Well, I’m way behind in blog writing, blog reading. Even way behind on watching the stuff I’ve stuffed onto my DVR.
So this clip is nearly two days old, and you might have seen it.
But if you haven’t you should. It’s Comedy Gold.
Stephen Colbert on Sarah Palin’s endorsement of Donald Trump.
Enjoy.
Filed under 'Merica, 2016, ; Don't Make Me Feel Perky Tonigh, Adult Traumas, All The News You Need, ¿Jeb!, Bat-shit crazy, Beating that Dead Horse, Campaigning, Criminal Activity, Crohn's Disease, Disgustology, Do GOP Voters Actually THINK?, Elections, Elections Matter, Farts, Global Warming, Huh?, Humiliation, Humor, Hypocrisy, I Can't Get No, laughter, Mental Health, Oh shit, Political Corruption, Sarah Palin, Seriously funny, Seriously weird, Shit, Shit happens, Stephen Colbert, Stupidity, Tea Parties, Useful thing to do with poop, Vote, Voting, Washington, What a Maroon, Wild Beasts, WTF?
They always come off the shelf at this time of year. The Harry Potter books. I’ve read and re-read all of them until the pages are worn and grimy. They give me comfort when I am fighting off “The Missing.”
“When I find myself in times of trouble …”
“The Missing” — Sounds like a “who-dunnit,” doesn’t it. But that’s not what I mean.
Go ahead and laugh. But I honestly mean that the Harry Potter books — kids books — help me fight off the sadness of missing people.
You see, in Harry Potter, the folks Harry loves and has lost get to come back sometimes. Once in every few books. OK, in the first, the fourth, and the seventh. What — you need page numbers?
And each time I read how they, those dead people, give Harry courage, I find my own again.
And you know what especially makes a difference? Throughout the entire series, folks talk normally about people who have passed. Just as if they were, and still are, an important part of a person’s life. The characters do, and are expected to, think about people who are no longer around. Grief, missing them is part of life; an acknowledged part.
Real life, however, outside of books, is not at all like that. The bereaved are allowed 1 week to 1 year to grieve, depending on the relationship and the circumstances. Within that time, and especially way beyond it, talking about a lost loved one is awkward. It makes other people uncomfortable. They don’t know what to say. What to do. Where to look. It’s taboo.
Death in our society pretty much wipes a person off the slate — we say good-bye, are moved to shed tears, and then expected to get beyond it. We are essentially expected to metaphorically “unfriend” them.
Of course, we all fear our own death, so we don’t want to talk about someone else’s death. We just can’t deal with someone else who has gone to that wizarding school in the sky.
Reading Harry Potter helps me feel like my missing are close by. Let’s me feel that there are folks, even if they are fictional, who let me remember and who also remember their own loved ones. Very much like my bloggin’ buddies, who let me lean on them from time to time. For which I will be eternally grateful.
It’s coming on the anniversary of my sister Judy’s passing, a time that is always difficult for me.
Judy too was a Potterhead, although she only lived long enough to read the first three books. I’m quite sure that that is one of the things that most annoyed her about dying, actually. Nobody likes to miss the ending.
So I’m really hoping she’ll hook up with Alan Rickman pretty soon. Because she’ll show him the ropes, and he’ll fill her in on the rest of the story. A match made in, well, heaven.
Fanpop.com Image
R.I.P. to so very many people gone way too soon.
Thanks to Deb of The Monster In Your Closet for making me come out of my closet as a Potterhead!
There are responsibilities that I take seriously. And giving all of you the scoop on poop is one of them.
But this week there is just too much. Too much scoop on poop, even for me.
Still, I can’t hold it all in. I must let it go. Besides, as I explained in Trifecta! all good comedy bits come in threes. So I had to, ummm, unload.
Number One: The first story is one that will, perhaps, ease your mind about all that downtime you spend at work in the bathroom. Because someone has invented a calculator to, well, calculate, how much money you make while on the pot.
Please don’t anyone tell my boss about this calculator. This image from the “Paid To Poo Calculator/Plumbworld”. I did not make that up.
***
Number Two: This one is toilet-focused as well. And really as suggested in this article, it could really save all of our asses, worldwide. I’m not just shitting you!
The article says that a British University (too embarrassed to own up to its research and identify itself) has developed:
A toilet that does not need water, a sewage system or external power but instead uses nanotechnology to treat human waste, produce clean water and keep smells at bay.
You won’t need that Brita Filter for long!
No need for this! Wikimedia Image
Seriously, though, a waterless toilet that could be developed and mass produced cheaply, and that would produce potable water, well, that would be truly wonderful for the world.
Science is pretty damn cool sometimes.
***
Number Three:
As a kid, a “Number Three” meant a fart. Usually an SBD — a “silent but deadly” one. But this number three? Far less benign.
Now as a person with serious bowel disease, I will confess that I worry that some day I will “go” the way of many famous people. That I will die literally on the loo. Those people include Elvis (who did not leave the building), Judy Garland (who did not make this list), and Catherine the Great of Russia (who may or may not have died on the toilet but her descendants have preferred the version to the one that says she died-while-having-sex-with-a-horse).
Still, if I die by poop, I’d always expected it would come from below the belt. Not above. And certainly not far above.
Shit! Now I have something new to worry about. Just what I need. Death via blue ice falling from the sky.
Wanna guess what blue ice is?
Apparently, blue ice is frozen shit falling from the sky. And pee too. Raining down from airplanes. And it is landing on and injuring unsuspecting people.
As the article states:
The Times of India reports that Rajrani Gaud from Madhya Pradesh suffered a severe shoulder injury when she was hit by a football-sized chunk of ice last month.
[…]
The newspaper claims that aviation scientists believe she may well have had the misfortune to become one of an incredibly rare group: people who have been hit by what the airline industry coyly calls “blue ice”.
That’s its euphemism for the frozen human waste that very occasionally forms around the overflow outlets for aeroplane toilets, and then falls to earth. “Blue” because of the chemicals added to the toilets in planes to reduce odour and break down the waste.
Oh shit (from above). Hurting people.
Judy Garland. Who was happy before blue ice hit.
Filed under ; Don't Make Me Feel Perky Tonigh, Adult Traumas, Advice from an Expert Patient, All The News You Need, Bat-shit crazy, Chronic Disease, Church, Cool people, Crohn's Disease, Disgustology, Flatulence, Health, Health and Medicine, History, Huh?, Humiliation, Humor, I Can't Get No, keys to success, laughter, Oh shit, Pooders, Poop, Satisfaction, Shit, Shit happens, Taking Care of Each Other
Sometimes, as I fulfill my contractual duty to the WordPress community to write about all the news that is, well, news-y, I find myself unable to keep up with the fast pace of the current most blog-worthy items.
For example, today I wanted to write about the Bundy Boys while I sipped my coffee at breakfast. I wanted to rant about bozos with bazookas, but alas, I had to go to work. I could not rant.
You’ve heard about the Bundy Boys, haven’t you? Ammon and Ryan (Ammon???? WTF?) Two sons of Cliven Bundy have taken over federal land (a bird sanctuary, because we all know that those folks pack heat(ed hand and foot warmers) to protest what they claim is unfair guv’ment action.
Here is the low down from the Washington Post:
A group of armed anti-government activists remained encamped at a federal wildlife refuge in Oregon on Sunday evening, vowing to occupy the outpost for years to protest the federal government’s treatment of a pair of local ranchers set to report to prison Monday.
The occupation of a portion of the Malheur National Wildlife Refuge, about 30 miles southeast of Burns, Ore., began a day earlier, after a small group of men broke off from a much larger march and rally held on Saturday evening
The armed occupation is being led by Ammon Bundy, an Idaho rancher whose father, Cliven Bundy, led an armed standoff with federal agents in Nevada in 2014 and who has described his supporters as “militia men.”
If you continue trying to send these convicted arsonists to jail, I will hold my breath until I turn blue. Oh, yeah, I AM blue. My bad. (Google Image)
On the way to work, I formulated perfect sentences expressing my disdain for folks who claim to be patriots but who work against the government. Petulant ammosexuals. Boys with more guns than either brains or balls. And if you’ve been paying attention, you might recall that I’m not big on guns. Or dopes. Or armed-fucking-rebellion.
Well, today, the delay in my blog drafting reaped rewards. Huge rewards.
Because at lunch time, because the interwebs are/is alive with ideas on just what to call the Bundy Boys. As described in a Huffington Post article, folks are rising to the challenge of just exactly to what to call the boys.
Here are the current contenders:
#al-Shabubba, and say the group is waging #YeeHawd
I thought we might help. You see, originally I had planned to insert a poll RIGHT HERE to see which name y’all prefer, but in the newest new Word Press format, there appears no way to insert a poll.*
Oh and the two men who inspired this anti-guv’ment protest? They were convicted of arson on Federal land and they served some time in prison. Recently a federal judge determined that they had been improperly sentenced, and that there was additional time to be served.
But my favorite tweet?
Every successful revolution starts with takeover of closed visitor center with gift shop. #OregonUnderAttack #YallQaeda
These two guys oppose the Bundy Boys, and turned themselves in today. They didn’t condone the Bundy Boys take over of the bird sanctuary-with gift shop.
In fact, it seems that self-proclaimed “patriots” — “militia men” are fallin’ all over themselves to distance themselves from the Bundy Boys.
I can’t imagine why. Can you?
***
* When the Bundy Boys are done with this here protest, I’m gonna call them up. Then they can take over Word Press and we can call it:
#stop-all the damn changes-Word-Press-or-I’ll-shoot
***
This story just keeps on giving. Just after I posted, I read this post, by I Tried Being Tasteful.
You really can’t make this shit up.
Filed under 'Merica, 2016, 2nd Amendment, ; Don't Make Me Feel Perky Tonigh, All The News You Need, All We Are Saying Is Give Peace A Chance, Bat-shit crazy, Beating that Dead Horse, Being an asshole, Cancer on Society, Crazy family members, Disgustology, Do GOP Voters Actually THINK?, Elections Matter, GOP, Gross, Gun control, Huh?, Humiliation, Humor, I Can't Get No, Mental Health, Oh shit, Politics, Pooders, Shit happens, Tea Parties, Voting, What a Maroon, Word Press, WTF?
Over the years, I’ve had to do some pretty weird things for work, had to work for some weird people. And while I have sometimes felt that my job was hell, and that it would be the death of me, well, I never thought that it would lead me to an early grave. Or an early casket.
Possibly among the things I’ve hated most have been those retreat-thingys organized by HR.
For the most part, I’ve gotten along with folks I worked with. Still, I find HR retreats — with their artificial conviviality — uncomfortable. And even I, who willingly tells my most embarrassing stories to the whole world, finds doing so in a closed room to folks I work with when I don’t choose the timing — awkward. They always seem so false, so forced. Perhaps because they are.
Google Images
Never again will I complain though. Because as bad as things seem, they can always be worse. MUCH WORSE.
Today I found out just how much worse things could be.
Yup, I read on my new BBC App that some Korean companies are holding mass funerals. For their employees. For their LIVE employees.
According to the article as well as independent sources, the Korean suicide rate is quite high, because folks are seriously stressed out. Of course that is a serious situation — so much is expected of employees that they just can’t take it.
So, to alleviate the stress, somebody came up with a colorful approach to stress reduction. [Please don’t tell my boss.*]
Well, they hold a company retreat, of sorts, many companies worldwide do that too.
But this one has a twist. Or maybe it’s just twisted. Perhaps both.
You see, they have groups of employees all get together, and write farewell letters to their families. As if they are about to kill themselves. Then, while gathered in a room with the folks they work with, they stand next to empty coffins.
The participants at this session were sent by their employer, human resources firm Staffs. “Our company has always encouraged employees to change their old ways of thinking, but it was hard to bring about any real difference,” says its president, Park Chun-woong. “I thought going inside a coffin would be such a shocking experience it would completely reset their minds for a completely fresh start in their attitudes.”
Yes. They get into the fucking coffins!
Let me reiterate: You go to work one day, and head off for a company retreat, knowing that it will be an awkward, wasted day and that you are already way behind in your work.
Then they have you write a suicide note and put you into a coffin.
BBC Photo, I’m guessing. Because while it came from the article linked to above, there is no credit given. Perhaps the photographer did not want to disrespect the, umm, un-dead.
The idea is to make employees feel that their lives are worth living. However, I think that if someone forced me into a coffin, I would be thinking long and hard about my career choice.
And about litigation. I would definitely be thinking about suing the shit out of somebody.
So the next time you decide you hate your job, count yourself lucky. Because things aren’t really all that bad unless they trade your cubicle for a pine box.
***
*My current boss would never do this. She’s a doctor. She tries to keep people OUT of coffins. But there have been other bosses …
Filed under ; Don't Make Me Feel Perky Tonigh, Adult Traumas, All The News You Need, All We Are Saying Is Give Peace A Chance, Bat-shit crazy, DON'T go back to your day job either, Huh?, Humiliation, Humor, Mental Health, Oh shit, Seriously funny, Seriously weird, Shit, Stupidity, Why the hell do I tell you these stories?, Wild Beasts, WTF?
I got TWO!
I recommend Karen Kingsley and Kingsley Ink
The Highest Honor
This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivs 3.0 Unported License.
FiftyFourandAHalf 