Mario World

Last year I started working at PML a few days before Halloween. I was so excited to find out that PML had a whole week of decorations, costumes and pumpkin carvings. I felt right at home. One of my coworkers in customer service really gets in to the Halloween spirit and he brought giant scary clowns, cobwebs and a barbecue pit with human remains roasting on crackling fire.

Alas last year Customer Service didn't win any prizes and they were dejected. People were considering not participating and the most enthusiastic of the bunch took Halloween day off to work on the decorations at his house.

I've been thinking about what to do for next Halloween ALL year. And when November came around I started bugging people to cheer up and I started floating ideas:
****Disclaimer in case you haven't noticed I'm a bit of a geek********
Original Star Trek (picture appropriate cardboard sets, bad acting, an unfortunate temp in a red shirt dying before days end)
Random Japanese Anime (think giant eyes, too much caffeine, floating subtitles)
Super Mario Brothers ( turtles, goombas, bowser oh my!)

I'm happy to say I won them over. Take a look







yea we won

Gabriela Hero of the Republicans

Make your own Barack O'Lantern

I guess I'm not as original as I thought. Found http://www.yeswecarve.com/ where people across America are posting pictures of their Barack O'Lanterns. If you would like to make your own they have some great and easy stencils.

Halloween Again

Timberline Lodge, Oregon (from The Shining ...)
Originally uploaded by chog

Yay!!! It's fall and though we don't get the turning of the leaves to extent you guys back East get them it's still my favorite season. In Portland as the days get shorter another reason to celebrate fall is because shortly the sun will go away for a few months and the rains will begin in earnest. So we try to enjoy every crisp and clear fall day that we can.

Also the BEST part about fall in my humble opinion is the advent of Halloween. How can you go wrong with free candy and opportunities to dress up? You just can't. I'm trying to convince Matt that for Halloween we should make the hour trek up to Timberline Lodge where The Shining was filmed. They are having a screening of the movie and it sounds like wholesome terrifying fun.

Oh yea and also I present to you:
THE BARACK O' LANTERN!

Matt's not the only one with a Raptor Obsession

Topical Humor + Yo Mama Jokes = Genius

Yo' Mama so big the Federal Government couldn't let her fail.

The Day the Market Died

If you're anything like me you need several of hours of someone like Matt talking in order to understand things. As Matt is currently otherwise occupied I thought I would share today's alternate source for information on the whole Bail Out/Market Crisis thing.

NPR's This American Life has put together an excellent show explaining how the banks got into the mess they are in, how their epic failure affects everyday people who don't have any money invested in the market, and how the bail out might or might not help. Oh also they managed to do all that without making it sound utterly boring or incomprehensible.

So pull up a chair and crowd the family around the computer or you know join the 21st century and download it to your personal MP3 player of choice. Listen HERE.

Oh,The places you'll go!

visited 5 states (2.22%)

Check it out. These are the countries I have visited (Germany was a layover but I'm counting it!). There's a website that lets you create this map by checking off the countries you have been in. I created my map and took a look. My first thought was "Hey I've never been to Alaska!" then I remembered that it's part of the United States.

....Meanwhile.....Somewhere in Missouri a little bit of Sarah Palin dies...

The same site let's you create a similar "Place's I've Been" map for the United States. I wish that blue was an option. I don't like seeing that much red on a map of the US; it's unsettling.



visited 27 states (54%)
Create your own visited map of The United States