This little bird just literally fell out of the sky and lay broken on the concrete 2 feet from where i was standing. We made a fake nest for him, but it's not looking good.

Not a great day so far.

I promise this isn't going to turn into pictures of dying animals.

Is this not the lowest rent halloween costume you've ever seen?

seriously, as bad a person I think I am sometimes, I'm SHOCKED I'm not a complete psychopath (ha)

There's... a lot going on right now. I'll leave it at that.
I'm not going anywhere, but expect sporadic posting at best. Just a heads up.

in the meantime, your wikipedia moment:
SONGS THAT MENTION WHIPPOORWILLS:

• "Alone and Forsaken" by Hank Williams
• "As Above, So Below" by the Klaxons
• "Back Where I Belong" by Darryl Worley
• "Blue Valley Songbird" by Dolly Parton
• "Birth of the Blues" by Frank Sinatra
• "Cry of the Whippoorwill" by Rhonda Vincent
• "Daniel and The Sacred Harp" by The Band
• "Deeper than the Holler" by Randy Travis
• "Does That Wind Still Blow in Oklahoma?" by Reba McEntire and Ronnie Dunn
• "Everybody Ought to Have a Maid" from the musical A Funny Thing Happened on the Way to the Forum
• "Gus: The Polar Bear from Central Park" by The Tragically Hip
• "Hotter Than Mojave In My Heart" by Iris DeMent
• "If the World Had a Front Porch" by Tracy Lawrence
• "I Got a Name" by Jim Croce
• "I'll Tell the Man in the Street" from the musical "I Married an Angel"
• "I'm So Lonesome I Could Cry" by Hank Williams
• "Magnolia" by J J Cale
• "Midnight in Montgomery" by Alan Jackson
• "My Blue Heaven" recorded by Fats Domino, Smashing Pumpkins and others
• "Philadelphia Freedom" by Elton John
• "Sad Song" by Cat Power
• "Sad, Sad Song" by M Ward
• "Songs About Texas" by Pat Green
• "So Says the Whippoorwill" by Richard Shindell
• "Speed of the Whippoorwill" by Chatham County Line
• "Tammy" recorded by Debbie Reynolds and others
• "That Sunday, That Summer" recorded by Nat King Cole and others
• Title track of the album The Stage Names by Okkervil River
• "The First Whippoorwill" by Bill Monroe
• "The Whippoorwill" by Keely Smith
• "Where The Whipoorwill [sic] Is Whispering Goodnight" by Charlie Poole
• "Whippoorwill" by Doug Burr
• "Whippoorwill" by Ozark Mountain Daredevils
• "Whip-Poor-Will" by Magnolia Electric Co.

OrangeCounty Swap Meet

I swear i don't get this place.the world's largest golf cart (limo).

So, I want to talk about this Hillary ad, which is absolutely appalling. Whether or not she's my candidate (and I've probably been pretty clear that she's not, but moving on), that's some pretty appalling campaigning for a primary. Especially one that you cannot statistically win. Really, all you're doing is just throwing rocks. Stop it. Grow the fuck up. Try campaigning on your own strengths like you swear to be doing. Fire more of your team or something.

But I thought it was interesting the way it ended with "Harry Truman said it best – if you can’t stand the heat, get out of the kitchen."

Does this mean... Does this mean that we want Hillary in the kitchen?

There wasn't a better quote to use there? Maybe I'm working in the wrong sector.

5% of precincts reporting

and 1,600 votes for Huckabee have been counted.


(can the Amish vote?)

One of the things about being away for a week is that you come back with scads of shit to catch up on. Work looked like a conspiracy theorist had been sleeping in my office. Podcasts accumulated on my computer, and I'm listening to week-old updates about TV and other stuff that I have convinced myself I care about. And reading through the news is just gutshot after gutshot.
I'm not going to get into it (aside from the post I'll make in 2 seconds about this fucking Hillary ad), but it's worth drawing your attention to this article in the Times about the abysmal state of our public education system:

Ignorance in the United States is not just bliss, it’s widespread. A recent survey of teenagers by the education advocacy group Common Core found that a quarter could not identify Adolf Hitler, a third did not know that the Bill of Rights guaranteed freedom of speech and religion, and fewer than half knew that the Civil War took place between 1850 and 1900.

Years from now we'll be sitting around recounting the glory days of America and her once proud stature of the leader of the free world. Invariably, some fuckface will blame the GOP or the Demmycrats. They'll talk about how it was the wars or it was not stopping the outsourcing of labor or it was John Kerry's giant stupid face. But nobody's going to point out that it's the fact that our kids can barely fucking read and would stab each other in the face for Hannah Montana tickets while we're all sitting here feigning outrage over bullshit minutia. Read the article, please.

Q: What sucks more than watching hockey on a shitty TV?

A: Listening to it quietly in your office.

(sigh).

Also, before you ask, YES, I watched the Sixers game. Yes, I drank a lot of beer while I did it. and YES, it was AWESOME.

So, in the past week I've pretty much been occupying myself by working like an insane person and not sleeping for 5 days, then sleeping for 2 straight. It wasn't so bad.

But it also means I haven't had the time to post here lately. Which is probably a good thing since I might be going crazy.

I finally got back around to cleaning up that thing I wrote what seems like ages ago and sent it out. If you wanted it and didn't get it, holler and I'll send it.

In other news, today is the PA primary. and while I can't be so delusional as to think this will end the frothing-at-the-mouth of the political beast these past few months (years?), at least it's rounding a corner.

Now if you'll excuse me, I haven't read a news article in a week, and I haven't gotten a chance to do most of my day-to-day job stuff. But I'll be back later today.

Hi, remember me?

I'm busy as all holy hell right now (no, I WISH I was an accountant. Steady work like that...) but I'm hoping to get that thing I wrote ages ago cleaned up and sent out tonight. Also, I've got some days off next week so I'll be hopefully writing through my nights as well. The point, though, is that I've got a lot of projects I'm working on, and probably less than a few will ever see light. But I'm working on them.

I post this twice a year, right?

In the meantime, though, I'm staying the hell away from this election until next week. I just...can't find it in me to think about this stuff on top of work and other crap. But I will say that "bittergate" is the stupidest thing I've ever heard. MORATORIUM ON ADDING -GATE TO THINGS PLEASE.

this is not a scandal. for fuck's sake, stop trying to make us think it is one.

In the meantime, I just occupied myself with this (while looking for the "original lyrics" to the Eagles Fight Song:

Fan enthusiasm and misbehavior

Eagles fans' devotion to their team is reflected by ticket sales: games are invariably sold out, and the waiting list for season tickets numbers 60,000.In June 2006, tickets for home games were sold out in a matter of minutes after phone and internet lines opened. Despite finishing with a 6-10 record in the 2005-2006 season, the Eagles ranked second in the NFL in merchandise sales the following year.

Eagles fans have become notorious in the NFL for their enthusiasm, knowledge and team loyalty, and sometimes also for their bad behavior. Eagles' fans enthusiastically embrace hard-edged, dedicated play, but they have also turned quickly against teams perceived as lacking a sufficient commitment to winning.

The most infamous example was the "Santa Claus Incident," on December 15, 1968, at Franklin Field, in which angry fans, upset at the conclusion of yet another failed season under head coach Joe Kuharich (including first losing 11 games, then winning 2, which prevented the team from getting first pick in the next draft, O.J. Simpson), booed and threw snowballs at a man dressed as Santa Claus during the halftime show.

Frank Olivo, a 20-year-old fan dressed as Santa Claus who had been drafted from the stands as an ad hoc replacement for the scheduled Christmas pageant, was the target of the crowd's anger. As Olivo recounts, fans threw snowballs at him after he reached the end zone, shouting that he made a poor Santa. Olivo was interviewed years later by NFL Films, recalling the incident with a smile, saying that he thought the whole thing was humorous.

Other high-profile examples of fan misbehavior include:

• At a December 10, 1989 game dubbed "Bounty Bowl II" against the Dallas Cowboys, the city failed to clear the stadium following a snowstorm. Fans threw snowballs, batteries, beer, and other larger objects onto the field, pelting Cowboys players and coaching staff, NFL officials, and one another. Future Mayor of Philadelphia and current Pennsylvania Governor Edward Rendell got caught up in the fallout from that game when he admitted to a reporter that he had bet another fan $20 that he couldn't reach the field with a snowball. (It can be seen from the videotape that Dallas Cowboys' head coach Jimmy Johnson was, in fact, pelted in the head with a snowball.) As a result, the team added security and banned beer sales for their last remaining home game of the regular season.

• During a November 10, 1997, Monday Night Football game against the San Francisco 49ers, the Eagles fans, in a 24-12 loss, infuriated by a number of calls by the officials and poor play by the Eagles, engaged in a number of highly visible, large-scale brawls on national television. In the last quarter, one fan fired a flare gun across the stadium into empty seats in the 700 level. Other incidents that evening included a woman flashing from the luxury suites and a man operating a chainsaw in the parking lot. Shortly thereafter, the infamous Veterans Stadium courtroom was established.^[9]

• A contingent of Eagles fans traveled to the 1999 NFL Draft in New York to jeer the Eagles' selection of anyone other than Heisman Trophy-winning running back Ricky Williams. Local radio hosts, notably Angelo Cataldi of 610 WIP (AM), had recruited thirty boorishly behaving fans, self-styled as the "Dirty Thirty", to protest the selection of quarterback Donovan McNabb. McNabb has since become a successful sports figure, while Williams has had numerous off-field problems, hampering his career. This has led to criticism of the "Dirty Thirty" and their radio-host instigators.

• In a October 10, 1999 game against division rival Dallas Cowboys, Cowboys wide receiver Michael Irvin was knocked unconscious when his head hit the Vet's hard artificial-turf-covered cement field after a catch. As Irvin lay immobile on the turf, some Eagles fans cheered. Irvin was later diagnosed with a career-ending broken neck. In that game, the Eagles rallied from a 10-0 deficit to gain their first victory of the season, 13-10.^[10]

Acts of violence by Eagles fans against fans of visiting teams, combined with ongoing difficulties with public drunkenness, prompted Philadelphia municipal judge Seamus McCaffrey and the Philadelphia Police Department to establish a small courtroom inside the Vet in 1997. Additionally, plainclothes officers dressed in the colors of the visiting team were assigned to sit in sections (mostly in the Vet's notorious "700 Level" upperdeck) known as being dangerous to opposing fans. By 1999, incidents of fan misbehavior had diminished to the point that the courtroom was no longer needed.

AWESOME.

SEPTA sign

Harolding = revenue?

There's an interesting article in the Inquirer today about Laurel Hill cemetery and how the upkeep costs have them considering the idea of renovating the site as a "heritage park" (i.e. tourist attraction). It's an interesting concept, and certainly one that has worked in other areas (as listed in the article), but it still has me a little baffled as to whether or not I like this idea.
I've spent a lot of time in cemeteries. Not Harold levels, but enough to know a few. I've been lucky enough to live down the road from one of the most beautiful cemeteries on earth, and I've been lucky enough to live near cemeteries that are almost disappeared from neglect. I'm not sure I've never been able to decide if I have a preference.

The grand drama of a place like Bonaventure, or the hundreds of Civil War cemeteries or the U.S. National Cemetery is something that is hard to compete with. The sweeping landscape, the mossy graves and intermingling of traditions that seem to spread across the apparently-still-applicable boundaries of race, class, and religious creed. It's something that makes you feel proud of the way we can celebrate our dead.

and then there's those cemeteries that you might visit just to see a particular resident in. There's Cimetière du Père Lachaise in Paris, where idiots trample over the graves of people like Oscar Wilde, Édith Piaf, and Frederic Chopin to get a glimpse of one of the most absurd and ridiculous people that ever fronted a rock band (which has to be pretty high up there, right?). There's a place like King David Memorial Park in Bensalem, in which Nancy Spungen (and Sid Vicious' ashes) reside*. These almost always make me depressed, since I focus on the graves that people have clearly walked over to get to one particular grave. Guh.

But I think my favorites have always been the ones which I never learned the name of. The ones which stopped expanding a long time ago and you're lucky if you can even see the stones from the road. those are the graves I want to see. The forlorn rocks of the long-forgotten. I don't give a shit about a crypt. Statues and monuments can be beautiful, but they usually just make me think of a phallic symbol of the afterlife or something.

But seeing a kicked over, neglected stone? I get curious. The one you actually gotta squat and sometimes have to brush off in order to read the name and dates and maybe an inscription. I guess I just feel bad for them so I stop for a minute and sound the names out to myself.
So that the man, woman, or child in that box gets at least another glimmer of recognition. or something. I guess I'm a sucker for the people that get screwed by graveyards.


All I know is that if I had Civil War reenactors hanging around my grave I'd be sorta pissed.
*I'm not gonna get into my feelings about these two again.

John Kerry, like many members of congress, is a war-profiteering douchebag.

Philly-bred (and Episcopal Academy alumnus) dicknose John Yoo is in yet a little more hot water.

and while it's been debunked, the naked-lady-in-Cheney's sunglasses thing is pretty funny.

PEDAL-POWERED ROLLER COASTER!

The 1970's CEO earned 40 times the salary of the average worker, the CEO of the early 2000's made 170 times the paycheck of the average worker. Or much more, depending on the study one consults and the way a paycheck is defined.

-John McCain is concerned about CEO salaries.

So I lost my sunglasses a week or two ago. Which in Southern California is pretty much like losing the roof to your home. I've managed so far, but as summer creaks into sight, I'm faced with the option of spending a lot of time in traffic being blinded.

I had them for just shy of 2 years. Which is probably 18 months longer than I've had any other pair of sunglasses in my entire life. But they're easily the nicest pair I've ever owned, too. I've always been more of an "I bought them in a truck stop" guy.

I don't think I ever owned a pair until after college. I certainly never bought a pair.

at some point after the whole thing with my eye happened, I decided that wearing sunglasses was cheating. That it was now who I was and to hide that is only to hide who I am.

I have never once claimed to be very smart.

So yeah. But after some point, you get tired of hearing about all of the eye cancer and you think "hey, those UV rays might be harmful." at least that's what I did. So I bought sunglasses.

Now they're gone, lost on historic route 66 without a care.

and now I find myself missing my shades. The odds of my having ones that nice ever again are slim to none.
No shades, no cable.

if I have a beard next week, hunt me down like a dog.

I haven't shaved in 10 days, so this is likely.

anyway, I miss my sunglasses, and now I have to figure out if there's a different kind I should be looking into, or if I want them at all. Because, you know, driving is overrated.

Classic Photographs recreated in Lego

Pretty much the greatest thing EVER.

(via Geekadelphia)

The census is fucked.

(sigh)