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Weak VII

12 February 2012

No. 5,795 (cartoon)

You’re looking remarkably cheerful.

I’ll be dead in a month.

13 February 2012

Stupid When I Think About It

I told Colleen that all the conjecture about some damn thing was pretty stupid when you stop to think about it.

“It may be stupid when you stop to think about it,” she replied, “but it’s not stupid when I stop to think about it.”

“That’s what I just said!” I protested.

And then I stopped protesting. Even I know better than to argue with a clever sophist like Colleen.

14 February 2012

Intelligence Trumping Imagination

It’s Saint Valentine’s Day, and Colin’s disconsolate. This artificial holiday, concocted by peddlers of flowers, chocolates, and greeting cards, is ostensibly a celebration of romantic bliss. There’s no romance—blissful or otherwise—in Colin’s life, so he’s more despondent than usual.

Colin’s been looking for the perfect partner for all of his adult life. He’s not going to find her because she doesn’t exist. If he hasn’t figured this out by now, I’m not going to be the one to tell him. Instead, I passed along some advice from H. L. Mencken.

“Love is the triumph of imagination over intelligence.”

I doubt that will alter his perspective on things, but it can’t hurt. Giving advice is usually a waste of time, but since it was time I enjoyed wasting, I suppose it wasn’t wasted after all.

15 February 2012

Gratuitous Photo of the Weak: Pink Flamingo

Captain Jack told me that pink flamingos get their coloring from all the shrimp they eat. We didn’t see any flamingos whilst we were cruising around the coastal waters near Naples (the one in Florida, alas), so I used one of Jimmy Audubon’s flamingos in my photograph instead. I like collaborating with dead people; they never disagree with me.

16 February 2012

Faux Paris

’twas ninety-three years and ninety-three days ago today that the First World War ended. The last survivor of that insane butchery died a few weeks ago, so it’s now bona fide history.

One new—to me, at least—story I recently read involved a fake Paris. The French feared that the Germans might bomb Paris, as Germans are wont to do, so they build a replica of the city just north of the real thing. It featured replica buildings including a facsimile of the Gare du Nord, street lighting (presumably to give the bombers something at which to aim), railways, and even and the Champs-Elysées.

In the end, neither Paris was bombed, and today there’s only one Paris left in France. Ooh la la!

17 February 2012

Thelonious Sphere Monk

Thelonious Monk (10 October 1917—17 February 1982) died thirty years ago today. I know nothing about him except this: his middle name was Sphere. Come to think of it, I suppose his middle name still is Sphere.

18 February 2012

Porcine Passengers

During a stall in boarding my flight to San Francisco, a flight attendant volunteered that she’s been doing her job for twenty-five years. In the old days, they used to have perhaps three seat belt extenders on the plane; now they carry enough for at least ten percent of the passengers.

My, what a picture of a lard landscape she painted!

I wouldn’t need a larger seat belt even if I was in the ninth month of pregnancy; how do people get so grotesquely corpulent?

“And people complain that the seats are getting smaller!” she added.

I was tempted to point out that although the seats themselves may not have changed, the space between them has decreased notably. I resisted that temptation. She was clearly enjoying complaining about her porcine passengers; why spoil her fun?

19 February 2012

Catsup or Ketchup or Catchup Revisited

A decade ago today I asked a simple, stupid question: catsup, ketchup, or catchup? Today, I again asked the Internet for the same rough word count. Here are the 2002/2012 results:

Catsup: ~46,200/385,000 (+833 percent)
Ketchup: ~272,000/43,700,000 (+16,066 percent)
Catchup: ~130,000/89,200,000 (+68,615 percent)

Sanctified corn syrup additive; catchup caught up! Still, my conclusion remains the same: who cares?

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©2012 David Glenn Rinehart