Off-Topic

IF I CALL the office of my "primary care physician" at the time I'd normally want to call (an hour or two after I get up and a couple of hours before I leave for work), I get a recording saying the office is closed for lunch. Closed for lunch!

Which proves my theory: People are big babies.

It's only a doctor's office. They couldn't, say, stagger people's lunch hours? Wouldn't want the widdle weceptionists to have to eat all awone! (Or maybe I'm just bitter because I don't get a fricken lunch hour.)

Then there's my gym. It's not a 24-hour gym, so there are plenty of late-night and early-morning hours during which routine maintenance could be done. But, of course, the big babies couldn't be expected to hire people to work anything but 9 to 5, and so while you're there you have to dodge vacuum cleaners and be prepared for the Jacuzzi to be drained for cleaning half the time. (Or maybe I'm just bitter because I have to work while everyone else is playing. What a big baby.)

ASS CLOWN. I'm probably years behind in my hipster lingo, but what a great insult! I'm told I should have heard it in "Office Space," but I just noticed it for the first time, in a Television Without Pity post about Alex, the "Survivor" loser who was white with rage, even months and months later, that anyone -- anyone -- dared to try to win the game rather than sitting back and letting him win it.

I still love "Survivor" and some its imitators (most notably "The Amazing Race"), but all this crap about "honesty and integrity" has got to go. Alex wasn't even really lied to, and yet he couldn't bear the idea of anyone truly competing against him. CBS needs to sit all the contestants down next time, before they're plopped off the coast of Panama, and tell them: "Now hear this! Lying is part of the game."

Other current ass clowns:

Jayson Blair, of course.

Golfer Vijay Singh. (Could he be that afraid of losing to a woman? I mean, Annika Sorenstam will be playing with the men under equal rules, so it's not as though there's some grand principle involved.)

And I've already mentioned William Bennett once or twice.

Posted by Bill at 1:24 AM   |   Link   |  

WILLIAM BENNETT'S DEFENDERS (as summarized here by Howard Kurtz) aren't stupid, so I guess I'll have to give them credit for skillful use of the straw-man technique.

The issue is not simply whether Bill Bennett's legal gambling is wrong. It's not wrong. It is our business, however, if we're interested in getting blowhard hypocrites to shut the hell up.

Bill Bennett has millions of dollars to lose in casinos only because he has gotten rich on the idea that everyone's personal business is everyone else's business. He has made a career out of condemning others for doing things like gambling, if not things such as gambling. It's as if Carry Nation had been a paint sniffer.

I TURNED ON THE RADIO and Sean Hannity was making what sounded like a reasonable point about how a family making $90,000-something in New York City can't really be considered "rich." Because he knows this and Tom Daschle allegedly doesn't, he concluded that conservatives are "intellectually superior" to liberals. And then, in a very excited next breath: "PAT ROBERTSON is going to join us later!"

When the words "intellectually superior" come up, the words "Pat Robertson" can never be far behind.

IF WILLIAM BENNETT were a secular moralist, I'd agree with the Weekly Standard's take on Newsweek's story about his holiness's gambling habit. I'm a moralist too. I don't think people should do bad things. I'm a gambler too. I gamble and swear and drink beers and do other things that are considered "bad" mainly by the invisible-man-idolizing, ancient-book-of-fiction-shouting weirdos whom Bennett says we should all be looking up to. Bennett wears better suits and speaks less twangily than most of the Bible thumpers, but listen to him for more than half a minute and it's God this and God that and get on your knees and pray pray pray.

I'm no expert on just how sinful gambling is supposed to be, but Bennett's fellow God-boys at Focus on the Family have this to say about Mr. Morality's expensive hobby.

But F-on-the-F will change its tune, I'm sure. Remember: Adultery was no longer such a big deal when it involved Henry Hyde and Bob Dole, and drunken driving was positively charming when George W. Bush did it.

I CAN MAKE UP SHIT TOO. Where's my multimillion-dollar Hollywood deal?

See, there's this planet called Kellzogg. Tommy Lee Jones is Frootzoor, and he comes to Earth in a flying-breakfast-cereal-bowl saucer. His head is a giant Froot Loop. Get it? It's funny, because in real life people's heads aren't Froot Loops!

I don't want to give away too many more details, but suffice it to say that there's an old lady who says "wiener" (which is funny, because you don't expect old ladies to say "wiener"). And at one point a male cute robot space dog looks at a female cute robot space dog and it becomes clear that they will have sexual intercourse and then "I Feel Good" starts playing real loud.

Oh, and Will Smith and Halle Berry show up. In outrageous get-ups. And there will be special-effects sequences that will make you gasp, "They must have had to use computers to do that!"

Also, it turns out the old lady is an alien. This is funny, get it, because in real life most old ladies aren't aliens. Guess I shouldn't have told you that part, though. You never would have seen it coming.

IT WAS GARBAGE DAY and once again the sidewalks were littered with the cardboard boxes that the trash collectors were too good to pick up.

No use fighting City Hall, of course, and so I'll switch to blaming the victims: Don't people know by now that the garbage men won't pick up just any garbage? I mean, it's not as though they get paid to do this! It's not as though they have big trucks equipped to hold and crush things!

The procedure for throwing away a cardboard box bigger than those used by Columbia House Music Club, if I remember it correctly, is as follows:

1. Find a box cutter, a sharp knife, a robust pair of scissors or a battle-hardened pair of hands and reduce the box to pieces smaller than a sheet of notebook paper. As many pieces as it takes.

2. (Optional but preferred.) Run those pieces through an industrial-quality shredder. A crosscut shredder, of course, not one of those piece-of-shit linguine makers.

3. Work up a nice bag of non-cardboard garbage, enough to conceal the cardboard from prying eyes, and hide the cardboard among it.

4. Write up a nice little note:

Hi there, Mr. Sanitation Engineer! Just FYI, I have no cardboard to throw away this week. In fact, I can't remember the last time I even saw cardboard. No, sirree!

The only paper you'll find with this bag is the attached $20 bill, a token of my appreciation for your fine work.

5. Attach note and currency to trash bag.