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Round 87: Autumn Daze Edition


Currently takes the dick with Arnold Palmer. Currently is a person. There’s a reader called currently. Who won the dick and has yet to claim it.

Sadly, the story where Arnold Palmer’s wife claims on air she kisses his balls for luck is not true. Even more sadly, that’s my only Arnold Palmer story. Saddest of all, that’s just one more horrible lie my mama told me.

Heigh-ho! Let’s go!

0. Rule Zero (AKA Steve’s Rule): your pick has to be living when picked. Also, nobody whose execution date is circled on the calendar. Also, please don’t kill anybody. Plus (Pupster’s Rule) no picking someone who’s only famous for being the oldest person alive.

1. Pick a celebrity. Any celebrity — though I reserve the right to nix picks I never heard of (I don’t generally follow the Dead Pool threads carefully, so if you’re unsure of your pick, call it to my attention).

2. We start from scratch every time. No matter who you had last time, or who you may have called between rounds, you have to turn up on this very thread and stake your claim.

3. Poaching and other dirty tricks positively encouraged.

4. Your first choice sticks. Don’t just blurt something out, m’kay? Also, make sure you have a correct spelling of your choice somewhere in your comment. These threads get longish and I use search to figure out if we have a winner.

5. It’s up to you to search the thread and make sure your choice is unique. I’m waayyyy too lazy to catch the dupes. Popular picks go fast.

6. The pool stays open until somebody on the list dies. Feel free to jump in any time. Noobs, strangers, drive-bys and one-comment-wonders — all are welcome.

7. If you want your fabulous prize, you have to entrust me with a mailing address. If you’ve won before, send me your address again. I don’t keep good records.

8. The new DeadPool will begin 6pm WBT (Weasel’s Blog Time) the Friday after the last round is concluded.

The winner, if the winner chooses to entrust me with a mailing address, will receive an Official Certificate of Dick Winning and a small original drawing on paper suffused with elephant shit particles. Because I’m fresh out of fairy shit particles.

September 30, 2016 — 6:00 pm
Comments: 57

G’night, my imaginary internet friends!

tuckered

Oof. Terribly sorry, you guys. I can’t even muster the energy for a cat or chicken post. This bug has really taken it out of me.

I’m for my bath (with eucalyptus oil!) and my bed. But I won’t forget…

Be here. 6WBT. Dead Pool!

September 29, 2016 — 9:00 pm
Comments: 7

Almost news

cochno

This story keeps coming over my threshold, and it’s not even a story yet (but it’s probably worth following). The Cochno Stone was discovered by Rev James Harvey on his property in West Dunbartonshire, Scotland in 1887. It’s got 90 perfectly preserved cup-and-ring carvings, making it the best example of its kind anywhere.

The ‘anywhere’ is significant because they’ve found these things all over Europe and as far afield as Mexico, Brazil and India. Nobody knows what they mean. They might be star charts, or deeds to property or symbols of immortality. They tend to turn up carved into stones near burials or scenic spots.

I have a feeling if we saw the tool they’re made with, we’d understand the appeal of the shape. The significance might be nothing more than leaving a permanent mark on an ancient stone.

Anyway, after fifty years of the light of day, the Cochno Stone was showing significant vandalism. So in the Sixties, they buried it again. It’s been sitting there between a private garden and a housing estate covered in several feet of earth, troubling the dreams of archaeologists. There has been significant lobbying to dig it up again.

To be fair, we have the technology to do a cracking 3D model and surface study. I hope it happens. The local Council has said it’s willing. It’s just not set to happen…yet.

Here’s a good article from Ancient Origins, if you don’t mind a source with a little oogida-boogida. And here’s one from the Scotsman, if you’re an uptight conservative-pants.

I’ll keep you posted.

September 28, 2016 — 5:46 pm
Comments: 6

Beta test!

gwent

CD Projekt RED, the Polish company who made the Witcher games, is hoping to break out the in-game card game Gwent into a standalone tournament game. I signed up for the beta, because of course I did. I love beta testing, with a special emphasis on breaking shit.

I’ve broken this one a couple of times, but I don’t see any place to brag about it. Perhaps because this isn’t even the beta — that’s scheduled for late October. This is a pre-beta effort to punish the servers and see what they’ll take. It’s not even keeping score. It’s no fun if they don’t keep score.

I’d say they have a ways to go to compete with Hearthstone — which I have also played since the closed beta. Though, to be honest, I’ve kind of dropped out of Hearthstone at the moment. One too many expansion packs have overwhelmed my limited ability to do sums in my head.

Oh, they said it was okay to post screenshots, but to bear in mind that a lot will change.

Me? Better by the day. Went in to work this morning. Still not fully myself, though.

September 27, 2016 — 8:29 pm
Comments: 1

Callin’ the Dick

Callin’ it. I didn’t realize anyone had Arnold Palmer, but currently did. That is, someone going by the username ‘currently’ did.

And no, per the conversation going on in the Dead Pool thread, it is NOT necessary to wish your pick dead. It would be a very mean-spirited contest if it were. Many’s a dick been won on the death of a popular figure.

I admit, though, there are one or two deaths in the past few years I would have had a hard time bestowing dick upon. Grateful it didn’t come to that.

You know what to do, currently. And the rest of you — back here,
Friday, 6WBT. Round 87!

September 26, 2016 — 6:31 pm
Comments: 3

Green Man in SPAAAAACE

salamanca

From the New Cathedral in Salamanca, Spain. The New Cathedral was built between the 16th and 18th Centuries. The Old Cathedral is late 12th C. So, old.

The astronaut was added, along with some other figures, in a renovation in the 1990s. I was going to slam the artist for the clumsiness of the carving but, after an images search, this appears to be its unfinished state. It gets better. And then, at one point, looks damaged and old. I dunno what that’s about.

I like his “demon eating an icecream cone” better. They call it a faun, but it has prehensile clawed back legs, so nuh-uh.

All of which puts me in mind of Darth Vader at the National Cathedral in Washington.

I am getting steadily better, thanks. Went in to work for a few minutes today and managed not to bump into anyone (but sent out lots of emails from the work account so everyone knew I’d been in.
They don’t call me ‘weasel’ for my excess facial hair).

Looking forward to a weekend of glorious loafing. Hope you are too!

September 23, 2016 — 9:01 pm
Comments: 5

Happy Equinox! It just gets darker and colder from here!

equinox

There. I’m out of my nightly lavender-and-eucalyptus soak and feeling somewhat less like The Dearly Departed.

Classic FM played three interesting songs while I was in the bath. In 1875, a St Petersburg music magazine commissioned Tchaikovsky to write twelve little piano pieces, one for each month of the year, then published one each month to their readership.

That’s right. Tchaikovsky was once a magazine giveaway, like spoons or model train bits or Franklin Collectibles.

Nothing new under the sun. Except the part about Tchaikovsky.

September 22, 2016 — 9:43 pm
Comments: 5

Not the most popular guy in the parish, I guess

beaver

From the Church of St Nicholas, High Bradfield. This isn’t even damning with faint praise.

Me, not died yet. Feeling better. Not getting up and going to work better. But not throwing up my Nite Nurse bad, either.

September 21, 2016 — 9:31 pm
Comments: 17

Holy cow!

antikythera

You’ve probably seen this, but I hadn’t (from my bed of pain): they’ve found a skeleton near where they found the Antikythera mechanism. They think they might be able to extract DNA from it.

I’m excited. The Antikythera mechanism is one of my favorite fantastic objects that is indisputably real.

I’m up briefly, waiting for my latest dose of Nyquil to kick in. I was resting pretty comfortably, but my lungs were making the most appalling squeaky noises. And not like squeak-squeak, either. More like several excitable chipmunks having a lively conversation in my body cavity. Eventually, Jack came over and investigated. That’s when I knew I needed drugs.

Things you may (or may not) need to know some day: Nyquil is called Nite Nurse in the UK. Same lethal green goo, though.

September 20, 2016 — 10:07 pm
Comments: 7

Ugh.

flu

I gots de flu! This is an honest-to-god, took-my-last-dose-of-Nyquil-but-brought-it-up-again, holy-shit-my-SKIN-hurts, my-lungs-make-noises-like-crinkly-cellophane son of a bitching flu. I haven’t had one of these in years and years.

I don’t expect to be going on adventures for a while. I’ll keep you posted.

September 19, 2016 — 10:02 pm
Comments: 24