Trust Your Eyes

Once more it is book review time. Today’s selection from the BlogHer Book Club is Trust Your Eyes by Linwood Barclay. As usual, this is a paid review for BlogHer Book Club but the opinions expressed are my own. Join the discussion here!

When Ray Kilbride comes home after his father’s fatal accident, one of the things he must deal with is his schizophrenic brother Thomas: a recluse who thinks former President Bill Clinton has personally tasked him with memorizing every street in every major city on the behalf of the CIA. Thomas spends all day, every day, clicking down streets of the world using a tool that is absolutely not Google Maps at all against the possibility of a massive internet outage making all online maps inaccessible. Then one day, he spots what looks like a possible murder.

This has by far been my favorite of the books I’ve been asked to review. It is a thriller with more twists than a mountain highway. I absolutely promise there will be things you didn’t see coming. Chapters are generally short, so I found myself thinking “Oh, I have time for one more” often. It is unfortunate that any accurate description of the plot gives away what should have been the first twist in the Prologue.

A++, Would Read Again.

In Closing: be sure to read to the end; aw that’s sweet; I’m so glad somebody is asking what the heck information on 12,000,000 Apple devices was doing on a laptop for any reason; “Ok, you can play, but only approved games led by an adult”; dirty lies; wage stats; as expected; and I liked number 4.

I guess with a zillion products, some are bound to be amusing

Has anybody else done Hip Hop Abs? There’s a great moment where they start playing Don’t Cha and big ol’ Shaun T. exclaims “That’s my soooong!” (alas, just before this clip starts).

Well, at Walmart you’ll find that the Pussycat Dolls have their own workout DVD:

Right. You’re totally gonna look like working out just 4 minutes a day. If you are a cheapskate, there are excerpts over on Youtube.

In closing: Presidential Beer; Republicans, Taxes, and Debt; young people don’t necessarily care about cars (why would they if Daddy will drive them everywhere?); and Atomic Ranch.

Cat Ass Trophy

Or, Caturday, Film Festival Edition

Ok, I like cats well enough. I even have a cat. Sure, I occasionally look at pictures of cats online, with or without witty catpions (intentional misspelling). I’ve been sucked in by video of Maru the Box Cat at least once. I have posted about Stationmaster Tama and  library cats. IBKC and Cute Overload are linked in the sidebar. But you know, I think this cat thing has officially gone off the rails. 

Thursday night in Minneapolis, ten thousand people turned out for a festival of short films starring cats:

The crowd — easily double what organizers expected — packed the lawn outside the museum, spilling onto the sidewalks across the street. There were local cat lovers and out-of-state fans of Fluffy; many wore kitty-theme T-shirts or simply ears and whiskers. Some took real cats on leashes. A few dogs came, for irony.

They all settled in for a screening of cats behaving badly, or cutely, or mysteriously, sometimes all at once. That much of the audience had already seen the clips on YouTube did not seem to diminish the enthusiasm. Quite the contrary.

Keyboard Cat and Nyan Cat allegedly wanted to be paid to attend. Inasmuch as Nyan Cat is animated, I’d like to know how that would even work. I won’t link to those furry freeloaders now just on principal.

Did they actually use film, or did they just cue up 60 tabs in YouTube?

In Closing: more stuff to do in Vegas; we don’t need no steenking warrant; just say no to huge birthday bashes for little kids; “The recovery continues to be skewed toward low-wage jobs, reinforcing the rise in inequality and America’s deficit of good jobs”; of course job growth is variable by region (which is why we need streamlined short sales now) Double Dose of Ezra; is that where I’ve heard it before?; Etch-a-sketch; mathematically impossible; yes the Republicans have a place for single women, I guess; low carb diets do work; the study never said skinny monkeys, just underfed monkeys; and great timing.

Oh Boo Hoo

Fortune Magazine tells us that “For banks, it’s getting harder and harder to earn a buck.” That’s because interest rates are so low. Or at least that’s what “conventional wisdom” would tell us. Please cry for the banks and demand higher interest rates!

Not so fast. If banks are having such a hard time making an “honest” buck, then how come “U.S. bank earnings rose 21% in the April-June quarter and lending to consumers increased, adding to evidence that the industry is strengthening four years after the financial crisis.” Turns out there’s actually a good reason the banks are doing so well:

That’s because most of them have increased the historic spread between the interest they charge for mortgages and the interest they have to pay for their own borrowing and, of course, the now minuscule rates they pay to folks with savings accounts. As a result, according to a recent news story in the New York Times, bankers are enjoying ballooning profits from their mortgage business.

If the banks were using the formula that was in effect up until a couple of years ago, the 3.55 percent rate for a 30-year mortgage would be close to 3.05 percent. Or, they could increase the rates they pay savers by about a half percent.

So yeah, the gap between “what they pay you” and “what we pay them” got bigger despite mortgage rates near record lows.

I hope Fortune Magazine isn’t hoping for a subscription fee from me anytime soon.

In Closing:  you might want to disable Java; trying to change the law without bothering to involve lawmakers; 14.8% of Americans are on food stamps; and Boehner admits that the easiest way to win is for poor people to stay home on election day.

Have you seen this crazy thing yet?

Ok, here’s an explanation of that thing you just watched. It’s nice to see someone with a sense of humor about himself.
 

Ok, and here’s a Music Monday Bonus: 10 Songs that you’re more likely to have heard the cover than the original! Complete with videos.

In Closing: hiding in plain sight; seriously?; AOL paying shareholders $500,000,000 (didn’t know they still had that kind of money); pseudoscience; Senator Kay Bailey Hutchison defends the Republican stance on women without ever mentioning birth control or abortion (she does at least mention rape) (“People in red cars don’t necessarily drive fast. I used to own a red Ford Escort!”); and listen, if you are applying for a job with me, I don’t want to hear from your mommy. I hear from mom, and your resume goes straight in the NO pile.

Missing the Point

It is absolutely a tragedy what happened at the Empire State Building. Who can possibly predict that a guy who was laid off almost a year ago would come back and start shooting? Nevertheless, I’d like to digress for a moment to point out that it’s a lot safer to never hire a nutcase than to have to fire one. Screen your employees before you hire them, people.

So then let’s get into the nitty gritty, starting with this opinion piece talking about how NYPD officers use great restraint:

As a rule, it takes a lot to get NYPD officers to fire their guns at anyone. Despite a handful of isolated, but highly publicized, exceptions to this rule when officers have shot unarmed individuals over the past decade and a half, New York’s 35,000-officer force remains a worldwide model of firearms restraint and veneration for human life.

[snip!]

In rapidly unfolding and completely unpredictable situations, assessing the need to use firearms is often a split-second decision. It can mean the difference between life and death. Officers have to sift through confusion, fear and fragmented information.

In the incident outside of the Empire State Building, it is made more difficult because the street is one of the busiest in America. The officers had to take into account the risk of the gunman hurting potentially many people in the vicinity were he not stopped.

Look, nobody sane is disputing that they had to make sure this guy didn’t hurt anybody else. The man pulled his gun out and was clearly intending to shoot at the cops. This wasn’t a place to experiment with a taser.  What were they supposed to do, offer to buy him a latte and talk for a while??

The problem is not that NYPD had to shoot this guy. The problem is that out of the 16 shots fired, 3 hit the perp. All 9 innocent bystanders were shot by the cops trying to “protect” them.

Take aim at the real problem: aim.

In Closing: It’s the jobs, stupid; the important question is the one about whether his mom was born in Kansas; if no blacks support Romney and a minority of women and Hispanics and people under 35 support him, how can the polls possibly be as close as they’ve been? Are there really that many angry old racist men?; school internet safety; yep (so why are these guys still married?); if Republicans get their way, be ready for $10,000 per ounce gold; abused by the system; fake world leaders; can’t make this up; trash can babies; ok, but Goldman didn’t make the drought happen; over 20 serial rapists in Detroit so far; scary; probably not what life is like in Russia; and the old man speaks the truth.

Shorties Awakening

When Al Jazeera points this out, it’s a problem: School to Prison Pipeline. If you find this topic interesting (or horrifying, whatever), the ACLU is a great place to start.

Old Flowers: In this case, 32,000 years old. For those keeping track, that’s over 5 times as old as young-Earth creationists think the world is. <sarcasm> Miracle, or Satan’s lies? </sarcasm>

The Last Ninja: Is an engineer who admits that most of what he learned has no place in the modern world.

Break it down: Here’s where Google’s ad revenues come from.

Burnout: Half of doctors report some signs of it. I’m really disappointed that they didn’t even try to look at why they might feel that way.

It’s not your imagination: The middle class earned less than they did a decade ago.

Apparently Alabama law allows death threats on the job: Seriously.

That can’t be good: For all the news coverage of Romney talking about his energy plan, he specifically refused to go into details where the press might hear it (If this is true, shame on the press for not pointing out that they have an incomplete story). So, does he plan on making up details to suit his audience, or is his plan so out there that he doesn’t dare risk the general public learning the details? Either way, do we want him in charge? What is already known is attracting criticism from many places.

Music Monday: Old School Redheads

And now for something completely different, a Baroque Concerto for Two Violins by the Red Monk, Antonio Vivaldi. My favorite is the second movement. Sorry about the static video.

In Closing: Clearly this was compiled before the weekend political talkies; Siberian Princess; some miscellaneous food items; as someone with experience, I don’t think much of their mapping algorithm; who could have known that making sure people can afford a mortgage could prevent default??; 5 reasons the Romney/Ryan plan is bad for America; rhetorical ammo; roads; the unemployment rate sucks; Arnold has ad-libs bigger than that car; why we need Social Security; and they should have made him check the damned thing.

NASA can be cool

…. And not just because some of a geek with a mohawk.

It turns out that in addition to putting robots on Mars, they’re responsible for a lot of things that are making life better right here on Earth. Just keep clicking for more great tidbits.

Welcome to yet another internet rabbit-hole.

In closing: brains and beauty; you don’t need that crap anyway; I was wondering when somebody was going to notice this; pass it on; turns out that harassment is  sometimes a security issue; and Ezra’s still got it.

The Bar Set Low

Music Monday will be delayed a bit.

So. A woman will be allowed to ask questions of all the important men at the big Presidential Debates for the first time in 20 years. This is after a “recent push” to let a woman do this big, important job. That recent push, by the way, is from 3 female high school students that started an online petition.

Really? This is what passes for an achievement these days? Has the participation trophy movement finally reached this high? Whoop-dee-freakin-doo.

No mistake. Congrats to Candy Crowley for being named a moderator. I hope she holds their feet to the fire and won’t take lies for an answer. And congrats to those high school ladies that learned they can make a difference just by bringing enough attention to an issue. That’s a great civics lesson and one we adults should take to heart.

However, there are many more “women’s issues” that deserve the same kind of news coverage: your right to control the size of your family is a political football instead of a private and personal matter; some high school students are subjected to pregnancy tests (here’s a hint, none of them are boys); sexual harassment still exists (and I admit it cuts both ways sometimes); a woman can still lose her job for having kids; women still earn less than men while conservatives make excuses instead of solutions; and, as PunditMom points out, nobody’s asking who will be watching Paul Ryan’s kids while he’s on the campaign trail as they asked about Sarah Palin.

If only we could solve all those things with a couple of petitions.

There is no in closing today.