Okay. Let me walk you through this slowly, because it’s a little hard to swallow.

In January 2001, 43-year-old Jerry Colaitis was enjoying the show at a Benihana hibachi grill in Long Island. The chef tossed a shrimp in Jerry’s direction, perhaps expecting the patron to catch it in his mouth, like most folks would do. But Jerry tried to dodge the shrimp, straining his neck in the process. So far, I’m thinking, “Well that sucks. He should have eaten the stupid shrimp!”

Five months later, in June 2001, poor old Jerry is going under the knife! Seems that Jerry’s doctor felt that surgery was the only way to cure Jerry’s chronic neck pain. The surgery didn’t go very well and Jerry ended up with some “complications” (whatever that means). Now I’m thinking, “Well that sucks. He needs to find a better chiropractor!”

Five months after that, Jerry checks himself into the hospital with a very severe fever. The next day, Jerry is dead. Not to belittle the fact, but I’m thinking, “Well that sucks. Maybe Jerry’s family should sue the hospital, or maybe even the doctor who did the surgery five months ago.”

But NO! Jerry’s family is not interested in suing the hospital (which would probably pay a lot of money to maintain its image as a safe place) nor are they interested in suing the doctor (who most assuredly has a plump malpractice insurance policy). No, they’re going for the big bucks… the hibachi chef! Cuz everybody knows THOSE guys have all the cash! (You can see it right there in their giant jar of tips. There’s gotta be twenty or thirty bucks in there!)

So now I’m thinking, “Wow, that really sucks. These people need to find a real lawyer instead of the guy who shouts on his commercials during ‘Days of Our Lives’.”

This story would be funny if it wasn’t true, but it is.

How do you rank in cyber space? Are you googlable? (Ooooh! New word!) I’ve always ranked pretty well because my name is a bit unusual. When you search on “Trint Ladd” you don’t end up with a bunch of links to some English professor or small town city council member’s web site. You get me.

I think it also helps that my wife is famous. *wink*

So, anyhoo, not to gloat or anything, but my combined Web Ego is over 4500. (Bill Gates scores almost 13,000, so I’ve got room for improvement.)

Give it a try! (http://www.EgoSurf.org) Be sure to click “more options” and check all the different search engines. (Warning, it takes a long time for the page to finish searching you. Let it finish.)

Lots of folks get depressed after the holiday season. No more parties. No more presents. No more candy. But don’t let the post holiday blues get you down. You can have Christmas every day! In fact, to help you with this, I’m posting a Christmas song I just downloaded. It’s sure to cure your January Blues.

Merry Christmas everybody!!

(You may want to right-click and “save as” on this one.)
*Clicky Clicky*
(Ripped from Steve)

…is brought to you by the letters Q and S and the number 3.

And now, Jedi Squirrels.

A man in a hot air balloon realized he was lost. He reduced altitude and spotted a woman below. He descended a bit more and shouted, “Excuse me,
can you help me? I promised a friend I would meet him an hour ago, but I don’t know where I am.”

The woman below replied, “You’re in a hot air balloon hovering approximately 30 feet above the ground. You’re between 40 and 41 degrees north latitude and between 59 and 60 degrees west longitude.”

“You must be in Information Technology,” said the exasperated balloonist.

“I am,” replied the woman, “How did you know?”

“Well,” answered the balloonist, “everything you told me is, technically correct, but I’ve no idea what to make of your information, and the fact is I’m still lost. Frankly, you’ve not been much help at all. If anything, you’ve delayed my trip.”

The woman below responded, “You must be in Management.”

“I am,” replied the balloonist, “but how did you know?”

“Well,” said the woman, “you don’t know where you are or where you’re going. You have risen to where you are, due to a large quantity of hot air. You made a promise, which you’ve no idea how to keep, and you expect people beneath you to solve your problems. The fact is you are in exactly the same position you were in before we met, but now, somehow, it’s my fault.

(Shamelessly stolen from Veni Vidi Vici.)

…will eventually be outlawed.

I recently posted (and am hosting) the friggin’ awesome Christmas light display that’s making the internet rounds. Thanks to the the good folks on Power FM‘s morning show (Thanks Dawn!) I have found a news article about the rawk-us display.

Carson Williams, a father of two near Cincinnati, spent two months stringing up the 25,000 lights ( ) which are controlled by a computer. The sound track for the display is broadcast on an FM frequency by the same computer, so folks driving by can listen in. (Thank goodness. I was afraid it was blaring over a loud speaker!)

Amazingly, Williams’ neighbors supported the project. Sadly though, it was too much of a good thing. Traffic coming to see the show overwhelmed the neighborhood and last week, after a small fender bender occurred, Williams agreed to end the display.

Read the complete story on The Cincinnati Enquirer.

Congratulations to Surely You’re Not Serious for not being nominated for the 2005 Weblog Awards. Not only was I graciously not nominated, but none of the blogs I frequently read made the list.

Actually, one of the blogs I read DID get a nod: Michael Yon, the self-described non-journalist reporting from Iraq, is in the running for Best Media/Journalist Blog.

You can vote once a day every day until the contest ends. And remember kids: Don’t take democracy for granted. You have no right to complain about the blogosphere if you don’t vote!

Frap… It’s the term my mom always used as a hollow threat when I was a teenager. “Straighten up or I’m gonna frap you!” To my knowledge, she never did frap me, so I am still not sure what it means… Until NOW!

Yet another weird Google beta project is making the rounds. Frappr seems to not much more than a pin map for groups of people. Cuz, of course, everyone wants to have a pin on a map that represents them… *blank stare* …I guess.

For my loyal fans, and anyone else who feels an urgent need to be frapped, you can put your own pin in the SYNS Fans Frappr map. Go on, knock yerself out! It’s free!! (Then again, so are dried leaves in autumn, but I digress.)

So does this mean that all that time, my mom was just threatening to indicate my location on a map somewhere? Jeez, I would have been much more rebellious if that’s all the consequences were.

Let’s liven things up a bit! Whadaya say?

This video has been floating around the net for a couple of weeks now, and it’s just too cool for me not to post.

This is a big file, so you may want to right click and “Save Target As”. (That will save me some bandwidth too! Thanks.)

Amazing Christmas Lights

Merry Christmas!!

*sigh*

Could someone please tell me when we changed the definition of democracy? I seem to remember a time when it meant majority rules, i.e. the opinion of the majority is of highest precedent.

However, sometime in the last ten years or so someone changed the definition to whiniest rules, e.g. if two atheists are louder than two million Christians then the atheists make the rules. For some odd reason, our culture has decided it is better to offend the majority in order to avoid offending the minority. Where is the logic in that?!

I tend to be a realist. I don’t take to mushy traditions or revisionist history. I am very vocal about the fact that Christ was probably not born on December 25th; that most of our Christmas traditions (including gift giving and tree decorating) are likely derived from pagan rituals (just like Halloween and the Easter bunny). I will not argue that December 25th has any historical, spiritual significance.

However, this is the season in which we observe Christ’s birth. This time of year would have no significance whatsoever if the early Christian Church had not decided to observe Christmas at this time of year. Do you really think that retailers would pull out all the stops to lure in shoppers for “Winter Solstice” or “Yule Feast”? Would there be parades and a national holy day (er… sorry… holiday) for the “Saturnalia” or the rebirth of Sol? (With all due respect to my Hebrew brethren, Hanukkah is a great celebration, but so is Yom Kippur and kids don’t get out of school for that!)

My wife posted a poignant essay on her blog. The summation of this essay is that we, as Christians, should not be surprised when secular America takes Christ out of Christmas.

We can’t blame a world that has rejected God for not doing the job WE have been called by God to do! … If you know Jesus as your Savior, it is YOU who is supposed to say “Merry Christmas”…

While I totally agree that it is not Target’s job to promote Christianity, I think it is totally retarded for anyone to celebrate the “Holiday” season devoid of Christian symbols. If you are offended by the fact that this holly-jolly, gift-giving, peace-on-earth time of year is based entirely on the birth of Christ, then you should try to get yourself elected to the Senate and propose a Constitutional Amendment outlawing Christmas. Otherwise, shut your trap and have a Merry Christmas!!