Marmaduke Explained

In the spirit of Shannon's new "Garfield Isn't Funny" shirt, I present to you Joe Mathlete Explains Today's Marmaduke in 500 words or less:

Marmaduke is chasing some dog catchers, and not the other way around. That little "pop" you just heard was your mind being TOTALLY FUCKING BLOWN.

If you don't laugh at this one, then you have no soul.

Gah!

Heh. Awesome.

Halloweenie

For most people, this weekend is the celebration of Halloween which means that...

SWEET JESUS! What is that? It looks like the world's worst case of hemorrhoids. I think I'm going to be--

Gah! It's like a Jon-Benet Ramsey fantasy doll. I'm--

...

Ooookay.

Anyway, there's lots more here. You've been warned.

Buffalo Eight

In researching the previous post, I came across this, and I can't stop laughing:

Buffalo buffalo Buffalo buffalo buffalo buffalo Buffalo buffalo.

Six-Word Stories: Brilliant, Aren't They?

Using Hemingway's six-word story ("For sale: baby shoes, never worn.") as an inspiration, the editors of Wired asked a bunch of different writers for their own takes on brief storytelling. Some of my favorites:

It’s behind you! Hurry before it (Rockne S. O’Bannon)

The baby’s blood type? Human, mostly. (Orson Scott Card)

whorl. Help! I'm caught in a time (Darren Aronofsky and Ari Handel)

Some of them seem more like first lines than actual full stories, and there's a lot of Bush bashing (not that I'm entirely opposed) and jokey ones in there, but it's still a pretty clever exercise.

So, think you can do better? Here's mine:

The world: Gone. My pants, too.

Why I Hate Batman

I admit, I went through a Batman phase for a while there, not coincidentally right around the time when the first movie came out. It's understandable: I was 14, a comic book fiend, and secretly wished I could be intense and mysterious so girls would like me. Eventually, however, I came to my senses and realized that suspension of disbelief is damned near impossible in Batman's world. Never mind that DC's writers can't make up their mind whether Bats is a mythic creature of the night that no one has ever seen (in his own titles) or a well-known public figure (when he appears in the Justice League).

Whatever. That's all pretty much the standard continuity baggage that comes from popular characters in sprawling superhero universes. No, what bugs me about Batman is he's so damn humorless Even if he is the ass-kickingest guy ever, his character seems so one-dimensional that I could never bring myself to care about him. (Although, oddly, I did find Batman Begins easier to take because they didn't make him the greatest-crimefighter-slash-detective-slash-billionaire "perfect at everything" fantasy that he usually is, but rather the new kid trying to figure things out. Still, it was almost unbearably grim. And I can't see Katie Holmes without thinking "nutjob" anymore, but that's hardly their fault.)

Which is why this Batman parody by Scott Kurtz of PvP tickled me so much. He manages to sum up the trouble with Bruce Wayne in about 10 panels.

That said, in a cruel bit of irony, I'm probably taking all this a bit too seriously, aren't I?

First the Breakup with Ken

Now Barbie has to clean up dog poop. (Click on the picture of Bar with her dog underneath the main movie.) We're a long way from the Dream House, Tanner...

Coming soon, GI Joe Field Surgery Kit!

"Hello, Irony Police?"

"Parents want to ban Fahrenheit 451."

Yay, America!

What Would Paris Hilton Do: Etiquette for the 21st Century

Always looking out for their readers, Britain's The Independent offers an update from the helpful publishers of Debrett’s Etiquette on how to hook-up, cheat, and basically imitate the characters on Sex in the City properly. Among my favorites:

One-night stands:Avoid dark-alley gropery, and unladylike fumbling in the back of a cab. [...] Offer him breakfast and (assuming you want no more of him) say that your mother is on her way round.

Sociable smoking: Social smokers, who do not actually buy cigarettes, should rotate the suppliers of their freebies; if asked to donate, it is churlish (though tempting) to refuse.

LyingLies can have a positive role (for instance to protect another's feelings), so it's worth learning how to tell a good 'un. The key is to keep it simple, involve no one else, and tell as few people as possible. If talking to a pathological liar, either ignore completely, or (in the case of a good friend) confront them with a well-timed "come off it!" Excuses are fundamentally the same as lies, so similar rules apply. False doctor's appointments can be useful, toothache is handy, but migraines and food poisoning are over-used and have lost all credibility.

Sadly, though the article mentions it in passing, it doesn't spell out the advice on proper lap dance etiquette. Because there's nothing worse than having a half-naked stranger grind on you and not knowing which fork to use.