BunkBlog

I have monkey bread and you don’t!

Also, Godiva’s Raspberry Truffle ice cream is fanfreakintastic; pass it on.

To announce that there must be no criticism of the president, or that we are to stand by the president, right or wrong, is not only unpatriotic and servile, but is morally treasonable to the American public. (1918)

Theodore Roosevelt

Astoundingly accurate Love And Sex Life Prediction quiz. Try it and be amused or amazed. 🙂

Meme of the day from Mike:

Why do you read my blog?

If you have over 40, you are spoiled.

Do you have:
() your own cell phone
() a television in your bedroom
(1) an MP3 player
() a photo printer
(2) your own phone line
(3) TiVo or a generic digital video recorder
(4) high-speed internet access (i.e., not dialup)
() a surround sound system in bedroom
() DVD player in bedroom
() at least a hundred DVDs
() a childfree bathroom
() your own in-house office
()a pool
() a guest house
() a game room
(5) a queen-size bed or larger
() a stocked bar
() a working dishwasher
() an icemaker
(6) a working washer and dryer
() more than 20 pairs of shoes
() at least ten things from a designer store
() expensive sunglasses
() framed original art (not lithographs or prints)
(7) Egyptian cotton sheets or towels
(8) a multi-speed bike
() a gym membership
() large exercise equipment at home
() your own set of golf clubs
() a pool table
() a tennis court
() local access to a lake, large pond, or the sea
() your own pair of skis
() enough camping gear for a weekend trip in an isolated area
() a boat
() a jet ski
() a neighborhood committee membership
() a beach house or a vacation house/cabin
() wealthy family members
() two or more family cars
() a walk-in closet or pantry
(9) a yard
() a hammock
() a personal trainer
(10) good credit
() expensive jewelry
() a designer bag that required being on a waiting list to get
() at least $100 cash in your possession right now
(11) more than two credit cards bearing your name (not counting gas cards or debit cards)
(12) a stock portfolio
(13) a passport
() a horse
() a trust fund (either for you or created by you)
() private medical insurance
(14) a college degree, and no outstanding student loans

Do you:
() shop for non-needed items for yourself (like clothes, jewelry, electronics) at least once a week
() do your regular grocery shopping at high-end or specialty stores
() pay someone else to clean your house, do dishes, or launder your clothes (not counting dry-cleaning)
() go on weekend mini-vacations
() send dinners back with every flaw
(15) wear perfume or cologne (not body spray)
() regularly get your hair styled or nails done in a salon
() have a job but don’t need the money
() stay at home with little financial sacrifice
() pay someone else to cook your meals
() pay someone else to watch your children or walk your dogs
() regularly pay someone else to drive you taxis
() expect a gift after you fight with your partner

Are you:
() an only child
() married/partnered to a wealthy person
() baffled/surprised when you don’t get your way

Have you:
(16) been on a cruise
(17) traveled out of the country
() met a celebrity
(18) been to the Caribbean
(19) been to Europe (when I was an infant!)
() been to Hawaii
() been to New York
() eaten at the space needle in Seattle
(20) been to the Mall of America
() been on the Eiffel tower in Paris
() been on the Statue of Liberty in New York
() moved more than three times because you wanted to
() dined with local political figures
(21) been to both the Atlantic coast and the Pacific coast

Did you:
() go to another country for your honeymoon
() hire a professional photographer for your wedding or party
() take riding or swimming lessons as a child
(22) attend private school (for two years)
() have a Sweet 16 birthday party thrown for you

1. Name one of your flaws. I’m a gigantic smartass.
2. Have you ever won first place?  In 7th grade, I won first place for the science fair (Tesla coil and Jacob’s Ladder) and also for an art contest (some elephant sketch).
3. Who is the last person to make you smile?  Probably one of the ladies at work.
4. Describe a time when you should have tried harder.  High school.  Specifically, the “getting into college” period.
5. What are you good at?  Folding paper, building computers, animated GIFs, sex, cooking, baking.  A few things, all of them indoors.  Huh.

Someone (phbt!) recently pointed out that it has been more than two weeks since I posted, which is some sort of rare event. Gee, sorry I haven’t had any particularly stellar blinding insights lately that I had to share.

I’m still happy with the MythTV box, which now has about 180 programs stored on it. I’m planning to get another drive to use just for storing movies, which I have been acquiring from late-night TV regularly now. I also had to stop feeling so packrat-like. I was recording shows that I remember from my childhood, as if I suddenly acquired the ability and desire to watch 45 hours of television each day while still going to work and caring for the Boy.

I’ve added limits to most of my recordings, to make them stop recording more than X number of shows (X can vary from 3 to 10). Exceptions are, of course, the SciFi channel shows, which don’t auto-expire and don’t have storage limits. Yes, I am predictable.

I’m still slowly converting my VHS tapes to DVD. Unless I buy a different piece of furniture for my television, I won’t have room for a separate DVD player or VHS player again, anyway.

Work remains fun and exciting. The two women I work next to need slapping on a daily basis, but it beats being in the Army.

It was 85 on Thursday, and 35 on Friday. Just in time for the big Rodeo Parade.

Three weeks until Game Night.

I’ve got chocolate.

From the altfriday5:

1. Which languages do you know? How did you learn them (e.g. natively, from classes, by immersion)? English – native; Korean – school and immersion; Spanish – school but lost most of it.

2. Which language would you most like to learn? Why? Swahili – duh?

3. Have you visited any places where you did not know the predominent language? If so, which ones? Was it hard to manage? Mexico – my Spanish blows. Fortunately, I’ve only gone to tourist spots so the English of the locals was good enough.

4. Which language do you most enjoy hearing, seeing, or expressing? Why? Spanish, it sounds very musical at times.

5. Which languages, other than the one(s) you know, are you exposed to your daily life? Arabic, Russian, Farsi.

I seem to have caught whatever it was that lay the Boy low this weekend.  You know that you have a bit of a fever when it’s 50 degrees outside and you think that’s comfortable.

Blame suddenlydizzy

Open your chosen media library for this (iTunes, WinAmp, MediaMonkey, whatever).

Answer, no matter how embarrasing it is.

How many songs?
18212

Sort by artist
First artist: ? And the Mysterians
Last artist: ZZ Top

Sort by song title:
First Song: #1 Zero – AudioSlave
Last Song: ZZ Top Goes to Egypt – Camper Van Beethoven

Sort by time:
Shortest Song: CEO Outro – Slick Rick (0:02)
Longest Song: (Excluding Symphonic Works) Sasha’s Voyage of Ima – BT (42:30)

First song that comes up on Shuffle: Pre 62 (Akasha’s Post Modern Mix) – Groove Armada

How many songs come up when you search for “sex”? 53

How many songs come up when you search for “death”? 35

How many songs come up when you search for “love”? 668

How many songs come up when you search for “you”? 1444

How many songs come up when you search for “why”? 54

The idiot governor of my adopted state says, Add intelligent design to teaching

From the article linked:

Marvin Olasky, a University of Texas journalism professor who has written favorably on intelligent design

That pretty much says all that needs to be said about Intelligent Design. No scientist is behind any of this. The college professors trotted out to be the educators willing to back ID are all liberal arts types. Nothing against my liberal arts friends, but you’re not scientists.

When we need someone’s expert opinion on Chopin, we ask a music professor. When we need an expert opinion on Shakespeare, we ask an English professor. When we need an expert opinion on biology, we ask…a journalism professor?

From 1up’s Essential 50 Videogames. Italicize the ones you’ve played, bold the ones you’ve beaten (or played to such a sufficiently high level that you could routinely beat the scores of your average joe). Make a note if you didn’t actually play it on its original platform, but instead played it on a MAME emulator or some “Greatest Hits” package.1. Spacewar (1962: PDP-1)
2. Pong (1972: Arcade/Console)
3. Space Invaders (1978: Arcade)
4. Adventure (1979: Atari 2600)
5. Battlezone (1980: Arcade)
6. Pitfall! (1982: Atari 2600)
7. Zork (1977-79: DEC PDP-10)
8. Game & Watch (1980-88)
9. Star Wars (1983: Arcade)
10. Pac-Man (1980: Arcade)
11. Donkey Kong (1981: Arcade)
12. Rogue (1980: VAX/BSD UNIX)
13. E.T. (1982: Atari 2600)
14. Dragon’s Lair (1983: Arcade)
15. King’s Quest (1983: PC)
16. One-on-One (1983: C64)
17. Super Mario Bros. (1985: Arcade/NES)
18. Gauntlet (1985: Arcade)
19. M.U.L.E. (1983: C64)
20. Dragon Warrior (1986: NES)
21. Ultima IV (1985: Apple II/PC)
22. The Macintosh (1984)
23. Tetris (1986: PC/NES/GameBoy)
24. Prince of Persia (1989: PC)
25. FaceBall 2000 (1990: GameBoy)
26. Doom (1993: PC)
27. John Madden NFL Football (1990: Genesis)
28. Sonic the Hedgehog (1991: Genesis)
29. Super Mario Kart (1992: Super NES)
30. Populous (1989: Amiga/PC)
31. Herzog Zwei (1991: Genesis)
32. Street Fighter II (1991: Arcade)
33. Myst (1993: Mac/PC)
34. Mortal Kombat (1992: Arcade/SNES/Genesis)
35. Virtua Fighter (1993: Arcade/32X)
36. Super Mario 64 (1996: Nintendo 64)
37. Tomb Raider (1996: PS/Saturn/PC/Mac)
38. Final Fantasy VII (1997: PS/PC)
39. Tony Hawk’s Pro Skater (1999: PS)
40. The Legend of Zelda: Ocarina of Time (1998: N64)
41. Metal Gear Solid (1998: PS)
42. Half-Life (1998: PC)
43. Gran Turismo (1998: PS)
44. Parappa the Rapper (1997: PS)
45. Ultima Online (1997: PC)
46. Pokémon (1998: GameBoy)
47. The Sims (2000: PC)
48. Jet Grind Radio (2000: Dreamcast)
49. Grand Theft Auto III (2001: PS2/Xbox/PC)
50. Halo (2001: Xbox/PC/Mac)

I’ve seemingly played a lot of games (most of them 15 or more years ago) but don’t beat them. Eh. What can you do?

According to the Official Kwanzaa Web Site, Kwanzaa isn’t just an artificial holiday invented by an American in order to have a “Black holiday” that explicitly excludes anyone of any other ethnicity.

As an African American and Pan-African holiday celebrated by millions throughout the world African community, Kwanzaa brings a cultural message which speaks to the best of what it means to be African and human in the fullest sense.

Of course, they neglect to mention that nobody in Africa celebrates Kwanzaa. Why? Because they have enough traditional holidays as it is, they didn’t need to invent one that sounded like a traditional holiday but isn’t.

So there was a small poll of the Top 20 English-language geek novels since 1932. Let’s see how I did – I’m bolding the ones I’ve read, and italicizing those I own.

1. The HitchHiker’s Guide to the Galaxy — Douglas Adams
2. Nineteen Eighty-Four — George Orwell
3. Brave New World — Aldous Huxley
4. Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep? — Philip Dick
5. Neuromancer — William Gibson
6. Dune — Frank Herbert
7. I, Robot — Isaac Asimov
8. Foundation — Isaac Asimov
9. The Colour of Magic — Terry Pratchett
10. Microserfs — Douglas Coupland
11. Snow Crash — Neal Stephenson
12. Watchmen — Alan Moore & Dave Gibbons
13. Cryptonomicon — Neal Stephenson
14. Consider Phlebas — Iain M Banks
15. Stranger in a Strange Land — Robert Heinlein
16. The Man in the High Castle — Philip K Dick
17. American Gods — Neil Gaiman
18. The Diamond Age — Neal Stephenson
19. The Illuminatus! Trilogy — Robert Shea & Robert Anton Wilson
20. Trouble with Lichen – John Wyndham

I guess my geek cred is still intact, although the fact that I’ve not read Brave New World is somewhat shameful. It may be worse that there are a couple books (Lichen and Phlebas) that I’ve never even heard of before.

Here’s a new revelation from staying up to watch SNL for the first time in years – at the very first minute of Sunday morning, the local NBC affiliate plays a craptacular public access Christian show. It’s a teenager, sitting in a chair, extreme closeup. He’s ranting about what God wants you to do, and he doesn’t seem to have practiced much. Lots of “um” and such.

I really need to go to sleep now.

If you’ve been hiding under a rock, you may not know that television shows are being pushed into new directions lately. It seems that a lot of plans were just waiting for a catalyst, and Apple gave the world that catalyst with the video iPod. Now, AOL is going to stream old shows. Some stories are claiming up to 300 shows will be available, all of them episodes you can’t get on television right now. The two that jumped out at me: Babylon 5 and Spenser For Hire. Oh, yeah, that old Avery Brooks “Hawk” character is gonna be cool to watch again.

I’m betting that AOL’s push is a play to guage interest in specific shows, to help them decide which to release on DVDs or put back in syndication. Imagine the business meeting, “We know Welcome Back Kotter will be a hit for you, because 800,000 people watched it just last week.”

This has been a good week for idiots claiming God wants towns destroyed.

Pat Robertson warned Dover Pennsylvania that they shouldn’t turn to $DEITY in any emergency, because they rejected Him when they voted the idiots out of the school board. Of course, Intelligent Design has nothing at all to do with religion, isn’t that right, Reverend?

Bill O’Reilly told citizens of San Francicso that he’d be happy to invite al Qaeda to blow up the Coit Tower, because the SF voters decided they didn’t like the military hanging around high schools trying to recruit their kids.

John 13:34 and 35

A new commandment I give unto you, That ye love one another; as I have loved you, that ye also love one another.
By this shall all [men] know that ye are my disciples, if ye have love one to another.

That doesn’t seem ambiguous to me, but I’m a simple-minded fellow it seems. Apparently what Jesus really said was, “Love one another, unless you disagree about something, and then hope that person dies in a horrible and painful way.”

Unsurprisingly, the “I hate gays” amendment passed overwhelmingly here in Red Neck Texas. If something is already illegal, why bother with amending the state constitution? Is it just a way to say, “no, really – we hate gays?” Of course, the way the Texas constitution is written, an insane number of things require amendments rather than laws – we’re up to 437 amendments, I believe.

California – what the hell is wrong with you people? You rejected every proposition, even the reasonable ones, just because Arnold liked them all? And, um…San Francisco banned all gun ownership? Damn, even the SFPD thought that was stupid. I realize that nobody needs a gun to go hunting on Fisherman’s Wharf, but that doesn’t mean the Second Amendment is irrelevant. What part of “shall not be infringed” is unclear?

If people don’t like a particular part of our legal framework, they’re perfectly welcome to attempt changing it. Just don’t circumvent it, eh? BTW, this applies equally to people finding legal loopholes to allow torture and indiscriminate imprisonment as it does to people who hate gays or guns. Some days, it’s hard to think of people as a group having anything like brains (Kansas, I’m looking at you!).

I went grocery shopping this morning, as I usually do on Sundays. I thought I’d go ahead and pick up a six-pack of 1554, but then I realized that when I moved to San Angelo I’d moved to the 18th Century as well. Can’t buy alcohol until noon on Sundays. I have this good-looking cake recipe I want to try this week, which requires raspberry liquer in the mix. Not only can’t I buy that until afternoon, I can’t buy it in the grocery store. Although they’ve recently made it legal to sell hard liquor within the city limits, nobody is doing so as yet (licenses not issued I’m guessing). OK, fine. I know I’m stuck in Bibleland (thank you, Poppy Brite, for that term), but at least the liquor stores outside the city limits are available, right?

Not on Sundays. I don’t know whether it’s a law that they be closed or just that nobody goes to the sinful liquor vendors on church days, but they’re all closed until tomorrow. Guess I’ll make that cake another day.