infinite improbability

Don't diss the entertainment when mobsters are present

This is just bizarre. CNN.com - Reputed mobster shoots man for heckling singer - Dec. 24, 2003

Up to my ears in Christmas cookies

Over the past few days, I've baked enough Christmas cookies to feed a small army. Don't know the exact count, but my best guess is between 40 and 50 dozen cookies. Due to childhood nostalgia, I decided to make my favorite cookies that my grandmother used to send and that my mom will never make because she says it's too much trouble. I have no idea how my grandmother could do it every year, making all the different kinds of cookies that she would send to each of her four kids every Christmas. I only made 4 different kinds, and it took forever. Memo to people who think that store bought pre-made slice and bake cookies are easier: making the dough is the easy part, it's slicing and baking the dough for ten dozen walnut slices that's the pain in the neck. I made the dough for all four kinds last Friday, and it took till today before I actually finished baking them all, but they are excellent if I may say so myself. The only question is, with my dad and brother around, how long will the cookies last?

And with that, I'm cookied out, at least till next year when I'll probably start getting nostalgic for walnut slices, date pinwheels, lace cookies, and sand tarts again. And maybe next year I'll actually get around to making my absolute favorite cookie, my grandmother's rum balls, along with the half dozen other cookies that my grandmother always sent us.

Return of the King

Well, I saw Return of the King last night, and it was good, despite the fact that a good 1/3 of the book disapeared into thin air, not even to be hinted at. Some of the corner cutting was good and helped with the flow of the movie, but there were a few things that they changed or cut that really should have been left in. Also, Jackson seems to have missed what the real threat was in the battle outside Minas Tirith. The men of Gondor and of Rohan could have probably won the battle on their own, if it wasn't for the Nazgul turning the tide of battle, but Jackson makes it look like the oliphants (which shouldn't have even been part of that battle) were the big problem. Because the Nazgul, and in particular, the Witch King of Angmar, weren't portrayed as the biggest problem in the battle, you lose some of the reason why it was so incredibly huge when Merry and Eowyn killed the Nazgul lord. That reminds me, I was really looking forward to the scene where Eowyn kills him, but was disapointed with the way that Jackson did the exchange between the two. Tolkien's dialogue was a lot better. Anyway, despite all my nitpickings, all in all, it was great and epic and one of the better movies this year.

By the way, for those Covenant folk who remember Matthias Shapiro, the CNN.com story about the people who went to see the trilogy marathon quotes him. He camped overnight to be first in line and get a good seat.

Forget Sharpie-gate, here's Cellphone-gate

Joe Horn of the New Orleans Saints got his team a 15 yard unsportsmanlike conduct penalty and himself a fine by pulling out a cellphone from the goal post padding and making a call after scoring a touchdown.

Brilliant.

Why it's not smart to shoot guns into the air

It was reported that 8 people were killed and about 80 injured by falling bullets that were shot into the air by people celebrating Saddam Hussein's capture. Also, what was first reported as a car bomb that went off immediately after Bush's speech to the nation ended turned out to be gasoline canisters exploding on a truck after getting hit by stray falling bullets.

Shooting guns into the air just isn't smart. This goes for Iraqis, as well as people all over the world, including America, who celebrate things by taking random shots at the sky. If you ever feel the urge to do so, just say no.

WE GOT SADDAM!

He was hiding in a hole in the ground.

Further complicating the BCS mess...

...CBS Sports Line is reporting that the Coaches Poll, which is supposed to award the #1 ranking to the winner of the BCS matchup, could in fact award USC the #1 spot. The USA Today editor who handles the poll says that he will count any first place votes for USC, if any coaches do in fact vote for them. So, if they get enough coaches deciding to disregard the system, we could have USC winning a unified national title, assuming they beat Michigan.

This is all rather interesting, and if it happens, it probably would spell the end of what ever credibility remains for the BCS. If the coaches and USA Today revolt, then what point is there of having the BCS? Whoever wins the Sugar Bowl will get declared to be the national champion, but that's a pretty empty trophy if the sports writers and the coaches both say that USC is the real champion.

After this years mess, that keeps getting messier, I don't see how anybody can keep a straight face while saying that the system works and we don't need a playoff.

Foot binding, American style

I'd never heard of it till a few months ago when I happend to see an issue of Vogue, but apparently the new plastic surgery rage is to get cosmetic foot surgery so as to look good in your pricey Jimmy Choo or Manolo Blahnik shoes. The Vogue article was favorable to the practice, though in an attempt to appear balanced, they threw in a few contrary opinions.

Sunday's New York Times had a very critical story on the trend, which seems to be driven by women who have already destroyed their feet by wearing poorly fitting shoes, and who are willing to go to any lengths, even having parts of their toes cut off, just to be able to keep wearing their fashionable shoes. The vast majority of podiatrists oppose cosmetic foot surgery and their professional organizations are planning on making formal positions condemning the practice, but there are still podiatrists out there who are either so shallow as individuals that they would rather risk their patient's health for the sake of fashion, or else they are just so greedy that they don't care. Dr. Levine, who's quoted in the NY Times article, said in the Vogue story that she wears stilletos even when in the operating room. Changing the shape of a perfectly good foot just because it doesn't look good in strappy sandals is asking for all sorts of problems, from foot pain, to shin, knee and back problems.

The quote that takes the cake is Levine's statement that she's "simply fulfilling a need, a need to wear stylish shoes." Yeah, you're going to potentially cause permant problems just so that someone can look good. There isn't that big of a difference between the foot binding that was practiced in China and what a lot of women are putting themselves through now. The only difference is that we're more "civilized" about it.

BCS--Bowl Controversy Series?

With Oklahoma's decisive loss, and LSU and USC winning big, things are going to get interesting with the BCS picture. The case can be made that OU shouldn't be in the national title game, since if they can't even win their conference, should they have a chance for the title?

The one thing that can be said is that no matter who ends up ranked #1 and #2, there is going to be controversy. The BCS was supposed to end the title controversy and to produce a true national champion, but it hasn't done a great job of fulfilling its purpose. It's time to consider a playoff system of some kind, so that there isn't any question about who deserves to win.

Decapitation is okay, but don't you dare mess with Santa

Apparently, some folks at Disney weren't too happy about Miramax making Bad Santa. I'm not sure what the big deal is, since Miramax is the studio behind the ultra violent movie Kill Bill, which pushed the envelope of the R-rating, along with plenty of other films that don't exactly fit with the Disney image. Beheadings and limbs being cut off with blood spurting everywhere is fine, but portray a drunken con man posing as a mall santa, well, that's just too much. I guess we now know the one thing that mainstream Hollywood doesn't want to touch--Santa Claus.

My Home Depot story

I've taken up making pottery, which I'll fire in a pit I've dug in the back yard. To keep the sides of the pit from collapsing, I'm lining the pit with concrete pavers that are generally used for steping stones. Anyway, my dad and I went to Home Depot last night to buy the pavers, which are quite heavy. As we were leaving, my dad was pushing the shopping cart when the wheel got stuck in the crack between the sidewalk and the parking lot. The cart stopped moving forward, but what with 200 some pounds of blocks in the cart, and my dad having a lot of momentum from pushing such a heavy cart, the blocks and my dad kept moving, and the cart flipped forward and ended up upside down, with my dad going with it. The end result was the wheels of the cart in the air, and my dad's leg in the wheels of the cart, hopping with his other foot trying to get himself untangled from the cart. It all seems pretty funny now, though it wasn't then, particularly because when my dad went to file an accident report since his finger may or may not be broken and since it happened because of the crack in the Home Depot sidewalk, the stupid manager was really rude and tried to insist that it wasn't their responsibility, and then insisted that my dad's finger couldn't possibly be broken since he could move it. Yeah, right, the Home Depot manager is really qualified to make medical diagnoses, yeah, that's why he's working at Home Depot.

prayer requests

I'd appreciate prayer for my uncle Don, who is going to be placed on the heart transplant list as soon as they get all the tests done that they need. His heart is only pumping at 20% (has to be less than 30% to get on the list). He's had bypass surgery three times, and has congestive heart failure really bad, so he's not in the greatest shape. His first bypass surgery was whe he was 35, and he's about 58 or 59 now.

Also, pray for a family I've babysat for since their kids were really little. The dad is a Major in the Army reserves, and he's being called up, they don't know where to yet, except that he leaves December 11th and has to report to Foot Hood, which means he's probably going overseas. His specializations are transportation and engineering, which likely means that he will end up either moving stuff in Iraq or Afghanistan, or else he'll be building stuff in Iraq or Afghanistan. When you're in the reserves, you have to expect that you could get called up (his old unit is already in northern Iraq), but just knowing the possibility doesn't make it any easier on the family when it happens. Their kids are 4, 7, and 10, so I'm pretty sure that at least the oldest is capable of grasping the whole situation.

While I'm at it, and not nearly as serious as the other two, is that I'm going to be taking the GRE in less than a month and for once in my life, I'm more nervous about the verbal portion of the test than the math.