Moonage Webdream

I guess from having my first kid at a somewhat advanced age, therefore knowing that as soon as possible, I’ll need him carting me around, I started teaching him how to drive appropriate transportation at probably too young of an age.  First it was small boats, then it was small aircraft.  Today, we moved on to something a little bigger:

A GP model deisel train.  It went pretty well I thought:

We hooked up to about 400 tons of sand and moved it to a different track to be picked up by a “real” train.  I think he’s ready for about anything but the highway!

Technorati Tags: corman, engineer, train

Travis Ford is coaching Massachusetts right now.  They are playing in the National Invitation Tournament.  Last night, they were down by 22 with a little over fourteen minutes to play.  No problem for Travis’s boys, they beat Syracuse.  This is part of what Tavis had to say post-game:

That was the worst half of basketball we’ve played all year. But being down 19 wasn’t a problem. The way we play, 19 points wasn’t a problem.”

Now, to some people, me probably included, being down by nineteen pretty much means you’re getting whipped.  You’re out of your league that day.  The opposition has your number.  It doesn’t matter what you do, they’re just better.

Apparently some people just think a little differently.  To some people, like Travis Ford, nineteen points is no biggie.  He has a reason to think that way.  On February 15, 1994, Kentucky went to Louisiana and promptly found itself getting whipped much, much, worse than Syracuse was thumping Mass.  With fifteen minutes left in the game Kentucky was down by 31 points and looking completely shell-shocked and hopeless.  Then, something happened, I still don’t know what it was.  For some reason, Kentucky turned on.  They went absolutely postal on LSU and wound up outscoring LSU 62-27 in the half.  And, even won the game.  By the time it was over, it wasn’t even close.  The point guard on that team?  You guessed it, Travis Ford.

So, if I had been watching the game, and had seen UMass down by 19, I wouldn’t have thought twice about them coming back.  Nineteen points just isn’t that big a hill to climb for someone like Travis Ford.  And, given that mentality, give him a couple of more years at UMass and I don’t think nineteen point deficits will be something they’ll have to worry about.  You guys have a real leader at UMass, a winner.

Technorati Tags: comeback, kentucky, lsu, massachusetts, syracuse, travis ford

Two hillbillies walk into a bar.  While having a shot of whisky, they talk about their moonshine operation.

Suddenly, a woman at a nearby table, who is eating a sandwich, begins to cough. And, after a minute or so, it becomes apparent that she is in real distress.

One of the hillbillies looks at her and says, ‘Kin ya swallar?’

The woman shakes her head no.

Then he asks, ‘Kin ya breathe?’

The woman begins to turn blue and shakes her head no.

The hillbilly walks over to the woman, lifts up her dress, yanks down her drawers and quickly gives her right butt cheek a lick with his tongue.

The woman is so shocked that she has a violent spasm and the obstruction flies out of her mouth. As she begins to breathe again, the Hillbilly walks slowly back to the bar.

His partner says, ‘Ya know, I’d heerd of that there ‘Hind Lick Maneuver’ but I ain’t niver seed nobody do it!

Technorati Tags: heimlick, hind lick, maneuver

It’s been a while since I’ve presented a “creation“.  So, without further ado, here’s a couple:

( Maybe this is what the creationalists had in mind? If so, I’m all for it. )

Technorati Tags: bikini, creationalism

Technorati Tags: easter

I had the most annoying nightmare, or dream, the other night.  I’m not looking for any interpretations here, just wanting to put it in print so that it can be forgotten.

Now, not sure about most people, but when I’m going to have a nightmare, I know it.  I get this creepy feeling that something very bad’s going to happen.  I don’t like nightmares, so this creepy feeling upsets me.  Sure enough , a scene emerges of being in a dark, creepy house.  There are people there, people I know.  They are sitting around talking to each other.  They are talking about stuff I don’t have any interest in talking about.  Now, a person doesn’t run around shouting something bad’s going to happen if they don’t know what it is, so I just kind of try to fit in without engaging the conversation.  I’m bored.  Very bored.  And, anxious because I know this is a nightmare and something awful is going to happen to someone.  But, I can’t say anything about it because I don’t want them to think I’m any nuttier than they already think I am.  So, I stand around bored and anxious waiting for the clue that something awful will happen.

It never does.  I just keep standing around bored and anxious.  I finally get so frustrated that I basically shout in my nightmare  that this is the worst nightmare I’ve ever had.  That sudden explosion of temper actually wakes me up.  I go to the bathroom and come back to bed hoping that this nightmare of nothing is gone.  When I went back to sleep, I returned to the same dream.  However, this time, I wasn’t anxious because I knew this was the lamest nightmare of all time.  Best I recall, the nightmare dissolved into the usual wild sex that allows me to sleep like a baby.

Technorati Tags: nightmare

I read this article over at the New York Daily News:

Move over, Beatles. Mariah Carey is on the verge of tying the legendary British band for having the most chart-topping hits.

The hip-hop diva’s newest single “Touch My Body” is poised to give her 18 No. 1 singles, knotting her with the Fab Four.

Man, that comes with so many caveats it’s hard to address them all.  So, I’ll just tackle a few of them real quick.  First of all, here’s a timeline of The Beatles’ #1’s:

• Apr-63 From Me To You
• Aug-63 She Loves You
• Dec-63 I Want To Hold Your Hand
• Mar-64 can’t Buy me Love
• Jul-64 A Hard Day’s Night
• Dec-64 I Feel Fine
• Apr-65 Ticket To Ride
• Jul-65 Help!
• Dec-65 Day Tripper / We Can Work It Out
• Jun-66 Paperback Writer
• Aug-66 Yellow Submarine / Eleanor Rigby
• Jul-67 All You Need is Love
• Nov-67 Hello Goodbye
• Mar-68 Lady Madonna
• Sep-68 Hey Jude
• Apr-69 Get Back
• May-69 Something
• Jun-69 Ballad of John and Yoko

Now, due to one caveat, it can be argued that The Beatles had twenty, not eighteen #1’s.  This is because two “singles” were actually doubles.  Eleanor Rigby and We Can Work it Out were both B sides that acheived #1 status as well.  People don’t do that much any more.  For that matter, I don’t think you can even buy 45’s any more.  Each song now is marketed totally independently.  So, the market is different today than it was forty years ago.  Given that, I think most people would go with the twenty #1’s as opposed to eighteen.

Secondly, it took The Beatles six years to get those twenty ( or eighteen ) #1’s.  Here’s Mariah’s list ( so far ):

• 8/4/1990 Vision of Love
• 11/10/1990 Love Takes Time
• 3/9/1991 Someday
• 5/25/1991 I Don’t Wanna Cry
• 10/12/1991 Emotions
• 6/20/1992 I’ll Be There
• 9/11/1993 Dreamlover
• 12/25/1993 Hero
• 9/30/1995 Fantasy
• 12/2/1995 One Sweet Day
• 5/4/1996 Always be My Baby
• 9/13/1997 Honey
• 5/23/1998 My All
• 10/9/1999 Heartbreaker
• 2/19/2000 Thank God I Found You
• 6/4/2005 We Belong Together
• 12/31/2005 Don’t Forget About Us

If #18 makes it this year, it will have taken her eighteen years to do what The Beatles did in six.  Not exactly the same airplay dominance.

But wait, that’s not all to me.  Another small caveat is The Beatles were actually four ( or more ) different individuals, which Mariah Carey is as well.  If you look at the results of the individuals, the picture changes dramatically.  Paul McCartney has had nine #1’s as a post-Beatle, giving him 29 #1’s to Carey’s 17.  George Harrison had three #1’s before his death, leaving him at 23.  John Lennon had two before his death, leaving him at 22.  Ringo Starr had two as well, leaving him at 22.  Looking at it this way, the list changes a lot:

• McCartney, 29
• Harrison, 23
• Lennon, 22
• Starr, 22
• Carey, 17

Or, you can look at it this way:

• The Beatles, 36
• Carey, 17 

To be in the same boat as the individuals of The Beatles, she’s got a long way to go.

Finally, the impact of The Beatles at the time wasn’t so much their hit songs, it was their impact on society.  From war protests to fashion to changing the entire recording industry, The Beatles, or a Beatle, was in the forefront.  A lot can be argued whether it was good or bad, but it was incredibly profound for a bunch of punk musicians from Liverpool.  I really don’t think Mariah’s done much of anything other than sell records.  So, comparing record sells by divas to the impact of The Beatles just isn’t going to fly for anyone that has a clue.

Technorati Tags: beatles, george harrison, john lennon, mariah carey, paul mccartney, ringo starr

Most seasons, the regular season and SEC tournament are just a preamble to Kentucky going to the NCAA tournament.  This year has been a tough ride.  I wouldn’t be surprised if they didn’t make it at this point.  However, it’s what has gotten in their way that is pretty remarkable to me.  Here’s what it apparently takes to get in their way:

• The previous coach doesn’t recruit anyone for three years.
• The previous coach, realizing he hasn’t recruited anyone for three years, abandons ship.
• New coach comes in with no time to recruit, but nabs two star recruits.
• Star recruit #1, Alex Legion, has his mother tell him Jesus thinks he should be playing somewhere else, and leaves.
• Star recruit #2, Patrick Patterson, is having a fantastic season, breaks his foot.  Out for season.
• Expected star guard Jodie Meeks stays injured pretty much the entire season.
• With an almost completely depleted line-up, lose to two nobodies.

Given all that, they finish the season 18-11 and 12-4 in the SEC.  Those are odds-on bubble numbers.  The only thing that could go wrong at this point is to lose the first game of the SEC tournament and have a bunch no-chance teams win their tournaments getting automatic bids and squeezing out the number of at-large teams.  So, guess what happens?

• Kentucky draws the last game of the second round of the tournament.  This guarantees a late-night finish with little rest for the next day’s game.  Worst thing that could happen is to have the game before them go into overtime, pushing UK’s game even later.  So, what happens?  The game before them goes into overtime. 
• It gets even better.  A tornado strikes the arena.  This pushes the end of the first game till about 11:30pm.  They debate and debate and finally decide to postpone the last game until early the next day.  Which creates an almost unheard of scenario of having to win TWO GAMES IN ONE DAY.  When trying to predict the worst case scenario for Kentucky getting into the tournament, I can assure you, not one single person thought of having a tornado strike the arena.  No problem you say, the Cats are well-conditioned and have beaten Georgia twice already.
• Toss in not getting back to their hotel until 2am and having to play at noon.
• Toss in completely eliminating the sixth man by not allowing ticket holders into the game.
• The only thing that could be worse would be for that game to go into overtime.  So, guess what.  It goes into overtime.  Now, at this point, you can pretty much conclude whoever wins this game is going to get creamed at 8pm.  It didn’t matter.
• Toss in a miraculous three pointer at the buzzer to lose it.
• Now, all that’s left is a bunch of upsets in league tournaments.  Like, let’s say, Clemson beating Duke or Arkansas beating Tennessee.

That folks, is probably what it takes to keep Kentucky out of the tournament.

Technorati Tags: alex legion, arkansas, clemson, jesus, jodie meeks, kentucky, ncaa, patrick patterson, sec, tornado, wildcats

When The Who sang “hope I die before I get old“, they had never met John Persinger.  In fact, when they sang it, John Persinger was old enough to draw retirement.  He’s still around.  Here’s a shot of his 100th birthday party:

Needless to say, his plan looks a lot more appealing than The Who’s.

Technorati Tags: 100, hooters, john persinger, my generation, the who

If you’re forty-something, that image means something.  Gilligan’s Island was the hottest show running for about twenty years of my life even though it wasn’t on for terribly long.  The reason that no one would ever admit publicly was because we couldn’t get enough of Mary Ann.  Ginger was sold as the Hollywood sexpot, but it was Mary Ann who had the curves, and the girl next door looks every teen boy wished the girl next door had.  Alas, the show was cancelled, and we had to move on.  Once those forty-somethings took control of entertainment tv, we seem to keep trying to reinvent the magic that was Mary Ann over and over, but it’s just not the same.  She was hot, she was innocent, she wasn’t trashy, she was smart, she was the perfect babe.

So, what does Dawn do now after convincing all teen males of the 60’s that something like her really did exist in real life?

Apparently staying stoned in Idaho while not organizing the annual Spud Fest family film festival.

Technorati Tags: dawn wells, gilligan's island, idaho, spud fest