rock over London. rock on, Chicago.

I think this ‘pork and beans’ song from the latest Weezer album is kind of catchy, and I think that’s embarrassing, that I like a Weezer song.
yes, this is true. I feel like I’m in high school — not to say that I especially disliked high school, but when I think of Weezer, I think of bad high school memories. not, like, ‘my prom date stood me up and I get picked on in shop class’ bad memories. bad memories, like ’falling asleep in English class and my C average’ bad memories. tedium.
 Weezer’s sucked for about half a decade at this point. but maybe that’s why the song’s good. it doesn’t sound like Weezer. at least, I don’t think it does.

saw a couple of interesting articles today.

I read this while I ate breakfast at this diner that’s about 50 yards from my door that’s the bomb-diggity. and it’s not really news, it’s the kind of article that’s important, that decent reporters dig up because while a lot of media doesn’t pay attention to it. it’s also important, so that I can read one article about futures trading while I eat, pass myself off as an expert on the subject, and then become indignant about it. so here goes:
it’s about the Commodity Futures Trading Commission, and how it has been suggested the massive growth of the energy futures market has been driving up oil prices.

The biggest financial speculators, called swap dealers, trade “futures contracts” that allow them to make money by betting on the price commodities will fetch in the future. They rarely take delivery of the goods themselves. In 2000, swap dealers held about 140,000 oil contracts, according to CFTC data obtained by a House Energy and Commerce Committee investigation. That has surged to about 1.8 million today, including a three-fold jump since 2006.

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to which I say: if you made those sons of bitches take delivery of all the goods they trade in, I bet the speculation market wouldn’t be so volatile. in fact, I think it’d be pretty quiet.

the general area around my sink has been unusually smelly the last day or two. then, the floor rug in front of it became damp, and I realized that the pipe leading from the sink is hanging free, and about half of what’s been going down the drain hs been just coming out underneath the basin. it’s some filthy shit. ruined my potatoes.

okay. okay, here’s another story. more Washington Post. I love the Post. I think it’s great.
anyway.
an office within the Justice Department – within the department — said that top aides to former Attorney General Alberto Gonazales screened prosecutor and judge hirings according to their political identity and religious conviction. meaning, the more you supported the Bush administration and espoused conservative Christian values, the better your chances at landing a senior Justice Department job.
this has been an ongoing investigation. the woman at the center of the allegations, who resigned a year ago and has declined to cooperate with investigators, is in her early thirties and a graduate of the Regent University law school. she did ‘opposition research’ for the Bush campaign in 2000. 
of course she did.

the end of ‘Brokeback Mountain’ is on. I am up late, finishing laundry. this film is painfully sad.

I’m too drunk to write anything worth a damn.

after work tonight, I got wingz with Lang and Bart and Bart’s wife, Anna, and their friend Beth. everyone was very nice. I enjoy Lang’s company. I’m very happy for Bart and Anna. and Beth is, she’s cool.
I drank a lot of beer. so did Bart and Lang. and we talked about Anna’s pregnancy, because she’s pregnant; two months. Bart tells me, though, I was the most excited of all the people they’ve told so far. I’m not gonna lie, I was excited, but I didn’t burn the motherfucker down when I found out. I mean, come on, man; kids are fun. and I tried to get that across in my congratulations. apparently, though, it made a big impression on Bart and Anna.
cause I’M GONNA STEAL THEIR BABY.

“Hook” is on.
this movie got awful reviews. I think. that sounds right. but anyone who gave “Hook” a bad grade can go to hell; this movie is the shit. the scene where they eat pretend food is the bomb. so is Rufio. and Bob Hoskins plays Smee. I mean, really, it’s got just about everything. even Charlie Kuzmich, or whatever the hell that child actor’s name was. he was in “What about Bob.” you know who I’m talking about. come on: Run Home Jack!

… for $8. nice!

lost my cell phone. then, I found it. that’ll save me a headache. truthfully, though, when I lose the cell phone, or my keys, or something the like, I usually bug. keys would be a real pain in the ass, but losing the cell phone, I didn’t even raise an eyebrow. fuck it. for a solid 18 hours, I could’ve cared less.

got an entire week off for vacation at the start of August. that’s pretty cool. I intend to be sunburned from neck to waistline by midweek.

and, I’m spent. nothing to write on, nothing to report. it’s been a pretty slow week.

you know, there’s nothing more fucking frustrating than spending half an hour filling out a job application online — for a place you’re not even that interested in anyway but you don’t care because you’re desperate to find new work outside of this burg – then, clicking “submit”, and getting a failure message because the link doesn’t work.
I need a fucking job. but I’d settle for an acknowledgement from any of the places I’ve applied. you motherfuckers, you.
god fucking damn it.
son of a bitch. shit. cocksucker.

it’s late. I’ll be quick.
I saw “The Dark Knight” after work tonight, midnight showing with coworkers. big, young crowd. couple people in costume. huge lines getting in.
it was a little unwieldly, a little long. but only a little. and, you know, I think it might be a lot to say Heath Ledger deserves a posthumous Oscar nomination for his role as the Joker. 
but I think I’m wrong about that. he was fucking awesome, man. all anarchy and nihilism. he does this thing with a pencil … god. movies are great, aren’t they?

I don’t know if I’ve mentioned this before. but Dave’s brother Jay is really making a go of it with this Gasoline Song of his.

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my friend Megan, the photographer from work, told me she wanted to photograph me when I cut my hair. so I did today, and before I did I called her, and she came over and took a bunch of pictures. I think they came out very well. and I’m nothing if not vain, so click on my two heads if you’d like to see more of them.

ok. so, ok, Ralph Nader. Ralph Nader, man!
I think it’s been well-documented that I like Nader. he’s redundant, a broken record, and incredibly unappealing to the eye, but I don’t doubt for a second that he’d be a better president than Obama or McCain. or he would have been in ’04, than Bush or Kerry. or Bush or Gore before that.
but unlike the campaigns of past, the fine, young ass has left Mr. Nader’s base, and there’s a myriad of reasons that no one listens to him anymore. and you can see it during his speeches, like I did. it was me, the local media, and a bunch of aging hippies. the crowd was, well, old. and there’s Nader, saying the same shit, only four years older. both candidates are corporate candidates. more of the same. etc.
that’s not entirely true. I think, unlike 2004, Obama has staked his claim on leaving Iraq. if he doesn’t, the country’ll fucking skin him. but the fire, that used to be in Nader’s speeches, it was gone. I was bored. Nader looks drained, like he needs to take a vacation.
you know, Nader isn’t crazy. he, and everyone on his campaign staff, knows full well he’s not winning anything, but that’s not the point of his candidacy. he’s doing it because if his set of campaign issues are completely different than McCain’s and Obama’s. you don’t have to agree with them – I don’t, not with all of them — but they’re fucking different. that’s the point. 
it’s ridiculous that there are only two serious options in the presidential election. a nation, of 300 million, and the election is four months off, and I can already narrow it down to two people that it could possibly be.
there’s a lot being left out. Bob Barr is running. Cynthia McKinney’s gonna be the Green Party candidate. and Ralph Nader’s gonna be dead some day, probably soon. hopefully, the next prototypical third party candidate won’t be treated with such vitrol.
and Eric Alterman is still a prick.

edit: also, I saw Ralph Nader speak on Sunday. but I’ll get around to that later.

I’m a big fan of the Beastie Boys. here’s a track.

tell me what makes you so afraid
of all those people you say you hate.
just give it one time, on your mind,
and let’s try to negotiate.
let’s try to negotiate …

Anheuser, InBev Reach A Deal for $52 Billion

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this Canadian lady makes some pretty funny comics. website is kind of janky, but that’s ok; I spend more time at work reading these than, you know, actually working.

when we were little, we used to go to the beach in New Jersey every other summer or so. I don’t remember an awful lot about it. I do, remember, that half-drowning yourself in violent wake for hours on end was, in fact, the greatest afternoon one could ever hope for. 
last time I went to the beach in New Jersey — three years ago – I slept on the floor at the Maddens’ place for a week. I got a really bad sunburn and drank a lot of beer and read a lot of books.
at night, we went down to the boardwalk while under the infulence of various intoxicants and rode carnival rides, and my cousin’s meathead boyfriend peed on the sand while facing everyone.
I witnessed for the first time how awesome my brother is at ’Galaga’ and ‘Ms. Pac Man’. there’s your generation gap, right there.
I’m going back to the beach next month, for a week. family members have rented more houses. I can’t go the whole time, but I’ll figure something out.
anyway, I am very excited. you could say, even, that I can’t wait.

“Vice President Dick Cheney’s office worked to alter sworn congressional testimony provided by a federal official in order to play down the threat of global warming and head off regulation of greenhouse gas emissions, a former government official said in a new accusation Tuesday.”

I got out of work at 11:30 tonight. fuck me. that’s early. that’s almost normal.

I feel like traveling.
I’d like to go down to Florida, or more specifically, the Keys. camp on the beach. and I’d even drive, expensive as it is. take a bedroll. sleep in the truck bed, under skies that only occasionally rain, and I can bathe in the ocean. get sunburned, gritty. watch hurricanes grow. buildings in pastels.
right now, I could do this for months.