pic o’ the day: notice!

Notice!

So this one time I was down at the Heather, and, in fact, I’ve been there more than just the one time; I’m there all the damn time, in fact, I was there today, only this one time? That was not this time. It was a completely different time. It was the best of times, it was the worst of times.

What? I only had two drinks!

So this time, I was down at the Heather and so were quite a number of other people, it being, I think, a Friday, and don’t we all need a good, stiff drink of a Friday? Indeed we do, and particularly myself. And one of these other people, a loquacious and somewhat recovering-fratboy-type fellow of a certain girth and a certain volume, was telling another, a much more discreet and forgettable straight man type in a hat, that he loved living on the Downtown EastSide, and why? Why, because he could take pictures of the junkies tweaking in the alley and post them to his blog.

And, as he said this, I wrote it down.

Cuz that’s how I roll, yo.

And, as I wrote it down, the manageress discreetly elbowed said frat-alum and pointed in my direction for, lo, she knows my evil, gossip-recording shenanigans from way back, and is generally the sharpest knife in the drawer to boot.

And fratboy, looking straight at me, said, “OH! Well I guess I better be careful! Big Brother is watching!”

And I said, still writing and without looking up, “Yes, but at least he’s not taking pictures and uploading them to his blog.”

Which got, it must be said, a fair round of applause, if no free drinks.

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meet Banditcar, lightsaber sensei

Ah, I love the internets. Getting big online is like starting a religious cult: if something doesn’t exist in the real world, just make it up. Once enough people believe in your premise, Bob‘s your uncle.

Before eBay, did anybody think Six Million Dollar Man crap was really worth THAT much? Suppose I can’t be too smug, though: I actually HAD that t-shirt. And no, I didn’t get it at the time.

As I write this, I am pimping out my Second Life avatar in preparation for leading online blogging classes. So we’re all about the meta, the virtual, and the zeta today.
For an example of the kind of ephemeral (and temporary {hello Mahir! I kiss you!}) career which the intertubes have brought down the i-chute, may I present Bandicar, the Lightsaber Sensei.

With no fewer than 26 different saber spinning styles, each with its own YouTube video, a presumably economically-rewarding relationship with the manufacturer of regulation lightsabers, and a DVD release last year, Banditcar here has clearly maximized the metaverse’s potential for self-promotion.

Hmm, are lightsabers futuristic or retro?

I have to ask these things.

Whether he’d truly be any good in a real lightsaber fight is a question which is the quintessence of irrelevance, given that there is actually no such thing as a lightsaber and thus, no such thing as a real lightsaber fight. So, it’s not a real object or a real activity, but it is a real career. Got that? Hey, money’s just a mutually agreed upon delusion anyway. It makes TOTAL sense to me.

Now, to think of crossover opportunities. Oh, ComicCon, sure, but let’s get creative here. Lightsaber-wielding bodyguard? Hey, we’ve endured the Cooterflash Wars, the Duelling DUI‘s: since lengthy prison stints do tend to take one off TMZ‘s radar, perhaps Pimp My Bodyguard is the way to go, and in the darkness of most nightclubs I can’t think of a more impressive way to stand out in Teddy‘s than to be guarded by a ring of lightsaber stormtroopers. Oh, scuse me, I’ve got a call…

Vin Diesel on Line One.

Vin Diesel, nerd

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breaking news: Cheney’s missing fingers located!

Cheney Bush puppet

Reuters has the full report, but surely this is no suprise to anyone who’s been following the US political situation for the past seven years.

WASHINGTON (Reuters) – President George W. Bush had five polyps removed during a routine colon cancer test…

Acting Emperor Doctor Evil Dick Cheney had no comment.

He refused to remove his right hand from inside his jacket.

He likewise refused all requests to drink a glass of water while the President was speaking.

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Harold Bloom, literary lion, loses his shit on Potter fans…again

Harold Bloom

Some of those New York intellectual types can be rather tightly wound. Here, the OriginalUnoriginal reports as eminence grise Harold Bloom, the king of litcrit heavyweights, Sterling Professor for the Humanities at Yale University, and Berg Professor of English and American Literature at New York University, goes apeshit on some hapless Pottermaniacs.

“It’s crap! It’s fucking crap! It’s double fucking crap!” He ranted at the assembly of overtly nerdy adults and blank-faced children – many wearing faux dark-rimmed glasses and wizard hats – who seemed more perplexed by Bloom’s sub-references than intimidated by his harangue.

“What’s a Northrop Frye?” one school-aged boy with an “I Heart Hogwarts” t-shirt asked his mother.

“I don’t know,” she responded. “Maybe some kind of breakfast special?”

He was taken away in an ambulance, attended closely by officers of the NYPD, but was expected to make a full recovery after a course of treatment at St. Mungo’s Hospital.

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Harry Potter final paragraph

wave, Harry, wave. You're doomed anyway

Here it is, folks: the penultimate paragraph in the most hotly-anticipated book of all time. I stole it from Gawker, and have secreted it over the jump so as to preserve the innocence of any innocents who happen to stumble across the demented galaxy which is the ol’ raincoaster blog.

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