Cheaper than Therapy: Loophole in the Culture of Life

Jon Stewart on Stem Cells, Iraq, and murder.

The rising cost of Beer

It appears as though an abnormally hot year, causing an abnormally lower crop yield will result in the rising cost of bread, pasta and beer.These are three staples in my diet.

On a side note; the article also mentions corn. Corn, the miracle grain that we're going to turn into ethanol in order to run our cars on something other than a petroleum product, and break our addiction to middle east oil. Does anyone else see this and make the following connection(s)? Corn crop yield is used for making ethanol. Corn crop yield is also directly proportional to the amount of fertilizer used. Most fertilzers are petroleum based. We're not any further ahead using ethanol. This technology seems doomed.

Canada

Canada is a great nation. Not a perfect nation, but certainly a great place to live. Take the situation in Lebanon. We're evacuating all 50,000 Canadians from the country, all paid for by the gov't. It doesn't matter if you're rich, poor, a 'born'n'bred' Canadian there on vacation or a Canadian/Lebanese with dual citizenship, if you're old or young, or good looking or ugly. Still, it's taking a bit of time to achieve this evacuation, which is understandable, but, at least they're being evacuated. Lots can be said (and has been said) about Canada's slowness in this and it's lack of preparedness, which are valid points in my opinion, and I'd probably feel a bit differently about this if it was my Father or my Grandmother, or my Daughter that was trying to flee Lebanon before a bomb landed on or near them.
Stateside, things are a bit different. Just like Katrina and New Orleans, if you've got the cash, feel free to be evacuated. If you're poor, we're sorry. It seems that the US of A is charging it's citizens to evacuate them from a warzone. To be fair, they're not demanding cash up front, just that you sign a promisary note saying you'll pay up later. Oh, and they don't bother telling you how much it will cost, because they don't really know. It's ironic that the states will spend billions bombing and rebuilding another nation, and then not be able to cover the costs of evacuating it's own people when the country they're in is being bombed (probably with bombs subsidized by the US...)
That's my morning rant...

South Park Liberal Leadership

This is hilarious. Worth a couple minutes of your time. What the liberal leadership candidates would look like if they were southpark characters.

And He Makes Three

Dave and Amber are having a kid, and telling the world about it.

Zidane

Zinedine Zidane deserved his red card. Anyone who head-butts another player deserves to be removed from the game. It was stupid, and a terrible way for him to end his career. He was obviously provoked (he was exchanging words with the 'victim', who had just been tugging on and grabbing Zidane's injured shoulder - injured on a non-call earlier in the game).

Otherwise, most of the game was stellar. There wasn't very much diving, or embellishment, and there was lots of great soccer being played. It was an excellent world cup final. I never like seeing a game decided on penalites, but since that option existed, both teams seemed to be playing for them, not taking too many chances in the extra time.

If I could change one thing about soccer, and the way the games are called, it would be this: Something needs to be done to disuade players from embellishing or faking injuries. If a player is tackled (or otherwise) and begins rolling around on the field, grimacing in pain (nearly crying), clutching his ankle, or shin, and the play is stopped to attend to him, that player should have to leave the field for a minimum amount of time, 5 minutes, maybe even 10, or else be substituted. That way, the player can assess if it's worth causing his team to be shorthanded for a period of time by causing the game to be interruped for his 'injury', or if he should just grow some balls, get back on his feet and be a man and keep playing. As a player, I've got no problem at all doing the sportsmanlike thing and stopping the game if one of my opponents is hurt, but if that same player is up and running a minute later it just seems suspect. There just don't seem to be any 'Ryan Smith's' in soccer, a player who gets his teeth knocked out and somehow keeps playing in the game - or a guy like Shanahan who limps to his bench on a broken ankle so that one of his teamates can come on in his place. I love the game of soccer, but I can't stand watching a player rolling around on the floor holding his foot because someone else touched it. I play soccer and the tackles/challenges are just as fierce in my league, but someone people stay on their feet, or somehow find their feet a few moments after being knocked down.

The Dilbert Blog: Planning my Funeral

This made me laugh out loud. It's 8:23PM, I'm sitting at work on my own, getting ready for a meeting tomorrow, taking a break to read the dilbert blog, where Scott Adams muses on planning his own funeral. It's a must read. If you don't laugh, then one of us has something wrong with them.

Go Karts can be a tonne of fun. 10 of us filled a track on Monday morning, and had a blast. I lucked out and had a fast car which meant that I could do stupid things like run Carlo or Michael of the road, or let them by for the thrill of catching up again and passing... I couldn't stop laughing the whole 5 (6..7??)laps. It's so satisfying when someone tries to pass you and you close the door on them, forcing them to either slow down or eat it in the tire wall.
In highschool I worked at a go-kart track for a summer and I hated people who drove like me, because it meant extra work for me, fixing the tire walls, pulling people out of the ditch, etc.
After it was all done, we piled back into our two vehicles on the way to a cottage for the day. I'm not sure if anyone else noticed, but the two most aggressive drivers on the course were now driving two slightly larger more powerful vehicles.