Trav?

As it has been nearly 4 months since your last post, those of us here in Texas are worried about you and yours. Are the bugs still noisy? Are the squirrels still nutty?

Sabado Gigante es la mas loca

So I wanted to see the candidate interviews on Sabado Gigante but an hour a fourty five minutes into a three hour show, there had been three musical guests, a number of things that I wasn't sure were skits or audience participation or some sort of contest, and then at least one tear-jerking interview... no sign of the candidates. So I switched over to the last Scooberang for October.

There are a number of places I can now take this. I'll choose "D" all of the above.

a) When I did the shift before the Navrang show, it would be both the 1-4 AM shift AND the 4-7 AM shift because they couldn't get four DJs. No one ever appreciated it. Maybe it was because I played all the Beatles, Pink Floyd, CCR, REM, U2, Greenday, ORB, Clash, King Missle, and Ramones in the stacks. But for god sakes, they had it on vinyl! They had records from the 60's that were probably worth something and when I played them on the air, they would disappear the next weekend. This is what I grew to really dislike about KTRU. They were alt-culture snobs. Obscure = good and the program manager = holier than thou. Well congratulations, Mr. alternative guy... urban outfitters is very popular now.

B) Remember when Scooby got elected president of Cartoon network? Don't blame me, I voted for Blossom. I would prefer president Scooby to either of the candidates, really. The only thing that would be dicey is secretary of defense Scrappy Doo. I mean... Scrappy might advocate an immature beligerent policy of pre-emptive war. Oh wait.... nevermind.

C) Watching hours and hours of Scooby Doo. I think about all the ranting that I have done on this topic. Really, I have nothing left to say about it. Scooby Doo... it is what it is. Its a monument to a mediocre idea that just kept going and going and going. People kept buying it, like Velveeta. And you know what? There are some times when nothing else will Doo.

D) Remember when Gillis kicked KTRU off the air and locked out the station? Scooby Doo would have handled it much better. Can you imagine if Gillis had be President of the United States and decided to lock out NBC because he didn't like them not pre-empting coverage of the pre-emptive war for more reruns of the 12 Ghosts of Scooby Doo?

elm sucks!

PINE RULES!

Two Hours to Vote!

That's a long time to wait. I would guess that at least 600 people votes in that period and at least that many were behind me. That is an amazing showing for one of the least competive districts in the country.

I was going to write about how my blog is typical

Of the type of blog that people don't like. Then I Googled what types of blogs people don't like and it turns out I was wrong.

Here's what I thought:

1. My blog is random. It has no theme.
2. I am a big nobody. Scratch that. I'm just nobody. I could be somebody if my blog had a theme. I could be the official blog of "Cognitive Science majors who became IT managers and parents and who are going to law school at night." Then if anyone wanted to know what that sort of person was "like" they could read my blog.
3. I don't talk about cogntive science, or law, or parenting. At least not in any meaningful way.

Here is why I was going to say that is stupid.

1. People aren't shopping for blogs about particular themes. People are either finding their friend's blog and reading them or they are googling about "whatever" and if it happens to hit a blog, fine.
2. I do talk about Cognitive Science, and IT, and Law, and parenting. All of those things go into every blog entry one way or another.
3. In 1992, I was highly annoyed that nobodies got to post on usenet. Particularly when I was trying to be serious but then it quickly became clear that This was just a bunch of sophmoric nonsense

I was also going to say something like:

*When the internet is free, Caveat emptor.
*The internet is not free. You pay for access and advertisers pay for web sites.
*Advertisers pay for TV also.
*Help America, go buy something.

Then I was going to make a joke-- "Knock knock, who's there, blogsaremoreofthesame"






But it turns out that people are already saying stuff like this. So there is no point for this post.




Anyway, that is not why I put up this blog. I put up this Blog because I found the Elkridge Hollerer so funny that I wanted to counter-point it. It's a black background with white text. Mine in black on white. It's well organized. Mine is a mess. His allows comments. My comment is "get your own blog" or "Join me!"

Then after a while, I just think. "Hey that's a blog entry" and there you go.

Well... apparently a lot of blogs get going this way, so why not mine. That's rhetorical. A lot of blogs get started this way, and mine did too.

And so what if I'm not the famous William li. I've emailed the famous William Li and he is way cooler than me anyway.

If I have one regret, it is that in 1994, I did not scope out william@hotmail.com because I thought "Check email on the web? Who the hell would want to do that! The only way to read email is with elm"

Awwwwwww, Never mind

Will, I was going to pick on you for spelling sherbet "sherbert", but it turns out both are acceptable spellings.

Damn.

orange october

October is a time of orange. Like Dave and Brian Knowles and pumpkins and traffic cones. And sherbert. Don't forgot sherbert.

Superheros cast their ballots

Click here first if you have lived your whole life reading nothing but library books or are from Europe and don't know the different between DC and Marvel.

This came up today at work. Here are the rules:

1. For purposes of this discussion, its 2004 US Presidential contest only.
2. Question is for whom would the superhero vote? Party affiliation is relevant for context but does not answer the question.
3. Superhero must have a human persona.
4. Superhero can be Marvel or DC only
5. Eligibility to vote is an arguable point.


Consensus

Clark Kent always votes for the incumbent. So it is W. for Superman.

Peter Parker is a liberal journalist from New York. He's pro-Kerry.

No Consensus

Bruce Wayne split the panel. Some people pointed out that he was a rich industrialist and would vote for Bush. I pointed out that he despises the abuse of power and could never do that and would vote for Kerry. One person suggested that Kerry was the real Batman. The answer that seemed to have the most traction is that Caped Crusader would probably not leave the batcave to vote.

Not eligible to Vote

Aquaman

Did not come up, but here is what I think

Logan. He's Canadian, don't you know?

Snagglepuss would vote for Ralph Nader. He liked Ralph in the Green party, as a libertarian even. What do you mean, Snagglepuss isn't a Superhero? Heavens to Murgatroid! Exit stage left...

But I listen to NPR every day!

So I am one of the adult advisors for the Senior High youth group at our church. Tonight, we did a current events photo quiz for the kids, filled with political figures, as well as sports pop-cultural, and church figures. Sad to say, but I got more of the pop-culture ones correct than the political figures. And sadder still (or perhaps a great hope for the future), the kids knew more of the political figures than me.

I blame KUHF's annual fund drive for limiting my news coverage this week.

Oh, and I blame radio for being audio and not visual as well. When will we get the car radios with video screen - popping up an apropriate still image as a hologram projected onto the road ahead? On second thought, maybe that is not the great idea I think it is. Hmmmmmmmm........

The Scotsman - International - Household chores set to end at last with rise of the robot

The UN thinks its 1955

Beep beep beep beep this newsreel brought to you in cinescope... in the future flying jet cars will smell like flowers as they speed through the air... Rosie the robot isn't affordable... yes she is, just pay with credit card... and even the traffic court judge has to stop for a commercial.

Jane, stop this crazy thing.

Sigh....

The worst part about it is that we will hear about this forever. Anyone from Boston will be all, "2004 Sox... Shilling" Blah blah blah

At least I won't feel conflicted about rooting for the 'Stros... or the NL

C'mon Bletran... let's do it.

Speaking of the Red Sox

I hate most recordings of "The Impossible Dream (The Quest)"

normally sung by some middle-aged lothario (Elvis, that means you) bellowing in long sustained notes, backed by strings, and a halleujia chorus.

Talk dreadfully misinterpreting a song.

Don Quixote knows that he is not really Don Quixote but an impotent old man.
Don Quixote realizes that his death his near, that we die alone, and is terribly afraid.
Despite this, he acts as is he is brave and has faith. In doing so faith and courage are given to him

The movie gets it right, mostly on the strength of the sad, sunken eyes of Peter O'Toole.

Go Yankees!

ESPN.com - MLB - Game Update

Don't dis the Shatner

Ben Folds is the king of wus punk. Therefore coming out with an album called has been seems like a dis on James Tiberius Kirk aka Tiberius James Hooker aka Bill Shatner.

Don't dis the Shatner. Go back and watch his work in context. He had no budget, no peers, no nothing. Only his wigged out craft and millions of Sci-fi fans with not poetry in the soul, unbeknownst to them.

Shatner was my favorite mystery celebrity on TV PIX (you really have to fish around in this link, be patient but I also have very fond memories of Paula and Carole and their insane pink squirrel). I loved it when the danger that the plot had dished up would get so ridiculous that Shatner would just look right at TVland, hold his NexTel phone next to his mouth and say the corny line that the writers put down with a "can you get a load of this nonsense?" flair.

I think that the reason Big Marty somehow convinced me that it was a good idea to catch speeding bikes by the handle bars with no protective gear was because I was inspired by Shatner jumping on the hood of cars, grabbing the windshield wipers and hanging on for dear life.

You know ladies and gentlemen, T.J. Hooker clinging the the front of a speeding car while the incompetent forces of evil try to eject him with a combination of swearing and wiper fluid... its a metaphor for life. That's where we all are, like it or not.

By the way, if someone jumps on your car, you have to stop and let them out or else its an intentional tort for wrongful imprisonment. See Noguchi v. Nakamura, 2 Haw. App. 655 P.2d 1383 (1982) (holding that suddenly dumped boyfriend nevertheless had to stop and let his let his ex-girlfriend out of his car).

So anyway, don't dis Shatner.

This is what the public took away from the third debate?

You must be joking that poll Shows Disapproval of Cheney Daughter Reference after the final question "Yo, candidates talk about your wives!" Featured Bush saying, "My wife speaks English better than I do."

Hello? How does a xenophobic smear against Kerry's wife go unnoticed?

It comes down to this: the GOP candidate saying something that ranges from merely culturally insensitive to totally bigoted goes unnoticed because saying comments so painfully offensive that you just assume its a malapropism is a GOP stock-in-trade. But to have a VP who loves all of children, even if he is supposed to disapprove is Earth-shattering.

It raises uncomfortable questions because it challenges our assumptions.

That said, I do not believe that the Cheney's are "feining outrage." At some point, the posture on this issue became "No I'm not ashamed that my daughter is gay nor do I want to discuss it." From the ferocity of the response, from Mrs. Cheney, I get the sense that this wasn't just public posturing. This is the way that polite people agree to disagree.

It so happens that the issue is homosexuality, but the issue can be anything. Have you ever known friends where one person was a Rangers fan and the other an Islanders fan? What can not be discussed with or amongst their peers? The NHL. Normally this works out fine because they happened to be part of the same quilting bee and so they can instead talk about something else like handicraft or who shot Lincoln. They can even have strenuous disagreements about other things without hurting their friendship. But when the conversation turns to the icing rule, you quickly change the topic to something lighter, for example containing the spread of Anthrax amongst sheep populations during the settlement and domestication of the American west.

Sometimes the cognitive dissonance becomes overwhelming. Sometimes you have to talk about the white elephant in the room. Other times it's just rude.

I guess the public has decided that bringing up this up is rude while the whole, "my wife speaks good English" thing is ok.

<>

3 of 4 - the greatest blog ever!

Louren, they prefer to call themselves importers of "Asian aficionados"

3 of 4 rules!

Pork!

Tax breaks for NASCAR track owners? Talk about special interest group. And importers of Chinese fans? I especially like the part about foreigners who win at the dog and pony tracks here.

Too tired to dig

Sorry Will, not going to dig into this any further. Just want to say that obviously when Bush doesn't have somebody writing his every word, or a teleprompter to read off of, he can't even remember who he is running against. Even his nephew George P. Doesn't seem to have high expectations for Dubya's debate performances, as evidenced by his commentary from the first debate. Well, at least he is proud of his uncle for not pulling a Gerald Ford.

Why the president didn't want to do the town hall meeting

I'll let Louren dig into this. I admit, Kerry seemed to fight cleaner this time (he must have read my blog) and Bush seemed to be petulent and unhinged. I'm sure that it comes as no surprise to anyone that politics is a game for keeps and that feelings run hot. Still, Bush's animosity toward Kerry was so apparent that at one point he called him Kennedy (that's the GOP equivalent of calling someone Satan)

Once again, I doubt it matters. The President showed what a class act he was in the first campaign calling some reporter a "major league a**hole" and people ate it up.

In scanning some of the newsfeeds, the pundits are even saying that appearing in front a room full of ordinary Americans and totally losing your cool is somehow better than his peformance. Incredible.

Why doesn't SONY market this great stuff in the US?

The VAIO type U is much closer to what I want than the dreadfully unoriginal tweener-rehash about which I have already complained

Sony made some different design decisions than I would have made based on their usage scenarios of "on the train", "in a box with a fox", "in love with a doofus". I have a tremendous respect for the industrial designers at Sony and conceed that they probably do know better than me what I would like out of my ultraportable.

For the record, the big changes are:

1. I don't really want it to have a dockable cell phone as much as I really want it to be walkman or portable TV that I can keep in my coat pocket.

2. When I am not in the office, I will hold the thing with two hands like a gameboy and punch in the secret pattern with my thumbs (Toward, Down, Down-Toward, Toward + A)

The big things that are exactly what I said I wanted was:

1. Better ergonomics for viewing, using, and not holding against your face
2. Nice pen interface
3. Good price

The strange and beautiful life of Rodney Dangerfield

One of the last great stalwarts of old-school stand-up has died. When Rodney Dangerfield was young and arrogant and 19, he set out for upstate New York to become a great comedian. He was mediocre to poor, so he married the signer and moved to New Jersey to sell paint and siding.

People have to suffer for great art. Suffering takes on many forms. Living in the Suburban purgatory of Englewood New Jersey through the "Happy Days" years was Rodney Dangerfield's liminal state. He emerged from that dark place a changed man.

Rodney now had a beautiful gift: insult everyone and then insult yourself worse. Rodbey Dangerfield was the king of making people laugh at him. The jokes would flow, enticing you forcing you really to laugh at, not with, him. Cruel humor, dredged up from an ugly part of human nature brought crashing down upon his head, a self-inflicted wound: the verbal equivalent of the carnival self-immolation artist.

Go and rent Back to School and remember: "you're a Melon".

Rodney died of a broken heart. He is survived by three wifes, the last of whom loved him dearly.

John Edwards, I am your father...

At one point in the debate Darth Vader matched up the similarities between him an John Edwards. "I came from modest means, my mother was a slave until I won the pod race, then I was in a Union: the Jedi Electrical Workers, I was in the hospital without health insurance, so it is with a heavy heart that I must chop off your forearm with my light saber."

Then John Edwards did the StopGraspOk sequence
hand gesture (nice to see that cognitive science is still alive)and said "Blah blah blah"

"William, you are confusing facts with fictional words with your bizarre vision of the way you think the world should be."

Me and the candidates both.

It's Calista Flockhart's fault

Everything that is wrong with the entertainment industry today is Calista Flockhart's fault. Television shows that suck, the downfall of Harrison Ford's career (and thus the downfall of the entire film industry), and the current sucky state of pop music as a whole. I even blame her for Seussical. I am not sure why, but I just know it is her fault as well. With that, and the final removal of CATS (no longer now and forever at the Winter Garden Theater - thanks to Calista), Broadway is even feeling the effects of Ms. Flockhart. Heck, wasn't she responsible for all the trouble Xena faced?

Leave Dad out of this.

MSNBC - Presidential debate: "You know, the president's father did not go into Iraq, into Baghdad, beyond Basra. And the reason he didn't is, he said he wrote in his book because there was no viable exit strategy. And he said our troops would be occupiers in a bitterly hostile land.
That's exactly where we find ourselves today."

While this analysis is both correct and relevant, within this comment are certain assumptions that show both why Kerry is going to lose and what's wrong with the power brokers within the DNC generally.

For the true Blue, this sort of statement is a knockout punch, "Your Dad was a terrible president and you are not even as good as him."

But even those who are merely moderately left of center recognize this as a cheap-shot on the level of "you are so ugly that when you were a baby your mama had to tie a porkchop to your ugly face so that the dog would play with you."

Those who are in the middle might also understand how this sort of remark is the worst kind of arm-chair quarterbacking.

There is no such analysis on the right. Social Conservatives adore Bush and loathe all Democrats on principal. Fiscal Conservatives distrust Kerry and are seem willing to forgive extremely bad fiscal policy. Hybrid conservatives both love Bush personally and actually do believe that the world is a safer place and that the economy has improved, at most willing to blame foreign countries for any problems we may have (as in: stupid U.N., if they want elections to go well in Iraq they should help rather than say its not going to work) The point here is that these people will never, ever, change their mind and vote for a democrat no matter how blandly moderate the Democratic party tries to present him, so don't bother. I call this the theory of "No Clinton Republican counter-weight to Reagan Democrats".

This brings me to the 2nd point: What went wrong with the Democratic nomination process? We didn't end up with the more obvious Edwards-Kerry or Dean-Kerry ticket, which means that something went badly wrong.

The DNC should have stopped Gephart from his murder-suicide attack on the Dean campaign. Clinton should have beat Gore to the punch backing Dean or maybe Edwards, rather than put up Clark (who isn't even a real Democrat)
The Democrats should never allow more than three candidates in their primary.
Super Tuesday, not Iowa should be the key contest for the nomination.

Finally: stop nominating boring moderates - Kerry, Gore, Dukais, and Mondale are all excellent candidates for vice-president. Who should the Democrats nominate? Here are some suggestions:

1. Former professional baseball players, preferably from the Midwest. Bill Bradley would have also been acceptable.
2. Steve Jobs
3. Ewan McGregor or Sean Connery (shut up, I know)
4. Lead singler of an Evangelical Christian-rock Band. Bono would also work (shut up! I know!)
5. Christopher Reeves (no one is going to vote against Superman). Bruce Springsteen would also work.
6. Oprah Winfrey

Wait a minute... At 1 AM, I write this blog more or less extemporanously. President Oprah is a brilliant idea.

Both parties could nominate Oprah and then the contest would be over the VP.

Would it be Winfrey-DeLay or Winfrey-Biden?

Wow! What a great contest that would be.