Human on Plastic Action

Posted on 25 May 2010 by Larry Russwurm

Since my last post was about shower curtains being attracted to humans I only think it’s right that I now discuss human on plastic action.

It’s on a TV commercial. This may be regional (southern Ontario) but it’s on a big brand’s ad. Cashmere bathroom tissue is the brand and the ad is mainly about a model strutting down a runway in a dress made of Cashmere bathroom tissue. Indeed her train is made of some not completely unrolled toilet paper. The model stops walking and zones out as she fondles a corner of her dress.

Above is all fine. That changes when they cut from this. The end is made up of anonymous arms and hands touching Cashmere bathroom tissue. One roll is free and a hand fondles it lovingly. It’s just that a marketing genius made all of the other rolls of Cashmere be a package with the brand name clearly visible. i.e. The rest of the rolls are clearly still wrapped in plastic. There are four other hands and arms fondling the plastic just as lovingly as the first hand fondles the Cashmere. “Mmmm, plastic,” they are saying by their actions. “Just as nice to caress as Cashmere bathroom tissue and a fraction of the price.”

Posted in Business, Humour | Tagged , , , | 3 Comments

The Horny Shower Curtain

Posted on 22 May 2010 by Larry Russwurm

I’m about to surprise you, dear reader, by saying I know you’re attractive. You’re saying to yourself right now, “How could he possibly know that – this must be one of those psychic tricks.”

But not only do I know that, I can prove it. You see, I know that you’re so attractive that when you take a shower, the shower curtain can’t control itself and gets closer and closer to you. To the shower curtain, you are indeed attractive.

Now some people might bore you with rationalizations. They might go something like this: “As the water is turned on, a partial vacuum is created and blah blah blah”.

But I know it is because you’re attractive that the shower curtain gets so close. Indeed it might even brush up against you or attempt to wrap itself around you. The shower curtain could be said to be horny.

I’ve even found out from asking attractive people of both sexes that the attraction transcends gender. You just have to be attractive. Maybe the shower curtain is bi. However can something be bi when we don’t know what sex it is to begin with?

I’ve asked attractive transgendered people and the report is the same. The shower curtain remains horny despite sexual reassignment.

With cross dressers there is the same report but that could have been assumed by the transgendered experience.

I even knew someone with an (I guess) attractive ferret. You see, even after being descented, ferrets get a bit smelly, so every week is a good time to wash them. My friend used to take his ferret into the shower with him. The ferret enjoyed the shower and was fresh smelling afterwords. This friend reported to me that the shower curtain would attempt to touch him and the ferret. So even attractive animal species are considered fair game by the horny shower curtain.

Postscript.

Maybe it is the “blah blah blah” and shower curtains always are attracted inwards. That’s for the ‘bestiality’ – offended of you. Personally I believe and continue to believe that the shower curtain’s actions prove that I am attractive.

Postscript the Second

Maybe the French, in their ongoing effort to see everything as masculine or feminine can tell us the sex of “shower curtain”. Anyone know that much French? I thought of looking it up in one of those online translators but it’s two words in English.

Posted in Humour, Science | Tagged , , , , , , , , , | 17 Comments

They’re Torturing Mice You Know

Posted on 15 May 2010 by Larry Russwurm

Scientists have just come up with something new, a Mouse Grimace Scale. The title alone clues you in that they had to torture mice to come up with such a scale. It’s exactly what it sounds like, they recorded facial expressions on mice who were undergoing various amounts of pain.

When I think about it I imagine scientists poking full grown male mice in the testicles, again and again, recording that grimace. But that’s a low pain. I’m imagining the highest pain being when a mouse’s back end is shoved in a snake’s cage and the snake chowing down is the moment that the high speed cameras record. Because, after all, the scientists will want to see this life taking grimace again and again. Besides, retakes would be cruel.

I know a few of you are up in arms about this and a few of you are shrugging your shoulders. That snake example says plenty. Some of you know of some snakes who are kept alive on just live mice. Some owners do this despite the availability of frozen, humanely killed mice. In other words this is a very common event. I’m somewhat in the middle. Ideally I don’t like mice being tortured but one alternative is people having to experience more pain if we don’t do experiments on mice. And now that experimenting has come to include torture.

Apparently people can identify the mouse facial expressions 97 percent of the time. Which means that every time it’s necessary to torture a mouse, at least two will have to be so harmed. It’s the way science works.

But let’s take a look at the ultimate mice torturers – cats. Judging how we don’t seem to hold mouse torturing against cats, I don’t think scientists really have to worry about being shunned.

And, indeed, with the Mouse Grimace Scale, when Fluffy captures a mouse we can now say, “Fluffy, I’m letting that mouse go when it reaches a 5 on the Mouse Grimace Scale.” Thank you science.

Posted in Humour, Pets, Science | Tagged , , , , , | Leave a comment

Great Big Convoy

Posted on 8 May 2010 by Larry Russwurm

Tractor trailers made a huge splash in the 1970’s. The logo “Keep on Trucking” was everywhere. There were TV shows and movies and songs. And indeed that culture helped lead us into our present dependence (especially in smaller centers) on the tractor trailer.

Maybe we could hark back to those earlier days and idealize the tractor trailer again. But I think we should add a ‘Teens’ twist, such as environmental friendliness. Like early recycling, the basic idea was there for trucking as well. The idea of the convoy.

And what, pray tell, is so good about the convoy? It’s the fuel efficiency. The first truck breaks up the air and has about the same drag as a lone truck. But the 2nd and 3rd and so on trucks use less fuel because they fit nicely into the slipstream created by the first truck. You could also change positions so the extra fuel used by the lead truck is spread around.

I propose going even further with the ‘Teens’ convoys. How about giving them right of way at every intersection on the road. Traffic lights can be made to give emergency vehicles right of way, so why not convoys? Thus, all the slowing down and stopping and accelerating could be avoided, saving even more fuel.

To be best at fitting into the slip stream of the convoy it would soon be seen that the closest these trucks could be would be best. Why not attach each of the trailers to a giant front engine. We could use articulated connectors for all the cars. Now we’ve just saved money by needing only one driver and maybe a couple of backup drivers.

Indeed, there are more savings to be had by making the engine pull as many trailers as possible. Roads, as they are built now, may not be so good for huge convoys. It would be expensive at first, but may I suggest building roads between suitable destinations specifically for the articulated convoy. That way, very steep grades and sharp curves could be avoided.

But I must say I’m at a loss as to what to call my huge ‘Teens’ convoys. Could anyone help?

Posted in Business, Humour, Politics, Science | Tagged , , , | Leave a comment

The New Political Movement

Posted on 5 May 2010 by Larry Russwurm

We’ve all heard of recent burka bans in various European nations. Now I was thinking about pointing out that the nun’s habit is along the same lines but…

Then it occurred to me, the full repercussions of these new laws. We are now able to legislate that women have to wear less clothing. And hardly anyone is crying foul.

Indeed, the anti burka laws are being promoted as being good for women’s rights. I can hear the chant in my head as I write this, “Less clothes, women’s rights! Less clothes, women’s rights!”

I can see this movement spreading as teenage boys finally join political parties for the first time. Next on the agenda will be the nun’s habit, and the movement will spread to other areas of clothing.

Feminists will adopt a “right for the weather” clothing strategy. But nice summer days could result in mandatory bikinis for all females.

Maybe in an effort to keep women’s rights aligned with the less clothing movement, the Gwen Jacobs law will take effect. Women will be allowed to take their tops off but only if they want to. The teenage boys won’t know the history of Ontario to know that law has been on the books since Gwen Jacobs’ famous stand (1991-1996) – and hardly any females since have felt the need to take their tops off.

Eventually the various factions would split and the movement would end. Still we’d have that nice chant to remember the movement: “Less clothes, women’s rights!”

Posted in Humour, Politics | Tagged , , , | 3 Comments

Cheesily Romantic Art

Posted on 1 May 2010 by Larry Russwurm

Years ago some friends of mine were getting married. I forget what I gave them as a gift. But for a card there was something “unique” that I wanted to give them.

You see, years earlier I had purchased “The Royal Family Pop-Up Book”. There was a bin full of them in the World’s Biggest Bookstore in Toronto in the late ’80s. Ordinarily I disdain royalty merchandise. But this was an elaborate pop up book and the price was only $1.99 . They must have been clearing them out. Judging by the dates given in the book like 1983, I’m sure this is what they were doing.

So what does this have to do with my friends? Well one page of the pop-up book had Prince Charles and Lady Di facing each other. A tab could be pulled and the pair would come together for their marriage kiss.

Since I can get a pretty good likeness of most people when drawing, I wanted to draw my friends heads and using a similar apparatus as the pop up book, have them come together in a kiss as the tab was pulled. It’s just that I don’t know how most pop-up book apparatus works. And did I say this was elaborate? Not only do they lean in for a kiss, the upper torso moves in and their locked hands move slightly.

My only hope was to copy the apparatus of “The Royal Family Pop-Up Book”. But it was mostly hidden, even from weird angles, and I was loathe to take apart the pop-up parts because I would ruin my book. When did I become so attached to a book I almost didn’t buy? Anyways, I never did make that card.

I’m looking at the book, now. There’s some neat 3D scenes but the highlight of the book is really the kiss.

“Oh, Charles!”

“Oh, Di!”

Smooch, smooch, kissy, kissy, kiss.

“But, Di, some people think I shouldn’t kiss a cadaver. And other people think I shouldn’t even kiss you!”

-er sorry, there, I must have zoned out.

Anyhow, if anyone on the Internet knows how to figure out the pop-up book mechanism and would like to post it online, I’d like to see it.

In fact I would like to see someone make a stock card of a kissing couple with blank faces. I could buy one for $5 and draw the faces and maybe sell the product for $50 and I and others could make more money off of weddings. Photographers could do the same – take a profile of the bride and groom’s heads and attach them to the stock card. Weird people could put a picture of Pacman and Ms. Pacman, put it on the stock card and play.

The byline on the book says paper engineering by Vic Duppa-Whyte. Maybe he could make stock cards. In my brief search of him on the Internet I found he paper engineered other pop-up books, all seemingly from the ’80s. I couldn’t find if he was alive today or even when he was born.

But that’s not my only cheesily romantic art idea.

Hopefully, you’ve all seen the picture of the vase. But is it two profiles? In its 2D incarnation it could be either. But I was thinking of making a 3D vase based on it. Years ago, I had the idea to make that vase and make it so the two profiles are of any couple of your choosing. Wouldn’t this make a cheesily romantic gift?

However, I saw that gift more recently in a psychology text. It was an art gift to some royal couple. The gift predated my idea.

But just to prove that I independently thought of it myself, I think it would be important to blend the profiles on the 3D vase such that the two profiles’ features would be blended smoothly, halfway to each other. That way, if you rotated the vase 90 degrees you would have an evenly blended profile.

To a childless couple you could say the combined profile is their child.

To a couple with children you could say the profile is their “good child”. Just remember if any of their bad children find out, the “good child” vase might end up broken.

Posted in Art, Humour | Tagged , , , , , , | 3 Comments

My Member of Parliament and the other Feds

Posted on 27 April 2010 by Larry Russwurm

I’m annoyed with my Canadian Member of Parliament and the sheer amount of propaganda he sends me from the federal parliament. Because he’s an MP and a member of the ruling party, he gets to send these out on the public dime (actually 50 cents or whatever a stamp is worth nowadays). And it is propaganda, allow me to illustrate from the latest update.

After the political rhetoric you’d expect on an issue from Harold Albrecht and his Conservative party, There is a big heading saying “I Value Your Opinion”. Fine, maybe he believes in participatory democracy. Below it says in smaller lettering “Do YOU support these improvements to the Youth Criminal Justice Act??”[There are two question marks on the flier – just thought I’d include them]. Below is a box to check “YES” and a box to check for “NO”.

Uh, if you’re going to answer “NO” to this question you certainly wouldn’t call the changes “improvements”. Obviously Albrecht doesn’t care for the other opinion someone might have. Obviously “I Value Your Opinion” was a lie and he is now a hypocrite.

So here is what I’m going to do about this. Remember that free mailing Albrecht got? Well it’s a two edged sword. My response (where I’m supposed to answer just his questions [there are more boxes]) is also free to send by mail. I’m going to highlight the word “improvements” and the “NO” with the box and say in the margin:

“Yo, Suit [Albrecht appears on the flier three times, in all three appearances he’s wearing a suit], if I were to check “NO” I wouldn’t call these “improvements”. It’s like you DON’T value my opinion and that is harshing my mellow.”

While we’re talking about the ruling Conservative Party, it should be noted that prime minister Stephen Harper is surrounded by three women in the House of Commons. So every time he’s shown on the news, we are allowed to assume that a large percentage of women are in the Conservative Party. Let me tell you up front that is not the proportion of women in the Conservative Party.

The opposition Liberal Party has the same but different idea.. They make sure that every shot of their leader contains Navdeep Bains, a turban wearer, to sell themselves as friendly to minorities and visible minorities. Again the makeup of the Liberal Party doesn’t have a proper representation of visible minorities either. I can accept this better though, because large amounts of visible minorities are recent immigrants and haven’t developed their power capital yet.

But really I think Navdeep Bains looks like one of those eastern mystics from the ’20s and ’30s who wore turbans and hypnotized people. So every time he is seen behind Michael Ignatieff is another chance for him to hypnotize Canadians into voting Liberal. “How’s that going to go?” you ask. Just wait till the next election.

Posted in Humour, Politics | Tagged , , , , , , , | 6 Comments

The Moon is the New Mars – the Way the US Space Program was Going

Posted on 24 April 2010 by Larry Russwurm

Under Dubya’s vision for space, the U.S. was going to to go to the Moon again then eventually get to Mars. Allow me to illustrate how this was going to go.

You can’t just have a vision. You have to have a way of achieving that vision. In the U.S. space program, that method is NASA. When NASA is starved of cash it doesn’t achieve all of its goals. When it is bathing in cash it is much better at achievement.

Just take a look at Wikipedia’s NASA Budget site and you can see that NASA needed much more money while developing the technologies to make it to the Moon.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/NASA_Budget

A similar boost is needed and probably for longer to make it to Mars as a manned mission. Dubya didn’t give NASA enough more to have the breakthroughs a Mars mission might need. In fact NASA funding remained low under Dubya even after the “vision” was presented. This is the first point in why I think the Moon was going to end up the final destination under Dubya’s vision.

The second reason happened only months ago. The LCROSS mission found evidence of water inside a crater at the Moon’s south pole. If you don’t have to transport water to the Moon, this lends support to the idea that it’s a good place to put a base on.

The third reason the Moon could become the new Mars and thus be the end destination of Dubya’s vision is occurring on the International Space Station. They are recycling the astronauts’ water. Yuk! Let me repeat, they are recycling the astronaut’s water. Thus, the little water that may be found on the Moon could go a long, long way. A Moon Base’s worth, maybe.

The fourth reason is possible life on Mars. Dubya and his successors would have given as a reason for not making it to Mars, that they were taking the moral high ground. That is, they would say that they do not want to contaminate any possible life on Mars by sending billions of microbes there along with their human hosts. That’s right, I’m saying that Dubya’s successors might take a note of ethical superiority.

Under Obama, the U.S. Does not have a rocket to space and thus, once the space shuttle missions have stopped, the U.S. has to rely on other nations to make it to space. This could go on for a while.

Rather than rush to make a Moon capable rocket, Obama is going to take longer to get a more powerful rocket to get to Mars and some asteroids. In a time of budget freeze in all other endeavours, Obama has increased NASA’s budget by 6 billion dollars over 5 years. Notice that this breaks the first point of Dubya’s destination, so it is quite possible that Obama might get his vision done by the 2030’s where it is said to pay off.

That leaves everyone else to try for the Moon like Dubya was going to do. And the Moon has no shortage of potential suitors like China, India, Russia, Europe and Japan who have each sent a probe to at least orbit the Moon. And this time, if an Obama descended program reaches Mars, these countries will say “tsk, tsk, endangering all those potential Martian microbes.” The U.S. will have new bragging rights and the rest of the world will take the moral high ground.

Being part of that rest of the world (Canada), I don’t think the height of that moral high ground is very high. All I can think of is that ’70s science fiction story that had “equal rights for germs” taking over society. Bathing became illegal because it caused the death of many microbes. [If anyone can find a trace of this story on the internet, I’d like to see it. I thought it was indeed entitled “Equal Rights for Germs” but found nothing under that search. I also think it was published in Analog because some of those magazines were kicking around the house while I was growing up.]

Posted in Humour, Politics, Science | Tagged , , , , , , , , , | 6 Comments

The No Name Decades

Posted on 17 April 2010 by Larry Russwurm

Last decade we all struggled to find a widely accepted name for that time. And here we are, fresh into another decade and once again it has no generally accepted name.

It made me laugh last decade to hear one particular radio station skirt the issue. They said, “we play the best of the ’80s, ’90s and today”. Now, even they’ve given up on the decade tags.

So what did they call the 19 zero whatevers? Maybe we can lift something from that. They called it the turn of the century. Maybe we could get away with calling last decade the turn of the millenium.

But that doesn’t sound right somehow. Turn of the century was coined in a much more pretentious time. Millenium is an even harder word to handle than century. And the dominant part of society right now seems to like things more bare bones and stripped down. So what should we do?

So what is the zero in the decade spot? Why it’s a place value of course. Maybe that’s what we could call last decade – the place values.

But I’ve heard people when talking about the turn of the century decade or the millenium decade refer to a specific year as oh nine for either 1909 or 2009. It’s this which gives me fire for how it’s worked out in my mind. So last decade could be known as the ohs.

And finally, at the very end of 2009 I heard a couple attempts of decade naming, calling it the oughts. As well I offer noughts as meaning the equivalent. So there you have it, not one name for last decade but five. I prefer the oughts, noughts or ohs. Just quit being so meek by not naming it. Pick one and say it every time. I at least will know what you mean and be accepting of any of the above choices. At least, finally, someone will be putting themselves on record.

This decade is relatively easier because I see fewer choices. There is the obvious one that doesn’t roll off the tongue “tens” which could also be written ’10s. But I prefer teens. I think most people would. But I know there are naysayers out there who will say that the teens don’t officially start until 13. I say we have the power to define teens any way we want.

I have made my picks and it is ohs and teens. So if you see me referring to last decade or this decade as anything else, call me on it. I’m planning to make this stand. Rather than the word vacuum we’ve lived through thus far, I’d rather you called these decades something even if it’s one of the other possibilities or something else you’ve latched onto.

And remember, at the end of this decade, we’ll be able to look back with 2020 vision.

Posted in Humour, Politics | Tagged , , , , , , , | 14 Comments

What’s Up With Earth Hour?

Posted on 10 April 2010 by Larry Russwurm

It was reported on my television news that the power savings of earth hour had gone down locally. During last year’s Earth Hour, power usage decreased 6% of normal. This Earth Hour the power usage decreased only 4%. Does this spell the beginning of the end for Earth Hour? The news report didn’t really say but you were left to conclude it might very well be.

But let’s look at Earth Hour. It is very much a symbolic event. Most people who support it pretty much just switch off their lights for an hour. And it can be a learning thing as events are set up with non electrical lights to gather as a group and maybe learn a thing or two about using less electricity and helping the environment..

Let’s be honest, saving that 6 or 4 percent electricity for an hour isn’t going to save the world. We need to cut down on the electricity for all the other hours of a year to help the environment by needing less capacity in the power grid. Since Earth Hour is symbolic, maybe it’s not the best thing to be eyeing the numbers so closely. Perhaps last year people turned off their computers and other electronics and this year they just did it with their lights.

Or maybe the ecopigs are jealous of the goody goods taking part in these events. Perhaps they are using extra electricity during Earth Hour. You know, put on the blender, the TV, the electric stoves the stereo etc., all in an effort to make the goody goods look like they have diminishing numbers. Maybe that will sap them of their group strength.

Or perhaps the neighbourhood is now composed of a large percentage of grow-ops. And since they are stealing the electricity to begin with, these marijuana king pins aren’t likely to come out to all their houses and cut the electrical use for an hour just to be a goody good.

And then again, maybe the numbers are proof that Earth Hour is a roaring success. After all, turning off the lights is the main thrust of Earth Hour. But let’s say one third of last year’s Earth Hour participants bought exclusively compact fluorescent lights. And replaced all their old lights with these. As the power demands of these lights approach zero when compared with the old lights, when all the lights of all the goody goods get shut off during earth hour, the power use savings will only be 4% rather than last year’s 6%.

You’re right, the compact fluorescent lights didn’t quite go to zero electricity usage. So we’ll need a shade more than 1/3 of Earth Hour participants to have bought exclusively compact fluorescents for their homes. But it could still explain the difference. It’s doable, could’ve been done and Earth Hour might be a rip roaring success. That’s why I hate unexamined numbers which let you come to any of a number of conclusions.

Posted in Humour, Mathematics, Politics | Tagged , , , , | 1 Comment