Month: May 2010

• Technically true, and, thus, kind of pathetic: "I don't think we will get caught if we stay discrete and careful." http://bit.ly/bAX1lV #
• Why does DEA have an opinion whether marijuana should be legalized? Shouldn't they do as told/shut mouths otherwise? http://bit.ly/cUsCas #
• On West Virginia time. #

• I ain't going to study comments war no more. #
• Pennsyltucky! #
• Wisconstruction! #
• Fargo! #
• So glad I decided to stop for the night in a town with an oil boom and a housing shortage. #
• Underway. #
• Secured from all Missoula operations #
• Clear from post office. #
• Clear from grocery store. #
• Clear from house. #
• Clear from garage. #
• The wise man knows that the more menial and seemingly endless a task is, the better it prepares his mind for enlightenment. #
• Headlines were once written with readers in mind… Now headlines are just there to get the search engines to notice. http://nyti.ms/cVA18L #
• I think I will load all of our earthly possessions onto a truck today. #
• My latest Went West column: Displaced and loving it. http://bit.ly/9FVGtu #
• Yes, why don't they let the girls play one of those sports that has a "point"? http://nyti.ms/9jEOCe #

• Qwest couldn't find the recording, so I don't have to pay the cancellation fee. #
• The good part about being sad to leave a place is that it means at least you had a good time there. #
• The once-outrageous satire of the Simpsons is increasingly simply a mirror. http://bit.ly/c3fHE1 #
• Hey Missoula, anyone have any moving boxes they want to get rid of? #
• No mystery here: women simply hunger for any kind of pants with pockets that will fit more than a tube of lipstick. http://nyti.ms/d9UmhF #
• Do I know anyone in Missoula who can lend me a dolly this weekend? #
• Surprised that Coen seems to be trying not just to walk but to do so like an Egyptian. #
• Yes! As I long suspected, increasingly wide incidence of "food allergies" is mostly BS. http://nyti.ms/dpPUCu #
• Are you an Asker or a Guesser? http://bit.ly/bYXVJh #
• Teen love = rock n roll: Getting to feel big, important feelings is more the goal than actually making something work. http://bit.ly/bds5qd #
• Dodging this bullet: "Working overtime can take its toll on more than just sanity. It might be bad for the heart." http://bit.ly/9UGWV1 #
• Companies would copyright the air we breathe if we let them. http://bit.ly/dmfEq3 #
• Wonder if AZ imm. bill supporters suffer cognitive dissonance over Arnold Schwarzenegger finding them a bit dim? http://bit.ly/9HD3Gy #
• Man, Michael Steele's head must hurt sometimes. http://bit.ly/aNfmNT #
• Man, Michael Steele's head must hurt sometimes. http://tinyurl.com/25teqr9 #
• "The scientists studied a worm brain that is similar to human's when intoxicated." http://bit.ly/bIPhly #
• "Officials say firebomb thrown into medical marijuana business/ "NOT IN OUR TOWN" spray painted on storefront." http://bit.ly/cM8SjY #
• "Officials say firebomb thrown into medical marijuana business/ "NOT IN OUR TOWN" was spray painted on the storefront. #
• OK, now I understand what derivatives and housing default swaps are (in less than 500 words). http://bit.ly/axvk4V #
• Watching the Coast Guard respond to the oil spill, and remembering my own time in uniform, stirs something deep inside. http://bit.ly/9PIGJP #
• Imagine how badly last week's Wall Street "glitch" might have turned out if the industry weren't full of our "best and brightest." #
• My latest at Went West: when I think of my Coast Guard years, I mainly think about vomiting. http://bit.ly/9PIGJP #uscg #deepwater #oilspill #
• My latest Went West column: when I think of my Coast Guard years, I mainly think about vomiting. http://bit.ly/9PIGJP #sempernauseous #

• "What evidence do you have of lavishness at our winter meeting in Hawaii?" http://bit.ly/9oPxYi #
• Killer app (well, hardware, technically) for parents: cell phone with earpiece built into phone, so it's always available. #
• Don't most people use their last day to clean out their desk on the clock? #MyWifeIsCursedWithOneOfThose"WorkEthic"Things #
• Is there anyone who understands less about American politics than Mark Penn? (No wonder Hillary didn't win.) #
• When you find yourself reaching for the space or tab keys to format a Word document, please: get help. #
• Cheerful at thought of wife's unemployment beginning in less than 8 hours! #
• Why, in official documents, do people write numbers like this: "twenty (20)"? Is there really a risk of misunderstanding the word "twenty"? #
• If the difficulty babies have sleeping were communicated more widely, people would probably stop reproducing. #
• Surprised to learn that Newsweek still exists. #
• What kind of homebuyer asks you to buy them CO2 detectors and a new toilet handle? #
• Who started calling Tea Partiers "tea baggers," anyway? The Tea Partiers: http://bit.ly/coHXxe #
• Changing Coen would be easier with the assistance of one of those big, burly orderlies from One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest. #
• Clarifying and simplifying an organization's jumbled, dispute-prone, committee-written employee manual. And I could do it for you, too! #
• "The [cop's girlfriend's son], who activated the car's emergency lights, was not authorized to drive the patrol car." http://bit.ly/agK0AL #
• Hint for the day: you know that thing people say that sounds kind of like "mute point"? It's really "moot point." #
• “I am all into national security. … I want to stop reading these guys their Miranda rights." http://nyti.ms/a6iSXC #
• Grover Norquist just doesn't know how much he doesn't know. http://bit.ly/dkg3lA #
• Does this still need saying? Yes: "Borrow money to buy things that go up in value. Consumer debt is not your friend." http://bit.ly/btvsxl #
• I love how Montana cops are referred to in some technical sense as "peace officers." #
• McArdle isn't ALWAYS wrong: "why is Joe Lieberman willing to share citizenship with Charles Manson but not TS bomber?" http://bit.ly/cL1p5I #
• "He used a cannon to protect his home and office. " http://bit.ly/bD0zm4 #
• I can't quickly think of a more cowardly, embarrassing national politician than Joe Lieberman. http://bit.ly/a3qGRS #
• Ur-foodie James Beard's philosophy: "Feel free and take a fresh look. My emphasis is on options. My motto: 'Why not?'" http://bit.ly/cvySkC #
• Oil spill: can anyone direct me to on-the-scene coverage of rescue/cleanup efforts, describing sea conditions, etc.? #oilspill #deepwater #
• Car-bomb suspect trained at Pakistani terrorist camp, will ask for tuition to be refunded. http://bit.ly/cZumep #
• Can't think of a commercial that makes me want to patronize a business less than the Ruby's Cafe/"you're so good" ad. #missoula #
• "If you want 2-parent families with stable marriages, bypass Sarah Palin country for Nancy Pelosi territory." http://bit.ly/h9176 #
• And in other signs of decline, not only does the Today Show exist but they are drinking "meat cocktails" on it right now. #
• Will people ever stop saying "give a shout out to," or are we just stuck with that one? See also: "give props to." #
• If you read only one essay today in which someone whines about how hard parenthood is, make it this one: http://bit.ly/9bzvR8 #
• "[S]tates that voted Republican were by far the biggest beneficiaries of federal spending." http://bit.ly/dht5DU #
• Tort-reforming Sessions advises Gulf Coast residents to sue BP. http://bit.ly/dht5DU #
• Passenger claims to be alien, requests to fly plane. http://bit.ly/d8kQWD #
• Why don't we just let the free market clean up the oil spill? http://bit.ly/dht5DU #
• Why can't people just do what they are supposed to do? #
• Hell hath no fury like a FEMA director scorned. http://bit.ly/aEy6b6 #
• Until today's conv. with the pest inspector, I never knew there were so many different things a person might want to kill. #
• Thought for the day: if we had to have an oil spill, at least it was from a company that makes heavy use of the color green in its ads. #
• And now to return to editing 100-word sentences of legalese! #
• Reasons to have children: drink all the coffee you want with no trouble falling asleep! (In early years, at least.) #
• GOPS's "damn" race problem: "If seeking diversity cookie, damned either way. If trying to learn, blessed either way." http://bit.ly/9NrCDK #
• Boston water-main break turns coffee into "liquid gold." If you can't understand why, you obv. haven't had yours yet. http://bit.ly/d35jAR #
• To be fair, the AZ immigration law just got "less draconian." http://bit.ly/ciWR3e #
• Oh, sorry that I was just muttering into a digital recorder while staring at the playground. #
• Obama "beats" Leno at standup comedy-but then, so does the average house plant. http://bit.ly/d6HZnK #
• "Sovereign squatters" a national movement: http://bit.ly/awoLl0 #
• My latest Went West column: What's so hard about parenthood? http://bit.ly/9bzvR8 #

In this AP article about the attempted Times Square car-bombing, I was struck by this quote from Crysta Salinas, a 28-year-old woman from Houston who was visiting the area when police moved in to investigate the suspicious Nissan Pathfinder:

“No more New York.”

There’s not much context in the article, so it’s possible she was only bemoaning the inconvenience she experienced (she “was stuck waiting in a deli until 2 a.m. because part of a Marriott hotel was evacuated because of the bomb”). As we’ve learned from, say, polls finding that huge swaths of Republicans aren’t sure whether Obama was born in the U.S. or not, sometimes people make dramatic, exaggerated statements when they feel out of control in a situation and want to express their displeasure. Maybe she was being interviewed at 2 a.m. in said deli. I know I’d be displeased, in her shoes.

But if she was really saying that she is never willing to visit NYC again, just because some mental midgets tried to detonate an amateurishly constructed car bomb-well, I’m just shocked. I thought Americans were made of sterner stuff. I know Texans like to think they are. Does Ms. Salinas realize that hers is exactly the reaction sought by whoever did this? And that she’s giving it to them in response to what amounts to a head fake?

Fortunately, not everyone is looking for a bed to hide under.

“This is America. This is what we do,” said Earl Morriss of Seattle, who was sightseeing. “Nobody is going to stop us from living our lives and doing what we want to do.”

That’s a little more like it.

• Suspicions were raised by the fact that the wounds did not appear to be consistent with a spear fight. #
• So glad they did away with the old Derby tradition of cooking and eating the winning horse "to absorb its power." #
• NBC relieved that "the weather continues to be a story" as it looks to fill coverage of the hour leading up to a 2-minute horse race. #
• China's presence in Africa better for Africans than traditional Western aid community? http://bit.ly/9AXoju #
• Why are the "similar stories" that newspaper web sites attempt to serve up so rarely "similar" to the one you are reading? #
• Happy May Day: unions better as mutual aid associations than as vehicles for mobilisation of the working class. http://bit.ly/bWQ1lk #
• Do I know anyone with David Simon's email address? I need to volunteer my services for the inevitable oil-spill/Coast Guard season of Treme. #
• Thought for the day: Missoula's Bagels on Broadway operates very much as if it were the only bagel place in town. It is, but still. #
• Another oil-rig accident? Almost enough to make you think fossil fuels are dangerous and we should seek alternatives. http://bit.ly/bMLBRS #
• Cleanup, baby, cleanup: fossil fuels without spills about as realistic as war without atrocities. http://nyti.ms/dwxz07 #
• Lots of dads in the parks these days. #
• Two simpletons to be removed from gene pool. http://bit.ly/9I0IDr #
• Health Care Reform benefits-such as end to dropping people because very sick-are kicking in ahead of schedule. http://bit.ly/dmzHr0 #
• Existentially dizzied by finding old third-grade classmates on Facebook. #
• People, please: as a default practice, emails sent from your work account should have a signature block with phone number, etc. #
• Also you Baltimore people: do I know any landlords just dying to get a renter into a vacant property? #
• Hey Baltimore: do I know anyone who has done a full-service in-town move there? #
• You haven't known fun until you've tried to sell two houses at once and buy a third while "working" from home/caring for a seven month old. #
• I knew the whole Rough Rider thing was kind of a charade, but I never realized how deeply disturbed Teddy Roosevelt was. http://n.pr/dkYTeo #
• Fights broke out as a "stop the violence" go-go performance was wrapping up in downtown Silver Spring. http://bit.ly/SXrE5 #
• Sure, Barney is always smiling, but he has the flat, affectless eyes of a sociopath. #
• Disappointed that house inspection did not find the chests of Confederate gold I was hoping for, but I guess they would be buried anyway. #
• In honor of Confederate History Month, why the "heritage not hate" excuse for flying the stars and bars is total BS: http://bit.ly/aJk55o #
• For my life insurance physical, does anyone have a pair of extremely light, extremely tall platform shoes I can borrow? #
• Trying to remember that our interpretations of quick, out-of-context comments online are almost always wrong. #