Vacant lotting you know whom

2003-08-14T19:50:00.000-04:00

Um.... So, I was walking down the street the other day, and the lights went off, and then what did I saw, "Ed, you are a big Con. Peace!" I then saw Yassar Arafat. He was in the Middle East.

2003-08-14T19:23:00.001-04:00

post, how bout toast!!!

2003-08-14T19:23:00.000-04:00

post, how bout toast!!!

2003-08-14T18:54:00.000-04:00

No blackout at Boycott. We are well-lit, but vacant, lot.

Funes has escaped, is posting regularly on other blogs. Morale is dead. Long live Morale.

2003-07-24T19:15:00.000-04:00

Announcing a new Product from the Vacant Lot: Enemyster

Based on the fundamental proposition that "the enemy of my enemy is my friend," we realize that all the world can be organized in alternating levels of "Enemy - Friend - Enemy - Friend" relationships. It is our goal to automate that task. Consider the following (reflecting the realistic world of law school hypotheticals):

Bill, driving home from work, gets cut off rudely by Sue, who is on her way to the mall. Sue, while at the mall, gets into a disagreement with Jeff, a clerk, and threatens to harm Jeff and Jeff's offspring. Jeff's offspring, at school the next day, gets into a altercation with the schoolyard bully, and pulls a 9mm pistol and wounds the bully in the leg. The bully is taken to a hospital, where he is vehemently reprimanded for his bullying by his uncle-twice-removed, who then returns to his Secret Undisclosed Location. The uncle-twice-removed then helps coordinate the bombing of a third world nation.

The following day, all the above log in to Enemyster, and list their experiences and their enemies. They then go into their separate chatrooms, where the following conversation is recorded:

Sue: I like going to the mall.
Bully: No way! I spend much of the money I collect from robbing small children at the mall. As soon as I get out of the hospital maybe we can meet up at the mall.
Leader of Nation: I also enjoy malls. That is where I buy my attractive dictator's clothing.
Sue: Do you shop at the Gap?
Leader: No, there are no Gap outlets near me. My sons tell me the Gap has quite reasonable prices, too.
Bully: Do your sons want to come over and play?
Leader: No, my sons are cruel and sadistic thugs. Also, they are dead.
Sue: Is that so?
Leader: Yes.
Bully: I could tell my uncle to stop bombing your small nation, but he is angry at me now because I got shot in my leg while robbing Jeff's offspring.
Leader: That's okay. I am thinking of emigrating and opening a five-and-ten store near a mall in Iowa.
Sue: Is that so?
Leader: That's right. I will give you a 10% discount.
Sue: You are a swell guy.
Bully: That would make it a 4.5-and-9 store.
Leader: You have a quick wit, Bully. My sadistic and thuggish sons would have enjoyed your company.

Tomorrow: Conversation from the other room.

2003-06-26T15:22:00.000-04:00

Good news, agnostic readers! Funes recently learned that he performed very well on his G.E.D. test, and therefore is quite likely to receive a high school degree. Well done, Funes!

In other news, I think this an appropriate time to share a little bit about myself:

It was my second year of vocational school and there I was, as usual, browsing in a bookstore, looking for something to steal. This was not, however, any ordinary bookstore. It was a Waldenbooks, marked primarily by its small size, poor selection, and emphasis on self-help books. And there I saw, lying cleverly (or perhaps ironically) in the section marked "Books about People Who Mistook Their Wives for Hats," The Man Who Mistook His Wife for a Hat. The title caught my eye, but I caught it with a left hook and it released its grip. I read the synopsis on the dust jacket, but this only led to uncontrollable sneezing (I am allergic to dust). I then placed the book back onto the shelf, but only after scribbling "Scharlach was Here! Funes is a Girl!" on each page, using my left hand to disguise my handwriting.

It was at this time that I realized that my interests, though seemingly all the same, were in fact - all the same. My sleeping late in the mornings; my napping during class; my refusal to go out in the evenings - they all indicated that, as I had suspected, I was really interested in being lazy.
This was also reflected in my academic pursuits. Only the last term I had taken a course on "Laziness: the Po-mo Industry" and a course on "Poetry: Like Prose, only Shorter." At the time, I was taking a tutorial on "Sleeping During the Middle Ages," or, as my tutor suggested we call it, "Sleeping During Medieval Times."

I also realized that even my most un-academic interest - humorous burglary and arson - was related to my interest in laziness. Even as a child, I enjoyed breaking into, and subsequently setting afire in a spirit of generous mirth, neighbors' homes. As time passed, I began branching out into school buildings and cultural sites. I realized now that this was all building up to the day when, so as to avoid having to get up for an 8:30 class, I burned down all the buildings on my college campus. Through this interest in burglary and arson, I have developed a skill with burglars' tools, kerosene, and matches, and believe that this skill will come in handy whenever I have to break out of a prison. Though, considering the extreme leisure and low expectations placed on those in prison, I also realize that I have always been on a path that would lead me there.

2003-06-17T14:23:00.000-04:00

Momentous times here at the Vacant Lot. Yes, illegitimate readers, one old friend of Funes and Scharlach, the Big Kid, is getting married, leaving bacherlorhood ("the 'hood") behind. No longer will he dwell with us in the 'hood, living large and carefree and laughing it up and, at least in the case of Funes, drawing hefty unemployment benefits. No, the Big Kid now ventures forth into the uncharted lands of Married Life, accompanied perhaps by Funes' cousin, who may or may not be getting married. Scharlach's cousin, incidentally, just had another child, who now joins the other two who so frightened Funes at an earlier time.

The OED, incidentally, claims that the origin of the word bachelor is shrouded in mystery, or perhaps in Turin. In any case, it seems that bachelor did not, as I had long thought, derive from a description of "one proficient in writing batch files." Chaucer, in the Merchant's Tale, wrote in 1386: "Bacheleris haue often peyne and wo." Not true. Chaucer was a chump, and a very poor speller as well. Bachelors have all the fun. Married people have the peyne and wo (see also the OED's expressive synonym for wo, "waesucks"). They also, and don't tell this to Funes, have the kids - short, small, requiring constant attention, and with little earning power.

So, in short, Funes and Scharlach will travel to Hicksville, New Hampshire (or is that redundant), where the Big Kid will leave the 'hood. Bon voyage, as they say, and don't forget to write.

Incidentally, Chaucer's references to peyne remind me of one of the few interesting things I learned in law school. The Statute of Westminster I (1275) provided that those criminal defendants who refused to enter a plea of guilty or not guilty would be thrown into a "hard and strong prison" (prison forte et dure) until they agreed to plead. (There was actually a reason why they might refuse to plead if, for example, they knew they would be found guilty in the end - by refusing to plead, their guilt was never fully adjudicated, and therefore the forfeiture provisions that operated automatically upon determinations of guilt would not take effect, and therefore the defendant's relatives might not be deprived of inheriting the defendant's property.) Anyway, over time and due to the tragically low standards of penmanship in those days, prison forte et dure came to be confused with peine forte et dure (I had a professor who could explain exactly why this particular misspelling occurred, due in part to the weird contractions they used in that day). Peine forte et dure ("hard and strong pain") came to be interpreted to mean placing large rocks on people until they agreed to plead or were pressed to death. This practice was finally abolished in 1772 - the last recorded case of a prisoner being crushed to death was in 1741 in Cambridge (England, not Massachusetts). Slow pressing to death - yes, that seems an apt analogy for marriage....

2003-06-12T23:02:00.000-04:00

Updates:

S.A. Hammett, writing under the name Phillip Paxton, authored a number of humorous tall tales about Texas life in the 1840s and 1850s, including among them Piney Woods Tavern, or Sam Slick in Texas (1858). See here.

I have located the citation for, but been unable to find online, an article entitled, "Swift's Yahoo and King Jehu: Genesis of an Allusion." The article is by Laura B. Kennelly, and was in English Language Notes 26.3.

2003-06-12T22:48:00.000-04:00

Things have been unusually quiet of late at the Vacant Lot. You know whom has left the continent, making it quite easy to boycott her, and Funes is on pilgrimage to his Cathar homeland. Libyans also have been strangely quiescent. The boycott has been sailing along very peacefully. I feel, however, the need for a lengthy, pointless, and pedantic post so as to keep up morale. I will now attempt to deal with that need.

Funes recently sent me a fine book, entitled God's Secretaries, about the King James translation of the Bible. Funes is always very good for supplying informative books about the Bible. (The book can be bought on Amazon.com together with Simon Winchester's Krakatoa for substantial savings - a $50.90 value for only $33.04 when bought together.) Anyway, reading this book, and browsing randomly through the Old Testament during a class at church, reminded me of one of the greatest passages from the KJV.

In a modern translation, the NIV, 2 Kings 9:20 reads:

The lookout reported, "He has reached them, but he isn't coming back either. The driving is like that of Jehu son of Nimshi - he drives like a madman."

Interesting, certainly. In the KJV, though, it becomes poetry:

And the watchman told, saying, He came even unto them, and cometh not again: and the driving is like the driving of Jehu the son of Nimshi; for he driveth furiously.

This picturesque turn of phrase led to Jehu entering the English language as a word for a "fast or furious driver." Thus, according to the OED, Dryden wrote in 1692, "But this new Jehu spurs the hot-mouth'd horse." (The OED incidentally, is the subject of a boring book on a fascinating topic by previously-mentioned Simon Winchester, whose Krakatoa can be bought together with God's Secretaries. Both Funes and I agree that Winchester's book on the gentleman who did yeoman work on the OED while confined in an insane asylum should be spell-binding but, to be honest, isn't. But that's neither here nor, as it turns out, there.)

Jehu is not to be confused with Jehoshaphat, another biblical king whose name has entered popular speech, as a "mild expletive." Thus, says the OED, S.A. Hammett wrote in 1857, "Jehosophat! Easy over the stones, Joe, ses I." This passage is intriguing, but alas the OED provides no more information. More research is required. Which stones? Why over the stones? Who's Joe?

Nor, for that matter, is Jehu to be confused with Je-ho, also something of an interjection, but one given to horses, a la Gee-Ho. The OED quotes Arbuthnot writing in 1731, "Like the Je-ho to loitering Horses." Again, it is unclear, but it seems perhaps unlikely, whether this is the same Arbuthnot who is the Cliche Expert so beloved by Funes.

Returning to Jehu, we learn that he is an intriguing historical figure. The Black Obelisk of Shalmaneser III, king of Assyria from 858 to 824 B.C., currently housed in the British Museum, includes a picture of Jehu rendering tribute to Shalmaneser. This panel is the earliest surviving picture of an Israelite. The caption, in cuneiform, reads:

The tribute of Jehu, son of Omri: I received from him silver, gold, a golden bowl, a golden vase with pointed bottom, golden tumblers, golden buckets, tin, a staff for a king [and] spears.

The obelisk was discovered in 1846. The story of the excavation can be found here. A picture of the obelisk:

I have searched for, but been unable to find, information suggesting that Jehu and Yahoo are somehow connected. More information to follow.

2003-05-23T02:52:00.000-04:00

Movie Commentary:

Many people have been confused by the blockbuster movie Matrix: Reloaded. It has provoked many discussions, as some of the crucial details are left unexplained: why, for example, can Neo stop the machines at the end of the movie? how can Agent Smith enter the brain of a person supposedly in the real world? what are all the TV screens in the Architect's room showing? People have proposed many different solutions. The most common one is that there is a matrix within a matrix - in other words, that Zion is itself within a matrix. Neo, Morpheus, Trinity, and company haven't really escaped to reality, they have just escaped to another matrix.

This explanation really isn't satisfactory. It leaves many things unexplained. Therefore I am pleased to announce that I have solved all these problems.

It turns out that the matrix is fictional. It exists only within a movie (or film) created by Hollywood. Even though the movie is filmed in the style of a documentary (at times I thought I was watching the Discovery Channel!), it is really not. Many (if not most) of the events on-screen are staged. Neo isn't really the One, nor does he have all these mysterious powers. He is actually Keanu Reeves, who is (get this) pretending to be Neo. Morpheus isn't really Morpheus; he's Lawrence Fishburne, an actor, not a fanatic. This makes everything much more comprehensible, though it is still unclear why everyone must wear sunglasses and why Lawrence Fishburne must speak in that particular way. Importantly, the reason that Neo is able to destroy the machines at the end of the movie is because that's what the directors wanted him to be able to do, and therefore they constructed the visual images so as to look like that is what he did.

And as for Persephone, the wife of the Merovingian? I have just two words for you:
Monica Lewinsky.

2003-05-14T16:25:00.000-04:00

A quick news update engendered by the riotous hi-jinks regarding former NYT reporter Jayson "Tony" Blair. Blair, you may recall, is the promising young reporter / promising young British Prime minister who, in the midst of helping start of small war in the Middle East, researched and wrote articles primarily by reading other reporter's articles and, well, making up interesting details to match them. This led to vigorous criticism in the Commons ("hear hear" cried his detractors), and dismissal from his reporting job.

In any event, we at the Vacant Lot would like to offer up support for Blair, support that he has found sadly lacking elsewhere. Our idiotic readers have no doubt never read the account given by Borges of Pierre Menard, "the author of the Quixote." In this account, Borges wrote:

I turn now to his other work: the subterranean, the interminably heroic, the peerless. And - such are the capacities of man! - the unfinished. This work, perhaps the most significant of our time, consists of the ninth and thirty-eighth chapters of the first part of Don Quixote and a fragment of chapter twenty-two.... [Menard] did not want to compose another Quixote - which is easy - but the Quixote itself. Needless to say, he never contemplated a mechanical transcription of the original; he did not propose to copy it. His admirable intention was to produce a few pages which would coincide - word for word and line for line - with those of Miguel de Cervantes.

Borges suggests that the Quixote of Menard is in many ways superior to that of Cervantes. To give just one example:

It is a revelation to compare Menard's Don Quixote with Cervantes's. The latter, for example, wrote (part one, chapter nine):
... truth, whose mother is history, rival of time, depository of deeds, witnes of the past, exemplar and adviser to the present, and the future's counsellor.

Written in the seventeenth century, written by the 'lay genius' Cervantes, this enumeration is a mere rhetorical praise of history. Menard, on the other, writes:
... truth, whose mother is history, rival of time, depository of deeds, witnes of the past, exemplar and adviser to the present, and the future's counsellor.

History, the mother of truth : the idea is astounding. Menard, a contemporary of William James, does not define history as an inquiry into reality but as its origin. Historical truth, for him, is not what has happened; it is what we judge to have happened. The final phrases - exemplar and adviser to the present, and the future's counsellor - are brazenly pragmatic.

In short, we assert that the articles from which Blair drew his insights, even if he happened to copy them word-for-word, were immeasurably improved by this process. To take just one example: no longer "just-the-fact-ma'am" accounts from simple mid-western rubes, these stories in his hands became emblematic of an emormously talented, metropolitan sophisticate who nonetheless harnessed his post-modern sensibilities so as to best communicate with the simple reader struggling to get a handle on difficult and complex modern events, all through the use of a mock-midwestern-rube, just-the-fact-ma'am style. Bravo, Jayson, bravo!

We also note, if only in passing, that Jack Shafer in Slate.com yesterday discussed the Affair Blair. He wrote:

The Sullivan blog's serial maiming of Raines isn't just payback, of course. The Raines regime deserves much of its dressing down. But when Sullivan goes on and on about how the Blair scandal isn't about "an overwhelmed, twenty-something young reporter" but "how he wasn't stopped, and despite crystal-clear warnings, was actually promoted at the behest of the highest authorities in the place: Gerald Boyd and Howell Raines," one can only offer two words: Ruth Shalit. As editor of the New Republic in the mid-'90s, Sullivan protected and defended the young Shalit in an almost identical fashion as she sloppily cribbed and plagiarized again and again after being busted in public again and again.

We note, further, and at this sit up and pay attention, gentle readers, that said Ruth Shalit is in fact the older sister of Wendy Shalit, fabled bathroom activist, about whom Funes has already been so memorious.

This, we think, must be a sign - Fate (not to be confused with The Old Guy in the Robe, standing on his head) has smiled on our modest (to quote the redoubtable younger Shalit - and we don't mean Gene) enterprise. We will be victorious.

2003-05-11T01:17:00.000-04:00

Erratic readers, you may hitherto not have considered this blog to be a source of on-going scientific research. You were wrong, and should now regard yourselves with self-contempt and bitter scorn. You may recall Funes' remark as to the MCAT that:

i would write all possible essays, but when i contacted the zoo they would only lend me 4 monkeys, which on last calculation is LORD MOUNTBATTEN less than I need.

As confirmation of this, consider the following report from the BBC:

A bizarre experiment by a group of students has found monkeys cannot write Shakespeare.
Lecturers and students from the University of Plymouth wanted to test the claim that an infinite number of monkeys given typewriters would create the works of The Bard.
A single computer was placed in a monkey enclosure at Paignton Zoo to monitor the literary output of six primates.
But after a month, the Sulawesi crested macaques had only succeeded in partially destroying the machine, using it as a lavatory, and mostly typing the letter "s".

This essentially substantiates Funes' calculation that he would require 4 + LORD MOUNTBATTEN monkeys to write all possible MCAT essay questions.

Other Questions to Consider:
Should Funes, who hypocritically made use (albeit clever use) of Star Wars references in the Vacant Lot after ridiculing Scharlach for making Star Wars references on public transportation, be included in the List of Eph Hypocritical Shame along with Bill Buckner, Wendy Shalit, Mark Hopkins (recently spotted burning logs in his back yard and telling undergraduates to get lost), and Mark Taylor (recently spotted making sense)?
How many monkeys would it take to write Shakespeare's works, if in fact Francis Bacon or the Earl of Oxford wrote them instead? Surely, a less than infinite number, like zero.

2003-05-10T17:47:00.000-04:00

Carthartically

We were shocked to learn, recently, that Funes (who we had long suspected to be of the Buddhist persuasion, as it is the hot religion right now) is in fact a Cathar, and planning a pilgrimage to the Cathar Mecca (or should that be Mecca Cathar?). We decided to do a little research about this schismatic group, as we are bored and have no friends.

We find this interesting information by the late Raynaldus, a Cistercian monk who accompanied the army of Simon de Montfort in the crusade against the Cathars:

Those who were called believers of the heretics were given to usury, rapine, homicide, lust, perjury and every vice.

We note, in passing, that does seem consistent with Funes' recent behavior. We are not sure what rapine means, but we think that Funes does it. He also buys many a lemon drop.

We also found an interesting and informative essay on inquisitorial techniques written by the late Bernardo Gui, who sadly passed away in A.D. 1331:

Hence they claim that confession made to the priests of, the Roman Church is useless, and that, since the priests may be sinners, they cannot loose nor bind, and, being unclean in themselves, cannot make others clean. They assert, moreover, that the cross of Christ should not be adored or venerated, because, as they urge, no one would venerate or adore the gallows upon which a father, relative, or friend had been hung. They urge, further, that they who adore the cross ought, for similar reasons, to worship all thorns and lances, because as Christ's body was on the cross during the passion, so was the crown of thorns on his head and the soldier's lance in his side, They proclaim many other scandalous things in regard to the sacraments.

Bernardo Gui, though long dead, did make something of a comeback when he re-appeared in Umberto Eco's The Name of the Rose as, surprise, an inquisitor. (The translation by William Weaver is highly recommended.) Gui (not to be confused with the graphics user interface of the same name) faced off against the detective in the story, William "The Hound" of "the" Baskerville"s". In investigating Gui's function in the story, we find the following learned interpretation:

"From the first day I realized you would understand" (p. 465): Jorge respects William of Baskerville as his first really challenging opponent. Intellectual affinity between the criminal and the detective is a theme that first appears in Poe's "The Purloined Letter," where Auguste Dupin regards the Minister as a formidable opponent because he is a poet. Again, Sherlock Holmes and Professor Moriarty consider each other formidable opponents. In Jorge Borges' "Death and the Compass," Erik Lonnrot and Red Scharlach regard each other as worthy intellectual opponents, even though Scharlach nurses a passionate hatred for Lonnrot.

And thus we come full circle, or, rather, sort of, roundish-like.

2003-05-07T01:16:00.000-04:00

Oh how the mighty have fallen
Yes friends, it appears we have all heard the news about Bill Bennett, champion of virtues, defender of morality, and 30 thousand a day slots player. And the biased American Media would have you believe that this is the big story, the only story about a moralizing Williams College alumnae caught up in both hypocrisy and scandal. But as Yoda (class of 32' Williams-Dagobath Programme) once said "There is another"

Yes, friends, while the American Media chooses to ignore the story, stalwarts such as Britain's Channel 5 (commonly referred to as the Game Show Network) and Qatar (pronouced pah-lit) based Al-Jazeera have both reported a scandal on the magnitude of Teapot Dome, or for those of you who live in Seattle, the Kingdome. It appears that a number of independent reports have placed a MAN coming out of a bathroom, a bathroom that is in an apartment that is currently leased by a one Wendy Shalit. Further reports indicate that said bathroom was very unkempt, and the furnishings described as anything but modest.

Roger Dodger, Channel 5’s weekend location reporter said “I saw it wit me own eyes, it was a bathroom allright, but when I opened the door there was no big money, no’ even a new car, but rather it was full o’ men. If I’ was rainin’ men, then there mus’ a been a thunderstorm ‘ere, you get me, eh, huh, ahh, uh, heh, ok…”

Al-Jazeera Field Reporter, a one Chemical Ali , was quoted as saying “This bathroom was very immodest, in fact if for some reason Allah decided that today this Wendy Shalit’s bathroom and the holy city of Mecca should switch places, I would refuse to make the Haj, flat out refuse. Until today I never truly understood the depths of American depravity, but one look at those immodest shower fixtures, and now I understand.”

Wendy Shalit could not be reached for comment, however possible relation Gene Shalit had this to say “HAVE you seen Chicago, its CHICAGAGREAT, you should CHICA-GO-GO as soon as you CHICA-CAN-CAN.”

2003-05-06T19:54:00.000-04:00

Studying brings knowledge.

Knowledge brings power.

Power brings resentment.

Resentment brings terrorism.

Terrorism brings Bill Maher to HBO.

Therefore Studying is Bad.

Gotta go - I'm running numbers for Bill Bennett, and I'm a little behind.

2003-05-03T01:27:00.000-04:00

Overheard: It's Gotta Be The Hi-Liters

- Yo, Mars Blackmon here with my main man, Red Scharlach, on the speed dial.
- Yo, Money, it's me.
- Who?
- Me.
- Who?
- Me. From back in the day.
- Mars?
- Yes.
- Is this really it? Are you gonna leave law school? Gonna quit? Is it true?
- Yes, Mars.
- You sure?
- Yes, Mars.
- Really? Truly. Cross-your heart, hope to die, stick a needle in your eye?
- Yes, Mars.
- Call you back in Five. Doing a commercial. Mr. Bar-Bri.
You're gonna hang them up. Put away the legal casebooks. Pack up the course outlines. No more torts. No more conlaw.
Arrivederci? Sayonara? Adios? Auf wiedersehen? So long? Goodbye? Farewell? For good? Again?
- Good-bye Mars.

2003-04-25T21:11:00.000-04:00

In light of the impending conclusion of my academic career, I present the following:

Top Five Post-High School Classroom Moments:

At least, the ones I can think of off the top of my head.

5. 1L Year - Law School
Perhaps the inevitable moment of one's first year of law school: the student who, carried away with talking about statute of limitations, accidentally says "statue of liberty" instead (in front of roughly 150 other students and one very cocky professor) and then realizes what she has said…. Still, despite its inevitability, it was most enjoyable.

4. Sophomore Year - College (1997-98)
Don't know why I loved this so much, but I did. During class one day, professor calls on a student to ask him a question about the assigned reading. The student obviously had not done the reading and had no idea of what the professor was talking about, but instead of simply saying, "I don't know," or "pass," the student said, very seriously and with a straight face, "I'm sorry but I'm not well versed in that text." Priceless. It made the professor seem almost ridiculous for asking. I have ever since wanted to use that line, but have not had the opportunity or the courage.

3. Freshman Year - College (1995-96)
Sitting in computer science lab, with about thirty students, half of which were sitting in the front and paying attention to the mind-numbingly boring teacher, with the other half sitting in the back and browsing the web on their computer terminals. I was happily reading sports stories while Funes was expanding into more esoteric realms. He found a page having to do with cows that somehow he found unbelievably funny, and broke into open laughter. This irritated boring teacher, who then called out Funes and threatened to write a program that would display Funes's screen for the entire class (as it turned out, this was a particularly weak threat, as none of teacher's programs ever worked. (The only thing that would have topped this, perhaps, would be if the law professor had called out the student who used to play Mike Tyson's Punchout on his laptop in front of me. Another close call came when, during a first-year law class, I powered up FIFA Soccer and, just as the computer was about to announce loudly "EA Sports - it's in the game!" I remembered that I hadn't turned the volume to mute as I usually did before playing in class and managed to slam the laptop shut.)

2. Masters Programme - 1999-2000
Sitting in tutorial with another student and stereotypical Oxford don (distinguished but absent-minded and wearing tweed jacket). Don is going through my tutorial essay for that week. Halfway through, the phone rings and he drops the papers. He comes back from the phone and gathers the papers and goes through the same two pages that he had just gone through, making the same comments, virtually verbatim. He then begins swinging his eyeglasses in his hand, at which point they fall apart. Complete disintegration. He is left holding the earpiece, while the lenses go one way and the rest of the glasses another. He says nothing about this, but continues to discuss my essay while he picks up the pieces and, for the rest of the tutorial, has to hold his glasses together with his hands. All the while, other student and I choke back extreme laughter.

1. Freshman Year - College (1995-96)
Sitting in mathematics class, listening to lecture, when who should walk in but Funes, who then proceeded to walk to the front of the room, grab the stack of papers off the professor's desk (the papers we had just handed in), and leaf through them. Professor asks, "Can I help you, Mr. [Funes]?" [Funes had accidentally turned in his Physics homework during his earlier Calculus class, and was trying to make a switch. Why he thought he would not attract attention is not clear.] Absolutely classic moment of sleepiness combined with pure memorious foolishness.

2003-04-24T22:28:00.000-04:00

All-Time Mitzel Things To Do When Meeting Famous Authors:

1. Wait in Waterstone's (or whatever was there before Waterstone's, something that started with a D., I think - Dillon's, that's it) in line for Famous Author to sign your book and then when you get to the front of the line, bow down before Famous Author (thereby wasting people's time and irritating Famous Author) and then ask Famous Author to sign your rock or stone, which you then produce from your battered bookbag (with no explanation as to why it is appropriate for Famous Author to sign said stone, and with some controversy over whether Famous Author's pen will work, having been designed primarily to write on paper or parchment, not boulders). This makes the two people behind you think you are a real weirdo, and make fun of you up to six (6) years later.
2. Ask a long-winded question about the Catch-22-esque craziness of American defense policy, which will then be translated by small-brained moderator to nearly-deaf Famous Author as "Do you know how much the U.S. Air Forces plan to spend this year on fighter planes?"

2003-04-24T18:03:00.000-04:00

About the Eight of Spades, ABCNews.com writes:
With his Groucho Marx appearance, Aziz was probably the most familiar face of Saddam Hussein's regime other than Saddam himself, and one of the longest-lasting as well.

Groucho Marx, who must be considered a fashion icon in Iraq, appeared in a movie called Monkey Business, in which he said:
I've worked myself up from nothing to a state of extreme poverty.

Douglas Adams, whom Funes and I once saw in person (Adams therefore joins Joseph Heller and Umberto Eco as the only famous authors I have ever actually seen in person - oh, and Gene Siskel), writes:
"Ford!" he said, "there's an infinite number of monkeys outside who want to talk to us about this script for Hamlet they've worked out!"

2003-04-24T16:57:00.000-04:00

Tariq Aziz has been captured, no word on his lovely wife Al-Samoud (or is that El-Anoud, neither Charles Pogemiller or Mike Alcee were available for comment at press time)

2003-04-21T00:33:00.000-04:00

Something for Funes to aim for during the MCAT essay section:
... From these two incontrovertible premises he deduced that the Library is total and that its shelves register all the possible combinations of the twenty-odd orthographical symbols (a number which, though extremely vast, is not infinite): in other words, all that it is given to express, in all languages. Everything: the minutely detailed history of the future, the archangels' autobiographies, the faithful catalogue of the Library, thousands and thousands of false catalogues, the demonstration of the fallacy of those catalogues, the demonstration of the fallacy of the true catalogue, the Gnostic gospel of Basilides, the commentary on that gospel, the commentary on the commentary on that gospel, the true story of your death, the translation of every book in all languages, the interpolations of every book in all books.

2003-04-19T16:03:00.000-04:00

You forgot to carry the whale.

By nine hours do you mean nine, or five hundred? That seems a bit long for a test. If so, I suggest bringing at least two No. 2 pencils. Or should I say Napoleon No. Napoleon pencils?

Untested standardised test theory: If you fill in all the circles, then you will be guaranteed to have answered all the questions correctly, and you will get a perfect score.
Similarly, for the essay questions, write all possible essays.

2003-04-19T12:07:00.000-04:00

You mock and mitzel, but multiplication is very difficult, for instance:

is tariq aziz times rosicrucians equal to apes or hunter thompson

if the whale times crosby,stills and nash equals the whale, does that make crosby,stills and nash the identity function, and if so what about young? where does he fit in, besides David Crosby's drug extended belly

see this is why the test is 9 hours long

2003-04-18T13:06:00.000-04:00

The Guy in the Robe writes in, saying:
I don't care if I stood on my head and said I was not going to continue it again. I'm reversing myself now. You cannot ask the Marquis if he lives in the jail.

The Marquis writes in:
Was it you, then, who concocted and had carried out the plan to have me locked up between four walls? And by what misadventure have the wise magistrates who today govern the State allowed themselves be hoodwinked to the point of believing they were serving the interests of a family when it was clearly a question of slaking a woman's thirst for revenge? ... Ah, Eugénie, have done with virtues! Among the sacrifices that can be made to those counterfeit divinities, is there one worth an instant of the pleasures one tastes in outraging them?

Funes writes in:
Why do they call SUVs 4x4s? Don't they really mean 16s?

Mitzel writes:
[ Unfortunately, his communication was not family-friendly. -- Ed. ]

Ed writes in:
I'm a talking horse.

A horse writes in:
I could do the multiplication tables, but I'm busy.

A prosecutor writes in:
What do you mean, you were busy?

2003-04-17T22:41:00.000-04:00

Rough times at the Vacant Lot, which has begun to fall into disarray and has become a dumping ground for trash and a potential location for drug dealing, thanks to its lack of good lighting and low police presence. Funes, though memorious, has abandoned the cause, concentrating rather on his upcoming test on the multiplication tables. One wishes him the best (look out especially for the ever-tricky 8x7, not to mention 9x6), but one misses his voice of calculated unreason. Scharlach is now forced to continue the fight against You know whom and Libyans largely unaided.

And indeed sometimes it is a close call. Only recently, Scharlach was enticed by a man in a dark coat, who sidled up to him and offered him secret information about the current roster of the Barbary Pirates (now a AAA team). Scharlach took a deep breath, sighed, and shot him ten times in the chest. Violent days, these.

Recent reports indicate that The Guy in the Robe, seeking to act while public opinion is still distracted by world events, attempts to seize dictatorial powers and establish The Kingdom of Roxbury. Entry is limited to those who know the secret password: "Ask a Question!" It is a land without wisecracks. A land without happy jobs.

We are pleased to announce the latest synonym for fin: Mitzel. The Vacant Lot gives its permission for all hipsters to use this term. New hipster term for deck/huckleberry: Marquis. And a new kind of non-hipster: namblipster.

2003-04-11T19:35:00.000-04:00

The Case of the Missing Jacket:

Yesterday, the founders of the Vacant Lot boldly ventured forth to the battle ground of the courtroom. There, engaged against the forces of evil (read: Libyans and You know who), which were in turn aided and abetted by a sultry French lover, Funes (in his traditional role as speech-writer and wardrobe consultant) and Scharlach (in his traditional role as ineffective operator of the tape recorder) were sorely taxed. Matters were made worse by the unexpected appearance of The Guy in the Robe, winner of the 2001 Mr. Irrational Anger competition. Where, you might ask, was Judge Wapner (and Douglas Llewellyn) when you needed him? He would have quickly realized that the representatives of the Vacant Lot had more papers than the other side, and therefore should win. The other side, however, was eventually betrayed by its own inability to differentiate between Blade and its worthy sequel, Blade II, and its bizarre insistence that it didn't remember anything about anything at all. Justice was served, and in response to the news the price of crack in Roxbury fell by 23 cents.

Some photos of the proceedings:

2003-04-08T00:15:00.000-04:00

Mideast Bracket Championship:

(13) Fertile Crescent DEFEATS (14) Al Samoud II Missiles

Fertile Croissant Wins Title! Freedom Bread sweeps to champeenship of the Mideast with surprise discovery that "al Samoud" means "death to weeds" in Arabic; missiles carrying payload dangerous to unsightly clover and dandelions but harmless to humans.

Congratulations to the Infantile Coruscant! (Yes, Virginia, that's a Star Wars reference, guaranteed to displease the memorious one, who has laboured many long hours to keep this lot Star-Wars-free.) To everyone else, better luck next War!

2003-04-05T02:09:00.000-05:00

The Vacant Lot announces a new feature: Movie Reviews with Funes and Scharlach

This Week:

Human Nature - *

It's Willard meets Emily Post (if it's Emily Post I mean, and not Amelia "Dave Earnhardt" Earhart). I think Amelia Earhardt was the one who flew planes, or maybe that was Orville "Wright" Redenbacher.
Mid-way through the movie, Funes became especially memorious, and thereby broke the fundamental rule of movie reviewing: you can't open up your futon, get out the sheets, blanket, and pillow, and then lie down and expect to stay awake. For that reason, he missed the exciting scene where Jim Varney (as John Malkovich) fought off an onrushing Charlie Kaufman (as Jim Varney) with a toothpick and a small manual on knitting.

Downloaded Ali G files - *****

Mucho laughso. Figure skater (and member of nobility) Sacha Baron-Cohen falls into a great tradition of Jewish-guys-playing-gangsta-wannabees. See also Groucho Marx as Suge Knight in "A Night at Death Row" (with its famous and hilarious stateroom scene, with Harpo and Dre hidden in the trunk).

The Enigma of Kaspar Hauser - (Not viewed)

Not viewed.

2003-04-03T23:04:00.000-05:00

Boycott Broadens!

In a bold move that has shocked and awed observers all across my apartment, the Boycott Spot announces a broadening of targetted persons. We now include in our vacant lot all members of that (dashing) rogue nation, Libya, including its poetic leader Col. Moammar ("Sanders") Gadhafi.

Question: Suppose Elizabeth Dole had, instead of marrying former presidential candidate Robert "Bob" Dole, had married current President George W. Bush. If he is called "Dubya," would she have been called "Libya"?
Answer: No. Nor would she have been called "Moammar." That name is already taken, by Moammar.

In other news, Chemical Ali had his/her house bombed (not, though, by the Libyans). Reports indicate that his/her cousins, Animal Ali, Vegetable Ali, and Mineral Ali, were either unscathed or, in alternate accounts, scathed.

2003-04-02T13:51:00.000-05:00

Third Round Results

(13) Fertile Crescent DEFEATS (1) Videophones
Everything looks so GREEN and FERTILE (and CRESCENT-SHAPED). Wait, it's just the night-vision videophone. We're really in a desert.

(14) Al Samoud II Missiles DEFEAT (10) The Kurds
Another upset: Al Samoud II employs Little Miss Muffet to eat up the Kurds (and whey)

Only one more round to go! The pain will soon be over!

2003-04-01T14:26:00.000-05:00

Second Round Results

(1) Videophones DEFEAT (8) Umm Qasr
Um, like, totally awesome video, though it's really green and fuzzy, man.

(13) The Fertile Crescent DEFEATS (5) Embedded Reporters
There is no "ME" in "Tigris + Euphrates"

(14) Al Samoud II Missiles DEFEAT (6) Secret Undisclosed Location
Observers anxiously await the arrival of the updated Al Samoud II.I missiles

(10) The Kurds DEFEAT (2) Wolf Blitzer
Turns out the Kurds may be descended from the Medes. Or may not. Wolf Blitzer is not descended from the Medes; unclear who he is actually descended from.

2003-03-31T22:43:00.000-05:00

A Not-so-modest Proposal

From near and far, a cry arises: "Give us definitions, oh Scharlach of the OED access! We long for useless and not entirely entertaining information! And also praise Richard Nixon's vice-president as a symbol of hipster-ness."

Nabob (partial definition):
1. The title of certain Muslim officials, who acted as deputy governors of provinces or districts in the Mogul Empire; an official thus designated; a governor of a town or district in India.
2. transf. A person of (high rank or) great wealth; spec. one who returned from India with a large fortune acquired there; a very rich and luxurious person. Now arch.

Some of words formed from nabob include:
nabobery (a place frequented by nabobs), nabobish (of the nature of a nabob), nabobishly (after the manner of a nabob), nabobry (the class of nabobs) and my favourite nabobical (pertaining to a nabob)

1834 New Monthly Mag. XL. 375 Such is the *nabobery into which Harley-street, Wimpole-street, and Gloucester-place, daily empty their precious stores of bilious humanity.
1852 W. M. SAVAGE R. Medlicott II. x, He reminds me of a nabob. Nabobbery itself.

And, of course, in its greatest incarnation at the hands of Spiro T. Agnew, "nattering nabobs of negativism."

The phrase itself was written by William Safire, a speechwriter for Agnew at the time, and now a columnist for the NYT.
Safire writes op-eds and therefore is po-mo and therefore is deck.

Incidentally, and this is my own discovery, Agnew spelt backwards is wenga. Wenga (often spelt wenge) is a type of tree, a dark brown timber from the family Leguminosæ found in Central Africa.
Trees can be cut down, made into planks, and used to build a deck.

Also: why yahoo.com? And not philistine.com? or degraded-or-bestial-human.com?

Finally, in a Brobdingnagian spirit of literary scholarship, some Tom Swifties: (it is for the purposes of finding such items that the Internet was devised):
"I've had my left and right ventricles removed," Tom said half-heartedly.
"Someone stole my wheels," Tom said tirelessly.
"Venus de Milo is a beautiful statue," Tom said disarmingly.
"Who roomed with MaryAnn on Gilligan's Island?" Tom asked gingerly.
"Dinna wave that axe aboot, Jimmy!" said Tom heedlessly.

and, in the spirit of Jim Varney and Oscar Wilde:
"Hey, Vern! Knowhutimean?" Tom said earnestly.

Incidentally, Tom Swifties were invented by Edward Stratemeyer, who was also responsible for the invention of two detective (i.e., like Scharlach) series about the Hardy Boys and Nancy Drew. The Hardy Boys books were published under the name of Franklin W. Dixon, which is widely (i.e., nowhere) regarded as a pseudonym for Richard M. Nixon and his President of Vice.

We now return you to your previously scheduled precious stores of bilious humanity.

2003-03-30T19:35:00.000-05:00

Have any of you, readers readers (pizza pizza!), ever seen this word? It is an insanity word.
Its origins are Swiftian you nabobs...
(hmm, are nabobs from swift? I am not sure you yahoos)

Brobdingnagian \brob-ding-NAG-ee-uhn\, adjective:
Of extraordinary size; gigantic; enormous.

The venture capital business has a size problem. A monstrous, staggering, stupefying one. Brobdingnagian even.
--Russ Mitchell, "Too Much Ventured Nothing Gained," Fortune, November 11, 2002

Any savvy dealer . . . will try to talk you up to one of the latest behemoths, which have bloated to such Brobdingnagian dimensions as to have entered the realm of the absurd.
--Jack Hitt, "The Hidden Life of SUVs," Mother Jones, July/August 1999

2003-03-29T23:42:00.000-05:00

Great Caesar’s Ghost (pizza pizza!) I have returned!
Friends, Romans, guys named C-Note, lend me your ears, and I will tell about a tale so terrifrying (if you’re a fish), so action-packed, so fraught with danger that it will make your blood curdle, which can then be used to make some kind of gross blood cheese. In this tale you will find danger (yes more danger, its very dangerous), romance, death-defying acts of bravery, and the explanation to why I have not posted in so long a time.

Better yet myopic readers, go see daredevil yourself, then come back and read the list of boring reasons explaining my absence. Ok, go on, I’ll be back here when you are done with the film.

Go on!

Ok, that’s it, move along

Buh-Bye!

2003-03-26T13:30:00.000-05:00

Symbionia Redux:
It turns out that Symbionia is not only near to Kyrgyzstan and Freedonia, but perhaps may be near to Iraq, which, like Freedonia, is ruled by Rufus T. Firefly:

Funes' Joke of the Day: After all, what is a Ba'ath but water on your body?

2003-03-26T01:03:00.000-05:00

All over the world, oppressed people are crying out with one voice: "Where is the Funes of yesteryear?" Many days have passed since last he posted here. I have been forced to resulting to the lowest of strategies, the posting of fabricated tournament results, just to keep the boycott alive. Morale is low.

Recent Reviews:
"... a fictitious boycott conducted by fictitious people for fictitious reasons..." - Michael Moore
"... [ something probably not that funny, though he got off a few good lines, such as the one about Moore and the Teamsters, Sean Connery and Red Lobster, and the video montage of people who we thought were dead but aren't ] ..." - Steve Martin
"... I forgot to prepare a blurb, so I will stand here awkwardly and look foolish and scatter-brained (though still attractive)..." - Nicole Kidman

2003-03-21T14:28:00.000-05:00

First Round Results

(1) Videophones DEFEAT (16) Body double
If a crazed, megalomaniacal dictator dies, and is replaced by a body double who has been trained to look, speak, act, and think exactly like him, has there been a regime change?

(8) Umm Qasr DEFEATS (9) Stealth Fighters
Umm, like, I think, uh, this was, like, a cool town, ahem, totally.

(5) Embedded reporters DEFEAT (12) Elite Republican Guard units
Embedded reporter: "My legs are stuck, and I can't get them out! Help!"

(13) The Fertile Crescent DEFEATS (4) Night-Vision Goggles
Birthplace of Civilization shows its superiority over goggles, which only show that everything at night looks really green.

(6) Secret undisclosed location DEFEATS (11) Jacques Chirac
Dick Cheney sighted at Graceland. Elvis sighted at White House. Dolly Madison sighted at McDonald's.

(14) Al Samoud II missiles DEFEAT (3) No-fly zone
Upset caused by Al Samoud II having chip on its shoulder after being compared unfavourably to the SCUD, possibly the second least-effective missile in history (the first being a pillow filled with goose down).

(10) The Kurds DEFEAT (7) Halliburton
Does Halliburton have a body double? Has anyone noticed that one of the leaders of the Kurds is named Talabani, which sounds a lot like Taliban? Coincidence?

(2) Wolf Blitzer DEFEATS (15) Old Europe
Wolf Blitzerkrieg - Lightning Reporting

2003-03-20T21:40:00.000-05:00

Mideast Bracket

1 Videophones
16 Saddam Hussein body double

8 Umm Qasr
9 Stealth Fighters

5 Embedded reporters
12 Elite Republican Guard units

4 Night-vision goggles
13 The Fertile Crescent

6 Secret undisclosed location
11 Jacques Chirac

3 No-fly zone
14 Al Samoud II missiles

7 Halliburton
10 The Kurds

2 Wolf Blitzer
15 Old Europe

2003-03-18T20:24:00.000-05:00

Strange happenings today:

I got a telephone call from my aunt. She was returning my call. Problem is, I hadn't called her. Or, at least, I didn't know I had called her. My cell phone (my piece) had, of its own accord, dialed and called her in New York, and had left an ambiguous message on her voicemail. This is the kind of incident that used to only happen to Funes, who was notorious for leaving audio records of long slices of his life on scattered voicemails across the country.

In any case, my aunt reports that she and one of the previously-mentioned small children spent a happy 30 minutes earlier this week when the small child asked her, over and over, to read the pieces of paper that Funes and I had written for her (in a bizarre moment of an earlier week, said small child had repeatedly forced Funes and me to write sentences on small pieces of paper, which she they collected and filed). Funes had had difficulties coming up with good material on the spur of the moment (at one point attempting to draw pictures, despite the clear instructions that he was supposed to draw words), but evidently his weaknesses were adequately compensated for by my clever prose - resulting, it seems, in a piece-meal tale fascinating to the younger set.

2003-03-18T00:12:00.000-05:00

The Vacant Lot is Dead! Long Live the Vacant Lot!

Sad news, on many fronts. Even the uplifting story of the tight little blue dress that could may not be enough to win the day.

Yes, illiterate readers, it seems that a small but dangerous breach has appeared in the boycott.

Suffice it to say that Scharlach, long considered the stronger member of the boycott team, was reported today to have been, shall we say, in material violation of the basic tenets of the boycott, since 2010.

"I was caught off guard," he remarked in his own defense. "It all happened so fast, and so unexpectedly (and was sequined)."

However, despite the obvious dip in morale caused by Scharlach's foolish actions, sources report that the boycott will only grow stronger and increase in power. Scharlach, for his part, pledged to be more diligent in his observation of the boycott. "The next time I boycott," he said, "I promise you that boycott, consisting of a single line that is invisible and unceasing."

To quote Raoul Duke:

Get out! The weasels were closing in. I could smell the ugly brutes. Flee!

2003-03-17T23:14:00.000-05:00

Well, ugly readers, it appears that the great load will, once again, be hefted on to the back of the mighty and memorious (or Elephant-Minded).

But what to post in these troubled times?
Something funny and escapist?
Something somber and thought provoking?
Something blue, tight and sequined?

Perhaps all three:

"The tight little blue dress that could (and was sequined)" by Scott Kaplan

The tight little blue dress went to the store. (blue/tight) On its way it slipped and fell in the mud. (funny/escapist) It went to the dry cleaners (escapist). It accidentally burned to a crisp (somber). Or did it? (thought-provoking) I am not sure (sequined)

Hmmm...... Started better than it ended.
Maybe funny stuff from professionals would be better, here are two humorous things I have read lately:

from Hunter S. Thompson's Kingdom of Fear (Red's B-day gift to me) story "The Witness":

"Indeed, but we can save those stories for later, so let's get back to this woman I was trying to describe. Her name is Gail, but for vaguely legal reasons we will have to call her Jane. If I called her Gail we would have a lot of bitching from lawyers"

and

from the New Yorker quoting a bit by Ali G:

Baron Cohen also appears as Borat, a Kazakh reporter who's taping a show on American Culture, and these bits are sometimes hilarious. "In U.S. and A.," he says to the camera during a segment about our mating rituals, "if you want to marry a girl, you cannot just go to her father's house and swap her for fifteen gallons of insecticide"

Ha ha ha

2003-03-15T23:51:00.000-05:00

Big Celebrity Sighting Today: Ben Affleck.
Though to be sure it he was in a movie I saw with Sally's younger brothers.
So maybe that is not a true celebrity sighting.
I tried to engage him in conversation but he was blind and unable to see me.
Also it was dark in the theatre.
That might have been it.
I began emitting sonar-like noises so he could "see" me.
But was asked by the management to stop.
Fools.

Quick Quiz! Who's the deck-est?
Ben Affleck
That duck from the AFLAC commercials
Bela Fleck
Bela Bartok
Rosa Luxembourg

Incidentally:
For a good time, ask Funes to do his "down periscope" impression.
Then ask him to do his "caveman" impression.
See if you can tell the difference.

Pinkerton's Slogan: "We never sleep."
Hence the original version of her song:
"In our family portrait, I look pretty sleepy."

Kilborn Was Here
Someone please get rid of Craig Kilborn.
Or at least his radio commercial.
5 questions, huh?
How about 5 swift kicks to the head, Craigie?

HINT: The "down periscope" impression is the one that sounds like a caveman. The "caveman" impression is the one that doesn't sound like anything at all.

2003-03-15T12:36:00.000-05:00

Tomorrow, in the Battle, Don't Think on You Know Whom

Funes is back, and in good form! With literary and sporting allusions aplenty! He juggles! He jokes! He performs face-painting!

But, given his troubling history, one wonders if perhaps Funes is merely posing. Or would that be poseuring? (Incidentally, gentle readers, did you know that the feminine of 'poseur' is poseuse?) I merely say this to note that an earlier edition of his post (unfortunately no longer available online) contained non-ironic allusions to Tom Clancy, John Grisham, Justin Timberlake, Randy Travis, and Carrot Top. Very, to coin a phrase, dorsal.

In other news, Bernardo Soares, assistant book-keeper in the city of Lisbon, writes in to give us what I now deem The Manifesto of the Boycott:

The only attitude worthy of a superior man is to persist in an activity he recognizes is useless, to observe a discipline he knows is sterile, and to apply certain norms of philosophical and metaphysical thought that he considers utterly inconsequential.

Or, as Funes so memoriously put it, "Where the Means is the Ends, Since 2010."

2003-03-15T11:25:00.000-05:00

Red Scharlach, avowed Milquetoast, once sent me a message in response to his milky toastness, it read:

Milque is deck

Toast is deck

from which I was to conclude that being a Milquetoast is, in summation, twice as deck as not. However, one of our greatest contemporary spanish writers politely declines:

From "All Souls" by Javier Marias:

Then he spoke more fluently: "Machen's horrors are very subtle. They depend in large part on the association of ideas. On the conjunction of ideas. On a capacity for bringing them together. You might never see the horror implicit in associating two ideas, the horror implicit in each of those ideas, and thus never in your whole life recognise the horror they contain. But you could live immersed in that horror if you were unfortunate enough always to make the right associations. For example, the girl opposite your house who sells flowers. There's nothing terrifying about her, in herself she doesn't inspire horror. On the contrary. She's very attractive. She's nice and friendly. She stroked the dog. I bought these carnations from her." And saying that he produced two bent, rather crushed carnations from his raincoat pocket, as if he'd only bought them as a pretext to speak to the flowerseller. "But she could inspire horror. The idea of that girl in association with another idea could. Don't you think so? We don't yet know her horrifying other half. But it must exist. It does. It's simply a question of it appearing. It may also never appear. Who knows, it could turn out to be my dog. The girl and my dog. The girl with her long. chestnut hair, her high boots and her long, firm legs and my dog with his one leg missing." Marriott looked down at the dog, which was dozing; he looked at the dog's stump of a leg. He touched it lightly.

See. Milque and Toast, both deck in their own rights, come together to inspire horror. "Twice as deck" you say? No, fin, through and through.

2003-03-15T10:55:00.000-05:00

No no, dear friend, and dear readers, I believe a mistake has been made. It is not Stockholm Syndrome that is easy to induce, but the closely related Stackhouse Syndrome. A recent encounter brought this to light:

Me: Excuse me, Do you have the time?
Jerry Stackhouse: It is three colon four five, how can I be of future service?
Me: Nothing else, just wanted the time.
Jerry Stackhouse: I can do many things, I can score 30 points in my next game for you.
Me: Listen buddy, I just wanted the time, I don't know who you are.
Jerry Stackhouse: Do you want me to lift you? I am very tall, I can lift you very high?
Me: Don't touch me. Listen I gotta catch my train.
Jerry Stackhouse: Wait, please, my feelings of isolation and abandonment, combined with fears that I may not survive, have caused me to paradoxically bond with you
Me: Whatever
[Exit Attractive Male (yes, that's me, no comments thank you) running quickly]

As for Symbionia, I believe it is near Freedonia, just left of Kyrgyzstan

Oh and it looks like certain people are trying to jump on the boycott bandwagon, posuers.

2003-03-15T00:57:00.000-05:00

From reading the papers, it seems like the Stockholm Syndrome should be fairly easy to induce. I learned today that that is not true.

Me [to passing pedestrian]: Excuse me. Do you have the time?
Attractive Female: Sure. It's 3:45.
Me: Thanks. I appreciate you telling me what time it is.
Attractive Female: No problem.
Me: Thanks for standing here with me.
Attractive Female: You're welcome, but I have to leave now to catch the train.
Me: Just a minute.
Attractive Female: What?
Me: Are you sure your feelings of isolation and abandonment, combined with fears that you may not survive, have not caused you to paradoxically bond with me?
Attractive Female: Whatever.
[Exit Attractive Female, walking quickly]

Where is Symbionia, and why did its inhabitants need to be liberated? What was France's position on this matter?

2003-03-14T22:53:00.000-05:00

Milquetoasts of the World, Unite!

Owen Gleiberman of Entertainment Weekly thinks Milquetoasts are deck. He writes:

A Dorian Gray of spaced oddity, Glover has always been such a naturally stylized human being that it's hard to think of many earthly roles he was born to play. An undertaker, perhaps, or a vampire, or maybe a Milquetoast silent-movie star. You can now add to that list the title character of ''Willard.''

Will Self, however, the author of a book entitled Dorian, has nothing to say on the subject of milquetoasts. He writes:

Another champion bit of fun had involved following an elderly lady home. I conned my way into her flat, spinning her the line that the local librarian had told me that she had a book I desperately needed, something I had to read for my conscientious, socially useful work.
'I've only go the large print edition, dear,' she said. 'I've such bad myopia that it's the only one I can manage.''
'That's all right,' I had replied, sipping the cup of tea she offered me. Then, once she had fetched it from the bedroom, I calmly and casually beat her to death with it.

No word if the sandwich workers of the world came through for Funes. They have nothing to lose but their peanut butter.

2003-03-14T15:57:00.000-05:00

WORKERS OF THE WORLD UNITE!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

and once you are all done with that, how bout you get some work done,
like make me a sandwich, I'm hungry

2003-03-13T21:41:00.000-05:00

Reservoir Dogs Meets L'il Bow Wow

MR. ORANGE:
(to Nice Guy Eddie)
You could've asked the cop, if you didn't just kill him.

LIL BOW WOW:
Bow wow wow yippie yo yippie yay
Where my dogs at? Bark with me now

MR. PINK:
Mr. Blue's dead?

2003-03-13T02:10:00.000-05:00

Perhaps a certain color that is not blue or green (ie Red) should remember that some of us do not spend 10-12 hours on the internet a day, but rather prefer to pass the time (10 hrs a day) by both driving back and forth between new york and boston and attempting to find parking in both cities. Why just today I was driving in between Boston and New York when I thought "This is fun, but I would much rather be looking for non-existent parking spaces in a city with 500 more cars than spaces at any given moment." Later in that same day as I was looking for a spot I thought to myself "Wouldn't it be great if I was driving back to New York right now." Alas, the grass is always greener, and we always want what we can't have... saturday thru sunday, monday twice, then back to sunday.

Meanwhile I too ran into Gene Shalit today he said "Your Blog is great, its like Reservoir Dogs meets an earlier showing of Reservoir Dogs, and one says to the other, 'hey I know you'

The boycott remains strong but its greatest test, April, is yet to come.

2003-03-12T23:17:00.000-05:00

Am feeling some of the strain of having to support this blog single-handedly, as Funes has been quiet the last few days, either re-living some previous days moment-by-moment (days, evidently, in which he did not post anything either) or engaging in ironic non-postage. Hence I must fall back on the finest (that is, fin-est) of posts, the dictionary entry:

refusenik, n.

[Partial tr. Russ. otkáznik, f. stem of otkazát' to refuse: see -NIK.]

1. A Jew in the Soviet Union who has been refused permission to emigrate to Israel.

2. transf. One who refuses to obey orders, esp. as a protest. colloq.

1. 1975 Nature 31 Jan. 297/2 If, as is often the case with scientists, the initial application is rejected, one may spend months or years as a ‘refusnik’, with neither the opportunity nor the necessary time to keep up one's reading or think about one's own research. 1976 Listener 26 Aug. 237/1 Hundreds of people all over Britain make regular telephone calls to refuseniks every week. 1978 Daily Tel. 19 Dec. 11/4 The couple..have recently been putting on a satirical show..mainly to keep up the morale of their ‘refusenik’ friends. 1980 Jewish Chron. 18 July 18/1 The dissidents languishing in exile, in prison camps and insane asylums, and the refuseniks cut off from family and friends and..from their sources of livelihood. 1980 Radio Times 29 Oct. 63/4 Tonight Avital talks about her life since she left Russia, a life of waiting and campaigning to free her husband and other Jewish refusniks from jail in the USSR.

2. 1983 Sunday Times (Colour Suppl.) 30 Oct. 39/4 Army regulations appear to have been altered to permit convicted ‘refusniks’ to be served with new call-up orders the moment they leave prison. 1986 City Limits 10 Apr. 7 The 30 ‘refuseniks’ who would not go to Wapping have been joined by 50 people. 1987 Courier-Mail (Brisbane) 8 Dec. 19/1 (heading) ‘Refuseniks’ of Voyager lobby Hawke.

2003-03-12T22:58:00.000-05:00

Morale was dangerously low today, due to the dearth of parking spots in Cambridge.

Funes, however, saved the day by remembering that out-of-control rage about a lack of parking spots, when combined with the necessity of parking really far away from the restaurant (where the food, incidentally, was quite bad), can, in fact, be quite hip, when done ironically.

2003-03-12T17:36:00.000-05:00

Recent reviews in the media:

"... a bold new voice..." - BlogReviews.com
"... a story of the uplift of the human spirit..." - HumanSpirit.com
"... they unceasingly speak truth to power..." - The Paris Review
"... clever design..." - Clever Design Magazine
"... huckleberry..." - Samuel L. Clemens
"... slanderous..." - Gene Shalit
"... showers are over-rated..." - Gene Shalit (again)
"... where did you guys end up eating that night..." - Gene Shalit (yet again)
"... I only ask because I planned to find you and stand awkwardly close until you acknowledged my status as Gene Shalit but I was unable to do so..." - Gene Shalit (still)
"... we claim responsibility, and will continue such attacks until the Basques are granted autonomy..." - ETA
"... we would also like to claim some of the responsibility, if it is not too late to do so..." - Islamic Jihad
"... us too..." - PETA
"... a bold new voice..." - CopiesOfTheReviewsAtBlogReviews.com.com
"... cooler, with a chance of snow tomorrow..." - The Weather Channel
"... I invented this blog..." - Al Gore
"... we have, unfortunately, been unable to locate Iraq..." - Hans Blix
"... excuse me while I read from my previously published work..." - Paul Auster
"... at the tone, the time will be 5:45..." - unknown
"... I will sell to you one of my excess names for $150.00..." - Boutros Boutros-Ghali
"... a bold new voice..." - CopiesOfTheReviewsAtCopiesOfTheReviewsAtBlogReviews.com.com.com
"... [Unghhhh]..." - Bruno S.
"... make up to $530 per day while working at home..." - Rick341312@geocities.com
"... we will support anything..." - Bulgaria

2003-03-10T15:05:00.000-05:00

A response to Funes' memories:

1. These two children were extremely mobile, using their low center of gravity to effect frequent and unpredictable changes in direction. This will no doubt be helpful in eluding taller predators, such as giraffes.
2. On the surface, I must admit that Funes seems correct in his assessment of their ability to fend for themselves. However, I must also note that, during the time of observation, the two children managed to forage for and then devour numerous cheese sandwiches (Kosher, no less). During this time period Funes, to the best of my recollection, neither produced nor devoured any cheese sandwiches.
3. During the time of observation, one of the children managed to obtain a sum of approximate $0.43 from her grandfather. Despite his supposedly superior powers of rhetoric, Funes (again, to the best of my recollection) did not manage to obtain any sums of money, from anyone, during that time period.

2003-03-10T02:43:00.000-05:00

Some thoughts, I ran into two small children today at Red's aunt's house. They were running around in circles, jumping and laughing and having a wonderful time. What is up with that? Don't they realize how pathetic their lives are? Hello! Last time I checked, both were extremely short and one was completely unable to create complex sentences, merely able to utter single words and nonsense sounds. And when I say short, dear reader, I am not talking about someone who is below average height, say 5 ft 1in or even 4 ft 10in, but ridiculously small, as small as two feet, and all their features, from their hands to their heads are proportionally small. Its as if these are smaller versions of adults; but how can they hope to compete with us on the world stage. I am afraid to say it, but these “children” are an evolutionary dead end. How they have made it this far, and with such good humor is beyond me.

2003-03-08T16:51:00.000-05:00

Survey Question--

You know who: Deck or fin?

2003-03-08T16:19:00.000-05:00

Funes should consider postponing all showering until right before he dies, and then taking a good shower. By that time, of course, it won't matter, so he doesn't need to take one at all. This will save water. And preserve the world's ever-diminishing supply of Pert Plus.

The ancient Greeks also considered this paradox.
For them, however, it was less pressing.
After all, they did not have showers.

2003-03-08T16:05:00.000-05:00

When I look back on my life on this my 25th birthday, my thoughts turn to time wasted. Using MATH, I have calculated that I have, in my 25 years on this earth, spent over 126 days or 4.213 months in the shower. And while I am currently very clean, I cannot help but think that I could have achieved similar results in a much more time efficient manner. The question must be asked; could I have not forwent those many months of showering, and just took one very long and effective shower last night. Would I not be as clean as I am today? I realize our corporate laden media would prefer that I not ask these questions and questions of a similar ilk. Questions like "Has Gene Shalit ever showered?" However, once asked, our corporate media is more than happy to answer them, and on this case it has spoken: "NO, not even once."

2003-03-08T01:22:00.000-05:00

First Great Success!!! Made the most recently published list!!!!

But we're still keeping it real. We know where we came from. For us, it's like breathing.

-- Jenny from the Blog

2003-03-08T01:08:00.000-05:00

Hey Charlotte, It's Your Birthday!
You make me Earl.

2003-03-08T01:04:00.000-05:00

Celebrity sightings actually total two, as I also saw Gene Shalit.

2003-03-08T00:55:00.000-05:00

Celebrity Sightings!!!!!!!!!!!
Wouldn't you know it, the intrepid founding members of z-boycott.org have topped themselves yet again! What, you ask, could possibly top the courageous and selfless inaction of our two heros. Hmmm...? Perhaps sighting one of the most famous celebrities ever to grace the silver screen? Yes, that would top just about anything. We, however, saw oddball movie reviewer Gene Shalit. He entered a restaurant in which we were attempting to eat. I (Funes) gave him a "I know you are Gene Shalit, but don't think I have to know who you are .. Gene Shalit." My counterpart (Red) gave him a "Are you related to conservative bathroom pundit Wendy Shalit" look. Momentary break in ranks about nature of the boycott, eg whether z-boycot should include chesscake and/or star wars references, regardless morale remains low.

2003-03-07T12:25:00.000-05:00

OED says:

Boycott, v.

[f. the name of Capt. Boycott, an Irish landlord, who was the original victim of the treatment described.]

trans. To combine in refusing to hold relations of any kind, social or commercial, public or private, with (a neighbour), on account of political or other differences, so as to punish him for the position he has taken up, or coerce him into abandoning it. The word arose in the autumn of 1880, to describe the action instituted by the Irish Land League towards those who incurred its hostility. It was speedily adopted by the newspapers in nearly every European language (e.g. F. boycotter, Du. boycotten, Ger. boycottiren, Russ. bokottrovat, etc.).

2003-03-07T12:21:00.000-05:00

Funes' suggestions are wise, yet voluminous.

One might even say memorious.

Didcot Parkway

I like Caldecott.
Is that the one with the Gold Star?
Or is that Newbury (?) Award.

Perhaps Man Booker Prize.
The former Booker Prize, now sponsored (evidently) by The Man.

2003-03-07T01:26:00.000-05:00

Perhaps we should rename it to girlcott, although we are not boycotting all girls, just lame ones
other possible names:
monocot/dicot
caldecott
philadelphia pepper pot
more often than not
gordian knot
vacant lot
lobster pot
liver spot
scott

2003-03-06T23:43:00.000-05:00

After one day, the boycott shows no signs of breaking. Morale remains high. Or at least as high as it ever is. Which isn't all that high, really. So I guess morale is actually low. But steady.

2003-03-06T23:40:00.000-05:00

Funes remembers a link: About Dennis Hwang

He writes: "note no references to a certain someone in that article, eh"