They may take our lives, but they'll never take our freedom... I posted bail.

Mel, Mel, Mel. What can say, other than Siege Heil!? I never really understood anti-Semitism, other than the Jewish habit of cloisterism makes them easy targets: it's easy to fabricate whatever you want about people if they always keep to themselves and never really let themselves be known to you.
I guess my opinion on Gibson's guilt or innocence is obvious. Apparently it comes from his dad. Hutton Gibson was quoted as saying something about the Holocaust being mostly fabricated. Mel responded saying that he wouldn't speak against his dad. Saying that you don't share the same view isn't speaking against someone, at least in my opinion. When accused of anti-Semitism during the release of The Passion of The Christ, Mel responded with something like, I'm not anti-Semitic because that's a sin. (And Lord knows that Gibson doesn't sin.) Wow, nothing about not being anti-semitic because Jews are people deserving respect like anyone else. Once again, modern religion based solely on Logos and devoid of Eros.

Man, I need to find that quote in the Old Testament about how one follows the letter of the law until he is mature enough to follow the spirit of the law.

Somehow, I doubt that he meant it.

I just got back from running an errand at lunch, where I had to sit in traffic for 20 minutes to go a half mile. The reason was road construction which funneled three lanes into one. Now, seeing as I sat in the queue like a good, law-abiding motorist I was reticent to let anyone in who had driven up the turning lane and the lane clearly marked way back as a terminating lane. So when this younger man tried to cut in front of me after I'd nearly had a stroke waiting in line, I didn't let him. He drove forward, I went around him. He gave me the obligatory dirty look, I stared at him impassively. Then, he got my attention, and pantomimed that he would pray for me. I stared at him impassively.

Later on I thought, I actually doubt that this guy will pray for me. I mean, heck, if he would pray for me when I had been so jerky, or at best uncharitable, I would not only appreciate it (I can use all the help I can get), but I would consider him quite the man. To be wronged - or at least - to receive a smart ass look when you've asked for a favor, and then instead of retaliating you hope for the other's betterment, is very admirable and shows quite the evolution of spirit.

But, as I've established, I seriously doubt that this guy will pray for me. I doubt that the next time he prays, he'll think, and Lord, please place some charity into the heart of that butthole who wouldn't let me in today. Instead, I think that that young man communicated that to me to make me feel guilty. (I didn't work :P) This is a prime example of how I think people abuse religion in order to manipulate.

People are so quick to point out the mote in another's eye when they have a boulder in theirs. And they feel not only justified, but righteous, and that God is on their side in the matter. In my mind, intent is as important as action. To chastise or correct not out of concern for the betterment of a fellow human being, but to shame them into compliance with your wishes is not righteous. To puff up and point your finger is self-delusional.

Wandering as my noodle does, it made me think of the chorus from that old Christmas hymn, Ave Maria. "Fall to your knees" it goes: damn right. One cannot truly receive redemption without radical humility. How can the slave ask for forgiveness of his debt, when he scolds another slave for his? This is not just forgiveness of someone's sin against you, but a recognition of your own imperfection, and therefore a "forgiveness" of anyone and everyone's sin, a.k.a. imperfection. Mohandis K. Ghandi said it best,
"We are all such sinners it is best to leave judgment to God."

I mean heck, I knew I was being a jerk.

I thought that this interweb thingy would make it easier...

So, a year and a half after the ex-Mrs. Scootypuff decided to have an ex-friend scooty her puff, the intrepid Scootypuff jr. decides to start looking for a new and hopefully permanent Mrs. Scootypuff.

Now, when Scootypuff jr. was more junior - early 20's - Scootypuff jr. would go in search of a Mrs. Scootypuff in bars and clubs. This never really worked out, because they soon found out that while they loved going to bars and clubs, Scootypuff jr. would rather stay at home and watch Discovery Channel. Once Scootypuff jr. admitted to himself that he was a colossal and lifelong nerd, he stopped looking for love in all the wrong places. Now that Scootypuff jr. is again looking for another Mrs. Scootypuff (the real Mrs. Scootypuff, not a practice run), and now that he knows that he is in fact and will always be a nerd, Scootypuff has decided to search on-line.

Now Scootypuff likes the Yahoo! Personals because Scootypuff can eliminate the uglies right off the bat. This leaves a pretty picture and not much else, as most other information is superficial. One big exception are the girls who want their man to make over $150k a year. Scootypuff doesn't make that kind of scratch, and if he did, Scootypuff wouldn't want a woman for whom that was a priority. So, Scootypuff appreciates their honesty.

For a long time however, Scootypuff has seen commercials for eHarmony.com, and figured this would be his salvation. This way, Scootypuff find girls with whom he has a lot in common. The problem is, too many don't include their photograph, and Scootypuff can't filter them out. Others wait until further in the process to reveal their photograph, which makes Scootypuff nervous. Why not post a picture? The only reasons Scootypuff can think of are:

1. They look like they've been hit in the face with a bag full of nickels.
2. They are hot, but "want a man to love them for who they really are," although if that man were broke, bald, and fat, they wouldn't give him the time of day.
3. They are hot but have poor self esteem.
4. They are wanted by Interpol and/or the FBI, and can't risk showing their face on the internet.

None of the above bode well for them becoming the future Mrs. Scootypuff.

So, Scootypuff jr. spends most of his time on eHarmony closing matches, which is basically rejecting people. eHarmony requires one to give a reason for the close, although the generic "I'd rather not say" exists. This however sounds too cruel to Scootypuff jr., as it could leave one panicky about "what is wrong with them." (Luckily Scootypuff jr. doesn't think this way anymore.) The ones who don't post pictures are an easy close, as that is a pretty good reason that says nothing bad about the closed match. It's the ugly ones who post pictures that give Scootypuff jr. the hardest time, as there is no "because you have a face that could scare buzzards off a carcass" check box on the closing screen, and if there were, Scootypuff jr. couldn't check it.

Even more disconcerting are the ones who never respond to Scootypuff jr's communications. If you don't dig Scootypuff, then close Scootypuff. Don't just ignore Scootypuff until Scootypuff closes you. This type of behavior of course just reinforces that she couldn't have been the future Mrs. Scootypuff. Scootypuff needs a stronger woman than that.

So, Scootypuff jr. will just keep looking, and hoping that the hottie from Cali will get back to him. This is vacation season. He also hopes that this girlie from Del Rio isn't as ugly as her job description would lend one to believe. Honestly, when have you ever seen a hot park ranger?

Scootypuff jr. likes the word Scootypuff, and referring to himself in the third person.

Miami Vice

Based on the trend-setting 80's television series full of neon flashes of South Beach decadence, one would have thought a movie based on Miami Vice would have been perfect for a summer blockbuster. Instead, director Michael Mann crafts a film that probably would have been more suited for the more subdued confines of an arthouse theater.

The basic premise from the old television series is familiar--Sonny Crockett and Ricardo Tubbs are undercover vice cops infiltrating the world of south Florida drug trafficking. The Italian-designed clothes, slick speedboats, roaring Ferraris, and moody soundtrack are still there, too, but that's where the similarities end. Shot in high definition digital video, the cinematography is grainy and dim. Instead of the pastel bright colors of South Beach glamour, we're taken along for a ride into the dark underbelly that exists in Miami outside the glitzy nightclubs and beachfront condos.

Colin Farrell has shown he can be an OK actor, but he's yet to display anything that I would consider leading man quality, and this is no different. I struggled through a quarter of his lines trying to figure out what he was trying to mumble or what accent he was trying to use. I can sure believe the rumors that he was stoned while he was making this film, prompting his need for rehab after production wrapped. Jamie Foxx fairs better, and this may be the first film I've seen him in where I wasn't thinking back to his comedic days on In Living Color. Gong Li gives probably the best performance, even despite a thick Chinese accent and choppy English that initially made me wince. Her strengths are in her presence and acting when she's not speaking, a skill that not many actors can accomplish.

The plot was pretty difficult to understand at times (not helped by the combination of Colin Farrell's mumbling and Gong Li's imperfect English). But the pacing was right on. The film starts out without even a title card and drops you straight into the middle of a Miami club where a bust is about to take place. Things sort of simmer over time, until things really boil over into the climactic minutes where Michael Mann really excels--grandiose urban shootouts. Pretty intense scenes that are almost on par with his previous work in Heat.

Rumor has it that the budget to make Miami Vice was around $140 million. I thought it funny that a recent review by the New York Times notes that this is well above the annual operating budget of the real Miami-Dade Police. Considering Pirates of the Carribean: Dead Man's Chest cost about as to produce, I am left to wonder where all the money was spent on this picture. The shootouts were spectacular, but certainly nothing I would have thought would have been that expensive to produce. Awhile back, I read about a supposedly killer speedboat scene that was supposed to be in the movie. Even some of the promotional stills prior to the films release suggested we would see Crockett and Tubbs competing in a flashy boat race. Yet that scene never made it into the movie, and I wonder if much of the inflated budget was left on the cutting room floor. Perhaps a director's cut on DVD will reveal a more coherent movie and show us what $140 million really buys.

I really dig Michael Mann films and this is no different. He has yet to make a movie that I didn't like. I'll admit, though, Miami Vice wasn't what I was expecting for a summer movie blockbuster, and it probably would have worked better had it been released under a different title and without all the expectations that the old TV series brings to mind. It wasn't his best work, but I certainly think it was worth my money.

*** (out of *****)

Guilty until proven innocent? How very un-American.

Back when I was 15, I vividly remember watching Greg LeMond win the Tour de France on television in 1989. Having just recovered from getting accidently shot in the back with a shotgun by his brother-in-law while on a hunting excursion, he managed to overcome a 50 second deficit in the final time trial and beat the smug Frenchman, Laurent Fignon, by 58 seconds to capture the yellow jersey. It was a pretty remarkable achievement, and his 8 second margin of victory still stands as the closest race in Tour history.

But now I really just dislike this guy. You'd think the first American champion of the Tour de France would be the first person to defend his fellow countrymen. Instead, he's been pretty vocal about his disbelief that Lance Armstrong couldn't have won all seven of his Tour de France titles without the help of performance-enhancing drugs, despite multiple court cases and years of negative drug tests that demonstrate he was clean. And now he seems to be essentially convinced that Floyd Landis is guilty, even before the "B" sample results have been revealed, even before hearing Floyd's side of the story, and even before any sort of investigation. He's never had any hard evidence to prove any of his speculation. Just seems like someone who can't stand the fact that his historical achievements have been overshadowed by a new generation of American cyclists.

Gay...like happy

I was in Chicago last weekend with my mother-in-law, and it just so happened that the last day of the Gay Games were in town. I'm not sure my mother-in-law initially understood what this festival was when we happend to pass by the official Gay Games souvenir store after eating lunch.

She saw the sign on the door, thought about it for a minute, then asked, "That means gay, like happy, right?"

My wife replied, "No, that means gay...like, gay."

"Oh," says my mother-in-law. She then proceeded to walk to the door. "Well let's go in and check it out. I want to see what gay games look like," thinking this was some sort of homosexual game store selling gay-oriented boardgames, I guess. Unfortunately, they were closed, but a lesbian couple on the corner watching this whole conversation seemed to get a chuckle.

Ultimate Fighting for the MTV generation

I was flipping through channels a couple of nights ago and came across Final Fu, a show on MTV2 hosted by Ernie Reyes, Jr. pitting contestants from various forms of martial arts against each other in a Survivor-like game where the group is widdled down until they have an ultimate winner. Sort of like a tamer reality television version of Mortal Combat (it's even on a beach) except no points for decapitations and such.

As cool as the idea sounded, I found it about as interesting as watching one of Scootypuff jr.'s tae kwon do tournaments back in the day, no offense. The Korean guy in the picture above did a few flashy jump kicks and such that didn't amount to anything other than him losing his sparring match. Yeah, without any climactic crane kicks, nothing ever seems to be as exciting as The Karate Kid. ;-) The cheesy commentary and slick MTV style edits didn't help much, either. Nevertheless, it sounds like something Scootypuff should apply to compete in. $20K to the winner...

Throwing the Guantlet

To my fellow contributors and readers, I issue a challenge. It is a challenge of creativity and endurance. I challenge you to come up with a sentence that makes total sense that incorporates alliteration throughout. I will start with...

Wild Willy wonders why whistle worthy women would want warm weather winters. (12)

You must come up with a sentence that has more words than the last entry in the comments section. Remember that your sentence cannot be one of gibberish. It must make sense.

You can't be serious

So this whole story about a positive urine test from Floyd Landis after his epic Stage 17 comeback really bothers me. The fact that they still need the results of his "B" sample to officially rule him guilty of using performance-enhancing drugs shows that this story broke way too early. Even if his "B" sample ends up negative, this stigma of him possibly being a doper will always hang over his head, and that would be a shame considering the obstacles he had to overcome just to win the Tour de France this year.

And if his "B" sample is positive? Well, I'm still pretty skeptical. All kinds of things about this don't make sense:

1. After having a featured exclusive story revealing his battle with avascular necrosis of his hip in the New York Times, one of the most read sources of news in the world, Floyd would have to be an idiot to be riding on a cycle of the juice with all the limelight focused straight on the only American who showed any promise in winning the Tour.
2. They drug test at the end of every stage of the Tour de France--20! And only one came back positive for abnormally high testosterone levels? Maybe I don't know much about using steroids for sports, but I don't think one dose of testosterone on one day of the race alone gives any appreciable performance boost, so it's ludicrous to think he'd use it in this fashion.

This all leads me to believe that cycling is the dirtiest sport in the world, or that these drug tests are too sensitive and not very specific. Just when I thought this year's Tour had been salvaged, it gets all messy again.

Our brains are turning to mush

Monopoly is moving to debit cards. Not only will children learn how to become experts at swiping credit cards and living on virtual nonexistent money, they'll forget how to count!

Now if only I could pay my real mortgage with a credit card. Think of all the American Express Membership Rewards points I could rack up. Eh, with my luck they will implement such a payment system, but only take MasterCard or Visa...

HC? Physics!!

I seem to be reading a lot about urinals lately. First, an endorsement of home urinals by Barry Sonnenfeld in his monthly Esquire column. Then, this tidbit about advertising on (or actually in, I guess) urinals that not only shows you a flashy ad on the urinal filter, it talks to you, too. This led to a question I posed a couple of days ago about urinals and splashback, as it seems it's nearly impossible to prevent pee from splashing back onto your legs when using these contraptions for all those who pee standing up. Below is Wild Willie's solution to the problem followed by some extra thoughts about terminology:

Splashback is going to occur when urine is angled improperly into the urinal with too much force. As a matter of fact, force is your major enemy in this problematic situation, but we are not in our sixties where things seem to dribble out. Rather we are all still spry young men, and the force at which we urinate is still going to be a little too much. So to solve our problem, we need to decrease the angle at which the urine hits the urinal, thus in turn decreasing the perpindicular force vector into the urinal. Where this tends to be a problem is on the urinals that are much shorter and elevated off the ground. The way to solve this problem is similar to above. You must aim for a curved portion of the urinal. This involves adjusting yourself to the side a little so that your urine is hitting the urinal wall at two angles effectually creating a decrease in the x-axis force and the z-axis force. Decreasing these forces greatly reduces the amount of splashback. Of course these scenarios are only good for situations not involving the urinal cake, because if a urinal cake exists then follow [ScootyPuff Jr.'s] instructions.

Finally, while I like the name "splashback," I would like to create a new word to describe a situation where you purposefully create splashback to land on the guy next to you because you don't like him. This is called "peeback," because there is nothing like a little good peeback for the chode next to you. Just imagine the scenario ... You do what you can to scare the guy walking into the bathroom from approaching the adjacent urinal. Heck you even whip out your pirate talk to make him think you are a little crazy. "Arrrrgggghhh its cold schwabbin the urinals with mee pecker." Yet the chode decides to use the stall next to you at which time you say, "Arrrggghhhh, careful matey or you might be asking for some peeback."

The Power of Photoshop

The other day I stumbled upon a picture that as a Texas Longhorn fan scared me a little bit. It was a picture of the Oklahoma Landstealer, Adrian Peterson, looking rather buff after a workout as seen to the right.

As you can see this guy looks like he could run the ball wherever he chooses flicking defensive lineman and linebackers a side at will. My fear was well warranted considering he could do that for the most part anyway. And now with the added muscle, he was just going to wreak havoc on my beloved Texas Longhorns.

But then today, I come to find out that the picture has been photoshopped. After studying the picture a little (seen below), I must admit that whoever did the work did a fine job. This made me think back to one of Scootypuff Jr.’s statements a while back about Photoshop and its power.

Even as an amateur I have easily and quickly turned myself into James Bond flanked by two Bond girls. I will save the laughter of this for some other time. But I will leave you with this thought. Don’t ever believe what you see on the internet!

Elvis sighted in Paris

Floyd Landis keeps the American win streak alive, winning this year's Tour de France. This was one wacky race. Team tactics (or a lack thereof) seemed to have really shaped the outcome of this Tour. Not to downplay Floyd's phenomenal comeback with the underappreciated help of his Phonak squad, but I never would have guessed that two elite teams like CSC and T-Mobile could have had such poor judgement, letting him breakaway in the last day in the Alps to essentially steal the race back.

Team Discovery had a pretty lackluster Tour, which wasn't surprising considering they've never really established a replacement leader after Lance Armstrong retired. It looks like Lance hasn't been shy about wanting Floyd back on the team. He might have to do something about those Elvis shades, though...

The Mennonite Menace

So after Ivan Basso and Jan Ullrich were pulled out prior to this year's start for doping allegations, and with the retirement of Lance Armstrong, I thought this was going to be a rather dull Tour de France. Boy, was I wrong.

Now we've got Floyd Landis revealing he's had degenerative osteoarthritis since fracturing his hip many years ago, and has been racing with all sorts of pain from his bum hip this whole time. What is it with American cyclists and stories of pain and redemption? If that wasn't inspiring enough, he's now within 30 seconds off the lead. After a major bonk two days ago on La Toussuire and falling 8 minutes behind the current maillot jaune wearer, he managed to stage an attack riding solo for almost 120 km to make up all that time back. Unbelievable! Unless these odd problems that have plagued his last two time trial starts continue, he's a shoe-in now to win the entire Tour. Then again, as weird as this Tour de France has been, it's probably not so inconceivable that someone would launch an attack in Paris on the final race day that's normally pretty relaxed.

Heart attack on a plate

My trip to Colorado gave me the opportunity to pass through Kansas City, and more importantly, grab the finest barbeque on the planet--Arthur Bryant's! Their fries are pretty damn good, too, and an old magazine article posted on their wall describes the process they use to make them. It goes something like "1. Cut potatoes, 2. Blanch in lard for 4 minutes, 3. Let rest overnight, 4. Fry in lots more lard." LARD!! Well, my coronary arteries probably clogged off another millimeter or two after that meal.

This recent meal made me a bit worried that such classic foods could be become endangered and illegal after I heard about a proposal in Chicago to ban all trans fats from public restauraunts. Crazy...

Bear Sightings

So I was never aware of the growing bear problem in Vail until I saw a story about it in the Vail Daily newspaper. Soon after, my wife from her vantage point on our condo balcony was convinced she spotted a bear running across a ski run high on the mountain not far from where we had hiked earlier in the day. Next time, I'm packing bear spray.

But in more calm bear sightings, I went searching through downtown Denver on our way back home for one of the coolest pieces of public artwork I've seen in awhile. Standing 40 feet tall outside the Denver Convention Center, this big blue bear (or I See What You Mean) is apparently the result of an ongoing public works project where a small portion of local taxes go to fund art in public spaces around the city.

I'm just surprised that the bear didn't melt the day I took this picture--it was 102 degrees outside!

[Sports] This is a test

This is a test.

--
Posted by hslie to Sports at 7/07/2006 09:00:00 PM

What does it mean to "Microsoft" something?

It seemed it wasn't too long ago when the big worry was that Bill Gates and Microsoft were planning to take over the world. How times have changed. The richest man in the world is retiring soon to help SAVE the world, and Google is primed to take over the mantle of world domination. It seems that I use Google services everyday, from searching the internet, to my personal email account, and even to blog this post. "Google" was just officially added to the Merriam-Webster dictionary meaning: "to use the Google search engine to obtain information about (as a person) on the World Wide Web." With all the information I've probably inadvertently given over the internet, they could probably practically clone me soon!

Tainted Tour

I was really hoping this would be Jan Ullrich's year, but alas, yet another doping scandal has guaranteed the 2006 Tour de France will forever have an asterix next to it no matter who wins this race. I suppose it's quite possible that all these top cyclists have been doping (which would add more credance to the accusations against Lance Armstrong given he's handedly beaten all of them), but I'm beginning to wonder if there's just something inherently flawed about the testing methods being used these days. I'm still bewildered by the case of Tyler Hamilton, especially considering how vocal he's been about his innocence. It stands to reason that these highly sensitive tests for erythropoetin and autotransfusions could also have some degree of false negative results.

But, oh well. Let's see if some of the Americans that have been hidden in Lance's shadow will emerge with this opportunity. I'm hoping George Hincapie or Floyd Landis will step-up to the plate.