Music by Creedy Coor; lyrics by Alternate Reality Loser, as told to Often On
Epigraph: “Pokemon have become rare. Rarer still are pokemon doing hula hoops.” --Vex Lit, drafting associate
Parents, cheer up. Every style of parenting produces miserable, profoundly unhappy adults, according to the results of a long-awaited longitudinal study conducted jointly by Wesleyan University and the University of Minnesota of more than 1000 families from every part of the United States except North Carolina.
“Local Factory Reopens to Make ‘America’s Crate’ Again”
“In common language usage, ‘fruit’ normally means the fleshy seed-associated structures of a plant that are sweet or sour, and edible in the raw state, such as apples, bananas, grapes, lemons, oranges, and strawberries.
"On the other hand, in botanical usage, ‘fruit’ includes many structures that are not commonly called ‘fruits,’ such as bean pods, corn kernels, tomatoes, and wheat grains. The section of a fungus that produces spores is also called a fruiting body.” (Emphasis added; footnotes omitted.)
So apparently I can open a “fruit stand” selling nothing but bean pods, corn kernels, and wheat grains and not get arrested for false labeling. I’d probably add atonal apples to the inventory, just to be safe. And other stuff, for that wonderful feeling of abbondanza.
Now some headlines:
“Pariah Nations: ‘Welcome back, Quatar’”
“‘Taco Cat’ Spelled Backwards Is ‘Taco Cat’”
“Paul Masson Sentenced to Drink Wine Before Its Time; Appeal Expected”
“Hey, I have an idea! Just for fun, why don’t you put down your one-scoop dessert spoon, come over by this desktop computer, and pledge your undying loyalty to me, law or no law? Wouldn’t that be a hoot? C'mon!”
Available online courses:
Python for Everybody
MySQL for Possessive People
Excel for Underachievers
Jimmie Walker’s Dyn-o-mite Way to Good Times
Psuccessful Pselling for Psychopaths
(Spoken with European accent) “Bye, son!”
Pop quiz! True or false: "The old Yankee Stadium was disassembled, moved to Arizona, and reassembled with only minor modifications not 25 miles from the old London Bridge."
How pronounce “MySQL”? Some say “my ess kyew ell.” Some “my sequel.” Others “my squeal.” Still others "MySquil" (rhymes with NyQuil). I favor “mice quell,” because (a) that’s what I’m told the program does, quell mice, and (b) "mice quell" sorta rhymes with “Excel,” and that helps the struggling poets of coding.
Pop quiz 2: Who are these women? Diana the Fascist, Jessica the Communist, Unity the Hitler-lover, Nancy the Novelist, Deborah the Duchess, and Pamela the unobtrusive poultry connoisseuse.
Frankie Dettori was a popular Italian jockey, the only one ever to have won all 7 races on a 7-race card (1996). It made him happy.
Mini-editorial: “We Need a Cyclist-Friendlier City, Bike Racky!”
“The stove is hot because of Fournier’s Law” is an example of an explanation that’s harder to understand than the thing to be explained. The old Latin name for that was “ignotum per ignotius,” lit. “the unknown by way of the even more unknown.”
If our country didn’t already have a flag, I would agitate for this to be it.
Can’t get enough Latin? Try “omne ignotum pro magnifico est,” lit. “every unknown is [taken] for a big deal.” It means we exaggerate the difficulty or importance of what we don’t know.
For example, if you arrived home too late to bathe and dress for dinner, would you go into dinner in your riding clothes, or would you skip dinner in the dining room and have a servant bring you something in your bedroom?
A wrong choice would dog you for the rest of your lonely life. Society being closed to you, you’d probably end your days studying Latin to ease the pain.
English, too, has its charming sayings, like “Who left the bag of idiots open?”, illustrated in this fine sculptor’s work, known also under the titles “God Give Me Strength,” “I Am Surrounded by Idiots,” and “Think, Man, Think -- Where Did I Leave My Pants”:
I interpret this saying by Charlie Pierce to mean POTUS is rich but clueless: “He was born on third base, but he thinks he’s playing field hockey.”
You can tell something about yourself by whether you consider the description “aspiring elitist” a compliment or an insult.
Relatedly, a recent news item was that at least 10 incoming Harvard freshmen had their admission offers revoked for sharing offensive memes on a private Facebook group. America’s finest news source quoted the reaction of Irene Hamlett, lens defogger: “I hope these students learned that such callous, condescending behavior is completely unbecoming of our country’s wealthy elite.”
Another reaction was: “This is more proof that book smarts don’t always equal meme smarts.” --Brian Choy, clock winder.
And a third: “It’s just as well. Even if they had gotten in, no fraternity would accept someone who joked about sexual assault.” --Mark Hess, seam ripper.
Foreign robots are moonwalking right across our borders and taking jobs from domestically manufactured robots (DMRs). You hear nothing about this because (1) the DMRs have no political consciousness or tribal fealty and (2) the handful of surviving investigative journalists have their hands full with clockround coverage of Tiny Hands and the tiny handful of other matters that matter.
Apophthegmatic analysis: Explain the following saying: “When something starts down the tubes, it usually completes the journey.”
One interpretation: “Don’t hitch your wagon to losing causes.”
Another: “If you love someone or something, keep her, him, or it far from the tubes.”
A third: “‘Going down fighting’ doesn’t mean ‘not going down.’”
Finally: “What is the sound of one maxim being unpacked?”
“Man-in-the-Street” Reactions to “Wonder Woman Makes Box Office Records”:
“As a woman, it’s so gratifying finally to be recognized as a demographic worth targeting.” --Vanessa Powell, aluminum exporter
“This proves that a strong, independent woman can poop out any commercial tripe a man can.” --Jeff DeSicco, tire vulcanizer
“Hollywood can no longer deny that blockbusters make money.” --Ryan Michener, systems analyst
Apopemptic popcorn:
“My shadow is always with me … sometimes ahead, sometimes behind, sometimes to the left or sometimes to the right ... except on cloudy days or at night.” --Wally “Where’s Brando?” Brando
The skywhales are coming.
“Trump” is close in spelling to “Truman.”
If the Pope is the successor of Peter, then Peter wasn’t a Pope.
If a Jew is the child of a Jewish mother, who was the first Jew?
Copyright law defines “copy” to include the original.
I foresee IRS problems: “The Golden Calf Center for Modern Idolators.”
“An atheist is someone with no invisible means of support.”
"In heaven, there is no beer." There’s more, but you can’t handle it.
“Never tip restaurant waiters or waitresses, no matter how much they beg or what sad stories they tell you. They just spend the money on drugs and you’re not helping them. What? That’s panhandlers? Never mind." --Emily the Teller
Hypographic Zen advice for female bankers: “Don’t amortize your man.”
It's hard for me to see how Pamela Mitford can be considered a "chicken connoisseur" in a group that contains her sister, Deborah, Duchess of Devonshire and author of "Counting My Chickens." At the very least, Pamela -- totally without literary output -- should be demoted to "chicken fancier."
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