I would like to spend a couple romantic days in Paris with my wife in July. How does one go about finding an appropriate hotel there? What should one see and do while in the city? How does one avoid freaking out re: pickpockets (my personal travel phobia on any trip anywhere)?
Two bowling pins walk into a bar.
Bartender: Could either of you guys spare a hand? My help is all on strike. I’m really handicapped here. Now I’m being investigated for labor violations, but I was framed. Seriously, it’s a perfect frame. They all just split. I’d say something about Kegler exercises but I can’t fit it in. Get your minds out of the gutter.
Pin 1: Sorry, we don’t have hands.
Pin 2: How’s your campaign to alienate everyone coming?
Pin 1: Fine. I tracked down an old friend and she wrote back all isn’t the future great internet etc and for an … Continue Reading
As luck would have it, the real estate agent was demonstrating the panic room when the house was attacked.
Like, what are the chances of that?
Million to one.
“The walls look like sheetrock, but they’re all brick. And the panic room here, super hard military brick and steel and shit.”
Everything was beige. I wasn’t too enthused about that, but I don’t mind painting.
“When we close the door, it doesn’t re-open unless we tell it to. No one’s getting in here.”
I pointed at the security monitors. “Like that?”
We watched as they breached the first two rings of defenses with trained skill.
“I’ll be damned,” … Continue Reading
They lay there on the flat rooftop in their yoga pants on their yoga mats. The slaughter had begun down in the streets, but they were too high up to hear the screams.
There are two sorts of people, she said, Here we are, now entertain us people, and here we are now, entertain us people.
There are two sorts of people, he said, people who dislocate their hips, and people who don’t.
There are two sorts of people, she said. People who are allergic to gluten, and people who are not allergic to gluten.
There are two sorts of people, he said. People … Continue Reading
You know, the alternate life form thing post, there is apparently a whole theory of that, you can read about it here. The shadow biosphere, kewl.
That really ticks me off, when other scientists beat me to the punch like that.
That is all, more or less.
Great morning fog these past two days. And warmer, so I only have to feed the birds every other morning.
The cats miss their mistress, and are acting weird, except perhaps the old red one who seems to have imprinted me when I taught him to eat solid food way back when. We were given him way too young, it turned out.
And there is the annual worrying about are the tortoises alive or dead, did they make it through the winter, doubly so this time as we boarded a guest. Two guests, actually, but one woke … Continue Reading
As it is her story and not mine, I won’t go into detail, but Beta is okay. It was worse than it would be in a perfect world, but a lot better than it could have been, and I am finding all sorts of ways to be proud of her, before, during and after.
And did you know someone can go on a business trip somewhere, Tokyo say, and you can send flowers to their hotel? How cool is that? The only problem is, if you do it once, you have to do it forever. But as problems go, that’s surmountable. … Continue Reading
The geological crustologist wakes with a desperate, lunatic energy he normally gets only at full or new moons. He wonders about the moon phase. The light is weird, he checks his alarm clock, the light is weird because it’s only three AM.
Also: what is a squamous moon? He’ll have to google that later. He can’t sleep. He gives up around four AM and gets up. He feeds cats and makes coffee and sits down and is suddenly sleepy, but it’s too late to go back to bed. He does yoga. He drinks more coffee.
Hello black hole, says the geological crustologist. … Continue Reading
This guy is feeling blocked. Like, he’ll lie awake at night, or be woken up in the middle of the night by cats, and have all these great ideas, so great, he thinks, that he’s sure to remember them in the morning, which he doesn’t of course, and when he sits down to actually produce something, well that’s the problem, he never actually sits down to produce anything. But then someone says, that’s odd, if someone were to tell me to write something about specific topic X, I would be totally stuck, yet you, told the same thing, bubble with … Continue Reading
First of all, thanks to all entrants in this year’s contest, and special thanks to A.C. Teathorn, who kindly agreed to adjudicate this year. Both the volume and quality of the entries makes judging a difficult job, and it’s always nice to have someone else do a difficult job.
Rather than single non-winners out for praise, which only risks pissing people off, let me say only that A.C. Teathorn and I agreed on the high quality of most entries and think you people are really great.
For the first time (I think, and I’m too lazy to check past contests, plus … Continue Reading