Moving on...

I’m sure that everyone will be pleased to hear that we successfully resolved this SI-writers pissing contest, as Dick acknowledged that he was wrong, realizing in the process that trying to beat me in meaningless competitions is a futile endeavor. In his defense, he is capable of addition, he was just working from the wrong set of numbers, which included unpublished drafts in the total. I hadn’t realized that any of those were floating around, but two were. One was a sentence that I had written and then probably lost interest in, the introduction to what seems like a post about crazy stuff I want scientists to invent. The more promising draft, also just a sentence, was by Winston, and had the title Ninja Pirates or Pirate Ninjas. I’m intrigued.

But since the title of this post is moving on, that’s what I’ll do. Biggest story, in my eyes at least, is the collision of two satellites over Siberia, one owned by Russia, the other by the United States. If this had happened during the Cold War we would all probably be dead right now; fortunately, it’s actually making people call out for some sort of Solar System Traffic Control situation. So many satellites have been thrown into orbit since Sputnik, and very few have been brought down, creating an unintentional minefield of space flotsam. The United States hasn’t been helping this situation, as in the past year we decided, “Hey, let’s shoot missiles at some of this crap.” While a pretty cool idea, it just made a lot more crap. So while I guess it sucks that satellites are crashing, it does highlight what could be a pretty big need in the coming decades. We really need to get some laws for space, before everybody gets up there and it’s just like anarchy.

My next final, on Monday afternoon, is Civil Procedure. It’s open notes though, unlike torts and property, which is a huge relief. More than any other class, this is one where you can just look at the rules and figure out what’s going on. And this quarter we covered substantially less than last quarter; basically all I have to worry about are pleadings, joinders, and preclusion. Hopefully this works out, as clearly I’m confident enough to type this while studying. I’m pretty sure I’ve devised a good system: two pages of an outline, one paragraph here.

A friend of mine was telling me earlier about Birthright, some system or whatever that lets you go to Israel for ten days for free if you’re between the ages of 18 and 26. The only catch is you have to be Jewish. Honestly, I think that the rest of Europe needs to get in on this. Pretty much all the important European countries (I’m not considering places like Moldova or Slovenia) have negative birthrates and declining populations. Sure, immigration from places like North Africa and Eastern Europe is keeping things afloat (that might be the one thing that I learned from that terrible Italian cinema class I took in Roma, from the movie Quando sei nato non puoi piu nasconderti), but if they want to get really serious about bringing up populations they should be taking people back from America. Giving away free ten day trips to suggestible kids would probably be beneficial. Also, at least in Italy, they may want to consider shutting down some churches. There are probably more churches in an Italian city than Starbucks in most American metropolises. Basically we need the mafia to step up, and start funding programs that would let me go to Italy for free. Joey Merlino needs to get on this after, you know, he gets out of jail.

What’s going on with satellite radio? Like, a couple years ago everyone was all about it, and it was supposed to be the future. Howard Stern switched over, cars were being equipped with it, Sirius and XM were feuding, it seemed like it would be around for a while. And now I’ve just read that Sirius XM, is about to file for bankruptcy, and have almost $200 million in debts. What the hell, how did this happen? I understand that giving Howard Stern half a billion dollars probably wasn’t the best business decision, but there isn’t any competition now, shouldn’t they be raking in money? Sucks for them. I wish I had something more insightful to add here. Meh.

Every year or so it seems like a minor league sports team comes up with an absolutely inspired promotion. The St. Paul Saints have been at the forefront of this movement, giving away toy boats in recognition of the Vikings’ Lake Minnetonka shitshow, and last year by creating a Senator Larry Craig Bobble-Foot doll. But now they’re being challenged by the Milwaukee Admirals, an AHL team. On February 19th, the Admirals are hosting “Don’t be Like Mike Night,” in response to this pot nonsense Michael Phelps has gotten himself into. DARE graduations can get into the game for free, as can anyone named Michael, Phelps, Mary Jane, Cheech, Chong, or Weed. One lucky fan will receive a weedwacker signed by the team, and everyone can bring incriminating photos of themselves to be shredded. But the real prize is, of course, the most difficult to win. If the Admirals score with 4:20 left in any period, someone will receive season tickets for next year. I can appreciate this promotion, because there’s a lot of humor in it. I’m still sick of sanctimonious reporters pontification about the evils of marijuana. Let’s be honest, most of these people were probably journalism majors, in college in the ‘60s and ‘70s; there’s no way that they didn’t smoke pot. Most of them have probably smoked more than Phelps. Hell, at least the last three Presidents have smoked pot, and they’ve gotten less shit than Phelps. I a little bit wish that Phelps would call a huge press conference, show up stoned off his ass, and say that he smoked before every race in Beijing. He listened to Lil’ Wayne before every race, so this isn’t outside the realm of possibilities. Just think, how many heads would explode? I’m pretty sure that would make the world a better place.

You might infer from my defense of Michael Phelps that I’m not a big fan of outrage and indignation. If that is the case, you would be wrong. I can’t stand when outrage is directed at the wrong person, like Phelps or A-Rod, but some decisions are absolutely despicable, and the people who made them need to be called out. It seems like most of those people, assholes who make terrible decisions and fuck good things up, are members of the Maryland Jockey Club. In quite possibly the worst policy decision since the French decided to pour all their resources into the Maginot Line, the Jockey Club is banning outside beverages from the infield at Preakness. In years past, the Pimlico infield would be a magical place filled with booze and bad decisions, and now these horse-racing assholes want to stop that. I don’t understand why. In all seriousness, Preakness probably hasn’t actually been about horse racing for years. I went a few years ago, the year that Barbaro ran, and didn’t know he had broken his leg until watching Sportscenter later that night. In all seriousness, you have to make a legitimate effort to see a horse if you have infield tickets. And that’s awesome. The rationale behind banning fun at Preakness is that they want to improve the overall experience. So they’re replacing bring your own beer with a ZZ Top concert (meh) and a Women’s Volleyball Tournament (again, meh). Clearly though, the real reason for this is so that they can charge $3.50 a beer, make a shitload of money, and bastardize a great American tradition. I am willing to state, unequivocally, that the Maryland Jockey Club hates America.

In the last 24 hours, I’ve watched Stephen Lynch’s second Comedy Central Special twice. If it were on again right now, I would watch it a third time. In all seriousness, Lynch is probably the best stand-up comedian going right now. But also, he’s probably one of my favorite musicians too. That’s not exactly a ringing endorsement for the music industry, but he’s really good. Not since Bob Dylan has an artist been as tapped into the social conscience of America as Lynch is, with songs about the Special Olympics, divorce, religion, and euthanasia.

Yesterday Loyola was an option on ESPN’s Streak for the Cash, hosting Iona. This was clearly a game they should have won, but, well, it’s Loyola, so the Streakmaster deemed it to be even enough. Jon texted me pretty early yesterday, wondering if he dare risk his streak of 4 on the Hounds. I had no such reservations; Loyola was getting even a little bit of national exposure, so I was going to take advantage of it. I checked the Loyola box. And they lost. I really haven’t had any faith in Loyola basketball since Andre Collins left for Italy. Well, hopefully my streak will rebound tomorrow with as AS Roma win over Atalanta. Oh, and speaking of Loyola Fucking Basketball, they come to Philly to play Drexel two days after finals end for me, on February 21. And I can’t go. Oh well.

The NBA All-Star game is this weekend. The NBA sucks, but its All-Star game is better than the NHL’s, the Pro-Bowl, and the MLB All-Star game when it’s ending in a tie. Seriously, where does Bud Selig get the moral standing to say that Alex Rodriguez shamed baseball? I mean, Selig has done so much deplorable shit that listing it all is difficult. Off the top of my head, I’d just throw out his involvement in collusion in the late ‘80s, which is killing Tim Raines’ HOF chances right now, his usurpation of the commissionership, and how he’s been throwing all sorts of benefits towards the Brewers since, expanded to the point that he had to threaten the Twins with contraction, the all-star game tie, the mess he made out of game 5 of the 2008 World Series, the one that the Phillies won, making them the World Fucking Champions, and of course he’s just as guilty as any player who took steroids. By turning a blind eye towards steroids since the Bash Brothers (the fake ones, Canseco and McGwire, let’s leave Fulton and Dean Portman out of this) were tearing shit up in Oakland all the way through Barry Bonds’ annihilation phase, Selig was ok with everyone shitting all over the last 130 years of baseball, and if not for grandstanding congressmen it would still be rampant. Fuck Bud Selig. And now he’s gonna be making moves for a salary cap, because dumbasses like Houston’s owner got pissy when the Yankees signed some free agents (obviously that Carlos Lee monster contract doesn’t count), when he makes more per year than all but like 7 players. Seriously, this past year that motherfucker made 18 million dollars. I would ruin baseball for half that amount.

One of the biggest things that I miss from college is the opportunity to have conversations with Jeff where we don’t use any real words, and when we do they have entirely random meanings. Like, I feel that I could communicate pretty much any thought through some combination of blame, tame, flow, shooter, jumpshot, pistratica, berkey, meh, allora, and berkey. You won’t be able to convince me otherwise. In closing, I now have a 30-page outline for Monday. I really need exams to be over so fun can exist again.

Lunch break thoughts

I don’t know what’s wrong with the internet, but it’s a lot less interesting today than it is on most days. Drudge is on some crusade against STD prevention, probably because he has herpes (I think this qualifies as breaking a news story. Suck it, Matt), the Democrats are passing around a petition trying to get Rush Limbaugh to admit to being an asshole, or something like that, the Flyers lost last night and I don’t want to hear about the Superbowl, so sports are out, and no one has published anything about dinosaurs. And of course this happens on the day where I have like an hour and a half between classes, and no assignment to read.

Right now insanity is swirling around me; I’m surrounded by some of the weirdest conversations imaginable: the composition of fruit roll ups, jumping out of moving cars (evidently today is a bad day to be driving without a license), the timelessness of the Macarena, which Word automatically capitalizes, and the merits of being an idiot savant.

There’s a ton of snow and ice and slush on the ground, public and parochial schools in the city are closed, and I’m sitting in a classroom. Even schools in fucking St. Louis are closed. (Fuck you, Dick) I’m really struggling to understand why I have to be here today. Hell, we have a guest speaker coming in anyway, and he’s going to be talking about arbitration. Unless he brings up Ryan Howard in the first couple sentences, my attention span will be tested.

Henrik Zetterberg signed a 12 year, 72 million dollar contract extension today. He could have gotten a hell of a lot more money if he had waited until the summer, but he’s pretty much guaranteed a handful of Stanley Cups before he retires. But he’s already got a bunch, so it’s doubtful they’re worth the $25 million dollars he probably left on the table. That’s like 125 flights on Virgin Galactic, he’s missing out.

So you know what makes law school suck? I’ll start a day thinking that if I can get al my reading done early I’ll have time to work on outlines for finals. This is terrible. No one should ever be excited by the prospect of finishing work early to do more work. I feel like law school sucks the humanity out of people. But yeah, I’ll be working on an outline for torts tonight. Fuck.

Sportscenter really sucks. I mean, it was groundbreaking and all that years ago, but now they’re all about stories and shit like that. Brett Favre, TO, Radomski, Torre, all that crap, and I don’t care. Why can’t they show more highlights. They’ll show basketball, and like ten minutes of hockey, and if there’s a major they’ll throw in tennis or golf. But what about other cool stuff? Maybe show more soccer; Beckham scored for Milan, maybe they could show some Serie A. What about like Rugby, or lacrosse, or ping-pong? Chinese people are crazy at ping-pong, and I would like to see more of that. They could even get really weird, like have some Jai Alai footage. What about Eddie Feigner? Yeah, he’s dead now, but he could throw a softball triple digits, underhand. In his prime he struck out Willie Mays, Roberto Clemente, Willie McCovey, Harmon Killebrew, all of whom are hall of famers. Hell, he threw 238 perfect games. That’s insane. And I doubt he was ever mentioned on ESPN. But TO is getting a reality show. Fuck him.

Ahmadinejad is saying that the US must apologize to Iran. I know that Hillary Clinton won’t do it, but I’m pretty sure she would lock up presidential successor if she goes to a joint news conference with Ahmadinejad and says, “The United States would like to sincerely apologize to Iran… for you all being a bunch of dickheads.” Then we let Israel bomb the hell out of them, enabling the US to win the game of Middle Eastern tic-tac-toe that we’ve evidently been playing for the past eight years.

I’m pretty sure that the other day was the first time that I wrote “President Obama.” That’s cool and all, but I think I may be more excited for Bush’s post-Presidency years. I really hope that he can just be a cool guy. Now that he’s out of office, I want Bush to be the guy that headbutted David Tyree, dodged shoes, and threw a strike while wearing a bulletproof vest. I want him to say outrageous things, and just not care about it. Most of all, in light of Fred Wilpon losing a ton of money to Bernie Madoff, I really want Bush to buy the Mets. Not only would he be in a public spotlight, but he would probably deport Santana and Reyes, and Wright would somehow end up in Iraq. Someone needs to make this happen.

Class starts in eight minutes, and it’s looking like a lot of people are going to be skipping. I think there’s a pretty good chance that the guest speaker doesn’t show up, and because no one has done the reading for Friday the real teacher just lets us go. Actually, I know that there’s no way that happens, but it would be cool if it did. Probably going to have to roll out the pistratica to get through this class.

I really wish that someone would invent like an eye implant that lets you transmit what you’re seeing to someone else instantaneously. Like, I understand that there are camera phones and crap, but some of the really absurd things that I’ve seen would need to be passed along less obtrusively that they allow. I just think it would be cool, and practical.

Ugh, the speaker is here, I might as well post this and get ready for what is sure to be a riveting hour and a half.

Blagging

My colleagues here at Suffering Idiots have recently brought to my attention the fact that I have been lagging in my blogging as of late... blagging if you will. This got me to wondering: what exactly would I have to do to be fired from a job where I don't clock in, don't get paid, and don't even have to bathe regularly? Allow me to hypothesize.

1. I could use this forum as a platform to launch my own personal agenda counter to the agenda of Suffering Idiots.

Now, since just about anything goes here (as our two and a half regular readers must know), it would have to be something beyond 'Jesus is the bee's knees.' Beyond 'Country music is vastly superior to all other forms of music for these one hundred and fifty-two surprisingly specific reasons.' Beyond even 'Jews are controlling the media by trading foreskin snippets to their alien overlords in exchange for access to secret government satellites that Beyonce built with the prototype of that robotic hand she had built for 'Single Ladies.''

2. I could personally insult each and every contributing member of Suffering Idiots.

Sure, I could tell everyone that Gimpy beats off to 'Walker: Texas Ranger' fan fiction. I could mention in one of my posts that Dick Gerber is some strange combination of chocoholic and megalomaniac who is compelled to eat his own likeness constructed from Cadbury Eggs every night and then purge on the garden beds of those who have slighted him, but I value this little corner of the internet too damn much. And, quite frankly, it would just be below me to claim that Quip and Bernard have an off and on relationship of a Biblical, Websterian, Necronomical, Encyclopedic, and Craigslistonian nature.

3. I could neglect my duties to Suffering Idiots to the extent that it has become detrimental to the blog.

This is a tricky one because I can't simply not post. I have to not post to the point where my name on the side of the web page becomes simultaneously confusing and enraging to our readers. "How dare that Winston Driftwood keep his name on the masthead without posting anything since the week of Suffering Idiots' inception? I've been a loyal reader of this fine site for the past 32 years, damnit!" (Self-fulfilling prophecy anyone? hmm?) I would have to become a vacuum of creative non-existence, funneling attention away from my more diligent co-contributors through inaction. I think I just might be up to this non-task if I didn't put my mind to it and double-negatived my way out of this heading with no discernible segue or ending...

Believe it or not, this is my apology post. Not to my fellow Idiots (they're a bunch of Jew-alien kotowing chronic masturbators) but to you, the reader, who has no doubt been pining for my literary presence. I resolve to be a better Idiot in 2009.