Monday Cool

Well, I'm not really sure what to say about all of this, but I just wanted to share this with those of you who haven't seen it yet. I just came across a guy named Pjotro who has built a suit that translates his dance moves into music. This video embedded below is from a truly bizarre Russian talk show (apparently hosted by Jabba the Hut [or the Baron Harkonnen, depending on which nerd-verse you're coming from]), and it shows a live performance of the dance suit. If you're interested, a search for "Pjotro" on Youtube will yield more videos. But do check out his website - with a bit of searching and enduring a rather long intro (which is hilarious, he sounds like Count Dracula) you get to the real gem. You can create a dance for him to perform using a variety of options and then make him dance it. Just check it out, it's well worth the time. He's also got a blog that talks about everything from the construction of the suit to his world tour. Be sure to check out the "about me" section too - it's hilarious.

How I Won Father's Day

So, holidays/birthdays that require the exchange of presents are always the source of some consternation in my family. Mostly my parents refuse to tell my brother and me what they want (or even what they would tolerate) as a gift. This year, for Father's Day, I applied my superior intellect to the problem and lo and behold - the greatest Father's Day gift of all time. Here's the product itself, but more importantly, below is a picture of my dad wielding it. Tremble in fear of this image and bask in awe of my complete and utter mastery of this holiday of holidays.


As a fun side-note, I was pretty uncomfortable buying this at Dick's Sporting goods - it didn't really help when the cashier immediately said, "Wow, you could really hack some people up with that!" He's right, but that's not what it's for. Honest.

Thumbs Up Special

So many things to bitch about, so little time. Instead of trying to cram everything in, I'm just going to talk about our Savior, Al Gore - or as the folks at Hotair.com call him, Goracle. In case you've forgotten, Goracle is now the champion of the environment, flying all over the world in his private jet to give talks (out of the goodness of his heart - and for over $100 million dollars in speaking fees). As a side note, he just bravely (after the nomination had already been decided) stepped up to endorse Obama (who admitted that he flies friends in to play basketball with him - nearly as environmentally hypocritical as the Goracle himself). But I digress. There's just so much to be appalled about with this guy that I can't even keep it all straight. For instance, the fact that he won the Nobel Peace prize for his "work," including the pseudoscientific (in that it distorts the facts to meet its alarmist ends) sham that is "An Inconvenient Truth" (a movie made from a slideshow). Now that's all fine and good - we need to be more aware of the impact we have on the environment. The real travesty here is that he won the Nobel Peace prize instead of Irena Sendler, who saved the lives of 2,500 Jewish children during the Holocaust at significant risk to her own life. Behold, Goracle!
By the way, I didn't make that image - if I had, it would have been way less understated. At any rate, the real purpose for this Thumbs Up for Mr. Gore is his valiant efforts to overhaul his enormous Tennessee mansion to make it more green (I would have just painted it). This was an important step for Gore, who has been criticized for being the world's biggest hypocrite. And boring. Click here to read the Tennessee Center for Policy Research's press release (really, it's short and well worth it) detailing Goracle's heroic transformation of his home from an energy-gobbling monstrosity that used 20 times the energy of the average US home to an energy-gobbling monstrosity that uses 10% more energy than it did before the renovation. That's right, it uses more energy now that he's made all of these improvements. But I guess all of that goes away when he throws money at "carbon-offsets," which are maybe the most idiotic result of his enviro-alarmism.

What people need to know, however, is that Al Gore might not actually be in this for the good of the world - what you never hear about is the fact that his investment company, GIM, holds a 9.5% stake in Camco Global, a company with one of the largest holdings of carbon credits. As you can see, Goracle stands to make quite a bit of money on the tails of the cap and trade program he has so fervently espoused. So for all this and more, here's a big thumbs up for Al Gore, savior of the environment. Want to learn more? Watch the video below to find out how you can help stop climate change. UPDATE: For those of you who want the facts, and not just my summary of them. Also not that Reuters reported it too, so this isn't just "Right-Wing conspiracy" against the Goracle.

Basketball is Stupid

So, during this exciting season, I know many of you out there are wondering how I feel about Basketball. Well, I'll tell you - I think it's stupid. Now, don't get me wrong, I enjoy a good, hard-fought college game, but I find the NBA to be borderline intolerable. Why, you might ask? Because laziness is rewarded - these players are some of the most phenomenal athletes in the world, not to mention the most immense, and they flop around like rag dolls when there's the slightest contact. "Draw a foul?" Despicable words. The worst part is that they get rewarded for moving just enough to make someone bump into them and then falling over like a baby. There is not another sport out there that encourages not trying to make a play (unrelated - NASCAR is not a sport and the drivers are not athletes). I know I'm not alone in thinking that this is ruining the game - in fact, click right here to listen to Commissioner (I totally want to have the title "Commissioner" before I die) David Stern talking about the flop on the Dan Patrick show. And if you don't believe that it's a problem, behold! The clip below will surely show you your error.



Maybe I just don't love basketball as much as this a-hole (on the right - he looks kind of familiar), or maybe I just can't revert to child-like wonder as easily as him. Oh well, I just hope Jack Nicholson doesn't read this and attack my car with an umbrella. Oh, and I couldn't decide which of these pictures to include, so here's another picture of Kobe Bryant. Also, go to www.floppolice.com for updates on the rumored rule changes and to sign the petition.

Back in Kansas

So, I guess it's been about a month already since the last post. I've been pretty busy - I'm back in Kansas, livin' it up. I missed the fam when I was up in Idaho, but definitely not the humidity. The awesome news is that I got back in town here just in time for all of my friends (or the last remaining KS residents) to leave - Jacob is in Lawrence for the month, and Adam is doing a medical program in India... and that's pretty much it.

In other news, I had the pleasure of going to the dentist today - probably my least favorite thing in the whole world. Everyone always says, "Oh it's so great going to the dentist! I just love leaving with my teeth all clean!" No. That's not generally how I feel when I leave the dentist's office. I feel brutalized. I feel violated, like I just paid to have someone rip up my gums with metal skewers and then proceed to berate me for not taking good enough care of them. I think that the hygenists want your mouth to be in perfect condition when you get there so they have a clean canvas on which to paint their portrait of pain (I've been pretty into alliteration lately). Now don't get me wrong, I don't go in there with crap in my teeth - I take very good care of my teeth. Partly because I would rather go back to China than have any kind of oral surgery (that's saying a lot), and partly because I don't want to get ragged on for not flossing when I go to the dentist. My dentist and the hygenist I normally get are really nice, but I'm pretty sensitive about the comments they make. Especially since they pretty much rate your effort over the last 6 months and they always put on this concerned/disappointed voice as if to convey the gravity of the situation. I floss every day and brush my teeth 2-3 times a day, so there's not a whole lot more I can do. And, they're sort of sending mixed messages since you always have to walk through the hall of horrors with all of the cautionary pictures of dental disfiguration just to get to the damned chair. But then, they have to do at most 30 seconds worth of cleaning before they polish (more like buff) and they still feel the need to make me feel like my teeth are rotting out of my head. Bitches. I just saw pictures of what it looks like when peoples' teeth are rotting out of their heads, and unless something changed pretty drastically from when I brushed my teeth this morning, I don't think I'm quite there yet. I'm not going to go into the whole awkward conversation tangent, because I feel like it's been pretty well covered over the last 150 years, but I will say that even when I do have a chance to actually say words (not just, "eeaooouow, eeehh hhooooll," or the like), I generally don't. Not because I'm rude or because I just sit there and pout, but because I don't like seeing someone perched over me, waiting to shove bloody meathooks back into my mouth while I wrap up my 5 word sentence about how rainy it's been lately. Bitches.

Speaking of bitches, in case you missed it, Clint Eastwood recently made Spike Lee his bitch by telling him to "Shut his face." Well said. Read the story over at Filmdrunk.com.