I'm not much a fan of Google but I do appreciate their defiance of the censorship laws imposed by that powerful statist regime (the one in Asia). I especially liked the government apparatchik's denunciation of Google's move: he said the nation's leaders are "opposed to the politicization of commercial issues."

Get it? When you defend your right to convey thoughts and information you're politicizing the issue. Restricting the right is not political at all -- that's all done in the general interest. That sounds familiar.

Yep, that's the same rhetoric used by statists around the world to clamp down on individual liberties -- rights to speech, religion, association, and property. Yeah, there is a right to property but you'd never know it from reading the popular newspapers. Or listening to elected "leaders." Or watching Google's lobbyists perform their black arts. The busybodies want to tell you how to manage your own earnings, evaluate your investments, and run your businesses; attempting to maintain a zone of self-determination is condemned as rank politics. The busybodies themselves? They style themselves more as Plato's philosopher kings -- no politics there!

Just a brief observation on the state of the statists, as I sit here sipping my coffee and reading my WSJ, pining for a restoration of First Principles, happy to see a glimmer here or there, saddened to see them swamped by the corruption inherent to our fallen state.

WHEREAS an act was passed in the last session of parliament, intituled, An act for granting and applying certain stamp duties, and other duties, in the British colonies and plantations in America, towards further defraying the expences of defending, protecting, and securing the same; and for amending such parts of the several acts of parliament relating to the trade and revenues of the said colonies and plantations, as direct the manner of determining and recovering the penalties and forfeitures therein mentioned: and whereas the continuance of the said act would be attended with many inconveniences, and may be productive of consequences greatly detrimental to the commercial interests of these kingdoms; may it therefore please your most excellent Majesty, that it may be enacted; and be it enacted by the King's most excellent Majesty, by and with the advice and consent of the lords spiritual and temporal, and commons, in this present parliament assembled, and by the authority of the same, that from and after the first day of May, one thousand seven hundred and sixty six, the above-mentioned act, and the several matters and things therein contained, shall be, and is and are hereby repealed and made void to all intents and purposes whatsoever.

Yeah, here they are comrades: the gangster-mobile and the slug-sled. We didn't do so well in the competition, as we expected. And the proceedings were lengthy indeed. So now we're back at Berea-Rose cooling out while Cookie does his homework, Alane watches XU play ball, and Mojo rolls around on the living room carpet.

Trying to avoid the news sites this evening, as I find all this advancing statism to be so friggin depressing. Infuriating, actually.

Later today we go to Mass, after which the Cub Scouts hold their Pinewood Derby races. Da Chimpz have crafted a pair of wacky racers using the crude tools in our basement -- that POS plastic miter box and saw cost me about $9 at Home Depot several years ago and even brand new it barely worked. Ah well, we did our best -- we're not exactly going into these races with any spirit of competition.

"Mojo, the wheels on your car kind of point in all different directions. I don't think you're going to win any races. Is that OK?"

"Yeah."

I also asked hi if I could paint his car brown and give it yellow spots. Then I had to talk him out of that.

Gotta give credit where it's due: if I wake up at 4 a.m. in a NYC hotel room, it's very unlikely that I'll be able to find an open newsstand anymore. And the few bodegas that run 24-hours -- I don't want to drink their yecho coffee anyway.

So it's nice to know that here at Berea-Rose the WSJ hits my driveway before 5 a.m. -- today I was all set up in my back room with hot coffee and a crisp newspaper by 4:30. That's living.

The weather is finally breaking around here, with temps going into the 40s yesterday. We broke out the Nerf and hit the street to toss it around. Then I got Da Chimps' bicycles into fighting shape and they rolled around a little while longer. Might even make it to 50 degrees later this week. In the Cleveland area, that's as good as August.

Mojo told me this morning that he wanted to make a poop so large that it would poke out of someone else's toilet.

I found this quite ambitious on its own -- even without his added goal that someone be sitting on that toilet when this happened.

I told this to my co-worker and his only response was, "And this is after you cut off the cable TV?"

Makes me think I should turn the service back on -- this kid's brain is a little too active.

Right now I'm blasting some old (it's old already!) Leftfield on the stereo downstairs and for some reason it's making me think of Thanksgiving 2006 when Merle and Ree joined me in the kitchen of Berea-Rose and we suddenly fell into a spontaneous symphony of celebratory food-prep -- as if we'd been making the sausage stuffings and squash soups as a team our whole lives. Reemus and Marlo: you are the coolest cousins.

And Mojo is one messed up kid.

The jesuitical Mojo has declared a Lenten sacrifice: for 40 days he will forgo gaming on his Nintendo DS.

As with all things Mojo, the sacrifice comes with an out: all the good games are on the Wii. Giving up handheld gaming leaves a loophole large enough for Mario to drive his Kart through.

But last night brought a further Motion for Relief: Mojo wanted to play a GameBoy game, and wanted to do it without breaking his faux Lenten resolution. At first, I misunderstood his request:

"Well, it hardly seems consistent with giving up handheld gaming on the DS to then just do all your handheld gaming on the GameBoy. But since it is a different platform, I guess you'd still be within your commitment."

But I had it wrong. He wanted to plug the GameBoy game card into the DS and play it that way. (Apparently the platform is backward-compatible.) The rabbinical court of Mastandrea promptly ruled this technique out of bounds.

Got a pot full of beef shanks and meatballs simmering in the stovetop. Berea-Rose is filled with a heavenly aroma -- perfect for a sacred Sunday morning (even one that has Mojo sitting in a living room corner furiously thumbing the controls of his GameBoy).

I like to keep track of things that don't matter. It keeps my mind blissfully unburdened by thoughts and cares that might otherwise have real consequence.

And so I declare that I just now used our basement shower-stall for the second time ever. And it was a good shower. I'm not sure what I was thinking when we first moved in, but after the moving van dumped out all our belongings back in May 2006 I happily dropped into place a bar of soap and a half-empty bottle of shampoo. What, did I think I'd be washing down there several times a week? Who knows.

Even today I didn't wake up planning to shower down there. In fact, I skipped the shower altogether for the day's first trip to Giant Beagle. Unshaven and unwashed I walked the aisles, loaded up on the grocery, and frightened the locals. Got back and did a few things out in the garage -- collapsing boxes (Space Ghost says it's the responsible thing to do) and changing the rear wiper on the Subaru.

(Oh, and that too is a first -- friggin car has been scraping by on the same stripped and exhausted rear wiper since we drove it off the lot back in 2006.)

Anyway, I shaved at the tiny sink in the bathroom off the kitchen (another first!) because Alane was cleaning the upstairs bathroom. Then I went up and got ready to shower. Then Alane saw me. From behind her caustic washrag she shot me the hairy eyeball -- as if I was about to undo all her work.

"I'm taking a shower, not a colonic."

It didn't matter, so I went to the basement. And what a treat: it's a totally no-frills stall with an excellent pre-Gore showerhead and that half-full bottle of Clairol Herbal Essences clarifying shampoo (with palm oil!) that I must've first opened back in 2005. I cranked up the hot water and luxuriated. Great experience. The bare-bulb lighting created a perffect underground ambiance and the stall's industrial utilitarianism was perfect for blasting the industrial stink off my no-frills body.

And now what remains of my hair smells as it did back in 2005.

Still got a few things to do today. Been a busy week around here. I've taken a new tack in waking the boys for school each morning -- I blast the rather-strong speakers on my computer in the room across the hall and play something ridiculous. Yesterday it was this:

A ton of snow fell on Berea-Rose yesterday. Da Chimpz were still out there today playing in the tunnels they burrowed through the mighty banks.

Later, with Mojo at the mall with his grandma, Cookie and I had vicious snowball fight in the driveway. I hate to say it but I think he won -- effectively landing a giant snow-form right onto the flat of my face, where it exploded in a cloud of tiny ice crystals. I became a Bumble.

Got a nice fire going downstairs. Alane just turned the game on so maybe I'll watch some of it. Or not -- I just don't have the patience.

And what the hell are these Duraflame logs that purport to burn in "festive" colors? The flame is just sort of bluish. Until you throw in some regular wood logs, like I just did (and like you're not supposed to). Then they burn very blue. And big. Eh, better than that stack of newspapers I immolated the other night. Made the house stink like the apartment buildings on the corner of 38th Street. Glad that's over.

I've been in a mischievous mood this week, so I got out my ancient Dr. Demento audio. Now Da Chimpz are familiar with the classics -- yesterday I rousted them from bed by blasting Frank Zappa singing "watch out where the huskies go, don't you eat that yellow snow." Then we went downstairs for breakfast (not St. Alfonzo's pancakes; I did not steal the margarine).

We also found this online. And we are struck by its genius. Spatula.



Oh, and there's also this guy. Genius? You be the judge.