What's your type?

Get a Myers-Briggs analysis of your blog here:

http://www.typealyzer.com/

Big Three won't get much sympathy if the keep doing crap like this

Apparently the big 3 are still traveling in private jet style:

Wagoner’s private jet trip to Washington cost his ailing company an estimated $20,000 roundtrip. In comparison, seats on Northwest Airlines flight 2364 from Detroit to Washington were going online for $288 coach and $837 first class.

After the hearing, Wagoner declined to answer questions about his travel.

Ford CEO Mulally’s corporate jet is a perk included for both he and his wife as part of his employment contract along with a $28 million salary last year. Mulally actually lives in Seattle, not Detroit. The company jet takes him home and back on weekends.

Hot Pockets!

Jim Gaffigan does a hilarious bit on Hot Pockets. Hot Pockets are sold by Nestle. What should really not be much of a surprise is that Hot Pockets are a joke foisted upon us by snooty Europeans.

I haven't had a Hot Pocket in years, but they used to be a regular staple in my teenage years.

Dan Savage is also quite funny

We all know this of course, but here's video proof: Savage on Colbert (that sounds naughty)

That Obama guy is pretty funny

I'd like to have a beer with this guy. That doesn't actually mean much, as I've been saying this about Al Gore as long as others have been saying that about W. Still, this is hilarious.

(warning, if you don't know who the hell Rahm Emanuel is, well, it's probably still funny)

Not what I expected

Some of you know that I've started playing golf. If you know me well, that means one thing - you know I've turned into a complete golf geek. In other words, I set my DVR to record golf instructional shows. You can roll your eyes here, but you're far behind my wife.

Anyway, I'm watching me some golf lessons, and it's one of these deals where a golf pro gives somebody famous a lesson. So far, the famous people have all been actors. I'm watching an episode with Don Cheadle, whom I like. He starts out the show with this great bit, "the 5 Stages of an Actor's Career:"

1. Who the hell is Don Cheadle?
2. Get me Don Cheadle.
3. Get me a "Don Cheadle" type
4. Get me a young Don Cheadle.
5. Who the hell is Don Cheadle.


I laughed my ass off. I'm sure he didn't think of it, but it's the first time I've heard it.

Jim Gaffigan called it

Well, almost.




The Where-Is-Your-God-Now? Burger from MAKE MOVIES on Vimeo.

44

I've been on a picture kick, why stop?

This brought a smile to my face

Read today from a blogger I like, Tim Fernholz:

From an Obama-Biden transition press release:

This morning, President-elect Barack Obama will attend parent teacher conferences at his daughters’ school with his wife Michelle.

I'm not sure if it's awesome or terrifying to be those teachers.

Why I don't watch TV news

Watching TV news is pointless. The pundits are wrong as much as they are right. Which isn't important anyway, because you don't actually know when they are wrong or right, so it's all useless knowledge. For an informed user, you might know when they are wrong or right sometimes, but when you see them get it so spectacularly wrong, you wonder what purpose they serve:

Campbell Brown: For those people who have been worried about the possibility of one party controlling Congress and the White House, the last president to do that, of course, was....?

John King: Ah, that was Bill Clinton, and...

Brown: Jimmy Carter! Jimmy Carter had... Bill Clinton had Democrats in the House and in the Senate?

King: Very briefly.

Brown: Very briefly. [Crinkles her nose] Didn't go so well.

King: No it didn't.

You have to be kidding me? The Republicans were in control of the House and Senate just 2 years ago!

Needs no comment

Awesome Star Wars comment I read

I won't go into how exactly it is I ended up here, but this line from a commenter was awesome:

I guess, "Master Luke you're standing on..." isn't enough warning for a Jedi. That or he's too busy using his dropping a deuce face, um I mean the force to actually hear 3PO's advice. Let's face it, Luke's a prick.

Where does the money go?

People say that Obama is a socialist, and wants to redistribute your wealth. For one, socialism is a bit more than "spreading the wealth." Something about the state controlling the means of production, and all that. What Obama wants to do is simply make the tax code slight more progressive. Specifically, the richest 5% of households see their marginal tax rates for income above $250K move from 36% to 39%. Why suddently that's "socialism" is beyond me. But taking a gander at yon pie chart, it should make it obvious why this needs to be done, and that Obama is proposing isnt' really enough, IMO.

great shot

This is just a great photo.

How dumb can you get

Apparently some on the Right are complaining that at a recent speech in Toledo, Ohio, Obama had put up his own flag:

http://mediamatters.org/items/200810160022?f=h_latest


Now, I happen to have lived in Ohio, and was always quite proud that Ohio's flag is actually a burgee, which made it quite unique. But even without know that, you'd think these people could seriously put 2 and 2 together and figure out the state of Ohio begins with the letter "O." Good god.

ACORN and voter registration

(Can you tell I'm having problems sleeping?)

In case the 3 readers of this blog noticed, I italicized "registration" in my last post when referring to voter registration. Why? Well, somebody already said it better than I. When it comes to the reporting on this, here's the deal:

"1) ...the statutes of most of those states require third parties registering prospective voters to submit all registration forms they receive; and 2) that actual instances of illegal votes being cast as a result of registration fraud are extremely rare."
(http://mediamatters.org/items/200810160020?newsref=www.eschatonblog.com)

This whole fixation on ACORN is one big put-on. It's voter registration! There's no vote fraud, which should be patently obvious, because we haven't voted yet. You can do whatever you want with your voting registration, but when you go to vote, you need to be able to vote as who's registered. Mickey Mouse isn't going to vote. You can complete 100 registrations for yourself, they'll still only let you vote once (er, we'll leave Chicago history out of this).

So when you hear somebody report about ACORN and voter fraud, roll your eyes and yell at the TV, "this is voter registration fraud!!!" This is not a threat to our democracy, and is simply a way for the GOP to discredit the election results, since McCain is going to get blown-out by Obama.

Joe the Plumber

This is just getting too rich, I have to post something.

Joe the Plumber is Samuel Joe Wurzelbacher. He's not a licensed plumber. That's not really a big deal in and of itself, but just to note that the United Association of Plumbers and Pipefitters has endorsed Obama. Joe's also got a lien for unpaid Ohio taxes in 2007. Again, not a huge deal, perhaps an honest mistake or mix-up. ( I'm not being snarky, I was recently audited because my mortgage lender and student loan lender neglected to report my financial information to the IRS. Yeah, really.)

But it sort of keeps going from here. The business he's looking to buy, by Joe's own admission, probably won't make more than $250,000 a year. Based on interviews with him, he just sounds like a standard anti-tax Republican. Which probably makes sense, because it turns out he's a registered Republican (granted, it appears he only first registered in March). But this again gets better. It was initially reported that he wasn't registered. Turns out this was likely due to a mispelling in the voter registration database in Ohio. Which has been a big deal, because the GOP has been using this as an excuse to hit voter registration fraud as the potential to end civilization as we know it. Or just cause Obama to win a total blow-out victory, take your pick.

So the guy McCain refers to 24 times in the last debate isn't a licensed plumber, isn't currently in any danger of having his taxes raised by anybody, isn't likely in the future to have his taxes raised by anybody, is actually a Republican, and may in fact have already had his voter registration purged due to GOP efforts in Ohio based on the fear of voter registration fraud. Seems like a good plan to keep bringing Joe up, this won't blow up in McCain's face.

General: Iraq-style surge won't work in Afghanistan

That's the title of an article about Gen. McKiernen, commander in Afghanistan:

http://www.signonsandiego.com/uniontrib/20081002/news_1n2afghan.html

Some select quotes:

“Afghanistan is not Iraq”

“The word I don't use for Afghanistan is 'surge' ”

I watched the debate on NBC, and didn't see the Truth Squad, or whatever they call themselves, say anything about this, while a blogger found the above article online during the debate just a few minutes after it was said:

http://talkingpointsmemo.com/archives/221584.php

This is pretty significant. Palin and McCain are claiming they'll listen to their commanders on the ground. Doesn't sound like it to me. We could use a bit better "fact checking" than what the jokers on NBC provided.

Determine your gender from your web cache

In case you weren't sure, this handy little applet will let you know how likely it is that you're male of female:

http://www.mikeonads.com/2008/07/13/using-your-browser-url-history-estimate-gender/

(you need to scroll down a bit).

There's a 69% chance I'm a dude.

A wink's as good as a nod

My 2 year old son loves "Cars." My wife or I (or both) get asked to "watch Lightning on TV" at least once a day. Sometimes he just asks for "race cars on TV", but I can't get away with some Formula 1, he'll say "don't want to watch that" or "Lightning race cars." Fortunately, I rather enjoy "Cars," so it only pains me somewhat to watch it for a the umpteenth time.

And what I've observed from these copious number of viewings is that somebody involved in making this movie loves to have the characters wink. I had noticed in the first 15 minutes of the movie a rather large number of winks, so over the course of my viewings I've been keeping track. And I'm up to 18 winks during this 1 hour 56 minute long movie.

So here's my catalogue of winks in the movie "Cars." Sorry, I didn't take note of the times, although these are chronological, so a description will have to do (warning, may contain spoilers).

1. Lightning McQueen (LM) winks at the camera on the back of another race car
2. RV fan on right during race
3. LM winks at twins while flying through air
4. LM winks at nobody in particular just after landing from above
5. One of the Dinoco Girls on sponsor platform
6. Another of the Dinoco Girls on sponsor platform
7. Dinoco helicopter in LM daydream sequence
8. LM in Rusteze commercial
9. LM at Sally in Radiator Springs court
10. Sally after LM runs out of gas
11. Lizzy at Van after slapping on bumper sticker
12. Dinoco helicopter in LM "Chick Hicks Dinoco" nightmare
13. LQ at sally when getting tires at Luigi's Casa Della Tires
14. Mater at Sally and LM during the "Sh-boom" music sequence
15. King winks at Dale Jr. before big race
16. Darrell Cartrip - I don't exactly remember this one
17. Dinco helicopter at LM when Tex offers him sponsorship
18. Tex at LM when saying just let him know if he needs anything

I just found 2 of these in a viewing a few days ago, and I think I've got them all, but I keep catching new ones. It's inspired me to try to incorporate the wink into my daily life, but I don't really seem to have many opportunities. And I don't think I'm very good at it, either.

Car Care, Italian style

I spoke of my dad working on his Alfa. I mentioned that blog post to him (what, no comments yet dad!). I thought he had worked on the rust and simply used touch up paint. No, he did the rust prep and then got the car repainted.

By an Eastern Orthodox priest who painted cars in his spare time. You can't make this stuff up.

Retrospective Reviews: 1986 Lincoln Continental Mark VII LSC

In my quest to be the worlds greatest blogger, I've clearly forgotten about what the 'Net can do. Take that all you other picture-less posts!

Here's car #2, the fabulous Lincoln Continental Mark VII LSC. The "Luxury Sport Coupe" was Ford's attempt to compete with the Germans. Or so I remember my dad saying about all the reviews in the car rags of the time. They apparently said it was their equal at some fraction of the cost. That fraction might have been 7/8, I'm not really sure. I do remember dad writing a very large check as I waited with him to pick up his new '86 LSC in what I affectionately referred to as "metallic shit brown." It was actually a nice looking color, but at the time I thought "who buys a brown car?" Apparently when you get older, not only do you like white cars, you like brown cars too, because both the Carrera (remember that post?) and Mini Clubman comes in a wonderful shade of shit brown.

This became my car shortly after I started driving, and the family decided to do some sort of crazy car shake-up. The Peugeot was history, dad had a new Explorer 2 door, and mom had a Mercury Capri XR2 convertible. Damn, I forgot about the Explorer, another Retro Review for me to do. I got the Lincoln.

Where the Peugeot was the antithesis of a gear-heads car speed-wise, the Mark was the antithesis of a sensible 16 year-old's car. And not just because it's a Lincoln. This was a hot rod lincoln, spec'ed out with the Mustang's 225HP 5.0 V8 HO engine. And I didn't drive it much differently than that's song pro(an?)tagonist. For the time, it was quite fast, 0-60 in 8 seconds (we all laugh at that now - I currently don't own a car that won't do it in under 7). It had a fancy-dancy air suspension that was supposed to keep the ride nice and taut when cornering, and nice and smooth when cruising. But under it all, it was yet another Ford based on the Fox chassis - rear drive with a live axle, and approximately a 95/5 front/rear weight distribution.

But despite those humble underpinnings, its performance was nothing to sneeze at. While not as fast as a 635 CSi, it was plenty fast, faster than most cars I was likely to find next to me at a stoplight, and fast enough to merge into highway traffic with ease. And that air suspension? Well, it worked to a degree. It did cruise nicely, and on big sweepers the suspension firmed up nicely. But quick steering inputs threw it off, and some road undulations could send it into a classic American car wallow. It could also eat up most speed bumps without the need to slow down.

Where the Mark could really boast was amenities; it had stuff. 8 way power leather seats, trip computer, auto dimming mirror, auto on/off lights with auto bright dimming, moon roof, a sweet climate control, power closing latch on the trunk. Probably missing a few things. Dad may may have purchased the car for the climate control. We were about to move to Florida from Ohio, and the A/C blew cold, and pretty quickly. You just set the temp to 72, and that's what it did. In my experience it's only been bested by Saab, who's climate control in my '96 900 was the bees knees.

I drove the Mark through the rest of high school. I managed to wreck it twice within about 6 months by being a stupid 16 year old. It was not the much worse for wear, although with the 2nd wreck, the entire car was repainted, and the guy doing it said he added extra metallic sparkle for free. Gee, thanks dude. It now looked like a metallic shit brown bass boat. And it was referred to frequently as "the bass boat" by my friends. There were many great exploits in this car, most of which I'd better not write about.

I like this car a lot. It had the speed that I wanted, it was big enough to put 5 guys in, and comfortable enough for 3 of us to drive it 5 hours north to Alabama to buy fireworks and then turn around and drive 5 hours back home after a 30 minute shopping spree. It was great fun on highway ramps where you could set it into a turn and accelerate through. And it was classic Q-car - I never got a speeding ticket in it.

It was handed down to my sister, who also wrecked it 2 times, the final one leading to the Mark's demise (UPDATE: Sis followed up in comments, only 1 wreck, but that's what did it in. Not trying to disparage ya sis, just a bad memory!). These wrecks were all fairly significant, and nobody was ever hurt, so it proved to be safe as well. While this was probably not the best car for 2 16 year olds, it fit the bill pretty well, and we certainly rode in style. Just not the style we wanted.

2nd Foreign Car?

The Peugeot was only the 2nd, I say? Well, actually, I just realized it was the 3rd. Dad's first foreign car was (surprise) a Beetle. I actually wouldn't mind getting to take a spin in one of those. But that's not the car that I missed out on. That would be import #2 - a 1979 Alfa Romeo Alfetta GT. Oh man, I thought that car was soooooo cool. We got rid of it shortly before I was able to drive. We moved to Florida in '86 (I started driving in '89), and the Alfa had a black leather interior with no A/C. Ouch. So it was parted with. I sure wish I had a chance to drive it.

Near as I can remember, the Alfetta had all the qualities associated with Italian cars. Maintenance: It rusted all around the doors and various other places, I remember dad working on that. High Maintenance: Dad took it to an Alfa mechanic who worked out of his home garage. Temperamental: It's the only car I've ever been in that just quit running while being driven. Really Temperamental: Shortly after buying the Alfa, dad got a daily driver, cause it only really ran when it was 72 degrees and sunny and the tape deck had Italian Opera in it. Ok, not that last bit, but maybe that was the problem.

I think Dad really liked this car. The first thing that happened when he brought it home was we all piled in and went for a drive. Just a drive, we didn't go anywhere specific. And dad got pulled over for speeding. Did I mention it was red?

Retrospective Reviews: 1985 Peueot 505 S wagon

This is the first in a series (I hope!) of reviews of cars that I've been the primary driver/owner of, or have driven extensively enough to comment on. That latter one puts the number up higher than I feel like counting, but don't worry, I won't forget any cars. :)

A 1985 Peugeot 505 S wagon was the first car I drove - not counting a family friends LeCar I got to drive (well, steer at least) at age 5. The Peugeot was, I believe, the second foreign car my dad purchased. This replaced a 1980 (?) Chevy Malibu wagon.

This was a pretty fantastic car. The front seats are still the most comfortable that I can remember, and these were manual 4-way adjusters, not like some of the fancy-dancy seats I have now. And a lovely, dark blue velour material, that I have never seen equaled, and I much preferred to any leather. I would love to have a set of these today. And the ride. I've come to find through car magazines and shows, that the French make cars the ride beautifully. This Peugeot was no exception. The memory of the ride is not marked quite as indelibly on my mind as the seats, but this car was quite the cruiser, and was comfortable on all surfaces. I can't recall complaining about the roads.

Along the same lines, French cars' handling are apparently not all that great. Makes sense, a comfortable ride is usually the enemy of a sporty handler. This is not a memory I have of the Peugeot. It had some body roll and mild understeer. It was rear wheel drive, which meant no torque steer to ruin its beautiful steering feel. Overall, the handling was a pleasure. In fact, this car can be summed up by doing well at several contradictory things: Great ride, and handles well. Huge car, but drove compact.

And when I say huge, it was. The interior was definitely bigger than the full-size American wagons you could buy at the time - think square Caprice. Headroom was amazing; the brochure referred to a "vaulted ceiling," and as cars went this was no lie. The cargo area was quite large, with about 5 metal strakes running longitudinally to help slide heavy objects to the front, something I don't see any more but was quite nice for getting, say, a heavy cooler backed up against the rear seats. The rear seat folded completely flat. But when up, the rear seats had plenty of room for my nearly 6'2" frame, and in fact the rear seat was much higher than in any car I've been in, and I had excellent thigh support - I could sit with my feet flat on the ground and be quite comfortable, another detail I've not seen even in most SUVs.

You're probably wondering why you never owned a car this great, and why Peugeot stopped selling cars on these shores in the early '90s. This reason I'm going to give probably isn't why, although I'm sure it didn't help. It was S-L-O-W. I mentioned it was big, and although I'm sure it didn't weigh as much as the Caprice wagon, it couldn't have been light. Whatever it was, the 120HP 2.0 liter four was no match for it. And coupled - or perhaps more precisely, saddled - with a 3 speed slush-box, 0-60 was in the neighborhood of 20 seconds. The bad neighborhood. This did not fire up the enthusiasm of a 16 year old gear-head. But this probably made it the ideal car for me, to keep me out of trouble. Alas, I drove it full time for only a few months, then giving way for, well, my next installment of Retro Reviews.

Time to blog?

I thought I'd have all sorts of time to blog. I'm not really sure what I was thinking, considering how the shows have been piling up, unwatched, on my Tivo. Maybe it's my self imposed vow to not blog during work, which I've followed almost absolutely. It could also be that I have nothing good to write. Which would explain this post.

Couldn't have happened to a more deserving guy

I like the way these guys think. They are seeking a vote on naming a sewage treatment plant in SF after Dubya:

http://www.nytimes.com/2008/06/25/washington/25rename.html?_r=1&ref=todayspaper&oref=slogin

Rush Limbaugh is an asshole

Sorry for the profanity. I never listen to the man, but if he has any redeeming qualities, they are all forfeit when you see stuff like this:

Limbaugh: I want to know. I look at Iowa, I look at Illinois—I want to see the murders. I want to see the looting. I want to see all the stuff that happened in New Orleans. I see devastation in Iowa and Illinois that dwarfs what happened in New Orleans. I see people working together. I see people trying to save their property…I don’t see a bunch of people running around waving guns at helicopters, I don’t see a bunch of people running shooting cops. I don’t see a bunch of people raping people on the street. I don’t see a bunch of people doing everything they can…whining and moaning—where’s FEMA, where’s BUSH. I see the heartland of America. When I look at Iowa and when I look at Illinois, I see the backbone of America.

http://www.crooksandliars.com/2008/06/17/rush-limbaugh-attacks-black-katrina-victims-and-praises-whites-as-the-floods-hit/

I might have been rash on the title. Limbaugh could simply be an imbecile who can't understand the fundamental differences between these events.

A deal at twice the price

Take a gander at this $500.99 cable:

http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B000I1X6PM

Be sure to read the comments.

Gift ideas

"That's what she said"

Er, uh, yeah.

I'm going to open with the last line from this article. "I know there are some who consider McCain a credible, knowledgeable guy. I just can’t figure out why."

http://www.thecarpetbaggerreport.com/archives/15840.html

This is the kind of genius that keeps coming from the McCain campaign. It really should be a Reagan-style blow-out by Obama this November, that fact that it won't is scary.

McCain the duffer

The comments were taken off of McCain's official site, but fortunately somebody got screen shots of these truly high quality comments:

http://www.balloon-juice.com/?p=10594

Porsche model names

So I referred to the Porsche Carrera Turbo in my last post. The astute car enthusiast (which is clearly you if you're reading my car posts) will know that I'm talking about the 911 Turbo - the true Porsche snob will call it the 997, the manufacturer's internal designation.

Take a look at the other models - nay a digit in sight. There are certainly internal designations by number still, but on the Porsche USA web page, the only model with a number is the 911. Why? The 911 rules the roost among the aforementioned Porsche snobs. Porsche tried to kill it before, and was roundly shouted down by 911 owners. "If it's not rear-engined, with an air-cooled flat-6, it's not a real Porsche." Thus, the 911 will probably never die, although those same Porsche snobs won't admit that the 911 has become the super-GT that the engineers at Porsche attempted to replace it with, and have since designed around the inherent driving-dynamic flaws of an engine hanging off the ass of the car.

What am I getting at? Despite what you might think from the above, I really like the 911. I'd love to own one. But take a look at a 911. What does the big badge on the back say? That's right, Carrera. It's a Porsche Carrera. The 911 designator was simply the internal numbering used at the time. It was originally going to be the 901, but Peugeot claimed the rights for car model numbers with "0" in the middle (ironically, Mr. Broccoli's estate came down like a ton of bricks on Peugeot's attempt to name a car the "1007"). Porsche then just decided on 911. Luckily, in my opinion, as 901 doesn't have much of a ring, but 911 does. It was followed up with a 912, and a 930 was the turbo. The numbers kept going up. But 911 stuck.

This is the beginning of my one man crusade - it's the Carrera from now on! At least until I own one. Then it will be the 911, of course.

The Nissan GT-R

One of the reason's I started this blog was to put my considerable opinions of automobiles into print. What better car to start with than the hugely (and deservedly ) hyped "successor" to the Skyline, Nissan's new GT-R. Let me preface all of this: I've never driven the GT-R. I've never driven any of the cars it's compared to. That doesn't mean I can't have an opinion. :)

The big number that car geeks will be familiar with is 7:29. That's the time (yes, minutes, smart-ass) it takes a GT-R to complete a circuit of the famed Nurburgring. That is damn impressive. Faster than a Porsche Carrera* Turbo. At half the price. I guess that's the little number to complement the big number (If you consider 70 large little).

Here's the number that I can't shake: 3900. That's the weight in pounds of this beast. That's a lot of pounds. Somehow, I can't get my head around how a car this heavy can go this fast without there being some caveat - are the tires only going to last for 100 miles? Yet I shouldn't be so critical. Perhaps my favorite car, enough so that I actually own it, is the 928, which was widely criticized for the same reasons the GT-R is today. It's big, it's heavy, it's not a true sports car (ok, maybe they aren't saying that about the GT-R). But the 928 outperformed the 911. Sound familiar?

Nissan figured out a way to make it go like stink. I shouldn't obsess over it's weight. So I should focus on the real reason not to get one: It's heinous. The exterior is just bad, but the interior, what you'll have to look at all the time, is atrocious. Does it matter how fast it goes?

*check for a future post on this.

The Air Force

I've been reading a lot about the "firings" of top Air Force brass. If you are interested in a bit of history about the Air Force and how it got to where it is today, try this article:

http://www.prospect.org/cs/articles?article=abolish_the_air_force

I know that title is provocative, but the article does a good job of making it's case, and it does give you a good history. It was published far before these recent events, but is perhaps more germane now.

It's a Disease!

Now I'm looking at these:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/BMW_2002

I've always liked the 2002. I certainly don't need another car, and I've been thinking about getting rid of the 928. Maybe I should just get an original Mini.

What's in a name?

To paraphrase our President, blog-name pickin' is hard work!

It's a blog

Considering how long I've been reading blogs, you'd figure I'd have started my own long ago. Not that I have some topic I've suddenly decided I need to blogviate on, but what the hell.