Miasmatic Review

Home at last.

And I'm ready to go back to work.

Clone had the last of his Birthday party's this weekend. We had his kid's party at McDonalds. Which after dealing with 10 3-6 year olds for 2 hours I was ready to call it the end. The important point was that he had fun.

After his party I took Clone to his first Football Game. Well okay, he's seen his brother play flag football and middle school football, but this was semi-professional football. The Rock River Raptors. I even had his name and birthday announced over the intercom and on the jumbotron. He loved the whole thing. He was pretty good up until the start of the fourth quarter. Then he started getting tired and wanted to go home. He had a lot of fun, and keeps asking me to take him again. And I will sometime... just probably not until next year.

After the game Bruce and I hooked up with Graumagus at Carlisle's for a couple of rounds of the best damned Scottish Ale on tap. This is where Graumagus tricked me into helping him move the next day. Apparently not only did he want me to give him the extra washer and dryer that I had, but he wanted me to haul it and help move it for him too. What an ingrate!

That was all on Saturday. Sunday I wake up at noon... after not getting home until 3:30AM. Grau was supposed to call and say he was coming over. I had just gotten downstairs when there's a knock on the door. Guess who? I answer the door with, "I thought you were going to call first?" He responded with, "Yea, I remembered that as soon as I pulled up." Fortunately I was awake.

The dryer was in my basement, the washer was in the garage. They had been sitting in the same spot unused for almost 10 years. It appears that my garage roof must have sprung a leak in the winter as there was a bunch of nasty water in the washer. Which made it that much more heavy. By the way, it seems that back in the 60's they made washers using cast iron. That damn thing was heavy! The extra water didn't help. Plus we had to lift it into the back of my truck. Fortunately it's only about a 3.5 foot vertical lift.

After moving the washer and dryer into his new apartment's basement, we plugged it in to check it out. I guess a 40 year old electrical appliance sitting under the leaking roof of a garage doesn't last too well... it didn't seem to work. Owell, as I told him. It's his problem now! I offered to give him his money back... but since it was free he didn't think it would be worth the hassle.

As punishment for making him take a broken washer, which I did warn him it may not work, I had to help him move a refrigerator too. At this point I should mention that Wes did come over to help with all of this. I don't want to leave him out. We go to his sister's storage unit where the frige is sitting and try to get it out. Grau had to play reverse tetris in order to be able to even thing about sliding it out of the unit.

When he opened the door we discovered that a year and a half ago when it was put in the storage unit, his sister hadn't bothered to clean nor properly empty the thing. Yea... that wasn't pleasant.

After getting that to his new place and making 398,7485 gay jokes about his curtains and just him in general we made a nice impression on his new neighbors. Lets just say me rubbing my nipples in the parking lot and saying in a lisp, "If you think that frige is dirty now, just wait until we get together later." Yeah... I think his new neighbors believe a big ol' "bear" is moving in. Even after that and the broken washer Grau was kind enough to take Wes and I to Hooters for some Hot Wings and beer.

That sounds like it was all pretty easy going and fun, so why do I want to go back to work? Well, Ktreva is in Chicago on business leaving me home alone with the boys. I'm about ready to tranquilize both of them and hide them in a closet.

Now if you'll excuse me in the time it took me to write this, I think they managed to disassemble Clone's bed.

Really, that's the best defense you could come up with?

When I saw this headline I thought it was a joke. Man Claims Bigfoot Molested.

A man who claims that he was molested by Bigfoot as a child was ordered to serve 20 years in prison yesterday for his own molestation-related activities...

...Morrill reportedly told an investigator preparing his pre-sentence report that he had been sexually assaulted by the legendary Bigfoot.

Patton said Morrill really believes the assaulted happened. "I take him very seriously because I know Mr. Morill has issues," said Patton.

I've heard of a lot of different defenses. I've heard a lot of different accusations. But Bigfoot molested me as a child is why I molest children is just stupid. Yet, it today's society that may be enough to get the guy an insanity plea.

Poultrygeist

I really don't know what to say about this. It's, um... different?

And if that wasn't enough, heres the really NSFW, ultra violent trailer.

Those Troma guys really know how to make movies.

That reminds me, it's about time for another Cheesy Movie day.

Robot Drumers

Over at Let's Make Robots, they have a Yellow Drum Machine robot.

Here's a video clip of it in action.

According to the site:

Notice how the robot first plays on the object it finds (or is forced to find by the angry cameraman), plays a small beat, and records the beat it plays on it. Then this recorded beat is played again, and it starts to play on the object (an belt tracks and everything else it has),and also playing this sampled beat :)

Pretty cool, huh? Now if they can only get it to play the Bodhrain.

Ultimate Defense

Need to kill some time? Want to waste a good hour of your life, try Ultimate Defense. It's like all of those tower defense games except instead of building and upgrading towers you buy heroes.

Better than a yard Gnome

And I like yard gnomes! I'm just wondering how much trouble I'd get in if I put yard decorations like this around my house?

The Zombie of Montclaire Moors

or

The Zombie Returns

I'm thinking Ktreva really wouldn't appreciate those, well not as much as I would. But if I want them I can get them here and here.

Black Dog Ale.

Shadoglare of Refractional Darkness sponsors this week’s review. Thank you sir for being an enabler! He donated a bottle of Black Dog Ale by the Spanish Peaks Brewing Company.

We have our standard 12 oz brown bottle. The label has a picture of “Chug” the owners black lab on the label with the name of the beer around it. In the background is a picture of a mountain range. The neck label has a brief story about the brewery and the beer itself on it.

It has a dark brown color, kind of like an old penny. Light passes through it easily; I didn’t see any cloudiness at all. It is dark enough that you can’t see through it clearly. When I poured it there was no real head. It formed a thin tan head that faded quickly to a crown around the glass. There was no lacing at all.

The scent was of roasted caramel malts and citrus hops. It has a nice and enticing aroma, not overwhelming at all. The taste starts out with a strong hop flavor. There are some malts that follow, but nothing specific. For the hop flavor, it’s not very bitter at all. The aftertaste is mild.

This is a medium bodied beer. It is a little heavy on the carbonation.

Overall I liked this beer. It’s not all that special, but it’s not bad. It really is something that one could drink and enjoy. I give it 5.5 out of 10.

How to make my employees laugh.

The inventory at work is really high and we are trying just about anything to get it out. Yesterday in a staff meeting one of my employees jokingly made the suggestion that I should spend an hour doing basic level work in our office to help out. Everyone found this highly amusing as I was never trained on how to do that kind of work and the couple times I did it turned into a disaster. Everyone had a chuckle at this and let it go.

Then today I was talking to my employees. The inventory was bad, their moods were gloomy because of the snow and there was just some overall moral issues. So I thought, hey why the hell not. I jumped in and for an hour I worked alongside them. Of course they found this highly amusing. They were telling everyone what I was doing and they where coming over to see me in action. I wasn't the best at it... far from it. In fact I only ranked about 25% production. It's not like I was helping out a lot. Yet at the same time I was.

Because I was willing to jump in and do the work, it showed the lot of them that I was taking them serious and that I'd do just about anything to accomplish the goal. Plus it improved moral. After I finished my hour they all sat down and worked even harder to help out. Now of course my peers all think I'm daft. Hell I had one try to talk me out of doing it because she thought it would set a bad precedent.

Well that might be the case, but for an hour my employees were laughing and enjoying work and all it cost me was a little public humiliation. I think it was worth the trade.

Pissed off.

I know I'm supposed to do the beer review tonight, but honestly I'm not in the mood to do it. I just got off the phone with Comcast about our new internet/cable service and they have my blood boiling.

We had Insight, but then Comcast bought them out. They have been telling everyone how great they are going to be when they finally take over for at least 5 months now. They've been sending us items telling us when it was going to happen and that the transition should be seamless. HA!

Today I get a mailer saying that the channels we have are changing, and so are the packages. I was confused so I called them to see how big of a change it was going to be. Long story short, in order to keep the channels I want to watch, my cable bill is going to be about $45 dollars more a month and I'm going to get a crap load of channels I don't want.

While trying to research this I had to switch my e-mail for our internet over to their account. That was less than exciting as it didn't work like they said it would. Nothing transfered properly. Comcast tech support said I had to call Insight. Insight said they had nothing to do with our area anymore and I had to work with Comcast. Two hours later and Clone learning interesting phrases like, "Cum gurgling gutter slut" along with various other curses because I was hung up on twice by Comcast, we finally came to a work around that didn't fix the problem, but masked it.

Now at this point I'm just really not in the mood to gently drink a beer and have a review. No, now I'm in the mood to go drink some really potent and cheap liquor... if you know what I mean.

I promise the review will be done tomorrow baring any further complications.

Oh, and for the record Comcast Sucks!

I thought they were illegal?

Shadoglare sent me notice of a story in the Chicago Tribune. Boy, 4, wounded on South Side after gun hidden in oven discharges, cops say.

This whole thing is a tragedy, fortunately it sounds as if the kids are going to be okay. What really gets me about this story is

Smith, a felon, had hidden the revolver in the oven in a home in the 4800 block of South Racine Avenue, Bright said.

First I thought handguns are banned in Chicago. Wait, they are. See how well banning handguns and firearms works from people getting hurt?

Secondly this guy is a felon. Which means that even if he left the city of Chicago to buy a handgun, he can't legally own one in Illinois. That means he bought it... ILLEGALLY! That's right, he probably bought it on the streets. I know he didn't buy one in the store because he can't have a FOID (Firearms Owners Identification) card that you must have in Illinois to even buy a firearm. As soon as he's convicted of a felony they suspend the card and when the background check was run, they would have red flagged this guy.

If the mighty Mayor Daley and the Chicago police can't even keep a felon from obtaining and owning a firearm with in the limited confines of their little kingdom, what makes them think that they can do anything about the rest of the state.

We don't need more gun laws. We need to better enforce the laws that we have. Banning doesn't work.

He's a whole hand!

Clone is all excited he hit the age of five. To quote him, "I'm a whole hand now daddy!" He says this as he holds up his hand with all the fingers spread out wide. He was very pleased with himself. In his head he has hit the first of the birthday milestones. In celebration of that achievement he decided he was going to eat some of his Easter Candy.

He pulled and pulled on the plastic egg. Which on a side note it was a plastic egg that looked like an egg shaped bunny. By yanking on the egg you are effectively ripping the head off of the rabbit to get to the candy in the middle. No wonder he enjoyed it so much.

Unfortunately five is the age when kids start to take notice of the happenings in their world. They notice how things are changing politically, socially and in technology. Clone, much like his father, does not like the future he sees for our country and has decided that he is going to take a stance against it. At five years old Clone has become

see extended entry:

The UNI-CLONE!

Yea, he's not happy...

...and neither will those that oppose him!

Honestly he's just not happy that I was taking his picture and couldn't care less about politics

Posted by Contagion at 04:45 PM | Comments (7) | TrackBack

It's Easter.

Clone has already been up, terrorized the basket, eaten more Chocolate than I probably should have let him this early in the morning and is now playing Super Mario Galaxy on the Wii why he works off his sugar rush.

Since it is Easter, I thought it would be a good time to re-introduce a couple of my favorite flash animations from years past.

First we have How To Make A Chocolate Easter Bunny.

Then after you've finished playing with that, try How To Make A Bunny Lay Easter Eggs.

Yea, I know. I have issues.

Become invisible?

I know people can sell anything on EBay, but seriously folks. Who the hell is going to buy the ability to become invisible?

Well, actually, probably the same guys that bought the x-ray vision glasses from the back of comic books.

1-800-Nerd-Girl

Yea, I'm sure there are many guys this clip speaks volumes to.

Yea, I know guys both now and from my childhood that if this was real, would have these girls on speed dial.

CBS Sucks!

CBS is canceling the show Jericho... again. They canceled the show last year, but an overwhelming response by fans brought it back.

I'll admit that I love this show. It's one of my favorites each week. I was upset when they canceled it. When they brought it back I was ecstatic. I just love the show, it appeals to my inner survivalist and contingency planning wackoness. GAH! Why do all the shows I like get canceled.

Live action Simpsons?

If they did a live action version of The Simpsons. How would they get a guy to look like this: Real Homer.

If you think that is creepy, check out real mario.

Both by Pixeloo.

This list should have been longer.

You all know that I'm a sucker for Historical Movies. I love movies that have to do with any and all parts of history. That doesn't mean that I don't pick them apart because the amateur historian in me is highly annoyed by fixable or avoidable inaccuracies. It's because of this that I found it highly amusing to turn on my computer yesterday and see Yahoo's: The 10 Most Historically Inaccurate Movies.

I enjoyed some of the movies on this list a lot. The Patriot, Braveheart, 300, The last Samurai, and Elizabeth: The Golden Age were movies I highly enjoyed watching. Gladiator sucked, I regretted paying to see it in the theater.

I love conducting interviews

One of my employees received a promotion last month. That means I had to replace her. Yesterday and today I spent most of my time at work conducting interviews. I enjoy interviewing people. It gives you a look inside their head, it lets you see how they tick a little more.

As this is an internal promotion position only, I don't think some of the people applying for the job even really tried. Some of them came across as assuming that they felt the job was already theirs and this was just a formality. They didn't answer the questions or to be honest even try to answer the questions. I don't know if they just assumed that since they have been with the company 10+ years that I would just know how awesome they think they are. Well, if that was the case it kicked them in the butt.

I have two really close candidates right now for the job. I can't make an offer until Tuesday until I finished the high level review with upper management. That gives me three days to mull over my decision. It's so close I'm not sure if I should have them draw straws or if I should do like that commercial and make them fight in the parking lot for it.

Yea, I know... but I don't think management would approve of me bringing swords to work.

Hurray for Snow!

The national weather service has issued a winter storm warning for my area. They are claiming we are going to get 6-10 inches of snow! I know a lot of people are tired of the snow, but to be honest, I like it. It makes life more fun. If we actually get that amount I'd be surprised, but if we do... YAY!

Nothing like a good Spring snow.

Barbary Coast Gold Rush Style.

We finally hit the last beer of the gift pack my father gave me for Christmas. Honestly, I appreciate my father buying this for me, he was trying to get me something I’d like and appreciate. He put thought and effort behind the gift and I really appreciate it With that being said, if you are going to buy beer for a beer drinking fan in your life, don’t get them this gift set. The beer isn’t bad, but there really isn’t much to it, most of it is just a bland rehash of mass produced American beers with names added to it. There isn’t much flavor to any of them. However, the book is kind of nice. Tonight’s beer is The Barbary Coast Brand Gold Rush Style Beer by the ever so mysterious MDII of Rochester, NY.

We have our standard 12 oz brown bottle. There is a cream label on it with a green bar across the middle with the name Barbary Coast on it. There is a red Circle with a picture of a mountain on it just above the green bar. The lettering is all done in that old fashioned late 1800’s style.

It pours a nice amber color. Light passes easily through it as there is no sediment floating. When I poured it into the glass it formed a nice inch thick white head that slowly faded to a film on the top of the beer. There was some very minor lacing on the side of the glass.

The smell is weak. First you smell the fruity citrus of the hops. Roasted malts can be detected as well. There is a slight metallic scent to it. The flavor was meager taste of malts with a slight sweetness. There really isn’t much else to it. The aftertaste is even milder and really can’t be described.

This is a light bodied beer that is kind of watery. There is a nice level of carbonation, but not much else to it.

If you had a friend that isn’t a beer fan but wanted to drink on, this is a very inoffensive beer to let them try. The flavor isn’t that much stronger than beer flavored water. Overall I give this a rating of 3.5 out of 10.

Some advice for my readers.

Do not eat the egg salad sandwich out of the vending machine. No matter how much you like egg salad and how good it looks, the side effects are not worth it.

Belated St. Patricks day.

Sorry, I had meant to make a Happy St. Pats day post yesterday, but I woke up really excited. It was kinda like this:

I had to go to work, but only for a couple of hours. Of course I went in style, I had on a green shirt and dress slacks as well as my family tartan tie. On my head I wore a big sparkling green derby and a ton of beads. After taking as much work as I could handle, I ran home to change into some party gear and headed down to Fritz’s. Basically I just changed into jeans and a Packer’s jersey and wore even more beads.

I arrived to see Tammi waiting for me at the bar. At first she wasn’t going to have a drink, but then she broke down and had not one, but two! Bruce and another friend of ours showed up and we started the festivities out with a couple of Irish Car Bombs. In which a great debate upon what exactly is an Irish car bomb ensued. I knew it wasn’t just Guinness and Jameson’s, but everyone told me I was wrong. Since I was there to have fun, and didn’t want to start trouble I just went with it. But technically an Irish Car Bomb is:

1/2 pint Guinness 1 oz Jameson 1/2 oz Bailey's Irish cream

Pour Guinness into a pint glass. Float Baileys on top of Jamison in shot glass. Drop shot glass, carefully, into Guinness. Drink quickly before it curdles.

I know I started giving beads to anyone and everyone that didn’t have a set. And I kept telling them that they were good Irish fun beads, not those naughty Mardi Gras beads. I didn’t expect anyone to start flashing their chests at me. Especially since I was also giving them to minors. It starts to get a little foggy after Tammi left and we did another round of Irish Car Bombs. I know there were some phone calls, but I’m not sure to whom. Allegedly I was swapping pictures with Bloodspite, but I have no recollection of that.

Ktreva and the boys showed up for some corned beef and cabbage. We ate a good meal down there; everyone seemed to really like the food. I must say that was some of the best corned beef I’ve had in a long, long time. After they were done eating, Ktreva and the boys went home and I headed to Old Chicago to meet up with Bruce whom had left to meet some friends earlier. En route I called Wes and told him to get his sober Irish arse to the bar and I’d buy him a pint. Of course the offer of free booze brought the Irishman running.

Overall it was a good day. A lot of toasts were made, some clean, some bawdy and some just downright raunchy. There were also a lot of jokes and humor at others expense to be had. I’m afraid poor Bruce took a beating. Fortunately he’s a good-natured fellow and took it for the friendly ribbing that it was meant to be. Oh, and I wasn’t even the worst.

HA! It's an indisputable fact!

You Are Very Normal

You scored 75% normal on this quiz You are normal in practically every way. Yes, you're average. But average definitely doesn't boring. You just fit in well with the mainstream. Why You Are Normal: You are still with your first love If given the choice, you would choose to have more money over more time You'd rather have rats than cockroaches in your home If you had to, you rather live without music and still have laughter You think glasses can make someone more attractive

That's right, I'm 75% normal.

As seen at Tammi's.

Guys and Leather.

No, not that kid of guys and leather. Seriously, is that all you think of?

Yesterday I spent most of the day working leather. I had to make myself a new pair of moccasins, this time I had a much better idea of what I was doing and this pair actually turned out looking decent. They aren't the prettiest damn things I've ever seen, but compared to my first pair, they are down right works of art.

While I was working on these Wes came over to try his hand at working leather. He needed to repair a saddle seat he has. I'm not sure what was more amusing to Ktreva, listening to Wes swear when he'd make a mistake or me when I would accidentally poke myself with a needle. Shadoglare came over to drink some beer and to converse. He had contacted me earlier in the day wanting to know if I wanted to go out, I told him that I really needed to get the leather work done. He also contacted Graumagus to see if he wanted to go out. He had to work.

Later in the evening Grau called and said he was heading to Carlyle's after work with some friends. He got off of work at 11:00. Since I started sewing at 1:00, when I finally got my mocs 2/3 of the way done, I decided to stop and go hang out there. Wes had to head home, four kids and all. Shadoglare and I went and hung out with Grau until 2:00 AM just getting caught up.

He's still alive right now. He's not sure when he's coming back. Mostly because he has some court time ahead of him and he's not sure how thats going to go. But that's all the detail you're going to get from me at this time.

Well if you'll excuse me, it's time for me to go make some leggings. Or as Ktreva wants to call them, 1750's arseless chaps.

Busy Weekend!

I'm getting ready to head out to the Kiwanis Pancake Day with the family. Besides doing my normal goofy Saturday posts, I've been busy this morning already. I've cut up a deer shoulder, sliced it and started a seasoning and curing process on it so that I can make jerky out of it tomorrow. This afternoon I'm going to be making a new set of Moccasins and leggings. This could be interesting, real interesting as I've never made leggings before.

Turbo Heather!

I probably should save this for closer to Christmas when all of those annoying commercials come out regarding new toys, but I'll forget by then. You know the commercials I'm talking about. The ones for the pretty dolls that all the girls want or the really annoying RC Car ones about how their cars can do all these neat tricks. However, they hardly if ever work the way they are shown on the commercial.

Now we have a commercial that combines the two together, Turbo Heather!

It makes me want to go get one.

Cool Clock.

Everyone I've ever met has played with an etch-a-sketch at one point or another. Some are better at making pictures on it than others. Myself, I was never that great at them. Yet, when I found this video two things came to mind.

First: This guy has way too much free time on his hands.

Second: How do you read it in the dark?

Vegas is lost!

Now for an important message from the formerly silent member of Penn & Teller about the current state of Vegas after a Zombie uprising! Here is the vital message from & Teller.

After reading this I'm still not exactly sure why he made this video, but it's rather amusing.

Maybe it's a Leprechaun?

Just in time for St. Patrick's day we get a clip from Argentina of some gnome-like creature wearing a pointed hat.

According to the article in The Sun:

The midget - which wears a pointy hat and has a distinctive sideways walk - was caught on video last week by a terrified group of youngsters.

Teenager Jose Alvarez - who filmed the gnome - yesterday told national newspaper El Tribuno that they caught the creature while larking about in their hometown of General Guemes, in the province of Salta, Argentina.

He said: “We were chatting about our last fishing trip. It was one in the morning.

“I began to film a bit with my mobile phone while the others were chatting and joking.

"Suddenly we heard something - a weird noise as if someone was throwing stones.

"We looked to one side and saw that the grass was moving. To begin with we thought it was a dog but when we saw this gnome-like figure begin to emerge we were really afraid."

Jose added that other locals had come forward to say they had spotted the gnome.

He said: “This is no joke. We are still afraid to go out - just like everyone else in the neighbourhood now.

"One of my friends was so scared after seeing that thing that we had to take him to the hospital.”

He's right, this isn't a joke. This would classify as a prank. Jeez! Not that I have any proof that it's a prank, but seriously am I really going to trust a group of teenagers hanging out on a street corner at 1:00AM?

Rock River Lager

Tonight is another from the gift pack my father gave me for Christmas. I’m actually looking forward to this one, because it’s not the Bud Light Chelada from last week. BTW, just so you all know I haven’t been able to get the memory of the taste of that crap out of my mouth. BLECH! Anyways, back to tonight’s, Tonight I’m reviewing the Rock River Lager Beer by MDII of Rochester NY. The apparently fictitious pseudonym of a larger brewery.

The deliver method was the standard 12 oz brown bottle. The label is off white with the words Rock River crossing it at an upward angle. There is a picture of a river on it, presumably the Rock River. (ED. Note. I’ve lived along the mighty Rock River and have traveled up and down the whole length of it through out my life. I’ve done this by car, canoe and boat. I don’t know for sure it’s the same river this is named after, but it adds just a bit more of coolness to the beer for me.)

There is a light golden yellow coloring to it. It poured a half inch thick head made of up of large bubbles. In less than 30 seconds the head faded into a film on top of the beer. There was some lacing, but not very much of it.

The scent was weak. What could be detected was malts and what can be described best as a freshly mowed field. Much like the scent, the taste was very weak. All that I could really pick out was a very mild malt flavor. It’s not much different that the mass-produced American light lagers that are on the market. Almost no aftertaste is left after your done drinking

It is a light bodied beer. There is some carbonation that bites on the tongue, but not much else. There is no coating and really nothing that lingers in the mouth.

If you are looking for a nice beer to go with a meal, this would be it. There is not enough flavor to it to alter the taste of the food. It went really well with the gumbo I had for dinner tonight. Overall I give this a 4 out of 10.

Hell of a lot better than a .22

I found this over at Petey's Powderhorn. Now I own a Colt 1991 .45 acp and love it, but I was really hoping for something a bit more... I don't know... revolver, perferably in the the .357 caliber.

I am a: Colt model 1911 in 45ACP

What kind of handgun are YOU?

IGOLD Results

Even though I don't have any official figures, I think yesterday went really well. According to reports thousands of firearms owners lent their support. I also don't have many pictures as I forgot the digital camera at home... again. Actually I remembered to grab it yesterday morning. Making sure I wouldn’t forget it, I set it on the shelf next to my phone and some other items I was taking with me. Upon my return home, there it still sits. Yes, I had my phone with me, but for whatever reason, I left the camera here. I did try to snap some pictures of the event on my phone, only two really turned out. Sorry for the quality.

March to the Capital (We were in the middle of the the march.)

End of the March.

Rally at the Capital Steps.

Both of the pictures are from the march. My friend J-man went with to show his support. We started at the Springfield Hilton hotel where we received instructions, an agenda, lobbying cards and various speakers, Senators and State Reps gave speeches regarding the individual right of the public to have firearms. One of the speakers, whom I can’t remember his name, made the comment along the lines that “… as Firearm owners we all must stick together.” I can’t remember exactly what he said, but basically the Constitution does not guarantee your right to hunt or target shoot. It guarantees your right to own firearms. If you are a trap shooter, or a target sportsman or even just a casual firearm owner, we all need to stick together. Any law the effects one will sooner or later affect the other. Even if you only shoot shotgun and you don’t own a handgun, you still should stand up against the banning of handguns. No, it may not directly affect you, but they could use this later on as a stepping-stone to ban shotguns. I believe he called it the “The gun owners UN”. Not that I support the UN, but I do support this idea. I may not own a shotgun, but if they made a law banning shotguns, I’d be against it.

After the speech we all marched to the state capital building. It wasn’t a long walk, but I think we made our presence known. We had permits and a police escort so everything was nice and legal. At the steps of the capital there was a quick rally with a couple of more speeches and words of encouragement for politicians. To be honest since I have a deep mistrust of 99.9% of elected officials, I’m not sure I trust anything these politicians said for their actual beliefs or if they were campaigning. Especially since there were a couple of comments made regarding two of them possibly running for governor in the future.

After the rally we headed in to deliver lobbying cards to our State Senators and Representatives. I hit both Dave Syverson’s and Chuck Jefferson’s office. Neither one of them were in. As much as I believe Senator Syverson is pro-firearm, I also believe that Chuck Jefferson is anti-firearm. It would have been nice if either one of them had been in their offices when I stopped by, but they weren’t. I really wanted to speak with Chuck Jefferson since he has never returned a phone call or e-mail of mine over the last 3 years. I guess since either I’m independent or pro-firearm; I’m not worth talking to in his mind. We also had cards for the Senate and House Majority and Minority leaders. If I’m not mistaken the leaders of the Senate and the House are anti-firearm and deeply involved in the Chicago “good ol’ boy network”. Meaning they are heavily anti-firearm.

After delivering the cards J-man and I hung around for a while going to let our presence be known by the politicians. Most of the committees seemed to be scheduled early that day, so we didn’t get in to too many of them. The ones that were being held were packed.

Overall we had a good time. I think we did good and at the very least I hope we hope to hold our ground so that no new anti-firearm legislation can be passed.

I would like to thank the Illinois State Rifle Association, Illinois Carry, Champaign County Rifle Association and the Sangamon County Rifle Association for organizing and hosting this event. Keep up the good work!

Off I go.

I'm getting ready to head down to Springfield (The State Capital of Illinois for clarification). I'm picking up my friend J-man and we are off to IGOLD 08. We are doing this to speak up for our rights as legal firearm owners in the state of Illinois. If we are lucky we'll at least do as well as last year and stall out all of the anti-firearm legislation. If things go really well, maybe we can get some looser laws. And in my dreams, concealed carry.

Wish us luck.

And for those of you that wanted to make the trip but just couldn't. I'll make sure to speak up even louder for each of you. If you have my cell phone and want an update on how things are going live. Feel free to call or text me.

New Glasses

I've been re-enacting for years. The one thing that has been seriously wrong with my gear has been my glasses. I wear them all the time and they weren't period at all. Most of the events turn a blind eye to this because they understand that people need glasses and as long as they looked close enough, that was fine.

For at least 4 years now you've been able to get period style glasses. One of my friends whom I've referred to as Wind In His Hair (WIHH), He plays a native and no that's not the name he goes by, gave me a pair that were once his father's. I had said something last October that I was going to purchase a set. He told me not to as I could have his father's old pair. They were the exact same ones I was planning on ordering. Yes, there is another pair that are actually for my time period, but the temple bars don't go over the ears. Everybody I've spoken to about them says the same thing, They fall off your head if you start to sweat.

Today I took them to Lens Crafters to have my prescription fitted in them. When the sales girl came to ask if she could help me, I produced the glasses and said I needed lenses fitted for these. The look on the girl's face when she looked at them was classic. She looked at the glasses, looked at me, looked back at the glasses and said, "I need to take these in the back to see if we can even fit them." She was gone 15-20 minutes talking to the technician that would make the lenses. Finally a lady comes out and says, "We can do it." My friend J-man was with me and we were joking they were arguing over who was going to come out and tell the burly guy with the funny glasses that they couldn't do it.

When the lady started taking measurements she asked me what kind of glasses they were. I explained they were replica 1785 glasses. She almost dropped them. In her concentration to enter the information into their computer she didn't hear the word "replica". After I explained they are $30.00 frames, she calmed down. Of course she added a caveat that if the frames were damaged they would not be responsible for them as they could not replace it. Fine, what ever.

I swung back there after work and picked them up. Now I'm not saying that I like these and the way that I think they are stylish. Nope, they are ugly as sin. Hell they look pretty stupid. They pinch and are uncomfortable. I asked if they could be adjusted and they tried a little, but were afraid to do more because the tech thought they would break. Since I've picked them up, I've been wearing them. I just want to make sure they got the prescription right, and it seems that they did. But boy do they give you tunnel vision and my peripheral vision is shot to hell.

Zombies and Baloons

Need some time to waste? How about a couple of games.

The first is Brainz. It's another typical zombie survival game. After each round you can buy better weapons and the such. It's pretty fun.

You want a game that is going to suck you in? Try Balloon Invasion. It looks to be a World War 2 setting where you control an Anti Aircraft Flak Cannon. The object is to shoot down the balloons. This game is really fun and if you are anything like me, you'll get sucked in to trying to get the upgrades and make it to the next level. This one is definitely the more fun of the two.

lists

I stumbled upon two lists this week, both of them amusing. Mainly because it's either observations I think most people have made and ridiculed, or because it's something that hits close to home.

The first is 40 things that only happen in movies. I think we've all seen enough movies to be able to place which movie or movies each item is making fun of. My favorite is: "If staying in a haunted house, women should investigate any strange noises wearing their most revealing underwear." Yea, like women walk around in their underwear. If they do, someone please let me know where?

The second is Things we've learned from playing RPGs (Role Playing Games). Most of the items on this list seems to come from video game RPGs, but there are ones that apply to the standard dice versions as well.

Terminator part 2.

Today I had to finish what was started yesterday. Again more terminations and more sever write ups. Yea, it involved that many people. By the time the dust settled, I couldn't walk through the office and make eye contact with any of the employees. Not that I wouldn't look at them, but they wouldn't look at me.

Every time I walked down an aisle, everyone would just shut up and start focusing on something else or walk away. One of my employees came up to me and asked me to just get it over with, and this person wasn't even on my list of offenders. I ended up having to have a talk with her, because she obviously did something wrong, but since the audit didn't catch it, no official talking to took place.

Later in the day two of my employees came up and asked if it was safe to talk to me again. I had to ask one of my peers people a question. When I walked up to them they were sweating and jumped when I said their name. The rumor on the floor is that this whole thing was my crusade. That someone narked them out and I ran with the investigation and termination. No matter how much I tried to explain that I was just the messenger, I don't think anyone believed me.

This afternoon before I left I had to take a conference call. When I asked one of the employees to join in the room because I wanted their expertise, they brought with their purse, coat and some personal effects. I looked them in the eye and rather frustrated said, "For the love of Pete, I'm not going to fire you!" I think they almost broke down in tears... of joy.

Great, I think this little reputation is going to stick with me for years.

I'm the Terminator!

Since I’ve had direct reports with my company, I’ve never had to terminate someone. Don’t get me wrong, two of my people have been fired, but someone else did that when I wasn’t even in the office. Hell, I didn’t know it was happening until I got back and found out. Well, that’s no longer true. In fact I’m making up for lost time.

Back on Valentines Day, (again I wasn’t in the office) there was an incident involving the misuse of company assets that involved A LOT of people. This was big enough that it went up the chain of management all the way to the executive level to determine what kind of action was going to happen. We ended up scouring through disciplinary records of the staff involved. Based on past disciplinary action, upper management made a determination on the type of disciplinary action was going to be taking place this time. They did this to make sure there was consistency as it involved employees working for different supervisors in multiple departments and units.

When the dust cleared it came down to everything from a warning for first time offenses to termination for repeat offenders. The only person I had involved received a verbal warning before so they were given a permanent written warning this time that could lead to termination if they do it again. Thus none of my people were getting terminated. Yet, I ended up doing all the other terminations.

One of the individuals terminated asked me to assist, just because I’m a guy and she thought there might be trouble. The others didn’t have supervisors in the office that day and the terminations had to be done. Because the other supervisors, even the ones that worked in the same unit, didn’t directly supervise these people, they didn’t want to do it. In fact they felt I should do it. They were scared of what these individuals were going to do, they were repeated disciplinary problems. Their logic was that they wouldn’t get upset if I was doing it because, “Contagion, you’ll kick their ass if they start anything.” Yea, that’s right.

So I spent most of the day terminating or handing out punishments to people. And I’m not done yet. Nope, we ran out of time before we could get to everyone. I’m mentally exhausted from doing this. I feel bad for the people that were terminated. Don’t get me wrong, they brought this upon themselves, but really it should have been their supervisor or one they worked with that handed out the punishment. Not the guy in the office they deal with rarely. And contrary to some people’s belief, I took no pleasure from doing it.

The worse part is that word spread quickly. You don’t start firing people left and right on the same day with out people not only noticing, but also noticing who is escorting them out of the office. Some of the people I terminated were friends with or relatives of employees of mine. When I returned to my unit for stuff, my own employees wouldn’t look or talk to me. They kept they eyes diverted. At one point they were gathered and talking and when they saw me, they all scattered to the wind like roaches when a light comes on.

Needless to say, tonight I’m mentally and emotionally drained. I’d like to have a drink, but the only think I have is that nasty Bud Light Chelada.

Bud Light Chelada.

I was called out recently over my beer reviews. As many of you that have been around since the origin of the review, I started doing this to review beers so that you were forewarned. After a while I started reviewing more and more microbrews and I started finding some really good ones. Back in December a new beer was brought to my attention, and I quickly told everyone, “I will never drink it.” T1G and Bruce have both heard me say this. I even came close to violating my rule that I would drink any beer bought for me. Fortunately the arsehole gentlemen that was going to purchase it for me changed his mind. Finally a couple of “friends” told me I “had” to review this beer, they had been waiting for it. So here I am tonight reviewing the only beer I’ve ever, EVER condemned before tasting. Tonight I’m reviewing Bud Light Chelada, AKA Bud Light & Clamato juice (Clam and Tomato juice) by Anheuser-Busch. May the beer gods have mercy on my soul.

Sorry T1G, It was the first beer glass I grabbed.

IT came in 1 pint 8 fluid oz (22 ounce) silver can. It proudly advertises that it is Bud Light and Clamato (with salt and lime the perfect combination) Below that it shows a beer goblet with limes in the rim and Chelada across the front of it. On the side it has a box that has both Spanish and English writing in it. The English says, “Enjoy the best of two worlds: a refreshing Bud Light and the unique flavor of Clamato. Drink a Red One, ready to go, or use your favorite ingredients to make it yours – wherever, whenever!” Ed note: Never

The color is like that of a dark pink grapefruit juice. There is a distinct red color to it. It’s thick; light passes through, but barely. It just looks thick. When Ktreva walked into the room she said it looked like chum. There is no head at all and no lacing on the glass. There is a film, but it isn’t pleasant looking. It’s like floating bits of stuff have stuck to it.

The smell is mainly tomatoes, salt and only what can be described as wharf. You know, that scent you smell along piers that are in large bodies of water. There is a hint of lime and I think you might smell stale beer. I’m not sure if it was there or just my nose wishing it was. Unless you really like the scent of fish and bloody marys, don’t smell this. The taste is going to haunt me for the rest of my life. In 20 years from now I’m going to wake up screaming while I have a nightmare remembering this review. First off, this does NOT taste like beer. Tomatoes, salt, clams with a slight stale beer backwash is what it tastes like. BTW, there are floaty bits in there. Not many, but there are some… and yes they are chewy. Fortunately they are few, far between and small.

I’d love to tell you what the mouthfeel is like on this beer, but honestly I didn’t want it in my mouth long enough to find out. I will tell you that for the brief milliseconds I had it in my mouth it reminded me of drinking tomato sauce and vomit.

Bud Light Chelada is proof that the gods of beer have a dark and mean sense of humor. This has to be the vilest and nastiest beer I’ve drank in my life. It’s not pleasant in any way or shape. It actually brought tears to my eyes at the thought of having to drink the whole 22 ounces and made me do the “it’s icky” dance. Any of you with young kids knows what I’m talking about. I’m not joking when I warn you, for the love of all that is good and right in the world, DO NOT DRINK THIS BEER. I give it .5 out of 10. Yes, point five out of ten.

Now if you’ll excuse me I’m going to go gargle with Everclear.

My shame.

Last weekend after helping Bruce move his brand new bed, (Sorry Tammi, not your brand). We headed down to Fritz's for an afternoon of conversation and beer. We hadn't been down there long when I hear Bruce spout off a "Contagion, you want a nipple with that?"

I look and his beer is empty and mine is mostly full. DAMN!

Normally that's the question I end up asking anyone that drinks with me. It was so shocking to hear someone else say that to me. The Bartender D and Fritz both shockingly stated looked down the bar at us and commented on how that, "has NEVER happened before." DAMN!

Then to make matters worse, he did it to me four more times.

I was off of my game. I'd like to say it was because I was sick, but that never stopped me in the past. Maybe it was because I was talking, but I have mastered the drink and talk. I just don't know.

That makes my score 9,723,459,234,598,723,459,872,349,875 to 4

This made me laugh.

When I saw this article: Weather Channel Founder Wants to Sue Al Gore, I laughed. I laughed for multiple reasons.

ohn Coleman wants to sue Al Gore for fraud. Coleman, who founded the Weather Channel in 1982, thinks taking legal action against Al Gore would be a great "vehicle to finally put some light on the fraud of global warming." Coleman rejects the notion that people must take drastic actions to reduce their energy use.

First I don't buy the global warming alarmist stuff, I don't see enough scientific data to prove anything. I'm sorry, the earth has been around more than the 100 years worth of reliable data they are basing this on. There is other evidence that the earth goes through cycles like this over large spans of time. So we are on a warm up, well in so many years we'll have a cool down. If Coleman won, I would love to see Al Gore's reaction. Which would probably be the same he has for everything else, damn robot.

Second, As much as I would love to see this happen, I think the guy would be throwing his money away. There is no way that any judge would let this go to court. Most of them wouldn't want to stand in the middle of this kind of political mess. Even if it did go to court, I highly doubt a judge would rule in favor of Coleman.

Anyways, It made me chuckle.

Thanks for the memories Brett Favre.

After a meeting this morning, the news I had been expecting, yet dreading was delivered to me. When I returned to my desk I had no less than 50 instant messages, e-mails or people walk up and tell me that Brett Favre announced his retirement.

I handled it well all day and kept myself composed, but I'm actually saddened by this news. I started really watching football in the early 80's. I remember watching Lynn Dickey, Randy Wright and Don "Magic" Majkowski lead my team on the field of glory. I also remember watching a game on September 20, 1992 when Majkowski hurt his ankle and was replaced by Favre where he lead the team to his first of many comeback victories. Over the last 16 seasons, almost half of my life, Favre lead my team to 15 winning seasons, 2 tie seasons (8-8 record), and one losing season(2005). When we won the Super Bowl in 97, Favre was easily recognized as Green Bay's favorite son.

Favre in the Super Bowl

It's not because of this that it saddens me, it's that over the last 16 seasons he's been there on the field for us. I've watched him, cheered for him and have seen him overcome many obstacles. He overcame injury, addiction to vicodin, injuries, the death of his father, his wife Deanna's breast cancer and Katrina damaging his home town. Brett was a classy man that is a role model to kids and adults. He has been a big part of my football life and I'm going to miss watching him play.

I was just happy I was able to be at his last winning game in the NFL. The most memorable game I've ever seen in my life. It was a great time and a good victory. I'm really glad I was there for it.

Thanks Brett. Thanks for everything you did for me, my team and the NFL in general. You deserve your retirement. You are one of the greatest.

However, if you come out of retirement like some people think you might, you're more than welcome back!

Rock River Raptors have angered me.

Tonight is the “second” Rock River Raptors home game of the season. And to be honest, I’m not sure if I am going to go or not. The management and front office have really angered me to no end. It all started last year when the Raptors made it to the playoffs.

To increase sales the management and front office offered a package deal. If you bought all the playoff tickets and the 2008 season tickets they would knock 25% off of the total package and if the Raptors didn’t make it to the next level of the playoffs they would refund the money for the tickets. It was a huge savings and well worth the money. I jumped on and purchased the tickets.

The Raptors were eliminated in the first round. Meaning that the second round of the playoffs and the championship tickets should be refunded to the ticket holders that purchased them. I kept waiting and calling about the refund only to never get it. The office would give me the run around about whose fault it is or just not return my calls. At one point I called the Raptors because I had heard that some of the season ticket holders that had pre-paid for tickets were not showing as paid.

When I called they told me they did have a record of my payment. I inquired about the refund and they told me they did not have me on the list for the refund. I was about livid. They added my name to the list along with the friends of mine and my father who had all prepaid. I still received a song and dance about when we will get the refund.

My tickets where paid for in June. The last playoff game was toward the end of July. It is now the beginning of March and I still don’t have my money back. They where quick to take the money out of the account, but they sure don’t want to give it back.

To make matters ever worse, they changed the league they play in from the UIF to the CIFL. When they did this they sent out a nice letter saying that they decided not to raise the cost of tickets this year, like they would have received another dime from me or I would have accepted anything short of the refund they owed me. I’m still fighting to get my money when the schedule comes out. They shortened the seasons from 8 home games to 6 home games. In the past they were all on a Saturday night, now some are on a Friday night. Okay, it’s a little annoying as no pre-game partying, but I can live with it.

When I questioned the raise of ticket prices, I was told they didn’t raise them. Yes they did! I paid for 8 home games, I got 6 home games. That’s when I was told that I still get two home games, but they are pre-season. Pre-season, that’s right. To add insult to injury, one of the preseason games wasn’t even held at the MetroCentre (The arena the games are normally played in). The night we were able to pick up tickets we had to go to this indoor sports center in Loves Park, fight with parking to get into a crowded arena to pick up tickets. Where they wanted me to pay an additional $5.00 for Clone (my four year old) to get into the game. Again, they are not getting anymore money from me.

This wasn’t even a pre-season game; it was an exhibition game against some local iron-man football club. You didn’t even get to see them play players of the same caliber. They had an away pre-season game against a rival team from the UIF. Then they scheduled a pre-season game on a Monday night. Monday night?!?!?! Hell, I’ve given up NFL tickets because it’s a Monday night game. I’ll be lucky if I get home before 11:00 PM tonight. Most of the people I know can’t go because they have kids and it’s a school night, they have to work, they have weekday obligations or it’s just not feasible.

As for the regular season games, I’m going to miss half of them because they are scheduled during re-enactments. That’s not their fault, but when you only have 6 home games, it decreases the chances of you being able to get to one if you have any other hobbies, kids or plans.

Needless to say I’m a bit annoyed. I do know that I’m not spending one dime more than I have to this year on this team until I get my money back. I also know that I better get a huge apology for the treatment I’ve received. There are a lot of other fans out there just like me, I bet you see their support drop off this year. You don’t treat your fan base like this and expect to keep them.

How stupid are people?

Reality shows, we've all seen one at one time. Some of you may have only seen bits and pieces of them while others are hooked on a dozen or so of them. Either way it's mindless television for the masses. When the writers strike was going on, the only new television were reality shows. They don't need writers or scripting so they could continue to make them.

I'll admit I've watched a couple of them. I was a Survivor fan for many seasons, the last couple have done nothing for me so I quit watching. Occasionally there is another one that comes along and I start watching, like this year. I was bored with re-runs so I turned on The Moment of Truth. The first day watching I told Ktreva, "This show is a divorce waiting to happen." Some of the questions got down right personal and really revealing. Yet, these people would continue to play in order to win money up to $500,000.00.

The premises of the show is that they hook the contestant up to a lie detector prior to the game and ask them a series of True or False questions. During the show they ask them 21 of these questions as the game goes one, as the stakes get higher, the questions get more difficult. If they lie once, they lose all of their money.

In the three episodes I've watched, I've seen people admit to things on national television that really surprises me. Especially since they have their loved ones and friends sitting there watching them. At some point you know that one of these people is going to ruin a relationship by being on this show. What makes it worse in my mind is that the contestants know what they are going to be asked and still go on the show! How stupid or greedy do you have to be?

To prove my point, here is the last three questions asked of Lauren Cleri.

At the Fox site you can see the clip of the questions she was asked, there are quite a few. Even if their marriage was over and she was just looking for the money, why would you admit this to anyone on TV. I mean come on, she's now damaged goods. Would anyone in their right mind want to hire her, or start a relationship with her? The funniest part is that she lost the whole thing when she was asked, "Do you think you are a good person?" and she answered yes, and the detector said no! I want to know what's going on in her peroxided head to believe that, "I lie, cheat, steal and love another man other than my husband, I'm a good person." Actually if it had come up true, it wouldn't surprise me either, it would just prove that she is more selfish and a bigger witch than I already thought she was. At least now I think she feels some remorse for what she did.

Zombie Weddding?

We all know I love the zombie genre of movies, games and books. I'm also fine for theme weddings, I had one myself. Ktreva and I were married in a traditional Scottish wedding. All the men wore kilts and the all the ladies had on Elizabethan style gowns. The church that hosted the wedding still talks about it to this day.

For the life of me, I could never, ever do a zombie wedding. First off, I don't think I'd want it. Secondly even if I did, there is no way in hell Ktreva is going to go for it. But that is us. Apparently there are people that would and have done such a thing.

If you want to see more pictures, head over to Fun-hunter.com and check out the rest of the photos. This does give new meaning to "until death do us part." Wait, wouldn't that nullify the wedding then and there?

Sea of Fire 2

Need to kill some time? Try Sea of Fire 2. It's a sequel to Sea of Fire that I introduced to everyone last May. I've spent hours playing this game, trying different strategies and even betting it on every level. It starts off easy, but it gets difficult quickly, especially once you jump the island.

For the cooks out there.

I like to cook, but I don't host that many parties were it isn't much more than a buffet style kegger. It's not that I wouldn't like to have the other kind, it's just we don't have room for something like that. However, if I ever did host one, or for those of you that are planning an upcoming party, I'd try to make these:

Bacon Cup

Over at not martha they have the complete instructions on how to make these yummy little salad holders.

My vehicle wish list.

Since it's been a while since I've posted about zombies, I thought it would be okay to hit you with a couple of items today.

Over at Jalopnik they have a list of "The Best Post-Apocalyptic Survival Vehicles"

We asked you what you think the best post-apocalyptic vehicle would be, assuming you could fuel it up and were unable to stay in one place due to the lack of other resources (and likely abundance of radioactive zombies looking for a tasty brain to munch upon).

Now most of the vehicles on the list aren't even available to the general public, are one of a kind or just plain fictional. But If I had my choice, I'd want the SISU XA-185 for all the reasons they list.

I bet I'd look cool driving it too.

YES!

For years the FDA has banned the importation of haggis into the United States. The only way to get one is to find someone that makes it here, which is damn near impossible. But that's okay, for those of us that like Haggis and can't get it, we have an alternative.

Gummy Haggis!

Haggis is a traditional Scottish delicacy consisting of sheep entrails and spices boiled inside a sheep's stomach. As much as we'd love to sell the genuine article (NOT!), we're just not in the business of boiled innards in stomach casing. We are, however, in the business of gummy candy that looks like boiled innards in stomach casing. Lucky you.

Each 3 1/2" long, 100 gram hunk of brownish Gummy Haggis looks disturbingly realistic and has the unmistakable flavor of butterscotch.

How cool is that? BTW, this is made by the same people that make Angry Scotsman Chewing Gum.