It's True.

I always thought it was a stereotype, but it is in fact true. Americans are loud. I am loud. I am really loud. I could direct ships I'm so loud. And back home? Well I'm quite. In fact I'm so loud, I have trouble hearing Germans speak. They all look like they are just mouthing at me. I have no idea how they communicate. Anyway, I've been trying to not yell so much, but it is tough. Thats the way I talk.

Florida Authorities Set to Execut Good Samaritan.

Remind me to avoid helping the cops next time I'm in Florida. Finally someone from the Alligator community does something good for society, and they put him to death.

MIAMI -- A Florida man police said was breaking into cars at Miccosukee Resort and Gaming was attacked and killed by a 9-foot alligator while trying to run from police.
Investigators said officers responded to reports of car break-ins at a Miccosukee Indian Reservation parking lot located at 500 S.W. 177th Ave. in Miami.
One of the men was quickly captured by officers during the incident last week but the other robbery suspect tried to elude officer by jumping into a large pond behind the facility, according to a WJXT-TV report.During the swim, police said, an alligator attacked and killed the man. He was apparently bitten on the head several times.
The victim's body was recovered at the bottom of the pond about a day after the reported break-ins.
The men were not identified in the report.Meanwhile, an alligator believed responsible for attacking and then killing the man was captured and transported to All American Gator in Pembroke Park.
"Some alligators just have a nasty disposition and he was just a nasty gator," owner of All American Gator Brian Woods said. "He seemed to have no fear of people."
The alligator is being kept in storage until the medical examiner's office can inspect the reptile, a trapper said.
Miccosukee employees said the alligator was well-known on the reservation and was given the nickname "Poncho."
"Anytime an alligator digests or even kills a person, it is a state law through the Florida Fish and Game that the gator be destroyed," Woods said.

Via: WPLG

Pointless.

It is 1:50am, and I'm supposed to be writing a paper that is due tomorrow at 10am. But, I need to take a break, so here are some things about Germany that annoy the hell out of me.

-They LOVE the song "Summer of 69" by Bryan Adams. I've heard this in nearly every bar, club and party I've been too. There are far too many dance remixes of this song for the universe to still be held together. At least I now know how to get a party started next time all my guests are German.

-Mullets are more popular here than in the American south and Canadian hinter lands combined. But, they are a bit fancier here. They are often times dyed a color contrasting the rest of the head.

-There is no such thing as spicy food. Nowhere. It doesn't matter what the sign/ menu tells you, your food will not be spicy. It might be spicy by German standards, but spicy by German standards is like being talented by Bryan Adams standards.

-The music stores here suck. I've been looking for the new Ryan Adams ep, and all I can find are Bryan Adams albums. Why do they love him so much? I also cannot find the new Sigur Rós DVD, and the new double ep costs me about $30USD.

-Stores are all closed on Sunday.

-Stores are usually closed between 6-8 every other day of the week.

-The buses stop running before the bars close (all the better to get out of there before they play "Summer of 69" one more time).

-Shampoo smells like ass.

-Beer is super cheap. No, thats a good thing, forget this.

-You cannot buy a steak anywhere, but you can get all the breaded and fried pork your heart could desire. And don't forget to put lemon juice on it!!! Lemon??

-Did I mentioned they LOOOVVVVEEEE Bryan Adams. I swear if he knew how much he was loved here, he could totally be the new Führer.

I miss you Red Sox.

I don't know what to think about this years World Series, probably because I didn't get to watch it. Not a single play. I haven't seen any baseball in over 8 weeks. I miss it. Baseball is the only sport I watch regularly. Sure I like watching football, but I've been able to watch that here. I missed last nights Patriots game, but I saw them play the Cowboys and Dolphins. I really feel for Baseball. The Red Sox are in my blood. And something doesn't feel right.

The Red Sox don't win two World Series in four years. They just don't. I know it happened, but how? This is a team for the poets in all of us. This is a team for the losers, and the outcasts. This is a team for people with a chip on their shoulder. This is not supposed to be a team with the leagues second highest payroll. And most certainly this is not supposed to be a team that wins.

At the same time I'm glad they won. I don't want to live the life my grandparents lived. I don't want to fight a world war, I don't want to live in fear of MAD, I don't want to watch the Red Sox become losers again. This team is no longer the team that we all hate as much as we love. This is a team for all of us to love. A team that did its time, and can now win with dominating results. This will be a good century. This will be a Red Sox century.

Good news from the music biz.

This week has seen, what I believe to be, two very important stories from the music biz. First there was the new Radiohead album, In Rainbows, which came out on Wednesday at an unspecified price. Now there is national outrage over ticket brokers ripping off little girls all across America.

First Radiohead: if you haven't heard about this yet you haven't been paying attention. Radiohead have put out a new album. It is called In Rainbows. You can pay whatever price you want for it. Or not at all. Radiohead currently do not have a record deal, and decided that they would release their new album on their own over the Internet. I could have paid nothing, but I was generous and paid 20 pence. I've seen people on the Internet claiming to have paid in excess of $20USD, for low quality digital files. This is could be another step in tearing down the machine of major record labels.

Second Hannah Montana: she is touring right now, and no one can get tickets. I know my sisters would love to go see HM on tour, but my parents being the Luddite concert goers they are, never had a shot at getting tickets. I've been to enough concerts that I've been able to figure out how to get tickets without paying broker fees. Most people are not so fortunate, and they are now stuck paying hundreds of dollars to make their children happy, or they could just complain to the authorities. (Why didn't we think of this earlier? We're not angry moms, that's why!) According to CNN Missouri and Arkansas are suing ticket brokers over selling Hannah Montana tickets illegally. That combined with a lawsuit from Ticketmaster against ticket brokers could be good news for those of us that have come to live with ticket brokers.

Homesick

Psych!

I love this place. BUT, there are a few things I miss. Like the MFing Red Sox. They are int he ALCS and looking like they have a chance to go all the way. I truly miss baseball, and American football. Soccer is like hockey, it needs to be seen live to be enjoyed. I just cannot watch these sports on TV. Fortunatly the Rugby World Cup is currently in action and Rugby is great to watch on TV. I've managed to catch a few matches so far. As fun as it is to watch I would prefer to be watching the Pats destroy the NFL with their supreme awesomeness. If the Sox make the WS I may be headed down to Zürich to see if I can find a bar playing the games, which will be expensive, it costs 26CHF for a one way ticket.

Other than American sports ther isn't much I miss. Beer is cheap, coffee is delicious (I'll never enjoy Dunkin' Donuts or Starbucks again), food is cheap, water is oddly expensive and always carbonated, and the people are all extremely nice.

Cargasm Weekend.

My dorm has the worst Internet connection I've ever experienced. It has failed to work at least half the time I've been here. That's close to 15 days of inactivity. I promise to try and update when my Internet works.

Tomorrow I'm taking a train up to Stuttgart to visit the Mercedes-Benz museum. I cannot wait, I came to Germany, more or less, to look at car pr0n every time I walk out the door. I'll be spending the night, and then on Friday I'll be checking out the Porsche museum. I'm not sure, but there maybe also be a factory tour involved with the Porsche museum, I'll let you know the next time my Internet works. I'm sure I'll be taking a boatload of photos there. I have two 2GB memory cards, if any museum could give me cause to fill these, it would be these museums.

As I've now told you twice, my Internet sucks. That isn't all that sucks around this place. I live in a place that is most often described as a prison, although Gulag and Soviet apartment block are thrown around almost as frequently. It is a 40ish year old concrete building with failing kitchens and bathrooms. The university had intended to raze the places a few years ago, but they haven't yet found a replacement plan that was economical. My shower constantly is emanating a scent more often associated with a septic tanks than showers. I share a kitchen with 11 other people, two of which happen to be African (Cameroon to be exact). And although they are really nice people, they cook constantly, and it stinks. Yesterday the kitchen smelled like someone had spilt around 3 gallons of sardine juices all over the place, and then defecated on it. The laundry room doesn't really work. The washing machines wash, but they don't rinse. After a 50 minutes wash cycle you have soaking wet, soapy clothes. Then it comes time to dry them, and the dryers don't work. Well, they work, just not properly. One of the dryers spins, but doesn't heat up. The other dryer heats up, but doesn't spin. Either way your clothes are f•cked. You can see the method I used for drying my clothes right here. Sonnenbühl OST Ghetto Laundry. There are two things that I love about my residence.
1: Is the Vag-ball; it is a piece of modern art that looks like a giant ball of metal vaginas. This picture isn't the greatest. It was taken from 7 stories up, I'll try to get a better photo for a future blog post.
2: Look at this view.
Those are the alps if you were wondering. I have more photos, some that are better, but I'm saving those for a possible dedicated post.

Despite the dismal living conditions I love it here in Konstanz. The city is beautiful, and full of history. If you do a quick query on wikipedia you can read all about the city for yourself.

After my Cargasmic trip to Stuttgart I hope to post more. Tschüß

Still Alive

I've been so busy here the last few weeks. I didn't get internet until last Thursday, and then it cut out on me over the weekend due to a fire. It was fixed on Tuesday, but keeps cutting out on me. Last Friday I went to the local Oktoberfest here in Konstanz. And, tomorrow I will be attending Oktoberfest in Munich. The weekend before last I went to a Weinfest (wine festival) across the lake in Meersburg.

I'll fill you in on more info when I get the time. I've been so busy and the internet is so slow here that I've been reluctant to upload any photos. I want to share where I live with the world, or at least the 3 people that read this blog.

Godspeed Me!

This is my last post from the US of A for a very long time. Next time I post, it will be from Germany. I've been going crazy getting ready for this trip, and right now it looks like I will be going just as crazy when I get there. If you don't here from me for a while, it is simply because I am busy beyond belief. I will try to post something about my new residence as soon as I possibly can. I've got a plane to catch in about 17hours, so I am going to finish packing.


I'll see you on the other side.

I'm sorry.

I leave for Germany on Sunday, so I've been very busy getting everything in order for my trip. I probably would still be leaving all my devoted reader(s?) waiting if it hadn't been for this.March sent me a link for the new MONO DVD, and what did I notice almost immediately? ME, and Gabriel in NYC!! Thats us in the red circle, I'm the dude running his hand through his hair, and she is the girl standing in front of me with a boys name.

I don't have time for a real post right now, but I'll let you be jealous in the mean time.

Busted

One of my many siblings broke the router for wireless internet a while back, which has prevented my updates until now.

I spent the weekend Rhode Island. Saturday and Sunday in the Westerly/ Watch Hill area, and then Monday in Newport. I was camping with my girlfriend and my family at Burlingame in down Westerly way, but spent my time with her. I noticed a few things while I was on vacation.

1. Lots of couples expecting children like to visit Newport. I cannot tell you how many young pregnant women I saw Monday alone. Of those that were pregnant I'd say a good 1/3 to 1/2 where Orthodox Jews from New York.

2. Rhode Islanders love expensive station wagons. I love cars that combine speed, utility, sleeper ability (ie: unnoticed by the five-O), and luxury. In that order. Although I didn't see any Audi RS4 Avants (they don't sell them here sadly), I did see Audi A6 wagons, BMWs 5 Series Wagons and Mercedes-Benz wagons of both the C & E class variety. The highlight of the
weekend was the über-rare Mercedes-Benz E55 AMG wagon. It wasn't the new E63, but it still rocks like no other station wagon does. This is a station wagon with 516ft pounds of torque, 469hp, 0-62 in 4.9 seconds and it was offered with an optional third row of rear facing seats.

D'oh

bring the rain

Taxes, Travel & Jury Duty.

Nothing pisses me off like the government wasting tax dollars on frivolous things, unless its me they're wasting money. And things get even better when they're not my tax dollars being wasted, but rather Dieter & Gunter's Euros being wasted on me. That's right, the oh so precise Germans are giving me free money. Yay. I'm getting 1500euro from the state Baden-Württemburg.

Speaking of Germany, I booked my flight yesterday and I will be departing on the evening of September 2nd. I won't be coming back until May, and then only for a 4 day weekend.

I had Jury Duty yesterday, and although I only was there 4 hours it was the most soul sucking experience in recent memory. As the bumper stickers say, "Never Again."

Why I love the Tour

This weekend the world's greatest sporting event that is not baseball began in London. Le Tour de France is something I look forward to watching every year, and I hope to watch in person next year. An incident today reminded me of one of the many things I love about the tour. In no other sport at this level of competition is the fan placed in such close quarters to theathlete . One of the riders was riding through his hometown, so he took a break to say hello to family and friends. You can't do that on a ball-field, or a hockey rink, or out the window of a stock car, but you can on a bike. LaurentLefevre rode out ahead of the peloton to meet with his family, and in respect to the great honor of riding through his home town the entire mass of competition slowed down to around 20mph and allowed him to catch up when the time came. Despite the constant barrage of doping allegation Cycling is still one of the most dignified sports around.

Hey Nerds. Go watch Transformers.

It's unfortunate, but I can almost guarantee you that these 7 Transformers were left out of the movie. Maybe they'll turn up in the sequel.

Man Skills Vol. 2

As you may recall I recently listed some my most embarrasing male deficiencies. I've set about to correct as many of those as possible. Now I'm not going to learn how to disassemble and reassemble a Chevy small block anytime soon, I did learn how to drive a stick today. It took me long enough, but now I can check that off my list.


Thursday I also mentioned seeing a guy pass-out, I figure I'll explain that little bit of awesomeness in more detail. I was at school for a meeting, and while walking down the hall I saw a kid sitting on the ground, looking really wan. The next thing I know his eyes rolled backwards and he slammed his forehead into the ground and then slid across the floor. I was surprised that his head did no bounce. I told someone in the nearest office to call 911, and then I went to my meeting. I probably should have stayed, but I was running late, and there were other people streaming out of offices and classrooms to help the kid.

Man Skillls.

I was going to tell you about the guy I saw pass-out and smack his head into the ground yesterday, but then I read these two blog entries and decided to treat you to some hallway horror stories Friday instead.

I've recently come to the conclusion that I've lived a much too coddled life. I can't do so many of the typical "man" things. I can't fix cars. I've never even changed a flat tire (never had to, AAA). I don't know anything about electrical wiring. I remember being in elementary school with kid that would build their own radios from junk lying around the house. I can't do much as far as wood working goes. I have built a couple of bird houses, a cutting board, and some other junk, but nothing working writing home about. I have told my girlfriend recently that I want to build a bat box, you know for bats. I hate bugs, and I want as many bug eating bats in my back yard as possible. The thing I'm most ashamed of. I cannot drive a car with a manual transmission. I've never had to. My dad drove a VW GTI with a stick until I was about 12, but since then only my brother had owned a car with a stick shift. I could, and will, ask him to show me, but I haven't had the time.

All that is bad enough, but I don't dwell on it. I'm sure that I could go my whole life without needing many of those skills, but I'd rather not. I want to build things. That's where these blog entries come in.

The first one is about a guy that took a stuffed cat, and wired into this old Police Interceptor so that the lights he put in the cats eyes would single when he turns. Check it out here.

The second one is the same guy building a 92lbs boombox from old car parts he found at a junkyard. They've included a video to whet your appetite before you read the how-to on the blog entry.

Deftones, Lupo's, Providence Rhode Island, 6/6/07

If there are two things the Deftones do well it is write and record amazing albums, and play extremely disappointing concerts. This was the third time I've seen the band. It is also the last. I understand that the bands first two albums were very heavy affairs that did little to separate them from the pack of other nu-metalers. However, since then they have put out three excellent albums that sounds almost nothing like their early stuff, in a good way. The first hour of the show I recognized maybe 3 songs (and I have all 5 of their albums), even the songs I knew I didn't recognize until well into the song. I was ready to leave the show after the first 30 minutes. I stuck it out, and the second half of the show was marginally better than the first. If I hadn't driven almost 2 hours to get to Providence I would have left. Had the show been in New Haven or Hartford I would have gone home. I just want to band to play the songs they write. If they want to continue playing only the really heavy stuff, then they should go back to recording the really heavy stuff. Is it too much to ask for a band to play the music off the album they are supporting? I think they played 5 songs from Saturday Night Wrist. If I told you half the songs came from the first two albums, I don't think I'd be exaggerating. I will not pay more than $18 in the future to see this band. That's right, I won't even pay $20. Speaking of $20, for that amount of money you could buy a pre-signed copy of SNW.

New Metallica

I don't know what to think of this. It is a lot better than anything off of St. Anger, which is a pretty easy task if you ask me. I could write a better album that St. Anger. But, it doesn't really sound like Metallica. I know this song, and another have been floating around on the internet for a while, but this is my first listen.

Blog wants to show Lexus the difference between a car and porn

Lexus has sued two pornographers for running a porn site featuring a character called "Lexus Cash" for fear it dilutes their brand. The auto blog Jalopnik is starting a campaign to make certain people won't EVER get confused. ;)


I signed up for Digg a little while ago, and I've been wanting to try this "Blog It" feature for a while. This seemed like a good place to start.



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