When I received my very first debit card (completely unsolicited, I should note) ten or twelve years or however long ago, I was unimpressed. The way I saw it, I had no need for this new-fangled card thingie. I used cash for most of my transactions, and, in the immortal words of grumpy old men everywhere, that was how I liked it. Once a week, I happily went to my neighborhood bank branch in person — no doubt with an onion tied to my belt, as was the style of the time — to obtain that week’s allotment of greenbacks. There, I enjoyed talking to a pretty teller who actually recognized my face and acted happy to see me, a definite fringe benefit to my cash-only way of doing things. (Must’ve been the onion.)

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Swiss Accidentally Invade Liechtenstein

I imagine editors just live for the chance to write a headline like that…

I’ve worn a beard for about 17 years now, not counting one horrible week following a misguided attempt to “update my look,” only to discover that I’d, ahem, put on a few pounds since I was last bare-faced. Let me tell you, I wasted no time at all re-growing my time-tested fuzzy accoutrement. I probably would’ve grown it back anyway, though, even if I didn’t need the camoflage for my unfortunate double chin, because I just plain like it. I think it lends my face some character, and, in my mind at least, it signifies both my masculinity and my individuality. And it doesn’t hurt that The Girlfriend likes it, too.

However, it hasn’t always been easy to be bearded here in arch-conservative Utah, where the preferred look of the predominant cultural group (that would be the Mormons, kids) is decidedly unfuzzy. Before I made a love connection with the current Girlfriend, I heard from more than one young lady that I was not suitable dating material because of the beard, and I also know that I’ve lost a few job opportunities because I refused to shave it off. Some would call my defiance of the local norms foolish vanity, but I’ve never understood why, if you keep it clean and trimmed short (as I do), so many straight-laced people find facial hair repellant. (Incidentally, I really dislike the term “clean-cut,” because it suggests that its opposite — i.e., bearded or otherwise hirsute — is unclean, complete with all the moral intimations that word carries.) And so I have soldiered on through the years, convinced of my own righteousness and determined not to let The Man force me into drab conformity. I’ve persevered long enough that the beard has largely ceased to be an issue for me — I’ve finally found success in love and work without having to compromise my self-image — but it would’ve been so much easier if I’d had some kind of support group. Perhaps even an entire web site dedicated to the proposition that beards are cool. But surely there couldn’t really be such a thing out there on the vast, vast Internet… could there?

Well, duh…

Oh, and in case you’re wondering, the title of this entry comes from an old George Carlin routine called “The Hair Piece.” It’s reproduced for your amusement below the fold…

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At first glance, this story looks pretty funny, just the sort of weird news item I chuckle over a dozen times a day: a would-be Good Samaritan, hearing sounds that he thought came from a woman being raped, armed himself with an antique sword and burst through the door of a neighbor’s apartment ready to face an attacker, only to find that there was no woman. The only occupant of the place was another guy watching a porno DVD all by himself at a ridiculously high volume.

Big laughs, right? So it would seem…

Then I read the coda: the not-quite-a-hero is being charged with three criminal counts, and his sword — a family heirloom, no less — has been confiscated by the police. I can’t believe this situation, an obvious (and funny) misunderstanding, couldn’t have been resolved during a 10-minute conversation between the two men and a cop as intermediary. Instead, it’ll now be dragged through the already-clogged legal system and a guy who was only trying to do the right thing faces jail time. Yeah, the screaming turned out to be nothing, but maybe next time it’ll be the real thing and passersby will choose to ignore it instead of risking this guy’s fate.

Everybody in this country needs to take a deep breath and chill the hell out…

I don’t follow basketball and I wouldn’t know Tim Hardaway from Tim Conway, but apparently he is taking some heat for bluntly admitting in a radio interview last week that he has a problem with gay people. That’s not an unusual attitude in our society, of course, and you can even make an argument that Hardaway is to be commended for his honesty. I, for one, would certainly defend his right to say whatever’s on his mind no matter how ignorant. But he should be prepared for the consequences:

Sulu rocks…

A month ago, it was so cold you couldn’t even breathe and the city was shrouded in murky, filthy “haze” (i.e., air pollution thick enough that it recalled stories of Jack the Ripper stalking Victorian fogbanks). Then about two weeks ago the air finally cleared out and temperatures rose to the relatively comfortable range they’re supposed to occupy in the winter months, between the high 30s and low 40s. The past two days have been spring-like, with temps in the high 50s and beautiful crystalline skies.

I woke up this morning to about five inches of snow.

I love Utah…

I don’t want to dwell too much further on the Trolley Square shootings. Not to sound insensitive or cold-hearted, because I’m absolutely not, but I find all the public wailing and gnashing of teeth after these random acts of violence overblown, and all the new-agey, namby-pamby talk of “healing” especially annoys me for some reason (I guess I’m a “climb back on the horse and keep riding” kind of guy). Nevertheless, there are a couple of articles in the Trib that I think are worth passing along.

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Man, I live for headlines like this: Batman Sighting Puts Schools on Lockdown.

The short version: a middle-school student in Pheonix, Arizona, saw someone in a Batman costume running across his campus, and authorities responded by locking down three nearby schools for 45 minutes. A reasonable precaution, I’d imagine, since there was probably a lunatic clown in a purple suit somewhere in the area, too…

A friend of mine just sent me a link to an eBay auction that ought to have plenty of crossover appeal for both the geek and motorhead demographics: somebody is selling was selling one of the three Lexus concept cars built for the movie Minority Report.

[Update: The eBay listing has been removed since this morning. Interesting. Oh, well, the rest of the entry still stands. I’ve added a link below so you can see what the Lexus looks like.]

As much as I love science fiction flicks, I’ve got to be honest: most futuristic movie cars leave me cold. They’re inevitably just bubbles or boxes on wheels, without any attempt to make them look “real-world.” This Lexus, though, impressed me in the movie as something that (a) might actually evolve from current automotive design, and (b) would be a design that people might actually want to own. I know I would. The opening bid on this one is a perfectly reasonable $88,000. Mere pocket change. I ought to have enough left over to pick up a Blade Runner spinner, too.

Oh, and speaking of flying cars (which the spinner is, if you don’t know), it seems they might not be so far off after all: according to this article, an Israeli engineer is working on a flying utility vehicle that he hopes to have on the market by 2010. Rafi Yoeli’s X-Hawk is designed to perform like a helicopter but without a chopper’s big exposed rotor blades that get in the way of snuggling up alongside a cliff or a building. The X-Hawk would instead have two enclosed fans at the front and rear with a cockpit and modular cabin that could be swapped out for different missions. It’ll supposedly be quieter than a chopper, too, which has obvious advantages for the military and, I suppose, for anyone bothered by that “whop-whop” sound. (Personally, I’ve always rather liked the sound of choppers; I was bummed when the Army stopped using Hueys, because I grew up hearing them off in the distance every day in the summertime.)

Yoeli has gotten a prototype to lift off (a mere three feet, but still, it did take off), and it looks much more practical to my admittedly ignorant eyes than a lot of the flying car designs I’ve seen. I’ll be watching further developments on this project closely.

If you’re interested, too, here’s Yoeli’s company web site, which includes conceptual information and a decent technical overview.