Hop Into This Stylish Death Trap!

I have mentioned commercials before that either 1) no longer make any sense or 2) rely completely upon some misplaced fear to cover their incredibly lousy job of communicating why you need their product. Now I have a new one! Presented by the 2009 Lincoln MKS, I give you a commercial sure to insinuate an ominous death in your future!

Watch the commercial here.

The commercial looks like many other car commercials, which special focus on circuits firing and cool engine combustion stuff represented by neon blue flashing lights. Pretty. My problem is that it's set to a lovely cover of Space Oddity by David Bowie. Yes, the song about the astronaut who dies in space because his space shuttle malfunctions. Why, that's JUST the sort of message I want to associate with your vehicle, Lincoln!

Come climb into the new Lincoln. Never mind that uneasy feeling of impending doom. It's probably nothing. Your circuits are probably just fine.

Can you hear me Major Tom?

Blast from the Past

Every now and then, I Google my name (in all of its many combinations) to make sure there is nothing I wouldn't want a potential client to find when checking me out. I recommend you all do the same. Anyway, this time around I started checking the really obscure pages at the back of the Gooooooooogle!, and I found something great: the 5k race results from the first race I ever ran with my best friend Melanie, way back in 1998 when we were 15 years old.

Melanie beat me by nearly 2 minutes and 40 seconds in that race, which doesn't surprise me in the least. In the intervening 10 years, Melanie has become a long-distance racing machine, while I only run when being chased. Or trying to chase away stubborn calories. Stubbornly.

What makes finding this race sheet even better is that I still have a photograph of Melanie and I from that very day, post race. Here it is:

smc and Mel, August 1998

Also in the intervening 10 years, I grew into my head and Mel learned how to open her eyes while smiling. And check out my awesome sparkly blue nail polish! Wolverine Pride! Unfortunately, this nail polish was not aerodynamic, which explains my long lag behind Mel. At least, that's what I tell myself. When I lie to myself.

And speaking of Googling, in honor of its 10 year anniversary, Google has released its oldest search index. Go see what you would have found had you been Googling back in 2001 here.