Monday, December 17, 2007

Those Wacky Koreans

Many of you know that I am a sucker for big dumb fluffy cats - hence, Bo and Abbot. Check out these guys sent to me by J:

http://www.cnn.com/video/?/video/health/2007/12/14/stout.skorea.glowing.cats.ytn

Craziness.

The funniest part of the video is when the reporter starts talking about applications for the technology for humans. Do you think glow-in-the-dark people are in the works?

Friday, December 14, 2007

I Couldn't Have Put This Better Myself

From The Week:

Why Obama's suddenly catching fire

If Hillary Clinton wants to know why she's sinking in the polls, said Jonah Goldberg (Los Angeles Times), she shouldn't blame Oprah Winfrey. Instead, she should take a hard look at Nancy Pelosi and Harry Reid. When Democrats took control of Congress in 2006, triumphant liberal activists expected "some sort of good-government reform." It hasn't happened. Congress is still married to pork-barrel spending, and it's done nothing about health care, the budget deficit, or global warming. Though now led by liberals Pelosi and Reid, Congress failed to stop the Iraq war. In fact, it keeps voting to fund it. The '06 victory, in fact, has translated to almost nothing for Democrats who believed they'd brought the Bush era to an end. "As Washington politics grow more disappointing," Democats are taking a new look at Barack Obama and his "politics of hope." His talk of transcendng politics no longer sounds quite so naive, while the prospect of electing a woman no longer sounds so revolutionary; she seems cautions, centrist, and safe. Democrats long for a president who "will magically change the world," and unfortunately for Clinton, neither "Clinton nor Hillary are abracadabra words anymore. But Obama is."

Or as my friend J. points out, there's been a Bush or Clinton in the White House for the past 20 years. It's time for someone else to have a chance.

Anticipating the reunion

In honor of the upcoming Abbott-TT reunion, I'm posting one from the archives. Abbott and TT happen to be littermates, and I think that gives them a special bond. Sometimes, when the mood strikes, they'll pile on top of each other like this:

Aside from the fact that Abbott is twice her size, you can barely tell them apart.

Tuesday, December 11, 2007

High Speed Donut Chase

Many of you know that I have always found it very peculiar that, given the number of truck-related accidents on highways, one never sees the remnants of food deliveries scattered all over the median. I believe I first considered this strange non-occurrence whilst driving behind an erratic ravioli truck in Providence, RI. I naturally wondered whether, if the truck tipped over, ravioli would spill all over the place.

Luckily, I was not to know the answer to this question. However, R. in Madison, WI recently sent me a news item about a man who used a Krispy Kreme delivery truck as a getaway vehicle for his sausage heist.

From The Capital Times:

Cash bail of $2,100 was set today for Warren G. Whitelightning of Crandon, the man who allegedly led police on a high-speed chase through Madison's west after stealing a Krispy Kreme Donut truck when he was drunk early Saturday morning.

Whitelightning was officially charged in Dane County Circuit Court today in a criminal complaint alleging several offenses. He is being charged with shoplifting eight giant red hot pickled sausages from the Open Pantry on University Avenue, stealing the doughnut truck, ramming a University of Wisconsin Police car, attempting to elude pursing officers, operating after revocation, his fourth time drunk driving, and a hit and run.

You can see the video here. It doesn't get really exciting until about 2 minutes in, when donuts start flying out the back of the truck. Luckily no one was hurt, but the Assistant District Attorney conceded that the incident was a "danger to the community."

I'm really not that malicious, but how often does a sausage robbery result in a high speed police chase of a Krispy Kreme donut truck?

Friday, December 7, 2007

Friday Catblogging: The two circles

Andre and TT have only one more day together, before they are separated for a few months due to Mr. Boo's employment logistics (I keep Andre, Ms. Boo will oversee the TT-Abbott-Ooma reunion). So it's nice that after living together alone for a few months, they have finally reached a detente where they can fall asleep within inches of each other. Today's a lazy Friday afternoon, and nothing better for it than to curl up in a circular fashion on the bed.


Apparently, mirror symmetry is all the rage in the cat world these days.

Thursday, November 29, 2007

Stupid flying

There's a new website called farecast.com that lets you check out pricing trends for different flying routes to figure out if prices are rising or falling, or when flying will be cheapest. So I'm trying to buy tickets to travel from Detroit to Portland over New Years, and I'm finding it really tough to get cheap tickets. The graph below from farecast explains why:

So apparently, right around Jan 1, all the flights are really expensive before dropping back to their reasonable price of about $320. I understand supply/demand and all that, but I have to say this really sucks. No other type of transportation works this way. Trains, tolls, bus fares, or ferries don't raise their rates around certain times of the year by almost 100%. I would even prefer if they just flattened the prices at a slightly higher rate rather than gouge people who have to fly during specific times. This is yet another reason why airlines sucks and they all deserve to go out of business.

Tuesday, November 27, 2007

New friend

I'd like to give a shout-out to Mr. Hound Blog and his new site, the appropriately named
hound-blog. Check it for pictures hounds doing what hounds will, which as far as I can tell mostly involved sleeping and looking dopey.