Category: Life

The corporate world proves B.F Skinner right once again. Our local Pizza Hut charges seventy-five cents for deliveries now, a cost it just appends to the top of your coupon and the tax. It doesn’t break out the cost nor publicize it anywhere, but you’re probably paying it.

Thanks to the phone companies, wireless companies, and all other companies who have accustomed consumers to surcharges, bogus taxes, and costs of businesses so that the advertised price represents purely the profit, and everything else is extra.

• Another Monday, another 5 unsolicited credit card offers, including 3 separate campaigns from Citibank. Gentlemen, it is my distinct pleasure to return your business reply envelopes with the terms of your offer, but not application. I consider it my small part to keep first class postal rates down and to raise your cost per customer acquisition for these campaigns.
• A plea for money from George Bush. Look, George, I’ve given money, we’re probably going to give up time and lawnspace for the campaign, but if you want more cash, you’re going to have to send a picture of your daughters.

  For this gambit to be effective, make sure that’s addressed to Mr. Brian and not Mrs. Heather (or, as she might be again known shortly after reading this post, Miss HLI, in which case I won’t have any money to give anyway).

• An offer for AOL 9.0 Optimized, which proclaims right on the box, Block Spam and Web Pop-Ups. As someone who’s logged into AOL 9.0 on a dial-up recently, I certainly notice the oversight that new customers won’t: Web Pop-Ups doesn’t say a damn thing about the six or ten AOL offers that display whenever you try to log in or log out. Those? Still in there.

  An overly expensive dial-up ISP that delivers its own ads to enhance my (slow) browsing experience? Throwing this out unopened is too good for this small box.

A family member bought this card for the punchline, but didn’t realize that she wasn’t part of the niche market this card serves.

The cover:

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Weapons of Mass Destruction. Money.

The inside:

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Two things you won’t find inside this birthday card.

Okay, I can see some humor in that, well, more an attempt at humor, but something. And then there’s the back:

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A caricature of George W. Bush, saying “Trust me, they’re there.”

So what’s your point, “American” Greetings?

I suppose they’re trying to cater to a hip urban crowd who’s swallowed the load that Iraq didn’t have weapons of mass destruction because those that have been found were just about destruction, not about destroying Catholic worship cermonies.

I’ve never paid much attention to greeting card manufacturers, but I know that the maker’s name is listed right above the price, and I’ll buy my 149 cards from Hallmark now, thanks.

I love it when I get an allusion made by some author, whether it’s Robert B. Parker or Varifrank, who quotes:

It’s not like John Kerry hasn’t tried to run for President before, and got nowhere, not even out of the early democrat primaries. He’s been “unwept, unhonoured, and unsung” for some time, and he’s a not exactly a stunning member of the Senate, he barely makes any kind of presence.

That’s Sir Walter Scott. I can almost quote the complete couplet.

Just don’t tell my mother-in-law, the former English teacher whom I impressed at our first meeting by reciting “The Love Song of J. Alfred Prufrock”, that I know this particular quote because, in the movie Groundhog Day, Andie MacDowell’s character Rita recites it to Bill Murray’s character Phil Conners and she attributes it. Knowning how I know what I know often spoils the illusion.

(Link seen on Instapundit.)

Here are the answers to some trivia questions soon to be asked:

1. Samantha Fox
2. Bright Lights, Big City
3. David Hartmann and Joan Lunden
4. Walter Mondale, Geraldine Ferraro, Lloyd Bentsen, Dan Quayle, Jack Kemp, Joe Liebermann, John Edwards
5. Teen Wolf Too
6. Nancy McKeon
7. The Satanic Verses
8. Here’s Boomer
9. Yemen
10. Texas Instruments home computers and Jello gelatin desserts.

Feel free to think up your own and to join me in studying to ensure dominance in trivia nights ten years’ hence.

Strategy Page has a list of Marine Corps bumper stickers. Check them out.

Yes, I mean you, Mom.

In case you didn’t think I had actual friends in the real world, I have posted the photos from Atari Party 5: Fellowship of the Joystick.

Of course, this could mean I married a woman with many friends, but I don’t dwell on it. Too much.

First, Subway eliminated its frequent customer reward program.

Now, according to Michelle at A Small Victory, its European outlets are promoting the “documentary” Super Size Me.

Crass. Very crass, Subway.

The Meatriarchy Guy, the anti-vegetarian icon, has ponders his match: a six pound burger.

On a bottle of Sea Breeze Oily Skin Astringent:

Deep Cleans Excess Oil Down To The Pores

I am no dermatologist, but I had not realized that one should deep clean the oil on one’s face. I was under the mistaken impression that all oil was bad oil, but apparently it’s dirty oil that causes acne. Given that, would Sea Breeze go so far as to recommend oil changes for one’s face? After, say, three months or thirty scowls and smiles?

Wherein our hero copes with life in a large household while his wife enjoys business-related adventures in Buffalo, New York.

“Crap! I can’t get the garlic bread residue off of this cookie sheet! Wait a minute….Heather will never miss one cookie sheet….”

Join us for our thrilling next adventure, when our hero tries to find a new cookie sheet with which to replace the new contents of his garbage can. Where do you buy cookie sheets? Like, Best Buy is all out of them…..

A hearty, hey, yer knuckleheads to the folks at the Home Handyman Club of America, whose membership I am abandoning since it managed to lose my subscription renewal a couple years ago, and then promptly sent me books I refused and for which they continued to bill me.

As a new example of its genius, it has sent me a professionally-printed envelope that instructs those suckers seeking to renew to enclose the invoice so that the club address appears in the window on the other side. The problem? It’s not printed on a window envelope. All the better for our recycling bin.

Man, I am glad I never had these handy fellows over to help me do anything to my house.

The headline on the Maxim article is Be Her Boy Toy and the lead is:

Younger guys and older women: Why should Ashton and Justin have all the fun? Rosie Amodio explains the benefits of Mrs. Robinsons…and how to score one.

Mrs. Robinsons? Hardly. Let’s count the rings on some of these “older” women:

• Like lots of girls my age, I’ve had a stud puppy. I was 26, he was 21.
• “Sure, when I dated a 30-year-old, I tried to act more sophisticated. I dressed well, held doors, bought her flowers, wore cologne,” says Benjamin, 23.
• The first time Billy and I had sex, I was the boss,” says Jane, 29.
• “A guy I dated picked me up in the cheesiest way. He said he’d been watching me all night but was intimidated because I seemed worldly and stylish,” says Luanne, 31.

Holy Hebe, Tulsa, those older women are younger than we are. I know, I am cherry-picking the ages by highlighting the oldest, but let’s see what we have in the senior citizen category from the article:

• “I dated this 25-year-old who was such a party boy,” says Jane, 35.
• “Once we went out, flirted all night, and didn’t even make it back to my place,” says Karina, 36.
• “It’s a mental rush to date some 23-year-old guy, but it’s weird if it goes on for too long,” says Jenny, 36.

Cripes, Tulsa, they’re still the same age as Grandpa Doug, who’s 36. You ever get the feeling we’re not exactly the people whom Hugo Boss seeks in his ads anymore? I mean, I’m about ready to bust out of the Hot or Not 26-32 age group. I guess we’re getting old.

Man, I can even remember changing fax machine paper rolls. Better hike my Dickies up another couple inches.

(Link seen on Fark. Those damn kids better get off my lawn!)

Anyone who wishes you a happy Fourth of July misses the point. It’s not the calendar date that’s important.