My Quiet Life

An interesting but deeply flawed article on "Web 2.0", the brand, and its ramifications for our capitalist economy. They provide an anarchist (in theory, though it strikes me as more knee-jerk anti-capitalist) take on the recent phenomenon of wildly-popular community-driven, but corporate-owned websites:

(more...)

Last night I couldn't sleep so I figured I'd try to get my credit score, for the hell of it.

Equifax's response was basically "You have no credit, so you have no score. See ya."

I have no debt. I've never had a credit card. I've never had a long-term car note. Never had a mortgage. I couldn't even verify my identity to one of the credit agencies because they use past credit accounts to verify your identity, and I basically have none. The only one they found find was a Saks credit card with a $100 limit I had when I was 17. Where the fuck am I supposed to find that?

I am, like, totally off the grid, dude. I will probably get a credit card just to build up some semblance of credit, but honestly I sorta like being non-participatory. I am not a fan of America's generally leveraged existence, and it's kinda nice not to be a part of it at the moment. Well, other than the advantage I reap just by being an American.

Some people post pictures of their kids. Well, I've got a cast-iron skillet. Lovingly raised for 8 years on a steady diet of porkfat and beef, it's only had one close call with a dish-soap incident and a few minor rustings. It's had a good life. There's nothing quite like washing it off after use and seeing the gunk slide right off and the water bead up on that beautiful black sheen. It's a work of art.

It's a shame that I never eat corn-bread (girl's gotta watch her figure), because this thing, combined with the vast quantities of bacon grease in my freezer, could be a serious cornbread factory force of nature.

Yes, I have what you may call an unnatural affection for my skillet.

Saturday night, Nick and I went to watch the UFC fights. There were some good ones, but by far the one that stands out was not even a good fight. It was a massacre. This guy, Mirco Cro Cop Filipovic, is perhaps the single most intimidating human being I've ever seen in my entire life.

He stalked Eddie Sanchez the entire fight, never breaking a casual walk. He never broke a sweat. He never changed his facial expression even once, and he utterly destroyed Sanchez. It was hard to watch. He's like a real-life Ivan Drago, complete with the eastern european accent.

Just heard via SistaSmiff that Terry McMillan died on Friday. I didn't really know him beyond meeting him a few times, but my folks did. I saw him play with my dad a number of times in the Bullpen at the Stockyard back in the day. Amazing harmonica player.

Please tell me that Muhsin Muhammed didn't just get booed because his last name is Muhammed. Please tell me there's some other reason.

UPDATE: Booed again when he scored?

UPDATE 2: As made clear in the comments below, they were yelling his nickname, Moose. Phew.