Whether you wanted to or not, you’ve probably heard there’s a basketball tournament going on (unless you’re my wife, who I’m pretty sure has no idea). You might also have heard that during a game between Oklahoma State and Gonzaga last night, CBS announcer Andrew Catalon (an SU grad, I’m sorry to say) referred to OK St.’s strategy of fouling Gonzaga’s Przemek Karnowski (who’s a crappy free throw shooter) toward the end of the game as the “Hack-a-Polack” defense. Even better, Catalon’s broadcast partner for the game was Mike Gminiski. As a fan of alliteration, I’d have probably gone with “Poke-a-Polack.”

Despite the fact that this is how guys tend to talk to each other in private (being perpetually childish, we tend to give each other shit – I think this is part of the reason why women can have a tough time in historically male-dominated professions. They expect us to act like professionals, and we act like adolescents. Of course, it’s all part of our charm) Andrew really should have known better. I assume Catalon comes from “Catalonia” so I wonder how Andy would like the “Smack-a-Spic” defense?

That would probably have gotten him in even more trouble – as would “Whack-a-Wop”, “Deck-a-Dago”, “Grab a Guniea”, “Clobber-a-Kraut”, “Mangle-a-Mick”, Jab-a-Jew”, or “Nail-a-N….” Well, that last one would get him thrown off the air permanently, I bet.

This all reminds me of the 1968 (I think – maybe ’72) summer Olympics. One of the basketball announcers on ABC (have no idea what his name was – I mean, shit, that was like 45 years ago after all) went on and on one night about the “Polack team.” I mean, he said it like 20 times at least. I can remember my dad and me laughing more and more every time he said it.

The the next night he offered a heartfelt on-air apology that went something like “I had no idea that wasn’t what you called them people.” :rofl2:

It was right up there with “as God is my witness, I thought turkeys could fly.”

And then it was all over and everybody forgot about it. Of course that was before the Internet and YouTube (hell, it was even before regular people had VCRs – which you younger folks will have to ask your grandparents about) so you could do something stupid in public and not have to suffer eternally for it.

You also didn’t have the huge number of perpetually outraged people out there looking for something to be outraged at (the bible thumpers are currently pissed at Neil deGrasse Tyson for not giving creationism “equal time” on the new Cosmos series – when they find out Seth MacFarlane in one of the Executive Producers, their collective heads will implode I say “implode” because that’s what happens when you poke a hole in a substance that contains a vacuum).

Plus I bet 43% of American households were going, “hell, that’s what I thought you called them people, too” – my wife will tell you how when she and her first husband moved to Poplar Bluff Missouri people wanted to meet her husband because they’d “never seen a Jew before.”

Oh well, let’s hope those other fellas from Syracuse have a better night tonight than Andrew had yesterday. It’s still not very warm around here (though not only are we in the lead for the Golden Snowball, we have now overcome what was once more than a one-foot deficit and are tied with Erie PA for the Golden Snowglobe award – and there’s more snow a-comin’), and winning definitely takes the edge off the cold.

I get e-mails every morning from YouTube. Not sure why – I don’t recall signing up for them – but maybe they send them to everybody. Anyhow, they make suggestions about what videos you might want to check out, and this morning one of the ones they suggested was Jonathan Winters and Dean Martin. From there I went to Jonathan Winters on Johnny Carson. Then Jonathan Winters and Robin Williams on Johnny Carson, then Robin Williams on Johnny Carson. I basically spent 35 minutes or so laughing. Then it was time to go to work.

Well, now here I am, and I aint laughing anymore. Plus I’m stuck in this shithole until 5:00 tonight. Sucks.

Speaking of things that suck: Bill Donohue. You perhaps heard that Guinness, Sam Adams, and Heineken decided to boycott this year’s St. Patrick’s Day parade in NYC because they (the parade people) don’t allow LGBTQMO people to march. Or at least not under their own banner. Or something.

Well now, self-appointed Head Prick of the American Catholic Church – Bill “Don’t Call Me Phil” Donohue has decided to counter that boycott with his own boycott, and is telling anybody that will listen to boycott those beers.

So if you’re a good little American Catholic, you better start chasing your Jameson (pronounced “gem-son”) with a pint of Smithwick’s (pronounced “smiddicks”).

Oh well, back to work, I guess.

Normally I’d be bummed that it’s Monday, but I had the foresight to take today off (which is nice, ‘cuz it’s, like, 4° out there at the moment and it’s only supposed to get up to twenty, which is some twenty degrees below normal). I actually didn’t remember taking today off until last Thursday, when I was going through the calendar looking for days to take off in the coming year (I think I mentioned, I have to burn 19 vacation days and 4 comp days just to avoid losing anything), so that was a pleasant surprise.

As if the news that Donald Trump won’t be running for NY Guv wasn’t sad enough, now comes word that Fred Phelps is on the verge of death. Lucky for him hell is just some made up bullshit meant to scare children (and the intellectually infantile) into submission, or Satan would be whomping up a special place for him right now (an eternity of anal penetration with a hot poker no doubt in store for him).

Much as some part of me would love to protest his funeral carrying a “God Hates Phelps” sign, in the end he really isn’t worth it. May he rot in the ground, just like the rest of us. The sooner the better.

If you need to fly somewhere, well, good luck with that. First there’s that whole missing Malaysia flight (personally, I think it went to some island chop shop, and is currently being sold for parts – though I wouldn’t be surprised if it’s actually out there flying over the 1939 World’s Fair trying to find Idlewild), then in yet another scene straight out of the Twilight Zone, a gremlin ripped off part of the wing of a Delta 757 headed for Atlanta.

I think I’ll take the train (or better yet, just stay home).

So, it’s St. Patrick’s Day. A day that’s not really a big deal in Ireland, and where they don’t eat corned beef (cabbage, maybe). That’s ‘cuz the goddamn English exported all the beef and the other decent food, leaving nothing but turnips and potatoes. And as we know, when the potatoes turned to shit, a million Irish starved to death and another million emigrated. In fact, by the turn of the century, the population of Ireland was damn near cut in half.

So, anyway, today we celebrate St. Patrick, an Englishman whose great claim to fame was driving the snakes out of Ireland in the fifth century (which sounds like a neat trick, until you realize there weren’t actually any snakes in Ireland to begin with – not for thousands of years, anyway).

Still, Patrick was considered a great man and the Patron Saint of Ireland. Besides the snake thing, he was kidnapped as a kid and forced into slavery in Ireland, then escaped and went back to England and became a priest or whatever they called themselves back in the 400s and then actually came back to Ireland again – which kind of shows a certain lack of common sense in my book, but, hey, who am I to argue?

So, anyway, to all the Irish and Irish at heart, have a happy day. Everybody else, go Phelps yourself.

Seo sláinte an tséitéara, an ghadaí, an trodaí, agus an óltóra!
Má dhéanann tu séitéireacht, go ndéana tú séitéireacht ar an mbás,
Má ghoideann tú, go ngoide tú croí mná;
Má throideann tú, go dtroide tú i leith do bhráthar,
Agus má ólann tú, go n-óla tú liom féin.

In a huge disappointment to tens (if not hundreds) of New Yorkers, Donald Trump announced (via Twitter, natch) that he will not run for Governor.

While I won't be running for Governor of New York State, a race I would have won, I have much bigger plans in mind- stay tuned, will happen!

— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) March 14, 2014

I’m guessing his “much bigger plans” are to (once again) not run for President in 2016.

Yes, despite an NBC 4 New York/Wall Street Journal/Marist poll showing that Governor Snotball would trounce the Orange Orangutan (he would actually fare worse than Carl Paladino), Trump is pretty certain he could have turned this thing around (I’m guessing he just wanted to spend more time with his wives and children).

• Against Carl Paladino, Cuomo has the support of nearly seven in ten voters — 68%. This compares with 25% for Paladino. Eight percent are undecided. Last fall, 67% backed Cuomo while 24% were for Paladino. Nine percent, then, were undecided.
• Cuomo — 70% — trounces Donald Trump — 26% — by 44 percentage points. Five percent are undecided. In that previous survey, 70% supported Cuomo compared with 24% for Trump. Seven percent were undecided.

It seems that NYers have a rather poor opinion of Donnie.

68% of people in NYC have an unfavorable opinion of him, 59% of Upstate folks don’t like him, and 55% of those in the “Suburbs” think he’s a dick (I’m not sure what this poll considers the suburbs – apparently Upstate doesn’t have ‘burbs – just pigs, cows, goats, corn fields, and the occasional farmer).

The list of people who don’t like him is really rather impressive (makes you wonder why the douchebag has a teevee show and the media pays so goddamn much attention to him).

Black people don’t like him, white people don’t like him, Latino people don’t like him, non-white people don’t like him, men don’t like him, and women don’t like him. Young people don’t like him, old people don’t like him, middle aged people don’t like him, rich people don’t like him, and poor people don’t like him. People who were contacted on landlines don’t like him, and people on cell phones don’t like him either.

Basically, people really don’t like him, and we’re not talking about any 51/49 splits here – I mean, people making over $100,000 a year hate him even more than people making less than $50,000 a year (63-37 vs. 58-38).

The only groups where his favorables are greater than his unfavorables are Republicans (60-37) and Conservatives (63-43). These are not the voting groups that are gonna get you elected to statewide office here in NY (I think he’d have a good shot at running for mayor of Branson, Missouri, though).

Without the threat of Trump on the ballot, I’m officially announcing that I, too, will suspend my campaign for Governor (a race, I might add, that I would have won – or at least gotten more votes than Trump).

Unless Carl Paladino decides to run again – then I might have to reconsider.

I spent a lot of time earlier this morning writing some stuff but then I read it and realized it was really long and dumb, so I ditched it (not that what’s coming next isn’t dumb – just not quite as long). It did lead me to look up the difference between a nautical mile and a regular mile, though, and I’ve been meaning to do that for years now (something I really should have already known, but I guess that one slipped through the cracks). I still haven’t found which came first (though I suspect it was regular miles, or nautical miles would be called miles and the other kind would be called “land miles” or something.

In case you’re curious, a nautical mile is the distance you’d travel if you went one minute of one degree around the Earth at the equator (which is about 1.15 miles). Why it was necessary to come up with this measure (and then call it a “mile”) I have no idea. Seems like they should have just stuck with what a regular mile was and be done with it.

Of course the English had to go and fuck with the mile to make it a messy measurement, too. The Romans kept it simple at 5,000 feet (though they apparently had slightly smaller feet back then). But then the English decided that a mile should be eight furlongs (a furlong being a rather imprecise measure of how far a horse could pull a plow before having to take a break – actually, I think they just turned around and went the other way at that point).

Somebody eventually nailed that down to being 40 rods. Ah, rods. Well, a rod is 16 ½ feet. Why 16.5 and not 16 or 17 (or maybe even 20), you ask? Because a rod is equal to 11 cubits (not 10, not 12, but 11). I mean, duh, right? It’s also the same length as a perch and a pole (whether on purpose or by happenstance, I’m not sure). And a chain is four rods. But I digress.

So, anyway, 16.5 x 40 x 8 = 5,280. Quite obvious, really.

So I guess I’m ready for Jeopardy now.

Not sure how much snow we got yesterday (never mind over night), but what we did get was very wet and heavy. The ride home wasn’t all that bad, thanks mostly to the fact that the companies around here that give a shit about their employees allowed people to leave work early, so traffic wasn’t bad. The roads were pretty shitty, though, so the going was slow.

I managed to blast my way into the driveway and get to the garage (but it wasn’t easy), and then got on my tractor and plowed. At this point the wind had really kicked up, so I was frozen stiff by the time I was done (in the case of my knees, quite literally. It was all I could do to walk back out and grab the garbage can). With the snow so deep and heavy, it took me over an hour out in the driving horizontal snow to plow, and I was caked with ice from hat to boot.

I must be getting old, ‘cuz I was literally shivering and had to sit under a couple of blankets (one of them electric) for about an hour just to get back to feeling normal.

This morning it’s about eight degrees out there, and the wind is still pretty fierce. I think the snow is close to done, though, and I’ll need to get out there and plow a path to the road so I can make my merry way to work later on.

This certainly wasn’t the biggest snow storm we’ve ever had, and if it was December or January, it would have been no big deal. Something about having to put up with this shit in March, though, that makes it really annoying.

There were a couple of warm spots yesterday, though. First, Notre Dame lost its first-ever ACC tournament game. It’s always nice to see ND lose, and the fact that this most likely officially relegates them to the NIT is just icing on the cake. Likewise, Georgetown lost to lowly DePaul. No NCAAs for you, Hoyas!

Oh well, time to get out there and plow, I guess.

Think spring!

According to the radar, the rain has started out there but not much so far. It’s still pretty warm (35°), but the cold and snow are coming. Where I live is just to the east of the “Blizzard Warning” and in the “Winter Storm Warning” area. So I guess it all depends on which way the wind blows and how cold we get. That means I’m either in for 10″-16″ or 14″-20″. Or so they say. We’ll see, but I think no matter what, my drive home tonight is gonna blow, and tomorrow morning won’t be much fun either.

The schools appear to gradually all be preemptively closing. The one I pay taxes to is still holding out, though. Things aren’t supposed to really start to turn to shit until late morning/early afternoon so they should probably see if they can squeeze in a half-day to get their state aid. Personally, I think the fewer school buses on the road the better.

I wish I’d had the foresight (and cash) to take the rest of this week off to go down to Greensboro NC and see SU in its first ACC tournament. I don’t know what the weather’s gonna be like there, but I bet it’ll be better than here.

But I didn’t go that, so I guess all there is to do is wait for the snow to come while deleting the spam comments, which I think I’ve got under control now (I hope). I forgot to disallow trackbacks when I redid everything. If you care, trackbacks are when some other site links back to a post, so if, say, the NY Times finds one my posts terribly witty and insightful (or even inciteful) – and why wouldn’t they? – they could link to it, and then in the comments here that link and mention would show up.

Sounds good, but since nobody ever links to anything here, it’s not something that’s actually necessary. And since spammers can spoof the trackback and just leave links to whatever crap they’re getting paid to generate links to, it’s best to just turn it off. Hopefully that’ll clear things up.

Ah, my school district just caved in and closed. Wimps. They’ll probably have to close again tomorrow if this forecast is right and the snow flies and wind blows hard.

Speaking of blowhards, Donald The Orange Orangutan Trump was in town yesterday to try and convince GOP leaders that they should allow him to run for Governor. God help us all if he should win. I just don’t see his loud-mouthed schtick playing up here, but you never know.

Happy 25th birthday to the World Wide Web, which was supposedly first proposed on this date back in 1989 by Tim Berners-Lee. Thanks for all the years of spam, Tim!

And it’s also Sweet Baby James Taylor’s birthday. He’s 66 today.

)

Yesterday was nice – warm, sunny, light until about 7:30. I actually had to stay up until 8:00 so I didn’t feel like I was going to bed in the middle of the afternoon. I even stayed in bed this morning until almost seven o’clock (I won’t say I slept until then, because I was – as usual – in and out of consciousness all night long). Today is supposed to be nice, too. Maybe even a little warmer. That, of course, will change tomorrow.

Right now, they’re not sure just how warm things will be when this big storm finds its way to us. If it’s warm enough, the first part of the storm will be rain and sleet. Otherwise, it’ll be all snow. I’m personally hoping for rain so I don’t have to get up at before the crack of dawn to plow the driveway on Thursday morning (or worse, park my car in the road when I get home tomorrow night because I can’t get in.

Or maybe I’ll just call in sick on Thursday.

We’re a third of the way through March, and that can only mean one thing: a bigass snowstorm is headed our way. So if you’re going to be anywhere between Missouri and Maine on Wednesday and Thursday, get ready. They’re calling for “about a foot” for us starting at about 5 AM Wed morning. That’s my late day at work, so that should be a truly wonderful day. Well, it was a pretty shitty weekend, so there’s no reason for things to change now.

First there was all this nonsense with WordPress, which I really don’t feel like messing with anymore. Then there was water coming out of the exhaust fan in my wife’s bathroom. I feared a roof leak, but it actually turned out to be the vinyl hose they (whoever “they” are – not the same “they” who predict the weather) used as an exhaust duct. They ran it 20 feet or so over to the soffit vent – undulating across the rafters along the way – instead of up through the roof. Unfortunately, water collected in a low spot and froze solid.

When I went to move it, the vinyl shattered and I was left with about a two foot chunk of four-inch diameter ice. It’s a little too cold to be putting holes in the roof, so I just got some insulated flex duct and replaced it. But doing anything in my attic is a huge hassle (and then there’s the whole being covered in fiberglass insulation thing).

Then last night, we seemed to be a couple dogs short. Turns out, they managed to find a way through (or more likely over) the fence. I was too beat (and it was too dark) to mess with it then, so there I was out there at six o’clock this morning (not any more light then) trying to find where they went out. I was pretty sure I found the spot (snow’s so goddamn high they more or less just walked over it), and the good news is I can close a gate and isolate that area.

The bad news is there was too much fucking snow to close the gate, and it’s more or less frozen solid. After a half hour of trying to chip out enough ice to get the gate closed, I gave up, took the gate off the hinges (actually, it was already off the hinges by that time) and used rubber straps to secure it to the posts.

And of course I stayed up past my bedtime last night, so I’m really tired and feeling like crap and some d-bag pulled in front of me (when there was nobody behind me) on the way in this morning and then drove really slow for the next 15 miles or so, and now I’m stuck here at work and they tell me there’s a foot of snow on the way.

Plus I’m out of beer.

If I didn’t have so much vacation time accrued, I think I’d just go ahead and shoot myself.

Some of you may have noticed that if you weren’t already logged in, you couldn’t log in. At least, that’s what happened to me. So I basically had to start all over again. I think I have all the user accounts, comments, and posts imported. “Regular” users still can’t embed stuff and there are a lot of things that need to be fixed, but for now I’m gonna leave things alone. Don’t forget – it’s later than you think.