Back In the Saddle

Well folks, I'm back with a new modem and my notebook all fixed up. Had a very busy and pleasant Christmas and New Year's. I went through withdrawal from the blogosphere for about a week, but then after that I was fine without the internet! Funny how we can find other things to fill in the gaps.

I was addicted to Deadwood during the holidays, which isn't for the faint hearted or for kids, but for a gritty portrayal of life in a historical western outlaw camp (South Dakota) then go and see! Ian McShane's performance as Al Swearengen deserves the Golden Globe he won, and the profanity laced script is brilliantly written by NYPD Blue's David Milch.

On to more serious topics: President Gerald Ford: RIP.

And Saddam Hussein has joined Mohammed in the eighth circle of Dante's Inferno:

The poets are in the ninth
chasm of the eighth circle, that of the Sowers of
Discord, whose punishment is to be mutilated.
Mahomet shows his entrails to Dante and Virgil
while on the left stands his son Ali, his head cleft
from chin to forelock...

Inferno XXVIII, 9-42.

Saddam is fortunate that all he got was a hanging for his earthly punishment. He deserved worse. Some mourned his execution (talk about Stockholm Syndrome!), as one Iraqi woman said:

"He was not a normal human being but a god. I felt as if I lost my breath".

Uh, no, lady, it wasn't your breath you lost. It was your brain.