Author: michael

Categories
Life

Mechanical Bull 1, Michael 0



Michael’s turn, originally uploaded by superkb.

Manlio was in town, so we took the opportunity to hit up Mason-Dixon, a wholly unremarkable neighbourhood bar, except for one thing – a mechanical bull.

Paraphrasing KevinC: “I thought it was going to be gruelling, painful and embarrasingly humiliating, but it actually turned out to be a lot of fun”.

My usual dose of healthy skepticism disappeared after the @#$@ thing started trying to throw me off. Some skin scraped off my finger and bruised inner thighs were my only wounds. Read all about it on Alex and Karen’s blog.

Categories
Fun Life

My high school, in the New York Times.

As is my habit lately, I was flipping through the online version of the New York Times this morning, when I came across an article about the release of the matric results in South Africa. To my surprise, they focused on my old high school – Greenside – and included a quote from my old English teacher – Ms. Whyte.

The school’s top math and science scholar, a “brilliant” kid, is black, Ms. Whyte said. “In 1984,” she added, “he wouldn’t have been able to come to this school.”

I remember when I started high school in 1991, that we were the first year that had black kids (about 5) studying alongside the white ones. We had been completely segregated up to that point throughout the whole of primary school. High school was the site of many changes, and this one, which went mostly unnoticed at the time was probably one of the more profound.

Categories
Travel

Free Running AKA Parkour hits Adsense

Picture 14-2

Categories
Fun Music

Rockenspiel and the Roamin’ Catholics trumped by Skull Sküll and the Weekend Nachos

Worst Band Names Ever

Jason Santa Maria’s Best Band Names Ever list has just been topped by The Onion’s Worst Band Names Of ’07.

I was chuckling the whole time, snorting and hooting at certain points and wondering just how many of these seemed like great ideas after staying up for three nights in a row on mushrooms, speed and creative combinations of prescription drugs chased with bottom shelf vodka. Here are some personal faves:

Butt Stomach

Their MySpace page looks like it was designed by Homer Simpson.

Unicorn Dream Attack

Penguins With Shotguns

Categories
Fun

Now this is funny…

236 – News – If They IM’d: Mahmoud Ahmadinejad and Condoleezza Rice

While the release of the National Intelligence Estimate on Iran has put the Bush White House on the defensive, it’s provided endlessly glib “I-told-you-so’s” from the chief horsefly at the neocon’s family picnic: Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad. The situation is so grave that President Bush has tasked Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice with keeping the pressure on the gloating Islamic republic.

Several media accounts have exposed the war of words going on between Ahmadinejad and Rice. It’s a shame these two can’t meet face to face to hash it out.