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Awww, yisss!

Received notice this morning that the McRib was back in town (why, yes, I’m on McDonald’s mailing list; aren’t you?) and Uncle B drove me right out to get one. Not a huge fan, it just tickles me to see ancient artifacts from my home planet.

We’re spending New Year’s Eve with the neighbors. We’ll be running along shortly. Thing is, our neighbors are mostly elderly sheep farmers. Early to bed, early to rise and all that. Their heads will gently bow to their chests and soft snoring noises will come from them, beginning around ten. Oh, such fun!

See y’all back here Friday: New Dead Pool. 6 WBT. Be here, or be somewhere else!

p.s. oh, yeah — HAPPY NEW YEAR!

December 31, 2014 — 8:59 pm
Comments: 22

eeeeeeeeee

Here you go. From the Smithsonian, the only known recording of actual American Civil War veterans doing the Rebel Yell. Many years after the fact, obviously.

I’ll save you the trouble. It isn’t “YeeeeeeeHA!!!” like I always thought. It’s more like “eeeeeeeee!”

Don’t get me wrong — thousands of armed young men pouring over a hill going “eeeeee!” straight at you would probably be pants-peeingly terrifying, I was just hoping for something more…coherent. Not just a bunch of dessicated old coots making a high-pitched noise.

Yes! I am still celebrating Holiday Lameness.

December 30, 2014 — 10:00 pm
Comments: 17

We knew this day would come

Jack has found his way on top of the beams in the kitchen. This wouldn’t be a huge problem — well, other’n the old greasy shit he knocks off the beams onto the work surfaces — but his only path to reach them is up a series of shelves covered in china. So far, no casualties, but I fear for my novelty teapots.

Welcome back! We had a lovely time and we’re trying desperately to hang onto that feeling for a few more days. I went to work this morning, but it was so utterly dead, I’m not sure I’ll repeat the experiment until Friday.

You?

December 29, 2014 — 10:20 pm
Comments: 16

‘Sup?

Jack thinks it’s awesome we brought a tree in for him to sleep under, but he’s a little concerned for our mental health. Also, what’s up with all the twinkly lights?

This’ll be my Christmas Eve and Christmas Day offering, so lemme know what Sandy Claws brings you in this thread. Merry Christmas, folks!

December 24, 2014 — 8:20 pm
Comments: 54

Hey, baby

‘Member this face? The burbling sunbaby from the Teletubbies? Well, she’s a nineteen year old college student now. Click the pic to see her all growed up. (No, it’s not a rickroll or anything, just a picture of a nineteen year old girl with an oddly familiar face).

The Teletubbies were new when I first started coming to the UK, and I got hooked. The UK version was much stranger than what it turned into when they brought it to the US (I can just see Children’s Television Workshop frowning at the screen, “but that wasn’t educational. It didn’t even make sense!”).

In my defense, I spent nearly all my time here either drunk or hungover, so my tastes ran to the simple and colorful. Uncle B plied me with an awful lot of strong drink back then. I’m not sure his intentions were honorable.

Last day at work before the holidays. No alarm clock for five days! w00t!

December 23, 2014 — 7:12 pm
Comments: 12

It’s a Christmas miracle!

So, a dog walker found this common seal in a field this morning in Merseyside. He had a minor head injury, a runny nose and he was, like, totally exhausted. They figure if he came up creeks and streams, he has swum some twenty miles from the sea.

Personally, I think he got there as a result of a Christmas party stunt gone horribly, horribly wrong.

December 22, 2014 — 10:12 pm
Comments: 23

Here we go — whee…!

Thanks to the various pre-Christmas sales, I’ve got a glut of unplayed games waiting for my attention but, goshdarnit, I enjoyed Far Cry 3 so much, I’m playing it through again. Just the really fun bits.

Should I worry that my “really fun bits” were finding a comfy perch on a high hillside and picking off pirates with a heavily modified sniper rifle? Mmmmmmnah.

Anyway, I declare the holidays officially begun. Expect blogging to be light and lame for the duration. That’s my promise to you!

Good weekend, and let ‘er rip!

December 19, 2014 — 9:57 pm
Comments: 13

Movie Night with Kim

Since it seems Kim Jong-un has been handed Hollywood’s remote control, how’s about we look at a few films the little wiggler *does* approve of.

The above is a still from the gripping drama A Traffic Controller on Crossroads (the link goes to YouTube, full movie with subtitles). I excerpted this synopsis from the blog DPRK Video Database (he kindly put a spoiler alert on it):

…the traffic woman gives a presentation on traffic safety to local citizens, who appreciate her advice. There’s lots of scenes with the man and woman deliberating over what to do. The traffic woman begins to wonder whether she should have gone into rhythmic gymnastics. She eventually speaks to her supervisor, who talks about how she let another young driver slide on traffic regulations, which resulted in a terrible accident. Later, the chauffeur of the head of the Research Institute violates a no parking zone. The traffic woman chastises him, and the head of the Research Institute goes back later to make a formal apology.

Or if romantic comedy is more your thing, how about Urban Girl Comes to Get Married. It’s like Tammy’s in Love. Only, not.

Okay, you know what? Hong Kil Dong is actually a pretty awesome kung fu movie, in the tradition of low budget Eighties kung fu movies. I love that shit.

Check the DPRK Video Database blog linked above or the sidebar of any of the linked videos for more zany Korean film goodness. But if you want to see the Kim Jong-un death scene from The Interview, you’ll have to skip around and chase it yourself. That thing’s getting pulled offline as fast as it goes up.

December 18, 2014 — 10:35 pm
Comments: 16

Oh, you wretched tallists!

“I tell this story – I mean, even as the first lady – during that wonderfully publicized trip I took to Target, not highly disguised, the only person who came up to me in the store was a woman who asked me to help her take something off a shelf. Because she didn’t see me as the first lady, she saw me as someone who could help her. Those kinds of things happen in life. So it isn’t anything new,” Michelle Obama, who is 5’11”, said.

It’s a little hard to tell what her complaint is here. It’s racist to expect a black woman to help? Or she’s miffed that no-one recognized her? Or if they did, didn’t come up and say anything to her? (Reminder: that’s an actual shot from this famous trip to Target).

Since the article is about everyday racism, I’m going to assume it’s that first thing.

The internet says she’s 5’10”, not 5’11”, which makes her exactly the same height as me. And, lemme tell you, I have completely lost track of the number of times strangers have asked me to reach things off shelves. It’s a thing short people sometimes ask of tall people. It’s not a put-down, it’s a little interpersonal gracenote of community feeling.

I had a black co-worker once who made a formal complaint of racism when he was given the exact same shitty treatment as everyone else by one particularly shitty supervisor (you know the kind, the harmless asshole boss who makes a big show of looking at his watch when you get back five minutes late from lunch).

Do black people really think white people are super awesome to each other and only rotten to them? Do they not see us being rotten to each other?

The president told his own experiences. “There’s no black male my age, who’s a professional, who hasn’t come out of a restaurant and is waiting for their car and somebody didn’t hand them their car keys,” Obama told the magazine.

Pff! Right! Like this guy has ever had a job that honest.

December 17, 2014 — 9:13 pm
Comments: 30

Done. I think.

There. Just finished my Christmas cards, I think. Thanks to the new job, I had to add a bunch more names to my list this year.

Joy.

I’m not muchofa one for Christmas cards. My family never bothered (at least, they never sent me one and I reciprocated), my work never bothered, and my arty friends weren’t the kind (they were more likely to mail me a packet of heroin and a doll’s head). But everyone keeps the custom here, it seems, and who wants to be a Christmas PoS? Not I!

So, do you do them? Do you do a lot of them? Are you doing more of them or less of them this year? Are you done?

p.s. Followup to yesterday’s moronic #illridewithyou story. Well worth a read, and not just because it confirms what I was saying yesterday.

December 16, 2014 — 7:54 pm
Comments: 14