Take the Last Train to Camden

 Your love is like  a car crusher

China is slowly moving into reality shows, with a show on genius programmers.

The Chinese name translates to Watching Paint Dry, and it's every bit as exciting. Everybody has to start somewhere, and China has started pretty close to the bottom. Even the furries with the masks laugh at them. We have obtained a preview of the show and here are some of the highlights:

• delivery of cases of Red Bull
• coding it to take over your tv and report what you watch (just like American tvs)
• learning to high five, with hilarious outtakes
• ordering American food
• crazy nights at the soda bar
• sneaking out to get brown highlights
• absolutely hilarious comments in the code, like 'Yo Chao!', 'Dig this loop', 'Yo mama be Chinese' and 'penis HAHAHAHAHA!'

Today the Russians hacked into the International Space Station and installed an air leak. Just because you can doesn't mean you should.

• Oxfam found the combined wealth of the 10 richest men during pandemic 'could buy vaccines for all'
• so could cutting taxes and limiting the constant war budget to a healthy defense-only posture.
• the (socialist) charity is urging governments to consider taxes on the super-rich

Note to people who have been online before there was an online: Tucows downloads is going offline.

Today I identify as  a retired Stealth bomber

Got an ADT security system? It turns out to be less secure than you thought. An employee accessed ~200 customer cameras on more than 9,600 occasions. You know he's not the only one doing it. In fact, there's probably a Hot Reel, with all the best vids of people doing it.

• "Protecting the last wild lions in Africa"
• what the hell have we done? 

Apple Magsafe on the iPhone 12 may interfere with pacemakers and cardiac defibrilators

For their part, Apple says they won't interfere moreso than previous models.

Even though they have more magnets in them.

• at a recent cybersecurity program, people were posting about it on Faceyspaces

Today the president sent another 10,000 troops to Afghanistan, "to protect our liberties, because the last guy pulled them out and I could feel our liberties starting to slip."  Also, warships are now conducting exercises in South China Sea.

Meanwhile, the vice president carefully shadows the president, because it's only a matter of time...

Are you ready to hear me stand up for Faceyspaces? Biden is getting ready to repeal Section 230, which would make social media liable for things people post. Next up: the community bulletin boards at your local grocery store. They can't be allowed to get away with the things they're doing. "Stroller for sale - good condition - $25." What if it's not in good condition? We need legal remedies. More government meddling.

Today's oxymoron: Google Ethics

If WhatsApp pissed you off, I strongly urge you not to get all nostalgic and go to ICQ: the Russian government can read anything you type, as can the moderators. Don't believe me? I used to regularly have a moderator comment on things I wrote privately. He outright told me they can read things. Oh yeah, Twitter too.

Hollywood News

Keira Knightly has said she will not appear in nude scenes for films that have a male director.

• Johnny Depp will not appear in nude scenes without 'a really hot co-star'
• Kevin Spacey will not appear in nude scenes without 'a really hot guy'
• Ben Afflek will not appear in a picture unless the producer gets the best shots of his rug
• Brad Pitt will only do nude scenes with a female director. This way, after the scene with the hot co-star, he can do the director too
• Tom Cruise requires 'a really gorgeous co-star' but a male fluffer
• Slyvester Stallone will not appear in any picture without a walker on-set
• Nicolas Cage will appear in absolutely anything
• Sean Connery requires nothing
• Sandra Bullock requires flights between filming location and my house
• Scarlett Johannsen will only film on Tuesdays and requires bowls of blue M&Ms only

Mexico's presidente, Andres Manual Lopez Ave Maria Obrador, tested positive for the Flying AIDS. The healthcare system is a little different in Mexico: if you get the virus, you say bad things about drug gangs and the problem goes away very quickly. You don't need health insurance - just life insurance.

• Just so you don't think any stereotypes are being broken, Dr. Anthony Fauci is the highest paid employee in the entire govt, at $417,608 in 2019.
• Any one of us could be making that salary - no qualifications required!

Just so you're not over-worried about your quadrupeds, there's now a Flying AIDS jab for dogs and cats. This is from a group of scientists who do not, in any way, have any financial interest in the pharmaceutical companies. No sir - they want to make this clear up front. Their expensive new cars can be explained by statistical chance.

• A hacker published the private info of 2 million people. MeetMindful apparently left the door open. The 2 million are elated, now that they're getting incredible coverage for their money.

Worst TV Show in America runner-up, Worst Cooks in America, season 20 pulled after the winner was charged with murder of child. Be fair - her cooking speaks for itself and other matters do not affect it. Unless she cooked with the child. 

Mainstream or Pr0n?:  My Feet Are Killing Me, Mobile Penetration Testing, 1000-lb Sisters

The Calcasieu Parish Sheriff’s Office would normally have a lot of detective work to do in the stabbing death of a 15 year old girl, but since this is 2021, all they had to do was log on Faceyspaces, where it was posted.

A Pennsylvania democratic lawmaker slammed the state over the vaccine rollout. He said other states are doing fine and PA's response was 'muddled.' Police and prison guards expressed outrage at having been shoved farther back in the line for their Flying AIDS shots.

Idiot Governor apologized for the confusion and laid out the order:

1. Idiot Governor
2. family of Idiot Governor
3. friends of Idiot Governor
4. contributors to Idiot Governor
5. people working around Idiot Governor
6. everyone else

The son of a couple killed in a Pittsburgh synagogue attack that killed 11 worshippers is suing the National Rifle Association, arguing the group’s inflammatory rhetoric led to the violence. "The gun lobby taught him to fear and hate Jews."

MOM - those words made me kill people!!! 

They better watch out - with the NRA's sizable membership, there's going to be a lot of people hating Jews and shooting up synagogues.

We both have very good communication. It's a shame everyone else in the family doesn't. We swore we weren't going to be each other's secretary. Now we just swear.

Mom Robodials....

Call Mrs. lefty. No answer.

Call landline. No answer.

Call lefty. No answer.

Call lefty: (friend of Mrs lefty) haven't been able to get in touch with her, what is her email address and clothing size?

Well, maybe the reason you haven't been able to get in touch with her is that she doesn't want to be touched. Do I look like her secretary?

Mom [10am]: Hi, are you working?

lefty: yeah, pretty much every weekday

Mom [10am Saturday]: are you sleeping?

BANG BANG BANG

Good thing I don't answer the phone or the door during working hours- it's distracting.

BANG BANG BANG

Mr lefty, we know you're in there. You just won Elon Musk's trip to Mars AND Publisher's Clearing House date with Marie Osmond! We have cameras, press, and neighbors out here waiting for you to open the door.

[gets dynamite sticks wrapped and ready...]

I'm thinking of changing our voicemail:

Thank you for calling the leftys. We're out or probably just don't want to talk to anybody. Leave a message and hold your breath until we get back to you.

That thing about us having good communication? I lied.

We have good communication like Brad Pitt has ugly chicks.

Of course it's all her fault. Unless you ask her, in which case it's my fault.

A friend said communication is all about pronouns, but not the kind people seem to think they're entitled to.

Men and women will recognize this one:

Take it to the kitchen.

That what to the kitchen?

The thing.

What thing?

You know, the thingy thing.

or

Put the pizza in the onion.

The onion?

The onion.

You can't physically put a pizza in an onion.

You do it all the time.

Are you talking about the oven? 

Yes, that's what I said.

No, you said put it in the onion.

I said oven.

Yes, Dear.

Here's where the fun starts:

Put the bag over there.

I can't possibly know where there is.

Nobody pointed to anywhere and there is no obvious place the bag would go.

Naturally, I'm the stupid one.

However,  nobody told me there was a part missing and a translation involved...

Put the bag over there means Hand me the bag and put the anvil over there 

Something tells me I'm not going to get out of this one alive.

My favorite bit of communication, which really isn't communication, is "Get me that box - it's over there."

This involves many tasks that are not apparent to the novice ear. 

Which box? There where?

This also contains a subliminal trick, which there's no way you could see coming...

Even after you figure out which box and where 'there' is, you spend 10 minutes looking for it, then you have to engage Her because you can't find it. 5 minutes later, it's "Oh, I'm sorry, I thought I put it there."

Meanwhile you're sweating bullets because it's supposed to be right in front of you and you can't see it.

I have a job list. No surprise for guys, it's a list of jobs to do around the house.

It's one of 30 job lists hidden around the house.

Job #1 is 'Find the job list.'

This is so loaded with permutations that you can live and die upon it. If you can't find the job list, you don't have to do anything. Of course if you don't do anything, you get right back to the somewhat agitated circumstances that caused the job list in the first place. 

The latest job list, the Official job list, was done a week ago. It is already missing.

I have asked twice as to its location. The first time it had moved under a spare television. As of last night, no one knows. And when I say no one knows, I mean someone is very angry at me because I don't know where it is. I know where it isn't: it isn't where it was left when it was drafted. Somehow this is my fault.

We're not an organized couple. In order to get a clue, she bought all sorts of books on organizing. They're currently blocking a doorway, next to the stack of books on getting rid of clutter.

I could write a book. I could write several books. No one would buy them, but I could write a book. A relationship, regardless of what kind, revolves around 2 people: one who sits on the couch a lot and one who gets upset a lot. Now I figure things would be so much better if the one who gets upset a lot wouldn't get so upset (a lot). This could lead to marital or other bliss. 

The one who sits a lot has developed his skill through years of sitting - he didn't just move in and plop himself down on a couch, no sir. He has a finely honed skill of ignoring things and people. One is not born with this skill. He can sit there and watch heavy iron cookware leap off counters, people throwing glassware, and a 1974 Camaro sitting in the living room without being bothered by any of it. 

The other person, not so much. 

This is not to say he will ignore a leak, especially one leaking on him, while he's on the couch. It's just not terribly likely he'll notice too many other leaks. Take it easy on him - he just figured out he has a back yard.  He started out ignoring his mother when he was young. This started his lifetime of skills. He proceeded to ignore teachers, then girlfriends, then cohabitants. This all led to his wife. She's probably his 2nd wife, because the first had a larger problem with being ignored than he thought. Bitch.

So I can't do stuff if I can't find the list.

Some of the stuff on the list is patently ridiculous, like cleaning gutters. If the Flying Spaghetti Monster had meant man to get up on really tall ladders, he would not have given him an incurable fear of heights. Sometimes the Listmaker also has a fear of heights (acrophobia or OH SHIT!!!). This might also remove other things from the list, like roofing, the part of the house that's falling down, pipes, and anything that involves dirt.  Ok, the dirt part is something different. Mother told me that when I was very little, I'd get my hands dirty and come home to wash them after playing. I remember none of this, but it makes a great story. It also explains why I'm a Knowledge Worker - I don't have to get my hands dirty. So anything involving dirt is out. Not liking dirt is a completely separate thing from compulsive hand washing, which used to be called OCD, but is now called good Flying AIDS hygiene.

I actually had a fight with a shipping/receiving department. He said bringing up the computer boxes was our job. We said boxes were his job: we're knowledge workers.

The slight exception is vacuuming. We all know how this winds up: the vacuum gets clogged up with animal, service elephant, and people hair, and winds up becoming airborne, taking out a few unnecessary lamps. This is an extremely clever way of clearing clutter and downsizing. When stuff doesn't work, launch it. So I've got vacuuming nailed.

Let's see... what else is on that mythical list that can't stay in 1 place for more than 2 hours...

We're plagued with Zombie Trash and Zombie Dishes. As soon as I do the dishes, they're back, like zombies. There are only 2 of us, yet the dishes sometimes come back in larger numbers. The trash goes out on trash day (I can perform this task also) and by the time the cans are back up, the one in the kitchen is full. I was thinking of getting one of those obnoxious ghostbuster groups in to study this, but they're afraid of zombie trash. This is why you never see episodes with trash in them. And that guy with the hat is so obnoxious, the house wouldn't let him in (Zac?). If he spent more time looking for ghosts and less time looking in the mirror... I liked that show were the 2 lead guys worked for Roto-Reuter. "We'll clean your pipes and get rid of your ghosts."  Actually the whole field is misnamed. They come into your house, completely disrupt everything, piss off the dog, and deploy video all over the place. They run around with meters, saying WOW - LOOKIDAT!" The ghosts shave half their body hair off overnight. The next day they sit you at a table and say, "Yup, you've got ghosts," then rush off in search of higher ratings.

So I have to be very careful not to let Zombie Trash or Dishes get me down.

Next on the job list, should we ever find it, is dusting.

This is a joke, and something we just put on the list for fun. We try dusting every now and then, but realize it's just not working. If you dust the tv, you get Zombie Dust the next day. Why bother? For our 20th anniversary in the house, we plan on dusting. We have the masks for it now...

Why does my neighbor drive with a mask on?

I wonder if he kisses his girlfriend with a condom on.

Putting stuff away: look, I have a lot of guitars and musical equipment. It would make sense that it's in a lot of places, right? My guitar room is overflowing. The point becomes moot when I mention someone's shoes all over the place because the shoe room is overflowing.  Look, I finally got rid of the Camaro in the living room - cut me a break. I still long for that beautiful blue tube tester for the living room, but it was too expensive. My friend still has that beautiful red air compressor in her family room and I didn't ask for one. Besides, if you put something away, you'll need it sooner, plus you won't remember where you put it away. It's easy for you to say you put it in the shoe room, but you will not be able to find it in the shoe room when you need it. If nothing else the Shoe Room Monster will have eaten it or moved it somewhere else. Let's see ghostbusters get rid of that problem. They'll have to carry diapers with them because they keep wetting their pants. The Shoe Room Monster plays nice with us, but doesn't like strangers.

I had a tube tester. It was from Radio Shack. I struck a deal to trade it for a piece of guitar gear. I made the mistake of giving her the tube tester first. She had the nerve to die in the meantime, leaving me without the tube tester or the guitar gear. I say ridiculous stuff on a regular basis, but I wasn't going to ask her husband for the tube tester back. 

Anybody seen my job list?