Empire of Shit, Sh*t, $#*!,$h*!

Posted on 10 November 2010 by Larry Russwurm

By now, even I have heard about Shit My Dad Says. This small empire was founded by son, Justin, putting out a Twitter feed with the strange, uncensored things his father said. That Twitter feed is still going and can be found here.

The Twitter feed snowballed after being mentioned on national TV and on a popular blog, Laughing Squid. Justin Halpern was green lighted to write a book with the more demure title Sh*t My Dad Says. If you wish to purchase it, it can be found here, along with reviews.

Then somehow or other William Shatner sunk his claws into the lead roll of the father as $#*! My Dad Says became a prime time comedy show. It’s pronounced Bleep My Dad Says. To watch episodes of $#*! My Dad Says, they can be found here at cbs.com .

And interestingly enough, Wikipedia cannot use a # sign in their titles so they call the television show $h*! My Dad Says.

Are you noticing the same thing I am? There is a multitude of ways to spell out Shit My Dad Says. In a way I guess it’s good. The Twitter feed is separated from the book which is differentiated from the television series. But what of those times when we wish to tie the whole empire together?

I suggest calling the empire $#!+ My Dad Says. Why this, then, another hard to remember series of symbols?

It’s not so hard to memorize. $ contains an S, # contains an H, ! gets substituted for i in many instances and + is obviously a t. Basically we can spell this particular swear word in symbols. You don’t have to memorize anything new if you can figure that out. And some of you thought leet speak was an endpoint, the world just couldn’t get more decadent.

In fact this should be used as the series title, since it’s easier to remember, if the FCC would allow it. But we all know how liberal they are.

As for Wikipedia, this just says that the world cannot be written in just one language. It can’t be written in just one character set, either. Let this be a lesson to you.

This blog post was inspired by the word @$$.

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An Obvious Sign of Refinement

Posted on 6 November 2010 by Larry Russwurm

Can we all just agree that the term “wino” is an abomination on the good name of wine drinkers everywhere. The vast majority of wine drinkers are refined people of good taste and are mostly not concerned where their next hit of alcohol is coming from. Else they’d join those winos looking for the cheapest drink with the most amount of alcohol.

And where is it more obvious that this refinement is there than in the class and culture of their leaders, the wine tasters. There is an art to this tasting and it can be seen here. Carefully these connoisseurs examine the colour, smell and taste of the wines. And then they spit it out.

Huh? They spit it out? Isn’t this an action reserved for the foulest tasting things one can put in one’s mouth? If spitting it out becomes an action of the most refined of society, we have managed to skew the importance of things.

Suddenly brushing one’s teeth becomes the most important, cultured act of cleaning up. Since it involves the fine act of spitting so very much, perhaps it is better to brush your teeth 7 times a day and shower only once a week. The refinement of spitting makes this palatable and almost necessary.

The act of chewing tobacco should become more mainstream and high class because it too, involves the refined act of spitting. But really, society doesn’t truly support it because we don’t want to see these uber cultured people die young because of the cancers caused by the tobacco. Otherwise…

It also becomes high class to show your derision of people by spitting on them. Sure, the police can arrest you for assault, but you’ll have the satisfaction of knowing you responded in a refined way to your feelings of derision to another person.

Spitting should take it’s rightful place of importance in the upper class. No longer should the upper class meet at noon to duel out a disagreement. No longer should one slap the face of your opponent with gloves. From today on the upper class should show it’s disgust by spitting.

Next week’s article : How we can tell apart the upper and lower classes when they both spit in your face to show their hostility.

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Them Heavy Nudes

Posted on 3 November 2010 by Larry Russwurm

I’ve had it pointed out to me a number of times that the late 20th century, early 21st century obsession with thin females is just a cultural thing. Indeed, the favourite subjects of nudes in the renaissance were much heavier. Women of this weight were considered more attractive back then. I’ve heard it said that they were likely upper class women so they were probably by definition more beautiful (since of course the definers would have to be sympathetic to upper class women).

So maybe fashion dictates what shape of woman is more attractive. Still, to hear the people down on the skinny thing (usually for good reason, anorexia and bulimia are large problems today), you’d think that a difference in fashion would make all the difference.

So let’s try out that renaissance nude ideal. Let’s assume images like this would be as pervasive as today’s typically skinny females. Firstly, it’s probably a good idea to clothe these females for their appearance in society.

Now imagine you were a typical skinny female teenager. You would be in the majority of your age group but you would see these images all over the place. And, just as now with heavy females, you would have low self esteem because you didn’t meet that ideal. Some of these skinny females would attempt to eat more to get to the ideal. But it would be too much for some as their metabolism kept them slim. The “lucky” few that could overeat that much might very well begin thinking ‘bigger is better’ and may end up going past even the renaissance ideal.

Too heavy leads to premature deaths, just as with too skinny.

Is there no way to save our women? Or must we idealize the middle ground and only that?

It’s commonplace for people to have high metabolisms in their teens which drops off by middle age. Which results in skinny teens and renaissance women(I’m using this term to mean shape) by middle age. So for even the average woman there is a range of shapes she has. And is a range any more obvious than in pregnancy?

It seems the media needs to portray all women. A life just can’t be said to be in style or out of style.

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Reusing a Political Cartoon

Posted on 1 November 2010 by Larry Russwurm

If you’re a regular reader of this site, you might wonder why I am repeating this political cartoon. It’s quite simple, It fits for new circumstances. Basically James Moore (depicted) held public consultations for a Canadian book policy review. After 3 months of submissions there were only 44 submissions. Included were only one author and one reader. It can be seen better on my sister’s blog site. James Moore might as well have just stuck his fingers in his ears and said “I can’t hear you!” Obviously the public consultation was not advertised enough. He is obviously trying to screw the electorate that voted him in. Will James Moore ever use his childish slingshot?

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First They Cleaned Up Christmas…

Posted on 30 October 2010 by Larry Russwurm

Christmas takes place on one of the darkest times of years in the northern hemisphere. So hauntings also were associated with this time of year. Ghosts feature prominently in The Christmas Carol and that was more in keeping with that time.

But it became commonplace for attempts to light the darkness of Christmas. Thus, even before the electric age, some Christmas trees had lit candles on them. In our more safety conscious age, I’m glad this custom has been replaced with electric light. And some people spend a fortune lighting the outdoors as well with their strings of lights and other lit up decorations. And now, with the advent of LED lights which work using much lower amounts of electricity, it is only becoming cheaper and cheaper to run these lights. So I expect even more people will do this in the future.

But at least we have Hallowe’en and its remaining hold on the dark things at the dark time of year. But in this age of safety consciousness and reducing the fear of little ones, is even Hallowe’en becoming so obviously safe that little or no fear is experienced by anyone? After all, it does seem to be the era that every child seems to have a night light. All little kids seem to know that light chases away the monsters.

A lot of kids these days Trick or Treat with glow sticks. I guess this is because city and town lights aren’t bright enough.

But one of the things stopping Hallowe’en night from being truly scary in the north, is the extension of sunlight. They did this a few years ago when they extended Daylight Savings Time from ending before Hallowe’en to ending after Hallowe’en. This was done through much of North America. So Hallowe’en night has an extra hour of light.

Now parents of little children, was it so hard to take your little ones out an hour earlier if you were that worried of the dark?

So Hallowe’en just becomes that time of year when horror movies appear at theatres and in videos. Any hint that the shadows might hide anything, seems to have been lit up.

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In Defence of Officer Bubbles

Posted on 26 October 2010 by Larry Russwurm

Some of you may have heard of “Bubbles” the Toronto G20 cop who threatened a female protester (henceforth known as the “force of evil”) with arrest if she blew that bubble and it landed on any law enforcement officer. The protester (or force of evil) did not blow the bubble at any law enforcement officer but was rounded up and herded into lockup a moment later. The whole scene can be seen here.

Now Bubbles clearly had a pair of sunglasses on during that fateful encounter. Still, a bubble blown near his eyes could possibly have penetrated this low level of defence. As well, if he had wilfully kept his eyes open, he might be stung in the eyes by the harsh detergent which bubbles are made of.

Also, if Bubbles wilfully kept his mouth open, the force of evil could have blown a bubble in his mouth. Thus Bubbles would be left with a lingering bad taste in his mouth.

And this is presuming that the bubble solution was standard issue.

Using police reasoning that is beyond most people’s abilities, Bubbles may have guessed the bubble solution was partly a strong acid, base or other caustic material.

The female force of evil could have been aligned with underground chemists. She held her bubble stick in such a way that none of the bubble solution could fall on her. Perhaps this was a wise precaution. The pavement where this altercation developed might prove officer Bubbles correct. Perhaps the pavement was dissolved at this site – imagine if officer Bubbles had been struck.

And, in this post 9/11 era it’s generally known that liquids can also be explosives. Perhaps the force of evil had access to adept underground chemists. Nitroglycerin is a liquid explosive and even a slight jostling can cause it to explode. If a nitroglycerin bubble were produced imagine it striking officer Bubbles. The breaking of a bubble may sound harmless to you, but from the bubble’s vantage it is a very harsh, violent act. Such violence could easily cause the suspected nitroglycerin bubble to explode.

Officer Bubbles controlled himself well knowing the possibilities that the whole of the general public had missed. It’s just possible that his actual life was on the line. But this time the force of evil was contained.

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Economist’s Isle

Posted on 23 October 2010 by Larry Russwurm

This is the oldest of my noughties cartoons, roughly it dates from 2002. Still, I wanted to publish it due to the effectiveness of its slight against economics. Yes, economics is still considered an art. It’s good to remember this fact. Else we could all remain financially secure during any recession. I apologize for the lack of sharpness and the center vertical line which is on an angle. Instead of doing this cartoon in the standard way, it was a sketch in my art book. I haven’t repeated this method nor will I ever.

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A Simple Fix But With Problems

Posted on 20 October 2010 by Larry Russwurm

Sometimes the simple fix isn’t good enough.

In parts of the developed world, population growth peaked with the baby boomers. Now that they are beginning to retire, there aren’t enough people in the younger population to replace all of them in employment. Worse, as they get older they will need more health care and that will require more working people in the health care industry. As well, fewer people of working age means there is less of a tax base to pay for all the extra care.

Canada takes in a lot of immigrants. So Canadians saw an easy fix for this problem: approve more young immigrants for entry into Canada. This would be a beautiful solution if only the problem wasn’t more complex.

You see, the majority of immigrants to Canada settle in Toronto/Montreal/Vancouver. And why not? By settling in the big cities, you can keep some of the community you had in your old country.

My friend, whenever he wanted to mention an obscure place on the face of the earth, would use Bulgaria as an example. He didn’t know anyone from Bulgaria and I think the people he would say this to didn’t know Bulgarians either.

But sure enough, while living in Toronto during the World Cup of Soccer, one day Bulgaria won their game. Just like with every other ethnic group, when their team won, Bulgarians drove their cars around honking their horns and displaying that country’s flag all over the city. As obscure as Bulgaria is, there is a community of their people in Toronto.

Indeed, when the Martians wish to colonize Earth, I suspect that they will choose Toronto as the place to put their first off-Mars community. Toronto already has many programs to help newcomers set up there.

Montreal and Vancouver have similar stories and also attract many immigrants.

Some immigrants also move to the smaller cities. But not nearly as large a percentage as in Toronto/Montreal/Vancouver.

Small towns and rural areas get virtually no immigrants. I don’t blame the immigrants because these areas of Canada are most likely to be racist. Not everyone in rural areas is this way but in my experience it’s more prominent than in the other areas.

In my home in Kitchener, a mid size city, I think I am in the goldilocks zone. Enough young immigrants are in this region to replace our aging population and care for our elderly.

I’m not in Toronto/Montreal/Vancouver and thus don’t have to pay onerous taxes for more English/French as a 2nd language and other immigrant settling programs.

I’m not rural and thus don’t have to tough it out when I’m old and somehow care for myself when decrepit.

The future, for me, looks comfortable. Thank you half-assed, simple solution. I just happen to be in the right place.

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They’re Coming

Posted on 16 October 2010 by Larry Russwurm

Asian carp were introduced to the Mississippi over 10 years ago and have spread up that river and into most of its tributaries.

Asian carp are an invasive species that push out a lot of the native fish since they feed so fast and breed so fast. They’ve even pushed into the Illinois river. Why is this so important? Well the Illinois is linked by canal to the Great Lakes (Lake Michigan).

Now the Americans have some idea of what devastation such a species might bring to the big fisheries of the Great Lakes. So they’ve built an electric fence to stop the fish from moving further afield. But a problem with the fence could result in Lake Michigan getting infected.

The province of Ontario(which borders the other 4 Great Lakes) and some American states are talking about cutting Lake Michigan off from the other Great Lakes. This would make another barrier to stop the Asian Carp from spreading. So with two barriers, the spread of the Asian Carp to the Great Lakes/St. Lawrence River should at least slow the spread if not halt it completely.

In reality, I think this species is so invasive that it will eventually spread to the Great Lakes. Although I don’t live on the Lakes directly, my city, Kitchener, is on the Grand River which flows into Lake Erie. So I will see this species close up and personal if it does manage to spread.

And after researching this species on YouTube, I’m not sure that everything about this fish is so bad. You see, it has 1 character trait that I kind of like. Boat motors freak out this fish so much that they jump 6 or 8 feet out of the water when they hear the engine. They’ve been called flying fish because of this trait. Electrical stimulus to the water makes this problem/advantage even worse.

Which brings up what a town on the Illinois has done. They’ve instituted a “Redneck Fishing Tournament”. That’s when fishermen on the motorboats don’t use a pole to catch the Asian Carp. Instead they try to catch the fish with fishnets as they jump out of the water. It looks like such fun. You can check a video of that here.

Because some of the fish are over 20 pounds, they can hurt you by hitting you. People worry about deaths from this but no one has been killed yet. Still, black eyes and other injuries are common.

When I first saw the leaping fish, I thought it would be fun to take a baseball bat on board one of those boats and try to hit the Asian Carp. But thinking it through that would probably be too gruesome and cruel. So I backed of that idea and now think it would be neat to be on one of those boats with a tennis racket for each hand. My only question then, is should I hit the fish back into the water or into a spot on the boat.

There are other videos on YouTube showing this stuff. Like the one that shows people trying to shoot the fish with a bow and arrow. If you want to nose around YouTube about this just try a search for Asian Carp.

And if the carp never reach the Great Lakes? Why then I guess I’ll have to do all my Redneck Fishing Tournaments on the Illinois River.

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Back to the Future

Posted on 13 October 2010 by Larry Russwurm

Usually I’m all for getting more for my money. However at times issues of quality raise their heads.

It was standard during the record era to have less than 45 minute albums. The maximum seemed to be slightly over 20 minutes that could be put on a side of a record. That changed with the more recent era of the compact disk. Indeed it was decided from the get go to make CDs longer because there was a classical piece that lasted about 70 minutes and it hadn’t been recorded in one chunk yet.

It was trend setting acts in the 80s like Dire Straits who put out albums with bonus songs or extended versions if you were to purchase them on cassette or CD. Brothers in Arms was a solid album to try this on – still I don’t like every track of that album both on vinyl and the longer versions. In short, I do not let this album play through although there are chunks that I like. This is the problem I’d like to talk about.

It’s rare enough to get a solid album at 40 minutes in length. To me the acts that have managed to do so are heroes. The prog rock acts were probably the best at this like Yes, Pink Floyd and Led Zeppelin. All these bands have at least one album I will play through to the end. And believe me Yes and Pink Floyd heard the accolades and tried to make songs their maximum length (the side of a record) even though that was met with limited success.

Other bands also would put out the occasional wonder album. Like the Who (Who’s Next), Van Halen (1984) or even Men Without Hats (Pop Goes the World)

But the world was listening to Dire Straits in 1985 and by the early 90s it was standard to have a 60 minute album.

In my opinion the only acts to have a solid 60 minute outing were Pearl Jam (Ten) and Nirvana (Nevermind). I’m not sure if it’s my mind or the music, I’m usually done listening to these albums before they are over. Do I not have the attention span or does the music become boring in such quantity?

Plus, in the 60 minute era, there were a number of outings that might have been very solid 40 minute albums, that didn’t quite work at 60 minutes. Like the Red Hot Chili Peppers (Blood Sugar Sex Magic), Alanis Morrisette (Jagged Little Pill) and the Smashing Pumpkins (Siamese Dream). Of course they would have to edit these albums the way I want.

So I found myself sitting up when I saw an interview with Chris Martin (Coldplay) and he had a post it on his keyboard that was pro- 45 minute albums.

In short, I’m expecting a shorter Coldplay album next time around. Indeed another newer act, Shinedown, released a pretty solid outing (the Sound of Madness) just over the last year. I discovered it because it had 4 songs as singles. It’s time is just under 42 minutes and I’m crossing my fingers that I’ll think it’s one of those album wonders.

Still, what’s driving this return to a supposed former golden age? It’s the backwards technology of that same vinyl record. Vinyl has reemerged in the recording industry and many of us now have turntables again. Vinyl has come back to the future and maybe that’s a good thing.

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