papsrus

This is about the the worst thing I've ever seen in a newspaper. Never mind that you know it's going to be highly offensive, it's about as amateurish as it gets. They pulled it after 30,000 papers were already printed, but geez ... how on earth did anyone think this might be OK?

Rays will finish spring training with best record. Meaningless, I know, but maybe they can hang in there and make a run at a playoff spot this year. Having Rafael Soriano as the closer should help, but they'll be without J.P. Howell until sometime in May, and who knows what his arm will be like whenever he does get back. Should be fun to watch 'em again this year.

Cute as a button, in that unbuttoned kinda way.

Any news Allen on pricing, ordering, etc?

Glad to hear you have taken care of this and that the outcome/prognosis is excellent. The "C" word seems to be something that only affects other people, until it happens to you. Fortunately, there are effective treatments today for all sorts of cancers, and so we don't need to be terrified of the disease anymore. Watchful, yes. Terrified, no. Good luck, best wishes.

OK, first time using this photobucket thingy, so who knows what will happen, but here goes: First picture is of three papillions, from left to right, Sam, Butter and Taylor. Sam and Taylor are sister and brother from a breeder. Perfect representatives of the breed, who remain with my ex. They're great dogs. Smart, attentive, affectionate, good-natured. Butter is a rescue who is nestled next to me now. She is about 14 years old and was used for breeding in a puppy mill. I drove to Tennessee to get her about four and a half years ago now. You can't really tell from this pictures but she is missing most of her lower jaw from some injury she suffered before I got her. Don't know the details. She's in a good place now. Next up is Prince. Also a rescue. Also a papillion (as are all these dogs). Prince was found emaciated, wandering the streets somewhere in South Florida. Adopted him from a foster home shortly after getting Butter. He had pretty severe kidney failure and needed regular medical care, special diet, to maintain reasonable health. He came with me and Butter after my divorce and died in his sleep about a year ago. He was happy and comfortable while I had him. A good guy. Next up is Pixie. I adopted Pixie about seven or eight years ago from a rescue group. Also an old girl who was used for breeding. Pixie was 100% deaf and incontinent. Quiet as a mouse until feeding time, then great excitement! If you look closely you can see the tiny diaper she sometimes wore. We gave Pixie a good final few years. She, too, had failing kidneys and a weak ticker. I regret to this day that she died away from us in an emergency vet center (after the attending vet said her prognosis was good). Don't blame him, cause I realize there's a little bit of guess work involved with vets and older animals. I just regret not having a proper farewell with old Pix. This is Elvis: He was rescued from a home in Pennsylvania with 72 dogs. No teeth (as with Pixie and Butter) and was pretty rough when we first got him. But he learned to trust humans and return affection with affection. He loved running in the dog park with Sam and Taylor, chasing squirrels and all the rest. Great dog. We fostered Elvis for about a year and a half, taught him how to behave and adopted him out to a very nice widow on Sanibel Island. Elvis landed in the lap of luxury and is living the high life now. One last shot of Butterball for y'all: Yep, about 4 pounds soaking wet. Cutest thing in the world.

Word.

I haven't seen a lot of Kentucky this year, but man, they couldn't hit anything. And it looked like their bad shooting percentage (don't know the number, but I'm guessing it's pretty horrible) all stemmed from them having no - zero - none - nada - offensive schemes whatsoever. They seemed intent on tossing the ball around the perimeter trying to -- I guess -- create some gaps in the West Va. zone but it never worked, and they never really did adjust. Couple of flailing drives inside that looked more like people running into a brick wall, but that was about it, looked like to me. And when they did manage to set up a post play, they had trouble sinking two-footers. Nice win for W. Va., but Kentucky ... man they laid an egg. (not even mentioning the 2-for-a zillion three-point shooting effort). I still cannot figure out how that The 2007–08 Memphis Tigers team lost to Kansas in the final. I thought Kentucky would come out after the half flying, but they didn't seem to make any adjustments at all. They looked as flat in the second half as they did in the first. They just had no half-court game to get the ball to the low post, where they should have dominated. And so, 8 zillion 3-point shots. Clang, clang, clang. Coaching. Gotta root for Baylor today now.

I'm thinking more like Sally, or Wanda. I've had it with these new-fangled names the kids are runnin' with these days.

I haven't seen a lot of Kentucky this year, but man, they couldn't hit anything. And it looked like their bad shooting percentage (don't know the number, but I'm guessing it's pretty horrible) all stemmed from them having no - zero - none - nada - offensive schemes whatsoever. They seemed intent on tossing the ball around the perimeter trying to -- I guess -- create some gaps in the West Va. zone but it never worked, and they never really did adjust. Couple of flailing drives inside that looked more like people running into a brick wall, but that was about it, looked like to me. And when they did manage to set up a post play, they had trouble sinking two-footers. Nice win for W. Va., but Kentucky ... man they laid an egg. (not even mentioning the 2-for-a zillion three-point shooting effort).

This is why Russians can get away with saying anything.

I think it might require a trapeze.

I'm with Moose. The cat will properly introduce itself to you after she settles in for a bit. You'll just start calling her by a name that becomes obvious after you've been around her for a little while. Nice going with the adoption.

Picking a favorite performance is too difficult for me. But I'll be revisiting some of the tracks mentioned here.

Congrats and best wishes for a super jazzy future ... if I can say that. :party: :party:

That's exactly right. I had it in 2008 but not in 2009. They were looking for something they knew would be enticing. Good sales job on their part. I'm happy!

I should have been more specific. I have Direct TV. Both people I spoke to gave me the old line about rewarding a valued customer, blah, blah. I asked them both if this offer was essentially intended to get me off of an outdated plan and into a current comparable plan and they both said yes. So that's their incentive. The way they structured the offer is this: they give me the first three months of my new service for free (plus some movie channels to try out) and I pay $58 and change for the MLB package during this three-month period. That's a decrease of about one dollar from what I pay now for my regular service. After the three months is up, the MLB Extra Innings package is paid for and my new monthly rate of about $62 kicks in -- which is an increase of a couple of dollars from what I currently pay for all the channels I have now. I'll be getting all the channels I have now, plus about 20 more, plus the MLB package. Couldn't find a reason to say no, and I did spend about 20 minutes on the phone repeatedly driving home the point that my new bill after the three months will only be about $2 more than my current bill, and that Extra Innings will be paid off, but like I said, I'll believe it when I see the bill. For that last reason, I made sure there were no early termination fees. ----- Comcast absolutely sucks, IMO. When I had them, they were constantly shifting channels around, changing plans, adding channels I didn't want and taking away ones that I did, etc. I wish someone would offer an a la carte menu of channels -- $40 for any 25 channels you want, something like that. Out of the hundreds of channels I have, I only tune in to about a dozen.

Slightly off topic, but DTV called the other day and offered me the MLB extra innings package free in order to get me to switch from my current plan (which is several years old and no longer offered) to a comparable new plan, which is about $2 more a month than my old plan. I'll actually be gaining 20 channels in the new plan. I grilled two people over the phone to make sure I would be getting the MLB package free and that what they were switching me to (if I agreed) would only cost me $2 a month more, and that there were no termination fees, yada yada, and received all necessary assurances, so ... I'm apparently getting MLB Extra Innings this summer, gratis! I won't quite believe it until I actually get the bill, but ... Any other DTV subscribers getting this offer?

I don't think anyone said that listening to Evans is exactly like listening to Jarrett, sans rants. It was just a statement of preference. I've enjoyed some of Jarrett's music in the past. May well again in the future. My listening interests simply lie elsewhere right now, that's all. I don't have any animosity toward the man. His rants are a sideshow that I don't find particularly significant one way or the other. Seriously? Because people point out that Jarrett displays some unusual behavior on stage from time to time? Would you feel less nauseous if everyone simply ignored it?

Pretty much sums it up for me, too.

Googled it. Looks beautiful.

I wonder if he'd be OK if you just let out the occasional moan and wail?

Went to see Halladay and the Phillies last Monday with dad in Bradenton. Nice park. Halladay looked like he was working on a few things, but whenever he wanted to, it was 1-2-3 you're out! Went 6 innings, I believe. Phillies looked good. Sharp. Pirates looked not so good -- a few base running blunders. Great day at the park.

Whew -- Dozens and dozens. I'm constantly being introduced to new and old music alike here. Didn't have more than a fist-full of Blue Notes before joining organissimo, now I have an entire bookshelf full of music discovered since plopping down here. So, thanks everyone! (I think) To name a few, I guess: Bev & Seeline -- South American influenced music. Artists like Myriam Alter, Dino Saluzzi. Chuck -- A wide swath of artists from Von Freeman to Steve Swell to Clarence Williams. Lon -- The Jazz Oracle label. Allen -- Wonderful insights into the history of jazz and blues, with a seemingly endless well of music and musicians that spring from all that. And Roswell Rudd. Brownie, Big Beat Steve, MG, BillF, Kenny Weir, King ubu, carnivore, mikelz777, It Should Be You, Jeffcrom, Larry Kart, paul secor, Bright Moments, Tom Storer, EKE BBB, Allen, Chuck, Bev, Lon, and more have all provided wonderful suggestions for early jazz that I've been discovering and listening to quite often these days. Bill Barton -- some of those slightly off-the-beaten-path artists (at least for me) such as the Mark Masters Ensemble and Royal Hartigan. And that's really just the tip of the iceberg. I don't think there's a day that goes by that I don't see something here that sparks my interest.

Thanks for the link. Looks interesting.