Antidisingenuousmentarianism

Whoa. So the ABH takes any sign of less than perfection, even when regulations are quickly and pleasantly complied with when violations are pointed out, as evidence that bars are evil? None of us thinks that fire codes are something to be cavalier about, but I'm willing to damn well bet that there are probably some kinds of safety violations in the Banner-Herald building, too, the kinds of things that don't seem like much, but, if an emergency struck, would lead to disaster. Because those things are clearly small and simple, and the chances of an emergency aren't all that high. What I thought the article made clear is that bar owners respond just fine to being asked to clear exits or not let more patrons in and that plenty are already doing those things on their own. It's a high-stress business, and that can lead to not everything being exactly letter-for-letter in the middle of their busiest times. Crusade much?

Podcast. Up. Links (n pictures).

It's a good color. It also shows I'm a sucker for brightness and a cute band with a cute girl up front who can even half sing. Stefy's pretty adorable. There will be a review at some point, but for now, you might want to go listen to their single and maybe a couple of other tunes in the "music + video" section. I'm kind of partial to "Orange County."

Titans of Filth are rock. i.e., Awesome.

Theft: On Sept. 19, a couple on Overlook Ridge Road reported that on Sept. 10 a woman they knew came to their home looking for a place to stay because her boyfriend had kicked her out. They felt sorry for the woman and said she could stay for a couple of days. However, they awoke Sept. 19 to find that she had left and the husband later found his wife's pocketbook outside on the side of the road. They checked the house and discovered other items missing including shoes, belt, pictures, shirts, pillows, checks and a Playboy handbag.

So did she leave in a U-Haul?

Dispute: On Sept. 23, deputy Lisa Price was dispatched to Fire Mountain restaurant where a woman reported she went to pick up her son from her ex-husband in the parking lot. When she arrived, the ex-husband's girlfriend went to her car and began shouting and cursing, then pulled off her necklace and bracelet and scratched her neck. The girlfriend said the ex-wife began cursing her first and that they both pushed each other. No charges were filed.

No comment.

Damage: On Sept. 24, deputy Lisa Price was dispatched to Fire Mountain, where the manager said he fired an employee who went into the kitchen area and smashed a metal tea urn valued at $50. Other employees watched as the woman threw the urn onto the floor.

I reiterate. No comment.

The rest here.

You know the Madison County Commission can't go more than a couple of weeks without soap opera.

School report cards in the process of being put online. But here's the thing. I'm all for information being as free as possible, but what's the real purpose of this? To allow for comparison shopping? And doesn't that create greater disparities among schools when all the rich, white people decide to go to one? I can't say that I wouldn't take advantage of it as a parent (although I'd try not to), but maybe the temptation shouldn't even be there.

This headline (Recent frat actions get NAACP's attention) is misleading. Because the NAACP in question is the local chapter, who should be paying attention to stuff like this.

Look, damn it! We will keep these poor colored people from voting if it takes amending the Constitution!

First responders in Georgia to teach driver's ed. Because a) that program's been largely eliminated, and b) clearly they don't have anything important to do. Also, are policemen, firemen, and EMT people excellent drivers?

Largely covered elsewhere, but the commission candidates debated in front of the chamber of commerce. Ed Vaughn doesn't like the historic district? I like the blue-collar job training idea (giving people actual skills is always good), but Girtz's WPA-type ideas are great. On the other hand, Girtz thinks the number of liquor licenses issued for downtown could be limited, while Vaughn opposes that idea (as does Garland).

"Safety zones" for Florida game will have some money behind them. Also, looks like student affairs staff might get a free trip to the Cocktail Party.

Tra Battle watches Dragonball Z.

ABH thinks Early Learning Center is an awesome idea but points out that the problem of teen pregnancy should also be addressed.

Other segments of the community - parents and churches come immediately to mind - should follow the school district's lead and step up to address teen pregnancy issues, especially with regard to preventing such pregnancies.

Or, um, schools and the public health department.

Shipp thinks you should vote for Marshall and Barrow or the Georgia Democratic Party will die. Those dudes are Democrats? Huh. I hadn't noticed.

See, I would say printing a letter like Norm Weatherby's merely exposes him as the ass he is. This person doesn't agree.

McGinty really didn't like Greg Benson's letter. But then, he's a Christian dude, which is fine. Greg's just a bit of a bomb-thrower, letter-wise, and I can see where he's coming from.

This letter makes some good points about the costs of anti-poverty programs.

Fire department's cracking down on packed clubs. As long as occupancy is reasonably calculated (and I have no reason to think it's not), this is well within the rights of the department, and bar owners seem to have no problem with it.

Georgia Transmission Corp being sued over easement appraisal.

Classic Center tries to follow recommendations of auditor, but more by increasing revenues than by using the ones they have more wisely.

It's not just about getting a raise. Some teachers care about improving the schools.

Faculty want more money.

The M in M.A.S.H. stands for moonshine running?

Even if ABH supports tax cuts in theory, at least they're talking about a cost-benefit ratio.

It actually sounds like Jeff Emanuel likes bilingual education.

Vice-chair of UGA College Republicans partially responsible for this focus on "child predators."

More on the River Road fraternity plan: the houses will be more like dorms.

A suggested change to fall break that we might all be able to live with.

Fighting in the letters section of the Flagpole. No, it's not about Tofu Baby.

And we miss Patrick Dean. Tear.

Week 36 is up.

Unblurbed:

Diddy ft. Nicole Scherzinger - Come To Me (USA)
At least the times of singing over a borrowed song usually meant there was something to listen to. This is fine freak music but I don’t have the endurance to dance for 4½ minutes.
[4]

I had a good week with this stuff, as a lot of it is pretty catchy and fun, even Timberlake's latest outing. He's almost forgiven. And we've already covered the Richie greatness. If you want any of it, email me.

PLC students are getting some childcare, and it seems to be good childcare to boot.

Franklin's license to sell firearms still suspended, due to their failure to account for hundreds of guns.

Ticketmaster might get the athletic association contract, but won't raise fees. The Ticketmaster?

Remember, kids. Uploading is what gets you in trouble.

Loran Smith is not kidding.

Headline dude, you might want to read what editor dude wrote just below your slot. That is, if he says we should have addressed the landfill issue 10 years ago, maybe the time to address it was then, not now. Or "yesterday," as the last line establishes.

I'm not crazy about Jim admitting he doesn't print inflammatory anti-Muslim letters either (although I understand his reasons), but it's not a conspiracy.

This guy objects to characterizing People of Hope's new project as a trailer park. So is it an error or just a semantic issue?

Drop/add's staying the same length despite the fact that a lot of other schools have much longer periods. For some reason, professors think they can't go ahead and start teaching on those days, when the experience of the teaching is what one should have to make a decision.

1. Marching band competition down the street at Cedar Shoals appears to be actually being performed in our front yard. That's what it's sounded like, at any rate, for the past several hours.

2. Stupid Lorelai! Stupid Luke! Also, urge to buy a bunch of ridiculous food to eat while watching Gilmore Girls actually on TV was overwhelmed by realization that this is simply too Gilmore-esque a thing to do.

3. Even if you bring your own bag with Kroger's program (I don't, yet), they put a plastic bag inside it. Point defeated, no?

Dudes, the new Lionel Richie song is really good. At first, I thought I was liking it as a joke, but it turns out, no. I genuinely like it. So go and listen if your rough edges need some syrup poured on 'em.

1. Willa Cather's Lucy Gayheart. Here's a blog post on it from someone who likes Cather as much as I do but for different reasons. She is emphatically un-snuggly, often cruel. I'm planning on reading the rest of her stuff at some point. All of it.

2. Virginia Woolf's To the Lighthouse, which I have read but not for a while. My impression is that I prefer Woolf's nonfiction to her fiction, which might be too modernist for me.

3. Edgar Rice Burroughs's Apache Devil, which is full of dotted letters.

4. Edith Wharton's New Year's Day, more of a novella than a novel and about adultery (?).

5. Stewart Edward White's The Unobstructed Universe, which is some kind of new-agey thing. "Foundation Stones" are here. "Earth is the borning place for the purpose of individualization," eh?

6. More Gone with the Wind

7. H. Rider Haggard's Heu-Heu, or the Monster, a Quatermain. Heu-Heu is "a monstrous, 12-foot-tall, clawed and red-bearded semigorilla god who may or may not exist." A more extensive plot summary here.

8. A bit from The Three Musketeers, which is easy to recognize because of the names. It's a fun book, though. I read it aloud to my sister when we were kids. Swashbuckly.

9. H. Rider Haggard's Allan and the Ice Gods, almost his last book. Site linked says, "What comes as much more of a surprise is to learn from Professor Cohen that this far-out adventure tale of a modern-day hero who takes an hallucinogenic drug which allows his consciousness to plunge backwards through time, entering the mind of an Ice-Age man, was actually plotted in collaboration with Rudyard Kipling." Comics-worthy indeed.

10. Virginia Woolf's Orlando, so never mind what I said about her fiction because I forgot about this one. It's quite nicely narrated

11. Sinclair Lewis's Kingsblood Royal. This one's about racism, and Modern Library's put out an edition, which they don't do for just anyone.

12. Ethel Lina White's The Spiral Staircase, which was originally published as Some Must Watch. It was adapted into a radio production, a play (which Jared's brother was in), and a movie (several, actually). I've only seen the play, not the movie, and I haven't read the book, but it wasn't that suspenseful. Maybe it's because they were middle-schoolers.

No facebook page that I can locate.

Can't we just blame our excess of garbage on Oglethorpe County? Recycle, dudes. Whether or not it's cost-effective and such, it does mean fewer giant garbage piles. The poll the ABH blog section is running shows that more than half of people who take online polls are douchebags. It's not like it's hard in Athens or expensive or a hassle.

Even if TCE is more dangerous than previously estimated, Nakanishi's still not emitting enough of it.

More on paper ballots as backups. It would be sort of a terrarium set-up, and it certainly wouldn't make the lines move faster.

ABH thinks Piedmont College's announcement of need-based grants to locals is a step in the right direction of the anti-poverty fight. The grants also put a decent dent in the tuition, unlike at many schools, as Piedmont's tuition is only about $8K a year.

What I like about this letter is that it contains a narrative of itself.

McKillip cites Novartis loss as symptomatic of the need for education here.

Dude. This sucks for Mama's Boy.

R&B reporting the GuardDawg defacement story. Lil' bitty firestorm in the comments. There will be more to come from R&B editorial telling the GuardDawg to shove it.

Pushing people off campus who used to park illegally on campus means they'll probably park illegally elsewhere.

So does this alternating seasons being an ass and screwing stuff up in the last episode go back all the way to the first season, or is the pattern imperfect?

Here's Blake's report on all the money spent fighting poverty in the ACC, which references this report. I didn't have the time to go through the latter that thoroughly, but I haven't figured out where the $51 million figure comes from. Also, poverty is expensive to fight, dudes. Perhaps a simple system of redistribution of income might be less so. ABH editorializes on it, figuring, with some serious rounding down, that that's an expenditure of just under $1000 for each person in poverty in the county every year. That's really not bad when you consider all the stuff it goes for. Consider rent costs alone. It's certainly not bad enough to get super-huffy about and say maybe some organizations fighting poverty shouldn't get any money.

ACC schools need that sales tax renewed so they can do things like fix roofs. Expansion would be nice, too, but unlikely, as the backlog of chores to keep things in working order will probably eat up all the money.

Winder police spell too good.

Orange Twin continues to try to move forward with their hippie community.

As a result of new eminent domain law, the commission now has to approve condemnations for that reason. This is not going to make things move any faster, but that sort of seems to be the point. Also, there was supposed to be discussion on stormwater, but it didn't happen.

Nicholson (town, not Jack) gets own police. Swears it's not a speed trap about a hundred times, raising suspicion that it is.

ABH thinks license plate brouhaha is substituting for real debate about issues and actual democracy.

Bass xylophone!

No coochie in the paper!

R&B talks about pandemics, avian flu, makes distinction between the two that doesn't seem to be warranted, finishes up with killer mini-interview:

Ty Baugh, a freshman from Cartersville, thought that he would survive well in an emergency but was unsure about the rest of the student body.

“I would personally know what to do, but I think the student body as a whole would be in a panic,” Baugh said.

Baugh also said that he would probably not be interested in attending a lecture on pandemic influenza because he is not really worried about it.

The message to the student body about preparing for emergencies is usually fairly simple, said Haley.

Although there is currently no pandemic influenza, Haley thinks that it is still an important message.

“It is something that everyone needs to know,” Haley said.

Students are dumb about panhandlers. May have to learn sometime, though.

Having a women's center on campus isn't a bad idea, but promoting it by talking about our "rape culture" probably isn't going to move it closer to reality.

Director of diversity relations at Terry wants to punish Chi Phi more.

R&B continues to discover internets exists.

Damn this new bar and its confusing name.

Center in a Schroedinger-type situation. Whereas Bishop is expanding.

People of Hope have plans in the works for their new community and grants contingent upon other grants, but the grants that need to fall into place look like they're not going to. Backup plan not being discussed. I hope they have one.

Georgia uses lots of energy. Perhaps because it's frigging hot down here.

Georgia GuardDawg, conservative student newspaper, is vandalized. And normally, you'd think it would be the work of those crazy liberals on campus. The fact that "seven racks were marked with slogans including 'communist,' 'gay' and 'too liberal,'" kind of undermines that theory, though, pointing instead to stupidity or boredom or some other factor. In any case, it's stupid and it shouldn't have happened, both because it's wrong and because it now lets them call themselves victims for a few months.

Butts-Mehre to expand in lieu of big indoor practice facility. Will cost ton of money, but the athletic association seems to have truckloads.

Yarbrough moves rapidly from again exhorting moderate Muslims to "take to the streets" (that would imply less moderation, wouldn't it?) to talking about corn-fried shrimp. Jim weighs in with his own take, which consists of admitting first that he's not printing every idiotic letter that comes in and second that he's thinking about doing it after all because he's annoyed with the direction of Islam. Huh?

Tony Arnold shifts the issue from panhandling to loitering.

This guy points out that military officers were living in the Navy School housing.

Some slight modifications to be made to Epps Bridge overpass, but GDOT would have to make anything bigger. Also, it's established that the speed limit is reasonable and that those who follow the rules will be fine.

Taylor and Perdue continue to accuse each other of ethics violations, but experts think it's not going to make any difference.

Update on how Culpepper campaign is going, complete with AthensPolitics ref. And one on Casey Cagle's, too, reminding us that, while an improvement over Reed, he's still pretty scary. His dudes were out in full force with stickers (Dawgs for Cagle) at the Georgia game, as were Perdue's. Not that I'm planning on voting for Taylor at this point, but come on, man. Work the stickers.

Shipp thinks our voter ID law isn't worth defending. And he says so very clearly, in words even tiny children can understand.

Especially on ligatures. It is a long and awesome entry, especially this part:

Perhaps the most common ligature is the ampersand: "&". This was originally a ligature of 'Et', Latin for 'and'. It has exactly the same use, except for pronunciation, in French, and is used in the English language just as in French. This character comes in many different forms. It is now not considered a ligature, but a logogram (in English, it is pronounced and, not et). Similarly, the Dollar sign, $ originated as a ligature but is now a logogram.

Gameday Crocs for the kiddies.


Ralphie in action.


Score.


Much happiness. Maybe some tears welled up, but they were wiped by this point.


Maybe I got a little much sun. Despite my promised 60+ SPF Hawaiian Tropic that supposedly smells like orange cream.

Hamachi is the new watermelon salad. Except that it's better. Eating it, at Five & Ten (late birthday dinner, yo), I had to stop and put my head in my hands and just chew and not even think about speaking. And a lil' tear fell up in my eye. Which is a joke, but no really, it did. What all is on the plate? Hamachi. Citrus. Little tiny greens. Sesame (?) seeds. Vinaigrette. That's about it. I would like to go around shoving it into people's mouths. Just random people on the street.

Also: leek and potato soup with lovely bits of apple and crisp ribbons of leek; shrimp and grits with peppers (grits superior to shrimp, buttery); Cuban-style pork roast thingie with amazing mashed plantains underneath; chanterelle soup, which tastes like the silkiest, most gorgeous dirt ever (that is a good thing); lemon semifreddo with yum yum cookie. There would be more details if bitches could update their online menu.

Muga goes with everything and is so nice not too cold.

And we kinda met this awesome guy. He's very smooth.

Not laughing when guest author referred to "ladyfriend" in all seriousness.

Since Winder voted to allow drink sales in restaurants on Sundays (yay football!), we might now have some discussions about aligning county rules with city rules, which might be good, depending on how many people live where, at least partially because of the reduction in drunk driving.

What's this now? Are Georgia Dems wussing on the voter ID issue? Or is their spokesperson just being careful?

You might actually be surprised at a few of the things that constitute academic honesty violations.

Health insurance for the gays' partners is still hanging around as a possibility in Athens, even if the committee discussing it can't unanimously agree on a recommendation. I'll give Dodson full credit on this one. It won't cost that much money, and it is a morality issue, whichever side you're on.

Watkinsville generally has its shit together on making sure everyone's prettified and not bulking up on steroids. We're speaking of buildings here.

Mark Taylor wants to kill child molesters. What's scary is that a number of states surrounding Georgia already have laws about this.

Charlie Maddox talked to the UGA College Republicans last night.

Richt-Ralphie feud. Not cool, coach.

Nike makes bad-ass contacts.


ABH thinks UGA is ignoring the racial aspects of the Chi Phi thing. If by ignoring, you mean "minimizing so African American students will still want to come here," then probably so. The R&B even thinks the administration was too gentle on them. As does this lady. Is she related to our Mr. Rozier? Look. Dudes. If you kick people out of school for violating the hazing policy with something merely tasteless and a bit racist, what are you going to do when they violate it with something serious that causes harm or death?

Also, in the same R&B op-ed is another issue, which contains the following bit:

The number of dirty looks, vulgar hand gestures and indecent four-letter words exchanged between pedestrians and drivers can be decreased with the addition of a cross walk on Lumpkin Street between the Fine Arts Building and the Student Learning Center.

Is there a road there?

Shipp thinks Georgia's Republican for the future.

Free newspapers: SGA thinks SGA is doing a great job. Here are a lot of letters. And here's the R&B explaining itself further. No, not about how great it is to be near a buffalo. The top part. Which makes plenty of sense, actually.

Hilsman Middle's lack of lockers is kind of a problem. But considering the school budget and the deep paranoia about safety, a few concerns about back problems later in life will probably not change things.

The only newsworthy thing in this article about a rabid skunk is that someone says, "I can't shoot, I have a defibrillator." It's still worth reading.

Piedmont College has money for students. It's called priming the pump.

Lynn Westmoreland says, "Perhaps I shouldn't have said what I said." You mean, said you loved torture? Maybe so, jackass.

All this back and forth is kind of hard on election officials. And it's only going to get worse with Congress poking its nose in. Also, adding a paper trail to the machines is pricey. And now Cathy Cox thinks it's not necessary.

Um, which school isn't serious about academics because it loves football too much? Huh? Which one?

ABH thinks legislators should visit classrooms. I'd add, "and any other place they make a bunch of law about."

Pro-missile defense system column sparks debate at McGinty's.

Even though gas prices are down this week, the university's not so stupid as to abandon all the fuel-saving measures it's put in place. Thanks, R&B, for the contextualizing.

Voter registration drives are working overtime on campus. But note that some students need to be registered where their parents are to retain health insurance.

Letters: Upscale housing is standing empty. Faculty should like football. Most TV-lovin' person ever.

Shades of Koko.

He also looks like he loves getting told off by his neighbors. What's up with that?

Will return tomorrow. Some of us are too busy madly watching Gilmore Girls.

You probably heard, if you live in this state, that Georgia's finally doing a new license plate, as it's been ten years of the gracefully reticent peach in the background. But it's not attractive. So the AJC is having a contest in which readers submit their own designs. Following are some highlights. (The first one is more about the comment next to it, so you may need to enlarge.)

Theft: A resident of Colham Ferry Road reported that on Sept. 7 he discovered where someone stole two concrete statues of a boy and girl in his yard that were on a picnic table. The objects are valued at $80.

Arrest: On Sept. 16, deputy David Gilstrap was dispatched to a car crash at the Oconee Connector, where a man driving the car reported that the wheel had fallen off. When Gilstrap arrived, he was told the driver was running down Mars Hill Road. The deputy made a quick check of the area, but saw no one, so he returned to the crash scene. A woman arrived and told Gilstrap that she had given the driver a ride to A.J.'s Food Mart on U.S. Highway 78. Gilstrap and Sgt. Shawn Burns arrived at the store and saw a man standing outside. When they learned his name, they ordered him face down on the ground, where he was handcuffed. He told the deputies he was only a passenger in the car, but later said, "All right Gilstrap, I was the driver." Jeffery Alan Morris, 47, of Garrett Road, Statham, was charged with driving while his license was suspended, leaving the scene of a wreck, obstruction and giving a false name.

Arrest: On Sept. 16, deputy Chad Parr was dispatched to a home on Monroe Highway, where a witness reported a man hitting a woman. When Parr arrived he saw Richard Tharon McDaniel, 34, standing in the yard with a 40 ounce Budweiser in his hand. McDaniel was swaying back and forth and cursing. He explained to Parr that he grabbed the woman around the neck and wrestled, but they were only playing. When Parr asked the woman how she got a scratch on her neck, she said the cat did it. McDaniel was arrested for simple battery and public drunkenness.

The rest here.

Grub Notes does chicken fingers.

And gets a letter.

Spacing etc. preserved.

Date: September 20, 2006 12:11:04 PM EDT
To: UGA-FORSALE@LISTSERV.UGA.EDU
Subject: items

I have a few more movies to add to the ones I have. Please email off list.

VHS- Christopher Columbus ( The Discovery) w/ Catherine Zeta Jones Beethoven's 5

Going South w/ Jack Nicholson ,( it's funny) The Dove based on a true story, it is good.

The Scottish Tale,( it is funny) Field of Honor ( champ d honneur)

Unconditional love w/ Kathy Bates and Dan Ackroyd,( it's funny) Jersey Girl, it is funny

2 Video Set Lagaan, Once Upon a Time in India,( this is a movie) Lone Star State of Mind in Texas

Esther and the King w/ Joan Collins as Queen Esther,( this one is a classic.) Witchtrap,

Frank McKlusky CI w/ Dolly Parton and Randy Quaid Hammer over the Anvil w/ Russell Crowe

I have a DVD that is a 2 features in one The Magic Sword and King Arthur,( this one is a classic.)

I really, really hope you watched Steve Irwin's memorial service, which was on last night, almost live from Australia. I didn't mean to, but I was slung from genuine feeling and choked-up-edness rapidly (sometimes in the same moment) to severe consciousness of extreme ridiculousness. The existence of these two feelings so close to one another is enough to provoke even more laughter. And then just shaking on the couch, unable to produce sounds, burying head in hands. I wish I had live-blogged it, but I only have a desktop. So, here are some notes.

Jared's notes:

--Kevin Costner looks like Garth Brooks now.
--Where is Nicole Kidman?
--the way people move from crying to "hey! I'm on TV!" when the camera passes them
--he wants a koala bear for his birthday
--also, a blooper reel to be played at his funeral

My notes:

--Crocoseum.
--Note that all this was commercial-free. To preserve its dignity or something.
--Extended clip of silly language that features the words "dragon poo" over and over.
--Dear god. There is one of the Wiggles. He's about the biggest celebrity at this thing. And he's wearing his Wiggles shirt. And belt buckle. I can't decide if this is classy or not. It doesn't seem appropriate funeral attire. Now they're showing a Wiggles clip featuring Steve Irwin. And now, every time they come back from a clip or whatnot, he's got a different animal hanging on him. A wombat, maybe? Something fat and furry and vaguely displeased.
--At end of show, a floral arrangement spelling out CRIKEY is revealed.
--I feel very sorry for his daughter, but I must also point out that she may be a robot.
--Justin Timberlake recorded a tribute! No. Not a song. That would've been awesome. He's just talking about the man. Why? Because he has an album to promote, y'all.
--Also Steve Harvey. Who does a nice job but is weird.
--Also also, what may be the worst poem ever written, reproduced here for your pain:

THE CROCODILES ARE CRYING

Endless visions fill my head – this man – as large as life
And instantly my heart mourns for his angels and his wife
Because the way I see Steve Irwin – just put everything aside
It comes back to his family – it comes back to his pride

His animals inclusive – Crikey – light the place with love!
Shine his star with everything he fought to rise above
The crazy-man of Khaki from the day he left the pouch
Living out his dream and in that classic ‘Stevo’ crouch

Exploding forth with character and redefining cheek
It’s one thing to be honoured as a champion unique
It’s one thing to have microphones and spotlight cameras shoved
It’s another to be taken in and genuinely loved

But that was where he had it right – I guess he always knew
From his fathers’ modest reptile park and then Australia Zoo
We cringed at times and shook our heads – but true to natures call
There was something very Irwin in the make up of us all

Yes the more I care to think of it – the more he had it right
If you’re going to make a difference – make it big and make it bright!
Yes - he was a lunatic! Yes - he went head first!
But he made the world feel happy with his energetic burst

A world so large and loyal that it’s hard to comprehend
I doubt we truly count the warmth until life meets an end
To count it now I say a prayer with words of inspiration
May the spotlight shine forever on his dream for conservation

…My daughter broke the news to me – my six year old in tears
It was like she’d just turned old enough to show her honest fears
I tried to make some sense of it but whilst her Dad was trying
His little girl explained it best…she said “The crocodiles are crying”

Their best mate’s up in heaven now – the crocs up there are smiling!
And as sure as flowers, poems and cards and memories are piling
As sure as we’ll continue with the trademarks of his spiel
Of all the tributes worthy – he was rough…but he was real

As sure as ‘Crikey!’ fills the sky
I think we’ll miss ya Steve…goodbye

- RUPERT McCALL 2006.

What rhymes with "stabbed in the chest by a sting ray"?

1. More Anthony Adverse

2. G.B. Shaw's On the Rocks, which I guess is a minor play. Here's a review of a recent performance.

3. Theodore Dreiser's An American Tragedy, which I've never read. Sometimes I feel guilty about it, especially since I hated Sister Carrie, but then I reread David Denby's review of its reissue. A Place in the Sun is a pretty good movie, though.

4. Frederick Philip Grove's The Master of the Mill. I've never even heard of Grove, but he has his own entry in the Canadian Encyclopedia. And seems to have written pornography under pseudonyms.

5. Stephen Hudson's A True Story. There's much more out there on the author than the book and mostly because he hung with the cool kids of the time. He also helped complete the Moncrieff translation of Proust.

6. Sinclair Lewis's It Can't Happen Here, a satire about fascism in America, and it sounds effing great. The Literary Encyclopedia, unlike the Canadian one, will only let non-registered folk read 600 words of an entry, but it's interesting stuff. It was also newly reissued. Wonder why. This is the one I would read of the selected entries this week.

7. D.H. Lawrence's The Plumed Serpent, which is, yes, set in Mexico. Seeing as I'm not nuts about regular Lawrence, I don't think an overheated setting would help.

8. Stephen Leacock's Short Circuits. More humorous essays, of which an excerpt is here.

9. John Galsworthy's Over the River. More Forsyte?

10. Frederic Manning's The Middle Parts of Fortune: Somme and Ancre, 1916, which was originally published anonymously and is about World War I and also says "fuck" in it a lot. Shocking!

11. Zane Grey's Wilderness Trek. Action-packed pictures.

12. George Orwell's "Marrakech," an essay. Here's an article on how his time there changed him.

13. John Buchan's The Three Hostages. More intrigue. A review from the Buchan Society page mentions some interesting stuff about it, including classical learning as a device.

14. Edgar Rice Burroughs's Swords of Mars, which I am surprised to find is actually about Mars the planet rather than Mars as metaphorical figure signifying war. Some stuff about the series it belongs to.

The humanoid Martians are harassed and preyed upon by the semi-nomadic Green Martians, a separate species with four arms and tusks who stand approximately four meters tall. The Green Martians are organized into loose hordes ranging over the dead sea bottoms, each horde taking its name from that of a dead city in its territory, such as Thark and Warhoon.

Barsoomians generally display warlike and honor-bound characteristics. The technology of the tales runs the gamut from dueling sabers to "radium pistols" and aircraft, with the discovery of powerful ancient devices or research into the development of new ones often forming plot devices. The natives also eschew clothing other than jewelry and ubiquitous leather harnesses, which are designed to hold everything from the weaponry of a warrior to pouches containing toiletries and other useful items; the only instances where Barsoomians habitually wear clothing is for need of warmth, such as for travel in the northern polar regions described in The Warlord of Mars. This preference for near-nudity provides a stimulating subject for illustrators of the stories, though art for many mass-market editions of the books feature Carter and native Barsoomians wearing loincloths and other minimal coverings, or use strategically placed shadows and such to cover exposed genitalia and female breasts.

I was gonna say this should make it into comics, but apparently it already has.

15. More D.H. Lawrence. This time, The Kangaroo, which is his Australian novel and clearly a topic of study over there.

Date: September 19, 2006 11:26:50 AM EDT
To: UGA-FORSALE@LISTSERV.UGA.EDU
Subject: clothing and shoes

Does anyone out there, have women's clothing size 14-16-Large and shoes size 9 Earth Shoes that you can buy at Walmart or other shoes as well for sale. I like those Denim jumpers, skirts, Christian T shirts, tops, etc. anything that i may want. I would appreciate it if you would email me off list, if you do have anything you want to get rid of. Thanks.

No I heart Muhammad T-shirts allowed.

Question: if the quest to get owners to spay and neuter their pets is working, then why are more and larger animal control facilities needed? Is it all coyotes?

Fall Break task force! Want to look like you're doing something? Call your committee a task force.

DOT doesn't want to put a traffic signal at 53 intersection in Watkinsville. The argument is partially that those involved in crashes are being dumbasses, but ain't that frequently the case?

Dang senior pranks.

You know the naming isn't coincidental. We could finally get our own CSI!

Chi Phi on probation. But hey, could someone clear up these pronouns for me?

In 2000, the fraternity was cleared of hazing accusations from visiting Georgia Tech pledges who said that, in 1998, members of the UGA chapter screamed at them, smeared food on them and ordered them to eat food off their bodies. The fraternity fended off the complaint by insisting that members were performing skits, swapping stories and singing pop music.

Harvard gets rid of its early admission program, while UGA doesn't, but isn't the difference that Harvard's was binding? Admittedly, both forms of application create problems, but the binding stuff is way worse.

It's a good point to make that a lot of the kids arriving on campus every year may never have had sex ed before.

ABH and Sonny talking about litter now. But dudes, you shouldn't arrest someone for throwing a cup out a window, no matter how much they shouldn't be doing it. I don't think the education effort will work much better, but it's sort of the right direction.

Woo! Ralphie IV!

After requiring grad students to have health insurance, UGA at least has the decency to cut them some slack on the price. And it's actually a good deal, but I'm still not sure I understand why they have to have it in the first place.

R&B continues to diss the free newspaper program.

Buh-whatnow?

Week 34 is up. Contains quite a lot of boringness. Unblurbed:

Mana - Labios Compartidos (Mexico)
Interminable but would probably go well with fajitas por dos (i.e., as a restaurant soundtrack).
[4]

Howling Bells - Setting Sun (UK)
It’s a bit hippie, but the chiming quality of the chorus is strong enough to cut through the floral muck elsewhere.
[6]

Taylor Swift - Tim McGraw (USA)
Witness-dancing country is the genre that this fits in and that I have just named. It helps that there is dancing mentioned in the song, but the general adult contemporary tone would evoke gentle swaying even if it weren’t. She doesn’t over-sing, though, and that is a blessing.
[5]

Stanton Warriors ft. Sway - Get 'em High (UK)
Why don’t we have rap disco in America? It would be an ideal bonding opportunity for the races (as well as the different sexual orientations), and it would add pace to the former and ass to the latter. Fast ass rocks!
[6]

Marit Bergman is the best of the week. Email if you want any of it.

1. First and foremost, the eerie glow bathing the faces of all. Poltergeist-y.

2. That dog is way too into TV.

3. Patrick Dempsey peering up from the bottom, looking unimpressed.

4. Misspelling of premieres.

More?

What the hell are the Perdues doing with all those peaches in their kitchen? Peachapalooza? Making peach schnapps? I find it very suspicious. I want to see that list.

More on the new push for more restrictive downtown panhandling laws.

"Who's concerned about the rights of business people?" said Anne Shepherd, a business owner [Chick Piano] and board member of the Athens Downtown Development Authority. "Don't we have the right to run a business without customers being grabbed by somebody who's too sorry to work?"

Ugh. I would like to think most people who own businesses downtown are not assholes, but then I remember that some of them certainly are.

Athens-Clarke Mayor Heidi Davison said she'd like to see the Athens Downtown Development Authority form a committee that includes county staff, business owners, nonprofit agencies, churches and University of Georgia administrators, who might be called upon to educate students not to give money to panhandlers.

While it's true a lot of students come from areas where they haven't encountered panhandlers, I don't think it's so terrible for them to pass on a few bucks here and there.

The family-friendly zones are still largely deserted (no surprise against UAB), but hey! People are drinking there!

Mark Taylor is strongly encouraging me not to vote for him by adding the revocation of state property taxes to his platform.

For a house valued at $150,000 on the market, that would save the owners $14.50 per year.

But it costs the state $76 million a year. Because we don't need that money for a useful purpose?

Perdue's spokesman Derrick Dickey pooh-poohed Taylor's proposal.

"He will no doubt promise every Georgian a Porsche and a shiny new toaster by election day," Dickey said. "Nobody believes Mark Taylor's promises anymore."

Kinda. Yes. Also note, Cathy Cox not present.

Taylor versus Perdue on health care. Perdue sells his income tax cut on seniors as a health plan.

Profile of Jim Martin, lieutenant governor candidate, which mentions some of the mud slung at him and may do him some disservice in the process, although the end picture is pretty good.

UGA's career education program, which teaches kids how to teach kids how to do useful things.

Speaking of such, the PPA chairman believes strongly in vo-tech education. While I think he's a bit conservative (and the article doesn't argue otherwise), useful things, as mentioned above, are useful. That's why they're called such. Education to a certain point is wonderful, but being able to get a job is too.

R.E.M. is awesome. This dude doesn't think so, though.

Winders on Commerce almost school shooting. And goes back and forth between sympathy and "we can't be too careful with our kids" mentality. Dude. Read the Gladwell piece I linked. We can.

So maybe people should take their cellphones away from their ears occasionally.

McCarter thinks the mayor does have power and explains why.

Northeast Clarke fire station being constructed.

Look, we should totally have a permanent VA clinic and a good one, but veterans are not more deserving than the rest of us.

Letter-writer opposes affordable housing on the Navy School site because it lowers the property value. That may be, but that doesn't necessarily make it a bad idea.

Rozier says it's garbage dudes littering. And this guy thinks we should have undercover cops to stop it. Waste of limited police resources much?

This woman has been worried about the Epps Bridge bridge for many years. Which is kind of funny, as it hasn't been there all that long.

Gameday round-up: Some people got scammed for parking (small-scale). The IM fields were clean. The new emphasis on recycling seemed to pay off. And the R&B grants credit where it's due.

Winter Passing: Um, it's kind of good, but then it's so overwhelmingly depressing for large parts that the goodness is not quite what sticks with you. Ed Harris gets to do some more acting with his hair. Zooey Deschanel kind of gets to play her character from Elf (complete with awakening to life by Will Ferrell), but much, much sadder and more slappable. The part where she drowns a kitten, near the beginning of the movie, is almost unbearable, and it kind of hangs a veil of misery over the rest of it. Mostly, in its combination of Grey Gardens and Wonder Boys, it made me think about a terrible fear, which is the fear of one's parents (or just one, really, because you sort of have to be on your own for it to work fully) descending into senile dementia. All the dirt and disaster and whims becoming craziness. I'm not sure I planned on confronting that when I rented this. Also, are people who live where it's cold most of the time more apt to be depressive?

In case I don't get to the hobbyhorse tonight, here's the link to my column that ran yesterday. The very last line, providing a description of the author, had read "She manages to combine a love of Maker's Mark with a decent grasp of the English language," but McGinty told me they'd take it out and so it was. Now it sounds like I think I'm completely awesome instead of only partially so. No letters yet. Except for Becky Vaughn's, which responds to Andy's, and makes me think (briefly) twice about the vote I cast her way in the past.

Damn. I wish I had a better picture than this of the pope being burned in effigy. Not because I support it or because I oppose it. Mostly because these people could really use a community college (or even personal development) course in effigy making. It's a stick figure with a paper bag on its head. And much as I wish the pope did wear a brown paper sack up there, you might at least want to shape it a little better, just to get your message across without misinterpretation. As is, folks might think you hate the Unknown Comic.

1) Sars Wars: Bangkok Zombie Crisis: Well, you'll have to hit up the podcast for that review. It's covered so thoroughly there, there's no point in redoing it here.

2) The Brothers Grimm: A few very strong and frightening images do not a movie make. Someone should maybe tell Gilliam this, as it's a perennial problem with him. In some ways, the more movies he makes, the more I dislike Brazil retrospectively. Not that it's ever been one of my favorites. It's too wandering and complicated and stupid and reliant on pretty/frightening things. But Brothers Grimm is much worse when it comes to that, and it degenerates into incoherence as it progresses. The ideas are good (and they usually are with him), but the execution is shoddy. It's like someone on drugs trying to tell you a story that you have a feeling might be interesting if he/she could fill in the gaps. Might.

3) Battlestar Galactica, season 1: Really damn good. Continually surprising, both in plot and character changes. It's nice in the way it sets you up to wonder when something will happen, then jumps and makes it happen much faster than you thought it would. It's smart and quick and the actors get to have lots of fun. And it seems to have all kinds of terrorist subtexts that are neat to think about (they walk among us, believe in a god that is only slightly different from ours, yadda yadda). I find myself a huge fan of Gaius (Jared pointed out that he's so the John Glover of this show, and part of the reason I like him is that he's a hugely unsuccessful liar who is believed by everyone around him) and Starbuck above all. Season 2 will definitely happen.

In the same big ol' education issue of the New Yorker:

1. Malcolm Gladwell's Comment "No Mercy," on the failure of zero-tolerance policies in schools:

. . . making a fetish of personal accountability conveniently removes the need for institutional accountability. (We court-martial the grunts who abuse prisoners, not the commanding officers who let the abuse happen.) To acknowledge that the causes of our actions are complex and muddy seems permissive, and permissiveness is the hallmark of an ideology now firmly in disgrace. That conservative patron saint Whittaker Chambers once defined liberalism as Christ without the Crucifixion. But punishment without the possibility of redemption is worse: it is the Crucifixion without Christ.

I was thinking of this, sort of, when writing the column Mr. Winders talked me into. And then a little bit again this morning, when McCain was on This Week and all making me like him again when he talks about torture and how it's a matter of conscience, not of results. Mercy beats justice every time, dudes.

2. Peter J. Boyer's "Big Men on Campus," about the Duke lacrosse scandal. This is one I'm very happy is online, and if you go to a school with a strong focus on athletics, it's particularly interesting. However, characterizing Duke as that isn't exactly accurate:

Duke means to contend at a championship level in sports across the board, and to do so without compromising academic standards. It is an audacious proposition—only two other private institutions, Stanford and Northwestern, even try it—and the undertaking alone attests to Duke’s vigor, and its idea of itself.

Because football is tops in that area, and Duke can't be characterized as contending at any kind of level in that sport. Duke president Brodhead seems to be trying to balance academics and athletics nicely, though, despite the fact that some faculty members come off like kids who were bullied by the football (or lacrosse?) players in high school and still haven't gotten over it. But the article plays down the middle very well. There are things that are appalling sounding about the lacrosse team and probably about college sports in general. But there are benefits too. And essentially, we should think about it all deeply.

3. Burkhard Bilger's "The Lunchroom Rebellion," about Ann Cooper, new head chef of the Berkeley public school system. The link actually goes to Chef Ann's blog, where you can read the whole article. Yes, it's about food and trying to reform the mess that is the school lunch program (where regulations about calories date from a different time and easily prepared anutritious carbs are most of the menu), but it's also about the pace of revolution and the modification of ideals in the service of practicality.

4. Alex Ross's article on music education programs isn't online, but the thing you mostly need to know is that there is a kid in it named Jihad Moore.

Aued covers Mexican Independence Day in Athens, which is less about fratboys putting on sombreros and more about racial equality or something.

Paranoia about school shootings bumps up a bit. MySpace research is done.

Next Western Judicial Circuit judge should maybe set up in a trailer next to the ACC courthouse. ABH supports having one but doesn't know where to put him/her.

Morris News Service reports on study by Tech saying deregulation of natural gas industry hasn't led to higher prices. Except that what the study seems to be saying is that deregulation didn't lead to higher prices this past year. And also, depending on what state you're in, you might've done better under regulation or you might not've. Also,

"The best we could say is they were not any worse off in Georgia" as a result of deregulation, said Robert Lann, author of the study and a member of the Community Policy and Research Services division of Georgia Tech's Office of Economic Development and Technology Ventures.

However, Lann speculated that most consumers didn't get the full benefit of deregulation by switching marketers frequently to whichever offered the lowest price at any moment.

"They're not really taking advantage of the choices they have in this system," he said.

Because there's a big fee every time you switch. That's not exactly fair.

McGinty's already talked about this a little, but all the mayoral candidates were invited to (and showed up at) Carrabba's to talk about real estate to a room of real estate professionals. Mr. Rusk clarifies his position here. No one talks about the insane number of luxury condos going up.

Don't throw your crap out the window.

Large percentage of both pedestrians and drivers are dumbasses. Less ego, please, and a better comprehension of the harm you can do to someone with your big metal rolling thing.

Two professors think Adams is more positively perceived than previously. One of them admits he doesn't know what the fuck is going on.

No smoking by any doorways on campus now, not just the main library. Smokers must officially stand in rain, be pelted with ripe tomatoes, etc.

The plan for the IM fields today was to open them only if everything else filled up.

New license plates for the state. Complete with mark of the beast.

Oglethorpe County must not have must crime if they're asking you to tie up 911 to report street sign thefts.

Five school systems are lobbying for exemptions from the new class size restrictions. What deserves an exemption? Um, there ain't rules on that.

Georgia Power wants to raise your bill a little more. Circular increasing fuel costs suck hard.

So did the national women's studies honor society get to pick III as their letters? I'm just saying, it comes off a little self-centered.

Hey, high five, Dick. Way to create connections between Muslims and Christians.

Mr. Covington raises a good point about the Epps Bridge ramp.

Oh lord. What is funnier than taking a phone survey on local health issues in which every time the woman surveying you wants to pose a questions, she asks if she can "ax" it?

How I wish the EU's ambassador would be taken seriously on global warming by the right people. But, like, huh?

American policymakers who refuse to impose stricter pollution standards until the governments in China and India do are ignoring the influence of Western culture, Bruton said.

"They're aspiring to our living standards at the moment," he said. "If we don't change ... the living standards, we can't expect them to change their living behavior and environment."

Europe's living standards, though, have been improving at a slower pace than those in the United States, in China and even when compared to the world's average last 10 years, according to a report released this week by the Robert Schuman Foundation.

First, what did he actually mean? Second, quick misinterpretation in a news service article no doubt will lead to no one paying attention to the important first part due to immediate "how dare Europe say they're better than we are" reaction.

Oglethorpe County has hired a collections agency for people who are delinquent on their ambulance bills. And this seems sort of awful, but then the story reveals that they do try to focus on people who aren't paying not because they're poor but for other reasons, which is sort of good. But how do they sort out who's who? And does Oglethorpe County specifically do this (not just counties who do this kind of thing in general)?

Damn. Redevelopment of the Navy School, according to consultant dude Jim Hicks, will be expensive, large, and probably cut down a bunch of trees. Also, little affordable housing.

"I've been called blankety-blank and blankety-blank for wanting to tear down housing," Hicks said. "We are not against affordable housing. We are not against poor people. However, I am in favor of making prudent decisions, because you're going to have a long period of negative cash flow."

If the LRA redevelops the Navy school itself - it could also turn the base over to one or more private developers who would follow a plan drafted by the LRA - the LRA or Athens-Clarke County would have to buy the property from the Navy, Hicks said. In that case, high-end housing would help pay back loans or out-of-pocket expenses more quickly, he said.

Isn't the lack (or reduction) of profit motive kind of the point of the government buying it?

Have y'all noticed more begging lately? I'm not a big fan of it (some people are jerks), but the existing laws, if enforced even somewhat, would seem to do just fine at controlling the problem.

Barrow County will have money to meet its budget, due to a property tax raise.

Sonny courts old people, gets called out on the radio. Um, nuh duh it was a set-up.

After accomplishing nothing in 2.5 years, bioscience authority decides to set smaller goals.

Erroll Davis thinks more low-income kids should be able to go to college in Georgia. Now where could they get that money? Maybe an income cap on HOPE? Finally? Eh, it's a swearing in ceremony. No specifics.

There are definitely good things about this new review process for USG bigwigs that Davis has introduced. For one thing, it takes some of the buddy-buddy stuff out of the equation, which I assume is the reason.

Dudes, aren't we suspicious of private companies supplying our troops with food and water? And isn't it nice to think not all reserves, who signed up for a bit of scout training, are getting blown up?

And when our reservists and National Guard members respond to the call to duty - as they continue to do without complaint - they'll know there was no one else to call.

They'll know we need them and only asked them to put their civilian lives on hold because they are vital to the U.S. military mission, the defense of America's interests.

I'm sure they know that really well by now...

Jeff Emanuel would prefer you no thinky, just feel mad! Hulk smash!

Darren Lloyd points out that when the middle is defined elsewhere than the middle, there's not much point in bar owners showing up for discussion. See? (Also, we do have strip clubs.)

James Garland wants the ACC districts redrawn to create a student-heavy one that would have a chance of electing someone younger to the commission. Mr. Dodson is absolutely correct where quoted. It would be lovely to have someone younger up there in the weekly meetings, but redrawing districts is a multi-gallon can of worms, and the four-year terms might present a problem.

Black Affairs Council not happy with Chi Phi.

“I think (the pledges) were just trying for a laugh,” he said, but added that pledges displayed a “social ignorance.”

That's the most accurate thing said on the matter. The thing is, Black Tail equals joke, even if they weren't showing the cover, but the inside. Penthouse isn't automatically funny. It's more of a title thing than a "we hate black people" thing, but that doesn't mean it's not insensitive to blacks. "Social ignorance" is a pretty good way of putting it.

PartyDawgs.com takes all this Greek discussion as an opportunity to advertise in the letters section.

R&B editorial raises questions about these "free" papers the students are getting.

Jace does pizza!

Transmet made me want to invent a magic helmet that levitates pizza directly into my mouth just by thinking about how delicious it’s going to be (patent pending).

I should just give this guy my Flagpole gig...

Date: September 13, 2006 2:51:59 PM EDT
To: UGA-FORSALE@LISTSERV.UGA.EDU
Subject: For the True Nascar Fan

Dale Jr. display car, approx. 5ft tall with stand, 6ft long. Asking $400.00 OBO

Don't you have $400 somewhere, Melissa?

Reviews of CDs by Bear (local rap dude) and Everclear.

Theft: On Sept. 4, a 52-year-old Oconee woman reported that on Aug. 26 she went to Petland on Epps Bridge Road, where she put down her wallet next to a parakeet cage. She turned away from the wallet and when she looked back, it was gone.

See? They are.

Arrests: On Sept. 5, deputy Shane Partain was on patrol when he spotted a Plymouth Breeze at Shady Acres Mobile Home Park in Bogart at 12:54 a.m. About 30 minutes later, he saw the car, noticed the driver wasn't wearing a seat belt, and stopped it on Fowler Mill Road. He arrested the driver, Christopher Daniel Deaton, 25, of Old Savage Road, Bogart, on a charge of driving while his license was suspended. Inside the vehicle, he saw four fishing rods, a large amount of change and a duffel bag containing a DVD player. In addition, deputy Jason Lowe was dispatched to Shady Acres in connection with the investigation of a burglary in Jackson County in which similar items were stolen. One woman in the car said that Deaton and Leah Frances Barton had brought some items to her house, but she asked them to get the items out. Deaton was taken to jail, where he was interviewed by Lowe and Partain. There, Deaton said he took Barton to the home in Jackson County, where he let her out at the house. He drove down the road and when he returned, Barton was waiting on him with the items. They then drove to Burson Avenue in Bogart. Partain spoke with Barton, who told the deputy she wanted a lawyer. Barton, 31, of Woodland Road, Watkinsville, was charged with theft by receiving stolen property. Deaton was charged with the same offense. Both suspects are expected to be taken to Jackson County as part of the investigation.

Why is this one here? It doesn't seem that funny. I like it because of the use of "waiting on" rather than "waiting for." Is that a Southernism or just regular colloquial speech?

Theft: On Sept. 8, a resident of Monroe Highway held a yard sale at his home. When it was done, he piled everything he didn't sell into a trailer and put up a sign saying "free." Later when he went to the store, he returned to discover that everything, including the trailer, was gone. The man told deputy Bryan Yoder that "he did not think about someone thinking the trailer was free also." The trailer is valued at $300.

Damn it. Truth in advertising!

Arrest: On Sept. 9, deputy Brad Williams was dispatched shortly before 1 a.m. to a home on Deni Court for a noise complaint. As he neared the home, Williams could hear loud music. As he exited his patrol car, a woman came out of the house and fell down as she approached him. He told the woman to turn her radio down and in a slurred speech, she said, "No you come in my house." Williams went inside and turned the radio down. As he was leaving, he told her to keep it down and she said, "No I love my music and I will listen to it." She began screaming, but as Williams was returning to his patrol unit, she turned the radio up again. Williams got on his radio and asked Cpl. Kevin Nolley to meet him at the house due to the woman's condition. Nolley arrived and they explained the neighbors were complaining about the loud noise so late at night. They turned the radio down again and as the two deputies were about to leave, she turned it back up. She then walked out of her house and fell down the steps, again telling the deputies she would not turn it down. Nolley tried to arrest her, but she resisted and had to be subdued. Lucy Mitic, 50, was charged with obstruction and violating the county's noise ordinance.

And molesting an officer of the law...

Threat: On Sept. 9, deputies were called to Fire Mountain, where an employee cutting steaks for customers said he placed a piece of steak on a young man's plate and it slid off and burned the man's hand. He started shouting at the employee, who apologized. The man's father came over and threatened the employee. When the manager came out, the man presented a badge showing he was with the Georgia Sheriff's Association. They left, but the father said he would deal with employee.

Seriously. Fire Mountain may have a worse record on this kind of thing than Insomnia or Classic City Saloon.

The rest is here.

Hey, you know who can write over there at the ABH? Merritt. She's managed to dig herself out of Oconee County on this story, which is about the discovery of a cemetery behind Clarke Middle and is all historical and facty and also spooky.

VA clinic to open here. Not in the Navy School.

Whaling. Not wailing away. Unless he also was. You wouldn't say, "I was wailing on my little brother."

Hot damn. Being a litter technician pays pretty well. Solving poverty and cleaning shit up at the same time seems like a good idea.

Headline of the week.

Fair enough. Taking some time to see if the "family friendly" tailgating zones are actually popular is fine. It's doubtful, but okay.

Badass yard sale at Tom Meredith's old crib?

Open records. Me and the ABH always agree on that one.

A letter about drinking in Athens in the past. It happened, apparently.

Also, it's awesome when the high school kids write letters.

This kind of free newspaper crap happens all the time. Does it make the kids really read more papers? Or does it get their advertising out there? Also, do you have to swipe your ID or something to get one?

Kids. You can have a big room. Or an environmentally friendly building. Not both. Why?

What the hell? Allowing people to fuck up the current IM fields is okay because we're going to spend millions of dollars and bulldoze wooded land to build new ones? Hmm.

Y'all learned a lesson from Showgirls?

Pete continues. Who's he voting for again?

City Pages covers: traffic calming (peeps are stealing the yellow dude slow down signs), recycling on game days (maybe there should be some), Ponsoldt, and working in Georgia sucks.

So I'm sure y'all, being upstanding Pepsi-haters as you no doubt are, have noticed this MyCokeRewards program, where you get poorly printed codes on the inside of your various Coke packages and enter them on a website for a chance to get stuff (or think about getting stuff, as the good stuff of the stuff is always gone). I do this. I like free stuff. I also shop at Kmart. It's near our house and it's a fine source for cheap consumer goods. So in the mail the other day I got a free $10 gift card to Kmart on behalf of Coca-Cola, basically saying that they'd noticed I like both things. So the Coke Rewards points are just a way for them to keep tabs on you? If I bought my Cokes at an Islamist store would they be sending the FBI to tap my phone? Is that all incredibly creepy? Kind of. But hey, free 10 bucks.

Not quite the tale of the poisoned dachshund, but still...

Date: September 13, 2006 9:10:46 AM EDT
To: UGASTAFF@LISTSERV.UGA.EDU
Subject: Umm, can my dog blow bubbles now?

My dog 9 month old 'puppy' got in my purse sometime between 4-6:30 a.m. this morning and ate an entire package (package, wrappers, foil and 13 pieces) of Orbit sugarless bubblegum.

I gave him plenty of food and water (which he consumed like normal) and took him for a long walk this morning to do his business, but he only tinkled. I watched him closely for an hour and when playing with our other puppy he acted as though nothing was wrong.

I've checked on line and saw that many of the holistic vet websites state that sugarless gum is toxic, yet my call to the vet's office was answered with "if he's acting normal he's fine. Let us know if he goes into seizures and bring him in" -- ok, I'm here at work, scare me why don't you...

So my question to you, and I hope that I get some responses from the Vet School is this: do I need to go home and take my dog to the vet, or would you feel comfortable knowing he's crated and has eaten normally and was his same cheerful self this morning? Swiper's approximately 50lbs and quite large for a puppy (Shar Pei/Retriever mix).

The town was wallpapered with "Elect Heidi" stickers last night, from the 40 Watt ladies' room to JB the polish sausage man (yeah, on his shirt). So, if you like semi-secret R.E.M. shows and, therefore (?), nostalgia and stuff for the way Athens used to be, vote Heidi. Is that the message? Or was it just a good time to reach the over-40 but still cool voter?

Yeah I know it's September. Still. You can finally watch that video for "Liquor" that I talked about way too much.

Get it? Two. Chickens.

Not me. Whoever writes the blurbs in the New Yorker's "Night Life" listings. Here's how it go:

A few weeks ago, only a handful of dates into the "Family Values" tour, a concertgoer in Atlanta was savagely beaten by inebriated fans, reportedly after he asked them to be mindful of his pregnant girlfriend. He later died from his injuries, and though this inauspicious event has cast a pall over the proceedings, the touring festival rolls on, headlined by...

1. This is weird, isn't it? Not so much that it happened, but more the calling attention to it in a blurb listing. If it happened in Flagpole, there would be angry letters.

2. Note that Korn has made it clear they were not on stage at the time. Morbidly funny much?

3. Right now it looks like one guy.

4. Billboard characterizes it as over a baseball cap.

5. This says there is much confusion.

6. So what's the point? Whoever writes these hates those bands? Wants to provide a public service by saying "Don't take your pregnant girlfriend"? Because you probably shouldn't anyway.

Hey, drunk assholes. How about taking surface roads home?

Norwood and Westmoreland can't deal with the fact that Georgia still has to pay the price for having a shitty voting rights record. This isn't going to help with that situation.

Dick Yarbrough does seem to be learning. Verrry slowly.

Mr. Rusk points out that fussing about underage drinking is indeed an easy thing to talk about and a distraction from more important issues, but I think it's more driven by the university than by the election year. And the university doesn't really care about the election year, as it's not going to make a huge difference to them. That said, again, can someone name me a bar that lets in 18-year-olds in Athens?

African American student recruitment club to get money. Yeah. That would help.

Griffin campus of UGA to get $10 million SLC of their own, but here's the interesting part: it's being funded by a one-percent sales tax in the county. How does that get swung? Does Spalding County not have a whole lot else it needs to pay for?

One of them articles on student loans and debt. They're lower here than average.

So you say it's getting too cold lately? This overheated editorial might help with that.

Beating Steve Spurrier trumps all other news stories.

And finally, a good suggestion to preserve "family friendly" tailgating zones and the intramural fields.

New podcast up.

Accompanying links.

Jukebox 33 is up.

Almost everyone hates Blue October, but I don't.

Blue October - Hate Me (USA)
This song has been running on my cable company’s music “hits” station for a few months now, and I’m continually surprised by how much I like its multitracked, closely harmonic vocals and its melody, especially considering the aggro beards on the dudes in the band. Emotional and pretty and very dudely. Huh.
[7]

Also unblurbed:

The Fratellis - Chelsea Dagger (UK)
Songs heavy on the “doot-doot”s get me almost every time. Including this one. Also they have a great font.
[6]

Jamelia - Something About You (UK)
Is this not Fefe Dobson? Of course it’s not. Because she can sing a bit better.
[4]

The Walkmen - Louisiana (USA)
This is almost as jangly and country as Camera Obscura’s song this week, but the vocals end up moving it in a slightly more Arlo Guthrie direction before the trumpets make it take a turn toward Mexico. It’s sloppy, a little drunken, and very sweet.
[7]

Email if you want any of it, even the bearded emo.

Your future Heisman winner. (I heart facebook.)

Please note that his interests are currently listed as: girls and football.

I agree with classiness in most cases. It's usually a good idea. And it's certainly easy to write an editorial in favor of. But, dude. We are not all Americans. If there's anything the last five years have made clear (and there are a lot of things they have), it's that some of us aren't. Some of us are illegal immigrants. Some of us are liberal internationalists. And some of us are told we're not because we disagree. "We are all human" must sound too hippieish. And no one said "We are all Southeast Asia" when they had their tragedy. I think perhaps those "we" statements are a bad idea in general. They certainly got my back up when I was reading Helene Cixous.

Also, family-friendly zones are embarrassing us with their cute bouncy toys and such.

And here's a letter complaining about other things that should be banned while driving, which apparently means cell phone use shouldn't. I'm sure there's an official name for that logical fallacy, but we didn't have a debate team in high school.

And dudes. Do not mess with the 40 Watt bartenders.

I promise I'll get on that Chi Phi porn thing at some point. Really, it's pretty creative hazing, even if it is insensitive and racist and so on. I'd rather be assigned to do that than whipped with a belt or something.

Goodday My Beloveth

As you read this, I don't want you to feel sorry for me, because, I believe everyone will die someday.

My name is Joshua Tinman , a Christian Caribbean Merchant in the Caribbean Island

I have been diagnosed with esophageal cancer, which was discovered very late, due to my laxity in carrying for my health. It has defiled all forms of medicine, and right now I have only about a few months to live, according to medical experts.

I have since lost my power of speech and can only manage to write now; as that has been the only way I am able to communicate.

I have not particularly lived my life so well, as I never really cared for anyone not even myself but my business.

Though I am very rich, I was never generous, I was always hostile to people and only focus on my business as that is the only thing I cared for. But now I regret all this as I now know that there is more to life than just wanting to have or make all the money in the world.

I believe when God gives me a second chance to come to this world I would live my life a different way from how I have lived it. Now that I know my time is near, I have willed and given most of my properties and assets to my immediate and extended family members and as well as a few close friends.

I want God to be merciful to me and accept my soul and so, I have decided to give alms to charity Organizations, as I want this to be one of the last good deeds I do on earth.

So far, I have distributed money to some charity organizations in the Caribbean Island, London and Ireland. Now that my health has deteriorated so badly, I cannot do this my self any more. I once asked members of my family to close one of my accounts and donate the money, which I have there to charity organization in Bulgaria, they refused and kept the money to themselves. Hence, I do not trust them anymore, as they seem not to be contended with what I have left for them.

The last of my money which only few of them knows of is the huge cash deposit that I have with a security firm. I will want you to help me collect this deposit and dispatched it to charity organizations.

Please if you are willing to help me and save me from this dilemma I am going through, do reply me on my email address for more information which I will provide.

May the Almighty be you and your family Amen.

JOSHUA TINMAN

1) Transamerica: Damn it. I hate Oscar-role movies, and I didn't want to like this, never having been particularly a Felicity Huffman fan, but motherfuck it was really really good. It's nicely individualized. It's not too corny. The acting is phenomenal. The country looks nice as filmed out of the car. There are a few things that are overdone, but it's just the kind of thing that could change people's minds without setting out to preach. Does contain the lamest blooper reel ever, though.

2) The Hills Have Eyes (2006): Why rent something if you think it's going to suck? Because it might not and then you would be happily surprised, as in this case. Perhaps standards for new horror movies, especially remakes (I haven't seen the Craven original), are very very low, but it is: a) violent, b) well-lit, c) filmed with a reasonably steady camera, d) has some sense of plot, and e) I didn't hate all the characters. That's really pretty good these days. The end is stupid, but Aja is an okay director, and there are moments of extremely violent comedy. Also, there is a sense of wronged nature taking vengeance in it--a smallish sense, but probably a remnant of the original's era. What is the point? That we all want to protect our own and will do anything to do so?

3) Good Night, and Good Luck: There's sort of nothing to it, isn't there? It's very attractive and classy, and the acting is good, but we all hate McCarthy, don't we? There are some interesting discussions among folks with different levels of power at the network, but despite all the characters arguing as hard as they can that they're loyal Americans with no communist leanings at all, a) one wishes that that level of ass-covering were not required (nothing illegal about being a communist, or at least there shouldn't be), and b) the movie ends up arguing subtlely along anti-capitalist lines, as the need for profit to please the shareholders is just what ends up downgrading Murrow into a crappy timeslot. Is this latter point intentional?

39) In the photograph, the model is shown rising out of a bubble bath, suds dripping from her body. Her tight panties and skimpy top are soaked and revealing. She gazes at the viewer, her face showing a wisp of a smile that seems to have been coaxed from off-camera.

In just over seven months, the model has become an online phenomenon. She has thousands of fans from around the world, membership lists show, who pay as much as $30 a month to see images of her. According to the posted schedule, new photographs of her -- many clearly intended to be erotic, all supposedly taken that week -- are posted online every Friday for her growing legions of admirers.

The model's online name is Sparkle. She is -- at most -- 9 years old. [from "With Child Sex Sites on the Run, Nearly Nude Photos Hit the Web" by Kurt Eichenwald, 08/20/06; don't make me feel so filthy, NYT!]

40) Start with underwear gossamer enough to prevent overheating and overbulking. Apply Arrid Extra Dry antiperspirant. Araks cotton bra and panties. [from "Layering Easy as One, Two, Three, Four, Five, Six, Seven" by Jonathan S. Paul, in Women's Fashion section supplement thing(?), 08/27/06]

41) Nowadays his father has a lounge act in the Canary Islands. "Tom Jones gets all the skimpy panties thrown at him when he sings," Mr. Statham said. "My dad gets the big apple-catcher underwear tossed on stage." His mother is also part of the act. [from "A Night Out With Jason Statham: Action Bloke" by Monica Corcoran, 09/03/06]

42) The outside of the invitation says, "Rub and Be Rubbed, Grip and Be Gripped, Tickle and Be Tickled." Inside, it says, "Touch and Be Touched." Next to those words is a picture of a woman in black panties lying atop a man wearing jeans.

The words and images are part of a new advertising campaign that Nivea will start a few days before the charity auction takes place Sept. 14. [from "Torre Defends Racy Invitation for Foundation Fund-Raiser" by Michael S. Schmidt, 09/06/06]

Note: Panty-watch is a regular feature here dedicated to tracking appearances of the word "panties" or "panty" in the New York Times, partially because it's amusing to see the Gray Lady venturing into such areas and partially to see if it correlates with anything specific. The end of the year should result in a few more graphs.

[previously]

More literary excerpts that have arrived.

1. John Galsworthy's Maid in Waiting, which seems to be part of his Forsyte saga, the big thing he's known for and semi-recently adapted into a big miniseries by Masterpiece Theatre. It seems kind of strange that he won the Nobel Prize for Literature, but apparently he did. Oh, wait. Lookit. "Through his writings he campaigned for a variety of causes including prison reform, women's rights, animal welfare and censorship, but these have limited appeal outside the era in which they were written." That probably helped his cause.

2. A.E.W. Mason's The Prisoner in the Opal, a mystery novel. He's another one of those Brits with a military photo on his wikipedia page. Best known for The Four Feathers, which I'd like to see some of the movie adaptations of. Here's a bit on the book from a longish bio:

The Prisoner in the Opal (1928) reunites Ricardo and Hanaud. The title refers to Ricardo, who sees the world as an opal with himself imprisoned within. Reminiscent of the psychic touches in At the Villa Rose are the warnings of danger to Diana Tasborough brought by the visions of Joyce Whipple. When Hanaud arrives it is to herald the murder-a woman's body found with the right hand hacked off. The theme of black magic and the occult is well handled but appears somewhat unorthodox in a Mason story. Ricardo is more central to the story than previously, and there are some delightful examples of Hanaud's practical jokes, but neither factor makes this a good novel.

3. Two more excerpts from David Copperfield, easily guessed via character names.

4. Sinclair Lewis's The Prodigal Parents. The amazon.com page linked there with the title has a good description of the plot from a reviewer, but it is largely what you'd think. The main character's last name is Cornplow. Here's a Time review from 1938.

5. George Orwell's Homage to Catalonia, from its most famous passage about being hit by a bullet and thinking you're dead. Haven't read it. Should.

6. S.S. Van Dine's The "Canary" Murder Case (A Philo Vance Story). The wikipedia page on this has some interesting theories. And here's a picture from the movie (actually, the photoplay).

7. Orwell's 1984, which I managed to guess, luckily, even though I haven't read it in forever.

8. Earl Derr Biggers, Behind That Curtain, a Charlie Chan mystery. I didn't know anything about Biggers or even, to begin with, that he wrote Charlie Chan, but here a couple of pages of info. He seems to have been a good humored guy.

The mayor, as he likes to be known, very much in Kinky fashion before the fact, playing cornhole in the tournament last night. He had himself a ringer of a partner, too, and they could've gone all the way, but ended up just going part of it. Anyway. There was some handshaking and some discussion of strategy (I suppose I am really not the person to ask on that matter) and whatnot. It was fun. I love Heidi, but I certainly didn't see her out on the patio last night. Don't we need a mayor who likes a little irresponsibility from time to time? Note that he plays a clean game. No cornhole bags were whipped at anyone's head or anything of the sort. Anyway. Vote Andy.

It is indeed football season.

So here is the first photo I was commissioned (nay, commanded) to post. The faux twopeat pic, posing with the Stanley Cup of Athens Cornhole.


And then, because some motherfuckers are 8 feet tall and therefore much closer to the board than the rest of us, the reality. Yeah. Team Brown 1-2. Out. Free shots. (Which were tasty.) But Team Keeney (Jared contends that their name is 30 Helens Agree; I cannot confirm officialness, but am told it is so)? Victors. Again. Hence title of post. But promises must be adhered to. Hence photos. Now sleep.

Most recent literary excerpts have included:

1) G.K. Chesterton's Four Faultless Felons, which I officially want now. Every time I read any Chesterton at all, I am amazed by how warm and intelligent and beautiful his stuff is, so apparently, I should read more. The American Chesterton Society web page is badly designed, but has good stuff on who the hell he is.

2) Charles Herbert Lightoller's Titanic and Other Ships, which is his autobiography. He was on it. He seems pretty awesome.

3) Willa Cather's Death Comes for the Archbishop, which is one of the best books ever written.

New idea for bonus school funding: detergent manufacturers pay schools to water down their playgrounds.

Fall break debate will continue with periodic spikes in the level of contentiousness for the foreseeable future. Can't faculty members enforce their own attendance policies? ABH would like a decision. Safety zone ain't a bad idea. But asking professors not to joke about alcohol treats them about the same way as students. Also, Blake Haas has an interesting letter.

Maybe neighborhoods should just close off their streets entirely, the way the university did with South Campus. That would calm the fuck out of traffic. Anyway, there's a committee being appointed to study more reasonable ways to do it. Also, George Maxwell voted against changes to leisure services fees. R&B talks to Kinman, who says permanent residents get as many speeding tickets as students, but recommends more driver education.

We got tons of road moneys, but that doesn't mean they'll be spent on the roads.

I'm sure Sonny has a pretty good grasp on what appearing with the president does for his poll numbers.

How much money is the state spending "educating" voters about their need for IDs? The law still has a good shot at being blocked once again. Especially with Perdue trying to make it harder to get the damn ID.

Shirley Franklin loves Heidi, but doesn't necessarily know Athens.

Some tenants evicted from Arbor Glen mobile home park are actually better off, but still... some people are still there. They are making room for sewer service to the area, though.

Most parents seem okay with their kids doing whatever for extracurricular activities.

Hot damn! Cell phone ban while driving might actually happen. At least, the ABH is behind it, and they damn well should be.

Shipp gives a lesson on Jimmy Carmichael.

Letter from another bar owner, also taking issue with the ABH. How many bars in Athens aren't 21 and up? The 40 Watt has shows that aren't, but is there anywhere else left?

No drinking on gamedays! And turn that racket down!

New grad from Clarke Central writes a fine letter on the schools to Jim. Also, them kids seem to know something about journalism.

I try not to link to the crime stories too much, but the details on Daryl Brown's nightmares are pretty interesting.

Navy School: group recommends historic preservation, upgrades to infrastructure. May be ignored.

Mark Taylor now doesn't believe in parole.

Taylor is running to unseat Republican Gov. Sonny Perdue in November. Ironically, Perdue introduced similar legislation in 1998 when he and Taylor were senators, but the measure stalled in a conference committee. Then, Perdue switched parties, and Taylor became lieutenant governor, stripping Perdue of most of his power in the legislature.

Neither Taylor in his eight years as lieutenant governor nor Perdue in his four years as governor has proposed ending parole since.

Pardons and Parole had instituted a policy requiring inmates serve at least 90 percent of their sentence if convicted of the 19 violent or sexual crimes Taylor is specifying. But last year, a judge rejected the policy and ruled that the board must evaluate each inmate individually.

Yet again, report card says Georgia's public colleges are too expensive. How many states don't fail this test?

Georgia is not alone its failing grade. Forty-three states received F's for affordability, up from 36 two years ago. The others got D's, except Utah and California, each of which eked out a C.

Drek Davis ain't writing a column no more.

Clarence Carter is sexy ^ 4.

Sandy Whitney has an interesting idea for funding trauma centers.

Students would like Tate II to be green.

Whose leather chaps are these?

They're still working on the medical amnesty for drinking.

Facebook is a good way for politicians to stay in touch with the kids.

Maybe Pete could just fill up a column with "Heidi for mayor" a la "All work and no play makes Jack a dull boy." The effect would be similar.

City Pages covers: hiring felons (not always a bad idea), the devil's drank in Watkinsville, and Taylor-Cox friction remains.

Match Point: Quite good and much more about money than love, which is often more interesting anyway. Rhys Meyers is good too, which is rare in my experience, or at least previously he's picked such annoying roles that I've rolled over those characters' obnoxiousness into my impression of him. But he's appropriately shaken at times and stupid, and Jared is right that you empathize with him even though he's a social climbing, gold digging little asshole who doesn't appreciate what he's been given or what he's obtained. The role of luck is certainly something the movie emphasizes strongly, from beginning to end, and it's also nice to see that stressed. It's not focused on enough. Mostly, London looks absolutely lovely, especially all those fancy modern art places. Love scenes' purported sexiness is often undermined by ScarJo wearing pants in them, usually tight ones, which distracts one from "ooh, they're making out and it's kind of hot" to thinking, "how is she/he going to get those pants off?"

Grub Notes goes to Bluebird and the new Jittery Joe's and recommends a dish that is apparently already gone from 5 & 10. Hell. Gotta move faster.

Also, Idlewild is reviewed.

Remember Matt Pulver, who demonstrated real liberalism in the pages of the Red & Black as a columnist? The kid's graduated, and here he is speaking in favor of labor rights on their particular day.

Does eliminating the car tax work? Not so much in Virginia.

Fire trucks hate speed humps.

Actually, it's pretty damn great that the Physical Plant offers GED classes to its workers and also classes at Athens Tech.

But unskilled employees who want to move into higher-paid jobs with the Physical Plant soon will have the chance to participate in a U.S. Department of Labor-certified apprenticeship program that UGA officials are developing.

The program likely will be a combination of courses at Athens Tech and highly structured on-the-job training in areas such as carpentry, auto mechanics and air-system mechanics, said Reginald Woods, the Physical Plant's human resources manager.

Woods said he doesn't know when the program will be in place because it's still in the infancy stage, and he wants to make sure he gets approval from the labor department.

But the sooner it is off the ground, the better, because the department wants to get ahead of the sweep of retirements that will happen in the next few years, Woods said. "As the baby-boomers hang up their tools, so to speak, the question will be how to replace them," he said. "So, we plan to grow our own. ... I just hope we don't lose too many once they are trained."

This is just the sort of program UGA should be putting together on other levels. It takes advantage of local resources and it really fits with the mission of a university.

There's a big Hispanic voter drive going on in Georgia. But rallies don't seem to be the way to go.

ABH supports medical amnesty for intoxicated students. Which shows exactly what a reasonable policy it would be to implement. (Also, letter writer is annoyed with the ABH's take on bar owners.)

Dick Yarbrough demonstrates limitations of his worldview. At least he's willing to expand it.

Maybe we should have busing among districts to create these perfectly balanced areas.

This letter points out that bus service is not always carefully created, especially when it doesn't serve those who badly need it.

To hell with news. What we really care about is comics.

R&B reports on tailgating, including the plans afoot to document damage to the intramural fields and who does and doesn't like the new restrictions. Editorial contends that this proves they don't need to be used at all.

1) The Devil's Rain: Monumentally silly and not scary, except for one minute at the end that is kind of molesty uncle. Still, worth seeing for Borgninosity, Shatner (though he's really somewhat restrained), demonstration of how to stretch out a nonexistent script to a reasonable running time (there are two separate scenes in which Shatner stops his car in the middle of nowhere, gets out, and takes off an item of clothing [a vest, a hat] that could have been taken off in the car, then gets back in and drives some more; nothing else happens in these scenes), and, of course, the great melting of the Satanists. Anyone who can tell me who the hell Travolta plays in this movie gets a cookie. Presumably he's missing some eyes.

2) March of the Penguins: They are cute and they do die. Technically amazing, but doesn't add up to any more than any other nature documentary, even ones on TV. Nature does things the long way around because most of its critters don't have big brains. We knew that.

3) Easy (2003): Too indie, as Mr. Brown pointed out, but in spite of that (and a few cringey plot twists), it pretty much works. Marguerite Moreau is super cute, and she can do the quirky thing. Jared thinks she looks like a young Stockard Channing. I think she looks a bit like Lindsay Lohan. Anyway, it's on Charter's On Demand thing on Showtime right now, so you might want to watch it if you have a few.

Jukebox 32 is up. If I seem somewhat abrupt, that is because my blurbs tended to be chopped about in half.

Unblurbed but appreciated:

I'm From Barcelona - Collection of Stamps (Sweden)
The climax of a rock musical with a sweet spot in the region of the heart, this tune could maybe mix the happy chaos a little more effectively, but it’s hard not to get caught up in it.
[6]

Danity Kane - Showstopper (USA)
Aw, they’re so cute and high pitched. This is like the preschool version of Crime Mob’s “Stilettos” and no doubt will be booming (sort of?) from adorable tiny convertibles packed with sorority girls for the rest of the warm season. I think they should add a verse about how it’s important to wear your seatbelt!
[6]

Email if you want any of it.

More and more old people flooding into Athens (and surrounding). Maybe this is why the conflict over when the bars close. See, old people vote. They'll be running this town before long. Get to having babies, yo.

Office parks kind of suck, but at least they sometimes result in jobs, and people aren't there all of the time, which is why I'd prefer one built next to my neighborhood.

Bulldog fans find Latinos much like kangaroos--intriguing, unusual.

Barrow County High has a good approach to SAT prep, i.e., lots of it.

Apparently, we write laws with exceptions to cover the governor's ass.

Overview of Perdue and Taylor on immigration. Taylor, note, supports sending even more Georgia National Guard to patrol the border. Whereas Perdue decided to jet to New Mexico for a tan. I mean, to meet with troops already there.

Golden Boy did aight. And by "aight," I mean "converted everyone I know."

Relying on the student market is iffy.

ABH editorial says we should concentrate on creating economic growth in other parts of the state than Atlanta, but also seems to think all the development there was necessarily planned. Saying it wasn't a good idea implies it was an idea at all, rather than a more bacteriological thing.

Jim Thompson enters the walls of several public schools, is surprised to find students not rioting. The effort is appreciated. New impressions reflected in columns might be more so.

Shipp talks about Zogby's poll, which has Perdue leading Taylor, but points out some flaws, such as Perdue projected to get 23% of the African American vote. Those damn ads running during every football game this weekend probably helped Sonny some, though.

Coleman Barks. Popular with the mullahs. More of a "translator" than a translator.

Athens firefighters don't currently have a union. Along those lines, ABH editorial reminds us of the purpose of Labor Day. It's that working is awesome. Innit?

Also, our state's lack of trauma centers, while possibly overstated in the case of somewhere like Athens, does seem like it could be a problem.

New tailgating restrictions went okay, for a game not many people cared about.

Hey, Mr. Rusk.

Norm Weatherby continues to contribute his folksy asshole wisdom to the paper.

In the lame Fashion Rocks supplement that comes packaged with the latest New Yorker but is produced by Vogue for VH1, there is a page on that guy, and here is the crucial bit (although his Rocawear sweater is also cute):

Jay-Z also co-owns an NBA team (the Nets), and he even has his own color, Jay-Z Blue. "I'm registering it with Pantone right now," he says. "Selected brands will be able to license it; it'll be a subtle way for them to say, 'This product is fly.'"

Yp! Wow. I do not condone songs in the range of 15 minutes, but there are always exceptions to fiats, and this appears to be one. Not boring. More like exfoliation for the ears.

The official start of the tailgating season wasn't until 5:30 p.m. Friday? Tell that to the Port-a-Potty up by the Terrell Hall bus stop that was out there at least by noon that day. Also, could we get a little more detail on what tailgating was allowed at the intramural fields and what was not?

UGA is selling spaces. $140 a year really isn't a bad deal at all.

Tom Chasteen's plans to clean up downtown by closing bars earlier won't work. But that man don't balk at the facts.

There is way less marijuana in Oconee County now.

Burning down your own house. Always a good idea.

Don't you make me root for John Barrow, Mr. President.

A fine, liberal letter saying education isn't the answer to poverty.

1) 24 Hour Party People: So the missing hyphen is mildly annoying, but I can get over it. Despite not really being into the scene the movie chronicles (though I do finally have "Love Will Tear Us Apart" down in my head, and it's a great song), mostly because it's either too druggy or too depressing or whatnot, I still found it almost entirely entertaining and y'all were right about the Coogan. He really can pull off multiple layers of meaning so nicely through dialogue. What's nice about the movie is how non-operatic it is. Hagiography is easier than this sort of laid-back approach to something that's thoroughly worshiped. Also, ew, who wants to be in a club with thousands of people, sweating and dancing? I can barely handle the 40 Watt when it's full.

2) The Skeleton Key: Not relentlessly tacky, unlike a lot of newer horror films, and therefore pretty pleasant to watch. There are some stupid moments (the lynching, which tries hard to rip from Kubrick, but unsuccessfully; some of the running around), but the cast is good, the plot decent, and the atmosphere the point more than anything (though obviously tinged with reality). Kate Hudson is good, too, though she might be the worst nurse ever. Not particularly scary, but that would be asking a lot. It has some lovely slow shots from above, too, in the classy 1970s horror style.

Presumably Charlie Weiss is being paid royally well. If so, why can't he buy a pair of pants that fits decently? Fulmer is not exactly svelte, and yet we manage not to look away in horror every time he's on the screen. For the love of god. Go up a size. No one's looking at the tag.

Okay. Catching up on back issues of the New Yorker.

1) William Finnegan's "Blank Monday" about Grubby Clark and how his decision to close down his blanks manufacturing business will affect all of surfing is not online. Finnegan has that hallmark of all the really great New Yorker writers, which is the ability to convey extremely technical, often mechanical information in a way that is both clear and not only interesting, but frequently eye opening. McPhee does it. Acocella does it (with dance). There are a few others. Actually, it's pretty interesting that this article shows up in the same issue as Adam Kirsch's "The Philosopher Stoned: What Drugs Taught Walter Benjamin," which examines somewhat that author's most famous essay, "The Work of Art in the Age of Mechanical Reproduction." That is, Grubby Clark shutting down his business, even though it produced blanks for surfboards mechanically, is probably going to lead to less artistically produced boards. The Benjamin piece is very sad, especially if you have some affection for the dude.

But what Benjamin called “the great hope, desire, yearning to reach—in a state of intoxication—the new, the untouched” remained elusive. When the effects of the drugs wore off, so did the feeling of “having suddenly penetrated, with their help, that most hidden, generally most inaccessible world of surfaces.” All that remained was the cryptic comments and gestures recorded in the protocols, the ludicrous corpses of what had seemed vital insights. In a session on April 18, 1931, Fritz Fränkel, a doctor who administered the drug to Benjamin, noted, “Arm and index finger are raised high in the air, without support. The raising of the arm is ‘the birth of the kingdom of Armenia.’ ” During another trance, Benjamin was very excited to have come up with the phrase “Wellen schwappen—Wappen schwellen” (“Waves splash—armorial bearings swell”), claiming that the rhyming words held the clue to a deep structural connection between waves and the designs used in heraldry. “The subject holds forth in learned fashion,” Fränkel noted. “ ‘Quod in imaginibus, est in lingua.’ ” Fränkel may have known the meaning of the Latin phrase—“Insofar as it is in images, it is in language”—but he could not have recognized how crucial the notion was to Benjamin’s thought, or how tremendously significant the nonsense phrase must have appeared to him. Under the influence of hashish, he felt that names and things belonged together, that a rhyme had revealed a reality.

2) Dan Baum's update on New Orleans, "The Lost Year: Behind the Failure to Rebuild." Unfortunately, you don't get Polidori's photos online, and there's not anyone more suited to document disaster and the conflict between its romanticization and the reality. (Hmm. There's something here with him talking and also some images from New Orleans.) Reading stuff like this still makes my heart clench. Perhaps because nothing has resulted but emptiness. Grand tragedy, grand hopes, and what we end up with is the equivalent of the lone tumbleweed drifting by and people watching it with dead eyes. Fatalism. There is a massive conflict between appropriate city planning/recovery and the rights of the individual, and, as with CDC quarantines and busing of students, the latter may have to give or should. But it won't. Note this also. Baum says,

a quarter of New Orleanians were poor, double the national average; in the Lower Nine, most households were getting by on less than thirty thousand dollars a year (the national average is fifty-seven thousand), much of it from public assistance.

Now note this. The poverty rate for Athens is 23.5%. The median household income is $28,403. That doesn't mean New Orleans wasn't dramatically poor. It means Athens is too. Also, this:

When I suggested that perhaps grief was buffing his memories, Lewis insisted that the Lower Nine was never as bad as the crime and the poverty statistics suggested. “People weren’t as poor as all that. At least, it didn’t feel like that,” he said. “People got by. Everybody knew everybody. The criming wasn’t everywhere; it was, like, this corner was bad, or that parking lot.” He winked. “We’re able to hold more than one thought in our heads.”

New word! And a good understanding of how perception of crime works. It narrows as you get closer in. Some people are scared of the whole city. Within the city, it's neighborhoods you avoid. Within those neighborhoods, it's areas. And within those areas, it's particular lots.

1) More Anthony Adverse.

2) L.M. Montgomery's Emily of New Moon. It's not as famous as Anne of Green Gables, but I may have liked the Emily series better when I was little. That is, the first Anne book is wonderful, but they get more boring. The Emily stuff maintains quality the whole way through. Maybe because there are only three.

3) John Buchan's The Free Fishers. Assassination of the prime minister + fishermen + logic professor. It sounds like fun.

4) Zane Grey's Wanderer of the Wasteland. Made into a Technicolor silent film in 1924 and lost. Damn. I've never read any Zane Grey. That link has a picture of him with a koala, though. It's kind of cute.

5) Stephen Leacock's Winnowed Wisdom. I know nothing of it and only the tiniest bit about the author. Apparently it is humorous.

6) Margaret Mitchell's Gone with the Wind, which I have read but not in ages and am not a big fan of. It's not a very interesting book.

7) G.B. Shaw's The Simpleton of the Unexpected Isles. The first play among these. And you can't tell, either, because it's all run together, without character names.

I think this is a fine profile of Jimmy Williamson, UGA police chief, if you are fond of seeing the UGA police chief gently mocked. He does not eat lunch. He favors Dasani. He likes to go home. Also Family Feud. And at some point, an owl got stuck under the hood of someone's car. More dramatic owl reporting, please.

Why do I picture Partydawgs at Bill Cowsert's house?

Yeah, these shiny new ATVs totally aren't going to get stolen and joyridden by drunken tailgaters. No sir. All I'm saying is, if I'm tempted, I know less responsible folks are too.

Hitting the big time. Me and McGinty.

Council on Intercollegiate Athletics discusses graduation rates (Mike Adams is letting people in) and ticket distribution.

Dog socialization is going on.

John Knox might be an engineering professor, but he's a market philosophy guy at heart.

For example, students evaluated one of Knox's colleagues as being a nice guy who can't teach, which Knox said he also believes to be true.

That guy is so looking himself up.

New clock rules suck. How much time do these even cut off the game? Is 12 minutes worth antagonizing people over?

ABH demands close attention by voters on a particular issue. a) How about on every issue? b) This doesn't tend to work out too well.

Mark Bell responds to snarky anti-bar editorial. And is tagged with editorial note. Ouch. Also, to reach back a couple of days, I found this letter calling Mr. Winders immature and irresponsible hilarious. I'm sure he did too.

There's a poll on how bad the alcohol problem is in Athens in the blog section right now. Apparently, 42%-ish of people think it's a big-ass problem that we need to be working on. I can only hope most of them don't live in Athens.

Oh hell yes, Frank Bruni is right about the irritation of the pepper grinder at nice restaurants and restaurants that fancy themselves so. Who asks for more pepper? Speak up, peeps. One of the nicest things about dining at the bar at Five & Ten recently was the way they just set the salt and pepper (grinder) down in front of you. No asking. They're just there if you want them. Hallmark of good service and a truly good restaurant.

This is really not the best way to win more Hawks fans. Unless "the stuff of nightmares" is what you're going for. Worked for Freddy, I guess.

So, having printed out the new David Foster Wallace article on Roger Federer some weeks ago and carried it around with me until I could find some free time, I finally found it again on the kitchen counter last night and dove into the thing, promptly hitting my head because it's not the size one would expect. It's a little short. And I'm betting there are valid internets complaints about some aspects of it, mostly the cancer kid. Here's the thing. I wasn't nuts about a lot of the article, but I did like the cancer kid stuff, and I liked it because its incredible, elephantine clunkiness really seems to be the point. And that reminds me of some things about Oblivion, which I finally picked back up and finished. There's something here I haven't gotten at yet that he's exploring, and it's partially a rawness, a not-quite-fresh scrape. You get the feeling the author has discovered that he is really a bag of jelly (read: emotions, pain) with the thinnest possible of skins. Think the cheapest line of trash bags on the market. Fill to almost-bursting with large quantity of jiggly substance. Not that he has never been an emotional dude, but recent stuff (the lobster piece very much so too) has shown that he is interested in exposing that side, and in (nuh duh) a non-boring way for the most part.

Also, the title is nicely non-metaphorical.

Sidebar: Does the correction now appended to the Federer story take away from it a lot? It might.

Um, Soul Asylum? I really hope that is not your absolute final choice. Perhaps some nostalgic old dude grabbed the CD on the way to last night's broadcast because he thought it fit this particular storyline. What it really did was put a big wet slanket over the whole beginning and the rest of the evening. At least Big and Rich had some energy.

New podcast at long last.

Follow-up links here as always.