Jimmy Neutron

Good call. I loved the first Die Hard movie, liked 2 & 3 and will see this one as well. Rickman does play a hell of a bad guy.

My 12-year-old daugher had an appendectomy a few weeks ago. Everything went fine, her appendix did not burst. She did have to stay in the hospital for an extra few days because of a post-op fever. Cost? Just over $23k. $1000 for the surgery, $600 for anesthesia - the rest is for lab services and the hospital room. That's more than we were billed for the combined 4 births of our children. I am the last one that'll ever suggest some form of socialized medicine, but there is clearly something wrong with the system as it exists today. I can't imagine being a family go through this relatively common procedure without health insurance. Our best friends are self employed and something like this would cripple them financially.

A co-worker of mine brought is iPhone in today and I messed around with it a little. Cool toy. Graphics are very good. His chief complaint is that although the phones are meant to be MP3 players, they don't use iPod accessories. I'd love to get one, but I don't want to switch carriers or pay five bills for one.

I agree. I'll go so far as to guess some of it is complete fiction. You know, like the other reality shows.

That's a good thing. Those trigger-happy commandos desrve to sit in prison a good long time. I'm more conservative than most around here, but am shocked that anybody thinks it's a good idea to give cops of any kind authority to do their best SS impersonation. For a very long time in this country, cops have not shot people unless there is grave and immediate danger to themselves or others. Now we have LEOs shooting and tazing peopel for simple non-compliance. If that doesn't frighten you somewhat, yer dumber than a box of hammers. The really sad thing is that these two officers couldn't catch the guy with 700+ pounds of pot. They were in a position to shoot him, but couldn't catch him? What's up with that?

My wife has tried talking me into taking her toys in the um, no.

This much I agree with. I think the war on terror will become much more real to a lot of folks within the next year or so.

An empty tube certainly has safety merit, but so does an extra available round.

Good advice in this thread so far - I will reiterate that you do need to be fitted for clubs at your height. I would get fitted by a pro and have some knockoffs made based on your fitting and swing speed. You can do all that for far less than 5 bills here. Lessons depend on a lot of factors. I had a friend start playing and just had a naturally great swing. Big money on lessons would have been a waste for him. If you don't pick the game up easily, ask around at local courses for good pros/teachers. Good luck and enjoy! I freakin' love the game.

Yup.

Personally, I'd stay away from trigger locks. Multiple studies have shown them to be excessively difficult to remove while disoriented (waking up) and under stress (someone is in the house). They take too many fine motor skills to remove when someone is under stress. It doesn't do a damn bit of good to have a gun in the house if you can't get to it quickly if you need it. My advice would be to keep an illuminated electronic push button safe near your bed. Keep the gun loaded in the safe, with a shell in the chamber and on safe. I have opted for a daily routine of taking a gun to bed with me and returning it to the safe each morning. This can be dangerous, because you can simply never forget to do it. As strongly as I believe in being armed to the teeth, I believe even more in keeping my kids and their friends safe. My kids are also trained to back off and tell an adult if they ever find a gun, but kids are curious and it's not uncommon for us to have over a dozen kids through our house on a given day. You can't be too careful keeping guns away from curious kids.

Shooting through building materials is hardly ever a good idea - despite Hollywood's best representations. If you and your loved ones are behind a good solid door, great - stay there and cover it with whatever weapon is available. If you are convinced you need to blast through building materials, use a heavy, centerfire rifle bullet. There's a guy that plays with these kinds of scenarios and posts the video and results on this website. Box o' Truth . Check it out. I hope I am as useful when I retire.

I'd buy the motorcycle I want, my wife a nice piece of jewelry and invest the rest.