The Real Pat Blair

There are a lot of things in life that feel good: sunshine, backrubs, fuzzy pajamas, sitting next to a fire on a cold winter day, hitting a fastball off of the sweet spot on a bat, peeing when your bladder has been overly full for a very long time, and so on and so forth. But I would have to say that taking off your shoes after 14+ hours of feet-al confinement has to be very near the top of the list.
It’s true – there’s nothing like letting the puppies get some fresh air at the end of a long day. So enjoy yourself: take off the shoes, kick back, relax, and read this amazing article by former Secretary of State George Shultz. You and your feet will thank me.

Something to think about as Iowa State attempts to reach the NIT finals: why do sports cause otherwise normal people to go completely insane? I’m not just talking about jumping up and down and yelling at the TV, either – I’ve had similar reactions to the 5 o’clock news on more than one occasion. There is just something about a game football/basketball/baseball/soccer/hockey (not golf) that sends people, mainly guys, back to their most basic, primitive levels. I don’t know what it is, but there must be something special about athletics.
What else would cause a calm, polite, well-spoken coach to confront a referee, cursing and screaming? What could possibly cause a professional baseball player to charge a mound, in spite of the fact that, for a living, he has small, hard, round things thrown at him on a daily basis? And what on earth could possible cause grown men to harass refs and throw elbows in a CHURCH LEAGUE basketball game? And then there’s hockey. Of all of the ridiculous things I encounter, things like this have to be pretty high on the list.
It’s not as though I’m speaking from a great position of moral authority on this subject – I was, after all, once ejected from a high-school intramural basketball game that had no referees (which, I must say, requires a certain amount of skill, as well as sheer, unadulterated rage) – I just feel like we all need to take a quick time-out to assess what is happening. Perhaps we have, as a society, allowed ourselves too much freedom in the realm of athletics, and made it acceptable to over-emote and behave badly. Men, after all, are supposed to John Wayne-like pillars of emotional solidity: never flinching, never trembling, never showing excitement, except for when both feet were clearly in bounds you freaking moron!
Is the problem that no one ever tried to draw the line of acceptable behavior until everyone had already crossed it eight or twelve times? Or is the problem that men are out of touch with their emotions, and sports provide a necessary release? I wonder what would happen if we taught a bunch of loud, abusive fanatics how to open up and share their emotions. Would they suddenly feel less intensely about the Division 7 Women’s Table Tennis Tournament Play-In Game? Would the world be more peaceful and serene? Could it be that perhaps, finally, men and women would be able to communicate, as would coaches and refs, elected officials and tyrants, and PC and Mac users, and that the world would finally live in harmony?
Ah, screw it, let’s go watch some boxing.

Proposed by a woman, mind you.
City Wants Bigger Bust for Mermaid

You think YOU’RE having a bad day?
Cambodian cuts off penis to feed spirits

Could you take Alec Baldwin with you, please?
Korn takes on the music business – Davis threatens: “If it gets to the point, period, where you can’t cuss on TV, I’m moving to a different country.”

In honor of this, it seems only appropriate to link to this.

The guy who wrote this headline has probably already been fired:
Lakers continue assault on a title

And finally (props to Dan Lennander for the heads-up on this one)…
Saddam’s French Lawyer Criticizes Bush
One would hope that, along with gall and either brain-damage or massive intestinal fortitude, this guy has a pretty good sense of irony. The article isn’t worth reading, but the headline should win a Pulitzer: I couldn’t make up a headline – or a scenario, for that matter – that is more ridiculous. Nonetheless, I’m going to hop on the next flight to Paris, walk around this guy’s security fence, and kick him in the knee-caps, and then wait for an international trial to determine that he’s a dunderhead.

Congratulations to the Iowa State Cyclones basketball teams – men and women – for advancing to the NIT Final Four. The women get another game in Ames, and the men get to go to New York City (get a rope). While it was probably completely unfair to our competitors to have back-to-back games in Ames, I have to say that I don’t really care. It was a great send-off for the seniors – Jake Sullivan and Marcus Jefferson, specifically – that have endured a lot.
Jake Sullivan gets my vote for Cyclone of the decade. While I admire his tremendous basketball skills, I think that he deserves a standing ovation for his attitude and behavior, both on-court and off. In his four years at ISU, Jake saw teammates and coaches come and go, many in a cloud of scandal and controversy, but he remained above the fray. Jake was always polite and well-spoken, and never bashful about his love for Iowa State and the Cyclones.
The incident that sticks in my mind the most (and that I can’t find record of on the internet, for whatever reason) is an apology that Jake gave. He was frustrated with the game and did something silly like slamming his water bottle to the floor during a timeout. In the post-game interview, Jake made it a point to apologize for losing his temper, and especially setting a bad example for all of the kids that were watching. This apology was for throwing a water bottle, mind you, not for public intoxication, DUI, drug possession, armed robbery, murder, or any of the other shenanigans that college athletes are involved in on a daily basis. You have to respect his 3-point shot, but, more importantly, you have to respect his character.
I’m happy that, after all the struggles and doomsday predictions, the Cyclones have had such success, and that we have been able to give the seniors such a great send-off. Sure, the NIT is sort of a consolation prize for those that don’t make the Big Dance: if you win the whole mess, you become the sixty-sixth best team in the nation. But Cyclones, you’re still number one in my heart. And, for what it’s worth, I’ll move you up a few notches in the rankings; I have a sneaking suspicion that you could probably beat Florida A&M.

What is John Kerry’s biggest asset going into the 2004 election? Other than being married to a rich heiress? Many would say George W. Bush, or, more specifically, the complete and total contempt felt for Bush by those on the far-left. Many would argue that Democrats never got over Florida, including Democrats, themselves. A fine example of this is an interview given by Congressman Charlie Rangel, D-NY, last month:

I can’t forget Florida. I really can’t forget Florida. It took a long time for my people to get the right to vote. And once they got it, they did it the way that they should have. We won the popular vote. And then all of a sudden, the Supreme Court comes in and says, “We got enough votes for Bush. Stop counting.” And that’s what happened. …there is no question that people who are entitled to vote were not allowed to vote in Florida. And so it was a bad count that we got. And we will never, never, never forget Florida. This is the only time that we have an appointed president of the United States in our history.

Ignore, for a moment, the fact that an elected Congressman apparently does not understand and/or acknowledge the existence of the Electoral College. Ignore, also, the fact that he doesn’t seem to remember that Gerald Ford, less than 30 years ago, became the first appointed president. Finally, ignore the fact that what he is saying is complete hogwash. Rangel’s point is that he’s mad, and so are a lot of other people in Florida, and they’re not going to take it any more! Starting in November.
It is undeniable that, for whatever reason or, more likely, myriad of reasons, Democrats really, REALLY hate George W. Bush. A quick look at “grassroots” websites like MoveOn.org and Democratic Underground will confirms this, as does a quick listen to the rhetoric of John F.C.C. Kerry, Howard Dean, John Edwards, and the staff at NBC Nightly News. Check out the anti-war protests that have been going on for the past year: these people are, with a straight face, comparing Bush to Hitler. That’s as absurd (Hitler would have gassed them all, and long before the protests ever got started) as it is downright mean. Sure, Republicans hate(d) Clinton, but they never compared him to Hitler; Larry Flynt, perhaps, but that was about it.
So, since they’re so darn upset, Democrats have been showing up in droves for the primaries, voicing their support for Kerry, their chosen candidate and savior (from things like tax cuts, apparently), right? Well, not so much. A study conducted by long-time Democrat Curtis Gans for the non-partisan Committee for the Study of the American Electorate, showed that primary turnouts have been at record lows this year. For the GOP, this is understandable since Bush faced no challenger. The Democrats, however, have a bit more to be worried about: they couldn’t even get people to show up in Florida.
While the dismal turnout in Florida can be explained away, in part, at least, by the fact that Kerry faced no legitimate competition, it should still be cause for concern among devoted Democrats: if they are so angry and so motivated, shouldn’t they at least be able to get out of the house for long enough to express their displeasure? Furthermore, the low turnout Florida mirrors the primaries that took place BEFORE Kerry had the nomination sewn up (excluding Iowa and New Hampshire). As the Washington Times points out, in a close election, voter turnout will be key, and, as of now, things do not look very promising for the challenger.
In fact, about the only news that could possibly be worse for the Kerry campaign would be the F.C.C. announcing a 10-second tape-delay on debates due to concerns about what he might say on live television.

***

Finally, from FoxNews.com, a sure sign that legal fees and court-room demands are getting out of hand:

For the health nuts out there, the hits just keep on coming! Hot on the heels of last week’s discovery that coffee is good for you comes the announcement that nicotine prevents disease. Double your pleasure, double your buzz, light ‘em up, and smoke ‘em if you’ve got ‘em, because researchers have found evidence that the leafy stuff reduces your chances of developing Parkinson’s, Alzheimer’s, and a garden variety of other nasty diseases. From now on, you can have a smoke and a cup of Joe on your lunch break and honestly claim healthy eating.
The good doctors do point out that smoking is rumored to cause a myriad of terrible health problems (emphysema, cancer, stinky-breath), and they even go so far as to discourage non-smokers from purchasing and wearing the patch, since doing so could be dangerous without “doctor’s supervision.” I think On the other hand, these same researchers point out that nicotine can could be used to battle against short-term memory loss (go figure – smoking can help reduce the side effects of “smoking”), as well ADD and depression. I think the message is clear: a pack a day keeps the doctor away.
Believe it or not, there’s more: DIFFERENT researches have found that drinking reduces high-blood pressure deaths. I quote (emphasis added): “Men with high blood pressure who reported having about one or two drinks a day were 44 percent less likely to die of cardiovascular causes such as heart attacks than men with hypertension who rarely or never drank.” This means that, at 9pm, when you’re all hopped up on the different “eens” (caffeine, nicotine, heroine, etc) that are good for you, you can calm down by throwing back a couple of cold ones. All in the name of living a longer, happier, healthier life, mind you.
(As an aside, these findings were published in Monday’s “Archives of Internal Medicine.” Where can I get a subscription to that? I cannot imagine a more perfect coffee-table (or perhaps stool-top) magazine.)
Of course, many doctors were quick to point out that HEAVY alcohol consumption can actually increase high blood pressure, and there is, of course, the obligatory hand-wringing that the study might send “a very bad public health message” regarding alcohol – this according one Dr. Lori Mosca of New York-Presbyterian Hospital, director of preventive cardiology, American Heart Association spokesperson, do-gooder, busy-body, and general pain-in-the-rectum know-it-all (timely use of medical terminology, +5). I have one thing to say about this: the word “mosca” is Spanish for “fly,” as in, the tiny, annoying insect. Are YOU going to trust someone with that name? I thought not.
You know, I would have never guessed that all of the people in the bars every weekend are actually health junkies. Sometimes, I amaze even myself.

When I was younger, back around the time of the wooly mammoth, I used to carry a pocket-knife all of the time, mainly, I think, because I was a boy, and thought sharp things were cool (remarkably little has changed since then, I might point out). It began, I believe, in Boy Scouts, when I got a tiny Swiss Army knife. Probably around 5th or 6th grade, I upgraded to a bigger Swiss Army knife, with a blade that was a full 3″ in length (or maybe not quite). At some point, I also had a fairly large lock-blade, but that somehow vanished. I am nearly certain that I lost it, but I wouldn’t be surprised to find out that my parents played some role in the disappearance, either. Anyway, the shocking thing is not the potential treachery of my parents (which I doubt occurred, anyway), but the fact that I carried my knife everywhere.
Yes, that means school, too. And you know what? No one cared. It seems like ancient history, but I’m pretty sure I was still carrying a knife at school during the beginning of the Clinton administration. It was not a small, rural school, either; there were no kids with gun racks on their bicycles. Not only that, I some how managed to never stab myself, my fellow students, or any faculty members. The only knife-related injury that I suffered was when I cut myself 20 minutes after the knife-safety class at Boy Scout camp (I got 4 stitches, but I also got Subway for lunch, so I think it worked out fairly well). Of course, those joyous years of frivolity and whittling were short-lived: I don’t remember why – there may not have even been a specific reason – but the rules were changed, and knives were barred from school, regardless of whether or not they were less dangerous than the Sporks available in the cafeteria or the halitosis of your teachers.
So I stopped bringing my knife to school. I only carried after school, on weekends, and when I went to the bars or casinos. Just kidding. Of course, I forgot one day and accidentally put my “big” knife in my pocket. I realized what I had done, I think before classes even started, and so I did what any good student would do: I went on a violent rampage. No, that’s not right… I went to my guidance counselor, explained to her what had happened, and asked her to hang on to my knife for me until it was time to go home. As I said, I was a good kid (I’ll let you know when I pinpoint exactly what went wrong), so she took the knife and locked it in her desk drawer. If you think that this is what would happen today, you should probably visit zerointelligence.net and see what a great effect those Zero-Tolerance policies are having. I probably would have been suspended, preventing me from getting into college and getting this great data-entry job. Who knows what could have become of me?
The good news is that young kids are no longer bringing tiny pocket-knives to school: instead, REALLY young kids are now bringing drugs. In a truly frightening story, a 4-year-old boy brought $10,000 worth of crack to his PRE-SCHOOL (Head Start, of course). He told his classmates that it was flour, but the teachers recognized that it the child wasn’t packing ROCKS of baking material, and called the cops. How did the teachers know crack when they saw it? We’re never told. The boy’s parents are AWOL, he and his sister are in protective custody, and my kids are never going to Head Start.
In a DIFFERENT story (which I find slightly amusing, for some reason), a much older, wiser, more mature kindergartner brought a bag of pot to school. He is 5. The young man was busted when a cafeteria monitor saw him sprinkling the stuff on the lasagna of a friend. There is some doubt over whether or not the boy even knew what he had, although the fact that he may have said that the thought it was oregano would lead me to believe this kid isn’t as dumb as he’s pretending to be. I can certainly count, on less than one hand, the number of times that I, when in kindergarten, brought my own oregano to spice up the dull and lifeless cafeteria food. On the other hand, he wasn’t baking it in to brownies, so apparently there is still some innocence left in the 5-year-olds of this great nation.
Want to know the kicker? The boy won’t be charged. School officials are more concerned about, “the child’s environment and what issues could have led to a child having a bag of marijuana in school.” Oh, I don’t know, maybe crappy schools? I don’t think they should lock the kid up, but you’d better believe that he’d be hanging by his toe-nails right now if he’d brought a TOY gun, much less a real one. I doubt he’d get off by claiming that he thought it was a textbook, either.
When I say that my life gets more surreal every day, this is what I am talking about. Well, this, too, but you get the point. Maybe I should just move to Japan. I think I might feel more at home there.

I love comic strips. It takes a certain amount of skill to get a laugh using so few words and such small pictures, and I appreciate that. I think that, more often than not, the key to a good comic strip is good characters, which is why a new comic will sometimes take time before I start to appreciate it. Then the key is for the author to keep writing without getting stale and repetitive. Like Garfield. They also have to be careful, lest annoying people (like me) stumble upon a borrowed (intentionally or accidentally) thought:

(from 3-22-93)

(from 3-1-04)

Oops. Oh well.
The reason I bring up comics is because, while in Kansas City last weekend, I discovered a new strip: Pearls Before Swine. It sarcastic, clever, and cynically, depressingly hysterical. So basically it’s really strange that I’d be a big fan, right? Oh, and there’s the occasional terrible pun, too. Why do I like it so much? See for yourself:

Cynical. Terrible puns. Post-modern meta-type references. Brilliant.

Last night, my life changed drastically. For the first time ever, I reformatted my hard drive and reinstalled Windows. I have had my computer for about 3 years. I got it when my previous computer, which I had also had for about 3 years, was stolen. I have added RAM, added an additional hard drive, and installed all kinds of programs (purchased and otherwise), but I have never reformatted. I am told that you’re supposed to do it every 6 months, but I had never seen the need. Sure, my computer crashed occasionally and had plenty of malfunctions, but it was working well enough. And yes, Windows ME is hardly the greatest operating system known to man, but I got by, even after I purchased a copy of XP Professional: changing would have been a lot of work, and I was comfortable with what I already had. In hindsight, it really sort of reeked with unloveliness, but life seemed OK at the time.
But, with the persuasion of friends over a period of time, I finally decided to make the plunge. Resident computer experts (read: geeks (yes, that’s a compliment)) Matt and Russ guided me through the process. It is a very scary thing to press the “Enter” key, knowing that you are destroying over 3 years worth of information and leaving everything behind. It was even worse when a little red bar came up on the screen, noting the 10 second countdown before the irreversible process began. It felt and looked very much like the self-destruct sequence at the end of Space Balls.
Once the decision was made and action taken, it took quite a while to delete all of the old garbage. That was also a scary process to watch/ignore. It also took a fair amount of time to completely install the new software. It would seem to be a safe assumption that when you install Windows and the machine says that the installation is complete, everything is ready to go. It is not. Due to well documented security problems, there are numerous large updates that need to be installed before the process is complete. Downloading roughly 80mb worth of updates is not necessarily a fun process, but the refinement is necessary, even if it does require 5 or 6 restarts during the process of it all. Once the Windows installation was complete, I got to start in on the little things. I now own every piece of software on my computer, and even though I am still in the process of installing all of the software and drivers, it is clear already very clear to me that things have changed for the better.
I don’t even recognize my own computer any more. My desktop, once filled completely with files and clutter, now has only 4 icons. I have only a handful of programs installed, compared to the literally dozens that I had before. Things are clean, tidy, and organized. My computer doesn’t crash (at least not yet). Everything is updated and functioning properly. I have a new operating system, and all of the old garbage that I had accumulated over the years is gone. Even though the box looks the same on the outside and has the same parts on the inside, it is as though, due to one simple decision, I have started over, and my computer has been transformed into a completely new machine.
Ahhh, if only life worked that way. There must be an analogy here somewhere…

Man, I love March! Here in Iowa, the weather is finally starting to get nice (even if Spring was interrupted by a quick 16 inches of snow), and the basketball is getting ugly. By which I mean awesome. Baby.
In an amazingly absurd turn of events, the tiny University of Northern Iowa won the Missouri Valley tournament, securing their place as the only Iowa team in the NCAA Tournament this year. Though the 14th seeded Panthers probably won’t get further than their round one match-up with 3-seed Georgia Tech, they deserve a big, if not a bit bewildered, congratulations for making it to the Big Dance.
The “big” schools, Iowa and Iowa State, ended up in the little dance, playing in the NIT and fighting for the chance to be considered the 66th best basketball team in the country. Iowa lost to St. Louis (who?) on a buzzer-beater in their first game, but the Cyclones fared much better: in back-to-back games in Ames, both the men and women picked up victories. The women started the evening off by whaling on Idaho State, and the men finished it off by picking up a hard-fought victory over Georgia. Though the game was tied at halftime, Georgia apparently wasn’t used to being tested, and eventually fell behind, in spite of fouling any Cyclone, with or without the ball, in sight. Mega-kudos to the Cyclones for shooting a torrid 74.4% from the field. No, that is not a typo. Relying mainly on passes for points in the paint, ISU put up numbers that are ridiculous, sick, wrong, and unhealthy. And I loved every minute of it. While there really is something wrong when a team’s free-throw percentage is 10.8% lower than their field-goal percentage, it’s tough to argue with victory.
Iowa State also played brutal defense, forcing several shot-clock violations. They also forced Georgia to take almost half of their shots from behind the 3-point line (which would have worked better if Georgia hadn’t made so darn many of them). Georgia also put up some incredible numbers, being charged with nearly a half-dozen lane violations on ISU free-throw attempts.
ISU has been plagued by stupid officials and terrible calls (3rd paragraph from the bottom) all season long (really, though, who hasn’t?), and last night was no exception. Jackson Vroman gets the award for being the recipient of the Worst Technical Foul Call. Ever. While “trying to clear” after a rebound, Georgia’s Chris Daniels took a clear shot at Vroman’s head with his elbow, making contact and sending Vroman to the floor. Daniels was called for a foul, and seconds later, the whistle blew again. Watching the game on TV with friends, this led to a lot of confusion. Vroman got up, showed remarkable restraint by saying only a few quiet words as he walked past Daniels, and was immediately T’d up. There was no chest bumping, no threatening, no trash talking, nothing. Upon watching the replay, Heather Hanson (winner of the Lip-Reader of the Night Award) said, “It looks like he just called him a punk.” Sure enough, that’s what happened.
Good grief, where is Bobby Knight when you need him? What do you do when someone throws a chair, or uses incredibly vulgar and abusive language when they miss a shot and accidentally say something like “poop?” Tar and feather? Fortunately it didn’t adversely affect the outcome of the game, but that is some truly terrible officiating. What a bunch of punks.