"I ate his liver with some fava beans and a nice Chianti."

I'm as sympathetic as the next guy — even more so — when it comes to a day with nothing to write about when that's your job. But this story I just read on the Web site of the Hornell Evening Tribune, the local paper for my old home town shows you just how desperate for excitement that burg is:

HORNELL - Web surfers researching the Maple City online instead learned about the birds and the bees when they stumbled upon a pornography link on a Hornell-related Web site

An errant visitor to www.hornellny.net - unaffiliated with any of the official city pages - posted the porno link in the site's guestbook, where anyone could post messages.

Someone actually called the mayor of the city about this. What's more, the mayor actually took this to the chamber of commerce to deal with. Oh, and the site in question? It hasn't been updated is six years.

Welcome to 2005 folks, where comment/trackback/guestbook spam is a way of life. Heaven forbid anyone on an "official city page" ever try to start a blog and gets the same flood of spam most receive. They'll have to call out the National Guard.

It's 6:30am here, and typical for me on a Saturday, I couldn't fall back to sleep after feeding the idiots their breakfast. Monday through Friday that's never a problem, since those are the days I have to get up. But come the weekend, when the world is my oyster, my brainmeat seems to say, "Get out there, get going! Face the day. Carpe diem, caveat emptor, ipso facto, ad naseum, buster!"

I think that Latin translates to "Today, in fact, seize a cautious buyer until you puke again and again." Tho maybe not. I never took Latin, I learned most of what I know on Law & Order reruns.

So I'm sitting here in my dining room, watching deer in my front yard try to find something to eat under the snow, which is again falling in great fluffy chunks, trying to think about something to write about from the past week. It was a span of days that was very typical in it's overall effect at boring the crap out of me.

I bought tickets yesterday to see Jon Stewart (the The Daily Show) perform next Friday at Cornell. I was heartbroken a couple of weeks ago to find out he was performing and that tickets were sold out before I even knew. But yesterday, in a quick perusal of the local papers online, I saw that he added a second show and bopped right over to the ticket page at Cornell.edu and snagged a couple. Though I was still on the fence about it... the seats are general admission and we'll likely have to stand outside in line for a couple of hours waiting to get in. That's always big-ass fun in the winter.

Not to mention the wife — whom I call "The Squantillion" — and I have a horrible track record of attending things at the Cornell campus that goes back to 1990. Back then, in the heady days of our relationship, I would frequently try to drag her up to Cornell to see movies, since the film board there always got in some unique stuff and had great crowds.

Two of my fondest memories of my freshman year (before I met the future wife) involve movies at Cornell. One was seeing Pink Floyd: The Wall for the first time and finally understanding what all my friends in high school had raved about for so long... that film and its message haunted me for weeks. I felt heartily stupid for resisting their entreaties to watch their much viewed VHS tape.

The other was sneaking away from the dorm—which was a whole big story in itself—to see a second run of the original Die Hard with the most enthusiastic crowd of students I had ever witnessed. It was the first time I'd ever seen a crowd so in love with what it was watching.

The memories of those great times were something I always wanted to recapture after, but it seemed that any time Squanto and I would venture to the East Hill of Ithaca, something would go wrong. Tickets were sold out, parking was impossible, students were rude, weather was bad, shiny demons would pop out of the earth to try and eat our souls. You name it, it went wrong and we started to get so sick of it that by the time senior year rolled around, I don't think we went over to Cornell at all. So, 13 years later, we'll see how it goes next Friday.

One week after that, we're heading down to New Jersey to stay with friends who snagged us tickets to see Spamalot, so it's the month o' entertainment for us. Though with TiVo and Netflix and memberships at the local theatre (with an 're' not an 'er'!), it's always the month of entertainment for us. It's just a more pure, concentrated form of entertainment when you pay over $30 or $100 per ticket.

Alright, this tears it: "Homosexual marriages are part of "a new ideology of evil" that is insidiously threatening society, Pope John Paul says in his newly published book."

World leaders spouting bigotry didn't go out with the past century, unfortunately. It's bad enough when you know your leaders think some evil crap, but at least most have to keep it to themselves these days. Mostly. When you're the Pope for life and you don't have to worry about being re-elected, I guess you can say whatever hateful crap comes to mind.

And does anyone see the utter hypocrisy of guys who can't married making rules about marriage? Yeah, I thought so. If they knew anything about marriage and they really wanted to punish homosexuals, they'd force them ALL to get married.

I mean, I'll give him his thoughts on abortion. I don't agree with it, but I can at least see his point. But any guesses how many lesbian's John Paul has knowingly had dinner with?

So, I will respond thusly: for some odd reason, since 1982, I have owned a copy of The Life of Pope John Paul II, a comic book actually published by Marvel Comics that told of the story of his life. I read it once. I remember it said he was Polish, and when I was twelve I was mystified because I thought you had to be Italian to be Pope. Anyway, as soon as he's passed away, that sucker is going on eBay the same night so I can maximize the profit potential of reselling it, and them I'm going to donate all the money I make to a Gay & Lesbian non-profit group somewhere.

Really, if there has to be a Rapture, it can't happen too soon, so us heathens can be left in peace with SpongeBob.

In the interest of full disclosure: I'm not Catholic so it's probably no surprise that I've never been particularly impressed by any pontiff, but my looking askance at one man telling all of his followers how to think goes way back to a visceral response. In the 1970s during the coverage of the death of John Paul's predecessor there was a full interruption of all Saturday morning cartoons for an entire day. On all the networks! Scars that run as deep as the time the Carter/Ford debates interrupted a night of Happy Days that I'd been looking forward to all day. (I'm as deep as a puddle some times.)

This one in from Joe: Abolitionist L. Thudded

Unmoderated commenting on the Squished Frog Blog is back on line. At least for now. I'm hoping that the comment spammers who've had me under attack on and off for the last few months don't really care enough about the so-called "content" of the site to actually read this. Hopefully they are counting on their automatic tools to screw with the comments, a problem which I may or may not have worked around. We'll see. If they do read this, I'm sure they'll redouble their efforts to screw with things, as is their nature. In which case, I hope you all like links for online poker games that don't really exist.

Also, yes, it's true, i'm a complete whore. I've put up ads on the site. Click them occasionally... for every ten thousand times you do so, I might make a nickel. I have dogs to feed, people.

The ads are served up from Google. I don't control what's in the link. They're auto-generated based on the (again so-called) content here. Last night, apparently because I had mentioned McDonald's, the ads were all about health food. Today they've switched and there's ads for tax software and, uh, ladies shoes, both of which I've also mentioned.

I suppose what I really need to get some good ads is an entry about a naked Paris Hilton porn video fighting asbestos lawsuits against Oscar nominees in a Hummmer using floride toothpaste from Victoria's Secret. (Let's see how it handles that...)

While not a decade beloved my most -- if anyone -- the 1970's did have some great things like the first Star Wars film, Lynda Carter as Wonder Woman... and this two minutes of video (in Quicktime format, or get the MPEG which has the end cut off). This is one of the greatest things ever captured for viewing pleasure. (Read a review of the episode it came from here.)

When you're done watching it, dowload the MP3 for your repeated listening. You won't regret it, though anyone you lives with probably will.

When I was in high school, one of my favorite meals to make myself was Stouffer's French Bread Pizzas.

I know that this stretches the definition of making myself a meal, but how many teenage boys are gourmet cooks? They are simply on the earth to consume mass quantities of, well, anything that isn't a vegetable, the calories of which are used in turn to fuel an unrequited libido that burns like the fire of a thousand supernovas.

Stouffer's French Bread Pizzas could be baked in 30 minutes, from frozen to my plate to my gullet, and deliver the perfect amount of pizza. They had a perfect crunch in every bite, as I'm a fan of the crust and don't cotton much to thems that don't eats their crust. Heathens. I remember with fondness how careful I'd have to be with the first piece—I would almost always burn away the roof of my mouth on scalding cheese—only to find the second piece had sat just long enough to reach the perfect temperature to be held in my hand, skipping the fork and plunging that crunchy goodness directly into my face.

Today I had Stouffer's French Bread Pizzas for the first time in several years. Perhaps my memory is faulty, looking back with fondness on something that was at the time only mediocre, or maybe my advanced years have introduced me to too many truly great variations on pizza (including my own homemade )—but I can say without equivocation that today's experience was far from as joyful as I remember.

This seems to be the running theme of meals as I grow older. Whatever meals I used to love in childhood, as a teen, even in my 20s, is lost to me. The quality has suffered (such as with the above), or I've cut myself off of the substance (ala Coka-Cola, which once proudly replaced the blood in my veins), or I've come to find that the plain ol' steak and potatoes of my youth just isn't as tasty in a world now replete with sauces, salsas, and soaking marinades.

There is one hold out however, one grand, gleaming food source that has remained a constant: The Golden Arches. Mickey D.'s. The multi-national corporation called... McDonald's.

I've seen Super Size Me, I've read the articles, I watch the news, I know the dangers and that they, like all corporations, are technically evil.

None of that changes the fact that when I get to eat a meal McD's once a month (at most!— when I as age 13-18 I ate there every day, Monday thru Friday!), I want to revel in it. I want my Quarter Pounder with Cheese next to my Six-Piece McNuggets with Barbeque Sauce, Sprite in a cup the size of a soup tureen—and most of all I want my Fries.

There has never been someone on earth who welcomes the query "Do you want Fries with that?" more than me. In high school, during those days of eating at Ray Croc's corporate legacy every day —it was right next door to my friend Mark's house, were I ate lunch every day from eight grade to senior year— the Fries were always my primary focus. I could handle having a crappy PB&J that was squished flat and soggy on Wonder bread that I'd had in a gym bag next to sweaty underpants all morning long after a particularly grueling first period PE class involving anything from sit-ups to squat thrusts to square-dancing—as long as I knew there would be Fries to go with that sandwich. I would spend the period before lunch checking my pockets for the change needed to make that single purchase—I had memorized the exact prices with tax for all the sizes of Fries. I was able to tell what coins I had by feel, like a blind person. A blind person who wants French Fries.

I admit, I eat Fries with a gusto that looks quite like a shark in chum filled waters eating a human leg, gulp after gulp after delicious gulp. I consider this a survival tactic because my love for McD's Fries is so great that I abso-fucking-lutely hate to share them. Loathe it. They are mine. Back off. I might be mis-remembering this, but I think I once stabbed my father with a spork when he reached for one of my last French Fries without verbally clearing it with me first. I was probably about 8 at the time...

This is all to say that my wife, who I dearly love and would probably never stab, is bound and determined to suck out all the joy and happiness I get out of visiting Ronald's place. Every time I've eaten there with her in the last two years, she has made a big issue of my habits, such as not letting any Fries to too waste—including hers, which she'd like to just throw away. Unbelievable. Why not just go take a piss in the fryer while you're at it if you hate Fries so much. Jesus.

Fries, by the way, are never filling. They only cause the desire for More Fries.

After I finish my meal in (an admittedly unhealthy three or four minutes), the Wife will then proceed to twist the knife into me by slowly and methodically eating her own Fries one...at...a...time. Her own container is always more than half full and taunts me, much like those anthropomorphic foods on TV that I can't stand, saying "eat me. C'mon, steal me from her tray, she won't mind." Such evil things... how I worship them.

When I give in to these salt-slathered morsels and make the reach, my wife turns on me with The Look. You know the one. The one that just says: "I'm so disappointed in you." When she gives me The Look I feel like she's caught me with a smoking gun in my hand, a crack pipe in my mouth, and a hooker in the passenger seat of my truck full of dogs from a puppy mill.

Which I respond to, quite reasonably says I, with anger: God dam it! Why should I feel guilty? So what if I eat some damn Fries? What's a couple more pounds on my frame? So what if my heart explodes? I'm still hungry, bee-yotch!

So, I told my wife last time we were at a McD's and went through this ritual, that I would never, ever, ever eat a meal with her under the arches of gold ever, ever again. Ever.

I'll take The Look when it comes to a lot of things: not doing the dishes, not emptying dead flies out of the light fixtures in the kitchen, running stop lights when listening to audiobooks in the car, setting the TiVo to record old episodes of Real Sex on HBO, etc.

But my love of McDonald's French Fries—the top pick of my last meal if I'm ever on death row—transcends any other wicked or immoral things I perpetrate in life.

Speaking of which, I have dishes to do.

I'm steeling myself to go back upstairs and face TurboTax.

As expected, we'll owe big this year. That's the price one pays for doing instant turn-overs of cheap stock options so one will have the cash on hand to go on vacation to Hawaii. Luckily, we anticipated the government's desire to anally rape us for their cut, so we put half of the money away. Turns out it might not even be as bad as I expected... I would know already if Merrill Lynch had seen fit to put all the info I actually needed on my 1099 form, which makes it look like all we did was get free money. We did have to pay something out for the initial shares, which, when entered in our 1040, will bring down the amount we owe by a few hundred bucks. I'll take it.

So today is St. Valentine's Day, that most hated of "holidays" by men the country over, as we confirm our inability to be sensitive to the needs of our womenfolk.

See, right there, I just called that female entire gender "womenfolk," solidifying my insensitivity. Sigh.

Last year was probably the best Valentine's day eve since the wife and I were in New York City for the evening to watch the Tony-winning masterpiece of stagecraft and musical comedy that is Avenue Q. It was truly a wonderful night, despite having to be in NYC for it and one we try to duplicate yearly. Not with the same play though (duh). In 2003 we saw the first Broadway version of Little Shop of Horrors. Next month we'll be down south again to partake of a little something called Monty Python's Spamalot, the musical based on Monty Python and the Holy Grail. Which actually opens officially on Broadway tonight, but we couldn't get tickets for then, and we're lucky to have tickets at all. (I don't know why we didn't start doing this years ago.)

Still, Valentine's is today, and there's nothing going on but finishing taxes. The wife and I will make a nice pesto chicken dinner and watch some TV (24 and Medium) and retire early (before midnight -- it's a school night). It's pretty much like almost every holiday that doesn't involve unwrapping big gifts. Which we'd probably do too, but neither of us got around to buying anything for each other as yet... though I am pledged to get her the finest sub-$100 waffle iron money can buy. I look forward to many a morning of Homer Simpson's Space-Age Out-of-This-World Moon Waffles in my future. (Hmmmm....waffle run-off....)

Signing up for some new Web service, such as one that helps me pays my bills on time, and being told I can't actually sign in until they email me an initial password (which I will immediately change when I get in to the service) -- and then sitting here for minutes, if not hours, waiting for the damn welcome email with my stupid temp password. Jesus.

Hooray, it's tax day! the day when the wife -- whom I call Squanto! -- and I run around like crazy, trying to think of anything we can that would serve as deduction enough to keep the government monkey off our backs. We won't beable to this year. I think there will be little doubt, once we calculate in all the stock options I exercised, that we made more money in 2004 than any year in the history of our lives. Sadly, even tho I'm rich as Midas, I didn't do much in the way of, how you say... "giving." Unless you count Xmas presents. If we could deduct those, then the frickin' government would owe me big.

If there is truly some benevolent caretaker of the universe, why the hell does he allow zits to grow inside a person's nose? That's just wrong.

Just IMed to me by the wife: cute phrase I just overheard.... "My heart is bleeding for you. I'm gonna go upstairs and swallow a band-aid."

I'm heading back to the gym at the ol' alma mater today for the first time in... I think it's been eight months. I really have no memory of the last time I was there, to be honest. Hopefully they'll let me in -- they aren't known for checking the IDs to thoroughly up there. Which is good, as I'd rather not pay my admittedly cheap yearly fee until next payday. (Because I'm lazy and don't want to go online and take the extra two minutes to transfer money from my savings account to cover the check. I disgust even myself, people.)

I'm wondering if I've spent too much time taking for granted the fact that for many years, I haven't had to pay for any software, just by virtue of having jobs where the stuff just rained down off the shelves. We had a closet the size of the one Carrie Bradshaw uses for her Manolo Blahnik's at FamilyPC, just to store all the stuff. Over the years I was there we had various interns, including the late father of a friend of mine, spend hours at a time organizing and alphabetizing the disks and discs, all so that six months later they'd be out of date when the next version or patch came along. This year though, I've paid for copies of Quicken, TurboTax, and WS-FTP... probably more money than I spent on software for the last ten years. I've paid out $10 here and there for useful shareware, but now I'm beginning to feel pinched by these company's (especially Intuit, which is working a number of scams).

Which makes me think... why? If I've got to make sure my OS is legal on all PCs just to download a beta of some free anti-spyware software that should be part and parcel of all copies of XP, why should I make sure to use any software, especially from Microsquash? I know I can easily scam with the "educational" version of MS Office—hell, that seems to be the only version they sell at Target—but why even bother with that? With the combination of Firefox for a browser, Thunderbird for e-mail, and OpenOffice for writing, 'rithmatic, and presesentations, why should I ever pay to upgrade a Microsoft product outside of the OS? Luckily that's only every four years. I even found an open source WYSIWYG (what-you-see-is-what-you-get) Web site/page editor that looks like my beloved MacroMedia DreamWeaver, called Nvu (new-view).

Even more importantly, maybe if I got some of my relatives on these products, they'd have fewer tech problems... though that's not likely. Going from Word at work to OpenOffice Writer at home would probably cripple them. My wife—whom I call Bon-Bon McSquanto!—can't even master the tabs in Maxthon, the shell I use of IE. Which I love.

I have not made the jump to any of these products, mind you. I've looked at most and find almost all of them lacking, in some respect. But I'm sorely tempted to just throw myself into them in an act of defiance. For me this is probably the technological equivalent to a 65-year-old man going to raves and doing exstacy, but still, it might be make me feel all rebellious. And I hear the chicks dig that. (Pick up line: "Baby, if you're still using IE and Outlook, well, I can show you something that will ROCK your world.")

It's been a productive day for a Monday, which is traditionally my day to feel like a complete sloth. I find it hard to rev up the old brain meat after a weekend of being, well, sloth-like. (For example: This weekend I shopped for gifts for a two year old, then gave said gifts to the two-year old, ate the two-year-old's cake, and made him laugh like a ninny by shocking him on the forehead with built up static electricity. Even when I put snow on the back of this kid's neck, he laughed. Griffith men are hearty stock, immune to cold and electrocution. At least at that age.)

I was up at a decent hour and put out the recycling on the "curb," though we don't really have curbs out here in the sticks where I live. I did five loads of laundry over the course of the day, simply amazed at how much clothing two people can wear in the course of a week. I even played with the dogs during the zenith of the day's warmth (unseasonable high in the mid-40's today).

Underlying all this throughout was the knowledge that my friend Bill has been in the process since about 6am of getting to a plane in Baltimore that will take him to Germany, then to Kuwait, and then on into the city of Baghdad, Iraq. Bill -- an original member of Squished Frog Productions before we even called it that -- is a major in the United States Army. And it's his year to go. Assuming it's just a year and they don't force him into another at this time next year.

If there's an upside, it's that he'll likely get combat pay while he's there (I hope) and that he's to be stationed at a location near the west side of Baghdad in or near the former Saddam International Airport that the US took over in the invasion. Bill told me last night when he called to say good-bye that he'll be working out of one of Saddam's former palace's, where all the generals are working (maybe it's even this palace ?). I hope he gets to take a dump in the former dictator's solid gold toilet.

All day it has stayed with me that he'll be there. Bonny and I talked about this all through dinner -- what it'll be like for him to get there, to live there, what he'll eat. Bill says it will be like Groundhog's Day -- 7 days a week of doing the same things over and over and over.

Mostly we wondered how his family copes. He's left his wife and kids -- a brood that has grown to seven as of this past December -- before to go to bad places. In the army since 1992 (and he was ROTC before that) he's been to Somalia and Panama, and I think others, during skirmishes there. I'm embarrassed that I don't know for sure.

Of course it all seems different to me now. More real. I'm closer to it because I'm more informed of this war than any other in my lifetime. I was too young for Vietnam and to absorbed in college during the first Gulf War. Even knowing Bill was over in conflicts during the 1990's I didn't think to much about it... they all seemed so small. Like they weren't real enough to have an impact. For that, I feel like I owe Bill and apology, though he'd tell me not to be an idiot about it.

I'm afraid throughout this year I'm going to be an idiot every time I hear about another bombing or insurgent attack -- let alone those stupid freak transport accidents that seem to happen to the damned armed forces all the time, killing people before they've even gone into combat, I think they bother me even more.

I can only imagine how his family feels.

I wish him well, hope that I'll be able to hear from him now and again (if they'll let him use his new laptop to go online), and I hope that the worst thing that happens to him is that he's bored by the repetition of it all day after day. It's not a good place to live for " interesting times ."

The worst thing that should happen to him is running out of toilet paper while he's crapping in one of Saddam's 24 karat thrones.

Since everyone always comes to me looking for job hunting advice and info and links and what-not, here's a new one that looks fantastic: indeed.com looks like the Google of job searches. Not gummed up with a bunch of ads (yet) but seems to turn up a butt-load of opportunities. Bookmark it, and if not that, run some search on it to make some fast e-mail alerts or RSS WebFeeds. Slick.

Last night, for the first time in years really, I got an instant message out of the blue from someone I didn't know -- and it wasn't a spam troll looking to get me on a pr0n site. What follows is the full transcript of my over 75 minute conversation. The name of the object of my ridicule has been changed, but nothing else.

Here's a highlight:

XtraLargeGoodies (6:47:48 PM):OKAY SOO HAVE YOU EVER TALKED TO THE SCREEN NAME .... YANKEESFAN AND SOME NUMBERS AFTER IT
ECGriffith (6:48:09 PM):hey, hey, relax, no need to yell.
XtraLargeGoodies (6:48:18 PM):IM NOT I JUST LIKE CAPS .. LOL
ECGriffith (6:48:35 PM):all caps is considering yelling in most online circles.
XtraLargeGoodies (6:48:59 PM):OKAY BUT CAN I JUST WRITE IN IT FOR NOW?
ECGriffith (6:49:25 PM):Yes, I suppose I'll just pretend your caps lock key is broken.
XtraLargeGoodies (6:49:30 PM):SO HAVE YOU EVER TALKED TO THEM OR HAVE YOU PLAYED A GAME WITH THEM , LIKE SOME KIND OF ONLINE GAME BEFORE?
ECGriffith (6:50:03 PM):Yankeesfan, yankeesfan... I dunno, what were the numbers after the name?
ECGriffith (6:50:14 PM):there are a lot of yankeesfans out there, after all.
XtraLargeGoodies (6:50:20 PM):1888
ECGriffith (6:50:30 PM):1888! that bastard!
ECGriffith (6:50:36 PM):He owes me money!
XtraLargeGoodies (6:50:37 PM):WHAT HAPPENED?
XtraLargeGoodies (6:50:45 PM):WHY?

Read the full transcript here

My misanthropy is at its pinnacle. Last night I was at the mall, waiting to get a pizza from the shop in the food court. They don't deliver, but the pizza is better than the delivery place down the street, so it's worth braving the cold. I got there early and they were still cooking my garlic knots (free on Tuesdays!) so I had to stand around and wait.

And as I did, I gazed out over the small crowd occupying the tables, trying to perform a little game in my head I used to enjoy, where I'd look at someone and try to form an entire backstory for their life in my head, everything from lifestyle to parents to financial status to overall happiness.

I tried. But the more I tried, the more I realized: I just didn't give a crap enough about a single person in that food court to even bother. There wasn't anyone there I was interested in getting to know better, even fictionally.

So I went home, and ate pizza, and enjoyed the company of the fictional people on television shows.