Blizza Blizza

That’s German for “late-night lab music” for you non-German speakers. And the late-night lab music this week seems to be Me First and the Gimme Gimmes, a ska cover band who seem to specialise in taking songs that you wouldn’t think would ever get skanked out and making them into ska masterpieces.

Go buy this band’s music. Now. They rule.

Well, OK, maybe not death. But prison sounds like a good plan for the parole violator who was caught kissing his girlfriend at the Reds’ game three weeks ago.

Note to self: never make out with girls - or persons of any other gender(s) - at public sporting events. Especially if I’ve been violating my parole recently, and I have any inkling that my PO is at the game.

Coming at you from the I-don’t-know-when-to-shut-the-hell-up-and-stop-talking department: Mike Tyson still hasn’t figured that out.

I feel like, who says that? (Hi, Jessie!)

I guess it sort of figures that the guy who can’t take a joke is a Southern Baptist minister whose name really is Bruce. I’d hate to know what the good Reverend thought of Kevin Smith’s brilliant film Dogma. At least some of the folks saddled with the burden of sharing a fone number with God (at least, as seen in Bruce Almighty) are making light of the situation. Good job, guys.

Today’s blog entry is brought to you by the number 5 and the letters C-E-N-S-O-R-S-H-I-P.

The P.C. police have struck again. And that’s the “politically correct” … uhmmm … “culturally aware” police, by the way.

Birth defects, blindness, barbarians, and busboys have all been banned from the latest round of United States school texts. How, then, do you describe someone who’s blind from birth? “Lacking visual acuity due to a developmental abnormality?”

Some of you will probably remember the last time political correctness cultural awareness was in the news. It gave us such ridiculous (and late-night talk show joke-worthy) terms as “horizontally gifted” (formerly “fat,” “overweight,” or “obese”), “mentally challenged” (formerly “retarded” or “mentally handicapped”), “vertically challenged” (formerly “short,” which makes me think the rapper 2Short really wouldn’t have had nearly the one-hit-wonder career that he did had his named been “2VerticallyChallenged”), and “metabolically endowed” (formerly “thin” or “skinny”).

It’s no wonder kids today can’t write a sentence shorter than 25 words. We’re teaching them never to say in five words what can be effectively said in 30. Call a spade a spade, people. This madness has to stop somewhere.

Anyone seen the new Saab commercial, where the voiceover wonders what might happen if all cars were turbocharged? He later says, “All Saabs are made in the state of independence.”

I’d just like to take this opportunity to note that Saab is owned by General Motors.

The colour scheme has been changed to black in remembrance of my friend Peter Schwende, who died Sunday at 1245 after a three-year battle with leukemia. He was 20.

I’ll be changing it back next Sunday after his memorial service. RIP, Peter. You were a beacon of strength to all of us.

And today’s Song of the Day is…A Sort of Homecoming, by U2, on the Wide Awake in America live album. I heard it whilst taking a shower this morning, thought nothing of it, and then this afternoon, it popped back into my head out of nowhere, and I’ve been humming it constantly since.

Tonight’s episode comes to you courtesy of the Centre For Reporting on Research Into the Blindingly Obvious(tm).

A report released yesterday by the Kaiser Family Foundation found a positive correlation between teenagers’ alcohol consumption and…

Are you ready for this?

Can I get a drum roll, please?

…sexual activity.

Say it ain’t so.

On a related note, the report apparently used data from three - count ‘em, three - federally funded surveys. The gub’mint needs my tax dollars to figure out that drunk teenagers are going to screw on prom night? Gimme a freakin’ break.

Next on the agenda: a study to determine whether alcohol consumption leads to drunkenness. Preliminary speculation is divided.

Seems as though baseball is in need of a rule change. How about pitchers who get blisters be allowed medical treatment with a league-approved substance - one that would offer no pitching advantage - under the supervision of an umpire. (“Hey, ump, can you check my finger?” “Sure, kid. Looks OK to me. Head on out.”) I understand the guy was breaking the rules, so he had to be ejected, but c’mon - he clearly wasn’t trying to put one over on anybody.

“Oh, it’s quite nice, dear. It’s Sunday. It’s the Church.”
“What about us atheists? Why should we ‘ave to listen to that sectarian turmoil?”
“You’re a lapsed atheist, dear.”
“The principle’s the same. The Mohmedans don’t come ‘round here wavin’ bells at us! We don’t get Buddhists playing bagpipes in our bathroom! Or Hindus harmonizing in the hall! The Shintus don’t come here shattering sheet glass in the shithouse, shouting slogans…”

One of these days I’m going to stop seeing Monty Python references in everything.

Nah!

Remember the old saying “There’s no such thing as bad publicity?” Someone tell the residents of Battle Mountain, Nevada - a.k.a. the nation’s armpit, according to Washington Post Magazine - to stop taking it so literally. Hey, at least they got Old Spice to sponsor the annual Festival of the Pit.

But really. We all know that Flint, Michigan, is the armpit of America. C’mon.

What a great name for a racing horse that would make, especially if that horse went on to win the Triple Crown, as Josè Santos has a chance to do on the back of Funny Cide at the Belmont Stakes on 07 June. I don’t normally follow horse racing much, but all the overblown hype surrounding this year’s Kentucky Derby perked up my ears a bit more than usual, so when I saw this Hartford Courant article, I just had to share it. It’s easily the best article I’ve read on the whole controversy, and quite correctly chastises the Miami Herald and Derby steward for being irresponsible in their handling of the issue.

The BBC has picked up a story about this eBay item, a rather well-done Lego-cased PowerBook 5300 (with the CD-ROM unit from a 3400). Its creator has put up a site dealing with its history here.

The real reason I think this is so funny, though, is because of this. Note the third paragraph from the bottom. Yes, he got a nastygram for trademark infringement from Lego’s legal department. Now that the BBC has gotten on the bandwagon, methinks mebbe the sharks will have to back the hell off.

Stupid lawyers.

At least if you believe CNN, they did:

I’d love someone in the NBA’s offices to explain how the Pistons could win four games in the series, most recently by a score of 93-89 in overtime, and have to play one more ;)

(Update: CNN fixed the goof about an hour later. I knew that screen shot would come in handy.)

Whoa.

There’s more character development of some of the folks from the first one (notably the Oracle, and Morpheus to a lesser extent), but there isn’t nearly enough with the new characters (especially the Twins and the Keymaker).

But whoa. The action is ridiculous. There’s one scene where Keanu looks very CG, but for the most part, the CG wasn’t noticeable.

Now, will someone please give me a Duc 996 with Monica Bellucci on the back of it?

Also from the BBC, which appears to be the source of all the funny headlines lately, comes “Badger Rampage Injures Five,” in which five Britons were attacked in separate incidents over a 48-hour period by a deranged badger before police managed to subdue and euthanise the animal. One man was taken to hospital and given two skin grafts to repair damage the badger inflicted upon his arm and leg.

Note that rabies has never been introduced to England, so it can’t explain the badger’s bizarre behaviour. Maybe the British are facing an epidemic of Mad Badger Disease…

The BBC, a British news agency, is reporting on research done at the University of Michigan intended to answer questions about a childhood disease common in central Africa.

Think about that for a couple minutes in the context of what we could do 50 or 100 years ago.

I already have my tix for the 2215 showing. Awwww yeeeeaaaah.

In the interim, this article will give you folks something to think about.

Oooh. I can’t wait. Wednesday is going to be GREAT!

Sheesh. I feel like Stuart Scott with that headline.

The Sixers had to Fear the Fro, of course, but what they didn’t count on was Rick Carlisle having a conference with Alan Trammell on winning by committee. Bullpen by Committee(tm) worked for the Tigers, and with Chauncey Billups out, Pistons coach Rick Carlisle stole a page from the Tigers’ book and used Point Guard by Committee to great success. Detroit won 104-97 in overtime after leading by as much as 14 during the first half.

Chucky Atkins and Rip Hamilton had 23 each, and rookie Tayshaun Prince had a career night, scoring two of his 20 points to send the game to overtime and scoring the first five points of overtime with ice in his veins, making tough shots over veteran defenders look easy.

Ben Wallace and Cliff Robinson, two veterans not known for their scoring, stepped up with key points throughout the game. Robinson hit his first five shots on his way to 14 points in the first quarter and helped the Pistons to get off to an amazing over-60 percent shooting in the same period. Jon Barry came off the bench in the fourth quarter and lit up the floor with 11 points - nine came from three-pointers - and two steals.

As Rip Hamilton noted after the game, the Pistons need to work on their free-throw shooting. They were a dismal 60 percent (21-35) from the line for the game, and only 20 percent for the first half. If it hadn’t been for the terrible shooting from the line, the Sixers never would have had a chance. Now we head to Philly. Look out!

It’s bad enough that Microsoft is getting off with virtually no punishment for their illegal monopolistic practises. And it’s even worse that they haven’t changed their behaviour at all. But the most amazing thing is that some of their MSN customers didn’t even sign up for the service and are being billed anyway.

I could probably write a rather lengthy discourse on why M$ is evil and should be dissolved as a company, but let’s just give them enough rope to hang themselves for now and see what happens.

From the headlines-that-never-should-have-made-it-past-the-editor department, the BBC brings you:

European Engine Beats Off Rival

No kidding.

The Pistons are going to win the NBA championship this year for one chief reason: Chauncey… Chauncey and Rip…Rip and Chauncey…the two reasons are Rip and Chauncey, and Mehmet…the three reasons are Rip, Chauncey, Mehmet… and Chucky…the four…no…

Amongst the reasons are such players as…oh, bugger it.

Really, though, with names like Chauncey, Rip, Chucky, and Mehmet, you can’t lose. Would you want to go up against a guy named “Rip” or “Chauncey?”

Someone better tell the Yankees to watch out. The Tigers overcame Bullpen by Committee, which managed - along with two costly errors in the eigth inning - to blow a 6-3 lead, on the back of Dmitri Young’s flawless 5-for-5 performance. Young had two solo home runs, two triples, a single, and five RBIs to pace the Tigers in their third consecutive win, a streak unmatched since August 18th-20th, 2002.

He also selflessly legged out a triple in the top of the ninth, putting an insurance run at third base instead of second and missing his chance to become the first Tiger to hit for the cycle since Damion Easley did it against the Brewers in 2001. Young, whose performance tonight raised his batting average nearly 40 points, from .190 to .229, in one game, is batting .778 (7-9) against Baltimore pitching this series.

The 6-25 Tigers wrap up their three-game series with Baltimore tomorrow afternoon at Camden Yards.

So Hooters got into the airline business a while back. Now we have the Fly Naked flights chartered by Castaways Travel.

Do I really need to put two and two together for you? How long until we have Deja Vu strip clubs in the Friendly Skies? Reminds me of a line from the Ghetto Airlines spoof: “These fat, round, thick-ass vessels run up in the sky so deep, it be cryin’.”

But oh, what a glorious pile of debris. The amazing thing to me isn’t that they found 40 percent of the shuttle, but rather that they found a body of a man who had wandered away from a nursing home, a pickup truck wanted as evidence in a homicide investigation, and walked from the Earth to the Moon and back, plus another couple of laps around the Earth, in the process.

And they still haven’t completed their searches of Nevada, California, New Mexico, or Utah, where more debris is thought to have come crashing to earth in the aftermath of Columbia’s breakup on 01 February.

When I sat down to start tonight’s blog run, I had just seen a commercial that I still can’t believe that I saw.

Ever seen those crackers called “Stoned Wheat Thins?” Maybe it’s just me, but those sound like they’re about the best munchies food ever. Well, I caught the last bit of Motor Trend TV on Speedvision this evening and there was a commercial for some newfangled aerosol glass cleaner called “Invisible Glass.” The telephone number to call?

1-888-4-STONER

I’m not making this up. It gets better: the company that sells the stuff is called Stoner, Inc.

Wow.

Maybe having Nate Cornejo pitching on three days’ rest is something Alan Trammel ought to consider doing more often. Cornejo, now 2-2 and the only starter on the Tigers’ staff with a .500 record, scattered six hits and one run through seven and one-third innings tonight, leading the Tigers to a 6-1 win over the Baltimore Orioles. Steve Sparks pitched 1-2/3 scoreless innings in getting his first save of the season, while Jason Johnson took the loss for Baltimore.

The Tigers’ four-run outburst with two outs in the third inning provided the victory as they batted around. Insurance runs came in the seventh with a Dmitri Young fielder’s choice to second that scored Omar Infante, and from a Bobby Higginson single up the middle in the ninth that scored Andres Torres. Young also had two RBIs on the night on a third-inning, two-out double that Orioles LF Larry Bigbie lost in the lights, bringing his team-leading total to 11 on the season.

The win is Detroit’s second in a row, the first time since August 2002 that the Tigers have managed back-to-back wins. Such an inspired streak might have something to do with their recently-discovered offense, which has managed 10 or more hits in four of its last five games and scored 19 runs in its last three.

Ah, the Tigers.

Not only did they lose both games of a doubleheader at home yesterday, but they lost the second game a) after carrying a 3-run lead into the 7th inning and b) after carrying a no-hitter into the 7th inning. This after losing the first game to an opposing “pitcher” who never actually threw a pitch in getting his victory.

Prize quote from the article, referring to the fewer than 1000 fans in attendance:

“What made the day worse was nobody was in the stands,” Detroit’s Dmitri Young said. “Nobody is behind us. These people don’t care about us. I’d rather be on the road.”

Gee, ya think? When you lose to your AAA farm team on a regular basis, of course the fans are going to quit caring.

I suppose the owners’ association probably can’t tell Mike Ilitch he has to sell the club to a new owner, can they? One who would actually spend money on talent, instead of trading all the talent away and watching it get to the All-Star game year after year. (*cough* Travis Fryman *cough*)

The British apparently have no shame. Fresh on the heels of the Jerry Springer Opera, we have auditions for Saddam Hussein look-alikes.

Hey, don’t look at me. I’m not the one coming up with these crazy ideas.

Scary part is people are gonna pay lots of money to go see all of that. Hey, wouldn’t you?

This new Honda Accord ad has to be the most incredible piece of work I’ve seen in quite some time.

Unfortunately it’s two minutes long, so you won’t be seeing it much on US television. But wow. Those guys really put together an amazing contraption. And the patience required to execute 605 takes before finally getting it to work is pretty impressive as well.

As if Dubya’s cutting of US family-planning funding to any overseas clinics that provide abortion or lobby on its behalf wasn’t bad enough, he has now cut the funding available to any AIDS clinics that are not separate entities from the local family-planning clinic. In poor areas of Africa and the Carribean, separating the two “is an unlikely development,” writes Joan Ryan of the San Francisco Chronicle. Much more likely, she speculates, is that these small clinics “would have to shut down their family-planning clinic altogether in order to qualify for the AIDS money.”

Great, just what we need. Higher third-world birth rates. Because that’s going to make the AIDS pandemic so much less of a problem.

What an idiot.

Looks like Dubya is going for a JAG-like return to the air when he lands on the USS Abraham Lincoln later today.

I find myself wondering how anyone on the ship has the authority to give orders to the Commander-in-Chief, and what sort of freedom he has to do whatever the hell he wants up there. Sort of a scary thought, really.

NASA just announced that some of the living experimental subjects, most notably hundreds of C. elegans specimens, have been found alive in the wreckage of Columbia. They aren’t the same ones sent up in the shuttle; they have an average lifespan of 7-10 days, and thus these worms are several generations descended from the original worms, but the fact that they survived is pretty amazing.