Kroger Incident

Last year, I remember posting a disturbing incident involving a romantic Kroger employee and a fish but I don't think I wrote anything about this. . . reason being I still think it could have been overblown and distorted.

Before the Forest Hills Kroger moved across the street as the flagship of the Anderson Towne Center, the deli department was in the shape of an "L" with unnecessary partitions and strangely angled walls (think the lair of Chthulu).

For a short while I had the lowest seniority and usually worked with the second-lowest employee, Erica. Later they hired a guy named Mike, bumping Erica and me marginally up the union ladder. Erica loved to cause trouble, such as asking elderly co-workers their favorite sexual positions and, while I got along with Mike, he vaguely reminded me of the Columbine killers.

One day when the deli was packed with customers, Erica began trash-talking (and yes, you can do this in front of the customers or even directly to the customers and only get "written up," a meaningless punishment with no consequences whatsoever). Mike was working on the slicer next to me and when Erica walked by, she said something that he took offense to.

I don't remember my exact order but it involved shaving lunchmeat (for those of you like the pre-Kroger me, "shaved meat" might sound dirty but it's simply cut extremely thin. It takes forever to do it and is difficult to judge how much it weighs. Extreme-bastards will reject two pounds of shaved meat and insist it be "more shaved than that.")

Apparently while I was shaving, Mike grabbed Erica around the neck and refused to let her go. They were close enough that I could have reached over and touched them but the way the deli was designed didn't give me a clear view so I just thought they were goofing around.

After a few minutes, Erica started yelling, broke loose, and went to the manager's office. Mike pretended it didn't happen. Other deli workers came out of the back and asked me what was going on. I looked dazed and said, "What?"

This happened in plain sight of at least 15 to 20 customers but none of them said or did anything. Eventually Erica's customer did get angry but only because she left the department without filling his order.

I got called up to the office and asked to write down what I saw. My account was much more vague than even what's above but apparently it matched Erica's story more than Mike's.

He was fired, from what I understand not because management believed he was guilty, but because Erica was already a union member and he was still probationary. I went back to being lowest deli worker until they hired a slew of new people for the new store.

I have no idea if Erica over-reacted or misjudged the situation. Many, many people brought up the point that I was standing right next to them, either implying that:
a. it wasn't serious; or
b. I was/am a moron.

Mike came back to the store a few times but didn't say anything to anyone in the department. For a while I was worried about seeing him approach in a trenchcoat but nothing happened.

Now Erica and I are on the top half of deli seniority. That was the last assault of any sort, and with the layout of the new store, anything like that would now be impossible to miss.

Pretty pointless compared to the fish story but that's the deli department for you.

Simpson Millionaire

Yesterday my wife clogged the toilet. My five-year old daughter had an accident getting out of the bathtub, spreading feces throughout the entire bathroom. My two-year old son had two solid waste diapers. I had to clean up after the dog outside and cleaned the cat's litterbox and two hamster cages. I was spared only by the goldfish.

Yet at this moment I feel happy. I just won $1,000,000 with Simpsons' trivia.

I Had Her In Class

Via Snopes, this sounds exactly like one of my old students who wanted President Clinton to raise the minimum wage in Mexico. I don't know what she would be doing in Orange County.

Bounty for the Tasmanian Tiger

Conventional science believes that the last Tasmanian Tiger (or thylacine) died September 7, 1936 but each year dozens of sightings are reported. Finally cash in on the line.

Cryptozoologists have special hopes for the thylacine (one of the crypto societies even adopted it as a mascot). As improbable as they might be, thylacines still seem more credible than Bigfoot or Nessie.

According to Robert Bakker in Dinosaur Heresies (I think--I don't have it in front of me), the thylacine was restricted to Tasmania because during the last Ice Age, sea levels dropped, connecting Tasmania and many other islands to the mainland. Various non-marsupial species, including humans, were able to make their way to Australia and take the place of native creatures. When Asian canines arrived in Australia, the thylacine couldn't compete. As fierce as they were, placental mammals outbred and replaced them. Fortunately for the thylacine, crossing the Australian desert isn't the easily thing in the world, so by the time the Asian dogs spread throughout the entire continent, the earth had warmed, making Tasmania an island once more. Had Tasmania been on the accessible northern side of Australia, instead of the southern, the thylacine (and the devil) would have gone extinct thousands of years ago.

The Asian canines evolved into the modern dingo, occasionally snatching a baby, but no longer such a genocidal threat. Thylacines thrived until European settlers wiped them out. Sadly, this wasn't the only species in Tasmania driven to extinction. Native humans were killed to the last man, woman, and child, giving Tasmanian settlers the distinction of being more genocidally effective than Hitler, Pol Pot, or Stalin. At least the devils are still with us.

Happy Easter/Birthday

My birthday fell on Easter this year but I still didn't get much of a payoff. My mom sent an ugly shirt and my wife gave me a DVD that cost $3.88. No candy at all.

I got my kids a ton of Easter candy but it's a far cry from when I turned 12.

The Negro Space Program

For years the accomplishments of the Negro Space Program were downplayed and ignored by the media. At long last, they're gaining recognition.

Everyone's a Cannibal

Since I started working in the Kroger deli, I've come to terms with the fact that anyone who eats meat from an animal he or she hasn't personally killed and cleaned, is eating a certain percentage of human flesh (this is also true of many vegetarian products which contain even more human hair and skin).

Here's a case of it going a little too far (via Snopes).

Recently there was a federal report that 80% of meat-workers cut themselves to some degree. That's like saying 80% of men masturbate. Virtually everyone who works with meat is cut on a regular basis. I cut myself twice last Sunday and since I started working at least four other workers were so badly injured that they went to the hospital. None of the injuries was reported to OSHA so it's as if they never happened.

This seems disgusting but considering some of the other additives that finds itself into food, human flesh is at least a good source of protein.

UPDATE: Tangent from Cecil Adams

Test Day

Literature classes are so much better than writing classes. Today we had the dreaded poetry test and I had a whole class of sitting happily, only answering the occasional odd question. With writing classes, there are no test days but twice the grading.

Democrats and the South

Here's an odd political posting for this blog but I've been thinking about this for a while.

Looking back at the Democratic candidates for president over the last century (and change) gives you this:

North South
2004 Kerry (Mass) L 2000 Gore (Tenn.) L (although I'm
not sure if Gore was considered a true Southerner)
1988 Dukasis (Mass) L 1996 Clinton (Ark.) W
1984 Mondale (Minn.) L 1992 Clinton (Ark) W
1972 McGovern (SD) L 1980 Carter (GA) L
1968 Humphreys (Minn) L 1976 Carter (GA) W
1960 JFK (Mass.) W/shot 1964 Johnson (TX) W
1956/1952 Stevenson L/L 1948 Truman (Missouri) W (is Missouri part of the South? It was a slave state until the end of the Civil War.)
1932-44 FDR (NY) 4W/died 1908/1900/1896 W.J.Bryan (FLA) L/L/L
1928 Smith (NY) L
1924 Davis (NY) L
1920 Cox (Cin.) L
1912/1916 Wilson (NJ) W/W (Wilson technically was a Yankee but was born in the South and was an open white supremacist.)
1904 Parker (NY) L
1892 Cleveland (NY) W (Last true Yankee who didn't die in the course of office.)

The last Northern Democrat to serve out his full terms of office was Woodrow Wilson who had strong Southern ties. Overall the South's record is 5-5 (going back to WJB--post-1908, it's 5-2). Overall the North's is 8-11 (half of which is from FDR). Since the Civil Rights era, the North is 0-5; the South is 4-2.

I've never heard the Democrats even mention this. I don't think a Southern candidate is necessary but it might be a consideration.

Liberal Bias

The Walk in Brain blog has posted a number of comments about liberal bias from university professors. Even though I try to have classes write about political and social issues, I think the only bias I give is from the deeply saddened point of view ("The president doesn't have the power to raise the minimum wage in Mexico" and "Murder is already against the law.")

I can only think of two times when I actually raised my voice about political issues. One was about animal rights which I think defies left or right status. A few students in class repeated PETA's claim that no medical advances have been made by animal experimentation. (Watch Penn and Teller's episode of Bullshit for a thorough refutation of this.) I brought up the point that the rabies vaccine was developed through animal (and human) experiments and has saved the lives of countless humans and animals (especially dogs).

They refused to believe it.

"You can argue that the advances made through animal experimentation don't justify it. You can argue that there are better ways to experiment now. You can argue that many experiments are pointless and needlessly cruel but you can't argue that no advances have been made whatsoever."

They denied it. They denied that Pasteur developed the rabies vaccine through experiments on animals AND that vaccinating dogs helped them.

I remember asking "Why do you think corporations pay millions of dollars for laboratories and to pay scientists if it never did any good? Because they care so much for the consumer?"

They stopped arguing so I'll never know for sure but I think they assumed the scientists were just being mean. This was back when "mean-spirited" was the catchphrase of the day.

The other time was about capital punishment. A group dogmatically stated that the death penalty was unconstitutional.

I pointed out that the Supreme Court ruled that the way states meted out death sentences was unconstitutional but that the ruling wasn't strictly against capital punishment itself.

None of them knew that the Supreme Court had ever struck down the death penalty but they still insisted that it was unconstitutional.

Finally I broke down and said louder than I should have that capital punishment is directly addressed in the Constitution (the Fifth Amendment to be exact) and so while it could be wrong, unfair, or immoral, it wasn't unconstitutional.

Again, I didn't change anyone's mind, just scared them into being quiet. It didn't occur to me until much later that the students thought "unconstitutional" was just another word for "mean" or "unfair." They didn't see a connection between the word and the actual Constitution at all. If I would have seen that then, I might have made myself clear.

These weren't the dumbest reactions from students (only one in about 35 students has even a foggy idea of what cloning is--many, possibly most, students think that clones have all the memories of the original organism and instantly age to become duplicates of the original).

I'm sure the students thought I was unfair and biased (although in both cases, it's more of a conservative bias than liberal). I have to wonder how much "liberal bias" is from comments like "Maybe the Trail of Tears wasn't the best decision the U.S. ever made" being interpreted as "I am a communist and hate America."

Stranded

I made a trip to NKU for a make-up test for a student. Turned out he didn't show. This is the last week I have daycare for devilboy (appropriately his expulsion isn't official until this Friday).

Starting wages at the Kroger deli pays more than teaching part-time (plus health insurance and employee discounts).

Hamster Update

The baby hamsters are now living in three separate cages. They're starting to fight so we'll need to find homes for at least half of them.

When I took them from their mother, she was no longer tolerating them. She climbed up into her loop tube (if you've ever seen the tubing for hamsters and gerbils, it's a circular tube leading from the top of the cage) to get away from them. The babies were too small to climb up so she would pack her cheeks with food and camp at the highest point, only coming down for provisions. She seems much happier to have the cage to herself.

Initially I put the babies in two different cages, putting the first four I could catch in a ten-gallon aquarium and the two quicker ones together in a smaller wire cage. Later when I bought a new cage, I split the group of four into two pairs.

By luck, it turned out the the two in the wire cage were both male and the rest female. I hope that I caught them in time so that we don't have to worry about a new generation.

IHOP over McDonalds

Normally the kids whine for McDonalds so much that we take them once a week. Last night we went to IHOP instead which was much more expensive but I guess worth it, considering this (via Hoax Museum).

KPA

I found all the material from KPA in my mailbox at NKU. According to the schedule, I was supposed to go on Friday March 5. I'm sure that was a typo (the next day listed is Saturday March 5) but with an obvious schedule screw-up, I don't feel quite as bad. I was supposed to go with Jim Chambliss of U of Louisville ("Sparks of Creativity: The Influence of Epilepsy in Writing and Art") and Becky Lee Meadows, also of U of L ("Manic Depression, Childhood Bereavement, and the Return of the Dead in Edgar Allan Poe's Works").

My paper was about development of children's ability to recognize gender in language and doesn't really fit the others (or anything else at the conference). They had me scheduled for 9:00 a.m., the first time slot, so I doubt if I had much of an audience.

I could probably put this down on my vida and no one would know but I don't think I'm that desperate yet.

Keeps on Going

Apparently it wasn't the end. The case went to court on March 11 and the prosecutor filed for a continuance until April 20 (Hitler's birthday and the anniversary of Columbine).

I get this information from my wife and she must have got something jumbled because she said that he was offered a plea bargain down to a fifth degree felony with no jail time and mandatory registration as a sex offender for two years. According to the Ohio Revised Code, only Importuning even comes close to those penalties and I don't think Importuning remotely fits the charges.

My niece is living with one of her mother's friends (which may not be good but at least is better than staying home). I hope, no matter the outcome of the trial, that she doesn't move back.

Now I don't know what to think. My wife gets most of this from her mother and some of it seems very distorted. At least this keeps whittling down the days until my niece's 18th birthday.

Waiting

I'm supposed to be in room 256 as I write this. I've been waiting for students to turn in final papers since 5:00. I've got two of them that I'm holding out hope but another 15 minutes or so and I'm out the door.

For about a minute yesterday, I thought I would be able to start taking classes again to finish my doctorate. Today it looks like my son is getting kicked out of daycare so that doesn't look like it's going to happen.

It just took the better part of ten minutes to move into "create a new post" mode. NKU's computers are about 40 times faster than Clermont's.

NKU

Last Friday I was supposed to give a paper at KPA (Kentucky Philological Association) but missed it entirely. Those of you who know Andy Miller know that he was a big part of the convention and I feel terrible for letting him down. Everything I've come in contact with lately has fallen to pieces. NKU's spring break is this week so I'll have more of a chance to get organized and get things back in order.

UC Over

Just finished my last class at UC. For the first time in my life, I didn't ask for feedback at the end. That was one of my least favorite classes of my life.

The End

It looks like my sister-in-law won. She's having my niece medicated for nightmares, claiming that she imagines people were grabbing her in her sleep. She couldn't do this unless my niece goes along with it to some degree. No one knows what is going on--neither my wife or mother-in-law have can get through to talk to her anymore.

I'm virtually positive that she won't testify. From hearing stories from 241-KIDS, parents can get away with more than you would ever imagine but I can't see what they could do to make her go back to living in the same house as him. It's 579 days until she turns 18 but now I don't know if she'll do anything even then.

This Wednesday I paid for the book she checked out from the library when she was with us. I doubt if she still has it--her mom restricts what she watches and reads.

I've been expecting something like this so I don't feel as mad as I should. The whole idea of him getting away with it.

Part this happened because my mother-in-law had more health problems. It looked like she had a growth on her liver but now it might not be cancerous. Part of it was that we didn't pursue it hard enough. I didn't think we'd have to resort to so much. I still don't understand this. If my niece made one phone call (and she and her much younger sisters and brother are often left unattended), it would be over in her favor. If she talked to one of her teachers or even a neighbor, it would be over. I still don't see how she felt like she did just a few weeks ago into this. Potentially everything could turn out well but I don't think it will happen. Maybe she'll change again but this is like something out of Orwell.

I should feel worse but maybe it hasn't sunk in completely. It still seems like a lead-in to a bad joke. My class went fine today, at least from my prospective.

Faulkner Not So Bad?

The guy who objected to "A Rose for Emily" turned in a luke-warm positive response about it. I'd rather someone honestly write "I hated the damn thing" and tell me why than tell me what they think I'd like to hear.

13%

Despite the Southern linguistic influence found in Cincinnati, I scored a 13% on the Are You a Yankee or a Rebel speech test.

And I say "pop" instead of "soda." (As I tell my wife uses East Coast expressions, "Soda involves ice cream.")

UC Nearly Over

It's about midterm at NKU but I've only got one more class to go with Tuesday night 103 (two more with Thursday 103 and three more with 101).

The final paper is on comedy and I showed video clips from different movies to illustrate various concepts and ended with my Oscar-worthy performance in Evil Ambitions. Didn't have the guts to show Live, Nude Shakespeare.

Please Be Fake

German artist wants to build a "corpse factory" in Poland.

Here's a list of wacky art projects, all listed as real, but I hope at least a few were hoaxes:

Artist Catherine Gregory exhibited in Scarborough in 1992, a dog that had been chopped into nine pieces, 63 smashed mice, and three dismembered rabbits

Artist Hermann Nitsch displayed a dead bull and 11 dead sheep in 1975.

Danish artist in 1994, Christian Lemmerz displayed six rotting pigs in glass cases. Shut down when it was too much for the building's ventilator.

"One is always considered mad when one perfects something that others cannot grasp." Ed Woods.

Slapstick

I can't imagine anyone else would be worked up over this but I just finished a class about comedy in literature and mentioned the origin of the word slapstick.

Oh, right. I didn't think you'd care.

Lame Updates

Good news: My mother-in-law's tumor is benign. Apparently medical practice in Clinton County operates differently than anywhere else on the planet but her situation is at the very least looking up.

Good news: The baby hamsters are doing well. They're eating solid food along with milk. Their eyes are just about ready to open.

Depressing news: My sister-in-law has isolated herself and my niece. She still has a library book that she checked out when she was here (Clinton County's library offers a wide variety of Left Behind and Harry Potter is the Anti-Christ books). She's not talking to Children's Services and seems like she's going along with her mother. The court case is in a few weeks but I'm starting to doubt if she'll testify. I still think that things will work out but I think that if she wanted a change of custody, she could have made it happen already by cooperating.

Hey Kids--Arnie Sez Roids Are Cool

If Tommy Chong says it, he's a deviant. If Arnie says it, . . .

Ancient Animals

A couple of articles about fossils got my interest. First is one about ancient crocodiles. Whoops, another gap in the fossil falls. More croc news.
Bear-dog discovered (oops, another gap). I remember a book I had when I was in second grade that mentioned bear-dogs as theoretical links between dogs and bears but I must have taken this long to find them. More of the same.

The oldest bunny and sea turtles.

Here's an older one: blasphemy, blasphemy!

I should have put this in my links--Dinobase.

This is unrelated but sad--panda hunts.

[Bad Pun Deleted]

I posted something about this before but I wasn't sure if it was true. However, another woman comes forward in gorilla harassment case.

My Lame Life

Remember the student who was offended by "A Rose for Emily"? For the last assignment, he wrote a paper on a Christian rock band. The paper was pretty good but he misidentified the Star of Bethlehem with the North Star. I wrote a note about it in the margin and he questioned me after class. Just when I was expecting a fight, he realized I was right and was apologetic and considerate. (Usually when students realize they're wrong, they get really nasty.)

Then I had two students, one in a local Fire Department, the other in the Army write papers about Ward Churchill. Both defended him farther than I would have.

I guess it shows the good and tolerance in the world but it makes for a boring blog.

The baby hamsters are just about big enough for their eyes to open. That's about the extent of things.

Rock Legends

Technically these are myths (according to folklore lingo) but it's still a fun article.

Via Museum of Hoaxes.

Intersexual

Remember the story of my old love interest Katy/Kevin? This might have helped.

No, on second thought, no it wouldn't have.

Supreme Court on Dildos

"Aren't sheep good enough for you, boy?"

Oddballs

Here's a number of tidbits from Karl Shaw's The Mammoth Book of Oddballs and Eccentrics.

In 1991, the Orthodox rabbis of B'nei B'rak, Israel, banned the sale of hot pizza in fear that while waiting for it to cook, boys and girls "might look at each other, which is an offense against modesty, or, God forbid, even touch each other." Cold pizza remained permissible.

The Cathar heretics of the 11th century whipped themselves with steel-tipped whips and allowed sodomy because it did not result in procreation (they forbid regular sex). They did not eat meat because meat was the result of animals having sex but allowed fish because they believed fish were born without sex. (I've read many positive portrayals of the Cathars but this is the first I've heard of this.) This was radically different than the motives for the proper Church from banning meat on Fridays--even most Vatican sources admit that the practice was influenced by the fishing industry.

"Driving alternatingly at high and low rates of speed; stopping at every filling station on the highway, walking around the car, always looking, then going on; entering a dark street in a residential area at night, making a sharp U-turn, pulling into a side alley and extinguishing the car's lights; entering a heavily travelled intersection on a yellow light, hoping to lose any followers or cause an accident." J. Edgar Hoover (1895-1972), explaining how to recognize a Communist.

The Waltham Black Act gave England the most capital crimes of any nation of the 19th century--in 1803, a 13-year old boy was hung for stealing a spoon. Capital offenses included "associating with gypsies," "appearing on a highway with a sooty face," "cutting down a tree," "damaging a fish-pond," and "writing on Westminster bridge."

Edward Bodkin, a 56-year old resident of Huntington, Indiana, was arrested for castrating men in 1999, saving the testes in pickle jars. When asked to speculate on a motive, state prosecutor John Branham said, "I can't sit here as a reasonable human being and give you an intelligent answer to that."

Sir Thomas Urquhart (1611-1660) developed a universal language while imprisoned in the Tower of London. Verbs had four voices, seven moods, and eleven tenses; nouns and pronouns had eleven cases, four numbers, and eleven genders.

Francine Wickerman spent 30 years in a bomb shelter in North Dakota after her husband convinced her that WWIII destroyed the world.

New Links

I have a list of links that I've been meaning to put up for the last few months. Once again I forgot to bring it in tonight but I depended on memory. . . which means I probably screwed it up.

Iron Hymen

Via Hoax Museum, the latest in promotion of abstinence.

Constantine

I hate to admit it but I really don't want to grade papers right now.

For a long time it seemed that Roger Ebert was going mellow in his old age, giving fuzzy reviews to even the worst of movies. He redeems himself with this one.

He raises a good point about Catholics and demons. Even in movies that seem against the church (like Stigmata), you never see supernatural forces giving a damn about Methodists, Mormons, or Unitarians. I'm surprised that the nuts who think that Jews control the media don't have theories about the Vatican sneaking messages into horror movies.

Update: Here's a list of cartoon laws from Ebert's review of The Son of the Mask. He's out for blood today.

Udate II: If Michael Medved and Rush have already ruined the ending of Million Dollar Baby for you, here's Ebert's response.

Does Pro-Life End at Parasitic Head?

I should be grading papers but I saw this and couldn't help myself.

A baby was born with a second head and doctors decided to remove it. Should we consider the second head as an individual? Is it morally right to lop it off? Unlike a fetus/unborn child/any-other-term-you'd-like-to-use, the head had apparently been gathering information for ten months and lived within an interactive environment.

Former General Surgeon C. Everett Koop, while conservative in most areas, favored separating conjoined twins even if it meant a high chance of killing both of them. As Koop put it "I am willing to take any reasonable risk to separate Siamese twins because of the grotesque future they face."

Classic bio-ethics (of Aristotle and Augustine) believed that conjoined twins with two heads represented two individuals. Stephen J. Gould even wrote an essay about them. I'm not a parasitic head advocate but I would consider it to be a greater ethical dilemma than traditional abortion. It seems if Michael Medved is screaming at Clint Eastwood for making Million Dollar Baby, he'd at least comment on this.

I did find this commentary about conjoined twins and Jewish law that at least dealt with the issue.

And, good lord, look what else came up. I guess I could find two sides to this but I'd better get back to the papers.

Exam Over

The last student just left. Only one of them went with the fill-in-the-blanks option so it looks like I'll have to start on the essay questions.

Laws of Florida

I was looking around www.findlaw.com to check up on statements about different state laws. I recently read a book that dogmatically stated that all sex except the missionary style is outlawed in Florida. Like most "dumb laws," that seems to be a joke but here are a few that are still on the books (which does not mean they are still enforced):

Apparently the Common Law of England is in effect in Florida (although it was a Spanish colony).

No commies, Nazis, or Fascists in the Sunshine State.

No need for comment on this.

I doubt if this is enforced (at least around college towns).

Uh, could we get some definition here? (Is this where the missionary position law comes from?)

Although this is nice.

The Lottery

I'm posting this while my ENG 200 class is taking their fiction exam. One of the students asked me if the lottery itself in Shirley Jackson's "The Lottery" could be considered a character.

I told her "not in the traditional sense but it does have aspects of a character."

Now I'm wondering. Could the lottery be considered a character? It does act as an antagonist but seeing the lottery itself as the antagonist would let the individuals in the mob off the hook. (I would be willing to see the mob as a character.)

The Latest Twist

My wife is starting her new job tomorrow. We're getting a big tax refund. The hamster hasn't eaten any of her babies.

Those of you who know outside the blogosphere know that my mom and my mother-in-law developed breast cancer about the same time (very bad news for my daughter). Initially it looked much worse for my mom but she's survived with no remaining problems. My mother-in-law has had one health problem after another, possibly due to the fact that she kept smoking several packs a day during treatment. If anybody wondered why I made such bitchy comments about smoking bans a few weeks ago, this was a contributing factor.

Today, one of her tests came up positive for cancer. It might be a false positive but she's been consistently unlucky with her medical history so far.

The only good possibility of this is that it might prod my sister-in-law into giving up custody of my niece. On the other hand, it might make matters even worse there as well.

I won't lie and say I didn't see this coming. Watching a cancer survivor chain-smoke is like seeing a slow-motion suicide. God knows I have an unhealthy life style but if I had a heart attack, I'd at least try to cut back on fatty foods. I wouldn't insult someone for suggesting I eat a healthier diet.

More as it comes but it looks like the next few weeks could get very ugly.

Killing Machine

I drove to class on Saturday a few minutes early and found a good parking space but as I began to watch to my office I realized that I'd left half of my papers at home.

I hurried home, grabbed the papers, and tried to make it back to campus on time. On 275, a little before the New Richmond exit, a deer jumped onto the highway. I swerved and slammed into the other deer following it.

I'd never hit a deer before and pulled off the road. My license plate was bent but nothing else seemed wrong. The deer didn't suffer long. I saw it sliding on the asphalt after the impact and its neck was flopping like Tim Krumrie's leg during the Bengals' last Superbowl appearance.

Years ago I hit a raccoon in a similar situation (swerved to miss one and hit the other) but never anything this big. Looking back, I should have called the police but I wasn't thinking straight (the deer slid off the side of the road).

If I hadn't forgotten the papers, it never would have happened. I suppose it could be worse (or even worse than that) but it did spoil the weekend.

Extreme Weather

Here's some stats from Christopher C. Burt's Extreme Weather: A Guide and Record Book.


Hottest Major U.S. Cities (1970-2000 average)

Key West, FL 78.0
Honolulu, HI 77.5
Miami, FL 76.6
Ft. Lauderdale 75.7
West Palm Beach, FL 75.3
Ft. Myers, FL 74.9
Yuma, AZ 74.6
Hilo, HI 74.1
St. Petersburg, FL 74.1
Brownsville, TX 74.0
Phoenix, AZ 73.9
Palm Springs, CA 73.8
Laredo, TX 73.7
Orlando, FL 72.7
Corpus Christi, TX 72.1


Hottest Major U.S. Cities (Average Max. July Temp., 1970-2000)

Palm Springs, CA 108.3
Yuma, AZ 107.0 (hit 124 in July 1995)
Phoenix, AZ 106.0
Las Vegas, NV 104.1
Tuscon, AZ 101.0
Presidio, TX 100.6
Laredo, TX 100.5
Redding, CA 99.5
Bakersfield, CA 98.2
Fresno, CA 98.1
Wichita Falls, TX 97.6
Waco, TX 96.7
Dallas-Ft. Worth, TX 96.3
Del Rio, TX 96.2
El Paso, TX 95.5

(Key West, while the hottest overall with average temperature, only hit 100 once in 120 years, in August of 1886)


Death Valley hit 134 in July 10, 1913; hit 129 in July of 1960 and 1998


Fairfield is warmest location in Ohio (based on average daily July temperature) at 88.1
Gilbertsville Dam is Kentucky's at 93.6 and Evansville is Indiana's at 90.5


Highest temperature recorded in Ohio was 113 in Gallipolis on July 21, 1934
Kentucky: 114 at Greensburg on July 28, 1930; Indiana's 116 at Collegeville on July 14, 1936
North Dakota: 121 at Steele on July 6, 1936 and South Dakota was 120 in Gannvalley the day before
Alaska: 100 at Ft. Yukon on June 27, 1915
Florida:109 in Monticello on June 29, 1931


The heat wave of 1936 was the worst in U.S. history with 15 states hitting record-breaking temperatures (although the heat wave that is thought to have destroyed the Anasazi Indians in the 13th century was even worse).


Least range of temperature between minimum and maximum temperature

Farallon Island, CA - 43 degrees (coldest recorded temp. 38 - hottest recorded temp. 81)
Honolulu, HI - 43 (52-95)
Point Piedras Blancas, CA - 56 (29-85)
Key West, FL - 59 (41-100)


Al Aziziyah, Libya 136 and Tindouf, Algeria are the only two places with higher recorded temperatures than Death Valley


Hottest By Continent

Africa: Al Aziziyah, Libya 136
North America: Death Valley ,134 (Mexico's hottest was 120)
Asia: Tirat Tsvi, Israel, 129
Australia: Cloncurry, 128
Europe: Riodades, Portugal, 123
South America: Villa de Maria, Argentina, 120.4
Antartica: Vanda Station, 58.3
South Pole: 7.5
North Pole: 39

Greatest range of temperature in American cities

Fort Yukon, AK: 178 degrees(coldest -78 - hottest 100)
Medicine Lake, MT: 175 (-58 - 117)


15 Coldest Cities in U.S. (average temperatures 1970-2000)

Fairbanks, AK 26.7
Anchorage, AK 36.2
International Falls, MN 37.4
Duluth, MN 39.1
Caribou, ME 39.2
Butte, MT 39.5
Sault. Ste. Marie, MI 40.1
Grand Forks, ND 40.3
Alamosa, CO 40.8
Williston, ND 40.9
Juneau, AK 41.5
Fargo, ND 41.5
St. Cloud, MN 41.8
Bismarck, ND 42.3
Kalispell, MT 42.6

15 Coldest Cities (Average January Min. Temp., 1970-2000)

Fairbanks, AK -19.0
International Falls, MN -8.4
Grand Forks, ND -4.3
Alamosa, CO -3.7
Williston, ND -3.3
Fargo, ND -2.3
St. Cloud, MN -1.2
Duluth, MN -1.2
Bismarck, ND -0.6
Caribou, ME -0.3
Aberdeen, SD 0.6
Eau Claire, WI 2.5
Huron, SD 3.5
Wausau, WI 3.6
Rochester, MN 3.7

Ohio's coldest place (average of daily Min. Jan. Temps.) is Paulding (around Toledo) at 13.9
Kentucky's is Ashland at 19; Indiana is Lowell at 12.1; California's is Bodie at 5.8
Florida's is De Funiak Springs, at 36.7 and Hawaii is Mauna Loa at 33.7 (actually it's the average February temperature)

Coldest recorded place

Ohio - Milligan at -39 in February 10, 1899
Kentucky - Shelbyville at -37 on January 19, 1994; Indiana - New Whitehead at -36 on the same day
Alaska - Prospect Creek Camp at -80 on January 23, 1971

Coldest recorded temperature in World

Antarctica, Vostok: -128.6
Asia, Verkhoyansk, Russia: -90 (Coldest recorded in Singapore is 66)
North America: Snag, Yukon, Canada -81.4 (Mexico's was 5 at Chihuahua
Europe: Ust'Shchugor -67
South America: Pato Superior Valley, Argentina -38 (Panama's was 63)
Africa: Ifrane, Morocco -11 (Djibouti's was 61)
Australia: Charlotte Pass -9.4


Worst cold wave in U.S. history was February 1899 (temperatures were below zero in every state in the Union), three inches of snow fell on New Orleans. Incidentally that same year the lowest number of beads exchanged hands than any year on record.


Wettest and Driest

Ohio - Middlebourne 30.44 and Cincinnati Fernbank 47.54
Kentucky - Wheelersburg 38.28 and Closplint 58.92
Indiana - Monroeville 33.74 and English 49.72
California - Cow Creek 1.60 and Honeydew 104.18
Florida - Key West 38.94 and Milton Experiment St. 69.48
Hawaii - Waikoloa Beach Resort - 6.81 and Mt. Waialeale, Kauai 460.00

Most at risk major cities to tornadoes

1.Oklahoma City
2.Dallas-Ft. Worth
3.Lubbock
4.Kansas City, MI
5.Indianapolis
6.St. Louis
7.Jackson, Mississippi/Birmingham, Alabama
8.Little Rock
9.Omaha
10.Chicago (although never hit directly by a major tornado)

Most at risk for Hurricanes

(15%-16% of a hurricane with 125 mph winds per year)
1.Key West to Palm Beach, Florida
2.Galveston, TX to Louisiana border
(13-14%)
3.Mississipi Delta of Louiisana to Walton Beach, Florida
4.Outer banks of N.C. south of Nags Head (11-12%)


Cincinnati's hottest temperature was 109 (July 21,1934) and coldest -25 (January 19, 1977) the coldest month was January 1977 (12.0) and warmest month was July 1901 (82.5) but hottest summer was 1932 (78.8); 20.0 inches of snow from 1-14-1863 to 1-15; 31.5 of January 1978, 53.9 of winter of 77-78,

More here

Work History

A few thousand years ago, Hegmo (I think) posted a bit about work history. I've done a lot of odd jobs but only listed the legal and taxable here.

Coney Island: 1984-85—Ran miniature golf, pedal boats, kiddie rides, and games; occasionally working in the parking lot, gift store, and food stand; 86-87—Lifeguard for waterslides and pool.

Cincinnati Recreation Commission: 1986-89—Lifeguard for Mt. Washington and Oakley pools and afterschool daycare for Mt. Washington and Oakley centers.

Cincinnati Zoo: 1990—Sold memberships for the summer. Horrible pay but free admission to the zoo.

Cincinnati Public Schools: 1991-92—Substitute teacher for Walnut Hills and Aiken. Easiest money ever, by just showing Driver Ed movies all day.

Snelling Personnel - Matrix Marketing: 1992—Gave 35 minute long ice cream surveys for a few weeks.

Snelling Personnel - RDI Marketing: 1992—Hospital surveys for about a week.

ManPower - Totes: 1992—Summer-long sock assembly line.

Clifton Magazine: 1992—Wrote profile article about public access television.

Re:Visions: 1992—Co-editor of a collection of essays used as text for Freshman English courses; made royalties on next year's edition.

University of Cincinnati, Arts and Science: 1992—First college class, back when Eng 101 was still called Freshman English.

ManPower - New Creative Enterprises: 1993—Worked in the returns section of a warehouse carrying novelty items. Mainly repackaged broken bird baths to send back to manufacturer. Stayed three weeks before getting job at Arnolds.

Arnold Printing: 1993—Worked printing presses. Left after the summer for NKU.

Northern Kentucky University: 1993-94; 2000-05—Taught Freshman Composition/College Writing (10 classes) , Intro. to Lit. (7), and Advanced College Writing (2).

University of Cincinnati University College: 1994—Two courses of Freshman English.

Snelling Personnel - Assistance in Marketing: 1994—Had to drive girlfriend to and from this job so started working there to save trips.

Snelling Personnel - Direct Marketing Research: 1994—Second girlfriend job. This one surveyed Dallas businesses. Stayed a few weeks on both places.

American Legal Publishing: 1994-02—Edited municipal codes for clients in 22 states. I'll probably do a post about this soon.

Coyotes Country: 1996—Videographed country line-dancing for Channel 5. Heard "Macarena" for the first time. Paid under the table so I probably shouldn't include it on the legit list.

University of Cincinnati, Raymond Walters College (1997-98): English 101, 102, and 103.

Southern Ohio College: 2003—Taught College Writing and Intro. to Lit. Pay was only about half of NKU's rate but classes only last four weeks.

Kroger: 2004-5—Slicing deli meat and cheese.

University of Cincinnati, Clermont College: 2004-5—Fourth UC college. Last quarter two Eng. 102. Currently two 103 and one 101. Next quarter two Eng. 102 again but at Anderson High School.

Hamster Explosion

I guess I made a mistake in letting my daughter pick out the hamster she wanted.

Today I looked in its cage and thought it was swarming with giant maggots. Apparently, Pikachu is female.

It takes about three weeks before the babies develop (right now they're hairless and their eyes haven't opened) but apparently it's common for young hamsters to eat their entire litter.

We haven't told my daughter until the babies are too big for a quick meal.

More on Churchill

One of the assignments for English 101 is to analyze a faulty argument. Most students are finding wackos on the Internet but at least one picked Churchill (I was going to include a link but I can't imagine anyone not already knowing about it).

I've known professors to take moronic positions all over the political spectrum and beyond. At NKU I shared an office with a part-time English instructor who used P.J.O'Rourke as a text book without realizing that O'Rourke was intentionally trying to be funny (this same guy sent a resume to the legal publishing company where I worked, bragging about how he headed various Star Trek and Quantum Leap fan clubs).

At UC, the former head of Freshman English taught that Catholics were racist because there are no black saints. (If your theology extends only to Madonna videos, you know that's not true).

But mainly the nutjobs weren't even remotely political. One of my English professors marked down my grade because I wrote a paper about Elizabethan belief in witchcraft. He was convinced that all Englishmen of the 16th century dismissed witches as superstition.

I doubt if professors have crazier ideas than the population at large or even talk about their beliefs at work more than other professions but nobody cares if a librarian or a truck driver spouts off about politics during the work day (at least Pete Bronson doesn't). On the one hand I can see the need to allow academic freedom but I'm still stinging about "even lower-class Englishmen would have chuckled at the idea of a witch."

Now I tell all my students that not only are witches real but unless you wrap your head in tin foil, they can read your thoughts.

I've shown him.

General Stuff

Just finished Lit. class at NKU. We had a discussion of "A Rose for Emily," and with a student from Nigeria and one from South Africa, nobody was as offended as the feller from Clermont.

Got my daughter a hamster for her birthday. Two days later, my son pulled a ten-gallon aquarium off a dresser and shattered it. Fortunately it wasn't full (he'd killed the fish a few months back) but if he'd done it before her birthday, I wouldn't have risked a small pet.

My wife finally got Unemployment approved. She had a positive interview on Wednesday so she might have a new job before we get the first check.

We're trying to get my niece to spend a night a week away from the hell hole. Not much developing but every day is a step closer to freedom.

Arthur Butz

There's a big fuss over liberal professors--even a bill to outlaw unpopular points of view. Throughout the recent debates, I haven't heard Arthur Butz mentioned.

With no training in history, Butz wrote The Hoax of the Century, one of the first and most influential books denying the Holocaust, yet kept his position as professor of engineering at Northwestern University. (Amazon.com gives it three stars.) Recently (the article I found is from 1997), he used the university's server to publish revisionist web pages. Again, despite criticism, he gets off scot-free.

You'd think that a network claiming to be fair and balanced would at least mention Butz. It took me about three seconds on a google search to dig up the dope on him. They've got to have at least an intern who can type.

Boring Class

The guy who was offended by "A Rose for Emily" and "Sonny's Blues" left early but talked to me about it during break. He was polite and joined in class activities so I guess I can't have justify any hard feelings. I'm still going to talk about the difference in swearing between Catholic and Protestant countries.

I know a professor at Northern who had a student storm out for showing a clip of Disney's Aladdin, which she thought was clearly Satanic. After he explained to her that virtually every example of literature from any class at the university would offend her in some way, she went to the dean and wanted an exemption from lit. classes. I would have liked to talk to her about swearing.

Yes, Hamlet is Very Long

I showed the Laurence Olivier version of Hamlet in class tonight (now I have about ten minutes of Internet time). The classroom only has a 20-something inch television and the seats are less than comfortable. I'd forgot the usage of "whoreson" in Act IV. I'm wondering if the student on Tuesday will catch it.

Offensive Lit.

On Thursday a student complained to me about the reading list on the syllabus for ENG 103 at Clermont College. ENG 103 is technically not a literature class but a "writing about literature" class. The amount of readings are much lighter than a straight lit. course and the number of text books we can use is very limited.

For the poetry section, I have two weeks of poems by Robert Frost. For drama, I torture them with the longer-than-they-can-believe Hamlet, and for fiction with "Sonny's Blues," "To Build a Fire," and "A Rose for Emily."

Yes, I know. Why didn't I replace Baldwin with The Turner Diaries and have the deadest, whitest, most masculine reading list outside of Bob Jones U?

Partially it's the book and partially it's the course objective. This is the first time I've taught this class and I tried to make assignments around basic elements of literature and these were the best selection from the textbook.

I started to explain this but this wasn't the issue.

"Sonny's Blues" uses (in the student's words) "G.D." and "A Rose for Emily" uses "the N word." This was an insult to "Christian beliefs."

On the one hand, I'm glad he included racial remarks as something that Christians should object to, but this is probably the least offensive reading list he's likely ever to encounter.

I don't mind him speaking his mind but what makes me wonder is that we're not set to discuss the stories until February 24 (after Hamlet). Did he read everything on the syllabus, just skim through looking for bad words, or is there a list somewhere of "godless works of blasphemy that liberals want to force you to read"?

I wanted to talk to him about it after class but he left before I was able. I wasn't planning to discuss Live, Nude Shakespeare, but now I'm tempted.

Cincinnati Weather Strikes Again

So few people came to my class today that I cancelled it (after years of teaching on Saturdays, I just found that they have no policy for officially canceling Saturday classes). More work to rearrange the syllabus.

Still in Limbo

All at once we came into some unexpected money and my wife has a potential job offer for Chicago. I had the thought of bribing my sister-in-law into temporary custody, moving to a blue state, and even if she reneged, it would be tied up in court for longer than the 627 days until my niece's birthday. I doubt if it would work. Apparently my niece made a remark about not being able to wait to move out and her mom is taking it out on her.

Strange new twist to the story is that she isn't going to the Christian Academy as planned (tuition was too high). Incidents where she wasn't allowed to talk to Children's Services at school happened in the local public school. My mom and my aunt are retired from Cincinnati Public, I have another aunt still teaching there, I substitute taught and attended, and for all CPS's faults, it would never allow something like that. Either there's more to the story than I've heard or the administration is stupid beyond words.

Bonsai Kittens

How gullible is the American public? This is taken seriously.

Status Report

Nothing much happening. I left Clermont College pretty abruptly the other day (the security guard either mistakenly told us that the hill to the highway was getting impassable or just wanted us to clear out).

Only nine students of 23 showed up for my Intro. to Lit. class today. I guess that's understandable but it's going to be a hassle getting everything straightened out.

My niece is home for the weekend for the first time in a while. My sister-in-law apparently is still mad at my wife for causing all her kids to make trouble (I suppose through mind-control) after watching them last week. My niece has 630 days until she can legally move out so any passage of time is good to that extent.

Library File

If you're one of the people interested in what I have checked out from the library but not a close personal friend of Ashcroft, here's a look:

Kids' Videos
Pokémon Johto League champions. Crash of the dairy [videorecording]
Barney. Happy, mad, silly, sad [videorecording] : putting a face to feelings
The Wiggles. Cold spaghetti western [videorecording]
Pokémon Johto League champions. [Distance to the Johto League champion] [videorecording]
Maisy. Good morning Maisy [videorecording]

Kids' Books
Maisy's train Cousins, Lucy.
Maisy drives the bus Cousins, Lucy
Maisy cleans up Cousins, Lucy.
Magical Pokémon journey
Big Little Patricelli, Leslie.
Bumposaurus McKinlay, Penny.
T is for terrible McCarty, Peter.
Fish eyes : a book you can count on Ehlert, Lois.
The dinosaurs of Waterhouse Hawkins : an illuminating history of Mr. Waterhouse Hawkins, artist and lecturer : a true dinosaur story in three ages, from a childhood love of art, to the monumental dinosaur sculptures at the Crystal Palace in England, to the thwarted work in New York's Central Park-- it's all here! Kerley, Barbara.

Wife's Books
Blood canticle Rice, Anne
The mammoth book of haunted house stories
A Muggle's guide to the wizard : exploring the Harry Potter universe Boyle, Fionna.

My Books
Extreme weather : a guide & record book Burt, Christopher C.
The book of fantasy, Borges, Jorge Luis
Irish fairy and folk tales, Yeats, William Butler
Forbidden knowledge : from Prometheus to pornography Shattuck, Roger.
Art of the 20th century
The Uncanny X-men
The Macmillan illustrated encyclopedia of dinosaurs and prehistoric animals : a visual who's who of prehistoric life
The complete T. rex Horner, John R.
The new illustrated dinosaur dictionary Sattler, Helen Roney.
Found : the best lost, tossed, and forgotten items from around the world
A nursery companion Opie, Iona Archibald.
The encyclopedia of vampires, werewolves, and other monsters Guiley, Rosemary.
The everything tall tales, legends, & outrageous lies book Segaloff, Nat.
The book of imaginary beings Borges, Jorge Luis

CDs
The mysterious rhinestone cowboy [sound recording] : Once upon a time Coe, David Allan.
Dance and sing! [sound recording] : the best of Nick Jr
Blue's big musical movie [sound recording] : soundtrack

Who Checked This Out?
Dead witch walking Harrison, Kim.

On Hold
30 days of night Niles, Steve.
Arkham Asylum : a serious house on serious earth Morrison, Grant.
JLA. New world order Morrison, Grant.
A history of nursery rhymes Green, Percy B.
Chased by sea monsters : prehistoric predators of the deep

IMDb Bottom 100

Okay, I lied. Due to Stephanie's Blog, I got caught up in this silliness. It almost seems inappropriate but this is the sort of stuff I used to live for:

1. Daniel - Der Zauberer (2004)
2. SuperBabies: Baby Geniuses 2 (2004)
3. 'Manos' the Hands of Fate (1966) Subject of one of the best Mystery Science Theater 3000 episodes ever. To establish that the protagonists were taking a long car ride, the director decided to show them driving for something like 45 minutes. Not interior shots with dialogue but long shots of the car crawling down a rural highway. But it introduced the world to Torgo and Torgo simply rocks.
4. The Wild World of Batwoman (1966) Another MST3000 masterpiece. It was supposed to be funny and sexy but was just weird. The Batwoman looked more like a ferret.
5. Stjerner uden hjerner (1997)
6. Nuevos extraterrestres, Los (1983)
7. From Justin to Kelly (2003)
8. Future War (1997)
9. Night Train to Mundo Fine (1966)
10. Space Mutiny (1988)
11. Girl in Gold Boots (1969)
12. Eegah (1962) MST3000 again. Got it on DVD. Technically it's Eegah! with an exclamation mark. Incredibly disturbing scene of a scientist with his grown daughter on his lap allowing her to be groped by a caveman. Meant to be funny (I think) but went horribly wrong.
13. Troll 2 (1990)
14. Hobgoblins (1987)
15. You Got Served (2004)
16. Backyard Dogs (2000)
17. Santa with Muscles (1996)
18. Glitter (2001)
19. Werewolf (1996)
20. Going Overboard (1989)
21. Turbo: A Power Rangers Movie (1997)
22. Police Academy: Mission to Moscow (1994) I think I saw this but they all run together.
23. Uomo puma, L' (1980)
24. Gigli (2003)
25. Kazaam (1996)
26. The Giant Spider Invasion (1975) I thought I saw this but Shatner was in it. The IMBd says that Alan Hale jr. (the Skipper) starred. Maybe I'm thinking of another spider invasion.
27. Santa Claus Conquers the Martians (1964) Pia Zadora in her first (or at least one of her first) starring roles. Meant to be appealing to children and adults but fails miserably with both.
28. Leonard Part 6 (1987) I think I saw part of this. Bill Cosby rides on an ostrich. Not very funny but all I remember.
29. Robot Monster (1953) Now this was a classic. The director didn't have enough money for a full alien costume so he put a space helmet on a guy in a gorilla costume. Instead of being a bad Bad movie, it's a good bad movie. Terrible but fun to watch.
30. House of the Dead (2003)
31. Battlefield Earth: A Saga of the Year 3000 (2000)
32. Lawnmower Man 2: Beyond Cyberspace (1996)
33. Baby Geniuses (1999)
34. It's Pat (1994)
35. Hercules in New York (1970) I'm pretty sure I saw this (with Arnie billed as "Arnold Strong" but maybe I just watched a preview. This occurred in a time that left very few brain cells active.
36. Cool as Ice (1991)
37. 2001: A Space Travesty (2000)
38. Jaws: The Revenge (1987) I used this in class. Ebert gives it a fitting review.
39. Simon Sez (1999)
40. The Return of the Texas Chainsaw Massacre (1994)
41. Dis - en historie om kjærlighet (1995)
42. Bolero (1984)
43. Shanghai Surprise (1986)
44. Steel (1997)
45. Police Academy 6: City Under Siege (1989) I'm virtually positive I saw this one but again differentiating between Police Academy movies is not my strong suit.
46. Mitchell (1975) I've got this on tape via MST3000. The movie is terrible but it's Joel's last episode of the show.
47. Rollerball (2002) Saw the original.
48. Teen Wolf Too (1987) Saw the first one.
49. Marci X (2003)
50. Vercingétorix (2001)
51. Smokey and the Bandit Part 3 (1983) I think this is the one without Burt Reynolds . . . and it actually hurt.
52. Police Academy 5: Assignment: Miami Beach (1988) See #45.
53. Piranha Part Two: The Spawning (1981)
54. Captain America (1991) I saw a terrible Captain America movie but it had to be before 1991. Were there two of them?
55. Mannequin: On the Move (1991)
56. Ringmaster (1998)
57. Bride of the Monster (1955) Ed Wood's greatest movie. How could they list this and not The Violent Years (the movie where teenage girls abduct a teenager and and force him to have sex with them).
58. The Master of Disguise (2002)
59. Tarzan, the Ape Man (1981)
60. Spice World (1997)
61. Rhinestone (1984) Dolly teaches Sly to be a country singer. As bad as it sounds.
62. Mortal Kombat: Annihilation (1997)
63. Out for a Kill (2003)
64. Plump Fiction (1997)
65. The Brain That Wouldn't Die (1962) I have this on DVD from MST3000 once more. The last five minutes of the movie brings in a previously unknown monster which resolves the storyline. Inane but watchable.
66. Problem Child 2 (1991)
67. Street Fighter (1994)
68. Mr. Nanny (1993)
69. Torque (2004)
70. Mighty Morphin Power Rangers: The Movie (1995)
71. Cop & 1/2 (1993)
72. Double Dragon (1994)
73. Barb Wire (1996)
74. Crossroads (2002)
75. Stop! Or My Mom Will Shoot (1992)
76. Cyborg 2 (1993)
77. Jaws 3-D (1983) Not nearly as bad as Jaws the Revenge but still pretty bad. The director tried to milk the death of a baby great white as a tear-jerker.
78. An Alan Smithee Film: Burn Hollywood Burn (1997)
79. RoboCop 3 (1993)
80. The Foreigner (2003)
81. The Mangler (1995) Of all the movies based on the writing of Stephen King, this is the worst. . . and I've seen Maximum Overdrive.
82. Silenzio dei prosciutti, Il (1994)
83. Children of the Corn II: The Final Sacrifice (1993)
84. Universal Soldier: The Return (1999)
85. Soul Plane (2004)
86. Iron Eagle II (1988)
87. The Cat in the Hat (2003)
88. FearDotCom (2002)
89. Derailed (2002)
90. Bats (1999/I)
91. Superman IV: The Quest for Peace (1987) As bad as it was, it was still better than Batman and Robin (the last horrible movie with Arnie as Mr. Freeze).
92. Mac and Me (1988)
93. Ticker (2001)
94. Dumb and Dumberer: When Harry Met Lloyd (2003)
95. Speed 2: Cruise Control (1997)
96. Mr. Magoo (1997)
97. Best Defense (1984) Pretty dumb but I wouldn't list it as one of the absolute worst.
98. Surf Ninjas (1993)
99. Pokémon: The First Movie (1999) This made the list of my worst five children's movies, one of my first posting on this blog. Curiously, most of the sequels were somewhat better, as if they slapped together the first one for a deadline.
100. The Avengers (1998)

Snow Emergency

They just cancelled my 6:30 class on account of snow. Normally I do my blogging during my office hours (zero calls or visits all of last quarter). With the roads getting worse, I won't stick around long. No new developments anyway.

Tuesday Update

After we watched (and fed and took them to The Incredibles) her three nieces for the weekend, my sister-in-law got in a fight with my wife so relations should get shakier. It turned out that it was the accused birthday this weekend and she wanted a way around the restraining order.

It also looks like I send out several e-mails about this on a system that wasn't working/installed right. I'm going to have to go back to my home system.

More Weird Twists

My wife had the niece I've been writing about and her two sisters stay over at our place last night. This was unexpected (at least for me) and I don't know if my sister-in-law is considering giving up custody or was just lazy. Ideally it would be good to get all of them including their brother out of there but with my wife still unemployed, I doubt if that could/would ever happen.

To try to answer some questions:

The case going to court is criminal (not directly concerning custody) in Clinton County, Ohio. I could find this terrible web site and contact information. My wife and mother-in-law talked to the Children's Service people here but I'm not sure to what degree they can help.

When I asked my wife what exactly were the charges in the case, she had no idea. I'm assuming that this would be public information but I'll have to find out. He at least is under a restraining order--which probably means he got to go home to yuk things up while she's away.

From what I understand, my niece called 241-KIDS (or the Clinton Co. variation) to get this started. Her mother either doesn't believe her or is trying to cover it up. I'm not sure how the legal procedure operates with a minor in a case like this (I know I sound like an idiot but I do have eight years of experience with legal publishing--just nothing remotely like this).

I had my first Intro. to Lit. class and showed the Twilight Zone episode "Nightmare at 20,000 Feet" for an exercise. I've never identified so much with Shatner.

Continuance

The saga continues while the defense delays. My sister-in-law has been trying everything to make my niece recant and it's highly likely that this will buy her the time she needs.

Children's Services haven't done much and my niece actually refused to talk to them when they tried to meet with her at her school. I don't expect much at this point.

I was trying to wait until the trial until giving out more particulars but here's some of the background. A while back I posted about relatives who had a house of abused, psychotic cats. A couple of people understandably wondered if I was joking. This group is far beyond that. If you can imagine Larry Flynt producing a sketch comedy skit about trailer trash, you're probably still not reaching their level.

My sister-in-law had the niece in question from a list of suspects. She told my niece that her father is dead but to say the least there are doubts. Years (and many stories) later, she married a toothless and presently unemployed gentleman. During this period, my niece frequently "walked into doors." One of the forms of discipline that they openly admitted to was sitting on her chest "to settle her down" (which under the Ohio Revised Code appears to be legal).

Two daughters later, my nearly 40-year old sister-in-law met a graduate of the class of 98. She divorced husband number 1 but after a few years allowed him to move back to their two-room apartment, essentially as a nanny. Husband number 2 produced a son who is now little more than a year old and already has had a skull fracture.

Sis-in-law claims to be a good Christian while never going to church or anything that might be associated with religion other than refusing to let her kids have trick-or-treat on Halloween or read Harry Potter. J.K. Rowling is out but she listens to heavy metal (the only subject she or husband number 1 seemed to know anything about was the history of KISS, although he seriously thought Spinal Tap was a real documentary). As I mentioned before, Bush wasn't enough for her. She's behind Buchanan.

Before the Matrix or the Truman Show, I came up with the idea that reality as we know it is a construct of a more advanced race. They made this world as a place to house their insane or mentally retarded. Every so often, they create situations meant to challenge the inmates to advance to the point of leaving the asylum. When people seem to die here, it really means that they've moved to the true reality. I wanted to make this a story but I'm to the point of preaching it on the streets. All this is just an incentive to leave the nest. There's a reason for everything.

Tomorrow's the Day

Unless anything gets held up, the court case should be tomorrow. I'm not expecting much but I'm still hoping for a change of custody.

Jenny

Thanks to the Museum of Hoaxes, phoning Jenny. This makes me feel better than I have in days.

Molesters: Not Just Priests Anymore

The UC Law Library has a book that details the best legal techniques for lawyers to get rapists off the hook. If the publishers decide to publish a book for child molesters, I know who would get my vote for author.

My sister-in-law is blocking her daughter from testifying in court, from talking to any sort of counsel, from attending her old school, and other tricks to protect her fuck-toy. The same sort of things saved him when he was charged with fracturing his one-year old's skull so he'll probably walk.

That's Red State rural values for you.

The Terminal

Does a movie exist that is worse than The Terminal? Why do people watch movies like this (I did because my wife turned it on and my dog didn't want to be walked in the rain).

If I took a piece of cardboard and spraypainted "Cute/Funny Guy" and smacked it against another one labeled "Empty Authority Figure," I'd achieve thousands of times the artistic merit as Hankberg. In Spiderman 2,Dr. Octopus is far more complex and multi-faceted than the characters in The Terminal. Even The Exorcist isn't so explicit in establishing "I-am-the-good-character" and "I-am-the-bad-character" moments.

My daughter has watched the same Pokemon DVD for a week. I'd rather watch that continuously for the next three years than hear Tom Hanks give his pseudo-Russian impression.

On the other hand, I'm glad I had to listen to it because it took my mind off of everything else.

Signs of Clinton County

I'm used to the anti-Catholic yard signs during the drive up to my wife's parents' house. This year someone put up one that reads "White is Right/Praise Almighty." I'm hoping that it refers to Ralph White being correct about something but I haven't much hope left.

Outside their Family Dollar store, the management put up a sign barring the use of credit cards: "Credit cards not excepted." Seems appropriate.

Has It Been Two Weeks?

The Jerry Springer Show-esque situation that caused my wife's 16-year old niece to live with us for two weeks looks like it's coming to a close. I don't have full details yet but apparently the girl's mother is claiming that she falsely accused her step-father of sexually abusing her because he really was severely physically abusing her. In other words, "You can't believe what she says about him molesting her--she's just mad that he beats her."

That's just one of the many plots and sub-plots of the sick soap opera of my last two weeks. I'll get back posting regularly on Thursday.

Update

Things are starting to look up. Thanks to UC changing pay days, we're dead broke (after Christmas it looks like we'll get a windfall).

My daughter needed two dentist visits in the last four days which helped bleed us dry but otherwise it's been washing and feeding. I'll try to post again if they ever go to sleep.

Getting Over Crisis A

My last exam is over and it doesn't look so certain that I'll get a divorce (I was looking for apartments last week).

It does look like I'll have a new kid to take care of (not through basic biology). I'll post again when I get facts straight myself.

Smashing Goldfish

Cecil Adam's explains why fish don't crash into the sides of their tanks despite the lack of binocular vision.

I'm not sure if my goldfish lacks this sense or just enjoys pain. He slams into the sides and lid of his aquarium on a daily basis. I have a large skull in the bottom of the tank and within a day or two after I clean the tank, he has it knocked over.

I never intended to have a goldfish but my step-daughter brought home a bucketful of tadpoles a few years ago. As they metamorphed into frogs, I noticed a tiny fish swimming with them. My wife, a biology major, informed me that it couldn't be a goldfish even though the water came from a pond full of koi. Within a few weeks, it grew into an obvious goldfish and ate the remaining tadpoles. He's lasted for several years, much longer than the fish I bought or won in festival contests.

According to the lists of facts that people feel compelled to e-mail around (which usually include blatant lies like "duck's quacks don't echo and no one knows why"), goldfish can only remember things for three seconds. This fish remembers that when his light is turned on that it's feeding time and surfaces for his breakfast. He's either very smart, a mutant, or you can't believe the goofy crap that people e-mail you.

Moral Centers of Oedipus, Othello, and Death of a Salesman

I gave my Intro. to Lit. students a choice of a take-home test and included a moral center question. There's no consensus to Death of a Salesman, but Tirerias and Cassio are the two main choices for the other plays.

Cassio seems too much of an obvious choice (and Iago does play him for a sap) but Tirerias works for me.

If you're not familiar with Greek mythology, Tirerias is regarded as one of the greatest (or the absolute greatest) seers ever to have lived. When Odysseus needs psychic help, he heads into Hades to specifically ask his advice.

What neither Sophocles or Homer mention is the source of his powers. It seems that when he was a young man, he took a stroll through the woods. On the way, he saw two snakes having sex. For some reason (perhaps he was an early incarnation of Phil Burress), this offended him and he struck the female snake dead.

The spirits of the woods were angered and for this destruction of female sexuality, they transformed Tirerias into a woman. A bit put off at first, he/she returned to society, married, and gave birth to several children.

She still enjoyed woodland hikes and in her later years took another walk through the woods. Again she saw two snakes having sex and, not learning a damn thing, she struck the male snake dead in disgust. The spirits changed her back into a man but with the breasts of an older woman.

What his/her husband and kids thought of this was never recorded but Zeus and Hera took an interest in him/her. Zeus had argued that women enjoyed sex more than men. Hera arguing just the opposite, obviously never having experienced or witnessed a woman's orgasm herself.

Since Tirerias had experience with both sorts, he was brought in as a judge. His answer, "For every pleasure a man feels, a woman has nine-fold," infuriated Hera and she blinded him. Zeus, happy to be proven right but slightly guilty over causing Tirerias's misfortune, gave him the power of foresight with the power of prophecy even greater than that granted by Apollo.

I mention this in class to various reactions but it's funny that even in a Red State, a pagan transexual can be thought of as moral.

Foetry

I've been meaning to create a link to this (and a million other things) for a long while.

If you plan on submitting your poetry to a contest, check here first.

Michael Crichton Attacks Global Warming

Crichton's new book, State of Fear, features environmentalists who control the weather in an attempt to kill millions of people. Why? To make the public believe that global warming is real, although Crichton knows it is not.

Crichton also includes "facts" about cannibals (if you read Congo, you know that he has a thing for man-beef). I have to wonder if anyone read his claims and thought, "Why aren't there any white cannibals?"

I'm not going to buy this book, not because of its message, but because years ago while reading Lost World, I realized, "This guy is a terrible writer." I'm sure that his book is no more moronic than The Day After Tomorrow but sadly many readers are under the impression that Crichton knows what he's talking about.

Argument on 275

A while back, a former student of mine (and Wes) was killed in a car accident.

It looks like another of my students (same name and area) was involved in a nonfatal but very strange accident.

It's depressing enough when they make you feel old. Reading bad news about an old student is even worse.

Concert Shooting

I've found some quotes about the murder of Darrell "Dimebag" Abbott. (Reuters for whatever reason saw fit to include them under the "Oddly Enough" section.)

"Dimebag was a dear friend of mine. I'm absolutely beside myself with grief. I can't for the life of me understand why someone would do this. Pantera toured with me many many times. I'll always remember the signed guitar that he gave me at my 50th birthday party." Ozzy Osbourne.

"It's a sad day when being such a good guitar player can get you killed. Metal will never be the same." Dan Jacobs of Atreyu.

"As a guitar player he was a true innovator. His sound tone and style shaped modern metal and his riffs are constantly referenced by nearly every band in metal including my own. Only recently did I have the pleasure of hanging out with him on a personal level and he was as genuine and down to earth as anyone you would ever meet." Mark Morton of Lamb of God.

Some violent crimes are shocking but you can understand them on some level. When Mark David Chapman shot John Lennon 24 years ago, it was a sick crime but Chapman's twisted worldview at least gave some reason why he did it. Even with other crimes in which the killers died--Columbine, Heaven's Gate, Charles Whitman, even the September 11 terrorists--you got some impression why they did it.

A few years back, in Dan Quayle's hometown, a nut castrated several men and kept their testicles in pickle jars in his apartment. No one's really explained that one either.

I'm not condoning "understandable" violence but on some level it's less disturbing.

Nude Students

I can see this happening at NKU. Especially in the winter.

Of course, there's a down-side.

Fraternity Tortures/Kills Possums

"It was just like an Iraqi prison," surviving opossum tells the press.

Best Friend the Church Ever Had

The Vatican is going after Satan. And this time, it's personal.

Against His Will?

Yes, doctors can be evil, idiotic, and/or arrogant. But I wonder about this case. Just what was left out of this article?

As a bonus, it might make GOP lawmakers pause in their attempts to cap malpractice payouts.

Sleep Rape

I'm praying this is a sick joke. At the very least, it happened in Norway.

Evils of Reefer


"Because of my age, I can't party with the big guys anyway. I haven't seriously smoked pot in years." Tommy Chong, 66, who is taking a role in the off-Broadway show "The Marijuana-Logues" after serving nine months in prison for selling a bong, in the New York Post.

Can anyone argue hat marijuana is the worst threat to American freedom since King George? It only took fifty years of smoking to slow down Tommy Chong. According to Rodney Dangerfield's biography, he began smoking pot at age 21 which almost immediately killed him sixty-one years later.

Very Good Year

The production of alcohol is recognized by many cultures as what separates us from the animals (consumption is not enough--many species recognize and seek out fermented fruit). Most pantheons of gods--Greek, Celtic, Aztec, to name a few--have at least one party god of booze. In the epic of Gilgamesh, Enkidu the wild man is brought into human society by alcohol (and a prostitute). Christ's first miracle was a biblical beer run.

It looks like we've been at it for longer than we've thought.

I'm Crushed

Bugs Bunny lied to me?

Sometimes I hear things that challenge my established beliefs and I want to reject them. Other times I think, "Well, duh."

Alien Porn

Proposal to communicate with extraterrestrials. Might not go over well on the planet of the CCV.

We Forgot

I'm not surprised at all that the British have forgotten that unpleasantness a few decades back.

If I mention Dr. Mengele in class, students have no idea what I'm talking about. I try to explain and they say, "Cool, what movie was he in?"

Bush Arrested

Sometimes I think satire should be labeled so that the humor-deficient won't mistake it for reality (e.g. idiots pointing to Onion articles as proof that Harry Potter promotes witchcraft). Snopes is reporting that this (and a more convincing fake CNN page)"fooled more than a few unsuspecting web surfers"

Bunch of Book Reviews

I'm leaving for my final class at Clermont College in a couple of minutes but I've added several book reviews.

Anybody read something that they'd recommend?

Carolyn Wyman's Better Than Homemade: Amazing Foods That Changed the Way We Eat.

I'm not sure why I checked this out but this book gives the skinny on 46 types of processed food/drink/semi-digestibles including Twinkies, Pringles, Kool-Aid, Cheez Whiz, Clamato, and Tang.

Apparently Pringles gets its name from a street in Finneytown.

Clamato is 99.9% clam-free.

Ataullah Durani, the inventor of Minute Rice, was a member of the Afghan royal family and became a star in Hollywood. He gave up the royal and acting life to experiment on rice.

Jim Jones did not use Kool Aid for the Jonestown Massacre. Apparently he was too cheap to spring for the real stuff and gave his followers grape Flavor Aid (at least according to Kool Aid execs).

Lawyers stopped Screw Magazine from publishing photos of Pillsbury's Poppin' Fresh Doughboy enjoying "lovin' from the oven" (after David Souter's 1994 Supreme Court decision protecting parody, you could get away with it today).

Lipton Cup-a-Soup was used in the first fatal case of food tampering with a packet of chicken noodle soup laced with cyanide in 1986 (I'm not sure how they figured this—obviously food has been poisoned in the past but this must have been the first known case when someone did it in a store to a random stranger).

According to Michael J. Weiss's Latitudes and Attitudes, consumption of Twinkies is linked to diets of bacon, malt liquor, and bacon (as well as the consumer enjoying professional wrestling, country music, and chewing tobacco).

Discontinued Jell-O flavors include celery, mixed vegetables,, coffee, cola, bubble gum, cinnamon, and Italian salad.

General Foods created Pop-Tarts while working on a moist non-spoiling dog food.

Hawaiian Punch had such a small advertising budget that when it premiered they only had enough money for one television commercial during the Tonight Show. Jack Paar was so amazed by Punchy's antics that he ran the commercial repeatedly for free, boosting sales through the roof.


It's heavily illustrated--See the evolution of the Kool Aid packet over the years, starting with an old newspaper style 1930s version offering "10 Glasses . . . [of] Sherbet" to the obnoxious Kool Aid Man of today. See junk food ads from the 1920s. See a photo of the original Beer Nuts factory. See George and Gracie hawking Spam.

If you have any taste at all, avoid this book. I couldn't put it down.

Rodney Dangerfield's It's Not Easy Being Me: A Lifetime of No Respect but Plenty of Sex and Drugs

I'm not an authority on celebrity biographies but this was well worth the time. A few weeks back, I had to quit reading a book about Stan Lee and the business operations of Marvel Comics because it destroyed everything I'd imagined about Marvel and Lee. (A hardcore atheist might tell me to face the ugly truth but Stan Lee's facade gave my otherwise sad life a shot of comfort. And besides you never hear about acts of terrorism based on the belief of superheroes.)

Dangerfield's life was miserable at points but he could make child abuse and invasive heart surgery sound funny. Dangerfield (or technically Jack Roy) retired from show business and had to work in alinimum siding sales for 12 years. Against the odds, he made a comeback and along the way helped many other comedians get their breaks.

I met someone from a Film Commission who claimed that Rodney was a pain to work with. I don't know if that's true and I don't want to find out. Until fanatics start bombing schoolbuses in the name of Rodney, I'm happy to take him at face value.

More material at www.rodney.com.

Alex MacCormick, ed. The Mammoth Book of Maneaters. New York: Carroll & Graf Publishers, 2003.

Entertaining and disgusting books which claims:

Hunter S. Thompson was bitten in the crotch by an alligator in October of 1997, during a tour of The Proud Highway: The Fear and Loathing Letters.

In Papua New Guinea two fishermen bled to death after a fish described similar to a piranha bit off their penises in June 2001. Supposedly, the fish follows the scent of urine

Monday August 17, 1888, a woman named Kate Duane, living in Glasgow left her baby in the cradle and returned to find a pig eating its face.

Hampshire, Englang: 18-year old Jordan Lazelle was hospitalized after kissing his pet Black Emperor scorpion named Twiggy. Said Lazelle, "I've kissed Twiggy goodnight hundreds of times without any problem. Obviously he just wasn't in the mood." To no one's surprise, police report that alcohol was involved.

And finally, a religious ruling that we can all agree with: Father Thomas Gonzales, a priest in Santiago, commented on a plane crash in which the survivors resorted to eating the dead, "In the case on board the Uruguayan aircraft, the most useful thing for these human bodies was to nourish the survivors. The dead, therefore, accomplished their mission, and there is no theological opposition in this case."

R. Gary Patterson's Take a Walk on the Dark Side: Rock and Roll Myths, Legends, and Curses

Not a bad book but Patterson uses "ironically" in place of "coincedentally" every chance he gets. Did you know [spooky voice]
that Robert Johnson died August 16, 1938, the same date as Babe Ruth and Elvis? (Patterson links dates in the life of Johnson to everyone involved with rock.) Did you know that Aleister Crowley is linked to everyone who ever picked up a guitar? That the Illuminati were founded by Adam Weishaupt in Bavaria on May 1, 1776 which links them to everything from the American Revolution to the death of Tupac.

Some other facts:

There's a lot of material on Anton LaVey who it turns out died October 29, 1997 but his followers [L. Ron-eque] tried to withhold the news until October 31...to be more devilish. Reading excerpts of LaVey's writing made me remember writer/professor Austin Wright's comment on narrative styles: "Exclamation points are for wimps." LaVey couldn't write a check without sticking a few dozen exclamation points on it.

Bob Dornan introduced House Bill 6363 which wanted to label suspect albums with "Warning: This record contains backward masking that makes a verbal statement which is audible when this record is played backward and which may be perceptible at a subliminal level when the record is played forward." Among the other silliness, wouldn't that be "subaural," not "subliminal"?

Testifying on behalf of the bill was a woman identified only as "Elaine" who said "I was, for 17 years, a servant of Satan. . . I attended special ceremonies at varying recording studios throughout the U.S. for the specific purpose of placing Satanic blessings on the rock music recorded. We did incantations which placed demons on every record and tape of rock music that was sold. At times we also called up special demons who spoke on the recording—the various back masked messages." Does this mean that there are still demons on some of my old records that I haven't played for years? Do demons have a shelf life?

Mark David Chapman led church youth-groups in a parody of John Lennon's Imagine which began "Imagine there's no John Lennon."

Young Deaths of Musicians (and some other famous people I could think of):

Ritchie Valens 17

Joan of Arc 19

Buddy Holly 22

John Keats 25
Tupac Shakur 25

Robert Johnson 27
Brian Jones (found of the Rolling Stones) 27
Jimi Hendrix 27
Janis Joplin 27
Jim Morrison 27
Kurt Cobain 27

J.P. "The Big Bopper" Richardson 28

Percy Shelley 29

Alexander the Great 33
Jesus 33 (traditional)
John Belushi 33
Chris Farley 33

Lord Byron 36

I'm sure there's many more but I'm not sure what to google this under.

Dogs and Cats Living in Sin

I worked in legal editing for eight years and, while many municipalities over-regulate zoning laws, in general they're a good and necessary thing (if you disagree, try sinking your life-savings into a house then have a neighbor start a pig farm).

Here's a case where local officials just couldn't stop playing God.

Lion-Killing Mule

I haven't linked to Snopes for a while but here's a new picture of what appears to be a mule killing a mountain lion.

Example of the importance of hyphens: "Lion killing mule" means "a lion is killing a mule." "Lion-killing mule" means "a mule is killing a lion."

Believing in Santa

Via Museum of Hoaxes, British study finds that belief in Santa is linked to good behavior. Experience bears this out.

Let Me Try This Again

Was I back in business a few days ago? Apparently not. I'm all but finished with Clermont College for the quarter so I'll get something of a break. (Thanksgiving was my first scheduled day off since September 22.)

Yesterday I took the kids to the library. I have to carry Devilboy or he engages in his favorite hobby of knocking things off shelves. As I was holding him, he suddenly reached out and jammed his fingers in my eye socket. It didn't go deep but he pushed down so his fingernails got stuck in the tissue below my right eye. I had to yank them out. As the bottom of my eye started to swell over, I realized that he'd either knocked out my contact or torn my cornea.

I felt around my eye and the contact wasn't anywhere. Still holding him, I started sweeping across the floor in the area I was standing. An old man wearing biker shorts was close by but thankfully he moved.

After several sweeps, I was ready to give up. I'm legally blind in the right eye and I have to special order my contacts so this would have cost a bundle before Christmas. Then I thought to check the shelves.

It was sitting on one of the lower shelves between two books. If it had been a few inches farther back, I never would have found it. By this point it was bone dry and I had to use spit to work it back in.

I needed both hands to put it back so I set down Devilboy for a second. By the time I was finished, he was out of sight. I ran around until I found him trying to climb the video shelves. He was laughing.

His sister was looking for books the whole time. I guess one out of two isn't bad.