Rhapsody in Montpelier Vermont

Today we are in Montpelier Vermont, one of the most lefty towns in America. Everywhere we see organic this and natural that, but the place is friendly and our lunch in Rhapsody Natural Foods Cafe included miso soup, tempeh and some great Kashmiri Chai tea. The tea was the best part, made by Honest Tea, of Bethesda, MD. I am keeping my tea label so I can contact them about selling this tea in the GoNOMAD Cafe.

The proprietor of this establishment told us that we were the first people to hook up to their new wireless internet via satellite. But there are more than five other networks that come through in this location already, so actually they did not need to add wireless since it was already here in copious amounts. But like us, they wanted to offer this to their customers. I heartily endorse anyone who brings WiFi to the masses...and mark my words in about two or three years there won't be very many places where you won't be able to get on-line.

Photographer Watches Cyclists Crash

This photo caused a stir...I found in on boingboing.net yesterday. The shooter was given a hard time because instead of warning the passing cyclist, he watched as they plunged into this monster pothole and shot pictures. Doh!

Gillette's in North Brookfield, for the Sink

Today we drove a country back road to North Brookfield to Gillette's restaurant supply. Anne the owner met us and showed us what we needed, a three-bay sink, 15 chairs silicon valley looking maple, a huge undercounter fridge and other things for the cafe. Nick Seamon of the Black Sheep accompanied me.

He told me some interesting restaurant news from Northampton. The Silk Road Cafe is closing up on Main St. and the Moan and Dove is coming in to its place. There is also a new restaurant called ZEN opening up two doors up from Moan n' Dove.

He is advising these guys and wanted to get his client that spot, too late! I am relying on his firm experience to get this cafe up and running with success from day one. Still looking for that perfect early morning employee to come join us in the cafe.

Algerian Music, Dancing and Sex

Last night I enjoyed a movie from Algeria. The film, called Viva Laldjerie, centered on an attractive woman who lives in a neighborhood that is becoming more and more fundamentalist. She has a doctor client/boyfriend whom she spends time with but who won't leave his wife, but the central theme is the contrast between 'decadent' and muslim.

Goucem, the woman, lives with her mother who used to be a great beauty, and still has the moves to prove it. She dances in a lithe and sexy way and the lovely Algerian music sweeps you up as her hips move to the beat. The older woman yearns for her glory days, and hears that a favorite club "the Casablanca" is being converted into a mosque. Quelle horreur! She rallies and turns the place back into a decadant place in which woman can dance to charm men. The men dance with each other and in front of the women, and the city of Algiers looks inviting and green.

I've never met anyone who has been to Algeria, but this film made me want to go and find out more. This north African country is very hard to get a visa for, but looks tempting, and undiscovered.

Moved Up the Street to our New Location

Moving today was exhausting...even though the heavy lifting was mostly done by Lexington Group's men. We are now officially working at our new office at 4A Sugarloaf St. right next to Georgio's restaurant. The cafe will open in a few weeks and today we wrestled with the people from Verizon about how soon we can get our two DSL lines lit up.

Today my daughter Kate called to tell me that WFCR had broadcast the segment about the GoNOMAD Cafe and our wireless scheme. Good to get our brand out there in the morning hour at the station that everybody listens to. well almost.

Tomorrow I'll go with Nick Seamon to Gillette's in Worcester, that is where we can get our restaurant equipment and chairs. The new office isn't huge but it is a big step up from our tiny digs at 14A. I envision moving again next year...but that's a good thing!

Five Long Minutes on the Bus

The woman across the row crawled up to the driver a second time. She crawled back. "Five minutes," she said. "He said five minutes." Kelly and Quang are blogging for GoNOMAD.

"Five minutes could not have passed more slowly. When we finally pulled up next to a gas station in the middle of nowhere, every passenger on the bus lept up. Apparently, we were all cursing our morning coffee.

Empty and feeling refreshingly free, we all gathered back on the bus. The driver revved the engine and pulled back on to the highway. Paved road! It was a paved road! The ride was smooth. I pulled out my book.

But I only got to read for 30 minutes. At 11:45, the paved road fell away and we were left zooming down another dirt road with nothing but flat, flat land to the horizon."

Buying a House with a 90-year Mortgage in Japan

Yesterday's NY Times included a story by Martin Fackler about Japan's devasting real estate bubble. The thought comes to mind--could it happen to US? He profiled a man named Yoshihisa Nakashima who bought a condo 14 years ago for a price of about $400,000. He was convinced it would go up in value, and moved there even though it was far from his job in Toyko.

Today there is no way out, the condo is not worth even half of what he paid, and he's got a $300,000 anchor keeping him there. The article maintains that the lesson is that it is easy to fall into a state of denial about real estate. "During a bubble, people don't believe that prices will fall," said a Japanese professor. "There's something in human nature that makes us unable to learn from history."

One particularly dangerous trend developing here is the interest-only mortgages, which allow homeowners to pay nothing on the principal for a few years. Japan had worse instruments, such as the three-generation loans, with a 90 or 100 year payment schedule, that when prices dropped led to even worse traps, many ending up in bankrupcy.

Japanese bankers say that the US Fed has done a much better job than Japan's central bank, moving nimbly with small rate changes to temper the market. "Avoid big shocks," said the professor, "That is the biggest lesson of Japan's bubble."

Make Mine the Clear Lane

Stephen Brill had a good idea when he published Brill's Content five years ago. Too bad that printed magazines are so hard to keep in the black.

Browsing Poynter.org this Christmas morning, I found what Brill is up to now. It all makes terrific sense:

It's called Verified ID Pass, or "Clear," and it means that you give the government lots of ID and biometric scans of your retinas and fingerprints, then you'll be able to do the airport equivalent of the Fast Lane---the new Clear Lane.

So far there is only a Clear Lane at Orlando Airport, and the fee to get the Clear card is $79 per year. The founders envision opening these security free lanes at all major airports in the months ahead. I wish them well, and wish I had a Clear Card for my next trip...but no way I'm going to Orlando!

Laying Down Arms for the Night

YPRES SALIENT , BELGIUM // WORLD WAR ONE // 1914: There is an infamous story of soldiers fighting in WWI on Christmas Eve. From one side of the battlefield, someone spontaneously started singing "Silent Night" -- in English. From the other side of the conflict, someone responded by singing the same song in German. Before long, both sides were singing in full chorus - together. Putting down their guns, they shook hands with one another, and shared stories and photos of loved ones far away. They celebrated Christmas together. When nightfall came, they retreated to their foxholes. Yet many could no longer fight one another, for they realized they were all the same

Men Tying Ties Around their Necks

ABC News' Marilyn Gardner writes on the 'Net today about ties, something I am happy never to wear.

"After a decade of sartorial rebellion and confusion, neckties and — gasp! — even suits are staging a modest comeback. Some wearers are simply obeying more stringent corporate dress codes. Others are enjoying a more polished look.

In the early 1990s, retail sales of neckties peaked at $1.3 billion, he says. At the height of the casual revolution, sales dropped to about $750 million. This year, Gerald Andersen, executive director of the Men's Dress Furnishings Association estimates that sales will climb to $1.1 billion.

For younger men, wearing ties may be a counter-rebellion. "When your dad is running around in jeans and a T-shirt, you want to look different," Andersen said.

Andersen attributes some of men's growing fashion sophistication to television makeover shows, such as "Queer Eye for the Straight Guy," as well as "The Apprentice," where "the corporate look is part of that milieu."

Ties can even spark a competitive spirit among men at work.

Contemporary ties also give men a way to safely indulge their inner peacock. Along with conservative reds and blues, they can choose bright colors — lavender, indigo, fuchsia — and bold designs. "For a guy, it's just about the only form of creative expression allowed to you," said Dave Platter, a marketing executive in New York.

Google Trucks Help World Takeover Plans

David Utter writes in his Web Pro News column today about Robert Cringely, who thinks he has some news about Google.

He's found a deep dark secret in the Googleplex, our Cringely has. Lurking in places where even Googlers may not tread, the probable answer lies in one of Google's underground parking garages in Mountain View.

There, in a secret area off-limits even to regular GoogleFolk, is a shipping container. But it isn't just any shipping container. This shipping container is a prototype data center. Google hired a pair of very bright industrial designers to figure out how to cram the greatest number of CPUs, the most storage, memory and power support into a 20- or 40-foot box. We're talking about 5000 Opteron processors and 3.5 petabytes of disk storage that can be dropped-off overnight by a tractor-trailer rig.

The idea is to plant one of these puppies anywhere Google owns access to fiber, basically turning the entire Internet into a giant processing and storage grid.

Forget about latency if Google drops one of these off at a peering point near you. High-bandwidth and low cost means Google can deliver streaming video content without a hiccup.

We've noted an increase in broadband adoption this year over past years. Google's datacenters-on-trucks could be the way the company maintains its lead in search advertising over its competitors

Transit Blog Turns Against the Motormen

Mediapost's Shankar Gupta, wrote about the TWU's blog today.

"While blogs can be a boon for business, they also have the potential to backfire on their creators. Just ask the Transit Workers Union in New York City.

The group apparently set up a blog, TWULocal100.blogspot.com, to provide news and information about the transit strike, which started in New York on Tuesday. By midday Thursday, it had garnered 733 comments, according to caches of the comments pages saved by various bloggers. Nearly all were from angry commuters. "To all the transit workers who are on this blog and out in the freezing cold on the first day of winter--I hope that you understand the severity of your unlawful strike," wrote one commenter.
Others heaped invective on the strikers, with some posters advocating that all striking workers be fired, while others resorted to name-calling--"idiots" being one of the tamer insults.

Some transit union members and supporters also wrote in, although their comments were outnumbered by those of annoyed New Yorkers. One commentor, who identified himself as a conductor, upbraided the angry posters, writing: "Boo hoo, you gotta push your baby in 20 degree weather or you going to lose a day's pay....[I]f you were looking at injunctions and fines and lost wages and you strike anyway doesn't that tell you something?"

After the comments began rolling in, the blog's operators shut off the commenting system, but the comments were still available online because other bloggers had created caches of the posts.

The union was probably not expecting to see an organizational blog filled with negative comments, Blackshaw said. "This is another example of where the blogosphere served as an organizing principle on both sides. I think that the union was surprised to the extent that folks opposed to the strike used the platform to organize."

Cheney's iPod Hogs the Plug

Cory Doctorow's Boing Boing.net had this great find today.

Cheney's iPod: first in line of succession for power outlets. From an Associated Press item about travels aboard Air Force Two:

[Cheney] is an iPod fan, and keeping it charged is a priority for his staff. Normally that isn't an issue, even when he's flying around the world. Air Force II is equipped with outlets in each row of seats. But when Dick Cheney was traveling home overnight Wednesday from his diplomatic mission, most of the outlets went on the fritz.

Working passengers began lining up their laptops to share the power from a couple of working outlets — particularly the reporters who urgently needed to prepare their articles to transmit during a quick refueling stop in England.

But when Cheney said his iPod needed to be recharged, it took precedent above all else and dominated one precious outlet for several hours. The vice president's press staff intervened so a reporter could use the outlet for 15 minutes to charge a dead laptop, but then the digital music device was plugged back in. That way, Cheney got his press coverage and his music, too.

Ultrawideband, a New Faster Way to Connect

Wired News reports on Ultrawideband technology, which makes it possible to do things like stream high-definition television signals throughout the home, send video shot on a digital recorder live across the internet, and even connect a digital music player to a car's stereo system -- all with a wireless connection.

Dating back to the 1960s, ultrawideband was once a classified military technology whose earliest applications weren't so much in communications as in tracking stealth aircraft and the like, said Bruce Watkins, chief executive of Pulselink, a San Diego start-up focusing on the platform.
Industry experts and analysts see ultrawideband complementing both Wi-Fi, which now transmits data downstream at up to 54 megabits per second, and ultimately WiMax, a high-speed wireless technology in the early stages of development that works over much greater distances.

"There is an effort underway to standardize ultrawideband," Mathias said. "And assuming that happens, we expect the market to be very big."

Aesthetically conscious consumers would appreciate the high-speed wireless streaming of HDTV signals through the home -- meaning, for example, no cables snaking up to the wall-mounted plasma TV.

At the same time, he said, the rapid transmission rate of Ultrawideband could even allow consumers to, in real time, broadcast DVD-quality video from a camera to friends and family over the Internet. "They can watch the video while I'm filming it," Watkins said.

How to Talk to Your 20-Something Employees

Random Access vs. Linear Thinking: From Twitchspeed.

"The under-30 generation is the first to experience hypertext and "clicking around," in children's computer applications, in CD-ROMs, and on the Web. This new information structure has increased their awareness and ability to make connections, has freed them from the constraint of a single path of thought, and is generally an extremely positive development. At the same time, it can be argued--with some justification--that unbridled hyperlinking may make it more difficult for these workers to follow a linear train of thought and to do some types of deep or logical thinking. "Why should I read something from beginning to end, or follow someone else's logic, when I can just 'explore the links' and create my own?"

While following one's own path often leads to interesting results, understanding someone else's logic is also very important. A difficult challenge is how to create experiences that allow people to link anywhere and experience things in any order yet still communicate sequential ideas and logical thinking.

One approach is to set up new information-delivery systems, such as corporate intranets, that let workers break out of the traditional boxes in which corporate information has been stored, and then to create tools to link this information to systems that provide logical and decision-making structure.

The U.S. intelligence and military communities recently created Intelink, an intranet-based system in which information becomes universally available as quickly as it gets created, allowing users at all levels the freedom to create and explore random paths that lead to new ideas.

The linking and browsing structures of the Internet and intranets have many positive benefits, and managers of Nintendo-generation employees should encourage, rather than discourage, their creation and use. Managers should also be exploring nonlinear electronic alternatives to today's reports, manuals, lectures, and lengthy narrational videos."

Iranians Want Rock and Roll Too!

Ali Akbar Dareini writes for the AP today about how Iran is laughing at their new president's decree to ban Western Music. "This president speaks as if he is living in the Stone Age...this man has to understand that he can't tell the people what to listen to and what not to listen to," said Mohammed Reza Hoseinpour, who was browsing a Tehran music shop.

Mahmoud Ahmadinejad became famous last month when he declared the Holocaust a hoax, and declared that Germany and Europe should create a new country there for all Israeli Jews.

The Tehran resident continued, as if he and the whole country were just plain getting sick of all of these decrees. "Clerics and officials speak about imposing restrictions every other day. I don't think it's going to be enforced. This man was buying an Eric Clapton tape.

Publicity is Always Good!

The Christmas season is always the most busy and rushed time of the year. But in all of this excitement, some of us thrive; we like it busy, busy, busy with all sorts of stuff coming at you at once. Well I do anyway.

This morning Tom Vannah from the Valley Advocate phoned to request another story of ours to use in a new publication that will debut in February. It is called Preview MA, and Kent St. John's recent story about Croatia will be a part of the inaugural issue. After being told no by the Gazette and reading between the [email] lines, I have decided to forget about trying to please that old ragged daily, and instead, embrace the youth and vigor of the Advocate. So no more tech stories for free to the Gazette.

Then Charlene Scott from WFCR public radio called, she wanted some quotes about our new cafe for next week's news broadcasts. While I tried like hell not to talk too much about our nascent wireless plans, I did convey our enthusiasm for South Deerfield, and why we're bringing a cool new cafe to this sleepy burg. I also told her that we'd be offering classes in computer skills, and that we'd have very good coffee.

The Tricked out Ads Rock the Best!

More from Mediaweek.

Magazine sales executives, described in this piece as a supremely jaded group, have been wowed by the kinds of ad pieces made possible by Americhip, a California company that produces the underlying technology in all those multimedia ads so popular these days. Americhip is the largest of the companies producing the latest generation of bells-and-whistle ads. Among the more memorable pieces, according to this Mediaweek story: An Aquafina advertisement in which bubble wrap was used to simulate the sound of carbonation. That one ran in in People magazine. Another winner: An ad for The WB's drama "Supernatural" that featured a clip from a Dave Matthews song while car headlights flashed. The ad ran in both Rolling Stone and Us Weekly. "When a marketing piece can interact with more than just the visual sensor of the consumer, it resonates much more strongly through audio, motion, and lights," says Americhip President Kevin Clegg.

Are Ads Dead?

From the LA Times today.

The Advertising Model Is Dying: Los Angeles Times columnist Joel Stein has put his comic touch to the topic of advertising, which he posits is no longer a viable enterprise. How *can* it be? When HBO, which books no ads, is the most profitable network, something has gone kerplooey. When DVRs make it possible to skip TV commercials altogether, what's the point of advertising on the medium? The networks, Stein notes, are busy making deals to deliver ad-free programming to various portable video devices. Little suprise, then, that the "advertising model is dying," according to writer Stein. "At this rate, we'll soon have to directly pay the real cost for most of our high-quality media." It's a curious POV, but that's Stein's style, to be both provocative and entertaining. Here, he hasn't made a convincing case, but at least he poses a few meaningful questions.

Dentistry in Faraway Places

This morning I had a root canal. It only hurt when I paid. But while the doctor was getting ready, he told me he traveled to South America and Africa helping poor people by fixing their teeth. In the Latin countries, he said he had no problem using sign language to communicate with his patients. They stood in long long lines waiting patiently for him and his team to extract teeth in large numbers.

But when he went to Africa last summer, the sign language did not work. No one understood his gestures to open your mouth, or rinse, and he needed a translator all of the time. They put a dental dam on my mouth, so wasn't able to comment or ask him anything more about his traveling dentistry. Later his assistant told him that she wanted to get a Rotweiler for her home, and how her little daughter would love it. I shuddered...but I couldn't pipe in 'cause the dam covered my mouth.

Site of the Scene in the Making

Republican Views of Our New Cafe

Denise Schwartz stopped by last week when the Gazette was interviewing us for their story about the cafe. Below is part of what the Sunday Republican just published about our plans.

"DEERFIELD - Sandwiched between the pickle company, the insurance agency, the family restaurant and the filling station that has operated since 1912, Max Hartshorne found the perfect spot for an Internet cafe in the village of South Deerfield.

GoNOMAD Cafe is scheduled to open in mid-January and in doing so will bring this town of 5,000 into a wireless world.

Hartshorne's move of his Internet travel business, GoNOMAD, from a few doors down to the new space at 4A Sugarloaf St. will give latte drinkers a better view of the little Town Common as they check e-mail or read Hartshorne's Web site's articles about traveling to destinations such as Croatia and "the two Koreas."

Scone-munching customers will enjoy a first half-hour of Internet access free from the computer-topped counters Hartshorne plans to build in the space's bay windows and front rooms.

"But it's not free forever," he said."

The Coffee Conundrum

Coffee, Coffee, how I love thee! Today we met and tasted coffees from two different vendors, with two different ways and mannerisms. The first was here at 10 am, and he brought a thermos of his freshest brew, and a few bags of his product to leave behind. He was young, and smiled, and explained a scientific process that reasoned his product would taste the best, compared with the other brands. His cappuccino machine price didn't include the 2nd grinder you need for the brew, nor did he mention it. He offered to install the coffee machines at no cost...hey a free plumber!

Then later today, an older owner of a more established coffee company came to see us. He had an embroidered company logo sweatshirt. He said no way, he wouldn't install any coffeemakers for free. He had a higher price for the cappuccino machine but told me up front I'd need the $200 2nd grinder. But his bean price was .80 less. And his name recognition is higher.

Both of these folks will make excellent business partners...one is cheaper for the long haul and the second offers a quick savings and a charming eagerness to have our business. Who would you choose?

Mrs Basil Rathbone's News about Ole Blue Eyes

Reading a book by Maureen Orth, a Vanity Fair Reporter, called "The Importance of Being Famous," I came across this chapter on Woody Allen and Mia Farrow.

"There was nothing fragile about Mia," her mother says. And nothing remotely conventional. By the time she was eighteen, she was a porcelain beauty eating butterflies at the Saint Regis Hotel with her dear friend Salvador Dali. At nineteen, as a budding flower child and ingenue star of the most popular prime-time soap of the mid 1960s, Peyton Place, she made sure she caught the eye of 49-year-old Frank Sinatra on the Fox lot one day and promptly flew on his jet to Palm Springs for a weekend. About a year later, her mother got a frantic phone call from one of her neighbors in New York: Mrs Basil Rathbone. "She said, 'Something terrible has happened to Mia.' I said, recalls [Maureen] O'Sullivan. "Tell me what. Is she dead?" 'No, she's married to Frank Sinatra.' "Oh, I said, 'is that all?'

The marriage started falling apart when Mia landed the starring role in Rosemary's Baby, made the hot new director Roman Polanski. When they divorced in 1968, Mia astounded Sinatra by not asking for a penny of alimony."

Will the Worm Turn on Google?

William Powers writes about the media's waning affection for Google in National Journal today.
Who's next? I think the worm is about to turn on Google. The company's ascent has been too rapid, its successes too extravagant. As I wrote this sentence a few days ago, Google's stock price was $416, up more than 300 percent since the company went public a mere 16 months ago.

Regular people look at that run-up and say: "Nice work, Google, you must be doing something right." Media people look at the same numbers and hear a little voice: Somebody's got to stop this.

Journalists have been making savage love to Google for several years now, churning out an astonishing succession of idolatrous stories about the two young men who founded the company, Sergey Brin and Larry Page, and the blinding brilliance of everything that bears the name Google.

Rich, brilliant, and modest, to boot. A story in the House & Home section of The New York Times once referred to Brin and Page as "sexy Silicon Valley billionaires." Seldom are old-line media outlets so out there with their libidos. But billionaires are special, and the Google billionaires were the most special of all.

While technology blogs have been full of anti-Google sentiments for a long time, the mainstreamers are now joining in. A few weeks ago Boston Globe technology writer Hiawatha Bray opened a piece with the question, "Do you hate Google yet?" Reminding his readers that once upon a time Microsoft was the heroic upstart, Bray then asked, "Is it Google's turn?"

It's kind of amazing it took this long for journalists to start turning on Google. After all, the company has its own news operation, one of those information-wants-to-be-free deals that is eating the old media's lunch. Why help them?

Plastic Lennon Speaks Just Like John

John Lennon: Yoko's Cash-In Continues, reports Roger Freidman on Fox News today.

"All right, this is for hard even for yours truly to believe, but here goes. It looks as if Yoko Ono has licensed a John Lennon action figure that will be sold, I don't know, in stores of some kind. Parts of it may be referred to as the Plastic Lennon Hand (get it, Plastic Ono Band?)

Ono is clearly out to prove that there's nothing you can sell that can't be sold.

But there's no limit to bad taste, and here we go again. You can actually see this thing at this link.National Entertainment Collectibles Association is the company with the license, and they've got a picture of the 18-inch plastic Lennon. They say it will talk, speaking "John Lennon" phrases. They also say it will be known as "The New York Years" Lennon.

NECA says this is the first ever licensed Lennon figure ever. That's quite a distinction. There is a line of "Yellow Submarine" pose-able figures, but those are of Lennon and the other Beatles in character from the animated film. This is actually one of Lennon, with all profits going to Ono.

Kelsey Moves On, Candidates Appear

Kelsey Flynn is leaving the River! So here is today's entry on her blog.

"Please Hold Your Applause Until the End -- Today was my last day on the River Morning Show on my own. All next week I'll be accompanied by one of the five W-R-S-Idol semi-finalists. May I have the envelope, please? The five semi-finalists for the W-R-S-Idol spot are:

Monday: Izzy Dunnington of Athol. British. Realtor. Fancy.

Tuesday: Tao Jones of Easthampton. Musician. Spiritual Advisor. Kind of licensed in Reiki. Fascinating.

Wednesday: Joanie Crawford of Conway. B&B owner. Former folk singer. Native daughter of New Yawk. Fresh.

Thursday: Zip Cody of Northampton. Frontman. Musician. Writer. Channeler. Funky.

Friday: Martha Cutt of Easthampton. Queer. Former flight attendant. Pet lady. Possible hoarder. Freaky.

Here's how we have you judge the candidates next week. After working with the best dog trainer in the world, I've decided positive reinforcement is the way to go. So, each morning after the close of the River Morning Show, call the feedback line (413)586-7400, x304 and give your positive feedback if you feel so moved. The person with the most "yays" wins. Limit one call per listener or Simon Cowell will be pissed.

Done and done.

Hanging with Weekend Cannibals

Reading the Village Voice in NYC on Wednesday, I came across a story by Katharine Gates titled "A weekend Among Suburban Cannibals." Really. The story detailed a group of people, men and women, who frequent cannible porn websites, and post on cannibal porn message boards.

Yes, Virginia, there is indeed a community of people whose most highly charged erotic imagery is of a woman who is captured, stripped, trussed, stuffed and "cooked." There are 'femcans', or men who want to be eaten by a woman, and of course women who love the idea of being that 'center of attention, just like the Thanksgiving turkey. "The most popular is the spit roast, a woman skewered through the vagina and out the mouth--a visual effect achieved through the use of cardboard tubes painted to resemble metal. There's also the face-down suckling pig, the parturition-style turkey girl, and finally the old cartoon-gag cliche, the jungle cannibal stew pot.

A woman named Meghan explained the appeal: "For me, it's all about being the centerpiece, or the center of attention. It's the same attention you give the turkey on Thanksgiving..everybody is just so obsessed with that turkey. When is the turkey going to be done? It's so exciting!" Meghan loves nothing more than to unwind by going into her homemade dungeon and being trussed up on her large rotisserie with an electric fire crackling realistically beneath her.

I Want a Gal Just Like Mom!

The Perils Of Dating On The Internet: Skirt-chasing playboy Daniel Anceneaux spent weeks talking with a sensual woman on the Internet before arranging a romantic rendezvous at a remote beach - and discovering that his on-line sweetie of six months was his own mother!

"I walked out on that dark beach thinking I was going to hook up with the girl of my dreams," the rattled bachelor later admitted. "And there she was, wearing white shorts and a pink tank top, just like she'd said she would.

"But when I got close, she turned around - and we both got the shock of our lives. I mean, I didn't know what to say. All I could think was, 'Oh my God! it's Mama!' "

But the worst was yet to come. Just as the mortified mother and son realized the error of their ways, a patrolman passed by and cited them for visiting a restricted beach after dark.

"Danny and I were so flustered, we blurted out the whole story to the cop," recalled matronly mom Nicole, 52. "The policeman wrote a report, a local TV station got hold of it - and the next thing we knew, our picture and our story was all over the 6 o'clock news. "People started pointing and laughing at us on the street - and they haven't stopped laughing since."

Falls Road Belfast

Some Call Her Vally Voo

Just Say Our Name....For Money

TV networks are turning to product placements to fight back against ad-skipping technologies like TiVo, but now some writers are putting up a fight, demanding more pay in exchange for scripting product plugs into their shows. Wired news had the story.

"The complaints may seem like crocodile tears coming from TV writers. After all, Hollywood was once perceived as the destination for artistic sell outs. Although some writers couch their protests in terms of betraying their craft, the Writers Guild also cites a more pecuniary concern: Their members aren't compensated for working commercial messages into their scripts.

It's no small issue. The use of product placements has increased 84 percent on television in the last year, according to the WGA's call for regulations. "There is no clear line separating a TV show from an advertisement anymore," said Carrie McLaren, editor of Stay Free magazine.

In a recent episode of the NBC series Medium, writers had to work the movie Memoirs of a Geisha into the dialogue three times because of a deal the network made with Sony earlier in the season. They even had the characters go on a date to an early screening of the movie and bump into friends who had just viewed Geisha to tell them how good it was."

Another product placement intruded a touching scene on ABC's soap opera, All My Children, when writers were forced to incorporate a line about a new Wal-Mart perfume into the dialogue as a character, Greenlee, sat at the bedside of her husband who was suffering from a fatal gunshot wound.

Some writers are so angered by the process of appeasing advertisers they have begun to strike back with a website called Productinvasion.com that pokes fun at embedded products.

Broadway Dazzles and the Gazette Spikes Me

Faithful readers...I apologize for not updating since Monday...believe it or not such a lapse has never occured. So today will be the update of little tidbits that have been keeping me away from my blogging tasks.

* Went to NYC yesterday and met my mother Valerie. The city was jammed, but the broadway show we saw "Dirty Rotten Scoundrels" was wonderful. The standout was Norbert Leo Butz, who played one of the swindlers next to John Lithgow. The stage rotated and the choreographers too full advantage; at one point a man on a bicycle turned into the front of a roulette wheel. Broadway never fails to dazzle!

* I've been politely rejected by the Daily Hampshire Gazette. Editor Larry Parnass spiked my tech column because I was too harsh about the future of printed newspapers. He made a good point in how vital and useful local papers still are, I am hoping to submit a slightly watered down version if they'll have it.

* The Valley Advocate ran my piece on San Pedro de Atacama with Paul Shoul's photo.

* Sony Stark is back from her around the world trip...and is writing a book and compiling her video about Semester at Sea. For the first time in decades, she doesn't have a job to go to. Scary...but that is what makes life interesting, right Sony?

Taking a Shot But Losing the Battle

After just 19 issues, Cambridge's newest newspaper broke some hard news -- about itself. Colleen Walsh of the Boston Globe wrote about it today.

The avowed goal of Cambridge Day, an eight-page daily broadsheet, was to offer a mix of local news, comprehensive listings of goings-on about town, and a venue for residents to vent or share ideas. Publisher Marc Levy started the paper on Halloween.

''I felt like Cambridge just deserved more," says Levy, 36, a former Boston Herald copy editor who sank $40,000 of his own money into the paper. ''If we just had a little more money, we would have gotten there."

Levy ran the operation from his one-bedroom apartment in Porter Square, where he had a few desks, bookshelves, one full-time paid staffer (whom he had to let go), and a stable of volunteers who popped in and out.

The paper cost $5,000 a week to print. The money didn't add up: Levy says he earned about $2,500 in ads, though he had about $7,500 pledged before he stopped publishing. He never found any investors.

"It's my fault that I got impatient and decided to do it myself and essentially gamble and lose the gamble." Levy said.

Rich-Induced Synchronous Head-Bobbing

Bryan Curtis writes cleverly in Slate today.

"A few weeks ago, I went to see Times columnist Frank Rich among the faithful, giving a talk at the 92nd Street Y in Manhattan. Each year, the 92nd Street Y brings in a roster of eminences, from Alan Alda to Barbara Boxer, designed to draw out the old lions of Manhattan liberalism.

A sign of Rich's star power is that tickets for his "evening with" had sold out well in advance, as they do every time he visits the Y. The lobby had the giddy buzz of a rock concert, and I spotted an elderly woman, suffering from age or just desperation to see her hero, attempt twice to sneak into the auditorium without a ticket.

Inside, the audience hung on Rich's every word, nodding vigorously when he skewered George W. Bush ("I think he has lost the trust of the country") and resignedly when he skewered the Democrats ("I think the Democrats are pathetic").

Within a half-hour the synchronous head-bobbing had reached a level achieved only by a few rock acts; I imagine the aging ladies in the front row were ready to pelt Rich with their underwear, if only they had been able to stand.

Everyone Rides the Fung Wah Bus

Few New Yorkers openly admit it, but everyone I know has taken the Fung Wah Bus. It’s the Queen Bee of the deep discount bus lines now operating out of Chinatown. And yes, it’s the real deal. But like any bargain, it comes with its own set of unique challenges. And unfortunately for me, I learned all the pitfalls of Fung Wah the hard way – by riding. Daniel Derouchie wrote this story for GoNOMAD.com

Then the mechanics of capitalism kicked in and things turned cutthroat. Travel Pack/Lucky Star came onto the scene, setting up a ticket stand right around the corner from Fung Wah’s site. Travel Pack/Luck Star offered one-way tickets for an astounding low price of ten bucks. Any hour, anytime – always!

Suddenly everything I’d anticipated accelerated at a rapid pace. The bus door opened as the crowd tightened into a snug round ball hoping somehow this would secure their entry. It was at this point that all rational thought went out the window; even the young Williamsburg-looking artists clenched their bags and teeth as everyone fought to make it on, but Sara hadn’t arrived yet. This put a wrinkle in my well-devised plan.

The Men at the Easels are Pissed!

More than 80 editorial cartoonists created about 125 drawings criticizing the shrinking state of their profession for today's "Black Ink Monday" protest. Editor and Publisher has the story.

Exactly 100 of those cartoons are currently posted at EditorialCartoonists.com, according to Association of American Editorial Cartoonists President-Elect Rob Rogers of the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette and United Media. The AAEC organized the protest.

A note on EditorialCartoonists.com states: "'Black Ink Monday,' a nonviolent protest by the Association of American Editorial Cartoonists, is a response to the Tribune Company's recent elimination of editorial cartooning positions at several of its newspapers, as well as a commentary on newspapers everywhere who have lost sight of the value of having a staff editorial cartoonist.

Rogers said he'd be surprised if Tribune Co. newspapers brought back cartoonists because of "Black Ink Monday." But he hopes the protest might make some papers think twice about dropping a cartoonist in the future.

"Syndicated cartoons may be cheaper, but a local cartoonist gives a newspaper something no other newspaper has," said Rogers.

The Post-Gazette staffer said he understands the economic concerns of newspapers and newspaper chains. But he added that most papers with cartoonists only have one cartoonist -- meaning dropping that person basically eliminates an entire department. Rogers said a paper without a staff cartoonist is more "homogenous" and "vapid," which "doesn't sound like a great business decision."

Speaking as an Entrepreneur...

Today I am giddy for a whole bunch of reasons. Our new GoNOMAD Cafe was featured in the Daily Hampshire Gazette, spilling the beans on our grand scheme for our internet cafe and wireless little town. I had tried to keep the reporter from putting as many details in about the latter, as this is a still a challenging piece of this complicated puzzle, but of alas my zeal for this project has made it hard to keep secrets.

The second piece of good news came when Tom Vannah called to let me know a story I wrote about San Pedro de Atacama Chile will be published in the Valley Advocate this week, along with Paul Shoul's fine photos.

The momentum of the cafe, the wireless, and the website pulls us along, giddy with the next prospect or challenge. I am working on developing travel content for mobile phones, another emerging trend. The more that I do this, the more I love it.

Let's Talk About Bones

Hung off Fido's collar, the PetCell is a bone-shaped cell phone that will let dog owners talk to their best friend over a two-way speaker. Wired News had the story today, as snow fell over the Patriots/Bills game on TV.

"The PetCell will ship in early 2006 and will sell for $350 to $400, the company said. President Cameron Robb said he got the idea for the phone while sharing a hotel room with a colleague at a convention.

"I overheard him talking to his dogs," said Robb. "I was mimicking and making fun of it, but the reality was his wife was holding the phone down to the dog."

The ability to track a lost pet has most dog lovers excited. The PetCell has a "call owner" button in case Rover strays. It also includes assisted GPS, or A-GPS, which works indoors, allowing dog owners to map their pup's coordinates from any web-enabled device or by dialing a voice-enabled call center.

"When dogs disappear, it's the first 15 minutes that are the most important," said San Francisco dog trainer Youngblood Harris. "If your dog runs out of the dog park and you don't see if he went left or right, (PetCell) would make life a lot easier," Harris said.

The PetCell will also have an option called GeoFence that will alert owners whenever their dog wanders beyond preset parameters, and built-in temperature sensors to indicate if the dog is too hot or cold.

So Many Good Reasons to Use the Newspaper

Tony Gabriele of the Daily Press in Hampton Roads VA provides some excellent reasons why newspapers are still superior to other media.

"Newspapers are handy things to grab for soaking up spilled coffee, or grease splatters in the kitchen. I think "Soaks up grease better than Bill O'Reilly!" should be a national newspaper advertising slogan.

If there's a power failure, you can't surf the Internet by candlelight.

You can't use your computer to start a fire in the fireplace. Well, maybe you could, but the smoke would smell funny.

I suppose you could also cover the floor with TV sets to catch the drips when you're painting the walls, but spread-out newspapers are much easier to walk around on.

You never have to worry your kids are spending too many hours reading the newspaper.

Sure, you can download and save TV shows nowadays. But you can't attach them to the refrigerator with cute little Garfield magnets.

You can swat flies with a rolled-up newspaper. Rolling up your TV set and swatting flies with it probably will void the warranty.

And if you live in an apartment, you never have to bang on the ceiling and complain because the people living above you are reading their newspaper too loudly after midnight.

Four things you are not threatened by while reading your newspaper: spyware, spam, phishing and viruses.

And seriously, folks: When there are no more newspapers, just where do you suppose the Internet will get its news from?

In China, Pay Up or Die

On the plane to Belfast I was handed a Wall Street Journal and found this story about how the lack of health insurance in China causes deaths and heartache to millions.

China's health system is strictly pay as you go. Cash upfront or you don't get treated. Fewer than one third of China's 1.3 billion people have health insurance, and more than half of all health spending it out of pocket. More than half of the total health spending is for prescription drugs...compared to just 15% for the US.

The story depicted a man from the country who had borrowed more than $18,000 from nearly every other resident of his village, and had made it through just two of the five required chemotherapy doses. The doctors chastised the father when his funds ran low, threatening to throw his son out if he didn't pay up.

The Giant's Curious Causeway in County Antrim

We drove up to County Antrim today on Northern Ireland's rocky coast. Here we felt the stiff winds and driving rain that the country is known for, and found a remarkable geological wonder called the Giant's causeway.

Along the cliffs of the shore, astonishing hexagonal shaped rocks about one-foot wide are placed all about, as if someone was designing a huge patio by the sea. Then there are the Giant's organ, thin tubular rocks that stretch dozens of feet up the sides of the cliffs. Their origin, said our guide Rosemary Connally is volcanic and they've been there for only about 60 million years, a geologic hiccup.

The waves, said Rosemary, where higher than she'd ever seen, (and she was raised here,) they were 8 or 9 foot swells that crashed on the rocks spewing seafoam on the beach. Northern Ireland's most famous sight did not disappoint us!

A Fiddler Shows us how to Scutch Flax

Yesterday we took a ride to County Down, a land a poet once called "a basket of eggs," because of the rolling hills. We met Eugene McConville, who is one of Ulster's last flax farmers, the plant from which linen is made.

He showed us how he takes the flax plants and holds the stalks in his water-powered scutching machine, that beats them up to remove the fibrous insides, and after a lot of combing the flax emerges like giant locks of blond hair.

The barn where we visited Eugene was cold and damp, and a giant metal waterwheel spun with the gurgling water sluiced in from a stream. Linen was once the cash crop of the land, outfitting lords and Kings. Eugene played some tunes for us on his fiddle, showing a toothless grin as he played. He has no children, and is getting up in years, so he might be one of the last men in this dying business.

The Scourge of Drug Fakers Strikes Back

This morning in Mal Maison, my cool and very dark Belfast hotel, I read the Independent, Britain's fiercely liberal tabloid. I leaned into a spotlight in the dimly lit dining room and read a feature by Simon Usborne profiled "Doctor Dora" a brave Nigerian woman who is called 'the scourge of drug fakers' in her job as director of the food and drug administration there.

"When Prof. Dora Akunyili, 51, became director in 2001, up to 80 percent of drugs in Nigeria were fake. Lured by big profits and weak laws, criminals have switched from dealing in cocaine and guns to fake drugs. The professor's sister died after taking fake insulin.

Her offices were burnt down, and she got death threats, and a bullet grazed her scalp when she left her fortified home to visit a village.

Dora was recognized in London after her public awareness campaign and a clampdown on corruption led to an 80 percent drop in the levels of fake drugs in Nigeria. "We are little people fighting with tiny hands," she said.

Meeting a Billionaire in Belfast

Tonight I joined other journalists at the All Ireland premier of Belfast-born CS Lewis' new Narnia movie, held at a waterfront arena called the Odyssey Center. A little while after we arrived and stood sipping champagne, a man entered who looked a little bit like Kirk Kirkorian. The deference with which the hosts treated him made me think he was a VIP. Like many others he had on a tux, but there was something about this older man with a stiff looking blond wife that intrigued me.

Later I saw him sitting on a couch, and as we chatted about who he might be, a man who was with him came up to me. He said I looked like somebody he'd seen in the movies. I was flattered, but had to ask--who is that older guy on the couch?

"That's Phil Anschutz," he said, "I work for him." Anschutz is the money behind this movie, he's a billionaire from Denver who believed in the Christian message of the movie and risked big bucks to see it made. I was introduced, and Anschutz told me that he'd like to make six more films, covering the entire Narnia series. I told him about seeing Lewis' childhood home, and the prep school he attended in the city. I was probably the only one there who knew his name, and his friend confirmed that while Anschutz may indeed have 7 billion or more, he doesn't like being in the news.

Fibber McGees Brings 'em out in Belfast

Tonight after dinner we got a chance to sample Irish music in Belfast. We went to a crowded little pub on a side street where a folk band called Brier was ready to play. The people in the pub were all locals, drinking a lot of Guiness and joking and laughing, and the place was packed. The band, three stout men with two guitars and a bass, played the kinds of tunes you'd expect--sing-along rowdy songs and rocking fast tunes with the main singer/guitarist wailing on the axe and the crowd singing along and dancing, swinging their partners around sloppily.

The rain drizzled down outside and the Guiness tasted sweet and creamy. A women leaned dangerously close to a very tall man in the crowd. His friend explained that women do that to him, they like how big and tall he is. This man, from England, said that he was here on business, his firm pays out tens of millions in claims in Northern Ireland. I'm not sure why he told me that--he didn't look like an insurance man. He said he wasn't sure what the women wanted--whether she was a hooker or just liked the tall guy. We walked home in the light rain, and talked about how much fun it was to hear live music and drink Guiness in this great little pub called Fibber McGees.

Ferry in Belfast Harbor

Rainy and Damp and Growing like Crazy

Belfast is rainy and damp but still warms my heart. Our guide Ken is a playwright who has several plays that have been produced here. While we toured Belfast he recited poems by William Butler Yeats in his rich Irish baritone. Very moving, the poem was about a man who catches a trout and it becomes a lovely woman whom he spends the rest of his life trying to find.

Our travels today took us to the Belfast harbor where the Titanic was built; we saw the many restorations taking place. A huge museum and visitor's center will be erected where this ship will be featured, as well as many waterfront condos, high tech offices, museums and shops. The city is giddy with building, the cranes in the skyline tell the story. But the biggest cranes are at the former shipyard, though no longer used for ships, they will be preserved since they represent the glory days.

The city and Ulster in general has moved so far from the days of the Troubles, there are no longer any army patrols on these streets. Now it's time to build and develop, today we toured a new five-star hotel being created from an ornate 19th century bank. People here are excited about all of this prosperity, and it is a pleasure to watch it all unfold.

The Wall that No Longer Divides Belfast

Our first morning here in Belfast we took a tour and absorbed the main message: Belfast is booming, and the days of the men in hoods and the violence is all gone. The same armored vehicles that used to prowl the streets can now be rented out for parties and prom rides. We toured first the Falls Road neighborhood, and viewed some of the hundreds of murals depicting the Republican side of the Troubles. Martyrs with guns, hunger strikers, grim and guant, and lots of fists and Irish flags in chains. Along the road was the Peace Wall, wire towering up high, separating the sides.

We drove up a little hill around a corner and we were in the Shankill neighborhood, the murals now glorified the Queen Mother, Queen Elizabeth, Thomas Cromwell, and also had the requisite men in balaclavas toting automatic rifles. But these are now tourist attractions, people come from all over to gawk and take photos.

The best graffiti of all was the scrawl on yet another dividing wall 'who has time for this shit?" Right on!

Gaping Void on Business Porn

Gaping Void is a very popular blog with a Google page rank of 7, written by Hugh Macleod. This means that when he writes, the search engine giant lists this blog very high in searches.

"I first heard the brilliant term "Real Estate Porn" when reading Gawker a few years ago. Basically, imagine a young, married Brooklyn couple reading through the property section of The New York Times, and you can just imagine, it would not be unlike college boys drooling over a copy of Penthouse.

So me and another friend were talking earlier this week about how totally obsessed thirtysomething guys like us get with "Business Porn".

Business Porn is just like Ordinary Porn or Real Estate Porn, except instead of it being about the women we wished we could sleep with, or the houses we wish we owned, it's about all those cool, lucrative, exciting jobs and businesses that we wish we had, instead of the normal, tedious, schleppy crap most of us end up doing to pay the bills.

You know, those kind of gigs that allow us access to the hot women and the nice houses. All three are somewhat connected, if you're a guy."

Burying Carbon Dioxide Beneath the Sea

Up early on this 15 degree morning reading the Telegraph UK about BP, and their environmental moves. "One such project is in Scotland where the battle against rising greenhouse gas emissions has focused on one of the main culprits, carbon dioxide. At one power station, the company is combining a number of proven technologies to allow the facility to produce electricity using hydrogen derived from natural gas.

Potentially harmful carbon dioxide removed in the process will be captured and sent to an oil field approximately 150 miles offshore. There it will be safely returned to the natural environment where it came from - a reservoir 2.5 miles beneath the seabed. In this 'pen', it will be stored safely and indefinitely.

The level of carbon dioxide emissions is expected to fall by 90 per cent, the company says, as a direct result of this project.

A similar endeavour is being operated slightly further from home, at BP's natural gas facility in Algeria. C02 that would otherwise be released into the air is being safely returned to the natural environment where it came from - one mile underground.

This so-called "capture and storage" project is one of the largest ever undertaken and BP intends to replicate its Algerian model on a wider scale in the US.

The Nightmare of a 12-9 Underground

"Imagine spending the whole day on that train," a motorman named William Martinez once said in a Bronx diner near the end of the D line, his route for several years. "It's an exercise in staying awake. I was telling somebody it's like watching the same movie 1,000 times, but having to watch for that one detail in it that's different every time." The NY Times today profiled a motorman and the nightmare of passengers falling beneath the train's wheels--a 12-9.

For Mr. Martinez, it had come in Harlem in November 2002, when a woman standing with her husband on the platform at the 125th Street/St. Nicholas Avenue station abruptly started running toward the edge, then jumped. When he saw her legs flip up into the air before she disappeared under the train, he feared the worst, but somehow she survived. Back at the control center, someone congratulated him: The delay in service was only 17 minutes.

"Among subway workers, among train operators and conductors, people that work on the tracks, the one incident during everybody's career that is life-altering is a 12-9," said Jimmy Willis, a former conductor and Transport Workers Union official. "After someone has a 12-9, those thoughts begin to crowd their awareness. There are people who are involved with a 12-9 who never get back on a train.

"You go to Great Adventure and you're standing on line for a roller coaster, and you can't get near the tracks because there's a barrier," said Dr. Matthew Clarke. "You go down into the subway station, and all that's between you and the tracks is a yellow line. And subconsciously, we all realize how vulnerable we are. That yellow line is all that's there."

Cozy Fireside Sunday

We woke up to snow this morning, gently falling and covering the cars in the driveway. Damn! Why didn't we remember to put them into the garage?! One of life's pleasures: watching snow fall and seeing that your car is snug and dry in the garage!

Hanging out here by the fire (another decadent thing: a fire during the day!) and sipping hot cider. Nathan is in a buoyant mood, watching my grandson beam and laugh adds to the coziness of this Sunday afternoon at home. Francisco, Kate Cindy and Kate's friend Nora with her own tiny baby are all here relaxing and sitting by the fire. Sundays are meant for this kind of relaxing...and while I am still pre-occupied with the details of the GoNOMAD cafe, today is indeed a day of rest and recharge.

Let it snow!

Integrated Advertising on Trump's Apprentice

What's New in Advertising? Integrated Marketing...Web Pro News' Rich Ord has the story today...

"Microsoft won last night's episode of The Apprentice hands down. In today's TiVo happy world content integrated marketing is the future and we all better get used to it. Not just for TV either.

Tonight's episode featured the final four Apprentice applicants in a task to prepare a 60 sec video for Microsoft showcasing Microsoft Office Live Meeting.

In the end Donald Trump fired both team members of "Capital Edge." Their video was very simplistic ... very much like a Power Point presentation instead of a polished promotional video. The statement voiced over in the beginning of the video, "Simply use your name and password to log in" gives you a clear picture where this promotion was headed. Not good.

The winning team Excel did a much better job focusing on a video story line showing the power of the service. I think it fit better with the tag line Microsoft has for the service; The service that gives you the power to hold live meetings anytime ... anywhere.

Microsoft will receive a powerful boost from this show ... much more convincing than the standard commercial. I think this is the future for television because it must hold the attention of the audience if it is to continue receiving big bucks from advertisers.

I see blogs, email newsletters, RSS feeds, podcasts and other online content as a natural part of an advertisers content integration strategy. Mesh interesting, useful and sometimes entertaining content with paying sponsors in order to maximize value for both the reader and the advertiser. Like I said in a recent blog post, quality content can only exist if it is paid for ... whether it is a TV show or delivered via the Internet.

Getting into the Cafe Business

I've tried to avoid becoming overwhelmed by this big, long expensive process of creating the GoNOMAD Cafe. I've been warned not to get drawn too far away from my essential knitting, that is, our website and computer cleaning businesses. But the cafe business is tempting, and will bring us many more customers who need our computer repair services.

Nick Seamon is a friend who's run the Black Sheep Deli in Amherst for more than 25
years.He knows all about how to succeed in the food business, and the key suppliers and tricks to doing this well. I've hired him as my consultant and guru, and he is preparing a plan for us to create our tiny kitchen, sell coffee, espresso, pastries and juice. I've also engaged my old reliable confidant, Joe O'Rourke to help me figure all of this out.

My hunch is that having 25-50 people a day surfing the 'Net and checking email will lead to inquiries about repairs, upgrades and software. I am willing to invest in this plan because I believe it will succeed. Now I just need to find the right people to help make it happen, so I am watching my mailbox for ad replies.

Crashing off England's Coast

Ahh the things you can find out while trolling the 'Net.

According to various British news media reports, the crew of the fishing boat "Oceania", out of the town of Blyth, blocked emergency radio frequencies for hours while they watched an erotic film on their shipboard television.

Unfortunately, the crew accidentally left their radio switched to the emergency channel while they were relaxing off Britain's northeast coast. They then settled down to watch the controversial erotic film "Crash" on TV, which was next to the radio - not realizing it was being broadcast over a 30-mile radius on the emergency frequency.

For those unfamiliar with the movie, it stars Holly Hunter and James Spader and tells the story of people who get sexual gratification from car crashes. Which more or less proves that just about anything can be a fetish for someone. Using the emergency frequency for anything but emergencies is a big no-no in the maritime world, which is as it should be.

Back on shore, meanwhile, all heck was breaking loose.

A lifeboat from Berwick was dispatched to alert the crew to their mistake. Frantic British coastguardsmen contacted Channel Four, which was airing the movie, to get them to broadcast an urgent message during the film to alert the Oceania's crew to turn their radio off the emergency frequency. Lifeboats apparently travel faster than phone calls, or at least faster than TV channel crews late at night, because the lifeboat crew from Berwick reached the Oceania before Channel Four could broadcast any message.

Meanwhile, the skipper of the Oceania apologized for the mistake. He said he had inadvertently jammed a clock radio into the switch that opened the emergency radio channel. He also said he was busy with chores and the movie was simply playing in the background.

Spreading the Plame

Why did we jump headlong into supporting a war in Iraq? Bob Norman of the Broward-Palm Beach New Times lists his top five co-conspiracists who made us believe in the cause.

*Thomas Friedman: "He's like a mouse on a sinking ship, running from nook to nook as the water comes to flood his excuses."
*Jim Hoagland: "This is sort of the Post's version of Judith Miller, only he gets more leeway because he's an op-ed columnist. ... Hoagland, to his great detriment, forged a too-close, 30-year friendship with Ahmad Chalabi. It obviously skewed the man's logic."
*Kingsley Guy: "I put Guy's name here only because he runs the Sun-Sentinel's editorial page, where numerous unsigned and unintelligible commentaries have appeared regarding Iraq."
*Nicolas Kristof: "Here's my advice to Mr. Kristof: Stop trying to fly with the hawks. They're smarter and meaner than you are. If you're a dove, be a damned dove."
*Jeffrey Goldberg: "I think Vanity Fair writer James Wolcott got it right when he described Goldberg's prose as 'neocon propaganda and scaremongering disseminated under the guise of reporting.'"