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Reason number 302 why digg blows my mind
As of now the digg difference between these two 778-231.

Here's a link to the comic, which is essentially some stoner who can't draw blaming everything on the president, as if he controls everything right down to designing the Ad Council's anti drug ads.

Remember kids - the shit floats to the top

Slate.com has an article about how Countrywide is still up to its tricks after helping melt the housing market. I don't understand it all, and there is lots of debate in the comments section, so I won't pretend to know what I'm talking about.

So I will look at something a whole lot simpler. Take a look at this picture from the Slate article. Look at that Countrywide sign. Am I the only person who finds that a little disturbing?

Hear me out. Look at its primary colors, its simple shapes. It reminds me of building blocks and preschool. It is simple and welcoming, like a pat on the head to a six year old. These are the messages associated with a massive company that deals with insane amounts of money. I don't know about you, but when I am dealing with a bank I appreciate some semblance of seriousness about them. Instead, Countrywide wants to paint itself in childish simpicity; seriously, the portrait place in Walmart has a more professional sign. It creeps the hell out of me. I feel like this is how little they regard its customers. Hey there stupid, you want a home right? The American Dream? We'll get you there. Just trust us. Meanwhile behind the scenes they screw everything up and get off scott free. It is incredibly insulting that this is how they try to disarm and distract us, and that it actually worked on so many folks. I hate the blanket statement of "I wish everyone else wasn't dumb", as it really is disingenuous, especially with the housing market. A lot of what happened was due to lender's duping people, as much as we claim it was due to families trying to live beyond their means. I just wish people weren't so obsessed with being coddled and praised and leisured, otherwise this kind of marketing would fail miserably.

The Orioles have a better record than the Mets. I hope this isn't a trend.

Rain

The highway I take to work is generally quiet. Not that there isn't anyone on the road at all, but there is not enough traffic to cause slowdown. Every one goes into Baltimore, and we the few go out. As such accidents are rare.

This morning I saw two, one which caused all but one lane to close, the other blocking off the on ramp to a major exit. Now it could be sheer coincidence, but maybe not. You see, yesterday it rained in Maryland. And if you drive here for even a few months, you will know that somehow, locals treat driving in rain like they would an ice storm. In most normal areas of traffic, steady (not heavy) rain means people go 65 if they're confident, 60 to be sure, maybe 55 if your'e really afraid of hydroplaning. In Maryland 55 is the top speed, and no one drives without braking constantly and for no reason. It took me twice as long to get home yesterday, which is exactly how long it took me to get home during the "worst" snow of the winter.

All of this for rain.

So if these two major accidents were caused by some strange post-rain conditions, where the drivers forgot that it the ground was still moist, it would not surprise me.

It seems the spell checker in the beta version of Firefox 5 does not like contractions. Now I know geeks like to be grammar Nazis, but this is getting ridiculous.

A Daily Post

Last night's win is the way it should be - tons of runs against weak pitching. I'm doubly pissed now at the game 2 loss. Pedro had the worst outing so far even before he left the game hurt, which makes me worry about him when he returns, and the fact that the team scored nothing against the Florida bullpen is absurd after they put up another five or so runs late last night.

If we can sweep Atlanta and give them an 0-5 start all will be forgiven.

Played Brawl online last night for the first time. The lag is inexcusable. Fuck you Nintendo, because somehow I doubt you will try to improve it in any way. I'm getting a bit tired of their current philosophy that as long as the Wii and DS keep selling, they don't have to worry so much about customer satisfaction and product improvement. Guess I'll have to drag people to my house the old fashioned way :)

I just learned that California is at least one state that does not want public schooling to be a legal option for children. Here is an excerpt as to why:

A primary purpose of the educational system is to train school children in good citizenship, patriotism and loyalty to the state and the nation as a means of protecting the public welfare

I still can't get over how scary that sounds.

Baseball failure

If the Mets' first game was what we were all hoping for, the second game was what we dreaded. Pedro is out and likely on the DL in his first start, and the team lost in extra innings against an inexperienced Marlins' bullpen because all of our bats decided to go cold at once. We need consistent run production and healthy pitchers. I'm going to be biting the nails I no longer have over game 3 tonight. Let's see some offense people!

I just read an article over at slate.com about cutting sugar out of one's diet. Its an interesting idea that I have been wanting to try; I love sweets more than anything, but diabetes is a big deal in my family. Eliminating might be impossible, but cutting down sure isn't.

It won't happen though; I told myself that I felt better when not drinking coffee during the day, and that habit ended after two weeks. I can't go long without soda, and while I can go months without tobacco, it doesn't go away for good. I want to live a good and healthy life, but at the same time I can't see it being a life worth living if one doesn't give into some of their vices. I always use this as an excuse for why I hate being single; when I have someone around that consistently cares about me, giving up other things is a snap. Until then, down the hole I go.

The other reason a no-sugar experiment would fail is that I am afraid of becoming like the author of the article. A quote for you:

For snacks, I had raw cashews and tamari almonds and guacamole and bricks of Gruyere in various combinations.

Is it possible for authors of these kinds of articles to be normal human beings? Who the fuck eats tamari almonds? I didn't even know what Gruyere was until now, and now that I do know, I have another question; is it really true that cutting out processed foods makes the grocery bill go down? With all this gourmet shit plus expensive/organic produce, they still must be spending a fortune on food. The first person to write about how they ate Planters nuts and Polly-O string cheese in their diet/food experiment will be the one to get me interested.

A Slate commenter described food talk as "porn for white women". They couldn't be more right, and damn does it take the steam out of many a good idea.

Taxes and stuff

My taxes are done. So far one federal and one state have approved of my returns. I now wait on Maryland. Of course, this figures; Maryland has given me shit with one thing or another ever since I moved. Troubles getting a license, trouble using my current PA license. If they come back saying something is wrong with their wonderfully simple tax return form I might take it as a hint. But where else do I have to go?

I decided on a few things to spend my tax return money on. Paying off a huge chunk of my smallest student loan will help. I'm also going to look into buying a new instrument to play. What that is is a surprise.

Any cash I have left over is going to, believe it or not, some new threads. I have a tendency to keep clothing forever, beating the hell out of it until it is embarrassing to wear, and even then I often let it go for too long. I have stuff I wore in high school still, and I think my coat is circa 8th grade.

My wardrobe is ridiculous. I hardly have any pairs of shorts because it has been many years since I have been able to wear shorts more than two days a week. But when I need them I often have nothing. I have shirts with a small tear in them that I keep because hey, its fairly new. It sits right next to a tearless, stainless shirt that has colors beyond faded.

Its just time for a reboot. The old stuff doesn't really look childish, but I've gotten more than my money's worth from all of it. I need to ditch the pants that I wore when I thought I was a 32x32 and now the cuffs are frayed.

I'm not going to go over the deep end. The fact is that most of my coworkers wear jeans a checkered shirt every day, so I feel like I can keep some of the old junk around for daily wear. But summer is coming, and that means going out more. Dressing sharp isn't a guarantee of anything, but hey, it can't hurt.

As an addendum, its interesting to see our priorities as consumers. Even with a job I try to keep my purchases of new games to a minimum, but if there is something I really like, I have no qualms laying down $50 or $60 for it. Yet paying that much for one article of clothing seems like blasphemy, even though you could pay much much more for something swanky. Most women on the other hand will scoff at that much for something they really like, but they can't understand my gaming habit. To me, buying a game that won't break and delivers consistent entertainment is worth the price, while my clothing is going to deteriorate no matter what I do. But the ladies out there teach a valuable lesson; no matter how many people will tell you "I don't care how I look and you shouldn't judge me based on that", appearances always matter to some extent, and wearing something crisp and up to date can be damn nice.

Baseball Post

Back to the blog. Anyone still reading or reading for the first time, spread the word. I could use some input of all shapes and sizes.

Baseball season is done with all its official starts both away and on these shores. Now the season can start for real; here are a couple of the games I was interested in most so far.

Mets - Marlins: I sat around watching the box score for this one all day after work ended. I started getting some flashbacks to last season. The Mets started off with great pitching, lit up the scoreboard with 6 runs in the 4th inning, and then allowed the Marlins 2. This was the pattern of many a game in the Mets 2007 slide, only back then Florida wouldn't have stopped at 2 runs. Instead they'd have left the inning with an 8-6 lead. All in all I'm glad to see a good first outing from Santana, but I expected that. Seeing both the offense perform and the bullpen hold it down was the greater relief. I still want to see runs distributed a bit more evenly over the game; if our bats decide they can only get hot together, it will spell great trouble when they all decide to get cold. 5, 6 run innings became peanuts at the end of last season, when an oppontent could go into the 7th knowing they could score 8 or 9 on the Mets bullpen. Strong outing today, but we still need to see the rest of the rotation at work.

Yankees - Blue Jays: This one didn't happen thanks to rain, and WFAN was lit up with callers screaming he said/she said about when the game was officially called off and why the Yankees didn't make an earlier decision. Francessa and Russo did decent damage control, emphasizing that neither team wants to lose a start from their ace, and that tomorrow's night game will give everyone in the Tri State area a chance to come back after work. Still sucks from the one guy who called in claiming to have come from Baltimore, but fuck him. I know the guy wanted to see the last opener at Yankee Stadium, but for that money he could see every Yanks-Orioles game this season. Anyway, if Halladay doesn't win tomorrow I'll be pissed. The Yanks have to learn that Wang as their ace is a bad idea.

Orioles - Rays: Hilarious. First the old school O's fans on the radio remakred how all the openers back in Memorial Stadium were bright and sunny, while today was an appropriately cold and miserable start for a team that is going nowhere. The Orioles are always a tease; they started off with a two run lead, but the Rays scored six later on. 2 outs in the 9th, the O's get a man on base after an error, only to have the game end with the next batter. Every glimmer of hope is squashed down with this team, and I really want to feel for the fans. Their protests of Peter Angelos last season were enough to make a New York fan proud, but if they want my full support, some fans need to do better. I'm talking about the folks who call this a "rebuilding year", even though they don't know most of the names on the team. In NY a rebiulding year means you know every player on the field so you can either call for their heads or throw their name into one of your 50 homebrew trade scenarios. Rebuilding means making moves when they're at their peak. Both the fans and Angelos seem uncapable of these things, and until they are I will give this team the death sentence, and suggest that O's fans not take cues from Ravens fans.

Nationals Vs Braves and Phillies: Unless I did my math wrong, the Nationals are the best team in the league. And they got there by beating my two most hated NL East teams. Not too bad to see them and the Mets on top. The jury is still out on whether these guys have the stuff to stay out of the basement, but here's hoping. The new stadium will bring the DC elite to the games, and that revenue can be put to good use.