He won't fight back! Wahh!

The Straight Dope talks about What is supposed to happen when you land on "Free Parking" in Monopoly?. Well, I play by the offical rules, where nothing happens if you land on FP.

But years ago I played a Monopoly variation with my uncle that used two boards; the first board followed the typical Monopoly rules, except that if you landed on 'Go', you had the option of jumping to the second board, which we called "Las Vegas". Once there, you could buy and build hotels on any property without first owning all the other properties of that color; and, all the rents were doubled.

Anyone else ever heard of that variation ?

Movie City Indie has a brief note about Crispin Hellion Glover's upcoming film, "What Is It?". What it is, according to Mr Glover, is "...the adventures of a young man whose principal interests are snails, salt, a pipe, and how to get home, as tormented by an hubristic racist inner psyche." Most of the actors have Down's Syndrome, but the film isn't about Down's Syndrome. Sounds, emr, interesting ?

More at crispinglover.com.

Who's Crispin Glover ? He was George McFly from Back To The Future.

Somehow, for the past year, I've neglected to put any Unrest on my iPod - a terrible mistake. Before they ceased to exist as a band, Unrest could write perfect pop songs - simple, blissful, and irresistably catchy. That they didn't dominate, or even reach, the singles charts (and change the sound of pop music forever), proves just how perverse the world is.

So, I dropped a few Unrest albums onto the iPod over the weekend; and now, Monday morning, the magic of the iPod shuffle presents me with their super-sweet Six Layer Cake.

i'm up and
you're with me this time
you're up and
still in the shine
pull over
you're getting dressed
all touching
all the right

chrous:
6 5 5 4 3 2 2 1
6 5 4 3 2 2 layer
6 5 4 4 3 3 2 1
6 5 4 3 2 1 layer cake

i've called you
with my head
my fingers
your lips to my hand
Front Royale
big kitchen day
my fingers
all over

6 5 5 6 3 2 layer
16 fingers 8 feet high
10 7 6 5 4 3 2 1
6 5 4 4 2 2 layer cake

one layer on halloween
no hands where
they ought to be
in pockets
keeping this in
in pants and
i'm so so

10 6 10 6 7 6 layer
10 6 7 6 10 6 high
10 6 5 4 4 3 2 1
10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 cake

fingertips show the way
relax on
USMA
pull over
you're getting dressed
all touching
all the right

6 6 6 6 6 6 layer cake

with my
i'll give you a slice
of mine

Lyrics rarely hold up without the music, and these are no exception. Without the music, it's probably impossible to appreciate just how fun a song can be when the chorus seems to be just a random stream of numbers; but when you hear it, the blissed-out exuberance of Mark Robinson's delivery makes even "6 5 5 4 3 2 2 1" catchy and fun to sing along with. And if it's hard to remember when he sings "6 5 5 4 3 2 2 1" vs. "6 5 4 4 3 3 2 1", then singing along becomes more like a game of follow the leader. And nobody cares if you get it wrong because it's just a nonsense sequence anyway.

I couldn't find these lyrics anywhere on the net. So I'll post them here in case anyone else needs them - or in case anyone knows what he's saying in the places I missed. A couple of those lines are definitely wrong, but I just couldn't decipher what he as saying. Maybe they're in the liner notes, I'll check when I get home. Corrected from the liner notes. The things I missed were things that don't make a lot of sense in this context: USMA, Front Royale ?

My boss tells us it took him six hours to drive the 15 miles to his house last night. A guy I work with said it took him seven hours, that included two miles of walking, as the police had closed the road to his neighborhood. Thousands of children ended up spending the night in their schools because nobody could get there to pick them up.

One inch of snow. Predicted at least 24 hours in advance.

CNN.

My car's rear end has been making funny sounds, so last Wednesday I took it to the shop. They couldn't reproduce the funny sounds and gave it back. When they sent me their on-line survey, I gave them low marks on everything, because I don't think they tried very hard. But, over the weekend, the weather changed from low 70's to low 20's, and now the car always makes the funny grinding/rubbing sound, especially when accelerating uphill or in turns. So, I dropped it off last night, hoping they could try it this morning when it would be cold, etc.. They reproduced it allright - "worn exhaust hangers" said the guy on the phone. Hmm. How the exhaust hangers on a 6-month old car could get "worn" is a secret only myself, that one pile of gravel in the middle of the road, and the now-disposed-of exhaust hangers can tell. Mr Warranty picked up the tab, and I'd hate for him to think it was my fault or anything...

So, Mrs. Cleek drove me to work today.

And then, at noon, it snowed. "Heavy unexpected snow!!", now says the weather page on one local news channel's website. Actually, it snowed for about an hour, we got less than an inch, and they'd been predicting it for at least 24 hours. The DOT apparently doesn't watch the weather forecast, because they didn't sand or salt any of the roads that I could see. So, even a half inch of snow caused all the local schools to close early, and to refuse to run any buses. And all the parents had to leave work early to go pick up their kids. The place I work closed at 2:30, because everybody was leaving anyway. Rock!

But, I don't have a car today, and so, I couldn't leave. And then as I watched out my office window, I-40 turned into a parking lot as every parent in the city tried to go pick up their kids, all at once, on the unsanded, unsalted, slightly slippery road. And then all the roads that lead to I-40 turned to parking lots. And then my wife, who works a few miles from me, couldn't come to get me because she couldn't get onto the road, because traffic wasn't moving. Three hundred accidents from 11am to 5pm today, says the Raleigh police dept..

The reason it's so bad is because the Raleigh/Durham area is laid-out like this :

D---J---R

All the people live in the "D" and "R" spots, and they all work in the "J". And connecting those three spots is I-40. And even on days when the weather is fine, traffic is a giant cluster-fuck.

So, I've spent the entire afternoon (now working on early evening) surfing the web and playing Gish. It's an hour and a half past when I normally leave, my wife says she's on her way but who knows how long it'll take. I don't expect I'll be getting home for at least another hour or so. And now the car dealer has closed, so I can't pick up my car. Hopefully, I can get it tomorrow AM.

Just bored. Whining. Grumbling. I suppose there are worse things that could happen than being stuck in the office. But few of them give me a chance to vent like this.

A guy just walked into the office and said he was unable to get home, after 4 hours of trying - all roads blocked.

Wife just arrived... took her an hour to go 3 miles.

Fuck this town.

Matthew Yglesias discovers the magical beauty in the iPod shuffle. Readers share their own shuffles' first ten songs. Everyone likes Death Cab For Cutie.

cough, um, ahem.