Honest Illusion

Yesterday, I as was stepping out of Penn Station on my way to work, I noticed that the woman walking a few steps ahead of me appeared, from the rear at least, rather pretty.  And as we started to walk up 8th Avenue, it seemed that our routes to work overlapped, so I got to follow her, without actual following her.    This reminder me of ...

Merry Christmas. Attending midnight mass last night, (message delayed a bit due to technical difficulties) I was reminded of what is clearly one of the dumbest Christmas traditions practiced by many.   Many (probably most) Christians will display a nativity scene along with their Christmas decorations, and (here's the dumb part) a large ...

For those of you who weren't on my Christmas card list (or whose name fell after the point where I ran out of envelopes), my Christmas card for 2006 is available here (785K PDF).  Download it, print it out (one 8 1/2 x 11 page), fold it into quarters, then open and enjoy the card.

Like most Americans (and many others around the world), I've spent a lot of time the passed few weeks shopping for Christmas presents.  Actually, I didn't spend that much until this week, which was part of the problem, so this week was a panic. Anyway, most of the gifts I was buying were for my many nieces & nephews.  The problem here is ...

English Genius You scored 92% Beginner, 92% Intermediate, 100% Advanced, and 100% Expert! You did so extremely well, even I can't find a word to describe your excellence! You have the uncommon intelligence necessary to understand things that most people don't. You have an extensive vocabulary, and you're not afraid to use it properly! ...

Ok, in this selection we've got politians and Rev Billy. One or the other is not going to forgive me. Music first.  The Church of Stop Shopping Gospel Choir singing ''Not For Sale'' [YouTube:CD9x4IrnJgY]   Now the talking heads.  We start with two from Rep Pascrell. [YouTube:RykiTZ1nWY4] [YouTube:7K8nqh2eCns] Next, we toss in one by Rep ...

I volunteer for the Menendez Campaign.  He came by the this morning   And so was Rep. Pascrell: [YouTube:STAyEkLKYTo] (Update: I finally got the YouTube links working)

OK, now that Rockstar: Supernova has been over for a couple weeks, I guess it's about time for me to review my earlier predictions.  My top four were all in the final five.  Dilana, who I said was the most talented, made it to the last two, so my sense of talent is on the mark, even if I misjudged the vote patterns.  I'm blaming Dilana's ...

I live in NJ, and last year (and half of this year -- but that's another story) I worked in New York State (Manhattan to be precise).  This meant that back in April, in addition to the Federal tax return, I also had to file returns for both NY & NJ.  I used TaxCut (Sooo much better that TurboTax), which has the interesting quirk of only ...

My pirate name is: Dirty James Rackham You're the pirate everyone else wants to throw in the ocean -- not to get rid of you, you understand; just to get rid of the smell. You have the good fortune of having a good name, since Rackham (pronounced RACKem, not rack-ham) is one of the coolest sounding surnames for a pirate. ...