What’s New With Mick

Aches & pains: n/a

Current reading: High Fidelity by Nick Hornsby

Recent listening: Dead Prez, Funkadelic, Parliament, Dyke & the Blazers, Prince, Bill Withers, A Tribe Called Quest, Rufus Thomas, Sly & the Family Stone, Tower of Power, The Getaway People, Charles Wright, The Commodores, The Meters, Gil Scott-Heron, Transformer by Lou Reed

Recent viewing: Real Time with Bill Maher, Grimm, Late Night with Jimmy Fallon, Touch, The Office, The Middle, Modern Family

Recent playing: Bloons 5

Recently accomplished: CDs for Jan, paper work for Thomas, taxes, got van running, new glasses

Imperative To Do: Troop 820 accounting, update allowances, groceries, uncategorized transactions, spring break chores for the kids

Aches & pains: n/a

Current reading: High Fidelity by Nick Hornsby

Recent listening: Hot Rats, Ten Years After, Back To Mine (Krafty Kuts), James Brown, New Roman Times, The Pizza Tapes, Kitaro

Recent viewing: 30 for 30, House of Cards, 7 Up, Killing Bono, Real Time with Bill Maher, The Daily Show, The Colbert Report, The Middle, Modern Family, Touch, Raising Hope, Larry King Now, The Office, Fringe

Recent playing: Letterpress, Bloons 5

Recently accomplished: Can & bottle recycling, birthday interview, bought iPad Mini

Imperative To Do: Appointments, Troop 820 accounting, sell OG iPad

Bill (can I call you Bill?), I want you to know that Has Been is one of my favorite albums of all time. I try to get people to listen to it but nobody takes me seriously. I recently had a “win” as a parent when my oldest son (17) asked me about Has Been.

I love how you poured yourself out for everyone to see and I use it as inspiration in my own (meager and infrequent) attempts to be an artist.

I bow to you and thank you, sir.

PS: How do I get invited to one of your legendary parties?

Here’s the original thread which was brought to my attention by an r/bestof posting. I submitted my comment twice but Reddit didn’t accept it. I suspect that Bill has temporarily disabled comments. 

Aches & pains: sore left shoulder

Current reading: High Fidelity by Nick Hornsby

Recent listening: David Grisman’s Acoustic Christmas, Christmas Spirit by Los Lonely Boys, Everything You Want for Christmas by Big Bad Voodoo Daddy, Best of 2012

Recent viewing: QI, Dexter, Homeland, Sons of Anarchy, Burn Notice, The Walking Dead, Portlandia, American Harmony

Recent playing: Letterpress, Bloons

Recently accomplished: Purged old items from Toodledo, finished negotiating Thomas’ property damages claim, Repair Bucks (iPhone & Xbox), Christmas

Imperative To Do: Doctor appointments, Troop 820 accounting, tree recycling, can & bottle recycling

Aches & pains: sore neck and shoulders

Current reading: n/a

Recent listening: I’m With You, The Limeliters, Peaches, Philip Glass, The Social Network, Hoyt Axton, Burl Ives, Joan Baez, Peter Paul & Mary, Ricky Skaggs, The Great Adventures of Slick Rick

Recent viewing: Treme, Revolution, Lillyhammer, Burn Notice, Fringe, Grimm, The Walking Dead, Key & Peele, Sons of Anarchy, QI, Homeland

Recent playing: Letterpress, Words with Friends, Monsters Ate My Condo

Recently accomplished: finished refinancing mortgage

Imperative To Do: Doctor appointments, Troop 820 accounting

Yesterday my old boss shared this graphic on his Facebook wall:

Of course, the analogy is deliberately flawed to achieve the comic effect of calling Obama a “clown”. A more apt analogy would compare the president with McDonald’s CEO, Don Thompson. Does Mr. Thompson cook your burger when you visit McDonald’s? Of course not, but he is an important member of the team that produces all those burgers. The real question is whether Mr. Thompson deserves any credit (or blame) for your crappy McDonald’s burger?
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Aches & pains: left leg numbness and itching

Current reading: n/a

Recent listening: The Kingston Trio, Arlo Guthrie, They Might Be Giants, The Beach Boys, Rick Nelson, Frankie Vallie & the Four Seasons, Back To Mono, Live at the Apollo, Bach on Wood, Sublime

Recent viewing: Falling Skies, Homeland, Breaking Bad, Warehouse 13, 2012 Olympics

Recent playing: Plants vs. Zombies, Words with Friends, Monsters Ate My Condo

Recently accomplished: Mortgage refinancing, hair cut, Crater Lake/Roseburg loop, Roundup weeds, mowed lawn

Imperative To Do: Vacuum, make doctor appointments, mail packages, turn compost, trim butterfly bushes, Troop 820 can recycling, refinish deck

A Facebook friend posted this to his pics awhile back:

Despite my friend’s protestations to the contrary, this image apparently makes the argument that an armed population is a safe population. More specifically, if considered within the context of the recent shootings in Colorado, it seemingly argues that the Aurora shooter would have fired fewer shots if that theater had more armed citizens at the movies that night.

I suppose that some might think that this image simply says that “guns prevent crime” or that “guns stop crime” but it goes beyond those assertions (with which, by the way, I would never argue). The inclusion of the word “crazy” is significant and tells us that the author is not speaking just of criminals but of people that are insane. Furthermore, the author also says that she is speaking of insane people who are armed – i.e. the kind that can “get off shots”. These two specific word choices strike a very specific chord in our psyche: vengeance.
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A friend of mine added this to his Facebook photos today:

My first reaction was to add this comment:

I’d rather see nobody drug-tested. Doesn’t that make more sense?

Then, since I remembered reading about Rick Scott’s program in Florida some time ago, I googled “florida drug testing welfare“. I skimmed two articles and added this comment:

BTW, Florida spent more money testing than they saved cutting benefits for those who tested positive. They also found that only 2.6% of those tested were drug users. Compared to Florida’s rate of 8.13% among the general population, it showed that welfare recipients actually use drugs less than everyone else.

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Aches & pains: none

Current reading: The Big Book of Basketball by Bill Simmons

Recent listening: Frank Zappa, Pink Floyd, Jane Siberry, Sam Cooke, Donovan, Nanci Griffith, John Frusciante, Deadmau5, Florence & the Machine, Earth, Wind & Fire

Recent viewing: Dexter, Twin Peaks, Anvil: The Story of Anvil, Winnebago Man, NFL Playoffs

Recent playing: DropZap, Words with Friends, Temple Run

Recently accomplished: Mowed lawn to remove most leaves, taxi service, Christmas tree recyling

Imperative To Do: Finish Neil Young “liner notes”, finish 2011 FY for Troop 820, clean office, pay bills, call DirecTV, Troop 820 can recycling