State of the Union

2 minutes out: Obama and Ted Kennedy look like smug cats.

1 minute out: Joe Biden and Hilary standing together? I have $5 riding on Edwards as VP!

1 minute in: "Mah feller citisens. I done good."

2 minutes in: Jobs are growing at a slower pace? Slower? Plummeting! Housing market has declined? King of understatement!

3 minutes in: Nancy Pelosi is one ugly woman. She's moving her lips like she has spinach stuck in her teeth.

4: I'd pay more taxes. Holy crap, Bush just made what was a good joke! IRS takes check or money order? Awesome! Biden and Clinton were freaking PISSED! I want to see that on Youtube!

5: Cheney just had a heart attack in the background. If you watch closely, you can see the EMTs reaching up with the paddles from under the podium.

6: Here we go--earmarks. Wait a second. Does anyone else think that Bush has Vulcan ears? Oh, my god! Did Bush just pull an executive order on earmarks? Bravo, dude! Of course, he follows it up with some offscreen interaction with someone we can't see.

8: Mortgage help? Don't buy a house you can't afford.

9: Universal health care? Hilary looks like he just pooped in her pie. Obama too.

11: "Turn the page slowly, George. Don't wanna cut yerself on the thick pages."

12: CAN'T DENY NCLB RESULTS? What the f. is he talking about? Choke on it, f.nut! Ah, yes, the great Texan president who turned around US education and made us competitive with other nations like El Salvador, Zimbabwe, and Bangladesh.

13: NAFTA is being revisited? We have agreements with Peru, Colombia, and S. Korea. Which one of those does not fit...?

14: "Quality products made in the USA." USA, the country in Norrh America?

15: He just said "terror!" How did he make it 15 minutes without saying? At least he segued from education before he inserted it.

16: Cheney's 2nd heart attack.

17: Obama's tie is 3 feet long.

18: The best way to meet the goal of reducing greenhouse gases in the US is to return Texas to Mexico so that it quits hurting our numbers. It works on the same principle as NCLB and poor performing students.

19: I think I just saw Jon Turteltaub scouting locations for the next National Treasure debacle. He was measuring Ted Kennedy's stomach for a possible entrance to the lost city of "El Gintonic."

21: Why do we stand up for mentioning New Orleans?

22: Ted Kennedy is snockered. A gin blossom just bloomed on his nose. I wonder how many of them are drunk.

23: Immigration--tricky topic. Holy crap, he just said "catch and release!" You know, this is one area where I overwhelmingly agree with Bush. He does have a much greater understanding (or facade of such) than do other poseurs.

24: What is that silvery thing next to Pelosi? It looks like a salt and pepper shaker. Do they really still use a quill and ink to sign documents?

26: Bush really is a poor speaker. He has no sense of timing, tone, emphasis, or any other basic element of speech. When he said "a clear September day," there was no emotion or weight to the words.

27: Of course Cheney stands up when he talks about war and violence.

28: "Spreading the hope of freedom." Really? You think that's what we're doing?

29: Kennedy just passed out and is drooling on Obama's 3-foot tie.

30: Fucking politicians. Clap for soldiers because it's a 1 point difference in the polls.

31-33: Maxx takes a leak.

34: It takes a lot of courage to be the lady in the audience who wears the green pastel dress. You stand out like... Well, like a nasty pastel dress in a sea of black and red.

35: Why don't the Supreme Court justices stand up? They above that?

36: BOB DOLE IS THERE! They cut to a shot of him just as he was showing the lady next to him his tie, and she was nodding at it! Can't you just imagine that conversation? "I had gravy for lunch, see." (too little time to develop witty, imagined conversation)

37: Cheney just communicated with aliens using a complex series of eye blinks. As far as I can tell, it's one blink per minute except when the word "terrist" is mentioned which elicits 2 blinks and a grimace. Pelosi, on the other hand, is blinking like mad.

39: Slooooowwww. You know, "the Iraqi people are taking hold of their future," but they're also taking hold of our future.

41: Take a few moments to check out Facebook. Nope, nothing new.

42: I support a Palestinian homeland. One hundred percent. Someone I was talking with on Thursday said, "Wasn't it Israel's to begin with?" Well, how to define "begin with."

44: "Dedicated men and women toil day and night to protect American lives." The DMV?

45: Uh-oh, Patriot Act territory. Careful, buddy. Hmm, the Democrats didn't like that.

47: But they do like mention of genocide in Sudan.

48: Interesting about using food funds to buy in-country food to share with... Is there an African woman with a baby dressed in leopard print in the audience? That was surreal.

51: I like the transferring of military educational credits to spouses or children idea. Definitely a good idea.

53: Just as it ended, Cheney stood and pulled up his pants. What was happening under there? Actually, I don't care.

So where's the after party?

El Salvador

I'm watching a film called Innocent Voices, a film centered around children caught up in the Salvadorean civil war in the 1980s. Except for being spoken in Mexican Spanish, it's quite well done and immensely painful to watch.

I really need to blog about this season of The Wire. Oh, by "this" I mean the 4th, the one I'm watching. All others are irrelevant at the moment.

There Will Be Blood

I went and watched There Will Be Blood again on Friday, this time at the Kentucky Theatre. I hadn't been able to get the movie out of my head since I'd seen it earlier in the week, and I desperately wanted M to see this powerful piece of work. It holds up well to a second viewing.

"There's room for someone to sit next to me. If you want. I'm just saying.


I'm so alone..."

steeping the grains

que?

If you had to guess, which Norrh American country would you say this comes from? And please try to avoid the cheap shot at the shit state of affairs in the US educational system.

Grain:
Crystal Malt, Chocolate Malt, Black Patent Malt, Roasted Non-Malted Barley

homebrew

Made some beer last night, my "Better Dead Than Red Russian Imperial Stout." I was going to write a step-by-step post with photos of the process, but I'm too lazy.

The "wort" boiling.

I just saw a wonder. Not a wonder like a meteor shower on a cold night, huddled with friends; not a wonder like mountains towering over robin-egg waters; not a wonder like wind raining down leaves on a fall day. All of those things are wonders, beautiful events which make us smile. There Will Be Blood is a wondrous study of vicious inhumanity and insatiable greed. It's a wonder to see a story so thoroughly explore that which makes us human, a humanity which is not all the nobility and creativity of other films which are character studies. Daniel Day-Lewis is ineffably good. Frightening, really. I've never seen intensity like that on screen.

why i watch the wire

Because funny things like this break the tragedy up a bit.

Someone directed me to FreeRice.com, a website that's a blast. Oh, and philanthropic at no expense to you. So is it really philanthropic? By the way, "ganef" means "thief."

Jekyll, a BBC production, is absolutely awesome. James Nesbitt is creepily fun as Hyde and also does a great job of being the pitiable Dr. Jackman.

Lou Dobbs says

...the ugly spectacle that Clinton and Obama created should serve as a reminder to all of us that group and identity politics have outlived their effectiveness and that pandering to socio-ethnocentric interest groups and special interests, whether as large as corporate America or as small as the construction company in a congressman's district, has no rightful place in 21st century American politics.

I quite like that.

a momentary lapse of reticence

1. I miss enjoying Pink Floyd. They used to bring joy and pensiveness to my life; now they bring "Next track" or "Seek" on the radio. Did I outgrow them?
   
2. Spartan, David Mamet's film, is awesome. His approach to military stories has drawn me in to a great show, The Unit. Any show that kills off a major character without a buildup has my vote.
   
3. Glenmorangie's 10-year-old single malt Scotch is delicious.
4. Maxx sprained or strained or twisted his leg several weeks ago, and he's still limping from it. Ever seen a 3-legged poodle? Depressing as hell.
   
5. I've come to the realization that it will sadden me not to know where some of my students will end up in life. They'll live to be 80, will live lives full and rich, and I will have played my small part, an extra, Ensign Smith, a "what was his name." I'm reconciling myself to that.
   
6. I finished our newsletter. Save a tree: email.
   

This game is awesome!

Tetrical

ha!

"Aroused Jesus statue outrage."

Do not click on this if sacrilege offends you.

naturalism

My juniors and I are continuing our study of Naturalism in American literature, a unit we began last semester with a Stephen Crane story. We're picking it back up by reading "To Build a Fire," a deceptively tedious story by Jack London. People often associate London with adventure stories, and while his works certainly revolve around exciting premises, their thematic depth is remarkable. "To Build a Fire" follows a prospector who slowly walks to his death through the frozen Klondike, a story that had my students yawning for the first day and a half of reading and arguing vigorously the last day and a half. They couldn't decide unequivocally if they would kill a dog if it was their only chance of possible survival. They also made bombastically thoughtless statements such as suggesting that dogs and bears are an entirely different matter, and that to kill a dog is much worse than killing a bear. God, I love controversy!

I also accidentally asked a student who was sitting on her hands what her hands were doing. Innocent mistake!

When was the last time you went outside and just stared at the stars?