Yes, yes, we’re all about the pirates lately. You know you love it.
This is a Blogathon post. Don’t just sit there, SPONSOR ME!
Category Archives: Historical
Operation Global Media Domination: The Proust Questionnaire Situation
Yes, yet another self-referential blog post. After all, what else is there for me to talk about but…you know…me? I’m an expert on me. I know me backwards and forwards, inside and out (or at least I do since I saw that CAT scan) upside and down.
In Bizarro World, raincoaster falls asleep every night promptly at a reasonable hour, beside one of: Viggo Mortensen, Johnny Depp, Steve Jobs, James Tiberius Kirk, Henry V as played by Kenneth Branagh, Michael Lewis, or Sebastian Junger; the bed is stuffed with fluffy, fluffy Krugerrands, and the nightgown is carved from one solid, flawless diamond. Ah, for a life of ease!
In Bizarro World, raincoaster works for Vanity Fair, or rather VF publishes old blog posts of mine, with the YouTubes embedded right in the glossy pages using special technology developed just for me.
And, most importantly, in Bizarro World raincoaster is profiled by Vanity Fair.
The raincoaster Proust Questionnaire:
1. What is your idea of perfect happiness?
Uh, didn’t you READ the post?
2. What is your greatest fear?
Server problems. If a blog falls in the forest and nobody’s subscribed to the RSS feed…
3. What is the trait you most deplore in yourself?
Modesty. I’ve almost completely succeeded in eradicating it, but not quite.
4. What is the trait you most deplore in others?
An inability to recognize my awesomenosity
5. Which living person do you most admire?
Besides myself?
6. What is your greatest extravagance?
Gin. My liver has a vested interest in keeping me poor and sober.
7. What is your current state of mind?
Fried. This getting up in the MORNING is for the birds. Right, birds wake up early. Birds eat worms. Therefore, getting up early sucks.
8. What do you consider the most overrated virtue?
Getting up early, duh. Haven’t you been reading?
9. On what occasion do you lie?
When the truth would give a falsely modest impression of my awesomenosity. It just wouldn’t be fair.
10. What do you most dislike about your appearance?
My tentacles will NOT stay combed.
11. Which living person do you most despise?
Is Thatcher still alive? Bush? The guy who cancelled M.A.S.H.? WHY MUST THESE QUESTIONS BE SO HARD?
12. What is the quality you most like in a man?
The ability to be Viggo Mortensen.
13. What is the quality you most like in a woman?
The ability not to get between me and Viggo Mortensen.
14. Which words or phrases do you most overuse?
Me, Myself and I would like you to define “overuse.”
15. What or who is the greatest love of your life?
Again, I am forced to ask haven’t you been reading this?
16. When and where were you happiest?
Any day now.
17. Which talent would you most like to have?
The ability to fake sincerity.
18. If you could change one thing about yourself, what would it be?
My socks. And if you were sitting beside me, you wouldn’t need to ask why.
19. What do you consider your greatest achievement?
Earning the good home-maker badge and the whatchamacallit, housewife emblem, in Girl Guides, thus proving once and for all that I can do ANYTHING.
20. If you were to die and come back as a person or a thing, what would it be?
The vindictive joke of a malevolent god, that’s what me coming back would be. The fucker.
21. Where would you most like to live?
Olympus. Failing that, Not-Ucluelet.
22. What is your most treasured possession?
My self-possession, obviously!
23. What do you regard as the lowest depth of misery?
No Followers.
24. What is your favorite occupation?
What are you hiring for, big fella?
25. What is your most marked characteristic?
Did you read this one?
26. What do you most value in your friends?
The ability to buy me drinks at the Heather.
27. Who are your favorite writers?
The ones who buy me drinks, and not just what they’re having.
28. Who is your hero of fiction?
I’d say Caspian the Tenth, King of Narnia, but he’s not fictional.
29. Which historical figure do you most identify with?
Myself.
30. Who are your heroes in real life?
See #27
31. What are your favorite names?
Robin, Anastasia, Skippy the Klingon
32. What is it that you most dislike?
Blogathons
33. What is your greatest regret?
Volunteering to do this blogathon without laying in an adequate supply of gin and/or z’s.
34. How would you like to die?
Vindicated. Stole that one from Fran Lebowitz, but how could I not?
35. What is your motto?
49 degrees latitude, 360 degrees attitude!
This is a Blogathon post. Don’t just sit there, SPONSOR ME!
DJ Winston
Everyone knows that Winston Churchill was one of the greatest Prime Ministers that Britain ever had. Many people also know he was an alcoholic. Some people know he was a wit. And a few know he was a painter of moderate talents.
But who knew he was a rapper?
Behold the wonder which is DJ Winston, as he and his crew get this dinner party started!
via Neatorama
The Decisive Moment, Updated
Some things (mostly Parisian things, it must be admitted) are classics.
The Decisive Moment, 1932
Some things are more of their time.
The Decisive Moment, 2009
Requiem for Franklin on a G String
Technically, it’s a bikini.
Raised, as I was, to learn the ways of the woods old-skool, telling direction with nothing more elaborate than a stick, tracking lynxes and bobcats, and finding fresh water aided by the smell of unseen ferns, I cast a skeptical eye on modern technology dependent on batteries, satellites, and whether or not you’ve renewed your license on that sorry-ass copy of Outlook on your computer back home.
Not to mention the three hour hike around the lake that was invisible to the GPS. Remember, when you’re using one of those things in Canada you’re rather in the position Columbus was in; ie, you have a pretty good idea more or less where A is, and B as well, but you don’t exactly know what you’ll encounter when you try to connect those two dots, because nobody’s done it yet. What will you encounter? Almost certainly things. Like lakes. And barbed wire. And lynxes and bobcats.
So, for me, I prefer the old-skool tools. After all, a cigar may not always be a cigar or a rock a rock, but a stick is pretty much more or less always a stick and even when it’s not, you can usually get it to hold still long enough to work. Cold-blooded things such as stick insects and other items which spring to mind are known to slow down, even to the point of immobility, in Arctic conditions.
Surprisingly, if the temperatures are cold enough, you can even get a bikini to hold still long enough to be put to practical use.
Hot:
Cold:
“Due to our proximity to the Magnetic North Pole, our compasses are currently going haywire, said navigator Ann Daniels. “The earth’s strong magnetic field on this part of the ocean means that the compass needle simply spins uselessly in its housing. As such, we’re currently relying on more traditional methods for day-to-day navigation, using the sun (for those few precious hours each day when it graces us with its presence), and using wind direction, as indicated by the panties…”
Polar Panties of Power!
If only Franklin had toted a pair of these along on his fatal expedition, perhaps things might have gone very differently. While Gizmodo says there is no word on whether the woman pictured above actually wears the windsock panties when they are not otherwise occupied, certain of the more broad-minded among us (and I refer, of course, to myself) are wondering whether or not there might be any Englishmen among the team.
raincoaster 