Posts Tagged: black humor

Weekend Tidbits or an Ode to Hedgehogs, Water, and the Deep Time of Trees, plus a few Con Men

Posted by & filed under ideas + opinions, tidbits.

Hedgehogs, UK Politics, and general understated Amusement in this Metafilter post: “1566 seems very recent, but the hedgehog was around before then”
Transcript of MP Rory Stewart’s hedgehog defense in Parliament in 2017.

Of all the possible Tory MPs possible to be the next Prime Minister, one can only hope that the Conservatives will vote for Mr. Stewart and not Mr. Johnson.

Why Water is Weird

Black, Hot Ice May Be Nature’s Most Common Form of Water

This Evangelical Prayer-Coin Grift Is What the Age of Trump Is All About

“The Wall Street financiers and C-suite lords-of-the-universe have made a Faustian bargain of their own, simply accepting that the President of the United States will have regular bouts of public insanity and upend the post-World War II geopolitical order because the Dow is up and taxes are down. This will not end well for them or for the Evangelicals, because everyone who gets in bed with Donald Trump ends up debased and disgraced. Often, he convinces them to do it to themselves. “

Men Have No Friends and Women Bear the Burden
Toxic masculinity—and the persistent idea that feelings are a “female thing”—has left a generation of straight men stranded on emotionally-stunted island. Unable to forge intimate relationships with other men, it’s women who are paying the price.

A landmark malaria vaccine has been rolled out in Malawi

This Graphic Shows the Best Air-Cleaning Plants, According to NASA

The Art of Blooming Late

Winning the Peace

Trees of deep time are a portal to the past : The vanishing groves
A chronicle of climates past and a portent of climates to come – the telling rings of the bristlecone pine

Dias de los Muertos, The Election, and Zombies

Posted by & filed under ideas + opinions, oh, california.

Dias de los Muertos Calaveras
Photo taken by Ms. Jen with her Nokia N8.

Tues 11.02.10 – I don’t like horror or scary movies, but I feel like I am living in one. Early this morning I woke up in the 5am hour from a nightmare in which everyone around me turned into a zombie. My first waking thought, of which I tweeted fairly soon after was:

“Is it just me or does it seem wrong that US Election day this year falls on Dia de los Muertos?“

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Eschew Obfuscation, Part II

Posted by & filed under news + events.

It has been two years and two days since the master of a good humorous poke at and romp with obfuscation died and his publisher will be releasing the novel he was working on at the time of his death as an unfinished work.
David Foster Wallace’s novel about entry level employees at the IRS, The Pale King, will be released in April 15, 2011:

“Set at an IRS tax-return-processing center in Illinois in the mid-1980s, The Pale King is the story of a crew of entry-level processors and their attempts to do their job in the face of soul-crushing tedium. “The Pale King may be the first novel to make accountants and IRS agents into heroes,” says Bonnie Nadell, Wallace’s longtime agent and literary executor.”

If one has a history of depression, why, even for reasons of sussing out the black comedic gems, would one write a novel about the IRS?

Who Cares? Really? I Want to Know…

Posted by & filed under ideas + opinions.

Rockstars do it all the time. If they don’t, it tarnishes their reputations.
Movie Stars would be deadly dull if they didn’t.
Sports dudes also do it, unless they are shooting ‘roids, then maybe they can’t.
We live in a culture saturated with it, so really people why does the media even care?
At least half the reporters reporting on this case have. So, why does it matter?
Yes, I am talking about Tiger.
So, the esteemed Mr. Woods is a horn dog. Yep, a multi-millionaire got some pussy.
Why do you care? Are you jealous? Did you wish you could score that much?
Or you like me and are baffled about this being news?
Baffled in a culture saturated in sex as to why the media would even cover such a thing when there are wars going on, people being killed, and budgets being strained by eight years of overseas military expenditures.
Is it the golf factor? Yes, golf is deadly dull, so the astounding fact that some chicks would divert attention from the stars of football, baseball, soccer, rock, hip-hop, actors to a golf dude is that what is so titillating? Is that the story, groupies for golf dudes?
Or is is the story as Cecily and Tiffany have pointed out? Is this story really about the Swedish Model Wife done wrong?
Wake me up when Jeff Sessions or Robert Byrd are outed as having life long gay high school sweetheart lovers.

The Pig

Posted by & filed under fun stuff, news + events.

I come from a large family on my Mom’s side, she is the oldest of five and each of her siblings has had between 2 and 7 children of their own plus a few grandkids scattered here and there. We haven’t all gotten together since May of 2002, and partially in May of 2007, then last week Tuesday my Mom’s siblings all got together, sans issue. Thus, various aunts were in town over Thanksgiving weekend.
On Saturday, my Mom’s youngest sister, Dana, who lives in Oregon, and I went to lunch at Udupi Palace for a lovely lunch and then we took Scruffy McDoget to Dog Beach for a good long walk. When we got back to my house and my aunt’s car, she left pretty quickly, which I thought at the time had to do with the fact we had hung out for about 4 hours at this point and the fact that she is a strong introvert.
On Sunday, I ate the leftovers from our lunch over the course of the day, including my Aunt’s leftovers. Hey, its Udupi Palace, spinach dosa is always good, even the next day.
On Monday, I got a text from my Aunt Dana that she had been officially diagnosed with H1N1 and if I got sick I should immediately go to the doctor.
Yes, it happened that fast. From what I found out today from my Aunt Anne, Dana was fine at lunch and after our walk she started to feel really bad, by the time she drove back to Anne’s house about 30 miles south of my place she was really sick. By Sunday, super sick, sick enough to go to the doctor.
I texted her back to let her know that if she needed any help to let me know. The first day, I was bemused. The Pig, The Pig, it is coming.
By Tuesday, while I felt fine, I did some research and found that the infectious period for H1N1 was heatedly debated and could be anytime from when the person was first infected until the last cough and the incubation period if exposed to a person with H1N1 could be anywhere from one to seven days.
How about if you shared a dosa, uttapam, and sambar with someone with H1N1 in the infectious period?
I then decided that getting The Pig would be a forced Staycation with a real good excuse for missing work. I twitter this. Yes, yes, I know, Hanen Black Humor Alert. Funny, ha ha.
All week, I have felt normal. Well, as normal as I ever feel. Ok, so I lie… Really, I have had a bit of a sore throat and swollen glands, I did cough up a big cough up yesterday on to my steering wheel while driving. Surprise!
BUT IT ISNT THE PIG, I swear. Today I have felt a little off, but not much. Really, I promise. I just stayed in all day and had the heater on. I never run my heater. It is SoCal, no need for a heater on when it is 72F, right?
This evening, my aunt Anne called to give me the report on how Aunt Dana was faring, to ask how I was feeling, and to give me instructions on how to get into my Grandma’s storage tomorrow so I can get & put up her Christmas decorations.
Aunt Anne: “How are you feeling?”
Me: “Fine.”
Anne: “You don’t sound good, your voice is weak and you have been coughing as we have been talking.”
Me: “…..uh….((cough))”
Anne: “Are you feeling sick? If so, go to the doctor…”
Conversation about immediate doctor visit and Tamilflu ensues, all the while I remain in DENIAL. I am fine. I swear.
No Pig here. The only Pig I can see is the one in the freezer. Maybe I should turn down the heater before it melts the apartment.