I have a weakness for completely off-the-wall campaign videos. That’s why I’m so excited about Mike Gravel’s new video. To my knowledge it’s the first one he’s made since jumping from the Democratic Party to the Libertarian one to continue running for President. Won’t you join me in glorying in the total awesomeness of this video?
You know, this reminds me of another version of a classic song.
Eli and his best bud, Josh. How do they already look like frat boys at four?
Mick Jagger practice.
This will come as a shock to everyone, but it appears we are rearing two kids who are 100% ham. Both want people watching them; both like to mimic things you do to get that attention.
The other night, Misty & I were talking, and I said something about a death march on a project. Eli promptly scooped up a spare maraca we happened to have lying around and marched around the house, shaking the maraca and singing, “Death march! Death march! Death march!”
Liza’s bouts of mimicry are less spontaneous. If you make certain sounds or do certain actions, she’ll repeat them. If you then repeat them, she’ll repeat them again. Continue until someone–mainly me–becomes tired. If I hold my hands over my head and say, “nnnnnnnngh”, she will dutifully hold up both hands, tiny fists waving in the air, and say “nnnnnnnngh.” If I say, “mmmmmmmMMMMBAH!”, she too will say “mmmmmmmMMMMMMBAH!” and then laugh.
Wait a second. She’s short, has blond hair that covers her ears, and says “mmmBAH.” Where have I seen this before?
Psst, Sony BMG. You’ve been at the forefront of the music labels’ anti-piracy efforts, right? After all, you were part of the successful RIAA effort to sue a single mom for $222,000 for sharing 24 songs. I take it you’re against piracy in any form?
A small software company has accused major label Sony/BMG of software piracy, in a reversal of the normal orientation of piracy cases between major labels and the rest of the world.
PointDev, which makes Windows administration software, claims that a raid on Sony/BMG servers revealed that as much as 47 percent of the software used by the company can be considered to have been pirated under French law, according to Zeropaid’s Google translation of the initial report…
The best part is that the Business Software Alliance raid was apparently triggered when a Sony IT worker asked for technical support for a program called Ideal Migration and provided a pirated software key.
There’s nothing like starting your morning with a steaming cup of schadenfreude.
We’ve upgraded to WordPress 2.5. Let us know if anything went kablooey.
I’ve been making this recipe for 13 years from a Reader’s Digest cookbook (of all things!) I got when I got married. The first time I made it, I had one pot to make it in and I hadn’t cooked much, so it was a fair bit of thinking for my 22 year old brain to make it work. Chances are if you’ve visited my house more than once, you’ve gotten to eat this dish. We have company coming tonight so it’s our old standby to the rescue!
1/2 cup butter
4 cups thinly sliced Vidalia Onions (sweet onions will work out of season, Vidalia are best)
1 lb. beef tenderloin or sirloin, sliced into 1/2†cubes
3 tbs. flour
1 tbs. dark brown sugar, packed
1 tsp. cumin
1 tsp. salt
1 tsp. pepper
1 qt. beef broth
2 cups cooked fettuccine
1 cup shredded mozzarella cheese
1/2 cup grated Parmesan cheese
In a large heavy-bottomed pan over medium heat, melt butter. Add onions; sauté, stirring often, until caramelized but not burned, 15-20 minutes. With slotted spoon remove onions to medium bowl. Add beef to pan; brown well on all sides. Return onions and any juices to pan. In a small bowl mix flour, sugar, cumin, salt & pepper. Add to pan; stir 1 minute until bubbly. Gradually add broth, simmer 10 minutes. Combine noodles and beef mixture in large baking dish. Spread cheese on top. Bake in 350° for 20-30 minutes.
We’ve never done an April Fools’ joke here, and I’d never though about why until someone asked me today. The big reason is that the kind of April Fools’ joke that I enjoy takes a fair amount of effort and is so seldom done well.
I enjoy April Fools’ jokes that are both obvious and amusing. I do not enjoy the “say something stupid and unfunny” approach to April Fools’ jokes, and I’m especially leery of pranks. They’re hard to make plausible and funny enough to overcome the prankiness of them, and they can completely misfire. Several years ago, one forum I used to frequent announced the day before, “We’re having to shut down. We can’t pay for all of the bandwidth we’re using. We’ll be closing tomorrow.” As you can imagine, forum regulars went crazy. They organized donation drives through PayPal and suggested cutting out the ability to post pictures and especially videos. A few people scoffed, saying, “Look at the date!”, to which the forum owner replied, “I only wish this were an April Fools’ joke.”
One day later, he said, “April Fools! Ha ha!”
See, that’s not funny, it’s not a good practical joke, and it sapped support for the forum.
Moreover, if I wanted to trick you, why would I do so today, when you’re expecting it? To pick an entirely hypothetical example, if I wanted to rickroll you, I wouldn’t do it now, when you’re going to view every link with suspicion.
Being funny on command isn’t easy. One of the benefits of this blog is that I can post funny things as I think of them. Putting humor on a schedule is too much like actual work for my tastes. And there are enough examples of bad and unfunny jokes that I’m not tempted to add to them.
It’s not all a vast wasteland. Virgle is good, and clearly took a lot of effort. Blizzard’s announcements were in good fun. And Wizards of the Coast did a fake D&D errata that I enjoyed, though I expect you won’t enjoy it as much if you aren’t a fan of D&D. But on the whole, I think I’ll sit this holiday out.