UConn James

I guess not many people paid attention to that Sunday School class discussing Jesus' parable of the man who builds on sand and the man who builds on rock. Either that, or they solely took it to as a religious euphamism. I think it was also meant as practical advice; Jesus after all, was a carpenter. It takes 42 muscles to frown and say "Sorry about your home." But it takes only 4 muscles to slap someone across the head and say, "You built your house WHERE!?!?"

The link is stalling out for me, but I would think he's referring to the crop of I-don't-see-a-problem politicians and the hard-data studies that show the atmospheric CO2 has gone into the ocean at a startling rate. Liquified oxygen levels have dropped and the CO2 is causing the ocean's temperatures to rise. Who knows by how much, but whale migratory patterns are pretty telling, and they've had to go far out of the normal path to find the cold waters they need. Hurricanes feed off of warm water. That's why they build up strength in open water and lose power the further they get inland. It follows therefore that rising water temps lead to stronger hurricanes.

Basically, we need to be the Ned Flanders of the world. It's what we're good at, mates!

You missed the point. In the last storm when Mr. Jones's house was hit by a tree, Mr. Smith was the first one there and paid for a tree removal service and carpenter to fix the damage. If I was Mr. Smith, I'd be a little perturbed as Mr. Jones can't be bothered to stoop over his rail fence and say, "Hell of a storm. Here, have a beer. Need to borrow my power saw?" Mr. Smith shouldn't have to knock on the door. So as I understand it, several here are saying that b/c we in the U.S. have a good economy that is the collective of people working their butts off 60 hours a week, that our resources and money gained while working those hours should be given away for free to others who will gladly take our aid and then spit in our face? Maybe they should get off their butts from their afternoon siestas and tea and smoking clubs so their economy can withstand a hit too, instead of depending on others to bail them out.

Speaking in terms of aerial flood pattern, physical and structural damage. But if Katrina had been as much a surprise as the tsunami and w/o the evacuation orders and the smooth execution of them (thank Ike for the interstates), we would be praying that it would only be a quarter million.

ABC just had satelite pictures up of where the devastation and flooding is, and if you remember the ones from the tsunami, this looks about as bad. I wonder when that guy from the U.N. is going to call every other country "stingy" b/c they're not donating enough, or for that matter, anything. Oh, that's right. Never. The Navy is sending down four ships with supplies. Americans are expected to take care of their own, in addition to everyone else.

Better than people I know who've lost $300 in the past 6 months in their so-called safe John Hancock mutual funds. Right now, I'm building up a fallback fund. Then I think I'll start burying my surplus in the backyard; it'll be safer. I also honestly don't plan on living to retirement age.

What would be the ramifications of this? We will be less able to buy products from other countries, we'll have to produce more things here in the US (production of tangible goods is something I feel we should do more of, b/c as a people we are losing our sense of purpose in a service/pampering-driven economy), bartering might get back in style, more localized economies.... Five years ago in an econ class I predicted this would happen. I'm no worldbeater in econ tho. Anyone who can chime in? I don't get the financial services and people who erupt into absolute panic over infectious paranoia and the smallest things (e.g. what happened when the S. Korean manager uttered "diversification" during lunch). It's a big part why I want nothing to do with the stock market, etc. I don't get what can suddenly make a dollar worth less in a matter of minutes b/c someone isn't as "confident" anymore. I also don't get what happens to the dollar you invested before everyone's confidence suddenly dropped (we need to send them to that kindergarten class that uses the purple pens for grading, I guess) --- did it evaporate or disappear? Or is it fancy, legal theft?

Barnum never said that. It was actually David Hannum, a sideshow rival. Dr. Z is good at breaking down plays while telling what happened and which stats are important (there was an article last year where he pointed out one guy's version of the QB rating that did make more sense and was compiled based on viewing every play of every game) and what they really mean. As for when he gets into prognostication, that's where everyone has their own opinions, usually based on 20 percent fact and 80 percent 'I think X might happen, so I'll fit them in here; what the hey.'

The precise wording of the commercial: "They survived on Luck.... They survived on Instinct.... But on the other side of the Island.... They'll discover that everything happens.... everything happens.... everything.... everything happens for a REASON."

So, if I buy a woodsplitter and after I use it and say, "Well, I think I've got enough to last the winter for me," the likes of Jerry Jones can rush in my house, and slap down some documents saying that b/c I don't use the woodsplitter to start a firewood business where I can make $175/cord in a market share that demands 20 cords a year (for which to maximize my profits and sell "We Heart Wood" T-shirts, I'll have to advertise to end), I am required by contractual statute to sell the woodsplitter. The point being lost on him that IT'S MY WOODSPLITTER! and I can manage it however I want. The state of property rights in America is hanging from a cliff by the fingertips. Jerry Jones is the man in black shoes (joined by the men and woman in black robes) who steps on its hands.

It should be, you miss a week, you lose one finger. Miss a second week? You lose two fingers!

Maybe she's a FFS protege and she's still typing her first post....

Nope, they use the seashell thingy from "Demolition Man." (They never explained how that worked, did they? Stallone just sh-- in the corner.)

Link You've gotta be !@#$ing kidding me. And, sociology is the most useless major ever. I had classes w/ some players for UConn (sat next to Sue Bird in French ). Some of them took classes seriously, some not. Why do they bother calling them student-athletes? And, why don't they have some kind of program where the kids who don't want to do the academics can elect not to, receive a stipend and not waste everyone's time and enrollment/registration slots?

Well, to be fair, he did help sell its soul for the almighty dollar.

From the desk of Tom Donahoe:

I'm sure everyone will still watch when it's LA playing NY every week, b/c no one else is in a big enough market to deserve an NFL franchise. F%¢#ing ¢%¢$^¢%er!

You aren't going by the AP stylebook and dictionary definition of "destroyed." Destroyed means pretty much nothing is left standing. The WTC was destroyed. The Superdome's roof was damaged. The steel gridding is still standing; on the face, it does look pretty bad in that section, but who knows. They may just need new canvasing (probably not, tho). The engineers will do the postmortem of how it held up and what to do going forward. The language they used to describe the damage, especially "blown off" in the commonly used lexicon (which conjures images of an entire roof, framework, trusses and plywood in the next county over), was craptacular, as usual.

I wonder if the peoples of the world will send all kinds of money, aid supplies, and other such help to the U.S. I guess when you're the "world's lone superpower" everyone else is quick to feed at the trough of our kindness, but when the tables are turned....

Twenty monarchs/presidents/"presidents"/dictators-for-life with control over money enough for hundreds of millions of people, while hundreds of millions of people starve and serve their rulers' whims and sexual appetites. And people wonder why Africa is such a $%^ing mess. Still, 100K boobies must be a sight to behold. Then again, it's the boobies of the National Geographic variety....

No more a spoiler than saying that 4, 8, 15, 16, 23, and 42 are numbers that you say when you count b/w 1 and 100. Aren't 3 and 7 and a bunch of others retired too? If those were the exclusive retired numbers, it might be something, but... On the most recent commercial I saw, it said "On the other side of the island, the survivors will discover there is a reason for everything that happens." Hmm.

That probably looks a lot worse than it actually is. My point was that the steel girdwork is still standing; it's the canvas and sheeting that's gone. The reports were that part of the roof was "blown off." The reactionaries were essentially saying that when half of the shingles blow off, a roof is utterly, utterly destroyed, even tho the beams are still standing.

Maybe it's God's way of saying he wants more open-air stadia.

Wow. Whenever hurricanes hit, I'm always reminded of the parable about the man who builds on sand and the man who builds on rock.