Get Incensed

Seven habits of highly repressive people

I was reading The Seven Habits of Highly Successful People the other day in the unemployment line and it occurred to me I need to take control of my life.

I need to start being proactive and beginning with the end in mind.

Which sounds like a great strategy for taking a nap.

But before I got comfortable, I thought I’d put first things first and think about the win/win situation of bringing you the Friday Six — six websites, videos or votes for third-party candidates that made me chuckle during the week.

Really all I’m trying to do is first seek to understand what you guys are looking for and then seek be understood about why I chose this group of people to be a part of the Friday Six.

After we’ve done all that we’re going to synergize and sharpen the saw. And since I don’t know what either of those things mean or have to do with the Friday Six … I’ll prolly just take a nap.

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There’s an alternate reality filled with strange and wondrous characters over at Renal Failure. It’s way funnier than the reality you’re probably used to.

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There’s some hardcore gangsta math goin’ on over at Clay Pigeon, G. Check it.

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If you missed Suzy Soro’s Oscar post over at HOLLYWOOD: Where HOT Comes to Die, you missed the best part of the Academy Awards.

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If you think going to the water park sounds like it will be a fun, hassle-free experience, you may want to check in with Dorky Dad first.

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Just in time for that summer job you thought you’d apply early for, The Onion has a list of the Top Verbs Appearing on Resumes.

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Bizlevity covers all the top business stories. It’s just that the perspective is a little more warped than CNBC.

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Have an excellent weekend, y’all.

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Awarded to us by The Cult of Qelqoth

It’s almost gone….

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Only one day left to get your last licks in on Project Blog.

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DISCLAIMER:I have absolutely no idea who won Project Blog.
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As it stands, I’m assuming Winnie’s legions of fans carried the day and my plan is to donate any money I might win to my buddy Mike Harris’ fundraising efforts.

So, stop on by Allison’s website (you’ve only got one day left, so hurry!) and let her know how much you’ve enjoyed Project Blog or her regular BCS Frenzy blog.

Me? I feel like a Labradoodle at the Westminster Dog Show. I was just happy to get a chance to hang out with all the classy contestants.

Woof.

Complete story compliments of our sister site:
Bizlevity - We Give Business the Business

When asked to name the most powerful person in the music business, many music fans might throw out names like Simon Cowell, Bono or DVD Jon.

Music insiders know better. In an unofficial Bizlevity poll, Rob “Diesel” Kroese was named the most influential man in the music industry for his contributions to reviving Huey Lewis’ career.

Lewis, known for catchy pop tunes like “Hip to Be Square” and the Grammy-nominated “Power of Love” had faded from the music scene until recently.

Thanks to the efforts of Diesel and the mobilization of followers of his Mattress Police blog, Huey recently snagged not one, but two, cameo appearances in the hot, new Jimmy Kimmel/Ben Affleck music video, “I’m F**king Ben Affleck.”

In the following YouTube clip, Jimmy Kimmel gives the background leading up to the making of the video and then shows the music video in its entirety.

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Huey at around 4:02 and 5:23 in this semi-exclusive Bizlevity video
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Diesel’s exerts most of his influence in music behind the scenes and he was unavailable for comment as Bizlevity went to press.

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Diesel (far right) meets with Hollywood power players Matt Damon and George Clooney

{Ed. note: In response to people asking me why I don’t have a better picture of Diesel: Far right in the hat, you knuckleheads — not the dude in the brown shirt facing the other way who wasn’t cropped out. Sheeesh!}
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A private figure, Diesel keeps a low profile and is described in Wikipedia only as “a specific fractional distillate of petroleum fuel oil or a washed form of vegetable oil that is used as fuel” which only adds to his mysterious aura.

The new Most Powerful Man in Music recently launched a new online humor magazine, Clay Pigeon which joins his original blog, Mattress Police and the Interweb’s best collection of humor sites, Humor-Blogs in his expanding media empire.

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* A high-quality version of the video is available on Jimmy Kimmel’s site

Which is more dangerous? Wrong. (according to experts)…

I hate Mondays.

No, seriously. I am almost unfailingly in a bad mood whenever Monday morning rolls around.

So, I would really appreciate it if everyone could just chip in and try to hold stupid news stories until later in the week when I’m less likely to fly off the handle.

That didn’t happen this week. I hadn’t even finished my first cup of coffee when I came across this headline:

Obesity more dangerous than terrorism: experts

Aw, crap. Really?!

So, given the choice between spending an afternoon at Taco Bell or downtown Baghdad, some expert is actually suggesting that Iraq is less dangerous?

I guess I must be confused. It probably wasn’t a bomb that killed 40 people at a rest stop outside of Karbala, it must have been all the trans-fats from the local Burger King Crusader Mullah franchise.

Still that doesn’t stop “experts” like law professor Lawrence Gostin who, according to the article, stated that “global terrorism was a real threat but posed far less risk than obesity, type two diabetes and smoking-related illnesses.”

You think quitting smoking is tough? Take it from the Israelis, trying to quit getting blown up by fanatical suicide bombers is darn near impossible. I don’t even think there’s a patch for that.

It’ll probably take a class action lawsuit to slow down terrorism because even those warning labels they have now on the sides of buses (Quitting Public Transportation Now Greatly Reduces Serious Risks to Your Health) don’t seem to be preventing a whole new generation of Jews (or any number of other people around the world) from getting blown up.

The Oxford Health Alliance conference, where experts are unable to tell the difference between an IED and bucket of KFC, was co-founded by Oxford University.

It seems to me Oxford used to symbolize academic excellence but apparently the university turned into a community college when no one was looking since they seem to be fine with putting their imprimatur on this kind of drivel.

Stig Pramming, the Oxford group’s executive director said, “It is true that new and re-emerging health threats such as SARS, avian flu, HIV/AIDS, terrorism, bioterrorism and climate change are dramatic and emotive. However, it is preventable chronic disease that will send health systems and economies to the wall.”

If this guy wasn’t wearing a beanie when he made that statement, I’ll eat a double Whopper with cheese.

How do you lump avian flu and terrorism in the same group of “new and re-emerging” health threats? Is there some kind of chicken jihad going on that I don’t know about?

And I guess if your kid goes to school and sneezes on one of his classmates, we should send him to get water-boarded at Guantanamo because, spreading the flu is pretty much just like bombing a train station.

Somebody should also point out to Stig it’s not preventable chronic diseases that are going to “send economies and health systems to the wall,” it’s politicians and “experts” who want to give everyone free coverage that’s going to do that.

Goddammit. Tuesday can’t get here fast enough….

Awarded to us by The Cult of Qelqoth

I’m normally a pretty punctual dude.

So, when having a job — which is important if you care about the little things in life like food, clothing and shelter — interferes with blogging, I have a moral dilemma.

Do I simply skip the Friday Six and let you think I was in such a foul mood that I couldn’t find six things in the entire week that amused me?

Do I come up with some lame excuse like my dog ate my lap top?

Or do I just level with you guys and let you know that groveling for a paycheck was, for one day, more important than bringing a solitary ray of joy into someone’s life?

Given those three options, I chose number four. So, I’m attempting a compromise here with a hastily compiled and posted Friday Six.

You know the deal. Six web finds. No alliteration.

The Friday Six. It’s like speed dating but without the annoying unibrow.

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You know how you get little pieces of knowledge stuck in the grooves of your brain? Mental Floss helps prevent having to go to a dentist and get a lobotomy at some later date. Especially when it comes to political rhetoric.

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Nice flag, dude. Awesome article on the world’s least inspiring flags over at Cracked.com

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Bible translated into LOL cats language. Can somebody put a virtual stake in the heart of this phenomenon now?

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Maybe not the funniest thing all week, but it may be the coolest. Even as a Orioles fan, I have to say the Chicago Cubs one’s my favorite. Obama vintage baseball jerseys. Shirts you can change into.

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Rock anthem or post-Hegelian rebirth of German Romanticism? Wait, couldn’t “Rock You Like A Hurricane” be both? Fun stuff from the brand new Clay Pigeon magazine.

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Sarit Catz is a comedian and an award-winning writer. Lucky me, we’re together over at Bizlevity, the Interweb’s newest business satire site.

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Have an awesome weekend, all.

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Awarded to us by The Cult of Qelqoth

Um, actually … don’t try this anywhere.

$3.9 million in cosmetic surgery doesn’t buy what it used to…

Believe it or not, the story is more scary than the picture.

It’s all fun and games until someone gets pregnant…

It seems like everyone in Hollywood is having kids these days.

Sure, I could get all critical here and suggest we get a judge to issue a restraining order that prohibits Britney Spears from getting pregnant. I think it’s pretty obvious the chances of her kids turning out to be productive members of society are about the same as her chances of getting tenure at Harvard.

But, I’m not going to do that because I believe people should be free to make their own choices and also because I got great odds on a bet at least one of the Spears’ kids will have a tattoo or a juvenile record before they’re out of elementary school.

As long as we’re on the subject, there’s another group that’s having a fertility explosion…

Some of our favorite blogs and websites have all had unsafe sex and are now having to deal with the consequences of their actions in the form of new blogs or websites.

I thought this kind of creative outburst deserved its own post.

So here are the proud parents and latest offspring of some of our favorite sites:

GET INCENSED => BIZLEVITY
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Get Incensed has a new sister blog, Bizlevity. Bizlevity is a hot-looking new blog. It’s so hot it’s going to take all the self-discipline I can muster not to sleep with it. I probably will anyway because Bizlevity is really more like a step-daughter and I’m a Woody Allen fan.

Bizlevity is a business news satire blog. Kind of like the devil spawn of The Wall Street Journal and The Daily Show. It’s a collaborative effort between Mark Jabo and the ridiculously talented and funny Sarit Catz.

Will this blog grow up to be famous? I don’t know. All Sarit and I really cared was that it was healthy.

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HUMOR-BLOGS => CLAY PIGEON
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It’s no secret that we’re big fans of Rob “Diesel” Kroese over at Humor-Blogs. If you haven’t already gotten Diesel’s book, Antisocial Commentary: From the Secret Files of the Mattress Police, you haven’t been laughing nearly as much as you should.

Diesel’s humor genealogy reads like the Book of Genesis. In the beginning was Diesel. Diesel begat Mattress Police and Mattress Police begat Humor-Blogs. And Humor-Blogs begat Clay Pigeon.

And it was all good.

Heck, it was all fantastic. Clay Pigeon is a “weekly magazine of humor and absurdity.”Clay Pigeon is like Humor-Blogs on steroids … but without all the boring Congressional testimony or bikini pictures of Roger Clemens’ wife.

Clay Pigeon is from a non-traditional household and, like Anna-Nicole Smith’s baby, there are a whole bunch of people who are claiming to be the father. You can see the results of the paternity test here.

Trust me, if your kid was a website, you’d want him or her to grow up to be as funny as Clay Pigeon.

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GAMING TODAY => G4M3R WEBLOG
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Gamers reproduce?! Who knew? Hahahaha. We kid because we love….

Seriously, as a closet game fiend (I play in the closet so my girlfriend doesn’t find out) I rely on sites like Gamer Today for news and updates from the virtual world because who the hell can deal with reality 24/7?

Gamer Today news editor and steely-eyed bon vivant William D. Snizek has a new blog, G4M3R Weblog.

G4M3R Weblog is William’s personal blog where he posts gaming news, videos, pictures and his personal thoughts. If you have intimacy issues, you may want to just go with the first three.

Contrary to what you might think, the blog wasn’t named after a quadratic equation. It’s a scrappy blog and I can guarantee you the cool kids won’t be picking on it like they will to Kal El Cage or Apple Paltrow.

So, there you have it. Stop by and check out all the new websites and their proud parents.

Everyone’s registered at Tiffany’s for baby gifts … but you shouldn’t feel like you have to get any of us anything.

Just having your readership is enough.

No, really. It is.

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Awarded to us by The Cult of Qelqoth

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Winnie, Watching the View

VS.

Mark, Get Incensed

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Contestants have been working up to this point for months, and it’s finally time to give away the grand prize:

• An autographed picture of Jackie Warner, courtesy of Sky Sport and Spa
• A pair of shoes from the newest line from Jonathan Kayne
• A Soffe college hoodie, courtesy of me, BCS Frenzy!
• Gold-plated earrings from Aurora at Between My Sheets
• A pet portrait, courtesy of Intricate Art
• A set of bud vases from Top Design’s Jonathan Adler

So who will be our grand prize winner? That’s for you to decide! It’s down to Mark and Winnie. This week, they were asked to create a sneeze page to their blogs - a website that focuses on the best of the best. They’ll be judged on site design, readability, and the links they’ve chosen to include.

Check them out:

Winnie ………………………………………… Mark

Vote for your favorites here! This week, you vote will vote a bit differently. There are TEN possible points on the line, and they’ll be given to Winnie and Mark according to your voting. So, if isn’t a dead heat, Winnie and Mark will both get 5 points. However, if one or the other has 70% of the vote, that blogger will get 7 points while the other will get 3. There’s NEVER been a more important time to vote than this week!

Remember, you can vote once every 24 hours from now until February 20. Also, if you tell us in a comment below who you liked best - AND WHY (that part is important) - I’ll give you and additional entry to win the fan prize - $40!

(Note - you MUST comment on this post, NOT on the screen for the poll after you vote. You can comment there too, but only comments here will count to win the cash!)

Don’t forget to also comment HERE for an entry to win the money.

Happy voting!

Beach season will be here before you know it….

Trust me, Spring is just around the corner.

Of course, the corner is about 87 miles up the road on the other side of a cold front … but we’re getting there.

There are a couple of things you can do in the meantime to stay warm like getting organized or pimp-slapping the next person who tells you to reduce your carbon footprint to combat global warming.

Getting organized seems like the more productive option.

For the final challenge of Project Blog, we were tasked with putting together a “sneeze page” which is basically like Tivo for bloggers - you can skip around and just pick out the good stuff.

Sure, you could spend most of the day scrolling through the Get Incensed archives for your favorite posts or you could just go to the sneeze page where we’ve already done the job of organizing for you.

Plus, we’ve got a section of Fan Favorites and our choices of the Top 5 videos. There are some recent posts as well as some classic favorites. So, in that way, it’s kind of like your porn collection … but with hyperlinks.

To top it all off, if you hustle over to BCS Frenzy and post a comment, you’ll have a chance to win cash money and other cool prizes.

Thanks for all your support during Project Blog and throughout the rest of the year.

Please enjoy the compendium of greatest hits at Get Incensed - Spring Preening 2008.

Starting tomorrow, we’ll get to back to work on this year’s mess…

Too many text messages?

The world’s biggest statue of Jesus was struck by lightning today leaving priests, reporters and bumper-sticker makers to wonder what the Son of God did to piss off His Father. (WTFDJD?!)

People waiting outside the Pearly Gates reportedly overheard an angry Heavenly Father telling His Son to clean up His Room.

“Just snap Your Fingers and get it done, already,” Yahweh was heard to bellow.

A spokesperson for God denied Jesus was caught running up the family cable bill with late-night pay-per-view purchases.

“Let’s face it,” said St. Thomas Aquinas, “Jesus would know He couldn’t get away with anything like that since God knows everything.”

“Besides, Jesus doesn’t have Those Urges and there’s no way He could have guessed the password for God’s cable block.”

Theologians were at a loss to explain why Jesus was being punished since, if He’s perfect He couldn’t do anything wrong …. and if He didn’t do anything wrong, then God wouldn’t punish Him … but if God punished Him, He must have done something wrong ….

A Vatican spokesman told reporters to check back with the Holy See in another 300 years after they’d had time to debate the conundrum.

Other Bible scholars suggested that the lightning bolt was just God’s way of warning His Son not to step out of line after 800 trillion gazillion bazillion years of good behavior.

Or 10 thousand years if you take the Bible literally.

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“Don’t mess with the bull … you’ll get the horns.” -variously attributed to Principal Vernon and God

When asked for an explanation, The Heavenly Father responded with a simple, “No comment” and asked that reporters respect the Holy Trinity’s right to privacy during this difficult time.

Pressed for an explanation, God (who loves a good pun as much as the next deity) responded, “Jesus is not in trouble. He’s just grounded.”

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Awarded to us by The Cult of Qelqoth

As you know, Project Blog is winding to a close, but we’ve got ONE MORE big giveaway for you readers - and this time, we’re not fu… messing around - you have the chance to win some COLD HARD CASH.

There’s money in this deal….

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That’s right - one of you reading this right now will have $40 in your pocket by the end of the month. SWEET. Well…not QUITE in your pocket - you must be able to accept the money either via PayPal or via an Amazon gift certificate

All you have to do to win the cash is leave a comment on BCS Frenzy telling Allison that you want it! Tell her what you’d do with the money, tell her why you need the money, tell her why you’re the best shopper in the world - well, say whatever you want to say as long as you tell her you want the big prize!

Following Project Blog? I’ve got something extra for you too! Seems are though our two finalists, Winnie and Mark are booth chipping in to donate a prize to two lucky runner-ups for the cash contest. So, you can also win your choice of a Watching the View Mug or Mark’s book The Sky is Falling: A Global Warming Survival Guide. Heck, I know ya’ll want the money, but those second and third place prizes aren’t bad either! And, if you mention it in your comment that you’re cheering for either Winnie or Mark, they will get an addition read vote tallied onto their score! It’s like a pre-vote for your favorite, so show your support!

And that’s not all. If you comment on this entry on Allison’s blog and then comment on ANY OTHER post on her website - she’ll give you up to FIVE ADDITION entries for the big prize (five comments = five entries). Then, if you BLOG about this contest and leave the link in the comments section of this post, you’ll get yet ANOTHER entry. So that means there are seven changes to win in total! Note, that you must comment on this entry first and your other comments must be legitimate. Any that just say “cool post” or “I want to win the money” on other blog posts will be deleted!

So, to sum it up:

1. Comment on Allison’s “Win Some Cash” post to win the money. You can leave a comment about anything.

2. If you mention your favorite Project Blog contestant, they’ll get an addition vote for the finale.

3. Comment on up to five other posts on BCS Frenzy (using the same name), and you’ll get five additional entries to win the money.

4. Blog about this contest for an additional entry.

BUT YOU HAVE TO HURRY! This contest will only run through February 20, 2008 at noon. Enter NOW to win!

Easy, right? RIGHT! So get to commenting today!

That’s big of you ….

The media hype machine is in full gear.

So far you’ve probably heard the upcoming Presidential election described as “historic,” “the most important election since 1980″ and “a third less filling than a regular election.”

Much has been made of how the Democratic Party will be represented by either a black man or a woman in the Presidential race.

Lost in all the hoopla has been the social breakthrough in the Republican Party. For the first time in the history of this great nation, people are forced to face the question: “Is America ready for a candidate whose wife is bigger than he is?”

Holy HGH, Batman! Janet Huckabee is not only three inches taller than her husband, she can bench 125 more pounds and is more of a force at outside linebacker.

Democrats like to point out that their party was the first to have a President with a taller wife but, to be fair, FDR was in a wheelchair a lot of the time so I don’t think we can count that.

As far as I can tell, the election boils down to a contest between those candidates who want to give everyone free health care and free housing and those who want to give everyone free housing and free health care.

The Friday Six isn’t some empty campaign promise. It’s a list of the six websites, articles or mission statements that made us laugh over the past week.

Not the same old alliterative Friday Five.

The Friday Six. A post you can believe in ….

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Diesel of Mattress Police fame cleans out his metaphorical sock drawer with predictably funny results.

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Improv Everywhere brings time and the janitorial staff to a standstill at Grand Central Station in New York City.

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The folks at 23/6 make sure you understand what NYTimes columnist Maureen Dowd is all about. The Dowd-O-Tron is merely icing on the cake.

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David Spade channels Daniel-Day Lewis with his There Will Be Oscars spoof over at Funny or Die.

If Professor Quippy had tenure at my college, I never would have missed a class.

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Overheard at the Beach is just like being on vacation but without the couple having sex in the next room while you’re trying to sleep. This week’s personal fave:
Brunette: Okay, now that I have your number, I’ll just call you and then you’ll have mine.
Blonde: Oh! It’s ringing. Okay… I’m going to reject you, and then I’m going to save you… I’m just like Jesus.

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Have a great weekend, everyone! And don’t watch too much election coverage … it’ll rot your brain.

Awarded to us by The Cult of Qelqoth

The classics never go out of style. Robert Plant sings “One Bad Apple” from the Osmond’s Greatest Hits Catalog

I normally don’t take requests on this blog, but awhile back fellow 451er Barbara Waters had a little bit of a health scare and I volunteered to guest post on her site.

There was only one problem … her site is Knitting Passion.

So with that, here is the slightly tweaked version of The Truth is Out There…

Greetings to all you passionate knitters out there.

This is what’s known as a guest post. As in, I guessed I could write a post about knitting, but now, I’m not so sure …

One of the most common bromides in “the writing game” is to “write what you know.”

Another common bromide is to put random words in quotes so you appear as if you have “inside knowledge” and are “superior” to all the “ordinary people” who don’t know as much about your “topic” as “you.”

Having said that, I know absolutely nothing about knitting.

Well, that about wraps it up for this guest post ….

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Hahahaha. Aren’t we having fun?

Only 135 more words and a link to go before we qualify Barbara to get paid for hanging out in the hospital.

Pssst. Between you and me, I don’t think Barbara thought this plan through before she put it into action. Sure, she can get people to blog for her, but the amount of money she’ll make from this post will just about cover a Band-Aid. And that’s only if the hospital buys generic.

I’m not sure why I think Barbara can’t read anything in italics, but let’s not let that stand in the way of a good time …

As a non-knitter (or should that be knon-knitter?), I thought maybe we could all learn something if we were to explore some of the common misconceptions about knitting.

So, grab your balls (of yarn) and let’s take a look at (cue dramatic orchestra music) …

The Top Five Misconceptions About Knitting!

Let’s address one of the most common mistaken conclusions people draw right off the bat …

1. Only old people knit. I’ll say that louder for all of you who have hearing aids … ONLY OLD PEOPLE KNIT. I’m kidding, of course. Sure, your grandmother knits. That doesn’t mean only old people knit anymore than the incident with your uncle means that only kids over 21 should be allowed to have birthday parties.

Knitting is more popular than ever among teens and young adults. Hey, I even heard Apple is coming out with the iNeedle – a combination knitting needle and MP3 player which allows you to purl and listen to your favorite Big Band tunes at the same time.

Now, that we’ve dispensed with the “old” stereotype let’s move on to another common misunderstanding about knitting ….

2. Knitting is just for women. Please. Haven’t 40 years of Cosmo and a woman running for President taught us that there are no gender restrictions on what men and women can do? You bet they have.

Don’t worry, we’ll get that whole pay discrepancy thing hammered out in another 40 years or so.

Did you know there is a website dedicated to men who enjoy knitting? It’s filled with nearly a dozen (okay, eight) pictures of men who knit, a rundown of the history of men in knitting and links to other useful sites … like ones that offer self-defense tips.

Knitting is not just for women. It’s also for men who are secure with their masculinity. Really secure.

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Macho, macho man…
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Man, we are just exploding one myth after another. Let’s continue ….

3. Everyone who knits owns at least seven cats. This is absolutely not true. Five cats is usually the max. No one is saying you have to have a cat if you knit, but most other animals tend to get bored after playing with a ball of yarn for 57 minutes straight.

Knitters are good-natured people who like to have fun, especially with bloggers who gently rib them about their hobby. For that reason, knitters may have other pets they keep in their knitting basket such as cobras. Asking you to get the red yarn out of the basket is their way of accepting you into their group. Sure, you may require an ambulance, but you’ll have a knitting story (and a snake phobia) to last a lifetime.

Shall we proceed to the next big yarn (zing!) about knitting? ….

4. There are only five things you can knit: a scarf, a hat, socks, gloves or an afghan. Okay, now we’re just getting silly. Savvy knitters know that you can also create a square piece of knitting and call it whatever you’d like. It can be a potholder, a drink coaster, a doily, a trivet or a decorative wall hanging. Many knitters refer to this square piece of finished yarn by its more common name: practice.

People unfamiliar with knitting often make the mistake of calling an afghan a “blanket.” This is incorrect. A blanket covers your feet when you lay down, an afghan comes to slightly below your waist. The real purpose of an afghan is to cover your shoulders when you read, watch TV or sit in the window of the Bates Motel. Truth be told, an afghan is really just an extra wide scarf.

Or is a scarf just a really narrow afghan? It’s all so confusing.

I told you I didn’t know anything about knitting. But, everyone is in agreement on the final point ….

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The Truth is Out There…
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5. There are no reliable, first-person accounts of anyone actually witnessing a knitting project being completed. This is one case where the perception is totally true. No one has ever been in the room with someone as they put the final stitch in a sweater and said, “A-ha!”

And it’s not just because “A-ha!” is something people only say in 18th century detective novels.

What usually happens is you see a friend of yours on Tuesday. She will be knitting what she says is a sweater but what actually looks like an amorphous conglomeration of stitching. When you go over to her house on Sunday, your friend proudly displays the finished creation.

Doesn’t that seem a bit odd? Can anyone actually be that talented that they can make an article of clothing out of random pieces of string?

You are not alone. There are many of us who suspect that there is a section of desert in the Western United States where highly-evolved sentient beings (”knitters”) have a vast underground warehouse of finished products. The warehouse is divided into five sections: Hats, Socks, Gloves, Scarves/Afghans and Practice. Finished pieces are sent out to those knitters who request them to maintain their cover.

Everyone knows that knitters are merely waiting for the right moment to join together and take over the world … or is that the quilters? But, until the day the knitters are ready to reveal themselves and save the planet, the have to do something to pass the time … so, they knit.

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It’s important to have a hobby…
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You may not believe everything I’ve told you about knitting fallacies and about the existence of alien beings who knit. But I was abducted by one of these knitters and have been with her for nearly two years now.

And I’m here to tell you — if there’s one thing you can say about knitters it’s this: sex with them is fantastic!

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Awarded to us by The Cult of Qelqoth

I can’t define it, but I know quality bedroom furniture when I see it….

There are places you can go and feel like you start losing points off your IQ just by walking in the door. Places like your local Motor Vehicle Department, a Kansas Board of Education meeting and Thanksgiving dinner at the Spears’ house.

After this weekend, we can add Woolworth’s to the list.

From the first new product meeting, throughout the entire marketing process, during the whole chain of ordering and delivery, from stocking the shelves right up to ringing up the sales, not a single person associated with the entire procedure thought that maybe there would be a problem if the store sold a product for little girls called the Lolita Bed.

Sure. What could go wrong marketing a children’s bed that evoked images of an older dude having sex with a 12-year old girl? The only way this could have been more of a disaster would be if each bed came with Jon-Benet Ramsey designer sheets.

I take that back. The whole thing could be more embarrassing if, like Woolworth’s executives, you came out and said it was a totally innocent mistake and that no one in the entire firm had any idea of who Lolita was or the connotations associated with the term. Maybe passing the G.E.D. should be a requirement for being a vice-president at the store.

My favorite part is where the executives explained they had to look up “Lolita” on Wikipedia. It’s only one of the major novels of the 20th century. It’s only been made into two different movies including one by Stanley Kubrick.

One explanation is all the Woolworth execs went to business school and studied only discount store operations. Unfortunately, at least some of their customers had a liberal arts education that included modern literature. Or some passing knowledge of controversial movies since the 1960s.

Luckily for the Woolworth’s officials they typed Lolita into the search engine correctly, otherwise they would have assumed the bed was named after a neighborhood in New York City.

Are we being too harsh on Woolworth’s here? I don’t think so. Is it too much to ask that somebody in the organization picked up on this?

I’ll be the first to admit I can’t name all of Shakespeare’s plays, but I know enough not to name a set of steak knives after Macbeth.

Maybe it’s time for Woolworth’s to start stocking books.

Awarded to us by The Cult of Qelqoth