u235

BOSTON (AP)-- A man serving a life sentence for murdering his wife is asking a federal judge to order the state to pay for a sex-change operation, arguing that denying him the surgery amounts to cruel and unusual punishment.

A psychiatrist testified Tuesday that he believes Robert Kosilek -- who now goes by Michelle -- will commit suicide if state corrections officials refuse to allow the surgery and Kosilek is unable to complete the transformation into a woman.

Damn funny, if you ask me. A convicted murderer with lots of time on his/her hands decides that he's really a she.... and wants the state to pay for the costly surgery to gender bend him. What's not so funny is that the state has already paid for part of the treatments....

In 2002, U.S. District Judge Mark Wolf ruled Kosilek was entitled to treatment for gender identity disorder, but he stopped short of ordering the state to pay for a sex-change operation.

Since then, Kosilek has received psychotherapy, female hormone treatments and laser hair removal.

What the hell? The therapy I can see, but hormone treatments? And ffs hair removal? That costs money - good money earned by taxpayers so a potential shemale doesn't have to shave? Gtfo. Still, I think like many problems the solution has already been presented with the problem...

Dr. George Richard Brown, a psychiatrist, said Kosilek's depression and anxiety have improved since the hormone treatment began.

If Kosilek does not have a sex-change operation, Brown said, ''I believe that she would kill herself.''

Whelp, sounds like a plan to me. If it wants to kill its self that's just fine. There certainly wouldn't be a good place for "her" if the operation was performed and you put "her" back in a male prison. It's also not fucking fair to put "him" in with an all-female prison.

Personally it just sounds like someone's sex fantasy has gone on a little too long. The asshole probably just wants to get his hands on some warm panties while he's still in prison and have the state pay for it.

I have yet to figure out why technical content publishers insist on putting portraits of authors or interviewees on the cover of their materials. WROX started doing this ages ago with their fire-engine red technical publications for software weenies. At the time someone I knew actually sent them email asking what in hell they were thinking. ATTENTION TEHCNICAL PUBLISERS: PUTTING UGLY PEOPLE ON THE COVER OF YOUR GOODS IS A DETERRANT TO THEIR PURCHASE. Wrox took it as an insult. We took their attitude as an insult. Nothing was resolved, but they did find out that some readers hated their covers, even if we were forced to buy the books... so in the end we just stuck stickers over the ugloids on the front and Wrox got their money.

On a quick aside, O'Reilly doesn't have that problem. The cute black/white litho-style prints of esoteric beasts endorses a Pokemon mentality in buying their products. O'Reilly >> Wrox.

Back to the topic. Ugly tech people.

Now I get the usual assortment of technical rags in the company mail. Once in a while I'll glance at a cover and see if there's anything remotely of value besides the miles and miles of advertising they're stuffed with. I have two journals of potential interest, but I haven't opened them yet to read the articles... why? Because the journal decided to put the ugly mug of the author on the cover. It's like a seal of warding. I want to read the article, yet I'm thoroughly deterred by their image. Thus the magazine goes from desktop to bookshelf and eventually to the trash...unread.

I have to presume that the only point to putting their picture on the cover is to encourage the author to manually distribute the copy to every family member, peer, and vague acquaintance within mailing distance (some of whom probably then burn their copy in ritual sacrifice in an attempt to protect themselves against repeat mailings).

Get a clue folks, I don't mind covers with technical pictures, graphs, charts, whatever. Even plain covers with just the title, publication date and price (if any) lend a certain staid dignity. But techs as a whole are not a generally handsome demographic group. The odds are you're never going to find one attractive enough - thus keep them OFF the cover if you want people to actually get to the content.

There's been a move on lately to classify some pets as therapeutic partners. What does that mean? It means that a person depends on their pet for constant, and I mean constant, companionship in order to simply exist without falling apart, and thus must have the pet with them at all times.

*cough*BULLSHIT*cough*

Ok with that out of the way lets look at what's going on.

In the NY Times article titled "Wagging the dog, and a Finger" (sorry no link provided because the Times now charges for access to older articles - even if it was published last week) they detail how doctors are being asked to provide letters for people who want to claim their animals as therapy pets. And by claiming your pet is the solution for your medical (mental) conditions, you can then gain it access to any place you want to go - restaurants, planes, salon's, probably even the hospital. Open to abuse? Fuck yeah. Rich bitches with chihuahua's in their purses as therapy pets is nonsense. The article starts with two of these Ho's in a cafe with their dogs, both of whom claimed they needed their dogs with them for comfort. And yes one had a letter from her doctor to "prove" it.

Now there are legitimate needs for pets who can provide services for the physically disabled, Seeing-Eye Dogs being the most obvious example. Yes it makes sense, to provide special services for these animals who are making up for essential attributes that someone is lacking. But to go on the web and buy a "therapy dog in training" vest, slap it on and then demand that it be seated next to you in the plane... well fuck that. Put the asshole in the kennel WITH the damn dog on the plane if they need to be next to them so badly.

Really what these people need is an education in reality. Chances are they're going to need a lot more therapy when faced with genuine hostility of the people around them. If you're fucking dog is shedding in my food at a fancy restaurant, or licking its nuts at the theater you know I'm going to have a few choice words for you. If you didn't need to hug your dog before I started, you sure the hell will want to after I'm done.

LIBERTYVILLE, Ill. (AP) -- High school students are going to be held accountable for what they post on blogs and on social-networking Web sites such as MySpace.com.

The board of Community High School District 128 voted unanimously on Monday to require that all students participating in extracurricular activities sign a pledge agreeing that evidence of ''illegal or inappropriate'' behavior posted on the Internet could be grounds for disciplinary action.

There's lots of facets to this issue that are easy to rattle off:
- The rights (or lack thereof) with respect to minors in school
- The obligations (or again, lack thereof) of parents with regard to their children when they're not on school property
- and of course Freedom of Expression (taking into account laws regarding threatening or misrepresenting someone)

Still, it seems that the school has over stepped it's bounds by believing that everything kids post online is within their jurisdiction to judge and act upon. On the surface it seems that the school is trying to target athletes, and others who might post hazing or other impolite pictures and stories online that could damage the school's image. But the critical thing is the wording.

"illegal or inappropriate".

Illegal is one thing, and yes - that's fine for anyone, not just a school to monitor. But "inappropriate"? By whose judgement? Would the coy picture of a cheerleader posed on her site fit that definition? Would a fictional story about teen sex between characters set in the high school fit? What fits and what doesn't in a vague loophole like that is disturbing and I'm certain deliberate. True, if a student were really worried about the school reading and disapproving of their online efforts they could simply quit all extracurricular activities hosted at the school. It will be interesting to see if indeed there is a drop out rate, if any, resulting from the boards decision.

While many parents I'm sure welcome the school stepping in for them, some parents aren't so pleased about the intrusion into their realm of influence. I've seen and heard of parents who basically don't do their job and look to the school to do it for them for fear of their kids reprisals or simply because it takes effort. But it's one thing to come out and say "a student will not post any lurid or offensive pictures of themselves on school property or in a team uniform online" and very much another to say "we're watching everything you post and measuring against a secret limit".

It didn't help that the Associate Superintendent Prentiss Lea is a dolt and issued the following asinine statement:

''The concept that searching a blog site is an invasion of privacy is almost an oxymoron,'' he said. ''It is called the World Wide Web.''

Of course it's not an invasion of privacy you dolt, it's a question of students being reprimanded for posting ANYthing that might be misconstrued, and furthermore doing it on their own time, on their own computer, and possibly not even involving the school. It means that students have to choose what might be more important to them - self expression or being involved in school activities. It means that the student isn't just judged by their performance in school but by any online expression they might make.

Well Princess Lea, here's my message to you "Fucking grow up bitch. The web may not be what you want it to, but you haven't the resources or intelligence to tackle the job of monitoring and evaluating the content Community High School kids will generate. The only thing you actually will do is ensure they know how to post and cover their tracks better than most kids their age. Twat."

I like to eat out. Often I'll go out for lunch with peers maybe 3 - 4 times a week, with family to dinner maybe once on the weekend. I enjoy Thai, Cambodian, Japanese, good Chinese (as opposed to cheap Chinese, I've never gotten over the unnatural color of those bbq ribs, the weirdness of egg-foo-young or the coagulative qualities of chop suey). I savor a good meal at Indian restaurants, BBQ houses, a rough-hewn pub meal. There's a certain grimy-chic to the diner (or even the chromed, neon of the posh ones with the glass dessert cases that look big enough to preserve Snow White AND all the seven dwarves laid out end to end). There's a savior faire to a nosh at the local bagelry, fresh bread at Panera, sauces and rolls at the chains of Bertuccis. I'm spoilt, and freely admit it, when it comes to the unparalleled options of gastronomical offerings in the North East, not just the variety and flavors of cuisine, but the quality of meat, fruit, vegetables, delectable fresh fish. However, nothing quite offends my palate than the rude interruption of what I consider to be an alien on my plate.

It's true that chefs are artistes, and should be understood in their efforts to incorporate the liveliness of local produce, but lets get it clear here - I honestly don't think that cherry tomatoes belong in chinese cooking. When I think of chinese vegetables I think, bamboo shoots, water chestnuts, chinese broccoli. I think of the bizarre and esoteric things I've seen in the Chinatown markets being shoved onto those hanging scales fresh from mounds of chipped ice. I can forgive them celery, but I'm sorry a tomato in my stir fry is simply as unacceptable as the topic of Taiwanese independence in Bejing.

I've come to a sudden halt at Indian restaurants as well. Not with tomatoes mind you, but with other vegetables (...is, is that really a pimento in my curry?). Eggplant, okra, potatoes, chickpeas, yes, yes, yes. Acorn squash? No, no, no. I support your right to experiment, but please - don't disguise it in a "typical" dish that I came here expressly to enjoy. When I want my korma, I want it just as Gandhi would have had it, please, thank you.

It's alarming that even in the North East the tolerance for anything as long as it's either:
a) deep fried or
b) covered in cheese
is considered palatable as an appetizer. I have no issues with nibbling slices of dubiously mottled roots either as a pakora or tempura - but please must I be subjected to gargantuan hunks of corn saturated in grease and plomped unceremoniously on a plate? Corn in India? Maybe... Corn in Japan? Go on, yank it again.

The only place I've yet to come across an unwelcome cellulose intruder is in Spanish/Mexican cooking. I'd like to think (perhaps naively) that the ingredients are so basic, so relatively inexpensive, that there's little to gain in introducing more exotic produce. Rice, beans, meat, a touch of dairy, maybe an onion or some lettuce (and of course tomato) for garnish. In the shrine of authenticity, most South American restaurants, even the chains, stand alone in guaranteeing that what you order is more or less what you think you'll get.

Of course, this is now. I don't choose to speculate on the potential impact of current immigration and border policies on my lunch faire, but of course if our relationship with our southern nature were a meal then the analogy ends with fortune cookie instead of a flan.

1. Bush - We need to militarize the border with Mexico
2. Hamas - For not renouncing violence and recognizing Israel
3. Iran - For openly pursuing nuclear weapons and being proud of it
4. Taliban - For everything they stand for
5. Pat Robertson - For everything he stands for
6. North Korea - For starving their population while turning down free food
7. Iraq - For continuing to kill their own people
8. Bush - For abusing his office to change or ignore the rules to suit himself
9. The Republican Party - For embracing wacko-evangelists and making them mainstream
10. All Government vs Rebel clashes in Africa, South America and the Pacific Rim - For killing and abusing citizens in a fight that no one can win

Perhaps the enemies of liberty are such only because they judge it by its loud voice. If they knew its charms, the dignity that accompanies it, how much a free man feels like a king, the perpetual inner light that is produced by decorous self-awareness and realization, perhaps there would be no greater friends of freedom than those who are its worst enemies. --Jose Marti

While possibly one of the greatest writers in the Hispanic World, I would have to disagree on the point he has raised above. In fact it is because the enemies of liberty truly understand its value, and its power that they seek to deny it to others. Imho unless you understand how precious something is, you would not expend untold effort to keep it locked away from the public. The reason dictators and militarists think this way is because they want to keep liberty for themselves and their population in social and mental shackles.

One of the openers in a conversation that I truly detest is "Ok, don't get mad but....". You know the next thing the person is going to say is that they did something that is guaranteed to be upsetting, yet by hypothetically preempting with the truth you're now hamstrung into glowering acceptance. Well no, not me personally, but I'm sure a lot of people find themselves in a position of wanting to launch into a fully justified tirade but muzzled by the 'first-strike apology'.

A further irritant is how the 'first-strike apology' is deployed. More often than not it's used in a public setting with innocent bystanders held hostage as collateral against a genuine counter-attack of outrage. Naturally what happens next is that when you do get alone the perp, they feign surprise that you're "still on that topic" and fall back to the previous "but I already said I was sorry" excuse.

Yes it's true that honesty is the best policy more often than not, but feeling that you're justified in getting away scott free because you admitted what happened before the victim was aware isn't fair. I've been in several situations where the person who caused me the grief then went on to get incensed themselves when I did get mad anyway. Just apologizing for doing something retarded isn't going to spare you my wrath, mitigate it yes, but spare you no. You did something wrong, now I get to vent about it. That's how things work.

What do you call someone that signs laws into existence and then simply states that they won't abide by them? If you're an American you call him President. That's right, while in the past most Presidents had the balls to veto a law they didn't like, our boy Bush just signs them anyway and then publishes a "Presidential Signing Statement". What the hell is that you ask? well it's an article issued by the President that more or less says "sure I just signed that bill into law, but fuck if I'm going to enforce it".

750.

Yes Bush has issued 750 of these declarations, lets compare that to 232 issued by his Dad in 4 years and a whopping 140 issued by Clinton in 8 years. Outta control much? I'd say. So lets sample a few of these "Presidential Statements" shall we? What have we got, well there's one where we passed a law that said the Defense Department couldn't censor the legal advice of it's lawyers (in this case dealing with the legal use of torture). Next. He said he wouldn't prevent the military from storing information about private citizens that was collected illegally. Uh huh. We already know about the eavesdropping thing, lets skip that one. What about the law protecting nuclear agency employees if they blow the whistle to Congress... nope he didn't like that one either. Turning over uncensored scientific data to Congress that was used as a basis of environmental laws, without delay? No way baby.

So where did this fucking concept of a "Presidential Signing Statement" come from? Who's the freak that inserted this bullshit loophole into the system? Well, looking back it was stunk up by one Edwin Meese the III'rd when he was AG for Regan. He had help tho. From a young lawyer at the time. His name?

Samuel Alito Jr.

Originally when the brouhaha broke over the NSA tapping phone lines people were comforted that it was only international calls that were being tapped. Most people don't call Jordan, Afghanistan or Iraq on a regular or even lifetime basis. I personally can't ever see myself placing a call to any of those places - so like me, most people just shrugged it off as over zealous media resurrecting the specter of Big Brother. Yes some people who are more dedicated to the idea of the rights and protections of the individuals got upset, and so did congress when they found out they weren't informed, but the average American wasn't being tapped just people who might, slightly, possibly be calling countries where the terrorists were. And the press was just being alarmist.... right,right?

Well, as it turns out they were right, because that wasn't all the NSA was doing. In addition to tapping into phone calls without a warrant they were also getting copies of all, yes that's right ALL domestic calls. Every phone call handled by the following companies: AT&T, Verizon and Bellsouth, time, caller and callee were handed over to the government to create a database of who called whom and when. Only one company Qwest, refused to hand over the records because of concerns for legality and privacy. Props to Qwest.

It's awesome isn't it? Apparently in the name of "national security" your private call data, who you called and when isn't so private. Somehow NSA believes that they can find trending patterns in this truly enormous mountain of data that will enable them to detect terrorist activity. I'm sorry but that's stupid on so many fronts. Terrorists deliberately don't pattern their calls, terrorists tend to communicate in person, and there are so fucking few of them making calls compared to normal people going about their daily life that there's no fucking way in HELL you can pull out a pattern from all the noise in the data.

Oh and back on the other front? The Justice Department dropped it's investigation into the legality of the original warrantless phone tapping program because.... their lawyers couldn't get clearance to access NSA records...

"Oh well, if I can't get a security clearance to uncover evidence then I guess there couldn't possibly be anything wrong with what they were doing...."

Three words: "President Jeb Bush".

I have a neat idea. There are several longstanding global conflicts that seem to have no end in sight, products of generations of educated hatred that must be a part of genetic heritage at this point. A good examples of this are the Israelis and Palestinians. Another are the Catholics and Protestants in Ireland. Sure there's lots more of unhappy culture-couples out there but lets start with these guys.

I'm going to wax philosophical for a moment so bear with me.

It's said you need black to understand white, you need hate to understand love, basically you need to have a side in order to define the other. It's my hypothesis that these pairs actually share a symbiotic relationship wherein the very existence of one side totally defines the other. If the question is "Who are you?" the answer is "I'm not them" where it doesn't really matter who 'them' are or what they're like. Tall, short, fat, thin, smelly, non-smelly, one side might totally resemble the other (when naked and in the shower) but dressed up, complete with signs, insignias and weapons you immediately know on which side of the street you're welcome on. The point I'm getting to is that these sides are so very used to their "enemies" that it makes me wonder - if someone were to wife-swap antagonists, what would be the result? To be precise, lets say you moved all the Irish Catholics lock, stock and barrel into the space occupied by the Palestinians and the Palestinians into Ireland's Catholic areas, what would happen next?

Well a few things are pretty easy from the logistical sense. I imagine the Palestinians would all head for the nearest pub and probably go into gastronomic shock (most people do when confronted with menu items such as "Toad in the Hole" or "Bubble and Squeak"). The Catholics on the other hand would probably have to have the requisite amount of sun-block products air lifted in bulk. Jokes aside what the hell does happen when the enemy you know isn't on the other side any more? It's one thing to become temporarily united with your enemy when confronted with a common threat such as environmental disaster or an attack from a third party, it's another thing entirely to wake up one day to have the chessboard changed to backgammon underneath you.

I understand the analogy falls short in the principle because when you have 2 parties laying claim for historical reasons to the same space, well the twain just ain't ever going to meet. But I proposed this as a mental exercise. Picture if you can what the Israelis might say to the Catholics, and the same for the Protestants and the Palestinians. Suddenly the differences would be far more obvious, visually as well as culturally - could there be a resolution, or would these new sides find reasons to hate each other just as quickly? Is it at all possible for a race to say "No, my beef was with the other guy, and because you're new we can figure out how to get along"? Or does the entrenched political hegemony require the existence of a genocidal threat?

I'm certainly not smart enough to figure that one out on my own, but it's a thought worth pondering...

There's lots of great reasons to avoid Jersey. The highway/parkway gives you lots of time to ponder on them as you gracelessly suffer the drivers, air pollution, shitty drivers, crappy signage, drivers and then get to pay for the privilege of suffering at annoying intervals. On occasion something will add the extra capsaicin to the whole trip. In this case it was a billboard advertising upcoming musical events at the local "thunderdome". In this case it was for "Def Leppard and Journey".

If I could have U-Turned without slaughtering myself and a few hundred other drivers in the process I would have.

Actually seen on the license plate of a white, BMW, SUV:

"NAKED K9"

Words fail me. Sadly the mental images didn't.

According to a February police report on the Arizona State University student newspaper's Web site, an 18-year-old student, arrested at Hayden Library for masturbating openly while watching Internet porn, explained to police, "To be honest, the Internet connection at my dorm isn't good enough." [ASUWebDevil.com, 3-2-06]

Of course, from News of the Weird...

DES MOINES, Iowa (AP) -- Wendy Dershem may think twice before leaving that egg roll on her plate at her next Chinese buffet. The Des Moines woman, her boyfriend and her two children were kicked out of a restaurant last week after management accused her of leaving too much food on her plate.
...

Employees said they had been watching her family on previous trips to the restaurant and were fed up with her habits.

''They just take one bite and throw it away,'' said cashier Lin Huyen. ''They take four egg rolls and crab ragoon, take one bite of egg roll and throw the whole plate. That is wasting food.''

I don't go often, but I have been known to visit a Chinese buffet in my area. Because of who I am, I take small portions, only go back once, and eat everything I take. But that's just me. Yes, my parents gave me the lecture about impoverished children. Yes, I've traveled in the third world and ~seen starvation and crushing poverty. However that's not why I behave the way I do.

I choose to take only what I can eat because I like looking at myself in a mirror. Having additional food on my plate means I might eat more than I actually need to feel full. Since going to a Chinese Buffet is more of an occasional treat than a typical event, I like to enjoy my meal, chat at the table, relax and take my time. I watch the frenzied guzzling of other patrons and wonder.

I've always viewed with distaste people pilling pounds upon pounds of food on their plate until you wonder if it will all compress like a Big Mac. Yes, it's all you can eat, but for the love of wasabi, have some fucking couth - it doesn't have to be all you can gobble down with minimal chewing.

Another thing holds me back, in terms of extreme eating behavior, it's that the staff is always whisper thin. This becomes all the more striking when the family next to me is typically stress-testing the cold-rolled steel chairs under their more than generous posteriors. Fat people kill my appetite. Maybe if I were eating in the same room as a super-model convention I could go back for a third plate, not sure. Porking out on mounds of food might be gross, but if they finish the whole plate I really can't complain. However the worst possible sin, imho, is waste.

Wendy Dershem, you and your fucking family are disgusting. It's understandable to leave something you actually didn't like, but to take the same food you just left on your plate? Wtf is that matter with you? Honestly, the best solution to people like you is to be shipped to a sugar cane farm on another continent and made to learn the value of what we have. It's gross and pathetic to teach your kids that's a buffet is nothing more than a food playground, and the wait staff is there to shovel out the slop you took but declined to consume. She tried to whine and cry that they only went to the buffet once that time, and didn't get to go back for more, but the staff was clear that this was typical behavior that they had witnessed plenty in the past.

It might be all you can eat, but it's not all you can waste.

It was a pretty simple objective, really, all I wanted was a new garbage pail for my bathroom. I figured a new one might cost, oh five maybe six bucks tops and that it just wasn't worth the money to try and scrub a decades worth of grunk off the inside. So I hucked the little white, plastic cylinder and went in search of a new one.

My first stop was a place, appropriately labeled, "Bed, Bath and Beyond". Honestly I wasn't too much interested in the 'bed' or 'beyond' part but the 'bath' label seemed to me just the ticket (although I was curious about the 'beyond' part).

Coming in the door, I wandered through a sea of stainless steel, brightly colored rubber, and natural wood kitchen utensils. Ok I'll admit - I never really thought about making a muffin pan out of rubber, yes it's a neat idea to be able to flex the tray and have the muffins pop out. But cooking something on greasy rubber? I wasn't so sure about that. I gave the tray a few experimental pokes. It had the feel of a deflated balloon. Weird. I moved on.

Somehow I meandered into the "Land of many baroque curtains". Did you have any idea that buying just one, ONE, set of curtains could cost as much as a really expensive meal complete with drinks? I didn't. I'm not sure who wants gold lame and velvet curtains with olive green trim with crystal beads dripping from it's edges. I know that in my house either the cats would shred the $45 ~per panel velour in an eye blink or my half-hearted vacuuming technique would ensure that these tassels would get sucked into the beater causing a disruption of my cleaning and a similar shredding to whatever the cats had left.

It took me quite a while to find the 'bath' section. I wove my way through pillows of all shapes, sizes and geometric possibilities (icosahedrons?). Past an entire section of hampers... who knew they were so important? And finally stumbled into the bathroom area, mostly by following the scent of new plastic and nylon shower curtains. I figured I was close to my grail, the cheapo garbage pail - preferably in white.

When I rounded the corner of the shelf I was dumfounded. There were pails all right, but what pails they were! There were pails cut from single pieces of Italian marble (weighing, by my estimate, between 25 and 30 lbs apiece). These puppies were built to LAST. I'm talking into millennia to come. If you wanted a pail that was destined to be unearthed at a later date by some archeologist, this one was for you. It cost $55. Not what I was looking for exactly, I mean I kinda wanted something I could pick up and shake upside down when I emptied it. I didn't want to have to use a floor jack in the process. Next.

Esoteric beauties of patterned mother of pearl glinted at me. Ceramic works of modern art, looking like refugees from the vase section filled the shelves. Again in a variety of swirls, swooshes, and geometric shapes (dodecahedron?). Not for me - I want something that actually empties when I shake it upside down, not gets shit wedged in some curl or corner.

Monsters of chrome and plastic. Laminations of exotic woods and pressed flowers lacquered into things so delicate and bizarre that dropping a used q-tip into it would seem like an arrestable offense. Byzantine creations of glass beads... and nothing, not one thing for less than a minimum of $25. Wtf, all I wanted was a plastic garbage pail how fucking hard was this?

I was about to give up in disgust and ponder hitting Staples or something and get a regular (oversized) pail when I spied, in a corner, a stack of $5 plastic pails. More funnel shaped than cylindrical, but hell at this point I couldn't care less. I snatched a white one - one of the few white ones (the rest being pastel shades that reminded me of Barbie). I get to the checkout and.... there's no price. I wanted to get out, out of the fucking place by then so I ran back to the bath area and grabbed a pink one and almost flung it at the cashier. "Do you still want the white one? I'm ringing in the pink one, they won't let you return it if it's white." I reassured her that yes I wanted the white, please, please, returning it was not in the realm of possibility.

I finished paying and bolted out. Happy to get the hell out of the store. I finally had a good idea of what they meant by the 'beyond' part, meaning much of their wares had to be purchased by people who were 'beyond reason'.

If I encounter someone in desperate need of a new bathroom garbage pail, I'll give them the best advice of their life - 'it's actually worth the 5 bucks to clean the one you've got than waste an hour of your life trying to find a new one... trust me'.

BEACONSFIELD, Australia (AP) -- Two Australian miners trapped for more than a week in a tiny cage more than a half mile underground were given iPods Wednesday to help them while away the hours as rescuers prepared to start drilling them an escape tunnel.

I can't take full credit for this, because it was something I brought up at lunch that my coworkers embellished with much gusto. But picture the following... You're trapped in a tiny area deep underground. After more than a week someone finally drills a little hole to you. You get some nourishment, and... a couple of iPods. Here's a list of songs to consider that might not be appropriate in that venue:

• Working in a Coal mine - DEVO
• Stairway To Heaven - Led Zeppelin
• Don't Fear the Reaper - BOC
• Canary in a Coal mine - the Police
• anything by Journey
• anything by Loretta Lynn
• Cemetary Gates - the Smiths

Ok well this list can go on and on in the most gratuitous manner, but you get the point. Still - you have to wonder about what they did put on that play list and who got to choose the selections. You figure it had to be a "shuffle" anyway...

Ok, while I did just post my 'top 10' of driver-antics that can make me insane I left off one of the single most important ones. This one is so gods-fucking-awfully-retarded that it's almost agonizing to describe (and thus rates its own post). Ready?

If you MISS your exit/turnoff/intersection then just take the NEXT one and come back.

Anyone, ANYone who honestly believes that it's ok to...

• stop on the highway and back up
• come to a complete stop in the left lane then try and signal their way over 3 lanes of 60mph+ traffic
• stop on the exit ramp and back onto the highway
• drive over the meridian
• signal from 3 lanes over and then "dive" for it

... needs, I repeat NEEDS to be dragged out of their car and killed. They are a hazard to every fucking man, woman and child on the road and have no concern for their own safety or the lives of anyone else.

I quite simpley HATE these motherfuckers. If I were to find one in the parking lot after I got off I would hurt them. Truth.

Well, well, well, color me surprised. The newest Pope, who was billed as a true "hardcore" catholic is considering the use of condoms for married couples when one partner is HIV infected. Whoa.

What does this mean? Well it means a certain amount of uproar, no question. There's the dogmatic types who believe that following stupid rules without thinking is a sign of true faith ("well god WANTS me to jump off this cliff - it says so in the bible right here") and then there's the more mainstream person who realizes that religion is only a part of life, next to essentials like food and shelter. I find it difficult to believe that Benedict is actually playing to this larger majority who will definitely approve of such an edict. Rather I have to, grudgingly, give the man credit. I never would have expected a pope to actually take into account the actuality of how stupid the whole abstinence shtick really is.

People fuck that's just life. They fuck even if it means they might get pregnant or get a disease, you just can't tell people to "say no". That's been more publicly apparent with all the pedophile-priest scandals who were supposed to be the standard bearers of all that's good, proper and dedicated.

Regardless, Benedict is really a lot more than meets the eye. He's someone who now merits more than the casual glance when his name is in the papers. Could he be a "Sleeper Pope"?