Catfish's blog

Bush Invokes "Criminal" Presidential Privilege

Wed, 16 Jul 2008 18:25:04 -0400

Okay, we all know he did it; President Bush gave up a CIA agent, someone whose job it is to protect the United States covertly, to settle a personal agenda. He let one of his patsies take the fall, then when the guy gets sentenced commutes the sentence so the guy doesn't have to go to jail. Very convenient.

Jaeger Threw Wimbledon 1983?

Sun, 06 Jul 2008 12:51:32 -0400

An interesting story came out saying that Andrea Jaeger actually "threw" the 1983 Wimbledon finals to Martina Navratilova, which ended up being th 3rd of her 9 championships.

I remember watching this, at the time, young phenom of 18, who was going though everyone else and suddenly, when she's up against Martina in the finals, gets crushed 6-0 6-3. However, reading about her throwing the championship seems freaky at best. I don't think Martina would have lost to her anyway, seeing as how Martina pretty much dominated her in other circumstances, but it does get us thinking about tennis and other sports and whether sometimes athletes quit for their own reasons.

Catfish Chokes On Soccer Ball!

Wed, 02 Jul 2008 21:08:22 -0400

First, I'm fine! Second, it's not every day that there's a news story that has your name in it, whether it's your real name or your pretend name.

In this case, I'm talking about a news story, so to speak, of a catfish in Germany that tried to eat a soccer ball, got it stuck in its mouth, and, well, that was that. Police are speculating that it might have been trying to commit suicide after Germany lost to Spain 1-0 in the soccer championships; of course that's tongue in cheek for those who are comedy-challenged.

The Mayor Is Back

Sun, 29 Jun 2008 23:52:55 -0400

There's a house down the street where a man known as "The Mayor" lives. He's presently 72 years old, and, oddly enough, this makes him one of the youngest senior citizens on the block.

He's also the sickest, but we'll come back to that. For all the years I've lived here, this retired fireman has stood out in his driveway, just watching cars go by and waving at them. Sometimes, if you stopped to try to talk to him, he'd give you one of those old time catch phrases that was supposed to be funny, but really wasn't, but you'd give him his due, sometimes anyway, and chuckle just a bit. In the summer he'd be standing out there without a shirt on; not a pretty sight, but it was his house. In the winter, he'd be out there in a thick coat with one of those Russian style hats pulled over his ears. Nothing stopped this guy from standing in the driveway outside of rain.

Blacks And Whites Don't Think Alike

Sun, 29 Jun 2008 14:44:54 -0400

A new study came out on Friday that basically said black people and white people in America don't see things the same way. My response to that was "duh"!

Since I know most folks won't download the entire report, here are some of the highlights:

How Not To Interview

Tue, 24 Jun 2008 00:19:31 -0400

Earlier today CNN had a feature story on the worst things one could do during a job interview. As someone who's interviewed a lot of people over the years, I can tell you that I sometimes think I've seen it all, but then someone else comes along and surprises you.

Israel, Iran & The Nuclear Threat

Sun, 22 Jun 2008 15:38:00 -0400

By now many of us have heard that Israel conducted a massive round of war "games", basically flexing their military muscle by showing that, at any time, they could launch a strike into Iran and take out the nuclear facility that Iran is trying to convince the world is only for them to have more power.

It's Not Seven Words, But,...

Sun, 22 Jun 2008 00:37:22 -0400

Okay, this one has to take the cake, sort of. In London, the Local Government Association has taken it upon themselves to create a list of 100 words or phrases that politicians are not allowed to use anymore. Unlike George Carlin's list of 7 dirty words, though, these aren't nasty words of any sort, but words this organization has deemed either too confusing or misleading to the general public.

Tiger Woods Is The Man!

Sun, 15 Jun 2008 00:02:34 -0400

Anyone who knows the name Tiger Woods knows that he's the greatest golfer in history. Well, there might be a bit of dispute to that claim by a few, but after his performance today, even if it wasn't the last round, I'm sorry folks but this guy is the man.

Watch What You Eat

Sat, 14 Jun 2008 17:11:00 -0400

Wednesday night I'm sitting in a hotel room, about to talk to my wife via instant messaging, and she asked me how I felt. I wrote back that, suddenly, I wasn't feeling well at all. By the time she wrote back to ask me what was wrong, things were going pretty badly. I was starting to feel shaky and somewhat off balance, and I was starting to get really cold. I wrote back saying I had to sign off and was getting into bed, turned the heat in the room to full blast, and got under the covers as the first chills hit my body.

Voting Obama, But Not With Enthusiasm

Tue, 10 Jun 2008 21:43:26 -0400

Barack Obama is going to the the democratic nominee for president, holding off Hillary Clinton, who I was pulling for, and making it to the top of the Democratic party, and will now be running against John McCain.

Maybe We Need A Mass Hug

Sun, 08 Jun 2008 10:14:07 -0400

Over the last week, a couple of incidents have come to light that makes me think that maybe we, as a world, need to come together for a mass hug.

The first is this video that's been circulating the internet showing, supposedly, a Russian business office of some kind, where suddenly this one guy goes berserk and starts attacking everything, people included. It runs a little over 3 minutes, and there was even a second recording from a different angle that helped show some of what was going on from another perspective. The jury is still out as to whether that was real or not, but to date no one has been able to disprove it.

Osama Killed!

Sat, 31 May 2008 10:04:46 -0400

Okay, not THAT Osama. But in Patna, India, an elephant that had been nicknamed Osama Bin Laden was killed after killing 11 people and injuring dozens others over the past couple of months.

These are the types of things we don't know about in America, because the last thing we can conceive of is having to deal with rogue elephants coming into our towns and neighborhoods and giving us grief. But in this area of India, in the eastern state of Jharkhand, I guess it's relatively common, as they've got another elephant, unnamed, who killed 7 people and injured 24 others before it was killed.

Where's Our Warm Weather?

Sat, 31 May 2008 09:43:24 -0400

I usually love where I live, but these days, I'm wondering if we're behind the 8-ball a little bit as it pertains to the temperature.

I'm not overly complaining, because we don't have to worry about tornadoes (much) or fires or drought, and I can't remember the last time we had even a small tremor in this area. But one day this past week, it was actually cold enough that it snowed in one area around here, and it's supposed to officially be summer! Friday early morning it got down to 39F here, before finally rebounding to hit 73; what a swing. On Tuesday, when the temperature in one city just about two hours away hit 80, we topped out at 52; that's just not fair.

Taking Living In The Closet To A Whole New Level

Fri, 30 May 2008 21:56:58 -0400

I knew that we American men don't always pay attention to what's going on in our surroundings, but I can tell you that something like this wouldn't get past me.

A woman was arrested for trespassing in the house of a Japanese man. He said he'd noticed food was missing for a couple of months and decided to set up surveillance cameras. They eventually showed someone in his house, and he called the police.