Checkmate

I'm not a huge Chuck Norris fan, but I do love chess, and this is pretty funny.  :)

Hot Toys For Christmas

What's going to be the crazy toy that no one can seem to get their hands on for Christmas?



I picked up plenty of real doggie doo when I was growing up (so we didn't run over it with the lawn mower).  This only brings back bad memories . . . hot, steamy piles of memories . . .

Old School

Now that's old school:

I'll be honest . . . I'm a little jealous . . .

Funny Business

I've always appreciated businesses with a sense of humor.  I love the fact that some companies realize the importance of being approachable.  Make your customer smile or laugh and you're halfway to a sale.

This doesn't exactly apply, since the iPhone app "Words With Friends" is free, but it's still good.  This is a clip from their how-to guide:

What else do you need to know?  You can play from your toilet seat?  Bring it on, world!

And "baazing!"?  LOL.  That's a new one for me.  I love it.

Word Verification #9

Word Verification #9

Happy Hump Day!  Make the best of it.  It only happens once a week!

Here’s captcha #3 for the week.  Enjoy!

Enite:

-verb

1.  To unite online, either in the form of dating or video gaming.

Ex: The World of Warcraft elves and dwarves enited to defeat the Orc Warlord boss.  (Sound nerdy?  It is.)

-noun

2.  The time spent online during the period of time between sunset and sunrise.

Ex: My enite was great.  I used the internet to pay some bills, do some blogging, and caught up on some reruns of Mork and Mindy.

Friday 8/20

Familiar Tree


Many neighborhoods have trees hanging over streets which look like this:

Basically, enough large trucks pass underneath to prevent the tree from really growing in that space.  Branches that do hang down quickly get mercilessly whacked when the next big truck zooms by.  This, however, is a little more uncommon:

Looks a little familiar doesn't it?  If not, maybe this will help:

Monday 5/10

History

Take a look at this for a second.

Figure it out?  If yes, continue reading.  If not, think just a little bit more.  Take your time. . . . Ok, let’s move on.

I couldn’t help but laugh when I saw this version introduced into the ranks of themed Monopoly boards.  Why, exactly?  Is it because umpires tend to maintain an uncomfortably close distance between them and the catcher?  Nope.  Is it because there’s a picture of a hot dog positioned in the upper left-hand corner, making it look like the umpire is thinking more about lunch than making calls?  No.  It’s because Major League Baseball is a monopoly.  This is essentially a game about trying to gain a monopoly over an organization that is, well, already a monopoly.  Why don’t they just call this one “History”?   

(In another twist of irony, Monopoly was originally owned by three brothers, George, Charles, and Edward (the Parker brothers).  Parker Brothers was eventually bought by General Mills, then Tonka, and ultimately Hasbro. The Monopoly patent brand is now owned by one company, kind of like a monopoly, using the right semantics.) 

So Major League Baseball escapes anti-trust laws in both the real world and in make-believe, board game world.  That’s convenient.  Well, I guess it won’t be long before we see Farm-opoly or Labor Union-opoly.  Oh wait, there is a Farm-opoly.  Figures . . .

By: S. Cole Garrett

Thursday

Anywhere?

Where did all the phosphorus sesquisulfide go?  By phosphorus sesquisulfide, I mean strike anywhere matches.  I haven’t seen them in years and in most states, they’re illegal to sell.  That’s because they have been deemed as “dangerous goods” by the government.  Well, leave it to them to nanny us out of some of the most convenient innovations in our lifetimes.  Oh, strike anywhere matches, how I miss thee!

The convenience of strike anywhere matches is in the name.  They could be lit with enough friction on just about everything.  Here’s a list of some of the most creative ways my friends, brothers, and I figured out how to light them in our youth:

-         On zippers, front teeth, other strike anywhere matches, a finger nail, toys, sidewalks, shoes, watches, the edges of school books, bricks, trees, bicycle tires, the telephone (cell phones weren’t widely-owned yet), cereal boxes, bowling balls, forks, stale bread, the metal on a pencil, computer speakers, and (are you sitting down for this one?) even ice cubes. 

Were we pyromaniacs?  I don’t think so.  I’d rather our creative, inclination to ignite be called something along the lines of . . . how should we say . . . thinking outside the box.  In retrospect, I can’t say we were smart about everything we did with strike anywhere matches. 

We had a particularly entertaining game we played called “burn the forest.”  Sounds safe, right?  Anyway, it goes like this.  Two players each gather a pile of dead leaves and put it in front of them.  They set up facing each other about ten to twenty feet apart from each other (depending on how skilled they are).  Each player has their own regular-sized, 250-count box of strike anywhere matches.   The concept is simple: burn the other player’s pile of leaves first.  To do this, the match box (or anything rough, for that matter) is turned on its side so that the striking side is face up.  A match is stood up vertically with one finger holding it and with the head of the match to the box.  With the other hand, the player takes aim at the opposing “forest” and flicks the match at the base.  The friction lights the match and it fully ignites by the time it reaches the other player’s leaves.  The players take turns until one pile burns down. 

There are plenty of other irresponsible ways we found to waste perfectly good strike anywhere matches.  If something was flammable, knew about it.  Camping with open flame might as well have been called camping with open fun.  In all seriousness, however, I don’t condone playing with fire. . . unless maybe it’s controlled . . . and supervised . . . and involves strike anywhere matches.

By: S. Cole Garrett

3/17/10

For The Weekend

Save Jackson

Don’t ask how, but I managed to drop several wooden pieces from one of my all-time favorite board games in the sink. Not just the sink, however, the disposal side of the sink. Before thinking, and as delicately as a spinal surgeon, I retrieved the six or so immediately visible pieces. After resuming thought, I came to realize exactly why I so cautiously plucked the pieces as quickly as I had: because of . . . the hole.

The wooden pieces scattered and certainly fell faster than I could count them and, even more certainly, faster than I realized how nice it would have been to have counted them. What if one of them tumbled into that darkness? I was almost positive one did. There were but two means of uncovering the answer. I could flip the disposal on and listen for any potential piece crying for mercy or I could simply reach into the hole and feel around.

My rationale kicked in. I significantly reduced my options by deducing two solid reasons for recovering what piece may have fallen into the black hole. First, the board game in question would be undeniably unplayable with an incomplete set of pieces, especially for such avid players as myself. Second, the board game cost me in the ballpark of twenty hard-earned dollars. Let’s put it this way. Twenty bucks is twenty bucks. So . . .

Flipping the disposal’s switch would likely mar both the wooden piece itself along with the integrity of its use in game play. The primary benefit, of course, would be the definitive divulgence of proof that there in the hole lies something worth going after.
The alternative, sadly, is extending a blind hand into a corner of the universe rarely graced by the light of day. The scary part is, both options ended with the latter.
I flipped the switch. CLACK! Clack CLACK! I heard the piece beaten again with the disposal revolving to a stop.

I know now and I knew then that in-sink disposals are cleverly designed to allow for safe retrieval of carelessly mishandled foreign items like jewelry, infant spoons, and small toys. In theory, that is, the turntable in a disposal unit rotates innocuously in a counter-clockwise direction. It still has hammers which force waste through shredders, though. Call me crazy, but it doesn’t sound limb-friendly to me. It is, without doubt, counterintuitive to willingly place your hand into a device that mauls pineapple tops into pipe-safe bits as easy as a bar blender pummels ice, rum, and strawberries into a daiquiri delight!

I know myself well enough to know I would talk myself out of doing it if I waited any longer. I rolled up my sleeve and looked at my hand as if I were sending it to the gallows or off to a deadly war zone. I reached in.

The slobbery tongues of the rubber disposal guard licked my wrist on the way in. My fingers pricked and teased the fangs of the turntable. My pinky grazed the piece! Trembling, I reached one finger and one prized opposable digit and seized it.

I might have kissed the piece if it wasn’t soiled with yesterday’s sink fodder. I sighed in both triumph and relief. I rest proudly at ease, having risked life and limb, mostly limb, for the love of the game.

By: S. Cole Garrett
3/4/10