Emmylou
Do I need to add a last name to that first name? Of course not. Emmylou and Mark Knopfler have released a new album "All the Roadrunning" which title song you can listen to in Real Audio if you visit the first link in this post. I'm very upset. I like the title song. A lot. It's not as overwhelmingly stunning as ... I'm thinking of the Carpenter's "Goodbye to Love" but that may be just due to the coincidence of the finest female vocals ever. I haven't decided to buy the CD yet (and I'm peeved at Amazon for not having the Roy Orbison CD in stock since March - now canceled though I'll get it elsewhere) but I probably will. The problem, what leaves me upset, is that I was reminded that I have so little of her music. In fact, on CD, I only have "Red Dirt Girl" (which, by the way, is just a fantastic, great, amazing disc). I'm going to have to start accumulating Emmylou CDs to catch it all up. So maybe this month my music acquisitions will be "Black and White Night" from Daedalus and one of Emmylou's. Perhaps "Wrecking Ball." I'd be interested in feedback from readers. Is there a better Emmylou CD to get into the stack first?
Also, please go visit her site (the first link above). I have always considered her to be a gorgeous woman (even without the voice she would be exceptional) but she now has the most amazing mane of snowy white hair and such eyes - to die for. The picture on her site is just stunning. I am in love all over again.

Upcoming At The Flickers
I just watched the trailer for the new Pirates of the Caribe movie over at Tyler Durden's place and it looks amazing. I won't spill anything (because you have nothing to spill having only watched the trailer?- Ed.) Shut UP Ed! But yeah, pretty much. So, know what I know - go and watch the trailer. This, to me, looks like the first "must see" movie of the year. No, "Flight 93" is a must see as well.

I'm Getting Better At This
Honorable Mention in the Wizbang caption contest. Wheee!
And by the way, I detest Jenny McCarthy so this one was easy. Skank.

Naming Names
All my guitars have names. All three of them. My first guitar, the Santana SE is called "Carlito" after the great, great Carlos Santana whose name is affixed to the production model. He is my only guy guitar. Then came Holly, the Hollowbody II. That name is almost self evident. And now, the blue Swamp Ash Special is living with me and her name is "Julie Ocean." Why? First because that lush deep blue color with the distinct swamp ash grain makes me think of ocean waves and secondly becuase of Emm Gryner's beautiful cover of the Undertones song of that name. Her name might change as I get more comfortable with her but for now, she is Julie.
A friend suggested that she's a Duke blue color but reaching for a name to go with that (Debbie With A Blue Dress On? I don't think so) involved too much stretching. Things could change.
As for Julie herself - I'm quite remarkably happy. She's heavy, heavier than Carlito who also has a solid body. But she holds the music like a miser hoards money. I strummed once across the strings and held the neck to see when I felt the vibration die out - 12 seconds. And bolt-on neck guitars are not renowned for their sustain. I've also played with the tonal settings and I'm impressed -the tonal variation is hugely evident even to a neophyte such as myself. In short, I am liking this guitar. So much that I'm not even looking at Paul Reed Smiths on eBay anymore.
For the downside, there is kind of a funk coming off the interior of the case (sort of a chemical smell) which I don't much care for but someone coming into my home may find a pong that's not their cuppa either. Not a big deal - I've left the case open for a couple of days and Febreezed the room a couple of times. It's pretty much solved by now. And I do need her checked out by my gitbox man. The fretboard needs cleaning and I'm unwilling as yet to de-string it to do so.
It's just so great to have one more beautiful PRS for the love of music.

Woo Hoo!
I made the list on Wizbang's caption contest again! Yay!
Yes, I do seek validation for the slightest of reasons. Why do you ask?

More PRS Lust
That would be a Swamp Ash Special in Blue Matteo with rosewood fretboard and Paul Reed Smith bird inlays. I love this guitar in a natural finish to show off the grain of the wood but this is just the prettiest dang blue I've seen. Looks like an ocean. Should I get it? I'm leaning hard toward "yes."
The SAS is an interesting guitar. Here's the PRS page on it. The upper and lower pickups (bass and treble) are fairly PRS-usual but there's a third pickup in the middle ("Seymour Duncan Vintage Rails" pickup) and the electronics allow the player to pick and choose amongst which pickups will be in use. My understanding is that this allows the SAS to switch between a more Fender sound and a more Gibson sound as desired. I ain't that good. Another year or so and I'll have a much better understanding of it all.
I'll tell you this though: Holly certainly sounds as sweet and clear as fresh spring water. I figure a Swamp Ash Special should have its own charm. Also, "Swamp Ash Special" - how cool is that? Sounds like something John Fogerty should be playing. Or singing about.

UPDATE: Oh yes. It will be mine. Possibly as soon as Thursday. And one thing I forgot to note - yes, that is a tremelo bridge. And to clarify something, my guitar hero (and PRS addict) friend 'splained it to me a little bit. One of the pickups gives the guitar a Stratocaster sound (not a generic "Fender" sound) and the other gives it a Les Paul sound (not a generic "Gibson" sound). It seems a lot of owners use their Swamp Ash Specials for gigging just because of the versatility. Neat. Unnh. I mean "Cool!"

Oh The Things You'll See!
I had a fun time this weekend for a few reasons, all revolving around the 85th birthday of the patriarch of an extended clan of mixed Norse and South American blood based in western Maryland. 85. I wished him welcome to middle age - as long as he was planning to live to 170. But that's not the fount of the fun.
He is still true to his roots in his love of pickled herring (something I enjoy but not as much, I think, as he does). I also learned that his favorite dessert is ice cream. So (you're getting ahead of me here aren't you?) I made him herring ice cream. And he was game enough to eat a scoop. What a hell of a guy.
Now, I have to say that I didn't spring this without trying it myself and truth be told - it's not a vile as you might imagine it to be. If you really like pickled herring, you wouldn't be gagging at the ice cream. In fact, it's based on herring in cream sauce so it's a lot like cold, sweetened herring in cream sauce.
I Googled "herring ice cream" and references to it have been made on the interweb but no one seems to have actually made it. I have. File it under "Small Claim To Fame."

Two Bit Reviews
First, "Narnia." Good. Not great. A good rental which I'm glad I didn't have to spend more than $3 to see. Effects were uniformly excellent - there is a moment when the faun Tumnus walks into his house and chatters his hooves to knock snow off that is just perfect. Cute kids pretty much. Though I was often put off by the British spade-y toothedness of them. I loved the beaver couple - they were cute and just delightful. Problems abounded though. Aslan, the Christ figure of the show was voiced by Liam Neeson. I have nothing against the rangy Irish thespian but if you're going to image Our Saviour, use a voice talent whose face we don't picture every time we hear the voice, eh? And the grand battle to save Narnia just doesn't come across as grand. "Lord of the Rings" is one of the few movies where the grand battle with evil really felt like the Grand Battle With Evil. Finally, I can't imagine anyone other than Tilda Swinton to be cast as the White Witch, she of the bleached out appearance (see her in "Constantine" for another perverse performance) and seemingly translucent skin. And yet there is something about her that makes me ... I'll use the word "desire" her in lieu of admitting to perverse impulses of my own. I look at the White Witch and want her as I hate myself for wanting her. I don't think that's what C.S. Lewis had in mind!
I also watched Mr Potter's movie with the Giblets of Fire. What can one say? The kids are growing up handsome or pretty so good on them. The effects were less "real" than in the Narnia movie but very effective nonetheless. I liked the lake sequence a lot - fresh water mer-people with salmon or cod-like tails was a very smart touch. But it strikes me that the actual goblet of fire is a pretty small part of the story. Yes, yes, it sets it all in motion but it isn't a big deal in almost all other ways. It does, I suppose fit with the naming convention of the books though. I really liked the blue hats of the French girls - kind of sexy in a haute coture kind of way and distinct from the Gothic style of Hogwarts. Harry really should stop being such a clueless tool though. That's Voldemort Harry! Kick his ASS! Whew. Talk about not getting into the spirit of the series! Good movie. I'm somewhat sorry I didn't see it in the theater.

Getting It Wrong
Sometimes, you don't listen hard enough. Or you don't hear quite right. I sat down for a nice long conversation with who I thought was JoJo and come to find out - her name is Holly. Sorry darlin'. My mistake. You are Holly now and forever.
You realize of course that I am talking about my guitar, don't you?

I Wonder...
As I was reading the title of the Narnia movie again, it struck me: This is awfully close to the description of the scumbaggery of the Clinton Administration and its revelation due to the blue dress. That would be "The Lyin', The Wench and The Wardrobe."

New On The Rental Block(buster)
Since there is crap all on TV on Monday nights (until 10 pm - CSI:My-yummy Calliegh Duquesne ... unnhh I mean the Miami CSI show), I hit up my local vid rental place with my $3 per rental card. "Narnia," "Walk The Line" and the latest Harry Potter. Yeah. I'm so far behind the times that the movies have beards on 'em but I watch these things on my own time.
Also, still haven't gotten Roy Orbison's "Black & White Night" CD from Amazon. Surprising that they haven't had it in stock or whatever. At least they sent me the Fagen discs. My thoughts for April involve Jake's new disc but so far his web site hasn't given up any info about a release date. And for that matter, his MySpace site seems to have been deleted. I'm starting to worry 'bout the lad. I may get myself a sort of "best of" disc of Brewer and Shipley. There are at least three songs I'd really like to have. The rest is a wonderful artifiact of my yute.

I Love Pugs
But this is wrong in oh so many ways. (Warning: dogs dressed as people)

Heartbreaking
The Enigmatic Misanthrope this morning directed my attention to a report in the Rocky Mountain News of the wake held by the Oglala Sioux for one of their own fallen in Iraq: Cpl. Brett Lundstrom. Read the report but do not make the mistake of missing the slide show in the "Story Tools" box. If this does not bring a tear to your eye, you have no soul.
May God bless Cpl. Lundstrom, his family and the nation of Oglala Sioux for their honor to this fallen warrior.

And One More Thing
No, I've not become Steve Jobs. I just thought I'd post my latest home improvement project - a curved shower rod in the guest bath. While on my latest trip, I noticed that the hotel had one of these and was surprised at how much more comfortable it was. OK, I can't say that it was this particular one but that's the one I bought and just finished installing. It is remarkably easy to install, all the mounting hardware is included. I'll provide a report when I have a guest stay and give it the pH-balanced test. (I'm pretty sure my shower water is not acidic!)
Generally speaking, I have never been a fan of shower curtains. As an Adipose-American, I find shower curtains to end up stuck to me instead of to the side of the tub. As the ad copy at the link says, I am tired of "cling-ons."

Putting the "Mental" in "Environmental"
I ordered my vegetables from Burpee's today. No thanks to anyone expressing an opinion of my damader plants, dang yees! But that's not all. I've figured out how to cover myself in both environmental glory and join the exclusive club of having something no one else has. I'm going to get a stencil and put "HYBRID" on the sides and under the badging of my six year-old Outback. Bingo. A Hybrid Outback! Genius.
Yeah, I know it won't be a hybrid but it'll drive people who see it nuts thrying to find one for themselves.

Trying New Things
I am an inveterate try-er of new products. Within reason. I haven't found the opportunity to "try out," say, a Maserati Quattroporte for a reasonable price. "Hello? Maserati? My name is BlogDog and I run an auto-review website called 'Pugs of War' ... What? No. Explaining that would be a long and boring story. The purpose of my call is to ask about the delivery of a Quattroporte for a test drive sometime in the near future ... Hello? Hello? Dang."
But I have recently tried a few new things. Coke Blak for example (Flash site warning on that link). "Coke effervesence with coffee essence" to quote the Coke Flaks. Good things: cute 8oz traditional CoCola glass bottle, surprisingly creamy "mouth feel" for a carbonated soda, tastes pretty good in my estimation. Now for the downside: Price. I bought it using a steep discount with my Safeway card - $4 off a four pack. There's no way I would pay $6 for a four pack. I think it's definitely worth your giving it a try but I can't countenance Coca-Cola asking so much for what they're offering.
I tried the new Gillette Fusion razor too. Damn those Safeway discount cards! Again, the site is another Flash site with way too cute an interface. (Yeah "Cassandra" is the "director" of "Fusion labs." Oh fer insulting my intelligence!) There is no rational way I can justify the idea that a razor needs five blades on the shaving surface. Six blades if you count the singleton which is reverse-mounted to be a trimmer blade. And yet. And yet after one shave, I want to say that I got the best shave I've had in years from that damn thing. I get razor burn on the lower neck on either side of the throat. And after this shave, I can honestly say that the razor burn was not evident. I quickly caveat this by saying that one shave doth not a product recommendation make. But I am going to give this beast my full attention in future shaves. Right now, I'm inclined to spend the absurd amounts of money on cartridges for the Fusion if the shave quality continues to be this good.
Finally, a breakfast cereal - the new Grape-Nuts Trail Mix Crunch (link goes to a review at Mr. Breakfast). Not bad. Not worth seeking out but not bad. I've had better granola-ish cereals. You could close your eyes and pluck a Trader Joe's cereal off a shelf and get a better, and less expensive cereal for example. But, again, not bad. Very different from original Grape-Nuts. (Which, by the way, is one of the name brands you should always buy as every store-branded version I've ever tried comes out as dust and grit, not leetle chunks.) I was two bowls in before I realized that the flavor I was tasting was the flavor of graham crackers. A good flavor but not what I expect from something calling itself "Trail Mix Crunch."
What new products have you tried recently?

The Wheels On The Bike Go Round and Round
Yesterday was the start of the '06 Atlantic Cycling season and I was there in my support capacity as is my wont. The day started cold and windy. Shiveringly cold. But as the sun rose, the wind scaled back and the temp came up to the point where the afternoon was really pleasant. Maybe more pleasant for those us with the thick layer of subcutaneous insulation perhaps. I sat, while cutting oranges and making PB&Js for the riders, facing the sun and today I have a nicely pinked-up face. Less, of course, the reverse-raccoon mask from the sunglasses.
We had nearly 150 riders (actually, I think, when you add in that Committee members rode, there were a few over 150 riders but don't hold me to that) and I got cleaned out of a couple of foodstuffs at the first rest stop (in lovely Lovettsville, VA). But there were other things for riders who missed the PB&Js. Plus, it was great seeing the AtCyc folks again after so many months.
I am actually going to try to ride at least a shortened course of next month's Blackwater ride and I'm definitely shooting for the full short course (start making sense please -Ed.) at the Easton, MD ride in August. Wish me luck - my bad hip joints are going to have to come through for me for a change. And, just to throw a bitch into the bucket - my left shoulder is killing me today. Maybe I mashed the joint when I lay on my side last night but I had to put some Biofreeze on it just to fall asleep. Getting old can not suck any more if it were composed of pure vacuum.
Well. Isn't that a nice way to finish off a pleasant post about another great Atlantic Cycling experience!

Let Me See Here...
Physical violence - check. Accusations of racism - check. Attempted coverup - check. Massive rowback - check.
Cythia McKinney could well be a member of the Duke Lacrosse Team.

InstaPundit Opts for the Black iPod Nano

And I dug and I dug until I found why!
I didn't even know there was a band called "Blue Osterizer Cult."

Just The Other Day
A friend of mine recently asked me about my religious belief. I told him that I worship Logy, the Norse God of Afternoon Lassitude.

RFC
That would be "request for comment." I've pretty much decided on getting the Burpee "Red Lightning Hybrid" tomatoes for my EarthBoxen. I'd be interested to see what you, the reader, might think of my choice. Or let me know what you think is a better bet. Please.
I'm also getting Burpee peppers and cucumbers for my other plantings. Depending on how well things turn out this year, I may be setting another two boxes next year for some additional veg - greens and beans perhaps.

New On The 'Pod
Donald Fagen's "Morph the Cat" (see the sidebar). Oh! So smooth! It's "Two Against Nature," "Everything Must Go" jazzy and it's like liquid ease. I actually prefer the rock-ier "Kamakiriad" but, allow me to repeat this, nothing Fagen does is wrong. Not ever. It may not be as good as something else he's done in one's own estimation but it's (damn, I'm actually going to say this) all good. There is something to like in every single song. From the trumpet solo in "The Great Pagoda of Funn" to the harmonica in "What I Do" there is something that makes each song special.
I could listen to this album for the next week and I just might do that. By then I'll know all the songs well enough to sing along. Maybe I can learn to play some of those riffs on JoJo. JoJo, by the way, just came back from being cleaned, adjusted and restrung and she's even more beautiful than when she arrived. My guitar hero friend even complimented her sound after he said that the PRS Hollowbody IIs tend to have too bright a sound for his taste. JoJo is supersweet.

Very Possibly The Hottest Picture On The Internet
It's Janet Leigh on Kim du Toit's site today. (scroll down to the bottom of the post) Whew!
I need a cool shower 'bout now.

It's April Fool's Day
And I'm not fooling anybody. But I hope your day is full of merry prankage.

Ripped From The News Of The Day!
I scanned this from today's Washington Times, "Weekend" section.


I'm thinking they meant "sambA." Click the picture to read the caption more clearly.

Brush With Fame
Last night I met E.J. Dionne of the Washington Post. It was a good scene all around. Perhaps I'll do details later. Perhaps not.

There Is Unrest In France
I'm sorry to report that there will be no end to the rioting in France (hat tip: Billy Beck for the link). Now that the French themselves are doing the rioting, there is no one to surrender to.

A Moment Of Foodblogging
I am not worthy to use the utensils of my fellow-blogger Paul when it comes to working the kitchen but every now and again I do something that I rather enjoy. Last weekend I had my friend Irving (see sidebar) over to help me with some tasks I was unable to handle myself. I mean, getting the new plasma TV onto the dresser was a two-person job I tell ya! And part of the process was having lunch eats.
I decided that the best bet was roll-your-own wraps. To that end I got the wraps themselves (square wheat breads) at Costco along with a roasted chicken. Laid out on the table, then were the following from which a hungry lad could assemble a meal: wraps, chicken, romaine lettuce leaves, hummus, olive tapenade, feta cheese, diced red onion, sliced jalapeno peppers and kalamata olives. Yum. You can make a damn fine sammich mixing and matching those ingrediments. And I have leftovers. It's going to be a week of eating wraps for lunch.

Faux Mysticism
If one were to combine Oriental martial arts with voodoo, would the result be jujujitsu?
I like the mysticism!

Sweet Lego Awesomeness
A sports arena built by someone(s) with pure, unadulterated Lego GEEN-yus. The Washington Nationals should have something as good looking built in DC. Only bigger. Yeah. Bigger.

Why I Don't Believe In ESP
I can't even read my own mind.

Stuff 'N' Nonstuff
Here is a link to the Krispy Kreme-bunned burger being pushed down the well-lubricated arteries of the Gateway Grizzlies fans. With fotos! Only a thousand calories and 45 grams of fat for four bits under a fin! Buy two! That's only $9.00.

Much thanks to Denny for using my quick and dirty Photoshop of his very cherry Bimmer and throwing a link my way. And for commenting on the post below. PoW loves feedback. Almost as much as we love the feedbag. Especially if it has a few Krispy Kreme burgers in it!

Ain't She Sweet!
I think I'll have to give her a name when she arrives.
Details: 2003 Paul Reed Smith Hollowbody II, 10 Top, rosewood fingerboard on a mahogany neck, stop tail bridge, locking tuners with ebony knobs, abalone soaring bird fret inlays (a PRS trademark), nickel hardware (obviously) and PRS archtop pickups.
The back is just as gorgeously flamed maple.

I don't love my Santana SE any the less, but now I have (or, shortly will) a guitar that will play as an acoustic when I don't want to plug in.

UPDATE: I'd rather hoped to be getting her today (Friday) but the tracking page shows me that she's only left Knoxville, TN at about 1pm. Egad I love the Interweb! I'd said it before and I'll say it again. Has there ever been a chance in all the world and time to follow physical packages as they make their way to you in very nearly real time? We live in a magical time.

More Music
Jake has a Myspace page which, when loaded will play an mp3 of his version of "Graceland." Now, keeping in mind that Paul Simon so utterly owns the song that it's a risk for another artist to cover it, Jake does a very creditable version. It hews closely enough to the original that the listener is not left behind but he also very much plays his version of it. Damn Jake. Just really nicely done. Can't wait for the new CD next month.
Hmm. I think I may work up a post on artists whose covers I have liked. Or not.

Why Was I Not Imformed?
Donald Fagen has a new CD/DVD combo out: "Morph the Cat" (see the sidebar for an Amazon link). There are very few artists whose output is required to be acquired and Donald Fagen is one of them. Steely Dan, of which Fagen is a third, is also a necessary buy but, strangely, Walter Becker's solo output is not to my taste. On the other hand, Fagen's "Kamakiriad" is quite possibly one of the best discs of all time - top 20 if not top 10. On Steely Dan's "Alive in America" live disc there is a version Becker's "Book of Liars" which is, simply, superb. Yet when I listened to the original on "11 Tracks of Whack," I was not knocked out.
I also finally ordered the CD of Roy Orbison's all-star "Black & White Night" which is a staple of PBS pledge week programming. What can I say? It's the Ooby Dooby man at his best surrounded by the likes of Bonnie Raitt, T Bone Burnett, J.D. Souther and Bruce Springsteen. I think I can honestly say my musical tastes are eclectic.

One From My Files
Years ago in the NBA, one Yinka Dare left George Washington University to play pro hoops. At nearly the same time, Manute Bol, a Dinka tribesman from Sudan was playing the pro game as well. It's just too bad they never had the chance to play against each other because it would have been a Yinka-Dinka do.

I Want
I want to install a steering wheel on my computer but I can't think of what I want it to do. And don't say play GTA! Maybe it should have a horn button as well. I find a good Google or YouTube video and HONK! HONK! Yeah. That's what I want.

Just Sick Cute
The NMSE has sent another picture from Pug Acres North. And this on the day I found that new next-door neighbors have a pug. Her name is Lola and she's feisty. That makes two pugs in the 'hood. "Rabito" has a new friend.
Still and all - the pug at the bottom of this pic has a strange Shar Pei-ish quality. Or so it seems.

New Favorite Waste Of Time
Splash Back. Use water drops to pop water droplet blobs. Addictive gorram it. I've made it to level 23 at my best. Go. See what you can do. Report back.

This
Is not the post I meant to make.

Working On It
Blogging has been light what with the ACC Tournament 'n' all. Yeah, yeah, go Duke, whatever. But I am working on a lengthier post than those in my last few weeks as I read Virginia Postrel's "The Substance of Style." I don't yet have my thoughts in order but I can join in the praise for the book with pleasure. I am not so great a fan of Ms. Postrel's writing style (it seems a little too academic for a mass-market book) but the point of her book is spot on.
More later.

Wherein I Win A Caption Contest
At Wizbang. Sniff. I'm so proud. Clearly, I need to mention boobs more.

Holy Kwap
My weather widget says that the expected high today is 77º. Seventy seven degrees! Gorram (that's a "Firefly" reference for the good-watching impaired) it's hot in NoVa.

Sweet Mother Of God
"Baseball's Best Burger" as brought to you by the Gateway Grizzlies and (wait for it...) Krispy Kreme. I think you can figure out the lay of this land before you even click the link.

Making You Hate Me Just A Little Bit More

Sometimes You Wonder
I will admit to many things - not the least of which is a case of sexual confusion. Not about my orientation of course, just about some objects of ... well, I can't call it "lust" because that's where the confusion lies. The point in this case being Suzy Kolber. She does TV ads for Chevrolet and at first her voice just grated on me. Then, after I became accustomed to that, I kept looking at her and I'm left flummoxed. I can't decide if she's just totally annoying or if she's actually turning me on.
I dunno. It is sort of pointless to wonder about such things since I'm never going to meet her, much less paint any part of a town in any shade of red. But since she keeps popping up on my screen (hell yes I'm watching the ACC Tournament), she nags at my increasingly feeble mind.
Anyone else care to comment on this particular sports chick?

Wherein I Channel Cletus

A Dash Of Morning Bile
In my morning surfing I got a pop-under window advertising Netflix. I was seriously considering getting Netflix as the Blockbuster thing is becoming increasingly lame. But screw Netflix if they buy advertising with sites that do pop-unders. At least opo-ups are more honest.
Secondly, I'm glad that "Buttcrack Mountin'" (Jeebus! how many differernt ways can that title be altered?) didn't win the Oskie and that "Crash" - well reviewed on this very blog - did. Ha. I didn't bother to watch the Oskies since I just got my DVDs of "Firefly." I didn't "get" Firefly when it first broadcast because the first episode aired was not the pilot. Fox, for some reason, thought "The Train Job" ep should lead off. Survey says ... BZZZZT! Wrong answer. There was plenty of chewy Joss Whedon goodness in that episode and much slam-bang action. But introducing it without the back story was moronic. Now I understand why the crew of Serenity acted as they did and it's a good show. I thought it was terrible when I first watched it.
A couple of things bear mention in regards "Firefly." First Morena Baccarin who plays the courtesan Inara is a very pretty woman (would have to be for the character, eh?) but more than that, she has just a most wonderful voice to listen to: sweet and soothing, very feminine. And Jewel Staite who plays Kaylee the ship's engineer is just adorable. When she smiles, which she does a lot, she just lights up. And when she feels hurt, it's like you've seen your favorite puppy yelled at. I just looked at her photos on the IMDB and I am struck at how much more attractive she is when she's not overly made up.
After such extravagant praise for the chiquitas of Serenity, I must say that you should at least rent the DVDs of the series and watch them as the makers meant them to be watched, not as they were broadcast. Also, the theme song ("Ballad of Serenity") is much better than I realized when you understand the back story. "Burn the land and boil the sea/You can't take the sky from me..." Lyrics here and listen to the mp3 here.

Stupid Joke Of The Day
Why did the crow divorce his wife?
For caws.

And A Short One To Top Off The Day
There is one thing about my return trip that really must be mentioned: The GA Pig. If you ever are travelling along I-95 in Georgia, you will pass exit 29 (Brunswick). Do yourself a huge, no, a massive favor: get off the highway if it's after 11am. Go east and look for a place that looks like little more than a shack on the north side of the road just beyond the gas stations, which, just FYI, have the cheapest gas for untold miles along the superslab. You will find the GA Pig which has just the most luscious barbecue you could wish to pass across your tastebuds. I can't say that the sides are exceptional but Oh Lord such Boston Butt pork barbecue is what God designed the pig to make.
I usually prefer "Carolina-style" pulled pork barbecue with a hot, vinegar-based sauce. Not any more. While I was getting my "to go" sammich, a couple was buying their lunch and since she was getting the same order I'd chowed down, I talked with them a moment. The male half of the couple told me that they were Carolina residents who regualrly travelled the highway and always stopped at the GA Pig. They too had been turned away from the Carolina barbecue by the seductive wonderfulness that is the product from the GA Pig.
Oh for God's sake! Just go there! Eat! Buy a pound or two to take with you. It's good. I'm only sorry that I didn't get the Brunswick Stew as a side. I will next time though. Oh yes. Yes. I will.

Loose Ends
Well, not really loose but part of the little dailiness of life that regular clogs up the blogs of piffling writers such as ... I keep coming back to "me" to finish that sentence. Dang.
File this under "love that interweb thing" or "this doesn't entirely make sense to me." I have a battery back-up for the base station of my house phones. You know the type of phone where there's one main base and three "satellite" phones that only plug into power. I figured it made sense to have the base station on battery back-up since each phone would run on its internal battery in the event of power failure. Of course, after the passage of several years, the battery in the back up device slipped into beeping senescence. Bargle flarg! I have to replace the internal battery. My first try, having found the dead cheapest replacement on the web, funked out as the battery I got was a two-cell version when I needed the one-cell version. But the return process was painless and I was out only the shipping.
Today I finally decided to get the right battery. I checked the manufacturer's website but found the proper battery to be just a wee bit more expensive than I preferred. So, of course, I checked Amazon. Heh. Bezos Inc. not only had it cheaper than the maker, but it was available at a few bucks less from Office Depot via Amazon. But (lotsa buts in the story), after setting up my order for the Office Depot version, I double checked and found that it was actually cheaper to pay Amazon more for the battery itself and opt for free "Super Saver" shipping. That just so rocks. I also bought the DVD of "Firefly" having become a slavering fan-boy upon seeing "Serenity."
Also, I recently ordered one of these headlamps. I gave one to Lycurgus for Christmas by using his wish list. I hadn't seen one in person before. It's the sweetest little four LED headlamp ever because it has an integrated headband. Most headbands are just that - big, bulky bands. This one has a retractable headstrap so you could put it on your wrist just as easily as on your forehead. Damnably clever. My bedside lamp is not really enough to read by but with my cyclopean book light .... Life could be a lot worse.

The Obligatory Sports Post
Oh fer wasted time. I watched a fair amount of the O'limp'ics and a good bit of basquetbol in the last fewweeks and feel compelled to make at least some comments. I'm a Duke fan so it's actually obligatory, right?
I'm so over the Winter Olympics. There was Bode Miller who was a world-class jerk (gold medal in assholery) and skater Johnny Weir who's "diva attitude" made me hate all male skaters just a little bit. It's a sad day when the American makes me applaud the grace, elegance and ability of the Russian fer crissake. I saw, incidentally, in a local paper that Weir is going to skate in some show in the DC area and I said to myself, "Not for a dime of my money." Hey Weir! I hope you marry Tonya Harding! Except I'll bet you're waiting for the defeat of "traditional marriage initiatives." I'm not a homophobe but I hate you.
The women, on the other hand, were wonderful. Kimmie Miessener was a delight - glowing smile and bouncing enthusiasm. I hope she vacuums up many medals and lots of money in her career. I applaud Sasha Cohen's performance but I just can't warm to that bobble head of hers. It's Alexis Bledel Syndrome all over again. But congratulations nonetheless for the silver. And it's impossible to leave off the women skaters without mentioning that for men, there can be no greater thing than a hot-looking figure skater who actually has the word "slut" in her name. And then I immediately apologize for saying such an ugly thing.
I don't ever recall seeing ski courses with sidelines before. Not that it's a big deal but it seemed new to me. Best not say anything more about the skiing except I hope Lindsey Kildow recovers fully from her nasty spill. It hurt just to look at it. Snowboarding. I dunno. Is this really an Olympic sport? Enh. Why not. And let women compete in the ski jump! Dammit. The sliding-down-icy-tubes-on-things events (luge, skeleton, bobsled) also don't do a hell of a lot for me. When you have to measure time in thousandsths of a second to get a winner, we've reached a point where the technology surpasses the human element. The only thing I really liked was a report on an Italian bobsledder who won gold in the previous Italian Winter Games (I think) who was the very essence of sportmanship. When in a previous Games the British bobsled team broke a bolt and had no spare, he, after his run, took a bolt off his sled and passed it along to them and the Brits then won. That is class beyond measure.
Finally, the speed skating deserves mention. Nice to See Apollo Ohno win a good, clean gold. He's a sportsman. And how sad to see the foolishness of Shani Davis and Chad Hedrick. My sympathy is a bit more for Hedrick but both played divo games when they should have sucked it up and skated for the team. Grownups probably would have scored a couple more medals for the US. Oh well (shrugs) whadda ya gonna do?
The best news out ofthe Winter Olympics? That we have four whole years before the next round! Hmm. I guess I went on longer than I intended. The basketball post might have to wait a bit.

Going Back In Time
I do have things to blog about that are slipping into the past a bit now that I'm home and getting onto other things. My trip had several wonderful things about it that deserve sharing (preëmptively: shut up Ed!). First, Lycurgus flew up from Florida to come in to Washington Dulles Airport. He departed from Tampa which airport, he discovered, offers free Wi-Fi. Logon was quick and painless so he e-mailed me that his departure was on schedule. I love it. Cheaper than using the cell phone if roaming is involved. Yet we decided that when he arrived, he'd call my cell from his cell to let me know what was up. I was then delighted by something I found at Dulles: a "cell phone waiting lot."
Not a place to put your cell phone while waiting but a parking lot for people who are to be notified by a call when meeting arrivals. Perfect! I wasn't sure how much time it would take me to get from the waiting lot to the arrivals portals so when I got the call I proceeded directly only to find that it took me less time to get there than it took brother to get out of the terminal. So I circled a couple of times, we met up and headed out. I think the cell phone lot is a feature at a lot of airports now. I recall Lycurgus saying that he saw one at the Tampa airport. Really, every airport should have one.
After a too-brief visit in my domain, we hopped in the Outback and scooted south. And not a minute too soon. The morning we left, the snow (predicted at 12 inches) began to fall. We drove through a dusting of snow for about an hour and then through rain down into North Carolina and then clear skies for the trip into Georgia. A car trip goes exceedingly easily when good conversation flows. I so oftern travel alone that having Lycurgus in the car was a treat. We'd solved most of the world's problems and very few of out own by the time we made our exit from I-95. And we went directly to the Randy Wood shop to pick up the tickets before even finding a hotel. We ended up at the Comfort Inn in Pooler. The room was fine (more free Wi-Fi) but the gratis breakfast was awful. As close to inedible as any meal I've ever been faced with. Unfortunately the new Holiday Inn Express which was cheek-by-jowl with the Comfort Inn was full to the point that all the non-smoking rooms were taken. Oh well.
It is startlingly ungracious of me to complain of something given away but it's also the truth which I think needs be told. I would gladly pay for a better brekkies than was presented. But it was no impediment to getting back out on the road. And so we rolled out in the dewy morn for the remainder of the trip.
We did stop a couple of times on the way down. Once at the Orange Shop in Citra, FLA where I acquired another gobbet of orange blossom honey and I couldn't resist buying a jar of "Key Lime Marmalade" because of its violent green coloration. Mistake. I tried it and it could not have tasted more like lime Jell-O if they tried. Bummer. I left that behind for someone else to deal with. The honey is good.
We also stopped in a town whose name I don't remember because there were tiger cubs beside the road. Some people who were invloved in animal rescue were selling Polaroid snaps of "you with the tiger" for $10 to support their cause (or just make money, whatever). So we stopped, Lycurgus got snapped with the kitty and we gassed up. If you've never seen a tiger at close range, it's a treat. They are singularly beautiful. I want the genetic engineers to snip out the tiger's skin and fur coloration genes and put them in other animals (like, say, goats) so we can start having "tiger-skin" fur coats again. Without, of course killing tigers. I'm all in favor of charismatic megafauna.
And thereby hangs a trip. I'll ask Lycurgus to scan in the photo of the tiger so I can post it. I'll probably give him the benefit of visual anonymity so his mug isn't palstered on the blog but it would be fun to have the pic for y'all's perusal.

Mental Cavitation
You're familiar with cavitation aren't you? Any submarine movie worth its saltwater will have some reference to it. In brief, if you set something in a fluid spinning sufficiently fast, the fluid can't keep up. Empty or vaporous voids are then formed which collapse with a sharp noise. Not a good thing when a metal tube full of ... no, I won't use that joke ... sailors is "running silent."
Well, my brain has been suffering from a sort of cavitation for the last few weeks. I've had so much on my mind that when it came to such things as blog posting, they became vaporous voids that imploded before escaping the wake I was plowing through the sea of cerebro-spinal fluid. Ouch. Plus, my bad joints have been giving more grief in the last few days than in any comparable period I can recall. Perhaps a 15-hour drive takes more out of me than it used to. In any event, I haven't kept up the flow of posting and I aim to change that in the upcoming week. I will be reporting on the trip, making up for music posts I've neglected (I've had a post in draft on Jake's house concert in January for at least a month now). I extend my thanks for those who keep stopping by to visit and my apologies for having made it less worth your time of late. There should be more substance, more gristly goodness, for you later today and in the days to follow.

Back From Eff El Ay
This is just a short one to say howdy to the PoW folks. Sorry to be so quiet for the recent days but I was enjoying sunny Florida just way too much. I return to the posting wold simply by noting my acquisition, on the trip, of three EarthBoxes which I posted about some time ago. I haven't decided what I'm going to grow but I'm definitely having cucumbers, bell peppers and possibly a tomato plant if I can get some seeds from ther heirloom tomato I ate while at my cousin's place in New Jersey last summer. Fresh veg. It's a good thing.

Regular Blogging Will Resume Shortly
I am in the bosom of sunny Florida, being gracefully accommodated by Lycurgus and enjoying fresh citrus. Oh yes. Key limes, blood oranges, tangelos and others will be consumed by me.
But that's not the big thing. If you read Acidman, you'll see he went to see Mike Cross at the Randy Wood Guitars concert space. He mentions (and links Gawblessim) talking with a fellow blogger which would be me. I met the Lord of Gutrumbles and he is as fine a human being to spend time with as I could imagine. He may show crust and vitriol on the blog but we, for Lycurgus was there as well, enjoyed the hell out of meeting him. Since I promised not to ruin his reputation, I have to say that there were moments of assholism but I just can't recall what they were.
Plus, Mike put on another great show. I was publicly cheeky during the show and got a laugh out of Mike and the crowd. It doesn't translate to the written word but I'll post my joke later.
Via candy ass con Dios friends.

Why Was I Not Informed?
Google Earth is now available for the MAc. It's been available for a month.
Jeez Edit', talk about bein' outta da loop!

Fun Stuff
One of my favorite things that the Interweb has made possible is the creation of custom stuff at CafePress. Yesterday I spent about three hours with a friend designing a custom image and having a few T shirts and a mug made. No details because the recipients get their stuff on the 14th (hint, hint). Still, my friend had an image in mind so we Googled up a base image, snatched a copy of it, opened it in Photshop, manipulated the bejabbers out of it and finally liked what we'd done. Uploaded it to CafePress and click, click, click (to quote Boomhauer), his stuff is on its way. I'll put up one of the images after the day.
I think I have to get on the ball and have that "Pugs of War" merchandise made up for the adoring public.

Rain Today
It's been warm here in the Doesn't Go section of the GCoV but today the rain is grizzling down and it's sleeping weather. But there's much to do even on a rainy Saturday. So what is it that crawls into my eye and sticks a toothpick in it? The early Sunday "B.C." comic strip. In the first panel a newly-emerged flower says to a rock, "Hi! How many light-years old are you?"
Oh ARG! I left a note for Johnny Hart at the Creator's Syndicate website (which opened a pop-under window so they can go directly to hell) to register my annoyance. A light-year is a measure of distance, not time. It is the measure of how far light travels in a regular old calendar year. Joan Baez made the same stupid mistake in an otherwise good title song on "Diamonds and Rust." In fact, if you go to the Amazon page for that disc, the sample prominently features the mistake. Serendipity do.

A Moment of Coffeeblogging
I grabbed a cup o' Joe at McDeath Burger this morning. Dang. It was good. Not just an-absence-of-bad good, actively good. Not the best ever but easily the equal of Dunkin' Donuts coffee. I was surprised. And I wouldn't have tried it had they not sent me some good brekky coupons in the mail.
Also, the coffee of choice for everyday consumption in the BD household is absolutely 8 O'Clock. Brilliant flavor and a very good buy. Safeway has a two pound bag for less than $12. Ahhhh!
And why did Dunkin Donuts do away with the "dunkin' donut?" It was a regular glazed doughnut with a sort of little dougnut handle on it. You held the doughy tab and then you could dunk the doughnut. Iconic. Why did it go away?

Since I'm Whingeing
I recently used some non-Epson branded replacement ink cartridges in my printer. I'm all for saving money but phew! The ink in these carts just reeks. I'll buy my brand name ink in three packs from Costco from now on. Only $11 per color cart and $25 per black. That's not too bad, really. The price may stink (a little) but at least the printed page won't.

Just Stick a Fork in My Eye
I have a new online massive annoyance: banner ads that have sound. I loaded a page the other day which had one of those "do this, get something free" ads. What you had to do was move a little cartoon guy to "catch" little cartoon hearts tossed from a little cartoon balcony by a little cartoon woman. And every time the guy catches a heart, he kisses it with a wet pucker and pop sound.
This is fine if you actually want to play the game. But the page I'd loaded had that ad below the displayed screen. And every now and then the guy caught a heart purely by chance. So what I was having was my computer making unaccountable noises for no reason. Can anyone see what's wrong with that? Anyone? Bueller...?
Thanks mutt-bunch (think Spoonerism there) for making me think something is going wrong with my computer. There's also a "cut your mortgage" ad which "features" the sound of an axe thunking into wood which also annoys the crap out of me. But I've only seen that as a top banner so at least I knew what was making the sound.

New Favorite Waste of Time
It only plays three levels but it's quite amusing for a while - Conan O'Brien the Barbarian.

Suffering The Wind
This has been the Year Of The Wind. I don't ever recall being blasted with as many storms with huge as I've been through in the past year. And last night was another. Which means a lousy night's sleep. My house doesn't creak like a galleon under full sail but the buffeting we took was noisy and lasted pretty much all night long. Yeesh. Feel awful this am. Just thought you'd like to know.

Great TV
I recently chanced upon a BBC program being run by PBS called "Battlefield Britain." When I saw the title in the TV grid listing, I thought it was part of the World War II series which I'd seen just enough of to make watching more inconceivable but I was wrong. This series is about battles in English history such as those against the Spanish Armada and the Welsh revolt of Owain Glyn Dwr. Absolutely fascinating.
The series hosts, a father and son team, do an amazing job of bringing the battles to life. They physically go to the locations of the fights - not exactly surprising given the title of the series - and demonstrate in a number of ways what transpired. They walk the field of battle and show how terrain affected the fight. Computer animations of the action give the viewer a remarkably good idea of what happened and, something that strikes me every time I watch, how few men were actually engaged in the battles that settled English history. These armies were of a few thousand men, not hundreds of thousands as the weight of history would make me want to believe.
There are actors in period garb who give a sense of immediacy to the computer simulations. A few men also are put in the position of commenting on the action as if they had been figting for one side or the other. Not that their commentary is particualrly brilliant but as dramaturgy, it is brilliant. Finally, the host has what I call the magic suitcase. It's a terrain model that folds open to show how the men were arrayed and opens the door for the computer animations to flow out of the narrative.
I can't do justice to how well done this series is in my description since they have done a masterful job of making history visual. But I will say this: If the show is broadcast in your area, watch it. It is one of the best military history programs ever.

Updates
Well, I was right to be worried. Duke lost to Georgetown by just a few points after getting behind early by way too many. On the other hand, I'd love to see a re-match in the NCAA tournament because Duke had its bad game. The Hoyas will not beat the Blue Devils again.
After looking at the Apple support pages, I see that the truncating of songs seems to be an issue. What I've found is that the first song of newly ripped in CDs appear to come up short. Actually, I think it's the importing that causes the problem. But I open iTunes, play the song and it pops back to its 'full' version and then updates to the iPod. So there's a work-around but I expect better from Apple.
And just as a note, I actually went back to Baja Fresh for lunch today but it was way too full to bother with. Being full alone is not a problem but I saw a cohort of screaming Hispanic kids with parents and just didn't want to put up wid dat. As the saying goes. So my fish taco will just have to wait. Ah! The sacrifices we have to make.

Doggie Fit!
How do you keep yourt pug of war svelte and lithe? Why, the Snackshotz of course! MMMMmmm! Frisbee snax!

Odds And Ends
I've been sweeping up the cyberdust for a couple of days and figure I have enough accumulated dross to make a post.
First, the new iPod is brilliant. I only have one viddy to watch, which is the first thing I did of course. Yes, the screen is not huge but it is incredibly sharp. So you hold it a little closer to your face - not a big deal. On the other hand I've been having some weirdness in iTunes itself. Some songs are just truncated on the former iPod. For example, this morning I started listening to Jethro Tull's "Aqualung" and the song stopped about two minutes and change in. It's a six minute and some song so I have no idea what was going on. I pulled up the iTunes app and checked the song length and it displayed as the iPod had it - short. But I then played the song in iTunes and it came up as the full version. I then connected the iPod and it "updated" the song to its full length.
I may have to go poking around Apple site to see if anyone else has reported such behavior.
A couple of things off the sports page need a quick glance. First, even as I write this, Duke is playing Georgetown and I'm rather nervous. I have no question that Duke is the better team but this just the kind of game that the Blue Devils can lose. The Hoyas are a good team, a top 25 team without doubt. They have a good coach who just may in the fullness of time prove himself to be better than his father. Duke has entered its ACC schedule which makes a non-conference game easy for the team to not be "up" for. Whereas G'town has every reason to be sky-high for the No. 1 team in the country. This game can make G'town's season. For Duke it'll be pretty much just another game. So I hope Duke plays the game necessary to win. Because it is possible for Duke to do the one thing it has never yet done - go undefeated. But I'm not holding my breath.
Secondly, dang. I would have put money on the Indianapolis Colts to win it all. They deserve it after their season and the fact that they have superb players. But the Steelers played the superb game. Oh well. Good thing I'm not a betting man. Well, there was that one rupee bet on the horses that won me 5 rupees in Mauritius. But that was a lark.
A moment of foodblogging. I went by Chipotle last night to get dins. Denied! The line was from the counter almost to the door. So I went to the local "Baja Fresh" which is actually closer to home. Got me a burrito. It was good. I can't say every bit as good as the Chipotle burrito because I got chicken instead of a carnitas. But it was very good. And I'll try their carnitas ere long and give the straight up skinny. The menu at Baja Fresh is more extensive. They have fish tacos. I want to try the fish tacos.
I see in today's news that little Jimmah Carter's son is going to run for office. 58 year old Jack Carter moved from Bermuda to Nevada about three years ago and since he's a new resident and not run for political office before, he's goign to run for the state legislature. Oh no! I got it wrong! I forgot the overreaching Carter ego. He's going to run for the US Senate. And let's look at a qupte to see the depth and brilliance of little bitty Carter: "I'm disturbed by the Bush Administration policies, ... I don't like the partisan bickering." Well which is it ya dumbass? If you don't like the partisan bickering then why don't you support the President in a time of war? Oh fer egotistical jackasses! I hope the people of Nevada have the native sense to slap this fool down.
Urg. I didn't mean to rant but the Carter family will do that to me. As a president, Jimmy was a pretty good poet. As a poet, he was a fair president. But the bottom line is that he was a crappy president and now he's a crappy author. But the Habitat for Humanity thing is laudable. Having said that, I'm off to watch hoops.

Denied!
This not the Jake post I promised. This is another fargin' iPod post. I loaded my latest acquisition onto the old G3 iPod and am left with a shade under 309 MB of space on the thing. I'm not sure of the numbers but I think that gives me maybe another two CDs of hard drive capacity before it burps on anything new. Which means I need to get a new iPod. A 60 gig viddyPod. Yeah. Must happen.
And I figured I'd buy it off the Apple site. This allows me free laser engraving just for funz. And I thought I'd grab a phrase off Chris Onstad. Specifically : "Everybody dance like/there's ass in your pants." It amuses me. And it's a call to dance on a music device. Apple, it seems, disagrees. My choice violates their offensive content rules. Which I don't know what are. My second choice is "What we need more of/is science." Which I can live with.
But I am not a little hacked off at Apple. I'm buying something from them which they offer to engrave for me. And yet they are going to censor my words. What the hell? MY money. My words. End of discussion. If it's offensive, anyone who sees it is going to blame me not Apple. So just stuff the censorship. ... Yeah, like that's going to happen!

More Jakeblogging Shortly
I saw Jake at a house concert on Sunday. He was fantastic. I want to add "as usual" to that sentence but this was the first house concert I've been to and the intimacy of the venue makes comparison to a more formal show a bit difficult. I'll have a full post up later today.

Just Can't Rant Today
I have been working up to a rant on the sad spectacle of "Brokedi Brokeback Mountain" but just haven't been able to make my remarks temperate. So I'll go off in another direction. Perhaps Hollywood can start making gay movies out of everything. My first suggestion: "Last of the Homohicans."

MovieDog Says "Go To Hell, Hollywood"
I see ads for the new installment of "Underworld" and wish for the parallel universe wherein I get to choose between Kate Beckinsale in a leather catsuit and Charlize Theron as Aeon Flux. And then the ugliness rolls in. I see ads for the marginally talented Martin Lawrence in the sequel to "Big Momma's House." Why for the love of all that's holy was this craptacle (i.e. that which is craptacular) even conceived? Was the first one such a roaring success that it made this baby from Sheol's womb necessary?
And they wonder why box office is down? Oy gestalt.
And oh yeah: "Tristan and Isolde?" No! Bad studio! Down boy! Heel!
Luckily America has the option of seeing a new Queen LaBeefa movie to watch instead. No! Bad studio! Heel!

Science In The BlogDog House
For Christmas I got a Dwarf Alberta Spruce - a live tree which I plan to use for the next several years as my Christmas tree of choice. But it got me wondering what the scientific explanation is for plants and animals that don't grow to full size. I figured it out: They have endwarfins.
What? You were expecting something serious?

And One More Thing...
Apple has done it again with new products at the Macworld Expo. I'll break things down (that doesn't sound good. -Ed.) shut up Ed, later. In the meantime, I am heaping abuse on myself for not buying Apple stock pre-split at 14. Yes, it could have been done.

Quiet Time
Not much to say in the last few days. Much is on my mind. Paul has given me much to think about which means any changes to the blog will be pushed into February at the earliest.
InstaPundit posted a podcast which is well worth listening to for several reasons. First, the InstaWife, aka Dr. Helen, has an absolutely wonderful voice - touched with Southern honey. Secondly, the first interview is with the talented and whip-smart Michelle Malkin. However, Insty's fascination with Audra Coldiron of "Audra and the Antidote" escapes me. I have nothing against the neo-punk style but it is a genre that celebrates lack of talent and elevates "attitude" over accomplishment. Sorry - the girl just can't sing. De gustibus non disputandum, eh?

What A Surprise!

Microsoft Corporation will do anything for a dollar. Now I understand that a corporation is a legal entity and not something with a conscious. I say this upfront so as not to offend all of our Libertarian and Conservative friends by sounding too Liberal. But a corporation is managed we can only hope by individuals who do understand the difference between right and wrong. Case in point:

Microsoft has shut down the blog site of a well-known Chinese blogger who uses its MSN online service in China after he discussed a high-profile newspaper strike that broke out here one week ago.

The decision is the latest in a series of measures in which some of America's biggest technology companies have cooperated with the Chinese authorities to censor Web sites and curb dissent or free speech online as they seek access to China's booming Internet marketplace.

I don't know what they are thinking in Redmond, Washington but censorship of the Internet is not only wrong it is nearly impossible. Of course this poor guy has been stopped for now but it is only a matter of time before people like him figure a way around this. The Chinese authorities seem to think they can control the news like they did in the days of Mao. I have news for them: It's not going to work! The news will slip out and the policy of trying to force multi-national corporations to censor descriptions of unpleasant events will eventually be rescinded. Where will this leave Microsoft? With egg on its face once again. Hey guys, have some gumption and tell the Chinese to do their own censoring. Do you really think they are going to ban you from China for not complying with their edicts? That would be like cutting off their noses to spite themselves. This is something the wily Chinese will never do.

Why Would I Ever Want This Service?

I admit to loving gadgets and I will admit to loving Internet-related services too. I use a Roomba for vacuuming and have even gone as far as to name this robot Rover. I use the Internet to backup my Quicken files. This all makes me an avid consumer and a marketer's dream. Though I am very hard pressed to understand why I would ever want to download music to my cellphone. Both Verizon and Sprint seem to think this is a good idea and are currently engaged in a very heated competition for my dollars. Here is a portion of a press report:

Verizon announced yesterday that it would begin selling phones that allow users to download songs over the airwaves. The company's decision to move into the music business through the cellphone market poses a potential threat to the makers of portable music players, like a

Verizon's new service will create competition for Sprint, which in October introduced a phone that lets consumers download songs through its wireless network for $2.50.

Verizon will charge $1.99 for a song sent over the air. It will also sell songs downloadable to phones through a PC from a Verizon music site for 99 cents each, the same price charged by online music stores like Apple iTunes.

I wish them both good luck but have to report that I will not be using their services anytime soon. I have to save up for a Scooba who will mop my floors after Rover has completed his vacuuming.

Yet Another Prediction Of A Bright Future For Blogs

This one is by Clayton Makepeace. It appears in an e-zine that I subscribe to by the folks at

www.earlytorise.com

A sample of their predictions for 2006:

Blogs will become an even more powerful marketing tool. These websites (where visitors are invited to share their opinions on a variety of topics) are still skyrocketing in popularity. In 2005, 33% more people visited Blogspot.Com than read The New York Times! Creating a blog and requiring visitors to register in order to share their opinions - PLUS adding links and ads to the blog site - will become a huge source of new e-mail addresses and revenues for anyone creatively exploiting them.

I personally read the NY Times less than I used to and blogs much more often. I have no idea how they came up with their numbers but I do appear to validate their findings.

Ooof!
I finally got to Chipotle for lunch today. Oh, the hours are 11am to 10pm. It says so on the door. In letters that are small enough to be unreadable to anyone driving by. I might have to rant about that one of these days. But I was starting on the lunch. Dang. Good stuff. A limited menu to be sure but really, really tasty. I had the Fajita Burrito with carnitas (mmm! carNItas!) and guac. I tells ya - this is a belly bomb. I was full, make that fu-ULL, when I walked out. The guac was totally needless. Next time I go, I get carry out: Burito Bol with the fancy beef and no drink.

If you haven't tried Chipotle, even after my griping about their website, I can definitely give them the two thumbs up. Worth the extra trouble of going on and ordering versus the Tac O'Bell drive thru.

Essential MAC OS X Applications

This will require the knowledge of a Lycurgus or the BlogDog himself to verify. I put it out here so I will know what to look for when I start playing on my father's new laptop. His old Mac PC got hit by a surge of lightning and his old surge protector didn't offer any protection. He has since bought a new Mac Laptop and surge protector. I can hardly wait to see it!

Using The Internet To Pick Up Babes and/or Hunks

This has a few amusing observations. It includes this funny quote:

"The thing to remember about love affairs," says Simone, "is that they are all like having raccoons in your chimney. ... We have raccoons sometimes in our chimney ... And once we tried to smoke them out. We lit a fire, knowing they were there, but we hoped that the smoke would cause them to scurry out the top and never come back. Instead, they caught on fire and came crashing down into our living room, all charred and in flames and running madly around until they dropped dead." Simone swallows some wine. "Love affairs are like that," she says. "They all are like that."

-- Lorrie Moore, in Birds of America

I think I would check out Hot or Not before hanging my hope on meeting a future mate via a web site or a blog. At least at the aforementioned site you get to see each other in advance to determine if there is a physical attraction. And the physical attraction is very important during those initial encounters. It helps make up for the nervousness that both sides normally feel. Though if you think putting up a picture of yourself cuddling a dog will work then by all means please do not let the friendly folks here at PoW stop your efforts.

A Scam or a Disturbing Web Site?

I saw this profiled on CNBC. The guy doing the interview had actually used the service to retrieve the cell phone records of the man from Best People Search.com that he was interviewing.

At times like these I sometimes wish I had an expense account to check out such things. It's akin to watching an auto accident, or Danny Bonaduce. In any event, the Internet has introduced the ability to find out most anything about anybody. The genie is out of the bottle and this new reality is not for the faint-of-heart or paranoid.

What Would You Expect Microsoft To Do?

I can see how a comparison of the new Microsoft OS with the MAC OS would reveal certain similarities. Though it only leads me to ask what you would do if you were in Microsoft's shoes. I mean there is an easy-to-use, rock solid OS (Apple) and you have a bug-filled, hard to navigate OS (Microsoft), and you are seeking to improve. Do you emulate what works well for your competition or do you try to fix your existing OS by bolting on more features and letting the customers tell you what to fix? The answer is a no-brainer. (COPY!)

Microsoft since they introduced Windows 95 has been trying to make themselves more like the Mac. Their latest attempt should come as no surprise. Large corporations usually don't make original contributions of ideas or technologies. They either buy what works or they copy it. Since Apple is not for sale Microsoft has to try to make their GUI and their feature set more like the Mac. They have no choice but to play catch up. And I see nothing wrong with this since most of Corporate America is saddled with Microsoft software and the belief is firmly ingrained that nobody get fired for buying Microsoft. At least this gives me some hope for my company purchased laptop. Maybe this next version of Windows won't crash so much and will offer features that my friends with Apple computers now take for granted. We can only hope, and live with the knowledge that we can replace our home computers when the time comes with the latest and greatest from Apple.

Home Decor
I've been poking around the IKEA site today with the idea of getting the "dark" corner of my kitchen set up. One thing I came upon was some track lighting which design I really like. Little UFO lights flying around the kitchen. But I am left to wonder if Richard Clack (Clack? -Ed.), the designer, has ever actually worked in a kitchen.
A kitchen, if used for its intended purpose, has the remarkable propensity to create fine airborne droplets of grease. Grease. An aerosol of grease. And then the dust of usual life comes to settle on that surface and pretty soon you have a real mess. I don't mind cleaning the kitchen. But being a guy, I want a kitchen that is easy to clean. And these lights, despite the high design, look like a real cleaning nightmare. So I'll continue on my light search.
On the other hand, I don't really want to have a light called "Fartyg" in any room of the house.

I Am A Programming Genius!
Not computers: television. As I was looking at the listings of shows in the daily noisepaper, I finally realized that what the new shows lack is synergy. The combinig of two distinct ideas into a new whole. What's the first element? One I've already complained about: the new psychic shows - "Ghost Whisperer," "Medium" and, to a lesser extent, "Supernatural" on CBS, NBC and the WB respectively. What's the second element? Crime shows of course, specifically the "Law & Order" franchise.
My new show would be "Law & Order: SVU." It's been done you say? Let me spell it out: "Law & Order: Spectral Victims Unit." (guinessguy)Brilliant!(/guinessguy)

Another Memo From The Law Firm
That would be the law firm of Bitch, Carp and Moan of course. Last night, as I was watching the Big Bowl Game (Boo! SC should have won), I decided that I might as well try the new neighborhood Chipotle for a bite of dinner. I tried to use their eponymous web site to do something as exotic as find out what their farkeling store hours are and I was sorely tried. First, the site is Flash-based to the point of annoyance but what's worse is that all the interaction results in pop-up new windows. Well, my Firefox is set to supress such actions so my inital visit meant I got no info. Trying the site in Apple's Safari worked better but I finally gave in to the annoyance factor of dealing with the just-too-clever-for-their-own-good interface and bagged out. I didn't go to Chipotle and I'm less inclined to after putting up with all that cutesy crap.
Well, I'll go sometime. It's just not going to be a priority. C'mon McDonalds! You can make a more useful site than that!

PoW Wishes Joe A Speedy Recovery
Joe Sherlock of the invaluable "The View Through The Windshield" blog has recently suffered a heart attack. Luckily for us, the reading public, it appears to be mild and as he puts it:

I returned home this morning and will be taking it easy for a while. I now have two stents in me - I think of them as My Twin Glasspaks - but I'm feeling reasonably good. Blogging will be lighter for a while as I now have other priorities in my life.

We will live with the lighter blogging as long as Joe keeps living and posting. He's too good to lose. Twin glasspaks. Heh. Rumble on, Joe, rumble on!

Dangerous Traffic
A report, stolen in toto from today's "American Scene" page of the Washington Times:

New York - A horse pulling a carriage bolted through blocks of traffic in Midtown Manhattan and crashed into a car, injuring the carriage driver and two persons in the car.
The horse ended up wrapped around a station wagon late Monday and was later euthanized. The windshield of the car was smashed and the carriage was mangled, said witness Philip Emran. There were no passengers in the carriage.
The carriage driver was listed in critical condition yesterday. The men in the station wagon were hospitalized and were in stable condition, police said.

Ironically, before it began pulling the carriage, the horse was also in stable condition.
Stevie will hate me for that.

Greeting from the DNC
I just got a holiday card from the Democrat National Committee. It says: Happy New YEEEAAAARRRRGGGHHH!

Another Needless Sports Post
The NFL playoff picture has suddenly been made clear, as if the grunting thrust and crunch of 300 pound linemen made the mist dissolve before our eyes. And the Washington Redskins are in the playoffs for the first time in ... I don't know, several years. I don't know how many years because I don't really care. Which is not to say that I hope the Redskins lose - oh no! Not by a long shot. I hope they win. I hope they don't win the Super Bowl because there are much more deserving teams (coughCOLTScough) but I hope they win a couple more.
Bear with me here. My motives are entirely selfish. First, I'm happy for coach Joe Gibbs. From what I've seen, Gibbs is a real gentleman. A Hall of Fame coach and a good guy in a business that chews up good guys and spits them out. Secondly, the Redskins seem to have an effect on the psyche of the whole Washington metropolitan area. When they win, life seems better around here. The annoying Redskin uber-fans are bearable when they're happy. In a way it's like living on a college campus where football is king: joy abounds when the "W" is put up; gloom descends when an "L" is posted.
Now, for the insect in the unguent: I would be really delighted if the Redskins never win another Super Bowl because the owner, one Daniel Snyder, is a .... I was about to use intemperate language. Some people end up hugely rich and they seem to be proof that a quality man is not always the winner in the game of life. Witness Danny Boy Snyder. I'm seeing a world-class case of small man's syndrome and overweening arrogance. But I'm not rich. Maybe I'm just really, really jealous.

And So It Begins
I'd like to first thank my fellowblogger Paul for the interesting and useful post below. I'm already getting into a couple things I wasn't aware of before.
New Year's Eve: spent with friends, a wonderful dinner of grilled swordfish and a couple of glasses of Dom Perignon (truly an excellent champagne but at $100 a bottle, hard to justify when Moet makes a $30 White Star that is wonderful, by which I mean: Thanks!) and a display of a guitar collection that just knocks your socks off. I learned a lot about the history of the electric guitar last night. It might even stick. Watched the ball drop on Times Square and headed home, tired but not quite ready to drop into slumber. So after several hours of fitful sleep, I am here - posting to the blog. Wishing you all a very happy New Year. I just have the feeling that come March I'll realize that I'm still hopelessly mired in 2005. D'oh!

2005

I can't call these the Best of 2005 because I haven't given them that much thought. This is a blog after all. If you want to read one man's list of the Best Desktop Applications of 2005 go here.

The topic of this post is places to visit if you haven't already.

Cool Product: TomTom This one has been getting quite a bit of advertising in the trade magazines. The BlogDog had mentioned he wanted suggestions for gadgets for a new auto and this qualifies.

A Combination of Good Design and Interesting Content:
1. Neave
2. Magnetic North
3. Favorite Website Awards

Good Informational Sites:
1. Reddit
2. Digg
3. Life Hacker