Running Around (the joy of it!)

Does anyone else have those times where you realize it's nice to use your body, to push it and to feel that tightness in your chest just after? Perhaps my vagary here will be mistaken for a description of some other thing from what I intend, so let me be clear:

Tonight I was back out on the softball field (a two-nights-a-week habit for me this summer) and between playing outfield for the first time in a game this season, and legging out some hits I really chugged around the field tonight. A teammate was nice enough to suggest I ought to be called, "rabbit" in the future. Still, speed aside, what really made me take notice were the moments where I really felt the fact that I had just been sprinting. Tightness in my chest, muscles truly awake and alert, cool night air rushing in my nose... fine examples of feeling alive may very well be out there, but for today I'll say that one takes the cake.

A few hours later there is very reasonable soreness, and the certainty that I'll be sleeping well tonight.

Summer, I'm so glad you're coming back to us. Stick around for awhile, wadda ya say?

Heading West to (Oregon and) Kentucky

Today is yet another chance for the Democrats to run head-long into one another, give some speeches and call it a day. Still, with the rally of 75,000 in Portland this weekend and the continued flood of Super Delegates to Obama, the air of inevitability seems to have shifted to a comfortable sense of acceptance. The Democrats have a nominee, and they have one last candidate who isn't ready to call it quits. That's fine. The Onion's got a great little piece on a possible new tactic for Hillary.



Continuing some of the way-back machine action from the past few posts, above is a clip from an interview between Daniel Day-Lewis and Bryant Gumbel circa 1992. The Last of the Mohicans had just come out, and the clip shows one of my favorite bits of dialog, when Day-Lewis's character talks about how he'll get to Kentucky.

ok... I can't have Bryant Gumbel in a post without some reference to, "white people love Wayne Brady because he makes Bryant Gumbel look like Malcom X." It had to be done.

Bill O'Boogie

I think there are few people who regularly haunt the internets who haven't yet seen the vintage clip of Bill O'Reilly freaking out on the set of Inside Edition back when he had hair (or this goofy response to the situation). Earlier in the week I heard a pretty brilliant remix of the sound clip from the video... then I stopped by Purple State this weekend and they had posted the following amazing video version of said remix!

BRILLIANT!!!



Because if you're not outside this beautiful weekend, at least you should have something hilarious to keep you company. And with that, I'm going to go get some fresh air!

Posting on a blog

I have now posted! I have neat things to tell you! But I must go to a flea market, so neat things will wait. A tid-bit:

100 miles on a liter of water! Fact? Fiction? Dream-turned-reality?

Stay tuned for more!

Remember When?

For whatever reason I'm having a way back evening. I just found out that Weezer is releasing a new album this summer... that had me thinking back to high school days listening to Buddy Holly, Surf Wax America and other fine tunes off their first album. Then for whatever reason I ended up going back and watching Jon Stewart on Crossfire from 2004, and WOW, I've got to say, that clip really doesn't get old.




Take your pick, honestly... I'm not sure what piece I love more. Is it when Jon Stewart mocksTucker Carlson's bow ties? When he tells him he's as much of a dick on his show as he is on any show? I thought this was one of the most brave, inspiring and remarkable moments in television back when it happened, and it still is damn cool today.

Anyway, heading into the weekend, if you're fishing around for other interesting stuff to read or check out, I found this:

• A post from Chris Cillizza over at the Washington Post discussing the 10 senate races that might end up with Democrats winning new seats this fall. With all the talk about the presidential election this year, these past few weeks have had people talking about the House and Senate. This piece gives some food for thought on that front.
• Jason Werth of the Phillies homered in his first three at-bats of tonight's game against the Blue Jays. Nice week for the Phils this week.
• And here I thought refusing nuns in their 90's the right to vote because they didn't have a photo ID was bad... in Amsterdam the Dutch are considering making it, "an offence to use the services of a sex operator without a licence or a non-registered independent prostitute"
  

Terry McAuliffe, One Craaaaaaaaaaazy Dude

This has been up at Talking Points Memo for a few days, and I just finally got around to watching it today. I'm going to admit, I never quite realized what a nut Terry McAuliffe is, but this little treasury of video clips certainly is a fun little intro if you, like me, haven't fully appreciated his zany antics. Once you watch it, let me know if you agree that America can likely completely eliminate our dependence on foreign oil if we figure out how to harness the energy stored in Terry McAuliffe. Patent pending on that brilliant idea, so don't go trying to steal it.

Here's the video:




If nothing else, be sure to catch the voice crack at 1:52!

"I don't know how ironic it would be,but..."

I heard about this a couple of days ago, but haven't gotten a chance to post until now. Seems that in Oregon, Obama was asked whether it would be ironic if he won the nomination by winning the state. Amazingly, he actually pointed out, in a nice way, that it would not be ironic. It's refreshing to see a candidate who actually uses words to mean things. Rather a nice contrast with McCain, who tends to use words loosely, even when they refer to terrorist organizations...

Biden for VP

Busy week here... wish I was posting more. Meanwhile, interesting stuff keeps happening in the world. For example, today George Bush celebrated the 60th anniversary of the founding of the Israeli state by giving a blatantly partisan speech overseas comparing Obama to Nazi sympathizers. Nice move Georgie. Best response so far?

"This is bullsh**t. This is malarkey. This is outrageous. Outrageous for the president of the United States to go to a foreign country, sit in the Knesset…and make this kind of ridiculous statement" - Joe Biden

h/t Americablog.

Meanwhile, if you're looking for entertainment, Purple State does it again this week with a week of Patrick Stewart (Jean-Luc Picard and otherwise) themed Daily Diversions. My favorite so far is here.

While you're there, Purple State also has some great coverage the fallout from the NARAL and Edwards endorsements, and a post with clips of former undersecretary of Defense Douglas Feith appearing on Daily Show, both things I found incredibly interesting and worth a little of your time.

Mental Images I Never Wanted To Have

Joe Lieberman... rarely do I blog about what a disgrace you are to my current home state of Connecticut. Still, some things simply can't be resisted, and pointing out how nauseating the mental image caused by the video below is seemed, well, unavoidable.

Yuck.



Just goes to show, Ole Joe really shouldn't try to be clever. Clearly clever isn't working for him.

A place where "power generation, water management, transportation, and urban planning all come together"

Check out a fun but somewhat tiny snippet about MIT and the United Arab Emirates working together to create the first carbon-neutral city. Interesting little article with fun discussions of "transportation pods" powered by the city's photovoltaic panels, and other fun and interesting stuff.

Andrew Sullivan had a link to Boozhy's post about the story that pointed out (astutely) that the future of environmentalism appears to be heading in a direction where change is driven more and more by the economic realities (and incentives) for shifting to green. The folks in Abu Dhabi clearly state their motivation as economic (the potential for a project like this as a magnet for business and investment).

Weekends and Sunshine

Heller's and Pfeiffer's and Sky oh my, originally uploaded by Chambo25.

Well, folks, I think it's been a pretty remarkable week... don't you? ABC is the first news outlet to tally recent announcments (and defections from Camp Clinton) and say Obama now leads in super delegates... perhaps another sign of the wave that is forming to come tidy up any unresolved questions in the Democratic primary. Not sure if it's a bigger piece of the wave or not, but the Time magazine cover is pretty darn cool. Also amazing, the website Hillary is Mom Jeans (a response to the brilliant Barack Obama is Your New Bicycle). I've got too many favorites from their all-caps little quips, but a new favorite of mine today is, "HILLARY YELLED FREEBIRD AT YOUR CONCERT" brilliant stuff.

Meanwhile, outside the world of primaries there's a whole mess of other stuff going on, right?

• On Ebay you can pick up JFK's air guitar... sweet (hat tip: Wonkette).
• Sadly, probably the biggest story in the world is still the mess in Myanmar, where somewhere between 20,000 and 100,000 people were killed by a cyclone that has supposedly impacted over a million lives, yet the military leaders are balking at letting outside aid workers inside the borders of their tightly-controlled nation. Hopefully progress on this mess will be swift (at least there are some signs of hope), but so far there's a lot to feel bummed out about here.
• The oldest gorilla in captivity celebrated his 55th birthday with a frozen fruit cake. I take it they mean a cake made of frozen fruit, not an unwanted Christmas gift retrieved from the depths of somebody's freezer.
  
• When bong-making creativity goes horribly wrong: In Texas some kids dug up a secluded grave, removing a skull that they then crafted into a bong. Wow.
  
• Finally, on a lighter note, researchers say some sexy orchids may reap the benefit from the way their forms attract certain insects, but they may also hurt the insects that pollinate them since they decrease their chances for reproduction. See, the confusion over their appearance causes the bees to, "frequently ejaculate and waste copious sperm." Wait... did I say that last story was on a lighter note... well, if you hate bees I guess this is good news.
  

Anyway... there's your Friday dose of randomness, have a wonderful weekend!

Oh, and the photo above is another from my March visit to Washington DC... taken along Mt. Pleasant Ave. in downtown Mount Pleasant. I'm not sure why I didn't post this sooner, but it's one of my favorites from that trip.

Finding the Right Time to End It

I was part of a fascinating conversation last night with a group of engaged and informed Democrats all raking over the details of what happened Tuesday. The consensus of the group was that the primary is basically over now, but the conversation took an interesting turn (I described this in a comment earlier this morning, but then thought it was post-worthy). What fascinated me, and what I would love to hear others' thoughts on was the following observation:

Someone in the group suggested that it would make no sense at all for the Democratic Party to have Hillary drop out of the race now. If she did, there is a fair likelihood that she would still beat Barack in West VA, and also a good chance she would win in Kentucky. The idea being suggested was that it is against the interests of both the party and Obama's candidacy to have Hillary drop out just in time for Barack to lose two of the first three uncontested races. Instead it would look much better for her to stick around and play nice for a couple weeks.

What I found intriguing about this idea is that I think many people are eager to see this whole thing end, to see Hillary change her mind, hold a press conference, and close up shop today. It's been interesting for me to ponder whether she would serve her party better to stick around at least for another week or two. Still, this all ignores the question of whether altruistic thinking like this is at play at all in the Clinton Campaign's considerations this week.

On an interesting side note, check out this post on Talking Points Memo regarding repaying the Clintons for their "loans" to Hillary's campaign (hat tip to Amiercablog where I saw this discussed). I had not heard about this piece of the picture until today, but as one of the 1.5 million small donors to the Obama campaign, I can say with certainty that I never intended my donations to go for paying the Clintons back on the loans that kept Hillary running in spite of inadequate fund raising totals this spring. I find the notion this could possibly happen quite troubling.

Update: Check out a completely dweeby but fascinating discussion of super delegates and primary election math over at SUPERDELEGATELAND.