Man About Murfreesboro - blog - funny - politics

Nov. 30, 2007

Moving day. My office is moving downtown to 2nd Ave. That means an extra 4 miles or so onto my commute, but it also means I don't have to get on I-440 anymore. So, it's a trade-off.

The new space is nice: exposed brick, high ceilings, a view of the river and Titan's LP Field. It still smells of paint and . . . uh . . . I don't know . . . hope?

The new building is within walking distance of about a thousand restaurants. When you exit the front door, the smell of grilled meat and alcohol hits you pretty hard. Second Ave. used to be such a dump – a place full of second hand stores and locally owned dives. Now we've got Hooters and Hard Rock and B.B. Kings. The used book stores have been replace with souvenier shops to sucker the yokels into buying a cap with a confederate flag and "Pobody's Nerfect" on it.

But downtown is exploding now. People are living down here. It's where the action is, which I guess is why we moved here.

I've been plugging my way through Mass Effect. I finished the game in about 28 hours, but I skipped a lot of side quests, so I'm running through it again using my same character. That's an interesting feature to the game. Starting at square one with a 30th level character full of cash and high-end weapons adds an interesting wrinkle.

I'm playing her evil this time, pumping up the intimidation points and using the most ill-tempered of the dialogue options. I intend to see how far I can push this.

The game forces some difficult decisions on you. At one point, you're deep inside a lab complex with a small team trying to set up a bomb to blow the place up. Meanwhile, a second team of aliens are attacking the front door in an effort to distract the guards and give you a chance to get in and away. Before the opperation, you're asked to pick a human from your group to coordinate with the alien team. It is most likely a suicide mission.

So I picked Kaiden and sent him off. Williams came with me. We fought our way to the place where the bomb is to be detonated and we receive a call from the Kaiden. He's pinned down and needs help. I leave Williams to arm the bomb and take a group to go rescue Kaiden. About five minutes into my trip, I get a call from Williams. The bad guys are swarming the place. The dialogue box pops up and asks: Save Kaiden? Save Williams?

There are several moments like that in the game and I've explored maybe a third of the side quests. Very entertaining.

I'm firing up the smoker again tomorrow. I promised Roy that he could watch UT on my TV sometime during the season and he's calling in the favor for the SEC Championship on Saturday. Badger is going to join us and I'm smoking some salmon for the occasion.

I'm told it will be UT vs. LSU on CBS. I'm also told that the SEC stands for Southeastern Conference.

At our last family gathering, my brother Scott said it was a sin for anyone to have a flat-screen HDTV and not watch college football. So I guess I'll be watching my first college game since . . . well . . . since I attended the Iron Bowl sometime in the late '80s. Even then I didn't watch too much of the game.

I've discovered my first downside to the time-shifting nature of watching television via DVR. The other day I was watching a show called "Top Gear." It's a British show about cars that is extremely entertaining. These guys are crazy and that's always a good time. As I was fastforwarding through the commercials, Max saw something and had me rewind it.

It turns out that ION Television was showing the complete miniseries of "Terry Pratchett's Hogwatch" in a single showing. I had read the book to Max a few years back and we were both very excited about the idea of a live-action Pratchett film.

I did a search for the title and came up empty. I re-ran the commercial to make sure we got the channel and, yes, ION is part of our lineup. However, it had shown the previous Sunday and wasn't schedule to repeat.

Bugger!

Now that I know it exists, I've looked online for a DVD. It's only available in Europe. In the modern era of globalization, that shouldn't matter. I can order something from Europe. No problem. But it won't play in my DVD player because DVDs in Europe are coded differently than in the U.S.

So, until an American distributor decides to sell a miniseries based on an obscure (in America) autho's novel about how Christmas is celebrated in a alternative fantasy setting, I'm boned.

The story goes something like this: on the Discworld, their version of Christmas is called Hogswatch. Each year, the Hogfather flies a sleigh driven by four large hogs around the sky giving presents to the good little children on the disc. However, this year, the Hogfather has disappeared. It seems that too few children believe in him, so he stopped existing. Death, complete with skull face and scythe, decides to impersonate the Hogfather to encourage more people to believe in him and therefore, bring him back.

Unfortunately, the grim reaper has no real idea how to interact with children. So hijinks ensue.

Happy Hogswatch.

Nov. 19, 2007

I reserved a copy of Mass Effect at the GameStop at the mall. I used the remaining balance of the giftcard my boss gave me for Christmas last year. I've never reserved a game before because I've never been that excited about a game's release date. That's not quite true. I was very excited about Star Wars: Knights of the Old Republic II, but I knew it was popular enough that there would be copies somewhere on game day.

And Mass Effect will be the same. I'm certain that copies will not be in short supply. But I had some money on the gift card and when you reserve the game you got a bonus disk with some gamer pics and themes, so I went for it.

Two days ago, I got a call from GameStop.

"We just wanted to let you know that we will be having a midnight release party for Mass Effect on Monday night."

"Uh . . .thanks."

But no thanks. I have to work Tuesday morning. I can't be standing around the mall with a bunch of nerdcore gamers counting down the seconds until Mass Effect is available. The temptation to blow off sleep and just play it the rest of the night would be too great. And while I don't consider myself a nerdcore gamer, I've been looking forward to playing this game since I first heard about it more than two years ago. It is the reason I chose the Xbox 360 as my gaming platform. The release has been delayed so often that I was never sure we would ever see it.

Tomorrow, she is mine.

Speaking of nerdcore. Last night's episode of "The Simpsons" was amazing. Alan Moore, Art Spiegelman and Daniel Clowes all made appearances. As Dollie, Max and I watched, the insider jokes about the comics industry had me laughing out loud all by myself.

Laurie asked me to check out FreeRice.com. It's a site that has a vocabulary test. For each word you correctly define, they donate 10 grains of rice to United Nations programs to feed the hungry. She said she hasn't been able to get past level 41. Dollie made it to 42 last night. I have yet to get past 41.

Last night, more than an hour after Rozzy should have been asleep, she came padding into the living room lugging a plank of wood.

"Mama, this piece of wood was under my bed," she said.

"What were you doing under your bed?" she asked.

"I wasn't," she replied.

"Where was the wood?" I asked.

"Under my bed," she said.

"Did you get out of bed?" Dollie asked?

"No," she said.

"Then how did you see the wood?" I asked. She paused.

"I accidentally lied to you," she replied.

"Go back to bed," I said.

She's been "accidentally" lying to us for about a week now. On Friday, she came home with a "yellow" in her agenda. The teacher had written a note saying she didn't want to swap stations with the other students and at one point climbed on top of a bookcase. When Dolls read it, she told Rozzy that we would all discuss her punishment.

But I knew the perfect punishment for young Rosalind. For the entire weekend, she was not allowed to change her clothes during the day. That meant that whatever she put on first in the morning was what she was wearing all day. That may not seem like much of a punishment to you, but to Rozzy – who thinks nothing of changing her outfit three or four times a day – it was a proverbial hell on earth.

With Max, it is the exact opposite. I swear, without direct supervision, he'd wear the same socks and underwear until they rotted off of him.

I'm fixin' to get my smoke on as we prepare for Thanksgiving. I've picked up some salmon, chicken wings and I'm about to get a Turkey. I'm going to stink of hickory and mesquite – just like the Pilgrims. Heh.

Nov. 13, 2007

Politics is a stupid game. It really is. If you're into it, you have to spend half your life outraged over some perceived misstep by someone in the opposition and the other half outraged at the outrage on the other side. And when something really important comes before the legislative body what is the first thing we're told? "Let's set politics aside and work together." That's when you know that the knife is sharp and you're going to get it. It might be in the kidney, it might be in the bladder, but you're going to get the pointy end.

And in this stupid game of politics, election time brings out the hacks, the amateurs and the armchair pundits who earn their bread and butter by ginning up false outrage or playing down other's false outrage.

When I was in high school, my American history class held a mock debate between Ronald Reagan and Walter Mondale. The student who portrayed Reagan was a friend of mine named Ernie and the guy who played Mondale was a student teacher finishing up his degree. During lunch, my friend Ernie was talking to me about the debate.

"Ask me about veteran's benefits," he said. "I've got a whole pamphlet about veteran's benefits."

So, despite the fact that I could care less about veteran's benefits, I raised my hand and asked the question. Prompting him to score some unneeded points because the debate pretty much reflected the general election that year.

Sen. Hillary Clinton held a press conference recently in which she called on a student who asked a question about global warming. It came out later that the question had been given to the student by campaign staffers. Clinton claims to have had no knowledge of the question beforehand, but so what? It was a dumb move. She's the frontrunner, ahead in money and the polls. This is not the time for her handlers to be playing fast and loose with the press.

What this does is give Sean Hannity another month worth of shows on how Hillary takes phoney questions. It prompts reporters to wonder how often Clinton has planted questions in the audience.

Did he work up this outrage when Homeland Security held their phoney press conference? Did he go off on the Bush Administration when homosexual prostitute Jeff Gannon was lobbing softballs at President Bush from the White House Press Corps?

It's all a show, people and Clinton is supposed to be better at it than to get caught doing something so cynical. It's not like the question was a softball. It was designed to get her talking points out. This election cycle is going to last forever.

We really have to rethink our notions of privacy. Sure, I post this blog on a publicly accessible forum, use my true contact information and tell people a great deal about what I think about various topics; but I know what I'm getting into and my relative obscurity means that no one really cares what I write here.

I'm not on facebook or myspace because I'm not interested in social networking sites. Plus, people get burned on those things. Take the case of Kevin Colvin, an intern at Anglo Irish Bank's North American arm. He recently emailed his boss and implied that there was a family emergency that would require him to miss a couple of days of work.

The "emergency" turned out to be a Halloween party. We know this because he posted photos of himself on his facebook page. His boss saw them and responded to the original email cc'ing the entire company (and now the world). Oh, and did I mention that he's dressed as a fairy?

When I was a bright-eyed undergrad in journalism school, it was my understanding that we journalists were the great hope for society. It was our job to ferret out the undiscovered truth, hold public figures accountable to the public and write pithy headlines. Mine was the last class required to count headlines or use a graphics camera.

It was also my understanding that the public relations professional were the enemy of journalists because they were trying to push a particular point of view on what should be an exercise in objectivity. The PR students had sold their souls to corporate America.

Of course PR work pays better.

My first gig was as a PR flak. It was then I learned that it was the job of the noble PR professional to ensure that the client's work/story/project recieved it's due credit in the press. Journalists were, by and large, lazy and needed to be spoonfed the "truth." Otherwise they'll make up their own narrative and we can't have that. It was the advertising jerks who had sold their souls.

Currently, my job requires me to write the occasional print/radio or TV ad. While I don't sell ads, I'm often place in the role of selling the idea and advantage of advertising. On the publication side, it's what pays the bills. On the client side, it means giving up some credibility in exchange for complete control of the message.

I believe I've outgrown the idea that one profession is "better" than the other. The three aspects of media relations: editorial/public relations/advertising are like a dance. If everyone is professional and playing their part, it works well. If one person gets out of step, it makes us all look bad.

A journalist cannot depend on press releases to get the whole story. A PR professional cannot depend on journalists to print press releases unedited. An ad rep cannot depend on advertising to convince as many people as an honest, well constructed story will.

My friend Laurie recently called to say she'd given my name to a newspaper publisher who was looking for an editor. She told him about this blog. While I appreciate that she's thinking of me and, if publisher is reading, I appreciate your consideration; I'm just afraid there is very little in my blog that would attract a potential employer.

I met with a vendor recently who works in the field of search engine optimization. That is, making web sites Google-friendly. He was demonstrating how you can code pages to show up higher in Google searches and used his own site as an example.

"What is this?" my boss asked.

"That's my personal, don't-hold-it-against-my-company web site," he said. I made note of the URL so I could go back and read it later. It was full of political opinion and bloviating, not unlike my own site.

I feel for him. Well, not literally, but you know.

I've been reading a new comic strip called Cul de Sac. I enjoy it mostly because the main character reminds me of Rozzy.

Heh.

Nov. 5, 2007

I just got a call from Dollie. Someone stole Max's bike last night. My instinct is to say "well, it's our fault for leaving it out unlocked" but you know what? It isn't. It's the fault of the jerk who wandered into my carport in the middle of the night and stole the bicycle of a nine-year-old little boy.

I shouldn't wish bad things on people, I really shouldn't. But it's hard not to feel angry and violated. They left his bike helmet laying on the ground. Dollie said they rifled through her truck as well.

It's a small thing, easily replaceable, but they had better hope I don't see them riding that bike around the neighborhood. They had better hope that whatever plans they have for the bike, it includes sending it far, far away.

It was a busy weekend. On friday after work, Dollie and Badger met me in Nashville at The Flying Saucer to celebrate our friend Mitch's birthday. He and his family have been living up North for several years and moved back to Nashville about eight weeks ago. I somehow missed the email that announced that.

It was good to see them again. I also saw my old pal, Read. He was up to his usual lies and B.S., which is always entertaining.

On Saturday, Dollie and I went to the Exit/In to see They Might Be Giants. We brought one of her fellow grad students with us, as she is a big fan. Not as big, however, as the superfan we met in the crowd before the show. He was wearing a TMBG t-shirt and cap.

A note to all you kids out there: going to a concert is not like going to a sporting event. It is not cool to wear a band's t-shirt to their concert. It makes you look like a dork. And believe me, this guy was a huge one.

"I've been a fan since 'Flood,'" he said. "When did you start liking them?" Another note: Everyone has been a fan since "Flood." "Flood" was a big hit for TMBG and contained the singles that actually charted. That's like saying "I've been a fan of Beethoven since his 5th Symphony."

"I bought my first ep on cassette . . ." I said, pretending to think about it. "'Don't Let's Start' I think."

"So since right before 'Lincoln?'"

"Yeah," I said.

"Wow."

Technically, what I told him was true. My first TMBG purchase was the EP "Don't Let's Start." It featured a cassette cover with a snowman burning piles of cash. But I bought it after hearing "Flood."

Anyhoo, TMBG has been playing for 25 years or so, so the crowd was . . . diverse. Dollie's friend remarked that she looked around the group and was somewhat pleased that we were pretty good-looking for this crowd.

Of course there was this skinny blonde woman beside me who was throwing off the curve. She appeared out of nowhere. I looked to my right and was taken aback.

"Do you like your positioning?" Dollie asked.

"Not bad," I said. "I'm trying to figure out which of these losers is her date." She was there by herself, as far as I could tell. She kept texting someone and she seemed bored through the entire set by "Oppenheimer." I glanced around and noticed that lots of guys were eyeing her. It was the tight sweater and her attitude of wanting to be anywhere but here, I think. She was cute and all, but rail thin and carried that bored expression like a shield, keeping the pervs at bay.

Evidently, her date had stood her up, but after leaving a voicemail, she stood around for the first two songs of TMBG's set and took off.

That just left SuperFan. SuperFan knew all the lyrics to all the songs and let us know by singing them loudly. He carried a piece of paper and pencil to write down the titles of each song as it was performed. He hooted, hollered and pumped his fist in the air.

TMBG played for over an hour, gave two encores, including "James K. Polk" and called it a night. As we were leaving the venue, Dollie's friend wanted to go wait by the stage door to get the Johns' autographs. So, we stood in the cold as she described how her brother told her that they love this kind of thing and that the Johns feel bad when noone waits.

We stood there for a while between the back door and the tour bus. I felt a little silly. I'm damn near 40. I shouldn't be standing in the cold at 1 a.m waiting on a couple of adult alternative musicians to appear. But she's young and excited, so we stayed.

Finally John Finnell and their guitar player Dan Miller emerged and walked to the bus.

"Is that him?" she asked?

"That's him," I said.

"Oh my god!," she said. "That's him! I don't know what to do!"

At that point I walked to the truck laughing. I sat in the cab and waited for Dolls and her friend to come in out of the cold.

The next morning, Max's big question was "Did they play 'Experimental Film?'"

This prompted Max and Rozzy to sing:

"The color of infinity inside an empty glass . . . "

Like I said, they appeal to a diverse crowd. They wrote and performed the theme from "Malcome In the Middle." They've appeared on Homestar Runner. They were animated in an episode of "Tiny Toon Adventures." They wrote and performed the theme from "Higgly Town Heroes." Their children's album is a staple in our home. They are, without exception, my favorite band.

But I didn't wear their t-shirt to the show.

It looks like we're going to invite Dollie's family to our house for Thanksgiving this year. I'm gearing up to smoke a turkey and maybe some salmon.

Oct. 31, 2007

Today is, according to my brother Dan, "Satan's favorite holiday." It is also my mother's, but that's merely a coincidence. I won't go into the long, boring history of Halloween's pagan origins, it's adoption by early Christians, the rise of retail expansion and finally the adoption by late Christians. Suffice it to say that Halloween means different things for different people. You can take this quiz if you're wondering how much you really know. I scored 2 out of 9.

For my kids, it is a chance to dress up like ninjas and cats and get bags of free candy. For some adults, it's a chance to dress like a hooker and/or gawk at same. For still others, it is a chance to reinforce Biblical lessons. Sadly, for some it is a chance to make inappropriate contact with children. In Texas, state officials have launched "Operation Boo!" Sex offenders must stay home with exterior lights off and not answer the door to anyone but law enforcement.

I long for a simpler time when it was just about the candy.

It was always a fun holiday at my grandparent's house. My grandmother would dress up and pass out candy. She would keep count each year of the number of trick-or-treaters. Despite living in rural Bedford County, she got dozens of knocks on the door that night. Way more than we did in the big city of Shelbyville.

Over the years my enthusiasm for the holiday has ebbed and flowed. The year Max and I dressed as Batman and Robin was probably my favorite. I was Robin and Max was the tiniest Batman ever. Every doorbell we rang opened with a laugh and extra candy for the boy.

This morning, my daughter greeted me with "Happy Halloween, papa!" She's looking forward to having her face painted like the actors from "Cats" she saw in Tullahoma.

Awwwww.

Max and his BFF Jake are both going out as ninjas, Max in white, Jake in red. I'll hand out candy and pretend it doesn't bother me when the older kids show up without a costume and demand treats.

On Monday it was discovered that there was another "not-gay" Republican accused of having sex with a man. His name is Richard Curtis and he's a state rep in Washington. He's also a reliable conservative voter who co-sponsors legislation to discriminate against gays. On Monday, he denied having sex with a man. In the vein of Larry Craig, he claimed to not be gay.

Of course, the police report came out so he's singing a different tune. Okay, I did have sex with the guy, but my wife knows I'm into men, so I only do it when I'm out of town.

He was at a retreat for Republican legislators in Spokane when he visited a pornography shop. While there, he met a man and suggested they have sex.

	The police report contains an account of how Curtis allegedly donned women's clothing, red stockings and a black sequined lingerie top before engaging in a sex act at the store. He continued to wear them throughout the night under his clothing.

Now, the guy he had sex with, a Spokane-area waiter named Cody M. Castagna, claims Curtis offered him $1,000 to have unprotected sex with him back at Curtis' luxury suite. Curtis said that Castagna left the hotel room with Curtis' wallet. Curtis allegedly agreed to pay Castagna $200, but Castagna demanded $800 more or he would spill the beans on his gay transvestite lifestyle.

	The entire incident might have never come to light if Curtis hadn't contacted Sgt. Roy Rhine of the Washington State Patrol. Rhine, who works out of the patrol's Southwest Washington office, is a fellow Republican who has run for the state Legislature. According to a Madsen's report, Curtis contacted a friend in the Washington State Patrol and wanted the agency to investigate "because the local police would talk and it would get out to the press." The WSP referred the case back to local officials.

So Curtis called the cops, rather than pay the extra $800. Castagna, rather than quiety accept a class B felony for extortion, called a press conference to announce his innocence. Curtis wanted to keep it quiet, Castagna wants to avoid jail time.

You know why Democrats don't get caught in these scandals? Because they let their freak flag fly, so to speak. You're gay and dress up in women's lingerie? Great. Welcome to the big tent. Just be sure your vote matches your lifestyle. It is the repressed, square-jawed buttoned down conservatives who get arrested in public bathrooms and parks.

It's not that you're gay, it's the fact that you're a hypocrit about it. Plain and simple.

Wow. The California wild fires were started by a young boy playing with matches.

I'm waiting for the other celebrity death shoe to drop: Porter Wagoner, Robert Goulet and . . .

The Parent's Television Council has released their review of television shows suitable for families. With my notes in blue.

Green light:

Extreme Makeover: Home Edition (That one always makes me cry, plus the host is a drunk. Pass)
Sunday Night Football (Football and other violent ground aquisition games are simply cryptofascist metaphors for nuclear war. Plus, too many players are bad role models. Pass.)
NBC's Deal or No Deal (Gameshow that promotes three of the seven deadly sins. Pass)
Fox's Are You Smarter than a Fifth Grader (Gameshow that provides a no-win situation. Either I'm dumber than a 5th grader, so I should be ashamed or I'm smarter than a 5th grader and as a college graduate, I shouldn't take pride in that fact. Pass.)
NBC's The Singing Bee (I don't like karaoke. Pass.)
Fox's Don't Forget the Lyrics (I don't like karaoke or Wayne Brady. Pass)
Fox's American Idol (I don't like karaoke and am inherently suspicious of anything so popular. Pass)
ABC's Supernanny (Never seen it. Never will either. Pass).

Yellow light:

ABC's America's Funniest Home Videos (Max's favorite show ever. I think it's all head and groin injuries. Pass)
ABC's Dancing with the Stars (Hmmm. Singing is fine, but dancing is questionable to the PTC. I find the show boring and the definition of "stars" as somewhat suspect. Pass).
Fox's So You Think You Can Dance (Again, the PTC is uncomfortable with dancing. Never seen it. Pass).
CBS' Amazing Race (Never seen it.)
CBS' Survivor (Never seen it.)
Fox's The Simpsons (I'm surprised this made it to yellow this year. Usually the Simpsons ranks in the red column. I guess the show has lost its' edge. I keep watching, though).

Red light:

Fox's House (Brilliant, but not for the kids. I approve of this placement).
ABC's Grey's Anatomy (Never seen it, but medical procedurals are generally not kid friendly).
NBC's Heroes (Again, brilliant, but too scary, violent and gorey for kids. Good decision).
CBS' CSI (See above).
Fox's American Dad (I watch it, but wouldn't think of letting my kids).
Fox's Family Guy (See American Dad).

Oct. 30, 2007

Last night, Dollie and her BFF Laurie met me at the Shopryland Mills Barnes & Noble to see an old friend of ours from college. Laurie Perry, aka Crazy Aunt Purl was there to read from and sign copies of her book, Drunk, Divorced and Covered in Cat Hair. It was good to see her again and we're all very proud of her success. Nashville was just one stop on her national book tour and the reading was attended by about 50 people for 20 chairs.

Rule #1 for any event planner, have fewer chairs than people attending that way you can say it was "standing room only."

Before the reading started, a woman in front of me noticed that I was the only guy there.

"You get dragged here or are you a knitter?" she asked.

"Neither," I said. "Laurie and I are old friends from college."

"So you're moral support."

"I don't know how 'moral," but yeah."

She came out grinning and waved at Dollie and me. She read from the first chapter. The crowd sat and knitted while she told the humerous and painful story about how a long day at work in which her skirt had split revealing she was wearing her Christmas thong, so she had to staple the seam back together and sit on metal jagged objects all day. She made it home in time to fix her husband dinner and he told her he was leaving.

During the Q&A, the first question was whether her ex-husband knew about the book and her success.

"That's always the first question," she said. "My lawyer tells me that he's very happy for me and I'm very happy for him."

She was great. She looked happy and genuinely glad to see that we made it out on a Monday night. She even complimented my bald head.

It would have been a perfect evening had we not left the store to eat dinner at Johnny Rockets. Dollie and I have eaten there several times and it is nice enough. The food is usually pretty good (it's hard to mess up burgers and fries), but last night was awful and it started when we hit the door.

A sign clearly stated "Please Wait to Be Seated" so we stood there, staring at a mostly empty dining room. The manager saw us, and ignored us. The wait staff chose that particular time to get on the floor and dance a choreographed routine to some Michael Jackson tune.

Now I can appreciate that Johnny Rockets is supposed to be "fun." But they were dancing instead of seating a customer. I went to the bathroom to wash up and when I came back Dollie and Laurie was seated. They had taken it upon themselves to find a booth. Eventually a server came over and took our orders. Three times during our meal (which was greatly extended by the fact that our server hid out in the kitchen instead of doing his job) we were treated to a dance routine instead of service.

It was loud and obnoxious.

I know. I'm an "old man." I don't "get it." But I do. I do get it. I just don't like it. It would seem to me that the priority should be serving the customers, not parading around doing the hand jive to "YMCA."

Rozzy came home from school the other day with a picture she had drawn. It was of herself and Max. However, she was really big and Max was tiny.

And a girl.

"Why did you draw Max so small?" Dollie asked.

"Because I wanted to," Rozzy said. "And I made him a girl. See? I gave him girl hair and a little dress. He's so cute!"

"Why?"

"It made my friends laugh."

Max had a fit, of course. He said he "oughta sue the pants off of" Rozzy.

This is why I love PvP. There isn't one person in a hundred who will get a Mr. Miracle and Big Barda reference.