Bosc Pears for Shut-Ins

It's called the road, it's called the rainbow road.

2008-07-15T08:28:00.002-04:00

Mark Kump's touching tribute to his (still-living) Uncle Walter:

I think if you can make it all the way to the end, the still frame of Uncle Walter makes the time you spent watching this video almost worthwhile.

Trapped in a Courtroom

2008-05-09T11:00:00.006-04:00

So it looks as if today will finally bring the I-can't-believe-it start of the R. Kelly trial. Almost six years after he was indicted, R. Kelly will ask a jury to believe that he is not peeing into the mouth of a child as young as 13 on that notorious video. This may be a problem since the prosecution supposedly has found a witness who had a ménage à trois with Kelly and the purported video girl. It also may be a problem since the line of reported Kells victims over the years could form a ring around Wrigley Field.

So to break it down: This may be the dirtiest trial in modern times of a man whose name is often mentioned in the same breath as genius. Many thought this day would never come what with the delays prompted by exploding appendixes and ladder falls. Kells has put the intervening years to good use though. He got into fights with Jay-Z and Ne-Yo. He worked drive-thrus. His long-time publicists quit, reportedly because he slept with her 19-year-old daughter. Oh, and he released increasingly critically acclaimed albums that millions of people bought. The self-proclaimed Pied Piper of R&B, because allusions to luring children when indicted on child porn charges isn't weird at all, also gave an interview some time back to Primetime Live. Here's my favorite quote:

ABC News Reporter: "Do you think that it is immoral for an older man to have sex with an underage girl?

R. Kelly: "If they're in love, I really can't be the judge of that."

Who's the Real Girl Now?

2008-05-07T12:55:00.008-04:00

During that whole greatest-team-ever Patriots hubbub last year, I was shot down when I asked men whether Tom Brady was the first true sports icon who was metrosexual. Joe Namath, duh, was the typical reaction. I accepted that as that I had never seen the iconic pantyhose ads Namath did back when everyone telling me duh was in diapers or wasn't yet alive. But, upon further reflection, I think I have a case.

Look here at the picture of Tom Brady at the Met's Costume Ball this week. Do people paid to model tuxedos look more comfortable? It's like the tux is his clothing of choice, people. Then consider, the commercial below of Broadway Joe and his girly legs. He's definitely comfortable with himself, but it's more cheesy than metrosexual, if you ask me. Granted it was the 1970s, so maybe he was the first metrosexual but Brady has to be the best one to date. I think I still win.

Guess You Had To Be There

2008-05-05T16:26:00.007-04:00

Even though 7-Eleven claims that more than 11.6 million Slurpees are consumed a day globally, I didn't have my first one until Sunday. My excuse: I never lived in a town with a 7-Eleven. And I was planning to avoid the new one in my hood because it's shiny and the wide aisles freaked me out a little. Cleanliness and not using every single possible space of your business is suspect in our neighborhood. But my coworker urged me (to the point of sounding insane) to have a Slurpee immediately. So upon sipping my icy carbonated drink Sunday, I thought it was sorta good. But I knew I would have coveted it as a 12-year-old. Something about eating/ drinking/ listening/ trying/ reading/ watching certain things for the first time as an adult is just wrong. You've already missed that window of goodness. My list of things that would fall short if I first experienced them now:

Top Gun

My reaction as a grade schooler: Oh my god, oh my god, oh my god. Tom Cruise is so hot! And when he sings to Kelly McGillis? OH MY GOD! Flying planes seems fun. I should do that. I need to find out what that requires when I finish taping this picture of Tom Cruise from BOP magazine to my wall.

My reaction if I saw it now: What a jingoistic piece of crap! I get that Tom Cruise is a movie star, but he is so creepy. Why does Maverick think its OK to ask Charlie if he can shower when he arrives at her place for their dinner date? Why does Anthony Edwards always play the most likable character in things and then die? And why is that volleyball scene so homoerotic?

The Dukes of Hazzard

My reaction as a kid: I LOVE THIS SHOW MORE THAN LIFE ITSELF. Two cute brothers, a pretty and fun sister, a Basset Hound, cool car and doofus man in charge? Greatest show ever. And I love that John Schneider album my Dad got my for my birthday!

My reaction now: I wish I had that Basset Hound.

Stale popcorn

My reaction then: Who cares if Mom made this huge batch in a Tupperware three weeks ago? It's still salty and delicious.

My reaction now: I drank enough last night that the dregs of this left over bag of microwave popcorn still sorta tastes OK.

So Bosc Nation, what's your list? And don't even think of including Dirty Dancing because that movie still rocks.

One of These Things Is Just Like the Other

2008-05-02T11:52:00.005-04:00

Jeremiah Wright (right), on 9/11:: "We bombed Hiroshima, we bombed Nagasaki, and we nuked far more than the thousands in New York and the Pentagon, and we never batted an eye. We have supported state terrorism against the Palestinians and black South Africans, and now we are indignant because the stuff we have done overseas is now brought right back to our own front yards. America's chickens are coming home to roost." -- Sept. 16, 2001
John Hagee (below left), on Hurricane Katrina:: "All hurricanes are acts of God because God controls the heavens. I believe that New Orleans had a level of sin that was offensive to God and they were recipients of the judgment of God for that." -- Sept. 18, 2006

Wright, on the United States:: "The government gives them the drugs, builds bigger prisons, passes a three-strike law and then wants us to sing 'God Bless America.' No, no, no, God damn America, that's in the Bible for killing innocent people. God damn America for treating our citizens as less than human. God damn America for as long as she acts like she is God and she is supreme." -- April 13, 2003
Hagee, on the United States:: "As a nation, America is under the curse of God, even now. Look at the scriptures and see for yourself. The stand we have taken on abortion, the stand we have taken against God in our classrooms, just may have sealed or doom." -- 1997

Wright, as crackpot:: "The government lied about inventing the HIV virus as a means of genocide against people of color. The government lied." -- April 13, 2003
Hagee, as crackpot:: "As millions of people anticipate the release of the latest Harry Potter book and film, we're reminded once again of Satan's ongoing attempt to deceive and destroy. The whole purpose of the Potter books is to desensitize readers and introduce them to the occult." -- July 9, 2007

Barack Obama, on Wright:: "Anybody who has worked with me, who knows my life, who has read my books, who has seen what this campaign's about, I think, will understand that it is completely opposed to what I stand for and where I want to take this country." -- April 29, 2008
John McCain, on Hagee:: "I admire and respect Dr. Hagee's leadership of the -- of his church. I admire and appreciate his advocacy for the state of Israel -- the independence and freedom of the state of Israel. I condemn remarks that are made that has anything to do which is condemning of the Catholic Church. ... I'm glad to have his endorsement. I condemn remarks that are in any way viewed as anti-anything." -- April 20, 2008

It's fun to do bad things...

2008-04-30T16:39:00.003-04:00

Shit wrapped in plastic

2008-04-24T10:13:00.007-04:00

As the soon-to-be-father of one Decabooter, I recently purchased a diaper genie in anticipation of the little feces balls that we'll be collecting and stringing together in long sausage links like this guy. I've been thinking about all this shit that'll be wrapped up in plastic thanks to me. Each week, it'll be my job to lug one plastic feces sausage out to the curb to be tucked away in a landfill for all of posterity. Alongside these baby shits will be the dog shit I collect and wrap in plastic bags when I eventually become a dog walker as well as my eventual grandpa shits wrapped in Depends when I finally get to just let go. My shit will be preserved for millennia so that some future archeologist can dig up these little poop preservers and wonder why an entire generation of Americans tried to save their excrement. But when you think about that archeologist trying to explain these efforts to ensure that this shit doesn't just decompose as fast as possible, you gotta admit: it's totally worth it.

The Tragic Scars of the American Dream

2008-04-17T14:28:00.015-04:00

There are probably 100 cars parked along the route I walk twice a day to allow Dog No. 1 to relieve herself. And what amazed me, today in particular, was that nearly all of the cars I passed had what, in my car-owning days, I would have called appalling damage. Dings, scratches, scrapes and outright dents. It was, if you'll allow some melodrama, an obscene movie written in fenders. A pimply teenage face in glossy paint and plastic.

Last night, someone described living in New York to me as being in an abusive relationship, which I instantly related to long lines, loud noises and bad smells. But here is the front line of the conflict, a ravaged picket line in the tired skin of every car in town.

Why would you put up with $3 gasoline and high insurance rates, which in the city would be more than $200 a month for even the safest driver, never mind a car payment, to have a car that is subjected to such indignities?

Owning a car once meant owning a slice of freedom. A transforming power. An innate insight into what it means to be an American.

Instead, we see destruction and hear the haunting sounds of more to come.

File This Under 'Useful'

2008-04-15T23:56:00.004-04:00

...

Tip of the hat to Steve Higgins, who hat-tipped this guy.

How to Sex (Not Sex Up) a Chick

2008-04-14T12:27:00.009-04:00

...

Steve Higgins is a grad student at Illinois, and he blogs with another like him about science. In the case of these screen captures, he is blogging on a psychology paper about, generally, the sexing of chicks.

Now, there are a number of things of interest here:

First of all, like success in most things (i.e., hammering a nail, holding a golf club, masturbation, etc.), the key is a proper grip. In terms of sexing a chick, that is displayed in the screen capture above.

Secondly, is the cold economics driving this process. Male chicks, apparently, are too aggressive and prevent female chicks from getting enough food. To avoid conflicts between the sexes, they are separated at birth. "What they do with the male chickens," Higgins writes, "I'm not entirely sure. I would assume they euthanize them."

Third is how something like this can become a trade skill. Higgins writes that the Japanese developed the process and brought it "to America in the 1920's where a number of chicken sexing schools were setup in Washington and California." Higgins says chicken sexers can classify 1,000 chicks an hour at 98 percent accuracy. Try doing that in a Manhattan nightclub.

Finally, we have the process itself. Hours after being born, the chicks are presented in trays of 100 to a sexer. The chick is first squeezed to clear it of poo, and then "gentle but firm pressure from the two thumbs and right forefinger are exerted to spread the ventral surface of the colaca upwards to expose the eminence." In other words, the chick is held upside-down, and its groin is mashed open to reveal its goodies. As in other cases of groin mashing, Higgins reminds us not to linger over our work: "The sexing decision must be made quickly because the chick is at risk from the vent eversion."

Below, you see the eminence, or "bead" as a sexer would say. Or the money shot to a pornographer. Four examples, and only two sexes. Which is which? Find the answer in the comments section.

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A feast for the......???

2008-04-10T11:57:00.004-04:00

Anyone remember the Seinfeld episode where George combines food, sex and TV into one "disgusting uncontrollable urge?" Apparently Carl Jr.'s does too.

Riddle Me This

2008-04-10T11:01:00.004-04:00

I know this isn't a novel question, but I have never gotten an answer. In all seriousness, where will Republicans in this country threaten to move if by some freak chance a Democrat moves into the White House come January? Canada is out, right? Too much free health care, too many gun laws? So where is a good Republican to turn? Or would a good Republican even joke about leaving the U.S.? Any ideas? Bueller? Bueller? Bueller?

Torch: 1. Monks: 0.

2008-04-10T00:47:00.008-04:00

This goes out from Bosc Nation to all the fireproof monks living in San Francisco.

On Monday, NY-fucking-Times columnist Roger Cohen -- reading the political tea leaves from unforgettable Ubud, Indonesia -- dashed off this droll prognostication:

If a Tibetan monk grabs the Olympic torch in San Francisco this week and immolates himself, nobody should be astonished.

Well, for the record, let me say that I, for one, would have been astonished. America has had all kinds of crazy in recent years, but let's face it, self-immolation hasn't been big since the '60s. Totally retro.

Now, I know gas prices are high, but some old people like Roger Cohen apparently can still remember a day when a monk intent on making a political statement had the stones to sit down in the middle of a street, douse himself in gasoline and light up people's consciences.

So Bosc Nation wants to know: Where have all the self-immolating monks gone?

Sometimes, it just sounds better in German

2008-04-08T17:20:00.008-04:00

So, You're Sayin' There's a Chance?!

2008-04-07T02:00:00.005-04:00

Never mind where I found this little gem. Consider its claims.

One: Samuel Poore, whom we are led to believe is a physician at a medical school (he is), "has described the steps that would be needed" to change a person's arm into a wing.: This is big stuff. This procedure has, so far as I can tell, never been described before. Even if you didn't want to have a wing, aren't you just a little curious? I mean, how soon we will see stuff like this on the bus?
Two: "A functional wing is, sadly, out of the question.": Aw, no! What?! Out of the question?! Why? That is only two sentences later and already the dream is dashed?!
Three: "But an arm might be converted to a decorative wing.": Well, heck. Why didn't you say so sooner? That could work. I mean, you'd say to yourself, So, I can't fly, but I'll look like maybe I could. Which, when you get right down to it, is how I look about a lot of things: That I could tie a knot, fold a map, satisfy a woman, etc.
Four: "...it all adds up to more trouble than it's worth, Poore concludes.": What?? No!! I thought that you said that, maybe, a decorative wing was possible. And now?! Now, you say it's not practical. Really?! To carve your arm into a wing is not practical?!

With Panoramic Views of... Nothing

2008-03-28T11:58:00.010-04:00

Very near my apartment is a not-yet-finished high rise, which has been baring its steel-ribbed insides to motorists for more than a year now. In the past week or so, the workmen have gotten around to adding balconies (pictured at right), two or three of which face directly into the bare brick wall of a next-door building.

The amenities of the apartments or condominiums in question are still a mystery to me; the only mention of the construction site I can find on the Web is a reference to how neighbors complained when crews were noisily working on Labor Day morning last summer.

But I wonder what manner of home buyer is going to be lured by the prospect of taking their morning coffee on a terrace, not more than three feet deep, with a sweeping view of a plastic-bag-strewn tree, a blank wall (pictured at left) and a tired, half-paved alleyway, while seated 10 or 20 feet above my street, which is a busy traffic link to the Prospect Expressway, and which in the afternoon is fairly crawling with knots of addle-minded teenagers on their way to the subway.

What's In A Name?

2008-03-26T11:22:00.004-04:00

Someone who occasionally posts here managed to get his gin-soaked seed planted in his wife's womb. The kid will pop out in the next two months so let's start a name campaign now. Since D-Web apparently won't allow the kid to be named Gracie because he's already called that one, I say they should name their child ... drumroll please ... Decabooter. Works for a boy or a girl, folks! (Well, sorta.)

I know what you're all thinking: "Shan, that's a great name." And you are right. Say it three times quickly: Decabooter, Decabooter, Decabooter. Rolls right off the tongue! And it's unusual enough to not even be in the baby name books, although it would go nicely between Decebal and Debra, so it fits that whole don't-name-your-kid-something-common mold.

In the interest of full disclosure, I must say that I have unsuccessfully tried to get others to name their child Decabooter before. It's not a novel, couple-specific name. And, I must admit that I first heard the name in connection to a crime. Decabooter Williams was convicted of burning two people to death. But, Williams was so suave that he gave a reporter an interview at the scene of the crime before he was suspected. "They were pretty good people," he said. Admirable. And a kid cuts his own path in this world. Not everyone named Jesse thinks he has to go out and rob banks. Not all people named Ned strike out to be the ultimate Bushranger. (That's for our Australian audience, folks.)

So do as they do in Chicago. Vote early and often. Decabooter for the little one!

2008-03-23T18:40:00.001-04:00

Innovation on the Gridiron

2008-03-21T16:15:00.007-04:00

I read a published quote from a Husker lineman today that reminded me of some advice a friend of mine was once given. Before a game, when he was a football player in high school, his coach stood in the front of the locker room and said, "Men, against this team we can do one of two things: We can run or we can pass."

For years, my friend and I used that anecdote as a sort of baseline for bland stupidity, an example of obtuse leadership. Of course there are two things a football team can do. There is running, there is passing and that is the end of the list.

Or, at least, I thought so. Now, apparently, there is a third thing.

When he was asked whether he thought this year's Huskers would run more than last year's team, guard Matt Slauson said, "There's two ways this can go, and I think it'll be a mix of both." Paraphrased here as, There are two ways this can go and I think it will be the third way.

Or. Better paraphrased, I think, by chucking all the words of the sentence and simply inserting the clank of a cowbell.

Summer of Halloween Head

2008-03-20T12:50:00.004-04:00

I want to start by saying that I love Ryan Adams. No, really, I do. No, you goofy Boscers, not Bryan Adams. (Although the Summer of '69 is a really good song. We played it all the time on the school bus when we were kiddies. Granted our opinion of good songs basically started and ended with Bon Jovi then, but still!)

Ryan Adams is a semi-popular singer, songwriter. Some know him for his work with Whiskeytown during that big alt-country phase a few years back. Others love him for New York, New York. The video for the song was filmed days before 9/11 and the Twin Towers are featured prominently. MTV put it in heavy rotation after the attacks. Others know Ryan for this song, which was covered by the ever-humble Bono, and got its fair share of radio play.

Along with Ryan's Grammy-winning genius comes a sometime heroin addiction and a predilection for writing a crapload (legal definition, of course) of songs. Some of those tunes, as one might imagine, are not of high quality. Halloween Head, featured on his recent album and supposedly produced during a post-heroin period, starts with the pithy lyrics, “Here comes that shit again.” and has Ryan yelling out: “Guitar solo!” That comes right before, you guessed it, a guitar solo. The song, painfully, is about the catchiest thing you have ever heard, so after a listen you find yourself going around singing, “I got a bad idea again. I got a Halloween head.” Not embarrassing at all.

So imagine my surprise when a blog posted the lyrics to a tune Ryan wrote for the dog, Gracie, who he shared with the actress Parker Posey when the two were THE East Village couple. The song is terrific. You will want to thank me after reading them. And, you are very welcome.

Hello Gracie, you're a good little girl
It's a beautiful world, knowing you're out in it
Last time I saw you playing in the yard
You were running with children and the old people were smiling

Do you miss me would you know me at all?
If you walked by my house would you smile and turn the corner
I'll blow you kisses, only make you feel worse
You know you've gotta make the best of the time god has given you

I scratch your name into a wall on the beach with my keys into the side of the pier
I used to sleep so I would dream I was lying with you midsummer
In the grass, in the fields

Nobody was right, nobody was wrong
But somebody had to go
Nobody appears so nobody is gone
Hello, goodbye, hello
Hello, hello, hello
Oh

I scratch your name in my arm with my keys on the beach on the side of the pier
I keep your picture in a frame on the wall of my place down the block
far enough away, it's like I'm not here

You're in my heart and you're in my soul
So I have to let you go
You're in my heart and you're in my soul
But I gotta let you go
Hello, hello, hello, hello
I gotta let you go
Hello, hello, hello
I gotta let you go
I gotta let you go
Goodbye, goodbye
I'm gonna let you go
Goodbye, goodbye, goodbye
I'm gonna let you go
Hello, hello
Hello, hello
Hello, hello

Click Play...

2008-03-19T11:52:00.001-04:00

"That guy needs a hug"

2008-03-15T17:41:00.002-04:00

"Oh, Monsieur" indeed. I think it's pretty impressive that the announcer doesn't try to sugarcoat this coverage...or the gratuitous instant replay.

An Unlikely Post From A Cynic

2008-03-11T11:20:00.004-04:00

It would be easy today to make a joke (See: Below, post. And, ahem, picture at left.) or to say that all politicians are sleaze bags. (See: Politicians, All.) But let's take a look at this Eliot Mess (See: Ness, Eliot.) from another perspective: It's all terribly disappointing.

Eliot Spitzer had potential. Sure, he was born with that oft-noted silver spoon in his mouth and likely pursued cases as the Attorney General that would generate headlines. (See: Sheriff, Wall Street) But this is a man who reportedly scored a perfect on the LSAT, was the editor of his law review at Harvard University, was elected to one of the most impossible jobs in politics (See: Booker, Cory for maybe the most thankless job.) with almost 70% of the vote and took on at least one very unpopular position within his first year in office. (See: Immigrants, not hating and wanting to know how many of them live here.)

Granted, it hasn't been a completely smooth path. He went to Albany thinking he was smarter than everyone and found himself in a duel with a grumpy and probably corrupt politician. (See: Gate, Trooper.) It was disappointing that he didn't use his smarts... more smartly? But yesterday's revelations are just dispiriting. It boggles one's mind that Spitzer would do such a thing, let alone that he wouldn't realize that investigators would watch his bank account after he spent so much time as a prosecutor and around law enforcement.

I didn't heart Eliot. And even if I did like him a lot, I would never leave my heart open to shattering after that blockbuster of a heartbreak. (See: Clinton, Bill circa 1998.) But it's sad all the same.

Speaking of sorry hypocrites, did anyone else in Bosc nation notice that Chuck Taylors hasn't posted a thing in the three weeks following his complaint that no one was posting? Too busy drawing hearts on your 8x11 glossies of Brad Pitt and Joe Montana, Chuck?

A Bosc Confession

2008-03-10T18:23:00.004-04:00

...

I was Client 10. But, no matter how many times I called, no one ever called me back. I'll be honest. I was more worried that Client 7 was going to eat Client 9. But I guess that never happened.

Has Anyone Seen His Pants?

2008-03-10T14:39:00.007-04:00

This specimen of American manhood, this tumid bashaw who probably tumbled out of the guest bedroom, fumbling in his pockets for a cigarette case, and burst unannounced onto the photo shoot, adorned the cover of a catalog that came in the mail for me today. I get a profusion of such catalogs, from a variety of purveyors, and am always amused at the absurd scenes depicted therein. But this guy? Do people wear that? A blazer, with the collar turned jauntily up and a pocket hankerchief; a sweater, probably cashmere, with a collared shirt; and instead of gray worsted wool trousers, a pair of Madras shorts. And a pair of those ridiculous boat shoes. Maybe he would really wear that, on the absurd spring afternoon that was both cool and breezy enough for a sweater and blazer and warm enough for shorts. But would he be dressed thusly to play croquet?