Far South of I-10

Dilbert author Scott Adams is blogging now. I saw the link over at Peeve Farm last week, but I forgot to bookmark it. When I remembered it yesterday, a quick google of Dilbert, blog, brought it to the top of the list. If I can remember my password at blogrolling I'll add it to the list, it looks like a good daily read, for example: Maybe it’s the way I was raised, but I find that I get mad about all the wrong things. For example, when I hear a news report about some serial killer who buried 43 victims in an underground bunker that he constructed beneath his shed, my first reaction is Wow. He built an underground bunker under a shed! I find myself admiring his industriousness and passion in the pursuit of his dreams. That’s clearly wrong. Which is pretty fucking funny if you ask me, not only is it easy to see the source of the very twisted dogbert as the king of the world, but is pretty much the way I watch the news now. Sortof, how'd the guy get 27 bodies under his hou...

I'm back from the UK finally. After two weeks of just watching 5 BBC channels, with no internet in the hotel, I'm bathing in information, surfing the web and watching tv while reading the newspaper. BBC is far more slanted than even the big 3 networks here. It seems like every news story ends with a jab at the bush administration: "Scientists expect a the coldest winter in the past 20 years, which will be hard on the poor, this is because the US didn't sign the Kyoto treaty." They will be doing a whole show Monday on "Katrina, America's Shame", and constantly showed those photos of Wilson and Plame with her dressed in dark glasses and a scarf as they did stories about how Bush led us to war based on a lie. (To them ambassador Wilson is still credible). Then when they have a true local story to cover, riots between Pakistanis and blacks in Birmingham, they never say the key word, the elephant in the room is never mentioned. It's easy to infer w...

I saw a fantastic band earlier this week, a band called Pesky Alligator, which I really did't expect to see here in Newark. Just two players, a girl who can do a perfect janis joplin, and a guitar player who can play acoustic or base guitar. One of those moments of serendipity, where I thought i was heading back to the hotel, instead I ran into the new student that joined my class this week. He'd just arrived from canada and hadn't eaten, so we went to the Navigator, a pub across the street from this hotel. And this great girl was there in front of me getting a beer. She was in a red miniskirt with knee high black boots. I thought. Wow. And when she walked up to the bandstand and started setting up her drum set, I thought double wow. With just a drum and guitar and vocals, they were the best live act I've seen this year. I knew I was in a really foreign country when they played "in constant sorrow" from "o brother where art thou", it was fantastic...

I'm in the UK, and the BBC showed the news that the Simpsons are being translated into Arabic I agree with one of the local arabs they interviewed for the show: "If Homer doesn't eat bacon,donuts and drink beer he isn't homer" The beeb also is screeching about avian flu, you could have copied the stories from the US, just changing "Evil Bush" to "Lapdog Blair". Yeah, we're unprepared but nothing really has changed.

I'm reading a book called The Four Agreements by Don Miguel Ruiz, here's a quick review at blogcritics: (http://blogcritics.org/archives/2005/09/18/223516.php The four agreements are: * Be impeccable with your word * Don't take anything personally * Don't make assumptions * Always do your best I'm just on the first agreement, which if you read a summary you might think is "just keep your word". But instead the author means it literally, be "im- peccable" with your word is "without sin". Words can hurt and cause echoes of pain, guilt and remorse. Don't use them as swords, or gossip or say negative things. Words have power, like black magic they can weave a spell. This is clearly illustrated in the movie dead poets society, which is playing on the TV here. Mean words are easily said to the people we care for most, and they can have the most drastic consequences. Anyway looks like it will be a good book. Thanks Mike.

I spent a few days in ciudad carmen and villahermosa in mexico, before I left there was hurricane that hit nearby. I didn't notice until it began to rain like a cow pissing on a flat rock. No continuous coverage from the weather channel, or even the local news. Ciudad Carmen already was flooded from just the normal afternoon rains, so I'm sure it flooded bigtime. In New Orleans after Katrina, the poor went from the projects, to the superdome, to the astrodome to other projects I don't think the poor in ciudad carmen were so lucky. I 'd hate to see the effects of a really bad storm there. I left mexico and flew through a hurricane for the 2nd time this year, and I learned several important lessons. Mexico city has the worst big airport I've ever seen, along with unhelpful stupid people. I asked one lady which way the American airlines counter was, and she said "derecho", which means straight. When in reality it was the other way. I walked to gate #1 ...