There is a God, and He is a pot-smoking Canadian

I was browsing Amazon's MP3 store while my docked iPod was playing in the background, set on Shuffle, as usual. Among Amazon's new MP3 releases, I noticed this Neil Young album and, just as I clicked on it, a new song started on the iPod - Neil Young's "Helpless".

Now, I have almost 7,000 songs on my iPod, and some 30-40 of those are Neil Young's; that makes the probability of a randomly chosen song being his about half a percent. But I am not talking about a song that just happened to be playing at the time; the song started within a second - or maybe two, to be generous - of my clicking on the album link. If an average song is a little over 3 minutes long, a 2 seconds window is just 1% of that time, making the odds of this event about 20,000 to 1.

In the tradition as old as mankind, that can only be explained as a supernatural intervention.

Deep penetrating thought

If khram didn't mean "church" or "temple" in Russian, I'd wonder if Borat's faux Kazakh word for penis was inspired by Rahm Emanuel.

BREAKING: President-elect Obama arrested by the Grammar Police

Obama in today's press conference:

Well, President Bush graciously invited Michelle and I to -- to meet with him and First Lady Laura Bush. We are gratified by the invitation. I'm sure that, in addition to taking a tour of the White House, there's going to be a substantive conversation between myself and the president.

This is the kind of grammar up with which I will not put. (Yes, I know the irony of this paraphrase. It's intentional. Snarky responses are preempted.) I expect my president to speak English better than I, an immigrant from a country most Americans can't find on a map.

Besides the felony of using "I" as a direct object, the president-elect has also been charged with stylistic misdemeanors of using unnecessary and awkward passive voice where "We are grateful for the invitation" would sound better and have a clearer meaning, and saying "between myself and the president" where "between the president and me" would be the minimally acceptable improvement, but we should expect no less than a complete rephrasing, such as "...I'm going to have a substantive conversation with the president."

The "tour of the White House" jab has been noted as evidence of good character, possibly mitigating the charges.

TAKS and KKK effects

The TAKS effect: Every state that starts with "T", "A", "K" or "S" voted for McCain. There are 10 such states and they comprise 98 electoral votes. McCain won those states' popular vote by a margin of 14%.

Eliminate TAKS, and the rest of the country voted for Obama by a 10% margin (compared to the 6% for the whole country). The electoral vote count is 349-64 (with 27 yet to be determined).

The KKK effect: Every state with a "K" in its name voted for McCain. There are 8 such states and they have 41 electoral votes; McCain has won 40, while one from Nebraska is still uncertain. McCain won those states by 19%.

Eliminate KKK, and the rest of the country voted for Obama by an 8% margin, with the electoral vote count is 349-122 (with 26 yet to be determined).

Eliminate both TAKS and KKK, and Obama wins by 11% and 349-50 electoral votes (with 26 pending). Additionally, the 55-40 advantage in the Senate becomes 49-21, and the 245-157 advantage in the House becomes 219-121. (Pending seats not counted.)

Well, Mr. President, you may say there are no red states and blue states, but there sure are TAKS states and KKK states, and they don't like you very much. The rest of the country looks pretty normal.

UPDATE (many months later): Oops, not every state with a "K" voted for McCain. Thanks to Samer for correcting me.

Good question

What happened to the 5 guys who graduated below McCain?

Burden

If you had $700 billion in $100 bills, how much would it weigh?

Approximately the same as all the people who ever voted for Sarah Palin.

Lipstick or no lipstick...

If I were a pig, I would resent being compared to Republicans.

Outdoorsy Palin

Aaaah, that Palin! Jawohl, jawohl:

Obviously, I need to start posting boobs here

Life's a bitch. Google Analytics tells me that the most common Google search keywords by which people find this blog are "economic trivia". OK, I like economics, and I like trivia. And I write a little bit about both. But I hardly ever mix them, or at least I don't think I do. When I write about economics, I like to think what I write isn't trivial. And when I write about random facts, I believe my horizons extend beyond economics.

The next most helpful keywords are "Buck Ofama". I don't quite know what to think of that one. On one hand, I am glad that I am not pigeonholed in the Google universe as an Obama worshiper; OTOH, I can't help but think "WTF! With all the stuff I write, this is the second most common keyword by which people find me!?" And the most common specific one...

The only other keyword search that stands out is "wafers of mass destruction". OK, I'm kind of proud of that one. But third place? Sigh...

After Rice - Rice?

Barack Obama's adviser on national security and foreign policy issues is Susan E. Rice.

Food for thought, Sun Tzu!

What's My Image?

PZ Myers infected me with this meme: google for the image that comes up first for your name. And so I did:


Wow, that really could be me. The resemblance is uncanny.

Small Steps

I made it on the blogroll at Pharyngula. Yes, I know, that's easier than getting on the "do not call" list, but every small step forward is important on the way to acquiring a critical mass of readers.

(Of course, now that I mentioned "acquiring a critical mass", I've probably made some NSA or FBI list as well...)

This Is What My Soul Looks Like

Yes, I am a Pullman fan. Meet my daemon:

UPDATE: Hmmm... when I posted this, my Theonilla was a chimp; as I write this, she is a sparrow. I hope she settles in a silly form, not a cute one.
UPDATE 2: A sparrow, huh? No way. Captain Jack Sparrow, perhaps?