Mating Season! Moose Season! Mating Season!
The Telegraph Online, one of my favourite places to go for those utterly bizarre news items that remind us the world is not all war, job losses, school shootings and sports scores.
Yesterday's edition included a story about a moose in Norway that mistook a small car for a potential mate, and when the vehicle, a Ford Ka, did not return the moose's affections, reacted in typical high-school fashion. The car's owner "found it bathed in lick marks, saliva and excrement," reported the Telegraph.
And while we're on the topic of lick marks and saliva (the excrement, for better or worse, does not figure in this), I was out for a walk at lunch one day this week when I stumbled upon some smut.
There it was lying in the gravel on the side of the road - "Mondo Extreme #9" - still in its cardboard box with gaudy graphics depicting women with men's parts, or possibly men with women's parts, and a label advising me that if I were offended by graphic depictions of sexual activity I should not view this video.
Seems to me if I weren't supposed to view the video it wouldn't be lying there on the side of the road. Porn doesn't drop from the sky for no reason, you know. So I took it home.
My wife was initially unimpressed that I'd brought found
pornography home, but then mildly curious (in a sort of "I know I shouldn't be looking at this, but look at this!" way) when she saw what the cover art depicted, then unimpressed again when we rolled the tape.
This was the first time I'd seen a transsexual porn video, and I hope it's not representative - of the porn or of the abilities of transsexuals. I guess my main concern is this: What's the point of a woman with a penis if it doesn't do anything? What's the big deal, if she still has to use a dildo on her girlfriend because her penis won't stand at attention?
All in all, quite a disappointment. Not enough that I'll react like that moose, but I think I will, at the very least, return the tape to the wilds whence it came.
E-venge.
Well, so much for mocking the Internet. Apparently it's got a mind of its own. A couple of little articles about getting away from the computer and spending some quality time on one's own and the impudent beasts turn on me!
I make a little harmless fun of all the e-this and e-that and before I know it, my computer's Windows95 is pretty much out the window. Directories deleted, files corrupted, data lost and a CDROM drive "not found."
What the hell do you mean, "not found"????? I didn't move it! It's RIGHT THERE! Answer me!
Rats.
So, if any of you were wondering what happened to HAL9000, he seems to have been reincarnated as a Compaq Deskpro 5133. I haven't started pulling chips out yet, but when I do, I know what will happen.
Snake.
One thing I like to do here on the DubyaDubyaDubya is to sort of aimlessly surf around and see if anything is happening - it's kind of the e-equivalent of being a teenager and hanging around at the mall and waiting for your friends to show up.
I say "sort of" aimless because I cheat just a little. At Webcrawler they have a thing called WebRoulette - it's a little cgi script that gives you 10 random URLs. You never know what you'll find there.
Like this link called "Python"-something-or-other, and as a guy on the web, you know that it's a virtual statistical certainty that I would have interpreted it as a link to something about Monty Python's Flying Circus.
It wasn't Monty Python, but it WAS Pythonesque, and it was ABOUT pythons. And what to do when they bite you.
Apparently, there was a series of incidents in which "emergency responders inappropriately dealt with a snake bite situation by cutting off the snake's head with a hacksaw."
Forgetting for a moment that you've had the presence of mind to head to the nearest garage after being attacked by a python, this is apparently an impractical and unnecessary response to the problem.
No, you want to buy the snake a drink. That's right, head for the nearest watering hole and order a martini. "Reptiles can be easily encouraged to release their bite by pouring a small amount of alcohol into their mouths."
Now, I know you're all going to run to the nearest herpetarium and stick your arms in the snake pit, but before you do that, read Melissa Kaplan's "Open Letter to Emergency Responders to Biting Snake Calls", okay?
The things you see on the road less travelled.
E-nough.
I've had it up to e-here with the new e-world. Do we really need to buy our toys from an e-tailer, our tomatoes from an e-grocer, and some so-called Survivor castaway's car from eBay?
E-business is all the rage. It's on the covers of all the magazines and newspapers and their e-sites. E-ven the company I work for has a giant digitization project going on to "e-enable" (no, really, they use that word) the business. (We're e-learning all about the Internet through courses on our Intranet. It must be e-specially
infuriating to management to know half the staff prints the web pages and reads them off-line.)
I'm not a Luddite. I'm not suggesting we throw out all our computers, board up the doors and windows to our local ISP or start keeping all our phone numbers on 3x5 index cards. But the corner store is a five-minute walk away. I can squeeze the melon to be sure it's ripe, smell the freshly-baked bread and turn my nose up at the wilted lettuce and celery.
"Hah," you think, "MY life is too busy for that sort of time-wasting stuff."
GET OVER YOURSELF. Instead of working ten-hour days, go home at five. Play with your kids and help them with their homework. It's not like your paperwork is not going to be there tomorrow anyway. And instead of spending all night surfing the web or watching TV, read a book. Or go outside - I hear there's a beautiful e-sunset tonight.
Tortoise.
From the January 16th Telegraph Online:
Owner sets fire to her tortoise
A TORTOISE called Thomas that was put in a cardboard box under a sunlamp to be kept warm was recovering yesterday after the box caught fire and set the dining room alight. Noleen Hagger, 50, of Wirksworth, Derbys, doused the tortoise in water to cool off before firemen took it to a veterinary surgeon for treatment to burns on its legs and face. Mrs Hagger was treated for shock.
One wonders if the veterinary surgeon followed these instructions or not.
Lazy.
So La-Z-Boy (or, here in Canada, "La-Zed-Boy,") has announced this new chair that's got nearly everything the 21st century couch potato could want.
From the beverage holder and "roomy" storage compartment in the right arm of the chair to the foldout table with the wireless keyboard for WebTV in the left, this chair has it all. It's even got a data port, a phone jack, a 110-volt outlet built into the chair.
It really says something about a person when he will spend 2 grand on an electric chair for himself, doesn't it? About the only thing this "e-cliner" (their word) doesn't include is a hole in the seat to allow its user to enjoy the chair all day, without, shall we say, interruption.
If I ever get to the point where I want something like this so badly that I spend that kind of money on it, it had better be wired to household current, because when I realize what I've done, I'll be begging my wife to gimme the juice.
And what about the inevitable obsolesence of the thing? "I'd like to upgrade my chair... I want something faster, more powerful, and with softer cushions."
You know who has a chair like this? Stephen Hawking. But he would have figured out the fundamentals of physics and clues to the origin of the universe with or without the chair, so don't buy the La-Z-Boy thinking you'll end up as the most brilliant theoretical scientist ever. For one thing, Steve was born with that mind.
And his chair has WHEELS.
Except where specified, use of the male pronoun shall imply inclusion of the female, and use of the singular shall imply inclusion of the plural. So do don't give me a hard time about "he/she" stuff, okay?
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Resolution
Well, here it is, January 9th, 10th almost, and I have doing sweet FA to keep this Pitas page up to date. No New Years' resolutions, no wry commentaries on how the store shelves have seamlessly switched into Easter mode, no grumbles about how I seem to be the only person shoveling a driveway that provides parking spaces for four cars, nothing.
I've been busy. Since December 24th I have driven to West Virginia and back (twice), North Bay (once) and have played hockey seven times. I've done 60 or so pushups. Raced a couple of hundred Crash Bandicoot laps. Gone to bed late. Slept in. Failed to do laundry. Read three books. Gone to the washroom. Done dishes. Spent way more than I've earned.
Kissed my wife. Laughed. Sneezed. All kinds of stuff. And it was Stephen Hawking's birthday today.
So this has suffered, and if you have too, dear reader, I apologize. Profusely, profoundly, and personally. I resolve to do better. Maybe not in 2001, but definitely by the end of the decade.
Your patience and understanding is appreciated.
