Poetry Thursday: We're Going Camping Edition

Summer in the Mountains
by Li Po

Gently I stir a white feather fan,
With open shirt sitting in a green wood.
I take off my cap and hang it on a jutting stone;
A wind from the pine-tree trickles on my bare head.

List Tuesday: Thursday Edition

All-time Best Song Parts (Not Neccessarily the Whole Song, Just Part of It That Is Really Good. The Rest of the Song Might Suck)

1. That one part in Whole Lotta Love off Led Zeppelin II right after the sorta spacey part with all the moaning and cymbals when the guitar comes in and it's all "Dunh Dunh. Bwowh-dee-deedley-deedley-dee. Dunh Dunh. Bwoh-dee-deedley-deedley-diggadum. Dunh Dunh. Doo-dee-doo-doo-dee-doo..." Man, I love that part.



2. That one part in What is and What Should Never Be from Led Zeppelin II when the guitar part is alternating between the left channel and the right channel and it's all "dunh-uh(R) dunh-uh(L) Dunh-uh(R) dunh-uh(L) dunh-uhn-dun(R). You know the part. It rules.



3. That one part from Bring it on Home off Led Zeppelin II (at this point I am thinking about making the list Best Song Parts From Led Zeppelin II) when the harmonica and bass intro transitions to the main riff part and it's all "dun-neener-eenah, bwow-digga-digga-dum, doodle-doodle-doo bwow-digga-duh.."



4. That part from Baba O'Riley about 41 seconds in where the big bashing piano chords start. Gives me goosebumps every time.



5. The whole intro part to Paradise City by G 'n' F'n R. It lasts for more than one minute is totally badical. Especially when the guitar comes in and it's all Baaaaaaa-bigga-baaaaaah chika-baaaaaaah chika-baaaaaaah chika baaaaaaah. And then Slash comes in on the lead guitar and I won't spell out that part, but is bodacious.



6. Basically all of You Shook Me All Night Long off Back in Black but we'll call the intro the best part. And the guitar solo. Any self-respecting guitarist had darn well better know at least the intro riff and preferably the whole thing. The greatest high school dance rock song of all time.



7. The Clarence saxophone solo right about two minutes into Born to Run by Springsteen and E St. Band. Best. Sax. Solo. Ever. Not that that says a whole lot, but still.



8. THe last minute or so of First Wave Intact by the Secret Machines. It's so loud and cacaphonous that it blows you away. Plus, the final snare beat that ends the song sounds like a gunshot, which is cool.



9. The very end of Wake Up by Arcade Fire when whatever-the-hell-his-name-is screams "You better look out below!" I also like the string action going on there.



10. The part from Sabotage by the Beastie Boys when they're all "listen all y'all it's a sabotage, listen all y'all it's a sabotage...." getting louder and louder and shit. Also, how many of you saw this one coming? Everyone? Well, what did I expect. As a white boy who likes rock, I think I'm required to say something along the lines of "nah, I don't really like rap. Except for the Beastie Boys and Tribe Called Quest. And Jurassic 5." I'm pretty sure it's a Federal law.



11. The guitar solo at the end of Sultans of Swing by the Dire Straits. I won't even try to sound it out, it's too fast.



12. I would say the opening chords to Smells Like Teen Spirit, but that's way to obvious. How about the part from Nirvana's Frances Farmer Will Have Her Revenge on Seattle when the lyrics are "She'll come back as fire, and burn all the liars, leave a blanket of ash on the ground." That is some good stuff. In Utero is another totally sweet record.



13. The second part of Paranoid Android off of OK Computer. It starts at about 2:20 and is so radical that it makes my eyes hurt and my hair catch on fire. Actually this just happened once.


I think that this is about enough for right now. Wait, I just thought of one more!



14. The very end of every single U2 song. You know, the part where it stops playing and you don't have to listen to it anymore. I love that part.

A Ton of Hot Air

Okay folks, I wasn't going to write about this, like, ever, but I have to. Did you see the Post today? No? Okay, here's the editorial cartoon...



Can we all just stop blaming things on global warming? Global warming is not an on/off thing. It doesn't directly cause any weather patterns. It influences average weather patterns over decades not days. This rain? Not caused by global warming. Hurricane Katrina? Not caused by global warming. Were the intensities affected by global warming? Possibly. But please, please stop saying "well, looks like it's global warming."

Also, while we're on the subject, no, colder weather than usual during the winter does not mean that global warming isn't true.

Also, while we're on the subject, I've heard that last year was the hottest in 2,000 years. Are you telling me that we are freaking out and blaming death, destruction and flooding on weather that isn't even yet out of the normal distribution of historical global temperatures? You are? Well I'll be! I thought global warming was a never before seen wave of highest ever temperatures. Huh.*

[Redacted due to policy violation]


*For those of you who don't normally read this blog, or for those of you that do, but never understand when I am joking, this is one of those times. I actually think global warming is real and a big deal. It's a big deal because our industrial society was built during a period of historically low global temperatures and is vulnerable to any major shift in weather patterns, even if it takes decades. And stop feeling smug about it. It'll affect you, too.

Stick it to 'Em

I'm not the biggest fan of those euro-style bumper stickers. You know, the ones that have some inscrutable abbreviation in black block letters against a white oval background?

Actually, I'll come right out and say it: I think they are stupid. No one cares that you once went to the outer banks and all you have to show for it is this sticker.

These people probably have one on their Audi

I'm not, however, predisposed against ALL these stickers. If someone were to print one like this, I would by it in an instant. Welcome to the jungle, tailgaters.

Random Picture Friday: Heavy Metal Edition

This is totally the next thing I am teaching to the brickson. Just yesterday I taught how, when somebody does something really dumb, you're supposed to say "suckerrrrrrrrrrrrrr!" He's really good at it. I've also taught him to say "dang it!" when he can't get something done that he wants to do.


I will not teach him to do this*, though. It is definitely hardcore and I think Ozzy might appreciate it, but I do not. Pretty impressive for a little kid.


*No dogs were hurt in the making of this picture.

Today in History

Eighty years ago today my mother's mother was born somewhere in Idaho, I don't remember exactly. Some things I do know about her: she has six children and 18 or 19 grandchildren and a bunch of great-grandchildren. She went to the same middle school/junior high school as me, Franklin, in Yakima. Like my mother and I, she is the third oldest child in her family and like my mother and I, her birthday falls on the 23rd day of the month. She plays bingo. She worked in an apple packing warehouse for many years. Her mother died at age 96 when I was in the fourth grade. Her husband died when I was in the 10th grade after being partially paralyzed for more than 15 years. He fought in World War II. She grew up in an orchard in the Yakima Valley and at harvest time, actual real-life indians in teepees would camp out in the orchard to work. She doesn't like having her picture taken. She is a wonderful grandmother and great-grandmother.

For her birthday my mom and aunts and uncles are throwing a big bash in Franklin Park in Yakima. We won't be able to attend, but we did send a little message and picture for the "memory book" or whatever you want to call it that my aunt is putting together. Here's what I said.

Dear Grandma,

We love you.

Thanks for being such a great hugger. Maggie, Levi and I all agree that you give the world's best hugs every time we see you, which isn't nearly as often as we'd like.

Thanks for making Maggie feel so much like a part of the family. Thanks for loving her like you would one of your own grandkids.

Thanks for being such an awesome Great Grandma. Levi loves you. A lot.

Thanks for letting us all get together at your house every Christmas Eve. Even if we never did get to open the presents as soon as I wanted (as soon as we got there!).

Thanks for letting us run wild in The Shop back in the day. And thanks for the lemonade or water or whatever it was we needed to drink after spending a hot summer afternoon baking in The Attic.

Thanks for giving me my first taste of coffee when I was three years old. I'm sorry that I spit it out all over you. I like it now!

Thanks for everything you've done for our family. From teaching me to play bingo to so many other things.

Most of all, thanks for being a part of our lives. We love you.

Love,
Schuyler, Maggie and Levi

Geez, it's getting a little dusty in here. Somebody turn on the air filter.

Bad Photoetry Thursday

Today's search word was "huckleberry"
If you can't read the "poem," just click on the picture.

Existential Poetry Thursday

Poetry and Religion
by Les Murray


Religions are poems. They concert
our daylight and dreaming mind, our
emotions, instinct, breath and native gesture

into the only whole thinking: poetry.
Nothing's said till it's dreamed out in words
and nothing's true that figures in words only.

A poem, compared with an arrayed religion,
may be like a soldier's one short marriage night
to die and live by. But that is a small religion.

Full religion is the large poem in loving repetition;
like any poem, it must be inexhaustible and complete
with turns where we ask Now why did the poet do that?

You can't pray a lie, said Huckleberry Finn;
you can't poe one either. It is the same mirror:
mobile, glancing, we call it poetry,

fixed centrally, we call it a religion,
and God is the poetry caught in any religion,
caught, not imprisoned. Caught as in a mirror

that he attracted, being in the world as poetry
is in the poem, a law against its closure.
There'll always be religion around while there is poetry

or a lack of it. Both are given, and intermittent,
as the action of those birds - crested pigeon, rosella parrot -
who fly with wings shut, then beating, and again shut.

I Give Up

Well, the death of this blog might be on the horizon. I couldn't be cynical today, and without that, my blog persona's got nothing. Nothing.

I wanted to say something cynical and funny about this house concert that I went to last night, but I can't. It was too good.

Dang it, Ryan and Holly!

Everyone else: I highly recommend The Cobalt Season's But I Tell You.

Dispatches from the Metro: Magical Happy Land

Just so you, you know, know, the greatest thing ever happened yesterday at about 1:05 PM on the New Carrolton Platform at Metro Center. Let me set it up for you....

A typical six-car train came barreling into the station, just like usual. I was standing towards the "front" of the platform. By that I mean I was standing where the front of the train would stop. I thought. However, as I stood there, I found myself thinking, "dang, that train is going pretty fast!" And fast was it going indeed. So fast in fact, that it didn't manage to stop until the first car was almost entirely past the platform. "Sucks to be the people on the first car," I thought. "I don't think they can get out."

Well, as it turned out, no one could get off the train for about, oh, five minutes. At that point the doors opened. The only trouble was that the doors that opened were not on the platform side, they were on the other side. After about 3 more minutes the real doors finally opened and several people spewed out of the train. And that's when it got amazing and awesome!

So, I walked onto the train while both sets of doors were open. What an opportunity this was! Deciding that I may never have this chance again, I stepped across the threshold into the most incredible land I've ever seen. I don't know if the WMATA uses some sort of cloaking device, but opposite the platform, where you never see anything but a vague light is actually a magical wonderland.

I stepped through the doors and found myself walking amongst lovely trees bearing all kinds of fruit. Except cashews because those things will mess you up with their urushiol. Anyway, it was just like heaven. You know that scene in Happy Gilmore where Adam Sandler goes to his happy place? Yeah? It was just like that. That's the best way I can describe it. Well, not just like it. Adam Sandler wasn't there because then it would have been like hell, not heaven. And there were no midgets because they freak me out.

I wandered for what felt like hours. I saw flying cars that ran on air, talking squirrels discussing dirt viscosity, and even some chick throwing moldy tangerines at a case of wine. It was undescribably beautiful. But in the back of my mind I knew that I needed to return to the train and get my butt over to DOT headquarters. And so, with pain in my heart and the seeds of a longing that will never be fulfilled, I returned to my door. I said goodbye to that place knowing that I would probably never visit again. As I was about to reboard the train, I asked the tangerine chick what this place was called. "Is it Narnia?" I asked. She looked at me like I was some sort of nutbag and said, "No, you dork, this is the real world. Where you live is just a hologram projected by the new world order shadow government to keep the masses under control. It's a conspiracy dude."

Maybe I'll make a documentary. I'll call it "Loose Change."

Random Dropkick Friday

This guy must be pretty cool. He is acting like a total idiot, dressed ridiculously with shades and a hat, but he still has some chick in a bikini holding is leg. He must be doing something right. I like this guy.

Now I like him even more becuase he is kicking a dog, and we all know how much I hate dogs.

I hate seeing dudes on the metro that give all us other twenty-something white guys a bad rep. Everybody thinks we're all d'bags, and it's because of people like the guy I saw last night. First, I noticed him because he poked me in the face with his giant, jumbo-sized magazine. You know the ones. They look like a regular magazine except they are glossier and about 50% wider for no apparent reason. I think to myself "what a jerk. I bet he's reading GQ or some other idiotic man-mag." I get a peek at the cover and, even worse, it's Details. I know that you're thinking nothing could be a stupider magazine than GQ. Well, you're wrong.

With my initial suspicions about this guy confirmed, I decided to check him out. Not in a gay way. So I see that he's wearing a nice crisp white shirt with no tie. He probably took his tie off before getting on the train so he could look "laid back." Actually, I do the same thing, so I can't fault him for that. The problems started below the waist. He was wearing black, pleated suit pants with a brown belt. Talk about a major fashion faux pas. Black and brown? Duuuuude. Plus, pleats? Don't they tell you not to wear pleated pants in Details? I guess not. But the piece de resistance of the whole outfit was his footwear. Light brown leather and canvas flip flops. I don't even have a comment about these.

So, with every bad sterotype of late 20-something white guy rolled up in one package, I just looked at him and wanted to punch him the throat. But I didn't. Then the train got to Cleveland Park, I got off and walked out of the station.

As I exited the station, I thought about that guy and how he was really just another guy trying to make his way in the world, although somewhat stupidly. I decided that I really hoped that he was at least a better Christian than I am. That he was more charitable than I am.

Because then he would've turned his other cheek and I could've punched him again.

Bad Photoetry Thursday

Today's search word: Moxee. The brickwife used to live there. She knows what I'm talking about.

Bad Poetry Thursday

Let's try another genre today. How about Sixth Grade (pre-angst) rhyming poetry? Okay, sounds good. What rhyme scheme should we use? How about aabbcdcd? Oooh, great call. Topic? Cheeses. Yes!


The Provolone Ranger
by Some Stupid Kid

A sandwich just isn't delicious
unless it's devoid of fishes
And covered in awesome cheddar
More and more cheddar is better.
Now add on some crumbled up feta
Some swiss, gruyere and havarti
And don't forget some more cheddah
And we'll have a cheese sandwich party.

Poetry Thursday Rolls On

Artist's Life
by Ella Wheeler Wilcox


Of all the waltzes the great Strauss wrote,
mad with melody, rhythm--rife
From the very first to the final note,
Give me his "Artist's Life!"

It stirs my blood to my finger ends,
Thrills me and fills me with vague unrest,
And all that is sweetest and saddest blends
Together within my breast.

It brings back that night in the dim arcade,
In love's sweet morning and life's best prime,
When the great brass orchestra played and played,
And set our thoughts to rhyme.

It brings back that Winter of mad delights,
Of leaping pulses and tripping feet,
And those languid moon-washed Summer nights
When we heard the band in the street.

It brings back rapture and glee and glow,
It brings back passion and pain and strife,
And so of all the waltzes I know,
Give me the "Artist's Life."

For it is so full of the dear old time--
So full of the dear friends I knew.
And under its rhythm, and lilt, and rhyme,
I am always finding--you.

Yesterday, the worst happened. Just as my trusty Red Line train started to pull out of Metro Center, just as it started to pick up speed, the operator (driver?) slammed on the brakes and the train came to a screeching stop. My first thought was "Oh no. Some idiot is stuck in one of the doors and got dragged into the tunnel and is now a bloody smear." My second thought was "Why did they have to do it at rush hour? This is going to cause a ferocious delay. I'll never get home." My third thought was "What? I live in Washington. I don't give a rip about other people as long as they are not inconvenienceing me. In that case I want them to die. But, again, not in a way that would inconvenience me. There should be a law that no track jumpers are allowed between 4 and 7 PM. Jerks." My fourth thought was "oh thank God, the train is moving again. I'll get home on time."

Bonus note: Metro needs to teach their drivers to use the brakes properly. There are three popular braking methods, only one of which is correct.

Option 1: Brake smoothly and evenly as the train is pulling into the station, bringing the train to a complete stop in the right location (i.e. there is a door directly in front of where I am standing on the platform) with a small, comforting, "you finally made it," jolt. This is the right way to do it.

Option 2: Come barrelling into the station before braking heavily (probably around 0.7 g's) and bringing the train to a stop with a crunching, horrible jerk. This is not the right way to do it. I will admit that seeing people fall over because they weren't ready is fun. Unless it's me, then it blows chunks.

Option 3: The Soul-Killer. All you train riders know what I'm talking about. The old brake, coast, brake, coast, brake, coast, brake, coast....ad infinitum. Literally infinitum. I think at atom-scale distances the train is still alternatingly braking and coasting. It never fully comes to rest. Unless it does, and then it's with a terrifying jolt. I hate, hate, hate, hate this one. It makes me die a little inside at every station. This is not the right way to do it.

Update: After what happened on the Orange Line Friday at lunch time, I kind of feel like a jerk for writing this. Sorry.

In Which A Ton of Bricks Writes About The News

Okay, before you all start throwing Precious Moments figurines at me, I know I don't write about the "news" very often (i.e. never) but today I have to. Normally I just leave the news to the other 1.5 billion bloggers to beat to death, but today I need to compliment CNN.com on their terrific reporting.

First, this morning CNN (and probably everybody else, but I don't care) started reporting on the least surprising report to ever come out of anywhere in the history of mankind. The second most unsurprising thing ever is that a report this boring was published by the Government Accountability Office (GAO). Anyway, the report claims that, and you are not going to believe this, some of the $1,000 debit cards handed out after hurricane Katrina were NOT used for dire neccessities. HOLY $*%t! I don't believe it! Is the GAO telling us that when you hand out huge amounts of money (and let's be honest here, for most of these people, $1,000 is like a month's worth of money. Or more.) indiscriminantly, some people might use it for $300 worth of Girls Gone Wild videos? That is outrageous! The $600 at the strip club I can understand. Somebody needs to keep those girls in the money. Plus, the liquor there is dang expensive. But it's all utterly predictable! The GAO might as well publish a report that says.....Um.... I actually can't think of anything else in the universe that is this predictable, what with quantum uncertainty and all. Well, to be fair, I understand the Girls Gone Wild stuff. I bet is was mayor Ray Nagin that purchased it to brighten everyone's spirits. Because what says "New Orleans!" like drunk college girls showing their boobs in return for nothing? Well, maybe drunk college guys peeing in the street, but I don't think anybody sells videos of that. Anyway, here's the complete unshocking article.

As a final note, if anyone from the GAO is reading this, when are you going to publish an audit of the FEMA audit. If this report took any longer to write than like, 25 minutes, there was some serious money-wasting going on.


Now I notice that CNN is reporting on another fabulous and important story. Apparently, if you buy a bathroom vanity in Massachusetts at Home Depot, there's a good chance that it's filled with marijuana! How awesome is that? This one contractor bought one and found two 50-pound bricks of wacky tabacky inside (that's a much funnier name than marijuana, plus no one will ever know what you're talking about because it's a secret!) But seriously, 50 POUNDS! Wait, I mean 100 POUNDS! That is a lot of weed. That would keep you in business for, let me see here, at an eighth a day....the next 35 years! Sweet! Maybe I'll drive up to Massachusetts this weekend. Ah.

Getting a new vanity at Home Depot: $250.
Value of 100 pounds of marijuana you found in the vanity: $145,000
Having an eighth a day for the rest of your life: Priceless.

Wait a minute. Did that say $145,000??? Screw "priceless." Give me the money.


Finally, CNN is reporting (and front page reporting at that) on such controversial issues as food labeling.

First, apparently the AMA wants the government to start forcing restaurants and food makers to label foods with more than 480 mg of sodium "high sodium food" or something like that. Yes, I know this fast food hamburger I'm about to eat is high in sodium. That is why I'm eating it you morons! Salt is awesome! A little picture of a salt shaker and the word "high" aren't going to make me think twice. Well, maybe it will. If I see that picture it might remind me how awesome the salt "high" is and I'll buy something that I hadn't planned on buying just to get that extra sodium. If you're going to label anything, it should be my mom. Now there is a high sodium risk if there ever was one. In my house we had two food groups: Salt and Everything Else. I loved it.

The other food labeling story is about KFC. Some Dr. from Maryland (where else) and an organization with a meaningless name (something like Center for Helping, or the Annoying We-know-better-than-you Persons Association) are suing KFC. They want the judge to force KFC to cook its chicken with something other than partially hydrogenated oils. Or failing that, at least tell their customers right before they buy some chicken that said chicken is deathly bad for them. Yes. We know that. Why do you think we eat so much chicken? It's because we want to eat it, clog our arteries, have heart attacks and die as soon as we can to get away from smarmy nincompoops like you people.

Hoyte (the doctor) said he is suing to force KFC to change its cooking practices "for my son and others' kids, so they may have a healthier, happier, trans-fat-free future." If I wanted anyone to have to live a trans-fat-free future, I would just send them to Somalia or something so they would starve to death because there is no point in living without trans fats. They are that good.

And finally, I was going to say that this kind of lawsuit is frivolous because the American people aren't stupid enough to think that KFC is anything but bad for you. I changed my mind, though, when I remembered that a few years ago there was a fried chicken place in the south that was advertising fried chicken as health food. And people bought it. We are that stupid.

L i s t T u e s d a y

A Bunch of Things I'll Probably Never Do, so what.

1. Play professional basketball


2. Eat a million pounds of steamed crab


3. Stop writing this stupid blog at the end of the month


4. Juggle more than 8 apples


5. Throw a baseball more than 1,000 feet on the fly. I've yet to top 800


6. Star in a Broadway Show about the life and times of Edgar Rice Burroughs


7. Care who Edgar Rice Burroughs is


8. Fight fire with fire


9. Lose more than one SmarTrip card at a time


10. Call someone who cares


11. Cry over spilt milk


12. Spill milk


13. Cough up a lungfish


14. Be buried alive


15. Climb every mountain


16. Ford every stream


17. Hold on loosely


18. Walk 35 miles through the desert to find some old sage just to get the chance to ask him one question: "What in the world are you doing out here?"


19. Shoot flames out of my ears


20. Think that Bono isn't a tard


21. Play chutes and ladders. It's Snakes and Ladders or nothing for this guy.


22. Fly to Nebraska


23. Drink a whole bottle of vodka in one sitting


24. Work in this town again


25. Join forces with evil

Wheelchair Extravaganza

Well, interest is waning from all parties so today you get two very brief stories from the year I spent in Mrs. Beehler's class in thrid grade.

1. I had a friend named Dan. He now works in politics in Oregon according to his myspace page. The summer before third grade started, he was hit by a motorcycle. It broke his leg in about 5 places or something like that. At school, he needed help going to the cafeteria/gym to get his lunch. Different people were signed up for different days. Once, my turn came up, but I didn't feel like leaving the room. So I didn't. He went hungry.



2. I got a spelling test back one week and saw that I received a bad score. The reason? I had literally forgotten to dot some i's. I was freaking pissed.

What Time Is It

I love when people use the old adage that "even a broken clock is right twice a day." That is, like, the best backhanded compliment ever.

But how come nobody ever points out the corollaries to this?

1. A non-broken clock is right all of the time.


2. If the clock is broken because the minute hand fell off, it will never be right in a million billion (a quadrillion) years.


3. If the clock was set for 24-hour days, it will only be right once a day


4. If it's a digital clock and the battery died, it will always be [blank] o'clock and thus never correct.


5. There is no such time as 12:00.

Randog Picdog Fridog

Well, it's that time again. Today our picture is a generic group picture of some group of generic asian people. Except that girl with the weird purple halo. She is obviously some sort of demigod or something, and is thus not at all generic.




And this is how cool the world would be if some people were actually happy-go-lucky dogs. Man, I wish this was real...

Bad Poetry Thursday: All is Dark Edition

I love bad poetry, it is so much funetry. My goal here is to make this poetry not make any sensetry. It's not very difficult and it sounds like something my 10th grade English teacher would have likedetry. He had terrible taste in poetry.

Look into the Mirror and Repeat My Name Three Times
by Mothface McGee


A world away
A goldfish flaps its wings
and a tornado happens
In a Back Alley.

The World is a vampire
And I am the one
That invited him in.

Man is dead
And the world is dead
And love is dead
And death is dead.

Who wants to party?
I've got three cases of
Imported organic beer
That will go bad tomorrow.
Let's all go to the lobby
And buy ourselves a snack
To eat while our bodies go.

Bad Photoetry Thursday: NBN Edition

SW: dork

Poetry Credit: Naughty By Nature

Poetry Thursday: Does Not Compute Edition

Personal Poem Processor
by Bill Knott


I swear the word insanity has two i's,
It Bears itself what it brands schizophrenia,
But if my diary is my obituary's
Childhood, do I hit Delete to update?

The northern none, the southern some, the eastern
Each and the western who are all to othern
To SpellCheck, or would be, if I knew how to
Correct my yawn's pronunciation of you.

Once born my meaning is porous to mania,
So forgive me if I speak of my penis before
My heart, me before you: I need such errors

To pamper this new ParseGram. Or is it too late
To index exits? Reaching the happen stage
Our navels lacked certainty, that body phase.

Street Nonsense

Yesterday, as I am wont to do from time to time, I purchased a copy of Street Sense (the DC Homeless newspaper if you don't already know) from Charles Nelson, my friendly Metro Center vendor. Amazingly, this was the first copy of the current issue that I had purchased. Well, maybe it's not that amazing since I was in Japan for two weeks. I meant to buy one last week, but all I had was a twenty. I meant to give him the twenty but I wussed out. Money, she's really got a hold on me dang it.

Anyway, one of the feature articles in this edition has to be one of the stupidest things I have ever read. The whole thing is one big long lament about the puny salaries of local homeless non-profit's CEOs. In the article they provided a list of local NPs, their budgets and their CEOs' salaries. It is ridiculous. Some of the CEOs have salaries that take up more than 30% of the total budget! On average their salary takes up nearly 5%. This is outrageous. All I ever hear about are the "exorbitant" salaries paid to the heads of big corporations. I never hear about how non-profit CEOs are fleecing the public. Let's just look at some numbers here.



Just look at that. It boggles the mind! Non-profit CEOs get paid, on average, more than 100 times the amount that CEOs of big companies (I used the top 28 from the Fortune 500) relative to the organizations' budgets. How is that fair? Okay, we're just looking at averages, that's true. Let's look at the medians then. For nonprofits, the median salary as a percentage of organizational budget is 7.5%, that's MORE than the average. For major corp. the median is 0.0162%, LESS than the average. Now are you happy? We looked at median, and it just got worse! Okay, I will grant you that there is one non-profit that pays the CEO $0.00. There is also one that pays the CEO $39,000 on a budget of $121,000; that's more than 30%. Sickening. The most that ANY CEO of a major corporation gets paid, as a percent of revenue, is 0.18% (Valero Energy). And that takes into account all the long term benefits. If we just looked at salary it would be much much lower.


Just for the heck of it, Let's throw out most of the Fortune 28's revenue. Let's only look at salaries vs. profit. Check out the chart.

I think I just threw up in my mouth a little. As a percent of profits, the CEOs of nonprofits get paid INFINITY PERCENT! That is so incomprehensible, that, well, I can't comprehend it. INFINITY PERCENT! Even the major corporations only pay, on average, about 0.7%.

So all of you out there complaining that Oil Co. CEOs get paid to much and what not. Change your target. It is the non-profit CEOs that are getting paid at levels that are completely out of whack.

Stupid non-profits.

Chrilistmas in June Tuesday: In Pictures!

My 2006 Christmas List. Also my 2006 Father's Day List. And Birthday.

1. A new computer.




2. A "You're With Me, Leather" T-shirt.




3. A new cell phone




4. A stuffed and mounted Jackalope.





5. As many bags of the world's best potato chips that I can carry.





6. Lame Garageband Jampacks so I can make more lame music, but this time with djembes! And timpanis!





7. Honey I Shrunk The Kids on DVD. The Special Collector's Edition if there is one.




8. A scanning electron microscope. This one is self-explanatory I think.





9. A Toothpaste For Dinner messenger bag so I can walk to the train "in style."




10. The limited edition Dale Ernhardt Timepiece. Never Forget #3, the savior of mankind.





11. Books by Will Leitch. He needs the money now that the Black Table is dead. That thing was a money making machine!




12. A 1966 Karmann Ghia Cabriolet.





13. I've got the other ones already. What a brilliant show. My favorite episode is the one where Angela Lansbury and some kids ride around on a flying bed and go to Cartoon World to play soccer.




14. Some non-empty 40's of Hurricane Ice. Or OE, same diff.




15. A digital SLR. Because what the world needs now is photos, more photos. No not just for some, but for me. And you.





16. A neat-o universal remote. Who doesn't want one of these?






17. A 12-month subscription to Cracked. Not that I just read Cracked. I aslo read Fine Arts Afficionado Monthly.




18. Gibson Custom Shop Transparent Amber 59 Les Paul Quilt Reissue. Owning one of these automatically makes you an awesome guitar player. It's true.




19. A man thong. Preferably mesh.

A Very Important Medical FYI

I just got off the phone with the "Hold" system at Georgetown Medical Center. Instead of music, they play informative medical tidbits. Today I learned something shocking and vital to our survival as a species:

"Veins are a critical part of your circulatory system."

When I heard that, I was utterly astounded. I had no idea that my veins were critical! No more badmouthing my veins for me, that's for sure. Up until this point I had been using my veins basically as an onboard storage system for snacks and stuff. When I wanted a nice afternoon bite of candy, I would slice one open, and out would pour the goods. No more.

Please, let everyone know about this world-changing discovery. Spread the word on menus nationwide.

Again, here is the message from Georgetown University Medical Center:

"Veins are a critical part of your circulatory system."

A Step Below Tertiary

I have been remiss in my promise to write stories from specific years in my life. I realize this. However, I am not sure that it is a problem. The stories I have written about my life in the First and minus-First year of school were, on the whole, not interesting. Except for the Valentine's Day one. That one makes me laugh every time! Now, I'm not one to go back on my words, but, well, I won't go back on my words. Get ready for second grade because it will be spectacular!

My second grade teach was named Mr. Smith, a most boring name to be sure. However, this same Mr. Smith was the maker of a decidedly non-boring chocolate cake. Each week, on Friday, he would bring in a chocolate cake and give a spelling test. The two were linked in that, if you earned 100% on your spelling test, you got a piece of that cake. This brought about the curious attitude among the 2nd graders of wanting other people to fail. The fewer students earning 100%, the bigger the piece of cake each one received. It was essentially a physical and culinary representation of schadenfreude. The top spellers revelled in the poor spelling of the others. Being introduced to this in the second grade has profound beneficial impacts. The sooner you stop deluding yourself about the nature of the world, the better. Also, I never didn't get 100%, so the feelings of the kids who didn't never mattered to me. Okay, there was one time that I didn't get 100% but that was because I wasn't there for the test, I was out at a Yakibatics performance (that will need to be a post in itself. It's just coming back to me now and is so weird that I'm having a hard time believing it was real). I did, however, get to clean the pan, meaning that I got to scour the pan for any crumbs that were left.

So, you're probably wondering amazing things I did in the second grade. Well, I'll tell you. We played Silentball. I will tell you the rules of Silentball.

1. You do not talk in Silentball


2. You do not talk in Silentball


3. You must sit on your desk at all times


4. You cannot pass the ball to someone without first making eye contact with them


5. You cannot drop the ball

If you fail to follow those rules, you are summarily kicked out of the game. There were several of us in the class who were quite good at silentball, and even fewer who were actually so into it that we would willingly forfeit part of our precious recess time to determine the winner. Oh, how I regret that now. The ignorance of youth is heartbreaking.


If you are seeing a pattern of ruthless competition here, well, don't expect it to stop now. Apparently that was Mr. Smith's thing.

You see, we also had math bees (we had spelling bees too, but everyone does. Speaking of spelling bees, I once eliminated myself by misspelling "window." To this day, I am convinced that I actually spelled it right and that Mr. Smith was the one who was mistaken). What is a math bee, you might ask? It's where the teacher stands in front of the class and divides the class into two parallel lines. He/She then shows a flash card. Of the two students at the heads of the respectives lines, the one who says the answer to the math problem on the flash card first is the winner and heads to the back of his/her line. The loser must sit down. It's like Machiavelli meets math. You just keep doing that until only one person is left standing. The winner gets some candy or something. The losers (all but the winner, there is no second place) get nothing. In my class, the math bee winner was either me or John Pham basically every time. John thinks that he won more often than I, but he's kidding himself. The one time I specifically remember winning, John and I dueled it out through all the addition, subtraction and multiplication cards. I finally sealed the deal when we started in on division. It was as epic as two 8 year-olds standing there answering math problems could possibly be.

Random Painful Friday

Note to readers: This is a very bad idea. If you were to get in an accident and the airbag was to deploy, the force of the deployment would probably drive your legs right into your face. That's not so good.






Note to Readers: if you put you legs on the dash in order to move your pelvis forward so that you can slouch to an extreme degree and thus can take a picture of a dog jumping over your car, that is awesome. Do it.