Do you remember in “Planes, Trains and Automobiles?” I give you the following clip:
No, those aren’t pillows. Similarly, that’s not soda, Billy.
You see Billy, daddy needs a little “medicine” sometimes. I bet he’s feeling much better now!
Uh huh. See, Republican supporters are mostly people who can’t afford Republican policies. That is, you have to be rich to benefit, and most of us Americans are not. No where is this more true than in the health care debate. The Republican plan is, essentially, to let rich people buy better care, while the rest of us deal with the fact that we cannot afford health care, and there is no relief in sight. Sadly, the Republican train is being driven by the likes of Rush Limbaugh and Glenn Beck, who seem to have lost sight of the fact that Americans - and even Republicans - actually want real health care reform. Remember, health care reform was a very real part of the Republican presidential primary conversation, because people need relief.
I digress. And I guess it’s not that funny after all.
But mix it up a little. No one else in the world does it the way we do here in the states.
I wonder if there is anthropological interest in why we have developed very different ways of counting very similar paper currencies?
Parker and Hart, Nov. 12, 2009, via comic.com.
Something bad happened to the Wizard’s brother-in-law, and now the Wizard has to go the to the opera with his wife because his Brother-in-Law cannot use the tickets. The Wizard is so ego-centric and caught up in his own crap; he thinks he is the only one with problems - attending the opera is a fate worse than death - while completely ignoring the fact that his Brother-in-Law has an injured back!
It is funny more in the ironic sense than in the sense that suggests hilarity, and it speaks to all of us.
Notice the appropriate use of a semi-colon to separate two independent clauses up there?
The Cash for Clunkers program has come and gone. It was not without problems, some of which persist (the vehicles received were supposed to be scavenged for parts and then destroyed, but there are so many parts to be salvaged that it is likely the deadline for destruction of the last vehicles will be missed by a full year). The list of most traded-in vehicles is interesting. People seem to be done with their SUVs and 4WD pickups. There are two models of Ford Explorer in the top ten, along with two Jeep models. Check it out:
If tanking sales and the above list were not enough to convince auto manufacturers that we are losing our desire to drive vehicles that have miles per gallon ratings in the low teens, look at the list of most-purchased vehicles for people participatin in the Cash for Clunkers program:
The two “off-road” vehicles both get better gas mileage than any vehicle on the trade-in list.
In 1934, William Powell and Myrna Loy created the roles of Nick and Nora Charles in “The Thin Man,” based on a novel by Dasheill Hammett. There would be five more movies, at least two of which were reprised by the original actors for Lux Radio Theatre.
The audio above is the Lux adaptation of “The Thin Man,” which aired June 8, 1936, and was their 84th screenplay adaptation. You can download others here.
Lux Radio Theatre used original actors whenever possible, in order to present fairly faithful one-hour radio adaptations of screenplays.
“Henry” by Carl Anderson. Thursday, October 1, 2009.
Henry is at the zoo when he sees a sign. The sign depicts a human hand pointing the way, as such signs sometimes do. Henry thinks the hand should look more like it’s attached to a monkey’s arm, because it is pointing to the monkey house, and so he draws some hair on it.
Henry’s clever like that.
By the way, Carl Anderson was 67 when he was first picked up for syndication in 1932 as a cartoon. Anderson died in 1948, and the strip was thereafter drawn by Don Trachte on Sundays, until his death in 2005. On weekdays, the strip was drawn by John Liney, until his retirement in 1979. If you receive one of the 75 newspapers that still run “Henry,” as I do, you are seeing vintage strips, not new work.
Eating out at 2AM on Friday night/Saturday morning in a college town is an invitation to long lines and drunken conversation. This weekend, I found myself in a Steak ‘n’ Shake in the wee hours. It was a choice - that or Denny’s. The lot at Denny’s was full, so I aimed for Steak ‘n’ Shake.
Steak ‘n’ Shake was full, too. And I mean full - wait for a table full.
I was seated next to a table full of young college kids fresh from a party (which was the topic of a very loud conversation). One young Jewish lady - which I mention only because she did. Ad nauseum - ordered a steak burger with everything. When it came and she started eating, the “everything” part started running down her arm. With disgust and vigor, she threw the sandwich on her plate and announced,
“This is unnecessarily messy!”
I fell out. I LOLed. I LMAOed. I barely avoided pointing and laughing.
Spiderman via atypyk
Preto Velho via Giovanni Tabolacci Artworks
Tetris by Erik Johansson.
via curiosidadesnanet.
via xkcd.com
