8 Ways to Sunday

 vs. 

Who would win in a fight, Smokey Bear or McGruff the Crime Dog?

My money is on Smokey for his size advantage and sharp claws. Besides, Smokey survived a forest fire as a cub and was raised an orphan; he’s obviously tough, and probably has some deep-seated emotional issues and repressed anger to boot. All told, I think he has the upper hand in this fight. Unless McGruff has a .38 Special under that trench coat, in which case the bear is toast.

Colleen, on the other hand, thinks McGruff would win it because “a guy in a trench coat beats a guy in a ranger hat any day.” What do you think?

Update: As Jen points out in the comments, the name is Smokey Bear not Smokey the Bear. Having worked in the Forrest Service, I actually knew this but… well, see my comment for the long-winded explanation.

Valve Software’s Gabe Newell has announced the voice cast, approximate release date, and other details about the infamously delayed shooter. Voices will include those of Oscar winner Louis Gossett, Jr. and Michelle Forbes of Star Trek: The Next Generation fame.

As for the release date, a seemingly humbled Newell was quoted as saying, “we [are] planning on delivering the game to Sierra in August… to the best of our admittedly weak planning abilities, we are looking at August.” Gee, thanks for that exceptionally vague and entirely non-official update, Gabe.

Among other details mentioned in same article with the release date quote was a passing indication that a re-issue of the original Half-Life, gussied up with the new Source engine, would be included in the box with the new game. I’d heard rumors of a Source version of HL1, but this is the first official confirmation I’ve seen.

Terry Jones, formerly of Monty Python, has offered up a hilariously dry spoof of the U.S. Defense Department’s stance on the inmate torture that took place in Iraq’s Abu Gharib prison. I never thought human rights abuses could be made funny, but the Pythons have always had an incomparable talent for turning the outrageous into the outrageously funny. A very good read.

You’d better enjoy it, or I’ll chain you to a radiator with a bag on your head. (thanks, Jen)

I heard the Scissor Sisters song “Take Your Mama” on the way to work today. I would like very much to personally cap the lame-ass record producer who thought it would be a good idea to record and broadcast this craptacular, Bee Gees-revival-sounding, hot steaming turd of a song.

Now if you’ll excuse me, I have to fire up my mp3 player and scour that song out of my head with better music played loudly.

Issues of politics, religion, and free speech are firing people up in the virtual world of There this week. I tipped off Terra Nova (a blog devoted to the sociology of virtual communities), and an interesting discussion has kicked off in response to their post on the topic. My comments can be found here.