Congratulations to my brother-in-law Monkeyboy. He was just accepted into Stanford's MBA program!

Looks like he and LWB will be headed out west, rather than to U of Chicago (which also accepted him). That sucks for us here in Oak Park, but it does mean that we have one more friendly pad in the Bay area (AKR of course being our first).

Monkeyboy, I'd suggest that as your first bidness deal out there that you work on getting In-N-Out Drive-In to expand northward. You'll see a lot of us then. ;-)

Have you ever noticed how totally freaking awesome ninjas are? I dunno what it is lately, but a seemingly random confluence of events has brought ninjas into my life. Consider:

Hitotsu! Just the other day, Dorito Icee sends me a link to the best ninja video podcast to be seen anywhere (or seen at all, for that matter): http://www.askaninja.com. DI says: "My face is hurting from laughing so much." My own laughter is annoying Shel this very evening!

Hitotsu! Just other day before the other day in the previous bullet, I took my Xbox to work to show a few of the guys, and we end up playing some Samurai Shodown on my MAME engine. And who did I play as? Was it Wan-Fu the Chinese warrior, or Jubei the samurai? Noooooooo! I played and dominated others as the legendary (and actually historical) neeeen-jaaah Hanzo Hattori, finishing my opponents off with his spinning inverted pile driver. That's the kind of special move you can only do if actually born a ninja, folks.

Hitotsu! As a fair trade of amusing links with Dorito Icee, I sent him the link to one of my all-time favorite sites: http://www.realultimatepower.net. Supposedly authored and maintained by a 9-year-old kid named "Ryan Hamburger," this site is a perfect realization of the world of ninjas as seen through the eyes of a 9-year-old kid. Just reading it made me want to flip out and kill people. Because that's what I call real ultimate power! In an interesting sidenote, the guy has a book out now, which comprises much of the material in the website. The added material mostly comes in the form of footnotes and explanatory marginalia, which I understand actually portrays some respectable adolescent angst on a level clearly unperceived by the narrator, Mr. Hamburger (or is that Master Hamburger?).

Hitotsu! Lastly, I offer the following site as yet another example of how the master shinobi has a death grip on our imagination, even in animated form: http://www.fuggyfuggy.com. Favorite moment in the 5-minute film: in the "Disguise" vignette, the sounds of the goat guy performing the Valsalva maneuver. Hilarious!

What can I say? I'm a sucker for ninjas. I look forward to killing you soon!