6/21/03
That's the answer to "Why is there a Mother's Day and a Father's Day but there's not a Children's Day?
Today
Andy and I went over to Heidi's to get the tops switched on my car, and
wound up taking Sorena with us for the rest of the afternoon, which wasn't
exactly a hardship and was, well, my idea. First stop after removing the
top was Home Depot, where I bought a 9x12 plastic tarp for 97 cents (including
tax!), which I will keep in the car for those days when I have the top
down and Mother Nature wants to mess with me. I've already fooled Mother
Nature with a tarp; two years ago I was at Heidi's after a day of fun
in the sun, and we were simply too tired to put the top back up, so I
took the tarp, spread it over the car and closed the doors to keep it
from blowing away. Sometime after dinner, Heidi came running into the
room where I was working on my computer to tell me it was pouring out
and I needed to put the top up. Big smile, no worries, onto something
else.
Today,
though a black stormcloud threatened to rain on us, it did no more than
drop a few drops and move on, leaving a cool breeze in its wake. After
getting the tarp, went for lunch. Sorena had strawberries and whipped
cream—far more than her mother would let her have. Can't help it;
my job is to spoil the children in my life and listen to their parents
complain that I am spoiling them. Then it was off to a park, where apparently
everyone in the entire county had also gone, as again, this was the
first effing dry weekend in like, two months. Tomorrow is supposed
to be sunny as well, which is good. I'm going to a picnic.
When we tired of being outdoors, we headed back to my apartment, where at my doorstep was my copy of Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix, straight from Amazon.com (thanks again, April!). "You're so lucky!" Sorena said. She was sure her copy was not going to arrive on time. She was right, as we found out later. She read the first two and a half chapters while we were driving out to get dinner, and also while she was just enjoying reading in The Chair That Swallows You Whole, cuddling with her new friend, Andy. I checked email while they were vegging. I am days behind, and likely to remain so for another day or two, sorry, the world intrudes.
Back to Sorena's after dinner (Popeye's, the best fast-food fried chicken) and an episode or three of Spongebob or whatever was on Nick, to pick up my Jeep's windows, which we had left there due to space limitations. The windows are on, so of course it won't rain for quite some time, but at least I won't be driving to Busch Gardens next week with the wind whipping my hair in my face. Too much of it is not long enough to tie back, and even the stuff that gets tied back refuses to stay in a tie no matter what I do. It's fine but thick, a seeming contradiction, but there you have it.
I lent Sorena my Harry Potter book. She insisted she could wait until Monday, but after all, she is nine, and I am not. Of the two of us, I do believe I'm the one who can wait until Monday to find out what happens next. Of course, I did grab the book from her and read two-plus chapters while she was watching Nickelodeon, so I know a little bit about what's going on. (J.K. Rowling used the word effing in the book. How about that?) As for the rest, well, when you see a nine-year-old trying hard to cover her disappointment and pretend that she doesn't mind if you take away the book she's been waiting three years for, there's no way in hell you can resist giving it to her. In fact, as I write this, she is probably sitting in her top bunk bed with her booklight on, two or three chapters further into the book, happy as can be. I think I got the better end of the deal, because she made me smile for hours this afternoon, and I'm smiling at the picture in my head of my "niece" reading my book.
Kids are great. permalink
And a prize to the first two hundred people who recognize which song lyric the title was taken from. I'm going to guess that none of the winners will be under thirty.
Anyway. Look here. This is the first decent day in weeks. We have had nine rainy weeks in a row, with only a few sunny days in between. Today? No humidity, no clouds, no rain, nothin' but sun. I am heading over to Heidi's in a few minutes to take off the Jeep's hard top and put the soft top on, though I don't think I'll be putting the soft top up. The odds are with me weather-wise, so I think I'll be riding topless for some time to come. (I so love to type that phrase, and get such a kick out of the free pr0n searchers that click on it and arrive here. Sorry, dudes, pictures to come later. Ooh, that oughta bring even more hits.)
I may not get back here for days. You never can tell what will happen once I'm on the highway with the wind in my hair. permalink
6/20/03
The depravity of the terrorists
A double-bomb attack was prevented by alert Israeli soldiers Friday morning.
Around 6am Friday morning, as Palestinian workers walked to work at the Gush Katif settlements, a disaster was averted when soldiers noted a bicycle parked suspiciously near the path they were using.
The soldiers cleared the area and blew up the bicycle in a controlled explosion.
The army then discovered a second bomb, a large 20kg explosive device, near the bicycle. According to Israel Radio, the device was to explode when aid workers arrived at the scene in the wake of the bicycle bomb.
Nobody was injured in the failed double attack.
This is Israel's reward for beginning to fulfill her obligations on the so-called road map. It was doubtless meant to be Colin Powell's usual welcoming blast. Instead, they had to settle for a shooting that murdered only one. And wounding two—both Americans. They were his parents. The Roadmap to Murderville continues. permalink
RJM over at The Illiterati wants to know if I know why the Hulk's pants don't split off his body the way the rest of his clothes do when he changes from Bruce Banner to the Hulk.
Of course I know the answer.
Nowadays, of course, the Hulk has Reed-Richards-designed pants made from unstable molecules, the same material that allows Mr. Fantastic to keep his pants on when he stretches hundreds of feet. But the answer to why Hulk's pants always seemed to be purple, no matter what color pants Banner was wearing, and why all the rest of his clothes splits and falls off, but the purple pants merely grow ragged and stretch to fit, is this:
It's a kid's comic book. He can't lose his pants or it'd have to be printed in adult magazines, and there would go the target market. Or they'd constantly have to have Hulk hiding his nether regions behind cars or vases of flowers or magazines, like they do with pregnant actresses in TV shows when they don't want to write in the pregnancy. A Hulk fight really wouldn't be nearly as fun if he had to keep on holding onto the cars instead of lifting them up to throw onto a group of soldiers who are shooting at him.
I think you should really ask Peter David. He wrote the book for twelve years, after all. permalink
The Space Ghost Group at Mac Thomason's
Today at Mac's: The Space Ghost Group, featuring Captain Euro, and with special guest star, The Incredible Hulk. Who brought movie clips. Very funny. permalink
Hulk smash Hulk! Hulk review Hulk movie!
Actually, I'll let Hulk take over after a bit. Fair warning: Don't read if you don't want spoilers.
Now, Ang Lee is a damned good director. And I could see what he was trying to do with the split-screen scenes that looked like comic book frames. But, well, here's the thing: If you have to take an hour to explain a comic book character's origin in a movie, you have let the wrong person write the script, and you have handicapped the director. C'mon, people, It's the effing Hulk. Junk science is still junk science. Whether you say he got his powers due to exposure from a gamma bomb while saving Rick Jones, or because his father passed along mutant DNA through experimenting on himself and it came out with exposure to gamma rays in the lab, it's still crap science. Nobody really believes it. It's an effing comic book, you idiots!
My tip for enjoying the movie: Arrive half an hour late. Maybe even forty minutes or an hour late. The second half was mostly action-packed, and woke up the moribund children in the audience who were all wondering if this was the Hulk movie, where was the Hulk? But the first half, they all told me, was booooo-ring.
I liked the CGI. Definitely better than Spider-Man. I'll be taking my former students to see the film, and I'll probably wind up buying it, but that's because I'm a Hulk fanatic and I intend to skip over all the boring scenes. And wow, did Jennifer Connolly model her acting on a mannikin, or what? She stunk in every scene except for the ones where she had no words. She has talent? Coulda fooled me.
And now, the second half of this review. (I tried to get him to call me by my name, but hey, you go argue with the Hulk.)
Hulk take girl to movie. Boy try to make Hulk pay for popcorn. Hulk threw boy into popcorn machine and got Hulk-size bag. Then Hulk and girl sit down. People not sit near Hulk, except for boys with long hair and big stomachs. Hulk not like boys. Think they will talk through movie. Better not.
Movie start. Movie boring. No see Hulk. See man who played Hulk on TV years ago, and man who wrote Hulk comic books. Puny humans, boring. Long time. Hulk yell to movie-man he bored, make it go faster. Nobody answer Hulk.
Finally, Hulk see Hulk on screen. Hulk bigger than that! Hulk can take that Hulk. Hulk roar louder, too. Hulk show girl, girl cover ears and ask Hulk to stop. Puny girl. Hulk in movie smash room with machines. Hulk like that. Hulk has done that before. Then Hulk goes to girl's house in woods. That girl Betty, not girl Hulk go to movie with. Hulk like Betty. Should have taken her to movie. Betty in movie boring. Not like real Betty at all. But Hulk in movie like that Betty. Well, she pretty. Movie Hulk save Movie Betty from big, ugly dogs. One dog has fur all cut funny. Girl say dog is poodle. Hulk not like poodle. Glad Movie Hulk smash poodle. Movie Hulk smash all dogs. Hulk not know how many. More than two. Girl wants to know why Movie Betty have such big house on grad student salary. Hulk not know. What student? Girl also want to know how Movie Banner (puny Banner! Hulk hate Banner!) have such great house, too. Hulk not know that either, tell girl to shut up. Boys with big stomachs tell girl to shut up, too. Hulk looks at them, and they shut up.
Movie spend too much time on puny Banner. Soldiers catch Banner and put him in tank, but Hulk rescues Banner, like Hulk always does. Hulk smashes tanks. Hulk smashes helicopters. Stupid soldiers think they kill Hulk, but all they do is knock rocks on Hulk. Rocks can't kill Hulk. Hulk is the strongest one there is.
Hulk fight lots of soldiers. Hulk beat them all. Then Banner's father do something strange. He try to absorb Hulk's powers. Hulk not know that Banner's father Crusher Creel. Hulk thought Crusher Creel was just stupid man who did not like Hulk. Hulk think that not right. Movie father not right. He look funny, too. Hulk think Movie Banner's father sick.
Movie Hulk have purple pants, just like real Hulk. Hulk like purple pants. Everyone look good in purple pants. Hulk fought Thing once, beat him, made him wear purple pants and get picture taken so Hulk can show Thing next time we fight. Orange and purple look good together. Movie dogs must have ripped purple pants off Hulk in fight, 'cause puny Banner not wearing any pants when fight is done. Girl say she like that scene. Boys with big stomachs make too much noise when she say that, Hulk move their seats to side of room. They stay there 'til Hulk and girl leave.
Soldiers think they kill Hulk at end of movie, but that not true. Soldiers never beat Hulk. Hulk always wins in the end. Hulk will be back next time. Hulk would like to fight Movie Hulk. Hulk bored now. Girl talk.
I got him not to hurt the fanboys too much, but yeah, listening to them overanalyze the movie while it was going on was a bit much. Alas, the Hulk film was a little too disappointing. Really, an hour of yapping before the real action starts? It'll have a good opening, but Marvel's going to be disappointed with next week's box office, I think. That's too bad.
They really need to hire Peter David to write the script. Or Joss Whedon. Or both. Now that would be a good team. permalink
Scientology: Impossible to ignore
It's the shit-for-brains problem. Tom Cruise is lobbying the White House to try to get favors for the shit-for-brains who follow this "religion." I tried to let it slide. Can't do anything about the scientologists, too many people are too craven, hell, they even scared the IRS into doing what they wanted—partly achieved by harassing the agent investigating their case. (You can look it up; I did, years ago.)
The Church of Scientology’s Top Gun has been lobbying the White House. Tom Cruise has been meeting with officials from the Department of Education and lawmakers at the White House, reports the Washington Post, and a source says he believes that Cruise is hoping to get government funding for the church.
Because, like, that wouldn't be a violation of the Establishment Clause at all, no.
“TOM IS A big believer in the teaching tools of Scientology and has spoken in the past about how it cured his dyslexia,” says alternative religion expert Rick Ross. “It looks to me like he is seeking federal funds for Scientology schools under President Bush’s Faith-Based Initiative."
Shame it couldn't fix his marriage. You'd think if scientology could cure dyslexia—an incurable disease—it could at least work as well as a decent marriage counselor.
Ross also says that Cruise is appealing to the Bush administration to pressure some European countries to ease up on their anti-Scientology policies — just as John Travolta lobbied the Clinton administration.
You mean like Germany, which refuses to grant scientology any status other than shit-for-brains fascist cultists? Hey, I'm with Germany on those rulings.
A Church of Scientology spokeswoman declined to comment on Cruise’s visit, saying that it was the “private activity of an individual person.”
Uh-huh. One who has to do scientology's bidding as he gets more and more involved in the "church." What is it with actors that they're such assholes about things like religion? Can't he just be a Southern Baptist or something and go around demanding that women be subservient to their husbands? At least I'd respect him more than I do now.
“Tom met at the Department of Education because he has always been passionate about education and wanted to meet the Secretary [of Education],” a spokeswoman for the actor told The Scoop. “And, in a separate meeting, he met with a few White House officials to discuss his concern about the state of human rights in the world today, especially religious intolerance in parts of Western Europe.”
Would that be authentic religious intolerance, or intolerance of the murderous, law-breaking cult known as scientology? Come on, Spokeswoman, it's your job to be specific. Hey, I've always been passionate about Mark Twain, but you don't see me lobbying the White House to declare a Federal holiday for America's greatest satirist, do you? (Come to think of it, I'd love to see a Mark Twain Day. Frog-jumping and fence-painting contests, eating southern food, wearing white on a hot summer day, putting on great big fake moustaches—what's not to like?)
Oh, just shut up about scientology, you stupid actors. Battlefield Earth was one of the biggest stinkers of the century, thankfully, and I do believe that it's only a matter of time until the law catches up with the lunatics and dangerous people who murder their followers and drive American citizens to seek asylum in Canada. Like I said, look it up. This isn't a church. It's a legalized mafia, and it has killed.
I no longer go to Tom Cruise movies. Or John Travolta. Or the films of anyone else associated with scientology. I won't support the cults. Maybe my few bucks aren't doing much, but hey, at least the profits aren't going to Xenu. permalink
6/19/03
Step away from the beverage, please
Do not, repeat, do not be drinking anything when you read this post by Marduk.
The man definitely needs a driver. permalink
A unique solution to targeted assassination
Combustible Boy came up with a great idea that would spare palestinian civilians. I like it.
Instead, they would have big electromagnets on the bottoms of their helicopters that they can use to pick up the Hamas car, fly it way up in the air, then cut the power to the magnet while over some unpopulated area so the car would fall to the ground and explode like in some 1970s Quinn Martin action show*.
I wonder if we can use our Blogathon donations for something like that. Hm. permalink
Two days later, still no signs of the Iranians protesting the theocratic government of the mullahs on any of the major Indymedia sites. But the main site has some really pressing world issues:
30 thousand workers protest pension reform in Brazil
U.S. Congressional Battles to Reverse the FCC
Days of Resistance in Thessaloniki
Itoiz is being evicted to build a water reservoir
Oh, and this one slays me:
Mobilizing in Sacramento for Global Justice
From June 23-25 in Sacramento, the US Department of Agriculture, the Agency for International Development, and the U.S. State Department are hosting government ministers from 180 nations and transnational corporate reps to lay out the US government and agribusiness' vision for the future of the world. A major grassroots mobilization and convergence is planned to confront the corporados. The event has been referred to as "a showdown for people to say no to a genetically engineered future, and to voice instead a living world vision, rooted in social justice and ecological sanity. It is also a chance to stand in solidarity with the people's movements and hundreds of peasant farmers groups from around the world that have called on social movements in the US to denounce and protest this meeting." Sacramento is the most important destination at the moment for anyone concerned about genetically engineered trees, foods, and fish, the rights of small farmers, and the environment and corporations controlling and commidifying the world's forests and food supply.Organizers in the U.S. note: "The Sacramento mobilization is time to show that we understand it is not enough for those of us who live in the US to turn out in hundreds of thousands at the outbreak of a military invasion - we need to be looking for strategic opportunities to confront Empire on an ongoing basis to turn this nation 180 degrees and walk together in a radically new direction."
Genetically-modified food constitutes fighting for "global justice" and agains "a military invasion," but thousands of Iranians protesting theocratic, fascist rule garner nothing at all from the self-proclaimed warriors for global justice. Nor do the beatings, imprisonments, and likely murders of the protestors.
There is something seriously wrong with the radical left. But then, there always was. permalink
This lame story on Hulk. Hulk is strongest!
CNN has what they think is a geek's look at who would win a fight between the Terminator and the Hulk. (Thanks, Francesca!) It takes them hundreds of words to get to the inevitable conclusion: Hulk. And they really only use one physics factor (strength), whereas a true geek would have gone wild on every aspect of the fight, using size, weight, estimated lift and thrust capacity of each, ability to withstand damage, whether or not Hulk has a fatigue factor, etc., etc. That's how things like the role-playing game "Champions" came about: From fanboys turning comic book heroes and villains into something resembling scientific explanations. (Note, that's not the origin of Champions, just a cause, please don't email me the exact moment the creators realized they had a game on their hands.) In any case.
I asked the Hulk if he thought the Terminator could take him.
What "Terminator"?
It's a sort of robot.
Hulk smash robots. Hulk always smash robots. Robots are stupid. Robots try to hurt Hulk.
Yeah, but this one's a really strong robot.
Hulk smash robots! Hulk is the strongest one there is! Where robot? Hulk smash him!
He's not here, Hulk, he's just a movie.
Movie? Picture on wall?
Yes.
Good. Hulk smash walls, too. Where movie?
It's not out yet.
Hulk wait. Hulk patient.
Uh-oh.
By the way, be here Friday afternoon. Hulk's going to review the Hulk movie. permalink
The shooting attack that killed a seven-year-old girl was accomplished by two Fatah and PFLP terrorists who cut through metal bars and crawled through sewage tunnels, all so they could deliberately murder civilians.
Using pneumatic wire cutters Tuesday night the terrorists sliced through two centimeter-thick steel bars separating Kalkilya's sewage system and Israel's, dashed the 50 meters to Highway 6, and fired on a passing car, killing a seven-year-old girl.
They then returned through the tangle of steel in the sewage canal, which lies under an eight-meter-high security wall, and into the relative safety of Kalkilya, unharmed and unheard.
Yasser Arafat's terrorists claimed this one.
Fatah's Aksa Martyrs' Brigades and Ahmed Jibril's Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine-General Command have jointly claimed responsibility for the shooting on the Trans-Israel Highway late Tuesday in which seven-year-old Noam Leibovitch was killed and her sister, brother, and grandfather were wounded.
In the meantime, Abu Mazen says this about stopping terrorists:
In an attempt to persuade Hamas and terrorist groups to agree to a temporary cease-fire with Israel, Palestinian Authority Prime Minister Mahmoud Abbas on Wednesday offered to give them representation on a newly-formed body called the Unified National Leadership.
Abbas, who met with leaders of all Palestinian factions in Gaza City Tuesday night, told them PA Chairman Yasser Arafat had agreed to form the Unified National Leadership within the PLO.
It is their reward for refusing to agree to stop murdering Israeli children
PA officials said Wednesday's meeting, which lasted for three hours, failed to achieve an agreement over a proposal calling for a temporary cease-fire with Israel. Hamas and Islamic Jihad leaders who participated in the discussions said Abbas did not have any new ideas regarding their demand that Israel stop its policy of targeted killings.
However, PA Information Minister Nabil Amr said the meeting was "making good progress." "We are now waiting for guarantees from the Israeli side about what we have asked," he said, referring to an earlier joint Israeli-Palestinian security meeting at which the Palestinians asked Israel to stop targeting terrorist leaders immediately.
On othe other hand, listen to what the associates of the man accused of financing the Munich Massacre had to say about Israel's refusal to target terrorists:
But the meeting that began late Tuesday night between Coordinator of Government Activities in the Territories Maj.-Gen. Amos Gilad and PA Security Minister Muhammad Dahlan ended without agreement. Dahlan attributed the failure to the "unclear Israeli position." "We understood there was not a serious Israeli desire to withdraw from the Gaza Strip or any area of the West Bank," he said.
A PA source described the meeting as "very bad" and accused Israel of wasting time. "Israel is not serious," the source said. "They are wasting our time through maneuvers and unacceptable proposals regarding a partial withdrawal from areas in the Gaza Strip."
"Israel must be obliged to stop all forms of violence and terrorism against the Palestinian people," PA Foreign Minister Nabil Shaath said. He said Israel's pledge to stop targeted killings "except in extraordinary cases" is "insufficient," and indicated that a clear Israeli commitment in this respect "would pave the way to reaching a truce agreement with Palestinian factions, Hamas in particular."
Harsh words. And yet he can't seem to use the same kinds of words to those who murder civilians. Oh, but I understand they're really close to a breakthrough with the Hamas terrorists:
Hamas leaders said following the talks with Abbas that they might consider a proposal that restricts terrorist attacks to the West Bank and Gaza Strip. Abdel Aziz Rantisi, one of the top Hamas officials who participated in the discussions, said his movement is studying the proposal according to which it would halt its suicide attacks inside Israel but continue targeting soldiers and settlers in the territories.
Okay, one more time, let's look at that first part of the Road Map to Murderville (™ Charles Johnson):
"In Phase 1 [May 2003], the Palestinians immediately undertake an unconditional cessation of violence."
Unconditional cessation of violence. The words are clear. The problem is, only Israel is following the road map. What did they do today, after a seven-year-old was buried, and a palestinian blew himself up in a grocery store, killing the owner? They dismantled an illegal settlement outpost, as the road map proposes they do.
MITZPE YITZHAR, West Bank (Reuters) - Dozens of settlers scuffled with Israeli soldiers sent to take down a settler outpost on Thursday just hours after a Palestinian suicide bomber killed a shop owner in northern Israel.
And the world condemns who for causing the "impasse" in the Middle East? Oh, right. Israel. Because they do things like this:
Northern police chief Ya'akov Borovsky said the suicide bomber was dropped off at the entrance to the moshav, some 300 meters from the store.
Eyewitnesses said the grocery owner may have spotted the man on a theft-prevention camera in his store, and had begun to move toward him.
"Our assumption is that he did not intend to blow himself up inside the grocery, but that he might have been waiting for people to congregate at the nearby bus stop," Borovsky said.
Borovsky said that Mordechai prevented a major tragedy by preventing the suicide bomber from entering the moshav, where many more people could have been killed.
Oh, wait. No they don't. That would be the pals. Their partners in "peace."
The road map is dead. Bury it and find something else. permalink
6/18/03
The New York Times finally gets the Internet!
Mac Thomason linked to this Times article about blogging, and how hard it is to get visitors. The article has links in it.
When did the Times start linking to websites? They never link to anyone in their articles. When did they do this? I've been reading the Times for ages. They never used to link. Never.
They linked to all the weblogs in the article except for the last one, and I think that one is a typesetting or editorial error. Because they link to all the other ones.
When did this happen? How could I miss this? I mean, really, guys, Jayson Blair, Howell Raines, Maureen Dowd, yeah, yeah, yeah, that's so five minutes ago, bored now—but the Times is actually linking to blogs in articles? Now that is news.
Damn. The Times is linking to weblogs, finally. permalink
This is where I was today:
It's
a 100-acre estate
that is in the midst of Richmond, built during the late nineteenth century
(the part known as The Gilded Age), and is astonishingly huge and beautiful,
and and example of far more room than two people could ever need to live
comfortably.
And if I had the bucks to do the same, would I? You bet your life. Except I'd have far better taste in furniture than the Dooleys had. Outdoors, now—that was beautiful. Glad I had my hiking shoes on, because we probably walked a mile or two. There's a waterfall, a large lake stocked with the usual ugly carp (I really don't know why people like them so much; I find them hideous, and the larger they are, the uglier they get), bamboo forests (yes, bamboo, yes, forests), phenomenally old trees of every kind (I'll post more pictures later), gazebos everywhere you turned, and then just because they have to keep the kiddies interested somehow, they have animals on the estate. Black bears, foxes, owls, hawks, bison, and inside the visitor center, fish and snakes and turtles. I stood closer to a black bear than I ever frankly want to be, especially as there was nothing separating us but a plain chain-link fence. Andy and I wondered if the bear could get through it if he so desired, which may have been the reason I decided to leave that part of the estate.
This bit of Richmond was brought to you by: Two bored people who are really tired of the rain in Richmond. Next week: More touristy pictures, as The Creator is coming to town. (That's mother to the rest of you.) permalink
Australian's Jewish community has had to implement safety features for their synagogues, schools, and community centers—because Muslim immigrants are working with terrorist organizations and targeting Jews.
A local Jew was targeted by an al Qaeda-linked organization, as were two Israeli embassies in Australia.
Mr Gutnick said he was told of the plan to bomb his house, synagogue or company offices in St Kilda, Melbourne, by Australian Federal Police (AFP) in December last year.
Mr Gutnick, an orthodox Jew, told The Australian newspaper that one man had profiles on his companies, and knew where he lived and prayed.
Maps and other evidence in the death plot were discovered during raids by ASIO on suspected members of Jemaah Islamiah in Melbourne, Sydney and Perth last October, the newspaper said.
Once again, the line between Israeli and Jew stretches thousands of miles. From one side of its mouth, the world considers all Jews to be Israelis when it comes to sharing responsibility for Israel's policies, and from the other, insists they're not against Jews, only against Israeli policies.
We see right through this asinine defense. It's the old school of thought: A Jew is a Jew is a Jew.
It's beginning to look like Jew-hatred goes hand-in-hand with Muslim immigration populations worldwide. Oh, just wait. Someone will accuse me of being a racist for saying that. And still, the attacks on Jews will be put down to Muslim anger over Israeli policies. Nothing to do with Jews, no, really. It's the oppresion of the pals, you see.
I would call it plain old hatred and anti-Semitism, but that's me, hm, Aziz? Seeing anti-Semitism in everything. Even where it really is anti-Semitism. permalink
Yeah, that ought to get some perverted search hits. Come to think of it, it ought to draw some folks from the RSS feed as well.
Well, if my friend arrives before I've finished showering, it will be Dr. Manhattan's fault. He sent me a very funny email, followed by a letter that made me realize that I've been reading him, but not linking him, and he's not on my links page, either. That's been remedied with this post. (I should have been in the shower ten minutes ago.)
Plus, he said I could post his email:
I like having comments on my blog, and have had relatively few trolls or other nuts.
But that is probably because my readership is probably smaller than yours, and my writing is probably more soporific.
So the obvious solution is for you to tone down your enthusiasm and downsize your readership. Then the trolls won't come. Elegant, no?
I hadn't quite thought of that solution. I'll keep it in mind, Doc. permalink
Silflay Hraka has moved! Bigwig and co. are off blogspot (no, he's not bitter, why do you ask?) and on their own domain, with a brandy new MT blog. Because all of the cool kids are doing it. The head bunny says if you can't get to the domain due to DNS problems, try using this link with the IP number. (I had no trouble getting there via the domain name.) He's got another post to the Saudi religious rat-out patrol, and his sad, sad Father's Day tale.
My blogdaughter Shanti is hosting this week's Carnival of the Vanities. I feel like farming out the work today; go ahead and read the entries and if you think there's one that deserves more attention, email me. Okay, I'll admit it, I'm going to be oot and aboot (that's Canadian to show Damian and Marduk that I can speak their language) most of the day. Or busy inside. Because it is once again raining, as it has rained nearly every day for nine effing weeks here in Richmond, and most of those weeks do, indeed, include weekends, and no, I'm not bitter, not at all, why do you ask?
Jim Treacher took comments off his blog, and isn't putting them back. The score so far on my comments question: "It's your blog, do what you want" is winning by a landslide, with the subtext of most of those emails a fairly solid "Ew, your blog would really reek if you had comments on it."
See, now I'm tempted to put comments up just to see if it realy would reek. But then, as Jim says, I'd have to play hall monitor, and I have no intention of chaining myself to the computer 24/7. I suppose if most people who disagreed with you on blogs weren't such shits, I'd have comments by now. But I've seen far too much nastiness and insult in comment threads, and not much adult disagreement, and frankly, I'll be damned if you're going to insult me on my nickel. You want to do that, pay for it yourself. permalink
6/17/03
I know I just did this, but he's on a roll today
Check out Lair Simon's post about Nefertiti on how to use her to get Egypt to do what we want. Hilarious. And he has a damned good fisking of today's Reuters article on Rantisi and Hamas.
While you're at it, AMCGLTD has two good referrals today, too. One's about kittens, and the other's about fortune telling with dicks. No, I'm not kidding. The latter has nekkid men's parts in it; not safe for work. The former has intense kitten pictures in it, not safe for people who go "Awww" easily.
And that's it for the day. I'm tired. permalink
What, Andrew Sullivan is the only one who can do this?
I have finally fixed my Amazon Wish List, and added various Hulk-related items to it. Though I was tempted to add the Hulk Walkie Talkie or the Hulk Lunchbox, really, I have no use for either. Not that I have a use for Hulk Hands or a Hulk Action Figure, but hey, it's fun to have them. (Why, look, the new Harry Potter book comes out this week. Isn't that a fortuitous coincidence?) permalink
Bill Cimino has been having a lot of fun getting people to make up state slogans that could go on their license plates. It started here, and has since grown to monstrous, more monstrous, and even more monstrous proportions. And it shows no signs of stopping. Go on over and suggest some state slogans. And remember: Bitchiness counts. permalink
This one, about Orville and Wilbur Wright, is hilarious. (New and improved, with 100% fewer swears!) He also responds to my post below about comments, including this moment of Amish zen:
Without the author, there are no readers.
Without the readers, there is still an author.
By the way, the score on comments so far: five from bloggers, five from nonbloggers. And, uh, there's an Instalanche going on today, so I think the results are going to be skewed. But right now, it's 2 for, 1 against, and 7 that say "It's your blog, do what you want." Hm. I'm leaning towards the third group's response. permalink
From National Review Online, an Iranian student protester speaks of the brutal way the protests in Iran are being handled:
It has become almost routine for us to go out at night, chant slogans, get beaten, lose some of our friends, see our sisters beaten, and then return home.
Each night we set to the streets only to be swept away the next dawn by agents of the regime. Two nights ago, on Amirabad Street, we wrote "Down with Khomeini" on the ground. Before long, the mullah's vigilantes attacked us on their motorcycles. They struck a female student before my eyes so harshly that she was no longer able to walk. As she fell to the ground, four members of Ansaar-e-Hezbollah surrounded her, kicking her. When I and two other students threw stones at them so that they would leave her alone, they threatened us. We escaped into a lane and hid in a house whose owner, an old lady, had left the door open for us. A few minutes later, we saw the young lady being carried away by riot police, her feet dragging on the ground, her shattered teeth hanging out of her still-bleeding mouth.
At least three of my best friends have been detained; nobody knows anything about their fate.
Yesterday I heard that the prosecutor of Tehran has announced that most of the detainees are hooligans with criminal records. What sort of criminal record does he mean? Perhaps the crime of walking with a person of the opposite sex? Of wearing Western clothes or playing a cassette in the car?
This is true protest and dissent. This, I thought, must be covered on Indymedia. So I check the main site. Nothing. New York? Nope. DC? Nada. Seattle? Nuh-uh.
Okay, then, San Francisco. There must be at least one article about Iran in the birthplace of modern American protest. No, there isn't. But there are articles against the war in Iraq, and a benefit concert by former rock star Patti Smith (who was so drunk and/or stoned at her concert at my college that she literally could not remember how to spell "Gloria" during her attempt to sing that song), with a follow-up article titled "Why Patti Smith Mattered." And of course, there are the usual anti-Semitic spews about Israel. But not a word on the Iranian students protesting against the tyrannical rule of the Mullahs, and being beaten and killed for it.
Here are the top headlines on SF Indymedia page:
Rally & March Against War in Iraq, Philippines & the INS
Anti-war Movement Audio Retrospective - The Struggle Against Empire
Thousands at punk rock heroine Patti Smith anti-war benefit
Beat Generation Bookstore's 50th Anniversary Draws Huge Crowd
Yeah, those are important issues. A bookstore's 50th anniversary. Patti Smith. Far more important issues than reporting on the true fomenters of dissent against tyrannical autocrats and theocrats. (Hey, I thought Indymedia was a news source? That's what all the people who got their panties in a bunch over Google dropping them as such were saying. For a news source, they seem to be ignoring a hell of a story.)
Apparently, Indymedia itself is the important issue. Protesters in Oakland got some really nasty bruises from being shot by wooden bullets while trying to stop ships from loading during the first days of the war with Iraq. Those words and pictures went all around the Indynet, but the situation in Iran is being ignored. The only time Iran is mentioned, in fact, is in the context of the President's Axis of Evil speech.
It seems that you don't matter to Indymedia if you're protesting an Islamic theocracy. You only matter if you're protesting a Jewish or Christian democracy.
But that isn't what really doesn't matter. I think I mistitled this post. It should be titled "Why Indymedia doesn't matter." permalink
I've been trying to post this to Marduk's comments on this particular post, and it keeps crapping out. So I'll post it here now, and try to get it there later. It's in response to Marduk making fun of the concept of "Open Threads," in which a blogger does not post, but turns the floor over to the readers who post in his/her comments.
The commenters at Marduk's imply that he's too stupid to understand that it means the democratic process is at work, and that the lack of comments on his weblog imply that nobody cares about what he writes:
* () @ 06/16/2003 13:38:
well, people actually seem to use them, unlike the comments at this blog......Dave () @ 06/16/2003 16:01:
its the free-market of ideas - get used to it baby!Mike (http://www.rigoletto.com/blogger.html) @ 06/16/2003 17:56:
And at least you know you're being read, and that what you're saying makes some sort of impression on your readers.
And here was what I was going to respond:
I don't buy that at all. All you need to know if your site is being read is some kind of web statistics program tracking your site stats.
I know that I'm making some kind of impression on my readers, because the number of readers has steadily increased since I started my weblog. Some of them even send me email. (Imagine that!) Sometimes, I even publish the emails.
All of this has been accomplished without comments.
In my opinion, a small percentage of blog readers write in the comments section of any given blog. The overwhelming majority of readers do not comment.
I think that cliquishness turns off the regular readers. And every single time I have raised the question of adding comments to my readers, the same few people--mostly bloggers themselves--reply in the positive. The overwhelming majority is silent--which is an answer in and of itself.
Open thread does give a blogger a chance to be lazy, but if you ask me, it's simply a fashionable thing to do. "Look, I can throw my blog open to The Little People. Aren't I democratic?"
Feh.
That was actually edited down from my original, more irritated response. Come to think of it, even when I publish highly controversial subjects (like a debate on sexism), the emails received still don't manage to come up to a double-digit percentage of the day's visitors. More often than not, the emails are not from regular readers of this weblog. They're from people who read other blogs that have linked to the controversial post. The same phenomenon occurs in the comments thread of a blog with a controversial topic that gets linked around.
There is an illusion out there that weblogs that don't have comments are less democratic than those that do. I think that's pure bullshit, especially after seeing how many people have their comments deleted from supposedly democratic blogs—for posting an opinion that goes against the grain of the blog. Ultimately, every weblog out there has some final arbiter who makes the rules, and there will always be someone who doesn't like abiding by those rules, and who bitches when s/he gets punished for breaking those rules. It may be fashionable to pretend that you're running a truly democratic forum, or taking part in such a forum, but it doesn't pass the smell test.
Here, I'll play the game again: How many of my readers want me to add comments to the blog? Send me an email.
My money's on the percentage once again not getting out of single digits. permalink
6/16/03
Yes, I know some of you think I should just get an external keyboard and shut up about my laptop refusing to acknowledge the dash and six keys, but this thing is such an effing puzzle that I simply have to make all of my readers suffer through it as well.
For the past few days I've been using the number lock and numeric keypad (or the laptop version thereof) for the six and dash, and just swearing when I try to use the Home and F2 keys and nothing happens. So a couple of hours ago, my brother calls and we're discussing (among other things) my computer woes, and he offers to buy me a new Dell desktop. I tell him I'll let him know if I think I need it.
So as I'm replying to an email, without thinking, I use the dash key. And it works. Then I try the six, and of course, it, too, works. Home key, delete key, F2, yep, they all work again.
I am more and more convinced that it's something loose inside the computer. I think I'm going to get the courage to open it up sometime soon, and see what I can see. So if you suddenly don't have any new posts for a really long period of time, you'll know I screwed up and am waiting for my Dell to arrive. permalink
Kate has a hilarious post on what it's like to be pregnant. Hm. Maybe I don't really want children, after all. By the way, I'm not bitter or jealous in the least that she's still higher than me in NZ Bear's Ecosystem. Nope. Not at all. Why should I be? The fact that I dropped a bunch of slots on Blogstreet's rankings doesn't bother me in the least, but it does make me wonder: Did they get mad at me for using their logo without permission, and making fun of them? (Geez. Firmly in the O'Reilly tech ghetto, please, get me out of there!)
Doctor Frank has a shiny new MT blog. And on it, a damned good post about British attitudes towards (or against) Jews.
This post by Marduk—well, to be more specific, the comments on this post by Marduk—inspired me. From now on, Monday is open thread day at yourish.com. Feel free to leave your comments in the open thread box.
I expect to start getting emails asking why on earth I link to Marduk, and I'll give you the same answer I gave to those who wanted to know why I link to Laurence Simon: Because I like his writing. Because he makes me laugh. Because I agree with many of the things he writes. And when he goes over the top, or writes something I disagree with, I will tell him so if I choose. If you don't like him, you don't have to click on the link.
Judith Weiss has a roundup of blog articles discussing the Altalena analogy (where Ben Gurion and Begin held what was effectively the Israeli Civil War early in Israel's history; Begin lost). I haven't read them all; I'm off to Lynn's place to start. permalink
Frank J, who is busy nuking the moon (dude, the Tick blew up the moon years ago), says his blogroll is too full to add me.
I say we should nuke Frank's weblog. Anybody got a spare nuclear weapon lying around that they're not going to use?
Update: See, deterrence works. Frank is so afraid of being nuked, he did add me to his blogroll. Either that, or I misread the post and he added me but told everyone else they were SOL. I'm really not sure, but his email said something about my misreading his post.
In any case, since he added me to his blogroll, and whether or not it was under the threat of nuclear attack, I'm going to add him to my links page, and everyone will be happy. I love a happy ending, don't you? permalink
I realized thirteen years ago that Heidi was not an ordinary person. I will not embarrass her—or me, actually—by going into detail about most of our escapades at the Clarion SF & Fantasy Writer's Workshop, but I will say that we laughed a lot. A whole lot. For instance, we really spooked the florists that spent a week living on our dorm floor while taking some kind of flower-arranging workshops. Well, except for the one who wound up my suitemate. She had just broken up with her boyfriend of many years and insisted she was far better off because of it, yet fell asleep every night to Sinead O'Connor's cover of "Nothing Compares 2 U." Repeatedly. Seven or eight times a night, actually. Sometimes more.
That may have been the beginning of my aversion to Sinead O'Connor. It was certainly the beginning of my aversion to The Florist (as I have called her ever since), whose last night there was spent getting drunk with us, as her co-florists were all older and rather boring and went to bed early. (They're the ones who were shocked to overhear the conversation that Heidi, a few other students, and I were having about how the alpha male in gorilla groups kills all the children after taking over the group, and relating that to human stepfather behavior.)
The Florist got drunk enough that she, a non-writer, gave us writing lessons. She knew what we needed to know to get published, you see. "All you need to do is put a punch in the beginning of every paragraph, and a punch at the end," she said, waving her fist in the air with each punch as emphasis. Heidi and the others thought The Florist was hilarious, except for the one guy who thought she was one-night stand material (turned out she was). I got annoyed and had to leave, as I was beginning to think of a punch at the beginning of The Florist, and a punch at the end.
Anyway. Heidi needed my help to pick up a Stickley desk that she'd got at an estate auction. Her husband G. has a bad back, having had various ruptured and bulging disks (ew) and an operation and other things done to fix it. So he's not allowed to lift things. If they're not too heavy, Heidi and I do it. If they're too heavy, we find guys who don't have bad backs.
When she told me she'd be renting a truck, I figured it'd be your typical U-Haul type. Nope. That's too pedestrian for Heidi. She showed up at my doorstep in a steel-grey Dodge Ram 1500 4x4. It dwarfed my Jeep in length, height, and width. Really. My Jeep looked like a kiddie car next to the Ram. As we pulled out of my parking lot, Heidi said she felt like her entire body had suddenly grown huge, driving that thing. And the talk inevitably turned to the usual drivers of large pickup trucks, and just as inevitably, we began to make fun of said drivers. I declared that I was pretty sure Heidi's testosterone level had jumped, and had she grown a pair? She responded that she didn't just have a pair; driving that truck had caused her to grow the whole set. Various roars and grunts ensued. And in the back seat, Sorena, who is quite used to her mother and me doing all sorts of crazy things, ignored us completely and concentrated on Radio Disney, which she had switched on as soon as she got into the truck. (You have no idea how amusing Sorena's bored expression is when her mother and I are discussing testosterone and other such boring things. Sometimes she interrupts us to tell us the conversation is boring. Ah, to be nine again.)
The other drivers seemed to be scared to death of us. And, well, Heidi driving an unfamiliar vehicle—a really huge unfamiliar vehicle—and being unsure of the amount of force needed for the brake and gas pedals reinforced that fear. (It rather reinforced my fear of Heidi driving the truck, but I kept quiet about that until near the end of the afternoon.)
So we get to the house having the auction, I look around and find a bookshelf for a very reasonable price, Sorena buys bunches of books, and Heidi pays for the desk. We're about ready to load our things into the truck when Heidi comes to me holding the ignition key. She can't get the door unlocked, she tells me shamefacedly. Perhaps she just wasn't doing it right, could I try? I started to worry, because the key was a sentry key, and if the embedded microchip wasn't working, we were in trouble. So I go to the truck, and see that the driver's side window is open, and look at Heidi. There is a white truck parked next to ours. So I ask:
"Which truck were you trying to open?"
"The white one."
"Ours is the grey one."
"Oh. That would explain why I couldn't get the door open."
We move the truck closer to the house, get the desk loaded with the help of the auctioneer's son, and everything is fine until the truck door, the bottom of which is at the exact height of the dead center of my knee, bangs into my left knee. Hobble back into house, get ice, ride with ice on knee all the way home, hoping it will be okay to stand on by the time we need to get the desk out of the truck. Find out that a tiny dragonfly is hitching a ride as well, and is sitting on my bag of ice. I entreat the dragonfly to get out by opening the window and shaking the bag. It gets blown back into the truck. It flies back onto the bag. I give up and try not to squish it on my knee. Back at Heidi's, the knee's not so bad, she and I unload the desk and my bookshelf and Sorena's many books, pick up her husband and head off to another auction, where G. is trying to get some kind of saw. G. has much to say about Heidi's driving skills in the truck, pointing out that she's not very tall and can barely see over the dashboard. Highly offended, we both point out that she can see just fine and she made it to the first auction and back without killing anyone.
"Yet," G. declares. We make it to his auction without killing anyone, park the truck in the wood next to the driveway, and stay only long enough to determine that the saw was sold, and entertain the gentleman directing traffic by discovering that if you're not in four-wheel drive, and you have a pickup truck with a bunch of people in front and nothing in the truck bed, reversing on a dirt slope is a major problem. G. thought it was Heidi's driving. I pointed out it was physics. My explanation was not received enthusiastically by G., but I'm pretty sure Heidi appreciated it.
Off to the next auction, the rolltop desk goes for more than they were prepared to spend, and we decide to head home and drop off G., who is now grouchy because the two things he wanted to buy both got bought by other people, but the thing that Heidi wanted, Heidi got. Dump G., Sorena, take a bathroom break, discover that Sparty did, indeed, pee near the new desk (the Urinator is on his way to being someone else's dog because he won't stop peeing indoors), clean it up, then head out sans husband and daughter. We need to drop off the truck, pick up Heidi's car, and stop by the computer store to get a new battery for her laptop. Seems simple, but there are three Enterprise dealers on the road where she rented the truck, and she never found the one she was supposed to rent the truck from. She stopped at the next one she saw and said, "I rented a truck from the other Enterprise dealer," and was fairly begged into renting from the one she was in instead. You would think that she would, say, write down the address or get a clear picture of what the Enterprise dealer is next to, but that's because you don't know Heidi. We passed the car dealer that she said it was next to. We couldn't find it. We turned around and retraced our route, and found it only because I was looking at the produce stand to see if they had any corn yet, and realized that the Enterprise dealer was two doors east of it. The car dealer that Heidi said it was near was west of it, so once you saw the car dealer, you'd already passed the Enterprise. And Enterprise simply does not make it easy on people. Their signs are all parallel to the road, perhaps so you can see them as you're passing and say, "Oh, there it is. I'll have to turn around and go back now."
And I haven't even mentioned that I was ready at 9:30 but we didn't get started until near 11 a.m. Okay, I finally did mention it to Heidi at the end of the day, but I think preceding it with the phrase, "Now, I'm not criticizing" really didn't take. She saw right through my "I'm just proud of myself for actually being on time for a change" line.
Anyway. Picking up furniture with other people is so boring. All they ever do is pick me up in normal vehicles, drive to the place, get the furniture loaded, and drive home. Heidi and I have a lot more fun. permalink
6/15/03
My pal Steven D. sent me this URL. It's too cool for words if you're a Marvel Comics superhero fan, but I think it'd be rather embarrassing if I tried to pass checks with these pictures on them. Guess I'm not that big a fangirl after all.
But take a look: Hulk checks. Or Spider-Man. Or Wolverine (old, yellow-and-blue costume, yuck!), or Captain America.
Update: Okay, the people running the website are effing morons. You have to go to the main page and click on the popular culture link and look for them. And even that might not work, as I keep getting session ID timed out errors. permalink
If this is the source Mel Gibson is using, I'm thinking the argument I had over fact vs. not-facts with Susanna Cornett was a waste of words.
Using Aramaic in his film is only one example of how Gibson is striving for authenticity. Another is opting for a less-well-known, multinational cast instead of big Hollywood names.
Gibson, whose films (such as the Oscar-winning Braveheart) are known for their graphic violence, is also bringing a high degree of graphic realism to his portrayal of Jesus’ torture and crucifixion. According to Fulco, the crucifixion scenes will be "quite brutal."
The main source Gibson used in writing the screenplay, besides the gospels, is a gruesome account of the Passion told by an 18th-century German nun, Anne Catherine Emmerich, based on a series of mystical visions she had. After her death, her visions were compiled into an 1833 book, The Dolorous Passion of Our Lord Jesus Christ. The book describes in harrowing and graphic detail such things as the wounds inflicted by the executioners’ whips and Jesus’ agony in being nailed to the cross. Gibson, a devout Catholic, hopes his film, too, will force viewers to confront the intensity of Jesus’ suffering and, thus, the extent of his sacrifice.
[...] "It was the overriding desire of Mel Gibson and the entire crew to convey to the viewer the meaning of the Passion, Death and Resurrection of Jesus Christ," Fulco says. "It was not their intention to do a documentary. They sought to move the heart rather than the head, although there is much in the film to do both."
Nothing like historical accuracy—sorry, authenticity—in Gibson films to make you feel all warm inside about the aftereffects of such films. "A series of mystical visions." Wow, that's some fact-based source he's going to use to tell the "truth" about the crucifixion of Jesus.
Feh. Told you so. permalink
Checking out the Axis of Weevil
Terry's got some good ones, as usual. This one is sweet. This one is funny. This one isn't his, and is both sweet and funny. This one is funny in only thirteen words. This one explains why it takes so long for Terry to answer his email. This one's a story of family, life, death, and after.
You know, sometimes I just head on over to Possumblog, scroll down to the bottom of the page, and read my way to the top. It's one of the best ways to read Terry if you can't get there every day. permalink
Michele's wishing her father and grandfathers a happy Father's Day. Glad you've got them, and even more glad that you actually like them. I grew to dread Father's Day for a number of reasons. One was that an aunt of mine didn't seem to see anything wrong in inviting me and my brothers to her big Father's Day shindig every year. I took it as an insult, as my father was alive and well in those days. It was a mark of my mother's family to decide that since my mother was no longer married to my father, we children shouldn't really pay much attention to him. They seemed to want us to hate him. Divorces suck enough without having other people put in their own animosities. Something to think about if you know anyone who is going through or went through one.
My father was always an angry, bitter man. Towards the end of his life, he grew angrier and more bitter, and far more difficult to get along with, especially for me. I am my father's daughter, and I inherited many of his traits, including stubborness. (Been working hard on the anger part, and have managed to calm down considerably over the years. Oh, stop laughing, writing rants is different.)
Father's Day became a contest every year, where Dad would use it to test the measure of our love for him while at the same time doing his damnedest to make sure we failed. "No, I don't want do do anything special. I don't think I want to come. Yeah, maybe I'll be there. I don't care what we eat, it's just another day. And no presents." My sister-in-law would invite us all to her and my younger brother's house, and we'd start taking bets on what time Dad would show up. Because he did show up. It was all just part of the grand act to make sure that his children loved him.
I missed two or three of the last four Father's Days. He disowned me three years before he died, and wouldn't speak to me withough my first apologizing to him. As I didn't feel I had anything to apologize for, our phone conversations were brief and unsatisfying. He ignored me completely at his brother's funeral, refusing to so much as say hello to me. And since my father actually boycotted one of his only grandson's birthday parties because I was going to be there, I didn't bother showing up for the Father's Day celebration. Neither, however, did I go to my uncle's big bash.
Dad died on June 22nd, about a week after the last Father's Day. My brothers and I all knew what day it was, and were over at his condo taking care of him. We didn't bother celebrating it. We didn't see the point. Dad never knew it was Father's Day, and not long afterward, he was dead.
So for those of you who have a good reason to enjoy Father's Day, I'm happy for you. May you have many more. I'm just pleased that Father's Day is finally truly just another day for me. permalink
Last week's blogs are archived. Looking for the Buffy Blogburst Index? Here's Israel vs. the world. Here's the Blogathon. The Superhero Dating Ratings are here. If you're looking for something funny, try the Hulk's solution to the Middle East conflict, or Yasser Arafat Secret Phone Transcripts. Iseema bin Laden's diary and The Fudd Doctrine are also good bets if you've never been here before.
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