5/29/03

How did Bob Hope live to see 100? Good Job, Bob!

Well, another three weeks of working from home. :( I sent off my first payment for COBRA this week, and have to submit the bill to accounting for expense reimbursement. (I go on company insurance at the top of august.

Plus side, three more weeks of physical therapy have been approved. Thank goodness for PCAnywhere.

I received a sweet letter from Rachel today, and her life seems so delightful right now. I'm very happy for her and her hubbie.

The revised regions of There are amazing... most have been at least a little cosmetically reworked, and some are downright new and improved.

Random Scotto factoid - Being a kraut, I have a gene that allows me to yodel.

Random German Joke:

How do you make a German chocolate cake?

First, you occupy der kitchen.

I really don't sound anything like this. but we do, what we can, don't we? - Newt returns.

revamp of the old talking heads site.

flashback thanks to for the new linkie... I really don't like the custom submission method, spam roulette, but it's fun anyhow.
Sweden bans 'Superman' baby name


IT'S a bird. It's a plane, but it's not Superman.

At least not in Sweden, where a couple who wanted to name their child after the comic book hero found the law harder to bend than the man of steel himself.

The tax authority, which oversees rules for names in the Scandinavian country of 8.9 million, blocked a request by Sara Lindenger and her live-in boyfriend, Johan Leisten, both 28, to name their child Staalman, Superman in Swedish.

"We wanted to call him David Rune Staalman Leisten," Lindenger said. "It would be much worse to be called 'Fantomen' (the Phantom) or Tarzan."

The authority said it wasn't suitable because it might "lead to discomfort for the person who uses it."

Lindenger and Leisten appealed the decision to the county administrative court in their hometown of Goteborg, southwest of Stockholm, but it was denied. They haven't decided whether to appeal.

And yet, in America, Jon Bogdonave names his kid Kal-El ...


This is what I'll use when someone asks me about free speech in other countries. When you can't even make your kid have a wacky *MIDDLE NAME*, then I think it's time to change countries.




A Florida family is suing Dr. Doom.

There are so many fascinating things about this article. There's the fact that the woman suing Dr. Doom is named "Buffy". There's the fact that they think a guy yelling at their misbehaving brat is worth 15 grand. There's the fact that when this poor schmuck grabbed his neck because the kid yanked his head back, the family interpreted this as a threat, which means that they're essentially suing for something that was their fault. There's this:

"Skinner said Brozovich was not playing the character of Dr. Doom during the confrontation."

How do they know that? Seriously. I mean, how do they know that it wouldn't be in character for Dr. Doom, who is, after all, a supervillain, to threaten to break the fingers of a kid who yanked on his cape? I would think that would be, short of actually breaking the kid's fingers, quite in character for ol' Vic.

And finally, there's this:

"Skinner said she thinks the incident wasn't taken seriously when she reported it to park management."

No kidding. (thank you seebelow!)