Well, I'm off, once again, to the Cities this morning, this time for a team building bowling experiment, which I expect to enjoy only slightly and despise quite mightily. Nothing like bowling with people you don't know and don't really care to know. Oh, what I do in pursuit of a paycheck. Still, bowling is fun.
Also tonight, the girlfriend and I are going to the Children's Theater presentation of "The Wizard of Oz." And, since it's a children's theater, I'm fairly certain Oz has nothing to do the HBO prison drama, but it would open some innocent eyes if it DID. Other plans for the weekend? Not sure. Thai food for sure. Possibly a run or two around Como Lake. Who cares? The weekend has arrived! I'm outta here.
Oh, and by the way, it's really fucking cold outside.
Hey, did you know that, yesterday, in Baghdad, thousands of Iraqis marched in protest against terrorism? Seriously, thousands marched. In Baghdad. Against TERRORISM.
Call me crazy. Hell, call me nuts. But, you know, as a journalist, I kinda, sorta, maybe think that such an astounding event--people organizing and marching AGAINST TERRORISM--should, I don't know, constitute some kind of news.
Let's say, just for the sake of argument, that a group of about 1,200 people gathered and marched on Washington to demand legal rights for those detained at Guantanamo Bay. Would that make the news? Count on it. We're talking possibly front page type stuff there. And yet, when thousands of Iraqis get together, in an act that would very likely have gotten them thrown into prison or their tongues lopped off under Saddam's Ba'ath regime, you hear nary a word in the Western media.
Oh, wait, I guess, as Glenn Reynolds points out, the New York Times gave the march a passing nod:
In contrast, a heavily policed march in central Baghdad on Wednesday, organized peacefully by the country's major political parties, drew thousands of Iraqis to protest attacks by guerrilla fighters, which have injured and killed Iraqi civilians as well as occupiers.
Ah, but what's the news here? A heavily policed march, as if a large conglomeration of Iraqis should not warrant a little extra attention in a country where suspicion reigns supreme, even amongst themselves.
Am I whining? Sure, a bit. But, you know what? Even if you didn't support this war, even if you are hung up on the lack of weapons of mass destruction, you have to admit that such a gathering, in a country where such gatherings were only previously organized by Ba'athists to tout Saddam's 100 percent re-election, is really kind of remarkable.
Even more remarkable still, is that the news media powers that be have decided that it's a non-story. Not even worth a page 8E article, apparently.
But, hey, at least Beyonce won four billboard awards.
It was snowing quite heavily this morning and, being that it was the first really substantial snowfall of the season, that logically meant that everybody forgot how to drive.
It happens every year: snow accumulates on the ground, slippery-fying all surfaces, and every motorist, no matter their skill level--from learner's permit to Rusty Wallace--are reduced in drivig ability to something akin to drooling infants.
Well, not me, of course. I'm awesome at all things at all times, because, as stated quite frequently, I'm a smoking hot specimen of male hunkiness. Except for math. I stink at math, which is why I'm a journalist.
Anyway, as much as I do so love to talk about myself, I was originally talking about bad weather leading to bad drivers. And today, my friends, the bad drivers were out in astounding force. Every vehicle I encountered was either in the process of skidding out of control or doing everything in their ability to get to that point.
For my part, I prepared for winter's inevitable arrival by buying new tires, so I am hereby absolved of all guilt when it comes to bad driving, and I don't care what that one lady says about me running a red light last month. She didn't see nothin'! You got me? Nothin'!
Well, anyway, as I made my way to work this morning, I was on heightened alert because overnight everyone, as stated, had forgotten how to drive. People were sliding, and spinning and bumping into things. It was kind of like a dance contest for people in cars.
The thing is, though, that most people refuse to admit when their driving stinks. They could wrap their car around a telephone pole and steadfastly maintain that the pole shouldn't have been there in the first place, or that telephone poles are outdated and should have long ago been replaced by cell phone towers and therefore all telephone poles around the world should no longer be standing and threatening motorists. Of course, then they'd just smash into a cell phone tower while talking on a cell phone, but I wouldn't dare point that out.
So, today, there I was, surrounded by bad drivers who refused to admit they're bad drivers. Of course, subconsciously at least, the motorists do realize they're bad drivers, and by the time that realization makes its way to the conscious mind, it manifests itself in one common gesture. Namely, they give the finger.
This morning, I recieved the finger no less than three times from motorists whom I had the audacity to tootle with my horn. It wasn't as if I was being impatient or anything, either. In all three cases, the motorists were coming at me, with half their vehicle in my lane of traffic. So, understandably, I wanted them to know that, if they didn't correct the situation, a collision was imminent. Strangely, each motorist corrected the dire situation before taking the time to give me the finger.
I'm not particularly offended by the finger. I think it's because giving the finger simply doesn't require enough effort. Now, if giving the finger somehow involved an elaborate hand ritual that took a few seconds to develop, then I'd start to feel offended, because then the finger giver would have gone through some real effort to show their disgust with me. As it is, the finger is just too much like a quick angry wave, so I typically pay it no mind.
Unless I get three fingers from three different people in rather quick succession. Then I start to wonder if maybe I'm somehow overly finger worthy. I start questioning whether I'm as right and correct as I usually think I am. And, worst of all, I wonder if maybe I've lost some of my stature as a smoking hot specimen of male hunkiness.
After some reflection, however, I came to the inescapable conclusion that I was, despite a flurry of fingers, in the right when it came to my nervous horn tootling.
Lousy bad winter drivers. *giving the finger*
Yeah, I'm soooo going to heck for linking to this. But, I laughed at it last year and, damn it, I laughed again this year. So enjoy.
Last night, a couple friends and I dropped by a bar and grill
Where I wolfed down several blazin' wings until I felt quite ill.
To put out the fire cooking in my gut, I guzzled down some beer.
I felt better almost immediately, despite heat-related tears.
As the night wore on, my stomach growled and murmured discontent
And although I didn't quite have to shit, I knew exactly what it meant.
Today at work, I squirmed and squirmed, and shifted in my seat.
The food from last night had journeyed down, and I could clearly feel the heat.
Finally, the inevitable arrived; my butt cheeks released some air.
I alone had to endure the stench, which really wasn't fair.
To say that my farts kind of smelled wouldn't do justice to the funk.
Rather, it's more direct to say that they really fucking stunk.
I sat there just all by myself, enshrouded in my gas.
It's astounding that something so truly vile could have ventured from my ass.
I've farted before, many times in fact, but today's were particularly sour
It's amazing to think that the powers that be could trust me to wield such a power.
Thankfully the food moved on and collected in my colon
And I put an end to the rancid farts by doing some toilet bowling.
In an unexpected act of generosity by my parents, they offered awhile back to pay for my girlfriend's plane ticket to Hawaii so my mother, father, girlfriend and myself can enjoy the Holiday season in paradise.
On the surface, such an act of generosity seems wonderful but, if you dig a little deeper, you'll see that my parents are actually punishing me for some sort of past transgression. I say this because my girlfriend is now driving me crazy with her attempts at showing my parents her gratitude.
Melissa is not used to parental generosity. While she pinches every penny to pay her way through school, her father pinches every penny so he can adorn himself with over $6,000 worth of jewelry over the Christmas season, rather than, you know, helping his daughters out with anything. So, I guess it's understandable that Melissa is a little nonplussed that a couple of strangers would pony up the dough to send her to Hawaii.
But, I think she's overreacting here. Because she lacks the financial means to show gratitude, she's instead relying on gestures, which is fine, I guess, but it's still driving me crazy.
Her latest gesture was to travel with me to my hometown a couple of weekends ago to decorate my parents' home for Christmas so they'll have a nice Christmassy house when they come home from Tokyo for the Holiday break in a couple of
weeks. It was a nice gesture, but she went about the task like a low-ranking Nazi party member preparing for a visit by der Fuhrer.
She ordered me around like I was some sort of work horse. I dug out the plastic tree and decorations and carried them downstairs to the awaiting girlfriend menace. I was tasked with putting up the tree lights and, when I was done, Melissa said, seriously, that I had put the lights up all wrong. Excuse me?! How the hell do you put lights up wrong? They're on the tree, aren't they? They're lit up, aren't they?
"Just shut up and put on the garland!"
It was perhaps the most tense tree decorating I've ever endured. Far from the carefree days of my youth when I'd put decorations on wherever, that day my decoration placements were under the brutal scrutiny of the Christmas crank.
I made a secret vow that, if my parents ever offer to pay Melissa's way to anywhere else, I'd kindly suggest they retract the offer.
So, like, if anyone out there knows of any really cool breaking news in the technology realm that I can pitch to my editors this week, I'd really appreciate it.
