Terrible Analogies

There are cases where using Photoshop to improve on a picture would be completely justified…

While working on a crossword puzzle found in a recent issue of Games Magazine the other day I happened upon the clue “C-3PO and R2D2″.  ”Easy!” I thought to myself, and dutifully penciled the word DROIDS into the provided squares.

Well, it soon became apparent that something was wrong with this puzzle.  None of the other solutions surrounding the word DROIDS was fitting.  Confused, I began to fill in the squares while ignoring the word DROID and to my absolute horror the actual answer was not DROIDS, but rather ROBOTS.

ROBOTS?! Are you kidding me?  As in, “These are not the robots you’re looking for”?

Nope.  No sir, I don’t like it.

By this time my nerd-rage was in full effect, and I caught myself saying out loud, “Robby the Robot was a robot.  Tweaky was a robot.  Heck, even WALL•E was a robot.  C-3PO and R2-D2 are droids.  There’s just no two ways about it…”

Way to go, Games Magazine.  And to think that I used to hold you in such high regard

So there I was, minding my own business, relaxing on a bench yesterday with my sack lunch (hey, I’m trying to save money), enjoying the amazing weather we’re having over here in San Diego when a tow truck and a police car pull up next to a Honda Prius parked on the street roughly 100 feet away.

The police officer exits his vehicle and slowly ambles his way up to the Honda, both hands on his hips, paying particular attention to the front license plate.  The tow truck guy, baseball cap on backwards and dickies unbuttoned to his crotch approaches the cop and they have a quick discussion filled with sweeping hand gestures and copious note-taking.  Apparently having come to a decision on the next course of action, the tow trucker driver walks over to his truck and quickly reappears with a slim jim to break into the Prius.

“Oh, joy,” I think to myself, settling down to watch the afternoon’s entertainment.

After ten minutes of fiddling with the lock on the passenger side the tow truck guy gives up and goes back to his truck and backs it up to the Prius with the intent of somehow sliding the vehicle out from between the two cars that it was tightly parked between.

That’s when some joker wearing an obnoxious yellow tie lurches from the company parking lot in an ungainly stride, arms flailing in the air like a repentant Sunday church worshiper in the clutches of the Holy Spirit, yelling “That’s my car!  That’s my car!”  The officer quickly moves to intercept this guy, stops him several paces away from the Honda, and they have quick conversation.  Twenty seconds later the cop has Mr. White Collar face down on the hood of the Prius, hands behind his back, with cuffs quickly descending down on the guy’s wrists.

The officer soon had dejected looking Obnoxious Tie Guy in the back of his cruiser.  The tow truck driver deftly slid the Prius out and hooked it up to his truck.  Minutes later the scene was clear, as if nothing had ever happened.

And that was the best time I ever had eating a homemade tuna sandwich.

I was surfing the internet this weekend looking for a case for Karin’s new 4G iTouch when I came across this Cronenbergian nightmare.  Apparently it’s a power supply cord designed by a Japanese artist.  This thing is equal parts disturbing and fascinating, and quite honestly it’s really nothing that I’d want in my house.

Reminds me of the movie eXistenZ. If you haven’t seen this flick yet, then I highly suggest you stop reading my blog and go pick up a copy.

Gearing up for my Mt. Whitney run next week I decided to go on a nice, easy five mile run after work yesterday. The route I took skirts a local golf course and lazily snakes through a quiet residential neighborhood. At roughly the four mile mark in my run I saw a woman approaching me on the sidewalk pushing a stroller. As I neared her I noticed that she was sporting a pair of old radio headphones with antennas extended, the kind thing you would commonly see people wearing in the 70′s, and she was clearly rocking out to something motivating.

As the distance between us quickly closed I could make out that she was the grandmotherly sort, pushing mid-sixties, yet doing so in style with brightly colored clothes and a skip in her step. I was close enough to make out the smile wrinkles in her cheeks, and could now very clearly hear her loudly belting out the tune “He’s Got The Whole World In His Hands”, with one hand pushing the stroller while the other wildly circled above her head as if she were swatting away at an unusually persistent dive bombing insect.

Looking down as we passed I saw a small dog, possibly a Yorkshire Terrier, strapped into the five-point harness of the stroller, wearing a bonnet and a pacifier strapped around its neck.

Mind. Blown.