Looks like tv.com is turning the screws on your pal mp34mp. I've recently received more TOS violations and another suspension with the threat of a possible (but most likely banning) to prevent me from using the site. I have to say I've been modded more times in the past few months than the other 3 years combined, including some stuff that was wrongly reported by a user (saying I was a 'troll' in a Hell's Kitchen forum which I am a big fan of the show) and other things as old as 2 years old now being reported completely out of context. Including stuff labled off-topic that got reported being off-topic, or SNL references reported as off-topic.

I have to say, this place has become a lot less enjoyable the past few months, and having almost 5,300 posts it seems to really not matter. I've seen lots of things modded but other likewise stuff completely ignored, and I've noticed a double standard in reporting, things that I found offensive & violated TOS & reported, were actually approved as alright.

I guess tv.com doesn't want people talking about bands or celebrities when it comes to shows like SNL, which is the very thing that the show is about. it's not like I was starting flame wars or dropping F-bomb after F-bomb. I guess it doesn't matter, and still, all of my emails & PMs to the site have been ignored by the Mods. I ask and I get nothing. I just don't understand it.

Abraham Lincon's bicentennial birthday is coming up. He was born February 12th, 1809. He's a big deal in Illinois, after all our license plates have "Land of Lincoln" on them & his head portrait since its ugly 2001 redesign. I suppose there would be a huge celebration, tho there probably shouldn't be when I heard on the AP radio news that the state could be up to $9 billion in debt due to Blagojevich's secret bookkeeping. One moment in my life, I was working with my dad on an electrical job at Bellevue Place in Batavia, Illinois, which is where Mary Lincoln was committed to a mental institution in 1875. I also got to see the building's basement, attic and high upstairs rooms that where small and cramped rooms where the staff would sleep. Tho however, due to my tragic upbringing, every time I see Abraham Lincoln, all I think is of him saying, "Party onnnnn, duuuuuudes!!" from Bill & Ted's Excellent Adventure.

Today I connected to the Internet and what do I see? "A-Rod tested positive for steroids in 2003" while playing for the Texas Rangers & won the A.L. MVP award. Turns out Jose Canseco right about him. Just when I thought A-Fraud couldn't get any lamer, he just did. He was supposed to be "the clean guy" that was going to break that cheater Bond's 762 HR record. I knew A-Roid's stats were too good to be true. So the hell with him. Albert Pujols is who I'm rooting for to get 763 HR. And as far as we know, he hasn't juiced.

I was going to do a blog about my Top 10 or 20 favorite food dishes. But then I concluded it'd probably be a stupid elementary list, since I've had no access to gourmet food or fine dining, and probably wouldn't impress even the most simpleton of minds like Rachael Ray, that chicken stock whore. Who the hell makes macaroni & cheese with chicken stock??! Awe hell, I may up doing a list anyway in the future. It'll give me a chance to tell people what the hell "Bitok 'o Beef" is.

On Wednesday night on PBS, I watched the 90-minute tribute special to George Carlin. Soon I concluded what eventually a screaming Lewis "the louder I yell the funnier I am" Black ranted about: they were censoring the profanity in Carlin's footage, at an adult event for no reason. I basically found it sacrilegious, because Carlin analyzed the hell out of the English language. One shocking thing was how clean cut & unoffensive his early stuff was, the very dated 1980s material about "stuff", and singing & playing a Doo Wop song on Arsenio Hall, whom I called "Arse-o Hall" back in the day.

Well here's something I didn't expect: I actually like the new show "Howie Do It". If you haven't seen it, it's a hidden camera prank / fake interview show that's basically as close to being R-Rated that you can get on TV. I got to see Howie Mandel drop F-Bombs, confront strangers that his family doesn't shake hands because there's germs everywhere, and I finally got to see Howie do his "Bobby's World" voice. This show reminds me of the prank I pulled on a friend while in high school. See, I was the driver in my group, and of course, I concentrated on the road while they farted in my car, listening to music and such. One of my friends who is a big Jimmy Buffet fan, kept playing that damn "Cheeseburger in Paradise" song over and over, which annoyed the snot out of me. So what I did one night, this being the mid 1990s and all, is I took an AOL Internet CD that offered like 2 free hours of Internet, scratched the hell out of it with a pocket knife, and in permanent marker, I wrote some really profane stuff on the non-label side, pretty much "**** YOU ******* *******!!!" in big letters, and then one afternoon I got to my car first, put that CD with the label side down in the Jimmy Buffet case, eventually my friend showed up for the ride home, proceeded to open his beloved CD case to play his beloved CD. The look on his face was total shock, while me and another buddy in on this were laughing our asses off. There was no more song abusing in my drives, and most importantly, a lesson learned: message received.

I am pissed at Obama & the Gov't for pushing back the date for digital TV conversion to June 12th. I rely on free broadcast for my TV. I got my coupon & got my digital converter box last Summer, well ahead of the date. And yet, moving the date made all that February 17th advertising worthless in the end. Quoted from a NY Times article, "the valuable analog spectrum will be used by wireless companies and public safety agencies. Verizon and AT&T, for instance, paid billions for access to the spectrum and are waiting to introduce new products using it," which I heard would trickle down to a fast & cheap Internet. And the biggest perk I'm going to miss? CBS's NCAA basketball 2009 tournament, which was going to broadcast every single game in full length, and show it on CBS-1, CBS-2, CBS-3 and CBS-4. That would had been a treat. But no. They have to go and punish us, the ones who have been paying attention and did our part because some stupid idiot people have been living under a freakin' rock for the past 2 years not to know about the switchover. It's stupid. Knowing this stupid country, they'll probably keep pushing the date back again and again, they've already done it a few times.

3 incredibly random pet peeves: people calling dinner "supper", calling soda "pop", and spelling Super Bowl as "superbowl".

Big day in the history of Illinois. at 4:52pm, the Senate removed ex-Governor Rod R. Blagojevich on a unanimous 59-0 vote, then immediately (tho apparently not necessary) voted on a notion to have him disqualified from every holding another public office in Illinois ever again. That too was a 59-0 unanimous vote. I've been watching this on TV all afternoon and evening, and I'm still shocked and out of breath. I guess I'm also relieved, because in the back of my mind, I was worried he wouldn't get impeached, and the idea of disqualification seemed like overkill. But given his history of arrogance, delusional acts which some health experts discussed that he's duped himself into believing his own lies and that he might be mentally ill, the East Coast media tour he went on this week to paint himself as a victim, which really angered a lot of the Senators here. And then there's was Blagojevich's 11th hour speech today that was deemed "vintage Blagojevich": an extraordinary speech maker, whom today sputtering complete lies and rhetoric.

I'm just still amazed at how somebody so crooked got to one of the highest offices in the state, yet got re-elected in 2006 for a second term, when there was clearly stuff going on. Blagojevich was a big city Chicago politician before he became Governor in 2002, which already has its own reputation of corruption and keeping seats in the family & family on the payroll. Blagojevich is an example of the worst kind of politician that exists, and according to the speeches the Senators made, he personally "hurt families, hurt Illinois".

The second Blagojevich was removed, his security detail left. He no longer gets a salary, but keeps his pension. He gets removed in disgrace as the 40th Illinois Governor and the first ever impeached. 2-and-out, private citizen Blago. We're finally spared of your corrupt "pay to play politics", selling a Senate seat to the highest bidder for own personal financial gain, all of your shakedowns one including a $50,000 shakedown that include depriving a Children's Memorial Hospital of $8 million of state funds. Regardless of your political affiliation, I know I'm going to sleep a bit better tonight knowing that crook can't poison the Gov't anymore.

Oh, and here are two great pics, first of ex-Governor's wife Patty Blagojevich and a little article about her rather colorful language , and of course Rod sporting the cap of his beloved favorite sports team . Looking sharp, Blago's! Rod also wanted to get his wife on state payroll and get her as a lobbyist, a sure first step in their scheme to get her in higher power. At least I know they won't get it in Illinois.

2008 was certainly a different year. I don't think I became as disinterested in television as I've ever been, and the Writer's Strike certainly played a large role in that. 2008 was also the year that Hell's Kitchen really sucked. I also finally got a digital TV converter box in the Summer, finally seeing TV clear for the 1st time since December of '00 when I last had cable. 2008 I never got around to declaring "Year of the Food". 2005 was soft tacos (basically an unheard of concept at the time for me), 2006 was the year of the Burrito, 2007 was the year of the Torta , and 2008 still never got a pick. One in the running was trenzas , which is a Mexican version of freshly baked and braided Hot Pockets filled with meats, vegetables, sauces and cheeses. Tho I guess one restaurant purchased thing I ate more of in anything of '08, it was Wendy's double stack with cheese .

2008 was also a year where I completely ignored any new music and movies, so I couldn't tell you anything about the state of those. 2008 in sports, it started off pretty good. On March 3rd, Brett Favre had supposedly retired but returned (meh) and that day awful ex-Sox radio announcer Chris Singleton was let go and the baseball guru Steve Stone made it to the radio booth, and then for 2009 the TV booth with that jackass hick Hawk Harrelson and replacing Darrin Jackson , who goes to the radio booth with Ed Farmer . 2008 also saw the end of the worst sportswriter to ever disgrace Chicagoland, Jay Mariotti , former of the Sun-Times. We won't miss your hate-rhetoric spewing columns of garbage, dirtbag . 2008 also saw both Chicago baseball teams in the playoffs for the 1st time since 1906 , and the Cubs did another wonderful winless 1st round exit , while nobody picked the White Sox to finish higher than 3rd, ended forcing a 163rd playoff game against the Twins and won 4 elimination games (including a record 3 in a row vs. 3 different teams) but lost in the 5th. We also saw Yankee Stadium close and host the longest All Star Game in history of 15 innings , with the A.L. winning once again, but it didn't help the Rays in the World Series and we saw the Yankees over-pay 3 of the 4 Top Free Agents before Christmas. We saw a resurgence in Chicago Blackhawks Hockey for the 1st time in over a decade; as well as long-time announcer Pat Foley returning to the Hawks as well. And of course, another playoff-less Bears team . 2008 was also the year of my first Fighting Illini football and hockey home games and first attended basketball games.

2008 was the year I finally got my long-sought item (tho it wasn't exactly the same, it's close enough) which was an authentic original & clean 1980-84 San Diego Padres New Era fitted size 7 3/8ths cap (actual auction pic). Trying to find an original 1973-79 all brown & Old Athletic Gold version proved to be too difficult and too expensive; reproductions are awful , which is the same problem with the brown, Old Athletic Gold & orange 1980-84 version , and to land an authentic/never-reproduced-correctly one of those, let alone in my size and clean and under $25, was some feat. As a birthday present, I also snatched up a 1990's game-used Minor League Cla$$-A Kane County Cougars baseball home pinstriped jersey (actual auction pic), in a wearable size as well. Where to take my sports memorabilia collection from here, I don't know. Maybe a red 1991-92 Jeremy Roenick #27 Blackhawks jersey or a 1987 home White Sox Carlton Fisk #72 White Sox jersey . Tho these aren't high priority purchases, and are most likely to build my sports literature collection via cheaply using Amazon with gift cards.

Oh man, I'm so angry I can barely breathe. The Yankees signed the #1 hitting free agent Mark Teixeira for 8 years at $180 million today. That's $423 million committed to 3 players this month alone. It's just... just.. terrible. I am extremely angry at MLB right now, for letting the Yankees have a monopoly on free agents and idiot Bud Selig for not having the balls in putting a salary cap in place. This simply cannot continue to go on. And what's even worse, is the Yankees could STILL get Manny and give him the ridiculous contract and years that no sane club would. The whole Yankees organization makes me sick. And even the sweetness of them missing the playoffs or early playoff exits won't help, because these contracts affect all other teams in their future deals. I'd go to every Yankees / White Sox game at the Cell to boo my ass off at every single Yankee, but I can't afford the tickets or the parking anymore. How's that for irony.

It's been snowing a lot here lately. No big deal. I can handle the cold a lot better than the heat. Cold? Just throw on another blanket or put on another layer & sip some coffee or tea. Hot? Cold water & drinks only last so long and fans only do so much. And to think, my stupid wuss-self in the Winter of '04 got so sick of the cold, I was going to move down to New Orleans to 'get away from this awful bitter Midwestern cold'. I was seriously considering it. Thought I could handle the heat better than the cold. And people, don't be a wuss and use a snow blower, use a shovel. And if you have an over-whelming snow, just do it in 15 minute periods. And I don't care who you are, if there's a sidewalk on your property, it is your duty as a citizen to shovel it and salt it. How many sidewalks have I slipped on and almost broke my neck because people didn't do it? Too many.

It has come to my attention that this thing has been declared Entertainer of the Year. Is this a joke? Are they trying to make this the worst year of my life? I blame the Republican Party for picking Sarah Palin, otherwise this & awful impression wouldn't have happened, and I blame the Republican Party for picking George W. Bush in 2000 for the nomination. These choices were of two blabbering easy-target characters which made for perfect mockery and seriously, couldn't you have at least checked the history of these people?? Were these two seriously the best candidates possible? Do your research, you idiots. McCain should had been nominated in '00, that was his only real chance. And who in the hell are we gonna nominate in '12? It already feels like Obama has '12 all locked up, and he hasn't even taken office yet. Anyways, I got off-topic here. Tina Fey sucks, the end.