web analytics

I’ll take ‘things that blow up in your face’ for 500, Alex

burntweasel

In my own defense, I didn’t think the gas would actually come on unless you held down the ignition button thingie, so I might have been a leeetle careless about, you know, hitting knobs and stuff. So when I lit the burner several minutes later and that giant orange fireball blew out the oven…boy, was my face red. And most of my right arm, also. But, hey — no scars, the stove still works, and I didn’t burn the house down. So win, win really.

Anyhow, it puts me in mind of our latest political scandal over here. Have you guys followed this thing? Righty Britblogger Guido Fawkes (whom I really should blogroll, since I read him) got hold of some emails traded between two Labour operatives. Basically, these guys were sick of blogs beating them up and stealing their lunch money, so they decided to launch an attack blog of their own.

Two problems: one, they were totally making shit up. And two, they actually worked for this government.

As it happens, the blog never got off the ground (for reasons that aren’t clear). But the scandal is sticking to Gordon Brown like you wouldn’t believe. It’s like the Dean Scream, or Clinton’s “meaning of is” — not important in itself, but somehow a perfect crystallization of everything that bothers you about the man.

If you like this kind of stuff (and I love this kind of stuff), you can start here.

Comments


Comment from S. Weasel
Time: April 13, 2009, 6:25 pm

I understand the frustration that government and corporations and mainstream media feel about the internet. It looks really fun and exciting and they want to play.

Thing is, they can’t.

The blogosphere is a free-wheelin’ medium. People who represent real, serious, grownup entities can’t afford to associate their bidness with the kind of informality and seat-of-the pants silliness that makes blogging interesting to read. That’s why corporate blogs are so fucking dull. And have to be.

But people like these Labour stooges can’t believe they’re being shown up by ordinary proles. They’re convinced Guido and bloggers like him are materially supported by…somebody.

I’ve lost count of the number of times I was accused of being a Mossad agent over the years.

Heh.

As if.


Comment from S. Weasel
Time: April 13, 2009, 6:26 pm

Though a couple of Jehovah’s Witnesses did stroll into the garden on Easter Sunday and I told them I was Jewish.


Comment from blake
Time: April 13, 2009, 6:43 pm

Oh, come on. As if the KMW (Krav Maga Weasels) weren’t the best known “open secret” in black ops.

Everyone knows it’s going to be the KMW that go into Iran. They’re the only ones that can be the MMM (Mad Muslim Mongeese).


Comment from scubafreak
Time: April 13, 2009, 6:46 pm

That’s OK, Toastie. When I was a dumb kid, I made the mistake of trying to get a BBQ grill going by dumping the last few ounces in the Lawnmower Gascan into the flames.

Needless to say, after I had put myself out and my father had put the curtains by the back door out, and as I was taking stock of the remains of what used to be a steel gas can while all the neighbors looked on shaking their heads and laughing, I determined that using gasoline on a lit fire MIGHT NOT BE THE MOST INTELLEGENT MOVE TO MAKE……

Of course, my eyebrows and hair eventually grew back, but that’s another story…….

(Oh, and I have a question. How is it possible for GordieB to stink any more than he already does? I mean, next to emasculating the British military, getting caught making up crap about Tory sex scandals does tend to come in a distant second..)


Comment from S. Weasel
Time: April 13, 2009, 6:52 pm

When I was about six, the whole family did a road trip to British Columbia in a camper van. One night, my mother lit a match to see why the pilot light in the oven wasn’t doing the trick.

She rose up in a halo of blue fire.

My dad and I stared at her, transfixed. I think one of us might even have breathed, “so beautiful…” Then my dad beat her head with two pillows.

She never forgave us. She took a flight for home the next day.


Comment from dfbaskwill
Time: April 13, 2009, 7:39 pm

I spent a summer without eyebrows and the hair on one arm lighting the stove in my grandfather’s house. The black char of the singed hairs stayed in place until you rubbed it and then it would come off. I’d do it again just as soon as it would start to grow again. What times!


Comment from Mrs. Hill
Time: April 13, 2009, 8:27 pm

There’s something odd about that article — it purports to expose Brown’s aids, but effectively carries out their plan on their behalf.

The carefully reported details of those emails won’t raze any eyebrows, though, right?

As for the stove — yikes! But I love the Toastie pic.

My mother, who is terrified if gas stoves, has left a trail of melted spatulas, disfigured mixing bowls, burnt-out kettles, singed potholders, etc., as a testament to the dangers of electric burners. At least when gas is lit, you know it’s lit — fwooomf!


Comment from Dave in Texas
Time: April 13, 2009, 9:19 pm

Glad you’re ok Stoaty McToastystoat.

Add this to the list of things you aren’t allowed to play with.

http://michaelscomments.wordpress.com/2009/04/13/i-gotta-get-me-one-of-these/


Comment from XBradTC
Time: April 13, 2009, 9:22 pm

Weas, this will give you nightmares…

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AXsieVOTbm0


Comment from XBradTC
Time: April 13, 2009, 9:23 pm

Fuck. You. Dave.


Comment from Kornkat Annie
Time: April 13, 2009, 9:30 pm

Weas, I just want you to know I linked you over at the Hostages and those two damn fools up there ^^ followed the link over here. I truly apologize. I’ll take them back home now.

*takes xbrad and dave by the ears*


Comment from armybrat
Time: April 13, 2009, 9:32 pm

Ever notice how the best stories always involve the phrase “we was sittin’ around drinkin'” and fire?


Comment from Gnus
Time: April 13, 2009, 10:11 pm

Another of life’s little lessons.


Comment from scubafreak
Time: April 13, 2009, 11:40 pm

ArmyBrat: It’s kind of like how you tell a fairy tale from a fishing story.

A Fairy Tale begins with “Once upon a time….”

A fishing tale begins with “NO SHIT!!!! Y’all ain’t gonna believe this!!”


Comment from Jill
Time: April 14, 2009, 12:22 am

I grew up with an oven we had to light by match. There was a definite finesse associated with the action, and Mom taught me that at a very early age. We never had any issues with balls of fire ‘n fun stuff like that. I was in my late 20’s by the time we replaced it. We keep appliances for a lonnng time in my house.


Comment from scubafreak
Time: April 14, 2009, 1:02 am

Meh. When I was growing up, you lit a match under one of two conditions. To light the fireplace or BBQ grill, or because someone did something unspeakable in the bathroom…….


Comment from blake
Time: April 14, 2009, 5:13 am

I can’t believe y’all are still playing with fire.

The rest of us are finding creative ways to electrocute ourselves.


Comment from Gibby Haynes
Time: April 14, 2009, 10:53 am

Yes this does seem to be sticking to McDoom like napalm. Whatever it takes to bring that dangerous psychopath down.

I once caught a deodorant fireball in the face as a kid when I emptied a can’s worth of Brut into the sink and lit it. Then I ran downstairs with the smoke alarms wailing and ran into the lounge to my parents – who had company at the time – with no eyebrows and my head consisting of curly little singed hairs, crying like a bastard.


Comment from porknbean
Time: April 14, 2009, 1:06 pm

Poor little bastard. Heh.


Comment from dfbaskwill
Time: April 14, 2009, 1:36 pm

It’s a wonder any of us are alive!


Comment from dfbaskwill
Time: April 14, 2009, 2:49 pm

You made the big-time again (if a collection of conservative morons is big-time!) on Ace of Spades! I lit a match in your honor just now.


Comment from scubafreak
Time: April 14, 2009, 3:14 pm

It’s a wonder any of us are alive!

LOL, I was just thinking of my friend Brian in San Diego, when his son decided to stick his steel slinky into the electrical socket….

Poor little guy was back against the opposite wall, hair completely on end, scared to death, staring at the slinky glowing bright red and smoking the wall when we all came running in…….

He was ok, but he never touched the slinky again….


Comment from S. Weasel
Time: April 14, 2009, 3:15 pm

Aw thanks, df. I appreciate you clearing the air if we have guests coming.

I’m glad you said that, Mrs Hill. I’ve thought that about ALL the MSM articles about this thing: none of them have emphasized enough that these guys made this shit up. It’s not “unproven” allegations about Tories, it’s complete *lies* and make-believe. By not making that plain, the MSM is effectively continuing the dirty work.

If you read Guido today (and you should; this is still hot), follow the link the Janet Daley in the Telegraph. The Torygraph used to be my favorite newspaper, but they’ve slid badly under new leadership. And Janet Daley used to be one of my favorite editorialists (she’s a fellow Righty Yank stuck in Old Blighty), but she’s got an obvious HUGE case of the Peggy Noonans over this: sour grapes and big paper resentment of another blogospheric scoop.


Comment from scubafreak
Time: April 14, 2009, 3:28 pm

Speaking of which, Stoatie, did you see the new guildelines for DHS to spot potential terrorists in the U.S.?

http: //www.thelibertypapers.org/wp-content/uploads/2009/04/hsa-rightwing-extremism-09-04-07.pdf

Basically the same report that got pulled a month ago, it seems to state that anyone who dissents with the Democrats in the White House and the Congress are all potential terrorists and need to be investigated…..


Comment from David Gillies
Time: April 14, 2009, 3:56 pm

The British MSM are doing their damndest to suck the oxygen out of the McBride affair. It remains to be seen whether they will be successful. If there are still revelations emerging by Thursday then they will have failed. But even if they manage to quash it, some damage has been done. At the very least, it makes that autistic Cyclopean dunderhead that has the nerve to call himself PM look like even more of a numpty (if such were possible). And anything that causes Dolly Draper pain is a good thing in my book. It has been very amusing watching all the usual crap-flinging monkeys (and I mean that as a term of highest approbation) — the Devil, Eugenides, Obnoxio et al. — chortling with glee and flinging even bigger handfuls of crap than normal.

There’s the same sort of febrile, fin de siècle atmosphere as in the dog days of John Major’s government. Shame it’s taken 12 years to realise what a repellent bunch of authoritarian economic illiterates are Labour, but with luck such a severe infestation of parasites will boost the British public’s immune system to the point where it will be impossible to elect another Labour government this side of the Last Trump.


Comment from Mikey NTH
Time: April 14, 2009, 4:03 pm

Heh, heh,heh.

At the Youth Camp I once worked at there was a gas toaster, one of the big jobs that hada continuous conveyor. What you were supposed to do was stick in a lit lathe of wood and then turn on the gas. if you did it the other way you had “Puff, The Magic Dragon”.

Lousie, one of the English counselors, saw the “Puff” effect, and did her eyes get wide.


Comment from S. Weasel
Time: April 14, 2009, 4:19 pm

The even bigger shame, Gillies, is that the current lot of Tories aren’t much better. I cannot abide Cameron. And, judging by the lack of landslide momentum in the numbers, I’m not alone.


Comment from scubafreak
Time: April 14, 2009, 4:23 pm

LOL….

Mikey, you should love this clip. The relevent part is at 3:25

http ://www.truveo.com/Dirty-Jobs-Ferrier/id/2648551045


Comment from Allen
Time: April 14, 2009, 4:41 pm

Woohoo! Things that go boom.

Let me see what incident can I relate where I don’t get in trouble. Oooo! Oooo! I know. I was doing some consulting where they wanted to test a portion of a bridge to see if it could withstand a terrorist attack. They asked me how I would go about instrumenting the test. They didn’t like my answer, which basically was: why instrument it, when there won’t be anything left?

Kaboom, hey sparky I think you over did it. Whole thing, really small pieces, raining down. Moral of the story: if you can make it, I can break it.


Comment from Mrs. Hill
Time: April 14, 2009, 5:52 pm

“If you read Guido today (and you should; this is still hot), follow the link the Janet Daley in the Telegraph.”

Wow — thanks for that, your Stoatliness. Guido’s comment on the Telegraph item was stunning.

I see what you mean by the comparison of Daley to Noonan (she lost me with Patriotic Grace — *blech*) — they could be clones!


Comment from David Gillies
Time: April 14, 2009, 6:13 pm

Weasel, too true. A pox on them all. There remains the glimmer of hope that Labour will be so comprehensively destroyed that Stuntman Dave and his gang of pusillanimous twats will have the political capital to actually cut spending and rein in the over-mighty State that the one-eyed Scottish idiot has created. Not much of a glimmer, mind, which is why I’m so glad I’m watching all the ructions from the other side of the Pond (I saw the way the wind was blowing and got out not long after that glad-handing shyster Blair was elected).


Comment from Deborah
Time: April 14, 2009, 6:42 pm

Doesn’t British cooking gas have an distinctive chemical odor added—like mercaptan—so that it smells and then you won’t go boom?


Comment from S. Weasel
Time: April 14, 2009, 6:53 pm

It does, Deborah. But it was the knob to the grill I accidentally twiddled, and the door was closed. I was running a front burner, so I didn’t hear the hiss. It’s when I turned on a back burner and the gas coming up the vent at the back ignited that I made Ye Balle of Fyre.


Comment from Mike C.
Time: April 15, 2009, 4:47 am

Ya know, your gas provider goes to considerable trouble and expense to put mercaptans in that gas so you can smell it. Let your nose be your guide.

Write a comment

(as if I cared)

(yeah. I'm going to write)

(oooo! you have a website?)


Beware: more than one link in a comment is apt to earn you a trip to the spam filter, where you will remain -- cold, frightened and alone -- until I remember to clean the trap. But, hey, without Akismet, we'd be up to our asses in...well, ass porn, mostly.


<< carry me back to ol' virginny