging very, very rarely and then only when I'm in a pretty good mood and feel inspired to do so, B) putting mediocre stuff out there just for the sake of putting stuff out there, or C) just shutting down the blog but continuing to read and comment on others?

Signs Revisited

2009-05-14T14:00:00.003+01:00

Spotted on Chincoteague Island, Virginia.

There are 3 things wrong with this sign:

They don't mention whether the quality is of the "high" or "low" variety. (Hint: It wasn't the former.)

They weren't very hospitable.

Should be trivial and obvious to the casual observer.

Friday Funnies

2009-05-01T16:06:00.003+01:00

This has been around for a while, but it was just forwarded to me for a second time, and it still cracks me up. Hope some of you enjoy this as much as I do.

The Switch

2009-04-29T16:00:00.002+01:00

Switchin' is easy.
Oh, it's essential and you know
when you flick it,
you can start a new episode.
--Golden Earring

(A.P. Somewhere in Virginia)

While attempting to determine the thought process of whoever it was that felt it might be a good idea to send Air Force One flying 15000 feet over Manhattan accompanied by a fighter jet without telling anybody, scientists at the Gilahi Institute of What The Hell Were You Thinking (GIWHWYT) have discovered a small 'switch' in the human brain that allows ordinary individuals to seamlessly move from Plan A to Plan B with no adverse affects on the surrounding population. People with adequate switches in their brain can accommodate unexpected changes so readily that anyone who observes their behavior would not even realize that the switch has been utilized. Some individuals appear not to have this switch. These individuals become so completely focused on Plan A that any unexpected event causes them to appear to be drooling idiots to anyone who might witness their behavior. These individuals are now thought to be the cause of all violence, road rage, war, premature balding, heart attacks, strokes, cramps, wardrobe malfunctions, eye tics, stock market crashes, bad movies, economic downturns, rap music, halitosis, accidental pregnancy, and Milli Vanilli.

Scientists were surprised to observe that both 'switch-enabled' (SE) and 'switch-deficient' (SD) individuals had a nearly overwhelming urge to beat the crap out of SD individuals.

This is big news. It explains a lot. The article goes on to cite examples of the thought patterns of SE/SD individuals in different circumstances:

SE: Darn, I'm already in line at the grocery store and I forgot to pick up a bag of Potato Poopies for little Hiram's lunch. Now I have to get out of line and it will probably add 10 minutes to my shopping experience.
SD: Darn, I'm already in line at the grocery store and I forgot to get that jar of Anti Monkey Butt for Aunt J-Lo. I can't possibly get out of line so I'll just leave my cart full of groceries here and block everybody else while I continue shopping.

SE: Oops! Missed my exit. Now I have to either turn around at the next interchange or take an alternate route.
SD: Oops! Missed my exit. There's nothing else I can do, so I'll just pull over to the shoulder and back my car down the expressway to get back to it.

SE: Uh-oh. I should be turning left here and I'm not in the left-turn lane. Now I have to either turn around at the next opportunity or take an alternate route. (See above)
SD: Uh-oh. I should be turning left here and I'm not in the left-turn lane. But I'm turning left here. I'll turn on my signal and block traffic until the left-turn lane is completely clear and then make an illegal turn. People sure do blow their horns a lot.

SE: My program crashed. I need to find the problem and fix it.
SD: My program crashed. I know the code is good so I'll just run it again. My program crashed. I know the code is good so I'll just run it again. My program crashed.... (this SD was never heard from again).

SE: Even though the phone is ringing, I'm assisting this customer in person so I will ignore it.
SD: Yes, we have those in blue, green, red and.... Hello, thank you for calling Ye Olde Flip-Flop Shoppe.

SE: This person seems bored/uninterested/horrified. Perhaps I'll ask them a probing question or simply change the subject.
SD: ...and despite the nosebleeds, I just can't seem to keep my finger out of there blahblahblahblahblahblahblahblah-de-blahblah....

SE: I thought about eating this doughnut, but I've added a couple of pounds lately so I'm going to pass.
SD: I've added a couple of pounds lately, but I thought about eating this doughnut so I have to eat this doughnut.

SE: "Trickle-Down Economics" is a failed theory. The idea that "a rising tide lifts all boats" is only workable if you're so out of touch with reality that you believe everyone has a boat.
SD: Ronald Reagan was a god.

SE: That Gilahi is a very insightful guy.
SD: I keep reading this Gilahi guy and he's just not very funny.

It appears that there may be hope for the development of an artificial switch which could be implanted in the brains of SD individuals. Unfortunately the surgery is fatal a large percentage of the time. Half the scientists at GIWHWYT want to refine the technique until the operation is considered safe. The other half feel that an 80% fatality rate in the target group is really not such a great loss after all.

I suspect there's a new telethon in the future.

Great Ideas #1 and 2

2009-04-23T13:00:00.001+01:00

Wife and I have become quite the social butterflies of late.

I'm from the Atlanta area and Wife is from somewhere north of here. We were, shall we say, pretty well established and living on our own when we met. We each had our own circle of friends, hers up north and mine down south. Maybe this is a pattern that couples go through, but for the early part of our relationship we spent most of our time with each other. We would occasionally see friends, but it was always an effort due to distance.

She used to lament our lack of outside contact and sigh that we needed to make new friends.

Not so much any more. Witness our schedule for this month (gleaned from our shared Google calendar):

March 29 - Lunch with friends in Columbia
April 4 - Lunch with blogger friends, Evening birthday party for neighbor
April 11 - Lunch with friend
April 12 - Brunch with relatives in Baltimore
April 13 - Happy hour with blogger friends
April 17, 18 - Visit family in NJ
April 18, 19 - Visit long-neglected friend in NJ
April 23 - Jazz concert at the Birchmere with friends
April 25 - Lunch with blogger friend, Party at blogger friends' home
April 26 - Lunch with friend

Note that there are only one or two occasions above where we'll be seeing any of the same people, and this doesn't include half the people to whom we still have outstanding social obligations. Also, we still make the effort to go on a date every single weekend, just so we can spend some time with each other and treat each other to some place nice.

While gazing out at our back yard last night, I commented that we needed to do some weeding. Wife pointed out that we simply don't have any free weekends on our calendar any more.

Thus came great idea #1, with full credit to Wife: "We should invite all of our friends over here to pull weeds." How great is that? It could be like a painting party where we provide pizza and beer. Since our yard is just really not that big and since we have approximately 9,547 friends, the yard work would be done in 10 minutes and then it's just a matter of waiting for the pizza guy.

I built on that with great idea #2. You know how marketers are always re-casting things with cool names so that it sounds like something it's not? I suggested that we just send messages to all of our friends inviting them to a "Weed Party".

"We'll provide the weed, you just have to take a pull."

Brilliant. Everybody would show up and wouldn't know the real party theme until we started handing out the gardening gloves.

And I suspect it would probably have the added effect of clearing our calendar for the next few months, until we could make some new friends.

Speaking of friends, thanks to Bilbo for bestowing a "Friendship Award" upon me:

Now in the interest of full disclosure, I have to say that I've never met the man, and we often have conflicting points of view. However we are reasonable (if occasionally stubborn) guys, and respect the idea that different people may have different takes on things. What a concept. I have every confidence, though, that if we spent a couple of hours in a room somewhere with a little bourbon and an adequate supply of ice, we could between the two of us solve all of the world's social, political, and economic woes.

If only someone would listen to us.

Thanks, Bilbo!

Hurrah for degrees.info!

2009-04-14T14:25:00.024+01:00

You may recall my last post in which I expressed some dismay at an advertisement for an online university website offering me a quick degree if I had an interest in "Public Speach". This didn't even take into account the whole idea of getting a degree in "Speach" on the Internet where people don't typically hear you speak. And I didn't even mention the fact that "speech" is a noun and they really meant "public speaking" (or perhaps "speeking").

Well, I'm proud to say that the good folks at degrees.info are continuing to pursue their fine tradition of academic excellence, despite the fact that they're still trying to sell me something using Christmas trees in April.

Popup ads irk me. The fact that the Google ad blocker is such a piece of crap that it blocks almost no ads at all irks me.

However occasionally an ad does make my life easier and brings me some joy. Witness the latest ad that I got that Google failed to block:

Again, you probably can't see what I immediately saw. Suffice to say the "Public Speach" is now not the only thing for which I could pursue a degree via this august institution.

I thought for a bit about a rant regarding this, but I did that before. Upon further consideration, I realized that a picture really is worth the thousand words I could have written.

I Know You're All Wondering Why I Called You Here

2009-04-06T13:00:00.002+01:00

There is a certain website that I like to go to (only at night and on weekends, of course) that has hundreds of games that I can play for free. The biggest downside of this site is that before each game I have to sit through the display of an ad for 30 seconds or so while my game is "loading". The only good thing about this is that sometimes the ads can be as diverting as the games. Take this one from degrees.info, for instance:

You can see my source of amusement, can't you? No? It's not enough that they're showing me Christmas trees in April, let's zoom in on the seventh tree from the left:

That's right, internetters, according to the small type on the left, if your talent is "Public Speach", then you're just one online form away from a degree. And if you think the irony here is the idea of getting a "speach" degree online where no one can actually hear you speak, then you've entirely missed the point (and I do have one, as Ellen Degeneres says).

Now I'll be the first to admit that I'm somewhat anal when it comes to spelling and grammar. I remember being on a fishing trip and seeing a small general store that had its offerings listed all around the front of the building: Bait, Tackle, Snacks, Soft Drinks, Beer, Flim. Yes, flim. My first thought was that if anyone should know how to spell, it should be a sign painter. But then I remembered Gene Wilder's character, The Waco Kid, talking to Cleavon Little as Sheriff Bart in Blazing Saddles: "Come on. What did you expect? These are simple people. People of the land. You know... morons." So I let it go.

Then there's the "Wafle Shop" in Alexandria, near The Birchmere. There's a huge awning with "Wafle Shop" on two sides of the building. At least this gets peoples' attention, though, and from everything I hear that's pretty much all this establishment has going for it aside from the fact that they're open 24 hours a day.

But come on. Here's a web designer creating an ad for an online university fergodsake! Wouldn't you think that someone from info.com read and approved this ad? Would you want to get a degree from a site that puts this much care and planning into what they do? Does the phrase, "Do you want fries with that" qualify as public speach? How about, "Welcome to Wal-Mart"?

It makes me wonder if they have degree programs in riting, bookkeaping, bizness, fizzix, or furrin langwidge.

When you get your degree certificate from degrees.info, instead of saying that you graduated Magna Cum Laude, it should say that you chose this school Lawdy How Come?

Monkeys and Maras and Deer, Oh My!

2009-03-25T12:22:00.008Z

You learn things when you travel. You may learn that the oldest rum distillery in the world doesn't necessarily make the best rum in the world. You learn that the rum you get in the islands has 3% more alcohol than the rum that's shipped to the States. You learn that dark rum is actually aged in used bourbon casks, which appeals to a bourbon-lover like myself. You learn a lot about rum. You sample the rum and then you don't really care any more.

You learn that Barbados, which produces tons of sugar, has contracts with European countries to export X tons of that sugar annually. If there's a bad year, crop-wise, they may end up exporting so much sugar in order to fulfill their contracts that they don't have enough for their own use, so one of the largest sugar-producing countries in the world ends up importing sugar from other countries.

Then you learn stuff that might actually be interesting. As mentioned over in this article, you learn that monkeys in Barbados are green.

They're not kelly green or avocado green or OD green or even Green Canary green, but they do certainly have a green cast to their fur.

If green monkeys don't convince you that you're in a fantasy land, check out this deer:

Is that weird or what? It's a real deer. Honest. I saw it. I took that photo.

But you start to feel like you're in The Neverending Story or The Princess Bride when you're busily snapping pics of green monkeys and weird deer; your wife pokes you and rather shakily says, "Um.... look behind you;" and your immediate reaction is "whatinthehellisTHAT?"

I took these pictures so you'd all know that it wasn't the rum talking. This is a mara. They're rodents, about 18 inches to 2 feet tall. I have to say that I've been watching nature shows all my life, I've worked with wild animals, and I'd never heard of a mara or seen anything quite like this. It's sort of a kangaroo-bunny-deer-mule looking animal. In true fantasy-movie fashion, they have weirdnesses like three toes on their back feet and four on the front. They can run 18 MPH and are related to guinea pigs.

We went to see the monkeys but admit it, you just gotta love this face:

Apparently they make pretty good pets if you get them when they're young, if you don't mind the idea of 2-foot, 25-pound rodent wandering around your house. Heck, some of you may have that situation right now and not even realize it.

You would not believe how long I sat here and tried to come up with some setup in which you would have a pair of maras as pets, since you got them young they'd be orphans, and this would allow you to sing, "Two maras, two maras, I love ya, two maras...". I even figured you could name one of them Annie.

But then I realized I'd just have to apologize for it.

Bare Naked Pole Dancer

2009-03-09T14:35:00.003Z

I don't usually post things like this, but this one is so sensitively done and just so beautifully rendered. I'm really not a pole dance fan, but I've never seen anything quite like this one. I hope no one is offended.

Confessions of a Luddite

2009-03-04T14:00:00.000Z

Despite the fact that I work in the computer bidness, I find that I'm often at best behind the times when it comes to technology. Sometimes I just don't understand the appeal at all.

I was actually called a Luddite by a friend a couple of years ago because I didn't have A) a computer and B) a DVD player.

Well, I don' t have a computer because my company gives me a laptop to work with. I do have a separate disk drive that I download all my personal stuff to, but I see no reason to purchase my own computer when I have unlimited access to a quality, state-of-the-art system for free. Plus, I'm a computer guy. Computers are my work. I don't relish the idea of coming home every evening and popping open work.

I have since remedied the DVD situation twice over.

There are various reasons that I don't keep up with technology. Sometimes there are terribly adverse side-effects, but most of the time I simply don't care. I don't see how going to the trouble of setting up or installing the latest thing-a-ma-jig (version 2.1) is going to enhance my life, at least not enough to make it worth the trouble.

Plus I'm cheap and these things often cost money. But I'm not interested in many of the things that are free, either.

I don't Twitter (or tweet).

I don't Facebook.

I don't MySpace.

I don't Tumblr.

It took years, but I do have a cell phone. I don't have a PDA. In fact, my phone doesn't even have a camera. I still write things down in my Day-Timer and refer to it.

But despite all my issues with new technology, despite my aversion to things high-tech, despite my avoidance of whatever the "latest" doodad is, there is one piece of technology which I dearly love and which I look forward to trying out every time I see one. If it weren't for the potential embarrassment factor, I could play with one of these things for hours. This is simply the niftiest piece of technology that has ever been invented:

"Miss those Georgia piney woods" - The Osborne Brothers

2009-02-26T13:00:00.002Z

That's better. Bluegrass trumps anything Bon Jovi will ever even aspire to.

Part 2

You may recall in our last episode, Gilahi had managed to land a nonexistent seat on an airplane with an exploding engine that was leaving approximately 2 1/2 hours past its scheduled departure time for a 1 hour, 20 minute flight to Atlanta. The high points of the story so far have been that we've had a couple of glasses of wine and my wife found a penny. I should point out here that we had actually planned to arrive in Atlanta in time to grab a bite of supper before driving the hour and a half to central Georgia, where we were staying. We thought we would have been in Atlanta by now. We're just leaving Virginia.

Also, there was the extremely humorous and creative use of a simile of the babysitter in a slasher movie and how her horror parallels ours. By now, she's taken a butcher knife from the kitchen without noticing that one is already missing, and is moving slowly through the house with the knife raised in her fist to eye level, which everybody knows is not the proper way to defend yourself with a knife.

Anyway, the flight itself was pretty uneventful and we landed in Atlanta some 2+ hours late. It was one of those occasions where applause breaks out on the airplane as soon as the wheels touch down.

We go to the rental car counter and get our pre-reserved rental car. After just a couple of wrong turns (it's late, and we're tired and hungry), we finally find the bus that will take us to the rental lot. We're dropped off right next to space #39, containing our rental which is approximately the size of a roller skate. I throw the bags into the trunk as a fine, misty rain begins to fall. We climb into the car, adjust the seats, adjust the mirrors, put the key in the ignition, turn the key and... nothing happens. Not a click, not a whirr. This car is deader than Rod Blagojevich's political career.

So I walk through the rain to the main building in the lot. There is a lady behind the counter who, by all indications, is extremely angry at the piece of gum in her mouth. I explain the situation to her, and she asked me if I wanted a car just like the original one I had. Any other time, I would have said, "No, I want one that works", but I was just so tired that I told her that all I cared about was that it didn't cost me any more. She gave me another key and we got a car a few spaces down which, happily, ran well.

In case you're not familiar with the Atlanta area, Interstates 85 and 75 run north/south through the center of town. I-20 runs east/west through town, and I-285 is the perimeter highway that encircles the city. The airport is just south of I-285. I want to be east of the city to get on the highway that will lead me to small town central Georgia, so I want to go north on I-85, around the east side of I-285, and then east on I-20 to my exit. However it's now dark, driving rain, I'm tired, and it's been many, many hours since I've had any food. I fail to negotiate the fact that I-285 is round and, much like our beloved Washington Beltway, has north/south/east/west designations that change depending on where you happen to be. You see it coming, don't you? I went the wrong way on I-285. I didn't realize this for many miles. By the time I did, I was only 9 miles away from I-20 (albeit on the west side of I-285), so I decided to just continue on, get on I-20 east, and go through town.

My wife is hungry too. She starts asking when we're going to stop. I tell her that we really don't want to stop in this part of town this late at night. Believe me. Never the less, we're both hungry and grumpy, so as soon as I feel that we've gone far enough past the city limits, I pull over and start looking for food.

At this point, all of the lights would go out at the babysitter's house.

We found a place that offered "chicken and seafood" and was open at 9:30 PM on Christmas Eve. How great is that? We park the car, run through the driving rain, and stop at the door.

I've read many restaurant reviews, and there's one little thing that I've never seen mentioned. I really believe Tom Sietsema (The Washington Post's restaurant reviewer) should add this to his column. If there's a very large person frisking people before they can go in, this restaurant may not be the best place for haute cuisine. Amazingly, we are so hungry that I submit to being searched before entering the establishment. Apparently my wife didn't appear as threatening as I, since they let her pass unmolested.

The interior of the establishment was smoke, pool tables, and low lights. The music was so loud that the balls were actually bouncing on the pool tables. A man wearing a Dekalb County Department of Sanitation uniform stopped by our table for several minutes to tell us how happy he was that we were there spending Christmas Eve with him. We never saw any indication of the advertised chicken or seafood.

Even in our exhausted stupor, it eventually dawned on us that this probably wasn't the best place to get something to eat. As we were leaving, we asked the very large gentleman, with whom I was now so intimately acquainted, if he knew where we might get something to eat at 10:00 PM on Christmas Eve. He told us that there was a Waffle House right across the street. We decided to keep driving.

We ended up in beautiful Conyers, GA, before we spotted a Comfort Inn on the side of the road. At this point, we just wanted a cube with a bed and a shower, so we pulled over. I had already phoned my family and told them that there was no way we were driving for an hour and a half on a two-lane road in the middle of the night in the pouring rain in the condition we were in.

When we walked into the lobby of the Comfort Inn, a young lady came from the back room and quickly and efficiently gave us a room. We asked her if there was any place at all in Conyers where we could get something to eat. We were hoping for something like a Ruby Tuesday's, or a TGI Friday's. Anything that might be open late on Christmas Eve.

"Just across de bridge is a Wapple House," she said. "Dey have BIG wapples and good coppee and hamburgers and chicken..." and she proceeded to recite the entire Waffle House menu to us as if it were some exotic establishment serving viands from The Sorbonne.

We would have eaten old tires with radiator water at that point, so we went to the Wapple House, as that establishment has forever been redubbed in our minds. I ate an egg and cheese sandwich with hash browns and a soft drink. My wife had grilled cheese and iced tea. You know what? Much like the Buddhist story of the man and the strawberry, it was some of the best food I ever ate in my life.

That's it. We slept, showered, and got up to a glorious sunny Christmas Day in Conyers, GA. We arrived at my family's house approximately 14 hours later than we had planned, but the adventure was over and we had survived it.

Had we driven, we would have saved the cost of two airline tickets, overnight lodgings, a rental car, and it would have taken us approximately 11 hours to get there.

Oh, and the babysitter kills the slasher and runs out of the house to the waiting arms of her boyfriend, but when the police go inside the house, there's no sign of the guy. So you know there's going to be a sequel.

There always is.

"Who Says You Can't Go Home?" - Bon Jovi

2009-02-25T13:30:00.001Z

Wow, talk about your mixed emotions...

On the one hand, I'm finally getting around to blogging about our adventures when we went to my home state for the holidays last year.

On the other hand, I'm quoting Bon Jovi.

You have to believe that things can only get better from here.

Anyhoo, here's the chronicle of Gilahi & Spouse's Excellent Adventure, starting on Christmas Eve, 2008:

Homeland Security says we have to sit around Reagan National for 2 hours before we board our one-hour twenty-minute flight, so we left the house in plenty of time. Upon arrival, the first thing we did was to check the departure board. We discovered that our flight had been delayed 30 minutes. Not a big deal on Christmas Eve, right?

You know those horror movies where the young babysitter hears a strange sound outside and chooses to ignore it? That's what our flight delay was like.

We do as much as we can electronically to avoid having to actually deal with people, especially people who are having to work on Christmas Eve, so we went to the electronic checkin. We had booked the tickets months in advance and we always, always go straight to the website and reserve our seats. Imagine my chagrin when the little electronic kiosk asked us to choose seats. I was sure we had already done that, but I had no way to prove it. So I pressed the "OK" icon and was presented with a diagram of a plane that had exactly one seat available on it. My wife, being the selfless, giving person that she is, immediately volunteered to forgo the quintessential joys of spending days with my family, go home, open a bottle of wine, and start sending me text messages about which episode of "I Love Lucy" was playing at the moment so that I could take the one available seat. I was so overcome by her generosity that I accidentally assigned the one seat to her, printed out two boarding passes (mine said SEAT ASSIGNMENT instead of actually having a seat designation), and we headed to the gate figuring we'd get the mess straightened out there.

As we were going through security, my wife noticed a penny on the floor and pointed it out to me. I told her that she should grab it, as that might very possibly be the best thing that happened on the entire trip.

This would be the second time the babysitter hears the noise outside.

We got to the gate, only to find that the delay had now been extended to an hour and half. There was no one manning the gate yet, and an employee at another gate told us they only showed up a half hour before the actual flight. At this point, we decided to leave the terminal area and head back up to the desk to get the whole seating thing straightened out. A very tired Delta employee tried to explain to us that the FAA requires all airlines to reserve several seats on flights for people who are handicapped or otherwise have special needs. These seats are opened up just before the flight. He assured us, by virtue of the fact that I had printed a boarding pass, I was guaranteed a seat on the plane although he was unable to actually assign one at the moment.

Since we were outside of security and we now knew that we had at least an hour and a half to spare, we decided to hit a nice, new little wine bar that they've opened in Terminal A. Thus fortified, we went through security a second time and headed back to our gate.

By now, there were approximately 427,332 people at the gate waiting for our flight. I got in line to talk to yet another very tired Delta employee about my seat assignment. After standing in line for 20 minutes or so, I was told that I still could not get a seat assignment, but that they would call me by name before they started boarding.

This is the point at which the babysitter would notice that all the phones in the house are dead.

The flight ended up being delayed by just under 2 hours. Imagine my surprise when it was announced that first class and those in need of special assistance could begin boarding our flight immediately. I rushed back to the desk, waving my SEAT ASSIGNMENT boarding pass, and mentioned in as calm a voice as I could muster that my name had in fact not been called before they started boarding. I was given a seat several rows away from my wife. None of our neighbors would switch seats, so we flew separately. It's only an hour and 20 minutes, right?

The babysitter discovers that her cell phone is also not working.

After many exhortations to please get settled as quickly as possible because it's so late, the fully-packed plane finally backs away from the gate.

And stops.

And sits for 15 minutes.

Then the pilot comes on and says, "Folks, I know it's late and I really hate to be the one to pass along this news, but our right engine won't start. They thought they had it fixed at the gate, but it's not. So we're going to have to pull back in to the gate. Hopefully they can get it going again and we can leave without much more delay."

This does not inspire confidence in me. I have visions of a guy in coveralls with "Earl" stitched across the pocket banging on the engine with a monkey wrench and calling out, "Try 'er now Joe Bob!" Even if this is fixed at the gate, how comfortable am I with this at 10,000 feet?

Astonishingly, we backed away from the gate again within about 10 minutes or so, although there was an odd odor in the cabin. As we're approaching the runway, the pilot comes back on and says, "For those of you who may have seen flames exploding from the back of the engine, and for all of you who may smell something like smoke, I'd like to assure you that this is perfectly normal. You normally don't see this because we're out on the runway in takeoff before the engines are started, but as a test we had to start the engines in the gate, which is why you saw the flames and now smell the smoke. Please sit back and relax and we'll get you Atlanta as soon as possible."

"Sit back and relax?" The babysitter is wa-a-a-a-a-ay past that point now.

As so often happens when I write, this has gotten longer than I realized. I have therefore decided, in the spirit of "Flash Gordon", to make this a 2-part serial. The adventure is not over. Stay tuned.

Coming up next: "Atlanta"

Blind Faith

2009-02-20T17:16:00.005Z

Am I pleased?

You bet your Bellbottom Blues I'm pleased.

Why am I pleased?

Thanks for asking.

I just scored two tickets to see Eric Clapton and Steve Winwood at Verizon Center in June.

My wife and my best friend down in Atlanta have teamed up to present me with these tickets as a birthday gift, although my birthday is months away.

You know what this means, don't you? This means that my wife has the dubious pleasure of hearing me walk around the house for the next 4 months singing.

But I'm
near the end
and I just ain't got the time.
And I'm wasted and I
can't find my way home.

and

I have finally found a way to live,
just like I never did before.
And I know I don't have
much to give,
but I can open any door.

Everybody knows the secret.
Everybody knows the score.

I have finally found a place to live
in the presence of the Lord.

I pity her, really I do, but she brought in on herself when she gave in to my begging-on-hands-and-knees, hold-my-breath-until-I-turn-blue, extremely masculine persuasiveness.

You may not understand the significance of this, but Mr. Clapton and Mr. Winwood constitute half of Blind Faith. I never in my wildest dreams thought that I could have the opportunity to see such a seminal group as this. God I hope they perform some Blind Faith songs.

So at least I'll have something to write about in June.

Inside The Blogger's Studio

2009-02-19T13:00:00.003Z

First off, I'd like to apologize for my extended absence. There's been an awful lot going on and quite frankly, I just haven't felt much like writing anything. In the past, when I've done stuff when I wasn't particularly inspired, I've been much less than satisfied with the results. Thanks to those of you who have left comments on my last entry wondering where I was.

Having said that, it occurs to me that the lovely and vivacious Fiona tagged me with yet another meme about 2 1/2 weeks ago. That seems to be sort of a built-in way to get back in the saddle, a metaphor which I'm sure she will appreciate.

The rules are that I'm supposed to tell you 10 honest things about myself and then tag 10 other people to do the same. While I'm not particularly predisposed to tag other folks, I'll do what I can. This becomes especially difficult when I realize that Fiona reads most of the same blogs that I do. I'm displaying the award anyway, since I can't display just half of it.

Never the less, we press on:

1) I find it very difficult to list 10 things about myself that I haven't already said in this space. That's what a blog is all about, right? You talk about yourself as if you're being interviewed by James Lipton and anyone might care.

2) As a result of either my advancing age or the length of my relationship, my wife tells me that I often repeat stories that I've already told her multiple times. Despite the fact that I don't recall relating these stories, she's always able to finish them for me so I know she must be right.

3) In 1975, I was the #2 ranked epee fencer in the southeastern United States. It's the most athletic thing I've ever done, and I continue to embrace it despite the fact that the accomplishment itself is older than most of you reading this.

4) I occasionally have these little bouts of OCD. I have a 3-CD player, and whenever I play just one CD, it has to go in slot #1 despite the fact that it would play equally well in any of them. I have about 700 CDs. They are arranged in alphabetical order by artist, and I can't stand knowing that one or more of them is out of order. And, as Lilu once posted, if I see a microwave that's not running but is still showing seconds, I simply have to reset it.

5) I also occasionally have bouts with (idiot) savantism (savantry? savantatiousness?). In a previous position, we had a project that was dubbed "902". When I asked about the name, I was told that it was supposed to be such a lightning-fast communication method, that it was named for twice the temperature at which paper burned (remember the novel "Fahrenheit 451"?). The person giving the explanation couldn't let it rest there, and also went on to say, "It's also the smallest prime number that..." at which point I interrupted him to say that 451 was not prime and that its factors were 41 and 11. I spent the next hour or so wondering how I knew that in less than a second.

6) Possibly related to the previous item, I find that I often play math games in my head. As I've mentioned, my wife and I are loyal viewers of "The Biggest Loser". At the end of each show, they weigh the contestants to see how much weight they've lost this week, which they express as a percentage. I find that I cannot resist trying to calculate the percentage in my head, at least in the ballpark, before they tell us what it is.

7) As a result of either my advancing age or the length of my relationship, my wife tells me that I often repeat stories that I've already told her multiple times. Despite the fact that I don't recall relating these stories, she's always able to finish them for me so I know she must be right.

8) I tried to learn to speak Cherokee. I had tapes and books. What I found was that, unlike the Spanish which I studied and the Latin and French I had been exposed to, Cherokee has no relationship to English whatsoever, and the language reflects an entirely different way of even thinking than I'm used to. I still remember a few words, but the difference in the sentence structures and verb conjugations, not to mention the fact that I had no one to practice with, pretty much killed that project.

9) My first car was a 1964 Chevy II. It had no power steering, power brakes, air conditioner or even a radio. My brother and I pulled out the front seat, drilled two holes in the floorboard, and mounted an 8-track player under the seat. This meant that when you looked in my car there was no visible means of producing sound, and yet there were 2 Jensen 6x9 speakers behind the back seat. We also hooked it up directly to the battery so that it would play when the car wasn't running. The result was that I could take a date to a secluded spot, park the car, and with just a slight motion of my heel pop in a tape and have Marvin Gaye suddenly start playing seemingly out of nowhere. It was magic.

10) As a former chemistry major, I know what paranitrobenzeneazoresorcinol is, and I aced the chemistry test which included requiring me to spell it correctly.

And I'm sorry, but since I haven't posted in so long, and since I really don't think I could handle much in the way of rejection right now, I just don't feel that I can tag 10 other people. If they had blogs, I might tag Oscar Wilde, Red Skelton, Harpo Marx, Buster Keaton, Charlie Chaplin, W.C. Fields, George Burns, Lenny Bruce, George Carlin and Tommy Chong, but I'm not sure they'd appreciate it either.

Rubber Baby Buggy Bumpers

2009-01-20T14:16:00.001Z

I've been debating about whether or not to do this for some time, but when I read Bilbo's blog today and he decided to talk about Tom Swifties, I decided that I'd go ahead with it.

I don't know if Dr. Seuss is as popular among beginning readers today as he was when I just a wee bairn (ask fiona what it means), but he was oh, so much more than those bad movies The Cat In The Hat and How The Grinch Stole Christmas. If you didn't grow up reading Dr. Seuss, then your life is not as full as it should be.

My all-time favorite Dr. Seuss book is called Oh Say Can You Say, and it's a book of tongue twisters. I mentioned this once several years ago to my wife and, being the wonderful person that she is, she saw to it that a copy of the book ended up among my birthday gifts the next time it rolled around. As a 40-something year-old guy at the time, you might think I'd consider a kid's book as something of a gag gift. If so, then you don't know me at all. I was thrilled, and this book is right up there on my bookshelf along with all my grown-up books (including the complete Winnie The Pooh).

I think these show the brilliance of Dr. Seuss as much as any of the more famous books he wrote. Maybe this one wasn't as popular because it's challenging in a different way than most of his books (read up on loraxes some time). This book challenges on a more physical level and less on a moral or intellectual one. And by the way, if you think that Dr. Seuss' writing isn't normally intended to relay a moral or intellectual message, then you're just skimming the surface (same with A. A. Milne and Winnie The Pooh).

Most of the tongue twisters are very easy to read to yourself. The difficulty comes in saying them aloud. Even reading them aloud can cause you stumble.

Some of them don't actually have much of a twist until the very end, when you're rushing toward the finish:

One year we had a brunch
with Merry Christmas Mush to munch.
But I don't think you'd care for such.
We didn't like the mush munch much.

Dr. Seuss' excellence as a wordsmith is in the seeming simplicity of these words that he runs together in ways that would never, ever have occurred to me:

The storm starts
when the drops start dropping.
When the drops stop dropping
then the storm starts stopping.

Some of them consist of the more familiar tongue-twister formula of using very similar words in new ways that are just freaking hard to say:

Bed Spreaders spread spreads on beds.
Bread Spreaders spread butters on breads.
And that Bed Spreader better
watch out how he's spreading...
or that Bread Spreader's
sure going to butter his bedding.

One tongue-twister that I memorized some time ago didn't come from Dr. Seuss. I'm not sure of the origin, but since I'm in a tongue-twister mode here, I'll share it with you:

A tooter who tooted a flute
tried to tutor two tooters to toot.
Said the two to the tutor,
"Is it harder to toot or
to tutor two tooters to toot?"

But that one is child's play compared to some of the ones in this book. As you might have guessed, it's also marvelously illustrated with classic Dr. Seuss creatures and people, adding to its appeal. This last one may be my favorite from the book:

Upon an island hard to reach,
the East Beast sits upon his beach.
Upon the west beach sits the West Beast.
Each beach beast thinks that he's the best beast.

Which beast is best?... Well, I though at first
that the East was best and the West was worst.
Then I looked again from the west to the east
and I liked the beast on the east beach least.

Blogs are amazing things. They can even get a middle-aged guy to admit that he still occasionally reads Dr. Seuss and Winnie the Pooh.

Who are these freaky people?

2009-01-15T17:00:00.001Z

OK, like most of you folks out there, people stumble across my blog all the time by doing various web searches. Some are odd. Some make me wonder what people are actually searching for.

Back in August, I wrote a little piece about those flashing speed limit signs. I didn't think it was particularly funny, certainly not my best work, but we had encountered some of these on a recent road trip where hundreds of cars were speeding by and we had no idea which flashing MPH applied to which car. On a whim, I titled the piece with a lyric from a relatively obscure little song from 1971 (#3 on the charts for a few weeks) by an even more obscure group (2 top 40 hits) from Canada (I don't even want to talk about the cover by '80s hair band Tesla, the hacks), even though it had very little to do with the article I actually wrote.

Now, I've written about (or at least cited) Keith Emerson, Bo Diddley, David Bowie, Eric Clapton, The Band, Kiss, Deep Purple, and many, many other really big names in music. I'll admit that my post on Johnny Winter has been found by many web searches. For that matter, my quotes from Elwood P. Dowd have garnered lots of hits. I suppose this means that Elwood has as many followers as Johnny does, although he doesn't sing in the movie.

But it never even occurred to me that so many people wanted to know about Five Man Electrical Band and their hit "Signs". This is a song that contains such poetry as "so I got me a pen and a paper". Meter, thou art a cruel mistress.

Now bear in mind that when I go to Google Analytics and tell it that I want to see all my hits sorted by keyword, the first and overwhelmingly largest is always "(not set)". After that, there's "gilahi" and a couple of other obvious ones. That makes this pretty much the leader in my hit rate:

Apparently, the first 8 words of this song qualify as the biggest earworm epidemic in '70s music. Then there are a couple of people who aren't really into verbs:

Then there's quite a list of people who manage to at least two of the first three words right:

And then there's these:

"long haird"? "low hear freaky people"? "we are the freaky people"? (see subject)

Every single week I get more hits on these lyrics of a 38-year old song.

You have no idea how tempted I am to put a post out there that contains nothing but the opening lyrics to little-known, underappreciated songs from my heyday, just to watch the search numbers.

As a matter of fact...

Dale a tu cuerpo alegria...

A little past my time, but let's just see what that might do.

In order to help out these seekers of the truth, here are the entire lyrics to this song by a little band from Ottawa:

Signs
by Five Man Electrical Band

And the sign said long-haired freaky people
need not apply.
So I tucked my hair up under my hat
and I went in to ask him why.

He said, "You look like a fine upstanding young man.
I think you'll do."
So I took off my hat, I said, "Imagine that.
Huh, me working for you."

(chorus)
Sign, sign, everywhere a sign,
blocking out the scenery breakin' my mind.
Do this, don't do that.
Can't you read the sign?

And the sign said anybody caught trespassin'
would be shot on sight.
So I jumped on the fence and I yelled at the house,
"Hey! What gives you the right

to put up a fence to keep me out
but to keep Mother Nature in?
If God was here he'd tell you to your face,
man you're some kind of sinner."

(chorus)

Now hey you, mister, can't you read?
You've got to have a shirt and tie to get a seat.
You can't even watch, no, you can't eat.
You ain't supposed to be here.

Sign said you got to have a membership card to get inside. Ugh!

And the sign said, "Everybody Welcome.
Come in, kneel down and pray."
But when they passed around the plate at the end of it all,
I didn't have a penny to pay.

So I got me a pen and a paper
and I made up my own little sign.
It said, "Thank you, Lord, for thinking 'bout me.
I'm alive and doing fine."

(chorus)

To all you pilgrims out there in Internetland, your search is at an end. You are welcome.

Trivia Day - The Word Edition: Answers

2009-01-12T16:00:00.000Z

I've got a screaming head cold today and just got off of a 90-minute conference call with an unhappy customer. I'm at home in a robe sweating with a fever and waiting for the rest of my left lung to come up with the next coughing fit. Either that, or for my entire red, irritated nose to wind up in the tissue the next time I sneeze.

Still, I said I'd publish these answers today, so here they are. If you think I'm wrong on some of these, I have to say that at this point I really could not possibly care less. I'm going to go lie down.

Here's the post I originally had written:

Some fun. At least a few more people gave this one a shot than on the previous one. Thanks for reading, and I hope it was fun, if not educational.

Here are the answers:

1) What's the longest word in the English language that contains only one vowel?
Strengths - Nine letters, one vowel.

2) What are the two words in the English language that contain all the vowels, including "y", in alphabetical order?
facetiously - In a facetious or flippant manner; in a manner that treats serious issues with deliberately inappropriate humor

and

abstemiously - Marked by abstinence or restraint, especially in relation to food or drink. I'm surprised that one of you, Mike, got this one.

3) What's the shortest non-capitalized word in the English language that contains all the vowels, not including "y"?
eunoia - A medical term that means "a state of normal mental health". I'm not surprised that no one got this one.

4) There is one word (and its variants) in the English language that contains 3 doubled letters (like "tt", "rr", etc.) in a row. What is it?
bookkeeper (or bookkeeping, etc.), also identified by Mike.

5) What's the original plural of the word "opus"?
opera - As identified by Bilbo and Mike.

6) Linguists refer to a word in which no letter is used more than once as an isogram. What's the longest isogram in English?
uncopyrightables - No other 16-letter (or longer) word has no repeated letters. Identified by Mike.

7) What's the only common English word (plus any derivatives) that ends in the letters "mt"?
dreamt - As identified by Fiona and Mike.

8) There are only two common words (and their derivatives) that end in the letters "shion". What are they?
cushion and fashion - As identified by Fiona, Eudea-Mamia, and Mike.

9) There are no common English words that contain all the letters "a" through "g". What are the two shortest English words that contain all the letters "a" through "f"?
There are lots of words in English that contain all of the letters "a" through "f", but the two shortest ones are feedback and boldface. Mike got one of these.

10) There is only one common English word that has 5 vowels in a row. What is it?
queuing. Mike got this, although he misspelled it with 6 vowels in a row.

11) What's the longest word with only one syllable? This applies to American English only, as the English English and most other English-speaking countries would pronounce it with two syllables, and in fact I suspect that some would argue about it even in America. It's my quiz, and this is pretty widely accepted, so don't fight me on it.
squirrelled

Oh, by the way, did I happen to mention the upcoming good time that's going to be had by everybody who's anybody in the DC area on January 18th? It's not too late to sign up. Just go here or here or here and follow the instructions. We look forward to seeing our new friends and to making even more new friends. Don't miss it!

This is normal, right?

2009-01-08T23:20:00.007Z

It's not just me, is it? Surely this has occurred to someone else. Every time I see an ad for this product:

My first thought is always that it's a laxative.

Right? Right? Come on.

Trivia Day - The Word Edition

2009-01-08T14:00:00.001Z

(First, a public service announcement from our friends bringing you the Bloggerational Ball on January 18. Read all about it and sign up here. It promises to be a good time for all!)

All right, due to the overwhelming success of my last trivia quiz, which a grand total of two people attempted, I've decided to try again. This time, with something that may be a little less obscure: English. Specifically, words. In response to the feedback from the previous quiz, I will make this one shorter and, I hope easier. As always, I'd appreciate it if you didn't go to the web to look these up. If anybody can come up with examples of other words that prove I'm wrong about any of the assertions below, I'd love to know them.

Also, since I can never be counted on to follow Sean's example and publish on Tuesday, I just decided to arbitrarily call this "Trivia Day".

So here goes:

1) What's the longest word in the English language that contains only one vowel?

2) What are the two words in the English language that contain all the vowels, including "y", in alphabetical order?

3) What's the shortest non-capitalized word in the English language that contains all the vowels, not including "y"? (The word "Iouea" is a genus of sea sponges, but as such is capitalized. Knew you'd want to know.)

4) There is one word (and its variants) in the English language that contains 3 doubled letters (like "tt", "rr", etc.) in a row. What is it? I'll take any form.

5) What's the original plural of the word "opus"? Today, people use "opuses", but that's a relatively new form.

6) Linguists refer to a word in which no letter is used more than once as an isogram. What's the longest isogram in English?

7) What's the only common English word (plus any derivatives) that ends in the letters "mt"?

8) There are only two common words (and their derivatives) that end in the letters "shion". What are they?

9) There are no common English words that contain all the letters "a" through "g". What are the two shortest English words that contain all the letters "a" through "f"?

10) There is only one common English word that has 5 vowels in a row. What is it?

11) What's the longest word with only one syllable? This applies to American English only, as the English English and most other English-speaking countries would pronounce it with two syllables, and in fact I suspect that some would argue about it even in America. It's my quiz, and this is pretty widely accepted, so don't fight me on it.

Good luck.

The Meming of Life

2009-01-05T15:00:00.000Z

It appears that she had some reason to believe that I wouldn't find it, but Photocynthesis tagged me for what is possibly the longest meme of all time. Apparently, I'm supposed to wonder "what the hell", so here we go:

Nah, I'm not really upset, I just liked the picture.

The thing about this particular meme is, there don't seem to be any rules or instructions, I'm just supposed to list a whole bunch of stuff about myself that nobody really cares about. Not even me. Still, in the spirit of good sportsmanship and just to show Ms. Cyndy that she'll have to hide better than that if she really wants people not to find stuff, I'm off.

All About Me
10 Years Ago:
I had several of my body parts replaced with Hefty Cinch Sacks full of Jell-O Pudding. When everybody started doing Bill Cosby imitations every time I came into a room, I decided to have all of my original body parts reattached. I still have my extra head, though. You never know when you're gonna need something.

8 Years Ago:
In a burst of mid-life crisis, I decided that I would no longer obey the laws of gravity or evolution, and for a time became a flying monkey. I soon found that the only occupation available to me was as an extra in "The Wizard of Oz", but being paid scale for performing in a movie that was completed 62 years earlier wasn't enough for me to survive on, so I cleaned up my act, moved to Virginia, and started my new position with my company. Oh, and I got married. I can still fly, too.

6 Years Ago:
The apocalyptic nightmare hit and the entire planet was destroyed in a series of fiery explosions that ended all life on earth just before the kind beings from Nepton-6 took compassion and replaced everything with exact cybertronic duplicates. What, you don't remember that? Oh. Never mind. Just go on about your business as if I hadn't said anything.

4 Years Ago:
Just in case you think everything I've recounted up to this point is unbelievable, in 2005 George W. Bush was inaugurated for the second time.

2 Years Ago:
My hair was darker, I weighed less, I was on track for early retirement, and my idea for an animated movie detailing the life of Sir E. Farquhar Buzzard with Gilbert Gottfried providing the voice of the title character still hadn't caught on. On a side note, I believe this is the second time that I've gotten to work the name E. Farquhar Buzzard into this blog.

5 Yummy Things:
1. Tabasco Sauce
2. Breyer's Heavenly Hash Ice Cream

3. Tyra Banks
4. Egg Nog
5. Black pepper

5 Songs I Know By Heart:
1. "Happy Birthday" (if I know your name)
2. "Wipeout"
3. The Alphabet Song (sung to the tune of "Twinkle, Twinkle Little Star")
4. "Tequila"
5. Beethoven's 9th Symphony

5 Places I Would Like To Escape To:
1. Petticoat Junction
2. Maggie's Farm
3. Up Around The Bend
4. Junior's Farm
5. Stone Soul Picnic

5 Things I Would Never Wear:
1. Asphalt
2. Uranium-238
3. Phlegm
4. Carbon paper
5. Crocs

5 Favorite TV Shows:
1. "The Dick Van Dyke Show"
2. Scrambled porn
3. Test pattern
4. Commercials
5. Closing credits

5 Things I Enjoy Doing:
1. ___ (this blog does not contain adult content)
2. ___ (this blog does not contain adult content)
3. ___ (this blog does not contain adult content)
4. ___ (this blog does not contain adult content)
5. Scratching

5 Favorite Toys:
1. Clumps of dirt
2. Sticks
3. Aluminum Foil
4. Dry Cleaner bags
5. Shoe boxes

5 People Who I Am Tagging To Fill This Out:
1. E. Farquhar Buzzard
2. Attila the Hun
3. Tyra Banks
4. Groucho Marx
5. That guy who's always asking for a quarter outside the Subway at lunchtime

Dayum

2008-12-30T15:25:00.006Z

Ah've jest spent fahv days in Georgia, en now it's goan take me two weeks to git shed of this southern accent agin.

Whahl it wuz good ta see mah family and friends agin, Ah always have to spend some tahm ta lose the drawl after Ah've bin there a spell.

Ah have to stop makin' two syllables out of one-syllable words agin (a doe-er is somethin' ya shut ta keep the draft out), Ah've got ta quit makin' mah "I" sounds as if the doctor has jest tol' me to open wahd, en even at mah best, Ah've never quaht got rid of mah tindincy ta make "en" and "in" sounds ahdentical (which is why we southerners have a tindincy to come up with colorful phrases like "ink pin" so that we can distinguish that item from a "straight pin").

It's hard not to pick the accent back up agin, since most of mah family can tawk the ears off a two-headed billy goat (Ah got to remember to stop usin' them colorful phrases, too), but it's dayum nigh impossible to stop oncet it's back in mah head.

So as soon as Ah'm able to communicate agin without bein' a laughin' stock, Ah'll post somethin' about our trip down south, although it wadn't as bad as the one LiLu had up north.

Ah hope ya'll had a good holiday, whutever that maht've looked lahk, en Ah hope yer New Year's collards and peas are tastier than briars are to a mule.

And bah the way, if yer not southern, don't trah to put own a southern drawl. It jest makes ya sound stoopid.

20 Years Later

2008-12-17T13:00:00.008Z

This post is not going to be funny. It may be sappy, sad, self-indulgent and downright melancholy, so if you're looking for funny, you should probably just go on to the next blog. As I've done once or twice before, I'm writing this more for me than for you, so don't blame me if you continue reading beyond this point. Quite frankly, I'm sort of glad that no one can see me as I type this.

You see, today is the 20th anniversary of the death of my father. I remember a time when I couldn't name anything in my life that had happened 20 years ago.

Dad was born in 1920 in the hills of north Georgia. He was raised on a small farm that made most of its income from a large apple orchard and a few dairy cows. His parents gave him a very unusual name, which he never really liked, so that in his adult years he went almost exclusively by his initials. Only his close friends knew his middle (preferred) name, and most people had no idea what his first name was. Only my mother could get away with calling him by name, and that was usually an indication that she was peeved with him about something. If she used both names, we knew there was trouble.

He was not a tall man, by most standards, standing about 5'6" ("soaking wet" as he used to say). My brother and I both towered over him. He had wiry dark hair that never went completely gray, and a deep complexion and brown eyes that displayed his Cherokee roots. He had a booming bass voice that lent itself weekly to the church choir.

For my entire lifetime, he was a deacon at the Baptist church in our town, which he literally helped to build with his own hands. He knew his Bible inside and out, as well as being familiar with The Koran, The Book of Mormon, most apocryphal Christian writings, and other religious texts. He encouraged all of his children toward Christianity, but unlike other Southern Baptists I knew at the time, he also encouraged us to think about things, to question things we didn't understand, to struggle with our beliefs. He didn't develop his own opinions or beliefs lightly. I learned early on that if I went to him with a difference of opinion about something religion-related, then I'd better have done my homework. He had come to his beliefs through years of study, questioning, and consultations with elders, and he could instantly point you to any number of (sometimes obscure) references to back up his opinions. I know that he was disappointed when he saw that my study and questioning of beliefs started to lead me in a direction that was pretty much the opposite of the one he would have liked.

Part of his service to his church was teaching Sunday School to 9-year old boys. He was good at it. He would give quizzes that forced them to do research ("Among the 12 apostles, there were three sets of 2 brothers and one set of 3 brothers, who were they?") and he would occasionally put things out there just to make them think, even if there was no "right" answer ("If young David had so much faith in God when going up against Goliath, why does the Bible tell us explicitly that he picked up five smooth stones?"). I no longer know the answers to those questions, although it seems that I did at one time.

In his non-church life, he was a salesman. He travelled around the city all day every day, calling on clients to whom he sold packaging products. His specialty was the moving industry. Anyone who moved in northern Georgia from the late '60s to the early '80s probably had their things packed in cartons sold by my father. He didn't make a great living, and I would classify my family through most of those years as "lower middle class", but he was able to buy a small house, raise 3 children and have the resources to get us all to college. There was enough for an annual vacation to Florida, and for my brother and I to get clunker cars when we were old enough to drive (my sister wasn't all that interested in driving at the time).

He desperately loved my mother for the 44 years or so that they were married. He spoiled her as best he was able. She kept house, cooked and raised us kids as a good '40s and '50s housewife did. For as long as he lived, they would hold hands when walking together. He kissed her as he left every morning and again on returning home. Their wedding anniversary was always one of the high points of the year for them.

He had a rather unusual sense of humor, delighting in plays on words. He would often tease those closest to him, to the point that my mother would say that he had gone too far and never knew when to stop. He knew a little bit about a lot of things. He was able to chat with me about the sciences when I was majoring in them, and at the same time he could tune up the car with my mechanically-inclined brother. He explained to me the wonders of various plants while strolling in the woods. When the pine borers destroyed all the trees in our back yard, Dad made lemonade from those lemons by grinding the stumps down and planting rose beds where all the trees had been.

He was a very patient man, but he had one or two "hot buttons". When I was a little boy, I once complained that there was nothing on the dinner table that I liked. He pulled me right out of my chair and told me that if I didn't like the food, then I didn't have to eat it, but I was not to complain about it either. It was so uncharacteristic of him that it left me in tears. My older brother later explained to me that, during the Great Depression, there were times when my dad's family of 7 simply didn't have enough to eat and therefore all food was to be appreciated. He would also tolerate nothing below "good" conduct in school. "If you aren't interested in learning, then shut up so you don't bother those who are."

Aside from those two occasions, my father rarely showed any emotion other than happiness. In my entire life, I saw him cry twice: once when his father died and once when he took my brother to the Army induction center at the height of the Vietnam War.

He was a lifelong smoker, starting when he was a young man before everyone realized the dangers. In his late 50s, he had a heart attack that was so minor that he didn't even recognize it for what it was until his next checkup when his doctor detected scar tissue. As time went on, he developed a condition in which his blood vessels began to constrict. The immediate and most noticeable result of this was that not enough blood got to his lungs and he would become winded easily. In December of 1988, he developed a case of bronchitis which constricted his lungs, causing him even more breathing difficulty, and he was hospitalized. He was on the road to recovery and was expected to be home for Christmas when he suddenly took a turn for the worse and, on December 17, 1988, he passed away. I find it somewhat sobering when I realize that I am now only 17 years younger than my father was when he died.

Despite his stature, the minister referred to my father as a "giant" in his eulogy. He was a charter member of the church, a lifelong supporter both financially and personally, well respected, scrupulously honest, highly knowledgeable, and well liked. There were hundreds of church members, coworkers, customers, neighbors, family and friends at his funeral.

In the few years after his death, I began to realize that I had placed my dad on a pretty high pedestal. As I began to notice a bit of tarnish on the image I had constructed in my mind, it made me somewhat uncomfortable. He made mistakes. He was wrong about some things. He could have done some things much better than he did. I struggled with this for some time, until I realized that it was me who wasn't being fair here. I had to allow my father to be the human being that he was, warts and all. He wasn't superhuman. He was a good man, and that's all anyone should really expect of a man. Finally recognizing that fact doesn't mean that I love him any less.

It's been 20 years since I got the phone call. That's almost 40% of my life that I've spent without my father. After 20 years I still think about Dad often.

And it has taken me 20 years to finally arrive at the realization that I will miss him for the rest of my life.

Please be assured that I'm not trying to sell you anything

2008-12-16T13:00:00.000Z

Friday evening, for the third time in two days, I received a call from the Bother You While You're At Home Research Group. For the third time in two days, I summarily hung up on them as soon as they identified themselves. For the first time in two days, I did what any self-respecting geek would do and looked them up on the Internet.

I found their website on the second try (spelling apparently counts), and looked around for some sort of opt-out method. Since none could be found, I went to their "Contact Us" page. The first thing I noticed was that the first e-mail address on there is for the president of the company. Impressive.

So I sent the guy a message. I informed him that I had gotten three calls in two days. I told him that I would never, ever speak to some corporate entity who called me uninvited during my precious leisure time. I asked him, if it was at all possible, to remove my phone number from any and all future calls, suggesting that to do so would save us both time and save him money. Since they already have it anyway, I included my phone number to expedite things.

Imagine my surprise when, within minutes, I got an email message back from him (from his Blackberry, it said) saying that my number would be removed. Impressive. I sent him a "many, many thanks" message.

It was then that I realized something for the very first time. All these polls you read about, all these "scientific" surveys, are only giving you the opinions of people who have nothing better to do with their time than to talk to pollsters.

So 37% of the incredibly lonely people in this country will probably vote in the next election.

62% of all agoraphobics are happy with the way this election turned out.

76% of all nursing home residents are extremely concerned about the economy.

50% of all people with multiple personalities are against the war in Iraq, and 50% aren't. Maybe.

Folks, if you're talking to these people, this is the impression you're making. You've either deluded yourself into thinking that they really care about what you have to say, or that you'd talk to Chia Pets if they didn't keep shriveling up and dying on you.

If your life is so empty that you're willing to take the time to talk to a total stranger about your opinions on things, join a meetup group.

Get a dog. A dog will listen to your opinions for hours, be completely fascinated by you, and will agree with everything you say.

Stand on a street corner and state your opinions out loud for the world to hear. We see this sort of thing all the time in Washington. Anybody who wants to hear what you have to say can stop and listen to you.

But please don't engage pollsters or telemarketers on any level at all. If you do, they're just going to call more people because there's a sliver of hope that it might be effective in some way.

Finally, if all else fails, if worse comes to worse, if you absolutely must spout your opinions no matter how idiotic they may be, write a blog.

My First Trivia Quiz: The Answers

2008-12-15T13:00:00.007Z

Most of the feedback (and there's been darn little) about my first trivia quiz is that it's A) too long, and B) too hard. Sorry about that. If I do another one, I'll try to lighten things up a little. As it is, only Dixie and Sean even took a stab at it. I had hoped it would be more fun than that. Anyhoo, as promised, here are the answers (just in case anyone didn't see comments on the original post, I'm including all of them):

1) In the chorus of Donovan's song "Mellow Yellow", the words "quite right, Slick" are whispered. Who's doing the whispering there?
Paul McCartney

2) Speaking of Donovan, what famous actress is his daughter?
Ione Skye is the daughter of Donovan and model Enid Karl.

3) Speaking of famous daughters, who is Nora Jones' father?
Ms. Jones is the daughter of sitarist and Beatles mentor Ravi Shankar and Sue Jones.

4) What late sixties/early seventies group had 7 platinum albums without ever producing a #1 hit?
Creedence Clearwater Revival.

5) What artist has the most top-10 records for an artist who's never had a #1 hit? (not the same artist as 4)
Bruce Springsteen, although several of his albums were #1 on the charts for weeks.

6) In 1965, The Easybeats had a top-20 hit with "Friday On My Mind". It was the only top-40 hit they ever had. The guitarist for The Easybeats was the brother of two guys in an eighties hard rock group that's still performing today. Who was he and who are his brothers?
George Young was the guitarist for The Easybeats. His younger brothers are Malcolm Young and Angus Young of AC/DC.

7) What's Alice Cooper's real name?
Vincent Furnier.

8) What's David Bowie's real name and why did he change it?
David Jones. He changed his name so as to avoid any confusion with Davy Jones of The Monkees. Like that was possible.

9) What famous novel was the basis of a rock opera written by David Bowie which was never produced because the estate of the author wouldn't grant permission?
George Orwell's 1984. A couple of the songs (1984 and Big Brother) did make it onto Bowie's Diamond Dogs album.

10) What female dance singer was the only artist to produce 4 top-10 hits from an album that didn't even make it to the top 20?
Taylor Dayne. Tell It To My Heart, Prove Your Love, I'll Always Love You, and Don't Rush Me from her self-titled debut album all reached the top 10 on the singles chart, but the album itself peaked at #21.

11) Two songs have reached #1 on the charts, then been off the charts for 12 months or more, and then reached #1 again. What are they? (Hint: One of these is not actually a rock & roll song, but it did make #1 on the pop charts.)
Bing Crosby's White Christmas (December, 1942 and December, 1955) and Chubby Checker's The Twist (August, 1960 and November, 1961). White Christmas is the best-selling Christmas record of all time.

12) Who played the steel guitar on Crosby, Still, Nash & Young's "Teach Your Children"?
Jerry Garcia.

13) Who was the first white group to record for Motown Records?
Rare Earth.

14) Where did Elton John & Bernie Taupin come up with the name "Levon"?
Mr. John and Mr. Taupin were big fans of The Band, in particular member Levon Helm, who played drums, mandolin, guitar, bass and sang.

15) What garbled lyrics gave us the title "In-A-Gadda-Da-Vida"?
In The Garden of Eden.

16) What singer has had at least one top-10 hit in each of the last five decades, including this one?

Cher.

17) What song hit #1 in 1964, but wasn't a certified million-seller for another 17 1/2 years?

The Beach Boys' I Get Around.

18) What was the only group to have #1 singles on 4 different labels?
The Beatles (Capitol, Swan, Tollie and Apple). By the way, Yesterday is the most-recorded song of all time. By the late '80s, there were more than 2500 versions of it recorded. I suspect there are even more today.

19) What do Harold Melvin & The Bluenotes, Paul Revere & The Raiders, Bo Donaldson & The Heywoods, The Spencer Davis Group and Manfred Mann's Earth Band all have in common?

They are groups who are named after a member that's not the lead singer.

20) Which duo had more hits than any other duo?

The Everly Brothers.

21) What name did Arnold Dorsey record under?

Englebert Humperdinck.

22) Who won the first Grammy in the "Heavy Metal" category? This may surprise you as much as it surprised the members of Metallica, who thought they were a cinch to win.

Jethro Tull.

23) Which #1 hit boasts the longest title of any #1 hit (excluding multiple-song medleys)?

That distinction belongs to B. J. Thomas' (Hey, Won't You Play) Another Somebody Done Somebody Wrong Song.

24) With 58 charted hits, 44 top-40 hits, and 26 top-10 hits, who is #3 in all-time hits after Elvis Presley and The Beatles?

Stevie Wonder.

25) In the '70s, there was an occasion in which a hit song, the album from which the song came, and the name of the artist were all the same. What was it?

Bad Company, Bad Company and Bad Company.

26) What's unique about Led Zeppelin's most famous song, "Stairway To Heaven", among all of their other hits?

Led Zeppelin's most famous song was never released as a single and therefore never made any of the top single hit lists.

Well. I thought it was fun. Thanks to all of you who at least looked at these.

Not Really TMI

2008-12-11T13:00:00.000Z

This is not TMI in the sense that it will make you go "ew", but it's still a bit embarrassing for me because it involves a time when I had a little too much to drink.

In the early '70s, I went to a Kiss concert at the Omni in Atlanta with my friend Gary and my other friend Gary. Back then, although there were strict rules about what you could and could not bring into a concert venue, nobody checked very closely and it was ridiculously easy to sneak things in that, strictly speaking, were prohibited.

Thus, my friend Gary decided that he would take along his mini-cassette recorder and tape the show for posterity. In 1973, a "mini-cassette" was approximately the size of an unabridged dictionary, but Gary somehow managed to get it into the show under one of the enormous CPO jackets that we were all wearing at the time (I've mentioned before that this was a very ugly decade).

Anyway, this thing was huge, came with a leather cover, and had all the fidelity of a tin can on a string. Since the microphone was built in, it tended to pick up whatever sound was closest to it, which in this case was about 10,000 screaming teenagers. Gary held this thing over his head at arm's length all night. We listened to the tape of the concert later. Since the little built-in mike was completely overloaded, the entire tape came across like a static-filled AM radio station at the bottom of the Grand Canyon. It sounded something like this:

SHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH and party ev-e-ry SHHHHHHHHHHHHHH lose your mind in Detroit, Rock SHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH
it's cold gin time again SHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH
SHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH
SHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH

Anyway, another advantage of attending rock concerts in the seventies was that the vendors would gleefully sell beer to teenage boys like myself and my friend Gary and my other friend Gary. Suffice to say that we took full advantage of this lapse of judgement.

As the evening drew to a close, Gary decided that it was time for him to retrieve the leather cover for his recorder, which he had earlier stowed under his seat. He searched around under there and came up with a hand covered in blood. Turns out that somebody else (none of us) had decided that it would be a good idea to smuggle a pint of vodka into the concert and perhaps, I don't know, break the bottle under the seat of some unsuspecting concertgoer.

Anyway, Gary had managed to gash his hand wide open on said broken vodka bottle. Fortunately, he was also in such a state that it really wasn't causing him a lot of pain. It was obvious pretty quickly that he was going to need assistance. We stumbled our way up the stairs and found an usher, who led us to a guard, who took us to the medical station, which was back stage. Gary and I are standing (reeling) there watching a nurse clean up Gary's hand and apply butterfly bandages while informing him that he should go for stitches, and just over to our left, 20 feet away, was Kiss finishing up their last encore.

As the show ended, I noticed a short, fat, balding security guard standing at the stage exit. He had his back to us and was holding his arms out and saying, "Stay back! Keep back! Back!"

The thing is, nobody was there. He wasn't holding back a crowd, except maybe in his own mind. He was holding back... nothing. In my state of mind (if it could be called that), I really felt sorry for the guy. I mean, here he is, working late at night, probably at a menial salary, and he has nothing to do, really. I give him credit for trying to make the best of it. So, being the kind and gallant guy that I am, I walked over to where he was and leaned against his outstretched arm. He immediately turned all his attention to me, but kept up the same banter. "BACK! Stay back! Give 'em room! Keep back!" I felt really good about it. I had given the man a purpose in life. How many of us can really say that?

Unfortunately, even then he didn't do a very good job. As Kiss took their final bows and exited the stage, I was able to slap every one of them on the back. I'll never forget what happened next. As I was slapping them all on the back and saying, "Nice show!", Gene Simmons looked over his shoulder and said "UUUuuuuh."

Even after giving his all at a show, covered in sweat, and exhausted, Gene Simmons went to the trouble to look over his shoulder at a young teenage admirer and offer him, "UUUuuuuh."

That's right, those of you who met me at the blogger meetup are one degree of separation from all of the members of Kiss.

OK, maybe I was wrong. Maybe it did make you say "ew".

My First Trivia Quiz

2008-12-10T15:36:00.003Z

I'll be the first to admit that I glean (read: blatantly steal) some of my blog ideas from other blogs. So in the spirit of Trivia Tuesday from Sean's Ramblings, I've decided to do one, and maybe two, trivia quizzes of my own. Since Sean probably has a copyright on "Trivia Tuesday", I'll just call mine "Trivia [InsertDayHere]". It's a little clumsy, but I think it has potential.

I've decided to do the quiz(zes) on things that interest me, of course, so this first one will be on music. You may not be interested. If not, don't play. If you do play, you should bear in mind that this is probably going to be weighted heavily toward my era, the late '60s and early '70s. I may throw in a little later stuff, but don't count on it.

As with Sean's quizzes, I'd appreciate it if you didn't just surf the web to find these answers.

Please feel free to enter your answers in the comments.

Here we go:

1) In the chorus of Donovan's song "Mellow Yellow", the words "quite right, Slick" are whispered. Who's doing the whispering there?

2) Speaking of Donovan, what famous actress is his daughter?

3) Speaking of famous daughters, who is Nora Jones' father?

4) What late sixties/early seventies group had 7 platinum albums without ever producing a #1 hit?

5) What artist has the most top-10 records for an artist who's never had a #1 hit? (not the same artist as 4)

6) In 1965, The Easybeats had a top-20 hit with "Friday On My Mind". It was the only top-40 hit they ever had. The guitarist for The Easybeats was the brother of two guys in an eighties hard rock group that's still performing today. Who was he and who are his brothers?

7) What's Alice Cooper's real name?

8) What's David Bowie's real name and why did he change it?

9) What famous novel was the basis of a rock opera written by David Bowie which was never produced because the estate of the author wouldn't grant permission?

10) What female dance singer was the only artist to produce 4 top-10 hits from an album that didn't even make it to the top 20?

11) Two songs have reached #1 on the charts, then been off the charts for 12 months or more, and then reached #1 again. What are they? (Hint: One of these is not actually a rock & roll song, but it did make #1 on the pop charts.)

12) Who played the steel guitar on Crosby, Still, Nash & Young's "Teach Your Children"?

13) Who was the first white group to record for Motown Records?

14) Where did Elton John & Bernie Taupin come up with the name "Levon"?

15) What garbled lyrics gave us the title "In-A-Gadda-Da-Vida"?

16) What singer has had at least one top-10 hit in each of the last five decades, including this one?

17) What song hit #1 in 1964, but wasn't a certified million-seller for another 17 1/2 years?

18) What was the only group to have #1 singles on 4 different labels?

19) What do Harold Melvin & The Bluenotes, Paul Revere & The Raiders, Bo Donaldson & The Heywoods, The Spencer Davis Group and Manfred Mann's Earth Band all have in common?

20) Which duo had more hits than any other duo?

21) What name did Arnold Dorsey record under?

22) Who won the first Grammy in the "Heavy Metal" category? This may surprise you as much as it surprised the members of Metallica, who thought they were a cinch to win.

23) Which #1 hit boasts the longest title of any #1 hit (excluding multiple-song medleys)?

24) With 58 charted hits, 44 top-40 hits, and 26 top-10 hits, who is #3 in all-time hits after Elvis Presley and The Beatles?

25) In the '70s, there was an occasion in which a hit song, the album from which the song came, and the name of the artist were all the same. What was it?

26) What's unique about Led Zeppelin's most famous song, "Stairway To Heaven", among all of their other hits?

There's more, but that should be enough for now. Let's see if there's any response to this at all.

And it's been a long time since I said this, but thanks for reading my blog.

Just Go Inside Already

2008-12-08T11:41:00.006Z

Aren't ATMs supposed to be for the convenience of quick transactions so you don't actually have to go into the bank? Why do I always seem to get behind the person who's decided that they can renegotiate their mortgage rate at the drive-through?

When I get to an ATM, I normally do one of two things: 1) Stick in the card; enter my PIN; yes I want a receipt; choose quick cash from checking; enter amount; done, or 2) Stick in the card; enter my PIN; yes I want a receipt; choose deposit; choose account; enter amount; insert envelope; done. Thirty seconds to a minute, tops. If there's somebody behind me, I don't even take the time to put away my wallet. I just toss things on the seat and move out of the way.

I'm a saint, that's what I am.

Friday morning, I drove down to my local bank. There was a pickup truck at the ATM. I couldn't see the person too well, and I couldn't see the ATM screen at all, but as nearly as I can tell, this is what he did: make a phone call, take a quick nap, write a letter to his congressman, finish that novel he started yesterday, and then get out his ATM card. He put the card into the machine and I thought, "Finally.... here we go". He then proceeded to enter what must have been some sort of NORAD security code, pausing to read the screen frequently between button pushes. I dunno, maybe he knew how to call up "World of Warcraft" on it or something, because I've never seen anyone push so many buttons in order to do an ATM transaction.

Periodically, a receipt would pop out of the machine which the man would take and peer at myopically for 30 seconds to a minute, but apparently Waldo continued to elude him because he would go back to punching buttons, reading the screen, and waiting for the next receipt. I counted four different receipts this guy got from the machine. Either he just needs some notepaper for his vehicle and thought this would be a good way to get it, or he's trying to figure out how to tap into his part of the $700 billion that government is giving away.

Anyway, he eventually got his card back and I, foolishly, once again thought, "Finally.... here we go". The gentleman proceeded to re-read his receipts, take other quick snooze, start his next novel, put his wallet back in his pocket, have a sandwich, scratch, look idly about, and start up his truck. Can you guess what I thought when he started up his truck? Hope truly does spring eternal, and at this point I had dreams of getting out of there in time to vote in the next presidential election. After starting his truck, he changed clothes, had a quick shower and shave, Q-Tipped his ears, sang a couple of Marvin Gaye tunes in front of his mirror using his hairbrush as a microphone, pulled forward about 18 inches and stopped his truck again.

I don't even want to speculate about what he was doing at that point, but eventually he managed to pull his vehicle into a parking spot and, finally, went inside the bank.

I suspect he's still there.

Facts

2008-12-05T13:00:00.000Z

These facts come mostly from this past weekend. Feel free to print them out, paste them onto 3X5 cards, and use them as talking points at your next party.

Fact: New Jersey is the most moronic place to drive in the world. I've driven in a lot of places: LA; Boston; New York City; Cozumel, Mexico; Atlanta and other locales, and I can say pretty confidently that whoever laid out the roads, signage and signals in New Jersey was either the Marquis de Sade or Koko the gorilla. Before she could talk. Consider that in many places, one cannot turn left. In order to turn left, you have to turn right, go around a jughandle, wait at a traffic light, and then go straight across the intersection. It doesn't seem to have occurred to the good folks in New Jersey that no other state in the entire country has adopted this inane traffic pattern, and maybe there's some reason for that. That's why the above Wikipedia link specifically says "New Jersey jughandle". Sometimes you have to do a complete 180 via jughandle. You have to drive a mile or so past your destination on the left, turn right, loop around, turn left at the light, and then go back the mile or so to get to where you want to be. Oh, and that light you have to stop at? It's a "delayed green". That means that when it's green for you, it's not green for the oncoming traffic. Do they give you an arrow or any other indication that the light that's facing away from you is still red? Hell no. You just have to know that the traffic is not coming from the other direction and it's safe to turn in front of them. Fortunately, you have approximately 26 picoseconds to figure this out before the car behind you starts blowing its horn and continues it for a quarter mile after you've completed your turn. It's really fortunate that gas is cheap in New Jersey, because that's the only reason I can think of that anyone would stay there.

Fact: People are stupid. Besides the traffic and the 35-degree rain, the cherry on the sundae that was our New Jersey visit was that we got to unexpectedly spend 5 days visiting a loved one in the hospital. As I was heading down to the Au Bon Pain (motto: "Not quite as bland as hospital food") for a snack, an elderly gentleman got on the elevator with me. We were on the top floor. That's important. Being the chivalrous guy that I am, my hand was hovering over the elevator buttons and the conversation went like this:

Gilahi: Where're you headed?
Elderly man: Downstairs.

Fact: Some people are in the wrong job. Or maybe it's the right job, just in the wrong place. Our patient's roommate was a poor little Italian woman who'd had a stroke. I say "poor" not because she'd had a stroke, but because her family, who was with her night and day, was the loudest, most obnoxious group of raving lunatics it has ever been my displeasure to encounter. I'm guessing that, since she survived and was apparently recovering, her stroke wasn't all she had hoped it would be. Anyway, while we're there, the speech therapist pays a visit to tell her about her time in rehab. Remember, the little old lady is Italian and apparently doesn't speak a whole lot of English (and, thanks to her family, no doubt, is somewhat hard of hearing as well). The speech therapist has a heavy Australian accent.

ST: HELLO MRS. P. WE-UH GOIN' TA TAKE YA TO REHAB.
LOL: ?
ST: WE-UH NOT ONLY GOIN' TA WUHK ON YOH WOHKING, WE-UH GOIN' TA WUHK ON YOH SPAITCH AS WELL.
LOL: ?
ST: YOH SPAITCH! WE-UH GOIN' TA HEP YOU SPAKE PROPUHLY AGANE.

At this point I was the one who was LOL. I would hate to be the one to try to decipher Mrs. P's accent in the future.

Fact: You are not allowed to pump your own gas in New Jersey. This is not necessarily a bad thing, as they have teams of the finest trained orangutans in the world to pump your gas for you. When this conversation took place, I had to go to the bathroom so badly that I was sloshing when I walked.

Gilahi: Fill it up with mid-grade, please.
Pumpmonkey: Fill it up?
Gilahi: Yes.
Pumpmonkey: With....?
Gilahi: Mid-grade.
Pumpmonkey: Mid-grade?
Gilahi (pointing at button on pump): 89 octane. This one.

Fact: At least one vineyard in New Jersey makes a surprisingly drinkable cabernet franc. "An insouciant little wine with a taste of blackcurrant and stone fruit on the front and just a hint of petroleum distillate at the end. The thick, foamy head lets you know that this is a wine of quality. If you're suffering from 'travel bloat' from eating out for days on end, this wine can really open up the sluices." And the waitress, ah the waitress.

Waitress: Do youse want ice in this?
Gilahi: In our cabernet franc? No, I don't think so.
Waitress: No, youse two would drink this without ice.

Whatever that means. What followed was a couple of minutes of her trying to decide where on our empty table she should put the bottle down. Eventually my wife picks a blank spot at random and says, "How about right here?" Since the bottle has been doing a Pit and the Pendulum motion for the past thirty seconds or so, it was with some relief that the waitress didn't have to finally make the decision on her own.

Fact: The definition of "clean" can change with your circumstances. When you've packed for a two-day trip that unexpectedly turns into a six-day trip, your choice of clothing can become rather, er, limited. Which is better, a shirt that smells like a Metro stairwell and has a soy sauce stain on it, or a shirt that smells like a zookeeper's heel and doesn't match your least disgusting pair of pants? How far away can you stay from people and not seem rude? If you put on enough deodorant, will it seep into the armpits of your shirt and perhaps stop them from actually decomposing? After you've smelled one pair of socks, how long should you wait for your sinuses to clear before you can tell what the next pair smells like?

Fact: In times of stress, your ideas about your health can sometimes change. We stopped at a Wawa (see "pumping your own gas in NJ", above). I was looking around for something to snack on. They didn't have these, but I really wish they had:

I try to eat right and watch my diet. Wawa sells fresh fruit, salads, water, health drinks, juice, and other stuff that you don't expect to find at convenience stores. Me? I got a fat-laden, sugar coated, Krispy Kreme apple fritter and a 22-ounce fountain Coke. After 6 days and 5 nights of hotels, restaurant food, hospitals, and driving around New Jersey to enjoy all these treats, I really didn't care too much if I went into a sugar coma. And you know what? It was gooooood.

Fact: There's no place like home. Even if you don't have any fresh monkey suckers.

Conversations

2008-11-21T22:58:00.009Z

One of the many great pleasures of being married to my wife is that we laugh a lot. Sometimes we actually laugh with each other instead of at each other.

Sure, there are the occasions where gender-oriented issues come into play. As I was getting dressed one morning, the conversation went like this:

her: That underwear is so worn you can see the elastic around the waistband.
me: Yeah.
her: YEAH?!?
me: ?
her: When I tell you something like that, it's not just to get an acknowledgement! I want you to do something about it!
me: ?
her: Throw. Them. Away.

At this point, I'm sure I was looking at her as if she had just told me to fly to the moon and bring home a hunk of cheese. There's a brief pause while I stare like a drooling idiot.

her: You're such a guy.

The term guy, said in that context and with that inflection, is roughly equivalent to leper, serial killer, or lawyer. In case you're wondering, I threw the underwear away.

Occasionally we ask each other to review some work papers or other things in progress, just to have a second pair of eyes on it. A while back, she asked me to look over a couple of blog posts she had started.

me: "Its" shouldn't have an apostrophe in it here.
her: OK.
me: ...or here.
her:
me: You don't say "might of", you say "might've" or "might have".
her:
me: What?
her: Are you trying to irritate me? Because you're doing a pretty good job.
me: What?!
her: I wanted you to look over it for content. Is it funny?
me: It's OK.
her:
me: What!!!

We spent some time discussing the content. I have no idea how, but at some point we went off on such a tangent that we got away from blogs entirely, searched this out on YouTube, and giggled occasionally while watching it on her laptop.

It's not unusual for our conversations to take such twists and turns.

Sometimes we actually try to make each other laugh. It usually works. We're on the couch, her head lying on my lap, I'm stroking her hair, things are lovely and peaceful and all is right with the world.

her: I can see right up your nose.

Or when she's away on a business trip and we're having a phone conversation:

her: What do you do there in that big house all by yourself?
me: I tie a big towel around my neck and run around the house naked with my arms stretched out in front of me while saying whoooooooshhhhhh!

The really funny thing is that she thought I was kidding.

Johnny Winter at The Birchmere

2008-11-17T13:00:00.002Z

Johnny Winter played at the Birchmere Saturday night. I was there. I had been warned that he didn't look good. A friend of mine told me that if I thought Keith Richards looked bad, it was only because I hadn't seen Johnny Winter lately.

Still, I was not prepared for what I saw. Mr. Winter came out from back stage with a bent-kneed, shuffling gate. He was wearing his trademark black hat and T-shirt. When he entered the lights of the stage, I saw a jowly, wrinkled, doddering old man who needed to be helped to his chair. He looked two decades beyond his 64 years. When he spoke to welcome us, he sounded as old has he looked. I gritted my teeth and steeled myself for the disappointment of seeing an old man who was selling tickets only because he was a legend.

And then he picked up a guitar.

Oh my God. For the next hour and a half his fingers danced on the strings of that guitar so fast that I often couldn't follow them. His voice seemed to get stronger with every song he sang. He opened with the classic "Hideaway". We heard "Johnny Guitar", "Black Jack", Jimi Hendrix' "Red House", Bob Dylan's "Highway 61 Revisited", The Stones' "I Used To Love Her", and so many others. At the end of each song, the house was on their feet. Even though the fake "end of show leading to a demanded encore" was less convincing than usual (apparently they didn't want to make Mr. Winter walk down and then back up the ramp, so he just stood to the side and chatted with the stage manager), the crowd was clapping and chanting his name until he sat back down and did a couple of closing numbers.

At the end of the evening when the lights finally came up, I was aware of three different sensations: 1) My jaw hurt because I'd been smiling and sometimes laughing with joy for the past 90 minutes, 2) my ears were ringing - first time a concert has caused that sensation in a lot of years, and 3) I really, really, really had to go to the bathroom. I'm guessing that I had needed to go for some time, but I wasn't about to miss a note of this show.

Afterward, there was a line at the tour bus. There wasn't going to be a "meet and greet" as there so often is at The Birchmere, because apparently Mr. Winter simply wasn't up to it. Still, he agreed to sign autographs. We stood in line for half an hour or so, handed our concert card and CD insert to the stage manager who disappeared into the bus with them, and they came back autographed.

Best concert I've been to in years. If you ever, ever get a chance to see Johnny Winter in concert, I strongly recommend that you do it before it's too late.

I leave you with these:

Highway 61 Revisited

Jumpin' Jack Flash

(Why yes, I do believe that is Rick Derringer playing that other guitar. How clever of you to have noticed.)

Public Service Announcement

2008-11-13T15:39:00.003Z

I know a lot of you out there help your parents, grandparents, aunts, uncles, etc., with technology-related issues. You may want to forward this along to them:

Sometimes I Draw More Than Flies

2008-11-11T14:00:00.001Z

I have mentioned once or twice that I do a little art. I've said in the past that I'd never put anything I've done out on the interwebs because that basically gives it away to the world.

After mentioning it once before, there was an overwhelming flood of comments asking to see some of it. Well, OK, one person indicated in a comment that she'd like to see it. Given that request and given that I'm a narcissist, I decided to rescind my rule and share with you some of the things I've done, since I suspect I won't be giving these away or trying to make a buck off of them.

A couple of caveats: 1) All of my best work has either been sold, given as gifts, or is framed and hanging on my walls. Things that are framed and hanging on my walls do not photograph well nor do they work with my scanner. Therefore what you'll see here is not necessarily what I consider my best stuff. 2) Speaking of my scanner, it's a little, inexpensive, HP thingy that only goes to about 8 1/2 x 14. Most of the work that I do is somewhat larger than that. 3) And still speaking of my scanner, please bear in mind that as it's a small, inexpensive, HP thingy, the quality and color that it provided when I scanned these may not necessarily be reflective of the actual piece.

OK, now that I feel that I've sufficiently given myself a long enough list of outs in case these are badly received, on to the drawings.

First, I really like flowers. This is a rose that I thought was just about perfect when I cut it. It's done in colored pencil on aqua-colored art paper:

I also love to work in pen & ink. Next up is an old friend of mine from The Carnivore Preservation Trust in black ink on white bristol board:

They say that the mark of a good portrait artist is that the portraits look better than the subjects do. I don't do many portraits because I'm almost never happy with the results. Never the less, here's a photo of Meryl Streep:

And here's a pointillist piece that I did of her many years ago. I think that it's still recognizable as Ms. Streep, but it's a complimentary image:

I've probably never mentioned this in my blog, but I really love dragons. This is one of the earliest pieces I ever did, again back to the colored pencil:

And one of my very few forays into the land of watercolor was another shot at a dragon:

Finally, a couple of years ago I for some reason got enamored with tree frogs. They're colorful and they're cute, and I ended up doing a series of 12 or so of them. Here are a few:

If you got this far, thanks for taking the time to look. If you don't care for them, I've already got my excuses (see above). I haven't actually created anything in some time. Perhaps this will inspire me to sit back down at the old drawing table and crank out some more stuff.

We'll try to get back to our usual inanity in the very near future.

You owe me cookies. You know who you are.

Gilahi's Gift Guide 2008 - Part 4

2008-11-06T13:00:00.003Z

Hi folks, and welcome to the fourth and final installment of Gilahi's Gift Guide for 2008, featuring gifts you may remember from your youth.

Those of you who follow this blog via a Google Reader or some other method may have seen part 4 show up on Sunday. This is because we at the Gilahi Blog are technical dimwits who don't know the difference between a day and a year when setting "Post Options", and ended up telling Blogger to post this on 11/01/2006. Sorry if we ruined the surprise, but I do believe that the first three are probably better than this one. Gimme a little break here.

You think your kids want video games, cell phones, DVDs, iPods and other electronic paraphernalia? Well you're right, but imagine how envious all the friends of little Sally and Joey will be when they see that your kids have these:

Yes, little green plastic military men that... well... they don't really do anything. It's not like you can even pose them. I mean, once you lay out a battlefield, you can pretty much just sit there and look at it. Get them a magnifying glass as well and they can amuse themselves for hours by playing "Destructo the Giant Lizard" by slowly melting individual army men in the summer sun.

As long as we're teaching our kids to have fun with war, we may as well go all the way:

Tear off one of the little paper caps, insert it into the "bomb", throw it high in the air, and when it lands the cap will POP... approximately 2% of the time. After trying six or seven more times, peel of the old cap, insert a new one, and start over. Even if they don't explode, it's always fun to throw die-cast metal way up into the air. Who knows? You might hit your kid sister right in the top of the head.

I certainly remember having these as a child:

This is a prime example of taking an existing phrase ("more fun than a...") and producing some hack "game" just for the ease of marketing it. The most fun you can have with these mutant monkeys also involves the above-mentioned magnifying glass.

As long as we're talking about toys that don't do anything:

For $40, you can get a box of colorful little pieces of plastic cut into geometric shapes, suitable for pressing onto an even larger piece of plastic. Your kid's imagination will stimulated beyond your wildest dreams when they put a little red triangle on top of a little blue square and realize that it looks like a house. Sort of. Three circles can make a snowman. Except with no features.

Actually this toy sucks.

Is your kid too young for war? It's still not too early to teach them violence.

Got a problem? Mad at your parents? Hate preschool? Didn't get that Red Ryder Air Rifle? It's OK to punch something. Notice that whoever put that picture in the catalog managed to reverse it so that the target says OZOB? Smack it in the face.

Go to school the next day, say "Wowee, Kazowee" just one time, and you may get hit in the face yourself.

We now come to the last toy in this year's gift guide, a favorite for generations.

OK, I'm done. If you're willing to shell out $50.00 for a cardboard barrel with 102 little pieces of wood in it, then just send the money to me. I promise to send something back and tell you it's worth that much, and you'll believe me. Don't forget the shipping and handling.

We hope you've enjoyed Gilahi's Gift Guide 2008. We wish you a happy and safe holiday season.

Don't eat the fruitcake.

Gilahi's Gift Guide 2008 - Part 3

2008-11-05T13:00:00.007Z

Welcome to the third installment of Gilahi's Gift Guide 2008.

I'm not going over all this again. If you're interested in the criteria for what I'm posting here, look at the two previous guides. I will say, one more time, that all of these "gifts" are still available for purchase, you just have to know where to find them.

When I was a kid, everybody that I knew had one of these:

Why? What is the point? They don't exactly do tricks or anything. They're a couple of magnets, fergodsake. Once you've played "how close can I get one dog to the other before it spins around and attaches itself" for oh, seven or eight hundred times, it begins to lose its appeal. Much like "Who Wants To Be A Millionaire". Now check this out: Seven bucks for a magnet with a little plastic dog glued to it, perfect for your three-year old to swallow. Good luck with that.

Speaking of three-year olds, got a neighbor with a loud kid? Perhaps you just really hate your neighbor even if their kid isn't so bad. Here's the perfect gift:

The top makes a humming sound and the little roller thingy is full of bells. Kids love these. It won't make the kid any quieter, but after about three weeks their parents will kill them. Everybody wins!

Again, here's something we old timers remember from our youth, because everybody on the planet had one.

Here's the way one plays with one of these:

1) Place a penny in the slot.

2) Laugh gleefully when the little hand comes out and grabs it and then jerks back.

3) Turn the bank over.

4) Open the bank, remove the penny.

5) Repeat steps 1 through 4 fifty times with the same penny.

6) Put the bank on the shelf, only demonstrating it occasionally to company.

7) Forget about the bank for three years.

8) Upon somehow being reminded of the bank, try step 1 again.

9) Open bank to try to determine why it's not working.

10) Throw bank away because the batteries have corroded all over the inside.

11) Wash your hands.

Here's an interesting novelty item:

That's it. "Grab hold of the bottom glass chamber and wait for the liquid to rise and boil." For $6.95.

I can save you the money. If you're thinking about shelling out seven bucks because you think this thing will let you know whether you're hot or not, you're not.

I used this stuff for a while in the '70s:

Supposedly, it really does contain the juice of one whole lemon. Using this shampoo will have two dramatic effects on your hair: 1) It will completely strip your hair of all of its natural oils, and 2) if used daily, it will bleach your hair. If your hair is dark like mine, use LemonUp and you too can walk around with a brass-colored broom on your head for months.

What walks down stairs, alone or in pairs?

Not just any old Slinky, but the original, metal Slinky. If you're like me and feel that the plastic Slinky of today is a pale imitation of the toy of our youth, here's your chance. I've heard legends of people actually playing with these for up to three days before they get a kink in them and are rendered completely useless (as if they're useful in the first place).

And finally for this edition, if you hate shopping or if you just have no idea what to get for that special someone, just buy several of these and pass them out.

Yes, folks, nothing says "I love you" for the holidays like a big jar of Anti Monkey Butt. Your significant other will finally know for sure how you feel about him or her when they see Anti Monkey Butt under the tree with their name on it. Don't forget Mom & Dad and all the aunts and uncles. The whole family will remember you forever when they realize that you saw Anti Monkey Butt and thought of them.

There's at least one more edition of Gilahi's Gift Guide. Maybe two. See you next time!

Gilahi's Gift Guide 2008 - Part 2

2008-11-04T13:00:00.002Z

Hello! And welcome back to the next installment of Gilahi's Gift Guide 2008.

If you're just tuning in, these are gifts for the upcoming holiday season consisting of 1) things you had forgotten about, 2) things you remember but didn't think were still available, and 3) pretty cool things. Remember, these are all things that you can purchase right now, in 2008. None of these things are out of production.

Let's start today with a handy stocking stuffer that everyone will enjoy.

You remember these, don't you? All the taste and pleasure of licking wallpaper paste right off the wall, but in a convenient, easy-to-carry form. No more having to stay home just for the pleasure of coating the inside of your mouth as if you've been drinking gravy. Have fun trying to identify the flavors of these little disks, since the colors (not found in nature) offer no clue whatsoever.

"I think this is maple."
"Like maple syrup?"
"No, like maple bark."

Here's an oldie I'm sure you'll all remember:

Get it? It's "ping pong" backwards! Press the little lever to send your colored balls to the other side. The first person to get all the balls to the other side wins! This provides minutes and minutes of fun until you realize that none of these balls ever, ever, ever makes it through to the other side, at which point the game will go on your shelf until your next contribution to the Salvation Army.

Since I was a male-type kid, I of course had a set of these:

Really, really great pictures on the box these came in. I couldn't wait to open it up and assemble that castle that was pictured on the front.

Give your child an introduction to "Marketing 101" when they open up the box and find that there are only about 8 pieces of wood in there, and 2 of them are so warped that there's no way they're useful for building anything. The only way you can assemble something that looks like that picture on the box is to by 15 sets.

Remember Lamb Chop?

That's OK. Neither will the kid you give it to.

And not that I'm dropping hints or anything, but I stumbled across this:

Let's analyze parts of this description, shall we?

Handcrafted in Vermont with patchouli : "People will avoid you."
...so that you can maintain your groove. : "People will point at you and laugh."
...benefits for aging and wrinkling skin... : "You may as well admit it, you are truly pitiful."
...ready to face a new dawn. : "Of the (nearly) dead."

On second thought, don't get me this stuff. I suspect that I'm more a candidate for this:

I gotta say, I just love that one line in the pitch, above: If you're too pressed for time to take a bath, take a footbath.

You may smell like a mule, but your feet won't.

Still more GREAT gift ideas coming soon!

Gilahi's Gift Guide 2008 - Part 1

2008-11-03T13:00:00.008Z

With the gift-giving season just around the corner, we at the Gilahi Blog, in the spirit of Dave Barry, would like to provide as a public service our first annual Gift Guide.

These gifts fall broadly into three categories: 1) Stuff you knew as a kid but had forgotten all about, 2) stuff you remember but didn't think they made any more, and 3) stuff that I just think is kinda cool. Everything in this and subsequent editions is available for purchase even today.

Remember this stuff?

Your funny-smelling Aunt Gertrude always had a dish of this stuff. Fortunately, they make it in such a way that it's already 10 years old and stale before it ever leaves the factory. What's it made of? Why, good ol' sucrose and a variety of colorful carcinogens. Picking out a piece of this candy was always more rewarding than actually eating it. You never knew if you were going to get the entire chunk in the shape of whatever bowl it was in or you'd actually pick up the bowl as well.

Now, in the realm of the truly creepy, it's difficult for me to imagine that anyone ever bought these when "Family Affair" was a popular show:

Aren't dolls supposed to teach little girls how to be mothers or models with tremendous breasts or something like that? Heck, for $100 this doll should clean my house every couple of weeks. Mrs. Beasley teaches little girls how to take care of old spinsters. What most people don't know, and the really creepy part of it all, is that Mrs. Beasley was actually Buffy's conjoined twin. They were separated just before the show aired for the first time.

And by all means let's not forget our little claymation pals, Gumby and the adequately named Pokey.

"Adequately-named" because after your child plays with this toy for, oh, 10 minutes, one of the little wires inside will poke through the soft vinyl outside and proceed to gore your child to death. "Pokey" indeed.

Hey, kids! Remember all the fun we had back in the '70s with these?

These make a noise like the Cicada That Ate Cincinnati. What could possibly be better than having a couple of 2-pound chunks of solid plastic slamming together at the speed of sound mere inches from your head? How great is it when one of these things explodes sending shards of shrapnel 100 yards in every direction like some sort of adolescent-launched hand grenade? I've heard stories of these things winding up on peoples' roofs and acting like magnifying glasses in the sun, thus destroying the home of the doting parents who shelled out 10 bucks for your pleasure in the first place, but that may be just an urban legend. I had also heard that they were illegal, but that may not be true either. All we need now is a source for lawn darts.

Finally on today's gift list, I can only say that if one gives this as a gift to a friend, one should warn that friend to be very careful where he or she applies it. On the other hand, if you're giving to someone you don't very much care for, well....

Stay tuned to this site for more great gift-giving ideas in the next few days.

Why I've Changed My Mind About Visiting New Zealand

2008-10-27T13:00:00.002Z

I've often thought about visiting New Zealand. Small country, beautiful scenery, very different attitudes about life, and they speak English! What a terrific combination!

However after a recent visit to Total Wine on Saturday, I may have completely changed my mind. I'm not at all sure what those folks eat down there, but I'd assumed that there would be a lot of lamb and seafood involved. Apparently, however, the economic bust has affected them pretty deeply. Witness the wine they're making there:

Can you see that label? Here's a closeup of the "Americanized" version of it:

That's right. The folks in NZ are actually marketing a sauvignon blanc named "Cat's Pee on a Gooseberry Bush". The back label extols the virtue of this wine by saying that it has an overwhelming taste of gooseberries "with just a hint of cat".

It's true that in wine circles, the flavor of sauvignon blanc is often likened to gooseberries which, by the way, tend toward the sour and acidic and aren't very popular. Some reviewers even mention "cat urine" when describing the flavors of certain sauvignon blancs. This raises the obvious question on which I'd prefer not to speculate here. Still, I have to believe that only in New Zealand would these features of a wine be considered selling points.

I'm sure the good folks in New Zealand are laughing their collective Kiwi arses off at the idea that Americans are not willing to have the word "pee" on some consumable product, but they are willing to turn it into a nonsense word and then pay $8.00/bottle for it.

I fear that this may lead to even more outrageous schemes on the part of the good folks in NZ to foist off stuff that most people would be repulsed by. I'm waiting to find "Sheepdog Turd from a Golf Course Sand Trap" packed up in a box somewhere for $12.95 (although I suppose the American version would be "Thurd"). I'm sure it will take the country by storm.

So if the New Zealanders are clever enough to pack up pet waste products, ship them across the Pacific, and make a profit on them, I shudder to think about what they might feed me in a restaurant down there when they realize I'm from this country.

Stupid American. Serve him the "Dust Bunnies from Under the Toilet Tank" and tell him it's a local delicacy. You should be able to get $29.95 for it easily.

Tell him he gets a free glass of Cat's Pee with it.

Welcome to the Target Demographic

2008-10-23T12:43:00.013+01:00

Several years ago, a friend of mine actually called me on the phone, upset that a Led Zeppelin song was being used to sell Cadillacs:

I told him then, "Welcome to the target demographic. You're in your mid to late 40s now, they assume you have disposable income, and this is how they're gonna get your attention. It's just going to get worse."

At one point, I sort of thought I had arrived when advertisers started using songs from my era, like "Smoke On The Water":

Or "Thick As A Brick":

Or even "Instant Karma":

I mean, at least they were advertising enjoyable things like cars, restaurants, and sneakers (although I suspect Mr. Lennon is still spinning in his grave)

Speaking of spinning in his grave, I really didn't even mind it too much when the Volkswagen folks appropriated the late lamented Nick Drake for one of their commercials:

But the Times They Are A'Changing. Now the songs of my youth are being used to sell blood glucose monitoring systems. This is the target demographic I've entered. I sure hope the members of Three Dog Night and/or the estate of B.W. Stevenson, this song's writer, are getting royalties from this:

And this? This is the travesty that actually inspired me to post this. Every advertiser who has ever used a rock song in an advertisement should fall down on their faces and beg forgiveness from The Youngbloods for this use of "Get Together" (you may have to turn up your volume if you want to hear this, although I can't imagine why you would):

I mean... come on. The entire hippie movement has been reduced to an animated disposable diaper commercial culminating in what is an obvious allusion to Woodstock? This is sadder than sad. There once was a time when our artists weren't sellouts. I only hope that the members of AC/DC had no control over the deal that is causing their first album in 8 years to be sold only at Wal-Mart. I don't want to wish any bad things on AC/DC, they've worked hard for a long time, but I hope they don't sell a single disc at Wal-Mart, and that this will prevent this sort of deal with the devil from being made in the future with any other rock group.

If only we could harness the energy of all the dead rock stars who are now spinning in their graves, we could completely eliminate our dependency on foreign oil.

Here We Go Again

2008-10-19T14:18:00.006+01:00

I've always heard about the price of fame, but I never realized what a burden it must be. Thanks to Bilbo of Bilbo's Random Thought Collection (why does it seem like I'm always linking to Bilbo? I've never even met the man, assuming he's a man.), it appears that I've received the coveted "Superior Scribbler Award". I say it's coveted because it's the first award I've been presented since I started doing this. Note that I am completely ignoring the fact that this is a blatant pyramid setup and that soon every blogger on earth will be displaying this award.

Being of something of a literal bent, I wonder why "Scribbler" was included in a blog award, since scribbling is not actually involved. Why not call it the "Tremendous Typist Award", the "Big Blogger Award", or the "Say! Some People Will Read Pretty Much Anything Award"?

Anyway, here it is:

Alas, heavy hangs the head that wears the crown. You can't just bask in the glory that is this award. Oh no. You gotta do stuff or you can't, in good conscience, display said award. Here's the list from the originating web site:

1) Each Superior Scribbler must in turn pass The Award on to 5 most-deserving Bloggy Friends (see below).
2). Each Superior Scribbler must link to the author & the name of the blog from whom he/she has received The Award (see above).
3) Each Superior Scribbler must display The Award on his/her blog, and link to This Post, which explains The Award (see current).
4) Each Blogger who wins The Superior Scribbler Award must visit this post and add his/her name to the Mr. Linky List. That way, we'll be able to keep up-to-date on everyone who receives This Prestigious Honor!
5) Each Superior Scribbler must post these rules on his/her blog (see 6).
6) See 1.

Thank you, Bilbo. I appreciate the award and your very kind words about my blog. Now stop wasting time on these silly blog memes and decide who you're voting for.

At the risk of insulting anyone who might not appreciate being referred to as one of my "Bloggy Friends", I would like to pass this award on to the following deserving people:

Fiona at "travelin through". She makes me laugh, her blog is easy to read, and, most importantly, she recently tagged me for something and paybacks are hell. I would've included Green Canary in this list for the same reason, but Bilbo beat me to it.

J.M. Tewkesbury at "The Chronicles of Tewkesbury". Passionate, eloquent, and frequently humorous, I thoroughly enjoy the things she posts. She is currently heavily into the politics thing, not that I blame her, but among the reasons I look forward to the end of the political silly season is the hope that J.M. will be able to return to the more pedestrian, day-to-day writing about her life that attracted me to her blog in the first place.

Herb at "Herb of DC". He's the only person I've ever read whose description of tying a shoelace made me laugh out loud.

Livitluvit at "Live It, Love It". Funny. Always a good read, despite the fact that every time I look at her blog I get a Led Zeppelin earworm. She's away in Costa Rica right now, and I'm hoping that when she gets back she'll be so mellowed out that she won't rake me over the coals for doing this to her.

Shannon at "Disaffected Scanner Jockey". I rarely read one of her posts without at least a grin, and usually there's a laugh or two. I only wish that I could write like her. I'll be surprised if she follows through on this because she's quite the busy person with an extremely popular blog, but I think she deserves it.

So there, Bilbo. I did it, despite the fact that you said I'd probably ignore the rules. As we've each mentioned in recent posts, we sometimes (civilly) disagree on a variety of subjects, but I'm very happy to say that we're able to put aside our differences and treat each other as mature, reasonable, thoughtful people. With that in mind, I'll close with this: "Nyeah".

Looks Like I'm It

2008-10-18T21:53:00.003+01:00

*sigh*

I hope I don't hurt anyone's feelings. That is not my intent, ever. Everything I'm about to say is the result of my own hangups, which others had no way of knowing. Please don't take anything personally.

I have in the past expressed my views on being "tagged". It basically leaves me with two choices: 1) play along, or 2) take a chance on being viewed as some sort of humorless or aloof wallflower who doesn't know how to have a good time. There's also the fact that on those occasions that I've tried to write posts just to write them, when I wasn't particularly inspired, I've been very unsatisfied with the results. I've written several that you've never seen. Oh yeah, the crap that you read here from time to time is the "good stuff". Sometimes I can't believe it either.

While I very much appreciate the fact that someone (or in this case two people) thought enough of me to tag me for this latest meme, my hippie tendencies balk at this sort of (perhaps self-imposed) coercion. Please believe that I have nothing but respect for the two people who tagged me, the vivacious and always readable Green Canary, and one of my latest finds, Fiona (aka Rodger (that's an inside joke)), who can compress many laughs into short, insightful posts and/or comments.

Here are the rules of "The Rule of 7":
1. Link to your tagger and list these rules on your blog.
2. Share 7 facts about yourself on your blog, some random, some weird.
3. Tag 7 people at the end of your post by leaving their names as well as links to their blog.
4. Let them know they have been tagged by leaving a comment on their blog.

Now given my waffling nature about this whole thing, one might imagine that I'd be hard pressed to say that I have some personal issues with this and then go tag 7 other people. Thanks to my pal and sometimes philosophical foe Bilbo, I will not be the first one to say that I'll play, but really don't know of 7 other bloggers that I can tag. Lacochran, Fiona, and Canary have taken pretty much all the bloggers I follow. I didn't realize that our circle was so tight until I realized that so many had already been tagged, leaving me with few options. Again, maybe it's my own limitations that I have to blame.

In that spirit, I will try to come up with 7 things about myself that won't bore you to tears, but I'll leave the tagging up to others. In the end, my own narcissism wins out.

7 Facts About Gilahi:

1. In 1975, I was the #2-ranked epee fencer in the southeastern U.S. I took this distinction at the Southeastern Sectional Championship held at Florida State University. I haven't held a blade in many years.

2. I am an ordained person. That's right, despite my currrent feelings about any organized religion and my extreme liberal tendencies, there once was a time when I was heavily into the church. I studied long and hard before being elected by my then congregation and ordained as a Presbyterian elder. I believe that an ordination like this is for life, so despite the fact that I haven't been inside a church since 1988, I'm still registered somewhere as a spiritual leader. Yes, you do have every right to be afraid.

3. I have equinophobia (or hippophobia), a fear of horses (sorry, Fiona). I think they're beautiful creatures and nothing is more graceful than a horse galloping in the wind, as long as I can see it from a distance. When I was a child, the area that I lived in was still rural enough that people could own some livestock. I was playing baseball in a field one day when everyone started yelling at me to watch out. I looked up just in time to see that one of my neighbors had lost control of her horse and it was bearing down on me at a full gallop. My instinct was to lash out and smack said horse on the snout with my baseball glove. This had two effects. First, it startled the horse to the point that my neighbor was able to get it back under control. Second, it left me with a lifelong fear of those huge, uncontrollable, sharp-hooved, vicious, man-eating animals.

4. As a teenager in the early '70s, I met and chatted with Mark David Chapman who, in 1980, shot and killed John Lennon. I had no idea. Honest.

5. I've never been to Spain, but I kinda like the music. I've never been to Heaven, but I've been to Oklahoma. Should that count as two?

6. I like dill pickles and french fries. Together. Don't ask me why, but if I have fries and a pickle on the plate, I will save the pickle for last and enjoy it with any fries that are left after the main course has been devoured.

7. I am an artist that has sold many pieces, had work put on T-shirts (which sold very well), and have even had work exhibited in The Torpedo Factory in Alexandria on a few occasions. Much of the work that decorates my home is my own.

At this point, I quote Bilbo:

I won't tag anyone else for this, but if you're reading and want to take a stab at it, be my guest. Just let me know so I can see what you said.

Thanks for your time. Thanks for reading my blog. And, honestly, Canary and Fiona, thanks for tagging me.

Another Incredible Voice of My Generation Lost

2008-10-18T14:14:00.004+01:00

I was very saddened to read this morning of the death of Levi Stubbs. I suspect that any of you who don't recognize the name would still recognize the voice.

He was one of the biggest voices in '60s and '70s Motown. He also lent his considerable bass pipes to the voice of Audrey II in the movie "Little Shop of Horrors".

Although his various illnesses have prevented him from performing since 2000, it's just always very sad to me when another of those who have brought me so much joy for so many years passes away.

Thanks for all the memories, Mr. Stubbs. You will be missed.

Encuentre Roberto

2008-10-13T13:00:00.004+01:00

Esto es Roberto. Sus amigos le llaman "Bob". Bob es una tortuga de mar. El tiene menos que un dia.

Meet Roberto.

This is Roberto. His friends call him "Bob". Bob is a sea turtle. He is less than a day old.

I decided to try to open up this entry in Bob's native language, in case he ever gets a chance to read it. His English was a little iffy when I knew him.

Bob was my best friend for the 8 minutes or so that I got to hold him before releasing him into the Pacific Ocean. In that 8 minutes, I think we bonded very closely. Just look at him waving at the camera:

What a ham.

In the wild, Bob's chances of making it to adulthood are about 100 to 1 against. We were told that thanks to release programs like this one, the odds are improved to something like 10 to 1. Not great, but better than the lottery or anything you'll get in Vegas.

As I've mentioned, I've been fortunate enough to have many opportunities to work with wild animals. On those occasions that I've actually gotten to hold a baby animal, I am always struck by how incredibly strong they are. We were instructed to hold the turtles with two fingers on the sides of their shells, as I'm doing with my right hand, above. When those little flippers pushed back against my fingers, it was all I could do to hang on to him. That's why I have my other hand cupped underneath him.

It was sunset, because sea turtles move toward the setting sun when they hatch. There were very specific instructions for handling and releasing them. We had to "wash" our hands in the beach sand, because sea turtles use the smell of the sand to know where they came from. We were to take three steps forward, place the turtle on the sand, and immediately take three steps back. This was to avoid accidentally stepping on any of the little critters that might happen to circle around before hitting the water. In 10 years, they'll come back to this same beach to lay eggs. Well, Bob won't, but his sweetheart will. (Just between you and me, I don't actually know if the turtle I was holding was a Roberto or a Roberta, but given that he pounded back a couple of Pacificos before diving into the water, I tend to think he was male. Maybe a college student.)

10 years. They're cold-blooded and they have a 10-year plan. Sure makes me think. I only hope that I'm able to haul myself up onto a beach in 10 years.

It was great. I felt really good about it. Quite frankly, I teared up a little. I know that the odds are only about 1 in 10 that Bob is anything other than fish poop at this point, but I prefer to think that if I could get back to that same beach 10 years from the time I plunked him onto the sand, I'd see Bob crawling back out and waving at me. We could reminisce, pop a few cold Pacificos (no lime, Bob doesn't care for lime with his cerveza), maybe a little Tequila Crema (Bob has something of a sweet tooth) and catch up on all the things we've been doing since we last saw each other. Bob's good that way. Who knows? Maybe his English or my Spanish will have improved by then.

The last picture is the last I saw of Bob just before a wave came and took him away. For a turtle, he was moving pretty darned fast. Ah, youth.

Adios, Bob. Vaya con Dios.

Doing My Civic Duty - Part 2*

2008-10-09T06:35:00.003+01:00

They took 237 eight by ten color glossy photos with circles and arrows and a paragraph on the back of each one to be used as evidence against us.
--Arlo Guthrie, "Alice's Restaurant Masacree"

I just spent six long days in the jailhouse
for the crime of having no dough,
and now I'm back out on the street
for the crime of having nowhere to go.
--The Band

Yesterday, I posted my experience with being impaneled on a jury. If you read it, you know that it involved a lot of waiting around and many repetitions of the word "crap".

If you think that might have been a dull, boring experience for me, then obviously you've never been on a jury and had to listen to lawyers speak. You know those great lines from the movies?

You want the truth? You can't handle the truth!

You're out of order! You're out of order! You're out of order!

It just doesn't work that way. You know all those Perry Mason moments where he spins around and pins the blame on the person you least suspect? Doesn't happen. Watching grass grow is more exciting, believe me.

It goes like this: There's a judge, a prosecuting attorney, a defense attorney, a witness, a court clerk and a bailiff standing as far away from the action as she can get.

PA: I have here a 574-page document that basically restates everything that's been said in this trial up to this point. I'd like to enter it into evidence.
[The bailiff ambles across the room, takes the document from the attorney, walks the three steps to the court clerk who puts a little sticker on it and hands it back to the bailiff. The bailiff then takes one step to the right to hand it to the judge, who's sitting two feet away from the court clerk, and then ambles back across the room.]
Judge: Entered into evidence as exhibit 9.
PA: I'd like the witness to look at exhibit 9 please.
[The bailiff ambles back across the room, takes the exhibit from the court clerk, walks three steps to her left, hands it to the witness, and then ambles back across the room.]
PA: Ms. Hapfenflufel, do you recognize the exhibit?
Witness: Yes.
PA: How would you describe the exhibit?
W: It appears to be a 574-page document that basically restates everything that's been said in this trial up to this point.
PA: So you would say that this is a document?
W: Yes.
PA: And how long would you say the document is?
W: [Flipping to the last page] 574 pages.
PA: So to be clear, you're saying that this is a document consisting of 574 pages.
W: Yes.
PA: OK, let's read the document starting at page 1, right at the top, where the words begin. Do you see the words?
W: Yes.
PA: What is the first letter you see in the first word?
W: It's a "T".
PA: And is there anything special about that "T"?
W: It's a capital "T".
PA: And what does a capital usually mean?
DA: I object to the use of the term "usually", since a capital can mean the beginning of a sentence, an initial, part of an acronym, or a symbol on the periodic table of elements.
Judge: Please restate the question.
PA: Ms. Hapfenflufel, what do you believe the capitalization indicates in this particular case?
W: I think it's the start of a sentence.
PA: OK, let's move on to the next letter. What is it?
W: It's an "h".
PA: And is it capitalized?
W: No.
PA: OK, so now what's the third letter?
W: It's an "e".
PA: And is that the end of the first word?
W: Yes, I believe so.
PA: Why do you believe that's the end of the first word?
W: Because the next character is a space.
PA: And a space indicates what?
W: It's a separator between words.
PA: So the first word is what?
W: "The".
PA: And what does "the" mean?
W: I believe it's a definite article indicating exclusiveness.
DA: Objection to the use of the suffix "-ness".
PA: Could you restate that please?
W: I believe it's a definite article indicating exclusivity.
PA: OK, let's move on to the next word....

And so it goes. For two. Full. Days.

We had a doctor as an expert witness that said the plaintiff was injured. We had a doctor as an expert witness that said the plaintiff was not injured. We had a psychologist that said the plaintiff was depressed. The plaintiff's mom said the plaintiff didn't used to be depressed. We had photos. Lots of photos. We had diagrams. We had receipts. We had a DVD to watch of a deposition. We heard about lost wages. Interrupted PhD programs. There were tears, and not just from the jury who had to sit through all this.

Then it was all over. The judge gave us our rules, which basically were: "You're on your own. We won't answer any questions so don't bother asking. Go into your little cell and don't come out without a verdict. See ya."

This particular case had nothing to do with guilt or innocence. The defendant had already admitted negligence. It was up to us to come with an amount to award. The prosecution was asking for an award in the 6-figure area. The defense indicated that the award should be in the lower 4-digit area. We deliberated for 3 and a half hours. "I think we should give the plaintiff a billion dollars." Did you hear the same case I did? "I think the plaintiff should give us ten dollars each." Did you hear the same case I did? As 5:00 approaches, though, it's amazing how compromising you become. The only thing we could eventually all agree on was that the plaintiff deserved something. Slips of paper were passed around the table, we each wrote down the amount we thought the plaintiff was due, we added it all up, divided by 7, and ended up awarding a very, very strange number.

So the way I've got it figured, if I can find some way to donate my $60 juror compensation to the big bailout, the government will only be on the hook for $699,999,999,940.00. Who's with me?

Oh, and if you get called for jury duty, take a book. Take several.

* Apologies if this showed up in some Google readers multiple times in various forms. I was entering a ^B to do bold followed by a capital P, and I kept hitting ^P which, as you blogger.com types may know, is "Publish". Why the hell did they create a hotkey for "Publish"?

Doing My Civic Duty - Part 1

2008-10-08T12:56:00.008+01:00

I just spent six long days in the jailhouse
for the crime of having no dough,
and now I'm back out on the street
for the crime of having nowhere to go.
--The Band

...the Sixth Amendment states that if you are accused of a crime, you have the right to a trial before a jury of people too stupid to get out of jury duty.
--Dave Barry

As mentioned recently, I've just spent two days on jury duty. Since my posts have a tendency to become rambling and disconnected, reflecting the actual activity in my brain, I've decided to split the experience into two posts. Today's post will cover the events leading up to the actual jury selection and trial.

First, you get a summons. It's threatening. You must report for jury duty or you'll be sitting on the other side of the witness box. You have to call a phone number after 5:00 PM the night before you're supposed to report to see if your group number has to show up. Isn't that convenient? You can't plan anything. You have to tell your boss that you may or may not show up for work the next day. Meetings scheduled? Need to take your kid to ball practice? Tough toenails, Harry. You're officially on hold until after 5:00.

So you call and you gotta go. Crap. Now to find the Fairfax District Court, which is located in beautiful Old Town Fairfax. Just because you're showing up doesn't mean you'll actually get on a jury, so maybe it won't be so bad.

Aside: Why does every town in Virginia have an "Old Town" section? I haven't actually found Old Town Pentagon City yet, but I'm sure it must exist.

I have a horrible sense of direction. I've been known to find myself going the wrong direction on a street, pull into a side street in order to turn around, and then continue on in the same wrong direction on the original street. Because of this, I rely heavily on my state atlases, and in the past few years I've relied extremely heavily on Yahoo and Google Maps. The summons tells me that the court is on Chain Bridge Road and that there's public parking "across the street" on Page Road. So I map both places. Much to my chagrin, the maps are extremely different, considering that one facility is "across the street" from the other. So what do I do? I take 'em both. May as well get lost twice. I also leave about two hours early because I will get lost. I promise.

The last direction on the map to the courthouse tells me to turn left onto Chain Bridge Road from VA-236. I can do that. Except that I can't. There's a big NO LEFT TURN sign on VA-236 at Chain Bridge Road. What do I do now? If you've ever driven through Old Town Fairfax, you'll know that it's an exercise in guesswork. (Even as I was leaving to come home, I saw a sign on Chain Bridge that said, "VA-236 East - Second Light". What it didn't tell me was which direction to turn at the second light. I had a 50/50 shot at it. Do you think I got it right? If you said yes, then you haven't been following along. I HAVE NO SENSE OF DIRECTION.) So I'm lost. I'm close, but I'm lost, and my mind is chanting contemptofcourtcontemptofcourtcontemptofcourt because I just KNOW that I'm going to be late and they're going to be a bunch of humorless bastards.

Anyway, eventually small signs that say "Judicial Square", which sounds right to me, get me to a parking garage that I think may be the one on Page Road that the instructions tell me about. There's a nice sheriff parked nearby, so I confirm with him that I'm in the right place.

I'm actually early, so I wait.

What I failed to ask the sheriff is where I go now. "Across the street" is the blank wall of a building. So I go wandering around behind juvenile detention facilities and police stations, waiting for the sirens and searchlights to pick me out. About a half hour later, I find that if I had turned left out of the parking lot instead of right (of course), then I would have encountered one of those nice directories with a "You Are Here" spot on it.

Having ascertained the general direction I need to walk, I proceed to find the Fairfax District Court which, by the way, neither faces nor is actually located on Chain Bridge Road, as nearly as I can tell. Happy to have been so resourceful thus far, I go inside where a uniformed deputy screams, "WE DON'T OPEN UNTIL 8:00!!! YOU'LL HAVE TO WAIT OUTSIDE!!" So I back slowly out of the door, stroll down the street, find a convenience store, and get a cup of coffee which by this time I'm pretty desperate for.

And I wait.

At 8:00, I go inside where three different people ask me if my cell phone has a camera in it (it doesn't). And that's before I go through an airport-style security screening where I have to empty all my pockets and take off my belt. Not sure why the belt thing is important, but there are approximately 137 deputies standing behind the three lines of security portals, all yelling intermittently that we can't have knives, weapons, cameras, laptops with cameras, cell phones with cameras; there are three lines please; remove your belt; empty your pockets into one the white baskets; do the hokey-pokey and you turn yourself around; that's what it's all about.

Having cleared that hurdle, I now follow the signs to the Jury Assembly Room on the 5th floor.

And I wait.

Eventually the doors open and about 200 of us file in, get our jury badges, get our parking validated, delousing and cavity search. OK, I made those last two up, but it sure seemed like that was the way it was headed. Find a seat.

And I wait.

They showed us a neat little film in which some actor has all sorts of questions about jury duty interspersed with some deer-in-the-headlights judge answering them. They understand that it's an inconvenience, but we're lucky that we live in such a great country where we can send our fellow citizens to jail after they've committed all of our faces to memory. The actor concludes by telling us how it actually turned out to be pretty interesting and he felt good about doing his civic duty.

*yawn*

And I wait.

Some time later, a line of brown-uniformed deputies comes into the jury room with lists of names. They all have exactly the same spiel: "When I call your name, please answer 'here'. I apologize in advance if I mispronounce your name, and I promise that I will." This got a chuckle from the first one. The next 5? Not so much.

This is the point at which you start praying to the Universe and whatever god or gods you have ever heard of that they don't call your name.

Bailiff: Er.... Tome Suh My Tha?
Voice: Here.
Bailiff: How do you pronounce that?
Voice: Tom Smith
Bailiff: Thank you. Er.... Sway Jo Ness?
Voice: Here.
Bailiff: How do you pronounce that?
Voice: Sue Jones.
Bailiff: Thank you. Er... El Vice Pre Slay?

And so it goes. You make it past the first bailiff, the second, the third, you're considering how much money to contribute to the Druids since that's the one that seemed to work for you, you open your eyes and realize that there are probably only about 10 people left in the room, and there's still one bailiff to go. I said it before and I'll say it again: Crap.

Bailiff: Jy Lay Hie?
Me: Crap! I mean here!

So I and 13 of my fellow civic-minded cattle file out to the assigned courtroom.

And I wait.

Eventually we are led into the courtroom where the judge asks us questions, followed by the attorneys asking us questions. This, I figure, is my last good chance at not actually getting on a jury.

"Yes, your honor, I fully believe that anyone who's even accused of jaywalking should fry like a pork chop."

They eventually call seven names and have them move to another section of the room. YES! It worked! HAHAHAHAHAHAHA! Then the judge points to the other group and tells them that they can go back to the Jury Assembly Room, and congratulates the seven of us on being impaneled as a jury.

Crap.

[Stay tuned for tomorrow's exciting conclusion!]

I'm Sorta Depressed

2008-10-06T13:00:00.000+01:00

I've posted before about not feeling particularly funny, and once again I'm feeling a bit low these days. Don't mean to bring you down, and if you're feeling particularly chipper, maybe you should just move on to the next blog in your reader list.

First, my 401(k) is simply melting away.

I don't know why. It never did anything to anybody. It's not like it was threatening a scarecrow with a burning broom or something. I feed it regularly. It should be really happy. It's like that plant you keep watering, but turns brown and droops despite all the care you try to give it. This leads me to feel like I may be the one without a brain in the above picture.

If that picture represents peoples' savings, then I suppose this one must be the mortgage companies.

Yep, all these cheap houses that can't even stand up to a little wind are falling all over the mortgage lenders, and ruby slippers are currently selling for $700 billion.

Just look at the latest bill issued by the US Government:

We used to actually have dreams of possibly being able to retire early. We've been tracking our net worth as best we can for years. The first couple of years looked like we might be right on track. The last couple of years have sort of leveled out. The past few weeks look pretty bleak. I thought that I might be able to enjoy retirement starting as a relatively young man. I'm afraid that now I may be working at least a few more years. My hair's alread gray and I'm wearing bifocals.

Next, there's still a lot of work left to do on the house, as I've been chronicling from time to time here. There's painting to be done in several rooms, new carpet to install, new furniture to get in place, and new window treatments. We went to the paint store yesterday and they were out of ceiling white. This is something akin to McDonald's being out of Happy Meals or Victoria's Secret being out of bras. How does one run out of ceiling white? (Aside: Why are so many of my similes in terms of food and sex? That word is "similes" not "smiles", although most of my smiles are in terms of food and sex as well. Maybe I just answered my own question.)

Since I live here, I see the work to be done every time I walk through a room. (By the way, I may post soon about the joys of recaulking tubs and showers, which we've done recently. Mildew is special. At least that project is completed, unlike the other two we've started. Small steps. Teeny, tiny, wee, almost infitesimal steps.) Current plans are to do a second coat of ceiling white (assuming we can find any) next weekend, patch up some crown molding, and then we'll call the decorator and schedule carpet installation.

Third, someone who recently worked on my house tells me that this absolutely must be the next big project:

Lovely. A new roof. Seems that some of the shingles on the current roof, while looking just fine from the ground, are actually so thin at this point that you can read a newspaper through them. It's just fortunate for me that nobody reads newspapers any more, or I'd be in real trouble.

Fourth, I've been summoned for jury duty.

I have mixed feelings about this. I don't have to go to work and Fairfax County will pay me the princely sum of $30.00 per diem, but I do have to trudge down there in the morning, find the place, park, and then sit and read for 8 hours. I hope. I sure hope I don't get on some multi-day trial. They won't even let me take a knife with me like Henry Fonda did. This is why people don't register to vote, folks.

Fifth, winter is upon us.

I hate winter. I'm currently loving the highs in the lower 70's, but there's already a nip in the air in the mornings, our heat has come on once or twice, and it's just a matter of time before it's below 50 degrees, which is too cold for me. Yeah, yeah, I know. I'm a real pansy. Screw you. I don't like cold weather and any delay in my retirement means I have to put up with a few more years of it.

Finally, there is a significant number of people out there who will, next month, despite every definition of reason that I can come up with, vote this way:

Sadly, their vote counts just the same as mine. Look at that button again. One of these people is extremely happy to be on this ticket with their running mate. The other one has a sort of "what just happened here?" look. Even in this still photo, you sort of get the "Omigod what have I done?" thought process alongside the "I'm not too sure what's going on, but I'm darn happy about it" thought process.

So there it is. My short-term future involves juries, home improvement, and new roofs; my longer-term future may have irrevocably changed over the past month; and I don't understand the voters in this country at all.

If you've read this far, I hope this hasn't depressed you in any way. Look at like this, things pretty much have to get better, right?

Oh yeah, and my left knee hurts.

Gotta Love the Trunk Monkey

2008-10-02T11:42:00.004+01:00

I know this is pretty old, but I still laugh every time I see it. Whoever came up with this campaign is a genius.

Washington Post Express Causes "Dismay"

2008-10-01T09:45:00.001+01:00

If the staff of The Washington Post Express had overheard a reporter walking away from "The Gettysburg Address", they would have reported it like this:

"Wow, that was pretty good!"
-- Abraham Lincoln expresses his opinion of the Civil War

Imagine my chagrin when I read one of my favorite blogs this morning only to find that The Washington Post Express has done it again.

In today's blog entry, the witty, clever, sometimes snarky but always humorous Herb of DC reports that he got a mention in the WPE. Cool stuff. This almost always prompts commenters to congratulate you and then you go to the WPE website and download that edition so that you can have it forever. It's like you won a Grammy or something.

Now that I think of it, we should start having "After The WPE Awards" parties. Red carpets, goody bags, paparazzi, Joan Rivers... How great could that be?

There was one small issue with the part of the blog that the WPE chose to cite in their paper, though. They weren't Herb's words. In fact, the weren't actually even part of Herb's blog. They were comments left by me on a brief video that Herb wanted to share with the world.

Herb was extremely laid back about the whole episode. He said that he was "dismayed". He also included very kind words for the author of the actual citation, referring to the entry as "...very smart. Analytical. Sober." Thank you, Herb. You're a better man than I am.

Now you may think that this is a little "whoops" episode and is no big deal. In fact, in this particular case, it's probably not. Herb got recognition for his blog even if the attribution was incorrect. I got a compliment out of the whole deal. The problem is that this is not the first time the WPE has botched things up.

In what I consider a much more serious episode, Liz of WhatLizSaid fame wrote a brief but thoughtful and moving article about 9/11 on the 7th anniversary of the date we all remember. The gist of her article was that she heard people talking about where they were or what they were doing when tragedy struck on 9/11/2001, as if proximity to an event of that caliber mattered in some way. Her point, I believe, was that it simply doesn't because in the end we were all affected in a very deep way.

The Washington Post Express managed to take just a few of Liz's words out of context, and then make an editorial comment that showed that they had completely missed the entire point of her article. Their comment made Liz look like some kind of hypocritical hack when in fact the thrust of her essay was exactly the opposite of what they said. I very much fear that more people may read the WPE than actually read Liz's article, and that's just way too bad. They owe her an apology in a very big way.

Liz - I'm very sorry that the WPE did that to you.

Herb - I'm very sorry the WPE did that do you. In future comments, I will make every effort to be less smart, analytical, and certainly sober. Perhaps I'll make humorous references to bodily functions or throw in a misspelling or two.

Washington Post Express - I don't speak for all bloggers, but if you're going to be so sloppy, inattentive, haphazard, and unprofessional in what you do, then I'd simply prefer that you remove the "Blog Log" section of your "paper" entirely rather than include improper citations and editorial comments that only display the fact that you can't be bothered to actually read before you publish.

Playing In The Heavy Church

2008-09-15T16:20:00.000+01:00

Mercy, mercy on the love defenders
Have pity on the pretenders
A little help from all life's losers
A little truth from the mind abusers
Ooh I need them playing in the Heavy Church
--Three Dog Night

So we're driving down I-95 yesterday. We came upon a small, dented vehicle in the right lane with three items attached to the back. First, there was this bumper sticker:

Next, there was this little gem:

Aaaaand finally, this reallly caught our attention:

When we passed the car, it was being driven by a 250-pound suicide blonde with a beehive hairdo and wraparound sunglasses, talking on the phone. Not exactly what I expected. See what can happen when you allow preconceived notions to color your perceptions? I was expecting a 250-pound guy in a John Deere cap.

I suppose it's possible that this person was just trying to ensure that all bases were covered, but I have to wonder who would be more proud of her, Jesus or the good folks at Hooters.

What I'd like to believe is that this is some sort of new cult that I haven't heard about yet. I can certainly understand the attraction of belonging to a group in which one is fed buffalo wings by scantily-clad young ladies and can tell everyone else what they can eat if they don't like it. I believe they'd call them "Angel Wings" and just dare anyone to point out the obvious problems with eating body parts off of God's messengers. Communion would be a blast (beer and cheese fries, maybe?).

Oh yeah, and Jesus. Can't forget the Jesus part.

WWJD? The Jesus that this group advocates would definitely eat wings at Hooters and, if anyone had anything to say about it, tell 'em who to call to register a complaint.

I can see the flyer under the windshield wiper now:

"Won't you join us this coming Sunday at the First Christian Church of Hooters, Wings and Screw You? We at the FCCHWSY believe that karma will balance everything, and heartburn is just penance for what you were thinking about your server. The television will be on over the bar so that we can say our prayers before the coin toss.

"It won't be your 'Last Supper', but at 3:00 AM Monday you'll wish it was.

"A gratuity of 18% will be added to all parties of 13 or more, even if one of you leaves early. Also, please note that since the incident where a member ordered 5 wings and 2 stalks of celery, fed the entire church, and then returned 12 plates of uneaten food, sharing is not allowed. In the event that water is turned into anything else prior to consumption, the appropriate price for the final product will be charged.

"We hope to see you there!"

Sometimes You Just Have To Reason With People (and other random stuff)

2008-09-10T10:30:00.000+01:00

OK, I'm COMPLETELY blocked at this point, so here's a few small things that probably aren't really blogworthy in and of themselves.

------------------------------------

This happened to me long ago. I was on a small road in North Carolina.

I approached an intersection that widened to allow for right turns (although it wasn't actually marked that way). There was a car in the left lane. It was a beautiful summer night and my windows were down. I pulled up next to the car and looked to see if there was any oncoming traffic before turning right. There was a gentleman driving the car to my left and a woman, who I presume was his wife, was in the passenger seat. The following conversation ensued:

Gentleman: HEY!!!

Gilahi: *turns to look*

Gentleman: I'M TURNING RIGHT!!!

Gilahi: Perhaps if you used your turn indicators this sort of thing wouldn't happen to you.

Gentleman: *looks at dashboard, looks straight ahead, passenger side window slowly goes up*

The best part of the experience was the expression on the wife's face looking at me as the window slooooowly eased shut. I don't know if she was happy that someone put her husband in his place or was just trying not to let him see her smile.

------------------------------------

Bilbo should appreciate this one, if he hasn't already heard it: Did you hear the one about the prisoner who was told that he could get early parole if he just made a pass at the warden's wife? He turned it down because he didn't want to end a sentence with a proposition.

------------------------------------

Mondegreen of the day: I'm driving my car so we're listening to my music. The current selection is Herman's Hermits' This Door Swings Both Ways. My wife says, "What does that mean?"

"What?", I ask.

"Disco swings both ways. I don't understand what that means."

I'm much more into '60s music than my wife, so I suspect that she's never heard this song. I tell her that it's "this door", not "disco"

The chorus comes around again. She insists that it sounds like "disco". I explain to her that A) the title of the song is This Door Swings Both Ways, so I'm pretty sure that's what he's singing, B) the song predates disco by at least a decade, and C) disco doesn't swing both ways.

We'll Muddle Through One Day At A Time

2008-09-04T22:51:00.007+01:00

Thought this was gonna be a political post, didn't you? Seriously, I have no insights that haven't been hashed around the blogosphere in the past couple of weeks.

No, today seems an apropos time to revisit my first-ever post and talk again about the Situational Awareness Quotient (SAQ).

A few years ago, I went on a lovely vacation to Santa Fe (which I strongly recommend to anyone who enjoys good food, good art and/or things Native American). While trying to pack lightly, my wife and I soon discovered that the smallish suitcase we had chosen had no room left for our toiletry kit. Rather than choosing a larger bag, we decided to simply count this item as a carry-on and take it separately (this was after 9/11 but before the days when liquids were being controlled). When we got to the airport, I dutifully put the bag through the X-ray machine and was asked to step aside. One of the security guys took us over to a table and immediately began to open the toiletry kit. Before thinking, as usual, I announced, "CRAP! There are razor blades in there and the shaver has a blade in it, too." Turns out that was just the right thing to say, because the security guy said that he could tell I was an honest man and that they hadn't even thought to check the shaver itself.

I can't tell you what a good feeling that gave me. Apparently, if you want to smuggle razor blades onto a commercial flight, a good place to hide them is in a shaver. I suspect it never occurred to the terrorists to try to smuggle plastic explosives in a box labeled "Plastic Explosives".

They took all my razor blades and, as it turned out, my little mustache scissors too. He offered to mail them to me, but at the price it was cheaper for me just to buy new blades and scissors in New Mexico.

So my SAQ was pretty darned low in that case.

As was my wife's.

Not that it matters.

So by now I'm sure you're thinking to yourself, "Gilahi, this is a fascinating and well-written piece of your history, as always, but what on earth does it have to do with MacKenzie Phillips?"

Well, I'll tell ya.

While it's true that I wasn't thinking ahead when I made the decision to carry weapons of beard destruction onto a plane, at least I wasn't, um, what, I dunno, carrying balloons filled with heroin, cocaine and also a few hypodermic needles.

That's right, the former "One Day At A Time" star was stopped at LAX because she was acting nervous, refused to stand still, and as soon as she was questioned, apparently blurted out, "I'm holding." She sat down in a chair and bags of drugs began falling out of her pants leg. I'm still not clear on where the hypodermics were. It's entirely possible that I really don't want to know.

Relative SAQ ratings -- Doing drugs: pretty darned low. Trying to carry bags of drugs and hypodermics onto a plane: abysmal. Acting all nervous, refusing to obey orders, and exclaiming your guilt to the authorities: Off the scale.

I feel sorry for her, I really do. The offspring of an enormously popular and talented musician and producer, early roles in movies and TV, and then nothing. It's a wonder she has enough situational awareness to get through a day.

On a peripherally-related note: I was a seething mass of raging hormones when this show first came out, I had a real thing for girls with long, straight hair, and I would've gladly gone to jail for the opportunity of spending one statutory evening with Valerie Bertinelli.

So, in remembrance of so many good things past, so many things we would have liked to have done differently, and hoping that Ms. Phillips is able to shake off her demons, I leave you with a stirring and hopefully inspiring piece of classical music.

Painting with Livestock

2008-08-26T13:00:00.000+01:00

I would like to take this opportunity to call down a rain of toads on the person who first thought that stippled ceilings were a good idea.

The family room project continues. Thankfully, the painting is completely done at this point. The last item to receive a fresh coat was our ceiling, which is, tastefully, stippled. Textured, that is. Imagine trying to paint this:

In order to paint a stippled ceiling, one must purchase a paint roller which is made from one entire dead sheep. They have to be dead, I suppose, or you'd never get the handle inserted.

When you pour your paint into the roller pan and dip this ovine contraption into it, the sound you hear is that of a roller sucking up what amounts to a gallon of paint. You may have to refill the pan several times before the roller is actually saturated. At this point, the roller full of paint, which weighs approximately 37 pounds, has to be hoisted over your head and applied to the ceiling. You quickly learn that, if you roll this veeeery slowly, you can effectively cover a ceiling area about 8" by 18", while at the same time spattering tiny droplets of paint in a 20-foot radius, effectively polka-dotting you, your carpet, your furniture, your freshly-painted walls, and the dog. Then you must refill the roller pan and reload the roller because there's not enough paint left to cover any more. In this manner you can paint an entire 10X20 ceiling using only 30 gallons of paint in about 2 days.

You do get to work on those flabby arms, though.

Once the ceiling has been covered, then it's a simple matter of taking a brush and going around the outside edges and any light fixtures that may be in the ceiling. That is, it's "a simple matter" in much the same way that threading a needle while wearing oven mitts is "a little tricky". This is because the texture of the ceiling must now be overcome with a brush. One must get enough paint onto the brush to get into all the little nooks and crannies and, at the same time, be sparing enough with the paint to prevent it from rolling down to one's elbow.

A couple of repairs, new carpet, a new mantel and insert for the fireplace, and we'll be ready to inhabit our family room again. Watch this space for further developments.

Henry Clay and Me

2008-08-25T08:30:00.002+01:00

I'd rather be right than president.
--Henry Clay

I'm a software guy. The software that my company sells runs on several different operating systems. We had a request at one point to implement a certain feature on the AIX version of our software. If you're not familiar, AIX is to operating systems, particularly Unix-like operating systems, what Esperanto is to world languages. It sort of does what it was intended to do, but nobody really takes it seriously.

There is a gentleman who works in our main office who is very, very knowledgeable about our product, from the inside implementation to the features it offers in all of its various forms. He is highly respected in the company and is seen as the go-to guy for many issues. He was a proponent of implementing this new feature on AIX. I knew that it didn't work the way he thought it did. After a series of pretty frustrating e-mails, he requested a conference call to discuss this issue.

I was prepared. I had examined the code in question. I had read the AIX man pages on the topic in question. I had closely examined the AIX documentation online. I knew exactly how this worked. Four of us were included on the conference call. He said what he wanted. I explained how it was simply impossible. The operating system, if I may call AIX that, simply didn't provide the information for the software to determine the necessary steps. He indicated that I could do it in this fairly simple manner. I explained patiently that it wouldn't work, and here was why. He said that I could get this information from this source. I told him that the source was inadequate and might mislead us with the information it provided. This was not a difficult concept. I really couldn't understand why he couldn't see the logic. I had never dealt with this guy much, but I knew his reputation. At this point, I honestly couldn't see how he had earned it. The more we talked, the more I began to think that he really wasn't all that bright, but had apparently gotten his reputation through sheer persistence. This was so simple that any dolt with a rudimentary knowledge of the issue should be able to figure out that it simply wouldn't fly. I tried explaining it in a different way. I tried using examples. We walked through it step by step. I showed him the step where it all fell apart. For God's sake, is this guy an idiot? I was forceful. I was emphatic. I was confident in the overwhelming weight of rightitude. Just about the time I was ready to start laughing at the absurdity of it all, the answer hit me:

I was wrong.

I was utterly, totally, inarguably wrong. It would work in exactly the manner he said it would. Dammit!

I don't recall exactly what I said when this realization struck, but I'm almost certain that it was clever and glib and all-around perfect. I'm pretty sure it went something like this:

"oh."

That's right. In the space of a heartbeat, I went from Daniel Webster to "oh".

The mind races at a time like this. How can I get out of this with a single shred of dignity intact? Maybe I'm not completely wrong. Maybe I can show how my way of thinking was right, but his presentation was inadequate. Maybe I got my information from an older version of AIX and the feature that would allow it all to work was brand new. Maybe.....

Nah. There was no way out. I had to tuck my tail between my legs and admit that everything that I'd been saying over e-mail for the past several days and during the last twenty minutes of highly-paid conversation with massive amounts of brain power was pretty much equivalent to arguing that Paris Hilton is "classy".

I went off and implemented the code. It was easy. Any dolt with a rudimentary knowledge of the issue could've done it. Coding, building and testing took me a total of about two hours. I was able to make an entry in our tracking system that same day that said it was done and worked like a charm.

I still don't know if the other guy was trying to be nice or just turning the screw when he responded with, "Gosh, it took less time to implement it than it did to talk about it!"

Asshole.

Yeah, I'd rather be right.

Rockin' To The Oldies

2008-08-20T14:00:00.002+01:00

Sometimes we get our ideas from our daily lives. Sometimes we get them from the news. Sometimes we blatantly steal them from other peoples' blogs. Sometimes we combine more than one of the above. This is one of those times.

I have written in this space about my age, music, and the time I got to meet Keith Emerson. I have read with great interest blogs from J-Money and Herb of DC about the various searches that people have used to locate some of their blog entries. This inspired me to do my own little bit of Sitemeter digging to try to see how people were finding some of my stuff.

I was pleased that people were still hitting some of my old blog entries as late as yesterday with this search:

Huh. People out there actually still look for Keith Emerson. It ain't just me. I felt good about that. Anything I can do to help out my ol' buddy and BFF Keith as his career wanes can only be a good thing.

It sort of came crashing down, however, when I noticed where the search came from:

So now I have visions of old guys in black suits, hats and prayer shawls kicking up their walkers to the tune of "Abaddon's Bolero". Old rabbis working on lessons that show parallels between Hillel and "The Sheriff". God forbid that there are old women in wheelchairs with shmattehs on their wigs crooning "Still You Turn Me On" to their hunky male nurses.

Notice the common word in each of the above sentences? Hint: It rhymes with "sold".

If I'm ever in a "Geriatric Center", will I be using Google to hunt up Black Oak Arkansas performing the innuendo-laden "Jim Dandy to the Rescue" or, assuming I can even remember Black Oak Arkansas, would I more likely listen in a hopeful fashion to "Uncle 'Lijah" which is, appropriately, about a man who lives to be 105 years old? Will the Beatles' "When I'm 64" have any meaning at all for me any more? Will Jethro Tull inspire me to sit on a park bench and eye little girls with bad intent? Will I be John Fogerty's "Old Man Down The Road"?

At least they're apparently having some fun. So let's hear it for the Google searchers at The Gurwin Jewish Geriatric Center. God bless 'em. May I be as spunky as they are when my time comes. Unlike Roger Daltrey, I hope I don't die before I get old.

To the folks at Gurwin:

May God bless and keep you always.
May your wishes all come true.
May you always do for others
and let others do for you.
May you build a ladder to the stars
and climb on every rung,
and may you stay forever young.

-- Bob Dylan

E=MC2

2008-08-19T11:00:00.000+01:00

I've often read that during repetitive, stressful, mind-numbing activities, your brain can go into its own little zone and sometimes startling revelations emerge. I wasn't sure I really believed that until yesterday.

As I was putting the final coat of semi-gloss white (a-baby, a-baby) on the trimwork yesterday, I was struck with such a marvelous realization that at the same time was so simple and obvious that I think I now know how Isaac Newton must've felt when the apple dropped on his head.

Or maybe it was more like Chicken Little felt when the acorn or whatever it was dropped on his head.

Anyway I was so stunned I had to pause for a few seconds to gather my thoughts. Could this be real? Could it actually be so easy? I thought it through for a while, and I really can't see any problems with my conclusion.

Here it is. Are you ready? I'm now prepared to share my epiphany with the blog world. Step in just a little closer.

Unless you have freakishly tall houseguests, nobody can see the tops of your doorframes.

Huh? Huh? Admit it. For all you know, the tops of your door frames have "REDRUM" scrawled in bat's blood on them. Somebody might have pencilled in some vague national threat that could get you in BIG trouble. There might be winning lottery numbers up there. You don't know.

For me, I'm going to consider the tops of my doorframes to be some of the last unspoiled wilderness in this country. Why would I want to pave over such unspoiled majesty with latex?

I say, give the dust bunnies a fighting chance.

I See a Red Door and I Want To Paint It Black

2008-08-18T13:04:00.006+01:00

Our hallway is still a beautiful shade of primer white. However with our short attention spans (Look! A squirrel!) we have decided to abandon that project for now and instead completely redo our family room. None of our visitors ever go upstairs anyway.

Our family room is rather small. It had two 1/2-watt ceiling lights in institutional-looking square settings in the middle of the room. The carpet is gray, '80s-vintage berber with something akin to single-ply toilet paper as a pad under it. I suppose at one time it may have been white. At some point, the previous owners installed dark brown molding around the top of the room to match the dark brown baseboard, window frame, and door frame that were already there. They must have raised Mogwais. Dracula had less fear of light than these people. The walls were a sickly yellow color. There was a ceiling fan that we haven't turned on once in the four years we've been living in the house. All in all, the effect was sort of like being in a locker room, only a little less bright and pleasant-smelling.

So we decided to call in Attila the Decorator for some advice on how to open it up and make it look bigger and brighter while spending a minimal amount of time in debtor's prison. She's been very helpful in the past, so we put ourselves in her hands, trusting lambs that we are. Here are Attila's suggestions:

Step 1: Get rid of that ceiling fan and put in some new lights. The electrician and his brother-in-law, the wallboard guy, show up bright and early one Saturday morning. In a matter of about 3 hours, we have 4 really bright pot lights, 2 ugly gray squares in the ceiling, and a little round plate where the fan used to be. After questioning the presence of the little round plate, I was told that it was actually illegal to have the hole plastered over as long as wires were still running from the wall switch to where the fan used to be. For just a few hundred dollars more, all the wiring could be removed and the wall switch could be plastered over as well as the ceiling. We decided that the little round plate in the center of the room was actually quite beautiful. All in all, this was a fairly painless step until Attila dropped by for her check.

Step 2: Pick out new carpet, wall color, and furniture patterns. Painless, but exhausting. Did you know that there are about 368 gazillion paint colors? We finally settled on something in the pale green range, reducing our choices to 62 gazillion. Then the carpet samples. Then the fabric pattern books. Did you know that there are 10^2876532 fabric patterns, and each one comes in 5 different color variations? My wife (who reads this blog and is a very forgiving person) has excellent taste and a sharply critical eye, but she has to see every single combination of carpet/paint/fabric that can possibly be put together. Given that we're getting both a new couch and a new chair, that's everything times 2. Since I've been burdened with a Y-chromosome, I tend to see the first combination, declare it good, and move on. "A purple floral couch with a yellow shag rug, blood-red walls, and pink paisley chair? I love it. What's next?" We have the same sort of issues when purchasing clothing or planning a vacation.

Step 3: Remove the hideous kitchen wallpaper that spills over into part of the family room. You may recall my previous wallpaper experience. That was an acorn falling on my head from a beautiful oak tree. This experience was more akin to what a large, diarrhetic bird in the tree would do to my head. Just before the tree fell on my head. I did take J. M. Tewkesbury's advice and scored the wallpaper before spraying on the remover, but I was still only able to remove about a 1/2 square inch at a time. It took me 3 days to remove about 1/10 as much wallpaper as my previous effort.

Step 4: Spackle, sand, and paint. Attila dictates that we can't just paint the walls. Oh no. If we want to really open up this room, we need to paint all the dark brown wood, too. A quick trip to the paint store nets me a couple of gallons of paint that, judging from the price, is individually mixed by hand by Christian Dior himself and contains liquefied platinum and yeti milk. I declined the Lloyd's of London insurance policy for the brief ride home. Saturday morning, bright and early, we move the ratty furniture to the middle of the room, cover it all with a drop cloth, open up the paint, and start a-slatherin'. We get the first coat on the walls, shower up, and head out for our weekend errands. Come home, second coat, shower again. Sleep like the dead. Sunday morning, mask off the baseboards, ceiling molding, window and door. Pop open the semi-gloss, and start painting the dark brown stuff white. God, is it streaky. Since the semi-gloss stuff doesn't dry nearly as fast as the flat, we have to wait a minimum of 4 hours before the second coat. The second coat looks a lot better, but it's going to take a third.

The paint we're using is enamel. It's supposed to be non-toxic, but paint fumes are the only possible reason that I can come up with for the following incidents:

A) At some point, one of us realized that the chorus of Third Eye Blind's "Semi-Charmed Life" fit pretty well with the materials we were using, and we spent the rest of the weekend hilariously singing

I want something else
to get me through this
semi-gloss kinda white,
a-baby, a-baby....

Really. We found this funny.

B) While putting the second coat on the walls, I was handling the brushing chores while wife was handling the roller. Admittedly, it was the second coat and it's sometimes hard to tell what's been done and what hasn't, but the following conversation took place:

Wife: Did you do this corner?
Gilahi: Yes.
Wife: All of it?
Gilahi: (pause) No Honey, I only did a third of it.

"All of it"? (Did I mention that my wife reads this blog? I love her very much.)

C) Lying in bed Saturday evening, we turn on the television. No reception whatsoever. We tried several channels, turned it off and on, wondered if we'd have to call the satellite folks. It took several minutes before we realized that the receiver box is in the family room and is currently under a sheet of plastic.

And that's where we are. Stuff piled in the middle of an unusable family room, no TV, pristine, beautiful walls edge in blue tape and molding that looks like bacon. We'll continue our saga as it progresses. Since they're no longer doing Flash Gordon serials, I'm sure many of you are just dying to see what happens in our next installment.

Will the streaky brown wood be defeated?

Will Gilahi and his wife ever be done with their house?

Will Attila the Decorator approve?

Stay tuned....

And the sign said, "Long-haired freaky people..."

2008-08-14T09:00:00.000+01:00

Didn't really need the "long-haired freaky people" part of that title, but I just really, really like the way it trips off the tongue. The Five Man Electrical Band is another underrated group I should've mentioned in a previous post. I understand they still reunite and tour occasionally. Great harmonies.

Anyway, that's not what this post is about. It's about a certain class of sign that I see popping up all over the place.

This may be something akin to saying, "the sky is blue" or "water is wet" but, I don't understand the DMV, or whoever it is that's responsible for these things.

First of all, they're often put up on heavily-traveled streets or even expressways. If you're flowing with traffic, how the heck are you supposed to know when the sign is indicating your speed? We were travelling last weekend in pretty heavy traffic when we passed one of these telling us that our speed was 68-72-75-77-66-80-72-71-79. If I'm doing 66 in a 65 zone, I don't much care. If I'm doing 79, I consider it pretty borderline. If I'm looking back and forth from my speedometer to the sign to try to figure out when it's pointing at me, then I'm not watching the road and I'm an accident waiting to happen, which is what I believe these signs actually accomplish.

Even if I'm in sparse traffic with one lane of traffic in either direction and it's obvious when the sign is indicating my speed, this tends to be my thought process:

I'm speeding (I'm always speeding).
Scan for a cop.
No cop, keep going.

What's the real percentage of people out there that see these signs, know when they're being clocked, realize for the first time that they're speeding, and as a result of all this, slow down? I'm betting it's pretty darn low.

This, to me, would be much more effective:

But this is really overkill. When I see the cop car, I really don't need the sign telling me how fast I'm going. My guess is that this is also true of most drivers.

Finally, though, what's up with this one?

So now I'm not only driving 55 (or more) miles per hour down the road, I'm also looking between my speedometer and craning up to see the sign. Great idea.

Oh sure, they're interesting and fun to play with, but I'm thinking they're pretty useless, and they're blockin' up the scenery, breakin' my mind.