Wild words

Occasionally, I hear the English language butchered by people who should know better. Yesterday it was a wild old lady who introduced me to "stababilities." It has to do with stability and ability, but I am not sure how. She wasn't clear about that.

8 days a week

The last 8 days in review (more like 10 days, but a nod to the Beatles could never hurt).

I flew to Vancouver B.C. for the Western Political Science Association meetings. I met few people that I have wanted to meet for some time, and I learned a lot about myself. Mostly that I have great research projects and little writing prowess. I plan on fixing that.


I had a scheduled dentist appointment to fix a tooth with an onlay. A simple procedure to drill the decay out of your tooth and replace the lost material with a durable cnc-ed machined piece of porcelain. It hurt later that day, but I figured it was not big deal. I took some advil.


We have had some problems with our DVD player in the Volvo, so I took it to work on wednesday. I dropped it off at the shop and caught a ride to school. I taught my wednesday classes in a little pain. We had planned on going camping in O.C. so I stayed at work until I had to recover the car. At some point during the day I called me wife and told her I needed pain meds, badly. I rushed back to and from the dealership and then on to pick up camping supplies and meet my family. Camping was fun. I would have never guessed that we were in a heavily populated area of O.C. (O'Neil regional park).

During our camping trip I called the dentist about my pain. He said, "you probably need a root canal." GREAT! Friday I canceled classes and went in for a root canal. They couldn't get it all done, so I am scheduled to return for another round. Hurray!

Saturady, in an early morning effort to quiet our loud toilet, me wife accidentally broke the overflow tube. This left us to one bathroom for the weekend. Not a big thing, but I have to take advantage of any opportunity to put a picture of a toilet on my blog.

Saturday was full of the Riverside Air Show. My favorite was the A-10. We watched the afternoon portion from my front lawn.

Sunday was the normal routine. I got to take a nap, which is not normal. I decided to try superglue on the overflow tube. It worked. The toilet was back in business.

Today is monday. I am at the Volvo dealership getting the DVD player fixed.

It should only take 3 hours. I have a laptop and internet access. Why not blog?

Simple yet effective

This is a very nice, short explanation of the credit crisis. It is probably oversimplified, but very effective.


The Crisis of Credit Visualized from Jonathan Jarvis on Vimeo.

[UPDATE] The Potpie Bandit

After a successful sting operation, the potpie bandit has been captured!! After months of effort, Dr. Chris Brown captured the thievery through a top-secret technology (a camera). That is why he is a Criminal Justice Professor, and not me. The culprit confessed to petty thievery of miscellaneous desk items and an insatiable appetite for pot pies. He was then relieved of his janitorial duties.

Hard wiring

If we as humans are innately advanced animals, then the story about male response to seeing scantily clad women is not a surprise. This is likely a corollary to recent stories about women having sexually related dreams about our new president. The issue of concern is not that we are hard wired to have sexual fantasies, but that society is trying to rid us of them. It is not socially acceptable to acknowledge them, and there must be something wrong with those who do. In the name of societal progress, we are exercising social Darwinism against those people who exhibit genetic traits that could save our species. I also believe this to be true of those of us who are able to store fat and nutrients in our bodies in case of an emergency. Society is promoting those genetically weaker subgroups who are thin and sickly over the more genetically robust subgroups. The real question is whether we as a society want to accept the implications of being advanced animals?

This is not why I am fat

The british tabloids always have the best stories. The Daily Telegraph posted a link to the site This is Why You're Fat, and I couldn't help but look. Needless to say, those foods are not the reason that I am fat. This is the reason that I am fat...

The Golden Halo Pesident

While looking at how the new president pulled a Gerald Ford by hitting his head on Marine one, I found this great picture of President Obama. Someone is going to get a big bonus for snapping this one.