Barkerburgh

1> Laura put the ‘It’s A Big Ad’ earworm into my head a while back and it stuck. I worked hard on dislodging it. I was trying for ‘Duel of the Fates’ but it didn’t take. Now I’ve got ‘Shut Your Fncking Face, Uncle Fncker’ running, from ‘South Park: Bigger, Longer, Uncut’ and that’s not so bad. Anything’s better than the ancient Meow Mix theme. Wait. No! Oh, God. What have I done!?

2> I’ve put on so much weight in the last couple of years that I’m starting to look like Fishka Rais, if you know who that is, and I know that at least one of you does. I can do the accent, too.

3> Tim and Anneli brought me back some cool rocks with interesting back stories from their two weeks at the Kennedy Space Center, Orlandoland, and a Caribbean cruise, but I haven’t done the research to present them properly, so look for it.

I just reread the book for the first time in over twenty years; what a blast! (I want to write ‘what a slartibartblast’, but I won’t.)

Then I watched the movie again on the computer. I didn’t see it at the cinema and was pleasantly surprised by it when I first saw it on the small screen.

Same again, but even more so, with the book fresh in my mind.

The Yanks who don’t illegally and immorally download TV shows from the internet are finally going to get a chance to see the first season of the new Doctor Who.

That link is also an interesting but short interview with Russell Davies, Doctor Who’s nurse-practitioner midwife, God bless’im.

Google Mars!

We should have been on Mars - a human presence - long ago.

Balls! Daring! Mass drivers! “Cannon fodder” space geeks willing to die to get us there!

But nooooo….

Stupid NASA! “Let’s raise space-tomatoes in the shuttle and see if ants can be trained to manipulate small screws in zero gravity!”

MARS NOW! MARS NOW! AT LEAST MARS SOON! BEFORE I’M DEAD! MARS BEFORE I’M DEAD! MARS BEFORE I’M DEAD!

Speaking of funny commercials, there’s a Ontario culture commercial running that is a montage of Fort York, a young girls choir singing in what appears to be the gallery overlooking the old main entrance lobby of the ROM, Dave Thomas, some opera guys, some ballerinas, bunch of stuff and places and people. The hilariously wonderful thing about this commercial is that the whole montage is shown with a soundtrack that is the theme from the Bugs Bunny show, as sung by the people in the commercial; yessiree, bob, “Curtain up, light the lights, we got nuthin’ to hit but the heights!” I love it.

BTW, Laura Suzuki (and I know you know who you are), I can’t get the damn ‘It’s A Big Ad’ out of my head. Just when I think I’ve replaced it, I see that commercial for Mediaeval Times, which has a vaguely similar song in the background (a little Hildegard of Bingen, a little Carmina Burana, a little Duel of the Fates) and bam, I’m back on ‘It’s A Big Ad’ so thank very much.

Now, another gift from Anneli and youtube, some English person put together a live action rendering of the the Simpsons’ opening sequence. It’s wonderful.

From Anneli, via email, the tool of the devil…

Laughs from Employee Performance Evaluations

For everyone who has ever had an evaluation - just remember, it could have been worse. These are actual quotations taken from federal government employee performance evaluations.

1. “Since my last report, this employee has reached rock-bottom and has started to dig.”

2. “I would not allow this employee to breed.”

3. “This employee is really not so much of a has-been, but more of a definite won’t be.”

4. “Works well when under constant supervision and cornered like a rat in a trap.”

5. “When he opens his mouth, it seems that it is only to change feet.”

6. “This young lady has delusions of adequacy.”

7. “He sets low personal standards and then consistently fails to achieve them.”

8. “This employee is depriving a village somewhere of an idiot.”

9. “This employee should go far, and the sooner he starts the better.”

10. “Got a full 6-pack, but lacks the plastic thingy to hold it all together.”

11. “A gross ignoramus - 144 times worse than an ordinary ignoramus.”

12. “He doesn’t have ulcers, but he’s a carrier.”

14. “I would like to go hunting with him sometime.”

15. “He’s been working with glue too much.”

16. “He would argue with a signpost.”

17. “He brings a lot of joy whenever he leaves the room.”

18. “When his IQ reaches 50, he should sell.”

19. “If you see two people talking and one looks bored, he’s the other one.”

20. “A photographic memory but with the lens cover glued on.”

21. “A prime candidate for natural de-selection.”

22. “Donated his brain to science before he was done using it.”

23. “Gates are down, the lights are flashing, but the train isn’t coming.”

24. “He’s got two brains cells, one is lost and the other is out looking for it.”

25. “If he were any more stupid, he’d have to be watered twic e a week.”

26. “If you give him a penny for his thoughts, you’d get change.”

27. “If you stand close enough to him, you can hear the ocean.”

28. “It’s hard to believe he beat out 1,000,000 other sperm.”

29. “One neuron short of a synapse.”

30. “Some drink from the fountain of knowledge; he only gargled.”

31. “Takes him 2 hours to watch 60-minutes.”

32. “The wheel is turning, but the hamster is dead.

Saw it on CityTV last night, missed it at the cinema.

What wonderful visualizations, what a treasure of a cast, what effort, imagination, and passion for such a crappy movie!

I kept going “Nice..wait…Nope.”

‘Van Helsing’, for what it was, was a much better movie.

Finally! The coughing fits were the worst part, (on and off fever, too, though) every couple of hours all the time, that burning kind that doesn’t feel like it’s going to stop. Went through a box and a half of generic NeoCitran, but it didn’t really help with the cough. It just made it easier to get back to sleep after I woke up coughing and proceeded to hack away for five or ten minutes. Once or twice I woke up gasping for breath but not coughing, unable to catch my breath at all. Don’t know what that was about.

Fortunately, I was alone most of the time and didn’t realize at first (and kept forgetting) that I had laryngitis too, on and off. I was housesitting and only remembered when I tried to talk to the resident cats or the TV.

PS, Battlestar Galactica looks awesome on a big screen TV.

Take a look at Roger Ebert’s Little Movie Glossary.

What it is is a compendium of movie archetypes, stereotypes, tropes (in a loose sense), and jokes based on all the former, that people have submitted to him over the years.

Some are funny, some are clever, some are interesting, but they’re all fun.

This is the longer archive.

Enjoy yourself, but be safe.