The Simpson Blog

A few things on the to-do list for the year ahead: Tackle weight loss, again Complete two albums -- first, finish "Mind The Gap", then work on some originals Play at least two open-mic gigs in Halifax Advance two more belt levels in taekwondo Keep my RRSP maxed out Increase my net worth. It's not bad now, but will be even better Finally finish quitting smoking and eating cinnamon buns Get a tattoo commemorating the disposal of all my vices Develop my leadership skills Become a more accomplished cook -- and cook at home more Be more assertive about inviting friends to do things Be less codependent -- own my own stuff and get more comfortable letting others take care of theirs On the small-to-do list that's been sitting for ages: digitize all my media (tapes, videotapes, slides, prints, super-8 film), renovate my web sites, get new glasses, steam clean the carpet, take the cat to the vet, etc.

This post is completely unrelated to anything going on in my life right now ... other than that someone I know mentioned something that sent me off on an interesting search. Coworker and buddy Jason White told me about a slot in the back of his medicine cabinet labelled "Old Razor Blades" (fixed broken link) -- but with no apparent site to recover the old blades. He figures they just go into a cavity in the wall. Strange? Yes. True? Apparently! Askthebuilder.com writes: If you want surprises when it comes to medicine cabinets, wait until you remove one from an old home and see all of the discarded double-edged razor blades that are waiting for you behind the plaster. Those of us who grew up in older homes can still remember the tiny slit in the back of medicine cabinets where razor blades were placed instead of garbage cans. Razor blades in garbage cans can be very dangerous, so medicine cabinet manufacturers of old thought it was a great idea to place the dull bla

To boast about Christmas gifts is decidedly un-Canadian, but I want to extend my thanks to everyone this holiday season for their generous and thoughtful giving by hitting just a few of the highlights. From my parents, a Roomba robot vacuum cleaner . I love vacuuming, but I also love robots , so to have a robot that will chase the kitties around during the day and clean up hair and crumbs will be really, really cool. From Sandra and Byron, a donation-in-name-of to an organization that buys goats for the goatless and hungry -- what a neat idea! And a Buddha Board -- a nifty thing that encourages you to just blurt out your visual creativity on a page by painting with water in a medium that shows up for a while, then fades away. We saw these in Charlottetown last year, and I thought they were way, way cool. Thank you. From Shannon and Chris, an item that could make my effort to quit eating cinammon buns easier or more difficult: body wash/shampoo that smells like cinnamon

Well, phooey on you for believing one of the great medical myths. BMJ (formerly The British Medical Journal) has issued its list of Seven Great Medical Myths. Among them: the idea that you need eight glasses of water a day. This notion was assailed in a BAS post from September 2006: Now, some people go overboard with the water. You've certainly heard the "rule" that you need to drink 8-10 glasses of water a day in order to maintain good health. Well, baloney. Snopes.com, the Urban Legends Reference Pages, debunks that myth . Furthermore, a Dartmouth Medical School study published in the American Journal of Physiology gives medical debunking to the "8x8" dogma -- eight glasses of water at eight ounces each. As reported this week on WebMD : 1. Medical Myth: Drink at least eight glasses of water per day. Reality: There's no evidence that you have to drink that much water to assure adequate fluid intake -- and drinking too much water can be unhea

Amanda stuffs our Christmas bird ... bacon-and-maple-coated turkey that wss deeeeelicious.

Stacks of Christmas joy , originally uploaded by BigAssSuperBlog . I thought we were going to "tone it down" this year. All these presents are dwarfing the tree.

TV karma will burn me harshly for this one day, but for now, I'm chortling. Last night, on The Simpsons, there was a YouTube reference, a la "PICTURE A DAY FOR 39 YEARS": (Fox may end up deleting this video at some point.) At the end of the video, the pretend YouTube offers a link to a video with 63-million hits called "Kitten smokes on toilet". After I watched the show, I checked YouTube and there was no video called "Kitten smokes on toilet". Of course, I felt obliged to provide one. See below. Note there is no toilet, no smoking, and the kitten is Amanda's Kitty. Yeah, it's cheap, but someone was going to do it. Why not me? UPDATE: After drawing 26-hundred hits with the "Kitten smokes on toilet" label -- and 30-some comments from YouTubers pissed off about my sneakery, I've put the video label back to something a little more honest.

Hey, look. It's my teeth. Spooooky, mang. That's the third panoramic x-ray I had done during a visit to one of Halifax's top orthodontists for a consultation on getting a billion-dollar smile. The panoramic x-ray machine had a hard time navigating around my broad, manly, hulking shoulders. That, and I was biting the bite-thingy wrong the first time and moved a little. So, here's the lowdown. Apparently I have a borderline skeletal Class III malocclusion. Moderate overbite, 2mm overjet , deep Curve of Spee , maxillary anterior diastema , excessive upper and lower interdental spacing, incisal misguidance , mandibular retropositioning, mandibular thrusting , anterior bruxing, abraded 1-2, 1-1, 2-1, 2-2, 3-2, 3-1, 4-1, 4-2, mandibular left closing shift, temporomandibular joint dysfunction , mandibular macrognathia , dental asymmetry, missing 1-8, 2-8, 3-8, 4-8, malformed (small) 1-2, 1-1, 2-1, 2-2, 3-2, 3-1, 4-1, 4-2. Yup. That's a mouthful. (Har, har.) The

Hey, groovy gang. I've tossed some old commercials up on to the YouTube. Visit my channel to see 1987 ads for: Water Pik - the one with the Cosby-sweater ventriloquist and the talking dentures The Brick Standard Auto Glass Royal LePage Remax Motts Clamato Cocktail - the guy who wants hot and cold running Clamato (what's with Clamato anyway? Was someone drinking tomato juice one day and thought ... mmm ... good ... but ... needs more clam.) Molson Export - you've spent all night in the cold rain fixing downed power lines. Now you need to get shitfaced. Ex says it all. Granada - wanna buy a TV or VCR? Go to the place famous for RENTING them! That's Granada! (Where's Granada now? Exactly. The last one I remember closed and became Adults Only Video on Yonge Street south of Gerrard.) Coors Gold - they don't make it any more. Burger King Chicken Bundles - they don't make these any more either. Think Chicken McNugget on a bun. Also posted a WW

Jason White just blew my mind by telling me the Channel 7 Eyewitness News theme I grew up with -- WKBW in Buffalo -- had words . He didn't sing them. He posted The Hilltop Singers, "Move Closer To Your World". There's a whole web site about it. (Or was, when I wrote this.) But the music doesn't work. So here it is in MP3 (nope). Jason says this TV station tribute page also has it. If you grew up in Western New York or Southern Ontario, check it out. Maybe you'll be as jaw-droppingly gobsmacked as me. (And if you're a Weinsteinophile, check out the Irv, Rick and Tom page .) It reminds me that some time ago, I asked the folks over at the Big Yellow Board, SOWNY , if anyone knew the name of the song they used to use on Toronto's CityTV for the CityPulse News Test. Turns out it's a Warren Zevon song called Nighttime In The Switching Yard. Here's a video at ArtistDirect . Mind blown again.

Mixer - Behringer Xenyx 1204 Monitors - KRK Rokit 5 active (pair) Backup speakers - Altec Lansing 2.1 Audio interface - M-Audio Audiophile 2496 Backup - Creative Sound Blaster Audigy Platinum Guitar processor - Line 6 PodXT with 3.0 firmware seiko st606 guitar tuner Mics: Shure Beta58a for vocals Shure SM57 for instruments Other dynamic beyerdyamic m422 n(c) Instruments: Fender Standard Fat Strat in sage green Squier P-Bass in blue Yamaha? Acoustic Fender? Acoustic Keyboard/MIDI - Casio CTK 541 Assorted shakers, whistles, harmonica Computer: Stallion Processor Mobo Ram Windows XP Pro SP2 release day ed'n HD / RAID Cd/dvd burner ATI All-in-Wonder 9800 Pro LG widescreen Main software: Adobe Audition for tracking, mixing, effects and mastering FL Studio 6 via ReWire for drums and midi Assorted VST plugins and instruments

I put some food down for Amanda's Kitty, and a few nuggets bounced away. One went under this piece of furniture. Kitty went under the furniture to get it. There, she stayed. We put the plate of food nearby to see if she'd do a variation of one of her typical eating routines -- lying down, reaching out lazily, grabbing a nugget off the plate, and happily crunching it with minimal effort. She did. Lazy kitty.