Last Weak  |  Index  |  Next Weak

Weak XLV

5 November 2022

No. 1,839 (cartoon)

Why are you so brutal and cruel?

You wanted all my love, no?

6 November 2022

In a Confusing State

I wrote to an Acme Customer Disservice Representative asking how I could get a warranty repair on my thingamajig while I was traveling here in New Mexico. The dimwit who replied told me that was impossible, and that I’d have to wait until I returned to the United States to get it fixed.

I wonder if “Is New Mexico part of the United States?” is a question on the citizenship test. I’m guessing that it’s not.

I shouldn’t be so snarky just this once. I, along with most other Americans born here, would probably fail the same citizenship test that all of the immigrants who do most of the hard work in this country had to pass.

7 November 2022

Toads Need Love Too

Most parks more or less shut down during the winter, leaving full-time National Park Service employees twiddling their thumbs and fiddling with their bits trying to figure out how to keep busy. I’m guessing they just issued a warning not to lick toads because they didn’t have anything else to put on their timecards.

“As we say with most things you come across in a national park, whether it be a banana slug, unfamiliar mushroom, or a large toad with glowing eyes in the dead of night, please refrain from licking,” they advised.

Now hold it just a toad-lickin’ minute here: “As we say with most things?!” Since they made a point of saying that wasn’t universal advice, what kind of things should you not refrain from licking? I’ve hiked in national parks for at least a thousand kilometers; did I miss out on something lickable?

The toads secrete a toxin that can generate magnificent hallucinogenic effects that may also result in seizures, nausea, or, on a really bad day, death. The Park Service notice didn’t mention the juicy good parts, or the caveat that all intimate relationships involve some risks.

What I found most objectionable about the advisory was its anthropocentric blindness. What about the toads? Toads need love too.

8 November 2022

A Cautionary Digital Watch Tale

There’s a tiny, vestigial pocket in my jeans inside a larger pocket that’s about a hundred years old, give or take half a century. (I’m talking about the design, not this particular pair of pants, despite their ratty-tatty appearance.)

A century ago I would have put my pocket watch in it, but is there such a thing in these digital times? I asked the Internet if I could buy a new digital pocket watch, and was informed that there ain’t so such thing.

I mention this as a cautionary example that in some cases even trustworthy Internet sites can’t be trusted. I have a digital pocket watch, and so do about a billion other people, give or take a hundred million.

Reach in your pocket and pull out your phony pocket computer. The first digits you’ll notice are the clock numbers. If that’s not a digital pocket watch, then I’m a Big Bad Brutal Baghdad Bully Boy Bamboozler.

9 November 2022

A Special Ignoramus

I was surprised when Alison told me that she was going to work the poles yesterday. I don’t find pole dancing at all interesting let alone erotic, so I told her that I’d heard it’s great exercise and wished her well.

“If you’re not on drugs, ” she replied, “then perhaps you should be.”

It was all a misunderstanding as it usually is. Yesterday was election day, and she was working at the polling station. Her work as a poll worker had nothing to do with pole dancing.

I protested that it’s a mistake any idiot could make, but she disagreed: she said that only a special ignoramus like me would get confused.

I blushed and smiled: that was the first time she ever said that I was special!

10 November 2022

Kentucky Fried Pogrom

A couple of weeks ago I wrote that it wouldn’t be too long before I saw something incredibly stupid about Kentucky. When I didn’t envision was that it would be the Kentucky Fried Chicken Corporation in Germany.

On 9 November 1938 Nazi mobs attacked Jewish businesses and synagogs on what became known as the Night of Broken Glass, or Kristallnacht. One of the preludes to the Holocaust should be remembered, and that’s what the dummkopfs in the German tentacle of Kentucky Fried Chicken did when they sent out this cheery advice ...

“Commemoration of Kristallnacht—Treat yourself to more soft cheese and crispy chicken. Now at KFCheese!”

Remember the pogrom with battery hens slathered in cheese-flavored chemicals?! Oy ...

Almost twenty years ago I found the Crystal Nachtbar, or Crystal Night Bar, in the labyrinthian Estrel Hotel in Berlin. I’m asking myself the same question now that I pondered then: are the people who came up with the Kristallnacht ideas anti-Semitic cretins or merely ignorant morons?

11 November 2022

Intentionally Blank (Garden Tent)

Two and a half years ago I made Intentionally Blank (Potato), the first in a series. Today I made the second, Intentionally Blank (Garden Tent). I don’t have a certain number of images in mind for the completed project, but I know it’s more than two.

It would be great if I finished it before I die, but if I don’t no one will ever know, including me.

Coming next weak: more of the same.

Last Weak  |  Index  |  Next Weak
©2022 David Glenn Rinehart