"You can take that to the bank": BHO in 2007: I will end the war

BHO on the campaign trail in 2007 explains how the first thing he will do in office is end the war. Two years later, he ponders just how much to expand the war in Afghanistan, and no doubt, any other 'Stans that need a tune-up.


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Six and a half Seasons of The Sopranos in nine minutes

It's a little bit snarky, but good. One guy's rundown of the entire story arc of The Sopranos. In nine minutes.



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A severed pig's head in Redmond, Wash.

Thanks to Jason Larsen for pointing out this strange story, although I have to admit it's not completely strange. We've written about paranormal activity in Redmond before (the aliens at the Nike Base on Education Hill). But this one is clearly terrestrial.

When I was in 9th grade, we performed a similar prank. We appropriated two sheep heads from the Kent Junior High biology labs and deposited one on the porch of our vile shop teacher, Mr. Ed Becker, and one in the mailbox of our vice-principal. Our shop teacher mentioned it in class, and I couldn't help but smile. I was not only smiling, but I had a s**t-eating grin. Mr. Becker called me out "Blummet! [which is what he always called me], you don't know anything about this?" I could only respond that while I wasn't involved, I admired the actions of whatever other juvenile delinquents did pull it off. "No, I'm sorry Mr. Becker. I regret I can't claim responsibility..." But I digress.

According to the Seattle Post Intelligencer website [our former morning newspaper now website], a Redmond homeowner just found a severed pig's head on his front doorstep.

As reported by the P.I., "A Lionsgate Townhomes resident woke up Monday morning to find a 'severed large pig's head' on his front doorstep, according to Redmond Police.

Police spokesman Lt. Charlie Gorman, said the pig's head was placed on a ground-floor unit front doorstep in the middle of the night.

As is always the case, the victim "said he had no idea why someone would do this and did not know of anyone who would do this."

Lieutenant Gorman said that the case is "inactive" because there are no leads or suspects., and they know of no other similar cases in recent history according to Gorman. In the meantime, Redmond resident, please note there is a lot of good eating in a pig's head. You could make scrapple for breakfast. Don't think of this as some weird or sinister event. . .look at it as a gift. And start cooking!
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Happy Veteran's Day to the two veterans who begat me

Thank you to all the veterans today for all you endured for us, and especially the three who happened to be my parents and uncle. (click photographs to enlarge)


Corporal John Brummet

My father, John Newton Brummet, Jr., joined the army a couple of years after dropping out of school in the eighth grade. He was discharged from the army not long before Pearl Harbor and then enlisted in the Navy, where he served for the duration of the war.

My Uncle, Bill Jones, enlisted in the Navy with a friend the day after Pearl Harbor. He was a senior at Ballard High School. The picture below with my mom was probably taken when he returned in June, 1942, to graduate with his class before getting back on a ship.


Betty Echo Jones on leave in her dress uniform


Betty Echo Jones and her twin brother Bill, June, 1942

Betty Echo Jones Brummet stayed in school and graduated. After high school, she worked as a riveter (yes, the iconic Rosie) and later joined the Marine Corps, for the duration. When she joined the Marines, she followed in her father's footsteps. William Jennings Bryan Jones was a marine veteran of World War I. He signed up again in World War II, when he had to be at least forty.


John Newton Brummet, Jr. clowning in the army


John Newton Brummet, Jr. clowning in the navy
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Republican Family Values, part 26: Idaho GOP national committeeman Blake Hall loses job over stalking and lobbing used condoms on ex-girlfriend's lawn

By Pablo Fanque,
All This Is That Crime and Punishment editor

Blake Hall, a leader in Idaho GOP and national politics for almost 25 years, was fired Monday as deputy prosecuting attorney in eastern Idaho. He just resigned from the Republican National Committee. The former Idaho Board of Education member pleaded guilty last week to stalking his former girlfriend and is serving a two-week jail sentence. He also sentenced to a year of supervised probation. but for some reason, a six-month jail sentence was suspended.

On ten different days—Hall tossed semen-filled condoms onto his ex-girlfriend’s lawn. He had stalked her for half a year. His victim said, “I was so tired of being victimized. It is unimaginable that a 56-year-old would be so deviant.”

Between March and August this year, Hall often followed his victim to restaurants, movies and home. He ignored her repeated requests to be left alone, according to police records and court testimony.

The victim said Hall once followed her to a Walmart, and took her car keys until she agreed to “hear him out” concerning her marriage, according to the Idaho Falls Post Register.

Hall and his lawyer denied none of this. When he gets out of the hoosegow a couple weeks from now, he joins Ex-Senator Larry Craig in the unemployment line. And the Idaho Hall of Shame.
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Coach Sally Mangina? Dr. Dick Chopp, urologist? A website of unfortunately named professionals

Check it out here.

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Jack Brummet Self Portrait No. 47

click to enlarge

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An excellent instructional video: "Toward emotional maturity"

A wonderful instructional video in which a teenage girl reflects on episodes in which her love, fear, anger were not always under control. She decides not to go "park" with her boyfriend.


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Music video: The Band/Rick Danko's awesome lead vocals on It Makes No Difference

In a band with an amazing three lead singers, Rick Danko always held his own. Next to Stage Fright, this is probably my favorite Rick Danko tune, especially when you bring in Garth's horn solo...



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Poem: The Moon's In Tune

A parchment full moon
In a pale fog aurora
Struggles to clear the mountaintops tonight

The Sea of Tranquility
Flowers in the center
The moon's in tune

She leads the wolves in song
And turns the tide
Of earth's one great ocean

Down here we cured
Polio smallpox and Hitler
But we couldn't save the Dodo.
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A boy and his dog: Jack Brummet and Slugger

circa about 1955 - click to enlarge

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The Knickerbockers, one hit wonders and shameless Beatles imitators

The Knickerbockers were Jersey Boys, and one hit wonders (and, as such appeared on the Nuggets compilations). They sounded like a British invasion band in their top 20 hit in early 1966 with "Lies."

We mostly remember the tune today because it is so shamelessly derivative of early Beatles, down to the spot-on imitation of John Lennon... on the lead vocal and the Paul McCartney-style whoops ahead of the guitar solo and later in the song. I think we all liked the tune, because back then two Beatles albums a year just weren't enough.


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A Fiddling Robot

Stephen Clarke-Willson pointed this one out. It's not new, but pretty fascinating. The Toyota robot plays violin (Mendelssohn?).


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Nuggets from the British Invasion: Herman's Hermits, The Zombies, and The Kinks

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Eleven foot Bill Clinton

Ooops! Wrong statue!

Last weekend, hordes of Albanians collected in Pristina’s main square to welcome Bill Clinton, the guest of honor at a statue-unveiling ceremony. The Albanians put up the statue to commemorate President Clinton's role in the Yugoslavian war of 1999.

“I never expected that anywhere, someone would make such a big statue of me,” Clinton told the cheering crowd as he removed the cover, revealing a eleven foot bronze likeness of himself.

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All Kramer's entrances on Seinfeld captured in a six minute, seventeen second video

It must have taken forever to capture and then edit this video. In six-some minutes, the video shows every single entrance Kramer made over the course of The Seinfeld Show. This is a fascinating labor of love.



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Jack Brummet - Point: "Why I miss the polling place" Pablo Fanque - Counterpoint: "You're stuck in the 20th century"

Point
By Jack Brummet
All This Is That creative director

It may be a sign of impending or fully-arrived codgerhood, but I already miss the polling place. Washington State has largely replaced the voting booth with mail-in ballots. On "Election Day," you no longer walk around the block to your neighborhood church or elementary school. You lick a stamp and then drop your secure ballot envelope into a mailbox or in the slot at the library. Yesterday didn't even seem like election day, at least until they "closed the polls" and began announcing vote totals after 8 PM.

I don't get to see the poll workers anymore, with their sometimes Parkinson's-trembling hands and shakily applied make-up, or the retired AFL-CIO workers, older party foot-soldiers, and stay at home moms who staffed the voting place on election day. I no longer get to watch as they try four times to find me on the voter list, or have me spell my last name three times.

There are no flags hung on the wall at the mailbox. Our children won't get to see democracy in action as we roll up to the drive-in mailbox. The strange grey steel analog voting machines where you actually pulled down a lever are long gone. Now, the "Austrian ballot" voting booth with the stiff curtain is gone too. Exit polls and political signage lining the street to within 200 feet of the polling place have disappeared. I no longer get to see my neighbors, or meet new ones at our neighborhood polling place at Our Redeemer's Lutheran Church.

The polling place has disappeared like phone booths, writing letters, mail order catalogs, and soon, newspapers and magazines, record stores and bookstores. You rarely find politicians at the retail level anymore, eating sfogliatelle, knishes, and hot dogs, kissing babies, and asking about your wife, as they press the flesh for your vote.

Progress doesn't always feel like progress. I think I liked it a little more when you had to actually do something, like walk to your poll and sign in. Sitting at your kitchen table filling out a ballot will never seem like voting to me. Roll back the stone!



Counterpoint
By Pablo Fanque
All This Is That National Affairs Editor

Really, Jack? You may not be that wrong when you point to your fully arrived codgerhood. America outgrew the polling place years ago. You don't seem to have a problem embracing other areas of technology that have changed our lives.

Mail in ballots dramatically raise the number of people participating in elections, and eliminate the costs of maintaining thousands of polling places staffed with workers. Jack, you're stuck in the 20th century, and after nearly a decade, it's time to leap into Century 21. Get out your stamps and pen.

And. . .if you want to meet your neighbors, well, they have doorbells, don't they?
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A charmingly sweet video: I love xkcd

What a lovely and sweet video. We don't see enough of things like this on the interwebs. Boom de ah dah...

I Love xkcd from NoamR on Vimeo.

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Two new profile picture candidates

click to enlarge


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Seattle's Ravenna sinkhole, circa 1957

It was such a gnarly event, that even the New York Times covered the story - click to enlarge


click to enlarge

click to enlarge

In Seattle's tree-lined (at least it seems tree-lined to me, a boy from the logged-off Ballard forest) Ravenna neighborhood, a massive sinkhole opened up in November, 1957, and threatened to suck the whole neighborhood down to the 145 foot deep sewer tunnel buried below.

These photographs are courtesy of the Seattle Municipal Archives. At the time, this was the biggest sinkhole, ever in the United States. You can read more about it here.

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America at work

This sweet flowchart is from Projectsidewalk.com




click to enlarge
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Windows Memory Leak At SeaTac Airport

An arrival/departure board at SeaTac International Airport (Microsoft's home airport), today shows a Windows error message that it is running out of virtual memory.

It makes you hope that the air traffic control system does not also run on the Windows operating system. . .

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Twelve Mormon moms whip off their clothes for charity

Twelve Mormon moms have whipped off their clothes (sorta, kinda) to become pinups, and raise money for breast cancer research.

In the "Hot Mormon Muffins" calendar, a "Devout Dozen" moms share recipes and revealing glimpses of themselves in suggestive (sorta, kinda)poses. The calendars go for sixteen bucks, or roughly $1.33 a muffin.

"Miss May" sees no reason for her church to be upset. But it has clearly stirred up a little dust in the LDS community. "We're not all in a stereotype, we're not all the same. And I'm not a stereotypical Mormon for sure," Tami Roberts said (that's her holding the pan of muffins below).

She went on to say that this is not a breach of her faith, but a way to challenge the "misconceptions" of the Mormon Church. Her husband and two daughters approve. The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints may not.

One reason Ms. Roberts posed in the calendar is that Chad Hardy, the calendar's creator, was denied his diploma from BYU, and excommunicated by the church when he published a 2008 calendar called "Men on a Mission," featuring partially-nude Mormon men.



You can check out the calendars, or even buy one, here. They also have a fan page on Facebook.
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self portrait No. 48 - Jack Brummet digital art

click to enlarge
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Drunken Ewoks throw food, moonwalk, drink, dry hump Al Roker on Today show

Visit msnbc.com for Breaking News, World News, and News about the Economy

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