Oggi, un signore di circa 70 anni, dopo avermi vista (credo) cedere (spontaneamente) il posto ad una signora, mi ha chiesto (giuro) se volessi sedermi al posto suo!

Le cose sono 3:

1) Credeva fossi incinta

2) Ha pensato fossi una sua coetanea ( ” Ecco! Fulminami ora! “)

3) E’ un attempato provolone (ragione che spiegherebbe perchè mi abbia fissata ininterrottamente per le restanti 8 fermate) che forse sperava fossi alla sua portata.

.

Mi sembrano comunque tutte ottime ragioni per saltare il pasto oggi. E per sempre.

Posted by Audiegrl

Vice President Joe Biden makes his sixth appearance on The Daily Show and the first for a sitting vice president! Really? On second thought, I guess a show with Dick Cheney would have been kind of uncomfortable.

In Part One, Biden says the Obama administration is creating new jobs by investing in energy, education and health care. In Part Two, he explains the necessity of the bank bailout and explains why the Democrats can’t pass anything in the Senate.

Toute bédéthèque qui se respecte doit comporter au moins un album de Gaston Lagaffe, l’anti-héros imaginé par Franquin à la fin des années 1950. Mais nous ne nous risquerons pas à vous indiquer lequel tant chaque numéro est une mine de jeux de mots et de chutes hilarantes.

Le seul conseil que nous nous permettons de vous donnez, ici, est de préférer la série éditée par Dupuis à l’actuelle, rien que pour les couvertures dessinées par l’artiste belge. Des exemplaires ressortent régulièrement chez les bouquinistes et dans les vide-greniers. Pas chers, ce qui est l’autre intérêt.

Prima pagina del “Fatto” di venerdì 13 novembre. Nel riquadro dedicato a Gomez, Barbacetto e Mascali compaiono frasi latine senza senso. Gli addetti ai lavori la soprannominano lorem ipsum ed è una tecnica utilizzata da grafici, designer e programmatori per riempire i bozzetti nelle prove grafighe.

Peccato che il tipografo si sia poi scordato di far pulizia!

Foto tratta dal sito di Luca Sofri (www.wittgenstein.it).

By James Bradley

Prince Edward has caused controversy after commenting on the death of a teenage hiker in Australia this week. After being asked for a comment, rather than just stating his sympathy and sending his wishes to the family, the royal decided that he should go one step further and make a comment that would make his father shed a tear in pride.

Prince Edward stated that the risk of death is appealing to teenagers and young people when it comes to hiking and other activities. Though in my experience teenagers with an interest in death don’t usually spend their time hiking mountains or white water-rafting.

However when it comes to gaffes there is one man, nay hero, in the UK that is somehow able to get away with flagrantly absurd comments without raising much more than a chuckle from the public. Prince Phillip is this man; somehow he has been able to get away with more gaffes than a Big Brother contestant. Everyone has their own favourite Prince Phillip quotes; I myself am quite fond of: “If it doesn’t fart or eat, she isn’t interested.” A comment on his own daughter Anne, which tells you pretty much all you need to know about the Queen’s hubby.

However, there are a few differences between Prince Phillip and a Big Brother contestant. A Big Brother is only in the spotlight until we get bored of them or their sex tape has poor production values; Prince Phillip is there for life. And bizarrely enough some of these comments do spark controversy and even anger from certain groups; for the most part his eccentric, almost fantastical views on the world are embraced by the people of the UK.

Why is this though, for what reason do we love these streams of consciousness emanating from what can only be called a true member of the aristocracy? (Mainly because it’s more polite than saying ‘a complete nutter’) For those against the aristocracy it seems to be an affirmation that people born with blue blood are so completely separated from reality that they are unable to fathom that anything they say could be anything other than completely right and utterly hilarious. And not what those on the receiving end of these statements probably believe i.e. a complete berk.

Those for the aristocracy seem to believe that it’s right for someone with such status to be able to say what he feels, and not be restricted by so called ‘political correctness’. However it should be said that there is a definite difference between being politically correct and having common sense.

However as the years pass and this pillar of respect and solidarity grows older, who will take his place when the unfortunate day comes and he is laid to rest? Who can take the place of the man who once gave his wisdom to several visitors to the orient warning them of the risk that their faces may transform to fit into the society they were now staying: “If you stay here much longer you’ll all be slitty-eyed.”

There can be only one man who can take his place, and that is Prince Edward his son. A man who said that the British media “hates anyone who succeeds”, and spent most of his time trying to create television shows that frankly nobody wanted. This is the man to be the pride of Britain, and our representative to the world, though hopefully not to any country that has an army which is more than five men with a spear. But why do we need someone who can say these things?

Why do we need someone who acts as though he has been pulled straight out of the 1920’s, given a suit and pushed in front of a bunch of foreign dignitaries and given free reign? Well in my opinion, it’s just a bit of a laugh really.

By James Bradley
Prince Edward has caused controversy after commenting on the death of a teenage hiker in Australia this week. After being asked for a comment, rather than just stating his sympathy and sending his wishes to the family, the royal decided that he should go one step further and make a comment that would make his father shed a tear in pride.

Prince Edward stated that the risk of death is appealing to teenagers and young people when it comes to hiking and other activities. Though in my experience teenagers with an interest in death don’t usually spend their time hiking mountains or white water-rafting.

However when it comes to gaffes there is one man, nay hero, in the UK that is somehow able to get away with flagrantly absurd comments without raising much more than a chuckle from the public.

Prince Phillip is this man; somehow he has been able to get away with more gaffes than a Big Brother contestant. Everyone has their own favourite Prince Phillip quotes; I myself am quite fond of: “If it doesn’t fart or eat, she isn’t interested.” A comment on his own daughter Anne, which tells you pretty much all you need to know about the Queen’s hubby.

However, there are a few differences between Prince Phillip and a Big Brother contestant. A Big Brother is only in the spotlight until we get bored of them or their sex tape has poor production values; Prince Phillip is there for life.

And bizarrely enough some of these comments do spark controversy and even anger from certain groups; for the most part his eccentric, almost fantastical views on the world are embraced by the people of the UK.

Why is this though, for what reason do we love these streams of consciousness emanating from what can only be called a true member of the aristocracy? (Mainly because it’s more polite than saying ‘a complete nutter’)

For those against the aristocracy it seems to be an affirmation that people born with blue blood are so completely separated from reality that they are unable to fathom that anything they say could be anything other than completely right and utterly hilarious. And not what those on the receiving end of these statements probably believe i.e. a complete berk.

Those for the aristocracy seem to believe that it’s right for someone with such status to be able to say what he feels, and not be restricted by so called ‘political correctness’. However it should be said that there is a definite difference between being politically correct and having common sense.

However as the years pass and this pillar of respect and solidarity grows older, who will take his place when the unfortunate day comes and he is laid to rest? Who can take the place of the man who once gave his wisdom to several visitors to the orient warning them of the risk that their faces may transform to fit into the society they were now staying: “If you stay here much longer you’ll all be slitty-eyed.”

There can be only one man who can take his place, and that is Prince Edward his son. A man who said that the British media “hates anyone who succeeds”, and spent most of his time trying to create television shows that frankly nobody wanted. This is the man to be the pride of Britain, and our representative to the world, though hopefully not to any country that has an army which is more than five men with a spear.

But why do we need someone who can say these things? Why do we need someone who acts as though he has been pulled straight out of the 1920’s, given a suit and pushed in front of a bunch of foreign dignitaries and given free reign? Well in my opinion, it’s just a bit of a laugh really.

E’ durato 3 minuti l’incontro tra Berlusconi e Benedetto XVI. Un saluto di passaggio? No, è il nuovo limite massimo imposto dai collaboratori del premier ai suoi colloqui con i potenti esteri, in modo che il premier non faccia in tempo a dire o fare cazzate.

I always like a good laugh, and obviously can enjoy when my news sources and current events give me a chuckle, whether deliberately or not.  This category Laughable will highlight random things I’ve found to be humorous for one reason or another. *I reserve the right to be low-brow.* (Yes, that is a warning)

Since I laughed at Bush in a post the other day and will continue to laugh at his Bushisms for the rest of my life, I decided to be fair and highlight a growing interest of mine: Bidenisms. Structured a little differently than a classic Bushism, they are also pretty darn entertaining.

Slate Magazine keeps a comprehensive list of the Vice President’s various instances of mispeak.  They describe it best:

“…George W. Bush’s gaffes were often the result of unintentional incompetence, which made them endearing. They could make Bush seem like a lovable dimwit, a kind of presidential version of Archie Bunker or Homer Simpson. Biden’s lapses are more akin to those of Michael Scott (who, like Biden, is a native of Scranton, Pa.). A statement becomes Bidenesque when his over-the-top attempts at folksiness fail. Unlike their distant cousins, Bushisms and Palinisms, Bidenisms generally stem more from arrogance or obliviousness than from difficulty with the English language or ignorance.”

Some of my favorites:

“A successful dump!”—Explaining his whereabouts (dropping deadwood at the dump) to the reporters outside his home, Wilmington, Del., Aug. 20, 2008

“Stand up, Chuck, let ‘em see you. … Oh, God love you! What am I talking about? I tell you what. You’re making everybody else stand up, though, pal. … Stand up for Chuck!”—Telling Missouri State Sen. Chuck Graham, who is bound to a wheelchair, to rise at campaign event, Columbia, Mo., Sept. 9, 2008

“Hillary Clinton is as qualified or more qualified than I am to be vice president of the United States of America. … She is qualified to be president of the United States of America, she’s easily qualified to be vice president of the United States of America, and quite frankly, it might have been a better pick than me.”—Nashua, N.H., Sept. 10, 2008

“All you have to do is go down Union Street with me in Wilmington or go to Katie’s Restaurant or walk into Home Depot with me, where I spend a lot of time.”—Referring to one of his favorite hangouts, along with a restaurant that had been closed for more than a decade, during the 2008 vice presidential debate, Washington University, St. Louis, Mo., Oct. 2, 2008

There are many more listed in the article, as well as links to video of him making all of the legendary statements.

Ha. Ha.

At the beginning of this video, The Anointed One seems to be dripping contempt for “non-Democrats.”

“Esse senhor não nos pode ensinar nada. A boca morre pelo peixe“.

Luis Filipe Vieira respondendo a José Eduardo Bettencourt

Twitter tells us everything we didn’t want to know about a person. You get to see the good, the bad and the ugly – intimate knowledge that would take years to achieve through a friendship can be gleaned in a single click.

Which is why Twitter might actually be a curse for the world’s celebrities.

Public relations agents carefully craft public statements, choose designer outfits and airbrush photos of their clients. We are made to feel that celebrities lead a fantasy existence that is far out of reach to most of us mortals.

However, all this painstaking work can be undone in a single, untimely tweet.

According to an E! Online Article: “Is  Twitter Totally Overt For Celebs“

“Hung’s Jane Adams (a doll we totally love) was caught dine-and-dashing at Barney Greengrass restaurant recently, via her stilted waiter’s Twitter account. Tsk-tsk, babe!”

Of course, when you take the same concept and apply it to YouTube and politics, the issues are a little more serious and the fallout even greater:

BET Co-Founder Apologizes for Stuttering YouTube Attack.

N.B After writing this post, a few weeks later this article - ”Actors banned and censored on Twitter by Film Studios” surfaced. Basically, it seems that major studios are cracking down on how much their actors use twitter:

“actors have new clauses in there contracts that prevent them from using social media sites. The Hollywood Reporter, Esq. blog reports that both Disney and Dreamworks have already added the clauses to their talent contracts.”   

 

 They may be adamant that this is simply to prevent important information from ‘leaking’ but I would suggest there is more at stake than that. It seems that companies with a ‘family friendly’ image are worried that their squeaky clean teen stars – Miley Cyrus and so on – could be tarnished by a wayward Twitter post.

Celebrities on Twitter

Photo: Lafayette Twestival 2009

Josh Gerstein:

What was he thinking?

Monday-morning Quarterbacking became Washington’s favorite Olympic sport Friday after President Barack Obama’s in-person pitch failed to bring home the 2016 Olympics to Chicago – and in rather dramatic fashion.

Chicago was knocked out in the first-round of balloting – winning just 18 of 94 votes — making Obama’s trip to Copenhagen seem not just unsuccessful but entirely ineffective.

A few Democrats were glum, some conservatives were downright gleeful and the White House scrambled to explain that Obama had no regrets about making the trip – despite the fact that it exposed the limits to the power of his high-wattage international popularity.

More: POLITICO.com.

Allow me to open with a quote from Leo Tolstoy’s War and Peace.

Then came some hilarious soldiers, who had unmistakably been drinking.

“And didn’t he up with the butt end of his gun and give him one right in the teeth,” one soldier was saying gleefully with a wide sweep of his arm.

“It was just a delicious ham,” answered the other with a chuckle. And they passed on, so that Nesvitsky never knew who had received the blow in his teeth, and what the ham had to do with it.

What the hell?! I think you’ve been drinking, Tolstoy. A review is forthcoming.

Picture by Patrick Alexander of http://raymondo.chickennation.com

President Barack Obama:

[...]

Every single one of you has something you’re good at. Every single one of you has something to offer. And you have a responsibility to yourself to discover what that is. That’s the opportunity an education can provide.

Maybe you could be a good writer – maybe even good enough to write a book or articles in a newspaper – but you might not know it until you write a paper for your English class…

Picky, picky….but the president might have done better if he had paid more attention in his own English classes!!

Full text of speech: WhiteHouse.gov/Media Resources

L’altro ieri le Frecce Tricolori, la pattuglia acrobatica dell’A.M.I. (Areonautica militare italiana), da sempre simbolo dell’italia nel mondo, ha fatto ( o meglio, gli hanno ordinato di fare) una gaffe inaudita.

Per i festeggiamenti del 40° anniversario della rivoluzione Libica, che portò Gheddafi al potere, i Nostri aerei hanno omaggiato il Dittatore libico coi colori della bandiera libica, che è poi quella dell’Islam: il verde.

il dramma, che potevano pure scegliere di non usare nessun tipo di colore. perchè non l’hanno fatto?

vai all’articolo

Yep, you read that right…from the website of the Department of Education, no less:

click to enlarge

See it for yourself while it lasts! (too late, it’s been corrected)

Via Breda, a link to this oldish Atomic Nerds piece about an interaction with the folks at H-S Precision, who I discussed here. Good piece, but the money quote is in the comments:

Hyman Roth:

Leave aside the whole murder/manslaughter issue.

I just read Jess Walter’s “Ruby Ridge”. Dead-eye Lon shot at Randy Weaver under the shoot-on-sight R.O.E., and only wounded him.

Then Lon shot at Kevin Harris, resulting in a wound instead of a kill.

Later, he claims to have been firing at Kevin Harris when he shot Vicki Weaver in the head.

That’s 0 for 3.

From a shooting skills perspective, how does this performance justify an endorsement for a precision-marksmanship product?

I looked around the Net a little to see if there was any more recent bad news, but I didn’t find any. As Billy said, they might as well torch the place.

Barack Obama went into unchartered territory yesterday: NASCAR.  He graciously welcomed last year’s NASCAR champ Jimmie Johnson to the White House, but managed to blow the history of the racing circuit:

You know, it’s fitting that you’ve all come here to the White House — the American people’s house — because NASCAR is a uniquely American sport.  Since its humble beginnings, when moonshiners raced on the sands of Daytona Beach during prohibition, it’s grown into a sport with tens of millions of fans here in America and around the world.

More: Hot Air

Commentary by Caroline Baum

Aug. 18 (Bloomberg) — “UPS and FedEx are doing just fine. It’s the Post Office that’s always having problems.” — Barack Obama, Aug. 11, 2009

No institution has been the butt of more government- inefficiency jokes than the U.S. Postal Service. Maybe the Department of Motor Vehicles.

The only way the post office can stay in business is its government subsidy. The USPS lost $2.4 billion in the quarter ended in June and projects a net loss of $7 billion in fiscal 2009, outstanding debt of more than $10 billion and a cash shortfall of $1 billion. It was moved to intensive care — the Government Accountability Office’s list of “high risk” cases – - last month and told to shape up. (It must be the only entity that hasn’t cashed in on TARP!)

That didn’t stop President Barack Obama from holding up the post office as an example at a town hall meeting in Portsmouth, New Hampshire, last week.

When Obama compared the post office to UPS and FedEx, he was clearly hoping to assuage voter concerns about a public health-care option undercutting and eliminating private insurance.

What he did instead was conjure up visions of long lines and interminable waits. Why do we need or want a health-care system that works like the post office?

More: Bloomberg.com.

At a town hall meeting in Portsmouth, N.H. today President Obama stated “We have the AARP on board because they know this is a good deal for our seniors.”  He also stated the following:

“Well, first of all, another myth that we’ve been hearing about is the notion that somehow we’re going to be cutting your Medicare benefits.  We are not.  AARP would not be endorsing a bill if it was undermining Medicare, okay?”

I think he must have been having a “senior moment” of his own because the AARP has not endorsed any health care plan yet.  The country’s largest advocacy group for Americans over 50 issued the following statement after the event:

“While the President was correct that AARP will not endorse a health care reform bill that would reduce Medicare benefits, indications that we have endorsed any of the major health care reform bills currently under consideration in Congress are inaccurate.”

ABC News senior white house correspondent Jake Tapper blogged about the incident.  Click here to read his blog post.