Quoth

I woke up on Christmas morning and saw a crow flopping around in the ashtray outside on my window sill. He looked right at me and flew away.

Then I went to see The Wrestler and ate Chinese food.

Nuts to you, death omen!

You should know that I am not in the espionage business, and yet, this is the error message I got on my computer at work after being prompted to change my password this morning:

The password supplied does not meet minimum complexity requirements. Please select another password that meets all of the following criteria: is at least seven characters; has not been used in the 12 previous passwords; must not have been changed in the last seven days; does not contain your account or name; contains at least three of the following four character groups: English uppercase characters (A through Z); English lowercase characters (a through z); non-alphabetic characters (such as !, $, #, %).

And with that, my new password is written on a post-it note on my desk.

Speaking of work and death and espionage, I was thinking that if I had interns, I'd make them watch the first six seasons of 24 to count how many bad guys Jack Bauer has killed. I feel like that'd be a great figure to toss around at cocktail parties. "Pretty good cheese plate, huh? So far Jack Bauer's killed 276 people."

Of course, rather than simply dividing up the DVDs amongst my staff, I'd have each person watch the whole series separately and then make sure their totals matched the others to prevent them from just pulling a random number out of their ass. I'm always one step ahead of my scheming hypothetical interns!

Merry Christmas!

Wish List

Hey, procrastinators! there are still a lot of great bargains over at Amazon. Check it out:

Poet's Market, 1989 (Hardcover)
16 used from $0.38

Y2K -- It's Already Too Late (Paperback)
18 used from $0.01

The Wit and Wisdom of Ross Perot: Over 100 Quotes and Anecdotes from the Man Who Could Be Our Next President (Paperback)
18 Used & new from $0.01


Scroll over the box below to see the secret behind the joke I just made:

Those are old, crummy books nobody would ever want. That's why they're so cheap. They're not actually bargains at all!

Do the Do

I went for a walk through Central Park yesterday. I found myself a hot commodity for strangers who needed someone to take a picture of them and their brood standing in front of stuff. And while I appreciate getting sized up as a guy who probably won’t run off with your camera, it’s still a little stressful. One, it’s not like I’ve never dropped anything expensive before. Two, long gone are the days when you had to leave a roll of film at the drug store before you found out I stink at taking pictures. In those days I could've made a clean getaway!

In sports news, Dock Ellis passed away over the weekend. He is most well known for throwing a no-hitter while high on LSD, but he also let loose one of the better quotes in baseball history:

Cincinnati will bullshit with us and kick our ass and laugh at us. They’re the only team that talk about us like a dog. Whenever we play that team, everybody socializes with them. When they ran over to us, we knew they were afraid of us. When I saw our team doing it, right then I say, ‘We gonna get down. We gonna do the do. I’m going to hit these motherfuckers.

Then he went out to the mound and hit Pete Rose with the first pitch. You can read the rest here. Point is, Dock Ellis was good old fashioned nuts. Godspeed!

The Bourne Reminder

I always see The Bourne novels prominently displayed at bookstores but I’ve yet to try one. The movies were pretty fun, but I have to assume they aren’t faithful adaptations as I’m not sure how 80% fights and chases would read:

Then Jason Bourne bashed the guy in the head with a book that he found on the floor and pressed the book against the guy’s face and started punching the book! But then the other guy did this somersault kick thing and it was hard to tell what they were doing but – wait—now they’re in the bathroom. The guy’s got a knife but Jason Bourne just picked up a towel…I think he’s fighting back with a towel! Did the government actually train him to fight back against a knife with a towel? That’s what Jason Bourne is still trying to find out.

“Where’s Bourne now? Get me, Bourne!” said the boss from the control center while everybody yelled and typed away on their spying computers.

Now Jason Bourne just got on a motorcycle and popped this crazy wheelie up onto the -- BEEP BEEP! Look out!

Books are for nerds!

Whisper in the Wind

FYI, the new HBO documentary Cat Dancers is 100% completely insane. You should really make an effort to watch it.

I waited for an elevator today. The doors opened and as I got on, the guy inside gave me the stinkeye, said, "Great, looks like I got the local" and started bashing the Door Close button with his fist. I'm putting the over/under on heart attacks this guy has had at 3.5.

I’m somewhat short on patience myself, but anyone who goes to town on the Door Close button is a born sucker. It seems to me that the doors close when they want to close and the button is just a pacifier for people who have to be the boss of everything. Secondly, that local joke, its crustiness aside, is meant for people who are already on the elevator with you. When you say it to the one person who is getting on the elevator you're basically saying, "Surprise: I hate you!"

For the record, my reply to him was "Huh? Oh. Yep." That's my crowd work skills kicking in!

Related to stand-up, almost every time I do Ochi's Lounge at Comix I find a way to hit my head on the low ceiling overhang. Before I went onstage there on Saturday I consciously reminded myself to avoid hitting my head. Then I walked onstage, leaned over to set my drink on the stool and instead of hitting my head, I stood up and BASHED my head. That is an improvement in the wrong direction. But don't worry, I bounced back and proved yet again that I am one of the comedians of all time!

Kid Dynamite

I’ll be the last person to feel sorry for a convicted rapist losing his figure, but still, this somehow makes me feel very old. Iron Mike is now your boss but with a face tattoo.

"Karen is passing around the new timesheets. Please be sure all overtime is up to date or I'll bite your ears off."

Your number is up

I just went through my archives and realized that I haven't made fun of Natalie Cole yet. An oversight on my part that ends right now! I had occasion to go to Staples yesterday. This is the CD they had on display at the checkout:



You heard her: still! And you’ll never guess what else. The album is all traditional songs plus a duet with her dead dad who is Nat King Cole. And people say that Madonna is the queen of reinvention. Obviously, those people have never been to Staples.

Just to clarify, Nat King Cole died when he was 45 years old and Natalie Cole is now 58 years old. Eventually, this might start to feel a little weird is all.

I guess the next step is to CGI herself into CAT BALLOU.

Boom! A reference to the movie Cat Ballou! And my earlier post about the cookbook for balls? It’s only Monday and I’m already on fire!

Commemorative

This is my 69th post of the year. I don’t want any off color comments about this. I mean, I get it. The number 69. Very funny. Now grow up and save that kind of talk for the gutter!

Anyway, check out the new book I’ve been reading:

It Begins

This comedy show should prove to be a doozy so start buying your tickets now:

Riverside Arts Center
Ypsilanti, MI
January 23rd and 24th
8:00 PM
$12

Vince Averill
Greg Johnson
Matt McCarthy
Jesse Popp

Like I said, start buying your tickets!