Random Notes from a Crank

I've never been an avid watcher of South Park, but the show is doing some outstanding work this season taking on President Adolf and his lackeys. 

This week's episode is wonderful satire of many topics, but my favorite part of the episode is how the characters are so reliant on ChatGPT, how stupid people are about how great it's supposed to be. 

My favorite part is when the wife pitches a business idea of turning fries into a "salad," the the AI says it's a great idea. 

I'm reading about the darker side of AI via the following book. 

After reading about the exploitation and the shit jobs people are doing for the tech companies and billionaires, you better think differently about how great AI is. 

The Micah Parsons situation with the Dallas Cowboys is bizarre. Since I am watching the Netflix documentary about the Cowboys in the 90s, the situation seems reminiscent to the Emmitt Smith holdout decades ago. 

Random Notes from a Crank

I volunteered to conduct a couple of mock interviews with graduating seniors in our department. The one I did last week was with a young lady who is intending to enroll in a graduate program at the University of Alberta. 

My first question to her was why that university, and I asked a joking question of "Are you a big fan of the Edmonton Oilers or something?"

Her reply was that part of the reason was the "political situation" in the U.S. 

I suspect Canadian universities are going to see an uptick in applications from U.S. students over the next few years. I know my daughter is probably looking at some grad programs in Canada along with universities in blue states. 

I saw this chart of sorts on Facebook. 

I'm no vegan, but looking at this chart and based on my tastes, here are more go-tos for protein:

• Almonds
• Pistachios
• Tofu
• Hazelnuts
• Walnuts
• Pecans
• Lentils
• Garbanzos
• Lima beans
• Spinach

Now that it's warming up, I need to get to making some tofu fried rice on my Blackstone griddle. Tofu is so cheap compared to meat. I wish I would have known how to cook it back in college. 

I'm worried about Ange's future at Tottenham if he doesn't move forward in the Europa League. Thursday's match looms large. 

I see the Vikings moved on from Sam Darnold, and they resigned Aaron Jones. And then they signed Ryan Kelly for the interior line. Good moves all around. 

I also saw that Najee Harris signed with he Chargers for a one-year contract in a run-first offense. I will be targeting that guy in my fantasy football draft. Harbaugh loves running the football. 

As we expected, RFK Jr. is claiming all kinds of nonsense in a recent interview. 

Musing of the Moment: Changes in Football to be Considered

I would like to propose a few changes to the game of football, two of which are related to scoring. 

Proposal 1: Make the Safety Worth More Points

The safety has worth two points forever. However, it's more rare than a field goal, so why not make it at least as much as field goal or maybe even more? A bold proposal would be a safety scoring 4 points. 

Proposal 2: Make Field Goals Over 50 yards Worth Four Points

People are familiar with fantasy football scoring system that give different points based on how long the field goal is. For example, in the fantasy league I am part of, a field goal from 0-39 yards is worth 3 points, 40-49 yards is worth 4 points, 50-59 points is worth 5 points, and over 60 yards is worth 6 points. 

But let's keep it simple. Any field goal over 50 yards scores 4 points, not 3. 

Proposal 3: In the NFL, Change the Kickoff Rules for More Returns

This season in the NFL the kickoff rules were changed for safety reasons, which I agree with. However, teams are still mainly just kicking it into the end zone for no returns and just touchbacks. 

If the NFL wants to really get kickers getting it into the "landing zone," they need to spot touchbacks not at the 30-yard line. Instead, touchbacks should be spotted at the 40-yard line to penalize touchbacks. 

Be bold. 

Random Notes from a Crank

Apparently the NFL is moving the Pro Bowl to become a flag football game. It was already that way in the past because like the NBA All-Star game, defense is optional in those silly games. Now the NFL is simply being truthful, which is a rare occurrence. 

"How Kansas Kept Abortion Legal" by Amy Littlefield in The Nation is worth a read. I hope it's a bellwether for the upcoming mid-term elections. 

I'm searching for a professional way of saying "bitch, please" without having to actually say "bitch, please." Here are suggestions from my friends on FB:

• Your opinion is duly noted, but I respectfully disagree.
• Bless your heart.
• Per my previous email
• Thank you for your interest.
• Please send me these concerns in an email.
• I'm sure that makes sense to you given your level of experience. 
• I'll take it from here.
• I appreciate your input, but we will be going in a different direction.
• Thank you very much, but I'm going to pass on that idea/opportunity at this time. 
• Thank you for the information.
• Perhaps.
• I've got you covered. 
• Ok, great. 

While I cannot find it online yet, you should pick up the most recent issue of The Nation and read Stephen Berry's "Confederates Take the Capitol." Berry is the Gregory Professor of the Civil War Era at the University of Georgia. He penned a trenchant essay about the January 6th insurrection and its historical context. 

Here's one of my favorite statements in the article: "At the base of most contemporary American conspiracy theories is the white male fantasy that indulges the feeling of being aggrieved, abused, dominated, or violated, precisely to justify the legitimacy of the ensuing white male vengeance and demonstrations of power and control." 

A few ¶s before, he makes this important statement: "...they [students of history and politics] assume that a majority of people act in their material self interest. Especially in the American context, they often don't. They act in their cultural self-interest. Any government program that benefits everyone (whether Obamacare, mask mandates, or vaccines) benefits out-groups relatively more--and America's traditionally dominant class (white male Christians and their allies) like winning less than they like watching other people lose. They not actually cynical about government; they know it works, but they want it to work for them particularly, perhaps exclusively, as it usually has--or they want it to not to work at all." 

Random Notes from a Crank

With the Packers losing at home and the unvaccinated Aaron Rodgers not throwing a TD pass, that offense and Rodgers really could have used ... a shot in the arm. 

The Washington Post has a good article about the game: "How the 49ers Beat the Packers in the Lambeau Field Snow."  The 49ers went old school against them. As Sally Jenkins says, "The moral to them [SF], with their bandaged-handed quarterback and their toss sweeps, is that football is still a hitting game, and still a game won as much by the unglamorous men as the glamorous." 

This not-so-recent article from New York Times Magazine, "What Teenagers Are Learning from Online Porn," is revealing and can be used to make a good argument for smart, comprehensive sexual education. 

Tottenham Hotspur hasn't done squat in the January transfer window so far. There are craptons of rumors and supposed reports out there on the InterWebs, but nothing has transpired yet. It's frustrating. 

When I picked Spurs to be my main club to root for in the Premier League, someone had compared Tottenham to the Minnesota Vikings in some online article I read, and I think that's a pretty apt comparison. 

They have a number of excellent and good players along with a strong tradition, but they'll often disappoint you. 

I've been commiserating with Ben and Sim on WeAreTottenhamTV during the window. Those fellows do some fine work. 

Random Notes from a Crank

I am against a verbal trend among sport broadcasters. When a player suffers an injury, many of these talking heads leave off the word "injury" in their reporting. For example, a broadcaster could be talking about a player who has an ankle injury, and the person says the player has "an ankle." Of course he has an ankle. In fact, he has two of them. What he has is an ankle injury, not an ankle. 

I think I've also complained about how sports commentators like to use the term "washed" for the extra syllable phrasing of "washed up." If someone is washed, that term means they've undergone some kind of cleansing process. Washed up means that a player is no longer playing at the level of play he or she is accustomed to. 

Tottenham Hotspur sacked Nuno. I liked Nuno because he was not a bullshitter, but he was not the right man for the job, unfortunately. It sounds like they're in talks with Conte. 

The debacle last night in the Twin Cities makes me question why I ever became a Vikings fan. They lost to a team led by a QB who had only thrown three passes in the NFL. Zimmer better start winning, or he's going to be out of job like Nuno.

Random Notes from a Crank

I don't get some of the dating rituals that are relatively new to me. 

First, there is the dreaded "promposal." This spectre surely is a result of the rampant social media posts. Why does it have to be a promposal? Can't we just go back to, I don't know, asking a person to prom and leaving it at that? Why does this all have to shared? 

Second, perhaps this trend is just happening in my little spot in the universe, but my seventh grade son is "dating" a gal, as much as 7th graders can date. Anyway, a way that they're showing they're dating is that the girl gave my son one of his hair ties that he wears as a bracelet. From my perspective, the hair tie denotes possession, so my son's girlfriend is kind of marking her territory I guess, saying "He's mine."

ESPN has been covering the NFL draft ad nauseam. One player who I think is get not as much attention as he probably should is Jaylen Waddle. With Waddle closest comp being Tyreek Hill, I suspect someone is going to draft Waddle and do quite well for themselves. 

As much as people want to bitch about the pandemic and the glut of Zoom meetings, the next couple of days I will be interviewing people using Zoom while wearing shorts. That's a happy side effect. 

Trevor Noah has a great bit in one of his stand-up routines about how calling someone a "pussy," meaning that the person is weak, is really dumb. If you think about it, vaginas are incredibly powerful and resilient. First, think about all of the heterosexual men who spend their lives chasing pussy. Second, and this is one of Noah's main points, is that a person or persons came out of vaginas, and they still work. That's impressive. 

Noah's point is that if you want to call someone weak, you should call them a penis. 

So that gets me to over five millions penises who did not get their second shots of the Moderna and Pfizer vaccines. What a bunch of dicks. 

Random Notes from a Crank

 There is one clear way to get the Congressional Medal of Freedom: aid and abet the criminal who is the 45th president. 

There's an article on Bleacher Report that Coach Saban is apparently considering Adam Gase and Bill O'Brien, both ex-NFL head coaches, to be the next offensive coordinator of the Crimson Tide. 

Both candidates don't enthuse me. But Saban knows what he's doing I guess. With Sarkisian going to Texas as their new head coach, why not consider Tom Herman? 

The NFL game of Washington vs. Philadelphia was ridiculous. The head coach put in the back-up when the Eagles were within striking distance of winning the game. Jalen Hurts deserves better. 

One league that is doing this social justice thang right is the English Premier League. Before every game the players and coaches take a knee for the league's "no room for racism" campaign. 

Stay Positive: Top NFL Quarterbacks

As is my nature with fantasy football, today I picked up a draft guide from my local CVS in my slapdash preparation for a draft this Saturday. 

I was looking through the rankings and noticed something, particularly about the quarterback position. 

The top 6 rated quarterbacks are all black. 

I remember when there weren't many black quarterbacks in the league if at all. 

The top six are the following:

• Lamar Jackson
• Patrick Mahomet
• Kyler Murray
• Russell Wilson
• Deshaun Watson
• Dak Prescott

The seventh ranked QB is Josh Allen, who is basically a poor man's version of Lamar Jackson. 

Times have changed, folks, for the better. 

Stay Positive: NFL Washington ???

The Washington Post is reporting that DC franchise is finally getting around to changing its name and mascot: "Washington Redskins Launch Review of Controversial Team Name."

So this situation makes me think about possible replacement names for the Redskins:

• Washington Lobbyists (That's who really pulls the shots.)
• Washington Gridlock
• Washington Confederacy of Whores
• Washington Minutemen
• Washington Senators
• Washington Homeless (The nation's capital has a large homeless population.)
• Washington Taxation without Representation (D.C. has a larger population than Wyoming and has neither representatives nor senators.)
• Washington Beauty Roses
• Washington Green (one of the greenest cities in the nation)
• Washington Cherry Blossoms
• Washington Generals (after the Harlem Globetrotters' opponent)

Random Notes from a Crank

I'm not surprised by the report that Jake Fromm texted folks that guns should be expensive and only "elite white people" should have them: "Jake Fromm Apologizes..."

I would imagine the reaction of police officers would be quite different if the groups protesting over George Floyd were packing handguns and rifles like the protesters who went to statehouses over two weeks ago at Moscow Don's egging on. 

Some people think the 2nd Amendment only applies to certain people. 

Regardless, those folks are not a "well-regulated militia," a key phrase in one of the most poorly worded sentences in the English language. The early Republic relied on militias because the founders were wary of large standing armies. Militias were also used to quell slave rebellions. 

As we've seen via social media, how can people still be upset over people taking knees during the national anthem? 

Read "Colin Kaepernick Was Right, and Pro Athletes Won't Stand Down." 

Random Notes from a Crank

News outlets are regularly running stories about Covid-19 deniers who die. One of the more recent ones is about a preacher who believed God can cure anything. He died of Covid-19 after discounting the pandemic and going to Mardi Gras: "A Virginia Preacher Believed 'God Can Heal Anything.' Then He Caught the Coronavirus." 

Thoughts and prayers I guess. 

The draft came and went, and as usual, Matt Miller of the Bleacher Report has "2021 NFL Mock Draft: Matt Miller's Way-Too-Early Predictions." There are a lot of players from Alabama and LSU on that list. 

I just heard on The Dan LeBatard Show with Stugotz that men who are able to grow beards early on are more likely to suffer hair loss. God damn it. 

Random Notes from a Crank

Because I have two fantasy football teams and I am always open to stealing someone else's plays since I run an offense at the JFL level, I've been watching quite a few NFL games in addition to the my regular viewing schedule of watching college football on Saturdays. 

I find it interesting that both the Colts (vs. the Chiefs) and 49ers (vs. the Browns) won convincingly this week by running the ball. And much to my pleasure, San Francisco used a two-back set with a fullback. 

I get that people like watching the passing the game, but I love it when a football team has a great running game. 

That is why is bothers me that Thielen and Diggs of my NFL team, the Vikings, are bitching about how they're not getting a lot of passes thrown their way. Boo hoo. 

Run the damn ball. 

I need that hat. 

Even better is a team that has a great defense. 

My fantasy baseball team, the Schlitzophrenics, won the league again this season. Over the last five seasons I've won the league four times. 

Bask in my greatness. 

Random Notes from a Crank

This Thanksgiving was the first one for me without both my mom and dad. Back when they still lived in their house, they'd always have the same argument. My mom would want my father to cut the turkey right away, and my dad, being a man who knows many things about meat, would always blow her off and say, "The meat has to rest." My mom would stomp off angrily, and after a short while Virg would mosey into the kitchen to cut the bird. 

I've tried and tried, but I just can't seem to like green bean casserole. I like green beans, but the casserole is just so damn bland. There has to be a way to make this concoction better. 

Over the past couple of weeks, I've bought some turkeys cheap from our local grocery store. If one uses the market's "max card," the turkey is $ .39 a pound. I got a couple of turkeys for later use. 

Instead of eating them at the holidays, people need to eat turkey all year round. You read that turkey industry, I"m trying to promote your birds for the whole year? Why don't you throw some sponsorship money my way? Write the check to "cash." 

I read an article in Utne about philosophical therapy, but it originally appeared in the UC Observer. In "Move Over, Freud," the author talks about a trend in therapy in which folks with a strong background in philosophy help others work through important questions and quandaries in life. 

The practice makes a lot of sense to me because I have gotten much more out of reading philosophical works than studying psychology, especially Fred, who has now become an intellectual anachronism in psychology, a guy often used by scholars in the humanities to support lame-ass analyses of this or that. 

Here are some stats from the the November and December versions of "Harper's Index":

• Estimated number of voters purged from Georgia's voter rolls from 2008 to 2012: 750,000
• From 2012 to 2016:  1,500,000
• Percentage change from 2000 to 2017 in US consumer spending on music: +25
• Percentage of music-industry revenue that is received by musicians: 12
• Percentage of US teenagers who "often" find their parents distracted by their phones during conversations: 14
• Who "sometimes" do: 37
• Number of counties in which no local newspaper is available: 176
• In which only one is available: 1,449
• Estimated number of US newspaper jobs lost since the year 2000: 241,000
• Amount of FEMA funding that has been transferred to ICE this year: $9,800,000
• Minimum number of US cities that have announced plans to establish supervised drug consumption sites: 5
• Estimated minimum number of cities that have such sites worldwide: 100
• Number of people who have ever died of an overdose at one of those sites: 0
• Percentage of interviews with professional baseball players that feature a variation of the phrase "one game at a time": 7
• That feature a variation of "a heck of a game": 50

From the stats above, the one that disturbs me most is the purging of the voter rolls in Georgia, which stole the election for Kemp along with minor mismatches between signatures such as Quin Nasty and Quintilian Nasty. 

The lack of local newspapers is also a problem because the fifth estate even in those small towns keep on eye on what's going on locally whether it's the local city council or local sports. 

Bunny Colvin's idea of "Hamsterdam" in whatever season of The Wire that was was right. Supervised sites makes sense. 

I know Andrew Luck is having an outstanding, comeback season this year so far, but I'll offer him a bit of advice for the hirsute among us. He needs to shore up his beard game. I get that he wants to grow a beard. I've grown one since my dad's funeral. However, Luck needs to shave his neck to make his beard look more presentable, more kept. Step up your beard game, Luck.

Random Notes from a Crank

The other day a friend on Facebook shared a listicle about left handers. One of the few surprises of that click bait was that only 10% of the population is left handed. That's astonishing to me. Only 10 flippin' percent. How is that even possible? I know back in the bad old days, people would "turn" lefties into righties for various stupid, inane, and insane reasons. But you'd think so-called progress would catch up and produce more lefties in this world. 

As you can tell, I'm a southpaw. 

It's not surprising the Raiders got approved to move to Las Vegas. Not soon after the news hit, there are various articles featuring a businessman who is providing the Pirate's Booty Sports Brothel. 

I need to start reading Informed Comment by Juan Cole more often. I've now put it on my "Blog Roll." Check out "The Simple Number That Will Defeat Trump's Attempt to Roll Back Obama Energy Policies." 

In the March issue of Harper's, the magazine has an excerpt from Simple Sabotage Field Manual put out in 1944 by the U.S. Office of Strategic Services, which is a manual intended for people living in "enemy states" at the time. What I find darkly humorous about the manual is that many of the recommendations I see happening in organizations -- both public and private, both government and industry -- all the time. Here are some juicy snippets related to to the behavior and actions of Employees, Managers and Supervisors, and Organizations and Conferences (which I quote in full):

• Employees: "When you go to the lavatory spend a longer time there than is necessary." 
• Managers and Supervisors: "To lower morale and production, be pleasant to inefficient workers; give them undeserved promotions."
• Managers and Supervisors: "Hold conferences when there is more critical work to be done." 
• Organizations and Conferences: "Make 'speeches.' Talk at great length, illustrate your 'points' with long anecdotes and accounts of personal experiences. Bring up irrelevant issues as frequently as possible. Haggle over precise wordings of communications. When possible, refer all matters to committee for 'further study and consideration.' Attempt to make the committees as large and bureaucratic as possible." 

Random Notes from a Crank

I spent the weekend on the couch. I got a vasectomy on Friday. That's right. My beautiful sperms can swim really well, but now they can't jump off the diving board anymore. 

So the past few days I've been getting intimate with a frozen bag of corn and a frozen bag of peas and carrots. I hope they don't get jealous. There could be fisticuffs in the freezer.

Coincidentally enough, an article "Block That Sperm!" from the March issue of The Atlantic relates only 13 percent of men have had a vasectomy. That seems awfully low. 

Tiffani Thiessen's cooking show is back with new episodes. That's something I discovered this weekend. 

Although I don't follow the happenings of the NFL too closely, I can get behind Stephen Jackson's faux "Save the Running Back" campaign. #STRB. 

Random Notes from a Crank

Having spent three subsequent days at Aquatica, Discovery Cove, and Sea World this past week, I have some observations and reflections to share:

• I'm done with water parks for a very long while. 
• If you want to see some really horrible tattoos, a water park is the place to go. 
• To hear British accents outside of Great Britain, the place to visit is Discovery Cove.
• For overhearing Spanish, go to Sea World.

After observing people at water parks this summer, I wonder if Chinese or Japanese people get tattoos of aspirational or positively vague terms in English on their bodies, words like "love," "strength," "soldier," "peace," "fire," "harmony," "family," "angel," and "beauty." 

HBO's Hard Knocks started this past week. They're following the Atlanta Falcons, a team that has a couple of former Crimson Tide stars on it: WR Julio Jones and OT Mike Johnson, 

Watching that show sometimes gives me some colorful terms that I might be able to repurpose. When they followed the Jets, I remember Rex Ryan haranguing his players about how they need to play like the "New York @#$%ing Jets" and not like the other NFL "slop dick organizations." 

Just in case the Nasty family needs it, this product is available for football Saturdays.

Random Notes from a Crank

If you're aware of Sherry Turkle's work or know about her through her appearances on various talk shows, you might find "The Eavesdropper" by Megan Garber worthy of a quick read. Turkle is working on a follow-up book after Alone Together: Why We Expect More from Technology and Less from Each Other. The new book is tentatively titled Reclaiming Conversation. As she says at the end of Garber's article, "Everybody's talking. And nobody's talking about anything except what's on the machines." "The Flight from Conversation" is a good read too, one that appears to be a preview of her new book. 

One of the books I'm currently reading is The Art of the Commonplace, which is a collection of essays from Wendell Berry. It'll be good to revisit a bunch of essays I read years ago, some of them probably been a decade or so. 

If you like good defense, the Super Bowl was fun to watch if you were rooting for the Seahawks. The Nasty family backed the Ospreys because Seattle has two former Tide players (James Carpenter and Jesse Williams) on its squad. Also, Mrs. Nasty loves those uniforms. 

As newfangled uniforms go, I'd have to agree with her. But it's hard to beat the college uniforms of Alabama (home and away), Penn State (home), USC (home), LSU, Iowa, Ole Miss, and Michigan (home). 

As for the NFL teams, I've always been fond of the uniforms of the Vikings, Packers, Colts (classic look), and the old-school Jets.  

Random Notes from a Crank

To counter the intellectual jock sniffing I've done this season on Sunday Hangovers and my last post, I'm providing a couple of articles from The Atlantic that take a justly cranky and reasonable view about our sports-obsessed culture. 

First up is "The Case Against High-School Sports" by Amanda Ripley, which points out the outrageous costs and mental energy we put toward high school athletics in American culture. As a lot of people know, football costs a tremendous amount of money, and the author details a school district in Texas that eliminated all of their sports programs and the academic benefits they reaped from such a move. She also questions the reasoning behind the claim that sports motivate students to do well in school. It might help a small percentage, but what about the majority of students? 

Of course, I read this article the day after I went to a local high school basketball game. At least basketball is one of the cheaper sports. 

Next is "How the NFL Fleeces Taxpayers" by Greg Easterbrook. Like churches, the NFL enjoys tax-exempt status. (The tax-free status of churches could be the source of a rant for another day). As the author puts it, "That's right--extremely profitable and one of the most subsidized organizations in American history, the NFL also enjoys tax-exempt status. On paper it is the Nonprofit Football League." 

In a more positive note for those of us who still believe in physical books and magazines, Scientific American (SA) has an article by Ferris Jabr called the "Why the Brain Prefers Paper." The writer culled a good bit of research, but here are some juicy snippets from the article because SA is smart enough to not give away their articles for free unless you go to your public library (or use a database) to read it:

• "Despite all the increasingly user-friendly and popular technology, most studies published since the early 1990s confirm the earlier conclusions: paper still has advantages over screens as a reading medium. Together laboratory experiments, polls and consumer reports indicate that digital devices prevent people from efficiently navigating long texts, which may subtly inhibit reading comprehension. Compared with paper, screens may also drain more of our mental resources while we are reading and make it a little harder to remember what we read when we are done. Whether they realize it or not, people often approach computers and tablets with a state of mind less conducive to learning than the one they bring to paper. And e-readers fail to re-create certain tactile experiences of reading on paper, the absence of which some find unsettling."
• Here's a visual aid that explains how "the physicality of paper explains this discrepancy." 
• For educators, this conclusion merits attention: "When reading on screens, individuals seems less inclined to engage in what psychologists call metacognitive learning regulation--setting goals, rereading difficult sections and checking how much one has understood along the way."  

Random Notes from a Crank

It's come to that time of the year when I'm so desperate for college football that I'm watching a NFL preseason game. I feel so pathetic. 

On Tuesday, the OED Online Word of the Day was "monkey parade." It's a noun, and here's the definition: "An evening promenade of young people, esp. for the purpose of meeting members of the opposite sex." Because I've lived in college towns for good portion of my life ~ Kirksville, MO; Tuscaloosa, AL; and Charleston, IL ~ I recognize these parades. Monkey parades are especially prominent in small towns when college kids travel on foot to a keg parties. I've observed many of them. 

I've been making pickles close to every day since my pickling cucumbers have been producing, which is three weeks or so now. I've been experimenting with different ratios of types of vinegar (hint: go heavy on the cider vinegar and light on the white vinegar) and experimenting with hot peppers in the mix. I did one jar with a serrano pepper and a couple others with jalapenos. Mrs. Nasty tried the serrano-infused pickles the other day. She hung in there, but she said they were pretty hot. I tried them too. They're hot, but serranos impart wicked good flavor. I've also thought about making a jar with three peppers marinating the cucumbers ~ a serrano, a jalapeno, and cayenne. I think I'll call it my "walk into a bar..." recipe. You see, a serrano, a jalapeno, and a cayenne walk into a bar, and... [you fill in the blank]. 

In October, we head up to Iowa to see my parents for their celebration of their 65th wedding anniversary. I hope Mrs. Nasty and I stick around long enough to have a 65th wedding anniversary. 

While I enjoyed The Wolverine movie, reading the comic books series from 1982 was quite a treat. I was somewhat right on what they kept from the comic book for the movie. Regardless, I'm a bit of purist, so I prefer the original comic book storyline, especially because it brings in the rest of the X-Men at the end (for a wedding that goes wrong). With all that said though, the movie reinterprets the Logan/Wolverine character in a thoughtful way. 

After reading the full series of The Northlanders by Brian Wood, I got into his most recent work, The Massive. It's good. I'm looking forward to the second volume.