EGADS.

Many pictures of tornado damage in southeast Nebraska can be seen here. The pics on the third page are especially chilling.

TEN RANDOM THOUGHTS #5

1. If you’ve got a good non-chain bagel shop near you, support it. Bagelmakers need to be encouraged.
2. This is my least-favorite time of the sports calendar: the NBA playoffs. Lakers, Lakers, Lakers. *yawn*
3. And I’ll bet the NHL is just thrilled that the Stanley Cup finals will draw the massive Calgary and Tampa Bay markets. Actually, they won’t even draw the Tampa Bay market, since I doubt 1 out of every 10 people in Tampa even know they have a hockey team. But I’m sure all 950,000 people in Calgary will be watching, which should generate about $36 in TV revenue for the league. Still, you’d better watch, because next year, there probably won’t be any hockey at all. Unless ESPN 6 is showing the Wausau Walruses versus the Battle Creek Flakemakers, that is.
4. The definition of high unintentional comedy: watching two people trolling each other on the typical Internet message board. There’s nothing quite like seeing how asinine people are will to be just in the hopes of inflaming another person. It’s like watching 14-year-olds trying to make crank phone calls, only without the intelligence.
5. Michael Moore is a controversial political figure, and that will make many people (including me, probably) decide not to see Fahrenheit 9/11. And that’s fine; we’re all free to ignore political viewpoints with which we don’t agree. But do not interpret Fahrenheit 9/11’s victory at the Cannes Film Festival as Hollywood’s endorsement of his politics. Beyond the bluster, it must be remembered that Michael Moore is the only person in recent history who’s figured out how to make money-making documentaries. He is simply an excellent filmmaker. (And if you think that means I agree with his politics, you need to brush up on your reading comprehension.)
6. Remember: feeding a stray cat is more or less a lifetime commitment.
7. Oh, joy! Jim Rome’s on vacation this week! No more sentences which take three and a half minutes to complete. And maybe somebody will express an opinion more controversial than “Shaq is good.”
8. Why do I listen to him anyway? Because nobody in this radio market has the guts to counterprogram with anything worth listening to. I got bored with Rush and his many imitators back in 1996.
9. I’m working on my Big Ten football preview. I doubt I’ll post it before June sometime, but it’s time to start thinking about college football again. Well, for me, anyway.
10. Pregnancy note: It is very possible to go from the “drinking water nauseates me” phase to the “I will eat anything that isn’t fighting back too hard” phase in less than 12 hours. I know; I’ve seen it happen.