Mercy, Mercy Corps.

We have given money in the past to Mercy Corps, the volunteer relief organization that I'm not linking to right now because I'm lazier than they are.

Naturally, once you give money to a non-profit outfit, they never quit asking for more.

Mercy Corps, unfortunately, has turned into a real phone nag. This is because they are one of those outfits that calls for Amy but won't leave a message. They always hang up before I can explain they should go ahead and talk with me. This problem has come up before -- Amy's name is on whatever giving list they have, so they want to talk with her. But she's not home during the day and she sure as hell doesn't want to talk to them when they call back at dinnertime.

I try to explain this, when given the chance. We've been getting calls every day from the Mercy Corps asking for Amy. But they hang up while I'm trying to explain how they should talk to me.

Finally I interrupted this latest Mercy Corps (paid) caller and she let me explain that I'm the one who writes the checks and looks at the mail. I gave them another $50 and thanked her for giving me the time to explain the situation. She was the first out of maybe ten calls in the last week who let me get a word in beyond "can I take a message?"

She said, "Well, that's why I pray every morning before coming to work, so I can have the wisdom to guide me."

"It worked!" I told her.

Grant v. Lincoln

Last night Cleo had to go to the football game as a member of the Pep Band. The game was at PGE Park, and it was the Grant Generals (our home team from just around the corner) against their cross-town rivals, the Lincoln Cardinals. The game was played at PGE Park because the bleachers at Lincoln's field have been deemed unsafe. Grant does not really have a field for games at this time of year.

The game was televised on Fox Sports Network, nationally broadcast (but not in all markets, we're told) as "Nike's High School Game of the Week." Grant, with its winning record of 6-1 (I think), was trying for the PIL division title. Last year's game drew almost 6,000 fans.

It was great to watch on TV. Grant has some good players, all lined up behind their star quarterback, Andre Broadous. Grant got off to an early start and scored twice right away. Then Lincoln came back with some fire to score before the half was over. Things were looking good for Lincoln, but in the second half the game got away from them completely and Grant won 42-14.

Yes, it was fun to watch. But it also took 2 and a half hours. It made me realize once again how much time is required to be a sports fan. Here's a photo from The Oregonian's site:

Smith and Bybee

Yesterday Greg came by after lunch and we went out into the warm sunshine along the Columbia. We stopped at Broughton Beach and watched some gulls fight over a good-sized fish, then drove on over to the preserve at Smith and Bybee Lakes.




We were a little mixed up at first... the stuff they did last year changed the parking and path layout, so we first went to the far south end of the water. Then we went back up to the old path, made a stop at the lookout and headed to the far lookout. There wasn't much in the way of excitement, bird-wise -- in fact, it was pretty quiet. Still, it was about 75 degrees and sunny and the colorful leaves are still on the trees.

Here's what it looked like there:


Here's a Great Blue Heron... this photo was taken by simply putting my camera up to Greg's spotting scope:

Today's Jumble 10/22

30 Days of Wha-?

Saturday Amy and I saw the movie 30 Days of Night. Fans of the comic book -- sort of -- we were looking forward to it. I kind of or want to like Josh Hartnett, even though I can't think of a performance of his that made me think "he's a good actor." He seems like an okay guy, I guess that's his appeal. He must be an okay guy for people to keep hiring him. I don't think they're hiring him because he's the coolest, the hottest or the most intense.

Anyway, fans of the comic will recall that the real protagonist is the female character, the estranged wife of the character played by Josh Hartnett. But this is Hollywood, so the female lead, some mouth-breathing, sissy-looking blonde named Melissa George, basically followed the dude around the entire movie. We were supposed to think she's tough, but she doesn't actually do anything that's all that tough.

Unless you count being rescued by the male lead.

A bigger problem with the movie is there's not much story there. That's easily forgiven in a 30-page comic (those comics were a rip-off, more money and few pages than average). But in a movie you really do want a little bit more.

In the end I can't say it was a BAD movie. It was disappointing to me that they took a very stylized comic and made it into a rather pedestrian horror movie, but fans of that genre probably won't find too much to complain about.

iTunes University

The Stanford-iTunes project I mentioned a while back has been expanded by iTunes to include several other universities, all under the umbrella "iTunes University."

Last night I spent a while poking around, while listening to a lecture from some American Muslim fellow who was discussing the problems with Islam as it is today. You can listen to them without downloading them, but I still downloaded several, mostly in order to add to the iPod in Amy's car. Some bits were only a few minutes long. For example, they had ten of Garrison Keillor's Writer's Almanac. I also grabbed ten or so of a similar program on composers. And several hour-or-so long lectures on a variety of subjects.

Now I don't have to listen to sports radio, Christian radio or Dr. Laura while I work.

Currently I'm listening to Korea: The Unfinished War by John Biewen and Stephen Smith, from American RadioWorks.

Oh, Ellen!

The Entertainment Industry finally hooked me on their Ellen DeGeneres narrative involving the adopted dog she gave away. The bait this time was that she's maybe a SERIAL DOG RE-GIFTER. You know it must be true if the NY POST got it from Howard Stern.

I've saved you the trouble of actually going to the NY Post's site: