PunditGuy

WASHINGTON (AP) Senate Minority Leader Harry Reid, D-Nev., saw a doctor after feeling light-headed Tuesday and has learned he’d suffered a mild stroke, aides said Friday.

Before.

 

After.

UPDATE: Yikes, there’s more pictures. Hello, Mr. Steroids. Forget about his hair and his body. Cripes, what happened to his face? From here forward, Carrot Top is dead to me.

MORE: The Carrot Top transformation.

STILL MORE: This is disturbing.

Michele Catalano’s Friday seems to be focused on the worst of everything. Just keep scrolling.

Yep, it’s real furniture built from those (practically) indestructible FedEx boxes.

They’ve got a couch, dining table with chairs, a bed, and a computer desk. Jose, the proprietor at fedexfurniture.com, says it’s 100% functional.

“FedEx Furniture is furniture put together by empty FedEx Boxes, and held together by FedEx packaging supplies. The couch is standing/sleeping approved, I sleep on the bed every night, I eat at the dining table, and I work at the desk almost 20 hours a day.”

I don’t think he gets out that much.

Oh, and if you’re wondering, the real FedEx hasn’t been too friendly with Jose. You can read their latest love letter sent to him by a real live FedEx lawyer. (pdf)

MORE: Jeremy Pepper talked to FedEx about this, and he also spoke with Jose.

STILL MORE: Steve Rubel thinks FedEx has blown a big citizen marketing opportunity.

EVEN MORE: This is cool.

This has been around a bit, but it was new to me.

Created and introduced by Scott Kelby at a Mac Design conference in June, a spoof ad for the iPod Flea (see video).

As with any new technology, this will need some tweaks in order to get it just right. Hopefully, they’ll solve the battery problem.

See anything different?

Maybe it’s a mid-Blog crisis, but for some reason I felt like I needed to change the design of PunditGuy. I guess it’s kind of like standing in front of the mirror and parting your hair on the other side just to see what you look like. Sometimes it works well enough that you actually go out of the house and face the public that way.  I suppose a blog redesign is no different.

Anyway, that’s what’s going on here.

“Hey Ben Affleck, you’re career will be forever linked with one of the worst movie failures of all time! What are you going to do now?” 

                              “I’m going to Home Depot!”

I was reading a post over at Michele Catalano’s place about ‘Worst Band Ever’ lists. If you’re into music as much as I am, you won’t be surprised by the submissions (Air Supply, Poison, Wilson Phillips – you get the idea).

It’s one thing to read opinions from people about why they love or hate a certain band – I can do that in my sleep. It’s quite another to read criticisms by musicians against other musicians. I’m not talking about rivals trying to get publicity, like when Elton John accused Madonna of lip syncing her ‘live’ concerts. I’m talking about people slamming people because they play bad. They don’t have any musical talent, yet they are widely famous and sell millions of CDs (boy, could I compile a list of bands who fit that description!). If your rant is to be taken seriously though, you have to be a master player. Otherwise, it’s nothing but sour grapes.

But, band on band cat fights are just about cheesy pop music groups, boy toy groups, and east coast/west coast rapper wars right?

Apparently not. It appears that a feud has been brewing in the Jazz music industry. A commenter of Michele’s linked to a jazz fan website containing this question posed to jazz guitarist Pat Metheny:

Pat, could you tell us your opinion about Kenny G?

OK, this shouldn’t be too tough right? Pat is a master guitar player, and has the credits and awarded accolades to back it up, so he’s as qualified as anyone to give an informed answer. I expect Pat to say how Kenny is a ‘great person’ and fun to be around and how they played together at some weekend jazz fest and the crowd loved it, yadda yadda yadda.

Wrong. Pat takes the opportunity to unload on Mr. G.

“I first heard him (Kenny G) a number of years ago playing as a sideman with Jeff Lorber when they opened a concert for my band. My impression was that he was someone who had spent a fair amount of time listening to the more pop oriented sax players of that time, like Grover Washington or David Sanborn, but was not really an advanced player, even in that style. He had major rhythmic problems and his harmonic and melodic vocabulary was extremely limited, mostly to pentatonic based and blues-lick derived patterns, and he basically exhibited only a rudimentary understanding of how to function as a professional soloist in an ensemble – Lorber was basically playing him off the bandstand in terms of actual music.”

Wait! There’s more!

“But he did show a knack for connecting to the basest impulses of the large crowd by deploying his two or three most effective licks (holding long notes and playing fast runs – never mind that there were lots of harmonic clams in them) at the key moments to elicit a powerful crowd reaction (over and over again). The other main thing I noticed was that he also, as he does to this day, played horribly out of tune – consistently sharp.”

Oh, but there’s even more. Pat goes on for paragraphs about how bad a musician Kenny G really is. Not only does Metheny disrespect him, but apparently, every other respectable jazz musician thinks Kenny stinks.

Meanwhile, I have yet to find a response to this criticism from the sax player. Oh, he has plenty of defenders (middle-aged housewives who curl up in a comfy chair with their favorite cup of chamomile and Kenny’s greatest hits), but no one of Metheny’s caliber has stood by the G’ster (yet).

I just hope this war of words doesn’t lead to a bullet flying confrontation on a street in Vegas. The tribute albums and benefit concerts would drive me crazy.

Stay tuned.

Most everyone in the MSM assumes that Hillary Clinton will be running for president in 2008. Even most bloggers I read believe she’ll make a run for the White House. This speculation (some would say “sure bet”) has prompted many to float the names of potential challengers to Hillary. Not surprisingly, another woman, current secretary of state Condoleezza Rice has been mentioned, and is regularly polled on her prospects. Other women, like Kay Bailey Hutchison have been suggested as replacements for George W. Bush.

Just tune into any of the Sunday TV talker shows and you’ll sense a sort of inevitability to Hillary’s candidacy, which leads into the mentioning of all the other individuals and their potential to win. Clearly, it’s a hot subject that quickly turns into a debate about whether you like one over another.

But I wonder why I don’t hear this question asked or discussed.

Is America ready to elect a woman President of the United States?

Not ready to think about electing a woman president. Not ready to consider the idea of electing a woman president.

I’m talking about the last question that runs through a voters mind the second before they “pull the lever”. In 2008, will a majority of Americans vote a woman into the oval office?

Forget about chances, and the spin, conventional wisdom and specially worded polls (which release nearly every day). None of these can effectively predict what happens on that Tuesday in November.

The last time Americans considered this issue the country only dipped their toe in the water with Geraldine Ferraro as the Democratic Veep nominee in 1984. And, before you go any further…I’m not suggesting that Ms. Ferraro’s failed campaign was an indictment on placing a woman in the highest office in the land. That was a completely different time. But even then, there were many who believed that the act of electing a woman president was long overdue, given that many other western nations had already been served by female heads of state. Since the ‘84 election, the subject of electing a woman president hasn’t gotten a lot of significant air time, until now.

And the noise is everywhere. With the help of Friends of Hillary, (indirect, under the radar) help from the DNC, FOB’s and complicit members of the media, you’d think that America has made up its mind about a woman president, so much so that office pool funds are accumulating, awaiting the winner who successfully picks the designer of the dress the new “Madam” president will wear at her inauguration.

But, I’m just not sure that the all important majority are ready. It seems that in most all decisions, Americans play a “what if?” game. I believe they would play a similar game in this case, and I’m wondering how it would come out.

Maybe we need to take time now, before the hype of the primaries, to ask this question, to talk about it and help people think through it? Whether you’re for Hillary or Condi or Kay Bailey, or a future unknown, the success of their run for high office will be affected by the same single question.

Are we ready?

I wonder.

Two blog posts within the same month…does this mean that Allah is back?