3/25/15

IT'S EVEN WORSE AT 95 DEGREES, WE HEAR
When you get to 55 or 65 degrees, it's hard to keep snow on the ground.
--weatherman, WFSB, Hartford, Connecticut

3/26

PRODUCT ORIGIN EXCUSES, SHAMELESS
STERLING JUMBO HIDE A KEY
AN AMERICAN COMPANY PACKAGE AND PRODUCT DESIGNED IN THE USA
--MADE IN CHINA

3/27

LEGAL DEFENSES, A LITTLE LAME
He could easily not have known, because as you can imagine, at these kinds of parties you're not always dressed, and I challenge you to distinguish a naked prostitute from any other naked woman.
--lawyer Henri Leclerc defending his client Dominique Strauss-Kahn who had been accused of sexual assault and of being a regular guest at prostitute-laden parties

      I sort of remember Red Buttons, as a washed-up comic who appeared on 1970s game shows, and that paratrooper who got his shoes shot off in The Longest Day. Apparently in the early days of TV, he was a gigantic star and also a gigantic fucking asshole. He hired most of the greatest comedy writers of his time, and then fired them after a week. Mel Brooks, Neil Simon, the guy who would create MASH--buncha hacks compared to Red Buttons!

3/29

YOU SHOULD HAVE SEEN HER BEFORE!
Mother Teresa was beautified ten years ago today.
--BBC Radio Scotland commentator

4/13

ROAD SIGNS WE THOUGHT WE'D NEVER SEE
BEWARE OF INVISIBLE COWS
--road sign, Hawaii

      I take online surveys for points, mainly iTunes gift certificates. One I got began with this. What do you think the survey is about?

Have you installed an aftermarket moon roof or sun roof in your vehicle in the past 6 months?
Have you received a vaccination for travel to Southeast Asia in the past 6 months?
Have you painted the entire outside of your house in the past 6 months?
Are you born in June?
Purchased or replaced your garbage disposal in the past 6 months?
Have you eaten at a restaurant in the last 12 months?
Can you ride a unicycle?
Do you own a Viking or Wolff or Subzero appliance?
Have you received a vaccination for malaria in the past 6 months?
Do you have a current opera subscription?

4/14

SOCCER COMMENTARY, BALLSY
Sometimes you want Obertan to open his legs and do something a bit exciting.
--soccer manager Alan Pardew

4/15

THINGS YOU PROBABLY SHOULDN'T SAY IN AN INTERVIEW
Right now I think I'm the smartest I've ever been � Like with this taxes stuff � I'm making sure everything is a write-off. Every single thing.
--Hugh Hefner girlfriend and reality star Kendra Wilkinson

      DJ, you're in the way, buddy--

      Yes, Lila sent me a cat-shaped cat food bowl! "I know Killsy's eyes aren't blue, but this was so darned cute I couldn't resist! With love (and hopefully less feline acne), Sophie, Moe, Fergus and Lucky's mama."
      Miss Kays did have blue eyes, until she was 3 months, not weeks, old. I think that's why she's mine--blue-eyed, all-white cats are deaf. But given her eyes, her pointed face, big ears and general chattiness, I think she has mucho Siamese in her. Jess said "That's probably why she isn't deaf!" which isn't something that I'd thought of, but probably true.
      The bowl was from "PETRAGE." Umm...okay. Maybe keep your enraged pet away from me then. Oh, it's "PETRAGE(paw emoji)US." So, "PetRageous"? Or "Raging Pet (Stomps Your Face), AMERICA!" It's hard to say.

4/16

WE'RE NOT SURE THE IRISH WOULD AGREE
Ireland needs fresh impotence.
--soccer manager Phil Babb

4/17

MARRIAGE, NOT SO GREAT FOR MEN
When I have stress, I stage a mock pro-wrestling bout with my husband. My favorite technique is to kick him in the groin. When I get a good kick in I really feel happy that I am married.
--Japanese wife quoted in Japan Times

      I had dinner with my Mom to celebrate my birthday. I had dinner with her and the family a month ago to celebrate hers. And then, 2 weeks later, dinner with the family to celebrate Easter. And in 2 weeks, I'll see her, a sister and a niece at Spamalot. That's 4 times in 6 weeks, whereas I've seen Jess twice all year.
      She'd just come from her smuggling operation. I have a nephew who lives in the Bahamas--you read that right--and she and his mother were sneaking in heroin and several machine guns. Actually, that's only how they acted. It was a satellite radio, a cheese cutter, and a bunch of pots and pans. There are heavy import duties on anything not a "gift," and "a bunch of used pots and pans" is kinda hard to explain as a "gift" beyond "Well, we're super cheap bastards." They were terrified of getting through customs, as we were all raised Irish Catholic and feel guilty for things we haven't done yet. Everyone else got waved through, but for some reason they got questioned. Maybe the fact they were likely sweating as if they had suitcases full of anthrax hand grenades with "I HEART ISIS" stickers on them.
      "Do you have any...gifts? TAXABLE--GIFTS?! YOU MAGGOTS!" they expected to be asked. "Do you have anything besides clothes?" they were asked in a monotone. This is the way one phrases a question when you want the answer to be "No", so you can move onto the next thousand people. Then, "Do you have any gifts? Or draws?"
      "Wait, what--what was that?"
      "Gifts or draws. DRAWS."
      "I...don't understand what you're saying..."
      (rolls eyes) "If you don't know what I'm talking about, then I guess you don't have any! NEXT!"
      Mom later figured out the accent and realized what she was being asked: "Do you have any drones?" The guy they were staying with confirmed that they ask you that now. I suppose that if you come from the USA, you're expected to have a swarm of Predator drones around you, looking to kill the 159th In A Row Number Two Man In al Qaeda, and any random toddlers within his city block.

4/18

PERHAPS YOU SHOULD REPHRASE THAT DEPARTMENT
I've never said the word "never."
--sports promoter Barry Hearn

4/19

SO NOW WHAT?
NO WALKING WHILE SIGHTSEEING. NO SIGHTSEEING WHILE WALKING.
--sign, China

      I took another survey. It asked about the last time I drank alcohol in a place that serves alcohol for drinking. (It kind of repeated itself) That would be the beloved Someplace Special in Putnam CT, with a certain long-legged lady with freckles. You know who I mean! (She was on stilts and Freckles is her pet Komodo dragon. Damn thing ate 3 people)
      The 99 Restaurant and Red Lobster were names I recognized, but the rest were utter cyphers to me.
      ALE HOUSE
      "We were thinking of going with 'Beer Hovel' or 'Place Where You Ingest Alcohol and Then Vomit,' but it's not like we're English majors here!"
      REDNECK HEAVEN
      "You can't miss it! Turn right at the burning cross, then look for the synagogue covered in spray-painted swastikas!"
      MELLOW MUSHROOM
      "You can't miss it! Look for the melting sky and the talking clouds, turn left at the...the...OH MY GOD THE COLORS ARE SINGING"
      RICKS CRAB
      "Formerly Dicks Herpe."
      FRICKERS
      "If you glance at the sign from a distance, it totally says FUCKERS! Oh God, we are so awesome!" (high fives another shithead)
      NATIVE NEW YORKER
      (pounds on car hood) "HEY LADY I'M DRINKIN' HERE!!"
      ROOF BROTHERS SOUTH
      "Oh, and I suppose you've never named your place using the leftover Scrabble tiles!"
      SERV-CAR LA JOYA
      "HU-MAN. WE SERV THE CARS. YOU WILL LA ENJOYA THIS! HA HA. IT IS A HU-MAN JOKE WE MAKE. YES, ALL OUR BEER SMELLS LIKE HU-MAN BLOOD. THIS IS NOR-MAL."
      STUMBLE INN
      "D'ya get it? Because we're drunk too!" (falls down)
      TWIN PEAKS
      "Try our damn fine apple pie coffee stout!"
      TWIN PEAKS
      "Yes, this was in the survey twice. But here your order is filled by a dwarf who talks backwards!" DWARF: "!boj siht etah I"
      QUAKER STEAK & LUBE
      This I've actually heard of, and it's still the worst name for a restaurant besides "MR SHARK: Where You're the Menu!"

4/20

FROM THE "I JUST DON'T BELIEVE IT" DEPARTMENT
SMOKING MARIJUANA LINKED TO LESS MOTIVATION ON THE JOB
--headline, newswires

4/22

BRING YOUR OWN (LARGE) SPONGE
WHALE WASHING ECO-TOURS HERE!
--sign, Mexico

4/23      An email I sent to Jess titled "Byron has a lip thing."

      I just noticed it yesterday. It may be a few days older. I caught it because his hair has NEVER been grey there. Sorry, the pics are big and also the best I could get.

      One

      Two

      He doesn't want me to touch it, but he doesn't want me to touch anything below his back anyway. He had no trouble eating or drinking, and I'm not sure he's even aware he has it. There's been some fighting with DJ, maybe he got what he was dishing out. Maybe he got MORE than that. Like I said, it's recent, but if it looks bad to you, well...gonna have to get him to the vet.

      And what do you guys think? I'm giving it a few days to see if it goes away, unless it begins giving him obvious annoyance, or he has trouble eating. Yes, any other cat I'd immediately bring to the vet, but my other cats don't get crippling mental illnesses from going to the vet.
      I should add that I'm always trying to get him to raise his chin, so I can check out his acne, so this may be only 2 days old.

4/24

TECHNICALLY TRUE, BUT NOT QUITE READY FOR PRIME TIME
Family Feud host Ray Combs: Something that falls from the trees, Jackie?
Contestant: How about birdsh*t?

      Woo, Annual Historical Society Book Sale! I actually didn't get that much, but I'll go 2 more times. They have so much they can't put it all out at once.
      Since I know you care, 2 CDs: a Narada New Age sampler, and Cantus Artica by...bear with me, he's Finnish...Einojuhani Rautavaara, born to parents on the day they had a big sale on vowels. I came so close to buying this back in my Lechmere music manager days, so worth it for $2. 3 books: a Bob & Ray book, as there always seems to be one Bob & Ray book every year. Don't Know Much About History: Everything You Need To Know About American History But Never Learned, a 670-page slab about what the title says. I opened it at random to the story about Uncle Tom's Cabin, written by a Hartford, CT native. And Panati's Extraordinary Endings of Practically Everything, and Everybody. It's by a guy named Panati. A quick read at only 470 pages, let's flip through: The Cambrian Extinction, which I just read a book about, Henry the Eighth's unfortunate brides, oh, cats can live to 27? (looks at Killsy, fast approaching her sweet 16th) Both of those last 2 look like they'd never been read.
      Seven dollars for the lot. I'll go this Sunday, then the following one for the 50% off sale. It'll give me something to do before seeing Spamalot again.

      7 Lost American Slang Words. It's spizzerinctum! An English teacher in high school said that his favorite Elizabethan word was "prog," meaning somebody who pushed their way through crowds. We could use that word today. If a guy's doing that at a Rush concert, he could be a Prog prog!

4/25

DOESN'T HE HAVE ENOUGH PROBLEMS?
MAN ARRESTED AFTER COPS SPOT SUSPICIOUSLY SMALL PACKAGE IN HIS UNDIES
--headline, NT News (Australia)

4/26

PLUSES, POSITIVELY NEGATIVE
There are positive pluses and negative pluses.
--Polish politician Lech Walesa

4/27

PERSONALLY, WE PREFER JESUS STEAK
Satan steak with spaghetti
Satan pork chop with spaghetti
--menu items, Vancouver, Canada

      I watched Interstellar. It started off brilliant, with a documentary feel for a story set in the future about a dying Earth. Then the science got a bit off. A planet for colonization orbits a black hole, so "the gravity is so heavy that an hour here is 7 years on Earth!" Yeah, I'm pretty sure that's how gravity works. Wouldn't kill the astronauts that high, just, you know, go all dog years on them. Whatever, I'll just accept that. Then we find out the truth in the film's most important lines, via Michael Caine's deathbed confession: "Wuh bluh buh duh muh..." The person he's talking to replies in shock "Muh blug huh?!" It's a Christopher Nolan movie, and he made one in which Batman and his enemy exchanged long chunks of dialogue like "RASP rasp wheeze rasp!" and "Mmph mmph RASP gasp urgh."
      I guess it was "There are no habitable planets, it's a hoax, just propaganda to give people hope!" because the movie also thinks the Apollo landings were a hoax (yes, that's at the very beginning). So, your propaganda was...about your Top Secret Program that no one's heard of, to give the people who've never heard of it hope? Da Fuq? But you built actual spaceships and sent them through wormholes and...This was already at the point where I was laughing at the movie for the wrong reasons, and soon the second false ending came. I checked the time left, and it was 20 minutes. "10 of that will be credits" I thought, "but 10 more minutes is too much." and I turned it off. I'm guessing Astronaut Farmer man made it home to his daughter. Didn't care if the characters lived or died at that point.
      His daughter's name was "Murf." Someday soon, Nolan will make a movie where every line of dialogue is "Murf. Murf MURF, murf murf murrrrrfffff" followed by Batman coughing up a hairball.

4/28

HOW-TO BOOKS ABOUT THINGS WE'D RATHER NOT LEARN HOW TO DO
Knitting with Dog Hair
Crafting with Cat Hair
Cooking with Poo
--book titles

4/29

HOCKEY PLAYERS WHO PLAY WITH MORE THAN THEIR PUCKS
This is the season that matters, and despite the fact that they had such a tremendous amount of sex during the reg�uh, success during the regular season �
--CSN Chicago's Susannah Collins on the Chicago Blackhawks

4/30

OBAMA SLOGANS THAT DON'T FLY
OBAMA
YOU DON'T BIRD ME.
I DON'T BIRD YOU.
--poster in China

5/1

PROLETARIANS, WINE-LOATHING
Marx had the feeling that the working class was going to rise up and destroy the beaujolais.
--on a college term paper, Western University, London, Ontario

5/3

YOU WOULDN'T BE TALKING ABOUT 1, WOULD YOU?
Please enter a number between 1 and 1.
--pop-up message on the Finale PrintMusic 2011 music composition program

      Better things such as--Seeing Spamalot for the third time! With Mom, sister Pat, her husband John, and niece Cassie. (Jessica was asked, but she's currently in Buffalo, NY. Dealing with family crap--and not even her family's crap--so she wished she was here instead).
      I've seen the Tony-award winning Broadway version, the off-Broadway touring company, and now--the Broad Brook edition! Which would be the historic part of East Windsor, CT. One of the featured players was my second cousin, Randy Davidson.
      I think I last saw him when he was 8? He's probably in his early 30s by now. I remember him then, as I was close friends (well, close for me, anyway) with his mother. He was play-acting with a friend on her lawn one summer day, and she whispered to me, "I think he's going to grow up to be an actor. And maybe gay. I have no problem with either!" Good prediction on his mom's part.
      It was in an 1892 brick building with giant wood beams, repurposed many times over its lifetime. When we arrived, Pat said "We're so early! Randy's not even here!" Mom said, reasonably, "How do you know?!" And there he was, on the back step smoking a cigarette. Mom said "That can't be good for his voice!" Pat replied "Why don't you tell him that."
      The seating capacity was maybe 150, but it was almost full, which is good for a playhouse that you have drive to through residential neighborhoods to reach. The "Emergency exits are at the" speech mentioned that "We're next door to the fire department. If you hear sirens, please stay in your seats."
      And a good audience mix--the really old people you expect at these things, but also families with kids and teens. Part of their funding was ticket sales, but also a raffle. That's at a place where everyone's a volunteer. But they have rent to pay, along with all the bills the rest of us have.
      If you ever have a chance to see Spamalot near you, GO. I was expecting a dinner theater level experience, but these people were very good. Sure, there was a flubbed line or spotlight hitting off or two, and the production was done as best they could afford, with the lines rewritten to reflect this (Arthur: "Here we are in a really expensive forest rather sparsely made forest," or such), although there was a very large wooden rabbit. But the acting was great overall, the dancing was amazing--these people work at actual day jobs, remember--and, wow, they had great voices. They sang great while dancing, yeah, try that sometime. Try singing to your iPod while power walking! The Lady of the Lake even handled her demanding songs amazingly.
      The sets were, of course, minimal, and the effects even more. When the great wizard Tim appears, he's not on "visible wires" but an aluminum stepladder. The Killer Rabbit is--a hand puppet!! oh wait that's what it was on Broadway too.
      Am I biased because I had a family member in the cast? No. They were all universally good. The singing I expected, but the dancing by everybody...I guess tapdancing is still a useful skill in some settings (there was a lot of tapdancing, and it didn't look easy).
      As we left, the fire department next door's sirens wailed. A couple behind us snarled "Well, this was a complete waste of money!" and "I couldn't wait for it to end!" Mom said "They couldn't say that after they left and got to their car? Didn't they think about who could hear them?" and I said "Like--someone's family?"
      And Randy was with the rest of the cast outside, greeting the theatergoers as they left, and was thrilled to see us. "Everyone says they like my hair like this," he said, touching his blond pageboy wig, "I don't think it's a good look for me." An apparent regular said "I wasn't sure it was you!" and he took it off, showing his dark red hair, "It's me!"
      It's a really funny show, and, if it appears in any form near you, just go. If you're a LTRotD, there's no way you wouldn't like it, whether you're a fan of musical theater or Python or just like smart funny stuff.

      I thank you for being able to read this. The Fifteen is currently the...Four or Five? *sigh* More calls to tech support await.

5/4

YOU MIGHT WANT TO REPHRASE THAT�
Tony Banks described the English fans arrested in Marseilles as brain-dead louts�that goes for me as well!
--British MP Harriet Harmon

5/6

ANCIENT GREEK PHILOSOPHERS, DULL AND BIRDLIKE
Socrates did not want to go to another city because he was afraid of being ostrichized.
Plato's ideal state is bound to fail, for a listless end of reasons.
--from papers marked at Western University, London, Ontario

5/7

INSTRUCTIONS, VERY HARD TO FOLLOW
INHALE 2 PUFFS BY MOUTH EVERY FOUR HOURS RECTALLY.
--on a pill bottle, New York

5/8

POINTS, GOOD
Grown men should not be having sex with prostitutes unless they are married to them.
--evangelist Jerry Falwell

5/9

WE'D RATHER GET FROG
PARK ON GRASS�GET TOAD
--sign in a park

5/10

CHILDREN, LOVING
"The Montecito was far superior for what I felt my mother deserved."
--ad for a retirement home

      We have to balance out our lottery drawer before closing. It takes 1 person 20 minutes to do it, if it comes out okay. It takes 45 minutes if it doesn't, like the last 2 days. If we get $3000 in sales a week from it, we make about $150. Divided by the time it's open, that's about $2 an hour. Nickels on the dollar.
      And we have a regular who's quite reasonable during the day. But he makes a point of coming in during the last half hour we're open, when he knows the lottery is closed, and then SCA-REAMING that we won't sell him any tickets. Today, he shrieked "YOU CAN'T SELL ME 2 FUCKING TICKETS?!" in a full parking lot. Why doesn't he come in when he knows we're selling them? I'm sure his wife treats him the same way when he's home. He needs some pathetic realease for his pent up, futile anger.
      You certainly remember DT. He'd verbally abuse all his employees, and random customers, in front of other employees and customers. Many times we'd have customers who'd tell him "If this is how you treat your employees, I'm never shopping here again!" And then he'd fawn all over them, because he knew that if that was kicked upstairs, he'd be in trouble.
      One time DT was moving, and told a coworker that he could take whatever he wanted. When E got to DT's house, DT started to say something and his wife said "ROBERT--SIT DOWN and SHUT UP!" And he did! People who are powerless in one aspect of their lives try to take it out on people who can't fight back. Because they're assholes.
      Note that the Booze Biz actually has the least obnoxious customers of any I've worked in.

5/11

HAIRSPLITTING, ATHLETIC
I regret what I did. But I'm not sorry I did it.
--baseball player George Brett on smashing a reporter's camera against a wall

5/12

DESIGNERS WHO SHOULD JUST SHUT UP. NOW.
I am not at all intelligent but I have amazing intuition. And I have to be somewhere where I feel in my right state to receive the intuitions my subconscious sends to me. It may seem pretentious, but that's what it is. I turn around the magma, the mud in my brain, and slowly oysters come out.
--designer Philippe Starck

      Rifftrax: "He had never directed a movie before. I don't think he'd even seen a movie before. Wait, he may have never seen another human being before."
      That's a good assessment. It's like a movie based on human behaviour as seen by carpenter ants. Character motivations change within seconds. They actually left a lot of dialogue unriffed, and the audience howled with laughter anyway. No human ever carried on conversations like these, with illogical interjections about something nobody would interject, except possibly during psychotic breaks. Characters appear from nowhere, then disappear, sometimes for the whole movie. Cinemax After Dark movies don't have this much simulated sex--3 scenes in the first half hour!--and those actors at least have attractive bodies. Actor Tommy Wiseau looks like someone shrinkwrapped 200 pounds of cottage cheese, and boy, does Director Tommy Wiseau love to linger over his Cronenbergian flesh. Almost every scene is someone walking into The Room, saying "Oh Hai!" and a few lines of dialogue, before immediately exiting when someone else comes in. Some enter only to to exit seconds later. Everyone seems to live outside the door. Plot, when there is any, is forgotten instaneously (what was the point of the brief scene with the screaming, gun-toting drug dealer? The mother having breast cancer, which is dropped after one more sentence?).
      The writer/producer/director/star Tommy Wiseau probably has less screen time than the other characters, who implode the Bechdel Test. Not only do the women talk only about the male characters, they talk only about him, as do all the male characters. One will go from praising how utterly awesome he is to the point a Mary Sue writer would feel embarassed for the schlub, to pointlessly backstabbing him in the same conversation. I'm guessing Auteur Wiseau had a relationship end badly, given his onscreen girlfriend's incomprehensible actions and personality. Oh, and Spoiler! He kills himself in the end, and It's all That Bitch's Fault somehow. And then he lays there dead while no less than 3 characters--apparently hanging around outside--rush in to scream at each other and cry about how much they'll miss him, including Evil GF and his "best friend" who was cheating on him. Much in the way a 14 year old would punch his pillow while thinking "You'll ALL be SORRY when I'm GONE!"
      Oh yeah, the Riffers made some really funny jokes. The latest Rifftrax offerings have been theater only, so you may not get to see it. Or maybe you will--it did have an after-credits ad for tommywiseau.com, which we thought was a weird joke, as he's selling "TWunderwear." "My underwears" is a line in the movie. But it looks legit, and for the love of Gourd, do NOT click the link. It looks like a corporate website from 1999. Yeah, I should talk (except most of my readers can't see my site THANKS READYHOSTING), with useless frames and a screaming autoplaying video. You can buy the movie's "script," and he'll throw in free underwear. That is not a joke. It's safe to visit the Wikipedia entry, and discover it cost $6M to make. It doesn't look like it cost $6K. I think the article may have been last edited by the second male lead, as his full name and the title of his book turn up about every seven sentences.

5/13

CAN'T ARGUE WITH THAT DEPARTMENT
FLT NO. MU2970 TO XIAMAN
DELAYED DUE TO SOME REASONS.
--sign in Chinese airport

5/15

GUESS HE DOESN'T WANT TO DO HARD TIME
BONER REJECTS SEXUAL HARASSMENT ALLEGATIONS
--headline, The Murfreesboro (Tennessee) Post

SHE SURE NEEDED A LOT
Police received a report of a dead woman needing medical attention.
--Minneapolis newscaster

      I'm on vacation! 8 days of not even thinking about work! So I got an incoherent phone call from work at 1020AM.
      Seems J. had no idea who was working that day. K. had called out with C. covering for him, because he hates working with J. (yes, everyone there is called by a first initial, at least to confuse the Googlebots) Then C. called out, as he was sick enough to be on antibiotics. K. refused to come in, because working 5 hours with someone you don't like is an eternity! (I work 36 hours a week with people I don't like) So we asked P. if she could come in, and she could. On the phone, I asked "Isn't Y. there?" J: "Oh yeah, she's here." Me: "She was the one who asked P.! Didn't she tell you that?" J: "Oh, she wasn't sure." J.C., WTF.
      This is why I need a vacation. At work, I'm always D.W.I. (Dealing With Idiots) Yesterday, P. came in 10 minutes late, which apparently is O.K., as she always does and the boss never says anything. "Let me guess how long Y.'s half hour lunch will last," I thought. And it was 40 minutes. When P.'s lunch hit the 33 minute mark, Y. screamed "What, is she going to take an HOUR?!" "You took 40 minutes!" "SO WHAT?! I--" and I walked away saying "BLAH BLAH BLAH!" If she does it, it's justified; if someone else does it, it's a fucking war crime. That place Drives me Mad with Fury!

      Are they giving Pulitzers for segues? I think that was eligible. Because it's likely that tomorow I'll be seeing Mad Max: Fury Road. The only review I've read (reading too many just leads to spoilers) is on RogerEbert.com, and man, do they love it. Or, woman, do they love it. It's apparently not just fueled with testosterone, but estrogen. One of the script doctors wrote The Vagina Monologues. One of the reasons I love The Road Warrior so much is that it's a crazy action movie on the surface, but there's much more below that surface.

5/18

TOURIST QUESTIONS, DEADLY
The buffalo that we're going to see, are they extinct?
--tourist from New York City in a Canadian national park

      Of the movies-I-won't-ever-see trailers before Mad Max: Fury Road, the only one that got a reaction from the audience was the title of one: Entourage. I can't say I understand why, but the reaction was best called "derisive laughter."
      I think that review I linked to about Fury Road overplayed the Deep Meaning bit. I was hoping that for once "empowered woman" didn't mean "kills the faceless bad guys with equal efficiency as the males do." The Slave Brides don't do more than reload guns, but the rest of the women fire them. There is some kindness and nurturing from the Brides, but...it's a 2 hour fucking car chase.
      With real cars! I stayed through the end credits, and the stunt team far outnumbered the CG people. And these cars are...holy shit. Ed "Big Daddy" Roth would die if he saw them, either by aneurysm or orgasm. The bigger ones are made of smaller cars. The few of you who saw Speed Racer: remember the Desert Race? Those insanely-designed cars are fucking Geo Prizms compared to these. And, you know--real. They crash a lot, with flying stuntmen. None of this "What means gravity and physics?" CG shit you see in every movie, making the effects seem "Who cares?" Crimeny, even The Room had green screen! These are real cars with real people. Crashing gigantically.
      There is some CG, especially in the weather. And I don't follow celebrities, but I'm pretty sure that Charlize Theron has a left arm. There's a shot at the end of the final chase that's clearly "Here's your fucking CGI, asshole!" But when a giant monster truck--we're talking more of a Godzilla truck--crashes, Jiminy Christmas, they couldn't fix that in post. One take, or build another Kaijumobile.
      There aren't a lot of pauses. Like Road Warrior, the bullshit that would fill another movie with subplots just isn't there. Sorry, Hollywood, but I'm guessing that when you're fighting for your life, you kind of don't care about the dating scene.
      If there's a downside, that's it. It's unrelenting. Forget what I said about testoerone and estrogen, it's all adrenaline. It's never boring. Just when you think "How more insane can this get?" it gets more insane. They find new ways for lunatic cars and their riders to interact. The main bad guys are of the "ugly is evil" kind, but more like "mutants deformed by the radioactive wasteland" variety. Showing the corruption inherent in their poisoned and poisonous souls, rotting on screen.
      Is it a prequel or some intersticial sequel? The director refers to it as "a revisit." I thought from the trailers, it was set between Mad Max and Road Warrior, as there still are guns and enough "gazoline". But while there are teasing moments that reflect on Road Warrior, such as the V8 Interceptor, the sawed-off shotgun, the metal knee brace, the bolt cutters (Hollywood's new star, Bolt Cutters, is more important to the plot here than in its historic first role), but well, spoiler--I expected through the whole movie for Max to recover the Interceptor, and maybe he still could at the scrap widely-scattered debris yard. So, I guess, same character, new continuity.
      Do you want to see it? Then, please see it in a theater. It will lose a lot at home. Bear in mind that I've seen silent movies where the heroes have more dialog. Also, if you're like me, yes, there is a lot of violence, but thankfully no gore that is lovingly lingered over as torture porn.
      Car crash porn, sure.

5/19

WHO'DA THUNK?
Signs of Impending Birth Specific Behaviors May Suggest That Birth is Impending, such as:
Sitting on one buttock
Making grunting sounds
Involuntarily bearing down
Stating "the baby is coming."
--listed in a health book

5/20

METAPHORS, MASSIVELY MUDDLED
Neither team has really taken the baton by the scruff of the neck and put their stamp on it.
--soccer manager Nigel Worthington

5/21

LET'S NOT STIR METAPHORS, PLEASE!
But Rudy�if one may stir metaphors into a batter�had never stopped dallying with the plum that hung, Damocles-like, over his head.
--from The Case of the Transposed Legs (1951) by Harry Stephen Keeler (as it appears in the book Wretched Writing)

      The New Mad Max Film Is So Feminist My Scrotum Killed Itself. It's funny, but as you might guess from the title, the humor is very subtle. (Also about the only post I've ever seen in which the comments are actually worth reading, if you don't mind spoilers)

5/22

BUT WHAT ABOUT LEGAL?
NOTE TO DRIVERS
DO NOT PLEASE THROW ILLEGAL ANUS OUT WINDOWS.
THANK YOU.
--road sign, Japan

5/25

BABIES, IRRELIGIOUS
Family Feud host: Something babies throw out of their crib.
Contestant: A prayer book.

5/27

GENITALIA, EASY TO OVERLOOK AND APPARENTLY QUITE SMALL (IF MALE)
Someone exposed himself or herself at the corner of Sixth and Locust Streets between 9 and 9:30 p.m. Monday.
--police blotter item

I collapsed into bed yesterday, sick as a dog, unless your dog is not sick, and why would he be? You let ME get sick with the Rick's Crab or maybe Dick's Herpe, your fucking dog shits, shits shits his shi-tsu, because sure, he shits smaller dogs, those dogs wouldn't be happy but that could happen somehow, and your picking up the small dogs your dog's shit I hope which are dogs and putting them in plastic bags,
      Uh...I was able yp eat 2m slices of plasti c weapped Americna cheeser yesterdat and HOLY FUCK THIS IS LITERALLY WHAT IMWAS TYPINH
      Therer were more typois than words there Oh FUCK
      I AM KINDA SICK RIGHT NOW

      Review of the Five Newest IPAs in Town: "It's hard to believe that Hop Teeth IPA has been around for six months already. Though there are already seventy-two newer IPAs brewed within the same city mile, I still reach for this simple and rustic beer whenever I'm in the mood to taste my own bile. The first sip really highlights a bright front that will bring up summer memories if most of your summer memories involve putting D batteries against your tongue."

5/30

QUESTIONS, STUPID
Is the gunman thought to be armed?
--newscaster Victoria Derbyshire

"Hey, send up a flare sometime either here or at FB so we know you're all right, k? I've been worried about you, what with the sickness and not-eating routine. Sending lots of groovy granola positive karmic energy!!"

5/31

OKAY, WE'RE PROHIBITIVELY CONFUSED
NON-PROHIBITED ENTRY OF FOREIGN EXPERTS
--sign, China

KUNG FURY!
This long-lost classic has finally been found! As you are someone who spent a lot of time in an 80s video store playing Nintendo, I thought you'd appreciate it! Ron might like it for its incredibly accurate depiction of the computer hackings.
It's only 30 minutes long, and, I know, it starts out slow and predictable. But it picks up at the 2 second mark. SPOILER: Kung Fury's job is to travel back in time and fight Kung Fu Hitler, before HE travels FORWARD in time.
I think it's a History Channel documentary.

6/1

PLEASE DO CLARIFY, BUT WE'RE NOT HOLDING OUR BREATH
I said earlier that my own relationship with Scotland was a figuration of the tendencies of my psychogeographic practice reveals in her [Scotland's] psyche�I should now clarify this.
--from a lecture called "Decontaminating the Union: Post-Industrial Landscapes and the British Psyche," given by Will Self at the University of Edinburgh

6/3

BUT WE THOUGHT HE WAS A ROMAN POET
The Weakest Link host Anne Robinson: Which ancient Greek poet is also the first name of a main character in The Simpsons?
Contestant: Bart.

      Since I haven't been posting much, here's a brief health update:
      I called out last Thursday, the sickest day of this thing. I never do that. I thought I was through it last Friday afternoon, despite still being sick in the morning. Then 350 cases of beer came in all at once. One coworker helped put maybe 10% of it away, then stopped to go socialize behind the register. When I slumped into my car, I realized that I'd made myself sick again.
      Saturday, woke up sick; felt better later. Sunday, woke up sick; felt better later. Better, not good. Monday, same thing--but it took. I felt normal. But at home, I still had to force myself to eat. I choked down, almost literally, a Cup O' Soup. I felt bloated. (Your stomach expands or contracts depending on how much or little you eat. This is why you eat like a pig on Thanksgiving, then wake up the next day and are hungry enough to eat a pig. A live one) Half an hour later, up it came like a geyser.Then I couldn't fall asleep until 630 AM.
      Good thing I had Tuesday off. I kept thinking it was Wednesday, because I'd been awake for so long Monday. Since I had a delicate tummy, I ate hot wings with hot sauce. A whole four! I slept almost 13 hours last night.
      Today I ate a bunch of clam strips. I feel okay. Except for wanting to scream at the landscapers' bulldozer "SHUT THAT BLOODY BOUZOUKI OFF!" But what did I have? I today remembered that during my physical, my doctor said "Let's check where you are with your immunizations...Up to date. Oh, did you get a flu shot?" "Yeah," I answered, thinking it was an odd question for mid-May. But the flu virus mutated this year, so maybe I got some less-brutal version.
      I certainly hope this is my last health update for a long time.

      Win The Most Sought After Bourbon In The World!
      *sigh* I deal with this as daily a Liquor Professional. The new marketing paradigm: the Fake Shortage. People want it, because they can't get it. And if they can: Participation Mystique. "I have it, you don't."
      The sought-after beer now is Sip of Sunshine. I had it at work. Out of 3 people, the reviews were two "Okay, I guess," and one "This is awful!" But even the people who have bought it want it, so they can brag about it. It's the sophisticated adult version of sticking out your tongue and going "NYAAH NYAAH!"
      I'm bringing out a new liqueur distilled from what I find in the McDonald's dumpster. Verrrry limited production! Infused with rotting McNugg--er, the finest ingredients. It's called "La Hypester."
      In other words, if you win a bottle, go straight to eBay.
      I'm not saying that I didn't enter the contest, mind you. I could fleece some suckers. Since I work in a Boozeteria, I have a ready made set of saps and rubes. "Well, I'll sell it to the best offer...MONEY UP FRONT."

6/4

EXPLANATIONS, ALMOST HELPFUL
A city representative says that 250,000 people almost used the pool last year.
--WLW Radio (Cincinnati) reporter Brian Combs

6/5

NIGHTCLUB DESCRIPTIONS, OH-SO-TYPICAL
What he and Robin's millions have come up with is a series of rooms of sublime, dazzling beauty. Light, bright and glittering, they are elegant and debonair, collections of wit and exuberance, like Diaghilev wrestling with Jackie Onassis in scented risotto � It's like sitting in a fairy story or being swallowed by a dragon or perhaps being Mme. de Pompadour's crystal dildo.
--A. A. Gill writing in Vanity Fair on the design of a new London nightclub

6/6

SURE, IF YOU WANT TO BUY A NEW MAC
Is it okay to clean my Mac in the tub as long as the power is off?
--caller to a tech support line

      It has been seen in earlier discussions in the Comments that Tim Burton fans have movies of his they love, and ones they hate, and other people hate the movies they love and love movies they hate...Well, in my case, Charlie and the Chocolate Factory. Yeah, that's my favorite. Also, fuck off.
      I thought that 6 Reasons Burton's Willy Wonka Is Actually A Serial Killer would be kinda dumb, but it actually makes such a clear if complex case for its premise that it sounds like noted weirdo Burton may have planned it that way.

6/7

We will just skip the Stupidest Quote, and go to one from a long out-of-print movie just rereleased by Netflix, Nightbreed. Brutally Violent Canadian Sheriff (from the hell hole of--dare I speak its name!--Calgary) with a really bad mustache:
"You are a freak, and a cannibal. And you've come to the wrong town!"

6/8

ANATOMY, PECULIAR
He's holding his face, so it must be a leg injury.
--soccer analyst Dion Dublin

6/9

SCI-FI DIALOGUE, DUMB
Capt. Neal Patterson: The ray that destroyed the space station and knocked us off our course may have originated right here.
Lt. Mike Cruze: Oh, come off it! How could a bunch of women invent a gizmo like that?
Lt. Larry Turner: Sure, and even if they invented it, how could they aim it? You know how women drivers are!
--Queen of Outer Space (1958)

      Hey, it's the terrifying comic book villain BRICKBAT! He wears a lime-green business suit with a Batman mask and kills you with bricks. Special bricks, with poison gas inside! Make sure you're upwind, Brickbat.
      That was recently featured on Gone & Forgotten, and if you don't check that site at least twice a week, you are the wrong kind of comic book nerd. It makes fun of dopey ol' comics, but in a smart way.
      In probably my quickest Amazon transaction (ordered Sunday night, arrived Tuesday afternoon), I have his book, The League of Regrettable Superheroes. Mmm, don't you just love the smell of a new hardcover with lots of color pictures? That new book stench? Seriously, this is like huffin' Magic Markers.
      It is a gorgeous book. I actually don't know some of these weirdo characters--just a few, really, I've been following strange comics since I read that one chapter in All in Color For a Dime 40 years ago. From reading a few entries, the book is not as funny as the site, but I don't think it's trying to be. It also sadly misses Super Green Beret, but then, who actually misses Super Green Beret? He's in his 60s now and, assuming that he didn't drown by confusing himself with his laundry and climbing into the washing machine, he's staring at the Food Pyramid and wondering "Where does it list library paste?"
      One of the heroes that I was barely aware of in it is The Red Bee. He fights crime with a pet bee in his belt buckle. The bee is named Michael. No, not even half of the bee is named Eric.

      I'll write a full review after reading it.

      5 Ways Powerful People Trick You Into Hating Underdogs. Cracked articles aren't always funny. Sometimes they're uncomfortably accurate.
      And very true. It's always been this way: If the people at the top can keep the people at the bottom fighting between themselves, they'll never unite to stop the people at the top.

6/10

LAWYER SYNTAX, EXTREMELY TYPICAL
The reason for that is that the answers that you give will be presumed to have been given by you after you have understood the question. If for some reason you do not understand the question or you need it to be rephrased, please ask us to do so, so that we don't later read an answer and feel that you fully understood the question that was asked.
--excerpt from a Dallas deposition, after the lawyer "had cautioned the witness to be certain that he understood the questions before answering them"

      But you got that.

      I could've also done (5 6) All-Mael band, which of course would be Sparks. They have a new album with some Austro-Hungarian archduke that I may get.

6/11

WHA??
Family Feud host: Something a woman sees that would make her tell her husband to stop the car.
Contestant: A bicycle.

      In a similar vein (because he played Dracula! No, fuck you), I rented a movie better than Nightbreed, White Tiger. It's a Russian WWII drama about the Eastern Front, and total tank porn. If you don't look at a wrecked tank and think "That's a T-34/76!" your tank-boner may not last as long as mine.
      Or was it some diesel-fueled fairy tale? The lead character is a Russian tank driver with 90% of his body covered in 3rd degree burns. He gets better, which is commented on a lot at the beginning, then ignored. The enemy is a Nazi Tiger tank that appears from impossible areas, slaughters the Russian tanks, then vanishes. "They never told you about the nightmares" is an early line. It doesn't so much have an ending as just end.
      But, man, tanks! Perfectly recreated, unless they're the real fucking things. Russia has the world's biggest tank museum. The Tiger looks like a fucking Tiger, and the hero's got a T-34/85, the war's best all-around tank. The German Panther was better, but who cares how good your tin box is once you've already lost the war and can't make enough? The British/Canadian Sherman Firefly could decapitate any panzer with one shot, assuming it got in the first shot. It was a Sherman, with armor thin enough that--why are you yawning?
      If you rent this, consult a doctor if your tank boner lasts longer than the Battle of Kursk.

6/12

EGG-STRAORDINARILY DIFFICULT METAPHORS TO FOLLOW
I'm a historian in large part because imitation is cheaper than invention. And this, this is sort of like how, how people develop cookbooks, you know. On the left you have this model you get a hard egg by putting it in a freezer. It is technically true. You leave it in�I don't know if any of you have ever tried this, but if you leave an egg in the freezer long enough it will become hard. It's just not edible. On the right you have this theory. You want a hard egg, you put it in boiling water and you boil it for a while. Now, both of them produce hard eggs. It's almost impossible to get a left wing academic to understand.
--politician Newt Gingrich

6/13

"I CAN'T BELIEVE IT'S NOT BUTTER BUT IS BUTTER AT THE SAME TIME"
Schrodinger's Butter
--Chinese brand name

6/14

ANSWERS, SO UNEXPECTED
Reporter: What is the best way to commemorate the holiday of Flag Day?
President and CEO of Peoria Flag and Decorating Co.: Fly the United States flag.

6/15

UH, SOMETHING'S WRONG HERE, WE THINK
FATHER'S DAY DEALS FOR THE MAN WHO GAVE BIRTH TO YOU.
--headline on a Groupon email

6/16

JUST WHAT DO YOU EXPECT TO SEE?
FOR OUR ENTERTAINMENT THIS ELEVATOR ALONG WITH ALL PUBLIC AREAS IN THIS HOTEL ARE MONITORED AND RECORDED 24 HRS. A DAY.
--sign in a hotel elevator, Honolulu, Hawaii

      And who turned 12!

      I tried taking photos of them today, but after a dozen attempts that turned out terrible--cats are smart enough to know that a camera means "flash," so they look away--I gave up, and simply Googled these. I like the Killsy one, as nothing in that 2003 picture is like that today, outside of the furniture. Not even that beautiful tree outside the window. Byron took care of the thriving spider plant. In his picture, he is asleep. Upright.

      Based on a dream of mine, an unsolicited drawing from Amy Mebberson titled "If Capcom got ahold of the Kids." Note Byron's hand, and the amount of fingers.

      Their birthday began with me in bed, DJ purring on top of me, and the sound of jackhammers. Christ, what now, Condo Ass?! They were destroying the concrete steps right outside my back door. Why? WHO THE FUCK KNOWS.
      Actually, I'm pretty sure that I do know. For the last 2 years, there have been all these unnecessary make-work projects, always done by the same construction company and the same landscapers. That beautiful tree in KK's photo? They cut it and all the others down with no reason given a few years ago. A storm came through a few days later, and Jessica said of the one that fell over, "Look at that tree! It's hollow! That's why they cut it down!" I said "That's the only one they left standing." They cut down the healthy ones and left the one that, if it had fallen in the other direction, would've smashed some cars.
      They destroyed the 40 year old oaks last year for no reason, recently ripped out all the 40 year old shrubs for no reason, and still haven't even bothered to reseed the grass where they did it. Well, I guess they uprooted the bushes so that they could rip apart the stairs that they were on either side of them, despite there being no fucking reason to do so. So, my theory is: kickbacks. They pay OUR condo fees to these 2 same companies, and then they give somebody on the Condo Ass some of our cash back to stuff in their corrupt pockets. If that sounds paranoid, remember that these are the scumbags who charge us for "heat" every month when they turn it off for 5 solid months. Our fees, their pockets.

      So Birthday Day was just a noisy source of stress for 2 of the Kids. For once, Byron was lucky; he slept through it, and of course the larcenous landscapers came right as the construction crooks left. I went to get groceries, including rotisserie turkey breast for the natal day kids. The store didn't have any. I also wanted some BOGO multivitamins for myself. They didn't have any. I went to KMart in the same plaza to buy a watch for work with a velcro watchband. They didn't have any. I settled for the cheapest one. Last week, I struggled to get the air conditioner in the window, the one with the "ON" knob busted off. I say "struggled." because the fucker likely weighs half of what I do. Then I found out that the needlenose pliers I use to turn it off were missing. So I did all that work for something that didn't work. And then there were jackhammers outside a window I couldn't shut without dragging the AC out, and putting it back in again later. They did have needlenose pliers! So...Win?
      The $18 on sale of $14 watch was easily opened, with its 2 security tags and four different pieces holding it in its impenetrable packaging, requiring only 10 minutes of pointless wrestling and cursing, and a hammer and a wire cutter (that is not a joke. I had to smash that fucker open, and I still needed another tool). I put it on my wrist and...Is this a women's watch? It's really small, but it looks like a regular "male" Casio. Wait--is this a kid's watch? It's the tinest damn watch I've ever owned. With my scrawny wrists, just as well.
      My last watch...why, yes, I am going to talk about my last KMart watch, feel free to do macrame or watch paint dry on grass growing while I do--was the cheapest fucking watch I ever bought. It had no brand name, unless "CHRONO" counts as anything but a 1960s Batman villain name, and it came with no instructions. Changing the time was mashing buttons, turning the alarm on or off at random. All I wanted to do was add a minute to the time, but it wouldn't do that. It kept changing the hour, and turning every alarm function on. I threw it out, and waited for the annual KMart Father's Day watch sale. The new one's manual tells me that it only loses/gains a second a day. If it loses a second a day, that means me and the cats are getting younger, right?

6/17

STUDENT DEDUCTIONS, STUPID
Student: Teacher, where are Arabs from?
Another student (before the teacher could answer): From Aruba, of course!

6/18

BAD, BAD "BOOM BOOM"
Jay's guests tonight include David Duchovny and stuntman Benny "Boom Boom" Cosky who they say will blow himself in a Porta Potty. Blow himself up.
--newscaster, live on air, teasing the upcoming Tonight Show with Jay Leno

6/19

FATHER'S DAY GIFTS, QUITE � DIFFERENTGIVE DAD WHAT HE ALWAYS WANTED!
A WEEKEND FOR BOTH OF YOU IN THE NUDE. WE SET THE MOOD. YOU PROVIDE THE ROMANCE.

6/20

UM, YOU NEED A BOOK FOR THIS?
What Color Is Your Dog?
--book title

      I'm to see That Woman next week. I missed out out on our visit last month, for the very good reason of her daughter graduating. And I may miss out next week, also for a very good reason. Which is also a truly terrible one:

On Tuesday evening Chanci and Gretel went to get a bird and jumped through the screen. Gretel jumped right back inside, Chanci ran under the front porch. Naturally she is the most skittish of them! I climbed under the front porch in an attempt to get her, she ran out a small crack and into the woods. Long story short, Ron and I have been out looking for her ever since. I have traps set up all along my property, made posters, and set up the camera in case she goes to [feral cat] Spit's house to eat. (Yesterday, I actually trapped the little guy, he was not happy) I have to check the traps constantly just in case she or anything else goes inside so I haven't been able to leave the house unless someone is here watching them. I have been sick to my stomach, a roller coaster of emotion, I think she will be okay once she gains the courage she will venture back home, then I think the worst and start bawling my eyes out! I have the Art Show today and that is the last thing I can focus on. If Jacqueline doesn't have to work on Tuesday then I can meet you, I will know more later today.

      An iPod can be replaced. Some things can't.

6/21

DITTO FOR MOM
If it wasn't for my father, I might not be sitting here today.
--BBC newscaster Mariella Frostrup

6/22

NOISES, NOSY
That noise in my earphones knocked my nose off and I had to pick it up and find it.
--sportscaster Jerry Coleman

      No good news about Jessica's girl Chanci after a week. In the "things can always get worse" file, her husband was sitting at a stoplight when an SUV rammed his Mercedes from behind at 45MPH. He's fine, but Jess referred to the car as "totaled." As she said "That is how bad the accident was. His trunk is in his back seat. I could have lost my cat and my husband this week.
      "The police office said if he was in any other vehicle he would be going to the hospital that is how messed up he would have been."
      What a week of nightmare! So, yeah, I'm really not complaining about buying pliers twice.

      Long but funny and frequently jaw-dropping, Conversations with Dad.

6/23

TRULY FRIGHTENING CRIME REPORTS FROM HIGH-INCOME NEIGHBORHOODS
El Camino Real and Selby Lane, 12:19 a.m., Friday: A pedestrian was reported not to be doing anything strange other than wearing black pants and a white dress shirt while walking at an odd hour.
--police blotter item, Atherton, California

      The haze and humidity made day seem as dusk. I approached the cairn, reeking with its Stygian miasma of another realm, one beyond the meager comprehension of Man. What foul creation that should never have been born laid under its cadaverous, loathsome, virulent, swamp-crotched evil? To know would be to go mad! But I love my craft enough that I dared to approach, like a fool, a mad, impetous fool, who dared to confront the abyss and probably should have brought a change of Fruit of the Looms. My fear grew, my terror increased, there was a squirrel nearby and I said "Hey there, Mr Nutty!" and longer, longer did my sentence run on, on and on it ran, like snot running down Aqualung's nose, it ran so far, so far away as if it were a veritable terrified flock of seagulls, maybe I should've bought it some New Balance sneakers, in the dreaded, cavernous, flame-broiling pits of Hell I hear that even the Damned find those comfortable. Trembling, I did what only a man of this new modern age of science, this one with flivvers and flappers and the 23 Skidoos could do: I took a selfie!
      Lo, what horror reaches from underneath the cairn? A tentacle--no, more than one! writhing toward me with grim intent, as slimy and ebon and malodourous as...a really old Fruit Roll-Up maybe? Look, ol' HP doesn't get out of the house much. "Curse you, damned hellion!" I cried, before remembering that if it was damned, it pretty much was already cursed. It rose, unspeakable in its horror, shambling indescribably, inutterably vague are my descriptions! I screamed "If I'd but brought a selfie stick!" And then, the hideous, repulsive, malevolent, I get paid by the word abomination marinated me in a light garlic mayo and et me down. ET ME DOWN!
      Wait, how the hell am I still narrating this if I've been et? Oh, from hell's gullet am I vomited! Well, you don't smell like you've bathed in months either, abomination. Oh. All the freakish abomination from across time and space wanted to eat was the mayo and my tie. And so I went mad, gibberingly insane. It was a really good tie! Now I cringe upon my knees, begging and pleading for an end to this madness (cf above; gibbering), the sweet release of death, or my mom buying me another tie. It had Darth Vader playing a guitar on it!

      At the grocery store, I passed the newspaper rack--yes, those still exist--and the Hartford Courant's headline was "NC Gov says Take Down That Flag." I put this on Facebook 2 hours later, but it's exactly what I thought after seeing the paper.

"But it's about Southern Pride!"
WTF IS THERE ABOUT THE CONFEDERACY TO BE PROUD OF? Slave-owning traitors who started America's bloodiest war--and against itself? That's like wearing a swastika armband and saying "It's German Pride." It should be a symbol of shame.

6/24

EXTREMELY OBVIOUS ANSWERS, EH?
Family Feud host: A country that has the best music to dance to, besides the U.S.
Contestant: Canada.

      Every state flag is wrong, and here is why. Washington is lucky it didn't name itself "Taft".

6/25

THINGS TO PUT ON A R�SUM�, BAD
Current Salary: �28,000. Salary desired: �170,000.
Hobbies: My interests include cooking dogs and interesting people.
Achievements: pig wrestling champion

6/26

DISTINCTIONS, VERY IMPORTANT
It wasn't a shark attack, but a shark accident. More than likely he ran into [the swimmer's] leg and got it caught in his mouth.
--Joe Rubio, South Padre Island, Texas, town spokesman, explaining away rumors that a woman had been attacked by a shark while swimming at the beach

6/27

TEEN IDOLS, APPALLINGLY BAD TASTE AND
Anne [Frank] was a great girl. Hopefully she would have been a belieber.
--written in the guest book at the Anne Frank House by singer Justin Bieber

6/29

AMERICAN HISTORY KNOWLEDGE, VERY PROBLEMATIC
Our Founding Fathers never meant for Washington, D.C., to be the fount of all wisdom. As a matter of fact, they were very much afraid of that because they'd just had this experience with this faraway government that had centralized thought-process and planning and what have you. And then it was actually the reason that we fought the [American] Revolution in the 16th century�was to get away from that kind of onerous crown, if you will.
--Texas governor Rick Perry

6/30

NOT ONLY ARE YOU REPETITIVE, BUT YOU REPEAT YOURSELF, TOO
Not only was Sue having a nervous breakdown, but she was having a tough time mentally, too.
--radio host Simon Bates

7/1

OY VEY! OR RATHER, EH VEY!
Where does Alberta end and Canada begin?
How far is Banff from Canada?
What's the best way to see Canada in a day?
--questions asked of park rangers in Banff National Park, Canada

      For those of you in CT crowing about how liquor stores must stay open another hour...Why do you hate local businesses? That was a giveaway to giant chains like Total Wine and Sam's Club. And let me ask you: When we started closing at 9, and then being open on Sundays--did you buy more? No, you just spread the same spending out. The business we did between 7 and 8 became what we did between 7 and 9. What we do on Saturday and Sunday is what we did on Saturday. But with 25 hours more payroll. Do you think I should work for free, because our being open for 85 hours a week isn't enough time for you to get your lazy ass into the store on time? Who do you think pays for that, the Beer Fairy?
      We aren't doing it. We know what's going to happen--the same amount of sales with more expenses. We're already the only place in town that's open 8AM to 9PM, and there's only one other that's open until 9. and they don't open until 11. We still get people banging on the door at 9--is 13 hours not long enough, because you're too fucking stupid to leave your house 5 minutes earlier?
      I know for at least a month, we'll get assholes shrieking at us in the parking lot at 9:05 "But you HAVE to be open until 10!" (No, we don't) I want to ask them: "So, we should spend 15-20 hours more a week on payroll and utilities for your convenience? And lose money doing it? Which would you prefer, that we lay people off, raise prices, or go out of business? Because you shopping more is obviously never going to happen. Well, I suppose you could just get here before we close, but that would require effort on your part."
      And remember--when you get excited about us being open later, or get mad when we don't, the person behind the counter is thinking nothing but "Wow. How pathetic an alcoholic are you?"
      Also, where do YOU work? I think you should stay there an extra hour every day and be open 7 days a week. For MY convenience! Or are you saying my time is less important than yours?
      Also, fuck off, you entitled little shits.

      C'mon, don't taunt Japan with your giant robot. They'll just breed a bigger kaiju.

      Instead, come park that sucker outside my liquor store. I'll get more use from it than you ever could.

7/2

JULY, NUDE AND MORE
July 1: International Chicken Wing Day
July 14: National Nude Day
Second full week of July: National Nude Recreation Week
July 15: Cow Appreciation Day

7/3

NEWSPAPER CORRECTIONS, VITAL
SETTING IT STRAIGHT
A July 1 story about neighbourhood opposition to Collingwood school's planned expansion quoted resident Andy Lepiarczyk as saying council's failure to halt the project would make them "Scum, scum, scum." In fact, he said the project was a "Scam, scam, scam." We regret the error.
--correction in the North Shore News (North Vancouver and West Vancouver, BC, Canada)

7/4

FAMOUS LAST WORDS, NEW AND IMPROVED
Just remember the words of Patrick Henry: "Kill me or let me live."
--college football coach Bill Peterson, in a halftime pep talk to his team

      Happy Fourth of July! Except you're reading this on not that day.
      The store closed at 8, an hour early. I actually argued for staying open until 9, although I was the one closing and the one opening 12 hours later. It turned out not to be as busy as I thought--the weather kinda sucked--but not as slow as the owner thought. We did like a regular Saturday's business. I took a phone call at 7:53 from a town a half an hour away, asking when we closed. "In about 5 minutes." Did you think we were closing at 8:21? If you live that far away, why didn't you call hours earlier, or just go to the store anyway?
      Both of the nearest stores I drive by on the way home had their doors open. Literally; meaning that they were showing people that they weren't closed, and probably getting the same amount of business we were. Which after 6, was Not Much. The store closest to my home was closed, although I have no idea when they did.

      Nathan Hale: "I regret that I have but one life to give for my country! And only one bag of delicious Cool Ranch Doritos, WOO!" (holds bag up; hangman gives him a high five)
      "And a Mountain Dew XTREME to wash it down with--GLAAaaarrrghh..." (hangs)

7/5

SPEAK FOR YOURSELF, ALEXEI!
There is nothing more unbearable for a person than liberty.
--Belarus president Alexander Lukashenko

7/6

CHECK AGAIN, BILL!
The last time I checked, the Constitution said, "of the people, by the people and for the people." That's what the Declaration of Independence says.
--President Bill Clinton, criticizing antigovernment rhetoric (The quote actually comes from Lincoln's Gettysburg Address.)

7/9

HOT FUN, TOO HOT
The Oakland Parks Department (273-3186) offers more party rusticity at lodges surrounded by forested acres. The Leona and Sequoia Lodges are large wooden structures with stone fireplaces, free wood to burn, tables, chairs, pianos, kitchens, decks and barbecue pits that can hold 150 and 212 people, respectively.
--The San Francisco Examiner

      �The Iron Giant� Will (Finally) Return to Theaters in September. The headline pretty much says it--limited theaters, no info where--but it will contain 2 new scenes that weren't filmed.

7/10

THE BEST REASON WE EVER HEARD FOR MUSICAL COFFINS WITH BUILT-IN STEREO SYSTEMS
This is genuine. I've already got my own ready, although I'm hoping I don't have to use it for a few years yet. Just because you're dead, you should not be deprived of the life-enhancing power of music.
--Fredrik Hjelmquist, inventor of the musical coffin

      I saw on the Book of Faces--which, when phrased that way, sounds like something from a Clive Barker book--a sarcastic post about of a bag of chips with the words "NO CHEMICALS" on it.
      I'm gonna go with those chips having chemicals. I'm made of chemicals. Rocks are made of chemicals; here's a bag of BBQ-flavored rocks, eat these. Don't worry, they're gluten-free! Y'know, do you have celiac? Then you don't need to worry about gluten. It's like when Atkins came out, and people had this really vague idea of how it worked, and then decided without asking anybody "I'll eat a pound of bacon every day and be healthy forever!"
      I'm thinking of selling bags labeled "Gluten-Free, No Carbs, All Natural!" and they'll be filled with dead cockroaches. I'll grind 'em up and make them Cool Ranch or Sriracha flavored or whatever else is trendy, and people would eat them. If I caught the roaches behind the dumpster, I could also label them "ORGANIC" and "FREE RANGE."
      On the "NO CHEMICALS" post, I commented "I only eat food without molecules!" All week on the work radio, I've heard an ad with the line "French's ketchup is made with 100% REAL INGREDIENTS!" Asphalt, broken glass and Polonium-110 are also real ingredients. And Wow, not even 25% Imaginary Ingredients?! I like my catsup with extra Phlogiston and Aether! Know what really brings out the flavor? Unicorn turds. But they have to be fed only free range, organic leprechauns.
      Wait--are your "real ingredients" made from molecules? Sorry, but my tummy gets upset when I eat atoms.

      "Obama wants the TPP passed without anyone actually reading it first?!" screamed Bill in aghastement.

7/11

SIGNS, CRUCIAL
THESE CUPS ARE FOR URINE SPECIMENS.
DO NOT USE THEM TO DRINK FROM PLEASE.
--sign in an urgent care bathroom, New York City

COVETING CONTESTANTS WHO MIGHT BE GETTING DIVORCE PAPERS SOON
Family Feud host: The one thing people living near you have that you want.
Contestant: A beautiful wife.

7/13

CARD TABLES, MUSICAL
PROFESSIONAL TEXAS HOLD 'EM POLKA TABLE
--classified ad

7/15

PARROTS, DELINQUENT
2 PARROTS SOUGHT IN LONG BEACH BIRDNAPPING
--Press Telegram (Long Beach, California)

7/16

YOU ALSO NEED A BRAIN
Tech support: How can I help you?
Caller: Do I really need an operating system?
--tech support call

      Which of the following items are blue? Please select all that apply
      Grass Dandelion Koala Blueberries Dirt Monkey Orange Banana Tree Elephant Sky None of the above
      It turned out be about grocery shopping. The survey is interminabile; I'm still taking it, and waiting for it to ask me "Did you walk through the store shrieking 'GRASS MONKEY DIRT BANANA SKYYYYY!!'?"

      Since possibly 2 people here might find this funny, and also because I don't know what people can and can't see on Facebook:

       Fan of classic horror friend Scott posted: �Nosferatu� Director F.W. Murnau�s Head Reportedly Stolen From Grave
      Pixie (Scott's sister): I know what I'm getting somebody for Christmas...
      Bill Young: (Singing) "I saw Scottie kissing Murnau's skull, underneath the mistletoe last night..."

      Bill Young: From the hit sitcom, "Two and Half Murnau's Skulls":
      SCOTT: "Honey, where did I leave Murnau's skull?"
      SHEILA: "In the cabinet!"
      SCOTT, opens cabinet: "There's nothing in here but--DR CALIGARI?!"
      (sitcom laughtrack)
      (out steps DR CALIGARI with Murnau's Skull)
      SCOTT: "Thanks, honey!"
      SHEILA: "I always knew you'd get--ahead!"
      (sitcom "Aaaaawwww!"

       Godzilla Marathon this Saturday!! I also don't care, I have to work all day or sleep so that I can work. Watch some Ultra 7 for me.

7/17

DEATH, VERY DEADLY
He can be lethal death.
--baseball sportscaster Jerry Coleman

7/18

CLICH�S THAT MISS THE MARK
I think you've hit the needle on the head.
--financier Christian Purslow

7/19

MOST?!
Most dinosaurs are extinct, and this is how you see them in museums.
--Plato's Big Fun Book, Publix Supermarkets

      THAT'S WHAT HE LOOKS LIKE. LET IT SINK IN, HE'S HALF OF THE FUCKING NOT-MOVIE

      This bug-eyed WTF freak thing--okay, let's not judge Minya on his face, which would make David Cronenberg spit out his cup of Tim Holton's, let's just focus on the fact, the idea, the concussion-based concept that he's meant to be FUCKING CUTE. And you spend most of the movie with this guy. Who would lose in a "cutest baby" contest with that kid from Eraserhead.
      No, seriously, look at Minya. LOOK. At MINYA. Oh, you can't, can you? But he's so cute! LOOK. At MINYA. He's Benjamin Button turned into a reptile. And he talks that way. Yes, he's 4 feet tall, but he has the voice of a 55 year old child molester with early onset Alzheimer's. He sounds like Barney as a 1960's Catskills comedian, but with a pipe through his head. After smoking a pack a day of Chesterfields.
      Did I mention that Godzilla was in this? Not really! Just old footage of him beating up other monsters! (MST3K fans: Godzilla fights that crab monster, and you say "I'm on a seafood diet! I see food, and I RIP IT OUT OF YOUR ARM SOCKET!" a-hahaha! That was awesome [YES, then G sits down like he's using a toilet OMG they left that in there]) The Godzilla footage is for no apparent reason, because this movie is about the evils of bullying. The last 20!!! minutes are about Kenny beating up a bully, because of Godzilla and Minya, his hallucinated friend. The gang of bullies then immediately marches in obedient lockstep with Kenny. Will they follow his every whim? Invade the Phillipines and attack Pearl Harbor? Who knows. KENNY IS FUCKING INSANE, and they may just want to date Hello Kitty. Or Minya.
      I should point out that Kenny's worst fear is a monster--a goofy, stupid redhaired lizard with pot-bellied abs--that is named Gamera. Take a wild guess at what flying turtle was Godzilla's biggest box office rival at the time Toho wet-farted this out.

7/23

DVD BLURBS, DREADFULLY BAD
Jackson Pollock is the Greatest living fainter in the united states always well known what if you are a little boy, you must like the film. Become the film is very beautiful and very funny. Hope everybody can watch this film quick, since that you maybe find a different file, another world, let's go to see quickly!
--cover copy on a Chinese bootleg DVD of Harry Potter and the Sorcerer's Stone

      Good news: Kev & Meg are doing so well in Austin that they bought a house! And they're coming to CT next month for a week, so I may actually see them!
      I say "may" as I asked "Which week?" a week ago with no reply. Plans might've changed.

      As you may remember, Jessica's little black cat Chanci got out of the house. I rescheduled our visit for 3 weeks later, hoping for the best. She cancelled again with a brief email, and until she caught Chanci.
      Here's some good news and some bad news. I thought I'd never see my only RL friend again. This put me into my spiral of deep depression This is depression that
      It spirals, okay? It'd been a month since Chanci ran. Then there was good news! Jess wrote back

Thankfully, I have seen her! Now it is a matter of trapping a "trap smart", female, feline! Girls are ALWAYS the hardest, they are smarter and they have a built in maternal instinct so they are automatically aware of everything and do not trust anything. For goodness sake, day 2 I trapped my feral cat, Spit! So far I have trapped Spit, a squirrel, chipmunk, and a groundhog. Ugh!!!! Oh and I almost trapped one of the neighbors stupid little dogs that got out of the yard. Needless to say, it has not been much fun around here!

      You can email me about this or comment (or completely not; I'm not looking for attention), but do NOT put anything on Facebook please.

7/24

SOMEHOW WE DOUBT IT
Is this going to be the first time in four years that Tiger Woods goes all the way?
--golf commentator Iain Carter

      Felines of New York. That's cheerier!

7/25

WINNERS, VERY OLD
He has won six million dollars in as many years.
--broadcaster Rob Lee

7/26

CAN'T ARGUE WITH THAT DEPARTMENT
CHILDBIRTH IS BIG STEP TO PARENTHOOD
--headline, Nogales (Arizona) International

      Shout! Factory has some new free streaming features! Yes, can see for yourself how awesome Godzilla's Revenge is!
      Godzilla
      MST3K (a LOT, and some great ones)
      Ultra Seven! I haven't seen one yet, but I'm hoping it's the Canadian-dubbed version that was dryly funny.

7/28

SLIP, POSSIBLY FREUDIAN
This to us is something that we're not going to give up on, because we're not going to give up on destroying the health care system for the American people.
--Rep. Paul Ryan (R-Wisconsin)

7/29

TRIPLES, SMALLER THAN USUAL
The throw is not in time and Hudson slides safely into second with his second triple of the game.
--New York Yankees sportscaster Michael Kay during a Yankees�Blue Jays game

      Unlike coming out here, I don't feel less stressed from telling my best friend. Because...well, I can't pretend any more. As we say, "Don't mess with Jess!" I could tell you guys "I'm fine, I'm fine!" but she's going to want to see action on my part.
      And there is. When she told me her husband got depressed, I thought "How can he be depressed? He's a literal genius, and married to you!" If he can be...maybe it is a chemical imbalance, and I'm not a worthless garbage shit person who never should've been born, and yes, that's how I think of myself. But how bad can I be if I have not just her, but three smart, funny, caring and very gorgeous women who say they want me alive? (Four if you count the one snoozing next to me. She knows Jessie's scent, and spent a long time yesterday sniffing the hand she held. She then sat back and didn't take her eyes off of me. You may say I'm anthropomorphizing, but I know when she's jealous and when she's concerned. Maybe I give off the scent of cortisol)
      I made the doctor's appointment. All I said was "I need to talk about my prescriptions." The earliest appointment that fits my work schedule is in 3 weeks. Longer than I hoped. At least I now I know I have a safety net.

7/30

THINGS WE ALWAYS SUSPECTED
HOMICIDE VICTIMS RARELY TALK TO POLICE
--headline, The Express-Times (Lehigh Valley, Pennsylvania)

7/31

TRY, TRY AGAIN
Northwest began serving penis�peanuts this month. Georgia is the top penis�pee, pros, peanut producer.
--CNN newscaster Zain Verjee

8/1

PASTORS, UNPOPULAR
NOW IS A GOOD TIME TO VISIT. OUR PASTOR IS ON VACATION.
--sign outside the Cape Coral Community Church

      This song came on the radio today, and a coworker pointed me to this:

8/2

JESUS, LIMELIGHT-LOVING
CHRIST COVETS NATIONAL STAGE
--headline, The Cincinnati Enquirer

8/3

BOB MACDYLAN
Pointless game show host Alexander Armstrong: We need the names of the Scottish acts who had hits with these songs �
Contestant: Scottish music isn't really my forte. But I'll have a stab in the dark and go for "My Old Man's a Dustman" and I'm not even sure he's Scottish, but I'll go for Bob Dylan.

      Hey, remember back when I actually tried to make this blog funny?
      Customer, holding up a bottle of Kahlua: "Does this Koala come in any other flavors?"
      Me, thinking: "Nah, just marsupial."

      "Do you have Rigling Merlot?"
      "Rigling?"
      "Yes. It said Rigling there on the label, then merlot right below it."
      "Umm...no, I can't think of anything like that. Are you sure?"
      "Oh, yeah, Rigling merlot! We had it in a restaraunt, and my wife said she got some here!"
      "Umm, let me just check the racks, maybe something will ring a bell." I walked up and down the aisles.
      (baffled) "I really don't know what Rigling could be," while thinking "besides some brothers' circus."
      "Wait! I have a picture on my phone!"
      "Chateau Saint Michelle Riesling, oh sure! It's right here. It's not a merlot. It's a semi-sweet white, merlot is a red--"
      "It said merlot right here on the label!" (conversation continues)
      Since the label matched his pic, he bought it. I'm glad for camera phones. This was the hardest puzzle since my record store days, when I somehow got from an angry screamed "YAN ETTAN!!" the name Elton John.

8/4

STRETCHING IT A BIT
If we decrease the use of carbon dioxide, are we not taking away plant food from the atmosphere? � All our good intentions could be for vain.
--Rep. John Shimkus (R-Illinois)

Jimmy was actually on something totally different than Prozac. (he told everyone that he was on Prozac, after working in Behavioral health there is no way he was taking that and had the reaction he had) The misconceptions that you walk around "happy" and "care-free" are not realistic, taking the medication gives you the mental energy to deal with the shit.

      Well, I don't have any funny of my own, but here's this. I've linked to it in the past, Something Awful's Dog Classifieds, which are a mix of absurdity, non sequitur and just plain WTF? Always funny, though. Here's the latest.

      The inevitable Sail Cat Fail Rip Off

8/6

WOW!
CARL'S OXFORD DINER
MENTION THIS AD FOR A FREE ICE WATER!
--ad for an Oxford, Massachusetts, restaurant

8/7

IT'S TOUGH ON THE WALLBOARD, THOUGH
Radio host: Name an instrument which can be found hanging on the wall in many households.
Caller: A piano.
--during a call-in quiz segment, BBC Radio Merseyside

      The coworker who witnessed my panic attack quietly asked me if I'd seen the doctor about my anxiety. No, I tried to move the appointment up, but they were booked. I asked her whom she'd told about my episode, and she said no one. She's the other store scapegoat, so we keep things about each other away from the dominant assholes.

      I somehow missed the Republican debate between the 42 candidates, which followed a different debate between the Legion of Two Percenters in the Polls, which I think included Ted Nugent, Ted Bundy, a pair of Truck Nuts, Flying Hitler Robot Space Whale, and 399 others. Here's what seems a good summary: I Watched the GOP "Debate" and All I Got Was a Lousy Hangover.
      It seemed to be the debate equivalent of speed dating, or speed hating. Surprisingly, Fox "News" immediately ignored the Black Guy. More surprisingly, they've decided that they don't want Trump, and went after him. (their article today is titled "Trump loses Republican debate but Rubio, Cruz and others triumph") Maybe a rich corporate pig may not rubber-stamp the marching orders of rich coporate pigs like Murdoch? Since the avocado with a tumbleweed head says What He Thinks, not matter how stupid, the audience loved him. He just flat-out goes evil without the code words and dog whistles the other crypto-racists use, and the dumber Republican bigots appreciate that he's talking to them in a way that don't got no big words. Some blonde Fox newsbot hit him with a question about his treatment of women, which is the first time Fox has ever pretended to care about women, except in the "Pro-Life" way (which means "I'm Pro into running other people's Lives"). Today, in true Trump style, he refuted this by calling her "a bimbo." I assume that when a Hispanic refutes him, he'll say "I'm not racist! He's just like any other drug-addicted rapist wetback!"
      Final question: "Does GOD speak to you, and what does he say?" OF COURSE HE FUCKING DOES AND TO ALL OF THEM and said that they should be the Prezdents.
      As the saying goes: "If you talk to God, it's praying. If God talks to you, it's schizophrenia."
      The last time a president said "God spoke to me," it was Dubya, and He said to invade Iraq. Bet Yahweh high-fived Jeez after that and said "PUNK'D!"

8/8

ELEMENTARY SCHOOL SLOGANS, FRIGHTENING
LA VERNE HEIGHTS ELEMENTARY SCHOOL
TEACHING TODAY, TOUCHING TOMORROW
--sign for a public school, California

      Comment I left at FB yesterday:
      I think Trump should replace his Head Tumbleweed with Timothy hay, and the next time he's blowing gaskets, his Hay Hair should move, and a guinea pig should stick its face out and yell "HEY TIMMY! I'm busy eatin' your hair here buddy, so shut up!"
      It would make the next debate better. Fox would give more attention to the guinea pig than the brain surgeon, because one of them's not bla
      ...NEVER MIND Just a coincidence

8/9

TALK ABOUT YOUR EDUCATIONAL NEWS STORIES!
BUGS FLYING AROUND WITH WINGS ARE FLYING BUGS
--headline, Redwood County (Minnesota)

8/10

ACTRESSES, SHOCKING REVELATIONS FROM
I didn't realize that [the dollar store] is a lie because they add tax.
--actress Kate Beckinsale

      Kev & Meg are coming back to CT for a week! And they want to see all their friends! On the same day, and only once. I have no idea what they're doing the rest of the week. Well, they did say that the only reason keeping them in CT was "friends and family," which to me seems like the best reason. Maybe they'll sit in a hotel room with their laptops the other 6.5 days.

8/11

TOURIST QUESTIONS, ALL WET
Can these life jackets get wet?
Why did Lake Powell form on that side of Glen Canyon Dam instead of this side?
--questions asked by tourists of Colorado River guides

      Hey, speaking of friends, I got together with one today! You'll never guess who!

      TA-DAAA!
      Oh, Professor Doctor Albert von Smartypants PhD, you guessed that. Well, you didn't count on us going to the same place we did 2 weeks ago and doing the same thing, did you?! Because it was only 2 weeks this time. It'd been 3 months since I'd last seen her. On our last and dark visit, she said she wanted to see me in 2 weeks, and I thought "Yeah, that'll happen." But it did.
      For this visit, I was in much better mental health than I'd been in a month. And we picked a gorgeous day! If you're a mushroom. It poured to the point that I couldn't see the cars on the highway until I was within ramming distance. She was forced to drive The Damned Pike in the middle lane, as the other lanes were flooding and cars were hydroplaning. Since I have no umbrella, I wore a Sam Adams pullover and an Angry Orchard hat. "You look like a walking ad!" she said, in her Audrey Hepburn shirt.
      At Cracker Barrel, we talked about me briefly, as she's been kept up to date via email. She talked about cat-sitting her bestie Emily's cats. Two have to be fed in the office, and then the door must be shut; another only eats on the guest bed; one gets her food in a special "mechanism" because otherwise she scarfs it and then pukes, and she needs to be fed first so the others don't try to steal her food. She forgot the first time that another one must be "canoodled" before she'll eat, meaning praised and petted, and she was yelling at Jess for not giving her her special Cat-dashian treatment. My cats are "Here ya go!" and my only worry is making sure Killsy doesn't abandon her food before she's finished it to steal DJ's.
      And then we kinda wandered. She was looking for a pair of antique stores right across from each other, but they were closed. Heading back to the Route 20, she suddenly said "Did you see that Gothic building?!"

      We're not missing out on a cemetery!
      We parked by the rectory, which was small and probably used for small services. She looked in the door and gasped "Is that what I think it is?!"

      Great photo, Bill! If Ansel Adams was alive, he'd drop dead just so he could turn in his grave.
      It's a little bat, dead of starvation or thirst, and not long dead. She has a mounted bat skeleton, so she immediately tried to open the door. (Her husband got it for her for Xmas. What she wanted was a cat skeleton, which is not something I would ever want, unless it was a replica. He found a place online in Europe, and he asked "Was the cat humanely treated?" Response: "Of course. We only raise them for their meat." End of conversation)
      "I want to tell someone 'Help me!' My pet bat's in there!" I said "Poor Bartholomew! I need to give him mouth-to-mouth!" And then, on this dark and stormy day, in a graveyard with a dead bat before us, did now the baying of the hounds begin. I am not kidding, a terrible howling and barking began from the suburban houses near us (for it is in the suburbs where our story is set), with one hound of the Baskervilles answering each in turn. It went on for nearly 5 minutes. It wasn't us, given the way the wind was blowing. I said "And now the thunderstorm will begin, with lots of lightning." The dogs suddenly stopped, and I said that they must've put the werewolves back in the dungeon.
      We crossed the street to the main cemetery. I looked around and said, "This isn't that old." I have one in my town next to Auto Zone with early 1800s graves. This cemetery was founded in 1922, so whatever. "I like ones with stones marked 'Revolutionary War Veteran.'" She said "When was that?"
      "1943."
      "Oh," she nodded.
      (realizing she believed me) "Jess! The Revolutionary War? The American Revolution?! It was 1776!"
      "Oh, right, right, I've heard of that."
      "It was won by our first president, George Jefferson!"
      She took photos of some graves with life-sized statues of an angel and the Virgin Mary, and told me that she'd begun plans for her own gravestone. "It will be awesome!" She's also started writing her eulogy. She was not joking. This is the woman who says that I talk about my mortality a lot.
      Walking back to her car, I pointed at the far end of the field and said "THOSE are some old gravestones!" I could tell just by their shapes.

      There were no other graves in a large field. "Why are they way over there?" she asked. "Probably a family site," I replied. And they were, from the Sykes. That large one is for Elizabeth Sykes, d. 1774. She pointed out a little mark by the side: "That's where the engraver would make a mistake, and try to fix it." Why that entire side of the cemetery was unused, I can only speculate. Maybe owned by their descendant, Igor Sykes backed by his baying hounds.
      Of course, before we left, we engaged in some light graverobbing.
      At the front of the cemetery was a huge plastic garbage bin, overflowing with dead memorial flowers and a fast food soda cup. Jess immediately saw something next to it.

      It said "Walmart Motorscooter Gnome Male, Made in China" on the sticker. She wants to put it in her garden, and I've no doubt it'll be described as "The one I stole from a graveyard dumpster!"
      "I hope I don't get haunted!"
      "You'll wake up tonight, thinking 'What's that sound?' And it will be the sound of a very small motorcycle. 'YOU STOLE ME FROM MY GREAT-UNCLE'S GRAVE, YOU BITCH!' And then he'll keep running over your foot, saying 'Stop laughing! I'm trying to haunt you!'"
      We drove back, trying to find Route 20. We passed a sign reading "Gentleman's Farm For Sale, 8 Acres." I said "I want to be a Gentleman Farmer! Wait"--[holds up hat]--"an ANGRY Gentleman Farmer! Angry Orchard, that's what I'll call it, and when people come to buy, I'll throw apples at their heads, and say 'I daresay, kind sir! Wouldst thou most graciously go fuck thyself?'" Then we saw 3 wild turkeys by the side of the road. "He could be my Angry Gentleman Farmhand! He'd wear overalls and have a big stalk of wheat in his mouth." Jess: "And wear a little top hat! A paper one, you wouldn't want to weigh down his tiny head."
      This visit was a little lighter in tone than the last one. You may have picked up on that.
      It's pretty much all anticlimax after that. We snarked our way through an antique store. I almost bought some plastic 1960s gumball machine charm bracelet things of all 4 Beatles, but they were $20 with no discount (sorry, Kitsplut!). I did get a Hallmark Xmas ornament of Neil Armstrong on the Moon, which talked and lit up, warranty good until 1997, $8. Jess said that everytime she hears about the Moon landings, she thinks about Little Bill, the only kid in the family who was excited enough to stay awake until 11PM to see it happen, and who, on the next day, looked at the Moon, visible during the day, and said "There's PEOPLE up there!" She bought a wide but thin hardcover children's book, "The Little Kitten Who Would Not Wash His Face." There were a lot of pages and words about this pretty easily solved premise (use a damp washcloth on him!), so I'm interested to hear her review once she's read it. It had many nicely rendered illustrations, and a copyright of 1922. It was $3. Maybe it's a science fiction story? "The Little Kitten Who Would Not Wash His Face" sounds like "The Cat Who Refused to Sleep 16 Hours a Day."
      I'm very glad this happened. This was truly the only stress-free day I've had in a month. It's fun to laugh with your closest friend, and write here out of the pure enjoyment of writing.

      Dunning-Kruger Writ Large: A Democrat Handicaps the 2016 Republican Candidates. Short and funny.

8/12

PRETTY DUMB
Caller: My pedophile won't print.
Tech support: Excuse me?
Caller: I sent my pedophile to print but it won't come out the printer.
Tech support: Oh, you mean PDF file? As in Adobe PDF?
Caller: Yeah, that.
--tech support call

8/13

WHY THE OBAMAS HAVE A HAPPY MARRIAGE
I promise you, the president has a big stick.
--Vice President Joe Biden in a speech after quoting Theodore Roosevelt's "speak softly and carry a big stick"

8/14

ANSWERS, TRUE BUT RATHER UNPLEASANT
Family Feud host: Something you wouldn't use if it was dirty.
--Contestant: Toilet paper.

8/15

BAD KITTY!
8:28 a.m.: A Lamphear Court woman said her son was attacked by a cat and the cat would not allow her to take her son to the hospital.
--police blotter item in a Corning, New York, newspaper

8/16

SPORTS TRUISMS, TRULY UNTRUE
If you can't win, make sure you don't lose.
--soccer manager Johan Cruyff

      How Many Bad Movies Have You Seen? I got a pathetic 54 out of 170, despite purposely watching bad movies since a teenager. By my late 20s, I realized that "so bad it's good" movies like the perfect Plan 9 are rarities. Most are just "so bad they're fucking bad." I saw almost nothing on that list past the early 90s. Life's too short for Sandler and the Wayans.
      And how did they leave off the outputs of Emmerlich and Boll? ("Outputs" used in sense of "what your dog outputs during his walk")

8/17

HELPFUL DRESS LENGTH MEASURING HINTS, NOT-SO-HELPFUL
If the eyes of the 'observer', i.e. the point E, is right on the extension of segment BC, then point B would fall into his eyesight. Then, let's make another line of DE which goes through E and is perpendicular to the extension of AC, then the right triangle of DEC is similar to the right triangle of ABC. So clearly, the length of DC is the horizontal distance between the man's eye and the lady's skirt. Ladies, have you figured that out?
--English translation of Zhejiang province (China) police department's official account explaining to women how to measure dress length to minimize sexual harassment

8/18

AND WHAT HAPPENS WHEN IT COOLS DOWN?
It'll be warm today after it heats up.
--weatherperson, KTIE 590 AM

8/19

RECKON IT WAS PRETTY CLOSE
Q: Had you seen that car up on the tracks before the accident?
A: No, sir.
Q: Never saw it before you hit it?
A: We saw it right at�
Q: Right at the last minute?
A: Yeah.
Q: How far were you from it when you hit it?
--trial testimony

      Hey, speaking of friends, I got together with one today! You'll never guess who!;

      TA-DAAA!
      HA! Got you! I set this joke up a week ago!
      That's Cos, Eric and Kevin (Meg would turn up much later) This was just hours after seeing the doctor and forcing myself to talk about my depression, so, yeah, pretty much an emotional roller coaster day.
      It's late (we closed the restaraunt!) and I have to work early, so no update tonight. I will say that Prozac has been acquired, though not yet taken. More tomorrow.

      Both exciting and ridiculous, Mad Max Tiny Road:

8/20

BOOK TITLES, BAD
A Century of Sand Dredging in the Bristol Channel: Volume Two
A Taxonomy of Office Chairs
Estonian Sock Patterns All Around the World
--book titles

      I picked up the generic Prozac today. I wondered why the register screen said 2.15. I paid and found out that's how little it costs. Well, I guess it technically is addictive, so they make it up on volume.

      I knew I'd probably have a late night with Kev & Meg and be emotionally wired afterwards, so I asked to come in to work at 10 instead of 8.
      But I was wired from the doctor's appointment, and not in a good way, and slept badly. I have to be in at 8 tomorrow after staying 2 hours later than usual, and so I don't want to write here and repeat last night's sleeplessness. Tomorrow I'll fill in the details.

8/21

SPORTS COLOR COMMENTARY, OFF-COLOR
When Gareth Bale opens his legs like that, it's just a magnificent sight.
--sports commentator Gary Neville

      Well, maybe we can catch up on things here.
      The doctor's visit wasn't fun. I gave him more details than I have even Jess about my suicide attempts (SPOILER: they failed). He's not some cooly detached clinician. At one point, he briefly buried his face in his hands. When it was time to end the visit, he hugged me. After I let my arms go slack, he said "I'm not letting go that easy."
      Side effect warning on the Prozac: "May cause depression or suicidal thoughts." Y'know, I don't take aspirin to get a headache.
      His office was just a couple miles away from where Kev, Meg & I were to meet. I asked the nurse if she knew anything about the place we originally were going to, Dave & Buster's. Given that 3 out of the group wanted to go there, and they're beer snobs, it was surely some new brew pub. I looked it up, and they were Chuck E. Cheese with a liquor license. The menu looked ridiculous--one was a double cheeseburger with a pound of fries. Is there a discount if you have a tapeworm? Because I'm not finishing that unless I'm eating for two. I figured I'd get something from the appetizer menu. Which started with the "Mountain of Nachos," which looked like an entire bag of Doritos.
      Then I checked their Yelp reviews. Wow...not a lot above 2 stars. Long waits, slow service, bad food, expensive, were the repeated complaints. "Maybe we should pick somewhere else" I emailed. The nurse had been there once, "And I'm never going back. You get a beer, and it's $8!" She also said that a coworker's daughter worked there. The management collects the waitstaff's tips and puts the total in their paychecks, so they pay taxes...after the management takes a cut of their tips. There's a reason right there to never patronize Dave & Buster's.
      Kev had decided to try Burger Fi instead. This is a chain too, but a small venue with beer on tap, and self-service. He arrived after me. But where was Meg? The afternoon before they flew up, her father was admitted to the hospital with a terrible leg infection. "I may not be able to do this tonight," he said, implying that her dad's days are numbered. He lives in CT, so...well, at least it happened when they were already on their way here (SPOILER: he's relatively okay). I gave him a CD of Little Rascals music, a series he enjoys unironically.
      When Cos and then Eric arrived, we talked outside while I made probably 25 attempts to start my camera. (The pic from Weds was maybe the 50th attempt; it took exactly 2 awful pics then decided to turn itself off)
      Burger Fi is like McDonalds with a liquor license, except the food isn't made from pet-grade meat slurry and their workers' tears. Excellent, actually, with a burger costing less than a Dave & Buster's beer. And they have some good beer. I had a Sam Adams Octoberfest on tap, and later a Shiner Prickly Pear, which I know is their Spring seasonal, but it's not that long ago. It didn't occur to any of us at the time, but it's from K&M's new hometown of Austin.
      And how are things? Meg's getting dog sitting/training clients, and Kev loves his job. It's "warm calling," getting current customers to renew their contracts and hopefully upgrade. He's making good money--did I mention they bought a house?--and now that's he's been there a year, thinks he may move up the ladder in his department. They're a cybersecurity company, so it's not like that's going obsolete. He wasn't thrilled when they were bought by Raytheon (company motto: "Building a Better Future With Bombs and Slaughtered Foreigners"), but it's not like he's piloting drones.
      Meg arrived very late, and looked drained, as one would expect with her dad in the hospital. Cos described our conversation as "Music, movies, beer, books--geeky stuff." And the differences between New England and Texas. Kev: "There are trees everywhere here! When Autumn came in Austin, the leaves turned brown and fell off in a week!" If you've ever heard how pretty it is in a New England fall, there's why. He also said how they wouldn't live anywhere in the state but Austin, and I told everyone about the (joke) headline in Funny Times recently, "Terrified Citizens of Austin Realize They're Surrounded by Texas."
      There were also some shared memories, with a lot of Kev saying "I remember that!" The only conversation I clearly remember (it's hard when there have been so many topics) was Meg talking about a mutual friend (no one I knew) who got a double masectomy, and who was pretty chipper about it. There are worse things to lose than body parts that are filled with cancer. "She's 'Want to see my scars?!' and lifting up her shirt--Umm, no thanks!" She's getting fake boobs, and apparently there are nipple tattoos that look very realistic. Cos: "I'd make my nipples eyeballs!' Me, pointing with both hands at chest: "Hey, buddy, my eyes are down here!"
      I could've done without the last half hour--it was late and I had to go to work early, Meg looked like she just wanted to go back to the motel and who could blame her, and the non-versation was just Kev & Eric talking about Mixed Martial Arts fighting, while the rest of us sat there (and Meg loves MMA). I kept being aware that we were the only people still there, and the employees were doing clear "closing time" activities. The sign outside said their hours were "11AM to Late Night," which is a bit vague. My old job was across the parking lot, so I watched to see if they stayed open until 10. They closed around 9:20-9:25, so I don't know what that meant. (After I left and stores could be open until 9, they were infamous for closing "when there were no customers"--and making their employees work 15 to 20 minutes off the clock) When a worker asked if we had any garbage, I said "I've got to get up early," and as soon as we left, they turned the music and lights off, and began stacking chairs on the tables. Yes, we closed the place. I haven't done that in a while. I think the last time I did, it was 10 years ago, and with Kevin...
      They say they want to make this an annual thing. It's not like when they lived a mile from me, but I'll take it over never seeing them again.

      Without humans, the whole world could look like Serengeti

      I thought after the cards from Jess and Kitty today, "If Lilly writes me, I've hit the perfecta!" And she just sent me an email inviting me to her wedding. Well, a 3000 mile drive is unlikely, but it's in a place in California named...VOLCANO.
      Hopefully, it's not on Kitsplut's route.

8/22

BOLD STANDS, CONFUSED
I'm not familiar precisely with what I said, but I'll stand by what I said, whatever it was.
--Massachusetts governor Mitt Romney

8/23

WELL, ARE THEY?
Family Feud host: A question you hate when people ask it of you?
Contestant: Are those real?

8/24

LACK OF SPELLING KNOWLEDGE, NOT HOLDING HIM BACK
Climbing the latter of success you will encounter Barriers � they will not #holdmeback.
--tweet by hip-hop artist Rick Rozay aka Rick Ross

      I handed a customer a credit card slip to sign, and she said "Why are you putting it on my right when I'm left handed?!" 1) I have no way to tell that without you saying so, and 2) your left arm from knuckles to elbow was in a cast.

      The other dumb person at work was me. I was checking in a beer order, and realized that it didn't have the keg I needed today. I've never forgotten to order something if it's written down. I thought I HAD ordered it. And of course it began--the near panic attack, soon to be followed by "I'm going to get fired!" paranoia and 2 to 3 days of depression. I hastily called the salesman to see if a merchandiser could bring the keg over today, even though I was in the middle of checking the order in. Once I went back to just the order, while still panicking, I could feel myself becoming calm. They've brought kegs over before, and they're only 15 minutes away. Why was I not flipping out? This has never happened before.
      Lily says "Give the Prozac a MINIMUM of six weeks to kick in, and it may not be something you notice immediately." I'm very aware of the placebo effect. So aware that I don't experience it, like that time Vicodin did nothing. If it was the effect, I wouldn't have felt anything. "Why panic; the Prozac is on this." Even after finding out that they couldn't deliver today and that the Owner would have to go and pick it up, I just thought "This isn't a crisis. He's not even bothered by it." Normally--well, normal for me--I'd assume he was quietly angry at me, and it would've been even worse. I thought "If there's blowback, eh, don't worry about things that haven't happened yet." Jess said about Prozac "The misconceptions that you walk around 'happy' and 'care-free' are not realistic, taking the medication gives you the mental energy to deal with the shit." And that's how I felt.
      This might be an example of "it hits different people differently." If it really is the placebo effect (and again, I don't think so. I would've decided yesterday that I felt different), I see no reason to complain about it.
      I called the keg customers, as the slip said "Monday 8/24 Call when it comes in." That means they want it right away. Since I got the same "default answering machine voice" my machine has and they hadn't come, I called back to make sure I dialed the right number. Our phones have endless problems with dialing out and have been there longer than I have, and I've been there since 2003. "Oh, somebody called my husband earlier. He'll be in to pick it up
      tomorrow."
      Yep. The guy who took the call meant "Monday" as in "on the Monday deliveries." I was worried over nothing.

8/25

� AY POR DIOS !
Plugs of Spanish omlet
Creaking cheese brie
Thorn of snuff and cuttlefish
--menu items, Barcelona, Spain

      Takes about 4 weeks
      Has to get in blood stream.

      Takes about 4 weeks
      Has to get in blood stream--BEEEP
      Hot Pocket is done.

8/26

JOB HUNTERS WHO WON'T GET THE JOB, CHECK
Skills:
1. Organizing sh*t? Check.
2. Calling numbers and sh*t? Doublecheck.
3. Customer support and sh*t? Mega-check.
4. Faxing numbers and sh*t? MOTHERFLIPPING CHECK ALL OVER THAT.
--on a cover letter for an office manager's position

      Mad Max: The Honest Trailer:

8/27

ROAD SIGNS, INTRIGUING
GO SLOW, ACCIDENT PORN AREA
--road sign, India

8/28

EXACTLY STUPID STATEMENTS
I just said that, in exactly the same but different words.
--sportscaster Geoffrey Boycott

8/29

GREAT MOMENTS IN PRESS CONFERENCES, HISTORIC
Reporter: Mr. Secretary, has anyone asked you the whereabouts of Mr. Molotov?
Secretary of State Dean Rusk (just back from a summit): No. No one has asked me that question. You can if you want to.
Reporter: Well, sir, where is Mr. Molotov?
Rusk: I haven't the faintest idea.

8/30

LACHRYMOTIC THEORY, GERMAN CONNECTION
She didn't like tears. No Brits do. They've been bombed by the Nazis.
--actor Tom Sizemore in his memoir, about his love affair with Elizabeth Hurley

      A new distillery opened up in town, run by a close friend of our owner. He was having a grand opening party for 180 people, and ordered 6 logs of excellent (and local) beer. Super nice guy, and I've tried his vodka, and I really like it--doesn't taste like nothing as most vodkas do, it's smooth and fruity. He decided to get another 2 logs to be safe, and I gave him a free 35 pound bag of ice to be safe, because I knew I wouldn't get in trouble for that.
      I got a surprise shipment of beer that day. Stuff we really didn't need, except for a 1/4 keg of Bud Light. We'd sold one the night before, after I'd left. Huh. Not a priority either, but I'm not the boss. I got called to the register today, and saw a guy hunched over the counter, with weird half-mullet half-mohawk hair. "What asshole has that hair?" I thought.
      3 days before, he demanded to see what smaller kegs we had. We had the Bud Light; he pointed at the logs and said "Give me one of those!" The owner said "No, those are for someone else."
      "Give me one of those!"
      "No, they're not yours."
      "I don't see why you won't give me one! You have plenty!"
      "Because they're not yours!"
      Today he was returning his keg for his deposit. Since he paid with a card, we were going to credit his account. He immediately began braying "If I don't fucking get this in CASH, I'm going to FUCKING KILL SOMEONE!" I said "We can only credit your account--" "If I don't fucking get this in CASH, I'm going to FUCKING KILL SOMEONE!" This was his mantra, repeated another 5 times. I was ringing up a tiny old lady in her late 80s, and she looked terrified. I called the owner down.
      And he gave him it in cash. He didn't know about the death threats until after the shitfuck stormed out of the store. A customer asked "Is he a regular customer?" I said "I sure hope not!"
      The cops don't take death threats lightly anymore. If Bad Hair Day/Worse Brain Life guy comes back, I'm telling him to leave while calling the police. And I wouldn't be surprised if he disputes the charge on his card.
      Later, a guy with the exact same unfortunate hairstyle came in. He was quite pleasant. Can't judge a book by its mullethawk.

9/1

IT IS?!?!
HITTING KIDS ON HEAD DANGEROUS
--headline, The Post-Crescent (Appleton, Wisconsin)

9/3

TOILETS, VERY LARGE
WOMAN FLEEING WHATCOM DEPUTIES, HELICOPTER FOUND HIDING IN PORTABLE TOILET
--Bellingham (Washington) Herald

9/4

PROMOTIONS, PROBLEMATIC
ABERDEEN BREWING CO.
JOIN US IN THE THISTLE LOUNGE FOR MONDAY NIGHT FOOTBALL
HOURS
Closed Monday

9/5

BEST WITH A CUP OF GOOGLE ON THE SIDE
Yunnan spice trees fried eggs
Wikipedia fried with eggs
--menu items, China

9/6

RULE METAPHORS THAT SHOULD BE CUT
We're not attempting to circumcise the rules.
--football coach Bill Cowher

      My Mom was very excited to give me a cat toy. "The cat in the ads loves it!" I said, "Mom, that cat is an actor."

      Weebles are Wobblies, but they don't fall down and vote against Eugene Debs! (Obscure Labor Day joke)
      One puts treats inside, and the cat is supposed to bat them out "Wobbert"'s anus. No, really, it has a face on one side, and a big hole where it would poop from. (Note to self: Dog version that excreted actual dogshit might prove profitable)
      I assume that's a very obese cat, or a walrus with antlers. Those growths are cat Slim Jims. DJ was the first to explore it, chomp on them, and completely fail to grasp the concept. It freakin' wobbled! KK was next, and figured out how to eat the stinky Rasta dreads. The treats inside bemused her. I took the top off so she see them, and rather than bat Wobbert over, she fished them out with her paw. One treat went flying, and Deej got it.
      I placed it in full view of Byron. He's been in self-exile for 2 years now. He was agitated, but all he did for the next several hours was ask, nay, DEMAND, that I pet him. Then after a minute or 3, he'd bite or claw me. "Overexcited" was not the state I was hoping for.
      Also, "Wobbert." That name's not wetarded!

9/7

IMAGERY, OVERDONE
[T]he most important question every worker will have to ask himself or herself [is]: Am I adding value by doing something unique and irreplaceable? Am I putting some extra chocolate sauce, whipped cream, and a cherry on top of whatever I do?
--columnist Thomas Friedman

9/8

YEAH, SURE, WE TRUST THEM
CREATIVE CHILDREN'S SOFTWARE SO FUN, THEY WON'T EVEN KNOW THEIR LEARNING
--billboard ad

      In Soviet Russia, arcade game plays you: "Well, to put it simply: it means no Pac-Man. It means no fantasies. It means presenting work as physical labor, promoting Communist patriotism, and glorifying habits of mind that were appropriate to Marxist thinking. Fantasy and role-playing games featuring treasure-hunting, princesses, and invented creatures had no home in the USSR."

      If Dumbass Donald Trump Quotes Were On Dumbass Donald Trump Campaign Hats. "These sound like reasonable ideas to me." --Phineas Gage, the man with 3 feet of pipe through his head

9/9

RUMINATIONS, RIDICULOUS
He is just the type of guy that he has grown to be.
--pitcher Clay Buchholz on opposing pitcher Mark Buehrle

      The Tale of the Cat and the Moon.

9/10

WE DON'T THINK THE SCREENWRITER WROTE WHAT HE THOUGHT HE WROTE
Are you sure you saw what you think you thought you saw?
--dialogue in Hellbreeder (2004)

9/11

GOOD POINTS, NOT REALLY THAT GOOD
Caller: I have a problem with my printer.
Tech support: Are you running it under Windows?
Caller: No, my desk is next to the door. But that's a good point. The man sitting in the cubicle next to me is under a window, and his is working fine.
--tech support call

9/12

CALL THE BRANCH OFFICE FOR MORE INFO!
FINDING STICKS WITH HIGH-GROWTH POTENTIAL
--email headline on stock investment letter