Best vacation EVER

Besides conferring swag on many relatives, I spent most of the week inert. The eggs were well-nogged, the music was festive, the fire was so delightful (sadly, no chestnuts roasted thereupon), and we got many thoughtful gifts and cards.

Alas, two of the cards were outgoing, and returned to us for bonus postage. Sorry! It's taken care of now, we think.



I hope you guys had as fabulous a Christmas as seen above.

The Good News About Global Warming..

...is that all us ignorant, Bible-thumping right-wing crackers will drown!

The area that will by completely inundated by the rising ocean—and not in a century but in the lifetime of my two cats—are the American southeast, including the most populated area of Texas, almost all of Florida, most of Louisiana, and half of Alabama and Mississippi, as well as goodly portions of eastern Georgia, South Carolina and North Carolina.

Is this writer just a tree-hugging Pat Robertson, pronouncing judgement on areas of the country not because of the glorification of the heterosexually deprived, but because they failed to bow the knee to Al Gore?

Where his thesis fails is that dikes may save Philly (quit laughing!), but the Walt Whitman would become a bridge to nowhere since good liberal New Jersey would be under water.

Turf War...

...at the birthplace of the Prince of Peace.

Seven people were injured on Thursday when Greek Orthodox and Armenian priests came to blows in a dispute over how to clean the Church of the Nativity in Bethlehem.

Following the Christmas celebrations, Greek Orthodox priests set up ladders to clean the walls and ceilings of their part of the church, which is built over the site where Jesus Christ is believed to have been born.

But the ladders encroached on space controlled by Armenian priests, according to photographers who said angry words ensued and blows quickly followed.

For a quarter of an hour bearded and robed priests laid into each other with fists, brooms and iron rods while the photographers who had come to take pictures of the annual cleaning ceremony recorded the whole event.

A dozen unarmed Palestinian policemen were sent to try to separate the priests, but two of them were also injured in the unholy melee.

"As usual the cleaning of the church afer Christmas is a cause of problems," Bethlehem Mayor Victor Batarseh told AFP, adding that he has offered to help ease tensions.

"For the two years that I have been here everything went more or less calmly," he said. "It's all finished now."

The Church of the Nativity, like the Church of the Holy Sepulchre in Jerusalem's Old City, is shared by various branches of Christianity, each of which controls and jealously guards a part of the holy site.

The Church of the Nativity is built on the site where Christians believe Jesus was born in a stable more than 2,000 years ago after Mary and Joseph were turned away by an inn.

Fighting Orthodox and Armenian priests. Boys in the Hoods?

Is this Pastor...

..some kind of clown?

The clown walked into church like he owned the place.

KoKoMo stood proudly in the sanctuary of Carrollwood Baptist, his huge white shoes planted firmly, his head-to-toe sequins glimmering, his nose and wig as red as a Christmas bow.It was no joke. KoKoMo was decked out for God.

The Rev. Tom Rives adopted his alter ego about 35 years ago and has used it ever since. The message delivered in his high-pitched voice is weighty for a clown: It is of love and salvation.

I want to remind you that the Christmas story does not end at the manger, that Jesus is more than just a baby eating, sleeping and filling his diaper. This story goes on to tell of a cross and an empty tomb. Now that's the Good News.

Posting a blog on Christmas Day. Yeah, I'm single.

On my list for next Christmas

This is the car I always expected to be driving when I grew up.

(pic © Aptera)

Of course, I always expected that it would fly, but you can't have it all. It looks like it could fly; frankly that's the whole point.

When Steve Fambro got bored building robots at a San Diego genetics company, he figured he could help keep his brain busy by building a kit airplane in his spare time. But his wife deemed the hobby too dangerous, so Fambro decided to build a car instead, one with low emissions and absurdly high mileage.

Let me just point out the most important part of this sentence. Hint - it's not "low emissions and absurdly high mileage."

When Steve Fambro got bored building robots at a San Diego genetics company...

The dude invented this car when he got bored BUILDING ROBOTS. Sweet Baby James.

Specs may change between now and autumn 2008, but the current numbers look like this: 300 mpg, a price tag below $30,000, and 0-60 acceleration of 11 seconds.

That said, yes, 300 mpg. This is for the hybid model, which carries two gallons of gas. Currently I get about 300 miles per trip in the Discount Chariot. I can get twice that on one-fifth the gas? I can fill 'er up for six bucks and go from here to North Carolina without stopping?

The Aptera's roof houses a strip of solar cells that serve double duty. In hot weather they power the parked car's air conditioner, keeping the interior cool for when the driver returns.

I want this thing so freakin' bad. George Jetson probably wants one of these.

There's also cameras instead of mirrors, to cut down on wind drag. (Hold on, I'm hyperventilating. Gimme a minute.) I wonder if they put the displays where the driver is used to looking, and flip the displays to be true mirror images. That would make it perfectly intuitive.

They're taking deposits of $500. When does my holiday bonus clear?

Christmas Eve in Tampa FL

It will be a little cool, the high will be 74 degrees.

I'm still wearing shorts and tshirt.

This is Bad...

….really, really, really bad.

The Lakeland elementary school principal arrested on child pornography charges Friday was expected to post a reduced bond and be granted pre-trial release Saturday, according to the Polk sheriff's office.

John Stelmack, principal of Lakeland's Scott Lake Elementary since fall 2006, was arrested by Polk County Sheriff's investigators Friday after a briefcase in his school office was found to contain digitally altered photographs of young girls and childlike naked women, investigators said. He faces five counts of possessing child pornography.

Lakeland is between Orlando and Tampa. What this guy did was take innocent pictures of little girls in his school, then past their faces on the kiddie porn pix. And he had this stuff in his office. Here‘s what started it:

The school district had been investigating Stelmack since last Friday, after faculty members complained about Stelmack's level of affection shown toward some students. He has been suspended with pay since that investigation began.

What’s more is that the school district hired this guy without receiving his personnel records from the school he resigned from in Buffalo, NY.

He’s out of the jail right now, but I hope he didn’t go home because we all own guns in Florida, and I can imagine there are a few daddies out there considering frontier justice.

Another thing that my Catholic friends have probably already noticed. I just googled “teacher, sex, student” and come up with 195,000 hits. But no one in the media is talking about an epidemic, or an organizational scandal like they did with the Catholic priests a few years ago. And we all know why.

Where Everybody Knows Your Name

Supermax, or United States Penitentiary Administrative Maximum Facility (ADX) in Florence, CO. It’s the Alcatraz of the Rockies.

Whenever you think of some notorious criminal and wonder, “Where is he?”, he’s probably in the Supermax.

The blind sheik, the shoe bomber, FBI traitor Robert Hanssen, the 20th 9-11 highjacker, the Unabomber, the Olympic Park Bomber, Sammy the Bull, the American Taliban and a whole host of others now call Supermax their home.

Including Woody Harrelson’s dad, who died in Supermax last March 15.

Dan Fogelberg started it

No, really. Go ask Ken if you doubt me.

Our replies were but a poor attempt to imitate fellow commenter Linda, because in her words, she's a big Dan Fan.

I associate that term with an entirely different recording artist, as you can probably figure out from my bloghandle. So, I guess it's on me to cook up some questions about their stuff. We'll warm you up with a few fungoes and progress to the real fun stuff. [UPDATE - I have added correct answers where given, and hints in Spoiler Vision™ where necessary. Turns out I made some of these way too crazy hard.]

1. 1. What do you hide when you're able? [Black cards - Ken; Julie gets half credit]
2. 2. When the shutter falls, you see it all in 3-D. What is it? [HINT - Peg is the one doing the seeing; but what is she seeing? (It will come back to you!)] **
3. 3. We can stay inside and do this... [Play games - Ken, then Barking Spider]
4. 4. The girls don't seem to care what's on... as long as what plays 'til dawn? [FM - Barking Spider. Bonus - nothing but blues, Elvis, and somebody else's favorite song - Spider again.]
5. 5. She thinks I'm crazy, but what's the real problem? [HINT - she's just nineteen, which means...]
6. 6. Where did you get those shoes? [HINT - almost, Spider. The man who gave me the news is the one who asked me this question. What was my answer?]
7. 7. What did everyone stop to stare at? [Your technicolor motorhome - Barking Spider. Confession - I put this in here specifically for him.]
8. 8. Who's a charmer like you've never seen? [HINT - she sings voulez voulez voulez vouz. There are three acceptable answers]
9. 9. Daddy don't live where no more? [HINT - this is the title of the song]
10. 10. Where am I never going back to? [My old school - Barking Spider]
11. 11. Like this item, I foresee terrible trouble. What is it? (And what do I do?) [HINT - Spider's close, right song - fill in the missing lines]
12. 12. Tonight when I face the dragon, what two things will happen? [HINT - OK, this wasn't fair. First, the water may change to cherry wine; second...]
13. 13. How did you settle up your bill? [HINT - this is shortly after he caught you with your fingers in the till, and slapped your hand. Again - title of the song]
14. 14. NEW ITEM - Now I can't wait 'till I move to the city - I'll finally make up my mind to do these two things.

Old 14. It's all in the game... and who are you? [This one was really mean, but it's one of my absolute faves. You're just another scurvy brother.]

With multi-part stuff, there's STILL a good amount to go on for now. Answer away!

** Double-secret bonus - this clip will spoil the answer, but it's fascinating: how Becker and Fagan actually laid down all the tracks for Peg. Includes some alternate guitar solos they rejected, shocking photos of everybody in 1977, and fun tidbits about all the crap they put Michael McDonald through.

The book tour may be off..

...but the TV Special is a possibility.

Nickelodeon is considering a special for its young audience about sex and love following the news that 16-year-old "Zoey 101" star Jamie Lynn Spears is pregnant.

The television network has made no announcement about the future of "Zoey 101," its popular program aimed primarily at youngsters aged 9- 14. Filming for the show's fourth and final season has finished, and episodes are scheduled to begin airing in February.

If you thought Mom's book on parenting was beyond parody...

Guess what I learned today

How to post photos!

The above was taken on August 5, 2007, yes, the very day that the Nightfly and the Ladybug were wed in the holy city of Eatonton, NJ (or was it the equally holy city of Freehold?).

Which explains the formal garb. The handsome young groom on the right is the Fly. The grey-bearded laundry bag with legs on the left is none other than the Barking Spider himself. You are probably saying to yourself, "Self, these two guys were in college together yet the Spider is in serious need of Grecian Formula for Men." I started school a little late and met the freshman Fly 18 years ago when I was a 30-year-old junior.

I hope my visage hasn't frightened any small children or ladies visiting the blog. This is the first time my image has been posted on the web.

So much....

...for the book tour.

Lynne Spears' book about parenting has been delayed indefinitely, her publisher said Wednesday.

Lindsey Nobles, a spokeswoman for Christian book publisher Thomas Nelson Inc., said Wednesday that the memoir by the mother of Britney Spears was put on hold last week.

She declined to comment on whether the delay was connected to the revelation that Spears' 16-year-old daughter, Jamie Lynn, is pregnant.

What a shame! I was so looking forward to learning about how to raise children to be responsible adults!

There's a fine line...

...between man's best friend and an entree.

Caddy was an 8-month-old, 50-pound German shepherd-Labrador mix.

His owners, Frank Manuma and Debbie Weil-Manuma, never had children. Debbie never even had a pet dog before. She said Caddy was their little boy.

On Sunday, Caddy was taken from them, and they know he's never coming back. They said police told them two men confessed to stealing the dog and one said the dog was slaughtered and eaten. They said that was confirmed by a third person who told police the dog was taken to his house, where it was slaughtered.

It's a Far East thing. I myself have dined on canine while I was on Guam many moons ago.

Michael Vick missed out on a moneymaking opportunity. You're killing the dogs anyway. You may as well open up a very special Asian restaurant.

Good times, bad times

You know, they've had their share.

Chris Simon, everyone's favorite unlovable scamp, fresh off a record 25-game sitdown for last year's Hassan Chop of Ryan Holleweg, limbo'd under the bar by netting 30 games for stomping Pittsburgh's Jarkko Ruutu over the weekend.

Now, while the whole "stick up for the team" concept is admirable, Simon is now in the Steve Howe Zone - this is his seventh suspension from the NHL, and after a while there comes a time where being a good teammate means respecting other players' safety, and not being blindly loyal to a guy who can't keep his act together on the ice. So, I hear Bryan Berard say "I've seen worse things on the ice that have gotten a lot less games, especially now with the head injuries, guys hitting from behind and things like that, and guys getting two games." ... Oy. I'm not sure he's right about "fewer games" for stuff, as several Flyers can attest. Second, has he really seen worse on the ice than a guy purposely stomping down on another guy's leg with a razor-sharp blade? Simon's 210 pounds - that's a lot of stomp.

Of the few things that are in the same league as what Simon has done (with sticks and blades), at least three resulted in similar punishments - Marty McSorely braining Donald Brashear, Todd Bertuzzi jumping Steve Moore, and Jesse Boulerice slashing Ryan Kesler in the face. (In the old days, I'll grant you, not so much.)

"I'm sure it's a tough one to accept but Chris is a repeat offender," Berard added, showing that he at least has some clue. But his head coach? "It's excessive," said Ted Nolan. "The league suspended him ... now we have to support Chris while he goes through this process."

Taken apart, I can kinda sorta see that they want to be good to a guy who's (by all accounts) a fine clubhouse guy, a good teammate, and someone that Nolan in particular has mentored since their time in juniors. Simon's overcome a lot to have a career, gotten a lot of his personal life in order... but it's time for the guy to leave the ice and get himself straight. If off-the-ice leadership and character are his strong suits, that's where he should serve.

The Isles celebrated "Rally Around a Felon Night" by firing off 43 pucks, only one of which found twine, and losing 2-1 to Buffalo. But, there is a little light at the end of the tunnel, in the form of Kyle Okposo, their best prospect, deciding that he's seen enough of this goal-free bunkum. But instead of fleeing (or simply staying at U of Minnesota long enough for his rights to lapse and re-entering the draft), he's decided to join the Islanders and start his pro career.

One of the biggest problems in turning around a struggling team is attracting big talent. Catch-22: nobody wants to waste away on a bad team, so the team stays too bad to attract the players to improve. It takes that one guy to lead the way. I'm impressed with Okposo as a player, and now as a guy willing to work and to be there to rebuild. I hope they can get the kid some help and not just ship him off in a few years. (See Jokinen, Olli; Schnieder, Matheiu; Spezza, Jason; Chara, Zdeno; Connolly, Tim; Torres, Raffi; Luongo, Roberto; and etc. etc.)

Comics, the fourteenth frontier

It's Star Trek Week Time Interval at Dave's Long Box, and that means that he's bringing The Pain!™, Gold Key style.

In his latest installment, Hell freezes over.




I picture Lucifer sitting around, jacking the thermostat, watching minor demons start snowball fights and making snow angels (and he HATES that)... then he looks out his window and sees the Enterprise orbiting the Third Circle. That explains a lot, he says to himself.

We're still working on the explanations to the cover, though. Is that Kirk in the foreground? Whoever it is, he seems not to be taking things very seriously. I mean, it's HELL and it's FROZEN. He's about to break his spine over the cover narration, which tells us that his entire crew is doomed to disappear into space. How bad is this? Even Spock is freaking out.

Now dig Captain Combover.

Gee, did I leave the replicator on?

To be fair, he's only falling on his bum, while poor Spock is being physically dragged off by demons. Which brings up an important question: if you had both diabolical powers AND laser gun technology, would you shoot to trip?

Thus it starts

The Mitchell Report is getting called a lot of things, and the leader in the clubhouse seems to be "unsubstantiated hearsay from someone with a vested interest in staying out of jail."

It is certainly less-than-substantiated, to put it clumsily, though an entire appendix is dedicated to copies of the various checks, money orders, and notes Kirk Radomski was given over the years. Hearsay, in some cases where a third guy overheard two other guys - but Radomski was a direct participant, so I don't think it's all cases. Vested interest, most definitely.

But now, some of the guys named in the report are starting to come out with apologies and mea culpae. Andy Pettitte, Dan Naulty, Fernando Vina, Brian Roberts... Roberts' is especially interesting in light of his employer, the Baltimore Orioles, issuing a statement urging people to be cautious while reading the Report.

Every time one of these guys joins the "mistakes were made" side of things, Radomski and the Report gain a little more credibility. As Sean Connery could said to Kevin Costner, everybody knows where the drugs are, Mr. Ness... but what are you prepared to do? And as the PTI guys said (and Ms. Sister reported in the comments here), this is only the stuff that Radomski or BALCO led to, and they still gathered up people from every clubhouse in baseball... how much more is out there?

[more on the whole mess:
Spam, meet fan
Waiting for the hammer to fall
I did not have relations with that steroid, Stanozolol
Steroids among the little guys]

The Pastor..

..and the porn.

The Rev. Brian James' confession of being a porn addict certainly was traumatic for this respected pastor and his congregation at the St. James United Methodist Church in New Tampa.

But the church was admirably direct in acknowledging James' lapses and deciding he could no longer lead the church.

The Florida Conference of the United Methodist Church, which oversees some 750 churches, dealt with the pastor's transgressions firmly by removing him from his post at the New Tampa church.

The church hierarchy also showed compassion, sending James to get help and leaving open the possibility of a return to the ministry.

The UMC church in Florida is not as squishy as the UMC in the Northeast or Northwest. The church is doing the right thing, "We love you bro, but you gotta go, you may be ably to come back."

I am even surprised that my local fishwrap gave its approval of dealing with a fallen pastor in a Biblical manner.

My question is: Would this editorial be so approving if Pastor James would have confessed to a hankering for manlove?

Letters...

..to God.

Realizing they were too old to write letters to Santa Claus, Jonathan Mihal came up with a better idea, much more in keeping with the religion class he teaches at Cathedral Grammar School here in the South End of the city.

He decided to have his eighth-graders write to God.

“A lot of times, kids their age won’t verbalize, telling you how they really feel,” he explained. “So I thought this might be a good way to get them to open up, especially since the class is all about our faith. I asked them to write on the theme, ‘Why, God, why?’ ”

Mihal, 27, in his third year of teaching, assumed it would be an enjoyable assignment, even whimsical, perhaps revealing imagination and humor. He was, however, in for a big surprise.

I have no comment, other than what He said:


"Come to Me, all who are weary and heavy-laden, and I will give you rest. Take My yoke upon you and learn from Me, for I am gentle and humble in heart, and you will find rest for your souls. For My yoke is easy and My burden is light." Matthew 11 :28-30

World's Oldest Man...

...was a bachelor for the same reasons I am.

Born, according to family documents, on 15 March 1891, Mr Nestor, a former farm labourer, put his long life down to the fact that he never married.

"He didn't find himself a mate because he was a short man and never had money," Oksana believes.

Uno cheesesteak, por favor

Dieses ist Amerika. Bitte Auftrag auf englisch.

A small sign that asked customers to order in English at a famous cheesesteak shop was never meant to be offensive, the shop's owner testified Friday at a hearing to decide whether the policy was discriminatory.

Joe Vento, the owner of Geno's Steaks, defended his policy before the Philadelphia Commission on Human Relations, which filed the discrimination complaint.

"This country is a melting pot, but what makes it work is the English language," Vento told the commission. "I'm not stupid. I would never put a sign out to hurt my business."

Vento posted two small signs in October 2005 at his shop in a diverse South Philadelphia neighborhood, telling customers, "This is AMERICA: WHEN ORDERING PLEASE 'SPEAK ENGLISH.'"

In a visit to Geno's last year by the Fly and Mr. Bingley of the Coalition, we learn the real reason the civil rights pimps are bent over a cheesesteak joint.