Friday Blogthing: I'm not as think as you drunk I am...

It's a vacation day for me, and after an afternoon of Christmas shopping, I plan on crawling into a nice clear glass of Glenlivet*.

91%DRUNKARD

*3 O'Clock AM encourages you to drink responsibly, and plentifully.

tagged: Friday, test, drink, drunk, alcohol, drunkard, meme, blog

The KU formula

Well it's been a few days, and by now most of the initial in-your-faceness of Mizzou fans toward KU fans has subsided.

I first want to congratulate you Mizzou fans out there on a game well cheered. You supported your team to a victory and you deserve your moment in the spotlight. And a tip of the hat to the KU fans as well, who stood up to the post-game smack with aplomb. Bloodied but unbowed, they showed themselves to be good sports in a tough loss.

So while the Tiger nation is gearing up for the Big XII title bout this weekend, and the Jayhawks are cooling their heels waiting to see what upper-tier bowl they will go to, it is a good time to make sure we don't overlook the gargantuan contribution of KU head coach Mark Mangino.

You may not have noticed this man, as he tends to keep a low profile on the sideline during games. But what he has accomplished this season should not go unnoticed. In guiding his team to a successful 11-1 season, he has proven the validity of two key coaching strategies.

First is the importance of early season, on-field, non-conference preparation.

By scheduling his team for a veritable gridiron grind house in its first four games verses the likes of Central Michigan, Southeastern Louisiana, Toledo and Florida International, Mangino made sure his troops were tough and battle ready for the brutal Big XII schedule ahead.

Secondly, and most importantly, Mangino understands the need to help his players off the field as well as coach them on the field. When new recruits need academic help, for example, Mangino knows it's the coach's duty to make sure they get that help.

Sure some may call it academic fraud, but the loss of scholarships is a small price to pay for a student athlete's academic progress and the promise of fat bowl payouts.

So we salute you Coach Mangino. You may have more chins than a Chinese phone book, but you have shown us how strong priorities can lead to success on the football field.

tagged: KU, Mizzou, Kansas, Mangino, academic fraud, football, Big XII

Race to win

Last night we were watching the season finale of Dancing with the has-beens Stars.

Yes. That's a good question? Why indeed was I watching this show?

I think it was a confluence of several factors, 1) our Time Warner DVR had shot craps the day before and left us with none of the recorded decent programming to fall back on, 2) it was less obnoxious than any other ChickTV programming which, to my primitive male brain, seems to consist of a single show aired seven nights a week under the title Brothers and Grey's Private October Murder Club in Trees, and 3) my head is so congested with my twice-yearly cold that I didn't really give two shits about what was on the teevee.

Anycrap, if your not familiar with the show, they take a professional dancer (WTF?) and pair them with a so-called celebrity and have a dance-off. It's kind of like Michael Jackson's Beat It video, but with lots more latent homosexuality (not that there's anything wrong with that).

So last night, they were down to the final two teams. In one corner, a Russian professional dancer I've never heard of and Melanie Brown, a.k.a. Mel B, a.k.a. Scary Spice.

In the other corner was Indy Car racing champ Helio Castroneves and All-American California girl Julianne Hough.

So with a Russian, a Brazilian and black Brit and a blond-haired, blue-eyed American on the stage, who do you thing the viewing public would vote for.

That's right, the pretty little white girl. Good job USA! Way to vote for the white girl just because she's white! Everybody knows that black people are far superior to white people in dancing. It was clear throughout the night with all of the highlight clips Scary Spice shakin' her money maker.

So here's the American viewing public, keeping it racist since 1789.

tagged: TV, television, Dancing with the Stars, race, Scary Spice, pop culture, Helio Castroneves

My latest Michael Scott moment

So my Supermodel Wife and I were meeting with a lawyer recently, getting "our affairs" in order (revocable trust, living wills, custody plans for our kid, you know all that rot that adults are supposed to do).

Well, it so happened that the lawyer was a woman, not that there's anything wrong with that. She was looking over some of our paperwork, explaining certain legal terms and concepts and she mentioned that we have a "sizable estate."

Well, of course I couldn't let that go by without remarking "That's what she said."

I received both a look of embarrassment from my Supermodel Wife (not a new thing) and a look of abject derision (also not a new thing) from the lady lawyer.

But it was totally worth it.

PS - Before you go kissing my ass to get me to buy drinks and pay for your dinner, you should know that our "sizable estate" is predicated upon both my Supermodel Wife and I being dead. Otherwise, all we have is big mortgage, a car payment and several credit card bills.

tagged: The Office, Michael Scott, lawyer, affairs, That's what she said

YouTube Tuesday: Pranksgiving

One of my favorite traditions at Thanksgiving was the playing of pranks on the new guy.

It could be a friend from college, a new boyfriend (of my sister, sister-in-law, niece, whoever), but we always tried to haze the new guy a little just to make him feel part of the family.

My brother and I used to pull this one regularly. Yes it's an oldie, but still a goodie.



tagged: movie, YouTube, video, wooden spoon, prank, funny, humor

Friday Blogthing: Travelin man, love when I can

Today's Friday Blogthing comes from R. Sherman at Musings From The Hinterland who discovered this neato geography quiz.

My first-time results are:

Final Score: 281,988
Final Level: 8 (I started missing terribly on the small African cities)
Traveler IQ: 102

But I think I can do better with a little practice and a few thousand frequent flyer miles.

PS- I just notices the embedded version of this looks like complete shite, so click this link if you want to take the quiz and match geographical wits with me.

This Traveler IQ
challenge is brought to you by the Web's Original Travel Blog

tagged: Friday, test, world, geography, travel, quiz, meme, blog

The real winner

So by now everyone has been severely exposed to all the hype surrounding this weekend's game between the universities of Missouri and Kansas.

There's a lot of made up media buzz around how this is a continuation of a "border war" that has been going on since before the American Civil War, and how for the first time in history the game has "significance" on the national college football scene (the significance of which is highly questionable in and of itself).

But for those of you looking for a clue as to who is going to win this weekend, let me give you a hint: The winner has already been decided.

Oh sure, the score on the field is still to-be-determined. But in the real contest, the contest that matters, the winner was decided months ago when the two schools agreed to play the game in Kansas City, rather than Lawrence where it was originally scheduled.

You can't really blame KU. At the time I'm sure school officials figured the Jayhawks would lived down to everyone's expectations and the best hope for a bigger payday would be to sell out and move the game to Arrowhead Stadium.

This of course leaves the businesses of Lawrence out in the cold. Unfortunately for them, the huge potential payday that has resulted from the Jayhawks amazing failure to live down to expectations will go to Jackson County, Mo., rather than Douglas County, Kan.

Kansas City is raking in millions in taxes from ticket sales from the 78,000-plus sellout of the game at Arrowhead. And area businesses and hotels are taking in even more in revenue and sales tax.

The businesses of Lawrence can look forward to a huge drop in sales revenues as crowds of KU faithful head to KC for the game. Can you imagine the financial devastation that will hit Lawrence when hundreds of KU alumni take all the cash they've been hoarding from their McDonald's jobs and spend in KC?

On the biggest shopping weekend of the year no less?

So here's to Kansas City, Mo. No matter the final score of Saturday's game, KC is the real winner.*

*Of course, all of the additional tax revenue will go into the pockets of real estate developers, but that's another story.

tagged: Lawrence, Kansas, Kansas City, Missouri, KU, football, Arrowhead Stadium

YouTube Tuesday: Know your place

As I arrived at my palatial upper-west side cube this morning, the two businesswomen who occupy neighboring cubes were discussing the upcoming MU-KU football tilt this weekend*.

It wasn't enough that I had to suffer through the over-coverage of this event on all the local so-called news channels, now I have to deal with this inanity at work, from the ladies no less.

So, in another public service announcement, this one goes out to the women out there who would be better off discussing fuzzy kittens...



*Yes, as a K-State fan I do have sour grapes about how this football season has turned out and all the hype around this game in particular makes me feel like the only kid NOT invited to the party. It's petty and immature I know, but then so is college football in general.

tagged: movie, YouTube, video, women, football, KU, Kansas, Missouri

Nutritional secrets of New York City cabbies

So I'm riding shotgun in a Jeep Liberty cab inbound to Manhattan from La Guardia.

Three of my colleagues are crowded into the backseat, discussing the latest work gossip. I'm hanging on for dear life while the Philippine cabby nonchalantly executes acts of automotive daring that would make Jack Bauer carsick.

We end up stuck in slow traffic near the Midtown Tunnel. The driver, seemingly oblivious to the relieved silence that had befallen the passenger compartment while we were catching our collective breaths, went rummaging through the depths of a large lunch sack sitting between us on the console.

He pulls out an avocado and holds it up like a magician producing a rabbit from a top hat.

"You know what this is?" he asks in his best broken English.

"Yeah. I like avocados," I answer.

"You eat one of these every day for 45 days," he said. "It will make you head come up."

"Whatsthatyousay?" was my reply. "I think my head is up as far as I want it."

"No. It will make your head come up," he repeated, pantomiming a pinching movement with his fingers, as if he were pulling strings out of the top of his head.

Through a combination guesswork and charades (which had the added affect allowing the cabby to demonstrate his skill at driving without the use of his hands), my colleagues and I learned that the he was telling me to eat avocados to make my hair grow.

"Makes small hair grow big and strong," he said. "If have no hair, not work. But like you, weak hair will be strong.

"One each day for 45 days."

Now granted, I'm aware (to paraphrase Dennis Miller) that as I've pushed on into my mid- to late-30s, much of the population of the once bustling downtown of my scalp has fled to the more desirable neighborhoods of my nose, ears and back.

And granted, the cabby seemed very sincere. He was grappling with a "molting" problem of his own and was eager to share with me what he thought was the solution. His theory, as I was able to decipher, was that the oil in the avocado would work as a sort of follicle fertilizer, strengthening the puny hairs so that they become big, strong hairs. Kind of like an organic Rogaine.

Frankly, looking at the cabby's locks, I wasn't convinced.

But you tell me. Is this worth trying? Has anyone else ever heard of this? Is it healthy to eat an avocado a day for a month and a half?

And more importantly, has anyone ever gotten any bad advice from a cabby?

tagged: New York, taxi, cabby, hair loss, avocado, travel, health

Friday Blogthing: Relatively speaking

What Famous Leader Are You?
personality tests by similarminds.com

tagged: Friday, test, world, leader, personality, Albert Einstein, meme, blog

Hotel Review: The W Times Square

Just got back from a whirlwind two-day trip to NYC where I became very familiar with the inside of a 12x25 conference room and the other occupants therein.

But I did have a chance to stay at the famous W Hotel on Times Square, so I figured I'd relay my thoughts to my loyal reader.

Like the majority of my colleagues, I voted for W as the place to stay. And like many of my colleagues, I regret choosing W.

In our defense, there aren't many good choices for hotels when you're choosing at the last minute. Ideally, we would have known in advance where we'd be going and could have used that knowledge to choose a better hotel candidate.

Several of my colleagues had chosen W only four weeks ago, and were willing to give W a second chance. So since it was a last-minute trip, we made the best decision from the options available. To be fair, W talked a good game.

On the surface W looks like a good hotel. You're greeted in the foyer by water flowing in the glass riverbed above your head. The welcome desk on the seventh floor features minimalist post-modern decor with thumping nouveau electronica club music piped in to compliment the constantly moving groovy lighting.

So the initial impression is the W is pretty cool, and you'll be happy choosing W as your hotel. But it doesn't take long to figure out that all the loud music, groovy décor and weirdo lighting is as much a distraction as anything.

My room was on the 43rd floor. Stepping out of the elevator, the lighting was very dim, the walls painted black and the floors covered with a dark gray Berber. As I neared my room, there was a distinct aroma of old, rotten water damage.

Inside my room, it was the same story. Everything seemed pretty good on the surface, but when you looked at the details you saw the lack of quality. There was mold on the bottom of the shower curtain. The handles on the plumbing fixtures were loose and seemed to do their own thing sometimes without my authorization.

W also insisted on ignoring my wishes with regards to the thermostat. It insisted on heating things up, even though I specifically wanted my room cooled off. I suspect there was some kind of hidden agenda behind W's actions, probably related to money and cooling costs.

In the end, W is responsible for the poor quality of the accommodations, though I suspect they got some bad advice from people claiming to be hotel experts. The advisers are probably the one's who suggested the night club The Whiskey in the basement of the building (The last thing W needs is whiskey).

So in conclusion, I'm not really happy with my decision to go with W, and I hope there will be a better hotel candidate available for future trips. I just hope the high-cost of the stay ($600 per night) hasn't done irreparable harm to my company.

tagged: travel, New York City, Times Square, The W, hotel, Whiskey, review

YouTube Tuesday: Is he havin' a laugh?!!

Yes, it is too early to be talking about Christmas. But in the case of the funniest guy to come out of the UK since Monty Python, I'm willing to make an exception.

I can't wait for this to air.



tagged: movie, YouTube, video, Extras, Christmas, Ricky Gervais, humor

The wrath of grapes

The first time I met Kathleen Sebelius I was a cub reporter at a major metropolitan newspaper.

She was making the newspaper circuit in her quest to be elected the Kansas insurance commissioner.

Almost right away, I could tell she was a straight shooter, a breath of fresh, honest air when politicians had become increasingly two-faced and dishonest.

One of the first questions I asked was, why run for insurance commissioner? Is this a stepping stone to higher office?

She answered an honest and emphatic "No!"

You see, she knew there was trouble with insurance in Kansas, what with the skyrocketing premiums on hurricane and earthquake coverage.

Fast forward to the present day, and it is commendable to see Sebelius sticking to her straight-talking nature.

Though she has been pushed unwillingly by her party into the limelight of the Kansas governor's mansion, and forced by her position to attend fundraising events for the campaigns of Democrats in Washington and California, she still manages to keep it real.

The incident reported by the Lawrence Journal World is a great example.

While at a fundraiser for Washington Gov. Chris Gregoire, Sebelius pulled no punches when she proclaimed that Kansas wine makers are crap.

The direct quote, according to the Journal World is

"You should be thankful we don’t make wine in Kansas. If you ever see Kansas wine, don’t drink it."

Of course, when you speak the truth, you're bound to upset a few grape carts.

“What it says to grape growers and winemakers in this state is she doesn’t recognize the quality of what’s here,” said Michelle Meyer, co-owner of Holy-Field Vineyard and Winery in Basehor and president of the Kansas Viticulture and Farm Winery Association.

This, of course, is just sour grapes. Sebelius is doing Kansas grape growers a favor by not sugar coating the bad news.

Hey, Kansas is a great state for growing corn, wheat and mullets. But let's face it, we need to leave the fine wine to the likes of California, Washington and Oregon.

I mean, what kind of leader would Sebelius be if she encouraged residents of her state to excel at a pursuit that they obviously have no chance at mastering?

Kathleen, I raise a toast to you.

tagged: Kansas, governor, Kathleen Sebelius, wine, agriculture, politics, viticulture

Friday Blogthing: Edumacation

Today's blogthing comes from my favorite Aussie, Blandwagon, who tipped me to this cute little web widget which purports to show the education level of your blog.

While I'm happy to see that this blog is published at a college level (which is why I have to use words like 'purports' and also why I totally pwnd Joel Mathis in Scrabulous), this reminds me that I might be speaking waaaaay over the the heads of you products of the Missouri school system.

So, for those of you on the east side of the state line, I'll try to start using smaller words.

tagged: Friday, test, blog, reading, level, education, meme, Missouri

Review: Saddle Ranch Chop House

You can really tell a restaurant is going to be successful by how it treats its customers.

And after spending so many enjoyable hours at the Saddle Ranch Chop House last weekend, I can tell you they have a unique approach in generating demand.

The Saddle Ranch, one of the new The Legends theme restaurants, features old-timey saloon decor with a genuine mechanical bull, big-screen TVs, an 8 brazillion decibel sound system and a horses ass sticking out of the wall.

One would think all this manufactured ambiance would be enough to maintain huge nightly crowds of loyal customers. One would be wrong.

Saddle Ranch takes it to the next level. There are several techniques they use to make sure everyone at the Saddle Ranch really really wants to be at the Saddle Ranch.

It starts as soon as you walk in the door and put your name on the list for a table. You see, despite the fact there there are three or four tables sitting empty, they still ask you to put your name on the waiting list and wait (and wait, and wait).

When they finally seat you at the table that's been vacant for the past 40 minutes, they know you're not the type to get all pissy and frustrated and walk out over a little thing like standing around not doing anything.

And this is good, because they want to you stay for a while and have a good time. There's never any rush to, say, get you your drinks, or menus. Once you've ordered, you're encouraged to sit back and keep your kids under control for the next 40 minutes while the servers ignore you and wait for your dinner to arrive.

You can take this time to admire the aforementioned decorations which include servers dressed in supertight t-shirts with even tighter Daisy Dukes. Our server's shorts were so tight you could read the label on her underwear. It read "Thursday" which was strange because we were there on a Saturday.

And kudos to the Saddle Ranch management for making sure you don't have to engage in banal conversation with the other people in your party. Thanks to a sound system blaring the latest hits from the early '90s, you're not bothered with conversational pleasantries with friends that you haven't seen in months.

Finally, when your food arrives, the wait staff makes sure you're really paying attention by selecting a couple of people at your table to receive the wrong order. Of course when you discover this fun little trick, everyone has a nice laugh and your actual order come out only 15 minutes later.

Yes, the staff and management of Saddle Rance Chop House really go out of their way to ensure that you want to be there.

It's reflected in their motto: "If you don't have a good time, it's your own damn fault."

tagged: food, restaurant, review, Saddle Ranch Chop House, Kansas City, The Legends, Daisy Dukes

Random Photo VII: Paris, 2001

Here's another one of my favorite shots from Paris when we traveled there a few years ago. I really found nothing not to like about Paris.


tagged: Paris, France, Europe, Eiffel Tower, photo, Bateau Mouche

Extreme Makeover: Emotional Exploitation Edition

I've always felt uneasy about not liking Extreme Makeover: Home Edition.

It goes beyond my distaste for network TV in general and the so-called "reality" TV in particular. I mean, it's easy to hate fake reality shows with amateur actors/attention whores as "contestants" who take direction from lame-ass producers trying to convince us that what we're seeing is totally spontaneous.

The problem with Extreme Makeover is that the actual work they do is good. They identify people who have had a rough go of it and, essentially, build a luxury house for them free of charge.

Good works, right? What could be a better motivation than to help those who are down on their luck?

Except that’s not the motivation.

The motivation is to use a sad story to manipulate the viewing public into watching an hour’s worth of advertising couched in melodrama.

But, you say, that’s what every television program does. And for the most part you’re right. Nearly every program, even sports, attempts to manipulate the emotions of the viewers to get them to keep viewing in order to see the messages of the advertisers.

Then again, most programs (sucky as they are) pay actors and writers to come up with increasingly implausible situations to tug our increasingly jaded heartstrings. In some ways, that seems more honest than the “reality” type shows because everybody – producers, writers, actors and audience – are aware of just what’s going on.

Extreme Makeover, on the other hand, is a bit more insidious. They find a real world tearjerker story and use poignant pauses and emotional music to amplify the emotion.

What could be more gripping than a Marine veteran returning home missing a leg to a house with a leaking roof and drafty windows and, oh by the away, his wife left him and his four kids.

This is a real world tragedy. It requires no emotional amplification and frankly I’m a little offended at ABC for exploiting our neighbors like this. The one saving grace, as I stated before, is that our neighbors are getting some help they haven’t received from our community.

So I guess it comes down to whether ABC’s exploitative motivation cancels out the good that is done to the families in need.

The answer is no.

But I still won’t watch Extreme Makeover or the other “reality” shows because I have a huge pet peeve against people trying to manipulate me.


tagged: Extreme Makeover, home, Ty Pennington, emotional, marketing, advertising, Kansas City, Daniel Gilyeat

YouTube Tuesday: Guitar Zero

I don't know what's more pathetic, being this good at such a worthless pursuit as a video game, or being so proud of being this good at such a worthless pursuit that you allow you roommate to video tape you in a dorm room chock full of latent homosexuality (not that there's anything latently wrong with that) and putting it up on the internet for all to see.

Still, balls to the fake guitar playing.



tagged: movie, YouTube, video, Guitar Hero, dorm, video game, lame

It's a major award!

I was just notified that this digital detritus you're currently wasting your time on was nominated last month for consideration in the highly prestigious and influential 2007 Weblog Awards.

The nominations were opened on Oct. 17, and closed about two days later and this blog was one of about 50 or 60 nominated in my category.

Of course, I'm not going to ask you all to vote for me. I'm not so shallow that I need to shill for some award just to prop up my ego. I mean, how pathetic would that be?

And besides, the all powerful muckety-mucks that run the 2007 Weblog Awards didn't see fit to include me in the seemingly arbitrary finalist selections, so you can't vote for me even if I wanted you to.

Still, it is an honor just to be nominated, particularly when the nomination was submitted by one of may favorite bloggers, John Swift, a very funny writer and one of the best satirist bloggers out there. So I consider this high praise (unless of course he was nominating me satirically, then it's kind of an insult. But I'll take the benefit of the doubt here).

Anyway, the best thing about this is that now I can legitimately use one of the neato banner's proclaiming that I was nominated for a major award, you know, like all the cool kids do. It will go great with my 2006 Time Magazine Person of the Year award.

tagged: blog, major award, Weblog Awards, John Swift, blogging, Ralphie

She's got a great sense of humor

Okay, this post is for the parents out there, which means it's long on sweetness and might make you singles and DINKs puke a little inside your mouths. But here we go...

Lemme set the scene:
It's the evening after our daughter's 5th birthday party. During the course of the party, one of the guests had accidentally yanked the lacy princess canopy hanging from the ceiling over her bed. Now, at bedtime, she wants the canopy back up before going to sleep.

And... ACTION:

me: Sorry, we can't put it back up because the hook got lost during your party.

her: Then what are we going to do? We need to get it back up!

me: Don't worry, we'll get another hook tomorrow at the store.

her: You can't get hooks at the store!

me: You can't? Where do you think you get them then?

her: From a pirate!

And scene.

tagged: kids, family, birthday, humor, party, hook, pirate

Friday Blogthing: No, man, like hey, man. Wow.

Today's Friday Blogthing quiz was involuntarily submitted by (i.e. "blatantly stolen from") John B at Blog Meridian.

I can't complain about the result. I'm just glad it didn't come up as The Manchurian Candidate or Marathon Man or something similar.

What Classic Movie Are You?
personality tests by similarminds.com

tagged: Friday, test, movie, Easy Rider, Manchurian Candidate, Marathon Man, meme, blog

For whom the bell trolls

I have implemented a policy on this piece of digital fishwrap to never mention certain names that will go unmentioned.

The rationale is that the organization and family behind this certain name want nothing more than to be named and garner the attention by which such naming is accompanied.

I think that by not naming the heretofore unnamed name, I'm taking away that which allows this organization to keep going - or at least I'm not contributing to it in my own small sense. I've always thought that if we can ignore them long enough, they'll go away.

Having stated that, it is nice to read news stories about the recent legal verdict against this unnamed organization. And even though the $11 million judgment in favor of the father of a fallen soldier will undoubtedly be appealed, it gives me hope that more such lawsuits will be successful.

If nothing else it will help keep the unnamed family tied up in court, devoting more of their financial resources to defending their obnoxiousness instead of perpetrating it.

tagged: funeral, protest, verdict, Topeka, Snyder, emotional distress

Book Report: No Country for Old Men

Title: No Country for Old Men

Author: Cormac McCarthy

Synopsis:
While hunting in the West Texas wilderness, Llewelyn Moss stumbles upon the bloody scene of a drug deal gone bad. Invoking the "Finders Keepers" clause, he claims $2 million in cash (but leaves the heroin). He gets more than he expects when the Mexican drug cartel sends Anton Chigurh - a psychopath who is not quite as dangerous as the Bubonic Plague - to reclaim the money and "product."

My thoughts:
Since reading McCarthy's Pulitzer Prize winning The Road, I've been working my way through the McCarthy library. My goal was to finish No Country for Old Men before the motion picture release later this month.

It turns out that wasn't a problem. Like The Road, No Country is a very quick read at just over 300 pages. But while the book showcases McCarthy's gift for language, it wasn't as emotionally satisfying as The Road. I wasn't left with the sense of stunned awe after turning the last page as I was with The Road.

That said, No Country for Old Men is still and amazing work. It examines the old proverb that "No good deed ever goes unpunished." When the central character Llewelyn Moss stumbles upon the drug deal gone bad and the accompanying $2 million in untraceable cash (well, nearly untraceable), all he has to do is let a man die alone and walk away rich.

His better angels take over though, and he returns to the scene to give the dying man a drink of water. For this, he is rewarded with being chased through the desert by drug traffickers who have come to collect the money.

This sets up the major plot line for the novel, and McCarthy describes the chase with all the physical and psychological detail to which I've come accustomed through reading his other works (though stylistically McCarthy is in his Hemingway mode rather than his Faulkner mode). Anton Chigurh follows Moss and the money, leaving a trail of blown out door locks and blown out brains across the plains of west Texas, while Sheriff Ed Tom Bell tracks the carnage trying to figure out what kind of person could do such evil but questioning whether he really wants to catch up with the assassin.

I give McCarthy credit for not pulling punches in the story (although by now I know McCarthy pulls no punches when it comes to death and violent imagery). In the end, Chigurh catches up with Moss, kills him, takes the money and gets away. We are then treated to a chilling scene where Chigurh, for no reason other than his demented psychosis, kills Moss's widow because he told Moss he would.

No, it's not a happy ending (Oh, by the way, SPOILER ALERT!!! Heh, little late with that, sorry).

In the denouement, Sheriff Bell retires when he is unable to prevent the bloodbath or bring Chigurh to justice (or even identify who Chigurh is). He retires because it really has become no country for old men. Bell (and McCarthy?) suspects the moral decline and growing violence of the world around him is irreversible.

"It starts when you begin to overlook bad manners. Any time you quit hearin Sir and Mam the end is pretty much in sight."

My biggest problem with the book is that there are a couple of pretty big plot holes. One is, why did Moss, after taking the money, decide to risk discovery by returning to the scene? I suppose it was because he felt conflicted about leaving someone to die thirsty and alone, but this humanitarian action doesn't seem consistent with his later actions. I can live with this since it sets up the conflict and action for the rest of the story.

My bigger gripe is with the Moss's death scene, or rather the lack of one. We are brought to the scene after the fact with the character of Sheriff Bell. I just think that after investing so much to develop Moss's character, he deserved a better, more detailed death sequence.

Still this is a profound and disturbing book, well written and very approachable. I hope the Coen brothers have done it justice (and from what I've read, they have).

Rating: Recommended.

tagged: books, literature, Cormac McCarthy, No Country for Old Men, Coen brothers