This Is How Irrelevant the Post Office Is

I had heard the US Postal Service was considering ending Saturday delivery. Brilliant. No one really needs them anyway, might as well save the man hours. Personally, I never understood why they did add mail on Sundays by simply employing Jews, Muslims, and all other non-lazy non-Christians on Sundays. (Non-Christians who are also non-lazy, not a double-negative saying all Christians are lazy. You are some of the most industrious murders in history. Hi Crusades!) We've certainly gotten out of enough last-minute Friday meetings with that whole "Sabbath" excuse, and I still can't believe you buy this "Passover" thing, but good on us, I guess.

More to the point, I read that this was being considered in passing yesterday. Today I wake up and I read that it's been decided on the BBC. I was surprised I hadn't heard on any of my news sites. Surely this was a bigger deal than Monopoly replacing the iron with a cat, which is goddam everywhere today. (Guys, they replaced the least liked piece with the least hated new idea. Not earth-shattering.)

Yet no. All my sites are internet-related. iO9, Gizmodo, MacRumors, RSS feeds from astrophysics sites and blogs and tumblrs, and no goddam mention of the US Post Office, because why would that ever matter?

All I ever get in the mail are bank statements because fuck you, Chase, I'm watching my money and I want this written down for when the EMPs go off, tax documents, medical insurance bills, and junk mail. Like 80% junk mail. There are many days I don't even receive a piece of that. Honestly, making me walk to the mailbox on Saturday if I'm not working is a dick move. I'm glad it's gone.

But I shouldn't have to hear about this from the goddam BBC.

Let's check CNN. Straight-up news, right out of America, and if there's any political slant it's one I'll generally tend to not want to strangle a former Alaskan governor over.

Feel free to expand that.

Yeah, there was a story on it right there.

You see it, don't you? Under the 'World's Fastest Hillbilly.' Under Jennifer Lawrence. Below the break in the section without pictures.

Under business. Second row, second from the left, first story. At least it got that much.

And what's that at the top of "U.S." news? Right after Donald Trump?

Eff this, I'm signing up for email notification of everything and just wrapping my laptop in a Faraday cage for the rest of my life.

Fidel Castro "In Good Health"

Oh, what a fun world I wake up to this morning!

Thank you, BBC!

As always, my news comes solely from tech blogs, and the BBC. Because no one's more fair and balanced in reporting American news stories than the Eastern hemisphere.

Apparently, Fidel Castro, former leader of communist Cuba, is not dying anytime soon.

"He could not even remember the last time he had a headache," says the article.

Other things Castro can't remember:

• His birthday
• Why the car keys were in the freezer
• Whatever happened to that nice Jack Kennedy fellow from up North.

This Week In "Too Soon"

"And IIIIIIIIIII-ee-IIIIIIII-ee-IIIIIIII…
Oh, sorry."

• Looks like somebody hit 'Unlike' on the facebook IPO.

• Ah Ah Ah Ah Stayin' ali- Oh, never mind.

• Space X launched the first manable commercial space vehicle, carrying the ashes of Star Trek's original Scotty. After two aborts and a delay, he finally figured out how to give 'em everyt'ing she's got.

• Mass riot arrests in Quebec. Any Canadians other than college students protesting money issues would have dispersed pleasantly after they were asked to leave the first time.

• The Global Polio Eradication Initiative is encouraging emergency measures to combat resurgence of the disease. I'm not so sure. We could really use a hippie like FDR back in the White House.

Yahoo CEO Steps Down, Doesn't Know Computers

I have no idea how no one could take this company seriously. No, really.

In a last minute reprieve, the Internet has given me my hot news item for the day:

Scott Thompson, CEO of Yahoo!, has resigned, after an "activist shareholder" pointed out that he didn't actually have a Computer Science degree listed on his professional C.V.

That is, the guy behind Yahoo!, Yahoo Mail, and Flickr didn't technically have an accredited understanding of how computers of the Internet work.

To anyone with the ability to register a new Gmail account in under an hour, this should have been patently obvious.

On Pronouns

Following the tragic but not altogether unexpected death of MCA of the Beastie Boys, I've been on the lookout for other celebrity death news.

Instead, today, I found something quite a bit happier:


Tom Gabel, of punk-rock band Against Me! has acknowledged that he is transgender. He will begin to dress and live full-time as a woman, begin hormone therapy, and legally change his name to Laura Jane Grace.

Tom acknowledges that she has been very unhappy with her body for a very long time, feels a legitimate sense of body dysmorphia, and is seeking to become comfortable in her own skin. The hardest part? Worrying how her wife would handle it.

Tom and her wife are going to stay together. They have a child together, a two year old. They still love each other, Tom just needs to change something in herself. She makes no reference to sexuality, merely her own gender identity expression. Laura's going to make the same music, just maybe she'll sing the high-end now. That's about the only real change here.


This is just wonderful for two reasons, immediately in that a prominent individual came to the conclusion that he was unhappy and was able to honest with himself and his loved ones, and those who surround him about what he needed to do to be happy with himself. Tom Gable did not kill himself or spiral into self-loathing and hatred, ultimately pushing away his loved ones and dying miserable, likely well before his time. So far, I have not read anything negative, only supportive, caring reports honoring Gable's bravery to openly transition. That attitude, that this is something uncommon but not so much so as to be out of the realm of the normal and acceptable, leaves me elated. Truthfully, I'm more accepting of this than I am liposuction.

What gets me even more excited is that the above article, admittedly on HuffPost, doesn't miss a beat in immediately referring to Gable as "her" in the third person. That's amazingly thoughtful, if the author did it on purpose, and heartsoaringly joyous if it was carried out without a moment's thought.

If Gable says she's a she, HuffPost isn't one to disagree with her. Not their place or their job. For my money, Tom was a guy and he got a he, until he realized he wasn't and he shouldn't. The she was a she.

Yeah, it makes past-tense a little confusing, but just pretend English is like any other language where pronouns are superfluous to verb conjugation. And while I'm sure there will be plenty of aggressively abusive responses to this story as well, it pleases the libertarian English major in me that the first place I read about a story is the place that respects the subject matter by swapping something as seemingly inconsequential as pronouns.

Because I really don't think it's inconsequential to Tom.

Things the Pope Could Criticize OTHER Than the U.S.'s Cuba Embargo

• Sexual abuse of children

  

  "My hand isn't touching Jesus' junk, right?
  I hate it when my hand touches His junk."

• Repression of women

• Hoarding of vast wealth, art and scholarly works deemed unsupportive of an organization's specific agenda.

• Revisionist histories painting oneself in a positive light, despite the exact opposite having been the case.

• … I don't know, the Hitler Youth?

• The international haberdasher monopoly

Katy Perry and Russel Brand to Divorce

"Smile, dear God, for the love of Christ smile."

Well there goes one of Hollywood's favorite odd-ball couples.

At the risk of potentially getting a cease and desist letter from Tosh.0 lawyers, "let's see how many jokes we can make in 30 seconds."


"I guess her boyfriend did mind it."

"Alright, this facade is getting a little difficult to keep up."

"Why would anyone ever want to divorce a person whose head is made of cotton candy?"

"If two obscenely wealthy celebrities with private jets can't make a bi-continental relationship, what hope is there for the rest of us?"

"I guess he got tired of her spraying her whipped cream boobs all over other guys."

"Being a recovering addict must be so hard when your wife acts like a stoned high schooler and looks like an acid trip you went on while playing Candyland."

"This is a major blow to inter-Muppet marriage equality."

"I always figured being that outlandish on camera, Katy Perry must be horrible in the sac. Turns out she's too stodgy even for and Englishman."

"I wonder if they're also getting divorced inside a tiger sanctuary."

"Yeah, okay, that's about how we feel too."

Herman Cain | Sensationalist Media

Here's the cover of yesterday's New York Post, as I saw it in a local bagel shop:

Okay, that's pretty funny. I will never buy this paper, I will never read the article, but thank you, New York Post, you made me giggle. 'Herm warfare.' What cutups you are. You must be a sensation at office parties. I bet you also loved Chris Kattan's "Makin' Copies' Guy on SNL back in the day.

For comparison, here's the New York Times front page covering the same story:

Yeah, that's would be the story right there on the left. The one with no picture, starting just above the fold. The 4.2 paragraphs before a jump.

The one titled "Cain Again Denies Accusations As Second Woman Goes Public." That one. That takes up less space than the full-color Louis Vuitton ad.


Bit lengthier. Also less catchy.

I guess what I'm saying is, I know which one is going to make more people laugh, and I know which one is going to be purchased and read exclusively by people already possessing subscriptions. I also know which one is in a dying industry considered a quaint, niche market by anyone who can access the internet.

Hint: it's both of them.

PHENOMENAL COSMIC POWER!…itty-bitty living space

This is one of those times where I lament all the major news going on in the world for taking up the entire news cycle and preventing the world from hearing some of the truly weird stuff going on.

Don't get me wrong, I love hearing the government admit we've been using stealth drones and heavily modified, tactical stealth helicopters for years longer than we've admitted they exist, or that SEAL Team 6 has a German shepherd with tougher body armor than most state troopers.

Still, the rest of the world is kind of kerploding.

It was one thing to neglect mentioning that Egyptian former president Mubarak basically had a heart attack over getting called in by his country's supreme court for "questioning." There was the whole 'sudden conflagration of violence in Syria' thing, and it looked like that fight was going to be a lot messier, what with the insane dictator order cruise missile strikes against peaceful protestors.

Easy mistake.

And of course we only stopped mentioning that when a half-dozen other nations started imploding, but we maybe, maybe would have kept at it until oh gee, we found and killed Osama bin Laden after ten years. Alright, that's a pretty big deal. I mean, that's one for the books. Obama can pretty much write his own ticket after that one. I'm not sure what one does after being the leader of the free world–generally die–but he's a young guy, he can go places. I know Taft served as a supreme court justice afterward. Still, I think "one of the youngest presidents ever" and "first black president" would be enough for some people. Now adding "caught the most reviled American enemy since Hitler" and "personally ordered and watched the death live," it's almost like over achieving. What, you want to be the first president on Mars, too?

*Side note: I just read yesterday that Obama actually cracked a joke after a 6' tall SEAL

laid out next to the body of bin Laden to verify the body by height, quipping,

"We donated a $60 million helicopter to this operation. Could we not afford to buy a tape measure?"

Classic 'Bam.

Well here's the story-of-the-week you'll never hear on the nightly broadcasts:

Psychopath Iranian president Mahmud Ahmadinejad has apparently gone so insane, that he has had increasing tensions with Shi'a Islamic cleric and official Supreme Leader of Iran, the Ayatollah Ali Khamenei. Yes, he's picking fights with his boss, who we used to support until his predecessors turned out to be even more violent and bad-for-business than the guy before them.


So now the Ayatollah's religious police have begun arresting Ahmadinejad's highest ranking supporters on charges of sorcery.


Let that sink in. Socery. They are formally being charged with summoning djinn to support Mahmud's crazed and counter-productive personal goals. One was described as "a man with special skills in metaphysics and connections with the unknown worlds."

Alright, that sounds pretty badass.

But sadly, there aren't any genies here, as far as can be told. It really just looks like the Ayatollah's getting worried that Ahmadinejad's Chief of Staff, this guy named Mashaei, is getting a lot more influence and might be groomed to be a successor. They're saying he's an evil sorceror and is possibly responsible for a documentary which claims the return of the Shi'a messiah figure is imminent, something the Ayatollah's group says cannot be predicted.

So, obviously, he's a witch.

The scariest thing is that as far as the rest of Western Society is concerned, it might actually be best if these guys get tossed from power by their own government, because for once the last craziest guys might be easier to work with than the new craziest guys. At least they don't deny that the holocaust ever happened. (They still hate Jews/Zionists, but hey, at least they admit it happened.)

"I tell ya, I don't get no respect."

Breaking News

On Poor Self Promotion

Recently, I've enjoyed a subtle spike in site traffic. Perhaps "enjoyed" is somewhat misleading.

It might be more accurate to say that I have become somewhat more popular as result of a recent British crackdown on the world's largest pedophilia ring. This, as people search frantically for information and images of said horror, possibly out of morbid curiosity, ave begun searching Google Images for the term "pedophile." Charming.

And yes, little demotivator poster in the top row? Third from the right? The one made from a somewhat suggestive clip out of a Nickelodeon Nick Jr. series? Yup. You shouldn't have to guess who that link belongs to.

On the upside, that post is titled "Woody Allen's Dilemma" and was written about Miley Cyrus a few years back. An update version is actually going into my book, so hopefully some of you will pay me to read the same thing a second time. Hopefully Mr. Allen also has a sense of humor.

I've seen Bananas so I think I'm good.

On Piracy (The Real Kind, Not The Fun Kind)

Let's just let the RIAA sue any Somalians who steal from us.
I'm sure that'll be incredibly effective.

So apparently, when you board an American commercial vessel, hold the crew hostage and try to steal all their stuff, we kill your crew and try the lone survivor for piracy. That's a pretty straight-forward, sensical system, I'd say.

Well, apparently, when you try and convict him, you place him in American prison for 33 years.

Yes, he turned to a life of gang-based violence in order to escape the crippling destitution and starvation rampant in his nation. And as punishment for that, we're paying to lock him in a gang-based, violent compound where there is no money but free food and medical treatment.

Man, taking an American hostage is like the Somalian Pirate fucking retirement package. I mean, if you survive and all.

On IRL Trolling

There once was a man named Philip R Greaves II who wrote an e-book he published to Amazon's self-publishing service. He called this book "The Pedophile's Guide to Love and Pleasure: a Child-lover's Code of Conduct." It was about exactly what you think it would be about. Colorado police arrested Greaves for violating Florida obscenity laws, finally finding a legitimate charge with which to charge a child molester who was shielding himself with lofty ideals of free speech.

At least, that's the story the media's spinning.

Oh, I have no doubt that this book was a horrifying thing. Obviously the book itself is protected free speech up until the point it encourages and actively incites others to commit crimes. I say "obviously" because that's how free speech works. Don't believe me? Ask the supreme court. Or Jack McCoy. Alright, I learned constitutional law from watching Sam Waterson on Law & Order. Shut up. I learned medicine from M*A*S*H and ER. I also learned cooking from Good Eats and how to make love from internet porn starring your mother. Piss off.

But I digressed a bit there. What I was originally getting at was this:

I don't believe Philip R. Greaves II is a human being. But he's not a monster. Actually, if I had to make my guess, I'd say he's Paul Giamatti.
This thing just reeks of an Andy Kaufman styled practical joke with a vague political point. Free speech is being pushed, I don't think anyone has actually read this supposed tome which no reasonable person couldn't consider an awful thing and–frankly–even the name sounds incredibly fake. It seems like a manufactured controversy, somewhere out there Jim Carey is waiting to switch places with Paul at just the right moment to make us think that Greaves is an actual person. They're the only ones who are going to get the joke, anyway.

Either that, or Jimmy Hetfield only founded Matellica for the sweet, sweet underage groupies.

Alright, maybe both.
(Sorry, James.

EDIT: Greaves was sentenced Wednesday, April 6, 2011 after pleading no-contest to charges of "distributing obscene material depicting minors engaged in harmful conduct." He will not have to register as a sex offender, which is great since I still don't think he's a real person.

On Mad Science

Why hasn't mainstream media been aflurry with the news that a Scotsman secretly re-cloned Dolly the Sheep three years ago?

This is what we need to be worrying about, people. Not whether a ball of cells is technically a person because it has a slim chance of eventually turning into a fetus that might become a baby that perhaps survives childbirth to ultimately be considered "alive." Not whether global warming is A) damaging enough that it'll kill us all the the world will go on or B) just awful enough to ruin our mode of civilization.

No. Science is terrifying when we just lets crazy assholes secretly clone shit. We eat cloned beef. We drink cloned milk. We goddamfuckit eat vegetarian food made from genetically modified soy beans. Our soybeans are wayward technology. We stand no chance.

And what's worse? These new-cloned sheep are sweet ass new clones. The first Dolly? She had to be put down because she got a lung infection and maybe developed arthritis. When she was three years old she was seven years old. That's because her genetic material had already been dividing and multiplying for four years before she was born. Jesus.

But the new clones? They don't suffer from the same genetic maladies as earlier models. They're three and they're just fine. In fact, they look even more exactly alike than regular sheep tend to. Did someone hire a sheep stylist to make sure their wool was neat and even?

Not to mention, Dolly was the result of 277 tries to clone a sheep. These new ones only took about four or five embryos each to cultivate a viable, living sheep. We are getting better at growing good clones easier.

Sweet lord, this is the plot of Blade Runner. We are making replicant sheep and cows, my friends. If you start seeing livestock in trench coats chasing other livestock, for the love of all that is Dickian, tell them they're clones too.

Were you just holding back on the news until you saw if the clones died horrible progeria deaths, Scottish Scientist? Was that it? You just weren't sure? Or were honestly thinking you could dominate the world with an army of cloned repli-sheep? Screw it, you just wanted to do it because you thought it'd be cool. That's the only reason to do any science.

On Headlines

"Steve Jobs and Obama Meet In Palo Alto … What Did They Discuss?"

"Hey, Bill, what's a white woman's vagina look like?"
"Damned if I know, Barry."

The fuck do you think they talked about? Obama asked how tech was going, Steve jobs told him the shiny white Apple path towards a lucrative singularity. Then they sat in a long silence in which both recognized the tenuousness of their grasps on power, both alone in the room with the other and then in the greater scheme of the world.

And then Barry shed a single, Amerindian-esque tear. As his waterdog runs into the room, trailed quickly by Sasha and Malia, then by Michelle, he wiped the errant saline from his cheek and returned from the brief moment of non-composure he had permitted himself.

On Goats II: The Maaaa-ening

Well, that's it, you guys. It's all over. The goats have won.

Okay, well, not yet, but it's just a matter of time, now. They've begun their war of extermination, and we're on the menu, delicately seasoned and topped with an expensive cheese made from the milk of our own women.

They will take our least savory bits and boil them in the lining of our own stomachs. This, I promise you.

On Sheer Idiocy

So there are miners trapped underground in Chile. It's going to be months to get them out.

Today, officials told them they could have cigarettes.


Wat?

You're trapped underground in a dank confined space. Do you really think it's a good idea to smoke up? Really?

No, not really. Actually some "science people" (I don't want to call them "scientists" just yet) said they had cleared the air vents enough and gotten enough air pumped in from above-ground to allow the miners to have cigarettes.

Still. This is just stupid. I'm sure no canary survived the massive cave-in. Sparking your Zippo would be a real fast way to test for gas leaks down there.

Well, on the other hand, if there is a gas leak, it's not like they can go anywhere to avoid it. And frankly, if I were trapped underground for weeks with escape a distant possibility, I'd probably be dying for a smoke too. So what are we taking, like a pack-a-smoker, here?

Two packs for 33 people.

Seriously? Jesus, now that you've determined it's safe to smoke and I've agreed they could use it, you're giving them a smoke a day with some loosies to fight over? That's cold, brah.

But I guess it's better than nothing. They've been getting sent gum and nicotine patches for the last couple weeks. I don't wanna see what a nicotine fit looks like a half-mile underground trapped in the dark.

Well, I wouldn't see it, but the noises would be terrifying.

On Addiction

The BBC reported today that British scientists have agreed it is mean spirited and "humiliating" to call heroine users "junkies" or "addicts."

Somehow, this is bad for them. The article goes on to state that being an addict now is like being gay or developmentally challenged 30 years ago.

Bullshit. They don't think addiction is the problem of the addicted? Of course it is. They were retarded enough to try something insanely stupid and instantly addictive. How is that not their fault? That'd be like saying it's not my fault I'm an astronaut, I just joined the air force, signed up for astronaut training, passed and beat out 98% of the competition so now I'm fucking stuck in low Earth orbit. But, guys, it's totally not my fault!

Here's a better idea: instead of calling them "addicts" or "junkies," how about we start calling heroine users "Fucking Assholes?" That way, every time someone asks for money to buy heroin, someone else can yell at them, "WHAT ARE YOU, A FUCKING ASSHOLE!?" I feel like that might just give heroin addicts the little jump start they need to put their lives in order. An "addict" can pity himself, but no one ever wants to be called a fucking asshole.

On Bret Michaels

I opened up my BBC News feed yesterday morning to discover former Poison singer and reality show persona Bret Michaels has suffered a brain hemorrhage.

The linked article states that he has dizziness, blurred vision and is suffering from slurred speech.


So basically nothing has changed for Bret Michaels since 1988.

An Open Letter to Tiger Woods

According to this article by the venerable Chris Harnick, Tiger Woods had to miss his son's first birthday because he was in sex rehab and he feels bad.

It took a while, but this was he final cog in the vast machine that was my thoughts and feelings on the matter of Tiger Woods and Golf. As such, I hereby address my concerns in "An Open Letter to Tiger Woods."



Dear Tiger Woods,

We still don't care about golf. Try all you might, we will never care about golf. There is no drama to golf and any attempt to instill that drama into the game will just remind everyone how boring and detached from the rest of life golf actually is.

You are a good golfer, maybe the best. However we still don't care. We liked you as a freak show attraction: "The Crazy-Good Golfer of Indeterminate Ethnicity But We're Pretty Sure He's Some Kind of Black Or Brown Or Something." That was fun. You shamed a bunch of racist old white men by outclassing them at their own sport. But that's like saying you like Rosa Parks because you like how good she was at sitting and not listening to other people.

You are a talented golfer. Now stop pretending that you matter to anyone other than retirees.

Please stop having press conferences and preempting actual news.

Signed,
Everyone Under the Age of 60