Rally to Restore Sanity - Great Sign

Text: GOD HATES FIGS. MARK 11:12-14

"...[Jesus] was hungry. And seeing a fig tree afar off having leaves, he came, if haply he might find any thing thereon, and when he came to it, he found nothing but leaves; for the time of figs was not yet. And Jesus answered and said unto it, No man eat fruit of thee hereafter for ever..."
(King James Version for copyright simplicity reasons)

Memory

"If I had a nickel for everything I'd forgotten, I'd really and truly have no idea how much money I'd have."
The Brain

Deficit spending

With thanks to Nicholas B. for bringing the topic up, since graphs are so much fun, here is the data from Treasury Department statistics on deficit spending for the Bush43 and Obama (so far) administrations. (Sorry if the numbers aren't so readable - click the photo to enlarge; the chart starts in January 2000 and the spiky blue and pink lines change to smooth in April 2005.)

The higher pitch of the line after January 2009 indicates increased rate of deficit spending. And that bump around September 2008? That represents $ 400 billion in new deficit spending in two weeks. Almost half a trillion dollars. Or pretty close to the total GDP (or twice the US wages) for that time period.

Do not attempt to beat this girl's father

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worldnews/asia/india/6244076/Farmers-daughter-disarms-terrorist-and-shoots-him-dead-with-AK47.html
Never tell yourself you are a victim. Take control. No other commentary needed.

[Published a year later than intended, because it was left in my drafts folder, which I rarely check --ED.]

Popular Among Athiests

"Christianity is the belief that a cosmic Jewish zombie can make you live forever if you symbolically eat his flesh and telepathically tell him that you accept him as your master, so he can remove an evil force from your soul that is present in humanity because a rib-woman was convinced by a talking snake to eat from a magical tree."

Legal word of the Day: Mayhem

Mayhem ['mae-'hem] (n)

willful and permanent crippling, mutilation, or disfigurement of any part of another's body; also, the crime of engaging in mayhem

Merriam-Webster's Dictionary of Law ©1996

This term falls under the fun category of words which have a specific technical meaning but are applied metaphorically in common usage. These are the words that mess with someone's head if they get used to the technical usage and then hear people throw them around where they don't really apply, e.g.,
"The rowdy youths did all kinds of mayhem."
"But I thought you said they only spray painted some mailboxes and broke a few windows."

It was only a matter of time

The L.A. Times reports that the first health insurance companies to begin trimming back their offerings after the reform bill are now doing so. [Article here.] It should probably come as no surprise that when you take away someone's incentive to provide a service, they cease to provide it.

I found particularly funny the (in his mind) rhetorical question posed by the reform pundit in the article: "Insurers need to decide if they are in the business of providing care or denying coverage." Actually, neither. They are not in the business of providing care, but risk management. Requiring them to do something else sounds like an invitation for them to go on strike to me.

Legal word of the day: Champerty

Champerty (n.) ['cham-per-te]; Champertous (adj.) ['cham-per-tes]

An unenforceable agreement to fund litigation for another in exchange for a portion of the proceeds of the suit.

Näkemiin?

Rumors are that Kimi Raikkonen may not go back to Formula 1, but stick around with rally racing. Best of luck to the Finn either way, but we'll miss him in F1.

Wolverine

"Essentially, this movie is about Hugh Jackman, the hottest actor ever, with the most un-attractive haircut ever. But, somehow it works."

~EKL

Luxury car worth £1.2m clamped outside Harrods

Click title for the story!

I seriously need some of these!

Lone Ranger

What many people don't realize is that when the Lone Ranger's parents died, they had not passed their property on directly to the Lone Ranger, but instead had created a fund for his maintenance, which was administered by Tonto. This is why Tonto is always referred to as The Trustee Sidekick.

Prison yard auto repair

If you ever find yourself needing to put a water pump belt back on its pulleys in a car with less than two inches of clearance, there is nothing like a homemade tool for pulling off the job. Not shown is the 1x4 which went through the loops to provide a foot pedal/pull bar. Also thanks to a kind contractor who provided the third hand needed for finishing.

Tool not recommended to establishing turf or maintaining dominance in maximum security pen.

Intentional Naughtiness

We found out that Warwick blew a head gasket, and will be in the shop for a week. Soon after hearing this Helmy decided that he was not getting enough attention. On our way home from a weekend away, just before we crossed back into Virginia, his temperature spiked and after we looked him over we found he had split the belt that drives the water pump. Since we will not put up with intentional naughtiness we left him north of Lucketts for the night, just to see if he would start behaving. We will be bringing him back home tomorrow, and we got him a new belt. We are not rewarding him, but the old belt is totally useless since he pitched his little fit.