explodo

Finished: Nick Cave - Lyre of Orpheus NP: M. Ward - Hold Time

Interesting choice. One of my top collections of short stories. This is impossible, but a couple that I have not seen yet that would be in my top five: White Noise - Don DeLillo Wind-Up Bird Chronicle - Haruki Murakami I would have to spend some serious time thinking to come up with the others, and most of them have already been mentioned. Slaughterhouse Five, To Kill a Mockingbird, etc.

Really? He was like 7th in the league (or higher) in most passing stats. What the team lacked was any sort of pass rush and, for the first 8 games or so, a running attack. He's not glamorous, but he had a very solid first season as a starter. Edit: I called it his rookie season earlier. That was obviously not the case.

Did we already get to the People tidbit that Ryan and Mandy Moore are getting married?

Excellent. Thanks again, y'all. I'm out of here in a few hours. I'll try to report back on what I actually accomplished.

Yowza.

Yeah, I'll agree with that. I remember some of it being really neat. Just kind of weird to have all of that other stuff in the middle of a state park. Unless that kind of thing is common in state parks that I'm not familiar with?

Is that the thing at that lame park outside of Atlanta? What a bizarre, stupid thing. I think I paid money to see it. And as for the recommendations, good work. I don't have any idea how much time we have, but I do know we're headed to the south rim (due to the north being closed), so some things like Zion are hours out of the way. I'll try to squeeze them in, but who knows. I just found out about this trip this morning so I don't understand or have too many details.

Perfect, y'all. Keep it coming. And nobody likes Canyonlands?

The answer to the question is no. The answer in my heart, which ignores silly things like personal squabbles, is an emphatic yes.

Tomorrow. From Iowa. Any recommendations on what to see or where to stop along the way? Going through Nebraska/Colorado/Utah/Arizona on the way there, and back through New Mexico/Texas/Oklahoma/Route 66. Things of interest to me are weird/good diners, interesting historical/natural sites, and bizarre bits of Americana.

First try. I have found my calling.

People always hate people for stupid reasons. And when you make your politics a part of football by bringing them up every time you talk to a camera, you are asking for people to hate you based on them. As for the actual Super Bowl, I vote Steelers. That said, I won't cry about it either way.

Having been raised Catholic, I'm aware that they're not exceptionally gung-ho about any form of contraception. I was just pointing out the lunacy of the whole ordeal. Coming from the largest employer of child molesters in the world, the idea that sex is so ultra sacred that even a tiny prophylactic is taboo rings a little hollow. If we want to end abortion (and my guess is that we all do), the pro-lifers are going to have to make some concessions.

I think any company willing to spend 1.5 million dollars on an anti-abortion Super Bowl ad has their priorities more than a bit out of whack. Values are likely more entrenched than whoever thought this was a good idea must believe. Couldn't they have instead put that money towards handing out condoms at schools and, you know, actually stood a chance of stopping an abortion or two?

Says the guy who (likely) voted for W. twice. All of a sudden you have a problem with this. And as for that abortion ad, are they going to air the one cursing Hitler's mom?

I wouldn't pay more than 50 cents to see any of the headliners, but the rest of the lineup looks pretty solid.

I did significantly worse on tonight's just fake-taking it via the forum. Came in under 30.

This is pretty great. Thanks, Graham!

Judging from what I saw of Tuesday's, tonight's was much easier.

By "a few more," I apparently meant ten. Yikes. 34 probably isn't good enough for a call back, eh? The answers to some of these make me feel like a total jackass for having screwed them up. Stupid Jeopardy.

I said Colbert Bump when I wanted to say First Bump. That was my moderately embarrassing mistake.

Not to toot my own horn or anything, but I thought that test was mighty easy. I know for certain I missed about 6, likely a few more. But I knew a lot of them. EDIT: The timer got me flustered on a few that I definitely knew. It is hard to not draw a blank on some of those.

I go tomorrow night if I can remember. 8 PM, I think. I am pretty likely to totally forget.

Lion in a Coma seems to not get as much love as I think it should get. It's been in my head for two weeks.