Life Is Hard...

The French Forgive Us

This advertisement was in the April issue of the prestigious Automobile Magazine:

And then this text underneath:

It is not for us to hold the grudge-- not even against ignorant swine. And so we come back to America, where you think your replacement starter should come as fast as your cherished McNuggets. A starter is not a McNugget. It is a creation wrenched from the mind of man. It is a symbol. It is art.

Sadly, you cannot understand such things. So this time, like the indulgent parent, we add features expressly designed for Americans. Your speed, it is shown by the Heads-Up Mime. Your agnst, it is calmed by five-year / 50,000-mile ennui protection. The Peugeot-- she is more than you deserve.

And then in the really small print: April Fool 2003 by Jay Lamm.

Jay Lamm, you are more than we deserve!

Fox News Lawsuit Generates At Least One Interesting Tidbit

I think most folks would agree that Fox News made a boo-boo when they tried to halt production of Al Franken's newest screed, "Lies and the Lying Liars Who Tell Them." However, I found this quote to be quite interesting:

"Parody is a form of artistic expression protected by the First Amendment and the keystone of parody is imitation," the judge said. "It is ironic that a media company, which should be seeking to protect the First Amendment, is seeking to undermine it by claiming a monopoly on the phrase, 'Fair and Balanced.'"

Now according to Dictionary.com:

par·o·dy n.
1. A literary or artistic work that imitates the characteristic style of an author or a work for comic effect or ridicule. See Synonym: caricature.
2. Something so bad as to be equivalent to intentional mockery; a travesty: The trial was a parody of justice.

And also:

car·i·ca·ture n.
1. A representation, especially pictorial or literary, in which the subject's distinctive features or peculiarities are deliberately exaggerated to produce a comic or grotesque effect.
2. A grotesque imitation or misrepresentation: The trial was a caricature of justice.

Now if Franken has to defend the title of his book based on a 1st Ammendedment 'parody' defense, that rather strongly implies, at least to me, that the title of his book has no merit as a representation of reality, does it? He might as well rename it "Truth and the Truth-Tellers Who Speak Truth: an Unfair, Unbalanced and Meritless Examination of the Right by All Fraken," mightn't he?

Heh.

Hallelujah!

All of the ceramic tile is finally set into the thinset! Pictures will be posted soon.

Carl Reiner, Call Your Agent!

Who ever talked the venerable Mr. Reiner into voice acting for the horribly bad animated series "The Allen Brady Show", (carried by TV-LAND), should be condemned to spend the rest of his/her life watching Jerry Springer reruns. My girlfriend and I were both appalled by what we saw. The animation lacked visual appeal, and was rather more annoying than South Park. The plot was boring. The characters were insulting. The premise was only remotely of interest; I mean, the Dick Van Dyke show went of the air fifty years ago!

In short, I wouldn't force my worst enemy to watch it.

Well okay, maybe I would. Hehe.

Hello and Goodbye, Twelve Hour Outage

I hardly knew ye.

So where was I when the lights went out? Sitting in my office at work. However, unlike most folks, I was aware of the scope of the situation within minutes. My good buddy from Gallucci's called to tell me that both CEI and Cleveland Public Power were offline. We both knew what meant: something big was happening.

I quickly packed up my laptop, finished shutting down the computers that were on battery backup, and got the heck out. When I got in my car and turned on the radio, I was even more alarmed: the outage had also affected New York, Toronto and Detroit.

But I was ready. Within twenty minutes of the outage, I was at home with a bath tub full of fresh water, two pots boiling, my boogy-bag located within arms reach, pistol locked and loaded, and enjoying a cold drink from the fridge while listening to the windup radio.

The rolling brownouts as the power came back on made my neighbors air conditioner squeak and squeal. I guess he didn't have the good sense to turn it off.

Update:

I just read a report that says the power problem may have originated here in Northeast Ohio. With that in mind, maybe it would be worth my time to note here exactly what happened as I remember it. Yes, it was around 4:15 PM. But the power didn't just go out. First it blipped off with a brown out and then came back on within a few seconds. (quickly enough that Matt Melis's PC didn't reboot.) Then the power stayed on long enough for Matt Melis to walk down to my office, which would be around 20-30 seconds, rough estimate. Then everything went off again, for good.

So there it is, for what it's worth

Matt Crandall: The Surreal Life

On Saturday,

I took the car out with the intent of filling the gas tank, but the little door wouldn't open no matter how hard I pushed on the release ... I had to turn around and drive to the dealer and have a mechanic pry it open...

My barber requested that I participate in a charade to deceive a woman into thinking that "my four kids" were in line in front of her, so she would not bring in her bratty three-year-old,

I almost got run off the road by a car backing out of a driveway,

I happened across the strangest Peugeot ad while reading a magazine. I'll scan it and put it on here later.

Posted by crandal at 07:52 AM

Painting

Mom and Dad came over today and we put the second coat of paint on the living room / dining room / kitchen. It's looking pretty good. The first coat went up on Wednesday.

Diversity Gone Wild!

Are you white? Then get paid to go to Church!

Inneficient Markets: A Commentary

This is a rough draft.

One of the things I love about leftists is how they dismiss the idea of efficient markets. If markets are inneficient because humans act irrationally, then socialism can't work either--- because humans act irrationality!