I'm still not feeling very well. Normally flu/cold type illnesses hit me hard for a day and fade fast. I still have a nagging cough and just feel generally poor. However, I can't tell if I'm still sick or if it's just the day-and-a-half-without-a-cigarette headache coming on. I find that the only way to deal with those is to lay in bed and try to sleep.

Which is what I'll be doing as soon as I get home tonight, I believe. Wednesdays are normally a great night for drinks after work, but I think a day and a half is a bit too soon to be exposing myself to drinking and ready access to cigarettes. I guess I'll be testing the waters on Friday night...

Last night I started feeling a big congested, and have been feeling steadily worse over the course of today. I'm loopy from the medication I've been taking and just generally achy all over.

I originally thought that I had imported some new flu from my trip to St. Louis over the weekend, but there are about six people sick up and down my aisle today, so I may have contracted this one before this weekend. If you St. Louis type bloggers start getting sick this week, I sincerely apologize...

I have this nagging feeling that there's a joke to be found in this story somewhere, but I can't seem to come up with one...

Tooth Whitening Treatments Banned in UK Under EU Law

This is quite possibly the most scathing book review ever.

(via Hit & Run)

Yes, more detailed accounts can be read over at Juan's and Kevin's sites.

I rolled into town at around 8:00 and had very little trouble finding the place. On my way into the bar, I walked past a group of people struggling with a cell phone. They looked far too suave and debonair to be bloggers, so I was walking past them towards the entrance when I heard one of them say, "Tell him it's Margo Kingston."

Assuming that this was the crowd I was here to see, I doubled back. They were trying to call Tim Blair over in Australia and having trouble getting their cell phones to dial international. They asked me my mileage (266 miles) for the longest-distance-driven contest, but I had already been bested. Since they decided to run back to somebody's house to place the call, I went on inside.

It was a pretty good turnout... The winners of the distance contest were the husband-and-wife team responsible for Overtaken by Events and Liquid Courage. They drove all the way up from my former home town of Fayetteville, Arkansas. (I think that Matt from OTBE is the first person that I've met that's seen Big Smith and not liked them, but I won't hold it against him...)

Unlike others I took very few notes, so I'm sure I'm forgetting people, but also in attendance were event organizer Charles Austin, J Bowen, and Christopher Johnson. There were other folks around, and I gather from reading comments that they were mostly friends, groupies, and one guy who found out about the event from reading Tim Blair's site. Interesting.

I didn't talk or drink nearly enough, as usual. I was wandering between the bar and the bloggers most of the evening. The bar was supposed to close at a very early 10:00, but at 11:00 they still hadn't stopped serving us. I asked the bartender if there were any places open later but she didn't know of any in the immediate area.

This turned out not to be a problem as the owner of the bar (or so she claimed to me at one point) was rather tipsy and seemingly enjoying hanging out with us. By 11:30 or so, the rest of the waitstaff was drinking with us, and I helped the bar owner get her stereo hooked up so she could play and sing along with her Lionel Richie CD. (Sorry guys, I'm afraid that was my fault.)

We stayed until around 1:45 or so, then I went to find a hotel. The Best Western was full, so I stayed at a pretty bad (but cheap) Day's Inn. The condition of the room was pretty poor, and made me want to get on the road early. I had White Castle on the drive home... (I'm still upset that you can get both large and small fries there.)

All in all, I had a great time. I should have stuck around for Saturday and headed home on Sunday, but I probably would have ended up stuck in the same snowstorm as Matt and Vicky, so I guess it's for the best. Hope to see you guys again sometime... Feel free to get in touch if any of you folks are ever coming through Kansas City, and I'll have to get in touch with Matt and Vicky next time I'm down in Fayetteville.

That'll actually be March 21-23 to see the Steve Kimock Band. There's a happy hour show you guys are welcome to come out for if you can stand to be around a bunch of damn dirty hippies for an hour or so...

One other thing... I went through my camera, and I apparently only took two pictures the entire time I was in town... That just sucks, but one of the two includes many of the folks who were in attendance. Just give me a bit of time to blur out the faces (would you want your face on this website?) and I'll get it posted.

Again, great to see all of you and hope to do it again soon!

That's right, Blogcritics (for whom I really do need to find something to review) has put out their answer to the Grammy's, the Critiquees... I voted for Yankee Hotel Foxtrot and Sea Change for album of the year. Others that I voted for included Home for Country/Americana Album of the Year and Largo for Jazz Album of the Year.

Other than that, I really didn't buy much music last year, so I didn't get too many nominations in.

So what did I miss last year that I really should grab? Any suggestions, folks?

More later, but I had a great time at the bash. Was up late, but didn't drink nearly enough. Unfortunately, I woke up very early this morning and couldn't get back to sleep. After a long slow drive home, I am beat and need a nap. I wonder if any of my pictures turned out...

Apparently there was in incident in Philadelphia last night...

A Saudi Arabian student going through security at a Philly airport sprays himself and security workers with cologne to prove the bottle he is carrying is, in fact, cologne. All hell soon breaks loose. FBI, hazmat teams, quarantine -- the whole package.

The mistake the guy made, of course, was assuming his spritzing would prove his bottle contained only cologne. Contained areas like airports and airplanes are great places to spread noxious agents. And in an age of suicide attacks, spraying oneself proves nothing.

But there has got to be a better way to handle such missteps besides the DEFCON 4 response. A table-side cologne test kit or something.

I don't know about that... Didn't you ever see Twelve Monkeys?

Well, that Facilidate party last night was interesting, at least. On first arriving at the location, I noticed that the women were physically more attractive than I was really expecting. One other guy from work signed up, so I chatted with him briefly before they told everybody to get to their tables.

We did get to our tables, and got started. We all got a bit more time to chat with the first person while everybody got settled in, then they ran down the procedure and we got started. Women sat at numbered seats for the evening, and after three minutes, music would come on and the men would move to the next table.

My first three tables were two very interesting women and one I was not in the least bit interested. Then I hit a hole (there were two more men than there were women, so over the course of the night, you sat out twice), then I ran into someone who I'm going to be doing work for starting next week or so. That certainly was odd. I've seen her name on emails forwarded to me, but have never met her. Those were certainly not the circumstances I was expecting to meet her in. On top of that, exactly what the hell do you mark on your sheet? It's not like she's going to be my boss, but I am going to be more or less directly reporting to her once I start this new project...

Then it got a bit dry. I don't know if the monotony got to me, if the beer got to me, or if there was just a long string of people I wasn't very interested in, but there was a big stretch in the middle where I was almost hoping that the night would just end.

Still, there were some interesting folks in there. There are two in particular that I'm really hoping to get matched with. I can think of at least five or six others that I wouldn't mind hanging out with. Over the course of the night I talked with 29 women. Of those, I marked 16 as hits and 13 as misses. I was trying to be sparing with my misses, but there were several people with whom I couldn't even fill up three minutes worth of conversation.

On the other hand, the three minute thing does bug me just a bit. Almost all of the women asked me what I did for a living. I should have lied, but I invariably said "Computer Programmer". "What do you do for fun" was my initial question with just about everybody, and a surprising number of people said that they really don't do much. Just kind of sit at home. Kids maybe? I never asked. In three minutes, you have about enough time for each person to ask one question, then to chat for another minute or so, then the music kicks on and you have to move.

There really wasn't too much time for notes either. Just like in school, I'm going over my notes now and have no idea what I meant by half the stuff I wrote. I remember the people that really stood out in my mind, but the majority of the people I marked as hits I remember nothing about.

Regardless, this isn't the time for judgement just yet. Today or tomorrow I should get an email with my matches and near misses. If I had to guess, I'd say that I'm expecting about five or so matches, and maybe five more near misses (people that I said no to, but said yes to me).

Will I do it again? Probably... At the very least, I did get to chat with a lot of people that I wouldn't have talked with otherwise. We'll see how it turned out when I get my results here in a day or so.

For quite a while now I've wanted to get one of those cool scrolling LED displays, put it in my living room, then put something on the page so you folks can update the message.

Well, Walt's LED Sign Page has been an excellent resource on the features of the various signs, where to get them cheap, and how to program them. I think I'm going to get one of these Pro-Lite boards eventually.

Unfortunately, he's beat me to the web message board. Stop by and leave him a message.

All kidding aside, I am looking forward to trying out this Facilidate thing tonight. They're the Kansas City based incarnation of that speed dating thing that's sweeping the nation, apparently.

Tonight's event is a Mid-20's to Mid-30's party. It's at a sports bar downtown and sounds like it involves about 35 guys and 35 women. Over the course of three hours each person will get about four or five minutes to chat with each potential date. At the end of the meeting, you mark your card with a yes if you'd like to meet that person again or a no if you wouldn't. A couple of days after the event, you'll get contact information for each person that marked you as a match and you also marked as a match. You also get a count of how many people marked you a match but you cruelly rejected. From there the ball is in your court.

I like it because it gets past the problem of having to approach someone while out, something that I am not particularly good at. Also, you know that everybody there is in the market. I have actually on two occasions chatted up a woman sitting by herself at a bar who later turned out to be the bartender's girlfriend. Good thing I haven't done that at Harry's yet...

It'll be interesting to see what kind of people come out for these. I'm wondering if it's going to be shy folks, hopeless losers, people too career oriented to get out, people new to town or just normal folks. I think I fit into one of those categories, but I'll leave it as an exercise to the reader to categorize me.

One thing I'm fairly certain of is that there will actually be a close to equal number of men and women. The women's side of the event had actually been full for the last couple of weeks, but apparently there are some slots open now. In one of my more cynical moments, I thought that the website might just have said that the female side was full in an attempt to get more guys to sign up. I don't think that is the case, though, as both sides have filled up and re-opened over the course of the last couple of weeks. I guess they have some formula for making sure that it doesn't get too out of whack in one direction or the other.

I was getting a haircut earlier this week and talking to my hairdresser about this. She said, "Yeah, you can usually figure out who the duds are pretty quick, five minutes should do it." My first thought was, "God I hope not..." We'll see, though. I'll let you know. Should be fun, anyway...

One thing definitely is going to be a problem, though. This website is still #1 on a Google search for Ryan Olson. Anybody that I do match up with is very likely to find this website. I need to start making more smart, witty posts, and fewer posts about Elisha Cuthbert in a tight tank top...

Glenn Reynolds writes:

Gephardt looks even better now -- it's switched to Dennis Kucinich, who by all appearances should be Karl Rove's favorite Democratic candidate. Jeez. "Poverty is a weapon of mass destruction! Homelessness is a weapon of mass destruction! Poor health care is a weapon of mass destruction! Peace will protect the rights of workers!" And he's delivering it in a half-shouting singsong that doesn't go over very well.

Of course, Kucinich's space platform -- which involves a ban on "orbital mind-control weapons" -- isn't very impressive, either.

So is Glenn in favor of OMCW's? Guess I'd better place my order now...

24 has been pretty good so far this season. I was starting to get annoyed with the silliness of the Kim sub-plot, but halfway through the episode was reminded why they keep her in the show.

I need to get a screen capture or two of her in that tank top when they re-run the episode on Monday...

Hey, I've never been above taking a cheap shot when the opportunity presents itself...

I found today at No War Blog a No War Wikki, a collaborative website meant to aggregate the best anti-war information.

I'm sure this won't last long in its current state, but if you get in there quick, you can check out their Top 10 Reasons Not To Go To War In Iraq.

Update: Since I'm sure it'll be edited soon, I've stored a copy in what I assume will be its most intelligent form... (Click for full image)

My cable provider is now offering PVR's. I was planning on turning in my old digital cable box for a PVR and cancelling HBO for only a new $5 in new charges per month.

Well, I guess it looks like I can't cancel HBO just yet...

Michele at A Small Victory has posted some pictures from the anti-war protests last weekend.

Wacky!

It was a Lisa episode that didn't suck ass. Amazing!

The Simpsons is so much better than real life...

"Paris is no more."

In today's Bleat, James Lileks points out what I've long suspected is the dirty little secret with respect to nuclear deterrence. In today's world, if we were attacked by a nuclear weapon, I doubt we'd retaliate.

What I truly don’t understand are the people who wish to kill everyone in Baghdad. And they’re out there. They want to drop a nuke on Baghdad. You heard me right: just take it out. Every man, woman and child turned to ash and gathered into a black pole, rising like a column that holds up the roof of Hell. Naturally, I heard someone espouse this view on talk radio.

That wasn’t exactly what he said - he wasn’t in favor of war at all, and believed that containment was the answer. He seemed to accept that Saddam would get the bomb he dearly sought, but he wouldn’t be crazy enough to use it. (As if the leverage the bomb grants comes explicitly from using it, as opposed to having it.) But if he did use it, hey, he’d get nuked.

Along with several million weeping vassals, but the caller didn’t point this out.

...

You can almost imagine how it would play out - would the US would take its evidence to the Security Council to ask for permission to nuke Iraq? It’s not ridiculous to think we would, since that seems to be the squinty aperture through which we have to shove all our big hot bricks. But the idea of Colin Powell demanding that the UN sanction a nuclear reply is preposterous - never mind the automatic veto such a thing would get. It’s impossible to imagine Powell calmly requesting that the world bless cold-blooded mass murder. He wouldn’t do it. Bush wouldn’t do it. The Congress, the American people wouldn’t stand for it. The voices that insisted It’s Clobbering Time would be outnumbered 100 to 1 by those demanding impeachment. MAD, in its awful way, was moral because it made the price of immorality too great to consider. But the Containment argument - hey, if he does nuke us, we can nuke him back - isn’t MAD, it’s just crazy. It presumes we could step back, pause, sift through the intel, then kill a few million people to make a point.

More very good stuff over there, Read The Whole Thing^®.

The initial lineup for the Bonnaroo music festival June 13-15 has been announced. I read some rumors that Willie Nelson, Neil Young, and Bob Dylan were going to be in attendance, but those don't seem to be true. Artists I'm very happy to see on the lineup include:

The Dead
James Brown
moe.
Bela Fleck & the Flecktones
Medeski Martin & Wood
Tortoise (hooray!)
Particle (yippee!)
Yonder Mountain String Band

Notably missing are The String Cheese Incident (not terribly upset), Steve Kimock Band (I was hoping), Big Smith (unlikely, but again I was hoping), and Phish. I'm not a huge Phish fan, and have never seen them in concert, but I was hoping I'd get a chance to catch them at Bonnaroo without having to travel to see just them. I'm not entirely sure that I'd be willing to do that to catch just Phish.

If I remember right, last year the first announcement included all the big acts. Smaller acts trickled in as the festival approached, but the headliners were pretty much set at the first announcement. So I'm not expecting Phish or SCI to come on the roster, but there's still hope for Kimock. Big Smith was just a pipe dream, I'm afraid.

Tickets go on sale next Saturday, February 22 at 10:00AM Eastern. An allotment will sell for $119.50, then another at $134.50, then the rest at $149.50. All tickets must be purchased at the web site. If you're loaded, you can get VIP tickets at $950 a pair. VIP tickets include some special parties, special seating, and most importantly I suppose, special shower and restroom facilities.

OK folks, you have eight days to make up your mind. Who's heading out with me?

Well, Mike Silverman points out that there is an official Iraqi website.

Well poke around a bit, and you'll find the official Iraqi Parasychology Center.

Is parasychology research allowed under 1441? Have the Iraqis captured Charlie? Are our troops going to walk into a trap when they try to raid the High School prom?

I certainly hope we know what we're getting into with this coming conflict...

I always learn so much from Instapundit. Today, I learned how to say "cheese-eating surrender monkeys" in French.

(It's "les primates capitulards toujours en quete de fromage".)

I've wanted a shirt for a while, so I finally got around to putting together my Cafepress store. I just ordered a T-Shirt and a Baseball Cap.

Mainly I put this together so I could order items to give away if I ever get around to running a contest again, but if you'd like to order anything, feel free. Among other things, you can get bumper stickers, coffee mugs, Steins, and by popular demand, Purple Gyakui Thongs.

Happy shopping!

Big Smith's new song "Columbia" is available for download from their website here if you're interested.

Bonnaroo lineup and ticket information is announced this Friday.

OK folks, start setting your money aside and let's get to planning the caravan...

The crew on the International Space Station has given their first interview since the loss of the Columbia. They say they've been mourning the crew, but are ready to remain in the station and get on with their mission. As for coping with the loss:

He said NASA has been "real good" about giving them some time off to grieve. Treadmill workouts have helped, he added.

"One of the things we noticed that really helps is exercise," Bowersox said. "It's incredible how it seems to sort of even out your nervous system and just put you in a better mood no matter what's going on around you on board."

A friend of mine works on these wacky space treadmills. I have a picture of him on it around here somewhere... Hmmm... It's probably at home. Well, the people of America salute you, Space Treadmill Man!

Update: There it is... It's Crazy Space Treadmill Man!

Royalty checks are issued on a quarterly basis.

Matt Welch, among others I'm sure, wants your lists for top five movies of last year.

I'm really struggling to think, but I don't think I saw five movies last year. If I remember right, I saw:

Spider Man
Attack of the Clones
The Two Towers
Adaptation

I really do think that that's it. That's pretty lame. I used to consider myself a movie buff, but I think I was just a Quentin Tarantino buff, and once he stopped making movies, I just stopped going.

Well, it's coming soon enough, anyway...

I love Cafe Shops. You can put anything you want on a thong.

Who could have seen this coming? Ben Curtis (the Dell commercial guy) arrested for marijuana possession.

(via Fark)

Yesterday at Instapundit:

BUT I DIDN'T LIKE THE FIRST ONE! There's talk now of a "Patriot Act II" and I don't like it. Read more about it here, here, and here.

Jeez. We need this like we need "Dude, Where's My Car? II."

Bwahahahah!

A couple are tasteless and have earned the artists admission to the Lake of Fire, but most of the lesser known danger symbols are downright hilarious.

One of my favorites, stolen from DrToast:

Well, I have been posting a lot about the good Doctor lately. I don't think I have a copy of Fear & Loathing in Las Vegas yet, and there's a new Criterion Collection DVD out. Hmmm...

I did head over to Lawrence for the shows tonight. Jessy couldn't make it due to some unfortunate circumstances, but I did meet Mike for dinner. Ate some enchiladas at a pretty decent place called "La Parilla". They're open late night and I need to keep that in mind for after a show sometime. I do miss the Houston taquerias. Chatted about football and politics, but then I figured I ought to head over to where moe was playing.

I spent about thirty minutes waiting outside Liberty Hall in the cold begging for tickets. Unfortunately, there were about thirty other people begging as well and almost nobody with extras. Finally I gave up and headed a block over to where Big Smith was playing.

They played several songs that I hadn't heard before. I think one was a new original, but I don't remember it well. They played it early, and I've already forgotten. They also wrote a song last weekend about the Columbia and played it at a gig in Springfield, and they used it to open tonight's encore. An excellent tribute. Apparently they hit the studio and recorded it last week. I'll see if I can't find myself an mp3 to share. From that, they went into a Beatles song that I haven't heard them play before. I don't know my Beatles, but it's the one that goes "I heard the news today oh boy..." Then they played Ponce and were done.

They played straight through... Probably went on at around 10:45 and played until about 1:15, only taking a break before the encore. The only song I wish they had gotten to that they didn't was "Should I Stay Or Should I Go". Oh yeah, and Mark Bilyeu has grown his hair out and now has a beard.

Looks like a bit of a dry spell for music now. Particle is going to be in Fayetteville on Monday, March 17, but I don't think that it's worth a day off during the middle of the week to catch that, particularly since the Steve Kimock Band is playing the following weekend and I'll definitely be down for their three day Chester's run. Particle still has that two day gap in their tour between Fayetteville and Urbana, IL, so hopefully there's still a chance for a KC or Lawrence gig in there.

Now that's a cell phone I could carry...

Well, Hunter S. Thompson has no business being alive at this point, anyway. I think it takes the combined powers of the forces of darkness too keep him moving on a daily basis these days.

I decided to try to stay up to watch Conan last night, so I stayed up and watched Charlie Rose, and was surprised to find him on there too. Honestly, the guy wasn't looking too good. He mumbles a lot, can't seem to string together a coherent sentence, and just looks generally confused. He went off on his little anti-war thing, and there was one interesting exchange. Charlie asked Hunter why he was opposed to war in Iraq, and Hunter said something to the effect of, "Well, Bush and his friends want that oil..."

Charlie then interrupted him saying, "Come on now, you know it's not just about oil. It's about power (this got a giggle out of HST), freedom and the future of the middle east." Interesting, but I don't watch Charlie Rose often enough to know if that's typical. It's rare that I see anybody give an interview where they challenge any statement made by the interviewee, now matter how incorrect.

They talked about his book, had some more light-hearted exchanges, and Charlie asked him how he was feeling. Was he healthy, does he feel as sharp as he used to. Hunter said that other than being a bit banged up, he feels great. Maybe he was just drunk.

I recorded the Conan appearance and watched a bit of it this morning. He didn't look great on there, either. Conan played a clip from a couple of years ago when he visited Owl Farm and Hunter took Conan shooting. The comparison of Hunter only three or four years ago to him today on the show couldn't have been more striking. I get the feeling that he's not doing well these days.

Again though, maybe he was just drunk.

The definitive Powell presentation recap.

(found at memepool)

Men who don't shave get laid less, have more strokes.

Two decent nights of TV this week. Tonight, Hunter S. Thompson is on Conan O'Brien, and the Kids in the Hall are on Letterman tomorrow.

Conan's too late for me, and I'll be in Lawrence seeing moe tomorrow night, so it looks like I'll have to record both. Hopefully it works...

I think I need a new CD changer too...

N.Z. Bear has thrown out a proposal for a cross blog debate on war with Iraq. Some of the good folks at Stand Down have accepted the challenge and are coordinating the anti-war side.

Over the next week or so, each side will come up with five questions to be presented to the other side. Anyone is then welcome to answer those questions on their own sites. Feel free to post questions that you may want answered. There are already some gems out there.

From the anti-war side:

Do you believe that the Bush Administration can democratize or significantly improve Iraq's government after invasion? If yes, are there any precedents in American foreign policy generally and Bush Administration policy particularly that lead you to believe this?

Do you believe that war and its attendant effects will cause less suffering, in the long run, for the people in Iraq than leaving Saddam in power? If so, why?

From the pro-war side:

If you lived under an oppressive and murderous regime without freedom of speech, would you want another nation to come in and liberate you by force, even if it put you and your loved ones at risk?

Are all nations ( or regimes ) to be judged equal in the eyes of the international community? If not, what distinguishes one from another?

In the general case, do you believe that extreme human rights violation alone -- e.g., genocide -- is sufficient cause for armed intervention? If so, what standard should apply, and how far is Saddam Hussein's regime from that threshold?

Well, should make for some interesting reading anyway. It sounds like the schedule is to have five questions for each side selected and posted by next Sunday.

Last Monday, a co-worker brought in a newspaper article on a quit smoking study that the University of Kansas is doing. They were looking for volunteers to gather data about their smoking habits. I called and volunteered, but didn't hear from them.

I finally did get a call from them Friday afternoon and they asked me some survey questions to see if I qualified for the study. I suppose I did... They called me back Saturday night and asked if I could come in on Sunday to pick up equipment and get started with the study.

I'm carrying around a PDA (palm m505) and a portable Carbon Monoxide detector. Throughout the day, I enter into a program on the PDA when I smoke, and it occasionally quizzes me about my mood, my desire for a cigarette, and a couple other factors. I also occasionally get a breath Carbon Monoxide reading and enter that. After a couple of weeks of gathering data, the program will switch to "schedule" mode, and I'll be told when I can smoke a cigarette. They will then collect data as to how irritable and snappy I get when I'm not allowed to have a cigarette when I want.

It's not really a quit smoking study, just data collection for the Psych department. I'm happy to be doing my part for science, and I'm even getting paid a bit to participate in the study. However, I am still smoking for the duration of the study. I'll probably quit shortly thereafter.

I still am cutting out the drinking, though. I'll still be going out, but will be drinking coffee or coke. A friend told me that if I catch any crap from strangers, bartenders or waitresses, a good trick is to tell them I'm in recovery. I will still probably avoid places where I'd be taking up a waitresses or bartender's time and not spending any significant amount of money. Any suggestions for places in Kansas City to go out and not drink?

I will be heading over to Lawrence this Friday to see either Big Smith or moe. I think the idea is to head to Lawrence, try to get a ticket for moe, then head to Big Smith if moe is sold out. Big Smith will be back in just a month or so, and moe comes through town much less frequently. I've never seen them, but they did just play a bunch of shows with members of Cracker, so they can't be all bad.