Idealogian

Earworm

This morning on the subway, I listened to James Taylor and Evanescence. They're currently duking it out inside my head to decide whose songs will be stuck in my brain for the next few hours. James is surprisingly tough, but I think ultimately he'll lose.

Update: Evanescence seems to have won for now. But let's see how they fare against 6'4" Chucho Valdes!

Relationship Advice

Couple Celebrates 82 Years of Marriage

It took George a year to win Amelia's heart, and even then her family didn't approve. Three times their engagement was broken. She never understood why they didn't see what a good man he was, so finally the couple decided to elope.

They were married Sept. 9, 1921. A month later, the devout Catholics had a formal marriage ceremony. She was 18, he 20.

"She was everything I wanted, and that's all," George Limpert, now 102, told the St. Louis Post-Dispatch. His wife is now 100.

There are a number of other interesting elements to the story, which is worth checking out, including this part:

[T]hey each have their own theories about what made the marriage a success.

"You have to cooperate with one another," said George. "Everybody has faults."

The children mention her patient and loving nature, his solid work ethic and the couple's faith in God.

"You have to stick together," Amelia said. "You can't disagree about everything. It would never work."

Of course, there is one other important tip if you want your marriage to last 82 years: live to be 102.

'Kindness' overwhelms Florida intruder

From MSNBC:

After a man wielding a sawed-off shotgun smashed his way into their home Tuesday night, two Carrollwood, Fla., women kept their cool and overpowered the intruder with "kindness."

Cathy Ord, 60, and Rose Bucher, 63, said they offered the man a ham sandwich with pickles, a bottle of rum and a shower, even providing him with a disposable razor to shave off his scruffy beard, the Tampa Tribune reported Thursday.

They also chatted amiably with the man and agreed to call him a cab when he indicated he was ready to leave. But when the sated "guest" fell asleep while awaiting the cab, they called sheriff's deputies, who arrested the man, the newspaper said.

Of course, when this story is made into a movie, the ending will be different: think "Yael."

'Slow Start' to Level Pre-School Playing Field

ScrappleFace has a really cute piece about achieving equality in schools:

The Senate version of the Head Start reform bill would rename and 're-mission' the Great Society program. Instead of trying to prepare poor children for school in hopes of enhancing achievement, 'Slow Start' will enroll children from middle-class and wealthy families and attempt to "confuse and de-motivate them" so that they won't excel their peers from low-income families.
...
"Our nation was founded on equality," said Massachusetts Senator Edward M. Kennedy. "But the poor kids will never catch up if we don't do something to trip up the rich kids."

There's more there. For those who haven't seen ScrappleFace before, I highly recommend you check it out. It's got some pretty witty satire and is updated frequently enough (a few times daily) to keep you interested.

One detail I really appreciate about the site is the note above its comments section: "Please Note: ScrappleFace readers are intelligent enough to express themselves without obscenities. ScrappleFace endeavors to be suitable for all ages."
Good to see some people still like to keep it clean.

Sanity Check

I believe there may come a time in the life of every millionaire when he or she goes beyond the standard "eccentric" and earns the full title of "Wacked-Out Psycho."

CNN, apparently, disagrees. How else to explain the headline: "Eccentric millionaire can't recall details of cutting up friend?"

For This We Need A Study?

Study: American toddlers eat poorly

Well, duh! I mean, anyone who's ever seen kids eat should know that. They get Cheerios all over the floor. They get tomato sauce in their hair. And sometimes they won't even open their mouths unless you make silly little airplane noises. It should be quite obvious that they all still need a lot of practice.

Filmwise

Last week's answers are up. This week I can get #2, #4, #5 and #6. Any others?

World RPS - Update

Well, the World RPS Championships I mentioned in an earlier post have come and gone, and once again I am trophyless. To my credit though, I was at least focusing on the right moves: the "Fistful O' Dollars" (Rock-Paper-Paper) I mentioned in that post was the winning gambit. Better luck next year.

Thanks to both of my sisters for the link

Titles

On the subway the other day, I saw an unusual slip of paper posted on the wall:

Mr.
Prophet Reverend
Michaels

Has God's given power to heal through prayer.
Solves all of life's problems.

This was followed by a phone number (which, regrettably, I didn't write down) and neighborhood. Strange, though not all that much stranger than subways in general.

What I'm wondering, though, is this: if you were a prophet, would you still preface it with "Mr." (or "Mrs.", or "Ms.")? I mean, we don't say, "Mr. Dr. Smith." But we do say "Mr. President" (though we don't say "Mr. President Bush").

I guess there's no good precedent for the etiquette on this one, so he probably knows what he's doing, you know, being a prophet and all.

U.N. Votes to Dismantle Great Wall of China

UNITED NATIONS (Idealogian) -- On the heels of its earlier demand that Israel halt construction of its security barrier, the United Nations General Assembly today approved a resolution calling for the dismantling of the Great Wall of China. Long viewed as one of China's national treasures, the Wall has recently come under attack for being outdated and archaic.

U.N. Secretary-General Kofi Annan welcomed the move. "It is a well-documented historical fact that this wall was built and made strong simply in order to keep out the foreigners. Such a horrific symbol of bigotry and xenophobia has no place in the modern era of multiculturalism, multinationalism and appeaseme-, er, peace."

The resolution's approval was lauded by its sponsors, the Mongols and Huns. They had urged the Assembly to overlook their shared history of aggression and hostility, and promised to "be nice this time." "The Wall is a relic of times past. It has lost both its military significance and its global distinctiveness," argued Mongolian Ambassador to the United Nations, Genny Kahn.

Still, the measure was not without its critics. "I fear we have begun the descent down a very slippery slope. It starts with the Great Wall, but where does it end? You or I could easily be next," said David Gilmour, lead guitarist of Pink Floyd.

Robert Frost, a well-known opponent of walls and barriers, could not be reached for comment.

Boy Band

OK, so he's no Justin Timberlake, but Eugene Mirman, the Marvelous Crooning Child may just be the Next Big Thing. (Make sure you have your headphones on.)

Filmwise

In this week's Filmwise Invisibles, I can get #1, #2 and #6 (and I haven't even seen any of those movies!).

Can anyone get any of the others?

Self-Fulfilling Satire

It's hard to believe that this article didn't originate as satire:

Concerned about the appearance of disarray and feuding within his administration as well as growing resistance to his policies in Iraq, President Bush - living up to his recent declaration that he is in charge - told his top officials to "stop the leaks" to the media, or else.

News of Bush's order leaked almost immediately.

Bush told his senior aides Tuesday that he "didn't want to see any stories" quoting unnamed administration officials in the media anymore, and that if he did, there would be consequences, said a senior administration official who asked that his name not be used.

Link via Best of the Web

Accept No Imitations

Tired of all those cow-building pages that just don't meet your cow-building needs? Then look no further! Try The Ultimate Build Your Own Cow Page (Version 2.05) and never settle for inadequate cows again!

Bad Hair Day

If I weren't already busy with the upcoming World RPS Championships and had more than a month's notice, I'd consider taking a shot at the World Beard and Moustache Championships. Perhaps I'll start getting ready for Berlin, 2005.

I just hope they have a category for "Light & Patchy."

Now on Sale

Just came across this oddity on my way to a New York Times article:

When's the last time you saw an ad for money?

Chutzpah

The very definition of it:

The mother of a man who killed three co-workers before shooting himself in a workplace rampage has asked the company to compensate her for her son's death because it occurred at work, the company said on Tuesday.

Modine Manufacturing Co. has turned down the request by Nina Tichelkamp-Russell, the mother of the 25-year-old gunman Jonathon Russell, company spokesman Mick Lucareli said. But the claim must still be reviewed by the state, he said.

Russell's mother filed a claim seeking death benefits under the workers' compensation system, which provides financial payments to injured workers or the families of workers killed on the job, Lucareli said.

Rocket Science

While I was away, I came across this gem of objective reporting by CNN:

Of course, as any space historian knows, Yuri Gagarin was the first man in space.

His 1961 flight aboard a Soviet Vostok space capsule, catapulted the former air force pilot into the history books and set alarm bells ringing in the Western world that the final frontier was about to turn a very communist shade of red.

But was he really the first?

Several centuries earlier -- legend says about 1500 AD, sometime around the middle of the Ming Dynasty -- a Chinese stargazer named Wan Hu dreamed of going where no man had gone before and set out to turn that dream into space age reality.

...

Wan's pioneering spacecraft was built around a sturdy chair, two kites and 47 of the largest gunpowder-filled rockets he could lay his hands on.

Come the launch day, Wan dressed himself in his imperial finery, strapped himself in the chair and called upon his 47 servants, each armed with a flaming torch, to light the 47 fuses.

Their job done, the servants speedily retreated to a safe distance ... and waited.

What came next, the legend goes, was an enormous bang.

When the smoke eventually cleared, Wan and his chair were nowhere to be seen.

Whether Wan actually made it or not has never been made clear.

The prognosis does seem a little doubtful.

CNN seems to be adopting FOX News's creed of "We Report, You Decide." Personally, though I'm no rocket scientist, I'd have trouble writing that article without making heavy use of the word "smithereens."