The Blind Leading the Desperate

This week, I received a letter from the California State Bar Association. The letter made me happy, sad, and nervous simultaneously. In order to explain why, let's take a tour through the legal profession (some of you may know this and can skip the tour and meet us at the end for drinks and snacks).

Lawyers, like doctors and accountants, are a self-regulating profession. That means that we get to decide who gets to practice law and who doesn't. Graduated first in your class from Harvard? Don't care, you may still never get to be a real lawyer. See, in order to actually BE a lawyer, you have to first graduate from law school (and not just any law school, but one accredited by the American Bar Association, which is answerable to no one regarding whom it chooses to accredit and whom it chooses not to accredit. Next year, it could un-accredit Harvard and there wouldn't be anything anyone could do about it. Suck it, Skippy Englewhite IV). THEN, and this is the big part, you have to pass the bar exam in the state in which you want to practice. Yes, that's right: in this day and age of people constantly moving from state to state (not like, say, 1812), your lawyer license is NOT transportable. In most states, if you've been a lawyer for at least 5 years, you can sign a piece of paper and they'll just waive you in. But in at least 12 states (including California and Texas, home of such legal masterminds as Alberto Gonzales), it doesn't matter if your 80 years old, have been a Supreme Court justice and shit lightening bolts: if you want to practice law in that state, you have to pass the bar exam all over again. Bit of trivia: the call it the "bar" exam, and they call the association of admitted lawyers the "bar" association because in every courtroom, you will find a little railing, or "bar" which separates the gallery (where plebes and minorities sit) from the "well," also known as the tables where the lawyers sit plus the witness stand plus the judge's bench. Only lawyers (or arrested criminals who are on trial, or civilians who are being sued) can go past the "bar" in the courtroom. Hence, lawyers "pass the bar." Oddly enough, 9 out of 10 lawyers are ignorant of this bit of trivia. Here's proof: go to any bar where $12 martinis are served, and start asking people. Many of them will be lawyers, and most of them will be ignorant of this. Fun!

Anywho, the state bar of California sent your dear friend CowbowLaw a letter which said, essentially, "We know you're a legal genius. Therefore, we'd like you to be a grader and assess the performance of future bar exam testees, and decide who passes and who don't." At this point in the letter, CowboyLaw was smiling.

Then, the letter got to the issue of compensation. See, CowboyLaw has a really good paying job as it is (fuck you, grammer Nazis!). And not a lot of free time. So, when you ask CowboyLaw to do something other than drink and watch TV in what little free time he has to himself, the question of compensation always comes up. (CowboyLaw also talks about himself a lot in the third person, but that's another story.) The California Bar Assoc. understood that, and so they came right out and spelled out how graders would be compensated. First, there's 4 training sessions you have to attend, which take about 2 days total. For that, you get $800. Not bad. After that, you start grading essay exams and performance exams. The CA bar exam has 6 essay questions and 2 performance exam questions. You get roughly 1 hour each to answer the essay questions. You get roughly 3 hours to answer each performance exam question. People write A LOT when they answer these things (throw in everything but the kitchen sink). The good folks at the CA Bar Assocation were proud to announce that, for each essay question I graded, I would be given three whole dollars. That's right, $3.00. But, that's not all. For each performance exam I graded, I would get $3.50.

Now, don't start dancing a jig and singing "We're In the Money!" quite yet. See, I actually have to grade these questions. And I know full well that I'm grading a question that literally involves the future profession of the person whom I'm grading. This isn't like a 6th grade spelling test where no one gives a shit about the fact you got a C-. If I give an examinee a bad grade, they may fail to get admitted to practice law in CA. Which, to put it mildly, is a fucking huge problem for them. I thought about what I would need to do if I was going to grade exams and sleep at night without concerns. And I decided that, if I just ripped ass, I could probably grade an exam answer every 10 minutes. That doesn't give me enough time to fully read the answer, but I could skim it and decide roughly how well the person did. So, I could grade 6 essay questions in an hour. Which means I would be making $18/hour, which in CA is just a little less than DOUBLE MINIMUM WAGE. My back-of-the-napkin math says that I make about $68/hour while I'm at work. So, I'd only be working for about 25% of my usual salary. Awesome!

Right about now was when I started to get nervous. Because, see, I had taken the CA bar. And when I had done that, all of my future plans and dreams and hopes were tied to me passing that exam. And it suddenly occured to me that, as a result, all of my future plans and dreams and hopes were dependent on the whims of someone who either (1) thought $18/hour was a great wage, or (2) thought he/she could grade my essays WAY faster than 10 minutes per. And that thought scared the shit out of me. Now, remember: I've already passed. This is like watching the movie Titanic and wondering how it ends. But the sudden realization that my fate had been in the questionable hands of such people retroactively scared me to death.

I've never been a fan of bar exams. They don't test real-world conditions or lawyering skills, they're arbitrary and oftentimes random. I've taken 2 bar exams and passed them both, so you can't call this a case of sour grapes. But this is a hell of a way to run a railroad. And finding out that the compensation given to the graders, the people who are literally the gatekeepers to admission to this noble profession, is not quite double what the guy who runs the Fry-O-Lator at McDonalds makes is a scary revelation.

So, suffice it to say, I shant be grading any bar exam questions any time soon. And I feel really bad for those whose futures depend on the questionable work done by the people who grade these exams.

Misheard Lyrics -- 'Yellow Ledbetter'

Thanks to Viking for sending this to me yesterday. I immediately thought of the Midge, so it had to go up here.

We need help. Seriously

We are so fucked.

At this point, you're probably wondering who "we" are. We are Ryan's kidneys. Why do we need help? If you read this website on a regular basis, you know already what goes on with this guy, but we are the first kidneys in the history human life that wish their host would stumble down to Mexico and find himself in a bathtub full of ice with a cell phone taped to his hand.

You see, Ryan's daily routine is something like this: The day starts with coffee. You're thinking "Coffee? Are you serious? Everyone drinks coffee." Not like this. When we say coffee, what we should say is black acid of death. Ryan likes it thick and black, just like this girl he used to date in college. And that's not the last of it.

Then there's the booze. By the end of the coffee drinking, we're already trying to process a substance that more closely resembles maple surup than urine. And he goes and drinks 6 beers to add insult to injury. Is this guy for real? Kidneys have failed for much less than this.

He was going to post some stupid crap about politics or religion, but he passed out at the computer, so we took over. Send help immediately. If you saw Silence of the Lambs with that chick in the whole and the whole "It puts the lotion on its skin or else it gets the hose again" situation, you know what we're up against here. We're being held hostage. There's probably a kid somewhere who needs a kidney or two kidneys, and here we are, filtering piss for this guy. Help.

Demolition Derby -- TUESDAY TUESDAY TUESDAY!

Lemme tell ya, it's been one hell of a week for me. Tuesday morning, I'm on my way to work, and I pulled out of my garage. I got onto the major street out by my house, I started to perform a legal u-turn (as I have every weekday for the last two years), and I get t-boned by some jackass who was hauling ass behind me. The driver's side door and rear quarter-panel are all jacked up. Here's a picture of where and how it happened:


What's puzzling to me is why he chose to go left instead of right. If he goes right, he might catch my bumper, but there was more room to slip past. The collision happened exactly in the middle of the intersection (there's still skid marks and broken plastic there), so even if I was taking the u-turn a little wide, he still didn't hit me until there was plenty of room on the right side to go by. However, he's not the smartest man alive, as you're about to find out.

So, there's that second or two where we're both coming out of the shock of the collision. Then he started to drive away from the scene (heading south), but when he saw my truck was not only driveable, but that I had started to follow him, he stopped. We traded insurance info, and then he said, 'Well, I gotta go.' I said, 'Yeah, so do I, but we gotta call the cops first.' He said, 'But I gotta go to work!' I said, 'Yeah, so do I! But if we don't have the police file a report, we won't be able to get our cars fixed.' He then attempted to blame me for the accident, but something he wasn't aware of is that the road he was driving on is one-lane, not two. He should've yielded as I was u-turning. The road is wide enough to fit two cars side-by-side, but there are no markings or painted lines, and people are allowed to park on the right-hand curb. People don't usually choose to, because of the maniacs on that road who drive as if there are two lanes. But, I wasn't about to waste any more of his precious time, on top of the fact that English wasn't his first language. So, he left the scene before I called the police.

After the collision, my head was hurting. The impact caused my left temple to hit the door frame. So to play it safe, I went to the clinic. Have any of you seen the movie Over the Hedge? It's actually pretty good, but I can't say I liked it as much the second time. Especially after watching it back-to-back, like I did as I sat in the waiting room for three hours, waiting to get x-rayed. Thankfully, they called my name before they put in the Willy Wonka remake. Although, I hear Carol Channing is pretty good in it. The x-rays came back negative, so no fractures.

As it turns out, the name on the registration for this dipshit's vehicle didn't match the name on his insurance. Fortunately though, he was dumb enough to call my insurance company, looking for them to cut him a check, so they have his contact info. As it stands today, it looks like he is insured, and didn't update the registration info once he bought the vehicle from a private party. However, I won't know for sure until the police report is official.

The moral of this story? Well, there isn't one. You never know when some fuck stick is gonna be speeding down a road, make a bad decision, and plow into you.

More to come...

Looks like heaven needed another anti-semitic bigot

RIP

Jerry Fallwell was found dead today, and despite the fact that I don't celebrate when anyone dies, I have to wonder what that conversation was like at the gates of heaven when he showed up there earlier today. On one hand, you have a guy who is very religious. No one can argue that. This is also the same guy who spent a good part of his adult life saying horrible and hateful things about jews, gays, feminists and anyone who didn't share his fire and brimstone version of christianity.

I completely believe people have the right to say whatever they wish, even if I don't agree with what they say. I do have a problem with people who preach hatred, which is exactly what Fallwell did time and time again. Some classic Fallwellisms:

-His National Liberty Journal warned parents that Tinky Winky, a purple, purse-toting character on television’s “Teletubbies” show, was a gay role model and morally damaging to children.

-In 1999, he told an evangelical conference that the Antichrist was a male Jew who was probably already alive.

-Shortly after the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks, Falwell said he held gays and feminists among those partially responsible.

This sort of crap doesn't help the already weak political discourse in our country. Fallwell was very hateful man, and I'm not going to fall into the same hateful line of thinking, just because I happen to strongly disagree with every word that crossed his lips. I'm sure someone, somewhere thinks his death is tragic. But it's not me, and it's not here.

Taco and Beer Ride

For those of you in the Omaha area, summer brings the return of the Council Bluffs to Mineola Taco and Beer ride on the Wabash Trace trail every Thursday night. Hundreds of bikers each week brave the elements, drunk people on bikes, long lines for $5 pitchers of beer and margaritas and the most disgusting $1 tacos you'll ever eat willingly to enjoy a nice evening that makes Friday mornings difficult to stomach. Check it out if you're in the area and you own a bike.

Good news for healthcare reform?

If people from other countries want a prime example of how stupid and pigheaded we are as Americans, they need look no further than the issue of healthcare reform. Since 1994 when First Lady Hillary Clinton proferred a plan for universal healthcare for all US citizens, the debate about if and how to do this sort of thing rages on.

The reason that this debate is so stupid is that the main arguements made against healthcare reform can actually be applied to the current system, which I like to call "pay or die".

People hold the Candian single-payer system up as a nightmare example, where people have to wait months for treatment and Candians have to pay out of their boots for this substandard care. The irony about Americans making this arguement aginst the Canadian system is hilarious. It's almost as ironic as when Al Sharpton calls someone a racist. You see, Americans spend more money paying for healthcare than any other country in the world, even those with universal healthcare.

As a result, US companies are getting smart on the issue of healthcare reform. Some American companies can't compete with overseas companies that pay their workers 2 cents an hour or with Wal-Mart, who pays their employees 3 cents an hour (1.5 cents if you're a woman).

My only concern is what universal healthcare would look like if it were designed by some of the same people who developed benefits packages for me over the years. The difference in this case is that companies are looking for a way to have someone else pay the rising costs of healthcare (you and me), so it might actually be somewhat comprehensive. In what will surely be a battle of insurance companies versus other corporations who are tired of being gang-raped by Blue Cross and United Healthcare, I am interested to see what sorts of plans arise from this consortium.

A Slippery Slope towards Internment Camps?

Things like this make it hard for me to believe that we live in 'The Land of the Free.' Was it because it was Texas? After the Virginia Tech shootings, was it because he was Asian? Was it because of mainstream society's general misinformation about video games (perpetuated by politicians and ignorant, uninvolved parents)?

And is 'terroristic' a word? Oh, I guess it is. It just sounded like a 'Bushism.'

P.S. Yes, the pun in the headline is very, very bad.

Maynard James Keenan goes country?!?

'My country boner, it won't go down!

President Bush: 28% Approval Rating is WAY TOO HIGH

Y'all are way too fond of me these days

President Bush's approval rating hasn't been a positive number now for over two years. 51% of people recently polled either had a somewhat negative or very negative feelings towards the President. I realize that W doesn't have to worry about re-election in 2008, and I know he's all about sticking to his guns, even when it's a really poor decision, but it seems like he's forgetting that he's not a dictator and that he was actually elected to represent the will of the people, which has been in favor of handing over control to the Iraqis for over a year.

Nonetheless, Bush is going to veto the emergency spending bill for the Iraq War because it contains a timetable for withdrawal. This is very unlikely to help his popularity, but I care less about his popularity than he does. It almost as though he's trying to go against the will of the American people, simply because he's made a gigantic mistake in invading Iraq and keeping US troops in the middle of a civil war for the past 3 years.

Bush made a statement that withdrawal from Iraq could send the country into chaos. I'm not sure what the President's definition of chaos is, but given his documented lack of understanding of English, I'll give him the benefit of the doubt and assume that he doesn't really understand what chaos is, since most people would define chaos by using Iraq today as an emperical example. Our military presence is the reason for that chaos, and keeping the troops there indefinitely will not change that.

It would be a completely different situation if the Bush Administration appeared to have a plan about what to do in Iraq, aside from a troop surge (which has been emperically shown to be a complete failure in curbing the violence there) or invading Iran. He has no plan. No criteria to define what "victory" might be at this point in time. Just that we need to stay the course and continue to put our troops in harms way with no end in sight.

If you're among the 28% that support the President, you should be over in Iraq fighting his war. Something tells me a dose of perspective on the situation might cause you to reconsider why you're supporting this sick, sad little man.

Lesson from a Road Trip

I'm sure Jesus will be thrilled when he cruises by this billboard

Anyone who has had the pleasure of driving through the Midwest has stories about some of the unique billboards and signs that line the side of the road. I had to drive to Kansas City on Saturday to pick up a rescue dog that we decided to take in. I saw a billboard near Mount City, Missouri on 1-29 like the one above, and it got me thinking about the purpose of such a sign.

The people who created this billboard obviously think that Jesus will be driving on I-29 to Kansas City and that he somehow needs reassurance regarding the people of Mound City's level of trust in him. The sign shows that they are emphatic in their trust in Jesus.

But let's think about this. If Jesus were around, that would present certain theological challenges that I won't get into (2nd coming? Isn't that supposed to be like the apocalypse?), but assuming that Jesus IS around, putting a billboard on the side of the road on I-29 is a huge waste of money.

First of all, Jesus probably flies everywhere. If you think the son of God is going to take a trip in his '70 Baracuda, think again. President Bush doesn't drive anywhere, and despite the fact that they are friends since George stopped snorting coke for breakfast in 1992, I think Jesus probably has the hook up on the private jet.

Jesus also probably doesn't need reassurance. The fact that he's the figurehead of one of the most popular religions in the US next to Mormonism and Scientology probably means he knows he's the bomb. His father is all-knowing, so if Jesus was lacking in confidence about the level of trust hillbillies from Missiouri had in him, he could just ring up dear old dad on the red telephone and get an update.


Then there's the ever-popular anti-abortion billboard that anyone who lives in the Midwest has seen anytime they drive anywhere. The entire idea of the anti-abortion billboard is that people assume that when you drive by you'll either be on your way to have an abortion or that you'll be performing an abortion as you drive by, and that by reading the billboard, you'll have an epiphany and realize that you forgot you had a baby inside of you.

But the baby inside of you is the whole reason you're getting the abortion. The problem isn't that you're forgetting someone. It's the knowledge of that person that leads to the desire to get an abortion. If you didn't know you had a baby in there, you probably wouldn't be seeking an abortion.

The anti-abortion movement has put a lot of effort into trying to humanize the fetus by making it seem as though people who have abortions don't realize that they're keeping themselves from having a baby. This is stupid mostly because if casual sex with your uncle didn't result in a baby from time to time, abortion wouldn't really be an issue, would it?

Needless to say, both groups need to work on their delivery a little bit, because the message really isn't getting across the way they intended.

Behold, the mighty Weng Weng:

So, Ryan keeps posting well-thought out opinions about recent news stories, and here I am, showing up with a rap video about the star of two horribly-dubbed, zero-budget 70's Filipino midget spy movies. I'm starting to feel like the comic relief around here:



Yes, his name was Weng Weng. And he was 2'9'', balding, and killed enough bad guys to make Chuck Norris blush. 'For Your Height Only' might be the greatest unintentional comedy of all time. The sequel, 'The Impossible Kid', is almost as good. The scenes in that rap video are from both movies and they are just as bad as they look. And by 'bad,' I mean 'incredibly fucking awesome.'

I just wish I'd have found these movies back when the Midge and I were in college. 'The Human Tornado' and 'For Your Height Only?' The Shelfo's would've been proud.

You can buy the movies here, and here. And you should buy them. They both got a 'thumbs up':

Fallacies about firearms

The aftermath of the violence at Virginia Tech has elicited a variety of reactions from individuals on both sides of the debate about the right to carry firearms. Most of the debate has been pretty lame. Both sides of the debate are people who are using a tragedy to justify their particular position on the issue of gun control, which is pretty sick and opportunistic when you think about it.

On one side, you have those in favor of gun control saying that the tragedy could have been prevented, if only for better gun control laws, which is completely ridiculous. Just as illogical are those who say that if the students at Virginia Tech had been armed with weapons, the whole mess could have been avoided like our friends over at Plains Feeder.

The idea that gun control laws are effective is emperically denied by the number of illegal guns that are estimated to exist in the US. You can ban all the guns you want, and that will just create a larger black market for guns. Since most attempts at gun control focus only on the currently legal methods of obtaining guns, like waiting periods and making certain models illegal, more laws will not make us safer. This was emperically shown to be the case in England. After passing one of the most restrictive handgun laws in the world, violent crimes committed with firearms doubled.

Similarly, the idea that more people with weapons is actually safer is also emperically denied by statistics. The Centers for Disease control reports that despite the fact that we have largest number of legal weapons, we also have the largest number of children who are killed by guns each year (5,285) in the world by an order of magnitude over the next highest country (Canada had 150).

If the students at Virginia Tech had been armed, they may have been able to stop the attacker before he killed as many people. But, they might not have. Police carry guns and this does not mean that they are never shot and killed or that they always get the bad guy. And police are extensively trained in how to use firearms. A bunch of 19 year-old college students with guns is a whole different situation. Having a gun is not a guarantee that you can stop a crazy person from storming your classroom and killing a bunch of people. It's not a cloak of invincibility, which you have to believe if you think that having a gun would have saved those people.

The potential benefit of stopping this guy from killing in a very rare and unlikely incident is far outweighed by the increase that would be seen in accidental gun deaths in people's homes. It would take 160 incidents like Virignia Tech each year to offset the number of children who are killed by guns each year in the US, assuming the number of weapons didn't increase when we told people they would be safer with a concealed weapon.

Both sides of this debate can accuse the other of cashing in on the fear and confusion that resulted from Virginia Tech. This does make both sides very hypocritical. I'm am not an advocate for gun control because banning things has been emperically shown to be shitty policy, but saying that something like Virginia Tech could have been prevented with a firearm is manipulative, and probably not very accurate when you look at the overall impact firearms can have on people's lives.

This planet's fucked! Let's go to another one.

Jokey headline aside, this is great news:

Earth-like planet found

Which reminds me, I wonder how Bush's plan to send humans to Mars is coming. I bet we'll get an update now that space exploration is back in the news...

Omaha Cop Gets 5 Years Probation for Rape

Officer BJ Hooker

I enjoy discussions about justice and morality, so let's try this one on for size: Former Omaha Police Officer Scott Antoniak, pictured above, was convicted in January of raping a prostitute in his police cruiser last year. Antoniak basically told her to put his service revolver in her mouth, point out crack houses to him or go to jail. When the prostitute initially refused, Antoniak started driving her to jail, so she changed her mind and gave him complementary roadside assistance.

The best part is that he was caught because she saved some of his man goo by spitting it onto her driver's licence. A subsequent investigation yielded a DNA match, and Antoniak was fired from the Omaha Police. The shocker came today when Antoniak was sentences to a mere 5 years probation, when he could have potentially faced up to 50 years in jail for his crime. He won't serve a single day in jail.

I think it's safe to say that if the victim had been say, a white girl from Elkhorn (an affluent area of whities in Omaha), he would have received the death penalty, but because we're talking about a black hooker in this case, he got the weakest sentence ever for rape.

People have argued that because oral sex is in the job description of a prostitute, this really shouldn't even be a crime, which is funny. Does that mean if I'm an accountant (which I thank God every single day that I'm not, by the way), that if the cops show up and want me to do their taxes for free or go to jail, I should do it? And does that make it acceptable for the cops to do that sort of thing? Absolutely not.

For some reason, our society places a lot less value on hookers than they should. In Seattle, when ladies of the night started turning up dead by the dozens in the 1980s, there was no real sense of urgency or outrage from the community. Eventually, Gary Ridgeway, the Green River Killer, strangled 49 prostitutes, and those are just the ones he admitted to avoid the death penalty.

Others have said that Antoniak paid his dues already since he lost his job, and given the circumstances surrounding his firing, he's unlikely to work in law enforcement outside of Kobe Bryant's personal security detail. My personal feeling is that if you rape someone, some jail time should be mandatory. At least long enough for you to experience what your victim did, at the hands of a large man named Larry, who doesn't offer choices between oral, anal, or all of the above.

Destined to repeat it

In the wake of a tragic event like the Virginia Tech massacre, it's easy to lose perspective on things. The news channels have been flooded with every detail of the gunman, his writings, his background, his favorite cereal, etc. While all of this is very interesting, the only purpose I could see to this sort of orgasm of information is if we actually were able to use it to prevent such a thing from happening again. The problem is that we won't.

Much of the same speculation about tougher gun laws, more controls on violent video games, better emergency response plans, was mentioned after the Columbine Massacre nearly 8 years ago. Schools have updated policies, stricter penalties for students who break the rules, and yet none of these things can prevent the sort of horrific attack that was brought against Virginia Tech students.

You can blame the university, you can blame the guy that sold the kid the gun, you can blame all the people who saw warning signs of behavior in the perpetrator. The bottom line is that if someone crazy wants to shoot and kill a whole lot of people, none of this analysis, preparation, rule-making, etc. will actually prevent an attack. The sick individuals who plan this sort of thing know what the regulations are and find ways around them. You could ban guns tomorrow, lock down the university every time someone sneezes, and install metal detectors in every school in the United States. We won't be any safer.

Meanwhile in Iraq, violence has claimed the lives of hundreds of Iraqi citizens and US soldiers. As the deathtoll rises, we've become desensitized to the fact that a GOOD day in Iraq is 33 people dead. Today, a series of bombs went off that killed 156 people at last count. And yet, no one in the media is talking about how our government's penchant for violence and war may have a huge impact on citizens here. If Dr. Phil thinks that violent video games lead to violence, he should check out the REAL death and suffering that we continue to catalyze in Iraq, and that is part of our regularly scheduled programming.

New Xbox 360 game podcast is up

If you liked the last 360plex.com podcast that I was on, I think you'll like this one even more. The original three from the 360plex.com podcasts are all there, as well as myself. You can download it here.

If no one who visits this site really cares about these, I can quit posting about them. It's just something I do in my spare time that I think some gamers might appreciate, but if no one here is into gaming at all, that's cool. Just let me know in the comments section and I'll stop wasting everyone's time. :)

Also, I'm too lazy to post a full review of the movie 'Hot Fuzz', opening on Friday, 4/20, so I'll just say that if you liked 'Shaun of the Dead,' you'll like this too. I don't think it's quite as good, but it's still a lot of fun.

500 impressions in 2 minutes

Okay, gotta try to bring some laughter back to this blog:



Props to my man Deva for sending me the link. It's a keeper.

Also, I saw 'Hot Fuzz' a couple of days ago, and will try to post a quick review sometime in the next day or two.

Abby 2005 - 2007

If things keep happening like this, people are going to think this is a pet eulogy blog or something. I am completely devastated right now, since this morning I lost a member of my family, my not-quite 2 year-old Boxer, Abby.

On Sunday, the wife and I noticed that Abby was lethargic and then starting vomiting, which is not all that uncommon for this dog. You see, a good part of Abby's diet consisted of non-food items like rocks, tree branches, dog poop (her personal favorite), and anything else she could eat. When the symptoms persisted and she stopped eating, we took her to our vet. Lots of X-rays revealed that she had something stuck in her esophagus, which is the tube that connects your mouth to your stomach. Our vet said we needed to see a special vet to look with a camera to see if whatever was stuck could be retrieved.

This morning, my wife took her to the special vet. I didn't know at the time that this would be the last time I would see her alive. I just figured "She's going to get something removed from her esophagus, and she'll be as good as new." When the vet started the exam of her esophagus, he found a massive infection and a piece of compressed rawhide treat that had lodged in her esophagus, cutting off the blood flow to that area. When you're a certified poop eating Boxer and tissue in your throat dies, the resulting infection is quick and, in this case, fatal.

She died on the operating table as they tried to fix her up.

The vet was a fantastic guy, and given the fact that he didn't know us before this morning, was very upset about the outcome. He cleaned her up so that we could say our goodbyes, which is one of the most difficult things I have ever had to do. I can't imagine having kids at this point, because if there is a feeling worse than how I feel right now, I'm certain it would kill me.

There's a subgroup of you reading this right now who probably think I'm being dramatic and that to have this degree of grief over a dog is silly, but you can kiss my ass on both cheeks. Abby was a member of my family, and the wife and I loved her like she was our child. There are thousands of people who take their dogs for granted and treat them like shit, but we spoiled Abby and gave her a great life.

Thanks for the memories, Abby. You were a fantastic friend, even though you were the naughtiest dog I have ever met in my life. I wish you would greet me when I walk in the door or stick your cold nose in my face to wake me up in the morning, but it's slowly dawning on me that I won't have that anymore. So, while the rest of the world worries about Don Imus and who the father of Anna Nicole's baby is, I have a huge hole in my life, where a very naughty and very wonderful dog used to be. We'll miss you.

Don Imus is racist? NO WAY!

Don Imus CAN'T be racist. No way. Just look at him...


I just don't believe it. I mean, look at the facts. He was born in the 40's, and loves to wear cowboy hats. No WAY is he a racist!

Sarcasm aside, initially, I wasn't even gonna comment on what he said about the Rutgers women's basketball team. But then during his 'apology' while talking to Al Sharpton yesterday, he said, 'I can't get anywhere with you people.'

'You people.' There it is right there, in plain ignorant English. Michael Richards's handling of his own meltdown might not have been ideal, but at least he didn't drop another bomb DURING his apology. Granted, his meltdown was a lot worse (this should go without saying, but the audio here is NOT SAFE FOR WORK):



Apology? Imus might as well have said, 'I just want to tell all you darkies that my wallet is REAL sorry for what I done.'

His radio show is going to be suspended for two weeks, but I really hope it's in lieu of being fired. If you're apologizing for a fuck-up, and you fuck up the apology, you're a true moron who should never be allowed near a microphone again.

Oh, and to those white folk who were born in the 40's, who love to wear cowboy hats, and aren't racist, I apologize to all five of you. But you know, I just can't get anywhere with you people...

Calling all 12-year-old boys and tapeworm sufferers

Okay, so observe Exhibit 1: Lindsay Lohan on GQ's cover a few years ago. Go ahead, take it in. Study it. You know you want to. Now, let's observe Exhibit 2:

This is a picture of the self-same Lindsay Lohan, taken in the last year. Now, take a second and compare the two pictures. Having done so, allow me to pose this question: why would anyone who looks like the person in Exhibit 1 ever want to look like the person in Exhibit 2? And, realize, it takes ACTUAL AFFIRMATIVE EFFORT to make the transition from Person 1 to Person 2. No one would ever accuse Person 1 of being overweight. Check out the abs on Lindsay 1. We can safely say that Lindsay 1 would fit anyone's definition of a thin, fit person. So we can also safely say that the only way to eliminate the roughly 20 pounds that separates Lindsay 1 from Lindsay 2 is through a diet consisting mostly of smoking cigarettes and licking stamps.

Now, no one is going to accuse CowboyLaw of being dangerously thin. And this probably affects my perception of other people. But I am certainly not the first person to say that women in this country are starting to get a little too skeletal for my tastes. I am, however, the first person who's going to definitively explain why this is. And the answer is simple: the reason we have so many women who look like 12-year-old boys or tapeworm sufferers is that gay men have been running women's fashion for too long.

Now, don't get me wrong, I'm a huge fan of gay guys. They're nice, friendly, polite, and throw absolutely bitchin' parties. I'm pro-gay marriage , pro-gay equal rights, and pro-gay adoption. The only way I could be more pro-gay is if I started dating a guy. But this simple truth needs to be recognized (if you'll forgive a sweeping generalization that I believe is 95% accurare): gay men have no use for breasts and hips. They do not consider them asthetically pleasing. And so the gay guys who run women's fashion do not design runway clothes that fit or look good on women who have breasts or hips. And, due to some crazy logic I've never understood, popular culture is actually influenced by runway fashion.

I propose the following solution: gay men will be slowly phased-out of women's clothing design, and replaced by normal men and women who have normal perceptions and ideas regarding what women should actually look like. This is a national emergency, people: smokin' hot women are in short supply as it is, and if prompt action is not taken, they may disappear entirely, like what happened to rational Republicans in the last 7 years. The time for action is NOW!

Air Travel is Double Plus Safe!

Every once in awhile, I come across a news story that makes me vomit in rage. This is one of those stories.

Here's the skinny. There's a government agency, now a branch of Homeland Security, called the Red Team. BTW, totally cool name. A friend of mine works for the San Diego County Attorney's Office, and reports to work every day at the Hall of Justice. Same sort of thing. Anyway, Red Team was originally formed after Pan Am flight 103 went down over Lockerbie, Scotland. Red Team's mission is to test aviation security by trying to sneak fake explosive devices onto airplanes.

Now, in an interesting move, the Red Team was put on hold after 9/11, but has since resumed testing airports. Which is exactly what anyone who wants safe air travel wants. Apparently, in recent tests, the TSA workers at Denver Airport (who are some of the biggest assholes I've ever encountered) failed to detect 90% of the fake bombs the Red Team attempted to (or, more accurately, were successful in their attempt to) sneak onto airplanes.

How do we know this? Probably because the government publishes this information because the government is willing to be held accountable to the voters and taxpayers, right? Sorry, I just couldn't help myself. Of course not. We know this because some TSA screener thought the 90% failure rate was so horrific, he/she leaked the information to the Denver news. See, according to the TSA, information on the performance of its employees is classified information. The TSA's Denver spokesman, when asked about the leak, said of the anonymous leaker: "They're out of line, it's not acceptable and it's not appropriate." Gee, I thought the same thing of your failure rate! But, let's be sure we keep our eye on the ball here: what's unacceptable is that someone leaked the test results, not that Denver TSA would apparently let Natasha and Borris and their bowling-ball bomb walk through security and get on my plane.

If all this talk of 90% failure rates is making you feel uncomfortable, rest assured that the TSA conducts its own tests, which are quite different from the Red Team's tests. TSA's spokesperson said that Denver's screeners have "done well in the past" with respect to the TSA's test. I can envision the TSA's test now: they hire a Mexican guy (because there are few Arabs in Denver and to TSA screeners, all brown people look alike), strap 2 bandaleros across his chest, Poncho Villa-style, have him carry 2 rocket launchers, and give him an ID that says his name is Percival Wiffelgate III. When confronted with that individual, Denver's TSA screeners apparently get a vague impression that something is wrong, most of the time at any rate.

I don't want to end this post on a down note, so I'll share the following comment from the former leader of the Red Team: "The last thing TSA wants to do is look bad in front of Congress and in front of the public, so rather than fix the problem, they'd rather just keep them quiet."

Whoops! That sounds worse than I thought it would. Let's try again: "There's very little substance to security. It literally is all window dressing that we're doing. It's big theater on TV and when you go to the airport. It's just security theater."

Holy crap! That sounds worse than the first one! Okay, third time's the charm: "The terrorists can pretty much do what they want when they want to do it."

Wow, that was, like, even worse yet. I guess I'll just try to end with a little recap:

People can smuggle bombs and other forbidden devices onto airplanes at will. You are not supposed to know any of this, which is why the TSA keeps test results top secret. The bad people in this story are not the incompetent, fascist screeners at TSA Denver who couldn't find bombs on passengers, but rather the person who leaked the test results to the public. The nation's foremost expert on security testing says that, in the language of the SAT: America is to future terrorist attacks as a drunk girl at prom is to the guy who slipped her a roofie.

Rest safely citizens, knowing that the government is acting in your best interests and keeping you safe!

Video Game Podcast

Hey everyone. I'm now contributing to the podcasts for 360plex.com, which is an Xbox 360 gaming website that combines all the news and articles from other blogs into one place, so if that's your thing, feel free to check it out.

I'd been listening to the podcasts on the site for about six months now, and I really liked the format. It's basically three gamers shooting the shit for an hour or so about Xbox 360 games, industry news, etc. I talked with one of them on e-mail for a while, and he decided to get me involved, for a bit of an 'insider' perspective. I think it went pretty well, minor sound issues notwithstanding:

Podcast #14

Hopefully my sound issues will be worked out in time for the next one. There's a piece of software that I'm going to download that will allow me to record my own voice during the podcast, so it'll sound cleaner, and I can send that directly to Jeff Haug, who will edit it in so it doesn't sound like I'm on a phone.

If you like the podcast, you can also subscribe to the iTunes feed (there's a link on the 360plex.com page), so that way even the iPod-obsessed like CowboyLaw won't have any excuses for missing it. Well, other than his not being a gamer. :)

Ask and you shall receive...

I know, I know, St. Patrick's Day was almost two weeks ago and I am just now getting the pictures up from the Bus of Destiny. So, here you go, complete with captions for your enjoyment.


This fine group of ladies and me were enjoying some beers. Those of you who have had a beer with me in the past know how many beers I drink before I start flashing the devil horns. Let's just say more than 6 and less than 100.




Here I am aboard the bus, just like you remember from 3rd grade. Except on this bus, the driver wasn't the only one drinking.




This is what happens when a nice Irish Midget meets a fine German lady and marries her. The traditions get mixed together. In honor of Mrs. Angry Midget, we went to the Huber House, a local German beer hall, and ordered up several of these fine giant beers to pass around. I'm pretty sure that's I got herpes that night.




Here I am with another good friend drinking a Smithwicks at O'Connor's Bar in the Old Market. Great place.




As you can see, we rode on bus 20 that night. All apologies to the children who had to ride Bus 20 the following Monday.

If they called the cops, she must've been REALLY ugly.

And I mean, ugly even by Michigan standards....

Gonzales v. Truth

Alberto Gonzales says "You're Fired."


Just a brief note on the currently brewing fight in Washington about Our Most Favoritest Attorney General Ever, Alberto Gonzales, his puppet-master Karl Rove, and their odds of testifying before Congress. For those of you living in a cave, or in Texas (where the news is limited to rodeo results and terror threat level updates), there is currently a controversey brewing over the firing of 8 U. S. Attorneys. Every reasonable person with any knowledge of the facts surrounding these firings has come to the conclusion that they were politically-motivated. If anyone wants to dispute me, cite the U. S. Attorney in question and I will respond, in the comments, with his or her CV, job reviews, and career highlights. I will also put you in a rhetorical headlock, give you debate noogies, and make you cry argument uncle. And then I'll strip you naked, paint you blue and throw you in the girls' locker room.



Anyway, not surprisingly, people who aren't big fans of corrupt government, nepotism and the placing of incompetent horse judges in places of power (paging Brownie.....) have taken exception to the firing of a number of good civil servants. And those people (read: Democrats) have asked the AG and the White House to explain why 8 good public servants have just been pink slipped. The White House has responded that it is happy to make Albie and King Karl available to give "testimony" to Congress, but only (1) in private, away from television cameras that might create an irrefutable record about what was said, and (2) not under oath.



Okay, take another second and read that last sentence again. Why doesn't Bush just tattoo the words "We're going to lie" on Albie and Karl's forehead and send them out into the world? Even the room-temperature-IQ crowd who voted for Bush the first time (49%, at any rate) and the second time (50.5%, including misrecorded votes in Ohio) should be capable of discerning that THE ONLY REASON ONE WOULD ASK TO TESTIFY IN PRIVATE AND NOT UNDER OATH IS IF ONE WERE GOING TO LIE HIS FREAKING ASS OFF.



I worked for 2 years at the U. S. Attorney's Office in Minneapolis, so I know that these people are political appointees who are subject to being dismissed for any reason at any time. Just like me, Bling, the Midge, and every single one of you who doesn't belong to a union. That being said, that's not really how it works. Good USAs can expect continuing employment. Just like me, Bling, etc. What we have here, instead, are people who were brave enough to stand up to Bush/Rove, and have lost their jobs as a result. Someone should answer for this. Under oath. In front of the cameras. And if the Administration had a good reason for what it did, it would be willing to do so. The fact that it is not is telling.



By the way, one of Albie's assistants is going to take the 5th at a hearing he has been compelled to attend. Constitutional niceties aside, let me note that everyone who can spell their name consistently knows that the 5th Amendment's text reads "I am guilty as shit, and am therefore not going to answer that question because I hear they anally rape WASP Republican lawyers in prison." Stay tuned for more details. Hopefully, we can reunite Albie and Rumsfeld in the near future.

Name Changing

For those of you who keep emailing me about pics from the bus, they're coming. Until then....

A co-worker of mine brought this article to my attention. It seems that some number (I use this generic quantifier, because it's likely there are only a few idiots out there making a big deal about this) of men are taking their wife's name instead of the usual practice. While I am certain there are people out there who are bothered by this, I can't say that I care.

What I think is stupid is that it was worth having US Today pay someone to write about it. These people could change their names to Hugh G. Rection and (say it fast 3 times) Mike Hunt, and I wouldn't care.

There is no law that says a person can't change their name. Women have been keeping their own names and hyphenating after marriage since we started letting them go to college. And furthermore, how is it less sexist for the man to take the woman's name than the traditional way? Last time I checked, a woman didn't have to change her name when she got married, which means she made a choice to do that. All of this put together means that if you're a dude and you're taking your wife's name to make some kind of statement about sexism, you're only making the same statement in reverse, and you're the one being oppressed.

I guess if this were some sort of patriarchal nightmare society, where women were forced to take their husband's names without choice, this might be more interesting, but really it's just stupid. Why not change your name to Bobby My-wife-controls-every-aspect-of-my-life-sky or Steve My-life-is-so-boring-that-taking-my-wifes-last-name-is-the-most-subversive-act-i-could-think-of-son. Go protest something really harmful to women like the government or cheerleading or me when I was in college.

David Lynch's 'Inland Empire'

This year, Dallas hosted its first annual AFI International Film Festival, and my employer was one of the contributors, so I got to go to a screening of the new David Lynch film, 'Inland Empire.' I was able to briefly meet the man himself, and get a picture with him:


I also got him to sign my Region 2 import DVD of 'Eraserhead' too, although he wasn't too happy about it (I was told before I met him that he rarely, if ever, signs things for people). When I handed it to him, he frowned, but I mentioned that I'd bought it years ago, long before it was available here, and it was one of the main reasons why I got a region-free DVD player. He signed it, so either he bought my story, or he just wanted to shut me up.

So, the movie. I'm glad I met him before I saw it, because I honestly don't know what I would've said to him afterwards. I'm a big fan of his other films. 'Eraserhead' is a classic, as is 'Blue Velvet,' and more recently, 'Mulholland Drive.' However, 'Inland Empire' doesn't deserve to be mentioned in the same sentence as any of those other films. In fact, the kindest thing I can say about it is that Lynch has successfully brought a living nightmare to the screen. Unfortunately, the nightmare is all ours, and the only way to wake from it is to fall asleep.

This film is truly 'Lynch untethered.' If you're a film buff, think about those words for a minute. And heaven forbid, but if you thought 'Mulholland Drive' didn't make any sense (and it took a couple of viewings and some web research for me), I'll bet dollars to donuts you won't make it through the first 60 minutes. Just the first hour alone was like watching a four-year old try to play Tetris. Once in a while, a couple of pieces may seem to fit together, but it'll be more by accident than anything else. Then you have hour two. Then, hour three.

The most upsetting thing about this film is that he's covering old territory, and not just of other directors (you'll see some not-so-subtle nods to Stanley Kubrick, Oliver Stone, Japanese horror, etc.), but of his own material. In a nutshell, 'Inland Empire' is another 'Fuck You' to mainstream Hollywood, but he did it a few years ago with 'Mulholland Drive,' and much better. He gave us a small amount of narrative, a character to root for, and even when the film seemed to go off the rails in the last 30 minutes, there were good reasons for it. With this film, it's not only off the rails, there were no rails in the first place. In fact, there's barely a train at all. I'm not one who complains when a film doesn't follow the three-act structure, but this film had about 50 or 60 acts. This is also why it felt like it had 20 endings, and yet felt like it never ended, even after the credits rolled. Talk about unsatisfying. Lynch makes one tiny effort to 'throw us a bone,' but it comes at about the 2:30 mark, and it adds more confusion than anything else, and by this time, I'd stopped trying long ago.

There are a couple of positives to take away, however. Laura Dern's performance is strong, but it may have felt that way because everyone else in the film acted like they were overdosing on Vicodin. Also, the score was very effective, and unsettling at just the right times. But these things aren't enough for me to even consider recommending this film to even the biggest Lynch diehards. Unless you like spending your free time putting together jigsaw puzzles of blurry pictures, and that have half of the pieces missing, stay far away from this one.

I was told that Lynch's original cut of this film was 11 hours long. If it were 30 minutes, it would still be too long. At 11 hours, there's only one way you would get me to watch it:


I like some abstract movies ('Begotten,' anyone?), but no matter what, a film has to make me care about something or someone in it. In this respect, 'Inland Empire' is a complete disaster. It may end up being my pick for Worst Film of the Year. I don't know if I've ever felt more disappointed while walking out of a theater, and I didn't read a single review beforehand (I saw that Ebert's website editor gave it four stars, but that's it), so my expectations were squarely on Mr. Lynch's shoulders. I appreciate when a filmmaker has the courage to take risks, but at least one of them has to pay off for it to make a difference for me. I don't want Lynch's next film to be Mission:Impossible 4, but I don't want it to bore me as much as this film did either.

Writing Letters by Hand is A Waste of Time

I'm on the road right now in Washington, D.C., doing my annual reacharound and pat on the back with the Nebraska Congressional delegation. In the Omaha airport this morning, I heard something that annoyed me. Now, I will in turn annoy you as well. That's how it works. Didn't you see that Pay It Forward movie? I thought since they killed Haley Joe Bob Osment at the end of that movie, it was pretty good.

ANYWAY, ff you ever need to find an elderly person, the Omaha airport is like Geriatri-Mart. This morning, there were flocks of them. While I was standing in the security line behind people who could have been George Burns's great grandparents, I overheard the following old-person cliche, which made me long for assisted suicide:

Old man that smells like he lives in the sewer "There's nothing like getting a hand-written letter. Getting an email isn't the same thing. If someone writes you a letter by hand, it shows that they really care. Kids don't understand that."

Elder McStinky then turns to look at me, shakes his head and says -
"I bet you've never even written a letter by hand."

It was early in the morning, but I immediately started compiling a list of thing this guy has never done, such as wiping his own ass or passing a test on multiplication. I just smiled, and didn't say anything, which I know those of you who know me are thinking "Yeah right, that'd be a first." But, really I did.

I wanted to say "So, if someone uses available technology to drive to visit you, instead of say riding a horse, does that make their visit less meaningful?" The irony that he was standing in line for an airplane and how that might affect the sincerity of the visit was completely lost on him.

Sentiments like this piss me off because writing makes my hand hurt. And because I'm left-handed, my hand gets all kinds of messy as I drag the fat part of my hand over everything I write. The idea that somehow writing by hand is superior to other available technology is absurd. The fact that someone takes the time to contact you, I think is the important feature. Not how they do it. Taken to its logical extreme, expressing yourself on stone tablets or by writing crude symbols on someone's wall is the ultimate act of consideration. If you're going to do it any other way, why bother?

Conversations with Drunk People

I'm sure many of you are wondering about the bus last night, and I am going to do my best to get pictures of the festivities sufficiently de-identified, so that they may be posted here for your review.

In the meantime, I can tell you that a fun time was had by nearly 30 friends and even some strangers and we consumed what can only be described as an asinine quantity of booze. The night ended without anyone puking on the bus, which frankly surprised me. However, another one of this blog's co-writers only made it 10 feet off the bus and into my neighbor's yard before dialing up our good friend Ralph. Here's to you Lepto.

What dawned on me last night was that there are certain topics of conversation that absolutely only occur when you're talking with either drunk people or small children, both situations lacking any entertainment value if you are sober. If I had started keeping track of these conversations in college, I could have written a book. Instead, I will highligh three of my favorites. Feel free to add more under comments.

The first example is best expressed by the following graph:

This might be an explanation why you hear a bunch of drunk people singing "Love on the Rocks" at the top of their lungs. I had no fewer than 3 conversations about how rad Neil Diamond is on Saturday night. Unless you're drunk, people don't talk about how much they love Neil Diamond.

My second example of a topic that people only discuss when they're boozed is application and management of sex toys. I would say a good number of people that I call my friends have some sort of sex toy. I only know this about the people I drink with, because otherwise, people don't discuss it. Give my friends and acquantainces a few beers and all that talk about sales figures and litigation and grant funding turns into butt plugs, dildos and butt beads. I think it's great that people use these things, but I find it interesting it only comes up when people consume a bottle of Jamison and two tall boys of the High Life.

The final example I will give is related to what people actually think of your girlfriend / spouse. Like any example of conversations had with drunk people, the lack of inhibition provided by Mormon Demon Water can steer the topic of conversation towards good things (see # 2 above) or bad things that create hard feelings. The bus crawl was not without an example of this sort of conversation either. While my lovely wife was telling her entire extended family what she really thought of her cousin's wife, another bus rider was getting read the riot act because his girlfriend had elected to stay home.

If the involved parties had been sober, the conversation might have started something like this:
"Oh, you have a girlfriend? What is she doing on this fine evening?"
What actually was said on the bus:
"Your girlfriend is a bitch for not coming on the bus with us. What is she too cool? Your relationship is doomed."

I wish I were making that up. Feel free to add your favorites under comments.

Friday, Stylized

This, gentle reader, is an account of my day of Friday last, submitted for your consideration and stylistic approval.

On Friday, I dressed and ventured forth from my apartment at my customary time and, boarding the nearby trolley-cart, travelled the broad avenues of California Street to the Financial District. I stopped, as has become my habit, at the shoppe of the local frozen fruit smoothie purveyor. After exchanging pleasantries with the counter-man, I paid and exited the establishment with my breakfast in hand.

Arriving at the office of the firm where I have been, for almost the last full year, employed in the very agreeable trade of barrister, I greeted our lady receptionist. "Good morning, Ms. M----," I said, "how does this fine morn find you?" "Why, sir," she replied, "it is indeed a good morn, and I am quite well and happy to be here." We briefly exchanged further pleasantries before I retreated to my office for my day's activities.

I toiled much of the day on the matter of our firm's client, one Mr. F-----, whom, it would seem, had become embroiled in a fairly significant and hotly contested matter with a local gentleman of some esteem. Being a man of significant means himself, and this being a controversy of great importance to his business in general, and his business in this area in particular, Mr. F---- had instructed us to spare no reasonable expense in the prosecution of his case. Thus it was that I came to strive on his behalf, busying myself for most of the day, as I have said, on various matters which required my immediate attention.

Shortly after noon, another barrister, one Mr. V----- of my office approached me and inquired whether I would be interested in joining him for lunch. I have always found Mr. V----'s company to be quite enjoyable, and in recent weeks he, like me, had been greatly busy, thus denying either of us the pleasure of the other's company. Therefore, seeing an opportunity to spend some time with the good fellow, I agreed to accompany him.

Another fellow, Mr. H---, who had only recently joined the firm, accompanied us as well. As we were departing, I observed Mr. H-- typing busily at his Blackberry Pearl, a rather slim and somewhat feminine cellular telephone and personal data assistant. I remarked that I had seen a number of people with such a phone as his, but that many of those phones were fuchsia, rather than black, as his was, and I inquired whether he might prefer a fuchsia phone. Mr. H--- replied that my experience with fuchsia phones was likely due to my habit of shopping for phones at IAmGay.com. Somewhat confused, I told Mr. H--- that I was unfamiliar with that particular website, although I did recall seeing it bookmarked in his computer. Mr. V--- found the entire tet a tet quite amusing, and we continued our riposte through the course of lunch.

Returning to my office both well fed and well rested, I parted company with Mr. V-- and Mr. H--- and returned to laboring on behalf of the good Mr. F--. Later that afternoon, I met with Mr. L---, who was a senior barrister at my firm, and with whom I had been working on another matter for another of the firm's clients. We discussed that matter at length in an attempt to determine precisely the course of action which we thought best to recommend to our client. This being a matter of some sensitivity, and the gravamen of this particular decision being significant, we spent long minutes discussing what the right, or, more accurately, best, move might be. After significant consultation, we arrived upon a course of action which, we both thought, allowed the greatest chance of the greatest success, while simultaneously admitting of the least chance of the greatest catastrophe, and also increasing, in like manner, the chances of lesser, but still favorable, results, and likewise (rationally) decreasing the chances of unfavorable, but not cataclysmic, results.

This matter attended to, and the hour of the day drawing late, I bade my fellows a good day, and returned home by a reversal of the same course outlined above. Finding my goodly wife already at home, and well on her way to the creation of a wonderful evening's repast, I settled in for what can fairly be described as a quiet and restful night.

Awesome.

The BUS OF DESTINY!!!

Yes, ladies and gentlemen, that's a keg of beer helping that nice young lad off of that school bus. What does this terribly arranged photo collage mean?

The Bus of Destiny. When the stars align and St. Patrick's Day meets my favorite day of the week (Saturday, for those of you without a calendar), there's only one thing to do - Rent a school bus, invite 50 of your closest friends, and hit the bars with authority.

If you're in Omaha on St. Patrick's day, post it under comments, and I'll send you a bus invite.

Photos will be posted here on Sunday or whenever I get out of jail.

Busy busy busy

I've been out of pocket a lot lately, so you haven't heard from me in a while. My job has gotten twice as busy (literally), and I've travelled for work, and as soon as I got back, I got a sinus infection. Anyway, a lot has happened in the world since my last writing, and yet, all I want to do is post THIS:


$70 million on opening weekend? I guess I wasn't the only one who liked that trailer.

I'll try to get inspired enough to write an actual post this weekend, but I assume that the Midget will have something better coming real soon. After all, Saturday is St. Paddy's Day.

Ryan the Angry Midget Cancer Diet

One thing that makes me really angry is when a group of people use their credentials to prey on people's fears. Like Dr. Phil, who is not a physician (not even in Mexico would they let that guy be a physician), but still feels the need to call himself "Dr. Phil" and give advice that would be considered practicing medicine if he didn't do it in front of a TV camera. A friend of mine at work recently told me about another example, a book called the China Study, which essentially tells people that our diets are very unhealthy and that we all need to become vegans to avoid lots of chronic health problems.

In this book, Dr. T. Colin Campbell and Thomas Campbell Part II make the claim that becoming a vegan will decrease the likelihood that you will get cancer. His claim is based on "research" in his book that looked at a number of factors in diets of people and their rates of cancer. Despite the fact that Dr. Campbell has his Ph.D., he must have skipped the classes where they explained that correlation is not causation.

There are numerous examples that jump out, but one of the most interesting is where he claims that children in the Phillipines with high protien diets have higher rates of liver cancer. Was there a control group? Nope. Were his results of sufficient scientific rigor to be published in a peer reviewed scientific journal? Negative. Probably because he didn't look at the children's exposure to pesiticides, lead or other risk factors for childhood cancer or genetics. That would have been a lot of work and research.

The sad part is that the jury is still out on how diet interacts with cancer. People who have cancer or who worry about getting cancer will do anything to get better or avoid cancer. This book has sold a lot of copies because of that. On the other hand, one recent study from Key, Appleby and Rosell (2006) from a little place called Oxford University concluded that "Studies of cancer have not shown clear differences in cancer rates between vegetarians and non-vegetarians. More data are needed, particularly on the health of vegans and on the possible impacts on health of low intakes of long-chain n-3 fatty acids and vitamin B(12)"

That means that not only does a vegetarian diet not differ from a non-vegetarian diet, but also there are health risks with becoming a vegetarian related to not getting all the nutrients you need. If you're a vegetarian for moral reasons or because you don't like meat, that's fine. Just don't become a vegetarian because you think it's reducing your likelihood of getting cancer or because two guys who can't get published in an actual journal wrote a book to scare you into thinking you're going to get cancer. If eating meat caused cancer, the city of Omaha would be one gigantic tumor. Some argue that it is.

Those sharp front teeth aren't the only reason that we were meant to eat meat. The Angry Midget Diet tells us that we eat healthy foods we like, excercise, and drink lots of beer. If drinking beer is bad for you, I don't want to be good. Follow the Angry Midget Diet and you still might get cancer, but you'll be happy that you didn't become a vegan, since the jury is still out about whether or not vegans are allowed to perform oral sex.

My Happy Joy Joy Trip to Houston

Recently, I had the pleasure and privilege to take a 2-day business trip to Houston. The following account describes why I will never go to Houston again in life.

The Flight Out

I flew on Continental. This was the first time I flew on Continental. At the time of my trip, Continental was the only major U. S. airline I had never flow on. Flights from San Francisco to Houston are surprisingly long (4 hours). Plus, you lose 2 hours on the way out. So, I had booked a flight leaving at 2:00 and ariving at 8:00. Except, of course, that the flight didn't leave at 2:00. The flight left at 4:30.

More on the details of the flight in a second. First, let me note my current working theory about how airlines determine arrival and departure times. As you and I and every sentinent being knows, there are literally hundreds of variables that can affect whether a flight makes it from point A to point B in a given amount of time. Winds, weather, equipment problems, slow ground crew, drunk pilots---all of these things can make flights late. For this reason, you can imagine that the process of determining flight arrival and departure times can be a very complicated process. I have now determined that the airlines have come up with a very scientific method for calculating arrival and departure times to publish to us, the flying public. The airline analyzes all of the variables, determines the effect the variables might have on the timeliness of the flight, and then ask this question: "If absolutely everything worked out exactly right, when would this flight arrive and depart?" And once they figure out the answer to that question, they publish those times.

Now, back to the flight. Thankfully, I had an aisle seat and there was no passenger in the middle seat. I remember the good old days, where people who were 6'4" could reliably count on getting exit row seats, provided we showed up an hour before the flight left and politely asked. Now, of course, airlines have decided that the better thing to do is to sell these seats for $15 each, more or less. Tall? Athletic? Too fucking bad. Anyone who believes the airline industry gives a leper shit about customer service has not flown in the last 6 years.

Sitting on the window in my row was an Asian man somewhere between 40 and 55 years old. For the first half of the flight, he was an ideal flying partner: didn't try to talk to me, didn't go to the bathroom, just sat there. Then, about 2 hours into the flight, I was listening to some Todd Barry (great comedian), and I suddenly smelled something......odd. Sour. Pungent. I couldn't quite place it. Then, like a punch with the meaty fist of the bridge troll, I was assaulted by aromas of fried sweaty ball sack, pig intestines baking in the sun, and sheep piss mixed with cat shit. My eyes watered. I threw up a little in my mouth. And I immediately looked around to determine if someone had thrown feces at me. And I noticed my Asian travelling companion staring, quite hard, out the window. Now, it was 7:00 at night in the timezone we were currently over, it was pitch-black outside, and we were flying over 100% cloud cover. If you want to replicate the view my companion was studying so hard, wait until nightfall, lock yourself in a windowless closet, put on a blindfold, and close your eyes. This is what was captivating the Asian gentlemen, who had apparently just instigated a biological attack on the 3 surrounding rows.

Now, I'll be the first to say that I, too, have farted in the past. And, on occasion, the result has been quite unpleasant. And, on a very few instances, I have test-ballooned a fart while in public, and discovered that it was not ready for prime time. I think we have all done this. And when a mushroom cloud emerges from your ass, you know not to continue down this path of destruction. And so, I presumed that I had smelled my last from my travelling companion. Perhaps he would excuse himself and pollute the bathroom. Perhaps he would suffer. But, certainly, obviously, he wouldn't fart again. Right?

Wrong, asshole. For the 2 remaining hours of the flight, the Asian gentleman proceeded to crack the top of another fresh bottle of eau de dumpster scum and hobo toejam just about every 10 minutes. After the first half-hour of this, I found myself in a real quandry. Most people who have met me know that I don't care much about what total strangers think about me. Fuck 'em. But everyone has their limits, and there was no way I was going to have the people in the adjoining aisles thinking that I was the source of this horror. So, how do you communicate to those nearby "Look, I smell that as well, and I want you to know that it absolutely isn't me"? After several solid minutes of pondering, I came up with this solution. Every time I detected a fresh assault, I swore. Out loud. Not screaming, mind you, but in a normal volume. "God damn!" "Jesus!" "Son of a bitch!" Etc. And I shook my head, as if to say "What nasty bastard would keep farting in the middle of an airplane?" The entire time, the Asian gentleman kept staring out the airplane window as though he was conducting a cartographic study. Or painting a picture, entitled "black cat sleeping on coal pile at midnight."

My Hotel

Finally, the flight landed, I collected my bags, caught a cab, and headed out into the vast nothingness/somethingness that is Houston. The nearest hotel to my meeting place was a Marriott Residence Inn, so that's where I was staying. I got to the hotel at 10:30. I was pleased to discover that there was a BBQ restaurant in the parking lot of the hotel. This was a nice surprise for 3 reasons: (1) there are few BBQ places in SF; (2) Houston, like LA and all of Texas, is city-planned in order to ensure that nothing is within walking distance of anything else, and I had no car; (3) I was hungry. The desk clerk informed me that the restaurant closed at 10:00. I actually responded like people do in badly-written TV shows: "What? I think I misheard you. When does it close?" I then managed to leave the front desk without saying "You've got to be fucking kidding me." Which, I think, demonstrates a lot of self-restraint.

Now, it may be that living in SF has spoiled me. But I want to go on record that the only people who would believe that 10:00 is a good time to close a restaurant are semi-retarded half-apes who have spent too much time huffing gold spray paint behind the Golden Corral. Or Bush voters. (Sorry, couldn't resist.) Thus defeated, I retired to my room. And made another discovery: because this is a Residence Inn, there is no room service. But there was a fireplace. In a hotel. In Houston.

My Cab Ride

The next day, having successfully completed day 1 of my meeting, I called a cab (Yellow Cab Cooperative of Houston) to pick me up and transport me the 2 miles back to my hotel. I then waited for 55 minutes for the cab to arrive. For a 10 minute trip. The people at the cab dispatch office believed this was not an issue. They had a hard time believing that I was displeased. Obviously, I was some kind of perfectionist asshole. Welcome to Texas! :)

The cab driver proceeded to seranade me during my cab trip back. Well, not really. But he did sing along to the radio the whole way back. Well, not exactly. It was more like yodelling. But not as good. Think about the way Canadians say "eh?" Take that sound. "Eh." Now, imagine just keeping up that sound, "eeeeeeeeeehhhhhhhhhh" while a song is playing on the radio, and varying the pitch to sorta-kinda-not really even closely match the pitch on the radio. For 10 minutes. 3 songs. I was actually starting to envy deaf people.

My Flight Back to the First World

I say this about Houston: the air is blue. No, not that blue. It's blue in exactly the way that diesel exhaust is blue. Exactly the way that diesel exhaust is blue. Mmmmmmmmm. Carcenigenorific!

By some absolute miracle, Continental managed to take off and land nearish to the times they said they would. But, my adventure was not quite over. I had changed my flight home. And, for some reason, the Continental website would not recognize my reservation, so I couldn't chose my own seat. By the time I arrived at the airport to sort it out, the only seat I could get was a window seat. My condition improved, because once again, there was no one in the middle. On the aisle, there was an Asian woman, between 30 and 40. I should have recognized that this was a bad omen. But I was exhausted, and not paying attention.

With about 45 mintues left in the flight, I smelled something.....odd. Sharp. Tangy. The Asian woman had thrown up. Now, thankfully, she had done so in the little bag the airline provided. No problem. Or so I thought. I soon discovered that, apparently, the insides of those bags are lined with a thin, perfumed film that dissolves when wet. To mask the smell of vomit, I guess. The problem is that the aroma they chose was bubblegum. The result was that it now smelled like someone had puked bubblegum. Bad call. I carefully breathed through my mouth for the next half-hour and hoped for no encore. I got lucky, got out of the plane, into a cab (no wait) and home.

I propose a truce. I will not mess with Houston, and I ask that Houston not mess with me. I will not visit Houston, and I ask those who live in Houston not to come to SF. We're just from separate worlds. It's better this way.

Movie Review: '300'

I was able to get into a screening of the movie '300' last night. The experience beforehand was weird enough to where it could be its own post (there was a talent contest on stage beforehand to win free stuff from a radio station, and UFC light-heavyweight champion 'The Iceman' Chuck Liddell showed up and answered questions for some odd reason), but that's for another post.

In my almost 32 years, I've seen many, many films (over 1,600 by my last count). I've seen most of the American classics, and I've seen many of the foreign classics as well. And yet, I can say that none of the films I've ever seen are quite as bad-ass as '300'. In fact, this may be the most bad-ass film ever made. The whole attitude of the film can't be summed up any other way. It talks the talk early on, and it walks the walk throughout the rest of the film.

Fans of the graphic novel will be ecstatic. If any liberties were taken with the story, they were extremely minor, and I'm going to have to go back and read it again to remember them. If anything, there may not have been enough blood (although there's plenty of carnage). For all the arrows and spears being run through people, there's a distinct lack of blood (other than some spurts in a couple of well-staged slo-mo scenes). All of the decapitations are clean, cauterized cuts. However, this is probably due to it needing an R rating. Why less blood would matter is pretty stupid, but there's a history of that, so I accepted it. I think most people will too.

Basically, when you see this on March 9th or later, you will see a beautiful film. Beautiful in the CGI backgrounds. Beautiful in the performers (who all seem to be carved out of silicon). Beautiful in the choreography of the violence. And, beautiful in the story, which gives you more than you might be expecting.

In fact, if I have but one complaint, it's the pacing. There are essentially two stories going on: The physical war at the Hot Gates (led by the king), and the political war at home (led by the queen). The build-up to the war at the Hot Gates is very intense, so once it comes, you're more than ready for it. Then, they cut to the war at home, to show more of how the queen is fighting for Sparta to send their entire army in defense of its land. It's a worthwile plotline, especially once it's over (the denouement got the loudest applause from the audience). However, you're worked up for the battle scenes, you get some, and then ... we're sent back to Sparta. It's quite a cocktease, and some aren't going to like it while it's happening, but trust me when I say that you'll get a good release from it. And I'm sorry, but this entire film is one gigantic sexual metaphor, so I think I can be excused just this once. Let's just say that fans of flesh (male or female) won't be disappointed.

Long story short? It's completely worth your eight bucks. My complaints are very minor, and my praise is very strong. Go see it on March 9th. Just don't bring the young children. It's one of the hardest 'R' rated films I've seen in years.