But I Digress ...

They say, "Winning isn't everything," and boy, is that true. This Sunday, a win would absolutely suck cauliflower. Allow me to explain. The greatest player since the last Greatest Player. There's a running back at USC named Reggie Bush. He just won the Heisman Trophy as the nation's best collegiate player ... as a junior . Even if you're not a football fan, you have probably heard the names Jim Brown, Gale Sayers and Earl Campbell. Well, Reggie Bush is supposed to be better than at least one of them. Based on potential, Bush could be one of the best running backs of all time. Meanwhile, there's a football team in Houston that has been the worst NFL team this season. The worst team in football one year gets to choose the first player in the following year's draft. The Texans are 2-13 with one week to go, and possess the the worst won-loss record in the league. If the season ended today, the Texans would get the first pick, and could sure use Bush. Bu...

On BlogExplosion , there is a very poor (but usually-functional) "chat room" device called the Shout Box. When I first got involved with the Gang O' Bloggers in the Shout Box, the very first person to welcome me with open arms (and the very first person to tell me how sexy my photo made me look) was Angie. So I owe her, big time. Angie's got kids, and a blog . That's usually a deadly combination. But don't be frightened. Angie also has a sense of humor, and frequently writes about things other than her kids. How many "mommy blogs" would also point out how a Spiderman game joystick actually looks like Spiderman's ... oh, shall we say, Levitra-enhanced body part? This is a mommy blog for those of us who hate mommy blogs. Angie's blog, "Ficken Chingers", is this week's blog renter. I strongly encourage you to click here and pay her a visit ... right after you finish reading my pieces of cr-- er, my pearls of wisdom .

As Kyle Broflovski of South Park sang, "It's hard to be a Jew at Christmas." But it's not impossible. The Wife, being from a family of the American religious majority, dragged my happy ass down to spend the day with her clan, to celebrate the birth of Our Lord and Savior by opening too many presents, eating too much meat, and drinking too much spiked eggnog. Since the Jewish calendar doesn't really have a holiday designed around presents and eggnog, Christmas Day seems as good a time as any for me to get with the program. (By sheer coincidence, this year Hanukkah -- or Chanukah or Hannukah or Chanuko or Chaka Khan, or however you spell it -- began at sundown on December 25th. But despite the "eight days for eight presents" theme that many American Jewish families have bestowed upon Hanukkah, our "Festival of Lights" is actually a fairly minor holiday, as Jewish holidays go. The gift-giving is mostly an attempt to keep the Jewish kids from feel...

It's official. The "Dumbing Down Of America" has reached a new nadir (or, if something negative becomes even more effective, does it reach a zenith?). "Deal or No Deal" premiered last night. Imagine a game show where the contestant has no need to even be conscious during the game play. That's "Deal or No Deal". It's the American version of a game created in the land of Heineken, legal hashish and storefront-window prostitutes, the combination of which would explain the brain-dead popularity of the concept. If you ever thought "Wheel of Fortune" was too intellectually challenging, "Deal or No Deal" is the game for you. I watched the premiere on a television set, with the sound off. From across the room. While I was sitting in a local restaurant, where the Wife and I were having dinner with another couple. And I still knew everything that was going on. In case you haven't watched NBC in the past few weeks (meaning you...

A big chunk of my traffic comes from BlogExplosion , which is (as far as I know) the biggest traffic-generating site for blogs on the 'Net. Traffic schemes are their game. You name it, they got it. Credits for surfing, "Battle of the Blogs" (two blogs ante up and duel over the pot, winner takes three-fourths), "Scratch Cards" (imagine a scratch-off lottery card that NEVER FREAKIN' PAYS OFF), and even occasional random credits just for being a nice person. (Or so I like to tell myself.) Something that's becoming quite popular is the "Rent My Blog" program, in which one blog trades credits for a prominent link on another blog. And, being the independent non-conformist that I am, I jumped right on the ol' bandwagon. Last week, I rented my blog out for the first time, for the princely sum of 15 credits. I had six offers. I took the one that signed up first. Out of the 1,473 visits I had last week from 662 unique visitors, my renter got 44 click...

(Disclaimer: This entry contains lots of twelve-dollar words. If big words make you nervous, here's a website you'll find more to your liking.) When I was a tender tyke, I had a talent for being a (nearly) champion speller. One particularly fond memory was of winning a spelling bee after I had already been buzzed out (the pronouncer had mispronounced the word "ingenuous", saying "ingenious", which I spelled correctly. I was reinstated to the bee in time for the final round, which I won. Nyaah ). Just because I was such an annoying child, I mastered the oral spelling of the word "antidisestablishmentarianism" in four seconds flat (a skill which I still have to this day and which, I assure you, doesn't even appeal to anyone as a drunken party trick). I didn't know what antidisestablishmentarianism meant, nor did I care. It was, as far as my tiny, immature brain could conceive, the longest word in the English language, and spelling it becam...

Don't get annoyed with me because I haven't posted another blog entry in the past few days. I value your intelligence, dear Reader, far too much to slap some piece of tripe together just to make it look like I post every couple of days. You deserve all the genius I can muster (which ain't much), and by God that's what you're gonna get, so I'm fighting the urge to blog about the finale of The Apprentice in favor of something really, really special. Speaking of really, really special, I want to direct you to one of the blogs on my Blogroll to the right. " Scheiss Weekly " is written by a very prolific, very witty schoolteacher, who has a lot to say about the current state of education (as well as the rest of the world). It never ceases to amaze me how she can write so many entries so quickly, and yet so eloquently, about so many various topics. Her blog is one of my favorites, and I encourage you to pay her a visit. Please feel free to tell her Gar...

Vegan. The very word sounds like something out of "Star Trek". ("Captain, the Vegans are locking phasers." "Sulu, get us out of here!") Vegans and vegetarians, as you probably know, are very different things. A vegetarian won't eat meat. A vegan won't eat meat, honey, eggs or Jell-O; won't drink milk; won't wear leather shoes, wool sweaters or silk underwear; and generally doesn't smile very much. As a proud beef-chewing, leather-wearing, Jell-O-swilling carnivore, I have a bit of trouble identifying with the philosophies of either. As a wise human once said, "If God hadn't intended man to eat other animals, how come he made them out of meat?" Many vegetarians and vegans believe that animals have just as much right to life as humans do. Well, that philosophy is fine and dandy, except it ignores the fact that animals have been eating other animals for millions of years. Antelopes have been brought down by lions, bears ha...

There are certain things I won't do with this blog. It's here as an overflow vent for my brain, not as a money-making mechanism. I won't put Google ads on here, and I won't sell space. At the same time, I have a raging ego, and want as many people reading this nonsense as possible. Yes, I'm a Traffic Ho, and I'm not ashamed to say it. So, while I haven't sold out ... I have leased myself. Over to the right, you'll see our first tenant in the BlogExplosion "Rent My Blog" sweepstakes: "Haunted House Dressing" , by writer Jeremy Shipp. I think you'll agree with me that, if nothing else, this is the most unique blog design you're going to find. (I'm still trying to wrap my brain around some of the things he has written ...) Putting my blog up for rent was an interesting experience. Within three hours of posting its rental availability, I had six offers from six outstanding blogs. Jeremy got the spot because he bid first -- ...

I have finally shaken free of the shackles of the standard Blogger templates (none of which are particularly exciting, and my least-disfavored of which, the "Parchment" motif, has been used by everyone and their dog ). Well, no more. This is my new look. Dark and mysterious, like the inner recesses of my brain (and the back corners of my closets). Your opinions are eagerly solicited, and will be carefully considered, then disregarded as unpatriotic.

In a comment to my last entry, someone (in an otherwise complimentary note) mentioned the "anti-Christian" tone of my posts. It's true that much of the humor (if you located any) in my last two entries centered around symbols of Christianity. But let me be entirely clear about this. I am not "anti-Christian" at all. Christianity is actually a darned nice religion, as religions go. Christianity -- REAL Christianity -- preaches love and tolerance and happiness, and I have no problem at all with that. So, I'm not in any way anti-Christian. But I am "anti-pompous hypocrites" and I am "anti-thought police" and I am "anti-Bible-thumping omnicrats". And, if you're a true Christian, you must agree with me that the so-called "Religious Right" (which, in my opinion, is neither) isn't making your faith look very good right now. Accordingly, they should be made fun of ... while we still have the freedom to make fun of...

The Christmas shopping season started early this year. It starts early every year. I think in 2005, you could see Xmas decorations in some stores on the day after Valentine's Day. In a forest of iPods and Xboxes and silicon bakeware "for only three easy payments of $39.95", we are constantly ambushed with overhyped, overpriced, over-technologized (somebody call Webster's, I think I just invented a new word) items that nobody really needs. This is the time of year when, regardless of our religious denomination, we should hark back to simpler times. I was musing upon this as I was wandering lost among the gift-baskets-in-bulk at the local Big-Box Warehouse Club, each basket of which could be mine for three easy payments of $39.95. It occurred to me that, back at the first Christmas, they didn't have Big-Box Warehouse Clubs or Xboxes or ginsu knives. When the Messiah of Christian mythology (remember, I'm Jewish) was born, the Wise Men didn't try to give him a...