The New Year Baby Has Arrived

And damned if he's not another British teenager.
Before you comment, remember, he's not gay, he's English.
"I will survive" is my motto for 2007.

NOTE: I stand corrected -- Tom lives on the Isle of Man ("Mann" and "Manx"), which is not part of the United Kingdom, but is a Crown dependency. The Isle of Man is in the Irish Sea between England and Ireland, and has oldest continuous parliament in the world, the Tynwald (Tinvaal), which dates from at least AD 979. The national dish of the island is Spuds and Herrin, boiled potatoes and herring. The Bee Gees were born on the island, where their parents ran a post office. Manx people are classed as British citizens, however, they have a special endorsement placed in their passports restricting their right to live or work in the EU. The Manx expression "Traa Dy Liooar", meaning "time enough," is said to represent the Manx attitude to life. I apologize for any misunderstanding. Jim

"Feed me or sell me!"

"Yes Virginia, there is a roast in the oven."

I hope you have a great weekend and New Year's Day -- and a terrific 2007!

Rooty mostly hopes for gravy with his roast beef, and world peace.

I'm really tired of 2006!

I'm going to sleep until it's 2007. Be back then!!!!

Some bumper stickers from the mall parking lot!

Your kid may be an honor student, but you're still an idiot!

Not all men are fools. Some are single.

And, my favorite du jour:

Hey jerk, you are driving a car, not a phone booth

Ho Ho Oh

I'm doing all my Christmas shopping from spam. Everyone gets either a fake Rolex or fake Viagra, depending upon whether they need to know the time, or have time to spare.

a sparrow that beeps when it backs up

if I remember my high school biology, the birds that live in each Home Depot and Lowe's should evolve into distinct species at each store -- if Darwin was correct, they should also develop fake smiles, barcodes on their wings, and join unions

Swatters needed

Why are supermarkets not full of flies in the summer -- the doors are usually open -- and it smells like food???

This does explain a few things...

Reuters - U.S. growers produce nearly $35 billion worth of marijuana annually, making the illegal drug the country's largest cash crop, bigger than corn and wheat combined.

A road too far.

I heard today that a college buddy is getting a divorce. This is someone I spent a lot of time with and traveled with to almost every out-of-town football game. Every time he saw a sign like the one above he'd say "Dead snake in the road." It was really annoying. That's probably why she's divorcing his sorry butt.

Monday morning parking lot bumper stickers:

"Jesus saves sinners...and redeems them for valuable prizes!"

"If you can read this, I've lost the trailer!"

"Gravity: It's not just a good idea. It's the law."

Didn't he used to be blond?

This is Prince William, the future King of England, who recently received his commission as an officer in the British Army. Probably just me, but the uniform looks more like he just joined the Russian Army.

Probably little point in buying a lottery ticket...

My sister, whose husband died unexpectedly in September, fell on an icy sidewalk earlier this week and broke her arm.

Bang

This is what happens to a Pepsi can if you leave it in the freezer too long.

You don't what to know what happens to the freezer.

Would a Marine by any other name still smell as sweet?

U.S. Marine sergeant Cody Baker, 29, thought he would sell naming rights to himself, like they do to sports stadiums and arenas.

The military thought differently.

Sgt. Baker put an online auction on his website -- the bidding got to $30,000. Some of the high bidders were:

Finest Freshest Fastest
George Bailey of Bedford Falls
and my personal favorite
Oprah Winfrey

The military wanted none of the above on Cody's military nametag.

His intentions were good -- to raise money for college and to "raise awareness about an orphanage for AIDS affected children in Thailand."

There is a rule against military endorsement of commercial ventures, however, which it was decided would include what would essentially be an advertisement on his uniform.

Too bad, Sgt. Oprah Winfrey would have been major kewl!

Here is his interview from CNN:

I'm hiding under the bed the rest of the day!

Rooty the Dog and I just went to McDonald's for lunch. There is a series of S-curves on the highway into town -- a two-lane road with a double yellow strip. I was not going slow, but some guy in a pickup passed me on one of the curves and sped on. What those of us who drive the road everyday know, and the pickup guy apparently didn't, is that it make no difference what speed you go through the S-curves. There are ten, twelve, fourteen, traffic signals just ahead, depending on which turn you take. They are not synchronized. He gained nothing by passing me. By the second signal, I was right behind him. Since I made a left turn and he didn't, I actually passed him as I turned.

Then there was the SUV that was directly ahead of me after I turned. In town, the highways are either three lanes or five lanes, with the center lane being a left turn lane. The SUV drove all the way through town, including through at least six traffic lights with left-turn lanes, straddling the yellow line. Even when it crossed through an intersection, it continued to straddle the yellow line marking the left-turn lane in the opposite direction. This produced many very startled looks on the drivers sitting in those left-turn lanes, and on the oncoming drivers in general. Basically, the driver kept the yellow lane under the drivers seat the whole way. I turned so I never did see who was driving.

Then there was the driver in the dedicated right-turn only lane who went straight ahead instead of turning, in the process almost crashing into two of us who were doing the right thing.

Maybe I'll make some popcorn and watch Oprah!

Gift Cards Have Become The New Fruitcakes

Stores really like to sell gift cards to you, primarily because a relatively high percentage of the ungrateful bums that you give them to never bother to redeem them. The recipients of your benevolence, when they do get off their lazy butts, also tend to buy more stuff than the value of their cards.

On the other hand, can you really spend $100 at Just Bulbs or The Licorice Store?

Well, plasticjungle.com to the rescue!

Where you can buy gift cards at a discount!

Where you can sell your gift cards for a small fee!

Where you can trade gift cards with others who don't want theirs!

And where you can sell your gift cards directly to Plastic Jungle at a discount!

It's terrific! Plastic Jungle has figured out a way to make money off of your greedy but unappreciative relatives and friends!!!!

Is this a great country or what?

The Bed That Ate Cleveland

Rooty the Dog's bed has gotten completely out of control. It started out as a single pillow in the family room, now it fills about 25% of the family room. There was an entire single-bed feather bed in it that I threw away because the feathers were escaping -- getting rid of something that large barely made a dent. His bed has swallowed old sofa cushions, guilts, blankets, pillows, and at least one of my old bathrobes. It's the Black Hole of the Doggie Universe, sucking in anything fluffy or cozy, snuggly or warm.

A less than silent night

One of the Catholic Churches in town has a life-size nativity scene on the corner of a very busy intersection. When we were stopped at the signal, Rooty looked to his right and mistook the floodlit Three Wise Men for carjackers. They were only about 15 feet away. Rooty went dogie-ballistic! Myrrh may have been thrown.

The very fine print

You've probably seen the ads -- post your resume on Monster.com and you double your chances of getting a job.

Sounds good.

But, it's double your chances of getting a job compared to Monster users who do not post a resume, not compared to all job seekers.

Here's the fine print: ComScore Networks, Inc. custom research 10/05 shows that Monster users who posted a resume
were twice as likely to get a job offer as Monster users who didn't post.

Thus raising the interesting question as to why you would be a Monster user and not post a resume, isn't that the whole point?

People with way, way too much time on their hands!

Unless they're Ameren Electric customers.

Click HERE for the complete story of the hamster-powered light.

"Is that your Hoover, or are you just glad to see me?"

It's a device for treating
erectile dysfunction!

"Once the user becomes manually stimulated, he depresses a switch with his foot or any other means to turn on the vacuum pump. The vacuum pump creates a negative pressure within the chamber that increases blood flow into the penis that produces an erection."

A more complete explanation, including what you do with the rubber band, and other wonderfully wacky patented contraptions can be found at patently silly.

Just kill me now...

Desperate times call for desperate pleasures.

If it gets any colder, I'm going to start wearing underwear!
If it goes subzero, I'll even wear socks!!

Up periscopes

A math professor that I had at UT-Austin was Japanese. Every December 7th he gave a pop quiz. I always thought that was in bad taste, funny, but in bad taste.

Here is a link to the USS ARIZONA NATIONAL MEMORIAL.

Thump thump thump

The round ceramic or plastic markers used by some states to mark lanes on highways and streets, creating rumble strips, are called Botts' dots (above). They are named after Dr. Elbert Dysart Botts.

A picture you can actually hear!

Avalanche buries local OfficeMax

I thought I would let those of you who live where it doesn't snow see what the awful stuff looks like after a few days. I took this picture today when I was over in Missouri. The snow is extra dirty because it had been plowed off of a Wal*Mart parking lot. The good news is that dirty snow melts faster because it absorbs more energy from the sun. The bad news is that it's only the start of winter!

the power is back on

the toilet seats will soon be warm again

a tunnel at the end of the light

the electric company says it will have almost all the power on by
sometime Wednesday, the key word being "almost"

power still out

still no expected restoration time, but there are electric company
trucks to be seen in the general area -- many of the neighbors have
bought generators so the street has a roar to it -- the seawall guys cut
up the limbs in my yard, about a pickup full -- warmer today so maybe
more will melt

my first cell phone to blogger post

|There are still almost 9,000 customers (households and businesses)
without power in my Zipcode. My little part of the electric grid serves
397 customers. The power went out Thursday evening.

|Restoring power in electric-company talk progresses from /order
received/, to /order assigned/, and then finally to power /back on/.

At present we are at "Order is being investigated" -- I'm assuming
that's something before "order received."

The cause of our particular outage is still unknown and there is no
estimated restoration time.

We lost cable before the electric went out but the landline telephone
has always worked.

Because of the windows on the south side, the house gets quite warm
during the day (about 70 degrees F). It will start cooling again when
the sun goes down.

I got out the sleeping bag so we could sleep closer to the fire tonight,
Rooty thinks we're going camping and immediately went and got his leash.
|

UPDATED UPDATE

SATURDAY AFTERNOON: lost power Thursday due to ice storm -- major tree damage but house ok -- keeping warm with fireplace -- limb crushed on car and three house roofs on my street -- 500,000 without electric in Illinois due to storm -- will post pictures later -- Rooty and I are ok
-----------------------------
SATURDAY EVENING: power still out, 78% of my ZipCode still out -- fireplace keeps family room about 65 degrees so that's fine -- I drained water from pipes in all but basement (I know it's cold but I'm still going to shower!!!!), and put antifreeze in all the drains except in the basement -- candles in bathroom and kitchen, powerpak keeps one lamp going in the family room -- I have a battery-operated TV with a 2 inch square screen -- the good news is that both McDonald's in town have power so we won't starve -- the street are clear, as are the highways, Illinois does a terrific job on snow/ice removal -- some photos of my yard are below.
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LATER SATURDAY EVENING: spent enough time in Missouri to charge the powerpak and cook Rooty some warm food, heading home now with a couple cases of logs in the trunk.

This poor pine lost all its limbs except on the south side. It's a big tree so I'll have to give some thought to whether or not it gets removed.

The white birch got turned into a weeping willow, hiding the front gate and the mailbox.

This is a close up showing how the ice bent the white birch over. Only one broke, but we won't know if the rest can be saved until the ice melts.

The line of maples on the west side had little damage, go figure!

I wanted to show the ice damage to the trees around the lake, but the phone cam just wasn't up to that. Send hot coals! Jim