good fences make good neighbors

And by "good fences," of course we mean "motion-activated webcam-toting nonlethal water cannons."

[via BoingBoing]

what to do when an astronaut has a psychotic episode

NASA has a contingency plan for just about everything.

a little more outside the box

British psychics couldn't find Osama bin Laden. No cause for dismay, though:

"I don't think this was a waste of public money. Many people will say so, but I think it is marvellous that the Government is prepared to think outside the box. And this is as outside the box as it gets."

No it isn't.

In accordance with this blog's tradition of envelope-pushing, I offer the following outside-the-box solutions the British government could have considered in tandem.

1. Training capuchin monkeys to recognize bin Laden; wiring them with GPS transmitters and releasing them into the Afghan mountains.

2. Announcing that Osama has won the lotto for over $250 million, and if he would please come to the nearest office to collect remuneration.

3. Holding auditions for "Cabaret," OBL's favorite musical, if the debris discovered in Tora Bora caves gives any indication.

4. Killing Chuck Norris, and then calling upon his disembodied spirit to roam the hills of Afghanistan until OBL is found.

5. Having all adult males in Britain surgically made to look just like OBL, so his forces couldn't figure out who the real leader was, thus quitting in frustration.

I'm sure readers can suggest their own outside-the-box scenarios, thus proving yet another governmental "failure of imagination" in the war on terror.


[link via Kerry Howley]

surely the Second Coming is at hand

Meet the new Jesus. Not exactly the same as the old Jesus:

He says he has a church-paid salary of $136,000 but lives more lavishly than that. During an interview, he showed off a diamond-encrusted Rolex to a CNN crew and said he has three just like them. He travels in armored Lexuses and BMWs, he says, for his safety. All are gifts from his devoted followers.

And what about the tattoo of 666 on his arm?

Although it's a number usually associated with Satan, not the son of God, de Jesus says that 666 and the Antichrist are, like him, misunderstood.

The Antichrist is not the devil, de Jesus tells his congregation; he's the being who replaces Jesus on Earth.

"Antichrist is the best person in the world," he says. "Antichrist means don't put your eyes on Jesus because Jesus of Nazareth wasn't a Christian. Antichrist means do not put your eyes on Jesus Christ of Nazareth. Put it on Jesus after the cross."

And de Jesus says that means him.

So far, de Jesus says that his flock hasn't been scared off by his claims of being the Antichrist. In a show of the sway he holds over the group, 30 members of his congregation Tuesday went to a tattoo parlor to have 666 also permanently etched onto their skin.

There's a sucker born every .1666 hours.

[via PZ]

just say no to 80s rap

Thank Radley Balko for this one. (Warning: before you click "play," have you thought about ear insurance?)

don't blame Canada

Alas, the insidious Canadian conspiracy to steal defense secrets, pending their invasion, is but a dream within an enigma wrapped in a pita. The Defense Department is backing off the story that tracking devices were hidden in some Canadian currency.

Don't blame Canada.

Yet.

your patriotic duty

It is your patriotic duty to turn in your penny jar to the police.

It is your patriotic duty to use only credit cards.

It is your patriotic duty to suspect Canadians.

bully puppet

"Puppets help to prevent bullies," reads the headline.

Jasmine Thomas and Kellen O'Reilly, both 8, said they would recommend the puppet show to other third-graders.

"It was pretty funny with the dog," Kellen said.

"This teaches kids a nice lesson about bullying," Jasmine said.

Both students said they learned something new about preventing bullying at their school.

"We can learn how to take care of bullying," Kellen said.

"If someone gets bullied, we should help," Jasmine said.

Not if that kid carries a puppet.

K-Fed's concert rider

The Smoking Gun, as always, has the scoop. Best zinger: "purported rapper."

In their summary, though, they miss the weirdest parts of the pseudo-celebrity's demands.

"Six (6) One liter sized bottled spring water (cold, no Evian please)"
K-Fed is that particular about bottled spring water? What's wrong with Evian? Anyone?

"Box of Altoids, red"
Cinnamon Altoids are red, and come in a maroon box. Regular pepperminty fresh Altoids are white, but come in a red box. K-Fed is the guy who likes purple on his toast and yellow on his hot dogs.

thanks for sharing

I nominate this...

What ho -
my identity
online.

Yes, this is my, Capt. Dylan Clifthorne's, haiku. I dedicate it to google. And God. Is that redundant? I don't know. Does god?...(Does Google?) Who are we kidding? Google knows everything. And for what out of everything they don't know, there's wiki"free"dia!

But really, I am interested in knowing why someone is interested in my letter, and why they disagree without disagreeing, and why Orwell is more than a socialist pig farmer, and why "Olympia in the know people", which I only circumstancially would identify myself as, should respond.

Sincerely,
Mr. Backwards Abraxas

...as the most intriguing and delightful and unsettling comment ever commented, on this blog or any other.

Iggy Pop's concert rider

I'm a drummer in a rock-and-or-roll band. Our lead guitarist, Mike Dean, is known for his massive email rants, paragraph after paragraph of zingers and self-deprecating snark.

I'm sure he'll appreciate this remarkable concert rider for Iggy Pop and the Stooges, which includes all the usual demands, but with a running commentary that would make Mark Twain proud. A sample:

Apparently we are going to be in your area, playing a concert, and you will be supplying the backline equipment. Good-oh! Are you sitting comfortably? Then I'll begin...

ALL OF THIS LOT FOR A START

2X MARSHALL VBA 8 X 10 CABINETS (There's lovely.)

3X MARSHALL VBA BASS AMPLIFIERS Make sure they're good ones or we'll all end up as wormlike web-based life forms in the bass player's online literary diahorrea. Honestly. He's like a sort of Internet Pepys or Boswell, except without the gout and the syphilis. For all I know.

If you can't supply Marshalls, then
3 x AMPEG SVT2 amps and 2 8x10 cabs iinstead [sic].

1 X KORG 2000 DIGITAL RACK TUNER. Digital in the sense that it works via an electronically generated number system, not digital because it only works if someone holds it together with their fingers.

It goes on like this for 18 pages.


[Thanks to the lovely folks at The Smoking Gun.]

preservation and transposition

We're pulling out of the Albertsons parking lot when I notice a vanity plate attached to a Chevy Suburban that reads "CRE8MEM." "Through scrapbooking," says the license plate holder. How clever.

Except when I first see it, I think it says "CREM8EM," which is just a little different.

we all have a parking meter story to share

But we all haven't published a book of parking meter stories, like Jack Fawcett has.

He's got lots of stories, most of them funny, and this summer, the Birmingham Historical Society has collected them in a memoir titled "Parking for a Nickel," released by JCarp Publications of Ann Arbor.... The book also contains stories unrelated to meters about silly little things Fawcett and other Birmingham police officers used to do.

I'm sure it makes for great reading, full of pithy wisdom and hilarious hijinks.

He'd better watch out, though. A parking attendant across the pond, already blogging, is planning on writing a book, too. A preview:

It has been almost intolerably hot on patrol today. Fortunately my beat was the leafy suburbs with lots of limited waiting and plenty of opportunities to duck into the shade. Drank a hell of a lot of water and even returned to base twice for extra supplies. I reek of sweat and the moment I have posted this am off for a nice long cool shower.

A sure-fire hit.

Writing a history of parking meters, though, is another matter entirely. Join the effort and help this guy!



[First link via Obscure Store]

life badly imitates art

We got snake in a m-----------' rental car!




[link via Obscure Store. Do you visit it daily? You really should.]

s-t-a-l-k-e-r

Am I ever glad ESPN wasn't broadcasting the National Spelling Bee when I was a contestant.

high sssssspeed chasssse

"A boa constrictor wrapped around someone's neck in a stolen car at 4:45 a.m., it adds a little more tension to a tense situation."

Read all about it here.

where the rubber crap meets the road

Two thousand pounds of crap, approximately, southbound on I-5 north of Seattle, and headed for--where else?--Tenino.

is it hot in here, or is it just the deep fryer?

A construction workers' tradition of cooking a turkey for an early Thanksgiving celebration went awry when the oil in their deep fryer caught fire burning the house they had just finished building.

Whatever you do this Thanksgiving, be careful.

coming soon to The Obscure Store

Woe betide the cop who starts a police chase "for fun."

poop de grace

Just when we're arguing whether whizzing in Sizzler's worth the intervention of the state, along comes this weirdo.