Thursday Shout-Out: New Adjutant Inspectors!

I'm a little late today. Had to go to church and sign paychecks and whatnot. Can you believe I'm the treasurer for an actual church that's not even a UFO cult or anything? Me neither. I have a weird life.

Anyway, I figured it was about time to promote a few more bloggers to Adjutant Inspector status. I'm selecting four bloggers this time, mostly based on how much they comment here and how much I enjoy their blogs.

- Theresa from The Rain in Spain...

- Harmonica Man from View from the Cloud

- Jami from Not THAT Different

- Wreckless from greenpiece

The powers that be will only let me promote four right now, but don't worry, if you're a loyal support of the Mattress Police you'll likely get your turn. And if you want to hurry things up a bit, you could always knock off Harmonica Man. I hear he's frail.

The responsibilities of the Adjutant Inspectors are as demanding as they are ill-defined. In fact, most of the work is in determining what exactly it is you're supposed to be doing. There's a lot of trial and error, which is amusing to me.

I'll be taking some much needed vacation from my busy fountain-building and blogging schedule to visit family (and maybe even meet Wreckless for a beer!) in Grand Rapids, Michigan starting on Monday. That means probably no posts for a week or so. I think I'm going to do a regular post tomorrow and put off the next caption contest until I get back. I'll try to post something on Monday before I leave too.

UPDATE: I've also added several blogs to my regular blogroll. If you've linked to me and I you don't see your blog on my blogroll, let me know. I'm often distracted by small shiny objects.

Also, I've just posted the review of Mad Kane's Humor Blog at the humor-blogs review site. Check it out.

A Cautionary Message for the Class of 2007

There are 86,423 high schools, 8,021 colleges and universities, and 14,319 trade and vocational schools in this country, and not once have I been invited to be the speaker at any of their graduation ceremonies. Why not? Is it because I'm not "famous" enough? Is it because the last time I gave a speech I tried to outdo Winston Churchill in brevity by simply yelling "FIRE!"? Is it because I shamelessly make up statistics that are often inaccurate by as much as three orders of magnitude? Probably. Whatever the reason, I have decided to impart some words of wisdom to the class of 2007 here on my blog, where I can reach potentially millions of unemployed recent graduates.

Graduating class of 2007, my life is no picnic. Why would you expect it to be a picnic? That doesn't even make any sense. Grow up, dipshit. This is the real world. Nobody cares about your propensity for metaphors and flowery, poetic language. All we care about is that you pull down on that sheet-metal stamping machine 8,600 times a day and occasionally unjam the machine with that bent coat-hanger we gave you. And what did we tell you about using your good hand for that? Exactly, it won't be your good hand for long.

As I was saying, my life is pretty rough. First of all, I'm unemployed. I have nothing to do all day but build fountains, take pictures of my house and blog about how miserable I am. Second, I have a wife who is way out of my league in pretty much every way. Can you even imagine what it's like to be constantly distracted from your own inadequacy by some hot chick who's always hugging on you and laughing at your jokes? Don't even get me started on my children, who are unreasonably beautiful and well-behaved. I'm constantly waiting for the other shoe to fall on that front (yeah, I mixed a metaphor there, metal-stamper, what are you gonna do about it?). And then there's my house, which is so big that I despair of ever filling it with enough material possessions to make me truly happy.

So my message to you is: Don't end up like me. Work hard in school, and get good grades. Find out what your teachers expect of you and do it unquestioningly. If they tell you that one letter is better than another letter, try to get the best letter you can. Memorize rote facts like multiplication tables and the names of all the states including unimportant ones like Delaware (no really, that's an actual state). Imagination and critical thinking are overrated, and anyway you'll have plenty of time to pick those skills up later.

Don't cheat in school, and don't always try to find the "easy way out." These tendencies will manifest themselves as creative problem solving later in life, and no good can come from that. Once, when working as a webmaster for a Fortune 500 company, I spent several months automating every aspect of my job. Eventually I was only going in to work 2 or 3 days a week, and while I was there I would spend all day downloading songs from Napster. Sure, that sounds like fun, but after a few months you start to wonder, "Why hasn't anybody noticed that I'm not doing anything? Surely someone will realize that I'm not doing any work eventually." But no one ever does, and ultimately you get bored and leave for a higher paying job. Do you want that to happen to you? I didn't think so.

Find out which of the standard personality classifications fits you best, and try your hardest to fit into that mold. Take personality tests that define you in some ridiculously simple way, say with a string of 4 letters like "ISFJ" or "ENTP". Claim your personality type and don't try to change. Learn the phrase "That's just how I am," and use it often. If you're an analytical thinker, don't waste your time on drawing pictures or writing stories. If you have a gift for using language, don't try to master computer programming. If you're an abstract thinker, don't try to build a house. Above all, know your limitations.

Be practical. Take only classes that have a direct practical application. If you go to college, major in business or welding or something. If you get a degree in computer science you can probably get a job doing technical support and gradually work your way into a programming job, whereas if you get your degree in philosophy.... well, you can do pretty much the same thing, but the nice thing about computer science is that 90% of what you learned will be obsolete in ten years. All that abstract analytical thinking you learned as a philosophy student will stick with you forever. While all the other programmers are driving around in their sports cars and buying condos in Sunnyvale, you'll be thinking, "Am I really doing any good at this job? Should I maybe be doing something more meaningful with my life?" Thoughts like that will just make you unhappy.

If you have a risky idea, listen to the warnings of people around you. For example, let's say that you have left your job to start your own web development company, but now the market has crashed and you're running out of money. You have a little equity in your house, but you can't get a loan because you have no job. You may be tempted to sell your house and negotiate a seller-financed deal on a ten acre piece of farmland with no house on it. If you're really creative, you might be able to give yourself some breathing room by negotiating a deal where you make a 10% down payment and then don't have to make any payments for two years. Then you could find a cheap place to live while you build a house, get another job once the market improves, and refinance the property after the real estate market skyrockets. You might, if all that stuff works out, have enough money to take a couple years off to build fountains and blog. But don't count on it. Listen to the people who tell you you're crazy.

If you follow all of these guidelines, you have a good chance of avoiding my fate. Because let me tell you, it's no picnic.


Everything I need to know I learned at humor-blogs.com.

Blogging about Blogging about Blogging

I'm over at the Snark today, with a list of warning signs that you're spending too much time blogging.

I'm happy to announce that we've wrapped up the first round of reviews at humor-blogs.com! To read the first two reviews, go to humor-blogs.com and click on the Reviews link at the top of the page. So far I've posted reviews of Bobbarama and Chinglishness. I'll post the review of Mad Kane's Humor Blog on Thursday.

Thanks to all the reviewers, who did an outstanding job reviewing these sites. Really, I'm impressed with the effort you put into your reviews. Good job!

I'll be sending an email to the reviewers shortly about the next batch of blogs to be reviewed. If you would like to be a reviewer, please email me at diesel -at- mattresspolice.com. If you have a humorous blog that you would like to have reviewed, please sign up at the humor-blogs.com join page.

I'll be back tomorrow with an important message for the graduating class of 2007.

A Day to Remember

It's a holiday here in the States, and I don't feel like doing a post. You can't make me!

I stole this picture (and description) from Al's blog.

"Unique among Battery Park's many monuments and statues, the American Merchant Mariners' Memorial recalls the more than six thousand sailors who, pressed into auxiliary naval service to transport troops and materiel, sacrificed their lives during World War II. Based on a photograph taken from the deck of the German ship that dispatched one of these vessels to the bottom, Marisol Escobar's easily overlooked sculpture in Battery Park captures the essential horror and despair, as well as the heroism, of war."



I'll be back tomorrow with an update on what's happening at humor-blogs.com.

Caption Contest Winners

This time the autographed digital photo goes to humor-blogs.com member The Drive-By Blogger. TDB, here's your award:



2nd place: Another humor-blogs.com member, Joel from Crummy Church Signs:

Spider man,
Spider man,
Does whatever a spider can.
Carries Diesel
Through the air
There must be more than friendship there.
Lookout! Here comes the Spiderman!


3rd place (tie): wyo

"Hey, Spidey! Do you know what this is? IT'S A BRAIN SUCKER! Do you know what it's doing? IT'S STARVING! Hahahaha! Oh grow up; it's just a joke."

3rd place (tie): Bluepaintred

"I shoot so much farther when you rub my head, diesel!"


I came in a pathetic 5th in my own contest. I claim fraud!

Thanks to everybody who submitted captions and/or voted. I'll be doing another one this Friday. Have a great weekend!

House Update

It's time for another house update. Over the past few weeks we've almost finished the framing and the plywood sheeting. It took a little longer than expected because we added four dormers (you can see them sticking out on either side of the new construction in the pic below) to the second story. We figured it made sense to put them in, since it adds a lot of useable space and makes it possible to put windows in on the second floor. Now, of course, the house is going to be even bigger than planned, which was already bigger than we needed. I think we're going to rent out the upstairs. In fact, we may have to rent out the downstairs too with what this is costing us.



The other reason things are taking a little longer than planned is that I get bored with cutting 2x4s and find other fun projects to work on. A while back I decided to put in a circular driveway with some plants in the middle. Simple, right? But then I thought, what would be really cool is to use that old trailer as a planter. And maybe use that old well pump as a fountain. And hook up that old pool pump to make the water flow. And have a series of wine barrels for the water to cascade through. And end up in a little pond, with a nice little fountain. So the circular driveway project turns into this (note that there's still no actual driveway).



Here's another pic of my glorious accomplishment. Sure, it doesn't really serve any useful purpose, but that bubbling sound is so soothing, and it sure looks good. In fact, the same could be said of the fountain. The other interesting thing about this pic is that Climber is hiding in it somewhere. Can you find him?



Here's one of Mrs. Diesel, expressing how she feels about me taking pictures from our roof. Have you ever seen someone express disdain so effectively from a range of 200 yards?



And another one of the fountain. Dammit, how did those loafers get in the pic again? I need to invest in some leg irons.



And finally one of the infamous treehouse. I decided it wasn't quite dangerous enough, so I added a slide.



That's all I've got for now. Remember to vote in the caption contest, if you haven't already. I'll be announcing the winners tomorrow!


Humor-blogs.com is dangerous enough even without a slide.

Thursday Shout-Out: Humor-Blogs.com

Hey, can he do that? Give a shout-out to his own site? This is like that time he made himself the featured blogger on humor-blogs.com. Man, this guy has a big head. What? Oh, why didn't you say so? I didn't realize this is what they meant by "synergy." Carry on.

When I first started blogging, I read that one of the ways to promote one's blog was to submit it to blog directories. So one day I spent several hours submitting my site to every blog directory I could find, and then I sat back and watched the hit roll in.

The fact is, blog directories suck. Mostly they are just lists of blogs in order by the amount of traffic that they drive to the blog directory site. Essentially they're popularity contests: Popular blogs get ranked higher, so they get more clicks, so they get more traffic, so they refer more traffic to the blog directory site, so they get ranked higher.... It's like a movie review website that tells you, "You should go see Spider-Man 3. Lots of other people have seen it, and some of them even liked it." Thanks.

So I did what I do whenever a game is going against me: I changed the rules. I created my own blog directory site, and set it up to show excerpts from five of the funniest bloggers I knew. Then I issued an open invitation for anyone with a humor-oriented blog to join.

Humor-blogs.com now has nearly 200 members, and it keeps growing. It's been so successful, in fact, that it's in danger of becoming just another blog directory. I had always planned on developing some kind of system for objectively ranking blogs by quality, but I hadn't figured on needing to do it so soon. Anita from Say No to Crack pointed me to Bloglaughs, which utilized a group of reviewers to rank funny blogs in various areas. I contacted the owner of the site and arranged to use Bloglaughs' scores to rank blogs on humor-blogs.com. Then the owner of the site decided to close up shop, and I was stuck with an ever-growing list of blogs and no way to rank them in any sensible order.

I know, some of you are probably thinking, "Just display them in random order. That way everybody gets a chance." Well, screw that. I want to reward smart, funny bloggers who aren't getting enough publicity, and I want to help readers find those bloggers. And I want lousy, unoriginal bloggers who think they're funny but aren't to go do something more productive with their time.

So what I ended up doing is stealing the Bloglaughs review system (and reviewers), automating the process a bit, and relaunching it as part of humor-blogs.com (well, I guess it's not really stealing since I did it with the blessing of Bloglaughs). Every blog on humor-blogs.com has a score, which is determined 50% by referrals to humor-blogs.com and 50% by the tabulated reviewer score. Every blog's reviewer score has been set to a default of 50 (on a scale of 1 to 100), and the blogger can keep that default score if they don't want to be reviewed.

Gradually, the reviewers will be working their way through all the bloggers who have asked to be reviewed (3 blogs per week), so in a few weeks the list of blogs should be sorted in some vague relation to quality. And no, I haven't figured out yet how or if I'm going to get Mattress Police reviewed, since it would be pretty hard to ensure objectivity. I'll figure something out eventually.

Why am I boring you with all this? Well, first of all I need more reviewers. I've got about 30 active reviewers right now, and I'd like to get several more. The more reviewers, the more objective the reviewing process is. So if you'd like to be a reviewer, please send me an email at diesel -at- mattresspolice.com. There are no special qualifications, and no minimum number of blogs to review. You don't have to have a blog or anything. Just an appreciation for funny blogs and a minimal grasp of the English language.

Second, if you have a funny blog please feel free to join by going to the signup page. If you want to join AND become a reviewer (and my NBFF), you can specify that on the signup page (well, not the NBFF part; that's implied).

Finally, thanks to all the reviewers who have submitted reviews of the first three blogs queued up for review! You guys really took your job seriously and provided some great feedback. You will begin to see the fruits of your labor early next week....

I'll be back tomorrow with a post that has less words. In the mean time, if you want to hear something really funny, check out Spicy Pony Head at Central Snark. You'll thank me.

Diesel out.


Did I mention humor-blogs.com?

Valdyrre, I Hardly Knew Ye

The Blog-Blond has tagged me with an education-related meme. The thing about memes is that they have rules, and the thing about rules is that they don't apply to me. So I may have slightly embellished a few of my answers. Enjoy.

What was the name of the teacher that was most influential in your life from grades K through 6?

Valdyrre the Magnificent. It was during the time of the Shadows, when the great gray-green tentacles of the horgauths tainted the land with their sickly sweet secretions. The only hope for the kingdom of Zumvalia was the semi-legendary Order of the Sparkly Razors. "Semi-legendary" because until that spring they existed only in the imagination of a confused old man, a man I knew as Valdyrre the Magnificent, or sometimes just "Ted." He trained me in the Ways of the Sparkly Razors, an art as old as Valdyrre's sandwich. "Don't eat that," we'd say. And he would just laugh, and die. There will never be another like him, thank the Hoary Lords of the Seven Unimpressive Hills.

What subject did you favor in high school?

Other than the Ways of the Sparkly Razors, I enjoyed the dark art of avimetrification, which is the measuring of the distance between pigeons.

Did you attend a university and if so did you attain a degree?

I spent seven years at the Mahalamahavatamadatam academy, the first six of which were spent trying to find the door. Once inside, I rotated slowly, gradually attaining all possible degrees. I was eventually released on my own recognizance, having exhausted the recognizance of several others.

Do you learn best through books, by watching, or hands-on?

It depends what I am learning. I learned to read books mostly by watching television. Learning to smell ghosts, of course, required a more nuanced approach. Generally, however, when I really want to learn something I seek out an expert in that field and attempt to learn by osmosis. Literally, I try to suck knowledge out of the expert's brain by putting my brain right next to theirs. When that fails (as it has every time so far), I hit the expert on the head with a hammer and move on to something else.

Has education been an ongoing process for you? How do you feel about that?

I pride myself on learning one new fact a day, keeping pace with my arduous forgetting schedule. I feel okay about it right now, but that could change. Every day is an adventure. A tiresome, confusing adventure.

What seven people are you tagging to do this?

1. Ann Boleyn
2. Deborah Harry
3. Tigger
4. Darth Maul
5.033.412 John Dewey
6. The entire cast of What's Happenin!
7. Valdyrre the Magnificent (May the Hoary Lords rest his soul)



May the great gray-green tentacles of humor-blogs.com grace you with their sickly sweet secretions.

Vote!

Ok, Mrs. Diesel and I stayed up late last night picking the best captions. I read them to her in random order with as much enthusiasm as I could muster, and she picked the ones she liked the best. Initially she had a list of 15 favorites, but several of these were by the same two people. One of these people is better known for commenting on crummy church signs. The other is known for occasionally posting insightful commentary at Central Snark. Once she picked her favorites from each of those jokers, we were down to ten finalists.

The poll will be up until Friday night. I'll post the results on Saturday. Congratulations to the finalists and good luck to everyone, especially me!

Spider man,
Spider man,
Does whatever a spider can.
Carries Diesel
Through the air
There must be more than friendship there.
Lookout! Here comes the Spiderman!

- Joel Bezaire



"If you have a few moments, I'd like to talk to you about life insurance."

- The Drive-by Blogger



"Hey, Spidey! Do you know what this is? IT'S A BRAIN SUCKER! Do you know what it's doing? IT'S STARVING! Hahahaha! Oh grow up; it's just a joke."

- wyo

"I shoot so much farther when you rub my head, diesel!"

- Bluepaintred

It turned out to be a good thing, actually, that Chiropractoman attacked.Spiderman's fifth lumbar had been irking him all week.

- tina



"NOOGIE!!!"

- Robin

"Oh Spiderman, your head is sooo soft, what moisturising cream do you use?"

- Theresa

"Could you sit still, I'm trying to read the tag - wash with like colors...size XS..."

- rjlight

"Did you just web?"

- furiousBall

"And if I press right here, POW! The arms fly out!"

- Diesel

Opinion Polls & Market Research

Humor-blogs.com has your back.

An Open Letter to Sam Raimi

As you know from the most recent caption contest, I have an unnatural love for Spider-Man (by the way, get your captions in by tonight; I'll be posting a poll with Mrs. Diesel's favorites tomorrow). I finally got a chance to see Spider-Man 3 this weekend, and felt compelled to write this letter. I'd warn you that there are spoilers ahead, but I'm not sure it's even possible to spoil something this lousy.


Dear Mr. Raimi,

I've been a fan of Spider-Man as long as I can remember. I loved the comics as a kid. I watched the live action TV show in the seventies. I used to watch Spider-Man and His Amazing Friends on Saturday mornings in the 80s. In college I collected Spider-Man comics obsessively.

I've also been a big fan of yours. Darkman was a favorite of mine before anyone had heard of you, Francis McDormand or Liam Neeson. Army of Darkness is one of my all time favorites, as is Spider-Man 2. When Spider-Man 2 ended, I was tempted to sit there in the theater and wait for the next showing.

So believe me when I tell you this: Spider-Man 3 sucked.

Let's start with the black costume/Venom storyline. I'm not a comics purist; I couldn't care less that you didn't pursue the Beyonder planet/Secret Wars storyline. But your explanation for the black suit is that it fell from space? Just like that, 50 feet away from Peter Parker's scooter? WTF?

Then there's Kirsten Dunst, who's been living on borrowed time since Interview with a Vampire, as far as I'm concerned. In the comics, Mary Jane was a model. How hard is it to find someone in Hollywood who looks and acts like a model? She was tolerable as a love interest in the first two movies, but now you've gone and elevated her almost to a leading role. I mean, she plays an actress who gets fired for being a lousy performer, and she can't even pull that off. Hello? I have two words for all casting directors: Rachel McAdams. Any time you're tempted to cast Kirsten Dunst, Kate Bosworth, Katie Holmes or pretty much any other perky young thing, please cast Rachel McAdams instead. She's cute as a button, and can act the crap out of any of those other chicks.

Speaking of minor characters and subplots nobody gives a shit about, could you possibly include any more of them? It's like I was watching my entire adolescence of comic reading flash before my eyes: Sandman, Venom, J. Jonah Jameson, Robbie Robertson, Gwen Stacy, Captain Stacy, Green Goblin, Blue Goblin/Hobgoblin, Aunt May, Uncle Ben.... What, was Flash Thompson busy? And with the number of times that a character got "killed off" only to reappear later, I was half-expecting Gwen Stacy's clone to show up. I was going to joke that The Lizard was the only villain who hadn't checked in yet, but then I realized that The Lizard was in the movie: his alter ego is Peter Parker's one-armed physics (!) professor, Doc Connors.

And do I really need to give you a refresher on Spider-Man's powers? First of all, Spidey can't be blindsided by a guy on a flying skateboard. He can sense danger. It's called "Spider-sense," in case you've forgotten. And tell me, which of Spidey's powers allow his head to be used to shatter brick walls without him getting so much as a headache?

Any superhero movie is going to have its share of unlikely coincidences, but Spider-Man 3 stacks them up like some kind of super-powered version of Six Degrees of Separation. I mean, let me get this straight: In a city of eight million people, Peter Parker's rival at the Daily Bugle, Eddie Brock, also happens to be dating Gwen Stacy, a girl in Peter's physics class, who is the daughter of the police captain who is overseeing the investigation of the murder of Peter's uncle. Peter's uncle turns out to have been murdered by an escaped convict named Flint Marco, who has been transformed into Sandman, a supervillain who shows up during a ceremony in which Gwen thanks Spider-Man for saving her life during a freak crane accident. After Peter's physics professor, Dr. Connors (you remember, from his class with Gwen) advises him about the dangers of the alien suit, Peter fights off the suit only to have it fall on Eddie Brock (no, literally, it falls on him), who happens to be standing below. Brock is turned into Spider-Man's nemesis Venom, who then teams up with Sandman to kill Spidey. I live in a town of 12,000 people, and I sometimes go three months without running into that many people I know.

Let's see, what else. I'm trying to keep the whole "Peter Parker turns into the evil version of John Travolta in Saturday Night Fever" storyline from settling in my long-term memory, so I'm going to skip over that completely.


There's Mary Jane's inexplicable break-up with Petey, prompted by some vague threats from Harry Osbourne, who is still inexplicably mad at Peter for killing his jerkwad father. There are Harry's three abrupt personality switches -- a bit much to ask of James Franco, who can on a good day manage only good-natured confusion. The last of these abrupt changes occurs when yet another minor character, Harry's butler Bernard, explains to Harry that oh, by the way, Spider-Man didn't actually kill your father. Hey, Bernard, you could have saved us all a lot of trouble if you had mentioned that like TWO HOURS AGO.

The Sandman storyline bothers me on about six different levels, setting aside his ridiculous origin ("We put a fence around that particle accelerator, it's not our fault someone fell in!"). First of all, making Flint Marco the real killer of Uncle Ben is lazy, cheap and unnecessary. And then there's Sandman's apology to Peter at the end. "Gee, Pete, I'm real sorry about turning into a giant sand-monster and trying to crush you with my gigantic sand-fists, but I really needed some money because my daughter is sick or something. Come to think of it, nothing I've done in this movie makes much sense. I'll just anticlimactically blow away in the wind now." And if you're going to try to make Sandman a relatable character by giving him a sick daughter, maybe you could actually follow through on that storyline. What happened to the daughter? You could at least have summarily killed her off like you did with all the other characters we were sick of after 2 and a half hours.

The plot makes virtually no sense, which makes it even more puzzling that you included so many dull expository scenes. I love Aunt May as much as anyone, but holy crap do I really need to hear about how Uncle Ben proposed to her while they were in their bathing suits? And then, when you actually needed a transition to explain how Peter and Mary Jane managed to overcome their problems and get back together, you fudge it with a lame romantic scene. It wouldn't have taken that much, you know. Something along the lines of "Hey, I know you lied to me about being involved with Harry because he was inspired by the ghost of his mad scientist father to threaten to kill me, and I only punched and humiliated you and acted like a total ass-hat because I was possessed by an evil alien costume from outer space, so let's say we're even and make sweet spider-love. Will you marry me with this ring that my Aunt May gave me, assuming I can get the image of her in her bathing suit out of my head by staying really drunk for the next several days?"

Having seen Spider-Man and Spider-Man 2, not to mention the rest of your work, I can't even fathom how you were capable of foisting such a shit-bomb on us. Dude, The Quick and the Dead was better than this, and that had Sharon Stone in it. The best part of this movie was Bruce Campbell's cameo. I'd rather watch a movie featuring his French waiter character than sit through something like this again. I'll admit it's not the worst superhero movie I've seen, but if it weren't for the sheer likability of most of your cast, you'd be a couple of spider-nipples away from Batman and Robin territory here. Trust me, I don't bring up the-movie-that-must-not-be-named lightly. Don't make me do it again.

I don't know what's happened to you. I can only assume that a big black slimy ball of money fell from the heavens and is using your movie-making abilities for evil. I urge you to fight it off and redeem yourself with the next installment. Short of that, hand the reins to Bryan Singer, Christopher Nolan or even -- shudder -- Brett Ratner. The future of our children depends on it.



Humor-blogs.com inexplicably fell to earth from outer space INTO a particle accelerator.

Caption Contest: Spider-Man!

I almost scrapped this pic, because I'm afraid of what y'all are going to do with it. But laziness won out over caution and respectability, so here we are. Just keep in mind that originality is a factor, so if you notice a lot of people submitting captions with the same [ahem] theme, you might want to go the other way, so to speak. And again, let's try to keep this in the PG-13 range; my mom reads this blog.

A couple other changes this week, in addition to the oddly suggestive photo. First, some of you who submit multiple captions have accused me of not selecting your best caption for the finalists. So this week I'm going to have Mrs. Diesel do the selecting. And she's going to do it blind: I'll read her the captions and she will select her favorites. If there are duplicates from the same submitter, I'll make her pick one of them.

Second, others have accused me of doing these caption contests because I'm too lazy to come up with my own content. So how's this for lazy: After the submission deadline, I'm going to submit at least 10 captions for the photo myself, and throw them into the mix. Mrs. Diesel won't know which ones are mine, so I'll be competing along with y'all. Except, of course, that I'm at a disadvantage because I don't get to submit my captions until all the obvious ones are taken. The odds are heavily against me winning, but if I do win then you all have to give me your souls. Fair's fair.

Ok, so here's the photo. You know the drill. Submit your caption in the comments by this Tuesday at 9pm PDT. Mrs. Diesel will pick her favorites and I'll post a poll on Wednesday. The winner, as usual, gets a signed digital copy of the photo. Unless it's me, in which case I get that plus your souls.




Humor-blogs.com was bitten by a radioactive border collie and now it dreams about chasing birds all night.

Thursday Shout-Out: Short Attention Span Stuff

To make up for my taxing post yesterday, here are some sites that will give you a quick fix of humor without requiring a lot of reading or paying attention for long periods of time.


Crummy Church Signs - A perennial favorite.


Chinglishness - "The Art of Asian English." I make myself feel better about laughing at this stuff by imagining that there are Chinese people somewhere (probably China) laughing about Chinese translations of English signs.


Radioactive Liberty - I try to remain apolitical on this site, but FIAR links to me so often that I feel bad not returning the favor. Plus, I stole the short attention span thing from him. You may not agree with everything he says, but you should.

Thot4ThDay - I can't begin to explain this site. It's like one of those old-timey almanacs filled with odd "facts" that aren't really facts. Or something. I guess I can begin to explain it, but I can't finish.


Pointless Drivel - Yes, once again I have to give a shout-out to Mr. Fabulous. Why? Because he sent me caffeinated soap. Now that's love. Or what passes for love in prison, anyway.


If you've read this far, congratulations! You've finally reached the end of the Internet. Now start over at humor-blogs.com.

Super-Ego

"Hey, man, what's going on?"
"Oh, nothing. Just sitting here trying to sort through some of this stuff."
"Same old, same old, huh? Wow, what a mess."
"It's always like this. You're just too busy to notice most of the time."
"What is all this crap?"
"This is all my stuff. Comic book characters, science fiction novels, philosophical theories, movies... everything."
"What do you need all this stuff for?"
"I don't need it. I just like having it around. Anyway, you're not one to talk. You're in here every other day ransacking the place, trying to find some obscure reference to string theory or the Hulk or something."
"Chicks dig that stuff."
"Yeah, whatever."
"You know, it wouldn't kill you to get out once in a while yourself."
"Nah, that's your thing. I like it in here."
"I've noticed. Hey, is there something wrong? You seem a little down."
"Did you see Mrs. Diesel's post the other day?"
"Uh, yeah..."
"She called me a jerk."
"That's what you're upset about? That was a great post, dude. It was hilarious. It really showcased your sense of humor."
"Your sense of humor."
"She also said you were really smart."
"Yeah, well, she was probably talking about you there too."
"I don't think so. You're the one who writes all the sensitive essays about religion and stuff. I'm the one making the smartass comments all the time, so it was probably me she was calling a jerk."
"Hmmm, I suppose that's true."
"Besides, what's so bad about being called a jerk? I called you an assh*le in my post the other day, and you didn't seem to mind."
"No, I called you an assh*le."
"Really? Well, I didn't mind."
"Of course not. You don't give a shit what other people think about anything."
"Damn straight. It might do you some good not to be so sensitive, you know."
"One of us has to have a little sensitivity. We don't want to alienate everyone around us."
"So huddling here in the dark sorting through fragments of Kierkegaard and episodes of the A-Team is your big plan for making friends?"
"Yeah, I know. It's kind of pathetic. I just don't care for getting out and talking to people."
"You mean you don't care for people."
"They make such a mess of things! Just when I start to get things straightened out...."
"Dude, you need to chill. People aren't that bad. You just need to get out there and show them who's in charge. Crack jokes, keep 'em guessing. If you make people laugh, they can't help but like you. And if they don't, screw 'em!"
"Wow, you really are well adjusted, aren't you? You've skipped right from social butterfly to sociopath."
"Ha! You made a joke. See, there's hope for you."
"I'm trying to lighten up a little."
"Nice job on that."
"Thanks. Hey, maybe your personality could use a little tempering too. You can be kind of harsh, you know."
"What do you mean?"
"That thing about 'punching up the middle'?"
"What? I was just giving her some constructive criticism on the story. It needed some help."
"Dude, it wasn't a 'story.' It was your wife, telling you about her day!"
"Her day was boring."
"People don't live to entertain you."
"Why not? I entertain them."
"You're an assh*le."
"Yeah, you said that earlier."
"Seriously, can you just try to say something nice once in a while?"
"Ugh. How about if you do that?"
"I try. You always interrupt with a joke. Like that thing about the racetrack?"
"Hee hee. I love that joke. Go to your happy place. Vroom vrooooooommmmmm!"
"Sometimes I think there's something a little wrong with us."
"Nah. It's everybody else. Friggin' people."
"So who's doing the post today?"
"I'll do it."
"Oh boy, another serious post. People are going to lose interest."
"No, it'll be good. I have an idea for doing sort of an internal dialogue between two halves of Diesel's personality."
"Sounds like more fun than a bucket of monkeys. Just do me a favor, would you?"
"What?"
"Put a few funny lines in there, for me."
"I'll try."
"Cool. You're not such a bad guy, you know."
"Yeah, well you're still an assh*le."
"I know."


Do you want to tell them to visit humor-blogs.com, or should I?

I Give Up

It's clear that you all love my wife more than you love me, so I'm slinking off to Central Snark today, where I feel loved and appreciated. Maybe I should just quit blogging and mutter to myself on the street instead. You'd be happy then, wouldn't you?

Ah, who am I kidding. I'll be back tomorrow with a post about my attempt to become immortal by contracting a debilitating disease. Wait, that doesn't sound right. I'd better go retool that post a bit.

Mrs. Diesel Speaks!

You did it! You convinced Mrs. Diesel to do a post! And to not kill me! Although she did say that the picture was "horrible." Anyway, without further ado here's my -- ahem -- sweetheart blogging about my favorite topic: me!

----------------------------------

Well, first let me say thanks for faking all that enthusiasm about having me post something. I know most of you probably died a little inside each time you forced yourself to leave yet another comment in the hopes of reaching 100. Your sacrifice doesn’t go unnoticed.

The most popular topic requests seem to be “What is Diesel really like?” and “How the heck do you put up with him all the time?” As for the first question, c’mon people! If you’re a faithful reader of this blog, you already know exactly what Diesel is like: really smart, a little self-centered, funnier than should be legal. He sees the humor in everything, which is a lot of fun. More than once he’s sent me into fits of giggles in church because of some comment or other. He takes perverse pleasure in doing that. The downside to this, of course, is that he can’t take anything seriously. When we went through a Lamaze class before Climber was born, he spent the whole time trying to make me laugh. When the instructor told everyone to choose a tranquil place to think about, Diesel leans over to me and whispers, “Racetrack.” All the other couples are obligingly going to their happy places while I’m giggling helplessly on the floor. I have lots of examples of that kind of stuff, but that’s enough for now. Suffice it to say that we can’t join any group where we’re supposed to discuss stuff seriously.

Another thing about this guy you know as Diesel is that he can’t remember anything. I’m not talking about important stuff like who directed Bladerunner or what was the name of the guy who coined the term “rock and roll.” Those things he remembers no problem. It’s the mundane things in life that he can’t keep track of. He posted once about my superhuman ability to remember where everything is, and he wasn’t exaggerating. That’s probably why we’re still married after 14 years—he wouldn’t be able to find shoes if I wasn’t around. But to be fair, I knew what I was getting into. On our first date we spent half an hour wandering around downtown Grand Rapids looking for his car. He said to me, “If you want to hang out with me, you’d better get used to this.” At least he was honest. Well that’s all I can think of right now in the “What’s Diesel really like?” department. If you have a specific question you want answered, just ask. More than likely I’ll answer it for you.

As for the second question, I was forced to develop a thick skin very early in our relationship. When we were dating, he never did the cutesy nickname thing. He’s never called me “babe” or “sweetheart” or anything remotely positive. He’s always called me the first thing that comes into his head, like “lumpy” or “squiggles”. I’ve chosen to find it endearing. His guiding principal in life is that if something is at least twice as funny as it is mean, then it’s okay to say. You suspected as much, right? Also, he has a hard time feigning interest in things he doesn’t care about. One time I was telling him a story about my day, and he told me I needed to "punch up the middle a bit." Make no mistake, living with Diesel isn’t always easy, but it’s never boring. So yeah, he can be kind of a jerk, but I’ve been cracking myself up writing this, so I guess I can’t complain. What are you going to do, I love the guy. Once in a while, though, I’d like him to take an interest in me rather than in this blog. I guess that’s what this whole thing was about. His attempt to show me he cares. Sweet, huh? Or maybe he could just buy me a nice piece of jewelry like normal husbands.

At least humor-blogs.com cares.

Caption Contest Winners

And the winner in the North By Northwest edition of the caption contest is...

G from G Simply Said (you can catch her today spinning at Central Snark).



Second Place: Sher from Wiping The Crazy Off My Face.

Dude, next time you wanna dine and dash at the nudie bar down by the airport, let's not do it on chimichanga night. I think I'm having a freakin' heart attack.

Third Place: Joel Bezaire from Crummy Church Signs:

Why the hell hasn't Snoopy shot down that damned Red Baron yet?!?

Everybody's a whiner at humor-blogs.com.

Happy Mother's Day!

Since I don't normally post on Sundays, I'm doing my Mother's Day post today. I've also updated Central Booking with my thoughts on Godel, Escher, Bach.

A couple quick reminders first:

• Today is the last day to vote in the caption contest. I will post the results tomorrow! Who will win the coveted autographed picture of me and Cary Grant?
• Also, it's not too late to beg my wife to do a guest post. Please? She hasn't seen the post yet, so it would be hella cool to get up to 100 comments by tonight. I'm hoping that affirmation from dozens of strangers will make up for the fact that I posted a picture of her without her consent. Post your comment here. Thanks!

And now, a joke that I came up with while riding around on the tractor, and two limericks I wrote for Mad Kane's Mother's Day Limerick Contest. Enjoy!

-------------------------------------

Jethro and his wife Enid are home watching TV one night when Enid unexpectedly goes into labor. Jethro grabs his car keys and helps Enid to the door. As they get to the door, Enid howls in pain.

Jethro says, "Come on, Enid. We gots to git you to the hospital."
"Ah cain't," says Enid, and sits back down on the couch. When the labor pains subside, Jethro helps her up again and they walk to the door. But once again, just when they get to the door, Enid screams. "Jethro, ah cain't!"

Jethro calls 911. "What is your emergency?" says the dispatcher.

"Mah wife is havin' a baby," Jethro says. "We's tryin' to get to the hospital, but ah can't git her to the car."

"Ok, don't panic," says the dispatcher. "How far apart are the contractions?"

Just then Enid screams again.

"They's real close together," says Jethro.

"Alright," says the dispatcher. "I can send an ambulance, but it might take a few minutes. Your best bet is to try to get her in the car and take her to the hospital yourself."

"Ok," says Jethro. "Enid, the man says you need to git in the car and --"

"Jethro, ah cain't!" sobs Enid.

"Ok," says the dispatcher, hearing her distress. "I'll send an ambulance."

"Thank you," says Jethro. "What should we do till then?"

"Just try to keep her comfortable. Tell her to take deep breaths and stay calm. You want to try to slow down those contractions if you can."

"Ok," says Jethro. He turns to his wife. "Enid, the man says you gots to slow down your contractions."

Enid nods, tears streaking down her cheeks. She takes a deep breath and says, as slowly as she can, "Jethro, ah caaaaaaiiiiiiinnnnn't."

-------------------------------------

Me mum didn’t raise any dummy
but after 5,000 years in her tummy
it felt less like a womb
and more like a tomb
but she’s still the world’s greatest mummy!

-------------------------------------

There once was a man like no other
who had an ape for a surrogate mother
He loved to fling poo
and when asked, "Was that you?"
He'd say, "No, ma, that was my brother."

-------------------------------------

I'm sure my mother is particularly proud today. Happy Mother's Day!


Humor-blogs.com is the mother of all humor blog sites.

Thursday Shout-Out: Mrs. Diesel

One of the main purposes of this blog is to make you all insanely jealous of me. Because, after all, I have the best life ever. Toward that end I occasionally post pictures of my gigantic house, my vast estate, my superfast sports car, my sweet tractor and, of course, my beautiful and angelic children. I almost never post pics of Mrs. Diesel, however, because... well, partly because according to her every picture of her is "terrible," but mainly because there's a limit to how much people will believe.

So you're probably going to think I just stole this picture from some modeling website, but I swear this really is Mrs. Diesel. I keep her in that little compartment in my basement.



Actually I stole this picture from her camera -- she just got back from a cruise. I guess those are portholes or something behind her. Anyway, she's going to kill me when she sees this. You hear me? I'm a dead man. You'll believe me then, won't you? When I turn up DEAD on my next blog post.

Despite the risks, I decided that I really needed to post this. Why? Well, because Mrs. Diesel rocks, and not just because she's way hot. She puts up with my blogging and all my other weird obsessions, and she's smart and funny and did I mention that she's way hot?

So now I have a favor to ask you. I'm trying to get Mrs. Diesel to do a guest post here one of these days. She'll never do it if I just ask her, because she's all shy and stuff. So what I would like you to do is to post comments asking her to guest post. You can give her suggestions for a post, or just tell her to post more pics of herself, or ask her questions about me, or whatever, but I want you to BOMBARD her with comments. I want like 100+ comments here, people. This is for THE Mrs. Diesel, without whom this blog would almost certainly not exist. Tell your friends. Oh, and can you keep things in the PG/PG-13 range? This is the mother of my children, after all.

Thanks in advance!

I'll be back with an early Mother's Day post tomorrow.

Diesel out


I call upon the might of humor-blogs.com to help me with this task.

Sock Drawer #2

Some random items from the sock drawer today:

I took the family to KFC the other day, and saw this sign on their window:



Mrs. Diesel and I were cracking each other up with the conversations we imagined took place as a result of this sign.

KFC Employee #1: "Why do people keep asking to use our no fee ATM? Can't they see the sign? It clearly states that we don't have a no fee ATM."
KFC Employee #2: "I thought it meant we were morally opposed to no fee ATMs."
KFC Employee #1: "Well either way, it's not likely we would have one, is it?"
KFC Employee #2: "Maybe we need a bigger sign."

Speaking of KFC, have you ever looked at their packets of "honey"? You'll notice that it's actually labeled "honey sauce." Honey is the third ingredient, which means that is at most one third honey. Makes you wonder what the first two ingredients in the "chicken" are.

I heard a commercial on the radio yesterday about how Coors has come out with a "cold-activated" bottle. The label’s white lettering and Rocky Mountain icon turn blue when the beer reaches optimal drinking temperature. Thank God for that, huh? Otherwise, how in hell am I supposed to know when my beer is ok to drink? I put a Coors in the freezer and took it out after 3 hours, but the label still said "Coors" so I threw it out.

I was at Home Depot recently, buying sprinklers for my lawn. I was trying to find the sprinkler with the largest watering radius, because I have a HUGE lawn. Anyway, I was reading the labels on the sprinklers and came across one that said:

For outside use with cold water only

I think I spent most of the rest of the day trying to imagine the lawsuit that prompted that warning. Most of the scenarios I envisioned involved someone named "JoeBob" installing a "discount shower head."

As I was checking out, I had yet another opportunity to plumb the depths of ignorance of Home Depot employees. I mentioned that I have a huge yard, right? Here's a view of the front yard from the roof of my house. That tractor is about the size of a Miata, if that gives you an idea.



I know, some of you probably live in Montana or wherever, but in California that open area is about 26 standard front yards. And of course it doesn't rain here for half the year, so you need some serious irrigation to keep grass alive. Anyway, I found a sprinkler with a forty foot watering radius (that's radius, not diameter), and bought the economy pack (ten) of them. We're talking football field irrigation power here, people. I get to the register and the cashier asks me what project I'm working on.

"Well, I have this huge area that I don't know what to do with, so I figure I'll put in grass."
"Oh," she says, ringing up the ten-pack of industrial strength sprinklers, each of which can water over three thousand square feet. "Or you could build a shed."

A shed. Yes! Why didn't I think of that? A twenty thousand square foot shed! I'd put the gardening implements and potting soil in one corner, and play arena football and store small aircraft in the rest of it! Brilliant!

I suppose it's a good thing that jobs at Home Depot are available for such people, because I'm pretty sure she'd be a ward of the state otherwise. Of course, she's about two years away from being replaced by a self-checkout lane, so I hope she's saving her money. On the plus side, when she's sitting around the trailer with no job in a few years, at least she'll have a foolproof method of determining whether her beer is cold.


I completely forgot to mention that I was guest posting at the Snark yesterday. So why don't you head over there today instead and say hi to the lovely and