E is going MIA.

I just wanted to let you all know I will be going offline for several days, Ill see ya'll soon. Be safe.

!! Score !!

so, we went to the Library book sale today and I made a cool score of tune:
Pear Jam; No Code (the issue with a bunch of individual loose pictures), and the single that was included in the Neal Young album
The Queers; A day late and a dollar short
Millencolin; Melancholy tune
The Used; in love and death (not a fan, I bought it based on the cover)
MU330; Chumbs on Parade (also, not a fan, I bought it based on the cover)
L7; hungry for stink
and a compliation album from DrMartens called Shoe Pie
all for less then $20

sweet

Our How to.....

How to Become a Punk Rocker
The real way to become a punk rocker is to not listen to what anyone says about how to be punk. You can't pretend punk. Now that said, here are some tips.

Steps
Don't take trash from anyone, and be an individual.
Listen to some good punk music. Remember Older is better!!! By default, you can always say you liked a band's first album the best!
The age of technology is great for punk. Now you can get music from the Internet instead of from your local record store.
Don't stand out too much. That stuff is out dated and cliché. In fact, you might be mistaken for a goth.
Wear a tee-shirt that makes you stand out (preferably designed by yourself). You could wear a Clash tee-shirt, but if you buy it from Hot Topic, you're contributing to the downfall of the punk movement. Learn to screen print and make it yourself.
Try your hardest to get others involved.
Go to the thrift store and find some old dickies. Do not, DO NOT, buy them from a box store, i.e. Walmart, Kmart, or Target. You can find them at a men's uniform store a lot cheaper. Also, dickies come in four colors: tan, blue, black and gray. If you're wearing red ones, you're trying too hard. If they are too big, you're trying too hard. If it has a cell phone pocket or creases on the front, you're trying too hard.
Fight for what you think is right.
Give other punk rockers the middle finger.
Go to punk rock shows and get into the pit.
Do whatever you want, whenever you want.

So, what do you think, should the name justify the pulling of the product?


DALLAS — Convenience-store operator 7-Eleven Inc. is telling franchises to pull a high-caffeine drink from its shelves because of the product's name: Cocaine.

The company acted after getting complaints from parents of teens, who are a big part of the drink's target audience.

"Our merchandising team believes the product's name promotes an image which we didn't want to be associated with," said Margaret Chabris, a spokeswoman for 7-Eleven.

Cocaine comes in red cans, with the name spelled out in what are meant to resemble lines of white powder.

According to the label, each 8.4-fluid ounce can contains 280 milligrams of caffeine — more jolt than a cup of coffee, a can of Coca-Cola or the leading energy drink, Red Bull — but no cocaine.

The drink is made by Redux Beverages of Las Vegas, which markets it as "The legal alternative."

Hannah Kirby, the company's managing partner, said 7-Eleven stores didn't account for many sales of the drink. It hit shelves in New York and California in August and is now available in more than a half-dozen states, mostly in mom-and-pop convenience and liquor stores.

Call me a flat Lander… Your weekly random post 10/23

Maybe it is just me, but I find it a strange sight to look up a hill and see not only a tunnel on my same steep slope but also another road that has an even more extreem slope atop it. Add houses, more cars, and I think to my self wow I am definitely not in Chicago any more. So in the sprit of Eric’s brain teasers do any of you flat fellow Landers have a guess as to what this piece of cottage cheese / city Colin and I just went a visiting?

recent trip

So, as you know I recently took a trip to my old stomping grounds of SW Fla. I thought it would be fun to sum the whole thing up for you folks on "the blog."
On Saturday morning while I was on the way to work Tiff called to let me know that my Step mom passed away. (I had spoken to my dad a week or so previosly and learned her battle with lung cancer wasn't going well.) I called my Dad as was moved to tears in very short conversation (She did teach me to drive after all).
After calling Tiff back we started making plans to go down for a visit. She made about 99% of the plans, arranging to rent a mini-van (our 92 Caprice was a bad choice, not only because it fuel efficency, but it's maintence level).
We decided to leave Monday after the boys got out of school.
After packing and shopping and map-questing (Yahoo, mapquest and google all had different routes) and all the other pre trip arrangement were attended to, we picked up the boys, and got on the Kennedy, in the rain. It rained pretty much all the way to South Georgia. Fortunatly we picked up a Harry Potter book on tape (Highly recomended) which passed the time well for everyone.
Arriving at Dad's was interesting, there was a small sign on the door saying "No Smoking, Oxygen in use" but when we opened the door, My Step Brother Josh was smoking, on the couch while watching football. Dad, Josh, and my Step-Sister Shelly all smoked constantly. Dad smokes little cigars which doesn't sound all bad untill you realize he inhales the things like a cigarette. It was definatly weird being indoors around smoke again after being a non-smoker for the last 2 years. and considering we were mourning the loss of a woman who had LUNG CANCER for cryin' out loud.
We spent a few days doing a lot of nothing with Dad, and my brother Rick who came down from Ohio. the highlights:
Rick and I went to the tattoo parlor where I got my first ink(Rick got a yin yang). the friend I was with in high schools pic was still in the photo book (She got a escher peeled face thingie)
The boys went to the beach with Rick one day & Tiff another
We drove by our old house, which is for sale for over $150,000 more then we sold it for, only 5 years later.
I got to see the hotel where I used to work. (lot's of changes from the last hurricane)
We all passed the time playing a little pool (dad has a table)
organised some crap (dad will be in a house full of junk and books if he's not carefull)
I aquired a bench grinder (he has crap tons of tools, many extras)
The trip home took 3 hours less then the trip down (rain really slows ya down)
My other brother Scott couldn't make it down, he is starting a new life in Gainsville, after recently (and suddnely) leaving his wife and job in FtMyers, and had a job interview he couldn't miss.
Tiff and I decided we were VERY glad we moved. It made us sad that we were not part of my Dad's life, but our life is healthier then it was, and it's not so damn hot all the time.

What expression is represented below?

+ DEEF


Hint
- DEEF would be the opposite expression

This blog is dead without PJ.

What are the odds of this?

The 30 March 2005 Powerball drawing wasn't the only time a fortune cookie had been successfully used to garner a lottery windfall. A decade earlier, two of the three winners who split a $4 million Lotto Texas jackpot had used numbers suggested to them by a slip of paper found inside a fortune
cookie.

Yet there was still more to the story than its mere cookieness. Those two biscuit-blessed winners were married to one another.

Scotty Turnbull purchased his ticket for the 25 March 1995 drawing in Mission, Texas, at United Drive In, selecting as his numbers the cookie-recommended combination 10, 24, 27, 29, 40, and 46. Later that day, wife Barbara Turnbull bought a batch of tickets on the same drawing at that same shop, with one of the tickets purchased also bearing that same set of digits.

JT has been here!

Just to let you all know, if you takea quick peek back under the random 10/12 photo thread, you will find Mr. "JT" has left a comment. It was a total suprize to me, so go check it out!

Quote-o- the day

In other words, I don't think people ought to be compelled to make the decision which they think is best for their family.
--George w. Bush

Be True to Your School!

SOUTH BEND, Ind. — A judge sentenced a man Tuesday to 160 years in prison for killing his father, stepmother and two stepsisters so he could attend high school prom events in 1989.

St. Joseph Superior Court Judge Roland Chamblee Jr. sentenced Jeffrey Pelley, 34, to four consecutive 40-year sentences in the shotgun slayings of his minister-father and the three others.

Pelley had faced a maximum sentence of 260 years in prison for the killings at the family's home in a parsonage adjacent to the Olive Branch Church of the United Brethren in Lakeville, about 10 miles south of South Bend.

End of an era for the true old school....

End of a Punk-Rock Institution Whose Attitude Won't Die


By JON PARELES
Published: October 16, 2006
Just after 1 a.m. on Monday morning, the last notes of live music rang from the stage of CBGB & OMFUG, the Bowery club where punk-rock invented itself. Patti Smith finished the club's final concert with her ballad "Elegie," growing teary-eyed as she read a list of dead punk-rock musicians and advocates. But just before it, she had worked up a galvanizing crescendo -- from poetry recitation to rock song to guitar-charged incantation -- in a medley of "Horses" and "Gloria," proclaiming with a triumphant rasp, "Jesus died for somebody's sins/But not for CBGB's."

The songs came from her debut album, "Horses," which was released in 1975, when Ms. Smith and CBGB were making each other famous. She was a poet turned rocker, tapping and then redoubling the energy she found in basic three-chord songs. The club -- its initials mean Country Bluegrass Blues and Other Music for Uplifting Gormandizers -- was a hangout in a dire location. But its owner, Hilly Kristal, agreed to book artistically ambitious, high-concept, generally primitivist bands that defied the commercial imperatives of early-1970's rock. It was a neighborhood place in a low-rent neighborhood that happened to house artists and derelicts side by side, inspiring some hard-nosed art. During her set, Ms. Smith described CBGB as, "This place that Hilly so generously offered to us to create new ideas, to fail, to make mistakes, to reach new heights."

In some ways CBGB, which opened in December 1973, ended its life as it had started. It never moved from its initial location, which was originally under a Bowery flophouse, now a homeless shelter. It never changed its floor plan, with a long bar lit by neon beer signs on the way to an uneven floor, a peeling ceiling, a peculiarly angled stage and notorious bathrooms. Through the years, the sound system was improved until its clean roar could make any power chord sound explosive. Mostly, however, CBGB just grew more encrusted: with dust, with band posters stuck on every available surface, with bodily fluids from performers and patrons. Ms. Smith did some casual spitting of her own during her set.

See ya'll soon

So once again I will be absent for a few days.
Unfortunatly my Step Mother lost her fight with lung cancer and I will be going to FtMyers for a few days to spend some time with Dad.
Tiff, Jake, Max and I are pulling a bit of road trip. should be a hoot. I'll let you know how it turns out when we get back.
we are pulling out Monday after School, but I will leave you with this pretty gothic stuff including a body bag shaped bean bag or you can test your 80's hair bad knowledge here (thanks FARK)
See you gang

Nuke concerns continue.....

Fraying of Old Restraints Risks a Second Nuclear Age

By WILLIAM J. BROAD and DAVID E. SANGER
Published: October 15, 2006
The declaration last Monday by North Korea that it had conducted a successful atomic test brought to nine the number of nations believed to have nuclear arms. But atomic officials estimate that as many as 40 more countries have the technical skill, and in some cases the required material, to build a bomb.

U.S. Hits Obstacle in Getting a Vote on North Korea (October 14, 2006) That ability, coupled with new nuclear threats in Asia and the Middle East, risks a second nuclear age, officials and arms control specialists say, in which nations are more likely to abandon the old restraints against atomic weapons.

The spread of nuclear technology is expected to accelerate as nations redouble their reliance on atomic power. That will give more countries the ability to make reactor fuel, or, with the same equipment and a little more effort, bomb fuel — the hardest part of the arms equation.

Signs of activity abound. Hundreds of companies are now prospecting for uranium where dozens did a few years ago. Argentina, Australia and South Africa are drawing up plans to begin enriching uranium, and other countries are considering doing the same. Egypt is reviving its program to develop nuclear power.

Continuing with the alcohol.....

How to Taste Single Malt Scotch
Tasting single malt whisky is becoming increasingly popular all over the world. To be a "single malt" a whisky must be distilled at a single distillery and made entirely from malted barley. To be called "Scotch," the whisky must be from Scotland, the country that produces most of the world's single malt whiskies. A good bottle of single malt costs about three times as much as a good bottle of wine, but it is a much stronger drink (starting at 40% ABV). You may also find that Scotch whisky has an intense taste, with flavors that can be more easily identified than the subtler ones found in wine.
Steps
Buy a bottle of single malt whisky. The chief rule is to drink what you like. Starting at $40 a bottle, you'd better like the taste, not the name. Names like Glenlivet, Glenfiddich and Macallan are famous for a reason, but they come from the same small area in Scotland and therefore taste quite similar. To begin, try some of your friends' favorite whiskies, or go to a whisky bar and ask for recommendations. If these options fail, some good bottles under $40 include Laphroiag 10 Year Old, Balvenie 12 Year Old Double Wood, Glenmorangie 10 Year Old, and Bowmore Legend.
Buy a good glass. The tulip glass (right) allows the rising alcohol to be directed toward the nose and splashes the spirit onto the palate like a martini glass. Most professional tasters believe that tumblers do not focus the alcohol, causing many of the aromas to be lost. A "dram" of whisky is about an ounce, but depending on your experience and how much you want to drink, this amount can be anywhere from half an ounce to two ounces.
Swirl the whisky around in the glass, which causes the molecules to spread out over a larger surface and evaporate, releasing the whisky goodness. Take a whiff. Remember that whisky (40%+) is stronger than wine (11%+). You do not need to be very close to the glass. The collection of aromas is referred to as the "nose."
Add water. Adding water depends on the whisky and the taster, but also on the strength and style of the whisky being consumed. "Cask strength" whiskies require more water. Regular bottles have spring water already added to reduce the alcohol content. However, a little water will always result in slightly different smells and tastes. Purists recommend adding distilled water. Some tasters do not believe in adding in water at all.
Swirl the whisky around in the glass and smell it again. Continue this for a few minutes while the water "marries" with the whisky and releases additional aromas you may not have noticed at first.
Take a sip. Take just enough to coat your mouth and begin to slowly swirl it around your tongue. Feel the consistency of the whisky. Some feel thicker, more oily, or grittier than others. This is referred to as the "palate." Try and coat your tongue so that the whisky touches all of your taste buds.
Taste the whisky. Try to hold still in this position as long as possible to notice all of the different flavor components.
Swallow but do not open your mouth or close your throat. Let in a tiny amount of air through your mouth and breathe through your nose slowly so that the fumes rise up into your sinuses. As the whisky evaporates from your tongue it will release a sequence of different flavors. This is called the "finish." Once the flavors subside, breathe normally.

had to share this link

I came accross this during my most unproductive day of websurfing in recent history and wanted to share.
the best(worst), unoffensive blond joke ever

liabach, the great seal

How to Enjoy the Taste of Beer
For those people that have had beer before but thought it tasted terrible and wonder why people even drink it...perhaps this may help you to get the "acquired taste" that everyone talks about.

Steps
Try a stronger tasting beer, like Heineken or Guinness. If possible, drink it lukewarm. The purpose for this is to be exposed to a strong flavor, most likely one that you will utterly not like.
Take some time off from beer, perhaps a day or two.
Choose a light, crisp-tasting beer such as Coors Light or Bud Light for your next beer. Rolling Rock is also an excellent starting beer. Make sure it's very cold and hasn't been sitting in any warm temperature - if so, it may be skunky and won't taste very good.
If you still find yourself not liking the taste of light beer, continue to drink lighter beers (in normal amounts) until you get used to the taste.
Once you get used to light beer, move onto more flavorful beers. There are many beers out there, all with varying degrees of taste, so be sure to find out which beers are lighter in taste. Get used to the lighter beers first, then move your way up at your own pace.

The 10/12 Random Photo

This will be it for now. I have decided to take a break from the Offmen Archive, is it seems to be mostly full of members whom are not active on this blog, with the exception of Eric, and a few of Pete in his undies. However I do plan on continuing the random photo concept only with out as many of the old archive images.

Final Market, Killdozer

Weather Report

I know I'm opening my self for some grief from Eric, since I gave him some shit when he posted weather reports, but:
It's Snowing
and it's not even halfway through October for the love of all that is good and holy.
global warming my ass

xrt radio, stevie wonder (I think)

Not that this study holds any water to whether it is totally accurate or not, but still, its something to think about.....


BAGHDAD, Oct. 10 — A team of American and Iraqi public health researchers has estimated that 600,000 civilians have died in violence across Iraq since the 2003 American invasion, the highest estimate ever for the toll of the war here.

A New Estimate of Civilian Deaths The figure breaks down to about 15,000 violent deaths a month, a number that is quadruple the one for July given by Iraqi government hospitals and the morgue in Baghdad and published last month in a United Nations report in Iraq. That month was the highest for Iraqi civilian deaths since the American invasion.

But it is an estimate and not a precise count, and researchers acknowledged a margin of error that ranged from 426,369 to 793,663 deaths.

how did we skip this?

Hey, we haven't even touched on this Mark Foley thing.
ya know he's the congressman from FLA who was sending suggestive IM's to 16 year old boys.
your thoughts?

intimate secratary, the recontours

The Significance of the “Dear Leader” Testing His Nuke
J. Peter Pham
October 9, 2006


The announcement from the official Korea Central News Agency was couched in the communist state’s usual blend of solipsistic discourse, hyperbole, and surrealism:

The field of scientific research in the DPRK [Democratic People’s Republic of Korea] successfully conducted an underground nuclear test under secure conditions on October 9, Juche 95 [2006, the North Korean regime operates on its own calendar which dates 1915, the birth year of “Great Leader” Kim Il-Sung as year 1] at a stirring time when all the people of the country are making a great leap forward in the building of a great, prosperous, powerful socialist nation. It has been confirmed that there was no such danger from radioactive emission in the course of the nuclear test, as it was carried out under scientific consideration and careful calculation. The nuclear test was conducted with indigenous wisdom and technology, 100 percent. It marks a historic event as it greatly encouraged and pleased the KPA [Korean People’s Army] and people that have wished to have powerful self-reliant defense capability. It will contribute to defending the peace and stability on the Korean Peninsula and in the area around it.

Nonetheless, the message was clear: the exclusive club of the world’s declared nuclear powers had just been crashed by a dangerous and potentially highly unstable upstart

Crazy, plain and simple.....

PATTAYA, Thailand — A Thai snake charmer kissed 19 highly poisonous king cobras in an attempt to set a world record.

One by one, the cobras were released Saturday onto a stage set up in this Thai beach resort town, as the snake charmer, Khum Chaibuddee, kissed each one and then moved onto the next.

Security was tight, with four additional snake charmers flanking the stage at each corner and a medical team waiting on the sidelines with serum in case one of the snakes snapped, according to a statement from Thailand's Ripley's Believe It or Not Museum in Pattaya, which organized the event.

The museum's manager, Somporn Naksuetrong, said Ripley's planned to submit the attempt to the Guinness Book of World Records to overtake a previous record set in 1999 when an American kissed 11 venomous snakes.

File under trying to fight fire with a bucket of gasoline?

After three sensational/tragic school shootings so far this 2007 school year Wisconsin Representative Frank Lasee proposes teachers to have guns in schools.

Robert VerBruggen blogs at http://robertsrationale.blogspot.com. Writes;

This story makes me proud of my home state. A Wisconsin lawmaker has suggested allowing teachers and principals to carry guns. Given the screenings teachers already go through (a friend of mine was fingerprinted and background-checked before she could teach in New York), and presuming training courses are required, this would prevent more violence than it would enable.

The gun control issue often turns into a logic contest — “criminals break laws anyway, so they’ll break gun laws” vs. “if they couldn’t get guns they couldn’t kill people with them.” Then there are the make-up-a-scenario debates, with “what if someone tries to rob you?” vs. “what if you accidentally shoot your son?”

But the fact of the matter is that the 50 states have tried a whole variety of gun laws, so it’s an empirical issue, not a hypothetical one, whether regulation works. Various scholarly analyses have revealed that, at best, gun control can’t be shown to work and, at worst, disarming law-abiding citizens actually causes more crime.

S- Um does any one else think this is a good idea? Eveidently there is more than I guy out there who does.

Fists of Love, Big Black

THIS scares me.

...More so than most....



Nuclear bomb test 'just a day away'
By Leo Lewis

Neighbours hold urgent talks as North Korea's leader says that blast must not rock sacred peak too much

Preparations to detonate a bomb at a 2,000 metre-deep abandoned coalmine close to the Chinese border have reportedly been completed, enabling North Korea to go ahead with the controversial test as the leaders of Japan and China hold urgent talks at a summit in Beijing.

Kim Jong Il, the North Korean leader who celebrates 19 years as head of his country’s Workers’ Party tomorrow, is reported to have given orders that the test should “not excessively rock” Mount Paetku, a nearby peak considered sacred by many Koreans.

another fun site

This one.... drinking related (really) you may, by now, sence a theme with me, but who knows. I came by this one honestly enough. I was researching a quote that Central 214 (the resturant I'm visiting) has on their drink list, I thought it was wrong, and I was right.
sweet vindication.

nhappy

Decipher this phrase-

NHAPPY

Random Photo 10/05

I see underage drinking, Johns guitar, Jason in his Doc’s before he cooked them in the fire, my self in some half baked drunken philosophy, and lots of mud. I must be getting old because none of this really looks like fun any more. Ahh but it was fun and it seems like just yesterday as well… 1990?

Any one know the Whereabouts’ of Jason? Last I saw him was at the North Avenue Home Depot in Chicago…. Maybe 5 years ago?

STOCKTON, California — President Bush took a swat at his critics Tuesday, bluntly declaring that if Democrats take control of Congress, the nation's stance against terrorism will soften.

He scolded Democrats who voted against his warrantless wiretapping program to monitor the communications of suspected terrorists and legislation to detain, interrogate and question high-value terrorist suspects.

"On each of these programs, the Democrats have said they share our goals. But when it comes time to vote, they consistently oppose giving our personnel the tools they need to protect us," Bush said at a $400,000 breakfast fundraiser for Rep. Richard Pombo, held 60 miles east of the San Francisco Bay area.

"Time and time again, the Democrats want to have it both ways. They talk tough on terror, but when the votes are counted, their softer side comes out," he said.

In the home stretch of campaigning for the Nov. 7 elections, Bush is using his $2.3 million fundraising sprint through Nevada, California, Arizona and Colorado to try portray distinct differences between Democrats and Republicans, especially on waging the war against terror.