Mark Steyn points out at The Corner that the residents of Dixville Notch, New Hampshire - 100% of whom apparently vote at midnight in each presidential election so the rest of us can ask “where the heck is Dixville Notch?” every four years - favored Obama, 15:6. Steyn comments about what this may foreshadow.

Mark is missing the bigger picture: in the past two presidential elections, 100% of the voting population of Dixville Notch was 26 people. It’s now 21. The village’s population has dropped over 19% in just four years! I can only conclude that National Review’s self-described Resident Demography Bore has been swept away in the uplifting tsunami that is Obamania. Shoot, at this rate Dixville Notch will be devoid of native citizens around the same time as much of Europe! Hopefully they’ve got a few Undocumented Americans filling in, doing jobs Dixville Notchers won’t do.

But seriously… I hope and pray that as the rest of our results come in, we see a majority of Americans who don’t want all the miserable things an Obama-Pelosi-Reid leadership would yield, and are prescient enough to vote accordingly.

USF, the nation’s #10 college football team, lost last night to unranked Pitt.  Just another wrench thrown into this season which I susupect will be interesting throughout.  Great year to be a college football fan!

It’s been a great weekend for football fans. Especially for me - I’ve always rooted for Ohio State, followed by the Big Ten, followed by The Underdog. So it’s fun to watch a few days straight of upsets, strong Big Ten teams, and another win for the Bucks. Even when one of the upsets is Meeechigan.

Watching the second half of the Penn State - Illinois game reminded me of being in high school at the end of the Cooper years. The Big Ten was tough and Ohio State won more than they lost, and that was all the more thought I put into it. To be honest, I like football season better that way. I cannot and wouldn’t much care to memorize facts and statistics; ESPN has a sharp slope of diminishing returns for me. I don’t need to hear seven different analysts all say the same things over and over, ad infinitum.

I’m glad, too, that I’ve gotten used to Musberger being “the guy” announcing most of the games I watch. He’s no Keith Jackson - whose voice I’ll always associate with my favorite time of year - but the man’s a good announcer. Especially with Kirk Herbstreit, who all of my female friends (and several of the guys) openly admit to being in love with, next to him in the booth.

….Since when have the Penn State fans chanted the bass line to “Seven Nation Army” when the team is doing well? That is really annoying.

Obama-Biden ‘08: Blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah

I got a few things from griffinhousemusic.com in the mail today and remembered that I haven’t mentioned Griffin enough, since I stopped writing my crappy little music reviews way back when. Although he may not have realized it, with a name like Griffin House the man was always destined for fame and/or notoriety. It’s a spectacular name.

Griffin was leaving Miami around the time I was arriving. One of my best friends there had an older brother, who got him listening to Griffin our freshman year when I’d barely started to realize there was good music other than the few bands I liked from what the top-40 schlock stations play. So it took awhile for the southern rock, or alt-country - whatever they’re selling him as - to grow on me. Griffin knows how to write a catchy tune, and his lyrics strike such a good balance between plain and poetic. Again I’ll link griffinhousemusic.com, with the suggestion that if you like “alternative rock” (or any of the samples playing on his website), you’d be hard pressed to do better than Griff.

To establish that I’m not a clueless fanboy, a complaint about Flying Upside Down, Griffin’s latest album. “I Remember (It’s Happening Again)” is a single - I always hate when an artist I like releases a single, and it’s one of the few tracks I skip. I have no place to talk and no expertise in the matter. Further, if it gets people talking and grows Griffin’s audience, all the better. But as a person who cares about lyrics, “I Remember (It’s Happening Again)” is… well, kind of silly. If you’re a person who thinks that war is never justified or that America should defend her interests only within her own borders, you’ll adore the lyrics. If not, you may find yourself digging the tune and shaking your head at most of the words.

There you have it, a complaint. As for the rest of the album, tracks 1, 3-6, 12, and 13 are great songs - some upbeat, some not… some about God, some about “the ladies,” all of them genuine Griffin. There are a handful of dupes from Homecoming or previous releases, but it happens. It wasn’t enough to keep me from ordering the disc, despite having bought a FLAC version of the album last year. I’m not sure whether I like Flying Upside Down as much as Homecoming or Lost + Found, but that’s not much of an issue considering that I love all three. Check out the man’s website!!

I woke up at 11:45 to the sound of Hilliard’s tornado siren - something that’s always annoying, but greatly preferred over the potential alternative of waking up to a tornado showering you in broken class and neighborhood refuse. I started to turn on the radio, then thought maybe that was a terrible idea since my bedroom is on the second floor. I unplugged the radio instead, and hurried downstairs to grab my wallet, phone, and keys.

Halfway down the basement steps the siren was ending its cycle but the thunder and lightning would have none of that quitter’s attitude. Fortunately my flashlight was sitting out in the living room from yesterday’s surround sound wiring adventures, and I found room for that in my hands, all the while expecting tree limbs and cattle to come bursting in from all sides. “Why would you turn around for the flashlight?!”, the audience moans. Good thing I don’t live in a big-budget action film.

Short story shorter, there was a sound in the basement I did not ever want to hear: dripping. One of the entry points for what looks like a Brinks wire is also an entry point for water. Doggone it. In the basement CD101 will only come in audibly if I hold the radio, which I realize is probably unacceptable as I’m standing there in a horrendous thunderstorm holding a wired electronic device next to my face. Now that I’m about to go back to bed I can see that the leak downstairs is a result of the north side of the house getting freakin’ steamrolled with rain. This is no consolation.

Man. I thought the worst of the storm was past here 20 minutes ago, but the foundation-rattling thunder just keeps keepin’ on. So much for a good night’s sleep. Is that hail? Delightful.

Lately I’ve been busy being “grown up” - and the oddest thing is how natural it all seems until I stop and think about it. Coffing’s jet-setting about the cosmopolitan city of St. Louis at an athletic training conference. One of the guys just bought his first new car. One of my sisters is gettin’ hitched. And, the Saturday before last I moved out of the apartment and into a house.

So, if you rely on me as your fount of nerdiness and have grown parched of late as I’ve run off in other directions, a thousand apologies. Somehow I managed to miss for an entire week the announced pricing for the 2009 Dodge Challenger. See, I read somewhere that they would start “under $30,000,” and I knew a 6-cylinder model was part of the mix. This had me assuming that, instead of buying one next fall about fifteen seconds after I pay off the Mazda, I would have to mope about the fact that any Challenger with three pedals and a HEMI was stupidly expensive. From the press release:

The U.S. MSRP for the all-new 2009 Dodge Challenger R/T is $29,995. Featuring the new-generation 5.7-liter HEMI V-8 engine, the Dodge Challenger R/T produces an estimated 370 horsepower (276 kW) and 398 lb.-ft. (540 N•m) of torque when paired with the standard five-speed automatic transmission.

Pricey? Yes, but not as horrible as I expected. Purty? Yes again. Sadly, manual transmission isn’t an option for the $22,000 base model, and it sounds like you’ll have to cough up another $995 for stick-shift on the R/T. Miserable. I’ve always wanted to drive a noisy, beautiful American muscle car before we burn up all our gas or the EPA forbids anything bigger than a golf cart. Don’t make me buy a BMW 128i in 2009, Dodge! Let’s see some financing promotions and racing stripes on the Challenger R/T, or I’ll do it!!