I just had a quick look through the list of comments that my spam software had correctly flagged as spam.
The majority of them have one critical thing in common:

Tonight’s the night that most of us lose an hour of sleep.  Isn’t that just what you wanted to hear?
Technically, there’s no such time as 2:00am this evening (or tomorrow morning, depending on how you choose to look at it).  The minute after 1:59am is 3:00am.  If you have one of those fancy atomic clocks that reads the time through …

Though the actual day doesn’t hit until Wednesday, this is the day many will celebrate St. Patrick’s Day, and by “celebrate,” I mean, “get drunk out of their mind with no regard for anything Irish or the significance of St. Patrick himself.”
I’m not a huge fan of beer, green or otherwise. Recently I had dinner with a friend of mine …

A North Carolina middle school teacher said that a comment on a student’s paper was just his way of relating to his students.
On the homework assignment, he wrote, “-20% for being a LOSER.” KSFY-TV reports that the comment was made twice, and even after the student’s mother complained to the school that the teacher was “bullying” her daughter.
Some parents …

It gets frustrating at times when you work in the media and find yourself in a profession that is constantly blasted by people accusing you of being biased, and you then see that the media outlet with the reputation for being most biased happens to be getting high ratings.
It’s such an obvious double standard.
Veteran journalist Terry McDermott, in this month’s …

Have you noticed a subtle change in a mouthwash commercial featuring American Idol star Ryan Seacrest? It’s so subtle that one wonders why they bothered.

Appearing on Larry King Live to talk about the death of his best friend, Corey Haim, fellow actor Corey Feldman delivered a challenge worth keeping in mind:
“I think that we all need to grow up, and we need to think about every time we laugh at somebody in the tabloids, or poke a finger at somebody, and say ‘They’re a …

On Wednesday morning, Early Show anchor Harry Smith will undergo a colonoscopy live on the air, becoming the first network anchor to do so.
I know what you’re thinking: what about Katie Couric?  Good question!

My mom sent me this link this morning and I thought I’d share it with you.
It focuses on a Southern tradition of providing food for people in need, and the battle of the sexes in the grocery store. 

Just heard on Today: “No one ever forgets the Oscar dresses.”
Sorry to break it to them, but I do. I barely pay attention to them on the rare occasions I do watch. If I’m going to watch the red carpet foolishness, my eyes are more likely to be on the ladies in them than the clothing itself, unless …

Someone please tell me this is some kind of sick joke!
Former Governor Sarah Palin is reportedly trying to find a network to carry a reality show about life in Alaska, according to the Hollywood Reporter. 

One week ago today, employees at Catholic Charities were told that the organization will no longer offer benefits to spouses of new employees or to spouses of current employees who are not already enrolled in the plan.
It was to take effect Tuesday, a day before same-sex marriage became legal in Washington, D.C.
The sudden move, and resulting lack of notice, stems …

I decided to temporarily redecorate the blog in honor of St. Patrick’s Day. It’ll go back to its normal garnet after the 17th, but I don’t think the green looks all that bad if I do say so myself.
When your first name is Patrick, it’s hard to ignore St. Patrick’s Day. It’s just sort of expected that you’re …

Do you use categories and/or tags on your blog? If you do, there are a lot of stats-keeping programs that can help you trace which ones are getting the most hits with your readers based on which category pages rank highest among the most-viewed pages.
I’ve got quite a list of categories that I use on this blog. It …

Almost three years ago, I registered the domain where you’re reading this blog. Prior to that time, Patrick’s Place existed on Blogger, having moved a couple of years before that from AOL.
Ever since relocating to this domain, I added a piece of code to the top of the HTML for the Blogger site that automatically redirected people to this …

How are you when it comes to helping people? Are you the kind of person who pitches in when a need is first mentioned or do you tend to step back and think of additional ways you can help?
Or, do you ignore chances to help and focus only on yourself? (Don’t answer that.)
Helping hands are the topic of …

Any time a major disaster happens, many people ponder what it would have been like if they had gone through the terrible misfortune they see victims going through. For many believers, they also consider whether the tragedy is a reminder that the Biblical end times are that much closer.
A friend of mine from church sent an email yesterday that …

It’s been a short while since I checked the top keywords that led people to this site, so I thought I’d have another look. For the first time in quite a while, the search phrase “mental feng shui” didn’t make the top 10. (This time, it was actually 14.)
Anyway, here’s the list with a few pertinent annotations as …