'Shindig'
Off-topic discussion. Wanna talk about corsets, duct tape, or physics? This is the place. Detailed discussion of any current-season TV must be whitefonted.
Sparky, Vortex, wanna chime in on this one?
Poor JZ, under the impression that Associates have any a) self awareness, b) accountability to the librarians.
Dear ASS-sociate,
Have you been reading Above the Law lately about all the layoffs and how the firms are going to need to get rid of people like you?
Signed, Hope You Get Canned
Grammar Vigilantes Get Probation:
Two self-styled vigilantes against typos who defaced a more than 60-year-old, hand-painted sign at Grand Canyon National Park were sentenced to probation and banned from national parks for a year...
...The fiberboard sign has yellow lettering with a black background. Deck wrote that they used a marker to cover an erroneous apostrophe, put the apostrophe in its proper place with white-out and added a comma.
The misspelled word ''emense'' was not fixed, Deck wrote, because ''I was reluctant to disfigure the sign any further. ... Still, I think I shall be haunted by that perversity, emense, in my train-whistle-blighted dreams tonight.''
The story concludes:
The TEAL Web site now has only this message -- ''Statement on the signage of our National Parks and public lands to come'' -- without a period.
The shame, the horror!
So, did anyone ELSE read this [link] and wonder if Maureen Dowd crossposted it to Current_Affairs (the political RPF comm on LJ)? Or just me?
I think my favourite Olympian is from the Winter Olympics, Steven Bradbury. In 2002 he won Australia a most unlikely first gold medal ever in the Winter Olympics (in fact, the first for the entire southern hemisphere) in the men's 1,000 metres speed skating. If I may let Wikipedia tell the story:
In the quarter-finals, Bradbury thought himself eliminated. He finished third (only the top two advance), but Marc Gagnon was disqualified, thus allowing Bradbury to advance to the semi-finals.
In his semi-final, Bradbury was in last place, well off the pace of the medal favourites. However, three of the other competitors in the semi-final crashed into each other, paving the way for him to take second place and thus allowing him through to the final.
Again well off the pace in the final, once more all four of Bradbury's competitors (Apolo Ohno, Ahn Hyun-Soo, Li Jiajun and Mathieu Turcotte) crashed out at the final corner, leaving a shocked Bradbury to take the gold medal, the first for Australia or any southern hemisphere country in an Olympic Winter Games event. (Alisa Camplin also won gold for Australia at the same Olympics).
In other Olympic news, Australia has won another gold, in the men's pole vault! Without injury, as opposed to the Sydney Vault of Terror. It's our twelfth of these games, but the first we actually won wholly on dry land; and our first field gold medal in sixty years.
This weekend, I have a bday party tonight, a crossword tournament tomorrow, and mini golf on Sunday. I am expecting plenty of random fun.
I have to admit to a certain fondness for Eddie "The Eagle" Edwards. He represented the UK in the ski jump ... unfortunately, his style was such that a commentator referred to it as a "ski drop".
I pared my inbox down to 1000 messages!
My favorite has always been Edwin Moses. Smart *and* one of the most enormously talented atheletes in the history of ever.
Eddie the Eagle! The Olympian without Peer! Flinging himself to certain doom for the honour of Queen and Country!
I have to admit I remember my mother and I watching Peggy Fleming when I was a young child.