Comic for Friday, August 25th, 2006

Posted: 1:12 am, Friday, August 25th

Lots of hugging going on these days. Man, I hate Ron's shirt.

The other day, Stacked outlined a plan to split Iraq into three states, which, while drastic, can’t help but be an improvement on the square-peg-round-holing that the bunch of nits running the show in Washington are insisting upon. Yesterday, Sleestak at Lady, That’s My Skull, laid out an alternate proposal, also better than staying the course. (Sleestak also found this abomination. “.999 pure silver recovered from Ground Zero”? You’re going to hell, anyone who conceived, approved, executed and purchased this.)

Awesome Lulu Eightball the other day.

So, Wednesday night, 2.0 and I went to the first Revenge of the Bookeaters for 826NYC. It was a night of reading and music, and kicked some ass. The host was the dude who’s a PC in the Mac ads, and was fairly hilarious. He began by welcoming all the people who had come to the reading part of the evening by explaining that the “long-haired, hash-addled” fellow next to him was a musician. Then he explained to the people who were there for the music that the noticeably less-hip folk in the crowd were literature groupies. I thought this was hilarious – evidently, it was necessary for some folks, since the guy at Stereogum (which I continue my love-hate relationship with) complained about how quiet the crowd was. It was a quiet crowd because it wasn’t a concert, you freaking nitwit, it was a benefit. And everyone was seated. The proprietor of Pops-tarts Suck Toasted also was in attendance, and missed half of Jon Stewart’s opening reading because they showed up late, also thinking it was a concert.

It was a weird vibe in the room, though – small enough that I, for some reason, wanted to keep yelling out and quasi-heckling Jon Stewart, as I had a clever response in my head for everything he said. (I should note, I’m feeling under the weather a bit.) Unfortunately, some hipster jackasses couldn’t fight that, and felt the need to shout out requests during the musicians’ sets when it was utterly silent. I fucking hate that. At least no one yelled ‘Freebird.’ Anyway, so Jon Stewart read from the annotated version of America: The Book, with a guy standing in to act as the professor who points out the inaccuracies in Chapter 4: Congress, the Quagmire of Democracy. You know what you’re getting with Stewart – a lot of self-deflating stabs and fast-talking. He didn’t disappoint, although his reading went on a bit long, I thought. I think the dude from the Long Winters was up next. I don’t know that band at all, but he played three songs with just him and his acoustic, and was really pretty great. I might hit up elbo.ws to see if he’s as good with a band. Eggers was next, and as is his wont to do at these things, did not read. He’s getting better speaking to a crowd, though – the last benefit we saw him at, he was really uncomfortable. He thanked everyone for coming and introduced a short film about the 826 program, and then wrapped up by showing some collages by this one kid who comes to the Brooklyn 826 every day. They were drawings and pictures cut out of magazines with hilarious captions like “A gingerbread man and a peanut got married. Can you imagine what the kids will look like?!” And “Wendy’s makes the best burger in Brooklyn. They are adding a triple burger. And piling on the cheese!” above a picture of James Iha holding a burger. Great stuff. I think Sufjan Stevens was next, and, man, he just isn’t very interesting. He writes really pretty songs, but now, after I’ve seen him live and everything (and his songs are definitely better live), I can finally say it’s not that I don’t get it, it’s just that he’s not that awesome. Illinois = massively overrated. Sarah Vowell read a new essay about the cartographer on John Fremont’s adventures across the country back in the day, Charles Preuss. He was a dour, joyless German guy who absolutely hated every step of the way, but drafted great maps. It was hilarious – she was the best reader by far. David Byrne closed, and was excellent. He played an all-country set, which is just as well, because unless he broke out Once in a Lifetime or Burnin’ Down the House, I probably wouldn’t know any Talking Heads songs (actually, he did country covers of some Talking Heads stuff). They passed buckets at one point (which seems to have upset the other bloggers in attendance), and from just the buckets managed to raise $15,000 to tutor the kids after school. Add tickets, which weren’t cheap, and that’s one helluva night for 826. They’ve got four dates left, so if they’re coming to your city, check it out. (This Rolling Stone article, curiously, gets the events out of order.)

Anyway, it was another late one last night. Man, it takes so long to get back from Shea Stadium. But what a snappily played game - two and a half hours. Sfortunamente for 15, who was somewhat attending the game with us, the Red Birds continue Red Sox impersonation. Unlike the Sox, I think the Cards can destroy their division competition head-to-head.

I can’t believe I only yesterday learned that Georgia Tech is actually called the Georgia Institute of Technology. Now I’m going to be screaming ‘Git! Git! Git!’ at the television all next Saturday night. 2.0 will be enthused.

That silly observation is not the Daily Irish, though - this video wiki from the Blue-Gray Sky, collecting all of the YouTube Irish clips in one place (or working toward it) is today's Daily Irish. Man, too bad Charlie didn't channel Layden's '35 team back in January. Friggin' Buckeyes.

Oh, and at Tree's request, here is the absolutely terrible video that runs during the credits of Snakes on a Plane. Seriously, they're like the white hipster version of Black-Eyed Peas.

Yeah, I can see the venom in their eyes, too. Because that's where snakes keep their venom. No nightmare again today. Wish me luck, I'm off to my ten-year reunion.

bullfrog

Has anyone else been reading the series by Jill Carroll about her kidnapping in Iraq? I found it facintating, and pretty politically neutral, especially for the CSM. http://www.csmonitor.com/2006/0814/p01s01-woiq.html

Shit! I just realized I have to set up my autodraft for both my fantasy teams before I leave work today! I hope no one needs me to do anything.

Quick, people, who's good at football?

Jeremiah yelling "Git" at the TV all afternoon...thrilling! I think I'll go to the library and research something.

(it did the trick last year anyway)

Evening, babe, it's an eight o'clock start.

If you simply rely on the Yahoo rankings, you are probably not going to end up with a bad team. However, the rankings are based on a normal Yahoo league, so you may end up with a bench that does not cover all of your bye weeks for a 2 QB league. Of course, if you want to pre-rank Notre Dame alumni or Washington Redskins ahead of everybody else, be my guest.

My plan is to aler the Yahoo rankings just enough to totally fuck my team up.

And so far, I have no doubt that's exactly what I'm doing.

We'll go right ahead and put Aaron Brooks on the 'do not draft' list.

Drat!

OK, y'all, I'm off to go to my high school reunion and tell everyone I'm a professional killer. Be back on Monday with yet another whacky installment of Five Bucks to Friday and a long, rambling blog with no particular point.

By the way, Domers - today's Rally in the Alley. Tree, I think you should make the trip from Chicago and go pick up sophomores.

It's officially Fall. I just got invited to watch some high school football tonight.