10/9/13

HEADLINES, UNFORTUNATE
FEWER BALLS, MORE WANGS AS BRITISH NAMES CHANGE: RESEARCHERS STUDY SURNAMES
--Reuters headline

10/10

WE BELIEVE THIS ONE
I hear comments sometimes that large oil companies are greedy companies or don’t care, but that is not the case with BP. We care about the small people.
--BP Chairman Carl-Henric Svanberg, speaking to reporters in Washington, June 16, 2010

10/11

IS THERE ANYTHING GIANT PANDA FECES CAN’T DO?
“Microbial Treatment of Kitchen Refuse With Enzyme-Producing Thermophilic Bacteria From Giant Panda Feces”
--title of a scientific study

10/12

THANKS, BUT NO THANKS
METCALF ANIMAL CLINIC
KIDS EAT FREE!
--sign outside an animal hospital
[Oh, c'mon, Stupid Quotes--I'll bet that the sign had a picture of a baby goat on it]

      SPOILER ALERT to the 15:

            
      If someone asked you to look at this picture, not knowing who was who, how would you answer the question "Who's the insufferable asshole here?"

10/13

CLICHÉS, CORRUPTED
Looks like we’re not out of the woodwork yet.
--Dallas news anchor Nerissa Knight, commenting on the possibility of more bad weather coming

10/14

WOW, THAT’LL NEED A BIG BOX
Family Feud host Steve Harvey: Name something imported from Italy.
Contestant: Rome.

      What eldritch horrors could lie within a simple DVD of Pink Lady? None to my mind, a mind as clear as a sunlit day free of gibbering, slathering, repulsive nightmares, I thought! As one does. Speak not of saying that you don't! He who refuted the thought, pooted the thought! The reference may be too esoteric for those who have not graduated Miskatonic U with full honors such as I, where "full honors" usually means "sane and with all limbs attached." It lies near Worcester, a dark and grim city cursed with a name that none from outside New England can pronounce! Like Gloucester, where the locals claim the mad fisherman of Dagon resides, he of the filets forever frozen in the feared freezers of forbidden Falmouth.
      I shall be the one who defeats the curse of the Jeffronomicon! I shall just press "open" on my mother's Victrola, she who died gibbering in an asylum--wait, did I use "gibbering" before? Maybe "drooling" instead?--and insert the 78 RPM disc, and laugh at the fools who believe that it can drive one mad!

      ...And that is where his journal ends. The rest is mainly the word "gibbering" and several indecipherable words repeated, mainly "DISCO" and "HOT TUB" and "FUCK THAT GUY JEFF!" In the book was tucked a crusted, ancient, mouldering, repulsive, century-old Netflix sleeve. What harm could come from pressing Play?

      A gargoyle beyond imagination! It spews its name like a crime, it is JEFF ALTMAN. He threatens us with Red Buttons and that vilest of names, one unspoken for centuries, it is--I dare not speak its name in such a sacred place as my condo!
      Already I find that the legends were lies! Pink Lady does NOT come out in kimonos and rip them off! They dress as robots, and do the dance the Robot! They lip-synch in a language unheard on our planet since the days of the Great Empire of Nippon, and robot samurai dancers join, their costumes making it impossible to tell if any are crossdressing, as they're all built like linebackers. There is much mist--perhaps they need it to manifest themselves on our sphere? Or to lull the future victims of their mad sacrifices in the audience into the stupor they're clearly all lulled about? Their baleful chanting, full of the maladorous pan pipes of the mad god Disco, finally ends, and their audience of slaves responds with applause, an applause that comes not from their unmoving hands.
      "Naow, we'd like to bring out our very special friend--JEFF ALTAMAN!" The "girls" went to a Disco, and the Altman says that they are Sagitarrians, not Leos, but "we can't pronounce that!" He makes them pronounce it. He's into Computer Dating, which the Girls think he means he dates computers. He likes the sea, realm of Dagon! Kei asks "Are you going to date Charlie the Tuna?" My mind curdles! Is it--it IS!--a reference to the foulest manifestation of black sorcery known to exist--the movie FOODFIGHT! Will Jeff's date be a fucking robot? Only in a world where humor has never existed--NOOO IT'S ROBBY THE ROBOT FROM FORBIDDEN PLANET!
      I shake the horror from my previously-mentioned curdled mind! The robot desires not fornification with the fleshy "Fast Pants" Jeff, preferring to watch Pink Lady and their guests Red Buttons, and--no! I shall not let the name escape my tongue, lest the demon escape its eternal imprisonment on the darkest moons of Pluto! Robot again refuses sex with the Jeff, saying that the she-bot "has a headache!" "Really?" says Jeff, the punchline crawling like maggots from a wound, "I though it'd be more of a FUSE-ache!" My mind! It reels! These are truly beings from the depths of eternity, ones which never evolved beyond crude appendages and with no such concept as "morality" or "humor"!
      Creaking from the weight of an eternity of the forgotten, shambling to our screen like a gimpy mummy, comes a skit about Johhny Carson's summer replacement. One is an anorexic Valley Girl, one is "a production clerk from the Sheriff Lobo show." And yet this abomination slimes across our cosmos! It sucks humor from the air as if it were the marrow from our very bones!
      Next, hospital surgery--if it was like a car wash! An automated assembly line of robotic trauma to the human body! Fear the robots, says the Jeffronomicon! Especially the ones on the show's writing staff!
      The special guest--NO! can it be? flutters my heart--wait, "flutters," not scary enough. Flaps my heart! You know, like an eldritch horror with bat wings. Eldritch horrors, man, they're the opposite of the bee's knees. It's Red Buttons, driven from the darkest pit of the Catskills! Cthulhu r'yleh oy vey! But he stands, old as the tides and just as unstoppable--he is not funny, but embarassment comes not, like the vicious, viscous ooze of the Jeff. Slouching towards Bethlehem, Jeff comes, in that beloved piece of not-medy, Art Nuvo. Who is this manifestation? Why does he appear in every show, like a boil in a plague region? There is no reason. There is only the infection. Art has an elephant. The elephant gets cranky. The skin of Art, worn like a ghoulish shroud by the Jeff, ends the skit by saying "This isn't funny!" Seven times. Repeating his hideous, screeching chant an eighth time would have made a sane man drop to the floor, rolling while he laughed, laughed the mad laugh of I don't know, some kind of rolling person on a floor.
      It's a roast of Lincoln, hosted by Jefferson Davis! This spirit, summoned from the dankest dungeons of the Hell that is the show's writing staff, jokes about how basketball players are all Negroes. Mary Todd Lincoln describes their sex life as "Foreplay was 7 years ago!" and brays a laugh, a laugh that echoes in the blistered ears of blighted burros. John Wilkes Booth. He has theater tickets for Abe, to--Oh. Got that one already? Wow. You are one gibbering, drooling genius. Abe "Hey Vern, It's Ernest" Lincoln says he freed the slaves because he was drunk. To Booth: "I hope at your next performance, you break a leg!" The spinning, the spinning grave! I hear it now, now and forever!
      Mei and Kie chant the dolorous hymn "MacArthur's Park," placating the malevolence that sleeps eternally in sunken R'yleh, by the cold plains where Nyarlathotep plays his hideous flute, the cold catacombs beneath the NBC studios in dread Rock'fell'a Center.
      BUT THEY FAIL! Summoned by the hideous, unpseakable nightmares of a million TV viewers, It rises! From Its cold tomb it shambles, its greasy and bloated head full of mad ego, It comes, and none can stop its implacable, irresitable march! It is he--finally he!--of whom I have dared not to speak! Its gaping maw, rows upon rows of sparkling sharp and capped teeth, it opens--it speaks!
      "It's --JEFF ALTMAN! I can't belie-ie-ie-ve I'm really here with--JEFF Alt-MA-A--AAN!" It coughs, violently, as if the very air of our world, the smell of humanity, causes it pain. It places a cigarette in its mouth--lights it with a Bic set on the highest flame, like a torch burning the innocents on a pyre--threatens to deport the Girls. To what Stygian hole, demon? To do what with their fair flesh?
      The sycophantic incubus Jeff sidles to its Master, and says "JERRY LEWIS is one of the Great Masters of Comedy!"
      The winds rise, the skies darken, thunder growls, a dog barks in the distance, crickets chirp! No, what was I thinking? I invoked the name! And the toady Jeff repeats the Name, as He repeats Jeff's, bonding them in a pact of ultimate evil and overacting. Will any mortal escape their mugging? They sublimate themselves into their darkest ritual, "FROINLAYVIN, OH LAY-DEE!" Then It sings. About voodoo. About witchcraft. Hijinks ensue. Spazzy hijinks--OF THE DAMNED. He is constantly frustrated by makeup, boom mikes, giant TV cameras that hem him in, just as it was in the circle of Hell he recently escaped. In the Universe of Jeff, there is no hope, there is no escape, only the unblinking eye of the camera, the cold fist of despair. The Lewis, humiliated by its very servants, retreats back into the realm of madness it escaped, never to inflict itself again upon the wretched masses of humanity it has so sorely preyed upon. Oh, would that some ray of light could cast its beam on such a sunless world of endless, ebon darkness!
      And he comes! A light of joy! ALICE COOPER! Singing "Clones"! Why does he look like he wants to kill himself? His shtick, or being on Pink Lady?
      Next, the gibbering drumming of the shuffling, shambling, grotesque, gangrenous, namby-pamby, flirtatious, succulent, lower sodium, gluten free, timorous, high-flying, deciduous, hirstute, dazzling...running out of adjectives here. Anyway, Jeff drums like he's in a band with something awful with adjectives in a drum solo. Yes, that really happened. Then, a closing medley. Of lip-synched disco songs. "Do Ya Think I'm Sexy," lure the succubi with their siren song. "Dancing Queen," come dance in the moonlight, you're the Dancing Queen, you will be sacrificed first. "If My Friends Could See Me Now," dancing dressed as marionnettes on literal strings, controlled by unseen forces above, puppeteers making you caper like clowns for the amusement of the audience, the jeering, barely-human audience, bobbing in unison like lemmings, if lemmings bob, I didn't research that.
      Do lemmings jump in hot tubs? For here is shirtless Jeff, stewing like the boiling souls in Hades in a soup of his own juices. "But Jeff--we do not think--you like--hot tub!" says Kei, wishing she had never seen the dim, flickering light of this benighted world, lit as if a candle was sputtering only to die, forever extinguished, with only a single last plume of black smoke to mark its existence.
      The headline on the newspaper is "SHARK SIGHTED IN LOCAL WATERS." Jeff does not believe the superstitions, the fusty old beliefs of the locals. As I did, once. Then a shark fin appears in the tub, and Jeff, gibbering pretty good, runs screaming. But the fin is merely attached to the head of Sumo Guy, a pallid, pale, pagan imitation of the carnivorous gods of yore that ate a man's soul, then picked their ochre-tinted fangs with his bones, then burped and loosened their belts. Belts of HORROR! You know, human skin belts with baby head buckles, made in China.
      With a strength born of desperation, I force the Jeffronomicon shut, but it fights me! Its evil Jerry Lewis face cover shrieks, "Oh, READ-DER! You can't with the SHUTTING, you CA-AN'T! FROINLAYVIN!" So I punches it in its stupid book cover face, it goes "OW! With the HITTING you now aaare? I don't LIKE you no mores, I'm thinking is what!"
      "Wait, foolish MOR-TAL! That's not the stick of the KRAZY GLUE, is it?! Oh, no, not the KA-RAZY GLUING OF MY PAGES with the TOGETHERS, I hate that!" But it is done! I try to bury it in the nearest unconsecrated cemetary, but apparently you need some kind of permit, and it won't fit down the toilet, so I banished it to the deepest pit of Hell, where none will ever find it! And the recycling truck took it away!
      As the truck leaves, a chill runs through my mind. There were only 5 episodes aired of Pink Lady & Cthulhu, and yet--the DVD claimed there were six. I hear it thumping now, like a heart buried beneath the floorboards, calling from beyond, from a veritable mountain of madness, gibbering, gibbering like a lemming in a hot tub, I will be back. None can shut the Jeffronomicon before the cold kiss of the grave. I see it now! I was the fool! I WAS THE F

      ...And there his blog post ends.

      Huh. Why's there a book in my recycling bin?

10/15

WE’RE GETTING A LITTLE TENSE HERE . . .
Tech support: Can I mute you for one minute while I look at your bill, please? If you need me I can hear you but you won’t hear me back for two minutes, but again, if you need me just call out, I can hear you.
Caller: Sure, no problem. (seconds of silence) (woman yells) Bubba! You get away from that there dog! That ain’t natural.
--tech support call to a wireless phone company help desk

10/16

TURKISH MEXICAN RESTAURANTS, SO AUTHENTIC
Water Burrito
Swarf Burrito
Opening Burnito
--menu items, Turkey

      The broken ship settles by an ancient fissure, torn open by an undersea volcano in ages long before man. A tentacle aeons old snakes out, slithering, searching. In the ship's ripped and broken hold, it finds the copy of the cursed Jeffronomicon. It curls around the forbidden book and pulls it deeper into its slimy grasp. Finally, thinks the mad god, finally I can return to the surface--as soon as the DVD rerelease!
      And the tortured face on the book hisses--"Nice...Laydee..."

10/17

POLICE COMPLAINTS, BIZARRE
A Longmont woman reported Thursday that someone broke into her home on the 1200 block of Sumner Street and switched hardware in her computer with identical hardware that doesn’t work. There are no leads.
--from the Longmont Times-Call (Colorado)

10/18

KNOWNS, UNKNOWN
We are not looking for any known suspects. That doesn’t say that there are no suspects. They’re just not known to us.
--Glynn County (Georgia) police chief Matt Doering

10/19

SINES, FALING
CALIFORNIA: A GLARING EXAMPLE OF LIBERAL FAILOR
--sign at a protest rally in California

10/21

AND A SECOND LATER . . .
ONCE YOU TASTE IT YOU WILL FIND IT IRRESISTIBLE FOR A SECOND
--ad for Sekchimei candy, Macau

      Kill Kill's number came up in Vet Roulette. As usual, she drooled in fear. Unusually, she actually resisted the vet when he tried to weigh her. It took 2 attempts--on the first, she managed to reach out a paw and turn the electronic scale off. She's also at a healthy weight--12.25 lbs, when she was 14 a year ago-- I don't know if that's because of playing with the boys, or if DJ's spending more time playing with her now that one boy hates everybody. Mr Bigfoot Crabapple.
      The vet had no idea what to do about the Byron situation, besides (like me) hoping that maybe Killsy going to the vet might prompt him out of it. So far, no change. He saw her leave, but slept through her return. She always demands to be let out of the carrier at the bottom of the stairs of our third-floor condo, racing up the 3 flights in the same amount of seconds. But I'd reassembled the carrier with the door in backwards, and there was a mutual struggle to get it open. Then--FREEDOM, glorious freedom!
      Unlike Byron, she was back to normal after 5 minutes.
      I miss "normal."

10/22

BOOKS, PAINFULLY DULL
100 Years of British Rail Catering
Advances in Potato Chemistry and Technology
Correct Mispronunciations of Some South Carolina Names
--book titles

10/23

LET’S NOT
Let’s dispense with all the discussion and get to the crotch of the matter.
--Minnesota state senator Clarence Purfeerst (D)

      For instance, as I have Sundays and Wednesdays off, I can get the Netflix 1-at-a-time plan, and still get 2 DVDs a week. That works out to a dollar a rental! Or a dollar's waste of time. Today's was Deus ex Machina 3. Well, that Iron Man 3 movie, but that should've been the name, as every fucking scene was "Now we're saved by a sudden appearance by an empty Iron Man armor!" In the last scene, it was more like Deus ex Machina 25. Or were there 50 Iron Men? A thousand? Who knows, who cares. Hey, did you know that rich white men are unstoppable while outside of their magic armor, but women and Negroes are totally, instantly stoppable while in them? That's actually a minor gripe in a movie that has the second most important role played by an "adorable" sitcom brat in a Dorothy Hamill-via-Bieber haircut. Hey, kid, you're so instantly likeable that George Lucas wants to you play baby Darth and a young Jar-Jar. Save yourself some time and enter drug rehab now.

      The early 70s Doctor Who was played in its most James Bondian style by the Third Doctor. "Double-O-Who? Jon Pertwee's secret life as a wartime agent." Like Christopher FUCKIN' Lee, he was a major badass during WWII. And if that "Double-O-Who" made you roll your eyes like I did--find out who recruited him.

      “Modern political religions may reject Christianity, but they cannot do without demonology. The Jacobins, the Bolsheviks and the Nazis all believed in vast conspiracies against them, as do radical Islamists today.”--from the 1986 book Turmoil in the Toy Box.

10/24

DO YOU WANT THAT BY CREDIT CARD OR CHECK?
Thank you for your order. We are unable to accept orders without payment. The total amount due is $0.00.
Please return this letter with your payment.
--letter from Cook’s Illustrated magazine

10/25

READ THIS AND WEEP
I was confident about one thing: stopping this pre-Madonna.
To make the death penalty less torturous, the gelatin was invented.
--from college freshman English papers

10/26

THANKS FOR THE MORONIC DISTINCTION
No, no, I didn’t go to England; I went to London.
--socialite Paris Hilton

10/27

CAN’T ARGUE WITH THAT DEPARTMENT
Meaningless yards are not meaningful.
--football commentator Jon Gruden

10/28

MAGAZINES, MIND-BOGGLING
Oily Boy (magazine for Elder Boys)
Don’t (boy’s how-to Magazine)
Croissant (women’s magazine)
--magazine names, Japan

10/29

INCORRECT CORRECTIONS, CORRECT?
The Ottawa Citizen and Southam News wish to apologize for our apology to Mark Steyn, published Oct. 22. In correcting the incorrect statements about Mr. Steyn published Oct. 15, we incorrectly published the incorrect correction.
--correction in the Ottawa Citizen and Southam News

10/30

THE ZOMBIE NAVY
One such translator was an American of Haitian descent, representative of the extraordinary work that our men and women in uniform do all around the world—Navy Corpse-Man Christian Brossard.
--President Barack Obama, mispronouncing “Corpsman” (the “ps” is silent) during a speech (He also got the Corpsman’s name wrong. It was Christopher, not Christian.)

      ...And as I finished typing that, snarls came from the other room. DJ was harassing Byron again. I picked up the squirt gun and said...Yeah, said what I said about my costume.
      I've pretty much decided "This is how things are now." I pulled out the last Feliway diffuser, although it has like a week's worth of juice left. If it hasn't worked in 6 weeks, why would it now? Pammy from Way of Cats read of our turmoil, and sent me a salve her husband has been working on. It's in a tin marked "Kitty Nerves." Smear a bit on one's pinky, spread it on a foreleg. Byron didn't mind the spreading, and smelled and licked it contentedly. Since this happened before the outburst mentioned earlier...Well, maybe it takes time to work. Maybe nothing will.

      Kevin's watching Doctor Who starting with the eps of the Eighth Tenth NINTH Doctor (I swear I proof these before uploading) and we're going to the "Day of the Doctor" thing next month. We might be both be going in blind. I thought that the 50th anniversary special would be stand-alone, but apparently it picks up from the end of the last episode. All I know is that--the Doctor gets Hurt in the John? Maybe I should've researched more.
      At any rate, I found this short but very accurate listing of the various Docs, A Whose Whom Of Doctor Who's to get him up to speed.

      Anybody remember the 1980s TV series Night Flight? I loved that! Here's 20 minutes of it from when it stopped using the amazing voice of Pat Prescott, whose enthusiatic dj delivery would bring even the stonedest of stoners back to semi-consciousness, and some 1985 iteration where she was replaced with live hosts, or as live as the canned hams of a blow-dried local Happy News Team could be. I was working for a living at that time, and thus not awake until 2AM. But this does give a "greatest hits" vibe of my favorite show from 3 decades ago.

      And now, I will watch Star Trek Into Darkness Title Without Punctuation. I'm sure that it will be REAL GOOD.

10/31

THOSE MONSTERS, ALWAYS SUING SOMEBODY
Frankenstein v. Independent Roofing & Siding
--U.S. court case

      And in news about other and stinkier sci-fi, Star Trek Into Dullness. I knew it wouldn't be good--every review hated it, and it came and went quickly at the theaters. And if it's bad enough to insult the intelligence of Americans...
      I wished I'd watched it on the computer, so that I could compare it to Save the Cat! It had every beat there, right down to "X happens at Y time." "Yet once you know the formula, the seams begin to show. Movies all start to seem the same, and many scenes start to feel forced and arbitrary, like screenplay Mad Libs. Why does Kirk get dressed down for irresponsibility by Admiral Pike early in Star Trek Into Darkness?" Well, that, and the fact that he's violated the Prime Directive by inexplicably plunging the Enterprise into a lake by what appears to be the only settlement on an alien world, as why else would Kirk be so concerned about a volcano killing the whole planet outside of "Screenwriter don't know how volcanoes work," and Spock goes into the volcano to put some Ice-9 in it and has to be transported out instead of transporting the stuff in from the Enterprise in orbit, and...whatever. Because "it's more exciting that way!" Know what else it is? More fucking stupid.
      "Save the Cat!" shows its flaw in this movie. It might work with a single protagonist, but this movie should've been called Star Kirk Into the Awesomeness of Kirk. He's the center of the movie. Everyone adores him and devotes their life to making him know how he's more important than they are--hell, the whole galaxy is only lit by the light he shines! Except for the bad guys, who are Bad because they oppose Kirk's desires. Does "Save the Cat" include a bit saying "Make your screenplay a total Mary Sue"? Maybe it might work better without a lead actor who has all the charisma of a blue-eyed fence post. Remember that other guy--what's his name, Spork?--he's kinda in the movie. As much as any other character is. But the black hole of Must Love the Kirk swallows them all whole, to a place where not even other characters can escape.
      And is it now a rule that every movie have a bad guy with a plot so insanely complicated and fine-tuned to what things other people do, that there's no way the plan could ever work? And also involve the villain being captured at just the right moment? This is at least the 4th movie (Skyfall, Avengers, Iron Man 3) in which I couldn't tell you what the bad guy was even trying to accomplish, or at least in a way that wasn't dependent on some byzantine labyrinth of utter coincidence, but this was the worst. What was Evil Starfleet commander doing? Possibly I was told, but was too busy not paying attention to this "everything happens all the time" bullshit. That's actually not exciting, it's boring. It's like WRITING IN ALL CAPS, YOU JUST TUNE IT OUT very quickly. Best review of a movie like this that's also like every other fucking blockbuster, another classic film that will stand as humanity's greatest achievement alongside the Apollo landings and a slobby guy just missing spilling his taco made of Doritos at the mall food court onto his TOTALLY favorite tshirt, Transformers 2: "It's like watching paint dry while being hit in the head with a frying pan."
      Plot: They took Star Tek II and threw out the good parts. And threw in stupid parts. Nobody in the making of this questioned the tribble "from the Mudd incident" and said "Wait, that wasn't Mudd!" Where was the 1920s gangster from the Nazi planet of Romans in tepees with green girls? Did the Abrams go "NO! YOU'RE the one remembering it wrong! Now, let's have sweet, brave Kirk the Mighty fight the Horta Gorn Wookiee Vampire Slayer! Stop him before he phones home, me!--err...Kirk!"
      Let us not forget the second most important character! You know who I mean! LENS FLAAAARE! Seriously, the fuck? EVERY fucking scene had Lens Flare, exciting new action hero that makes you shade your eyes in pain. Lens flare used to mean "CUT! Shoot the scene again, because our cameraman is an idiot!" In this movie, how many millions of dollars were spent adding lens flare? If someone had picked up a fucking slice of pumpernickel, it would blindingly flare. It just screams "You're watching a movie!" everytime it happens...not that this movie ever lets you think otherwise, but will the next crapfest, Star Kirk Into the One With Whales, have nonstop boom mikes waggling at the top of every shot? Maybe the key grip drinking a Mountain Dew in Chekov's lap?
      I give this movie one star, and that's on a scale that includes every star visible in the night sky.

11/1

WITNESSES, WITLESS
Lawyer: And your father died intestate?
Witness: No, he died in a train wreck, and you know it!!
Judge: He’s just trying to find out if your daddy had a will.
Witness: Well, why didn’t he just ask me that instead of getting personal about it?
--courtroom testimony

      Hey, sure why not, let's run all the cool Who stuff I can between now and 11/25: 2 year old girl dresses up as all 11 Doctors.

11/2

BUT HE MADE AN ELOQUENT DEFENSE SPEECH
HEADLESS CORPSE ACCUSED IN COURT
--headline in the "Bedfordshire on Sunday"

11/3

TRUTH IN JOURNALISM, EXCESSIVE
Eight candidates, including all four incompetents, are seeking the four City Council positions.
--from the Cheney (Washington) Free Press

11/4

BRILLIANCE AND BEAUTY
Judge: Should the U.S. have universal health care as a right of citizenship?
Miss Arizona USA Alicia-Minique Blanco: I think this is an issue of integrity regardless of which end of the political spectrum that I stand on. I was raised in a family to know right from wrong and politics, whether or not you fall in the middle, the left or the right its an issue of integrity, no matter what your opinion is, and I say that with the utmost conviction.
--during a Miss USA Pageant

      Byron will let DJ get very close to him, sometimes inches away, without freaking out. Except when it's 2 hours later and he hisses and snorts when DJ enters the room 10 feet away.
      He's getting better, but he still won't leave that one tiny strip of the house. I've been giving him that Kitty Nerves salve from Way of Cats, but not consistently. Consistently enough that he looks forward to it, though; he hates having his feet touched, but a schmear of the salve on his foreleg he likes. He'll contentedly lick it off. So it certainly isn't hurting. Maybe he just needs time.

      Do people give you advice on how to do your job? Unsolicited advice? Fucking stupid advice? I get it every so often in retail. From people who have never worked in retail, or in the very specific subsets of retail. Toy stores are not like record stores which are not like liquor stores. Funny thing is, no one says "Hey, have you guys ever tried this idea?" No, it's usually "ALL YOUR WINE SHOULD BE CHILLED!" in a tone of voice that implies the fact that we don't is killing the puppies who keep the Moon from crashing to Earth.
      "All the wine? But most reds are meant to be drunk at room temper--"
      "ALL THE WINES BLAARGH!"
      "But--then we'd need either half as much wine, or twice as much store! They only way we could do it would be to set the thermostat at 38 degrees for the whole store--"
      "NO! YOU'RE STUPID AND HATE THE MOON PUPPIES! ARRGH I WILL NEVER SHOP HERE AGAIN DESPITE NEVER HAVING BOUGHT ANYTHING HERE! And may I say in parting, BLAAARGH!"
      I'll leave it to you to decide how much of that conversation I made up. (Pro Tip: not much. He was instantly psycho about all the wines being chilled. Good luck finding that store, buddy, at least in this dimension)
      "All your wines should be alphabetical! Why aren't they?!" Yeah, that makes sense. "Where's your box wines?" "Well, Almaden is over there, Franzia is there, Vella is waaay over there..." That complaint makes sense in a record store, but there I got complaints about the Crosby Stills Nash and Young CDs not being seperate from the Crosby Stills and Nash CDs. They'd be next to each other anyway!
      One I've had at every job I've ever worked: "YOUR PRICES SHOULD INCLUDE THE SALES TAX!!" Why? Seriously, why should they? If we did, people would say "I used to shop at that store, but then one day all their prices went up by 6.65%! This $11.99 bottle was $12.75 at their store! [to cashier] What do I owe you?" CASHIER: "12.75." "Wow, imagine how much it'd be at that other store!"
      Should we also include the gas you used driving here? And the calories of the food you burned and the cost of the shoe leather you wore out walking from your 11MPG Hummer? If you want to know how much the price is with sales tax, buy a pocket calculator and join the fucking 1980s.
      Why do you think you're an expert in a business you've never worked in? It'd be like me going up to a programmer and shrieking "YOU KNOW WHY YOUR SOFTWARE SUCKS? IT WON'T RUN ON MY COMMODORE 64! Why are you using C++?! Are you so dumb that you don't know BASIC?!"

      Speaking of the 80s, after a run of bad movies, I rented a decent one. Maybe it was because my expectations were low, but they weren't lower than I had going into Star Trek Taste the Kirk or Iron Man Also Saves the Cat. (Although I did have higher hopes for a Miyazaki I hadn't seen, Tales of Earthsea, which was the opposite of the former movies. Those were boring because things never stopped happening; this was boring because nothing ever happened. Unless you like sheep herding. In which case, it's an awesome date movie if you ever go out with a border collie).
      It was 1988's Killer Klowns From Outer Space. It's a parody of bad 1950s monster movies (Pro Tip: there are no good ones--well, Them! and the occasional Harryhausen one, but not much else). The best of this tiny subgenre is The Lost Skeleton of Cadavra, but this was funny by pretending it was serious. Everyone played it pretty much straight, even The Most Assholey Police Chief Ever. People get wrapped in cotton candy cocoons by the Killer Klowns, who then eat them by using Crazy Straws. Possibly the only movie in which the climatic escape scene involves an oubliette that opens into a ball pit.v

11/5

TYPOS, PAINFUL
WHOEVER WINS ELECTION WILL TAKE A KNIFE TO OUR PUBIC SERVICES
--headline in the Enfield Advertiser (UK)

11/6

NOVEMBER, SO MUCH MORE THAN THANKSGIVING MONTH
National Impotency Month
November 1–7: National Fig Week
November 4: National Medical Science Liaison Awareness & Appreciation Day
November 15: National Bundt Pan Day
--official designations for the month of November

      It was Election Day, and I almost got voted off the island.
      Yesterday I immediately went to work putting a beer delivery away, thinking "Somebody must've called out, because the beer cooler looks like no one's been in it since I left 2 days ago." And I soon found out "D.'s been laid off."
      What the fuck? The store's Number 2 man? New Owner said "He was making too much money...$20 an hour!"
      I said "I'm making $16.65 an hour! Am I next?"
      "Well...it could be."
      Another reason given was that "Something's wrong with our core numbers," [Beware any sentence that involves non-language like "core numbers"] "we're taking in more product than we're selling." So...fired guy was stealing pallets of it? Leaving no evidence? Certainly nothing to do with the Real Owner, New Owner's dad, buying 40 cases of Halloween wine.
      No, Halloween wine was not I thing that I was aware of before 6 weeks ago, and I've been in the booze biz for 16 years. It's called "Haunted" and has glow in the dark labels of monsters and names like "Zombie Zin." Did it sell? Are you fucking kidding me, why would it?! It'll take at least 3 years to get rid of that shit, sold over progressive Octobers. We have Christmas themed wines from 2 Xmases ago. And that's just one example. Daddy buys all sorts of cheap, high-profit margin wines by the (literal) truckload. We always sit on them for months or years. Some have already gone bad, so no one will buy more than 1 bottle. I wonder how many people just stop shopping at our store, just as they would at a grocery store that sells expired chicken. And no matter how high the profit margin is, the margin is nothing if no one buys it.
      $20/hr, okay. Know who makes $30/hr? Yes, our old foe Drunken Toddler! Who does nothing that New Owner couldn't do by coming in at 8 instead of 9. There's a fucking wise investment.
      D. was the fine wine guy, who knew everything about every wine and could sell a $30 bottle. Who's doing all the things he used to do? Not fucking me! Outside of the fine wines, I run the entire floor, and nobody can even be bothered to go in the cooler and put a 6 pack on the shelf when I'm not there. And the lottery, the schedule, the wine tastings? Who'll do that now, the guy on the glow in the dark Zombie label?
      There's another full-timer who's 15-30 minutes late for work every day, is 15-30 minutes late coming back from lunch every day, who disappears into the bathroom inexplicably for 20 minutes at a time, is a former heroin addict, does nothing but play with her Stupidphone when she's on the floor...I'm sure she makes less than D., but at least you got your money's worth with him. Hell, he was scheduled 40 hours but came in early and worked about 8 for free. This hag is no bargain. She's like a car that never starts and you have to replace the oil filter monthly. Keep the better car, dump the junker.
      Me? Who knows. My schedule changed, but who knows how much. Now they say I'll get 3 days off a week, but have to work every 3rd Sunday. I guess. I already had to resched a dr's appointment, and I guess the Dr Who special is now off as I have to close every Monday. I can live with that. If they're not lying to me.
      They changed the alarm pad and everyone's codes. Except mine. Am I above suspicion, or is it "Eh, don't change his, he's fired after the holidays anyway." Am I paranoid? I was told that "We looked, and D. was the best choice to get rid off." So...It wouldn't be L., as his wife suddenly is working here, right after M. go fired. Like 2 days afterward, and right as the wife's unemployment ran out. Did L. engineer M.'s firing, bad mouthing her to new boss? He thinks that D.'s firing is because of DT's machinations. Which is an interesting way to think. The people you can trust the least are the people who trust others the least, so is he projecting his motives onto DT's? So, besides D., the only other choice would've been ME. D. worked 25 years as the town's chief engineer and retired with a pension, has a well-paid beard wife, and only worked because he's one of those "I could never retire" types. Me--my income is just me. So maybe they took mercy on my soul. Maybe they're just waiting until it's more convenient for them.
      And yet DT still steals 3 cases of Heineken a week and they're fine with that. What an awesome job I don't have. Soon, possibly literally.
      I think I'll go back and watch the kitty chase video again...

11/7

GOATS, EXPRESSIVE
9:36 p.m., Copperopolis: Reporting party states his goat herd has been stolen; it happened sometime today; states he should have known something was up because this morning one of his goats kept looking at him funny like something was wrong; report taken. Buckboard Drive.
--police blotter item in The Union Democrat (Sonora, California)

      And the job gets weirder, because when hasn't it. DT said that the fired mgr only wanted to work 12 hours a week after the holidays. So why didn't they cut him down to that now? It'd plug the biggest holes in the schedule that firing him left. Other mgr is still convinced that DT was behind it. Maybe DT needs the money because he's decided that, as he's dying of leukemia (slowly dying. Waaay too slowly for his coworkers, anyway) and mentions it all the time, maybe he's decided that being an ex-heroin addict isn't good enough. Off the methadone and back onto the horse! And that he framed the fired guy for it. Who the fuck knows? There's so much shady shit that we know about--2 sets of books, thousands of dollars of sales not rung up to pocket the sales tax, people paid under the table to avoid all sorts of taxes--who the fuck knows what's going on that we don't know about? All I know is that the asylum is run by the inmates. All it takes is 1 disgruntled employee, like the last 1 they fired, to drop a dime and the company goes down and a bunch of people have no jobs. Hey, don't look at me. I'd only do it if it somehow targeted only DT.
      And if you thought "Wait--exactly how many ex-heroin addicts work there?" it's 2. Hey, they're on methadone. Unless DT isn't. Better than when we had the 20 year old who DT kept cutting slack to, despite the fact I had some pretty hard evidence that he was shooting up in our bathroom. Bloody alcohol prep pads, and the whole "nodding off at the register" thing. You've got to have a pretty high tolerance for junkies to keep a current one on your payroll.
      DT and fired guy worked mornings, and alone for an hour or so per shift. And the other mgr--he closes every night he works, when there's no oversight, unless you count clueless part-timers staring at their phones all shift. The guy who worked as a bartender in this exact part of town for 30 years, and would know which bars would pay half-price for stolen booze? Like the owners of his old one, which reopened a year ago, just across the parking lot? The guy who has already blamed it on 3 different people?
      Methinks he doth protest too much.

11/8

THINGS WE DON’T NORMALLY WORRY ABOUT
There’s worries about the position of his groin at the moment.
--sportscaster Clive Tyldesley

      Laid-off D. came to get his last check today. And I've never seen him happier.
      He was planning on cutting back his hours when he gets Social Security on 1/1/14, because his pension plus the job would put him in a higher tax bracket. He's always been a bit of a workaholic, but "I have no plans to work. I just stay at home with the dogs!" he said with clear enthusiasm. It might just be the only time he's ever just kicked back and relaxed. "I'll still be coming in [as a customer]. If it gets busy during the holidays, they might want me to work a few hours." He went upstairs to talk to DT, and I overheard them a minute later talking about how one of their cars has a leaky roof. I really didn't get the feeling that he left under a cloud, but that everyone was happy with the decision. Or that DT had framed him to cover his "renewed heroin habit" that someone imagined just yesterday.
      New Owner said when he told me that D. was gone that "More product is coming in than going out," but quickly clarified "Not that I'm accusing D. of anything!" One could interpret that 2 ways: "We have no proof" or "We're not accusing anyone of anything!" No one ever said anything about product magically disappearing from the store. It could be, as I've said, just the store's weird bookkeeping.
      No one said anything about product disappearing except L., the manager who was accusing everyone else of stealing. Interesting that it was his first thought.
      My last thought, before finally falling asleep very late after stewing about this subject all night: This is my last thought about it. There may be something shifty going on with L., but, eh, I just work there. I suppose that if he's trying to blame other people I'm next on his list, but we'll deal with that shoe when or if it drops.

11/9

CLOTHING STORE NAMES, NOT GOOD
Uncle Meat
White Trash Charms Japan
Carrion
--clothing stores in Japan and El Salvador

11/10

GENDER CONFUSION, CONTESTANTS AND
Family Fortune game show host: Name a famous historical heroine.
Contestant: Winston Churchill.

11/11

AMBASSADORS IN THE KNOW
Q: What is your opinion of the North Korea–South Korea conflict?
U.S. ambassador designate to Singapore Richard Kneip: You mean there are two Koreas?

11/12

HAND OVER THE KEYS, FIDO!
Warning on dog medication:
USE WITH CARE WHEN OPERATING A CAR OR DANGEROUS MACHINERY

11/13

IRONY, IRONIC
Translink [public transit system] offers free transit for school children during “Walk to School Week.”
--headline on NEWS1130 (a.m. radio station in Vancouver, British Colombia)

11/14

JOB HUNTERS, SELF-ESTEEM PROBLEMS AND
I’m just an average engineer, nothing special.
Accomplishments: None.
Please overlook some of my personal qualities and interests.
--included on résumés

      > I'm a regular reader of your blog.

>Thought you should know... I googled 'bill the splut' and the first entry is...

      At least Yahoo showed me this decade-old image of me and a then-sane cat:

      Stay away from my cats, Weirdo Swedes!

11/15

MENU ITEMS, ABSOLUTELY COMPLETELY INCOMPREHENSIBLE
Deep Fry Chirp
Simmer Urinal
Not a Mono-Character Ward
--menu items, Xiamen, Fujian Province, China

11/16TIDE REPORTS, NOT VERY HELPFUL

Low tide will be at a quarter to sometime this morning.

11/17

PARKING RULES, NOT SO HEAVENLY
When parking on the north side of the church, please remember to park on an angel.
--in a church bulletin

11/18

CUSTOMERS, CLUELESS
Tech support: Okay, I’m just going to need to take your contact details, so I can try and trace your order. Could you give me your address and your phone number?
Customer: I don’t have a phone.
Tech support: How are we speaking now?
Customer: I don’t know.
--tech support call

      In further WTFery, a guy came into the store and spent 30 minutes alternating between angrily denouncing a coworker and threatening to fight him while sucking up to everyone else in the store. I really didn't catch a lot of it, as it's hard to understand loud people who have no teeth, but it boiled down to said coworker, E., texting said gummer's girlfriend "Why are you dating that old crackhead?" Yeah, I know, typical workplace shenanigans, assuming you work in a fucking asylum.
      Me, I'd be more interested in how E got my GF's phone number in the first place. I kinda pasted together a theory from Mr I Can Only Eat Oatmeal when he said "I only deal with people I can benefit from! Right now, she's benefittin' me!" E's current "girlfriend" is 67. He's 35. He fucks grandmas. Because "they do things for him." I guess they both found the same sucker and wanted a ride on her gravy train, like remoras on a shark although I suppose that metaphor only works with remoras that like gravy and ride trains. (NOTE fix in rewrite)
      "Should I throw this nutjob out?" I thought. "Maybe lure him away by telling him that Rite Aid is giving away free dentures?" But he kept on a-babbling, not at all like a total crackhead. Maybe just a guy with that one remaining brain cell ping-ponging relentlessly through his empty skull. With eyes that were black. All pupil, no iris. Complete solar eclipse black, dilated like the massive Black Hole at the center of the galaxy, "the abyss stares back" black. He said that his GF buys things in stores to distract the workers while he shoplifts. That's...interesting to say in a retail establishment. There was no one in the store besides him and never more than 1 other (normal) person at a time, so he wasn't trying to distract us then, but I think I'll give the store a call tomorrow. If he does come in and start screaming, everyone's going to be paying attention to that, and none to any of the "boys from NYC" he mentioned.
      One baffled customer he tried to drag into his manic monolog he fist-bumped. As the customer left, we mutually rolled eyes and he muttered "Gonna make sure to wash that hand!" Then Gummo insisted on shaking my hand. I cut it off and boiled it.

11/19

"NO, HAMBURGERS!"
Reporter: I am standing outside The Bicycle Shop with the owner. So tell me—what do you sell?
Owner: Eh, bicycles . . .
--on Radio Forth

      Things that will likely never sell in a consignment store: a 5 pack of men's thongs.
      And yet there it was. Along with 3 copies of the DVD Disco Worms. Not in the same section of the store, fortunately. Guy in used thong: "Stayin' alive, stayin' alive--DANCE for the people, my worm, dance!" As bad as that mental visual is, click the link to see worse.

      Nerd News!
      Monty Python to Reunite
      'Mystery Science Theater 3000' tradition Turkey Day is back! It will apparently run at this site on T-day, starting at noon EST. My favorite Thanksgiving ever was just staying home with a grocery store rotisserie turkey breast and the Turkey Day Marathon. I had to close Weds, open Fri, and my parents wanted everyone to drive to their place in Vermont. 3 hours at dinner, but with a 3 & half hour commute. If it'd just been me begging off, 20 years later I'd still be hearing about it. But my sister Pat & her husband had the same schedule, so we all stayed at home. I went to Lechmere on Black Friday relaxed and invigorated and ready for the next 6 weeks of retail battle.

      Bill the SplOOt! Just call me that now!

11/20

ANALYSIS, ASININE
They’re going to keep running the ball even when they’re not running the ball.
--football player/commentator Troy Aikman, on the Packers

      Then, after much discussion about Byron's metal illness, antiquing! Jess bought an adorable baby doll.

      ...FROM HELL.
      She liked the freakishly short arms. I said "She's all 'I'm Talking Tina and I don't like you'!" It's for her Edgar Allan Poe themed room at her house, because of course she has one. She handed it to me at one point so she could draw a sword, because what else would she be doing. And there was a moment of revulsion when I held it and realized that it was warm. From Jess holding it, but still..."She's coming alive!" I handed it back and said "You can take Creepella now." As she paid for it, the old lady at the counter said "You're going to clean her up!" And Jess said "No, she's staying just like this!" and laughed. The lady looked worried.

      We went to the store we always go to, the first we ever went to in town--what, 12 years we've been going there? "We can see if that taxidermied bullfrog mariachi band is gone yet." Closed. Not even a "We've moved" sign, just gone. Gone with the bullfrog mariachi band.
      There was a new place up the road. I think it was warmer outside it than in, and it was 40 outside. I bought this:

      My camera's battery decided to die as I took the pic, but it says "Stolen From The IGLOO DRIVE-IN Route 30 Rockville Conn". That's almost my town! (I live in Vernon, but there were once 2 towns named Rockville and Vernon that got merged into Vernon-Rockville) All the info of the place I found was in the founder's obit. It opened in 1960 and was sold in 1979. I could've gone there back in the day. And of course nothing says "North Central Connecticut" like an Eskimo.
      There was another new store called "Famous Antiques Flea Market." Jess said "Then how come I've never heard of it?" But it's apparently famous for being closed 3 days a week, so we may never know.

      Well, I thought this was funny. Because I was there on the front lines, man! Disco Wars 1979

11/21

BUREAUCRATS, PLAIN-SPEAKING
reutilization marketing yard.....................junkyard
natural amenity unit...............................outhouse
organoleptic analysis.............................smell
-bureaucratic definitions

11/22

HOTELS THAT ARE TOO HELPFUL
We’re working hard so as to make you satisfactory.
--in a hotel brochure, Kunming, China

11/23

WE WERE THINKING XAULIFLOWER . . .
Radio host Greg James: Name a vegetable beginning with “X.”
Caller: Xparagus.

      I have to work 1 Sunday a month. Of the other 3 people who alternate with me, 1 leaves Saturday at 630, the other 2 have Saturdays off. I'm the only 1 who closes every Saturday. Tonight after work I walked in my front door 12 hours before I have to walk back out of it to go back to work.
      It could be worse. I could have to work every Sunday, which almost happened. Or I could work at KMart. They have to work on Thanksgiving (which is also the start of Hannukah), 6 to 3. That's 6AM to 3AM. No one should work on a major holiday except emergency crews. Not so assholes can buy "Door Buster" specials on--WTF, the flyer doesn't even say on what! Just "Limited quantities, no rainchecks," so you're standing in line for some mystery items. Oh, wait--"Members Only." What, 1980s jackets? No, you have to be a member of some special KMart secret society. Does one join with a blood oath to kill any worker from Sears? Or get in with the secret magic sigal of a pentagram with a K, the 14-stage handshake, the dead daisy in one's right lapel, the practiced enigmatic look that says "I know what the Blue Light Special really is, and when does the sacrifice start?", the secret password "The turkey flies high at 2AM, guess what, turkey isn't what you're eating with your family today, maybe on your break you can force down an in-store boiled Nathan's hot dog." No, you do none of that. You become a member by going online. Why not have the Thankless-giving specials be ONLINE ONLY?
      This has become one fucked up country. Why complain that everything we buy is made in China, when this country is becoming China?

11/24

MYRIADS, NOT SO MYRIAD
It was a myriad of a couple of things.
--Brigham Young University football coach Bronco Mendenhall, commenting on a humiliating loss to Utah State University

11/25

NEW MEXICO GOVERNMENT EMPLOYEES, INTERESTING PERKS FOR
Tell the voters, “I used it for fancy resorts for my employees. I used that money for luxury cars. And I took border security funds, border security funds to protect our borders, and gave big, fat boners.”
--New Mexico lieutenant governor Diane Denish, during a gubernatorial debate, in which she derided her opponent for the ways she spent public money (she meant to say “bonuses”)

AND WE CAN SEE WHY
A really good friend said to me, “I always thought you were like a beautiful lacquered box with a silver handle. Now I know there is something inside the box.” Nobody said these things to me before.
--fashion designer Tom Ford

Dear friend,
How are you?
Here now we have discount on colorful led bulb for party or Christams use with color cover, attached is quotation please check, are you interested in? Or may I hear from you which do you need? We have agents in German for your refer.
We factory wish to develop business with your esteem with satisfied products.
Waiting for your reply to disucss more. Thanks ahead.
Best regards, Daisy Zhang

11/27

INTERVIEW ANSWERS, CONFUSING
Do we have boyfriends? We are interested in delicious foods and sweets. And tiny animals like the cat.
--Naoko Yamano, member and founder of the Japanese rock trio Shonen Knife (ed: OMG IT'S SHONEN KNIFE AND THEY'RE TALKING ABOUT CATS!!! I need some Banana Chips, STAT!)

11/28

TURKEY QUESTIONS, VITAL
Is it okay to thaw my turkey in the bathtub while bathing my kids?
Can I brine my turkey in the washing machine?
Can I use my oven’s self-cleaning cycle to speed up the cooking process?
If I cut my turkey with a chainsaw, will the oil affect the taste?
Can I take my frozen turkey into my sauna to thaw it faster?
--questions asked by callers to the Butterball frozen turkey help line

11/29

DADS, PART TIME
Attorney: How long did you know your father?
Plaintiff: Most of my life except when he was working.
Attorney: So, you’re certain in your mind you knew him when he was at home.
Plaintiff: Most of the time.
--testimony from an heirship hearing, Houston Probate Court

      At work before, a newer hire asked "What's your favorite Drunken Toddler story?" It was too late and too busy for anyone to tell one, but I remembered one that was, well, a story, as it was told to me, from long ago and far away, in the store's old location, in the misty distance and over the many mountains, to the place across the same parking lot. Told by G, back before she became a crack whore (literally--LTRotDs may remember her master plan of supplementing her "blowing drug dealers" income by stealing scratch tickets, which worked for a whole month). Also present were Neil, the only guy that everyone who has met has hated more than DT, and B, a guy who was about an inch shorter than me but made of 3 of me, if all you kept was muscle.
      DT was foaming at the mouth. He would get so drunk on top of his many drugs (methadone, tranqs, legit meds) that little puddles of foam would form at the corners of his mouth. He always bragged about being a bar brawler back in the day. I can picture him in a sleazy dive, getting some vague idea of being offended by some other scumscucker, then waiting for him to get drunk and turn his back and then smashing a pool cue on the back of his head from behind. Even in his aging and infirm older years, in his mind he was still that ballbuster. He and B were jokingly taking swings at each other when B decided to end it by grabbing the taller DT under his shoulders and slamming him to the floor.
      WHAM! And thunk! when DT's skull as it hit the floor. And then...DT didn't move no more...
      This happened about 10 feet into the store, by the way. Now, there was this inert body laying there for any customer to see. DT wasn't moving! So of course they called 911!
      No, they all ran to seperate corners of the store, pretending that nothing had happened. Unconscious drunken druggie as a carpet, it must be Tuesday!
      After 5 or so minutes, DT was still cold on the ground. They walked up slowly. "Do you think he's knocked out?" asked G. "Nah," said Neil, "he's faking it! Hey, DT! HEY, DT! Cut it out! We know you're faking it!"
      Nothing happened. "C'mon, DT!" said G, as she nudged him with her foot. Like a kid poking a dead squirrel with a stick. "Stop faking!" and she kicked him in the ribs. Nothing happened, just drool pooling on the floor from the foam at the corners of his mouth.
      So then they called 911!
      Of course not! G rolled up her sleeve, said "There's only one way to tell for sure if a guy's faking it!" and grabbed his testicles, clenched, and yanked. Then they all jumped back!
      And nothing happened. So then they called 91--No, they ran to seperate corners of the store.
      They all returned, apparently thinking that they were in Stand By Me, wondering what to do besides debating the merits of cherry Pez. Then Andrej, the Dutch coworker, came out of the office where he'd been doing computer work. He saw the prostate, possibly dead body of his immediate boss lying on the floor in a pool of drool, and of course he called 9
      No, he said "I haff to go to our other store, I don't haff time to deal with zis sheet!" and stepped over the likely corpse, and walked out the door without looking back once.
      So then they cal
      Of course not! After another 5 minutes, the zombie rose, rubbed the back of his head, and stumbled back to his office.
      A couple of hours later, G asked DT about it. He said, "I was awake! I was faking it the whole time!"
      Moral to the story: Don't smash your skull in my store, because your coworkers have all the empathy of the linoleum they almost splattered your brains on. Or, more importantly, don't be a Drunken Toddler.

11/30

AND THIS MAKES NO SENSE, EITHER

If there were fish in the lake, fishing would make no sense.
--Polish politician and human rights activist Lech Walesa

12/1

AND ONLY MR. GOD KNOWS WHY THIS SONG WAS WRITTEN
“What for are we living until we die? Only Mr. God knows why.”
--Latvian hit song (title in English) by “Aisha”

12/2

DECKS OF CARDS, WEIRDLY NAMED
HIGH GRADE PUKE
--label on deck of cards, Shanghai, China

      As promised, "Comics Strips I Like That You May Never Have Heard Of!" or CSILTYMNHHO! Possibly my acronyms need work. They'll be done as they occur to me, and the link will be not to their greatest strip ever, but whatever's current.
      Today's: Basic Instructions. This is really funny, and the art is photorealistic! Because the "artist" takes photos of himself and his friends and runs them through a program that makes them look like line drawings. It's smart and funny and acerbic and nerdy, and run through the archives as far back as you can, because it's also addictive. Here's a recent one called How to Understand People Who Say They "Hate" Cats.

      25 Of The Worst Food Product Names To Ever Hit The Shelves. As bad as "Shrimp Flavored Crack" sounds, "Crack Flavored Shrimp" would be even worse.

12/3

AS OPPOSED TO . . . ?
When you’re in our situation with two wins [and 10 straight losses] there are a lot of things going on mentally in everyone’s minds.
--football offensive coordinator Bob Bratkowski, discussing his team, the Cincinnati Bengals

      Much as I hate Xmas music...

12/4

THANK GOD IT WASN’T A DIME!
5:00 p.m.—Police were called to Market Square for a report about a “suspicious coin.” Investigating officer reported it was a quarter.
--police blotter item in a Portsmouth, New Hampshire, newspaper

      100 Basic Training Movies at Nerd Academy. I got an 84, but that's counting movies so bad I never finished watching them. The 14 I missed I don't consider worth my time, and those include E.T. and Jurassic Park. Yeah, I'm older than most of my readers. And it's clearly Just Some Guy's List of Movies He's Seen. My list would include Real Genius, Strange Brew, every Godzilla movie, and at least the acknowledgement that MST3K existed. I could go on all day (Avengers but not Pacific Rim? Avengers is mainstream, and thus about as nerdy as "Two and a Half Men"), but, again, Just Some Guy's List, and his opinion on what makes a nerd. Y'know, I think the inevitable "nerds AREN'T cool" backlash will come sooner than some people think.

      Scalzi's shopping guide for nerds (ignore previous sentence; nerd culture thrives!--for now). I told Jessica, and she immediately posted--to the wrong day's comments. Today's the day, not Monday! I started to write her, then thought "Maybe she knows what she's doing." She got in a fangirl-squee comment thanking Mr. Scalzi for opening his page so that others could post, and then today she posted a direct link to Marjoriam's Colony, where she sells her handcrafted polymer clay kitty figurines. I wish that she'd mentioned to sci-fi readers that her commisions have included custom-made Sailor Moon and Dr Who cats. But still, I shouldn't have doubted her. She got in 2 posts for her site, one linked and one not, without breaking any submission rules. Well played, Mrs J!

12/5

CHEAT SHEETS ON HAND, BIBLICAL REASONS FOR
I didn’t really had a good answer, as so often—is me. But then somebody sent me the other day, Isaiah 49:16, and you need to go home and look it up. Before you look it up, I’ll tell you what it says though. It says, hey, if it was good enough for God, scribbling on the palm of his hand, it’s good enough for me, for us. He says, in that passage, “I wrote your name on the palm of my hand to remember you,” and I’m like, “Okay, I’m in good company.”
--politician Sarah Palin, explaining why it was okay that she wrote notes on her hand during her Tea Party convention speech

      Today's comic: Rip Haywire, a parody of old action strips while still being an action strip. It's rebooted so many times that I really can't summarize it--at first it was chin-heavy, fist-fightin' Rip going against bad guys with his dog TNT "the anti-Lassie," with the help or hindrance of his very-bad-girl nemesis/BFF Cobra, then RJ came along, a boy sidekick trope since Batman and Robin 70 years ago, then RJ got aged to teenage, then kind of dropped out of the strip, Cobra was his enemy pirate queen, then G.U.N.S. vs S.K.U.L.L., then Breezy the good gf vs Cobra the evil gf, I kinda lost track.
      But! Where its continuity lags, it succeeds at being exciting in an action strip way, while still being a very funny parody of it. And it's probably the only strip that has multiple punchlines. Usually 2, sometimes 1 in each of the four panels.

12/6

LET’S NOT SPECULATE HERE
HOW JUSTIN BIEBER AND HORSE SEMEN ARE HELPING CHARITIES>
--headline in a press release sent to Entertainment Weekly

      Bob Cratchit: Whiny Ingrate: "But does Bob really have it so bad? After all, this was Victorian England, where children were thought of as a potential substitute for coal and people were thrown into debtor’s prison for taking a penny but not leaving a penny. This was an era where factories would work employees 25 hours a day thanks to a glitch in Greenwich Mean Time and people were oft paid in metal dross, which could then be exchanged for a whipping. Women were perceived as chattel, children were considered office supplies, and the working man was as expendable as the pandas factory owners would throw into the furnaces to fuel their elephant ivory polishing machines."
      Scrooge has been taxed enough already! Can’t the paupers see that he’s a job creator?

      Comical strippy thing: Web Comix. Not that long ago, it was called "yonkoma, or 4koma comics." Just Macros and LOLCats-style stuff with more than one panel. Then it literally changed overnight to emerge from its chrysalis as a host for many, many web comix. But generally the funniest ones. Definitely worth the quick daily read. Far more than any "legacy" strip. The ones like Blondie and Hi & Lois & Hagar that are being done beyond the grave, that will live undead forever, and always be as funny as a cold corpse mouldering.

12/7

WELL, THEY DO CALL IT “TOASTING”
Warning label on champagne bottle:
REMOVE LABEL BEFORE PLACING IN MICROWAVE.

      E rescued that cat in the road, and, well, here's the last update. He said he'd tried to give her to "6 or 7" places, but since he only named 2, I'd say that it was really a number lower than 3. The Humane Society wanted $150 to take her--which sounds like the Humane Society. The local no-kill sent him to a voice mail. So he called Animal Control, which suggested "leaving her where you found her." "But I found her in the road!" So unless she's microchipped, she's gone. Or worse--waiting in a cage for 2 days, until the euthanologist goes back to work Monday.

      Sequential Art of the Day: Retail. As someone who's worked in retail since birth, I identify with the subject. The creator worked in a department store in Massachusetts, and so the strip is set there. The store's called "Grumbel's", but I like to think that maybe he worked at my old dream job Lechmere, which became a nightmare when Internationally Known Incompetent Fuckwads Montgomery Ward bought it and turned it into a clone of their flailing, and then failing, and then bankrupt business model-for-disaster. What Monkey Ward did to a beloved 50-year-old chain could've only been worse if they'd filled it up with hydrogen and said "We're renaming Lechmere Hindenburg's!"
      The strip's for people who nod in rueful laughter at Not Always Right. There's continuity, but you can pretty much jump in at any time. The linked strip might need a bit of set-up: Stock boy Cooper builds sculptures out of boxes in the backroom. Otherwise, you can guess another reason I love this strip: at times, It's Nerdy!
      Did you know that I'm the top 2 Google results for "Internationally Known Incompetent Fuckwads"? I didn't!

12/8

GENDER CONFUSION, PRIME MINISTERS AND
I am not a man of faith, but my wife is.
--British deputy prime minister Nick Clegg

12/9

HON, THAT’S NOT YOUR ONLY PROBLEM
Can you hear a wireless phone ring underwater? My boyfriend missed our date last night and he said he didn’t know I called because he can’t hear the phone ring when it’s underwater? Should I believe him?
--tech support call to a wireless phone company help desk

      Jess said to keep a diary of Byron's behaviour when he does something other than sulk by himself, and there really hasn't been a need. The only exceptions in each week over the last month were:
      "Feed them all together!" she said. "They bond over that!" So I did, and Bigfoot glared and snarled at DJ, despite Deej being 8 feet away and totally ignoring him for his bowl of Friskies.
      I petted Byron on his Tower for 10 solid minutes, and he actually jumped down and ran to the computer room! Of course, DJ wanted to rush after him and ruin it, so I restrained him. Byron's extra toes made it as far as the kitchen linoleum, when he made a noise, then turned and ran back to his self-imposed exile, snarling at everyone involved. Although none of use were doing anything more "involved" than "existing".
      I picked Hermit the Crab up and took him to the recliner to watch a movie, and he ran back to Byronistan, somehow managing to make it without putting a paw on the ground.
      Then yesterday he was invisible. I only found him by following the growling. He was on THE FLOOR! Hiding behind the TV, under an old shelf. This lasted...not long. He raced back, screaming his anguish at the world.
      I tried just now with the petting at length, and he purred and turned into me and rubbed against me and purred and even accepted a kiss on the forehead, and then he snarled at the world in general and raked my hand. If his non-retractable claws were as sharp as a normal cat's, he would've gone to the bone. I went to wash my wound while Siouxsie sang "Fury Eyes" on iTunes with unintended accuracy.
      I think I may just accept that this is the way it's going to be.

      Custom bumper sticker makers Build-A-Sign have a 20% off sale that lasts through Xmas with free shipping--use coupon code 20everything.

12/10

BLOCK THOSE METAPHORS!
This is a slam-dunk reversal, admitting error. Now, when they play poker, they show their hands to each other, so they don’t get another curveball.
--op-ed piece in the New York Times about the U.S. government’s stance on Iran’s nuclear capability

      Once upon a time, the way to watch TV outside of your tiny viewing area was to wait until all the local stations went off the air between midnight and 1AM, and maybe pick up a broadcast as far away as New York City. An incredible distance of almost 100 miles! That's how I saw Robot Monster and Monster-A-Go-Go long before anyone ever believed those movies existed. On "Metromedia--New York--FIVE!" Yeah, I did it enough 30+ years ago to even remember Channel 5's jingle.
      Then came cable. Wow, I can now not-watch Canadian rules football on ESPN! This was the era that created "narrowcasting," the opposite of broadcasting: not trying to reach as big an audience as a network could, but specifically targeting niche groups. This led to today's channels such as the All-News That's Not Really News Network But We Have 24 Hours To Fill, and the All Cakes Baked by Screaming Assholes Channel. And also ones that modern people would find quaint. Such as a music video channel that showed actual music videos, a history channel that didn't believe that all human history was caused by Aliens, and a learning channel that didn't actively make you stupider for watching it. Hard to believe, I know! Did you know that humans once believed that vaccines made you safer from disease?! It was a different time.
      Narrowcasting spread to the comics page. The first I became aware of "Cathy," a strip about a single working woman who said "ACK!" and threw sweat blobs everywhere when considering a swimwear purchase. Said strip got published by a comics syndicate that her father coincidentally ran. It actually predated 80s cable, but became most successful at that time. Bill "Zippy the Pinhead" Griffith once described it as "Her art looks like she threw string on the floor and photocopied it!" Of course, the master of the clothing folds was merely jealous of her inability to draw anyone not looking moon-faced right at the audience, talking while looking out of the corners of their eyes. Try that sometime. Look away from anyone you're talking to, eyes fixed in the corners. It is actually possible to talk to someone that way, but you still can't see them and your eyeballs start hurting pretty quick. Also, people think you're psychotic.
      I really can't chronicle the narrowcasting of comics, as it came during the period where I worked so much I didn't have time or reason to get the newspaper, but before they were all available online. I remember a strip called "Adam," a bland office-based strip, that suddenly became "Adam@Home," featuring the cutting edge opposite of Cathy: a married guy who works from home and cares for the kids.
      Somewhere in there, when I'd visit my parents and could read the comics, came a strip that was pretty much just "Cathy, Except Married." (I think it wasn't in the Hartford Courant, but the east-of-the-river tabloid the Journal Inquirer. Which is known as either "the JI" or "the Urinal Inspirer," depending on how much you dislike it. Even Jess calls it that, and her mom works there). It was called "Sally Forth."
      My comics reading falls into these categories: It's Awesome! or It Fails Hilariously! or Why the Fuck Does This Still Exist?! The last two overlap. Hey, Blondie, it's been 80 fucking years, maybe get a joke beyond "Dagwood has a tapeworm that causes narcolepsy and crashing into the mailman"? Hey, look, today's 20 year old repeat of Archie has another "joke" where they replaced "beeper" with "cell phone"! But Cathy and Sally just fell into that zone where they weren't funny, or even funny ironically. (Seriously, read Archie long enough, and every "cell phone" has a ring tone of "BEEP BEEP BEEP" and no one actually uses them as phones)
      Somewhere along the line, I became aware of a humor site called Medium Large. It's funny! I've linked to it or the author's Smosh articles repeatedly. (But not Smosh itself--outside of him, it's like Cracked for people who flunked English) I eventually discovered that he writes the modern incarnation of Sally Forth.
      Did you click that link? It's what the strip is now: funny, true, and pop culture obsessed. Titular character Sally is kind of off to the sidelines, and husband Ted is generally in front. Having read Medium Large for months before the strip, he's clearly the author's avatar. Or, possibly, the only character in the comic strip aware that he's in a comic strip. Or insane, and believes he's the only person who's sure that he's in a comic strip.
      It's not the logical near-weirdness of Get Fuzzy or Monty, but like those strips, Sally Forth is one of the ones I look forward to the most every day.

      If you clicked the link to the Sally Forth strip, notice the cartoony but detailed art--in the last panel, the bowl of popcorn has only unpopped kernels--now go click the Medium Large link. Yes, Virginia, there was a horrible Pac-Man Xmas cartoon. And you can see it there. Unlike Monster-A-Go-Go, there's an internet now that proves some of things I've seen weren't fever dreams. But the holiday tradition on this page is--YES! CHRISTMAS IN TATTERTOWN! It's either the greatest anti-Xmas special ever, or an utterly incomprehensible fever dream. I think the difference all comes down to the simple phrase "Do you currently own a bong?"

      And the only Xmas special in which Santa screams "WA-HOO! I HAVEN'T HAD THIS MUCH FUN SINCE MiG ALLEY!"

      Do you like this new keyboard I'm using? Its bigger keys allow me to drivel at interminable length more efficiently!

12/11

WE’RE CONFUSED TOO, CHAD
OGOchocinco I’m up already, what are y’all doing? Watching ESPN Roger Clemens is in serious truble, as a pitcher how does steroids help? I’m confused.
--football player Chad Ochocinco, in a tweet

      OK, so Medium Large's link to "Christmas in Pac-Land" didn't work. Here's one that looks like it works. I haven't watched it yet, so thank me later if it plays. Or, more likely, thank me if it doesn't. It's pretty dire.

      In my latest of the "Awesome Comic Strips You Haven't Heard Of," it's
      CHUCK ASAY!
      MWA-HAHAHA! You cringe, you cover your eyes, you shriek "You BASTARD! You BLOODY, BLOODY BASTARD! I'd forgotten that misbegotten, racist, crypto-fascist shithead! And now--YOU BRING HIM BACK! Oh, god, the memories, the MEMORIES! They flood back like a collapse of the Three Gorges Dam! You--bastard!" (dissolves into uncontrollable sobbing)
      Actually, I'd pretty much forgotten about him, too. He retired, either to his native right-wing madhouse of Colorado Springs, or back to the Stygian nightmare realm that spawned him in a forbidden ritual, where he plays games of Duck Dynasty-themed Monopoly with Cthulhu, Hitler, David Duke, and the malevolent redneck who invented the Billy Bass Singing Fish (who was also Cthulhu). But Something Awful also remembered, and started a mash-up of his old bile-filled ravings. It's very funny. So that's my comic link of the day: SA, keepin' the UpChuck-Hate alive!
      And let me do my part. Here's a link from 2008, the most UpChuck-centric era of this drivel, when he was the source for about a third of my posts. And, since I haven't done a repeat in a long time, here's my personal favorite UpChuck.

      "OW-OW--OWOOOO!"

      "OW-OW--OWOOOO!"

      "Heh heh heh! Yes, kids, it's me, Count Floyd again! Let's see what we have coming up on this Saturday's Monster Chiller Horror Theater! OW-OW--OWOOOO!"
      "Okay, kids, Count Floyd's not going to lie to you. Last week's movie wasn't that scary. Count Floyd was...up late with a sick friend, and he didn't get to see it before he booked it. Hey, it was a Japanese movie from the '50s, and had a title that sounded like some monster Godzilla or Gamera would fight! Rashomon, what, that doesn't sound like a monster that gives you a really bad rash? Like the whole city of Tokyo gets the heartbreak of psoriasis? Look, I don't even know what the deal was with that movie! Did they write four scripts and not know which one to go with, so they filmed them all?
      "Well, don't you worry this week! One of the kids right here in our own peanut gallery recommended a film that's guaranteed to give your goosebumps the heebie-jeebies! I admit I haven't seen this one yet. I was...busy chasing a dog, to get some of the hair that bit me or something. But we have clips, and they're in 3-D! So you better get yourself some of Count Floyd's branded 3-D glasses before the show! They're only three dol...Nineteen. Only Nineteen Ninety-Five! These aren't those flimsy cardboard 3-D glasses, no, these are made out of high-impact, durable plastic! Hand-crafted by the finest 3-D optometrists in Malaysia. Make your checks out to Count Floyd, and send them in care of this TV station.
      "Okay, I think it's called The Creature From The Colorado Springs Gazette! The kid who recommended it says it...has something to do with Chuck. Chuckie! Oh, brrr, that killer doll monster! Oh, he was scary! He'd...scare the buttons right off your overalls, and then this little Cabbage Patch monster would come after you with a big barbecue fork in his pudgy hands or something, and you'd scream and run away, but the buttons were scared off your overalls, and they were around your ankles, so you'd just trip and fall and he'd fork you, fork you right in the behind, over and over! WHOA, woo-oo, scary!
      "Okay, let's all put our 3-D glasses on, and see what we got here. Oh, it'll be scary! If you're standing, you'd better sit down. If you're sitting down, then lay down. If you're laying--well, I dunno. Pray or something. Roll the clip, fellas!"

      "Umm. Okay. Woo, it's scary how...those horses must get hernias dragging those big blocks of metaphor around! I guess that's why the economy's so bad, because of all those climate change accords George W. Clayface there hasn't paid any attention to. Not Iraq or the mortgage crisis or tax cuts for the rich. Hey, kids, did you hear Clayface's parting words at that G8 summit? "Goodbye from the world's biggest polluter!" And 'he then punched the air while grinning widely.' Okay, kids, you gotta admit THAT'S scary. I bet he went to Crawford and drove a Ford 350 truck around the ranch for days while giving the atmosphere the one-finger salute, just to mess with everybody's head.
      "Okay, fellas, let's roll another clip!"

      "WHOA! Did you see that?! All those flies buzzing around that guy's head? He's some kind of zombie gunfighter! Remember when we showed Billy the Kid vs Dracula? Woo, brrr, scary! Now it's some undead Jesse James! He's even got that morgue toe-tag, but his name's so long that he has to wear it around his neck!
      "Okay, this must be an old movie, a really old one. You know, that 'cowardly darkie' thing kinda went out of style 60 years ago.
      "And there's Clayface again. His face has melted a bit more. He really should get out of the sun. It's clearly affecting his brain. Even the chicken black guy has the sense to hide when someone's shooting at you. Well, he's black, those people get shot at all the time, I'll bet the director of this movie thinks. You know what Gumby-face there should do? Threaten to bomb that zombie's ranch and kill everyone in it! Because if you want to make a paranoid less paranoid, you make them more paranoid, and they push out the other side of the Moebius strip all sane.
      "Oooh, kids, did you see how those flies just leapt right out of the screen in 3-D?! It's like you could practically smell the zombie! It's better than Doctor Tongue's 3-D House of Pancakes! And those bullets just leapt right out! Although I think one of the bullets was Photoshopped in. That just makes the zombie scarier! He knows Photoshop! Okay, fellas, roll another clip!"

      (pause)

      
      "Whoa, that'll...curdle the blood, lemme tell you. You'll have cottage cheese in your veins when...umm...Clones! CLONES! Oh, kids, BRRR! Clone wars, like the Star Wars you love so much! Maybe that's not Obama, but really an Obama mask worn by Jar-Jar the Binks! WOO-OO, everyone hates him! And he'll be out there, shaking your hand! And...possibly saying in his creepy voice, 'Hello, I'm Obama, I'm your friend, and not--A JAR-JAR CLONE IN A MASK! Come, my trusting fool, come see--THE LATEST PREQUEL!' Oh, don't tell Count Floyd your knees aren't jelly now!
      "Okay, the Count's kinda going against his better judgement now, but let's run one last clip."

      "WHOA! Bummer of an ending! They must've been killed by the zombie gunfighter Jar-Jar clones from the G8 Summit. I'd sure hate to be one of those Media-types who kept harping on this subject, like the Murdoch tabloids and FOX News and the Colorado Springs Gazette!
      "Well, it sure looks like we've got a scary show this week! Let's all give a big round of applause to the little kid who suggested it! C'mon and stand by Count Floyd's side, little Ed! Don't try sitting in my lap. You kids are all germ factories."
      

      Little Ed: "OH! This is like my luckiest of lucky days! Here I am, by Count Floyd my hero's side, looking as pretty as a picture, I must say!"
      "I'd run my fingers through your hair, but it appears to be 85% Valvoline. Hey, little Ed, why did you recommend this movie?"
      "Oh, that Chuck is a pain that's gonna linger! He's gone completely mental, I must say! I know it's considered bad form to show the monster before you see the movie, but here's Chuckie!"
      "Heh, that's nice, Ed, but we all know what he looks like. Like a My Little Buddy doll gone sour, or John McCain as a kid."
      "Far be it from me to contradict my very idol, who would be you, Count Floyd, but it's not the Chuckie you're thinking of!"

      "We're as DOOMED as DOOMED can be, ya know!"

      That particular New also had the guy who thought I was a ghost. A headless ghost. Who could still talk, and haunted the terrifying trails behind my suburban condo. It was a different time.

12/12

PRECEDENT-SETTING LAWSUITS
Friends of the Kangaroo Rat v. California Department of Corrections
U.S. v. Pipe on Head
Jones v. God, Jesus, Others
--U.S. court cases

      I commented on the Cartoon Brew link that had that excellent copy of "Christmas in Tattertown" and then forgot that I had. I remembered and checked today, just to see how many times I was called a gay fagg looser!! And instead found this:

Bill the Splut:
I saw this when it was first broadcast and loved it! The next time I saw it, I found it incomprehensible. The third time, loved it; the fourth, hated it. And wondered why I had such differing opinions about it.
Oh, right--the times I liked it, I was stoned. I think that's the only way to watch his work. Spider-Man in "Dementia 5," anybody?
Alternate theory: Was it conceived as an hour long cartoon? There sure seems to be a half hour's worth of plot missing from the "finished" version.

Tom Minton:
"Christmas in Tattertown" was indeed written as per Ralph by Jim Reardon and me, as a 90 minute feature script of around 120 pages. No shorter draft was ever done, once it sold a few months later as a half hour television special. No time! Ralph did the entire storyboard himself and he cut the feature length script 'on the board,' as he put it. That storyboard took up an entire wall and was a thing to behold. There's some good animation in the five minutes of "Christmas in Tattertown" that were animated in America, some of it by golden age greats Virgil Ross and Irv Spence. Later Disney voice Keith David (so prominent vocally in "The Princess and the Frog" as Dr. Facilier) cut his teeth in animation as the narrator of "Christmas in Tattertown," years before the mainstream animation industry knew who the heck he was. Ralph always had an eye and an ear for new talent.

12/13

TOOTHPASTE BRANDS, SO CLOSE YET SO FAR
Crust toothpaste
Oral-Me toothpaste
--toothpaste brands from China and Malaysia, sold in the Middle East

      Don't know if it will last, but DJ was in my lap purring, and I was able to snip a lot of toothpastey fur off of him while sweetly saying "Let's get rid of this toothpaste!" and he seemed to get what I was doing and enjoyed it. I just need better scissors!

12/14

ANSWERS, POSSIBLE, UNLIKELY, AND STUPID
Family Fortunes host: Name an instrument you can play while walking in the street.
Contestant: A cello.

12/15

BELIEVE US, WE’RE NOT UNDERSTAND ESTIMATING YOUR INTELLIGENTS
Why is that people always try to understand estimate my intelligents?! They should never do that!
--rapper Mary J. Blige, in a tweet

12/16

WE’RE PRAYING, WE’RE PRAYING!
Great part of the palimpsest is classified to the young people, with programs speeches, mixed and championships . . . If in the translation of our pages, they appear of the errors caused from the translator, we pray You of communicate to us.
--on the Radio Idea website, Molfetta, Italy

      A customer's friend brought the beer, Blue Moon-wannabe Shock Top. Ten minutes after drinking one each, they were puking.
      Bought not from us, fortunately, but a competitor up the road. The 6 pack had a "born-on date" of March. It was probably good until July. He tried returning it, and was given a big runaround about how it couldn't possibly have gone bad, and finally was given a refund for the only beers he'd opened. And vomited. Meaning, the store was probably going to put the unopened ones back out for sale...
      If you're thinking "What cheap bastards!" I'm thinking "What the fuck?" My product goes out of code, the salesman picks it up immediately, we get full credit. Because Anheuser-Busch or Miller Coors does not want people buying bad beer. Most people will blame the beer, not the store, and never buy that brand again. I assume that they have the same saleman I have, and he finds that old crap faster than I do. If a surprise inspection from the manufacturer finds that your salespeople have let old beer sit in stores, they'll give your business to some other distributor. The Miller Coors standard is finding only 1.5% of outdated beer, which is far better odds than winning MegaMillions, although them finding that is kind of an anti-jackpot.
      I have beer that's out of code, but I left some of it on the salesfloor because who the hell buys it? I would've had it picked up last week, but the salesman's supervisor was covering his route, and I didn't want him to think he'd missed it, when we were just getting it out of the store bit-by-bit. Better move all that beer to a place where it'll never be seen!
      And the last Busch 20 pack was missing. Bought 2 days ago. It was delivered 6 months ago...
      We'll give a full refund to anyone who returns it. But we won't cover any hospital bills.

      Cat Domestication Traced to Chinese Farmers 5,300 Years Ago

12/17

.JOE BIDEN, TYPICAL
His mom lived in Long Island for ten years or so. God rest her soul. And—although, she’s—wait—your mom’s still—your mom’s still alive. Your dad passed. God bless her soul.
--vice president Joe Biden, on the mother of Irish prime minister Brian Cowen

      It's Kill Kill and Byron! Note the amount of fingers on Byron. Note that Killsy has never looked SEX-AY-ER.

      Here's Baby Peanut Smush looking like a cat, and me and my scrawny, hairy arms and 80s haircut:

      From our old friend Mimi, back in the day.
      She didn't update My Junk Drawer for a long time, so I forgot to look. For like a year. Then in late October I looked, and dammit! She was at a con in NYC in early October! I could've totally gone down there and met her! Except--okay, not. I doubt I could've found anyone to go with me, and me myself would've ended up yelling "HEY! Am I near the Empire Statue of Liberty Building?!" in Yonkers.
      Yes, it's another roundabout Comics That Are Fuckin' Awesome! post! Mimi's "junk drawer" is anything but. I was amazed at how much her art had improved in a year. And that's improved from already fucking awesome. Those drawings for me, seen above? Those are a decade old! Disneyphiles will certainly love her current work (She works for Disney, I, um, think). But kaiju otakus will also love Welcome to Monster Island. I printed it out, because visiting Monster Island's on my bucket list.
      "OH! What is that sound that I hear? With my ears that are on my head?! OH! NO! MONSTAAAAH! Well, guess I can scratch that one off. AAAHHHH!"

12/18

FILM DIALOGUE, VOMITOUS
How many times have I held your head over the toilet while you threw up everything except your memories?
--Tess (Cher) in Burlesque (2010)

12/19

THIS IS THE KIND OF HARD-HITTING, INFORMATIVE REPORTING WE LIKE TO SEE!
An unnamed committee of unknown members will apparently be tasked with yet-to-be-determined duties regarding unspecified actions of the Sarasota Police Department for an undetermined period of time, under the guidance of an unknown law enforcement consultant.
--from the Islander Reporter (Lee County, Florida)

12/20

SHUT UP ALREADY ABOUT THE DAMN COW!
Sometimes you look in a field and you see a cow and you think it’s a better cow than the one you’ve got in the field. It’s a fact, right, and it never really works out that way. It’s probably the same cow and it’s not as good as your own cow. Some players like to think there’s a better world somewhere else. It never really works.
--soccer manager Alex Ferguson

      A woman asked for a half-pint of Jack Daniels for her son at Xmas. "I don't approve of drinking, and I won't do anything to encourage it!" she said, after buying a half-pint of Jack Daniels for her son. "Oh, wait! Do you have a good, cheap pinot noir?" Possibly she was going to not encourage drinking by beating people with the bottle. I should point out that she was well into her 70s, so her wayward drunk of a son is probably still in the youthful indiscretion years of his 50s.
      Another older lady asked if we had "Freixenet Extra Dry--NOT Brut! I've been to 3 places already!" I gave it to her, and she asked "Do you match Crazy Bruce's prices?" Who, the homeless guy who sells bottles of his own pee screaming "EX-TRAAA DR-YYYY! KILL THE STALIN TELEVISION MOONMEN!!"--oh, wait, that's an actual store. So she drove to a fourth place to save $2. Cheap gas in this state is $3.50+ a gallon, so do the math. Who's the Crazy one again?
      Me, I'm just waiting to see who in the store gets their ass kicked to the curb on New Years Day. My suspicion is it's me, being the guy after the $20 an hour/worked his ass off for 9 years guy who got canned, as I'm the $16.65 an hour/worked his ass off for 10 years guy. Maybe L. and his wife who replaced M. have another relative whose unemployment is running out.
      I wonder why I had a nightmare about having no control of the slightest aspect of my life last night...

12/21

THOSE WONDERFUL EASTERN EUROPEAN DISHES
Soup of Globule
Old Polish Grease With Bread
Pork Medallions From Italian Guy
--menu items, Poland, Russia, and the Czech Republic

12/22

WE DON’T GET THIS AT ALL
Radio host Greg James: Give me a word beginning with the letter N that’s associated with winter.
Caller: Mustache.

12/23

A HAPPY CHRISTMAS THOUGHT FROM THE WORLD’S RICHEST MAN
Trillions of dollars have been given to charity in the last 50 years, and they don’t solve anything.
--billionaire businessman Carlos Slim

12/24

LOGICAL, YES, BUT STUPID, YES
Weakest Link host Anne Robinson: What was the sequel to the movie I Know What You Did Last Summer?
Contestant: I Know What You Did Last Winter.

12/25

THERE GOES THE PHOTO OP . . .
MICHELLE OBAMA WORE CLOTHES TO LIGHT THE CHRISTMAS TREE
--headline in New York magazine

12/26

BOOKS, NOT SO FUN AND EXCITING TO US
The Fun and Exciting World of Roots
Celebrating Boxes
Crocheting Adventures With Hyperbolic Planes
--book titles

12/27

MORE THAN THE HOME NEEDS IMPROVING HERE
Caller: Do you sell ½-inch drywall?
Home improvement store salesperson: Yes we do. They come in 4 foot by 8 foot sheets.
Caller: Is that 4 foot wide by 8 foot tall?
Salesperson (jokingly): No, they are 8 foot wide by 4 foot tall.
Caller: Never mind. Thanks anyway. [hangs up]
--conversation between a home improvement store salesperson and customer

12/28

HOUSTON, WE HAVE A PROBLEM
Tech support: What state are you in?
Caller: California. No, wait, North Carolina.
Tech support: The city?
Caller: Tennessee.

12/29

THE TRULY GREAT THEMES IN POETRY
Now for a minute, lend your luggs,
Our theme, it is potato bugs.
--from the poem “Potato Bug Exterminators” by James McIntyre, as collected in the book Very Bad Poetry

12/30

LIBRARY PATRONS, MENTALLY CHECKED OUT
Do you have—well, I don’t know the author, or the title, but the title had a number in it. Could you tell me where to find that book?
Where are the good books?
Could you tell me who wrote Dante’s Inferno?
--questions asked of librarians

12/31

RESPONSIBLE?!?
When I go to a party, I am the party! I’m the girl doing shots, jumping on tables, screaming, and getting wasted. Am I advocating drugs? No! When I say get wasted, that doesn’t mean go crazy. Drink in moderation. Be responsible, yeah?
--singer Avril Lavigne

The sign above the door at this Walmart location reads:
"Store Hours 7am to 12pm"
Can anyone tell me what's wrong with this picture??
Clearly the employees are members of Mensa.

      Note to Czech guy who hit this page using the "Seznam screenshot-generator": Were you looking for a slide for a Power Point on "Some websites still think it's 1997"?

1/1

POINTS, EXTREMELY GOOD
Things have never been more like the way they are today in history.
--President Dwight D. Eisenhower

Linda Scott
      Quietest, easiest resolutions ever in our home this year: both of us plan to carve out a little more hobby time and to eat more effing vegetables. . I hope you've all been easy on yourselves.

      Bill Young
      I resolve not to get in fistfights with villains on the tops of trains racing towards tunnels. Seems doable.

      I also resolve to not get eaten by sharks jumping out of ice fishing holes that I'm pooping in. Seems doable.

      I resolve to escape giant firey explosions by jumping towards the cameraman and not the key grip. I got killed like 4 times last year making that mistake. Seems doable.

      I resolve not to get crushed by a giant pie that's rolling down the road after it broke loose from the Traveling Giant Pie Exhibit Featuring the World's Largest Pies. Seems doable.

      I resolve to not go to Amazon and order the "Jack in the Box that is actually a starving barracuda made of poison spiders in the Box." Seems doable, unless there's free shipping.

      I resolve to not be Rand Paul, unless they give me an operation where they transplant my brain with a baboon's asshole. Seems doable, unless the baboon's dad insists I run for a House seat.

      I resolve to...fuck, I forgot. Sorry, the baboon's asshole brain transplant took.

      I resolve that all my resolutions can be quantified with "Seems doable." Because if I can't do them now, what difference would an arbitrary date mean?

1/2

WHEN AUTHORS TRY TOO HARD
Managing a Dental Practice the Genghis Khan Way
Why Bring That Up? A Guide to and from Seasickness
How YOU Are Like Shampoo: For Job Seekers
--book titles

1/3

HUSBANDS WHO’LL BE PAYING A LITTLE BIT EXTRA IN ALIMONY
Attorney: Isn’t it a fact that you have been running around with another woman?
Husband: Yes, it is, but you can’t prove it!
--testimony during a divorce proceeding

1/4

NATURE, NAUGHTY
I TOUCHED A TINY NATURE.
I TASTED AND ENJOYED “NATURE.”
THIS IS EXTREMELY LUXURIOUS NATURE.
I AM ABSORBED IN NATURE.
A NAUGHTY ACT OF NATURE.
--printed on a baby wipe package, China

1/5

MERLE HAGGARD, LITTLE KNOWN FACTS ABOUT
Among those interviewed were his two ex-wives, Kris Kristofferson and Robert Duvall.
--caption under a photograph of Merle Haggard in a newspaper

1/6

C AS IN STUPID
Help desk: What’s your modem serial number?
Caller: 001, E as in igloo, A as in apple, 3251, E as in igloo.
Help desk: So that was 001, Echo, Alpha, 3251, Echo?
Caller: No. E as in igloo!
Help desk: Sorry, sir, but igloo begins with an i.
Caller: No. Igloo is spelled E-G-L-U-E. I have a G.E.D. You can’t pull one over on me, Mr. Fancy Pants!

      "School of Fish" by Dreamfish was the last song one my iPod in my car, and the first one played by iTunes on my computer. What are the odds?! Seriously, Math is Hard, so I don't know. There are 15,500 songs on each. So were the odds 1 in 15,500? 1 in 31,000? 1 in 15,500 x 15,500, or 260 million, which is the odds of winning the MegaMillions jackpot?