The Off Topic Topic

[DGuller]

Ah, CNN in a nutshell 

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5l3oUUUzOxE

Tim in a nutshell

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IRsPheErBj8

[garbon]

[Syt]

Huh. They have a brand specifically aimed at Lettow.

[Eddie Teach]

I don't think you can get high off tea.

[Lettow77]

I'm a responsible, continuously sober person.

[Jacob]

Hairless cats do Putin impersonations:







More here: http://cuteoverload.com/2013/08/07/the-ukraine-cats-really-knock-me-out/

[mongers]

Sense of humour failure ?

Marmite TV advert draws widespread complaints

A TV advert in which a spoof rescue team saves "stricken" jars of Marmite from homes where they have been neglected has prompted 278 complaints.

Some 250 complaints were received by the Advertising Standards Authority in just 24 hours, following the advert's debut on Monday evening.

Those who objected found the advert "offensive" and "in poor taste", said a spokesman for the ASA.

Viewers complained "it trivialises the work of animal welfare charities".

The spokesman confirmed that complaints were being monitored, but stressed that no further action was being taken by the watchdog at present.

Despite receiving a "high volume of complaints in a short space of time", it said, the number of complaints has subsequently dropped off.

The ASA said action would be taken if there was found to be problem with the advert under the advertising code.

A spokeswoman for Marmite, who are owned by Unilever, said it was "never [their] intention to cause offence".

"We have made every effort to ensure that this commercial entertains anyone who watches it," she continued.
'Light-hearted'

"We believe we have created an unmistakably Marmite ad - people will either love it or hate it and they certainly won't forget it.

"We hope that everyone will watch and enjoy this commercial in the light-hearted way it was intended."

The advert, which features the voice of BBC journalist Michael Buerk, parodies a team of welfare officers as they uncover neglected Marmite jars "stuck right at the back" of kitchen cupboards.

"Who knows how long that's been here?" says one actor as he carries off the Marmite to "clean him up".

"It's a baby one," bleats another actor. "[It's] not been used in a month... lid's stuck."

The 90-second advert concludes with a family enjoying their re-homed Marmite and the slogan: "Love it. Hate it. Just don't forget it."

Marmite trailed the advert's debut, during Monday's Coronation Street on ITV, on its Facebook page. Viewers posted mixed responses following its broadcast.

"This ad shows no regard for all those involved with animal welfair [sic] and I personaly [sic] will no longer eat Marmite till this ad is pulled," wrote one.

"How can u compare animal cruelty with marmite neglect...?" wrote another. "Come on people, have a sense of humour."

The RSPCA (Royal Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals) said it understood that "animal lovers are concerned on our behalf".

"We plan to talk to the makers of Marmite about how we can work together on animal welfare."

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/entertainment-arts-23601215

[CountDeMoney]

Long live Luddism.  And death to hipsters for co-opting it.

I Am TOM. I Like to TYPE. Hear That?
By TOM HANKS
August 3, 2013
New York Times

BECAUSE Mike McAlary started reporting on cops for the New York tabloids in 1985, Nora Ephron's play "Lucky Guy," which recently completed its run, featured word processors on the newsroom desks rather than typewriters. Too bad. We in the ensemble would have loved to pound on bulky desk-crowding typewriters for the sound alone.

Well, I would have, as I am well versed in the focus-stealing racket one can make with a vintage manual typewriter. I use a manual typewriter — and the United States Postal Service — almost every day. My snail-mail letters and thank-you notes, office memos and to-do lists, and rough — and I mean very rough — drafts of story pages are messy things, but the creating of them satisfies me like few other daily tasks.

Keeping score at a baseball game with a typewriter is not only possible but is also a much more detailed record of the match. (ORTEGA. Full count! Fouled back three in a row ... OH, THAT BALL'S LANDIN' WHERE THE FANS ARE STANDIN'!!! Walk. Off. Home. Run. Thanks for your attendance and drive safely.)

I confess that when real work has to be done — documents with requirements equal to a college term paper — I use a computer. The start and stop of writing begs for the fluidity of modern technology, and who doesn't love choosing a new font like Franklin Gothic Medium, Bernard MT Condensed or Plantagenet Cherokee?

For less important doodles in text, the kind that go no farther than your desk or refrigerator door, the tactile pleasure of typing old school is incomparable to what you get from a de rigueur laptop. Computer keyboards make a mousy tappy tap tappy tap like ones you hear in a Starbucks — work may be getting done but it sounds cozy and small, like knitting needles creating a pair of socks. Everything you type on a typewriter sounds grand, the words forming in mini-explosions of SHOOK SHOOK SHOOK. A thank-you note resonates with the same heft as a literary masterpiece.

The sound of typing is one reason to own a vintage manual typewriter — alas, there are only three reasons, and none of them are ease or speed. In addition to sound, there is the sheer physical pleasure of typing; it feels just as good as it sounds, the muscles in your hands control the volume and cadence of the aural assault so that the room echoes with the staccato beat of your synapses.

You can choose the typewriter to match your sound signature.

Remingtons from the 1930s go THICK THICK. Midcentury Royals sound like a voice repeating the word CHALK. CHALK. CHALK CHALK. Even the typewriters made for the dawning jet age (small enough to fit on the fold-down trays of the first 707s), like the Smith Corona Skyriter and the design masterpieces by Olivetti, go FITT FITT FITT like bullets from James Bond's silenced Walther PPK. Composing on a Groma, exported to the West from a Communist country that no longer exists, is the sound of work, hard work. Close your eyes as you touch-type and you are a blacksmith shaping sentences hot out of the forge of your mind.

Try this experiment: on your laptop, type out the opening line of "Moby Dick" and it sounds like callmeishmael. Now do the same on a 1950s Olympia (need one? I've got a couple) and behold: CALL! ME! ISHMAEL! Use your iPad to make a to-do list and no one would even notice, not that anyone should. But type it on an old Triumph, Voss or Cole Steel and the world will know you have an agenda: LUGGAGE TAGS! EXTENSION CORDS! CALL EMMA!

You will need to make space for a typewriter and surrender the easy luxury of the DELETE key, but what you sacrifice in accuracy will be made up in panache. Don't bother with correcting tape, white-out or erasable onionskin paper. There is no shame in type-overs or XXXXXXiing out a word so mistyped that spell-check could not decipher it. Such blemishes will become the personality of your typing equal to the legibility, or lack thereof, of your penmanship.

The physicality of typing engenders the third reason to write with a relic of yesteryear: permanence. Short of chiseled words in stone, few handmade items last longer than a typed letter, for the ink is physically stamped into the very fibers of the paper, not layered onto the surface as with a laser-printed document or the status-setting IBM Selectric — the machine that made the manual typewriter obsolete. Hit the letter Y on an East German Erika typewriter — careful now, it's where the Z key is on an English language keyboard because German uses the Z more often — and a hammer strikes an ink-stained ribbon, pressing the dye into the paper where it will be visible for perpetuity unless you paint it over or burn the page.

No one throws away typewritten letters, because they are pieces of graphic art with a singularity equal to your fingerprints, for no two manual typewriters print precisely the same. E-mails disappear from all but the servers of Google and the N.S.A. No one on the planet has yet to save an Evite. But pull out a 1960s Brother De Luxe 895, roll in a sheet of paper and peck out, "That party was a rocker! Thanks for keeping us dancin' till quarter to three," and 300 years from now that thank-you note may exist in the collection of an aficionado who treasures it the same as a bill of sale from 1776 for one dozen well-made casks from Ye Olde Ale Shoppe.

The machine, too, may last as long as the rocks of Stonehenge. Typewriters are dense things made of steel and were engineered to take a beating, which they do. My dad's Underwood, bought used just after the war for his single year at U.S.C., had some keys so worn out by his punishing fingers that they were misshapen and blank. The S key was a mere nib. I sent it to a shop for what was meant to be only a cleaning, but it came back with all the keys replaced. So long, Dad, and curse you, industrious typewriter serviceperson.

STILL, I have the machine and it works, as do most of the typewriters that take up space in my office, home, storage facility and trunk of my car, a collection that started when, in 1978, the proprietor of a Cleveland business machine shop refused to service my mostly plastic typewriter. "A worthless toy!" the man yelled. Yes, yelled. He pointed to shelves full of his refurbished typewriters — already decades old yet all in perfect working order. A typewriter was a machine, he yelled, which could be dropped from an airplane and still work! He gave me a deal on a Hermes 2000 ("The Cadillac of typewriters!"), which featured a knob that adjusted the tension on the keys and the crispest, straightest line of type possible. I've since added the 3000, the Baby and the gloriously named Hermes Rocket to my shelves. Cadillacs, every one!

There is no reason to own hundreds of old typewriters other than the sin of misguided avarice (guilty!). Most can be had for 50 bucks unless, say, Hemingway or Woody Allen typed on them. Just one will last generations — if it is cleaned and oiled every once in a while. The ribbons are easy to find on eBay. Even some typewriters made as late as the 1970s can be passed on to your grandkids or encased in the garage until the next millennium, when an archaeologist could dig them up, hose them down and dip them in oil. A ribbon can be re-inked in the year 3013 and a typed letter could be sent off that very day, provided the typewriter hasn't outlived the production of paper.

Come to think of it, I'd better start hoarding stationery and pray the post office survives.

[garbon]

Ever seen this before on HuffPo? Friend posted this link to an article on facebook.

What Happened When My Son Wore A Pink Headband To Walmart

A grown man who should know better decided it was OK to step in and "teach" my child what it is to be manly. He thought it was OK to judge my child because he was not adhering to HIS idea of what a little boy should be.

But if you click on the link it now says:

Editor's Note: HuffPost provides a platform for bloggers to share their thoughts and experiences. In a post published last week, an author described witnessing an incident that is now being investigated by local law enforcement. At the blogger's request, we have removed the post. We have also confirmed with investigators that they are in contact with the author.

[garbon]

Oh!

http://thestir.cafemom.com/toddler/159267/2yearold_boy_wearing_pink_flower

UPDATE: According to the Orlando Sentinel, on Monday night officers investigating the event took Kathleen Carpenter in custody under Florida's Baker Act, which allows law enforcement officials to keep people in custody for mental evaluation. A deputy from the Lake County Sheriff's Office said, "Based on the continuing media response through Facebook and generated response to the incident by online subscribers, possible video of the incident may be obtained and viewed to in fact verify that the incident actually did occur or if it was all made up."

[CountDeMoney]

Neil likes the strap-ons his wife uses on him in pink.  Because sometimes he just likes to feel pretty.

[garbon]

Long live Luddism.  And death to hipsters for co-opting it.

That article makes him sound nutty.

[derspiess]

My 3 year old nephew got into the girl Halloween costumes we brought down to Argentina last year.  I intervened, but not before my wife & her sisters took a bunch of pictures.  It was funny at first, but Ziggy's already different enough.

[Barrister]

My 3 year old nephew got into the girl Halloween costumes we brought down to Argentina last year.  I intervened, but not before my wife & her sisters took a bunch of pictures.  It was funny at first, but Ziggy's already different enough.

I don't get the concern over that.  My three year old has little to no concept of gender - I couldn't convince him that although he, his little brother, and daddy all had 'peepees', that mommy did not.

He's danced around and said he was a princess, and said that he has a baby in his tummy like mommy does.  But he also routinely pretends to be various farm animals, a dinosaur, Batman, and Bob the Builder.  Actually when he plays 'Bob the Builder' he is either Bob or Bob's helper Wendy - and whichever character he is, I am the other one.

[Barrister]

I'm reading a police report and I see someone described as a "soul lease holder".