Another sacrifice for the common good

Last year I blogged about this guy, who spent $30 on one month's food. Now a woman has decided to duplicate his experience. From April 10th to May 9th, only a dollar a day, no mooching from co-workers or shoplifting steaks is allowed. She is allowing herself to forage, so her blog has great tips on dandelions as a food source. This could be connected to her resolve wavering after eight days.

The edumacashun wars

If you've been to college, you know the dangers of selecting random professors. Everyone seems to have at least one horror story about a course, and dead center can be found----The Evil Professor !!! Since I'm in a local community two year el-cheapo college, the traditional method of asking around has limits, there's less of a rumor mill. So I turn to the problem solver of the 21st century, the internet. Ratemyprofessors.com allows students to post thoughts about their professors anonymously. It's pretty accurate if you keep a couple of rules in mind. First, posts with atrocious grammar/spelling usually reflect the poster's intelligence. A great number of these posts are negative, presumably in revenge for a deservedly poor grade received by the disgruntled student. Second, posts with details such as "tests for material not covered" are much more valuable. If you can wade through all the ranting, you can find valuable information, and an occasional witty comment that will make you laugh. (My all time favorite: "If you take his class, you'll need a pillow. Your pillow will need a pillow.")

As you might expect, most professors have a contrary view of ratemyprofessors.com. So in response, someone launched a blog, Rate Your Students. I think it started off as a place for venting responses to student posts on what professors call The Site That Is Not To Be Named. Now it's expanded to include tales of archetypal professoring moments like busting insanely stupid plagiarism . Since I sit next to some of these students, I don't find such stories particularly shocking. I hate to sound old, but kids nowadays are something else.

Liberals Are Annoying

Do you ever miss the feeling of being young and knowing everything about everything? Prepare yourself, this young lady has devastating rhetoric for those who may disagree with her political ideas.

Maybe after she's finished getting the world on the right track she'll clean up her room.

I'm so frakkin' excited!

Tonight the fourth (and final) season of Battlestar Galactica begins. I've been squirreled away for the past week, since the Sci-Fi channel has been showing a marathon including every single episode. If you haven't seen it, it's a far cry from the late '70's version, which was basically a ripoff of Star Wars. The original did introduce some fairly interesting ideas for its time, the producer was a Mormon who introduced rather twisted elements of Mormon theology into his product. But let's face it, TV in the 70's was crap, so the original series had its limits.

In the brave new world of the 21st century this Battlestar Galactica (BSG) is a very different animal. Some of the weird Mormon elements have been retained, like a lost tribe of people who long ago separated themselves and left for an unknown place. The basic story is the same...a race of robot-creatures destroy most of humanity, the small group of human survivors flee in spaceships and begin their search for the lost tribe, which has settled on the mythological place called "Earth. " Other elements of the original series are present, the Commander of the Battlestar Galactica is named Adama, his son is a pilot named Apollo, other pilots are named Athena, Starbuck, etc. Before the Cylon destruction they lived on worlds named after their tribes, loose interpretations of our astrological symbols, i.e. Caprica, (Capricorn) Picon, (Pisces) etc.

That's where the comparison ends, as the modern series goes in a whole new direction. The religious element has been expanded, creating two new detailed--and conflicting--religions. The theology of the Cylons is monotheistic, and the humans worship a pantheon of gods. The Cylons are no longer just shiny robots, they've evolved to look exactly like us. This means there are Cylon infiltrators among the humans, some of which are "sleepers" and unaware of their true nature until their real memories are awakened. Humans and Cylons crossbreed. Life is pretty crazy in the BSG space fleet.

Like most great science fiction, BSG uses all these elements to ask hard questions and provide a social commentary. They speculate about what it means to be human, since the evolved Cylons are so similar, some defect to the humans. Of course, some humans then defect to the Cylons. Religion drives conflict, with the Cylons claiming to follow the one true God as they try to wipe out humanity. Humans then pray to the Lords of Kobol before flying into combat to destroy Cylons. Amen.

In contrast to the original series, the humans aren't all good guys, and humanity itself is possibly unworthy to survive. Starbuck, as you can guess by her picture here, is a hard-drinking chick. She occasionally punches her Commanding Officer and is responsible for killing other pilots through dereliction of duty. She isn't the only drinker, the second-in-command is an alcoholic. Humans sleep around, married or not. (sometimes with Cylons, who use sex to lure humans into betrayals. The female cylon models are totally hot. ) They all curse liberally , the word "frack" is equivalent to...well, you can guess. President Laura Roslin orders so many summary executions by tossing people into space, her nickname is "airlock". If she's in a good mood, maybe she'll authorize a kangaroo court, then shove the defendant out the airlock. The Vice President is an ex-terrorist. There is a flourishing black market among the fleet, child prostitution, treason, rigged elections, and other ills of humanity. To top it off the military occasionally shoots rioting civilians. What fun! The music is a great addition and reflects the series. There are lots of percussive sections, interspersed with haunting melodies, and vocals sung in Sanskrit. The entire tone of the series is dark, both thematically and visually. The eight-minute overview, however, is maniacally frakkin' funny.

So, tonight, after more than a year, I hope I'll see 1) why four "human" characters began hearing Jimi Hendrix's "All Along the Watchtower" in their heads just before their hidden Cylon memories were triggered. 2) What happens during the reunion between Starbuck (recently back from the dead) and her husband (recently realized he's a Cylon). Those two kids have a lot to talk about. 3) What will happen to the main human traitor, who is constantly advised by an imaginary Cylon only he can see and hear. 4) What other ancient religious scriptures the President will fulfill, since she's been having religious visions--again.

To make sure nothing interrupted my little three-day obsession, I stockpiled supplies---frozen foods, diet Cherry-Vanilla Dr. Pepper, and pretzels. Food for the cats. And I have plenty of time to make lengthy blog posts while keeping one eye on the TV. Life is good, in an unhealthy sci-fi geek way. It could be worse, I suppose, I could be hooked on World of Warcraft... some of those people never see daylight again.

The World's Smallest Political Quiz

If you haven't done so before, try it out.... even the ultimate McPaper, USA Today, calls it "quick and relatively painless." Unless you really cling to your political identity.

I'd rather be in California

Especially after the tornado last night, and more storms rolling in today. Now Laura taunts me by sending pictures.


The cat and the dog seem to be working together, but that rat looks like he's ready to bail. Maybe posing isn't in his contact.

Apple iRack

This is a year old, so if you've seen it, go back to work. :)

And if you saw it here several times, go back to work. Apparently youtube just cleared its throat, I tried posting this video multiple times this weekend. Well, it finally worked---several days later. I wonder where all those posts were? Purgatory?

Barack performs bodily function, crowd goes wild

A sad week in Geekdom

Gary Gygax,the co-creator of Dungeons and Dragons, died Tuesday. He failed to roll a save vs. abdominal aneurysm at the age of 69. Anyone who has held their breath watching 2d20 bounce across a tabletop knows what a loss we've suffered.



In other bad news, Bill Gates is no longer the world's richest guy. He was bumped by Warren Buffett, and some guy named Carlos Slim Helu. Now, Buffett doesn't surprise me, but who the hell is this Helu guy? The news reports say he's a Mexican telecommunications magnate. It kind of burns me up that Mexico has millions of desperately poor people, many of them come here just to try and feed their families, and this dude is quietly raking in the dough. I guess it's not just a sad week in Geekdom, it's a sad week in the world of human rights. The upside is that Bill Gates has slipped in the wealth rankings because he's giving so much of it away. The Gates Foundation announced this week they were handing out thousands of grants for innovative solutions in health. Having already spent 26 billion on charitable causes, I think it's safe to say Bill and Melinda are racking up major karma points. Probably worth a move from #1 to #3 in available stacks of cash.

Grown-up polar bears being cute

Or at least not being vicious killers.

Ladies and Gentlemen...

Please cover your ears for our national anthem. Any time a singer has to promise "I'll make it up to you", you know you're in for a bad ride.











If you want patriotism, stick with Cheryl's blog. I only publish the a**hole stuff.

Okay, okay, I'll post!

But no heavy thinking or insight. I'm taking the lazy way out and going for the cheap laugh.