So it's been a while ... seems like an eternity.

(e:chicoschica) and I are gearing up for the big move -- eight days and counting down!! It's starting to feel really weird, we have made a life for ourselves in NJ and now it's time to move on.

We've been too busy to reminisce though -- last two weeks have been a whirlwind. My sister's wedding in Baltimore two weeks ago, last week a really nice going-away party thrown by my buddy Bill and some other good friends, plus a family party the next day...this weekend we had our niece Camille's one-year birthday party (yesterday) and today we have chica's friends coming over for a homemade Indian feast (fortunately, cooked by our friend Sayandip, not by us! haha).

Tuesday or Wednesday I think chica will do an advance trip to B-lo to clean the apartment, which means she'll miss my dissertation defense (Wednesday)...but that's OK, our defenses are kind of boring anyway. So she cleans; I defend, get rip-roaring drunk, then finish packing all our stuff while hung over. :-) But wait! I still have to finish my syllabi and lesson plans for my courses, write my paper for an upcoming conference, revise the dissertation.... aaaaack! Oh, and did I mention that I'm completely broke? *sigh*

Aw hell, it's not as bad as losing $400 and a wallet full of credit cards and ID ( (e:jenks,200) ) but I'm feeling just a little overwhelmed right now. But soon we'll be in Buffalo, and that will make everything better, right? ;-)

My sister Liz is getting married this weekend. I'm happy for her but pissed about the fact that we have to drive to Baltimore on the final weekend of my big push to finish my dissertation, and with only 3 weeks left till the big move to B-lo. *sigh*

Nonetheless, I'm excited for her, not only because of the wedding, but because she has lost a ton of weight and looks fantastic. She's even featured as a success story on e-diets! Check it out:


I'm so proud of her. :-)

No that title is NOT meant as an ethnic or religious slur.

In case you haven't seen the news, the Middle East is on the brink of war, thanks to what many see as an overreaction by Israel to the kidnapping and killing of its soldiers by Hezbollah.

Video of the attack on the airport in Beirut:

I'm intensely interested in this not only because I study war, but because I have a friend who was in Lebanon when the Israelis bombed the Beirut airport. Fortunately she's nobody's fool so she scampered back to Syria, where she is studying Arabic this summer.

Her recent blogs give an interesting first-person take on the crisis from the point of view of an American political scientist in a country hostile to Israel. If I know Emily, she'll keep the news coming. She uses fifty-cent words but she's perceptive and the posts could be really intriguing.

At the moment, we're just hoping that the crisis/war doesn't escalate to include Syria...

Hey, just in case anyone cares, they announced the 2006-2007 Sabres schedule today...tix page at

I'm damn disappointed that my beloved NY Islanders will be at HSBC just once this year, and on New Year's Day no less. Oh yeah, that crowd will be REAL interested in getty noisy. Noise is always good medicine for hangovers. Ouch.

Anyway, for those of you nursing wounds from last month and wishing for revenge, there are a few chances to see the Sabres take on the Hurricanes.

I leave you with a funny picture of DP, the Isles' netminder. He looks a little hung over in the photo. Hmm, maybe even still drunk.


keep your eye on the puck

I have seen some choice graffiti in my time, but this is a new one on me. Sure beats all that stupid garbage about sitting on the toilet broken-hearted.



I found it scratched into a metal bistro table on Rutgers' College Avenue campus in New Brunswick, NJ. Apparently, from what I can tell, it's the Kool-Aid guy ( ) in drag. Note the fishnet stockings and high heels. Sweet.

I guess the artist almost got caught because the requisite "Ohh YEAHHHHHH" caption is unfinished.

Also, when I emailed the photo to someone, freaky old G-mail suggested some sponsored links, including this interesting one:

Do people really use that stuff? I can't tell if the Kool-Aid guy does or not.

OK, so I'm no tree-hugger, and I know some (e:strip)pers don't give a damn about the suburbs, but this story in the Buffalo News reminds me of some of the crap I was so happy about leaving behind in New Jersey.

Developer back to cut down foliage
Amherst officials say work appears to be legal

Amherst's foliage is on the chopping block - again.

Chain saws sputtered to life Thursday afternoon, clearing underbrush and felling more than 100 small trees in a Wehrle Drive plot owned by developer William Huntress. But while residents on nearby Bellingham Drive fretted over losing their backyard woodland, town officials assured residents that the developer's men appeared to be within legal bounds.

"We're just taking down all the trees that we are legally able to do," Huntress said.

Hey, why not? They're there, right? Who the fuck needs trees? Useless obstacles to creating a new vacant lot or something. This guy's got some nerve... Oh! But I'm just some sort of wacko environmentalist, right? And this developer is actually just doing what he needs to do to make a living, right? Read on:

Area homeowners were variously incensed and saddened by the renewed clearing.

"This is a spite cut," said Bellingham resident Ann Suchyna. "He [Huntress] will just destroy for the point of destroying."

"If Ann wants a park in her back yard, she should have moved in behind one," Huntress said.

OK, so maybe a little he-said, she-said bickering. They're probably both wrong. But remember the developer's snotty remark, OK? It's important. Now, keep going:

Construction of an office building on the site has long been stalled over a 1983 agreement between the town and the EPA, which forbids wetlands developers from connecting with the town's sewer line. Huntress' company, Acquest Wehrle LLC, which took over the land in 1997, has since sought a waiver from the regulation, but support from the Amherst Town Board has been tough to come by.

"There's no approval to build any kind of building on that property," [Amherst Assistant Building Commissioner F. Robert] Danni emphasized.

So wait... lemme see if I've got this straight... the developer bought the land 14 years AFTER the town's agreement with the EPA to preserve the wetlands area, and NOW he's complaining because the town won't give him a waiver to build an office building in that area? You've got to be kidding me.

I say, hey there asshole, if you wanted to build an office building, you should have bought property that's connectable to the town sewer line!

Ugh. For any of you who is sensitive to foul language or who has a developer in your family, I apologize if I've gone too far. But these bully tactics are total garbage, and no one should level a wooded area just because they're having a temper tantrum because they didn't do their own damn homework!

AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAUUUGH

I'm not really a vindictive person, but this really burns my ass:



For those who don't want to click over to the article, Ken Lay died of a coronary at his VACATION HOME in ASPEN.

Couldn't this prick suffer just a LITTLE for what he did to employees of and investors in Enron, not to mention the poor suckers in California and elsewhere who got to pay for this man's underhanded financial bullcrap?

Goddammit.