As nothing seems to be going my way at work today (computer’s frazzled, paperwork snafu), I thought I’d try my hand at an update to this blog.  It seems that I only post rarely these days, so now would be a good time in my estimation.  This will be one of those link-ta-fied posts that’s sort of like an Easter Egg hunt.  All links are safe for work.

• Happy St. Patrick’s Day!  May your pints be full and your lasses be fair and hearty.  Not an actual Irish blessing that I know of, but a decent one that I just made up on the spot.
• Voces Novae began rehearsals for their final concert last night.  A collection of songs based on Robert Frost and Walt Whitman poems.  Among my leading favorites are “O Captain, My Captain!” and “The Pasture.”
• Spring is a mere 3 days away, officially.  However, I like to get an early start on things, so I took the bike to choir practice last night.  Beautiful ride, and there’s something about riding at night that is peaceful and calm, even on the more traffic-laden streets.
• Speaking of traffic, there’s a new German study out that proposes a link between traffic and heart attacks.  An interesting theory and not altogether bizarre in nature.  I know that sitting in traffic makes my blood pressure go up.
• I’m entered in the Rodes City Run 10K for this weekend and I’m anticipating an outstanding run.  I’d love to run it under 1:10, but we’ll see how it goes.  I’m happy just to be running.
• Bathroom renovation continues.  I’ve got paint on the walls and I hope to finish up either tonight or tomorrow, depending on how things progress.  
• The baby’s room is another story.  We do have paint colors now, but all the trim will have to be sanded before continuing and that will have to wait until the bathroom is done.  Still, the countdown has reached 7 weeks to go and time’s a-wasting.
• I’m dying to tell you what the baby’s name is, but we’ve kept it a secret this long, I’d hate to spoil it for you.  Folks seem to have had an entertaining time guessing though.  Feel free to continue to guess though.  Nobody has guessed it thus far, but many have come very close.
• How about those Louisville Cardinals?!  Number one seed overall…pretty impressive!  I’ve made my picks on at least three different brackets, knowing full well that I don’t know squat about basketball.  If only they had a bracket for baseball.  Anyway, I would like to say that I foresaw this early on.  I made predictions about this team being this good years ago, so maybe I know a little.

Okay, well, I guess I should go back to work now.  Maybe my computer has decided that it wants to work and possibly I can give some of this paperwork to somebody else.  

See you in the funny papers!

I do not like winter.  I don’t hate it, but I don’t like it.  There are some aspects of winter that I enjoy.  Hot cocoa, gently falling snow, warm crackling fires…but on the whole I could leave winter behind any given day.  Today was the day I started disliking winter this year.

I ride my bike to work.  It saves on gas, parking, good for the environment, good exercise…myriad reasons why I ride my bike to work.  However, today…today the temperature was a whole 19°F when I set out on my bike.  Plus, here in the Ohio Valley, we have humidity issues.  That very humidity Aside: that we also love to curse in the summer created a wind chill of 10°F.   TEN DEGREES!  Think that’s not bad?!  First of all, you’re probably driving to work in a car that you warmed up for 20 minutes while you decided whether to hit Starbucks or Dunkin’ Donuts on the way to work.  OR, you live in a climatic zone that tends not to even have anything below thirty on the thermometer.  What I’m saying is that it was nightmarishly cold.  It was so cold that during one point of my ride Aside: the downhill part I covered my eyes with a gloved hand to keep my glasses from freezing to my face.  It was like having an ice cream headache for six minutes.  And yet…I do it for you, and your children, and your children’s children, that they might be spared the agony of wandering a post-apocalyptic world where the thought of oil is an ancient memory, where water is more expensive than gold, and where alternative energy sources are mocked as they bow to their overlords, the CEOs of energy companies.  Wow…that was dramatic!  My brain must not be as frozen as I thought it was.

In other news…congratulations to Steve Kragthorpe and company on yet another fruitless season.  I realize that there are so many other things in the world to concern myself with besides the scramblings of boys in a game, but to hear they lost 63-14 to Rutgers last night to cap a 5-7 season is priceless.  I don’t blame the kids, they’re just innocent bystanders in this economic tug-of-war that is university athletics.  But, to have a program that went to bowl games for several years in a row, only to have it slip back into obscurity, is sort of pathetic.  And then, to have the gall to add seats to a stadium for more such events in the future is an offense to hardworking people everywhere.

See you in the funny papers!

As you may have noticed, I failed to complete the NaBloPoMo challenge for a second year.  I’d like to make the excuse that our internet connection was not functioning properly (which it wasn’t).  But the truth is, I realized I had failed to post on Friday when I came back from an errand on Saturday.  However, the weekend was exciting and that was what partially led me to a lack of posts.

Friday night, I was sitting at home…like I usually do…and The Neighbors called to see if we wanted dinner.  We headed to Señor Iguanas for some Mexican and then, we settled back into the couch for an evening of Wii and movies.  We played Tetris Party for Wii which I suck at, but managed to make other peoples’ games miserable due to the exciting addition of “items” which enabled me to be a general nuisance.  Not the least of which caused my wife to call me a “little bitch.”  Seriously…she actually said that.  Then we watched Gone Baby Gone which was a really decent movie starring Casey Affleck and Morgan Freeman.  There’s no review up yet, but check back soon.

Saturday was when it really got busy.  I had errands to run in the morning, a little house upkeep to take care of, and then off to Voces Novae rehearsal.  Two and a half hours of joyous singing and then home again.  I was able to check out the Louisville basketball game which was fairly awesome, at least in the second half.  And, then, honestly, it was just so cold, I didn’t do anything else.  I wanted to go to the Dropkick Murphys concert, but I decided that was a bad idea before church AND a concert on Sunday.  Also, we’re pretty broke in anticipation of our going to Arizona for Thanksgiving, so spending extra money is sort of out of the question.

Sunday, there was church which went well considering we had a guest organist.  Y’know…whenever you have a guest anything really, church doesn’t flow the way it should.  And that’s understandable.  Sometimes it’s okay, sometimes it’s horrendous.  Even so, church on Sunday was not terrible.  After church, I grabbed a bite to eat, got all gussied up in my tux and headed to the concert.  The Voces Novae concert was incredible.  Most of the pieces were the best they’ve ever been, the dynamics were sharp, and I believe, given some early reports from friends, that the songs were incredibly moving.  It was, however, draining and even though I protested being tired, I believe I was exhausted.  I was in for the night and spent the evening watching SuperBad.  All in all, a wonderful weekend.  And now I’m looking forward to an encore performance this evening, since we had a sold-out crowd yesterday.

See you in the funny papers!

P.S.  A big thank you to all regular readers and visitors to the Conspiracy of Happiness.  This month was the first time since the Conspiracy set up shop that the number of views increased for 3 months in a row.  Thank you for you support.

I’ve spent most of the afternoon mulling different post topics in my head.  I’m trying desperately to avoid any more politics…I’m just on overload.  However, I do wish to say that I’m still very excited by the turn of events on Tuesday night and I’m glad that my guy has hit the ground running.  Even announcing a chief of staff today.  Anyway, enough politics for the moment.

And, the sports scene is woefully bereft of anything interesting for me at the moment.  The Louisville Cardinals don’t seem to have quite the same momentum or entertainment value that I usually seek out.  Baseball is in its “hot stove” days and, while I’m anxiously awaiting info on how a Jason Varitek deal with the Red Sox might pan out…there’s not much else to be interested in from my point of view.  I don’t watch the NBA or the NFL.  I could get into rugby or cricket, but oddly ESPN doesn’t show much of that anymore.

My running is going okay, but the last couple of runs have been lackluster and not anything to brag about by any stretch.  I have another run tonight and I’m hoping that I can manage something great.  I’m still sore from Tuesday’s run though, so I’m not holding out a lot of hope.

This is probably the final warm day of the year…tomorrow it is supposed to rain and be colder which can only mean the onset of winter, my least favorite season.  I sincerely hope that I’m not in these sort of doldrums until March.  That would be a fairly long and depressing winter.

So…I guess, in the search for a topic, I wound up giving you not much of anything and a basic wrap-up of life in general.  Hopefully tomorrow’s post goes a lot smoother.

See you in the funny papers!

And so it begins, again!  Yes, I have decided to attempt the NaBloPoMo challenge for the second year in a row.  Last year I made it 23 posts in a row and while I was disappointed in not being able to complete the entire month, it was exciting and interesting to try and maintain that level of writing for a full 30 days.  So, this year, I thought I’d give it a whirl again.

For those of you who are not familiar with the idea…NaBloPoMo stands for National Blog Posting Month and is a takeoff on the National Novel Writing Month (NaNoWriMo) and requires a blog post every day for 30 days.  Hence the image to the left.

So, what’s so interesting today?!  Mattresses!  Yep, today we went mattress shopping and it was an ordeal.  At least, partially.  We went to five mattress stores looking for information, a good deal, and, most importantly, a comfortable mattress.  There are a lot of folks out there who are willing to sell you a mattress, but if you really want someone who knows what they’re doing and is going to give you a fair shake, let me tell you about Duane.  Duane works at Mattress & More on Outer Loop near the Jefferson Mall.  He’s extremely knowledgeable about his mattresses and he’s very easy to deal with.  No high pressure sales, no slick talk…just info about mattresses.  If you need a mattress, or even if you don’t, go talk to Duane.

In other news, I’m watching the UofL/Georgetown College basketball game right now Aside: Isn’t it too early for basketball?  The World Series just ended. and let me just say that Louisville is not looking AT ALL like the number 3 team in the nation.  It’s a little scary.  And Rick Pitino looking like he’s aged about 10 years during the offseason.  So, let’s hope that it gets a little better for the Cardinals.

See you in the funny papers!

Yeah, the beloved hometown Louisville Cardinals stunk up the city this afternoon with their terrible impersonation of a football team.  They did happen to score two points and avoid a shutout for the first time in eight years.  However, those two points came at the expense of a poor decision by an inexperienced quarterback making his first college start.  Basically, it was an accident.

UofL Marching Band

• Did I watch this inept episode of collegiate action? Yes.
• Did I turn it off when it was still 13-2? Yes.
• Am I still angry that traffic after this ridiculous debacle made me a virtual prisoner in my own neighborhood? Yes.
• Do I think the university bears some of the responsibility for that, in addition to the city? Yes.

Four yesses!  That’s a very positive outcome for such an insane situation.

But…how about the band?

See you in the funny papers!

For those of you who did not hear or read Barack Obama’s comments on race in this country, please go here now and absorb.

For those of you who did hear Barack Obama, can you imagine how a silly thing like a magazine cover garners such racial divisiveness? Here’s more on what I’m talking about:

NEW YORK – When Vogue announced its April cover starring LeBron James and Gisele Bundchen, the magazine noted with some fanfare that James was the first black man to grace its cover.

But the image is stirring up controversy, with some commentators decrying the photo as perpetuating racial stereotypes. James strikes what some see as a gorilla-like pose, baring his teeth, with one hand dribbling a ball and the other around Bundchen’s tiny waist.

It’s an image some have likened to “King Kong” and Fay Wray. …more of the article…

To imagine that a fashion magazine cover, photographed by arguably one of the most famous photographers, is under fire for some racial connotation conjured by commentators after this brilliant discourse on race in this country is absurd. Blatantly absurd. Apparently a very slow news day if this is the sort of thing that warrants discussion.

I have very little in the way of contributing any more eloquently to what Senator Obama has to say on the subject. However, I will say this. If we as a country are prepared to advance any further as a society, we’re going to have to move past this stumbling block. I’m not saying forget it; I’m not saying relegate it to a historical dustbin merely to be resurrected on an arbitrary month as patronizing deference to a proud people. I’m saying that it needs to be dealt with, understood, and then we need to move on. And one way to move on is not to characterize a photo of a black man and a white woman in a fashion magazine as communicating a “King Kong” vibe.

In other news, how about those Louisville Cardinals? Taking on all comers in this NCAA tournament. Earl Clark is a monster…a big basketball eating monster. His numbers are magnificent in this tournament and I’m of the opinion that if he gains 10 to 15 pounds of muscle in the offseason that he could challenge for the Naismith Award next season. His wingspan is ridiculous. He’s like a rebounding pterodactyl out there. Simply stunning. But the main thing is that they’re all playing as a team…every one of them. I say let Hansbrough and friends bring it! North Carolina is going down!

And finally, because it’s been so long…how about a 55Fiction for Friday?

Jonas placed his hand against the cold glass of the window.  Absently stroking the cat, he gazed out into the sunny day.  The shade of the great oak in the yard beckoned.  He imagined a light nap in his hammock with a cool refreshing lemonade.  “Well, Dudley, ” he said wearily “that grass won’t cut itself.”

See you in the funny papers!