Wherein, for a short period of time I am loaded

So I both got my paycheck and my security deposit back from my last abode yesterday and I am temporarily rolling in dough. It's a heady feeling that I intend to enjoy for the entire month that I will have it. Then I go back to regular rent prices and utility bills kick in and I'll watch it all slowly drain away until, sometime later this year I suspect, I'll be back to scrimping and harsh budgeting much the same as when I first moved out here almost 7 years ago.

Life really is pretty cyclical when it comes right down to it.

Ah well, for now I'm feeling almost financially secure and I have an Odwalla smoothie so life is good.

Gimme some loofah, baby

I'm not sure which I'm looking forward to more, watching Stephen Colbert skewer "Papa Bear" O'Reilly as only he can, or the blowback the Big Giant Head is going to get for this latest gem:

On the January 15 edition of Fox News' The O'Reilly Factor, host Bill O'Reilly said of Shawn Hornbeck -- who was abducted at the age of 11, held for four years, and recently found in Missouri -- that "there was an element here that this kid liked about this circumstances" and that he "do[esn't] buy" "the Stockholm syndrome thing." O'Reilly also said: "The situation here for this kid looks to me to be a lot more fun than what he had under his old parents. He didn't have to go to school. He could run around and do whatever he wanted." When fellow Fox News host Greta Van Susteren pointed out that "[s]ome kids like school," O'Reilly replied: "Well, I don't believe this kid did."

The following day, during his "Talking Points Memo" segment, O'Reilly responded to viewer mail criticizing his comments about Hornbeck. O'Reilly concluded: "I hope he did not make a conscious decision to accept his captivity because" his kidnapper "made things easy for him. No school, play all day long."

Of course what else would one expect from King Falafel? He's been accused of being a sexual predator himself so it's probably partially professional courtesy, and partially his own deep need to believe that victims of this kind of thing secretly enjoy it. Gods I'm kicking myself for not making it home in time for Olbermann's list of Worst Persons in the World last night. I'll bet it was a doozy.

(no subject)

The 50 Most Loathesome People of 2006

Personal faves:


30. Rush Limbaugh

Charges: It’s hard to believe this repulsive shit fountain is even human, until you remember that we share 70% of our DNA with pigs.

17. Tony Snow

Charges: A soft-spoken scoutmaster with the obfuscatory skill of a Jedi car salesman. After years defending the Bush administration’s worst excesses on "Fox News Sunday," Snow’s job transition to White House Spokesman consisted solely of getting directions to the new office. Very first answer at very first press briefing was a lie, containing that old stonewaller’s chestnut, "we will neither confirm nor deny." Snow’s vast ignorance greatly enhances his ability to appear to believe the bullshit he emits for a living—he thinks evolution "is pure hypothesis," that black/white disparity in America has "all but vanished," and that the Baker-Hamilton report is "partisan." This kind of willful denial of reality makes him a much more sophisticated protocol droid than his monotonous predecessor.

9. Ken Lay

Sentence: Drinking a martini in his bathrobe and reading the Wall Street Journal at his secret compound in the South Pacific, the "late" Mr. Lay starts choking on an olive when the 400th major daily article to describe his life as "Shakespearean" makes him laugh out loud. Lay falls out of his chair, impaling an eyeball with the stem of his glass and catching his penis in a $900 toaster. The electrical current triggers the long-dormant prefrontal cortex of his now-smoldering brain, suddenly activating Lay’s conscience. As he is slowly and painfully electrocuted over several minutes, Lay experiences a lifetime of guilt and remorse. Then he catches fire.

6. Dick Cheney

Charges: The dark master of the White House, Cheney strikes fear into the blackest of hearts. Only surfaces occasionally to nod and grunt at a reporter from Fox News, the only station he ever sees, before returning to the White House boiler room to continue planning the apocalypse.