I feel shitty enough that I want to go home, but not shitty enough to leave work, so it’s gonna be a long day. But as bad as I feel, I’ll take comfort in the fact that I’m not as big an asshole as Rush Limbaugh.
“He’s moving all around and shaking and it’s purely an act. . . . This is really shameless of Michael J. Fox. Either he didn’t take his medication or he’s acting.”
Nice.
[tags]michael j. fox, parkinsons, rush limbaugh is a big fat idiot[/tags]
Ah, Deadwood. If it doesn’t have the best one-liners ever, I don’t know what does. Another favourite: “He likes to berate the gimp mornings.”
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Scarlett Johansson, avec Dita Von Teese (Marilyn Manson’s wife) poses for some S&M photos. You’re welcome. [via Buddha Canvas]
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Speaking of Scarlett, she’s recording a Tom Waits cover album. That should…wait, what?
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Shoot. The Catholic bishops have wandered into the lawmaking again. Where’s my broom?
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Lunenberg might be getting a strip club. Question: would it be part of the UNESCO site?
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What a coincidence that a 10,000-year-old meteorite should be dug out of the ground in Kansas. No doubt they’ll have trouble convincing some of the locals who think the earth is younger than that.
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Still on the topic of idiots, a garbage disposal manufacturer is suing NBC because of a scene in last week’s Heroes depicting an indestructible girl’s hand getting mangled (and then healing, natch) when she sticks her hand in one of their products. Of course, you couldn’t really read the brand name. And even the simplest of the simple would know that sticking your hand in an operating garbage disposal would cause it harm. But yeah, sue those fuckers. Twice.
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More idiots: George W. Bush and the Congress he rode in on. The bill he’s just signed into law means that anyone suspected of terrorism isn’t guilty until proven innocent, they’re in purgatory. You know it’s gotta be a peach when the executive director of the ACLU calls it “one of the worst civil-liberties measures ever enacted in American history.”
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The recording industry has launched 8,000 more file-sharing lawsuits. Now where’s my buggy whip?
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OK, back to the Catholic bishops: some of the quotes from Winnipeg Archbishop James Weisgerber are just knee-slappers. Gob-smackers, even. Check it:
“As leaders, we are guardians of long traditions of wisdom”
Really? ‘Cause I was 17 when your church admitted you were wrong about the whole “We condemned Galileo ’cause he said the earth revolves around the sun” thing. Also, as I pointed out to someone recently, you still officially have it on the books that communion wafers become the body of Christ somewhere between the beak and the gizzard. You may not really admit it in public anymore, but…yeah. No need to go on, but you’ll pardon me if your promised knowledge of “long traditions of wisdom” don’t set me all a-twitter.
“People don’t really have a sense of personal sin or reflection. We are becoming a more selfish and hedonistic society.”
Catholicism (or any other religion) does not equal morality. In some cases it’s quite the opposite. Anyway, that’s the same tune that church officials have been whistling for centuries and we’ve somehow managed to avoid Armageddon.
[On the issue of gay marriage] “We really need in Canada to support families.”
Now you’re pissing me off, padre. Once again, let me help you with the math: marriage != straight-and-child-bearing-only club. Besides, if you let gay people get married, wouldn’t that just create more family units? Or would you just like Canada to support a certain type of family?
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I find this whole religion thing difficult. About 80% of Canadians practice some kind of religion, including many of my family and friends and other people I respect. I couldn’t care less if they’re religious, or about the particulars of what they believe. But when religious people try to impose their beliefs on the public, and especially on the law, I get annoyed. I hope some of them do as well.
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By the way, sorry for the brain dump; I was sick yesterday and this stuff just built up. OK, off to eat and watch some Friday Night Lights.
[tags]deadwood, scarlett johansson, tom waits, catholic bishops, gay marriage, lunenberg, garbage disposal, heroes, nbc, dubya, file-sharing, buggy whip[/tags]
Today had been supermega cleaning day. Our apartment has been neglected and, as such, has turned on us. There’s still more fun to be had, like ripping the cat hair out of the carpet, but it’s nice to have a (somewhat) livable environment again.
Really, we’re just phoning it in now. Our condo is set to be ready for us by early April, and we just don’t care about the place we’re in anymore. It’s a rental, so we’re not destroying the place or anything, but there’s not exactly a pride of ownership right now either.
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Day Night Day Night, one of our favourite films at this year’s TIFF, has won the award for best feature film at the Woodstock Film Festival. I’m glad; it deserves more attention than it got here in Toronto.
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Scott Adams is at it again. This time he thinks he has an idea that will win him next year’s Nobel prizes for both peace and economics. It relates to the old no-two-countries-who-have-a-McDonald’s-have-ever-gone-to-war maxim, which is really just a symptom. Open trade with a country makes it much harder to go to war with them (unless you plan to overrun them completely). For example, the US will never attack China; Wal-Mart gets most of their cheap goods from China and would likely go out of business, or at the very least drastically increase their prices.
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Late last night we watched Henry Fool (imdb | rotten tomatoes), the precursor to Fay Grim, another film we saw at this year’s festival. It was good, but I think I was expecting the style of Fay Grim, which was far more frenetically paced. And, of course, I wish there could have been more focus on Parker Posey, but I guess the title should have made it obvious that there wouldn’t be. I would definitely recommend watching Henry Fool before watching Fay Grim, though; it would’ve helped us out a lot.
[tags]day night day night, scott adams, dilbert, henry fool, fay grim[/tags]
Darcy Tucker loves him some Dubya.
“I would like to pick his brain,” Tucker said. “I think his political views are on the same line as my own. I think the wave of the future is someone who doesn’t back down to terrorism.”
Oy.
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Sometimes I hate living in Toronto. Tonight, my only option is watching the Leafs play Calgary instead of being able to see Montreal open their home season against Ottawa. And can someone explain to me why even French CBC isn’t carrying the Canadiens game?
[tags]darcy tucker, dubya, maple leafs, canadiens[/tags]
This year’s Nobel Peace Prize was awarded to a man and a bank for their work and theories on micro-credit and other grassroots methods of eliminating poverty. When I first read this I thought it was the prize for economics, but after re-reading it realized the press release was for the peace prize.
Muhammad Yunus has shown himself to be a leader who has managed to translate visions into practical action for the benefit of millions of people, not only in Bangladesh, but also in many other countries. Loans to poor people without any financial security had appeared to be an impossible idea. From modest beginnings three decades ago, Yunus has, first and foremost through Grameen Bank, developed micro-credit into an ever more important instrument in the struggle against poverty. Grameen Bank has been a source of ideas and models for the many institutions in the field of micro-credit that have sprung up around the world.
I find this very interesting; early in my international business class we had a debate about whether poverty breeds (or contributes to) terrorism, and the Nobel committee seems to be saying that it does. For my part, I agree; I think poverty breeds desperation and ignorance (through lack of education), two factors that increase the likelihood of terrorism on a macro scale.
Thoughts?
[tags]nobel peace prize, muhammad yunus, grameen bank, micro-credit[/tags]
TV notes:
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Sports notes:
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Political notes:
[tags]er, friday night lights, heroes, colbert report, canadiens, raptors, vince carter, stephen harper, iraq[/tags]
Let’s see, what happened while we were gone and ignoring the news (apart from the obvious like the whole Foley-page thing and the continuing deaths of Canadian soldiers in Afghanistan)?
[tags]sunday shopping, stephen baldwin, canadiens, sabres, leafs, vinnie vincent, kiss[/tags]
Of all the reprehensible things the Bush administration has done, this is one of the most terrifying: in an article titled Forget Nuremberg: How Bush’s new torture bill eviscerates the promise of Nuremberg, Slate explains how the President has granted himself the authority to “interpret the meaning and application of the Geneva Conventions.”
The court system is now emasculated regarding the issue of torture. The executive branch has subverted the judicial branch, and has the legislative branch by the throat. The checks and balances set out by the forefathers Republicans claim to hold so dear are being chipped away, bit by bit.
I fear America is sliding into a period which, not too many years hence, they’ll view as one of the darkest in their history.
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On a lighter note, and in preparation for our trip, I’ve added a little Google Map to the sidebar. It’ll show you where we are, so long as I can get enough signal to update our location on the blackberry.
[tags]bush, torture, nuremberg, geneva conventions, google maps[/tags]
At lunch today I finished watching another Werner Herzog documentary: Lessons Of Darkness (imdb | rotten tomatoes). Essentially 50 minutes of aerial film from Kuwait, taken just after the first gulf war, set to a Wagner score or to Herzog himself reading passages from Revelations, it’s enough to boggle the mind and drop the jaw. Fountains of fire spewing from sand, rivers and lakes of oil stretching for miles, racks of crude torture paraphenalia, burned & rusted skeletons of old vehicles, blackened men trying desperately to regain control over the exploding landscape…it’s just incredible stuff.
Herzog’s a freaking genius.
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It’s natural that a conservative government would cut social programs. That’s what they do; it’s the basis for conservative politics: you lessen the role (and spending) of government, thereby reducing the short-term tax burden on the public. So it comes as no surprise that the Tory government is cutting $1 billion from human rights lawyers, students, museum-goers, etc.
What does surprise me is that they cut the programs on the same day they announced a $13 billion surplus.
While I agree with their decision to use the surplus to pay down the debt, couldn’t they have paid down $12 billion and left the social programs intact? It would’ve been a good PR move, certainly, and it would have been a non-dickish thing to do.
Weighing in with their (predictably opposing) viewpoints: the Toronto Star and National Post.
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While piddling about on my computer tonight I put ye olde Windows Media Player on random. These were the first ten songs served up. Apparently my PC likes the instrumental post-rock; I didn’t hear a single word for about 22 minutes starting at song #6…
I should have kept writing them down. It just played The Cooper Temple Clause, Sleater-Kinney and Iggy Pop all in a row.
[tags]werner herzog, lessons of darkness, conservative spending cuts, budget surplus, random music[/tags]
Thanks for making me laugh so early in the morning.
[tags]stephen harper, rolling stones, bruce mackinnon[/tags]
Skirl | Dan Dickinson 