T.O. to media and world "Getcha Popcorn Ready!"

T.O. leaves a note for reporters. I have got to say I haven't been this excited by a non-playoff game involving the Cowboys since they played the Niners in '94 and I was at the game. Sunday 2:15 MDT. The game is on. You know the rest... How bout them Cowboys?!!?11!!??

No Fall(Autumnlessness)

It looks like Baby Jesus or the Flying Spaghetti Monster, whoever runs this shit, has decided that we don't need any slow descent into winter here in the land of the blessed souls. It went from being hot to cold overnight at the beginning of September and is now starting to snow with regularity in the mountains. It was like 79 degrees in Boston for the game last night and it is freezing here. How is that fair? Fuck Boston. I haven't got my winter clothes out yet. I blame the Mormons, it is conference weekend, which made me late for work this morning. Thanks Baby Jesus.

There is no poem for losing fall but here are two haikus mourning the loss of summer. So here is my own contribution to haikudom.

AUTUMNLESSNESS

Mets miss playoffs, no
losses for the Cowboys yet
My life is a game

10 Lessons from the Road

I have returned to the land of salvation and sin. Road trips are grueling and this one was no exception. The overall effect is one of constant movement that still hasn't stopped. Here's the lowdown, last Thursday at 10:30 am we left the valley. Saturday at approximately 4:30 pm local time we arrived in Bradenton, Florida. Sunday was football day, Monday at 9:30 I was on a plane for JFK. After a brief layover I was headed back to SLC. By 4:30 I was back home and headed to the 7eo. So that is how far I have gone in under five days. What have you slackers been doing?

Trans-continental road trips can be instructive so I thought I would explicate some of the lessons I learned, or in some cases relearned.

LESSON #1: The first day always sucks. It is simply impossible to get your mind right before you are on the road. I suggest that in order to alleviate some of the difficulties you leave a day early and use it as a kind of warm up day. Obviously I will never do this because it would require planning that is beyond my capacity. The first day of this trip is indicative of the problems that can occur. First of all we were towing a U haul trailer with BBA's Hyundai Elantra. This made trekking over the Rockies a real joy. The normal 5 to 6 hour drive from SLC to Cheyenne took eight hours. We decided to find somewhere to sit down and eat, we looked for an Applebees because we had seen the sign upon exiting the freeway. We drove around for almost an hour before we stopped to ask someone where it was. If you don't know Cheyenne is small and in an hour we covered almost all of it except where the Applebees was located. Upon arriving at said Applebees, we decided to go to the Chilis across the street. We sat at the bar ordered a drink and our food. There was a nice woman who thoroughly enjoyed the fact that we had been lost in Cheyenne. We chatted with her for a few minutes and then Boom...The power on the whole block went off. They promptly told us to leave and we were still without sustenance. When the power went off I, in classic Chancelot mode, said, "Fuck it! I'm going to smoke and wait for Armageddon." After I leave the lady who had been laughing at us says to BBA, "Is he always like this?" To which he responded, "Oh this is nothing, you should see him in everyday life." or words to that effect. Which is funny because I was at that moment on the phone with my previous road trip partner, KJ, who was telling me, "You know sometimes you get grumpy when you travel." or words to that effect. This caused me to have an existential crisis, as I have said before introspection is not really my thing. This is all leading to...


LESSON #2: I do not deal well adversity. The above anecdote displays this trait quite accurately. While I do not generally completely fall apart I tend to adopt a "woe is me!" attitude which is rarely productive and in the worst case sends me into turtle mode. Mostly, this does not cause me many problems, but looking at my life I can see times where adversity has kicked my ass and my reaction has been inadequate or down right harmful. Anyway enough about me.

Lesson #3: Nebraska is way better at night. Nuff said.

Lesson #4: I am really good at driving across the country. I did some calculations and in the last 11 years I have driven from Salt Lake to the east coast or from the east coast to SLC 10 times. Five times heading east and five west. I have never received a speeding ticket or had an accident. Admittedly on this last trip I was encumbered by a trailer and couldn't speed if I had wanted to, but still that is pretty good, I think.

Lesson #5: Utah is not the only place you can see Bush/Cheney bumper stickers. I love the South, really I do.

Lesson #6: Road trips are better if you are with someone with whom you can have sex. I'm just sayin.

Lesson #7: KFC in KC delivers. Why can't this happen everywhere?

Lesson #8: You always get lost in the ghetto at least once. This time it was in St. Louis, where you can't make a left turn and we ended up in south STL looking for a gas station. The first place we stopped the local squiggey guy thought he knew BBA and said "Hey, Nathan..." before he realized it wasn't Nathan. I thought it was funny, BBA not so much. The gas pump we were trying to use was of course broken so we headed to East St. Louis and pulled over at a gas station next to Larry Flynt's Hustler Club on King's Highway. A really nice part of town.

Lesson #9: The south is sexually repressed. The adult supercenters that litter the highways really speak to the level of repressed sexuality in the Bible belt. Do these idiot Bible thumpers think that the .001% of the population that are atheists in the south support all these stores?

Lesson #10: Flying is not so bad. My flight home was quite enjoyable. I watched the West Wing for most of the way, thank you Jet Blue.

That's all.

OH NOES!!!1!!11! THE METS SUCK

The Mets have nearly played their way out of the playoffs. Losing a seven game lead in the last two weeks.

Despite this I am predicting the Mets win their remaining two games, and the Phillies lose their final two games.

Homer Warning: These may be the sad hopes of a completely exhausted man. I have been in a car for much of the previous forty hours.

Update: My laptop has MDT, it is actually later here in Georgia. Which means, not just for storytelling purposes, that morning is also earlier.

Road trip

BBA is out. Tomorrow we are heading to FLA. Really looking forward to driving thruogh Nebraska, really I am... I link to BBA's site even though he never blogs, hopefully he will keep us better informed of his antics when he is Florida.

I may or may not be blogging, while I am road tripping, we'll see???

Return of the No Fun League

T.O. gets fined for this? Goodell you are truly approaching David Stern-like assholeness... oh noes there it went!

The Pina Colada Song

The internet version, it really happened. The joys of marriage. Why do people barter sex(sometimes, I mean they are married) for endless misery and pain. Remember brothers and sisters, its a war. I'm just sayin'...Not that that I'm bitter;)

I just can't take it anymore (NFL picks)

Seriously, the Mets blow a three run twice in one game. If you didn't know, before this baseball season I have never been a passionate fan of the game. Don't get me wrong, I always cheered for the Mets but on a daily basis I did not follow the game until the playoffs. This year I have watched a majority of the Mets games and a lot of Yankees games. Now I know why I haven't invested my self in Baseball before. IT HURTS. It sucks when you watch a team implode right in front of your eyes. This team is clearly the best team in the NL but they can't even close out their division. So now I'm just waiting for the inevitable collapse in the playoffs. As if being a Jazz fan wasn't hard enough now I have to watch another team choke. Anyway, that's all.

Here are my NFL picks for the week.

Favorite					Final	Underdog		Pick Status	Game Details
	Indianapolis				6.0		HOUSTON	--	Sun, Sep 23 at 11:00 am
	NEW ENGLAND				16.5		Buffalo	--	Sun, Sep 23 at 11:00 am
	NEW YORK (NYJ)				3.0		Miami	--	Sun, Sep 23 at 11:00 am
	PHILADELPHIA				6.0		Detroit	--	Sun, Sep 23 at 11:00 am
	PITTSBURGH				9.0		San Francisco	--	Sun, Sep 23 at 11:00 am
	TAMPA BAY				3.5		St. Louis	--	Sun, Sep 23 at 11:00 am
	San Diego				5.0		GREEN BAY	--	Sun, Sep 23 at 11:00 am
	BALTIMORE				8.0		Arizona	--	Sun, Sep 23 at 11:00 am
	KANSAS CITY				3.0		Minnesota	--	Sun, Sep 23 at 11:00 am
	OAKLAND				3.0		Cleveland	--	Sun, Sep 23 at 2:05 pm
	SEATTLE				3.5		Cincinnati	--	Sun, Sep 23 at 2:05 pm
	DENVER				3.0		Jacksonville	--	Sun, Sep 23 at 2:05 pm
	Carolina				3.5		ATLANTA	--	Sun, Sep 23 at 2:15 pm
	WASHINGTON				3.5		New York (NYG)	--	Sun, Sep 23 at 2:15 pm
	CHICAGO				3.0		Dallas	--	Sun, Sep 23 at 6:15 pm
	NEW ORLEANS				4.0		Tennessee	--	Mon, Sep 24 at 6:30 pm

Its a dog week people.

Stoopid Republicans(mandatory Wednesday blogging)

I know everyone is probably wondering, "Chancelot, Why no NFL blogging?" (Not wondering? I am going to tell you anyway.) Two reasons: 1) I read too many football blogs so it seems as if I have nothing original to say. b) The above mentioned blog reading makes feel as if I am not as funny/insightful/good as the blogs in my blog roll who do the NFL.

For instance, HCIC on Belicheat/Spygate. KSK on the same topic.(Warning extremely funny.)

Too lazy to link to more posts, use the blog roll bitches.

But as you can see from this posts title that, brothers and sisters, is not why we are gathered here today. No we have come together to view in all its naked aggression and ugliness, the stupidity of the GOP, and I'm not even going to talk about the endless series of wars that Shrub is trying to get us involved in, Iran your next motherfuckers.

Here is a piece from earlier in the summer that I missed, apparently abortion is not only bad because of the baby killing but it also causes... wait for it... illegal immigration. Yes, so says Tom Delay.

"I contend [abortion] affects you in immigration," DeLay told the Washington-area gathering. "If we had those 40 million children that were killed over the last 30 years, we wouldn't need the illegal immigrants to fill the jobs that they are doing today. Think about it."

Yes, women, your ability to make choices in your life instead of being the mindless baby machines that Jesus intended you to be causes brown people to stream across the border. Wow, remember this was in front of the college republicans. Can't Delay be indited(again) for poisoning the youth or something. Thats what they got Socrates on right?

Also, remember Alan Greenspan, you know the Fed chair who endorsed Shrub's tax cuts for the rich. Well, apparently he is having second thoughts. Now, I'm no economist but I can't believe that cutting taxes for rich people, while continueing to subsidize their corporations raping and pillaging our country as well as Iraq(see: Enron, Halliburton, Blackwater USA.) had negative consequences. Really? This wasn't a good thing? Really? Thank you Mr. Ex-Fed Chairman, I would have never thought of that.... Except, wait a minute, I did think it was a bad idea. So did 460 economists, including 10 Nobel prize winners in economics. But they can't possibly know more than a C student who believes baby Jesus said "Let there be tax cuts." Ahh, certainty the hobgoblin of great minds...or something.

Here are some quick hits from the candidates for presidential candidates from the Stupid Old Party.

Romney: "Some people have said we ought to close Guantanamo. My view is we ought to double Guantanamo." How the fuck do we do that, oh I know lets invade Cuba.

Giuliani: "Freedom is about authority. Freedom is about the willingness of every single human being to cede to lawful authority a great deal of discretion about what you do." Orwell spoken here.

McCain: "F**k you! I know more about this than anyone else in the room." Grumpy little grandpa isn't he?

Romney: "My sons are all adults and they've made decisions about their careers and they've chosen not to serve in the military and active duty and I respect their decision in that regard. One of the ways my sons are showing support for our nation is helping me get elected because they think I'd be a great president." Thank you, Tag. You really are working for the country. Gotta love those Mormon family values.

Huckabee: "If a person dresses provocatively, they're calling attention -- maybe not the most desirable kind -- to private parts of their body." Oh, the 1950's were such a great time.

Note that none of these are malapropisms or solecisms. These are(theoretically) thought out statements made knowingly to the press. These people are unbelievable. Of course we already know who is going to get the Republican nomination. Ladies and gentlemen the Republican nominee for 2008!

Mets WTF??!!11!???

I'm with BMF. The Mets are scaring me to death. I can't take this shit I'm old. Please win today.

kthxbai

Happy Birthday to Me

Yes, once again the mostest specialest day of the year has rolled around. Of course, the party will be jumpin off at 6:00 MDT at the 7EO. If you can't make it leave a comment... or don't.

Patriot Act

Wow, the Patriot's have to cheat to beat the Jets. The NFL should take away one of Brady's babies.


Photo by Flickr user Silas216 used under a Creative Commons license.

Wednesday LOLCATS/Highlander blogging

THERE CAN BE ONLY ONE

Duck Teabags Cougar

This shit is funny. H/T Larry Brown Sports




The fuckin Duck got suspended. How do you suspend a mascot? Furthermore how do you suspend a duck for reversing the laws of nature and kicking a cougars ass. It's funny. Oregon U needs to relax.

Saving Lives(misanthropic wednesday blogging)

Linsay Beyerstein has a an interesting post about how easy it would be to stop deaths from the flu. I have no problem with her larger point, that we have the ability to drastically reduce the number of deaths from influenza. She ends the post with this.

"...it is utterly within our power to save roughly 28,000 lives per year, and yet we fail to do so."

Apparently the good of this end i.e. saving lives, is self evident. I, however, am not so sure. This kind of talk about "saving lives" inundates the media and our culture. It leads to Utopian programs like Zero Fatalities in my home state of Utah.

I suppose I have two problems with this, the first is grammatical/semantical and may be somewhat petty, but I still think it is valid.

There can be no such thing as "saving lives." What you can do is "save lives for now." I know it is difficult to comprehend, but no life is forever. Everyone dies. Therefore it should be known as "postponing death" not "saving lives." As far as the grim reaper is concerned if it is not one thing then it is another. The underlying implication of the "saving lives" formulation is that this is some kind of inherent good, which assumes that dying in particular time and place is better that at some other time and place. I don't know about ya'll, but I'm pretty sure death sucks no matter when it happens. Got that, Death Bad!

Or is it? Certainly, many of the presumed lives saved in programs such as vaccination and education programs to stop deadly behavior are going people of no particular worth, and may in fact be bad people. The argument that the next Einstein might die in a car wreck is specious. The next Ted Bundy might die as well, and given that of those of us who are still alive are mostly are flawed, corruptible and many times just bad, it would seem that these life saving programs do as much to deflate the quality of life as to increase it.

Now, obviously, I don't want to be the person deciding who life is worth saving and whose isn't but I not sure indiscriminate life saving is such an obvious good as it is made out to be. I'm just sayin'.

power outage

No electricity @ work. Boring, as a co-worker said " We can chain smoke and whack off." Which is about all we can do. no wait I can phone blog... WEEEEEE!!!1!!

Rocket Science

Apparently, there is a movie about high school debaters, called Rocket Science. It looks pretty good. Would it be too pathetic for me to go see a 9:30 movie by myself? Especially since this movie has a kind of chick flick feel to it...? It is an R movie so that means my main reason for not going to movies(Kids, yes kids. Why are they allowed outside?) is not a factor. And it has been commended as "sweetly nostalgic" and a must see for former debaters, like me. You did not know that level of geekiness was possible in such a sophisticated gentleman as myself, but alas it is true I was a high school debater. It was cool and made the hell of high school almost bearable. At any rate this is all the excitement in my life, besides watching the Yankees-Sox and the implosion of the Mets.

Speaking of the Mets... Ok, You're right let's not speak of the Mets.( Single tear runs down cheek.)

Here is the low down on the last night's game and 7EO antics. BBA left out the hilarious Rickey Henderson commentating on everything discussion. It went something like this...

Rickey as Weatherman: "Rickey says that this storm is gonna fuck your shit up."
RBR as Court TV guy: "Rickey doesn't believe Mike Vick is guilty, Rickey thinks he is getting railroaded. Rickey says, 'FREE OOKIE.'" Raises fist in air.
RBR as RBR: "Rickey believes Rickey can still be effective, Rickey is no Coco Crisp, but Rickey can still get down, ya dig?"
Or something like that.

Funny random video.



That's it brothers and sisters, until the next episode...

My fantasy

ronmexico'srapestand
QB	Ben Roethlisberger
WR	Hines Ward
WR	Andre Johnson
WR	Donte' Stallworth
RB	Shaun Alexander
RB	Laurence Maroney
TE	Reggie Kelly
K	Jason Elam
DEF	San Francisco

Those are my week one starters. I have Carson Palmer, Reggie Bush, Cedric Benson, Jamal Lewis, Deion Branch, and Maurice Morris coming off the Bench. My league is gonna be tough, but I like my Chances. How do you like my team name? I think it is lovely, and certainly fitting for the worst person ever.

Update: I'm gonna kick BBA's ass week one, you know it, kid. As you can see BBA now has a blog, He needs our support so lets all visit and encourage the noob. Holla!

Worst Person Ever

So, last night this guy told me, "Chancelot, when you get a few drinks in you are the Worst Person Ever." (dramatic pause)


Did you get that "EVER," not limited by time and space, mind you. So the rest of the night whenever I introduced myself I had to add WPE, as in "Hi, I'm Chance, The Worst Person Ever." Or when I was introduced to someone it was with the addendum, "WPE." Of course, some of you might remember the episode of The West Wing where Toby Ziegler, had to say "I work for the White House" after each time he said his name. This was kinda like that, but drunker and funnier. Being called the WPE actually seemed to intrigue the ladies, especially given my apparent soft and cuddly nature. Women love them an enigma. So I think I'm gonna stick with it, ya know see where it goes.

Also live fantasy draft at 3:30 MDT. May live blog it, may not. Either way I'll post my team later.

you gotta have fear in your heart

I thought I had alot to say, but not so much. Here is my empathy playlist.

1. Shane-Liz Phair, Whipsmart
2. Love/Hate transmission- Liz Phair, LizPhair
3. World without Tears- Lucinda Williams, Live at the Fillmore
4. Fuck the World-Tupac, Me against the World
5. Wagon Wheel- Lou Reed, Transformer
6. The Sun Also Sets- Ryan Adams, Easy Tiger
7. La Cienaga Just Smiled-Ryan Adams, Gold
8. Gun-Uncle Tupelo, Still Feel Gone
9. Somethings You Can't Take Back-Uncle Cracker, 72 and Sunny
10. Nobody Wants to go to the Moon Anymore- Kelly Willis, Translated from Love
11. Can't Complain- Todd Snider, Viva Satellite
12. Adrenaline and Heresy- Sun Volt, The Search
13. Don't Let the Bastards Get You Down- Kris Kristofferson, Broken Freedom Song:Live from San Francisco
14. I think I'll Just Stay Here and Drink- Merle Haggard, Lots of albums
15. New Years Day- Charlie Robison, Good Times

Remember, brothers and sisters, it can always be worse and frequently will be.

"Love / Hate Transmission"

I was a mess in my open eyed youth
I grew up thinking
What's good for one, oppresses the other
It's my turn, my life, my way, mine, me

It made me crazy
I couldn't fight it
I couldn't wait to get away
It's a war
With the whole wide world
It's a war
With the boys and girls
It's a war
And nothin's gonna change
And nothin's gonna change

It's sister and brother, mother and daughter
Father, son, husband, wife, thing

It's drugs, it's hunger
It's race, sex, and government
Any way you look at it, you're part of it, you know it

The wrong inside you, can't get it right
You might as well get on the train

It's a war
With the whole wide world
It's a war
With the boys and girls
It's a war
And nothin's gonna change
And nothin's gonna change

The screen is so white, and it's so big
It's hard to get over the feeling, you're losing your mind

You offer the usher your ticket
You open your soda, see what guy you're sitting behind

You get excited, the lights go down
You get a > on the plane

It's a war
With the whole wide world
It's a war
With the boys and girls
It's a war
And nothin's gonna change
And nothin's gonna change

It's a war
All the give and take
It's a war
All the love and hate
It's a war
And nothin's gonna change
And nothin's gonna change
And nothin's gonna change
And nothin's gonna change
And nothin's gonna change
And nothin's gonna change

Nothin's gonna change
Nothin's gonna change
Nothin's gonna change
Nothin's gonna change

Iraq is Arabic for Vietnam

The Decider has now embraced the Iraq/Vietnam analogy. Wtf???!?!?1? This has caused me endless cognitive dissonance, haven't we been told for five years that such comparisons were specious, defeatist, and indeed traitorous rhetoric that only full blown Comintern members would accept? Thankfully, I have Google to try and verify my suspicion.

Here is a sample of the writings explaining the wrongheadedness of the Iraq/Vietnam analogy.

• Remember when Colin Powell assured us that, unlike Vietnam, Iraq "is not a swamp that will devour us." Perhaps, he just meant that because it was the desert, it was quicksand that would devour us, which would explain why he has since claimed to be against the war in the beginning.
• Hitchens called it "an ex-analogy."
• Fred Kagan called it "A pernicious equivalence."
• In 2003, George C. Wilson explained the main difference between the two wars is a lack of Pentagon body counts.
• John McCain made this non sequitur in 2005, South Vietnam "never had a legitimate government in Saigon that the people believed in and trusted." Unlike the universally loved and supported government in Iraq.
• Here is one I missed, from Lieutenant Colonel Powl Smith in September 2004, "Iraq isn't Vietnam, it's Guadalcanal—one campaign of many in a global war to defeat the terrorists and their sponsors. Like the United States in the Pacific in 1943, we are in a war of national survival that will be long, hard, and fraught with casualties. We lost the first battle of that war on Sept. 11, 2001, and we cannot now afford to walk away from the critical battle we are fighting in Iraq any more than we could afford to walk away from Guadalcanal." The obvious implication being that if we had lost on Guadalcanal the Japanese would have occupied California in short order. I'm no expert, but from what I know of military history rarely is war decided by one battle. But, then again, after Little Big Horn the Sioux did lead a enraged Indian army straight to the Potomac, didn't they?

There are over 42,000,000 results if you Google "Iraq not Vietnam" so this is obviously a extremely truncated list, but you get the point.

The analogy Bush is trying to make is that if domestic political pressure(which is clearly influenced by the fifth column Stalinists who run rampant all over America) forced us to withdraw from Iraq then millions would die. The fact that this outcome was virtually guaranteed by the invasion of Iraq does not deter him from demonizing critics of his endless series of wars strategy. Jim Henley points out that in Vietnam "millions died while we were there." The same is true in Iraq, tens of thousands are dying and being displaced while we are there. So will any of our intrepid MSM reporters point this out to Bush? No. The media will kowtow and continue to regurgitate the administrations press releases and disserve the American people. Which is, as Norman Solomon points out, one way that Vietnam and Iraq are certainly similar. Money shot.

War after war, decade after decade, the U.S. news media have continued to serve those in Washington who strive to set the national agenda for war and lay down flagstones on the path to military intervention.
From the U.S. media’s fraudulent reporting about Gulf of Tonkin events in early August 1964 to the fraudulent reporting about supposed Iraqi weapons of mass destruction in the first years of the 21st century, the U.S. news media have been fundamental to making war possible for the United States.

The wingnuts who, from an undisclosed location, continually tell us that the liberal media are undermining the war have exceedingly short memories. The beauty of this is, of course, that the warmongers who bravely sit in front of their computers and insist that others die in service of an impossible goal for dubious reasons also get to falsely harangue the commie news media in an effort to stir up support among their base.

White People...Please!

Head Chick has a hilarious post. (Rick James Voice)Read it, bitches.

Max Roach Dies

Max Roach ,the drummer of the best Jazz band ever.

Life sucks(news not good)

This isn't a complaint, just an observation. It is not even my life that sucks at this moment. That probably makes it worse, the cynicism and fatalism that help me survive are of no use when the tragedy is someone else's.

"news not good" is what the text said. I knew exactly what had happened. I didn't want to know, I felt such anger and sadness. It sucks.

Bonds is the greatest

I was all alone, at my favorite watering hole, cheering for Bonds when he Hit #756. So much so that the manager threatened to 86 me. Not because I was loud mind you, just because he is a hater. But I think Matt Yglesias has it just right.

"He is, in short, the greatest offensive player in the history of baseball....Yes, it appears that during the period when Major League Baseball had no steroid policy, he took steroids. And the day when MLB invalidates all the other records from the Steroid Era -- rescinds the World Series titles and the division penants, takes back the Cy Young awards and the Golden Gloves, etc., etc., etc. -- I suppose it would make sense to take Bonds' achievements away too. But until that happens, the records are the records and he played better than anyone else."

Remember ,brothers and sisters, steroids were not against the rules of MLB.