These kids rock. I had never heard of them until today. Whereas most of the male rockabilly pioneers had tragic ends or scandalous lives that made them household names beyond what was warranted by their music, these two just stopped. She got married at 17 to Johnny Cash’s manager who was in his mid 30s. She quit performing with her baby brother when she had her first child at 19. The young man pictured here was no flash in the pan, he kept performing and writing for most of his life. He wrote Delta Dawn and You’re The Reason God Made Oklahoma. These two had a reunion concert in 1993, 32 years after they had stopped performing together, and they are still at it.

I think Britney Spears should look to women like Lawrencine “Lorrie” Collins for role models. It is already too late in a lot of ways for Britney as far as her legacy as a performer goes, but she can salvage a normal personal life if she would just quit the celebrity thing cold turkey.

I have been hearing a lot about the destruction of records in Washington lately. Some people are even suspicious of the recent fire in the White House compound. The secrecy, and the reasons for the secrecy are troubling, but what bothers me more is the waste and the pollution involved in these actions. The Bush administration has been talking the talk with reference to environmental issues in recent months, but they need a lesson in the three Rs. Reducing, reusing and recycling all that incriminating paper and videotape would be much better for the environment than burning it. I created this illustration to suggest a great photo opp; decorating the White House Christmas tree using shredded paper and unwound videotapes.

I am the lazy deadbeat dad of invention. I am going to plant my seed of an idea here and if anything comes of it, I will visit it on Christmas and maybe its birthday. Here is the seed…

I have several draft posts that I wrote for this blog that have been deemed unsuitable. I just had the great idea to find some online tool that would convert text in such a way as to say the opposite of what it says before it is converted. People could use it to celebrate opposite day and I could use it to make use of my inappropriate draft posts. To the best of my knowledge, this tool does not exist.

Edit: I was actually able to build this tool myself, enjoy

Opposite Day Tool

I just read the CIA factbook entry for Iraq. There is a page for every country on their website. I highly recommend it as a resource when you are planning international travel. What caught my eye on this particular page was the choice of wording for the comparative area… slightly more than twice the size of Idaho.

Iraq’s total area is 437,072 sq km, Texas has an area of 678,051 km², so I guess I can’t accuse them of not using a comparison like around two thirds the size of Texas for political reasons. I honestly do wonder why they didn’t just say that it was approximately the same size as California (423,970 sq km).

One of the individuals in this picture did not want to participate at all. The other one was conflicted, but felt that there was a social obligation.

Last week’s self portrait was taken at the Ponte Vecchio. While I was fact checking on the Internet, I found out that Hannibal was partly filmed in Florence. Catherine and I watched the movie one evening this week and we saw a lot of familiar scenery. You can see the bridge where I took my self portrait in the background of this unaltered photo of me and Sir Anthony Hopkins.

Grand Theft Auto has been marketed as GTA in recent years to obscure the fact that it is a game that teaches children to be effective felons.

I just heard about a website that is marketing cheats for the latest installment of this game. That’s just wrong. I have been blogging intermittently about how happy I am that Manhunt 2 is bringing gaming out of the virtual closet and celebrating gay culture in a fabulous way. I certainly hope that people won’t start marketing cheats for Manhunt 2.

Remember to ridiculous faux standoff between 50 Cent and Kanye West at some awards show?

If you had any interest in it at all, you know that there was this thing where Fiddy said that he would retire if his album didn’t outsell Kanye’s. Fiddy lost.

50 Cent may think he is uncontested by other big name rappers in the realm of video games. He is blissfully unaware that the hugely popular online Furry game called Furcadia is controlled by none other that Kanye West. This completely unaltered screenshot proves it.

When there is a fake Santa in every mall and department store in town and when IMDb can tell you what actor portrayed Santa in every movie ever made, it is hard for a kid to believe that there is one true Santa. If they get a letter from Santa with an actual signature they can be pretty sure that it is the real thing right?

Letters From Santa are better than Skyping Santa or hearing Santa on the radio because they are a permanent record of your correspondence with one of the most generous and well traveled people in history.