If at First You Don't Succeed...

Hello everyone!

If at first you don't succeed, well, sometimes it's best to just quit before you end up looking like a complete idiot. Especially if there's a camera recording:



Rob

ANSWER QUESTIONS AND RECEIVE FREE CRAP!!!

Hello everyone!

Have you ever gone to one of your favorite websites and seen those banner ads with some bogus quiz? They usually say something like, "WHO IS THIS CELEBRITY?" They'll have a high school yearbook photo of, say, Brad Pitt, and you can select from:

A) Pauly Shore
B) Ben Stein
C) Dave Chappelle
D) Brad Pitt
E) Cher

If you answer correctly, you can supposedly win an iPod or a Playstation 6 or whatever the latest trendy gadget is.

Or sometimes there will be a "survey" question such as, "Is President Bush doing a good job? Answer and win a FREE 96-INCH PLASMA SCREEN TV!!!!!" And then you have the option of clicking "YES" or "NO," but really whichever you click takes you to some unrelated website. Have you ever seen these? THEN CLICK YES OR NO TO RECEIVE A FREE $50,000 JACK IN THE BOX GIFT CARD!!! Or not.

I'm waiting for the one that gives me the option of clicking: "WHAT AN IDIOTIC QUESTION. JUST WHO IN THE HELL IS YOUR TARGET AUDIENCE?"

Then, and only then, will I click on your stupid ad.

Rob

Lawn Decoration Returned, with Photos

Hello everyone!

Take a look at this story:

Lawn decoration returned, with photos

PORTLAND, Ore., July 15 (UPI) -- A Portland, Ore., woman who had given up hope of ever seeing her missing ceramic dog again said the item has returned -- with photos of its travels.

Edwina Cramer-Norris said she had assumed the dog was gone for good when it disappeared last month, but then she began receiving postcards addressed "To Master" from "Lucky Dog," KPTV, Portland, Ore., reported Monday.

Cramer-Norris said she saw a blue van leave her driveway Sunday and when she went outside to investigate, she found her missing lawn decoration sitting in a makeshift dog house alongside a photo album documenting its adventures. She said the pictures depict the dog with a family at locations including Disney World, Graceland, the Mississippi River and New Orleans.

She said a note accompanying the pictures explained that the dog had needed a vacation from Oregon because the weather was too rainy.

"It's a strange thing," she said. "We're happy to have him back and it gives us something to share with others. (It's) some kind of a strange story."

Cramer-Norris said the missing dog returned with two new additions to the family -- a pair of ceramic puppies.

This is the greatest story, ever! And it's such a typical Portland story, too.

Rob

Odds and Ends

Hello everyone!

Well, I'm officially half way done with my summer classes. Today I took my final for my "History of Latin America" class, and I think it went well. This is the first time I've taken summer classes, and I actually like it. Instead of ten week long classes, I'm taking two classes in consecutive four week long blocks, one of which I just finished: the aforementioned Latin American one, and the other I'll start next week: "History of the Iraq War," which will be interesting because it's a history class about something that's ongoing. Or maybe it's a statement on the fact that the war has been going on for too long--that it started so long ago that it can now be classified as "historical."

In addition, I'm also taking two weekend seminar classes: Abolishing Nuclear Weapons, which happened last weekend, and The New Al Qaeda Threat, which will happen in a little over a week from now. Both the weekend seminars are taught by my insane Causes and Prevention of War professor from last fall. But each of these only require a 6-10 page paper, which is totally reasonable. I don't have to worry about any "pop-quizzes" that we had last fall. They were essentially midterms in which we had to write what amounted to an essay on the spot within 15 minutes.

Last week's seminar was interesting. After I first walked in and sat down, 6-8 football players sat down right next to me, all the while talking smack to each other. Now, I'm not certain they were football players, but they were very large men, they clearly knew each other well, and most of them were African-American.

I hate to say it, but the University of Oregon is so white that the odds are fairly high that any male black student is an athlete. Black women are pretty rare, or at least that's been my experience in my political science and history classes. However, this "whiteness" is pretty much the case throughout all of Eugene and Oregon in general, so much to the point that a guy in nearby Corvallis set up a booth at Farmer's Market with a sign that read, "Meet a Black Guy." If that's not bad enough, someone commented to the reporter that she and and friend "said they have black friends, and would be voting for Barack Obama for president." I couldn't make this stuff up if I tried.

Anyway, once these guys sat down, it was clear by the way they were talking to each other that they weren't very interested in being there, and my student/nerd instinct told me that they were going to keep talking to each other throughout the lecture, and I wouldn't be able to hear a thing. So I had to move. There was just one problem, though: if 6-8 black guys sit down next to one white guy, and the white guy gets up and walks away, what are the black guys going to think?

Maybe I was totally over-analyzing the situation, but I did come up with a "solution." I noticed one guy off by himself with a laptop plugged in and remembered that I had mine with me. So I walked over and asked, loudly enough for the football players to hear, if there was a place to plug in a laptop (I knew there was). The guy predictably said there was, and so I immediately sat down and plugged in my laptop. Success!

I was right about the football players talking, though, but some of them also decided to catch up on some sleep during the lecture. I don't know--I guess they have someone lined up to write their papers for them. But there was one other thing that I didn't expect: right after the lecture started, some woman sat down next to the other laptop guy, and the two proceeded to talk to each other (flirt) right in front of me during the course of the whole lecture. I guess I'm just expecting too much if I expect to be able to hear what the professor is saying. What an unreasonable jerk I am!

***

The other day, I heard one of the funniest stories I've heard in a long time. Amy, the produce lady at Market of Choice, apparently has a sister who waits tables at some snooty French restaurant. One day, she had an irate customer actually say this to her: "I've been to Paris, and I've had Soup-du-Jour, and this soup tastes nothing like it!"

I think it was this lady:

***

Hey look, it's the fashion police. Literally!

And here's a handy-dandy chart to help keep troublemakers like you from breaking the law!

Yes, you now can get arrested and sent to jail for not wearing your pants "properly." Apparently a wave of ill-fitting pants is terrorizing Flint, Michigan. I wonder what Michael Moore has to say about this?

Not only that, but if a cop doesn't like the way you're wearing your pants, that's reason enough to search you. Of course, that's the real purpose of all this. Remember that Fourth Amendment? You know, the one that protected us "against unreasonable searches and seizures"? Those were good times, but now they're gone. Of course, our old buddy Barack Obama didn't do us any favors on that one.

***

Since the right-wing knuckledraggers have nothing left but to blame Democrats for everything, some guy went above and beyond and bought himself a billboard:


Of course, he can't even claim to be original since God was apparently so angry he sent Democrats here to force your daughter to have gay sex and then have an abortion:


Anyway, the guy with the towers on fire billboard thinks he's some sort of a musician. If you go to his website, you can buy one of his CDs, featuring the cleverly-named song, "The Republican Song." Here are the lyrics taken directly from his website, complete with all the original typos and grammatical errors:

The Democrat secular progressive move,
political correctness is killing us too.
They want to take the money from the hard workin man,
and give it to the lazy folks that don't give a damn.

Chorus

Democrats and Liberals, shame on you,
don't punish us all just to please a few,
Your holdin people back while we're pickin up the slack,
and that's why we can't vote for a Democrat.
Oh no, a no, no, no, no, no, no...
Oh no, a no, no, no, no, no, nooo...
Yeah, your holding people back, while we're pickin up the tax,
Oh no, no please don't vote for a Democrat.

Now we're trying to win a war and wipe out the terrorists,
We're not fightin for oil we got plenty if we drill it.
But the liberals and the media are spreading their lies,
Get the hell out of our way and let our soldiers fight.

Chorus

Democrats and Liberals shame on you,
don't punish us all just to please a few.
No we can't afford to have another attack,
and that's why we can't vote for a Democrat.
Oh no, a no, no, no, no, no ,no...
Oh no, a no, no, no, no, no, no..
No we can't afford to have another attack,
Oh no, please don't vote for a Democrat.

Republicans, we're not perfect but we know the truth
We uphold the Constitution and the Golden Rule.
We believe a mans freedom is a God given right,
the USA is the beacon to the whole world in sight.

Chorus

Democrats and Liberals shame on you,
don't punish us all just to please a few.
our Constitution, Nation and God are under attack,
and that's why we can't vote for a Democrat.
Oh no, oh no, no, no, no, no, no...
oh no, oh no, no, no, no, no, no...
Our Constitution, Nation and God are under attack,
Oh no, please, oh no please, don't vote for a Democrat.

Our Constitution, Nation and God are under attack,
Oh no, please, oh no please, don't vote for a Democrat.

"Oh no, oh no, no, no, no, no, no" is right. I feel bad calling these lyrics because it's an insult to any lyric that's ever been written, even including ones written by Steve Perry. Seriously, that crap I took this morning could write a better song than this. The verdict:






Here's a much better song. Enjoy!



Rob

Hypermiling Tips

Hello everyone!

Say, has the price of gasoline ruined your summer vacation plans?


Are you finding it difficult to make ends meet each month due to the ever-increasing cost of putting fuel in the tank of your Giant SUV?


Do the various forms of computer-mediated communication found throughout today's modern world (particularly internet slang acronyms) confuse and frighten you? Well, kmhba. Rob Dow's World can't help you there.

I can tell you, however, that if you see gas prices like these...


...it just means the gas is very expensive.

So now that there has been a sharp decrease in federal revenue brought on by the tax cuts for the wealthy coupled with ever-increasing expenses, often due to waste and corruption, during the so-called War on Terror quagmire, the government has had to resort to excessive borrowing, mainly from the communist Chinese government, which in turn has led to a devaluation of the dollar, causing the the price of just about everything to skyrocket, and since Congress is too spineless to regulate anything but our civil liberties

So now that the confusing invisible hand of the free-market has somehow inexplicably raised the price of gas, some people may have the blues. But fret not--help is on the way, and it's Frankenoid's compendium of hypermiling tips! What's hypermiling? Simple: it's using specific driving techniques to help conserve every possible ounce of gasoline in your tank and raise your mileage. Here's the compendium, pilfered word for word from the Daily Kos:

1. Your increased mileage is the most important consideration. Pay no attention to the speed limit, timing of lights, inconvenience you may cause to other drivers, and the over-all wrench you throw into the smooth flow of traffic.

2. Look ahead to see the color of the next half-dozen traffic signals and any other condition that may cause you to have to vary your speed. You're driving a huge SUV and can see that far — that's why you have to be so goddamned fucking concerned about your gas mileage.

3. Leave precisely a half-block of space between you and the vehicle in front of you. It must be — and remain — precisely a half-block: that’s enough room so you can properly maneuver, creep, crawl, and otherwise claim the entire roadway as your own to accomplish your "hypermiling" maneuvers, but not enough room for other drivers to be able to enter traffic, perhaps causing you to put your foot on the brake (see #4 below below).

4. Avoid braking: every time you step on the brake, you're throwing away the momentum you paid good money to achieve. It's a hard habit to break (hah!). It is helpful to wire the brake pedal to the electrical system of your car so as to deliver a strong shock every time you touch the brake. Negative reinforcement will soon train you to be constantly vigilant to any situation where a normal person would apply the brakes. Instead, you'll drive so slowly that coasting to a stop will be possible in almost any situation and, if not — well, just run over the goddamned cat. It shouldn't be in the street anyway.

5. Always time it so to never stop at a red light: when your car's in idle, you're getting zero miles per gallon! Further, when you stop your car all the way you waste precious fuel to get it rolling again. When you see a light 3 blocks away is red (see 2 above), remove your foot from the gas and coast, creeping every more slowly towards the light. Pay no attention to the fact that you're keeping vehicles behind you from the left-turn lane where the signal is green, or blocking access to a right-turn only lane.

6. Pay no attention to the speed limit, and do not concern yourself with the fact that lights are timed in accordance with that speed limit. If you need to go slower than the speed limit and/or the prevailing flow of traffic to achieve the optimum mileage in your car — do it. If the cars behind you miss green lights because of the extreme amount of space you leave between your vehicle and the one in front of you, or because you have crept out so slowly from a stop light as to impede the flow of traffic, too fucking bad! You're getting a gajillion miles per gallon!

7. Take shortcuts: if you can avoid a stop-sign or traffic light by cutting through a parking lot, or the neighbor's yard, do it. You may cause a little property damage, but what's that compared to the price of wasted gas? Besides, it's not like it's your property.

8. Avoid stopping at stop signs. Look ahead (damned but that extra height in a giant-assed SUV comes in handy!) and, if cars are lined up at a 4-way stop in front of you, slowly coast up until the last car in the line has moved through the stop sign. You can then coast through on their tail, paying absolutely no attention to the cross-traffic vehicles that have patiently been waiting their turn. What are they going to do, hit you? You're driving a giant-assed SUV!

9. If you've fucked up and have had to come to a complete stop — and it happens to the best of us — accelerate verrrryy veeerrrry slowly. Take your foot off the brake and don't touch the gas at all — the idle on your automatic transmission will likely be enough to get the car moving. If you're really lucky you'll be facing down a hill and, barring that, if you wait long enough, the frustrated driver behind you may become angry enough to "nudge" your bumper and give you a little free momentum. Alternatively, if you have children in the car, have them get out of the car and push — it's good exercise for them and, as slow as you'll be going, they'll easily be able to jump back in.

10. When turning onto an arterial from a stop sign at a side street, you must both (a) avoid rapid acceleration and (b) not spend a second of excess amount of time idling at the stop sign. Thus, it is critical that you take the absolute first opportunity to proceed with your turn, even if you do so directly in front of the only vehicle visible for a dozen blocks. But, you must not immediately accelerate, even if you force the other driver to slam on his or her brakes to avoid hitting you. If the other driver had been as eternally vigilant to the art of hypermiling as you, he or she would never be in a position where they have to slam on their brakes. Too bad for them (and even if they do hit you, see #7 above).

11. Get rid of "dead weight": anything you carry in your car decreases your gas mileage. I mean, really — how often have you actually needed that jack and spare tire in the trunk? Or the carpet — merely there for aesthetic value. Those child car seats — have you ever lifted one of those fucking things? They weigh a ton! Strap a bike helmet on the little darlings instead: if it's good enough to protect them when riding a bike, it must be good enough to protect them in a car. Chrome trim, seat covers, music systems, excess fluid for the windshield washer, passenger seat, maps, proof of insurance, registration, anything that is not directly connected to getting from here to there just hinders your fuel efficiency and decreases your gas mileage — get rid of it.

12. Calculate exactly how much gas you'll need for your planned trip, and then buy a little less. Gas is a liquid, and is very, very heavy. Not only will you decrease excess weight (see 11 above), but walking home a few times will give your motivation to be hyper-vigilant to hypermiling and improve your performance. What satisfaction you'll feel as you coast into your driveway on fumes, day after day!

13. Don't use the air conditioner or drive with the windows open: it's murder on your mileage. Instead, drive naked — it will keep you cool, and is one more step for 11 above. Also make sure all of your passengers disrobe before entering the car — if your children end up needing to push to get you rolling at a stop sign or traffic light, nudity will give them proper motivation to really get moving.

14. Plan your parking: whenever possible, park heading downhill and turn your front wheels out — even if the so-called safety "experts" contend that you should crank your front wheels towards the curb. If there's a light at the bottom of the hill, time leaving your parking place so that you can just release the parking brake and roll lickety-split through the light without ever turning on your engine — ignore the flow of traffic which also will be timed for that light. Just bull your way out (see #10 above) — remember, you're in a giant-ass SUV and they can't hurt you.

15. When parking in a parking lot, always park head-out so as to avoid having to back up, stop, then go forward when leaving — that means you're accelerating twice, the bane of a hypermiler. Of course to reap gas savings, you can't back into a space — you must find two open slots in a line, so you can drive through the first slot and be head-out in the second slot. If you must wait for another car to leave to obtain such an arrangement, simply stop and turn off your engine wherever it is convenient for you until the magic space appears. Although you may be inconveniencing others by blocking the traffic lane, that's not your problem.

16. When parallel parking, always park in the middle of two parking spaces, so as make it easy for you to get out of your parking space. Never mind if it's an urban neighborhood where on-street parking is scarce. And remember — your first try is good enough. It doesn't matter if you're parked crooked, with the ass-end of your car extending into the traffic lane, or a foot and a half from the curb: you'd negatively affect your mileage by making any further attempts to do a decent job of parking.

17. To truly achieve great savings fucking leave your goddamned SUV parked. Ride the bus, ride a bike, car-pool — just fucking get off the goddamned road. You're driving me absolutely batshit insane.

How about those tips! Now, I agree that this is not a good long-term solution, but it's something to help us until a viable alternative transportation source is perfected, such as this prototype:

And to those of you who who'd rather do nothing but fuel up your SUV gas tank and then later bitch to me about how expensive it is, I've got five words for you:


Rob

Joe Cocker for the Hearing Repaired

Hello everyone!

In honor of the upcoming 39th anniversary of Woodstock, I thought it would be appropriate to honor one of the original performers. Here is a video from the festival of Joe Cocker doing his version of the The Beatles "With a Little Help from My Friends," complete with subtitles so you can tell what the hell he's saying:



Rob