Back from the beyond

Month: May 2003 (Page 5 of 8)

King Ralph

When they announced that the Speaker of the House would be taking over for President Bartlet on “The West Wing,” I knew immediately it would be stunt casting. Little did I know how much of a stunt it would be.

John Goodman. First “King Ralph,” and now this.

I guess I should be pleased, since this whole “President’s daughter gets kidnapped plunging the world into chaos” thing does inject some juice into the show. But unlike J.J. Abrams’ stuff on “Alias,” this feels like a stunt and nothing more. A cool stunt, but a stunt. We’ll see.

Stocks and bonds

I’m sort of enjoying Blogshares again, based on 1) making a killing on Mike’s site, since his value shot up exponentially when he was linked from the Movable Type site, and 2) John and I becoming majority stockholders in Andrea’s site.

It’s the little pleasures, isn’t it?

But my problem now is, I have a fair amount of cash after selling my Epenthesis stock, and few places to put it. I’m having trouble finding weblogs I’m interested in that still have shares available for sale. Any stock tips, let me know.

Post – May 14, 2003

“The administration’s justification for immediate war has proven to be a false pretense, obviously and purposely fabricated. Ignoring that means it’s open season on the world. Anything can be justified. I mean, I could run out into the street with my shotgun right now and kill every drug dealer, junkie, and bum on my block. Crime will go down for a while. That’s a good thing, right? Ends justify the means, right? If we, in our minds, can accept this, then the tradition and values of this great nation have been dealt a far more damaging blow than a bunch of third-world idiots with body-bombs could ever deliver. Fuck Baghdad. Rebuild Detroit.”

If you’ve never read Mark Driver you’re missing out.

Post – May 14, 2003

Miss Anthropy asked God to eject Josh Gracin from “American Idol,” and she got her wish. I would never be so bold, but I sure hope Clay “If Strawberry Shortcake and KD Lang Mated” Aiken gets the boot tonight. That spiky hair and those fluttery eyelids are driving me mad. His “Vincent” ruined a beautiful song, and his “Mack the Knife” was embarrassing.

I want Ruben and Kimberley for the final two. Please.

Post – May 13, 2003

Rick Spence of HGTV’s “Curb Appeal” has earned my undying loyalty by using one of my favorite words of all time on his show: cattywampus. I’ve always thought he was nice to look at, and now I find out he’s a word person too (I’m convinced that only word people use “cattywampus” in conversation).

Rick, call me.

Post – May 13, 2003

“In order for the Democrats to win in 2004 they don’t need to adopt the policies of the Republicans. They need to adopt the personality of the Republicans.”

Insightful thoughts from Chris Andersen at Interesting Times. I’m quite skeptical that anyone can beat GWB in this insane climate, but I agree that we need someone with the courage of their convictions, and Howard Dean seems to have that. Andersen’s point is, people respond to those who are confident and assertive – that’s what won in 2000, not the policies.

If we’re not careful, we’ll end up with a moralizing milquetoast Bush supporter like Joe “Iraq Yes!” Lieberman, and lose anyway. He was second on a ticket that couldn’t capture Gore’s home state, and now he wants to be President? Dean looks better with each passing day.

The lottery

Talking with my friend Paul the other day, the subject of lotteries came up about three times in relation to unrelated subjects. This gave us the impression that it was a sign, and we should go out immediately and buy a lottery ticket.

Then we forgot. Damn.

But it got me thinking, as I have several other times in the past – what would I do if I won the lottery? That depends on the size of the winnings, of course. But what would you do if you had, say, $2 million free and clear (aka after taxes)? Let me know in the comments.

Quote of the Week

Quote of the Week

“Did you at least get their presents?”

-Howard Stern, interviewing teenage porn star Nikki Norwood, whose two sisters, aged 2 and 12, died as a result of a Christmas tree fire when Nikki was 9. Her manager is her father.

Happy Mother’s Day

Happy Mother’s Day

Since Amanda told some stories about her mom in honor of Mother’s Day, I thought I would do the same. Many people who know me already know this story, but it’s a good story, and it’s my site (see below), so here goes.

My mother spent much of her life traveling – car trips, cruises, and lots and lots of flying all around the world. But for some reason, when I was a teenager, she developed a crippling fear of flying, to the point of having to be given oxygen to calm her down. This was a serious problem, since she loved traveling.

In her own inimitable way, my mother decided that the only way she could cure herself of her fear was to learn to fly herself. She figured that if she knew what was going on with the plane, she wouldn’t be afraid. (I myself look at a 747 and am sometimes baffled that the giant metal thing flies through the air, thousands of feet up.)

So she started taking flying lessons. I remember her coming home with reams of weather charts that she had to learn to interpret. I think flying is cool, but the complexity (and danger, for that matter) is daunting to me. But my mother kept on.

And not only did she learn to fly and get her pilot’s license, but even more amazingly, it cured her of her fear of commercial flying forever.

My mother is a flat-out amazing woman – this story is just the tip of the iceberg. I love you, Mom.

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