1. First, you must learn to pronounce the city name. It’s Deh-troit NOT
   DEE-troit. If you pronounce it DEE-Troit then we will assume you are from
   Toledo and here for the country Music hoe-down.
2. Forget the traffic rules you learned elsewhere. Detroit has its own
   version of traffic rules… Hold on and pray!
3. The morning rush hour is from 6:00 am to 10:00 am. The evening rush hour
   is from 3:00 pm to 7:00 pm. Friday’s rush hour starts Thursday morning
   Weekends are open game.
4. If you actually stop at a yellow light, you will be rear-ended, cussed
   out and possibly shot. If you’re first off the starting line when the light
   turns green, count to five before going across the intersection. This will
   avoid getting in the way of cross-traffic who just ran their yellow light to
   keep from getting shot.
5. Schoenherr can ONLY be properly pronounced by a native of the Detroit
   metro area. That goes for Gratiot too.
6. Construction and renovation on I-94, I-96, I-75, I-275, I-375, The Lodge
   and The Southfield Freeways are a way of life and forever. Just deal with
   it.
7. If someone actually has their turn signal on, it is probably a factory
   defect or they are “out-of-towners” .

8. All old men (or women) with white hair wearing a hat have total
   right-of-way.
9. The minimum acceptable speed on I-696 and I-275 is 85 regardless of the
   posted speeds. Anything less is considered downright SISSY. Oh, and don’t
   even think of allowing more than one car length between cars!
10. That attractive wrought iron on the windows and doors in Detroit is NOT
    ornamental. DO NOT get out of your car to take pictures.
11. Never stare at the driver of the car with the bumper sticker that says
    “Keep honking, I’m reloading”, he/she is.
12. If you are in the left lane, and only going 70 in a 60 mph zone, people
    are not waving because they are so friendly in Detroit. I would suggest you
    duck.
13. I-275 and I-696 is our daily version of NASCAR.
14. It’s not M-10, it’s “The Lodge”.
15. That’s not a lake, it’s a pothole.
16. If someone tells you it’s on Outer Drive, you better hope you have a
    map.
17. The Michigan left turn is simple. If you want to turn left, go a 1/4 of
    a mile past your turn, get to the left, then make a left, then make another
    left, then make a right when you get back to the intersection where you
    wanted to turn left in the first place. NOW you have gone left.
18. And those 2 really ugly arches over Telegraph???? DON’T EVEN ASK!! WE
    DON’T HAVE A CLUE!!!!!
19. WELCOME, ENJOY YOUR STAY, BUT AVOID EYE-CONTACT WITH THE LOCALS.

In what will most definitely go down as a ground breaking study, researchers have found beer fights carcinogens found in charred meat.

After a few days of administering the beer diets, the scientists laced some of the animals’ food with either of two heterocyclic amines (HCAs)—the carcinogens from cooked meat….Beer diminished by some 40 to 75 percent the number of HCA adducts (abnormal DNA structure) that formed, depending on the type of tissue (studied after dissecting the mouse) and quantity of beer ingredients ingested, the researchers report in the Feb. 9 Journal of Agricultural and Food Chemistry. Good news for beer drinkers: Both light-colored lager and a darker stout proved protective.

I always knew there was a reason my brain was telling me to buy a nice cold beer with that hamburger I just ordered. Of course, too much beer causes liver cancer and brain damage. Just more proof that just about anything is OK as long as you don’t take too much of it.

Jesus speaks through the Republicans

I hope the election of George W. Bush is seen as a wake-up call to all the liberal Democrats who oppose God’s will.

It is His doing that George W. Bush is still our president. Millions of born-again Christians helped win this election through our prayers and votes. Jesus speaks through the Republicans.

The Democrats will not be able to win elections until they renounce their sinful ways and stop encouraging abortions, gayness, and trying to take away our guns.

Earl Balboa

I couldn’t make this shit up if I tried.

I just watched the US men’s basketball team receive their bronze metals. They looked ashamed and they should be. They played like crap, but I’ve got a few notes for everyone who is lauding a “new era in international basketball.”

1. This team was, for the most part, a bunch of B teamers and six men. Allen Iverson and Tim Duncan being the only tried and true starting verterans.
2. This team only had about a month to prepare for the games. Not much prep time considering many of the other national teams have played together for years.

It’s a joke to think that if true verteran starters were to have played they would have only managed a bronze. Let’s just list a few who could have easily made the Olympic team: Shaq, Kobe, Rip Hamilton, either of the Wallaces, Artest, or Jermaine O’Neal. Hell, we could have sent a team who has played well together (ie. the Detroit Pistons) and won gold.

In other news, the FIG is putting pressure on Paul Hamm to give up his gold. This is crap for a few reasons.

1. FIG screwed up and it’s against the rules to change the scores.
2. South Korea didn’t protest the score soon enough. They had their chance and passed it up for some odd reason.
3. The South Korea contendor was docked 0.10, but replays show an extra release, which would have lead to a 0.20 doc (thus negating his 0.10 lost by the idiot judges). So if you want to play the replay game then he still loses.

What other sports out there would do such a thing? If you’ve already used your instant replay in the NFL you don’t get to put pressure on the other team to give up the win. Sometimes winning includes getting a few calls going your way and I consider this just that.

I recently posted about how I am in favor of legalizing drugs. This is a completely foreign concept to some, but makes a lot of sense if you cool your head and sit back and think about it.

My dad would often tell me when I was growing up that I could hate him and think of him what I pleased as long as I respected him. He taught me all about two key words that are lost on most Americans today: respect and responsibility. I believe in those two words very much, which is why I’m in favor of legalizing drugs. I respect your right, as perverse as it sounds, to destroy your own life. I respect myself enough to not use drugs. I’m responsible enough to realize that doing drugs won’t get me ahead in this world.

I think that more people should respect others actions, unless those actions tread on other people. What people are saying when they think drugs should not be legalized is that they don’t respect the decisions I make or think I’m not responsible enough to make the decision not to use drugs, which offends me.

I’d like to clarify a few things about my stance on legalizing drugs that some people forget.

1. Legalizing drugs would allow us to regulate them, much like alcohol is regulated (ie. you can’t buy grain alcohol in most states). This would lead to safer drug use.
2. I would want anti-drug campaigns to continue just as they do now.
3. I don’t use nor wish to use drugs, but I respect your choice to use them responsibly. Just as I respect your choice to responsibly use alcohol now. I trust that you aren’t hopping in your car drunk and driving around and, if you are, then there are laws to deal with you.

Before posting a comment this time sit back and think about the statements above. If you’re a parent worrying about your child using drugs if they are legal, your naive. You need to be worrying about them using drugs RIGHT NOW. I can tell you from experience that drugs are readily available as soon as junior high. You know what you’re doing? You’re not taking responsibility for your child’s actions.

My parents were involved in my life growing up. They asked the tough questions, they made the tough decisions and they disciplined me whenever I screwed up. I see it too often these days that kids run their parent’s lives and not the other way. I used to say that I’d be cool to my kids, but now I realize that if I was their best friend I’d be doing them a disservice.

You heard it here last – crappy parents are responsible for rampant drug use among teens – not a failing war on drugs.

I read a story about a mother who moved into her daughter’s dorm room at college and just had to laugh. While my mother wasn’t anywhere near this bad, I do know mothers out there who I could see doing such things. I’ve also heard similar stories about parents who couldn’t let go once students leave home. I can see the point that they’re paying for the education and they should know what they’re paying for.

On the other hand you have students who view college as a soft launch into adulthood where they learn inventive ways to cook raman noodles and the precise number of classes you can skip and still get a decent grade in a class. I tend to lean in favor of the students. This isn’t a time for more parental involvement, but less. It’s a time for young adults to define who they are and parents to respect that.

Luckily my parents only cared that I was getting good grades and stayed out of jail for the most part. Things turned out just fine too. I made some mistakes, learned a few things both in and out of the class room, met my soon-to-be-wife and generally had more fun that I should have, but I graduated and have a decent paying job so I guess it’s all good. But, under no circumstances, would I have allowed my mom to live in my dorm room with me.

I’ve been storing this blog post up for quite some time. Mainly because it deals with such a sensitive issue; namely race and racism. I have been reading some commentary on such things as reverse racism and affirmative action from both the Right by Larry Elder and the Left by Al Franken.

In his book “Ten Things You Can’t Say In America” Larry Elder says that blacks are more racist than whites. While I find this to be a little obtuse I have to think he, as an African American, would know a little more about this than I would (by the way he hates the term “African American”). His views on affirmative action are interesting as well. He basically says that it has served its purpose and that it is time for blacks to stand on their own two feet.

Al Franken has a different view on affirmative action in his book “Lies and the Lying Liars Who Tell Them: A Fair and Balanced Look at the Right.” Al says that a baseball coach once told him that if you have two base runners who can both run to first base in the same amount of time, but that one of them has perfect running form he would choose the other runner because you can teach him better form and, thus, get a better time to first from him. In turn, Al translates this into academics. If you have one student who has two middle class parents, went to a good high school and scored a 1300 on their SAT and then you have a student who went to a bad high school, had a single working mother and worked two jobs while going to school and still managed to get a 1200 on their SAT who is to say they are any less qualified than the first student?

I am completely torn. They are both good arguments. I think the problem is that schools rely too much on black and white scores (a la “No Child Left Behind”) and not on extenuating circumstances surrounding each individual. I also believe that using a persons skin color as a scoring method is not the answer – but what is? I would think wealth would be a better indicator of who is in need of assistance, but that could be open to debate as well.

As to the charge that Elder makes that blacks are more racist than whites I have a short personal story to tell. I was talking with one of my newest fraternity brothers, who happens to be black, at the student union the other day. I was there fulfilling some of my alumni advisor duties and stopped to talk to him while he was chatting with a short, rather cute black girl. After she had walked away he apologized for her rather cold reception of me telling me she was a “racist”. I was floored. A few minutes later we were talking about something else when a girl walked by who would make a dead man’s head turn. I made a comment on how pleasing she was to the eye and he asked “You’re into that?” (the girl happened to be black). “Into what?” I asked. There’s a reason by Beyonce and Naomi Campbell are two of the most sought after beauties in the world – it’s because they are amazing samples of the female form – not because there are a bunch of white boys out there with fetishes for black women.

It was after this little conversation that I realized something. Blacks and whites know very little about one another. We instead choose to ignore each other and mind our own business in the hopes of not upsetting the other. This is, of course, wrong. I’m not sure what the answer to our “racial” differences (I’d say “cultural” differences, but who am I to say) is, but I do know the current laissez-fair approach is only a temporary fix.

I find this to be probably the most ridiculous thing I have heard of in a long time. The state of Georgia is planning to replace the word “evolution” with “biological changes over time”. How dumb is that? My favorite quote is from a Republican who opposes the change.

“If you’re teaching the concept without the word, what’s the point?” said Rep. Bobby Franklin, a Republican. “It’s stupid. It’s like teaching gravity without using the word gravity.”

I could not agree more. Obviously Mr. Franklin and I differ on how the teaching of evolution should be handled, but we both agree that merely rewording the teachings really does not change anything. In fact, Georgia does not plan to force schools to buy new books or even ban teachers from using the word. What a waste of time.

I just got off the phone with my girlfriend. Her car, evidently, is acting up and she was wondering if she should call the dealership to get it fixed. I told her that was probably her best bet. I think it’s funny how gender stereotypes are so prevelant in our thoughts.

For instance, I wouldn’t know any more what could be wrong with Lauren’s car than she does. For all I know the hamster died. However, being male, we are supposed to know what is wrong with the car and how to fix it. If we can’t fix it we should know who to call.

What I find more humerous is that if we followed this trend you would think you should ask Lauren how to make a decent Basil Chicken or who she thinks the Salem Stalker is on Days of Our Lives and me who won last night’s baseball game or which stout to get next time your at Ashley’s, right? Wrong. I do all the cooking and I think Stephano is controlling Rex, John Black and possibly Kate to kill off his foes. And about that baseball game and stout? You’ll have to ask Lauren – she’s the expert in those areas in our household.