June 30, 2008
10 Reasons To Support Getting High Before You Fly
From that bastion of objective news, The CW:
SAFER, Safer Alternative For Enjoyable Recreation, which got a ballot initiative passed to make enforcing marijuana laws the lowest legal priority in Denver, is now pushing to allow passengers to get high before they fly. But since the FAA oversees the airport and smoking pot is against federal laws, the idea has some people scratching their heads wondering how it would work.
SAFER members aren’t mapping out the legal landmines. Instead, they just say that the smoking lounge, outside of security at Denver International Airport, falls under Denver Police jurisdiction. And since the new city ordinance was enacted, all penalties for adult marijuana possession have been removed. So they think adults should be allowed to smoke either marijuana or cigarettes in the airport’s smoking lounge.
So why should you support this?
10. It’s the mile-high city. Duh!
9. It makes the jerk in the seat next to you for 5 hours much funnier.
8. Letting a drunk out of his window seat three times during a flight to pee is annoying.
7. Flying 500 mph at 35,000 feet in a steel tube is just plain trippy, man… Whoa.
6. It’s probably easier to get weed through security than liquor.
5. The event of a “water landing” is a great cure for cottonmouth.
4. Pilots fly better stoned than drunk.
3. No sober person wants to watch “Snow Dogs.”
2. Because it’s natural, dude. It’s from the earth…
And the reason that it might actually happen?
1. The airlines will find it a lot easier to sell a bag of Doritos for $5 if passengers have the munchies!
June 24, 2008
George Carlin, RIP
As a comedy buff (my XM radio is regularly set to channel 150), yesterday’s news of George Carlin’s passing was not a happy day. Carlin had a knack for taking ordinary parts of life and simply looking from them from an outside perspective, only to show how absurd and funny we all are.
It’s only fitting, then, to post one of his later bits, about our response to the death of friends and family.
Thank you, George. You will be missed.
May 6, 2008
Apparently, I Don’t Exist
I found a site to check the commonality of names, and apparently, I don’t exist!
| HowManyOfMe.com | ||
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Even worse, it finds that there are zero people with the last name Warbiany in the US!
Does this mean I can stop paying my taxes, since I don’t live here?
May 5, 2008
Cute Little Devil, Huh?
Wyatt is not short on personality. He’s quite a fun little kid, but he’s also inherited a strong will from Joanna and I.
Tonight, somehow he decided that sleeping just wasn’t in the cards. The normal routine is dinner, a little playtime, a bath and then sleep. Tonight we had a nice dinner out (and he got some nice minestrone soup), bathtime went well, and then sleeptime just didn’t happen. He wouldn’t settle down. Eventually we just had to set him in his crib and let him get to sleep on his own.
Well, after a bit of crying, he finally settled down. And I went in to check on him. This is the sleeping baby I found…
Daddy’s been known to fall asleep in positions like that, but that was mostly in college, and alcohol was involved. Wyatt must have just been a bit overtired!
March 3, 2008
A Horrifying Realization
Last weekend, my wife and her parents were out looking at new rentals, since we’re bursting at the seams of our apartment. My mother-in-law is a realtor, so she had access to all the listings available in the MLS system. We ended up finding an absolutely beautiful condo for rent, close to my work. Even better, the lady who owns it isn’t looking to move out until late April or early May, which works perfectly for us, as we’re locked into our apartment lease until the end of April. Even better, our apartment company is looking to raise our rent, and we currently rent our appliances, so while our total rent will go up in the new place, it’s going to be a much better deal for us, and a much nicer place.
We finished up our rental search, and my wife wanted to take her parents to a new church we were looking at. It’s one of those mega-churches, similar to the church we attended in Georgia, where they offer things like child care, etc. Given that we’d never been there, we weren’t about to hand Wyatt over to a caretaker, so my wife and her mother went into the main auditorium, while Wyatt, my father-in-law, and I stayed out in the foyer (where they had speakers/monitors showing what occurred).
That’s when it started to get interesting.
I’m a hands-on father, so I don’t run away from taking care of the messier portions (although I’ll gladly pawn it off on others when I can!) of child-rearing. Thus, when I saw Wyatt get “the look” on his face, and heard him start making grunting noises, I realized #2 was coming. I knew it was either my father-in-law or I that would have to take care of it, and diaper duty isn’t Grandpa’s job*. So it was me.
I took Wyatt into the bathroom, got the changing table all set up, and got ready to get to work. The changing table was obviously uncomfortable, and they had speakers in the bathroom area (they were still playing music) and Wyatt was not at all happy. He’s screaming, and I’m rifling through the diaper bag looking for a diaper. I can’t find any. Zip. Zilch. Nada. I nearly tried prayer!
Knowing that I had to get the job done, I ended up getting him cleaned up (thankfully we had plenty of wipes), wrapped a burp cloth around him, got him clothed, and went back to find my father-in-law. I let him know “We’ve got a problem”. We were about to leave and check the car for more diapers (or even to head to the store), when we thought of the nursery area. We found our way down there, they gave us a couple diapers to get through the crisis, and we ended up with little more than something to complain to the wives about when they emerged at the end of the service.
But that’s one crisis I could have done without!
* I guess there are some advantages to being a Grandpa… You get lots of this:
And I’m the one who gets to clean this up!
January 16, 2008
She’s No Mechanic, Folks!
My wife, despite past experience, drives a European automobile. It’s nearing the end of its warranty, so it’s getting about time to sell it. In fact, the check-engine light went on a few days ago, so we were planning on taking it in for service.
Well, I was at a homebrew club meeting last night, and my wife was on her way back home from her parents’ house. She called me to inform me that the temperature gauge was going up!
Not a good thing. We had her last POS Euro car overheat on us driving from Vegas to LA one year (strangely, just after the warranty expired), and it cost us a horrendous amount of money. So when I heard the car was overheating, I was a bit concerned.
Then she told me it had stabilized, and it only went up while she was accelerating. Given that it was stable, I told her to keep an eye on it, and if she saw it rise, to open the windows and crank the heat. It was a bit chilly, so she could probably have gotten away with that without getting too uncomfortable.
For the rest of the homebrew meeting, I was a bit worried, but I didn’t hear from her again. So I called her when I left to tell her I was on my way home, and check on it.
Me: “How’s the car?”
Wife: “It’s okay, it actually wasn’t a problem.”
Me: “Really? How so?”
Wife: “I think I was looking at the wrong thing.”
Then it hit me… I know how the dash is aligned, and put two and two together (it only occurred when she was accelerating)…
Me: “You were looking at the tachometer, weren’t you?”
Wife: “Uhh, yeah… I probably shouldn’t tell you about these things, huh?”
And I laughed so hard I’m surprised I didn’t run off the side of the road…
January 7, 2008
Quote Of The Day
I was listening to an interview with Emo Philips, a rather bizarre comedian… He was asked if, as a comedian, he enjoyed being on the road a lot:
“I do enjoy being on the road. Of course, I don’t have a wife and kids, so I don’t get the full benefit of it.”
Given that I am on the road a fair amount in my new job, I busted right out laughing when I heard that one!
November 29, 2007
Brilliant!
Dublin thief makes off with 180 Guinness kegs
A thief made off with 180 kegs of Guinness beer after smoothly driving into the Dublin brewery, which makes the black stout and snatching a trailer load of drink, police said Thursday.
…
“A man drove into the yard in a truck and took a trailer containing the drink which has an estimated value of 64,000 euros ($94,770),” a police spokesman said.
He drove “smoothly” in…
…and swerved his way out!
November 28, 2007
Quote Of The Day
From stand-up comedian Keith Alberstadt:
Fantasy Football is like Dungeons and Dragons for the guys who used to make fun of people who played Dungeons and Dragons.
I take part in neither. As I’ve said to the many people who suggested I join either: “I’m a geek. But I’m not that kind of geek.”
August 7, 2007
Guinness Gets Beer Muscles
Guinness is an interesting dog… He managed to swallow a bee yesterday, ended up with my hysteric pregnant wife taking him to the vet, as he’s throwing up and apparently having trouble breathing. The vet gave him a couple injections in case he was having a reaction to the bee, and eventually he came home.
But I think one of two things occurred. Either there was a mixup, and my little Guinness is juicin’ like Barry Bonds, or the bee was radioactive and has turned him into a superdog. Because I don’t know how else he would have picked up this massive bone!
July 11, 2007
Terrorist Metalheads Coming To An Airport Near You!
James Hetfield, lead singer of Metallica, looks suspiciously like a terrorist to the Brits.
I’d describe the full story, but Justin of autoDogmatic has done a much better job. He explains that government is quite capable of dishing out its nonsensical harassment and justice for all:
James Hetfield, lead-singer of Metallica, learned this week that the UK’s Luton airport was not on his list of places he can roam freely. Sad but true, Hetfield was detained due to his “Taliban-like beard” making officials nervous. One wonders if the rock star felt like an outlaw torn or just another victim of the master of puppets, big brother government. But for his devil’s dance, quickly explaining to the officials that he was a rock star, and not a terrorist, Hetfield may have felt a bit … I don’t know … minus human? Though Hetfield escaped relatively unscathed, nay more a hero of the day, I have no doubt that the memory of his detiainment will remain though nothing else matters.
Let this be a lesson: in the land of wolf and man, the bell tolls for us all … until the-thing-that-should-not-be sleeps, that is.
I’d warn those governments about Hetfield, though… He’s been known to fight fire with fire, and may leave you blackened.
May 7, 2007
Bachelor Chow, Part 2
I was showing off pictures a few weeks ago of things like red meat and vegetables, elaborate fajitas, and the like. I chose not to show any pictures of tonight, because it’s little more than a broken man.
With the move coming up, I’ve been packing like a madman. I stopped cooking a few days ago, because I packed up the cookware. I’ve thrown away the various additives that don’t transport well and are cheap (vinegar, flour, etc). And tonight for dinner I polished off the leftover roast beef sub I bought for lunch.
Hungry in the evening, I started looking around in the freezer… “Hmm”, I thought, “there’s some mint chocolate chip ice cream in here! That’ll hit the spot!”
So I pulled it out of the freezer and opened the cupboard. “Ahh hell, I packed up the bowls…” Then I opened the drawers. “Ahh shit, I packed the silverware too!”
So it was off to improvise. I looked around and I saw a slightly non-conventional spoon. It was marked with a stamp that said “1 tablespoon” and was on a keyring with other, similar, spoons. And I didn’t have a bowl, but I still had the tub the ice cream was sitting in.
So I sat down with a 1 tbsp measuring spoon and a tub of mint chocolate chip ice cream to end the evening… Gluttony, thy name is Brad.
April 10, 2007
Italians & Their Mothers
I saw this…
Mammas pick their sons’ brides on Italy reality TV
Often seen as mommy’s boys, Italian men are now letting their mothers choose their future wives live on television.
Italy’s state TV aired the first episode of a new reality show this week in which the mothers of five single men have to pick out prospective brides from a selection of candidates.
Must.Avoid.The.Joke…. Ah, screw it.
Why do Italian men grow moustaches? (answer below the fold)
April 3, 2007
Grocery Inflation
I blame the money supply.
Ever since my wife went out of town, my grocery bills seem to have doubled. She would come home every Saturday talking about what she’d bought for the week… “I’ve only spent $39, and I’ve got us food for a week!”
Well, now that she is out of town, I can’t seem to spend less than $75 for the week. And I’m only feeding myself! And I didn’t even factor in the cost of beer!
Now, I could suggest that maybe it’s due to the fact that I’m buying little more than large quantities of meat and fresh vegetables. And that since I haven’t figured out portion control, I’m pretty much eating enough food for three (oddly, I’m not gaining weight?)… After all, one night last week I had a little over a pound of salmon ($15) and a little over a pound of asparagus ($3). Tonight I had over a pound of sausage/peppers/redonion, which came in a ready-cut package, and two ears of corn on the cob. Maybe quantity and choice of food have something to do with it? Nah…
It can’t be my eating habits, my lack of shopping acumen, or anything of my own fault. I prefer to blame inflation. Damn you, Ben Bernanke! Damn you to hell!
The Unrepentant Individual linked with No Lambic! Cheezborger Saison!
April 2, 2007
This Is Sick And Wrong. You Shouldn’t Watch It.
Seriously. Don’t click play.
Next Page »
Well, they said that there are 13 people in the US with my name….
Comment by Lucy Stern — May 7, 2008 @ 8:00 pm
It would be interesting to know how the site compiles its list of names. Maybe we can zero in on it. You are employed, so it’s not the IRS or the SSA. Do you have a listed phone number? Maybe they use phone records. That would be a terrible source for something like this, but you never know.
Comment by Jeremy — May 8, 2008 @ 4:55 am
Jeremy,
They get their data from the census. Apparently a number of names (such as mine) are so uncommon that the census doesn’t even report their frequency of use.
Elsewhere on the site, they say that about 10% of both first and last names don’t appear on the site, and thus about 19% of visitors will experience the same fate I did.
Comment by Brad Warbiany — May 8, 2008 @ 12:18 pm
Yeah … now that I check it again, I see it right there on the site’s home page. But I rarely bother to read things in advance and pass up an opportunity to make myself look like a true idiot. [shamefacedly] … [/shamefacedly]
Comment by Jeremy — May 12, 2008 @ 4:48 am