Sean is just some guy who lives in the Twin Cities. Updates to this blog are at random intervals.

30 December 2003 - The December 22 button below is supposed to be funny, obviously...I just liked the idea of somebody corresponding the terror alert levels to Sesame Street Muppets. I put it up there after it was changed from "Bert" to "Ernie". More seriously, I'm hoping that somebody else noticed that after Howard Dean opined that the capture of Saddam Hussein did *not* make America any safer than before, the Bush's government followed up on his claim by raising the terror alert level just days later. The usual conservative dimwits won't notice this, as expected. Anybody wonder what the odds are that the GOP is going to have Bush raise the terror alert again just before next year's general election? And on a slightly related note, I recently added the old "miserable failure" trick to my links page so that, because of many others doing the same thing, when you enter the phrase on Google, it links to a bio of George W. Bush. And now I think I'm going to add another "miserable failure" link. Hee-hee... 22 December 2003 - Terror alert level is now: 21 December 2003 - So the fill valve in one of the toilets in our house broke this weekend, so I had to replace it. And most people just need a wrench to replace the fill valve. Not just anybody needs a hacksaw and wirecutters as well. I'm quite the handyman. 19 December 2003 - I think maybe I left the stove on this morning. Usually I just eat a sandwich for breakfast, but this morning I got up early and made eggs. I mean, I always turn the stove off after finishing eggs. I just don't remember doing so, this morning. But I probably did...I always do. I'm pretty sure I turned the stove off. Maybe I should go home. But then it would be an hour till I got back to work. We have a gas stove...so leaving the stove on would just be like having a gas fireplace on all day, right? It would be a waste of energy, but it wouldn't cause a fire. Would it? Okay, I just called home, and the answering machine picked up. So that means that the fire hasn't got to the answering machine yet. I'm going to stay at work. I'll call the answering machine again in a couple of hours. If the house burnt down, I'll let you know. 17 December 2003 - This is for football fans only. I was watching the Packers play the Chargers last Sunday, and it was then that I realized: being an NFL announcer has got to be the easiest job on the planet. I don't think I've heard anything new from any of them in the past three years, and yet they still get paid millions to do their jobs, for three hours for twenty-or-so weeks, every year. For example, at one point one of the coaches was challenging whether a wide receiver had made a valid catch, or whether it had bounced on the ground first. The broadcaster (and I don't remember specifically who it was, but they're all the same) patiently explained, "To overturn the call on the field, there has to be visible, incontrovertible video evidence." The broadcasters went over this several times as they waited for the call. We get this explanation every single time there's a challenge on the field. There are usually two or three challenges per game. I watch two or three games every week, and I watch football for 20 weeks a year. The instant replay "challenge" system has been around since 1999. So, that means, I've heard this explanation approximately 625 times already, and so has everybody else who watches the NFL. I know the broadcasters are just trying to fill up time, but, please, can you find something else to talk about? Please? You know that you don't need to tell viewers that team gets six points every time a touchdown is scored. This is the same thing. On a different, but slightly related note, I want to share the litmus test for finding out if someone knows anything about football. Inevitably, near the end of the NFL and college seasons, somebody, on TV or in print, will make some comment that such-and-such NFL team is so bad that such-and-such college team would be able to beat them. "Why, the Lions aren't even the best football team in Michigan!" Or, in past years, it would usually be Ohio State and the Cincinnati Bengals. Anybody who says something like this doesn't know anything about football. If Michigan played the Detroit Lions, Detroit would end up being ahead something like 84-0, and then they'd just abort the game at halftime. I mean, I like college football, but it would be ridiculous. The NFL game is that much faster than the college game, and I don't care how bad the NFL team is. I mentioned the litmus test to a guy I know at work. He immediately started to argue with me. "Hey, I think that Michigan could beat the Lions maybe two out of five games if they got a chance..." Boom! Flunked the litmus test. 13 November 2003 - Maybe I'm a geek, but I had my TiVo record the X3D Chess Man vs. Machine match on ESPN2 on Tuesday, and man, I thought it was really great. I thought it was better than any of the football games I saw on the weekend. When Fritz played the surprise move Bxa2! on move 31, it was as exciting as any touchdown. The game ended in a draw, however, though since Kasparov was playing the white pieces it could almost be considered a loss for him. I'm recording the second game again today. This time, tonight, I'm going to play along with my own pieces. Yes, I am a geek... 9 November 2003 - Speaking of not being worth your valuable time, I just saw The Matrix Revolutions. All I can say is, when one of the characters in the movie actually says, "It doesn't make sense," well, believe it. 6 November 2003 - So the designs of the upcoming new nickels have come out. Since it's well known that I've been dutifully collecting the state quarters that have been being minted since 1999, somebody today asked me what I thought about the new nickels. But I'm not as interested in collecting the nickels as I am the quarters. In fact, I think I'm only about a fifth as interested. 28 October 2003 - Daylight saving time just ended. Benjamin Franklin invented the idea, in Paris at the end of the eighteenth century, to save on candle wax, and we still do it today to save energy. Can you imagine what would happen if the federal government, today, would suddenly issue a declaration: "To save energy, we demand that everybody in the country, for the next six months, get up an hour earlier, go to work an hour earlier, and all businesses must open their doors an hour earlier." There would be a huge uproar. No one would abide by the rule. Hundreds of thousands of people would go out protesting in the streets. House Republicans would impeach the president. Some of the right-wing nuts I know would start plotting a government overthrow. But instead, the government just says, "Hey, everybody set your clocks forward an hour today", and although this is exactly the same thing, everybody just quietly goes along with it. It's brilliant. 13 October 2003 - Hooray! The McDonald's Monopoly contest is back again this year! And this time, it's not fixed! 9 October 2003 - I haven't played with Legos since I was a kid. Now that I'm an adult, and have plenty of disposable income, it occasionally occurs to me that, if I wanted to, I could just get up, go to a toy store, and in less than half an hour suddenly have ten times as many Legos as I did twenty years ago when I last played with them. It's when I see something like this, I think, that someday soon it's going to happen. 8 October 2003 - So I'm driving down I-94, and as I'm going by, I see a man throw another man off the roof of a two-story house. Or, maybe it was just a large black bag that just billowed kind of man-shaped as it was falling. I only saw it quick out of the corner of my eye. There was nothing about it in the newspapers the next day. 4 October 2003 - Today we're having spaghetti for supper. When it comes time to take the spaghetti from the box and put it into the pot, I never know how much spaghetti to put in. It's always too much or too little. One time this summer I was at my parents' house for supper, and my mom was making spaghetti. She said to me, "I never know how much spaghetti to put in." I give up. My mom has been making spaghetti for more than thirty years. If she hasn't gotten it by now, I know that I'm never going to. 15 September 2003 - The other day we couldn't find a conference room, so we had our meeting in the work cafeteria. There, at a table beside us, a woman was having a late-afternoon snack: a big bag of popcorn, and a tall glass of milk. Popcorn with milk! Can you think of two things that go less together?! After seeing that I couldn't even concentrate on my meeting... 10 September 2003 - Mountain Dew is my favorite soda, by far. I probably drink about four cans a day, on average. I'd drink even more, but I don't want to get addicted. It's made by Pepsi, while Coca-Cola makes Mello-Yello. Mello-Yello is far inferior. Here's a question: is there anybody, anywhere, that actually prefers Mello-Yello over Mountain Dew? If so, I've never met them. I'll bet even the guy who invented Mello-Yello likes Mountain Dew better... 1 September 2003 - In case you don't know, according to Whatis.com, a blog is "a personal journal that is frequently updated and intended for general public consumption". According to Greg Knauss, a blog is "To noisily and simultaneously void one’s spleen, stomach, bladder and bowels. 'Get outta my way! I think I’m gonna blog!'". That sounds about right.