Day: April 21, 2008

Schadenfreude: Feel better about your broken dreams

It’s Monday!  Yay!  What better way is there to follow-up a lazy weekend than to go to your dream job and embark on another week of meaningful employment?

What’s that?  You hate your job?  You didn’t want to be an analyst, but a rock star?  Well, things didn’t work out for you, unlike American Idol winners.  Don’t you hate how they don’t even need a band, much less a garage and lousy drummer, to become famous?

You know what will make it better?  Starting your week with a savory cup of Schadenfreude.

Her successor hasn’t even been named yet, but Jordin Sparks may never sing again, thanks to “an accute vocal chord hemmorage.”  Jordans around the world are rejoicing, as is the alcoholic/caffeinated beverage that unwittingly shares her last name.

Mm, Schadenfreude: it may be shameful, but it’s still joy.

These things happen

Russians are good at several things. Creating spy networks, yep. Writing crappy rock songs, absolutely. Drinking, hell yes.

Recently, a Russian man was so smashed he did not even realize he had been stabbed. According to the story, the man, an electrician at a factory, was having an argument with the security guard at the factory. Both happened to be under the influence and on the job. The security guard allegedly stabbed the electrician in the back.

The electrician passed out at work and woke up the next morning, being sent home because he was still too drunk to be working. The man took the bus home, got some food and went to bed. It was only discovered he had a knife in his back when his wife noticed it. The two men however might still have a friendship.

“We got drunk together. Things happen when you drink,” [the electrician] said.

U.S. Government to spies: ‘Bug ya later, BFF.’

First things first: happy birthday, DARPA! You’re 50 now, which means soon you’ll be the cranky and incontinent organizational hand of the government yet. Yes, you’ve led quite a life, haven’t you? We won’t go over it, what with you being old and liable to die soon, so, just what have you been up to lately?

Why, it seems you’ve been attempting to make people cry havoc and let loose the … bugs of war? What’s that you say? You want to help in this valiant war against animals by stuffing a bunch of computer chips and whatnot into the body of larvae, thus creating a half machine, half bug servant? Well, I can dig that. But, won’t that create the fuel for a bio-mechanical war if the technology gets proliferated by another country (Brazil, I’m looking at you)? What? You say that ants have been doing that sort of thing already for eons on end? So, essentially, you’re turning those six-legged monsters into servants that can actually be useful? I see! Oh DARPA, you’re still crafty after all this time! Don’t ever believe anything that the Department of Agriculture says about you!

Sects Sells: ACLU suddenly likes Jesus?

Having just kicked the Easter Bunny out of shopping malls, the American Civil Liberties Union has found a new high-profile case to remind Americans that they’re still around. However, they’ve zigged just when we thought they would zag.

The ACLU is taking on the state of Texas, claiming they may have violated state and federal laws when they raided the XFZ polygamist ranch in Eldorado and then placed all 416 children in state custody. (This is not to be confused with the Bunny Ranch in Mound House, Nevada, where polygamy is only one of many services offered.)

Look, ACLU, you need to decide: do you or don’t you like Jesus? Or do you only like Jesus when he’s marrying his underage cousins? This blog’s best guess is that you’re entertaining your perverted Little House on the Prairie fantasies.

Bonus: The judge who sent all those kid’s into protective custody?  None other than Judge Barbara Walthers.  (OK, not really that one.)

The McBournie Minute: Paintball kicked my butt

There I was, hunched down behind some logs, looking up every now and then and pointing my weapon, searching for the enemy. I have seen the face of war, and I can safely conclude one thing for certain: I am really not good in combat situations.

If the welts up and down my body prove anything, it’s that when it comes to playing paintball, I have a lot of practicing to do. Over the weekend, as part of my friend Paul’s bachelor party, we menfolk did what menfolk have been doing since time began, the oldest of bachelor party rights: playing three on three paintball with only face masks as protection. Continue reading The McBournie Minute: Paintball kicked my butt