Totally Insane-y, Miscellany

Couple of quick notes while I try to de-sludge my brain and the rest of my body from this cold:

  • Remember that last city council spot I mentioned in yesterday’s piece about the election day turnout? We’re still waiting for a couple of precincts to report, but right now the margin between the guy who would get the job and the guy who be almost-but-not-quite-there is 76 votes.
  • Joe Posnanski has become one of my favorite sportswriters. He has been living in State College working on a book about Joe Paterno. Um, get me rewrite?
  • My current Facebook status: The Penn State story continues to be a tragedy, but now it’s adding farce. The “Blue Out” T shirts that are supposed to send an anti-child abuse message this weekend say “Stop child abuse, Blue out Nebraska.” Really? It’s really a good idea to add a sports slogan to the “Stop chid abuse” message? And correct me if I’m wrong, but I don’t recall Nebraska employing, giving facilities access to, or covering up the actions of an alleged child abuser. Pretty sure it was a different school that did that.
  • Now that Alton Brown has retired Good Eats I should probably do a retrospective of the things he’s taught me to cook. This week we’re getting a lot of mileage out of his recipe for Perfect Popcorn. I use safflower oil instead of peanut oil because I do not like peanut oil. And I take the melted butter (2 tablespoons) and drizzle it over the kernels right as they start popping. Gotta be careful not to burn it but it saves me from having to drizzle it over the popped kernels.
  • Mike Mills and Michael Stipe are doing lots of promotion for the upcoming retrospective. NPR will stream the double album until it comes out. I have two major thoughts right now: 1) I will finish the next part of my own retrospective this week; 2) With all the talk that Mike Mills in particular has done about leaving on their own terms, I desperately hope that there is no reason to fear a revelation that would tarnish everything that the band has meant to its fans for three decades. Not that there are any contrasting stories in the news or anything.
  • Did I mention I really hate being sick?
  • Before I go, if you’re not reading Autodizactic, here’s the kind of post you’re missing.