Miasmatic Review

Ding dong the Governors Gone.

Well it looks like the circus involving the Illinois governor is over; Ill. senate votes 59-0 to remove Gov. Blagojevich.

YES!!!!! I've never seen a more incompetent politician in my political experience. I'm sure there are more out there, but I just have never had it where their incompetency directly impacted me before.

I kind of figured he was going to get impeached, and removed from office, but this surprised me:

"After a four-day trial, the Illinois Senate voted 59-0 to convict him of abuse of power, automatically removing the second-term Democrat. Democratic Lt. Gov. Patrick Quinn, one of his critics, immediately became governor.

In a second 59-0 vote, the Senate further barred Blagojevich from ever holding public office in Illinois again."

BWAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA! Serves him right. I'm just wondering if this ego maniacal, delusional, corrupt, sociopath is going to try to take up politics in a different state. Hey, maybe Obama will give him a position... Secretary of pot hole filling!

Honestly, I figured he would be impeached and booted out of office. I was pretty sure they would never let him hold a political office in Illinois, the fact that the man didn't have anyone in the senate to stand up for him is surprising. All 59 of the Illinois senators voted yes to booting him out. That has to be a blow to the ego.

Now we just have to wait for the Feds to get done with him. With that Big Boy Restaurant mascot haircut of his, I bet he'd have a good time in prison.

Saison Dupont

Tonight’s beer is Saison Dupont brewed by Brasserie Dupont, Tourpes, Belgium. This is another beer that was donated by Petey of Petey’s Powderhorn. It’s a Belgian Farmhouse Ale. Unlike most American beers it’s unfiltered and bottle conditioned.

This is bottled in an 11.2 Fl. Oz. bottle. It has a black label with a yellow and off white checkerboard pattern that is on a tilt across the label. In black letters in the middle of the checkerboard pattern is the name of the beer. The label boasts a 6.5% alcohol by volume. . On the back label there is a bit of a story about the beer and what exactly a Belgium Farmhouse Ale is exactly. “This increasingly rare specialty originated before the age of refrigeration as a beer to be brewed in winter for summer drinking. The style required a beer sturdy enough to age in the bottle but refreshing enough to be enjoyed in warm weather. “There’s a bit more to it, but you’ll have to buy a bottle to read it!

There is a hazy pale straw color to it. Light passes through easily enough, but the cloudiness makes seeing through it near to impossible. When poured into a pint glass a dense off-white head forms about half an inch thick. It fades slowly and even at the end a nice ring is still around the edge of the glass, with a film over the top. A creamy lacing forms on the side of the glass.

When brought to the nose, the first thing you notice is a spicy mixture of clove and coriander. There is a sweet banana-like scent. A touch of yeast carries the rest of the scents and there is a slight white pepper accent to it that brings it all together. The flavor is spiciness with a mellow fruit and hop flavor. The fruit sweetness is balanced by hop bitterness that combines for a beer that isn’t too sweet nor is it too bitter. The taste is rather refreshing with a mild aftertaste that lingers gently.

This is a light bodied beer. The carbonation provides a crisp bite. There is a creaminess to it that is pleasant on the tongue, but isn’t thick or coating.

This is a pleasant beer to drink. It’s light, flavorful and easy to drink. The sediment is a little disconcerting. This is an enjoyable beer to drink, and I would enjoy drinking this more on a hot summer day than on a gold winters evening. I give this beer 6 out of 10.

Meetings

My day at work was spent mostly in meetings. From 30 minutes after the time I arrived until 45 minutes before I left. I had a 15 minute break in the day for a lunch, but that was it. Of course I put in a 10 hour day on top of it.

You'd think I would have completed something, in the end nothing was accomplished other than me wasting a day.

I feel so productive.

Blagojevich's defense is a media blitz.

Well the circus that is the Illinois state government has taken another odd step as the impeachment trial is under way. Now instead of being there to defend himself, Blago has decided that his best defense is a media blitz in New York.

Blagojevich is not expected to attend the trial. Today, he has been getting interviewed on various national television programs, including "The View" on ABC.

I know he also did the Today show and Larry King Show. But it's the view that's gonna be his defense, because once he gets Barbara on his side, he's won! Just kidding, but he might think that way. Honestly I think he's doing it to contaminate the jury pool for the federal corruption charges. Think about it, he's being on national television means that a lot of people are going to see it and form an opinion in advance of the trail. Meaning it's going to limit those that can sit jury to the limited few that live under a rock.

So now instead of trying to defend himself, he's throwing a media broadcasted temper tantrum. He claims that they are trying to run him out of office so they can increase taxes. Well they wouldn't have to if he hadn't ruined the state budget by over spending. He also claims they are preventing him from defending himself because he can't call witnesses. Well this isn't a trail and the senate can't call witnesses either. The feds won't let them call any witnesses that may be part of the federal trail due to the possible damage it could cause to their case.

We'll have to wait to see how this little governmental joke goes.

Just weird.

I'm not sure what Cadbury is trying to imply with this add, but if their Dairy Milk bar makes my eyebrows do this, I don't want it.

I should do this at work.

Ktreva found this video of a prank where a guy hooks up a car battery to the kitchen sink. Watch as his unsuspecting victim not only touches the sink once, but twice.

I'm not sure what's funnier, his reaction or the fact he went back for more. lol

Planet 51

Speaking of Movies... Here's a trailer for a new cartoon movie that looks interesting. It's based on another planet... and humans are the aliens. Check out the Official Planet 51 Trailer.

Some of these would have saved me money

Have you ever seen a movie poster and thought, "hey that movie looks neat"? Then when you see the movie, you realized that the only neat thing about the movie was the poster. Yea, I've been suckered in time and time again by trailers and movie posters. Wouldn't it be nice if movie posters were more like this:

Yea, that one would have saved me the $50 (tickets plus snacks for the family).

Here's a collection of If Movie Posters Told The Truth.

Evolution of Dance.

I believe everyone has seen the original Evolution of Dance that came out a couple of years ago. If not, click on the link and watch it, it's hilarious.

Then when you are done watching it, you can watch the sequal, Evolution of Dance 2. It's not as good as the original, but still funny.

Bell's Lager Beer

Tonight I’m reviewing another beer donated by Petey of Petey’s Powderhorn. Right now he’s down in Florida enjoying himself at the same event I was supposed to go to. O’well, it was worth the trade. The beer this week is Bell’s Lager Beer by Bell’s Brewery.

It came in a 12 oz brown bottle. There is a tan label with an old fashioned style map of the Great Lakes. Around the map are 8 icons. (Clockwise from top right) Water-skier, bridge, leaf, snow shoes, sailboat, pine tree, trout, paddle. At the top is the name of the beer flanked by a map compass and an anchor. Under the map it states “Lager of the Lakes”.

When I poured it into a pint glass, a half inch white head. It faded after five minutes into a film on the top. The color is of golden straw. There is a slight haziness to it. Light passes through easily enough.

The smell is dominated up front by grainy malts. There is a hint of hops to it that balances the scent out. A slight grassiness also is noticeable. The beer starts off with a nice crisp malt and follows through with a grassy hop taste. The flavor is very light, it’s reminiscent of a pilsner. A little bland for a lager, but more flavor than a pilsner.

This is a medium bodied beer, with a light carbonation.

This was an enjoyable beer, which was easy to drink. Nothing overly rememberable about it, it tastes good, but it really is a run of the mill lager. The flavor is kind of like a pilsner, but it has a medium body to it. Realistically it’s a good meal beer; you can drink this with a burger because the flavor won’t affect the flavor of the food. I give it 4.5 out of 10.

He's here.

Obama took the oath of office today and is now officially our President. No, I didn't vote for him. No, I don't think he is qualified to do the job. No, I don't think he's what the country needs. With that being said, he is my President. I hope and wish the best for him. In the end I really hope he can pull our country out of the downward spiral it's in, but I just don't see it happening.

What gets me is all the pomp and circumstance around this man. I have never before in my life seen more people cheering on, celebrating and just singing the praises of a man that has done nothing. He did nothing as a state senator, he did nothing as a US senator and now he's the President. Other than being the first African American to rise to that office, he really has done nothing. I really can't understand why he was Time's man of the year. I wish someone could explain it to me.

My office even let people stop working so they could watch the inauguration of him. They never let anyone do that for the last two inaugurations. There were advertised parties and tons of media coverage for the man. I don't recall any of that for the last 20 years.

Either way, I think everyone is getting their hopes and aspirations set high just for a fall.

MLK day

It's Martin Luther King Day. This is one of the holidays we are given off at work. I still haven't figured why this is a day off of work holiday for us. Especially since most other companies work today. Since most of my friends are working today or in in Florida, I decided I'm going to go spend the afternoon down at Fritz's.

If you have the day off, you are all more than welcome to join me.

Bacon Explosion

all I can say about this recipe is yum.... Bacon. All hail the Bacon Explosion.

Battle of the online Social Networks.

Okay, I admit I have a Myspace Page. I use it mainly to play some online games, oh and to keep intouch with some of my fellow Zombie hunters. I don't have any other accounts, and this video is kind of why.

However, they could have thrown in blogging into the mix. HA!

Sea kittens?

Okay, this is just stupid. Over at NPR they have an article; PETA Attempts To Make Fish More Adorable.

""PETA thought that by renaming fish sea kittens, compassionate people who would never dream of hurting a dog or a cat might extend that sympathy to fish, or sea kittens," PETA campaign coordinator Ashley Byrne says."

Yea, really, I wonder if the people with PETA have any grasp of reality. I can't see anyone other than one of their reality challenged chuckleheads to actually go for this proposal.

Barely recognizable.

Over at Listal, basically a place that makes lists, they have a post up of Almost Unrecognizable actors. It's a list of various actors that have done roles that required them to wear make up. This list is what they feel is the best jobs were you can barely tell it's the actor. Some of them I disagree with, you could tell Mrs. Doubtfire was Robin Williams, etc. If you like movies, you'll probably find this list interesting.

Heaven or Hell?

We've all joked about "I'm going to hell" at some point or the other. Now The Path of The Savior has a quick online quiz to let you know if you indeed are going to go to hell.

It's based on the ten commandments, so there are only ten questions.

And yes, I am going to hell.

We know, it's cold.

Okay, so all day long all I've heard is how cold it is. Yes, we made a record low -24 degrees. Sure the hair IN my nose froze between my front door and the truck. Okay, I had icicles hanging off my facial hair. I get it, it's cold.

But that doesn't mean I want to listen to you whine and complain while you pump gas. I don't want to listen to your sad story about your car not starting while I'm waiting my turn to check out. Heck, I don't care that you just moved here from Arizona and you are convinced the Cubs just won the World Series.

However, I did enjoy watching you struggle with your doors opening because you washed your car yesterday and the water froze everything shut.

Welcome to Northern Illinois!

It looks like the Brit's may have learned a lesson.

People have been talking about banning guns for a while. In the UK they did an all out gun ban. Well it looks like the people there have decided they have had enough.

I like how at the 3:50 mark the Bobbie (Police officer) talks about how the gun ban has actually increased the amount of crimes where a firearm has used.

And the case of Tony Martin sounds earily familiar. Could it be because it's like an incident that happened here locally, in Stillman Valley last April. In America he gentleman defending himself wasn't charged with a crime... because it's not illegal... yet.

Ktreva Update

Ktreva had what hopefully is her last surgery today. Everything went well and she's home already. There was a chance that it was going to have to be an inpatient surgery, fortunately everything went so well that she didn't even need the 23 hour observation. There were no complications or even difficulties what so ever.

Now there was a problem with her pain killer prescription. They gave her a prescription for percocet, but neglected to put the dosage on there. When we took it the the drug store to be filled, they couldn't. For the last 30 minutes we've been trying to get a hold of the doctor so Ktreva can get her meds. So far we've had no luck. The pain killers she was given after surgery are starting to wear off.

We also had the window closed on us being able to go to the Alafia in Florida this weekend. The doctor said in no way are we going to be able to go, Ktreva just won't be able to travel. To our firends that are going; I hope you all have fun, sorry we can't make it. We'll try again next year.

As for tonight's beer review, yea not going to happen because of all the above.

New Hobby

Since Christmas I've picked up a new hobby. Now this one is nothing like my other hobbies... re-enacting, shooting, blogging. No this hobby is a little more... genteel persuasion. It started around Christmas, I took pity on the poor birds in the cold outside.

Then I put up some bird feeders. Of course this attracted squirrels that annoyed me. So I went on the war path against squirrels.

That lead me to go to a local store that specializes in feeding wild birds. Where I bought a "squirrel resistant" feeder. Along with some special feed that is supposed to attract a wider variety of birds.

I haven't gotten to the point that I've started jotting down and identifying the different birds I get, but I'm sure that time is coming. Although I do know that I have a lot of cardinals.

So yeah... Ktreva is making fun of me for this.

At least this is a cheap hobby!

Starting the day off with a bang.

This video is in Japanese, but you can get the general idea of what they are talking about.

I need to get me one of these. I don't know how well it will work as an alarm clock, but it sure would be fun.

Winter Driving.

Right now outside it's snowing pretty good. We've gotten about 8 inches of snow since yesterday evening. Now anyone that lives in Northern Illinois and Wisconsin has to know how to drive in the snow. Then again, sometimes the conditions get so bad that you just shouldn't be on the road.

Yea, it's like watching a ballet of stupid.

Celebrity Midgets

I know that some people like midgets. Okay, I find them fascinating. So when I found a post at Celebrity Fun Pictures that photoshopped celebrity pictures to give you an idea what some celebrities would look like if they were midgets.

Jennifer Anniston as a Midget

If you want to see more, go over and check out the whole post.

Sky watching.

Here's a video clip that I found really interesting. It's a series of time lapse pictures of the sky.

I found this over at Astronomy Picture of the Day. The website says it gives a different picture each day, but it hasn't been updated since December 31st.

RC Jet Crash.

I didn't even know they made remote control jets until I saw this video.

All I could think when I saw that jet crash in a fiery ball, is that the guy that owned it had to be pissed. Those things can't be cheap.

Childhood games come back.

When I was younger I remember getting a Nintendo, the original one. It came with a three in one game that had Duck Hunt, Super Mario Brothers and World Class Track Meet. I loved Duck Hunt. I spent hours sitting there shooting the ducks and clay pigeons.

Now I can play Duck Hunt online.

So if you like shooters, or just want to reminisce about the past, go wast a couple of hours shooting ducks. Unfortunately in this version you don't get to shoot the clay pigeons.

booze

damn you liver... it's time to turn you to stone!

Bad week at work, it's time to make my brain and liver pay for it.

Samuel Adams Chocolate Bock

Last weekend at Fort Obie, Petey of Petey’s Powderhorn decided that he wanted to jump up on the enablers list and gifted me a box full of beers to review. Thanks Petey! I started with the first beer in the box that I had been chomping at the bit to review. Tonight I’ll be reviewing Samuel Adams Chocolate Bock by Samuel Adams in Boston, MA.

It comes in an impressive 1 pint, 9.4 fl oz brown bottle, aka 25.4 fluid ounces. The label looks like cast pewter, texture and all. The name of the beer takes up most of it. What looks like hops are flowing around the edge to the bottom where it kind of resembles tilled fields. The bottle cap is covered with a plastic wrapper, which reminded me of how wine is sealed.

There is a nice dark brown coloring to it with a touch of crimson to it. Light passes through with much difficulty. When I initially poured it, an inch thick tan head formed. The head was made up of tiny bubbles. The head fades to a ring around the top of the beer. There is no lacing at all.

The smell is very simply that of chocolate and cocoa. You can make out the feint scent of malts as it warms. The taste is very simple as well; it’s mostly chocolate with a touch of coffee malts. There is a bit of bitterness to it that one associates with coffee and dark chocolate. The aftertaste is reminiscent of chocolate milk.

This is a medium bodied beer, based on the appearance I was figuring it would be a bit more full bodied.

This beer costs about $14.99 a bottle locally (Thanks again Petey!); to be honest I was expecting a lot more from it. It’s not a bad beer, but for the price it’s really not worth it. Based on the price, the bottle and the marketing, I’m going to say this is one of those beers that is drunk by people being pretentious. I enjoyed the beer, but it was lacking in its simplicity. Overall I give it a 5.5 out of ten.

Snuggie

KTreva and I always have a war of the thermostat every winter. I like it cold, and she likes it so she can bake muffin's in the living room. That's right, she wants to make it so hot in the house she can bake with out the oven. Of course if you ask her, I like to keep it so cold you can hang meat in the house. We finally have to agree on a temp of around 70 degrees. It's too cold for her and way too warm for my likes.

For years she would sit under piles of blankets in the house so she could watch TV. However, when she was on a computer it wouldn't work. The blanket would keep falling off of her shoulders. Then in early December, before all of the surgeries, she saw a commercial for Snuggies.

Blankets are OK but they can slip and slide, plus your hands are trapped inside.

The Snuggie™ keeps you totally warm and gives you the freedom to use your hands. Work the remote, use your laptop or do some reading in total warmth and comfort!

Snuggie™ is made with super soft, thick, luxurious fleece with roomy, oversized sleeves that let you do what you want while still being totally wrapped in warmth.

Dude, Totally!

Ktreva saw this and went nuts. She really, really wanted one. After much discussion, including some whining and begging, I finally caved in and ordered her one. Which means that with their deal of buy one, get the second free (not including shipping and handling), I ended up ordering two.

For four weeks she has been bugging me about, "When is it coming?"

Today it finally arrived. She was so excited, she had to send me a text message telling me about it while I was at work. Then when I got home, she is sitting there all cuddled up under the damn thing typing on the computer. Then she had to call her mother to brag about it.

Folks, let me tell you that a snuggie is really nothing more than a bathrobe being worn backwards. Its a little bit longer, and there is no collar, but if you take an oversized bathrobe and wear it backwards you get the same thing.

At least for now I get to have fun making fun of KTreva and her snuggie. That is until she gets mad at me and hits me with something.

Fort Obie Winter Camp.

Friday afternoon Wes and I left for the Quad Cities area to attend winter camp. This is the season opener for me. It was good seeing all the guys again. But just to give you an idea of what winter camp is like let me put it to you like, a lot of alcohol, cold winter night in a cabin, a lot of food that causes gas. Yea it was drunk out.

I'd tell stories, but what happens at winter camp, stays at winter camp.

Ktreva and I were planning on taking the family to Florida in a couple of weeks for the Alafia River Rendezvous. Unfortunately with her surgery and treatment schedule it's looking like it's just not going to happen for us this year. We are thinking of possibly going to the Rocky Mountain Nationals instead or the Midwestern Primitive Rendezvous in July.

We really want to hit a large national event and those are the two that look like we might actually be able to make this year. As much as we had been planning on doing the Alafia for a year and a half, it just doesn't seem like it's going to happen. Don't get me wrong, I'd rather have Ktreva healthy and not do the Alafia, than do that Alafia and have her sick. That doesn't mean I can't lament not being able to attend.

Owell, we have time to decide on which one to do.

Welcome 2009

2008 was a an interesting year for me. It started off really great, turned for the worse, and then at the last minute good news saved the year from being a total loss.

Now 2009 is here to great me. I'm thinking this is going to be a good year. I don't know, but I have a good feeling that things are about to start looking up for my family.

I hope that all of you have a good 2009.