Posted 7/30/2005 05:57:00 PM by Douglas

Not bloody likely.

It goes without saying that the USA's image will be considerably damaged, if NASA shuts down the shuttle program and starts buying spaceships from Russia. The myth about the ultimate predominance of American technologies would be destroyed in this case. On the other hand, the Russian space industry would receive a powerful impetus for its development: the profit would most likely be used for another technological breakthrough in the field of space exploration. Washington will have to solve a very serious problem in the nearest future: is the USA ready to put the lives of seven astronauts at risk just to keep the illusion of its technological supremacy?

How could we possibly lose our technological superiority when we've still got the all-you-can eat buffet, realistic Christina Aguilera ring-tones for our phones, and talking refrigerator alarms?

Posted 7/29/2005 05:55:00 PM by Douglas

Local ethanol plant gives farmers something (local) to do with their farm subsidy checks.

Kim Ames has weathered good times and bad on the 4,000 acres his family has farmed for three generations.

He hopes a $125 million ethanol plant being built near his central Indiana farm tips the scales in favor of the good, giving him a local buyer for half the 300,000 bushels of corn he produces each year.

"I think it's good," he said. "We've always been exporting our corn somewhere. Now we'll be doing something (local) with it."

The Putnam Ethanol plant being built in Cloverdale, about 40 miles west of Indianapolis, is one of dozens of ethanol plants being developed across the country as part of a national push toward alternative fuels.

What an incredible waste of money. The government gives money to farmers to raise a crop that is converted into fuel, yet the plant where it's created doesn't even create enough energy to run its own plant!

At what point in the discourse of "alternative energy" are we going to discredit totally impractical and infeasible sources, such as ethanol, pixie dust, and magic beans?

Posted 7/29/2005 05:36:00 PM by Douglas

This is a sad headline:

About 30,000 cans of beer blocked an Arizona interstate Wednesday after a tractor-trailer flipped.

Not a sad headline:

Thousands of cans of Bud Light spilled on the highway, snarling traffic for hours.

Thousands of Bud Light cans in the ditch? Think of all the time this wreck saved. . . . No, not from traffic being tied up, but from the beer being consumed, and the drivers pulling over to pee on the road sign. This wreck saved countless hours.

Posted 7/29/2005 05:22:00 PM by Douglas

I don't know what it takes to be Santa, but if all you need is a gut and a big white beard, I'm half-way there.

It's beginning to look a lot like Christmas. At least in Denmark.

More than 100 Santa Clauses and their helpers danced and bellowed ho-hos at the annual World Santa Claus Congress.

Despite a sprinkle of rain and trees in full Nordic summer bloom, the St. Nicks from 10 countries were in a yuletide spirit Monday as they kicked off a three-day convention in Denmark, including a Santa parade and a chimney-climbing competition.

Man, what a gig! And check out these ho-ho-hos:

Where's my mistletoe belt buckle?

Posted 7/29/2005 05:15:00 PM by Douglas

On-orbit baby!

A picture of President Bush, watching the launch on TV:

And now, a totally doctored picture from NASA Watch that shows what President Bush was really watching.

Posted 7/28/2005 05:46:00 PM by Douglas

It was a dark and stormy night.

As he stared at her ample bosom, he daydreamed of the dual Stromberg carburetors in his vintage Triumph Spitfire, highly functional yet pleasingly formed, perched prominently on top of the intake manifold, aching for experienced hands, the small knurled caps of the oil dampeners begging to be inspected and adjusted as described in chapter seven of the shop manual.

The Bulwer-Lytton Fiction Contest continues, unabated. Funny stuff.

Labels: Bulwer-Lytton

Posted 7/28/2005 05:45:00 PM by Douglas

Blood donors, the gauntlet has been laid down.

An elderly South African broke his own Guinness world record when he donated blood for the 350th time, inspired by the enduring memory of a terrible accident he witnessed as a child.

The South African National Blood Service said in a statement that 79-year-old Maurice Creswick had cracked his own record for the fourteenth time and that he donated 480 ml of his blood every 56 days.

Almost 44 gallons. Considering that most people have 1.5 gallons of blood in their entire body, that's pretty damn amazing to consider he's completely changed his blood almost 30 times.

Posted 7/27/2005 05:51:00 PM by Douglas

Long day, time for another out of context quote from Lileks:

Why not a big tank? Why not? Who doesn’t like to look at fish? If I ever designed the house of my dreams, I’d have a big tank two stories call with windows in every room. Not because I love fish; I’m rather indifferent to them, unless I’m snorkeling. A fish tank is the cable-access channel of the natural kingdom. But still, it’s better than nothing, and adds color, life, shifting patterns, and the reminder that one can still imprison and dominate some lesser creatures for your own aesthetic amusement. The Supreme Court hasn’t taken that away! Yet!

There’s a paragraph that will show up, read in a nasally voice by some ichabodnik on that documentary. (An “ichabodnik” is a thin, unattractive humoreless lefty nut. Just made the word up. Feel free to submit righty versions.)

Dang, I wish I had the time to get into how funny that is (the cable-access show part).

Posted 7/26/2005 05:27:00 PM by Douglas

Finally!

Discovery roared into the skies over Florida Tuesday morning as NASA returned to shuttle space flight for the first time since the 2003 Columbia disaster.

Long day, and that's all I can say about that. There were a few hiccups, but if every one of the previous 113 shuttle flights got as much attention about their missing tiles and debris strikes as this one is going to get, then there probably wouldn't have ever been 113 shuttle flights. But here's to the triumph of hope over experience! Hope and some engineers that know what they're doing.

Posted 7/25/2005 05:21:00 PM by Douglas

The blog's got nothin' today, so here's a link to the prettiest thing in Waco, Tx [anyone lucky enough to have never been to Waco, trust me.] Let's not forget that this beauty is the work of the John Roebling's Sons Company, although this wouldn't be their most famous suspension bridge.

Posted 7/25/2005 05:13:00 PM by Douglas

Ah, the mysteries of life. Why do you blink? Now ya know:

In the new study, scientists put fiber-optic lights in the mouths of people. The lights were powerful enough to penetrate the roofs of their mouths and strike their retinas, where light is recorded. They wore goggles to block outside light.

When the test subjects blinked, the amount of light hitting their retinas didn't change. Activity in their brains was monitored by functional magnetic resonance imaging.

During blinking, brain activity was suppressed in areas that respond to visual input, the scientists report.

If only I could train my brain to suppress everything that was equally as pointless. Like when the guy in front of me at the deli actually stop and consider, for at least 10 seconds, what kind of cheese he wants on his sandwich. It's cheese, you moron.

Posted 7/24/2005 05:45:00 PM by Douglas

How not to have a great Hawaiian vacation.

An Austin man who spent five days lost in a lava field near the Big Island's Kilauea volcano said Saturday that he survived by squeezing water from moss he found on trees sprinkled across an otherwise barren landscape.

Gilbert Dewey Gaedcke III was rescued Friday afternoon after a helicopter spotted him stumbling across the rocky lava, trying to attract attention with a mirror from his camera.

He had been missing since last Sunday night, when he decided to take a hike across the barren and desolate lava fields to get a closer look at the active volcano.

The 41-year-old experienced hiker said he saw no water, but there were pockets of junglelike vegetation sprinkled throughout the old lava flow.

What a freakin' moron. Experienced hiker? My ass. No one experienced is going to get stuck out in the lava for three days. There's three little letters Gaedcke should look into: GPS, and even the model under $100 has a backlit screen. Much easier than licking moss for three days.

Posted 7/24/2005 05:14:00 PM by Douglas

A gynormous dust cloud headed for the Southern States. That can't be good.

An enormous, hazy cloud of dust from the Sahara Desert is blowing toward the southern United States, but meteorologists do not expect much effect beyond colorful sunsets.

The leading edge of the cloud -- nearly the size of the continental United States -- should move across Florida sometime from Monday through Wednesday.

"This is not going to be a tremendous event, but it will be kind of interesting," said Jim Lushine, a severe weather expert with the National Weather Service in Miami.

He said the dust could make sunrises and sunsets spectacular.

Isn't this the sort of thing that bad Sci-Fi is made up from?

Posted 7/23/2005 04:26:00 PM by Douglas

We're Not Afraid:

Posted 7/23/2005 04:10:00 PM by Douglas

There seems to be a lot of speculation about Bush's Supreme Court nominee, but leave it to the unostentatiously attractive Ann Coulter.

If the Senate were in Democrat hands, Roberts would be perfect. But why on earth would Bush waste a nomination on a person who is a complete blank slate when we have a majority in the Senate!

We also have a majority in the House, state legislatures, state governorships, and have won five of the last seven presidential elections — seven of the last 10!

We're the Harlem Globetrotters now — why do we have to play the Washington Generals every week?

Conservatism is sweeping the nation, we have a fully functioning alternative media, we're ticked off and ready to avenge Robert Bork ... and Bush nominates a Rorschach blot.

I really don't have an opinion about John Roberts, but if Ann's pissed off about him, he can't be all bad. But seriously, how hard does she have to work at being this freakin' crazy?

Posted 7/23/2005 04:00:00 PM by Douglas

Here's a site for the bourgeoisie Suburban Leftist that has everything but a clue

Posted 7/23/2005 03:56:00 PM by Douglas

This story is a lot more interesting than I first thought. At first I was amazed that it was getting as much press as it was, but then I think I had to agree. These chicks are pretty low-rent.

The clothes also reflect a bit of the aesthetic havoc that often occurs when people visit the White House. (What should I wear? How do I look? Take my picture!) The usual advice is to dress appropriately. In this case, an addendum would have been helpful: Please select all attire from the commonly accepted styles of this century. (And someone should have given notice to the flip-flop-wearing women of Northwestern University's lacrosse team, who visited the White House on July 12 for a meet-and-greet with the president: proper footwear required. Flip-flops, modeled after shoes meant to be worn into a public shower or on the beach, have no business anywhere in the vicinity of the president and his place of residence.)

I'd have to admit, "shoes meant to be worn into a public shower" definitely don't have a place during a Presidential photo-op in the White House. Not exactly the burning issue of the day, but a sad commentary of the state of affairs. Here's the picture that started all of this:

Posted 7/23/2005 03:50:00 PM by Douglas

The drive-in picture show, apparently making a come back.

"I wanted to take people back to a simpler time," Murray said. "You hit 1958 once you enter our driveway."

Probably a lot of traffic, too. Texas drive-ins are seeing the biggest surge in decades, as Galaxy is among at least five outdoor theaters to open since 2003. The latest debuted in Killeen, near the Fort Hood military post, on July 1, and a new two-screen in the West Texas town of Midland is expected to open in August.

Several more are planned. Steve Rodman, owner of the Crossroads Drive-In in Shiner, between Houston and San Antonio, hopes to open a Houston theater with a more contemporary design by February.

Not the best way to see a movie, but at least if there's someone behind you kicking your chair, you can turn around and smack them in the head. Here's a list of Texas drive-ins.

Posted 7/21/2005 05:52:00 PM by Douglas

Things overheard in New York City. [via Dullard.] This one's a real winner:

Girl on cell: So I went up to my Professor just now? And I was telling him I've chosen a country for my project. He was like, "Africa? That's not a country." I was like, "Come on, what was all that Live 8 stuff about, then?". He was just like, "Never mind. Africa is fine."...Yeah, totally.

--The NYU Bookstore, Washington Place

Ha!

Posted 7/21/2005 05:44:00 PM by Douglas

This had got to be the strangest and most self-indulgent piece of technology since the inflatable sheep, yet something about its aesthetics I find oddly intriguing. The sheep and the dashboard.

The Ambient Executive Dashboard provides the fastest and easiest way to stay tuned in to information that affects the course of your day.

Stock Market trends, weather forecasts, traffic on your commute - all just a glance away! A quiet interface that avoids the buzzing of cellphones and the complicated interfaces of computers, the Executive Dashboard provides the flexibility of digital information with the simplicity of analog displays. Easy-to-swap faces allow you to track information that's relevant to you: A countdown to your next sales meeting, the number of emails waiting for you, or how the market is doing.

Ok, so it would be kinda cool to look up at a cool set of analog gauges to see how my inbox is doing, check stock prices or even the weather. But the day I need up to the minute updates on the Presidential approval rating is the day my sheep and I move to Siberia.

Posted 7/20/2005 05:16:00 PM by Douglas

After 21 years and over 100 successful shuttle mission, who would have suspected this headline:

Shuttle: no launch this week, engineers still baffled
NASA says the Shuttle Discovery will not launch before 26 July, as the space agency's engineers continue their investigation into the misbehaving fuel gauge that grounded the Shuttle again, last week.

The return to flight was cancelled after a liquid hydrogen low-level fuel sensor circuit failed a routine pre-launch test. It showed a fuel tank to be nearly empty, when in fact it was nearly full. This could cause the engines to cut out at the wrong point of the Shuttle's ascent, mission controllers explained, which could be catastrophic.

Ya know what NASA needs? Some real engineers that aren't scared to make a bad call. Where's Scotty when you need him? Oh yeah, dead.

James Doohan, the burly chief engineer of the Starship Enterprise in the original "Star Trek" TV series and motion pictures who responded to the apocryphal command "Beam me up, Scotty," died early Wednesday. He was 85.

Enter your own "beam me up" and/or "I'm givin' it all she's got, cap'n" joke here.

Posted 7/19/2005 05:30:00 PM by Douglas

The daily kitten.

Posted 7/19/2005 05:14:00 PM by Douglas

An interesting, almost Lileksian approach to the 1971 Sears Catalog. Man, what where they thinking. Sadly, they're going to be saying that about 2005 in 35 years.

Posted 7/18/2005 05:47:00 PM by Douglas

Looks like the last lingering outlet for Krispy Kremes closed in Amarillo. Sources cite abundant alliteration.

The "Hot Doughnuts Now" sign has switched off for the last time in Amarillo.

Krispy Kreme Doughnuts rolled into Amarillo in 2002 with huge fanfare and long lines, but left with none of the pomp and circumstance of its arrival.

Operators of Amarillo's only Krispy Kreme on west Interstate 40 switched off the lights for the last time Sunday night and hung a simple piece of paper on the door stating that the store was closed for good.

"We can't say anything more than that," said a man in the store, who refused to give his name, while gesturing to the sign.

I have another theory. The donuts suck. When the donut consists of equal parts sugar-glaze and fried dough, you're really limiting yourself to 10 year olds and diabetics that need a glucose injection and can't find a syringe.

Posted 7/18/2005 05:41:00 PM by Douglas

Put this story in your tin foil hat and smoke it.

US scientists are planning a 240,000-mile trip down memory lane - a tour of inspection of all the Apollo landing sites on the moon.

In 2008 a powerful camera aboard a new spacecraft called the Lunar Reconnaissance Orbiter (LRO) will photograph the moon's surface in fine detail - fine enough to pick out the Apollo 17 moon buggy abandoned 33 years ago, along with lunar landing platforms and other relics.

The camera will have a resolution of half a metre. So a moon buggy three metres long and two metres wide should show up clearly.

Is this going to convince anyone that still believes the Apollo landings were faked? Of course not. Anyone with a pirated copy of PhotoShop can put Louis Farrakhan eating a BLT on the surface of the moon. They're not the type to be swayed with photographic evidence.

Posted 7/18/2005 05:36:00 PM by Douglas

Kind of interesting collection of seldom used words. If I had to pick one (today), I'd have to go with pleonasm, obviously.

Posted 7/18/2005 05:28:00 PM by Douglas

Death to Hermione!

Posted 7/18/2005 05:27:00 PM by Douglas

"Maybe all one can do is hope to end up with the right regrets."
Arthur Miller.

Interesting quote, coming as it does from a guy that was married to Marilyn Monroe, but it really just reinforces my theory that I picked up off the bathroom wall of
Posse East in Austin about a decade ago:

No matter how beautiful she is, someone, somewhere, is sick of her shit.

Words to live by.

Posted 7/18/2005 05:22:00 PM by Douglas

Was there an insurgency in Iraq before the invasion? Probably, but this guys doesn't think so:

New investigations by the Saudi Arabian government and an Israeli think tank — both of which painstakingly analyzed the backgrounds and motivations of hundreds of foreigners entering Iraq to fight the United States — have found that the vast majority of them are not former terrorists and became radicalized by the war.

The studies cast serious doubt on President Bush's claim that those responsible for some of the worst violence are terrorists who seized on the opportunity to make Iraq the "central front" in a battle against the United States.

However, interrogations of nearly 300 Saudis captured trying to sneak into Iraq and case studies of more than three dozen others who blew themselves up in suicide attacks show that most were heeding calls to drive infidels out of Arab land, according to a study by Saudi investigator Nawaf Obaid.

I don't think is going to be a major sticking point when the history of Bush 43 is written, but it's interesting that it's being brought up.

Posted 7/18/2005 05:20:00 PM by Douglas

Momma would be so proud. . .

WEBLOG wannabe 2005 weblog award awarded to Enthalpy in the category of "Most Pointless Weblogger"

Posted 7/18/2005 05:13:00 PM by Douglas

I don't think I "get" Garrison Keillor, but this line made me laugh:

How did the graduate of a liberal arts college who attended class in a building with Greek columns and an inscription that said men are ennobled by understanding come to this sorry state, sitting in shorts and T-shirt in a stream of cold air, consuming ice, reading trash, looking forward to his second shower of the day? What happened to the nobility?

Give me iced tea, air conditioning, three showers a day, and I could spend August in Texas, no problem. Happiness is in the details. People who study the Larger Picture are bound to get depressed.

How true it is. Also, all nobility goes out the window when it hits 100º, and everyone is bound to get depressed in the details, regardless of the temperature.

But to Keillor and the likes from the great frozen north that like to decry the oppressive heat of Texas, I offer you this: I've never had to shovel heat out of my driveway so I could get to work, nor rake it off my house to keep my roof from collapsing.

Posted 7/18/2005 05:01:00 PM by Douglas

"After watching my six year old son Justin's first two soccer games this spring I finally understand why Europeans riot at soccer matches. For the same reason that inmates riot in prisons: out of sheer boredom."

So begins my all-time favourite op-ed about the game that Socialists love and Americans eschew like the metric system. Well it can no longer be said that East Texas is behind the times with such an advanced form of sportsmanship. Of course, I'm talking about a soccer riot.

At least four people were injured Sunday in a brawl involving two adult soccer teams and spectators at a Tyler park. Authorities said one man was cut with a beer bottle and another was beaten with a baseball bat.

Witnesses said the fight, which involved nearly 100 people, started while a Tyler team called Real Madrid was accepting a championship trophy. Real Madrid member Junior Perez said the situation erupted after a teenage girl began arguing with two older women.

Carlos Perez, another Real Madrid player, said members from the losing Alcones team retrieved five aluminum bats from their cars and began striking other vehicles during the brawl.

God Bless America! Even at an East Texas soccer riot, what's the weapon of choice for pummeling the crap out of the other team? A baseball bat. Even at a soccer riot, the red blooded tool of America's pastime rears its ugly head. If only to beat the crap out of someone else's.

Posted 7/17/2005 05:09:00 PM by Douglas

If the blog dies in its sleep tonight, it will die happy. Cornell and Berkeley have finally released a study showing the absurdity of ethanol as a renewable energy source.

Farmers, businesses and state officials are investing millions of dollars in ethanol and biofuel plants as renewable energy sources, but a new study says the alternative fuels burn more energy than they produce.

It's about damn time someone said it, because I was beginning to annoy myself.

Supporters of ethanol and other biofuels contend they burn cleaner than fossil fuels, reduce U.S. dependence on oil and give farmers another market to sell their produce.

That's probably all true, but when the government is the one paying the farmers (or more specifically, ADM) to grow the corn and soy beans, it doesn't come out with a net positive, financially, or thermodynamically.

But researchers at Cornell University and the University of California-Berkeley say it takes 29 percent more fossil energy to turn corn into ethanol than the amount of fuel the process produces. For switch grass, a warm weather perennial grass found in the Great Plains and eastern North America United States, it takes 45 percent more energy and for wood, 57 percent.

It takes 27 percent more energy to turn soybeans into biodiesel fuel and more than double the energy produced is needed to do the same to sunflower plants, the study found.

The researchers included such factors as the energy used in producing the crop, costs that were not used in other studies that supported ethanol production, said Pimentel.

The study also omitted $3 billion in state and federal government subsidies that go toward ethanol production in the United States each year, payments that mask the true costs, Pimentel said.

If the corn is rotting in the silo anyway, then you might make some money turning it into ethanol for fuel. But when you figure in the $3 billion in production costs, it makes Saudi oil cheap by comparison.

Q.E.D. I will officially shut up about this topic.

Labels: ethanol

Posted 7/17/2005 04:51:00 PM by Douglas

From the "who cares?" file, here's a list of words that have double U's, instead of a W.

• continuum
• muumuu
• duumvirate
• vacuum
• menstruum
• residuum
• triduum

But I think Vacuum is everyone's favourite.

Posted 7/17/2005 04:37:00 PM by Douglas

This whole Rove/Plume/Miller/Novak thing is about to get blown wide open, regardless of how tightly Bush circles the wagons.

No one has been closer to the president longer, or bailed him out of more tight spots, than Karl Rove, his chief political adviser. Now the question is whether President Bush can protect Mr. Rove from a gathering political storm, no matter how furious it becomes.

I don't quite understand why Miller's in jail for an op-ed Novak wrote, but now Rove said Novak leaked the info to him, not the other way around. It's all getting as torridly complex as a Las Vegas paternity suit. But this has got to be the crowning achievement of asinine comments made by any Bush official:

A former official who has worked for Mr. Bush said: "This president is Mr. Alamo. He sees the hordes coming over the hill and he heads for the barricades. And not to raise a white flag."

Quick history lesson: Everyone at the Alamo was killed.

Posted 7/17/2005 04:22:00 PM by Douglas

From the Weekly World News, America's finest source of bat-boy related news comes this little nugget. How not to act at a titty-bar. Sadly, there are some guys I work with that would find this informative. Especially #8. I know a guy that tipped a stripper with a Sackagewea dollar.

Posted 7/17/2005 04:18:00 PM by Douglas

Happy birthday, nuclear age. You don't look a day over 50.

Thousands of people gathered Saturday at Trinity Site, a restricted area of the White Sands Missile Range, to mark the 60th anniversary of the world's first test of an atomic weapon.

Scientists working at Trinity site as part of The Manhattan Project created the nuclear device used in the test on July 16, 1945. That successful detonation led to the construction of the two atomic bombs that killed hundreds of thousands of people in Japan in August 1945, essentially stunning Japan into surrender and ending World War II.

The depression created by the blast at ground zero on what is now the White Sands Missile Range is marked by an obelisk with a simple inscription: "Trinity Site, Where the World's First Nuclear Device Was Exploded on July 16, 1945."

There's a lot of moralizing of the right and wrong of such devices in this article, so I won't get into any of that, but I will say one thing. Watch your ass, New Mexico. We bombed you once, and we'll do it again.

Posted 7/16/2005 02:31:00 PM by Douglas

You just know NASA's really got their shit together when they firm up a launch date bay saying "late next week." Yeah, that sound diffinitive.

The first space shuttle launch since the 2003 Columbia disaster will not take place until late next week at the earliest, NASA spokesman Mike Rein said Friday.

NASA previously had said the shuttle Discovery could lift off as soon as Sunday, although it was unlikely.

The launch originally was scheduled for Wednesday, but it was scrubbed 2 1/2 hours before liftoff because of a faulty fuel sensor.

The space agency has until July 31 to attempt a launch or must wait until September.

Light that sucker already.

Posted 7/16/2005 02:23:00 PM by Douglas

Russian space exploration has defiantly taken a back seat since the collapse of the Soviet Union, but at least they're still trying.

The Russian government has approved a space programme for the next ten years.

The programme provides money for the development of a reusable spacecraft to replace the ageing Soyuz manned launch vehicle.

Russia also wants to start experiments to test whether it is possible for humans to make the flight to Mars.

A new reusable spacecraft and Mars feasibility studies? That's a pretty tall order, considering how much money they're throwing at this.

But the new 10-year budget, reported to be about 300 billion roubles ($10.50 billion), is less than the US spends on space in a year.

NASA's annual budget is about $15 billion, but this came from the BBC, so I'm not sure if that's $10.5 Billion (a million million, or what we call a trillion) or just a thousand million.

I'm pretty sure it has to be the American Billion, as I don't think the entire Russian economy is going to see $10.5 trillion in the next 10 years.

Posted 7/16/2005 02:13:00 PM by Douglas

The Aristocrats reviewed.

Well, that's what "The Aristocrats" is like. It's a nonstop dirty joke you can't escape from, told by more than 100 of the greatest comics in the world. The only thing to do is sit back and laugh until it hurts. Obscene, disgusting, vulgar and vile, "The Aristocrats" might be the funniest movie you'll ever see. Audiences are bound to flock to theaters to see what all the talk is about, and later the film is destined to become a classic video item. The film, acquired at Sundance by ThinkFilm, is being released without an MPAA rating.

"The Aristocrats" is not an easy movie to talk about, but here goes. The premise is simple. Actor/comedian Paul Provenza and his pal, magician/comedian Penn Jillette, had the bright idea to do a kind of home movie with their friends all telling the same dirty joke. Sort of an Olympics for comedians without the heavy lifting. And the joke to tell was clearly the Aristocrats, a staple of comedians' private reserve since vaudeville days.

The more I read about it, the sillier it sounds, but I'm still going to have to see it.

Posted 7/16/2005 02:11:00 PM by Douglas

When looking for things to do in Houston, always remember to check the Amarillo Globe News.

Posted 7/16/2005 02:02:00 PM by Douglas

God Bless Texas

Summer heat here is cooler in temperature than out West, but more oppressive: stickier, cloudier, as if the sky is closer to the land. I think that the heat in Texas is like playing baseball with a father who burns in fastballs that sting your hands, making you proud you can take it; and the heat back East is like a mother who makes you wear too much clothing.

Damn it's hot.

Posted 7/14/2005 05:15:00 PM by Douglas

Tomorrow. Don't forget. It's Cow Appreciation day, which means a free sandwich at Chick-fil-A. I hope they give special consideration to people whose last name is the same as the thing that cows barf up, chew on, and then swallow again.

Posted 7/14/2005 05:14:00 PM by Douglas

Happy Bastille Day, commies.

Posted 7/13/2005 05:53:00 PM by Douglas

Do you like to put stuff on your cat while it's sleeping? You're not alone.

Posted 7/13/2005 05:44:00 PM by Douglas

Damn. Are we ever going to fly again?

A faulty fuel sensor aboard the space shuttle Discovery on Wednesday forced NASA to delay its launch until at least Saturday.

Wednesday's attempt to launch, on the first day of a launch window that closes July 31, would have been the space shuttle program's first mission since the Columbia disaster 2 1/2 years ago.

"We would not in any conceivable way be ready to launch before Saturday," Wayne Hale, deputy shuttle manager, told reporters Wednesday afternoon.

A launch controller described it as "a low-level fuel sensor in the external fuel tank, one of a set of four -- two of which are needed to work."

I know they don't want to take any chances this time around, but I think there's something wrong with the math here. There are four sensors, two are required for launch, and one of them failed. Am I missing something?

Let's go already.

Posted 7/13/2005 05:26:00 PM by Douglas

I think I have a blog-stalker, if there is such a thing. I was farting around the other day seeing who has a link to this little corner of the internet, and I found this blog, which doesn't really seem like a blog at all, so I don't get it.

I'm about 5% sure I know who this person is, but if it's one of my loyal readers, or one of you three might know who this phantom blogger is, be sure and let me know. Yahoo mail is to the left.

Posted 7/13/2005 05:22:00 PM by Douglas

I always thought that if I ever saw a headline like Lobotomy Back in Spotlight After 30 Years, it would be from a renewed and prosaic condemnation of its barbarity. Apparently, the New England Journal of Medicine has a different take:

The lobotomy, once a widely used method for treating mental illness, epilepsy and even chronic headaches, is generating fresh controversy 30 years after doctors stopped performing the procedure now viewed as barbaric.

A new book and a medical historian contend the crude brain surgery actually helped roughly 10 percent of the estimated 50,000 Americans who underwent the procedure between the mid-1930s and the 1970s. But relatives of lobotomy patients want the Nobel Prize given to its inventor revoked.

Damn, and doctors wonder why most people are skeptical of their empirical diagnosis. But hey, when you're driving an icepick through someone's skull to destroy brain tissue, one out of ten ain't bad, right? This might change your mind, though not in quite the same and literal manner an icepick would.

Posted 7/13/2005 05:17:00 PM by Douglas

Lileks waxing [droning?] poetically about living in the moment today, but I had to take issue with this point:

Do people who have cats ever put their faces in the creatures just to smell them? Smell that good cat smell? Is there such a thing?

I hate to beleaguer such a banal and Lilekian point, but cats smell like, well, cats. Everyone knows that cats are constantly and meticulously cleaning themselves, but just because you can't smell them from across the room doesn't mean they don't have a scent that's detectable to even the most obtuse olfactory perception. They smell. . . .clean.

Posted 7/13/2005 05:11:00 PM by Douglas

Having never been to Michigan, I have no idea just how "un-cool" it is, but apparently Governor Jennifer Granholm does, and she's ready to do something about it. [via Agitator.]

A revamped vendor shed at Detroit’s Eastern Market, a gay and lesbian community center in Ferndale, and a downtown fountain and ice rink in Warren are among 20 projects in 17 cities deemed cool enough to get up to $100,000 each under a new state grant program, Gov. Jennifer Granholm announced Wednesday.

These so-called “cool cities” pilot projects also will be first in line, eventually, to draw from another $100 million in grants, loans and other state resources, said the governor, who made the announcement surrounded by crates of fruit and vegetables and flats of petunias at Detroit’s Eastern Market.

“These projects have priority status,” Granholm said. “They’re destined to attract a work force for the 21st century.

Wow. Just, wow. I can't believe they're spending that kind of money like this. Where do they think $100 Million in grants comes from? The "cool" fairy? Wait 'till the cranky taxpayers of Michigan (and all taxpayers are cranky) find out where their money is going; to paint a big, angry chicken on the side of a market in Detroit.

Be sure and check out Michigan's survey, so they can find out just how un-cool they really are, and how far they need to go.

Posted 7/13/2005 05:06:00 PM by Douglas

If you want to hear the world's dirtiest joke, you'd better not plan on going to an AMC Theater.

"The dirtiest joke ever told" won't be told in an AMC theater.

AMC Theatres, which will become the country's second-largest theater chain after its pending merger with Loews Cineplex, has decided not to exhibit "The Aristocrats," an upcoming unrated documentary about a particularly blue joke, on any of its screens.

According to the movie's distributor, ThinkFilm, the Kansas City-based AMC originally agreed to play the film in two markets -- Atlanta and Chicago -- but later backed out of its obligations.

God bless America, and the First amendment. If they don't want to show this vile film, then that means someone else will take my money. Fuck 'em. I sure would hate for someone exiting Herbie: Fully Loaded or The Dukes of Hazzard or whatever mindless dreck from the 70s they're currently remaking to be offended by a dirty word spilling forth from the adjacent theater.

"We are trying to program more specialty films in our theaters, but we are very selective," Blase said. "We've made a business decision and evaluated all the factors and we will stick with that decision."

The "business decision" he speaks of? They show crap. All the time. And they charge $9 for it.

Get in line, sheep.

Posted 7/12/2005 05:20:00 PM by Douglas

Fox News. Fair and balanced my ass.

From the July 6 broadcast of Westwood One's The Radio Factor with Bill O'Reilly, guest-hosted by Gibson:

GIBSON: By the way, just wanted to tell you people, we missed -- the International Olympic Committee missed a golden opportunity today. If they had picked France, if they had picked France instead of London to hold the Olympics, it would have been the one time we could look forward to where we didn't worry about terrorism. They'd blow up Paris, and who cares?

From the "My Word" segment of the July 7 edition of Fox News' The Big Story with John Gibson:

GIBSON: The bombings in London: This is why I thought the Brits should let the French have the Olympics -- let somebody else be worried about guys with backpack bombs for a while.

I know there are people that are this stupid, but how do they get on TV? Do they really think that London was bombed because they got the Olympics?

Posted 7/11/2005 05:20:00 PM by Douglas

A handy list of Kosovo-era quotes from people that wish the tape wasn't running when they said them. A couple of keepers:

• “American foreign policy is now one huge big mystery. Simply put, the administration is trying to lead the world with a feel-good foreign policy.”
  -Representative Tom Delay (R-TX)
• “If we are going to commit American troops, we must be certain they have a clear mission, an achievable goal and an exit strategy.”
  -Karen Hughes, speaking on behalf of George W. Bush

Damn you CNN!!!

Posted 7/11/2005 05:17:00 PM by Douglas

And now, for almost no reason, here's a picture of the STS-114 stack, ready to go.

Well, not totally ready to go, because the Payload Ground Handling Mechanism is still on the back of the Orbiter. But it's still pretty damn amazing when you're standing under it.

Here's the countdown page.

Posted 7/11/2005 05:02:00 PM by Douglas

Brazil is mad as hell and they're just not going to take it anymore. U.S. cotton subsidies, that is.

US cotton subsidies which have fuelled a long-running trade dispute with other countries are to be scrapped, the Bush administration has revealed.

The US government will ask Congress to pass legislation to repeal subsidy programmes after the World Trade Organization ruled they were illegal.

The move came on the same day that Brazil threatened to raise tariffs on US imports in retaliation.

This might actually turn into an interesting test case for the WTO's power. Brazil knows, just like everyone else does, that American farmers would come much closer to turning lead into gold than they would turning a profit from cotton without government subsidies. [also here.]

Posted 7/09/2005 05:09:00 PM by Douglas

What a great use of company time and about a zillion post-it notes. Long live the king!

Posted 7/09/2005 05:06:00 PM by Douglas

You gotta fight, for your right. . . . to party!

A man arrested when police showed up to break up a New Year’s Eve party at a friend’s house has filed a lawsuit, arguing he had a constitutional right to get drunk on private property as long as he didn’t cause a public disturbance.

Eric Laverriere, 25, of Portland, Maine, was taken into protective custody by Waltham police and locked in a cell for nine hours until the effects of the alcohol wore off.

Legal experts said his lawsuit, filed this week in U.S. District Court in Boston, is the first to challenge a state law allowing police to lock up drunk people against their will for their own protection.

News flash: Drunk people are never going to be able to convince sober people that they're not drunk.

Posted 7/09/2005 05:06:00 PM by Douglas

The trailer for the funniest joke ever told can be found here. Here's an actual listing of many different versions of the joke. Pretty vile stuff.

Posted 7/09/2005 04:56:00 PM by Douglas

Great link to some NYT articles about the end of terrorism.

it's clear that no one can stop terrorists from killing. Spending billions on airport security has simply diverted them to transit systems, and spending billions on transit systems could at best divert them somewhere else: stores, restaurants, sidewalks. Terrorists don't even need bombs. They could simply adopt the [October 2002 Virginia] snipers' technique for spreading fear.

President Bush briefly admitted last summer to Matt Lauer that the war on terror couldn't ever be won, but he got so much criticism that he promptly backtracked. It was a textbook Washington gaffe: perfectly true but terribly inconvenient.

It was inconvenient because politicians like to promise a cure for any problem in the news, especially if the cure means dispensing money to constituents and campaign contributors.

Promises to halt terror have turned homeland security spending into the biggest porkfest in Washington, and the London attacks have inspired calls for still more spending.

Washington obviously has a role in hunting terrorists and protecting the borders, but it can't stop small-scale attacks like the ones in London, no matter how much money it gives to each Congressional district.

It's quite sad that this aspect isn't explored more today. Guerilla warfare isn't new, and it's the only choice any kind of insurgency would have against a vastly superior force. And it's not going to just go away if we keep throwing money at it.

It's good to keep in mind that the war on terror is being brought to you buy the same guys brining you the war on drugs. And we know how successful that's been.

Posted 7/09/2005 04:52:00 PM by Douglas

"Thank you for calling, good bye, and good luck."

TEX encouraged University of Texas students as it announced good grades; it dashed their hopes when a class was full; it even knew how much tuition students owed.

But TEX, the University of Texas' telephone registration system, will say "goodbye and good luck" for the last time when it's laid to rest July 15 at 5 p.m.

"An era has passed," said William Livingston, UT senior vice president and the voice of TEX, who can be heard reading the system's eulogy at the TEX number. "Something will have to replace old TEX."

That something is the Internet.

It was bound to happen, but I'm still a little sad to see it go.

But for alumni, saying goodbye to TEX, who was both a friend and a foe, is difficult.

"I remember that TEX had definitive kinds of tones," said Daron Roberts, who graduated in 2001. "If you were not going to get a course, there would be that definitive silence, and you'd just think, 'I hope TEX comes back with an upbeat voice.' "

Posted 7/08/2005 05:31:00 PM by Douglas

Rain. Welcome back. We've missed you.

Thanks to ImageShack for Free Image Hosting

Posted 7/08/2005 05:25:00 PM by Douglas

A disturbingly banal and increasingly common approach to writing about things without actually trying: Lists. There's an endless array of them, in every corner of the internets, providing you with one of two things. They're either a countdown of "ways" that would make a grocery store woman's magazine seem informative ("ways" to find a man, "ways" to lose your man, etc), or a countdown of the "best" or "worst" of something you're probably only vaguely interested in to begin with. In order to keep from being left behind in this burgeoning new field, I present Enthalpy's List of Pointless and Totally Useless Lists. So here it is, ironically, in no particular order. Enjoy!

1. Top Ten Favorite Words (Not in the Dictionary). Impress your friends! Vanquish your enemies! Condescend to co-workers because you know some words that are so freakin' cool, the dictionary is scared to include 'em. That's right. . . . scared.
2. FBI's Ten Most-Wanted Fugitives. I have no idea what their success rate is when it comes to the apprehension of the FBI's Top Ten, but I've always thought it was a source of pride for a fugitive to finally make the cut. Not unlike the Who's Who of American High School Students, except without the keep-sake photo book they try to sell to your grandma.
3. Top 100 Albums of the 1980s. This one fuses together two recent popular obsessions. Lists, and the 1980s. I guess we're far enough removed by now to have some sort bizarre fascination with feathered hair and parachute pants, but take it from a survivor: It sucked. Hard. But what would a list of lists be if it didn't include some blow-hard's synopsis of some random Talking Heads album? Nothing, I tells ya.
4. Top 10 celebrity excuses. Excuses for what, you might ask? Your feigned indifference towards their pointlessly decadent lifestyle? Excuses for their less than stellar performance in that crappy movie you were forced to watch on the plane to Newark? It could be an excuse for why they're stalking you, or for their very existence. I don't know, but I'm glad CNN's there to keep track of all this for me.
5. 10 Things Your Contractor Won't Tell You. In reality, there's probably a lot more than 10. Do you think he'd tell you if you had a big honkin' piece of spinach in your teeth, or if your fly was down? What if you had a big greasy snoogie hanging out your nose, and it receded into your nasal cavity with ever inhalation, only to reemerge as you let out a sigh over the tile samples he was showing you? Do you think he'd tell you that? Of course not. Bastard.
6. Top 13 Most Overrated Songs. As rated by the International Federation of Song Raters. Well, no, and therein lies the rub. Here's yet another list of overplayed crap that someone got tired of listening to on the radio. There's a solution for that, and they come on these little round plastic disks with holes in them. They're called CDs, and you can pick 'em up almost anywhere, and then not be subjected to Hotel California by one of ClearChannel's DJs ever again. Unless you want to.
7. Most Unwired Cities. I lay a challenge to you, the unwired cities of America: Get Wired! When I first saw this one, I thought it was a list of "The Most Underwired Cities", but sadly, this has nothing to do with boobies. Imagine my disappointment.
8. America's [top 25] Revolutionary Athletes. Sadly, I have not been able to find the top 25 list of America's Most Athletic Revolutionaries. You wouldn't know by looking at him, but Eldridge Cleaver was quite a pole vaulter, and the Symbionese Liberation Army's time in the four man, 800 meter relay was unbeatable. Patty Hearst was the anchor leg.
9. 28 Ways to Save on Vacation. Ah yes, the randomly numbered list of things a common garden slug already knows. If you need to be told that your hotel is going to rape you on your phone bill if you use their long distance (#22), chances are you're not smart enough to work the lock on the door, either. You'll probably be better off staying home, drunk in your wading pool.
10. Ten Ways to Spice-Up the All-Star Game. Are you wondering why the TV ratings for the All-Star game has been shrinking in past years? Me neither, but if you were, here's your opportunity to disagree with some yahoo at Sports Illustrated (which is neither a Sport, nor Illustrated, but I digress.)

There are countless others, but I can't make fun of them all.

Posted 7/08/2005 05:05:00 PM by Douglas

Back from Florida and not a moment too soon. After three short days there, I can't think of anything to say about that state that four hurricanes didn't say last year. But even after only 3 days there, it's painfully obvious why Florida has its own tag on Fark.com: They earn it. Daily.

Posted 7/04/2005 05:50:00 PM by Douglas

Happy 4th but I can't top Apu's assessment from years past. Ironically, the "threat assessment" is still in place, with no more derived meaning. Kooky, isn't it?

Posted 7/04/2005 05:38:00 PM by Douglas

Pardon my pessismisim, but this can't be good news.

The birth of a white buffalo calf is to many Native Americans what the coming of the Messiah would be to Christians.

So, Native Americans from many Indian nations held a sacred Lakota ceremony yesterday to name Medicine Heart, born June 3 at Buffalo Crossing in Shelby County. Its Lakota name is Cante Pejuta

It happened in Bagdad Kentucky! How's that for a sign?

Posted 7/04/2005 05:05:00 PM by Douglas

Ripped from the pages of Duh magazine, TV is bad for children's education, studies say

The more time children spend watching television the poorer they perform academically, according to three studies published on Monday.

Excessive television viewing has been blamed for increasing rates of childhood obesity and for aggressive behavior, while its impact on schooling have been inconclusive, researchers said.

There was a study done for this crap? Holy crap!

Labels: Duh

Posted 7/03/2005 02:41:00 PM by Douglas

When I first heard that there was a push to repeal the 22nd amendment, I really thought it was a joke. A sad, sick joke. But apparently, someone doesn't think it's funny.

Proposing an amendment to the Constitution of the United States to repeal the 22nd amendment to the Constitution.

Mr. HOYER (for himself, Mr. BERMAN, Mr. SENSENBRENNER, Mr. SABO, and Mr. PALLONE) introduced the following joint resolution; which was referred to the Committee on the Judiciary

I still think this is bullshit, because all those guys (except for Sensenbrenner) are Democrats.

Posted 7/01/2005 02:48:00 PM by Douglas

Looks like I'm now officially throwing my hat in the ring to become the new supreme court justice.

Supreme Court Justice Sandra Day O'Connor, the first woman to serve on the high court and the key swing vote in some of the nation's highest-profile cases, announced her resignation Friday.

In a letter to the White House, the moderate conservative, said she will step down when her successor is confirmed.

President Bush said O'Connor was well respected.

My, isn't that a glowing recommendation.

Kind of a shock, since we all thought Rehnquist was next, but who knows?

I wonder which one of the Coors Light twins G'dumb is going to nominate?

Posted 7/01/2005 02:44:00 PM by Douglas

Girls gone wild, and apparently, quite litigious.

The company that produces "Girls Gone Wild" _ racy tapes of young women baring their breasts _ was ordered to pay a woman $60,000 after a jury determined that filmmakers illegally used her image in a video.

The punitive damages jurors awarded to 26-year-old Debbie Aficial represent $1 for each copy of "Girls Gone Wild: The Seized Video" that her attorney estimates Mantra Films sold last fall.

Surely this isn't the first woman to regret her antics in front of a "Girls Gone Wild" camera once she sobers up, but it wasn't like this was some hidden camera trick. She was a willing participant. What would possibly be her excuse?

Both lawsuits stem from a February 2003 incident when according to testimony the two women attended a promotional event at a Norfolk bar, where they were approached by Mantra Films employees.

Aficial agreed to go to a nearby location and film a video, encouraging Davalle to participate. Martingayle said neither had shown proof of age and therefore thought the footage would end up on the cutting room floor.

Riiiight. Like when you go into a bar and they don't check your ID. . . they automatically assume you're not going to drink.

$60,000 will buy a lot of jell-o shots.

Posted 7/01/2005 02:39:00 PM by Douglas

Even more unlikely than the Red Sox winning the world series is an Boston-area baby boom nine months after game four.

''Last week we sold more memberships than we had any other week," said Jo Myers McChesney, cofounder of Isis Maternity. ''There could definitely be a little bit of a Red Sox phenomenon going on. People being fired up after the playoffs and the World Series. We have strong class enrollment for couples delivering in late July and August, and they may very well end up being higher than other months."

Red Sox newborn baby clothes are flying off the shelves faster than Dave Roberts dashing for second base.

''We have definitely sold record numbers of Red Sox paraphernalia," said McChesney. ''Onesies for babies, teeny tiny T-shirts for newborns with Red Sox logos. We have definitely seen and expect to see an increase in kids named Manny."

And why is it unlikely? Who would have thought that a Sox fan would have been sober enough to get the job done after the Sox won?