Doesn't Anybody Stay Together Anymore? Pro-cyclist Lance Armstrong and his wife, Kristin, are splitting up after four years of marriage. There is sure to be speculation on what effect this will have on Lance's ability to train and get ready to make his attempt to win a 5th straight Tour De France.

My guess is that the problems in his personal life will increase his chances of winning this year. Last Fall when my girlfriend and I split up I found that riding the bike was a great way to take my mind off of things and to work out some of my feelings. By mid-October (when I put the bike away) I was riding stronger and faster than I'd ever ridden in my life.

 
Can a dog be Racist? That's the question addressed in this essay.
I had a dog once that despite being very loving and friendly to almost everyone she met had a dislike of black people. For example, if the dog was in the car and we passed a black person walking on the sidewalk she would bark louder and angrier than she would at other people. We were never sure whether the dog realized that she herself was black.

 
Strep Throat? I talked to Cindy last night and she is sick as well. She went to the doctor and found out she has strep throat. That increases the chances that Cindy got me sick and that I have strep throat. I have a doctor's appt scheduled for late today to find out. I've never had strep before. I just read that it's rare to have a runny nose (which I have) with strep throat. Maybe I've got strep and a cold at the same time. Lucky me!

Update. No Strep. The wonderful throat swab test came back negative for strep. Nope, it's just another cold that I'll probably have for 2 weeks.

Talked to Abby last night. She said she'd just recovered from two days of migraine headaches. I've never had a migraine. From what I hear they're awful. We never have trouble talking to each other on the phone so conversation flowed smoothly. However, I've put Abby back in the friendship pile so I ended the call without asking to get together.

 
Samizdata has a nice parable to help explain our Saddam problem.

 
I'm an Introvert. Parts of this Jonathan Rauch essay really hit home for me.

....introverts are people who find other people tiring. Extroverts are energized by people, and wilt or fade when alone. ..... Leave an extrovert alone for two minutes and he will reach for his cell phone. In contrast, after an hour or two of being socially "on," we introverts need to turn off and recharge. My own formula is roughly two hours alone for every hour of socializing. This isn't antisocial. It isn't a sign of depression. It does not call for medication. For introverts, to be alone with our thoughts is as restorative as sleeping, as nourishing as eating.

 
Sick Again! I've caught another cold. This makes three in one cold-season. Last year I didn't have any colds because I was in a long-distance relationship and I rarely left my house. I definately wasn't having the type of close physical contact that I'm having this year. I guess everything has its cost.

 
NBA Gambling. My sources assure me that Phoenix will beat Chicago by at least 2 points tonight. Other sources have assured me that I should bet on Minnesota +4 in their game tonight.

Update: My sources were wrong on Phoenix who lost to Chicago by 3 points. However, that is balanced by a correct pick of Minnesota which won their game out-right by 3 points.

 
Where is the line? My primary complaint with the anti-war crowd is that none of them will draw a line that says "if this happens, I'll support military action." This suggests to me that there is nothing that would make them support this war to rid the world of Saddam.

Example: Rep. Dennis J. Kucinich was on Meet The Press this morning. Russert asked him if Iraq refuses to destroy its missiles (as ordered by the UN), would he then support military action. Of course, he didn't answer the question. Kucinich said that you'd have to keep all options open (a typical non-answer) and then concluded by repeating "I'm against war" several times as if it were a brave position to take. He also threw in a "Bush is risking soldiers' lives for the desires of big oil" insult and when called on it, could not provide a shred of evidence for his wild accusation. I'm embarrassed that this man is a member of our legislature.

 
A Night at the Theatre. I went to the theater again with Cindy. The play was pretty good but sometimes the acting wasn't so hot. We ran into some people that Cindy knows from work and she acted girlfriend-lie rather than date-like. I'm thinking that maybe she didn't believe me when I said I didn't see us being a long-term thing. Maybe she thinks that if she's patient that I'll change my mind. I've used that strategy on women before (and a couple of times it even worked) but I'm 100% sure that it won't work on me---at least not for her. Maybe I should stop taking her out on nice dates and sleeping with her. But, I don't want to.

And, to keep some balance in the universe, I'm getting a taste of rejection myself. This will make two weekends in a row that I haven't seen Abby. She called me from work on Friday afternoon. Early in the conversation I could tell that she wasn't very interested in getting together so I didn't ask. For whatever reason, Abby's lost interest in me.

 
Some guy and a few of his friends joined in the San Francisco "peace march" and carried some interesting signs. My favorite "Communism has only killed 100 million people, let's give it another chance!" (via PowerLine)

 
My first sexual experience - or what the French really fear. I had my first sexual experience when I was in the 9th grade. It happened with my best friend's sister. She was two years behind me in age but two years ahead of me in every other way. Long story short, one afternoon I made out with her and touched her breasts through her shirt. Of course, it was a HUGE deal to me at the time.

For reasons I'll never know, it was a one-time thing. I never tried again, she never offered. Anyway, about two months later my friend came to me laughing and said "hey, look at this, I found my sister's diary." I immediately went into a panic. What if she wrote about what had happened? what if my friend reads it and then kicks my ass? or worse, tells his parents and they kick my ass!"

I played it cool and said "look man (it was 1980), that's not right, you shouldn't read that stuff, that's your sister's private thoughts." My friend looked at me like I'd lost my mind. He ignored me and began to read aloud passages from the diary that dealt with some kid in her class that she had a crush on. Again, I told my friend that what he was doing was wrong, that I didn't want any part of it and I walked out of the room."

You see, my arguments were bullshit. I didn't care whether my friend read his sister's diary. Actually, I wanted to read the thing to see what she wrote about me and whether she wanted to do it again. I lectured my friend that what he was doing was wrong only because I was afraid of what the diary would reveal about me.

Similarly, I think that's why we see the French and Germans throwing every roadblock they can in front of the U.S's desire to invade Iraq. They're terrified that if we invade we'll find out that they've been touching Saddam's boobies.

 
Movie Review. Last night I saw a good movie on cable....In The Bedroom. It was not the most uplifting of movies but it held my interest to the end. On the other hand, I recently watched the first 20 minutes of Punch Drunk Love starring Adam Sandler. I'd read rave reviews about the movie so was looking forward to seeing it. My summary....It Sucked! I don't understand how this awful movie received such great reviews.

 


I'd actually be interested in reading an article titled "History Lesson: Why Clinton attacking Iraq was OK and why it's wrong for Bush now."

 
Wildberry Pie. When I got home from work yesterday there was a message on my machine from Cindy saying how she'd like me to come over to see her. I'm pretty sure that Cindy was in the mood for....something. I must be getting old because although the offer was intriguing, I knew that if I went I'd get to bed late and then be wiped out the next day. So, I waited until 9 to call her back and then politely declined her invitation. Because I know that women don't handle such turn-downs very well, I made sure to ask if she would go to the theater with me again next weekend.

Ok, I know what you're thinking, he turns down sex, but wants to go to the theater----Brian's gay! It probably sounds that way, but I'm not. I shagged the woman three times Saturday night (applause) so maybe my "interest" hasn't recovered. I made the right call because I did get a good night's sleep and I got a lot of work done today. And what's really important at the end of the day? work or sex?

 
Google. Someone found my blog by searching "lingere sex show powerpoint". Google lists me 5th for that search. I'm sure they were disappointed when the photo of the pope came up instead of a lingere show.

And why would they add the word "powerpoint"? Does internet porn now come in helpful powerpoint presentation style? If so, send me the link.

 
James Lileks writes about what our country would do if Saddam actually obtained a nuclear weapon, invaded a neighboring country and then taunted us to do something about it.

...the chances of assembling a coalition to push him back again would be nil. You’ve heard of the Amazonian butterfly whose wings set in motion a disturbance of the air that eventually leads to a hurricane off North Carolina? The fluttering of hands among EU diplomats presented with the possibility of a war against a nuke-armed Saddam would cause typhoons to swamp every island in the Caribbean. Leave him be! Let him alone! He’ll be satisfied now! We can nuke him if sets one off, but he won’t! He’s in the box - granted, the box has now expanded to include a significant portion of the world’s known oil reserves, but it’s still a box, albeit an oddly-shaped, nuclear-armed one.

Sadly, I think Lileks is right. I've read the arguments of the leftist anti-war protesters. The one constant I noticed is that none of them will state what would justify a military response on our part.

 
Valentine's Weekend. Friday, nothing-nada-zip romance wise. I had a wallpaper-scraping party.

Saturday, I picked up Cindy around 6 and we went out to dinner. Afterwards, we drove to a nearby upscale hotel where I had purchased a valentine's weekend special. For one fairly reasonable price, we got a suite, a bottle of champagne, chocolate, one free inroom movie, and two tickets to an excellent breakfast buffet. Around 9 pm we took advantage of the hotel's heated indoor swimming pool.

It was a fantastic way to spend a Saturday night except that I didn't get enough sleep. No, not because of that. It's because I'm not used to sleeping in a bed with someone and I woke up numerous times during the night. Normally I fall asleep within 5 minutes and don't wake up until the alarm goes off.

 
Orange County, in my opinion, is almost a good movie. It has numerous scenes that are laugh-out-loud funny along with some great cameos. Unfortunately, it bugged me that the movie couldn't make up its mind what it wanted to be: zany teen comedy, amusing teen comedy, or ABC after school special. Of course, this is exactly what Roger Ebert praises about the movie. A quick search of other reviews shows that this movie's reviews are mostly positive.

Misc: Tom Hanks' son (Colin) doesn't have enough star-quality to carry a movie, yet. The scenes that include Jack Black are the funniest. The main character's girlfriend is pretty---but in an out of the ordinary way. Reading the reviews I learned it's because she is the daughter of Sissy Spacek who also is pretty in an out of the ordinary way. The movie is very short, around 75 minutes.

 

I agree with the instapundit, this is very funny.

 
Andrew Sullivan sums up the message that I try to convey to my peacenik friends. A "no war" position banishes a certain segment of the Iraqi population to death.

No-one should treat lightly the moral responsibility of waging war. But no-one should discount the moral burden of the alternative either.

Don't believe me? Read this this letter from an Iraqi posted at Instapundit.

 
Glamour Magazine. Yesterday I went to get a haircut. While waiting I flipped through an issue of Glamour magazine (hey, don't look at me like that, it's all they had). It appears to me that this magazine has only 3 types of articles - fashion/makeup, famous people and sex. One interesting (very unscientific) sex article contained quotes from guys in different age ranges answering questions about what they know now about sex that they didn't know when they were younger.

I agreed with the quotes from the 30s guys. One guy said he was surprised to find out how much women enjoyed sex. If they'd asked me I would have commented on how women in their 30s are much better at sex than women in their 20s. And I'm not talking about stuff like weird positions or increased use of oral sex. The things that seem better to me are far more subtle: the way they move, the way they kiss, the sounds they make. I can only wonder if women in their 40s are even better!

 
Art Imitates My Life. I watched the NBC show "Ed" last night. Although I'm a fan of the show, this was the first time I'd seen it in months. Last night's episode had a Valentine's theme. One of the character's younger sister came to town and brought along her artist boyfriend (played by a very old looking Tim Matheson). Their plotline was that Matheson was too into his art career to appreciate his hot (and too young for him) girlfriend, even to the point that he blew her off Valentine's night.

This young woman is chased by one of the series' regulars, high-school student Warren Cheswick. During the show he does several stupid things to get her to see that she should be with someone who appreciates her. In the end, she dumps never-there boyfriend Matheson and it's strongly implied that she deflowers young Cheswick.

Strangely, this plot-line parallels my own situation. [or, maybe it's like horoscopes and I'm simply bending it to fit my situation]. Regardless, I've reached the point where Abby isn't worth the effort. That sounds harsh, but it's true. I feel like I've done my best to move our relationship forward and for most of January things seemed to be progressing, but lately she seems to be pulling back. She did this to me before in the Fall and what snapped her out of it was when I stopped calling her and even turned her down a couple of times when she asked to get together. Back then it was easy to cut-her-off because I didn't have feelings for her and I was seeing another woman (Betty--mentioned in early posts). This time will be harder.

So, Abby is out for Valentine's day and probably out of my dating life for the foreseeable future. I still think Abby is a great girl, she's just not as interested in me as I am in here. Therefore, I'm putting her back into the "friend" category where she probably should have stayed last Fall.

Where's the parallel to the woman in the show having sex with the high school student?

I think I might have that as well----although add 10 years to each participant. I've got a date with Cindy arranged for Saturday and last night she asked what my favorite lingere color is.

Wait, didn't you write in a previous post that you told her that you didn't want a relationship with her?

Yes, I did. But what I didn't post is that later that same night Cindy asked if we could have a physical relationship. She's a very sexy woman and despite my advancing age, I've still got a healthy sex drive. I don't know if it's really possible to have just a "physical" relationship but I think it might be worth a try.

Of course, Abby might surprise me and change over the next 48 hours. But my instincts say it's time to move on.

 
Foiled Again. I talked to Abby last night and she has this way of talking to me where within 3 minutes my concerns evaporate and I feel stupid for doubting her. But knowing that my doubts would return the next day I pushed ahead with my plan. I asked Abby out for Friday and she was noncommital about it. She said she's been so busy with work that she didn't even realize Friday was V-day. She commented on what a pain going out that night would be because of crowds. I suggested that we have dinner at my place and she said "that'd probably be better" but still never said "yes" or "no."

I asked her if things were ok between us and she said "yes" with a "why do you ask?" tone and then launched into a string of statements of how she's been burning the candle at both ends and is exhausted etc. etc. I told her that if she ever thought something was wrong that she should talk to me about it rather than avoid dealing with it. She said ok and then we went on to various other topics for 45 minutes.

She drives me crazy. When I met Abby last Fall I thought she was nice, a little quirky (in a good way) but I wasn't that attracted to her. I remember holding her phone number in my hand, looking at the phone and thinking "oh, what the hell, she seems nice and I need to start dating again." Sometimes I wonder if I'm developing an attraction to her because of the "you want what you can't have" trick. Am I that susceptible to manipulation?

 
Dave Matthews has posted his thoughts about the coming war with Saddam. I hoped that such a gifted musician would also be a great thinker, but alas, is not the case. I'm sure his naive ramblings will get ripped apart my many a blogger. here and here and here for example.

Dave states as fact that Hussein is only a threat to his neighbors and that none of them support an invasion. How does Dave know who Saddam is a threat to? How does Dave know whether Saddam's neighbors support an invasion? He offers no evidence.

Dave predicts that our invasion will kill "..hundreds of thousands of Iraqis." When this fails to happen, will Dave post an apology on his website? Don't hold your breath.

Dave thinks regime change should "...be up to the people of the region and the people of Iraq." I guess Dave thinks Saddam's election with 100% of the vote was legit. If Dave saw someone trapped in a burning building, I guess his response would be "hmmm...that person must like burning to death, otherwise he'd choose to leave that building."

And, of course, Dave concludes with the old "it's about oil" quote. No pledge from Dave that his band will stop using giant gas-guzzling tour buses on future tours. Surprised?

 
Scraping Wallpaper and Thinking about Life. Yesterday I started the process of removing the ugly wallpaper in the masterbathroom. While working through this project I analyzed (and probably overanalyzed) the Abby situation. Maybe I'm worried about nothing, but the Abby situation has gotten uncomfortable. I know that she is busy with work and family obligaitons but from my own dating experience I know that when I like a woman I make the time to see her. Therefore, my brain tells me that something's not right. My analysis came up with three different theories that explain Abby's behavior---although none of them explain all of her behaviors. The behaviors that I'm referring to are how she acts as if she's into me but then makes it difficult to get together.

1. There's another guy in the picture and I'm Abby's fall-back/safety-net person. This was something I suspected last Fall but had ruled out. Perhaps I ruled this out too quickly. This could explain why she frequently makes plans with me that later get cancelled as well as why she's kept us from starting a physical relationship.

2. Abby's not that into me but enjoys my company when it fits her schedule. Although I'd be disappointed if this were the case, I could deal with it. I enjoy going out with Abby, I'm attracted to her but yet, I don't find myself that sexually attracted to her. The lack of a strong sexual attraction is why I haven't pushed the physical part of the relationship. So, if friendship is what she wants, I think that I could deal with it. At least in that case, I'd know to put my dating/emotional efforts other directions.

3. Abby's afraid to get too close. There's things she's told me (that I haven't written about on this site) that make me think this is a possibility. For example, she's been married before, it lasted only a short time and the guy sounds like he wasn't that great to live with. The divorce has been within the past two years and maybe she's not ready for another relationship.

Why don't you just ask her? I want to but I think it's something I'd prefer to discuss with her face-to-face. Unfortunately, I've only had phone conversations with her over the past week. I plan to ask Abby out for Valentine's day. If she says anything other than "yes" then that will greatly increase the chances of theory #1 being correct. or Maybe she'll say "yes", we'll have a great time and I'll be posting that all three of the above theories were unfounded.

 
Great Play! Last night I took Cindy to the theater and we saw a fantastic play. This was my first trip to one of my city's leading playhouses and the experience could not have been better. After the play we went to a japanese steak house. It surprised me that Cindy had never been to such a place. She had no idea that the chefs cooks right at your table and does a performance. It also helped that our tablemates were six friendly, funny, slightly intoxicated 20-somethings and we all got into the spirit of the night.

After dinner Cindy and I went to a local pub and had a couple of drinks. I took this opportunity to talk to Cindy about my thoughts on our relationship. My thoughts are basically that I find her physically attractive and I enjoy going out with her, but we don't seem to have that extra something that I believe a relationship needs to go to the next level. She, of course, wasn't thrilled with the news but handled it reasonably well. After about 15 minutes of uncomfortable discussion, things settled back down and the remainder of the date passed without incident.

I'm not good at these types of discussions but who is? I tried to put a positive spin on things but made sure to not leave any room for false hope.

 
Weekend Plan. Earlier in the week Abby had to cancel our very tentative plans to get together Thursday night (work, of course). At that time I asked her about the weekend and she said that Friday night she had to go out with people from work and Saturday was a litany of family stuff so she said "maybe sunday". I'm not doubting the legitimacy of what she says because I know that her company has a reputation for working people to death. However, it's frustrating to be attracted to someone and then never get to see them. I'm also concerned that Abby may have a fear of getting close. I don't know much about her previous dating experiences. I might start probing that topic a little to see if there's anything there.

Last night I talked to Cindy and we decided to get together tonight. A couple of hours later I called Abby and we had a nice "in-bed" talk. She asked what my plans were for the weekend and implied that her after-Friday work-thing might fall through. I talked about my Saturday plans and then changed the topic. Although I'd like to see Abby, I'm not going to cancel on Cindy. One of my pet peeves is people who make plans and then cancel without an extremely good reason (e.g. death in the family).

Saturday I'm scheduled to go out with friend Kelly and other assorted friends. I told Abby that if her family-related stuff ends early enough on Saturday that I'd love for her to join us. Otherwise---we'll shoot for Sunday.

 
A Simple "No", Part III. Thanks to Jo and Snarkyfriend for their input. I'm a little surprised/disappointed that more of my readers didn't take the opportunity to put in their 2 cents. Not that I have much of a readership, but still.....

After taking the time to think things through I tend to agree with the opinions of both Jo and Snarkyfriend. I realize, however, that I'm not objective. Maybe Tracy couldn't say 'yes' because of some situation (boyfriend?) but didn't want to burn the bridge between us completely which a flat-out "no thank you" would have done. I probably caught her off guard and then she had to quickly think of a way to not accept a "date" but yet still keep open the possibility of getting together. I hope that's what was happening. Time will tell.

I'll back burner this for a couple of weeks before calling her. And, when I do call, I'm thinking that my best bet is to approach this from a "friend" angle.

 
A Simple "No", Part II. Tracy did attend last night's reception. Picture 30 people standing around drinking wine in a dimly-lit fancy hotel meeting room. As soon as Tracy saw Kelly and me she came over to our group. She could not have been friendlier---especially considering this was only the third time I'd seen her in my life. Amazingly, the only time that she left my side the remainder of the reception was to go to get food----which, btw, she brought back enough crackers & cheese for the three of us.

At one point Kelly leaned over to me and whispered "you are so in". Kelly is very cool like that. After several people made brief presentations about various aspects of the charity's work things started to wind down. I kept hoping to get Tracy one-on-one so that I could ask her out but people kept joining our conversation and frustrating my goal.

I eventually gave up and figured I'd have to phone her to ask her out. I said goodnight, found Kelly, we got our coats and headed for the elevator. The elevator was so slow in coming that Tracy caught up with us and the three of us walked to the parking lot together. Kelly's car was closest so she walked away from us. Ah-ha! I finally had Tracy one-on-one so I took the opportunity to ask her if she would be ok with me calling her next week and asking her to dinner. The night had gone so well that I felt fairly confident that she'd say "yes" and that would be the end of it.

No such luck. First she paused (never a good sign), then she said "that's sweet" (really, really bad sign), then she paused some more, and then said something about having a lot going on in her life right now. I didn't need an explanation so I tried to make things less awkward for both of us and said "ok, I understand" and started to make my exit. She, however, stood her ground and started explaining further. Now the story became "well my boyfriend moved to [insert somewhat distant city here] in November and....." and again I tried to help her out by saying "ok, you're involved with someone. I understand." and tried to make a graceful exit by beginning to step away and towards my car.

But again, she didn't move, said some things I can't recall because the voice in my head was speaking and it was saying "Why is she torturing me? This is so uncomfortable." and then I heard her conclude by saying "...but I guess dinner would be all right." By this point I was completely confused and didn't know what to say. I believe my final words were "oh, ok, then you'll probably be hearing from me. Have a good trip." [she was leaving on a business trip today] and this time we both said goodnight and headed towards our respective cars.

That's my recollection of how things went. I am at a loss for what any of this means and welcome any and all interpretations and advice.

 
A Simple No would be Sufficient. Part I. I attended a reception for a charity last night with my friend Kelly. Was hoping to cross paths with a woman named Tracy that is on the board of the charity. Background to the story: I met Tracy last summer during a bike ride through a local biking club. At that time, my relationship with girlfriend, X, was wrapping up and I was making my first efforts at flirting with potential dates. I talked to Tracy for most of a two hour bike ride but couldn't get up the nerve to ask for her number. Thought I'd see her again at a future club ride but never did.

Fast forward to late October and Tracy's a distant memory. I assisted at a charity fundraiser with Kelly who at that time, was one of my newest friends. By one of those weird twists of fate, Tracy was on the board of this charity and so was at this benefit. I saw her across the room but didn't recognize her from the bike ride. I asked Kelly to introduce me to her. Even when I was introduced to Tracy and told her name I still didn't recognize her from the bike club.

Surprising? Not really. First, I'm not very bright. Second, on the bike ride she was sweaty and had her hair tucked under a helmet. At the charity event she was dressed up and her long hair flowed past her shoulders. Somehow she recognized me which I guess means I look the same whether I'm sweaty or clean and fresh. I couldn't believe my good luck at running into her again and thought it was a sign from heaven that I was meant to be with this woman. That feeling was short-lived as minutes later I was introduced to her boyfriend. Ouch!

Inexplicably, that night Tracy told Kelly that her boyfriend was moving away in November and that the relationship "wasn't going anywhere. we're from two different worlds." I say inexplicably, because Tracy barely knew Kelly so it's surprising that she would relay such personal information to a virtual stranger. I did try to call Tracy once in December but all I got was a recording saying that the phone was disconnected. And if you're thinking "wow, this Brian is bold" you're wrong. I called during work hours with a phony work-related reason for getting in touch with her.

Anyway, I saw Tracy last night at the reception, a glass of wine in her hand.....(song?). Details to follow......

 
Lincoln's Powerpoint Presentation for the Gettysburg address has been located and is available here. Amazing what historians are able to find nowadays. I'm especially impressed that Lincoln was aware of the power of presenting his data graphically.

 
TalkingPointsMemo is keeping me worried about North Korea. I don't agree with Marshall's assertion that the administration is doing "nothing" about the situation though I can't refute the assertion either. I hope that the administration is working on the issue but not discussing it publically so that we stay focused on the Iraq issue.

 
Dating Update. Not much to report, unfortunately. Abby and I had talked about getting together tonight but her job responsibilities are getting in the way. Probably won't see her until the weekend. Tomorrow night I'm going to a small reception with my friend Kelly. I'm not clear on the details but the reception has to do with a local charity that Kelly is involved with. I'm going because Kelly is my friend and I haven't seen her in a while and because the last time I went to one of these functions there were several single, attractive, educated women there. Let's hope a few of them attend this reception as well.

 
Sorry for getting political. Despite the last post, I'm not a gun-loving member of the NRA. I've never owned a gun or even fired one. I am against gun-control laws because they cannot prevent criminals from getting guns. If anything, they encourage criminals to use guns because the criminals know that Mr. and Ms. law-abiding citizen won't have a gun to defend themselves with. Under our current system, someone thinking of breaking into my home must pause to consider that maybe, just maybe, I have a gun and will use it to blow his (or her) ass away. I'm convinced that most criminals are rational and do pause to consider this possibility.

I never had much of an opinion on gun control until the early 90s during the Rodney King riots in L.A. when I watched in amazement as the police took an attitude of "sorry folks, you're on your own. We refuse to help you. Good luck defending your stores and homes from the thugs." That shocked me into realizing that you can't always count on the government to defend you.

 
Everyone should read this essay from Reason online. I'd heard for years that England's overall crime rate exceeds that of the U.S. except in the area of murders. The U.S. still leads in murders but the rates are converging...

In 1981 the American rate was 8.7 times the English rate, in 1995 it was 5.7 times the English rate, and the latest study puts it at 3.5 times.

AND, the article points out that our FBI asks police to list every homicide as murder thus making our reported numbers as high as possible. The English, on the other hand, go out of their way to "massage down" their reported numbers. If a suspect pleads guilty to a lesser charge, the English remove that murder from their statistics.

I can't help but wonder how many innocent people are dead because of England's wrong-headed policies. It's a shame that the English did not listen to this guy when debating their gun control laws...

In the House of Lords, Lord Saltoun argued: "The object of a weapon was to assist weakness to cope with strength and it is this ability that the bill was framed to destroy. I do not think any government has the right, though they may very well have the power, to deprive people for whom they are responsible of the right to defend themselves." But he added: "Unless there is not only a right but also a fundamental willingness amongst the people to defend themselves, no police force, however large, can do it."

 
Great Interview with Christopher Hitchens. I can almost hear Hitchens thinking to himself "What are you, some kind of idiot" just before answering some of the questions.

 
Slow Progress. I'm not sure on which of the following I've made the least progress: a) work project, b) date project or c) house project. This weekend I made some progress on the house. I bought a 4 bedroom house about 18 months ago (why? long story better told another day). Three of the bedrooms are empty and the only thing in my bedroom is a bed, two nightstands and a television. I don't even own a dresser!

On Sunday I bought a new mattress set and then tonight I bought a new bed. I'm so indecisive that I could not decide on a nightstand or a dresser. The dresser that I want has to be custom ordered and takes 8 weeks. I've made it 18 months without a dresser, what's another 8 weeks. I also stopped into Home Depot and bought stuff to remove the flowery wallpaper from the master-bathroom. Baby steps....baby steps.....

The date project is slow going. Things with Abby are good I guess---except that I've known her for almost four months, spent a night in bed with her and still haven't "made out" with her. There's a story there somewhere.

 
Wrapup. The rest of the weekend was quiet. I stayed home Saturday night and did laundry and read blogs & magazines on the web. It's amazing how much good stuff is available.

Sunday night I went over to my friend's house (from Superbowl post below). He'd rented the movie The Good Girl starring Jennifer Aniston. Like a lot of guys, I think Aniston is pretty close to being a perfect woman. Although she looked great in the movie, the movie itself was not very good. I like to read the reviews of movies after I watch the movie. Does Roger Ebert have standards anymore? He thought this movie was great. I agree with him that Aniston did a good job, but the plot was too stupid for me to care about the characters.

My friend's little boy is only 2 years old. When I first got to their house he walked into the kitchen and asked me "where's your friend?". I didn't know what he meant. His dad laughed and said that he's asking you where Abby is. The kid only met Abby the one time the night of the superbowl. Clearly she made quite an impression.

I talked with Abby today by phone. She spent the day with her mom and one of her sisters (reluctantly) helping them to plan a wedding. We're going to try to get together some night this week.

 
Kevin Parrott has some funny things to say about online personal ads. Some are a little mean-spirited but others made me laugh out loud at their dead-on accuracy.

Last fall I had two dates with women that I'd met through on-line personals. One was a really nice, educated and attractive woman. We had a very good date but we had no romantic chemistry and due to our busy schedules we never got together again.

Another date was with a woman that I talked with on the phone for hours over a period of weeks before we met in person. She seemed very normal for the longest time but eventually little factoids would come out that made me suspect things weren't so normal. One of these factoids was that she had recently legally changed her name to one that is gender-ambiguous so that her mother couldn't locate her. Is that common? I really enjoyed talking with her on the phone. I was disappointed when she turned out to be strange.

 
Friday Night. Abby came over to my house last night. Prior to her 9 pm arrival I went to a restaurant and picked up dinner for us. As I listened to her tell me about her bad day at work I prepared a plate of food for each of us, set the table, and opened and poured the wine. Look at me being Mr. Nice Guy.

After dinner we sat on the couch and watched two episodes of the Sopranos that I'd taped over the holidays. I'm a fan of the Sopranos and think it's one of the best shows on television. Abby had only seen the show a few times before but is also a fan. The second episode we watched was from the latest season and it is where Carmella and Tony fight and she throws him out of the house and they separate. I was really impressed by the dialogue as well as the acting in the scenes where the two of them argue.