Unwanted Commentary

I love Guinness ever since my first sip from a plastic cup at a reinissance fair. The thick head and deep black color just...the hearty taste and the unique feeling that it gives you after your first pint.

And I understand that everyone has a right to enjoy Guinness, but I can't help buy cry a little now that it seems Guinness is getting so well known...dare I say trendy. There's a Guinness truck (like the common Bud truck...sad), I see t-shirts all the time, almost every bar serves it...but doesn't pour it correctly. And the whole 6 pack now...it was so much cooler to buy it in those nifty 4 pack pint cans. Not that I don't like the bottles...their nice and I buy them...but I miss those days where I felt like a rebel drinking a quirky beer...ah well...I still get the pleasure of my wife and friends always saying they don't see how I can drink that stuff.

I remember one time I complained at a bar for not pouring my pint right...the dude got offended, but sadly when I took him up on his offer to let me come around the bar and do it myself he wouldn't let me....loser. So I had to suffer with his crappy pour.

And you know...its not that a pour has to be perfect...but damnit part of the fun of ordering a Guinness is getting a special pour...I'm not sure if it acutally does anything...I just appreciate the effort...the showmanship so to speak.

My favorite pub...the Emerald Mist...God rest her soul...had the best bartender...Jet always went through the proper procedure, he even claimed to have been trained by the Guinness man himself...but he could never ever do it without leaving a bubble in the head...but I loved it all the same....those were the days....8 pints and Irish music, familiar faces and damn good shepards pie with all the soda bread i could eat.

Posted by Jeff at 08:23 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

You know, I like to think I talk about things that are important here or at least make you think. Perhaps that's a far cry from reality, but I like to think it so please don't disillusion me.

It troubles me a little that more than 75% of the comments I've gotten here are for the dirty smilies that someone made for Yahoo Messanger. A while back I posted something about them amidst some useless drivel and I've gotten so many emails aobut them that I've taken the drastic step and delted the entry.
I'm sure my hits are going to go down, and in a way that saddens me. To counter it I'm considering putting a lot of commonly searched for terms in my blogs so that I get more hits. Things like HOT LESBIAN CATHOLIC SCHOOL GIRLS PICTURES XXX SEX or something of that nature. I'm not sure if I want to take such a low step though...but who knows.

:nonono

Posted by Jeff at 08:10 PM | Permalink | Comments (1)

I'm a little troubled by the fact that President Bush is saying that we might not find WMD in Iraq. Umm...why did we go over there then? Sure we freed the Iraqi people from an oppresive regime, that's all well and good, but it wasn't the reason that this whole ball of wax got going. It was about the WMD and both Pres. Bush and PM Blair got up and said point blank that they did...AND that they had proof of it. So...ummm...where they telling us a lie?

I like and want to trust people, even more so with our President. One of my problems with Clinton is that I felt I couldn't really trust what he was doing and now Bush is headed the same way in my book. The situation, to me, is that this means Germany, France, Russian and the rest of the anti-war group are essentially right.

I feel let down by all of this. It isn't in my nature to trust politicians, I always say I have liberal thoughts, but conservative actions. I went out on a limb to support the President, gave him trust and faith that this situation with Iraq was one that we needed to take care of or else there were going to chemical/biological and/or nuclear weapons getting into the hands of terrorist.

As of this point, unless something changes, I will quite possibly vote against President Bush in the next election...and that means something since I don't vote.

Posted by Jeff at 08:27 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Wow, I haven't blogged in a long time.
Honestly...I've been playing Hearts of Iron at work and since I do all my blogging from work...well...it just hasn't been happening.
That and I've just gotten tired of commenting on all this war stuff and the different groups throwing shit around.

So I'm just going to play Hearts of Iron :smile

GO STARS!!!!!!!!

Posted by Jeff at 11:25 PM | Permalink | Comments (1)

There has been a lot of commentary by those in the entertainment industry, from actors and actresses to film makers and sports stars. There has been a lot of commentary on that commentary and the reciprocal commentary on that commentary. There's been a lot of name calling and defensive posturing as well. I'm one who has had a hard time dealing with the remarks that a lot of celebrities are making that are anti-war, anti-American or anti-Bush. This was based primarily on the annoyance factor and nothing more than I disliked people using their privileged access to TV to spout their opinions to a large audience. But as I thought about it last night I began to expand on my original opinion.

First off, the wide umbrella of that defines celebrity includes individuals who are among the most financially rewarded in the history of mankind. I haven't looked up the numbers, but I'm sure if you were to look up the total gross dollars generated from the industry as a whole it would rival the GNP of small nations. If the members of this sect would like to effect change in the world they could start by taking the enormous profits they garner for making a film or recording a record and instead of spending it on themselves distribute it amongst the needy. Sure, there are plenty of celebrities that donate liberally to charities and do volunteer work, but I don't see them giving up one ounce of the privileged lifestyle they lead. Maybe instead of the custom gown for the awards show they could send my future kids to college or instead of the new mansion they could pay off the debt of several middle class families (who work every day mind you).

I also find irksome that celebrities regularly sound off on issues as if from some other worldly mountain of wisdom. That, because they are celebrities and make more money than most of us ever will, they must know what is best for us, the nation and the world at large. Should I even have to remind us all that these are amongst the most morally corrupt and twisted group on the planet? They afford every luxury and favored status for no other reason than that they can pretend to be someone else really well and fool us into believe something their not. Drugs and alcohol abuse, the money to cover it up is just the tip of the iceberg. The drive to celebrity status draws in thousands if not millions of wannabes, but only a few ever make it to the elevated status that the most vocal pundits seem to come from.

Continuing on the trail of moral depravity and pretending to be what you aren't, Hollywood regularly glamorizes all manner of society's ill effects. You've easily got the endorsement of smoking tobacco products or worse, all manner of sexual depravity and flippant life styles. One could go on and on, but I think we've all heard this song and dance before.

How you feel about it depends on your point-of-view and situation. I think my biggest beef is simply that a group of people who have prospered beyond any reasonable measure by the American way of life and culture, which in turn was allowed by the American government, just don't hold a lot of guff with me. Why is it that these groups of people who have benefited the most from America are some of its largest opponents?

This article sort of lost steam as I went along, I was trying to look up numbers, but trying to juggle work, writting and listening to the war developments I kind of lost track.

Posted by Jeff at 09:34 AM | Permalink | Comments (2)

We spent most of last week with the in-laws after spending two days at my parent's house playing X-box and relaxing. At the in-laws we engaged in redecorating my mother-in-law's upstairs bathroom and while it wasn't complete torture, it wasn't a lot of fun. It was my expectation that the in-laws, my wife and I would all work on this project together, unfortunately I was mistaken. The wife and I did the bulk of the work removing old wall paper and then painting, the wife had the bulk of the bulk and I felt for her. The in-laws weren't completely unhelpful with the project and they did feed us pretty well, but I still couldn't help but feeling that they didn't contribute as much as we would have liked. I take some satisfaction, though, that they were forced to finish up the end details after we ran out of time and had to come back home.

One side effect of being at the in-laws most of the week was watching the continuous war coverage on Fox News and CNN. We don't have cable at home so we're limited to the local news stations. I was not only impressed with how long they were able to drag out the same stories over and over again, but also how addictive it was to watch it. The headlines that came out on Wednesday were still being played on Saturday with little or no new information, but they were enthusiastically displayed as breaking news and reported with vigor. This seems to be the case with most of the media covering the war and it makes me think that the military is now closely watching what information gets sent out.

I find the variations and inaccuracies in media coverage frustrating, though it may be the media's zeal to get stories out as quickly as possible that is the source of frustration. I appreciate the effort to keep us updated on the events in Iraq and I believe I understand why they do it, but I'm beginning to think that I would appreciate accuracy over speed. The fight for the Baghdad International airport was a good example as confusing reports poured in for hours over the status of the battle. Anchor people were reporting that we had "complete control" or that the airport had fallen and U.S. troops were securing the area. While all of this was in some parts true, it all seemed somewhat pointless in the end when they finally spoke to a ground commander on sight and he filled us in on the details. Another example is the supposed chemical agents that were reported with much ballyhoo yesterday that might turn out to be pesticides

Perhaps this is just the reality of the news media in our age. With so many news channels to choose from they have to compete with each other, and no matter what anyone says ratings do matter. I can't even say that I would watch a station that was slower to report, but more accurate when they did. Of course, as far as I know, that isn't an option.

Posted by Jeff at 09:54 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)