April 17, 2008
CorporateSpeak: The Game
This BoingBoing gadget lets you smash corporate shillery in a most amusing way.
Speaker info
Atom Feed
April 14, 2008
The Two-Thirds Life Crisis
I am coming to grips with the sticker shock of hitting my 40th birthday. Unfortunately, I’m 57.
This inconvenient truth is born home by Doc Searls‘ recent “incident.” [More from Doc here, here, here, and here.) I am one of the absurd number of people who count Doc as a close friend. I happened to be in the conference room when the pain in his chest got too strong to ignore. He called the Harvard health folks who said it might be a good time to stagger on over. So, I walked him there. It’s the least the second oldest person in the room could do. Not to mention, that way I found out as soon as possible what was going on with him, which turned out to be a pulmonary embolism (a blood clot that had traveled to his lungs), which was treated quickly and well.
Boston is a good city to get sick in.
Doc’s doing well, thank heavens. He blogged a couple of days after the incident that he’s resolved to start taking better care of himself. Good. We want Doc around for many decades, purely for selfish reasons.
Doc is in the midst of what I guess we should called a Two-Thirds Life Crisis because it comes some time after the Midlife Crisis. I’ve been through my own, having eaten my way into Type 2 diabetes a couple of years ago. I resolved to start taking better care of myself, and, fortunately, you can no longer use my blood to top off your pancakes in the morning. I’m actually in better shape than before. (Irony alert: I’ll probably drop dead this afternoon, just to give y’all something to blog about.)
Anyway, here, is a handy comparison chart:
|
The Male Midlife Crisis |
The Male Two-Thirds Life Crisis |
Occurs in your 40’s |
Occurs in your late 50’s or early 60’s |
Brought on by hearing your songs played on the oldies station |
Brought on by hearing your cardiologist going “tut tut,” and then realizing that your cardiologist is 15 years younger than you. |
|
Can’t believe you’re not twenty years younger |
Can’t believe you’ve only got twenty years left |
|
Purchase sports car in desperate attempt to appear young |
After catching yourself in a mirror, you give away your baseball cap and shorts because you realize you’re too old for camp |
|
Work on abs |
Work on cholesterol |
|
Ready to prove to the ladies that you’re still in your sexual prime |
Continue lifelong redefinition of “sexual prime.” |
Learn (= pretend) to like hip hop |
Learn your parents were right about Duke Ellington |
50 seems really old. |
50 seems really old. |
April 6, 2008
Attention, passengers (How it sounds from coach)
Attention, passengers. We are now 15 minutes from landing. Please turn off any electronic equipment, make sure your seat belt is buckled, your seat is returned to an upright and locked position, and any carry-on luggage is safely stowed under the seat in front of you.
For our Deluxe Elite passengers, please return your footrests to their stowed position, and turn your stemware in to the attendant who will shortly be coming down the aisle with your choice of mints and Belgian chocolates. Also, turn off and stow your media entertainment console, reduce your back massage to off or low, and make sure your balloon hats are safely secured around your head, as loose headgear can disturb the poodles. If you are seated next to one of the surprise celebrities strewn about the cabin, now would be a good time to exchange telephone numbers, unless you’re seated next to Bono, in which case be advised that he is happy to accept your contribution in the African denomination of your choice. Those of you traveling with small children should have them begin to say goodbye to their clowns, and please don’t forget your pony vouchers. Feel free to keep your travel tiara for your next trip, with our compliments. And now, as we approach our destination, we ask you to please return your attendant to the upright and secured position.
It is, as always, our pleasure to serve you here in the luxurious skies.
April 1, 2008
Thoughtcloud scrapes neurons
The Media Re:Public group at Berkmanhas announced a breakthrough technology that promises to take the “conference” out of “un-conference.”
Categories: blogs Tagged with: blogs • business • conference coverage • culture • digital culture • digital rights • folksonomy • humor • science • social networks • taxonomy • tech • uncat • web 2.0 • wifi
March 31, 2008
March 27, 2008
Dept. of unfortunate semantic blockages
On the flight to LA this morning, while I was standing in the attendant’s cranny, waiting for the bathroom to free up, I noticed a sign on a bit of the JetBlue plane that jutted in at about knee level. The sign said:
DO NOT SIT HERE
NO SENTARSE AQUI
But, the attendant had left a piece of paper there which accidentally obscured half the sign, so that it read:
SIT HERE
ARSE AQUI
(This would be funnier if I’d had a camera with me. Or maybe not.)
March 24, 2008
With a side of long pork?
Solana Larsen has a fabulous idea. For those of us vegetarians who love faux meat, why doesn’t a restaurant serve up something besides the usual mock chicken, beef, pork, etc.? Why not faux endangered species? Solana suggests a menu…
Categories: Uncategorized Tagged with: culture • food • humor • vegetarian
How Stonehenge was made
It came to me as if in a dream. They constructed Stonehenge by digging holes in the ground, dropping slabs into them, laying the crosspieces on the ground, and then excavating around the whole shebang.
Or, possibly, Superman built it for them.
March 14, 2008
Chinposin, the latest faux rage
There’s nothing that makes you more intelligent than posing with your hand on your chin, although Martin Heidegger seems to have insisted on always posing with his finger pointing at his temple. But for mere mortals, it’s all about the chinposin’.
Read all about it here. And, as James Governor explains in an email: “To join simply follow @chinposin [at Tweeter], upload a chinposin avatar pic, then @reply @chinposin with “update”]
(Please forgive typos in this post. It’s hard to type when you’ve got one hand holding onto your chin to convince the people around you that you are bracingly intelligent.) [Tags: chinposin authority]
March 13, 2008
An old joke made new
During the first Bush administration — GB Sr. — when we feared Japan’s economic power, I heard the following joke:
Pres. Bush is in a car crash and is in a coma for six months. When he wakes up, VP Quayle is at the bedside. “Tell me how the country is doing,” asks a worried Pres. Bush. “Start with, say, education, because, as you recall, I am the education president.”
“It’s going great,” says Quayle. “Our math scores are up. Scores among the poor have caught up with the rich. More kids in college. All good.”
“That’s fantastic news. How about foreign policy?”
“Even better news, Mr. President. Peace in the Middle East. Justice in Africa. New global partnerships around the world.”
“Wow! I’m almost afraid to ask, but how’s the economy?”
“It’s doing fantastic. For example, you know that little French restaurant you and I sometimes go to? I was there yesterday. I had the full three course meal, with a decent glass of wine, and a cheese platter to finish, and the whole thing cost me just … um, yeah, it was just 2,000 yen.”
Search and replace on the old Bush for the new Bush, Cheney for Quayle…and yuan for yen. [Tags: humor bush jokes]
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