Terrible Analogies

Apparently, drivers in New Zealand are incapable of slowing down when it rains.  The problem, I’m to assume, is so severe that an advertising agency has created billboards that bleed in an attempt draw attention to the issue.

Eye-catching, to say the least.  I have to wonder, though, if it’s too distracting.  Here in California we have the Amber Alert system that activates electronic signs along the highways that are meant to convey critical information when a child is abducted (or something else equally heinous) and the cops need people to keep an eye out for suspect vehicles.  When these signs are on, people lose their minds.  They begin to drift into other lanes and become incapable of traveling at a safe speed.

I can only imagine how people in New Zealand will react when they spot these bleeding billboards for the first time.  At night.  In the rain.  With an eerie song playing on the car radio.

“I see in Fight Club the strongest and smartest men who’ve ever lived.  I see all this potential.  And I see it squandered.  Goddamn it, an entire generation pumping gas. Waiting tables. Slaves with white collars. Advertising has us chasing cars and clothes. Working jobs we hate so we can buy shit we don’t need.  We’re the middle children of history.  No purpose or place.  We have no Great War.  No Great Depression.  Our great war is a spiritual war.  Our great depression is our lives.  We’ve all been raised on television to believe that one day we’d be millionaires and movie gods and rock stars.  But we won’t.  We’re slowly learning that fact.  And we’re very, very pissed off.”  

                                                                                              - Fight Club by Chuck Palahniuk

I’m glad to see that Tyler Durden is still around, but the irony of his promoting a product seems to go against the very nature and spirit of the character.

All right now…if you’re going to show off your phone, at least shell out a few extra bucks for a hand model that doesn’t suffer from occupational dermatitis.

In one of the more anticipated chats at All Things Digital, Palm Executive Chairman Jon Rubinstein showed off the Palm Pre and talked about several features of the smartphone for the first time.

Yikes!  Those are the hands of Palm’s Executive Chairman?  Now, I know that Palm has hit hard times recently, but come on Jon, spring for a bottle of Jergens.  It’s called “moisturizing”, and it’s nothing to be ashamed of…

…What kind of toys are kids playing with nowadays?

In the span of a single afternoon I happened to stumble upon:

Disgusting Anatomy Heart:  Have you ever found yourself standing in your darkened kitchen late at night, with the only light coming from the single dim frosted bulb inside your open refrigerator?  There you are, slouching into the open box, your arm draped heavily over the door as you slowly scan its chilled contents.  Unsure what you want to eat you’re suddenly overcome with an overwhelming, insatiable desire to hold a slick, pulsing, quivering human heart in your bare hands.  

No?  Strange…I can’t believe I’m the only one ever to have that feeling.  

+1 for the bonus eyeball kit.

Gabby Girl: High creep factor with this toy.  I’m not sure where the manufacturer was going with this doll, but the posable mouth, flickering tongue, beady, vacant eyes, and 80′s inspired clothes propels this toy into the high stratosphere of the uncomfortably abnormal.  

Recently I’ve been having this reoccurring nightmare of waking up in a cold sweat and seeing that sometime, in the dead of night, this life-sized doll had silently pulled up a chair next to my bed and has been patiently sitting there, in the dark, inches from my face, watching me sleep.  The only sound I hear is a sticky, rubbery *smack* *smack* as it gums it’s lips together, her dead eyes staring straight into my shivering, cowering soul.

This doll eerily resembles a cousin of mine who lives in San Francisco, but with fewer facial piercings, no chronic cough, and absence of strict vegan diet for “religious reasons”.

Gummy Tapeworm: Knowing that by eating this it’ll soon be working its way through my colon is enough to make me want to wash my hands after handling the package.  I wonder, if I ever had an opportunity to eat a real honest-to-gosh tapeworm, would it taste like apple?  Who knows what a tapeworm tastes like?

Okay…that’s enough disturbing thoughts for one night…

There are quite a few topics I’d like to address, but as I sit down to write this post I’m not sure which one to focus on:

1- Air Force One doing a low-level flyover of Manhattan and ground zero.  What moron thought that was a good idea?  Whatever happened to “the buck stops here“?

2- Swine Flu:  What’s the real story?  Why is Mexico taking extreme measures to combat this illness while America sits back and does nothing?  Is this a case of hype over facts?  Did you know that 36,000 Americans die every year because of the flu?  The victims are typically the very young and the very old.  This Swine Flu (no, I’m not going to call it H1N1) seems to be killing people of all ages.  I’m not quite sure what to believe about this illness, but I’m not about to panic.

3 – Arlen Spector: The man who created the “single bullet theory” switches political parties, jumping ship to the Democratic ticket.  This is the same Arlen Spector whose key vote helped pass Obama’s pork-filled stimulus bill.  Face it, he switched sides because he had no chance in hell of being re-elected in the upcoming Republican race.  This is yet another example why nobody should be forced to vote along party lines.

4- The University of Central Florida has developed a new technology which could allow for a single disc to store over 4 terabytes of information.  Call me jaded, but I won’t get excited until I can hold a data crystal in my hands.

But above all of this dire news and political flack one thing really had me questioning my faith in humanity and all that I hold most dear in this world.  I thought I knew everything, that nothing of this magnitude could have possibly escaped my finely honed observational senses for all of these years.

Did you ever notice who the supervising producer of Who’s The Boss was?

You doubt me?  See for yourself:

Sometimes I shock myself at what I find newsworthy…