"Top Gear" is my favorite television program. Hosted by three fey middle-aged British men, the show involves test driving supercars, timed celebrity laps, and ridiculous challenges like racing buses and driving across Viet Nam on a moped. The show also features a "tame racing driver," someone in a white jump suit and helmet known as The Stig.
I watch the Stig driving Aston Martins and Zondas and Bugatti Veyrons around the test track and I think to myself: "God, I'd love to have a go at that!"
The driving, that is, not the Stig. I really, really would.
Being an American, I am wont to declare my affection for and allegiance to things by purchasing a decal and placing it on my car. Therefore, I have a die-cut Stig decal on the back window of my big black Dodge which proclaims: "I AM THE STIG."
By what may be just a strange coincidence, I have been pulled over by cops more times in the last six weeks than I have in the 22 years I've been driving. Cop #1 pulled me over one night as I was on my way home from my part-time job. I'd crossed over the center line a few times, apparently, and he wanted to see if I was drunk. He asked me some questions and checked my information, thankfully not making me get out of the car and do a sobriety test. Cop #1 sent me on my way telling me to drive carefully.
Cop #2 got me for going 52 in a 35. This was not very Stig of me at all, I feel, as one does not really reach a true state of Stigness until the needle hits at least 65. Nevertheless, Cop #2 issued me a ticket. The cheaper kind of ticket that didn't result in the points on my license; the one they give you and make it seem like that hundred bucks it's costing you is a big favor. It was my own dumb fault, as there's a speed trap on this stretch of road every Saturday morning. There's always one of those weird keyboardy-looking radar things set up alongside the road, a fact which on this particular day completely escaped my attention.
Cop #3 pulled me over for a 'rolling stop.' You know what I mean, where you slow down to a near stop, but don't stop completely. It was at one of those intersections where no one ever comes to a complete stop because it's a stupid place to have a stop sign. 500 people probably roll through this stop sign on a given day, but evidently it was my turn to get a ticket for it. Second verse, same as the first; cheaper ticket, no points, hundred bucks and a tug of the forelock. "Thank you ever so much for not giving me points or a bigger fine or shooting me, officer sir."
I don't know if it's the decal that's getting me in trouble. One would have to assume that in order to know about the Stig, all three cops were the sort of fellows who watch BBC America. Somehow I think the odds are against that. And if they do watch, and they are fans, you'd think that rather than inciting them to pull over and issue tickets they'd be saying "Go, Stig, go!" while waving their little clipboards.
My husband says it's because I drive too fast, but he drives like an old lady so what the hell does he know?
In any case, as of late I have been mindful to stay between the lines, watch my speed, and come to a complete, lingering stop. How dreadfully UN-Stig.
Tuesday, April 6, 2010
Friday, March 26, 2010
Rosenrosen and the Curse of Family Ties
When I first met Rosenrosen, my political views leaned decidedly to the left. She was, and still is, very conservative. Somehow, though, we managed to hit it off.
I voted for Clinton twice, but during his second term when he said, "We all need to tighten our belts," and then proceeded to start pulling on mine even though he'd promised that only rich people would see tax increases, I began to rethink my stance. Most of our political discussions, though, had me pro-labor and her pro-business and ended in good-natured name-calling. Somewhere around about the time of the disputed Bush/Gore elections, in which I hesitantly voted for Gore and she voted for Bush, Rosenrosen issued forth a prophecy. "You know, hippie," she said, "Your son is probably going to grow up to be ultra-conservative."
"Oh, shut up," says I.
"No, really," she went on, "I can see it now. You'll be sitting around the breakfast table in a tie-dyed t-shirt listening to NPR and flipping through the "Utne Reader," and he'll be there in an oxford shirt and a tie with a copy of the "Wall Street Journal." He'll be like Alex P. Keaton!"
Then she walked away cackling.
Nowadays, age and responsibilities have changed my outlook; my political views now fall in the general vicinity of Margaret Thatcher, a scoche to the right of G.W. and slightly to the right of Hitler. A classical conservative, I think they call it; fiscally conservative and socially ambiguous. Nevertheless, it seems that Rosenrosen's prophecy regarding my son has come true anyway.
He is not wont to wear oxford shirts and ties, but he DOES read the financial pages. He's developed an interest in the stock market, takes note of the rise and fall of the price of things, like gas and milk, and follows politics. I noticed when he was about ten, and he piped up from the back seat,"Oh, boy. Gas has gone up ten cents since last week!" He rolled his eyes, muttering, "Well, that's just GREAT."
In some ways, it's a good thing. Early interest in stocks and bonds is probably a good indicator that a child may be a financial success, and buy his mommy a new house and an Aston Martin. I was thinking I should give him some seed money and open him up an e*trade account.
On the other hand, he could turn in to a nervous wreck and develop an ulcer by the age of 13. He may go prematurely bald, and stalk around the house shouting incoherently at the Bloomberg Business Report while drinking Maalox straight out the bottle.
I voted for Clinton twice, but during his second term when he said, "We all need to tighten our belts," and then proceeded to start pulling on mine even though he'd promised that only rich people would see tax increases, I began to rethink my stance. Most of our political discussions, though, had me pro-labor and her pro-business and ended in good-natured name-calling. Somewhere around about the time of the disputed Bush/Gore elections, in which I hesitantly voted for Gore and she voted for Bush, Rosenrosen issued forth a prophecy. "You know, hippie," she said, "Your son is probably going to grow up to be ultra-conservative."
"Oh, shut up," says I.
"No, really," she went on, "I can see it now. You'll be sitting around the breakfast table in a tie-dyed t-shirt listening to NPR and flipping through the "Utne Reader," and he'll be there in an oxford shirt and a tie with a copy of the "Wall Street Journal." He'll be like Alex P. Keaton!"
Then she walked away cackling.
Nowadays, age and responsibilities have changed my outlook; my political views now fall in the general vicinity of Margaret Thatcher, a scoche to the right of G.W. and slightly to the right of Hitler. A classical conservative, I think they call it; fiscally conservative and socially ambiguous. Nevertheless, it seems that Rosenrosen's prophecy regarding my son has come true anyway.
He is not wont to wear oxford shirts and ties, but he DOES read the financial pages. He's developed an interest in the stock market, takes note of the rise and fall of the price of things, like gas and milk, and follows politics. I noticed when he was about ten, and he piped up from the back seat,"Oh, boy. Gas has gone up ten cents since last week!" He rolled his eyes, muttering, "Well, that's just GREAT."
In some ways, it's a good thing. Early interest in stocks and bonds is probably a good indicator that a child may be a financial success, and buy his mommy a new house and an Aston Martin. I was thinking I should give him some seed money and open him up an e*trade account.
On the other hand, he could turn in to a nervous wreck and develop an ulcer by the age of 13. He may go prematurely bald, and stalk around the house shouting incoherently at the Bloomberg Business Report while drinking Maalox straight out the bottle.
Saturday, December 19, 2009
Snowpocalypse.
Here's what happens: the weather man predicts some snow and/or sleet and freezing rain, and everyone flocks to the grocery store to buy eggs, milk, bread and toilet paper. No one really knows why, but I have a theory.
Now toilet paper I get. No one wants to be caught out on the can with no paper in the house. One can use anything to wipe, really; an old sock, a paper towel, a page out of the Victoria's Secret catalog, etc., but it's never a good idea. Cleaning up with anything other than the paper made for that purpose tends to leave the roundeye agitated and angry.
But bread, milk, and eggs? I don't get it. Why those foods and not red onions and bagged lettuce? A couple nice steaks and some cole slaw? Townhouse crackers and kumquats?
We discussed this one day last winter at the Vortex, and decided that everyone gets some weird collective urge to make bread pudding. Now I know the fact that people aren't buying up all the sugar and cinnamon as well put a hole in this theory, but bear with me.
The weather man is prophesying certain doom by way of a winter storm, which leads people to think about the apocalypse. Thinking about the apocalypse caused people to wonder, "Whatever does one feed the hordes from the Pit of Hell?" Then some kind of instinct kicks in, possibly the result of race memory and evolution, and everyone goes, "Why, bread pudding, of course!"
In keeping with this, I've come up with a recipe. Write it down and put it in your recipe box, or tuck it in your Bible (perferably in the book of Revelation.)
Apocalypse Bread Pudding
3 Loaves of bread
1/2 dozen (6) eggs
3 cups milk
1/2 C. sugar
2 tsp. cinnamon
1/2 tsp. nutmeg
pinch of despair.
Preheat oven to 425, unless your neighborhood has begun to burn in which case pudding can be baked on the sidewalk.
Combine ingredients and pour in to baking dish.
Bake for 45 minutes; top should be brown and crispy.
Garnish with coppery red sauce, or eyeball rosettes.
Serve in warmed pottery bowls, while weeping and gnashing teeth.
Serves four horsemen.
Now toilet paper I get. No one wants to be caught out on the can with no paper in the house. One can use anything to wipe, really; an old sock, a paper towel, a page out of the Victoria's Secret catalog, etc., but it's never a good idea. Cleaning up with anything other than the paper made for that purpose tends to leave the roundeye agitated and angry.
But bread, milk, and eggs? I don't get it. Why those foods and not red onions and bagged lettuce? A couple nice steaks and some cole slaw? Townhouse crackers and kumquats?
We discussed this one day last winter at the Vortex, and decided that everyone gets some weird collective urge to make bread pudding. Now I know the fact that people aren't buying up all the sugar and cinnamon as well put a hole in this theory, but bear with me.
The weather man is prophesying certain doom by way of a winter storm, which leads people to think about the apocalypse. Thinking about the apocalypse caused people to wonder, "Whatever does one feed the hordes from the Pit of Hell?" Then some kind of instinct kicks in, possibly the result of race memory and evolution, and everyone goes, "Why, bread pudding, of course!"
In keeping with this, I've come up with a recipe. Write it down and put it in your recipe box, or tuck it in your Bible (perferably in the book of Revelation.)
Apocalypse Bread Pudding
3 Loaves of bread
1/2 dozen (6) eggs
3 cups milk
1/2 C. sugar
2 tsp. cinnamon
1/2 tsp. nutmeg
pinch of despair.
Preheat oven to 425, unless your neighborhood has begun to burn in which case pudding can be baked on the sidewalk.
Combine ingredients and pour in to baking dish.
Bake for 45 minutes; top should be brown and crispy.
Garnish with coppery red sauce, or eyeball rosettes.
Serve in warmed pottery bowls, while weeping and gnashing teeth.
Serves four horsemen.
Online Nakedidity: The Great Debate
There's a girl at work who has all the men drooling all over themselves. She's a tiny, petite girl with a spray-on tan who dresses like an extra from an Aerosmith video in 1987. I originally remarked that she looked like an extra from a Cinderella video in 1987, but my boss said I was wrong because the girls in Cinderella videos were too trashy and kind of gross. My boss really, really likes this girl.
According to my boss and my co-worker, tiny girls are more attractive because a man wants a woman he can lift up and toss around. It must be some kind of innate urge going back to caveman days; a kind of ancestral race-memory with roots in the need to be able to pick up one's woman and flee an oncoming dinosaur or a spewing volcano.
I referred to the girl, whose nickname keeps changing (from "Orangina" to "Tropicana" to "Object,") as my boss' "lady love." I was duly corrected.
"I'm not in love with her. I just want to show her how a demon fucks." Then he mimed what that would look like, complete with devil horn hand gesture. I think most women probably would have taken great offense to this, but I laughed so hard I snarfed my diet Coke. This goes a long way to explain why I'm just one of the guys, and also adds tremendously to my dude cred.
The outfits old Tropicana wears to the office are often less-than appropriate. One of my tasks as the resident good-old-boy/gal of the department is that when this girl is in the hallway or some other common area of the office, I have to sound the alarm. Mostly this is just me running in the door yelling "OBJECT!" I do this regardless of what she's wearing, but some days' outfits require a little more urgency.
One day there was a schoolgirl outfit that had the whole office talking; the men were beside themselves, giddy with lust and ogling at her as often as possible. The women were angry. "Did you see that?" "Who would wear that to work?" "Her supervisor should send her home!"
"Man," says my boss, "you battle-axes better not start complaining and ruin this for me!"
These women were all jealous, although I doubt any of them would admit it. Most of the women in the office couldn't get such a get-up in their size, unless Lane Bryant has started a stripper collection, and even if they could it would look ludicrous. I'm thinking most of us would wear silly sexy stuff like she does if we could.
We had a discussion that day about whether or not this girl had any kind of online profile. Turns out she does, and now there's a half-nekkid "Glamour Shots"-type photo circulating around. The reactions are the same as the outfits: the men are chuffed, the women acting disgusted, clicking their tongues with righteous indignation and muttering about sluts.
I said to a couple of my broad friends that if I had stunning abs like this girl, I'd do the same thing.
"No you wouldn't," said one of them, "and if you did we'd call you names!"
"Yes, I would," I retorted, "and I'd call you jealous."
Who wouldn't want to command that kind of male attention, to wield that kind of power? It certainly must be something to experience, although I'd wager that many of the girls who look good enough to have that kind of effect aren't smart enough to realize it.
Another friend, after viewing the photo, said, "That's it. I'm going to do what I did in my teens, where I only ate once a day, subsisted on water, and I'm going to get down to a size 8." She admitted this is delusional, and said that even if she got thin and toned, she wouldn't post such a photo on the internet because it would scar her kids.
"Think about it-even if your mother were hot, you wouldn't want to see her nipples on the internet, would you?"
She may have a point, but if I had amazing abs I'd surely be tempted.
According to my boss and my co-worker, tiny girls are more attractive because a man wants a woman he can lift up and toss around. It must be some kind of innate urge going back to caveman days; a kind of ancestral race-memory with roots in the need to be able to pick up one's woman and flee an oncoming dinosaur or a spewing volcano.
I referred to the girl, whose nickname keeps changing (from "Orangina" to "Tropicana" to "Object,") as my boss' "lady love." I was duly corrected.
"I'm not in love with her. I just want to show her how a demon fucks." Then he mimed what that would look like, complete with devil horn hand gesture. I think most women probably would have taken great offense to this, but I laughed so hard I snarfed my diet Coke. This goes a long way to explain why I'm just one of the guys, and also adds tremendously to my dude cred.
The outfits old Tropicana wears to the office are often less-than appropriate. One of my tasks as the resident good-old-boy/gal of the department is that when this girl is in the hallway or some other common area of the office, I have to sound the alarm. Mostly this is just me running in the door yelling "OBJECT!" I do this regardless of what she's wearing, but some days' outfits require a little more urgency.
One day there was a schoolgirl outfit that had the whole office talking; the men were beside themselves, giddy with lust and ogling at her as often as possible. The women were angry. "Did you see that?" "Who would wear that to work?" "Her supervisor should send her home!"
"Man," says my boss, "you battle-axes better not start complaining and ruin this for me!"
These women were all jealous, although I doubt any of them would admit it. Most of the women in the office couldn't get such a get-up in their size, unless Lane Bryant has started a stripper collection, and even if they could it would look ludicrous. I'm thinking most of us would wear silly sexy stuff like she does if we could.
We had a discussion that day about whether or not this girl had any kind of online profile. Turns out she does, and now there's a half-nekkid "Glamour Shots"-type photo circulating around. The reactions are the same as the outfits: the men are chuffed, the women acting disgusted, clicking their tongues with righteous indignation and muttering about sluts.
I said to a couple of my broad friends that if I had stunning abs like this girl, I'd do the same thing.
"No you wouldn't," said one of them, "and if you did we'd call you names!"
"Yes, I would," I retorted, "and I'd call you jealous."
Who wouldn't want to command that kind of male attention, to wield that kind of power? It certainly must be something to experience, although I'd wager that many of the girls who look good enough to have that kind of effect aren't smart enough to realize it.
Another friend, after viewing the photo, said, "That's it. I'm going to do what I did in my teens, where I only ate once a day, subsisted on water, and I'm going to get down to a size 8." She admitted this is delusional, and said that even if she got thin and toned, she wouldn't post such a photo on the internet because it would scar her kids.
"Think about it-even if your mother were hot, you wouldn't want to see her nipples on the internet, would you?"
She may have a point, but if I had amazing abs I'd surely be tempted.
Sunday, December 6, 2009
As A Matter of Fact, They Don't Know It's Christmas.
In 1984, a passle of bedraggled sexually ambiguous pop stars assembled somewhere in London to record a charity record as "Band Aid." Organized by Bob Geldoff (the singer for the Boomtown Rats,) the purpose of the project was to raise money for starving Ethiopians. A noble idea, to be sure, but it is quite possibly the dumbest Christmas song ever recorded.
Don't get me wrong; I like the song. It's a good Christmas pop song, catchy and with the appropriate number of bell-like tones. To this day, when it comes on the radio I go "Oooh! Band Aid!" and turn it up. I seem to recall that at some point, all the radio stations everywhere were supposed to play "Do They Know It's Christmas?" simultaneously. Or maybe that was "We are the World," I can't remember. If I had worked in radio in 1984, I would have pretended to forget it was time to take part in the total unifying Geldoffing of the world. At the appointed moment, I would have played something else; some Nat King Cole, perhaps, or T.Rex's "I Love to Boogie."
I've always wondered if Geldoff (who's been KNIGHTED, for Christ's sake) is very stupid or was very, very high when he penned these lyrics. Maybe they were written in a hurry, so there was no time to really put a lot of thought in to them. Perhaps he scrawled them on the back of a Wimpy's napkin on the way to the studio and the limo driver took a couple of really hard, sharp turns that caused the words to smudge, and so what he really wrote was intelligent and insightful but by the time the napkin got to Boy George and Simon LeBon it was totally illegible and they had to wing it.
At any rate, I was listening to the song and thinking about how dumb it is, and decided it could use some analysis. The first part of the song isn't too bad:
It's Christmas time
There's no need to be afraid.
At Christmas time,
We let in light and we banish shame.
And in our world of plenty
We can spread a smile of joy.
Throw your arms around the world at Christmas time.
Aw, that's nice. Smarmy and saccharin and silly, just as a Christmas song should be. "Throw your arms around the world" puts me in mind of the "I'd like to teach the world to sing..." Coke ad from the 70's. C'mon, everybody! Frankie Goes to Hollywood say, "Buy the world a Coke!"
The next bit is where it starts to go downhill. I think this is the part of the napkin that got wet:
But say a prayer,
Pray for the other ones.
At Christmastime it's hard.
But when you're having fun,
There's a world outside your window
And it's a world of dread and fear,
Where the only water flowing
Is a bitter stream of tears.
And the Christmas bells that ring there
Are the clanging chimes of doom.
Well, tonight thank God it's them instead of you.
I get this part; pause in your Christmas debauchery to say a little prayer for all those hapless saps who, to invoke the late Sam Kinison, don't have the sense to move the hell out of the desert. The saps have no water save their own tears, poor buggers, and then there's all those clanging chimes of doom with which to contend. This line always gives me pause. Really, Sir Bob? Clanging chimes of doom? Seems like an attempt to wax poetic gone horribly wrong, although I feel it's a great name for a death metal band. The last line, which I assume is meant to be taken sarcastically, is sung by Bono of U2. My husband has postulated, and I agree, that this is the exact moment where Bono decided he was Jesus Christ.
The dumbest part of the song follows:
And there won't be snow in Africa this Christmastime
The greatest gift they'll get this year is life
Where nothing ever grows
No rain or rivers flow;
Do they know it's Christmastime at all?
Well, no shit, Sherlock. It's AFRICA; even when Africa is not in the midst of a drought it doesn't fucking snow. Well, except the peaks of the mountains, so I reckon if the Ethiopians wanted to feel all Christmassy, they could take a hike up Kilimanjaro. Most importantly, a good number of them DON'T know it's Christmas. People in this part of the world are predominantly Muslim, and although there are some Christians, the starving bush people about whom you are singing probably aren't either. I'd expect their religion probably has a lot to do with ancestor worship and praying to rocks. Even if they weren't hungry, they probably still wouldn't know it was Christmas.
The song finishes:
Here's to you
Raise a glass for everyone
Here's to them
Underneath that burning sun.
Do they know it's Christmastime at all?
Feed the world
Let them know it's Christmastime again.
I get it; take some of your Christmas spirit and send some money to Bob Geldoff so he can buy some food for the starving Africans. A nice gesture, all in all, although 25 years on it's reportedly been largely ineffective, as the corrupt governments of these African nations have a propensity for taking the food aid they receive and reselling it in order to expand their personal wealth. Perhaps a better way to let them know it's Christmas than sending boatloads of rice and powdered milk would be to build them some sustainable irrigation systems and send some agricultural people down there to help improve their farming techniques.
Don't get me wrong; I like the song. It's a good Christmas pop song, catchy and with the appropriate number of bell-like tones. To this day, when it comes on the radio I go "Oooh! Band Aid!" and turn it up. I seem to recall that at some point, all the radio stations everywhere were supposed to play "Do They Know It's Christmas?" simultaneously. Or maybe that was "We are the World," I can't remember. If I had worked in radio in 1984, I would have pretended to forget it was time to take part in the total unifying Geldoffing of the world. At the appointed moment, I would have played something else; some Nat King Cole, perhaps, or T.Rex's "I Love to Boogie."
I've always wondered if Geldoff (who's been KNIGHTED, for Christ's sake) is very stupid or was very, very high when he penned these lyrics. Maybe they were written in a hurry, so there was no time to really put a lot of thought in to them. Perhaps he scrawled them on the back of a Wimpy's napkin on the way to the studio and the limo driver took a couple of really hard, sharp turns that caused the words to smudge, and so what he really wrote was intelligent and insightful but by the time the napkin got to Boy George and Simon LeBon it was totally illegible and they had to wing it.
At any rate, I was listening to the song and thinking about how dumb it is, and decided it could use some analysis. The first part of the song isn't too bad:
It's Christmas time
There's no need to be afraid.
At Christmas time,
We let in light and we banish shame.
And in our world of plenty
We can spread a smile of joy.
Throw your arms around the world at Christmas time.
Aw, that's nice. Smarmy and saccharin and silly, just as a Christmas song should be. "Throw your arms around the world" puts me in mind of the "I'd like to teach the world to sing..." Coke ad from the 70's. C'mon, everybody! Frankie Goes to Hollywood say, "Buy the world a Coke!"
The next bit is where it starts to go downhill. I think this is the part of the napkin that got wet:
But say a prayer,
Pray for the other ones.
At Christmastime it's hard.
But when you're having fun,
There's a world outside your window
And it's a world of dread and fear,
Where the only water flowing
Is a bitter stream of tears.
And the Christmas bells that ring there
Are the clanging chimes of doom.
Well, tonight thank God it's them instead of you.
I get this part; pause in your Christmas debauchery to say a little prayer for all those hapless saps who, to invoke the late Sam Kinison, don't have the sense to move the hell out of the desert. The saps have no water save their own tears, poor buggers, and then there's all those clanging chimes of doom with which to contend. This line always gives me pause. Really, Sir Bob? Clanging chimes of doom? Seems like an attempt to wax poetic gone horribly wrong, although I feel it's a great name for a death metal band. The last line, which I assume is meant to be taken sarcastically, is sung by Bono of U2. My husband has postulated, and I agree, that this is the exact moment where Bono decided he was Jesus Christ.
The dumbest part of the song follows:
And there won't be snow in Africa this Christmastime
The greatest gift they'll get this year is life
Where nothing ever grows
No rain or rivers flow;
Do they know it's Christmastime at all?
Well, no shit, Sherlock. It's AFRICA; even when Africa is not in the midst of a drought it doesn't fucking snow. Well, except the peaks of the mountains, so I reckon if the Ethiopians wanted to feel all Christmassy, they could take a hike up Kilimanjaro. Most importantly, a good number of them DON'T know it's Christmas. People in this part of the world are predominantly Muslim, and although there are some Christians, the starving bush people about whom you are singing probably aren't either. I'd expect their religion probably has a lot to do with ancestor worship and praying to rocks. Even if they weren't hungry, they probably still wouldn't know it was Christmas.
The song finishes:
Here's to you
Raise a glass for everyone
Here's to them
Underneath that burning sun.
Do they know it's Christmastime at all?
Feed the world
Let them know it's Christmastime again.
I get it; take some of your Christmas spirit and send some money to Bob Geldoff so he can buy some food for the starving Africans. A nice gesture, all in all, although 25 years on it's reportedly been largely ineffective, as the corrupt governments of these African nations have a propensity for taking the food aid they receive and reselling it in order to expand their personal wealth. Perhaps a better way to let them know it's Christmas than sending boatloads of rice and powdered milk would be to build them some sustainable irrigation systems and send some agricultural people down there to help improve their farming techniques.
Thursday, November 19, 2009
What's Eating You?
This is the stuff that is most irksome to me at the moment. There's no significance to the order; just stuff that's currently pissing me off.
1) “That’s just ignernt.”
Can we get something straight? “Ignorant” has three syllables, and does not mean “rude” or “uncouth.” According to Mr. Webster, the word “ignorant,” (pronounced ‘ig-n(ə-)rənt,) means “Destitute of knowledge or education; also: lacking in knowledge or comprehension of the thing specified.
“Ignorant,” then, cannot be applied to person who insults you, cuts you off in traffic, fails to hold the elevator for you, leaves her used tampon on the back of a public toilet, or commits any other breach of social ettiquette. It also cannot be applied to your boyfriend’s baby mama when she take him back to domestic fo’ mo’ suppo’t, yo, nor can it be applied to me when I say that you who use the word in the ways I have described here should be stuffed in to a cannon and shot in to a wall. I may be an asshole, but I am not ignorant.
2)Speaking of ignorance…
Don’t send me any information about any political process, piece of legislation, university study, or anything else if you got it from any site leaning unabashedly to the left or to the right. I like to get my news and information directly from the news wires, not from media outlets who get the wire stories and edit them. I don’t pay much attention to anything that comes from anything with either “Christian” or “Progressive” in the title. (Send me anything that originated from the Center for American Progress and I’m likely to run from the room screaming, then spend the afternoon hiding behind the couch and clutching my wallet. “Modest” value-added tax my ass!)
You read something you find compelling? Research it a bit, why don’t you? If you’re going to take the time to forward on some information, find a few differing viewpoints, offer up the data, and ask me what I think.
Ditto for health-related news. Someone sent you an email saying that aspartame consumption causes MS? Google it; go out to the Center for Disease Control or National Institute of Health or Mayo Clinic web sites; hell, even Web MD is marginally reputable, and see if you can find anything that suggests there’s something to it before you hit “forward.” Otherwise, I’ll have to do it, and then I’ll have to reply to you and all creation that whatever information you’ve sent me is a bunch of crap; how in Bob’s name can you be such a moron?
3)Fa ra ra ra ra…
Some things about Christmas:
The retail Christmas season starts after Halloween. It’s been like this for years, and it’s not going to change any time soon. Stop complaining about how it's too early and we skip over Thankgiving. No one sings Thanksgiving carols because a) there aren’t any, and b) it’s a holiday created by government mandate. The religious holidays (Christmas, Easter, Halloween) exist because there’s a connection to some high holy day. The ones brought forth because they were tacked on to some piece of legislation? Not so much.
These holidays also garner more attention because they are accompanied some kind of consumption (candy, gifts, decorations) and therefore are heavily advertised. Thanksgiving only really generates revenue for the grocery and travel industries. Perhaps instead of focusing on the proliferation of Christmassy stuff though the month of November, stick with the spirit of the thing and reflect on the things in your life for which you are truly thankful. I’m thankful if I get though the day without hearing someonewhine, “Christmas already? What about Thanksgiving?”
Jesus is not, in fact, the reason for the season. Our modern Christmas, by and large, originated with the pagans celebrating winter solstice. The church assigned the birth of Christ to the soltice celebrations because they couldn’t get people to give up the parties and it was not economically feasible to excommunicate everyone.
Christmas is reverent, holy day to mark the birth of the Son of God, or it’s a noisy, filthy, garish celebration of gluttony, sloth, avarice and any other of the deadly sins. It’s up to the individual to choose, although personally I prefer the schizophrenic approach and make it a bit of both.
4) Healthcare-shmealthcare.
I will concede that the American health care system is imperfect, and that everyone should have access to it. I do not agree, however, that the system is “in crisis,” and I feel that a complete balls-out overhaul of the system is short-sighted and foolhardy.
Whatever work is to be done needs to be done incrementally, tackling one problem area at a time. Some kind of gap insurance for chronic and catastrophic illnesses, perhaps, so that thos who manage to survive long-term illnesses aren’t wiped out financially from all the treatments and services their insurance does not cover.
Government-subsidized health insurance plans for the self-employed or for those whose employers don’t offer insurance might not be a bad idea. Streamlining Medicare and Medicaid might be a reasonable goal.
Examining the reasons that health care costs are so bloody high might serve the country well. The previous administration sought to place caps on malpractice awards, in hopes that this would drive down the exorbitant cost of malpractice insurance. This was shot down, of course, and right along party lines. After all, faithfullness to one’s party is much more important than doing something that might actually do some good.
The healthcare legislation, currently in the Senate, will probably get pushed through because Obeekaybee and his progressive drones are working diligently to push through all of Clinton’s failed initiatives…because they CAN. They’re in a hurry because they know they are not likely to keep their current majority status, so they’re tacking health care and the student loan overhaul because once a few more Republicans are elected, they’ll lose both battles.
If you’re middle class, meaning 200% of the poverty line or above, your taxes are probably going to go up. Haven’t gotten a wage increase in a few years? Struggling to pay your bills? Tough shit. 56.8% of eligible voters participated in the 2008 elections; Obeekaybee took approximately 52% of that vote. For all intents and purposes, then, there are a very small number of people in this country who, in supporting the current regime, think that everyone else just needs to shut up and write out a check. These people are made up primarily of the dregs of humanity who'd never voted before but came out for the last election because they know there's something in it for them, and milquetoast progressives who vote for welfare and taxation out of guilt. Or stupidity, I'm not quite sure.
1) “That’s just ignernt.”
Can we get something straight? “Ignorant” has three syllables, and does not mean “rude” or “uncouth.” According to Mr. Webster, the word “ignorant,” (pronounced ‘ig-n(ə-)rənt,) means “Destitute of knowledge or education; also: lacking in knowledge or comprehension of the thing specified.
“Ignorant,” then, cannot be applied to person who insults you, cuts you off in traffic, fails to hold the elevator for you, leaves her used tampon on the back of a public toilet, or commits any other breach of social ettiquette. It also cannot be applied to your boyfriend’s baby mama when she take him back to domestic fo’ mo’ suppo’t, yo, nor can it be applied to me when I say that you who use the word in the ways I have described here should be stuffed in to a cannon and shot in to a wall. I may be an asshole, but I am not ignorant.
2)Speaking of ignorance…
Don’t send me any information about any political process, piece of legislation, university study, or anything else if you got it from any site leaning unabashedly to the left or to the right. I like to get my news and information directly from the news wires, not from media outlets who get the wire stories and edit them. I don’t pay much attention to anything that comes from anything with either “Christian” or “Progressive” in the title. (Send me anything that originated from the Center for American Progress and I’m likely to run from the room screaming, then spend the afternoon hiding behind the couch and clutching my wallet. “Modest” value-added tax my ass!)
You read something you find compelling? Research it a bit, why don’t you? If you’re going to take the time to forward on some information, find a few differing viewpoints, offer up the data, and ask me what I think.
Ditto for health-related news. Someone sent you an email saying that aspartame consumption causes MS? Google it; go out to the Center for Disease Control or National Institute of Health or Mayo Clinic web sites; hell, even Web MD is marginally reputable, and see if you can find anything that suggests there’s something to it before you hit “forward.” Otherwise, I’ll have to do it, and then I’ll have to reply to you and all creation that whatever information you’ve sent me is a bunch of crap; how in Bob’s name can you be such a moron?
3)Fa ra ra ra ra…
Some things about Christmas:
The retail Christmas season starts after Halloween. It’s been like this for years, and it’s not going to change any time soon. Stop complaining about how it's too early and we skip over Thankgiving. No one sings Thanksgiving carols because a) there aren’t any, and b) it’s a holiday created by government mandate. The religious holidays (Christmas, Easter, Halloween) exist because there’s a connection to some high holy day. The ones brought forth because they were tacked on to some piece of legislation? Not so much.
These holidays also garner more attention because they are accompanied some kind of consumption (candy, gifts, decorations) and therefore are heavily advertised. Thanksgiving only really generates revenue for the grocery and travel industries. Perhaps instead of focusing on the proliferation of Christmassy stuff though the month of November, stick with the spirit of the thing and reflect on the things in your life for which you are truly thankful. I’m thankful if I get though the day without hearing someonewhine, “Christmas already? What about Thanksgiving?”
Jesus is not, in fact, the reason for the season. Our modern Christmas, by and large, originated with the pagans celebrating winter solstice. The church assigned the birth of Christ to the soltice celebrations because they couldn’t get people to give up the parties and it was not economically feasible to excommunicate everyone.
Christmas is reverent, holy day to mark the birth of the Son of God, or it’s a noisy, filthy, garish celebration of gluttony, sloth, avarice and any other of the deadly sins. It’s up to the individual to choose, although personally I prefer the schizophrenic approach and make it a bit of both.
4) Healthcare-shmealthcare.
I will concede that the American health care system is imperfect, and that everyone should have access to it. I do not agree, however, that the system is “in crisis,” and I feel that a complete balls-out overhaul of the system is short-sighted and foolhardy.
Whatever work is to be done needs to be done incrementally, tackling one problem area at a time. Some kind of gap insurance for chronic and catastrophic illnesses, perhaps, so that thos who manage to survive long-term illnesses aren’t wiped out financially from all the treatments and services their insurance does not cover.
Government-subsidized health insurance plans for the self-employed or for those whose employers don’t offer insurance might not be a bad idea. Streamlining Medicare and Medicaid might be a reasonable goal.
Examining the reasons that health care costs are so bloody high might serve the country well. The previous administration sought to place caps on malpractice awards, in hopes that this would drive down the exorbitant cost of malpractice insurance. This was shot down, of course, and right along party lines. After all, faithfullness to one’s party is much more important than doing something that might actually do some good.
The healthcare legislation, currently in the Senate, will probably get pushed through because Obeekaybee and his progressive drones are working diligently to push through all of Clinton’s failed initiatives…because they CAN. They’re in a hurry because they know they are not likely to keep their current majority status, so they’re tacking health care and the student loan overhaul because once a few more Republicans are elected, they’ll lose both battles.
If you’re middle class, meaning 200% of the poverty line or above, your taxes are probably going to go up. Haven’t gotten a wage increase in a few years? Struggling to pay your bills? Tough shit. 56.8% of eligible voters participated in the 2008 elections; Obeekaybee took approximately 52% of that vote. For all intents and purposes, then, there are a very small number of people in this country who, in supporting the current regime, think that everyone else just needs to shut up and write out a check. These people are made up primarily of the dregs of humanity who'd never voted before but came out for the last election because they know there's something in it for them, and milquetoast progressives who vote for welfare and taxation out of guilt. Or stupidity, I'm not quite sure.
Friday, November 13, 2009
Udo on Childbearing.
"When someone is going to have a baby, why does it come down like this?" Udo asks this while bending his legs and gesturing between them.
I ask him what he means. "When someone is having a baby, it comes out here and this thing all splits open," he explains. "Down here where their winkle is."
"Where in God's name did you hear about that?" I ask him.
"Never mind that," says Udo, "why does the baby come down like that?"
I ask him again where he heard about this. He sighs and rolls his eyes. "On that episode of 'Family Guy!" I make a mental note to put the kibosh on the Family Guy.
"Why does the baby come down like that?" Udo asks again. "It looks like it would hurt."
I say it might hurt a bit.
"Why does it come out that way?"
"Because that's how it works," I tell him.
"Oh," says Udo. "Can I have a Popsicle?"
I ask him what he means. "When someone is having a baby, it comes out here and this thing all splits open," he explains. "Down here where their winkle is."
"Where in God's name did you hear about that?" I ask him.
"Never mind that," says Udo, "why does the baby come down like that?"
I ask him again where he heard about this. He sighs and rolls his eyes. "On that episode of 'Family Guy!" I make a mental note to put the kibosh on the Family Guy.
"Why does the baby come down like that?" Udo asks again. "It looks like it would hurt."
I say it might hurt a bit.
"Why does it come out that way?"
"Because that's how it works," I tell him.
"Oh," says Udo. "Can I have a Popsicle?"
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