Very important One-sentence post

Read this, if you would, since JD wrote it, and it's one of the most important things you'll read all day, and you ought to thank me for recommending it at all, for even deigning to come down off my high horse and offer you a link to someone else's blog post.

He had a certain brashness to him

The end of November. It was a fine month all around, all will agree. I came closer to finding out where I'm headed, this month.

What I'm trying to say is, I've got freedom and my youth. What I'm trying to say is, I'm in a happy spot. Here's to another glorious year! [years start on December 1st, right?]

[The business with the exclamation points is really getting out of hand! I need to be careful, or I'll start using them without thinking! WITHOUT ANY FORETHOUGHT! Can you only imagine?! That would be like throwing a party and charging your friends 20 dollars to get in to the 'VIP Section'! Say it ain't so, Joe!]

The better part of valor is discretion, in the which better part I have sav'd my life.

Being on my lunch break at work, and not having too much else to do before 1:50 pm, I thought I'd post a list of some of my favorite periodical titles, whether absurdly obscure, or just humorously titled, that I've encountered working in the Checkin department.

-Portable Restroom Operator - Basically everything that could remotely be considered an industry has its own trade paper. This is one of them. There's a lotta dung out there that needs to get moved and disposed of, and this is the magazine for the people who are out there on the front lines every day.

-Australian Clay Target Shooting News - The title really speaks for itself, like an absurd Sci-Fi channel movie (Sharks in Venice, anyone?). The thing that gets me, though is how small the target audience must be for this publication. How many people subscribe to this? 500? 1,000? Can't be too many more than that, can it?

-Journal of Civil War Medicine - Not that funny a title on its own, until you notice that it's published by "The Society of Civil War Surgeons". Sorry guys, it's not 1863 anymore. You can call yourself "Civil War Surgeons", but you're really just 20th Century People who have way too much time on their hands.

-Millionaire Corner - For those issues in a millionaire's life that ordinary commoners just wouldn't understand. As I remember, this publication concerns itself mainly with telling millionaires about things that other millionaires enjoy, and that they should therefore enjoy. And I think it goes without saying that you have to be a millionaire to subscribe.

-Mythprint - I think the lithping English professor/mythologist who thought of this title is still patting himself on the back to this day. Mythprint! Get it? Mythprint! No, seriously, do you get it?

-The Avant Gardener - My favorite, and another one, in the vein of Mythprint, that's just a little too clever for its own good. Really, guys, you've outdone yourselves. Let's scale it back a little. Once again, though, everything you need to know about the magazine is right there in the title. Looking for cutting-edge horticultural techniques? You've come to the right place!

You are tearing me apart, Lisa!

-Don't be afraid

-Portmanteaus can get ugly fast. Have you seen MANswers?

-Yourself or a body double like you

-I wouldn't say my mind is exactly fertile, but I do try to practice crop rotation and plant some legumes

-Evaporation doesn't get enough credit for the important role it plays in our lives

-The embodiment of death is the smiling, pink, chubby face of Glenn Beck

-B-R-E-V-I-T-Y

-We really shouldn't be afraid of anything that won't kill us

-I bet if I quit drinking I could drop 20 lbs. just like that

-It's the company you keep

-Ashton Kutcher was enthusiastic, and the writing was tight. Along with the Jon Hamm episode, best couple of SNLs in a long time

-It's a strange thrill to meet someone with whom you have a great many things in common. Like arriving at an oasis in the desert, which analogy I am almost completely unqualified to make

-The Room: beyond your wildest dreams of how bad a bad movie could be. Unspeakably bad

-"Dance with me, beneath the circuitry"

-Unattributed quotation

It's the simple things

I checked in 271 issues today. Tomorrow I learn overrides.

I am a checkin fool.

Nice work if you can get it. Which I did.

"America is still the land of the rugged individualists"

I'm going to pose the question that I'm sure is on everyone's mind:

Is the only goal of every indie band starting out to get their song on a car commercial?

I've really had way more than enough of this junk. What happened to the good old days of Chevy picking Bob Seger's "Like a Rock" for their commercials and just pounding it into your head, day after day, night after night, advertisement after advertisement? Yes, those were the days. Enough of the indie band meal ticket ads. Really, what are the people who make these spots thinking? Nothing sells cars like seedy-looking, reedy-voiced twentysomethings in flannel?

Again, I oppose fast food

This guy in the Phoenix said it better than I am currently able to:

"Watching folks eat at national fast-food outlets depresses me. Not only are they paying for advertising, but they're getting so little give-a-damn in their food."

Can we stop eating at these places already? Obesity will kill you! Yes, it will.

My thoughts betray me

It strikes me that having the letter x twice in a name where it only belongs once betrays a lack of class. People who add the second x by choice are telegraphing their urgent need to get your attention. If they can't get your attention because of their talent, why not try a gimmick like adding a ridiculous second x to a name? If I see the second x, I assume low-rent, low-class.

Alexx Woods

Bubba Sparxxx

Alexxis Tyler

The only exception is Jimmie Foxx, who was a solid hitter, and who clearly didn't choose to add the second x.

Stop up the access and passage to remorse

I foresee a future state of the National Football League that is centered around injuries. The games take twice as long because there are multiple serious injuries on every play. The rosters are twice as large because of the need for replacements due to in-game attrition. There are several deaths due to injuries sustained in games every year, which, while bemoaned as tragic, are tolerated. The year? 2025.

It's not too far away from today's game. There is an upper limit on how big and fast football players can get before very serious injuries become more and more frequent, eventually leading to the first in-game death. It will happen, someday, and don't be surprised when it does.

Mark my words.

your future now

Someday I would like to make a move with this line in it:

"Well Barney, I'd like to think that today I lost a paying customer, but gained a good friend. And that's what matters most. Goodnight folks."

Just my little way of giving back to the community. Because that's what matters most. Goodnight folks.

T-No (I'm angry)

I'm watching "The T.O. Show" on VH1.

It's awful.

It seems to be set up a lot like "The Hills", including all the shots looking down streets in LA with indistinguishable music playing between scenes. Aaargh, the music. The people who put this show together really seem to be trying to copy all of the worst parts of the Hills and none of the best. There are more little cut up bits of songs in this show than Sullivans in a Boston phone book. They add little or nothing to the show. There are plenty of pretty obviously scripted lines read by TO and his friends, and let me tell you, they aren't very good actors. I think the reason people like the Hills is that they've seen it before. They have some sense of who the characters are, and they enjoy ridiculing the people on the show for their bad decisions and ludicrous behavior. The T.O. Show has none of this familarity. It's just another badly produced reality show in a long, long, long line of badly produced reality shows that I couldn't care less about, but networks still feel obligated to produce because they cater to the basest and most moronic, and therefore the broadest swathes of our society. This show brings absolutely nothing to the table. They'll get a spike of curious viewers the first two weeks maybe and then nobody will watch because there is nothing remotely interesting about this show. I don't care about TO, he's not a compelling figure, the popular fascination with him makes no sense. And while I'm here, has anyone noticed that MTV doesn't show music videos anymore? Does that make any sense? All they have now is freaking marathons of "16 and Pregnant", one of the most despicable TV shows of all time, and a subject to be delved into at another time. The direction our culture is headed makes me steaming mad. We're getting stupider! The media we use to distract ourselves is getting dumbed down. I am not pleased, and I am not amused.

The dark little secret of the show is that there's nothing particularly interesting about the life of Terrell Owens. He's actually quite tame from the looks of things. The producers of the show try to create tension by having him act the party animal while his female friends try desperately to keep him from having fun, but there's absolutely nothing compelling about what ensues. The problem is, I don't know anything about Owens as a person and I couldn't care less about him or what he does. He's not strange, he has few distinguishing characteristics, he almost never says anything revelatory or surprising. After watching the show, I know maybe one thing about him that I didn't know before, that he likes to shop. Oh, wait, don't let me forget, he also appears to have no discernable personality traits!

Do yourself a favor and don't watch the show.

i make dough, but don't call me doughboy

WEEI's Jon Meterparel, commenting without irony on the oh-so-lovely way the Lakers' Pau Gasol can take it to the cup with either hand:

He might have one of the best left hands in the league. He's amphibious!

Way to keep those standards high, guys. Incidentally, I don't find Meterparel's Boston College football play-by-play work to be repulsive-it's actually quite decent. This, however, is something which I will not tolerate from someone who is handsomely compensated to speak on the radio. The word for which you went fruitlessly searching is ambidextrous, and you're making America stupider.