A Mexican Funeral

Me: "President Obama won the Nobel Peace Prize!? What do you think about that, America?"

America: "It's absurd! Look at our responses to this Washington Post poll!"

Me: "Wow, looks like a pretty clear verdict. But...I think something's funny with the scale on that chart."

Washington Post: "Don't worry, it's a non-scientific poll."

Me: "Oh, you mean the kind where anybody can click the button on your website, and the respondents are mostly the same lunatics who leave comments about your articles?"

Washington Post: "Yes."

Me: "But why don't you at least show the chart with an appropriate scale? Those bars are awfully misleading."

Washington Post: "Because it doesn't matter anyway. Does anyone really take Nobel Prizes seriously anymore?"

America: "Yes!! This is an outrage! And while we're at it, let's talk about ACORN!"

OK, that's enough. But seriously, let's talk about ACORN.

On my recent trip back home to the Midwest, I was reminded of the amusing/disturbing political climate in the Land Where There Are So Many White People, They Rarely Have to Interact with Minorities. (Sample bumper sticker: "I'll keep my guns, money and freedom. You keep the 'change'!") There was a law office with a sign out front with movable letters, the type you see at churches, like this:

The sign in front of this law firm said:

"ACORN" IS NUTS.

Three questions immediately occurred to me:

1) Why do conservatives care about ACORN so much?

2) Why are there quotation marks around ACORN?

3) What more amusing message could be spelled by rearranging those letters?

Abandoning questions 1 and 2 as lost causes, I sought answers to number 3 with help from the Internet Anagram Server:

RACIST "NOUNS" (Placement of quotation marks is paramount...especially when they only serve to increase confusion.)
"ANUS CITRONS" (I don't know what an anus citron might be, but it sounds funny.)

"TACOS IN URNS" (my favorite)

I wish I had enlisted the help of some mischievous high school kids to bring my ideas to fruition. You don't think I would bear the risk of covert letter-changing personally, do you? Instead, I decided to offer my sign message consulting services to the law firm, and keep this all on the up-and-up. It could truly be a win-win situation. And other things that involve repeating words. We're still working out the contract (non-disclosure agreement, non-compete clause, etc. - I won't bore you with the technical details!), but I'm optimistic that we can make this happen.

I leave you with the anagram of my own name that I've selected for pseudonym purposes. Everyone really should have one prepared in the event that they start a career as a street graffiti artist or something.

Signing off,

MAN BOY CRYING

"My name is my name!"

The McGib-L**tch household has largely relied on eMusic as our source of new music for the past three and a half years. Their selection was often sorely lacking, but the price was right. When there was something we really wanted that was unavailable there, we'd buy overpriced, DRM-laden mp3s from iTunes. The system worked.

eMusic recently struck a deal to start carrying Sony's back catalog, and increased the price of subscription plans. Our plan went from $0.23 per track to $0.40-0.50. OK, fine, that's still cheaper than most other legal ways of acquiring music. And maybe I'll go for some old Wu-Tang Clan that I never owned, but having access to The Black Crowes' Greatest Hits does nothing for me.

I'm still debating canceling. Either way, it's apparent that getting good prices on music will require more shopping around. At Lala, you can listen to whole songs for free the first time. Amazon has DRM-free tracks that are usually cheaper than iTunes'. Amie Street is an interesting site that, though it carries next to nothing, offers a lot of songs for less than twenty cents apiece, with prices rising the more often a song is downloaded.

Whatever. My reason for bringing all of this up is that, what with all these recent changes at eMusic, I can't help getting the feeling that they've lost their personal touch. See below.

Bamboozled!

Over the weekend I picked up the best thrift store t-shirt I'd found in a while. It said "Cure for the blues: Bill Clinton for President," or something like that. There was a giant, stylish cartoon of Slick Willie emblazoned across the front.

I'm afraid of unwashed thrift store clothing, so I threw the shirt in with a load of laundry tonight before ever wearing it...and it fell apart, literally. I opened the washing machine and there were pieces of saxophone stuck to my pants.

Exhibit A.

Consider yourselves warned, fellow consumers: 1992 Hanes shirts are NOT heavyweight.

My 10-year-old self wants his vote back, Mr. Clinton.

Baby's First Jaywalk

In the interest of combating blog inertia, I will say a few quick things:

1. To all the parents in my neighborhood who push their kids' strollers across the street while they clearly have a "DON'T WALK" sign: shame on you. Just...shame. (I really only wanted to be able to use this in a post title.)

2. I watched The King of Kong, a documentary about guys playing Donkey Kong. It was pretty good, but it disturbed me to hear people describe video game levels as "boards." I had only heard that term while in college, and at that point I figured it was regional slang. Little did I know that some of the most famous gamedorks in the world say it! It's confusing, really, because they also refer to the innards of arcade machines as boards. Meaning the motherboard, I guess? At least I think arcade games have motherboards. Computer Hardware was the class that made me abandon computer science as my major.

3. The Indians' bullpen just blew another game. Life isn't fair! ...which leads me to this and this. Wah!

Adventures in Public Transportation

Here's something that I meant to write about back before the election.

I don't make a habit of reading things that I expect to disagree with, but I think I should start doing more of it. It was for this general purpose that I started reading Atlas Shrugged a while back. (I have since given up on it.)  Now, the problem with doing this kind of thing is that people make assumptions about you based on what reading material you're carrying around. Since I would be reading the book on my Metro commute, I got paranoid and decided that I needed some way of counteracting any political vibes that I would be giving out. Luckily, I have a "VOTE OBAMA" playing card that I can use a bookmark.

Sure enough, I got my first comment a couple days in. I was getting off the train and a white yuppie-type who was standing next to me leaned over and said, "You know, this [pointing to Obama card] doesn't go with this [pointing to book]." All I said in response was "Yeah, that's on purpose." I think we both left the conversation confused.

Was this an innocent comment on his part? That's what I thought at first. But I was left wondering which one he agreed with, the book or the card. I didn't make any effort to discern his intentions at the time, but now I regret this. I'm left with the lingering suspicion that he was an Obama hater trying to start some shit.

I should have tried one of these responses instead:

"Why, bookmarks are as old as books themselves! What a ridiculous thing to say!"
"Oh yeah, well do you know what this [pointing to own fist] goes with?" ...and then punch him in the face.

***

A lot of the time when I ride the Metro I don't hold onto anything, because I am trying to avoid Stranger Germs.  And because I'm short and don't like to perform the slight stretch required of me when there is only an overhead bar nearby.  So I often go several stops in a row just standing in open space.  As I was getting off the train the other day, an oldish lady said to me, "Your balance is amazing."

Now that is a compliment that can make a guy feel good about himself.

***

I try my damnedest to tune out everything and everyone else on my commute.  Earbuds in, book/magazine open and I'm set.  This is what makes 50 minutes of Metro better than 25 minutes of driving.  Last week on my way home, I was trying to ignore a waving hand in my peripheral vision and finally looked up with what must have been an expression of annoyance.  Meeting my fiery gaze was a kindly Chinese man who was trying to hand me the umbrella that I had left on my seat.  A lady on the train with us was watching the whole encounter, laughing and saying, "He kept saying, 'Sir.  Sir.'"  Luckily, the doors opened immediately after this and I was able to thank the guy and make my getaway.  The lesson: don't forget your umbrella.

The Bachelorate

Oh hey, is this thing on?

I'm going to take a page from the book of one of my favorite bloggers. Thanks, Katie!!!!!

Need a quick fix for dinner? Look no further. I present you with tonight's meal: peas and tater tots.

Start by putting the frozen peas in a microwaveable container of your choice (this is all about customization). Add some water and microwave for a minute, stir, repeat. Add a butter-like substance and salt, and you're good. If you've thought this through, you will have had the tots in the toaster oven for a few minutes already, but come on people, I'm not a professional!


Like I'm sayin', put those tots in for some minutes and get them nice and crispy. Serve salted with ketchup and/or horseradish sauce (ideally of the "sassy" variety). Forget about the fact that you just ate a bunch of pretzel sticks and are probably definitely exceeding the recommended daily allowance for sodium.


And now it's time for the main course. Don't worry, this part's easy!! Just open the box and grab some cookies! You'll notice that a serving is "2 cookies," but go ahead and have three. You deserve it.

This happened in Vegas

Oh man, I haven't updated this thing in a long time.  What a crappy way to treat a fledgling blog!  Sorry, blog.  I'll find a way to make it up to you.  I hear that lists are good for traffic:

Nine Amusing-ish Things About My Week* in Las Vegas

1) I've been in a classroom eight hours each day and have achieved a superficial understanding of discrete choice modeling, cluster analysis, and other fun marketing research techniques.

2) The place where I'm staying is a resort with a casino and spa, and it's fairly classy -- yet the casino is infested with the usual Vegas trash.

3) The casino is down the hall from the conference rooms, and slot machines were audible from where I sat yesterday.  I thought I was losing my mind at first, but later confirmed this fact.  I mean the fact that I heard slot machines, not the fact that I was losing my mind.  Because the latter is not a fact.  Stop talking about my Muslim faith!

4) For some reason I felt compelled to order chicken fried steak for dinner last night.  It didn't seem like a steak at all!  Such a curious consistency.

5) An instructor at the conference, in an attempt to introduce an example, asked if anyone knew what The Federalist Papers were.  Other than my mumbling "James Madison," none of us had anything to say about the subject.  We are dumb.

6) I heard someone say that two people wanted to "literally be on the same page."  These people were not reading books.

7) I celebrated my 2nd annual Vegas "Lose Forty Bucks at Poker" night:  a tradition in the making.

8) Some jackass at the poker table was repeatedly making comments about "Barack Hussein Obama," for no apparent reason, and the dealer had to call the pit boss (I guess?) over to get him to shut up.  Then the guy claimed the dealer was making things up because the guy wasn't tipping him.  These distractions are probably why I lost my forty bucks.

9) I'm going to bed at 9:00 tonight because it's past my bedtime on the east coast, man!

*four days