Why sleep?

My brain seems to kick into a higher gear immediately before I sleep, although my readers may disagree with me on that. Because of that, I've always been kind of fascinated with sleep and why we even need it. Today, the New York Times looks at that very topic.

You CAN take the cheerleader out of the girl

The male portion of the blogosphere is agog over Angela Keathly and Renee Thomas, the two (former) Carolina Panther cheerleaders who got in a boatload of trouble after having sex with each other in Tampa club bathroom. But guys, have you stopped to look at those mugshots? Those mugs are not all that pretty. Apparently, the key to taking the cheerleader out of the girl is a late night visit to jail and a mugshot.

Update
As I folded some laundry, I realized that there is another way to take the cheerleader out of the girl. Pound on the door to their stall.

Where T.O. was right

Terrell Owens was suspended and deactivated for the rest of the season by the Eagles yesterday. This was the result of a culmination of bad behavior by Owens, but he was right about one thing: The Eagles would be better with Brett Favre at quarterback right now. Part of this is because Donovan McNabb has been playing hurt, but even before that, Brett was the better quarterback. McNabb is a very good quarterback, don't get me wrong, but he's never really been a Favre caliber quarterback. Even this year, with the team rotting around him, Favre has been playing pretty high caliber football. I dislike Owens as much as the next guy, and I think he fully deserves his suspension, but not for the comparison of McNabb and Favre that he made on ESPN.

France a quagmire; French to pull out

Okay, perhaps the French won't give up that easily on their homeland. Yet. But it does seem that Chirac is fiddling while Paris (and the rest of France) burns.

Beer fights cancer!

I usually ignore "new studies" unless they tell me something I want to hear. The latest new study tells us that the hops in beer curb the growth of tumors. There is a small problem, though:

Mice studies show that the compound is metabolized quickly by the body, so it's hard to get a large amount in the body at one time, Stevens said.

Only if you aren't trying very hard.

Jet lag

I'm sure this will disappoint some of you who stop by here regularly, but while in Las Vegas I:

1. Worked hard.
2. Drank modestly
3. Went to sleep at reasonable hours.
4. Only gambled $4.

Still, this trip always wears me out. It was fun to ease my way back into blogging today, and I'd love to do my regular late night blogging, but I'm done for. I'm going to walk upstairs now, crawl into bed, and pull the bags under my eyes back up over my eyes and sleep the slumber of a house cat.

Hope for the Packer season

In 1984, the Packers started a season 1-7. That Forrest Gregg lead team had an exciting second half, ending the season with a 7-1 run and just missing the playoffs.

Of course, that team had more than 4 talented players, so I wouldn't get too excited...

Cheerleader dreams do come true

And you thought this was only the thing of fantasies:

Two Carolina Panther cheerleaders spent the night in jail after a rough night in Channelside. The Panthers were in town to play the Bucs Sunday afternoon.

Witnesses say Angela Keathley and Renee Thomas were engaged in some type of sexual activity inside a bathroom stall at Banana Joe's around 2:20 am Sunday. Another woman waiting to use the bathroom got into an argument with the pair.

Next week: Lingerie models have a pillow fight on the catwalk.

West Wing "debate"

I am watching The West Wing's live "debate" right now. It is like a car wreck, and I cannot turn away. It is a wingnut fantasy scene, with the Republican candidate being an asshole only concerned about money and the Democratic candidate a caring soul with all the answers. It is terrible. But in some sense I welcome it. As long as the far left continues to "misunderestimate" what those of us on the right are all about, they will continue to misunderstand Americans, and they'll continue to lose elections.

Update
I kind of wish that I had watched this from the beginning. It would have been fun to correct the factual errors and misleading statements.

Thank you, fellow bloggers

I've started to get caught up on the events of the past several days, and I have to thank all of the bloggers on my RSS feed reader. The posts have been wonderful ways for me to get back into the swing of things. And all of you certainly write a lot. I started with 1500+ posts to catch up on. I still have over 700 to sift through.

Duh

AP: "State battles likely if Roe overturned."

If you've had a civics course in high school and stayed awake for it, you'd know this, already.

Get used to it

When I left several days ago, the Paris riots were already a few days old. I anticipated that they'd be over and done with by the time I boarded my flight home. I was wrong.

The urban unrest that triggered scores of arson attacks on vehicles, nursery schools and other targets across France reached the capital overnight, with police saying early Sunday that 13 cars were burned.

By 1 a.m., at least 607 vehicles were burned — including those in Paris, said Patrick Hamon, spokesman for the national police. The overall figures were expected to climb by daybreak, he added.

Europe had better get used to this. Several things are going to lead to more and more incidents like this in the "Old World." First, Europe's appeasement of radical Islam. Second, Europe's inability to grow its native population, along with the growth of Muslim immigration from north Africa. Third, Europe's socialism has led to an economic stagnation that is bound to create frustration in the young.

Although Europe may have called this upon itself, it still does not excuse the rioters. Nothing excuses setting an innocent 55 year old woman on fire. Period.

Where I've been

Mostly here.

The best laid plans...

So much for posting during my trip. Much to my disappointment, here at the airport is the only internet access that I've had. It's nice to see that the world still spins even without my pontification.

Off to Vegas

I'm off to Vegas for a few days, but make sure you stop by here every now and then. I'm going to try to do some photo blogging as my schedule allows, and perhaps some more in depth blogging in the evenings.

Speaking of hard hitting journalism

Nothing says "Edward R. Murrow" like pretending to be Marilyn Monroe. Can we finally admit that most network news is more about entertainment than news?

Burying ledes

In a Paris suburb, Islamic youths have been rioting for 6 days. If all you read was the AP, though, you may not get that "Islamic" part. In this story, they don't really mention who's rioting in the Paris suburbs. In fact, they only mention the makeup of these individuals once, in paragraph #11:

Suburbs that ring France's big cities, home to immigrant communities often from Muslim North Africa, suffer soaring unemployment and discrimination. Disenchantment and anger thrive in the tall cinderblock towers and long "bars" that make up the projects.

Ah yes, hard hitting journalism that gets to the bottom of a story.

Jib*log

By the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel's logic, anyone who doesn't walk along in lockstep to racial stereotypes deserves an asterisk next to their name. As a blogger who is 1/4 Native American, and who possesses a brain of his own, I guess I deserve an asterisk. This site shall be known as Jib*log until further notice. Oh, and to the Journal Sentinel editorial board: **** off. There are for more for ya.

HT Sykes Writes.

Update
Ah, wait. 1/4 probably doesn't meet the proper quota to really be considered Native American. I'll have to pull that asterisk. After all, I'm a 3/4 white guy.

The new beer in town-Leinie's Apple Spice

Ladies and gentlemen, I present to you the latest from the Jacob Leinenkugel Brewing Company, Leinie's Apple Spice. Apple Spice should be hitting the shelves of your favorite liquor store today. It will only be available in six packs and on tap, and it will be available through the end of the year.

I have tried my first sip of Apple Spice, and it is actually pretty good. The company says that they use two tons of apples in each batch of Apple Spice, so I expected this to be a very sweet beer. It really isn't. On my first sip, I could tell it was a Leinie's product. I can't explain it, but most Leinenkugel's beers have a taste to them that is trademark Leinie's. This one does as well. But after the second sip, the flavor of the apples really started to come through with a hint of cinnamon. It is a very mild beer and the flavors in it don't over power the way, say, a Berry Weiss does. In their promotional Leinie Lodge Legend newsletter, they say that the beer can be heated up and drank with a cinnamon stick. A) I did not believe them when I read it, and B) I didn't want to defile my beer that way, but I may actually try it.

If you have tried Woodchuck, don't pre-judge this beer by it. It has very little similarity to Woodchuck. Woodchuck is a very sweet beer that can get overpowering quickly. Apple Spice is much more mild and I can see a person enjoying several of them. For you beer purists out there, this may not be the beer for you, but I think you should try it just the same. I'm normally a purist enough that these flavored beers (like Berry Weiss) turn me off immediately. This is actually quite tasty, though.

As always, I do not receive dime one from the Leinenkugel Brewing company, unless you count the two free beers they allow me every time I visit their hospitality center.

This is creepy

For only the second time ever, I was going to reveal an image of myself tonight. The image, which you can kind of see in the upper left hand corner of this picture, won Mrs. Jib third place in a photography contest 10 years ago. But when I try to upload the image, I get this creepy return. Amongst the snow, I see three women in skirts dancing, seemingly in a chorus line. What makes this creepy is the image doesn't look like this on any of my imaging editing software, only when I upload it here. I think Jiblog may be haunted by some fun loving women of yesteryear.

Update
If you click on the image to view it at full size, the dancing women disappear. Wasn't Halloween yesterday?