Yearly Archives: 2005

Real ID Act

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  • Post category:Politics

I keep saying it’s getting worse, and then it gets even more worse. I keep thinking, “surely, cooler heads will prevail, here, and this will get scotched, right?” but then stuff like the Real ID Act gets passed, and I’m dumbfounded.
Wil Wheaton’s got a good explanation of what’s going on here. Basically, the government inserted a provision into a completely unrelated bill that will create a National ID card, wherein we will all be registered with the government, and they will be able to track us. And buried in the obscure language of the bill is a provision that says that this bill is not subject to judicial review — meaning that individuals have no recourse if the bill gets abused, as it absolutely will because we have an evil and corrupt president.
I’m back to the question of when did the first Jews leave Germany, and how did they know it was the right time?

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Louisville, Kentucky

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  • Post category:Big Things

It’s been a couple of weeks, but I finally got my pictures edited from our Big Things photography trip to Louisville, Kentucky. I love this city! In a lot of ways it’s more sophisticated that Indianapolis. Much better arts. Their historic areas are huge and much better preserved than in Indianapolis, and their downtown is in way better shape than here. There seems to be a lot more to do there, too.
And I’d like to point out that one of the many things that I adore about my wonderful girlfriend is that she’s willing to jump into my “big things” photos to show perspective. Check out the cute picture of her inside the giant baseball glove.

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Pointless car chases

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  • Post category:Movies

I’m in the middle of watching the movie Paycheck… and I was enjoying the somewhat interesting techno-thriller, until the middle section of the movie, where they threw in a completely ridiculous, pointless and mind-numbing car chase into it. Now it have in on pause because I had to get up and leave after that annoying bit of nonsense. Why did they ruin the movie with that crap, anyway? That was fifteen minutes of plot time they could have devoted to making the movie make slightly more sense. Instead there was a brain dead chase sequence that was completely out of pace with the rest of the film. Now I have a headache. God, I’m glad I didn’t see it in the theater; I would have to get up and leave.

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I wanted to be a Darwinist, but I wasn’t selected

If you’re following the news at all, you’ve read that Kansas is having a second Scopes Monkey trial wherein they’re planning on teaching creationism in the classroom as a form of science. In 1999, Kansas decided to drop the teaching of evolution in the classroom (this decision has since been reversed). But today the Kansas Board of Education are having a trial to change state standards to allow the introduction of creationism under the guise of “intelligent design” the bonehead idea that the pattern behind natural laws is devised by a higher power.

So far the people arguing in favor of “intelligent design” have shown their intellectual level of thought: they admit they haven’t even read the state’s current standards for education, so they don’t even understand what they’re planning to amend. That’s some Republican smarts for ya, right there.

If plain common sense isn’t enough for you, read “15 Answers to Creationist Nonsense” from Scientific American magazine to learn how to answer their inane drivel.

I have some more thoughts on intelligent design, but if you’re at all squeamish, you might not want to read on. Don’t say I didn’t warn you.

Here’s the best argument IN FAVOR of intelligent design, but I have a feeling that the creationists won’t be keen on arguing this point: God designed the male body for gay male anal intercourse. You heard me. God intended men to take it up the ass. Why else would the prostate gland, a gland that sits INSIDE the body, be a sexually-sensitive organ that when stimulated, causes an intense orgasm? Why on earth would God give this organ the ability to do that, unless he intended men to put something up there to stimulate it? In addition to that, men have much larger anuses than women do, and they’re angled differently, to accomodate something going in.

Something I’ve never understood about heterosexual men is how they are terrified of anal intercourse when it comes to two men doing it, but they’re all keen on getting their girlfriends to participate. Why is that? What is the appeal of it with a woman? Especially when it’s much more dangerous for women to do than it is for men, because of the way women are built. The same straight guys who will say crap like “it’s an exit, not an entrance” (untrue for men!) are the ones trying to persuade their girlfriend to turn over (where it really IS an exit!).

Another “intelligent design” conundrum for you: why is the clitoris outside the vagina? Why, if God intended for us all to use the heterosexual missionary position, didn’t God put the clitoris inside the vagina to encourage women to participate in penis-in-vagina sex? Why put the clitoris outside where it’s easy for, say, me, to reach? Yes, because God intended women to be gay.

That really is some intelligent design.

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Smoking Gun Memo on WMD

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On May 1st, a memo leaked to the London Times was published that exposed the Bush Administration’s dirty secret — that they, along with Tony Blair and British intelligence agencies, knew there were no weapons of mass destruction in Iraq, but they doctored intelligence reports to make it appear that there was so they could go to war. Despite the publication of Bush’s WAR CRIME, major news outlets are ignoring the leaked memo.

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Stuff I’ve Read Lately

The Broom of the System
David Foster Wallace
I read this for my book group, so I’m not going say much about it before we meet to talk about it, because the first rule of book group is “don’t talk about the book before book group.” But as far as David Foster Wallace goes, I wasn’t all that impressed.

The Sticklepath Strangler (Medieval West Country Mystery)
by Michael Jecks
I picked up this paperback mystery based on the cover, which was really kind of fun and looked somewhat like the Bayeux Tapestry. I learned my lesson about not judging a book by the cover, because the book itself wasn’t great. It’s a murder mystery set in a medieval village, and while the idea of that is interesting, the plot dragged on too long and the murders were pretty gruesomely described, which I think might have contributed to some of my nightmares after surgery. Not the best book to read in the hospital.

The Seven Wonders of the Ancient World
by Paul Jordan
I remember reading about the Seven Wonders when I was a kid, so I ordered this book recently to learn more about them. I didn’t realize that it was the Greeks that determined which architectural feats were classified as “the seven wonders” and that their choices were based on their limited knowledge; other great architectural and artistic achievements (like the great wall of china) would probably have made the cut had the Greeks known about them. The book covers each “wonder” and what we know about it today, including recent archeological excavations of some of the sites.

Misfortune
by Wesley Stace
A pleasant historical fiction novel about a boy who is rescued as a baby from a trash heap by a rich lord, and who is raised as the lord’s next heir — as a girl. An odd, charming novel that was a nice light read.

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Veronica Mars

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  • Post category:Television

Just finished watching the season finale of Veronica Mars — and I have to admit I didn’t piece the whole thing together before the end, although all the elements were there and I should have figured it out. I did predict that Aaron Echolls was the one who had the cameras in the boat house, but I didn’t manage to put that together with Lilly. I’m bothered that they didn’t wrap up what happened with Weevil and Logan’s confrontation. And I predict that it’s Wallace that showed up at her door at the end.
I love the way they treat story arcs in this show — they write them in the same way Joss Whedon did in Buffy. They have stories arcs that last for a single episode, stories that span several episodes, and stories that stretch over the entire season, all of which mesh together well with the shorter arcs advancing the larger ones. It’s a formula that two of my other favorite shows, Lost and Desperate Housewives also use, and when the writing is good it keeps me riveted to the show. I wish more shows were written this way.

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