Wednesday, February 11, 2009

The Klingon Kemal Ataturk

To all of you uninitiated, here is a very short explanation of this post. In today’s NY Times Crossword, a clue was “_____ Ataturk, founder of modern Turkey”. The answer was Kemal. Crossword puzzle guru, Rex Parker stated the following in his blog:

“Today, accuracy was nearly compromised when I ended up at my final square: the KEMAL (52D: _____ Ataturk, founder of modern Turkey) / ELY (60A: English cathedral city) crossing. I'm sure I've seen both (particularly the latter) before, but intersecting at a vowel as they do here, they both may as well have been Klingon.”

Well, a little research revealed that general_mustafa_kemal a Kemal Ataturk was indeed a Klingon (see photo at right). This photo is a detail of the one posted on Mr. Parker’s blog. As further evidence, please note for aKOORDyourselves other similarities with a known Klingon, General Koord (oddly enough, pronounced kurd).

Well, Mr. Parker, once again you are correct. At least one of them was speaking Klingon.

QaQ ram 'ej QaQ poHmey

allan

jai guru deva

Monday, February 9, 2009

Here’s to New Friends

As I’ve said before, I have gotten into blogging thanks to the one I follow regularly, Rex Parker Does the NY Times Crossword Puzzle. This past weekend, some of the regular posters to the blog met in Westport CT for a CWP competition.

Since I didn’t have the courage to compete, I didn’t go. But one of the bloggers was kind enough to forward some pictures of the group to me (shout out to chefbea). Rex was a little slow in posting the pictures, as he wanted some commentary on them before he put them up on his blog. I offered to put them up here, but by the time I got them, Rex had posted them.

I’ve decided to post them anyway, so that those involved in the blog will have a place to come to comment their hearts out without breaking Rex’ rules. So without further adieu, I present the Westport 5:

CIMG1918 CIMG1932
NYT Puzzle Editor Will Shortz Beet salad at the restaurant
CIMG1920

Rexites at Mac's house. From left to right : Ulrich, Mac, Karen,
IMSDave, and chefbea in front wearing t-shirt featuring puzzle by IMSDave

CIMG1922 CIMG1934
Beet brownies (a la chefbea)
chefbea enjoying the beet salad

Looks like a splendid time was had by all; wished I was there.

allan

jai guru deva

The Rodriguez Conundrum

It comes as absolutely no shock that Alex Rodriguez’ name has now been linked with steroid use. Does anyone really think that there are any major league baseball players in this day and age that have not used any performance enhancing substances? One would have to be awfully naive to still believe that.

So how will Arod respond to these allegations? Hopefully, he will take a different route than that travelled by Barry Bonds and Roger Clemens. I expect that he will have no choice but to own up to his mistake.

Judging from the trouble that Bonds and Clemens find themselves in, maybe causing them to be denied entrance into the Hall of Fame, Rodriguez will be smart enough to follow in the footsteps of Andy Pettitte. Pettitte , of course came clean, apologized for his poor judgment, and went on with his life.

So Alex, be smart. Just admit it, apologize and try to move on. Sure you’ll get booed a little more; maybe even at home. But it’s your best shot at keeping that door open. And believe me, no one will be booing when you get some clutch hits in October.

allan

jai guru deva

Wednesday, February 4, 2009

The Bishop Richard Williamson II

The New York Times reported today that the Vatican has called for an immediate recanting of the remarks that Bishop Richard Williamson made in an interview last month. (See January 25, 2009 post)

The article states that Bishop Williamson “must absolutely, unequivocally and publicly distance himself from his positions on the Shoah”. The Vatican representative went on to say that the Bishop’s positions were “unknown to the Holy Father at the time he revoked the excommunication.”

Recant? You mean do over? This man made these statements last month!!! Does His Holiness really believe that recanting will mean anything??? Oh, yeah, like “C’mon you zilly Juuuden and Mooslims you know he vas only kidding.” (an attempt to get you to read in a heavy German accent, with some Bela Lugosi intonations).

He is kidding, right? He went ahead and revoked an excommunication based upon the fact that he had rehabilitated the Bishop without verifying that the Bishop was in fact rehabilitated. Now he wants us to believe that he is stepping up; that he is doing the right thing. Are we buying this?

The only thing the Pope can do at this point is to say:Pope Benedict XVI “Oops! I made a mistake. I am reinstating Bishop Williamson’s excommunication.” (No accent or intonations required here.) This of course, would make the Pope look like a fool, but not as big a fool and bigot as he appears now.

A special thanks to Nat for sending the on-line article to me. I missed it in today’s paper. Ok, it wasn’t short.

allan

jai guru deva

Monday, February 2, 2009

Don’t Count Your Chickens…

A Fable (Fables have morals, so stick with it)

A long time ago, there was a farmer who raised, among other things, chickens. Now he had some wonderful chickens. They lived to a ripe old age, farmer01and laid many eggs. Although the farmer did take some of the eggs the imagechickens laid to feed his family, most were hatched, and grew to be happy healthy chickens, which the farmer was able to sell at market for quite a nice profit. This profit helped him pay his monthly rent, and allowed the farmer and his family to live quite a happy life.

Times were so good, that the farmer thought he would be able to buy his land soon, and be rid of his evil landlord. It seemed that the landlord, who was quiteimage old and smelly, was in love with the farmer’s young, beautiful daughter. He hoped that one day, the farmer would not be able to pay his monthly rent, for then he would demand that the farmer allow him to marry the farmer’s daughter or the mean landlord would take back his lands. This seemed very unlikely though, because of the good times all were experiencing.

There soon came a time when economic conditions did get very bad, and in order to pay his landlord, the farmer began selling more of his chickens than was his custom. As times worsened, and taxes kept rising, the farmer had to sell more and more chickens to save his farm, and provide food for his family. Things got so bad that the farmer had very few chickens left, and it seemed that he was going to lose his farm after all.

But as luck had it, the old king of the land, who was quite mean and selfish died. His son began to rule the imagekingdom in a new way. He promised the people that he would make up for his father’s greedy ways, and restore prosperity to all the lands. The farmer, upon hearing of this promise began to rejoice. “We’re saved,” he exalted. “My lands will be saved and we will flourish once again.”

Now the farmer turned his attentions to restoring his stock of chickens. He was quite pleased over the next few weeks. His chickens laid eggs. The eggs hatched, image and the farmer’s income began to grow. Yes all was good, so good that he went to his landlord and offered to buy the lands.

The landlord, although very disappointed that he would not be able to marry the farmer’s daughter, agreed that he would take 200 hundred chickens in exchange for the land. “Why that’s wonderful,” exclaimed the farmer. “I will have the 200 in less that a week.”

Now we all know that things do not always go as planned, and there came to pass the worst chicken blight ever. All imagethe farmer’s chickens were lost. This left the farmer and his family destitute. The landlord got his wish and married the farmer’s daughter.

The moral of the story is: If you are participating in a Super Bowl Box Pool, and have the numbers 0 (AFC) and 4 (NFC), and the NFC team is driving down the field at the end of the first half and about to score a touchdown to make the halftime score 14 to 10 (in favor of the NFC team, and you have visions spending your winnings), but the AFC team intercepts the sure touchdown pass and runs that pass back 100 yards for a touchdown of their own, making the actual halftime score 17 to 7 in favor of the AFC team (and therefore there are no winnings), you should realize that you shouldn’t count your chickens … Or better yet, if there are less than 3 minutes to go in that same game, and the AFC team has the ball (although very deep in their own territory, like at their 1 yard line) and is leading 20 to 14, and on third and ten miraculously gets a first down that will just about allow them to run out the clock (and putting the BIG PRIZE in your pocket allowing you to envision even better ways to spend the money than before), but wait, there’s an offensive holding penalty IN THE ENDZONE, nullifying the first down and resulting in a safety which makes the score 20 to 16 (and thereby ends any chance of winning said pool, thus, for the second time in the same game have the money ripped out of your hands) you realize yet again, that you shouldn’t Count your chickens...

PS:

Remarkably, the landlord turned out to be quite a good and loving husband. He gave the lands to the farmer as a gift to his new in-laws, and even restocked the chickens. He and the farmer’s daughter had many children, and they all lived happily ever after.

And by the way you filthy minded pigs, where did you think I was going with the farmer’s daughter bit?

image

allan

jai guru deve