My Two Cents

Remember the game "Expressions" that I blogged about? Well, here’s your newest scenario: "You’re about to be interviewed on national television by a reporter who thinks you’re an expert on the Internet music business, when you’re really just the expert’s ride home—go!”

Yes, this really did happen. In the same sitting that I saw this video link on one of my favorite news feeds, I read about the same situation on a friend’s blog (props to wt).

With the seconds ticking down to a studio discussion about a court case involving Apple Computer and The Beatles' record label, a floor manager had run to reception and grabbed the man, thinking he was Guy Kewney, editor of Newswireless.net, a specialist internet publication.

Actually, he was a minicab driver who had been waiting to drive Mr. Kewney home.

Baffled, but compliant, the driver was fitted with a microphone and allowed himself to be marched in to the studio.

Kudos to the cabbie for taking Expressions to the next level!

So I’m supposed to give the family dog her meds, one pill twice a day. Sounds pretty easy, right? WRONG! My step-dad showed me how to do it: cover the pill in a glob of peanut butter, grasp her snout from above, and then, when she opens her mouth, stick it in the back so that she swallows it. I have tried to do this myself more times than I can count now, and somehow the pill pops back out every time, sans peanut butter. Meanwhile, the other dog keeps trying to snag the pill because it seems edible, which is an adjective he uses rather broadly, considering that his favorite snack is bits of paper. At this point, I can't even get the dog to open her mouth anymore, and I'm left with enough peanut butter lodged underneath my fingernails to sustain me for several days, should I find myself stranded in some deserted location.

Needless to say, I have moved past frustration to that state of mind where you just have to laugh at your predicament, or else you’ll go mad. I’m also guessing I’ll have to clean up PB puke here before too long… It brings to mind a hilarious episode of "My Name Is Earl" where he has to give a friend’s grandmother her eye drops (which she hates) every 10 minutes so that her lids don’t dry out.

From the transcript for “Monkeys in Space”:

Earl: Alright, let’s get going. Hank is waiting.
Grandma: Okey dokey.
Nurse: You have to take her drops.
Earl: What?
Nurse: Her eye drops. You have to put drops in her eyes every ten minutes or they’ll dry out and her lids will stick to the balls. You don’t want to see that. Her watch has a timer on it to remind you. Oh, and she hates it, so good luck. (Earl looks at the eye drops.)
Cut to Earl driving down the road. The timer goes off.
Earl: Does that mean its time for your drops?
Grandma: No.
Earl: I think that means it’s time for your drops.
Grandma: No, it doesn’t.
Earl: (pulls car over) Now, I have to give you your drops or they’ll dry out.
Grandma: I don’t like them.
Earl: I know, just give me your head.
Grandma: I don’t wanna.
Earl: Give me your head.
Grandma: No.
Earl: You’re gonna make me wrestle you, aren’t you?
Grandma: Yes.

*Update (5/15/06): The Knight in Shining Armor Award goes to Ryan, who should be the next Dog Whisperer, seriously. After spending precious minutes this morning cleaning up crusted peanut butter from the dog's face and the living room carpet, I stuck the pill into a piece of bread-- per Ryan's advice-- and rolled it up into a little dough ball. Voila! Within seconds, the medicine was downed, and I enjoyed a day without orange fingernail gunk. Thanks, Ryan!

The cover story of this week's U.S. News & World Report, entitled "What Dreams Are Made Of," seeks to make sense of our dream lives based on evidence gleaned from studies of the human brain using today's technology. The article was interspersed with a few interesting stories about celebrities having discovered or created something in a dream, which they then put to use upon awakening. My favorite: the tune for "Yesterday" came to John Lennon in a dream in May 1965. "At first, lacking lyrics, he improvised with 'Scrambled eggs, oh my baby, how I love your legs.'" (This becomes doubly funny when you start singing these words to the well-known melody, and equally annoying when it gets stuck replaying in your head all day.)

The article also included several narratives of dream sequences as provided by everyday individuals to UCSC scientists. Their databank of approximately 16,000 dreams is available on-line. I went to check it out and let the computer pull up a random dream for me to read. How eerie that this is the one I was given:

John Lennon and Paul McCartney were sitting on the floor in a hallway. They were on the second floor of their mansion. They were young with looks as if it were the late 1960's. Occasionally, George Harrison walked by and said something, but mostly John and Paul were there. Sitting next to them was a cameraman filming them. He was about their age. John and Paul kept getting annoyed with him and they'd push him by the forehead, so that he'd fall on his back. John had a guitar, and they were singing and writing a new song. They decided to live and sleep there, in the hall, naked, except for shorts made out of paper bags, with leg holes cut out of them, and the bag going up to their chests. They had a pillow inside it for a cushion to sit on. Then they poured Ruffles potato chips in their paper bag shorts, and crushed them by sitting on them. They laughed, and declared that it was for some unknown political cause.

While I'm not out to write an opinion piece about immigration reform, I thought I'd share some things I've thought or learned over the past couple of weeks.

Interesting facts (in no particular order):

• There are currently about 12 million illegal immigrants living in the United States, with the majority having come from Mexico.
• The number of illegal immigrants that enter the U.S. each year from any country is about 1.1 million.
• 10% of all births in the U.S. are to illegal immigrants.
• The average American wage exceeds the average Mexican wage by 10 times.
• Many American companies often hire workers for 3-month periods to avoid paying for benefits.

Ironies:

• Many of the large, U.S. owned companies that were boycotted on May 1 are the same ones that employ many immigrants and consistently lobby Congress in favor of changing immigration laws.
• The contents of this letter to the editor of The Fresno Bee:

The Mexican Constitution, the "Ley General de Poblacion," spells out in detail the country's immigration policy.

Immigration authorities have a record of each foreign visitor; foreign visitors do not violate their visa status; foreign visitors are banned from interfering in the country's internal politics; foreign visitors who enter under false pretenses are imprisoned or deported; foreign visitors violating the terms of their entry are imprisoned or deported; those who aid in illegal immigration will be sent to prison.

Yet, if the United States adopted such statutes, Mexico no doubt would denounce it as a manifestation of American racism and bigotry.

Why is our southern neighbor pushing us to gut our own immigration laws, when its own immigration restrictions are the harshest on the continent?

Stupidities:

“Above all, we want legalization, because many of them [immigrants] have lived up there for many years.”

--Nice logic.

“Hispanics are taking away our jobs. They are moving into our neighborhoods, so now where are we going to go?”

--Who says you have to go anywhere? Would it be so horrible to live in the same neighborhood as—gasp!—a Hispanic family?

(Sources: The Fresno Bee, http://www.pbs.org/newshour/extra/)

“I simply do not remember getting out of bed, being pulled over by police, or being cited for three driving infractions. That’s not how I want to live my life.”

As soon as I heard these words from Rhode Island’s Representative Patrick Kennedy, I knew the culprit cited would be Ambien. Sure enough, Kennedy was taking Ambien along with Phenergan, an anti-nausea drug that can also cause drowsiness.

Several have expressed their disdain for Kennedy’s “excuse” and decried police for not administering a sobriety test to see if alcohol was the real reason for his car accident on Capitol Hill last Thursday. I, however, can certainly see how it could have been directly related to the collision, even if Ambien were not the sole factor in the crash. I wonder if they found any McDonald’s wrappers in the vehicle...

Awhile back, I saw a newspaper article about a new sewage pump plant that, when built, will be hidden under a building designed to look like a barn from the early 20th century. The city’s special projects manager, John Lovejoy, wanted to be a “good neighbor” to the homes already existing in the area.

At the same time, the city planning director, Dwight Kroll, wanted to create more open space for the public. Therefore, the sewage plant will also include a landscaped park, trails, tables and benches, a creek with a stone bridge, and plenty of parking.

Apparently, the technology that is being incorporated into the project can eliminate odors “in the high 90% range.” That seems pretty good, I guess, but not good enough for this: “[Kroll] envisions young couples perhaps using the garden and accompanying park for weddings and other family events.”

Cover the plumbing with a façade of the Eiffel Tower if you want, but I don’t know of any girl who would send out wedding invitations that read,

Appropriately filed under “Can’t Possibly Be True,” this tidbit, courtesy of the Duluth News Tribune-Cox News Service, is quite possibly THE sign of our times:

Teachers at several nursery schools in Oxfordshire, England, have been encouraging kids to learn the verse "Baa, baa, black sheep/Have you any wool?" without the word "black," but in its place a variety of emotions (e.g., "Baa, baa, sad sheep") or colors (including "Baa, baa, rainbow sheep") because they believe that kids with black skin might feel disrespected.

*Editor's note: I apologize for publishing posts less frequently in recent weeks...it appears one does not have much time for blogs and such when one is no longer on vacation.