EXTRA EXTRA: We are killing the shrimp - AGAIN!!!!

I don't actually know if we've killed the shrimp in the past, but it seems likely that we have.  I mean, we kill stuff all the time, right?  Actually, that reminds me, I've been meaning to write about my huge step closer to being a vegetarian, but that will come later.  For now: SHRIMP!

Our overwhelming societal depression issues are causing increases in antidepressants in the ocean which are causing shrimp to swim up to higher waters (closer to sunlight), making them more likely to get eaten by predators!  So because we live in a world that forces us to be unhappy all the time where the only escape is constant medication, they are getting drugged into a blissful "find the light" kind of state where they end up dying.  It's kind of sad, if you think about it.  Or ironic?  Probably not ironic.  Probably just sad.  Or unexpected, anyways.

I wonder what other sea life is blissing out to our meds?

Original article: http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2010/07/100706204430.htm

One of Many Open Letters to Facebook

Dear Facebook,

I know people write you open letters all the time.  I read once that the majority of status updates on Facebook have the word "facebook" in them, which means that people are talking about you.  Probably saying things like "Dear Facebook: I am scared of change and am angry that you changed the layout" or "Hey Facebook: Stop abusing my personal information!  I am threatening to quit you but probably actually won't but will tag all my friends in this so they have to see it!"

My letter is slightly different.  First of all, it's not on Facebook itself because, well, I felt a little silly writing a note to you on there for some reason, and feel much less silly about writing an entire blog post about it.  It's like the best use of social media ever - using one form to comment on another form.  And also totally original, because that is what blogs are for.  Pure originality.

Okay, I will now get to the point.  That point is that you have all these annoying ads lately telling me that my other friends used the Friend Finder and I should too.  It's like you are telling me that my friends are not enough.  I need more.  You are saying "LOOK!  Your cousin and friend's sister have found more people to add to their online collection of 'friends' - you are so much less of a person if you don't do it too!  Don't you want every single person you've ever emailed to be permanently connected to you through the internets?"  At first I resisted.  I said, "No Facebook, I am okay with the number of friends I have.  They are, for the most part, people I am actually friends with.  That is all I need."

But then you kept on posting the ads.  With different people as examples of those who have used it.  I am skeptical as to whether they actually did, but you are not known for your honesty, oh Facebook, so I am not going to nitpick this particular detail.  The fact of the matter is that the ads continued and I am the kind of person who notices things even if I try not to, so I couldn't help but stare at them every time I logged in.  Which was not all the time.

Thus, in a tragic turn, I caved.  Yes, Facebook, you won.  I was tired of seeing the ads and was growing curious as to whether or not there was someone who I have emailed over the course of my life who I would wish to permanently cement friendship with through your useful social networking tool.  In short, I succumbed.  At the very least, I figured, the ad would go away and maybe I would reconnect with someone I actually want to talk to again.

So I let you into my email account, let you see everyone I'd ever emailed, and browsed the list of people I could add as "friends".  Now I was faced with the usual dilemma where I used to be good friends with someone a long long long time ago and do I really want to add them just as some record of our former friendship?  Am I that person?  What does it even mean to be that person?  Is it actually a good thing?  Finally, I selected a few people I was happy to regain some form of contact with and people who I considered to be useful contacts to have another connection point with.  I added new friends through the Friend Finder.  It felt dirty to do exactly what you had asked of me, Facebook, since you had been a bit of a bully about it.  I felt weak.

Now I am not only weak, but I am annoyed because THE ADS HAVE NOT STOPPED!!!!!  I DID WHAT YOU WANTED, FACEBOOK!  I USED THE FREAKING FRIEND FINDER AND ADDED NEW PEOPLE!!!  WILL YOU NOT GIVE IT UP ALREADY?  I KNOW YOU HAVE THE CAPABILITIES TO TRACK THESE THINGS AND DO YOU HAVE NOTHING BETTER TO DO THAN PESTER ME CONSTANTLY AND POINT OUT THE FAKE FRIENDS I LACK??????

I mean seriously.  Don't you have a life?  I know I do.  A life I am spending writing blog posts about YOU, Facebook, and it's all your fault.

What do you call a couple who uses the rhythm method?

Parents!

Best joke ever.

But seriously folks, the rhythm method doesn't work.  There have been known cases of women getting pregnant even whilst they are on their moon time, which many ladies think is impossible.  Nothing is impossible with nature y'all.  I mean, have you seen Jurassic Park?  Nature always finds a way to make the most effed up thing happen.  And what, I ask you, is more effed up than getting pregnant when you aren't planning on it?  Maybe thinking that all the dinosaurs are ladies and won't get preggers but realizing instead that your genetic scientists didn't account for the variability society allows women in terms of gender roles and sexuality that is not allowed to fellas.

Why am I talking about the lamest form of birth control ever, you ask?  Well, apparently a whole whack of teenagers think it's a good idea.  Like 17% of teen girls who are sexually active.  17%?  That's pretty close to the efficacy of the rhythm method!  Okay, that's an exaggeration - the rhythm method (which is timing when you "do it" based on when your "aunt flo" is "coming to town" - I use quotation marks and awkwardly attempted vague lingo to mimic what teenagers might say because they are uncomfortable with real terminology which probably means they shouldn't be doing those things in the first place if they can't say them!) works more like 75% of the time.  Which is really not that much when there's a baby on the line, y'all.  Not to mention that I'm pretty sure it's 0% effective at blocking the venereal your man-whore boyfriend picked up from one of his many other escapades.  Just sayin'.

Now I'm off to grumble about abstinence-only education and how it actually increases the number of teen pregnancies and disease-contractions.

Wow. Version 2.0.

I don't know if this will post big enough to be legible, but this ad for Lysol brand douche (if you're me then that's enough to make a scrunchy face and make a skeptical/pain sound) literally equates marital strife with a non-disinfected lady-box.  Seriously?  Golly gee, I'd better get me some Lysol Concentrated Germ Killer to maintain my feminine daintiness!  

At least modern companies that try to convince me my lady-box is disgusting on its own and needs to be disguised with fancy washes and scents pretend that they are made for confident, empowered women instead of meek housewives desperate for a dude's approval.

Prime Minister #3: John Abbott

I am feeling way too lazy to look up the format I used for the first two prime minister posts, so instead I'm just going to tell you some fun facts about John Abbott.

1. There aren't very many fun facts about John Abbott. 
2. When you google him, the fourth link actually goes to a site talking about him.  Apparently a college in Montreal (that is actually probably named after him) and a photographer are more important than the third prime minister of Canada!
3. He was the great-grandfather of Christopher Plummer!  Now there's a guy who shows up first when you google his name.
4. He was a reluctant PM - he actually wanted his successor (John Thompson) to be the leader, but everyone forced him to do it instead.  Bet they regretted that when he wound up being all corrupt, which is exactly what happens when you force someone into a job they don't want.  Even I could have told them that.  YEESH.
5. His famous-est quote is "I hate politics."  Oh hardy-har, how ironic.  Was he the first hipster prime minister?
6. Just below Prime Minister John Abbott's listing on Google is the Imdb page for an actor named John Abbott who was in the Audrey Hepburn classic Gigi.  Well done, John.  Well done.

First of all, brilliant marketing strategy.  Seriously.  Second of all, this one is my favourite.



There's much more where that came from on the Old Spice Youtube page.  These guys are seriously brilliant.  Oops, I already said that, except what I actually said was that they were "brilliant.  Seriously." so maybe that wasn't as redundant as I thought?  Anyways, I love how in this one he uses a nice long, run-on sentence of fertile imagination, as I tend to do in my writing.  Also, I love the idea of being fertile with him.  Except not actually the fertile part, I just want the activity associated with fertility minus the actual fertility.  Although if someone was going to convince me to carry and squeeze out their spawn, he could probably do it.  Let's be honest.  All he'd actually have to do is say my name, from a horse that is riding a motorcycle over a desert that's actually a tropical beach surrounded by hot tubs.

Andrea's Advice!

Another instalment of Andrea's Advice!

I have been dating a guy over the net. We are close and even told each other that we loved each other and we both really mean it. I am almost 16 and he is 18.

Now he won't email me back or even try to find me on the net. I know he has a steady job but shouldn't he make time for his girlfriend? Please tell me what to do.

Yes he should make time for his girlfriend.  This guy is clearly a cad and you are not being unreasonable at all because you love each other and you really meant it when you said it so he must have too and actions do not speak louder than words, so the fact that he is ignoring you now doesn't mean he never really loved you and has found a new trollup to trollup with, but that he has simply forgotten how to be a good boyfriend and needs to be reminded.  The best reminders are constant.  And I don't mean that you should constantly send him messages because he also might be too busy to read them.  No, since it's his work that's keeping him busy you just need to find out where he works, march on over there, sit your butt down in his workspace, and not move until he gives you the love and adoration you so richly deserve.  If that doesn't work, let him know in no uncertain terms that you will find a way to be wherever he is, because if he can't make time for you in his life you'll just have to be his life.  Find out his complete schedule and show up wherever he goes.  If he starts getting angry at you for disrupting things then his priorities are all out of whack and you should gently redirect his energies towards you by getting rid of those distractions.  This includes getting him fired, turning his friends against him (especially if any are girls) and alienating him from his family in any way you can.  Then he will be yours forever.

Men and Vampires

Men and vampires - they are more similar than you might think, although there are some key differences that will help you tell them apart.  The main key difference is that vampires drink blood all the time and human men usually avoid drinking blood, or at least do it secretly and in private with a whole lot of shame involved.

Now for the similarities:

Similarity #1: Many vampires actually are men.

Like, biologically.  They have man parts.

Similarity #2: Like men, only one vampire is needed to continue the survival of their species.

This is the real thing that makes men and vampires pretty much the exact same thing.  This realization was born out of a combination of one of the many episodes of Buffy where Spike taunts her about the inefficacy of The Slayer on a global scale, and a super intellectual conversation I was having with some old high school friends.  The super intellectual conversation was about how societies tended to send young men out to battle as frivolously as I might send a manservant to buy cheese (if I had a manservant and a special bank account just for cheese that a secret cheese donor made sure was always brimming with cheese-purchasing cash) because young men were dispensable.  Not that they weren't valuable members of society, we all know that the ladyfolk have traditionally been much lower-rung in that regard.  No, men were dispensable because their nation could survive and carry on even if most of the men died.  Heck, even if there was just one left, he could go around inseminating all the ladyfolk and continuing the survival of the species.  Although, actually, a generation down the line that would mean half-siblings getting hitched and that's icky, so I guess they would need to hold onto a few men.  Anyways, all I'm saying is that less men = birthrate can still stay the same, whereas less ladies = probably lower birthrate.

Likewise, as Spike so sweetly pointed out to Buffy, all that vampires need to continue the survival of their species is for one to remain.  Just one to bite and turn all the fleshy humans into steely killing machines of awesomeness.  So, kill off all vampires except one or maybe two = vampires will never leave our society so you might as well get used to them.

I will pay you $4.50 to kill someone

Or so Stanley Milgram might as well have said in his newspaper ad for those famous electro-shock obedience and authority studies.  Of course, then he probably wouldn't have gotten the same results.

http://www.boingboing.net/2010/07/12/eerie-relic-of-scien.html

The power is out in my basement suite. AGAIN.

The power is not actually out.  A fuse has been busted or blown or whatever the technical term for that is.  Maybe a circuit got stomped?  Flustered?  Stumbled?  Anyways, some of the electricity in my house is working and some is not.  This happened once before, right at the beginning of a party I was having.  Luckily the only people who had arrived thus far were burly and helpful men who said practical things like "where is the nearest electrical panel thingama?" - but they even actually used the real name for it.  Of course, then it turned out that my landlord had done something to make the fuse/circuit blow/trip and then he did something to fix it a few minutes later and the party was restored.

This time I am alone in my crummy little hovel wonderfully affordable basement suite, and am unsure if my landlord realizes what he has done.  Since anything plugged into an outlet seems to be working whilst all the lights actually wired into the home are not, I can only assume this is a similar situation and has something to do with the fact that he is upstairs drilling things.  Since it is all summery and bright out, and he lives above ground, he may not be aware that the lighting potential in his home has been significantly reduced.  I, on the other hand, live like a burrowing animal/vampyre below ground and need as much light as I can get.

Sadly, I lack the technical prowess and matter-of-fact confidence to do something practical like go tell my landlord he has disabled the lights in my home.  Instead I will sit here in the orangey glow of the decorative lights left over from Christmas and stare directly into the glaring, neon light of my laptop until I go blind.

Well, now that I've informed you all of my plan, I guess I'd better go... and act on it.

Attack of the Giant Killer Bees - upcoming?

This morning when I was in the bathroom I heard a buzzing coming from the Evil Closet of Darkness.  I'm pretty sure the buzzing was the giant killer bees regrouping.  It sounded like there were a lot of them.  Meaning, it sounded like I might actually have some kind of nest inside my home.  I cannot say enough how much this scares me.  An actual HIVE of giant killer bees?  REALLY UNIVERSE?  WHY?????  I cannot for the life of me think of what I may have done to deserve this.

Just in case, let me try to make some amends and try to fix my karma:

Krista, sorry I read your diary when we were in elementary school and wrote about it on the board in my class.

Mark, sorry I was so mean to you when we were kids and kicked you in the head and splashed water on your face those two individual times.  Also, all the other times I was mean or hit or kicked you.

Mom and Dad, sorry I was the best child you could ever imagine having.  I know it made it harder for you to love your other children.  Also, sorry for being so indulgent in my pride just now.

OKAY UNIVERSE?????  Now no more bees.

Please?

Canada Day - it is over.

Yesterday was Canada Day.

Just thought y'all should know.

Canada is a pretty cool place.

Most of the time.

Best.

From the font of all things awesome online, Boing Boing, comes this piece of comic genius:

Okay, technically it came from American Apparel.  It's just so... so... SO!  I like the Boing Boing blogger's suggestion of wearing it over a speedo, and American Apparel's choice of pairing it with a Western-villain moustache.  Would a big, gold chain be too much?  I really hope to see some of these on Main Street this summer.  

If the speedo is a little revealing for you, this could go over very well with a pair of ratty swimtrunks rescued from the bottom of your Dad's closet.  Just make sure they used to be neon pink with a contrasting accent, but are now dusty pink with a dusty accent.