Tacky.

I am slightly miffed at The Drudge Report. Yesterday, Matt Drudge broke the voluntary media silence about Prince Harry's deployment to Afghanistan and published a report on the Prince's deployment. Once the word was out, the story became big news, leading the British military to pull the Prince out of Afghanistan for obvious safety reasons.

Seriously. Tacky.

No one was adversely affected by being oblivious to the fact that Harry was in Afghanistan (except maybe the terrorists). The media, with the obvious exception of The Drudge Report, were actually acting fairly admirably in keeping the story to themselves.

I am not the only one who thinks Drudge made a serious faux pas.

According to the Telegraph, Wikipedia users expressed their displeasure by changing the wikipedia entry for the Drudge report to read "irresponsible and ill-advised 'news' website that has seen fit to put the lives of many soldiers at risk by publishing reports of Prince Harry's deployment in Afghanistan".

Shame on you Drudge Report. Tacky.

Hello Again...

Excuses: My life got a little out of control during the last two weeks. Some aspects of my normal routine, including the Blog and sleep, were exiled to the back burner... my apologies to those of you who, as a result, became depressed and found it hard to get up in the morning.

Along those lines, today's post will be a tribute to another young woman whose life has gotten out of control of late... Pop Princess Ms. B. Spears.

I have a confession to make. I own every one of Brit Brit's albums. Sickeningly poppy pop music is my ultimate guilty pleasure. You may make fun of me... I am used to it. The Boy says that I have no musical taste. I don't really know what that means... clearly I have taste (I like certain things and not others) but my taste simply does not mesh with the Boy's taste. I think this might qualify him as a music snob. Who died and made him the definer of good music taste?

I try not to let my affinity for Britney's music pour over into a strange obsession with her personal problems, but even if one avoids the E! News Channel, it is hard to miss the drama! For instance, I went to D.C. last weekend and after successfully navigating the Metro (all by myself), I attempted to cross the street to get to the Starbucks (another guilty pleasure!). Half way across the street, I noticed a news ticker running across the side of the building in front of me. It said something along the lines of, "Insane Pop Star regains limited visitation with Baby Federlines." This struck my attention to such a degree that I stopped dead in the middle of the crosswalk to read it. I realized that this wasn't really the best idea a few seconds later when I was almost mowed over by a taxi. [Note to self... practice walking and reading]. Luckily, the "yellow ones" do stop, albeit late and with funny screeeeech noises.

In my defense, I am trying to branch out beyond Britney pop.... the Boy gave me Dance Dance Revolution for Christmas which has really helped to broaden my pop music horizons. The game is seriously fun, even for those who, unlike me, have highly refined musical tastes! If they made a DDR full of Britney songs, I would run out and buy it. This makes me think that I might have a problem.

Valentine's Day

Yesterday, I was lamenting the fact that I had not yet gotten the Boy anything for Valentine's Day. Don't worry, a friend said, Valentine's Day is a holiday for girls... you don't need to get the Boy anything but a card....

This got me thinking... is Valentine's Day really just a holiday for girls? I decided it was time for a history lesson....

According to History.com, Valentine's Day, which most people think started with some dusty old martyr name Saint Valentine, was actually another one of those old pagan holidays that the Church ripped off.

Evidently, it used to be some type of fertility ritual in Rome called Lupercalia. The Romans sacrificed a dog and a goat and then the men ran naked through the streets with bloody animal skins and smacked the women with them so that they would be fertile.

Now that is romantic.

So, I guess Valentine's Day really did start as a holiday for women! Now I don't feel so bad. I just hope that the Boy doesn't try to recreate the pagan ritual instead of presenting me with sparkling and/or flowering tokens of his affection.

Thanks Congress!

Boy... I am sure glad that Congress is hard at work solving all the big problems facing our country, like war, terrorism, the economy, immigration, taxes, and so on....

Wait... they aren't.

Instead, the House Oversight Committee spent all day interviewing a baseball player and his former trainer about whether or not the player had used steroids or human growth hormones. Honestly, is this a matter that really deserves Congressional hearings?

Who cares? I don't care. Roger Clemen's baseball success has little bearing on my life, while the big issues that Congressional Representatives were elected to work on, may effect me a great deal.

I hope that Congress goes back to doing more important things soon. I kind of feel like they are wasting our money and America's valuable time. Is it any wonder that Bush told the House no this morning when they requested more time to reach an agreement on the Protect America Act. Maybe if they spent more time on the important issues and less on baseball witch hunts, something would get done.

In the Dark

Last Sunday was a pretty windy day. I had to get up kind of early as far as Sundays go (9:30) in order to play flag football, so afterwards I came home and curled up on the couch to resume sleeping. [During this nap time... the Boy usually cleans the house so it looks nice when I wake up - isn't that nice!] My Sunday nap was interrupted, however, by a loud "POW" noise and then a weird little "Peeeouw" sound.... as the TV went dead. The power had gone out.

Now, to be honest, the power begins to flicker in Richmond if it even looks like rain, so I wasn't really alarmed. After all, it was early in the afternoon and really windy.... I decided to go back to sleep and hope that the electricity would be on again when I woke up.... kind of like how the house would be clean.

No such luck. When I came to, it was beginning to get dark. Luckily, the Boy was working hard and had built a lovely fire to keep me warm. He really is handy to have around!

Observation: Have you ever noticed that when the power goes out you can't keep from flicking the light switch to the on position when you walk into a room, even though you have a flashlight in your other hand because the lights won't work? I always feel dumb as soon as I hit the switch.

Back to the story.... After much deliberation we drove to the Walmart and cleaned out the candle section. The Boy lit all the candles and then the house looked quite cozy. One problem with candles is that it is really easy to catch things on fire. [Like your Sorority House for instance... oops!] I was pretty worried that the Keep was going to catch his fluffy tail on fire. The other problem is that candles do not really provide enough light to read by... especially if you happen to be reading law books... so I had to give that up pretty quickly. Darn. Life became painfully boring without TV or the Internet to distract me... I looked through the giant stack of wedding magazines my friend Katie gave me and watched half of a movie on the computer before the battery died. Then, I gave up on Sunday and went to sleep again.

Monday came and went and still no power... though to the power company's credit, they sent a whole army of "power people" to fix the problem. It was hard to drive down the street because there were so many power trucks. I learned that three houses down a giant tree had fallen and taken out both the power lines and a transformer. [Evidently that was the big "POW."] The "power people" had to go into our backyard to run a new line, and not realizing that they were back there (because it was dark), I let Keeper out to do his thing, at which point he was nearly electrocuted. Poor guy.

The worst part was that the people across the street from us had power. They were warm and happy, watching their reality TV shows, cooking yummy things and taking warm showers while we sat grumpily in our cold dark house staring jealously across the street. Needless to say, we ultimately decided to go to a hotel for the night because you can only go so long without taking a shower and we were well past that point.

Apparently, the power finally came on again in the wee hours of the morning. I know this because the power company was nice enough to call the Boy's cell phone and wake us up to tell us this wonderful news. When daylight came, we trekked home. Sure enough... the power has now returned but the hard-working "power people" managed to cut our cable and internet lines in the process. Great.

The uTube Campaign

The best part of the ongoing presidential campaign is the wide variety of media content appearing on the web in support of various candidates. They are a heck of a lot more interesting than the political commercials!

Here are some of my favorites...(in no particular order)

Obama:

1984/Macintosh (one copyright violation after another???)

Obama Girl (Despite her crush, she didn't even go vote!)

Yes We Can (Pretty neat)

Swift Kids Tongue Twister


Clinton:

Swift Kids Cookies

Hott4Hill (slightly creepy)


McCain:

Bomb Bomb Bomb (McCain makes his own laughs)


Huckabee:

Border Security Plan


Some people think that they might even have an effect on the election.
Feel free to share your favorites with me!

Something in the Water....

Is it just me, or are more people going nuts than normal lately... and no, I am not talking about Britney. She's been crazy.

In the last week alone....
Husband shoots/stabs wife at school
Louisiana student shoots classmates
Man goes to "war" with city council
Man kills women in clothing store

Kind of disturbing.

Who is John Galt?

Book Review:

Who moves the world and what would happen if they stopped?

If you are in the mood to read something challenging, I recommend my favorite book, Atlas Shrugged. This book is amazing on a number of levels and you need to get started on it now because it is super long (over a thousand pages) and the movie, based on the novel, is scheduled to come out later this year.

As an English major and now a law student, I do a good amount of reading. Nothing I have ever read has influenced the way I think about the world to the same extent as Atlas Shrugged.

Atlas Shrugged is a mystery, a love story, an economic, political and moral philosophy and so much more all wrapped up in one, very long novel. It was written in 1957 by Russian Immigrant, Ayn Rand, but, in my opinion, it is just as relevant to today's society. It is the type of book that is hard to set down. Rand clearly articulates concepts you always thought about but could never piece together coherently. In short, I think it is brilliant.

Rand's philosophy, which the book sets forward, is known as Objectivism and it has quite a following, including some pretty famous faces such as Supreme Court Justice Clarence Thomas and financial guru Alan Greenspan.

I don't mean to suggest that everyone who reads this book will love it. Those on the far left and far right of the political spectrum may take issue with some of Ms. Rand's ideas. If you fall into that camp but you are willing to explore ideas you don't agree with instead of ignoring them.... consider reading it anyway.

18-1

18-1 sounds so much better than 19-0. I went to a Superbowl party last night where only one person out of 15 was rooting for the Pats and only because he had money on them. Even he cheered for the Giants when they won....

I think the widespread support for the New York Football Giants had a little more to do with a widespread distaste for New England than the fact that the G-Men were the underdogs. No one likes big fat cheaters/womanizers/people who run up the score unnecessarily by keeping the starters in when they are up by 30 in the 4th quarter. No one wants a team like that in the same company as the '72 Dolphins.

For the record, I am not a Giants fan... I am almost the opposite. I root for "America's Team" (the Cowboys), whose season sadly ended when the Giants beat them in Texas Stadium (tear!). Despite this fact, I'd be willing to say that last night, the Giants really became America's team, if only for a night.

So, Congratulations and thank you to the NY Giants!

On a side note... if I were going to pay 3+ million dollars for a commercial, I would want to make sure it was a good one. The commercials, with a few exceptions, were pathetic. The only ones worthy of note were:
Gold: Pepsi's "Baby don't hurt me" - really funny but Coke is still better.
Silver: Budweiser's "Rocky" Clydesdale commercial - I love ponies.
Bronze: E-Trade Baby commercial. - Slightly creepy but memorable.
I can't even think of any others that are worth mentioning.

Hello, My Name is BRIDE

A few days ago, the boy informed me that he had an idea for our wedding. In order to humor him, I asked him to tell me about it, at which point I tuned him out and started thinking about more important things, like how long it would be before Britney got herself committed again (evidently not very long).

These profound thoughts came to a screeching halt when somewhere in the very small part of my brain that was still scanning his monologue for appropriate times to nod and say "uh huh," I realized that he had just said "name tags." Name Tags? I started listening again until I finally comprehended that the idea he was proposing included making our reception guests wear little sticky name tags. The kind that say "Hello my name is..." The kind that people think are funny to fill in with things like "drunk" or "stupid" or something else really clever and original that no one else has ever thought of before.

"Just think of how useful it will be," the boy said, nodding enthusiastically. " You won't have any trouble remembering the names of my 57 first cousins." Like that was ever a problem. I scanned the boy's face for any telltale sign that he was joking. Nope. Not a joke.

Later on, we decided to pick out food that we wanted to try at the taste testing in order to decide on a menu.... the boy flipped through the options and then asked where the pigs-in-a-blanket were on the list of choices. I laughed, thinking that maybe this time he was joking.... wrong again.

I began to imagine what my wedding pictures would look like if the boy was allowed to plan the wedding on his own...... I would be the one in the white dress, holding a plate of pigs-in-a-blanket and wearing a sticker that said, "Hello my name is BRIDE," while distant relatives named "Drunk" and "Stupid" danced in the background.

If, by some very microscopically tiny chance, the boy does get his way, I think that I would want something a little more creative than BRIDE to put on my name tag.

Right now I'm considering:










But I'm open to suggestions.