To get you in the Halloween spirt, here’s a photo I took of a giant spider:

Thanks to Dave and Neesie for the camera, btw! It takes great shots. Detail below:

Previous Discussion:
SENATE APPROVES FISA REFORM
WHO’S WATCHING YOU?

From the archives, some hilarious comments by tgirsch of Lean Left:

Wrong on Obama. Not only was he present, he voted yea, in support of those of us who aren’t crippled enough with pants-wetting terror to want to throw away the fourth amendment and rule of law.

and

Mea culpa on the bill itself. The important point, however, is Obama did vote to try and stop the reactionaries from gutting the fourth amendment. Clinton couldn’t even be bothered to do that. To be fair, though, I would have preferred that Obama also cast a Nay vote on the passage of the bill itself, even if that vote didn’t make a difference.

But while you were right about Obama not voting on the bill itself, you’re still wrong on the merits of the bill. I refuse to believe that security from terrorism has to involve allowing the government to outsource fourth-amendment violations to private companies, or that meaningful oversight to prevent abuse would somehow short-circuit our ability to defend against future attacks. Oh, that’s right, I forgot: demanding accountability and rule of law = surrendering to terror. My bad.

Heh. This time around, Clinton could be “bothered to do that,” while BRCK BM came to his senses.

Finally, here are the senators who changed their vote on the Dodd amendments, which stripped immunity from the bills:

The St. Jude Marathon is this Saturday. If you’re running low on eggnog, now is the time to stock up.

We know you can’t be subjected to the trouble of sitting in traffic, much less actually participate in an event that saves the lives of children, but for the love of Pete, plan ahead this time.

And if you do happen to run out of eggnog during the course of the event, please remember:

1. It’s nobody’s fault but your own

2. You can live without eggnog for three hours

3. Whining about a fundraiser for sick kids because of a personal, minor inconvenience is about as selfish, lame, ignorant and dishonorable as it gets

Let me apologize on the front end for this one, because it’s really bad.

I’m talking really, really stupid and almost nonsensical.

That said, who can guess what the photo above stands for?

This photo of me with my dad’s Afghan hound was taken yesterday in his front yard.

Exactly two people who read this blog could possibly know the answer unless I give you the dog’s name, which is Shama.

So that’s your first clue. Two more below the fold, if you need em: (more…)

Will the fake Gadfly please stand up?

Two of these haunting faces belong to Marty Aussenberg, the Memphis Flyer “Gadfly.” The third is just a mockery of a mockery.

I had been meaning to take this civics quiz since reading articles about the average college scores a few weeks back. (Thanks, A.C.)

My results: I answered 47 out of 60 correctly — 78.33 %. Not so great, but apparently better than the typical Harvard senior, to my surprise.

I missed questions 1, 7, 12, 14, 26, 31, 35, 36, 38, 43, 53, 58 and 60.

The questions involving dates really messed me up, but I feel worst about confusing “The Great Society” with “The New Deal,” and about forgetting what single item eats up the biggest share of the federal budget. The rest of these, I never really knew in the first place, and many of the ones I got correct forced me to think back to high school economics and history classes.

Good luck.

Some folks who kicked my butt: Owen, Red, The Anchoress and King.

AND NOW: Bob.

I agree with Radley Balko’s take, but Ben Franklin (as usual) said it best:

We must all hang together, or assuredly we shall all hang separately.

Related thoughts here.

I ran across this anagram generator and had to track down the ones I figured out for my name earlier. Here’s my top five:

1. law get him rich
2. the magic whirl
3. calmer high wit
4. chat while grim
5. HTML chili wager

Let’s see what the generator says about the 2008 hopefuls:

Democrats:
1. Only I can thrill (Hillary Clinton)
2. Aback a Rambo (Barack Obama)
3. Jaw shod nerd (John Edwards)
4. Shrill drab icon (Bill Richardson)

Republicans:
1. I dig unruly. Ai! (Rudy Giuliani)
2. PMS of hot nerd (Fred Thompson)
3. Chic ‘n’ on jam (John McCain)
4. My! Merit not (Mitt Romney)

It looked like H.C. would be the runaway winner… until I plugged one last name:

“Our plan”

Score one for the Ron Paul rLOVEution!

UPDATE: My wife, Alison is “also writhing.”

Hemingway would be proud, that “sneer, weighty man.”

UPDATE II: I must say these are significantly worse:

Lynch harlot in mid-oral (Hillary Rodham Clinton)

Damn hotpot fondlers (Fred Dalton Thompson)

My thanks go to the faithful readers who have made inquiries about my state of continued existence, or lack thereof. I am indeed alive, at least I am at the moment. I guess it has been a while since I’ve gone a full week without blogging, having kept a moderate pace since relaunching this site. Looking at my archive list, it appears I’ve been posting about every other day on average.

We’ve had a busy week, with friends staying with us, hanging out and experiencing Memphis. New things recently encountered: The Avenue Carriage Crossing, The National Civil Rights Museum and Big Foot Lodge.

I haven’t been totally offline, though; I did add a new feature to the sidebar on the homepage — a box containing my “shared items” from Google Reader. I plan to keep that updated with links I find interesting but either don’t have time to write about or anything particularly noteworthy to add. At the bottom of the sidebar, I also added a link to the Victory Caucus website, which I wholeheartedly endorse.

I do have a backlog of topics to write about and post, though, as you can imagine. I want to tell you about some ideas I’ve been pondering, share some goals I’ve set for myself, and make some changes to this blog and the attitude or voice I bring to it.

For starters, one thing I’ve been thinking about this week and have decided to do: I want to apologize to the Ron Paul supporters I mocked in a recent post. I feel bad about it, and I want you to know that I’m sorry I offended you. I might have gotten a few chuckles out of that post, and maybe a few more visitors and links, but I’ve decided that I don’t want to go down that road anymore. I want to be more positive and more constructive in my approach and in my writing about politics, as well as other topics. I won’t take down that post or any others like it, because I consider site scrubbing unethical, and neither will I compromise my principles and ideas I think are right or abandon my humor, but I will pledge to try to be more positive from here forward.

I’ve also been working behind the scenes on some other web projects, which you might know about… if you were a member of the Butter Cowncil, this blog’s volunteer advisory board. Just this morning, I received verification from and swore in the first Cowncilor. You, too, can join the Cowncil by simply donating ANY AMOUNT to the charity of your choice (some restrictions apply) and sending me a copy of the receipt.

More later…

UPDATE: Welcome, StumbleUpon users. I’m not sure why you’re here, but thanks for stopping by!