Can't Stand Prosperity

After watching eight years of Oregon State football, and having those first four while I was in school there be winning seasons and good games, I have to say that the dismal performance tonight was quite possible the worst, most pathetic Beaver loss I've ever seen.

In the first half, OSU was ahead of UCLA, having sacked their quarterback three or four times and showing a general strength in both their offense and defense. By the fourth quarter things really turned around. UCLA made a few pass interceptions, OSU's punt returner fumbled the ball three times which allowed for two of three turnovers, basically giving the game to UCLA for a 40--14 win. It was actually a reverse of how the Beavers played when I went to school there. (It was widely known that Beavs would be down in the first half only to come back strong and win in the second.) All this lead one of the announcers to proclaim that Oregon State is a team that can't stand prosperity.

So, if you like UCLA, this was a good game. If you like OSU, it sucked.

Self-Torture

I got pretty bored this evening. I was supposed to go down to see my new niece but it fell through so I'm going Sunday. But with time to kill and nothing much to kill it on, I decided to pick my top five cars. (None of which I can buy, thus the title of this post.)

1. 1970 Hemi Cuda
2. 1970 Challenger 440
3. 1969 Camaro 396
4. 2008 Challenger (for my daily driver)
5. 2008 Viper (pictured)

Most of my readership would not immediately realize that all but the Camaro are Chrysler/Dodge cars. I showed the picture of the Viper because I actually went to the Dodge website where you can "build" your own car. That was fun. Mine came to a grand total of just over $86,000, with minimal upgrades costing a teeny extra $1700. Of the cars in my list, it is a distant second in price to the number one car which one could purchase for a few hundred thousand with the least expensive being the number two car, one of which I saw for just $27,000. Yes. This kind of thing is fun for me.

Needs No Comment

Eugene Is A Weird (Backward) Place

So I noticed this on one of the blogs I regularly read. I found it shocking for the primary reason of the 5 or so city jobs that $250,000 could provide for a year. Or just think of how many other things Lane County could do with that much money? How much stuff could that do for some schools?? UGH.

I was kind of annoyed but not surprised so I went to the Register-Guard site where I stumbled upon this.

It never ends. First of all, taxing cigarettes to "raise" money for health care is a guilt tactic. And even though those few commenters seem to be illiterate they make good points. Of all of them, "Roxanne" seems to have the best, most logical solution...

Halo 3

The newly released Halo 3 is pretty fun. So far it is really not much different than the first two. It is still entertaining however, and due to hours of playing I managed to miss dinner. Then, I became motion sick from watching the screen, I can only assume, and combined with a lack of food, was forced to stop playing.

Deep Voice=More Kids

According to this painfully obvious, ridiculously short article on msn, men with deeper voices have more kids.

The reason is that deep voices are more attractive to women, and thus...they hook up more, which results in more offspring. The article doesn't mention whether or not any of these were unplanned pregnancies.

The article also notes that the researchers attempted to make a correlation between voice pitch and offspring survival. What year is this? 1950? Of course they failed to make that connection.

Of course, my natural tendency is to question why the hell anyone would fund such useless, pointless research for a subject that most people have already known about for, well, years. It's called natural selection.

Death Proof

I watched Death Proof finally. The movie can be divided into two halves. The first half is horrific ---if you hadn't guessed---blood and guts horror. The second half leads you to believe it will be a repeat of that theme until the tables are suddenly turned. Once this happens, the flick becomes extremely comical. I laughed and I laughed.

I still found it to be deeply disturbing though. What bothered me though, wasn't the portrayal of death (since it obviously isn't real), but the destruction of all those cool cars. Especially the Challenger. Did they really crash them??

Funny

When boredom is paramount, these are the kinds of things that keep me entertained.

la petite chou chou -- [noun]: A person who has the ability to be invisible 'How will you be defined in the dictionary?' at QuizGalaxy.com

Again, No Surprise

You are a Social Liberal (65% permissive) and an... Economic Conservative (76% permissive) You are best described as a: Libertarian (76e/65s) Link: The Politics Test on Ok Cupid Also: The OkCupid Dating Persona Test

Untitled

There were a few things about this article that surprised me.

1) I didn't know anyone was even close to testing an AIDS vaccine
2) I almost can't believe they were able to find volunteers to take the vaccine
3) I find it shocking that in America today, lifestyle choices still lead to HIV/AIDS

Before I go on, I just want to clarify #3. The article says the volunteer base was made up of people more likely to get HIV/AIDS. It was comprised of a group of people who were mostly homosexual men and female prostitutes. The article states that:

They were all repeatedly counseled about how to reduce their risk of HIV infections, including use of condoms, according to Merck.

And:

NIH said a data safety monitoring board, reviewing interim results, found the vaccine did not prevent HIV infection. Nor did it limit severity of the disease "in those who become infected with HIV as a result of their own behaviors that exposed them to the virus" — another goal of the study.

The whole thing is sad because even though it may seem odd that American's still get HIV (knowing EVERYTHING we know about it), there are still other places, namely Africa, where they almost can't avoid it. I must say though, I cannot imagine a day when someone comes up with a cure or preventative immunization ---the other side of me thinks it more likely that HIV is one of nature's ways of limiting population...a modern day plague.

The Press Club

There was a happy hour get together tonight for the magazine but since I seem to be not as sociable as some of the others, I decided to drag along CH. Oddly, she knew one of the people there and was introduced to everyone else basically. The real treat though, was the food. We were both starving so we had dinner there. (An additional bonus was that their house wine is a really smooth Sangiovese at only $5 a glass.)

I ordered the prosciutto, mushroom, mozzarella crepe. It was drizzled in a light cream. I'm admitting that my starvation could have been partly to blame but I thought it quite good and easily and without hesitation ordered a dessert crepe of sugar, cinnamon, butter. Also delicious.

I definitely recommend it to anyone.

While there, I also consumed a glass of Old Vines Zinfandel. Please visit Red Reviews for a full report.

In Record Time

Tonight I finished The Time Traveler's Wife. In just five sittings, I read the entire thing, which is by far the quickest I've read any book within the last few years.

Thanks for recommending it, BB. :)

What A World

In what world do we live in in which you can shoot your husband to death, claim insanity over the death of your sister and alleged spousal abuse, get three years in jail (of which you spend only five months), then get released, essentially as you were, back into your former life, sans husband?

That's right. This one.

I am so bloody sick of hearing people claim insanity to cover their own asses for doing shit they shouldn't have done. Of course, we have been hearing about the piteous Mary Winkler, but insanity pleas are a dime a dozen these days.

Day Trip: Seattle

From the freeway, Seattle appears to be quite spread out but also very dense. Whereas Portland hillsides seem mostly tree-covered, Seattle's seem mostly structure-covered. We approached downtown from Seneca Street. At the top of the hill from the freeway off ramp there was a lovely, small garden planted in the concrete and the ivy was taking over. A much nicer welcoming than many other cities.

Overall, I found Seattle to be very likable. I haven't been there as an adult so I found it very appealing as a nice change away from Portland. The highlights of it were that everything was uniform, which settles what others refer to as my OCD. By this I mean that all the sidewalks were the same (clearly they didn't settle with patchwork concrete when doing construction) and there weren't numerous superfluous construction projects happening all over the place. It was also extremely clean. I've actually never seen a cleaner downtown in any city. (On a related note, I mentioned that to my friend who used to live there and she told me that it was all an illusion and that ONLY downtown is clean. Other friends validated that there are some scuzzy areas but agreed that in general, Seattle is cleaner than Portland.) We only saw two panhandlers the entire day, and there were no petitioners or signature collectors which also made the experience much more enjoyable.

The biggest drawback I noticed was that the downtown seemed sort of small. However, I felt this was outweighed by the fact that the tall buildings are taller than Portland's. I also would have liked to see what it looks like in the sun because with gray sidewalks and mostly gray buildings, it was a bit bland thanks to all the clouds and sprinkly weather. Another sort of aesthetic drawback was that there really weren't any old historical buildings in downtown---maybe they just weren't in the area we were in, but Portland definitely has an older, more historical feel.

To analyze myself, I think I am comparing Portland to Seattle for a few different reasons. 1) I am bored as hell after four years in Portland. 2) I am getting sick of all the construction, panhandling, signature collectors/petitioners bugging the hell out of me every time I try to go to work, or leave work, or take my lunch break, etc. 3) I want a change. Aside from meeting my close friends, Portland hasn't really given much back.

Newest Family Member

Ha!! You all thought I was talking about my niece, didn't you! No, she still hasn't arrived.

I picked up these lovelies while on a trip up in Seattle. Turns out there are some shoes I can't live without. That's right. These are a blue and black tweed with a little metallic thread and a little red thread---they are a peep toe and I believe this style is called d'Orsay. They are by Linea Paolo, one of my favorite decently priced shoe designers. And, as with all my shoes, I'm secretly hoping that no one else has them.

Good Reading

The Time Traveler's Wife is on loan to me. I'm a little ashamed to admit that I only started reading it this evening but I'm already a couple hundred pages in.

I have always thought it would be hard to find a truly unique story. I haven't read one like this before. I recommend it to all...

...Obviously!...

So I found this quiz site, quizfarm, and took a bunch of the quizzes out of boredom. Of all of them, only one had results that made any sense at all (albeit, not that much and you can tell that the people who invent these quizzes aren't necessarily smart).

What do your eyes reveal about you? For me, the answer is the astonishingly obvious:

You scored as Anger, Your eyes reveal anger, you are likely to blow up over things and over-react. You tend to assume the worst and if it ends up being for the best then well someone else got screwed. I'd advise you to try and find the happier side of things and to remember there is good in this awful world.

I wanted to post the result page which has a pretty picture of an eye, all in red and with flames and such, but the code was causing it to appear behind all the other elements of my blog so you wouldn't have been able to read it. Nonetheless, the results still fail to surprise.

Finally! I've Been Waiting For This!

Ok, so I haven't been waiting for the Northwest Passage to open up. I haven't thought about it at all in fact---maybe never. But this article has things to say about the opening of the Passage, a few of which I am compelled to refute.

First let us start with the opening statement:

The most direct route through the Northwest Passage has opened up fully for the first time since records began, the European Space Agency says.

What they don't bother to mention until half-way into the article is that records began in 1978. That's just a mere 29 years of data. Not nearly enough to claim that "global warming" is the cause of ice reduction. In fact, only three years prior on August 28, 1975 Newsweek printed an article in which climatologists were discussing possible means of melting the ice caps because there was a global cooling scare. Here is a scan of the actual page from the magazine. The skeptic in me says that they will throw out whichever term is more frightful at the time.

Next let's talk about the next fallacy:

It says this made the passage "fully navigable" for the first time since monitoring began in 1978.

According to this there are several expeditions that resulted in full navigation by ship from one end of the Northwest Passage to the other. And here is an excerpt from another source:

The Passage would not be successfully navigated until the twentieth century when, in 1903-06, Roald Amundsen, (who would later beat Scott to the South Pole), made the full transit by sea in the Gjöa. It was left to a Norwegian to accomplish the crossing of the Northwest Passage, but as he himself pointed out, the fact that it was possible had been due to the earlier explorations by British seamen.

All their 29 years of records aside, the pass was navigated, and quite a lot. In fact, many ships became frozen in the ice, because---brace for it---sometimes ice melts and sometimes it refreezes!!!

Finally, let us talk about the Canadians:

Canada says it has full rights over those parts of the Northwest Passage that passes through its territory and that it can bar transit there.

But this has been disputed by the US and the European Union.

This is true. Would the US allow foreign vessels to "sail" from the Atlantic through all the great lakes and down into the Mississippi for an alternative route to the Gulf of Mexico? No. If the territory belongs to Canada, they can say and do whatever they want when it comes down to it. And frankly, why does the US or the EU give a crap?

There is also another new post on Red Revews.

Child's Play

Pretty soon we will be able to fulfill our barrenness with little Zeno, the robot boy.

1) Is he a replacement for the love of would-be parents?
2) If he becomes a play thing for little nerds, won't they just fall further into reject oblivion?

I have to admit he is kind of cute and bears only the smallest resemblance to Chucky; and at this point he is incapable of doing anything at all without the help of his plethora of computers telling him what to do.

Another thing the article mentions is the "uncanny valley" theory. For those of you who didn't get to that part in the article or don't know, it is the theory that robots that are too human-like and realistic become grotesque in the eyes of humans but that those only bearing a resemblance to humans elicit a positive psychological response. I actually find the circumstances surrounding this theory more interesting than the robots themselves.

Additionally, there is another new post at Red Reviews.

The Dimentia Of Rosie O'Donnell

In an article I read regarding Rosie O'Donnell's book, the author describes the book as "brave." She describes Rosie the same way. I personally like to describe her as "insane," "unstable," "certifiable," "wacko."

Below is an excerpt from the article:

But reading this passage is heart-breaking. Rosie, who lost her mother at age 10, felt she couldn’t get attention or sympathy otherwise.

She broke her own bones, she recalls, “my hands and fingers usually. No one knew. It was a secret.” She used a Mets baseball bat she got on bat day or the hanger. Why? It was “proof I had some value, enough to be fixed.” She recalls that she was no longer sad about her mother’s death, but “distracted.”

Rosie also dangles another clue about her childhood in two sentences. “There were many benefits to having a cast. In the middle of the night, it was a weapon.”

Take special note of the words "attention" and "sympathy."

Now, note below the definition of Munchausen Syndrome:

A psychiatric disorder in which those affected feign disease, illness, or psychological trauma in order to draw attention or sympathy to themselves. (Emphasis mine.)

Obviously, someone knew she was breaking her bones (if she indeed was) because she describes how a cast is a useful weapon. Whatever that means remains a mystery. And even if she didn't break her hands or fingers, just saying she did to garner attention could still probably be considered something similar to Munchausen's.

There is also a new post at Red Reviews.

The Censorship Of Kathy Griffin

Apparently Kathy Griffin is a godless woman. That is a personal choice but according to this article, she will be censored for saying something bad about Jesus and proclaiming a graven image (Emmy) as god.

I'm 100% against censorship. But I tell you, I don't care at all if someone shuts her up. She is perhaps the most annoying person currently alive---even more annoying than the person in the video clip I posted earlier.

Borderline

This person is a borderline mental case.Trust me, you will want to watch this video. I laughed and I laughed and I laughed.

What The....?

Below is an article I saw today:

A McDonald's worker in Union City, Ga., was arrested and jailed Thursday night for putting too much salt and pepper on a police officer's hamburger, MyFoxAtlanta reported Friday.

Kendra Bull was mixing hamburger meat when, she said, too much salt and pepper accidentally spilled into the bowl. Bull said her manager was working with her, and continued to make patties out of the meat. Bull grilled and ate one of the over-seasoned burgers for her dinner break and grilled the remaining burgers from the batch.

A police officer purchased one of the salty burgers and became sick. According to MyFoxAtlanta, the police accused Bull of purposely pouring the salt and pepper on the burger and charged her with reckless conduct. The police photographed the burger, took the sick cop to the hospital, and carted Bull off to jail.

Bull, who spent Thursday night in jail until she was released on a $1,000 signature bond Friday morning, admitted the burgers were too salty, but said she ate one from the batch and did not get sick. She also said that security cameras trained on the work area and grill will prove that the salt was spilled accidentally.

Bull's attorney, a public defender, asked the judge to dismiss the charges, but the judge refused.

Here's what I want to know: Is the officer accusing her of doing it maliciously because he is a cop? Granted, she shouldn't have served it if there was too much salt in it, or could have added meat, or even tipped the bowl up to dump some of it off...but seriously---how can she be arrested for this? Also, is the judge touched in the head? Utter ridiculousness.

And lastly, I've been under the impression this whole time that McDonald's hamburger patties were pre-made. Have I been wrong all along?

Yay For Baby Nieces

As most of you know, I am about to become an aunt. My little niece will be born by the end of this month. So I've been doing some shopping for the baby shower this weekend. It is weird because I have an innate desire to spoil her---I am so excited to get to meet her. I can't wait till she's born.

On a completely unrelated topic, there's something new to read at Red Reviews.

Forgive And Forget

Today, I happened to be involved in a conversation about the phrase "forgive and forget." This is in relation to when one is crossed by a close friend or relative. Disclaimer: This in no way relates to any recent occurrence---just a chance conversation.

The person on the other end of the conversation made the argument that forgiving someone who doesn't deserve forgiveness requires indifference, which means you are able to progress without any attachment at all to that person. Indifference is the worst thing you can offer a person who you no longer care about, because to dislike or hate him is too close an emotion to love.

I've never been secretive about the fact that I've written a few people off. Sometimes people do things that can't be forgiven. My personal belief on the matter of "forgive and forget" is that a person can forget about something they couldn't forgive (forgiveness in these cases could be interpreted as "it's okay that you hurt me," when it isn't and serve to open you to further insult/injury). Indifference here is that I don't invest enough care in the situation to bother forgiving it. It is about not wasting the time trying to forgive something one could more easily forget. Indifference, also in this case, becomes the least one could ever offer that person while forgiveness would be the most. Of course, this is reserved only for cases where one would refuse to see the person socially again.

Odd how the central theme of indifference brings two different outcomes. Anything to add?

She's As Svelte As That Super Skinny Fly!

As was reported all over the news a couple weeks ago, researchers had identified a virus that causes stem cells to develop into fat cells. Of course, the natural reaction was to question whether getting rid of the virus would cause the host person to begin losing weight? I didn't see the answer to that question among the articles I read.

This week, researchers are proud to announce the discovery of the "skinny" gene, which they have undoubtedly been searching for since it occurred to them to do so. The corresponding obvious question is whether or not you could make a drug that would cause fat regulation the same way this gene does. What I find interesting in the article was how it shows that the focus is on how to make people skinnier, but that most of the research is on the already skinny.

Here is an explanation related to flies: “In times of plenty, these super skinny, sleek and fast flies can easily get away from predators,” Graff adds. “But in times of shortage, they don’t make it.” I guess that's just more evidence that the svelte won't make it through the next ice age.

Lastly, here is another article that talks about a fat gene. Do we have both? And the final question is, why do we (and Americans in particular) think that any problem can be made to go away with the simple swallowing of a pill?

Scientology---Who Needs It?

That may be what the Belgians are asking. According to this article, the Belgians have been building a case against the Scientologists for 10 years.

In a previous post, Tangling With Tom, I linked and discussed a related article in which Germany was putting its foot down on Scientology---a battle I believe it has lost, since Tom Cruise will be starring in the debated movie. But the Belgians seem to be taking a bit more of a legal approach to the matter. The "Church" will be facing charges of fraud and extortion and probably a myriad of others (I imagine whatever they can conjure up).

I actually hope it works out and they can prove the illegality of something the "Church" is doing. I mean, there are almost 7 billion people and only 10 million of them think stealing money from brainwashed people is okay. Wait, I forgot all the lawyers, governments and their employees, unions, communists, and looters there are out there. Adjust numbers accordingly.

Failing To Understand

In this article posted on MSN today, we are informed as readers and would-be consumers that there are even more "green" cars out there than we know of. And why don't we know of them? Because we don't live in California. Apparently, the government won't allow automakers to sell the ultra green cars outside a few states---California, New York, and a couple others.

It isn't the fact that I can't get my hands on one of these cars because they aren't available here that bothers me. What does is that they aren't available here because the government won't allow them. Why won't they? It actually boggles my mind---we could be driving our zero-emissions cars up here too, helping Portland's other-than-pristine air conditions (and also put a stop to the SUV hypocrisy). Further, the car manufacturers could sell their product wherever they had a customer base...which I think would encourage them to produce more clean cars. In this case, they are doing two things at once---forbidding a manufacturer to sell a product, and forbidding a consumer to buy it. It leaves a bad taste in the mouth...

Corner Vendors

Here is what The Onion has to say about Portland's counterfeit market. Apparently, trafficking toothbrushes here is on par with watches, handbags and the like in LA or New York. Were it not reported on The Onion, I would actually believe it could be true, that and I've never seen any sort of counterfeit vendors in Portland. But I find it exceedingly funny when Portland is the subject of humor articles, be they true or false.

Now I'm REALLY Nerdy

While perusing around, checking out actors I would put in my movie if I were making The Fountainhead, I stumbled upon this quiz (which you can take by clicking at the bottom). How you may ask did I happen to find it? I was looking up the guy who played Wash in the Firefly series because I think he could do a good Howard Roark. Next thing I knew I was at the myspace page of the guy who played the captain. (No, I don't really understand what the percents mean...)

Your results:
You are Malcolm Reynolds (Captain)

Malcolm Reynolds (Captain) 85% Zoe Washburne (Second-in-command) 65% Alliance 60% Wash (Ship Pilot) 60% Derrial Book (Shepherd) 60% Jayne Cobb (Mercenary) 55% Kaylee Frye (Ship Mechanic) 55% River (Stowaway) 55% Dr. Simon Tam (Ship Medic) 45% Inara Serra (Companion) 35% A Reaver (Cannibal) 15%

Honest and a defender of the innocent. You sometimes make mistakes in judgment but you are generally good and would protect your crew from harm.

Click here to take the Serenity Firefly Personality Test

"I Mean To Misbehave"

I bought the collector's edition of "Serenity." You may remember me mentioning it before in a post called "Firefly, Serenity." I never get tired of that show, and since I'd only seen the movie from about the half-way point till the end, I decided I better see it again.

I haven't checked out all the special features yet. Though I mean to soon.

Here are some links to related information:
Review of the new release edition
Sequel? Joss' Post is a good click.
Whedon interview

Is it odd to get attached to something and wish there were more of it? Apparently not. Even, and especially, Whedon feels that way. In fact, I can definitively say that if I were super rich, I'd invest in getting the show back on the air---there are a lot of fans out there who would also like that. But that's me...