persiflage
most comfortable in the midst of a stunned silence
October 15th, 2009We had a drinking party to admire the peonies. I drank cup after cup till I was drunk. Then to my shame I heard the flowers whisper, "What are we doing, blooming for these old alcoholics?" Liu Yu Hsi ClassifiedsFor sale: four and one half inches of the fuzzy bit of a velcro strip. Very useful if you already have four and one half inches of the hooky bit. $7. Box 3.
Listen to Part Twenty-Seven of The Mystery of the Lost Lenore Click on the picture. (3:38) ArchivesLinks |
Multi-Tasking - Stop It!I have no problem with concurrent activity. Say, letting your instant pudding set while you watch the first season of Who's the Boss? on DVD. I also don't have a problem with combining super low-brain, non-moving, non-maneuvering activities with low-brain activities. Like doing a crossword puzzle on the toilet. What I do have a problem with is people who attempt to combine public, moving about /maneuvering activities with other potentially distracting activities. Like one time when I saw a guy putting in eyedrops while driving. Let's face it, NONE of us is clever/co-ordinated enough to pull off this kind of thing. A lot of people (perhaps even you) THINK they are but, believe you me, they (you) aren't. Just because you haven't killed anyone or set yourself on fire whilst "multi-tasking" it doesn't mean that you are successfully pulling this off. If you are doing more than one thing at a time chances are VERY good that you are doing a fairly shitty job of a least one of them. But many people persist in thinking that they are good at this. but a lot of people also think "I drive better when I am drunk" and "I could have been a professional singer". In the first instance you are relying on the none too reliable observations of a drunk (you) and in the second - no. Your mum may have told you that you have a lovely singing voice but what you didn't notice was that she was rolling her eyes when she said it. And while we're on the subject - stop doing things while you are on the phone! Say what you have to say and then get the hell off and THEN do whatever the hell it is that you think needs doing so urgently! I have no desire to talk to you while you are brushing your teeth or tobogganing. I don't want to hear it and neither does anybody else. When did it suddenly become a good idea to do a half-assed job of nineteen different things at once? I think we should all go back to the philosophy of the great Charles Emerson Winchester III who did one thing at a time, did it exceptionally well and then moved on to the next thing. That is how I plan to operate in future. I will do one thing, I will do it exceptionally well and then... oh, something dinged. Ah! My muffins are done. I better pull over. Elrose Watermuldar  |
The Waitress Tables For Ladies - Edward Hopper (1930) Once upon a time there was a waitress. The waitress worked in a small restaurant that did an okay business but she was so mind-numbingly beautiful that she made an astronomical amount in tips. This was sometimes somewhat annoying to the owner of the restaurant who was, after all, a pretty good-looking woman herself. But the owner had little to do with the customers on a day to day basis and, really, as the owner, she wouldn't get tips anyway. She tried to remind herself of these two things each morning when the waitress arrived in her solid gold car. As her manservants carried her into the restaurant in her jade and ebony sedan chair, the waitress would always look down on the owner, wave and give a little smile. That made it very hard for the owner to dislike her. Sally Kind Epi or Pan, Which Demic is Right For You?The Grammatical Implications of The Flu Now that we are officially entering flu season it behooves us to consider how we are to speak, intelligently and grammatically, about influenza. There has been much confusion concerning the words "epidemic" and "pandemic" and it has fallen to me, as the resident language expert, to clear up this matter. Let us consider their respective etymologies: Epidemic comes of course from the Greek words επι meaning "on top of" and Δημος meaning "people". Thus an epidemic is a disease that comes from being on top of people. Pandemic comes from Παν meaning, of course, the God "Pan" and Δημος meaning "people". Therefore a pandemic is a disease that comes from associating with people who worship the god Pan or perhaps play the pan flutes or possibly wear goat pants. That should put your mind at ease. Leonard Derwerthy |