There is no end to my

abhorrence, abomination, acrimony, alienation, animosity, animus, antagonism, antipathy, aversion, bitterness, coldness, contempt, detestation, disapproval, disfavor, disgust, displeasure, distaste, enmity, envy, execration, grudge, hard feelings, hate, horror, hostility, ignominy, ill will, invidiousness, loathing, malevolence, malice, malignance, militancy, odium, pique, prejudice, rancor, repugnance, repulsion, revenge, revulsion, scorn, spite, spleen, venom and hatred for the fuckers who are running this country.

Did you hear that they're finally getting off their asses to raise the Federal minimum wage? It's been stuck at $5.15/hr since 1996. In that time, congress has voted itself $35,000 in cost of living increases.
So cool, you think. Raise that mother up. Bring some people out of poverty. About time.
Then you see something like this and you realize that there is nothing, nothing that those shitheads cannot turn into self-serving, country-destroying, so-fucked-up-it-makes-you-bleed-from-the-eyes bullshit asshattery.
Congressional republicans will only raise the minimum wage if it comes along with eliminating the capital gains tax. Now excuse me while I go throw up.

My powers of understanding have failed

Why are Democrats falling over themselves to prove who is the most pro-Israel?

Shout-out to the West Coast (and the South, and the Midwest, and Europe and...)

Hot enough for you?

See the damn movie and then fight as hard for this cause as you have for anything, ever. Trust me, we're not going to give a shit about gay weddings, Gitmo or Palestine when we're all fucking drowning.

The Bright Side of Global Warming

First, watch this fine piece on Colbert (and yes, now that I've discovered youtube there's no turning back. BBD goes multimedia!):



Funny, right?

Now read this article (I know it's long. Just read it, ok?) that came out THE NEXT DAY in the Wall Street Journal on the front page, above the fold. (Note - article slightly cut for legal purposes but you get the idea.)

Feeling the Heat: For Icy Greenland, Global Warming Has a Bright Side - As Temperatures Inch Up, Melting Glaciers Bring New Life to a Frozen Land - But Could Polar Bears Vanish?

By Lauren Etter

QAQORTOQ, Greenland -- Stefan Magnusson lives at the foot of a giant, melting glacier. Some think he's living on the brink of a cataclysm. He believes he's on the cusp of creation.

The 49-year-old reindeer rancher says a warming trend in Greenland over the past decade has caused the glacier on his farm to retreat 300 feet, revealing land that hasn't seen the light of day for hundreds of years, if not more. Where ice once gripped the earth, he says, his reindeer now graze on wild thyme amid the purple blooms of Niviarsiaq flowers.

The melting glacier near Mr. Magnusson's home is pouring more water into the river, which he hopes soon to harness for hydroelectricity.

"We are seeing genesis by the edge of the glacier," he says.

Average temperatures in Greenland have risen by 2.7 degrees Fahrenheit over the past 30 years -- more than double the global average, according to the Danish Meteorological Institute. By the end of the century, the institute projects, temperatures could rise another 14 degrees.

The milder weather is promoting new life on the fringes of this barren, arctic land. Swans have been spotted recently for the first time, ducks aren't flying south for the winter anymore and poplar trees have suddenly begun flowering.

Greenland represents one of the largely unrecognized paradoxes of global warming. In former Vice President Al Gore's recent film "An Inconvenient Truth," the melting of Greenland's ice cap, along with a similar cap in the Antarctic, is portrayed as one of the greatest threats of global warming. If the layers of ice and snow holding billions of tons of water were to melt, scientists warn that global sea levels would rise by 40 feet, submerging lower Manhattan, the Netherlands and much of California.

But to many of the people who live here in Greenland, the warming trend is a boon, not a threat.

It is no small feat to get things living and growing in Greenland, an arctic and sub-arctic country at the northern tip of North America whose frigid landscape is often confused with Iceland, a smaller, greener European island nation to the southeast.

More than 80% of Greenland is covered in ice. Temperatures in the south regularly drop to 22 degrees below zero during the long, dark winters when the sun shines for as little as five hours a day. Intermittent frosts during the four-month growing season make it difficult for anything to thrive.

Even small increases in temperature can make a big difference in the quality of life for many Greenlanders who scrabble out a living at the whims of the weather. Freezing temperatures are the biggest factor limiting plant growth in Greenland. If the average temperature warms just a degree or two, the number of freezing nights is reduced. Higher temperatures produce stronger, healthier plants and provide farmers larger crop yields.

Already, the temperature rise in Greenland has extended the growing season by two weeks since the 1970s -- no small matter since those two weeks come during the spring and summer when the sun shines for as long as 20 hours a day in southern Greenland. Warmer days allow farmers to take better advantage of the extended sunlight, which gives plants more energy and a better chance to survive and thrive. If temperatures rose enough to allow the growing season to begin in late April, rather than mid-May, Greenlandic farmers might be able to grow fruit, including strawberries or apples.

Improved crop production could help wean Greenland from its heavy dependence on expensive, imported produce: Greenlanders pay about $3.50 for a cucumber at a local grocery store, $5 for a head of lettuce and $7.50 for a pound of carrots. Since 1980, Greenland has seen farmland devoted to growing crops increase to about 2,500 acres from 620 acres.

For Mr. Magnusson and his reindeer ranch, the longer grazing seasons mean fatter animals for slaughter, since reindeer gain about half a pound per day during the spring and summer grazing season. More abundant grasslands have prompted one farmer to buy cows for a government-funded experiment in dairy farming. A longer growing season allows crop farmers to expand their home gardens into commercial enterprises. Fishermen have begun catching tons of warm-water cod, after that fish's long absence from the region.

"We have so many cold places in Greenland, and a lot of it is covered with ice," says Mr. Magnusson. "So we are grateful for those two extra degrees we get."

Other places are also seeing benefits from a warming trend. For every 1.8 degrees of warming, Canada's wine-growing region can expand 120 miles northward as the climate becomes suitable for growing wine grapes, according to David Phillips, the Canadian government's senior climatologist.

Thirty years ago, farmers in the Peruvian Andes were unable to cultivate crops above 14,000 feet because it was too cold, says climate scientist Anton Seimon. Now, farmers are planting large potato fields at 15,000 feet.

Many climate scientists argue that any local benefits of the warming trend are more than offset by the global costs. One worry: That discussion of the benefits could undermine efforts to slow global warming. "I'm not keen to provide ammunition to those who oppose action," said Dr. Wallace Broecker, a researcher at Columbia University's Earth Institute, in an email declining an interview. "Of course there will be benefits. But the net will be bad."...

...Josef Motzfeldt, Greenland's Vice Premier and Minister of Finance and Foreign Affairs, says he worries about the places that may be engulfed by the sea if Greenland's glaciers melt. "When the seas rise just one meter, it will be a big catastrophe," he says.

Warmer weather has a downside even in Greenland, Mr. Motzfeldt points out. It's hindering the native Inuit's traditional way of life, undermining their ability to hunt seals and polar bears on the thinning ice. He's concerned that polar bears could "disappear completely" in the changing environment.

Even Greenlanders who welcome the recent climate changes recognize a downside. Mr. Magnusson says he typically uses a snowmobile to herd his 2,300 reindeer. But the area where he can use his snowmobile is shrinking, and the melting snow and ice could eventually make snowmobiling impossible. He says he will adapt by using horses, helicopters or by simply walking.

Still there's no denying the good news for many Greenlanders. "If we are egoistic, we will be happy," says Mr. Motzfeldt. "We have longer growing seasons for the plants and the vegetables."

Many here see warming as an important step toward greater economic independence from Denmark, which still provides about half of Greenland's government revenue. With just 57,000 people on the roughly 840,000-square-mile island, Greenland's gross domestic product is $1.1 billion, about a quarter of the GDP of Fiji, a South Pacific island nation of about 7,000 square miles...

...From the early 1960s to 1998 cows were rare in Greenland, and Greenlanders relied on powdered milk subsidies from the Danish government. But improved grazing and hay fodder are tempting some farmers and sheep ranchers to add cows to their livestock holdings.

For Greenlanders, adapting to the effects of climate change is nothing new. Oxygen isotope samples taken from Greenland's ice core reveal that temperatures around 1100, during the height of the Norse farming colonies, were similar to those prevailing today. The higher temperatures were part of a warming trend that lasted until the 14th century.

Near the end of the 14th century, the Norse vanished from Greenland. While researchers don't know for sure, many believe an increasingly cold climate made eking out a living here all but impossible as grasses and trees declined. Farming faded away from the 17th century to the 19th century, a period known as the Little Ice Age. Farming didn't return to Greenland in force until the early 1900s, when Inuit farmers began re-learning Norse techniques and applying them to modern conditions. A sharp cooling trend from around 1950 to 1975 stalled the agricultural expansion.

Since then, temperatures have mainly been on the upswing. Ole Egede is taking advantage of the warmer climate. He and his brother live on Greenland's southwest coast on an isolated farm at the head of an inlet that can be reached only by helicopter or by a boat that can navigate around the icebergs that often choke the blue fiord. Mr. Egede started Greenland's first commercial potato farm in 1999 and it remains the largest potato farm in Greenland.

Improved farming technology and methods, such as new cold-resistant seed varieties and cultivation techniques -- are responsible for some of Greenland's expanding agriculture. But experts credit the more-favorable climate with much of the new growth. "There's no doubt he's now growing potatoes because of better conditions," Mr. Hoegh, the farming consultant, says of Mr. Egede.

Greenland's fishermen also are beneficiaries of the higher temperatures. Warm-water-loving cod, one of the region's most commercially lucrative fish, are booming in the balmier coastal waters. In the 1960s, 90% of all fish caught in Greenland were cod. But a string of cold winters in the late 1980s drove off much of the cod population by the early 1990s.

The cod, says commercial fisherman Kim Hoegdan, "just came within the past three years. We have never seen them before in this amount."

Mr. Hoegdan says he expects to catch as much as 440,000 pounds of cod this year, up from about 3,000 pounds two years ago, when the fish began trickling back.

Shrimp -- Greenland's largest export -- could actually decline in numbers since they prefer colder water, and are eaten by cod. But the value of an increased cod harvest likely would exceed any losses of a reduced shrimp harvest, according to the Arctic Climate Impact Assessment, a multigovernmental study looking at the social and economic consequences of the warming. A revitalized cod industry could double the export earnings of the Greenlandic fishing industry, according to the 2005 report.

Greenlanders are aware that the benefits brought to them by global warming could spell disaster for people elsewhere. But as long as the temperatures are rising, they're determined to make the most of it.

"We, as people, need warmer weather as well," says Mr. Frederiksen, the sheep farmer.

I don't really have any clever snarky comments to make. When reality surpasses satire, irony is cheap.

About that war...

I've been toying with this one in my head for a few days now, and I'm not sure that I'm going to get it right, but I think its worth a try. Keep in mind that I have no special knowledge of anything at all, I'm just a girl who likes to read and talk shit. And I live in a happy safe bubble where no bombs are falling (yet) and so it's easy for me to say all this.

What's going on in the Middle East is incredibly scary. Reading the news of watching TV has become harrowing, and the mix of guilt and fear and terror and pity is really tough. The destruction of Lebanon is a crime and morally reprehensible, and god even knows what's happening now in Gaza, and Ethiopia and Somalia and Iran and North Korea and Iraq and Syria and maybe Egypt and ugh, I can't help it but I've got that 'this is it - we're all going to die' voice in the back of my head. It's all really, really scary.

But.

It seems callous to say this but this kind of shit has been happening in that part of the world forever. Conflict is the norm. There's been a little lull recently, but really - war is not new in Beirut. The thing I want to point out is the direction that the alarmism is coming from. Then you notice that all the "OMG IT'S WORLD WAR III" talk is coming from Fox News and the far right. It's Gingrich, Hannity. O'Reilly and Co. that keep repeating it, and that can only mean that it's a GOP Talking Point. Comic genius and sexpot Stephen Colbert has a clip of a bunch of blowhards who got the memo:



So you have to stop and think. From the very beginning of this situation, I've noticed that the papers on the left and the international press (I tend to read
Le Monde and The Guardian and struggle through La Repubblica, all left of center-ish) have had a different take. They say that this is a very serious issue, and a humanitarian crisis, and possibly even a war crime. They say that this is horrible and scary. They also say that there is little chance that this conflict will spread beyond the region. In essence, this is chapter MCXII of the same old story.

Why the discrepancy? For some reason the right wants us to think that This Is It. To be honest, I don't know exactly why. I don't know whether it's some sort of crazy Book of Revelations end times shit, or whether it has to do with making money for defense contractors or whether its just the same damn fearmongering so a cowed populace will vote republican. I wonder whether terrorism turned out to be not as big a deal as they had claimed and so they need to amp it up in order to keep their sweet sweet military contracts. I wonder whether it's, if not part of the plan, at least a side bonus that more terrorists are being created, so we will can live in fear forever. Because one thing is very clear to me - they (you know, Them) want us to be afraid. Always. When we act out of fear we act out of our lizard brains - our old, reactionary self-preservation easily manipulated brains. It is fear that is keeping their machine running - fear of terror (a bit of a tautology, if you think about it), fear of gays, people of color, immigrants, it doesn't matter - fear. And the thing with fear is that after a while, if you've lived with the same threat for long enough, you're no longer afraid of it. You learn to adapt. So there needs to be some new threat. Something else to keep you on edge. The more terrorists there are, the more people across the world who shout and demonstrate and hate us, the better it is for the GOP. Search your feelings - you know it be true.

Also - notice we're not talking too much about that other place too much lately, what's it called? Iraq. What a coinky-dinky.

So whatever the reason I think it's really important to try and keep a little bit of a cool head and realize that the panic is being whipped up by the right and to be terrified - to think that this is the beginning of WWIII - is exactly what they want.

That said, yes it's fucking scary.

Madness

How can we not be calling for a ceasefire in Lebanon? SO much destruction, so much killing, and we're cheering it on. What is going on?

You is talkin loco and I like it!

We've always always always loved Dave at our place. We tune in to Letterman for at least a few minutes several nights a week. We were in ecstasy when the Billo smackdown took place. The man gets more and more overt with his politics every day (while Leno stews in the land of obvious-dick-jokes), up to this top 10 list from a couple weeks ago:

Top Ten Chapter Titles in George W. Bush's Memoirs...

10. "101 Ways I've Misspelled Condoleezza"
9. "Why Mom and Dad Voted for Kerry"
8. "The Best Memos I've Ever Read"
7. "The War in Iraq, a 6-Foot Sandwich, and Other Things I Started But Couldn't Finish"
6. "How to Lose an Election and Still Become President"
5. "Good News America -- Just 923 More Days"
4. "1962-1964: The Cheerleader Years"
3. "Huh?"
2. "Bubba Was Right -- Monica Is Up for Anything"
1. "Chapter 20...Or Is That My Approval Rating?"

Dave could be a poster child (or Harry!) for why liberalism is basically common sense + common decency. Plus my friends and I saw Alan in a restaurant the other night--it was cool :)

Puts the flake in snowflake

I came close to putting my fist through several glowing boxes yesterday because of bitch boy Bush and his sickening base-pandering veto bullshit. First the computer, when I read that he said 'these boys and girls deserve to live,' referring to... clumps of cells... oh god... and then later, watching Keith, when they actually showed those freaky ass children of the snow corn and 1) Bush said we mustn't take innocent human life--okay, what does this even mean?? is the logical point I'm missing, that those of us who've already been born aren't innocent because of, like, original sin? like all those people we're killing everywhere? not innocent? no?--then 2) Sam Brownback Mountain did this unbelievably obnoxious presentation, complete with visual aids, on the children of the snow corn and how they don't want their embryonic brothers and sisters to die. This is the same logic by which every time a woman has a miscarriage, even when it's so early on that she didn't even know she was pregnant, which by the way happens all the time (look it up), we should all grieve the loss. Which is a nice thought and all, but completely ridiculous, especially given the overwhelming scientific incentive of the damn stem cell research. I'd bet money that if Bush was asked to explain the miracle of life he'd get some part of it totally wrong, like it'd still somehow involve a stork.

Is there a word for something that would be really funny if it weren't so damn depressing?

Maureen Dowd, from behind the wall of TimesSelect (which, btw, is worth it just so you never again have that "aaarrgh damn TimesSelect! Curse you!" moment again) manages to elucidate exactly what it was about The Decider's G8 open-mike night that was so disturbing. He's like the anti-Prince Hal (does that make Iraq the anti-Agincourt?). For all you legal eagles out there, I snipped two paragraphs out to make this more or less legal, I think.

G-8 Frat House

Reporters who covered W.’s 2000 campaign often wondered whether the Bush scion would give up acting the fool if he got to be the king...

...“In many regards, the Bush I knew did not seem to be built for what lay ahead,’’ wrote Frank Bruni, the Times writer who covered W.’s ascent, in his book “Ambling Into History.” “The Bush I knew was part scamp and part bumbler, a timeless fraternity boy and heedless cutup, a weekday gym rat and weekend napster, an adult with an inner child that often brimmed to the surface or burst through.”

The open-microphone incident at the G-8 lunch in St. Petersburg on Monday illustrated once more that W. never made any effort to adapt. The president has enshrined his immaturity and insularity, turning every environment he inhabits — no matter how decorous or serious — into a comfortable frat house.

No matter what the trappings or the ceremonies require of the leader of the free world, he brings the same DKE bearing and cadences, the same insouciance and smart-alecky attitude, the same simplistic approach — swearing, swaggering, talking to Tony Blair with his mouth full of buttered roll, and giving a startled Angela Merkel an impromptu shoulder rub. He can make even a global summit meeting seem like a kegger.

Catching W. off-guard, the really weird thing is his sense of victimization. He’s strangely resentful about the actual core of his job. Even after the debacles of Iraq and Katrina, he continues to treat the presidency as a colossal interference with his desire to mountain bike and clear brush.

In snippets of overheard conversation, Mr. Bush says he has not bothered to prepare any closing remarks and grouses about having to listen to other world leaders talk too long. What did he think being president was about?

The world may be blowing up, and the president may have a rare opportunity to jaw-jaw about bang-bang with his peers, but that pales in comparison with his burning desire to return to his feather pillow and gym back at the White House.

“Gotta go home,’’ he tells the guy next to him. “Got something to do tonight. Go to the airport, get on the airplane and go home.” A White House spokesman said Mr. Bush had nothing on his schedule after he returned to Washington on Monday about 4 p.m...

...Perhaps it’s that anti-patrician chip on his shoulder, his rebellion against a family that prized manners and diplomacy above all. But when bored or frustrated, W. reserves the right to be boorish — no matter if the setting is a gilded palace or a Texas gorge.

He treated Tony “As It Were” Blair like the servant in “The Remains of the Day,’’ blowing off his offer to help with the Israel-Lebanon crisis, and changing the subject from substance to fluff at one point, noting about his 60th-birthday Burberry gift: “Thanks for the sweater. Awfully thoughtful of you.’’ Then he razzed the British prime minister, who was hovering and wheedling like an abused wife: “I know you picked it out yourself.”

After doing his best to undermine the U.N. and Kofi Annan, W. talked about the secretary general like a fraternity pledge he wanted to send out for more beer or a keg of Diet Coke: “I felt like telling Kofi to get on the phone with Assad and make something happen.’’

His loosey-goosey confidence that everything could be fixed with a phone call — and not even a phone call made by him, and not even a phone call made to the Iranians, who have more control over Hezbollah — was striking. He seems to have no clue that his own headlong, heedless actions in the Middle East have contributed to the deepening chaos there, and to Iran’s growing influence and America’s diminished leverage.

Mr. Bush may resent the sophistication required of a president. But when the world is going to hell, he should stop chewing and start thinking.

More Zizou Interview

This time without the giant screen in the back saying "Zidane L'Interview" in 80's style jagged script.
Part One:


Part Two:

Zidane Interview

Il ne regrette rien.

Unsatisfied

I don't feel like my previous post said what I wanted to say. I haven't managed to verbalize why the whole Zidane thing is so fascinating. You could try reading this interview from 2004 for a little bit of the fascination. But there's something enormous about it. Maybe it was partly to do with it happening at in the most-watched event in the world, live. A collective shock went through the air. But maybe it's because it's so Shakespearean. Or maybe the pure focused rage, the intensity you can feel in that moment. Even on a shitty grainy youtube video it pops out of the screen. I wish I had seen it in HD. So maybe it's the purest expression of charisma. Or the ability of life, reality, to be genuinely shocking. Of men to be larger than the scripted roles we plan for them. Or the biggest badass move ever. Or as Azulita says, the way he steps back on his left foot afterwards. I can't explain it.
On the internets there are already websites, games, songs, photoshop pictures. The press has moaned about how he has tarnished his legend, but everything that has come from the bottom up seems to imply that he is becoming a folk hero. I hope that France is a place that loves a touch of gangsta like we do. I found a good sign in a French person's comment in the Guardian:

Why do we love even more Zizou? Because he said us football isn't just business, marketing, ad, football is madness, fury too. He could lose millions of euros in one second (I fancy Beckam too but I can't imagine David doing it, he couldn't forget his business'dutys). Because In my country we love the great magnificient and looser people. And we are very happy to see how Zidane deprived the journalists of their holystory....beacause we don't like the "saints", the too much positive heros, we love the men, the real men (like the liar an unfaithfull Mitterand) and for us, his violence wasen't machos'violence. I remenber when I was 8, I broke the glasses of a boy who said my father was old. I had to apologize but I never did regret. It's typical about this country and today Zidane showed he was very french.
After "ich bin ein berliner" , "je suis un Zidane"

The Marseilles Handshake

Here's what's going on in the world:
- Israel has invaded Lebanon
- North Korea is test firing missles and Japan wants to hit them with a pre-emptive strike
- Over 100 people have been killed in Iraq in the last few days
- There are terrorist bombings in Mumbai
- The Bush Administration now claims that they are going to (finally) respect the Geneva Conventions

Here's all we care about:
- Zinedine Zidane

In case you've been living in a cave for the last couple of weeks, Zidane (nicknamed Zizou) is/was the captain and star of the French national soccer team and is an absolute beast. Watching him play can be a totally transporting experience. He can do things with the ball that are just remarkable. It's gorgeous. He is widely spoken of as the greatest soccer player of his generation. He is the child of Algerian immigrants and grew up in the pjs of Marseille, which is pretty fucking roughneck. That's as hard core as it gets in France, and believe it or not, it gets pretty hardcore in France (see: riots earlier this year). He is known for his humility and grace.

So in the second overtime of the World Cup final on Sunday, which was Zidane's final match before retiring, he had a couple of words with the Italian Marco Materazzi (who can be clearly seen tweaking his nipple which is just weird) and then, seemingly without warning, Zizou dropped his shoulders and gave Materazzi a huge head-butt to the chest. Materazzi fell to the ground and Zidane was sent off from the match, which France proceeded to lose on penalty kicks.

I'm sure the video is up on youtube or google - look it up. It's amazing. Notice how Zizou jumps back with his fists raised and looks ready to keep fighting if Materazzi didn't go down. He is keeping it more real than anyone has ever kept it.

Worldwide reaction was swift and enormous. A billion people watched it live. If you check google news right now, there are 4,000-odd stories about this (compared to 1,300 for the Mumbai bombings). You can't even find an article about Italy and the fact that they won the damn thing.

So that's the background.

The obvious question is WHAT THE HELL DID MATERAZZI SAY? Lip readers have been hired, investigations begun, the world sits on the edge of it's seat. In a few minutes (8:00 PM in France) he is set to do an interview to tell what happened.

On Sunday I thought, Zidane would not have done that if it wasn't something incredibly serious. Some reports suggest that he was called a filthy terrorist, or possible the son of a terrorist whore. So we thought, well, ok. That's a good enough excuse. Matterazzi deserved worse if that's what he said (keep in mind that the very multicultural French soccer team regularly has bananas thrown at it and hostile crowds make monkey noises at the black players - beautiful game, ugly fans).

But now? After more reflection I don't care if Materazzi just said that Zizou had bad breath becuase the head butt was so bad-ass, so above and beyond the call of any normal bounds of bad-assery, that I am madly in love no matter what.

'Nuff Said

Aaarraaaghhhh, splat. That's the sound of my head exploding. Really, what is there to say about these assclowns? It's clear they want us dead. Seriously.

Breaking...

Pentagon to follow the law!

Honestly, aren't you just a little embarassed that it's a big deal that we are going to, you know, actually obey the treaties we've signed? That said, yay for the rule of law and human rights. Mmmm, delicious human rights.

An article

I'm not really inspired to post anything, so here is a great article about Veronica Mars from In These Times called, "Veronica Mars, Class Warrior." That's right! Watching VMars is not just fun but totally pc too. We met the guy who wrote it at Ykos and corrected him vis-a-vis the Paris Hilton thing. He was really cool and loves him some VMars, so read it and bump up his traffic, yo!

On a serious note

My close personal friend, provider of luxury transport and basketball superstar O'Neil (aka O'Boy) is having brain surgery today to stop unexplained bleeding. He fully expects to be fine once they "take the staples out" of his head, but if you have any pull with the larger forces of the universe, put in a word for him right now.