I don’t get much of an opportunity to watch the NFL these days, and I knew the Colts were having an “off” year (to put it politely), but, damn, I see the Saints dropped 62 points on them yesterday. Cool. And the Lord Almighty led Denver to a victory over The Fish, using Timmy Tebow as His instrument. Seems God was wearing His orange and blue this weekend. Let’s hope He keeps it from now right through ’til March Madness (which ends in what, April these days?).

But, alas, the weekend is over and it’s time to go back to work again. No more long weekends planned for me until Thanksgiving. That sucks.

Billboards aside, the Internets say George Beauchamp (though multiple people were working on it), and he appears to hold the patent – #2,089,171. I think Oklahoma needs to quit buying their textbooks from Texas.

Early day – time to go.

After being up for 23 or so hours, then getting less than 3 hours sleep and staying up for another 15, you’d think I’d have been able to stay in bed for a while this morning. Sadly, I was awake before 4:00. I’d heard this not sleeping thing happens when you get old, and while I never really thought it would happen to me, it appears this is just how my life will be from now on – which is probably OK, since I’m not that far from the ‘eternal sleep.’ Not that I’m looking to check out anytime soon, of course.

I spent a pretty fair amount of time in the tractor seat yesterday, for the first time in a while. On the orders of the wife, I’m in the process of removing what was once a decorative pond, but is now mostly a stink hole. The first order of business was to try and get the liner pulled up (or at least sufficiently shredded to pieces to allow it to drain) without rolling the tractor into it and drowning. I’d hate to die on a Saturday with a ton of sick leave and vacation time on the books.

Unfortunately, I feel quite horrible about all the frogs. Here I come in and destroy the only world they’ve ever known, and they just hop away – terrified – looking for a place to hide under the ever decreasing water with their little eyes blinking up and me, wondering why. It was bad enough pulling them from the swimming pool skimmer, but to actively seek out and destroy them, well, as I said, I felt awful. I only hope they’ve managed to relocate – though there isn’t actually any water nearby (which begs the question, “where the hell do they come from?” I mean, I dunno about where you live, but here, if you get a little rain in the spring, you wind up with a puddle full of pollywogs).

Anyhow, I shredded and tore and filled what I could, and hopefully the water will have diminished by some time today. Problem is, everything is clay around here – that shit is like cement and doesn’t exactly drain rapidly. It also doesn’t come off your boots, pants, tire treads (you do not wanna get your tires buried in this stuff), or anything else that comes in contact with it.

Yesterday was a cold(ish), cloudy, windy, damp (muddy) day, so, between that and the exhaustion (not only from lack of sleep, but also from spending Friday night more or less hollering as loud as I could manage), I’m sure I’m ripe for pneumonia or a sinus infection (or at least a cold). So I guess I better start pounding the Oil of Oregano.

There’s no time in the budget for being sick – or sleeping.

I’m pretty tired right now, having stayed up way, way, WAY past my bedtime last night. I didn’t even get home until about 1AM, and then I felt compelled to watch a certain football game that I’d recorded while I was out. I only made it ’til halftime (guess I’ll have to watch the rest this morning – which ought to bore Granny to tears), but I still didn’t get to bed until about 3:00, and then I was up at six. Not that I’m complaining, mind you. It was nice to see Floyd Little at halftime (I don’t think I’ve seen him “in person” since I was about 5 years old), and the game wasn’t half bad either. It will be at least a few days before my voice comes back.

Good thing I had yesterday off and got some stuff done, ‘cuz I’m thinking I won’t be good for much today. Especially since I managed to drop the mower deck on my foot (my “bad” foot, too – though, if it wasn’t the bad one before, it sure as hell is now). Fortunately, I took my typical safety precautions and was wearing a pair of sneakers instead of, like, work boots.

As if that wasn’t enough, I managed to somehow hurt the ankle on the other leg. This getting old shit blows.

So I think maybe today I’ll just have to hang out and not play my new guitar. Yes, I bought an electric one as kind of a birthday present for myself (and, no, it isn’t actually my birthday, so no need to send presents – unless you’re bound and determined to, in which case, I’ll post a link to my Amazon Wish List). In fact, I bought a very cheap Fender knockoff “kit,” complete with a practice amp, picks, strap, and a “gig bag” that will be nice when I go on tour. The most important thing, of course, is that it has a whammy bar. I’ve removed the label that proudly identified it as be “handcrafted in China” (made from the finest melamine, no doubt). So now I guess I need to buy a wah-wah pedal, envelope filter (so I can sound like Jerry Garcia), and maybe a fuzzbox. And a bigger amp.

If I could actually play, I would be totally awesome.

But for now, I think I need more coffee (and then go add a wah-wah pedal, fuzzbox, envelope filter, and bigass amp to my Amazon Wish List).

I think I speak for every American who types for a living and/or as a hobby, when I say how happy I am that the former leader of Libya is now officially out of office. There are just too goddamn many ways to spell his name, and I’ve always tried to avoid it, though I mostly liked to think of him as Colonel Gadaffy Duck. As I’ve mentioned before, we’ve had a special relationship with Col. Duck here in Syracuse, what with him ordering the bombing of Pan Am Flight 103 and all. Ironic that the guy they put in prison for that seems to have outlived the Duckman, isn’t it? I say “seems to” because I’m certain that we’ll be hearing the conspiracy theories soon that Gadaffy is actually alive and living on an island off the coast of Argentina with Hitler, Osama, Saddam, Elvis, Jim Morrison, and JFK. Yes, yesterday was certainly an exciting day, as exemplified by Sec State Hillary Clinton (who is letting her hair go long – I like it; she should let it go gray and get that whole crazy cat lady thing going), who, upon hearing the news, said, “wow.”

Speaking of exciting, it was another exciting finish in game two of the world series last night (yes, I realize that “exciting baseball” is kind of an oxymoron), as one team I wouldn’t give a crap about even if I gave a crap about baseball beat another team I wouldn’t care about either, except I’d rather have the latter win the series just because the former will always be associated with Dubya. Though Rick Perry could probably use the bump that would be associated with a “winner.” But who can possibly care about baseball when it’s football season?

Not only is it football season, but tonight is the big game between SU and West Virginia – which will be highlighted by a rare appearance at the Dome by yours truly (depending on what time The Rapture Part 2 kicks in, of course).

At halftime, they’ll be remembering Ernie Davis, who became the first black guy to win the Heisman Trophy 50 years ago this year. No doubt, Floyd Little will be on hand to say a few words.

I will, of course, be wearing my Ernie Davis #44 replica jersey (the orange one, not the white one), which I only trot out on game occasions (I bought it as a birthday present for myself back when I turned 44 years old – which was longer ago than I’d care to think about).

The winner of the game gets to keep the Ben Schwartzwalder Trophy (named, ironically enough, for WV native Ben Schwartzwalder, who played center for West Virginia back in olde tyme leather helmet days and coached a football team here in Central New York).

We’ve played WV more times than anybody else with the exception of Colgate, and it’s always a big game for us, though apparently WV doesn’t actually give a shit – at least according to WV AD and former QB Oliver Luck.

“In fact, I would trade Air Force or Navy for Syracuse every day of the week in terms of the quality of the football program.”

Well, fuck you, too, Ollie. No doubt you’re bitter because you were 0-4 against SU when you were playing.

What with SU heading to the ACC and WV trying to wangle its way to the SEC or Big 12, whoever wins tonight may get to keep the trophy for a long, long time.

Sadly, seeing as WV is playing very well and ranked #11 in the country and Syracuse is, um, not so much, it’s liable to be a very long night for yours truly (and not just because the game doesn’t even start until the time that I’m usually snuggled up in bed with my Kindle). My hope is that it won’t be totally embarrassing.

Anyhow, if you get bored tonight, tune in to ESPN and look for me. I’ll be the guy wearing an orange #44 jersey (should only be a couple thousand of them). Don’t expect to hear from me in the morning (not that anybody cares, I realize), because not only will I probably be out until well past midnight (in fact, what with the game being on TV, I’m not likely to get home much earlier than I normally get out of bed in the morning), but odds are I’ll be terribly pissed-off and depressed.

And then Vernon (and Oliver Luck) will be able to gloat.

I really don’t wanna think about the animals in Ohio, so I won’t. I also don’t want to think about what sort of craven individuals would kidnap the disabled and chain them to a boiler, as happened in Philadelphia (no wonder a dog-killer like Michael Vick doesn’t bother them in the City of Brotherly Love). Though I suspect there will no be a rash of these things being discovered over the coming weeks – unless some blonde chick comes up missing in Aruba, which will push all other stories out of the media consciousness. Plus, I’m trying not to think about why East Aurora, NY is some 100 miles west of Aurora, NY. Mostly, I just want to think about getting through today, because I have tomorrow off.

I thought I had my annual health assessment today (which consists of having your blood pressure taken, telling them to take their flu shot and shove it, and telling them you have a doctor that you go to so that they won’t lecture you on their mainstream Western Medicine bullshit), but it turns out that’s actually next week. So today, I just have a stupid meeting instead (not as stupid as yesterday’s biweekly stupid meeting, though).

God, how these people love their meetings. To me – at best – meetings are like masturbation without the payoff. At their worst, meetings are what I imagine being temporarily buried alive must be like. Restricted movement, gradually diminishing oxygen, and fighting the rising panic while trying to not to think about the likelihood that you’re going to suffocate and die there.

I hate meetings, and I hate talking on the telephone. I mean, phones are like, what, 18th Century technology? Don’t call me – e-mail me. And for chrissakes, if you’re gonna call me, leave voicemail beyond, “call me back.” There’s a reason I didn’t answer the phone in the first place. Tell me what you want so I can find out the answer before I call you back. Unless you just want to hear me say, “uh, I dunno. I’ll have to look into it,” because that’s probably about all you’re gonna get.

Finally, somebody is brave enough to speak (or at least write) the truth: Hitler died in 1962 in Argentina.

Grey Wolf: The Escape of Adolf Hitler claims the Fuhrer and his mistress Eva Braun were secretly flown out of Germany in April 1945 and taken to fascist-controlled Argentina.

It is alleged Hitler lived in the country for 17 years until his death in 1962.

The book also accuses US intelligence of being complicit in the scam in return for access to Nazi war technology.

“Stalin, Eisenhower and Hoover of the FBI…

As opposed to Hoover of the Vacuum Cleaner Institute?

…all knew there was no proof of him dying in the bunker,” Williams told Sky News.

I know what you’re wondering. “What about his dog? Did they get Blondi out, too?”

I think I smell another book opportunity.

The story isn’t that Herman Cain is the frontrunner in the Republican reality show, but how extraordinarily terrible Rick Perry is. I mean, here’s a guy who seemed tailor-made for putting the “white” back into the White House. Texan? Check. Executioner in Chief? Check. White? Whiter than Wonder Bread or a Pepsodent smile. Christian? Shit – he’s so damn Christ-like, he’s even being persecuted (I think he’s even got a touch of the stigmata). But then a funny thing happened. He opened his yap. Hard to figure you could out-stupid and out-cray the likes of Michele Bachmann, but damned if Ricky didn’t manage it. Now he’s fallen so low, he’s polling lower than Rick Santorum in Florida – a mere 2.9%, which, even using Texas math, is pretty piss poor.

Speaking of Herman, we know Cain is Able, but is Cain also Liable? Liable to be charged with some campaign finance shenanigans, that is. Seems it isn’t technically illegal in and of itself, but the Cain Campaign has paid the for-profit “Herman Cain T.H.E. New Voice” (which is a pretty crappy name for a company, if you ask me) $100,000. Apparently his company promotes his books and “philosophy.” No word on how much the Cain Campaign has spent on Godfather’s Pizza.

West Side Story (the movie) was released 50 years ago today. In case you don’t know, it tells the tale of two of NYC’s gayest gangs – a conflict between the Jets (white people in pale makeup), and the Sharks (mostly white people in dark makeup) dancing their way through the streets, snapping their fingers in a threatening manner, and saying things like “daddy-o” as NYC “toughs” were wont to do back then.

This movie is when I fell in love with Puerto Rican women, developing a life-long crush on well-known hispanic chick Natalie “Maria” Wood. Though I always thought the movie – and musicals in general – was pretty stupid.

Big birthday day today, as Chuck Berry hits 85, Keith Jackson goes rumblin’, stumblin’, bubmblin’ to his 83rd, and everybody’s favorite castaway – Dawn Wells – is 73. And still cute as a button.

Not a lot of time this morning, as it’s an early day, and I’ve squandered my morning looking at guitars I can’t actually play. I have an acoustic I can’t play, and am thinking I ought to get an electric I can’t play (because it would be easier for me to not play, plus I could not play it with headphones on). So, anyhow, I pretty much have to get going if I’m gonna save up to buy a backhoe to start digging a moat between the US and Canada. Herman Cain might be a quitter, but I’m not.

I’ve never been the parent of an infant, but, at the risk of seeming smug (which, on a side note, is the extremely apt acronym for the Syracuse Mac Users’ Group, surpassed only by the Onondaga County Water Authority for best local acronym), I’m fairly certain I possess enough latent parenting skills (and, oh, I dunno, common fucking sense) to know better than to give a baby a bottle full of prescription pain killers as a rattle. Actually – and, again, I haven’t read any of the books or anything, so this may be going out on a limb a bit – I think that probably goes for non-prescription drugs, too. If nothing else, I’m pretty certain that if there was an infant in the house, I’d need those drugs. This, as Sue would point out, is what happens when you teach to the test (as opposed to trying to give people the skills required to “think”). You can’t possibly put everything on the test, and clearly the one about giving drugs to babies wasn’t in the rotation. Granted, it does appear to be a pretty good way to get them down for a nap, but there seems to be an issue with the whole getting them back up again thing. Whatever happened to soaking their binky in brandy?

Speaking of somebody who’s apparently been soaking his binky in brandy, not only does Herman “Abel” Cain (BTW, set your DVRs, as he’ll be on Press the Meat this morning) want to dig a moat between Mexico and the US and fill it with alligators (thanks to Gail Collins via Sue for the tip), but he also wants to build an lethal electrified fence along the border as well.

No details on whether it would be moat-fence, or fence-moat, but it seems pretty clear that – care and feeding of the alligators aside, these are not financially feasible proposals.

I mean, Herm said he wanted a “really big” moat, which kind of goes without saying – I mean, if it’s gonna cover the entire US/Mexico border, by definition it’s gotta be pretty big. He didn’t say if he meant “big” as in wide, or as in deep, but, presumably it needs to be pretty wide (or you could just throw a 2×4 across and walk over).

Now, unlike Herman Cain (who is a very successful CEO and serious Presidential candidate), I haven’t crunched all the numbers, and wouldn’t be certain how to go about estimating construction costs. The Erie Canal might be a good start. It’s something like 360 miles long (or it was when they finished it), but it’s only 40 feet across and 4 feet deep. That might be sufficient for mule-drawn flat barges, but it doesn’t seem Herman Cain “big” to me (and certainly not big enough to keep out those pesky Mexicans, unless you keep it pretty densely stocked with alligators, which they’d probably just catch and eat anyway – I mean, if this idiot can catch ‘gators, I’m thinking it wouldn’t be much of a challenge for Mexicans).

So let’s think “big” – like, Panama Canal big. Now, the Panama Canal cost $375,000,000 to build (BTW, if you search for information on the Panama Canal, be prepared to look at some truly ugly websites). But that was in, like 1914, which would be roughly $8.2 billion today. Of course, the Panama Canal is only 51 miles long, and the US/Mexico border is over 1,900 miles long, so, extrapolating from there, a bigass moat would cost over $300 billion. And that’s just initial construction. Presumably the annual maintenance would be rather astronomical (keep in mind that we couldn’t really use cheap Mexican labor for all this ‘cuz, well, they’d be building in back doors and stuff (and the Irish don’t work as cheap as we used to) – though I suppose we could use prison labor, though in this “prisons for profit” world we live in, that would probably still be pretty expensive.

On the bright side, alligators are free. Assuming Cain is Able to go and catch them himself.

And that’s not even for the electrified fence. Your basic electric livestock fencing (which doesn’t even contain cows when they have a mind to wander) costs about $6 a linear foot. So, let’s see here, 2,000 miles is like 10.5 million feet, so that’s another $60 million (which I guess is chicken feed, compared to the cost of the moat). Not counting the cost of electricity (I suppose it would be a good excuse to go solar, though). But you’d really need to construct something more substantial to string that across. So, well, let’s just say it would kinda cost a lot of money, though it might create a lot of jobs.

Now far be it for me to poo-poo Herman’s plan. One thing I’m bummed about is the loss of the “can do” American spirit. So let’s get out there and start digging. I mean, it took 10 years to build the Panama Canal, so it could take, oh, I dunno, 400 years to dig our moat (assuming we don’t want to employ any technology that didn’t exist in the Bible, of course), so we have lots of time to figure out how we’re gonna stock it with alligators.

Hey, looks like we’re getting ourselves into a new war, as President Obama is dispatching troops to Central Africa. I hope there’s oil or something there. Diamonds, maybe? Everybody loves diamonds. Not to worry, you lily-livered, bleeding heart (I think the hepatic disorder is what leads to cardiac hemorrhaging, but you should, of course, consult your physician) liberals. Obama is only sending 100 troops in an advisory position, and sending “advisors” into a war could never lead to anything unpleasant. Right?

The warm weather has finally broken (though, all things considered, it’s not exactly “cold” – yet), and today is supposed to be chilly and rainy, and very, very windy. We’re all kind of hoping for a bit of a break this year, what with last year being kind of a pain in the ass (particularly if you’re an aging baby-boomer who is beginning to discover all the nifty little places your body can feel pain – often for no apparent reason, and especially when the weather is cold and damp).

According to the woolly bear caterpillars (which were out in force last weekend; y’all know what woolly bears are, right? I mean, they aren’t a local or regional phenomenon are they? I’m really not very worldly – shocking, I know), it looks like we’re gonna have a short, harsh start, followed by a long, fairly mild stretch, and a short crappy spurt at the end. I guess I can live with that. And the woolly bear caterpillars are way more accurate than the National Weather Service or the Farmer’s Almanac (the Farmer’s Almanac weather predictions are kinda like a horoscope – vague enough so there’s something in there for everybody).

So, anyhow, I figure I have one more grass-cutting to do (assuming it’ll stop raining long enough), and then I can take the mower off the tractor and get ready for winter. Next Friday (barring the Rapture, of course) will be the one-year anniversary of when we closed on this house. So of course, we’re all moved in by now.

HA!

Private joke there.

Oh well, time to get going on whatever it is I’ll be doing today. Like watching last night’s Bill Maher – assuming I can stomach looking at and listening to that smarmy little piggish bag of douche, John Fund.

Or, I could regale you all with tales of the SU Alumni hoops scrimmage from last night, featuring players from 4 decades of SU and NBA history. And I’m sure nobody wants that.

I just saw this important news story on the lo-cal news, and thought I’d pass it along as kind of a public service. Turns out, if you’re not careful when carving your pumpkin (as the kids call it these days), you can cut yourself. A pediatrician interviewed for the story said that he sees as many as “one or two” kids a year with jack-o-lantern wounds. My god! With carnage like this, you’d think there’d be a law. They didn’t say, but I’m guessing most adult pumpkin-carving injuries are alcohol and/or drug related. To quote an “expert” from the story, “pumpkins are slippery, and knives are sharp.” I’m thinking of getting that printed on a t-shirt, along with a picture of a severed hand or something. Might also make a good epitaph for your tombstone (people will wonder what the story behind that one is). So, y’all be careful out there when handling your pumpkins.

Although I suppose Rick Perry would pretty much have to have a wife, I never saw her before this morning, when I caught a clip of her attempting to diss Herman Cain. Turns out, she’s exactly what you’d expect – a bubbleheaded bleach blond who appears to equal (if not surpass) her husband in the area of stupidity.

When eye he-uh nine, nine, nine, eye want to call nine, wun, wun

Pause for laughter…. No laughter.

Becawze it will rayuze the taxes.

Yeah. OK.

In other news, not only is it Friday, but it’s the official start of basketball season with Midnight Madness (which starts at 7:00 – go figure) at the Carrier Dome here in Syracuse (and other places that, let’s face it, nobody gives a shit about). Good news for sports fans like Sue and my wife, as, if you can’t make it to the festivities in person, you can watch MM coverage from around the nation (including here in The ‘Cuse) on ESPNU. SU’s will be the best, of course, in part because, thanks to the NBA lockout, the main event will be an alumni game with former SU “legends,” including current NBA players like Carmelo Anthony (I’d keep on naming them, but I realize nobody else cares).

Must be Dave Bing is too busy being mayor of Detroit to come (or Jim Brown, who of course was also a very good basketball player, ‘cuz there’s nothing he wasn’t good at – with the possible exception of relationships with women, but, hey, nobody’s perfect).

As if all that wasn’t enough, it’s a huge day for the iLemmings out there, as the Steve Jobs Memorial iPhone will be released in record-breaking numbers. Turns out that dead Steve Jobs is an even bigger marketing genius than living Steve Jobs, and if Apple can find a way to trot him out at every new product release, they’ll kick some major ass for centuries to come (I’m thinking a holographic appearance – kind of like after a Seldon Crisis; you probably have no idea who I’m talking about, so I guess you’ll just have to get on the Google).

Word has it that Woz is first in line at the Apple Store in LA. I hope he’s got cash (‘cuz, as they say in Cupertino, “In Jobs We Trust – All Others Cash”).

Speaking of cash, time to go make some.