Handle with Care

In the local newspaper a couple weeks ago , the health columnist Lynda Shrager wrote Making whoopee restores body and mind -- honest. "Sex twice or more per week reduced the risk of fatal heart attack by half for men. Also, men who ejaculate frequently can decrease their risk of developing prostate cancer by, as the American Medical Association says, 'clearing out the pipes.'"

"Clearing out the pipes"?

Then I found this article, which reads: "In 2003, research on middle-aged Australian men found that those who averaged at least four ejaculations a week had a one-third lower chance of developing prostate cancer than those who had fewer. 'When you drain the pipes, as it were, you have less clogging,' says Irwin Goldstein, MD, head of sexual medicine at Alvarado Hospital."

Well, OK, then. As some of you know, my father died of prostate nine and a half years ago. While the general media touts those who have survived prostate cancer, I am reminded of those who did not. Here's a mixed list.

Unfortunately, thinking about pipes, a popular Irish tune came to mind. I can just imagine men wooing their significant others with the tune to "Danny Boy": "My darling dear, the pipes, the pipes are calling." You can substitute "My darling dear" with any four syllables of affection (darling, dear, dearest, lover), including the beloved's name. Or not. (The mind will go where the mind will go.)

Ms. Shrager talks about additional benefits of sex for men and women.
***
Oh, the pictures. I was looking for a visual for the F is for February post. So I went to the LIFE magazine archive, typed in the word February, and the picture above was captured. It's for Thayers Patent Medicine, and the picture was taken in February 1949 by George Silk. The bottom picture I found typing in the word Thayers in the LIFE photo archive.

Interestingly, the product, a slippery elm throat lozenge is still being produced, "Trusted by tenors, teachers, tour guides and other types who trill, talk and testify." Here's a positive review.


ROG

February Ramblin'

Cartoon by Dave Walker. Find more cartoons you can freely re-use on your blog at We Blog Cartoons.

Roger Ebert's Last Words, con't, commenting on the Esquire article (linked) and photo of him. "Resentment is allowing someone to live rent-free in a room in your head."

How the Somaly Mam Foundation is trying to help end human trafficking

Wayne John tells about the time when a Burger King employee threw a double cheeseburger at him. Lousy aim, too.

Gordon reveals Dymowski and DeNiro - together.

Lady Gaga or Johnny Weir? "Can you tell the difference between the pop princess’ outrageous outfits and the Olympic skating star’s flamboyant costumes without seeing their poker faces?" You Olympics watchers who see figure skating only once every four years have no idea...

Springsteen covers.

And SamuraiFrog has three recent pieces worthy of mention, about Kermit the Frog and friend,Christina Hendricks - no, I've never seen Mad Men, either - and a particular Super Bowl ad which also annoyed me. (Should note that, on the latter two pieces, his language is coarser than mine.)

This next section is graphic.

Western New York Legacy web site, www.wnylegacy.org, is freely available online, and contains thousands of digital images, documents, letters, maps, books, slides, and other items reflecting the rich cultural heritage of Western New York

Print & Photographs (P&P) online catalog: Some photos copyright free (and some not).

Rose DesRochers – World Outside my Window: Free Cartoons for Your Blog, two examples of which appear in this very post.




Courtesy of Past Expiry Cartoon

ROG

Things I Love on the Internet

* A new blog on the Oscars and Instant Runoff Voting -- http://oscarvotes123.blogspot.com/. Here's a post about the new voting system for Best Picture, written by the Chair of FairVote Board of Directors, Krist Novoselic.
* The last new Johnny Cash album, American VI: Ain't No Grave is being released on February 23, during what would have been his birthday week. Am buying, sound unheard, if I don't get for my birthday.
* Brian from Coverville turned me on to Deanne Iovan's mission, inspired by Julie & Julia, as well as the 09/09/09 Beatles' releases, of covering The Beatles’ White Album, track by track, putting out a new song every nine days. She just put out Julia, which is at the end of side two. (Side 2? Hey, I grew up with the vinyl version of this album.)
* 500 cartoons on life in biology research.
* The Business Librarians listserv helped me answer a question this week. Apparently the doohickey on the tops to plastic containers, where the grated cheese comes out, one side being a shaker while the other side you can use a teaspoon to dish it out, is called a spice lid or a dispensing closure.
* Valentine’s Day/Census tie-in campaign with a selection of electronic postcards in Spanish and English.
* New CPR on YouTube: Continuous Chest Compression CPR - Mayo Clinic Presentation, sent to me by a nurse friend of mine, who thinks it's terrific.
* A recent study outlines the health benefits of having more sex. CNN's Elizabeth Cohen has the details.
* My medical reimbursement company, only this week, has FINALLY decided to accept e-mailed PDFs, GIFs, etc. as well as mailing and faxes. This is particularly helpful since our fax at work does not seem to work. (When someone announced "Fax is dead!"", they weren't kidding.)
* Found several places: The Muppets: Beaker's Ballad - the Internet is SO mean.
* Thom Wade points to Hey! It's That Guy!? It's a page "dedicated to the character actors collectively known as 'That Guy'." Simon Oakland was one of the first ones I knerw by name as a kid.
* Betty White for host of SNL. My only problem is the notion that it's a resurgence; she never really left.
* Arthur@AmeriNZ found a video response to the Google Super Bowl ad done from a gay man’s POV.
* An old friend accidentally pushed some button that sent an email to EVERY address in her e-address book, which allowed us to reconnect. I've had a child and she's had two since we last communicated.
*Local school catches Olympic fever. "Events have included ring toss, rock climbing, hockey, boggle, hang man, reading comprehension, and math facts." I'll pick math facts.
* The 9th Annual Underground Railroad History Conference, Friday, February 26 at 8:30am through Sunday, February 28 at 2:00pm at Russell Sage College, Troy, NY, where I'll be one of many presenting on that Saturday. Register now!
ROG

1000 Cuts

Have a feeling that we just don't understand.

On a business librarians listserv I'm on, someone was seeking information about the expenditure of single women - the "Carrie Bradshaw" types. (That's a reference to the lead character in Sex in the City for you guys who poo-pooed the series' social significance.) Unbidden came these testimonials of women who went shopping for a new car or other large purchase with their father/husband/boyfriend, made it clear that the woman is the customer, and yet all the customer service people directed their attention to the man. In fact, one of the storyteller was the father, who notes that his daughter is the car nut and all he knows how to do is open the hood and sigh when something's not working. To a person, the purchase was not made.

There was a Snicker's ad in the UK that got axed as potentially homophobic. I can only imagine some people crying out, "it's only an advert," and that people are being "politically correct" or "don't have a sense of humor" or "how to you even know thee protagonist is supposed to be gay?" Well, I remember the Snickers Super Bowl ad where they toy with a "Brokeback moment", so I tend to be suspicious. The ad did bother me, especially the tagline, "get some nuts."

Disney is working on its first black princess. Imagine my ambivalence about THAT. But the vitriol that shows up in the comments, especially those of the "get over it, it's only a cartoon" variety, as though images don't matter I found profoundly disturbing and annoying.

I guess what I wish for is that people try to see things from a perspective that's not their own.
***
Someone on a Methodist listserv wrote this: "I get so much junk email from so-called 'friends' that I am a frequent user of snopes.com and truthorfiction.com. Unfortunately, when I confront these 'friends' with what I found out about the emails they have forwarded me, they act as if I have insulted their religion. Which
makes sense, because I have. The emails that they forward have become their religion.
Junk email has replaced whispering as the means of spreading false rumors. It is time for the Church to take a stand against this sort of thing. Sermon anyone?"
***
From my spam e-mail folder: "New reports show men are sex hungry".
Mingle2 - How Sexually Experienced Are You?21

ROG

July Ramblin'

There is this guy I see on the bus; saw him yesterday. He is what one would call in the vernacular unbalanced. Sometimes he talks to other people, but usually it's to himself, running down a bizarre checklist. In my professional building, I saw this woman walking towards me yesterday, also engaged in conversation. Initially, I thought she was talking to me, but then I surmised she was talking on one of those tiny communications devices.
Or was she?
***
There were only two TV shows on my summer schedule. No, The Greatest American Dog (or whatever it's called) is not one of them. The one running currently is the return of The Closer, so recent that when I saw my DVR trecording last night, I didn't remember why initially.
The other, I'll admit, was Million Dollar Password, now on hiatus. I loved the show with Allen Ludden, and still like it, but its real flaw is that no one in his or her right mind would ever go for the million dollars. To do that, one would have to have succeeded at the $250,000 level, which no one has done yet, then risk all but $25,000 of that to get five passwords out of five, with no errors, offering no more than three clues each.
***
If-Then Contingencies and the Differential Effects of the Availability of an Attractive Alternative on Relationship Maintenance for Men and Women (PDF)
Yes, this is heterocentric, but I SO love the title.
"Temptation may be everywhere, but it’s how the different sexes react to flirtation that determines the effect it will have on their relationships. In a new study, psychologists determined men tend to look at their partners in a more negative light after meeting a single, attractive woman. On the other hand, women are likelier to work to strengthen their current relationships after meeting an available, attractive man."
***
I love adjectival forms of place names. a person from Albania is an Albanian. A person from Albany is also an Albanian. Make of that what you will.
***
Another canard foiled:
Evidence Shows That Tax Cuts Lose Revenue from the Center on Budget and Policy Priorities
"The claim that tax cuts 'pay for themselves' — i.e., cause so much economic growth that revenues rise faster than they would have without the tax cut — has been made repeatedly in recent years and is one of the many tax policy issues that is likely to receive renewed attention in light of the upcoming election. As explained, this claim is false. The evidence shows clearly that tax cuts lose revenue."
***
Interesting Scientific Experiment
***
I'll probably see The Dark Knight at some point. It's only playing at least 12 screens in the county. My wife wants to see it, mostly because her high school kids will likely have seen it and she wants to keep up on their influences. Question: Do I need to, or ought I, see Batman Begins before seeing The Dark Knight? Lots of positive reviews, so I'm more interested in the negative ones, such as this one and this one, the latter with 300+ comments, most of them not appreciative of the reviewer's POV. There's also this mixed review in Salon; of particular note to me is the first starred comment.
***
I saw this a couple months ago: Wedding Album [IMPORT] by Yoko Ono and John Lennon.
I own this on vinyl, that is the first two, album-side-long cuts. #1 is Yoko saying "John!" then John replying "Yoko!" sometimes talking, sometimes yelling, for about 25 minutes. #2 is an interview and is at least interesting.
Add-ons #3, #4 and #5 are B-sides of Instant Karma, Merry Xmas, and Cold Turkey, respectively, performed by Yoko. Heck, why not add Remember Love and Sisters O Sisters, other Lennon B-sides done by Ono?
1. John & Yoko
2. Amsterdam
3. Who Has Seen the Wind? [*] - John Lennon & Yoko Ono, John Lennon & the Plastic Ono Band, Yoko Ono
4. Listen, the Snow Is Falling [*]
5. Don't Worry, Kyoko (Mummy's Only Looking for Her Hand in the Snow) [*]
In any case, at $76, no way in heck do I buy this.

ROG

May Ramblin'

Black Television News Channel (BTNC) announced plans to launch the nation’s first all-news cable network dedicated to the African American community. That was sort of interesting; more intriguing to me was this: "Based in Washington, D.C., BTNC is the creation of J.C. Watts, the former Republican congressman from Oklahoma." I figured that if Hillary Clinton somehow won the Democratic nomination, and I suppose it could still happen, the Republicans would counter by putting a black conservative Republican on the ticket. Actually, I was specifically thinking J.C. Watts. Guess that's not going to happen.

Speaking of McCain, take the Bush-McCain Challenge, an online quiz to see if you can tell the difference between George W. Bush and John McCain.

And, as I said, Hillary's not dead yet, but the funeral's been planned: In Loving Memory of the Hillary for President Campaign.

Is everybody happy? Well, no, and age, gender and race seem to be factors. I suppose a story like this - E-Mail Shows Racial Jokes by Secret Service Supervisors - while disturbing, doesn't fill me with as much outrage as it used to, maybe because I'm less surprised than I used to be. I appreciate whimsy more, e.g. Czech crash victim wakes up speaking English. And maybe I can laugh a little at myself more. This is a thread for label suggestions for a homebrew called Old Librarian Ale. BTW, I am NOT responsible for the content. The NSFW item (clearly labeled within) REALLY is NSFW.

So always remember, and never forget: Nothing is more dangerous than a wounded mosquito.



ROG

Sex, drugs and politics QUESTION

Here's a promise for you: I'm never running for elective political office. You never know what skeletons, or even perceived skeletons, might pop up. Well, maybe when I'm 70, when I will be able to honestly say, "I don't remember" when asked about my presumably sordid past.

I'm thinking about this because New York's NEW governor, David Paterson, is caught up in some sexual infidelity. Truth is, I don't much care because it's none of my business, and, unlike his predecessor, "I'm a f***ing steamroller" Spitzer, he hadn't set the morals bar so high that his affairs are major disappointments. Mostly because most people outside of Albany didn't even know who David Paterson was until a little over a week ago. In any case, he's likely to survive this politically because he would be succeeded by the Senate Majority Leader, who is a REPUBLICAN, Joe Bruno.

This begs the questions:
1) How much of a person's personal life should be open to the public when he or she is considering running for public office?
2) How far does one get to dig about someone's history and place as relevant? I recall that GWB said some years ago that he had not done certain drugs (cocaine, I believe) in the previous 25 years, answered in such a way that it suggested that perhaps he HAD used it earlier than that. As much as I dislike GWB politically - and I mean a WHOLE lot - I don't much care about an old drug bust.
ROG

Mondo meme

The groupings or levels are practically random. Jaquandor did it, but dropped some questions. I went back to Samauri Frog's post and took all the questions, masochist that I am.

Level 1
(x) Smoked a cigarette.
() Smoked a cigar.
(x) Kissed a member of the same sex.
(x) Drank alcohol.

I've probably smoked 25 cigarettes in my life, a plurality of them in the early part of 1977 when I was living in Charlotte, NC with my parents for four months. They used to sell stuff (costume jewelry, knickknacks) with others at these craft fairs. I didn't really fit in. I was an effete snob from the North who used words of more than two syllables. I tried smoking, which most of them did, to try to fit in; didn't work. (I'll say that Charlotte is much better now.)

I was in a production of Boys in the Band in May 1975 in Binghamton, which involved greeting someone at a party with a kiss.

Level 2
(x) Are/been in love.
(x) Been dumped.
(x) Shoplifted.
() Been fired.
(x) Been in a fist fight.

Most recently (late 1990s) dumped by e-mail.
Shoplifted gum when I was eight or nine; got caught; mortification.
I've been in about five fist fights, but it was almost always brought to me.

Level 3
(x) Had a crush on an older person.
(x) Skipped school.
(x) Slept with a classmate.
(x) Seen someone/something die.

Heck, went out with a couple of older persons.
I had perfect attendance from 3rd to 11th grade. Senioritis then struck.

Level 4
() Had/have a crush on one of your friends who is now on Facebook.
() Been to Paris.
() Been to Spain.
(x) Been on a plane.
(x) Thrown up from drinking.

At a party drinking Polish vodka, feeling very lucid. Ran out, switch to some Johnny Walker something, got drunk and sick in about two minutes. Lesson: don't mix alcohol.

Level 5
(x) Eaten sushi.
() Been snowboarding.
() Met someone BECAUSE of Facebook.
() Been in a mosh pit.

Don't really LIKE sushi. My wife does.

Level 6
(x) Been in an abusive relationship.
(x) Taken pain killers.
(x) Love/loved someone who you can’t have.
(x) Laid on your back and watched cloud shapes go by.
(x) Made a snow angel.

In high school, I had this father confessor role, where people, mostly female, would tell me their problems. One young woman told me about her boyfriend problems; I had a massive crush on her, but never let that show.

Level 7
(x) Had a tea party.
(x) Flown a kite.
(x) Built a sand castle.
() Gone mudding (offroading).
(x) Played dress up.

I had two sisters; of course, I played dress up.

Level 8
(x) Jumped into a pile of leaves.
() Gone sledging.
() Cheated while playing a game.
(x) Been lonely.
(x) Fallen asleep at work/school.

I don't recall cheating in a game, unless you mean throwing it to a three-year old.

Level 9
(x) Watched the sun set.
(x) Felt an earthquake.
() Killed a snake.

There have been at least two earthquakes that one could feel in upstate NY. The last time, I thought a huge, overweight truck must be rumbling down the street.

Level 10
(x) Been tickled.
(x) Been robbed/vandalized.
(x) Been cheated on.
(x) Been misunderstood.

I've lost baseball cards, LPs, my coin collection, a boom box, a half dozen bicycles. And that's without really thinking about it.

Level 11
(x) Won a contest.
() Been suspended from school.
(x) Had detention.
(x) Been in a car/motorcycle accident.

I won a racquetball tournament in 1989.

Level 12
() Had/have braces.
(x) Eaten a whole pint of ice cream in one night.
(x) Danced in the moonlight.

The ice cream was undoubtedly related to affairs of the heart.

Level 13
(x) Hated the way you look.
(x) Witnessed a crime.
() Pole danced.
(x) Questioned your heart.
() Been obsessed with post-it-notes.

Called the police on some jerk hitting a woman.

Level 14
(x) Squished barefoot through the mud.
(x) Been lost.
() Been to the opposite side of the world.
(x) Swam in the ocean.
(x) Felt like you were dying.

I liked swimming at Jones Beach on Long Island when i was a kid, and in the Caribbean when Carol and I went to Barbados in 1999.

I thought I'd die on a mountain in Utah in 1994.

Level 15
(x) Cried yourself to sleep.
(X) Played cops and robbers.
(X) Recently colored with crayons/colored pencils/markers.
() Sang karaoke.
(x) Paid for a meal with only coins.

Broke in Schenectady, 1978 - talking about nickel and diming someone. And I paid the tip with a check, because I didn't have enough change.

Level 16
(x) Done something you told yourself you wouldn’t.
() Made prank phone calls.
() Laughed until some kind of beverage came out of your nose.
(x) Kissed in the rain.

Done something...more than once.

Level 17
(x) Written a letter to Santa Claus.
(x) Watched the sun set/sun rise with someone you care/cared about.
(x) Blown bubbles.
(x) Made a bonfire on the beach or anywhere.

I love blowing bubbles. I find it to be a great stress reliever.

Level 18
() Crashed a party.
() Have traveled more than 5 days with a car full of people.
(x) Gone rollerskating/blading.
(X) Had a wish come true.
() Slept with a member of the same sex.

Never was very good at rollerskating, or ice skating, for that matter.

Level 19
(X) Worn pearls.
() Jumped off a bridge.
() Screamed "penis" or "vagina".
() Swam with dolphins.

When I was a kid, used to wear my mother's. They probably weren't real pearls.

Level 20
() Got your tongue stuck to a pole/freezer/ice cube.
() Kissed a fish.
(x) Worn the opposite sex’s clothes.
(x) Sat on a roof top.

Halloween, 1978.

Level 21
(x) Screamed at the top of your lungs.
() Done/attempted a one-handed cartwheel.
(x) Talked on the phone for more than six hours (in one day).
(x) Recently stayed up for a while talking to someone you care about.

Talking on the phone with my sisters.

Level 22
(x) Picked and ate an apple right off the tree.
(x) Climbed a tree.
(x) Had/been in a tree house.
(x) Been scared to watch scary movies alone.

I always wished I had had a treehouse.

Level 23
(x) Believed in ghosts.
(x) Have had more than thirty pairs of shoes (not necessarily all at once).
(x) Gone streaking.
(x) Visited jail.

Well, if you count sneakers...

Not only did I visit a jail (friend Alice in May 1972), I WORKED in a jail as a janitor (summer 1975) and visited Greenhaven prison in the early 1970s.

Level 24
(x) Played chicken.
() Been pushed into a pool with all your clothes on.
() Been told you’re hot by a complete stranger.
() Broken a bone.
(x) Been easily amused.

I can still be easily amused by things no one else gets.

Level 25
() Caught a fish then ate it later.
() Made a porn video.
(x) Caught a Butterfly.
(x) Laughed so hard you cried.
(x) Cried so hard you laughed.

Laughing and crying - always reminds me of the actors' muses.

Level 26
() Mooned/flashed someone.
(x) Had someone moon/flash you.
(x) Cheated on a test.
(x) Forgotten someone’s name.
(x) French braided someone’s hair.
(x) Gone skinny dipping.
(x) Been kicked out of your house.
() Tried to hurt yourself.

Cheated on a bio test in 9th grade. Didn't work for me.

Level 27
(x) Rode a roller coaster.
(x) Went scuba-diving/snorkeling.
(x) Had a cavity.
() Blackmailed someone.
() Been blackmailed.

When I was a kid, we loved rollercoasters. I'd ride with my sister Leslie, my father would ride with my sister Marcia. My mom would hold our glasses; the great fear was that they'd somehow fly off.

Level 28
(x) Been used.
(x) Fell going up the stairs.
() Licked a cat.
(x) Bitten someone.
(x) Licked someone - not in private places.

Haven't we all been used at some point?

Level 29
() Been shot at/or at gunpoint.
() Had sex in the rain.
() Flattened someone’s tires.
(x) Rode your car/truck until the gas light came on.
(x) Got five dollars or less worth of gas.

But I've seen someone else flatten someone's tires because the driver was taking up two parking spaces. This was a matter of "justice".

ROG

"The Line" QUESTIONS

Wrestling Boxing Day, I'm coming out of a convenience store. A young woman is coming in, so I hold the door open for her. A young man, coming from a different direction, follows her in, saying "Ummm, sexy THAT!"

This led me to posit several questions:
1) Was he talking to her, or more to the universe at large?
2) Was she offended, delighted or what? (I was waiting for a bus, and I could have gone and asked her, but thought the better of it.)
3) Does that kind of line actually work on some people?

I never had a "line", as far as I am aware. Sometimes I would do stuff (throw peanuts in someone's beer, play air guitar), but smooth talking, I didn't do.

So, I'd like you to answer question #3 above (and #1 and/or #2, if you have some insight). Additionally, I'd be interested in what kind of lines you've tried, and whether any of them actually worked.

I'm interested to know your gender, approximate age, and sexual orientation to see if it differs.
***
a guy I know and his brothers singing in three-part harmony.

ROG

Let's Talk About Sex

A couple guys at the gym were talking about a recent Oprah show featuring Doctor Oz, who promotes living longer, and feeling younger through a variety of some familiar ideas, and some not so common ones.

From Oprah's website:
Question 10: According to Dr. Oz, how often should you have sex?
A) Once a week
B) Twice a week
C) 10 times a month
D) 200 times a year or more

My compatriots were pleased to discover that the correct answer is D.

"If you have more than 200 orgasms a year, you can reduce your physiologic age by six years," Dr. Oz says. He bases the number on a study done at Duke University that surveyed people on the amount and quality of sex they had. "They looked at what happened to folks that are having a lot of intercourse over time, and the fact is, it correlated." For you math-deprived folks, that's four times a week.

Among the benefits of having sex often, Dr. Oz says, is that it can prove that your body is functioning as it is supposed to. "But in addition, having sex with someone that you care for deeply is one of the ways we achieve that Zen experience that we all crave as human beings," he says. "It's really a spiritual event for folks when they're with someone they love and they can consummate it with sexual activity … seems to offer some survival benefit."

So, it's not the act of sex as exercise that will help one lose weight - one only expends an average of 25 calories. It is that satisfying one appetite center of your brain (desire for sex) can help satisfy another (desire for food).

I wonder if any of my buddies made a point to mention this when they got home?
***
I come across all sorts of things that I consider for my blog here. But then the internal censor kicks in, and I don't use them, not because it offends me, but because I wonder if it might offend you.

For instance, I came across this story some time ago about a condom fashion show in China, designed to get more Chinese to use prophylactics. I wasn't sure it was even real until I saw stories such as the one here. Still, I let it go until I read stories posted by Rose, a good, respectable blogger, about velvet vulva purses and Japan's penis festival, the latter an ancient tradition which currently raises money for AIDS education.
***
Speaking of condoms, the magazine Ad Age has been chastising television the past couple weeks. For while there are more sexual acts on TV, there are still major restrictions on advertising condoms. One of the articles can be found here.
***
At the website/podcast Quick and Dirty Tips for a More Lawful Life, Legal Lad(TM) discusses all sorts of useful information, including Plea Withdrawal (see Larry Craig) and Nudity in Public Places.
***
I came across the ill-named Hornitos. Somebody was paid good money to come up with that brand name?

ROG

Next Post QUESTION

I'm curious how you folks who look at other blogs actually find them. Initially, I went through the links of the handful of bloggers I knew then, but I soon found a certain redundancy of common sites.

So, my favorite thing to do became using the Next Blog feature on the Blogger sites. However, I've been trying it recently and finding it increasingly unsatisfactory. I keep finding, every fourth or fifth hit, a sex site. And not just a sex site, but one site nearly identical in spite of mild permutations. It's always a white background with a title of the video, which may be fairly innocuous - "David Beckham's first MLS goal". But on the right is a list of:
Related Top Posts that include - and I've eliminated more than a few:
# PAMELA ANDERSON AND JENNA JAMESON BOTH IN ONE SCENE!!!!(772)
# Sexy Chopper Biker Girls Naked(708)
# hot girls part 3 - the russian(445)

Of course, the non-sex sites I find are uneven. Either, I can't understand the language or it contains information such as: "Well let me just say this, Zac Efron totally hotty! Danngg!" What's a Zac Efron? (OK, I DO know about High School Musical.)

I do find some interesting places, but, where it used to take me about 10 minutes to find three commentable sites via Next Blog, now it takes a half hour, because among other things, the porn sites have disabled the Next Post button, so I have to go back before going forward. (They've also taken out the Flag Blog feature, not surprisingly - is there a way to report them to Blogger some other way?)

So, as I asked initially, what do YOU do to seek out new sites?
***
And speaking of Disney and sex, Mark Evanier, writing about the demise of a Disney digest, writes: Once upon a time, Playboy sold seven million copies per issue and now it sells three million. This is not because of a declining male interest in beautiful nude women or because the women aren't as beautiful or as nude as they used to be. The phraseology, for whatever reason, cracked me up.
***
Geico Uncovers Secrets About Flintstones, Clampetts - the commercials will almost certainly be better than the upcoming Caveman series.
***
Starting this Monday: Changes in the comic strip For Better or Worse.
***
Two guys named Ken:
Levine - and his readers - on movie theater etiquette (or the lack of same)
Jennings (August 30) on separated at birth
***
I had asked who won the Democratic debate in Iowa on ABC-TV's This week a couple weeks ago. I got five voters, four of whom picked Dennis Kucinich, and one who selected Barack Obama.
***
Karl Rove and now Alberto Gonzalez are both gone, and I'm not feeling the happiness I thought I would. It's like the letdown I got when I would rehearse for a choir piece or a play; the event would go off well, but I'd be left with a mild melancholy. At least now I know why they left when they did.

ROG

I Have Been Tosyed AND Coshed

"Here you are Roger," said Tosy and Cosh. Questions carefully crafted for my consumption.

1. Which of your daughter's innumerable wondrous traits and abilities makes you smile the most?

Her desire to be helpful. It'll serve her well in life for her to be outwardly thinking. That picture of her bringing the newspaper from last week - she does that all the time, even the heavy Sunday version; this week, she helped with the garbage.

2. Where stand you on the question of libraries filtering the Internet on their public computers, to protect kids?

I prefer actual people doing it. So many of those software programs filter useful information: BREAST cancer, SEX education, ASS (as in donkey)...well, you get the idea. (Hey, if I put those words in my labels, what bizarro traffic will I get?)

3. You must (not can, but are forced to) eliminate one musical genre from the face of the earth. Which is it?

I don't really hate it, but I heard way too much of it growing up in Binghamton, NY. So, reluctantly, it'd have to be polka music.

4. Who is the most underrated actor working today?

I never know how to answer that question, because its definition is so sketchy.
The first person who came to mind was Tobey Maguire, who had a good, varied career, but will probably be best best known as a human arachnid.
But I guess I'll say Jeffrey Wright on the theory that anyone who's primarily a stage actor will be largely overlooked by the general public. I've liked him in everything I've seen him in: "Basquiat", "Broken Flowers", "The Manchurian Candidate" remake, and the TV version of "Angels in America".

5. What job do you wish you had?

I heard about a job just this week in the MPAA library that I'd love. Of course, that would mean moving across the country. I'd like to write questions for JEOPARDY!, but that's on the other coast as well. More likely, working at the Baseball Hall of Fame. However, if Gladys Knight needs another Pip, I'm there.

Oh, and I'm supposed to offer to do questions for your blogs again.
***
When Jaquandor was busy dissing Albany, more or less at my request, he did say nice things about the band Hair of the Dog. In this Times Union article, Rick Bedrosian, the founding bassist of Hair of the Dog, "the popular Irish band that has been packing houses around the Capital Region and beyond for 15 years" is asked five questions. He is leading a Magical Mystery Tour of Beatles' historical sites November 10-16; it costs around $2K. He also has a movie podcast that I think is worth listening to, and I discovered he used to go out with the ubiquitous Rachael Ray, and still thinks of her fondly.

ROG

Too Darn Hot

I was away this past weekend, which I'll tell you about soon, so I wanted to get some piece done last Thursday for today. I even had a couple topics picked out to write about, such as this story about a 42-year old female high school teacher who apparently had sex with a 16 year old and 17 year old boy, and how some of the national press has salactiously pounced on it as though it were national news. I think they're looking for the next Mary Kay Letourneau.

Unfortunately it was too darn hot to write (the weather, not the story). After decent conditions last weekend, the hot and humid weather has returned. There have been 13 days over 90 this summer, and 2 of them were last week.

Not only that, the power went off (again) Thursday afternoon for 45 minutes. At 7 pm, it was 88 at the Albany airport and 85 in our living room.

Unrelated to the weather, but relavant to blog posting, I had found some material that just needed typing, but it has since gone missing, tempoarily (I hope).

So, I'm going to keep it short and share with you my favorite summer song. I think it's the way this "royal" man says "beer." And I don't even LIKE beer.

SING ALONG!

More Sunday Random Meanderings

Day o' rest:

RELIGION

I was reading my parents-in-law's Guidepost magazine (March 2005) when I came across the name Len Wein. He was described as a "comic book writer and creator of the new X-Men." I don't have the magazine, but Googling, I found this quote attributed to him: "A friend is someone who is there for you when he'd rather be anywhere else."

I saw spray-painted on the wall of a church parking lot last weekend: "Blinded by Patriotism, Silenced by the Dollar."

On a church sign on Route 28 between Oneonta and Cooperstown: "There's no point being a pessimist, because it won't work anyway."

TRUTH

A radio talk show pundit said on the air that he thought that the reference of Karl Rove as Turd Blossom in Doonesbury was verisimilitude, when in fact W actually DOES call Rove Turd Blossom.
Verisimilitude. I love that word.

Someone recently turned me on to the The Borowitz Report. Where else could you read:
July 28, 2005 KIM JONG-IL DEMANDS IPOD
Latest Twist in Nuke Talks Raises Eyebrows, Concerns
July 27, 2005 DEBRIS FALLS OFF CHENEY
Scientists Study Videotape of Vice President Disintegrating
July 24, 2005 SWIFT BOAT VETS MISS ATTACKING KERRY
Life Without Negative Ads Devoid of Meaning, Vets Complain
July 21, 2005 ROBERTS PROMISES STRICTER CONTROLS ON FOUR-YEAR-OLD SON
Child’s Rampage Through D.C. Prompts Nominee’s Conservative Stance
July 18, 2005 NEW HARRY POTTER BOOK DESTROYS PRECIOUS RAINFOREST
652-Page Tome Ignites Ecological Catastrophe, Sierra Club Warns
Of course, these are "humorous" stories, but they COULD be true! They have verisimilitude!

These postcards ARE supposed to be true.

SEX

I went on a "next blog" meanering. Usually, they're new sites that pop up, but this week I came across the blog of Marshall Brain. He is the founder of one of my favorite websites, How Stuff Works. He has some insights into porn. And it's clean! Honest!

NOT CLEAN: One of my least favorite people is U.S. Senator Rick Santorum. The readers of sex columnist Dan Savage came up with a new term, and they named it after the junior senator from Pennsylvania. You may find it crude, but it seems to have caught on.

SCIENCE & TECHNOLOGY

I saw this on a news program, and then Brother IH sent me the info:
Store the word " I C E " in your mobile phone address book and against it enter the number of the person you would want to be contacted "In Case of Emergency".
In an emergency situation, ambulance and hospital staff will then be able to quickly find out who your next of kin are and be able to contact them.

Remember that Mars is getting closer. If the Martians are going to launch the invasion, this would be a good time.

Blogger Greg seems to think the current President isn’t all that bright. I mean he REALLY thinks W is dumb. I don’t know how he could say such a thing. Just last month, he acknowledged that global warming exists and that it is at least partially a function of human behavior, only a year after his own administration had reached that conclusion, and only several years after just about everyone else had.
So this is what I’m trying to figure out:
If global warming is human-made,
and if global warming heats the oceans,
and since hurricanes thrive on warmer waters,
so that more hurricanes will occur,
are hurricanes still acts of God or, increasingly, acts of human insensitivity to our environment?

Which takes me back to
RELIGION, which is where I started this.