For the preservation of historical sightings of the elusive “Big Rib”

There he is on the left, in all of his glory. This was the night where after seeing a movie, not 5 minutes after this photo was taken, that we came across a squashed pizza box in the parking lot containing a slice of pizza. Big Rib was offered 10 bucks to eat, which he of course accepted, and then defaulted on. After taking our money, but not eating the pie, he was chased (by me) with the slice which was thrown at him. The 10 yard dash was enough to make him immediately throw up.

I can’t wait for this.

Maybe this is old news, but I just came across this and I have never stared at my computer screen with such a look of dumb before. I don’t get this, I don’t know if I want to, and I am pretty sure that much like Halloween when I was a kid, this video celebrates the unknown in the world.

Where my entire circle of friends gets to sit as members of the board in Santa Cruz.

Please watch what we have in store for us. Imgine Councilwoman Bumps from 2:02 – 2:12

Here

My friend put this up on her Facebook page today. It’s a conversation we had via IM, and through the magic of Xtranormal, you get to watch it as an animated conversation between dogs. Watch the Video HERE

http://www.xtranormal.com/

Obama is the new President of the United States.

Assuming you don’t know the ins and outs of every single ballot initiative for this election (I certainly do not), I thought it might be a good to use the Whateves forum for us to ask questions, and for other to answer them.

After listening to NPR conduct polls and interviews about young voters and how they feel about Proposition 8, A fundamental question struck me. A major source of support for banning Same Sex Marriage (aside from being uncomfortable with the idea of “redefining” marriage) is that if gay people are allowed to get married, then our (your) children will be learning about this newly defined marriage in school.

Which is when it occurred to me that I never heard about regular ol man and woman marriage in school. Yet this is something that several of the people interviewed today said “I don’t want my kids learning in school that  now marriage means any two people can get married”. Am I wrong? Is anybody an educator on whateves? Can you confirm or deny if, or when, teaching grade schoolers about marriage is part of your curriculum? Is this something that they cover in private religious schools but not public schools? If so that’s even more infuriating. If this is only being taught in religious schools, maybe instead of amending the constitution to exclude the rights of some of our population, we should be changing it to have more strict secular teaching curriculum laws that apply to schools no matter of their ownership.

Anybody know the answer? Even if you don’t feel free to post questions here and then see if they get answered.

Here’s a resource – FactCheck.org

I didn’t get to watch the debates last night, but I heard highlights on the radio this morning and am currently downloading them as a podcast to listen to in their entirety. I heard McCain rail against Obama’s lack of experience, and Obama calling for change. For no apparent reason this morning, I was curious to see what has changed about PResidential Debates over time. Here is a video of the first televised Presidential Debate between Nixon and Kennedy in 1960. There are a few interesting things here. Mostly the way that Nixon gracefully states that he and Kennedy want the same thing, what is best for the country, they only differ in how they will get there. No backstabbing, no underhanded blows. Then at 1:57 the film cuts to campaign speeches for the two candidates that are eerily relevant to this election, maybe these sentiments sound familiar to you:

Nixon – I saw we can’t afford to have the White House as a training ground for an inexperienced man

Kennedy – This administration has failed to recognize that in these changing times… the United States has lost its image as a new strong, vital, revolutionary society

Nixon – I have been to Russia and I have seen it (almost exactly mirroring John McCain’s defense as to why his foreign policy is stronger than Obama’s; because he is more well traveled)

Man this is awesome. Somebody at the  Pentagon has been “researching” terrorists using MMO’s (like WOW, Pictured) to organize strikes in the real world. In the link there is a correlation between in-game and real-world targets that is hilarious. The second – best part is that in the context of WOW, the above conversation makes no sense, and the best part is that my Mage gained the Dragon Fire spell yesterday.

Probably no one cares, I think I am the only MMO Player on the board, but I read between the lines on this story and came up with the following origin scenario.

20-Something think tank college genius gets job at Pentagon.

Assigned by the President himself to “find the terroristsesses” , he says “yes sir” at all the appropriate times, and then promptly goes back to playing World of Warcraft on Government time until the one day when GW Bush pops his head in and ask how the search is going, at which point our young genius pauses for three nanoseconds and discloses his new “research” involving terrorists using MMO’s to plan attacks.

and I should write a book about my dealings with crazy fucking people who own property in this town.

I responded to a very vague listing on Craigslist simply asking to set up a time to view the place, and I got this response:

I work for the City of Santa Ana and for the second time I have been put in charge of finding musical entertainment for the Annual Southern California Coastal Cleanup day on Saturday, September 18th. This is the same event that Sendaero was commissioned to perform at two years ago. Last year there was no band, but I did back into and demolish the car that belonged to the parent of a high school student who was volunteering with a huge City Owned Flatbed Truck.

The Problem is that I don’t know anybody in bands anymore. So if you know people who have a band that is accessible to people outside of whatever specific musical niche or sub genre the band may cater to (aka they can’t be Chaos UK), then hit me up. I need to have this nailed down by the end of the weekend, and the band will get a check for at least $300.00 a few weeks after the event.

The band will be expected to be set up and ready to go by 11:30 am (Tenacious D is out) and play from Noon until 1:30 at Santiago Park in Santa Ana.

While I got a good chuckle out of “going out in a blaze of bluegrass”, my frustration and anxiety with what has happened over the RNC has made me take up Madex on his suggestion that I contribute rather than criticize.

I have been watching with growing disgust as stories come out about the abuses going on before the RNC started and the tactics of the Police force in dealing with protesters during the convention. What I have not been hearing is commentary from anyone that I know, and that’s almost as disturbing.

I first noticed the story when the Police pre-emtively raided houses where protests were being planned and illegally seized people’s property. Then you had Amy Goodman from Democracy Now being arrested, despite showing a press tag as she attempted to intervene in two other DM reporters from being arrested. And Finally today you have Police shooting explosive devices into a crowd of protesters who were “verbally abusing” them. Really? The proper response to someone yelling obscenities at you is to shoot tear gas at them?

What do y’all think? What is the RNC so afraid of that they need to arrest people for PLANNING peaceful demonstrations?  Why isn’t ANY of this being reported through National News sources (this is a redundant question, the real question is why do we accept that it is not being reported) and where do you draw the line between the Police holding a defensive position and waging war against an unarmed populace?

I wish I could make this slicker, but you are going to have to actually click the three links:

Search and Seizure

Amy Goodman Arrest

Police Fire Tear Gas at Crowd

The government is trying to kill us with rainbows.

This dude has the best page on Yelp.

Read his review of Prehistoric Pets