Quick Takes.

Here Comes The Sun.

Author: December 3, 2024 2 Comments

A wave of bitter cold swept through, well, everywhere, apparently. I hadn’t been watching the news because I’ve been on vacation, so I’ve missed the weather forecasts. Being on vacation also meant I didn’t get dressed until well after the sun was up, and even then I could just pull on a sweatshirt and jeans. Coming back to work I have to put on a button-down shirt and jeans because there’s at least some flexibility in the office dress code. It’s better than when I was a customer service agent for the trucking industry. The dress code there required slacks, a dress shirt, and a tie so I’d at least look nice while I sat at a desk and answered the phone all day.

The cold weather outside was made even worse by the fact that the building maintenance staff turned off the heat over Thanksgiving. The person in charge of maintenance believes it’s cheaper and more efficient to turn off the heat on holidays and weekends, and since the maintenance office has a separate heating system they don’t have to come into an office that’s fifty degrees Fahrenheit—that’s ten degrees Celsius—first thing on Monday morning.

At least I feel lucky that where I am the bitter cold held off until December, with the days only now getting noticeably shorter. I left for work in the dark, after scraping flowers of frost from the windshield, and was greeted by the sun through the buildings. And then, in the evening, when I came home in the dark, I was greeted by snow.

Adventures In Busing., Quick Takes.

Really Rough Drafts.

Author: November 15, 2024 6 Comments

Notes From The Journals Of Mother Goose

Who does Muffet think she’s fooling? She didn’t drag a mattress out to her garden just to sit on it and eat cottage cheese. Probably airing it out after all the use it’s gotten if you know what I mean. Boy is she gonna be surprised when she realizes what’s crawled into that thing.

 

Met a guy from Ives. What a character! He’s been married seven times. How’s that even legal? Every one of his wives had a bunch of bags filled with cats. People from Ives are so weird.

 

Don’t tease your pets. I’m gonna laugh so hard when old Hubbard’s dog bites the shit out of her.

 

Farm animals got loose again. Seriously where’s the kid with the horn? Probably suffocated under that haystack. I hope.

 

That black sheep is pumping out wool like crazy. It’s nice the owner’s got enough to give away bags of it to pretty much everybody but seriously anything that gets knitted from that wool is probably gonna be cursed.

 

Pease porridge? More like please take this porridge, hot or cold, and bury it. That mess has been there for over a week and even the rats won’t go near it.

 

Told Jack and Jill to be careful but did they listen? Noooo. What kind of asshole puts a well at the top of a hill anyway?

 

London Bridge has been shut down AGAIN. I say we stop paying for its upkeep, sell it to Arizona or something.

 

Sixpence is a pretty good price for a pie but, look, you just stuck a crust on top of a bunch of live birds and no one wants to eat that. Oh, wait, royalty. That explains it.

 

Went by a house built to look like a shoe. If that wasn’t weird enough the place was packed with kids. I guess we know who wears the pants in that family and it’s not the husband because he never has time to put ‘em on. People from Ives, man.

 

I get that a screaming baby can make anyone a little crazy but you stuck the cradle on a tree branch. What did you think would happen JILL?

 

Swear I saw a cow jump over the moon. Dog’s laughing, cat’s got a fiddle, and now all the dinnerware is running crazy. Tell me you didn’t feed me that pease porridge.

 

Always thought Mary’s garden was a little eccentric but nice. The cockle shells added minerals or something and the silver bells were pretty when the wind blew. But who’d have guessed she murdered three milkmaids and buried them in a row? No surprise she’s from Ives.

Not Non-Fiction, Quick Takes., Submitted For Your Approval., The Weekly Essay

Something For Everyone.

Author: October 31, 2024 3 Comments

For three years now people on my street have managed to block, or at least restrict, traffic for a couple of hours so families and kids can wander up and down trick-or-treating safely. It’s been a great event and a nice chance to meet people who live in my neighborhood—sometimes people from nearby streets come over, and the more the merrier. Rather than making anyone walk all the way down our fairly long driveway in the dark I set up a table with a bowl of candy and a lantern and set off on my own, trusting any takers to follow the honor system. The ideal bowl of candy, I think, should have a good mix—a little something for everyone. There’s an assortment of chocolate but because not everyone can have chocolate I make sure there are plenty of non-chocolate sweets.

And since not everyone can have candy last year I added stickers to the mix, hoping, again, that trick-or-treaters will follow the honor system and the ones who can have candy will take it and leave the other goodies for those who can’t. Last year when I came back to check the stickers were the first things to go—all that was left was a few lollipops and those eventually got picked up too. I was glad because, while it’s nice to have a little leftover Halloween candy, I really don’t need it.

Source: Yarn

This year I’ll be including something special at the very bottom of the bowl. The worst thing I think could happen to any trick-or-treater is going away empty handed and I want them to know that good things come to those who are late.

With that it’s time for Halloween though, as always, the last word goes to Lou Reed.

Adventures In Busing., American Graffiti., Happy Birthday., Quick Takes., Ramble With Me., Submitted For Your Approval., The Vault

Old School.

Author: May 2, 2024 4 Comments

Source: FOBO (Fromoldbooks.org)

Grammar mnemonics and rules I found written down in a notebook from 7th grade that I had completely forgotten:

I before E except after C and when it sounds like “a” as in “neighbor” and “weigh”.

And also when it sounds like “i” as in “heist” and “Fahrenheit”.

And also for some reason when it sounds like “e” as in “protein”, which is weird.

 

Never end a sentence with a preposition unless the sentence ends with “a preposition.

 

Confusing “who” and “whom” is really the worst

So never ever ask “Whom’s on first?”

 

Be more or less specific and decisive if that’s okay with you.

 

“I hate quotations. Tell me what you know.”—Ralph Waldo Emerson

 

“Gray” is spelled with an “a”

Except in Canada, Australia, New Zealand, and also the UK.

 

“Color” and “flavor” are spelled without “u”

Except outside the United States, pretty much anywhere you’d want to go to.

 

A noun is a person, place, thing, or idea, but it seems like ideas should get a category of their own.

 

“Sesquipidalian” should be replaced with something that sounds less like a deep sea animal.

 

Splitting infinitives is to usually be avoided.

 

A “dessert” has twice as much sugar as a “desert” if your dessert is sugar-free because deserts don’t have any sugar at all.

 

A “principle” is a rule or belief, a “principal” is a school leader who pretends to be your pal to maintain the status quo, and Victoria Principal wasn’t the one who shot J.R., was she?

 

Most sentences are subject-verb-object and “subject”, “verb”, and “object” are three nouns that really need a category of their own.

 

The “b” in “subtle” is pretty much what it says it is.

 

Now you know how to tow two toes.

 

Double negatives should never not be used.

 

Similes are like metaphors but different.

 

The only rule that has no exceptions is the rule that there’s an exception to every rule.

 

No one remembers who Mnemosyne is.

Source: Imgur

Not Non-Fiction, Quick Takes., The Weekly Essay

Annual Report: 2023/2024.

Author: April 1, 2024 4 Comments

April 2023-Staff assembled in the conference room to mark the occasion of the 28th year of Freethinkers Anonymous and to try and answer the question, What are we doing here? There are a lot of excellent blogs out there on a wide variety of topics that, thankfully, are still going while others, sadly, have dropped off. If anything makes Freethinkers Anonymous distinctive it’s longevity. What started as a random assortment of jokes emailed to a distribution list has grown into something resembling an internet landfill. It predated and survived the dot-com boom and, like those early internet companies, has never had a plan, purpose, or profit. On this note everyone cheered and went back to work.

May 2023-Staff assembled in the conference room to mark the occasion of the 28th year of Freethinkers Anonymous before realizing we just did that, but since no one had gotten any work done in the last month everyone cheered and went back to work.

June 2023-Everyone remembered that every year there’s a vague plan to sample as many local milkshakes as possible to try and determine the best one. And every year an argument breaks out over what defines “local”. Or whether it should be limited to ice cream places since a lot of restaurants serve milkshakes. There was also a side discussion of how some years the plan is to sample every gyro to determine the best one in the area which would be a lot easier, and another side discussion of how to define “best” and a further side discussion of what the definition of “ersatz” is but no one could remember how that came up in the first place.

July 2023-Work was put on hold for the 4th of July. Also July 1st, since it’s Canada Day, and also the 2nd through 3rd of July, and everyone just called in sick from the 5th through 13th. Then everyone took off for Bastille Day, and planned to get back by July 20th, but that’s National Moon Walk Day, and the 21st is National Creme Brulee Day and of course everyone had to celebrate that, as well as the 26th which is National Coffee Milkshake Day, and finally everyone made a solemn vow to get back to work at the start of the next month.

August 2023-Toată lumea și-a amintit brusc că acum vreo douăzeci de ani ne-am propus să învățăm limba Romanian. Nimeni nu-și putea aminti de ce și, în loc să se întoarcă prin arhive, toată lumea a decis să se întoarcă la muncă.

September 2023-Side effects include swelling, brusing, pain or tenderness, itching, dizziness, fainting, blisters, lumps, hives, bee hives, drowsiness, headache, insomnia, autodidacticism, nocturnal cake baking, dehydration, foaming of the ears, hair growth on furniture, and spontaneous decomposition. Seek medical help immediately if you become ersatz.

October 2023-The staff Halloween party was such a great success it lasted the entire month. This year the theme was “Aposematism” and resulted in several people being hospitalized.

November 2023-Staff assembled in the conference room to discuss whether “No Shave November” should be celebrated. Everyone agreed that it should but that staff would only grow sideburns. This led to a discussion of why they’re called “sideburns” since no one wants burns on their face, not even on the sides. Large sideburns are also called “muttonchops” but this was considered problematic for vegans and causing potential copyright warnings from the estate of Shari Lewis. Staff finally unanimously agreed that from now on sideburns should be called “earbrows”.

December 2023-The preponderance of holidays in the month of December meant no one got any work done.

January 2024-Recovering from the preponderance of holidays in the month of December meant no one got any work done.

February 2024-Staff assembled in the conference room to begin the disassembly of a jigsaw puzzle everyone had been working on for over a year. This proved surprisingly challenging as no one could decide whether we should start from the center or go out or from a corner and work inward, and if we did go in from a corner which one should be start with? Finally everyone decided the best solution was to just flip the table over.

March 2024-Staff assembled in the conference room as Freethinkers Anonymous prepared to start its 29th year. The team leader reminded everyone he’d read something once about how the average life of a blog is three years and the realization that we’d almost but not quite gone ten times that put everyone in a somber mood. All things must come to an end, even things without a plan or purpose. And yet it was decided unanimously that Freethinkers Anonymous would go on for another year. On that note everyone cheered and went back to work.

https://media3.giphy.com/media/AxVvk3UlCVPiPxtGLK/giphy.gif?cid=6c09b9527bfmkxwmt1t066j2so3jrrgcc0lssdr7b163qftp&ep=v1_internal_gif_by_id&rid=giphy.gif&ct=g

Adventures In Busing., American Graffiti., Hail & Farewell., Happy Birthday., Not Non-Fiction, Quick Takes., Ramble With Me., Submitted For Your Approval., The Vault

A Spring In Their Step.

Author: March 15, 2024 4 Comments

Famous Literary Rabbits

Bugs Bunny-The greatest of all Leporidae Bugs was originally based on Groucho Marx—hence the carrot which replaced the cigar, but his trademark phrase, “What’s up, doc?” and all his wit are purely original. Bugs isn’t just the pinnacle of rabbits; he just might be the best cartoon character ever.

Source: Tenor

Rabbit-For all of A.A. Milne’s imagination in adapting his son’s stuffed animals into the characters of The Hundred Acre Wood you’d think he could have come up with a more original name than “Rabbit” for Winnie The Pooh’s Neighbor. A bit crotchety and eccentric he should have been “Reginald” or even “Herbert”.

Peter Rabbit-Few writers understood rabbits as well as Beatrix Potter. Peter isn’t nearly as wayward as his cousin Benjamin Bunny and, let’s face it, while his siblings get blackberries and milk for supper Peter gets to spend all day stuffing his face in Mr. McGregor’s garden, which has to be a lot better, and was also a convenient way to get rid of the jacket he never really wanted in the first place.

Thumper-A lot of children were traumatized by Disney’s film Bambi but somehow I avoided it by finding Thumper a lot more interesting as a character, and also he was the one whose mother didn’t get killed.

The Velveteen Rabbit-While not really a rabbit until the end of the story but Margery Williams’s hero still deserves special recognition for goodness and endurance.

The March Hare-No one really knows what a “hare” is, and by “no one” I mean the average person like me who hears the term and thinks, What is the difference between hares and rabbits? I should look that up only to completely forget about it ten seconds later. Anyway, hares are larger, have forty-eight chromosomes compared to forty-four for rabbits, and have never been domesticated. And now the number of people who know the difference between hares and rabbits is slightly smaller so Lewis Carrol’s character belongs on this list. Also, unlike the White Rabbit, who serves the King and Queen of Hearts, the March Hare is his own boss.

Judy Hopps-While Zootopia is a film and not adapted from any literary work Officer Hopps is  a solid character. Honest, hardworking, ambitious—she stands out for being pretty much the opposite of most rabbits, real and fictional.

Source: Tenor

Harvey-Another example who’s not really a rabbit Harvey’s still special for being Jimmy Stewart’s pal.

General Woundwort-Richard Adams’s Watership Down, the epic tale of rabbits escaping the destruction of their homes was adapted into an infamous 1978 animated film that’s been shown on TV a few times. Well-meaning adults have turned it on thinking, “Oh, it’s a cute cartoon about bunnies” and left their children alone to be traumatized by, among other things, the rabbit Woundwort fighting a pack of ravenous dogs in a scene so violent and bloody it’s a wonder the animators didn’t run out of red paint.

The Easter Bunny-While always second banana to Santa Claus the Easter Bunny—originally the Easter Hare among German Lutherans—once also had his own version of the “naughty and nice” list and still brings baskets of candy and eggs to children. Sometimes the eggs are hidden and children have to go on a hunt for them which is a problem if no one finds that one under the couch until July.

John Updike-Honorable mention.

Nature Talks., Quick Takes., The Weekly Essay

Fantasy Football, Super Bowl LVIII Edition.

Author: February 11, 2024 7 Comments

 

Offensive Line
QB Patrick Mahomes QB Xena, Warrior Princes
RB Isiah Pacheco RB Jareth
WR Marquez Valdes-Scantling WR Schmendrick The Magician
WR Rashee Rice WR Hellboy
WR Kadarius Toney WR Yog Sothoth
TE Travis Kelce TE Lessa/Ramoth
LT Donovan Smith LT Sandman
LG Joe Thuney LG Buffy Anne Summers
C Creed Humphrey C Rocket Raccoon
RG Trey Smith RG Inigo Montoya
RT Jawaan Taylor RT Dark Helmet
Defensive Line  
DE George Karlaftis DE Optimus Prime
DT Derrick Nnadi DT Gamera
DT Chris Jones DT Ellen Ripley
DE Mike Danna DE Peter Pan
LB Willie Gay LB Aziraphale
LB Nick Bolton LB Crowley
LB Leo Chenal LB Princess Peach
CB Trent McDuffie CB Spock
CB L’Jarius Sneed CB Falkor
S Justin Reid S Arya Stark
S Mike Edwards S Ged

 

Wondermark Comics on X: "“Great game, Red. Amazing run in ...

Source: Wondermark

Happy Birthday., Quick Takes., Submitted For Your Approval., The Vault

Take Me To Your Mascot.

Author: February 2, 2024 7 Comments

School has been back in session for a few weeks now which means it’s time for a pop quiz! Match the following advertising mascots with little known trivia about their personal lives.

  1. Mr. Clean
  2. The Jolly Green Giant
  3. The Energizer Bunny
  4. Snap, Crackle, and Pop
  5. Chester Cheetah
  6. Captain Morgan
  7. The Pillsbury Doughboy
  8. The Michelin Man
  9. Mr. Peanut
  10. Ronald McDonald

 

A. Also owns a modest chain of car wash places with locations in Van Nuys, Pasadena, and Yorbalinda.

B. Worked with Ted Healy in vaudeville before moving to food marketing.

C. Lives in Nebraska, only travels by hovercraft.

D. Showed up at an audition for mascots after misreading the ad as a sale for “ascots”.

E. Has 20/20 vision but can only read Braille.

F. Did an episode of Undercover Boss wearing a vintage toupee and fake beard previously owned by Eisenhower.

G. An accomplished bass player, often touring with Herman’s Hermits

H. Also has a line of athleisure wear.

I. Went to college to study nuclear physics, was expelled after a bizarre incident involving a Geiger counter, a box of Brillo pads, and an electric eel.

J. Can’t eat gluten.

Scoring

1-2: You have no idea who most of these characters are. Congratulations–this is a winning score.

3-4: You were raised on a commune in upstate New York but have been acclimating to “normal” life. Good luck on your CPA exam.

5-6: One of your parents made you watch “Days Of Our Lives” with them each afternoon during the summer.

7-8: Both of your parents made you watch “Days Of Our Lives” with them each afternoon during the summer.

9-10: You are an advertising mascot.

 

Answer key:

1-F

2-D

3-G

4-B

5-E

6-C

7-J

8-A

9-H

10-I

Pop Quiz, Quick Takes., The Weekly Essay

Resolvulations.

Author: January 12, 2024 4 Comments

Having read several articles about New Year’s Resolutions over the years I’ve been able to coalesce all that I’ve learned into the following recommendations:

 

-Always make New Year’s resolutions. If your goal is self-improvement in any form having specific resolutions will help you stick to that and give you a marker to work from.

 

-Never make New Year’s resolutions. If your goal is self-improvement in any form having specific resolutions will just frustrate you and distract you from what you need to do.

 

-Share your New Year’s resolutions with others, especially friends who will help you remember what your resolutions are and keep you on track.

 

-Keep your New Year’s resolutions private. Sharing your goals can actually have the effect of making you feel like you’ve already accomplished something, making you less likely to finish what you started. Your friends also have their own resolutions and forcing them to remember yours just makes you a jerk.

 

-Make your New Year’s resolutions realistic and attainable. Setting goals that you’re unlikely to meet is just going to harm your self-esteem, making you even less likely to accomplish anything.

 

-Set lofty, seemingly unobtainable goals for yourself. Don’t be too hard on yourself if you don’t accomplish these goals but even incremental steps toward something grand can help your self-esteem.

 

-The practice of New Year’s resolutions started in ancient China. Also ancient Greece, ancient Egypt, prehistoric Ireland, the Mayans, western Africa, and Hoboken, New Jersey, in 1932.

 

-The first modern record of a New Year’s resolution is from Peterborough, England, on January 1st, 1802. George Critten put a notice in the Peterborough Times that he had resolved to take a bath once a week.

-The first modern record of a New Year’s resolution being broken is from Peterborough, England, on January 3rd, 1802, when George Critten reportedly declared the River Nene “bloody frozen”. He would eventually take a bath in the summer of 1809.

 

-Create a reminder, either by writing it on a calendar or on a phone or other device, to remind you throughout the year of your resolutions so you’ll stay on track.

-Keep your resolutions in your head. If they’re really that important you won’t need reminders.

 

-Beryllium in its pure form tastes sweeter than sugar. It’s also incredibly toxic. However since it’s relatively rare on Earth and is never found naturally in its pure state our taste receptors never evolved to recognize it as a poison. This was in an article about New Year’s resolutions. I don’t remember what it had to do with them but I thought it was interesting and I’m pretty sure I missed everything else the article was about because I was so busy wondering who looked at some pure beryllium, which is silvery and crystalline, and said, “I should lick that.”

 

Johnny Karate: Always remember, kids: When you find something new, you must always lick it before you eat it.

Carpenter Ron: That is incorrect in a number of ways.

Source: Nesflix

Not Non-Fiction, Quick Takes., Submitted For Your Approval., The Weekly Essay

The List.

Author: October 27, 2023 7 Comments

While Reese’s Peanut Butter Cups have, for obvious reasons, consistently been ranked the best Halloween candy, with Snickers, M&M’s, Kit Kats, Twizzlers, Mounds, Sour Sack Babies, and gummy worms usually making it into the top ten, it’s just as important to look at the opposite end of the list and consider the things you definitely should not give out at Halloween:

Apples

Basically any fruit is a bad idea but, in spite of their associations with fall, apples are the worst thing you can give trick-or-treaters unless you want apples thrown through your window. Save them for your Halloween party. If you’ve ever played Bobbing For Apples you know all this does is ruin the apples and leave everyone soaking wet. This is a feature, not a bug.

Apples With Razor Blades

In spite of it being a popular Halloween urban legend you should never give out these under any circumstances. There are no documented cases of these really being given to trick-or-treaters, and the reasons should be clear. For one thing an apple with a razor blade stuck in it is really obvious. For another razor blades are expensive. And finally if you did give these out you’d end up with apples with razor blades thrown through your window.

Caramel apples

Maybe you think the neighbors know you well enough and trust you enough that they know you’d never harm their children so they’d be totally fine with you making a special treat that requires an incredible amount of work on your part. Even if that is true do you know what takes even more work than making caramel apples? Eating them. Congratulations, you’ve just ruined both a perfectly good apple and perfectly good caramel. On the bright side you’ve put the apple on a stick which will make it really easy to throw it through your window.

Loose change

Once upon a time trick-or-treaters carried special cardboard boxes and collected money for UNICEF. Some of that money might have even made it to children in need rather than the change dish next to the rotary phone in the kitchen. Now you’re just weighing down kids’ bags with pieces of metal that, collectively, won’t be enough to purchase gift cards, which are the preferred financial medium of both kids and UNICEF.

Cough drops

Sure, they’re basically candy that pretends to make you stop coughing, but Halloween is just not the time to make sure the kids are getting their recommended daily requirement of menthol, and that eucalyptus could be saved for hungry koalas.

Vitamins

All other considerations aside these are never packaged individually so you’d have to distribute them in plastic bags, and if you’re doing that you might as well be sitting on your porch with bloodshot eyes wearing a tie-dyed shirt and ripped jeans while sitting next to a Victrola playing Tom Lehrer’s “The Old Dope Peddler”.

Gummy vitamins

These are really tasty and for adults it’s fun to get your daily dose of riboflavin as a sweet treat, but they’re still not individually packaged, so if you’re handing these out you might as well be sitting on your porch under a shingle that says “Dr. Timothy Leary” and telling everyone not to feed your pet dragon.

Laxatives

In 1959 a dentist in California thought it would be funny to give out laxatives to trick-or-treaters. It wasn’t. It still isn’t. Among other reasons anyone who’s ever suffered the after-effects of a Halloween candy binge knows laxatives wouldn’t make any difference.

Toothbrushes

I’m sure there are dentists who think it’s funny to give out these. It’s not. You might as well give kids a packaged lecture on the economic impact of coal mining on southwest Wales in the late 19th century. Let kids have this one special night and, hey, if they’re under a certain age they’re just gonna lose all those teeth anyway.

String cheese

Seriously, what is wrong with you?

Doughnuts

When I was a kid there was a house somewhere in my neighborhood where they handed out Krispy Kreme doughnuts–the basic frosted kind. They were not wrapped. Whoever did it also handed them out quickly enough that none of us got a good look at what was being tossed into our bags. The result was a pulverized doughnut and gooey frosting all over our candy. You know who you are and you are more evil than the Silver Shamrock mask company in Halloween III.

Full-sized candy bars

This may sound like a good idea, and it’s briefly going to make your house the most popular one in the entire city. Then you’ll run out and you and your family will turn into the trapped people in Night Of The Living Dead as an army of crazed trick-or-treaters shuffles toward your house, breaking your windows with the apples they got from that house across the street, and if you’re lucky they won’t be candy apples.

Mary Jane Peanut Butter Kisses

If you don’t recognize the name you’ll recognize the black and orange waxy paper these come wrapped in. Technically they’re a molasses taffy with peanut butter so, congratulations whoever made these, in one package you’ve ruined molasses, taffy, and peanut butter. Fortunately no one’s really to blame for these as scientists have discovered that they spontaneously generate in Halloween bags. This is a good thing because anyone responsible for giving these out should be arrested.

 

Source: Makeagif

Pop Quiz, Quick Takes., Submitted For Your Approval., The Weekly Essay