Merry Christmas

McCain Ad

I thought McCain's holiday ad was the best of the bunch.

White Christmas

Work up to an inch or so of the white stuff this morning. We expect another few inches for the rest of the day.

Twisted Sense of Humor

The Twisted Sister Christmas album. My wife has a twisted sense of humor. There was the added entertainment factor of trying to guess what Christmas song was up before the singing/screaming commenced.

UPDATE: My favorite on the album:

On my heavy metal Christmas my true love gave to me,
12 silver crosses
11 black mascaras
10 pairs of platforms
9 tattered t-shirts
8 pentagrams
7 leather jackets
6 cans of hairspray
5 skull earrings
4 quarts of Jack
3 studded belts
2 pairs of spandex pants
and a tattoo of Ozzy!

A Christmas Meme

Tagged with a Christmas Meme

We've been tagged with a Christmas meme by The Feline Theocracy.

The rules: Link to the person that tagged you, and post the rules on your blog. Share Christmas facts about yourself. Tag random people at the end of your post, and include links to their blogs. Let each person know that they have been tagged by leaving a comment on their blog.

1. Wrapping or gift bags? Both. I prefer to wrap, but after the first half dozen packages, I find myself reaching for bags.

2. Real or artificial tree? I used to always get a real tree, but last year I couldn't find one small enough for the place we planned to put it, so I sprung for an artificial one. It looks pretty good - not like the ones my grandparents had, but I do miss the smell of a real pine tree.

3. When do you put up the tree? Mid-December. I never get around to it before that.

4. When do you take the tree down? Sometime in January. Again usually the middle of the month. We usually need the space for something else.

5. Do you like eggnog? Yes, but only because of the rum in it. It seems too rich to me now. And the wife doesn't like it, so I don't bother getting it anymore.

6. Favorite gift received as a child? Most of my early childhood gifts blur together. But I remember two. When I was about 4, I got a metal hook and ladder Tonka fire truck. I still remember it. I also got my first bike a few years later. Had it until my early teens.

7. Do you have a nativity scene? We have one, but I couldn't remember where it was packed away, so it didn't go up. Its missing about half the figures, so we actually need to get a new one.

8. Worst Christmas gift you ever received? I can't think of one.

9. Mail or e-mail Christmas cards? We mailed Christmas cards this year, but only at the last minute. Its not clear that they will reach their destination in time. Typically the last few years I'd send out an email letter. But I wanted to do a bit more this year.

10. Favorite Christmas movie? A Christmas Story. I missed this when it first came out. Caught it in a theatre a few years ago and couldn't stop laughing.

11. When do you start shopping for Christmas? Early to mid-November. I usually start looking for sales online.

12. Favorite thing to eat at Christmas? Prime rib with Yorkshire pudding. Although this year it will be lamb instead.

13. Clear lights or colored on the tree? A mixture of both. This year it turned out by accident to be red, white, and blue. I'm going to look for strings of warmer colors to add for next year.

14. Favorite Christmas song? Carol of the Old Ones.


Now it's time to tag someone. Let's see how about ... Dr. Zaius, Evil Spock, and mem beth.

White House Fire

A fire erupted this morning in the White House compound in the Executive Office Building. The blaze appeared to be located near the ceremonial office of Vice President Dick Cheney on the second floor of the building. Rumors abound that the fire was caused by one of the VP's many shredders which operate 24/7.

UPDATE: It appears that the fire was not caused by the shredders since they are housed at Cheney's undisclosed location and not in the ceremonial office of Vice President.

The current theory is that since Cheney is the Devil its actually quite hard for him to sit in a modern office what with all that paper around and not cause a fire. He must have had a rip in his human suit.

At least they're not waterboarding the animals

Back in June I had a half serious post asking why do the Republicans hate our pets? My goal was to provoke while pointing out how each of the major Republican candidates had demonstrated questionable, and in one case criminal, judgment with regards to their treatment of animals.

I had thought that I could leave this distasteful story in the past, but a recent Newsweek story details allegations that the then 17 year old David Huckabee, son of presidential candidate Mike Huckabee, was involved in the torturing and hanging of a stray dog at a Boy Scout camp in 1998. David Huckabee was dismissed from his job as a counselor by the scouts, and there were calls for him to be investigated for violation of the state animal-cruelty laws. No charges were ever filed. The then director of the Arkansas state police, John Bailey, claims he was fired by Huckabee, because he refused to kill the investigation.

Conservative talking heads tried to diminish the importance of the story by focusing on Mike not being responsible for the actions of David. One when so far as to dismiss the torture itself by joking that David hadn't water boarded the animal.

This misses the point that David was a minor. Mike Huckabee had some responsibility for his son actions. Especially when that son that was demonstrating classic sociopathic behavior. One has to wonder what sort of parenting led to a son who can behave in this way.

Secondly, Huckabee's killing of an investigation into his son's behavior, if true, demonstrates a true subversion of justice. One that should lead to corruption charges.

One would think that the resolution of either of these charges would be critical when deciding something as important as the office of the president.

The trouble with Hillary

Glow in the Dark Cats

Atomic Mutants or enhanced cat tracking. You decide!

Its that time of year again.

Dickipedia

A great send up of Wikipedia biographies. This could have been straight out of South Park, but they would have called it Douche-ipedia, Dickipedia is the wiki of dicks. While consisting of only a handful of articles, they range across the political spectrum and even include the Pilgrims.

The Pilgrims had originally fled a volatile political environment in the East Midlands of England for the Netherlands. But once in the Netherlands, the Pilgrims’ level of dickishness was such that they couldn’t live even in the Netherlands. Many have asked, what kind of dick would find the Netherlands too intolerant or too constraining? The answer is the Pilgrims.

Of the current presidential candidates both Hillary and Giuliani have their own pages.

What is it about Dogs and Squirrels

Walmart's attack on teenage girls

Walmart's message to little girls - Who needs credit cards when you've got ...

Thanks to Blue Gal for pointing this one out.

Joys of Winter

We'll we've finely gotten our snow. About 6" over the weekend and a few more inches over the night. Its still coming down as I type.

Over at Zaius Nation, the doctor has a post on the joys of snow and seasons. It seems he misses the boring mild weather of California.

A much better Presidental Chooser

Ultimate 2008 Presidential Candidate Matcher Your Result: Barack Obama   Barack Obama is noted for his inspirational speeches and honesty about his positions. He is liberal on social issues, being pro-choice and supporting same-sex civil unions. Obama wants to reform healthcare, fund stem cell research, and renegotiate NAFTA. He supports a withdrawl of US troops from Iraq.
Dennis Kucinich
Hillary Clinton
John Edwards
Rudy Guiliani
Ron Paul
Mitt Romney
John McCain
Ultimate 2008 Presidential Candidate Matcher Take More Quizzes

What American accent do you have?

What American accent do you have? Your Result: The Midland   "You have a Midland accent" is just another way of saying "you don't have an accent." You probably are from the Midland (Pennsylvania, southern Ohio, southern Indiana, southern Illinois, and Missouri) but then for all we know you could be from Florida or Charleston or one of those big southern cities like Atlanta or Dallas. You have a good voice for TV and radio.
The West
Boston
North Central
The Inland North
The South
Philadelphia
The Northeast
What American accent do you have? Quiz Created on GoToQuiz

Young Chimps beat College Students

Researchers that pitted young chimps against human college students in tests of short-term memory found that the young chimps scored better on the tests than the humans. This ability decreased as the chimps aged. The researchers speculate that the chimp's memory skills resembles a skill found in children, but which dissipates with age and that the development of language in humans supplanted this ability.

Of course a simpler theory is that its all due to alcohol consumption and sleep deprivation.

The sign of the Beast may not be 666

Thanks to Mock, Paper, Scissors for this image.

California Peeing

I always thought that the water in southern California tasted like crap, starting the end of this month this will be literally the case.

... here in Orange County, pulling the lever will be the start of a long, intense process to purify the sewage into drinking water — after a hard scrubbing with filters, screens, chemicals and ultraviolet light and the passage of time underground.

Avoiding blogging today

Canine Humor

Add a caption

Cyber Monday

Today is cyber shopping day, for all those people who didn't find what they wanted over the weekend. The claim is that more people shop online from work today than any other day of the year.

Happy Turkey Day

Happy Thanksgiving everyone.




We got our first real snow last night that has stuck to the ground. It won't be melting anytime soon with projected daily highs only of 30 and 32.

Call of the wild

Change in Terror Alert Levels

KT Cat has post about the recent changes in European terror levels.

Dogs have Owners, Cats have Staff

Dr. Zaius has a great post about the joy of cats that strangely has nothing to do with chasing them.

Canine Humor

Canine Humor

Buyers Remorse

This month has brought two of my coworkers little bundles of sleep deprivation and anxiety - all costs of having a new born. It amazing how much new parents complain about their choice now, but within a year have absolutely no memory of what you're talking about.

On a related note Amelia Tyagi has a provocative book called the The Two-income Trap where she argues that changes in society have created a situation where having a child has become the greatest indicator of who will file bankruptcy. MJ has an interview with Amelia Tyagi discussing the finding in her book.

Definition leCondel

Hebrew slang created by Israeli government officials. Derived from the name of the Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice, meaning to come and go to meetings that produce few results.

More Colorado Insanity

Colorado, like California, ranges politically from the lunatic authoritarian Christan ring-wing nuts of Colorado Springs to the whacked out self-absorbed people's republic of Boulder. Usually both groups are kept contained within in their respective reservations, but recently the christofascists emerged from their caves to annoy the rest of us.

The Colorado Supreme Court cleared the way Tuesday for an anti-abortion group to collect signatures for a ballot measure that would define a fertilized egg as a person.

While I see where they are going with this, their lack of understanding basic human biology means that the law would define nearly every sexually active woman as committing murder when one of her fertilized eggs doesn't implant. So even if it passes, it will clog the courts and waste everyone's time getting it overturned. When the left uses the law to harass business the right has a fit, but when they do the same thing, they turn a blind eye.

Thanks to Brilliant at Breakfast for pointing this out.

Evil Spock?

Water Boardin' USA

Harry Shearer from My Damn Channel

Ask500People Poles

Ask 500 People is an online community Poling site. By adding their script to your site, anyone who visits your site can vote on the question of the day. One hundred of the votes are taken at random to be used for the survey. The attempt here is to create a meaningful survey by using random selection. Unfortunately since the online community isn't itself random, there is a built in bias. Still the results can be interesting. The potential survey questions are submitted by the community and ranked. If enough people vote for a question, it becomes part of the pole.

First Snow

Well technically at least. Woke up to a thin frosting of the white stuff in our back yard. It only took a couple hours of day light to make it go away, so it didn't disturb Kelly one bit.

Geek Humor

What Fantasy Character Are You?

Take the quiz to find out.

Strange little quiz. I'm a Neutral Good Half-Elf Barbarian.

Alignment:
Law and Chaos:
Law ----- (2)
Neutral - (3)
Chaos --- (3)

Good and Evil:
Good ---- (2)
Neutral - (1)
Evil ---- (-1)

Race:
Human ---- (8)
Half-Elf - (9)
Elf ------ (5)
Gnome ---- (4)
Halfling - (1)
Dwarf ---- (4)
Half-Orc - (8)

Class:
Fighter -- (7)
Barbarian- (12)
Ranger --- (10)
Monk ----- (7)
Paladin -- (8)
Cleric --- (8)
Mage ----- (7)
Druid ---- (8)
Thief ---- (-5)
Bard ----- (9)

Chinese offshoring to less developed parts of US

The up-and-coming Chinese solar power manufacturer Suntech, is considering building solar cell manufacturing facilities in the United States.

"We are currently in discussion with the governors of three different states who have been recruiting us to build factories," said Roger Efird, president of Suntech America, the company's U.S. subsidiary, on a Solar Energy Industries Association conference call. "And we have actually begun looking at sites..."

Canine Humor

From the Nov 6, 2007 Overboard.

For KT Cat

Who to vote for?

Presidential elections have a tendency to degenerate into popularity contests. So to help voters select a candidate consistent with their world view, Glassbooth has just introduced an online survey that matches you with a candidate.

The survey proceeds in two steps. You begin by distributing points among priority issues, such as drugs, trade, social security, Iraq & foreign policy, and so forth. Then based on your answers in the first part of the survey, a series of questions are generated to match you up with a candadate.

BBC in Iraq

Is the spell broken?

My Generation

The Zimmers - My Generation - ZappInternet

Just like Coultergeist

User Friendly

From todays User Friendly.

Mac Trojan horse found active "in the wild"

The October 30th post of MacInTouch has an important article about a malicious Trojan Horse for Mac users viewing videos on the web. The exploit claims that Quicktime can't play the movie selected and you therefore need to download a new version of the codex. Installing the codex provides the Trojan Horse your administrator password and control of your system.

The original alert is here.

Diapers into Diesel

A recent article in the Toronto Star describes a plan to turn disposable diapers into a synthetic diesel fuel. The plan involves using a technique known as pyrolysis that chemically breaks down organic materials by cracking their molecular bonds through heating.

Democrat Debate

This evening the mules had another of their many debates. But tonight there was a difference. The Hildabeast showed some chinks in her armor.

Make A Cylon Jack-O-Lantern

The Evil Mad Scientist Laboratories shows you how to make a Cylon Jack-O-Lantern. The design even includes the sweeping light. He even has a link to a YouTube video of it in action.

Braaaaaaains!

Here's a recipe for brain cupcakes from epicurious.

Mac-O-Lantern

... the coolest thing about this project is the fact that such an extraordinary amount of precious time was squandered on a fruitless(!) pursuit.

More pumpkins that speak to your inner geek.

Problems with Leopard

Seems that folks are having some difficulty upgrading their Macs to Leopard. ;)

There appears to be a patch out now.

Obama Promises a Forceful Stand Against Clinton

Too little too late. Clinton has been pounding Barack all weekend and the best he can do is promise to respond. What a disappointment. He really is just another John Kerry.

The Secret Canine Plot

Cat Alarm Clock

Thanks to both KT Cat and Dr. Zaius for pointing out this video.

Wild Fires can't keep Cheney awake in Cabinet meeting

I appears that Wild Fires can't keep VP Cheney awake during a recent Cabinet meeting. Clearly the poor man has his plate full and needs a rest. I suggest an immediate extended tropical vacation.

How to cook ground squirrel

Squirrel is advertised as a delicious, low-fat dark meat which is especially popular in the south. Squirrel can be baked, stewed, or fried as a main dish, with biscuits and gravy.

San Diego Fire Update

KT Cat has a link to a Google earth map of the fire. The San Diego Union has some more.

San Diego Fires

This is a bad one. I grew up in Southern California, and the fire has never gotten this close to the ocean in San Diego. for those not familiar with the area the fire is heading west toward the ocean between Solana Beach to the north and Del Mar to the South. My parents just got the evacuation warning and are heading to UCSD to the south in La Jolla. The city of San Diego told them to head up to Orange County near LA. Which is insane. I never thought I'd see it, but California is out of its depth - its just one step from turning this into another Katrina screw up.

Bill Maher Rocks

Live TV seems to bring out the crazies.

First Snow of the season

She who waits! The little dog doesn't appreciate bad weather when its in her back yard. It's just fine on her walk, but in her back yard she wants sun to nap in. Somehow she expects us to fix things. Today is not a good napping day for the little black dog.

Yesterday was a beautiful 80 degrees here on the front range. Last night the wind picked up, and it started raining around midnight. This morning we woke up to snow. Not much, and its barely sticking, but real snow nonetheless.

Taco Bell opens shop in Mexico

Taco Bell has opened their first fast food restaurant in Mexico in 15 years. No need to worry that Taco Bell's menu would confuse Mexican consumers since Taco Bell admits it doesn't serve Mexican food:

"What we are bringing to Mexico is not Mexican food, it's our exciting quick-service restaurant brand," said Rob Poetsch, a spokesman for Yum Brands. "We feel the timing is right, and we've done quite a bit of consumer research to validate that this goes beyond product. It's about value and convenience - that's the universal appeal."

Arctic sea ice reaches record low in 2007

This summer's Arctic sea ice pack has melted to a new record low in 2007. This trend spells difficult times for Arctic wildlife.

Fiddling while Rome burns

Feeding Time

Taken from Overboard

Geek Humor

Wives of the candidates - The Barbie Doll Edition

Blue Gal has a fun post about a few of the potential first ladies. I'd like to see Bill added to the list though.

October Snow

No not here, but in California. The Tahoe area received a heavy dusting last night, with temperatures down to the 20's. Typically storms this heavy aren't seen for a few weeks more. The temperature here in Colorado today is a sunny 80 degrees.

Blender Pole

Just like the Bass-a-matic

Happy Birthday Sputnik

Today is the 50th anniversary of the first artificial satellite. Launched by the Soviet Union on October 4, 1957, the satellite was about 2 feet in diameter and weighed about 200 pounds, and had a rotation period of 96 minutes.

Spamalot

We saw Spamalot this weekend. It's brilliant!

Doug eat dog

Looming water crisis in China

Cities in the North China Plain, such as Shijiazhuanh, are experiencing a boom in the local population due to local economic growth topping 11 percent. To support all these people, the underground water table below the plan is being reduced by roughly four feet a year. Municipal wells have already drained two-thirds of the local groundwater.

Water usage in China has quintupled since 1949, and leaders will increasingly face tough political choices as cities, industry and farming compete for a finite and unbalanced water supply.

According to Richard Evans, a hydrologist who has worked for the world bank and China’s Ministry of Water Resources, China will run out of groundwater within 30 years if the current rate of extraction continues.

The other coast for today

Pet tchotchkes have gone a bit too far.

Today's Bizarro

The Feline theocracy has some competition.