Wednesday, December 31, 2008
skippy's new years eve music club
diana krall & the clayton-hamilton jazz orchestra - new years eve
skippy's new years music club - bonus trax
say hello
year-end "end of the year list" list
kevin drum's top ten whines about blogtopia (and yes, we coined that phrase)
ed kilgore's list of things that conventional wisdom knew were inevitable, but didn't ever happen
jon swift has his annual best blog posts of the year as chosen by the bloggers themselves, including this humble space, and thanks, jon!
jeremy remmers @ the moderate voice gives us his idea of the best and worst of 2008
show me progress shows us the missouri political year in pictures
miss cellania has 2008: a look back at miss cellania (which reminds us of the top 20 stories on skippy in 2006 of a couple years ago)
hello, you must be going
scott gration, a senior official on obama’s transition team, called and emailed several of president bush’s pentagon appointees about 10 days ago to inform them they were being dismissed.
those calls and emails were followed up by an email from jim o'beirne, the special assistant to the secretary of defense for white house liaisons, who expressed exasperation that gration informed the employees directly instead of letting o'beirne's office know first.
meanwhile, and insert your own "space" joke here, the wife of nasa head michael griffin is staying classy by using an on-line petition to convince obama not to fire her husband. an on-line petition?? what is she, a blogger? asspress:
rebecca griffin, who works in marketing, sent her message with the subject line "campaign for mike" to friends and family. it asked them to sign an online petition to president-elect barack obama "to consider keeping mike griffin on as nasa administrator."
she wrote, "yes, once again i am embarrassing my husband by reaching out to our friends and 'imposing' on them.... and if this is inappropriate, i'm sorry."…
a cash-strapped nasa last week also sent — by priority mail costing $6.75 a package — copies of a new nasa book called "leadership in space: selected speeches of nasa administrator michael griffin, may 2005-october 2008."…
"it sounds like the only thing left is to stencil mike griffin on the side of shuttle," joked paul light, a professor of public policy and a presidential transition expert at new york university. "i've never heard of a campaign to keep one's job that goes beyond the edge of private discussion."
![Photobucket](http://web.archive.org./web/20150906201225im_/http://i32.photobucket.com/albums/d11/skippybkroo/MikeShuttle-1.jpg)
it's news to us
the only thing more disgusting would be indiscriminate linkage to the piece just to get some cheap traffic hits.
[ed. note: she is awfully cute, tho.]
more voting
sore loser
Norm Coleman On Bush's Last Eight Years
Originally uploaded by Aaron Landry
Labels: flickr, losers, politicians, republicans
the bernie madoff "s- - t"
a hedge fund investor who poured millions into saratoga's equine economy has abruptly stopped all new construction on his huge horse farm and wants to sell his thoroughbreds after losing some $7.5 billion in the bernard madoff scandal. - times unionyes...that's a "b" after $7.5.
Labels: financial markets, horses, madoff, new yawk, wall street
put this on your "to do" list for 2009
despite recent storms, state surveyors reported tuesday that snow levels in the sierra nevada are below average for this time of year, making water rationing almost certain in 2009 with california's water supply in crisis....in october, the agency announced that it would deliver just 15 percent of the water requested by cities and farmers statewide in 2009 - the second-lowest level since deliveries began in 1962.- sfgate
Labels: california, drought, water, weather
Tuesday, December 30, 2008
skippy's tuesday night music club
Labels: music, skippy's music club, travel, youtube
accolades coming out of our asses
![The 2008 Weblog Awards](http://web.archive.org./web/20150906201225im_/http://img504.imageshack.us/img504/4562/wa2008_500x250.jpg)
when it rains, it pours. no sooner had this humble space won our second coveted golden turkey award, then we get nominated as finalists in the spectacular weblog awards for 2008.
that's right, we have been nominated as the best large blog (authority between 301 and 500). now, we had no idea we were a large blog, let alone that we had any kind of authority whatsoever, never mind 301 to 500. but that's the category we are finalists in, along w/these other fine blogs:
best large blog (authority between 301 and 500)
sister toldjah
desmogblog
miss cellania
jammiewearingfool
bloggasm
skippy the bush kangaroo
the agonist
fafblog
mombian: sustenance for lesbian moms
yes, we know what you're thinking. how can we ever hope to compete w/
voting is scheduled to begin on jan. 5 of next
got time warner?
what an awful way to ring in 2009. it turns out that viacom claims it has been trying to negotiate a "fair" renewal of its prized cable channels for months and months, but reputedly time warner cable has been unresponsive and "unreasonable" so talks have stalled.
...at 12:01 am on january 1st, just after the ball drops in time square, time warner cable's 13.3 million subscribers will lose 19 viacom channels -- comedy central; cmt: pure country; logo; palladia; mtv; mtv 2; mtv hits; mtv jams; mtv tr3s; nickelodeon; noggin; nick 2; nicktoons; spike; the n; tv land; vh1; vh1 classic; vh1 soul. - nikki finke laweekly
Labels: corporations, hollywood, teevee
this day in history - 1940
despite a quadrupling of traffic volumes, the original roadway north of the los angeles river largely remains as it was when it opened in 1940. trucks and buses were banned in 1943, though the bus restriction has since been dropped; this has kept the freeway in good condition and relatively safe, despite its outdated design. this design, state-of-the-art when built, includes tight "right-in/right-out" access with a recommended exit speed of 5 miles per hour (10 km/h) and stop signs on the entrance ramps; there are no acceleration or deceleration lanes. while the curves are banked for higher speeds, they were designed at half the modern standard. - wiki
time for someone in the government to start the conversation of our "modern day" infrastructure.
Labels: history, los angeles, youtube
6 degrees of kevin bacon
...we'd heard that along with hollywood boldfacers jeffrey katzenberg and steven spielberg, bacon and his wife, kyra sedgwick, lost money in madoff's devastating $50 billion ponzi scheme, and bacon's rep, allen eichorn, confirmed it for us. "unfortunately, your report is true," he wrote. - new york magazine
Labels: financial markets, hollywood, madoff
best of the worst
and kevin drum @ mojo has a contest running, asking you to send in your own home-made videos that say "goodbye" to awol.
but seriously, kevin, you say awol is a "serious contender" for worst president ever...who else is even close?
pawnshops go upscale
people pulling up to pawnshops today are driving cadillacs and bmws...lee amberg, owner of aa classic windy city jewelry & loan in affluent evanston, ill., said he's been seeing cartier watches, two-carat diamonds, david yurman jewelry and pieces from tiffany's. one client, he said, brought in a fur coat from saks fifth avenue that retailed at $9,000. she told him she needed a loan to help buy private-school uniforms for her child. - wsj
Labels: economy
environmental news stories
Labels: climate change, energy, environment, food safety, ocean, pollution
Monday, December 29, 2008
skippy's monday nite music club - rip delaney bramlett
eric clapton, delany bramlet, bonnie bramlet, bobbie whitlock, dave mason - poor elijah
robert writes us:
delaney’s songwriting credits include “superstar” for the carpenters, “never ending song of love” and eric clapton’s “let it rain.” on a personal note, he dueted with me on two songs: “small change deal” and “that’s why they call it a shot” from my 2005 album built myself a greenhouse. he was a sweet, talented man and he will be very much missed. he leaves behind his wife, suze, as well as former wife, bonnie and daughter bekka. i received this news from my co-producer and best friend chad watson who was at delaney’s side during his final days at the ucla medical center.
delaney had been in failing health for some time, but he never lost his faith or his sense of humor. i’m sure he’s in heaven now, jamming with all his old friends.
for more on delaney:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/delaney_&_bonnie_and_friends
and
http://delaneybramlett.com/
-robert morgan fisher
delaney, bonnie & friends - never ending song of love
rest in peace, delaney bramlet
skippy's monday night music club
what a tripp
bristol palin, the 18-year-old daughter of former republican vice-presidential candidate sarah palin, gave birth on saturday to a healthy 7 lb., 7 oz., baby boy in palmer, alaska.what is with the naming of babies in that family? i'm sure that bristol could earn some marketing moolah if she names the next one "nascar."
...the baby's name is tripp easton mitchell johnston and he was born at 5:30 a.m - people
all hell breaks loose in the middle east
while bush has been briefed on the situation by secretary of state condoleezza rice and national security adviser stephen hadley, he has opted not to interrupt his final vacation as president to make a public statement on the crisis. for someone who has enjoyed the most vacation days as sitting president — including days spent relaxing in comfort during hurricane katrina and in the lead-up to 9/11 — it shouldn’t come as a huge surprise that bush prioritizes vacationing over crisis management. - think progressworst president evah.
Labels: aWol, israel, middle east
glow in the dark hellish breezes
the breeze is critical in planning for diablo canyon emergencies, but scientists doubt pg&e's model is good at tracking it. if so, it won't be able to predict where winds would carry nuclear contamination in case of an accident. - san luis obispo new times
Labels: energy, environment, nuclear power
Sunday, December 28, 2008
skippy's sunday night music club
"little stevie" and miss diana ross - "i'm going to make you love me"
the incomperable marvin gaye - "what's going on"
Labels: music, skippy's music club, youtube
santa arrived in ohio
yes, ohio, there is a santa claus!
and in the small town of ashland, ohio, about 50 miles southwest of cleveland, santa’s name is lance.
well, lance, inc., actually – it's a corporation.
a rarity in recent times, lance inc. is in the news -- not for something negative like excessive executive pay in the face of shareholder losses and employee firings – but for compassion and kindness. for no apparant business reason, the snack food corporation swept into ashland and gave 274 unemployed bakery workers a reason to celebrate this year.
the story begins in october when the archway cookie factory was closed by its owners, a private equity firm. despite assurances that the closing was temporary, within days, the locks were changed, bankruptcy was filed, and the almost 300 employees were left without jobs or benefits. even in ashland, hard hit by the economy and losers of over 200,000 jobs during the Bush administration, the closing came as a blow.
...as of last week, 60 of the original 274 archway employees were back to work, with their seniority, health benefits, and pay intact, as lance re-opened the bakery with plans for full-capacity production by the end of 2009.
not satisfied with bringing good cheer to the 60 rehires, lance gave each of the former archway employees a $1,500.00 gift card and the promise that bringing all of them back to work is the intention. - examiner.com
Labels: cookies, corporations
can cookies get this kid to the inauguration?
adam feingold is rolling in dough. cookie dough, that is.
the 15-year-old sandburg high school freshman is hawking tubs of cookie dough to raise money for next month's trip to washington, d.c.
he and the entire 160-member marching eagles band will perform at president-elect barack obama's inaugural parade.
each member is responsible for raising $598 for the trip.
so far, adam, who plays the clarinet but can also play the trumpet and tenor saxophone, has raised about $150.
not bad, considering he's also been cramming for finals. and he's not just selling the dough. he's actually baking it....tubs of cookie dough cost $14.50, and they come in about a dozen different varieties.
to buy a tub from adam or to make a donation in his name, contact carl sandburg highschool at (708) 671-3100 - southtownstar.com
environmental news sunday
'eat local' movement catching on nationally. “it's really amazing how it's just exploded,” says jennifer maiser, a san francisco database consultant who was part of a small group credited with coining “locavore,” as part of an “eat local” challenge they mounted three years ago. - palm springs desert sun
ash spill deepens safety debate. a deluge of coal ash sludge that broke through a dike at tva's kingston power plant onto a 300-acre stretch of fields, homes and rivers has made the site ground zero in a fight over how "clean" burning coal to produce electricity can be. - nashville tennessean
risk of diagnosis exceeds risk of not taking action. as california gov. schwarzenegger explained to columnist thomas friedman, "if 98 doctors say my son is ill and needs medication and two say 'no, he doesn't, he's fine,' i'll go with the 98. it's common sense -- the same with global warming." - portland oregonian
Labels: climate change, coal, ecology, energy, environment, global warming, governator, nuclear power, organic, pollution
Saturday, December 27, 2008
skippy's saturday night music club
is cerberus doing the same thing to chrysler
“cerberus capital management lp and a group of private equity investors bought mervyn’s from target corporation in 2004 for $1.25 billion. the investor group, which structured the buyout as two separate purchases – one for retail operations and one for the chains valuable real estate holdings, has earned more than 250 million in profits…the mervyn’s store chain, by contrast, is in liquidation…”
by stripping out mervyn’s valuable real estate, selling premium parcels and then leasing its own buildings back to the store at exorbitant rates, cerberus guaranteed a big profit for itself and bankruptcy for mervyn’s. - california progress report
when the firms bought mervyns for $1.2 billion in 2004, they promised to reenergize the retailer. but, as it turns out, what they did was suck the life out of it. one of the first things these leveraged-buyout firms did was saddle the company with $800 million worth of debt. the new owners then promptly paid out $400 million of that to themselves in the form of dividends. - the trumpet.com
...well-connected cerberus executives john snow (former secretary of the treasury), cerberus executive dan quayle (former vice president of the united states under george bush sr.), and an army of highly-paid lobbyists will be working behind the scenes to get cerberus off the hook as quickly and cheaply as possible. so far this year, cerberus has spent nearly $2 million on lobbying, while chrysler has spent $5 million, according to senate records. - chrysler death watchlet cerberus fix the mess with chrysler....not the taxpayers.
Labels: bankruptcy, cars, corporations, greed
someone got their goat
a giant straw goat erected each christmas in a northern swedish town has been burned down - yet again.. - bbc
images from a webcam posted near the world-famous gävle goat showed a blackened skeleton and clouds of dark smoke were all that remained of the once towering straw goat. - the localh/t to bryan at why now?
top 10 worst real estate markets for 2009
Labels: california, economy, foreclosure, housing bubble
who obama should have named secretary of labor
as the creator and executive producer of discovery channel’s emmy-nominated series dirty jobs with mike rowe, mike has spent years traveling the country, working as an apprentice on more than 200 jobs that most people would go out of their way to avoid. from coal mining to roustabouting, maggot farming to sheep castrating, mike has worked in just about every industry and filmed the show in almost every state, celebrating the hard-working americans who make civilized life possible for the rest of us. - the discovery channel
Friday, December 26, 2008
skippy's boxing day nite music club
joan baez - the boxer
skippy's boxing day nite music club - bonus trax
dave foley, joe flaherty - where do monsters go at christmas?
w/special appearance by dave thomas as bob hope
from a dave foley xmas special on the cbc, here's the ultimate bowie/crosty christmas...
the corporate soap opera...broadcom
the ex-wife of billionaire broadcom co-founder henry t. nicholas 3 has sued to break up their joint trust, alleging nicholas misspent $60 million of their fortune, ordered his private investigators — once dressed in gorilla masks — to stalk her and threatened to have her “whacked.” - oc regshe also claimed that her ex-husband spent $1 million on detectives who tailed her, their three children, and her boyfriend as far as europe, and once "stalked [her] in gorilla masks and cameras outside a coffee shop when she was with a girlfriend." - ceo.comnicholas, broadcom’s co-founder and chief executive officer from 1991 to 2003, was indicted in june on 21 counts of securities and accounting fraud for conspiring to backdate — and inflate the value of — $2.2 billion in employee stock options. also charged in the case was william j. ruehle, broadcom’s former chief financial officer. - ocregthe register is publishing an article about the e-mail because it sheds new light on this influential business leader during a period in which the government charges that, as ceo of a large public company, he was breaking laws pertaining to securities, accounting and illegal drug use. the e-mail is now in federal authorities' hands....according to the four-count drug indictment against nicholas, the warehouse was a lavishly decorated retreat in an industrial park on el camino real, near his laguna hills mansion, which nicholas created "to distribute and use controlled substances."- ocreg...one possible e-mail in the dispute is an april 2002 message nicholas sent to his former wife in which he wrote that he was “not fully functioning” because he was using cocaine, methamphetamines and other drugs while working as broadcom’s chief executive officer. - oc reg..perhaps the most astonishing story of all involves henry t. nicholas, former chief executive of semiconductor firm broadcom. a colorful civil suit claimed nicholas built a secret "sex cave" under his california home to host drug- and prostitution-fueled parties.
a subsequent 2008 indictment from the u.s. district court in santa ana, calif., charges nicholas with conspiracy to distribute cocaine, ecstasy and speed, and alleges that nicholas had hired prostitutes for himself and clients and supplied the prostitutes with drugs. the trial begins in 2009. - financial postthe former manager of billionaire henry nicholas’ personal fortune has pleaded guilty in federal court to two misdemeanor counts for attempting to conceal bank withdrawals exceeding $10,000, a plea that could send him to jail up to 18 months under sentencing guidelines. - oc regbroadcom corp. today “terminated” a senior vice president whose resume listed degrees from uc irvine that he never earned.
...manian, who has worked at broadcom since 1996, earned $3.28 million in 2007 - oc reg
Labels: ceo, corporations
obama the golfing president elect
golf.com has performed an important service. it has posted five photographs, taken by apphotographer gerald herbert, that shows president-elect barack obama on vacation in hawaii playing golf. this is invaluable as we all know that nothing, not even a cnn special called "obama revealed," reveals the soul as ruthlessly and efficiently as how one plays the old scottish game. - golf.com
i want to save the environment...but
how many kangaroo steaks will australians eat this holiday season? not enough, according to a growing body of academics who say that giving up beef and lamb for kangaroo would reduce australia's greenhouse gas emissions and ease pressure on a drought-stricken land.
...it is not a new concept. environmentalists have long touted kangaroo as an ecologically sound alternative to hard-hoofed livestock, which erode australia's drought-parched soils and damage its delicate waterways. but the push to address climate change has given new impetus to an old idea. - international herald tribune
Labels: environment, food, kangaroo
the best present opening
Labels: california, horses, sports
hoppy kangaroo blogging friday
Labels: flickr, kangaroo blogging friday
Thursday, December 25, 2008
skippy's christmas music club - bonus trax
the drifters - i'm dreaming of a white christmas
skippy's xmas nite music club - bonus trax
holiday sadness
the one and only eartha kitt has passed away.
a family friend of the sultry entertainment legend has confirmed that she died of colon cancer today. - black voices
in 1968, lyndon and lady bird johnson invited kitt to a celebrity women's luncheon at the white house to offer her views on inner-city youth. taking the event seriously, not as a publicity stunt, kitt pointedly criticized the vietnam war and its impact on poor minorities. an infuriated johnson put out the word that kitt's rudeness had reduced the first lady to tears, and kitt found herself essentially blacklisted across the country -- afraid of incurring the government's wrath, venues simply refused to book her. it was later revealed that kitt was made the subject of a secret federal investigation; her house was bugged and she was tailed by secret service agents. when the fbi failed to find evidence that kitt was a subversive, the cia compiled a highly speculative dossier that attempted to portray her as a nymphomaniac. unable to find work in america, kitt moved to europe, where she would spend most of the following decade. - answers.comadieu, miss kitt. adieu.
skippy's christmas nite music club
the rx party - imagine/walk on the wild side
cry 'ho ho ho' and release the dogs of christmas
and it's w/bittersweet fondness that we enjoy the last barneycam christmas:
can't be christmas without elvis...part two
it can't be christmas without elvis
"the junky's christmas" (part one)
"the junky's christmas" (part two)
Wednesday, December 24, 2008
skippy's christmas eve music club
camryn manheim steamroller - been ridin' on a one horse open sleigh
skippy's christmas eve music club - bonus trax
chris pirillo - blue vista
skippy's christmas eve music club - bonus trax
christmas singers - the most wonderful time for a beer
skippy's christmas eve music club - bonus trax
some weird girl - i'm dreaming of a wide penis
not safe for work! or kids! or anybody w/taste! or who likes singers that can stay on key!
oh, hell, it's not safe for anybody!
it's just an honor to be monkeyfisted
![Example](http://web.archive.org./web/20150906201225im_/http://i32.photobucket.com/albums/d11/skippybkroo/TheGoldenMonkeyfistAward.jpg)
we at skippy international are beside ourselves w/pride. this humble space has won yet another golden monkeyfister award.
we actually tied w/mike finnegan of c&l; for the coveted damned good blogohood citizen honorarium for our work in highlighting and linking to, in monkeyfister's words "small market bloggers."
readers of this space know that we were the proud recipients of one of the first golden monkeyfisters way back in 2006. we are beyond words to describe our feelings upon winning another one.
merry xmas
happy holidays to you and yours, christy!
christmas eve - 1968
forty years ago, the biggest tv audience in history tuned in to watch humankind's first close encounter with another world, as the crew of apollo 8 reached lunar orbit. here, the apollo historian and film-maker dr christopher riley gives his perspective on the mission and how that christmas eve of 1968 changed the world. - bbc
Labels: environment, space, youtube
no such thing as clean coal
an environmental disaster of epic proportions just happened in tennessee. monday night 2.6 million cubic yards (the equivalent of 525.2 million gallons, 48 times more than the exxon valdez spill by volume) of coal ash sludge broke through a dike of a 40-acre holding pond at tva’s kingston coal-fired power plant covering 400 acres up to six feet deep, damaging 12 homes and wrecking a train.
according to the epa the cleanup will take at least several weeks, but could take years. officials also said that the magnitude of this spill is such that the entire area could be declared a federal superfund site.
...as many people in the blog world are noting, it's this sort of thing that really makes the proposition of clean coal so absurd. even if you can scrub all the co2 out of it, you still have so many other toxic waste products associated with burning coal that have to be stored that carbon emissions are just a part of the problem. - treehugger
Labels: disasters, energy, environment
mad about banks
right back atcha
too cute for words
bernie's criminal enterprise affects l.a. foodies
it's a good thing nancy silverton still has her day job.here's hoping that nancy's sister gail didn't lose everything along with her, as gail is part owner of the gelato bar which supplies their amazing gelato to spoon, here in santa barbara.
the la brea bakery founder and queen of l.a.'s restaurant scene is among the legions of investors who've lost their fortunes in the alleged $50-billion fraud attributed to new york financier bernard l. madoff.
...silverton said she learned the bad news from her father when she called him at his office as she was driving up to napa valley about two weeks ago.
"he said, 'I want to tell you something. everything's gone. we lost everything.' " -latte times
Labels: banking, criminal, food, los angeles, restaurants
Tuesday, December 23, 2008
skippy's tuesday nite music club
christmas singers - grab your balls like michael jackson
granted, the video quality sucks, but this time of year, what child doesn't want to grab his balls like michael jackson?
using spare tires as fuel for the suv
liposuctioning unwanted blubber out of pampered los angelenos may not seem like a dream job, but it has its perks. free fuel is one of them.
for a time, beverly hills doctor craig alan bittner turned the fat he removed from patients into biodiesel that fueled his ford suv and his girlfriend's lincoln navigator. - forbes via ecorazzi and autobloggreen
Labels: cars, gas, los angeles
christmas movies that aren't about christmas
yesterday while watching tv we happened to catch a glimpse of two different movies that, interestingly enough, were set during the holidays, but most definitely were not about the holidays.
first, on bravo, we watched the beginning court room scene and subsequent reinstatement of their poltergeist-chasing business of ghostbusters ii. we had forgotten that that film was set during christmas time, until we saw the sidewalk santa ringing his bell for change outside of the courthouse as peter venkmen, ray, egon & their lawyer emerged triumphantly from winning their trial (by exorcising the ghosts of the scoleri brothers, whom the judge had sentensed to electrocution years before).
then, we switched over to american movie classics to catch the bombing of the american naval base in hawaii in michael bay's pearl harbor. of course, since this was the date of dec. 7th, which will live in infamy, it was christmas time. a few scenes showed tinsel and santa just before the bombs exploded.
the actual attack sequence is the only good thing about that film, and once it was over, we did something more productive (switching over to a law and order rerun, we think. one w/lenny). but we got to thinking: what other great films are set during the holidays, but are definitely non-holiday in their themes?
by that we mean, not "counter" to holiday themes, (ie, bad santa, a funny, but still very holiday-centric movie). but rather we mean that the timing of when the action takes place is incidental to the action, themes, and character development.
off-hand, aside from the two above we saw, we can think of die hard and gremlins. both take place during christmas time. but either could easily take place any other time of the year, and still pretty much would be in tact.
any suggestions?
those traditional thanksgiving clams
but we are using this space to consider the non-traditional fare that we've come across in the last few years. one thanksgiving many years ago when mr. & mrs. skippy had neither the time nor energy nor the inclination to spend a day and a half preparing a huge turkey dinner w/all the trimmings, they decided that year to celebrate the bountiful harvest by having spaghetti w/clam sauce, one of their fav dishes in the non-holiday days.
the joke, from then on, was the "traditional holiday clams."
another great food to be enjoyed this time of year can only be found up beachwood canyon in los angeles. beachwood canyon is a lovely series of roads that snake into the hollywood hills (and in fact, is where the famous hollywood sign resides). a few blocks up the canyon on gower street is the convent of the angels, one of the last convents in america where the dominican nuns are cloistered.
and the hip foodies in los angeles know that this time of year is when the nuns offer their home-made ('convent-made'?) pumpkin bread for sale. better than fruitcake, more substantial than any holiday pie, but not as over-sweet as cakes, this great bread has the texture and quality of fresh-baked gingerbread, only with the taste of pumpkin.
![Photobucket](http://web.archive.org./web/20150906201225im_/http://i32.photobucket.com/albums/d11/skippybkroo/Pumpkin.jpg)
the pumpkin bread makes great gifts, because not only is it delicious, the whole story of cloistered nuns making dessert from scratch is a rather christmas-y kind of tale to start with.
mr. & mrs. skippy always buy a few for presents to co-workers and friends, and are sure to keep a couple of extra loaves for their own holidays.
does anyone else have some non-traditional tradtions for holiday treats?
[cross-posted at you look hungry]
american express doesn't like poor people
kevin d. johnson returned from a dreamy jamaican honeymoon in october eager to check out wedding photos and help his new wife open stacks of beautifully wrapped wedding gifts.
before getting distracted by the fun stuff, the 29-year-old entrepreneur opened the mail. johnson’s mood soured when he got to a letter from american express, saying it had slashed the credit limit on his account.
johnson was surprised, since he has a perfect payment history and a high credit score. and he was floored by one of the reasons american express cited: it didn’t like where he shopped.“other customers who have used their card at establishments where you recently shopped have a poor repayment history with american express,” the letter said. johnson complained to american express by phone and letter.
...american express declined to discuss johnson’s account. but it confirmed that it examines spending patterns. it’s just one of many tactics that credit card companies are using to try to keep default rates from growing higher. along with studying shopping habits, american express considers which mortgage lender a customer uses and whether the customer owns a home in an area where housing prices are declining. - atlanta journal constitution
Labels: banking, class warfare, consumerism
recent college grads getting ready to rumble?
a new report by the u.s. army war college talks about the possibility of pentagon resources and troops being used should the economic crisis lead to civil unrest, such as protests against businesses and government or runs on beleaguered banks.
“widespread civil violence inside the united states would force the defense establishment to reorient priorities in extremis to defend basic domestic order and human security,” said the war college report.
...u.s. sen. james inhofe, r-okla., and u.s. rep. brad sherman, d-calif., both said u.s. treasury secretary henry paulson brought up a worst-case scenario as he pushed for the wall street bailout in september. paulson, former goldman sachs ceo, said that might even require a declaration of martial law, the two noted.- bizjournals
Labels: bailout, class warfare, economy, war
bribery and influence peddling
oh...i just feel so much safer now
san onofre nuclear plant under tighter federal scrutiny. federal inspectors said monday they will ratchet up scrutiny of the san onofre nuclear power plant after discovering that a battery meant to power safety systems had been inoperative for four years....apart from the battery, the commission discovered seven additional safety flaws that it described as minor in themselves -- including poor documentation and inconsistent follow-up on potential problems -- but that taken together formed a troubling picture.- latimes
Labels: energy, nuclear power
Monday, December 22, 2008
skippy's monday nite music club
some hallucination or other - santa in the sky with reindeer
is there even really a country of france or not?
this letter was a fake. it should not have been published.
doing so violated both our standards and our procedures in publishing signed letters from our readers.
we have already expressed our regrets to mr. delanoë's office and we are now doing the same to you, our readers.
this letter, like most letters to the editor these days, arrived by email. it is times procedure to verify the authenticity of every letter. in this case, our staff sent an edited version of the letter to the sender of the email and did not hear back. at that point, we should have contacted mr. delanoë's office to verify that he had, in fact, written to us.
we did not do that. without that verification, the letter should never have been printed.
but try to convince wen ho lee of that.
that will learn them
i wonder why incurious george has the sudden interest now? is it because voice of america reports:
Mr. Mugabe said he had taken control of agriculture by seizing nearly all white-owned farms, and that it is now time to take over all foreign companies, in particular foreign-owned banks.
Labels: aWol, banking, foreign policy
Sunday, December 21, 2008
skippy's sunday nite music club
harry potter, ron weasley, draco malfoy, albus dumbledore - the chipmunk song
Saturday, December 20, 2008
skippy's saturday nite music video
the kids @ bev facey community high school - christmas shoppin'
granted, these kids are terrible singers and dancers, but you can't beat their enthusiasm, and who doesn't like grease parodies? ("sell me more, sell me more...")
Friday, December 19, 2008
skippy's friday nite music club
santa & the elves - bohemian christmas rhapsody
merry xmas to him, al franken
the intense scrutiny of "voter intent" resumed today by the five-member board charged with directing minnesota's recount in the u.s. senate race between incumbent republican norm coleman and democratic rival al franken, and the day's rulings turned the challenger's slight deficit into a triple-digit lead.
…
on thursday, the board reviewed coleman's challenges of hundreds of election day ballots, and the day's work saw the unofficial margin between the candidates dwindle to within a handful of votes.
then, as the board took up and rejected more coleman challenges today, franken pulled ahead in the opening minutes and steadily built his advantage to about 250 before the panel recessed until monday.
we write letters
one reason civil rights are important to me is because i'm denied them. my partner of 15 years and i are can't get married. and pe obama thinks that's fine. he also thinks i should be fine with listening to a man whose compared my relationship to polygamy and incest giving the invocation at his inauguration. as a christian (the whole 9 yards, steward of my church, teach sunday school etc), i am offended at the choice of a preacher of such hatred in the name of christ to represent my sectarian identity. as some who believes in the separation of church and state, i'm offended that there would be an invocation or benediction at the inaugural at all. and as a queer, i have only one conclusion - pe obama wanted a sister soulja moment to make the chuck todds of this world happy. for obvious reasons, the democrats need a new minority group to slap around. it's my misfortune to be in the one you've chosen. i hope you've succeeded in making the villagers happy.
please remove my name from all your mailing lists. after more than 30 years of active participation in the democratic party, i’m changing my voter registration to unaffiliated. maybe rick warren's parishioners will phonebank for you in 2012.
sincerely,
pudentilla
Thursday, December 18, 2008
skippy's thursday nite music club
not r. kelly - trapped in the clauset part 1
part 2
part 3
Wednesday, December 17, 2008
skippy's wednesday nite music club
don romano & andrew mack - have a bowie/crosby christmas
just in case you don't get it, here's the original...
mad about caroline kennedy
question of the day...
Tuesday, December 16, 2008
skippy's tuesday nite music club
some guy - a barack obama christmas carol
shoes for industry! shoes for the dead! shoes for industry! hi, i'm joe beets
Monday, December 15, 2008
skippy's monday nite music club
janice dickinson - 12 days of christmas
this one's for cookie jill
i don't care who wins; it is nice to do that we will have a guy who can handle his pretzels in the white house.
Labels: food, obama, white house
this thing in iraq?
nope. it's really a guazzabuglio.
well, it is...
Labels: iraq war
Sunday, December 14, 2008
skippy's sunday nite music club
two stoned guys - oh chronic tree
congrats
question of the day...
alaska gov. sarah palin's home church was badly damaged by arson, leading the governor to apologize saturday if the fire was connected to "undeserved negative attention" from her campaign as the republican vice presidential nominee.
damage to the wasilla bible church was estimated at $1 million, authorities said. no one was injured in the fire, which was set friday night while a handful of people, including two children, were inside, according to james steele, the central mat-su fire chief...
some idiot has a lot of explaining to do...
Labels: lawlessness
"shoo!"
u.s. president george w. bush had two shoes thrown at him sunday during a news conference in the iraqi prime minister's office in baghdad.
the man who threw the shoes, apparently a journalist, shouted an arabic phrase, which reportedly translated as, "this is a farewell kiss, dog," the new york times reported sunday.
bush ducked and narrowly missed beingstruck by the first shoe, and the man threw a second shoe, which also came close to hitting the president.
"all i can report is it is a size 10," bush said jokingly...
credit where credit's due: awol may be one of the most reviled people in the world today, but he just keeps on smilin'. maybe he's finally said eff-it and hopped off the water wagon, who knows...
Labels: funny stuff
Saturday, December 13, 2008
skippy's saturday nite music club
camryn manheim steamroller - have you ever had fruitcake?
Friday, December 12, 2008
skippy's friday nite music club
some dude in a hat - christmas carols in a minor key
self-explanatory
minnesota canvassing board sides with him, al franken
the coleman campaign, however, is now asking the minnesota supreme court to halt the counting of the absentee ballots until, per the star tribune's reporting, "the justices can rule on the campaign's request that they order counties to follow a standard procedure in identifying wrongfully rejected ballots." for the time being, the coleman campaign merely appears to be seeking a constituent standard for the counting of the absentee ballots, rather than to preclude them from being counted in their entirety,
indeed, with the missing ballots having been restored to franken's total (although that ruling also may become the subject of a coleman lawsuit), it now appears as though the absentee ballots could well tip the balance of the race in franken's favor. whereas the state had originally estimated that between 500 and 1,000 absentee ballots had been rejected improperly, that estimate is now up to 1,600 wrongly rejected ballots. a pre-election poll showed franken leading by 8 percent among absentee voters, which would translate to a net gain of 128 ballots if there are indeed 1,600 such ballots to be counted. this estimate, however, is fairly crude, and nobody knows exactly how the rejected absentee ballots might break, although from my previous conversations with officials close to the franken campaign, franken also believes that a plurality of such ballots will be counted in his favor.
producers to actors: you can't get what even george w. bush recommends for americans
the tax agency said the optional standard rate to calculate deductible operating costs for business vehicles will rise from 50.5 cents a mile to 58.5 cents for the final six months of 2008.
and the producers are refusing to increase that number, even tho the government allows almost twice that.
Thursday, December 11, 2008
skippy's thursday nite music club
eric stiffler & kevin spellman & some elves - crank that santa claus
question(s) of the day...
Labels: questions
Wednesday, December 10, 2008
skippy's wednesday nite music club
the delgados - all you need is hate