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Weak XXIV

11 June 2010

No. 3,496 (cartoon)

You’ve been drunk since breakfast.

You can’t drink all day unless you start early.

12 June 2010

A One-Armed Story

Isabella and I were recycling stories from our increasingly distant younger days. She told me about a guy she met at a party in the Minnesota woods many Decembers ago. They took a bourbon-fueled fancy to each other, and went back to his place.

When they woke up the next morning, she was somewhat surprised to discover he only had one arm, something she’d not noticed because of the bulky winter clothing (and perhaps the alcohol as well). She explained that she wasn’t completely surprised, because she slept soundly with one arm around her and without the other arm in the way.

Her story ended happily, and with a bad joke. They continued their introduction over breakfast; that’s when she learned he was an accomplished carpenter who’d built his house without help from anyone else.

“How did you do that?” she asked, looking at the empty space his other arm once occupied.

“Single-handedly!” he explained/exclaimed.

13 June 2010

Coworkers Suck?

A few years ago, Ezzat Attiya, the head of the Department of Hadith (teachings of the Prophet Muhammad) at Cairo’s Al-Azhar’s University, suggested that an unmarried woman and man could work together if the man sucked on the woman’s breasts five times. The idea was widely ridiculed, and university bureaucrats expelled Attiya—then quietly reinstated him a couple of years later.

But the idea of a woman’s breast in a man’s mouth is an idea that’s here to stay, even—or perhaps especially—in the grotesquely sexually repressed society of Saudi Arabia. There, a couple of clerics have picked up where Attiya left off.

Sheikh Al Obeikan suggested that a man could establish a maternal relationship with a woman by dining on five meals of her milk, without actually touching her breasts. The consultant to the Saudi Ministry of Justice maintained that would make her a member of the family, and thus protecting her from sexual advances because of the incest taboo.

Breast milk from a glass?! Sheikh Abi Ishaq Al Huwaini maintains such a shortcut wouldn’t work; the milk must be sucked directly from the breasts or it doesn’t count.

I wonder which argument will prevail? And what happens if a woman works in a department with dozens of male colleagues; how will anyone ever get any work done? The learned theologians never discussed how a grown man is going to get five meals from a woman who’s not lactating, and rightly so. Logic and science have no place is such specious debates.

14 June 2010

No Bikes, Please; We’re Green

David Brower died almost a decade ago, and now some well-intentioned dogooders have built a “green,” or environmentally-sound, building in Berkeley, California and slapped his name on it.

I dropped by the David Brower Center this afternoon to prepare for my upcoming junket to Morocco. They had a small parking stall for bicycles that was designed by either an idiot or a bike thief. The walls aren’t tall, and any kid with the right tools could hop inside and be out in less than a minute with any bicycle(s) s/he wanted.

I carried my bike up three flights of stairs, and was rewarded with a frosty reception.

“Sorry, you can’t bring your bike in here,” my contact informed me.

“There’s plenty of room,” I protested.

“It’s a violation of our lease to have bikes in the office,” he explained.

“Green” building. No bikes allowed. Green the color of diarrhea; nice!

I knew Brower, albeit in passing. Over cocktails, I heard him denounce “conservation” groups who build multimillion dollar offices instead of using those funds for environmental campaigns. And now, he has such a structure with his name on it. There’s no safe place for bikes, but at least it has a big, secure parking garage for lots of automobiles.

15 June 2010

Jean Cocteau’s Amazing Day

Bernie criticized my annual celebration of Jean Cocteau’s Amazing Day; he said human stupidity is so all-encompassing that it’s unremarkable. He wouldn’t have said that if he’d heard about Ross Jeffries’ Speed Seduction® Catalog.

Welcome to my online catalog of amazing, girl-getting products! (Who wants to waste time some dating advice tip? Dating and tips about that kind of stuff are for losers who have to buy a woman’s favor. These products show you how to rapidly attract women and get them into bed before you spend one red cent!)

Incredible! Jeffries brought the cliché of the sleazy, repugnant misogynist to life! Anyone can be a mere jerk, but Jeffries has the brilliance and dedication to become the very embodiment of a reprehensible lecher.

“Get the hottest woman completely lusting for you within twenty minutes, without even having to bother with a ‘date!’ ” Jeffries importunes. “Trigger her automatic ‘lust filter’ and use these touches to get her dripping!”

Jeffries’ creepy idiocy is exactly what Cocteau had in mind when ho sagely observed, “Stupidity is always amazing, no matter how used to it you become.”

16 June 2010

Falling Ovations

How does one tell if a sword-swallower is very accomplished? It’s not as obvious as having unperforated innards; that’s more or less the minimal competence standard. No, the unit of currency among sword-swallower cognoscenti is the falling ovation.

Chayne Hultgren reports that, during a recent series of shows in Belgium, typically some seven people a night fainted—gave a falling ovation—watching his performance.

I don’t have what it takes to be a virtuoso sword-swallower. Hultgren, for example, has magnetic implants in his chest to steer any épée(s), rapier(s), et cetera clear of his vital bits. I wonder how much whiskey I’d have to swallow to get a falling ovation? That’s a purely rhetorical question; I have no desire to be a performer.

17 June 2010

Revisiting Honey Renders a Precision Instrument Inoperative

As I was cleaning out my studio before flying to Morocco tomorrow, I decided to jettison the camera that I photographed for my piece, Honey Renders a Precision Instrument Inoperative. Even though it was ruined, I hated to throw it in with the other recycling. And so, I attached a worthless lens to the honey-drenched camera, and put it—along with a FREE CAMERA sign—on a neighbor’s doorstep around 7:30 this morning. I then photographed it, came back to my studio, and looked at the shots.

I thought I could make a better image, so I went outside to photograph it again. During the five minutes I was away, someone took the lens, along with the front plate of the camera as well. I wish I knew who; I’d like to thank him/her/them for removing the front of the camera. I certainly couldn’t figure out how to do it.

I brought the camera back to the studio, since I now have more exposed gears to photograph. When I’m back in Sans Frisco, I shall add more photographs to Honey Renders a Precision Instrument Inoperative, a piece I thought was completed. I’m glad this is a rare circumstance; if I kept reworking and refining my old work I’d never have time for anything new.

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©2010 David Glenn Rinehart