Go to Breda's Friday Funny for a good giggle.
Ya gotta love Marines.

Went to the Gun Show with Holly and JPG, and to everyone's delight, Bayou Renaissance Man and LawDog were along for the occasion, and they are just as entertaining and erudite in person as they are on the page. I could blather on about the occasion, but I'd never come up with so eloquent a description of the day so I'll just leave it at "Yeah! What he said."

I did get a really nice belt and a holster, so I'm all set. Oh, and there had to be conchos (the belt needed a little extra va-va-voom), so I picked a set of those, so that represents the jewelry-buying portion of the event.

I must say I was not prepared for the odd cross-section of humanity represented therein, and this has to be one of the ultimate people-watching gatherings to be found, and I'll be going to more of these.

Have you seen the new $5.00 bills? Did you ever notice the teeny tiny FIVE DOLLARS printed in each of the teardrop shapes along the border? (click on the detail photo and I think it'll pop up big enough for you to read. Anyway, what surprises me about this new series of bill is that the series number is 2006, and yet here we are well into 2008.

Anyhoo, I think the new fives are really nice, and the extra color gives Abe a little extra oomph, even if it does look like it was washed in a pair of jeans with a shopping list printed in red ink.

I'll probably send this little baby on its way when I go with Holly and JPG to buy my carry belt and holster today.
Good times.

NOTE TO SELF:

Dear Self,

Next time you take a day off your reglur job to make beads on the torch all day, do not crack open a new Terry Pratchett Discworld novel on one of your breaks, mkay?

Love,
Me.


Started Men at Arms today. Have only read a couple of the Watch novels so far because I'm addicted to the Witch novels, and frankly, I've been in squander mode of the woefully short quantity of those, so I've been perhaps too singular in my focus. Must winnow this out longer because only one time can you read a Discworld novel for the first time, but I'm in LURVE with P's writing and running for the barn. Anyway, they all abound with gems, and a mere 5 pages in, I already folded a corner over.

quotable quotes thus far include:

It was said later that he came under bad influences at this stage. But the secret of the history of Edward d'Eath was that he came
under no outside influences at all, unless you count all those dead kings. He just came under the influence of himself.

That's where people get it wrong. Individuals aren't naturally paid-up members of the human race, except biologically. They need to be bounced around by the Brownian motion of society,
which is a mechanism by which human beings constantly remind one another they are...well...human beings.

and

He could think in italics. Such people need watching.
Preferably from a safe distance.

and

If traitors and dishonorable men would not see the truth
then he, Edward d'Eath, was the finger of Destiny.

The problem with Destiny, of course, is that she is often not careful where she puts her finger.

and--
and--
and--

GO MAKE BEADS, PHLEGMMY!

No respect.

More cruelty from the English tabloids served up hot and steaming for Jack Nicholson, but he can sleep soundly knowing his passport data is secure. Headline? I'm so glad you asked. It's Blubbery Jack Nicholson has a whale of a time in St Barts... but still draws the females. A bit cruel. He's no Sean Connery (who is now 81), but he seems to have no problem pulling the chicks, even with the man-tits on display. The pictures are a bit much, but I did sort of giggle. I didn't understand the point of the above photo, 'ceptin it tied in with the whale story. I think he looks more manatee than whale here. It's sort of strange, trying to figure out what position he's in in the water - I mean, where's his head? I think I see a nipple, but he seems curiously arrayed here. Hmm.

_________________________

One great site that has hilarious send-ups of celeb faces superimposed into unfortunate photos is PlanetHiltron.com. That's where I found this delicious photo of Cameron Diaz' nerdy little secret and from the presidential mash-ups comes the other abomination. Be sure and check out their re-imaginings of Angelina Jolie and Ann Coulter. *fun*

They're special. So special.

Apparently lots of folks at the State Department have been fired for snooping the passports of celebs and poligicians. From the article:

Supervisors recorded each instance a file was viewed because the applications in question belonged to members of a select group of several hundred citizens whose passport files were "flagged" for extra protection due to their visibility, the officials said. Among these people are government leaders, movie stars and
athletes, the officials said.The list maintained by Bureau of Consular Affairs has included as many as 500 people at any one time, they said. The list is kept secret partly to deter workers from making unauthorized inquiries into high-profile records. Although there are no formal criteria for inclusion, people on the list are deemed to warrant special consideration because of their
public status, the officials said.

I'm trying to think what information was required lo those many moons ago when I got my passport. I mean, other than my vitals and where/when I've traveled, what really is contained in my passport files? They never axed me what toothpaste I use, or what style of dining room seating I prefer. What, other than the woefully mis-used social security number and other basic details is really contained in those files? Are there different criteria for granting/processing passports for the elite? Do they have to tell whether or not they've had a nose job and anal bleaching? I'm guessing not.

This just illustrates that there's one set of rules for the wealthy/prestigious, and a whole 'nother set that applies to we mere mortals. No matter what, people should maintain their professionalism in their jobs, but to expect people to not notice people of celebrity status in their work is to stretch credulity.

Ooscray that, I say.

It's funny how when celebs want at the front of the line in restaurants in NYC and LA, they are more than delighted to bank on their celebrity, and yet they want to be able to turn off public curiosity at will.

At the nadir of his fame, a former bratpack star had a suitcase lost in travel. My girlfriend was working the phone line and the person (who was Brat-packer's assistant) apparently felt my friend wasn't acting concerned enough and said "he's so-and-so, do you know who he is?!!!" My girlfriend bit her tongue and resisted the urge to say "well, I know who he was."

When I worked for a posh department store (rhymes with steamin'-carcass), the first day of training I was with a seasoned employee when the assistant of a high-profile media person (rhymes with pliant crumble) called in to order a common household item. This was something I guarantee you have your home, and like me, you probably have never paid over a couple or few hundred dollars for one of these items. Well, the assistant was ordering two, to the tune of several thousand dollars each. Um, well, okay. Funny thing was I could fairly feel the smoke rolling out of the assistant's ears when the person training me asked them to spell [crumble]. I maintained my composure, but I admit I've giggled more than once over this through the years.

I say if they want special status, we should regard them as special, but perhaps not in the way they were hoping for. I can think of a few special treatments I'd like to dole out...

Families of shooting victims from Virginia Tech scoff at a settlement offer from the school. Clearly, this offer is meant as a head-em-off-at-the-pass effort to prevent the school from being held accountable in court for the tragic deaths of these students.

Why don't the families sue the lawmakers who prevented their children from protecting themselves?

And I'd love to serve on that jury panel.

Tonight's bead making music:



Call me outdated, but this is still one of my favorite songs.
Such a Shame by Talk Talk

Betty Butterfield gets drunk and accidentally marries a Mormon, and Brigman Young don't want her smoking. How does she get in these prediccermurnts?



Poor Betty.

Recently I met a waitress who once worked at Aw Shucks on Lower Greenville until about 14 years ago. Aw Shucks was owned by a guy named Dirty Bob and his partner Sam.



After Dirty Bob died, Sam sold Aw Shucks and now runs Fish on Fire near Belt Line/Preston.



I asked the waitress why they called him Dirty Bob, and she rolled her eyes and said he was a terrible mess, that you never knew what offensive thing he was going to come up with next.



She said one day two women were at Aw Shucks and one of the women had enormous breasts, and the other was extremely pretty, so Dirty Bob walked up to the table and said "now if we could have your tits to go along with her face, we'd have the perfect woman."



She said she liketa died of embarrassment, and comped the meal for both women.



Dirty, indeed!
***********************

Bringing up the subject of brazen tactlessness gives me the opportunity to say something I've been wanting to own up to here for a long time.

Despite my pretenses of being the brassy sort, I can be waaaay too much of a soft touch. I tend to take everyone at face value until given reason to regard them otherwise. Sometimes, though, I say things which may give the opposite impression-- that I'm a ruthless and withering critic. Every once in a while I think of something I've written in the blog which was intended as an archly self-deprecating remark, but which may have read as a dig at someone other than myself. I really hate to hurt anyone's feelings, and I generally take pains to try to avoid doing so. One of the problems of communicating purely via text is that tone can be very difficult to convey. All of this is by way of saying that if I've said something which offended you, most likely it was not intended to be so. If someone takes umbrage at a careless remark I've made, then I appreciate the opportunity to clarify my thoughts on the subject.

Some things such as my right to defend myself with a firearm or to speak my mind are not things I will ever apologize for, though.
Have a nice day.

The layout of my building is Office/Workout Room/Bathroom, in that order. You'd think that a good 50 feet of remove from the bathroom would *ahem* cushion a person from the fallout of the (presumably) hideous depth-charges which are deployed in that locale. Thanks to over-achievers, that would be a big negatory, good buddy.

My first two years at the company, there was one employee who at least once per week unleashed a fury which inspired blasphemous thoughts. I always knew I was in trouble when he snatched the Dallas Observer(free local weekly paper) from the coffee table by the entry and headed for the back of the building. He invariably unleashed a roiling stench which made it through two substantial doors and one wall. Beastly. If I had to hazard a guess, I'd blame Burger King, because the words "flame" and "broiled" certainly came to mind on such occasions. Fortunately, the personnel in his department removed to another office a couple years ago, but I still recoil in horror at the memory.

I had to call in a technician for repair to a major system on property this week. The answering service spirited me to a voice mail system, and I was thinking it would be a day or two before I heard back from them. Oh well.

15 minutes later, the tech pulled up to my office. I was surprised and relieved the repairs wouldn't be back-shelved for days. Turns out, he was stuck in traffic on Stemmons, and just thought he'd pop on over. Before he got cracking on the repairs, though, he headed for the back of the building, and proceeded to set afoot an implacable stench. I quickly realized that the excuse of coming to my property had been a godsend for this guy, as he obviously must have been near-to-expiring with that dead animal trapped inside him as he languished in the traffic jam.

NOT to be critical, and you know mine smells like roses, but... I suppose gas and poop are like bratty children: everyone else's is way more repugnant than one's own.

Tuesday brought a phenomenal amount of rain. I grabbed my wool wrap from on top of the basket of clean laundry and threw it on the passenger side of my car when I left the house that morning. When I got to work, I noticed that a black bra had hooked itself onto the throw. I unhooked the beast and tossed it on the floorboard, where it looked at home with my black leather gloves, a bag from Panera and amongst a plethora of papers, discarded concert tickets and the other sorts of crap a floorboard will catch. Overcommitted as usual, I promptly forgot about the bra.



Thursday I went to lunch with a couple colleagues, one of whom insisted I drive. I said my car was a rolling garbage can and to simply deal with it. I thought no more of it until I was leaving work that afternoon and saw the black bra on the floorboard, and then I remembered that the man in the front passenger seat was an incredibly formal, strait-laced button-down type who may not have understood. Mortified, I called the considerably wilder friend who'd been in the back seat and left him a voice mail, laughing uproariously about how our very formal friend Jed must have been shocked and baffled by the situation.



My friend called me back and left me this voice mail:

My condolences to Fat Hairy Bastard whose father passed away this week.

The worst, most humiliating baby names.

SRSLY.

When an in-law told me about the name of another in-law's new infant a couple years ago, I couldn't help it: I blurted "future stripper." Did I ever mention that I'm a blurter? I blurt occasionally.

Anyway, in the article linked above, there are links to several categories of horrific names with which people have saddled their unfortunate offspring.

Once I heard of a pair of twins named Cash and Carey. In the 1980s, there were 3 brothers at a Dallas area uni named Sterling, Cash and Bond. Another newborn name I saw once in Dallas was (no lie) Doidriontai. What is wrong with people? I getting giggles when I think about the fact that people have actually named a daughter "Placenta."

Let's have a contest and make up our own interesting names with which to doom future generations. Halitosis, anyone? Corruga Fla'shonday? [don't forget the apostrophe's'ese's] Boncretiatay Chowdown. Toothpick Taneenda.

Anyhoo, here's a list from the above article of deadly sins wot made it into the given names of several sad souls:

Lust Garten
Greed Sister Mancini
Avarice Sullivan
Sloth Washton
Wrath Gordon
Envy Burger
Greed McGrew
Pride Saint
Lust T. Castle

The article does mention that no one named their child "Gluttony," for some reason.

What is so terrible about giving a child an at-least-recognizable name and then allowing the child to distinguish itself with academic merit or other personal achievements? When I see these creative spellings or complete departures from any mapped territories in the realm of sobriquet, then I wonder to what end they aspire for their children, other than to vex the little old ladies who do the data entry in our medical- and correctional facilities record-keeping divisions.