File Under: Cost-Effective Therapy

The most rednecked thing I do is always done on the first day of the year. After my family and I spend the night at the house of our hospitable best friends in Grass Lake, my friend and I go out behind the garage to the edge of the woods, armed with a pair of earplugs each, and one .22 guage. Our victims aren't peasant pheasant or deer, but old dishes, panes of glass, building scrap, and champagne bottles from the night before. I've been known to yell the name of whatever frustration is on my mind at the time before squeezing the trigger and, if my aim is true, before the satisfying splintering of glass, pottery, and occasionally brick.

All this to say, I can understand the theraputic value in this.

File Under:Money for Nothing

Nigerian soccer officials are allowed to take bribes
now, apparently, as long as they don't actually let it influence their calling of the game. Which kinda calls into question just how a bribe is defined, and to a lesser extent, how to report such earnings for tax purposes.

In related news, the MLB is considering now allowing players to use steroids as long as they don't let that influence their performance on the field.

File Under:Career Damage comma Self-Inflicted

In what will surely be defined as a teachable moment, a youth minister taught by example a lesson in forgiveness and utterly insane personal violence. Perhaps he should try his hand at a different career. Like, Little League coach, or something.

Thanks to Chris L for throwing this my way.

Speaking of Apocalyptic Things...

I saw a bumper sticker on the back of an old car yesterday. It said, FINE ARTS FOREVER. At first glance, however, I transposed the N and the R in the words, "fine arts." I think the phrase FIRE ANTS FOREVER would be more appropriate for a sandwich board.

File Under:Is It Tax Deductable?

Here's a good cause: A guy with a boring job is accepting monetary donations toward early retirement. As of this writing, the website listed in the article redirects to Google, which may explain why he's got something short of $60 donated thus far. Poor guy. Perhaps he should have been a lion tamer, instead.

File Under:Politics comma Schoolyard

What do you do when your political rival won't leave? You call the cops. That'll make him take his ball and go home.

File Under:Harboring a Gnome of a Criminal

I hear Willie Nelson did the same thing with his collection of pot people.

Buzz Off.

I work in an office where nobody has any hands. That must be the case, because all of the phones here are equipped with speakerphone. And, since they have speakerphone, everyone feels compelled to use that particular feature.

The use of the speakerphone is bad enough. It results in an office full of people yelling at their phones, which are located exactly three feet from their heads. That makes it hard to get any work done, unless you consider commenting via e-mail to other employees about your next cube neighbor's conversation, work. But add to that the completely wretched "buzz-in" feature that allows anyone in the company to suddenly hear everything that's going on in your office without any warning, and you've got yourself a genuine telecommunicative pain in the butt.

Earlier this week, my boss (who I like; don't get me wrong, but he has an unhealthy appreciation for/dependence on speakerphone and the buzz-in feature) buzzed me (of course) and asked me to come back into his office. He had some additions to a document revision we had been working on. I stood in front of his desk for a minute or so while he tried to find the page he was looking for. Then, someone buzzed him.

"Hey. Hello?" (This is how all buzz-in/speakerphone conversations start.)
My boss stopped looking at the papers in front of him, and turned to the phone, three feet from his head. "Yeah! Hello?" (This is the standard reply to all buzz-ins on speaker phone.)

The buzz-er continued to set up a semi-complicated scenario that he wanted my boss to comment on.

About half a minute later I realized, suddenly, that I was no longer in the room as far as my boss knew.

I walked back to my desk, muttering under my breath about the damned
speakerphone and buzz-in system. If a standard phone call (you know, with the ring?) is like a solicitor ringing your doorbell while you're having a conversation in your house, then a buzz-in speaker phone call is like a solicitor walking into your living room and pushing your guest off the couch.

I was thinking about this for a while at my desk, when my boss buzzed my phone. I picked up the receiver and he told me he was ready to go over that document now.

File Under:It Really Tied the Room Together

If you're going to Lebowski a rug, make sure it isn't
from a courthouse. In front of a security camera.

File Under:That's Just the Drugs Eating.

If you must sleep, please don't eat.

File Under:Utilities comma Bonus

I thought this kind of thing was only possible on The Simpsons.

File Under:You Can't Go Back Home

Reversing farther than necessary is apparently a ticketable offense in Australia. Who knew?

File Under:News Flash comma Safe Cycling

Oh, come on. It's not like Lady Godiva wore a riding helmet.

File Under:Gut Bomb comma Atomic

Hungry? You won't be after eating this. And I mean, like, you'll never be hungry ever again.

But what am I going to do until THEN?!

I just saw this trailer. This looks like the best movie I haven't seen yet. June 2 is only two-and-three-quarters months away. But it seems like a full three months.

File Under:Confusing the Customer

As a technical writer, I'm not sure what to make of this. The following excerpts do lend some credence to tech writers' claims that developers do not make good writers:

Product developers, brought in to witness the struggles of average consumers, were astounded by the havoc they created.

and,

Most of the flaws found their origin in the first phase of the design process: product definition, Den Ouden found.

File Under:Jacket Required

I'm trying not to be judgmental about it, but there's a certain degree of absurdity in this. Does this mean Keslinger is going to cancel its gig at next week's curling match, as well?

Thank you, Chris L, for uncovering this story.