It’s Friday night. Tammy and I made a spontaneous trip to Six Flags after work and rode the newly redesigned Texas Giant.

First, let me say that it’s been over 2 years since we rode the Giant. It was just too rough. Painful. No fun anymore. But the new steel redesign is freakishly smooth and quiet.

Usually, for a “hang time” ride, like most woodies, you want to ride in the back for the faster, negative-G drops. But for a fast, smooth, super coaster, you want to ride in the front for the better view.

We road in the front first. It was fun, fast, and the “over 90 degree” turns were really cool. But it wasn’t “the best ride ever.”  The line was short (30 minutes) so we rode again, this time in the back. OH EM GEEEEE! What a difference. It was a completely different ride. It was OH-Mazing. The “hang time” was off the charts. I usually scream my roller coaster scream (Tammy says I sound like a girl. Pshaw.) But on this ride, I was going back and forth between gasping, “Holy crap!” (Yes, I’m sorry, chil’ren. I cussed.) on the huge negative-G drops, and laughing so hard I couldn’t breath. It RAWKED.

I’m not sure if it’s better than Mr. Freeze (my all-time favorite ride), but it’s dang close.

Rapper, poet, Christian, Jason Petty (a.k.a. Propaganda) spells it out. Share this!!

My favorite part is where he says our good works are like spraying cologne on a corpse.

I’m a mammal, but I don’t like to brag about it.
-Wally

Amazing! Stupendous! Why didn’t someone think of this sooner?!

The best new product of 2011 is…

[Drum roll]

2-D Glasses!!

Yes, now you too can enjoy all the latest action block-busters and animated hilarity that Hollywood can throw at you even though they insist on releasing said hilarious busters in [dramatically evil reverb voice] evil 3D.

Yes, I’m being completely serious. Hank of the VlogBrothers has actually conceived and brought to market 2D glasses that allow you to watch 3D movies without the headaches and vertigo! Seriously!

Check it out: http://www.2d-glasses.com

Take that, Hollywood!

I love Weird Al. And his polka cover songs are the stuff of legend. The song here mashed up with a My Little Pony cartoon is one of my favorites. I have multiple ring tones on my phone that are shamelessly ripped from this polka cover. For that reason, whenever I hear this one, I instinctively reach for my phone.

And as if Weird Al’s polka’s weren’t enough, this mashup is really, truly, masterfully well done!

I just sent off the following letter to my Texas congressman and senator. If you agree, you can do the same!

Subject: Cellphones and distracted driving.

I saw on the news recently that the Texas House is working on legislation to ban texting and driving. While I applaud the effort to keep our roads safe, I feel the approach is misguided.

As an avid cyclist and motorcyclist, I see lots of distracted drivers and I know full well that they are putting my life at risk. But I feel that cell phone use, and texting in particular, is only the latest in a long line of distractions that can kill.

Personally, I have seen a woman knitting at 45 mph, countless women leaving their lane while applying makeup, people eating, reading, attending their children, or programming their GPS devices, and all of them distracted enough that they could have easily killed someone.

I’ve also spent a lot of time thinking about enforcement and I feel we would be asking too much of our law enforcement officers to try and determine if and when a driver would be breaking a ban so specific as texting and driving.

As such, I think a state law the described a more generic “Distracted Driving” would be much more useful to law enforcement. And, much like the current seat belt law, it would easy for law enforcement to “catch” distracted drivers.

I also feel that, if well written, such a law could be used to severely punish distracted drivers who cause accidents with penalties closer to those for drunk driving. Because, quite frankly, I would be just as dead if I were run over by a drunk driver than if I were run over by a driver putting on makeup.

Please take this into consideration as this hot topic makes its rounds.

Thanks again.

Once upon a time, people were completely freaked about about subliminal advertising. They insisted that the previews at movie theaters contained subliminal messages that made you hungry and/or thirsty. There were oodles of supposedly evil subliminal messages in TV commercials.

Now days, I think we just don’t care. In the age of pop-up ads and spam emails, the idea of secret messages altering our minds wouldn’t be so much something to fear as it would be a pleasant relief from all the non-subliminal junk.

And now for this week’s white board quip:

Today’s subliminal thought is:

Surely you’re not serious.

Surely you are NOT serious!

SURELY YOU ARE NOT SERIOUS!!

If you’re not completely fed up and furious at the TSA by now, you may need to have someone check you for a pulse.

There’s an old idiom about about the shoe being on the other foot. I’ve tried putting a shoe on the other foot. It never really fits and is quite uncomfortable.

In other news…

President Bronco Bomber, campaigning to raise the federal debt limit, was faced with the fact that, when G-Dub was in charge, the Bomber voted against raising the debt limit. Back then it was the Democrats trying to defund the war in Iraq without appearing to be anti-military. After all, that war cost of over 800 billion dollars! Can you imagine?!

Now, Republicans are using the debt limit to defund the Bronco’s pet social projects which are projected to cost multiple trillions of dollars!!

Finding his toes awkwardly cramped by misplaced footwear,  The Bomber now admits it was “a mistake” for him to vote against raising the debt limit.

In other news…

Millions of Americans admit it was “a mistake” for them to vote for the Bronco Bomber.

Did you ever get the feeling that someone did not appreciate you enough? Like maybe they’d rather stare at a blank wall than listen to you? Nah. Me neither.

You are totally blocking my view of the wall.
-Dogbert