Haven’t had anything to say (or the time to say it) in awhile, but sometimes life just hands you a gift.
Today, I got a comment on a post from April 5, a post which contained only pictures of my neighbors’ house being torn apart by fire. The comment? Read [...]
It’s my favorite conservative, Daniel Larison, in this brief post on criticisms of President Obama not going to Germany for yet another photo op:
Republicans object to so many irrelevant things that Obama does and they treat absolutely everything as some supreme, unpardonable error that it is impossible to take [...]
My friend Ben commented on my last post, wondering what difference it makes whether one is “grinding” their coffee with a “blade grinder” rather than an actual burr grinder.
Basically, the “blade grinder” is just a subversively named food processor; some blades whirl around and chop up the coffee beans, with [...]
While I’m waiting for the long-awaited unveiling of foodcoffeelife.com (not hyperlinked because there’s nothing there yet), I thought I’d share my thoughts on “quality-driven” coffee, and some options I hope to evangelize throughout southcentral Kentucky. Below, you’ll find brief explanations on why every home [...]
If homeowner’s insurance worked like American health insurance, it would not only pay for fires but also cover utility bills, replacing broken appliances, baseballs hit into the window and all the food, drink and paper towels that pass through the kitchen. Certainly, a company could offer an insurance product that [...]
Me and my coffeehouse… it’s a love/hate relationship, for sure. It’s great on the rare occasion that Shelley and I get to go “sit a spell,” sans kids, and just soak it in. It’s great when someone who actually likes coffee — black coffee, and not [...]
“Democrats think the constitution says what it doesn’t and the Republicans think the constitution doesn’t say what it does. We’re lucky to have such a wide choice.” — random commenter at random blog
Biggest regular-season football game of all time? Maybe, maybe not… but this blogger goes way in-depth into the Favre/Packers/Vikings conspiracy, and there’s plenty of reason to be suspect of Purple Brett!
The monster of all conspiracy theories, of course, goes something like this: Favre decides to end [...]
…and it doesn’t include a new congresswoman named Krystal Ball.
Seriously! Check out her Facebook page, and tell me it’s not a parody! 1.) The name; 2.) The Obama-meets-Globetrotters logo; 3.) The “info” page (her favorite books include “The Origin of Wealth: The Radical Remaking of Economics [...]
I jumped into President Obama’s latest healthcare speech in the middle (wife gone, two rowdy boys causing all sorts of trouble), but what I heard was reassuring — assuming, of course, it’s anywhere near accurate. That’s the problem with presidential speeches about Congressional actions: they’re often more idealistic than realistic. [...]
I’ll apologize up front for the overuse of quotation marks as indicators of sarcasm. That said, it has been disappointing to watch the level of “outrage” amongst “conservatives” these past few months on any number of “issues,” most recent of which is a back-to-school speech by President Obama that will [...]
My main criticism with “conservatives” (most who label themselves as such deserve the sarcastic quote marks), put most aptly by the always insightful (and actually conservative) Andrew Bacevich:
Only those who recognize the omnipresence of sin—recognizing first of all that they themselves number among the sinful—can possibly anticipate the moral [...]
“Fresh until March 2010″… So read the label on a bag of coffee at a Starbucks in Nashville. My boss and colleagues decided to stop there on our way to Alabama (and seemed a bit puzzled that I, the real coffee lover of the group, didn’t partake), so I killed [...]
Sundays for me are different than they used to be, mostly because we now attend church services in the evening rather than in the morning.
Creativity is something that is nurtured, not manufactured. The problem with “creative” work is that, well, it’s still work.
Rest of American Christian World: You’re missing [...]
Yours truly happened upon a site people use to do illegal downloading, and this was the biggest ad on the page. What does it say about faith, digital disobedience, and the state of human relationships? I don’t know, but it’s pretty funny.
Jon Stewart makes fun of her, and a lot of people think she’s stuffy. But as a person whose politics are part paleoconservative, part libertarian (look those up on Wikipedia to be sure) — but who finds himself voting for Democrats because they’re less obnoxious than Republicans — Peggy Noonan’s [...]
My wife and I don’t go out to eat often, but when we do, we usually have no problem agreeing on a place to go. Yet oftentimes, the place we end up going isn’t the same place either of us individually thought of when we first decide to go out. [...]
A smattering of weird things you should read/watch/think about:
1.) “I Survived a Japanese Game Show”: The first entry is the most recent: I just found it 5 minutes ago! Sure, it has a lot of stupid American “reality” [...]
I’ve heard it said that the harshest truths — the most spot-on, no-nonsense criticisms — usually come from those closest to you, especially your family. And so I was delighted to see conservative columnist Peggy Noonan’s recent impalement of the Palin Gospel, an absolutely scathing undressing of all the [...]
NOTE: There is no “Day 1″ post and probably won’t be a “Day 3″ post; this is not meant to be a daily chronicle, just an occasional update on my new line of work.
So far, I’ve worked on a “creative exploration” for a growing bank in the region; rewritten [...]
I didn’t comment on Michael Jackson’s passing, mostly because I’m but 28 years old and his life didn’t really affect me all that much. (Ditto for Farrah Fawcett, and certainly not Billy Mays.) Former Titans QB Steve McNair, however, is a different story.
Now that I have a particular type of, um, dataphone, I’ve been taking a lot more pictures. The camera on it isn’t high-quality (only 2 megapixels), but the light-adjustment is pretty good and I found a great suite of filters called CameraBag. Some of the filters are lame, and most [...]
About four-and-a-half years ago, I found myself at a crux: Quitting the only job I was qualified to do, jumping into a venture I knew nothing about, and giving relatively little thought to the potential downsides of what was to come.
Since that time, I’ve had two children; gone into great [...]
Philip Giraldi, who usually writes about the seemier side of foreign relations, has an interesting post up about speeding laws — and how safety has nothing to do with them.
Let it be known up front that I routinely warn other drivers about police speed traps by flashing my lights. [...]
As of today, I have eight shifts left to work at the newspaper. Then it’s off for an entire week — off from the paper, the shop, the everything — on a trip to Barren [...]
Today, Apple announced its newest iPhone, the “3GS” version. Basically, it’s the same, except with double the storage, and it can shoot video (not just stills).
My story, while not as cool as Obama’s or Sotomayor’s — or even Bill O’Reilly’s! — is sort of interesting, particularly after I got to college. I decided to study journalism, but by the time I got to the college paper, the only spot left was on the copy desk.
On Saturday, Shelley was having some girls over, so I decided that, when I got off work, I would go have a beer at Entourage (a weird upscale club stuck in Bowling Green) before I went home.
The best laid plans of men…
First, work took longer than usual; I got out [...]
I’m a faithful fellow. I don’t blog about it too much, mostly because I’m no theologian or prophet (and because I don’t blog often in general). But I believe in God, and Jesus and his resurrection, all that good stuff. (And it is good stuff.)
He was born with a simple — and popular for the ’80s — name: Justin, meaning just, fair, righteous. His true first name was Roy — king — and the world could certainly use some just [...]
Thursday for me starts at 7 a.m. at the paper, and ends at 11:30 p.m. at Spencer’s, with a couple half-hour breaks in between. Friday starts at 7 a.m. at Spencer’s and ends at midnight or later at the paper, with the same half-hour breaks. So forgive me for a [...]
This is the scene from the shop tonight. Pretty… but boring.
PS: Some kids were throwing snowballs into the windows. I went outside — partly to tell them to stop, partly to bring in my snow-covered bike — and they didn’t like what I had to say! Moreover, they didn’t believe [...]
When I started this blog — actually, carried it over from an old one — it was with the intention of exploring politics, media and culture, three threads of thought that often intertwine. Yet I haven’t been able to shake a little personal blogging as well, and have generally marked [...]
I try not to blatantly rip off other bloggers very often, but Larison picked this up and it’s too funny not to pass on.
What on earth is this? Well, it is an interview between Michael Steele and ABC Radio’s Curtis Sliwa, but beyond that I don’t know how else to [...]
I happened upon a Facebook ad telling me how rich I can get if I follow Paul’s plan. I clicked his link and it took me here. Which is where I found this. See if you can figure out how I know it’s a sham (aside from the obvious [...]
THOUGHT 1: Blogging is light, and I’m not even apologetic this time. I’ve rediscovered working in — as opposed to simply owning — a coffeeshop, and while I miss my time at home with Shelley and the kiddos, I’m doing my best to enjoy a few things I’ve missed:
Sure, he was taped trying to solicit tens of millions in campaign contributions in exchange for Barack Obama’s Senate seat. Sure, his wife curses like a sailor. Sure, his hair is AWFUL (Stephen Colbert last [...]
As of this moment — not even noon on my 28th birthday — about 20 people have “written” on my “wall” to wish me a happy one. That is more people, I feel confident, than ever called me on the phone between my 1st and 27th.
I will be upgrading to Wordpress 2.7 today… hopefully it all goes smoothly. In the meantime, you may not find anything here.
addthis_url = 'http%3A%2F%2Fin3rds.com%2F2008%2F12%2Fmaintenance%2F';
addthis_title = 'Maintenance';
addthis_pub = '';
I really have to apologize — mostly, perhaps, to myself — for being such a slacker on the blog front in recent weeks. There are lots of reasons, but it still pains me to suddenly realize I haven’t written in a week, and that I have nothing substantial to add [...]
I posted a bit ago about our president-elect and the seeming continuity in foreign policy with “Bush-McCain” policies… and was roundly rejected by one of my closer friends for intimating that maybe, just maybe, Obama’s talk of change was ringing hollow. Perhaps I went overboard? Perhaps I was grasping [...]
I think it’s a combination of the economic meltdown (my 401k lost 25% this year) and my general stress level. Whatever it is, it’s making me take stock of my life and attempt to blow away the chaff.
The guys I play music with (we’re called Foxhole) are some of [...]
1.) Best essay by a washed-up celebrity: Dick Cavett of “The Dick Cavett Show” writes an occasional online column at the New York Times, and his take on Sarah Palin’s post-election stardom and her butchering of the English language is really, really great:
Oh, how I wish I had been fortunate enough to have a presidential candidate walk into my front yard. And have it taped by the media. And have my named mentioned 20 times during a debate. If it had been me, maybe I could have “secured my [...]
Interesting blog thread over at The American Conservative, which has become my unlikely first click when I open my computer and start to surf. Blogger Sean Scallon writes:
(Modern “conservatives”) tried to assert the government’s authority over education with No Child Left Behind and in a private medical case [...]
Doing things in reverse today, first the punchline: The always pointed Daniel Larison (of The American Conservative) explains Palinonics — the method of decoding the governor’s record-breaking run-on sentences.
I have concluded that the problem that so many people have in understand what Palin is saying is that we make [...]
It may be hoity-toity, and it may be one of those magazines that graces more coffee tables than actual readers. But it’s got great longform journalism (a dying breed, indeed), and two of this month’s pieces on Obama are worth noting:
This weekend was the fifth anniversary of my marriage to the most all-around awesome woman I’ve ever met. To celebrate, we left the kids with her parents and headed to Cincinnati for a trip to the Gap Clearance Center (jeans for as little as $5?!), Ikea, the Apple Store (where [...]
NOTE: This is not meant to be a daily chronicle, just an occasional update on my new line of work.
Oh, how I wish I had been fortunate enough to have a presidential candidate walk into my front yard. And have it taped by the media. And have my named mentioned 20 times during a debate. If it had been me, maybe I could have “secured my 
Interesting blog thread over at The American Conservative, which has become my unlikely first click when I open my computer and start to surf. Blogger Sean Scallon writes:
It may be hoity-toity, and it may be one of those magazines that graces more coffee tables than actual readers. But it’s got great longform journalism (a dying breed, indeed), and two of this month’s pieces on Obama are worth noting:
More »