No gay hate measures on the ballot in Maryland this year

Nice work by state senator Brian Frosh. This guy was sort of marginally my boss when I worked at Karp Frosh as a legal assistant six years ago. He was barely ever around the firm and I never met him, but I'm guessing that he must have been a decent guy. I've had a lot of not-so-nice things to say about Karp Frosh since I left there, but now I have at least one nice thing to report about the "Frosh" from Karp Frosh.


In other news, I got mauled by a metro entrance gate a little while ago. I swiped my Smart Card and continued moving through the gate at a pretty high rate of speed. I did not slow down because, to my right, I observed the fare go down on the electronic readout and because the RIGHT half of the gate actually opened. Unfortunately, the left gate did not retract.

So I rammed my left leg/quad straight into the gate. And it hurt like a motherf@*#er! Plus I must have looked like a total idiot since nobody else would have been able to see that it was actually a gate malfunction and not a dumbass tourist malfunction.

I'll be going out for a jog in a few minutes to see if I'm really injured.

New CNN.com layout

Quite frankly, I think it sucks. There's too much junk and not enough actual content on the top half of the page. Until now, I liked CNN.com (among the non-original news sources) for a quick look at what's happening. If they wanted to revamp, they should have just tried to copy the BBC's well-designed website.

Mary totally destroyed our kitchen this afternoon with a mayo bomb

As she took the large glass jar out of the refrigerator, it slipped from her usually perfect grip and detonated on impact with the floor. I heard it from over on the couch. My ears told me that a large hunk of glass had been obliterated, yet the shatter sound was also not quite what you would expect to hear.



While the top portion of glass attached to the lid did indeed launch across the kitchen along with a spattering of glorious mayonnaise, the bulk of the structure remained congealed thanks to the contents. The strange quality I had detected in the shattering sound was the mayo sticking to the innards of the glass jar just as it might stick to the inside of your arteries.

Chris Matthews OWNS the Bush Administration on Iraq

Three meg clip of him speaking on the Imus in the Morning show about all the BS coming from Bush, Cheney, and the rest of their crew. (via Crooks and Liars)

Bah-Bye

J.J. Redick can suckit.



And somewhere out there, another little boy is crying... again. He can suckit too.



And by the way, I had LSU over Duke. Go brackets.

Thursday reads

A great post from the Poor Man with significant Commando vs. Red Dawn content.

And a good one from The Onion on the current state of affairs in Iraq.

Entire city of Pittsburgh shuts down because of guy trying to scare pigeons with a pellet gun

For real.

All city public schools shut down early... downtown buildings evacuated... the inbound Fort Pitt tunnel (i.e. the beginning/end of Interstate 279) closed. All for a guy with a pellet gun.


Pellet Gun Terror Update -- The Post-Gazette got a great photo of Mayor Bob O'Connor being hurried away from the Pigeon-Fire danger zone:


Pellet Gun Terror Update 2 -- It turns out the guy who caused the whole scene managed to leave Downtown in the middle of everything:

There was no sniper after all, only a maintenance man at the Pittsburgh Allegheny County Thermal plant shooting at pigeons inside the 10-story facility with a pellet rifle... When police discovered that tidbit of information, they also learned another. Despite the rapid response and overwhelming police presence, the worker, a Fayette County resident, had quietly left, possibly oblivious to the uproar he had caused.

Wow - no posts over the last week

A sign of depression?

Or just a sign of nothing going on?

March Madness is here -- and I'm already in last place

In my grand tradition of not being able to pick a good bracket to save my life, I'm already screwed a mere six hours into the tournament. On one sheet I've already lost a Final Four team and on the other, I've lost two Sweet 16 teams.

Some jagoff stole my credit card last night...

... from a Kinko's self-pay copier

Hardcore Kayaking

This guy or gal has quite a story to tell after this incident.

Desperate story placement by the Washington Times

Is this story newsworthy??   Sure.

Front page, above the fold newsworthy??   Not a chance.

Here's the basic push underlying today's front page piece: Saddam was talking about reacquiring weapons of mass destruction at some point in the mid 1990s. And essentially, past discussions about acquiring weapons is the same thing as actual possession of weapons at the time that we went in. So its really a good thing we invaded a sovereign Arab Islamic nation that had not attacked us and did not possess the suspected weapons of mass destruction.

Urinal hilarity and other weeekend BS

- A few of us ran over to Lucky Bar on Friday night after catching a night of the Banff Film Festival at National Geographic. The film festival? Pretty good. Watching the Terps get nuked by Boston College while at the bar? Not so good. What I saw in the bathroom at the bar? Awesome.

There were three urinals in the bathroom. I was using the middle one. Then someone walked in and set up shop at the urinal to my left. From my peripheral vision, here's what I could tell you: 1) He had a full pint of beer with him, and 2) He balanced it on top of the flushing apparatus above the urinal.

Since I went back to concentrating on my own business, I did not actually see what happened next. I heard a big commotion. And then I went back to my peripheral vision and saw the guy trying to catch the beer in mid-air -- while he was in the middle of taking care of his own business.

And he caught the beer... upside down. The entire beer poured out onto his chest. And presumably all over his exposed crotchal region and his boxers or tightey whiteys and pants. I honestly felt bad for the guy. Plus I didn't want it to seem like I was actively watching him at the urinal (which I wasn't). Thus, I almost bit a hole in my lip trying not to burst out laughing.


- Played my first spring league ultimate game with PIMP yesterday. We won, though I definitely had nothing to do with it. I touched the disc twice on offense. Both times, I wound up throwing it away on bad deep shots. I also touched the disc once while playing defense. And though I thought I had a defensive block, that disc also deflected straight to someone from the other team. Maybe I'll contribute next weekend.


- Just saw Senator Joe Biden on Meet the Press. He handled himself pretty well. I have two observations, though: 1) Is he actually a host on the show??? It seems like he's on Meet the Press every other week. The guy is a whore for that camera, and 2) Here's yet another Democrat who is doing everything he can to blame others for his idiotic vote for the Iraq war. And he wasn't even bullied into the vote as some less secure senators were. Short of being arrested for selling crack, there really isn't anything he could do that would cause Delaware to vote him out of office. He could have "safely" voted against the war.

I had to beg the DC Police to send help... but I'm not to hopeful anything will happen

The 4am trash trucks are back. And when I called both the local zone office and the 311 non-emergency number to complain about it, I got the 100% brush off. So I wrote a letter to the Chief:

Office of the Chief of Police
Metropolitan Police Department
Government of the District of Columbia
300 Indiana Avenue NW
Washington, DC 20001

    Re: Lack of Service from Zone 2 office / 311 service


Dear Chief Ramsey,

          Hello. I live in the apartment building directly behind the "Sam's Park n Shop" on the 3500 block of Connecticut Avenue NW. We have had instances of commercial trash trucks showing up in the middle of the night and making an insane amount of noise. The service alley in question is between Connecticut Avenue NW and 2755 Ordway Street NW. It is easily within 300 feet of residential property, so the trash trucks are clearly violating city noise code by showing up before 7am -- last night, ETW'’s truck was here at 4:10am. Other times, it has been Waste Management's trucks in the alley.

          I have called both DC's 311 non-emergency service and the Zone 2 police office and have been told there is nothing the police can do for me. They've basically told me that my only options are to complain to the trash company or to file a civil suit against the trash company in accordance with DC noise regulations.

          Is this true?? Is there really nothing the police can do for us?? I have tried in the past to complain to the trash company and to the local restaurants that employ them, but that has not proven to be very helpful. I am aware this is certainly not a high priority violation in the grand scheme of DC crimes. However, I would very much like to avoid engaging in litigation, so I'm really hoping you can do SOMETHING to help enforce the city's noise regulations for us.

                      Thank you for your attention to this matter,

                      Samuel Stein

Penguins' record heading into tonight's game in DC

ENTIRE SEASON

vs. Capitals: 3-0
vs. the rest of the NHL: 11-48

SINCE JANUARY 3

vs. Capitals: 2-0
vs. the rest of the NHL: 1-20

So I'm going to the game tonight hoping for a win... and also hoping it won't be our last one of the season!

Awesome new TV series on ABC

Actually, I have no idea what the show is about or if its any good, but I just happened to catch the first couple minutes of a brand new series call Sons & Daughters. The entire opening sequence of the series premier was set to the song Althea by the Grateful Dead. In addition to that, one of the main characters also threw in a random Mickey Hart reference a couple minutes into the show.

I'll probably never watch the show again, but I felt I had a Deadhead duty to report on this.

Ummm... do any of these morons in Pennsylvania remember Florida 2000?

It appears that a prominent pro-choice activist is contemplating running for Senate as an independent this fall against Democratic challenger Bob Casey, Jr. and Republican incumbent Rick Santorum.

I know its undemocratic to argue against a candidacy rather than a candidate's actual merits, but there are times to run for office and times to keep your mouth shut. For example, if Ralph Nader had wanted to run for President in 1996, I would have been all for it. First, Bob Dole was already contending with the Ross Perot effect on the right in addition to incumbent Bill Clinton. And more importantly, the possibility of a Bob Dole victory was not as awful for the left to contemplate as the possibility of a Bush victory was in 2000. At the very least, Bob Dole had a nice looking resume and was not a certified idiot.

On the other hand, Ralph Nader in 2000??? That was a lot like what this woman in Pennsylvania is thinking about.

We need to get rid of Rick Santorum. He is one of a very small number of Congressmen that you could describe as a true national (or international) embarrassment. As Tom Ferrick of the Philadelphia Inquirer famously put it last year, Rick Santorum has "one of the finest minds of the 13th century."

Kate Michelman may be dismayed by the fact that both major party candidates in her state this fall will be generally pro-life, but that's too bad for her and the pro-choice voters. Michelman needs to shut the hell up, be a good liberal, and help boot Rick Santorum out of office. Even a pro-choice activist should see that its worth allowing a single pro-life vote in the Senate to go uncontested if that means a Rick Santorum defeat.

If Michelman does decide to run for Senate, I wouldn't be surprised if Rick Santorum himself contributes to her campaign.

All this talk of independent and third party candidates leads me to wonder how those 97,000 people that voted for Ralph Nader in Florida six years ago are feeling right about now. I'm thinking about 90,000 of them are still sick to their stomachs and/or lie to others about who they voted for. Because deep down, they know that they elected George W. Bush. And I'm sure, if given the opportunity, a lot of them would beg Michelman and potential Michelman voters not to unwittingly help re-elect Rick Santorum this fall.

The CD Retro Mail...

the DC Metro rail map

the DC Metro rail map, 100% anagrams (via Gene Cowan)

Dude, I can't wait for the Season 4 premier of "Iraq" on March 21 on NBC, CBS, ABC, FOX, PBS, MSNBC, FOXNews, and CNN!

This is going to be awesome.

I'm so glad the networks decided to renew the show's initial contract. Remember originally when it hit the air back in March 2003, the producers over at the White House made it sound like this was just going to be a limited budget, short mini-series. But I guess they got green-lighted to turn the project into a full fledged television series after all the positive feedback following the popular Jessica Lynch rescue episode.

Ratings have been in decline since that episode where the bumbling President, superbly played by George W. Bush, made a ridiculous photo-op landing on the aircraft carrier emblazoned with the "Mission Accomplished" banner. Yet the show still goes on.

As for Season 4, here are some things to expect: A forbidden romance between a female American soldier and her boyfriend who is caught up in the Iraqi insurgency.   ABC News anchor Bob Woodruff completes his recovery and returns to Iraq... looking for revenge.   A dramatic Saddam Hussein escape episode.   And in late October and early November, the show will air a multi-part crossover extravaganza with the cast of the show "Mid-term Elections."

Also, I heard a rumor somewhere that Jack Bauer is going to both track down and kill a fleeing Saddam Hussein and uncover the big link that may lead him to Osama bin Laden in the season 4 cliffhanger finale.

Damn. We're not even into the fourth year yet and I think I'm already excited for season 5!