Bench-Warming......

Sometimes, ya get E-mails fwd. from friends.....and you say: "Damm, I gots ta check out this shit on snopes...."

And then you look around a bit.....

......and you find that it IS true.

Eewwwww...............

God, I always knew that the Criminal justice System is so twisted and fucked beyond belief......but THIS??

Creepy.....

-E-

Did he REALLY say THAT......??


No, really......seriously......did he actually state that quote on record???

Ladies and Gentlemen, I give you Justice Antonin Scalia, and what he wrote during an opinion on a case that the U.S. Supreme Court ruled on regarding the death penalty:

"The American people have determined that the good to be derived from capital punishment — in deterrence, and perhaps most of all in the meting out of condign justice for horrible crimes — outweighs the risk of error."

"GOOD" to be derived from capital puinishment??

"OUTWEIGHS" the risk of error??

AGAIN.....did he REALLY write that?

If you are an American.....you should be very, VERY afraid.....

I'd really like to see one of HIS orgies....

-E-

Random Hungover Sunday Afternoon Ramblings.....

Quite sad and distressing, actually. I was trying to make this a more lighthearted piece today, and then, something just pissed me off so badly I had to write about it.....

The Ugly Game in The Dutch Oven......

The Dutch get farted on and then blanketed by Portugal. In a rough match where Russian referee Comrade Valentin Ivanov quickly lost both, presence and control, he ended up showing 16 yellow cards and four red cards.

For starters, European football is such a dismal wretched affair to watch compared to the South American version of The Beautiful Game! I mean, during the Argentina/Mexico match, a hard, nasty kick to the cubes would result in the player jumping right up and getting RIGHT BACK AT IT.....whistle or no whistle!!

Shit, in Euro-soccer, a guy takes a veeeerrrry SLIGHT poke to the thigh, and he drops literally just like he's been fucking SHOT DEAD with a 30-06!! The Southern European National sides are the biggest offenders (though British club sides originated this art form)....looking at the USA-Italy and today's Holland-Portugal matches are all the proof of that that one needs!!

Despite Ivanov's obvious bias towards The Netherlands in his officiating, the Portuguese emerged victorious. Still, though, there were a couple of things that really pissed me off....

Initially, I was slightly rooting for The Dutch, hoping to see Holland FINALLY advance beyond the quarterfinals for the first time in, like, 30 years!

THAT all changed when The Oranj broke one of The Codes....

Now, there are literally like about three (MAYBE four) Codes in the world that are NOT to be broken! Full stop. Just NOT to EVER be broken......

All these codes are unwritten...........

An example of one of these three or four codes is The Man Code. Simply put: Any, ANY Ex-girlfriend (by Ex-girlfriend, we mean like they dated for more than a year) of a good male friend IS off limits after the break-up. Period. End of story!

A man who violates The Man Code is usually ostricised by his fellow men and told to walk out alone into the desert and never to return to The Village.

One of the other codes NEVER broken is the Footer Sportsmanship Code. This was broken by the side from The Netherregions today.

The Footer Sportsmanship Code is where, in a soccer match, someone is in clear possession of the ball on a very very good offensive opportunity, somebody gets seriously injured at the other end of the field, a player with the ball sees this and intentionally boots the ball out of bounds and thus the ref blows the play dead.....and the injured player is attended to. THEN, the team taking the re-kick to start play just gently passes it deep to the other team, as sort of a thank you.....

It's just what you do.....that simple!

In I don't know HOW MANY YEARS of watching soccer, I had NEVER seen The Footer Sportsmanship Code violated.....until today.....in a World Cup match, much less!!

A Portuguese player had a great opportunity as he was tearing through the centre of the pitch towards the Holland goal, when the referee was alerted that one of the Portuguese players back in the Portuguese defensive zone was writhing in pain on the ground!!!! So, he blows the whistle, kills a great opportunity for Portugal, and play ceases for about five minutes, and this injured guy is taken out.

Play then resumes with a drop ball. Portugal stands back and lets The Dutch take the ball......

.....now, in these sort of situations, the team with the ball (The Dutch, in this case) will ALWAYS boot it out of bounds to give the other team a throw-in, or boot it to their goalkeeper at the other end of the field, and the other team can start from there! Holland should have just booted it out of bounds!!!

It's just sporting.....and it's just what you do and what has always been done...

Instead, this jerkoff from Holland takes the ball off of the drop-ball situation and tries to go tearing down the field towards the Portuguese goal with it!!!! The Portuguese players are standing around, stunned at this action by the Dutch midfielder, until one of them tried to slide-tackle the ball away and ended up getting booked with a yellow for slide-tackling from behind!!

There were a couple of other uncool things Holland that kinda bugged me! It's just no wonder when, during important international matches with England, the English Hooligans all go over there and kick the hell out of the Dutch fans! Then they smoke black hash later and laff about it all......

The second thing that bothered me was FIFA president Sepp Blatter's comments about the ineptness of the referee. No, he wasn't THAT bad....but the point being that even if he actually WAS that bad, you DON'T publicly embarrass your referees!

Stern (NBA), Bettman (NHL), Selig (Baseball) and whoever is in charge of the NFL this week would NEVER publicly call out a referee!!!!!! Come on, I mean, they actually fine managers, coaches and ANY team official who makes ANY statement to the media about how horseshit the refereeing may have been, so I think for Blatter to make that statement was VERY unprofessional and undermining! ESPECIALLY when Blatter's OWN organisation (FIFA) keeps shouting from the rooftops that in THIS year's World Cup, we will take no shit and the ref's will be there with the cards at the ready!!! TO QUOTE: "Certainly one aspect to [the increase in yellow and red cards] is the fact that referees received before the World Cup very clear instructions on which types of things to clamp down on, [including] reckless foul play, elbowing opponents, wasting time and simulation," FIFA spokesman Andreas Herren said. "Nothing has changed in terms of the laws of the game, they're simply being applied more strictly than they have in the past."

What the hell kind of signal does THAT send??

I've NOW seen it all.....Bass fishing Championships on ESPN where (this is no shit) two of the tournament participants were talking smack to each other!! Coming up next on ESPN2, the world paint-drying finals.....brought to you by Sherwin Williams!!


And finally, yet ANOTHER reason WHY hockey does NOT belong South of the Mason-Dixon Line.....

.....God, I HATE Drought Season (one of Portland's two seasons...the other being drizzle/mist/fog season).....100+ degrees here today. Thank God I live around a rainforest and not in the concrete heat island known as Downtown PDX!

-E-

Just when you think shit can’t possibly get more bizarre……


Turns out that there was a middleman between those gamblin’ Indians, the brokering lobbyist, and the scary Christian Right!

According to a U.S. Senate report, close Bush Confidant Grover Norquist (has ANYBODY in the PAST SEVENTY-FIVE YEARS named their kid “Grover”??) had acted as a conduit between Indians giving cash to Jack Abramoff for lobbying with Ralph Reed, the scary Right-Wing fuckwitt who founded the Christian Coalition (and who actually wrote an article for a college newspaper entitled “Ghandi: Ninny of the 21st Century” - has ANYBODY in the past 75 years used the term “ninny”??? -) receiving that cash.

This was cash that was paid by the tribes to stop the closing down of these casinos that Abramoff and Reed had covertly worked to close down so they could extort more lobbying money from the tribes in order to get some influence to keep them open.

Too scary….just begs the question: DOES George W. Bush have anybody left who he can “distance himself from” whenever another embarrassing scandal breaks out??




This law is going to do WHAT???


Maryland passed a very progressive statute to stem it’s spiraling Medicaid costs: They passed a law that states that employers who have more than 10,000 employees working within the State of Maryland have to either A) - provide affordable health insurance to their employees or B) - pay an amount equal to 8% of their total payroll to the state’s medical program for the poor.

Mega-Lo-Mart (Wal-Mart) is saying that this is a targeted law that affects only them. I say this is bullshit because there are FOUR employers who employ more then 10,000…..yet ONLY Mega-Lo-Mart does not provide affordable health insurance, so the other three employers WOULD NOT be affected in any manner because they provide their employees with affordable healthcare!!

Mega-Lo-Mart is also arguing that “only the federal government may dictate health spending by private companies.” Fine, cool……I agree.

Now, if THAT is true…then maybe the Federal Government and ONLY the Federal Government should pay the tab for Medicaid INSTEAD of pawning off THAT bill to the individual state governments. Can’t have your cake and eat it too!!

Now, the son of U.S. Supreme Court Justice Antonin Scalia is handling the case for the giant retailers (including Mega-Lo-Mart) against the State of Maryland. HMMMMMM……..wonder how THIS ONE is gonna end up when it gets to the U.S. Supreme Court! Like Dick Cheney’s duck hunting trip, though, there is ABSOLUTELY ZERO conflict of interest here, and I doubt Scalia will recuse himself from the panel when it comes time for the U.S Supreme Court to rule on this case! Which is only right, because there IS no conflict of interest.......right.......?


......right?


The biggest “DUH! Ya THINK???” quote from these developments?

"Scalia said Maryland's law was unlikely to do anything but force Wal-Mart to spend more on health care"

Really?? It'll do that?? Now, WHY would Wal-Mart want to agree to something dumb like providing health care for it's workers?

......and now, back to The Beautiful Game......

It’s weird that the Czech Republic (2nd in the World in FIFA rankings) and the United States (5th in the World in FIFA rankings), thee two highest ranked teams in the World Cup’s “Group-Of-Death” (group E) failed to advance to the round-of-16. Ghana (ranked something like 50th or some shit like that) and Italy (12th) advance.

Instead, of advancing to the round-of-16, US and Czech players will go home to advance to the dance-of-the-three-snakes!

HOW do we fix it?

Simple!

STEP ONE:

Can Bruce Arena’s ass, and pray that SoCal resident and German National side WunderManager Jurgen Klinsmann’s American wife talks him into taking the job.

STEP TWO:

Sign Landon Donovan to a twenty-year, iron-clad contract with F.C. Antarctica and revoke his U.S. citizenship.

STEP THREE:

Assign Claudio Reyna as Manager to the aforementioned F.C. Antarctica and pay him a $10,000,000 signing bonus ON THE STIPULATION that he has NO further contact with the United States National side for the next fifty years!

Then we'll take the cup home!!

Our two quotes of the day:

"What the Republicans need is 50 Jack Abramoffs.”

Grover Norquist, to the National Journal, 1995


“You are only furniture suppliers”

Stadium-wide chant of German National side fans as their footer club played Sweden in the elimination round of the World Cup on Saturday

Random Wednesday ramblings of no particular importance.....


Of neckties....

I was running out of my house today (like most days, I literally run because I'm perpetually late for something) off to work when I passed by my closet. Bored yet amused, I decided to grab a necktie. I had always stated for several years that I would never wear a corporate collar and dress like a professional unless I get paid like a professional.

Well, I have breached that XXX dollar amount per year where I did tell myself that, if told to as part of the dress code, I WOULD slap on a tie. BUT, it is NOT part of the dress code in the jurisdiction where I work (come on....Pacific NorthWest???)! But still, I was bored today, so for shits and giggles......I wore one to work today!

Needless to say, quite a few jaws dropped! Women were complimenting me, guys were smiling, nodding their heads.....kinda creepy.

Weird.....came in handy, though. Got a rather hefty amount of respect from an Assistant District Attorney when I drove across town during lunch as she was advising me on the procedure as to how to press charges against an individual, and my boss actually allowed me to come in 90 minutes late on Thursday Morning so I could catch the U.S.-Ghana World Cup match!

Tomorrow, though, I go back to wearing my fatigues, hiking shoes and my hemp shirt!


....and of Union meetings....


This is the first position I have held where I am lucky enough to belong to a legitimate union (well, actually, ANY union). What I mean by "legitimate" is an organising body that actually possesses some literal bargaining and protective power for the workers.

Tonight was my first union meeting. I had no idea what to expect.....






















I mean, I grew up in the Industrial NorthEast! I was expecting an ooooold, large wooden hall called something like "The Loyal Order of the Fraternal Brotherhood of Government Workers Lodge" and they would hold weddings and punk shows there when they weren't conducting union business! A sort of place with fold-up wooden chairs lined up in rows and a dimly-lit, smoke-filled room with a bar at the corner and plenty of ass cleavage of heavyweight middle-aged labourer guys (and women)!

A place where some gruff-looking sort would mumble to the meeting facilitator: "That blankety-blank foreman Mr. Slate is always giving me guff about blah blah blah blah......" and some rail-thin man would stand up in the back of the smoke-filled room and shout: "We don't need to take that bologna!! Let's STRIKE!!!!!" And then 300+ union workers would stand up and cheer wildly and toast their beer glasses and then, suddenly, a movie film crew would show up.....

(this is all in black-and-white, of course!)

Well....no.

This turned out to be in the Parks Bureau garages meeting room, and about 35 people showed up. It was brightly lit, no smoking to be found anywhere, no beer, and they served healthy platters of fruit (come on...this IS the Pacific NorthWest!!)....

....and then a board member bitched about the low turnout!!

Christ on a bike!!!! Make me Grand Poobah or whatever they're called, and I'LL show 'em how to hold a proper union meeting!!! THAT'LL boost attendance!

-E-




P.S. - Watch the match tomorrow (10AM Eastern Time)......support your nation....we really have to win this one!

I mean, if this great game can pause civil wars.....the least you can do for your country is call in sick and plunk your ass down in front of a television set tomorrow morning for this critical footer match!!

Man....you GOTTA hand it to Google......

When you think, quite literally, that they HAVE ALREADY done it all......they keep inventing, innovating, and kicking the rest of the Internet's arse......

A wet dream for us Geographers: New, updated Google Earf!!!

Too cool......I had installed Google Earf about nine months ago when I had seen it at work when I used to work for The City of Portland! Just fell in love with it....then, though, shit was really blocky and raw in lower density areas, like what, by U.S. standards, would be some smaller towns in Europe......shit, I couldn't even see the Rynek Glowny in Krakow!!

Hopefully, the update fixes that!!!!





And now......SPORTS!

Can't believe it's late June and my Rocks are ONLY 2 games out of first place in the National League Western Division!!!!!!!!!!

Damm, so, when I go to see 'em play in a few weeks from now......does this mean that the game might actually MEAN something????

Edmonton lost......again, Stanley Cup does NOT belong in NASCAR/Redneck/Mullet land......but, hell, I give up!!

U.S. has to beat Ghana Thursday (who, oddly enough, stunned the Czechs, 2-nil...these same Czechs gave the American team a clinic on soccer last week three-nil)....and the Italians have to beat The Czechs, and then Jupiter must enter into retrograde and Mercury must enter into Virgo's ninth house within the next week!

Then the U.S. makes it to the round of 16!!!!




Sticking it to the working poor.....



Fascinating piece in the paper in the town I grew up in about legal scams put out on the working poor. Kinda interesting why it's out NOW....since ever since I can remember, there was pretty much nothing BUT working poor in that city......

Now, before the right-wing free-market dipshits go off on me with the usual bullshit like:
"NO, Ernie.....you see, these people have BAD credit! And these places provide a SERVICE exclusively for these types of folks!!!" "Otherwise, where would they get ca$h in an emergency? Or, what about when their washing machine breaks down??? Do you think they're really going to go to Sears and grab one really quick on their Sears Charge Card?????? See, Ernie....SEE??? These places serve a purpose and a niche."

.......I worked in one of these places......I used to manage one of these places....and shit, the stories I can tell you about the higher-level management of this company specifically (I ended up suing them as a former employee and winning in court) and this industry in general......and if anybody with a singular solitary OUNCE of moral right inside them can keep a straight face and sincerely believe it when they say "These rent-to-own and Payday loan stores serve a needed 'service' to some segments of our community"....then I'll have seen it all.

Whilst this is generally a very informative piece and it IS an article that helps serve a purpose, it does a great job of telling you what the actual costs are!

For example, I would go to Teelak Distributing (a electronics distributor on Broadway in Buffalo), pick up a VCR (OK.....so, this is in, like, 1991 dollars) and (wasn't supposed to do this) I'd check out the invoice.

All right........

Now, we (the Rent-To-Own store) would get tagged $189.95 for the VCR. OK.

THEN, somebody would walk into our Rent-To-Own store, and ask what that VCR would be for ca$h outright. We'd tell them "Oh, let me take a look on our computer....they are just updating the new sales this week (when, simply, in reality, we were playing "tetris" on that computer)."

"Ahhh........this week, the computer system says it's on sale for our cash price of $519.95!!!"


THEN, we'd get those coming into the store that are like "Ahh....yes, you know, I need a [TV/Video camera/computer/etc./etc.] for a very short term situation....ooooh, maybe two weeks."

You were trained to scoop 'em out! If they were minority, sort of flashy dressed, etc. then they weren't going to return it in two weeks!!!! They were just going to keep coming back and paying the weekly rental payment. You just nooded your head to them and said "OK, sir, now, let's just fill out the paperwork....."

If the person was white, and dressed like they just walked out of the 'burbs, then this person DID need it for literally two weeks, WAS actually going to bring it back, and this was NOT a ca$h cow!!!! So we'd say: "Ahhhhh, DARN!!!! We JUST rented out our last [TV/Video Camera/computer/etc./ etc.]!!!!! SOOOO sorry, sir!"

"Well, what about that one on the shelf???"

"That's a......aaaaaah......display piece. Yeah, that's it....a display piece....yeah. The guts are all fake....it's not a real product!!"

"Oh....golly!! Feels real heavy for a gutted-out fake dummy piece....."

"Ahhh.......oooooh......uhhhhh, yeah, that's to give the appearance of realism to the customers so that our merchandise doesn't appear flimsy."

"Actually, Sir, I hate recommending our competition, but [Rent-To-Own/Aaron's/Rent-A-Centre/etc./etc] actually specialises in short-term rentals and their stock is a lot larger than ours......"

......and we'd send the dupe to the dupes!

So, then we'd get the ca$h cow$!! The people who's sign the long-term rental agreement, and for that VCR that we paid $169 for, and we'd sell it ca$h outright for $419.95, these unfortunate individuals would sign up for $9.99 a week for 104 weeks!! Thus, the VCR that they could have gotten at K-Mart or Rosa's or wherever for $229.95 ends up costing them $1024.95 grand total after two years!

Cute, eh?

then, they had another emergency....so baby's new pair of shoes (or baby's new doctor visit bill) kicks in, and then they haven't quite got the funds to cover this week's $9.99 VCR payment.

OK....welp: TOUGH SHIT. Give it back to us (as we'd crowd on their front porch in a veeeerrry intimidating manner)......and they literally would give it back to us and that would be that! The single Mom paid 24 weeks rent on that VCR, we come get it, we had collected literally $240.00 worth of rent in the last six months from it, and here we come now to repo it back!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

So, wait, then.......we just got $235.95 for renting that thing for six months!!! We (us at The Rent-To-Own store) paid $189 for that tokoshuko Made-in-Hurry model VCR!!!

Hell.....I'd then toss it to my assistant, tell him to pur fresh battries in the remote, give it a quick clean-up......

...and VOLIA!!! We is NOW renting a USED VCR for, yes, you got it: $9.95 a week......same as a new VCR!!!

"AHHHH......but Ernie, these people you rent to aren't exactly the cream of the crop. You must have lost a lot of stuff thru theft and such that you never did recover!!!!!!!"

Yeah......literally, in three months (before I started getting really morally and ethically sick of working for these skumbags), I pushed 384 items!!!!!!

We lost two VCR's, one stereo set and we had to take another customer to court for a non-returned TV set!

So, that's what, then......a less than two percent loss rate???

Verses what.....a 400%+ markup????

Just fucking sickening.....


The company upper management I worked for was quite derogatory. The store was in a predominately African-American Neighbourhood, and some of the terms the senior-level managers would refer to Black folks as was revolting! The first of the month was referred to as "Mother's Day", which implied that the base of our clients who happened to be on Social Assistance were accused of just squeezing out puppies to get an increase in their Social Services cheque.......and, when we went to go repo something, we'd joke on the ride there "You don't pay : It don't stay!" "Don't gots da dough : Shit's gotta go!"

It was just fucking sick......not one of the more honourable periods in my life.....no, not at all because I took part in any of this behavior (obviously I did not!), but rather because I knew where my weekly paycheque funds were coming from.......



-E-

Few questions this Sunday Morning.....

WHEN the did Superman get commandeered by Organised Religion??



Can the U.S. beat Ghana?? And, WHY can't we have more love between the Bruthas and the Hebrews?




Just wondering.....



-E-

I can't believe I went to work today......











Well......in retrospect.....then again....maybe I can!

I had been tormented all weekend, torn between if I was going in Monday Morning, or was going to come up with a creative excuse like "explosive diarrhea" to "water emergency, none of my housemates are home and I have to wait for a plumber!!!"

This IS the World Cup!! I could be dead by the time The Americans get into another one........And I've not missed watching a U.S. match on TV in the World Cup since 1990!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!


I was fucking livid that they had even discussed the idea of keeping The Government open today!!! Didn't they realise what today is?? The first U.S. match in the World Cup!

I mean, 90% of the civilized world literally shuts down for the World Cup.

Well...that PROVES that the U.S. is a barbaric society!

I could end up missing an amazing upset of a heavily favoured Czech side.....or a crushing loss for our US side! I finally rationalised that, hell, this is a first-round match, and every team gets three games no matter what, and the thing is that if the United States won and ended up advancing, THEN, then I'll blow off work for a later match in a couple weeks.....like a match that really means something! Like "win-or-go-home" round-of-16 or Quarterfinals or something!!

So.........

......I went against the advice of friends and went to work today!

Best move I had ever made!!

Ya gotta love those happy-go-lucky, optimistic pieces.....glad to see this guy has much faith in the resiliency of our lads on the pitch.....




Tea Drinker AND Raging Alkie?? No dice!!!!

Ya know, one can always hope that they find a way to make sure I'm around long enough to become the next Bukowski....but not this time.....


-E-

Ladies and Gentlemen......it's time for The Beautiful Game....

.....Everything else in the world has just been ruled as "meaningless" by the United Nations!!


Do you think the fucking U.S. Superbowl can pause a Civil War???

THIS is THEE only time ever that I go ape-shit and wrap myself in a U.S. flag and become something that even RESEMBLES being patriotic!!!

It's good we're finally catching on! The U.S. is somehow ranked #5 in the World and I went to the Cedar Mill Farmers Market down the street from my house this morning and Lo and Behold: People were talking about the World Cup!!!!!!! "Oh man!! Did you see that Sweden match this morning???"

I hadta ask the guy nicely to keep it down as I was taping it and hadn't watched the match yet!!


In America.......could you literally pictured this happening twenty...hell, even TEN years ago?????

Good.........

.....now I can stop paying attention to hockey!

I wish the U.S. solders would stop bringing their fetishes overseas with them......


....tell me this wasn't a fucking prop???? I mean, this is like if let's say the Iraqi insurgents overwhelm and storm a large US military encampment and they show off to Al-Jazeera that they found sex toys and drugs and pictures of Ayatollah Khomeini in the soldiers personal possessions as they went through the rubble!

Do you really believe this shit they are feeding you?????


Too sad.....too pathetic.....

-E-

So anyways......

As a post-script, somebody told me that they couldn't post! I looked at the settings, and I guess the default setting is to block out all comments from those who aren't members of Blogspot or Blogger or whatever the hell this thing is called.......

....well, I changed the default to now allow anybody to comment.

Happy commenting!

Nanny state.......


Now, this is absurd!

No, I'm not big on Internet Gambling......but to legislate one's stupidity with a law that quite literally cannot possibly be enforced.....well.....well.....it's just very.....uuhhh.......Seattle-esque!!




Only in my house could......


...the firing of a housemate be greeted with overwhelming glee and envy by the other housemates! The sheer happiness for him....the jealousy towards him for being able to go on the dole....ahhh....the world of work! Gotta love it....


And, in two days.....the beautiful game in the ultimate contest.....


That be right friends......Copa Monde.....in Germany begins Friday! And I just looked at the odds......

.....now at work, I was literally drafted into a World Cup pool where I had nooooo idea how, when or where the "random draw" was held!! All I knew is I came in Monday Morning, and there's this sheet with everybody's soccer teams on it on my chair.

"OK.....uhhh.....what is this??"

"Oh Ernie.....it's the random pool draw for the World Cup. T---- is running it, and it gives some of us who don't know anything about soccer a chance. Oh, by the way, you owe five bucks for it!"

"Errrmmm......for what?"

"For the random pool! Your teams are listed on that sheet that was left on your chair!!"

"Squeeze me? WHEN was this draw? WHO drew the team names? WHAT teams did I draw?" Huh?? What???

Shit....this mysterious "Matt M." (best buds with T----, the guy from my work who is running this thing) somehow drew Germany and Brasil......errrmm......OK.....sure......



OK...here are your teams and the odds-to-1 to win the thing!


Brazil
3.75

England
8

Germany
9

Argentina
9.5

Italy
11

France
13

Holland
15

Spain
17

Portugal
26

Czech Republic
34

Sweden
41

Mexico
51

Croatia
67

Ukraine
67

Ivory Coast
81

USA
101

Poland
126

Serbia & Montenegro
126

Switzerland
126

Australia
151

Korea Republic
251

Paraguay
251

Ghana
301

Japan
301

Ecuador
401

Tunisia
401

Angola
751

Costa Rica
751

Iran
751

Togo
751

Saudi Arabia
1001

Trinidad & Tobago
2001


And Ernie drew what two teams, then??

The Czechs? Nope! Argentina?? Yeah, as IF!!! OK, so, you got ONE decent team out of two.......all right, I'm guessing the Italians!

Uhhh.......................no!

No....no.......

I get Trinidad and Winnebago and fucking Togo (wasn't that a cartoon or a bad 80's band or something) in this supposed random draw!

Guess they tend to do things like that to the newer guy in the office to see what they can get away with.......

-E-

IN CASE OF SHUTDOWN......

Hey guys......


An individual whom identifies him/her self as only a "Joe Maahma" has offered to keep fans abreast of this page by E-Mailing her/him if this web site is shut down!!

Mr./Ms. Maahma will then proceed to tell you where the blog will continue, in the event that this blog IS shut down!!!

Ms./Mr. Maahma is at NowFreeSpeech@hotmail.com


Just wanted to let you all know........I DID see Lycos/Tripod tracking my last webpage, but didn't think they'd shut it down for a while (even though Lisa was harassing my mother by telephone telling my mom that she is going to get people to flag the blog and complain to the web host and have it shut down)......but they did shut it down quickly.

Fans of the former 16,740,473rd (*sniff*, *sob*, may it rest in peace) won't be left out in the cold this time!!!


Enjoy!

-Ernie-

Sorry all......


....haven't been around a for a bit......

.....been busy.....

But there are a couple of blogs that are nice:



My buddy Siva's blog rocks!

Viceland is great for a twisted laff


I promise, I'll keep up better in the future! Just been really busy since I've started this blog......now I got some free time....and heck, I had been so busy over the past few weeks that I almost forgot that I even HAD this blog!

-Ernie-