Oh, the Hannity!

A gas bag has certain risks.

     
     From The Copy Desk: It's been a while since the last update and there's news from the wandering would-be wonks, Marty and Warren, who seem to be enjoying their foray into the educational-industrial complex (albeit with vegan food) so much that they missed the car home last week . . . twice. We're thinking they don't like us any more. Which makes The Copy Desk sad. But life goes on and sometimes we think about stuff.

Lecturing people about racism.

     Warren and Marty were alone in the room, which to their horror featured a laptop streaming Faux News. After many hours of application, the glazed look in Warren's eyes told Marty it was too late to save his half-brother. He would be convinced all his misconceptions, misconsrues and mislabeling was actually fact.He would also buy lots of gold.
     "I've got to shut down that laptop," Marty said,.
     Zombie-Warren sprang up to stand between Marty and the laptop. "You shall not pass," he howled.
     "Sorry, I left my Balrog in my other pants. Oh, wait, I don't own pants," Marty said. "It's time to cut the cord Warren. Regain your brain. Think!"

    

I'm Mad As Hell

From The Copy Desk:

      Two of the great disappointments of my life involve NBC. At some point in the late '60s, I won permission to stay up late to watch The Tonight Show with Johnny Carson because B.B. King was on the show.
     But the dolts at NBC (I'm talking to you Fred de Cordova), lacked enough of a brain to get this simple task right. B.B. King came out and was singing, and, as he put his left hand up on Lucille's neck and was about to play his first notes - they cut to commercial.
     Then, 45 years later, I sat down to watch the London Olympic ceremony because I heard that Ray Davies was going to lead the world in a sing-a-long of Waterloo Sunset .... but of course they cut it because of time.
   
NBC . . . . Never Been Competent. At least they are consistent.

     God Bless Riley B. King. RIP.

Space Monkeys!

      From The Copy Desk: With The Boys still away and undecided as to if they're coming home after spring break, it once again falls to those of us who shovel roofs to fill the void left by the halphlings. So, we're going to go on about Monkeys in space. Well, that's the link to the Wikipedia page, where all the actual details are supposed.

      Now that elephants are being retired by the circus, see Pachederms Paroled. The Boys would urge everyone to pick a reputable charity working to save wild elephants and give according to your means. As for the monkeys, we killed most of them during early space flight experiments. Please remember their sacrifice whenever you (or your cell-phone signal) are in space.

Miss Baker, a squirrel monkey, a species presumably from Earth. was purchased in a Miami, Fla., pet shop and enlisted in the U.S. Navy. She was the first primate to survive space flight.

The Bard Owl

     From The Copy Desk: While our young half-brothers are off matriculating in Annandale, the home burrow has seen some changes The Boys surely need to be aware of, or even alert to. The boughs near the burrow now harbor an owl, a barred owl to be precise. It appears to be a young one and its presence has trimmed the bird seed bill for sure, as no birds brave the feeder with the owl on top. Unfortunately the home burrow's communique to The Boys regarding all things owl was garbled, and received first by Warren. This took a while to clear up to their mutual satisfaction. After Marty convinced Warren cell phones were not just for people in jail, we talked. A transcript follows.


     Copy Desk: Hey Marty, did you guys understand the last communique about the owl.
     Marty: Warren's out of his mind with fear ..... he's convinced the message meant that there was an owl sent to hunt him down here on campus. He's been under the covers for days.
     Copy Desk: Shove the phone under the covers. I need to talk to him. Hey, Warren. It's OK there's no owl specifically out to get you.
      Warren: So I should just exhibit my normal terror at the sight of Raptors?
      Copy Desk: That would be a start.
      Warren: I need to go change these sheets. I matriculated all over them.
     Copy Desk: You mean micturated, fancy-speak for urination.
     Warren: Oh. At least I don't have any pants to wash. But didn't you say it was a Bard Owl?
     Marty: Or a barn owl.
     Copy Desk: No. We believe it's a barred, b-a-r-r-e-d owl.
     Marty: Well, that should help. Warren, you can come out now.
     Warren: Never! There's Raptors everywhere!
    

Happy Groundhogs' Day!

     From The Copy Desk: Whatever Phil predicts today, remember groundhogs are mammals, not meteorologists.

Gugelhupf Time!

     From The Copy Desk: The Boys are missing. It was in this wheezing Upstate city, a global powerhouse down on its luck, that The Boys were last seen. Schenectady, where GE made the stuff that lit up the world, is due to get a state-sanctioned casino complex . . . are The Boys involved in gambling or have they slipped away somewhere to further their education. We expect to see our fuzzy, Hawaiian-shirt wearing half-brothers on milk cartons soon, and if you actually spot The Boys tell them their burrow is still here for them and the larder is stocked. 
     Since it's a holiday weekend, Monday is of course Groundhogs' Day (Hey, it's a day of marmot solidarity, so the apostrophe follows the s to indicate the day belongs to all marmots, not just our imprisoned brothers awoken rudely on an annual basis and forced to become meteorologists), The Boys did leave behind recorded greetings for this august occasion. A transcript follows.

    Marty:  "On this Groundhogs' Day Eve, we plan to remember our imprisoned brothers and sisters. We plan to boycott green screens, that tool of the cult of meteorology, and to enjoy a traditional meal of root vegetables and greens, followed by a bundt cake with green and purple frosting, . . . "
    Warren (interrupting): "Just one cake?"
     Marty (droning on attempting to ignore his half-brother): "green and purple frosting and another with orange frosting - representing all those imprisoned and forced to practice meteorology. We ... "
     Warren (interrupting again): "Hey, should we be messing with meteorologists? They recently cast a spell that shut down New York City!"
     Marty (exasperated): "We plan to leave no leftovers."
     Warren and Marty: "Gugelhupf."
    

Monosyllabic

    

     "Why is the word for the shortest words five times as long?"
                                                                                                 - Warren.



 

Je Suis Charlie

          "I have never made but one prayer to God, a very short one. Oh Lord, make my enemies ridiculous. And God granted it."
                                                - Voltaire

Top of the World

     The wind rushed around outside, just a bit short of a howl, and The Boys were settled in near the wood-stove for a long, cold afternoon of reading. Marty grabbed the new issue of Monax Jones (How The Thing You Hate Is Ruining Your World!) and Warren snagged the iPad off the chair.
      "Throw a log on half-bro," Marty said to Warren. With a new log safely ensconced in the metal box for wood burning, Warren set about to "reading."
     "Why are you wearing headphones if your reading on the iPad," Marty asked. "Why are you wearing headphones! Hey! Warren!"
      "What. Oh, right, you figured it out. Well OK, I'm watching cable TV on the iPad," Warren said. "So what."
     "What's on," Marty said.
     "I can't tell. It's either an old movie on TCM or it's the mid-term election results from the Democrats' point of view," Warren said.
     "Oh I know that one," Marty said. "Top of the World."

The Boys watching a movie, or election results.

    
     From The Copy Desk: Loyal readers will remember back a few months ago when Marty predicted the Democrats would retain control the the U.S. Senate. He was wrong, another data point in the case against groundhogs as useful prognosticators. Phree Phil! If you want to predict anything, it's best to use the "wisdom of the crowd" to improve your chances. See this story,
http://www.npr.org/blogs/parallels/2014/04/02/297839429/-so-you-think-youre-smarter-than-a-cia-agent

Twenty Cents

Warren with his two new dimes.

     It's been a while since The Boys have posted, but they'll tell you they've  been busy and couldn't find the time. In reality, which they sometimes visit, they are just a couple of lazy homebodies who on the whole have accomplished very little these last weeks ..... except for enjoying the amazing string of warm, sunny days that make living in Upstate New York worth all its other annoyances. Now however, they have some catching up to do - The Copy Desk.


     "The guy on CNBC says there's a new pair of dimes, now that the price of oil has crashed, the stock market is tanking, E-bola has escaped from Africa, ISIS is holding and gaining territory and the Republic Party looks poised to take control of the U.S. Senate next month," Warren quivered, shaken by the thought of impending doom injected into his brain by the "nooze media."
     "War, greed, pestilance and total disaster," Marty said, "Same old, same old. Keep Calm and Carry On, Warren. This is all just morte of the same."
     "So you're not worried?" Warren asked, "What about all the other things like ...."
     "No! It's just life. Things change, bad things happen and by the way the word is paradigm, and there are fewer overused phrases than 'new paradigm,'" Marty said. "So that's why you've got 20 cents there with you? You should really think about this stuff before you go out on a limb."
    Warren now realized that his harrowing trip to the bank to exchange his two old dimes for two new ones was pointless - unlike the dog with pointy teeth he had to avoid and the spears on chains at the bank. (They looked like pens, but none of them wrote so they had to be something else, Warren thought.)
     "But what about the market today, it's really taking a beating," Warren asked.

The Boys watch Wednesday's market meltdown.

"And Gold Man Sacks makes money no matter what happens," Marty said. "Besides, by the time The Copy Desk posts this, the market could change its mind and shoot back up. It's already bounced back from down 460 to down "just" 360."
     Warren, grinning, said, "So you're saying the market has recovered, since it's done a '360.'"
     "Sometimes, halph-brother, you really make me wish I was an only child," Marty said.
     "So now as punishment for your bad joke, I get to pontificate," Marty said, "so let's get to it, in list form, please, Mr. Copy Desk .....
     * ISIS is a minority and will eventually be overwhelmed by reasonable people. This is will be fine, until ISIS is replaced by another radical faction.
     * E-bola, it's not a new operating system. As a virus we can, and are reportedly close, develop vaccines and anti-viral treatments.
     * The plunge in oil prices was overdue since U.S. production surged and world demand eased - last year. This drop is good for the U.S. economy, to a point, and is providing the only real increased spending power to the 99 percent in the last decade.
     * Stock prices move all the time. The market trades on greed and fear. Now with computerized trading, it can swing faster and farther.
     * The U.S. Senate race isn't over yet. There are still a few weeks for Republic Party candidates to implode. The best non-biased site for tracking U.S. elections remains http://www.electoral-vote.com/
     * Troubles are a dime a dozen, we just might have 20 cents worth now because we've stopped solving problems in Washington, D.C. for the last four years.
     "Thank you, Holy Father,' Warren said.