Man of Leisure

"Irrational Exuberance" redux

I'm not saying this just to hate on algore, but I'm afraid that the announcement that the former Veep is sharing the Nobel Peace Prize will bury an important story from yesterday: a UK judge declared An Inconvenient Truth to be a politically-motivated film, thus precluding its being shown in schools without balanced disclaimers.

Also hidden in the Peace Prize news was one other self-evident award: the Nobel Prize for Sycophancy, awarded to... the Nobel Prize Committee.

Terorrists are Everywhere!

Julie and I went to the mall to do some wedding registry stuff today, and the local Shriners were out in force, pimping next weekend's Shrine Circus. The group here in Oregon is called the "Al Kader" shrine, and I can only imagine that this fact causes confusion in Washington, D.C.:

Michael Chertoff: Mr. President, we've received intelligence about a cell of terrorists in the Portland area. They're well-organized, connected with other cells across America, and they... they...
GWB: Yes, what is it?
Chertoff: Mr. President, they... they wear fezzes, sir. And drive little cars.
GWB: My God. They must be stopped!

Oh, how I wish I could be a Shriner. Too bad they're satanic Masons.

Comic Genius

John Hodgman is a riot. His appearance last evening at Powell's was better than an hour of serious therapy - funny, engaging, and multi-sensual (if that's even the right word to describe visually and aurally pleasing entertainments).

I sat in the front row of a packed Pearl Room, and before the reading began, interacted a bit with Mr. Hodgman by suggesting that he read the list of 700 hobo names as part of his presentation. Later on, he gave me a shout-out by name, saying, "And, by request of Ken, I will now read the 700 hobo names in order. Number 1: Stewbuilder Dennis."

He took questions from the crowd, including one about his work in the Apple adverts. I have posted a clip of his answer, where he describes one of his favorite ads that began airing this week. He talked about the iMovie ad, and how the guy who played the home movie composed on a PC reminded him of Jon Lovitz. The clip is over on the GoogleTube (I guess that's what we call it now?):

Tonight: Complete World Knowledge!

I am so excited! Tonight I will be found at Powell's City of Books, the famed independent Portland bookstore, for a reading and signing by John Hodgman, the author of The Areas of My Expertise, and Jonathan Coulton, musicial collaborator of the aforementioned Hodg-man.

Even if you don't read chapter books, you know John Hodgman. He's the "PC" in the current crop of Apple adverts -- you know, the dumpy-looking businessman who has no clue what's happening and why he's so uncool. He can also be seen occasionally on The Daily Show as the "Resident Expert". Here are some Hodg-man resources for your edification:

Apple adverts
The Daily Show excerpts
The Areas of My Expertise website (with free audiobook clips!)

Who's That Guy?

I read today about a photo-editing technology called "Tourist Remover" that takes unwanted folks out of digital photos. What a bummer. I've ruined dozens of holiday snaps by standing in the background and waving. I refer to this as being "That Guy", as in, "Who's that guy?"

I've prepared a slideshow of some good "That Guy" photos on my Flickr account. Here's a preview of my favorite:

More Comedy Courtesy of Ted Stevens

Courtesy of CNET.com:

"I have a letter from a big scientist who said I was absolutely right in using the word 'tubes,'" he told reporters.

If you're a "big scientist", you surely understand how the Intertubes work.

DJ Ted Stevens - A Series of Tubes

Please do not miss this. You will be sad if you do.

Internet is dead. Long live the Intertubes!

Senator Ted Stevens' (R-AK) ranting has given us a new way to refer to the interwebs: Intertubes!

I just the other day got, an internet was sent by my staff at 10 o'clock in the morning on Friday and I just got it yesterday. Why?

Because it got tangled up with all these things going on the internet commercially...

They want to deliver vast amounts of information over the internet. And again, the internet is not something you just dump something on. It's not a truck.

It's a series of tubes.

And if you don't understand those tubes can be filled and if they are filled, when you put your message in, it gets in line and its going to be delayed by anyone that puts into that tube enormous amounts of material, enormous amounts of material.

So then, there it is: the Internet is officially the Intertubes. Here's the definition that I submitted to Urban Dictionary:

"Intertubes, n. A series of tubes that move information around the world via computer."

As a side note, it's amazing how many morons there are out there. Perform a Google blog search on the word "intertube", and you'll find 769 entries, 768 of which are using "intertube" when they should be using "inner tube". Stunning.

Catholic Comedy

I responded to a challenge over on The Ironic Catholic to come up with some good haiku about the faith. Though I didn't win (nor even make Honorable Mention?!?!), I thought I'd offer here the few that I did submit for the contest:

Father, Son, Spirit
Three in One, plain as can be.
If only it were!

The Popemobile
Has got to be the best perk.
Though the pad's nice, too.

Leo's Last Supper:
Is that John or Mary M?
Dan Brown is no help.

and, my personal favorite:

Michael and the Pope:
"When will you make an end, man?"
"When I am finished."

What exactly IS "Rocket Scientry"?

I was watching a spot of the C-SPAN this afternoon (the Cable/Satellite Public Affairs Network), and caught a speech by Senator Mike Gravel (D-Alaska, 1968-80), as he announced his candidacy for the 2008 presidential election. His ideas included direct democracy of some undisclosed sort involving Internet. When he was asked about how he will ensure that all Americans can participate in spite of many not having Internet, he brilliantly responded, "It's not rocket scientry!"

Sounds like he takes his speaking skills from George W.

You can read a WaPo column about the press conference here. Unfortunately, the columnist didn't include the Bushesque quotation, so you'll have to watch the archived clip from C-SPAN. The precise quote begins at 19:10 into the conference:
rtsp://video.c-span.org/15days/e041706_gravel.rm (cut and paste this into your RealPlayer address box).