The White House probably does not heart Stephen Colbert (but I do)...

More on the IFF Boston coming – I promise. But this was too good not to post right away.

Stephen Colbert spoke at the White House Correspondents’ Association Dinner last night, and pulled no punches. (No, seriously. None.)

He may have made every single person in the room uncomfortable, but the rest of us can enjoy it! (And I did! And I will again!)

Posted on YouTube by some wonderful person called kingcathan:

Part 1 – The Speech:


Part 2 – The “Press Conference”:


Dear God. That was harsh. What kind of balls does it take to pull off something like that?

I think I'm in love.

But do wombats eat bananas?

All right, for my immature fun of the day, I've been frolicking over at Sadly, No!. Some kindred spirit in the comments posted a link to this Insult Name Generator. You may want to give it a try. My insult name:

Wombatrapist Penisbreath

Yep, my brain is so fried this morning that I read that first one as womb-a-trapist for quite a while. Couldn't figure out what the hell that could possibly mean, unless it was some veiled reference to the pro-lifers that I couldn't quite parse. I'm fine now though. Wombat. Rapist. Got it.

I’ll also link to something that S,N! (and half of the rest of the planet) has linked to – because it’s just that damned good. In it, Kirk Cameron and his scary friend Ray Comfort use a banana (AKA “the atheist’s nightmare”) to prove Intelligent Design. Or that Ray has some feelings that he really needs to come to um… grips with. Or, who knows, maybe both.



Here’s the Crooks & Liars link. As they say, you only need to watch from the 3:30 to the 4:36 mark. Watching outside of that could do some serious damage to your brain or other vital organs. You’ve been warned.

I'll be back later with my thoughts on screenings at the Independent Film Festival of Boston...

I Heart HawkCam

Hooray spring! Along with warm(ish) weather, and mind-numbing allergies, spring has brought the return of a mating pair of hawks to our courtyard here at the lab. And with the hawks: HawkCam!

At the moment, they’re limiting traffic by making it an Institute-only link, but for those of you at the ‘Tute, check out:

HawkCam

For those who can’t access HawkCam, here are some screen shots of the hawks, and their babies (hawklets?). Please note the disembowled mouse on the right of the pictures. Earlier, the babies were trying to pull intestines out of it, but they couldn’t break them loose, and they kept snapping back. That was pretty freaking funny. In a really revolting sort of way.





This is just great. I didn't need any more distractions right now, but watching these hawks can be absolutely mesmerizing (I will note that I am not the only one in my lab who is guilty of this). Fortunately they only feed every few hours, so I might get some thesis writing done in the interim.

Next time they feed, I’ll try to get some better gory pictures. Be sure to check back.

Bill Napoli's moment of truth?

Because I’m all about piling on, even if I’ve joined the party really late, (and also because it’s Patriots' Day here in Massachusetts, which makes me feel like I should say something at least a little political), please check out this post at Smart Bitches about that absolute charmer, South Dakota State Senator Bill Napoli. If any of you don't know, Senator Napoli was gracious enough to fill the world in on what kind of rape he thought might be severe enough for a resulting pregnancy to fall under the category of "threatening the mother's life". I’m in full agreement with the Smart Bitches post – Bill Napoli is, in fact, an asshat. So, I will cast my google vote accordingly: Bill Napoli.

Also, linking to a site that normally reviews romance novels gives me a chance to post a picture of my favorite romance novel cover of all time, which somehow failed to win the 2002 (yes, I told you I was behind the times) award for worst cover over at All About Romance. Here, in all its glory, is the cover for Moment of Truth:



I can’t really say anything about this that wasn’t already covered by the commenters at All About Romance, but I can concur with their sentiments – he could at least try to look appreciative of her efforts.

I liked the cover so much that I bought a copy for myself and my hockey team to enjoy; you can too if you'd like. Prices start at $0.01 on Amazon. I will give you fair warning though - we didn’t find anything in the text of the book that even came close to matching the entertainment value of the cover. And believe me, we looked.

Anyway, that’s it for now. Happy Patriots' Day, and best of luck to all my lunatic friends and fellow PT invalids who are running the marathon.

Indestructible Peeps...

Since tomorrow is Easter, and also since I’ve just been reminded of the existence of Peeps, I thought I’d share this link with my scientifically-oriented readers:

Peep Research

Of particular interest (concern?) to me is the solubility testing experimentation – specifically the “Nastier Solvent” follow-up experiment. Not only am I concerned that this might violate the protocols for the Ethical Use of Peeps as Research Subjects, but seriously – 50 minutes to dissolve one of those things in phenol? We had a phenol spill in the lab a couple of months back (no one was injured, thank you for asking), and it did some serious damage to the floor tiles in less than 5 minutes. I’m rethinking ever eating another Peep upon looking at that result. I don’t think my stomach can handle it.

A little help?

All right, just for the moment, a serious question... In my role as Christmas in the City webmaster, I’ve agreed to help promote CITC’s major fundraiser of the year by trying to get it as much attention on-line as possible. I’ve updated the CITC webpage with a .pdf ticket order form, added in another donations link, and done pretty much all I can to the actual site right now (please don’t let me know how appalled you are by the layout or the color scheme – I inherited the site, and we’re redesigning it, but it isn’t ready yet, so for the moment this is what we’ve got). For your edification, the page with information about the fundraiser is here:

2006 Christmas in the City Night at Pops

I’ve hunted down information for community events postings for the major Boston TV stations, several online sites, and a few radio stations. I’ll start there. Does anyone have any suggestions on other ways I might drive some traffic to the site, and hopefully sell a few more tickets? (Before anyone asks, my budget is... well, it isn't). Know any Boston-based blogs who would be willing to help me out? Any place I can post the info that it might make a difference?

I’ve got more obnoxious pictures to post, but you won’t get to see them until I’ve gotten at least one useful suggestion. OK, maybe that’s not true, but I can hold out for at least a few days. Ha!

In other CITC-related news, someone was smiling upon me and my Jake Kennedy internet re-balancing project. (See here if you'd like to know what I’m talking about). We’ve catapulted up in the rankings from #631 to the top 10. Amazing what one can accomplish with a blog and a little help.

Take that, pr0n star Jake Kennedy!

The Professors: Fun with David Horowitz

Wow. People have been having a lot of fun at poor David Horowitz’s expense lately. Michael Bérubé makes regular sport of him (see here, here, and most recently here for good examples), and now the folks at Sadly, No! are piling on as well. As if that isn’t enough, some horribly misguided people (or vampires, if you’re to believe Mr. Horowitz) pulled off a little prank in which they re-subtitled his latest book on amazon.com. Unfortunately, I was too late to catch the American version of the prank, but they were a little slower to notice it in the UK. It’s been returned to normal now, but I did manage a screen shot before they restored the page to reflect the proper (well, official, anyway) title of the book:



You can click the photo for a full-sized screen shot, but for those of you aren't inclined, and who don't have such good eyesight, that's: The Professors: Springtime for Stalin and Other Hits.

Honestly, I’m not sure what the problem is. The re-named version has a nice ring to it. And if you’re to believe Mr. Horowitz, the title of the book wasn’t even his idea:

Yet, before it went to press I had a dispute over this very idea with my publisher. It was the publisher who actually gave The Professors its subtitle: “The 101 Most Dangerous Academics in America.” And this worried me. In writing the book, it had not been my intention to justify such a title. In fact, the adjective “dangerous” appears only once among the 112,000 words of its text -- in reference to Professor Juan Cole's "dangerous sophistry."

From this statement, it doesn’t appear that Mr. Horowitz is particularly attached to the current subtitle of his book. In fact, he apparently doesn’t even think it’s entirely appropriate. So perhaps the Amazonian vampires weren’t being malicious. Maybe they were just trying to assist him in renaming his work to more accurately reflect the content. Make the title a little snappier. Really appeal to Horowitz’s target audience. I’m sure they were just trying to help. You’d think he would be a little more appreciative.

Yeah, OK. Maybe not.

Allegedly anti-drug campaigns, and Bruins-induced depression

While driving from the Kansas City airport to where I was staying in Kansas, I missed the opportunity to get a picture of perhaps the worst anti-drug billboard I’ve ever seen. The slogan?

Weed: The More You Smoke, The Less You Care

Seriously. I was under the (apparently mistaken) impression that anti-drug ads should actually discourage you from wanting to use the drug. I must admit, all I could think when I read the sign was: "Sweet! Great idea!". I have to think that that isn't the response they were going for.

In any case, I didn’t get a picture, because I didn’t know the professor who was hosting me that well, and I’m not sure that asking him to pull over on a busy highway so I could get a picture of a billboard which appeared to encourage drug use would have been the best way to make a first impression. Looking back, I regret that.

Later in the week, I went on a lunchtime pilgrimage to Arthur Bryant’s with a couple of the members of the lab I was visiting. On the way back the University we tried to find the billboard on the freeway, but didn’t have any luck. The undergrad lab assistant who was driving was familiar with it though, and reassured me that I had read it correctly. I am not just imagining things.

If anyone does manage to get a picture of that sign (if it’s still up – I have to think that eventually someone would point out how counterproductive it might be), I’d be eternally grateful for an image of it.

In other news, while I was on my way to KC, my team was finishing up the season without me, winning the finals of the HBS Women’s B-School Tournament (no, we’re not a B-School, but we get the invite anyway) 7-0, and finishing the season 15-8-1. Hopefully next year I’ll be able to get into more of the games, but right now my rehab isn't going as well as it might. More on that later.

I don’t have a lot to say about the upcoming NHL playoffs – I don’t have cable, so I rarely get to see any games, and it's easier for me to cope with being injured if I just ignore the game altogether right now anyway. On top of that, the Bruins just make me sad these days.

To better illustrate how the Bruins make me feel, I'll post the large version of my profile picture, taken the night after they traded Joe Thornton:



That’s me in the front row, with the mouth full of nachos, looking concerned. My goalie coach is the one next to me, looking like he’s trying hard not to cry. (Since a few people have asked, the guy on his left we didn't know, but he did actually look like he was in disguise when you saw him in person; it isn't just the photo.) Collectively, we looked cheerful enough for the picture to make sports sections all over Canada (it was taken by a wire service photographer), and even appeared in the Sunday NY Times. You'd think the sight of such despondent fans would have given Bruins management pause, but no, they didn't stop there. The Bruins represent one extreme of nightmarish pro-sports management, and as luck would have it, my NBA team, the Portland Trailblazers, are on the other end. The Bruins won't pay anyone anything no matter how good they are, and the Blazers will clearly pay anyone anything, no matter how badly they suck.

Gah. It's been a rough year.

I wish all of you with teams still in the hunt the best of luck. I'll be here, praying for a long-term contract extension for Patrice Bergeron. If they can't hang on to him, I may be shopping for a new team to support. Suggestions are welcome...