Funny as hell!

This is an absolute hilarious mix of "Peanuts" and "Scrubs"...

Was Gordon Gekko* Right?

Christmas is fast approaching, and that can mean only one thing… do you know what that one thing is?

Peace?

Love?

Happiness?

No…

It’s greed.

The children, and let’s be honest, some adults, are getting greedy and The Peanut Butter and The Jelly are right in line with all the other 3-10 year olds.

Now I don’t think this is something that purely affects my children… I think all children of a certain age experience this concept of greed at Christmastime… it’s natural… they’ve been getting these brightly-wrapped packages that they are not only allowed to tear open, but are encouraged to tear open, and inside are things they get to play with or wear… how could they not get greedy?

The Peanut Butter and The Jelly are four, and they now know that Christmas = Presents. It’s a pretty easy equation along the lines of 1 + 1 = 2 that anyone (save for our current “President”— sorry, I should save that kind of talk for my poli-blog) can understand…

We as parents try to teach them the true meaning of Christmas, whether it be from a secular (the birth of Jesus) or non-secular (love to all mankind) standpoint… but who can compete with the constant barrage of catalogs, friends & cousins, TV & radio commercials and the like that are children are being inundated with?

At our house, we’ve been receiving gift and toy catalogs since mid-October… and the girls seem to have a sixth sense when it comes to those. They can sniff ‘em out and pour over them faster than people running from a Kevin Federline “concert.”

So where should we, as parents, place the blame?

Ourselves? I’m a firm believer that it’s up to the parents to make sure a child does what is right and doesn’t do what is wrong, so with that I say yes, but with a qualifier: we were probably the same way when we were their age and we turned out alright. And as I said above, we try our hardest to teach them the true meaning of the holiday, but sometimes we’re outgunned and outmaneuvered and it’s easier to pick your battles and know which ones can be won or lost.

Who else can be blamed?

Cousins? Well, I could blame a couple of my nieces and nephews who seem to exacerbate the greed with The PB & The J, but that would be unfair…

The media? Well… the media definitely seems to be an aggressor/agitator/make-it-worser (it’s a word it I use it) when it comes to children and greed, but I don’t think I can place the blame solely on them.

Greed is not necessarily a bad thing in moderation, and odds are my kids will grow out of it eventually… I did. But for now, “get while the getting’s good” seems to be the mantra for Christmas 2006.

Next year, I bet it will change….


* “…greed, for lack of a better word, is good. Greed is right, greed works.”

D'oh!!!

I no longer have access to blogs at work... so... if you thought my posting had been in a lull lately, you ain't seen nothin' yet.

Seriously though, I will try and post as much as I can in the evening hours after The Peanut Butter and The Jelly go to bed.

First Scott loses his access, then me... who's next??

11/30/06 UPDATE: Hmmmm... something very strange is going on here... at times I have access, other times I don't. It seems as though someone is sitting at a computer monitoring station somewhere and every once in a while, just to piss me off, they'll take away access to bloglines...

Where's the Christmas love man? It's not like I'm surfing through porn (like any man I do that in the comfort of my home after my wife has gone to sleep...), it's a blog...I'm trying to keep up with my blogmigos (some of whom seem to be ignoring me now, but that's another post for another day)

What will the next hour hold? Access to blogs... or no access to blogs? Come back later and find out... I know I will.

Happy Thanksgiving!!!

Hope you all have a very Happy Thanksgiving! Enjoy this snippit (about 5:30 minutes in length) from what I consider the best Thanksgiving sitcom episode EVAH!

Words Escape me...

Word's escape me in trying to describe this, supposedly one of the 'hottest' toys this Christmas.

This is supposed to be a children's toy, but first blush brings to mind a toy of a more "adult" nature...

Your thoughts?

Edmund Fitzgerald Redux

Kemp's Note: Today is the 31st anniversary of the wreck of the USS Edmund Fitzgerald. I wrote a post about it last year (classified to the right as one of my Top Ten Posts), so I thought I would post it again, this time with a useful LINK HERE, to a story from WJRT-TV. Enjoy.

The Great Lakes cover over 90,000 square miles and supply one-fifth of the world’s fresh water, with Lake Superior being the largest. The Chippewa Indians call Lake Superior “Kitchi-gummi” which means “great-water”. Later discovered by French explorers who named the lake, “le lac superieur”, which translates to upper lake.

Lake Superior is one of the busiest shipping lanes in North America and is connected to the Atlantic Ocean via the St. Lawrence Seaway. More than 1000 ships travel its waters each year landing either in the port of Duluth in the United States or Thunder Bay in Canada. Lake Superior is also large enough that it has considerable effect on the weather, especially when winds blow across its surface. Duluth sees over 50 days of fog between spring and fall and sometimes during a particularly cold winter the entire lake will freeze over. Another weather phenomenon common to the region, and particularly to Lake Superior, are the sometimes-vicious “northeasters”, which are gales that occur (mostly in November) and are formed when intense low pressure systems pass over the lake, thus creating hurricane-force winds that churn up enormous waves.

(Locals refer to these storms as “the witch of November.” It’s little wonder that the bottom of Lake Superior is littered with the skeletons of no less than 350 ships, most of them falling victim to the temperamental November ‘witch’)

That’s fascinating Kemp, but why the hell are you telling us all of this? And why the hell so many links?

Simple. Today (Thursday, November 10, 2005) is the 30th Anniversary of the most famous sinking on Superior (as well as the most baffling): that of the S.S. Edmund Fitzgerald.

This is a story that has always interested me and I knew, after realizing that the anniversary was today, that I had to write about it and give all you loyal readers the means to find out more, thus the superfluity of linkage.

The Fitzgerald was one of the largest lake vessels of her kind at 729 feet long, 75 feet wide and with a cargo capacity of 27,500 tons. The 7,500 horsepower engines were built by Westinghouse Electric Corporation and helped the ship set different shipping records.

The captain was Earnest MacSorley and gale warnings had already been issued when MacSorley steered the Edmund Fitzgerald, loaded down with taconite, out of Superior, Wisconsin’s docks shortly after 2PM. Meanwhile what looked like a typical November storm was intensifying. On the morning of November 10, heavy rain was falling and winds were gusting from the Northwest in excess of 60 mph as the storm tracked toward Canada, pummeling the Fitzgerald. A little after 3PM that same afternoon, Captain MacSorley reported that his ship was suffering damage and listing. At that time, another ship (The S.S. Arthur M. Anderson) that was sailing close to the Fitzgerald, agreed to stay close until they reached the calmer waters of Whitefish Bay.

In less than a half hour, the storm intensified with wind gusts clocking in at over 100 miles per hour. Shortly thereafter MacSorley again called in to the Anderson, and reported that the ship had lost all radar. Both ships continued on through the worsening conditions, the Anderson keeping track of the Edmund Fitzgerald on her radar screen. By early evening, around 7PM, meteorologists believe the storm’s pressure reached its lowest point; this combined with energy from the jet stream and created a series of enormous waves that first slammed into the Anderson and then into the Fitzgerald. The Anderson sustained damage but survived the onslaught and immediately The captain of the Anderson, Jesse Cooper, radioed the Edmund Fitzgerald to warn the crew of what to expect. The last words that came from Captain MacSorley were, “We are holding our own”.

Ten minutes later, around 7:25 PM… the big freighter had disappeared from all radar screens and the ‘witch’ had claimed yet another victim.

The day after the wreck, Mariners' Church in Detroit rang its bell 29 times, once for each life lost, a memorial that continues to this day. Every year on the anniversary, the church reads the names of the crewmen and rings the church bell.

An investigation by the Coast Guard suggested that the Edmund Fitzgerald had likely suffered enough initial damage that she began taking on water, causing the ship to list. Already unstable, the Fitzgerald was unable to ride out the onslaught of the massive waves once the northeaster worsened and she foundered, plunging to the bottom of Lake Superior with enough force to snap her in half. That report proved controversial, with the most common alternate theory contending that inoperative radar forced the crew to rely on maps that were woefully inacurate and, as a result, the Fitzgerald ran aground on a shoal without the crew knowing it and received bottom damage, thus causing it to gradually take on water until it sank.

The Edmund Fitzgerald now lies rusting under 550 feet of water. None of the sailors bodies were ever recovered. On July 4, 1995, a submarine expedition salvaged the ship’s bell and replaced it with another (as a tribute to the sailors and their families) with the date of the disaster and the names of the dead engraved on it. The bell is on display at the Whitefish Point museum near Paradise, Michigan.

The mystery of exactly how and why the Edmund Fitzgerald sank has never been discovered and the attachment of the ship and the story lives on, helped by the Gordon Lightfoot song: “The Wreck of the Edmund Fitzgerald.” (lyrics to the song can be found here)

After reading a piece about the sinking in Newsweek, Lightfoot was inspired to write one of the signature songs of his lengthy career (and also one of his greatest hits) that turned into an improbable Top 40 smash.

Maritime historian Frederick Stonehouse, when speaking about the song, states: “In large measure, his song is the reason we remember the Edmund Fitzgerald. That single ballad has made such a powerful contribution to the legend of the Great Lakes.”

Three decades after the tragedy, the Fitzgerald remains the most famous of the 6,000 ships that disappeared on the Great Lakes. And the reasons for its sinking will probably never be known.

Much left to learn, young grasshoppers...

Last night I was talking to my brother on the phone about the (euphoric) events of the past few days. In doing so, I mentioned that since Rumsfeld resigned earlier that day, and since the Democrats won control of the House and the Senate, that “Dubya is curled-up in the fetal position and crying.”

The Peanut Butter and The Jelly immediately asked; “Cuckoo-Bananas is crying?”

I obviously have taught them well...

Something Wicked this Way Comes: The Book Meme

I’m a reader. An avid reader. So I’m gonna change it a little and make it ‘More Than One Book That…’

Why? Because I’m suffering from a severe case of Blogstipation (should that be capitalized?) and think this could be the very thing to get me out of my blogging-doldrums.

What gives me the authority to change it? Well… it’s my blog so, conceivably, I can do what I want.

1. One book that changed my life. To Kill a Mockingbird by Harper Lee. Quite possibly the best book I’ve ever read with a message of tolerance, acceptance, and friendship. Another one is Patterns of Culture by Ruth Benedict. My parents (both Sociology majors in college) made me read this book when I was in 8th grade… and I understand why. For those of you who don’t know the book, it’s an examination of cultural studies that many say is as relevant today as it was when it was written in 1934.

2. One book I read more than once. The problem with this question is that there are quite a few books I’ve read more than once. Some of them include: Spoon River Anthology by Edgar Lee Masters, The Art of War by Sun Tzu, To Kill a Mockingbird by Harper Lee.

3. One book I'd want on a deserted island. Okay, changing this one to more than one sort of voids the premise, so I’m gonna keep this as ‘one’ and say To Kill a Mockingbird. It’s one of those books that every time I read it, I notice or read something new.

4. One book that made me laugh. The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy by Douglas Adams. Actually, let’s throw in the entire series while you’re at it and add a couple of his non-Hitchhiker’s works like Dirk Gently’s Holistic Detective Agency and Long, Dark Tea-Time of the Soul.

5. One book that made me cry. I’m a man… we don’t cry… what are you thinking?? Me cry?? Hey! How about them Rams Bears Colts? Sigh… no one’s buying this so I might as well ‘fess up’. Les Miserables by Victor Hugo. Cried like a girl baby…Also Travels with my Aunt by Graham Greene. While it’s not a tearjerker per se, it’s full of wit, wry comedy and poignancy. If you’ve never read Graham Greene, I highly suggest you start off with this novel then progress to The Quiet American, Our Man in Havana and one of his plays: “The Potting Shed”

6. One book I wish I'd written.. This is a toughie. Do I go with something that made the author a shitload of money or do I go with something that changed society and/or people?? I’m gonna have to go with one of my favorite all-time books and say The Art of War by Sun Tzu. Granted, he probably didn’t make a whole lot of money from the book, but his ancestors are and let’s face it; it’s changed a lot of people and probably has altered some lives.

7. One book I wish had never been written. The Seven Habits of Highly Effective People by Stephen “Whiny-Ass Bitch” Covey. What a bunch of claptrap; pointless, inane, and chock full of shit that should be freaking COMMON SENSE!!!! It’s not that hard… Why do I wish it had never been written? Because some people take it to heart (if you’re one of those people: I feel for you, I really do) and try to live their entire life by it. I read it the first time in high school and felt like I needed a shower afterwards. I don’t mean to get off on a rant here, but if more people stopped reading Covey and started reading real books, then we wouldn’t have this problem with every person in the world thinking that they can solve the problems of everyone else despite not having any training or education in that area…

Whew… I’m okay now…

8. One book I'm reading now. QB VII by Leon Uris & The Tao of Physics by Fritjof Capra.

9. One book I've been meaning to read. War and Peace by Leo Tolstoy. I’ve never read it… I’ve meant to… I’ve wanted to… I just never have… but I am meaning to read it… just give me some time…

10. Tag, you're it: Scott, MetroDad & Croutonboy.

V-O-T-E-!

There’s less than 24 hours to go and while many politicians (and Liberals) are contemplating sedatives (if not something stronger) there is an election tomorrow and we at TBWA (and Kemp's Blog) want everyone to get out and vote…

You can’t vote by sitting in front of your computer (at least not yet).

And you can’t vote by sitting on your couch at home…unless of course you have an absentee ballot.

You have to go to your respective polling place and pull the lever, punch the chad, push the button, scan the optic or fill-in the oval (which one of those do you think sounds sexual?).

In short; you must vote.

It doesn’t matter if you’re a Democrat, republican, Independent, Libertarian, Communist, Green or even a Mickey Mouse party fan… you must get out and vote.

If you think your ballot is worthless and doesn’t carry any weight you’re wrong.

According to The Voters Paradox by Leon Felkins and Mack Tanner the importance of any single vote declines the more voters as having made a rational decision.

The other side of the coin says that with fewer voters, the influence of an individual’s vote rises. Furthermore, if you don’t’ vote, you’re allowing others to speak for you… and that ain’t right.

You want another reason? Voting is a profound statement of our democracy, a birthright if you will, that no one, absolutely no one, should take for granted and ignore.

Every voice counts.

Every opinion counts.

Every vote counts.

So get your ass out to the polls and vote tomorrow.

Now… if you want to use your own brain and make an informed decision that will help our country, then vote Democratic.

If you want to screw the country with it’s collective pants on while maintaining the status quo, then vote republican.

If you feel guilty and want to vote your conscience while drinking coffee from a styrofoam cup, vote Green party.

If you want to vote with an eye on common ownership, vote Communist.

If you want to vote with an eye towards being free to do whatever you want, vote Libertarian.

However you decide to vote… just vote.


Cross-posted at The "Bush"Whacked Administration

When sports means more than just a pastime

My life, lately, has been rather pathetic, sad and depressing.

Deaths in the family, a fruitless job search, a current job hanging by a thread, difficult personal financial situations (all of which have caused problems with the wife and I. I know, I know… we shouldn’t let those problems effect us, and we sincerely try not to take the problems out on each other or the kids, but as most of my readers know… it’s hard. As MetroDad says about marriage: "...marriage is like a duck. On the surface, it looks cool and effortless, but underneath, everybody's paddling like hell." But I’m getting far off the point…) have all made my life very, very stressful. And while my life lately has been enough to make one incredibly depressed and despondent (which is how I’ve been for the last couple of days weeks months…), this past Friday night, something… something that some people might call insignificant… happened…

My baseball team, the St. Louis Cardinals, the team my parents, my aunts & uncles, my cousins, my brother and I have followed for as long as I can remember, won the World Series for the first time since I was a nine-year old lad in 1982.

Granted, it may not have been the most exciting World Series for non-Cardinals and non-Tigers fans to watch; after all, it was sloppy, short… and very, very wet.

But for Cardinal fans; it was bliss… and since it happened on a Friday I had a whole weekend to revel in it. More importantly, since I live in the Chicago-land area, I had the whole weekend to enjoy the victory in front of Cubs fans that had to live through the cross-town rivals winning it last year and their long-time league rivals winning it this year… talk about a sweet moment(s).

For a short time, the victory helped me forget my troubles and focus on the joy of a city and the joy of ‘Redbird Nation’…

And for that moment, and the euphoric moments that followed… all was right with the world.

Now I only hope that it continues and transmissions to something more vital... like a new job, a new outlook on life and better financial standing... otherwise I might be hoping for an ever-unlikely Super Bowl victory for my Rams... and I think we all know the chances of that happening...

Whoo-hoo!!!

All the experts said it couldn't be done...

They all said the Tigers would win it in 4, 5 or 6 games... one jackass even said 3...

The "worst" world series ever some sportswriters said...

To them I say two simple words:

Fuck.

You.

My boys... the team I've followed my entire life, won the 2006 World Series.

After the humiliation of 2004...

The agony of 1987 and the Garbage Bag's "fans"...

The blown call of 1985...

The 1982 championship against a team that's now in the National League...

The St. Louis Cardinals won the World Series 4 games to 1.

If you all don't mind, I'm just going to savor this for now and will write a more meaningful post about it later.

For now... I have some beer to drink, some people to call (Cubs fans mostly), some gloating to do (mostly Cubs fans, but a few Tigers fans) and some air to walk on...

In the words of Jack Buck: "Go crazy folks, go crazy. That's a winner!"

HELL YES!!!!!

It's on Queen...


Cross-posted on Draft Day Suit

It’s getting worse...

My blogstipation is turning into a severe lack of posting-desire.

Any suggestions?

Ultra-quick Random Thoughts

• I’d like to thank everyone who expressed their well-wishes to me last week, I truly appreciated it. Thank you.
• Big thanks to Kara for making me laugh last week with this “special” post.
• I am the proud new owner of a Motorola Razr… talk about a sweet phone. The phone was free, and I’m getting a free Bluetooth wireless headset as a rebate as well.
• I took a picture with my new phone on Saturday. It was a picture from a store here in town of a Christmas display… on October 6th… Christmas hype starting in five… four… three…
• How many people visiting this blog would elect me President if I promised to pass a law making it illegal to start selling Christmas before Thanksgiving?
• Looking for a job sucks moose cock…
• I am suffering from a severe case of blogstipation. I can’t think of anything to write for any of my blogs. I haven’t started to panic yet, but just wait.

A Bad Week

For those of you asking why I haven’t been posting this week, I’ll let you know...

Last Saturday night, the husband of one of my cousins was killed in a car accident near St. Louis... a car accident that resulted in the deaths of five other people.

Add to that the news that another cousin (one who retired two years ago after 30 years in the army) is going back to Baghdad as a private contractor for one year.

And even more, it was a year ago yesterday that the daughter of another cousin was murdered (along with 3 others) and we received word this past week that the trial has been set for mid-November.

So needless to say, the past seven days have not been easy on my family and me, so I just wanted to let all of my faithful readers, and blogmigos, know where I’ve been.

I’ll be funny again next week, I promise...

Yep, we're that sophomoric...

Honey Mustard was reading a bedtime book about planets to The Peanut Butter & The Jelly tonight.

She turns the page and reads: "Can you find Uranus?

...

She and I burst out laughing... meanwhile the girls are looking at us like we're strange (which, of course, we are)... and we can't stop laughing...

Must be our juvenile sense of humor...

Sans cast

The six weeks is over...

The cast is off...

Things are returning back to normal at Casa de Gemelos as The Peanut Butter had her short cast removed yesterday (her long-cast was removed 2-weeks ago) and is now, cast-free.

Let me get a ‘whoo-hoo’ for The PB!

It Begins

I know it was inevitable, I just didn’t think it would be this soon.

Pop quiz; what do candy bars, popcorn, wrapping paper, books and pizzas all have in common?

You give up?

They’re all things that kids are forced asked to sell while they are in school.

You can see what’s coming next, right?

They’re only four (and ½) years old, but The Peanut Butter and The Jelly have already started a ritual that every student in the United States has to endure for years & years and years & years…

That’s right, The PB & The J are selling stuff for their school.

Four years old… in preschool… and they’re selling stuff.

Well, not them so much as Honey Mustard and I.

They are selling popcorn… and not just any popcorn my friend; “Gourmet” popcorn (which in layman’s terms means small amounts of “relatively expensive” popcorn) There’s no normal buttered corn here, no sirree bob… this popcorn has flavors like Macadamia Crunch, Chicago Style, Chocolate-drizzled Carmel Corn, White Cheddar cheesecorn, Cookies and Cream and Rainbow (green apple, cheery, peach and two other flavors that have NO right being anywhere near a kernel of corn)

The girls did a good job of asking people if they wanted to buy popcorn (as good as any four-year old could), but let’s face it – when kids are this young and are assigned to sell something, the schools are expecting the parents to do it.

I remember selling stuff in grade school, junior high and high school… but not preschool.

Candy bars that were small and pricey (never mind that you could get essentially the same thing in the story for half that amount), pizzas that tasted like ass, popcorn that never fully popped, tins of popcorn that had probably been sitting around since the Eisenhower administration, wrapping paper that was ugly and magazines that no-one ever wanted to read… ever…

The strangest thing I ever sold? Poinsettias. Not for a garden club or anything, but for the speech/debate team in my high school.

My questions to you, dear readers and blogmigos, what age do you remember starting in on this grand tradition and what was the strangest thing you remember selling?

Inquiring minds want to know...

They're Aaron Sorkin junkies...

Having been subjected to seeing every episode of "The West Wing" since... hell, since they were in the womb, it's no wonder that The Peanut Butter and The Jelly are big West Wing fans.

On Monday & Tuesday nights (my wife is at school those nights. BTW, cheer her on blogaudience as, after this semester, she has only two classes left towards her Master's Degree), when I ask the girls what they want to do- their response is usually the same: play legos and watch West Wing with Daddy.

(Truthfully - how many 4-year olds do you know who will ask for West Wing by name?)

So we'll play legos and watch one episode of West Wing (their favorite episode is "Privateers" from Season 4... probably because in one scene, Josh mentions Captain Feathersword) before I turn the TV off and read them one two three four books before it's bed time.

Now... it seems I've gotten them hooked on "Studio 60..."

I recorded the first episode last week because Honey Mustard and I weren't home, and when I watched it last Tuesday night, they sat on the couch next to me... somewhat mesmerized.

Because HoMu was at school last night, I taped it for her and me (I was watching the football game)

When I picked them up from school this afternoon, on the way to their grandma's, The PB asked: "Daddy, Sunstriptudi tonight?"

I can only assume that she was asking me if we were going to watch "Studio 60 on the Sunset Strip" tonight.

What can I say, my kids are Aaron Sorkin junkies.

Maybe I can use their love of all-things-Sorkin to get "Sports Night: The Complete Series" on DVD.

It's worth a shot...

Psst, hey... buddy...

Did you know that tomorrow is the First Anniversary of Scott and mine’s Poli-Blog – The BushWhacked Administration?

You didn’t?

Well… now you do.

What do we have planned?

We have a guest post by a friend of mine about her feeling’s towards former Texas Governor Ann Richards, a couple of reflective pieces by Scott and I, a wrap-up of the last 12 months and last, but certainly not least, a special post by everyone’s favorite Goon Squad leader; Sarah.

BTW; if any of you (wink, wink, nudge, nudge... I do mean any of you) want to write a guest post for TBWA, by all means, let me know at kempsblog@gmail.com… even if you’re a conservative (there must be a few out there who read my blog) we’ll post it as Scott and I both believe in practicing tolerance for those that disagree with us… no matter how wrong they may be.

So be sure to stop by TBWA tomorrow and say hi.