I've had the subject of this entry rattling around in my head for awhile but it's not "topically fresh", as my buddy Mike would say, so indulge me, if you will.  I was finally prompted to write it after reading this excellent entry by my other buddy, His Royal Diddyness.  Of course, I could only find time to write this in between serves in a game of "comment tag" with yet another buddy, Jack, who I'm pretty sure is only repeatedly visiting my last entry so he can look at my woman's boobs.

Not that I blame him. 

Speaking of boobs, the following is a video of Miss South Carolina, Caitlin Upton, as she fumbles her way through an answer to a question given to her during the 2007 Miss Teen USA pageant.  Several versions of this video have been floating around the internet for months, but I only recently discovered them.  Please, watch this subtitled verision now if you haven't already...





I didn't even laugh when I first saw the original video.  My jaw just dropped in disbelief that anyone could be so stupid.  But I'm not really making this entry to (just) make fun of Miss Upton, so I'll link you to the video of her subsequent appearance on the Today Show where she addressed her response and reanswered the question.  I also have to admit that she's a good sport because she also made fun of herself at the 2007 MTV Video Music Awards.  I guess there really is no such thing as bad publicity.

Anyway...

What I really wanted to address was the question posed to her:  "Recent polls have shown a fifth of Americans can't locate the U.S. on a world map.  Why do you think this is?"

Now, if she truly misheard the question, as she stated she did on the Today Show appearance, the proper response would have been, "I'm sorry, would you repeat that, please?"  Even if she had understood the question, it still would have been a good response.  I mean, come on, my kids say that all the time!  OK, what they really say is "huh?", which we all know means "I heard you, but I have a feeling that I'm going to look bad if I give you a wrong answer, so I'm going to buy some time until I can formulate the response that I think you want to hear... even if it isn't the truth."

The truth...

That's what really intrigued me about that video:  what is the truthful answer to that question?  Miss Upton's truthful answer--not the one she gave on the Today Show, days after she had time to research it (read: ask someone smarter)--was probably "I don't know", but giving that answer definitely would have cost her the crown... which her actual answer did, anyway.

Perhaps the judges should have posed only the first part of the question, shown her a world map, and then asked if she could point to the U.S.  If she'd identified it correctly (which she also stated she could on the Today Show), she could have then said something patriotic, like "How could I not know where this great country of ours is?  God Bless America!".  That probably would have earned her the crown and a standing ovation.

But let's think about that question in broader terms:  "Why doesn't someone know something?"

The answers are simple, but not the kind you want to give during a beauty pageant:

• They haven't been taught.
• They lack the mental ability to learn.
• They don't care to know.
• They have forgotten the answer.

Now, let's address the first answer and bring it back to geography.  Is geography really not being taught in schools now?  I shudder to think that might be true.  I distinctly remember a heavy emphasis on geography even back in my own elementary school days.  Heck, one school I attended even had a Geography Bowl.  One student from each classroom (K-8) was picked for a competition with other students and [ahem] I was chosen to represent my second grade class.  The students and attending parents gathered in the gymnasium and the questions and answers were given to the team members individually and orally.  I don't remember how the teams were set up, but I do remember that even though my team lost, I had answered all of my questions correctly.  I didn't consider it a defeat, personally, and it sure beat the time I played a tree in the school's production of Cinderella.

Anyway...

I suppose I should know whether or not schools teach geography now, being that I have three school-aged children myself, but the truth is that most of their geographic knowledge came from Wal-Mart.


About 5 years ago, shortly after moving into our current residence, I realized what utter slobs the kids were at the kitchen table.   On a Wal-Mart trip, I picked up 6 laminated placemats--educational types with things like American presidents, a U.S. map, a world map , U.S. money, the solar system, and colors (it had Elmo on it and my youngest was 5 at the time)--hoping to keep dribbled food and drink off the table.  Well, it didn't work.  They actually held the placemats and read them.  They learned from them; especially from the map mats.

We still have those mats and they still don't keep them under their food; they still read them, although these days it's more like a competition.  From the kitchen, I often hear things like:


And that's really the best part of education, folks--letting someone know you know something they don't know so you can make them feel stupid.
 

Getsuyobi.  Day of the Moon.  Monday.

I'm sure most of you hate Mondays because the weekend is over and you have to go back to work and stuff.  I love Mondays because I get Mondays off.  Yay me!

Anyway...

I was hoping for more guesses in my last entry but I can't say that I'm dissatisfied with the turnout; although one of you didn't guess at all... twice!  Who knew that a scientific mind would opt for comedy instead of accuracy?

[Ed. note: Let it never again be stated or implied that I sleep with men.  Men are selfish pigs and usually leave after they "get some".  That said, I have never slept with a man... or two.  Let it also never be stated or implied that I sleep with my subscribers (save one).  My subs usually fall asleep in the middle of reading my entries--wherein I'm off on a tech tirade--and I'm left awake... and unsatisfied.]


Honorable mention goes to Mike and The Other Mad One, both of whom also correctly identified the proper Ted.  Leda wins by a nose because her reason was dead on.  My Ted isn't much to look at but I love him anyway.

I'll also give snaps to Raquel and Stiv, both of whom picked Ted Logan.  That Ted is certainly a good guess but Mr. Logan's personality more closely resembles my own, rather than that of my car; although I'm not one to judge the strangeness of things which are afoot at the Circle K.

Though I know why she picked the Ted that she picked, I still have to wag my finger at The Mad One.  I thought she knew me better than that.  Ted Nugent was easy... TOO easy.  I may be a rocker but my car isn't.  Hell, the radio doesn't even work--but then again, I didn't mention that in my video.  Forgive me.  I suppose that I should also mention that while I admire Mr. Nugent's rock 'n' roll prowess (one can't help but be moved by a lyric like "when in doubt, I whip it out"), I whole-heartedly disagree with his politics.

I'd like to congratulate all of you for not picking the red herring that is Ted McGinley.  I wanted to have four Teds in my quiz and he was the only other one that came to mind.  Mr. McGinley is best known for being added to the cast of TV shows that end up cancelled soon afterward.  For the purposes of comedic irony, I thought it would be funny to include a person whom I wouldn't let DRIVE my car, let alone be named after him.

So, congratulations, Leda!  Pick a good topic for me and I'll do my best to make it blogworthy.

In closing, I give you... The Best of Ted:

"There's a serious dearth of decent reading material around here in Xangaville." ~ CapnK8

The above quote, which is part of a comment Kate left for me on my previous entry, made me smile when I first read it.  It is neither the truth of that statement, nor the implied compliment to me (when read in context), that amused me.  No, it's the fact that I only recently discovered the word "dearth".

I asked for and received Steve Martin's autobiography "Born Standing Up: A Comic's Life" for Christmas.  Midway through the book, Mr. Martin tells the story of his audition for The Steve Allen Show in 1969.  Here's an exerpt describing part of a conversation he had with the show's producers:

They accepted me with more ease than I expected, and when I spoke to them afterward, they commented, "There seems to be a dearth of young comedians right now."  I looked puzzled.  I said, "That's odd, I don't think there are many at all."  Their stares made me realize my blunder.  I knew the word, but I had the definition backward.

If I'd heard the word for the first time in a similar context, I also would have assumed that dearth meant "abundance" instead of "scarcity".  Now that I know what it means I think it's a really cool word, but I doubt I'll have the chance to slip it into a conversation.  And even if I do, I have the feeling that the other participants in said conversation will make the same mistake Steve and I did.

EXCUUUUUUUUUUUUUUSE MMMMEEEEEE!!!

I love amusing coincidences like that.  I suppose I could take it further and assume that Kate hadn't heard the word before either, and that she discovered it reading the same book, which would not only make us phone twins (comment context again) but BOOK TWINS!  How cool would that be?

But I digress...

kinda...

I was happy to read (again in my comments) that my buddy Mike also has a red Samsung SYNC phone, but he's a silly, silly man for thinking that I don't already have all the cool goodies and attachments for it.  I'll forgive him for that as he is the ONLY one of my readers who left me a voice message when I begged for... er... humbly solicited one.  Shame on the rest of you.

I must say that I love love LOVE the SYNC.  I love its large screen.  I love its 2.0 megapixel camera which can take pictures with dimensions up to 1600 X 1200.  I LOVE the Micro SD expansion slot, which currently houses a 1GB card the size of a pinky fingernail!  And in the snazzy red color I chose it's a fashionable geek's dream!

However, what I DO NOT love is the fact that I can't use a USB cable (or even bluetooth, for that matter) to put games on it.  Yep, somebody at Samsung got wise to the workarounds and made it so that games can only be downloaded.  The bottom line is that I have to PAY for games if I want them.  I HATE that.

As many of you know, I am a Solitaire junkie.  As such, I was lucky to find a FREE version of the game.  Bless the hearts of the people at Sun Microsystems for offering free tool kits for developing Java applications for cell phones.  Doubly bless the hearts of those folks that have taken the time to learn Java programming and develop games and apps to be distributed freely.  Granted, I still have to pay transfer fees for downloading--which is 1¢ per KB on my current plan (Solitaire came to a whopping 27¢)--but I'll take that over the $5.99 most other sites charge for an "officially licensed" game.

Honestly, I can overlook the game thing because I've learned to do so many other cool things on my phone.  For example: I can take any video I find online and convert it to a viewable cell phone format thanks to an amazing (and FREE) program called SUPER (Simplified Universal Player Encoder & Renderer).  I've mentioned this program before but now I actually have a computer powerful enough to run it!  A few months ago, my dad sent me yet another one of his old computers... one with a faster processor, more RAM, and Windows XP.

Yes, you read that correctly.  I've finally graduated from Windows 98.  And, as His Royal Diddyness recently put it to me (yet again in my comments):  "it's about time..."

It's also about time I wrapped up this entry, so I'll just drop names of the rest of you that left me recent comments:

• The Mad One, who just came to the harsh realization that she's appliance dependent (with which I can sympathize) and who also likes to apologize for her husband's curtness (which isn't necessary because I still think he's a cool guy).
• The Other Mad One, Mad's faithful sidekick, who was the first one to welcome me back to the "blogosphere" (another cool word I hadn't heard before).
• Tina, who thinks she's being funny by saying she's glad to see I'm "still around", even though she lives only a few blocks from me and picks up my woman for work every morning.
• And last, but not least, Stiv, who seems to be the only one who appreciated my Seikima II video.  Rock on, my metal brother!

I'll end this by embedding yet another video from a Japanese heavy metal band.  These guys are called Anthem and I've really been digging into their music lately--so much so that I've downloaded all 12 of their studio albums onto my phone.  Pretty cool, huh?

(Don't ask where I got the albums, just enjoy the video, mmmK?)

 

 

I feel the urge to explain why I've been obsessed with Japanese bands (and not just those of the heavy metal variety) lately, but I'll save that for another day.  I'd also like to keep sharing videos with you, but I need you to tell me if posting too many vids on one page drags it down.  I may have a faster connection and a better computer now, but I remember how much it sucked when an overloaded web page froze up my browser.

And thanks to all for your continued support!