Woody Cavenaugh

8/31/06

We have left sunny and beautiful Onowa Iowa and headed up to Souix Falls where we took a hard west. I was at the controls and let me tell you. The speed limit is not a hard and fast rule in South Dakota so much as a goal to be attained. Due to high winds, it was everything I could do to maintain 65...and keep us from dying. 75 was simply out of the question. It was rough enough sailing that I had to stop for breaks to work out the kinks in my shoulders from the tension created by keeping our shiney side up. As luck would have it a few hours later we finally drove out of the foul winds and it was safe to turn the controls over to someone else.

Our next stop was The Bad Lands National park. It was big, it was beautiful, it was magestic, it looked like the sandcastles of giant babies. Our camera battery died the moment we turned into the driveway. So we took about twice the number of pictures using our camera phones. Sara says we may have to come back, partially for the pictures, but mostly because I think she found someplace she really and truly loved. I have not seen her this relaxed and truly happy in a long time. It was a lot of fun.

As we left the park the road took us to the highway in the town of Wall. I have seen Wall Drug (from the road) and let me tell you, nothing was more exciting to me than finally seeing the end of those ubiquitious signs that dot the landscape for thousands of miles in every direction. From the road it wasn't that impressive.

Next stop Mt. Rushmore's KOA. We found it late, and while Sally went in to see if there was a vacancy, Sara and I looked out the window and pondered our navagational short commings. While there, I saw a schoolbus come and drop off a whole load of senior citizens. They all walked back to their RV's...in their overcoats, long pants, and in some cases tobogans. I went outside in my shorts, sandles, and t-shirt. Ah! That's why. the temperature here is somewhere between 40 and 50 degrees.

During the night the thunderstorm with the hail came...
This morning I proved to the crew that the furnace works as well as the AC. My crew loves me. Even in a thunderstorm with hail.

Now, if you'll excuse me, the coffee is ready.

Oh yeah, thank you all, I have just reached 1000 legitimate comments.

Posted by at 9:48 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

8/30/06

We followed a route from Granite City (Chain of Rocks Road!) up the border to Hannible MO (where I found internet access in a coffee shop. While in Hannible MO please visit Java Jive "The First Coffee Shop West of the Mississippi". From there we skirted the river up past Omaha (by passed it completely) and stopped finally in Onawa Iowa at the KOA.

It was late, we were tired, we had a lake side spot that wasn't a pull thorough. With great morning views comes great responsibility. Compounded by the fact you have the set up for a very funny joke. A Project Manager, a PHD, and a man were trying to pull a 31 ft RV towing a car into a spot designed for the RV to back in. I don't know the punchline exactly, but I learned that Sara hates traveling.

I was going to make the crack this morning that Iowa was beautiful if you happended to be an ear of corn. I would be lying however funny I had hoped to be. I like this place. According to our brochure and campground map there is even places (plural) to get food.

Looking around outside this morning I noted that there are about 50 Rv's that are set up for what looks like their summer lodging. I Guess late September and early October, they pack up and move south for warmer winters. Not a bad life if you can afford it.

We awoke this fine morning a little chilly with hail raining down on our roof. At least that's what we though it was. The trees we parked under are very similar but nothing like pecan trees and the hail was small dark berries that were being knocked down by hundreds of birds feeding on them. I don't know what's in those berries, but the birds aren't pooping it or anything else. We know this because Sally was up there sweeping the berries off the roof with a wisk broom while Sara showered, and I stumbled over the nose of the Saturn twice cutting myself on both calves in the process each time. Swell. Clearly I haven't had my coffee yet.

The fishing here looks good, I could see movement in the water pretty regularly and the "fish cleaning shelter" is the same size as the main office.

Up to now, there has been nothing to see at all. The states we passed through offered us little more than land necessary only to hold the world together. Someone planted corn on it. And eventually, someone else built giant factories in one part of it as well. I thought we might have been nearing a population center because I started signs for "Hustler", but as it turns out different people find different things sexy. The locals (as local as you can be over the course of three states) seem to find lawn equipment sexy. They don't even have to drape a half naked woman over it. And I learned that Hustler is also a brand of lawn and garden equipment. I'm thinking the centerfold is going to be boxey, and wearing red. Turn ons include lawns and gardens, turn offs include being stored outdoors and snow. To each their own.

Next stop? Who knows. I think we might spend a few minutes being tourest at Mt. Rushmore but I won't know til we get there.

More later.

Coffee supplies running low...I fear for the moral of the crew. Need more alcohol.

Posted by at 9:34 AM | Permalink | Comments (1)

8/29/06 later that day...

As predicted, we opted to stop at Granite City on "Chain of Rocks" road. How awsome a name is that for anything? We got our spot, did our laundry and planned our Old Spegetti Factory meal. The weather is overcast with light showers. Very pleasant really, I call it coffee drinking weather. Little did I know that a coffee drinking afternoon would turn into a hard drinking night...

The route into St. Louis is ugly in the direction we were sent. The road we were on was worn hard by the hundred years of semi trucks and a hundred years of freight. We realized soon enough that it can always be worse. The streets of Old St. Louis are cobble stones, and stop lights are a new fangled contraption that these folks want no part of. They don't seem to be all that interested in strait roads and simple intersections either.

But we finally made the restaurant, had a good meal, and got back to the car. The problem we had in the car was that there was no way to get back the way we came, so we had to improvise. Sally was driving, Sara was navigating, and I prayed we would see the sunrise again. Prostitues were yelling at us, suspiciously burned down strip clubs were surrounded by newer flasher strip clubs. East St. Louis is a third world country and we had UN logo's all over us.

Kitty Scared!

But through it all, they managed to get us back to the RV park with a minimum of traded gunfire. (I only had to reload twice).

As of this moment I have little urge to see St. Louis again anytime soon. At least without armor, and heavy weapons. I swear I think I saw an overturned UN truck burning a block from where we were.

Even the GPS after a quick warning of "I wouldn't do that if I were you", quickly was replaced by the message, "you're on your own." I guess there are some places even satellites fear to tread.

But by the fact that you are reading this, it is evidence that I at least survived this far.

We are now back at the RV, alive, safe, and about to drink heavily.

Posted by at 3:35 PM | Permalink | Comments (1)

8/29/06

This is my first shift in the back of Serenity and I am learning that it is difficult to type while bouncing down the road in an RV. I know it has been a couple of days since I have gotten any updates out in the world and it is my hope that I can make up for this once we hit St. Louis. The last thing I want is folks wondering wether or not I am having a good time. I want you not only to know that I am, I want you to share in it as best as you can.

This morning we woke up at The Kentucky Horse Park, which is a Kentucky state park. Over the weekend the normal horse trader crowd was replaced by the kennel club crowd. infact not all of the dog owners had left by the time we arrived on Monday. It wasn't loud though. Apparently if you are going to have a dog worth showing you are going to train it to keep its darn yap shut after sundown. Tuesday2 our Public Relations Officer and shipboard cat had no issues sharing the park with a bunch of smelly old hounds. Again, I think of smuggling beagles...

In an effort to keep down the ammount of waste building up in our tanks I will do my bathroom business in public facilities whenever I can. Plus, its kind of a tight fit. Showering is like showering in a sleeping bag, but that's ok. I imagine it is much like it was on skylab sans the zero gravity. Anyway, I degress. I am sitting in a stall in the facilities provided by the Kentucky Horse Park and I am reading the walls, as expected there are plenty of offers for gay sex liasons, but there is always some local color to be found that I find most interesting. In this case, two pieces of writing on the wall caught my eye. The first said simply, "Skol Mint". I assume this is some sort of grass roots ad campaign with a pocket knife on plastic walls but who really knows the real meaning in the message. The second that caught my eye was "I love Inuyasha". I can only guess that even Kentucky has a anime fan base.

While I am pondering smokeless tobaco and anime a cricket hops into the stall promptly rolls over and dies right there at my feet. How rude! Oddly enough when I went to wash my hands at the seven sinks there was a dead cricket in each one but two. One had no cricket at all (I used this one) and the one next to it had two. Best laid plans of crickets....

We're maybe an hour and a half from St. Louis, the plan is we are going to go to a KOA in Granite City and hook the RV up to power so Tuesday2 may enjoy cooler temperatures and the three of us will take the shuttle into St. Louis and gaze upon the arch a while. The plan is we will eat an early dinner at the Old Spegetti Factory and then return to the RV dock the shuttle and head to Hanable MO. If I can find them, maybe I can hire the A Team. (It was a TV show, look it up kids.) That was the plan. My gut feeling is though that we will end up staying in Granite City for the night and heading out in the morning to catch lunch in Hannible rather than dinner. That will be OK too.

Well, that's my story up until now. More later. As for me, I think I'm going to lay down on the couch and take a little nap. Why not? Sara is driving... Sara is driving and I need to demonstrait how comfortible I am with her at the controls for the very first time. There. I said it. :)

Posted by at 3:33 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

8/28/06

The road flowed easily beneith us as the West Virginia flowed into Kentucky We had had a late morning at Pipestem State Park so we knew we wouldn't put that many miles behind us before dark caught us. We timed it just right, saw the road in front of us and arrived at Kentucky Horse Park about an hour before dark. Once set up, Sally sent Sara and myself in the shuttle to pick up some food. By the time we got back the wine had had time to breathe and a wonderful meal was had by all. Our very first shindig on the road. I knew I was tired by just how hard the wine hit and how warm I got from it, by 11pm I was more than ready to sleep beneath kentucky skies. (In the RV, what? You think I'm some sort of barbarian or something?)

Weather remains good, only a few short drizels, moral is high and I think Sara is starting to relax and have a good time. I couldn't have more fun covered in oil and cheerleaders myself. I enjoy the simple life though. Hot showers, refrigerator, AC, GPS, 3 camera sensor system and a robot back in the shuttle.

Yes a robot.

Very clever little guy too. He is plugged into the brake lights on the car, should the driver of the RV hit the breaks, he will push the brake peddle on the car so it slows down too. It is a very handy thing.

Posted by at 3:32 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

8/27/06
I find it ironic that I can get better internet service in an RV in a KOA than I can in my own home. Cell phone service is better too. Plus it only cost me $36.00 a night. Ok, that isn't as good as home, but its better than a hotel. Plus they have these really cute cabins if you don't have an RV.

Its 8:11am and the Doc has not yet contacted us about rendezvous. I am not worried about it. The coffee is strong, hot, and I have already had my shower. Good times... I am even thinking about the Lance Crackers I am going to have for breakfast later. I've got Lance. In my pants.

Now to kick back, drink my coffee, and gaze all relaxed like out of the window.

10:49am. The checkout time is noon, so after making contact with The Doc, it was determined that she might need just "one more hour" so if we could get some sort of "day pass" for the RV she would do her best to catch up with us ASAP. I didn't bother to tell her that her gift card wasn't working so all fees so far have been eaten by us. What are friends for? The KOA will allow us to move at noon to their parking lot until 3pm where we have to either move on or rent a new space. I am prepaired to rent a new space.

2:00pm. *snort* Huh, wah? Phone... Our Mrs. Robinson is calling. She has left Greensboro cat in tow and will be here in one hour. It is worth noting that she would be arriving "just in the nick of time" to dock, dump, and depart. My nap interrupted, I was dreaming of smuggling beagles, we can begin preperations for departure and hopefully without paying for an extra night.

Sara says "Hi" and something else that is only really funny if you have ever watched Zefrank.

3:30pm Sally makes contact. Only a building separates us. 15 minutes later I am getting instructed on the fine art of dumping our "trash" or to be more precise, unloading liquid waste product from the onboard holding tanks and transfering it to the KOA's septic system. Finally, now that I know this, I will be able to poop indoors. That will be nice.

I did get a meal with food in it. We went to Elkin. Happily we didn't choose to dine in Bland Virginia. I'm just not getting a good vibe about the passtimes and pleasures available there. Tomorrow's breakfast will be either at Gino's Pizza and Spegetti, or at Gino's Biscuite World. Yes, they were both located in the same building. Convenient that.

In the parking lot of the restaurant in Elkin we had an adventure. Just as we are about to leave the RV the generator cuts off on its own, uninvited like. While Sally (Sarah) and Sara get the windows open I set to work on solving the mystery of the sudden non-functioning generator. I noted that the oil, though perfectly fine wasn't 100% full, and I know that modern generators wil shut off for safety if their oil gets the least little bit low, so I figure oil is the culprit. The issue is that the generator takes 15W40 oil which is fairly non-standard, we're probably going to need a garage or an auto parts store to find some.

I begin walking down the road looking for any place to buy some. Three convenience stores and 1/3 a mile later I walk up on a convenience store with a service bay in it. Its sunday so the garage is closed, but the supplies in it should be just as for sale today as any other day. I walk in scan the shelf and find the magical mystery fluid. Sadly it is only available in the convenient one gallon size, but I didn't expect different, and besides, this stuff has a decent shelf life. On the way to the register I noticed up on the wall was a display (created in the 1950's) selling pocket combs. I needed one so up to the counter I go with a gallon of specialty oil and a plastic pocket comb. The guy looks at me and what I purchased, "Pocket comb?" he asks. "29 cents" I answer pointing up at the wall display. "You want a funnel with that?" he asks. "Yes please." I could feel his curious gaze upon me as I walked out of the parking lot, across the street and down the road out of sight. I am sure that is one sale he'll mention later.

Turned out that the gas powered generator is tied to the gas tank in such a way that it won't run should the fuel level drop below 1/4 a tank. By sheer concidence, we reached that point just as we pulled into the parking lot. I by the way didn't have to look that up either. ...not that I can find any documentation of this fact. I simply started from the easiest solution and escalated up the possibility chain until I found a solution that works. I am a knowledge manager after all, I know stuff.

10:46pm We are now in a West Virginia state park, Pike Hole creek or somthing I forget. As I type this Sally and Sara are hiking back up to the state store in order to pay for our spot. Oddly enough this place has the water and sewer on one side and the power on the other. All RV's I am aware of have water, sewer, and power all on the back left side of the unit. So water stretches across the back, electricity is fine and sewer is...well...shit out of luck. More dumping of the "trash" tomorrow.

A word about West Virginia state parks. Let me back up. A word about West Virginia. I love North Carolina and I am proud to call it my home, but West Virginia has proven itself to be a more civilized state for two reasons. Reason one is that every few exits you can see giant signs from the highway pointing towards 24 hour Starbucks. NC has none of the 24 hour variety that I am aware of and if they do, they are not easily found from the highway thanks to large and familiar signs. Two, NC has state parks, lots of beautiful state parks. You go, you park, you pitch your tent, you walk to the nearest bathroom and fresh water station, you buy your firewood if it is safe to have a fire at that moment in time. You camp. In West Virginia you can have that if you want but they are billed as State Park Resorts. You can have your tent if you want. You can rent a yurt if tents are too unciviliazed for you. You can rent a cabin if yurts are too uncivilized for you. You can get a hotel room in the park if the cabin is too rustic for your taste. Did I mention the indoor pool and hot tub?

Goodnight all. Oh yeah, Sally gave me the name of the place, Pipe Stem West Virginia. Don't know why I couldn't remember that. We also had breakfast at the State Park Resort Restaurant. Plush, tasty, and not expensive. Way nicer than anything I have seen in NC.

Posted by at 3:28 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

A man once wrote that men were from Mars and women were from Venus. A woman immedately countered that infact women have been and always will be from Earth, and men were from Pluto. Shortly after making this decleration, they made another one. Pluto would no longer be considered a planet.

By way of evidence I offer this ancidote. When the plan to leave Greensboro was made, I understood it that at 7am when my vet opened, Sara and I would be there with our five animals for delivery. At 8:00am sharp we would be at The Doc's. At 8:30 when the storage facility opened we would be first in line by the gate.

What Sara got was this: Get up when you can, start packing. Get the pets to the vet sometime before noon and we would leave whenever we were good and ready and not a moment before.

Turns out I was wrong on every count. It is now 4:13pm Saturday as I write this. We are sitting in the RV about a block from The Doc's house. At 4:30pm I go back and see if there is more stuff to load. The odd thing is that Sara and I are having a lot of fun. Glad she remembered to pack some DVD's.

10:10PM We're all gone to die! Whose driving this thing??? Oh, wait. That's me. We made it all the way to Statesville...sans Doc. The decision was made to send myself and my darling wife ahead with Serenity, and she would take the shuttle and meet us here in the morning. So here we are, dinner was a pack of Lance crackers each and a bottle of water. I look forward to having some food that actually has food in it.

Now for the surprises, I spent several minutes trying to level the thing when it occured to me (I saw it written on the leveling controls) that one should read the manual before leveling. What? I'm just the pilot. You want levels, you get a leveler. Electricity was easy, you just plug it in. Water was easy to. Take garden hose "a" and connect it to spicket 1, and tank nozle 2. Turn on spicket. Look honey, Water AND electricity!

We spent 8 hours vacationing in Greensboro, followed by an hour on the road only to stop at a KOA. All in all its been the best day ever.

Posted by at 10:22 PM | Permalink | Comments (1)

Hungry Like a Wolf Baby!

Rock stars are more primitive than we previously believed.

Posted by at 3:00 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Recently we had a leak in our roof. I stayed home half a day last week to patch it. I didn't test it, prefering to wait until the calking dried and let rain test it. However, Amuck In America 2006 begins tomorrow and prudence suggested that I probably give the roof a quick spray with the old watering hose just to make sure since we hadn't had any rain lately.

I sprayed for a while and came inside. Sara was unsure of the patch and the test even after I climbed up on a stool and ran a paper towel around the interior edges. So it was agreed that I would go outside and spray some more water on the roof.

As I was walking out the door I turned to look at Sara who was at this point sitting on the stool under the sunlight looking up in anticipation. She was bathed in this beautiful bright light from the sun comming down through the sunlight and I had never seen her so beautiful and angellic. She was like my own personal angel of doubt.

I couldn't make the patch fail by letting water from the hose rain down on the sunlight. Perhaps I should stand on the roof and spray it directly...with a firehose.

Posted by at 12:56 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

My Butt's Parking Here.

You cannot have!

Posted by at 10:51 AM | Permalink | Comments (2)

I am in a position where every day I can witness the new fads and fashions, and happily rip them apart with my lunch friends. Don't get me wrong, I see lots of good use of clothing, but I also see my fair share of "WTF were they thinking??"

For instance just today I saw a girl in nice clean well fiting jeans, a tasteful pink top and a cute little white sweater. It would have been very flattering (and parent approved) except for one tiny little flaw. Her shoulder length hair had not been brushed this week yet. So instead of thinking about how nice she looked I was thinking instead, "BRUSH YOUR HAIR! You are not the star of Cold Case. She doesn't get away with it anyway." (In fact in recent seasons her hair has even been styled)

One of my lunch companions brought up that if you are going to wear a shirt that shows a little belly, your pants can't be so tight that it forms a roll of flesh at the waist line. Even if you need to eat a twinkie, you're going to look like you're the girl who ate Manhattan. Cam's rule of fashion is simple and elegant, you can wear a tight shirt or tight pants, you may choose only one. Sound advice.

Worn looking denim is all the rage now. I realize that most Americans of this age group are far too lazy to actually wear holes into their pants, so they buy the pants pre-worn out. Whatever, it's your dollar. I have a pet peeve connected to this however. When you wear pants with the holes in it I can at least imagine the possibility that you got your holes through honest wear and tear. When you wear the denim miniskirt with the holes in it, there is only one way you could have POSSBILY earned the wear and tear honestly, and that is by having sex in a car and tearing the hole in the skirt with the gear shift. So when you're walking around in your miniskirt with the holes in the butt I'm not thinking that you are someone who isn't afraid of a little work, I'm thinking you're cheap and easy. Is that the effect you were looking for?

Camo is also not that unusual, you can usually see camo pants on a daily basis. Here's a tip. If you choose to wear a green shirt with your camo pants, be sure that color green exist in the pants. You can wear any color you want with your camo and it will be fine, but if you choose green and it is a shade not already in your pants, you FAIL. Its that simple.

I have been noticing something new this year, its a thin lace button up overshirt. Often they have some ruffels in the front. I like the concept, but I haven't actually seen a proper execution yet. Two tips. One: Silly boy, these are for girls. Two: Wear it over a solid shirt not over a t-shirt with text printed on it.

Today for some reason I have seen maybe as many as six shirts that are plain except for a large number on the chest. Not a jersey, not even sporty really. It is just a shirt with a number. I have no problem with it personally, but for me thanks to this it has meaning WAY beyond what you're probably thinking. It makes me smile. :)

Dredlocks. Face it, white people will never be really good at this hair style. You can make it work in the back, but up top you look fuzzy. There is nothing you can do about this. Its the other mullet. Fuzzy on the top, Rasta in the rear.

A message to skinny girls who wear tank tops as their only shirt (as opposed to an undershirt). If we can see your ribs, eat twinkies until the condition improves. You don't look healthy even if you are. You may be perfectly healthy, just unable to gain weight, my tubby butt doesn't hold it against you (I'd probably injure you if I did anyway). I just don't think you want others thinking you have some kind of eating disorder.

Early in the spring the half-jacket started making an appearance among the ladies. This was a jacket, it could even be denim, long sleeved but in length it stopped just below the bust. I like it because it allows the wearer to do something different with the layering effect. Instead of the layers only showing at the neckline, the layer can now show lower. As summer came the material went from warm to mesh so now not only do you get that nice layering effect, you also add texture. It is shaping up that this half-jacket top is going to be this years Jessica Alba's Dark Angel inspired one shoulder top. However, there is something one should know when buying one of these. It fits BELOW the bust. It doesn't tie across it, it doesn't tie above it. If you buy the right size and wear it correctly, it will be a hit. If you don't, you'll look like a tard. We'll smile, we will wish you well, but we'll always be afraid that at any moment you're going to pick and lose a fight with an inanimate object. Don't do that.

Look for other tips and tricks in the next installment of BIG WOODY'S FASHION PARADE.

Posted by at 8:50 AM | Permalink | Comments (6)

I remember back in 1992 when I got my very first email account (still using it btw). I was using a program called "Mail" on VAX. Ok, all you guys who laughed at that are old geeks. All of you that failed to laugh at the VAX thing, but laughed at the "old geeks" comment-- You guys are N00bs. At any rate, not long after getting that email account I received an email about giving a cat a pill. It was uproariously funny and from the number of <'s in it I would say it had circled the globe many times before getting to me. This will not be nearly as funny as that, but it shares several things in common with that. It is about a cat, and it has to do with medicating one.

Sara's cat Maximillian recently had his teeth cleaned, he's 15 now and I guess it is about time for that. He is a good cat in good dental shape and got a gold star from the vet. He also got a bottle of liquid antibiotic he's supposed to have an ounce of it twice a day for two weeks. So upon getting home Sara grabs him up and fires a dose down his gullet with the included syringe.

Max who is perhaps the most patient and most forgiving cat to ever walk the earth did not like this one bit. He shook his head until stumbled. He tried to completely eject his tongue from his mouth. He foamed, he tried to run away from it. Licking his own butt didn't help. Even licking the dog's butt didn't help (didn't seem to do the dog any favors either). After several minutes of foaming, drooling, shaking, and being unhappy he finally vomitted, which seemed to solve the problem. For him anyway.

A call to the vet revealed that in this case we should mix it with his food and make him eat it that way. It was a sad couple of days, he'd eat a little, he'd foam a little, he'd make faces, he would eat a little more and the process repeated.

At the end of that couple of days, he drew a line in the sandbox. He was on a hunger strike. So what are a couple of pet owners to do? I wanted to find out what was so bad about that liquid, I mean, besides being pink. I popped the top and took a big old wiff of the offending pinkness. It smelled exactly like bubble gum. Bubble gum???

You see, mammals can share a lot of the same medicines just in appropriate dose sizes. Your cat gets car sick, just give it a child's dosage of over the counter children's montion sickenss medicine. Dog has pain, give him a buffered asprine. Cat has a little gum damage after a good vigerous cleaning, baby liquid antibiotic is just the thing. However, we now know thanks to experimentation and analysis that cats don't like bubblegum flavor. At least 100% of the cats we tried it on didn't like it. It may also be that the cat honestly is having an allergic reaction, but just in case, lets try another flavor. Personally, I'd like to run some lemon flavor past the cat to see if we'll have a sour puss in our midst. That would at least be funny. Plus the lemony scent would actually do our dog's butt some good as well.

I will have to remember to ask my pharmisist to request a new flavor to go with the other 50+ flavors that can go into children's liquids. I'm thinking liver. Of course, if I could get it in chicken or tuna I would like the taste as well. Come to think of it, I think I ought to request bacon wrapped fillet mignon flavor. You do that then we will have something so popular that you could actually turn an execution into something the victim would enjoy taking orally. No more rope, needles, gas, bullets or sharp bladed objects. Just a tablespoon and your guilty of nine counts of first degree murder guy will happily accept his demise. Unless he's a vegitarian, in which case, he needs to be stoned. (Both in the smoked up way as well as in the "to death" way should his munchies not make him crave glorious bacon wrapped fillet flavored death.)

But I degress, and suddenly crave steak.

Posted by at 12:55 PM | Permalink | Comments (2)

I was listening last night to the latest offensive and harassing voice mail from Vernon Robinson on the phone. This time to the tune of The Beverly Hillbillies, some idiot is singing to me in true redneck fashion about how their politiical enemy was spending all of my money on illegal immigrants. It occured to me that the phone call was harassing, insulting, and not for a candidate in my district. Perhaps I should return the favor either with some phone calls of my own or maybe a lawyer's note. Then it occured to me that the candidate they were attacking is the one that really should be doing the lawyering. I started thinking back to all of the other heated political campains and how candidates took turns lying about each other. This candidate was AWOL from the national guard, this candidate was hated by everyone under him in the military. Look at this picture we made in photoshop with this candidate and a known traitor. If I had said any of the things above about any of you, I'd have found myself in court answering to either libel or slander charges.

Then it all became clear to me. They have an honor system. Honor among politicians as it were.

Look at it like this with these entirely made up ficticious examples.

"Vermin" of the Bloated Pachyderm Party accuses "Cockroach" of the Stubborn Ass party of being a child molester. The media goes wild with the story and Cockroach falls like a stone in the polls the only way Cockroach can combat it is to take Vermin to court for libel, slander or both.

They get to court and Vermin has to prove beyond a shadow of a doubt that Cockroach is a child molester. He made it up clearly, so he can't do it even though he has reams of color photos of Coackroach kissing babies at various Wally World grand openings. Instead, he takes the time in court under oath to prove beyone a shadow of a doubt that in 1979 Cockroach got drunk and slept with someone not of his wife at a party out of town. He also proves beyond a shadow of a doubt that Cockroach failed to file a tax return during his sophmore year of college. It is quickly forgotten that Vermin lied about the baby raping thing, because everyone's going goo-gah over the 1979 "One Night Stand-Gate" and the tax dodging incident. (Even though one of these may not have actually occured.)

So what have we learned? Politicians can say anything they want to about anyone they want to without any fear of repercussion. (They can also get past the "do not call" list.) So maybe what I really ought to do is run for Trinity or something and accuse Vernon Robinson of being an abuser of small furry woodland creatures. It clearly wouldn't even matter that I wasn't running "against" Vernon for the position or even in the same district. I'd be a politician and would only have to answer to the bloggers.

On the other hand, being a politician is a pretty slimy and disgusting job. I don't think I have the stomach for it. If I want to lie for a living I'll I do it honestly by writing fiction, or being an actor.

Posted by at 9:01 AM | Permalink | Comments (3)

So what if I am an attention whore.


At least I'm not wearing a red prom dress at a casual event.

Posted by at 8:22 AM | Permalink | Comments (5)

Not believing I really look OR sound like that.

Maybe if I had a big ugly scar...or an eyepatch?

Posted by at 9:28 AM | Permalink | Comments (4)

I really wanted a little digital camera to take on my vacation, so I could take pictures and share them with you, the reader. To this end, I went to Sara and asked her for her advice, she is after all the one with a masters degree in film. She consulted the sources and proclaimed that I should buy a Nikon and spend no more than $130.00 for it. A couple of thrilling hours of mad web surfing later we came upon the Nikon CoolPix L4. 4 Megapixels (whatever that means), and a bargan at $129.99. We find it in town at this price and on the way to the vet stop by to pick it up. We find it and it was just seconds from being mine, when Sara noticed the NIkon CoolPix L5. $40.00 more and 5.1 megapixels. Sara said this was a good thing, and I trust her. We left with a $199.00 camera. The Nikon CoolPix P2. The P2 and the L5 are exactly the same camera, but it had one thing that made us both agree that we must own it. It is wireless. Where I'm taking pictures, I don't need wires!
Are we not married? We are geeks.


Well, she's a geek. I'm a geek AND an attention whore.

Posted by at 6:14 PM | Permalink | Comments (2)

We awoke this morning to find it raining outside. We awoke this morning to find it raining inside. Always one to look on the bright side I announced that we had been awarded one of those fancy indoor fountains. Turns out Sara isn't impressed by fancy indoor fountains. Especially those that rain on the electric stove. (I dont' know what the problem is, it isn't like we're using it.) Truth is only a couple of things would have impressed her this morning. First off I needed to get out there and patch that hole, sooner would be better than later. The second, I needed to refrain from using my psychic powers to predict the color of shirt she is going to choose and choose a shirt myself that same color first. It really annoys her when I choose the color she is going to wear before she does. (I think its funny! Mom thinks I shouldn't use my powers for evil.)

All I wanted to do is go a full work day this week without having to leave early for something or other.

So at lunchtime, I go to the home improvement store and pick up some stuff that I might need to patch the skylight. I get home, change into some working cloths and head up the ladder. Somewhere up there I remembered the words my mom and dad always said whenever they assigned me gutter cleaning duty. "Don't get on that roof without someone here to find you if you fall."

Ok. Jake, Bud, here's the deal. There is a reasonable chance that my tubby butt falls off or though the roof. Should that happen, Jake I know you have the emotional intelligence enough to know that I am going to need help. Bud, you have the raw intelligence enough to figure out how to open the door, grab the phone, and bring it to me so I can call for help when I wake up. No licking my face when I'm down, no eating me until I'm good and dead. Do we have an understanding?

I have no idea if they understood or cared, but I had done what I could do and that was enough for me. Plus, Sara was at work. If I didn't come back to pick her up she would worry and start calling the house and my cell phone. She would call at regular intervals until I called back. If I didn't call back I imagine she would ask around and see if anyone would be willing to take a long lunch to drive her home, when folks started arriving at the office in the morning.

I'm clearly kidding. I actually have no idea what she would do if I was at home alone and in trouble and she was at work alone wondering if I was in trouble or not. I do know that she is going to give me no end of harassment for the comments above. Especially the part about me always wearing in advance the color she is going to choose to wear that day.

She hates that. (I think its funny)

Suffice it to say I didn't get hurt, as I made it back to write this. Did I fix the leak? I donno. Ask me again after it rains.

Posted by at 4:51 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

As you may recall, I am a big fan of the Roomba. Roomba filled a hole in our married but still somehow bachlor lifestyle. Roomba makes us pick up our stuff, then it vaccuums our floors. Roomba is family. But there was still a hole in our lives. Sara would occasionally use a swiffer wet to try to get the kitchen floor clean. By occasionally, I mean time measured in full moons. I'm not knocking her, I've never touched the swiffer at all except to move it out of my way. The same can be said for the vaccuum cleaner in the days before Roomba. Yesterday thanks to woot.com, our Scooba arrived in the mail. What roomba does for dust, dirt, cat hair, and other particles, Scooba does for our kitchen floor with the power of mopping!

So how does it work? It brought tears to my eyes. While Roomba made our lives such that we didn't have to worry about tracking mud outside when we got out of the shower, Scooba makes it possible to reintroduce the 5 second rule to foods dropped in the kitchen. Those cheese puffs won't get away that easily anymore! Thank you Scooba!

Scooba uses a particular "Scooba Fluid" made by Clorox, it contains no bleach and is designed especially for this amazing plastic pal. It takes only a small ammount of scooba fluid and Target sells the Scooba and its fluid should you run out today to get one. The device itself is ever so slightly taller than roomba, and when you see it in action most of what you are looking at is its tanks. One for clean water, one for dirty water.

The Scooba will check the room out, mop, squeegie, and dry itself off before shutting down. Thanks to the miracles of modern technology the Scooba is even smarter than the Roomba and is even more user friendly to use. The Roomba will tell you what's wrong with a series of beeps, the Scooba will tell you with text and friendly lights.

Scooba will clean our kitchen and hall in about 45 minutes. All we have to do is empty the tank, clean the easy to clean parts, drop the battery in the charger and wait for the floor to dry before we serve food on it. I LOVE SCOOBA.

But don't take my word for it. Read the Woot! blog on it or better yet, listen to the podcast. "I'm in your kitchen and I'm cleanin yer floorz"

Posted by at 7:59 AM | Permalink | Comments (2)

This weekend's visit to the Condo Coast was a mercy mission as I had to come in and return mom's computer which needed a motherboard and processor replaced. Mission Accomplished.

While working very hard to make it appear that nothing was different, and everything she remembered was exactly where she left it, I used a copy of Underexposed Productions, Gone to Ground to test the video and sound. It also allowed me to show my parents what we can do in 48 hours.

My mother, who also doubles as my greatest critic, who had already commented negatively on my haircut, had this to say.
Greatest Critic: "Why does it have to be so violent. There's too much killing."
Me: "We drew the genre 'spy'. It is very difficult to do this genre without some good natured bloodshed."
Greatest Critic: "What does Sara do in this, I didn't see her?"
Me: "Sara is the Assistant Director, her job is to make sure that everyone and everything is exactly where it needs to be exactly when it needs to be there. It is just like her day job as a project manager."
Greatest Critic: "I saw you in that one scene. You were just sitting there. Were you supposed to be some sort of guard?"
Me: "Yes mom, I was a guard."
Greatest Critic: "You could have done something else. I don't like it when you die anyway."
Me: "Yes mom, possibly, but you have to remember, off screen I was the boom operator- I hold the microphone for the actors to talk into."
Greatest Critic: "Sara does all that, and you only hold the microphone, and be a guard."
Me: "Yes, we both really enjoy what we do."
Greatest Critic: "You could be doing more."
Me: "Yes mom."

Overall I think it was a successful screening. I had to explain some stuff to her, and some things over and over again, "No mom, we drew 'spy', that's what you do in a spy movie."

*sigh* I wanna go home.

Posted by at 8:11 AM | Permalink | Comments (1)

I used to pride myself in my ability to see beauty in everything and everyone. I thought it was some sort of cool virtue. As it turns out, it was nothing more than making lemonaid out of lemmons. Or perhaps more accurate making chicken salad from chicken poop.

That was my new realization about life that occured just a few minutes ago at the wallyworld a'la Christal Coast. Blame it on the water, blame it on the sun, blame it on the small gene pool, but this place is dying all around. Not the buildings, businesses, condo's and cars, its the people, the local folk that make up the place I call home. The major population comming into this place is retired folks. The only fresh source of genetic material is Cherry Point Naval Air Station, and if they are marrying the local kind, they aren't sticking around.

Even the geography, I truly love, on second look with eyes that have seen a little more of the world is a touch rugged and a bit ragged around the edges.

It made the place seem a little smaller and a little lonelier, even with an exploding population of Yankie geriatrics.

Oddly enough, I think it made me love it a little more.

Posted by at 6:59 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Yeah I'm talking about man stuff here. I got a "Y" on my zipper and a "Y" in my genes. Man up! Man up! Scratch. Grunt. Spit. Now pee standing up. Yeah.....

Um...guys...I think we're in trouble. Apparently that whole "Y" thing that makes us manly men may be a massive mistake made of missing...manstuff? Our little "Y"s are shrinking. No, I don't think we can blame cold water either. I know we all read this article from back in 2003 that said that our little "Y"s could take care of themselves. Yeah, me too. But today I was reading this brand new article. It says we're screwed as far as our half of the species goes. We've got maybe 15 million years left to strut around adjusting ourselves. Then we're nothing more than a few rusting war machines and some writing on an abandoned bathroom wall. Clearly the man hating lesbiens are going to be thrilled when that day comes. Those of us who become XX dudes, fight the good fight. Remember us when you write your names in the snow (I mean, if you can still do that). Be like the mole vole.

From the article:

Graves says this has already happened in the case of the mole vole, an aggressive little rodent that appears male and is able to reproduce despite having lost its Y chromosome.

Aggressive huh? Those little guys are like John Wayne, "Take 'em both, we don't need either of them." I don't know about you but I think that mystery is solved. Put me in an apron on my knees cleaning the toilet and I'd get a little aggressive too. Now multiply that by being a mole and a vole, that's short guy syndrome times several billion, no matter what witty statement is written on the apron.

I guess there is only one thing left to do guys. We've got to party. We've got to party like there's only five billion four hundred and seventy five million tomorrows left to go.

Wow...that's a lot of beer. Maybe we can postpone the party for a billion or so days. But when we throw that party it will be so huge and so loud and so crazy that the XX Men will be talking about it billions of years later. "Yeah, those XY guys really knew how to party."

Posted by at 3:39 PM | Permalink | Comments (1)

The Carolina Theatre played host to a packed house for their showing of Indiana Jones and The Raiders of the Lost Ark. Although I am a big fan of the franchise I had never actually seen Raiders on the big screen. Come to think of it, I hadn't seen it in years. I was not disappointed. Though film convention had evolved a bit since 1981, the film still thrills.

Check out the Carolina Theatre's list of upcomming feature films, A Clockwork Orange is comming soon. Not to mention the 1925 Lon Cheny version of The Phantom of the Opera. This by the way is a silent movie, so for the extra treat we will have a live accomppanyist just like one would have seen back in 1925. Not to be missed, and best of all tickets are only $5.00! Who could ask for anything more?

Posted by at 3:23 PM | Permalink | Comments (1)

Wow, just wow. For the third year running I have been fortunate enough to be on the "bridesmaid" team, awsome buzz, awsome product, excellent award collection, never quite enough to take the "Best Of Greensboro". I think this year my team took more awards than we have any other year with seven. I am very proud to have been a part of that. Especially since the "Best of Greensboro" film only took two awards. The other teams comming closest to matching our "medal count" did so with four each.

Now, as something of a disclaimer. The judges this year did a winner in each category as well as a runner up. Different people have different opinions of the "runner up" award. My opinion is that "runner up" equals second place. Second doesn't suck. As I have never been first in anything, second is as good as a win as far as I care. However, for the sake of those who see "runner up" as "first loser" I will break it down your way. Team Underexposed took first three times and "first loser" four times. The "Best Of Greensboro" won one and was tied for "first loser" with one. The two teams that were second in medal count one team had no first and 4 seconds. The other team took first 4 times.

Each year three different judges are chosen and they make their own rules for how they award. This is a good thing in my opinion as it means that you can't "play to the judges". If you knew exactly how the judges were going to judge you would probably end up spending all of your time trying to get all of the technical marks and this contest would degrade into figure skating. The downside of this is that each year the teams walk away not knowing how they were judged. They have no feedback on how to get better. So after the applause dies, there are always little groups of folks trying to figure out what happened and why. Especially when their favorites are snubbed.

In previous years the team that brought home the most "medals" took best overall. The judging then became clear even if you didn't agree with it. This year was odd because the team that took it all only one a "runner up" in one category (and that was judged by the fans not the Judges). I have a theory on this that might shed some light on the situation. Remember Judges perrogitive, they make the rules their way just as it should be. This year I believe that the judges wanted more teams to receive awards. They did after all give "runner up" awards in all of their categories. If I'm right, and I am just guessing here. The judges went through and judged each film. the team with the most awards took "Best of Greensboro". The judges then went through and removed them from all of the other categories, and everyone got bumped up by one. "Runner up" would become "winner" and the unnamed third got to get an award as "runner up". But this is just my theory of how it was done. I have heard some other theories that are just as plausable.

One of the outstanding members of our team Todd Williard went through and assigned a point value each "win" got two points and each "runner up" getting one point. By his system our team scored 10 points for the win. It does not take into account that the "Best of Greensboro" winner only scored one point by that system. However, if you use his scoring system with my "take the winner out and push everyone else up" theory I think it stands.

All of this of course brings up another ethical delima. Do teams do this to do it because it is fun, or do they do it to win. The first year when we did "Purely Platinum" we did it solely to have a great time. And we did. It was by far one of the most fun shoots I have ever been on. The past two years with Underexposed the emphasis has been on turning out a high quality film, excelling in every possible area, and have fun too. The third reason to do it is to make a film that the audience absolutely loves and to heck with winning anything but the audience award. For those folks a jury of their peers picking them is far superior to the technical awards given by the three judges. All in all, there is no right way to play so long as you come away happy.

I for one am pretty gosh darned happy. Maybe even happy enough to play again next year....

Posted by at 9:19 AM | Permalink | Comments (2)

Many thanks to Ed and Nisha for making the 2006 48 Hour film Project: Greensboro the amazing success it was. Last night The Green Boro and McCoul's were standing room only as the awards ceremony kicked off. A&V via Ike Quigley made it possible to see the action from every room in both establishments with an amazingly complex simulcast on both establishment's many TVs. I would love to link to these films but most teams were concerned enough about ruining their eligibility that no one on the winner's list has posted publically yet. I will update this space should any of these incredible films go public.

1. Best Use of Line-Winner “Gone To Ground”-Team Underexposed

2. Best Use of Prop-Winner “The Little Ninja That Could” The Jive Mechanics

3. Best Use of Character-Winner “Izzie and Sophie’s Funnel Frenzy” Sloppy Entertainment

4. Best Costumes-Honorable Mention “The Daisy Dukes” Summer of Love, Winner “Butterflies” Good As A Mugg

5. Best Choreography-Winner “Kill Tong Pao” KVT

6. Best Musical Score- Honorable Mention “The Little Ninja That Could” The Jive Mechanics ,
Winner “Pursuit of Happiness” Loose Ends

7. Best Special Effects-Honorable Mention “Kill Tong Pao” KVT,
Winner “Jade Dagger” Green Pax

8. Best Graphics-Honorable Mention “Gone To Ground” Team Underexposed,
Winner “Cletus & the Beast” The Macaroni Project

9. Best Sound Design-Honorable Mention “The Daisy Dukes” Summer of Love,
Winner “Gone To Ground” Team Underexposed

10. Best Editing-Honorable Mention “Gone To Ground” Team Underexposed,
Winner “Kill Tong Pao” KVT

11. Best Acting- Honorable Mention “The Daisy Dukes” Summer of Love,
Winner “Moving On” Team Because We Can

12. Best Writing-Honorable Mention “Z-Day” The Mad Ones,
Winner “Cletus & the Beast” The Macaroni Project

13. Best Cinematography-Honorable Mention “Moving On” Team Because We Can,
Winner “Gone To Ground” Team Underexposed

14. Best Directing-Honorable Mention “Butterflies” Good As A Mugg,
Winner “Cletus & the Beast” The Macaroni Project

15. Audience Award "A"-Runner Up “Weapon of Mass Distraction” Louie Louie Productions,
Winner, “Cletus & the Beast” The Macaroni Project

16. Audience Award "B"-Runner Up “Gi Ho Lo: The Legend of Richard Long” Pure Energy Productions,
Winner “The Little Ninja That Could” The Jive Mechanics

17. Audience Award "C"-Runners Up (tie)-“Gone To Ground” Team Underexposed & “The Daisy Dukes” Summer of Love,
Winner “The Pursuit of Happiness” Loose Ends

18. Best of Greensboro-Honorable Mention “Gone To Ground” Team Underexposed,
Winner “Gi Ho Lo: The Legend of Richard Long” Pure Energy Productions

And there we are! 2006 48 Hour Film Project: Greensboro... thats a wrap.

Posted by at 8:52 AM | Permalink | Comments (2)

Over the years our representitive democratic government has been frought with scandle, politicians bought, votes bought and sold, votes stolen, elections stolen, presidents that dare not to hold to a higher ideal. Thanks to the power of the internet, these events are being uncovered more and more because more people with equal voice (like bloggers) are watching. I have heard folks say that the corruption in our government was some new thing brought on by a lack of "Moral Values". Nobody can agree on what those values are by the way. "Moral Values" seems to be defiinded as "How I want you to behave."

I remember back in High School history class where the winners were always right because they wrote the history. In this class there was never any corruption worth mentioning because the winners always stomped it out. In this class we were taught that in ancient Greece all citizens had one vote and they all participated in government. It worked because the population wasn't all that great, they all lived in a city state, and women, slaves and foreigners were not citizens. (Slaves and foreigners could buy freedom and citizenship however.) This system stopped working when there were too many citizens too far apart geographically to really effectively govern themselves. Throw in a couple of invasions, and the sytem eventually evolved into something like we are using today.

I contend that the very technologies we use to keep a fire lit under those people who claim to represent us could be used to create a system whereby we could bring back the true democracy. There are more than enough smart people in internet land to make that happen. The power of many over the power of few and all.

Off the cuff we would need a system where by each eligable American voter can authenticate into a system and be allowed to cast a vote on issues that concern them. True majority rule. We can even use some of that freedom were giving up anyway to make it where we have to use a fingerprint or retina scan to prove who we were and each of us would have a complete record of ever vote we cast. Why not, we're all spewing our opinions online everyday and more and more people are comming to realize that nothing is truly anonomious.

In the bright side of my little dream, beurocracy would shrink. No more electing a guy to represent you only to have him get bought out by some corporation through a well paid lobbiest firm. Now those corporations have to pay lobbiest to buy YOU out.

True, Exxon would surely monitor the voting practices of its employees and frown upon those who "vote against the best interest of the share holders" but good news folks, there are other corporations who probably like the way you think and you could work for them and safely vote your consious.

Could it be fudged DiBold style? I am sure it could, but with each person getting to see their vote in action and so many of us looking for bugs, it would quickly evolve into a ironclad bug free system.

Would it require each eligable voter to keep abreast of current events. Yes. (That's a good thing.)
Would some people still not vote? Yes. Either they don't know the issue well enough to make a educated vote, or they choose not to participate. How is that different from today? I mean other than the fact that there could be an obstain button for folks to use when they didn't know how to vote.

Is it a perfect plan? No, I only starting writing this entry a half hour ago, but you have to ask yourself, would it be any worse than what we have now? And you lobbiest can just obstain from that question, I wasn't talking to you.

There is a phenomonom called various things like "collective wisdom", "crowd intelligence" and "Wisdom of Crowds". It works like this. Fill a jar with marbles and ask everyone you know to guess how many marbles are in the jar. Write down all their answers. You will find that the answers range widely and infact no one may guess it correctly. Now average all the guesses. Whatever that answer is is proabably frightenly close to the actual answer. This method is so accurate that it is pretty standard practice in Project Management to use it in determinining timelines for work you've never done before. It is powerful, and it could be leveraged in a true democracy.

Think it over. Shoot all the holes in it you want. Holes can be filled.

Posted by at 5:14 PM | Permalink | Comments (4)

Thanks to Kim of Poppin's Ponderings for this interesting and short little quiz.

You Are a Snarky Blogger!

You've got a razor sharp wit that bloggers are secretly scared of. And that's why they read your posts as often as they can!

Posted by at 4:39 PM | Permalink | Comments (2)

Warning: If you are easily offended please read on, I don't want to miss anyone.

Its Summer at The University, it is Tarzan Hot and some of the students are back on campus being trained for their new on campus jobs. It is Tarzan Hot, there are students. Bless each and every nearly naked one of them, I am glad they do while they can, and while they should. Good times....

Today I'm having lunch with The Wife and I see a tank top with writing on it in big letters. I am more or less literate so when I see words I make an effort to read them. But what I was seeing wasn't making much sense, I ran it through my dyslexic filter twice and what I was getting was something like "brown tits" but I knew that wasn't right. There was more to it than that. I stared harder, and she was still walking in my direction so eventually I picked out "Your Favorite Brown Tits". But I knew that wasn't right. Being dyslexic I get a particular feeling when my mind doesn't get the whole translation and fills in the gaps to make words. She sat down facing me, and like a pig, an illiterate, or an illiterate pig, there I am still full on stairing at her very large chest with the tight tank top wrapped around it. Once she stopped moving I was able to finally figure out what this shirt was trying to despretly to tell me. "Your Favorite Brunnette"

The problem for me was being dyslexic, looking at words that are moving both forward and up and down, while the words themselves are wrapped around a surface made of one concave, and two convex shape. I've never figured out a single "Magic Eye" poster. Many can, I can't, I rack it up on the way I'm wired. The relief I experienced when I finally figured out what her shirt said was the same relief I see of the faces of those people who stair at "Magic Eye" puzzles for ten minutes and finally see the sailboat. Only their sense of relief doesn't come with the guilt associated with stairing long and hard at some other girls chest when your wife is sitting next to you.

One day I know something like this is going to happen and the owner of the boobillusion is going to come over and demand to know what I am stairing at. I only hope my wife will be standing there to tell her, "Its ok, he's not a pervert, he's retarded." Somehow I think if I were to try to explain that I wouldn't be believed.

Posted by at 1:18 PM | Permalink | Comments (1)

Yes, the main stream media and the blogsphere had me convinced that the stupidest people in the whole great big wide world were liberals and conservatives, I now know I was mistaken. Liberals and Conservatives are now officially the second stupidest groups of people in the entire world. The new Champions of Lunacy aren't even American. This sacred honor has been bistowed upon the british politicians who came up with the "Anti-Social Behavior Laws" and those morons who enforce those laws. Just like with our own idiots who really and honestly believe they are doing the right thing, the summery of the law doesn't seem too terribly stupid. It is how the law is applied that brings the term "numnutz" to its new and lofty position. Wait, they are from the UK, so I believe the term is acutally numnutze, note the "e" at the end.

I'll bet you are wondering what started this entire tirade? Two stories almost in the same day put me on this rant, in the first one police are busting little girls for playing hopscotch. Apparently the chalk on the sidewalk constitutes an anti-social behavior under the law. I can only imagine how that must have played out. Little girls hopping up and own the sidewalk doing their little sing song thing while they hop and a bobby saunters up.
"Whot's this then?"
"We're playing hopscotch."
"A likely story. A likely story indeed. You know what I see here? Gang signs. That's right, you little tarts are marking your territory. No doubt every one of you have a record down at the yard as young ladies of the night. You're a clever bunch, you probably turn your tricks, and still make it back before your bedtimes. Well teddy isn't going to be there where your're sleeping tonight."

I actually let this one go. I read it, rolled my eyes, mumbled something offensive under my breath and kept skimming the news. Then I see an article about three twelve year olds who were arrested, finger printed, photographed, DNA sampled, and tossed in a cell. Their heinous crime? Climbing a tree. Specifically suspician of damaging a tree by climbing. I suppose when this goes to court they will also tack on attempting to build a treehouse without the proper permits and as there were two girls and a boy a possible felonious cohabitation charge of some kind.

Once when I was in high school we did a children's show around christmas. The show was very successful and we felt we had pulled off quite a performance. After the last show we gathered back stage and ended up spontaniously breaking out into song. The total cast and crew were about 20 if memory serves and every one of us were joyously singing our collective hearts out. Meanwhile....out in the main auditorium a teacher's aid from one of the local elementary schools heard the faint sounds of joy and teamwork comming from somewhere back stage. Two hours later we're all sitting in a classroom being screamed at by a frothing at the mouth principal (named Gordon Patrick btw). We were threateded with every punishment up to and including expulsion. We were not allowed to speak. We were not allowed to raise our hands. We were not allowed to talk to anyone. We were not allowed to go to the press. Our crime? Apparently after the show we went back stage and worshipped. I'm not kidding. That was the charge. Gordon Patrick really helped to shape me into the mildly paranoid, angry, and disrespectful to authority person I am to this very day. Thank you very freakin' much *sshole. You just reminded me to add your name to the list. Since I am going in Chronological order your name goes near the top of the list just under Ms. Hesser.

On the other hand, without his asinine behavior shaping my fertile little mind I might not see a problem with kids being harassed by the british po-po for hop scotch or climbing a tree. My lord! Worse yet I might have been a conservative who wouldn't have allowed the tree to grow in the first place or a liberal who would have granted the tree welfair and voting rights. The more I think about this the ANGRIER I GET.

Swell.

Posted by at 9:46 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

The awards night for the 2006 Greensboro 48 Hour Film Project is comming Sunday at M’Coul’s Pub, 110 W. McGee st. and The Green Burro Sports Bar, 106 W. McGee st. and I though it might be fun to show you some of the submissions curtesy of YouTube. To be eligable, you must have used bubblewrap as a prop, B. Jones television personality as a character and the line "Its like my mother always said", it must be no longer than six minutes with one extra minute for credits. It must have been turned in by 7pm on the Sunday night. And there was a paperwork component with location and people waivers that had to be included with the movie. Those films above were missing one or more of those elements and thus can be posted right away on YouTube as they are ineligable for judging. After the judging, on Sunday night other films may pop up at this link if they can compress it down to 100MB or less and it didn't win. The winning project goes on to the finals and no one will want to risk their eligability in that.

Even though these films were not eligable or did not win don't think for a minute they are poor examples. Quality will vary, but this stuff isn't bad, especially when you remember that they were made in 48 hours from elements to concept, to script, to finished product. In a nutshell, the worst thing here is a triumph given the short time span allowed and the sheer number of things that could possibly go wrong.

Posted by at 1:48 PM | Permalink | Comments (3)