so this principal in Mclean, Virginia, a ritzy suburb of DC, banned the game of tag from her school. How stupid. She called it a game "of intense aggression." Give me a break, it's a game that kids play, and thus some kids win and lose. What's next, banning all sports, video games, and Candyland? How stupid.

Here's the principal's email if you want to comment.

so Vladimir Putin is Time's Man of the Year. Are you kidding me?

But you know what, I think they just did it to get press. I'm not going to link to it. It's such a stupid pick, a dictator who squelches dissent, has journalists and political opponents killed, puts a lackey in power, etc etc, there's no way it could be a serious pick. But if they chose Al Gore or Ban Ki-Moon or somebody, would they get as much reaction? No.

Then again, check out their 1938 pick. (Apparently the covers floating around with him on them are fake, as he wasn't on the cover that year.)

so I observed some Britney Spears driving today by a diplomat.

I was walking east on Indiana Ave/D Street NW outside the courthouse and saw an SUV with diplomatic plates. The guy backed up without looking so my coworker had to jump out of the way, then we noticed the guy had a little kid in his lap while driving. I should have gotten a photo with my cameraphone but unfortunately didn't. I don't remember his full plate, it was DA 0401 or something like that, which isn't a full plate anyway. I did tell a MPD officer parked two cars down, but he didn't seem too concerned and didn't immediately go after the guy. That sucks.

Of course, diplomats have immunity anyway (unless you are Mel Gibson in Lethal Weapon 2)

so this video has been super popular at work ever since Appalachian State beat Michigan in football. It's ridiculous and terrible.



You can just tell it was created by some committee of dumb administrators, and lo and behold, it was. The school newspaper reports on the video, saying it was made for a state tour by, you guessed it, a committee. It was on VH1 and elsewhere, and got even more hits after the big win.

A university spokesman is trying to distance the school from the video, saying the video was created for a tour through the state by the university, and that "somebody probably picked the video up from the Internet when it was linked to the Appalachian Family Caravan Web site and is now using it for purposes other than for what it was created." The spokesman thinks "the video will not directly hurt the way Appalachian is viewed and hopes people who know the university understand the video was taken out of context."

Good luck with that, considering how much we've been laughing at it, and one alum said "I sincerely hope this is some kind of joke video. If not, ASU will never again see a dime of my money."

For those unfamiliar, ASU is in Boone, NC, and is kind of a hippie school.

so I had an "Office Space" moment at work today. About a week ago, they sent around a mass email telling everybody to change their voicemail greetings. There's this long script which everybody has to follow, and which they (whoever "they" are) actually check it, and now we all had to change it again. They decided to change one of the phone numbers, so everybody in the agency has to change their outgoing voicemails. Which is certainly not stupid or a huge waste of time. (That is sarcasm.)

The script is long and took me about five times to get it right the first time. Here it is:

Hello, this is (------ Your Name ------), (------ Your Title ------) with the Office of the ( ----- name of the place where I work -----).

I’m not able to take your call right now, but if you’ll leave me a message, I will return your call within 24 hours or the next business day.

For immediate assistance, please call (202) _________ to reach our Project Coordinator.

Thanks for calling.

The "thanks for calling" part is on the second page of the Word document they sent out and I forgot to say it. No big deal, who cares, right? No, I got an email saying I have to fix it or we'll get in trouble.

That's got to be the stupidest thing I've ever heard. We'll get in trouble for me leaving off "thank you" on a two paragraph voicemail greeting? It's up there with the guy in "Office Space" whose job is to pass documents from one guy to another. I can't believe it's someone's job to do this. What a humongous waste of time (not to mention money, since I'm getting paid to change my voicemail greeting so many times and someone else is writing these greetings and then making us change them.)

How about "Hi, this is Andrew Wiseman, leave me a message" beep? Is that so wrong?

so I write about this every year: Valentine's Day is the stupidest holiday. You're supposed to buy your loved one crap they don't need, like teddy bears, boxes of chocolate, or jewelry, then take them out to eat at a restaurant that is two or three times as expensive, and two or three times as packed, as it normally would be. No thanks, I'm good.

It's such a vapid, commercialized holiday - how is being forced to buy somebody something because everybody else is doing it an expression of love? You should do nice things for your loved one whenever, not when some stupid holiday tells you to. I keep seeing ads for Vermont Teddy Bears - those motherfuckers are expensive! $60 and up! What, is it full of gold or something? Is it life size? Does it actually walk around and roar and grab salmon out of rivers? I might pay $60 for that.

I'm single, but I could care less about that. But another crappy thing about this holiday is that I always see people who are single feeling worse about themselves. Wow, great holiday, let's have more like that. "Hey everybody, it's feel shitty day! Let's have the opposite of a party!" Good thing Valentines Day doesn't come around every month.