Not only was he an honorable and admirable contender for Trump’s celebrity contest, Trace Adkins knows how to write a good song. I heard “You’re Gonna Miss This” for the first time a couple mornings ago and it made me cry in the car on my way to work.

Here’s a live performance of this song in Bloomington (which increases it’s poignancy for me):

Usually, on a nice lazy weekend day, I love to sit back and listen to A Prairie Home Companion (the movie was pretty good too). My favorite section of the show is, by far, the jokes. Here are a few clips from past shows that still make me chuckle.

Men, Women, and Marriage jokes:

Guy Walks into a Bar, Jewish, and other jokes:

Man, I find myself still loving AmieStreet. Here are a few artists/songs that I think are stellar:

I love to listen to NPR, and one of their best shows is easily Wait Wait… Don’t Tell Me!. It’s a news quiz show with a panel of witty comedians. Their special guest this week was NBA star Chris Paul.

Below you can listen to this past week’s show - it was an excellent episode. Chris Paul’s interview starts around the 18th minute:

I listen to NPR all the time, mostly because they present a wide range of stories that are not as biased as other “news” out there. The other day I caught a short interview with Anoushka Shankar, who happens to be Norah Jones’ half sister. She is a musician herself and just released a new album called Breathing Under Water.

This type of music isn’t exactly mainstream - it’s an eclectic mix of electronic and sitar sounds - but for some reason the CD is great to just relax and listen to. There are also duets with more mainstream artists like Sting (honestly, who doesn’t duet with Sting?).

Here’s track 7, “Easy,” featuring Norah Jones:

In case you haven’t heard yet, Verizon customer service representatives can’t do basic math. This one guy moved to Canada and selected a plan that was quoted to cost “0.002 cents/kilobyte”. But when the bill came he was being charged 0.002 dollars/kilobyte.

Seems like a simple problem, right? Wrong. Evidently Verizon employees and managers have no idea that “0.002 cents” is DIFFERENT than “0.002 dollars”. Here’s a short clip [40sec] from one of his phone calls to customer service:

Caller: Do you recognize that there’s a difference between 1 dollar and 1 cent?
Verizon manager: Definitely.
Caller: Do you recognize that there’s a difference between 0.5 dollar and 0.5 cent?
Verizon manager: Definitely.
Caller: Then, do you therefore recognize that there is a difference between 0.002 dollars and 0.002 cents?
Verizon manager: [pause] No.

Classic. What’s incredible is that EVERYONE he talked to didn’t understand the difference. He even walks them through all of the math at a simple 2nd grade level and still couldn’t get them to understand. You can listen to the entire 27 minute long exchange and judge for yourself - it’s a little bit scary how inept most people seem to be at math.

You can see the original post here.

… well, technically he never left. But it has been a good 5 years since I had last heard a song from him and I must say that he still has a gift of parody.

I just heard a newly released song titled “White and Nerdy” (which parodies Chamillionaires’ “Ridin’ Dirty”) and it was hysterical as I am both white and nerdy. The song is from a soon-to-be-released album called “Straight out of Lynwood“, which covers many spoof genres (not just hip-hop/rap). It is going to be half DVD and half CD (so lots of videos and other extras). I must admit, I actually might buy this album!

In other Weird Al news, I just ran across this NPR story about one of his songs being removed from the new album by Atlantic (who refused to give him permission to parody James Blunt’s “Beautiful”, even though James gave him blessing). So, since it’s not available on the album, go ahead and download it here (screw you Atlantic):

• Weird Al Yankovic - You’re Pitiful

In 1961 John F. Kennedy gave a speech entitled “The President and the Press” (listen) that is surprisingly poignant in today’s political and social climate:

The very word “secrecy” is repugnant in a free and open society; and we are as a people inherently and historically opposed to secret societies, to secret oaths and to secret proceedings. We decided long ago that the dangers of excessive and unwarranted concealment of pertinent facts far outweighed the dangers which are cited to justify it.
…
The newspapers which printed these stories were loyal, patriotic, responsible and well-meaning. Had we been engaged in open warfare, they undoubtedly would not have published such items. But in the absence of open warfare, they recognized only the tests of journalism and not the tests of national security. And my question tonight is whether additional tests should not now be adopted.

That question is for you alone to answer. No public official should answer it for you. No governmental plan should impose its restraints against your will.

How is America Online still in business when they treat their customers like this? The link goes to the blog of a guy who tried to cancel his AOL account. He actually recorded the telephone call (which you can listen to here). It is funny at first until you realize that it’s real. Even if AOL’s internet offerings are going down the tube, at least their customer service department is still making great progress toward creating bigger, better ass-hats.

In a related story, Netscape (which was bought by AOL in the late 90’s) just released their beta site. Unfortunately it’s just a poor copy of the popular Digg.com. Obvious differences on the Netscape site include more ads, more clutter, and less content. Well, at least AOL is consistent.

UPDATE: Looks like the service rep was fired. Check out AOL’s response.

current twc: 15,002

While Shannon was out of town I went to a stand-up comedy show featuring Dan Chopin at Walter Payton’s Roundhouse (a surprisingly large complex full of good beer and entertainment). I quite enjoyed the show, though I am pretty sure the beer helped with his humor. For $15 I got to see three comedy acts (he had two opening acts), so it was also well worth my money. Here’s a brief clip of Dan Chopin talking about going to the drug store (I bought his CD after the show):

Beers I enjoyed from the Roundhouse micro-brewery:

• Payton Pilsner: light and easy to drink
• Honey Wheat Ale: a bit too grassy for my taste, but respectable
• Aurora Amber Ale: a nice mellow taste with a hint of wood/oak