The Wife keeps a housecat that she's had for about three years now. Unfortunately, the animal suffers from some kind of Dr. Jekyl and Mr. Hyde syndrome; which manifests itself in bouts of cuddling/wanting to be scratched follwed immediately by fits of rage. Seriously, she'll be shoving herself on you for affection, and then she'll whip around and try to take a peice of your hand off. I've had it with that beast; I hate the damned thing.

That being said, I think it would be cruel to torture or harm the animal in any way. I have thought about taking it down to the beach and attempting some kind of return to the wild type of experiment. This, of course, would require buy-in from The Wife (impossible, I already asked) or a covert operation. I'm not good at keeping secrets (hence, I only keep a few so that they're easy to keep track of); so that's not an option either.

After considering various methods of attack, I've decided that the only feasible strategy is to bring an animal into the house that makes the cat never want to return. I know a dog would work, but I don't want an adult dog; and puppies don't scare anyone. Plus, it would have to be a pretty big dog, because I've seen this feline attack dogs for getting sniffy around her ass. It almost made me want to keep her, but it reminded what kind of shredding those claws are capable of.

I did a pretty exhaustive internet search to look for merchants who sold miniature tigers (you know, like those miniature poodles), I'd totally buy a miniature tiger. No such luck, meh. Except for these things called serval cats, and they squick me out.

Although I did find a site on the web where you can buy monkeys; it was pretty expensive but I decided that it would be effective and quite entertaining. So for a couple grand I picked up this thing called a macaque, it looked big enough and sort of smart. Let me tell you something about monkeys - those things are fucking retarded. It scared the cat enough alright, but I couldn't get it to stop eating it's own shit long enough to train it to bring me a beer; let alone iron my office clothes.

I took it down to the beach last weekend and reintroduced it to the wild. The little bugger's still alive, because I catch a blurb about him in the police blotter every few days.

At this point, I can't think of any more animals that might fit the bill; so I'm turning to you guys. I've only got a few criteria:
1. No poisonous animals. I don't want this thing creeping up on me when I'm sleeping or drunk.
2. Can't be much larger than 30lbs or so.
3. Needs to be somewhat intelligent or trainable.

I'm taking all ideas at this point, and I'll post feedback here for each one that I try. Thanks for your help!

Posted by: shank at 08:37 PM | Comments (4) | Add Comment
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Flat front pants are horrible; I don't care how you cut it. There's just not enough room in the crotch of a pair of those things for a real set of balls. Seriously, I wore a pair all day today at the office; and my nutsack is still creased. I'm hoping that the throbbing ache will dull tomorrow. Unbelievable. Seriously, I was going to post a photo of what a guy's package looks like in a pair of those pants when he's sitting down; but seeing as how you could make out every wrinkle and vein, I decided against the pics. It's not like I've got abnormally large bits, in fact I'm sure it's a mindset. See, I'm a pretty laid back person, when I'm not at work my fashion sense most closely resembles something The Dude might don. My totally relaxed nuts just can't hack that buttoned down coporate bullshit man.

Check out this thread at HotAir, with the Loose Change wingnuts debating with some Popular Mechanics folks who no doubtedly contributed to the now epic article.

I was eating one of those dill pickles at work today - one of the kind that comes as a whole pickle, not a spear - and the fucking thing absolutely exploded on me. No one was in my office at the time, and eventually the juice dried up; but I smelled like a total moron all day long. It was very unprofessional.

Posted by: shank at 07:16 PM | Comments (10) | Add Comment
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IÂ’m having a hard time differentiating between the technically stupid, those having a very low IQ, and those who are either crazy or emotionally disturbed. I used to think that people who were acting unreasonably about something were all half-wits. My wife patiently explained to me that thatÂ’s not always the case. Her claim was that some people are so emotionally immature/disturbed that that it overrides the logical thought process.

We were discussing the idiots who claim that 9/11 was perpetrated not by terrorists but by our government. She reasoned that some people, in spite of normal intelligence, are so emotionally invested, in this case with their hatred of Chimpy, that reasonable thought is simply not possible.

I countered with the fact that if that is indeed true, and that they can’t “think straight” due to whatever emotional problems they might have, that they are crazy. There was a debate about temporary insanity versus just plain crazy, but we decided that yeah, they’re crazy.

I have assembled the following formulas to aid in your understanding of these matters:

A genuine moron = a genuine moron

Normal IQ + emotional instability = a half-wit (for all intents and purposes)

A moron + emotional instability = an online customer service rep or blogger

High IQ + emotional instability = a serial killer or mad scientist

How crazy is crazy? I donÂ’t know, but I suspect a lot of people I have contact with every day are a hell of a lot crazier than many people under lock and key on the 8th floor somewhere. I reckon it to alcoholics. You have your unemployed blathering hobos and your functioning alcoholics. Same with crazies.

And nobody knows what to do with the nuts. As long as theyÂ’re not killing people were content to let them walk around with the rest of us. ItÂ’s really the only explanation for a lot of the people I see every day. And the range is huge. I know a guy who walks around all day grunting, laughing too hard at almost anything anyone says and occasionally singing in gibberish like a toddler. HeÂ’s a fucking nut. All I can do is keep my distance and shake my head.

But IÂ’ll tell you this. Not a day goes by where I donÂ’t expect somebody to start clawing at themselves and jump through a first floor window.

Posted by: Pixy Misa at 07:04 PM | Comments (3) | Add Comment
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I was working on this longwinded post regarding geopolitical strategy that cited recent global developments and intelligence reports from StratFor.com; but halfway through it I figured "Fuck that. It's Friday."

more...

Posted by: shank at 03:05 PM | Comments (1) | Add Comment
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My cohort has alerted me to the news that Bob DylanÂ’s new album is currently number one.

Being perfectly frank, I can only handle Dylan in very small doses. I like Desire, Blood on the Tracks, and Blonde on Blonde, but I canÂ’t really listen to more than three Dylan songs in a row. And that could last me more than a year. But IÂ’ve got a lot of respect for his songwriting which is brilliant.

I hear heÂ’s got a show on satellite radio now, though I canÂ’t imagine it. I havenÂ’t heard the guy speak in years, but the last time I did I couldnÂ’t understand a word he said. ThatÂ’s not an exaggeration; I mean I literally couldnÂ’t understand a single syllable. Might as well have been Klingon or Laotian.

Regardless, he’s got a number one album and I’ve reached the point where any album not recorded by a boy band or lip synching strumpet is a triumph. I have no use for house, techno, hip, hop or anything recorded by people who have gone to the “Creed” school of moan rock. I am old and jaded and I remember the days when people actually wrote their own songs. I remember the days when you put on an album and listened to the whole thing because it was good. The order of songs on an album was a big deal.

ThatÂ’s no longer true because the music industry cultivates only the most processed shite and gang rap. There you have it, two choices; completely emasculating or violence inducing.

I take this Dylan thing as a sign, especially after the old bastard starting spouting off about how all music these days is crap. He may be unintelligible but heÂ’s no dumbass.

I need to dig out my copy of Almost Famous tonight.

Posted by: Pixy Misa at 04:54 PM | Comments (1) | Add Comment
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I caught the same blurb that Paul did today. Look, I feel like I've said this 'til I was blue in the face, and I must've linked this exact same link a million motherfucking times.

IT'S A LITTLE FUCKING MAGAZINE THAT GOES BY THE NAME OF POPULAR MECHANICS, AND THEY WROTE AN ARTICLE ABOUT THIS SHIT FOUR FUCKING YEARS AGO, IN WHICH THEY CONSULTED 300 FUCKING EXPERTS IN ALL FIELDS FROM AIR CRAFT ANALYSIS, AIR DEFENSE, AVIATION, STRUCTURAL ENGINEERING AND . . . . BUILDING COLLAPSE.

So help me Baby Jesus, if I hear one more word about this shit from somebody, I'm going to have the mother of all aneurysms. Seriously, my veins will bulge from my head in such a fabulously bulbous manner, that I will pluck them from my skin, point the pulsing blood stream at standers-by and scream; "THIS IS WHAT YOU GET FOR BEING A BUNCH OF DUMB FUCKING MORONS WHO NEVER READ SHIT THAT REALLY MATTERED, INSTEAD OPTING TO EAT THE INTELLECTUAL SLOP LAYED DOWN BEFORE YOU BY IGNORANT SENSATIONALISTS BENT NOT ON THE TRUTH, BUT ON PROFIT ALONE!"

As an aside, I think my caps lock is broken.

Posted by: shank at 06:27 PM | Comments (3) | Add Comment
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Seventy-five “leading scholars and professors” have gone off the deep end. They claim that 9/11 was an inside job to justify overtaking the muslim world.

Laugh if you like. I did at first, before I became enraged.

"We challenge this official conspiracy theory and, by God, we're going to get to the bottom of this."

IÂ’d like to get to the bottom of a few things myself. Like finding out which universities in particular harbor these half-wits under the umbrella of tenure. I wish J. Edgar were still alive, because when he wasnÂ’t wearing womenÂ’s clothes, he was all over shit like this.

IÂ’m a big fan of Hoovers. He engaged in blackmailing notable public figures and other effective means of dealing with the unsavory elements.

Hoover habitually fired FBI agents, either randomly or by singling out those who "looked stupid like truck drivers" or had "pointy heads." (wikipedia)

Posted by: Pixy Misa at 10:41 AM | No Comments | Add Comment
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I bought a new grill over the weekend which was a real pain in the ass. IÂ’m the kind of guy that researches every grill made before buying one. Anyway, the market is now full of stainless steel grills because people have finally gotten tired of replacing these things every year and by now all the manufacturers have realized they can get more money for stainless.

Unfortunately, the quality of stainless steel varies greatly. When you buy silverware, actually cheap flatware, you can see on the box the ratio of nickel to stainless, usually 18/10 or 18/8. The stuff with more nickel has a higher luster. Well, you canÂ’t do that on a grill yet but IÂ’m here to tell you, you get what you pay for and most of these stainless grills are of poor quality stainless and will look like shit directly. Also, the burners, the important part, are sometimes made out of crap while the rest of the grill is stainless.

Regardless, I picked one but the half-wit at Home Depot decides he doesnÂ’t want to look for one in the box, he wants to sell me the floor model. I know the floor model wonÂ’t fit into my car because I was bright enough to measure before coming into the store and I was standing there with my own tape measure when he tried to pawn it off.

“This won’t fit in my car.”

“What kind of car do you have?”

“Just get me one in a box.”

“We can deliver it.”

“Get me one in a box.”

Forty-five minutes later I leave with the grill. I carefully unpacked each piece. I opened up the bag with all the screws, counted them, and placed each individual size into itÂ’s own little Tupperware things which I keep for these occasions. I laid out all the tools I could possibly need and more, just in case. I am an expert assembler.

I then checked all the parts according to the instructions and put them into a rough order as I would need them. The final step was to sit down on the couch and read the instructions cover to cover, insuring I knew how the process would pan out as I progressed. I noted that there were some problems with the illustrations, namely, that they seemed to be rough crayon type sketches similar to what a child draws when they have no sense of perspective. There was no detail at all, just rough blocks of out of focus shapes.

Well, I could work around that. However, the instructions themselves seemed to have a lot of words I’d never come across before and I have a large vocabulary. In three languages. I figured I could work around that too, being mechanically inclined. In addition, there was no mention anywhere in the instructions of the many washers and lock-washers enclosed. Not enough for every bolt but plenty of them and I would have to guess on those, as well as a large piece of grill, about 24” x 6” that was also mentioned nowhere in the instructions.

After struggling for thirty minutes trying to attach the heavy-ass weighted base to some legs with no help, on the next step I realized I had them on backwards and had to start again. They were backwards because the instructions were backwards. Literally. That started a long afternoon of swearing and sweating. The high point was trying to decifer sentences that went like this:

“Place F end C into equipment section vsentraew.”

Nice, huh? By the time I got the damned thing together I was fit to be tied and IÂ’m good at that crap. I was a broken man by days end.

Posted by: Pixy Misa at 05:39 PM | Comments (2) | Add Comment
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What do these three things have in common?

Brit Rockers Attack Timberlake
MTV Awards Suffer Big Hit in Ratings
Banksy targets Paris Hilton

Could it be that people have finally had enough shit thrown at them? I know that the masses haven’t wised up—it would be absurd to think people finally woke up with some taste and intelligence. And the stepford factor runs deep; there’s no way to deprogram everyone. But at least there are signs of hope.

I have no idea who this British band is bashing Timberlake but they have my support and best wishes. If more people spoke up and called a spade a spade we wouldn’t be so tolerant of this type of shite. And that’s exactly what it is. Remember people, we once overthrew disco in a coup d'état started by the common man. Do you have to be kicked in the head by a mule to realize that this guy is to music what Sherwin-Williams is to art?

The fact that MTV lost 28% over last years ratings on the awards was also encouraging. ItÂ’s all become tiresome.

And last but not least, some idiot “artist” smuggled 500 doctored copies of Paris Hilton’s album into music stores throughout the UK where they are being sold without the shops knowledge. In place of her shitty music is a basic rhythm track with wacky sound bites of her stupidity dubbed over it and all the photos have been ‘shopped to replace her head with her dog's, etc. The track listing on the back has been replaced with questions like, “Why am I famous?,” “What have I done?” and the classic, “What am I for?”

Momentum. WeÂ’re gaining momentum.

Posted by: Pixy Misa at 07:35 AM | Comments (7) | Add Comment
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Okay, so it basically just rained it's ass off. We didn't even lose power. By 11:30pm we were so bored, we decided to take the truck out for a little 4x4 action. Well, when you throw a couple of kids, a few beers, a truck, and a hurricane into a bowl and stir them up; you end up with two soaking wet idiots in need of a tow truck. Nobody got hurt or anything like that (Christ, I said a few beers), but you can't help but feel like an idiot when you have to explain something like this: more...

Posted by: shank at 04:39 PM | Comments (17) | Add Comment
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