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You are here: Home / Open Threads / Open Thread

Open Thread

by John Cole|  November 16, 201111:58 pm| 48 Comments

This post is in: Open Threads

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Had some stuff to take care of. Now it is too late to do anything.

Such is life.

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Previous Post: « Big news in California
Next Post: A Golden Age of TV Drama? »

Reader Interactions

48Comments

  1. 1.

    spudvol

    November 17, 2011 at 12:06 am

    So, Cole, how is OccupyBFE going?

  2. 2.

    hamletta

    November 17, 2011 at 12:06 am

    Rick Perry challenges Nancy Pelosi to a debate. Because presidential challengers always debate the minority leader of the House, right?

    What?

  3. 3.

    The Dangerman

    November 17, 2011 at 12:07 am

    This week prior to the Holiday, I’m giving thanks for the pathetically weak Republican field of candidates…

    …as I expect the word “lazy” to be placed around Obama’s neck, just as malaise was placed around Carter’s.

    Yes, it’s taken out of context; doesn’t matter. They have the money and the mouthpieces.

  4. 4.

    trollhattan

    November 17, 2011 at 12:10 am

    Swinging dicks in the Pacific. Methinks this Australia deployment announcement deserves more attention than it’s getting.

    http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-asia-15715446

    Also, too, zinfandel es muy bueno.

    [Edit: sometimes I love the intertrons. Right after I post this, I get a rotating ad with Wilma Flintstone selling Fruity Pebbles…in Spanish.]

  5. 5.

    TooManyJens

    November 17, 2011 at 12:11 am

    @hamletta: I was literally speechless for a minute after reading that. Couldn’t get anything out of my mouth but sputtering. Does Rick Perry know what office he’s running for?

  6. 6.

    The prophet Nostradumbass

    November 17, 2011 at 12:12 am

    If you haven’t seen it, you should watch this week’s episode of Nature, My Life as a Turkey. It is awesome.

  7. 7.

    spudvol

    November 17, 2011 at 12:13 am

    @hamletta: Next Perry will challenge Nancy Sinatra to a deboot.

  8. 8.

    Steeplejack

    November 17, 2011 at 12:14 am

    Night shift checking in. Just got home from work, after closing with the slowest of the slow managers. Excruciatingly, painfully slow. I will be up for at least two or three hours as I decompress.

    ESPN is on in the background. I found myself wondering today what they are going to do to fill up the time if they don’t have the NBA for the next six months. Makes you think.

  9. 9.

    trollhattan

    November 17, 2011 at 12:14 am

    @spudvol:

    We have a winnah!

  10. 10.

    trollhattan

    November 17, 2011 at 12:15 am

    @Steeplejack:

    I found myself wondering today what they are going to do to fill up the time if they don’t have the NBA for the next six months. Makes you think.

    Sweet jeebuz deliver us from hockey and subtropical golf. Amen

  11. 11.

    The prophet Nostradumbass

    November 17, 2011 at 12:17 am

    @trollhattan:

    Sweet jeebuz deliver us from hockey

    SILENCE!

  12. 12.

    eemom

    November 17, 2011 at 12:17 am

    Had some stuff to take care of.

    See a man ’bout a mule?

    Oh wait — wrong thread.

  13. 13.

    Spaghetti Lee

    November 17, 2011 at 12:20 am

    @hamletta:

    I suspect he, or at least someone working for him, knows it’s stupid, so when Pelosi says “What kind of moron are you?”, the wingnuts can run screaming “COWARDLY LIB PELOSI REFUSES TO DEBATE PERRY” headlines. It’s like the equivalent of 3rd graders daring each other to eat dog poo.

  14. 14.

    eemom

    November 17, 2011 at 12:20 am

    @The prophet Nostradumbass:
    @trollhattan:
    @Steeplejack:

    psst: maybe this is the good Lord’s way of telling all you sports freaks to get a life. Jussayinzall. kthxbai.

  15. 15.

    Spaghetti Lee

    November 17, 2011 at 12:21 am

    @Steeplejack:

    Well, they might have to do something ridiculous like televise card games or spelling bees or cup-stacking championships but OH WAIT.

  16. 16.

    hrprogressive

    November 17, 2011 at 12:24 am

    Cole has a life?

    Film at 11!!!

  17. 17.

    Hill Dweller

    November 17, 2011 at 12:25 am

    @The Dangerman: I suspect they’ll try and hang “lazy” around Obama’s neck, but Romney said something nearly identical in his book(which Politico pointed out), and Perry the half wit is largely ignored.

    Moreover, it will give Obama to explain the context, which was Us businesses not selling America hard enough.

  18. 18.

    The prophet Nostradumbass

    November 17, 2011 at 12:25 am

    @eemom: Me? I couldn’t care less about the NBA. Anyway, ESPN don’t show the NHL, so it’s not like they’re going to show more of it.

  19. 19.

    Paddy

    November 17, 2011 at 12:26 am

    Stunning amount of police force- Video- NYPD raiding Occupy Wall Street / Zuccotti Park, set to “New York, New York” Music

    How the F do they pay for all those cops?

  20. 20.

    hamletta

    November 17, 2011 at 12:27 am

    @Spaghetti Lee: You are very wise.

    You also seem to have gotten all the way to junior high school, unlike Perry’s campaign advisors.

    Also, too, unlike Governor of Texas, Minority Leader is a real job.

  21. 21.

    AA+ Bonds

    November 17, 2011 at 12:28 am

    fo yo sorrows

  22. 22.

    hrprogressive

    November 17, 2011 at 12:29 am

    @hamletta: Not while Boner, The Orange holds it!

  23. 23.

    Steeplejack

    November 17, 2011 at 12:29 am

    @eemom:

    Fie, woman! We are sophisticated men of the world who can interest ourselves in the full panoply of life’s rich tapestry, not just professional sports. Why, we even read and comment at cutting-edge intellectual blogs such as this one.

  24. 24.

    Jay in Oregon

    November 17, 2011 at 12:30 am

    @hamletta:
    He can’t even punch in his own weight class with the jokers in the GOP primary race, and he’s going to try to debate someone with real policy experience?

    As George Takei would say, “Oh, my.”

  25. 25.

    Redshift

    November 17, 2011 at 12:33 am

    @Spaghetti Lee: It’s clearly designed to appeal to the Rush demographic, for whom Pelosi is the evil puppetmaster even though the Republicans control Congress. Unfortunately, it comes at the cost of making him look like an idiot to everyone else.

    Personally, I hope she accepts, because it would be a prime opportunity to explain what Congress could be accomplishing if we didn’t have a broken Republican “status quo” and almost certainly either make Perry look like a dumbass again, or further alienate women from Republicans if he acts like a bully (or more likely make him look like a gutless coward as he finds a way to weasel out of it.)

  26. 26.

    Yutsano

    November 17, 2011 at 12:48 am

    @Steeplejack: Is it a bad sign when you have to get coffee just to get you through the night? Even though my day tomorrow will be hella longer and more exhausting?

  27. 27.

    Atticus Dogsbody

    November 17, 2011 at 12:51 am

    @trollhattan: The Chinese and Indonesians are a bit iffy on the idea.

    Also, the Marines that get posted to Tindal will probably by a bit pissed at being stuck in such a shithole (Google maps: Tindal, NT). Oh well, at least they won’t be getting shot at… much (it is the Northern Territory).

  28. 28.

    MikeJ

    November 17, 2011 at 12:52 am

    @Yutsano: I’m trying to decide if I can take a nap and wake up for a two am skype or just stay up, and I’m already tired from getting up at 0 dark thirty today.

  29. 29.

    MikeJ

    November 17, 2011 at 12:54 am

    @Atticus Dogsbody: I understand that Tojo never made it to Darwin.

  30. 30.

    mclaren

    November 17, 2011 at 1:00 am

    Had some stuff to take care of. Now it is too late to do anything.

    Succinct summary of the Obama administration.

  31. 31.

    Steeplejack

    November 17, 2011 at 1:07 am

    @Yutsano:

    [. . .] have to get coffee just to get you through the night?

    How does the coffee help? Do you have to stay up tonight? Or does coffee somehow calm you down and help you get to sleep?

    My pathology is that I get home between 11:00 and 12:00, can’t go to sleep before about 2:00, then have to monitor myself carefully to make sure I don’t overshoot into full night-owl mode and stay up until 4:00 or 5:00 a.m. Then, no matter what time I go to bed, I wake up between 7:00 and 8:00 and can’t go back to sleep. So I get up, putter around, do some chores and then, if I’m lucky, grab a short or long nap around noon before going back to work at 3:00 or 4:00 p.m.

    And then my circadian rhythms get really screwy when they change up my schedule without much rhyme or reason: e.g., I opened yesterday (Tuesday)–7:00 a.m. to 3:00 p.m.–but now I’m closing the rest of the week. And often my schedule is screwier than that.

  32. 32.

    Steeplejack

    November 17, 2011 at 1:13 am

    @MikeJ:

    One good metric I have read, which seems to be true for me, is that the human sleep micro-cycle is about 90 minutes, so if you are going to sleep for less than your usual full time you should do it in 90-minute increments. E.g., you will feel better after sleeping for 4½ hours than after 5 or 5½ hours.

  33. 33.

    Mnemosyne

    November 17, 2011 at 1:16 am

    @Atticus Dogsbody:

    I dunno, is it really that much worse than some of the American shitholes they could end up in?

  34. 34.

    Atticus Dogsbody

    November 17, 2011 at 1:18 am

    @MikeJ: Very true, although his bombs did. I made it to Darwin and in two years managed to do probably as much damage. I could never understand how the boys and I never drew the ire of the coppers until a few years later when I found out that my boss (a former cop and a Darwin bigwig) had told them to let us be, bless him. Heady days.

  35. 35.

    Mnemosyne

    November 17, 2011 at 1:21 am

    @MikeJ:

    You could try a caffeine nap.

  36. 36.

    Atticus Dogsbody

    November 17, 2011 at 1:28 am

    @Mnemosyne: Fort Irwin has Vegas and LA 2 1/2 hours drive away, no crocodiles and no wet season.

  37. 37.

    Linkmeister

    November 17, 2011 at 1:30 am

    @Atticus Dogsbody: It’s interesting to me that the Marines aren’t going back to the old NCS site (Harold Holt) at the Northwest Cape (Exmouth, I think). The mission dictates where they go, but there are already facilities that were once US-used. One of the guys I worked with at NCS Japan had been stationed there; met and married his Aussie wife there, too.

  38. 38.

    MikeJ

    November 17, 2011 at 1:31 am

    @Mnemosyne: *That* is handy advice. Of course I need to be alert for my call and then be able to sleep after so I don’t screw my schedule.

    Who had the bright idea of making the earth round and fucking us up with time zones any way?

  39. 39.

    Atticus Dogsbody

    November 17, 2011 at 1:36 am

    @Linkmeister: At Tindal they’re closer to, and have a nice straight highway leading to, the U.S’s most important base in Oz – Pine Gap.

  40. 40.

    Yutsano

    November 17, 2011 at 1:47 am

    @Steeplejack:

    How does the coffee help?

    It fixed my headache, so now I can get stuffing done (accomplished!) and settle in for the night.

    Do you have to stay up tonight?

    Nope. But I do have to get up early and do some more cooking before work. It’s my fault: I overbooked myself tomorrow.

    Or does coffee somehow calm you down and help you get to sleep?

    It dilated the blood vessels around my cranium, so I could actually concentrate enough to cook. After that burst of productiviteh, I can calm down for the night. Caffeine never has kept me awake. But I don’t get sugar rushes either. I r an odd duck.

  41. 41.

    Spaghetti Lee

    November 17, 2011 at 1:49 am

    @MikeJ:

    Probably some judicial activist.

  42. 42.

    Mnemosyne

    November 17, 2011 at 1:51 am

    @Yutsano:

    You could have ADHD. We has strange brains that don’t react to stimulants like most people’s brains do.

  43. 43.

    Yutsano

    November 17, 2011 at 2:02 am

    @Mnemosyne: That might explain why Vic odin does virtually nothing for me. Whereas Perco cet definitely gets me feeling next to nothing. The funny thing is I’ve never been diagnosed because psychologists are cat toys to me.

  44. 44.

    Brother Shotgun of Sweet Reason

    November 17, 2011 at 2:08 am

    @MikeJ:

    Who had the bright idea of making the earth round and fucking us up with time zones any way?

    You can blame Physics for a round earth: maximum volume with minimum surface area. Time zones are the fault of the railroads, who had to keep a schedule but couldn’t make it work when every midwestern town and city was on its own solar-based time.

  45. 45.

    Mnemosyne

    November 17, 2011 at 2:45 am

    @Yutsano:

    The only thing Vic odin did for me was make me violently ill after a couple of days — didn’t do much for the pain. I had to seek out the ADHD diagnosis after suspecting it for years. G was skeptical until he read this thread on Ask Metafilter and was like, “Holy crap, that’s what I married.”

  46. 46.

    Steeplejack

    November 17, 2011 at 2:53 am

    Are all the site add-ins refreshing themselves in the dark of night? They’re breaking my balls right now, taking forever to load. I’m looking at you, e.change.org and something something sitemeter.

    ETA: Also pts.lockerz.com. WTF?!

  47. 47.

    CarolDuhart2

    November 17, 2011 at 4:40 am

    @Spaghetti Lee: . Figure Skating. Professional Ski Events. Soccer. Just a few suggestions.

  48. 48.

    Joe

    November 17, 2011 at 7:27 pm

    Loving WP department: I read this on an iPad. The change.org ads on the left sidebar (the ones that use Flash) overflow the column and block whatever perspicacious commentary might be that far down the page.

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