A Man Walks Into A Brewpub

So yesterday, Kathy, Emelia and I stopped in at a brewpub in upstate New York for lunch on our way back to DC from Vermont. We get there at noon, right as the place opens. The greeter is in fact the co-owner, and after he assures us that we haven't arrived too early to be seated, he asks if we know what was special about the day.

I immediately answer, "It's Talk Like a Pirate Day!"
"Uh, it is? Well, that's not what I was thinking."
"Oh right -- it's Rosh Hashanah."
"Is that so? Well, it's also the start of Oktoberfest in Munich!"
"It is?"
"It sure is, and we're about to tap our Alt in honor of Oktoberfest."

Even though we weren't on the same page as far what made Saturday special, I did try the beer they had made in honor of Oktoberfest, and thought it was pretty decent.

Contraindications

From the side of Kathy's pre-natal vitamins:

CONTRAINDICATIONS: This product is contraindicated in patients with a known hypersensitivity to any of the ingredients.

On the one hand, it states something so obvious that no thinking person needs to read it. On the other, some people who believe that the Democrats are proposing to implement death panels are or are going to be pregnant.

What's the Deal with Dallas?

I'm trying to find a rental car for when we visit my brother and his family in January. Check out the screwy rates that I'm finding (click on the image to enlarge):




















With these rates, I can see why everything's bigger in Texas.

At Least Someone Thinks I'm Funny

A couple of weeks ago, firedoglake had a contest to come up with an appropriate title for George Bush's autobiography. I tossed out several suggestions (comments # 89, 244, & 269), and got a good laugh at many of the other entries.

This evening I was going through my Google Reader backlog from the holidays, and came across the announcement of winners -- I was surprised and delighted to see that I won. I guess anything's possible, but I'm betting that W won't be using the winning entry, "You Can Fool Enough of the People Some of the Time."

In the Presence of Genius

It's not every day that one finds one's self in the presence of genius, but I was on Friday, at my daughter's birthday celebration (I find it hard to call it a party when the attendees are five adults and two children, including the honoree). You see, when our friend Anna was served her cupcake, she ripped off the bottom half of the cupcake and put it on top of the frosting, in essence creating a frosting sandwich. She said the idea just came to her right then. To be witness to that spark of genius was an experience that only slightly surpassed the bliss of eating a cupcake in that fashion. Indeed, I plan never to eat a cupcake any other way ever again.

And how did I repay her brilliance? By having this exchange with her on Monday morning while I was walking the dogs and she was starting her walk to work, when she was only half awake.

"I realize that I should have carved my Halloween pumpkin into an ox."
"Why, is it something to do with a beer?"
"No, it's because that way my gourd can be an ox."

I fear that genius will never set foot in my house again.

Neology

I forwarded this nonsensical response by Governor Palin earlier this week.



Note that she gave awful responses to other questions posed by Couric, but while those answers generally demonstrated facile understanding of various issues (indeed, apparently Henry Kissinger is beyond naive on how to engage Iran), the clip I've provided is truly babble, a cacophony of spoon-fed Republican domestic talking points all thrown together in a mishmash.

Later, it dawned on me that her response made about as much sense as it would have if she had given it completely backwards. And it was then that I realized that we needed a new word for such a presentation -- Palindrone.

I Don't Believe in God

...but if I did, I'd have to feel comforted by the fact that after fundamentalist Christians had prayed for "rain of biblical proportions" to spoil Barack Obama's acceptance speech at the DNC, Hurricane Gustav has wreaked havoc on the RNC.*

* - By no means do I wish to suggest that I'm happy about Hurricane Gustav or the damage it's caused, but that doesn't mean I don't appreciate irony.

From the League of You Can't Make This Stuff Up

Apologies for another political post so soon after the last one, but after that downer, I needed a laugh:

Just this week, a group of Republican senators re-introduced the Federal Marriage Amendment to the Constitution, which, as we know, would ban gay marriage.

And once again, the language is pretty straightforward:

Section 1. This article may be cited as the `Marriage Protection Amendment’.

Section 2. Marriage in the United States shall consist only of the union of a man and a woman. Neither this Constitution, nor the constitution of any State, shall be construed to require that marriage or the legal incidents thereof be conferred upon any union other than the union of a man and a woman.’.

This isn’t especially surprising. Republicans are looking at the political landscape, and they’re feeling awfully discouraged. The polls look bad, the base looks depressed, and fundraising looks iffy. Rallying the far-right troops with an anti-gay amendment to the Constitution — even though it has no chance at even getting so much as a hearing — might be helpful to the conservative movement.

But the funny part is looking over the list of the 10 original sponsors. Most of the names are predictable — Brownback and Inhofe, for example — but there are two others whose names stand out: Sens. David Vitter (R-La.) and Larry Craig (R-Idaho).

Yes, two of the principal sponsors of a constitutional amendment to “protect” marriage include one far-right Republican who hired prostitutes and another far-right Republican who was arrested for soliciting gay sex an airport men’s room.

As my friend Kyle put it, these two are “not exactly the poster boys of the family values crowd or particularly upstanding examples of the supposed sanctity of the ‘union of a man and a woman.”‘

Source.

'Tis the Season 2

I know a beer snob like me shouldn't take pleasure at seeing a bunch of Grolsch bottles, but sometimes it's all in the presentation.



My friend Pete sent this to me, joking that it was something for the beer party. Maybe in past years, but all I could think of in the here and now was, "Oh yeah -- I could see Little Miss Destructo Girl having a reaaaaallly good time with that. Sure she'd just 'look' at it."

The Onion

About the time I returned from paternity leave, The Onion started a DC edition, and it's definitely helped with the transition back to work. Since then, I've been looking forward to each Thursday morning, as that's when I can pick up the latest edition. Without fail, I always find something during those 12 minutes before I reach the office that gets me in the right frame of mind for the day, be it politics, news, sports, or pop culture.

Not only that, now The Onion offers video features as well (not available in the print edition). Here's one from this week that seems particularly relevant to my life.

But, But -- Republicans were in Control When It Passed

After reading this letter to the editor, I have to conclude that newspapers don't have any responsibility to protect people from themselves.

Update 4/25/07

The Urban Dog Owner's New Pithy Maxim

Find a poop, pick it up, and all day long you'll have good luck.

After all, why should you have good luck for finding something that enriches you (however slightly)? It would make much more sense to think that the good deed of picking up the poop of someone else's dog would be good for your karma, resulting in your getting good luck. Besides, you've obtained immediate good luck by eliminating the possibility of stepping in it.

You Can't Make This Stuff Up

Concerning One of Those Unstoppable Forces

Sometimes protest helps create awareness of an issue, so that, even if the protest fails once, it has an effect on future acts. That being said, I'm skeptical this group will have even such limited success.

Happy New Year!

As Obvious as the Nose on Your Face

Today's Washington Post has an article on the growing concern over internet addiction. The article includes the observation that "scores of online discussion boards have popped up on which people discuss negative experiences tied to too much time on the Web."

What's next, a meeting of Overeaters Anonymous at Dunkin Donuts?

Quote me

A man who can lie to himself is no man. But he may be a politician.

Please note that in keeping with my general approach, I tried to make this gender neutral. Despite my best efforts, and consultation with someone else, I saw no clean way to do so. My apologies.

Question of the Morning

Given that one's nose keeps growing throughout life, how come none of the many sci-fi books I've read that have dealt with immortality ever brought up the elephantine noses of the extremely aged?

Vision of the Future?

April Fooling

For April Fools Day, I had fun writing up a fake press release (which I linked to on RateBeer), announcing that Anheuser-Busch bought AleSmith and Southampton, two of the best breweries in the world (#1 & #12 according to this list). My friend CapFlu made the awesome fake logo for AleSmith. Beergeeks are so paranoid about such things, which made for ripe pickings. Of course, despite getting "confirmation" from a brewer of the sale (top post), any lingering doubts soon gave way. If any of you appreciated that, you might also want to check out what that same brewer did yesterday to celebrate the holiday.

More Photoshop Beard Madness

Looks like CapFlu started a movement over at RateBeer -- here's a collage of what other folks did to my userpicture: