From this week’s The Onion.com National News Highlights:
FAYETTEVILLE, AR—Town officials once again pleaded with federal officials to become part of Ohio, to no avail.
It’s not really funny, and I doubt the joke even registers to more than 1% of Onion readers, but I sure do feel famous. Why Ohio though and not Illinois or something?

(After I posted this, JTTM went crazy. I didn’t do it. Hope Joel fixes this soon. I can only see this one post and some crazy error message.)

If you check the blog even a tenth as often as I do, then you probably noticed that it was down for much of last night and all of today. Turns out an upgrade to the server caused some kind of a conflict with WordPress. Any way we’re back now … with more content spam than ever.

P.S. I’m gonna do something about the spam sometime soon

CNN Headline News’ studio caught fire on live TV yesterday. [Watch the video here.] Rushing off the set, the anchor hurriedly explained, “Umm we are going to have to go to a break guys…. We have a fire in the studio. We’re out of here….” It’s no wonder Dick Cheney prefers FOX News.

Congratulations Joel. After holding out for several years, beards are in, finally.

At hipster hangouts and within fashion circles, the bearded revolution that began with raffishly trimmed whiskers a year or more ago has evolved into full-fledged Benjamin Harrisons…. On city streets, too, trends in scruff have reached new levels of unruliness, a backlash, some beard enthusiasts say, against the heightened grooming expectations that were unleashed with the rise of metrosexuality as a cultural trend.

UH OH!!!!

Kieth Olbermann feeds President Bush his own words right back at him! [Video here.] Must see TV!

Lately (for the past few weeks), at least 80% of the time when I go to JttM it is fucked up, like Joel posted about here. I still think it’s bush league.

And something that may or may not be important: when JttM is fucked up, and I go down to the bottom of the screen to try to login, it enters my password into the blanks, and I hit enter and it takes me to a screen saying my password’s wrong, then I hit “back to blog” or something, and JttM is “all good” as the kids say and I am logged in. Is this crazy but true?

Are you guys getting this too or am I crazy from listening to too much Coco Rosie?!?

I just wanted to start a new post where we can talk about the big upsets, how great our picks are, and talk all things March Madness.

I haven’t looked at other’s brackets yet, but I’m guessing I’m not the only one who picked UW-Milwaukee over Oklahoma. I’m watching the OT of Pacific and Boston College. I’ve got BC going pretty far, but I’m definitely rooting for the upset here.

Okay, it’s time for me to win again. Don’t get me wrong, winning last year’s hand-scored informal pool was satisfying, but let’s take advantage of technology this year.

So I’ve started the Official JttM Pool– not for money, just pride– on ESPN.com. You’ll need to create an ESPN.com username and password. Everyone is invited to enter. The group name for our pool is “Journey to the Middle“. The password for the group is “Arkansas“. You can sign up for the pool now, even if haven’t completed your brackets (but really, what are you waiting on?) Just have your entries completed before the first tournament game.

Does anyone wanna get up on this? I feel inspired since our beloved Hogs have finally made the tourney. The only thing I DON’T like about the Razorbacks going to the Big Dance, is that Stan Heath has bought another 3 years at the head coaching spot. Maybe this will be the turnaround, however I kinda doubt it.

Anywho, does anyone want to fill out brackets?

Montreal keeps spittin’ ‘em out like rapid-fire. Some times I wonder why I even try to pay attention to the whole music scene when most of the good stuff is coming from Montreal. Before you get too excited, I’ve only heard three songs from this band I’m praising - Malajube. But they might be so good that the warrant purchasing they’re new album, Trompe-L’Oeil. They sound like The Arcade Fire, but they’re Frenchies and slightly quirkier and funkier. You can listen to “Monteal - 40c” on their website. “La Monogamie” is even better, but might be hard to find.

Oh, and the Stars new album - “Set Yourself On Fire” - is pretty darn good, but not great. Check out the track “Ageless Beauty.”

Online concert tonight, or if you’re in the DC uhrea, it’s at the 9:30 Club at approx. 9:30 pm. Whoa, blown mind.

Visiting the Fayetteville Public Library yesterday reminded me of Murder’s ancient post on the XLERATOR Hand Dryer. Yes, the Library has them (or something very similar) and yes, they are awesome. The dryer blew so hard that I could see my skin rippling in its wake. I don’t normally note bathroom facilities, but these hand dryers left quite an impression on me.

Coincidentally, yesterday Slate also had a hilarious article about improving bathroom technology. And, as usual, it was right on: auto-flushing toilets and urinals must go. Instead, like Murder with sinks, the article’s author prefers foot-pedal activiated flushers.

Engadget featured this article
from the New Scientist a little while ago, and I’m not sure how I missed it. I didn’t even read the article, but the video is amazing. The thing is designed to carry stuff for military personel and it can handle lot’s of different terrain and, most impressive, has animal like reflexes when it is pushed that keep it from falling over.

Woody Allen’s Match Point and Crimes and Misdemeanors

It’s no coincidence that my slow but steady decline into nihilism — now nearly complete — has paralleled my increasing love for the films of Woody Allen. Allen’s most recent film, Match Point has been called one of his top 5 of all time (by Roger Ebert) and “his most satisfying film in more than a decade” by the New York Times. It’s also probably his only movie that could accurately be described as a thriller (trailer: here). It has a mostly British cast, though co-stars Scarlett Johansson (Scarjo), who turns in a good performance for once. The movie is terrific, though rehearses the same themes of many of his movies, most notably his existential masterpiece, 1989’s Crimes and Misdemeanors. Essentially, both deal with the question of life as “harsh and empty of values and pitiless” or life endowed with a “moral structure, with real meaning, and forgiveness, and some kind of higher power”. You can probably guess which side Allen comes down on in both films (it’s the first one).
Read the rest of this entry »

Hey,

I just wanted to say that I am coming up to Fayetteville this Friday and was wondering, does anybody have a place where I can crash Friday and Saturday night? I am a well-groomed person, and have a suitcase of Little Debbie treats that I can utilize as reimbursement. If need be, I’ll bring pillows, sleeping-bag, towels, etc. I’m looking forward to a little reunionizing for sure!

Note: This is only the first part of a book that I plan to write sometime in the near future:

Oh, how fortuitously the basketball winds blow these days! Not only are our beloved Hogs once again climbing the gilded ladder of success to reclaim glories once taken for granted, but our US basketball program appears to be poised to reclaim the United State’s rightful position as the world’s supreme basketball nation. Before I continue, let me give a quick recap of why yesterday’s selection of the pool of 23 players who will form the National Team over the next 2 and 1/2 years is so momentous.

www.pandora.com is the future of radio. You type in a favorite artist or song and it creates a “station.” It then plays the song you entered or a typical song from the artist. After the song is over, or after you’ve clicked “skip,” it plays a song with similar musical qualities, pulling from a seemingly infinite music base (probably Apple’s). You can tell it whether or not you like the songs its offering you, and it will adjust its future recommendations. It will also tell you what similar qualities the songs share. An account is free and you can store up to 99 different stations, and add multiple artists to each station. The catch is that although you can listen to whole songs for free, you can’t restart the songs and there are links to the iTunes music store and Amazon - at worst minor bumps in the road if you ask me. Seems too good to be true.

My impression of older people is that most are technologically inept if not althogether technophobic. So I was disturbed to discover that some older people may be exploiting this stereotype to their advantage.

In an otherwise uninformative article about stealing or “piggybacking” on your neighbor’s wireless Internet signal, one older person, when asked what she would do if she were caught by her neighbors, responded, “I’m a grandmother. They’re not going to yell at an old lady. I’ll just play the dumb card.”