{ A white woman who had a black baby claims she fell pregnant while watching a porn movie in 3D }

I woke up one day and everything in the apartment had been stolen and replaced with an exact replica. I said to my roommate, ‘Can you believe this? Everything in the apartment has been stolen and replaced with an exact replica.’ He said, ‘Do I know you?’

{ Steven Wright | NY Times | Continue reading }

photo { Johan Willner }

Wildlife experts are hunting a rogue bull elephant in southern India accused of killing at least 10 female elephants during a testosterone-induced ’sex rampage’.

{ Metro.co.uk | Continue reading }

I bought a Stereo! Wow! With two speakers!

But then I heard the quad with the four speakers and I was like this is it, so I got rid of the stereo and got the quad.

I’m listening to this thing and I’m like “Hey this sounds like SHIT!”

So, I got rid of that and got the dodecaphonic with the 12 speakers.

This was more to my liking…for a while.

But the ear gets pretty sophisticated pretty fast and I got rid of that and got the milliphonic with the 1,000 speakers.

And I’m listening to that one and I’m like, “Hey, this sounds like SHIT too! The other one was SHIT one, this one is SHIT too!”

So, I traded that in and got the googlephonic, which is the highest number of speakers you can have before infinity.

Sounds like SHIT!

So, then I said, “Hey, maybe it’s the needle!”

I had the typical diamond needle. I searched around got the moonrock needle, cost me 3 million bucks, but what the hey. So, now I have a googlephonic stereo with a moonrock needle.

It’s okay for a car stereo, I wouldn’t want it in my house.

{ Steve Martin }

logotype { House Industries }

{ Sam Potts, A Tax Form for the Marginally Employed | Enlarge | Thanks Colleen! }

{ Clowningforchrist.com }

Dual Function Design, November 10, 2008
By B. Govern “Bee-Dot-Govern”

This item has wolves on it which makes it intrinsically sweet and worth 5 stars by itself, but once I tried it on, that’s when the magic happened. After checking to ensure that the shirt would properly cover my girth, I walked from my trailer to Wal-mart with the shirt on and was immediately approached by women. The women knew from the wolves on my shirt that I, like a wolf, am a mysterious loner who knows how to ‘howl at the moon’ from time to time (if you catch my drift!). The women that approached me wanted to know if I would be their boyfriend and/or give them money for something they called meth. I told them no, because they didn’t have enough teeth, and frankly a man with a wolf-shirt shouldn’t settle for the first thing that comes to him.

I arrived at Wal-mart, mounted my courtesy-scooter (walking is such a drag!) sitting side saddle so that my wolves would show. While I was browsing tube socks, I could hear aroused asthmatic breathing behind me. I turned around to see a slightly sweaty dream in sweatpants and flip-flops standing there. She told me she liked the wolves on my shirt, I told her I wanted to howl at her moon. She offered me a swig from her mountain dew, and I drove my scooter, with her shuffling along side out the door and into the rest of our lives. Thank you wolf shirt.

Pros: Fits my girthy frame, has wolves on it, attracts women
Cons: Only 3 wolves (could probably use a few more on the ‘guns’), cannot see wolves when sitting with arms crossed, wolves would have been better if they glowed in the dark.

{ Amazon.com }

I am currently ensconced in my plush executive hotel suite in an international location, ready to attend an international marketing conference.

Quite rightly, I’ve been given the VIP treatment because I’ll be one of the conference’s key speakers. At 3am on Sunday in the Herman Goerring Room, I will address a select audience on ‘Female Stereotypes in Advertising’. (They couldn’t have picked a better person, to be honest. I fucking love female stereotypes! I use them all the time!)

I’ll post more on that when I get back, but for now, I thought I’d shine a light on the real goings-on at events such as these.

What do the various attendees want from the event? What do they bring in terms of insight and skillsets? What do they hope to take away with them?

The answer to all those questions is nothing, fuck-all and diddly-squat. But here’s what they’ll actually be up to.

{ I am the client | Continue reading | via copyranter }

makeup { Zach Bowens }

{ Freddie DeBoer comments | Gawker }

Mirage: The Omnidroid 9000 is a top-secret military fighting robot. Artificial intelligence allows it to solve any problem it’s presented with, and, unfortunately…

Mr. Incredible: Let me guess. It became smart enough to wonder why it had to take orders.

Mirage: We lost control, and now it’s loose in the jungle, threatening our facility.

{ The Incredibles, 2004 }

Dave: Open the pod bay doors, HAL.

HAL: I’m sorry, Dave. I’m afraid I can’t do that.

Dave: What’s the problem?

HAL: I think you know what the problem is just as well as I do.

Dave: I don’t know what you’re talking about, HAL.

HAL: I know that you and Frank were planning to disconnect me, and I’m afraid that’s something I cannot allow to happen.

{ 2001: A Space Odyssey, 1968 }

Nazi theft of Greek gold during the Second World War is to blame for the country’s faltering finances, Athens claimed yesterday. It came as new protests about the economy turned violent.

Greece said the real culprit for its problems were the Nazis, whose occupation lasted from 1941 to 1945.

‘They took away the Greek gold that was at the Bank of Greece, they took away the Greek money and they never gave it back,’ said Deputy prime minister Theodoros Pangalos. ‘I don’t say they have to give back the money necessarily but they have at least to say “thanks”.’

{ Daily Mail | Continue reading }

Where is all that Greek gold?

Last week I mentioned the (what seemed to me and much of the world) odd incident of Greek politicians talking about the need for Germany to pay its debts to Greece. I got this response from a Greek reader. Comments afterword.

“Dear Mr. Mauldin,

I am an avid reader and I just wanted to correct you about a comment in one of your articles, “The Pain in Spain”, specifically:

‘Somehow they forgot about the German government paying 115 million deutschmarks in 1960 — not a small sum back then.’

This repayment of 1960 is undeniable. but the total amount owed was $10 billion ($3.5 billion for the return of the gold stolen and the repayment of the war loans Greece was forced into giving Germany, and $7 billion in war reparations awarded to Greece in 1946). As the DM/$ parity was then four for one, this means they gave Greece $29 million out of the $10 billion owed.

Germany also proclaims that they have given Greece over the years, in one form or another, €16.5 billion. But the fact of the matter is that despite these alleged payments, the issue of the war loans and gold is still not settled.

Greece has never stopped asking for the money to be paid back … it is estimated that this sum owed now totals $70 billion [I assume the Greeks want interest – JM]. So even taking into account the €16.5 billion, more than $50 billion is still owed.

Helmut Kohl refused to even discuss the repayment, presenting as an excuse that this amount was owed by the whole of Germany and until Germany is unified the issue could not be discussed.

Guess what, Germany is unified….

Best Regards,
Anthony Kioussopoulos

P.S. Do not take my e-mail as a refusal to acknowledge the fault of successive Greek governments in creating this mess; just take it as a correction for a specific issue.”

+++++

The point here is not that Anthony is 100% right, though his statements have the ring of authenticity. The point is that the Greeks believe it. And thus my lack of surprise last week when I noted that leading Greek politicians of both the conservative and liberal parties were talking the same line. This is an issue that runs across the Greek political spectrum. And that makes the situation all the more intractable, as emotional responses are not the stuff of rational debates.

{ John Mauldin | Continue reading | PDF }

Conformity is such a strong influence in society that it’s impossible to understand human behaviour without it. Psychological experiments show that people will deny the evidence of their own eyes in order to conform with other people.

Understanding when we conform has all kinds of practical real-world benefits, depending on your aims: it can help you understand your own behaviour as well as understand how others will behave under a variety of different situational pressures. Everyone should be aware of these factors and how they affect the most important areas of their social life.

Here are the ten timeless influencers of conformity:

{ PsyBlog | Continue reading }

cartoon { Doug Savage }

{ My New Pink Button | Thanks Chris! }