EXCLUSIVE!! INTERVIEW WITH SCHRODINGER’S CAT

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PEOPLE OF EARTH:  Thank you for agreeing to speak with us.

SCHRODINGER’S CAT:  My pleasure Paul.  I’m a big fan of your blog.
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POE:  Thank you. Let’s get right to it: you are  Erwin Schrödinger‘s cat, correct?

CAT:  Yes, I belong to that mother fucker.

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Erwin Schrödinger – total mother fucker.

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POE:  I beg your pardon?

CAT:  You heard me.  A total mother fucker.  Do you know about his famous experiment?

POE:  In broad terms, yes, but not in detail.

CAT:  Well, let me tell you all about it.  That asshole Erwin came up with this experiment to prove something or other dealing with quantum theory.  Are you following me?

POE:  I’m following you.

CAT:  Okay, well, in this experiment, he puts me in a box that contains a deadly poison, the poison is released and supposedly the person looking at the box can’t tell if I am alive or dead.

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POE:  He tried this?

CAT:  Yeah.

POE:  So what happened?

CAT:  What happened is I busted the hell out of that fucking box!  Screw the experiment.

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NEXT – INTERVIEW WITH PAVLOV’S DOG

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A Grim Fairy Tale – THE HANDSOME MONSTER

Hello, children. I am Brother Grim. Would you like to hear a story?

Once upon a time, there was a handsome monster.  But he wasn’t born handsome.

He wasn’t born at all.   He was made.  A brilliant young scientist with a fetish for reanimating dead tissue made the monster from bits and pieces of dead people.

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An early attempt.

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 The young scientist did it in a laboratory he built in an abandoned castle in the middle of nowhere.

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He chose the abandoned castle for four reasons. First, the price was right.  The place where the castle was built was experiencing a deep economic depression.

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Years before, the local real estate market was red hot.  People bought castles and then resold them at a profit, over and over again.

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But when this bubble burst, it drove property values lower and lower until, by the time the young scientist was looking for a place to do his experiments, he could buy a castle for next to nothing and, if it was a “fixer-upper” he could buy it for even less.

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"It only needs a little work."

The second reason the young scientist bought the castle was because it was isolated and provided him with privacy.   The young scientist wanted to keep his experiments secret because, at that time, the reanimation of dead tissue upset stupid people much like stem cell research upsets stupid people today.

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Is also afraid of frozen food (not mentioned in the Bible).

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 The third reason the young scientist wanted to experiment with dead tissue in secret was because he found the creation of life distinctly enthralling, and people with socially unacceptable desires prefer privacy when there is any chance their socially unacceptable desires might manifest.

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The obvious benefits of privacy.

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 The fourth reason the young scientist chose that particular location to perform his viscerally unsettling experiments was because the economic conditions that depressed the local real estate market also impoverished a nearby village.  The young scientist was from a wealthy family, and, as a member of the 1%, he knew that poor people embodied four virtues that would advance his interests – poor people lack curiosity, they keep to themselves, they overlook the eccentricities of the rich, and they die in large numbers.

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Poor people are buried on their sides to save space.

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 So the young scientist built his laboratory high inside a castle in the middle of nowhere near a poor village with a busy graveyard.  He built a man, stitched together from bits and pieces of dead people he “borrowed” from the village graveyard and, in time, his experiments bore strange fruit.

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“It’s alive! Alive!!!” the young scientist shouted, filled with a love that dare not speak its name.

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But, as quickly as the thrill coursed through his body, it vanished just as quickly when the young scientist realized that the man he made was incredibly ugly.

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It was a gross miscalculation. Even worse, the young scientist overestimated poverty’s effect on the local populace. They found out about his monster, but they did not shrug it off due to lethargy or indifference.

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The villagers didn’t look the other way as they would have overlooked the excesses of other wealthy people acting badly, such as flamboyant homosexuals, or those who abuse their domestic servants, or those who use political influence to manipulate economic policy to their further enrichment at the poor’s expense and enhanced demise.

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Reanimating dead bodies scavenged from the local cemetery was just too much to overlook and, in response, the local populace organized into a large mob, armed with torches and pitchforks, bent on killing the young scientist and destroying his unholy monster.

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They killed the young scientist, but the monster got away. He wandered  alone, afraid, and friendless.

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Then one day, deep in the forest, the monster stumbled upon a little cabin where lived an old, kindly plastic surgeon (the cabin was a  vacation home).  The old man took the monster in and offered to inject some collagen into his lips.

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At first, the monster refused.

“Needles, bad,” the Monster said. 

But, in time, he learned to trust the old man, signed some consent forms, and submitted to the procedure.

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The result was nothing less than spectacular.  Rounder, fuller lips transformed the monster from ugly into handsome.

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And, in the twinkling of an eye, the monster’s fortunes changed. 

He found an agent.

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He made a sex tape that was “accidentally” released to the internet.

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He was recruited for a new reality television show The Real Monsters of the Enchanted Forest.

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His sudden fits of anger and violence were especially popular with the audience.

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He was a frequent guest on late night chat shows, with interchanges similar to the following:

LENO

I’m told you don’t like fire.

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MONSTER

Fire, bad!

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LENO

I’m also told that you are being considered to play Joey in a remake of the poplar television show Friends.

MONSTER

Friends, good…

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But some things are just not meant to be.  One day when the monster was on tour promoting his new celebrity fragrance Menacing, he was killed by a mob of blind peasants

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(who lost their sight due to malnutrition and lack of basic health care) – which is a powerful sermon on the fragility of modern celebrity.

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HEADLINE – Japan scientist synthesizes meat from human feces

TOKYO - Mitsuyuki Ikeda, a researcher from the Okayama Laboratory, has developed steaks based on proteins from human excrement. 

“The process is very complex and expensive,” Ikeda explained. “The result is definitely edible. The problem is that it tastes like shit.”

“That tsunami really messed those people up,” said Evan Boylan, a student at Illinois State University, upon learned of the Japanese excrement-to-meat scientific breakthrough.

“That’s worse than f**king Soylent Green,” Boylan added.

SOURCE: http://japanesescientistscreatesmeatoutoffeces-

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HEADLINE – Freeway air pollution linked to brain damage in mice

LOS ANGELES – Exposure to air pollution from cars and trucks on Southern California freeways has been linked to brain damage in mice, including signs associated with memory loss and Alzheimer’s disease, according to a USC study in the journal Environmental Health Perspectives. 

In a statement, senior author Caleb Finch, an expert on the effects of inflammation and holder of USC’s ARCO/William F. Kieschnick Chair in the Neurobiology of Aging, said “This study raises the possibility of long-term brain health consequences for mice that drive, especially mice with long commutes to and from work that expose them to freeway pollution.”

Dr. Finch was quick to point out that, even though his study reveals previously unknown risks to mice that drive, there are more serious problems mice with automobiles must consider.

 

 

 

Source: http://latimesblogs.latimes.com/greenspace/2011/04/freeway-air-pollution-brain-damage-mice.html

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“I WISH IS COULD TALK IN TECHNICOLOR…”

 

I just watched a video of an ordinary 1950′s housewife take LSD.   Here is what she looked like:

Here is the link:

 

http://news.yahoo.com/s/yblog_thelookout/author-discovers-footage-of-50s-housewife-in-lsd-experiment;_ylt=Ap4VOiwZ343Im4WbTM5_Q9.s0NUE;_ylu=X3oDMTVkOGlzZ3VjBGFzc2V0A3libG9nX3RoZWxvb2tvdXQvMjAxMTAxMTgvYXV0aG9yLWRpc2NvdmVycy1mb290YWdlLW9mLTUwcy1ob3VzZXdpZmUtaW4tbHNkLWV4cGVyaW1lbnQEY2NvZGUDbW9zdHBvcHVsYXIEY3BvcwM5BHBvcwM2BHB0A2hvbWVfY29rZQRzZWMDeW5faGVhZGxpbmVfbGlzdARzbGsDZm9vdGFnZW9mNTBz

 

I’m not sure what to say.

HEADLINE – Toxic Waste Bars Have Hazardous Levels Of Lead, Recalled

LOS ANGELES –  Candy bars called “Toxic Waste Chew Bars” have been recalled because a sample lot was found to have high levels of lead – 0.24 parts per million, as opposed to the FDA tolerance of 0.1ppm.

“We clearly labeled those candy bars as Toxic Waste,” said Vinnie Slimp, Vice President of Marketing for Circle City Marketing and Distributors, producers of Toxic Waste Chew Bars.

Vinnie Slimp

“It states quite clearly on the wrapper that the ingredients include three kinds of lead, arsenic, dioxin, chromium 6, spent nuclear fuel and there is also a clear warning that the candy may contain traces of tree or ground nuts,” Slimp said.

“It isn’t our fault when someone ignores these clear warnings and actually eats that stuff,” Slimp concluded.

Circle City Marketing and Distributors  is also recalling  ”Deadly Poison Gum Drops” which they also produce and market.

Both Toxic Waste Chew Bars and Deadly Poison Gum Drops are manufactured in China.

Source: http://www.ecoworld.com/agriculture/toxic-candy-bars-recalled-for-lead-content.html

HEADLINE – FRITO-LAY ISSUES DORITOS WARNING

ST LOUIS – The Frito-Lay corporation is warning the public not to eat the new Doritos variety Extra Spicy Nacho Cheese Extreme.

“Look, I said to stay away from those things,” said Eric Paulson, Frito-Lay Vice President, hurrying out of his office with a box stuffed with personal belongings. “It’s not my fault. I didn’t know this would happen. No one could have known,” Paulson said as he ran off.

In response to Frito-Lay’s warning, the Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA) posted the following advisory on the FEMA website:

“Close and lock or barricade all doors and windows.  Close all blinds and/or window coverings.  Turn off all lights.  Move everyone as far from potential threat areas as possible.  Take cover behind heavy furnishings or structures. Stay down.  Do not open doors unless instructed to do so by FEMA or positively identified public safety personnel.

If possible, shut off building ventilation systems. If it is safe to do so, provide first aid and appropriate care for the injured or ill person.  Whenever possible, if blood, vomit, or other bodily fluids are present, avoid contact with these and use appropriate Personal Protective Equipment (gloves, mask, etc.).  Do not move seriously injured people unless movement is necessary to protect them from immediate, life-threatening danger.  Consider the possibility that injured persons may have been contaminated and take appropriate precautionary measures.”

“We will survive this,” said said Janette Hemply, Acting Frito-Lay Board President from an undisclosed location. “We will rebuild.”

“It’s in the trees!  It’s coming!” yelled an unidentified person behind Hemply.

Source:

http://www.walletpop.com/blog/2010/06/15/fake-doritos-coupon-warning-from-frito-lay/

Can a cat collapse a wave function?

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Of course they can. Absolutely. Anyone who believes otherwise has never known a cat.

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DID I MENTION I DIG SPACE CHICKS?

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Of course I have. Over and over again. Since I came to this place I have freely expressed my appreciation for space chicks.  I have written scholarly critiques of new media, expressing dissatisfaction with this television program or that new film because the program or film didn’t have enough space chicks. Conversely, I have expressed my approval when a program or film featured the proper quantity of quality Space Chicks.

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But what, academically speaking, is a Space Chick?  Is it merely a woman in space?

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The first woman in space.

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Clearly not. The media has depicted many women in space, not all of whom can be properly classified as Space Chicks.  And, where life has imitated art, only one female astronaut can be properly considered a Space Chick.

Allow me to elaborate, elucidate, pontificate and fabricate (but just a little):

As I’ve discussed earlier in this blog, pulp magazines acted as the vehicle through which science fiction entered popular culture.  These pulp magazines – published from the 1920’s through the 1950’s – embodied the motto “sex sells” and so habitually featured women on their covers.  For example:

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1919

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1929

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1933

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1936

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1942

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1949

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1950

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With this marketing heritage it was only natural that pulp science fiction magazines would feature, as often as possible, images of women, often scantily clad.

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A Space Chick who apparently likes lollipops.

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These were the original Space Chicks – objects of amorphous adolescent male fantasy.  And, as objects of early 20th Century amorphous adolescent male fantasy, these space chicks often needed rescuing from monsters.

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Film, and eventually television, adopted the pulp magazine formula and expanded upon it. In the same way that producers began insisting that any science fiction project include aliens, they also insisted that Space Chicks be part of whatever awful film or television show they were going to finance.

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But something happened that differentiated Space Chicks from their non science fiction counterparts. Space chicks were often depicted doing more than simply needing rescue and being more than merely sexy.  The Women of Tomorrow were shown to be, not just desirable, but also fast, strong, smart, capable and brave as any man.

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Cinema and television imitated the pulp formula and began depicting Space Chicks that were not just sex objects, but also intelligent, confident and professionally accomplished -little realizing that they were part of a social and political revolution.

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When humans actually began poking a tentative finger into outer space, life imitated art.  The Russians were the first to put a woman into space.  Long before they did, they tried to let their people, and the world, know what to expect.

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Make no mistake: this is a Space Chick.  We can’t see the rest of her, and her space suit is undoubtedly too bulky to determine the attractiveness of her physical charms, but her mascara, eye shadow, false eyelashes and lipstick tells us that she is ready for action.

Reality did not meet this expectation.  The actual first woman in space looked like this.

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There is a rumor that persists to this day that she was really a man in a wig.

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In any event, she was no space chick.  The United States did better, but none of the women NASA put into space can be characterized as Space Chicks. Even zero gravity – which one would think, like beer, would make women more attractive – tends to make things worse.

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Lesbians seem to adore this photo. I have no idea why.

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There is one exception – Mae Jemison:

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She is more than pretty.  She is a medical doctor. She is strong, smart, capable and brave enough to ride in the space shuttle – a crapshoot against disaster every time its engines ignite. But even more important for the purposes of this essay, her cuteness survives zero gravity. Click on the following link to see what I am talking about.

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Mae Jemison

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That isn’t just a picture. It is a pose. But that isn’t what makes Dr. Jemison a Space Chick.  What makes her a bona fide Space Chick is that, after actually going into space, she appeared as a minor characer on Star Trek!!!

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Dr. Mae Jemision is the only women who is a media space chick AND a real world Space Chick!

How cool is that?

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REMEMBERING THE 2000 SAG COMMERCIAL ACTORS STRIKE

If you are anything like me, then every so often – when the winter wind blows clean and fresh from the north – you are overcome by nolstagia for the halcyon days of the 2000 Screen Actors Guild Commercial Actors Strike.

Ah, those halcyon days! – when men selling things on television had to do without actors because actors who acted in television commercials wanted more money for their labor, but the major studios wouldn’t give them more money.  And so they went on strike.

Commercials got made and were broadcast without professional acting, and sometimes the results were simply wonderful.

The Discovery Channel used accounting and technical employees to act in a series of commercials that have since become legend, the first of which I feature below.

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AHHH!!!   THE ATMOSPHERE!!!!  AAAAHHHHHH!!!!!!

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HALLOWEEN AT MY PLACE

Culturally speaking, the United States has contributed two things to the world – popular barbecue and Halloween.

Why not both at the same time?

By “popular” I mean widespread.  No people on earth have popularized cooking outdoors over live fire the way we Americans have. For a more serious discussion, please click here. l

Considered good eating in Perth.

By “Halloween” I mean an unabashed annual celebration of the spooky.

Other cultures celebrate death.  They do it in China. They do it in Mexico.  But those celebrations are essentially spiritual and/or religious.  But not Halloween.  Halloween has nothing to do with the spiritual. It has nothing to do with religion.  It has everything to do with fun.

Every year on October 31st – when the wall between the worlds is thinnest and most easily crossed – kids and adults dress up in costumes and, when it gets dark, they go door to door essentially begging for candy – which they receive in large, monstrous handfuls.

This completely non religious festival is becoming part of the international scene.  American style Halloween is now celebrated all over the world.

Halloween in Costa Rica

Halloween in Singapore

My favorite expression of this spread is Sandra’s haunted balcony in Hamburg, Germany.

It makes sense that the Germans in particular would embrace Halloween.

Admirable Teutonic exuberance.

But I digress.  I am here to tell you – to show you – what Halloween is like here in Northern California in the small town where I live.

For me Halloween began with a knock on my door early in the morning.  My neighbor and his son came by to ask is they could install a portal into a dimension of evil in my front yard.  My lawn was destroyed when my home was remodeled, so I figured, heck, when would there be a better time to have a portal into a dimension of evil installed in my front yard?

A hole was dug.

The device was installed.

While my neighbors tinkered with the field densities between the universes, a flock of wild turkeys strolled down my street foraging and decided to spend some time on a roof at the end of the block.

It was a good omen.

I decided to carve a pumpkin, but the pumpkin bin at my local market was somewhat bare with slim pickings left.

Nevertheless, I was able to find a reasonably decent pumpkin and was able to exercise the minimal artistic talent every American is born with and which is useful only for carving faces in pumpkins.

The dirt from the hole that housed the portal into the dimension of evil made a couple of fine impromptu graves.

All we had to do was wait for darkness and some unsuspecting Trick or Treaters.

Actual Trick or Treaters who came to my door.

I went out and bought candy to give away to the little boys and gouls who would come to my door that evening.

In addition to the usual treats, I included in my selection the very finest fake glow in the dark sour worms I could find.

The perfect Halloween treat.

And then it was time to get our collective freak on.

The device in my front yard worked nicely.  I had a switch inside the house that triggered the device whenever someone rang the door bell, causing much shouting and the occasional scream.

It was a most satisfying Halloween.  But I’m beginning to wonder if that portal is going to harm the value of my property.

 

WHY I TEACH (IN FRANCE)

As many of you know, I am more than just an attorney.

In addition to being an amateur gas dynamics engineer, cheese fermentation expert and an antique podiatry tool enthusiast, once a year I travel to France to teach negotiations to law and business students at the University of Poitiers.  I am leaving at the end of this week to do it again.

On first impression, it seems like a bad idea.  It takes a few weeks to prepare my lectures.  My classes last two weeks. Together, this means I must put my legal practice on hold for a month or more.  The University of Poitiers pays me a little for my efforts, but it doesn’t make up for the income I lose during that month.

In addition to an income drop, I feel a profound sense of isolation when I am in France.

I don’t speak much French (my students are from all over the world and my classes are taught in English).  Poitiers is off the beaten path for English speaking people, which means that, for the most part, my time in France is very lonely. Sometimes I find myself asking directions to destinations I know just for the interaction.

"Excuse me, Miss, but I cannot locate the train station on my map."

And then there is the weight problem.  Every time I teach in France, I come home weighing 10 pounds more.

French food tastes great and, frankly, when I am there I eat a lot of it.

You have no idea how good it is.

So why do I do it? Why not teach closer to home and avoid loneliness, jet lag, weight gain and income loss?  Well, I tried that but I didn’t like it very much because my American law students were just too darned lazy.

The L1 class I taught at Harvard

Over these years I’ve experimented with many teaching methods.  I’ve discovered that the best way to teach negotiations is through lectures combined with exercises where groups of students practice negotiating.  This method works extremely well to teach negotiations theory and practice.  However, my American students constantly complained about it. They grumbled about the effort the exercises require and repeatedly asked: “why don’t you just give us the answers?”

None of my foreign law or business students ever asked for easy answers. None of them ever complained about the amount of effort it takes to learn how to negotiate effectively.  All of them are in class on time and participate enthusiastically – and they do it in a foreign language: English.  A big reason why I go to France to teach – and am willing to experience sleep deprivation, weigh-gain, income loss and isolation – is because I prefer teaching non-American students.  I wish it weren’t true, but they are just better students.

There is another reason why I travel so far to teach. I believe that the American Empire is in decline. In addition to being an amateur gas dynamics engineer, cheese fermentation expert, antique podiatry tool enthusiast and a teacher, I am also a student of history – and history shows that the great empires of the world declined and atrophied when their governments became so corrupt that they became unable to solve even simple problems.  It happened to Imperial Persia. It happened to Imperial Rome. It happened to Imperial China. It happened to Imperial Brittan.

And it is happening to us.  Lobbyists for special interests are so influential that our local, regional and national elected officials cannot get anything meaningful done.  For example, there is no question that our health care system needs fixing. We spend more for less than even some Third World nations. But there is no chance our health care system will be fixed because there are too many people making money off of the system, and they are using this money – billions and billions of dollars – to pay lobbyists to buy politicians who work hard to keep thing exactly the way they are.

The same is true for any number of important, pressing problems. Name it: if it is important and pressing, nothing will be done about it.  There will be plenty of talk and maybe a law or two will be enacted, but nothing will change and the problem will definitely not be remedied. Our political system is corrupt, the corruption cannot be fixed, and so we have no chance of effectively solving the important problems facing our nation.  Our standard of living is falling. Our international power is slowly slipping away.

However, where we are falling, I believe that Europe [lead by France, Germany and Britain] is rising.  I am included in the faculty of one of the oldest and best universities in Europe.  My students will be decision makers in business, law and government. In my own small way, I am trying to influence these new Masters of the Earth.  When they are voting on treaties and drafting trade agreements that will affect American lives, I want them to remember Professor Boylan and, hopefully, judge Americans more kindly than they would have if not for my example.

I realize this sounds simplistic, even hubristic, probably illusory. But it is why I do it.

And so, once again, I will be tolerating the many indignities of international travel.

I will rent a car in Paris and make the 3 hour drive down the A-10 past Orleans, past Tours to Poitiers. That night I will have dinner (salad, duck, a glass of wine and profiteroles for dessert) at Le Serrurier, my favorite café.

Let the weight gain begin.

HEADLINE – Taliban admit Mehsud dead

Pakistani Taliban admit leader Mehsud dead

By Rhappee Kanasta (Ass. Press) – 4 hours ago

DERA ISMAIL KHAN, Pakistan — After weeks of denials, two Pakistani Taliban commanders admitted Tuesday that the group’s top leader, Baitullah Mehsud, is dead.

“Okay!  He’s dead!  We admit it!  Are you happy now??” Hakimullah Mehsud asked at a press conference called to announce that the Taliban finally admit Baitullah is dead.

“Does that make you happy?” Hakimullah repeated. “He’s dead, okay? Dead. He’s pushing up daisies. He’s joined the Choir Invisible.  Baitullah is no more.  He’s gone. Kaput. Finished.  Blown to bits by a Predator drone missile.”

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Predator drone firing missle.

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“Go ahead, rub it in. Tell us you knew he was dead weeks ago. Go ahead. I won’t stop you. You’ve won. We admit it. He’s dead,” Hakimullah added.

“You people make me sick,” Hakimullah shouted and ran off.

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A DREAM DEFERRED

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My house was recently remodeled, and I am disappointed. To make matters worse, my disappointment is causing me to question my goals and dreams.

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Me, standing in the wreckage of my dreams...

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My disappointment has nothing to do with the work that was done.  The construction company that did the work – North State Residential Development – did a great job.

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Rob - God of Electricity and other stuff

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The work was performed on time and on budget.  North State more or less built me a new home in five months.  No one in my neighborhood believed it was possible.  But these guys worked on weekends, in the dark and even in the rain to get the job done.

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The men responsible for my bitter disappointment.

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But every time I look at my new home I cannot put behind me the hopes I had when I originally decided to remodel my home. You see, I am an evil genius, and that means I have always wanted a secret lair. Allow me to explain.

There are lots of evil geniuses in the world – but they are not all created equal.Sure, there are high profile evil geniuses sitting around in big chairs, stroking persian cats and using their genius to plan and execute diabolical plans to threaten the world with the goal of getting rich.

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My role model - Ernst Stavro Blofeld

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Despite these few “stars” most evil geniuses live very humble lives. We have families. We go to church on Sundays.

Secretly evil.

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But we live secret lives where we dream of threatening humanity with extinction in order to become enormously wealthy.

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I am that kind of evil genius.  My extreme evil and my uncanny genius are well established.  How else do you explain my otherwise unexplainable success?  I’ve spent my life crafting a respectable persona that hides my secret evil identity – Professor Iniquitous.  Over the years I have hatched countless ingenious plans for taking over the world – none of which I have been able to execute.

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There is one primary reason why I haven’t taken over the world yet.  It isn’t the lack of sufficient evil.  If the editors over at Merriam Webster knew about me,  the word “evil” in their dictionary would have my picture next to it.  And I do not lack for genius.  I am always the smartest guy in the room and I know all of the answers to questions asked on television quiz shows.  Nevertheless, I lack the one thing that all successful evil geniuses possess:  membership in the Amalgamation of Evil Geniuses (AEG).

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The AEG is an international labor union that more or less controls all evil genius activity on this planet.  You can’t really be an evil genius without belonging to AEG.  And to join AEG you must have a secret lair – a private place to conduct your evil experiments and hatch your evil plans.

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So when my wife and I talked about remodeling our home, I was very excited about the possibilities of including a secret lair in the project.With a secret lair, I finally had a chance of joining AEG – and after that happened, it was only a matter of time before the world would be mine.

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The contractor at North State loved the idea.I talked to their architect, who drew up the plans and even made a 3D computer simulation of what my secret lair would look like after it was built.I sat there in the architect’s office as he showed me my underground secret lair – my future laboratory, my control room, my nuclear missile silo, my shark tank and the kitchen where my evil minions could microwave hot pocket snacks.It was a dream come true.

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Then I saw the price.  Underground lairs are very, very expensive.  So we began to reduce the project. The shark tank was the first thing to go.  I really didn’t need a shark tank.I could use other means to dispose of the secret agents sent to stop me.

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Then I gave up the missile silo.Nuclear weapons were old fashioned. I could eventually replace the nuclear missile with a much less expensive death ray.

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Even with these sacrifices, the costs associated with a secret lair were just too high to afford. More and more of what I wanted was cut away until eventually I was left with what amounts to a secret closet in the garage.

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Don’t get me wrong:the closet is very secret.  Unless you knew what to look for you wouldn’t really notice it.  But it is still a closet.  I can stand in it, but that’s about it.  I really cannot use it to menace the world.

And that is exactly what AEG told me when I sent them a picture of my secret closet attached to my membership application.They wrote and told me

The AEG New Member Selection Committee has decided to hold onto your application until such time that you improve upon your secret lair to meet or exceed AEG’s secret lair standards as described in the AEG publication “So You Think You Have a Secret Lair…” a copy of which is enclosed for your convenience.

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So I guess my plans for world domination are going to have to wait.  Maybe I should reconsider this whole evil genius thing.In the meantime, I am using my secret closet to store some gardening supplies…

Wait! That gives me an idea – a beautifully evil idea!  I can infect seemingly ordinary gardening supplies to spread bacteria genetically engineered to transform people from home gardeners into an army of zombie slaves!  Mooohahahahah!!

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I am back, baby!

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REVIEW: WITHOUT WARNING by John Birmingham

I just spent the last two days putting off high paying work to read WITHOUT WARNING, the latest novel by John Birmingham.  I’ve never reviewed a book before, so I am compelled to enact what I imagine a book reviewer would say, and this is it:

I experienced John Birmingham’s WITHOUT WARNING in the same manner I would have experienced a full glass of a good California zinfandel: it began strong in character, getting better with each taste and ended with a big finish, making me sad it was gone and leaving me wanting more.

No kidding. It was a really good read. The zinfandel analogy is spot on.  I highly recommend WITHOUT WARNING to the thousands of people who read this blog. Go out and buy it. I promise you won’t be able to put it down, and when you are forced by time and fate to do so, you will be scheming to find time to pick it up and continue.

Okay. I’ve done my book reviewer thing. Now it is time to get back to what I do a little better.

All of the characters – other than Fifi – were memorable. I especially enjoyed seeing the Rhino and a cameo by Murphy.  But the one character I enjoyed most – but didn’t quite get enough of – was Stavros. I LOVED that guy, and I believe he was more pivotal than would appear on first reading.

John Birmingham, where ever you are, please continue to develop this fine, Greek character (whom I suspect also has an Irish ancestry).

The guy on the left has an Irish last name.

As a matter of fact, please consider adding additional Greco-Irish characters, perhaps one that is an attorney with a small liver.  Yeah!  Wouldn’t that be great?  I mean, really, who doesn’t want to read about a character who is half Greek, half Irish – and is an attorney – who gets drunk really, really easily? And, while you’re at it, give him (has to be a guy) Attention Deficit Disorder. And flat feet.  Oh yeah, and he has to be bald.  I mean, that is a must, don’t you think – for verisimilitude and pathos?  Bald middle aged attorneys of Greek/Irish ancestry just reek of pathos. At least I hope that reek is pathos.

I am not a professional writer, but I can tell you that this is a very good idea.

The author of WITHOUT WARNING writing down my idea for possible future reference.

 

And remember: the Wave eats people.

 

A BOYLAN NEW YEAR’S FAMILY TRADITION

I must say I am somewhat shocked and surprised – but not yet astonished – by how many visitors this, my new blog, has seen.  I see many familiar faces from the now legendary JournalSpace diaspora. But I see an unexpected number of new faces, too.

My new friends are asking me some of the same questions my old friends asked me when they first encountered the grandure of my bearing.  That isn’t a another way of saying they were shocked by how overweight I am. That is not what I am saying.  To be honest, I could use to lose a few pounds.  But who couldn’t, especially after the holiday season when we cannot escape from running into food that we really aught not eat?

But I digress.  I have recently been asked “what happened that made you this way?”

I am forced by habit and custom to interpret questions like this to mean “what are the forces in your life that shaped the man you are today?”  I, too, have asked myself this very same question many, many times.  The answer is always the same: my family made me what I am today.

In particular, it is the family traditions handed down from generation to generation that have engendered the – person – that writes these words.  And no time are my family traditions more apparent  than at the start of a new year.

I am not sure how it started or why, but it has become a tradition throughout my family that, on or before New Years Day, we share with each other photos or videos of our pets eating.  You may find this strange, but it is a tradition, okay? And that makes it worth respecting.  Traditions are the bedrock of moral values, and it is moral values that made America great.

My Great  Aunt Hilda has a pet snake.  A really big one.  This is a vid of her snake, Princess Precious, eating a rabbit.

From my family to yours, have a very happy new year.  When all is said and done, we are only that which is reflected in the collective face of our family.

Which is why I’ve taken steps to cut myself off  from mine.  I have a big family. It is going to take time.

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THIS IS A TEST

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I am a refugee from JournalSpace – which has served me well, but, frankly, has proven unreliable.  I am axious to see if this place will serve the same interests.

I must say I am not happy being unable to adjust the size of this font, or change fonts at all.  But, let’s see what else I can do here.

Rotwang in contemplation.

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Okay, not bad.  A good start. How about

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Uncle Henry

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Ah!

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I’M BACK, BABY!!