Right Wing Nation

From now on, Central Pennsylvania Orthodox will be my primary blog. I’ll cross-post health updates here, and overtly political posts here (it’s just that I’m not very focused on or interested in politics right now), but will use my other blog as my primary platform. At this stage in my life, I am focused more on Christ than Obama, and that’s not likely to change. So if you have me bookmarked here, change it to http://centralpennsylvaniaorthodox.wordpress.com.

I know. God makes people uneasy, and I don’t want to drive you away if that’s the case. But if I choose a primary blog, I can use what time God gives me more efficiently and productively. So I hope I see you there.

Oh. And if you use my Penn State email addy, switch to clay.bond@gmail.com or rightwingprof@gmail.com. Penn State will obviously at some point nix my account, so since I don’t know when they will, it makes more sense to start using one of the gmail accounts now (the added benefit is that I don’t have to use that crappy webmail interface, and it really does suck bad).

Just an observation here, now, and then I’ll move on — also, I raise no point about the commentators’ support from this. But have you noticed that it’s hip to support the Troops? The Fox guys are in Afghanistan today. They’ve been running tributes all day — and that’s great, really. I just question the timing, that’s all.

Oh the up and down side at once, boy, I’d love to see Dallas smear McNabb all over the field today, but I don’t think I’m going to make it all the way through after a 7:30 kickoff, not on these drugs.

My brother was here practically from the diagnosis before it was more than a guess and went back to Indiana last night. He waited until the last minute, so I’d shut down by the time he left. Anyway, this morning, I booted up and sent a message to my sister-in-law, just a “he wasn’t doing too well when he left, take care of him” message, and managed to get myself all upset. Ok. Enough. Stop. This is silly. Nobody’s dying — yeah, well, ok, but you get what I mean. I just need to get a grip here.

And I did mean that literally. I had never seen him near that upset as he was when he left last night, and he’s my little brother, after all, I’ve seen him really get wacked out. Phyllis, you do need to take care of him. I already lost one brother, and I only have two left.

Thanks to all of you wonderful people for asking questions. Something similar is happening in my email queue with my priests, deacons, and brothers and sisters at Holy Trinity. I’m “cognitively challenged” by the cancer and the narcotics (we ain’t talkin Tylenol #3 here, folks), and answering individual questions is hard. What I’m doing with the folks at church is giving periodic updates, and as additional questions arise, addressing them when I can (I don’t always have an answer).

Today is the “official release” of the biopsy (sounds like a software version, Win7 is coming out today!) The oncologist was here yesterday, though, and gave me the 2-hr-early release version. lung cancer, and the not so good news, non-small cell lung cancer. No, I had no idea what that meant either.

There are four (I believe) types of lung cancer. I have the major type that metathesizes and invades bone, and does not particularly react to chemo. The “it’s all about maintenance” type.

The 24-hr-early-release version was good enough that next, I saw a palliative doctor, a relatively new field of medicine that focuses on maintenance. He was very nice and tried to be the most helpful doctor I’ve seen yet (tried to be for reasons that will be clear). The cancer caused me to lose the use of my legs, you recall (that’s how we got here in the first place), so maintenance will include physical therapy so I can learn to do spins and dives in my wheelchair in the supermarket aisles (okay, I’m not quite up to humor yet, sorry), studying to see if we can ever look at moving back home or whether we’re talking facility, and pain management. He doubled my morphine dose, and gave me a whole new perspective on pain management. I can’t run around (oay, so the humor still isn’t working) all day hooked up to a morphine bag and IV, so he needs to put me on a pill of the correct strength that it knocks out the pain. He doubled my dose and told me anytime the pain passes the comfort barrier (but without going past the slobber barrier) — he said, I believe, that he didn’t give out prizes for John Wayne imitations — to push the button. He then gathers the data, and can use it to start trying pills like Dilaudid, oral morphine, that sort of thing.

I’m likely moving to a facility, after we find the best option. The purpose of the facility is to learn how to better exist at home, whether I ever end up moving home or not. Maybe, maybe not, depends on how I cope with reality, I guess. Either way, can I take all, or most, of the nursing staff here? The nurses here are really great, and I don’t ever want them to leave.

My brother flew in from Indiana. He is not taking this well, and that makes me sad. I am starting to understand — really understand — what is meant by not being a burden. Really understand, down in my gut understand, and not intellectually understand. I hope I can do everything possible to avoid being burdensome. He isn’t the only one. Christopher is not handling this well either, even though he wants to seem to be. If you were here in the oncology ward of this mega-hospital complex, you’d see just how much care is involved. One person cannot do all of this. Anyway, that’s kind of a tangent. Stick to the update.

And that’s pretty much it, medicine wise. Holy Trinity (my parish) is being so supportive it brings tears to my eyes. I hope and pray I can live long enough to return to worship there, and return some of the love they have shown me. Father Alexander, from St Michael the Archangel Orthodox Church in Louisville, Kentucky, said he is trying to come next weekend. I cannot describe how much this would mean to me, since Father Alexander took it upon himself to save my soul these 25 years ago. Father John, my parish priest, has been a show of virtue and strength, and has helped me more than I can say, and the other night, Deacon Alex was here for a long visit, that I found comforting. I could use more of those, and I am very glad he came. One can perceive a show of virtue, but having that virtue come sit by your bed, a physical presence, is so much more powerful. I enjoyed our visit, and look forward to more.

You know, if I denoted the interruptions here as elipses, you wouldn’t be able to read the English for the dots. They have to do blood work. They have to change the IV site. They have to turn me. It just never stops. So while I am at a position where I’ve given you more or less all the news, I will stop here. More updates as they become available.

UPDATE: It appears from what one of the doctors said (it’s been a near constant flow of doctors in and out) that I’m to get the “official biopsy release and talk” later this morning. It could be that I get information I didn’t previously have, and if so, I’ll pass it on, but if we haven’t discussed “the options,” what were we discussing yesterday?

Just in case you’re wondering why no politics here. Obama. Cancer. Do the math.

Hard to say, watching TV through a morphine fog.

Norman Vincent Peale, wasn’t it? When (actually if, but that’s where the positive thinking comes in) I get back home, and by extension, church, I’ll be in a wheelchair (I have no illusions about regaining much use of my legs). Orthodox worship in a wheelchair. It’s kind of upside down, isn’t it? I doubt I’d be able to sing in the choir. I could read from the readers’ stand. I guess I could sing at the kliros if we could figure out how to get the music so all of us could see it. And treasurer, to which I was just elected? Sure, I guess, with Chuck’s help (but I was going to count on that anyway).

Last week when I suddenly lost the use of my legs, that was horrifying. After I found out why, mobility seems less important than being alive.

How to proceed depends on the results of the biopsy.

Major surgery today. More sometime in the future, when I’m well enough and I have a way to post.

My legs are pretty much useless today — I can’t even close the recliner. I have an appointment Monday with the orthopedic surgeon, but as bad as this has gotten, I wonder if maybe I should call his office today.

Yesterday, the pain was the worst so far, and it did not let up all night (and I got no sleep). Today, I broke down and hit the pain meds, something I don’t want to do a lot, since there are only a finite number of them, and it takes more than a couple to get the pain under control.

“Gun control is going so well that machine gun-toting police are patrolling the street due to the gun crime. Unpossible.” Also from Uncle, but not the UK, Granny compensates for the size of her penis.

“President Obama’s promise to empty the detention facility at Guantanamo Bay has run into a little obstacle: It turns out the place is full of terrorists! Like everything else, this is not Obama’s fault. The terrorists are there because George W. Bush put them there, leaving poor Obama once again stuck cleaning up someone else’s mess.”

Those progressive, white cities!

I quote:

ABC’s “V” premieres Nov. 3 and will air for four weeks during sweeps, then go on hiatus until early 2010.

There’s another trailer posted there, too.

The Blogfather:

THE HEADLINE READS OBAMA CONTINUES TO LEAD 2012 CONTESTS, but that’s putting a pretty good spin on the fact that he’s only 4 points ahead of Mike Huckabee. Yes, Mike Huckabee. If you’re 47-43 over Mike Huckabee, that’s not a good sign. When, you know, you’re President, and the media love you.

Walking is a lot better than it was — mobility is improving rapidly. So I’m starting to hope that this won’t be as bad as it could be (although I awoke in sweat-inducing pain).

I’ve been discharged.

I’ve been admitted. I fractured my spine. There’s wi-fi in the room.

Yesterday while leaving Baby’s, I didn’t see the step down and fell. Blinding pain. I can barely walk, so I’m headed in to see what I did.

As if I didn’t have enough to worry about.

Going back up to the 50s and 60s in the next few days.

Just now watching the season finale of Psych. I’m not sure why it works. It has to be one of the stupidest shows on TV — yet, it’s hilarious. Love the stupid storylines, love the stupid characters, love the stupid writing. If you’ve never seen it, either catch old episodes on Hulu, or watch when the next season comes on.

Actually, it’s not without parallel. Bones is an example. It’s the most unbelievable show on TV. The storylines are unbelievable. The characters are unbelievable. It’s the writing that saves the show. But Psych really is stupid, which Bones is not. Stupid, but hilarious.

NCIS: LA is the biggest disappointment on TV. It has nothing to do with NCIS, the military, or forensics. The characters aren’t particularly likable. It’s unbelievable. The storylines are so-so. And it could have been really good — still could be, if Bellisario, who obviously is not involved in the show, took an interest.

Then there’s Stargate: Universe. I can’t say I’m disappointed, since I was no big fan of the Stargate franchise, so I had no big hopes. Eh. I’m still confused by the … timelines? flashbacks? … whatever they are when these people stranded on the ship are suddenly back on Earth, but it’s sort of Stargate meets Voyager. Ragtag group go through stargate and end up on badly damaged ship billions of light years from Earth and can’t get home.

Extremely unlikable characters all, and idiotic storylines. Oh well.

It’s snowing again. Some guy from the Weather Channel was broadcasting from Mt Nittany yeterday.

Heavy, wet snow. Powerlines are down all over town, and half the stoplights aren’t working. And it’s only the beginning.

Stacy McCain on fake victimhood.

Pens beat the Canes in a 3-2 shootout win. And with 12 points (24 goals for, 17 against, and 6-1-0 so far), the Pens are #2 in the NHL, behind the Rangers. Ironically, the only team that has beaten the Pens this season yet is the Phoenix Coyotes (proving that yes, you can sleep on skates).

I can’t begrudge Phoenix for that game. After all, what better way for a near bankrupt team to start the season than beat the Stanley Cup winners? And you just have to feel sorry for the Coyotes. If you’ve ever seen them play on home ice, what’s striking is all of the empty seats.

What’s wrong with you people in Arizona? If I lived there, I’d be at the ice rink for every game — not just because it’s hockey, or because the Great One is the owner of the team, but because it’s nice and cool. You’d think the rink would be packed, like Mellon always is — the Pens had their 100th consecutive sell-out game about halfway through last season.

Seriously, it’s got to be depressing for the Coyotes to play, and see all of those empty seats. Buy tickets, you people in Arizona! Some Canuck is trying to buy the team and take it to Canada, and probably the only way to stop him is to go to the games. And it’s not that Arizona isn’t a “hockey state.” Neither is North Carolina, but at halftime, they showed a clip from practice, and the Hurricanes had more people there to watch the practice than I’ve seen at Phoenix games.

It’s just sad. So what is wrong with you folks in Arizona, anyway?

Got yours yet?

Story here.

Leafs fall to Pens, 5-2.

Detroit. Steelers win, 28-20.

Penn State 52, E. Illinois 3.

From the commenters at Pensblog: Hannibal Hartnell and the Broad Street Biters.

Big Dog recently posted about Sauce Bolognese, and it turns out we use the same recipe, from Hazan’s Classic Italian Cook Book (Hazan is the Italian Alice Waters, and other than many great recipes, spews idiocy, like Waters).

Bolognese is sadly neglected in the US, rarely seen, at least in edible form, on a restaurant menu, and nearly always ignored in favor of a variety of red sauces. Understand, now, that few things are as wonderful as a good red sauce (though those are also hard to find), and I have little use for the Northern Italian craze, but Bolognese deserves to be better known.

Bolognese is known as Italy’s “meat sauce,” although that’s a misrepresentation. It is, indeed, a meat sauce, but it is emphatically not a red sauce. Thick and chunky, Bolognese is a naturally sweet, delicate sauce. The sweetness comes from the onions, celery, and carrots (while Vidalias are by no means necessary, they do work well in Bolognese), as well as the white wine and milk. My recipe is here, but I have a few addenda.

Bolognese is easy to make, provided you follow a few guidelines. As I said, the sauce is not a strongly-flavored sauce, but sweet and almost delicate. The recipe calls for a mixture of ground pork and ground chuck. All beef is too strongly flavored, so all pork would be better. Better yet would be to substitute veal for the beef, if it’s on sale. I grind my own meat, and for this recipe, I use a coarse, or Texas chili grind.

The more finely the carrots and celery are chopped, the better. I run mine through the slicer disk, then the chopper blade in my cuisinart to get a very fine grind. Big chunks of celery or carrot in Bolognese are, well, obnoxious. The local Italian restaurant makes fairly decent Bolognese, except that there are always a few big chunks of carrot, and it’s far too smooth. A Bolognese is not smooth.

The wine should almost all be evaporated before adding the milk, and the milk should almost all be evaporated before proceeding. As the wine (then the milk) cooks down, it concentrates; for both, there should be a couple of tablespoons left. I use a medium dry white, such as a sauvignon blanc, as it adds to the natural sweetness of the sauce. I see no point in using cream for the milk, although evaporated milk would work well.

Do not overdo the nutmeg. It’s there to point up the natural sweetness of the vegetables. I don’t measure, since I use a grinder: A couple of full turns is perfect. More would be overpowering, and it’s very easy to overdo nutmeg. You shouldn’t be able to taste it in the final product, at least not more than a vague hint.

Resist the temptation to add garlic, basil, or oregano (well, basil might work, but I see no reason for it). Garlic and oregano are both too strongly flavored for Bolognese.

Serve this will plenty of freshly grated Parmigiano-Reggiano; the nutty flavor is the perfect complement to the Bolognese. Pecorino-Romano is too sharp.

Thyme, pepper, salt, nutmeg. Nothing else is needed. The predominant flavor comes from the sweetness of the vegetables, wine, and milk, and it is masterful in its simplicity. This is a slow-cooked sauce, and improves as the flavors meld. I make Bolognese “on top of” Bolognese, that is, when I have some leftover, I will start a new recipe, then add the leftover to it, and let it simmer a couple of hours. You get superior Bolognese, much better than it was the first day you made it, if you do this. It not only refrigerates well; it freezes well.

I despise Americanized lasagne, with red sauce (no!) and worse, ricotta or cottage cheese (no! no! no!) and for whatever reason, I attract people who make bastardized, Americanized lasagne with all of the worst attributes (ricotta — ugh!) and are absolutely sure they want to make it for me. I have choked down many a serving of this abomination. Alternate layers of bechamel and Bolognese, with small meatballs, and no ricotta or cottage cheese, for a memorable lasagne.

I won’t say Bolognese is the best thing Italy ever created, but nothing surpasses it. Try it. You’ll see what I (and Bird Dog) mean.

Dead deer in clown suit left on Iowa porch

The Pens beat the Flyers last night in Wachovia Center, final score 5-4! But the big news is that nobody told us Philadelphia had hired Mike Tyson. Nobody told Letang, either.

Maybe Hartnell has been hanging out with Vick.

Seidling’s report. Nothing (except the finger biting incident) at Pensblog yet.

Other news: Pens honor Iraq war veteran.

Game highlights:

Thanks to Ace Mætenloch for this entertaining news-of-the-weird from Wales.

Two thugs who attacked what they thought were a pair of transvestites picked on the wrong men - when their intended victims turned out to be cage fighters on a night out in fancy dress.

Dean Gardener, 19, and Jason Fender, 22, singled out the two men walking along a street in wigs, short skirts and high heels.

Bare-chested Gardener was caught on CCTV confronting one of the men in a pink wig, black skirt and boob tube - then seen swinging a punch, a court heard.

But the other cage fighter, wearing a sparkling black dress and matching long wig, sprang to his friend’s help, delivering two lightning-quick punches to the two stunned yobs.

The cage fighters were then seen teetering away in their high heels, stopping only to pick up a clutch bag they dropped during the melee.

Gardener and Fender were left dazed and seen staggering to their feet after their failed attack.

CCTV cameras followed the pair as they weaved along The Kingsway in Swansea, South Wales, before being arrested by police.

The TV station showed video footage, but unfortunately, it’s not posted as far as I can tell. Nobody ever addresses why MMA fighters might be doing an evening in drag, but really, do we care?

Definitely a “Who’d'a thunk?” moment.

Update: Thanks to a couple of sharp-eyed readers, I corrected a couple of decimal place errors. That’s what I get for even thinking about math on pain meds, I guess.

My doctor did a stint as an epidemiologist, so he’s a statistician (most doctors are not, by the way), and we always end up talking statistics. He turned me on to a great term today: The NPR number.

He was telling me how he was listening to NPR, and they reported, of course in a hysterical manner, that the occurrence of negative side-effects in women who were on hormone replacement treatments had increased by 4%. He yelled at the radio that fewer than 1 in 10000 women had those negative side-effects in the first place, so the “increase” was ridiculously small, and said the 4% was the “NPR number.”

That’s a great phrase. It reminds me of something we did at the beginning of the semester. I do this when introducing Bayes’ Theorem of conditional probability. It doesn’t have much to do with business (the example, not Bayes), but it is an easily understood context for which most people will immediately believe they know the answer.

We have a test for a disease (we’ll call it Jones Syndrome), and the test is 99% accurate, but it returns a false positive in 1% of those tested (that is, 1% of the time the test returns a positive, the disease is not present). If I test positive, what is the probability that I have Jones Syndrome?

Like I said, I’ve done this many times, and at least half the hands in the class will fly up, and all of those people will say, “99%.” The thing is, they’re all very, very wrong.

First, what, exactly, do we mean when we say that the test is “99% accurate”? We mean that out of 100 people who have Jones Syndrome, the test will give 99 a positive result. That relative clause in bold is crucial, because it leads us to the next point, that we are missing a very important piece of information.

How prevalent is Jones Syndrome, that is, what is the probability of my having it, irrespective of any test result? We’ll say that 1 in 10000 have Jones Syndrome, so the probability of having Jones Syndrome is 0.01%, or 0.0001. Note that we do not know the probability that the test will return a positive, regardless of whether the person has the disease or not (we’ll calculate it), but we’ll call the probability that the test returns a positive P(B). (By the way, I’m on pain meds and I did all of the math in my head — if I screwed anything up, let me know.)

We’ll use the following shorthand.

P(A) — The probability that I have the disease
P(B) — The probability that the test will return a positive result

What we eventually want to calculate is:

P(A|B) — The probability of A given B, that is, the probability that I have the disease if I got a positive test result

In order to calculate this, we have to know P(B), the probability that the test will return a positive result. In order to calculate it, we have to do some quick calculations.

P(A) = 0.0001 (the probability that I have the disease)
P(~A) = 1 - P(A) = 0.9999 (the probability that I don’t have the disease)
P(B|A) = 0.99 (the success rate of the test, or the probability that it will return a positive if I have the disease)
P(~B|A) = 1 - P(B|A) = 0.01 (the probability that the test will return a negative result if I have the disease)
P(B|~A) = 0.1 (false positive rate)
P(~B|~A) = 1 - P(B|~A) = 0.9 (the probability that the test will return a negative if I do not have the disease)

What we need to calculate is P(A|B), the probability that I have the disease if I have gotten a positive test result. Here’s the formula:

P(B|A) * P(A) / P(B)

Oops! We need to calculate P(B), the probability that the test will return a positive, whether I have the disease or not:

P(B) = P(B|A) * P(A) + P(B|~A) * P(~A)

P(B) = 0.99 * 0.0001 + 0.1 * 0.9999

P(B) = 0.100089

So now let’s calculate the probability that I have the disease if I have gotten a positive test result, P(A|B).

P(A|B) = P(B|A) * P(A) / P(B)

P(A|B) = 0.99 * 0.0001 / 0.100089

P(A|B) = 0.00098912, or 0.0989%

So the probability that I have the disease given that I got a positive test result is 0.00098912, or 0.0989%.

That’s wildly different from 99%, is it not? I think the reason so many people leap to the conclusion that I have a 99% probability of having the disease if I got a positive test result for five reasons: 1) We tend to make snap judgments; 2) We think in terms of generalities and not specifics; 3) We don’t really think much about the situation when it is presented to us, so we don’t realize that we’re missing vital information; 4) Even if we do realize we’re missing that information, we don’t know how to integrate it, and arrive at a result (nobody did until the Reverend Bayes came along); and finally, 5) Our society enables fuzzy thinking about — even utter incompetence in — math.

Bayes isn’t arcane. It isn’t even calculus. It’s basic arithmetic operations: addition, subtraction, multiplication, and division. Yet, introduce it in class, and eyes glaze over almost as soon as you start.

I’m not suggesting anyone should be able to do Bayes in his head. I am saying, however, that in this high tech age when we are being bombarded with the results of studies every day, and base so many of our own decisions on those studies, that reporters on NPR or Fox should be knowledgable enough that they don’t report “NPR numbers.” While I’m at it, it would be nice if more listeners yelled that fewer than 1 in 10000 women had those negative side-effects in the first place. I mean really, there is just no excuse for hearing the same junk statistics over and over again for years, you know, like women are paid 75 cents for every dollar a man makes, or those ridiculous stats about sexual assault (One out of every three women will be raped in her lifetime! Every second, over 1500 women are raped!)

Maybe I’ll write to Santa Claus.

I’m going to have to take a break from grading (I’m nearly done) to go to my doctor. Course, this hip thing has gotten a lot better and I’m not quite sure what I’ll do there, but I do have some questions I’d like answered.

Oh. That, and pick up an extra value meal (more about that when I get back).

Thanks to Darren, I saw this story about a study.

Douglas Reeves, an expert on grading systems, conducted an experiment with more than 10,000 educators that he says proves just how subjective grades can be.

Like me, you’re thinking, “Well, duh!” and wondering how much money was wasted on such an obvious study. Well, keep reading.

Reeves asked teachers and administrators in the United States, Australia, Canada and South America to determine a final semester grade for a student who received the following grades for assignments, in this order:

C, C, MA (Missing Assignment), D, C, B, MA, MA, B, A.

The educators gave the student final semester grades from A to F, Reeves said.

What? And reading the rest of the story doesn’t make this any clearer.

Why? Because, he said, teachers use different criteria for grading.

Some average letter grades. Others consider effort (which in this case seemed to be picking up toward the end) and attendance.

Were teachers allowed to assign their own weights to assignments? Where do effort and attendance come into the study? How do you come up with final grades ranging from A to F?

This is, however, a study in why test scores are reliable and grades should be ignored.

There were the two Penn State victories, hockey and football. In the season opener, the Pens rocked the Rangers. On Saturday night, the Pens played the Islanders, and won in a shootout 4-3. Tavares is the man to watch, Islander or no. And where was Doug Weight?

The Steelers haven’t started the season well, with two defeats in a row. But last night, they redeemed themselves by tanking San Diego 38-28 at Heinz.

Unlike the previous one, it was a great weekend for Pennsylvania!

Pens TV online

Steelers TV online

The Penguins play the Coyotes Wednesday in the Igloo, then the Flyers in Philadelphia Thursday.

The Icers played the Townson Tigers yesterday afternoon, the first Saturday home game of the season. Penn State has almost a whole new team, and there’s a rising star: Dominic Marrone, a freshman, who scored (at least) two goals in yesterday afternoon’s game, and one in Friday night’s game. I say “at least two goals” because I had to leave about two minutes into the third period.

The first period, Towson just couldn’t keep the puck. Every time they had control, the Icers took it away. The second period began with a Towson goal less than a minute in, tying the game, and less than a minute later, an Icers goal. And for Towson, it rapidly went downhill from there. The second period was a massacre, ending at 7-3.

In the first two minutes of the third period, Penn State scored three goals, pushing the score to 10-3. That’s when I had to leave. The final score was (are you ready for this?) 15-3 (and they wouldn’t have gotten 3 goals if Teddy Hume had been in the net). Yes, that’s 15 goals in a hockey game.

Next Saturday home game is on Halloween, against West Virginia.

The Icers are playing in the NCAA Showcase Hockey games in the Igloo on January 8th (Friday), and the night before, the Pens are playing the Flyers (!) Trip to Pittsburgh?

In related news, the Lions stomped the Illini, 35-17.

Yes, we did! Pens defeat the Rangers 3-2!

Pics from Pensblog (they’ve moved, so update your link).

Offense lines:

Kunitz-Crosby-Guerin
Fedotenko-Malkin-Dupuis
Cooke-Staal-Kennedy
Rupp-Adams-Godard

Defense:

Orpik-Gonchar
Eaton-Legang
McKee-Goligoski

FRIDAY, OCTOBER 2, 2009
2 - 3 PENGUINS

GOALS
NYR: C. Drury (16:01 - 1st) , M. Gaborik (05:56 - 3rd)
PIT: E. Malkin (PPG, 07:48 - 1st) , S. Crosby (12:25 - 2nd) , T. Kennedy (13:33 - 2nd)

Jason Seidling’s game analysis

Opening:

The Penguins!

Raising the banner at the Igloo:

Godard (6′4 211) v. Brashear (6′2 235):

Highlights:

More:

Tonight, we play that other New York team (we’ll see if they suck as bad as they did last season).

I got up and cruised through the guide to see what was on. I found this flick called Open Water 2: Adrift and tuned in, about ten minutes into the movie. There’s, oh, I don’t know, maybe three girls and four guys in the water, right next to a yacht, screaming for help.

This, of course, leads one to ask: Why not just get back on the yacht? Well, this wasn’t obvious, so I looked up the movie on IMDB. Are you ready for this? They jumped in the water, but forgot to put the ladder down.

That’s amazingly stupid. In fact, it seems unbelievably stupid, until you see what mouthbreathers these morons are. Everything they do is stupid. They tear up their bathing suits into strips and tie them together, then throw it up over the edge. It catches. One guy climbs all the way up, but instead of grabbing the post, he tries to grab the slick wood rail, and falls back in — and they never try again!

Another guy swims way down, then back up really fast, and gets the bends. Seriously. They cut themselves and bleed into the water (you know what’s going to happen with that). They just get stupider and stupider.

Maybe I’m just a grumpy old curmudgeon, but I have a real problem sympathizing with morons. This is an incredibly stupid movie, with incredibly stupid characters, written by incredibly stupid screenwriters. If anything, it’s a Darwin Awards movie.

Don’t even bother.