LOLdog of the day: Don’t always believe what the cat says

Cats lie:

see more dog and puppy pictures

Cleaning up

If you haven’t noticed, I’ve made some changes to the sidebars.

I figured there were some things I could get rid of in order to make the sidebars leaner.

I’m considering going back to a two-column version of this layout, so cleaning up the current widgets is a must.

Truth or dare?

Welcome to Stupid Quiz Sunday, in which I'll take an online quiz that may or may not be stupid and post the results.

You Are Dare

You are outrageous, adventurous, and wild. You live to have fun. You are all about taking risks and pushing limits. You love the rush of doing something forbidden. Like most daring people, you are highly intelligent and creative. That's why you get bored so easily. You need a lot of stimulation and novelty in your life. You aren't satisfied with the mundane.

Are You Truth or Dare?

Have you taken this quiz? Have a quiz you want me to take? Leave a link in the comments.

Cake and grief counseling will be available at the conclusion of the test

OK. so there wasn’t any grief counseling or a test at the Bunny Run, but there was cake:

I never actually got a piece of it though. Oh well, it’s not like I need it anyway.

Apologies… and a question

It has become apparent to me through recent media coverage that we’re not supposed to call it the swine flu anymore, but H1N1. I’m sorry for offending.

I do, however, have a question:

Why is “swine flu” not used anymore?

• Are swine offended by the term?
• Is the swine industry (for lack of a better term) offended by the usage and association with swine?
• Is it an attempt to make the virus kosher?
• Or is it something else?

Inquiring minds want to know…

Swine Flu? BAH!

My aunt’s a nurse, so usually my grandmother listens to her when anything involving medicine is involved.

Well, this time she didn’t.

My aunt asked her what she was doing about swine flu, and my grandmother responded “nothing.”

You would have thought my grandmother had admitted to being on the grassy knoll.

My aunt told her things like “don’t go to church,” “wear a mask,” and “don’t hug anybody.”

My grandmother, being the woman she is, went to church the next day without a mask on and walked up to a guy that knows my aunt, said “my daughter says for me to not hug people” then gave him a really big hug.

She says she hasn’t had the flu since she retired from teaching, so she’s not worried about this one.

If only more people were like that.

Here’s my sign!

Welcome to Stupid Quiz Sunday, in which I'll take an online quiz that may or may not be stupid and post the results.

You Are CURVES AHEAD

When you're confronted with a problem, you take it on immediately - but with your eyes wide open. You deal with stress well. You take things as they come, and you don't panic. In fact, you often enjoy challenging situations. Difficulty makes you feel alive. You are alert and observant. You notice every twist and turn in the road.

What Street Sign Are You?

Have you taken this quiz? Have a quiz you want me to take? Leave a link in the comments.

My thoughts on the Kentucky Derby

GO THE HORSE WITH THE COOLEST NAME!

That’s all I’ve got.

---

Alright, so I’ll tell you which I think has the coolest name.

I would have gone with I Want Revenge, but it was scratched this morning.

So, in it’s place, I must dub Chocolate Candy as having the best name.

And now I have a craving for chocolate.

---

And really, who names a race horse Hold Me Back? That doesn't make sense…

Ike retired

There will never again be a storm named Ike:

Three hurricane names in the Atlantic and one in the eastern North Pacific were retired from the official name rotation by the World Meteorological Organization's (WMO) hurricane committee because of the deaths and damage they caused in 2008.

The names Gustav, Ike and Paloma in the Atlantic and Alma in the North Pacific will not be used again. Those names would have been used again in 2014. In their place will be Gonzalo, Isaias and Paulette in the Atlantic and Amanda in the North Pacific. The committee issues the list of potential names for tropical cyclones to be used every six years for both the Atlantic basin and eastern North Pacific basin.

Since they’ve retired the name, I think I’ll retire the button I made up too.

Stitching

Welcome to Friday Photo, a new feature where I share photos that I've taken with the world.

I took the digital camera my mom gave me to the Astros game I caught two weeks ago and took a bunch of shots with the intention of stitching them together.

This is actually eight photos stitched together with Windows Live Photo Gallery:

I’d say we had decent seats…

(Anybody think I should put together a post on how I plan out and execute stitched photos?)

The Swine Flu stare of death

I’m afraid to leave the house.

No, I’m not afraid of catching Swine Flu, I figure that if it happens then it happens.

I’m afraid of something much scarier: the “Swine Flu stare of death.”

My allergies have been acting up, probably due to all the rain we’ve had lately, and they’ve left me with a cough.

I figure I’m going to get a lot of looks, especially while I’m in Houston tomorrow for an eye doctor’s appointment, since a Mexico City boy in Houston for treatment died yesterday.

I’m thinking I might do good to wear one of these…

Video of the day: ‘We’ll make sure we notify you so you can leave the building’

The scene near the end of this week’s episode of 24 between Jack (Kiefer Sutherland) and Janis (Janeane Gerafalo) made the episode worth watching…

Check the video out over at Blogs4Bauer since I can’t ever get Hulu embeds to work.

Ok, I admit it, I just liked seeing Gerafalo getting yelled at.

Seriously, the scene made having to see Gerafalo’s ugly mug all season worth it.

I really shouldn’t have taken this…

Welcome to Stupid Quiz Sunday, in which I'll take an online quiz that may or may not be stupid and post the results.

Occasionally I take a quiz directed towards women. This is one of those times:

You Are A Bad Date!

Sometimes it just seems like your heart isn't in it At least, not unless the guy is a dead ringer for Brad Pitt (with more money) You just don't spend enough time wondering if he's having fun... And newsflash - he probably isn't!

Do Men Think You're a Good Date?

Have you taken this quiz? Have a quiz you want me to take? Leave a link in the comments.

More from the Bunny Run

After we got back from the run to San Leon, we set up an easter egg patch for the kids…

We’d originally planned to do this in San Leon, but the folks in San Leon decided they didn’t want their kids around bikers or something like that.

That’s really not bad quality for a cell phone pic…

Video of the Day: A promo for The Unusuals

@TheUnusualsNYC posted a link to this before Tuesday night’s episode as a promo:

If this peaks your interest, you can watch the four episodes that have aired on ABC.com.

Mother’s day plans

At church we’re starting a new tradition this year. On Mother’s Day, we’re doing an anthem as a men’s chorus, and the women will be doing the same on Father’s Day.

When our director told us about her plan to do this, I got pretty excited. My senior year of high school, I sang with the school’s men’s chorus. I’ve been wanting to perform in one again, but haven’t had a chance until now.

When competition time came around, one of the songs we did was Be Thou My Vision, which has an awesome men’s arrangement that we used.

It turned out that our choir director (who also directs at a local high school) picked Be Thou My Vision for the piece we’re doing.

As you can imagine, I’m pretty pumped.

If you’re curious, here’s a video with the arrangement that we’re doing, by a pretty awesome-sounding college choir:

I can’t wait!

LOLdog of the day: Well, would I?

I get this look a lot from Bruiser:

see more dog and puppy pictures

And, yes, he usually did it…

Who said cupcake? Oh, I did.

Welcome to Stupid Quiz Sunday, in which I'll take an online quiz that may or may not be stupid and post the results.

You Are a Vanilla Cupcake

You are very sweet and mellow. You are easy going and easy to like. You are drawn to those stronger personalities. You get along with powerful people. You are like a cupcake because you appeal to almost every type of person. You are friendly and accepting. You bring out other people's best qualities.

What Flavor Cupcake Are You?

Have you taken this quiz? Have a quiz you want me to take? Leave a link in the comments.

LiveTweeting the ‘Stros game

I’ll be live-tweeting tonight’s Astros-Reds game, since I’m there and all.

You can read my tweets here.

Two new shows I’m loving -or- Justin does a real blog post for the first time in forever

Used to be I only watched two shows: House and 24.

Now I’ve got a few more shows I catch:

Lie to Me: I think the whole detecting lies thing is what interests me the most about the show. Each show has, for lack of a better word, “mysteries” that Cal Lightman and his team solve.

The show is a bit like House, but that’s ok.

The Unusuals: It’s part cop drama, and part comedy.

I’ve always known that cops have an interesting sense of humor, and this show touches on that. Through the two episodes I’ve seen so far, I’ve really dug the stories. and I’m interested to see where it’s going.

UPDATE: The Unusuals is on Twitter at @TheUnusualsNYC. From what I can tell, it’s run by people actually affiliated with the show, so it’s legit.

Bunny running

Welcome to Friday Photo, a new feature where I share photos that I've taken with the world.

This is from the Bunny Run last Saturday in Houston.

The bunny run is an annual motorcycle run that traditionally delivers Easter baskets to Shriners Hospital in Galveston.

This year the run wasn’t to Shriners because they still haven’t opened back up since Ike hit, so instead the run was down to San Leon, a small town along Galveston bay that was hit hard by Ike, and delivered the baskets there.

I’ve got more pictures from my cell and I’ll post some of them over the next few weeks.

LOLdog of the day

see more dog and puppy pictures

Am I a city slicker?

Welcome to Stupid Quiz Sunday, in which I'll take an online quiz that may or may not be stupid and post the results.

Apparently not…

You Are Country

You'll take natural beauty and quiet over the hustle and bustle of the city. You can appreciate the simple things in life, and it doesn't take much for you to feel content. While you appreciate the many opportunities of the city, you see them as too much of a good thing. You love living a peaceful life. It's important that you can hear yourself think.

Are You City or Country?

Have you taken this quiz? Have a quiz you want me to take? Leave a link in the comments.

WIN of the day: When zombies attack

see more pwn and owned pictures

Birthday prediction

Welcome to a special edition of Stupid Quiz Sunday. It’s special because it’s Wednesday. And my birthday. So this is appropriate:

Your Birthday Predicts You're Influential

Ever since you were born, people have found themselves drawn to you. You have a superstar personality. You are charming and fascinating. You believe in hard work and persistence. You know how to make your big dreams a reality. You are demanding, but your standards are reasonable. And you demand the most from yourself.

What Does Your Birthday Predict About You?

Have you taken this quiz? Have a quiz you want me to take? Leave a link in the comments.

Rainouts: The other Opening Day tradition

PPD:

It's Opening Day for most of Major League Baseball on Monday. Mother Nature apparently isn't a baseball fan, however.

The Boston Red Sox and Chicago White Sox both had their openers postponed because of inclement weather in the local forecasts.

Can we finally institute the “no roof rule” that Laurence has been pushing for for years?

I’m thinking that maybe I should clean the thing a little more often…

Welcome to Stupid Quiz Sunday, in which I'll take an online quiz that may or may not be stupid and post the results.

2,696,400

Created by OnePlusYou - Free Online Dating

Have you taken this quiz? Have a quiz you want me to take? Leave a link in the comments.

Sick of certain people

I’m sick of people that have nothing better to do than come to me when they have a problem and lay it at my feet like it’s mine too.

People that expect me to quiver to their every want and need or help them when they fuck up, but piss and moan when things don’t happen their way.

People who weren’t there for you for years, but now think that they can insert themselves into your life and act like they always were.

Those people need to just get the fuck out of my life.

If they won’t, I’ll be glad to show them the door.

That is all.

Squaring up

Welcome to Friday Photo, a new feature where I share photos that I've taken with the world.

Roy Oswalt squaring up to bunt:

Twigle?

Apparently, “The Google” wants to be cool…

That, I’d assume, is why they’re reportedly trying to acquire Twitter:

Here’s a heck of a rumor that we’ve sourced from two separate people close to the negotiations: Google is in late stage negotiations to acquire Twitter. We don’t know the price but can assume its well, well north of the $250 million valuation that they saw in their recent funding.

As a Twitter-er, I’d welcome Google. I remember what they did with Blogger. When I got on Blogger, it was just as Google was really starting to get itself wrapped up in Blogger and making it better. There were some growing pains along the way, but Google made Blogger into what it is today.

Soon enough, Google will own us all… and I wouldn’t necessarily call that a bad thing.

Before Twitter was cool…

It seems that now everybody has been jumping on the Twitter bandwagon.

Two local TV stations (@KBMTNews and @KFDMNews), the local paper (@BmtEnterprise), and even the Beaumont District of TxDOT (@TxDOTBeaumont) are on Twitter now.

Twitter is now, apparently, “cool.”

I’m thinking it’s about time that Twitter veterans unite and scream something:

WE WERE ON TWITTER BEFORE IT WAS COOL!

I need to make up a badge or something…

A new path

It is with a heavy heart that I am today announcing that I am leaving blogging.

It was a very tough decision to make, but I realized that I simply won't have the time for it with my new career in the male strip club industry.

It's been a great ride, with a lot of great people I've met along the way.

I'm really going to miss y'all.

Oh, and...

APRIL FOOLS!!!

You're not getting rid of me that easily.

(For those of y’all that don’t remember, I did this same gag two years ago)

Lasagna

Last week, I made a lasagna recipe I found on the internets.

Here’s the recipe.

I’d never seen lasagna where you rolled the noodles before, but it was really quite interesting.

The only thing that seemed weird about the whole thing is that it didn’t have a tomato sauce in it.

It didn’t matter, it was still really good.

We had enough of the spinach mix left over that I’m going to try making it again with that and using spaghetti sauce instead of making the white sauce the recipe calls for and seeing how that turns out.

My personal battery… or something…

Welcome to Stupid Quiz Sunday, in which I'll take an online quiz that may or may not be stupid and post the results.

Your Energy Level is Moderate

For you, life is all about balance. You keep active, but you rest a lot too. You have enough vigor to get everything done... with a little left over for some fun. You find that you have plenty of energy, as long as you give yourself time to recharge. But if you don't take care of yourself, you notice that your energy levels really plummet.

What's Your Energy Level?

Have you taken this quiz? Have a quiz you want me to take? Leave a link in the comments.

Opening day fades into opening night

Welcome to Friday Photo, a new feature where I share photos that I've taken with the world.

Another from Opening Day 2006:

This is actually two photos that I stitched together using Windows Live Photo Gallery. It was as simple as selecting the photos and clicking on “Create panoramic photo.”

Light blogging haiku

Lazy blogger here
Mind has been on other things
Haven’t felt like it

I spent Monday and Tuesday up at the lake helping my cousin move stuff out of her lake house that she just sold.

Since I got back, I just haven’t felt like blogging. Not quite sure why.

Less geeky than I thought…

Welcome to Stupid Quiz Sunday, in which I'll take an online quiz that may or may not be stupid and post the results.

48% Geek

Created by OnePlusYou - Free Dating Sites

Have you taken this quiz? Have a quiz you want me to take? Leave a link in the comments.

I hate to brag, but…

After the first round of the NCAA’s has been completed, my bracket is rocking.

I’m 27 for 32, which places me in the 99th percentile for all of Yahoo.

15 of my Sweet 16 teams are still alive.

Just don’t ask me what I did right… I’m not even sure.

Baseball season is coming

Welcome to Friday Photo, a new feature where I share photos that I've taken with the world.

Since baseball season is starting soon, I’ve decided to use a few of my baseball shots that I have lying around.

That’s from opening day 2006, when Jeff Bagwell was introduced for his last opening day, greeting the team as he’s introduced.

I plan to have more baseball shots in the weeks to come.

WIN of the day

I don’t consider this to be a FAIL:

see more pwn and owned pictures

I’ve always joked that I wasn’t a morning person because it was too early to drink…

Curves can be good sometimes, but other times they’re just silly

Yesterday I was at a local park that they’re in the process of renovating.

Part of the renovations included new paved walkways.

I noticed the old ones were fairly straight, but all the new ones kind of wind through the park.

Don’t get me wrong, I love curves. I love curves on a woman and a fast road, just not on my walkways that would be just fine perfectly straight.

Finding normal

Monday my grandmother went to her bone doc for another checkup.

Her wrist is completely healed now, but she needs some more physical therapy to get back all her strength in the wrist.

She’s gained a lot in the past month, but she still has trouble with a few things.

Half of the battle, as you can imagine, is getting her to trust that wrist again. She’s still a little scared of doing things with it sometimes…

…so I make her do it.

She has to get over her fear of things somehow, and I don’t know a better way than that.

Things are getting back to normal. Thankfully, that also means that I can cook things that she had trouble eating earlier.

So I’m making a pot of chicken spaghetti on Thursday.

Maybe I’ll share the recipe sometime soon.

LOLcat of the day

I’ve had this happen before…

see more Lolcats and funny pictures

…but then I had another beer and it was all good.

Video WIN of the day

This is pretty cool…

From FAIL blog.

Updated: It’s tourney time!

And since it’s tourney time, I’ve decided to set up a pick’em group for all my readers/twitter followers/anybody on Yahoo.

It’s group number 79572 and you don’t need a password. You can sign up here.

The group’s set up with a progressive scoring system with a bonus for picking upsets. The details are below:

Round	Pick Value
1	1
2	2
3	3
4	4
5	5
6	6

All upset picks are worth a 1-point bonus.

The winner gets my undying love… or something else of no real value whatsoever.

Hi, my name is Justin and I’m a blogaholic

Welcome to Stupid Quiz Sunday, in which I'll take an online quiz that may or may not be stupid and post the results.

71%

Created by OnePlusYou - Free Online Dating

Have you taken this quiz? Have a quiz you want me to take? Leave a link in the comments.

Happy Pi Day!

Happy Pi Day!

(Notice what time this posted. Yea, I’m THAT bored.)

In which Taffy tells me to shoot some fresh pictures of her

Welcome to Friday Photo, a new feature where I share photos that I've taken with the world.

Taffy again:

You really need to stop using these pictures from Gustav, Justin. Shoot some fresh ones!

I’ll admit, I’ve been lazy… but I’ll shoot some new ones within the next week.

LOLdog of the day: One of the advantages to living in the south…

…is that you don’t have to worry about scenes like this:

see more dog and puppy pictures

We just might get there in time after all…

A few weeks ago at church we started diving into Crucifixus from Bach’s Mass in B Minor.

You can give it a listen here. Sorry, couldn’t find a recording with an audio track I liked on YouTube.

It’s got to be one of the dreariest tunes I’ve heard… and one of the hardest I’ve sung.

We’re aiming to do it on Palm Sunday… if we can get it sounding good enough in time.

We’d been spending time on sections of it, but last night we sang the whole thing through for the first time. It was kind of shaky at times, but I think we’ll get that kicked out of it in time.

If we don’t have them kicked out, we’ll just not do it.

Video fail of the day

There’s a reason I refuse to use these:

That, of course, comes from FAIL blog

I have found the secret…

…to not letting little kids that you’re watching wear you out.

Yesterday I was babysitting a one-year-old at church while his grandmother was in a meeting. Cute kid, behaves wonderfully.

Last month, his grandmother told me to wear him out so they could both nap when they got home. Of course, in the process, I ended up wearing myself out and taking a nap of my own.

This time I was smart. I took a more laid back approach and trying to conserve my energy.

It worked.

Not sure if I should even post this one

Welcome to Stupid Quiz Sunday, in which I'll take an online quiz that may or may not be stupid and post the results.

Created by OnePlusYou - Free Dating Site

Kind of pathetic, I think…

Have you taken this quiz? Have a quiz you want me to take? Leave a link in the comments.

Such a lady

Welcome to Friday Photo, a new feature where I share photos that I've taken with the world.

This week, we have Taffy:

I’m so dignified!

Of course you are!

PS. Did you know this is the 75th installment of Friday Photo?

PPS. Did you know that the tagline up top still says that it’s a ‘new’ feature? Because it does, and I don’t plan on changing it anytime soon.

PPPS. Maybe I’ll change it after the 100th edition. Or maybe I’ll do like Laurence did with “Ask the Cats” and just keep on calling it new until the end of time.

Video of the day: Change

More from Guitar Guy:

See yesterday’s post for more info.

Either SiteMeter’s lying or this guy is… and I don’t think it’s SiteMeter

I got an email earlier today from a guy who wanted to do a link exchange.

In the email, he claimed that he’s added the blog already and goes on to say this:

By looking at my stats, it looks like today I have sent you 10 visitors but it may change by the time you receive this email.

So, out of curiosity, I check my SiteMeter.

No referrals from his address.

Nevermind the fact that I didn’t see a link to me on the site

Moral of the story: If you want to exchange links, don’t make a bullshit claim. It’ll just get you mocked.

Video of the day: Guitar Guy

Last night I went to see Jeff Dunham and Brian Haner (a.k.a. Guitar Guy) opened for him.

This is probably the song that got the greatest reaction:

 

More coming tomorrow.

Not so fast…

I’d said after Ike that I was going to move to Fort Worth.

After a lot of thought, I’ve decided not to.

While Fort Worth doesn’t have hurricanes, they do have tornadoes.

Sometimes, big ones. Like the F3 that ripped through downtown in 2000.

With major hurricanes, you usually get enough warning that you’re able to get the hell out of dodge.

Tornadoes aren’t so accommodating, only giving you time to hunker yourself down if you’re lucky.

I think I’ll take my chances with the hurricanes.

I wish she’d just kept her mouth shut

I took my grandmother to a late breakfast yesterday morning. She’d gotten up early yesterday morning (like before 5) when my little brother woke her up and said something to the tune of “I think I’ve got appendicitis, I need to go to the ER.”

They went, and he was right. They caught it early, so it wasn’t anything terribly serious. He’s had it removed and will hopefully be coming home today.

I stayed home because things had to be taken care of, then got up to the hospital about 10:30. My grandmother hadn’t eaten yet, so we planned to go grab a bite in a little while.

When my cousin got there we told him we were going to head out and grab a bite to eat.

While we were chowing down on Breakfast, my grandmother (who, I remind you, broke her wrist in January) said “2009 has just been a bad year for us.”

Now I’m wondering what’s going to happen to me…

Of course, I’m just worrying too much. Right?

Get more out of Twhirl

Twitter’s @donthorp, after a conversation with @GadgetVirtuoso, blogged a hack to TweetDeck that allows your Twitter timeline to be updated more frequently without sacrificing reply requests.

It clicked that the same hack could work in Twhirl, my Twitter client of choice.

The newest version of Twhirl is set up to allow Twitter Search to automatically search for replies. And since Twitter Search doesn’t count against the API limits, it’s essentially a “free” request.

It’s easy to set up too.

1. Click on the wrench icon near the top right corner of your Twhirl window.
2. Click on the Network tab.
3. Change the two settings within the red boxes to the values shown:
   
4. Click Save.

Now you’ll recieve all your replies and get your DM’s and Tweets more frequently.

But math ain’t my strong suit…

Welcome to Stupid Quiz Sunday, in which I'll take an online quiz that may or may not be stupid and post the results.

This week, we enter the magical world of office supplies

You Are a Calculator

No matter what someone tells you, you're likely to focus on facts and data. You're a highly analytic person. You are only concerned with what you can know for sure. You look at situations objectively, and you have no problem approaching problems from multiple angles. You would make a good analyst or investment banker. You are confident enough to make tough calls and hard decisions.

What Office Supply Are You?

Have you taken this quiz? Have a quiz you want me to take? Leave a link in the comments.

Getting things set up

Welcome to Friday Photo, a new feature where I share photos that I've taken with the world.

I took this with my cell while we were setting up one of the two areas where we fried oysters for the Oyster Supper yesterday.

Yes, that’s cardboard duct taped together on the ground. It’s a lot easier to throw that out than to clean up the concrete underneath.

I had a lot of fun working yesterday. I ended up being there for 10 hours (minus a lunch break) and worked my ass off.

All for this. (I’d already eaten some)

I’ll be doing it all again next year.

Busy day

Today I’m working our church’s Oyster Supper.

It’s something I’ve attended my entire life, but I’ve never worked it before now.

I’ll try to send some observations and pictures throughout the day to my Twitter and TwitPic pages.

Could have some interesting stuff come up!

Video of the day: Kim Jong Il on eHarmony

Found this in Blogs4Bauer’s liveblog from last night:

The pancake quiz

Welcome to Stupid Quiz Sunday, in which I'll take an online quiz that may or may not be stupid and post the results.

You Are Buttermilk Pancakes

Your prefer traditional, old fashioned foods. You shy away from anything fake, and you like meals with simple ingredients. It's not likely someone would find margarine or diet soda in your kitchen. Instead, someone might find a loaf of homemade bread baking or a soup simmering.

What Kind of Pancakes Are You?

Have you taken this quiz? Have a quiz you want me to take? Leave a link in the comments.

It’s a bird! It’s a… yea, it’s a bird!

Welcome to Friday Photo, a new feature where I share photos that I've taken with the world.

Yep, some sort of bird.

The Ike Report

The National Hurricane Center recently released the Tropical Cyclone Report for Ike (PDF, 3.07 MB).

Basically, as I understand it, the report summarizes everything a tropical system did.

Weather geeks (like myself) might have some interest in it. The report has a lot of statistics for wind speeds, storm surge levels, rainfall, and other things from various locations.

The thing I found the most interesting though was the maps showing storm surge inundation by county. It was amazing to see just how far inland that the surge came.

Have a look, if you dare…

Today we see the domin… er… physical therapist

As y’all might know by now, my grandmother had her cast taken off on Monday, having it replaced with a removable splint

She’s happy about that.

What she’s not too happy about is the month of physical therapy she’s beginning today.

Three days a week she’ll be experiencing pain just short of what a highly-trained dominatrix can deliver, just a lot less fun.

We were going to see how she’d do driving tomorrow, but we agreed that it’d be better to see how she reacts to the physical therapy first.

So we’ll do that next week.

FAIL of the day

I’m not sure how impressive this would be…

see more pwn and owned pictures

…unless you’re in to that sort of thing…

Looks like we have a winner!

Recently I asked if my grandmother would get her cast off first or if Obama would sign the stimulus bill first.

Since Obama’s planning on signing the bill Tuesday, my grandmother will definitely be getting her cast off first.

The poll results were split evenly between the two options, each side getting two votes.

Congrats to those who got it right!

Why couldn’t I have been the “any” key?

Welcome to Stupid Quiz Sunday, in which I'll take an online quiz that may or may not be stupid and post the results.

You Are "esc"

Some people might try to say that you're unreliable or flighty. But you can't help it. You're always finding yourself in sticky situations. You're willing to bail if things are looking bad. You are quite impatient. For you, having to escape every now in then is the price of taking risks. And you're not about to stop taking risks!

What Keyboard Key Are You?

Have you taken this quiz? Have a quiz you want me to take? Leave a link in the comments.

Conserving water 101

We’ve been asked to cut back on non-essential water use by 30%.

This is the first time I can remember that we’ve been asked to do this. We probably have before, but I just didn’t notice it.

Anyway, here are a few simple tips for people who are unfamiliar with how to conserve water:

• Don’t wash your car daily. Washing your car daily uses up tons of water and makes people (like myself) who can’t remember the last time they washed their car look bad. You don’t want to make me look bad, do you?
• Don’t run your sprinkler system every day. Sure, your yard might not look as good as you’d like, but it won’t be any worse than that neighbor of yours that never does anything to his yard either.
• Drink less water. You may wonder how you can manage to drink less water, but it’s actually quite easy to do. When you find yourself wanting a tall glass of water after you get home from work, have a beer instead. Not only will you be conserving water, but you’ll get drunk, which will make you feel better… at least until the next morning.
• Shower five times a week instead of daily. I’m sure there’s a couple days on your weekly calendar where you could get by without one. Do so. If somebody says something to you about it, just point out that you were trying to conserve water. You’ll still stink, but at least you look like you care.
• Oh, wait, scratch that last one. You might be confused for a hippie and get punched in the face.
• On a related note, don’t let naked PETA protestors shower on the sidewalk in your town. She was doing it to make some point about conserving water somehow, but I forget what it is.

Now you can go save enough water to fill up any lake out there!

Frankie

Welcome to Friday Photo, a new feature where I share photos that I've taken with the world.

This week I’m doing a little something different… because I’m lazy.

This week’s Friday Photo is posted over on TwitPic.

Frankie’s my cousin’s extremely cute dog.

Stimulating myself (it’s not what you think!)

(H/T K T Cat)

Somehow I managed to sneak into the stimulus bill.

Don’t believe me, this is Title III, Subtitle A of the bill:

wireless and broadband deployment grant programs

(including transfer of funds to Justin Yarbrough for the Justin Yarbrough Personal Economic Stimulus Program)

For necessary and unnecessary expenses related to the Wireless and Broadband Deployment Grant Programs established by section 6002 of division B of this Act, $2,825,000,000, of which $1,000,000,000 shall be for Wireless Deployment Grants and $1,825,000,000 shall be for Broadband Deployment Grants: Provided, That an additional $1,007,297,449.05 shall be paid directly to Justin Yarbrough in the form of subsidized loans that do not require repayment. Provided Further, That the funds be used by Justin Yarbrough to construct a water recycling facility or for whatever. Provided Even Further, That Justin Yarbrough will receive free Houston Astros tickets for life. Provided Even Further Still, That Justin Yarbrough shall be treated as a cabinet-level appointment for the purpose of income tax reporting, and therefore no taxes shall be paid on any of the aformentioned benefits. And one more thing: Nancy Pelosi is hereby expelled from Congress, effective immediately upon enactment.

See, I’m totally in there!

If you want to be in the stimulus bill, all you have to do is fill out this form.

FAIL of the day: As long as they don’t mess with my orange juice!

see more pwn and owned pictures

‘Mark Twain Tonight’ tonight

We had a lunch at church on Sunday to discuss the plans for renovating our 40-year-old building.

But this isn’t about that.

During the lunch, the couple we were sitting next to gave us four tickets to Hal Holbrook in “Mark Twain Tonight.”

They’d been given tickets by somebody else, but couldn’t go because it was one of theirs’ birthday and they were having a party.

They told us that they’d seen the show on Broadway when they were in NYC and that it was great.

I’m really looking forward to it…

I’ll post some thoughts about the show in the next few days.

OK, now this one is just crazy.

Welcome to Stupid Quiz Sunday, in which I'll take an online quiz that may or may not be stupid and post the results.

A hat-tip to @crallen for pointing me to this one:

You Are a Colon

You are very orderly and fact driven. You aren't concerned much with theories or dreams... only what's true or untrue. You are brilliant and incredibly learned. Anything you know is well researched. You like to make lists and sort through things step by step. You aren't subject to whim or emotions. Your friends see you as a constant source of knowledge and advice. (But they are a little sick of you being right all of the time!) You excel in: Leadership positions You get along best with: The Semi-Colon

What Punctuation Mark Are You?

Have you taken this quiz? Have a quiz you want me to take? Leave a link in the comments.

Video of the day: Stimulus

Hat-tip: K T Cat:

Updated: Let’s protest wasting water by… wasting water!

It’s time to protest:

Two women will shed their clothes Friday afternoon and shower in public in downtown Beaumont, in support of PETA's belief consumers should become vegetarians to help the environment.

People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals says the meat industry wastes water and creates a large amount of greenhouse gases, and the organization is inviting the public and media to an event it says will help expose the scope of the problem.

Isn’t showering on the sidewalk a waste of water too?

No, I’m not making the trip downtown to see this spectacle.

Now, if there wasn’t a curtain…

Update 12:15 PM

You know, I can’t take these girls too seriously doing this on a day when it’s 70 degrees outside. If it was 45 and windy, then maybe I could admire their dedication to the cause.

More from the snow

Welcome to Friday Photo, a new feature where I share photos that I've taken with the world.

I wish I’d gotten some pictures of the other dogs out there:

Hey, daddy! What’s this white stuff? 

Seeing as how rare it is here, I was wondering the same thing.

Which came first?

The goal for Obama’s stimulus package has been to have it on his desk by Presidents’ Day.

Whether or not that will happen is up in the air.

What I know will happen on Presidents’ Day is that my grandmother (who broke her wrist a month ago) will have her cast taken off for good.

I thought this would make for a good poll.

Which will happen first: My grandmother has her cast taken off or Obama’s stimulus package is signed into law?

The polls are open until noon Presidents’ Day.

Fifth annual Super Bowl predictions

Yes, that’s right, this is the fifth year I’ll be doing these.

Here’s my previous attempts:

• Last year: Only got the spread.
• Two years ago: Three for three
• Three years ago: Only got the winning team right.
• Four years ago: Three for three.

That makes me 8 for 12 all time.

This is the hardest Super Bowl of the bunch for me to pick. While I know the Steelers are the best team, the Cardinals are really hot. That makes it really tough to pick.

It should be noted that I reserve the right to change these picks up until kickoff. I probably will.

The game:

This may totally backfire on me, but I’m going to have to go with the Cardinals. The Steelers are definitely the better team in this game, but the Cardinals are playing some great football right now.

I don’t buy into the whole “well the Cardinals have never been there” argument either. Some of their more vital players (like Kurt Warner) have plenty of big game experience.

The spread:

Since the Steelers are favored by 7, I have to pick the Cardinals here too.

The over/under:

This year’s over/under is 46.5. The Steelers have a hell of a defense and have struggled to score more than 30 points a game. If the Cardinals get pressure on Big Ben (as I expect they will) they should be able to hold that offense in check.

I think it will be under, but it could go either way.

The results:

Not so good… only got the spread, making me 9 for 15 all time. Which ain’t bad, considering I figured I’d pull a 0-fer at the half.

A man’s gotta eat!

Welcome to Stupid Quiz Sunday, in which I'll take an online quiz that may or may not be stupid and post the results.

54%

Created by OnePlusYou - Free Dating Site

Have you taken this quiz? Have a quiz you want me to take? Leave a link in the comments.

Repaving

We got an interesting letter in the mail from the city on Thursday.

Starting sometime next week, they’re going to repave our street.

Our horrible, ancient, pothole-ridden street (which has to be one of the worst in town) is going to be reconstructed.

The city actually began the work today when they dumped all the limestone that they’ll be mixing into the base on the street, but that wasn’t too invasive. Take a look at the picture I posted to TwitPic.

	A shot from Google Maps Street View of a portion of our street. You can clearly see how many patches the city’s had to do over the years.

I guess the city realized, after patching potholes early this month, that the entire street needed to be done. Something I could have told them years ago.

The letter gave the impression that the work should take about a month.

Here’s my question to y’all, my loyal minions:

Would y’all be interested in seeing pictures of the work in progress?

I can post pictures here or I can not bother, it doesn’t matter to me.

Leave your thoughts in the comments.

Happy happy happy!

Welcome to Friday Photo, a new feature where I share photos that I've taken with the world.

Bruiser’s a very happy dog!

I love this backyard!

They loved the backyard in Fort Worth when we were up there for Gustav and Ike. My aunt’s backyard is a lot bigger than ours is.

Selling fake crack is also illegal, just for a different reason

Say it with me again, "tortillas are not crack."

Two Beaumont men accused of trying to pass off flour tortillas as crack cocaine, then refusing to give refunds, were indicted on charges of aggravated robbery Thursday.

Read the story for more info.

I was going to try to make a Scarface reference and twist it into this situation, but I couldn’t make it work.

If you have anything, leave it in the comments.

Working with a new toy now

Recently I found out that the cell plan mine is attached to has unlimited texting.

Before that, I was allowed something like 250 a month.

Neither of these facts I knew.

As you can see, nobody ever tells me anything.

Anywho, I’d been wanting to get a new cell phone for a while. The one I had was never really a good one and I’d gotten tired of it’s crap.

Since I now had an unlimited texting plan, I figured I’d get a phone that was good for texting. You know, something with a real keyboard and not that joke of typing with the number pad.

So now I’m the proud owner of an LG enV².

So far I’m really liking it. The keyboard’s nice and handy, even though I look like I’m saying a BlackBerry prayer when I’m using it.

It’s kept me much more active on Twitter, which I do like.

All in all, I’m really happy with the phone I got.

The emailer’s creed

Yesterday I had to send my brother an email so he could send me some stuff.

I got a corny idea for a little gag, so I sent this in the body:

This is my email. There are many like it but this one is mine. My email is my best friend. It is my life. I must master it as I must master my life. Without me, my email is useless. Without my email I am useless. I must fire my email true. I must email straighter than my enemy, who is trying to kill me. I must email him before he emails me. I will. Before God I swear this creed: my email and myself are defenders of my country, we are the masters of our enemy, we are the saviors of my life. So be it, until there is no enemy, but peace. Amen.

Of course, it was wasted since he’s never seen Full Metal Jacket.

I score a comment of the day!

The single funniest blog I read has to be The Bloggess.

On Friday, Jenny (who writes the blog) wrote a post about Barack and Michelle Obama fisting… or something.

The post made me think of a true story that happened just two days before. I posted it in the comments.

Jenny always chooses a “Comment of the day” and adds it to the bottom of a post when she updates the blog. It’s basically the best comment, in her mind, to the post.

Well, my grandmother’s doctor’s poor choice of words scored me a “Comment of the day” spot.

I’m so honored!

Should I tell her doctor about this when she goes back next week? Should I thank him? After all, I never would have scored this without his help.

The crazy thing is that I’m not a huge fan of lemon cake

Welcome to Stupid Quiz Sunday, in which I'll take an online quiz that may or may not be stupid and post the results.

You Are a Lemon Cake

Strong, sexy, and overpowering. You know who you are, and you're not afraid to show the world your fabulous self. You're confident, charming, and extremely popular.

What Kind of Cake Are You?

Have you taken this quiz? Have a quiz you want me to take? Leave a link in the comments.

Somewhat embarrassing.

I’ve been making breakfast burritos a lot lately.

Well… trying to.

I’ve never been very good at rolling a burrito. They usually tended to fall apart on me or something.

So, today, I finally broke down and Googled how do you fold a burrito, which led me to this page.

That works a hell of a lot better than my technique I was using.

Tweeting up

Welcome to Friday Photo, a new feature where I share photos that I've taken with the world.

@humbearto and @whereisbryan at Monday night’s tweetup:

We had six people at the event. The others were myself, @slingerr, @crallen and @rafaelromero. Not a bad crowd for an event thrown together in a few days.

Hopefully we do a lot better next month.

So METRO cops can do stuff… just not in Houston, apparently

That lady that fell onto the tracks in the D.C. subway yesterday.

She was rescued by a Houston METRO cop:

It all happened so quickly, Houston Metro Police officer Eliot Swainson never even got the woman’s name.

Swainson, a 15-year veteran of the transit agency’s police force, was credited with saving the woman’s life Tuesday morning after she fell off a subway platform in Washington, D.C., with a train approaching

[…]

Swainson grabbed the woman’s right arm while another commuter grabbed her left arm and began tugging, trying to pull her back onto the platform. Swainson said he then saw that the train was approaching fast and there was not enough time to pull her up.

He instead maneuvered her to crouch beneath a “cove” underneath the platform. The cove is designed as a safety feature, large enough for a person to fit under to escape harm from a passing train.

Good for him. And her.

To all those loonies out there

A thought from Laurence Simon.

I couldn’t agree more.