The Legendary Jackalope

For some reason in my boredom, I wondered where the idea of a jackalope came from. The answer was quite disturbing. The legend of the jackalope was inspired by sightings of rabbits infected with shope papillomavirus, which causes growth of antler-like tumors in various places on the rabbit's head and body. The actual sight is quite gruesome. In my research I also discovered several other facts about the jackalope legend. It has been said that the jackalope can convincingly imitate any sound, including the human voice. It uses this ability to elude pursuers, chiefly by using phrases such as "There he goes! That way!". Although no jackalope has ever been captured alive, it is said that a jackalope may be caught by putting a flask of whiskey out at night. The jackalope will drink its fill of whiskey, and its intoxication will make it easier to hunt. I'll e sure to add that to my mental bank of useless information.

Opps I Did It Again

Sunday August 27th, 2006 marked the death of my beloved iPod. It was found suffocated under a pile of clothing inside the dryer. It was a good iPod, an inexpensive one, but a good one. We had some great times together, me and my iPod. We went on walks together, worked out together, and spent almost every day keeping each other company during our daily commute. And then I did something that I am not overly proud of, something that marks an end to more relationships than I'd like to admit: I consumed 18 drinks in one night. I woke up the next morning in a half drunken haze. That's when I decided to do my laundry while forgetting all about my buddy tucked away in the comfort of my shorts. Tucked away until the flood waters starting rushing in. After that I don't even want to think about the torture that he went through. Abandoned by his best friend he died all alone in the tumble cycle. All the beautiful song that he remembered slowly flooded from his ROM. And then... darkness. But I suppose that with every end a new beginning is just around the corner. It will be nice to get an mp3 player for a 3rd consecutive Chirstmas. And the price was the reason that I chose this particular breed of mp3 player. Having getting drunk and ruined my first mp3 player, I felt nervous that I would do it again and ruin a second friendship. And unfortunately I was right. Perhaps I should stop my drinking, but on the other hand...

Plane Crashed and Entertainment

While I am on the subject of planes, I have to voice some thoughts about how people are far too sensitive. In this particular case I am referring to a big controversy surrounding Conan O'Brien's introduction to the Emmy Awards which featured a parody of the show 'Lost' in which Conan's plane goes down and he get stranded on an island. It just so happened that earlier in the week there actually was a plane crash where several people died. Then everyone comes out and cries that the intro was in poor taste. The intro was not even about that crash; it was a parody of a show. If the parody was in bad taste, then the entire show must be in bad taste. If there was some sort of terrorist attack the week of the Emmy's people would probably be crying that Conan also featured a parody of '24' in the intro. Sometimes planes crash and sometimes terrorists strike and it seems that in some respect that we find these events entertaining. If this were not true these situations would not be a central theme to many of our popular television shows. If a skit or show has the misfortune of bad timing then some consider it to be in poor taste, but if the timing is okay then we give it a little metal statue to show how much we like it.

Free to Eat Applesauce

This past weekend our rugby team flew to Minnesota for a match. I had brought a couple of granola bars and a small package of applesauce for a snack for when we landed. Then we went through security and the bastards took my applesauce. Apparently applesauce is a threat to national security as it is a highly unstable compound. I asked if I could just eat it there, and the guy said, "not here but if you want I can take you to the front and you could have it there." Yeah like I want to go through this joke of an operation again. So the next time I want applesauce on a plane I have a couple of strategies. First I will just bring a whole apple and smash it myself. That way our country will be safe. Or I could just bring a baby with me. Then the applesauce would go right through, 'It's for the baby,' I'd say (because if terrorists wanted to have an applesauce bomb -even typing it seem ridiculous- they would never think of using a baby a great diversion). I understand that there was a thwarted plot to blow up planes with some liquids, but they caught the guys. Let me repeat... they caught the guys. Therefore the current security measures are good enough to discover and prevent such activities, but just in case why don't we take away the right of eating and drinking to airplane passengers. Some may claim that I shouldn't be mad at the people who are trying to protect me and should be mad at the terrorists. Of course I am mad at the terrorist, but in this case they were not the ones to take my applesauce. Is it really worth it? Instead of having applesauce and being 99.99997% safe, I don't have applesauce and am 99.99998% safe. I think that that is a risk I am willing to take because I really do like applesauce, but I think I like my freedom a little bit more.

Umbrellas

Early this morning I was awoken by a thunderstorm. My first thought of the day was to give (my girlfriend) her umbrella back that was still in my bag from the weekend. When it was time to leave she said that I should take it because she didn't like umbrellas. This made me flash back to when I read an essay by my dad that he wrote in his younger years. Basically it stated that men were to never cary and umbrella and instead should walk in the rain. He would have been ashamed of me this day. I think that I should purchase a trenchcoat for the rain, it is a pseudo-sexual icon. I'd like people to wonder if I was wearing anything under it or just preparing to go streaking. Then I would walk in the rain without an umbrella and make my dad proud.

The other observation that I had this morning was when I was walking down rainy LaSalle St. It seemed that everyone had a blue umbrella. I looked across the street and saw six or seven people in a row carrying blue umbrellas then look in front of me to notice the same thing. I am not sure why blue (especially dark blue) is such a popular color for umbrellas. You would think more people would choose colorful umbrellas to help cheer you up during a rainy day. But I guess people would rather be reminded of how gross it is outside.

Air Show

I got a first hand experience at this year's air and water show. No I didn't attend the event but was irritated by it just about the entire weekend. With all the flyovers that took place it seemed as if OHare rerouted all flights to land in my backyard. To be honest the first flyover I heard I thought that a plane was going to crash into my house. It made trying to relax quite difficult. Although I am sure those who watched the show enjoyed all of the loud noises and shiny things.

Weddings IV

As a followup to my entry about the expense of weddings, I must state that I spent just about the $300 that I estimated that I would for the wedding I attended this weekend. And that includes the $70 cab ride that I could have avoided if only I had the foresight to successfully plan a ride which could have been easily granted with one phone call. But the bottom line is that I caught my fifth garter. Half way to beating my dad's record.

Wedding III

So after I had my thoughts on weddings, the Red Eye (one of the most useless papers on earth) ran a timely article and I couldn't help but to take a peak. This article was about the financial burden of attending weddings. They estimate that if you are a guest you will pay between $400 and $800, if you are in the wedding party $700 and $1,200, and if it is a destination wedding $1,500 to $3,000. Not only do the wedding guest pay a ton but an average wedding costs $27,852 with 2.3 million weddings to take place this year. So thats $64,059,600,000, for you non-math majors that just over 64 billion dollars! And that's only the expense for the wedding. Say that the 380 million wedding guests spend $300 a piece (this is probably a low estimate) that total come to $114,000,000,000. Overall that's about 178 billion dollars that will be spent on weddings this year. I think I need to start selling weddings.

Weddings II

I got a call yesterday from one of my best friends from grade and high school about this upcoming wedding. He asked me to be in the wedding party, which is a good honor especially since we do not keep in touch too well. I think in my stooped (read drunken) state I vowed to brew him some wedding mead for the honeymoon. So if anyone is wondering, I will be busy the weekend of November 3, 2007. Yes I have plans that far in advance. On the other hand, my roommate got invited last weekend to a wedding that is occuring this weekend. A bit of a difference. Wedding planning sounds like a real bitch.

Independent Films

Last weekend I went to see the movie 'Little Miss Sunshine.' To do so I had to visit a hippie mall with a Landmark Theatre. I must say that it was one of the best movies that I have seen anywhere in a long time. Then this weekend I saw last year's biggest independant film 'Sideways' on HBO. These two movies have got me going on an independent film kick. Then I saw the movie 'The Oh in Ohio' on Sunday and although this was not up to the high standards of the first two movies I mentioned, it was still much more interesting than most of the highly marketed movies that you see. I think what appeals to me most about these movies is that they are movies that are made by people who just like to make movies. As a result they can defy the many norms of the movie business. They can break free of the format that major movies are forced to follow in order to appease the masses. In many ways independent films embody the same characteristics as craft beers, in that they are not for everyone but they will enrich you life if you discover them and are willing to take a chance to break the norm.

Crashed

Yesterday and the day before our computer went down, oh yeah and all day on Friday. We have had so many computer problems over the last week it is starting to become the norm. And it always happens when something important is happening, like when there is a lot of activity or I'm trying to get out to go home. I actually watched each individual program crash one at a time in front of my eyes. The cool part was that it gave us a free ticket to do whatever we wanted (knowing that we would have to stay later than usual to catch up). But if there is one thing that I hate about computers crashing it is listening to people bitch and moan about it. 'Oh, our technology suck.' Shit happens and why don't you just shut up!

Time Wasted

I was reading in an article in the newspaper today on how much time people waste at work and how they go about doing it. It stated that people waste just under two hours a day by engaging in a plethora of activities, including surfing the internet (which coincidently includes blogging), running errands out of the office, and staring blankly at computer monitiors. I started to think about the activites that we do around here to kill time. I feel that I spend pretty much my whole day wasting time. In fact that's why I started this blog in the first place. But we watch movies, play video games, read newspapers, surf the internet, write business plans, take extended lunches, come in late, talk about movies and sports, buy stuff that we have been meaning to pick up, take walks, and go to the library. And despite all these activities we have never really been repremanded about wasting time. Probably because we have the time to waste. So much so that we actually postpone time wasting activities for later in the day so they will be more spread out. What I really need to do is find a gym around here and go workout during the workday...now that's multitasking!

Why Do People Suck?

This past weekend I spent some time in Rockie Mountain National Park and drove through several national forests. These parks and forests are so nice because they are for the most part left alone by people. In other words we were not allowed to mess it all up. The park has signs all over the place telling us how not to mess it up. I find it interesting that messing things up is so inherent to people that we need signs to tell us how not to screw everything up.

Perhaps the world would be better off if we put up more signs instructing people how to behave. Like signs in the airport that say no making out. No body really wants to see you stick your tounge down someone else's throat. As I thought twice while waiting for my flight to Colorado.