Missed me?

No?, well screw you very much...

Well, been a busy eleven days, what with hat trick of Christmas, New Year's, and the impending implosion of my professional career...

Oh, don't cry for me, Argentina. Something will come up, it always does...

Anyway, on to important stuff: Gino, that purveyor of Iranian beauties, has tagged me. Well, hi-di-ho, something to do.

Here be the tag rules, according to Mr. Badger:

1. Players start by listing three things he/she got for Christmas.

2. Then they list three things he/she definitely did not want to get for Christmas.

3. Then he/she tags five friends and lists their names.

4. The ones who get tagged write on their blogs about their Christmas wishes, and state the rules clearly.

5. Then tag five more victims. The tagger needs to leave the taggees a comment that says you have been Christmas tagged! and tell them to read the tagger's blog.

Okay, I'm game.

First, what three things I got for Christmas.

1) The Dork Three Pack. This booty was the haul from The Jones Intergenerational Christmas Party two days before Christmas. Motherdear got me "The Earth is Flat" by Thomas Friedman, and Brothergoodson found the latest additions to my burgeoning Dr. Who DVD collection.


2) Railroad Tycoon 3. Absolutely addicting. I think these Tycoon and Sim games so appeal to us bureaucrats (egads, now I'm identifying myself as a bureaucrat..) because the world therein is rational, understandable, and manageable. Which is totally and completely unlike the real world we inhabit. Oh, and you don't have to go through four years of environmental permitting to cross a river.



3) My new garment bag. Will come in handy carrying my clothes around when we lose the house because I'm unemployed. Will double as a shelter in the rain and snow...

Three Things I definitely DID NOT want for Christmas:

Well, that would be ungrateful, wouldn't it? I loved everything I got. But, we are slaves to the meme, so:



1. James Brown dropped dead. Godfather of Soul, Hardest Working Man in Showbusiness, is an ex-entertainer. Ripping it up with the Choir Invisible. Of course, I wasn't too much of a JB fan, but, c'mon, the guy made Rocky IV. And it gives me an excuse to post a YouTube of Weird Al's "Living With a Hernia" -- which was on one of the Weird Al CD's we Santa got The Boy for Christmas.

2) I'm glad I didn't get a cold this Christmas. Usually the running around and madness of the holiday season leaves me with a low-grade cold; not enough to shut down and stay in bed for three days, but a little more than enough to make the commute and eight hours of work a chore and a half...

3) I'm really glad I didn't get another sweater. I hate sweaters. Plus, as I evolve into the next phase of human development -- the Buman, part Bear, part Human (hairy and fat), sweaters are redundant at best.

Okay, there. Fufilled my blog duties. Now, on to tag five of you.... Hmm... Alright, Mossy, Penny, Duff, MD, and The Gypsy, since she's gone blog MIA for a while, and even if she doesn't do it it's worth it zipping over to her site to see the Indian version of thriller in her "V" post.

Well, I've gotta split to get ready for the baccahanal New Year's Eve party now, but I promise a post tomorrow - no more disappearances.... Until Thursday (details to come)... (Ooo! How's that for a tease?!?)

Testing 1,2,3.... Testing 1,2,3

A former co-worker friend was having a hard time uploading her photos on blogger so I told her I'd give it a try. Seems to be working fine.

Miss you already, Big Red.

Slave to the Meme

Karamia, bored with all the football talk (and just when I thought I you were perfect...) threw a tag my way, and as a man of honor I must submit to the tag.

So here's the deal. It's the old "six weird things" meme, which Penny got me on last March on the old blog, which for some reason was five then. Except my answers really kind of sucked last time, so I'll redo it. Now, as I am perfect in most every way, I had some difficulty coming up with six weird things about myself, so I put it to a vote of the family (around the dinner table, and as much of my weirdness revolves around hygienic issues, it made for quite a dinner) and this is what they came up with.

Without further ado, here are the top six weird things about me, according to my devoted family (whom I now hate, just so you're clear):

In no particular order,

1) When I drink wine my intestines get all hot and squishy feeling, including the very end of the intestines, if you get my drift...

2) I eat in a very deliberative way, dismantling my food. So when I eat pumpkin pie I'll eat the back of the crust first, then the topping, then the pie, then the bottom of the crust. And things get eaten in order, generally from least favorite to favorite, and all at once: so peas first, then potatoes, then chicken, then grilled asparagus, for instance.

3) I have obscure pop-culture reference Tourette's and will occasional explode with "Spoon!" (The Tick's battle cry) or launch into the Dead Bishop skit (Ma, Dead Bishop on the landing!) at the dinner table.

4) When I take my socks off invariably I'll sniff them. It's not even like we're living in Victorian England and I want to see if I can wear them after another washing. Trust me, nothing that comes off this body is capable of being worn again wihtout washing. I'll even bring back-up underwear if we're going swimming over Brother-in-Law #1's pool: I'm not interested in putting dirty laundry back on my body. I think I just like to experience the relative grossness of the sock. I don't know, it's a compulsion!

5) I really, really can't stand having my second toe touched. Gives me the heebie jeebies.

6) (and I don't think this is weird at all, but the Wife insists...) I love scented candles. Love burning them (perhaps to cover up the smell of my socks I'm carrying around) constantly. Gives me a warm, homey feeling (okay, okay: I'm a big girl).

There. There's six weird things. I'm loathe to tag anyone, as it would reveal that no one's reading nowadays and all my traffic (1,200 hits in the last four days) are from Muslim perverts looking for a non-existent Zahra Amir Ebrahimi sex video link (thanks Gino.... By the way, if you're interested in the Kevin Federline-Britney Spears honeymoon video, here it is...).

(God, I'm a whore to the traffic...)

Anywho, if you're visiting, or especially if you're a member of the Daily Canon over there on the right, consider yourself tagged.

And try to get the image of a corpulent, smelly man smelling his dirty socks out of your heads...

Well that was a close one...

Wifeypooh, who doesn't get herself all worked up over football, likes to say that the Patriots give you your money's worth; a Patriot's game always lasts 60 minutes and the outcome is usually in doubt for most of the time.

And the Chicago Bears are a quarterback away from being one of the best football teams I have ever seen. Even with Rex Grossman, the Bears are one of the two teams I think could be the NFC representative in the Superbowl. The drama in Dallas, with Romo playing Tom Brady to Drew Bledsoe's, well, Drew Bledsoe, creates the other viable storyline to satisfy the football gods.

Every Patriots game is like watching Saw and Saw 2 back to back. They seem on the verge of losing every game, and find new and exciting ways to cough up the ball and snatch near-defeat from the jaws of easy victory.

But this is always how they've been; the three Superbowls in four years were won by a total of nine points. And yesterday was no different.

They bears came to town to play on the new rug (not bad looking), and punched the Patsies around. And the Patsies punched back. Ten turnovers between the two teams weren't because of wet balls or inept play, rather two very aggressive and opportunistic defenses playing their hearts out.

It was another costly game for the Patriots; two weeks after losing Rodney Harrison to a broken shoulder, Junior Seau left the field with an arm looking appallingly like Harry Potter's after Gilderoy Lockhart "fixed" it. It jiggled.... Ugh. Couple more weeks like this and I'll get to suit up for the hometown team. Heck, I am younger than Vinny Testaverde...

As you may recall, there was a friendly wager on the game, with me proposing to RW and Gino, two Chicago supporters, that we put our respective blogs where our mouths were, and have the losing teams supporter(s) write nice things about the winning team, and winning team supporter(s) blog.

Well, RW was a good sport about the whole thing and wrote a wonderful post acknowledging the dual greatnesses of Kal's World and the New England Patriots, although it is possible that he might, just maybe, have been a little sarcastic with some of his praise. "A portly intellect"? Hmm...

The way the game was going I had started thinking of superlatives for RW and Gino by half-time. I spent the entire second half watching from the kitchen, as every time I ventured into the living room bad things happened to the home town 22 (we Irish are a very superstitious people...)

But thanks to Asante Samuel's (man, is he a hot dog... just shut up and play man...) third pick of the night, the honor of Kal's World was preserved.

Here's to hoping we can renew this bet come February in Florida.

Attention Foreign Pervert:

Hello, my friends from Iran, Kuwait, Switzerland, UK, Canada (other than my usual canadian perverts Mossy, Penny, and Dani), Malaysia, Germany, United Arab Emirates...

I'm sorry, there is no naughty tape of Zahra Amir Ebrahimi here.

You have been misled by Gino, who is himself a well-known pervert with a sense of humor (and poor taste in American Football teams).

I have, however, uncovered a tape of Gino in naughty action, and to sate your prurient interests, I will post it here for you...



Try and get that out of your head...

Bring it on!

Well well well. You Bears fans are feeling pretty good about yourselves, aren't you? Nine and one. Not bad. Two straight wins on the road too...

Yup, pretty good. And you're coming into Foxboro where the (ahem... Three Time World Champion) New England Patriots have reverted to the Patsies of old, going only 5 and 3 and dropping three horrid games to the Broncos, Colts, and Jets. The very same Jets you guys blanked last week...

Well. So. Like your chances, eh?

You know who I'm talking to, yup, that's right: you, RW and you, Gino.

Well Gents, feel like putting your blog where you're mouth is? What do you say about a little wager, eh? Little friendly action?

Here's what I propose gents: my Patsies win, you owe me a post about the brilliance of my Patsies, and, well, yes, my blog too. And your Bears win (roll eyes here), and I owe you two a post about the brilliance of your Bears and your respective blogs.

Well, you in?

Update: My take on last night's game may be found here