My Sick Mind

Being a shut-in allows me to monitor the TV and check in on what is going on while the rest of you are going out. Over on TNT, they're showing a NASCAR race in Florida. The people in charge have figured a creative way to run commercials while the race is going on. Meanwhile, the ad and the junk at the bottom of the screen take up one-fifth of the screen space. I have no idea what this must look like to someone without a hi-def TV, but it can't be pretty. They call it "Wide-open coverage." I call it a shameless method for working commercials into content while not showing enough of either. Am I supposed to be watching the race or the ad? Neither one is emphasised. JUNEAU, Alaska – Outgoing Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin on Saturday laid the groundwork to take on a larger, national role after leaving state government, citing a "higher calling" with the aim of uniting the country along conservative lines. In a statement posted on Palin's Facebook account, ...

This summary is not available. Please click here to view the post.

Here's the thing about vending machines. We have made great advancements in technology across the board: Cellular telephones, hi-definition TV, microwave ovens and cars that run on batteries. Meanwhile, the best way we can think of to dispense snacks is a machine with those spiraling mechanisms. At best, they're hit or miss. At worst, they'll make you buy two of something in order to get one of something. They're stress-inducing. I call it a Vendosecond : The length of time between seeing the snack get to the edge and having it actually fall to the bottom. We're never sure if it's going to make it. Frequently, the machine at work is half-filled with snacks hanging perilously, waiting for someone with another dollar to get in on the two-for-one sale after a frustrated potential consumer walked away snackless. I rode my bike the 6 miles to River Winds (out local fitness facility) tonight. Afterward, I needed a beverage to refill my bottle for the ride home. The...

Around here - Pitman specifically - the holiday makes people do odd things. Starting on Tuesday, the locals began propping chairs up along Main Street in preparation for the annual July 4 parade. It happens every year, and I suspect that jumping in line or removing a chair and replacing it with another are acts of war in the neighborhood. The chairs are a local fixture for the rest of the week, and extend for a couple of miles along the road from Mantua to Glassboro. I've never been to the Pitman 4th of July parade, mostly because I eschew parades, and partly because I don't live in Pitman, but I can't imagine how it could be such a thrill that it would encourage people to place lawn chairs on the road five days prior to the event. Is there nudity or free beer? Nope. It's Pitman. Whatever it is, it must be horrible to have to stand and watch the parade. At first glance, it seems lazy, but when you consider the effort that is made to ensure a spot, it's ambitious...

LOS ANGELES – A plan to bury Michael Jackson at his sprawling Neverland ranch fizzled Wednesday, leaving details about his funeral undecided as another mystery was solved: His newly unveiled will says his mother should raise his children, or failing her, Diana Ross. The changing funeral circumstances thwarted many Jackson fans who had descended on the estate in the rolling hills near Santa Barbara with the hope of attending a public viewing. "We're terribly disappointed," said Ida Barron, 44, who arrived with her husband Paul Barron, 56, intending to spend several days in a tent. They're terribly disappointed. More disappointed that there is no memorial service than in his death, one presumes. One wonders (or at least I do) what those two would be doing today if Michael hadn't died. Wandering the streets aimlessly? Where do they get the time off work? Do they tell their boss, "Hey ... um ... I need a few days off." "Why?" "To go to the N...

I'm old enough to have been through five incarnations of music. Vinyl, cassette, 8-track, CD and now mp3. Along the way, I've had to endure the endless (almost) remastering and remixing of stuff that I bought and listened to when I was ten years old. Part of the problem is that the stuff was good when I was ten, but somehow it did not age well enough to be left alone (much like Michael Jackson) and had to be altered in some way as to make it "marketable" to the masses who probably didn't hear it in its original form. While cruising Amazon's web site for some new music (I pre-ordered Son Volt's new CD) I came across this list of remastered Beatles CDs which most of, I'm happy to say, I didn't buy when they were first issued as CDs about 20 years ago. That's nice because now, I see that the third generation wasn't good enough, and now they have had to be remastered (by who?) and re-issued AGAIN on CD, for sale to a gullible American mus...

HARTFORD, Conn. – The Supreme Court ruling in favor of white New Haven firefighters who said they were victims of reverse discrimination will probably leave employers confused, civil rights advocates and labor attorneys say. I don’t know about the employers, but it’s leaving me confused. I’ve seen the term reverse discrimination several times and I’m never sure what it means, except that it sounds ridiculous. The dictionary defines discrimination as “treatment or consideration of, or making a distinction in favor of or against, a person or thing based on the group, class or category to which that person or thing belongs rather than on individual merit.” If that’s the case (and it is) then what is “reverse discrimination?” Why is the term discrimination confined to people of color and “reverse” when it happens to white people? If something is discriminatory, it doesn’t matter whom the action is against. By definition, reverse discrimination means you are treating people fairly, an...

It turned out that pitchman Billy Mays (some job description, eh?) died from hypertensive heart disease, and not a blow to the head as originally assumed. You can bet that there was a collective sigh of relief over at US Airways. Oh yes. It's a lot easier to sue some company for being hit on the head by a carry-on bag during a landing than it is to sue a company over a lifetime of bad eating habits. I wonder if anyone has ever been killed by being hit on the head by a carton of cigarettes? There's a lawsuit for you. Death, as well as being a cure for disease, is good for sales. Eight of the top ten downloaded tracks and 7 of the top ten downloaded albums on Rhapsody (Real Player's music service) are Michael Jackson recordings. As though his death suddenly reminded people, "You know, I don't own any of his songs. It's about time I owned all of his songs." Strange behavior. Now that Michael's dead, I can find a good excuse to say I liked him . We...

We're a forgiving bunch - sometimes. It depends, of course, on our level of affection for what the offending person did and how much we're willing to absorb on a personal level to subsidize the nonsense they created in their personal lives. We now hate Barry Bonds because we didn't much care for him to begin with. Most of us knew he was an obnoxious jackass and once the steroid allegations rolled out, we had vindication for our original feelings, and we let the hatred fly. Sometimes we don't know what sort of a jackass someone was in life until they die. Then, the books and magazine articles start coming and we change our opinion from one of unconditional love to one of massive doubt. We still might like their work, but while we're involved in it we're thinking, "Man, that guy was a fucking weirdo." I think we always knew that about Michael Jackson, but the thing that surprises me about the outpouring of love I'm seeing after his death is that ...

I have a ticket for the Wilmington Blue Rocks game tonight. Big deal, right? Uh huh. Little did I know, it's dog night: Bring your dog out to Frawley Stadium as Concord Pet Food & Supplies will be sponsoring Dog Days of Summer. Me and two thousand dogs. Geez. That's worse than going to Singles Night at Jenny Craig. Why don't they ever have Cat Night? I might take him anyway. Ten bucks says I step in poop. We had a thunderstorm warning last night. The warning said that "lightning is one of nature's number one killers." As though there could be more than one number one killer. Nobody is editing the weather forecast. Or this blog. A riddle for you: If a chair sits in the woods, does it make a sound?

Steve Porter has created a modern classic. It features the iconic Allen Iverson "practice" press conference as well as gems from Dennis Green, Joe Namath, Jim Mora and Terrell Owens. Mike Missanelli has been playing it on his ESPN radio show, and it makes me smile every time I hear it. The video is even better. Kudos to Steve Porter. You're awesome, dude. Words fail me. Visit his web site and hear stuff for yourself.

"Michael Jackson is a 5 asshole having, pterodactyl marrying, werewolf raping, baby dangler." - Patton Oswalt Every time someone near my age dies I start thinking about my own mortality. Michael Jackson was only a year younger than me, but his dying didn't make me think much. He was like a piece of fine china - a little to fragile to be human. I always wanted the job of the guy who used to walk behind him holding the umbrella. If you can't go outdoors without an umbrella over your head, you're way too dainty. Although, I guess he only had one or two layers of skin left, so it stands to reason. The odd juxtaposition of always wearing a germ mask and having a pet chimpanzee is too bizarre to explain. Now, as death often does, the bizarre stories of his life will come to light. What's the over/under for the number of posthumous biographies? I say ten before the end of the year. First though, the autopsy should be very interesting. Michael Jackson died. Now the...

COLUMBIA, S.C. – After going AWOL for seven days, Gov. Mark Sanford admitted Wednesday that he had secretly flown to Argentina to visit a woman with whom he was having an affair. Wiping away tears, he apologized to his family and gave up a national Republican Party post, but was silent on whether he would resign. "I've been unfaithful to my wife," he said in a news conference in which the 49-year-old governor ruminated on God's law, moral absolutes and following one's heart. He said he spent the last five days "crying in Argentina." Boo hoo. Another teary confession from somebody who got caught. Now, he's Mister Apology - lamenting his twisted life. People like that always ruminate on God's law once they're caught. If he had a brain in his little head, he'd have had her flown to South Carolina and his little tryst would still be going on. But he's a dumbass on top of being a Republican. "He left the state unattended," sa...

It's that time of year again. The time when we'll have to listen to so-called professional broadcasters say Wimbleton when they really mean Wimbledon. Why do I find it annoying? Although, it's not nearly as annoying as the women screaming every time they hit a shot, as though they're giving birth. Who taught them to do that? For those of you who may be wondering, giant hematoma leg is healing slowly. No, I'm not taking another photo. Has anyone ever tried Kefir? It's supposed to be one of those "good for you" foods. I've seen it described as a drinkable yogurt that tastes like sour milk. One article said: Beyond the satiety-inducing protein, the probiotics in kefir may also speed weight loss. British scientists found that these active organisms boosted the breakdown of fat molecules in mice, preventing the rodents from gaining weight. I'm guessing I can get it at Whole Foods Market, but wondering if it's worth the effort. I'd like ...

This is one of those stories that sounds like I'm drunk, but seriously... The last thing I do before I leave for work every morning is to make sure I have my wallet. You may remember this item I purchased a while ago , because I don't carry a "real" wallet, but got tired of misplacing credit cards and/or my driver's license. I'm sort of scatterbrained. I blame alcohol, the cause of and solution to all of life's problems. Anyway, this morning I realized that I hadn't seen the thing since Sunday, but I didn't have enough time to look for it unless I wanted to be late for work. The shock left me dumbfounded, so I left the house with nine dollars in cash and a lot of anxiety. When I got home tonight, I tore the place apart looking for it, to no avail. I checked my accounts and made sure no one had absconded with my tens of dollars, so I felt like I was left with nothing but to replace the scattered shards of my life, which included my driver's ...

Another weekend in paradise. Cloudy, rainy and generally crappy weather all weekend until Sunday at around 6:00pm when the sun came out. Just in time for me to take a stroll to the grocery store and start getting stuff together for work on Monday. I know better than to complain about things that I can't control - like the weather - but Jeebus! I spent a couple of evenings at the ballpark watching the woeful Phillies get swept by the even more woeful Baltimore Orioles. The games weren't part of our ticket package, so I went out of my way to get them, since I'm kind of an Orioles fan. I pay $40 a month for the MLB Package on cable, and when the Phillies aren't on, I spend my time watching the O's. There are probably people in Baltimore who don't do that. Anyway, most fans thought the Phils would get fat off the Orioles, but the forty bucks made me a more well-informed fan, and I wrote to one of the Inquirer columnists and told him that "I wouldn't be su...

I love those green envelopes that come in the mail from my condo association. They're always full of such good cheer. Wednesday's missive was especially wonderful: PLEASE TAKE THE TIME TO FULLY READ THIS IMPORTANT NOTICE it said, underlined so that we wouldn't miss the 16-point type face. "It has come to the attention of the Country Creek Board of Trustees (BOT) that person are entering the Country Creek pool compound during hours when the pool is not open." Egad. On several occasions recently, sections of the fence surrounding the pool compound have been cut to gain access to the pool area. The nerve. Each time the fence is damaged by vandalism, the repairs cost the association money, which in turn, costs you [underlined] the homeowners/residents, money. [me] Within the next two weeks, cameras will be installed around the pool compound to ensure its integrity. We are fortunate to have a big beautiful pool and pool compound (there's compound again) to e...

The plus side of crashing my bike and winding up with a giant hematoma is that I can show it off to the girls at the gym. That's right. Hike up the shorts and put it on display. In my best Stewie Griffin voice, " That's right. Crashed my bike. Didn't hurt much. Hit my head and got this ." [hike up the shorts and listen to the gasps] It's as good as a knife-fight scar or a gunshot wound, only better because there's a cool story attached to it. Girls love a good battle scar story. Follow up the story with the tag line, "It was pretty cool" and you have the makings of a legendary tale. If only I could parlay it into a nighttime sex romp or bawdy massage session. Did I just use the word bawdy?

If you think that's bad, you should see the road! This is what happens when you bump into another rider and go down in a heap in the rain. For some perspective, that's my left upper thigh in the hip region, which took the brunt of a collision with someone known only as "Joey the Hat" for reasons too long to explain here. Thinking we could outrun lightning (a thought that last goes back to Ben Franklin) we took off for home at the first sign. The rain pelted us like a last call hooker and two of us (one of them me) touched shoulders and one of us (me) went down on the asphalt, hip first, then elbow, then shoulder and finally a snapping head (mine), whose helmet-covered orb smacked the road with more force than a Mike Tyson left hand. Thinking I was seeing my final day, I felt the impact and quickly got up, retrieved the bike (behind me by 5 feet) and scurried to the relative safety of the shoulder of the road. Then, I waited for what I thought would be a dizzying...

A week away from the world is nice. The morning newspaper is scanned like an Evelyn Wood course and what I'm left with are a couple of things that are blown so far out of proportion that they are impossible to ignore, even on vacation. Sarah Palin repeats on America like a bad tuna salad: David Letterman quipped that the Palin family went to a Yankees game and "there was one awkward moment during the seventh-inning stretch: Her daughter was knocked up by Alex Rodriguez." That, says Palin, "crossed the line." What really "crossed the line" was putting Sarah Palin in front of America as a vice-presidential candidate. That's crossing the line. "It's quite a sad commentary on where we are a culture, as a society, to chuckle and laugh through comments such as he made the other night," Palin said. She may believe that Letterman's comments were inappropriate, but how about the premise that what makes someone a legitimate political fo...