if cats took vacations…
March 27th, 2009
…they might head to a coast.
then again, they might not.
the could go to europe.
but they don’t like hats (save dr. seuss).
maybe they just sleep. see ya wednesday.
rock’n'roll
Archive
Archive for March, 2009
back to gardner
March 24th, 2009
apparently i didn’t offend enough in garnder during the primary elections. they’ve asked me back to host the candidate forum on thursday night where 2 mayoral and 6 council candidates will face off. the hot topics will no doubt be the intermodal facility, the warehouses and whether or not council candidates banding together with mayoral candidates is a good thing. 
i hope someone submits another ‘have you paid your taxes’ question so we can see how the candidates react this time, remembering that someone in the audience, whose vote they theoretically want, submitted the question (see previous post). if only i had been watching ‘lie to me’ back then…i could have picked out the questioner.
rock’n'roll
round 1, done. and i may be too.
March 21st, 2009
first off (let me deflect by saying that), major miles is a whiner. he refuses, until the last minute, to get in on the big kansas city’s morning news ncaa bracket blowout because he’s worried that people like ellen and me, who pick teams by pretty uniforms or the characteristics of their names, will win and make him look like an idiot.
yet after round 1 of the ncaa tournament, who sits alone atop the bracket rankins? maj! and who sits alone in the toilet?
me.
and nobody wants the much coveted b.k.c.m.n.n.c.a.a.b.b. grand prize more than i do! mmmmmmmmm, oreos!
but that looks unlikely as my strategy for picking winners — by counting the number of vowels in the college’s name — appears to be failing miserably. i don’t even wanna talk about it.
so after round 1, it’s maj, followed by gary lezak, gallo, klingler and mark in third, jayme alone in 6th place, ellen (who had wake forest in the finals — oops) and jeff bell in 7th and me dead last (1/2 of my midwest bracket was completely wrong. thanks no dak state!
at least it’s the weekend. i can get up late, eat and forget about it all.
rock’n'roll
the st. patrick’s day excuse
March 18th, 2009
is it really necessary to get so drunk that you stumble to a nice restaurant after a st. p’s day parade, order a mess of food, drink even more, curse like a sailor through your (and every other patron’s) meal and then complain about the price on the check?
is it necessary to get so drunk during and after a parade that the person unlucky enough to be the designated driver has to pull over on the plaza, open the sliding door in the mini van and wait there while you puke your guts up all over the street within view and earshot of the people trying to enjoy dinner at previously alluded-to restaurant?
is it necessary to get so drunk during a st. p’s day celebration that you end up accused of taking a cab home (good call) but then pulling a gun on the cabbie when you don’t have the cash to pay the fare?
dad always says, ‘getting drunk puts you in situations that require real clear thinking.’
rock’n'roll (’n’ don’t puke during dinner ya moron!)
your dhs presents: interview hell!
March 17th, 2009
when we created the old “red button blog,” part of the thinking was that we would be able to talk about stuff that happens when the red button is off…the behind the scenes stuff…inside baseball…y’know? well, we recently had one of those days.
there’s this pr guy for the department of homeland security. he’s coming to town with the fusion conference. i tell him i want the secretary or the director of national intelligence (DNI). he laughs. that’s not unexpected. people laugh at me all the time. so he offers 4 possible interviews. 2 of them don’t interest us. the other two guys work for the DNI and can talk about intel and terror. good stuff.
but the guy keeps pimping the two who make us yawn while we insist on one of the other two guys. what’s the difference to him?
now, i understand that if i don’t do what the guy wants, i can be wire-tapped, followed, have my emails read, credit cards cancelled, house torched, cats waterboarded and that i will likely be shot in the back of the head in a dark alley (ellen says i’m being over-dramatic), but i don’t care. we don’t take interviews for the sake of taking interviews.
things got a little outta hand though. while still trying to convince us to take one of the yawners, he’s yelling at our executive producer jayme (she wanted to contribute to this post, but i didn’t have the time to edit it) because we won’t take his guests.
seriously? does dhs control the airwaves? i thought that was the fcc (and they usually only have an issue with johnny). so poor baboo-the-pr-bear finally breaks out his color-coded threat-level fanny pack slash secure tea-thermos-cell-phone and calls washington to arrange the interview we wanted. and guess what, the guy, john cohen, was quite good and interesting.
so why all the tooth-pulling? at least this guy is the exception. most pr folks who approach us are respectful and good to work with as we try to be when we go after interviews.
the next time this guy calls, i hope he’s offering up the president for an interview. otherwise, we’ll probably let it roll over to voicemail…and then think twice before we listen to the message.
rock’n'roll
airport security? how it has(n’t) changed.
March 9th, 2009
so i’m flying over the weekend out of a missouri airport which will remain unnamed (hey, nice arch!) and a couple of things struck me as odd.
first, when you’re going into the security line and there is NO line (literally nobody in line…the same line you’d expect to find at a hot chocolate stand in the sahara), why is it that southwest has a lady whose only job is to ask you if you have your “a-something rewards card.” when you say “no,” she won’t let you take the simple “L” shaped path to the security line (which by the way has nobody in it), but rather makes you walk the rat-maze to get to security. why is that? how did that motivate me to fly more and actually earn an “a-something rewards card?” sorta like the scene in ‘meet the parents.’ poor ben.
anyway, here was the more exciting news. it’s apparently okay to take bottled water through the security checkpoint again. i forgot that i had a bottle on the outside of my backpack as i put the bag through the xray machine. no alarms. no buzzers. no questions. just pure h2o bliss courtesy of the tsa! post-screening, i was thrilled yet half-expecting security to come up to me before the flight and question me about the bottle of water that i “snuck through security” (read: they didn’t detect during screening).
i must admit i hate buying water for the trip and having to give it up before the security part. it’s like pouring money down the drain, literally. so in these tough economic times i think it’s great that the tsa has decided to help us save $2.69 on that extra bottle of water. reasonable and economical. now that’s government at its best.
of course, on the off chance that this liquid lapse was unintentional, it sure doesn’t make one feel confident in airport security…if indeed a bottle of liquid like that can be used as an effective weapon onboard an airplane. once again, makes you wonder, are we any safer now that we were before terror hit home.
rock’n'roll
making the most of the mortgage mess
March 4th, 2009
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president obama’s mortgage mess makeover is open for business starting today. the plan will reshape mortgages giving relief to some homeowners under water. it will also try to convince lenders to get in there, roll up their sleeves and work with troubled borrowers.
but at the end of the day, how many of us are still sitting around wondering how things got so screwed up.
friday morning, we’re gonna try and get to the bottom of it…even if the housing mess hasn’t found its bottom.
if you or someone you know is in trouble with a mortgage OR if you’re suffering because of foreclosed property in your neighborhood, we’re looking for your insights for our week in review round table on friday morning. we’ll go in-depth to see how we got here, how we can best get out of here and how to really help those caught up in the middle of the crisis. if you, or someone you know would like to contribute to our discussion, please send me an email at ej@kmbz.com and i will get back in touch with you.
rock’n'roll.