• Wanna very nice joke?))
  • What insect does well in school?
  • A spelling bee.
• Do you want a joke? :)
  • What’s the difference between roast beef and pea soup?
  • Anyone can roast beef.
• Good joke :)
  • What do you get when you drop boiling water down a rabbit hole?
  • Hot cross bunnies.
• Fresh joke!
  • Why do Vampire have to brush their teeth?
  • Because they have Bat-Breath.
• I have a nice joke.
  • Did you hear about the guy who ran through the screen door?
  • He strained himself.
• I have a nice joke for you)
  • Why don’t fish play tennis?
  • They might get caught in the net.
• Do you want a joke? :)
  • Homeowner: My house is located in an earthquake zone.
  • Agent: Sorry, but I can’t help you. I only sell no-fault insurance!
• A JOKE! )
  • Why did the cannibal rush over to the cafeteria?
  • He heard children were half price.
• A joke for you peoples!
  • How can you recognize a burned-put hippie?
  • He used to take acid, now he takes antacid.
• Do you want a joke? :)
  • Why do bagpipers walk when they play?
  • They’re trying to get away from the noise.
• Good joke :)
  • What city has the largest rodent population?
  • Hamsterdam.
• I have a nice joke.
  • What do snowmen eat for breakfast?
  • Snowflakes.

Words, when spoken out loud for the sake of performance, are music. They have rhythm, and pitch, and timbre, and volume. These are the properties of music, and music has the ability to find us and move us, and lift us up in ways that literal meanings can’t. Do you see?
- President Josiah “Jed” Bartlet, The West Wing

If you’ve ever read this blog you know I’ve got a thing for Sorkin. I’m a sucker for his writing, I’m a sucker for his stories, I just can’t get enough. And, as I watched Obama’s speech tonight, as I listened to his words, it was hard not to hear the voice of Sorkin’s greatest characters echoing around the back of my head.

At one point tonight my iChat status read: “It really does sound like Sorkin came in and punched up the speech a bit,” so you can imagine my happy surprise when I flipped from PBS’s excellent convention coverage to MSNBC in time to hear Brian Williams say that listening to the speech reminded him of two things… He mentioned quickly how he was left wistfully thinking of Tim Russert and then went on to say that the other thing he was thinking of was Aaron Sorkin.

Williams then went on to quote the parts of the speech that sounded like they’d been pulled almost directly from the movie The American President. The American President, a movie about a dashingly youngish President fighting an uphill re-election battle against a gnarled old Senator. Sound a bit familiar?

The speech sounded familiar too, but not in the “I think he blatantly ripped of Sorkin” kind of way. No, it was more that he did what good writers do, he developed a rhythm, he developed a cadence, and it worked for him. I mean, at one point tonight Olbermann had to cut off Pat Buchanan because Buchanan could not stop gushing over how great the speech was! Srsly.

Now, I’ve found an early copy of the speech and a script of The American President and pulled out a couple of the passages Brian Williams mentioned…

The American President:

I’ve known Bob Rumson for years. I’ve been operating under the assumption that the reason Bob devotes so much time and energy to shouting at the rain was that he simply didn’t get it. Well, I was wrong. Bob’s problem isn’t that he doesn’t get it. Bob’s problem is that he can’t sell it.
- President Andrew Shepherd

Tonight’s Speech:

A nation of whiners? Tell that to the proud auto workers at a Michigan plant who, after they found out it was closing, kept showing up every day and working as hard as ever, because they knew there were people who counted on the brakes that they made. Tell that to the military families who shoulder their burdens silently as they watch their loved ones leave for their third or fourth or fifth tour of duty. These are not whiners. They work hard and give back and keep going without complaint. These are the Americans that I know.

It’s not because John McCain doesn’t care, it’s because John McCain doesn’t get it.
- Sen. Barak Obama

And then, more from The American President:

A.J.
Would we have won?

SHEPHERD
If we’d had to go through a character debate three years ago, would we have won?

A.J.
I don’t know. But I would’ve liked that campaign. If my friend Andy Shepherd had shown up, I would have liked that campaign.

Tonight’s Speech:

And just as we keep our keep our promise to the next generation here at home, so must we keep America’s promise abroad. If John McCain wants to have a debate about who has the temperament, and judgment, to serve as the next Commander-in-Chief, that’s a debate I’m ready to have.
- Sen. Barak Obama

Later on in the coverage NBC News’ Chief Foreign Affairs Correspondent Andrea Mitchell reiterated the Sorkin connection. I definitely got a big kick out of that.

And now, I’ll finish with one last snippet from The West Wing where Sam explains how the great writers do it…

 MALLORY

One good moment is good.

SAM
Oh, I’m not complaining. I’m saying one good moment is great. It’s a golf shot. I’ve got to get back in there. That’s where it’s happening. (beat) You came by just to tell me you liked the speech?

MALLORY
“This is a time for American heroes and we reach for the stars.”? I’m weak.

SAM
Yeah. I think I stole that from Camelot.

MALLORY
Let me get you home. I don’t think you’re going to make it.

SAM
Yeah. I don’t think I’m going to make it, either.

MALLORY
Camelot?

SAM
Good writers borrow from other writers. Great writers steal from them outright.

THE WEST WING
“20 HOURS IN AMERICA PART II”

JOSH
It was a better organized thought in my head. Is she done?

BARTLET
I converted it to Celsius in my head.

BARTLET
Hang on, I’m doing math in my head.

SAM
I could’ve countered that, but I’d already moved on to other things in my head.

JOSH
I’m sorry, I had in my head that we were doing this in your office.

BRUNO
I have to be. I have only so much RAM in my head. I have to prioritize. I have to throw some things overboard, so, I’ve chosen, for instance, not to care whether or not Purdue has a fencing team.

Primal Quest Montana – Race Day 4, originally uploaded by Brian Knight Photography.

Wow was that ever painful. I’d like to take this moment to track down and kick the ass of whomever came up with that cute little diddy about sticks and stones… Clearly they never tried to be a writer, professional or otherwise.

I am happy to report that when inspiration finally and truly took hold I was driving down 395 in rush hour traffic. Instead of zoning out to NPR or cursing my fellow commuters for their crappy driving skills I started talking to myself. A little kernel of an idea snuck into my brain and I started working it over and over until I had a couple decent paragraphs going… When I pulled up to my house twenty minutes later I rushed inside, fired up the Mac, logged into Google Docs, and started typing on a fresh new page. Four hours later I was done. Whew.

And now I leave you with this classic West Wing moment:

CHARLIE
Aren’t you supposed to be writing?

TOBY
I am writing.

CHARLIE
I don’t see paper.

Toby walks up to him and sits down.

TOBY
“We can sit back and admit with grave sensitivity that life isn’t fair and the less-advantaged are destined to their lot in life and the problems of those on the other side of the world should stay there, that our leaders are cynical and can never be an instrument to change, but that, my friends, is not worthy of you, it’s not worthy of the President, it’s not worthy of a great nation, it’s not worthy of America!”

Paper’s for wimps.

I gotta say that the write up for the Jeep Wrangler Unlimited, the #1 Worst.Car.Ever. (2008), is amusing:

Highs: Off-road ability

Lows: Everything else… (Ride, handling, braking, noise, fuel economy, fit and finish, visibility, front seat comfort, access, reliability)

That’s quite the list. And also, have you seen these things out there on the road? Could they look any dumber all stretched out like that? It’s true, I’ve never been a Jeep Guy (or a Car Guy for that matter), but still… I know an aesthetically pleasing auto when I see one, and the Wrangler Unlimited is not it.

In the Shattering My Dreams Category comes #6, the Toyota FJ Cruiser. This is a cool looking car that I want to love. My neighbor has one and he parks it out front, often right next to my little Pathfinder, and boy does it make my car look shlumpy. Now, I know I just made a sort of bold statement by calling out the stretched aesthetics of what once was a classic vehicle design, but the FJ Cruiser looks cool in that same, weird sort of way that the Honda Element looks cool. They’re sexy-ugly.

Anyways, I want to like the FJ, but apparently there is much left to be desired…

Highs: Off-road ability, powertrain, reliability

Lows: Visibility, ride, handling, noise, fit and finish, premium fuel, access

Again with the high marks for off-road ability. If only Consumer Reports took that into account. Seems that not a lot of people require off-roading skills to drive to the Giant for milk. Shocking.

Now, I’m not sure why this car got to be #8. If you ask me I’d bump it up to the #1 spot. Why? Well, let’s see what they say about the Suzuki Forenza (base)…

Highs: Turning circle

Lows: Acceleration, fuel economy, ride, IIHS sidecrash result, ABS option hard to find

Ok, so it can turn in circles (and I’m assuming we mean tight circles here). Fantastic. Let’s skip down to some analysis on the low points. It won’t accelerate quickly so if you do need to get out of a problem you’re out of luck. Also, you’re going to get to pay a lot in fuel dollars for the privilege of driving an underpowered small car. And the ride will be crappy. And your anti-lock brakes option (a helpful tool for, you know, stopping and what not) is difficult to find. And then, what’s this about the “IIHS sidecrash result”? Hmmm…

The Forenza received a “Poor” rating from the Insurance Institute for Highway Safety for side impact protection despite having head- and torso-protecting side airbags.

Even with extra air bags you’re still going to get totally F’d up in a crash!! The Jeep at least (one assumes) is going to let you live and/or walk away from an accident. Not so much with the Suzuki death trap. Awesome.

Now, to be fair and end on a positive note, here’s a link to the Top 10 Best Cars.

The Best 80s Movie Made In The 90s

Which movie? Why Point Break of course! Keanu, Swayze, Busey… friggin’ John C. McGinley! The all-star quarterback, lawyer, sharpshooting FBI agent gets buddied up with the out-of-shape old timer crank then learns to surf, gets the girl, and stops a spree of bank robberies performed by fellow surfers and daredevil skydivers who dress as the ex-presidents.

Would somebody please put an end to the writer’s strike? This is the kind of material America is clamoring for! And what’s better than watching this movie from the comfort of your living room couch on a Friday night? Try introducing this classic to your friend who at the time of its release was only seven years old.

Persepolis

The cartoon network is not a channel I ever surf to and I’m never first in line at the box office for the latest Pixar release, but there was something intriguing about this Persepolis movie… whatever it was, the buzz machine worked and Saturday night, beers in hand, we ended up at the front of the line to see a feature length, French language (with English subtitles), black and white cartoon. And it was great. Really, really great. Because it’s got this great story about a girl and a country and a war and… I don’t want to say too much, but I enjoyed it. And though when the credits rolled and my friend leaned over to ask what I thought, and all I could say (and in perhaps not the most convincing tone) was “I liked it,” the fact is that like with most things my brain was still working it over and it would take a while longer for my opinion to fully form. My friend Estee likes to call this “the highway”… Imagine a long, straight, flat highway (like I70 through eastern Colorado) and that’s the kind of path a lot of my thoughts have to take before they can be spoken (or in this case written). Metaphorically, questions asked at the KS/CO border will be answered in Denver.

Sorry, that was a bit of a tangent… the point is, if you can, think about seeing Persepolis. It’s actually way better than Juno.

Orienteering Meets & Flickr Meetups

Sunday morning was spent running around a park in the cold with friends and a camera. Sunday afternoon was spent running around a city in the cold with friends and a camera.

About the Flickr Meetups I have this to say… I’m really starting to enjoy them. This is not to say that I did not enjoy them before, but the whole meeting and talking to new people has never been my strongest skill (thus photography, right?) and now I find myself looking forward to seeing the newish yet familiar friendly faces. It’s possible I have a problem though, because Monday night I totally had a feverish dream about Flickr and taking photos of people taking photos of people taking photos…

Smash & Grab

Monday morning I went to my car and discovered that someone had broken that lesser known commandment… thou shall not covet thy neighbors consumer electronics. The driver’s side window had been smashed into little green pieces and the windshield mounted personal GPS (a great Christmas present from Dad) had been ripped out of the car. Shit.

I called the police non-emergency number, then work to let them know I’d be late (that turned out to be quite the understatement as I didn’t get into the office until 4pm), then I called my insurance company (they rock), then my folks (had to tell somebody and they’re the only ones not working at 10am on a weekday), then I called the body shop who would be repairing the damage, and then finally Enterprise, who just like their commercials say, came to pick me up. Ugh. Not a great way to start off the week.

The rest of the week so far…

Work, work, and more work. Dinner at Kilroy’s with Dad who was in town for one night only. More work. A birthday party for Jess meant I got to legitimately geek out on some WW stuff which is always fun. And I also got to open some packages and everyone loves doing that!

I also need to finish writing a 700 – 1000 word story about racing off-road triathlons (due Friday). There’s no greater inspiration like a last minute deadline.

*oops. turns out this wasn’t exactly brief… sorry!

Clicking to the Style section of the Post today you were confronted with a sort of weird image of the uncredited “Man Dancing in Club” from 1971’s Oscar winning Klute. Don’t remember that guy? Maybe you’ll recall Lincoln Hawk, the struggling trucker trying to regain control over his life and win at arm wrestling?

The arm wrestling gave it away, right? I mean, if I’d said there was a photo of the guy who played Judge Joseph Dredd you’d have known too. And forget about it if I’d mentioned Rocky Balboa or John J. Rambo. Then everybody’d know I was talking about Mr. Sylvester Stallone.

Rambo IV comes out tomorrow and according to the post, The movie…

Written, directed and produced by Stallone, …could be the most graphically violent R-rated movie ever.

It goes on to describe in detail the many different ways the movie depicts the graphic violence and talks about how even Stallone was a little surprised about receiving only an “R” rating.

And maybe I just have my cynical switch in the off position today, but the surprising part of the article was the apparent reason for making such a violent movie. Seems Stallone actually cares about the world and wanted to let people know that atrocities such as those shown in his film happen everyday in crap countries such as Myanmar (aka Burma).

I’ve seen the previews a few times and the amount of violence has just seemed comical. Stallone, Rambo, over the top violence… they seem like a match made in heaven and so I clicked on the article expecting to read a puffy promotional piece.

And while it is no shocking revelation to me that such events occur in the world, I was kind of glad to read that Stallone was making the movie with the intent of possibly broadening people’s world views.

Just maybe a 14 year old kid might walk out of the theater and wonder to himself, “I wonder if any of that shit is true?” If he goes home and checks out Wikipedia he’ll discover that yeah, it is.

Part II: Oh To Have Such Problems (Apparently The Grass Is Greener On The Other Side)

Maybe it was for this story that I was saving my cynicism and snark…

Last fall, KC Reeves, her husband and three children moved to a suburban house that is much bigger than their previous one. The master bedroom is airy and sunny, Reeves says, but at 19 1/2 feet by 19 1/2 feet, it feels large and boxy. Reeves would like a more intimate space where she and her husband can “retreat from the rest of the world.” She envisions a French-country-inspired room where she can read in bed.

Oh poor you! I am soooo sorry that your bedroom is 381 square feet and is filled with light and looks out over a forest and has a french doors leading outside to a deck. I can imagine the settling down to read a book in such a room must be difficult. Whatever.

Here’s a before picture:

And how did you change the look of the room? Why, you swapped a flat panel TV for the pretty painting over the fireplace and then moved the bed so that it longer faced that awful view out the windows. And where does the bed face now? Yup, the TV. That will make for some conducive reading in bed and retreating from the world.

From Season 3, Episode 17 “Stirred”
Original Air Date: 27 March 2002
(Teleplay by: Aaron Sorkin & Eli Attie)

LEO
Yeah, it sounds like you’re getting tripped up by 1783.

CHARLIE
Which is?

LEO
HR 1783; it’s a tax rebate from last year.

CHARLIE
Why would that affect my return for this year?

LEO
Did you get a tax rebate last year?

CHARLIE
Yeah.

LEO
There’s the answer.

CHARLIE
Where’s the answer?

LEO
Your rebate came off of this year’s taxes. That’s how we paid for it.

CHARLIE
Hang on. The money I got back last year has to be paid for?

LEO
Yeah.

CHARLIE
That’s not a rebate; that’s an advance.

LEO
Well, technically I guess…

CHARLIE
Not technically. This is like getting a Christmas bonus and having it deducted from your January paycheck.

LEO
This doesn’t sound like very patriotic talk to me, Charlie.

CHARLIE
It’s not. Why did you call it a rebate?

LEO
So people would spend it. If they thought it was an advance, they might save it.

CHARLIE
It was an advance.

LEO
Did you spend it?

CHARLIE
I paid my VISA bill.

LEO
We would have preferred it if you’d ate in a restaurant or traveled.

CHARLIE
Me too.

LEO
Well, in any event… [puts out his hand]

CHARLIE
What? [Leo starts wiggling his fingers] Oh, what are you the collector?

BARTLET
Leo.

LEO
He used the rebate to pay off his VISA bill.

CHARLIE
It wasn’t a rebate; it was an advance.

BARTLET
A trip to Banana Republic would have killed you?

laundromat, originally uploaded by catbagan. used under a Creative Commons license.

This started off as a simple comment to this post. I was about to write something like “ha ha, that does sound like an excessive amount of laundry. ” But then I got to thinking about the subject a little more and it turns out I’ve got some thoughts about laundry (and I’ve been doing my own laundry since the 7th grade, and that was a long time ago so I have a little bit of experience with the subject matter).

Now, it’s not like I sit around all day thinking about laundry and average loads of laundry per household, but, if I had ever given it much thought I would have come up with the notion that I probably do an average amount of laundry for my household.

Average household size, by the way, as defined by the 2000 US Census is 2.59 persons.

After a very liberal estimate of laundry usage at my house (a hold of two persons), in which I fired up Excel and made a quick spreadsheet, I came to the conclusion that my household does the following amount of laundry (where “loads of laundry” = number of loads run through the washing machine):

• 156 loads of laundry/year
• 1.5 loads of laundry/week

Factors to consider…

My place of work is pretty casual and I could get away with jeans and a t-shirt everyday of my life if I wanted. This means that I never go to the dry cleaners. Ever. Actually, that’s not true, I might go to the dry cleaners once, maybe twice a year in order to make my suit look nice if I’m shooting a wedding, but otherwise, no dry cleaning for me.

No dry cleaning means I wash everything at home. Luckily, things here are pretty easy… Every two weeks or so I have about two loads of darks to wash… Two cycles of cold water and I’m done. None of this warm wash/cold rinse stuff for me. So I’m saving energy there by not having to heat water with the electric water heater. Then, I hang dry all of my shirts, so that’s at least one cycle of the dyrer that is spared.

Now, the energy savings stop when it comes time to wash large, bulky items (like towels and sheets). My washer is at least 20 years old and is a top loading model of probably medium capacity. The agitator is a little wonky at times, so you have to be strategic when it comes to washing larger loads (like towels and sheets). Instead of dumping everything into one load you have to split stuff up into at least two loads (sometimes three) or else this terrible KA-CHUNK sound occurs during the rinse cycle and a buzzer goes off that you can hear all the way upstairs. The sound is really auwful and when it goes off a slight amount of panic ensues and you end up running down to the basement in order to push in the dial and make it stop. And so every couple of weeks, in order to avoid that horrible “the washer is ajar” alarm, I split larger loads into smaller loads and thus screw up my average number of washes. And I assume waste energy.

If I had my dream washer, a giant front loading model, I could save on water and energy and reduce the number of loads (also I could wash my sleeping bags at home and not have to take them to the coin laundry in Annandale next to the 7-11 where all the day labourers hang out – not that there’s anything wrong with day labourers… it’s really the coin laundry bit I don’t like). Unfortuneately a large front loading washer is not in this year’s budget and so I will have to made do with what I’ve got (unless someone can point out the savings that might be obtained by reducing the number of laundry loads performed at my house).

Thanks to John Catbagan for letting me use his photo. Check out his work on Flickr. 

The Twitter experiment was fun and lives on in the sidebar.  So, if you want to know what I’m up to, or be mystified by the latest inside joke and/or West Wing quote (a whole subset of inside joking), then look right.  Or, click over to the full on Twitter page to see what’s going on…

In the meantime if you have a strong opinion and really miss the daily digests, then, well, leave a comment, but even I was getting tired of seeing them so often.