Mele Kalikimaka is Hawaii's way to say Merry Christmas to you

Turn on your speakers and press play:


"Mele Kalikimaka" by Bing Crosby

Mele Kalikimaka is the thing to say on a bright Hawian Christmas Day
That's the island greeting that we send to you from the land where palm trees sway
Here we know that Christmas will be green and bright
The sun to shine by day and all the stars at night
Mele Kalikimaka is Hawaii's way to say Merry Christmas to you

(The Andrew Sisters)
Mele Kalikimaka is the thing to say on a bright Hawian Christmas day
That's the island greeting that we send to you from the land where palm trees sway
Here we know that Christmas will be green and bright
The sun to shine by day and all the stars at night
Mele Kalikimaka is Hawaii's way to say Merry Christmas to you

(The Andrew Sister's and Bing Crosby)
Here we know that Christmas will be green and bright
The sun to shine by day and all the stars at night
Mele Kalikimaka is Hawaii's way to say Merry Christmas to you

Mele Kalikimaka is the thing to say on a bright Hawian Christmas Day
Thats the island greeting that we send to you from the land where palm trees sway
Here we know that Christmas will be green and bright
The sun to shine by day and all the stars at night
Mele Kalikimaka is Hawaii's way to say Merry christmas a
very merry christmas , a very, very, merry,merry Chistmas to youuuuuuuuuu

An open letter to Carolyn Washburn regarding Dennis Kucinich's exclusion from the Iowa Debate

The following is an e-mail I sent to Carolyn Washburn, regarding the exclusion of Dennis Kucinich from the Iowa Debates because his "office" is in his Iowa home. For more info, see: http://blogs.usatoday.com/onpolitics/2007/12/were-only-surpr.html

To: Carolyn Washburn (cwashburn@dmreg.com)
Subject: Political Hackery (that's you!)

Aloha,

I am a 26-year-old working class American. I am by no means a pundit or political extremist or uber-liberal or whatever convenient label you want to throw out there. By excluding Dennis Kucinich in the Iowa Debate, you've stooped to the level of political hackery that is so common among people such as Bill O'Reilly, Bill Maher, and Ann Coulter. What kind of excuse is "His home doesn't count for an office," is that? Beings that he actually LIVES in Iowa and he's a serious candidate, he has more of a right to be there than the rest of them. He's the only HONEST candidate. Obama and Hillary are talking heads supported by the media and have a proven track record of doing the same Goddamn thing that the rest of Washington is doing and it's what is screwing up this country, so why give them preferential treatment?
People like you are the reason that the American people are more and more disenfranchised with the political process. People like you are the reason that more and more our Government believes it's okay to abuse the ignorance of its people. Shame on you.

Sincerely,
Jay Chrisman

The end of Movember

It's been a long, strange journey growing this moustache. I've sported some kind of facial hair since I was about 15, but this is the first time I grew only a moustache. I've never realized how powerful facial hair can be in effecting the way people react to you.
Throughout the month I had at least 3 situations where people assumed that since I had the classic conservative Republican look going, that I was a neo-con. They confronted me on various topics ranging from how much they hate Republicans to how spineless Democrats are. I agreed with most of their opinions, but by then we were so drunk and/or high that it was impossible to convince them that I agreed with their viewpoints.
I've also had friends tell me how much they don't like "clean" Jay, even though I haven't felt like my face was this dirty since I grew my goatee out for like a year, the result being a gnarly, tangled mess of pube-like hair growing from my chin that extended down to about my sternum.
Tomorrow will be a new era of facial hair. I'm going to shave off the Mo and possibly dye my hair. I won't be updating this blog with photos on a daily basis anymore, although I may keep a running tally similar to those vids that were popular a while back of the guy who photographed himself every day for like a year.

The end of Movember!

Day 30

Movember Days 28 & 29

Day 29

Day 28

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Days 22 through 27 of Movember

Over the Thanksgiving Holiday I rented a car and drove to Oregon to suprise my Dad. The visit with all my family was great and I even got to see an old friend from college who I haven't seen in about 2 years. On the way up I stopped and partied in Bend, OR, which is a pretty rockin' town. Someone at that party treated me like a cop/dirty Republican because of my Mo (did I talk about how I got treated like a cop around day 15?), which I'll probably reflect on in a few days. Other than that, pretty smooth sailin'.
If you get a chance, check out my review of the Pontiac Grand Prix I drove up and why you should never buy one.

Here are all the photos:

Day 27

Day 26

Day 25

Day 24

Day 23

Day 22

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Why the 2006/2007 Pontiac Grand Prix sucks balls

Over the Thanksgiving holiday I rented a 2007 (it might have been a 2006) Pontiac Grand Prix so that I could go on a roadtrip. At first I was pretty stoked with the car, but after driving it about 1500 miles there were several design flaws that although minor, seriously detracted from my experience.

The first problem that I noticed and the easiest for a consumer to fix himself is the quality of the factory installed stereo.

Reasons the factory installed stereo sucks balls:
• The equalizer settings made all of my CDs sound like shit. I tried to find the best sounding EQ setting for every CD I put in, but none of them sounded good. I’ve come to the conclusion that the only CDs that would sound good on this stereo are ones with spoken word or heavy bass.
• Acceleration caused the volume to increase. I’m not sure if this feature was on purpose, but if it was, the guy who thought it was a good idea should get a solid kick to the nuts. It was kind of nice for about the first hour that the stereo adjusted the volume for road and engine noise, but after that it just got annoying that I wasn’t in control of how loud or quiet the stereo got.
• If I put a CD in, it was either loud or quiet – no happy medium. The volume knob clicked for each increment of volume. A comfortable volume for the radio was about 10-15 clicks, however for CDs, 3 clicks meant I could hardly hear my music and 4 meant it was too loud for my passenger to put on headphones and watch a movie.

The second problem I noticed was the cruise control.
• Most car manufacturers have figured out that the cruise control is most easily accessible on the steering wheel, near where you rest your thumbs. Not the case for the Grand Prix. Instead they put it on the turn signal branch, which wouldn’t have been too bad if the controls weren’t useless.

• There was no decelerate option. That meant every time I hit some slower traffic, I either had to turn the toggle switch to off or tap the brakes to turn the cruise control off, let the speed of the car decelerate until it matched traffic and then turn it back on. That wouldn’t have been too bad except it got annoying that every time some idiot was hanging out in the passing lane – going slower than the speed limit – I had to take my hands off the steering wheel to fuck with the cruise control.
• The designer had the good sense to make the accelerate side of the toggle switch spring loaded, but not the off switch. I know, minor detail, but the on button doesn’t override the off switch and I forgot to switch the damn thing back to the middle enough times that it got really annoying.

My third and final complaint didn’t rear its ugly head until after dark. The dome light sits in the middle of this big upside-down dome thing that extends down from the ceiling. Whenever you switch the rear-view mirror to nighttime, the lights from the car behind you are bright enough on the dome light area that it reflects in the rear-view mirror and obstructs your view.
Why is that big upside-down dome thing there? I couldn’t find a purpose for it other than an aesthetic one. If it was put there purely for aesthetics, I’d like to know the address of the guy who thought that was a cool aesthetic because I’d like to go over to his house and shine a floodlight through his bedroom windows at 3 o’clock in the morning until he realizes how shitty I thought his idea was.

Other than those three complaints, I was really impressed with the performance of the vehicle. It handled well, the acceleration – even on an incline – was impressive, and the gas mileage was superb for a non-hybrid vehicle. If the interior design hadn’t completely pissed me off, I would probably recommend the Pontiac Grand Prix to anyone who would listen.

Day 21 of Movember

Day 21

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