This Is Kids Stuff

When I was a boy, I was fascinated with two subjects...space (thank God I grew up in the 60s) and dinosaurs. This is a news story from Yahoo today. As a grumpy old guy, I still find these creatures simply amazing. Maybe when I die, all the secrets will be releaved about space and dinosaurs.

"Monster" fossil found in Jurassic graveyard
By Alister Doyle, Environment Correspondent
Thu Oct 5, 3:32 PM ET
Scientists have found a fossil of a "Monster" fish-like reptile in a 150 million-year-old Jurassic graveyard on an Arctic island off Norway.
The Norwegian researchers discovered remains of a total of 28 plesiosaurs and ichthyosaurs -- top marine predators when dinosaurs dominated on land -- at a site on the island of Spitsbergen, about 1,300 km (800 miles) from the North Pole.
"One of them was this gigantic monster, with vertebrae the size of dinner plates and teeth the size of cucumbers," Joern Hurum, an assistant professor at the University of Oslo, told Reuters on Thursday.
"We believe the skeleton is intact and that it's about 10 meters (33 feet) long," he told Reuters of the pliosaur, a type of plesiosaur with a short neck and massive skull. The team dubbed the specimen "The Monster."
Such pliosaurs are known from remains in countries including Britain and Argentina but no complete skeleton has been found, he said. The skull of the pliosaur -- perhaps a distant relative to Scotland's mythical Loch Ness monster -- was among the biggest on record.
Scientists would return next year to try to excavate the entire fossil, buried on a hillside.
Plesiosaurs, which swam with two sets of flippers, often preyed on smaller dolphin-like ichthyosaurs. All went extinct when the dinosaurs vanished 65 million years ago.
The scientists rated the fossil graveyard "one of the most important new sites for marine reptiles to have been discovered in the last several decades."
"It is rare to find so many fossils in the same place -- carcasses are food for other animals and usually get torn apart," Hurum said.
Hurum reckoned the reptiles had not all died at the same time in some Jurassic-era cataclysm but had died over thousands of years in the same area, then become preserved in what was apparently a deep layer of black mud on the seabed.
At that time, the area of Spitsbergen under water several hundred km (miles) further south, around the latitude of Anchorage or Oslo.
Hurum said the presence of fossils was also an interesting pointer for geologists hunting for oil and gas deposits in the Barents Sea to the east. "A skull we found even smells of petrol," he said.

Fox Baseball Promos

Very Funny. Tommy Lasorda plays the straight guy very well. I really like the one where he tries to talk the Cubs fan out of the tree. Very creative and funny stuff.

Happy 58th bro

I miss you dearly. Wonder how my life would have been if you were still around. Always my big brother. Thanks for your courage, strength and ass kickings. Thanks for the 70 RoadRunners,(fastest mahfugga on the planet, just ask the cop....) thanks for the Beach Boys, Beatles, "Telstar" by the Tornadoes, The Honeycombs, Gene Pitney, too. Thanks for your first wife, your second, third and fourth, too. Thanks for your kids, they have made you proud. I hope I have too.

RIP bro.

In My Time Of Dying....

This was on Metro Source today...


As pop music becomes more prominent throughout all aspects of life, it's also cropping up more and more in death as well. A recent survey by the UK's Bereavement Register shows that the majority of the most requested songs for funerals started out as hit singles. Bill Medley sings two tunes that made the top ten. His duet with Jennifer Warnes, "I've Had the Time of My Life," is at number three while the Righteous Brothers' "Unchained Melody" holds the number ten spot. Bette Midler's "Wind Beneath My Wings," Elton John's "Candle in the Wind," and Eric Clapton's "Tears in Heaven" are other top selections among UK mourners. James Blunt's "Goodbye My Lover" is the most requested song for British funerals. The Bereavement Register's founder Mark Roy told the BBC Online the trend toward contemporary music reflects the association of a particular song with a certain person, special place, or significant event.

The Top Ten UK Funeral Songs

1. James Blunt, "Goodbye My Lover"
2. Robbie Williams, "Angels"
3. Bill Medley and Jennifer Warnes, "I've Had the Time of My Life"
4. Bette Midler, "Wind Beneath My Wings"
5. "Requiem, Pie Jesu"
6. Elton John, "Candle in the Wind"
7. U2, "With or Without You"
8. Eric Clapton, "Tears in Heaven"
9. The Police, "Every Breath You Take"
10. The Righteous Brothers, "Unchained Melody"

WTF? "With Or Without You"? "Every Breath You Take"?



When I go, it'll be in a blaze of glory. The songs to be played at my service will be

"He Is Sailing" by Jon and Vangelis
"In My Life" by the Beatles
"Into The Mystic" by Van Morrison and then the party starts.

We finish out big time with

"Let It Rock" by Bob Seger (the "Live Bullet" version) then "Born To Run" by Bruce Springsteen..."thank you, you've been a great audience...goodnight!"

Post Number 467

"We sleep safe in our beds because rough men stand ready in the night to visit violence on those who would do us harm." ~ Orwell

Our Military Heroes

This photo was taken by a soldier in Afghanistan of a helo rescue mission. The pilot is a PA Guard guy who flies EMS choppers in civilian life. Now how many people on the planet you reckon could set the ass end of a chopper down on the roof top of a shack on a steep mountain cliff and hold it there while soldiers load wounded men in the rear??? If this does not impress you ... nothing ever will. Gives me the chills and a serious case of the vertigo ... I can't even imagine having the nerve ... much less the talent and ability ... God Bless our military!!!!!
As a younger brother of a man who did two tours of Vietnam, I have an abounding and deep respect for our military. Those young men and women who serve our country deserve every ounce of respect and love we can muster. I hate this war, though. I don't think we should be there, I never have. We armed the soldiers in Afghanistan a nd Iraq that we are now fighting against. The last 35 years have seen the biggest bonehaeds in office in the country's history. Will there ever be a Truman, a Lincoln, a Teddy Roosevelt again? I am beginning to have my doubts.

Guess The Occupation Of This Guy....

Uh, yeah, he's a scientist. I could have looked like that once. Here's the accompanying story:

The discovery by John Mather and George Smoot of "cosmic ripples," which won them the Nobel Prize in physics on Tuesday, was lauded in 1992 by cosmologist Stephen Hawking as "the greatest discovery of the century, if not of all time."
While most physicists do not go that far, they are universal in their praise of the experiment, in which the pair and their team designed a satellite and used it to find proof of the Big Bang theory of the universe's origins.
They found faint variations in microwave radiation that dated back to just 300,000 years after the fiery birth of the universe.
These ripples in the microwave radiation, they said, were the primordial framework on which the galaxies, stars and other stuff of the universe took shape. It explained why the universe is lumpy and not a smooth sheet of matter and energy.



Ok, sure whatever you say...I coulda been a contenda.

Sell Out

I started out really liking John Mellencamp. When I interviewed him in KC right after his debut release, he spent 45 minutes with me talking about cool stuff on the air. He even agreed to be a part of a promotion for one of our clients that was a motorcycle dealer. After "American Fool", I think he became one. I remember in 1986, while at KSHE, we took a group of winners to Dayton Ohio to see him. After the trip we all got together and found out that in each one of the pictures we took of him with various winners, he had his eyes closed. What was up with that? Why be so difficult? Those people loved you but afterwards had a real bad taste in their mouth. Well, now he has completely sold out. His new song is "My Country" and the debut of the song was Sunday on TV. It's in the new commercial for Chevy Trucks. How sad. The guy who gave us genius with songs like "Make Me Feel","Play Guitar","Ain't Even Done With The Night", "Rain On The Scarecrow" and "Cherry Bomb" now is a shill for Chevy trucks. Too bad. You'll never get another cent of mine.

"Go Crazy Folks, Go Crazy!!"

On Fox Sports Network tonight, they replayed the National League Championship game where Ozzie launched the home run heard round the world. I believe it was 21 years ago today and I know exactly where I was. This was the last time I danced with or saw the woman who up until that time was the love of my life. It was at my friends Rich and Lisa's wedding and she and I were in the wedding party. I danced with her at the reception. It was the last time I saw her. She looked at my girlfriend at the time and said she wasn't good enough for me. She later died in a car accident and after all this time, the smell of "White Shoulders" perfume takes me back to a place and time that seem a million light years from now. I still think of her and probably always will. Of course that year The Cardinals went on to the World Series and lost to the Royals.

Saturday Night

It was a very fine evening of good classic rock at Jefferson Barracks Park in South St. Louis. Firefall (the photo is of their only original member Jock Bartley)did a fine job playing the hits that we all love to hear. They did "It Doesn't Matter","Livin Ain't Livin", "Cinderella", "Mexico" and a song about the 1993 flood. Very fine, tight band, it's obvious that they had been together for a long time. After the show they invited everyone to their tent to sign autographs and say hi. The line was very long but, to their credit, they stayed and signed until everyone who wnated an autograph got one. Very cool.

Craig Fuller is back in Pure Prairie League.

I have always enjoyed these guys. Their music has always been fun. They started with "Kansas City Southern" and played "Early Morning Riser", "Two Lane Highway',"Tears" and of course "Amie". They had a number one song in 1980 with "Let Me Love You Tonight" when Vince Gill was the lead singer. They played that,too. The only problem was when Craig decided to include a Little Feat song. Don't get me wrong, I love Little Feat but I came to hear stuff they didn't play. Oh, well. The night was enjoyable and this show drew a HUGE crowd. Congrats to the people at Emmis.