Expecting to fly

I first saw this Canada Goose early last week and wondered if she was nesting. She is. But why would she choose a nest site that's so high up? That's one of the pillars that holds up the foot bridge. Pedestrians have a front seat view of her sitting on her nest, which also makes me wonder why she would chose that as a nest site.



In the photo below you can see how high the pillars are. She's probably at least fifteen feet above the water. You can just barely make out her head sticking up on the left side of the pillar.



And so she sits there incubating her eggs, mostly ignoring the gawkers on the foot bridge.



Here's a shot of the eggs from Sunday morning during a rare period where she was away.



But what I want to know is, what's she going to do when the eggs hatch? Will she just sweep the goslings into the river and then try and round them up? That's a long drop.

Big Ugly Bird

I went down to the river this morning to feed the geese and ducks crushed pretzels. As soon as I got to the goose-zone, I saw this ugly-ass thing.



At first, when it was far away, I thought that maybe it was maybe the result of a Canada Goose interbreeding with one of the feral domestic ones. When I saw the red lumpy flesh on its face I wondered if it was diseased. After I got a really good look (it stood a few feet away for quite a while as it chomped pretzels), I assumed it was some kind of weird goose breed I wasn't familiar with. I planned on posting the image here and up at Flickr to see if anyone knew what the hell it was. (Maybe professional anthropologist and amateur ornithologist, Dr. X would come through with another bird identification.)

After I got home, a little searching among water fowl breeds at Wikipedia (oh, what would I do without you, Wikipedia?) told me it was actually a breed of duck. To be more specific, it's a Muscovy Duck, a big duck that's native to Mexico, Central, and South America. There's feral populations in Florida and Texas. So what's it doing in Virginia?

They're also kind of mean. It totally kicked a big male goose's ass while I stood there happily shooting pictures.

Flim-flam!

A few years back I bought a calculator at Dollar General for a buck. It was cheaply made, but it worked great. I liked it because it was compact and had a door on it. Small enough to put in your pocket and literally forget the damn thing was in there.

I took it to work and began using it there. (The work calculators were these big, clunky things. I guess they didn't want people stealing them, so they made sure they bought some that were the size of a sandwich.) It worked out great until I had to do a lot of stuff out in the warehouse and I ended up sweating on it a lot while it was in my pocket. It started malfunctioning, so I bought another one.



So what to do with the broken one? After it laid around for a few months, I decided to open it up to get the battery out of it and maybe swipe the solar cell for some kind of experiment. But, much to my surprise, I found out the solar cell was fake. It's just a couple of pieces of plastic not electronically connected to anything.



I have since lost all faith in civilization.

I'm on the internet, grandma!

Since nothing else is going on, I'm posting my most recent totally effed up search requests. Internet users of the world, most of you are insane, perverted, and/or stupid, but you amuse me greatly.

how large is a wild turkeys penis
Yeah, I know, it's just for research. Sure.

legality of masturbating using video cams
No good can come from this.

nice man wanking
He was such a nice man, despite all the wanking.

internet meh
Boy are you at the right place.

staples in your head after i cracked my head open
Why would the staples be in my head after you cracked your head open? Is the doctor's eyesight really that bad?

largeness your x organ
Is the x a variable, like in algebra?

pictures for wanking in front of porn
Porn is the easiest thing to find online, but yet somehow you can't seem to locate any.

korea pornography what happens
I'm no expert in Korean pornography, but I would guess that what happens is that naked people have sex.

where can i post my porn pichers
This is sad on so many levels.

Search fuel my wank
Frankly, I'm speechless, but I think Fuel My Wank would be a good name for a game show.

girls in soaking wet socks
Talk about your weirdly specific, but yet completely uninteresting, porn search request.

pictures of boring bastards
Well, I am a boring bastard, but I have no photos of myself here. Sorry.

He ejaculated and
And...? And what?! The suspense is killing me!

boxing helena oops
I think the only "oops" involved with Boxing Helena was when the backers realized what a god awful movie they had sunk their money into.

pictures of boring
You should check out my Flickr page; I'm intimately acquainted with boring.

TURKEY HOMEMADE PORNO
Is this homemade porn from the country Turkey or porn that involves poultry?

penis geodes
I'm not cracking one of those open.

change vagina's taste
New! From the makers of Kool-Aid!

Postum if you got 'em

This morning I ventured out to the dreaded Wal-Mart to see if I could get my hands on a jar of Postum. Yes, Postum. It's a caffeine-free coffee substitute invented by noted cereal baron and whacko, C.W. Post in the late 19th century. (He also invented Grape Nuts, a cereal that contains no grape and no nuts. The man was a genius!) Post (a follower of another cereal barron, whacko, anti-masturbation crusader, and enema enthusiast, John Harvey Kellogg) considered coffee unhealthy and came up with a substitute made of wheat bran, wheat, molasses, and corn dextrin. All of this is roasted and ground up until it looks sort of like instant coffee. (In the South during the Civil War, the North cut off coffee supplies so it was common for people to roast things like grain, chicory, peanuts, acorns and brew them like coffee. My guess this is where Post got the idea from.)

I found it without much too much difficulty right there in the coffee and tea aisle. Postum! At last, victory was mine! So I grabbed a jar and made my way up to the checkout line to pay for it. No doubt I didn't impress the chunky goth-lite girl behind the cash register because the only people who buy Postum are older than your grandparents. Once the last of the people who remember WWII die off, Kraft Foods will probably dump Postum. But let's hope not.

So, this Postum, you ask, what does it taste like? At first I was afraid it would taste like off-brand dollar store instant coffee (or worse, Folgers) because that's kind of what it smelled like. But much to my surprise, Postum is actually kind of good. It does taste a little like cheap instant coffee, but it doesn't have that rank, burnt taste instant coffee always has. And it thankfully doesn't taste like Folgers instant. I like it. I can't say I'd want to give up real coffee for it or that I would want to drink it everyday, but I do like it. And I suspect it would go well with ice cream.

Addendum: This originally was a comment, but apparently it had too many links in it and Haloscan wouldn't let me post it.

The German coffee substitute I mentioned in my reply to Xolo's comment is called Pero, and it's actually Swiss, not German. Another Swiss one is Cafix.

There's a Bolivian one called Café de Cebada.

And on the herbal, healthfood side of things, there's Bambu, soy coffee, Teechino, and ramon nut coffee.

So there's a whole lot of coffee substitutes out there. No idea if any of these actually taste like coffee. Or if they go well with ice cream.

-----------------

2/11/08 Addendum: Since Kraft announced back in December (or whenever) that they had discontinued Postum, my humble blog has had a sudden, and fairly large, increase in visitors, most of whom are looking for Postum. A quick check at Google shows this blog entry is the second listed website for Postum. I'm suddenly one of the internet's leading authorities on Postum. Sadly, there's no way for me to cash in on this.

Today I got an email from Seattle Bob who informed me had formed a brand new Yahoo group for Postum lovers. Just go to the Yahoo Groups page and type in Postum. Bob outlined the aims for his group in his email:

The purpose of the group is multi-fold:


1. To lobby Kraft to resume production. I think this is a dead issue. A Kraft employee posted on one site that they had already removed the production equipment from the factory, But if they see a niche demand, they may decide to sell the rights to someone else.
2. To keep this story in the media. I am encouraging people to contact news media, and keep the pressure on Kraft. I am hoping to creat a "New Coke" type marketing fiasco for them.
3. To encourage people to contact smaller food processors and suggest Postum may fit into their marketing plan, and ask them to approach Kraft to sell them the rights to Postum. This seems to be the best scenario in my opinion. Even if there isn't a large enough pot for Kraft, a guarenteed market of a couple million people would be a tempting "cash cow" for a smaller processor.
4. Discuss alternate products from other manufacturers, such as Pero and Cafix, although I have tried them both, and they are terrible! I think they try too hard to simulate the taste of coffee, and end up tasting like bad coffee.
5. If all else fails, to try to crack the recipe, and make Postum in small batches for personal consumption. CW Post originally made small batches for his sanitarium in an 1890's commercial kitchen, all the ingredients are listed on the jar, and are available in retail quantities, so it may be possible to hack the recipe.... you know, 12 monkeys typing. It is also another way of letting Kraft, and other food processors know there is an interest.

So instead of desperately reading my old blog entry, go join the Postum group!

One interesting thing I've dug up on my own is an alleged recipe for homemade Postum. I have no idea if it's the same thing as what Kraft sold, but it's worth trying I suppose.

One last thing. I have a confession to make. Back in December I gave away my sole jar of Postum to my sister because it had been sitting around untouched for months. Now I'm kind of wishing I'd kept it despite being kind of sick of it.

2/18/08 Addendum: The madness continues. Now there's a post at Metafilter on the discontinuation of Postum. And there's a few interesting links. (Thankfully they left me out of it.)

9/28/11 Addendum: There's a site called Ersatzcoffee.com that sells a Postum substitute. I haven't tried it.

Self portrait

Vote

My philosophy of life

I had to suffer for my art, now it's your turn.

My original of this mid 90's collage hung in my sister's kitchen for years. The text came from a Beetle Bailey strip, believe it or not.

Of things bloggy and dull

A few days ago I posted something about Blogrolling not working. I don't know if any of you noticed, but Ross Rader from Blogrolling left a comment on that post:

We've seen a couple of problems related to some unrelated code that runs on the same cluster. I'm working on a solution that should elminate this problem permanently, but we're in a bit of a reactive mode right now - ugh.

The good news is that we can look forward to Blogrolling 2.0 coming out this summer. More details on that soon...

So it's not dead, just slightly dormant. When the new version comes out I'll definitely try it.

Also, you may have noticed the obtrusive ad in the sidebar. Yes, I'm experimenting with the Google ads again. I wish I could just display ads in my archives because that's where I get the overwhelming majority of my hits. That way maybe those people constantly searching for various bizarre items and services can finally find what they're looking for. Sadly, some of those folks are beyond help.

The young inventor

Since yesterday's old artwork went over so well [note: sarcasm] I decided to post more. I think the collage below from 1994 doesn't need any explanation at all.



Now I don't feel quite so bad about squandering my 20's. [Buries head in hands and sobs.]

Old crap

Over the past week, my sister has been posting some of her weird collages from the mid 90's. I too can play this game of posting old crap I did well over a decade ago. So today I'm posting this comic I drew back in 1989. It used to be my dream to be a cartoonist and this sad, scrawling monstrosity goes a long way in explaining why I never achieved my goal. [WARNING: Huge picture of something stupid.]

Oh, the horror

A couple of posts down I made fun of the people who blundered across my blog while searching for really stupid and/or bizarre things. This morning while looking for something else, I found a pie chart of the top search requests people have used to hit my blog over the past 365 days. Great shrieking Christ on a Tilt-A-Whirl, this is a strange thing to read through. Or maybe it's just depressing. Do people ever search for normal, non-deranged, non-porn things while online?

3 extra on your willy?

A couple of weeks ago I noticed a pattern in the penis enlargement spam I was getting. (Yes, I know, I should be deleting these and not reading them for my amusement, but I have no life. Humor me.) In certain emails the first sentence was always a bizarre variation of the same statement. It's sort of like the spam version of Raymond Queneau's Exercises in Style, a book where a trivial incident between two men is shown in 99 different styles. Well, OK, maybe it's not quite the same thing as what Queneau did, but I found it sort of interesting. Kinda.

If you wish to find advice with respect to by which means you are able to accumulate a few additional measures for your male organ, see our site.

If you expect to gain information relating to in which way you are able to reach another measure in your reproduction organ, don't hesitate to see our website.

If you are wanting to gain info on by which means you can achieve largeness (u know what :P)), you have come to the right place.

If you are wondering for recommendation relating to by which means you could grow some + in the breadth of your rod, do the right thing.

You need information with respect to in which manner you could amplify more size for -----D, you've opened the right email.

Should you want recommendation dealing with in which way you can accumulate a few additional measures for your x organ, u have to check out our page

We can give you expert's knowledge about how you could increase a few more inches in your male organ, do the right thing.

But now that I think about it, these are more likely just permutations done with a program than simply variations in style written by humans. I haven't really looked, but I imagine that I could break these down into four or five parts. As an example, if there were four parts and six different ways of wording each part, that would be 6 x 6 x 6 x 6, which would give you 1296 different versions of the same statement.

The lesson here? I amuse easily and have no life at all. Sad really.

Blogrolling no more?

I believe Blogrolling is dead. I'm referring to the site or maybe the actual functionality of the code. When a blog on your list updates an asterisk (or whatever else you chose) pops up beside the link. Mine hasn't worked properly in quite some time, something I originally blamed on the new Blogger code which seems to be incompatible with some of the third-party add-ons we've all been using for years.

This morning I decided to see if I could fix it by replacing the code with new code. Nope. Still broke. To see if I could find a fix, I went to their forums but instead found out lots of other people are having the same problems and the powers that be weren't doing anything about it. In fact, there hadn't been an update to the news portion of the main site since last summer. So it appears that Blogrolling is all but dead. Our links are still displayed and they still work, but that's it.

Tucows bought Blogrolling some time back, so it's kind of odd that they would buy this service and then basically abandon it.

So how do we go about fixing out Blogrolls? We don't. Instead we dump them in favor of blogLinx. It's in beta, it's free, you can easily import your old Blogroll data, and it actually works.

The stupider side of the internet

Since I can't think of anything else to write about, here's yet another post of stupid search requests actual humans have used to blunder across my humble blog.

Rube Goldberg marital aid
Great idea for a porno movie.

so me pichers off how to fined a womans g spot
Like any woman in her right mind would ever let you try to find it.

pop ups, hearing things , flashbacks stuff that happen in real life
Seriously, do you even know what you're looking for?

"enormous schlong" wife
That's so not the kind of wife I want.

watching videos of BRUSHING a dog's TEETH ONLY
That's one kink even I've never heard of.

funny events that happened in the year 1973
Nothing funny happened in 1973. Nothing.

under no circumstances should the bagpipes be mistaken for a musical instrument
But I like bagpipes.

pictures for wanking in front of porn
The porn is for... Oh, forget it. You'll never understand.

girls accidentally peeing in stores
Yet another reason not to open a store.

"but i was naked"
Nudity's rarely a good excuse.

Staples, Do they drug tesT?
Ah, yes, the cream of America's work force. Remind me not to shop at Staples. I'd rather not have to deal with either Cheech or Chong when I want to get some paper for my printer.

can lava melt everyting?
Get off the island, now! You need an airplane or boat, not Google in this situation.

Enema Warehouse
This is either the title of a movie I don't want to see or the name of a company I don't want to work for.

small pens porn
And the winner for least interesting porn category is...

cartoon of someone wanking on the internet
Don't do that, you'll get the internet all sticky.

Of things spammy

I can understand a subject line that reads "start losing weight", but I simply can't fathom one that reads "start losing weight groin". Leave my groin out of it, please. Or your groin. Whatever. Also, "fiduciary less victorious" doesn't fill me with confidence either.

Mystery solved

The astonishing Dr. X has identified the odd birds shown in the above photo: they're cormorants. After a bit of Googling, I found a page on them that shows, and explains, the wing-drying behavior I saw (but didn't get a photo of).

To get the above picture, I had to set the camera to its maximum resolution, max out the 4 x optical zoom, and then crop it when I got home. That's a small section of fairly massive photo.

Down by the river

I went back down to the river this morning, but this time I had a bag of sunflower seeds to feed to the geese. My only fear was that they would rush me, peck me in the nuts, and when I was on the ground in a fetal position, they would eat all the sunflower seeds, then peck me to death. Fortunately, that didn't happen. When I tossed the first handful of seeds on the ground they all came to me, but didn't eat the seeds that much. They're probably too full from being fed potato chips and popcorn all day every day.

Anyway, I put up more photos at my Flickr page.

Photos of boring stuff

I posted around twenty-four pictures over at my mostly unused Flickr page. All the stuff I mentioned yesterday is there: the bridges, the scenery, the squalor, the geese, the ducks, and even the big snake.

Gooselets!

I went for a long walk along the river this morning, something I haven't done in a couple of years. Since I'm now unemployed I have the time for frivolous things like enjoying myself. I walked the new section of the paved walking trail that runs along the river. No idea how far I walked, but it was a few miles at least.

The trail is an odd juxtaposition of beautiful river scenery on one side and depressing industrial squalor on the other. Danville is trying to make itself look less ugly and depressing, and it sort of works in places, but since there's so many closed factories and mills with smashed out windows, the curtain of beautification isn't anywhere near large enough. This city has the highest jobless rate in the Virginia and the eighth highest in the nation.

With my spiffy new digital camera at the ready, I took pictures of everything in sight, including both the beautiful river scenery and the depressing abandoned buildings. I even got a couple of photos of a big snake. But mainly I took pictures of geese. I took almost 150 pictures total and maybe half of those are of geese. They were all over the place and in a better mood than usual. Well, the Canada geese are pretty relaxed most of the time, but the feral domestic geese are usually a bit obnoxious and more than a little aggressive. I was able to get closer than I usually can and they seemed not to care that much that I was standing there like a rube taking loads of photos.

I was planning to post more than one photo, but I took so many that it's overwhelming. Maybe I'll work up enough enthusiasm to put a bunch up at Flickr. Maybe not. The photo at the top of the page is one of the better ones I got. The white goose is apparently the father and the mottled one is the mother. At first I didn't notice the little goslings, who must've hatched quite recently, because the two big geese were sitting on them. The white goose was very protective of the little ones and on several occasions chased off Canada geese that got too close. I thought of running down and snatching one up to take home as a pet, but I didn't relish being pecked to death by those honking abominations. I'm joking, of course, but geese are rather big and kind of scary.

A really long-ass post (with pictures)

I hit Richmond friday evening and didn't get back until a few hours ago. The above photo shows one of the many hardships I endured at my stay in Casa de Catastrophe. Why this animal isn't bald by now is mystery best left to those more qualified to investigate it. Everything my sister owns is covered in cat hair. Everything I brought back home is covered in cat hair. I've probably got it in my lungs.

The reason I was in Richmond in the first place was to go to Ravencon and meet up with Sherri and Jay. So my sister and I went yesterday around four. Neither I nor my sister go to cons, so we basically wandered around like lost dogs and just generally got in everyone's way. I brought my camera, but was too embarrassed to actually take photos of the people dressed up like Storm Troopers and whatever the hell else they were supposed to be. (You can tell I really keep my finger on the pulse of modern science fiction and fantasy, huh?)



I did get a picture of the scheduled events taking place, most of which we didn't see. Actually, I don't think we saw any of them. We're just not hep to this convention stuff. In a world of nerds we're just a couple of dorks.

When weren't getting in the way, or bothering Sherri and Jay at their big table in the dealer room, we sat on a couch at the far end of a hallway away from the con action and talked about stuff that had nothing to do with the con.



In the above photo you can actually see the convention at the far end of the hallway. Well, actually you can't see anything because it's too dark, but that stuff on the foreground table was free. We both loaded up on free stuff, because it's like, you know, free stuff.

We did actually meet an author, which is appropriate since the con was devoted to science fiction and fantasy authors. C.J. Henderson, who I must admit I'd never heard of (but I'd also never heard of the big famous guy on the schedule that won all the awards), had a table set up in the hallway and was seriously working at selling his books. He could probably sell water to fish. I bought a book and my sister bought two.

While I regret not taking pictures of people in costumes, I mostly regret not buying any of the dice from the dice-guy. I like dice. I have regular six sided ones, but none of the multi-sided Dungeons & Dragons types. He had loads of many types of dice and even though I looked several times, I didn't buy any (dumbass that I am). Not that I want them to play Dungeons & Dragons or any other RPG. Nope. I'm fascinated by the random number thing. Yes, seriously. I actually own a copy of the Rand Corporation's A Million Random Digit and 100,000 Normal Deviates in book form even though I could've downloaded it free. (You think maybe I was at the wrong convention?)

All in all it was interesting and fun evening. I even got tanked up on free Mexican food and later unexpectedly got to say hi to Jammies on the phone. My usual Saturday would've passed with me in front of the computer slowly irradiating myself.

Tedium

Well, I'm here in Stinktown. Right now my sister's at work and her ramshackle apartment and filthy cat are at my disposal. Later this afternoon we'll head out to the Con to do whatever the hell people do at Cons.

The trip

Today at 2:00pm I leave for Stinktown (aka Richmond) to rendezvous with Sherri and Jay at Ravencon. Maybe this year I'll actually get to see a little of the con unlike last year's rain-besotted, sleep-deprived fiasco.

Since my sister hasn't been answering her email over the past few days, no doubt the first words out of her mouth when I show up will be, "What are you doing up here?" And I'll say, "Well, Grouchy McButthead, if you would check your email more than once a month you would know what I'm up here for."

A fun time will be had by all.

Update 12:52pm. I just got an email from Grouchy written in her usual thoughtful, poetic, and highly cultured style: "Today??? This weekend? Dammit dammit sonofabitch."

Never too late

I didn't get one on Easter, but I did finally get a chocolate rabbit. Sadly, cheap chocolate doesn't exactly age like a fine wine.

Here, my dear

All my worries are over. I've struck it rich! Look at this email I just got:

Hello Dear,

I know you don't not know me in person, however I will want you to bear with me after reading my mail and be of good assistance to me. Of which you know bad people in this world has made us not to trust the good once again, but i really want you to trust me, because i always like truth and honesty in anything i am doing, and let truth and honesty be our watch word in this transaction.
For your information, my name is Mr. Ken Samuel , i am working in a Bank here in Côte D'Ivoire as the remittance director of our Bank. Be informed that i am writing you this proposal in regards to a trust transfer of the sum of $6,500,000 ( Six Million Five Hundren Thousand Dollars) That was deposited by one Late Dr. Richard Ahmend. And since he died nobody has come for the claims of the fund, so that is why i am writing you this proposal as the remittance director of our Bank, in order for you to make claims of the fund as a New Appointed Beneficiary to Late Dr. Richard Ahmend.
In addition, there is no risk in this transaction, all i need from you is for you to help me with a trustworthy account where i am going to transfer the fund into, and once the fund gets into your account, i am going to give you the sum of 30% for your assistance. So if you have agree to help me, do not fail to get back to me, in order for me to give you the full details on how the fund will be transferred into your account without any problem.

Best Regards,
Mr.Ken Samuel.

Wait, why'd he call me Dear?

I haven't gotten one of these 419 scam emails in a long time. I wish I'd kept the ones I've gotten in the past. They're little works of art. Stupid art, yes, but still art.

It speaks volumes of my terminal boredom that I'm considering writing this assclown back. Maybe I should hook him up with one of those slutty Russian girls who keep sending me spam. It'll be a head-on collision of dumbass.

Update 4/25/07: He never did write me back. Jackass.

Unemployed

As of Friday morning I no longer work for the stupid party supply company run by irrational idiots. I quit. Why should I work somewhere that literally makes me miserable every single day?

Meanwhile, I'll be eating ramen.

It is joke, comrade

This photo is the funniest thing I've seen on Ebay in a long time. Or maybe it's the stupidest thing I've seen on Ebay in a long time. Whichever it is, you have to be a camera nerd to appreciate it. See, it's a clunky Ukranian FED 5, a camera you can buy for under $50. (I've got a FED 5S and can vouch for its clunkiness.) And it's been painted black and someone's put Leica logos and stuff on it so that it sorta, kinda, maybe looks like a black M-series Leica if you squint and are really drunk or high. M-series Leicas cost thousands new and are only slightly cheaper used. (The lovely M7 in the photo below costs more than my Buick, I'm sure.) Translated into non-camera nerd speak: It's the equivalent of painting Porsche on a Yugo.
The dealer (located in Moscow) isn't selling it as a real Leica, it's advertised as a "Perfect copy of a Leica". And he isn't selling to make tons of money either. You can buy the thing for $108. I can't see it fooling anyone but the very stupid. Mainly I suppose it appeals to camera collectors as a sort of joke.

Spam, spam, spam, spam, spam

My spam for the most part is the usual stuff: penis-enlargement, prescription drugs, fake Rolexes, weight loss, stock tips, diploma mills, etc. Lately though I've gotten a few interesting ones, mainly from Eastern Bloc spammers catering to my baser needs:

My name is kourtney. I found your email on that dating site.
I also love sex on the side. I have a loving partner but he is working 16 hours a day and we have sex only once a week :(
If you are interested and wanna see my pictures just email me at ckourtney51@fakeassemail.info
Don`t reply, use the email above (my boyfriend doesn`t know about that email!)

A recent spam touting some vague business opportunity ended in the following bewildering fashion:

Sorry if this was sent to you by mistake as we were told you are someone interested in this type of thing.

Now worries send me back a email letting me know you wish no more.

But today I got perhaps the greatest spam I've ever read:

If you are a lesbian and you can't find your better half, if you lack attention and love, if you can't find understanding with other girls and you want to change your life, please, read this. Now you have a fantastic chance to start your new life, saving from all your problems and hang-ups.

If you want to - Change your life;
- Save from your problems and hang-ups;
- Become more sexually attractive for other girls;
- Meet more beautiful women, without any problems;
- Grab all the attention;
- Increase your self-confidence;
- Get approached by another lezzies far more often;
- Make a fantastic impression every day and hour - You have a chance to do this now!

Alpha-Pheromone perfume - it is a unique way to change your life. It is a perfume for sexual attraction of humans of the opposite sex. Now, we propose you an excellent possibility to order Alpha-Pheromone perfume to attract lesbians! You will forget all your problems with your single life! Buying Alpha-Pheromone perfume, you will open new prospects for your intimate and everyday life.

And they ever have a website.

Damn, it's really too bad I'm not a lesbian or I'd be all over that like stink on an ape. But perhaps that's a poor choice of words.

Too much paranoias

The internet paranoia continues. Yesterday morning I opened my Yahoo mail account and saw there was a message from some My Space person. (Yes, I have a My Space account which I never, ever use. One of you, who shall remain nameless, semi-badgered me into getting it a couple of years ago so I could read their stuff during their brief(?) obsession with My Space.) The only email I get from My Space people are from the occasional cam whore, and even that's kind of rare.

I logged into My Space and looked into my messages. The first one I saw had a subject that was my name (with the last name) and several question marks. Naturally, I began to panic wondering who had tracked me down this time. Maybe it was my old gym teacher, Mr. Whatshisname. That red-faced little freak, I'd like to mash his head. But I digress.

So I read the message, which was from some girl asking if I was the same Scott that went to some high school I've never heard of. How did she get my last name? My last name isn't anywhere on the damn My Space page. The only information there is the name Scott, my age, and the state I live in. Nothing else. No links. No photos. No posts of any kind. Nothing. Was it was just a total shot in the dark on her part? She saw my name was Scott, that I was the right age (I guess), and that I live in Virginia? And she somehow got my last name right? Bizarre.

I sent her a message through My Space (the first time I've ever done this, really) and told her she had the wrong Scott. She sent a quick reply saying she was sorry and wished my a happy Easter. And for some reason she changed her avatar from a picture of a dog on a couch to a photo of herself. Whatever. I still don't know who she is, but it kind of creeps me out.

If brains were gunpowder

Today someone at work seriously suggested to me that I could get the hair on my arms transplanted to my ever-balding head. This person says all kinds of bizarre and idiotic things constantly, but as hairy as my arms are, do they really think they would be a suitable treatment for my bald head? I should probably consider myself lucky he didn't suggest that I get the hair from my butt.

Creeping paranoia

Earlier in the week I checked my Yahoo mail account because I wanted to look at my spam since it's gotten sort of interesting lately. (Yes, I fully aware of how much I need a life.) In the regular inbox there was an email with a subject that read "old high school friend" or something similar. (I'm too lazy to check.) I sort of groaned when I saw it, wondering who on earth was contacting me. No one ever sends me email unless they want me to have a larger penis, buy prescription drugs, invest in dodgy schemes, or help them get millions of dollars out of a Nigerian bank. OK, I'm exaggerating, but I don't get much personal email in this account, which is also the email account for this blog.

I looked at the name on the email and it was Jeff, my old best friend from like 7th grade until he moved away right after 10th grade. How the hell did he find me after all these years? After we exchanged an email or two I found out. Back in December I put some information up on my old unused Flickr account and then forgot about it. I put my name (with last name), a small photo of my face in all its hideousness, my hometown, my email address, and a link to my blog. GAH! What did I do that for? (I plead insanity.) An old high school friend tracking me down via Google and Flickr is one thing, but family members and co-workers possibly doing it is something else entirely, so I took that information down and then went around the entire internet taking other information down in a fit of paranoia worthy of the Nixon administration. So I guess the crisis (such as it was) has been averted. My nightmares involve me being shown a printout of my blog at work and asked to explain myself. Other nightmares involve me being spanked by naked midgets, but I digress.

Anyway, back to Jeff. We used to play Dungeons & Dragons together and he and his older brother Mike would come over to my house to play video games on the Atari 2600 or Commodore 64 and annoy my sister. We were nerds. Hmmm... Sounds like I had an almost normal childhood. Or at least a really nerdy adolescence. Good thing I grew out of that. Shut-up!

Jeff was so inspired by the inanities of my blog that he's gone and started his very own. So enjoy the blogging enthusiasm while it lasts, Jeff. When the enthusiasm takes a hike, as mine did long ago, you'll look at your blog one morning and say, "Why the hell do I do this?"

Career opportunities

Remember last month (or whenever) when I was going on about this new better paying job I might get? No? Well, just play along and pretend you know what the hell I'm talking about. I decided not to take the job. Actually, I made this decision a couple of weeks ago, but just never got around to mentioning it here because I'm wracked with sloth. I toured the place and saw the horrible jobs on offer and just couldn't see myself doing them for any length of time without shooting myself. It's like Dante's Inferno in there. And I messed up my lower back around the same time basically doing nothing. There's heavy lifting on this job and I'd end up in traction after a few hours of schlepping heavy crap. Oh, and they have twelve hour shifts. I'll pass.

So, in lieu of a life of toil and misery, I've decided to give up regular work altogether and follow my dream of becoming a clown. I'll rent myself out to children's parties and the like. My name will be Fuzzy-Nuts the Clown.

The American system of taxation is deranged and criminal

Over the weekend I decided that I'd put off doing my taxes long enough. Last year I started doing them myself online and I recalled it being fairly boring and somewhat nit-picky, but not necessarily difficult. So Saturday night I turned off the Miles Davis and Velvet Underground CDs and set to work.

It didn't start so well as I couldn't locate last year's return. I couldn't even remember the password I'd used on the unnamed tax filing conglomerate's website where I did my taxes. Eventually I found last year's return, but I couldn't locate anything else other than the W-2 from my job and the sad document from my bank showing the miniscule amount generated by the interest in my checking account.

About two thirds of the way through I had an actual fit. I was asked to provide information from some strange document I didn't have. If I didn't have it and didn't even know what the hell it was, then how I was supposed to provide the information they needed? The website's "help" feature was strangely silent on this subject. After a long episode of pained ranting and muttered curses, I figured out that what they wanted was the goddamn document from my bank listing my checking interest. Whatever.

To make a long story even longer and sadly duller, I ended up owing money. Almost $100, to be exact. I've never owed money to the government and I've always gotten a return. The returns have gotten steadily smaller over the years, but I've still gotten them. Last year's was around $280 or so. I was hoping to use this year's return toward getting a new digital camera.

At my job, once January 1 comes around, my co-workers always go on and on about their tax return and what they're going to do with the money. But the people who always do this have kids. Single childless people (like me) get the shaft. So I've decided to get married and have a few kids. Naturally it'll be a marriage of misery and suffering. The kids will end up hopelessly maladjusted, even as maladjusted as I am. And a few of you have spent time with me in meat-space, so you have an inkling of just how maladjusted I am.

My requirements for a mate are few. She must be of robust nature. She must be able to fend for herself. She must be able to keep the damn kids away from my stuff. And she must be willing to engage in the occasional bout of vigorous love-making. Mainly I just need a female human of some sort and some kids. Also, I'd like it if she were able to do what the woman in the picture above is doing. Naked.

Photo courtesy of Spam Glam.

Recycling

A woman who works in our office walked in from the warehouse and said, "It smells like a popcorn toilet bowl in here." I just looked at her because I had no idea what she was talking about. Apparently on the other side of the office there was yet another urinal cake being utilized as a air freshener and someone had a freshly nuked bag of microwave popcorn in one of their desk drawers.

Then I began to wonder if it were possible to retrofit an old toilet so it could pop popcorn. The water tank is the perfect place for unpopped corn, and if the bowl had heating elements attached to it, the corn can be popped. There's even a lid. A flush would not only dump the unpopped kernels into the bowl, but the popped corn would be forced out the back into a collection bag.

Navel oranges?

During a typically moronic office discussion, one of my coworkers said, "I know a woman who's so fat you could stick an orange in her navel." My fist thought was, why would anyone want to put an orange in there?

Oh, agony

I strained my back several days ago lifting heavy stuff and then aggravated it further by having to stand for hours a couple of days later. Wednesday morning I could barely get out of bed and ended walking around like Quasimodo at work the rest of the day while my coworkers said things like, "poor baby," and "someone get Scott a wheelchair". This morning was even worse with nausea and flop sweat. So I called in sick and went to the doctor.

Waiting rooms are named correctly. That's all I have to say about that.

I got an injection in the ass with cortisone and something else. One in each cheek. It was the most action I've had in a while, but I digress. Then I was x-rayed. I was expecting the worst, but it turned out that I only had pulled muscles and not the slipped disc I was afraid of. (A nine year old kid in the next room with back pain bit and kicked someone trying to hold him down during the examination. I was better behaved.)

The injections worked miracles and soon I'll have the muscle relaxants and pain killers I was prescribed. Then I'll really be feeling good. All that and a doctor's note saying that I don't have to work tomorrow will end up a nice birthday present, but anything's better than searing spinal pain.

Let's call it love

I think I just met my future wife in the spam folder of my Yahoo mail account:

Do not ignore me please,
I found your email somewhere and now decided to write you.
Let me know if you do not mind. If you want I can send you some pictures of me.
I am a nice pretty girl. Don't reply to this email.
Email me direclty at dstacy0@findmehigh.info

I shall call her Spamuella.

Tragically delicious

Yesterday morning I found myself in a grocery store wandering around like a zombie. I drifted into the frozen food section and glanced over the nauseous selection. Out of the corner of my eye I saw what at first looked like a picture of Osama Bin Laden on a yellow box of fish sticks. It was the Gorton's Fisherman.

Enter the beaver

I was going over some stuff at work and noticed that one of our customers has a store on Beaver Ruin Road. Yes, Beaver Ruin Road. Just how bad did the beaver ruin have to be for them to name a road after it? That must've been some serious beaver ruin. Old timers in the area often tell about it, I imagine. After a bad thunderstorm someone will say something like, "Wow, that was a really bad storm!" Then one of the old guys will spit out some tobacco juice and say, "Bad? Boy, you don't know bad. It's nothing like what the beavers did back in '26. I still have nightmares."

International relations

Things suck at work, but they have gotten slightly more interesting with the recent addition of genuine Latvian mail order bride. Well, OK, she's not a mail order bride, but she did come all the way from Latvia to marry some guy from this area that she met online. And she speaks better English than most of my coworkers. She's also really hot, but that doesn't help me much.

Tinkling terrors

The paragraphs below were a superfluous comment for the previous post, but since it was sort of long and had nothing to do with the post in question, I decided to make it a post of its own. Aren't you all just so so damn lucky?

And speaking of peeing... Last year I was in my sister's crappy new apartment. When I needed to use the facilities I was distressed to discover that the door wouldn't shut all the way. I knew my sister wouldn't barge in on me, but I still wanted the door to latch. For a lack of anything else to do, I shut the door as far as it would close and hoped for the best. (Whatever that means.)

I stood in front of the toilet and tried to concentrate. Suddenly there was a flash of orange at my lower left. I jolted slightly and looked down. Her damn cat had wedged his head into the crack between the door and the frame and had come into the bathroom without my knowing. He had his front paws up on the edge of the toilet and was looking down into the bowl. (My sister has to keep the lid down so he won't drink out of it.)

I couldn't pee with him like this, so I picked him up and put him in the bathtub so he could drink the trickle of water coming out the faucet. If I'd inadvertently splattered a little on him while I was taking a leak I knew I would have a difficult time explaining to my sister just how it was I had managed to accidentally pee on her cat. But with him in the bathtub, I could sort of pee in peace, although he totally spoiled my concentration.

Commercialisms

Several posts down I was griping about seeing an AARP commercial that used a Buzzcocks song. Well, it's happened again. A few days ago I was watching TV and heard a familiar bass riff. It was the Jam's great "Start" being used to sell Cadillacs of all things. (If you're not familiar with this song it has the same bass line as the Beatles' "Taxman". And if you're not familiar with either the Jam's "Start" or the Beatles' "Taxman", I have some bad news for you: your record collection probably sucks. Sorry to be the bearer of bad news.)

So lets review my outrages. I've heard the Buzzcocks in an AARP commercial and in a car commercial. I've heard the Jam in a car commercial. I've heard Stiff Little Fingers' "Gotta Getaway" in a video game commercial. I've heard Iggy and the Stooges' "TV Eye" in a minivan commercial. I've also heard the Velvet Underground's "Heroin" (sans lyrics, of course) in a minivan commercial. I've heard an early Ramones song in a commercial, but I can't remember what it was. (Was it a cellphone company?) And I've heard a Feelies song in a Citibank commercial. Good god, have I left any out?

I hate this sort of stuff. It's bad enough to hear classic rock stuff like Zeppelin and the Who in commercials, but it's really annoying for me to hear great, more non-commercial stuff in commercials. (Non-commercial in the sense that most of the bands listed above didn't have any US hits.)

Naturally, if I were in the Feelies and Citibank offered me a bunch of money I'd take it, but it still irritates me to hear music that a lot of us (like me) think of as thumbing its collective nose at big time rock'n'roll success being used to hawk crap I can't afford.

If companies are going to do this sort of thing, why not at least make it interesting? (Although using "Heroin" to sell minivans is pretty interesting. Or maybe just deranged.) Why not use the Buzzcocks' "Orgasm Addict" in a Viagra commercial? How about Big Star's "Holocaust" to sell Prozac? And now that I think about it, the pharmaceutical industry would have a field day with alternative/indie rock stuff. But I don't want to give anyone any ideas, not without a commission at least.

Found money

Last night I dreamed I found a $500 bill in my wallet. Oddly, I wasn't that surprised. Even odder was that the bill had a picture of Mr.T on it.

How to succeed in business with even a really stupid idea

Sometimes the best ideas come to us in the dead of night. Sometimes not.

I woke up last night and suddenly had an idea for a business: a store that sold nothing but laxatives. The name? Laxative Land!

Curse you, Red Baron!

I dreamed I was reading the newspaper comics and in one strip Snoopy had diabetes and the punchline was that he couldn't find his insulin.

You'd have thought that Charlie Brown would be taking care of this sort of thing rather than having his dog manage his own illness, but maybe since the damn dog can type (among other things), Charlie Brown figured he'd be fine looking after himself.

Brrrr!

It's still to cold to blog. Hell, it's too cold to do anything except eat and sleep. Too bad I can't get paid to eat and sleep. But only if I didn't have to leave home, of course. No reviewing hotel and restaurant for me. Nope. I just want to get money for not leaving the house at all. Better yet, pay me not to get off the couch. I'll need bathroom breaks though.

Get a job!

It's too cold to blog! It's 62ºF in my office.

Meanwhile, I have a shot at getting a really nice paying job. (It's more than twice what I'm currently making, which isn't saying much since I'm paid in balloons and whoopie-cushions.) I have to go and take a test and fill out an application on Tuesday morning. And it's only a five minute drive from home. Problem? I need at least three references. Who the hell ever has references? I never have them. I always end up with these weird family friends. God only knows what they say about me if they're ever called. I need real references. Anyone out there want to be one of my references? Seriously. I'm not joking.

God, I'm pathetic.

What?

I'm getting some added responsibilities at work that include having to do a detailed report on a regular basis. (No raise, though. Bastards.) The guy who's going to train me to do the report told me that I would be good at it because I was "very tedious". I'm thinking he meant something like meticulous, but you never know. Maybe I am tedious.

Old

A few days ago while watching a bit of the network news to make sure the world hadn't come to an end while I was frittering away my life with my head in a series of books, I saw a commercial with a familiar song being used as background music. It was a Buzzcocks tune, "Everybody's Happy Nowadays", a classic blast of catchy buzz saw British punk circa 1978.

What was it a commercial for? The goddamn AARP, you know that organization for old people. Of course the original members of the Buzzcocks (sadly reunited to cash in on the current cheap punk nostalgia of people who didn't even exist in 1978) are pretty damn old these days.

The internet? Meh

I haven't been blogging or reading blogs over the past week. In fact I haven't spent much time at all online. I've been reading lots of books since Christmas and these days I'd much rather read on the couch than sit in front of my computer with a string of drool coming out of my mouth while I flip through endless websites. I can drool just fine on the couch with a book.

Oh, the agony

The unspeakable Jammies has tagged for a meme. Something about grabbing a book that's close to your computer, noting the title, going to page 123, reading the first five sentences on that page, and then copying out the next three sentences. Or something along those lines. No idea why anyone would want to do this, but such is life.

The closest books to my computer are a dictionary and a big-ass Mouser catalog. So instead I just reached over my right shoulder and grabbed a volume from the shelves right behind me.

The volume? Sane Sex Life & Sane Sex Living by H.W. Long, M.D. (I even found a reprint online.) The subtitle of the book is "Some Things that All Sane People Ought to Know About Sex Nature and Sex Functioning; Its Place in the Economy of Life, Its Proper Training and Righteous Exercise". The book was published by the Eugenics Publishing Co,. Inc. in 1937. Yes, eugenics.

If you're wondering why I have this book, I buy old, weird sex education books when I find them. They're quite amusing. And educational. Which probably goes a long way to explaining why I'm single. But I digress.

Oh, the sentences. They're not that interesting, but here goes:

But it paid to wait, for their doing so proved that the bride had two weeks of "free time" in each month, and this was worth all it cost to find out! Take time!

And now let it be added that it is a great accomplishment for a husband and wife to be free from a fear of pregnancy as a result of coitus.

These sentences refer (I suppose) to what's usually called the "rhythm method" or what I like to call the "How did I end up with all of these goddamn kids method".

Now the bad part. I'm supposed to tag three people. OK, first I'll tag Sara because not only will she not do it, she probably won't even know she's been tagged. Then I'll tag my sister just for the pleasure of pissing her off. Heh-heh. And, lastly, I'll tag Sherri even though she's probably already been tagged. So there.

Phoning it in

Sherri posted this new meme thingy that looks intriguiging. Actually, it just looks like an easy to way to do a post without breaking a sweat.

What you do:

1. Go to Wikipedia.
2. In the Search box, type your birth month and day (but not year).
3. List three events that happened on your birthday.
4. List two important birthdays and one interesting death.
5. List any holidays
6. Post it.

Simple! Whatever. [Grumble.]

My birthday's March 24th.

1. OK, three events. Hmmm... In 1832 a group of men tarred and feathered Mormon leader Joseph Smith Jr. In 1973 Pink Floyd released Dark Side of the Moon. And in 1989 the Exxon Valdez, with a sleeping drunk at the helm, ran aground and dumped an ass-load of oil on the Alaskan coast.

2. Two important birthdays. I have several interesting people sharring my birthday and I recall writing a post about it once or twice over the past few years. Here's two: Harry Houdini and Wilhelm Reich.

3. One important death. Only one? But there's so many. OK. Jules Verne.

4. Any holidays? How about World Tuberculosis Day? Party down!

Free and weird

Some Russian has gone and scanned what looks to be the entire text of Codex Seraphinianus. This can't be legal, so enjoy it while it lasts. One day I hope to be able to afford a copy of this book.

Puppies + discomfort = cute?

A couple of weeks ago the above photo was printed on the front page of the newspaper (or rather the closest thing to a newspaper we have in this area). When I first glanced at it, for one bizarre second, I though the three puppies hanging on the clothesline were posed in mock crucifixion. Imagine some lunatic thinking puppies posed like they're being crucified is cute. ("Oh, look, Arthur! They think they're Jesus and the two thieves. How precious!") But instead of crucified puppies, it was just puppies hung on a clothesline. And you know animals just love to be hung up like that.

Horrible

I've been tagged again by the scurrilous Sherri for yet another damnable meme. This one's entitled, 5 Things You Probably Don't Know About Me. Ugh. Where to begin? This blog's over four years old and was started way back in 2002, so what the hell haven't I told you people? What brand of underwear I like? Just how bald am I? Certain, er... personal measurements? My favorite Hollywood musical? Just how long did I spend in prison for killing that clown? No, I'll have to find something new. Or else just make up some crap. No one will know. Nope. They won't suspect at all. It's a blog after all and no one really reads these things. Just a vanity project. Something to fill the time. Yes. The time. But I digress.

1. I've never ridden a roller coaster. Yes, you read that right, I've never ridden a roller coaster. I suppose the main reason I've never ridden one is that I never go to amusement parks. I hate them. But then I hate most places that have loads of people milling around. I loathe great stinking masses of humanity. The closest I ever came to riding a roller coaster was when I was in my early teens, I think, when we went to Busch Gardens. They had a roller coaster called the Loch Ness Monster that I think has been replaced by an even wilder contraption. All I remember about it was that it looked like a snarl of green steel loops. My sister and I talked of nothing else but riding this thing, but our mother took one look at it and said, "Oh, no. You're not riding on that." I imagine she pictured the cars coming off the track at high speed and being flung into the next county. So we didn't get to ride it.

2. I don't drive long distances, nor do I like traveling long distances by myself. I have anxiety issues. Driving around unfamiliar parts of my own small city unnerves me. I don't really have anything funny to say here. It sucks, actually. Sherri invited me to come to Florida, but it's unlikely I could do it alone. Cindy invited me to come to Durham a few times in the past, but I never did because there was no easy way for me to get there. My sister lives 150 miles away. She didn't invite me to come up there, but I did manage to do that once via bus. But she had to come and get me at the bus station to make sure I didn't get lost. Naturally, she was less than thrilled. It's probably for the best though. None of you need me sleeping on your couches and eating all of your food. And I will eat all of your food. Yes, all of it. Even that stuff in the back of the fridge you're scared to touch. I'll also annoy your pets.

3. I don't know how to swim. When I was little I got knocked down by a wave at the beach. I think it was the first time I set foot on the beach after we got there. From then on the water terrified me. I remember howling as my mother dragged me down to the water in a vain attempt to show me that it wasn't that scary. Anyway, I eventually learned to play in the water, but never learned how to swim. Of course no one ever bothered to show me how to swim. Bastards.

4. I joined the Marine Corps in high school, but never served. I couldn't do pull ups so they kicked me out before I got sent to boot camp. I didn't care really. I'm not even sure why I joined anyway because I didn't want to be a Marine. Had I served I probably would've been in the invasion of Panama and the Gulf War. Yippee. Instead I got to watch it on TV in my pajamas which is the only way to experience war in my opinion.

5. I don't like to see bands play live. It's too loud. Way, way too loud. There's bands I'd like to see play, but I don't think I could stand it. I'd have to wear earplugs. And if there were tons of people packed in there I'd probably freak out and leave. Too many people in one place makes my skin crawl.

OK, that's it. Five things you didn't know about me and probably didn't want to learn. I've found this entire experience to be thoroughly horrible. I hope you're happy.

Seriously messed up

Ever want to see a Tickle Me Elmo on fire? No? Not even a little bit? Oh, just look at it!

How do they know?!

A few days ago I got an envelope in the mail from Skulptur Form, you know, the rug company. What I want to know is how they knew I was losing my hair? Are they spying on me?

Also, I went to the website a few minutes ago and saw they're selling something called Cyberhair. Cyberhair? Would that be a virtual reality kind of deal where when I put on the video-helmet thing it would look like I had hair when I looked into a virtual mirror? Or would Cyberhair be like when a guy (not me, honest!) is trying to impress a girl online and he tells her he has full, flowing, gorgeous head of hair?

First Saddam and now this

Yesterday morning I dreamed that British topless model Keeley Hazell was going to be executed. Apparently her crime was posing topless. Naturally, I was quite upset at this travesty of justice and still felt a bit unsettled long after I woke up.

Living in the past

Twice this morning I woke up and thought, "Well, it's 1997." Twice. I don't know why I'd want to relive 1997 because that was kind of a crappy year for me.

Moron of morons

I just went and accidentally posted two stupid posts over at Lists of Books that were supposed to go over here. [Smacks head with hand. Smacks head again with hammer.]

Boxing Day tedium

It's back to normality. Almost. I don't have to go back to my crappy job until tomorrow. But the smelly, filthy, drooling, shedding, screaming beast has gone back to Richmond--and she took the cat with her.



Also, Americans have no use for Boxing Day. So there.

Infected

Somebody gave me a cold. Or maybe it's the early stages of the flu. Better not be the flu. Who gave it to me? Did I get it at work yesterday during the free meal we had when all 300 of us were shoehorned into the not quite big enough break room? Was it my sister? Was it that damnable, filthy cat of hers? [See below.]



Fat lot of good all that vitamin C did. Might as well have been Chicklets.

Woe is us?

I found a detailed blog post on installing Haloscan in Blogger Beta. Looks interesting. I may work up enough nerve to try it later.

Ooh, I also noticed when I logged into Blogger that the new Blogger stuff isn't beta anymore. I wonder how long those who haven't switched over have before they're forced to switch?

Update: Hey, it works so far. Welcome back Haloscan!

Duh

I can't figure out how to put the Haloscan comments code in the new template. The old Haloscan code is HTML and the new Blogger Beta code is XML. I'm not sure if they'll play nice, so for now I'll just use the built-in Blogger commenting system. But I want the Haloscan comments back; I've got four years of bizarre dialog on that.

Changes

I switched over to the new Blogger Beta a week or two back, but hadn't changed the template. Blogger Beta lets you do all kinda whiz-bang crap with the template where you don't have to soil your hands by touching filthy, nasty HTML. Anyway, since I changed to the new template system, I figured I might as well change the template itself. How long did I have the previous template? Two years or more? This new one reminds me of the first two I had, which also had a blue bar across the top. Exciting, no?

I'll fix the other stuff in a bit.

Fluffed or stiffened?

I bought a cheap Chinese yo-yo at a dollar store yesterday to add to my growing collection. The warning on the back of the package features the following bewildering advice: "Yoyostint is wasting please replacing while it fluffed or stiffened." I think this refers to replacing the yo-yo string. Or at least I hope it does.

Yuletide misery

I hate Christmas. Really, I do. And, sadly, the older I get the more I hate it. I sort of figured I'd get more sentimental and weepy in my old age, but the opposite is true. I'm the grouchy old bastard who tells you Santa got shot down by the Strategic Air Command because they thought he was a Soviet missile. Or something like that. Anyway, I hate Christmas. All of it. Well, I like getting time off. And I like the food--for a while at least. Like I need to eat more. Dick Gregory hasn't shown up to help me yet, so I'm guess I'm in the clear for a little longer. But I digress.

I find the gift-giving thing particularly miserable. The whole process makes me feel both embarrassed and guilty. I'm not sure why, but I just hate the whole thing. I hate buying gifts because I never know what to get and getting gifts makes me feel more or less like crap for reasons it would take a battalion of psychoanalysts to plumb the depths of. It would suit me just fine if I just got some time off from work and got to stuff my face with garbage I don't usually get to stuff it with during the less festive times of the year.

I don't really like getting together with my family either. Sorry, family, but I don't really like being around people that much. I can tolerate my sister and her drooling, shedding cat for a while, but that's more than enough. I don't need to see every single person I'm related to and their mysterious offspring. Go away.

Automation

Thanks to the Point Horror plot generator now I can turn out crap with ease! Writing is so much easier now.

Susan was having a happy normal day in Harvard. She had lunch with her best friends Belinda and Jennifer, and completed her work for Dr. Boeldeke. It was all going wonderfully, until she discovered aphids in her locker - she had a terrible fear of them, and wondered who could do such a cruel thing.

'I bet it was Amy,' said Belinda. 'She's been jealous of you since she heard that you were going to the prom with Ralph.' Susan sighed.

'Did you read the Daily Bugle?' said Jennifer. 'There was an article about Dick Cheney, who shocked everyone when he dropped his pants and showed his horrible arousal.'

'Really?' said Susan. 'Can I read the article?'

Jennifer gave it to her.

The Daily Bugle has heard rumors that Dick Cheney is back after the shock of many years ago when he dropped his pants and showed his horrible arousal. This is not true. Dick Cheney is in Mongolia.

Susan scanned the article and was startled to discover that she and Dick Cheney were alike - They both had the same DNA structure.

Susan walked home feeling very troubled. When she got home, there was a note on her doorstep. She opened in and screamed. It was full of aphids. There was also a letter.

To Susan. Watch your step. Ha ha ha. Signed, Dick Cheney.

Who could it be? Was it really Dick Cheney or someone closer to her? Susan suspected everyone - Amy of course, who always sneered at her. Ralph, even though he was the dreamiest boy in Harvard. She even suspected Jennifer who had a great love for aphids and had been acting strangely recently. The only person she could trust was Belinda who had been her friend since they were small children.

The night before the prom, Susan went with Belinda to the town square, and they discovered it was empty. Susan was pleased to have Belinda with her, because she was very nervous about Dick Cheney, as well as avoiding Ralph, Jennifer, and Amy. 'Isn't it strange,' said Belinda. 'How much we have in common?'

Susan remembered that they both had the same DNA structure. She became uneasy. 'Belinda, don't you have family in Mongolia?'

Belinda laughed manically. She threw some aphids at Susan, then attacked her with a homeless man, and Susan was forced to fight back with litter. She ran away and was found by Ralph and Jennifer, who had a perfectly rational explanation for her strange behavior.

'We came to save you from Belinda,' said Jennifer.

The next day they discovered that Belinda had died horribly. Susan was sad - Belinda had been her friend for years, and becoming a crazed psycho in the space of a few days could happen to anyone. But she placed her trauma firmly behind her and went to the prom with Ralph, much to the dismay of Amy.

#@$% meme!

The shameless Jammies has tagged me to do a meme. Me, a meme! I never do those. Ever. Except that one below from a few days ago. That one doesn't count. Or those other ones either. Nope. Don't look in my archives either. They're broken. Trust me.

Oh, the meme? I'm supposed to list things I want for Christmas. But I assume it's supposed to be stuff I can't get in real life, so the list won't have things on it like new socks and underwear. Although I really do need new socks and underwear.

1. A job I don't hate. I've given up on ever finding a job I actually like, so I'll settle on one I don't hate. And I think I'd be OK with one I hated if they paid me enough. The people who decide what we make at the current job don't seem to comprehend concepts like living wage and not being poor.

2. A hovercraft. Why? Because it's my goddamn list, that's why.

3. A Vox AC30. I can't play the guitar worth a damn, but I've wanted a Vox AC30 for twenty years. Don't know what I'd do with it. Probably just sit and look at it all day. Maybe sniff it obscenely. Rub up against it. Something nasty, no doubt.

4. A high-speed internet connection. Sad, really. I'm supposed to be listing pie in the sky stuff and this is probably what I want more than anything.

5. An alligator. Don't know what I'd do with it and it would probably kill me, but I'd still like to have one. My sister's old enough to remember seeing baby alligators for sale somewhere in Florida on a trip in the early 70's. I don't even remember going to Florida because I was two or three years old.

6. Someplace to put all my books, CD's, records, etc. so that I can actually enjoy them instead of feeling like they're sucking the life out of me.

7. A new laptop. I don't need it, but I want it. In fact, I'd probably drop it if I had one.

8. Enough money to retire. Forget about the job I mentioned above; I want to retire. And then I'll slowly descend into madness!

9. A tank. You know, an army tank. And lots of stuff to run over with it like old cars, houses, etc. I have to do something with my time after I retire.

10. A battalion of trained monkey assassins with which to conquer (yes, conquer) the world.

I'm supposed to tag other people to do this, but I think everyone's been tagged except Xolo, Sara, and my sister. Xolo will say he's too busy. Sara will just say something like, "bleh". And my sister will bellow, "I WILL KILL YOU!!!" Therefore no one will be tagged. So there.

The literary life

Since I've gone and written a 50,000 word first draft of something resembling a novel, I decided to go to a copy place and have them print the thing out. It's all fine and good to have the manuscript on a computer, CD, or USB thumb drive, but I want something tangible. And, of course, I can't spread it all out on the floor and roll around naked in it if it's on a CD. Nope, I need paper.

At the copy place I gave the woman behind the counter my CD and she opened the file. Immediately there was trouble.

"What is this," she asked, with more than a little confusion in her voice.

"It's my novel."

"You wrote this?"

She didn't seem the least bit impressed, only bewildered.