Let’s start this week with a confession. I’m not a big pre-screener of the stuff my kids watch. Usually I’m just too busy to watch everything they consume, so I kind of tend to trust parental filters and monitors to do the work for me.

Hoo boy, was I ever wrong to do that.

My daughter loves this one particular show called “Yo Gabba Gabba.” It’s a kids’ show, so it can’t be all that bad, right? And the people who run the summer camp my daughter attends have tapes of the show they play during TV hours, so it’s got to be at least educational and wholesome, right? Continue reading →

It’s time once again for a collection of musings, observations, opinions, and ramblings, all offered by a visually-impaired middle-aged crazy man on the Internet. As such, none of these should be taken seriously. Unless, of course, you agree with me.

I learned this week “Ogentroost” is the name of a Dutch metal band. It also sounds like some kind of obscure liver disease. Continue reading →

“I feel like our job as a group of documentarians trying to cover this very delicate issue was to do what we’re always trying to do, which is tell the truth. Let’s hear everybody out. And then let’s let the audience decide for themselves what’s true and what’s not true or what’s right and what’s wrong.”—“Cheer” director Greg Whitely (emphasis mine)

It’s funny reading a comment like that from a documentary filmmaker. One of my problems with that genre, specifically in the realm of criminal justice issues, is the tendency to take nuanced issues and present them as unvarnished truth. When the director’s eye turns its gaze toward what makes a story pop for the camera, concepts like the presumption of innocence become evanescent. Continue reading →

Happy Friday! Here are a few short jokes for your consideration, two of which I will make no bones about being completely awful.

Boutrous-Boutrous Ghali and Yo-Yo Ma go out to dinner. They ask the waiter, “How is the mahi-mahi?” “So-so.” “Then we’ll have the cous-cous.”

******************** Continue reading →

Hey everyone! Last week Hunting Guy struck a nerve with me when mentioning one of my other rabid passions outside of the law and writing: magic. So this week, I’m going to try and start your new year off with a dose of love, good luck, or whatever else you may need!

You’re about to experience Woody Aragon’s “Love Ritual,”* which many magicians, including Penn, Teller, and myself, have used repeatedly in shows to great effect. If you follow all my instructions, you’ll have a piece of magic you can do in your own home that will bring you good luck or make you lucky in love in 2022. Continue reading →

The holidays were quite the experience this year. Usually we go all out to make the kids’ Christmas special. It is, after all, a special time of year for everybody. This year was markedly different, however, as we planned to take the kids to my wife’s family home in Vermont.

We hadn’t seen this side of the family in two years due to, you know, the whole pandemic thing. I’m blessed to have the family I do. Somehow I tricked them all into thinking I’m this incredibly nice guy and my wife’s lucky to have married me.

I’m not joking. That’s basically what the last birthday card my in-laws sent me said to the letter. Continue reading →

Welcome to 2022! We made it through the year in which “Mad Max” was to occur and there’s no signs of any roving motor gangs terrorizing wastelands. Yet.

Admittedly, the bar was very low this year compared to the absolute dumpster-fire of a shitshow that was 2020. That doesn’t mean 2021 wasn’t without its milestone achievements, like killing off the scientific method’s credibility in favor of “THE SCIENCE!” Continue reading →

Jesse Custer was never one to celebrate Christmas. This year, however, Tulip made a convincing case The Grassy Knoll Pub should be decorated in a festive manner to attract “holiday traffic.”

So one December morning, Christmas lights replaced the yarn on the conspiracy theory boards. At one end of the bar sat a plastic replica of Charlie Brown’s Christmas tree. A Santa hat adorned the alien head on one wall. Continue reading →

Ed. Note: Who doesn’t fight with loved ones at some point during the holidays? Fault Lines alumni Mario Machado and Chris Seaton seem to love arguing with each other, so they put a debate topic on Twitter, and with over sixty percent of the vote, SJ readers chose “Resolved: Die Hard is a Christmas Movie” as the SJ Holiday Debate topic. Chris will argue the affirmative, Mario the negative. Below is Chris’ argument.

Ah, Christmas. A time when we hang the stockings by the chimney, put decorations on the tree, and watch Hans Gruber fall to his death from Nakatomi Tower to celebrate the season.

Hey, some people go for “National Lampoon’s Christmas Vacation” or “It’s A Wonderful Life.” There’s no denying, however, that Bruce Willis’ action classic “Die Hard” is a Christmas movie. Continue reading →

With music provided by Tom Lehrer

Christmas time is here by golly, disapproval would be folly
Deck the halls with hunks of holly, fill the cup and don’t say when Continue reading →