I am taking an indefinite hiatus from Bramble Tamble. Not that this place has been a hive of activity as of late.

Don't fret. I know that I've put thousands of words toward this endeavor the last couple of years, so to up and walk away from it (though it's obvious that my passion for BT has ebbed considerably in the last year) might raise some eyebrows and cause some worries among what few friends who might visit. There are no serious underlying reasons why I'm stepping away (i.e., health issues, etc.) - just a complete lack of interest, time and ambition on my part.

My [pending] deletion of my MySpace and Twitter accounts can also be attributed to this. I've burned myself out on blogging and twittering every last inanity of my life, to the point where it bores even me shitless.

I've also realized as of late that "internet stuff" is taking up way too much of my time, time that I've already devoted to my family as well as my job, the latter of which is taking ever-increasing chunks of my mental energy.

Lastly, and almost as importantly, It doesn't help that I feel like I've run out of things to say at this time. Case in point: I'd hoped to have at least 10,000 words posted since the election on why I fear that the majority of the electorate checked its wisdom at the door on Election Day, and I can't even muster anything beyond the first part of this sentence. For someone who's as politically minded as I am, the lack of righteous indignation from these quarters is inexcusable - another impetus for dropping the charade that BT still exists and holds some level of importance for me.

So, for the forseeable future, I will be nothing more than a disconnected, passive observer. Maybe the time away will reignite whatever passion has disappeared. Who knows.

I don't have anything further to add other than that the archives are over to the right. All the best to everyone, and thanks for your time..

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I just bought a studfinder. I will refrain from making the obligatory joke.
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Lies in children's advertising, pt I

"Bratz Girls really rock."

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So, you've lost the election. Now what?

Yeah, I've been laying low for the last couple of weeks. I did offer my sincerest congratulations to my one friend who is an Obama supporter, but beyond that, I still haven't gotten my head around what happened last Tuesday.

You won't find any Obama Derangement Syndrome in these quarters in the coming years. I'd like to think that whatever criticisms I offer up here will be constructive, and I'd like to think that, years from now, you can compare what you read here about our President-to-be with what you've read about President Bush on various lefty blogs the last 8 years and say, "Yeah - he took the high road."

Still, I can't help but think that last Tuesday's result is a direct repudiation of my values, not to mention the values that I thought (erroneously) a majority of the Republic held dear. Optimistic as I try to be that things won't be so bad the next 4 (or - gasp! - more) years, my cheer is dampened by a feeling of dread.

I'll expand on these thoughts later, but I'll leave you with something to chew on:

If the Reagan Revolution isn't dead, our party's leadership has done its damnedest to kill it.


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Heard at a shooting match:

"I'm gonna kick you in the balls and be done with it."

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Chills

John McCain at a rally in Newport News this morning:

"I am an American, and I choose to fight!"

Bring it home, John. Bring it home.

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Word count

By my estimate, I am using some form of the word "aggravate" about 78 times a day, while I'm using the word "asinine" roughly 41 times per day. About 13 times a day, I really get on a roll and use them both in the same sentence.

(If that gives you any clue as to my current state.)

My dad uses "asinine" a lot. Usually in reference to politics. It's always appropriate.

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Adventures in signage

"Who needs radio ads or a big fancy billboard out by the interstate? Dude With A Can Of Spray Paint Creative Agency will handle all of your business' signage and advertising needs! We're just a dude with a can of spray paint! We don't use poles, or wood, or graphics, so our overhead is low, and we pass the savings on to you - you get more bang for your advertising and signage buck!"

You think, 75 years from now, someone will discover this place and work to preserve it, kind of like the Mail. Pouch Tobacco barns of yesteryear?

(In Indiana, we don't call them "interstates." We call them "four-lanes.")

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And we added Arizona, too!

Overheard in line at The Gas Station That Sells Candy Cigarettes:

"I just heard on the radio that they sold the winning Powerball ticket in New Mexico. I can't believe that some Mexicans won."

Reminds me of the fact that New Mexico's license plates (at least used to - don't know if they still) read "New Mexico USA," and that their tourism bureau had the hardest time convincing other Americans that they don't need a passport to visit.

I know that American geography isn't one of our strong suits, but still.

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Relics

Saw something this morning at the gas station that I thought was long, long gone.

Candy cigarettes.

I know that the settlement with Big Candy Tobacco put the impetus on candy cigarette makers to reformulate their candy cigarettes so that they didn't look so much like real cigarettes. And true, these boxes looked longer (think 120s), but there was no mistaking the packaging.

Still, I thought they had just faded away into our past, like metal icepicks or Jarts. Man, I can't wait to get my kid hooked on them.

(Kidding!)

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Adventures in shuffle

As the Captain will tell you based on our collective experiences in our Roaring Twenties, everything I own is shit.

This maxim was most accurate when discussing any electronic equipment I owned. I'd jerry-rigged any number of CD players, cassette decks, RCA jacks and AC adapters together solely to listen to music. It's really any wonder I'm a music fan at all, given how much of a chore it was to be able to even listen. (It's also no small achievement that I didn't burn down whatever house or apartment I was living in, given the tendency of my electronic equipment to short out with the slightest 3-millimeter movement, not to mention my tendency to compensate for those flaws with cardboard, books or other paper-based items.)

Unsurprisingly, although my earnings have increased and I'm better able to afford more reliable listening equipment like iPods, my luck has remained the same. The controls on my MP3 player are boogered up to the point where if you are listening to an album or a saved playlist, hitting the "advance to next song" button will, about 50% of the time, act as the equivalent as a "shuffle entire catalog" button.

And so it went this morning. I wanted to jump to a certain Sloan song, and instead shuffled the entire catalog.

Rats.

"Well, this might not be so bad," I thought. "There's about 5,000 songs here, and I tend to listen to about a tenth of those pretty constantly. There may be something I've forgotten about."

First up was Buck Owens. Wasn't in the mood. *skip*

Dwight Yoakam. See above. *skip*

XTC. Ditto. *skip*

Cadmium Orange. "Small Bodies of Water."

Perfect.

*turn shuffle off*

I'm in 1998 again, in a house on Hunter Street in Bloomington, crammed in a basement with 40 or 50 or more other folks, watching them tear through "Rocket Pole" and knowing that it was light years better than whatever was playing at the rock clubs in town. So raw, so visceral, yet so hooky and poppy and punky and memorable and sweaty. My ears still ring from those nights.

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Well, that blew.

Kind of a bad pass-interference call on 4th and 1, but the Colts shouldn't have been in that position. Colts are 2 games back on the Titans, who I hate almost as much as I hate Jacksonville and New England.

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1:07 left. Colts just scored to take the lead, 21-20. I don't trust Garrard to make a game-winning drive.

Marvin was *huge* on the last drive.
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4th quarter of Colts-Jags (and I almost hate Jacksonville as much as I hate New England):

The way that Jacksonville is running the clock in the second half is almost like how I would play some of the old Madden or Tecmo Bowl games on Sega Genesis. Hang on to the ball as long as you possibly can, and you are much more likely to win as long as you can keep the opposing QB off the field. It's working, and now the Colts have 2 1/2 minutes to get a touchdown to win.

Also:

My wife thinks The Luke is cursed.

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First, let it be known that I don't like animals. I don't hate them, and I don't go out of my way to hurt them. I've owned pets before, and I've never felt that warmth and happiness that a lot of pet owners have. And I have never understood the line of thinking of pets as children. It doesn't mean that I don't have a soul, it's just that I feel that actual children are much more rewarding and bring you a much wider range of emotion and experiences.

That said, I'm thisclose to placing a call to my local Humane Society.

My dumbass neighbors (well, I have lots of dumbass neighbors - they're not all dumbass, but it seems to be more the rule than the exception) breed Boxers. The most recent litter of puppies have wandered into our yard on more than one occasion. It's funny how our neighbors have taken the time to clip the puppies' tails, but don't take the time to feed them. You can see their ribs. I don't know a lot about Boxers, but it would seem to me that if you can see their ribs, this would illustrate how underfed they are.

They have been trying to scavenge in our yard for any sustenance. I tossed some chicken their way earlier, and they seemed grateful. But whatever the case, they're not eating enogh (seems to me), and it's wrong. I'm pro-profit, and so if my neighbors make a few bucks off selling these puppies, so be it, but damn - feed your dogs.


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garfield minus garfield

It's a one-note joke, but the one note is pretty hilarious.

http://garfieldminusgarfield.net/

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Your daily nature shot:

The problem with multifamily yard sales is that, while you may put out some quality crap for sale, others might put out things like this and set them out for sale between your National Geographics and your mint condition Ricky Rudd coaster collection.

I hope the writing on the tag is visible in this picture. Next to the price and the initials of the seller is this handy piece of information: "5 left."

I've never priced these, so answer me this: is 10 cents each a bargain?

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Your daily nature shot

"I will crush you!"

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Your nature shot for the day:

From the genus Big Ol' Fuckin' Bug.

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Because you can't spell "community organizers" without "Communist."

Much has been made in the last 72 hours about Sarah Barracuda's dig at Barack Obama's past as a "community organizer" on the south side of Chicago during her VP acceptance speech at the RNC the other night. The slight was in response to the Obama camp's belittling of her experience as a small-town mayor.

"Being a mayor is kind of like being a community organizer, except a mayor has actual responsibilities," Palin said. (I may be paraphrasing just a bit, but not by much.)

Naturally, this has rankled some people who fill the role of "community organizer." I suppose, in a very, very broad definition of the term, some of the disgruntled folks have a point - that is, if you want to include charities, ministers, and people who are actually doing good works in cities and towns all across the country.

But I don't.

When someone uses the term "community organizer," here's what I think of.

I think back to my first year of college, back to the group of people who were stationed just outside of McDonald's, casting verbal stones at people who were going in to eat, including me.

I think of the filthy hippies in that college town who had nothing better or more productive to do with their lives than be pissed about something, whether it be cop-killer Mumia Abu-Jamal's incarceration or the death penalty or titty bars or new apartments for people who really needed them.

I think of people who have plenty to contribute to society but choose not to, who feel that the world is unjust because we have haves and have-nots since we don't live in a socialist utopia, who are into various causes only to feel better about themselves and not because they've ever believed in anything substantive in their lives. These are the same people who wear the Che Guevara shirts without any inkling of who that POS really was.

So, when I heard Sarah Palin take a shot at "community organizers," I thought she hit the nail right on the head. And I still do.


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I spent part of my Labor Day evening sobering up and reading some of my old blog posts about my old job. (They can, for the most part, be found under the category "Wage.")

It's been a year and a week since I finally got the call and made the move into project control. I can't say it's been smooth sailing for 53 weeks, but I feel like I've learned a lot. There have been times when I've feared for my job because I'm just not up to its demands; Nemesis, for instance, works about 50-55 hours a week, and it's not that I can't do it - I just won't. My family comes first, and while I'm sure that everyone loves their families, I feel confident in my decision to put my money where my mouth is. If that's not good enough for the position I am in, then I will be happy to go back to dumbass menial Very Important Front Desk Work.

And I've made some mistakes that have been pretty glaring - ultimately, they're my responsibility, but there were some circumstances surrounding those mistakes that I won't delve into here, other than that I have had the distinct misfortune of meeting someone who I've actually wished death upon, much to the consternation of my wife.

This particular waste of sperm and eggs is no longer a part of my life, as he no longer wished to work with me because of my supposed incompetence. Which ... well, I may be a lot of things, but incompetent isn't one of them. He's the one who's micromanaged the ever-loving shit out of his contract, even though he couldn't manage his way out of a wet paper bag. I tried to keep up the best I could. And I came up short.

It frustrates me, though, that I failed in my dealings with him, because no matter what an awful human being he is, I still wanted to see it through, no matter how it was affecting my life at work and my life away from work - and I'll just say that it was affecting a lot of things pretty negatively and leave it at that. Still, up until this person stepped into my life, I had never met anyone who I couldn't win over with my general outlook and attitude, but he is the meanest, most abusive, most hateful, most malicious, most despicable piece of shit that I've ever known. And I've known a lot of useless human beings, but most of them had at least one redeeming quality. Hell, I might have said a lot of not-very-nice things in this space about Doom, but he trusted me most of the time, and that means a lot.

Compounding things in this mess was the fact that I got no support from the manager of this particular contract. We had a pretty close relationship at one time, but it has deteriorated in the last couple of months because she has no backbone to stand up for her employees in the face of unreasonable demands from this "customer"; instead of "You have no right to treat my people that way," she instead pointed the finger at me and asked me why I failed. Listen - I don't care if I am in the wrong, but at least have the decency to stand up for your employees. I don't care what kind of potential dollar figures you're dealing with - if you're too scared to confront a bully when that person is causing your support staff all sorts of problems, then you don't deserve to be a manager.

Conventional wisdom says that the customer is always right, and that's one of the worst phrases ever put to paper. It's a built-in excuse for so much abhorrent, assholish behavior: "I can yell and scream and point fingers and call names and be an overagressive, tiny-penised bully because I am the customer and, ergo, I am right."

Fuck the customer. Not my call to make, but if I get asked, they can put me down for one "yes" on the question, "Should he get gangfucked by angry goat-scorpion hybrids in a very warm place for all eternity?"

I've been reassured by superiors that I have a "bright future" in my company, which doesn't really make me fear any less for my future. (After all, how many coaches in sports have been fired shortly after receiving the dreaded "vote of confidence" from GMs or owners?)

Other than all that, everything's fine at work, thanks for asking.

Bridges to nowhere, or somewhere

There's a part of me that's kind of a bridge nut. I don't like the newer breed (read: "newer" = "last 25-30 years") of bridges that exist solely to carry cars across water, with no soul and no charm and no character. Give me an old, possibly "haunted" bridge any day of the week.

Until the last year, there was a bridge on US 231 between Loogootee and Jasper, just north of Haysville, that took people across the East Fork of the White River. We had one just like it in our town (before that one was replaced when I was a teenager), yet the one on 231 seemed a little more narrow and scary. I'm sure there was a lot of folklore surrounding that bridge, and I don't recall exactly what any of it was, but I do remember driving across it at night with my lights off when I was a teen. I don't remember if that meant I was going to get laid or fired from my job at Dairy Queen; the folklore wasn't clear on this point.

Of course, with the collapse of the I-35W bridge in Minneapolis just over a year ago, there's been a lot of reassessment of the state of our bridges. And a lot of these charming old bridges are probably going to be going away soon. Including that old four-spanner on 231; it's already met its maker and has been replaced by a lifeless bridge that looks a lot like this. (Which, incidentally, just opened this week, replacing a gorgeous - if frightening - Old Portersville Bridge.)

You'll note that photos of the new Haysville bridge isn't available anywhere on the internets. I wonder why. It doesn't have anything to do with it being strictly utilitarian, does it?

That's why, before it's too late, I'd love to go about an hour south/southwest of here and cross this bridge. Imagine - a rickety old wooden one-lane bridge that's about 100 years old, crossing the Wabash, which is a little bigger than your standard ditch - where if you look down at the floor, you can see the river below in spots. How breathtaking and awesome and terrifying. And what a cool name: the Wabash Cannonball Bridge.

I also would have loved to have seen this bridge, about an hour west/northwest, but it's been gone about 20 years.

Two other local bridges of interest that I hope my son is able to appreciate when he's older are Brooks Bridge and the covered bridge over the East Fork White River at Williams. People go apeshit over their covered bridges, so I'm sure that the latter will be around forever in one form or another, but I worry about the future of the former. Now that is a spooky bridge. I have always been certain of pending death when I cross it.

"We are THE Worldwide Leader In Sports, but we are NOT the Worldwide Leader In Spelling!" (Taken during ESPN's NASCAR coverage on Sunday night.)

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Pointing out the obvious:

No matter what happens this week with Hurricane Gustav, I am certain that no amount of evacuation/preparation/protection will mute the howling from the left, not unlike the insufferable post-Katrina bitching that takes place to this day. All it will take is for one person to be inconvenienced or ass-deep in water, and he/she will be the 2008 poster child for George Bush's incompetence.

And God forbid if that person is black (errrr, I'm sorry - "Black") - then he/she will be representative of George Bush's hatred of Black America. (Cause he gave orders to blow up the levees during Katrina, you know. This is a known fact on the left.)

Yes, just like Cindy Sheehan's experience is representative of every military mom's experience, and just like Matthew Shepard's death is representative of the prevailing American attitude toward gays, all it will take is one negative story for the left to seize upon as an example of why America in 2008 is the worst place in the world to live. Ever.

And someone's house will get wet. Let the caterwauling begin anew.

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That thing I said last night, about not voting for McCain? And that if he picked Romney, I was sitting out the election?

Speculation is centering on Alaska Governor Sarah Palin.

And if we have a McCain/Palin ticket, I am in. Hell, I'd even put a McCain sign in my yard.

I'd be so stoked. Palin is pro-life, pro-guns, and has no issues with turning on her own party when she sees ethics violations. A strong governor with a 80-90% approval rating - even if she isn't in a swing state, I think McCain could do no better.

Man. What a great pick she would be. I hope the rumors are true.

If I knew absolutely nothing about politics, nothing about the deepening red/blue chasm that's become more prevalent in the last 15 years, I'd probably be swept away by Barack Obama's acceptance speech at the DNC tonight. Sounded like he is trying to be everything to everyone, and although it was a fabulous speech on the surface, I'm still not buying.

I believe in the American promise, but I don't believe that Obama is the one to sustain it (or restore it, as some believe needs done). I don't believe he's not going to raise my taxes, I don't believe he will take steps to protect the unborn, I don't believe that he won't come after my guns, and I don't believe that he will protect my interests when dealing with other nations on things like the scourge of terrorism or the fallacy of climate change.

(And no. I am still not voting for McCain, either, unless he completely wows me with his veep pick. If it's Romney, I am taking the election off.)

One other note: all sorts of lefty musicians and singers raise all sorts of hell when a GOP candidate uses their music at campaign rallies and whatnot. Yet I find it hard to fathom that Brooks & Dunn authorized the use of their "Only in America" as Obama soaked in the 80,000-strong Obasm that rained down on him at the conclusion of his speech.


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He put his foot in his mouth, it's the American way.

It's important to note that Toby Keith's glowing words about Barack Obama do not necessarily constitute an endorsement, as was so breathlessly reported on various lefty blogs today.

Regardless, I think it's safe to say to Toby Keith: welcome to the end of your career.

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Remember this the next time you're watching the Olympics, either for the remainder of this week or in 2012:

Next time you're watching some ridiculous not-a-sport sport, like dressage or modern pentathlon or that ribbon-twirling deal or trampoline or even badminton, remember:

Those sports remain on the Olympic slate, but they dropped baseball and softball.

At that point, you should probably stop taking the Olympics seriously as an arbiter of sport. At least until the IOC stops being dominated by old-money Europeans brmming with corruption. Just saying.

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Hey man. Watch out for the cornhole.

I'm sorry, but I can't take the backyard game/bar game known as "corn hole" seriously. I didn't realize how widespread it was till my friend at work (whom you may remember I'd originally christened "Nemesis"), a transplanted New Englander, came back to work one Monday and said he was at a party playing corn hole on Saturday. Said it like it was nothing.

I'm sure it's a fun game and all, but the mere mention of the game gives me a case of the Butt-heads.

***

Also, The Onion's AV Club covered this the day after I had originally thought of writing about it, I shit you not, but can we stop using "man" as a prefix? Manscaping, manssiere, manboobs, mancave ... enough, already. What a bunch of mantards.

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FYI

Had a pretty fierce lightning storm here at the palatial BT Estates earlier in the week, and it knocked out my modem, so I am blogging and doing most of my internet activity via BlackBerry. In doing so, I am unable to reply to comments left here, but trust that I do read and ponder every last one that gets posted.

Fuckin' dial-up.

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Things that shouldn't upset me, but do:

"Cooperative weather observer needed," read the headline on the weather bureau's local page. I was intrigued and tapped out a note to the point of contact indicating my possible interest in the volunteer position.

I've long had an avid interest in the weather and weather-related phenomena. I took storm spotter training back in March or so, though I am not yet confident enough in my abilities to report weather conditions preceding a storm to the weather bureau.

In fact, I probably let the weather dictate my life a little too much. Chance of rain? I'm staying in. Might snow? I'm taking the day off work, and imploring my wife to do the same. And so on and so forth.

Anyway, I had about a week's worth of correspondence with the guy from the National Weather Service. We'd established a fairly good rapport, it seemed, and he Google Earthed my address to see if my yard was sufficient to put a small weather station (i.e., no significant obstructions, large buildings, etc. nearby to impede accurate temperature and precipitation measurements). It was sufficient, and it seemed that I was on my way to being a part of the team. Co-op observing is a Very Important Element in the weather bureau's climatology measurements and predictions.

"Great," I said. "I just have a couple of other questions about time commitments and whatnot."

The weather bureau guy copied and pasted some info from a webpage, and said, "Are you free Monday afternoon?"

But.

The info he sent me kind of put me off. Said that there were daily reporting requirements, and observations should be made between 3 and 6 in the afternoon. If there was no precip in the last 24 hours, you just log onto the website and report temperature readings, and you're done for the day. If there was some rain that day, then there's a little more effort involved. And if there's snow, it can take as much as a half-hour to measure it - you've got to melt the snow, and blah blah blah, and so on and so forth. Just sounded like a lot of effort, more than I was ultimately willing to put in.

The thing that turned me off the most, though, was the fact that they were going to bury some wiring to run from the station to a thermometer in the house, so temperature observations could be made without leaving the house. I just didn't dig the fact that they would be digging up my yard to run this wire.

I took all of this into consideration, and sent a very polite note back to my POC telling him that while I appreciated the effort and communication over the last week, that I couldn't make the commitment necessary, and thank you for your time, good luck in your search for an observer, and may the wind always be at your back and all that good-time-touchy-feely garbage that I've made an art form in my professional career.

And he wrote back, saying, "Thank you for your interest, and sorry that you won't be able to assist us, and good luck to you as well."

Just kidding. He didn't write me back.

And that's what pisses me off the most. You spend your time being a decent human being and showing an interest in something, and being genuinely upset that you had a change of heart, and your heartfelt words get roundfiled without the courtesy of a reply.

So, you know, fuck 'em.

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Weirdest dream I've had in a while was last night.

Kevin Harvick was living in my sister-in-law's old house. I was there, my wife was there, and my sister-in-law's kids were there. Except the house wasn't in our town, but somewhere north of Bloomington.

Harvick was shooting off illegal fireworks - shooting these amped-up bottle rockets off a cliff into a nearby lake about a half-mile or more away. They were carrying small bombs that made huge mushroom clouds when they hit the water. The police came.

The house smelled like cat pee.

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And so tonight, we were out of the house, when 7 o'clock rolled past and I said to my wife a series of words that have never been strung together before in the history of the English language:

"We need to get home so we can watch Jim Sorgi!"
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Doodled at a wedding rehearsal

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After a short chase, the suspect was pulled over. He was cooperative, and told police he had no idea where his shoes were.

The suspect was also reported to be eating banana chips, and was in possession of an MP3 player with The Wiggles on it.

First sunflower

(of, hopefully, many)

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Here's another advertising slogan that has been co-opted by dumbasses and rendered stupid:

"(X) - 24 dollars. (Y) - 45 dollars. (Z) - priceless."

If you use this terminology, I will immediately have that much less of an opinion of your intelligence. Please retire this phrase yesterday.

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Someone call EBay! A pork chop that looks like Michigan!

Sans U.P., of course.
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Product lines as metaphor

As I sprayed down the car after washing it by hand that July Saturday, only then did I realize in my heart of hearts, that this summer was truly the Best Summer Ever.

Fuck.
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Getting my wicked weather on

Here are two overused more turns of phrase that should consign the speaker to leprosy, or at least a really painful sunburn that itches real bad:

1. Any variation of the phrase "get(ting) my (any noun here) on." It was kind of catchy about 5 years ago, but cripes, you're telling me the language hasn't evolved since then?

I've noticed that the grub-and-games franchise Dave and Buster's has co-opted this phrase, using the "Get your game on" tagline on their advertising. (Because "Unleash Your Inner Frat Boy" or "Where Dickheads Eat" were both taken, I guess. I swear, I've never seen a less appealing group of people than the people in their TV ads. And the universe is full of unappealing people, so kudos to D&B's ad agency for rounding up the cream of the crap.)

Usage of the phrase has expanded to non-game situations. I, for instance, might use the phrase "I'm getting my project control on" if I were both a project controller and functionally retarded. (I am one of those. It's up to you to decide which, and no peeking!)

Rule of thumb: If a big-time country music singer has used the phrase as a song title, and the song gets moderate-to-heavy on your local Nu Country station, it's a good time to drop the phrase from your lexicon.

2. Hurricane season, tornado season and Indiana's monsoon season will bring a spate of headlines and soundbites using the term "wicked weather." That's just a tired, too-easy way to summarize crappy weather.

Rule of thumb: If Fox News uses it in a graphic or on their chyron - and I say this as an impassioned Fox News defender - then you probably shouldn't use it in any form whatsoever.

Bonus "don't say that": Big Brown sounds like a giant poop, and I'm kind of glad he didn't win the Triple Crown, because I don't like thinking about poop.


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Jumping The Sponge (Preface?)

One of the things that I am planning to hold court about in the near future, next time I am in front of my computer proper (because I can't tap out these thoughts coherently on a BlackBerry), is my disappointment in recent seasons of SpongeBob SquarePants.

I'd hoped to drop 1,000 words on how singularly awful newer eps have been, but I'll prime the pump and say that, while I am a little late to the game as far as my SB fandom, I'd estimate that the theatrical release of the SpongeBob movie some years back coincided with the creative and artistic zenith of the series. I'll check the particulars and get back to you on this point.

In the meantime, if you're a fan, I'd ask you to take the sweet silliness of classic episodes like "Imitation Krabs," "Krab Borg," "Krusty Love" or "Opposite Day" (to name four) and compare them to "To Love A Patty" or "The Splinter", two episodes that are a microcosm of the show's sustained nadir.

The former group, like almost all SB episodes from that time, had depth, warmth and a goofy innocence about them that made the show appeal to kids and adults alike. The latter eschews any redeeming qualities in favor of an cheap, uncreative meanness, not to mention turning the "gross-out" knob to 11 solely to curry favor with toddlers and kids who think fart jokes are hilarious. Even David Bowie lending his voice to "Atlantis SquarePantis" couldn't pull that episode out of the murk.

Sad that a "kids' show" that I probably liked more than my son does has now found itself lost at sea. Is it time to bury SpongeBob - and awful dreck like "Fungus Among Us" or "The Krusty Sponge" - in Davy Jones' locker?


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So I was saying to my wife, "Wife, I'd love to take our flower vases with us when we go shopping today, but dammit, they're just too clunky and take up too much space."

Problem solved. And not a minute too soon.

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How my son spent his summer vacation, pt. #1

Come on, boy! We're burning daylight! Ain't got time for you to mug for the camera - got three more acres to till!

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Don't all the girls all get prettier at closing time?

Yes. Yes they do, Mickey Gilley.

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There's a phrase that needs to die, and with your help, we can eradicate it.

All I need you to do is physically harm anyone who uses the following turn of phrase:

"Best [any noun here] ever."

Or anyone who uses this doubly offensive written usage:

"Best. [any noun here]. Ever."

But be discreet about it. I don't need the law showing up at my house.

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Gratuitous life update #2: The State That I Am In

It was a warning shot across my bow, and I count myself lucky that I have an opportunity to fix it before it's too late. Now to follow through!

***

At the urging of my betrothed, I paid a visit to my doctor - - -

Wait, wait, wait. Ever since ol' Doc Beemblossom passed on some years ago, I haven't really had a doctor to speak of. Even so, it had been about. 17 or 18 years since my last visit to someone I could call my family physician. I had gone to various walk-in clinics or ERs since then for a cornucopia of maladies, accidents and hypochondrial heart scares, but as far as a doctor that I know and trust, who knows about me and my bodily quirks and foibles, no.

Anyway, I set about acquiring a new family doctor and found one. (Again, at my wife's urging. She's been on me for years to see a doctor, just to make sure all is as it should be as I cross into the backside of 30.)

(... the short side of time ... Back on the bottom, with no hill to climb.)

(I don't care what you say, I'll put John Conlee up against any of those early '80s country singers any day of the week. "I Don't Remember Loving You," "Rose Colored Glasses," the just-quoted "Backside of 30" ... mmm. About the only real clunker he did was "Common Man," a trite, cliched piece of pablum about being - you guessed it - a common man. [Who drives a common van. His dog ain't got a pedigree. Et cetera.]

(I would imagine that he closes his shows with it these days.)

(Let it be known that, on the date and time of this post, this is the first time in the short history of blogging that John Conlee and Belle and Sebastian - in the title of this post - have been intentionally quoted in such close proximity to one another. Someone call the Guinness Book.)

It took random smoking-related numbness to finally convince me to go (not to mention "get me to quit smoking"). So I went and answered all the questions and got signed up for some blood work. He congratulated me on putting down the cigarettes - how disappointed he would be to see me now, as I guess the rules of quitting smoking don't include "continue to smoke a pack a day."

The results of my blood work came back a short time later. Several of my irrational fears, chief among them being diabetes, did not come to pass, so I was thrilled about that.

But.

"Your cholesterol is moderately high." The nurse practitioner rattled off a set of numbers regarding bad cholesterol, good cholesterol, LDLs and whatnot, none of which I remember save for the overall number of 236.

I can't say that it was a total shock to my system - I've known for years that my diet is pretty lousy. I love my fried foods and my red meat and my Long John Silver's and my McDonald's. I've convincingly faked an allergy to vegetables. So, yeah, the numbers weren't surprising.

But my eyes were opened when I went to my follow-up appointment.

I had a choice to make: did I want to go ahead and get on a cholesterol-lowering drug that I would have to take every day for the rest of my life? Or did I want to make some lifestyle changes and see where we stood in 6 months?

Obviously, I opted for the latter. I'm not ready to start considering "the rest of my life" yet. It seems so finite, and yes, it *is*.

But right now, at 33, I feel like I'm still within the reach of "limitless possibilities," and when you put a punctuation mark on that, it tends to limit the limitless.

Maybe that's just the irrational optimist in me talking.

***

Irrational optimist that I am, I nevertheless moped around the house for a solid week afterward until my wife finally got pissed off about it and let me have it.

There are two types of people in this world:

The first is the kind of person who it can be said, "If he/she ain't happy, ain't nobody happy." It's not that that person is a black cloud, it's just that the sheer force of their personality leads people to do whatever they can to keep them happy.

The other is the kind of person who it can be said, "If he/she ain't happy, then everybody's happy." If you read my old posts about Doom, then you know that that's the kind of person he is. The ludicrousness (is that even a word?) of what comes out of their mouths when in a state of unhappiness is comic gold.

My wife, on the other hand, falls into the former subset of the population. I ended my pity party before the cake was even served and got to the task at hand.

***

So, now what?

I used to joke that the only two things in my house that I didn't read as much as I should are food labels and The Bible.

So I'm reading food labels now and, while I'm still eating a lot of the same things as previously, I eat them much more in moderation.

I've been drinking those little 3-ounce shots of Promise Activ. Phytosterols and all that. Tastes like a tiny smoothie, so I can deal with that.

Spending much more time outside with the boy, planting trees and trying to get a garden in the ground, though the monsoon season in Indiana hasn't allowed for much progress on that end.

Stopped eating donuts. (Like with most things, it's pretty easy if you don't buy them.) Replaced with Cheerios.

All of this with an eye toward October. That's when I have my next round of blood work. If I can get my numbers down where they should be, or at least make significant progress - how hard is it to knock 40 points off your cholesterol in 6 months? - then I'm good to go for a couple of years.

And if not, then I'll have an idea of what "the rest of my life" will entail.

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What is this "beer" you speak of?

Sometimes the simplest product additions are the best.

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It's not a cardinal - I know this much - so I will call it a sand piper. Who the hell knows.

The reason that a little sand piper yelled at me the other day for walking across my own friggin' driveway? These eggs she is nesting.
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I'll say it again.

Fuckers.

Get a little better anal rape (tm). Only at BP.

And Neil Cavuto - normally a sane, respectable business journalist - defends those indefensible fuckers. Sad.
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Fuckers.

No, seriously. Fuckers.
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Gratuitous life update #1 - politics

"So," you say, "six blog posts since April started. What the fuck, man? I mean, what the fucking fuck?"

It's a number of things, most of which I'll lay out in due course, but thank you for your concern.

Ever since I turned 30 - which this year can be measured in old-style Olympic years and not just human years - there's been a steady undercurrent of "What the fuck am I doing with my life?" that's made itself apparent in everything I do. That feeling has only become more prevalent in recent months.

I ran into a very dear friend at the dollar store the other day. She said that she still checks out BT to see if I've said anything about the election or anything else.

(That, my friends, is probably a 21st century definition of a friend - someone who still checks your blog even though you haven't posted anything worth reading in a month of Sundays.

(Which is, incidentally, a very 20th century expression.)

Anyway, my thoughts about the election, since A asked:

1. Senator Ted Kennedy has been diagnosed with a malignant brain tumor. I'll set politics aside for a moment and ask that you send up a prayer for him and his family.

2. I took great pleasure in not voting for He Ain't My Man Mitch in the Republican gubernatorial primary. Unfortunately, he ran unopposed, so he still won the party's nod quite handily....

I had figured that the fact that the only positive things I had heard about Daniels came from his advertising meant that there would be a whole slate of Republicans to at least split the vote and send Daniels a message. Everyone I know has a laundry list of complaints about Daniels' list of accomplishments - I raise hell about him every night when it's 9 o'clock and I can't get my son to go to bed because it's still solidly daylight outside. So of course there would have been a handful of disenchanted Republican folks on the ballot, right?

No such luck. So now he has a mandate from the party. Bully for him.

3. I'll grant that the GOP primaries have been, for all intents and purposes, done for several months, and John McCain came out on top. OK, fine. He's our guy. Count me less than impressed - for that matter, count me less than impressed with the whole field of Republicans that ran.

It's saddening, as much as sites on my side of the aisle like RedState, et al., like to pump him up as our best shot against the Democrats in the fall, that McCain is currently the GOP standard bearer. He was the best we could put forth? Really? We're the Republican Fucking Party, and we put a RINO on the general election ballot? What, Lincoln Chafee and Chuck Hagel weren't available?

(In my primary, I voted for Romney. I held my nose, too.)

Still ...

4. Just because I'm not voting for McCain doesn't mean I've had a full-on Obasm. Sorry, I can't take part in the Barack worship. Which, to hear some of his supporters tell it, makes me a racist.

I'm not a racist, I just vehemently disagree with everything he says.

It's scary to me as an American when a man who could be the face of the nation for the next 8 years says things along the lines of, "You can't drive your SUVs, eat what you want, and heat your homes to 72 degrees and expect other countries to just say OK."

In other words, a President Obama is going to get the OK from other nations to determine how much I can eat, what I can drive and what temperature I can set my thermostat to. "Change We Can Believe In," indeed.

(Perhaps I'm just bitter.)

Hillary's not off the hook with me, by the way - but she does get a pass for dragging out the Democratic nomination process, hopefully all the way to the convention.

One other thought on #3 above: Who is the leader of the conservative movement now? I think the GOP is so rudderless right now because we don't have any strong leadership from someone with solid conservative credentials.

Just my $.02.

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Yay

I guess the below test worked, except replace all mentions of "below" in the text with "above."

Gratuitous life updates forthcoming.

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Sunflowers sprouting

Testing to see if I can send pics from my BlackBerry directly to BT. If so, consider the below a mere sample of the miracle of plant life. We've gotten 7 or 8 inches of rain since these were planted, packing down the tilled dirt into a homogenous sodden clump. Yet these sunflowers - there are about 25 or 30 sprouts overall, most unseen below - still pushed their way up out of the dirt to eventually stand tall in the coming weeks. Wow.
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Wasn't he in "Baby Shitheads"?

Did I ever tell you about the time I killed a bird that looked like Jonathan Lipnicki?
With a softball?
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My new hero ...

… is Ozzie Guillen.

 

Although I’m not clear on why he meandered off into “Ol’ Ozzie needs the money.” 

 

Still, he’s right. 

 

Especially about the Cubs. 

 

Which is why he’s my new hero.  Bleep the Cubs, indeed.  I’ve been beating that drum for years.

It'll blow your mind - get it? Ho ho!

Here's a thought that I can let depress me real easy:

The kids who were born when "Smells Like Teen Spirit" came out will be graduating high school next year.

Back to your regularly scheduled nothing.

----------------
Now playing: Mother Love Bone - Heartshine
via FoxyTunes

About the only thing harder than quitting smoking is blogging about trying to quit smoking.

So it’s been 14 days since my last cigarette. I wish I could say how wonderful I feel, but really, I still just want to beat someone’s face in with the nearest available blunt object.

But that impulse is getting weaker and weaker. It was strongest in the first 3 days after my last, but it’s still present in small doses.

Incidentally, one of the things I considered in the time immediately preceding my quitting was about how great it would be able to smell again, but damn, the world smells awful. So that’s not really a great trade-off.

To be honest, it was just the stopping that was the problem. The first 24 hours are the worst. The cravings get to be overwhelming, to the point where you can’t see. Literally. Your vision becomes hazy, you don’t know what to do with your hands, and you find yourself stopping in mid-sente ... ... ...

Anyway. I still have cravings, sure, but after the first day or so, I became convinced that I could beat it, especially after spending a short amount of time with my mom on Saturday. My mother smokes like someone set her afire, and the fact that I got through my visit with her without so much as sneaking a puff testifies to my renewed willpower, my singular focus on dropping this habit once again.

But how am I doing it? Have I become a health nut? Have I at long last changed the basic DNA of my modus operandi and stopped being selfish long enough to want to be around my wife and my son for decades to come?

Do I finally give a damn about my general well-being?

Uhhhhh ... yeah, but no.

It’s because I want a TV.

Let me explain.

A few weeks ago, I went to my in-laws’ house, and sitting on top of their old console TV was a new HDTV with crystal clear digital reception of local broadcast channels. As someone who has to hold the rabbit ears “just so” in order to get clear reception of sporting events like Indianapolis Colts games on CBS – Mylar balloons are quite useful to that end, by the way - let me just say I was intrigued by this new knowledge.

Yes, I’m aware that I can call the government and get a $40 coupon for a converter box for use in the coming months when analog signals go dark, and I’d get exactly the same result, but that would mean I’d still be watching the same old TV.

And a new HDTV, for about the cost of 35 cartons of cigarettes, would be a new TV. Which is important.

And that’s how I quit smoking.

Former President Clinton is coming to the area.

Hide your wives and girlfriends.

And daughters.

So, this dude you know is a typeface snob. Now what?

So, CBS just bought and/or renamed College Sports TV and has rechristened it CBS College Sports. In doing so, they’ve moved it from one of the premium tiers on my satellite dish to one of the lower tiers, and I’m able to watch it for that extra bit of March Madness information and analysis that I haven’t been bombarded with in the other 78 places that I get my info. And thank God for that, because … oh, nevermind.

Right now, however, they are showing the NAIA Fab Four (because I don’t guess the NAIA can use “Final Four” to denote the last four teams in a tournament - I don't know, which would you rather have your event confused with? The most popular basketball tournament in the world or the most popular music group that ever put pick to guitar?).

Sometime just after World War II, the NAIA was a much more relevant competitor to the NCAA, but now plays its basketball championship games in places like Kansas City’s Municipal Arena, which was once a major player in the NCAA tournament, hosting championships in the 1940s.

What kind of a place is Municipal Arena? I've never been. But look no further than the egregious misuse of the worst typeface in the world, Comic Sans MS, on the end lines and along the sidelines. There have been a lot of inappropriate uses of Comic Sans MS since it came to prominence – from billboards for law firms and restaurant menus to business e-mail and business cards.

(Oh, come on. You know Comic Sans MS. It looks like this.)

And, what’s the only way to make the usage of Comic Sans MS even more inappropriate and egregious? That’s right – MAKE IT ALL CAPS.

(And, of course, I can find zero pictures of the basketball floor anywhere on the internets. You'll just have to trust me when I tell you that, on the ends of the court, it reads KANSAS CITY, MISSOURI, and on the sidelines, it reads MUNICIPAL ARENA, and imagine how foolish that font looks on a basketball court.)

My guess: The people who the city of Kansas City commissioned to design the floor of Municipal Arena are a couple of middle-aged housewives who have an Angelfire page with all of the angels and dancing babies and kittens on it. Remember to dance like nobody’s watching and love like you’ve never been hurt and forward this on to six of your friends or else you don’t love Jesus. And all that other FWD: FWD: FWD: shit.

(For more information on the sheer idiocy of bad Comic Sans MS usage, click here. For more information on stupid forwarded shit, click here. For a picture of Heather Mills-McCartney when she had two legs, click here.)

I don't know much about the mortgage crisis, but I do know this:

I’m not making excuses for people who have gotten themselves screwed on the subprime or adjustable rate mortgages - pay your bills, dammit - but I do have a bit of sympathy for those who have seen their monthly payments balloon to 50 or 100 percent more than what they formerly paid. Only a bit, though, because it's nothing but hubris if you thought the good times and good interest rates were going to last forever, and you really do need to read the fine print when buying a carton of eggs or a $200,000 house.

But it seems to me that the crisis, in a nutshell, can be traced to the fact that if you’re paying $100 a week to put gas in your car (or more), whereas previously, you were paying only $30 or $40, then that sure as hell is going to eat into your house payment.

I'm just saying.

Maybe it’s a bit too simplistic, because overreliance on easy credit is surely a culprit, but I think that there’s way too much brainpower being devoted to overanalysis of the situation when the answer is right there.

Bring down fuel prices – open up more drilling in the West or down in the Gulf or up in Alaska, to the point where OPEC sees we’re serious about being less dependent on their oil – and it seems like there would be more money available for people to make their house payments.

We don't need a bailout, we need to get gas back down below $3 a gallon.

March Malaise. (Caution: boring sports rambling)

I love March Madness, but this year is the first time in years (that I can recall, anyway) that I didn’t fill out a bracket. It’s to the point where I get to be just about bracketed out by the time Thursday of the tournament’s first week rolls around.

To that end, this is the first tournament in years (that I can recall, anyway) that I have truly enjoyed - probably the first since 1987, when IU won its last championship. I admit that I was kind of a back-on-the-bandwagon IU fan when they made their improbable 2002 run – my wedding was on the Saturday of the Final Four, and the band made sure to provide the reception crowd running updates of the IU defeat of Oklahoma. I was a bit swept up in the euphoria at that point, but not enough to assuage my hurt feelings that I still hold to this day about the Bob Knight firing. (Tangent alert.)

(“It’s been almost eight years; get over it,” you say.

(“No,” I reply. I just re-read Knight’s autobiography and am sincerely flabbergasted at his treatment by the university in the waning days of his tenure there, not to mention the beatings by the media that he absorbed over the course of his 29 years there. Even if the names at the university have changed since then, the M.O. remains the same, as the university’s shoddy treatment of Dan Dakich – a Knight disciple and a coach that I think I could have truly gotten behind – can attest:

(“We support you so much that we’re putting a 10-person committee in place to look at a permanent replacement for Kelvin Sampson, and we support you so much that we’re going to announce the formation of this committee on the Monday of the week of the NCAA tournament,” the university told Dakich. “Now go get ‘em and lay the groundwork for your replacement.”

(On top of all that, the team, quite frankly, quit on Dakich when their preferred assistant wasn’t promoted to head coach after the Sampson firing, and I don’t think a combination of George S. Patton, Vince Lombardi and Dr. Phil could have led Team Death Spiral to victory under those circumstances.)

Anyway, back to the tournament. As a sports fan, I read several sports websites, watch ESPNews when my son hasn’t hijacked the TV, and generally try to keep up with the goings-on with the teams and sports I enjoy. But I’ve said it here before, and I’ll say it again: I get tired of all the shouting. And the wall-to-wall analysis of every possible angle in the run-up to the tournament burns me out:

Western Kentucky could beat Drake, and they probably will, but only if Courtney Lee shoots better than 45 percent from the field … however, Drake is 29-4 for a reason, and Adam Emmenecker will carry them to victory … but the game is on a Friday, and Western Kentucky is 3-0 on Friday games at neutral sites, but they are only 1-2 against teams from the Missouri Valley Conference whose mascots are from the animal kingdom … but Drake won the automatic bid from the Missouri Valley, and teams that have won the automatic bid from that conference are only 14-12 in the last 12 years in the tournament … oh, and it’s a 5-12 matchup, and we know – know! – what kind of pitfalls that can present to the 5 seed … but the dude from Fox Sports brought up a very good point, that schools that end in vowels have not advanced past the Sweet 16 since 2007, and that’s really something to think about … and Drake beat a team that had just lost a teammate to a car wreck/projectile leprosy/shingles/ennui, so if they can put away a team that plays with that kind of inspired effort, then they will be dangerous in the tournament …

Ugh. (And, after all that analysis, Western Kentucky won on a freak 30-footer at the buzzer in overtime, which I don’t think anyone accounted for.)

Then you have the window-licking fans of sports talk radio who congregate on these websites and talk smack, and there’s NOTHING I HATE MORE THAN HEARING PEOPLE TALK SMACK. I even hate that phrase, “talking smack,” and I’m going to hell for even using it. Seriously, though – I think confidence in your chosen team(s) is great, but God, do you have to be such a dick about it?

Imagine that times 64, and you wonder why I’m so burned out.

****

So you can include March Madness on my list of Shit They’ve Fucked Up. (The “they” in this case would be the sports media, with a huge assist from the over-testosteroned sports talk radio crowd.)

My three favorite sporting events of the year - the NCAA tournament, the Indiana high school basketball tournament and the Indy 500 - are all on the list of Shit They’ve Fucked Up.

A caveat: The Indy 500 is on its way to being Shit They’ve Fucked Up But Fixed – we’ll see how reunification treats The Greatest Spectacle In Racing come May – but for now remains on the list. (If they have more than 34 cars entered for the race, creating actual Bump Day drama on that final qualifying Sunday, then I’ll remove it from the list.) (They = Tony George, who may be vindicated in short order.)

And the Indiana high school basketball tournament is irrevocably on the list of Shit They’ve Fucked Up, when they decided to take the purest high school event in the history of the world and turn it into T-ball, where everyone gets a trophy, where Participation is as important as Winning. (They = the IHSAA, with a huge assist from self-esteem gurus who think that feeling good about oneself is more important than playing to win)

Also, not on my list of favorites above but just as saddening, NASCAR is on the list of Shit They’ve Fucked Up, for various reasons (Car of Tomorrow – errr, Today – the sanitizing of personalities, the emergence of Toyota, moving races from historically significant tracks like Darlington and Rockingham to insignificant, inconsequential, bor-r-r-r-ing tracks like California, waiting till 2 in the morning Eastern time to postpone a race due to rain, Boogity Boogity Boogity). (They = NASCAR, bowing to the television god.)

Major League Baseball is on the list of Shit They’ve Fucked Up, because every – every! – historically significant achievement will now and forevermore be tainted by the question of, “Is he or isn’t he on the juice?” (They = the chemists who spend their time in labs trying to create the next undetectable drug that will help a person hit a ball 20 feet farther or throw a ball 3 mph faster, with an assist from the players who take them - I hope the health trade-off is worth it.)

The NBA would normally on the list of Shit They’ve Fucked Up, except I haven’t gave much of a shit about it for years. (They = The People Who Didn’t Make a Bionic Back for Larry Bird So He Could Play Forever)

The NFL is not on the list of Shit They’ve Fucked Up, but give it time; I’m certain They will Fuck it Up as well. (When they do, I’m sure the They will be Bill Belichick. Maybe Brett Favre, but most likely Bill Belichick.)

I hate it when They take Shit I like and Fuck It Up.

water's up

The following is a public service announcement:

Southern Indiana received as much as 6 inches of rain in some places since Monday, and other locations in the Midwest received even more. While creeks and rivers in the area are not expected to rise to levels seen in the record flood of 2005, they will still be out of their banks for the forseeable future. Bramble Tamble would like to take a moment to remind you:

Don't drink brown water.

That is all.

From the Archives: A self-deprecating look at negotiating.

Last night, I found a paper I wrote for school about three years ago. It was an assignment about my negotiating style; I answered a bunch of questions about my tendencies, and the end result was that the respondent was put into one or two different categories (N1, N2, N3, etc.) based on those tendencies. Then, to complete the assignment, you had to write a three-page paper about it.

As the below was only a first draft, I didn't end up turning this paper in. Still, it was significantly better (and less sanitized) than what I did end up turning in. Regardless, I'm sharing it with you strictly for the amusement factor, even if it does tell you all you would ever need to know about me.

****

My negotiating style profile turned out as expected. As a person who abhors conflict and will do just about anything to stay out of the way of it, I had suspected before completing the profile that my scores would reflect a combination of N3 (accommodate) and N4 (withdraw) behaviors. N1 (defeat) showed up in the "very low" range, as I suspected it would, and N2 (collaborate) and N5 (compromise) behaviors were in the average-to-high range.

The N3 style revolves around accommodating the other party's needs. Promoting harmony, avoiding substantive differences, yielding to pressure to preserve the relationship, and placing interpersonal relationships above the fairness of the outcome are all traits of the N3 style, and they are also traits that I am familiar with using in interpersonal negotiations. "Keep the peace at any price necessary" is a credo I find myself living by.

The other style that I often use in negotiating is the N4 style, which involves a low degree of concern for the substance of the negotiation and the relationship with the other parties. This most often occurs in my business relationships, like when I avoid phone calls from the mortgage people or the car loan people when I get behind on my payments. I have a feeling of powerlessness and resignation that I am going to get fucked, and that I am only going to get what the other party is willing to concede. (And on that last point, I'm certainly not going to ask for it.) The gist of my behavior is to withdraw and remove myself from the situation – just get it over with.

There were several statements in the questionnaire that we were asked to score ourselves on that, if there were any responses higher than "completely characteristic," I would have marked that one instead. Number 24, which states, "I often let others take responsibility for solving the problem," was on that I would have answered as "super-duper completely characteristic of me" if that were one of the options. I would suspect that a lot of this has to do with the fact that I grew up an only child, and as such, I often heard about how spoiled I was, and how I wasn't concerned with anyone else. I was told how wrong it was to be selfish and how one should always, in any circumstance, be considerate of other people. I've since learned that this isn't always the proper course of action to take, and I've been reading a lot of Ayn Rand to try and overcome this feeling. (I would probably follow her a lot more closely if she weren't in hell now for being so godless.)

Still, habits are hard to break, and as a result, at least in my interpersonal relationships, I find myself often bending over backwards to make sure that the other party's needs are satisfied. If that involves seeing to it that they solve the problem the way they see fit while completely fucking me sideways in the process, so be it. Even in my marriage, I refuse to make any decisions, no matter how small or inconsequential they are. From deciding what to watch on TV to deciding what we should have for supper, I find that I have no opinion or preference, because "getting my way" isn't important to me. "Please, just make a decision, I don't care" are words that are often bandied about in our house. I feel that otherwise, if I stated an opinion, it would just mean that I had to have my way (as I was inexplicably often told growing up). That's not screwed up or nothing, is it?

My negotiating style is a natural extension of this aversion to "having my way." (I would also guess that another reason I "let others take responsibility for solving a problem" absolves me completely of any responsibility if the solution fails. To that end, I don't believe that I've made a decision that involves other people since roughly 1991.)

This "take it squarely up the ass early and often" philosophy can also be found in my response to statement number 4, "I often feel I lack the power to produce a successful outcome." If one of the possible selections was "Does a bear shit in the woods?", I would have marked that one. I don't feel like I have much to offer to anyone in the way of concessions, and as such, a successful outcome to most difficult decisions or negotiations hinges entirely on the other party's capability or willingness to do so, because I don't care – regardless of any actions I take, I am going to find a way to screw myself anyway.

This exercise has caused me to think a lot about why I get fucked so often. But at the end of the day, I don't know that I really want to change, because I overheard others in the class talking about "taking all that you can get" and "doing unto others before they do unto you." How repugnant. I would be a lot more of a people person if it weren't for people.

Man, where did *that* come from?

No snow predicted for today, yet Son was able to have a hand in this:

Bunch of new shit over at my companion blog, Winless Watch. Go there now for instant narcolepsy. (Disclaimer: for fans of Indiana high school basketball only.)

Popeye: "I am what I am, so hand me that bad boy so I can beat Bluto's ass."

My newest pet peeve – out of hundreds, as it turns out – is the overuse of the phrase "bad boy." (Not in terms of dog ownership or parenting. It's perfectly acceptable to say, "Rex, why did you shit all over the floor? Bad boy!" Or "Son, if you're a bad boy, Santa Claus won't come to your house.")

Rather, my gripe is with the use of the phrase vis-à-vis inanimate objects. "OK, let's move that bad boy over here." (It's a cabinet.) Or, "Give me that bad boy; we're just about finished." (It's a screwdriver.)

I also hear it a lot in the use of Microsoft Office. "Copy that column … then go back over to your main spreadsheet … and paste that bad boy right there." (Ugh.)

Also getting under my skin: the overuse of the phrase "it is what it is." Is it? It is. What?

What else would it be, really? Christ, it'd better be what it is, because if it is not what it is, then I think we'd all be in an existential crisis of epic proportions.

(P.S. The "bad boy" in question in the header of this post is, of course, Popeye's can of spinach. Popeye truly was who he was. He wasn't James Garfield, and he wasn't Mamie Eisenhower.

(And, while we're on the subject - was it "Bluto" or "Brutus"?)

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Now playing: Robert Pollard - Nicely Now
via FoxyTunes

Coast to Coast Silverfish Happiness

One of the common complaints about Robert Pollard's albums anymore is that if he slowed down a bit and didn't put out a new album every 43 hours, the overall product would be stronger. A lot of times, this reaction is upon the first handful of listens to a new album, and I'm guilty of feeling that way also. In fact, it took me up until this week to get into his previous album, Coast to Coast Carpet of Love, although the effort was well worth it in the end - I can now count it among one of his stronger post-GbV releases.

That said, what if we took his last two full-length solo efforts, as well as his Silverfish Trivia EP, and consolidated the best offerings from those albums into one considerably stronger record? Here's the track listing I came up with, with additional thoughts where applicable. We'll call this one Coast to Coast Silverfish Happiness.

(C2C = Coast to Coast Carpet of Love, ST = Silverfish Trivia, NH = Normal Happiness)

1. Our Gaze (C2C) – This one has a classic GbV "opener" feel to it. Reminds me a lot of "Submarine Teams" from Kid Marine.
2. Whispering Whip (NH)
3. Towers and Landslides (NH) – Top of the Pops!!!
4. Rud Fins (C2C) – If The Who did Pollard's "Pop Zeus," it would sound like this.
5. Circle Saw Boys Club (ST)
6. Customer's Throat (C2C) – Even if it weren't a great song, it would still be included solely for the line that sounds like, "I will take you home and nail you." (GBVDB.com says that it's "I will take you home an alien." Which is not as cool, but is.)
7. Slow Hamilton (C2C) – A "sneaky good" tune from Coast to Coast, this one has turned into almost my favorite from that album.
8. Penumbra (C2C)
9. Accidental Texas Who (NH) – The slot for "opener" came down to "Our Gaze" and this one. I had a hard time slotting this one anywhere else – it doesn't really "fit" anywhere but as an album opener, really! - but settled for it as the opener for the second side.
10. Count Us In (C2C)
11. Supernatural Car Lover (NH)
12. Pegasus Glue Factory (NH)
13. I Clap For Strangers (C2C)
14. Rhoda Rhoda (NH)
15. Cats Love A Parade (ST)
16. Nicely Now (C2C)

Just missed the cut – would have made the "Supernatural Car Lover" single: Youth Leagues, Tomorrow Will Not Be Another Day, Full Sun (Dig the Slowness)

This is a first draft. I'm going to test-drive the playlist and see how it works out.

Update: It's crap!

Nawwww, I'm kidding. But not really. It's really not bad up till "Accidental," which really only fits as an opener, I think. From that point, though, it plays like a bad mix tape. "Cats Love A Parade"? What was I thinking? Oh, wait, here's what I was thinking: "I'll put a 7 minute plodder with noise and shit on an otherwise perfectly crafted album for no damn good reason."

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Now playing: Robert Pollard - Slow Hamilton
via FoxyTunes

So, my wife got a jury duty notice in the mail this week. And holy cow, was she pissed. I tried to be sympathetic, but I think I failed in that regard. I tried to use the "that's the price we pay for living in a free country instead of one where death squads roam the countryside to pass judgment without the benefit of a trial" argument, but its impact was lessened by the fact that that was essentially one of the same arguments used in the notice. And she hates authority, so that rendered my argument impotent.

Anyway, after her howls of protest about the meager jury duty pay, the sheer inconvenience that the assignment generates and the inherent unfairness of it all – after all, this is the fifth or sixth time she's been tapped for possible jury duty, which even I think is excessive - she dutifully completed the questionnaire that came with it and mailed it back in. (An aside: Did you know that potential jurors are now asked if they watch shows like "CSI," "Cold Case" and the like?) So, her name is in the jury duty pool for the next year. If she'd ignored the notice, or even forgotten to mail it in, she could have been nailed for contempt of court, fined and/or even imprisoned.

I bring this up not to give you a rare peek behind the curtain of my life, but to illustrate a point about something else entirely:

The violations that have cast a long shadow over Kelvin Sampson's soon-to-be-terminated tenure as Indiana University's head basketball coach are petty. The rule about limiting phone calls to recruits is a stupid, stupid, stupid rule, and any punishments that come about due to its violation are not unlike the rule itself: draconian and extreme.

But.

It's still a rule, one of the roughly 7.8 trillion or so included in the NCAA's rulebook. It's easy for a school or a coach to stumble every once in awhile because they don't know the rulebook backwards and forwards – but in this case, ignorance is no excuse for Sampson, seeing as how these are the same types of violations that followed him from Oklahoma. Seeing as how these are the same types of violations that Sampson lied about when introduced at the press conference announcing his hiring at Indiana in 2006, following the end of the Mike Davis Error.

Which is the part that slays me.

I'd be more willing to give Sampson the benefit of the doubt if this were a new allegation, although even the shadow of an accusation on the face of a historically clean program is a little bit troublesome. The fact that IU's administration brought Sampson on board in spite of the issues he'd had at Oklahoma, yet continue to be shocked and disappointed at his continued flouting of the rulebook, speaks volumes to their ignorance of the Snake Rule:

When you pick up a snake, try not to act surprised when it bites you.

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Now playing: Robert Pollard - Cats Love A Parade
via FoxyTunes

From the "I Don't Give Two Shits If Roger Clemens Took Steroids - I Want To Know If He Took Steriods!" Department:

(Hey - which one would have worked better? The one I used or this alternate lead-in: "Steriod Abuse Up Among Nation's Dyslexic Athletes"?)

Unfortunately, unlike the screenshot in this early 2007 post that I photoshopped to illustrate a point, I had no hand in the faulty - nay, tragic - subject-verb construction found somewhere in the below screenshot from the same paper. Can you spot it?

It occurred to me watching a speech on TV the other night, after Romney dropped out of the race, that maybe I could support McCain. He seemed forceful and acted conservative instead of like the squish that he's revealed himself to be. Then I remembered that he was talking to one of the top conservative groups in the country and of course he's going to try to sound like Reagan. Ahhhhhhh, barnacles.

So, to recap the remaining Republican field:

McCain is a RINO, I could never support someone whose derogatory nickname is "Tax Hike Mike," and Ron Paul is batshit crazy.

And I'm a man without a party again.

Which is OK, because as I've detailed here several times in the past, I am still burned out on politics. McCain's speech to the CPAC folks almost lit a fire under me - and on paper, it looks great! - but ultimately, he's still a man who supports the wrong kind of solution on illegal immigration, and he's had a hand in curtailing free speech (being the "McCain" of the "McCain-Feingold Act"). And - right now - I can't get behind that - stellar pro-life, pro-2nd Amendment and pro-troop record notwithstanding. Once we get closer to Election Day and McCain's in the fight of his life against Obama or Lurleen, maybe I'll be able to cast aside my protests.

Update from the previous post:

We'll call it 0-for-2.5. We didn't get the 4-7 inches of winter precipitation that was forecast. We did get a smattering of ice. And yes, I went to work. And came home early.

We'll call this round a draw, Mother Nature.

Bitch.

I predict that somewhere in America, it's raining.

Dear National Weather Service,

I hereby wish to submit my resumé to your austere organization, with hopes of working one day in your Indianapolis office.

I think you'll find that my qualifications for employment are, in a word, impeccable. I have had an avid interest in the weather since I was a small boy, and have followed you closely as you've streamlined your operations, saving more people's lives than ever before while striving to increase your accuracy.

Some of my notable accomplishments in the field of meteorology include:

* Predicting with 75 percent accuracy at least 26 percent of southern Indiana's sunny days between 2004-2006;

* Forecasting the Great Tornado Outbreak of March 18, 2004, for the southeastern corner of the country (of course, the most severe weather that day was some chronic drizzle near Talladega, Alabama, but I digress);

* Remembering the names of at least 7 Atlantic hurricanes that have hit landfall since 1968 (and no, I'm not even including Katrina in that count because quite frankly, I think we're all pretty sick and fucking tired of hearing about Katrina);

* Forecasting within 6 months the latest-ever winter storm to hit the lower 48 states, the Blizzard of July 1998 (which, admittedly, didn't come to pass till December of 2004; I was clinging to an old obsolete forecast model that was a relic when Taft was president, but if nothing else, it shows I've got some initiative);

I am also in the process of writing a screenplay with the Captain for a big-budget disaster epic called "Humidity." It will grind your dick.

Please call me at your earliest convenience so I can further lay out my credentials for you and your staff. Thank you for your time.

Sincerely,
--Brandon G.
Director of Internet Blog Operations
Bee Circus Network

***

Twice so far this winter, we've gotten fucked by winter storms that were supposed to slam southern Indiana, yet tracked slightly to the north of us and left nothing more than some bitter winds and a barely-perceptible sheen of ice that was able to be smudged off my windshield with my thumb. Will we be 0-for-3 by this time tomorrow? Let's just say that I'm counting on going to work Tuesday.

And if they're right? Hell, even a blind dog finds the hole some days.

Which is why I'd fit right in with our friends at the National Weather Service.