Hard science

Apparently our spying activities have been very inspiring! In revealing them online, though, we are running the risk of blowing our cover! Our computer remembers everything we do and announces himself at every place we visit; the dastardly bastard would rat on us without a second thought or the faintest trace of remorse.

If you ever engage in illegal or otherwise objectionable activities, do not let your computer know. Look what happened to poor Melanie McGuire of Brick, New Jersey.

MacGuire was convicted last year of murdering her husband William by shooting him with a gun obtained in Pennsylvania. The following search terms had been entered into Google and MSN search engines “on a computer belonging to her family” (we could be quoting Harper's magazine here, May 2008 issue, p.30, or maybe we followed the trial – it doesn't matter, does it?):

instant poisons
undetectable poisons
instant undetectable poisons
pesticide as a poison
insulin as a poison
insulin overdoses
toxic insulin levels
fatal insulin doses
euthanasia
tranquilizers
barbiturates
state gun laws
purchase guns
how to purchase guns illegally
how to purchase guns illegally in nj
how to purchase hunting rifles in nj
where to purchase guns without a permit
how to purchase guns in pennsylvania
how to commit murder

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Luckily The Atlantic's articles are available freely online. But maybe they are less fun. In any case, in the spirit of espionage and international dealings, if you would like to read long articles regarding how to and more importantly how not to, say, smuggle enriched uranium out of Russia, that's the place to go. But not on your own computer, obviously!

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Could you help us resolve a little dispute?

Today Roufa declared, for some reason: If science was like sex, we would have solved everything two thousand years ago. Which Mimi countered with: If science was like sex, we would be living in caves to this day! What do you think?

You don't have to cast your votes yet! Let's all ponder this over the weekend! Have fun!

Espionage, shaken and stirred

Our vacation was lovely, Dear Friends! Life can be kind -- almost as kind as you and your sweet messages! The sun was bright and the air was warm. The waffles were delicious, vanilla ice-cream on the side. Scottie was crazy, as usual. All she cared for was her tennis ball. She uses it to communicate. Play with tennis ball = Love. Scottie is a black Labrador that belongs to relatives. She bounces her ball like a basketball player, and balances it on the tip of her muzzle like a seal! And she is very patient, just like Frog. She'd lay there waiting outside the bathroom for Mimi to finish showering (and hair styling and the works) and come out and play with her. And her ball.

What else did we do? We watched U2 live in Latin America in 3D – four cities in one afternoon. We put on our magic glasses and were just beamed there, rendered invisible intruders on the stage! We took off the glasses and found ourselves back inside an empty theater. We walked out into the afternoon heat. We had coffee.

The next day we visited a science museum together with [other] kids. Mimi lay on a bed of nails; Roufa powered a TV by pedaling. And then we played in the spy section, where we saw real mikes hidden in fake olives, antennas in toothpicks. We crawled our way through booby-trapped corridors, trying not to intersect the laser beams.

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And then something funny happened. Roufa was studying the Enigma code and Mimi was fiddling with some wires. Roufa had just deciphered an eight-lettered word – Istanbul! -- when Mimi urged him to come and listen, for she had intercepted a telephone conversation! Well, she assumed it was a recorded conversation waiting for kids to discover it. Interestingly enough, it was being conducted in Terrible English – the official language of international dealings. It sounded so real! But, curiously, not very spy-related. What we could hear was a no-nonsense manager, representing a major European electricity supplier, and some counterpart from a small country, discussing the possibility to install a nuclear plant in that country. For peaceful purposes. Big deal!

It turns out though that we've spied for real! This was a real conversation, believe it or not – and what a scoop! You see we did a little further research and discovered that in that little lignite-devouring country nuclear energy is fiercely opposed and nobody seems to be remotely aware of any plans to introduce it! So: was the manager being misled, or are the little country's citizens being fooled to believe that Russian natural gas is the future?

Where are the real journalists when you need them? Recycling each other's garbage.

Dear journalists, here's the deal: The beautiful little country is Greece, home of the beautiful little Greeks. Now, if you want us to name more names, you will have to pay: Full immunity in writing and an all-inclusive three-week holiday in Santorini for two adults and a dog should do! No, wait, make that a house downtown Fira with a volcano view plus a generous budget so that we can decorate it ourselves. We have a very exquisite taste.

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As far as we know, we will not be traveling for a while. Not before August. Finally, we can start looking for a French Bulldog! Preferably black with white spots! Like this cuty here! Oh, we've waited too long.

Goin West

From Freud to Herr Fritzl, Austria seems to have a very mental mentality. If we were the Austrian authorities, we would promulgate (finally, Bimmy!) monthly Raid Your Neighbor's Basement Days. Just in case. After a couple of months, another 3 million Austrians could be produced! Imagine the logistical nightmare!

What a country. You ask them what is going to happen to the victims of rape-imprisonment-incest next, and all they can think to say is that they will need to get them social security numbers.

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Yes, our Dear Readers, this will be our Leave of Absence #4.

For almost two weeks, posting is not guaranteed. Forget us not!

Garfield, 080307

The Breakfast Club

Now that you've grown up, do you still believe that? That when we grow up our souls die and we become like our parents? (Do you care?)

Will you stand above me?
Look my way, but never love me?

A soul may die if you don't feed it. And nobody really becomes like their parents. (Not that there's anything wrong with that.)

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We are all adults here, most likely, so there's no problem if we post a picture of Knut the Sex Tourist -- see previous post! Behold the good friends Knut and Frog Ted -- along with our Vonnegut collection and some poetry.



Knut was named Knut after Knut the Berlin Zoo bear, who was rejected by his mother and so he was raised , cuddled, and played with by a Zoo employee, an adult man. Hopefully, this hasn't screwed up Knut's mating orientation. Is it possible? Biologist, anyone? In any case, Knut the bear, for some reason, will have to travel far to find the girl of his dreams, and thus become a sex tourist, according to a popular German newspaper. As for our Knut, he claims he's a well-traveled fellow already.

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We are having talks with Ferrari regarding the production of our new patent, if we can call it that, RTGML080423a: Designer Air-Drying Kits! Consisting of designer clothes lines and clothespins, and even screens, to conceal your drying laundry – depending on how anal your Homeowner Association is. For more details on the issue, see Catpaw's post and the comments there. Our clothesline would be Ferrari-red and the clothespins would be black, in the shape of the Ferrari horse. (Alternatively, yellow triangular crests with a black Ferrari horse.) The inside would be rubber (in order not to damage Tiggy's sensitive lace smalls).

Get the Ferrari Drying Kit NOW for ONLY $9,999.99 and let the Joneses try and keep up with YOU!
The waiting list opens NOW!

Freedom of Expression

We don't have an opinion anymore. We've set it free.

Quoting a cartoon by Kamagurka – Belgian cartoonist and impolite servant of magic surrealism.

You want change? I'll give you some change if you dance naked in front of me!

Quoting an impolite Biko Azinuth stream of consciousness.

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Wouldn't it be great if we could fly south now?

South where? South of what?

We could go to Santa Fe. Where we could have coffee with an old native, who would remind you: This thing that you have achieved for yourself, nobody will ever take away from you. We could go to Marseille, unwind in the sun, savor the sea flavors.

We will go West instead. And then return North. Worse things than that could happen to a person.

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Sven is doing great! We gave him his minerals and his vitamins again. Bundles of baby prickles are sprouting around his crown! If he blooms, though, we will have to reconsider his name and/or sexual orientation.

Our Frog Ted has a new friend, one to exchange endless traveling stories with: Welcome Knut the Sex Tourist! Oh, it's just a pet name. Knut belongs to an endangered species, you see, and he will have to travel half around the globe in order to mate and reproduce.

In a bar, under the sea

Q: What do Dutch beer and making love in a canoe have in common?
A: They are both fucking close to water.

(Was this good enough?)

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Dutch people, beer, etc, are people, beer, etc, from the Netherlands, also known as Holland. Dutchland does not exist, but Deutschland is Germany in German. Netherlands means Low Countries -- as in below sea level -- which, we learned at school once upon a time, are Belgium, the Netherlands, Luxembourg. Sounds like the Dutch are claiming all three countries' territories for themselves, by calling themselves the Netherlands! Shame on them!

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Kamagurka is a Belgian cartoonist and this is not his best joke, but Jillian will understand:


Can't we just stay friends?

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Still accepting ideas, what to call our invention, see previous post! Meanwhile, we hope we won't need our umbrella for a while (with or without lights, music, water cooler, coffee machine installed). We hope for a wonderful, sunny weekend, for us and for you too, of course! One more day to go! Hurrah!

The Green's Functions Blues

The sun finally poked through the clouds on Sunday and we went for a long walk in nature. We saw colorful flowers and blooming trees, we saw ducks and other birds. We saw funny insects and even horses. And humans.

Yes, now and then we encountered another wandering couple and they said hallo and we said hallo back. Later, downtown, we saw many more people, but we didn't exchange any hallos with them.

It was cloudy and dark when we were back in the city. It started raining and we opened an umbrella. It felt even darker under the umbrella.

So here's our Brilliant Idea of the Week. Or of the Day, as we've been rather prolific lately. You know those birthday cards that start singing when you open them? How about umbrellas with spokes that light up when you open them! They would make a dark, rainy day so much more bearable. Patent No RTGML20080414a.

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It's been a while since we last treated you to some of our household jokes! Let's see what we've got for you...

We watched “Paris, je t'aime” this weekend. It's a movie consisting of 18 short movies, mostly love stories, set in Paris. Quite predictably, Gérard Depardieu the Ubiquitous was co-directing and appearing in one of them.
RTG said: 'Somebody should make a movie called “Gérard, je t'aime”: eighteen short movies starring Gérard Depardieu.'

Here we were just BS-ing and improvising:
...
RTG: I've put all my money in stockings.
ML: You mean stocks.
RTG: No, stockings.
...
ML: Stocks are dropping.
RTG: I wish stockings were dropping.


We are allowed to outsource now and then, so this last one comes from poor Marina the Nut. Another attempt to bake a decent cake had failed or something, inducing her to lament her geeky self thus:
“All I can do properly in this life is calculate Green's functions. Green's functions is all I am good at. It does bring bread to the table... I don't even like bread.”

That's close to Woody Allen's “The food here is so bad... And such small portions!” or another Marina: “Gortz shoes are so ugly – and they're always way too big for me!”

Torch-Relay Hurdles (and other novel Olympic Disciplines)

On the 24th of March, the Olympian beauties of the Peloponnese assembled again to dance their ancient ceremonial dances under an ominously wan early-Spring Sun. And then, as tradition has it, or should have it, or as we'd like to think anyway, the most beautiful virgin amongst them lowered the torch in the hollow of the parabolic mirror, whereupon it received the blessed fire of the (almost impotent on that day) life-giver. And then the fun began.

Hail Torch-Relay Hurdles as the newest Olympic discipline!

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What the International Olympic Committee were thinking when they assigned the 2008 Games to Beijing is hard to say. Certainly their bribes must have included more than yet-to-be-built luxury apartments in polluted sweat-shop cities swarming with desperate peasants. Well, as the official story goes, the Summer 2008 Olympic Games are a great opportunity for China to show her new, modern, human, welcoming, etc., facade to the world. A legitimate political reason actually.

Too bad then that, according to the Organizers, the Olympic Games are about sports, not politics.

They are also about money, and it will be fun to watch the Olympic sponsors trying to save face, in the mess our loyal readers were warned about months ago. It could also be a matter of time before the first bunch of obscure athletes realize that boycotting China can give them more and better publicity than hopelessly going for it.

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In any case, a smooth torch relay nowadays requires shielding measures more radical than a US presidential procession through a Middle Eastern capital.

What a shame this is, seriously. What a dishonor for the Olympic flame to suffer, what a disgrace! From the idyllic olive groves of Ancient Olympia to the battlefields of our globalized world, snatched, shoved, desecrated! We have to save the Olympic Spirit. And to that end, we have a cunning idea that we wish to share first with you, our loyal readers.

It is very simple, really, and has many advantages: let the Olympic Games return to Athens forever. The facilities are already in place, since the very successful 2004 Games. They are sitting there rusting, actually. Greek politics rarely cause any global stir. Who would ever boycott the Games in Athens? A Balkan neighbor with a beef? Who cares! And everybody loves to visit Greece! The whole world is welcome there! To party, relax, bake in the sun, pretend they can say kalimera like a native. The ever grumpy and overworked Athenians would get the chance to exercise that lovely smile of theirs every four years! They did it once, they proved themselves. Of course, as soon as the Games ended, they were pushing each other's buttons again. Well, it doesn't have to be this way!

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Athens, Beijing, whatever: rather than Torch-Relay Hurdles, a far more fitting Olympic Discipline would be: the Cross-City Triathlon. Cross the city from south to north, or east to west, whatever is longer, as quick as possible, using all three kinds of public transportation (bus; streetcar; subway; but no taxi or rickshaw; are we forgetting something?).

Another brilliant idea tossed out into the blogosphere.

Manneken Poo

Dear readers, we have wonderful news regarding our crazy cousin, Marina the Nut. Two and a half months after placing her order, she's finally received her first Gucci shoes, size 34.5, 9.5cm heel. Pheew. No, we mean, Hurray. Our new-year wish to her came true. We'd love to watch her work the cobblestone paving in those. That's why you need a man by your side! In any case, for her colleagues' sake, we've urged her not to wear those weapons of mass distraction at work. We don't know if she will listen. Being surrounded by socks in sandals can do things to you brain.

Speaking of cobblestone, Belgium boasts hectares upon hectares of it. Speaking of Belgium, we just had a brilliant marketing idea for its tourist office. Their most famous attraction is Manneken Pis, the “famous statue of a little boy peeing in a fountain”. How about installing also a Manneken Poo! A little boy – or girl for that matter – pooing little Belgian pralines for the tourists! Voila. It's copyrighted now. The date is April 4, 2008.

Aaanyways. Weekend is almost there and, apart from airing ourselves as usual (our friends Ms Quarks and Kimba the White Lioness have been airing themselves too), we'll also be watching movies. We would so much love to watch a silly movie based on this true story! The schools from which those college students graduated should be closed down for failing to prevent such stupidity pollution from leaking into higher education. Oh yes, the April issue of Harper's was the best entertainment ever. We'll be reading some of that too.

Banana's Appendix

Anybody out there suffering the après-Easter egg coma? In the Unorthodox Christian world? Talking to you, Frog?

Before we continue, a little quiz: do you think a banana can have an appendix? Can it get appendicitis? Any ideas? Yes? Ok, you may continue reading.

So we would like to dedicate this post to Jillian, who expressed the wish to have one million dollars. Jillian, be careful what you wish for. Here is a link containing excellent advise on the matter, as well as the answer to our quiz.

Our greetings also to Ms Quarks who almost stopped blogging. She was almost finished with people. We were almost finished with people while watching TV. The news was that, according to witnesses, a stranger had thrown a beautiful, adorable one-year-old boxer dog off an overpass and down on a busy highway. No particular reason. We don't know what fruit, vegetable, or pie the person who could do this deserves to be awarded or thrown at. He's beyond our capabilities. Any suggestions? We do have all our golden apples to offer to those who saved her and took her to the vet! One asshole, a dozen angels! We are not finished with people.

The boxer had just strayed from home. She survived with a broken jaw and is reunited with her loving mistress Haley Savage.

In any case, our Hero of the Week is Seven the Boxer dog and her helpers. Seven! George Costanza for once not jinxed.