Pop quiz

Has anyone ever attempted to perform psychological evaluations by having subjects select their favorite songs? (And what would this tell us about the investigator?)

See you there

There are things I just can't help, including being an engineer. That means things like riding something at Disney World and looking around for the fire protection sprinkler heads to see how they managed to meet codes without ruining the effect.

Or on a cruise, I'd be the guy who'd want to look around in the engine room and other auxiliaries.

So I guess that means that if I make it to Paris, I'll probably have to take the tour of the sewers.

The ultimate cellphone add-on

The Gun Phone.

Yes, our intrepid guardians at Homeland Security are aware. Cell phone mods are nothing new.

Actually, this device doesn't really function as a cellphone.

Hot stuff

The Midwest is not known for spicy food. I seek it out to an extent, but I found out years ago that there's hot and there's HOT.

And then there's this. Someone has isolated and packaged pure capsaicin, the active ingredient in peppers. The result is *8000* times hotter than Tabasco sauce.

(Yes, they measure this, originally in Scoville units. It's based on how many units of sugar water it took to dilute away the "hotness". It turns out that 1 part per million of capsaicin is about 15 Scoville units)

Why develop this? Well, he has sold the stuff, but only to people who have signed disclaimers. Manufacturing it must be right up there with nerve gas in terms of personnel protection.

My favorite part of the story was why the developer started fooling with hot stuff in the first place. He discovered that the easiest way to get drunks out of his bar at closing time was to give them free chicken wings dipped in a very hot sauce. (Could it be that Buffalo wings were actually invented in NJ?)

It's settled

If we proved anything with this edition of "Dancing with the Stars", it shows that the show's public voters aren't particularly worried about good ballroom dancing when they vote for winners.

And IMO it shows why in most pro-am competition, male amateurs compete with male amateurs only and likewise for the women. Since the roles are different, the two groups are to some extent incommensurable.

I haven't seen any reports on the show's demographics, but they must not be particularly woman-friendly. Even when the first comp went to Kelly Monaco, they decided to run a rematch which John O'Hurley won. And O'Hurley was just George Hamilton less a few years - about 90% presence and 10% dance.

So now we've seen Stacy Keibler tossed from the show, leaving only two men (Drew Lachey and Jerry Rice. Yes, *that* Jerry Rice). Which must be perversely comforting to some who were tossed earlier, because this is the nastiest screwing of the whole exhibition - this makes it clear that the contest was not about skill.

The fact is that JR doesn't belong in the same room with Drew (or Stacy, or Lisa Rinna) when the dancing starts. Hell, *I'm* better than Jerry is (and given that I've probably spent a lot more time working on it, I should be).

Well, they're about to open the envelopes...

What do you know? - Drew won. Maybe there is some justice.

Jerry-rigging "Dancing with the Stars"

Jerry Rice, you're a champ at football. You are not at dancing. So what the hell are you doing on Dancing with the Stars for another week instead of Lisa Rinna?

You're trying hard? Terrific. No doubt that had you put in the same amount of time into dancing that you had put into football, you'd be a phenom. But we don't reward effort, or else "Rudy" from Notre Dame would have been a Pro Bowler too. And if we could pledge performances instead of delivering, maybe Ryan Leaf might have as many Super Bowl rings as you.

Yeah, maybe your fan base will let you win. Wonderful. Hell, it's such a terrific idea, let's settle penalties in football the same way. We'll just have a vote on ESPN to settle them, instead of using professionals.

And the Jerry Rice I remember was too classy to attack the officials. Was I wrong? Or is that panel of people who've forgotten more about dance than either of us will ever know is wrong because they don't agree with you on your performance?

Are you sending some sort of public service message? And what would that be? Work hard and you can do anything you want? Or will you be reinforcing the OJ rule - it's all about popularity, and rules and standards and even laws are for suckers?

Watching yourself after watching, say, fellow competitor Drew Lachey, don't you get a little embarrassed? How much do you have to know about dancing to tell the difference? I'll bet that your little girls can tell.

Given enough time, I'll bet that you'd do even better. But that's not going to happen before the contest ends in a couple of weeks - if the standings show otherwise, it's the kind of ripoff that gave 50's game shows a bad name.

No Jerry, you're not the only one living off the fans. P should have left on week 2 or sooner instead of dissing every dance he claimed he did, and George Hamilton should have been close behind. Then you. The producers wouldn't have been very happy with a show of 5 women and Drew Lachey, but then they'll just have to work on their recruiting.

Hey, for all I know the whole works is fixed based on the ratings. Maybe you're just reading from a script, like washed-up pro football players who become professional wrestlers. If so, how sad. About all sentient beings know that pro wresting is plotted, but this show has been represented as an actual contest.

I guess we'll find out this week. If your legendary ass isn't gone when it's over, you and/or your writers will have made a mockery of the show.

Remember COSCO?

It was 1998 or so, and we had a President who was suspiciously cozy with China. It was then that I heard of a plan involving China Overseas Shipping Company (COSCO) and the port of Long Beach, CA. It was all over various right-wing outlets at the time, such as Michael Reagan's show and WorldNetDaily.

I don't recall the details, but it was hard to believe that anything could be as bad as the lurid descriptions I heard (and at the time I was willing to believe just about anything about then-President Bill Clinton). Most of it had something to do with the fact that COSCO was effectively owned by the Chinese army. But most of all what I do recall is that the right wing outlets were the only sources of the story - I never saw anything about it in the MSM.

Now it's a few years later, and there's another company associated with a foreign nation doing a deal involving our ports. The difference now is that 1) we have a Republican President for the press to sucker punch (nope, no racial profiling here!), and 2) A new Congressional race has some Republicans are seeking ways to distance themselves from President Bush - that's always hot news, and 3) like monkeys flinging their feces, the Dems are following their usual throw-anything-and-see-what-sticks attack strategy, and anytime a Dem raises an accusation it's newsworthy.

Whatever the truth is, there's no question that the Bush Administration looks maladroit here. Sorry, but this doesn't sound like a good time for foreigners - Middle Easterners no less - to have a lot of influence on our ports. It's natural to expect lots of serious honest questions, and to have well-reviewed answers ready for the faxes. (If someone thought that this could slip by just because Clinton got by with murder, well - how naive can you get?)

And we have answers from a number of respectable outlets. Short answer - it's not a big deal.

In particular, note that there was a comment period on this deal, and it has expired. So be sure to ask the loudmouths why it took them so long to start bitching. If Congressmen are reading about this stuff in the paper, what does this tell us about Congress?

OK, I'm satisfied. Next story, please...

Blogging with the stars

You want excitement? Here it is - liveblogging "Dancing with the Stars"! Well, you're getting what you're paying for, anyway.

Well, I'm not quite live. I let Stacy Keibler's first dance (quickstep) pass uncommented. Two weeks running she got perfect scores (3 10's), and this week she fell all the way to 3 9's. IMO that has more to do with the judges being tougher than anything she did wrong - she's not a pro, but she probably could be.

Jerry Rice? I love ya, man, but that wasn't a tango. As one of the judges said, he was Jerry "Springer" - he was bouncing, while tango should look like more of a stalking motion.

And they had a broomstick for a prop - I'm thinking that the real reason for this was to help him with his dance frame. He didn't have it, and that's a shame. Bottom line - this should be his last week unless the rabble forces him back. And now that George Hamilton is justly gone, I don't think Jerry will mind leaving too much.

I can relate to JR a bit. Yes, I am a competitive ballroom dancer (not *very* competitive, but I'm not the worst). But if "What's My Line" were still on TV, nobody would ever guess - I don't have any particular physical or other relevant gifts. I just woke up one morning with a really wild hair and decided to do something unlike anything I had ever done before. And I know just what the man has gone through, only he had to do it in a much shorter period of time. So that man has absolutely nothing to apologize for, and I hope he sticks with it.

Lisa Rinna is doing a pretty good foxtrot right now to the old standard "Fever". I'm guessing that this is her next to last week though - I can't see her beating Stacy or having a 2 girl final. (Incidentally, in real competitions amateur men do not compete directly against amateur women most of the time. That's because the roles are different enough to be largely incommensurable).

Drew Lachey is talking about rumba and the hip action. Believe me, it feels unnatural as can be for a small-town straight Midwesterner like me, and it uses muscles I don't use, so it doesn't take long to get sore from it. It has to be good for the obliques and other ab muscles.

Whoops, he's doing his foxtrot now. They're doing a lot of open choreography, where you're not in contact with your partner. This is probably easier for Drew, with his background in pop dance. Although I was typing for part of the time, I didn't notice any screwups, but one of the judges is picking on him a bit. He'll be OK - I'm guessing a 26 or so.

Back to that hip thing, aka the "Cuban Motion". Actually it's not the hips at all - the motion is all in the knees. If the shoulders are to remain in position as they should, the hips have to move, in a motion that's a little up and down and a little

Oh yeah, the feet. Keep the toes on the floor - the dance gods will smite you hard if you do "heel leads". And keep your toes pointed slightly outward.

Stacy again. A good cha-cha - probably a 27 or so. Whoops, she got 28. Hey, she can have anything she wants...

Back to Jerry. He's still stiff and doesn't have the hip motion down right in his rumba. But if I pick on him, remind me that I have some video of myself...ewww. Sorry bud, but this should be your last week, because anything else is an insult to your competitors. I can't see him getting much better than his last score of 20. He got 21.

Lisa Rinna just did a cha-cha. She looked good. The way the scoring is going this week I'll give her a 26. I could do without all the open choreography and the funny arrangement of "Material Girl", but it works I guess. They got a 27.

Now they're talking to Lisa, and she's concerned that this could be her last week. Not if there's any justice, babe. She's certainly better than Kelly Monaco was, and Kelly won the first edition of the show.

Now Drew Lachey is back at it. He's doing well. He doesn't quite have the hips yet, but he's getting there. I'm guessing a 27. It ought to be enough to keep him in the show. Wow, they gave him a 29, which is enough to tie him with Stacy.

Of course we won't know until tomorrow who lives and who dies. Jerry Rice should be gone, but the audience could foul things up.

Stalinist irony

The History Channel has recently run a program about Joseph Stalin and his incredible Hitler-dwarfing crimes. Among other things, it noted that even in the one area where Hitler was most notorious - for the killing of Jews - Stalin still had him beat.

And it appears that shortly after Stalin got his H-bomb, he was itching for a war with the West. Toward that end he engineered a huge provocation, involving a giant transfer of Soviet Jews to the gulags. Allegedly he told henchmen that if the "imperialists" wanted to fight, there was no more favorable time.

But this purge did not come off fully as planned. The so-called "Doctor's Plot" with its show trials was interrupted by the death of Stalin.

As it happened, Stalin had ordered his staff not to bother him, and they complied fully. So that by the time Stalin had missed a dinner appointment and a senior official dared to enter his chambers, Stalin was found lying on the ground in a puddle of his own urine, unable to speak.

Sounds like a good time to call a doctor, eh? No, his inner circle was in no hurry, and the doctors they did summon eventually appear to have been incompetent.

Another reason to be glad you're not a frog

Above and beyond the diet and complexion issues, it turns out that they used to be used for pregnancy tests.

You heard it here first

Yeah, TV shows are after ratings, and "Dancing with the Stars" will disappear if its ratings aren't good. So maybe it's a small price to pay to have the audience vote, even if they don't like the same things I do.

Even so, I'm guessing that Tia Carrere will be gone this week, instead of the more deserving George Hamilton. Jerry Rice is next to last, but he's better than Hamilton and probably has strong audience support. Whatever happens, surely all three will be gone two weeks from now. Anyway, we'll find out Friday night.

Upcoming dance competitions

Alright, Midwesterners, I'm giving you plenty of warning. Two terrific competitions will occur in the next month and a half, and you'll get a chance to see some of the best dancers around at both of them.

The Indiana Challenge should be going on Feb 23-26 at the Radisson in Merrillville, IN, just southeast of Chicago. Their website seems to be kaput, though. Anyway, last I knew they where going to have Bob Powers and Julia Gorchakova there as feature performers, and those two only monopolized the American Rhythm championships for a decade or so.

Then on March 9-11 there's the St. Louis Star Ball. Past competitors have included Ben and Shalene Archer Ermis, repeat American Smooth champions whom you may have seen on the recent "American Ballroom Challenge" show, and although I don't know their plans I'd be surprised if they didn't make it to nearby St. Louis from their home in Nashville, TN. Other terrific competitors will be there too, putting on a memorable show there as they have for years.

If you do decide to show, dress up or you'll look out of place. And there will be intermissions, so be ready to dance.

For you Easterners, don't miss the Heritage Classic in Asheville, NC around the end of February. Or Westerners can go to Utah for the US National Amateur Dancesport competition on the BYU campus in Provo.

These are just a few of the competitions that happen across the country over the course of a year. No more excuses - come on out!

Musical blegging et al

Remember the old show "Name That Tune"? I'm looking for a way to play it, with search engines as contestants.

Well, it's not the game I'm after, it's the songs. Once in a while I have one I'd like to identify, and you can bet your sweet patootie that someone out there knows it. But how do I find the info?

Imagine recording something, feeding it to Google, and getting a list of songs and artists back. Precise tuning might be able to distinguish between separate takes, or a fuzzier search might find, say, "He's So Fine" and "My Sweet Lord".

Then it could be scary too. Imagine being able to record someone, feeding it into a search engine and having it return a list of names. They're probably working on it now, for the new Chinese Google.

Sometimes you can find songs from the lyrics. There's a commercial, I think for the US Winter Olympic team, that was playing something I hadn'd heard. I could make out "you're gonna fall behind me" and fed it to Google. Sure enough, it pointed me straight to the Donnas, a punkish SF based girl group.

But what to do with instrumentals? Like, say, the song they play on Taco Bell commercials? This might be a step in the right direction, but we're limited by whatever they happen to have in their databases.

Oh yeah, I've gotta know that "ooh baby baby" song they play on the boom box on the Sprint/Nextel commercials. Then just wait for the next status meeting...

Jimmy Carter: wrong then, wrong now

Cataloging the errors of ex-President Jimmy Carter could keep a blogger busy full time for quite a while. Many of these involved energy - apparently he never fully appreciated that it's an essential part of habitat for humanity.

Rod Adams corrects some misinformation about Carter's qualifications with nuclear power here.

But don't stop there - make Rod's blog a regular stop.

Dancing with the gangsters

Disturbing things happening in the world today. Hamas won an election. Iran is rattling sabers and allegedly is in the final stages of developing nuclear weapons. China is dealing with internal disturbances. The genocide goes on in Darfur. And Master P has made a mockery of "Dancing with the Stars".

DWTS is now in its second season. It's a way for B and C list celebrities to get some exposure while competing against each other in rumba, foxtrot, tango, etc. They are judged by a panel of three experienced judges and response from the TV audience - supposedly each is weighted equally in determining standings. Each week the lowest-scoring competitor is voted off.

Each celeb has a professional partner for practice and performance. Most of them seem to take if fairly seriously in terms of effort - after all, the longer they last the more exposure they get. In the latest competition some of them allegedly have spent as much as 130 hours practicing so far, and we're only 4 weeks in.

And then there was Master P. He wound up entering as a last-minute substitution, so it's fair to cut him some slack. He certainly needed it.

Week 1. Two people emerged from the pack as truly sorry - Kenny Mayne from ESPN and P. Mayne got the axe. The judges noted that P could do better with more appropriate shoes. Centimillionaire P noted he was from the 'hood, in New Orleans, he suggested donations for post Katrina cleanup, and by the way he sold his own shoes. Meanwhile Tatum O'Neal got an excellent score. .

Week 2. Ex NBA athlete P put in another pitiful performance. Tatum O'Neal was dumped. Giselle Fernandez put in a fine performance for the 2nd week straight, but in an interview she expressed fear that she had little natural fan base to support her.

Week 3. P did a little better, but still stunk out loud. Giselle Fernandez was dumped. One of the judges said openly that it was time for P to go. Competitor George Hamilton (no dance hero himself) joked about his "'hood". P noted that he had a new release out.

Week 4. P was an utter disgrace, putting on a paso doble which amounted to him flatfootedly following his partner around the floor. The judges reamed him but good, and said that the people at home who were voting to keep him alive weren't doing him any favors. Someone mentioned that to this point P had spent a grand total of 20 hours learning 4 new dances, vs. as many as 130 for others. P suggested that the judges "hated", and worked in a couple more plugs for his enterprises. Would he survive another week?

No, yesterday night they finally dumped him. Given that the judges scored him at 8 and the second lowest (Tia Carrere) was 21, apparently audience support wasn't enough. Either that or it's my favorite case of election fraud.

Ballroom dancing is well established worldwide, with elaborate rules and expectations. You don't have to know them to enjoy it, but you should at least respect them, especially if you're going to compete. Arguably P wasn't even any good at whatever he *was* doing, and that certainly wasn't anything like what he had signed on for.

So why did he last so long? Near as I can tell, he's a good enough guy who got along well with everybody. He was a last minute sub, so he deserved some allowance. His professional partner, Ashly DelGrosso, is very likable herself - she was on the first show too and busted her butt carrying a difficult partner then too, so she probably has some sympathy voting herself.

Was P the worst? He had some competition - Kenny Mayne had better keep his day job. George Hamilton is getting by out of effort and personal popularity and should have been the next to go after Kenny and P. Tatum O'Neal would have lasted longer, and near-anonymous Giselle Fernandez was robbed. Bottom line - there was no reason for P to survive past week 2.

The others? Jerry Rice won't win, but he's clearly putting in some effort. Tia Carrere delivered a baby just before the contest started and isn't back in actress trim yet, but she has worked hard too. Lisa Rinna looks good, has some talent and arguably has the best partner (Louis Van Amstel) there - she might be a dark horse.

But the clear front runners are Drew Lachey and Stacy Keibler. It's tough to handicap them, but I'll go for Ms. Keibler if only because her partner, Tony Dovolani, is much more successful and more experienced than Lachey's. (Lachey's partner is good for sure, but she is still competing in the minor-league Rising Star ranks). And it doesn't hurt Ms. Keibler one bit that she's 100% pure eye candy from head to toe - she's definitely not your father's lady wrestler.

Anyway, by now the riff-raff is gone, so this is as good a time as any to start watching "Dancing with the Stars". Performances are on Thursdays and executions are on Fridays. What are you waiting for?

...He who controls the past controls the future.

George Orwell died half a century before Wikipedia showed up, but he called it right.

Betsy reports on an attempt by a political hack to control the past.

"Like a breath mint for smokestacks"

Another use for algae right here.

Link via Wilson Fu, who knows watermelons when he sees them.

Bottom story of the day

NWA has entered its 5th year of obscurity.

Actually the date was a few days ago, but I've been working under a ridiculous deadline lately and haven't had the time for even minimal blogging. Anyway, I don't know when to quit, so you can count on receiving more of what little you expect to see here.

Sing it, brother!

Oh, just read it.

How does a trumpet work?

The answers are here.