A Kinda Good Post

TAKE IT TO SPIKETOWN!!!


Would this have anything to do with you playing a volleyball tournament this weekend?


As a matter of fact, it would. Partially.


What's the other part?


A volleyball resource website opened not all that long ago that features my friend (As proven by Facebook below) Danny Kinda.




This website, Kindagood.com, features some helpful volleyball tips, great volleyball gear, and a volleyball-specific workout program to help you get the best results. I highly recommend it to all of my friends, Facebook or otherwise, as well as everyone in The Most Intelligent Readership In The World.


Wow...that really is a helpful site. Thank you for pointing this out to me Jeremy.


You're very welcome. In addition, Danny was nice enough to post some helpful and instructional videos on the site to help everyone get the most out of their game. Here's one of the videos featuring Danny and his coaching session with the Men's US Olympic Indoor Volleyball team. If absolutely nothing else, watch around the 4:10 mark for an absolutely friggin' ridiculous spike by Reid Priddy. And that was on the high net, too!




I'm going outside right now to practice "The Gator." Who's with me?

Rollin like a Limp Bizkit

I have a strangely strong desire to buy a steamroller.


As much as I don't want to ask, that's what you have me around for...so why do you want to buy a steamroller?


Because somebody on my way to work has one for sale in their front yard.


And this is enough?


Apparently. Every day this week, I've driven past this person's house, saw the steamroller out by the tree, and it calls to me. It says, "Jeremy...you need a steamroller." By the time I ask it why, I've already driven out of imaginary earshot, or saw a shiny object and have lost interest.


What would you even do with a steamroller?


I have no idea. I like to believe I'd think outside the box. I imagine that I could roll people's yards for them in the spring...for a nominal fee of course. I could rent myself out for baseball game promotions akin to Disco Demolition Night where I flatten bobbleheads or effigies of the other team's mascot or something. I could start a diner that serves the flattest pancakes in the Northeast, or a very specialized laundry service that guarantees to take all wrinkles out of your clothes.

Anyone else have any ideas? I'm looking for brainstorming suggestions and generous financial investors.

He cut me off yesterday

License Plate: SATYENDR. You get to tell me what it means.


Yeah...I have no idea.


Me either. That's why I put it to The Most Intelligent Readership In The World to figure it out. We had at least some measure of success with the last one, I decided to try it again.

Good luck everyone!

Secure Once Again!

It's Password Day! My email password is no longer f3arb1rdflu


Well done! Improved security and another stern warning about the imminent dangers of Bird Flu all in one.


I feel it's my obligation to keep awareness high for this deadly disease. I owe it to The Most Intelligent Readership In The World.


Most of which thought you were a little off your rocker yesterday for thinking "Your fries is hot" could be grammatically correct.


Very true. The returns were overwhelmingly negative for my new friend in the drive-thru window of a purely hypothetical restaurant chain we'll call "Ess-Cee's."


That one may be a little harder for the readers to figure out than "High's Home Improvements"


Either way...most people felt that since "Fries" was the subject of the sentence, and it was plural, that the proper conjugation of the verb "Be" would be "Are," thus creating the sentence "Your fries Are hot."

For the most part, I agree, and that is how I would have said it, but as Robert Wuhl says about Britney Spears, Judge Slowly.

I submit to you that "Fries" may not have been the subject of that sentence. The subject is a singular implied noun (Thus making "Is" the proper conjugation), and "Fries" is merely the object of an implied preposition. Many of us have gone to a drive-thru window and ordered "A burger, lemonade, and a large fries," and thought nothing of it. In this case, the words "Order of" describing the fries is implied, and the article "A" appropriate for the singular noun. Otherwise, you'd have to say "some large fries" at which point, the person taking the order is more confused than usual and runs out to the store to find abnormally large potatoes to cut up. The same can easily apply to the time when my fries are delivered. The guy in the window was merely pointing out that my order is hot, and was grammatically flawless.

So, to my buddy in the drive-thru window at "Ess-Cee's," I'd like to say that I'm with you. Keep living the dream!

A Good Debate

"Your fries is hot." Grammatically correct or not? Discuss.


This would be based on your trip to some cookie-cutter fast food chain not long ago, right?


Indeed. I'll save the debate for the emails and IM's that I'll get throughout the day today for the actual discussion and post the results tomorrow.


Then you should probably have something interesting for the Blag today.


Interesting comes in many forms. In today's case, the town of Rabbit Hash Kentucky is having a special election soon to decide on the new mayor. This election was necessitated by the fact that the previous mayor passed away back in May. Apparently, the election is still very much up for grabs, so if anybody's interested in throwing their hat into the ring, now would be a good time. Why is this even remotely interesting, you ask? Because the The Former Mayor Was A Dog.

Theme Week Closing Ceremony

Jeremy’s Sametime Status Proudly Presents: Olympic Fun Facts Week! The Olympic flame in Olympia, Greece is rekindled every two years using the sun's rays and a concave mirror.


Hi everybody. I'm filling in for Jeremy while he's on vacation today. Fear not (or Fear, depending on your perspective), Jeremy will be back bright and early monday morning with all new Sametime Statuses and Edutainment.


In the meantime, no week of Olympic Blooper videos would be complete without the ultimate pole vault incident from the Sydney Games in 2000. So, hope you've enjoyed Olympic Fun Facts Week, and "enjoy" the following clip:

Theme Week Medal Presentation

Jeremy’s Sametime Status Proudly Presents: Olympic Fun Facts Week! Poland's Stella Walsh won the women's 100 meter dash at the 1932 Olympics in Los Angeles, becoming the first woman to break the 12-second barrier. When she was killed in 1980 as an innocent victim in a robbery attempt, an autopsy declared her to be a male.


Speaking of people named Walsh, rumour has it that Misty May-Treanor and Kerri Walsh won the gold medal in Women's Beach Volleyball last night, much to the surprise of roughly nobody in the world. I say "Rumour" because I recorded the match since it was after my bedtime (9:00 PM) and I haven't watched it yet. So if you know what happened, don't say anything, okay?


We go from great success to great failure. Here's people failing at gymnastics:

Theme Week Medal Round

Jeremy’s Sametime Status Proudly Presents: Olympic Fun Facts Week! At the first Modern Olympic Games in Athens in 1896, Silver Medals were awarded to the winners, and Bronze Medals were awarded for second place.


So apparently, the phrase "Going for the Gold" is slightly newer than the Modern Olympics themselves, as the awarding of Gold, Silver and Bronze (in that order) originated in the 1904 games.

Here's a clip of some people Going for the Gold, Silver and Bronze, but ending up with Red, Black, and Blue:

Theme Week Round Robin

Jeremy’s Sametime Status Proudly Presents: Olympic Fun Facts Week! Beibei the Fish, Jingjing the Panda, Huanhuan the Flame, Yingying the Tibetan Antelope, and Nini the swallow are the Official Mascots of the 2008 Olympic Games.


Most sports teams have a mascot. Come even have a couple. The local baseball team basically has 4, but they're all the same. (It's a family of Raccoons) But, being the Olympics, we have to take things one step farther. They have five, count 'em, five mascots. Combine that with the fact that each of their names repeats, and you have 10 mascot names for a single Olympiad. Not bad! Granted, a flame isn't much of a mascot, but It's Been Done Before.

For some good, wholesome edutainment, you can check out The Official Mascot Homepage of the Olympics to learn more about these lovable creatures, colored after the Olympic Rings, and each with a back story that some chump actually spent time and money to write and then had to pitch to a bunch of chumps sitting around a long table while they bobbled their heads in approval and/or disapproval.

Enough of that. While not at the Olympics, this guy attempts a pole vault. Needless to say, he does not succeed. Also, please note...yes, I know there is a video of some dude totally ruining his arm during the weightlifting at this year's Olympics. No, that will NOT be one of the videos posted this week. It's just...well...ew.

Theme Week Opening Ceremonies

Jeremy’s Sametime Status Proudly Presents: Olympic Fun Facts Week! The 1912 Greco-Roman wrestling match between Finn Alfred Asikainen and Russian Martin Klein lasted more than 11 hours.


Well, everyone. The Olympics are in full swing. And full run, full jump, full spin, full throw...whatever it is athletes are doing at the games is happening now. To celebrate, this week will be "Olympic Fun Facts Week" which will highlight an amusing tidbit about the Games, both past and present.

Along with that, you'll also have the opportunity to watch amusing videos of Olympic games gone horrible wrong...such as this gymnast's unfortunate vault in the 2004 Athens Games. Enjoy!

I'm not sure what he was getting at

It's a good thing I don’t like olives. Because if I did, I'd eat them a lot...and I don't like them.


Congratulations. That makes no sense.


That's okay. It's part of a lecture once given by my old history teacher. Maybe it's part of why to this day, I know nothing about history. Lines like this that make no sense at all and send my mind into a swirling miasma trying to figure out what it's supposed to mean instead of listening to the rest of the lecture.


You could just take it for what it's worth, let it pass, and move on with life...and the lecture...


It's akin to Nerd Sniping, made popular by the whimsical webcomic xkcd. Here's the comic for your Friday:

I'll also poke my eye out.

Mom always told me “Never stand outside during a thunderstorm waving a sickle around.”


You do know that your mom is one of your readers, right?


Very true. Hi Mom! So while this little bit of sage wisdom may not have specifically come from Mom, it probably would have been helpful for This Moron who was, in fact, struck by lightning while wielding a sickle.


Thunderstorms tend to sneak up on you.


Yeah, the distant rumbling of Thunder is easy to confuse with UFO's, and maybe the water drops coming down were actually the neighborhood punks with their squirt guns. Definitely easy to mistake the two.

Nothing says “Good Morning!” like driving behind a truckload of asphalt.


One of the advantages to working from home.


Or not having a job, I guess. You'll never have the pleasure of driving behind a full dump-truck of fresh asphalt on your way to work. It's really quite unpleasant, and I'm probably going to have that smell in my car for the rest of the day. Thanks, dump truck guy! You couldn't have stopped an extra second or two at the intersection to let me get in front of you instead? Jerk.


What? You couldn't have peeled yourself out of bed a minute earlier and beaten the truck to the turn easily?


That's beside the point. Here's a flimsy segue to a video of people moving a crane with a crane:

It's like falling off a bike

People are like Slinkies. Basically useless, but it’s so amusing to watch them fall down the stairs.


I like watching people fall down the stairs. It's pretty amusing.


Well, I'd like to take today's Blag opportunity to edutain The Most Intelligent Readership In The World with the right and wrong ways to go down a flight of stairs. Here is an example of what we refer to in The Industry as "The Wrong Way."



Note how even in the best set of circumstances, the downward distance to be travelled was a bit too far to negotiate safely in one movement. Also, when attempting a descent down a flight of stairs, choosing a path parallel to the stairs themselves is a near imperative. In this case, because the stair-taker chose a path not parallel with the travel of the stairs, the intersection with the railing was inevitable. It was simply fortuitous (for us) that the intersection happened in the...uhm....shall we say "perilous" location that it did.


That's all very true and helpful information. But, is there an example of how to properly negotiate a flight of stairs?


An excellent question, and the answer is a hearty "Yes!" Allow me to now present you with what is referred to as "The Right Way."



Do note the smooth motion, perfectly in-line with the direction of the stairs. Also note the safe two-point landing at the base of the stairs, and the proper hand position during the descent.

I'd like each of you Loyar Readers to find a flight of stairs in your home or work and spend the rest of the day practicing this method and let me know how you do.


Thank you Jeremy. I'm off to practice right now!

You'll note I didn't reject it, either

I’m Jeremy, and I did not approve this message.


Well maybe you should have gone over it once or twice first...you know...to make sure it doesn't suck.


Few things are more irritating than Election Season. And as much as I like to leave politics out of the Blag, I feel it's important to rant a little about the elections themselves.


Just make sure you get out and vote, people!


From now until November, every other commercial you see on TV will be for one election or another, particularly if you live in one of the "Swing States." No, this doesn't mean that they like to dance to jovial jazz-era music, it just means that people in your state aren't sure how they're going to vote and you need the politicians to tell you how to vote so they can tell you how to live after they're elected. It makes perfect sense really.


Sure does. I want to be a slave to The Man!


To make things even more fun, half of the commercials will only be about telling you why you shouldn't vote for the other guy. It's called "Negative Campaigning" and is the first tactic turned to by every candidate who says they won't resort to Negative Campaigning.

So what I'm proposing here is that you elect Me for Office. I don't particularly care which office, so just write my name in wherever you'd like. I feel that I'm the best candidate, and I don't really care who I'm running against. I have no idea what my platform is or what I stand for, but I will make this one promise to you, The Most Intelligent Readership In The World: I will NOT run for re-election! That's right, you will not see a single campaign commercial from my at the end of my term. That alone, I think is reason enough to elect me. Remember...VOTE JEREMY!

Living up to potential

The Olympics don’t start until 8:00PM, and I’m already sick of swimming and running.


There are numerous problems with The Olympics.


Oh boy...here we go again.


So, let's start off with the fact that there are hundreds upon hundreds of events packed into a 2-week span, which means that at any given time, some sport is happening. That said, NBC and its affiliate networks are going to show games in 3-minute increments when an American is supposed to win, amid hours of "fluff" about Little Johnny's life back on his Wisconsin farm and growing up without a left pinky toe. Here's a tip, NBC...I don't give a crap. Show Little Johnny when he's actually running, riding, or jumping off of something.


Yes, yes...the well-documented "Fluff" speech. This is your big issue?


Far from it. My second biggest gripe is the diversity in the same events. There will be plenty of airtime for running. Why? Because We get to watch people run 100 meters. Then 200 meters. Then 400 meters. Then 800 meters. Then 1500 meters. Then 3000 meters. Then 5000 meters. Then Marathon. Then the same thing in relays. Then repeat most of those with crap in the way (Hurdles, I guess they're called). Seriously? It's people running. We need 2 of these. Maybe 3. Same with swimming. 50m, 100m, 200m, 400m, 1500m, freestyle, backstroke, breaststroke, butterfly, medley, relay. It's all the same thing! People trying not to drown. Let's whittle that list to 4 events and say, "Here's people swimming" and move on. Did you even know that 10-Meter Air Pistol Shooting is an Olympic event? No. Why? Because we spend too much time on running and swimming.


But people like running and swimming.


You're assuming that people won't like Judo and Fencing and Field Hockey. People never get a chance to appreciate these other sports. Why not? That brings me to my biggest issue...

The focus on events simply because Americans are supposed to win. We're going to get treated to lots and lots of gymnastics because of Shawn Johnson. We'll also get to watch lots and lots of swimming for Michael Phelps. That's all well and good, but there are MANY perfectly worthwhile sporting events that will be more entertaining than the 1500m freestyle swim (That's 30 laps for those scoring at home). Americans, and the United States as a whole, put more time and effort into training for the Olympics than any other country in the world. This is based on an exhaustive study performed without research while writing this paragraph. But it makes sense, since the US typically has the largest contingent of athletes in the games and takes home the most medals (at least for the Summer Games). Despite that, Americans are not favoured to win every event. We likely won't be medalling in ANY women's shooting event, or Rhythmic Gymnastics (Which is totally worth watching for Various Reasons), and the US didn't even manage to qualify a Team Handball Team. So, despite the fact that elite athletes from all over the world will be competing in these equally entertaining games, we won't get to see them.

NBC bases all of their Olympics coverage around the fact that the people are more interesting than the games themselves. It's why we get to watch Fluff instead of Sport, and it's why we get to watch Americans winning instead of sports that we normally don't get to watch. That said, I enjoy watching the Olympics for the brief moments of Badminton, Table Tennis, Rowing, and Indoor Volleyball that are harder to come by in between Olympiads. It's something different. I'll just have to wade through a whole lot of swimming and running to get to it.

Then, the Blag explodes!

The ultimate story for men: Hamlet sips some whiskey while punching a man in the nose. Ophelia says she's crazy for him and they go on a helicopter ride. A ghost appears, and when Hamlet high fives him, he explodes! Then Denmark explodes.


This sounds pretty sexist. I'll prepare the court papers.


Well then you'll be preparing court papers for T-Rex of the whimsical webcomic Dinosaur Comics!


Ahh....should have recognized the one-sided ramblings of T-Rex. I always prefer the more even-keeled Utahraptor. That guy's pretty smart.

Zoooooooooooom!

Stupid Bumper Sticker of the Week: "American Muscle Car Association." Why? It was on a Kia Spectra!


Those Kia Spectra are pretty quick...


Okay, let's forget the fact that the Kia Spectra produces an outstanding 138 horsepower, capable of blowing any go-kart off the line, and focus on the fact that this particular bumper sticker was on a Spectra 5. This, of course, is the sorta Station-Wagonesque version of the Spectra. Station Wagons are rarely, if ever, considered "Muscle Cars".


So it's not exactly a muscle car. Cars can dream too, can't they?


Let's also ignore the Non-Muscle Car aspects of the Kia Spectra 5 and consider the fact that it sported an "American Muscle Car Association" sticker while being made by a South Korean company.

This car fails every aspect of its bumper sticker.

In my best Jay Sherman impression, "It stinks!"

I don't really care if you’re a celebrity chef. Don’t tell me to put "Stinking Nightshade" in my salad.


Yeah, isn't Stinking Nightshade poisonous?


Yes, but that didn't stop Celebrity chef Anthony Worrall Thompson from recommending it as a tasty addition to summer salads.


Apparently, he meant to say "Fat Hen" instead of "Henbane."


Yes, I can see where the confusion comes from. My issue with this whole thing isn't the toxic nature of henbane, but the fact that somebody actually told people to put something called "Stinking Nightshade" into food. Simply because something is green does not mean it's salad.


And now, just because it's poisonous doesn't mean it's not food.


The good news is that despite all this hubbub, nobody seems to have died from adding poison to their salad based on this chef's recommendation.


Probably because it stinks.

You can't touch this

The good news is, The Team of Matt and Jeremy remains undefeated in tournament play.


Not that I'm doubting you, but this sounds like one of those good news/bad news situations.


Well, yes...but that's hardly the point. The bad news, of course, is that despite now being registered for 4 volleyball tournaments, The Team of Matt and Jeremy has yet to play a single game. Appearances and entire tournaments have been cancelled every time, preventing The Team from ever actually being on the court.


So you also haven't WON a game...


We prefer to say The Team is undefeated. In fact, this past weekend was the closest we've come. the weather forecast was spotty, but it looked like we were going to get the games in. However, as The Team was officiating the second match of the day, preparing to play in the third, the skies opened up, lightning flashed, thunder rolled, and the tournament came to a sullen end, once again, without Matt and Jeremy as the champions.


It's just a matter of time, really.


True enough, but if you're the betting type, you can beat the rush and predict the weather forecast for August 30th. Rain, thunder, hail, tornadoes, and locusts.