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Notice to Consumers

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It has come to our attention that some of you have been seen engaging in activities that have little or nothing to do with consuming.  This, of course, must stop, as it jeopardizes the entire consummation system.  In the 19th century, enthusiasm for consuming was so robust that people were even reported to have died from consumption.  Are we to fail such a heritage?

Even the French have surpassed us.  There is a soup there called consommé which is quite widely used in cooking, even though, judging from the name, it has clearly already been consumed before.  Surely we can do as well or better.

If the general population fails to improve by next Tuesday, all businesses in the US will be forced to not only become French, but to move all operations involving wage earners to an impoverished country … what?  Oh, never mind.  Become French, then.

Some rank observations

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Why is the lowest rank in the army, which affords its holder no privacy whatsoever, called private? The corporal, at least, seems reasonably preoccupied with bodies. But what is a sergeant? Someone bedecked in serge? A warrant officer, I suppose, is the person in the office which processes warrants, but you’d never know it from their duties.

I get lieutenant; he’s a tenant in a place, and the captain is surely the head man. But if he’s the head man, why are there ranks above him?

To be sure, in the navy, there are fewer ranks above captain, but that’s the navy, always going their own way, doubtless from spending so much time on the bounding main, far from civilization. A friend, and ex-submariner, once told me they left port with 150 sailors, and returned with 75 couples. I guess that explains the ranks of mates; very chummy, these sailors. Perhaps it also explains admirals, presumably persons most to be admired. As for the rest of them (only some of whom are able bodied), they are seamen. Very clear and to the point, much like the airmen in the … air force. Someday soon these basic descriptive ranks will have to be modified to reflect the modern military: seapersons and airpersons.

But above the captain in the army there are majors and colonels before you even get to the highest ranks. Majors, I believe, are self-explanatory, but what on earth is a colonel? Something to do with columns? If so, why is he allowed to lord it over the head man?

The generals, those with the highest ranks, presumably do not have any specific duties, like the lower ranks, with the exception of the lowest of them, the brigadier, who mucks about with brigades. Yet they feel compelled to recapitulate practically the entire officer rank system among themselves, from lieutenant to major, skipping colonels, perhaps because generals get nowhere near any columns except during parades.

Don’t get me started on unit designations; that’s something only a very admiral general could explain.

Damned PC!

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Tired of all the political correctness? Hey, me too! Here’s a list of the rules of political correctness from when I was young.

• If you’re black, always defer to a white person
• If you’re female, always defer to a male
• If you’re a white male, always show your superiority by using the words nigger, chink, spic, pollack, and sheeny every chance you get
• Remember, when a woman says no, she means yes
• If someone uses a racial slur, a good-natured laugh and hearty agreement are the best responses
• Always laugh at jokes at the expense of minorities or women
• Never show an interest in shop class if you’re a girl
• Never show an interest in home ec if you’re a boy
• If you’re male, love sports. or at least pretend to
• If you’re female, wear clothes that emphasize your sexy bits, and give in to rape graciously
• If you’re an overweight college girl, be grateful when a frat boy takes you to an “ugly date” party
• If you’re male, always remember, no matter how ugly or disgusting you are, you get to pass judgment on the appearance of any female

Well, that’s just a few; there were many more. Bet you’re surprised that we’ve been fighting PC much longer than you suspected!

ithink therefore iam

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I see lower case i being used for the personal pronoun more and more frequently these days. I suggest that, rather than railing against this usage, we could take it at face value. Mathematically, it stands for √(-1) which is an irrational number, since any number multiplied by itself must always be positive. Nevertheless, it can be mathematically useful at times, and so too in ordinary discourse. Lower case i, when used as the personal pronoun, can be interpreted as an indication of the person using it self-identifying as irrational. This can save a lot of misunderstanding, and obviate the need for a rational response to any statement made subsequently.

This usage can also help enrich our understanding of various words in the English language, such as icon, idolatry, and idleness, or, indeed, enhance our appreciation of technology, in the case of any device made by the Apple Corporation. That this last would be ironic is itself the ultimate irony, receding into infinite regress.

It can even be a handy prefix for anything irrational: icontact, ipinion, or indeed, the word irrational itself.

i think this makes sense. Do u?

Peanut butter manifesto

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The coffee shop I frequent was out of peanut butter cookies today, again.  This may seem a minor issue to you, but there’s a backstory.

When I was very young, I put my trust in all the usual stalwarts of society – the used car salesman, the insurance company, the heroin pusher, even (against all my instincts) the priest – only to see my hopes crushed one by one, until all that remained was a bitter shell of a man.  I became a cynic, and believed that not only was everyone just out for personal gain, and to hell with everyone else, but they actively sought and enjoyed the experience of disappointing others.  Worse, I thought they had tumbled to my instability, and banded together to make my personal life miserable.  I would hear of a terrific sale, only to find that the price had doubled once I made an irrevocable order.  Or I would attend a formal affair, and find that, not only was my fly open, but the zipper was irreparably broken (I still don’t know how they did that).  Worst of all, whenever I would start buying something regularly, it would disappear from the shelves.

I know what you’re thinking.  That’s just crazy paranoia, and I should get over it, trust the used car salesmen again, get on with life.

Well, that’s exactly what I did. It was a tough, grueling road, fraught with traps and pitfalls, but with perseverance and, yes, positive thinking, I began to see these coincidences for what they were.

Then I started going to a small local coffee shop, just a hole in the wall, really, but with a friendly, quirky vibe.  They had a display case with a variety of munchies, including which were, regularly, peanut butter cookies.

Now, a peanut butter cookie is the perfect snack.  Fist of all is the delicious flavor, along with that unique and inexpressible texture, which together make for un unsurpassed snacking experience.  As if that weren’t enough, the thing is made of peanuts, a small amount of sugar, and eggs.  Nutritionally speaking, you couldn’t find a combination that could provide a better fuel for a human.  So I started buying one regularly with my breve.

It started slowly.  I would go in one day, and they would be out of peanut butter cookies.  No big deal; it happens, and the next day all would be well.  But it started happening once a week, then twice a week, until, now, I rarely find the cookies available, ever.  When I ask, I’m told the last one was sold just moments ago; once recently, they even went to the lengths of pretending their oven was broken, and they sold only funky looking things that looked like gravel encased in polyurethane.

Yeah, right.  If the oven was broken, how did they make the gravel cakes, hmm?

But this time, I’m not giving in.  I’ll never go back to the life of paranoia that I so narrowly escaped.  I know exactly what to do.

As God is my witness, I will never eat another peanut butter cookie as long as I live.!

That should get them back on the shelves in no time.