Freaks! Freaks! Freaks!

Are you one? Test yourself ...

This is a rather interesting quiz, although one tends to know early in life if he is one of those nonconforming freaks.

By the way, I scored an 83 overall. Again, no surprise. The test actually has three grades -- on the need to be unique, on the need to not conform, and the willingness to express dissent (also known as stirrin' the puddin'). My scores were fairly consistent across the board, ranging from 79 to 89 in the three categories.

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Don't just do something, sit there: America's laziest states

(He's not sleeping; he's hard at work inspecting his eyelids. Photo by Getty Images.)

Call it laziness or just smelling the roses a little bit, but taking it easy is an art form in some areas. Here's an interesting study on the subject by Business Week:

America's Laziest States 2010: More Sitting, Less Doing - BusinessWeek

The 10 most sedentary states are:

1) Louisiana

2) Mississippi

3) Arkansas

4) North Carolina

5) Tennessee

6) Kentucky

7) West Virginia

8) South Carolina

9) Alabama

10) Delaware

Of those 10, eight are in the Solid South while border-state Kentucky counts as a ninth in some circles. But dipping into the next rank of 10 you find the Northeast fairly well represented, a few Midwestern states, and one -- Arizona -- west of the Rockies.

Surprisingly, New York ranked 11th. A surprise because you'd think of all those get-'er-done ADHD types in The City. I guess those slackers upstate pulled the rankings right down.

South Carolina, the place I call home, ranks #8, Here's what Business Week says:

South Carolinians watch more television than all other Americans, according to BLS data. A report by the South Carolina Health & Environmental Control Dept. shows about half of adults do not get the recommended amount of physical activity, only one-third have sidewalks in their neighborhood, and only 37.4 percent use walking trails, parks, playgrounds, and sports fields for physical activity.

We're not lazy. We just know how to relax.

According to the stats from various sources, folks in Mississippi sleep the most at 8 hours, 59 minutes per day. That state also has the highest obesity rate at 33.8 percent. South Carolinians watch the most TV at 3 hours, 7 minutes per day, while Louisianans do less actual work at 2 hours, 41 minutes per day.

This working-per-day is an interesting figure, and it comes from the Bureau of Labor Statistics. That's the average for everyone aged 15 and older, and doesn't really take unemployment rates into consideration. Still, that's a lot of screwing off. By contrast, South Carolinians work a relatively industrious (!) 3 hours, 26 minutes per day.

Strangely enough, age isn't as much a factor as you'd think. Maine, the state with the oldest residents (median age 41.5 years) placed 16th, while Florida (40.1 years) came in 16th.

I'm surprised California didn't make the list ... oh, they said "laziest," not "craziest."

Never mind.

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Sp@m: It's what's for dinner

Have you checked your inbox lately?

Yeah, I'm in another one of those moods.


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Airport security: A modest proposal

I'm not sure who originally wrote this, but I like the idea. It was one of those Fw: emails that crosses my transom, sent by my mom.


In all, it sounds like a good workable solution. Later with all these pat-downs at the airport security line and invading your carry-on luggage. This is quick, clean (well, sort of), and cheap in the long run.


Here it is:


Here's the solution to all the controversy over full-body scanners and racial profiling at the airports:


Have a booth that you can step into that will not x-ray you, but will detonate any explosive device you may have on your body. It would be a win-win for everyone, and there would be none of this crap about racial profiling and this method would eliminate a long and expensive trial. Justice would be quick and swift.


This is so simple that it's brilliant. I can see it now. You're in the airport terminal and you hear a muffled explosion. Shortly thereafter an announcement comes over the PA system, "Attention standby passengers. We now have a seat available on flight number 4665 .... Paging maintenance. Shop Vac needed in booth number 4."


See, it could work. Who's with me on this?

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Multitasking while driving? Survey shows how many people do what

Distracted driving? How distracted?

I found this in Consumerist.com, which links to an article in Wired. The upshot is, folks will do just about everything under the sun when they should be driving and paying attention. 

Survey: 15% Of Drivers Getting Their Swerve On While Driving: "

From cell phones to stereos to billboards to those pesky other vehicles on the road, driving a car comes with a whole host of distractions. A new survey attempts to quantify just how many people are being distracted by the various and sundry things vying for drivers' attention.

The online survey, conducted by cell phone headset makers Jabra, came up with some interesting -- if not terribly scientific -- results.

Among the more lurid: 15% of respondents admitted to having "performed sex or other sexual acts” while driving, though what exactly "other sexual acts" means is left to the filthy part of your imagination. And, as the folks at Wired.com pointed out, the survey required no proof of respondents' carnal car exploits.

Meanwhile, 35% of those surveyed said they had changed articles of clothing while in the driver's seat. One would have to guess that at least some of these people belong to the 15% mentioned above.

On the high end, 72% of respondents admitted to eating or drinking a beverage while behind the wheel.

Though just about everyone has used their cell phone in the car, only 1/3 of those in the survey use a headset of some sort. Also, despite being illegal in more than half the U.S., 28% say they have texted while driving; 12% confessed to reading and sending e-mails.

More frightening, at least to me, are the 5% who admitted to having played video games during a driving session. I just hope they weren't playing MarioKart.

Says a dude from Jabra's parent company:

It is truly unbelievable what people are doing while driving... The results of our survey show that so many people are distracted and doing other things while on the road — even though they know the consequences that can occur. We hope that people will soon understand the implications of these bad behaviors and will change their own behavior accordingly.

Of course, part of 'changing their behavior' would mean 'buying more Jabra headsets.'

Which of these risky behaviors do you exhibit? Do you do something dangerous that didn't make the list?

Surprising Number of People Get It On While Driving [Wired.com]

OK, boys and girls. Heavy confession time, and you can call this my own at-the-wheel bucket list. I have:

- Eaten while driving

- Trimmed my beard while driving.

- Consumed coffee at the wheel. Of course. I consume coffee any time, while doing anything, for any reason.

- Played harmonica while driving. Sometimes I've done this on my way to a gig, having a warmup set on some state highway.

- Talked on the phone while driving, both with and without a headset.

- Sent text messages while at the wheel. Once. It terrified me, so I gave up the practice immediately.

- Read newspapers, or more likely maps, while driving.

- Played CDs while driving, including changing out a disk. And, while riding a bicycle, cycled through song lists on an mp3 player.

- Fought drunk passengers while driving; one of the things I don't miss about my taxi driving days.

- Written while driving. With the clipboard on the console, steering with one hand, and without looking at what I was writing. I used to do that quite often in my newspaper days. Amazingly, I was able to read what I wrote.

- Made obscene gestures at a Presidential candidate while driving. Seriously. It was Walter Mondale in 1984. He was in a motorcade en route from San Bernardino to L.A., and his escorting officers had all freeway drivers pull to the right and stop. I did, I was ticked, and I gave the famous gesture when his limo blazed by at 90 mph. Since I was stopped, I had both hands free and I was able to use both for the double bird. I'm still amazed I wasn't arrested.

- Driven barefoot. It really is not illegal. I usually do this on long hauls; the better to feel the pedals. You actually get better gas mileage this way.

- Changed clothes while driving. Unfortunately, I always ended up looking like I dressed in the dark.

Did I ever, as the article suggests, "get my swerve on" at the wheel? None of your business. I ain't sayin' nothing. I'll take the Fifth.

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Some wonderful truths to ponder late at night

As if I don't have enough distraction in my life, Mom sent this email of questions for me to ponder. And since I'm always trying to stimulate good thought and to open people's minds (sometimes with a wrecking bar), I thought I'd pass this along to y'all.

So, if you're lying awake at night for no reason, grab one or two of these questions and turn them over in your mind for a while. It may not help you get to sleep, but at least you'll have a reason for this insomnia.

Thank me later.


1. Is it good if a vacuum really sucks?

2. Why is the third hand on the watch called the second hand?

3. If a word is misspelled in the dictionary, how would we ever know?

4. If Webster wrote the first dictionary, where did he find the words?

5. Why do we say something is out of whack? What is a whack?

6. Why do "slow down" and "slow up" mean the same thing?

7. Why do "fat chance" and "slim chance" mean the same thing?

8. Why do "tug" boats push their barges?

9. Why do we sing "Take me out to the ball game" when we are already there?

10. Why are they called "stands" when they are made for sitting?

11. Why is it called "after dark" when it really is "after light"?

12. Doesn't "expecting the unexpected" make the unexpected expected?

13. Why are a "wise man" and a "wise guy" opposites?

14. Why do "overlook" and "oversee" mean opposite things?

15. Why is "phonics" not spelled the way it sounds?

16. If work is so terrific, why do they have to pay you to do it?

17. If all the world is a stage, where is the audience sitting?

18. If love is blind, why is lingerie so popular?

19. If you are cross-eyed and have dyslexia, can you read all right?

20. Why is bra singular and panties plural?

21.. Why do you press harder on the buttons of a remote control when you know the batteries are dead?

22. Why do we put suits in garment bags and garments in a suitcase?

23. How come abbreviated is such a long word?

24. Why do we wash bath towels? Aren't we clean when we use them?

25. Why doesn't glue stick to the inside of the bottle?

26. Why do they call it a TV set when you only have one?

27. Christmas -- What other time of the year do you sit in front of a dead tree and eat candy out of your socks?

28. Why do we drive on a parkway and park on a driveway ?  (This last one was something the late George Carlin wondered about, too.)

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Obsolete Anonymous: Who's next to join?

I saw this in the Huffington Post, and man, does it make me feel ancient!

J.A. Konrath: Is Print Dead?: "

Moderator: Welcome to Obsolete Anonymous! I've gathered you all here to welcome our latest member, the Print Industry.

Print Industry: Hello, everyone. But there's been a mistake. I don't belong here.

(chuckles all around)

Print Industry: I'm serious. I'm not obsolete. I'm relevant. Print books have been around for hundreds of years. They're never going to be replaced.

VHS Tapes: Yeah, we all thought like that once.

LP Records: It's called denial. It's tough to deal with at first.

Print Industry: Look, everyone, I assume you all think that ebooks are going to put me out of business. But that won't happen.

Phone Company: I remember when you couldn't walk twenty yards in a city without seeing a pay phone. Then those gosh darn cell phones came along. Do you know some people don't even have land lines anymore?

(Phone Company begins to cry. Print Phonebooks joins in. So does Dial Up Modems. Encyclopedia Set, wearing an I Hate Wikipedia T-Shirt, pops a few Prozac. A group hug ensues.)

Video Rental Store: What Phone Company is trying to say is that when a technology comes along that's faster, easier, and cheaper, the old technology--and all the companies that supported it--tends to fade away.

Print Industry: Why are you here, Video Rental Store? There are a lot of you around.

CDs: There were record stores everywhere once.

Cassette Tapes: Hell yeah! They sold cassettes, too! Someone give me a high five!

(no one gives Cassette Tapes a high five)

Video Rental Store: Things looked good for a while. I had a decent run. Then I got hit by all sides. Netflix. On Demand. Tivo. YouTube. But the nail in the coffin came in the past two years. Hulu. Roku--which allows subscribers to stream video instantly. iTunes and Amazon offering movie downloads. Red Box, which rents DVDs for 99 cents and takes up no more space than a candy machine...

Print Industry: But ebooks are just a tiny percentage of the market. People have been reading print since Gutenberg. They won't adapt to change that easily.

SLR Cameras: You're correct. It takes a few years for people to fully embrace new technology. Some never do. Instant Cameras never replaced me.

Instant Cameras: Shut up, SLR. We both got our butts kicked by digital. How much film did you sell last year?


TV Antennas: I'm still big in some third world countries!

Typewriter: The bottom line is; when technology improves, it becomes widely adopted. Me and Carbon Paper used to have a groovy thing going. I'd make the words, he would make the duplicates. Then Copy Machine got into the act, but he's not doing well now either.

Copy Machine: Effing computers.

Dot Matrix Printer: Effing laser and inkjet. Doesn't anyone else miss tearing off the perforated hole punches on the side of paper? Don't they miss the feel and smell of that?

Fold-Out Paper Maps: I agree! Isn't it fun to open up a big map while you're driving, in hopes of figuring out where you are? Don't you miss the old days before cars came equipped with GPS and no one ever used that upstart, MapQuest?

CDs: Effing internet. That's the problem. Instant access to information and entertainment for the whole world. You guys want to talk about pirating and illegal downloads?

(everyone shouts out 'no!')

Moderator: We all read on JA Konrath's blog that the way to fight piracy is with cost and convenience. Print Industry, are you lowering your prices and making it easier for customers to download your books?

Print Industry: Actually, we just raised prices on our ebooks.

(all-around sighs and head shaking)

Moderator: Well, far be it for you to learn from any of our mistakes. Are you making it easier at least?

Print Industry: Well, we've begun windowing titles, releasing them months after the hardcover comes out.

(collective head slapping)

Music Industry: Have you at least tried selling from your own site? I wish I'd done that. But then Apple came along...

Print Industry: Uh... no. We haven't tried that. In fact, some ebooks--we'll use JA Konrath as an example since he was mentioned--aren't even available on all platforms and in all territories.

Moderator: What do you mean? Konrath's ebooks are available all over the place.

Print Industry: Those are the ones he uploads himself. The ones of his that we sell are missing from several key markets, and have been for years. But it's okay. We're paying him much smaller royalties and jacking the prices up high so we can still make a profit. Besides, ebooks are a niche market. Ereading devices are dedicated and expensive.

Arcades: I used to be a thriving industry. Kids dropped millions of quarters in my thousands of locations. But then Nintendo, Sony, and Microsoft made home arcade machines, and now people play their videogames on dedicated devices. It's a multi-billion dollar business now, and I can only compete if I sell pizza and give out plastic trinkets to kids with the most foosball tickets. If people want the media, they buy the expensive device. Period.

Print Industry: None of you are listening to me. Print will always be around.

Newspaper Industry: Yeah! What he said!

Print Industry: Let's not compare ourselves, okay Newspaper Industry? No offense.


Newspaper Industry: None taken. Hey, maybe we can help each other. I'm selling advertising space for dirt cheap these days, and...

Print Industry: No thanks. No one reads you anymore. People get their news elsewhere.

Moderator: So why won't people get their novels elsewhere as well?

(Print Industry stands up, pointing a finger around the room.)

Print Industry: Look, this isn't about me. All of you guys have become irrelevant. Technology marched on, and you didn't march with it. But that WILL NOT happen to me. There will always be bookstores, and dead tree books. We'll continue to sell hardcovers at luxury prices, and pay artists 6% to 15% royalties on whatever list price WE deem appropriate. And the masses will buy our books BECAUSE WE SAID SO! WE SHALL NEVER BECOME OBSOLETE!!!


Buggy Whip Industry: Amen, brother! That's what I keep trying to tell these people!

CDs: (whispering to LPs) I give him six years, tops.

All of this begs the question: Who is next to join their ranks? My money is on DVDs, and they haven't been around very long. I can hear 'em now: "&%$#@!! Blu-Ray!"

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How to tweet your job away, in six easy steps

I've been known to tweet. That's using Twitter to send 140 characters' worth of twaddle to the other tweeps (or is it twerps?) out there in Twitter Land. I'll admit, it's a lot of fun, and once you figure out how to get past the ridiculous signal-to-noise ratio on that microblogging site, it can be useful.

I've used Twitter to spot trends, to get up-to-the-second dispatches on some news event, and even to grab some background information on whatever I'm writing. 

But then, we have a lot of folks who use Twitter just to massage their diseased egos, or to spread a whole bunch of mundane crap all over the world. While many people have used Twitter to find jobs, quite a few used Twitter as a way to lose whatever job they had.

I got this from MentalFloss, and it's a hoot. i urge you to read the article:

How to Tweet Your Way Out of a Job:

"Hate your job? Want to leave without giving two weeks notice? Thanks to Twitter, it’s never been easier to get fired. All you have to do is sign up for an account and follow these simple steps. You’ll be unemployed in no time!"

Step 1: Drunk Tweet

Well, yeah, this goes without saying. You know your boss -- or potential boss -- may be monitoring you on Twitter, Facebook, and all the other social media. But Mike Bacsik, a former ballplayer and now, ex-sports-show host, found out what happens when you mix the tweets with the Lone Stars. Or whatever he was drinking.

Step 2: Break the Law (or Just Anger Your Governor)

I tell you, you need to read the article.

Step 3: Have an NSFW Lifestyle

Step 4: Question Company Policy

D'oh! Never a good idea -- especially if you don't want your boss to know.

Step 5: Make a Celebrity Look Bad

Step 6: Don’t Get Hired in the First Place

From MentalFloss: " ... when recent college grad Skye Riley heard back from Cisco, the computer networking giant, about her job application, one of her first instincts was to tweet about it. Unfortunately, this is what she tweeted: 

@theconnor: Cisco just offered me a job! Now I have to weigh the utility of a fatty paycheck against the daily commute to San Jose and hating the work.

The unfortunate part? An employee of Cisco, Tim Levad, came across her post while doing a Twitter search for Cisco. He replied to her by saying:

@timmylevad: Who is the hiring manager. I’m sure they would love to know that you will hate the work. We here at Cisco are versed in the web.

Whoooops!

You see, these computers, handhelds, and smart phones are dangerous toys. Too dangerous to be in the hands of idiots.

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'Duck And Cover' brings back some memories

Remember this?



I think I saw this in my kindergarten class. Rather a tense time, what with Khruschev and Castro feeling their oats.

Anyway, I was doing my usual manic Google thing, and uncovered this. I think it was originally done in 1951, and became a schoolhouse staple until the 1980s.

I forgot the turtle had a name. It's Bert.

Thought I'd share this little piece of nostalgia with you. Enjoy.

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Twinkies turn 80: Is the original still edible?

It was 80 years ago, on April 6, 1930, when the first Twinkie went on the market. As now they travelled in pairs; selling two for a nickel.

The then-Continental Baking Co. (now Hostess) was looking for something cheap, a snack that would go over well in an economically depressed time. Now, almost 500 million are sold every year, and that snack cake became part of our folklore.

Never mind the fact they became a legal defense for murder (albeit an unsuccessful one) in Dan White's trial for killing San Francisco Mayor George Moscone and Supervisor Harvey Milk in 1978. And just ignore the hypothesis that Twinkies are locked in a time-warp of freshness, they're the stuff of legend.

Here are some Twinkies facts, from the Orange County Register:

• Twinkie inventor James Dewar named the snack after a billboard he saw advertising Twinkle Toe Shoes, but never got paid royalties for his creation.
• The Twinkie originally had banana filling, but bananas were rationed during WWII, so vanilla was substituted. Customers liked it so much it stayed in there.
• The deep-fried Twinkie was invented at the Texas State Fair. Here’s a recipe.
• In a nod to the supposed indestructibility of the snacks, the T.W.I.N.K.I.E. Project lists several silly experiments that can be performed on them, such as the “gravitational response test” (i.e. dropping one from a 6th-floor window).

So what's the story about the never-aging, bionic Twinkies? Untrue, says Snopes. But one thing that did catch my attention, according to Snopes it takes a Twinkie 45 seconds to explode in a microwave.

Exploding Twinkies? Cool! I tell you, they're the original fun food.

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Time to log off, you think?

As a public service ...





Think this deserves your immediate attention?

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Bucket List can get revealing: What have you done?

I got this by email from my brother Rick, and this is making the rounds among the family unit. It's revealing. Give it a shot, and have some fun!

Here are the rules of this Bucket List:

Hit forward and place an X by all the things you've done and remove the X from the ones you have not, and send it to your friends (including me), or post it to your blog.

This is for your Entire Life!

OK. Have you ever ...

(X) Shot a gun

(X) Gone on a blind date

(X) Skipped school

() Watched someone die

() Been to Canada

() Been to Alaska

() Been to Cuba

() Been to Europe

(X) Been to Las Vegas

(X) Been to Mexico

() Been to Florida

(X) Been on a plane

() Been on a Cruise Ship

() Served on a Jury

(X) Been lost

(X) Been on the opposite side of the country

(X) Gone to Washington, DC

(X) Swam in the Ocean

(Do I get bonus points for more than one ocean?)

(X) Cried yourself to sleep

(x) Played Cops and Robbers

(X) Played Cowboys and Indians

() Recently colored with crayons

(X) Sang Karaoke

(X) Paid for a meal with coins, only coins

(X) Made a prank phone call as a kid

(X) Laughed until some beverage came out of your nose

(X) Caught a snowflake on your tongue

(X) Danced in the rain

(X) Written a letter to Santa Claus

(X) Been kissed under the mistletoe

(X) Watched the sunrise with someone

(X) Blown bubbles

(X) Gone ice skating

(X) Gone skiing

(X) Camped out under the stars

(X) Seen something so beautiful that it took your breath away

(X) Are or have been married

() Have children

(Wrong plumbing. If I have, call the Weekly World News!)

(X) Have a pet

(X) Been skinny dipping outdoors

(X) Been fishing

(X) Been boating

(X) Been water skiing

(X) Been hiking

(X) Been camping in a trailer/RV

(X) Flown in a small 4-seater airplane

() Flown in a glider

() Been flying in a helicopter

() Been flying in a hot air balloon -

() Been bungee jumping -

(X) Gone to a drive-in movie

(X) Done something that should have killed you

(X) Done something that you will regret for the rest of your life

() Been to Africa

() Been to China

() Been to India

() Been to Korea

() Ever ride an elephant

() Ever ride a camel

(X) Ever eaten just cookies for dinner

(X) Ever been on T.V.

(X) Ever steal any traffic signs

(X) Ever been in a car accident

(X) Have a nickname? Wingnut, among others

There's more:

Favorite Drink: Sweet tea

How much do you love your job? Enough to keep doing it.

Is your car a 2 door or a 4 door? No doors

Favorite number? Google(.com!)

Favorite movie? Most recently seen again? Round Midnight

Favorite holiday? National Procrastination Week

Favorite dessert? Anything involving the use of chocolate.

Furthest place you will send this message? Worldwide, via blog

Who will respond to this the fastest: Whoever sees it first and has a civil service job.

SCORING: No rules here. Let your conscience be your guide. Too few checked off probably means you need to turn the computer off and get out more.

(Personal note: A few friends and I regularly get together, and one of the group pastimes is a game called Three Truths And A Lie. That's where you come up with four statements about yourself and have the rest of the group pick out the BS. Scoring is, well, it's like pants on a toll booth collector in that no one knows or really cares. The trick to winning Three Truths And A Lie is in the degree of separation between true and false statements; either all outlandish or none outlandish.)

Snow brings back old memories, lessons

I don't do winter. I hate the cold, and the older I get the less I like it. I've never really been used to winter, and I don't plan to start getting used to it now.

That's one of the reasons I call the South Carolina Lowcountry home. But in my nearly 15 years here, I'm seeing a first. As I write this, snow blankets the ground.

Insane.

Again, I hear all of y'all Up North laughing. Accumulation in my front yard is probably about two inches; in most of the country that's nothing.

I define my life into three main periods, all set apart by geographical location. I spent my first 30 years in southern California, and in all that time I saw this kind of snow twice. If I wanted to see snow, all I had to do was look out my window at the San Bernardino Mountains, where there was plenty to be had. I spent five years in Arizona, and now here.

I did spend a couple of years in Indiana, a couple of years in Tennessee, and a year in the North Carolina hills, so yeah, I know all I need to know about winter. Cold. Uncomfortable. Terrible to drive in.

But pretty, and kind of fun.

I had dinner with a few friends last night, and we hung out inside while the snow fell. I went outside for a couple of minutes and promptly skidded, almost on my butt. I forgot that snow gets slippery. Barbara and her daughter, Elizabeth, both made snow angels while Derek (another expatriate Californian) and I shook our heads at the weirdness of it all.

At home, the front yard is covered. My third-world trailer park never looked better; it's like looking at a black-and-white photograph. My 15-year-old dog is as wonderstruck as I, and for a couple of minutes the arthritic old girl was a puppy again. Snow, she figured, is edible as long as it's not yellow.

A few snow things came back fairly quickly:

• The going-back-indoors two-step, where you stomp each foot, then bang your feet together twice. Especially important when your shoes have a deep tread (such as my Timberland boots). Snow belongs outside, not inside.

• It's not so much the sound of snow crunching underfoot, but the feel. There's nothing quite like it.

• Driving is rough. I bummed a ride home with Derek, and we swapped wisdom on the subject. Where you put your wheels is really kind of important; even more so than "high-siding" your tires on mountain roads. I remembered my first forays driving in snow (at age 37), when I learned that a Camaro with automatic transmission doesn't handle well under such conditions.

• Memories of my first snowman, sculpted on Mount Charleston, a few miles from Las Vegas. It was anatomically correct.

• Snow isn't for adults. Like Santa Claus or Trix cereal, it's something that was invented especially for kids. That's OK. For the night I became a 50-ish kid.

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Sarah Palin: Talk to the hand

I was amused to hear the latest political scandal, the one about Sarah Palin giving a speech using crib notes written on her hand.

It's a blast from the past. Many of us can recall writing cheat notes on our hands and wrists back in our school days. I know I did, and it was worth an extra five or 10 points on many tests. I never really gave up the habit after my school days were over, either. I'm quite a notetaker, and I swear by the wonderful low-tech "Hipster PDA" (little more than a bundle of index cards) for my very survival. If I don't have that or a note pad handy, I'm not above using my hand.

Barack Obama takes a lot of ribbing about his love affair with the TelePrompter (I'm still checking on rumors that he has one in the Lincoln Bedroom with a selection of sweet nothings for Michelle loaded in), but that's little more than a high-priced version of the palm-of-the-hand note.

Now, I like Palin. I know she doesn't have a chance of being elected; she's probably the most polarizing figure since Hillary Clinton. I can't think of anyone who is neutral about her. And she takes a lot of crap from the media. Shoot, there are a lot more conservative folks out there, and many politicians tote a lot more baggage than her any old day. There are many more viable targets than her. But she's a threat to the mainstream partly because of the attention she normally gets, but also -- don't discount this -- she seems to be a genuinely happy person. But this bit about using crib notes -- will someone please tell me the significance of that?

Understand, if you're in politics you're going to give a lot of speeches. And if you're a big-name person like an Obama or Palin, chances are you didn't write the speech yourself. High-level politicians hire speechwriters, and sometimes it's a crapshoot because every word loaded into the TelePrompter is a surprise.

Unless you're giving the same basic speech over and over again, it's pointless to try to memorize all this stuff. And forget about speaking off the cuff; the political graveyard is littered with the bodies of those who said the wrong thing just because it sounded good at the time.

I've given talks over the years, mostly back in California. I was a member of Toastmasters then (and am looking to get back on board there), so I'm no stranger to the other side of the lectern. I spoke from fairly skeletal notes, usually no more than an outline and a few key words. Still, I was working from an advantage over your favorite politician because I wrote my own stuff.

One time at Toastmasters I gave a talk, and my notes were written on half-sized index cards, something I could conceal in my hand. I liked that idea because I could then step out from behind the lectern, move around, and still have my notes -- my crutch -- with me.

It worked well enough, or at least I thought so.

My speech evaluator thought differently, but he was the type of guy who, if he noticed you nervously jingling loose change in your pockets, he'd place a bet on how much money you had there. He was just a totally evil person. Anyway, he pointed out that I had my fist clenched through the speech, and he was worried I'd go over and beat someone up.

Man, I know I should have written those notes on my hand.

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(Above: Sarah Palin gets caught with her notes during Tea Party Convention in Nashville. Below: Palin's answer, after the ordure hit the rotary cooling device. Hi, Mom!)

Love that bubble wrap? Then get your own!

My name is Eric, and I'm a bubble wrap addict ...

From The Huffington Post:

... it's Bubble Wrap Appreciation Day today, Monday, Jan. 25, 2010, a day honoring the conception of the bubble wrap 50 years ago ... "Spirit 95" Radio, a local radio station in Bloomington, Indiana, officially started Bubble Wrap Appreciation Day in 2001 with a number of events to celebrate the anniversary ...

Read the rest of the story here.

And hey, stop by the post office or UPS and pick up your own bubble wrap already. You can't have mine!

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Multitasking? Do I have a browser for you!

Here's a bit of fun for the computer ubergeek, particularly if you just don't have enough time to get four things done.

It's called googlegooglegooglegoogle.com, and here's a screenie of the site in action.

Each quadrant of the browser window (I'm using Chrome here) is a working Web page of its own. Forget the browser tabs, this is the real deal.

Of course if something like this interests y'all, there's a phrase that just about says it all: Get a life!

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Cooking without salt doesn't mean bland dinner

I'm still thinking about salt here; talk of more government regulation always does this to me.

I don't use much salt. I don't even keep it in the house. Part of it is the health angle, but part of it is just plain preference. I use a lot of other seasonings in the kitchen, and my cooking -- which I'd describe as more utilitarian than gourmet -- is anything but bland. When I eat I want to actually taste something; it's part of the pleasure of eating.

Here's a partial inventory of my spice rack:

• Mrs. Dash Garlic & Herb seasoning blend: This is my go-to, and I use it like most people use salt.
• Mrs. Dash Extra Spicy seasoning blend: I use this when I want to kick it up a notch.
• Tabasco sauce: Required. I use it in my morning grits, too. A bit hotter and more of an aged-in-the-keg taste than Texas Pete.
• 5th Season Italian Seasoning: Any kind of Italian seasoning will work; this is the cheap stuff (half a buck at WalMart). Has thyme, oregano, and who-knows-what in it. I'll use it in eggs and on grilled cheese sandwiches, too.
• Garlic powder: Another must-have. Leave the garlic salt for the amateurs.
• Tony Chachere's Original Creole Seasoning: This does have salt, but the red pepper is enough to counterbalance the effects.
• Cavender's All Purpose Greek Seasoning: A friend turned me on to this. It has salt and monosodium glutamate in it, and I don't use it much. It's good on burgers, though.
• Dill weed: Good on fish and in casseroles; gives a little extra tangy bite.

But I do have a stash of pretzels somewhere in yonder kitchen. After reading about New York City Mayor Michael Bloomberg's campaign to regulate salt usage in restaurants and processed food, I need some junk food ... and I need it now.

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Dressing for weather becomes an obsessive science

It's getting to the cold part of the year in coastal South Carolina, with the occasional blasts of rain, so it's time for me to prepare.

Like figuring out how to dress. Or remembering how I did it last winter.

I know you folks Up North are laughing at this. As I write this it's 39 degrees outside, the high is expected to hit 53, and the temp is supposed to bottom out at 31 tonight. Shoot, that's what all of y'all would call a heat wave Up There. See, there's a reason why I'm Down South.

Yesterday I had to run some errands, a series of short lobs, easy bicycle runs. Except for the cold and the rain, it wasn't bad, but some preparation was needed.

I don't do cold weather very well, because I was raised in desert climates and because I don't have a lot of body mass. I don't have that padding you can only get from a lot of supersized fries and Big Macs (some hate my guts for that), so this preparation is crucial.

Before setting out yesterday, I had to really plan out the layers I was to wear. Admittedly there's a little obsessiveness-compulsiveness at work here; things have to be just so.

I have heavy-duty rain pants that I wear on the road for those rainy days. Even when it's not raining, the bike will kick up all the water that's already there, drenching me and splattering me with mud. These rain pants are thick, high-visibility orange, designed to be abused. The question is when to put them on.

If I put the rain pants on last, they're the quickest thing to remove. But I might as well forget about unzipping my jacket, or going into my pants pockets.

Then there's the issue of keeping my upper body warm and dry. I opted for a pullover sweatshirt, with a hooded jacket on top of that. Over all of this I had a cheap vinyl rain jacket. All good so far, but then I wanted to wear my long scarf. What was problematic was deciding where among the layers to put it.

Off with the rain jacket. Off with the hooded jacket. Put scarf on. Put jacket back on. Put rain jacket back on. And if I'd put the rain pants on last, that's another thing to deal with just to put the scarf on.

Then there are the usual carry-around items that I need quick access to. Wallet. Note pad. Pen. Cell phone. When I need these items, I need them right now, and I don't need to be feeling among all the layers to find them. Plus, when it's buried in all these clothes you can't hear the phone ring. Those went in my raincoat pocket, dry and accessible.

Finally, I'm good to go. Put the hood up on my jacket and raincoat. Put on my backpack, and hit the road.

One of my stops was at the bank. It's a local credit union where everyone knows everyone and the tellers greet you by name. My kind of place. I was telling the tellers about the preparation involved in bundling up, and one of them dropped the conversational bomb:

"How do you go to the bathroom?"

I hadn't even thought of that. Now, a day later, I'm still obsessing for an answer.

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Steering wheel tabletop for the multitasker who has everything

There's always someone on your Christmas shopping list who is guaranteed to stump you. I'm talking about the person who already has everything, right?

I found this in the mentalfloss blog, and wasn't even sure this was real. Can't be. But the Laptop Steering Wheel Desk might be just the thing to give this year.

This cool item is a little tabletop you can attach to your vehicle’s steering wheel, and it creates a level space to do anything you might need a level space for.

But when I wrote this, Amazon had 326 reviews for this product. Mentalfloss writer Miss Cellania related some of her favorites in her blog entry, and here's one:

... I am a Pathologist in Riverside County California and the Laptop Steering Wheel Desk has changed my life. I used to spend long hours in the autopsy room and had too much time away from my family. With this new tool I am able to dissect the organs of a patient during my commute home ...

OK, I grew up in Riverside County, and I can attest that not all of us are freakos.

Then there's the review -- I'm not making this up -- from a dope dealer who loves his steering wheel tabletop because it allows him to ply his trade without having to hire a runner. I tell you what, some of these reviews are classic.

On its face, the whole thing sounds kind of pet-rockish. Why do you you even need something like this?

I can see some uses for this item. During my taxi driving days, my office was behind the wheel. I kept a manifest of all my trips, plus I always had a few other things cooking. Between calls I'd do some writing, arrange some music, or make some phone calls. I'd always have two or three notebooks lying around, a clipboard or two, a briefcase, a couple of books, a newspaper, my lunch, and a travel mug of coffee. Plus my cell phone, charger, handheld computer, and a folding keyboard for that. Trying to keep all that stuff neat was a real chore, and it wasn't good for my legs and back to work while slumped in the driver's seat.

But maybe its allure is a little behind the curve of society. It seems our multi-track fast-lane culture is giving way to something a lot simpler. I'm reading lots of articles suggesting that multitasking is on its way out, that you really don't get anything done when you've got 15 things going at the same time. Which is true, by the way. Like it or not, multitasking is a moral weakness.

But if you feel your time in the vehicle is dead time, you might want to take a look at this item. Just don't use it while you're driving, and we'll all be OK.

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Is chocolate the great stress reliever?

In a world where the news seems to get worse and worse, there's finally something uplifting in the headlines: Chocolate can relieve stress.

According to psychcentral.com writer Rick Nauert PhD, chocolate does seem to help the body cope with stress, and helps to correct any biochemical imbalances related to stress.

H'mm ... Prozac in one hand. Chocolate in the other. Which one to take? Man, you've got to be kidding.

According to Nauert:

In a clinical trial, investigators found that eating about an ounce and a half of dark chocolate a day for two weeks reduced levels of stress hormones in the bodies of people feeling highly stressed.

I wouldn't have minded being a lab rat for this test.

OK. Who cares about what the clinical tests say? I could have done these tests myself and saved the scientific community a ton of money. Maybe I can't tell these scientists the chemical breakdown of how chocolate works on mind and body, but I can tell them the world would really suck without it.

Nauert's article also mentions a few other bonuses of dark chocolate:

Sunil Kochhar and colleagues note growing scientific evidence that antioxidants and other beneficial substances in dark chocolate may reduce risk factors for heart disease and other physical conditions.

That's the buzzword in nutritional circles these days: Antioxidants. That's the mystery stuff you find in some food that, if it doesn't cure all your ills, it helps to make the body more resistant to all kinds of illnesses. Fortunately, you'll find a good dose of antioxidants in all my favorite things:

Sweet tea (known in these parts as "Southern crack").

Coffee.

And now chocolate.

Bring it on. And while you're about it, fire all those viruses at me. I'll shed them like Superman does with bullets.

And then there's this:

Studies also suggest that chocolate may ease emotional stress. Until now, however, there was little evidence from research in humans on exactly how chocolate might have those stress-busting effects.

Ahh, the mystique of chocolate ... Di, a blogger who writes about her experiences in the love wars, will tell you about it:

I remember getting a book years ago for chocoholics like myself. In one chapter there was scientific evidence cited to show that the human brain experienced similar chemical reactions when they “fell in love” and when they ate chocolate. This led the scientists to the conclusion that people eat chocolate as a substitute for love. However, chocoholics like myself know that the opposite it true – that people fall in love as a substitute for chocolate ...

Now, even though I'm male (you know the Mars/Venus dichotomy), this still makes sense to me. A whole lot of sense. We guys may not talk about it, but we've got to have our chocolate too.

Another rumor I'd heard years ago was that some components of chocolate were structurally similar to THC, the active ingredient in marijuana. Now, that sounds like the makings of good urban legend, but aq dose of chocolate does seem to make the world a better, more peaceful place. Now, it's been many years (actually decades) since I've smoked one of those left-handed cigarettes, and I've never felt like I missed it. Who needs it when you've got chocolate?

I don't think chocolate will give you the munchies, but writing about it sure does. I think there's a last piece of cake in the fridge. I'm after it.

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