You SBC broadband customers might want to beware: the CEO of your ISP, Edward Whitacre, is thinking of shutting off your access to Google and other handy dandy sites unless they cough up payola for using his "pipes." He wants everyone using his service---customers and internet sites---to pay up as they come and go and make stops in between.

{...}How concerned are you about Internet upstarts like Google, MSN, Vonage, and others?

How do you think they're going to get to customers? Through a broadband pipe. Cable companies have them. We have them. Now what they would like to do is use my pipes free, but I ain't going to let them do that because we have spent this capital and we have to have a return on it. So there's going to have to be some mechanism for these people who use these pipes to pay for the portion they're using. Why should they be allowed to use my pipes?

The Internet can't be free in that sense, because we and the cable companies have made an investment and for a Google or Yahoo! or Vonage or anybody to expect to use these pipes [for] free is nuts! {...}

Mike at Tech Dirt correctly lays the blame for this odious suggestion on the FCC's inhibitions about allowing for market competition:

{...}Notice that the only reason this is possible now is because there's less competition in the broadband space, not more. If there were real competition, SBC would never even dare to suggest that they might cut off a Google, Yahoo or Vonage.

Michael Powell had a huge opportunity to get something done about how the FCC regulated the telecom industry; he had the opportunity to create competition and he didn't do it.

Chickenshit.

Posted by: Kathy at 12:08 PM | Comments (3) | Add Comment
Post contains 307 words, total size 2 kb.

If you...

A. Live in the Twin Cities
B. Have been looking for a place to wear that Catwoman/Batman/Random Superhero costume you just happen to have hanging in your closet
C. Have a spare $40 to blow
D. Want to boogie until the wee hours
E. Enjoy the comedic stylings of Miss Richfield 1981
F. Want to meet with and buy your friendly Cake Eater a drink...

You should go here this evening.

Seriously. You should come on down. Mr. H., who's on the board of this here ball, would really appreciate your support.

And, yes, Steed and Peel won out.

Posted by: Kathy at 11:35 AM | Comments (2) | Add Comment
Post contains 103 words, total size 1 kb.

Take the jump for a Friday treat.

(Mom, skip right past this one, eh?) more...

Posted by: Kathy at 12:31 PM | Comments (5) | Add Comment
Post contains 51 words, total size 1 kb.

That would be the sound of my head hitting the desk repeatedly.

{...}Nor does the 37-year-old share Bond's love of Martinis shaken and stirred.

"I love a Martini straight up. I don't think anybody makes a Martini stirred any more," he said. {...}

It's shaken not stirred, you flipping idiot! NOT shaken and stirred.

(Hat Tip: Ith, who pretty much wrote the same damn post, but it was such an egregious error that I feel the need to pile on.}

Posted by: Kathy at 10:45 PM | Comments (12) | Add Comment
Post contains 86 words, total size 1 kb.

1 LOL! A pile on is well deserved.

Posted by: Ith at October 27, 2005 11:02 PM (P/TlQ)

2 Do you suppose gnat for brains (and that's a concession to the Cake Eater Mom) will pull a Miers and withdraw his name?? Nah, he's too flippin' stoopid. Personally, I'd like to see Adrian Paul (Highlander TV series) take the role...after all, there can be only ONE. He's hot! {{swoon}}

Posted by: Chrissy at October 28, 2005 08:15 AM (zJsUT)

3 I think Clive Owen would have been perfect, but he's too highbrow or whatever for the role. Daniel isn't a bad actor, per se. I would highly recommend Layer Cake. V.V.Good as Bridget Jones would say. And he's a nice piece of eye candy.

Posted by: Kathy at October 28, 2005 08:34 AM (kZ6IS)

4 I also see that he's phobic about firearms. I don't have the link, but he made a comment recently about how guns frighten him, and he's convinced that guns do nothing but hurt people. Great, the new James Bond is a disciple of Sarah Brady. I guess he's going to grow a mullet and start playing hockey in the next Bond movie. Geez, if they're going to go this way with the character, they might as well hire Richard Dean Anderson to play the part.

Posted by: Russ from Winterset at October 28, 2005 11:17 AM (M7kiy)

5 AIEEEEEEE! He's alive! Where have you been, Russ? I was starting to get worried about you!

Posted by: Kathy at October 28, 2005 11:40 AM (kZ6IS)

6 Yes, I cringed when I saw that article too, but didn't get around to mocking it. Thank you for saving me the trouble.

Posted by: andy at October 28, 2005 11:56 AM (vX6Is)

7 Am I the only one disturbed by the fact that this asshat confuses the whole "straight up" versus "on the rocks" issue with the "shaken" versus "stirred" issue? Sweet Jeebus, this can NOT be the new Bond.

Posted by: Doug at October 28, 2005 12:54 PM (b+3Ky)

8 I got a part time job hiding under Scooter Libby's porch to pull cable for the wiretaps. Mr. Fitzgerald paid me double to work nights and weekends, and I figured "Hey, I can use the money to fix my broken motorcycle". Yes, you heard that right. Broken. And sitting at a shop in State College PA. At $50 a pint, I figure that I'll need to sell around 20 pints of blood plasma to make the repairs.

Posted by: Russ from Winterset at October 28, 2005 08:02 PM (ywZa8)

9 Wow, I'm losing it. Make that 40 pints of plasma. Usually I'm good with calculations in my head.

Posted by: Russ from Winterset at October 28, 2005 09:19 PM (ywZa8)

10 Oh, ouch! What's the matter with it?

Posted by: Kathy at October 28, 2005 10:04 PM (kZ6IS)

11 Overheated & busted a connecting rod. The pieces of the broken con rod played havoc in the crankcase, so they're taking it apart right now to see which parts need to be replaced.

Posted by: Russ from Winterset at October 29, 2005 07:50 AM (M7kiy)

12 Oh, maaan. I'm sorry. Is it deer season yet? If it is go and kill bambi a few dozen times---that'll help with the frustration.

Posted by: Kathy at October 29, 2005 11:09 AM (kZ6IS)

Hide Comments | Add Comment

Well, Chrissy claims she's no longer feisty, but I'm not believing her. But that's irrelevant. What is relevant, however, is that Chrissy is blogging again. And has a new moo knewvian home

New title, new mantra, same great woman! Run along and thank your lucky stars that she's baaaaaaaaaaaack!

Posted by: Kathy at 09:09 AM | Comments (4) | Add Comment
Post contains 51 words, total size 1 kb.

1 Heh. The secret's out.

Posted by: Pixy Misa at October 26, 2005 09:38 AM (QriEg)

2 Oh, thank you, girlfriend! A warmer welcome home I could not have dreamed or wished for. ; )

Posted by: Chrissy at October 26, 2005 10:33 AM (hbYbX)

3 well, I'm just stating the obvious, but you're very welcome.

Posted by: Kathy at October 26, 2005 11:00 AM (kZ6IS)

4 It is a cause for great rejoicing!

Posted by: RP at October 27, 2005 12:49 PM (LlPKh)

Hide Comments | Add Comment

Posted by: Kathy at 10:51 PM | Comments (3) | Add Comment
Post contains 2 words, total size 1 kb.

1 My kind of post Thank you from coloured leaf free CA. I wish I lived smewhere with an actual autumn.

Posted by: Ith at October 24, 2005 05:17 PM (IHVEd)

2 Ah, but you don't want the actual winter that follows. I guarantee it

Posted by: Kathy at October 24, 2005 08:21 PM (kZ6IS)

3 I actually miss winter. Strange, but true

Posted by: Ith at October 24, 2005 11:36 PM (P/TlQ)

Hide Comments | Add Comment

The husband complains every now and again about my magazine habit. Not about the fact that I read them, but about the fact that I save them. Now, I fully admit I'm weird this way. While some people would be content to keep a file full of articles they'd liked and had ripped out of magazines, that's not my m.o. I like to keep the entire magazine itself because it provides a frame of reference for the article. For instance, somewhere in the vast collection of junk that one could identify as my belongings, there is a Life magazine from July 1969. That was back when Life still published weekly and was huge---and this particular issue covered the first moon landing. Now, I hadn't even been born yet when this was published, but I found this particular issue, of course, to be very, very cool when I came across it in the Cake Eater folks' assorted clobber. Not only did you have cool moon landing photographs, but you had ads for portable radios. And for cigarettes and for brands of cheap whiskey that don't even exist any more. Pretty cool, no?

Yeah. Go ahead and call me Lileks if you must. I can take it.

But the husband isn't wild about this magazine habit. Because I like to keep a lot of magazines. For many different and varied reasons. And they have a tendency to pile up. This annoys him, and, of course, he wants me to throw them out. I refuse and say, "Gee, honey, you'll never know when they'll come in handy!" Like today. When dearest Jonathan mentioned an article on Sarah Silverman from the March 1999 GQ in this post, I was able to email and inform him that I had that issue of GQ lying around. I asked him if he would like me to scan the article for him. He responded in the affirmative and so I present the scanned copy of Michael MacCambridge's Sarah Silverman Has The Cleanest Breasts in America.

Which I never would have been able to post if I wasn't a packrat!

Take the jump if you're interested in actually reading the article. more...

Posted by: Kathy at 03:06 PM | Comments (2) | Add Comment
Post contains 387 words, total size 5 kb.

Since today's the 200th Anniversary of the Battle of Trafalgar, I have yet another excuse to post this picture, taken by yours truly in a moment of daring in the crypt at St. Paul's in London, where you're not supposed to take pictures because it's a. either disrespectful to the people who are buried there or b. because flash photography will hurt the tombstones or something to that effect.

If you couldn't already tell, I'm pretty proud of this picture.

Anyhoo...

Of course, if you want to know what actually happened during the battle, go here for Robbo's account. The Big Hominid has chimed in as well.

Posted by: Kathy at 09:30 AM | Comments (3) | Add Comment
Post contains 111 words, total size 1 kb.

About the probabilities of Monopoly.

Just in case you're curious---the Reds give you the best bang for your buck.

Personally, I prefer the Greens, but to each their own. If nothing else, this gives credence to my theory that Park Place and Boardwalk are chump investments.

Posted by: Kathy at 04:06 PM | Comments (1) | Add Comment
Post contains 54 words, total size 1 kb.

Ahem.

A bunch of football players decided to have a party wherein they got drunk, laid and treated everyone below them on the social strata like crap.

And this is different from high school, how?

Seriously. John Hughes could make a decent movie from this one.

Posted by: Kathy at 12:52 PM | Comments (1) | Add Comment
Post contains 70 words, total size 1 kb.

But I really can't quite resist.

You see, I have this photo of the Cake Eater Mom from when I was a little girl. It was taken in our dining room at our old house while she was working on some sewing project back in the day before she went pro and converted the basement into sewing central. Whomever took this particular photograph caught her completely by surprise. I'm assuming the photographer was Dad, but you never know: we had a surplus of people hanging about in those days.

Now, Mom hates this picture. I know for a fact that she despises this picture. She, I'm sure, thought this picture had disappeared into the ether somewhere. That it had been destroyed or lost or whatever. I sure she thought she was safe from this picture ever being seen again.

Well, not so.

The reason I'm posting a thirty-some-odd-year-old photo of my mother is because it's her birthday today!

Don't you wish you had a child like me?

{Insert evil chuckle here}

UPDATE: Hey Mom, did you know you share a birthday with Maggie Thatcher? Cooo-el.

Posted by: Kathy at 12:12 PM | Comments (3) | Add Comment
Post contains 208 words, total size 1 kb.

Because then we will know who will play James Bond now that Pierce has hung it up.

Sony Pictures Entertainment, the Hollywood studio backing new Bond film "Casino Royale,"said on Wednesday that the actor who will portray the suave secret agent with a license to kill would be named at a news conference in London on October 14.

No further details were disclosed, and the mystery remains over who will star in the film franchise that has grossed nearly $4 billion at global box offices since the first Bond flick, "Dr. No," hit the silver screen in 1962.

Reports in London have identified English actor
Daniel Craig, who recently starred in the gangster film, "Layer Cake," as the new Bond, but that could not be confirmed.{...}

Daniel Craig, eh?

Curious. We shall see if shagging Sienna on the side was a good career move.

Posted by: Kathy at 10:00 PM | No Comments | Add Comment
Post contains 154 words, total size 1 kb.

Born to Run sucks. It is loaded with cheesy innuendo, hence it is not great poetry, nor is it even the best song in Springsteen's catalogue, let alone the best rock song ever. However, if you're doomed to sticking with the Springsteen catalogue, Thunder Road, is great poetry. It wins. Hands down. It kicks Born to Run's ass every day of the week and twice on Sundays. I wouldn't say Thunder Road was the greatest rock song ever, either. But it's pretty damn good.

Lyrics can be found after the jump. more...

Posted by: Kathy at 10:38 AM | Comments (1) | Add Comment
Post contains 509 words, total size 3 kb.

But instead, they committed Smurf genocide.

Putting aside the very unsmurfy genocide for a brief moment, you just know Gargamel is just pissed off right now. UNICEF---freakin' UNICEF---succeeded where he's failed too many times to count. He's probably drunk in his cottage right now, and is trying to come up with fun and interesting ways of torturing the cat.

Posted by: Kathy at 10:17 AM | Comments (7) | Add Comment
Post contains 77 words, total size 1 kb.

1 Can I just say this REALLY pisses me off? Where does UNICEF get off, huh? They murder and maim a beloved icon from my childhood, and this is supposed to get me to want to donate? Screw that! That is so freakin' unlikely now, I can't even begin to express it. What's next? Strawberry Shortcake and Huckleberry Finn become landmine victims on their way to Porcupine Peak? Barbie gets gang-raped in her Malibu beach house? Or perhaps, the Bratz girls will get sold as sex slaves to unsavory UN peacekeepers. This is disgusting. It is desperate, reaching, and wholly without merit. I find the entire thing reprehensible. Blech! What some people won't do to get attention.

Posted by: Phoenix at October 12, 2005 11:06 AM (4N2f4)

2 And you're worried that villains vanquished has become pussified????? have no fear, m'dear.

Posted by: Kathy at October 12, 2005 11:15 AM (boYqP)

3 Curiously, that's not the first time we've seen Smurfette at less than her best.

Posted by: MRN aka "The Husband" at October 12, 2005 09:45 PM (boYqP)

4 Glenn Beck had the same thoughts as you and did another blurb on the smurfs. I don't know if it is on his website or not. VERY funny. Christi

Posted by: Christi at October 12, 2005 10:11 PM (h6L+r)

5 Uh gee....not to put too fine a point on it....but did some of you folks MISS the entire intent of the UNICEF use of Smurfs? The campaign is DESIGNED to get YOU to REACT to the problem of war and specifically, CHILDREN in war. Yes, the images of our beloved Smurfs being subjected to so cruel a fate DOES upset us, and rightly so. Perhaps if YOU can now SEE the same fate happening to so many REAL children, you might be induced to: 1.) Question the "neccessity excuses" to go to war. 2.) Question the leadership ability of those who continually tell us we must sacrifice the lives of our children, and the children of others, so we can "maintain our way of life". 3.) Understand that we are ALL children of someone, and that none of us are "disposable". If the campaign can accomplish that...then maybe it has accomplished its goal.

Posted by: L2T at October 13, 2005 09:35 AM (aBJmJ)

6 And all that preaching from a person with the email address, "love2torture@yahoo.com"? One must really love the age of post-modernism if for no other reason than that it really does produce some first class absurdism.

Posted by: Kathy at October 13, 2005 09:59 AM (boYqP)

7 love2torture? Torture what, puppies? His own nipples? Hell, this campaign doesn't work primarily because most sane people get a chuckle out of seeing the damn blue menaces in a most un-smurfy predicament. ;p

Posted by: MRN aka "The Husband" at October 13, 2005 11:00 PM (boYqP)

Hide Comments | Add Comment

...as in, Murphy's Law seemed to rule over Robbo's Saturday with the Llama-ettes.

Go read and be enlightened about everything that could possibly go wrong when visiting the mall on a rainy Saturday afternoon.

Posted by: Kathy at 09:26 AM | No Comments | Add Comment
Post contains 42 words, total size 1 kb.

As in this is guaranteed to do three things.

1. It is guaranteed to make the husband laugh long and hard
2. It is guaranteed to make his sister blow a freakin' gasket because she's a die hard creationist.
3. It is guaranteed to make sure much amusement is had by me while watching the two of them slug it out. (No pun intended, but am appreciating the one that sprung up there, thankyouverymuch.)

{One HUGE tip of the hat to Sheila)

Posted by: Kathy at 10:01 AM | No Comments | Add Comment
Post contains 84 words, total size 1 kb.

Just for you my lovelies, here's an interesting article on how to get around 0870 numbers.

Enjoy, and don't say I never did anything for you.

Posted by: Kathy at 11:07 PM | Comments (1) | Add Comment
Post contains 40 words, total size 1 kb.

1 Just typical.. I read this after I've stuck the phone down and spent 10 minutes on hold )

Posted by: Nugget at October 10, 2005 08:47 AM (U9kHN)

Hide Comments | Add Comment

Yes, please.

Posted by: Kathy at 01:09 PM | No Comments | Add Comment
Post contains 10 words, total size 1 kb.

It was 88 degrees and very muggy on Monday.

Of course we turned the AC on, not being the kind of people who enjoy sweating for the heck of it.

Yesterday---Tuesday---it started raining. We had several typhoon strength thunderstorms last night, and it's kept on through this morning. But, fortunately, it was still warm when I woke up this morning. As in it was sixty-eight degrees. Which is nice for this time of the year. It was also still raining.

But the rain has stopped for the time being. The wind has picked up. And the temperature is dropping: it's currently fifty-seven.

Now my little weather bar on my browser is telling me that the low for today will be thirty-six degrees with a chance of a snow or rain shower later on this evening.

Only in the midwest can you go from using the AC to using the furnace within a span of forty-eight hours!

My mother, who is currently on her yearly Florida jaunt with my father, is undoubtedly laughing her head off as she reads this.

Posted by: Kathy at 11:28 AM | No Comments | Add Comment
Post contains 183 words, total size 1 kb.

I think Don Cheadle should be added to this list, and Emily Watson and Emma Thompson should be added to this one.

But that's just my opinion. I could be wrong.

Posted by: Kathy at 10:09 PM | Comments (1) | Add Comment
Post contains 43 words, total size 1 kb.