Books

The last few books I've read have been exceptionally well-written and/or interesting:

The Amazing Adventures of Kavalier and Clay: Won the Pulitzer for fiction, understandably. I just can't say enough about this book. It draws you into the lives of the protagonists and takes you from Prague to Brooklyn to Antarctica to Manhattan and along the way makes you care about them deeply. With one or two exceptions, it never crossed my mind to doubt that such truly amazing adventures could be happening to real people. (This was a selection from my mothers' club book group.)

The Jesus Machine: How James Dobson, Focus on the Family, and Evangelical America Are Winning the Culture War: Dobson has been one of the most powerful non-elected men in politics over the last two decades. This is an unbiased (really) examination of how and why he got there, and also how the Christian Right became so powerful that it was able to pull off feats like winning Dubya the 2004 election.

Three Cups of Tea: I'm only about a third of the way through this book, but I'm totally hooked. The writing is wonderful and the story is truly incredible. It follows an incredibly fascinating person that I can't relate to at all to a place I can't imagine but makes me want to be along for the ride. (Our latest book club selection.)

More meat = more heat

As Bigdra points out over at NoE, transportation and electricity aren't exactly the only bit culprits in global warming.

American meat eaters are responsible for 1.5 more tons of carbon dioxide per person than vegetarians every year.

Quote of the Day

"Remember: Beer has food value, but food has no beer value."

Seen on a sign over the bar at Jersey Joe's, where, apropos of nothing, male customers outnumber women 10 to 1.

2007 deadlier than usual for drivers, pedestrians in San Jose area

The trend runs counter to what is happening statewide, where highway deaths fell 9 percent in 2006, the biggest drop in 14 years. Yet deaths on Bay Area freeways rose 9 percent last year.

"If there were that many homicides, people would wonder, `Where is this crime waving coming from?' But we seem to accept it," (police Lt. John) Carr said.

More proof the Bush Admin. is evil and dumb

In his attempt to dismiss us, Mr. Rove turned to head toward his table, but as soon as he did so, Sheryl reached out to touch his arm. Karl swung around and spat, "Don't touch me." How hardened and removed from reality must a person be to refuse to be touched by Sheryl Crow? Unfazed, Sheryl abruptly responded, "You can't speak to us like that, you work for us." Karl then quipped, "I don't work for you, I work for the American people." To which Sheryl promptly reminded him, "We are the American people."

Ah, spring in Yosemite!

This was the view from our tent Sunday morning in the Upper Pines campground. We were not really prepared for snow, so we packed up fast and came home.

Matthew woke up in a tent covered in snow and went wind surfing the same afternoon!

Off to Yosemite!!

Schrenk Rap is taking the weekend off for camping in Yosemite!

'Most E-Mailed' List Tearing New York Times' Newsroom Apart

This is a great Onion article because it really could be true. And I found it on Romenesko, so I was actually fooled for a second.

I also love how the Onion homepage has been redesigned to more closely resemble the NYT homepage.

Guns vs. cars: No contest

There is much hand-wringing, and rightfully so, this week about guns and how 30,000 people a year are killed by guns and how we need to revisit gun control (though not enough angst, me thinks, about how the Virginia Tech shooter wouldn't have had access to the weapons he used if Dubya had signed the renewal of the assault weapons ban, but that's another post).

And yet 41,000 Americans are killed each year in automobile crashes. That's about three-and-a-half Virginia Techs a day. And millions, of course, die each year of diseases caused by obesity and inactivity, which can be largely attributed to the sedentary lifestyle our car culture has enabled. Yet no hand-wringing there. No calls for more public transit or fewer roads. No outcry for expanded bike lanes or walkable cities. I guess it's easier to call for stricter gun laws when only 38 percent of American households own firearms, while 60 percent of American households have at least two cars. For most Americans, you'll have to pry the steering wheel out of their cold, dead hands.

Retailers drop invasive species

This is pretty progressive stuff, especially for a Midwestern mega-chain like Meijer that sells guns alongside groceries and baby clothes.

More on the values of Religious Right politicos

Regent University, founded by the televangelist Pat Robertson to provide "Christian leadership to change the world," boasts that it has 150 graduates working in the Bush administration.

Unfortunately for the image of the school, where Robertson is chancellor and president, the most famous of those graduates is Monica Goodling, a product of the university's law school. She's the former top aide to Alberto Gonzales who appears central to the scandal of the fired U.S. attorneys and has declared that she will take the Fifth rather than testify to Congress on the matter.

...

Consider George Deutsch, the presidential appointee at NASA who told a Web site designer to add the word "theory" after every mention of the Big Bang, to leave open the possibility of "intelligent design by a creator." He turned out not to have, as he claimed, a degree from Texas A&M.

...

Or there's the case of Claude Allen, the presidential aide and former deputy secretary of health and human services, who stepped down after being investigated for petty theft.

Divorce vs. Gay Marriage: The Dobson perspective

Good forbid some college kids have fun!

Can't people just learn to relax and take a joke?!?

Score one for the reader (finally)

This week a judge recognized Dean Singleton is out to screw the average Joe (whether he works for a newspaper or not) in order to fatten his own wallet.

MediaNews and Hearst had sought to dismiss Reilly's suit, arguing that individual readers have no stake in antitrust laws because they suffer no harm from any alleged reduction in newspaper competition.

Oh that's interesting. As a reader, I shouldn't give even a little rat's ass if my local paper is going down the crapper.

But U.S. District Judge Susan Illston said federal law recognizes the public's concern in maintaining competition and diversity in the news media....

law shows that "Congress values the existence of separate sources of newspaper content in a community, and that loss of separate sources injures consumers," Illston wrote.

More generally, she said, a consumer in a market that is threatened by anti-competitive activity has the right to sue for antitrust violations.

So, good luck to Clint Reilly, who should get a plaque or something for trying to help the rest of us get decent news coverage of our area.

Terry Gross sucks

No one, except for maybe Neifi Perez and George W. Bush, gets more success and acclaim for doing a crappy job than she does. Terry Gross is a terrible interviewer. If you're on the radio on stations all over the country and have a famous radio show, you shouldn't be using "um" and "like" in every sentence.

She is the queen of the painfully obvious statement. Such as saying something to Sacha Baron Cohen like: "Your humor is based on making other people feel uncomfortable." And that's not nearly the worst.

She is so freaking pretentious and overrated. The way she says "Frr-ESH Aairr" is enough to deserve banishment from the airwaves.

I would love to have someone comment on why they (or others) think Terry Gross is such a great interviewer.

Cubs snowed out

You read that right -- snowed. Why do people live there again?

By Paul Sullivan
Tribune staff reporter

April 11, 2007, 11:27 AM CDT

With a fresh blanket of snow on the field and the aisles as slushy as a convenience store drink, the Cubs opted to cancel Wednesday's game with Houston and reschedule it for the night of July 12.

A Cubs spokesman said the team is able to add another night game to the schedule because it kept one date open in case ESPN wanted to add a Sunday night game.

Manager Lou Piniella, holding his first press briefing in his new office at Wrigley, was realistic about the decision to cancel the game.

"You couldn't play today," he said. "And the weather for (Thursday) doesn't look all that promising. … You'd like to play, but you can't do anything about the weather."

The Cubs already have a scheduled off-day for Thursday, so Piniella and pitching coach Larry Rothschild decided to rearrange the rotation, moving Carlos Zambrano up to start Friday's game against Cincinnati, with Wednesday's scheduled starter, Rich Hill, moving to Saturday.

Ted Lilly will now pitch Sunday instead of Saturday, and Jason Marquis and Wade Miller will round out the homestand, starting against San Diego on Monday and Tuesday, respectively.

"What we're trying to do is keep everybody pitching as much as we possibly can," Piniella said.

Baseball announcers

Ah, it's that time of year again. The crack of the bat, the cry of the peanut vendor and the nails-on-a-blackboard sound of major league baseball's TV and radio announcers. Like every season, I am amazed by how bad most of these guys are. This is the major leagues, people!

Of course, part of the problem is that many color men are former players, and as a rule, those guys just aren't that bright (see yesterday's post -- and if you have ever heard Ron Santo on the radio, you know what I'm talking about). But still. There are only 30 major league teams. Assume there are a couple TV guys, and a couple radio guys, and throw in a couple more for the middle innings or whatever, and that's only 180 guys. One hundred and eighty people get these jobs, out of the 300 million Americans. And we baseball fans have to listen to people like Bob Brenly butcher the English language?

Granted, I get exposed to the low end of the curve because Chicago's teams have arguably the worst announcers in the biz (the Sox have un-arguably the worst announcers EVER). I know this because I pay the extra cash every season to get the satellite package that lets me watch every single ballgame, so I have listened to pretty much all of them. And listening to the Giants game the other day I noted that those guys can barely put a sentence together.

What must it be like to listen to a minor league game on the radio? It has to reduce your IQ by a point an hour or something. Then again, maybe something is keeping the good ones out of MLB, something like the chuckle-head ex-players getting these sweet gigs.

Sliding into first base

As I was listening to yesterday's Giants-Dodgers game, I heard a description of Jeff Kent sliding into first base. This has to be one of the least intelligent moves in all of sport (aside from pretty much any move in boxing, of course). For those who aren't aware, the rules of baseball require the runner to run from home to first and touch, but not remain on, first base. So the idea is to run as fast as you can for those 90 feet and not slow down until after your foot hits the base. Sliding is only required when you're trying to avoid a tag (at second, third or home) and when you need to stay on the base. Sliding is not going to get you to first any faster, and you don't have to avoid any tag. So why do players do it? I can only conclude that it is because they are dumb (for excellent example, see Kent above and associated facial hair). They are simply of below-average intelligence. Which may be why most announcing teams are so bad (more on this tomorrow).

More problems with the Merc

It's becoming ever more obvious by just reading the paper that Dean Singleton now owns it. In the last week we've noticed two typos in section front headlines -- first the biz section, yesterday a sub head on the front page -- above the fold!

To summarize: at this point, the Merc is about one step above the Fremont Argus.

Something fishy at the Murky News

This morning I was actually reading the print edition of the paper when I came across this story on the front of the local section. It seemed at first like an ordinary story about modern parenthood and kids' over scheduledjou lives, but then I opened to the jump on Page 6 and was created almost two full pages of of full-color ads for various summer camps! I think this would seem suspect even to the less media savvy of the South Bay. Dozens of giant ads right next to a story about the same topic? Close reading of the story itself reveals a rather one-sided view of parents scheduling each week of their summer vacation with video-game camp or Mandarin immersion overnights. I guess it's necessary for dual-income parents of school-age kids. But whatever happened to spending some summer weeks at Grandma's house? My kid's only a year and ahalf, but I know he -- and Grandma -- would love that!

"I support separation of church and hate"

That's the Bumper Sticker of the Day, seen at the Flower and Garden Show.

Also on the same car: "Partnership for an idiot-free America."

Alas, I fear both are pipe dreams.

Baltimore Examiner publisher uses his paper to sell his home

The utter absence of journalistic ethics in the Anschutz-owned Examiner chain from coast to coast is amazing.

The Baltimore Examiner recently ran a full-page piece (with four color photos) on a home that's selling for $606,000. What the paper didn't disclose is that the person trying to sell the "prime property," as it's called, is Examiner publisher Michael Phelps. The paper called on the guy who owned the house before Phelps to describe all of its charms, reports Laura Vozzella.

Drain Hetch Hetchy, Lungren says

Rep. Dan Lungren, R-Gold River, believes it's time to restore Hetch Hetchy Valley in Yosemite National Park by draining the reservoir that has been a source of clean water for San Francisco for more than 80 years.

"Rep. Lungren is the first member of the U.S. Congress to come out in support of this," said Ron Good, head of Restore Hetch Hetchy. "It's a breakthrough."

Lungren's endorsement of draining the 360,000 acre-foot reservoir is being announced in an opinion article the conservative Republican is sending to area newspapers. The cost of the valley's restoration is estimated at as much as $10 billion, although Good said environmentalists believe the cost will be far less.

Congress would have to approve the work, however, and that's where the big rub is. Sen. Dianne Feinstein, D-Calif., has been longtime opponent of the restoration idea. No other Bay Area Democrat in Congress has endorsed the idea, especially House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, D-San Francisco.

But Lungren is not exactly striking out on his own, either. The Bush administration has included $7 million in the Interior Department's 2008 budget to study restoration.

Celebrity sighting!

We finally saw our first celebrity on this weekend's visit to SoCal! It was this guy, who apparently played the brother on Everybody Loves Raymond. He was at the Subway in Malibu with his kids (well, I assume they were his kids and not just some random kids he borrowed) and a Bernese mountain dog puppy. Since I've never seen the show, I never would have recognized the guy if my brother-in-law hadn't pointed him out. He was actually wearing funny glasses and a hat. And apparently he does a lot of voice work.

Movie reporters too neat

If I'm an opossum who has been recently displaced by construction work, I'm going to the nearest newsroom and making a home within the work space of one of the cops or courtroom reporters. You could burrow a basketball-size hole, feed off half-eaten ham sandwiches and birthday cake and raise a nice opossum family.

Judges go after reporters

First amendment doesn't apply in Kansas and Minnesota, apparently.

The Midwest is a scary, scary place.

Two words: Box turtle

Santorum in talks to become Philly Inquirer op-ed columnist


Former U.S. Senator Rick Santorum says his talks with the Inquirer are "informal" and the column "may or may not happen." Publisher Brian Tierney confirms "low-level discussions" with Santorum, but puts the chances of the politico's column ever appearing at "one out of 1,000. We'd probably be more likely to have Dan Rather write a column for us. Seriously. And I'm not being facetious."

The Fang's prove once again to be bumbling idiots

AsianWeek Editor at large Ted Fang said Tuesday he regrets publishing a controversial column titled "Why I Hate Blacks" in this week's edition but has not decided whether to keep its author, Kenneth Eng, on his staff.

To read an excerpt of the column, click here and scroll down to the 2.24.07 post.

Lost sucks

Just wanted to put that out there, in case you didn't know.

"Next Wednesday! If you miss this episode, you won't know what everyone's griping about the next day!"

Does anyone give a crap about Jack's tattoos or the Thai chick he nailed on vacation? I didn't think so. "Secrets revealed" my ass.

Global warming will flood airports, parts of SF and 'burbs

If you live on the Peninsula (i.e., San Mateo, Redwood City, etc.) east of 101, you are hosed.

Airlines are evil

Someone is actually trying to do something about it!

West Wing gets it right (as in correct)

While watching an old episode of The West Wing the other day (I plan on doing this and pretending it's real until we have an administration that doesn't give me nightmares), I saw the president lecture a Dr. Laura-like radio host who points out that the Bible says homosexuality is "an abomination." He reminds her that the Bible also says that death is the appropriate punishment for working on the sabbath, touching the skin of a dead pig and wearing clothes made with two different kinds of thread. Of course, the character in the show had no response to this. As a matter of fact, I've never heard anyone on the right, real or fictional, explain this.

I'm also still waiting for someone to explain to me how my marriage is damaged when gay people get married.

More dumb abstinence stuff

The administration also has budgeted another $241.5 million for abstinence-only programs in 2007. Kirby compared California and Texas, two states he said were similarly populous and were home to many Hispanics, a group whose teen pregnancy rates are high.

"California took a very progressive approach," he said. "Texas pushed abstinence and made it a little more difficult for teens to receive contraceptives. Pregnancy did go down between 1991 and 2004, but Texas had the second-lowest decline of all states, 19 percent. California had the second-greatest decrease, 46 percent.

"What's really sad is that Bush is trying to take some of the policies that didn't work in Texas and implement them nationwide."

...

Claire Brindis, a professor of pediatrics and health policy at UCSF ... believes comprehensive sex education should be required, rather than merely permitted, by the state.

"Because there are so many myths out there," Brindis said, and teens grow up in a culture dense with sexualized mass media.

"One myth I've heard is that a person can't get pregnant the first time, and by the way, 20 percent of teens do. I've heard that if your boyfriend drinks Mountain Dew you won't get pregnant, or if you have sex standing up. Or if you sit on a cold sidewalk after you have sex -- I heard that in Southern California.

"I see in my work how early childbearing is both a result of poverty and how it contributes to an endless cycle of poverty. There's a lot of people who believe knowledge is dangerous, that if you give kids more information about condoms they'll go out and have sex.

"But isn't it better," Brindis asked, "to give young people and our large immigrant population the tools to plan? I can't think of anything more moral."

News Flash! Morons run the Examiner

Here's my reply:

As a resident of San Mateo County and a consumer of Hetch Hetchy
water, let me respond to your sarcastic editorial implying that
proponents of Hetch Hetchy Valley restoration all live outside the
Hetch Hetchy service area.

Your editorial demonstrates a gross misunderstanding of the facts.
First, the O'Shaughnessy Reservoir isn't "mammoth." It's the 20th
largest reservoir in California, and one of nine in SF's system.
Second, draining the reservoir will not reduce the amount of water
flowing to customers. Advocates of Hetch Hetchy restoration propose
moving the water closer to the people who drink it and returning the
valley to its originally intended purpose – the enjoyment of every
American.
Third, you are incorrect in saying Hetch Hetchy is "adjacent" to
Yosemite. It is, in fact, INSIDE Yosemite National Park. Uncovering
Hetch Hetchy Valley, which John Muir considered a second Yosemite
Valley, is doable and would right a century-old wrong.

America's favorite architecture

An interesting list of the most-nominated buildings listed as favorites by architects. Yankee Stadium and AT&T Park (Giants) are on the list above Fenway Park? Fenway is far more interesting than any other ballpark, and AT&T is just a copy of Wrigley.

Then there's the Astrodome. Please.

Something good in the federal budget!!!

Of course, the Wicked Witch of the West is already screaming her shrill warnings about the end of western civilization (i.e., San Francisco) if restoring Hetch Hetchy is even considered.

Immigration officials harass moms at school

Thank goodness the government is working so hard on national security. Those Mexicans in our schools were a real threat.

And Redwood City schools didn't need the ADA money those kids were bringing in. Not at all.

Update Feb. 8: Immigration officials claim it's all lies.

The redder, the greedier

This graphic from The Economist is pretty interesting. Sure, you could say that the red states are cold, but so are a lot of the Eastern blue states. When it comes right down to it, this is evidence of the red staters buying into Bush's ridiculous argument (until the State of the Union) that global warming doesn't exist, or isn't man-made. I'm amazed at how people have bought into that, since it's purely economic on his part, and not in any rational way ideological or Biblical.

MediaNews considers buying SF Chron

This would pretty much mean the end of Bay Area journalism.

More legislation in search of a problem

Sally Lieber doesn't have a monopoly on goofball legislation. This guy thinks that people who have just lost a family member in some sort of newsworthy event aren't aware that they can just tell the reporter to go away; he evidently believes that they are under the impression that they are obligated to talk to a reporter just because he or she starts asking questions.

And, in fact, time and again I have witnessed this phenomenon of reporter-as-therapy. People are almost always more than happy to talk to someone about their loved one and any crime or injustice that resulted in their death.

Sergey wants the world to have more reporters

Let's see him put his billions where his mouth is, buy some newspapers (or start some) and pay "professional journalists" what they're worth. Since that's never been done before, it seems an innovator like Brin would be eager to dive right in and try.

More on "pilotless drones"

This from the Freakanomics blog. Interesting theory. Doesn't make the call any less funny.

"Correct me if I'm wrong..."

This is beyond fantastic. It's the funniest thing I've heard since I was reporter and got calls like this on my voice mail. I hope the Chron continues to put these online on a regular basis.

Studio 60

Danny's obsession with Jordan: sweet or spooky? The jury's still out...

24 SPOILER ALERT

In five seasons of 24 we've never heard peep about Jack's family (other than wife and daughter) and now Evil Bluetooth Man is his brother? And Jack used to bang his wife? Um, ok.

As for the previews for next week, why couldn't they get Donald to play Jack's dad??

Pressure -- pushin' down on me, pushin' down on you...

Pressure -- of kids' birthday parties, that is. Kudos to these parents for starting this organization, but it's kind of disturbing that there is a need for it. Parents shouldn't have to be told that they don't have to have a better birthday party than the last one they attended. All that said, the website is kind of entertaining, especially the quiz and the examples of out-of-control parties.

Quite a gaffe, Mr. Morford

Mark Morford is one of the more, um, interesting local newspaper columnists. I subscribe to the email feed of his twice-weekly column. This week there was something more interesting to his writings than the usual references to nipples and bodily fluids. Morford's Wednesday column linked to this press release. At least, the first version, which was emailed to me, did. Since I subscribe, I get it before it even goes on the Web site. I read the column as it appeared on the web site in the morning, when it was called "9 Uncommon Ways to Keep Warm." I also clicked on the link to the press release, but didn't have time to read it until much later in the day. When I read the release, I realized that, instead of being about rangers being gagged on the evolution topic, as I had believed after reading the column, it was about a single book for sale in the visitors' center book store. I went back to the Chronicle web site, hoping to clear this up. That's when I realized the column had been edited on line to eliminate that item and was now called "8 Uncommon Ways to Keep Warm." Apparently someone had finally gotten around to editing the column. I haven't gotten around to searching for the paper version, if the column even ends up in there...

Bush administration hopes all the reporters' hands fall off

And anyone who actually has to work for a living, he doesn't care about them either way.

"David LaGrande, health and safety director for the Communications Workers of America, the Guild's parent union, argues the Bush administration and its congressional allies succeeded in burying the issue by preventing the federal Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA) from promulgating ergonomic standards. The precipitous drops in reported MSD injuries in industries such as meat-packing and telecommunications, he says, are evidence only that employers are no longer required to document these kinds of injuries.

Union priorities have shifted, too. LaGrande notes that two of the Guild locals most active on ergonomics, Philadelphia and San Jose, Calif., have been preoccupied more recently with preserving jobs under the old and new owners of their members' biggest newspaper employers."

Marin County-ites show their ignorance

These people have obviously never seen a Habitat for Humanity development, or talked to anyone who owns a Habitat home, and they very likely don't even have a basic knowledge of what Habitat does. They just hear "low-income housing," know they don't want those people in their posh neighborhood, and come up with the traffic excuse to explain their opposition.

Habitat is perhaps the most well-run non-profit I've become acquainted with. The homes are high-quality, the owners are chosen with great care, and safeguards are put in place to make sure the families who live there are stable. Anyone would be lucky to have a Habitat home in their neighborhood.

This is the all-time greatest blog post EVER

A must-read.

If you don't use your turn signal...

you are a selfish jackass. Don't give me your excuses about how you don't need it when "there's nobody around." Just because you don't see me trying to back my car out of my driveway or pedal my bike through an intersection, doesn't mean I'm not there. If you really can't be bothered to spend half a second flicking your wrist to show your fellow travelers where you are going, you are a narcissist and a borderline sociopath, and you shouldn't be allowed to drive.

Snorter In Chief

A diturbing review of Dubya's free ride.

Pro-lifers whif again

When I heard about this on NPR, I thought that maybe, finally, someone in federal government was going to do something practical about the abortion problem. While giving money to pregnant women and people who adopt babies is fine, why don't the right-to-lifers want to try to prevent unplanned pregnancies -- which often result in abortions?

If right-to-lifers really wanted to make a difference, they'd be handing out condoms in high schools and funding ad campaigns telling people how to use birth control. For reasons I can't fathom, they skip over this step in their head.

We somehow managed to convince people that smoking is bad -- even people who won't quit know it's bad for them. Why can't we convince people that having sex without birth control results in pregnancy?

I hate the freaking TSA

Arthur got these fabulous shoes for his birthday. They are so freakin' adorable.
If you're unfamiliar with Robeez, they are soft leather and openings are stretchy and the soles allow for a little bit of traction for those just learning how to stand up. Again, these are totally soft, nothing hard or stiff or metallic or even rubbery in any way involved.

Enter the Transportation Security Administration.

The TSA chuckleheads at all the airports we flew threw last week actually made us take Arthur's shoes off. Yes, the little soft leather Robeez could be the apparel of the world's youngest shoe bombers. As we come out of the assembly line of terrorist victory (aka, airport security at St. Louis) only one shark shoe comes down the conveyor belt. One has apparently been eaten by the x-ray machine. Bastards.

Grandma will be going home through there tomorrow, and she will check the lost and found, but I'm not holding out much hope...

Examiner (in Baltimore) hires disgraced journalist

Shocking!!

(yes, this Examiner is affiliated with the SF version)

Bah *$?!in' Humbug!

Well, my first mistake, I suppose, was going to Best Buy. (Well, first was probably waiting till the last minute, but I can blame my husband, the master procrastinator, for that.) Then I requested help from an employee.

Me: "Can you check to see if any other stores have it?"
Her: "Sure... Sunnyvale has one, but by the time you get there, they won't have it any more! *giggle*"
Me: "Can you check other states?"
Her: "Other states? You're going to another state?"
Me: "Yes, I'll be in St. Louis on Saturday."
Her: "St. Louis?...(looks at computer screen) We can check Nevada, Utah, Montana, Idaho..."
Me: "It's in Missouri. Can you check Missouri?"
Her: "Um, I'm not very good on my states."

I really hope this chick doesn't go to one of the high schools where I might end up sending my kid...

Shocking.

Most Americans have had premarital sex.

Even more shocking is the fact that someone from the Bush administration spoke conflicting statements!

This from today's article:

Wade Horn, assistant secretary for children and families at the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services, ... insisted there was no federal mission against premarital sex among adults.

"Absolutely not," Horn said. "The Bush administration does not believe the government should be regulating or stigmatizing the behavior of adults."

Then there's this, from a couple months ago:

"The message is 'It's better to wait until you're married to bear or father children,' " Horn said. "The only 100% effective way of getting there is abstinence."

The revised guidelines specify that states seeking grants are "to identify groups ... most likely to bear children out-of-wedlock, targeting adolescents and/or adults within the 12- through 29-year-old age range." Previous guidelines didn't mention targeting of an age group.

GnR!!

That's right, I was at the Guns n Roses concert in Oakland last night! It was exactly what you would expect from a GnR concert: lots of fights in the crowd, the smell of marijuana thick in the air, and Axel appearing ready to pass out after most songs. There was also a lot of pyrotechnics and even columns of fire ("Yeah, yeah, cool! Heh heh!) that warmed the crowd. Not exactly a big crowd, but, hey. It has been, oh, 15 years since they came out with an album.

Lucky for us, they decided to focus on that new album after this concert date. But we got to rock out in a swanky box close to the stage, thanks to Regan's awesome job! So, no, I did not actually spend money to see Axel Rose and some other guys who kind of look like the original members of Guns n Roses.

Now, at the concert, I thought that the most amusing thing about the event was the fact that Axel needed teleprompters (FOUR of them) placed around the stage, just in case (including the "Hnh!" at the end of Welcome to the Jungle.)

But then, I read this.

It ain't the West Wing, but...

Is anyone but me still watching Studio 60? I wasn't really expecting it to turn into this romantic dramedy, but I kind of like it. Really, how could I not like anything with Matthew Perry and Josh Ly -- I mean, Bradley Whitford?

Also, does anyone find it confusing that Bradley Whitford's character's name on Studio 60 is Danny, and Timothy Busfield's characters name on the West Wing was Danny? At least they made things easy in one respect by naming Matthew Perry's character Matthew.

Barney's Holiday Extravaganza

As cute as Barney and Miss Beazley are, I'm astounded by this... use of taxpayer money.

Weather anomalies

It seems that every time I talk to someone who has visited Chicago, they report having experienced excellent weather -- no rain or lightning, no unbearable humidity. Coincidence? Or is Daley somehow controlling the weather now, too?

Has this man had a surgical chin dimple scoop?

Nathan thinks so. More importanly, he's a tool and his continued employment is an American tragedy....

The fact that Fox allows Joe Buck to do the World Series when Vin is sitting at home is not only a crime but a slap in the face to one of the finest broadcasters of all time, one who has dutifully witnessed some of the greatest moments in baseball.

John Cusack, aka milkshake mofo

Last night we watched The Ice Harvest, an odd, but watchable movie. It reminded me of the milkshake quote, excerpted from this blog, found searching google for the milkshake quote:

I think Chuck Klosterman, in his excellent book Sex, Drugs, And Coco Puffs, summed up Cusack's appeal best:

It appears that countless women born between the years of 1965 and 1978 are in love with John Cusack. I cannot fathom how he isn't the number-one box-office star in America, because every straight girl I know would sell her soul to share a milkshake with that motherfucker. For upwardly mobile women in their twenties and thirties, John Cusack is the neo-Elvis. But here's what none of these upwardly mobile women seem to realize: They don't love John Cusack. They love Lloyd Dobler.

Lloyd Dobler, of course, is the hero from the 80s flick Say Anything. A charming, lovable and sometimes goofy teenager, Dobler uttered one of my favorite movie quotes of all time, in a scene in which he tries to explain his future plans to his potential girlfriend's father:

I don't want to sell anything, buy anything, or process anything as a career. I don't want to sell anything bought or processed, or buy anything sold or processed, or process anything sold, bought, or processed, or repair anything sold, bought, or processed. You know, as a career, I don't want to do that.

No sex for anyone

This is, um, interesting.

Still more legal corporate scams

Don't get that extended warranty!

More corporations that want to hurt you

As this columnist says, this is a good time to think about how bad it really is to rack up credit card debt.

Priorities

This is the kind of anecdote that really brings home the disturbing nature of the consumer-focused American culture:

Charlo Sterio, a 58-year-old horse groomer from Miranda, about 55 miles south of Eureka, was first in line to wait for the doors to open at 5 a.m.

Having camped out in front of the store for 24 hours, Sterio passed up Thanksgiving dinner offers from friends in order to drive down in his RV and buy a $380 laptop, a $190 desktop computer, a TV/DVD combination unit and other gizmos at steep discounts.

"I'm pretty hungry," Sterio said as he was jostled in yet another line inside the store at the computer section. "I missed Thanksgiving dinner. I sacrificed that."

But Sterio had no regrets. "I can't be in two places at one time, and my first choice was coming to Best Buy to get the deals," he said.

"Black" Friday

Busy day, today! At one point there was cookie-baking, soup-cooking and candle-making going on simultaneously!

The only buying I did today was of lunch at Quiznos and some candle-making supplies at Michael's.

Turkey Day

I'm thankful that this baseball season eventually did end.

I'm thankful that OJ isn't going to get to be on TV again.

I'm thankful that I live in California and not here.

Mostly, I'm really thankful for my wonderful little boy, fabulous husband and cute doggie. Happy Thanksgiving!

I hate Trader Joe's, too

So I went to Trader Joe's today to get this special pumpkin creme pie for tomorrow's Thanksgiving dinner with our neighbors. I was also shopping for the rest of our Thanksgiving stuff. Trader Joe's failed to provide fully HALF of all the stuff on my list. I don't understand why people shop there! You can't actually do your shopping there. They don't have pop. They don't have Cheerios. They have, like, two kinds of soup. Ugh. How do they stay in business?

oops

Boy, sometimes it's hard to post every day! And yesterday, I could have ranted about this or pontificated about the Soriano deal.

I hate Dianne Feinstein

She embodies all that is wrong with San Francisco politicians. She believes the entire world revolves around San Francisco and the needs of the city trump everything else. Most San Franciscans believe this, but she has the power to impose this belief on the rest of us.

How dare a private business announce plans to leave the glorious city! How dare the cities that buy water from San Francisco ask that SF use those cities' own money to fix the broken water system! And how dare environmentalists even consider moving San Francisco's water (never mind the millions of little people who don't live in SF who use the water) so that a crime against the land of a national park be reversed!!!

Meteor shower bust

Arthur and I drove up to Skyline tonight to try to view the meteor shower. Some other folks who were up there claimed to see a couple shooting stars, but I guess I missed them. We all left after about an hour...

This is pretty terrible

This is one misguided judge.

Horrors! I didn't post yesterday!

Luckily, this post, which links to one of the most disturbing things I've seen in the paper recently, makes up for it.

This is what's wrong with the world

A cyclist gets run over by a car, and then gets arrested. No charges for the incompetent driver, of course.

Andrew Hamm web memorial

Please check out this great website in tribute to our friend Andy.

Cool the Planet!

Cool the Planet: Tips #3 from Cool Families

The air is crisp and you've probably turned on your heater or furnace
by now. So here's the first Action of the month: Turn down your
thermostat by two degrees in winter. For each degree, you can cut your
energy bills up to 5 percent and keep 315 pounds of planet-heating
carbon dioxide out of the atmosphere in a year. Flex Your Power
recommends 68 degrees in winter, and 55 degrees at night and when
you're not home. Consider installing an inexpensive Energy Star
thermostat that you can program (set it to warm the house just before
you get out of bed!).

Second action of the month: Use less gasoline! This is probably one of
the biggest things we can all do to stop global warming. Here are a
few suggestions to get you started:
* Don't idle. Whether you're in the school's drop-off zone or on the
wrong side of road construction, turn off your engine and save gas and
money.
*Spend a few minutes talking with your family about how you can drive
less. Maybe you could set up a carpool for after-school activities.
Maybe you could walk to a nearby shopping center to run a few,
lightweight errands, or if you do drive, park in a central location
and walk to the shops within a quarter of a mile. Ride your bike with
your kids to do your errands or go to school.
*Consider if there's one day in your week or month when you can leave
the car in the driveway, choosing instead to bike to work, take the
bus to the movies, or stay at home relaxing. One less pound of carbon
dioxide is emitted for every mile you bike, walk or take public
transit instead of driving.

To learn more: Last month we talked about how much money and
electricity you can save by installing compact fluorescent bulbs. Old
thermostats and compact fluorescent light bulbs contain mercury.
Please dispose of them at free household hazardous waste days or the
San Carlos Recycling Center, 650-592-2411.

To do more: Consider supporting International Buy Nothing Day, held
the day after Thanksgiving. By staying home from crowded shopping
centers, you'll save gas, save money, and save on the gasoline used to
make products, package them and ship them. We'll give you some great
alternatives to shopping next month in the December issue of Cool the
Planet. In the meantime, check out these great resources on
simplifying the holidays http://www.newdream.org/holiday/simplify.pdf
and buying responsibly http://www.newdream.org/consumer/index.php.

Subscribe to the Cool Families bulletin for future tips and links at
this site: http://groups.yahoo.com/group/Cool_Families_Bulletin/. If
you'd like to work with us to inspire positive action, join the group
here: http://groups.yahoo.com/group/CoolFamiliesRWC/.

Warming, schmarming

Great to see people are pointing to Chrichton's novel as a way to learn about global warming. As my hubby said, that's like reading "Disclosure" to learn about sexual harrassment. Yikes.

Farewell to Rummy

Here's a good one:

"We do know of certain knowledge that he [Osama Bin Laden] is either in Afghanistan, or in some other country, or dead."

Or, just stick with the old classic:

"Reports that say that something hasn't happened are always interesting to me, because as we know, there are known knowns; there are things we know we know. We also know there are known unknowns; that is to say we know there are some things we do not know. But there are also unknown unknowns -- the ones we don't know we don't know."

The "Real OC"

I'm trying to decide if I can actually feel sorry for these parents or not. Yeah, the MTV presence is probably a distraction, but they're the ones who are letting their kids drink, go on shopping sprees and get plastic surgery.

"Anyone out of high school forced to watch more than an hour of “Laguna Beach” might possibly feel the urge to beat themselves about the head with a large stick."

Down with Pombo!

A lot of great stuff happened this Election Day, but this one may be the top.

Don't forget to vote!

...if you havne't already. (This isn't Chicago, after all...)

A's actually moving?!?!

OK, I know tomorrow is election day and all, but this is a really big deal! If it actually happens this time.

It would totally rule to have them so close!!!

(Btw, am I the only one who thinks it's incredibly freaking weird that the Chronicle is linking to Wikipedia???)

Prop. 87: YES (duh!)

If Exxon is opposed to it, you want it to happen.

Andy's obit from the Tracy Press

Andrew Hamm June 7, 1960 — Oct. 30, 2006 Services will be Monday for former Tracy Press reporter Andrew Hamm, 46, who suddenly died Monday at his Tracy home. A native of South New Jersey, Mr. Hamm had lived in Northern California for the last 26 years. A veteran of the U.S. Marine Corps, he served from 1978 to 1982 and was discharged as a corporal. Mr. Hamm covered city and police issues for the Press until about 1998, when he left for a position with the Tri-Valley Herald. He spent the last six years reporting for the Silicon Valley/San Jose Business Journal. Mr. Hamm loved sports, especially baseball, and he played on many recreation softball leagues as an adult. He was an avid fan of Bruce Springsteen. Mr. Hamm was a beloved brother and son and he will be missed by all who knew him. He is survived by his mother, Jean Hamm; brothers, Douglas Bonnell, and his wife, Amanda, Glenn Hamm, and his wife, Annette, Frank Hamm, and his wife, Trish; sisters, Marianne Bonnell, Paula Hamm, Alice Baker, and her husband, Larry, Janet Brunetti, and her husband, Jon, Betty Carter, and her husband, Dale, Judy Barker, and her husband, Michael, Victoria Anderson, and her husband, Jim; former wives, Esther Gonzales and Zena Robbins; and numerous nieces and nephews. He was preceded in death by his father, Frank Hamm. Monday’s services will be from 2 to 4 p.m. at Hotchkiss Mortuary, 5 W. Highland Ave.

Published on Saturday Nov 04, 2006 in http://www.tracypress.com

Andrew F. Hamm, 1960-2006

A good friend, good writer and good softball player.

Prop. 90: NO

It's almost election day. So it's time to talk about propositions. Let's start with 90. Proponents say this is supposed to limit eminent domain, which sounds like a great idea. Except it actually forces the government to pay people when they do something that damages their property values. (Does that mean Redwood City has to pay me because my street is unsafe and they refuse to do anything about it? Hmm, probably not.) This would basically decimate all publicly funded programs. So I don't know how this got on the ballot. Anyhow, it's bad.

Cheap Food Nation

"Throughout the European Union, laws have been passed to guarantee food safety and animal welfare, restrict the use of antibiotics among livestock, ban genetically engineered foods, encourage organic production, and begin the deindustrialization of agriculture. These laws do not mean a return to the 19th century. On the contrary, they encourage the wise, careful application of 21st-century technology, along with a sense of humility before nature."

It's November

Regan says we're supposed to post every day.

Boy, are we lazy

So you really think you needed your car for that trip to the store today?
(ignore the first pic and scroll down for the really good ones)

suckPod

I hate my iPod. I believe I have posted about this before. I still hate it. Even more than when I first got it. Sheep that I am, it didn't occur to me to look at other MP3 players. Everyone's got an iPod; they must be great, right?

The click wheel is stupid. I always end up overshooting my goal when wheeling through menus. It's impossible to use it while driving, since you pretty much have to be looking at it to hit anything but "play" or "menu". And if I want to listen to the same album today that I was listening to yesterday, I have to go all the way through all the menus again and find the same playlist! Can the stupid little drive just remember what I was listening to when I hit pause? Noooo....

Those people won't stop until they make on that's microscopic. Maybe they should focus on making the normal-sized ones usable. I don't see why anyone needs one that's smaller than my Mini.

St. Loser

Oh how I hate the Cardinals. If only I could have stayed in Europe for the entire month and ignored this pathetic mess completely.

The double-curse

We all know that the team with the most ex-Cubs almost always loses the World Series. But in this case, he was asking for it.

Why Christians should care about global warming

"This concern for Creation Care as we call it, comes straight from God and the Holy Spirit who is regenerating people’s hearts to realize the imperative of the scriptures to care for God’s world in new ways. It comes from God Himself. ... The climate change crisis that we believe is occurring is not something we can wait ten years, five years, even a year, to address. Climate change is real and human induced. It calls for action soon. And we are saying action based upon a biblical view of the world as God’s world. And to deplete our resources, to harm our world by environmental degradation, is an offense against God. That’s what the Scriptures say. Therefore, if we are to be obedient to the Scriptures, there is no time to wait, no time to stall, no time to deliberate."

--Rev. Richard Cizik, Vice President for Governmental Affairs, National Association of Evangelicals

Find out where to see the movie.

Nice post by Nemesis today

Especially worthy of observation is the violent-rage-of-Clinton link.

Sienna and the Tuscan countryside

We enjoyed our guided tour out to two old towns in Tuscany, and the
views of the country-side that we saw from the bus to and from our
destinations. The tour first took us to the town of Sienna, which is
one of the oldest towns in Tuscany, having been an ancient city
settled by the Etruscans, with stone buildings and walls before Rome
was more than a camp. Sienna is built on three hills, and has very
narrow streets running between old brick and stone buildings that are
4 and 5 stories tall, so the streets are in shade for most of the day.
They have an amazing Duomo (cathedral) with many elaborate stone
carvings on the floor, and the usual assortment of statues and
illuminated manuscripts, ornate gilded patterns on the ceiling, etc.

The central piazza of Sienna is very large, and shaped like a big
sea-shell. They have a horse race around the square every summer, in which the 17 different districts of the town each enter
one horse to compete. 40,000 people cram into the middle of the
square and the horses run around the outside. It sounds crazy, and
very hot. It is odd to think of living in a building that is 800
years old, or even 400 years old, like some of the people in Sienna
do.

Our tour then took us to San Gimignano, which is a very well preserved
medieval town. Partly it is so well preserved because it was
abandoned for hundreds of years after the black plague killed most of
the people in the town. It is famous for the tall towers that still
survive, packed in relatively densely.

While both towns were interesting, we felt rushed. I think this is the nature of any guided tour, but it seemed the best way to get out to Sienna. We wished we'd had more time there; as it was, we hardly had any time to explore in either of the towns. But it was certainly relaxing to spend a day not having to make any decisions about what to do and where to go, and talking to some people who were native English speakers for the first time in 10 days!

Back home

Our access to the Internet was pretty limited in Italy, but we're back in the states now, currently in St. Louis. We are heading back to San Fran tonight.

My in-laws asked -- and we keep asking each other -- what our favorite cities or sights were. I still have to say that maybe my favorite aspect of the whole trip was finally getting to use the German that I studied for so many years in high school and college -- but it also made me wish I knew more! In Prague most people we dealt with spoke English, but it was disconcerting going to Italy where even the hotel clerks didn't know much English. That was a challenge.

The main thing I didn't expect about some of the cities we went to was the amazing throngs of tourists and the accompanying trade of tourist crap. Florence in particular is overrun with guys who spread out a sheet on the ground and display knock-off handbags. They use the sheet as a bag to move to a new spot on a regular basis. There are also the stands selling t-shirts, hats, post cards and other junk (like cheap statues of the David and the ubiquitous boxer shorts with the corresponding parts of the David statue printed on them). At times it almost felt like we were in a Disneyland version of these cities instead of the real thing, since everything seemed geared toward tourists. After a couple days I was able to get used to it and notice but see past the crowds and appreciate the grandeur of the sights we were seeing. Still, our experience in Berlin was different. Though we did touristy things there, I also felt like we experienced some of what Berlin is like for Berliners; I don't think we got that in the other cities.

I'll post some more detailed summaries of what we did in Florence and Rome, drawing from Nathan's updates to our families from when we were there.

Florence

This morning we arrived in Florence around 9 a.m. We were on our train from Prague from abou 5 p.m. until almost midnight, when we switched in the Munich train station. That, so far, has been the most surreal of our experiences in Europe. On the train to Munich, I had been stretched out on some empty seats sleeping. Nathan woke me up when we pulled into Munich and we quickly gathered our things and detrained and learned out Florence train was on the other side of the station. As we quickly hauled our bags across the station, we were passed on all sides by streaming masses of young German Frauen und Herren in traditional German dress and lederhosen. Oktoberfest was supposed to have ended the day before; my theory is that the festival stays open an extra day for those who worked it, and the Bier drinking goes on ... I was half asleep through all this and kind of disoriented. I pulled out my little camera to try to capture at least one of these groups of crazy bier drinkers, but it was temporarily not working. So I'll never know if it was all just a dream...

From Munich we were in a car with a set of bunk beds, so we slept (surprisingly well) on our way to Florence. We took a cab from the train station to our hotel and were lucky to find our room ready, we checked in and showered and then set off to explore for the day. I was starving, and luckily we found a place that sold big, delicious slices of pizza for 2.50 Euros. In our wanderings we saw more African guys selling knock-off handbags and sunglasses than just about anything else. Well, except tourists, of course. My guidebook says Florence has about 320,000 residents and 9 million visitors per year. We passed over the 'gold bridge', which houses dozens of jewelry sellers. Shopping appears to be the favorite past time here. The tourist guide brochures even advertise guided, all-day shopping tours. I think maybe you can get some good deals here, if you're so inclined; designer jeans that would probably cost about $150 at Nordstrom are about 50 euros here.

On our way back to the hotel, Nathan commented that the city seemed dead outside of the tourist center. That was around 2 p.m. After resting at the hotel and venturing back out around6, we realized that we had been seeing the long lunch break; at 6 things were happening. So I guess the ideal schedule is : mornings at a musuem, than lunch, then a nap from 2-4, then shopping, then dinner!

Florence is very walkable, and our hotel is outside the city center, which I think is beneficial in that it shows us a more authentic Florence neighborhood as we walk back from meals, sightseeing and such. It is absolutely a lovely city.

Tonight we ate at a terrific restaurant that was recommended in the guidebook. I tried tripe, which is supposed to be a Florentine specialty. It was ok. I think Nathan's veal was better.

Tomorrow we hope to get up early and go to one of the famous museums before the que gets too long.

Prague

Sunday morning we left
our hotel in Berlin after eating a quick breakfast so we could get to the
Hauptbanhof (train station) for our 7:42 train. It arrived on time, of
course, and we took our seats and settled in for the four-and-a-half
hour trip. We napped some at the beginning, read our books, and looked
at the scenery. The part of Germany that we went through was quite
flat, and Berlin quickly gave way to farmland. No sprawl like in the
U.S. After the Czech Repub. border it started getting quite
mountainous. We even saw terrain that reminded us of Yosemite, as the
train tracks followed a river with sheer rock cliffs jutting up from
the banks.

Our train happened to arrived in the smaller of the Prague train
stations. We decided to take a cab to our hotel, since we didn't have
any idea how to do public transit here (we only took one cab in
Berlin, to the hotel this morning, because the buses weren't running
frequently enough that early on Sunday--only about $15 for the cab
ride). We were quickly spied by a cab driver who offered to take us to
our hotel for 500 Crowns -- about $30! I didn't realize the exchange
rate and that we should have bargained with the cabbie. Oh well. Now
we know.

Lunch was at a restaurant near our hotel. It was an Italian place, but
we had some Czech sausages in addition to our salads. The salads were
not quite like anything we knew -- I had tuna and Nathan had fried
calamari. His came in the shape of onion rings on a bed of cucumber,
super-thin-sliced onions, eggs, tomatoes, etc (mine was on the same
bed). It was good, but the beer and sausages were great.

After that we checked into our hotel room. Then we
took a bus down to the main part of the city and walked to the castle,
which is by far the most popular and most celebrated attraction in the
city. It's really a little city unto itself on a hill above Prague.
And it is filled with souvenir shops and restaurants just waiting to
ensnare tourists (most of whom speak English or German). Prague
reminds me of the Fisherman's Wharf area of San Francisco, with it's
throngs of tourists, souvenir shops and signs blaring -- mostly in
English -- things like "best ice cream in Prague" or "oldest pub in
Prague." In spite of all that, the castle is amazing. Construction
started in it in the 1300's. It took a couple centuries for it to be
mostly finished, I think. We visited St. Vitus (sp?) Cathedral within
the castle. It was crammed with people tilting their heads to take
pictures of the enormous stained glass windows, the towering ceiling
and the colorful light reflected through the glass onto the stone
walls. Nathan said it reminded him of Notre Dame, and I think I heard
someone else there saying the same thing. After that we wandered
through some of the rest of the castle and down through the gardens in
front. Then we walked down the main touristy drag and did a bit of
souvenir shopping. (Prague is known for its crystal and blown glass
items.)

Monday morning we had breakfast in our hotel -- included again, and
pretty similar to our breakfasts in Berlin, but we missed having
orange juice. After that we checked out of our hotel and took the bus
to the main part of Prague. It was a bit of an adventure. First we
couldn't get on the 133, the bus we took last night that took us right
where we wanted to be, because it was too full! So we waited a few
minutes and took the 207, which stopped a little short of where we
wanted to be, so we had to walk an extra half mile or so. The bus was a bit slow because of traffic jams -- a thing unknown in Berlin. The subway
and trams in Prague don't seem to cover a great area. The buses seem
to go just about everywhere, but I don't think we had a great transit
map. The streets are so windy in Prague that I had a very hard time
getting my bearings, and the language is so unfamiliar that it was
hard to remember the names of the streets we were on.

We spent the whole day wandering around the main part of Prague,
stopping here and there to sit and watch the people go by. Prague is
an amazing city, and a bit overwhelming. Walking the cobblestone
streets and alleys between the centuries-old buildings is a unique
experience. This is a day we won't forget; hopefully we'll be able to
come back here some day.

One last thought: Before we came to Prague, we heard lots of talk about how cheap
it is. From what we can tell, that's a bunch of hooey.