Earlier this year, while

Earlier this year, while admiring the garishness of the Vegas strip, we spotted a new Ford Thunderbird. You know the one: the fiery roadster with retro lines, contemporary materials, and a V8 engine. "How postmodern," I said, not realizing that this seemingly trivial comment would soon turn into a debate that would plague us for months.

At issue: Is the Thunderbird truly an example of postmodernism, or is it simply a nostalgic rehash? Tough question. Fortunately for us, we live in the post-postmodern era of high technology. ("Post-human," suggests K.) And so, in the manner of all great debaters since the mid-1990s, we will turn to the ultimate authority: the Web.

The fate of the dispute is now up to the recently unveiled Google Answers service. Let's see what sort of solution $3.50 will uncover.

Postmodernism in Automobile Design: Is the new Ford Thunderbird (model year 2000 and later) an example of postmodern automobile design?

Yeah, we're geeky like that.

Life under the new

Life under the new airport security screening procedures:

The Flight There: I stood in line for half an hour just to get to the security screening where I passed through the metal detector without problem, but had to turn on my laptop for the security agent, and had to have my bag analyzed for traces of bomb-making materials.

The Flight Back: I stood in line for five minutes before getting to the security screening where I was told to put my "billfold" through the luggage scanner, was pulled aside for setting off the metal detector, and had to stand in another line for several minutes before being taken to a chair where I was screened with a wand and had to wait another five minutes while a "runner" carried my shoes back to the luggage scanner. No mention of the laptop or luggage.

The Kicker: I was carrying the same luggage and wearing the same clothes on both flights. The only difference was the underwear, the t-shirt, and a slightly smaller amount of toothpaste on the return trip.

So much for standardizing the screening process.

Latest articles, if yer

Latest articles, if yer at all interested:
Singapore SMS: Tlk Drty 2 Me
Why Online Age Checks Don't Work

I'm self conscious every

I'm self conscious every time I use an exclamation mark.

I recall seeing an

I recall seeing an episode of the The Osbournes where the whole nutty First Family of Rock gets bent out of shape over their noisy neighbors. And I can't help but think, If Ozzy Osbourne has trouble with inconsiderate neighbors, then by god what chance do we average people have?

I'm finding that there

I'm finding that there is a discrete number of words I can squeeze out in a day. It seems that number is currently about 3,000, to be split between articles, stories, or anything else I write. Today, 2,736 of those words went into emails alone. This note is taking up another 56. What to do with the rest?

Every so often we’d

Every so often we’d pass a side road that cut away perpendicularly, heading straight out through the desert to the horizon. I wanted to turn onto one of them and not let off the gas pedal until we reached the end, wherever that was.

October: When San Francisco

October: When San Francisco makes up for those crummy summer months.