When News Breaks, We Report It...Then We Include 75 Articles of Crap as Filler

I've been bad.  I haven't been offending people and insulting others lately, or at least not on this blog.  As it goes, each time I go on my hiatuses (anyone know the plural of hiatus without looking it up? Me either.)  I promise to write more often.  So, I'm really gonna try this time.

I've been flipping thru the exciting world of news website stories this morning and was just amazed at how redundant and dumb the news really is.  That's right...I've brought examples.

"Pakistan Escapes Major Quake Damage"
No shit.  What in the hell could an earthquake in Pakistan damage?  The buildings are made with the same durability one might see in a sandbox or Sauter furniture.  Seriously, what could possibly be damaged in Pakistan that couldn't be fixed in 20 minutes?  Can you even buy steel in Pakistan?  I mean, sure you can import it for weapons and tanks, but would they really allow the people to use it to build buildings?  Hell no.  So, this is not news.  This is just assumed by, well, everyone.  Even Pakistanis.

"U.S.-Mexico Border Fence Climbed in 18 Seconds"
Good, I'm glad we were able to rip out a stopwatch and accurately measure this.  Good productive use of time.  Perhaps maybe we could also have a 40-yard dash event to see if they can outrun the Border Patrol.  You know, I'm expecting to see Mexico do really well in the Track and Field events at the next Olympics.  With all the free training we're offering, the Hurdles and Pole Vault should be easy gold.

"Mom on Facebook as child drowns"
The next line of this should have read, "Mom was taken into custody and there will be a public hanging at the courthouse today around 2pm."  But I'm sure she will receive a light sentence because she was addicted to Facebook and her farm needed watering.  Maybe some counseling will help...after that fails, please hang her and do not allow her to get 3 squares a day on the taxpayer teet.

"Prepping for the Chinese president"
Take shoes off before entering room...Check.
Bow everytime you do anything...Check.
Have chef order rice and dog...Check.
Order giant gong...Check.
Remember that Ming is a dynasty and not the guy from Flash Gordon...Check.

"Big breakfasts won’t help you lose weight, study says"
Yep, apparently breakfast is an important meal, but a breakfast consisting of 71 sausages, 8 pounds of eggs and 15 biscuits is bad.  I'm glad this finally got out....news like this can save lives.

"CNN crew caught in Tunisia tear gas"
Helpful tip of the day...stay out of Tunisia.
 
"'Deliberate' weight gain angers 'Loser' trainer"
1.  This is not news.  2.  She should be thrilled...she wouldn't have a job if everyone were in shape, so this is just like bonus work her her.

"Exercise bikes that get 5 stars"
I didn't know you needed a rating system for a wheel, 2 pedals, handlebars and a seat.  This 5-star bike has a bell and a place to put your baseball cards in the spokes.  This four-star bike over here has a seat that goes from "Hurting the Anus" mode to "Uncomfortable on the Crotch" mode but no bell.  Does a one-star bike have a seat?  Really, we must get these ratings printed up for everyone.

That'll do for now.

Goodbye Leslie Nielsen

He's a great entertainer with a laundry list of great comedies under his belt, but that's not important right now.
Losing people like this means we will have to watch more movies from people like Michael Cera.  I've seen toilet seats with more ability than Michael Cera.

Godfather's Restaurant Nightmares, Part One

I'm going to start a new feature here....Restaurant Nightmares.  Little stories and phrases from my experiences that I'd like to share and hopefully, none of you will attempt to do or say any of these things.

1.  "I'm not one who normally complains, but..."  Yes you are.  If you ever hear these words, prepare for a lashing.  In every manager job I have had, anyone who prefaces their statements with the above sentence went to the Laquisha Jefferson College of Complaining.  Shortly after this sentence will come a cornucopia of phrases and words that would frighten Sam Kennison.  Once the tirade begins, you have roughly 30 seconds of finger-pointin' and Lord-praisin'.  I usually zone out during this period and think about what I am going to eat for lunch or dinner.  Then, as the customer begins to run out of big words, you slowly begin to lose interest in even standing there and decide to either give them nothing or give them roughly 25% of what they demand.  I usually opt for the former, but sometimes I'll give in, depending on whether I want to argue more or go and make my lunch.

2.  "I work in the customer service industry..."  Well, excuse me Your Highness!  I didn't realize that you held a position in the most sought-after business field second only to ditch-digging (I can say this because I am in this field, kinda like how blacks can use the N-word without repercussions).  People who use this sentence believe that the Wal-mart greeter job is a highly coveted position.  Honestly, if you are in the customer service industry, the last thing you should do is bitch simply because you feel the same way in your job, but outside of your castle, you think that flashing your Deputy Customer Service Officer badge is somehow going to make me think or react differently.  "Oh, you're in customer service???  A thousand pardons, my lady!  I'll go back in the kitchen and re-make your food with our gold-encrusted signature cooking utensils.  Gordon Ramsay is on our speed dial and will be here shortly.  I'll call the home office and have the CEO fly out right now to hand you your items while bowing, standing straight only long enough to place the Crown Jewels on your blessed head!"

3.  "I don't want anything for free, but..."  Yes you do.  That's exactly what you want.  You feel like your soul has been cast down to hell because your burger didn't have the right cheese on it, and other than the immediate disemboweling of the staff member responsible for this, you want justice.  Justice = free stuff.  Whether it be a free dessert or free food on your next visit, you want something for free and feel that telling me you don't want anything will make me feel guilty about the nothing I was going to give you.  "I appreciate you not wanting anything for free, sir, but no that you said hat, let me sign the deed to my house over to you.  We certainly want you to come back, so here is a free food for a year card!  Your server is now your indentured servant...feel free to use them for any random tasks around your home or office."  If you don't want anything for free, then please say nothing.  It will save me time I could have spent thinking about something worthwhile.

4.  "My server was rude!"  Really?  I agree that there are occasions when a server is rude, but I have found that the reasons are almost always caused by the very customer that has complained.  If you had not sent the food you ordered back to the kitchen 3 times because your sensitive and royal taste buds determined that we incorrectly made your item 3 times while every other customer who has eaten the same thing did not notice, then maybe the server would be more pleasant.  Or hey, here's a tip, if your child is screaming like the Sirens and you notice that you can't even hear the server speaking to you 3 feet away from your face, then maybe you could understand why the server and the entire restaurant would be agitated.  Apparently, servers are human beings or so I am hearing.  If you treat someone like a piece of gum on the bottom of your shoe and then expect them to kneel each time they approach your table, you're going to be disappointed.  If a server is taking an order at another table and you yell across the restaurant to get their attention because you want another napkin after already using 6, I'm betting that they along with everyone else between you will think that you, in fact, are the rude one.  Lastly, if a server is carrying a large tray of food to another table and you think this would be a good time to tell them you need a refill but they don't immediately drop the tray and run to get you another Coke, the server is not rude, you are an ass and deserve to wait.

5. "I know what Bud Light tastes like, and this isn't Bud Light."  True story.  Sure, kegs can occasionally get mis-hooked to the wrong line, but honestly, umm, is there such a thing as a Bud Light connoisseur?  And is this something you would want to admit in public?  Sure enough, he was wrong and it was, in fact, Bud Light.  I decided to give him another one poured from the same tap out of the same keg and directly following the one he just said was wrong.  I told him I changed the keg and asked if he noticed a difference.  Hi response: "Oh yeah, that's Bud Light."  Now, if I had not told him I changed the keg, there was a 75% chance he would have sen it back again, but when you tell them that you had a fact-finding commission check the line, determined that the line had been corrupted by Pete Coors himself and that you personally checked the keg, they never say a word.  My other issue is this...do you take pride in knowing exactly what domestically-bottled water and a pinch of alcohol tastes like?

Coming soon..."There's no alcohol in this drink" and "I'm gonna get you fired."

You Sounded Like Dirty Harry Just Then...

"Between grief and nothing... I'll take grief."  -Ed Rooney

A good quote there.  Perhaps you should have chosen nothing.  It would have kept the police away.

Bored...

So, that creepy woman Elena Kagan is going thru her confirmation hearings.  I have tried on more than one occasion to watch and find out if this wee lass is going to be an effective, yet unbiased judge.  Sadly, I haven't been able to get past her appearance.  Is it just me, or does this woman look like the offspring of Rachel Maddow and Miss Piggy?  There's something creepy about her...I don't know if it's the way she smiles like Pennywise from "IT" or if maybe it's the way I can so easily see her in combat pants and a cutoff flannel shirt.  Either way, I don't think putting her on the Supreme Court is a good idea.  Remember the semi from Maximum Overdrive with that giant green face on it?  Now, imagine trying to plead a case and seeing that sitting behind the bench.  Case closed.

I was going to go on an Obama rant, but Jesus, there's just too much to cover.  Hell, even his elitist douchebag media cronies on MSNBC are starting to turn on him.  BP is being raked over the coals for this spill into the Gulf, and if Bush had handled this the way BHO has, he would have been tarred and feathered and thrown into the pit of broken solar power cells that can barely power a toaster.  But that's okay, Barack's not at any fault...it's the failed policies of the Bush Administration, like always.

So, I'm sitting here at the local auto dealership service area waiting on my vehicle to be fixed and I just can't help but to discuss the wonderful array of people sitting around me...a real cross-section of Americana.
1. I know it's mean, but there is something so entertaining about an elderly man walking past me with the walking farts.  How does he time it so perfectly?  Is there a reason why the farts slip out only when his right foot hits the floor?  Sometimes I really do feel like a child when I can't help but to laugh when I see a grown man sawing buttlogs as he gingerly walks to pay for his car repairs.
2. Why is there always the one guy who just can't sit down?  Yes, waiting is boring, but you haven't sat down once and you have been here as long as I have.  It's like if he paces around aimlessly the car repairs will magically fix themselves quicker.  Or perhaps he also has the walking farts and is enjoying crop-dusting the other patrons of this service department.
3. Why do they put pamphlets for new cars in the Service Department lobby?  Isn't that like a smack in the face?  "Hey, your car sucks and while you're sitting here for 7 hours waiting for me to refill your wiper fluid, take a gander at these cars that you obviously will never be able to afford."
4. The business guy.  Always one guy who sits over in the corner with his laptop in a full suit patiently waiting for his car and making important-sounding phone calls.  "Yeah, Tom, make sure we get those T384 reports over to Distribution before the final cut goes thru...the A4150 test sounds positive, but we should run it past R&D again to guarantee the results."  See, I can make up stuff too and sound all smart.
5. The TV.  Every time I have set foot in a service department, there is always a TV and it is always tuned to the most gut-wrenching shows.  I checked it three times thus far.  First, it was one of the morning network news shows, which do not provide any news unless it's about hippie-gothkid-vampire Twilight shitheads.  Second and still on is NBC's coverage of Wimbledon.  You'd think sports would be a good thing, but tennis?  If I wanna see a woman flailing her arms and screaming every time a ball flies at her, I'll watch porn.
6. The angry man.  There's always one person who gets the unfortunate news that the part needed to fix his car "is not available on-site but we can order it and have it here by Thursday."  Man, that sucks.  Service guys are not like doctors and juries...you can't look at them and know it's going to be bad news.  You have to wait til they start speaking, and then it hits you.  You go from hopeful to furious in 5 seconds.  It's better than watching a child drop candy or being the guy at the urinal when the poor bastard in the bathroom stall realizes he has fired out his demons but there's no TP.
7. Lastly, the single 20-ish lady sitting in front of the TV, yet not watching the TV.  Reading, sure enough, Twilight, she sits with her head down like she's some Japanese schoolgirl on a subway in Tokyo afraid to make eye contact because some creepy businessman will take that as an invite to cop a feel.  Just reading that crap will keep the boys away, so she doesn't have a lot to worry about. 

Unimportant Observations #1

While I was driving home, my wife mentioned that Dixie Carter was on an episode of SVU.  Actually, she had said it was the dark-haired lady from Designing Women.  As it did not require a wide-angle lens, I knew it to be Dixie and not Delta Burke.  Anyway, my thought was this...Throughout the entire run of Designing Women, did they ever actually design anything?  I remember Meschach Taylor carrying fabric and them talking about "important meetings," but did they ever actually design something?  Shit, man, even the A-Team made a tank out of a bus, random piles of sheet metal just laying around the almost empty warehouse they were locked in, and the odd arsenal of machine parts used to make guns that shoot heads of lettuce.

UPDATE: So, Dixie Carter apparently passed away yesterday.  Define eerie.  I haven't thought of her or that show until my random thought, and then boom, she's gone.  Maybe I should try writing more about Congress and DC.

The Doctor Is In....Sort Of.

Florida Doctor Refuses Obama Voters

Hahahahahahahahaha.  Welcome to health care reform!

So, Uh, Here's One For You.

So, as I sit at the stoplight at 86th and Michigan waiting for my time to turn, I casually glance over at the strip mall sitting at the NE corner of the intersection.  As expected, considering the neighborhood, there is a large liquor store, check cashing place, a tobacco outlet, and a cash-for-gold store.  While I sat there perusing the storefronts, I noticed a man standing near the street holding a sign flagging people into the cash-for-gold store.  While this is not un-common, what I witnessed was, well, jaw-dropping.

The man looked to be 30 years old, was white with a slightly heavy build, but certainly far from Kirstie Alley.  Dressed in what I affectionately call "ass pants" (low-sagging shorts) and a T-shirt last cleaned in November, he waved his sign to and fro, alerting the passers-by that the cash-for-gold store was open and ready to not give you a fair deal for your gold.

Then it happened.

The man hunched over, and without any sign of what was to come, he began puking up what I can only call "orangy-brown liquid with scattered chunks" right there on the street.  Since this light takes a bit longer than some around the city, I stared at him long enough to watch him expel his magical bile 4 separate times.  Mind you, he was using the sign to hold himself up while purging his stomach demons.  Never one to feel the complete and total humiliation of violating the walkway with his vomit, the man wiped his chunk-covered face with his hand and then continued to wave his sign, going so far as to use his chunk-wiping hand to signal people over in the other lanes to come and stop by. 

The light turned green, as did my stomach, and I pulled away, left with only a last fading glance of Chunky holding his stomach while proudly waving the cash-for-gold sign like he was atop a hill during the Battle of Sterling and was signalling the archers.

So, I guess the moral of this story is that vomiting on the sidewalk in open-view of a major intersection while holding a business sign is a good way to draw attention to your business.  I always thought a newspaper or radio ad would suffice, but these cash-for-gold people have a firm grasp on new-age marketing.  Unfortunately, if any of you need to visit a cash-for-gold business, I now happen to know of one.