Bird and Mike go bowling

It's almost time for the first bowl games to start - Southern Miss and Middle Tennessee play in the New Orleans Bowl on Sunday - so Bird and Mike wanted to talk about their New Year's plans.

Hi everybody! After Uncle Jam/Daddy sings his concerts we get to watch bowl games. We like the ones with actual name names like Orange Bowl and Sugar Bowl because when our teams are in them it means they did well. We think the Chick-fil-A Bowl that Bird's team is in is especially bad cause Bird doesn't want people to eat other birds.

We saw this thing where sometimes schools lose money even though they have teams go to bowls. This is poopyhead! We think that at least if someone like the San Diego County Credit Union wants to name a bowl after themselves they should at least give enough money for the schools to break even.

Merry Christmas! -Bird and Mike

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James here again. There's actually two legitimate reasons the San Diego County Credit Union has the advertising budget to sponsor a bowl - they are the largest bank-type institution based in San Diego; yet, they face immense competition from, among other places, the largest credit union in the world. I can't give the first person who gives the right answer anything but a pat on the back, but I'm interested in seeing if any readers know the answer without looking it up on Wikipedia...

Messiah Thursday and Friday nights!

I'll be singing with the Symphony Chorus of New Orleans as we and the Louisiana Philharmonic Orchestra present Handel's The Messiah at 7:30 PM on Thursday, 17 December at First Baptist Church New Orleans and the same time the following night at Holy Ghost Church in Hammond.

Tickets for both concerts are still available here and here and start at $15. The concert lasts about 2 1/2 hours including intermission.

At least for the New Orleans concert, I'm in the middle row just about center stage. Can't miss me; I'm just about the only young tall guy with glasses in the whole group. Hope to see you there!

How not to empty a trash can

At the hotel we have a couple of commercial garbage cans that SDT services every morning. At the Tuesday 4AM pickup, SDT puts the trash in the dumpster and puts the bins back on the sidewalk...with the lids open. As you may recall, we were in monsoon phase at that point so, naturally, the 96-gallon kunks filled up with water.

Here's a hint: don't grab the handle a try to tilt it on its wheels to take it to the storm drain. You guessed it - Aspie boy did just that, not realizing the thing was so full that the water immediately rushed out on all sides, soaking my socks and shoes. At least I found anohter hold on the other can and tilted it away from by body.

So, I get to spend the rest of my shift in my bare feet while the socks and shoes dry at the fireplace. Oh well.

Is it ever going to stop?

It seems like we're getting at least 2 inches every other day with no signs of stopping. It reminds me of that great quote from the computer game Civilization:

Rain, Rain, more Rain! Noah predicts. 

The forgotten minority group

When I talk with other people here and someone asks me to descibe myself, I like to (jokingly) point out that I'm in two minority groups here; I'm not a native New Orleanian, and I'm a Methodist. The large Catholic proportion of the population and the influence of the Archdiocese in everyday life make New Orleans unusual if not unique among Southern cities.

I bring this up because this Slate article talks about the increasing religious homogeny among the Supreme Court justices and how this may or may not influence the court's thinking. It would be an interesting exercise over the coming weeks to think about things we take for granted or don't notice down here that are influenced by the area's religious tradition.

Economist stories for the week of 10 December

The Red Cross movement: How much evil can you not see?
There are very few organizations in the world that can truly call themselves completely neutral. The day will come when the IFRC has to give up its neutrality as well.

Public-sector unions: Welcome to the real world
The battle over preservation of pension plans is the holy grail of public sector unions; in recent months this issue held up the long-expected privatization of New Orleans' public transport management.

Softly softly, charming Huckabee
I don't know whether my more progressive friends should be happy or concerned about his future prospects. Comments please!

Better ways to collaborate
Lest people forget, people even had shared Interne discussions before mass email. Anyone remember Usenet?

It's sad when you have to say "Which shooting?"

We had two shootings in town overnight, here and here from WWL-TV. A couple of other news outlets had one story but not the other on the front page, or vice versa. Maybe they were trying to sugarcoat our problem and not give us all the bad news at once?

In any case, now the cab drivers who pick up fares at the hotel are up on edge and I'm going to have to pay for parking next time I go see the LPO. Ugh...