Comic for Friday, August 11th, 2006

Posted: 12:10 am, Friday, August 11th

Man, how much longer is this wedding storyline going to last?! I have no idea, either. Just sit back and let the strippage wash over you.

Man, I totally know what I'm doing on Sunday at noon. I've been trying to see some base ball for a few years now, but because of the brief home schedule, I've never gotten to it before this weekend. Now as long as all possible rain holds... Let's see the forecast. High of 83, no chance of precipitation. Sounds like some base ball weather if I've ever heard of it.

I actually sat out the home console 16-bit era, but I absolutely freaking loved Altered Beast and Golden Axe in the arcade, and always heard good thinks about Phantasy Star. This may be worth a look.

I just saw a second of the Fox preseason game just now. God, is there anything more shitastic than preseason NFL? Bleh. Anyway, anyone see the way Fox was indicating quarter? They have four little boxes, and light up however many correspond to the quarter (in the case I just saw, three). How friggin' stupid is that?

Man, I never would've thought it possible, but the Black-Eyed Peas managed to get more embarrassing than My Humps.

Some sweet contests are going on over at Stereogum, if anyone's interested.

Yesterday was evidently the day I would stop mentioning Sleater-Kinney. Today, though, I found someone who's divvying the NPR mega-mp3 into actual songs, in case anyone's interested.

Anyone want to get a little Two-Minute Hate in today? Have at it!

Unfortunately, those douchebags make me think of Notre Dame's mega-recruit. (He doesn't always look so bad, thankfully.)(Crotchcam! I'm huge!) That's all I need to go into today's Daily Irish (true story - some Washington fans asked me freshman year if the Word of Life/Touchdown Jesus mosaic was a poster we put up for football weekends)(it's not). Today's is actually just a heart-warming story about defensive tackle Travis Leitko's readmission to school. Leitko is hopefully going to give us some depth at DT, after missing a year to take care of his parents, both of whom were deathly ill with cancer last year. At the same time, Leitko, who had gotten a 1470 on his SATs, was diagnosed with a variation of ADD, and was forced to drop out of school. He got diagnosed, got treated, got his parents back on their feet, and now is going to kick some Georgia Tech ass.

You know where you want to go to find your wedding planner? MySpace, duh.

bullfrog

Do you think you guys paid inflated prices when you were in Rome? http://www.nytimes.com/2006/08/09/world/europe/09italy.html?ex=1155441600&en=ac0e5c51b802eb66&ei=5087%0A

I don't think so, no. But part of the reason is that we were so damned poor that we oftentimes just went to places with 10,000 lire pizza and beer places (that's about six fifty, seven bucks) in Rome, or Trattoria Kick-Ass, where the guy liked us (but did constantly screw up our drink order - nothing bad, though, a half carafe instead of a full, white instead of red)(and, looking back, he may have been correcting our wine order to match our meal better). Outside of Rome, the only place I can imagine having been ripped off was in Naples, but I don't remember that happening.

Subbing out lower-quality ingredients? Totally possible. But like a 19-year old psyched at being able to order wine is going to notice.

Speaking of the Eighties, does Lissa have a makeup star on her hand? That's cool!

And I love her updo!

Is it just me, or is there a little Lissa-Ron flirtation going on? I sense drama approaching, Chief.

Actually, it's a plastic star ring. My friend Lauren gave them out at her birthday a few years back, and I gave one to 2.0. People honestly asked her if it was an engagement ring at the time. All you readers who have never met me, that probably adequately tells you all you really need to know about me: People who have met me would not be surprised if I gave my ladyfriend a plastic star ring for an engagement ring.

And I'm glad you like the updo, Shooter.

MNP - I don't remember thinking we were paying too much. I do know we learned quickly how to ask for tap water so that it would be free. We also avoided any places with tourist menus in the window. Of course if we had a not-so-great meal we just didn't go back. I can see how it would be easy to get away with those tricks, though.

speaking from many trips to italy and especially in rome, there is an aspect of rip-off practiced big time in rome and in some cases, firenze (florence) not sure about the other large cities such as milan, naples, etc. places such as in the almalfi coast, parts of abruzzi and tuscany are touristy and will already have the inflated seasonal rates applied to their menus. they key to advert that, if possible is go with someone who is pretty fluent in italian or has spent more significant time (than your or your group) to be able to NOT get ripped off. also bar service is cheaper than table service. i recommend when possible get food or drink at a store, or order it direct from the counter, rather than sit down, cuz the price goes up significantly. if you get the hook up to have a meal at someone's house, then you're fucking golden. some of the best meals i've ever dined on were from family or friends in italy. food has never tasted better, in my opinion.

That's pretty much true wherever you go. It's good to have family living abroad.

And American hotels in Tokyo do not know how to properly make sushi and raw fish entrees!

That is all.

Hope no one's huge on this strip, because if there's ever a Collected Five Bucks to Friday, it's not likely to make it. I evidently saved over the original file. Haven't pulled that one in a while. I'm a winner!

I love that picture of the wankers in the blue shirts. My favorite part? The guy peeking in bottom left. Dead ringer for Rodney Dangerfield.

Nentuaby - which strip are you talking about? Just curious.