Sigh

Had a migraine earlier today.

Discovered that an e-mail address I use for business purposes got pwned by some cretins in China selling Viagra knockoffs. (Good thing for them I don't speak Mandarin. Or Cantonese. Or whatever.)

Fred's out of the race.

It's brrrrrr outside.

But I'm listening to Waylon Jennings and Johnny Cash. I think I can make it another day. :)

Potato Jesus

Fox News: Florida Pastor Finds Jesus Image in Split Potato

Is this woman for real? She was having an existential crisis about whether she should make potato salad?

"I was hesitant about making the potato salad because Sister Frankie makes the potato salad at church and I said, 'Lord, if it’s not for me to make potato salad then send me a sign.'"

::: smacking forehead :::

Apparently, she interpreted the "sign" as an indication that she should, actually, make the potato salad, which she did.

“It was good. It was the best you [sic] ever made ... it was almost as good as Sister Frankie's,” said Bishop Brewster.

Sister Frankie was unavailable for comment.

Heath Ledger, RIP

To be honest, I was not familiar with his work and knew him by name only. Sounds like this might have been an accident, but regardless, it's definitely tragic.

Prayers for his young daughter and everyone else who cared for him.

Fun with Wii news, part 2: Astonishing quote of the day

NOTE TO THE READER 1/25/08: A few days after first posting this entry, I considered editing it or taking it down altogether. I still stand by my contentions that Mr. Goddard is being illogical and sanctimonious and his comments merit criticism, but I feel I was graceless in my approach and choice of language. The original post still stands for you, gentle reader, to judge for yourself.


Ya know, I've never been shot.

Which is a good thing.

I suppose being shot changes your life and your outlook on things. Which is why I'm trying not to be too judgmental.

Screw that. I am going to be judgmental because this quote I'm about to share with you is one of the most astonishingly stupid things I've ever read. This is Colin Goddard, who was responding to a gun-rights advocate who told him that he would have stopped the Virginia Tech shooter because he carries. Again, a photo of the Wii:



Well, Colin, I feel sorry for you for being a shooting victim. That sucks. I am glad you are alive.

It also sucks that you apparently expect police and armed civilians like me to defend your sorry butt because it's just TOO MUCH for your enlightened soul to take responsibility for your own safety. And when someone comes along basically offering you protection, you sniff and act like you're superior.

And THAT is what it comes down to, folks. You don't like guns? Don't want them in your house or on your person? FINE. But realize that if a cracked-out rapist is knocking down your door at 3 a.m., you are essentially expecting OTHER PEOPLE to risk their lives while you go hide in the closet.

It's a job that all law enforcement and many civilians are willing to do, but when you act like people who want to protect themselves AND YOU TOO need to be pitied, that we have some sort of mental problem, well, forgive us if we feel inclined to mock your silly ass in a public forum.

Goddard went on to say:

"You're afraid of crazy situations happening."

Damn straight, but I am less afraid knowing that I have the potential to stop a psychotic goblin from killing me and those around me.

"I've lived through this and I know that I can't continue in my life afraid of things."

Congratulations. But "lack of fear" is no protection against hot metal speeding toward you at hundreds of meters per second.

He then went on to add that he puts his "full trust" in police to protect society. Yes, we see how amazingly effective that was against Mr. Cho and his little ballistic friends.

Note to self: Do not send any future offspring to Virginia Tech.

Fun with Wii news, part 1: A Tale of Two Prisons

I once worked for a woman who was mean as a snake. An ungodly terror, but she'd worked 17 years for a newspaper and taught me more about proper writing than anyone else, save my college profs. She told us that in her day, your third misspelling would get you fired.

This sort of makes me long for those days:


(FYI, that's a cell phone photo of the Wii news feature displayed on the living room TV.)

"En route two prisons." I mean, I can understand making a silly mistake and typing "two" instead of "to," but pluralizing "prison"? What is this, leet-speak?

Im in ur cort, rulin aginst ur muzlims

Scarlett Johansson's PSA

Michelle Malkin today reported that actress Scarlett Johansson visited our troops in Kuwait, and good on her for that. Malkin noted that Johansson is gracing the troops with her presence despite being a sharp critic of GWB (big surprise -- I know) and his anti-abortion stance.

Which led me to finding this interesting tidbit about Ms. Johansson: She gets tested twice a year for HIV. She says frequent testing is "part of being a decent human being." And, if you happen to be either freebasing or randier than a frat boy on Bourbon Street, I would agree with you.

But au contraire:

"Contrary to popular belief, I'm not promiscuous. There does seem to be a mistaken belief out there that I am sexually available somehow — which is not to say that I'm not open-minded about sex."

Makes perfect sense, ScarJo. Obviously, non-promiscuous, non-sexually-available people are in dire need of frequent HIV tests. After all, toilet-seat transmission is still a very real and scary possibility.

Thanks for clearing that up.

Unspeakably tragic

Two-year-old Bronner Burgess, son of Rick Burgess of "Rick and Bubba" fame, died last night from drowning in the family swimming pool. Investigators have ruled it a tragic accident.

The city of Birmingham is reeling. Yesterday was such a day of wonder for our city's small children, many of whom had never seen snow before. Now, there's a sad shadow on that happy memory.

God's grace be upon the Burgess family and everyone else who loved little Bronner.

White Saturday

Central Alabama is getting its first significant snowfall since 2000, and hubby and I are enjoying a quiet and relaxed day of the white stuff. Behold. To the left are our cars, Betsy and Gladys. Interestingly, the snow on the Bug's hood has slipped to the ground, but Gladys' hood rendered a bounty of clean snow for making snow cream. I used Michelle Malkin's recipe but substituted evaporated milk for the regular milk. Even better!

I am now threatening to break out the cocoa, evap milk, cinnamon and cayenne for some righteous Mexican-style hot chocolate, and hubby is very happy about this.

UPDATE: The hot chocolate is a hit! Here's the recipe:

In a coffee mug, combine
- 1 T plus 1/4 tsp. sugar
- 3 tsp. cocoa powder
- pinch of salt

Meanwhile, microwave 1 cup of evaporated milk on high for 1 minute or until hot but not scalding. Pour the heated milk into the mug, stirring briskly to combine the dry ingredients with the milk.

Add freshly ground cinnamon, fresly ground nutmeg and cayenne pepper powder to taste. Finish with a dash of vanilla extract.

Que delicioso!

The GGB 10-second roundup of last night's GOP forum

Fred -- rules.
Mitt -- plastic.
Giuliani -- sharp.
McCain -- irritating.
Huckabee -- nauseating.
Ron Paul supporters holding up signs outside the focus group -- trolls.

Just one thought on the Iowa Caucus

Tonight -- just for tonight -- I like Barack Obama. Because he kicked Hillary's butt. And he made a helluva speech. And I can't stand Huckabee.














Pwned!

Methinks the lady doth protest too much

Ladies and gentlemen, introducing the latest inductee into the 15 Minutes Hall of Fame: Jane Doe of the "Rock My World" commercial fame. Here's the story on Fox News, and here's the video of the jewelry ad that Jane Doe claims made her look pornographic without her consent. (She's suing for $5 mil, saying it has tarnished her "wholesome" image.) Please note, the video is somewhat NSFW.

Hmmm, let's see ....

Lacy nightie? Check.
Red satin sheets? Check.
Writhing? Check.
Stroking the face? Check.
Heavy breathing? Check.

As an astute commenter on YouTube said, "I can see why she's upset. The director just asked her to act like she's playing tennis."

No wonder he kept it a secret so long

Singer Neil Diamond has just revealed the inspiration for his hit "Sweet Caroline" -- none other than Caroline Kennedy, daughter of the late JFK. "It was a picture of a little girl dressed to the nines in her riding gear, next to her pony," Diamond recalled. "It was such an innocent, wonderful picture, I immediately felt there was a song in there."

That would be ... uh ... sweet, but let's review the evidence:

Neil Diamond is 66.
Caroline Kennedy is 50.
The song was written 40 years ago, which means Diamond would have been 26 and Kennedy 10.
The song contains lyrics such as:

Hands, touchin hands
Reachin out
Touchin me
Touchin you

And ...

But now I
Look at the night
And it dont seem so lonely
We fill it up with only two
And when I hurt
Hurtin runs off my shoulders
How can I hurt when Im with you

Does anyone else besides me find this a little creepy??? Now I'm not going to be able to hear that song without thinking of ... never mind.

I guess I should blog again

Hey, folks. GGB here. A friend of mine with a three-year-old and a newborn is showing me out by blogging almost daily, so I figured it was high time to get my hiney in gear and talk to the world.

Hi, world.

Yesterday, hubby and I passed the 200-day mark of our wedded bliss. I keep waiting for that dreaded "tough first year" to materialize, but so far it hasn't. The toughest things about 2007 have come from outside, not from within. No, if anything, 200 days have proven that I chose beautifully. "Peas and carrots" comes to mind.

Otherwise, it's been hard to know what to blog about. It's been nice not having a day job to complain about, and days at home have been mostly productive and absolutely peaceful. Coming up on an election year, you'd think I'd be back in political-junkie mode, but lately the news only gets me angry. Suffice it to say, Hillary Clinton is a Marxist and I will vote for her opponent, whoever that may be. In fact, I'm kinda tickled that Pat Robertson -- kooky as he is -- decided to endorse Giuliani, especially after James Dobson's whining that none of the front runners is Jesus-y enough.

Speaking of Jesus ...

Michael Horton is my hero. (After Jesus.) I finally got my hands on a copy of a fantastic volume he edited, titled Christ the Lord: The Reformation and Lordship Salvation. For those of you who did not grow up Southern Baptist, this will be meaningless, but this book has finally settled the anxieties of this former SBC'er who grew up constantly hearing: "Are you really, really, really, really, REALLY saved?" (For those of you who did grow up So. Baptist, I hope you are giggling now. And go buy the book.)

Okay, our older dog is giving me that look. Time to feed the mutts. Arividerci!

Dumb government idea of the day

FDA considers additional food labels

Memo to the FDA: Believe it or not, it is not your responsibility to make sure we eat our greens and don't pig out on Doritos. And cigarette packs are labeled to hell and gone and that doesn't discourage most people from smoking, now does it?

Dragon*Con recap

Hubby and I got home LATE last night from Atlanta. His brother and sis-in-law gave us weekend passes to Dragon*Con and two nights' lodging as a wedding gift, and a good time was had by all. A few highlights:

• Rich went over on Wednesday night to attend a two-day writing seminar hosted by author Ann Crispin and gave it rave reviews.
• Sunday night, we saw a panel discussion on "Beer Snobs in Space" on the schedule and decided to attend. (Rich is a homebrew and winemaking enthusiast.) The featured speaker had to cancel at the last minute, but a group of homebrewers filled in -- and they brought samples. :) Props to the chemistry professor who brought his "Imperial Death Star Stout" and the dude in black who treated us to real honeymead. So cool. Man, I love geeks.
• I got to meet two male idols from my childhood -- Erik Estrada of CHiPS fame and Gil Gerard, better known as Buck Rogers. Gil was friendly and wisecracking; Erik looked unbelievably handsome, even 30 years past his CHiPS days. When I told him my mom loved him, he asked her name and said, "Be sure to tell her I said hi." I called her later and told her I had a special message from Erik Estrada. Tickled her to death.
• I also got to meet three Star Trek: TNG cast members: John DeLancie ("Q") and Jonathan Frakes ("Commander Riker") were polite but seemed like they really needed a nap. (Granted, this was yesterday on the last day of the con.) But Brent Spiner ("Data") made my day. Super nice, joked with me and looked terrific.

Special note: I'm sad that our buddies Tom and Minde couldn't make the con, but they had good reason: Their daughter was born Friday. :) Welcome to Geek World, little girl.

ISO: Halloween recipes that don't induce vomiting

I love Halloween. I hate Googling for Halloween recipes.

To everyone out there who posts Halloween recipes: Please put your vomit-inducing recipes on a separate page AWAY from the recipes for roasted pumpkin seed and caramel apples. I am getting so tired of searching for innocent recipes and instead stumbling upon these appetizing selections:

*** Please do not read if you've recently had a meal or plan to within the next hour. ***

"Bloody Popcorn"
"Kitty Litter Cake"
"Brains and Eyeballs"
And perhaps the all-time worst: "Hair Salad with Saliva Dressing"

I am not 11. I do not think that gross is cool. I do not want to consume food that may taste fabulous but looks like roadkill, bodily waste or a serious industrial accident. I do not want scary bits floating in my beverage. I do not want to consume things that remind me of sinusitis.

I was at a Halloween party years ago at the home of this artsy-tartsy couple of university professors. The house was way out in the hinterland, which just gave you this heightened sense of foreboding. (Oh, so this is where they hide the bodies?) The decorations were fabulous in a house that already had this quirky Dali-esque spookiness about it. (The kitchen was decorated RED and BLACK.) The appetizers were delicious and the beverages were flowing.

I was having a grand old time swanning about in my Bollywood princess outfit when some knucklehead guest brings out the kitty litter cake. In a real kitty litter box with a scoop.

Although my rational forebrain knew I was looking at rolled oats dotted with some kind of fig paste, my reptilian brain was screaming, "DO NOT EAT POOP! DANGER! DANGER! DO NOT EAT POOP! POOP BAD! POOP BAD!"

I could feel the bile rising in the back of my throat. I wanted to punch the guy.

So, all you recipe posters: No gross stuff where I can easily find it. Thank you.

Alton Brown on the real reason we cook

Our Patron Saint of Perpetual Good Eats


The GGB recently gave up her 40-hour-a-week Corporate America job for a kinder gig as Household COO (and occasional dance teacher and freelancer). When my former coworkers asked me if I was looking forward to a change of pace, I often told them I was excited about cooking dinner and having it ready when my husband gets home.

A few people looked at me as if I'd said I was going to be manacled to a stove and given daily beatings for my trouble.

It is not fashionable these days to be enthusiastic about the home arts. And if you do cook, you're supposed to do it as quickly as possible a la Rachael Ray. (That's another post entirely. The woman is a blight on humanity.)

However, I picked up on a bit of cosmic brilliance by the anti-Rachael, the sensei of culinary kung fu, the high priest of all that is sacred and holy about the range top and the saute pan. I give you words of wisdom from Alton Brown:

... feeding someone is an act of caring. We will always be fed best by those that care, be it ourselves or the aforementioned friends and family.We are fat and sick and dying because we have handed a basic, fundamental and intimate function of life over to corporations. We choose to value our nourishment so little that we entrust it to strangers. We hand our lives over to big companies and then drag them to court when the deal goes bad. This is insanity.

Amen, brother.

How come no one ever "finds" Buddha?

Puppy murderer Michael Vick says he has "found Jesus" and now claims that dogfighting is a "terrible thing."

Ever notice how no one ever "finds Buddha" or "achieves nirvana" in the pokey? (And Vick isn't even in jail yet. This must be a record.) I'm just saying that since Eastern-style religion is all the rage these days, I'm curious as to why it's the Jesus card that gets played.

Ministers behaving badly. Congregants behaving stupidly.

"The saying is trustworthy: If anyone aspires to the office of overseer [bishop], he desires a noble task. Therefore an overseer must be above reproach, the husband of one wife, sober-minded, self-controlled, respectable, hospitable, able to teach, not a drunkard, not violent but gentle, not quarrelsome, not a lover of money."

-- St. Paul, I Timothy 3:1-3

Evangelist Juanita Bynum recently got the stuffing knocked out of her in a hotel parking lot by her husband, "Bishop" Thomas Weeks III. A hotel bellman witnessed the attack, as relayed here in an article by Fox News:

"They were talking about a reconciliation. They got into an argument. In the process of the argument, her husband walked out to the parking lot area, turned back around and started to choke Miss Bynum," [Atlanta police officer Ronald ] Campbell said.

"As he choked her, he pushed her down to the ground and started to kick her and also stomp on her," he said. "There was a bellman at the location who witnessed the whole assault, intervened, and pulled Mr. Weeks off of Miss Bynum."

"Bishop" Weeks has yet to repent and instead took a few brief moments in the pulpit this past Sunday (before a guest preacher delivered the sermon) to blame the devil for his troubles, according to the Atlanta Journal Constitution. His congregants are being all mashy-mouthed about "not judging." One particularly pathetic comment to the AJC site [emphases mine]:

I am a member of Global Destiny. I was there yesterday and I support Bishop 100%. He is a true man of God who made a mistake. I get paid on this week and will sow my entire pay check to the ministry. I know these are trying times for him financially. My 8 year daughter does not mind forfeiting "back to school shopping" b/c Bishop weeks is in need. Praying is not enough. We need ot take action. I signed the thing on yesterday to have the Judge decrease the felony to a misdemeanor. I am praying that his case is dismissed due ot self defense or he gets Community Service. Everyone does stuff they regret. I know he is pure, he did not mean to hurt her-he got caught up in the heat of the moment. I pray that he will Preach on this coming Sunday.

Good Lord Almighty, this is so cosmically insane, I don't even know where to begin. Weeks is in flagrant violation of at least four Biblical requirements to be a bishop, and not only is he not being held accountable, people are flinging MONEY at him!!! ENTIRE PAYCHECKS!!!

"Judge not," my arse. I cannot judge Weeks' heart or motivations, but I sure as heck can judge that smacking your wife around is a big fat honkin' no-no for any man who claims to be a Christian, much less a "Bishop." And when church members do not stand up and demand decent behavior from their leaders, it makes us all look like cretins and gives cover to ignorant people who think that the Bible actually endorses that kind of behavior.

Aggghhhh. I want to throw something.

And now I'm appalled by Fox News' commercials, too

I am, admittedly, tuning in to Fox News via XM Radio to catch up on the horrible bridge collapse in Minnesota. Call me a rubbernecker.

I'm glad that my handy-dandy pink Pioneer Inno displays the name of the programming, including when the program switches to commercials. I can mute it when they're yammering about ordering Viagra and Cialis online.

Sheesh. It's like listening to spam.