Category Archives: Pedantry

Of Presidents and Booze

A friend of mine recently pointed out that a drinking game has been published in anticipation of tonight’s State of the Union Address by George W. Bush. While I am, as a general policy, in favor of anything that encourages the irresponsible binge drinking of this country’s youth, there are certain qualities that must be borne in mind when creating such a list.

  • The rules must be conducive to a hard-line interpretation of what “1 drink” means. 1 drink is a single ounce of hard liquor or a 12-ounce beer. Wine isn’t for drinking games.
  • With the first guideline in mind, the list of triggers for a drink must be simple enough to keep track of while inebriated. No unnecessarily-nuanced or specific rules should be introduced.
  • The human body is only capable of processing so much alcohol before its toxic effects will prematurely end the drinking game, possibly resulting in a slurred call to the paramedics, followed by a stomach-pumping or funeral. The anticipated total number of drinks should not exceed the limits of human physiology if roughly 3/4 of the rules are scrupulously obeyed. This is why most versions of the Star Wars Drinking Game are totally unacceptable.
  • When compiling a list of rules, a great deal of editorial control is necessary in light of the above. Specifying a rule that can be reasonably expected to cause a drink to be consumed more than once per minute is simply unacceptable.
  • The subject of a rule should be ironic or anthemic in a way that is readily-identifiable by those expected to participate. An excellent example of this would be “Drink any time half of congress gives a standing ovation” or “Drink any time a member of the opposition party is shown conspicuously not applauding.”
  • Multiple-drink rules should be rare. These should be reserved for trigger conditions that are either highly ironic, likely to only happen a single time, or highly unlikely. Examples would include “Drink twice if the president commits sepukku,” “Drink twice if the Vice President chokes a puppy to death,” or “Drink twice if the Presidents mentions that his big Social Security Reform push fell flat on its face,” or “Drink twice if the President mentions Casey Sheehan by name.” Examples of things likely to happen only once would be “Drink twice if the President introduces an Iraq War veteran seated within two seats of the First Lady.”
  • On that subject, the follow should be present: “Drink thrice if the token Iraq War veteran is not clearly of a minority ethnicity or female.”

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Doctor X Revisited

[Doctor X has many creations As mentioned previously, my former roommate is a mad scientist. His work on defying gravity continues with the successful launch of a triangular lifter measuring roughly two feet on each side (Budweiser can present to show scale). Next, I understand he’s going to build a magnetic gun. Keep your heads down, folks!

Apologies for the lack of visibly-arcing electricity in these shots; apparently the assembly process has been improved upon at the expense of our entertainment.

It Rains in December

[Flooded Parking Lot in Napa] Every couple of years here in the the lovely North Bay / Wine Country / Redwood Empire / NorCal we see some actual weather. By actual weather I mean weather that genuinely merits news coverage. The area immediately North of the San Fransisco Bay has a pleasantly-uninteresting climate, with summers being largely rain-free and only creeping above 100° a few days out of the year. We almost never have days that remain below freezing after 11am, snow is almost unheard-of, we’ve never had a tornado or hurricane hit anybody. The only thing that keeps land prices here from allowing only bona-fide billionaires to live here are those pesky fault lines.

Unlike other parts of the country, we don’t really get a “winter” to speak of, instead getting a season that more closely resembles a slightly-chilly springtime elsewhere. Temperatures dip below 60°, our annual 6-month-drought takes a break, and the hills turn a lovely green. That’s a normal winter. This year, things are taking a more interesting turn, seeing day after day of precipitation, much to the dismay of folks that have recently purchased insanely over-priced homes in places like Healdsburg and Napa.

[Levy in Novato Failing]

This tendency is why you almost never hear about us when the national news gives reports. Chicago may be socked-in with snow, hurricanes and tornadoes tear apart the Southeast and Midwest, and everybody’s national weather map has a pretty little rain animation permanently-glued atop the Pacific Northwest, but you almost never hear anything about Northern California. This is why most people don’t know what good internet-based resources we have around:

Paul Grosso’s Weather Page has been steadily providing accurate information from a variety of sources for over 10 years now. It used to be located on Paul’s personal webpage at Sonic.net, but has since graduated to its own domain name and everything. Not the prettiest page in the world, but a great resource. Amongst other things, he provides a great cross-section of North Bay river-gauge graphs.

[Height of the Russian River at the Guerneville Bridge]

Speaking of Sonic.net, they’ve recently made available weather.sonic.net which gives information from right there at their corporate HQ on the West edge of Santa Rosa. In addition to providing your typical temperature and wind information, this provides a handy hour-by-hour look at the rainfall during an interesting week such as this.

[December rainfall per Sonic.net]

Well, here’s to hoping you have a dry place on high ground, and a happy new year, folks!