It seems others are interested in fancy toilets too!

Catching a blip on cnbc.com today made me curious. It seems that the former Merrill CEO, Thain, was ousted by Bank of America today. There aren't any reasons I know of that have been directly stated but it seems that he was a pretty extravagant spender. It has only been about a month since his firm was taken over by BofA and he decided to spend $1.22 million on his new office. After reading through the list of improvements I was struck with one line item. A commode on legs costing $35,115. I decided to find out what could be so nice about a commode on legs and a quick google search revealed the following option.

Its price tag was much lower than what Thain spent though. I can hear Firecracker George saying, "It better reach up and give you a massage for that price." Of course, I believe it might come out a little less polite than that.

No, this is not a joke...

There are moments when I love PETA.  This is typically when they're all about putting up ads of hot naked women with nothing but strategically placed veggies to cover up their naughty bits.  But most of the time I think they're a bit too radical and border on insane.  Case in point--their new campaign to rename fish as sea kittens:

Whoever was in charge of creating a positive image for fish needs to go right back to working on the Britney Spears account and leave our scaly little friends alone. You've done enough damage, buddy. We've got it from here. And we're going to start by retiring the old name for good. When your name can also be used as a verb that means driving a hook through your head, it's time for a serious image makeover. And who could possibly want to put a hook through a sea kitten?

Personally, I kind of hate cats, so this campaign actually probably has the opposite effect of what they're proposing.  

Now I'm hungry for sushi. 

The Clone Wars Animated Series

Last fall the Cartoon Network started a series on the Clone Wars. I am sure that everyone was aware of it, but I have been surprised that I haven't heard from anyone else in the gang that they are watching it. So ... I decided to put up a review about it.

Each episode is a short 30 minutes, which translates to about 22 minutes of actual show time. Star Wars the Clone Wars is set in between Episodes II and III as far as I can tell, and the shows are a much more thorough set-up to Episode III than the iconic scrolling words you find at the beginning of that movie.

You get much more exposure to other characters that you hoped for from the films. While I enjoyed the movies, I felt like they lacked significantly. There didn't seem to be the mysterious element found in Episodes IV and V. General Grevious had so much potential, but didn't really do it for me. In the series on TV, however, you get a deeper look into who Grevious was and is. I have only watched the first 10 episodes, and the last one was entitled Lair of Grevious which reveals some fascinating character history. This was the sort of thing I loved about Boba Fett and his Mandalorian armor. There was some character history there, but not enough to give you the whole story. Plus what was there often had to be read between lines. In the Lair of Grevious you get glimpses at statues of ancient warriors in battle. Each successive statue looks to be a transforming version of the previous one, and each one has similarities to what Grevious looks like. Interesting indeed. You also get to watch other Jedis in battle and on missions. Its like being a kid all over agian in the Star Wars universe.

Most of the episodes have been very enjoyable. They all start in a similar fashion to the movies. Instead of scrolling text to set up the current story, they start with a one line proverb of sorts. Then each episode reveals the truth behind the proverb. There are times where it is a little too hokey with the padawan learners or newly knighted masters still showing there immaturity. This really has been my biggest if not my only disappointment to the shows. I can't imagine that you would make it into the jedi fold with such undisciplined thoughts and actions, but maybe this is just the writers way of showing the jedi losing there ability.

I would highly recommend watching the series. In a strange sort of way it has given me some of that excitement I was missing from the movies. From what I understand you can watch episodes on the Cartoon Network. Let me know what you think.

Yaybia

After trying to figure out what the Tiddy Bear was (an "As Seen on TV" product that makes for a more comfortable seat belt), I came across this funny video. I kept laughing and I figured yall would laugh too. NSFW

All you need is four chords?

I guess balloon animals aren't even innocent anymore...

I guess this is sort of NSFW, but too hilarious not to share.  Be warned it involves balloon animals made out of Durex condoms and a lot of squeaking.

R.I.P. Ricardo Montalban...

In honor of perhaps one of the greatest villains of movie history, turn up the volume and click over here.

Watching this may either hurt your New Year's resolution or help it...

Given his family's penchant for relatively healthy eating, I'm guessing Fandango may have never eaten here when he was living in Arizona. I thought this video might make me hungry, but it actually made me a bit nauseous thinking about trying to eat their 8000 calorie quadruple bypass burger:


Watch CBS Videos Online

I guess all those fake crop circles threw off their navigation...

Either he's got ADHD or he's weak in the Force...

Personally, I'd just like to learn that Jedi power of suggestion, but I guess telekinesis could be cool, too. 

From USA Today:

The Force Trainer (expected to be priced at $90 to $100) comes with a headset that uses brain waves to allow players to manipulate a sphere within a clear 10-inch-tall training tower, analogous to Yoda and Luke Skywalker's abilities in the Star Wars films.

Porsches are not only fast, they're really sneaky...

So I was reading this blog post about how Porsche screwed the hedge fund market and unintentionally led one man to take his own life.  This is probably up Wild Willie's area of expertise, so I'll direct the question to him:  I know the financial market should be able to have some freedom in how it conducts it's business, but how is short-selling still a legal way of making money?  It just seems about the equivalent of a card counter in Vegas--essentially gambling with knowing a few insider things to give you an edge.  

Love is a battlefield...

Marraige, at times, feels like a war.  After the veil of newlywed bliss falls away, we gradually see our spouses in an exposing light that didn't seem to exist before.  Odd habits, mildly annoying mannerisms, character traits that you thought would magically change once you said your "I do's."  Eventually, this leads to conflicts, and in an argument where you know all of your "enemy's" secrets, the fight can get quite ugly.  When we overcome our natural instincts to protect our pride and insecurities, these conflicts can bring out the best of us.  But more often it draws out the basest feelings that hide in our soul. It's this sort of personal understanding that makes watching Revolutionary Road so painful.

In the original book the film was adapted from, Richard Yates succintly sums up the sheer ugliness of marital discord in describing a fight the main protaganists Frank and Alice Wheeler have in the opening chapter:

Then the fight went out of control. It quivered their arms and legs and wrenched their faces into shapes of hatred, it urged them harder and deeper into each other's weak points, showing them cunning ways around each other's strongholds and quick chances to switch tactics, feint, and strike again. In the space of a gasp for breath it sent their memories racing back over the years for weapons to rip the scabs off old wounds; it went on and on.

The entire movie feels something like this.  I felt myself almost wincing throughout just waiting for the whole disastrous relationship to finally fall apart.  It's like watching a race knowing the mechanic sabotaged the car, or like a horror movie except the terror comes from wondering what issues Frank and Alice are dealing with that will ring too true to real life and reflect something I've faced in my own marital life.

The Wheelers are portrayed as the perfect American couple.  Frank with his comfortable city desk job, Alice with her comfortable homemaker role, two cute children, perfect picture-window house--all a facade hiding a much more troubled pair who feel trapped in an ordinary world of suburban conformity.  The unfortunate thing is that they can't come to the honest conclusion that perhaps they aren't as extraordinary as they think they are.  And maybe they aren't as in love as they think they are.  Real life comes too quickly for them.  An accidental pregnancy forces them to marry early.  Practicality forces them to move out of the excitement of the city and into the suburbs.  Even when they finally decide to escape their mediocre life and move to Paris, reality still  seems to get in their way.  It's a universal obstacle we all face, coming to grips with the loss of the freedom and fun of married life before the realities of economics and responsibility set in.

The movie actually doesn't offer much in the way of redeeming qualities for either of the Wheelers, and it's a bit of clever casting, I think, that gets us to actually empathize with them.  After all, what love story do most of us know better than Kate and Leo from Titanic?  It's like we go into the theater already feeling like we know their backstory and all the romance that led up to their pairing.  All the better to get us watching so that it can all be torn apart.  Kate Winslet won the Golden Globe for her role last night as the wife coming to the realization that her life isn't what she wanted it to be, and I can understand why.  Even Leonardo DiCaprio, who has steadily improved his acting skills with each new movie he makes, comes out with a very believable interpretation of a guy with lofty words trying to hide a fear of inadequacy.  The adaptation as a whole seems to stay true to the source material, and Sam Mendes direction seems flawless.  

This is definitely not a movie to see if you're having major marital problems.  It paints a rather bleak picture about marraige, and gives us no glimmer of hope anything good that comes out of that bond.   I left Revolutionary Road feeling like I had seen perhaps one of the best movies of 2009, yet at the same time felt almost afraid to discuss much about it with my spouse afterwards because perhaps too much of it hit too close to home.  It's an ugly movie--and oddly I mean that in a very good way.

Swany's Top 10 Movies of 2008...

So this will be the third year in a row that the cinema has disappointed me.  Most of the movies that I thought would give me geeky glee (e.g. Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull, The X-Files: I Want to Believe) kind of fell flat, and it continues to be a long wait for that next masterpiece film that will be remembered for years and years to come.  That being said, there were some standout films that I enjoyed this year:

1. [Addendum] Slumdog Millionaire - When I initially put this list together, I hadn't seen this film.  Original plot, excellent score, moving romance, uplifting message.  Forget what I said about this being a horrible year for masterpiece films that I'll remember for years--this movie was wonderful.  It makes me wonder why people like Titanic so much when there's movies like this around that are so much better.
2. The Dark Knight - This has perhaps redefined what a comic-book movie can be.  Comic book geeks have always made the argument that certain comics and graphic novels could be considered great literature, and this film proves that they can be inspirations for great films.
   
3. Iron Man - Not only was this a spectacular film to watch, it was actually fun without being stupid.  This was almost on par with the great superhero movies like Superman, Spiderman, and The Dark Knight, except the final climactic battle was a bit of a letdown.
   
4. The Diving Bell and the Butterfly - The closest thing to art on film I've seen in awhile.  Very moving, and reminds us all not to take life for granted.
   
5. WALL*E - Another magical slamdunk from Pixar, and shows the power of the moving picture to evoke strong emotions without even needing dialogue.
   
6. There Will Be Blood - "I drink your milkshake!"  It's worth seeing again and again for Daniel Day-Lewis alone.
   
7. Definitely, Maybe - A sweet romantic comedy that didn't resort to the usual formula.
   
8. Body of Lies - Reinforces the impersonal nature the war on terror has become to most of us here in the United States, while it's a very personal and daily experience for those abroad in the Middle East.
   
9. In Bruges - Probably a movie you missed (and even one that I only saw because there wasn't anything else remotely interesting at the theaters at the time).  It's humorous, a little violent, and very entertaining--I highly recommending renting it.  
10. Tell No One - Everyone tries to emulate Hitchcock, but this actually got it right.  
    
11. The Reader - And not just because Kate Winslet is naked for half the film.  When you turn a blind eye to atrocities you know are happening, can you really claim innocence?  Some overriding questions that seem applicable not only to the Germans during World War II, but all of us who witness evil in the world and perhaps do nothing to stop it.

Potential movies that I didn't get a chance to see yet but might have cracked the Top 10:

Frost/Nixon

Slumdog Millionaire

The Wrestler

Worst movie (perhaps ever):  The Happening

Granted, I had just watched that SNL short "Mark Wahlberg Talks To Animals," and busted out laughing when Marky Mark uttered his first lines in the movie.  But when he starts actually talking TO A PLANT?!  

Biggest surprise:  Twilight

I wasn't dragged kicking and screaming to see this film, but I wasn't expecting much. Surprisingly, I thought the vampire angle was kind of clever for an abstinence/sex can wait message.

Biggest disappointment:  (Tie) Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull vs. Quantum of Solace vs. The Curious Case of Benjamin Button

Indiana Jones and James Bond are perhaps my favorite franchise film characters of all time.  I enjoyed both films, but neither seemed to live up to expectations.  In the case of Benjamin Button, it was a great looking film that was entertaining to watch, but never really moved me emotionally as much as I think it was trying to.  Whatever overriding message they were trying to convey was lost on me. 

What I'm looking forward to in 2009:

1. Watchmen - I watched a Japanese trailer on the internet recently, and was even more stoked.  Let's just hope 20th Century Fox doesn't muck it up and keep this from being released.
   
2. Star Trek - I'm so ready to come back to the Star Trek universe.
   
3. X-Men Origins: Wolverine - This will either be really good or really bad.  
   
4. Terminator Salvation - I'm usually not a big fan of these franchise sequels that I feel have run too long (I thought they should have stopped at Terminator 2), but truth be told, I think I sort of have a man-crush on Christian Bale.  Actually, I think my wife has a crush on the guy, too--is that weird?
   
5. Transformers: Revenge of the Fallen - Giant f@$&'in robots!
   
6. Nottingham - Ridley Scott, Russell Crowe, Robin Hood.  'Nuff said.
   
7. Public Enemies - Michael Mann, Christian Bale, Johnny Depp, John Dillinger.  'Nuff said, part 2.  Can anyone think of a Michael Mann movie that wasn't good?

So what do you think? Agree? Disagree?

The pen is mightier than the sword. The RED pen that is...

I thought this was from The Onion, at first.  At some point in time, I'm guessing the practice of even pointing out mistakes will become too psychologically damaging to a young child's development (which I think someone in this article almost inferred).  I was actually surprised this nonsense didn't originate from the U.S.  From The Daily Telegraph:

Marking in red ink banned in case it upsets schoolchildren
Hundreds of schools have banned their teachers from marking in red ink in case it upsets the children.

They are scrapping the traditional method of correcting work because they consider it "confrontational" and "threatening".

Pupils increasingly find that the ticks and crosses on their homework are in more soothing shades like green, blue, pink and yellow or even in pencil.

Traditionalists have condemned the ban sweeping classrooms as "absolutely barmy", "politically correct" and "trendy".

They insist that red ink makes it easier for children to spot errors and improve.

The red pen goes back further than most schools, having been developed during the mid-19th century when ammonia-based dyes became available.

But the opposition to using red ink is now a worldwide trend with recent guidelines to schools in Queensland, Australia warning that the colour can damage students psychologically.

Of course, if this theory was actually true, I figure I should have been one of the more confident students in our class given the fact that I was a pretty good student and had less red marks on my papers than most.  

Lego Artist: Yeah, this was probably the job I was supposed to have.

I can't say it any better than the article. Check it out here.

A New Years Gift for Everyone

I really liked JT's D@#$ in a Box video from a few years ago, and it was a running joke for about a month with everyone I knew. I am not quite sure this will take the same place in my near future, but this one is just about as funny.

Merry Christmas to the Kool Aid Gang

I hope you got what you wanted from your loved ones, because Santa might have some trouble getting your gifts to you.

It ain't easy being cheesy...

So here is the Periodic Table of Awesome. I was pleased to see that cheese, cheetahs, and Kool-Aid made the list. Alas, they left off Cheetos.

Is Christian Bale the new action hero?

I tend to think of Christian Bale as a serious dramatic actor for some reason, but when you think about his film resume, it's surprising that's he's been in so many action-oriented mainstream movies.  Batman Begins/The Dark Knight, 3:10 to Yuma, Reign of Fire, Equilibrium, and soon as John Conner in Terminator: Salvation.  It's like he's becoming a modern day Arnold Schwarzenegger or Sylvester Stallone, but with better acting skills.  Anywho, I thought making a Terminator 3 was a bit of overkill for the franchise, and wasn't thinking Terminator: Salvation would amount to much more (especially given that it's directed by McG), but this trailer looks pretty awesome:

The Cult of Apple...

My Blackberry Pearl is on its last legs.  The speaker is giving me garbled up sound, the battery cover is falling off, and the memory is maxed out to the point that I can't even hang up on a call most of the time unless I pull the battery out.  If you know anyone who's owned a Blackberry, they're kind of addicting and it's no surprise that a Crackberry cult exists.  Even Barack Obama is trying to figure out how he can still keep his Blackberry when he is sworn in as President.  Of course, like anyone who's seen an iPhone, I've always had a bit of envy, and now I'm thinking about changing my allegiance to the iPhone cult.  My only concern is that I'll become one of these Mapple followers from a recent episode of The Simpsons.  Scary:

Let's go Tigers!

I guess you've got to give Graham Harrell credit.  Despite playing most of the game without his favorite receiver and with a shattered hand, he still eeked out a win for the Red Raiders.  I can't say I really expected the Baylor Bears to pull off the upset, though.  And because of the Tech win, oddly enough, we all had to root for yet another Landstealer win yesterday.  Now I don't ever wish injury to anyone, but I kind of have to find some hope in the fact that Sam Bradford won't be 100% going into the Big 12 championship game.  Would an OU loss be enough to push Texas back up the BCS poll just enough for a trip to Miami?  

I'm still sickened by all this Sooner support I've had to muster over the past two weeks.  I'm much more comfortable cheering for the Missouri Tigers.  What a relief!

GO MIZZOU!!

James Bond vs. Vampires...

Over the past couple of weeks, I've managed to catch two of the most anticipated movies of the fall, the latest 007 film Quantum of Solace and the movie adaptation of the teen sensation book Twilight.  I was a bit surprised by my reactions to each.

First up, Quantum of Solace.  After Daniel Craig's first stint as James Bond in Casino Royale, I was pleased to see that the franchise had gotten a fresh reboot into something that was a bit less preposterous than what the Pierce Brosnan movies were escalating into and before they got to the absurd realm of the later Roger Moore films.  Bond was still a debonaire spy who looked good in a tux and was still quite smooth with the ladies.  Yet, this iteration of Bond was not indestructable.  He could screw up.  He could bleed.  He could be tortured.  And he could even love.  

Quantum of Solace seems to pick up with that notion, by opening up with it's first scene as a continuation of Casino Royale.  Literally moments after the last scene of Casino Royale, Bond is in quite an exhilarating car chase scene through the cliffside roads of Italy.  This will later be followed by just about every chase sequence possible--on foot, in a boat, on a plane.  Lots of action sequences, just like any good Bond film.  So far, so good.  The problem is that the action doesn't seem to flow very well, and the pay off at the end of most of these scenes isn't satisfying.  Marc Forster, known more for his dramatic films, lends a bit of artistry to the action by using unusual angles and lots of montages.  A foot chase underground is intercut with a horse race going on right above them.  A shootout is mixed with scenes from Puccini's Tosca being performed in the auditorium nearby.  I actually liked what he was doing with this, except he goes a completely different direction with the rest of the action sequences, filming them in the standard flow of action way we're all used to, which seems to give the whole movie a bit of a disjointed feel.  

There are flashes of classic Bond goodness.  Daniel Craig still fits the role well, despite his non-classic looks for Ian Fleming's ultimate British agent.  We get just a peek of his usual playfulness during a hotel changing sequence with a female British agent sent to bring Bond back to England ("Fields.  Just Fields."--although pay attention to the credits, her name is Strawberry Fields, and probably the only playful name we usually come to expect in Bond movies).  There's even a nice touch involving her that harkens back to a famous scene from Goldfinger--a nice sort of Easter egg for all the devout Bond fans out there that's almost as cool as the scene in Casino Royale that explains how Bond got his Aston Martin DB5.  We get a glimpse of the ongoing friendship between him and his CIA contact Felix Lighter.  And his relationship with M is also developed well.  

Even the way the ended the film was quite clever when you look at it as if Casino Royale was the beginning of the story.  The final scenes of Quantum of Solace are very reminiscent of how Bond waited in the shadows on a snowy day that started the previous film.  And they even save the classic walk of 007 across the screen before he shoots directly at the camera for the end of Quantum as if to say that this segment, in combination with Casino Royale, is finally over.

But in the end, it's just not enough.  Why?  Because the villain wasn't scary.  At all.  He didn't even have any scary henchmen.  And his diabolical plan?  It involves controlling Bolivia.  Bolivia!  No offense to Bolivians, but who cares about Bolivia?  Granted Le Chiffre wasn't all that scary either, but at least you got a twinge of fear when he was literally busting Bond's balls in that torture scene.

Finally, the worst offense?  No, not the theme song (although that was a disaster).  The worst offense is that Bond doesn't bed the Bond girl at the end.  That just seems like blasphemy.  I mean, come on.  They were stranded in a chasm in the earth in the middle of nowhere.  He couldn't pass the time like he usually does when a beautiful woman is around?  I know this is going to sound completely sexist, but what is the Bond girl for?  

All in all, Quantum of Solace was a bit of a let down.  It closes out the events of Casino Royale well, I guess, and lays the ground work for a sinister group of evil to fight in future films, but it just doesn't quite deliver as a film all its own.  As the usual words at the end of the credits say, "James Bond will return," and I hope its with a bit more of the classic ingredients put back into the formula. 

In contrast, I found Twilight a bit of a surprise.  Usually I wouldn't have had much interest in this movie.  Lemon, however, picked up this book on a whim awhile back and has been reading the entire series ravenously since then.  As all fans of this series (which apparently is some phenomenon with teen girls that almost rivals the Harry Potter craze with younger kids), I was "forced" to watch with my wife.  Based on the first book of a series by Stephenie Meyer, Twilight introduces us to Bella Swan, a teenage girl who moves from Phoenix, Arizona to the small town of Forks, Washington to live with her father while her mother and her boyfriend travel the country.  Her adjustment as the new kid in school seems to go relatively well until she seems to spark the obvious disgust of Edward Cullen.  Of course, the outward nausea he seems to exude towards her at first really is essentially love at first sight mixed in with a bit of hunger, as Edward is actually part of a family of local vampires.  

This is a no doubt a teen chick flick, complete with longing gazes into each others eyes and some sappy dialogue.  There was even one particular scene that looked like something out of a cheesy John Tesh music video and that I might put up there on the "roll your eyes" kind of scale as the obligatory chick flick sing-along-scene (which, thankfully, this movie did not have).  The romance itself, central to the entire series, isn't even developed all that well.  Yet for some reason, it all just seemed to work for me.  Perhaps I'm intrigued by the whole vampire angle.  Edward belongs to a vampire family that are strict "vegeterians" as they only feed on the blood of wild animals and not humans.  Running around are a group of more traditional blood-suckers who will feast on their human prey at will and eventually come to spoil all the love and harmony.  Maybe it's the hint of future things to come.  The Cullen family had apparently made a pact long ago with the Native Americans in the area who descend from a wolf-respecting tribe--can you say vampire vs. werewolf throwdown in the future sequels?

But in the end, I was just kind of impressed by the whole abstinence message this movie seemed to convey.  The typical teen drama seems to portray love at first sight and true love as something that can only be visualized by sexual intercourse, and never seems to emphasize the importance of waiting.  What a better metaphor than a male teenager with hormonal urges who has to control himself before literally devouring his girlfriend, and a girlfriend that needs to figure out how to slowdown her own impulses to give up her entire life strictly on her feelings of first love?  In a pop culture world where I think sex is thrown around way too easily for eye candy and quick stimulation, it was nice to see a story treat it as something special to wait for.

So there you go.  Two movies.  One a bit of a disappointment.  One a bit of a surprise.  Oddly enough, I didn't like one because it wasn't naughty enough, and I liked the other because it wasn't really that naughty at all.  In the end, though, I give them about the same rating.

Be careful what you wish for...

As every Texas fan Saturday night, I made a deal with the devil and wished for a Sooner win over the Red Raiders.  Alas, as I washed my mouth out with soap the following day, I find the aftermath that the Sooners brought forth with their total domination of Texas Tech.  OU leapfrogs over Texas in both the AP, Harris, and Coaches' polls, and only a hair under Texas in the BCS rankings? With just one week left, there's only a thin shred of hope that the Longhorns will come out on top of the Big 12 South in hopes of competing for what should be a BCS National Championship berth.   I don't have confidence that even Mack Brown could lobby the voters to get Texas back on top, and I fear the devil would own my soul if I asked for too much, such as both Tech and Oklahoma losing next week.  But maybe just Tech?  

Man, to think that the destiny of this years UT football squad could have been determined on one touchdown score at the last second of a game.  I just may be crying by the end of this season--I'm just not sure if it'll be tears of loss or tears of joy.

Return of the Trekkies (or is that Trekkers?)

Anyone catch the trailer for the new Star Trek movie coming out next summer?  I've always thought Star Trek had the potential to overcome its nerdy reputation as a franchise only loved by supergeeks.  Then again, I think I'm still in denial as to how much of a dork I am.  Anywho, in this day and age when nerdy and geeky has become hip and cool, perhaps this is the perfect time for a Star Trek resurgence:

Enough Said!

How to kill a bull...

The global financial market has gotten way to complicated for me too understand. Granted, I didn't major in economics in college, but I still consider myself a relatively intelligent guy who should be able to sort of get some semblance of how Wall Street works. This scares me given the fact that we all rely on financial investments to insure we aren't living in a tent eating Spaghettios for dinner when we retire, especially with the gloom and doom reports that I hear on the news everyday.

It used to be, that this didn't worry me so much. Heck, I'm no Warren Buffet genius, so I figured, it's best to leave the mental work of the market to the experts. But as I think about it more, I have to wonder where this unearned confidence in the investment community ever came from. I used to recall a banner in the commons at some college once that said something to the effect of, "Want a BMW when you grow up? Get an MBA."  This was the kind of people they were recruiting into business school.  Not anyone with a social consience, just guys whose goal in life was to make lots and lots of money.  Now typically there is the occassional wiz kid that really wants to understand  economic theory, but I always got the feeling that most of the guys going into finance and business weren't always the brightest guys in the world.  I had this stereotypical image that the smartest students became engineers, doctors, scientists, and maybe even lawyers while the others were a bunch of frat boys just extending their party to Wall Street, with some bullshitting their way to the very top.  So instead of the best and the brightest in the world overseeing essentially our future livelihood, we've got clueless guys playing a game of high stakes poker and making poor bets with our money.  Based on this article by Michael Lewis about what led to the current economic collapse, maybe I wasn't so far off:

Here's where financial technology became suddenly, urgently relevant. The typical mortgage bond was still structured in much the same way it had been when I worked at Salomon Brothers. The loans went into a trust that was designed to pay off its investors not all at once but according to their rankings. The investors in the top tranche, rated AAA, received the first payment from the trust and, because their investment was the least risky, received the lowest interest rate on their money. The investors who held the trusts' BBB tranche got the last payments—and bore the brunt of the first defaults. Because they were taking the most risk, they received the highest return. Eisman wanted to bet that some subprime borrowers would default, causing the trust to suffer losses. The way to express this view was to short the BBB tranche. The trouble was that the BBB tranche was only a tiny slice of the deal.

But the scarcity of truly crappy subprime-mortgage bonds no longer mattered. The big Wall Street firms had just made it possible to short even the tiniest and most obscure subprime-mortgage-backed bond by creating, in effect, a market of side bets. Instead of shorting the actual BBB bond, you could now enter into an agreement for a credit-default swap with Deutsche Bank or Goldman Sachs. It cost money to make this side bet, but nothing like what it cost to short the stocks, and the upside was far greater.

The arrangement bore the same relation to actual finance as fantasy football bears to the N.F.L. Eisman was perplexed in particular about why Wall Street firms would be to and asking him to sell short. "What Lippman did, to his credit, was he came around several times to me and said, 'Short this market,' " Eisman says. "In my entire life, I never saw a sell-side guy come in and say, 'Short my market.' "

And short Eisman did—then he tried to get his mind around what he'd just done so he could do it better. He'd call over to a big firm and ask for a list of mortgage bonds from all over the country. The juiciest shorts—the bonds ultimately backed by the mortgages most likely to default—had several characteristics. They'd be in what Wall Street people were now calling the sand states: Arizona, California, Florida, Nevada. The loans would have been made by one of the more dubious mortgage lenders; Long Beach Financial, wholly owned by Washington Mutual, was a great example. Long Beach Financial was moving money out the door as fast as it could, few questions asked, in loans built to self-destruct. It specialized in asking home owners with bad credit and no proof of income to put no money down and defer interest payments for as long as possible. In Bakersfield, California, a Mexican strawberry picker with an income of $14,000 and no English was lent every penny he needed to buy a house for $720,000.

More generally, the subprime market tapped a tranche of the American public that did not typically have anything to do with Wall Street. Lenders were making loans to people who, based on their credit ratings, were less creditworthy than 71 percent of the population. Eisman knew some of these people. One day, his housekeeper, a South American woman, told him that she was planning to buy a townhouse in Queens. "The price was absurd, and they were giving her a low-down-payment option-ARM," says Eisman, who talked her into taking out a conventional fixed-rate mortgage. Next, the baby nurse he'd hired back in 1997 to take care of his newborn twin daughters phoned him. "She was this lovely woman from Jamaica," he says. "One day she calls me and says she and her sister own five townhouses in Queens. I said, 'How did that happen?' " It happened because after they bought the first one and its value rose, the lenders came and suggested they refinance and take out $250,000, which they used to buy another one. Then the price of that one rose too, and they repeated the experiment. "By the time they were done," Eisman says, "they owned five of them, the market was falling, and they couldn't make any of the payments."

The entire article is a bit of a lengthy read, but kind of fascinating to see exactly how either clueless or evil these guys are.  Maybe that's where the symbol of the bull for a growing market came from--it's all just based on bullshit.

Comic book geeks have no excuses anymore...

Much has been said about the historic victory Barack Obama achieved with his presidential election and it's effect on minority achievement.  I think I heard Will Smith say something on Oprah the other day that from his point of view, African-Americans now have no excuses not to strive for greatness.  I find this reassuring for my own future kids.  And now, I'm even more encouraged by the fact that Obama has raised the bar for another group of stereotyped underachievers--comic book aficionados.  What's the first thing mentioned on "the 50 facts you might not know" about Barack Obama?

He collects Spider-Man and Conan the Barbarian comics.

Heck, if the President of the United States and the leader of the free world can read comic books, well, so can I.

And a part of me dreams that Chuck Norris from The Delta Force aka Major Scott McCoy was part of at least one of these missions...

I was reading this article in The New York Times about an order signed by then Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld secretly authorizing the military to go into a number of foreign countries we weren't actually at war with to hunt down Al Qaeda targets:

The United States military since 2004 has used broad, secret authority to carry out nearly a dozen previously undisclosed attacks against Al Qaeda and other militants in Syria, Pakistan and elsewhere, according to senior American officials.

These military raids, typically carried out by Special Operations forces, were authorized by a classified order that Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld signed in the spring of 2004 with the approval of President Bush, the officials said. The secret order gave the military new authority to attack the Qaeda terrorist network anywhere in the world, and a more sweeping mandate to conduct operations in countries not at war with the United States.

In 2006, for example, a Navy Seal team raided a suspected militants’ compound in the Bajaur region of Pakistan, according to a former top official of the Central Intelligence Agency. Officials watched the entire mission — captured by the video camera of a remotely piloted Predator aircraft — in real time in the C.I.A.’s Counterterrorist Center at the agency’s headquarters in Virginia 7,000 miles away.

I'm still deciding whether I think this is a good or bad idea.  I'm not sure anyone really knows how we're supposed to conduct this war on terrorism, but a part of me thinks you have to hit targets when the opportunity arises and not become Boss Hogg chasing after the Duke brothers having to stop at the county line when the General Lee makes that jump over the river.  But that's just my first impression.  Regardless, this directive sounds like something straight out of the movies.  

John Williams is the man...

Yeah, yeah.  This is kind of nerdy.  Lemon has been giving me the eye as I've watched this video like, "OMG.  My husband is a dork."  That's OK, 'cause I think it's pretty cool:

Change is good...

As I celebrate with the rest of the country on this night, I'm struck by the fact that the truly historic nature of tonight still hasn't hit me.  Although I was born and raised in the United States, I've still grown up as a minority in this country and in some subtle ways have had to deal with the hurdles that entails.  Now, my struggles are in some respects pretty minor compared to other minority groups (and even some in my own minority group).  I haven't had to deal with too much blatant racism, low expectations, or hidden mistrust based solely on the color of my skin.  Still, there have always been subtle reminders growing up that I'm not white.  My entire life, I've tried to shrug off such things.  Much of this is a result of the environment I grew up in, essentially separated from minority groups of my own kind.  Perhaps some of it, too, was my defense mechanism to try and fit in.  But I like to believe that some of it was my way of trying to prove something I've always believed--we're all equal Americans in this country, and the minute I start making categories for anybody is the minute I've become a racist myself.  

I've prided myself in the thought that I had the potential to achieve anything my own intellectual and physical abilities were capable of, and I tried not to see my race as a barrier to my potential.  Yet reminders of the state of this country and the ignorance that still exists becomes more apparent to me day by day.  But as we celebrate the election of our 44th President of the United States, I again see hope that what I grew up believing is truly achievable.  And I'm proud of the fact that perhaps the majority of people that voted for our next President didn't support him to make some sort of statement about race.  They did it because they were truly moved by his words, ideals, judgement, and leadership.  

Thank you, Barack Obama, for reaffirming my belief in the American dream.  You've truly inspired all of us to believe that "Yes we can."

Rants and Raves

Since when did I begin to care so much about politics? It is not so much the outcome of what is unfolding tonight in terms of the election, but how I believe that it unfolded.

It began for me by looking at the election results for my county, and seeing that there is only one contested Republican that won. This does not bother me, what bothers me though is that almost all of the winners won by an amount that is almost completely identical with the number of straight party ticket votes.

I have heard many educated people talk about there being some qualification other than age for voting. Examples include, a certain level of education attained, a certain level of income, or even holding voting to happen on one day. I don't agree with the examples listed, but I do feel like every citizen should do his or her civic DUTY to research the candidates.

Allowing an option for a straight ticket vote only enables an absent civic duty. This goes for both Republican and Democratic parties. I believe that not only should this not be an option when voting, but that there should also not be any party affiliation of one individual listed on the ballot. I believe that then you would end up with people voting the way they do for judges - either blindly or with a well prepared civic duty.

I performed my civic duty before voting. I ended up voting not only for Republicans and Democrats, but I even voted for the Libertarian candidate for some seats. Maybe it is because I have become a parent and this sort of stuff crosses my mind now, but I am going to make sure that my children see the value in civic duty.

[Update: Obama has been announced as our next President. I do look forward to his Presidency, and I hope that the idea of change he has spoken of can happen.]

I don't know about Lando, but Chewbacca definitely has my vote...

On the eve of the Presidential election, here's something to lighten up the mood a bit.  And let's all break out the Colt 45 tomorrow night for whomever ends up being our next President:

See more funny videos at Funny or Die

By the way, is that the Washington D.C. subway tunnel in the background that's standing in for some Star Wars locale?

There may be hope for this country yet...

Check out this short video from the BBC.  I say there's hope not because this guy is supporting Obama, but because he's looking beyond race and color to vote for the candidate he feels will do the best job in leading this country.  I'm a bit embarrased and ashamed to admit that I probably would have grouped him into the stereotypical redneck category upon first glance.  I may never automatically make fun of anyone wearing a NASCAR hat again.

I think watching Texas this year has taken at least a few years off my life expectancy...

(AP Photo/LM Otero)

Can you believe how close this game was? Crazy that you can chalk up the loss to every part of the Longhorns team. An ice cold start to the offense in the first half, bad special teams play on the last kick off, a horrible defensive effort on the last drive to lose the game--ugh. Maybe I don't give the Red Raiders enough credit, but I think Texas really had the skills to win this game and it's too bad they didn't bring their "A-game" to key parts of this.  

So the three way tie scenario in the Big 12 South is one step closer to reality. I've been worried that the conference was going to beat each other up to the point that no one from the Big 12 gets to the National Championship game. Maybe I'm getting ahead of myself, but one could realistically predict OU beating Tech and winning over OSU, creating a tie between the Longhorns, Sooners, and Red Raiders. I'm not sure what the rules say about how you break this--anyone know?

And if Colin Powell's endorsement wasn't enough...

I give you the great Stephen Colbert!

Happy Halloween!

I figure some of the Gang will think this is funny, but my guess is that Firecracker George will find it to be in bad taste.

I can't believe who's in the news these days...

Actually, I don't really know who he's decided to vote or not vote for:

I miss the days when MTV actually showed music on TV...

Back in the day when I was kid that watched endless hours of TV yet had no cable to feed my addiction, I had to resort to watching Friday Night Videos on NBC to keep up with the latest and greatest music videos of the moment. This meant I probably missed seeing a video every so oftent and maybe that's why I never realized that Toto was kind of a dorky looking band. Anywho, now MTV MUSIC has posted a number of classics and new releases on the Internet so I can catch up with all the cheesy 80's videos I missed.

Toto |MTV Music

Damn, I forgot to write-in Brad Esposito...

So I early voted today. What does that mean? I don't have to read or listen to any of the political rhetoric until 2009 when the next President is sworn into office! WOOHOO!

I'm not sure I like these electronic voting booths, though. I don't think you can even call it a booth. Just a little screen with a six inch divider on either side. I'm pretty sure I could have seen who the woman next to me was voting for if I looked over. What ever happened to the full privacy booths with currents and such? I miss my hanging chads!

It's Time We Put a Kitten in the White House.

I think it's high time we gave voting rights to stem cells, and dismantled our military completely. Frank Tambenili will ruin this country. Brad Esposito all the way.

Check out both candidates here.

The 80's will never go away...

Is it just me or does this new song "Human" from The Killers sound kind of like something that could have been on the radio 15 years or so ago? Nothing wrong with that. I kind of like this tune even though I haven't quite figured out what the lyrics mean:

Man, I've missed this guy...

F yeah!

Damn liberal media...

I figure Wander might have an interest in this op-ed piece from one of his favorite authors (I think--maybe I'm remembering wrong), Orson Scott Card. Apparently, he writes a column for a paper up in Wild Willie's neck of the woods and had a few choice words to say about the journalist coverage of this whole financial meltdown and takes a different angle than what I was expecting before I started reading this:

This housing crisis didn't come out of nowhere. It was not a vague emanation of the evil Bush administration.

It was a direct result of the political decision, back in the late 1990s, to loosen the rules of lending so that home loans would be more accessible to poor people. Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac were authorized to approve risky loans.

What is a risky loan? It's a loan that the recipient is likely not to be able to repay.

The goal of this rule change was to help the poor — which especially would help members of minority groups. But how does it help these people to give them a loan that they can't repay? They get into a house, yes, but when they can't make the payments, they lose the house — along with their credit rating.

They end up worse off than before.

This was completely foreseeable and in fact many people did foresee it. One political party, in Congress and in the executive branch, tried repeatedly to tighten up the rules. The other party blocked every such attempt and tried to loosen them.

Just goes to show you that no one's hands are clean in this mess.

Say "hi" to your mother for me...

As Wild Willie mentioned on a comment post, last weekend's SNL had some winners, including a couple of guest appearances by Sarah Palin and this cameo by Marky Mark:

You guys would be so proud of me.

My brother needed someone to go to the Texans game yesterday, so he gave me a call. Everyone knows how much I like watching sports, but Hermano de Pertardo Jorge figured I might like it. I also thought that I might, and even if I didn't it would be good to hang out with my brother.

But as it turns out it was fun watching the game (mainly because Houston beat Detroit 28-21). It was also cool just watching and talking with the fans. The scenery was excellent as well; there were of course the cheerleaders (whose teeny tiny shorts and Wonder-Woman boots were about to give me a heart attack), but even just walking around the stadium was good for the circulation.

Anywho, I think I'm actually interested enough in watching the game next week, or at least finding out what the score is.

Vince who?

AP Photo/Eric Gay

C'mon.  Admit it.  You were surprised at how lopsided last night was. Heck, I was amazed at some of the passes Colt McCoy was threading into his receivers. And the Texas defense actually looking dominant? Muschamp must be a defensive coordinating genius.

And now, of course, the top ranking in the initial BCS poll of the season.  I don't know about you, but I'm kind of scared. I'm just waiting for the wheels to fall of this thing. 

Boy, I hope I'm wrong.

Not that you really needed another reason to vote Obama...

I've always admired Colin Powell and I've told Lemon repeatedly if he ever even considered running for President, I'd fill out my ballot and give him my vote right on the spot.  He always appears very calm, intelligent, and nonpartisan in any of his appearances and seems to look at things in a very thoughtful, logical manner. His argument before the United Nations that was instrumental in our invasion of Iraq will forever be a black mark on his career, but I still give the guy credit for admitting he was wrong.  That's what I call honorable.

Of course, Powell has said he has no ambition for the highest office in the land, but I still like to listen to his opinion as to who he's voting for come November:



I think political historians will look back on McCain's campaign in a pretty negative light. The whole "lipstick on a pig" crap they were trying to hype up was just the beginning. Since then, his campaign has sunk lower and lower into the mud. I used to think McCain was a pretty honorable man himself, but there's only so much your military career history can stretch to give you a pass. In just a few months, he's gone from someone I admired in the Republican Party to one that's joined the worst of them. He's been saying in all his stump speeches and debate rhetoric that he and his fellow congressmen were "elected into office to change government, and instead it changed us." It's sad that he let the far right change him in this way. Sure, you have to get elected first to get into office before you can change anything, but this negative strategy is not what America wanted or needed right now, and certainly it's not what he needed to get elected.  Some have said that McCain's presidential aspirations will be looked on in a tragic light as a man whose ambitions were squashed twice by George W. Bush. The first being the 2000 Republican primaries and the second being Bush's abysmmal approval ratings making it difficult for any Republican candidate to get elected. Unfortunately, I don't think McCain can blame W. on this one--he'll lose this one all by himself.

The Final Debate

Just in case you missed the final debat last week, the SNL Thursday night primetime special pretty much nailed how it went.

Hey Pimp, I need shoe help.

Work doesn't let me access my webmail (the bastards) and I don't feel like typing this with my thumbs, so I'm entering my plea here. Swany, I need new shoes - something pimptastic that I can wear with nice jeans. I'd like to avoid something so metro it borders on homo (i.e. no roach killers), and I'm looking for something that I don't see on ever other pair of feet when I go out. Any suggestions? CAN YOU HELP A BROTHER OUT?

If you can't, I may just have to get Crocs.

Actually, I've been kicking around (tee hee) the idea of braving black and white wing tips for about 15 years now, but I've always been too chicken. Maybe it's time to set a new trend.

It's been a long time since I was excited about Star Trek...

Here are a couple of pics from J.J. Abrams' version of the early years of Star Trek that doesn't come out till May 2009. I was wondering how Karl Urban would work as Dr. McCoy, but damn if he doesn't look kind of like Bones.

I'm disappointed, though, that I see no Felicity alums nor any evidence that Greg Grunberg will make a cameo in this film.  Maybe J.J. has finally cut the cord.  More links to other pics here.

I'm sure the regular TV watchers have seen this...

... but it's a new one for me.

Although, associating C-3PO for C and Luke for L probably would have made more intuitive sense...

Well, I figure Wild Willie may be thinking about ways to make teaching his kid the ABC's in a fun way without having to watch endless hours of Sesame Street, so I found the perfect solution--STAR WARS ABC FLASHCARDS!

Every so often, I kind of fear for my life...

I don't mind people criticizing a candidate's experience, policies, or overall character, but it's so depressing (and a bit maddening) to see Americans who still have such a narrow-minded and racist view of their fellow citizens here in the United States.  I'm actually almost worried about a second Civil War if Obama is elected in November based on the almost hatred these people have for the guy.  

To be fair, if you had a Republican blogger going to a Democratic rally and pulling a "Michael Moore" kind of interview like this, I'm sure Obama supporters would have some critical things to say about McCain and Palin that may look a bit fanatical.  Still, their rants would probably have something grounded in things that they did or did not do.  It would have nothing to do with what their ethnic background was nor with what their name sounds like.  

This video is downright disgusting.  I'd almost classify it as NSFW because it'll just leave you in a foul mood for the rest of the workday.  Be sure your desk is free of things to throw at your monitor before viewing:

It's around 1:30 PM on a Sunday, and guess what?

To think I was expecting this to be sort of a rebuilding year for the 'Horns.  The legend of Colt McCoy will undoubtedly grow after yesterday's win over OU, but I was encouraged to see everyone on the UT squad step-up their game.  That was a pretty impressive team effort.  Who knows how the rest of the season will go--based on the upset win by Oklahoma State over Mizzou last night, it looks like the Big 12 may just beat each other up and right out of a place in the national championship game.  

But lets not think about the future, for now, and savor what was yesterday's awesome Red River Shootout! Hook 'em!

Addendum:  You know, this was almost turning out to be a great weekend.  Texas won and was vaulted into the top spot in the latest college football polls, I saw a relatively good movie (Body of Lies), I filled up on Costco gas at only $2.83/gallon, I had a really good waffle for brunch today.  Then the Cowboys lost...to Ari-freakin'-zona!  And then I had to watch the video from the post above.  Dammit!  

It's all funny money...

Random thought I had as I was reading about how every financial market around the world is tanking:  If stocks are dropping so precipitously everywhere, where is all this money going?  It seems that if there was all this "value" in the stock market, that somehow means that actual cash is somehow being redistributed.  If the stock market is falling, shouldn't that financial worth be making someone rich?

I don't know if I'm making any sense at all, but the bottom line is that it shows you just how imaginary all of this money is we're talking about.  I think we should do what Fandango proposed many years ago--let's go back to the barter system!

That's just plain depressing...

A random YouTube encounter.

This was pretty fricken' hilarious.

Last week's SNL was actually kind of funny...

Maybe it's because it's damn late or maybe it's because Andy Samberg sounds exactly like him, but I thought this was hilarious:

Not to worry, I think this is safe enough to watch at work...

Here's the first episode of a new series of shorts called PG Porn:

Nailing Your Wife | Girls | SPIKE.com

Penguin Dreams and Stranger Things

Berkeley Breathed is putting his penguin on ice. The 51-year-old cartoonist said he will pull the plug on his comic-strip career and “Opus” after Nov. 2.

In an e-mail to the Los Angeles Times, the 51-year-old Breathed wrote, “30 years of cartooning to end. I’m destroying the village to save it. Opus would inevitably become a ranting mouthpiece in the coming wicked days, and I respect the other parts of him too much to see that happen. The Michael Moore part of me would kill the part of him that was important to his fans.”

Sad, but at least Opus stopped before I did. I have basically been taken to pacing around the house in my underwear, muttering to myself about the entire collapse of the United States. Some hard changes need to occur in this country and nobody is prepared to make them. Mutter, mutter, mutter...

And this is why I wouldn't do well in the movie business...

According to Box Office Mojo, Speed Racer has pulled in a little over $93 million worldwide since its release back in May. Considering this was supposed to be a major summer blockbuster and the fact that it cost $120 million to make, that adds up to a definable flop. Critics seemed to hate it, too, which probably didn't help its abysmal numbers.  

I mention all this because I'm a bit perplexed as to why it did so poorly after watching it on DVD last night.  I happened to miss out watching it on the big screen only because Lemon had no interest in seeing it, and I never found an opportunity to sneak off to the theater to see it alone.  After finishing it, though, I was disappointed that I hadn't seen it on the big screen.  The visuals are amazing!  It was like tripping on acid without the acid.  I imagine this is what they were going for when they tried to bring Dick Tracy to the movies.  It was truly a live action cartoon.  

Sure, the physics were preposterous.  Sure, the script wasn't the most intricate thing ever.  Sure, other family-friendly cartoons like any of the Pixar movies probably have more heart and soul.  It was fun to watch nonetheless, and I felt was a pretty entertaining movie.  

So why did it do so horribly bad?  Is there something I missed?  Granted, this endorsement is coming from a guy that still enjoys Joe Versus the Volcano whenever it's randomly showing on TV late night, but still, the special effects of this movie alone should have gotten it to at least break even in it's box office sales.  Even some stinker sci-fi movies from Paul W.S. Anderson did better--that's kind of insulting.

In response to Swany's last post.

I saw this a few months ago on my favorite way to goof off at work, the Onion.

At first I laugh at it, then it makes me a little nervous. 2000 already demonstrated that who receives the most popular votes is moot.


Diebold Accidentally Leaks Results Of 2008 Election Early

Perhaps the only way McCain is going to pull off a win this November...

Something tells me Wander doesn't think such a diabolical ploy is really all that preposterous:

Where did the last hour go?

I can't remember if I posted this before, but if you need some procrastination tools, here's a game that's highly addictive.