How to spot a psychopath

Every time I see an article about spotting a psychopath I always end up reading it, and my worst fear is that the first paragraph is going to say that the first sign that you’re insane is that you like to read articles about spotting psychopaths.  Other than one poorly written article on Huffington I haven’t really come across anything yet, so at this point I’m going to assume I’m perfectly sane.

This particular article is a pretty interesting read, and it even includes a quiz to see if you too are a pschopath! It’s the infamous Hare test, and here are the first ten of the twenty items that are used to rate a subject:

Item 1 Glibness/superficial charm

Item 2 Grandiose sense of self-worth

Item 3 Need for stimulation/proneness to boredom

Item 4 Pathological lying

Item 5 Cunning/manipulative

Item 6 Lack of remorse or guilt

Item 7 Shallow affect

Item 8 Callous/lack of empathy

Item 9 Parasitic lifestyle

Item 10 Poor behavioural controls

When tested you’re rated on a scale of 0-2 and if you score more than 30 – apparently you’re dangerous to society (or not, you can read the article for more information on that).

The full piece is an abstract from Jon Ronson’s new book (he wrote ‘Men Who Stare at Goats‘), and mostly details the plight of one man who avoided prison by feigning insanity only to find out that once in a mental asylum he couldn’t prove he was sane.

Tony said faking madness was the easy part, especially when you’re 17 and you take drugs and watch a lot of scary movies. You don’t need to know how authentically crazy people behave. You just plagiarise the character Dennis Hopper played in the movie Blue Velvet. That’s what Tony did. He told a visiting psychiatrist he liked sending people love letters straight from his heart, and a love letter was a bullet from a gun, and if you received a love letter from him, you’d go straight to hell.

Plagiarising a well-known movie was a gamble, he said, but it paid off. Lots more psychiatrists began visiting his cell. He broadened his repertoire to include bits from Hellraiser, A Clockwork Orange and David Cronenberg’s Crash. Tony told the psychiatrists he liked to crash cars into walls for sexual pleasure and also that he wanted to kill women because he thought looking into their eyes as they died would make him feel normal.

(Click here to read the article at guardian.co.uk)

And here is one more segment about alternative testing (most of the article is about the author’s interactions with Tony):

In the mid-60s, Hare was working as a prison psychologist in Vancouver. He put word around the prison that he was looking for psychopathic and non-psychopathic volunteers for tests. He strapped them up to various EEG and sweat- and blood pressure-measuring machines, and also to an electricity generator, and explained to them that he was going to count backwards from 10 and when he reached one they’d receive a very painful electric shock.

The difference in the responses stunned Hare. The non-psychopathic volunteers (theirs were crimes of passion, usually, or crimes born from terrible poverty or abuse) steeled themselves ruefully, as if a painful electric shock were just the penance they deserved. They were, Hare noted, scared.

“And the psychopaths?” I asked.

“They didn’t break a sweat,” said Hare. “Nothing.” The tests seemed to indicate that the amygdala, the part of the brain that should have anticipated the unpleasantness and sent the requisite signals of fear to the central nervous system, wasn’t functioning as it should. It was an enormous breakthrough for Hare, his first clue that the brains of psychopaths were different from regular brains.

Prior to reading the article I would have wholeheartedly endorsed the plan of faking madness to get out of even a short prison sentence.  Hell, I would be willing to feign madness to avoid going to my room as a child. Now, I’m not so sure though.  Despite every effort we find out that the more normal Tony acted the more indicative it was of his insanity.

Also, we find out in the article that many psychopaths walk amongst us and pose no danger at all and most of them are running our country or acting as CEO’s of large companies (very comforting) – none however are authors of seldomly updated blogs on WordPress!

Bear Attack

Yahoo had an interesting story about a bear attack today that resulted in one man being severely mauled and left in critical condition.

Perkins, a former Nome fire chief, was attacked on Sunday by a large bear that he and two companions were tracking by snowmobile in a hilly area outside of Nome, the Alaska State Troopers said.

Perkins was riding in front of his companion when the bear charged him, trooper spokeswoman Megan Peters said.

The other men in the hunting party shot and killed the bear and called for help by radio, she said.

I have to say I take exception to the fact that they keep referring to the bear attacking Mr. Perkins.  I’m pretty sure if you’re tracking something in snowmobile to shoot it, you’re the one that’s on attack.  You’re probably not really hunting either I think the technical term is a drive-by.

NCIS: LA

I have been watching NCIS for a few years now, and when NCIS: Los Angeles first came on I decided to watch an episode or two.  My initial response after the first episode was that it was quite possibly the worst show I had ever seen.  Chris O’Donnel is the least believable cop (especially one that goes undercover) of all time, and the rest of the cast was pretty annoying as well.  The only bright spot was Linda Hunt, but even she couldn’t make the show watchable.

However, things may be turning around in Los Angeles with the world’s great actress now taking over this unlovable group of misfits!  Linda Hunt wasn’t enough to make the show watchable, but if anyone is up to the job it’s going to be Claire Forlani.  We’ll see how long it lasts, but for now we can all rejoice that Claire is once again going to be appearing on prime-time television each week.

What was once the most awesomely bad show on television, may soon be turning into the most awesomely awesome show on Tuesday night at 9:00 (EST)….stay tuned!

Porn at the library

I saw this article a couple of weeks ago in the New York Post and I would have written about it earlier, but I was too busy being sad about the fact that Blockbuster had closed.

Now, for as long as I can remember I always felt like there was something missing when I went to the library and now I know what it is!  Porn.  It never really occurred to me whether you could or couldn’t surf for porn at public libraries, but apparently outside of New York state it’s pretty much frowned upon.  Once you cross that border and step into New York though – it’s on!

Shakespeare’s plays, Einstein’s theories — and porn queen Jenna Jameson’s steamy online sexcapades.

New Yorkers can take their pick at the city’s public libraries, thanks to a policy that gives adults the most uncensored access to extreme, hard-core Internet smut this side of the old Times Square.

The electronic smut falls under the heading of free speech and the protection of the First Amendment, library officials say. (NY Post)

The article is definitely worth a read.   My favorite lines:

• Shakespeare’s plays, Einstein’s theories — and porn queen Jenna Jameson’s steamy online sexcapades.
• (Text under photo) CHECK IT OUT!  Cruising porn sites, like those with Jenna Jameson , on public-library computers is protected by the First Amendment, say officials

Okay, the author of the article clearly has a some kind of odd fascination with Jenna Jameson.  The first mention seemed harmless, but going back twice – kind of odd.  I think somebody has a crush on Jenna.

• The looker was using library-provided extensions on the sides of his computer to block the view of his screen — which was featuring a threesome at the time — “but I could still hear the voices,” a disgusted Nazario said.

I just found it sort of amusing that the author felt the need to comment that it was a threesome as if a twosome would somehow be perfectly acceptable, but a threesome!  Dear god, what about the children!!  They could handle a twosome, but you add one more to the mix and anarchy is sure to follow!

Re-Screening!

In my never ending quest to master basic household tasks I decided to take it upon myself to rescreen all the windows in the house this week.   My initial plan involved glue and Scotch tape, but after venturing out to the local Ace Hardware store I was informed that the whole process was decidedly more complicated.

Against my better judgment I decided to purchase the recommended supplies since the cats had ripped the existing screens to shreds and it just made sense to close off all the holes before the bees attack.  Ultimately I was able to master the entire process in 23 seconds and may open up my own re-screening business sometime this summer.

Netflix

As anyone that follows my blog would easily notice I have fallen into a bit of a drought following my local Blockbuster shutting down.  Without access to movies on a daily basis I have been unable to muster the energy to write anything.  My creative juices have been drained.

Luckily for myself (and all of you) I decided to join Netflix on Sunday.  I was pretty excited at first, but after rating 400 movies so I could utilize the  “Recommendations for You” feature I’m starting to get a little frustrated.  For some reason Netflix will only suggest foreign films, stand-up comedy movies, movies featuring Adrien Brody and no matter what I do it will not suggest horror films for me.

It always says I need to rank more horror films, but I have easily ranked upwards of 100 and I am still getting the same message.  I have also noticed a disturbing lack of new releases, which ultimately force me to switch to Blockbuster Online – well, that and the fact that Blockbuster rents video games as well.

March Madness!!!!

March Madness.  It’s all over – and for the first time in my life I think I am going to add the word thankfully to the end of that statement.    Maybe it was simply that Syracuse was eliminated in the round of 32 or maybe it’s that I have yet to get past the memory of what was easily one of the worst basketball games I have ever witnessed, but either way I am just glad this season is finished.

I had a feeling this particular tournament was going to be a disaster as soon as the brackets were announced.  Here are some on my thoughts on the tourney as it progressed since I didn’t do any updates during the tournament itself:

The Round of 64:

When the brackets were first announced I had two major problems.  My first issue was that VCU and UAB even made the tournament.  Like most of the college basketball analysts I couldn’t quite figure out why the committee elected to place either team in the tourney, however, after seeing the run VCU made to the Final Four it appears they saw something I definitely missed.  I still don’t think they should have been selected based upon the criteria the NCAA has laid out in the past, but it was certainly fun watching a true Cinderella dance all the way to the Final Four.

The downside of course to VCU making the Final Four is that anyone arguing for a 96 team tournament, a huge mistake in my opinion, has some pretty big ammunition now.

My other big gripe was that the NCAA did such a poor job of seeding the teams that deserved to make it.  It was relatively simple to avoid having Big East teams playing each other in the second round, but apparently the committee couldn’t be bothered to go that extra step.  In general they’re supposed to avoid having teams in the same conference match up that early, and with 11 teams it was going to be difficult, but it was possible.

As a result of the lazy seeding my beloved Orange as a 3 seed got stuck being matched up with a Marquette team (11 seed)  in the second round that already beaten them once this year.  Quite the reward for a year’s worth of hard work!

The first round was fairly unspectacular with a few upsets, and after having a record number of teams make the tournament the Big East was already showing signs that they were going to struggle.

Round of 32:

The second round saw the Orange fall at the hands of Marquette, and the rest of the Big East mostly faltered as well with only Marquette and UConn advancing on to the Sweet 16.  In the tournament’s most compelling game Pitt managed to lose to Butler with one of the most memorable, and stupidest fouls, in the history of the tournament.

Now the round of 32, and the entire tournament for that matter, left it’s most memorable mark in my mind with the absolutely horrendous officiating that played out on that Sunday.  UNC vs. Washington, Arizona vs. Texas, and Syracuse vs. Marquette all had games that ended with the officials making game changing calls – incorrectly.  Syracuse had an over the back violation that wasn’t.  UNC vs. Washington has so many bad calls and new rule interpretations that I’m still confused to this day.  And the Arizona vs. Texas game ended with an official calling a 5 second violation after he had only counted to 4.  I’m still not sure how you make that mistake since counting doesn’t really seem to be a talent one would need as an official, we all just sort of know how to do it.  I guess they should start asking if that’s something you have experience with before handing out assignments from now on.  Great job guys!

Sweet 16:

Duke got blasted by Arizona! At this point I was still just bitter about Syracuse.  Watching Duke go down in flames is always a nice pick me up though, and they really got destroyed by Arizona in the second half.  Welcome back Arizona, it was nice to see you return to national relevance after a few down years.

Elite 8:

UConn wins again – could this team really win it all after playing five games in five days to win the Big East tourney a week before the NCAA Tournament began?  At this point it was starting to seem like a realistic possibility, and UConn was the Big East’s last chance to regain some respectability.  If the 9th place team in the Big East could win the whole thing maybe the Big East wasn’t as bad as the first two rounds suggested.

Final Four:

VCU is out.  Butler is in.  Why?  Why are the basketball god’s subjecting me to another tourney filled with Gus Johnson and every other announcer yelling “And the Butler did it again…” I hear it in my sleep.  It haunts me.  Butler is one of those teams that people love and I’ll never understand why.  They play hard, and they play good defense, but they clutch and grab and it just makes for ugly basketball.  They also flop – a lot.  I really don’t want to see them in the championship.

Championship:

Butler made it!!!!  Ugh.

Well, the worst tournament in history ended with one of the worst basketball games ever played outside of the Big 10 conference regular season.  It’s never a good sign when thirty minutes into the game I’m still wondering if I was playing for one of the teams they may be scoring more points.

Now, some people (UConn and Butler fans) are trying to chalk it up to stellar defensive play, but anyone watching that game knows that no defense is capable of being played so well that it can make an offense look that bad.  It was pretty much a competition to see which team could suck less – and UConn did it!  They sucked slightly less than Butler!!

I just hope that nobody was watching basketball for the first time last night, because if they were they most assuredly will never watch the sport again.

Can’t wait till next year!

Melo to the Knicks

I was extremely excited when the news broke that Melo was finally dealt to the Knicks and I tuned in last night to watch his first appearance with his new team.  After watching five minutes of the game though I realized that there was a very good reason why I rarely watch NBA games – it’s excruciatingly boring.

As much as I wanted to care about Melo returning to New York I just couldn’t really muster up the interest to watch the game for more than 3 minutes without flipping back and forth between the Knicks game, the Providence/Notre Dame game and SuperMarkets Inc. on CNBC.

Supermarkets Inc is actually very interesting so if you get a chance I suggest you watch.  For example, Hellman’s tried selling mayonnaise in both a Buddha shaped container and an hourglass shape (both the same size, labels, etc…) and almost every person chose the hourglass shape because they thought it seemed more health conscious.  You can see that and even more interesting supermarket related facts if you watch the special!

Anyway, back to my point – the NBA still sucks.  It’s all isolations, with some screen & rolls and virtually no emotion or effort until the end of the game.  The college atmosphere and style of play is just so much more interesting and entertaining.

Andrew Sullivan on Obama

Andrew Sullivan, (best known as Bill Maher’s best guest panelist), had a pretty tough take on Obama recently, and I have to say I pretty much agree with everything below.

They have to lead, because this president is too weak, too cautious, too beholden to politics over policy to lead. In this budget, in his refusal to do anything concrete to tackle the looming entitlement debt, in his failure to address the generational injustice, in his blithe indifference to the increasing danger of default, he has betrayed those of us who took him to be a serious president prepared to put the good of the country before his short term political interests. Like his State of the Union, this budget is good short term politics but such a massive pile of fiscal bullshit it makes it perfectly clear that Obama is kicking this vital issue down the road.

To all those under 30 who worked so hard to get this man elected, know this: he just screwed you over. He thinks you’re fools. Either the US will go into default because of Obama’s cowardice, or you will be paying far far more for far far less because this president has no courage when it counts. He let you down. On the critical issue of America’s fiscal crisis, he represents no hope and no change. Just the same old Washington politics he once promised to end.

Admittedly I was a pretty fervent supporter of Obama back in 2007-2008, but at this point I’m really past thinking he’s going to be the President I envisioned.

It’s a good read, and you can find the whole post here.

Borders goes bankrupt

It’s a sad day for those of us that prefer Borders to Barnes & Noble as the bookseller filed for Chapter 11 protection this past week.  I’m not really sure why I prefer Borders over B&N, but my best guess would be because they feature Seattle’s Best Coffee and that place makes the world’s greatest hot chocolate.   Plus, it just seemed cooler in the same way that liking Target more than Wal-Mart is cooler.  Well, that and Wal-Mart is just kind of evil.

In other sad news:

The Blockbuster that I frequent on a weekly basis is closing it’s doors as of next Thursday.  It seems like an odd choice to close on a Thursday though.  Why not go for broke by staying open one last weekend?  I would imagine that’s when you make the most money anyway.  That may actually be why they’re going out of business though – they’re not very bright.

Although I stream through Netflix I still prefer going to the stores for new releases, so this is going to be a huge setback for me.  The nearest Blockbuster to my house is now at least a 10-15 minute drive away and I just don’t have that kind of time to waste.

I sold my Ford Escort a couple weeks ago which marks the end of the most beautiful friendship between man and machine that the world has ever known.

I ended up selling the car to some strange family of 40-60 people that stood in my driveway for 30 minutes in the snow while I was filling out the paperwork with the girl (and her cousin) who were purchasing the vehicle.  I even offered to let the rest of the family/friends stand in the garage while we were filling out the paperwork, but they preferred to stand outside.

It was very odd since they also had the option of waiting in one of the two minivans that they brought to the sale.  I thought for a second they might be surrounding the house in some devious plot to kidnap me, but then I remembered how awesome my car was and figured the entire neighborhood where these people live wanted to see it as soon as possible.  I couldn’t really blame them for that.

Here she is, my Ford Escort on one of our last days together (I have a picture of me with the car, but I’m crying in the picture so I decided not to share it with you all):

And this is my new car: