I have been a hockey fan for as long as I can remember knowing about hockey. Needless to say, I have several (thousand) gripes with the sport, despite maintaining it is the best sport in the history of sport.
First off, icing. What the hell is it? I have watched many hockey matches live, a few on television, and listened to none on the radio but nobody has ever explained this to me. Like any good researcher, I looked on Wikipedia first. According to the article on the subject, icing is “when a player shoots the puck across two red lines, the opposing team's goal line being the last, and the puck remains untouched”. Now I certainly can see why this dangerous act is worthy of penalty. Oh wait, no I don't. Yes, certainly it's boring, and not something players should do as a habit, but is it worthy of completely stopping play and having a referee arm signal? Besides, I thought that was “dumping the puck”; icing just gives the idea that we're penalising people for stopping suddenly in front of each other and causing ice to spray all over each other, and this is a sport where if they don't do that, there will be a lot more injuries than just from fights.
On the subject of fights, the NHL is utter crap. My first NHL game was a St Louis Blues matchup against the New York Islanders. This was back in 1994, when the Blues had Brett Hull, and were sort of somewhat good as opposed to just nearby. Anyway, there was real excitement in the air. There were hard body checks, there were fights, there was shouting and swearing – all a beautiful experience for a nine-year-old boy who is still afraid to say “damn.” Of late though, I have been hard-pressed to see much (if any) fighting on an NHL match. If I want to watch a beautiful game, I would watch football (real football, not American football. I know it can get confusing but I refuse to call it “soccer”). I want to see some action in my hockey, not skating back and forth. Throw a punch or change the name of your sport.
Of course, I have no idea when players stopped fighting in NHL hockey, because for several years now hockey has been almost impossible to find on television. I know in 2006 there was a player lockout which probably didn't help convince any networks to air hockey, and that decision carried over a couple years, but the thing with lockouts and strikes is they don't happen every year, or even every other year. If they did, they'd just declare it a holiday week and write it into the calendar. NBC/Universal must have grown some yarbles of late by starting up NHL Sunday, airing daytime games even during NFL season. Unfortunately I can't commend them too much because NHL Sunday airs just this side of not at all. The last time I saw it was in February, and there are still games to play, therefore games to air! NBC, as well as every other network with a sport division: air some hockey already. We fans south of the snowline are starved for a real sport, and this is the only one that happens in this country between January and April.
06 April 2009
04 April 2009
We're here to defend wealth
I'm not sure when I decided I hated money, but I think it was around age ten. Yes, ten. I took a good hard look at the function of money in society and decided it was a middleman and therefore could be removed completely. I came up with my own simple way of acquisition of goods and job creation - everyone can go in and take what they need. Nobody steals anything because the idea is meaningless. Everybody works unless it's medically necessary to not work (that would include old age).
I'm well aware of how complicated this would be to do worldwide (because it would be necessary to implement it worldwide), however in our current system, people can go into debt and even bankruptcy before age 25. There is an entire industry based on high-interest short-term loans to people who are already living paycheque to paycheque. There is an entire second industry based on the first one that takes any and all information surrendered at the high-interest loan place and bombards the phone numbers with unsolicited text messages and phone calls at odd hours, and the email addresses with hundreds (at least) of spam messages (how spam messages make any fucking money for anyone I've yet to understand).
Money is theoretically how we determine if someone has worked hard enough to receive certain goods and services. When we throw CEOs, no-talent musicians, professional athletes, and all of Wall Street and the City into the mix, doesn't that completely bastardise that definition? I defy anyone to tell me how a stockbroker works harder than a minimum wage retail worker. I defy anyone to tell me how a professional athlete works harder than a factory worker who works twelve hours per day in dangerous and unhealthy surroundings, and then his bosses try to cut his pay to raise theirs. How the hell do Nickelback deserve all that money they make?
I won't even get started ... that's a fucking lie, I'm already started on the health insurance industry. When people get sick, the options include pay cash for treatment (usually an entirely too-large amount) or already have insurance before you even got sick. Isn't "insurance" a euphemism for "protection racket"? Anyway, the insurance doesn't even work that well because if you already have insurance, odds are it doesn't cover everything. It doesn't necessarily even cover what you need. And even if it does cover what you need, some shitbag at the company can just decide you don't really need this particular procedure. An insurance company isn't there to help its customers, it's there to take their fucking money.
Even if the insurance company DOES pay for some of your treatment, they probably won't pay for the whole thing (which makes PERFECT SENSE!). They'll pay for maybe half to three quarters of the bill, leaving you with a huge amount of money to pay them. Gods help you if you're really sick and need multiple procedures, and even more so if you're young and don't have a lot of money anyway.
Recently I've heard and seen a lot about a move towards universal health coverage. Some of this I've heard from representatives of doctors and insurance companies. The representatives of insurance companies I don't fucking trust - I'm completely certain they only want a law to make god damn sure every human in America has to buy a policy from their existing company, and they can still turn people away for procedures their doctors (you know, the people who are fucking qualified to decide if something is medically necessary) have decided is medically necessary. Frankly, I wouldn't be satisfied if that happened. I guarantee anyone with an existing medical bill will be totally screwed. The only thing I'll be actually satisfied with is full health coverage including psychological, surgical, and preventative treatment.
It worked for every other post-industrial nation in the world; I think we could pull it off.
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Now listening: Billy Bragg - No Power Without Accountability
I'm well aware of how complicated this would be to do worldwide (because it would be necessary to implement it worldwide), however in our current system, people can go into debt and even bankruptcy before age 25. There is an entire industry based on high-interest short-term loans to people who are already living paycheque to paycheque. There is an entire second industry based on the first one that takes any and all information surrendered at the high-interest loan place and bombards the phone numbers with unsolicited text messages and phone calls at odd hours, and the email addresses with hundreds (at least) of spam messages (how spam messages make any fucking money for anyone I've yet to understand).
Money is theoretically how we determine if someone has worked hard enough to receive certain goods and services. When we throw CEOs, no-talent musicians, professional athletes, and all of Wall Street and the City into the mix, doesn't that completely bastardise that definition? I defy anyone to tell me how a stockbroker works harder than a minimum wage retail worker. I defy anyone to tell me how a professional athlete works harder than a factory worker who works twelve hours per day in dangerous and unhealthy surroundings, and then his bosses try to cut his pay to raise theirs. How the hell do Nickelback deserve all that money they make?
I won't even get started ... that's a fucking lie, I'm already started on the health insurance industry. When people get sick, the options include pay cash for treatment (usually an entirely too-large amount) or already have insurance before you even got sick. Isn't "insurance" a euphemism for "protection racket"? Anyway, the insurance doesn't even work that well because if you already have insurance, odds are it doesn't cover everything. It doesn't necessarily even cover what you need. And even if it does cover what you need, some shitbag at the company can just decide you don't really need this particular procedure. An insurance company isn't there to help its customers, it's there to take their fucking money.
Even if the insurance company DOES pay for some of your treatment, they probably won't pay for the whole thing (which makes PERFECT SENSE!). They'll pay for maybe half to three quarters of the bill, leaving you with a huge amount of money to pay them. Gods help you if you're really sick and need multiple procedures, and even more so if you're young and don't have a lot of money anyway.
Recently I've heard and seen a lot about a move towards universal health coverage. Some of this I've heard from representatives of doctors and insurance companies. The representatives of insurance companies I don't fucking trust - I'm completely certain they only want a law to make god damn sure every human in America has to buy a policy from their existing company, and they can still turn people away for procedures their doctors (you know, the people who are fucking qualified to decide if something is medically necessary) have decided is medically necessary. Frankly, I wouldn't be satisfied if that happened. I guarantee anyone with an existing medical bill will be totally screwed. The only thing I'll be actually satisfied with is full health coverage including psychological, surgical, and preventative treatment.
It worked for every other post-industrial nation in the world; I think we could pull it off.
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Now listening: Billy Bragg - No Power Without Accountability
23 March 2009
Walking around USI's campus I find myself wishing I had a big box of sidewalk chalk. One of the primary forms of student group advertising is writing on the sidewalk with multi-coloured chalk like many of us did as kids. Today I saw a chalkvert that said "Liar, Lunatic or LORD: Is Jesus who he says he is?" The chalkvert is from the student christian group, so I think we know which answer they want us to give. Disappointing, really, because I sort of wanted one of those controversial-views speakers to talk about how Jesus was just some crazy guy and piss off half of campus.
The more usual type of chalkvert is for events, like a stand-up comic or a movie night. However, the College Dems and College Republicans also make considerable use of this medium. Last fall I saw plenty of anti-Obama stuff, but strangely little anti-McCain or anti-Palin stuff (I fully expected no anti-Biden stuff because nobody cares). Even now, the College Reps have in their ads such things as "Tired of big government spending? Tired of socialist policies? So are we" and then the time and place of their next meeting. That's a pretty ballsy statement for people affiliated with a party that DID spend huge amounts of money on an unpopular war, and even ballsier considering this is a school with easy access to things like dictionaries, encyclopædias, and possibly even actual hard copies of The Communist Manifesto, all of which could easily define socialism as "not what's going on right now". Calling this socialism is like calling pub darts a sport: some things are similar, but there are too many more differences.
19 March 2009
The LORD be with your botty
Every few weeks, if not more often, I find myself wondering just how many crazy people exist in the world. I usually wonder this after seeing some news story about, well, crazy people. Frequent topics include public nudity and the kind of mother/40-year-old son who lives at home domestic dispute that one can expect to see on the Maury Povich Show, but one of my absolute favourite topics of crazy people news stories involves people seeing the face of Jesus, the Virgin Mary, or Mohammad in a potato crisp, slice of toast, wall, or most recently, a chair.
The French island of Reunion, located in the Indian Ocean, is the source of this latest sighting of the Lord. Someone discovered one day that the rumples in the priest's cushion resembled the Son of God too closely to be a coincidence. According to an Agence France-Presse report, thousands have come to the island to witness the miracle that originated with somebody's bum.
This brings to my mind significant questions about the Divine Nature of Christ. It would appear that the Son of Man first appeared on foods, and now has appeared on someone's seat. Literally. I have been told throughout my life that God works in mysterious ways, but this just seems silly. If God wanted to send somebody a message, why not use the classics – a burning bush worked wonders for the Israelites in Egypt, after all, and don't get me started on the ten plagues! But I don't remember the biblical tale of King Saul seeing the face of Joshua Ben Nun in a plate of hummus, proclaiming it a miracle, and ordering all to visit to take souvenir etchings. Frankly, I think this is mere coincidence. If the real God wanted to send a message to his people, I think he has a better marketing department than one that would tell him to appear in somebody's butt imprint.
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Now playing: Rob Zombie - Feel So Numb
via FoxyTunes
The French island of Reunion, located in the Indian Ocean, is the source of this latest sighting of the Lord. Someone discovered one day that the rumples in the priest's cushion resembled the Son of God too closely to be a coincidence. According to an Agence France-Presse report, thousands have come to the island to witness the miracle that originated with somebody's bum.
This brings to my mind significant questions about the Divine Nature of Christ. It would appear that the Son of Man first appeared on foods, and now has appeared on someone's seat. Literally. I have been told throughout my life that God works in mysterious ways, but this just seems silly. If God wanted to send somebody a message, why not use the classics – a burning bush worked wonders for the Israelites in Egypt, after all, and don't get me started on the ten plagues! But I don't remember the biblical tale of King Saul seeing the face of Joshua Ben Nun in a plate of hummus, proclaiming it a miracle, and ordering all to visit to take souvenir etchings. Frankly, I think this is mere coincidence. If the real God wanted to send a message to his people, I think he has a better marketing department than one that would tell him to appear in somebody's butt imprint.
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Now playing: Rob Zombie - Feel So Numb
via FoxyTunes
10 March 2009
Bitter ilstack is bitter. Also, fuck
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Now playing: Ozzy Osbourne - I Don't Know
via FoxyTunes
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Now playing: Ozzy Osbourne -NOT MISTER CROWLEY THAT'S FOR FUCKING SURE
via FoxyTunes
Now playing: Ozzy Osbourne - I Don't Know
via FoxyTunes
To quote the great Stephen Fry, "Bah, Poo, Botty and Tit." I was enjoying the weather this evening, sitting on the "porch" behind my flat with the screen door open and the cat on a leash, letting her explore where she would. I pushed the computer chair out there and was reading Luke Skywalker and the Shadows of Mindor, when I thought I ought to get a picture of me and the cat doing this. I popped inside to look for my camera ... only to find FUCK ALL.
So I dug up a few things to look under them, opened a few things, threw a few things, checked the car, phoned USI security, Liz, and my friend Joe in Henderson, and yet no joy. Trust me with an expensive piece of equipment, I'll lose the fucking thing in three months. It was at this point I decided the only possessions I need at this time are a television, a computer, clothes, a car to get to work and school, a camera (EL OH EL FUCK ME), and a place to live. Hell, I don't even NEED my iPod, I think. Everything else I can borrow ... I have a library membership, I have access to bookshops, I have the computer ... WHICH DOESN'T WANT ME TO LISTEN TO MR CROWLEY APPARENTLY.
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Now playing: Ozzy Osbourne -NOT MISTER CROWLEY THAT'S FOR FUCKING SURE
via FoxyTunes
28 February 2009
Galactica fanboyism - it's totally justified
I can't believe it's been a tenday since I wrote anything. To be fair I've been a little busy between work and school, but today I'm free. Just in time to fanboy out over Battlestar Galactica. Major last-night spoilage ahead.
For those who saw the episode last night, "Someone to Watch Over Me", you know this was simultaneously one of the best, most intense, most disturbing, and most ASLDJFALSKJDF (to use a computer curse) episodes of any television in ... ever. It was one of the most intense episodes of telly I've ever seen, plot-wise almost certainly. It was partly a Starbuck episode, one we've been waiting for since she found Char-buck on Erf (Yes, that's several fanon words but you'll have to get over it). Kara's drinking (big surprise) and she hears this guy incessantly playing a piano ... because he's composing. She goes over to help him because her father was a pianist and composer. In what we think is a one-off scene, she goes to Helo's place and gets a tape (cassette tape, yeah I know!) of one of her father's recordings, and Hera, AKA "Creepy Cybrid Kid" gives Kara a picture of what we think are stars. Later on, when Kara and the pianist, nicknamed "Slick", are working on the second movement, she remembers the stars drawing and puts it on a sheet of music. It works. They try it.
It's the Final Four theme - the "All Along the Watchtower" based theme music for the final four Cylons.
Col. Tigh and Ellen are sitting at the bar, and Tigh's face is completely fucking priceless. He goes over and demands to know where Kara learnt that music, and 1) she says she played it as a kid and 2) she looks over at Slick, who is no longer there. Slick is her Head-Dad character. What the frak.
Meanwhile, the Cylons on the Fleet Baseship want to try Boomer, currently in Galactica's brig, for treason. Chief Tyrol, who used to be frakking Boomer before she shot Adama (christ, this is like a soap opera!) wants them to not try her and execute her. He replaces Boomer with some random innocent 8 and lets her go free. She uses his good will to beat the shit out of Athena, frak Helo (Athena's hubby) in front of her while she's locked in a cupboard, and kidnap Hera, drug her, put her in a box, and take off in a Raptor to take her back to Cavil, proving that she's a god damn piece of shit all along.
All of it reads like a soap opera, certainly, except it wasn't like that. The one part that was VERY not like that was the "Boomer beating up Athena and frakking her husband" scene, which was very explicit albeit out of focus, and seriously fucking disturbing, because what we see IN focus is Athena, watching this other woman frakking her husband. The scene takes about a minute, and it's horribly painful to watch. What makes it worse is that Tyrol is an accessory to Boomer's kidnapping of Hera, because he actually helped her load the box into the Raptor, not to mention BREAKING HER OUT OF PRISON.
This episode is by far the best example for why Galactica is one of the best god damn shows on television, dare I say ever. Every time you think something could go right, guess what, it not only goes wrong, but it goes more wrong than you ever imagined it could. Given one episode, anyone will get absolutely hooked on this show and be irretrievably attached to finding out WHAT THE FUCK IS GOING TO HAPPEN HOLY SHIT.
17 February 2009
Businesses = idiots who want my money
Businesses must be, as a rule, run by retarded people.
Liz and I opened a joint bank account the other day. This has caused no end of problems, not one of which was our fucking fault. First, her direct deposit tried to go into her old bank account, which being closed, would not accept it. This is a similar situation to what happened with my direct deposit fuckup except slightly better except not, because the bank account in question 1) existed at some point and 2) belonged to the person who was getting the money.
The bank people claimed she would be able to access our account via her existing online banking username and password. We would have appreciated it if the bank people had been so kind as to inform us at that time that they were lying to us. She is currently only able to access the account using my password and name. This is not a problem apart from the fact that the bank people are dirty god damned liars who lie to people and don't tell the truth when they do it. Also, her debit card doesn't work, which we kind of figured would happen and we never even bothered to ask about.
Today, and this is where the complaint against dumbasses running businesses comes in, we sat down to figure out why our account had got so low. We looked at our online ledger which showed us no fewer than fifteen pending transactions. When we removed from consideration the deposits, there were thirteen pending transactions. Many of these transactions are from Thursday, when we went to Indianapolis, or Friday, when we were in town, or the weekend. Now I certainly know that banks don't do a god damn thing on the weekends, and they had, for some inexplicable reason, President's Day off. But the fact that since Thursday none of our transactions have gone through is not the fault of the banks.
This indeed has happened once before - to Liz when she was closing her personal bank account. She had a pending four dollar transaction on her card, which was at Chik-Fil-A, the famous mall crappy chicken "fast" "food" "restaurant". She hadn't used the card since the first day of that week, and the day we closed the account was either a Wednesday or a Thursday. Either way, they'd had three days to take their money. Apparently businesses aren't in any hurry to be paid for things, which is odd, because if you actually try the Wimpy approach ("I'll gladly pay you Tuesday for a hamburger today," from Popeye cartoons) they will laugh in your face and probably spit at you and call the police because there is a crazy person in their place of business and they don't have to put up with that.
And I thought debit cards removed the money from your account instantly, and credit cards chalked up a running tally for you to pay later. Maybe I need to redefine. Or they do.
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Now playing: Daft Punk - Face to face [Cosmo Vitelli rmx]
via FoxyTunes
Liz and I opened a joint bank account the other day. This has caused no end of problems, not one of which was our fucking fault. First, her direct deposit tried to go into her old bank account, which being closed, would not accept it. This is a similar situation to what happened with my direct deposit fuckup except slightly better except not, because the bank account in question 1) existed at some point and 2) belonged to the person who was getting the money.
The bank people claimed she would be able to access our account via her existing online banking username and password. We would have appreciated it if the bank people had been so kind as to inform us at that time that they were lying to us. She is currently only able to access the account using my password and name. This is not a problem apart from the fact that the bank people are dirty god damned liars who lie to people and don't tell the truth when they do it. Also, her debit card doesn't work, which we kind of figured would happen and we never even bothered to ask about.
Today, and this is where the complaint against dumbasses running businesses comes in, we sat down to figure out why our account had got so low. We looked at our online ledger which showed us no fewer than fifteen pending transactions. When we removed from consideration the deposits, there were thirteen pending transactions. Many of these transactions are from Thursday, when we went to Indianapolis, or Friday, when we were in town, or the weekend. Now I certainly know that banks don't do a god damn thing on the weekends, and they had, for some inexplicable reason, President's Day off. But the fact that since Thursday none of our transactions have gone through is not the fault of the banks.
This indeed has happened once before - to Liz when she was closing her personal bank account. She had a pending four dollar transaction on her card, which was at Chik-Fil-A, the famous mall crappy chicken "fast" "food" "restaurant". She hadn't used the card since the first day of that week, and the day we closed the account was either a Wednesday or a Thursday. Either way, they'd had three days to take their money. Apparently businesses aren't in any hurry to be paid for things, which is odd, because if you actually try the Wimpy approach ("I'll gladly pay you Tuesday for a hamburger today," from Popeye cartoons) they will laugh in your face and probably spit at you and call the police because there is a crazy person in their place of business and they don't have to put up with that.
And I thought debit cards removed the money from your account instantly, and credit cards chalked up a running tally for you to pay later. Maybe I need to redefine. Or they do.
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Now playing: Daft Punk - Face to face [Cosmo Vitelli rmx]
via FoxyTunes
15 February 2009
I think I'm quitting driving.
I hit a motherfucking SUV today. There was damage to my car, and there was a scratch (that came off with a little light rubbing) on the SUV. I fucking hate driving and occasionally life in general.
Here's what the car looks like now:
Here's what the car looks like now:
Emo Conservatives
Now playing: Daft Punk - Robot Rock / Oh Yeah
via FoxyTunes
Oh, National Review, what won't you make up a "liberals destroyed it" myth about?
I'm sure we're all familiar with the "War On Christmas," where "every" retail store "forbade" its employees saying "Merry Christmas" to customers out of a desire to "Discriminate" against "Christianity". Most of the examples of stores I've heard this myth about are Wal-Marts, and anyone who thinks Wal-Mart gives a rat's rotting corpse about anything other than cash is retarded. When I first heard of this, I worked at Best Buy. That year, we had gift cards with a Christmas tree on, as well as one with a menorah. The two years after that, I worked at Borders, where we had no shortage of Christmassy, and even Jesusy items for the season. At no point was anyone, to my knowledge, told to say any specific holiday greeting to anyone else, or refrain from saying a specific holiday greeting. I have never bought the utter horseshit idea of a "war on" any particular holiday. It certainly didn't help that it is notorious liar Bill O'Reilly's pet project from late October to whenever he gets tired of hearing himself talk.
Today, on Valentine's Day, the bastion of conservative circle-jerkery known as the National Review Online had a column on how awful Valentine's commercials are. I happen to agree with them, mainly because most of them are sexist and based on an ancient and irrelevent way of thinking. NRO, however, claim the problem is the same as the "commercialization of Christmas and the candy-fication of Easter". Okay, I don't like the commercialisation of Christmas either, mainly because I like to think of that holiday as one of family togetherness and sharing what we have in common. Easter is something I haven't celebrated in some years, so I don't care so much.
But then, the NRO went on to say that Valentine's has been reduced to "mail-order seduction by a nation of salivating Caligulas?" The obvious meaning is that Valentine's Day, in the modern tradition a celebration of love, has lost its original meaning, and this has happened recently as a result of the loss of "traditional morals", meaning of course since "Leave It To Beaver" went off the air. This is yet another example of tories being desperate for a time that never existed and using holidays that never or only recently meant what they want them to mean.
Much like Christmas and Easter, Valentine's Day has its origins in a Roman festival. Lupercalia, yet another Roman fertility festival, was celebrated between the equivalent of February 13-15 and was abolished by Pope Gelasius I. According to Prof. Jack Oruch of the University of Kansas, no link between a saint named Valentinus (the alleged basis for "Saint" Valentine's Day) and a celebration of romantic love existed until the time of Geoffery Chaucer, when courtly love became popular. In short (too late), Valentine's Day and its historic predecessors have been, and always will be, about fuckin'. And really, I'm not sure why conservatives have a problem with that. Maybe they don't like what they find at every branch in their family tree.
(Fuckin'.)
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Now playing: Daft Punk - Face To Face / Short Circuit
via FoxyTunes
via FoxyTunes
Oh, National Review, what won't you make up a "liberals destroyed it" myth about?
I'm sure we're all familiar with the "War On Christmas," where "every" retail store "forbade" its employees saying "Merry Christmas" to customers out of a desire to "Discriminate" against "Christianity". Most of the examples of stores I've heard this myth about are Wal-Marts, and anyone who thinks Wal-Mart gives a rat's rotting corpse about anything other than cash is retarded. When I first heard of this, I worked at Best Buy. That year, we had gift cards with a Christmas tree on, as well as one with a menorah. The two years after that, I worked at Borders, where we had no shortage of Christmassy, and even Jesusy items for the season. At no point was anyone, to my knowledge, told to say any specific holiday greeting to anyone else, or refrain from saying a specific holiday greeting. I have never bought the utter horseshit idea of a "war on" any particular holiday. It certainly didn't help that it is notorious liar Bill O'Reilly's pet project from late October to whenever he gets tired of hearing himself talk.
Today, on Valentine's Day, the bastion of conservative circle-jerkery known as the National Review Online had a column on how awful Valentine's commercials are. I happen to agree with them, mainly because most of them are sexist and based on an ancient and irrelevent way of thinking. NRO, however, claim the problem is the same as the "commercialization of Christmas and the candy-fication of Easter". Okay, I don't like the commercialisation of Christmas either, mainly because I like to think of that holiday as one of family togetherness and sharing what we have in common. Easter is something I haven't celebrated in some years, so I don't care so much.
But then, the NRO went on to say that Valentine's has been reduced to "mail-order seduction by a nation of salivating Caligulas?" The obvious meaning is that Valentine's Day, in the modern tradition a celebration of love, has lost its original meaning, and this has happened recently as a result of the loss of "traditional morals", meaning of course since "Leave It To Beaver" went off the air. This is yet another example of tories being desperate for a time that never existed and using holidays that never or only recently meant what they want them to mean.
Much like Christmas and Easter, Valentine's Day has its origins in a Roman festival. Lupercalia, yet another Roman fertility festival, was celebrated between the equivalent of February 13-15 and was abolished by Pope Gelasius I. According to Prof. Jack Oruch of the University of Kansas, no link between a saint named Valentinus (the alleged basis for "Saint" Valentine's Day) and a celebration of romantic love existed until the time of Geoffery Chaucer, when courtly love became popular. In short (too late), Valentine's Day and its historic predecessors have been, and always will be, about fuckin'. And really, I'm not sure why conservatives have a problem with that. Maybe they don't like what they find at every branch in their family tree.
(Fuckin'.)
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Now playing: Daft Punk - Face To Face / Short Circuit
via FoxyTunes
12 February 2009
Anna Nicole Shitty Music
Today I'm going to talk mainly about my favourite place in the world: Britain. Britain has been called many things: a far-away colony, a damp little island, an empire, THE empire, and my personal favourite:
I'm glad I don't have to say, "This has got to be the stupidest idea for a musical ever," because I already know about the Jerry Springer and Batboy musicals (which incidentally had a long run on the West End). Granted, apart from stupid shit like this, the West End has Shakespeare plays and long-established old-ass musicals that most people have seen in one way or another before. When I was there, I saw Chicago and Fame, both of which are American. I didn't see any Shakespeare because ... well, I'm an idiot. I went for the cheap and easy ones I already knew about instead of LEARNING something about acting.
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Other topic: Who doesn't know "Muzak"? It's a widely-known term for that crappy music they play at every department store, mall, grocery store, and most other public places. They used to play instrumental shitty versions of shitty pop songs, until they got the idea to play the shitty songs themselves. They are the reason you hear crap like the Dawson's Creek song in the mall, and ... probably the only reason anyone under the age of should-be-dead-by-now heard even one Barry Manilow song before he started getting blown by Pop Idol contestants. At the risk of ripping off Best Musical Ever Sweeney Todd, "But not for long ... "
Muzak, based in North Carolina (reason 47,827 not to visit the American South), has filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy protection. Apparently they owe between $100m and $500m. The CEO believes this will give the company* the chance to regain control of their finances and continue torturing people with good taste worldwide. Or, the way it was put in El Reg: Muzak says that its "sensory experiences" reach 100 million people each day. That should be a fucking war crime.
*hideous conglomeration of auditory shit
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Now playing: Dogma Free America - Episode 76.5--Dogma Free America
via FoxyTunes
Britain, Britain, Britain. Why would you ever want to leave? Anybody who goes on holiday abroad is a traitor! I bloody love it here! Bloody love it! We produce the best films, the finest cuisines and our dogs are relatively rabies free. And this is all thanks to the peoples of Britain. Let us look at them in this program in which we now look at them now. Boom, boom, shake the room! - Tom BakerThat is an introduction from an episode of the hit sketch comedy show Little Britain. As noted heavily in the show, Britain is full not only of culture and history, but also idiots. Case in point: This news story from Britain's Guardian newspaper. Following on the heels of the Jerry Springer opera, which was the subject of an asinine obscenity lawsuit, one of the creators has decided to make a musical about Anna Nicole Smith's life. My only response is "ALKDSJFAKLSJDFALKSDFALKS" as that is what happens when I bash my head upon my desk without first moving my computer out of the way.
I'm glad I don't have to say, "This has got to be the stupidest idea for a musical ever," because I already know about the Jerry Springer and Batboy musicals (which incidentally had a long run on the West End). Granted, apart from stupid shit like this, the West End has Shakespeare plays and long-established old-ass musicals that most people have seen in one way or another before. When I was there, I saw Chicago and Fame, both of which are American. I didn't see any Shakespeare because ... well, I'm an idiot. I went for the cheap and easy ones I already knew about instead of LEARNING something about acting.
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Other topic: Who doesn't know "Muzak"? It's a widely-known term for that crappy music they play at every department store, mall, grocery store, and most other public places. They used to play instrumental shitty versions of shitty pop songs, until they got the idea to play the shitty songs themselves. They are the reason you hear crap like the Dawson's Creek song in the mall, and ... probably the only reason anyone under the age of should-be-dead-by-now heard even one Barry Manilow song before he started getting blown by Pop Idol contestants. At the risk of ripping off Best Musical Ever Sweeney Todd, "But not for long ... "
Muzak, based in North Carolina (reason 47,827 not to visit the American South), has filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy protection. Apparently they owe between $100m and $500m. The CEO believes this will give the company* the chance to regain control of their finances and continue torturing people with good taste worldwide. Or, the way it was put in El Reg: Muzak says that its "sensory experiences" reach 100 million people each day. That should be a fucking war crime.
*hideous conglomeration of auditory shit
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Now playing: Dogma Free America - Episode 76.5--Dogma Free America
via FoxyTunes
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