Feb 02
I was searching online for assistance with a Blackberry issue for work when I stumbled across this topic in a tech support forum:
I really have no idea why he posted this in a phone forum. Maybe he doesn’t actually want any assistance and he’s just venting.
The obvious solution is for him to tell his female to stop her yapping.
Jan 27
André the Giant died 19 years ago today.
André was always one of my favorite wrestlers. When I was a kid, we didn’t watch wrestling at our house. Whenever we were at Grampa’s (my Dad’s dad), every Saturday morning was Bugs Bunny followed by, as Grampa called it, rasslin’. This was back in the early 80’s, with Hulk Hogan, Ricky the Dragon, Jake the Snake, King Kong Bundy, and of course, André.
The only match I remember was between King Kong Bundy and André the Giant. Bundy was obviously the heel (villain), as evinced by his shaved head, his black unitard, and his being 500 lbs. He did a splash (jump from the top rope with arms and legs out, landing flat) on André like five times, breaking the giant’s sternum. I remember after the match when you saw André walking out, you could see his sternum pressing against his skin. I already thought KKB was bad, but to break a man’s sternum? Pure evil.
At least that’s the way I remember it. I’ve done some searching around online and found out that that was a kayfabe injury. In wrestling lingo, kayfabe means that whatever happens inside the ring is presented as real, but in real life it is not. Examples: The Undertaker is not really dead and Kane is not really his brother. In and out of the ring Vince McMahon really is a jerk, and Mick Foley really is hardcore. In wrestling lingo, a mark is a fan, and a smart mark is a fan who knows wrestling isn’t real. I was not a smart mark.
At any rate, I still don’t know how they did that sternum thing.
Anyway, celebrities die all the time (who doesn’t?), and it’s not like you actually know any of these people, but it was really sad when André died, like we really had lost the 8th Wonder of the World.
Jan 25
“You lost today, kid. But that doesn’t mean you have to like it.”
One of the best lines in Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade (or any movie of that matter). It’s what the lead tomb robber (played by Richard Young) said to Young Indy (River Phoenix) as he gifted him with what would become his trademark hat.
The character’s name is simply–Fedora.
The man he was working for? Panama Hat.
Jan 22
“From the day that you’re born
to the day you ride in the hearse
things are never so bad
that they couldn’t get worse.”
Sam Duncan was an African American educator in Higginsville, Missouri from the 1950s-1970s where he taught a number of classes and coached several sports. The high school’s football field is named in his honor.
Despite his wise and cynical advice and his years of teaching service, my own personal experience with Mr. Duncan was far less impressive. We were in American History–the first class that was really a challenge for me–and Mr. Duncan was subbing in for Mr. Pace. One of the preps that usually caused problems was whistling–just barely audibly, and just enough to be annoying. My friend Wilxn was sitting in front of him, and Mr. Duncan accused Wilxn of being the whistler. Wilxn--your semi-standard nerd who was almost always good in class–thought the situation was so absurd as to be humorous.
“It’s not me,” Wilxn said, smiling.
“Don’t get smart with me,” Mr. Duncan snapped at Wilxn. “I’ll take those glasses off of you and show you somethin’!”
Sadly, this only provided confirmation bias to what I felt about authority figures in general.
Jan 19
My friend Dawn’s colloquial name for those bare ceramic light bulb sockets usually seen mounted in basements. Deluxe model shown below:
Jan 16
“What a waste of money! What a waste of time! It’s no answer to say that I was well paid. Nobody can be adequately paid for wasting his time.”
From a letter to Alfred Hitchcock, which can be seen in its entirety at Letters of Note.
Jan 10
Jan 04
I took this pic of a car in Kansas City. I’m not big on vinyl window decals anyway, but this is just…wrong:
Jan 03
Yeah, I know: my streak is finally broken. I went for almost five months with updates every 2-3 days, and then just totally fell off the wagon. I’ve had a few things going on (and by a few, Perry, of course I mean a googolplex).
Anyway, I have at least spent some of my time being somewhat productive: I have read three books already since Christmas.
First, I read Diary of a Wimpy Kid: Cabin Fever, a gift from The Baby, and it was just as good as the others in the series
For Christmas I also received the first two books in Alan Gordon’s Fools’ Guild mystery series that I had asked for, thanks to Grampa Tom. I really wanted these books, and it was kind of cool the way I received them: each book was from a different edition, and both were from different editions than the third book that I already owned. See the obvious significance? A jester’s motley is made up of a wide variety of bits of cloth, and my collection of books starring jesters is…
Fine, whatever. Philistines. Anyway, despite the fact I really wanted these, I didn’t plan on reading them as quickly as I did (I finished the first one two days after Christmas, and finished the second the day after New Year’s). But when you get hospitalized because of your stupid A-fib, suddenly you have lots of time to read. I was still in the joint when I finished the first, Thirteenth Night, and started Jester Leaps In shortly after I got out.
For my evening devotions before going to bed I am reading The Man God Uses, by Henry and Tom Blackaby. I’m just a few pages in, but it is good so far.
For months now I have been trying to read The Secret of Lost Things by Sheridan Hay–a book about a young woman from Tasmania who gets a job working in a used bookstore in New York City. It started off amazing, but has become a real chore to try to get through. Kind of odd, really, since I started reading it while I was reading The Fatal Shore by Robert Hughes, a history of the founding of Australia (and Tasmania), which also started brilliant, couldn’t put it down, but by the time he got to the chapter on Norfolk Island, I was really just slogging through out of duty.
Anyhoo, I’m not making any apologies or excuses or promises: the fact is, if I don’t have anything to say, I won’t waste my time–or yours–creating a fluff piece that isn’t interesting for me to write or interesting for you to read.
