John McCain fails at logic.

From a recent John McCain ad: "The real Barack Obama promises higher taxes and more government spending. So, fewer jobs."

What? Seriously? No. Just no. Can anyone explain how this is a valid argument, irrespective of soundness? Anyone?

The Need for Specifity When Discussing Melons

It has recently come to my attention that the English call all varieties of melon "melon". This does not make sense to me at all. It seems natural (and logical) to differentiate these glorious fruits by their forenames, as it were. If you were having dinner with the Smith family, would you say "Say Smith, this is a lovely roast" and "Smith, how are the grandkids?" and "Smith your ass looks great in that dress"? I'm guessing not, unless...well, I'm not even going to go there. It's the same with melons!

"Those are some lovely melons!"
"Those are some lovely melons!"
"Those are some lovely melons!"

And therein the confusion lies. Those sentences should read (respectively, and I apologize to those on Facebook where I'm not sure the links will work) "Those are some lovely watermelons!", "Those are some lovely honeydews!" and "Nice tits!"

Considering the huge variety of melons (excluding the colloquial definition, about 27), just saying "Hey I want some melon" begs the question "Well what type, you jackass?" Can you imagine walking up to a melon bar and telling the...er...barman..."Hey, I'd like two slices of the melon, one slice of the melon and a whole melon, please"? Patently absurd jackassery, and I refuse to allow it to continue.

If this generality is allowed to continue, where does it all end? Do we go around calling all cheese "cheese" or all wine "wine"? It just cannot be allowed to happen. We've got to put a stop to it!

I propose invading England.

McDonald's

Er, so I just saw a new McDonald's commercial on TV. In it, Ronald McDonald was in a tree luring small children over so he could give them fruit.

A park. A tree. A man in a clown suit. Fruit. Children.

That's damn creepy. I'm just sayin', is all.

Band of Evil Macaques Take Over Bovine Compound, Demand Voting Rights and Release of Political Prisoners from President Kiwi

Also, Macaques Can Apparently Talk

by Benjamin Lloyd

Maputo, Mozambique -- A band of decidedly evil macaques have taken a local cow compound hostage and a list of demands has been presented to president Kiwi.

At 0700 GMT, a group of macaques who have recently been accused of rambling on about many inane things into the ears of unsuspecting citizens stormed the local Haven de Vaca and took twenty-three cows hostage. At 0730, a list of demands was faxed to president Kiwi along with some photos of the macaques being evil and poking cows with big sticks. The list of demands is fairly extensive, including voting rights for all macaques, the release of all macaques in worldwide zoos, four pints of Ben and Jerry's One Sweet Whirled ice cream, and the island of Madagascar.

President Kiwi has heretofore expressed a desire to not negotiate with terrorists, but the level of outrage displayed by the cow and penguin citizenship has forced his hand. Kiwi has acquiesced to all of themacaques' demands save one: the ice cream. Ben and Jerry's is staunchly refusing to relaunch the One Sweet World flavor for any reason. A spokesperson released a press statement saying, "Hey, if we did it for them, we'd have to do it for everyone. Frankly, it's just not cost effective." B&J's stock has dropped considerably since the announcement.

Owing to the ice cream giant's staunch refusal to acquiesce to the macaques' request, Kiwi had no choice but to send in the SPAT (Special Penguins and Tactics) team to raid the compound. All of the cows were rescued, and all the officers of the SPAT team returned unharmed. However, two macaques were pip-slapped to death by the penguins' tiny, furious little flippers.

Also: Apparently macaques have evolved the ability to speak English. I'm sure someone cares about this, but no one could be reached for comment. -- A[P]P

The Southern Culinary Review

Local Woman in Mississippi Starts Latest Food Craze

by Benjamin Lloyd

Chickasaw County, Miss. -- A new food fad is emerging from the back woods of the American Deep South. Previously made (in)famous for such famed foods as the deep-fried Twinkie, deep-fried Oreo, and of course fried chicken, a new craze is sweeping the South: deep-fried chocolate cake. That's right: deep-fried cake. Here is its incredible story.

It all began some six months ago with Clarice Culver, a 380-pound housewife in unincorporated Chickasaw County, Mississippi. Mrs. Culver, who suffers from atherosclerosis, or a hardening of plaque within the arteries, was rooting around in her single-wide for something else with which to clog her already-congested circulatory system (I asked our medical expert what her arteries looked like on the inside, and his prognosis was less than stellar: in a rare show of extreme sarcasm, he purchased a length of 4" PVC pipe and filled it with concrete) when she came across some week-old birthday cake and a decanter of frying oil.

"I thought to myself, 'Well heck! I can't let this all go'n to waste, now can I?' So I fired up the deep frier, battered [the cake] and tossed it in," Mrs. Culver reports. She claims she then ate the entire thing. It should be noted that not everyone believe's Mrs. Culver's story. Many claim that the chances of a cake lasting an entire week in her trailer are "ass-treadnomical [sic]." Despite these few naysayers, however, majority opinion rests on the side of Mrs. Culver.

From Accidental Delight to International Craze

The truly remarkable thing is how quickly delicacy exploded onto the international cuisine scene. From that first remarkably delicious cake, Culver knew she was onto something big. She immediately sped away to the nearest supermarket to purchase several different cake mixtures to decide which was the best. She went through white, yellow, orange, spice, and carrot cake mixtures before settling on devil's food chocolate as the most delicious. After perfecting her recipe she set off to rule the food world.

She set up a booth at the state fair where the cakes were a big hit, the first non-freak fair feature to outgross the Bearded Talking Cow for the first time in seven years. Culver was approached by a major culinary firm and sold the recipe for a record $42 billion. Though many in the industry were outraged by such a high price, and financial analysts had predicted that such reckless spending could push the country further into recession, the economy has seen a considerable boom since the transaction, with the newly-branded fried cakes having grossed nearly half the recipe price in a short 8 months.

Mrs. Culver has since fulfilled all her childhood ambitions, including having purchased a brand-new double-wide trailer and a 1996 Ford Thunderbird 5.0. We at the Associated [Penguin] Press have obtained exclusive rights to the original recipe, which we were able to obtain through a huge loophole in the contract Mrs. Culver signed with her buyers, and here it is, reproduced for you below:

Ingredients:
- 1 cake
- 1 gallon frying oil
- 1 frying basket made from old chicken wire
- frying batter of your choice

Roll cake in batter; place battered cake into basket; lower basket into oil; fry for 5 minutes. Eat.

Mrs. Culver claims to be working on a new secret recipe. We can only hope it will bring as much joy and heart disease as has her previous effort.

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Coming articles: Get a behind-the-scenes look at how a large, multinational news agency goes through the process of replacing a recently-sacked medical expert!; Guns: the loud killer; Space: Is there anything useful out there at all?
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"Gilligan's Island" Remake Dream Team: A Testament to How Boring My Job Gets

Gilligan -- Steve Carrell

The Skipper -- Reginald VelJohnson (you know, Carl Winslow from "Family Matters")

The Professor -- David Duchovny (Mulder)

Mary Ann -- Mila Kunis (Jackie from "That '70s Show")

Ginger -- Gillian Anderson (Scully)

Thurston Howell III -- Michael Caine (or perhaps Kelsey Grammer)

Mrs. Howell -- Betty White (if she's still alive (I didn't bother to check))

Thoughts?

A Friend of Bill W.

I'm going to do something new for the blog (and me): I'm going to post a short story. It was written as an assignment for a creative writing class. It's short -- about 750 words -- and we were constrained by our professor only allowing us to use monosyllabic words. I'm rather fond of the final product, so I thought, Hey, why not? For my Facebook readers, I apologize for the lack of paragraph breaks. Something gets lost in translation from my blog to Facebook. If you go to http://imsayinisall.blogspot.com you'll have an easier time reading it.


A Friend of Bill W.

Up to this point in his life, Tom was a man who was, some might say, “fond of the drink.” Those who might say this would say it as friends will, when they tried to make it sound like it was all right, not a big deal, though he had just crashed down their stairs, or broke their chair, or, in one fun tale, barged (broke) in the wrong house at 3 a.m. They called him this so that they could pull a hat down to their eyes and shield them from the truth and thus the charge they all felt to help in some way. They did not see marks on his wife or his kids (there were none; he did not hit), and this helped them to feel that all was well.

Then, though, there were those who would call him what he was, and though they too said this as his friends, they were friends of the man he could be, not of the man he was. This last set of friends would call him what he was to try to get him to change, to see what they saw, and to fix it. This did not work.

So it is that we find him in a bar late at night. It is a bar: bar stools pushed to a long, coarse-wood bar top; a few booths lined the walls; two or three large drink stands with chairs in the space from the end of the bar to the door; some dark, dull glass looked out on the cold, lamp-lit glow of the street. He sat at the bar, on one of the stools, a full glass of scotch in hand.

He stared out into space. My wife is with child, he thought. A new kid. A new life to add to mine. One boy, three girls he had had by now, all grown. His new wife had one of each, both young. He did not think that, at this point, he would have more kids, but here he was, with two step-kids and one more on the way. He thought of his own kids, grown up, raised in the house with him, the way he was. He looked down at the glass, shook his head, slapped a five on the bar and walked out.
  The cold air hit him; he looked left, then right, picked left and walked. He walked, found he had stopped in front of a store, saw a light blink, glanced into the store. The store was dark, and he stood in front of a light on the street; he saw a man in the glass look at him. The man was drawn, pale; fat, but looked too thin; eyes sunk on pouched dark half-moons; chin with rough fuzz; thin hair on his head not combed. He glanced down, and stood in shock. He saw that the man in the glass had on the same shirt and tie, the same three-pleat pants, the same look of shock on his face. The glass-man’s jaw hung down; his breath came in short, quick grey mists in the night air; his hands shook; he bent over and retched up some bile.

  Tom stood up, looked at the green-brown pool on the walk in front of him, wiped his mouth. He looked up to the street signs, struck out south. He knew where to go. He walked fast, a near-jog. He saw the sign, found the stairs; ran down the stairs, turned the knob; walked in, closed his eyes to the bright light; looked out, was stared at. Smiled at. Hands on him, a push to the front. He looked out, saw help. Saw truth. He coughed, took a breath.

“My name is Tom, and I’m an—“