Ever notice how it's the little things in life that amuse us so much? More to the point, ever notice how it's the silly little idiocies in life that amuse us more than anything else? Well, this is not as much ''the little blog that could'' as it is ''the blog that enjoys going up the down escalator in your local mall.'' Will it have anything of real importance? No, probably not. But enjoy the ride never the less!

 

...with the death toll from the tsunami practically doubling overnight since this last little bit of nowhere. From some reports, it's up to officially 55,000 confirmed dead, and a lot more missing and still presumed dead.

And while it seems almost trivial and contrite in comparison, the day didn't get much better when Mel glanced at the local Ontario Renfair webpage, only to discover that the gang running/managing the Renfair have decided to call it quits. This was on their main page: http://www.rennfest.com/orf/index.html

After nine seasons of operation and effort to bring you a continually-growing quality family entertainment experience in Ontario we will be closing the gates of Trillingham. Our decision was made after much careful consideration of the past nine seasons and projections for the future of the show. It has been our pleasure to work with the entire company of performers and vendors who were the festival. Each season the festival and its vendors provided employment for more than six hundred people and over the years entertained more than half a million customers. Thank you for your patronage over the years and thank you to any of you who became our friends during that time.

Mel & I have visited the Renfair during two summers in the past, and were happily anticipating going next year. This is a bit of a surprise and a crushing blow, since it's always been a spectacular festival to go to. The carousing at the very end at the Black Dragon Tavern was a favourite of mine. At the very least, we have a special picture to remember it by, and a goblet. But it's still an unpleasant sting.

Today's Lesson: regular mall hours have resumed. That means everything closes down at 9pm. And no, I don't care how desperate you are, but I will not sell you a damned scarf when the clock reads 9:05pm. The curtain around our kiosk has been drawn for a reason. Thank you, and good night.


posted by Phillip at 10:42 AM

 

There are times when humanity attempts to discover new ways of destroying itself, and most of those times prove disturbingly effective. And just to remind us of how amateurish we really are, nature comes along and dryly remarks in her not so subtle way, "Anything you can do, I've been doing better for millennia." I've been watching the news reports and reading what I can in the papers about the enormous tsunami that hit southeast Asia. It's not pretty, especially the death toll, but it is very humbling and for me serves as a very stark reminder of how we can dominate the earth, but will never control it.

Equally disturbing is how this isn't even the largest tsunami on record either. Nature could still have dealt a blow that was worse. Much worse.


posted by Phillip at 9:49 AM

 

posted by Phillip at 5:48 AM

 

I'm sure many of you are aware by now that the sixth book in the HP series, Harry Potter & The Half-Blood Prince, is going to be released July 2005. Already the book is topping best-seller lists by pre-order alone.

But what do we know about the book? Well, we know it's going to involve Harry. And a half-blood prince. And someone's going to die. Yet this only serves to taunt and torment fans who want to know now what's happening in Harry's Muggleverse. Well fear not, Potter fans! By using my vast, superior information and intelligence networks, I have secured the first official chapter by chapter synopsis of "The Half-Blood Prince."

Behold what will happen in year 6, in all it's glory!!


Chapter 1: the Gerbils Without Pants attack Harry, leading to ominous theories about Voldemort's favourite cheese.

Chapter 2: sexual tension between Ron & Hermione peaks due to misunderstandings about whose turn it is to use the shower. Ginny manages to take a picture of the moment for posterity and future blackmail.

Chapter 3: the gang travels to Diagon Alley to retrieve their books, and the Sasquatch's shoe fetish is at long last revealed. Cheese wedges are thrown, and Draco has a drunken otter shoved down his pants.

Chapter 4: during the opening ceremony, Dumbledore introduces a new transfer student from the States--who happens to be Harry's long-lost and qually brilliant & powerful sibling. Said transfer student is also a half-blood prince. Smelling a self-insertion, the Griffyndors and Slytherins put aside their differences and pelt the avatar with squishy octopuses. As usual, nothing happens with Hufflepuff.

Chapter 5: Harry realizes he has feelings for Cho, and confesses his love to her. Unfortunately, he tries to do this while Cho is busy kissing Padma Patil. Sensing the awkwardness of the moment, Harry tries to Macarena his way out of the room.

Chapter 6: in which we learn about Voldemort's secret obssession with Hello Kitty.

Chapter 7: the stars have come into perfect alignment, the air has a very gibbous feel to it, and the great & terrible Old One, Cthulhu, rises out from the depths of the lake next to Hogwarts. Unfortunately, just as he emerges to begin his reign of madness and horror, he's clobbered in the head by a wayward Hippogriff and sinks back down to Ryleh in embarrassment.

Chapter 8: it's revealed that Draco's carpetting doesn't match his drapes. Hermione eats some cake, and pieces togethere the Caramilk secret.

Chapter 9: misunderstandings complicate Harry's love life when the Golden Snitch shoots down Ginny's pants during a Quidditch match, and he & Cho viciously fight to retrieve it.

Chapter 10: Ron is attacked by Death Eaters, but manages to escape thanks to his overpowering after-shave.

Chapter 11: Howgarts files for bankruptcy.

Chapter 12: Dumbledore explains to Harry why Dementors are afraid of David Hasselhoff.

Chapter 13: War breaks out. Hilarity ensues. Insults are thrown, which segues into an all-dancing, all-musical Can Can number.

Chapter 14: Harry claims Neville is dead. To which the not-quite-a-corpse of Neville sits up and exclaims, "I'm not dead yet!", to which Harry then retorts, "You will be in the next book", and has Neville lay back down on the stretcher.

Chapter 15: Voldemort holds Harry's prized cactus hostage in an attempt to lure Harry out of Hogwarts. When that fails, Voldemort gives Harry's Mmail address to a Muggle Spam list. Naked Quidditch matches ensue.

Chapter 16: the Gerbils Without Pants return, bringing with them an apocalypse and some French Fries. In the spirit of togetherness, Ron buys them a bottle of malt vinegar, then sells the gerbils as pets.

Chapter 17: Hermione sets the House Elves free. They immediately form a fraternity, get drunk and before the night out (in no specific order) they hit on all the girls in Ravenclaw, pee in the Prefects' Bath, make sashimi for everyone's breakfast out of the giant squid, spend all night singing dirty marching cadences in every common room, and fill the Great Hall with every-flavour beans. Hermione subsequently begs Dumbledore to enslave/employ them again.

Chapter 18: a great deal of toast is thrown about. Draco is caught wearing fishnet stockings. Harry begins to wonder when the plot will get back around to him.

Chapter 19: feeling insecure after having been thwarted so many times, Voldemort joins an Evil Overlord support group alongside Boss Hogg, Dr. Evil, a legion of Bond villains, Trogdor, Dr. Claw and Martha Stewart.


So there you have it: the secrets behind book six revealed. Now now, there's no need to thank me. Just knowing I have passed on this knowledge to other HP fans is enough thanks for me....

Today's Lesson: sometimes it's just better to not look out the window and discover just how much snow is out there and how badly its blowing around.


posted by Phillip at 7:54 AM

 

It's beginning to look a lot like Christmas: the presents are stacking up, parking lots are crowded with irate drivers vying for open spaces like hyenas (hyenas who know how to make rude gestures with their hands, at that), and the smell of desperation is filling the mall air. You can see it on many of the faces that pass you by; as panicking customers ask you in that half-crazed, half-near-homicidal voice for specific items you know you don't have; as you kindly remind said customers after informing them that no, you don't have what they're looking for, that if they continue to shout at you, you will have to disable them with your Customer Appreciation Scarf (i.e., strangle them) before you call mall security.

So far our kiosk, at least while I've been there, has not been the recipient of many of these irate customers, but they are starting to look rather grumpy and neurotic. And then there's this guy: right in front of me, a man bares his teeth, leans up really close to one of our mirrors...and spends a minute or so thoroughly examining his teeth. Oddly enough, he didn't seem very pleasant when I said encouragingly, "They're quite clean, Sir, I can assure you."

In other news, I am bemused, grieved and perplexed to discover that the Muppet Family Christmas DVD is missing scenes from its original TV showing. (Fozzie & the snowman's outdoor comedy routine, and the full version of the Muppet Babies singing "Santa Claus is Coming to Town", for those nit-picky ones wondering.) Normally this wouldn't annoy me, but having watched every Christmas the TV version we taped years ago, it's rather disconcerting to have my happy DVD copy, and know full well that things have been removed. Besides, they were good scenes. Now a generation of Muppets fans will never know that, upon seeing baby Piggy, Floyd the Electric Mayhem guitarist exclaims, "Hey, it's Miss Hamhock, when she was just a little sausage roll!"

And in other other news, our new cat Chance mews like one of those hooting Dilophosaurs from the Jurassic Park movie. I'm waiting to get a toxic hairball to the face any day now...

Today's Lesson: nothing amuses me more than seeing Mel aggravated over the fact that she can rattle and shake her presents all she wants, but she still won't be able to know the boxes' contents for another few days. Yeah, I'm going to get smacked for this; I already know this fact.



posted by Phillip at 6:22 PM

 

Last night I wrestled with annoying turtles and evil, carnovirous mushroom-thingies. (You know: the kind of mushrooms you meet in a dark, empty alley with not a badger in sight.) I also had to contend with fireball-spitting plants and some sort of wrench-flinging raccoon. The only way to defeat them was to dress up as a frog, and sometimes a tanuki.

Yes, you guess it: I've regressed. A few days ago, Kevin loaned me out his old Super NES, complete with the Mario All Stars game (containing Mario 1-3) as well as Super Mario World. I've been having this Mario 3 craving for almost 6 months now, waking up at night from vivid childhood recollections of playing the game, unable to get back to sleep at night because I've become haunted by those images of Mario bouncing around in that big giant, green boot and stomping on things. Which, incidentally, is why World 5-3 remains my favourite level, period.

I've spent a number of evenings sitting back and playing Mario 3, which hads delighted me to no end. I've been reminded of how much I adored the game when I was a kid. I've also been astounded by how much I remember, even the tiny little cheats and things, courtesy of me practically memorizing the Gamepro guide to M3 I bought years upon years ago. Between rounds of playing the matching game, choosing which treasure chest for me to open, and trying to earn me extra lives in the slots game, Mel's been boggled by how much I've been acting like a little 11 year-old version of myself.

"You're like a little kid all of a sudden," she informed me last night.

"Because I'm grinning like an idiot from playing this game?" I said.

Whereupon Mel shook her head and said, "No, mostly because you can't beat World 6 and have spent the last ten minutes constantly swearing and hurling childish insults & threats at the TV."

She's right too. Damned Ice World. Sure, when I was a kid, it was World 7: Plant World that always gave me trouble. This time around, I conquered Plant World in one go, to my surprise. But Ice World? Noooo, I just have to keep falling down holes or running into enemies who kill me on contact. Stupid monkey-bastard, rassafrassing game...kick it in the nuts....

*Ahem!* Excuse me, I don't know what came over me for a moment there.

Today's Lesson: the holidays are only as enjoyable as the customers you serve, or the cynicism you serve back to them.


posted by Phillip at 8:16 AM

 



You are Penny Arcade! Edgy and sarcastic, you cut
through the stupid mundanity of everyday life,
but mostly the world of computers and video
gaming. While you are hilariously funny, no one
will ever know if you never go outside. Put
down the controller and get some fresh air.

If you don't get the reference, check yourself out
at http://www.penny-arcade.com/


What Internet phenomenon are you? -updated-
brought to you by Quizilla


posted by Phillip at 8:06 AM

 

posted by Phillip at 8:04 AM

 

Have any of you seen those Old Navy commercials that are manifesting themselves during commercial breaks like an unwanted ass-wart? You probably know what I'm referring to, and if you're denying it you no doubt have regressed the dreadful memory, and gone with something less traumatizing. Like the time you discovered that superman capes will not actually enable you to fly (and you only discovered this at the base of that very steep hill).

There's our hapless victim idling around various places always associated with the $-mas season: stores in shopping malls; bakeries; their closet. Suddenly, they are accosted by a ragtag and badly-dressed group of kids, teens and desperate actors in their early 20's. (Actually, I'd be hiding in my closet if I knew these bozos were stalking me.) Before our hapless victim can use their pepper spray or yet "Cut!", someone blows on a harmonica (actually, I argue they all blow, but that's just my amateurish opinion), and they all start to sing. Or to be more specific, they all start to engage in some sort of off-key caterwauling that could be called singing. I've heard dead cats fuck with more harmony than these people.

But what are they singing? Something redemptive? Something Superfreakish? Oh, it's not a Christmas song or carol they're torturing, mind you. No, no. They use a melody that bears some resemblance to a horribly mangled version of some well-known tune like "Jingle Bells." Instead of the usually cheery and festive words we've come to know and love from a song like, oh "Jingle Bells", this group of ravenous and colourfully-dressed monsters launch into some uninspired dreck about last-minute shopping and how Old Navy will save your ass with inexpensive brand-name clothes.

And their smiles! My God, did they all get shot up with Prozac or Botox before shooting this commercial? I can almost see the coarse humanity seeping out of the corners of their mouths as they try and try to emote. But it just doesn't work. What I think was intended to be a witty and sentimental commercial that tugs on the seasonal heartstrings of us all managed to take a bad concept, and create a painfully limp commercial that switches our heartstrings with piano wire and then tries to strangle us with it.

Though oddly enough these Old Navy commercials do bring a smile on my face. Mostly because I imagine what would happen if this crew showed up at a store my friends and I happened to be at. Once their rousing rendition of "Oh dear God, I repent of all my evil, just make the hurting stop!!" ends, and the little boy makes some inspid remark whilst holding up the Old Navy sign, I consider my reaction to it.

It would probably involve a bunch of the group all desperately trying to hold back one of us from charging. And I'm shouting, "No, Roupen, not the beam cannon! They're right in front of the cookies! You'll take the cookies out with them!"

So please, end these Old Navy ads before innocent cookies get hurt. Won't someone think of the cookies?

Today's Discovery: Shady will yowl pitifully along with Menchi during Excel Saga's closing song.


posted by Phillip at 8:27 PM

 

There's so many things I want to say here.

I want to say a belated thanks to all the birthday wellwishers out there, from cards to Livejournals to calls. And Ysa-chan, your unique ability to launch into happy-babble halfway through an answering machine message is impressive! This also goes out to my fellow tortured souls...er, coworkers, who to their utterly vicious delight bought me a Hilary Duff CD as a gift. (My exact and first words to the primary culprit when I saw her next were, and I quote: "Hilary freaking Duff?!") I was half-expecting a Clay Aiken CD myself, since my loathing of him, and having to see his videos or hear his songs, is only sightly higher than my loathing of Duff. I can in fact have more than enough of that not-so-wonderful Duff. And yet it was done in good spirits, and ultimately not a waste since I was able to trade the Hilary Duff CD in for the 'Best of Marilyn Manson' CD.

No, I'm serious. (Those of you aware of my educational background can stop snickering anytime now...)

I also want to say that my prolongued absence in this little bit of nowhere is due primarily to me being too tired to even stare properly at the screen every other night. And on the nights in between those, blogger was too fscking wonky to work right and even let me sign in.

I also want to say that the term "quality control" has reach newfound levels of irony, where the air is so saturated with iromy it's...er...ironic. Okay, so that analogy died a horrible death and is still suffering a rather tortuous afterlife, but you get the idea. Some of you have followed our exploits involving the kiosk of not-as-much-death -but-definitely-shoddy-construction. For those of you just tuning in (and more importantly, too lazy to glance back at previous bits of nowhere), the seasonal kiosk I am currently running, or at least pretending to look like I know how to run something like this, is usually constructed by one specific handiman who works for our company. He's a great guy who knows what he's doing.

This year the company contracted out to a different bunch of handimen. After all the seasonal kiosks were assembled, the word of the day was officially made: "Oops?" You see, having a kiosk assembled is one thing, and a great thing unto itself. But having a kiosk assembled properly is an ever better thing. The new guys putting together our kiosk only managed to get the first line right. The track for our kiosk curtain had numerous gaps in it, plus it wasn't properly secured on two of the four sides of the kiosk. The panels were all uneven, there were electrical cords all over the floor, and now...

...and now, I always like to start my morning shifts by opening a cupboard door to retrieve some extra understock, and then step back with the cupboard door still in my hand. Sometimes doors come off because the hinges pop out of place; those are easy to repair. On the other hand, it's a different problem when the wall bracket the hinges are supposed to be attached to pop right out of the wall as well, leaving happy little metal screws rolling around by your feet.

So yeah, all I could say at the time was "oh, those wacky handimen." Hours later, at the end of my shift, my remarks changed to "oh, those wacky handimen...when I find them I'm going to take this door and shove it up their rassa-frassing handi-bastard butts!" when a second door decided to rip most of itself off the wall. The lower hinge is curently all that's keeping it in place. I spent the last part of my shift eyeing this door as it hung lopsided and swayed optimistically every now and again. I wish I could say this development surprises me. I really wish.

While I'm at it, I wish for a pony. My Little Pony, to be exact. Season 1 is now a DVD box set. My Little Pony remains that one guilty, secret show I used to watch religiously when I was a kid. And firmly denied ever liking it at the time. I'm not sure if I should admit to nostalgia or being chagrined to seeing this box set and thinking to myself, "Cool! I'd like to get that one day!"

In the meantime, I'd also like to talk about Chance, the new neko-butt wandering the apartment. He's really taken to his new surroundings, and as I write this he and Shady have engaged in yet another wrestling match. They're rather adorable to watch, since they'll roll and wrestle and flop all over each other; then pause for a moment, and bat at each other's faces when they want to play again. Chance is certainly making himself a welcomed addition to the family, as it were. I still am advocating for a narcoleptic penguin, but Mel's winning the argument so far. Mostly because we haven't been able to located any narcoleptic penguins on Ebay.

Finally, I'd like to say that I think I'm suffering a mild case of burnout, primarily where writing is concerned. I haven't written much of anything for a month or so, and what I have written I strongly dislike with a near-eternal passion. (But at least I don't hate it!) This has taken me a bit by surprise, since I rarely suffer writer's burnout, and on the two prior occasions it happened, I recognized it right away. The first instance was due to me writing a long and very dark story that took a lot out of me emotionally and psychologically. The second instance was more situational, given how it happened while I was in Brazil for 3 months--and as a result, missing Anime North, something that really agitated me at the time.

This time around I think it's a combination of the two, following in the wake of my parents' separation and finishing the 130-page SM fanfic, "The Paranoia Groove". So where does that leave me? Well, trying to recover my drive for starters. There's some small projects I'm wanting to work on. Plus there's the screenplay, which is different enough from everything else that I might be able to make some progress on it. And if I somehow defy all logic, I might even be able to pull off a new and unexpected Fanboys! seasonal fic by the end of the year. (I have yet to decide if all hell gets to break loose on Christmas or New Year's for the crew.)

So I remain hopeful. Who knows, I might be recovering already, if the ridiculous length of this not-so-little bit of nowhere is any indication. In any case, my carnivorous forest much be enjoying the sudden slack in: "Eat! Eat some heroes, why don't you? You look so skinny!"

What else do I have to say? For the time being I think I've run out of things to say. At the very least this has proven an enjoyable exercise/venture. Now if you'll excuse me, I'm going to listen to Marilyn Manson crooning out the lyrics to Depeche Mode's "Personal Jesus."

Today's Lesson: a little time may heal all wounds, but enough of it'll kill you and render all those small wounds rather moot.


posted by Phillip at 6:11 PM

 

With today's link being: albinoblacksheep.com/flash/bunny.php , featuring a disillusioned animated rabbit lamenting how "everyone else has had more sex than me." (As sung by Bernard Derriman.) I don't know what's more disturbing: how catchy the song is, or how the rabbit looks so cute & dejected that by the end you acually are sorry for him and want him to have more sex.

Now if you'll excuse me, I need to shuffle off and listen to the Planet Smashers' song "Super Orgy Porno Party."

Today's Lesson: it is counterproductive to try and fasten a price tag to your thumb instead of to a pair of mittens.


posted by Phillip at 10:00 AM

 

One of the many tasks we need to do at my job is to take out all the cardboard from our daily shipments, and toss the cardboard into the specialty compactor. Usually we have a ridiculously small amount of boxes from the kiosk, whereas the store itself garners enough for 2-3 separate trips to the compactor. Since it was a rather quiet evening, and there were two of us manning the kiosk, I volunteered to help the beleagured evening-shifters at the store by taking out the recycling for them.

On my first trip out to the cardboard compactor, I discovered on the ground a peculiar, round red object inside a plastic wrapper. "Good heavens!" I thought to myself, "Someone else who was recycling cardboard dropped one of their condoms!" But as it turned out, upon closer inspection I realized it was just a red button.

Oops.

In other news, from what I've been able to glean based on the video clips, President Bush is looking at pushing a special ballistic missile system, which may in turn lead to orbital weapons in space. Is it just me, or is anyone else suddenly thinking of Bubblegum Crisis' orbital satellites and the disturbing tendency they had to wipe out large neighbourhoods by mistake? Though if we go by previous articles found in the World Weekly News--if Dick Cheney is in fact a robot, we could just rename him Largo!

Carnivorous Forest Update: still refusing to eat heroes, despite the heroes now being chocolate-covered.


posted by Phillip at 8:11 PM

 

There's the pitter-patter sound of feet in our apartment, and it's not because we're making a bunch of gerbils run across a piece of corrugated metal. Though if one were to hazard a guess, the gerbils aren't that far off. The curious menagerie in our apartment has increased, and the family (as it were) has grown by one new member. For the longest time, Shady's wanted a playmate--a desire that has been rather unique in that she's terrified of any other dog aside from her littermates, but adores playing with cats to no end.

The original plan was to acquire a kitten, preferrably from an animal shelter or humane society. Mel especially wanted a little bundle of fur to squeak all over and coddle. We were hoping to use some of our $-mas money to buy said kitten, and later on go through the rigours of declawing and neutering/spaying said feline. And then, much to our surprise, Chance unexpectedly dropped into our laps.

Chance's history is filled with a lot of close calls, and even greater luck. He and his littermates were abandoned in a box by the side of the road somewhere outside Oshawa. Luckily, someone noticed the box and rescued the kittens before anything unpleasant happened. The kittens were brought to a local veterinary clinic, and all save for Chance were adopted. One of the employees, not wanting Chance to be left on his own, volunteered to take him in, despite her low-degree asthma. For the last few months, she had been searching (mostly in vain) for owners willing to take Chance in. The few potentials all were dubious at best, and so Chance remained with her for almost 4-5 months.

Earlier in the fall, she joined the veterinary clinic my sister was working at, destined to be my sister's replacement. They spent less than a week working together before my sister had to leave. But when my sister called the clinic about a week ago, to catch up on things and see how everyone was doing, Chance's surrogate owner asked, "Say, you wouldn't know anyone who was wanting a cat, would you?" And my sister, knowing what Mel & I were shopping around for, answered, "Why yes, funny that you should mention it."

Before you could say, "Stop spinning the litterbox, I'm making a mess on the walls", Mel & I had adopted Chance. And he's proven to be an amazing find: he came declawed and neutered, with all of his first-year shots. He was raised with a Jack Russel (a.k.a. "crack on spring legs"), so he was used to dogs and in fact enjoyed playing with them. And his temporary owner was more than happy to give Chance away without receiving any payment; all she wanted was to know he was going to a good home. She even threw into the deal his litter box, food bowls, toys, and all the litter and catfood he still had.

In light of all that he's had to go through--with being abandoned, rejected by anyone who really looked at him, and wanted by people who in all likelihood would have ignored or abused him--the name we gave him is more than appropriate. He's a cat who's been lucky with a lot of second chances, thus ensuring he hasn't had to frivolously spend any of his nine lives.

It's been about 3 days now since Shady and Chance first learned of each other's existence. And while Chance is starting to warm up to Shady, he's a bit stand-offish. Which is understandable, considering that Shady is still so excited about her new roomie that she has to run over and sniff his butt whenever she sees him. Other than that, they are learning to play together, and Chance has taken to his new digs, as well as cuddling up to Mel and myself. (Furry suck that he is.)

Though Chance is not without his eccentricities. For starters, he growls exactly like a dog. It's difficult to tell sometimes whether it's the cat or the dog who's just growled. So now we have a trirumvate of odd pets: there's a cat who sometimes acts like a dog; a dog who I think believes she's a cat; and a fish who admittedly doesn't seem strange, outside of his 4-second memory span. All we need is a narcoleptic penguin and we've got a veritable zoo of natural curiosities. Anyone seen one at the animal shelters?

Today's Lesson: true love is typing out your wife's essay from paper onto the computer while she's still working on it, even when you could be writing something else, and then only realizing after the fact that you could have in fact been writing something else, and in the end not really caring anyways.


posted by Phillip at 4:18 PM

 

Descriptive, cleverly Brit-sounding words and phrases to describe this escape me:

http://www.prattle.net/archives/001659.html

Granted, the weblink there connects only to a report on the page in question. While the original page seems to no more be amongst the lviing or Internet-working (decide for yourself if a sardonic "alas" should be added here), here's just a brief hint of what to expect before you click:

This site is dedicated to spreading the Gospel in the werewolf and furry communities. It is my hope that many trans-species people will accept Jesus as their Savior through this ministry. I will explain the etymology of this website's name. I got the idea from Werewolf Tobias' tradition of calling a werewolf stronghold a House. Well, I'm a dragon, so my ideal stronghold would be a Castle. And since this is MY website where I am MASTER, I call this my Castle.

As I said, words and clever Brit-sounding descriptions escape me. Though I now have this image of a particularly deluded were-otter typing up a storm on an online message board....

Today's Lesson: there is no limit to humanity's eccentricity. (Or stupidity. The words may very well be interchangeable.)


posted by Phillip at 5:49 AM

 

You find the darnedest things inside a giant squid these days: small fish, pieces of an unruly killer whale. And then sometimes you find this.... http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/6510728/


LIMA, Peru - Peruvian police said on Monday they seized nearly 1,540 pounds (700 kg) of cocaine hidden in frozen giant squid bound for Mexico and the United States. The drugs were covered in pepper to divert sniffer dogs and sealed in several layers of plastic and other wrappers. Police had been on the trail since August.< style="font-style: italic;">

Seven people were arrested in the drug seizure. Police said the haul would have a street value of about $17.5 million. Peru is the world’s No. 2 cocaine producer after Colombia, and many of its drugs end up on U.S. streets after being sent via Mexico.


Or if calamari isn't your thing, how about some sandwiches? http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/6511148/

Virgin Mary grilled cheese’ sells for $28,000
MIAMI - A woman who said her 10-year-old grilled cheese sandwich bore the image of the Virgin Mary will be getting a lot more bread after the item sold for $28,000 on eBay. GoldenPalace.com, an online casino, confirmed that it placed the winning bid, and company executives said they were willing to spend “as much as it took” to own the 10-year-old half-sandwich with a bite out of it. “It’s a part of pop culture that’s immediately and widely recognizable,” spokesman Monty Kerr told The Miami Herald. “We knew right away we wanted to have it.”

< style="font-style: italic;">Photos posted on eBay show what can be viewed as a woman’s face emblazoned on the sandwich, a bite taken out of one end. Bidding closed Monday. In a statement, GoldenPalace.com CEO Richard Rowe said he planned to use the sandwich to raise money for charity. Kerr and Steve Baker, CEO of GoldenPalace’s management company, Cyberworld Group, flew to south Florida on Monday to make arrangements for a sandwich handover from its owner, Diana Duyser.

< style="font-style: italic;">“I would like all people to know that I do believe that this is the Virgin Mary Mother of God,” Duyser, a work-from-home jewelry designer, said in the casino’s statement. The online auction site initially pulled the sale, saying it didn’t post joke items. The page was restored after the company was convinced that Duyser would deliver on the bid, said eBay spokesman Hani Durzy.

Duyser said she took a bite after making the sandwich 10 years ago and saw a face staring back at her. She put the sandwich in a clear plastic box with cotton balls and kept it on her night stand. She said the sandwich has never sprouted a spore of mold.

Today's Lesson: nature is a strange and wondrous thing to behold. Though sometimes the things we humans do to nature is even stranger.


posted by Phillip at 8:45 PM

 

The day couldn't have started out more ominous for me. It's not even 10:30am yet, and already I have found myself trapped at a summer camp, been chased by an oven-black lobster roughly the size of a toilet seat, although this was only after I had discovered that the neat $104 dollar bill I'd found was in fact counterfeit. (How was I supposed to know?) And just when I thought things couldn't get any worse, I was subjected to a small horde of Fraggle Rock and Sesame Street characters trying to break this token-generic-Anime-babe out from her cabin (though in their Muppety defense, they were under the influence of mind control at the time), which was really a bad thing since this token-generic-Anime-babe was trying to steal Mel from me.

If this is what it's like to remember your dreams, then suddenly I'm rather pleased to have had great difficulty recalling any prior ones for months on end.

In other news, I need to get my ears cleaned, since last night Mel made a comment to me, and I translated it as, "furniture gay." Which naturally perplexed me to no end, as I'm not used to giving furniture a specific gender, let alone a specific gender orientation.

Oh well.

Today's Lesson: as Freud himself once said regarding dreams, "Sometimes a cigar is just a cigar." $104 dollar bills and maniacal tarantula-sized lobsters don't mean a thing...right? Right?!


posted by Phillip at 7:10 AM

 

Sometimes, what matters more than anything else is not what you know, or even what calibre weapons you are in possession, but it's where you are. Last year, our kiosk was situated near a major intersection with jewellry and telephone stores around us. This year, we're right in the midst of three major clothing stores. The significance of this? All three stores enjoy blasting their music so anyone in the mall promenade can hear it.

So tonight, I was able to close up the kiosk while enjoying Depeche Mode's Personal Jesus, as opposed to visualizing the many psychotic and no doubt painful things I would inflict upon Mariah Carey for her rendition of All I Want For Christmas (Is You). I'd rather reach out and touch faith, thank you very much.

Or, as Kevin would say after watching Buffy season 3: "Reach out and touch Faith." (Amazing how one litlte capitalized letter can turn something philosophical into sex. Then again, most of the best philosophy out there revolves around sex or intimacy in one way, shape or form. Though "I boink, therefore I am" seems more like a line that Havoc, and not Descartes, would say.)

In the meantime, many things have happened in the world.

Mel & I visited Kevin and Donna. There we discovered that I possess the superhuman ability to induce farts from Gabriel whenever he's in my arms. He won't really do it around anyone else, but place him in my arms, and he'll almost instantly let loose with an attack of flatulence. Let someone else pick him up, and the farting ceases. We also discovered that when I play Grand Theft Auto: San Anwhatever, my car is inexplicably attracted to the nearest inanimate object and must crash into it.

Carly and her fiance also stopped over for a weekend visit, and while going through old family photos (as part of a present to our Dad, who will be spending Christmas in Nova Scotia), I must say there's nothing so interesting as to hear one's own sister exclaim, "Good God! Look at me in these pictures! I look like a special needs child!"

And currently it appears that Shady is trying to muscle in on Mel's plate of tater tots, after already having gorfed down a small legion left for her in her food dish. I should probably intervene before Shady tries to point behind Mel, and try to get her to look away. (The tactic's worked for Shady before, I'm chagrined to say...)

Carnivorous Forest update: still refusing to eat the heroes. Have since resorted to attempting to bribe it, and hiding the heroes under a pile of choclate, but the forest seems the be onto my plans.

Today's Lesson: the most unexpected joys can arrive in the unlikeliest of packages, and through the oddest connections.


posted by Phillip at 7:09 PM

 

...and other really wrong ideas I feel the need to share with everyone else. Not for posterity or enlightenment. Not even for those tingly feelgood sensations you get after watching an After-School Special movie. (Or else the tingling sensation was that burrito you ate before the movie.) No, ultimately I just want to scare people.

Or does the concept of a "Pop-Up Book of Venereal Diseases" not scare you? Or if that didn't work, how about this?

Good Idea: for family night, you rent the movie "Puss In Boots."
Bad Idea: for family night, you rent the movie "Pussies N' Boots."

Scared yet? If you're not, you're probably deranged like me, which is probably a good thing. After all, fear is a curious phenomeon. Lovecraft tells us that the most primal of all human emotions is fear, and the greatest of those fears is fear of the unknown. Tiawon Gongloe states that we should fear nothing, but fear itself. And Largo insists that we must PH43R his lack of B33R!

Everyone experiences fear at one point in time (or each day) in their life. I'll admit I was scared today when I discovered that I've now achieved new levels of corporate whoring. We received a new manual taking us through the rigours of some fancy new things the computer can do. One of which was a spiffy upgrade to the personnel files. The instruction manual decided to give a randomly selected name as a demonstration for how to input a new employee into the system. And guess which name was listed in the manual?

No, it wasn't that man, Yang Wen-li. And no, it wasn't Cthulhu either.

Yep, I blinked a few times upon seeing my name in there, first and last: Smith, Phillip. They even had the spelling right too. Now I understand that in signing up with the company, I've become a corporate whore. I'm tainted. And I'm all right with that. I can accept and deal with that. On the other hand, if I'm going to be whored out by the company, I'd like to be notified of it beforehand. Maybe even get a cut of the profits. Otherwise I feel violated somehow. If we ever run short of money, Mel & I already have an agreement where she will pimp me out to Boystown in Toronto. I may not get much of a profit, but at least I'm aware of this beforehand.

Quote of the Day: "[What were my parents like?] They were great. They tasted a lot like chicken"; as spoken by David Boreanez from Angel: Sense & Sensitivity.


posted by Phillip at 5:39 PM

 

Christmas music has begun to play in the mall. There are now 42 days left until the suffering ends.

In other news, I was going through old family photographs last night, and was dismayed to learn that for a time, I looked like one of the Hanson brothers. (On a related note, once again someone randomly commented how I look like Harry Potter. I should try to find a way to milk this somehow.)

Today's Lesson: read the small print on any store sign before you ask questions. It makes you look less like an idiot, and makes me less wanting to strangle you with our kiosk's complimentary Customer Appreciation Scarf.

Man-Eating Forest Update: still balking, and still vegetarian.



posted by Phillip at 3:34 PM

 

I am rather annoyed right at the moment. In the current story I'm trying to write, there is a forest that likes to eat people. Right now my protagonists are in said forest, and for some inexplicable reason the forest is refusing to eat them. I can't say this is all bad; the resulting extended scenes have some added character development I hadn't expected to see in this part. But at the same time I cannot help but wonder at how difficult it is to just have the forest come right out and (try to) devour them.

Why won't it eat them? Aren't they beautiful enough for it? Has the forest already eaten too much this month, and is worried about putting on weight? It feels like I'm having to coax a non-compliant child at the dinner table.

Me (the author): "Come on, try it! Just a spoonful of heroes. You'll see that you like it."

Man-Eating Forest: (shaking its head) "Mmm-mmm."

Me: "What's the matter? We've been planning this meal for months. All you could talk about for a time was eating these people. Just open your mouth a little bit, and try some. It's not bad. Not like that jar of 'creamed ogres' you ate last week."

Man-Eating Forest: "You can't make me."

This could only get worse if the man-eating forest turns out to be bulemic and coughs them back up somewhere. Or else the forest has scanned ahead to the end of the scene, and discovered it actually doesn't like the taste of our heroes (one in particular). It still seems ridiculously peculiar that despite my being the author, the story is currently putting me through the rigours and not the other way around. This really does throw the whole concept of the creative process out the window (though hopefully someone opened the window first before any glass was shattered), since--at least with me--the story is the one that usually tells me what happens next, and not the other way around.

Certainly there are scenes I have sketched out, endings planned and even specific events that must take place at key times in any story. But to have the story, or to be more precise the man-eating forest in it, pull this filibuster tactic, as if thinking this will prevent me from ever having it try to eat the protagonists, feels like any authority I had as an author is being totally undermined.

In other news that may surely one day bruise my rampaging ego, I have been MSTied. I can't honestly complain, since it's a pretty good MST, and besides I deliberately wrote this story as a horrible piece of self-inserted schlock just for the fun of it. And mostly to hurt people's brains: fibi.wishing-blue.net/viewtopic.php?t=103

Man-Eating Forest Status: going vegetarian.


posted by Phillip at 5:41 AM

 

Well, things have happened since the last little bit of nowhere. Kevin & Donna have been moved from Stratford to Brantford. Mel saw the Aurora Borealis for the first time. Stories have been written (or in some cases, partially written) involving cats plotting against goblins, and large wolves debating with unlucky bastards. I also had peculiar dreams involving my laptop being melted by lava in my old family basement, and me riding/steering a city bus down a large hill into large enemy cannon towers. (No, even I'm not sure what the hell any of that means...though I imagine Freud would still blame my mother for it.)

In the meantime, I've been collecting thoughts and a various number of articles all revolving around villains and the evil things they do. Or in some cases, the evil they have or had allegedly/debatably done. With my brain currently on the "blue screen of death" mode, I hope to make my own remarks in a later bit of nowhere, but for now, sit back and ruminate on notable villains recent and not so.

We begin with villains who appear to be misunderstood, though if the fact that it took the Catholic Church a few hundred years to admit they were wrong and Galileo was right is any indication, I somehow doubt the Protestant Churches will be agreeing with the government's decision anytime soon.

'Witches' pardoned after 400 years
From correspondents in London
October 30, 2004

A SCOTTISH town is to mark Halloween by granting official legal pardons to 81 supposed witches executed during a frenzy of religious fervour about 400 years ago. Descendants of some of the women put to death in Prestonpans, just east of Edinburgh, will attend a ceremony to mark the witch hunts in the town during the late 16th and 17th centuries.

More than 3500 Scots were executed amid a resurgence in Catholic feeling during the Reformation period that reached a peak under King James VI, later crowned King James I of England. Many were condemned on evidence such as owning a black cat or cursing a neighbour who subsequently fell ill. Among those executed was one woman who confessed under torture to leading a coven responsible for a storm intended to sink the king's ship as he returned from Denmark with his fiancee.

The 81 pardons were obtained in the Prestoungrange Baronial Court, an ancient body which will be abolished next month under a law removing the last vestiges of feudal authority in Scotland. At this weekend's ceremony, the pardons will be publicly declared, and a wreath laid at a specially commissioned plaque.

Local historian Roy Pugh, who presented evidence about the witches' cases to the court, said it would be a "simple and solemn" ceremony. "It will recognise the crimes that were perpetrated against these people," he said. "It's too late to apologise, but it's a sort of symbolic recognition that these people were put to death by hysterical ignorance and paranoia."

A spokeswoman for the court, Adele Conn, said the pardons would be for convictions under the Witchcraft Act 1735. "There were some concerns that we've got the ceremony on Halloween, but we couldn't have a witches remembrance in the middle of March," she said. "It has a serious purpose; we're respecting these unfortunate individuals."


Next up on the roster, we have...not surprisingly, especially in the wake of all the election fruh-frah:

Bush Would Be Perfect Kids' Villain - Author Pullman
05/11/2004 12:33:01 PM

LONDON (Reuters) - For children's fantasy writer Philip Pullman, George W. Bush would make a perfect villain in his epic sagas of good and evil. "He would fit right in," said the British author of the trilogy "His Dark Materials" which now looks set to follow in the cinematic footsteps of Harry Potter and The Lord of The Rings as the next blockbuster franchise. "Bush has this baying certainty and has imposed this fervent zealotry," said Pullman whose books have been condemned by church groups for attacking organized religion.

"The Christian right in America is the mirror image of the Islamic fundamentalists," he added.


And finally, a question of which happens to be the lesser of two evils:

Victims' families angered by new Bernardo movie
CTV.ca News Staff

A Hollywood movie about notorious killers Karla Homolka and Paul Bernardo is sparking outrage, despite the producer's assurances it won't be exploitive. Billed as "the incredible true story of Canada's most lethal couple," the movie Deadly has already been shot for the relatively low budget of less than $5 million US.

But Tim Danson, the lawyer who represented the families of victims Kristen French and Leslie Mahaffy, says there's no need for such a film. "The public has what they want. They don't need anymore," Danson told CTV News. "There is nothing served at this point in time for a graphic, detailed re-presentation in Hollywood format of my clients' violation."

The film's Los Angeles-based producer, however, says the story of a couple without conscience is one that needs to be told. "This story has a particularly compelling quality to it -- two people who were, to all intents and purposes, a happy, beautiful young couple who were able to descend into such a dark place," Quantum Entertainment's Michael Sellers told CTV, explaining that people need to understand how that can happen.

And besides, Sellers says, he's taken several steps to protect the victims and their relatives. "The victims' family's situation is something that weighs heavily on all our minds. We changed all the names and we didn't have them physically resemble the victims. The actresses are over 18. We tried to show as much sensitivity as we could."

In addition, he says Deadly, which is now being edited, won't make it to Canada. "We have no distributor in Canada, and honestly we have mixed feelings," he said. "I specifically reserved the right not to distribute in Canada. That's where it stands right now. There's still a lot of steps ahead of us."

Actress Laura Prepon, who also plays Donna on That 70s Show, will take on the role of Homolka. Misha Collins of 24 plays Bernardo. Quantum will release the film early next year, just months before Homolka is due to be released from a maximum-security prison in Quebec.

Bernardo was declared a dangerous offender after he was convicted in the sex slayings of French and Mahaffy in 1995. He's serving a life sentence with no chance of parole. There was a public outcry when Homolka struck a plea bargain with the authorities, cutting her sentence down to 12 years on two counts of manslaughter. Two years ago, Danson succeeded in halting a Canadian company's plans to film their own version of the case.

Today's Lesson: the longer the dry-spell duration, the harder it becomes to pick anything back up and resume as if nothing had ever stopped...especially when it comes to writing little bits of nowhere.


posted by Phillip at 8:21 PM

 

It's legendary. It's infamous. It's one of those fabled artefacts that stirs the imagination and ignites...er, tingling in the loins? Yes indeed, this little bit of nowhere is all about the Hello Kitty vibrator. The article itself can be found here, for posterity sake of course:

http://www.asiansexgazette.com/asg/japan/japan02news06.htm

The history of the Hello Kitty vibrator

By Peter Payne
October 4, 2004

Sanrio is one of the top character licensors in the world, having more or less created the business model of doing business by creating something that doesn't really exist and licensing its use to other companies. Sanrio produces nothing -- all their characters, like the Little Twin Star, Minna no Ta-bo, Bad Batz-Maru, exist as legal entities and nothing more. Their most successful character, Hello Kitty, or Kitty-chan as she's known in Japan, is now now thirty years old.

One of the many companies that license Sanrio's characters for their products was a Japanese company called Genyo Co. Ltd. Genyo made a wide variety of products, from bento boxes to children's toys to chopsticks, many with the Hello Kitty character on them. They scored big in the late 1990's with an off-the-wall hit, a series of Hello Kitty toys which featured a different Kitty figure from each of Japan's 47 prefectures, each representing something the prefecture was famous for. (The figure from Gunma Prefecture, where we live, represented a wooden kokeshi doll.)

In 1997, Genyo designed a product that would live in infamy: the Hello Kitty vibrating shoulder massager, which really is a shoulder massager (trust us -- it says so on the package). Sanrio approved this design without batting an eye, and the product enjoyed modest sales in toy shops and in family restaurants like Denny's and Coco's. It wasn't until 1999 or so that people began to catch on to the fact that the Hello Kitty massager had other potential uses, and with amazing speed, they started popping up in adult videos in Japan. The next thing anyone knew, they had changed into a cult adult item, sold in vending machines in love hotels -- after all, what self-respecting man wouldn't buy his girl a Hello Kitty vibrator when she asked him for one?

The emergence of the Hello Kitty vibrator as a cult adult item caused friction between Sanrio and Genyo, and Sanrio ordered the company to stop making the units. Genyo refused, since it had paid a lot of money to license Kitty for their products. There seemed nothing Sanrio could do, since they had approved the item for sale (see the official Sanrio sticker on the boxes). The answer came when the Japanese tax authorities raided Genyo on suspicion of tax evasion. It seems that some creative accounting was going on between the president of the company, a Mr. Nakamura, his vice president, and the owner of the factory in China where the units were made. All three were arrested, and Sanrio had the excuse needed to yank Genyo's license. They seized the molds used to make the vibrators and destroyed them.

And so, the sad, weird chapter of the Hello Kitty vibrator is at an end. The last of the Kitty vibes are gone, so now what will the world do for wacky comic -- and sexual -- relief?

More information: http://www.jlist.com

Quote of the Day: "It's interesting to observe how the whole concept of harassment has changed over the years. You know, in my day, 'harass' was two words."

(Followed immediately by me remarking, "You know, it's amazing your wife hasn't killed you yet.")


posted by Phillip at 8:56 PM

 

Welcome to Bush Country? seemed like a pretty good title. It was witty and semi-ironic, and I thought that it was necessary given how grave everyone else seems to be in light of the election and its outcome. Of course, now that I posted that little bit of nowhere, suddenly inspiration has to give me this the next day:

And the Lord spake unto Moses, "Go into Washington and tell the President these words from the I Am: Let my Democrates go."

Though I don't think we'll be able to get Charleton Heston to lead them out. But it would be interesting to have him exclaim how they can have his part-the-Niagra-staff when they pry it from his cold, dead hands.

Speaking of the book of Exodus... http://www.worldnetdaily.com/news/article.asp?ARTICLE_ID=33168

Today's Lesson: inspiration is a fickle thing, and unfortunately it is the hand that feeds an author, so biting it tends to be counter-productive.


posted by Phillip at 7:17 PM

 

So George W. Bush wins the election after John Kerry concedes. Does that mean technically Bush won by default? To quote Homer Simpson: "The two sweetest words in the English language! De-fault!" For that matter, since he technically didn't win the last time around either, is it possible for him to find or acquire a loophole that lets him run for President another 2 times?

Hey, it worked for Richard Nixon's head. You never know!

In the meantime, the States are now proclaiming: "Welcome to Bush Country!" And obvious, as this CNN article tells us, everyone is pushing and shoving each other to get in!

OTTAWA, Canada (Reuters) -- Disgruntled Democrats seeking a safe Canadian haven after U.S. President George W. Bush won Tuesday's election should not pack their bags just yet.

Canadian officials made clear on Wednesday that any U.S. citizens so fed up with Bush that they want to make a fresh start up north would have to stand in line like any other would-be immigrants -- a wait that can take up to a year.

"Let me tell you -- if they're hard-working honest people, there's a process, and let them apply," Immigration Minister Judy Sgro told Reuters.

Asked whether American applicants would get special treatment, she replied: "No, they'll join the crowd like all the other people who want to come to Canada."

There are anywhere from 600,000 to a million Americans living in Canada, which leans more to the left than the United States and has traditionally favored the Democrats over the Republicans.

But statistics show a gradual decline in U.S. citizens coming to work and live in Canada, which has an ailing health care system and relatively high levels of personal taxation.

Government officials, real estate brokers and Democrat activists said that while some Americans might talk about moving to Canada rather than living with a new Bush administration, they did not expect a mass influx.

"It's one thing to say 'I'm leaving for Canada' and quite another to actually find a job here and wonder about where you're going to live and where the children are going to go to school," said one official.

Roger King of the Toronto-based Democrats Abroad group said he had heard nothing about a possible exodus of party members.

"I imagine most committed Democrats will want to stay in the United States and continue being politically active there," he said.

Americans seeking to immigrate can apply to become permanent citizens of Canada, a process that often takes a year. Becoming a full citizen takes a further three years.

The other main way to move north on a long-term basis is to find a job, which in all cases requires a work permit. This takes from four to six months to come through.

Statistics show the number of U.S. workers entering Canada dropped to 15,789 in 2002 from 21,627 in 2000. In 1981 some 10,030 Americans gained permanent residency, compared to 5,541 in 2003.

Asked if there had been signs of increased U.S. interest, Sgro said: "Not yet, but we'll see tomorrow."

The Canadian foreign ministry said there had been no increase in hits on the Washington embassy's immigration Web site, while housing brokers doubted they would see a surge in U.S. business.

"Canada's always open and welcoming to Americans who want to relocate here, but we don't think it would be a trend or movement," said Gino Romanese of Royal Lepage Residential Real Estate Services.

Those wishing to move to Canada could always take a risk and claim refugee status -- the path chosen earlier this year by two U.S. deserters who opposed the Iraq war.

"Anybody who enters Canada who claims refugee status will be provided with a work permit...it doesn't matter what country they're from," said an immigration ministry spokeswoman.

Refugee cases are handled by special boards, which can take months to decide whether to admit applicants. The rulings can be appealed and opposition politicians complain some people ordered deported have been in Canada for 10 years or more.

Today's Ironic Question: now that Kerry has conceded and given Bush the victory in the election, what might the first words out of Kerry's mouth be should he discover that, amazingly, he actually won the election? And would they have to be censored?


posted by Phillip at 6:57 PM

 

The location of our kiosk being in a mall, we see all sorts of kids and teenagers every day. Sometimes we see more of them than we'd like, courtesy of those half-days for high school. But then again, there are occasions where their presence makes life a little more interesting on days when I'm almost discovering that it is in fact possible to die from boredom.

A day or two ago, a 13 year-old boy was walking by our kiosk, his close group of friends with him, when suddenly he spotted one of our suede hats. With all the excitement of a rabbit discovering how delicious the taste of human flesh is for the first time (thanks again, Baboo, you carnivorous little bugger!), the 13 year-old had to stop and try the hat on. He then turned around to his friends and showed off how he looked with the hat, all the while exclaiming how cool it was.

I had not the heart to tell him it was a ladies hat he had on.

In other news, just when I think the people at our Head Office responsible for buying new styles of luggage couldn't be on any more crack, what to my disbelieving eyes should appear? Is it a tie-dye shirt? Is it a lava lamp? Is it a paisley shirt that's become radioactive? No, it's the latest piece of luggage, direct from the makers of "I Can't Believe It's Not Pastel-Coloured!"

If you can picture a carry-on suitcase that looks like all three of these aforementioned things horribly spliced together, and then electrified to a brighteness of ridiculously-neon proportions, then you will no doubt nod your heads and agree with me that those wacky buyers at Head Office have found a new kind of crack to enjoy at the water cooler.

There are times where I wonder if having a fashion sense means you've lost any sense of taste. Or decency...

Today's Paranoia Propaganda: if zombie movies have taught us one thing, it's that no good comes of resurrecting dead things. When will people learn that bringing back the 70's may spell disaster for us all?


posted by Phillip at 5:55 PM

 

November is National Novel Writing Month, where aspiring writers try to crank out 50,000 words over the course of the month. With all of my current attempts to siphon my ongoing writing projects down to a meager one or two, combined with the usual frenetic activity that comes with pretending like I know how to run a retail kiosk, I sadly doubt I'll be participating. But that doesn't mean I can't recommend this project to anyone else reading this little bit of nowhere.

If you like to write, or want a challenge for the artistic side of your brain, check out the Link of the Day: http://www.nanowrimo.org/

But if I learn you've been using this as an excuse to write that epic Cthulhu/Harry Potter/Indiana Jones crossover (complete with lurid sex scenes involving a Deep One, Snape and a bunch of Nazis), I'm afraid I'm going to have to bludgeon you with a rabid weasel.


posted by Phillip at 9:05 PM

 

November is National Novel Writing Month, where aspiring writers try to crank out 50,000 words over the course of the month. With all of my current attempts to siphon my ongoing writing projects down to a meager one or two, combined with the usual frenetic activity that comes with pretending like I know how to run a retail kiosk, I sadly doubt I'll be participating. But that doesn't mean I can't recommend this project to anyone else reading this little bit of nowhere.

If you like to write, or want a challenge for the artistic side of your brain, check out the Link of the Day: http://www.nanowrimo.org/

But if I learn you've been using this as an excuse to write that epic Cthulhu/Harry Potter/Indiana Jones crossover (complete with lurid sex scenes involving a Deep One, Snape and a bunch of Nazis), I'm afraid I'm going to have to bludgeon you with a rabid weasel.


posted by Phillip at 8:37 PM

 

As few days ago, I watched a most amusing commercial for some kind of large super-sized truck complete with all the fancy schmancy extra features: fold-back rear seats, cup holders, A/C, and those small TV you can watch porn on while you're driving. Now what happened in this commercial was that in the faraway distance, a volcano erupted. Seconds later, debris starts raining down in the foreground. Amidst that debris sudden drops said truck, which is now covered in ash. After giving the ol' shocks a good what-for, the truck casually starts up and drives off, leaving the happy volcano behind to fire hot molten lava all over the local towns.

Now I know what you're thinking: if the term "putting on the Ritz" was interpreted literally, does that mean for a night on the town, some guys take Ritz crackers and wear them like a tuxedo? For that matter, would those Cheese Ritz-Bits be the best kind, since the cheese filling will make for a good adhesive to the skin? And once they've covered themselves in the Ritz, would problems arise once they went outside and the pigeons came after them?

The world may never know.

If you're not thinking that, then you're probably asking, "What's so amusing about that commercial thing?" Well, the commercial unto itself didn't amuse me. But the disclaimer appearing in it did; you need the volcanic context first. I cannot help but wonder just what kind of idiot it took for them to insert Warning: dropping trucks is safe only in commercials.

Are they fearful that after seeing this commercial, some soon-to-be Darwin Award nominee would sit up and say, "Hey! That looked so cool! Let's take Grandpa's truck, drive it into an active volcano and see how far it spits us out when it finally erupts! And on the way, we'll smear ourselves with Ritz-bits!"

Are we doomed to soon see a new disclaimer being added into "The Wizard of Oz" movie that reads Warning: dropping houses on witches is safe only in movies? And if this continues, we might yet see a disclaimer being plastered all over the Lupin III series telling us Warning: not obeying the laws of physics is safe only in Anime. It might reach newfound heights as they scream at us on CDs Warning: letting the piano drink is safe only in Tom Waits songs! And what about the Swedish chainsaws that already have the label Warning: do not attempt to stop chainsaw with hand or genitals?

In the end, I don't think it's the disclaimers themselves that worry me. It's the idiots who inspire them.

Today's Warning: ranting about silly, nonsensical things is safe only in blogs.


posted by Phillip at 6:50 AM

 

Baby Gabriel now has eyebrows. Or at least the beginning of eyebrows, which is an improvement on his inherent and total lack of eyebrows when Mel & I last saw him.

In other news, the new seasonal kiosk in the mall has finally arrived. Instead of us selling debatably kitch/filler presents, we are now presenting onlookers with a wide variey of scarves, mittens and hats that resemble a bunch of skinned Muppets. Well...in all honesty, we only have half a kiosk selling Muppet-skin winterwear. We're still waiting for the rest our merchandise to arrive, so the other half of the kiosk is pleasantly void of anything.

And what, might you ask, would make my pleasure in this new kiosk complete? My answer is simple: the curtain and its track, a jerry can of gasoline, a match, five minutes and an alibi. Now I don't want to gripe. Far be it from me to sound like I'm whining, but I always thought that when they put together these kiosks, they would...you know....actually assemble it correctly. But it appears we have that special "not allowed to play with edged paper" sort of kiosk. In short, there are parts of the track not connected to the kiosk frame, the curtain won't line up with the border of the kiosk, there's a screwhead in the track preventing any part of the curtain from moving past it, and there are gaps in the track large enough for the curtain rollers to actually fall through.

I suppose I should be thankful, though: from the sounds of it, the same guy who put our kiosk together also tried to assemble another one in a different mall. And that kiosk was not only put in crooked, but also put in the completely wrong place.


Today's Lesson: prioritize. Put together a kiosk, and then get drunk. While doing it in the reverse order will make things interesting, it will also make employees homocidal.



posted by Phillip at 9:22 PM

 

For some reason, when I woke up this morning, the entire right side of my ass was uncomfortably sore. While I can attribute it to having endured somewhat cramped sleeping quarters last night (thank you Shady for taking up more of the bed than I'd think possible for a small dog), I am still bemused at how it's only the right side that's suffering. No full ass, no left-and-right. My pain is only half-assed.

As a result, I feel asymmetrical somehow. My ass has become lopsided. Whenever I clench my buttocks (ah, revel in the visuals! Or reel, whatever works for you.), the one side feels as if it's been tenderized the way a punching bag must feel after a boxer's had a go at it for ten minutes. It will probably take a day or two for the right side of my ass to heal.

In the meantime, though, I say to the masses born of the Age of Enlightenment and Reason: why can't science have it's useless avenues like everything else? I want to know about the effects of country music on suicide, and whether the 5-second rule is truly sanitary, and that herrings apparently communicate by farting!

And you can too, now: http://www.improb.com/ig/ig-top.html

Today's Lesson: pigeons will be instinctively attracted to any statue--except for a bronze statue located in Kanazawa, Japan.




posted by Phillip at 8:23 AM

 

A few nights ago, the gaggle of us poor sots spending our working hours trapped in a store filled with heavier-than-thou luggage, recently messed-up (again) winterwear and "oh dear god who thought that shade of regurgitated lima bean green looked good?!" purses, decided to commiserate by going out for a night of bowling. In light of that night, Today's lesson might as well be: 5-pin bowling is harder than it looks. I could be technical and say that the 5-pin bowling balls are overall lighter, and so they gain more of a side-spin when you launch them. Or I could be honest and saw my piffly arms have no real muscle mass on them, and by the second 10-frame game, my poor biceps had all the power of soggy ravioli.

Speaking of playing with balls, courtesy of Pesti-chan, the Word of the Day is: Innuendo! (That, or else "double entendre", deliberate or otherwise.)

http://rainbow.arch.scriptmania.com/rainbow_tv_episode.html

Anyhoo, back to the bowling, it was a truly a time of comraderie. Unless you count the first game, where I decisively beat the pants off of everyone else. And unless you also count the second game, where everyone else decisively beat the pants off me in what became known as the "I don't care who wins, someone just beat the pants off Phil!" game, where I got the worst score of the gaggle. Again, refer two paragraphs up to my soggy ravioli-biceps. (Mel won game 2, incidentally.)

You know, in light of the Rainbow TV link and the word of the day, perhaps I should rephrase the whole "beating their pants off" thing. Naaaaah....

And remember: just like Rainbow TV says, it's fun to bang away all night with your friends, just so long as you don't break their plucking instruments.


posted by Phillip at 7:06 AM

 

Some days you don't have a lot to write about. Some days you're just too tired to write. Some days you're just too tired to even care. And some days, you're not exactly sure whether or not people want to hear about how little baby Gabriel seems to have this uncontrollable urge to fart incessantly whenever he's in my arms. Sure, one time be balanced it out by sneezing all over me, but it's a little disturbing to see him burbling away in either Mel or Donna's arms, and then the second he gets handed to me, he makes a noise that I can only hope is flatulence. And it's constant at that, a nigh-incessant barrage of rude noises I could never get away with making in public. Then again, I'm not small, wrinkly and in need of a diaper changing every few hours.

In other news, provided we're allowed to and my co-workers finance the venture, I'm going to be dressing up at work on Halloween as 70's Elton John, complete with the large shades and extreme suits.

And I think that should I ever start a production company, I'm going to name it OMGWTFBBQ Productions. If anything it would be amusing to be interviewed and have someone ask me what that means...especially if it's for television. Get out the censor, it's time for a bleeping!

Today's Lesson: a hiatus can sometimes be a good thing, so long as you're still energetic about going back to whatever it was you were doing beforehand.


posted by Phillip at 5:38 PM

 

If that's even a word, and if it's not, it'll do. This is the English language after all, and people are getting away with creating new and hybrid words that creep their way into the common vocabulary with each passing day. But yes, to summarize: one more step of Mel's immigration process is done. The processing centre in Buffalo finally sent us a form stating that yes, they received her file and will be going through it sooner or later (alas, the odds favour later). In essence, the last step will really be them telling us that, yes, Mel's immigration has been completed and she gets her landed status. In the meantime, we can check on their website to see how the progress is coming along with her snazzy (see, that's a new word to have infiltrated our vocabulary, even though it sounds like someone trying to describe Prince while sneezing) new file number.

In other news, Shady seems to still be protesting about last night's bath (even though she earned it by rolling in a large dirt pile during her evening walk), and Mel thoroughly trounced me in Monopoly. Again. It wouldn't have been so bad if she didn't always land on Free Parking and get ridiculously large amounts of cash on top of her already large pile of money.

Today's Lesson: wet dogs in the bathtub can move surprisingly faster than you think. (And when they escape they leave a lot of water on the floor to be mopped up.)


posted by Phillip at 7:34 AM

 

It has just come to my attention that next week's episode of CSI: New York will involve nyotaimori. Is this a case of art imitating fanservice imitating life? Perhaps, perhaps not. All I do know is that chances are very good if any girl is shown with her otherwise naked body adorned with elegant displays of sushi, she's probably going to be wearing a lot of sushi...or else there's going to be a lot of strategically-placed ohashi.

Though this does annoy me somewhat; I've been fighting for a year now to have the producers pick up my concepts of CSI: Nerima District or CSI: Crystal Tokyo, but for some reason I've been denied. True genius is never appreciated in it's own time.

Now if you'll excuse me, I have to go preen my ego.

Today's Lesson: nothing can mangle an otherwise perfectly good 8-hour sleep like a Shih-tzu taking up as much of the bed as she can (that being at least half of it).


posted by Phillip at 7:56 AM

 

Last night, I was going back through some random writing notes I've been making and then stashing away like a chipmunk, and I stumbled across some remarks meant for this little bit of nowhere. They actually date back to the time Mel & I recently spent in Connecticut, enjoying a wedding of one of her cousins, and then really enjoying the open bar they had all night during the receiption.

Oddly enough, what struck me the most wasn't the stretched white Hummer limo the wedding party had (or the inherent lack of anything to eat or drink the Hummer limo had), or the not-so-sublte biblical references to how the wife must submit to her husband (presented in a fashion that sounded almost as if suffrage had yet to exist), or even how the incredibly long candles at our table were the only candles to melt and leave large bits of broken wax all over our tablecloth (which unto itself was an impressive feat considering they were supposed to be dripless candles). No, in the end it the was the name of the church that struck me as vastly amusing. As we pulled up to the church a short time before the wedding ceremony was to begin, there was a large sign boldly proclaiming an "Evangelical Free Church".

This suddenly had me wondering just what "Free" meant. Was this church "free", like how a building might be "termite free" or "accident free for 10 days"? Did they finally manage to contract a denominational exterminator and get rid of those pesky Evangelicals skittering around the pews?

Or perhaps Evangelicals are free here, like that toy you find in a Happy Meal. Does this subsequently mean that you get 1 free Evangelical to take home with you after every sermon? For that matter, do you get to choose the Evangelical, or do they get randomly stuffed in bags and handed to you, so you get surprised after you've pulled out of the church parking lot?

Or perhaps this is the church that broke off from its mother church: the "Evangelical Pay Church."

So what is the meaning behind the "free"? The world may never know....


Today's Lesson: it is counter-productive to try and write comfortably while sitting on a broken swivel chair. (First the rice steamer, now this...)




posted by Phillip at 7:48 AM

 

The apartment is suddenly a lot larger and a lot quieter than it had been not so long ago. This past Sunday marked the last day my Dad was not only crashing in the apartment (as he really had no other place to go while he was trying to work things out with my mother), but also the last day he'd be living around here at all. After many attempts that all subsequently failed, he's decided to turn and walk away from it all. He's going to be staying with his brother for a few days, and then they're going to move his stuff out to Nova Scotia, where he'll stay with my grandparents.

I personally can't call what he's doing 'running away.' When you're left with virtually no other options left and nowhere else to go, courtesy of the other party involved, you're not running. In all honesty, I think my mother didn't actually believe he would leave, and thusly she kept jerking him around with the wild hope that they might actually be able to resolve their problems--all so she could keep him on a proverbial short leash and get him to do whatever odd jobs she wanted him to do. Resolutions can't be made when someone isn't listening yo a word being said, or holding the search for a resolution as a high priority on her list.

All in all, I feel strangely relieved that this has happened. I deplore the circumstances that have led to this, and I doubt that all will be forgiven as time goes on. I can only hope for the best for my Dad, wish him the best of luck in Nova Scotia as he tries to create a new life for himself, and keep in contact with him through calls and letters as much as I can. At least now he's not being trapped in a limbo state, no sure if he should stay or go, uncertain if things will work out. The distance will be unpleasant, to say the least, but it's a distance that's needed between the two of them right now. Maybe it'll help dislodge my mother's head out of her ass. I wish I could remain optimistic as I make such a caustic remark as that, but I'm not going to hold my breath.

Life still goes on despite all of this. My Dad's picking up the pieces of his life, with the support of pretty much everyone else he knows, including my sister and I. Mel & I suddenly are alone in our apartment again, and while if he ever needed the crash space my Dad could stay without qualms or concerns, it's good to have the freedom and quiet again.

Today's Lesson: when a loud "bzzzt!" suddenly is heard from your rice steamer, it probably means in all likelihood that your steamer has committed ritual suicide. (As what happened with ours.)


posted by Phillip at 7:27 AM