Saturday, March 04, 2006



From the upcoming series 52

Thursday, March 02, 2006

Greetings, Loyal Leaguers.

I haven't been posting much as there's not been much on my plate I felt was worthy of discussion. Not that complete boredom has been a deterrent in the past, but I just haven't had the energy. Plus, I've been watching gobs of porn.

Little joke there, Judy.

The Mellies results are coming in. I don't know if it's the group of Leaguers sending in answers this year or what, but the responses are a pretty colorful bag. I'm expecting the results to be content fodder for about a week, which is great, because lately, Leaguers, I've got nothing.

I think I've now got 7 responses, including two from people with whome I do not believe I've ever had any previous correspondence. It's that sort of effort, Tamara and Natalie, that makes it all worthwhile. I'm trying to get Steanso to revise his responses as he sent in only one word answers. Dedman will surely make something of that. One word responses are not really in the spirit of the whole thing. We need your comments and criticisms up here in black and blue, and we want a little explanation.

That said, other Loyal Leaguers (such as my wife) have as of yet to respond. Nathan has been curiously silent. Where are these Leaguers? Where is Shoemaker? Where is Harms?

Oh, and a special note for Jim D., RHPT has sent in his responses. And he managed to do it without writing a novel (ahem).

KareBear's big birthday is just around the corner, so I'm also losing precious blogging time working on a much requested gift. The League has been asked to create some work of art for KareBear. Well, The League was getting close to completion on Tuesday night when we totally screwed up what we were doing, and now we're trying to figure out if we should start over or try to salvage the piece by turning it into something different. Only time will tell.

Our refrigerator's ice machine died this fall, and being poor, we could not afford to fix it, nor could we get a new fridge. Now the ice machine is giving off a foul odor that is omnipresent in the freezer as well as in the fridge. The smell is in the food. It's in the g-d food. Now I gotta go get a new damn fridge. And refrigerators aren't cheap, Leaguers. Not with an ice machine and water filter. Well, I am fairly certain the fridge left by the previous occupants of this house is VERY cheap, but I am going to be looking for a more robust design and a 3 year warranty on anything I buy.

The best part is, now I get to go to Sears and have somebody spend like an hour telling me about the benefits of a wide variety of refrigerators. This is a topic I have never once before pondered. It's a brave new world for The League.

Oh, and I've asked Jamie for a word to update you regarding her pneumonia. She says "Hack-cack". Nice.

I don't have any idea if she's feeling better or not. "I never really felt sick. I just kind of felt fevery," she says, reading over my shoulder. "It's great having everything I say documented," she adds.

Now she is curiously silent... "How to get your wife to shut up. Oh GOD! STOP!" She insists with just a hint of Erica Foster in her voice.

Again... the horrible silence.

She pats me on the head like I'm Mel. It is nice. Until she points out a type-o which I fix. There is much sighing and rolling of eyes. Now a rapid departure and an addendum. "How to get your wife to leave..."

She is eating ice. And now she's gone.

I think that's all for today, Leaguers.

Keep it real.

Tuesday, February 28, 2006

Arrested Development to Showtime?

It's a rumor! And that's good enough for The League. Read here.

The irony of this, of course, is that we just got rid of like 15 movie channels. Just when you think you're out...

Mr. F!

Monday, February 27, 2006

Hey, ya'll.

Okay, so... today sucked. Jamie woke up around 3:45 AM and noticed, "Hey, I can't breathe." So we went to the ER and got her fixed up. Turns out she has a touch of the pneumonia. Fortunately, around our house, a touch of pneumonia is nothing to get all that wigged about. Now how does one get pneumonia in PHX? I have no idea, but if someone could do it, it's my wife.

Anyway, she's doing better. A little rest, a couple of pills, and we're right as rain. No need to move the house to the lee side of the stone or anything.

Anyhow, I am pretty tired, so I'll abbreviate tonight's post by celebrating the Suns' victory over the Houston Rockets, and this with both Amare and Kurt Thomas out. And, uhmmm... what else.

Man, I'm pretty tired. Ya'll are on your own.

Sunday, February 26, 2006

Olympic Closing Ceremonies

I'm in a little late. Bear with me. Roar.

YMCA by a clown orchestra? My God. The horror. The horror. Are those aviators dancing to YMCA? Does the homoerotic spirit of the song translate well into Italian? Why do I always end up dancing to that song at weddings? Oh, yes... booze.

Now there's some fascist raising a Greek flag. I had a Gyro and Greek Salad for lunch on Friday. Delicious.

Is that Gypsy Kings? More people should dress as a cone. That looks sharp. The athletes look tired and unenthused entering the stadium. Bolare? Wow, the orchestra looks like they're on crank. Joey Cheek! That guy's a piece of work. Pressuring everyone else into giving away their hard earned Olympic money. Oh, he's going Ivy League? Well, of course he's giving away his money, he's probably fabulously wealthy. I've always suspected you had to be rich to, you know, train for speed skating-

Whoa. A new "Posedion Adventure"? Starring Josh Lucas? I want to be a movie executive. Didn't any of these people see "Swimming with Sharks?"

Jamie's doing laundry. I should help. Nah.

I am not going to miss the ten Olympic themed commercials they keep showing over and over and over. Life takes not watching Visa commercials until your eyes bleed.

Oh, here come the athletes. This is going to take a while. I'll be back.

Wait, no... they're wearing clown noses. I'm not really clear what the deal is here. That's a lot of Canadians. "That'll be a mosh pit!" Yeah, cause I think Avril "Punk Rock" Lavigne is performing. People are going to want to do the pogo and whatnot. So punk rock.

Again, what's up with the white-clad aviators?

This is really boring, and the music sounds like the stuff they play at La Madeline. I haven't been to La Madeline in, like, forever. Is it a sandwich shop? A coffee house? Is it overpriced? Only the guy in the funny hat knows for sure.

You may not know this, but The League's family hails from Finland. At least half of the family. The Admiral's family is much more typical American Mutt. But KareBear is a child of Finnish immigrants. 1) I always think it would be funny if they had my Mom standing at the end of the race under the banner that says "finish", 2) Everyone from Finland looks like my mom and/ or the people from her hometown, which is like 70% Finnish.

I need a 5 blade razor. For those "tricky" places.

I don't care what you say, those US uniforms look like the piped winter jackets KareBear used to outfit us with from K-Mart when The League and Steanso were just wee little bloggers.

Hey, Shani! Going to train in Vancouver. I guess that's good. Emily Hughes. She acquitted herself beautifully. There's that Japanese dame who... wait, now I have to watch this again? I've had this song in my head since the opening ceremonies. I guess it's from Carmen. The League is no Opera buff. It confuses me, and often features angry clowns. She can really pop around on the ice, can't she? Zip zip zip. Well, she's happy. I've already seen this. "Cool Beauty"? I had a nickname for like five minutes in 8th grade. They called me "Mueller" after George Mueller, the goofy center of the UT basketball team. Could have been worse.

Deal or No Deal? No Deal, thanks. I'll take my handbag and go.

Jamie hates the ads where people drive across a tumultuous CG landscape, serenely secure in their luxury SUV. I hate them, too, but I don't bring it up all that often. Blam, there's a skyscraper blasting out of the lush countryside. Blam, there's a freeway. And there's some lady in the passenger seat looking like maybe she has to go potty but she dare not ask her husband to pull over lest she upset his dispassioante SUV driving.

Doo doo doo dooot... This is really dull. Sorry. You guys seemed to like my "real time blogging" during the opening ceremonies, so I felt obliged to do it again.

There's Ohno. Oh no. He's still cheesey. I don't care what medals he won. He's Johnny from Karate Kid. He'd so sweep the leg. Does he have an ugly cleft chin? Why the nasty looking facial stripe? Does it look good? oh, no.

I like that S. Korean guy. He's okay. I watched this already. And I know Ohno won. They just told us that. Can't say I'm a fan of these flashbacks. Now they're trying to interview a sleep deprived Ohno. He seems fairly sober. Nobody wants to interview Bode.

Okay, gang, I'm out. This is boring.

Oh, Dad, they're going to fuel cars with corn. Sorry about your whole industry. I remember Ari Fleischer telling folks looking into alternative energy back in 2000 to please stick it in their ear. I guess that was a long time ago now.

We can't forget about Shaun White because you will show us. I like that there's now something in the Olympics you can get points for called a "fakey". That's almost as awesome as "salchow!" I have to say this, I think the Flying Tomato is annoying. But I find most 13-20 year olds annoying. I think it comes from knowing what a moron I was. Am. But, yeah, he's like my Gen Y nightmare.

Ah, Sasha Cohen. She looks like a hummel figurine. Wow. She has nothing to say. Now they're dwelling on her errors. See, Leaguers, this is why I don't even try. You're like the third best athlete in your sport, and all they can do is dwell on that one second of slip-up... I need to be involved with things where they're not going to dwell on what you did wrong. Wait, if that's true, I need a new job.

Be a part of "Walk the Line"? That seems like an odd way to sell a movie about a guy's spiralling drug abuse. "Naked Lunch"! Be a part of it! "Trainspotting"! Be a Part of it! I want to work in advertising. Apparently you can be a complete moron.

That is a tiny car.

Jamie is screaming at Lucy.

More of those damned clowns. God, how I hate clowns. Goddammit, it's more of this Cirque crap. Felliniesque? See, this is why I avoid European film. I remember when Wesley Snipes did this floating bit in "DROP ZONE". My Dad used to take me to all the Wesley Snipes movies. We LOVED Wesley Snipes. Not a lot of room for error in floating over a giant, whirling fan, I'd think.

These commentators suck. Who IS this? Enough with the Wesley Snipes guys. It's just not that great, and this post-Enya music is dippy. I miss the tree men. I also think that this would be more impressive if these guys had lit their heads on fire, a la the opening ceremonies.

Getting boring. Wait, he might leave the stadium. That can't be safe. Dammit, no injuries. I haven't watched Tron in, like, forever. And I have it on DVD. That clown car is on fire. Why? There's so much about European culture I guess I should know, but I simply... wait, those dudes have flaming pin wheel backpacks. Jamie has declared she wants one.

Now this boring dude who looks like someone who The Admiral would work with. Oh, sweet. That dude is so going to jail. I mean the guy who just rushed the stage. Note the Golden Palace.com shirt. I guess that's good advertising of some sort.

Lucy is in trouble for trying to eat Jeff, she's sitting down next to me.

Wait, this Olympic guy has been "seduced" by fairplay and the Olympic spirit? That's a little weird. I don't think that translated correctly. Why are they fighting doping? Can you imagien how @#$%ing crazy sports would be if we had all these roid freaks skiing around? I'd buy that for a dollar.

The Olympics head for Canada, eh? The mayor of Vancouver. A quadraplegic! Wow. Our mayor just has bad hair. Not the same story of personal triumph. Holy crap. Mounties. I love Mounties. O, Canada! That opera guy looks liek someone you'd see at the Sizzler. I need to learn to take Canadians seriously. One day it's going to get my ass kicked.

Transfer of the flag. This is less formal than I'd envisioned it. Volare? I'm speechless.

This Candadian mayor guy is a ruler. He has my vote.

All right! Vancouver's presentation! What will they bring? Native Americans. Man, I got those in my office. And, now... a snowmobile with an acrobatic snow skiier. Oh, man. Yahoo Serious. This is starting to suck. Badly. Wait, that was cool. "This remind sme of Ice Age" says Jamie. Not cool. Wait... Whales? Now I'm scared. Is this a tribute to the agricultural products of Vancouver?

There's a uniform suckiness to all of these things, isn't there?

If this is Vancouver, Vancouver is dumb. A fish. Great. Oh, it's Avril Lavigne. And she's blonde. Wow, she's really evolved from a one-hit wonder into a bland, forgettable artist. I'm sure she's still HUGE in Canada. Are there more Cirque clowns running around? Oh, for the love of Mike.

A tribute to something... a flag is being lowered. Well, so far, no Bryan Adams. We're doing well. Those are nice hats.

Man, who spent all the time coming up with all this ceremony? I mean, this is a lot of work.

Oh, good, singing kids. And an accordian. Just what the doctor ordered to break up the mood. There goes the flag. Bye, flag. Ah, they turned off the rings. My Mom must love all those dopey kids in their angel outfits. Stuff like that makes her giddy. That and Neil Diamond. She LOVES Neil Diamond. Oh, and an angelic aviator. I am definitely missing something.

I've never seen "The Apprentice". I don't like self-serving over-achievers, and I don't like to see people making asses of themselves on TV.

They're really pimping our local weather man. Keep in mind, it hasn't rained in PHX in 140 days. Why I would care about the weatherman is beyond me.

Now we get Andrea Bocelli. He looks sort of familiar. I think he's been on PBS. I think they brought in the virgins. What the hell is going on here? Bocelli looks sleepy. He's wearing jeans. Pretty freaking casual when Pavarotti wore a cape and all when he opened the games.

Seriosuly, what the hell is up with all the brides or whatever? Are these the available women of Torino? Hey, big American athlete, you want to marry local girl? We give you one for cheap. You go find one you like.

They represent hope and rays of hope. Okay. Well, you know, I remember getting married, but I don't remember "Hope" being how I felt when I got married. Trapped, maybe. Just kidding, sweetie. That's a joke.

The virgins have formed a big dove. Don't let Cheney get near them.

Oh, they made themselves into the Torino logo. Here comes some lady trudging up to the stage in a really big wedding dress. I dunno. This makes no sense. There goes the eye of Sauron.

Fireworks! zap zap zap

It just doesn't seem right without yet another rendition of Carmen playing.

Oh, great, here comes Ricky Martin. I wasn't aware he was still relevant. Oh, look, S&M outfits, As Jamie points out, that's quite the contrast they got goin' on. This is the sexiest Olympics closing ceremony ever. Much more so than that summer when they accidentally left Stevie Wonder out in the middle of a field in a giant, floating piano. Ricky Martin must have a very interesting view of the world. I guess I'm a little jealous.

The Dan Jansen DHL commercial? See, when he fell that time right after his sister died, my mom totally freaked out. Like, seriously, I needed therapy. She was crying and crying for Dan Jansen. I still have a twitch in my eye from when that happened.

Oh, right on. NBC and Sunday Night football looks rad. I actually like Costas, and I think I'm on the record about Al Michaels being one of my favorite sports commentators.

I wonder if Shaun White is glad he came back now. I have a Ricky Martin tolerance level of like .04. This is already way past that limit. Just remember Event Organizers, when you pick an artist because you think everybody likes them, that usually means nobody is really all that much into them. Unless you can somehow bring George and John back from the great beyond, there are very few groups we'd all be very curious to hear.

Ah, Joey Cheek. He seems too decent. Nobody is that decent. Nobody. Well, maybe Joey Cheek.

And this "Do the Hustle" ice skating commercial for car insurance... it needs to end.

I watched "Law & Order SVU" once (dunh dunh). I have no recollection of the show at all. (dunh dunh)

More dancing aviators. Oh no. It's Ohno. He loves the camera, does he not? There's Abba in the background. Wait, nevermind, it's that dumb Madonna song. Toby Dawson. He seems amazed enough that he's there, so I can't imagine what it's like for him to have won.

These packages where they show you stuff you already saw? It needs to end. Cindy Klassen. Canadian. Swearing she'll be there for 2010. Huh.

Well, that's it. I'm done.

Hope you guys enjoyed. This was a pain and I plan never to do it again.

Oh, hey... Jamie was reading my post and she tells me "Bocelli wasn't sleepy. He's blind." There's been some hemming and hawing here over how I should address this oversight. Wait, that's not what I meant... oh... God. I am going to Hell. Jamie has just wrapped it up with "Ryan Steans, 'Sensitivity' is thy middle name."
Venom is coming.

Saturday, February 25, 2006



Godspeed, Mr. Knotts. You will be missed.

Don Knotts has merged with the infinite at the age of 81.

Thursday, February 23, 2006

The 2006 Mellies: Rules and Guidelines

All right, Leaguers. Thanks to overwhelming support in favor of another round of official League of Melbotis Awards (aka: The Mellies), we're going to give this a shot.

What the hell is a Mellie?

The Mellies are a celebration of the readership of The League of Melbotis. We ask you, the Leaguer, to give us some feedback not just on the super awesome content you can find here regularly at The League of Melbotis, but also we have some questions for you about this amazing world around us.

Here are some questions from a previous go-round.

Here are responses from day one, and day two and day three.

Now, some guidelines.

1) Try to answer all of the questions. The more answers we have, the more fun this will be.
2) All answers will be reprinted.
3) Thus, try to keep your responses down to a sentence or two. I don't want this turning into War and Peace. That said, a "why" is usually going to be key to your response.
4) I will also, of course, list all answers, and then make a special note of the answer that wins the 2006 Mellie. This may or may not be preceeded by a comment from The League as to why the comment took the coveted award. The League will probably also chime in with his own answer.
5) All entrants should submit answers to: melbotis_steans at yahoo dot com
6) I'm considering sending a special "thank you" to all entrants who also include their street address. So, you know, include your street address.
7) Keep it clean unless really, really funny
8) Entries will be accepted for the next month


And now, your nominating categories for the 2006 Mellies!

League of Melbotis categories

a) Why does the League obsess about _____?
b) The League needs to cover _______
c) In the future, The League should not ________
d) You should really add this blog to your blogroll


And now, on to the rest...

1) The person who is always on TV, but whom drives me insane
2) Most questionable release from a major movie studio (theatrical release)
3) Most poorly thought-out band/album/ song
4) You know what was surprisingly good, but you'd never think it? (category: movie)
5) It is bad television, and yet I cannot look away
6) You know what was the most amazing day this year?
7) You know what's surprisingly good, but you'd never think it ? (category: food)
8) God help me, but when I saw this on the news, I was secretly gleeful
9) I never mentioned it, but you know who is kind of hot..?
10) If I had a time machine with a single use, and my time travelling would not be filled with all sorts of crazy logic problems, I would go back to fix this one thing this year
--in my personal life
--on a more macrocosmic level
11) Best item at Burger King
12) If I could force you to read but one book, it would be
13) I'm no astrologist, but I love the planets. If I could dedicate myself to studying but one planet, it would be
14) I am most like the following Hanna Barbera cartoon character


That's it! Send in your submissions, and we'll be getting back to you guys on this late in March.

beep***beep***beep***beep***beep

SPECIAL MID-DAY GORILLA RELATED BULLETIN!

The History Channel will be broadcasting a show tonight about a gigantic gorilla which lived millions of years ago in Asia somewhere. The gorilla is commonly known as Giganto. Which is awesome.

Set your DVR's, Leaguers.

Go here for more.

we now return you to your usual, non-gorilla related day.
Huh

Who is Nancy Grace, why is she crazy and why is she allowed to go on Headline News and rant like a pedantic maniac every night for an hour?

And did I just dream it yesterday, or was CNN.com running a story on some pastor in the SouthEast who was going to military funerals and protesting them? I swear I read a very complicated story on CNN.com about bikers going to military funerals to shield the families from these folks. The craziest part of the whole thing was that this minister believed that the reason the US was embroiled in the current conflict in Iraq (and possibly Afghanistan) was because the US "harbors" homosexuals, and God was punishing the U.S.

Today I couldn't find a trace of the story, which literally is making me wonder whether I dreamed the story last night. Am I nuts? Wasn't it there? There are items about Lindsay Lohan and shit in the headlines on CNN.com and I can't find THIS story? I distinctly remember making a note in my head that I wanted to blog on the topic, specifically that this pastor had not just made the statements, but somehow found a very active flock... and today... Wha-?

I swear I must have just made the whole story up in my crazy head.

Oh, wait, no, here it is...

God Bless America

Wednesday, February 22, 2006

the 2006 Mellies

God knows why, but for some reason this week RHPT and Jim D started asking me this week "Whatever happened to the Mellies?"

For those of you coming in late to the game, The League used to have lots of contests and stuff. I'd pose a question or group of questions, usually with a set of rules, and then I invited Loyal Leaguers to send in responses. We've had two or three Halloween contests, Holiday contests, one or two goes at The Mellies (a sort of all around awards) and a few other things.

I dunno. I guess at some point people quit sending in responses, so I sort of lost interest. In fact, ironically, I recall Randy pitching a fit when I asked why he hadn't participated in one of my last contests. And then my Halloween contest this year received exactly zero responses. So, anyway, that's that.

I do get comments, so I guess that's sort of made me feel that The League is plenty interactive. But even that's been a bit of a wild ride. Once you add a comments section to your blog, you really change the dynamic of the whole enterprise. There's a lot more give and take. Instant feedback lets you know what people are interested in (in my case, for some reason, everyone's always interested in my days as a high-school loser and my lack of success in various minimum wage jobs. Nobody cares about comics, that's why you don't see anymore about that here, despite the original intention of this site to be comics and pop-culture stuff).

Bottom line: Feedback makes you want to blog. When you get no comments for a while, you REALLY start to lose interest.

The biggest downside is having to police the comments section when people are feeling cranky or decide to pick a fight. I've lost some good Loyal Leaguers after tiffs in the comments section. Now, I can't say that the odd comment is what has driven their departure for sure, but, yes, a few people disappeared forever and ever once myself or someone else has disagreed with them in the the ol' comments. And that's sad, because The League is really intended to be a happy place.

I have also had the unpleasant task of occasionally removing a comment I felt was inappropriate, which I REALLY didn't want to ever have to do. I know it makes me a Nazi, but I also sometimes just don't want to deal with the headaches that I can guess are going to spiral out of the comment, not to mention private e-mails, blah blah blah. I'm always going to leave up political opinions, and I even left up one comment which gave away the ending of a movie four days into that movie's release. But if you're going to time something badly which may be hurtful to someone else, or that you've just gone a little bluer than I would normally do in front of, say, my mom, you might see the comment evaporate.

In general, I will alert the party whose comment has been taken down and then e-mail them privately as to why I took the comment down. It sucks, Leaguers. I'd love to let you all dig your own graves here, but I gotta maintain some stability.

Just FYI: There's also some folks who lurk around the League whom many of the more vocal Loyal Leaguers forget are there. My parents, my in-laws, my uncle, Jim D's mother... Lots of folks who may or may not want to hear some of the more choice stuff that might pop up on this blog if none of these people ever became aware of this site. But there it is, so we're on good behavior here.

So do I want to run the 2006 Mellies? Sure. Will I?

Well, you know Leaguers, there's a bit of work involved in all this. If I were going to do this, I'd like to know if anyone but RHPT and Jim D. were going to pop up with their responses.

So, that's your cue, team...

Tuesday, February 21, 2006

Sunday, February 19, 2006

Greetings from Oval LeagueMelbotiso

Another fine weekend, Leaguers. Not much to report.

We went to La Stalla here in Historic Downtown Chandler. I always like La Stalla. As much as I'm a fan of Primo's swingin' strip mall/ senior citizen hang-out atmosphere, La Stalla has a nice interior and the food is a little bit more, shall we say, upscale. That, and Evan the waiter (who we've now had twice) is one of those waiters who seems REALLY into his job. Like, when you say, "Maybe I'll have a glass of wine..." and Evan knows what you should have and will hear no argument. Sometimes I need that in order to quit guessing.

Here's a tip from the couple who is now doing their 10th Valentine's Day together: There's Valentine's Day, and then there's Valentine's Day Observed. Going out on actual Valentine's Day is for suckers who like to stand around for lengthy periods waiting for a table, and then get rushed through the meal so the next couple can sit down. Bleah.

We try to go before or after Valentine's Day, and just do the candy and whatnot on Real Valentine's Day.

Uh, what else... we've been trying to entertain Lucy and Melbotis a lot this weekend. And we bought a magazine called "Training your Labrador Retriever", which, if anyone has visited recently, will agree was a necessary purchase.

I'm still watching some Olympics. I like this Ice Dancing business. The women are much better looking than in normal couples' skate. Also, they're showing some speed skating which I'm enjoying with these shorter races. The speed skaters have the coolest looking legs, like they could kick over a Kia, if need be.

I like this dude who won the races last night, Shani Davis. He gave Melissa Stark the best interview, ever. "Shani, you're a black man who just won a medal. How does it feel to be a black man?" "Stick it in your ear, Melissa." Also, is it just me, or does the Chad Hedrick/ Shani Davis dispute seem completely blown out of proportion and/ or fabricated?

Hey, this Russian dame has on the best outfit ever. Well, huh... She's pretty good looking, anyway. He looks like a villain.

I have been summoned by the wife. Ya'll are on your own.

Saturday, February 18, 2006

Cowgirl Funk is having the best week ever.


So longtime Loyal Leaguer Maxwell of Cowgirl Funk has had herself an interesting week. Go check out her blog to see her visit to the White House with the mighty UT Longhorns and Dubya himself.

Read here.

And to learn how this came to be, and to see Maxwell getting personal with the Presidential pets, read her hubby's blog here.

Friday, February 17, 2006

The League identifies a non-dumb Winter Olympic/ X-TREME sport

You know what's really dull after two contestants have gone through? The snowboarding half-pipe. You know what's even more dull? Skiing. Anything but that tricky obstacle course skiing is as much fun as regression analysis.

Tonight, between figure skaters, NBC featured a sport I'd never even heard of before: Snowboard Cross.

It's like a BMX race on the snow using snowboards. No endless critique of technique, no silly outfits, just four dudes at a time hurtling down a carved out path in a mountain trying to beat each other to the end of the track. Yeah, there's strategy and skill, but there are also a lot of wipe-outs and knuckle-biting moments.

Of course, since we made up this sport in the US (like all X-Treme sports), we won the Gold, but BARELY, Leaguers. And it was fun to watch.

read more here
RIPPED FROM THE HEADLINES

So you're probably wondering what The League thinks about two of the big stories of the day. What? No?

No, I'm not touching the further adventures of the Abu Ghraib scandal with a ten foot pole. That's prime Steanso territory, and I'd hate to steal his thunder.


Cartoon Riot

Harms has the best posts on this I've read so far here

The League didn't say much early on because The League was not really wanting to get into a flame war with some angry person he does not know from a far off land. Like Beaumont.

Honestly, the cartoonists probably made a miscalculation when they forgot that depictions of the prophet Mohammed are forbidden in Islam. Or maybe they did know and they felt like poking the tiger with a stick probably figuring nobody pays any attention to Denmark, anyway (it's always the quiet ones). Who knows? But that's about as far as I'll go in defending what's now, what?, two weeks' worth of damage to life, limb and property across the whole of the Middle East.

Whenever I get blue about something that may happen in the U.S. of A., all it takes is a few seconds of international TV to remind me that we've got it pretty good with our whole semi-protected freedom of press dealy-o.

Freedom of press and speech doesn't mean (as Jim D. once wisely pointed out to me) that you are free from repercussions for saying what you like or printing anything which comes to mind. Part of this freedom of the press bit that is interesting is that we often ALSO have people calling for heads in our country. But I like to think the cumulative effect in Western Culture is that we acknowledge that people can say and print what they like, and we hope that things sort of even out with printed and spoken counter-points. IE: We don't feel the need to arm grannies with AK-47's and parade through the streets whenever someone prints something we don't like (I always love grannies with machine guns).

I assume it's not the cartoons themselves which are sparking the rioting. I assume this is really about the frustration with the West that has been building since World War II. And while I may not agree with US policy at every turn in regards to the Middle East, this is one place where the West, in general, should stand firm. As upset as the rioters may feel towards the strips, if we hold freedom of the expression as sacred as we claim we do, I'd like to see someone, somewhere explain in print why the West tends to shrug these things off.

The quandry for Western editors is clearly whether or not they should paint a big, red target on their employees by reprinting the cartoons. One of the great ironies of the story is that in two weeks, I still haven't seen the strips, and I'm a fairly avid consumer of news. This lack of action leads me to believe that editors are being extremely careful, perhaps overcautious, in their decision making.

All of this, of course, should be a cautionary tale to Westerners who take their freedoms for granted and who passively poo-poo censorship but feel the fight is already won. Obviously American media feels the need to censor the images, or we would have all been overwhelmed with Danish cartoons.

Is it waving the strips in the face of the Muslim world to rebroadcast, reprint or redistribute strips which are 6 months old? That seems to be a key complaint of the rioters. But is the rest of the world beholden to their belief anymore than I should be hemmed in by a Catholic's decison not to eat meat on Friday, Jamie's devotion to the Flying Spaghetti Monster or Steanso's belief in the divination of the Doug Henning?

I'm fascinated by, and I'm sure Scott McCloud would have a book's worth to say on the topic of, the power of the iconography here. It's worth considering how words and pictures have melded to have meaning beyond simple ink lines. Clearly there's a hell of a lot more going on here externally, but it would be an interesting case studyto see the cartoons themselves to understand the power of an icon which is, by law, not supposed to be portrayed in any way.

For more on these sorts of ideas, I recommend McCloud's "Understanding Comics".

Heidi has identified some interesting fallout. Apparently, in the face of the state-sponsored Iranian "Holocaust Funnies" contest, an Israeli comix company has decided to pitch their own Israeli Anti-Semitic Cartoon Contest.

Leaguers, you can't make this stuff up.



With Friends Like Cheney

Nor can you make THIS stuff up.

I've never been shot in the face with birdshot, but I reckon it hurts like a bastard. While I may see Dick Cheney as a chairless Old Man Potter, you gotta feel a little bad for both parties when someone unintentionally shoots their pal.

As an avid eater of meat, I'm not against hunting because I think it's a wretched pursuit. The League is against hunting because it's boring.

The League values it's time and considers sitting in a box in the freezing cold at 5:00 am in December to be sort of stupid. Especially since the only way you can guarantee a deer is to bait the deer all season long and then shoot it on the one day you get your fat ass out of bed and remember to load your gun with the telescopic scope. To us, this is the equivalent of showing up at Fatburger one day and the clerk shooting a hole in your neck. I don't think I consider that a "sport". (Don't worry, I don't think lots of things are sports).

Quail hunting seems to consist of scaring birds into flight and then blasting a wide enough patch of sky that you manage to actually hit something. I assume you use this method because you're too lousy to do it with a .22 or something that requires skill. Honestly, to me, I fail to see the difference between using a shotgun or tossing a net over the birds and then hitting them with a shovel.

I was sick with the flu when the story broke about the Veep's mishap, and thus I more or less slept through the first 24 hour news cycle. The press seems to feel there's some hint of a cover-up going on, but it seems more like a mish-mash of bad information from a press corp that can't get a story straight unless they're working in 5 second sound bites.

Cheney took it on the chin and took full responsibility for what happened. Sort of. He also received a $7 citation, which seems like not much punishment.

I'm guessing no charges will be pressed, and I don't pretend to understand the law enough to know what the usual route for this sort of accident would be. I know that: had the guy died, they have a term called "manslaughter" that has some harsh consequences in Tejas. Again, honestly, I don't know the law, and I'm not looking to see the Veep go up the river on this one.

And, of course, things are always less funny when you shoot someone in the head and chest.

Thursday, February 16, 2006

A few quick items:

1) For some odd reason, Jim D. wants to start a book club. For some entirely odder reason, he wants me to lead said club. I just need to ask: how many of the rest of you poor souls have me confused with an avid reader?

2) I am feeling better. I've been at work the past two days.

3) Things went south with that thing I was hoping for. C'est la vie.

4) Valentine's Day was okay. I worked late.

5) I've been thanklessly pitching DC Comics to the world at large over at Nanostalgia.com. There are also conversations on many other pop-culture related topics ongoing.

6) My favorite cancelled series, Action, is coming to DVD.

7) I am already sick of the Olympics. Tonight I ran Lucy and watched stuff off the DVR instead of watching people fly down a hill. I have no idea what I'm looking at anymore. I can't cheer for a guy named "Joey Cheeks". I'm from Texas. Snow sports make as much sense to me as cricket.

8) Mel is a good boy.

Tuesday, February 14, 2006

Olympic Review

So here we are in day 18 or something of the Olympics. So far here's what I've learned:

  • People like to say "Bode"
  • The Chinese can take a hit to the knee and still keep going
  • While snowboarding has now been legitimized as a sport, the expert commentators still sound like a bunch of morons
  • The Russian figure skater I remember from 2002 must not have made the Olympics in 2006
  • Curling is exactly as boring as you would assume it might be
  • According to commentator Dick Button, no one is a good enough skater to grace our television screens
  • If you can choreograph a 5th grade pageant, you can get a shot at the Olympic opening ceremonies
  • People really like to say "The Flying Tomato"
  • Male figure skaters should never try to be "tough" in their routines
  • There's nothing to make you feel guilty like getting really excited because somebody got knocked out participating in the luge
  • Replacing all the players on a hockey team with women somehow still doesn't make me interested in hockey
  • Oh, how I hate that Plushenko

Well, that's it for the lessons so far. Lucy is now licking the computer which tells me it's time to knock it off.

This guy in the 007 outfit is awful. I can't believe I know the difference.

Oh, an extra special lesson: Young prosecutors are like sexy, holy angels. This must include Steanso, who is, apparently 4 years older than the avergae prosecutor. Does Steanso lack CONVICTION?

There's a big Comic Convention going on.

Here's a picture from the upcoming relaunch of Justice League America.