"...the most terrifying headline ever"

Balloon Juice:

"...the most terrifying headline ever:

Lynchings in Congo as penis theft panic hits capital

Lynchings AND penis theft? That can’t be good for tourism."

All right, now it's just getting ridiculous.

With the caveat that it'll all be fine and I'm sure I'll probably have a grand time all around... as of this morning, in May, I've got - 2 enkais, 2 concerts, a wedding and a community group trip. And the school sports day. [Which doesn't really count, as kids > adults, almost always.] For one such as I, who is, for whatever reason, generally inclined to introversion and quiet evenings with a book and/or the internet... the social activity level for the next month is rapidly approaching the "way too fucking much to want to deal with" threshold.

Gambaremasu.

[I am not doing a damn thing in June. And I'm not going to any post-undokai enkai. The enkai money-suck has already exceeded comfort levels.]

Training 16.

Training
30m Bas Rutten MMA/Thai Boxing/2m rounds
Bungee shoulder dislocations x20

Food
2 cups coffee w/equal, cream
500ml diet soda
2L water
Shake - 3eggs, cream, inst coffee, equal
2 steaks
Broccoli w/cheese and butter

Bed@2340/20m guided meditation

"How much do we miss in life because of our attachments to who we think we are?"

Wise. More at the link.

Live Life Aggressively!: The High Price Of Ownership:

"Growth requires letting go of that in which we used to so firmly believe. Once we become comfortable within the constructs of what we think we are, it's difficult to let go, even if we don't like the construct! Many people like neither who, nor what, they've become yet find a coincident comfort there since the known is more acceptable to them than the unknown. Dishonest self-assessments always result in stagnant growth, and when you fail to grow, you fail in living life at its fullest--a serious disservice to yourself.

How much do we miss in life because of our attachments to who we think we are?"

Mad. Yo.

Another Fucking Book-Reader

Professor #1: Some fucking student requested we read the book in the class.
Professor #2: That's mad twisted, yo.

--Barnes & Noble, Court and Schermerhorn, Brooklyn

Overheard by: Ladle
via Overheard in New York, Apr 20, 2008

Training 13-14-15.

13
Training
Rutten MMA/Thai Boxing/2min rounds
Shoulder press/pressouts - 40x10/10, 50x8/8, 60x5/5
Single arm row - 35x15, 45x10, 52.5x6
DB snatch - 52.5x3
Lateral raise/side/front/rear - 20x10
Shoulder bungee dislocations - 20x

Food
Tuna fish sandwich w/mayo&blk olives
6slices meat combo pizza
1.75L Water
750ml diet soda
500ml coffee w/milk and Equal

Bed @ 2330+20m meditation CD

14
Training
None - Sunday

Food
250ml coffee w/milk and equal
2slices meat combo pizza
Ebi/fish tempura and 1/2 bowl rice
250ml green tea
360ml diet soda
Sausage and chs
Chips and salsa/guacamole
2pork tacos w/pineapple
2doughnuts and a glass of milk

Bed @ 0015

15
Training
DB snatch - 30x10, 35x10, 40x8, 45x8, 50x6
Pressup - 10-7-5-5-6
Lunges - 3x20
Calf rs - 35/30/30
Rows - 52.5x10/10/10
Neck nods - 50x each direction
Shoulder bungee/dislocations - 20x

Food
250ml coffee w/equal and cream
Shake - 3 eggs/sf cocoa/cream
1.35L diet soda
1.25L water
4 salami sticks, 4 snack cheeses
2 slices cheese/mayo
2 steaks/mayo

Bed @ 2330+20m meditation cd

I don't even play games, but c'mon... Mortal Kombat vs DC Universe? Even I can get on board with that one.

[JM, are you paying attention?]

NC continues slow descent into nanny-state retardation.

But it's for the children, of course.

Reason Magazine - Daily Brickbats > Afterschool Shooting:

"For 30 years, North Carolina's Wildlife Resources Commission has been holding marksmanship contests for high school students. Tradition apparently means little to East Wake High School principal Sebastian Shipp and area superintendent Danny Barnes. Less than a day before the school's marksmanship club was scheduled to compete in a regional contest, the officials barred the team from competing, negating months of practice by the students. The two cited school policy banning weapons at school and on school trips. 'If we had more time, we could have done something about it,' said team member Robert Lumley, which may explain why the officials stopped the team at the last minute."

Commentary on last week's debate, and how ABC cocked it all up.

Late to the party, but the best criticism is satire anyways.

Obsidian Wings: The Lincoln-Douglas Debates of 1858 (Slight Return):

"Presidential candidates Abraham Lincoln and Stephen Douglas held this debate on April 16, 1858 at the National Constitution Center in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania.

MODERATORS:
CHARLIE GIBSON, ABC NEWS
GEORGE STEPHANOPOULOS, ABC NEWS

MR. GIBSON: So we're going to begin with opening statements, and we had a flip of the coin, and the brief opening statement first from Mr. Lincoln.

LINCOLN: Thank you very much, Charlie and George, and thanks to all in the audience and who are out there. I appear before you today for the purpose of discussing the leading political topics which now agitate the public mind.

We are now far into the fifth year since a policy was initiated with the avowed object, and confident promise, of putting an end to slavery agitation. Under the operation of that policy, that agitation has not only not ceased, but has constantly augmented.

STEPHANOPOULOS: I’m sorry to interrupt, but do you think Mr. Douglas loves America as much you do?

LINCOLN: Sure I do.

STEPHANOPOULOS: But who loves America more?

LINCOLN: I’d prefer to get on with my opening statement George.

STEPHANOPOULOS: If your love for America were eight apples, how many apples would Senator Douglas’s love be?

LINCOLN: Eight.

STEPHANOPOULOS: Proceed.

...GIBSON: We get questions about this all the time over at Powerline and on Hannity’s talk show. Mr. Douglas has said this is a major vulnerability for you in the fall. So I’ll ask again – do you love America?

LINCOLN: (scowling with a forced smile). Yes.

GIBSON: If your love for America were ice cream, what flavor would it be?..."

Crooks and Liars » Important Questions George Stephanopoulos Must Ask John McCain This Sunday:

"...in the spirit of seeing how all the candidates deal with “scandal,” or just being queried about everyone they have associated with since that 6th grade teacher who crossed the street against a red light (do you denounce her Senator Obama? Denounce and reject her!?! Or perhaps just reject?), here are some questions that John McCain should be asked...

1. Do you agree with Pastor John Hagee that war with Iran is the fulfillment of biblical prophecy?

3. Doesn’t your confusion regarding basic facts about the war in Iraq, including repeatedly citing a nonexistent Al Qaeda-Iran alliance, make you unfit for command?
On four occasions in one month, you confused friend and foe in Iraq by describing Sunni Al Qaeda as being backed by Shiite Iran...

4. Given your past adultery, should Americans consider you a moral exemplar of family values?..

5. Doesn’t your flip-flop on Jerry Falwell being an “agent of intolerance” show your opportunistic pandering to the religious right?...

6. Given your wealth and privileged upbringing, aren’t you - and not Barack Obama - the elitist? You have called Barack Obama an elitist. Yet you recently returned to your exclusive private high school, one which now costs over $38,000 a year to attend. Your wife is the heiress to a beer distribution company, reputedly owns 8 homes and has a net worth well over $100 million... Shouldn’t the American people in fact view you as the elitist, and a hypocritical one at that?...

8. Didn’t President Bush betray you with his signing statement on the Detainee Treatment Act? You claim to be against torture, but aren’t you a hypocrite for voting “no” on the Senate waterboaring ban?..."

The random genius statements of Grant Morrison.

Crazy brilliance.

Comic Book Resources > CBR News: NYCC: Grant Morrison Spotlight:

"...Follow up question asked about drugs in his Katmandu experience, which Morrison has described as a divine experience. He was on hash, but has not been able to replicate the experience, leading him to believe it was not drug-related.

..."Pop Magic" is coming "very slowly. But my guardian angels are watching over me for this, saying if you don't finish this soon we'll kill you."

...He described his take as a deconstruction of Batman. "I kinda wanted to humanize the guy, because he'd been a dick for a while. Which is fine, because if you're Batman you'd probably be a dick."

...A fan said: Superman's my god. "Don't you feel good?" Morrison said. "Superman loves you! And he's a lot more proactive than God."

..."Christian Bale Batman is the best Batman ever," Morrison said, mentioning that he's loved most on screen interpretations. Batman and Robin? "The colors are brilliant! .. If you just switch off your brain and think, I'm watching the gay Batman..."

...Seaguy is "like if you put on a wetsuit and said I'm a superhero."

...He also said that "Superman escapes from the confines of the DC Universe into something else." Morrison is interested in the idea of dimensions, with comics occupying 2D space.

"Superman was born before us," Morrison said, and will outlast us all. "in a way he's more real than any of us, and he occupies 2d space within a 3d world." And what if there's something above us?"

Pulp Fiction, Shakespeare style.

That's funny. More at the link.

metaquotes: Pulp Fiction, as performed by the King's Men:

"ACT I SCENE 2. A road, morning. Enter a carriage, with JULES and VINCENT, murderers.

J: And know'st thou what the French name cottage pie?
V: Say they not cottage pie, in their own tongue?
J: But nay, their tongues, for speech and taste alike
Are strange to ours, with their own history:
Gaul knoweth not a cottage from a house.
V: What say they then, pray?
J: Hachis Parmentier.
V: Hachis Parmentier! What name they cream?
J: Cream is but cream, only they say le crème.
V: What do they name black pudding?
J: I know not;
I visited no inn it could be bought."

Can you be a man?

Most. Whipped. Ever.

God, You're the Wimpiest Kidnapper Ever!

Five-year-old boy: I want a spoon of peanut butter for breakfast!
Dad: Are you allowed to eat that for breakfast? I'm not sure, let's call your mom.
Five-year-old boy: You're an adult, you can make those decisions.

--Bleecker St

Overheard by: Cecilia
via Overheard in New York, Apr 18, 2008

Your political question of the day.

Crooks and Liars » Question(s) for the day:

"Do you think if Barack Obama had left his seriously ill wife after having had multiple affairs, had been a member of the “Keating Five,” had had a relationship with a much younger lobbyist that his staff felt the need to try and block, had intervened on behalf of the client of said young lobbyist with a federal agency, had denounced then embraced Jerry Falwell, had denounced then embraced the Bush tax cuts, had confused Shiite with Sunni, had confused Al Qaeda in Iraq with the Mahdi Army, had actively sought the endorsement and appeared on stage with a man who denounced the Catholic Church as a whore, and stated that he knew next to nothing about economics — do you think it’s possible that Obama would have been treated differently by the media than John McCain has been? Possible?"

Training 12.

Yesterday - sleep @ 2310 + 20m guided relaxation mp3

Pt
DB one arm hang snatch [both arms] - 20x10, 40x5, 45x5, 50x5/5/5
DB front squat - 40x10, 70x5, 80x5, 90x5x5x5
DB Bench - 40x10, 80x5/5/5/5/5
Seated dips - 3xfailure - 17/10/9
DB shrugs - 105x3x15

Food
6 eggs w/cheese
1 pork chop
3 pieces of steak
2L water
1L coffee w/equal, cream
100ml diet soda

Bed @ 0030 + 20m guided relaxation mp3

Days I wish I had my camera...

Today was the bukatsudo presentation, when all the kids in the various sports and other clubs at school give presentations to the new 1st graders to show them what they're all about. Judo, kendo, b-ball, table tennis, art, etc, etc. All giving little shows and putting their best, choreographed and speechifying feet forward. Brilliantly adorable. I need to just start keeping my camera with me all the time. I now get the appeal of cell phone cameras.

I just get a cell phone camera without the, you know, cell phone part.

So people couldn't bother me all the time.

You know, it's hard work being this anti-social.

"...the key is to be open to new ideas."

Always.

[And that would make four links there today. That site can be addictive.]

What Do You Want to Be When You Grow Up? ∞ Get Rich Slowly:

"“I think the key is to find something you love and to do it,” I said.

“But how can you know what you would love to do?” he asked. “How can you find that?”

“That’s a good question,” I said. “I don’t have a good answer. If you had told me a year ago that my vocation was to write a personal finance web site, I would have laughed. The idea would have seemed absurd. I think the key is to be open to new ideas. To be in a state of readiness. You want to be receptive to even the oddest thing that might come your way.”

Wayne nodded.

“You want to be able to recognize an opportunity when it appears,” I said.

“Yeah,” said Wayne. Just then, Kris called us inside to dinner.

Wayne and I never did finish our conversation. In a way, it feels like the continuation of a discussion I had last week with my friend AJ. She, too, is in her mid-thirties, and at a place in her life where she’s not sure which direction to go.

“I just don’t know what I want to be when I grow up,” she told me.

Few people do."

"...the truth is that the things that are priorities in our lives are the things we actually do."

"...It’s one thing to say something is a priority, but it’s another thing to do it."

Via: Get Rich Slowly

From a trifecta of great articles I read there today.

Do not feed the trolls. [Internet and Elsewhere.]

Facing and Fighting Financial Trolls ∞ Get Rich Slowly:

"...Other examples of behavior you might see in external trolls include:

* You might have a goal, and have a plan to pursue it despite the risk involved. The troll in your life focuses on the obstacles, on the reasons you can’t achieve it: “You don’t know what you’re doing”, “Think of all the things that might go wrong”, etc.
* Perhaps you admire other successful people. Trolls often resent success: “Warren Buffett go rich on the back of others”, “Bill Gates is a crook”, “Rich people don’t work for their money”
* Some trolls complain all the time. They complain about their jobs, they complain about their lives, they complain that they don’t have money. They complain, but they rarely take action. Complainers are poisonous..."

Improv to Yes.

Great article. Much more at the link.

The Power of Yes: A Simple Way to Get More Out of Life ∞ Get Rich Slowly:

"...I made excuses not to do things because I was afraid of what might happen if I accepted.

I made a resolution. I decided that instead of saying “no” to things because I was afraid of them, I would “just say yes”. That became my working motto: “Just say yes”. Any time anyone asked me to do something, I agreed to do it (as long as it wasn’t illegal and didn’t violate my own personal code of conduct). In the past six months, I’ve put this philosophy into practice in scores of little ways. But the power of “yes” has made larger changes to my life, too, has exposed me to things I never would have done before.

* Soon after I started saying “yes”, a GRS reader offered to provide free wellness coaching. My gut reaction was to say “no”. But I caught my negative thinking. “Just say yes,” I said to myself. So I did. Working with Lauren, my wellness coach, has been an amazingly positive experience.
* One of my friends works as a career counselor at a nearby university. Recently he asked me to present a talk to graduating seniors about the basics of personal finance. Normally I would refuse out of hand, but only because I am afraid. I said yes. Though the presentation fell through, the copious notes I made will serve as the basis for many future articles.

...

* A close friend asked me to go see a band I’d never even heard of. On a Thursday. At midnight. This was totally outside my comfort zone, but I said yes. The experience was fantastic. We had a great conversation, and then I got to discover The Black Angels and their wall of sound.
* I don’t know anything about table tennis, but when my former soccer coach stopped by to recruit me for a local club, I agreed to join. It’s been fun learning the sport, and getting re-acquainted with his family. (I was once good friends with his son.)

These things will seem minor to the extroverts here. But for me, these were big steps. These experiences were new, and I wouldn’t have had them if I hadn’t forced myself to just say yes."

Training, Day 11.

Yesterday - bed @ 2250, 20m guided relaxation

PT
Bas Rutten MMA Workout/Thai Boxing/2m Rounds/30m

Food
4 eggs w/chs & mayo
Shake - 3 eggs/coffee/cream/sugar free cocoa
2 porkchops
6oz tuna/avocado/tomato/mayo/wasabi
2.5L water
1L diet soda
250ml coffee w/Equal & cream