Throughout the day I frequently visit social bookmarking sites and link aggregator sites to waste pass the time. On these sites, users submit links to stories or articles that they find interesting, and other users visit and comment on the stories submitted. One of the most popular of these sites is Digg, and if you look at the bottom of this post you’ll see the icon for Digg. Click that button, and you will be taken to a page where you can submit this post as something interesting to share.

Anywho…today I was screwin’ around perusing the stories at Digg, and I saw this headline “Milk is Bad for You,” and the link description read, “This is also not an alternative view. Thousands of doctors worldwide are speaking out about milk. It’s up to you to decide who to believe.”

Needless to say, that piqued my interest. My parents own a large dairy farm, and during a slow week I drink a gallon of milk every two days. I read the article, and as I had previously suspected, it was a piece of shit. You’ve probably read articles similar to it—we’re exploiting the cows, mad cow disease, we’re exploiting the poor cows, etc….

But that’s not why I’m posting. I went into the comments section on Digg and I was amazed at the number of people that truly believe that milk is bad for you. Now, I understand that some people are lactose intolerant, and that milk is high in fat, but for those of us that can drink milk it’s a good source of calcium, vitamin D, and protein. There’s a good reason that milk has been the staple of breakfast tables for centuries.

What really pissed me off was the number of people that were making ill-informed, and blatantly incorrect, comments about a subject that they obviously didn’t know anything about. So, I got into an argument with one of them, and now I’m wondering why I even bothered.

You can go to the comments section of Digg here. My screen name at Digg is “hypermarkalan.” If you don’t feel like reading through all three hundred and some odd posts, and I don’t blame you if you don’t, hit ctrl-f and then type in my screen name. Keep hitting “find next” until you get to the long post that I wrote.

I don’t know why I get all bothered by the ignorance, and the stupidity, of others.

I have no ending to this, other than to say drink milk, because my parents could use the money.

The past two days haven’t been kind to celebrities. Gerald Ford passed away, as did the Godfather of Soul, James Brown.

I know this is kind of stupid, but whenever I hear of something bad happening on a holiday, I always think of the Phoebe Cates character from Gremlins. In the movie, she hates Christmas because when she was a little girl her father dressed up as Santa and tried to climb down the chimney to surprise her. Unfortunately, he became stuck about half way down and died.

At least The Godfather and the former Prez didn’t die in a chimney. That’s a sure way to ruin Christmas forever.

• Ding Fries Are Done!!

I sure hope that Santa brought you as many gifts as he did Ellie.

• SWORD NEWS
  Sword-swallowing not as safe as you’d think. In other news, Taco Bell food will make your ass fat.

Three days till Christmas. Let the boys from Run DMC get you into the spirit.

• I want this
  Just in case any of you are searching for any Christmas gifts for me.

I love watching movies, but I think I almost enjoy watching movie trailers as much as the actual movies. Trailers are full of potentiality. They’re like a first date in that way. The trailer goes by rather quickly, it’s a carefully manipulated and meticulously crafted peek at a larger product, and its purpose is to leave you wanting more.

Let’s take a look at a few, shall we?

Transfomers

Is it just me, or did that look like Independence Day + Armageddon = Transformers? From the trailer it looks like Michael Bay thinks that all you need for a Transfomers movie is a bunch of big robots fighting each other. I know the transformers couldn’t look exactly like they did in the cartoon, but why the hell did Optimus Prime have flames on him? And how does Shia LaBeouf keep getting work in Hollywood? Hopefully Bay will calm down on all the whip-pans and tracking shots.

I’m reserving judgment on this one, but I’m not hoping for much. First date final impression? I’d keep her number, but I’d probably hold off on calling unless it was a slow weekend.

Spider-Man 3

Oooo. Now that’s a trailer. Sam Raimi knows how to shoot a movie. The only bitch I have about this one is that for some reason it looks as if they’re going to try and tell us that Sandman, aka, Flint Marko, killed Ben Parker. Well, that’s bullshit.

I’ll overlook that for the simple fact that the scariest Spidey villain of all time appears in this film: Venom. Compound that with the fact that the baddest horror director is directing, and you’ve got the makings of an awesome movie. Plus, they’ve completely recreated the classic scene with Spidey ripping off the symbiote suit in the bell tower. Good stuff.

If that trailer was a first date I’d be fighting the urge to call her in the middle of the night to proclaim my undying love.

Live Free or Die Hard

Did I miss something? I didn’t know Michael Bay directed two movies for 2007.

Okay, I know Bay didn’t direct that. Len Weisman did, but it sure looked like a Bay movie.

That was only a teaser trailer, so I don’t have much to go on, but one thing really concerns me. That looked way too stylized for a Die Hard movie, and if there’s one thing that McClane ain’t, it’s stylized. There are three very important ingredients to McClane that must go into creating a Die Hard movie: 1) McClane is a dirtbag who may or may not be drunk; 2) McClane is only cool because he’s a smartass who just won’t quit. He’s a monkey in the wrench; a fly in the ointment; a pain in the ass. 3) Despite all his shortcomings, and he’s got a million of them, McClane can’t lose.

A Die Hard movie must be gritty and dirty. McClane busts his knuckles when he punches a bad guy, and when he gets hurt we can tell that he’s truly injured. I don’t want to see Matrix-looking shots in a Die Hard movie. That whole bit in the tunnel looked like it was ripped right out of Matrix Reloaded.

I really, really want this one to be good. I’d go out on a second date with this one, but only with a group of other people, and only to somewhere like the bowling alley.

Ocean’s Thirteen

I’m excited about his one. I loved the first two, and I can’t help but think this one will be just as entertaining, and maybe even more so.

Brad Pitt looks like he did in Twelve Monkeys. For that aspect alone I’d go see the movie. The Clooney eye-roll at the end was also pretty entertaining.

This trailer was pretty short, so if this was a first date I’d probably get admonished for trying to slip her the tongue during the goodnight kiss.

Sometimes the stress of the Christmas season can really be overwhelming. Such is the case with Mr. Clark Griswold.

It’s seven days before Christmas. I’ve been listening to Christmas music on XM. We’ve bought presents and wrapping paper. Yesterday, I ordered the delicious, but maddeningly seasonal, peppermint mocha cappuccino at Starbucks.

And it was so damn hot today that I was wearing shorts and a tank top.

Seriously…what the hell?

For the most part, I think environmentalists are alarmist nitwits, but it was eighty some odd degrees today, so I think we can all pretty much agree that something’s just not right.

From what I’ve read, anti-environmentalists (I don’t know what else to call them) argue that we don’t have enough data to accurately discover whether or not the rise in temperature is due to our influence, or that perhaps the earth just goes through periods of time where the temperature fluctuates.

You know, despite what scientists say, that sounds pretty logical to me. The rise in temperature could be systemic. Unfortunately, that doesn’t change the fact that the temperature has risen, and I GET NO WINTER!

Everyone agrees that the weather is changing, but we disagree on the reasons for the change. We also agree that at some level human activity does affect out environment. So, here’s what I don’t understand—why don’t we just go ahead and start acting more responsibly, since by proxy we all agree that by doing so we could positively affect our environment? We can figure everything else later.

You know what? Enough with this logical reasoning. I don’t give a shit if we have to replace the ozone with enormous layers of Saran Wrap, but next year I want Christmas weather. I also want the water in the Brazos river to return to its original state of clear. I’m tired of “algae-brown” year after year.

I also think we should all collectively decide to run people that drive Hummers right off the road. You get extra points if you cause them to smash into a cement embankment, or if they have kids in the Hummer with them.

And not for any environmental reasons either. I just think that people who drive Hummers are a bunch of douche bags.

Excuse the digression. Let me reiterate: The weather is psychotic. We need to fix it. I don’t ever want to be wearing shorts at Christmas again unless we are vacationing in the Bahamas.

Merry Christmas. Now pass the sunblock.