The past couple of days have been spent wading through a rat pack lifetime collection of crap that strains the walls of my father’s basement. He has been on this simplifying his life kick lately which basically means that I have to be on this kick as well. Within the first six hours we had already filled the 12 cubic foot dumpster he had rented and we’ve been waiting for the disposal company to come pick it up and give as another empty one. Looking around the basement, I can see us filling this one as well.

*sigh*

Enjoy my reviews of David Bowie’s 1996 album Earthling and Skinny Puppy’s The Greater Wrong of the Right.

I’ve made my argument for The Best TV Show of the 80s!

Here are my thoughts about how the Portland Trailblazers will make use of Andre Miller now that they have signed the point guard free agent.

Today NBA teams can negotiate contracts with free agents and with players currently under contract. For the Portland Trailblazers this means that they will be negotiating first and foremost with agents representing Brandon Roy and LaMarcus Aldridge. While it is almost a foregone conclusion that Brandon Roy will be extended a maximum salary contract that will probably range in the 3-5 years , I think there has been some expectation that the Blazers will not extend the same deal to LaMarcus Aldridge. To that I say, don’t go cheap Portland. I say emphatically, sign LaMarcus to the max! I fully expect that Lamarcus Aldridge will average 20 points and 10 rebounds this year, even in the face of an improved Greg Oden, a constant paint warrior Joel Pryzbilla, and the young backup forward buck Jeff Pendergraph.

Rumor has it that Portland is trying to sign Hedo Turkoglu as starting small forward and backup power forward. It is my opinion that unless the Blazers know that Martell Webster cannot play during the next season there is no reason to spend all of that money on Turkoglu! We have the backup power forward slot solved potentially between Jeff Pendergraph and Travis Outlaw. The position we don’t have solved is point guard.

I am aware that signing LaMarcus to a maximum contract will limit our ability to play around in the free agent market. Frankly, I think we just need the reserve or starting point guard spot filled. I am confident Portland can get Kirk Hinrich without trading a player. They will just have to use all or the majority of their salary cap space and trade exception to get him. They will need to let Channing Frye go, which rumor has it that Portland intends to do so.

I would only encourage Portland to sign Hedo Turkoglu if they already have an informal trade deal in place should he sign with them to be used to obtain the veteran point guard position, which I think, having observed Kevin Pritchard and team the past few years, is a very real possibility.

Malcolm Gladwell, a sociologist, is the author of such popular works as The Tipping Point, and Blink,. He follows them up with perhaps his most comprehensive and interesting work yet, Outliers: The Story of Success. His book outlines why there really is no self-made success stories, and explains how the cultural influences that surround person with purpose is more responsible for success of a person. He demonstrates empirically that the best Canadian born hockey players are almost always born in the months of January, February, and March.  It is a great read! I cannot recommend this book highly enough. It is certainly a book that is well-suited for someone who really wants their intellect challenged about the societal expectations we may take for granted.

Arthas: Rise of the Lich King, a novel by Christie Golden

As a big fan of science fiction and fantasy over the years I can tell you with complete sincerity that Christie Golden has done a masterful job with this novel. It is perfect for players of the game who have wondered exactly why Durneholme was destroyed, why Undercity is in the old captial of Lordareon, how and why Arthas’s relationship with Jaina Proudmoore is so important, and how it is possible for a powerful and charismatic young man (that is similar to Anakin Skywalker/Darth Vader)  to fall so far from grace.

The novel is a light read, so its perfect for that brief weekend at home or at the beach. I recommend it. It is incredibly fun imagining this tale in a world that our characters have traveled so thoroughly!

The film starred Peter Strauss (Judge Kenneth Hoffman) and Melissa Gilbert (Leah Furman, Court Clerk). The film dealt with the struggle of a Judge who must follow the letter of law even if the consequences may set a serial killer free.

One of the reasons this was such a monumentous occasion was because so many of my family and friends appeared in the film in one way or another. In the title sequence we see a still frame of our Wasco County Courthouse. Outside the building seated on a newspaper on a bench is my cousin and renowned landscape painter Anthony Kiser reading a newspaper.

My mother and many of my cousins appear in the audience that listens with rapt attention to the political debate that takes place in the film. The location for that scene was The Dalles High School auditorium.

I bring up this film because recently because I found this essay that Gale Patrick Hickman the writer of The Penalty Phase (former attorney and Orange County, California presiding Judge) posted, The Writing and Filming of The Penalty Phase, that recounts his experiences that led to the creation of the screenplay and the process of casting and filming it in The Dalles on the banks of the Columbia River.

The companies are SBOonline.org and Unitedtel.com. SBOonline likes to charge people for a non-existent survival kit fee of $15.25 per/mo and Unitedtel.com likes to charge $14.95  fraudently for an MP3service. Both were a serious pain in the ass to deal with. Be careful when calling them they  like to try to phish information out of you. Whoever crammed me used an incorrect residental address and birth date, and in both case these companies tried to get me to provide them the correct data which of course they don’t require to cancel the account. They also don’t need it for a refund because all refunds or credits will be sent to your telephonecompany anyhow.

These kinds of creeps seriously piss me off. I guess a down economy like this really brings out all of the bozos.

If you do have charges like those above you can dispute the charges with them at SBOonline.org (1-877-726-4222) and www.unitedtel.com (773-329-2775).

Hope that helps! Power to the peeps!

Unfortunately, they removed it because it was stressing their servers too much, bringing the Twitter service down every couple of days it seemed. In its place has arisen a user driven workaround - the hashtag. When twittering, just add a pound sign (#)before any subject. For example if you were twittering about the recent Portland Trailblazer score you might follow it with #trailblazers, enabling other Blazer fans to find all the recent news, information, and rumors that might be of interest to them on Twitter. A great website that archives all of these hashtags is #hashtags.

 Kevin Rose explains in this guest post how hashtags and 9 other tweeting techniques and habits can be used to increase the number of people who follow you on Twitter at TechCrunch.

$10,620,397,126,433.52 as of today January, 26th, 2009