to anyone that celebrates

merry christmas, reeds!

hope everyone had a happy holiday season--whatever you may celebrate.

(be back soon)

donald vs. rosie in a 50th post extravaganza!

happy 50th post, reeds!

all you dedicated donnies and donnettes who have either been reading since day 1, or caught up on what you missed, have now read 50 rambles by yours truly.

ahh, the memories. together we've been through so much. and there's so much more to go!

with that said, i bring you post #50, this momentous thursday, december 21st, installment of tiny damaged notions!

[millions of cheering fans can be heard]

record-reed left me a comment today:

Uhh, Mike, I think you're falling for a Simpsons-esque "free boat" trick here. You're walking right into a trap laid by the police to catch criminals while in possession of yours and all your friends' firearms; the cops are going to take you down for being the vile, gun-running survivalist you are.

if you don't know what "'free boat' trick" he was referring to, shame on you!

and, mr. know-it-all, i highly doubt the police would care how i acquired so many firearms, or why so many of them are not even legal to own. i'm sure i'll get the $300 and free candy-cane for each one, no questions asked. so quit stalling and give me your guns!

but wait! that's not all. record-reed continued:

By the way, I tried to buy some Christmas presents with that "Confederated States of Goldence" money you gave me and they said it wasn't valid tender... yet.

don't worry, reeds. the "confederated states of goldence" currency that i distributed to you all is legal tender. however, it is currently only legal tender in my bedroom, which is the capitol of the "confederated states of goldence." once i win the presidency in 2008, change the name of the country, and expand the country throughout the whole world, you'll have no problem purchasing "mike-day" gifts for people.

and by people, i mean, obviously, me.

the name of my country, i'm sure, raises some questions. questions such as, "hey, what's with the name of your country? isn't your last named spelled with an 's'?"

to answer: yes, my last name is spelled g-o-l-d-e-n-s-e. the name of my country has a "c" in place of that "s" because i'm not an egotistical maniac, ok? maybe the pronunciation of the country's name is a play on "golden sea," rather than that of my last name, which is just "gold dense."

any further questions about this matter, and your dedication towards the confederacy will be put in question.

with that out of the way, we move towards entertainment news--the more popular, yet less important little brother of the regular news.

rosie o'donnell and donald trump are in a fight!

that's right. it all started on the view--where everything important begins--when rosie o'donnell
badmouthed trump's decision to keep the multi-talented coke-snorting, alcohol-addicted miss USA around (remember, we spoke about that yesterday).

donald trump,
seen here sticking a toothpick into his brown & white tongue, fired back with his own video, which subtly insinuates that he didn't like rosie's rant so much.

TMZ.com, everyone's favorite paparazzi-pusher, has a whole mess of videos up pertaining to this here brawl we got goin' on.

both sides seem to be debating with eloquence rivaling cicero.

trump: Rosie O'Donnell is disgusting, both inside and out...You take a look at her, she's a slob. She talks like a truck driver.
(E! News, "http://www.eonline.com/news/article/index.jsp?uuid=a138e89e-c246-4046-9e3d-0913e020640d&page=1")

rosie: Donald, sit and spin, my friend
(E! News, "http://www.eonline.com/news/article/index.jsp?uuid=a138e89e-c246-4046-9e3d-0913e020640d&page=1")

wow. good stuff.

while donald's attack may seem mean spirited, rosie o'donnell is no stranger to danger herself:

The loose-lipped View host has issued something of an apology for repeatedly using the phrase "ching chong" while speaking in mock Chinese tones last week, saying that she "never intended to hurt anyone"...[she also said] "So apparently 'ching-chong,' unbeknownst to me, is a very offensive way to make fun, quote unquote, or mock, Asian accents. Some people have told me it's as bad as the N-word. I was like, really? I didn't know that."
(E! News, "http://www.eonline.com/news/article/index.jsp?uuid=b33c7760-8170-4fca-83b3-ecf82ebb11d0&entry=index")

i guess she'll need to throw away her whole "lucky me chinaman" routine. watch out, rosie, your turn-of-the-century vaudevillian minstrel act may be next in line on the chopping-block.

so, reeds, check out all the videos, and make your own opinion. or, better yet, start a betting pool on who will win the impending court case! trump's got the money, rosie's got the fans. this could be the big battle of '07.

before i bid you farewell, check this out:
yahoo! is claiming i owe THEM mail.

well, tough luck, yahoo! i ain't givin' up not one here mails o'mine!

thanks go out to yahoo! beta mail for the glitch, or material. however you look at it.

have a wonderful thursday, reeds! pick a fight with a billionaire tonight. go on, it's fun! the leader of the confederated states of goldence commands it.

drugs, guns, and trump!

mubble, mubble, mubble. i'm tired.

i'm feeling alright. nothing fantastic.

so, with that disclaimer of fun out of the way, here's your wednesday, december 20th installment of tiny damaged notions!

andy-alliteration is back!

(new york daily news, "http://www.nydailynews.com/front/story/481753p-405329c.html")

"teary tara to keep her tiara." brilliant.

so, what's this story about? donald trump's fetish for eating human ears, and the subsequent pain it causes his prey?

don't let the picture fool you, it's actually about "miss USA." apparently, the hard-drinking, cocaine-snorting, wildly-promiscuous beauty queen is being allowed to keep her crown after--well, being all those things.

tara conner, the aforementioned miss USA, told reporters

I wouldn't say that I'm an alcoholic. I think that would be pushing the envelope.
(new york daily news, "http://www.nydailynews.com/front/story/481753p-405329c.html")

but that's a little vague, don't you think?

i mean, to understand that, you need to understand the idiom "pushing the envelope" as meaning "to exceed the existing limits in a certain field." then you have to put both parts of that thought together as meaning "i do not believe i am an alcoholic. i believe calling me an alcoholic is going too far."

donald trump, who owns the miss USA pageant, seems to agree with me on this one, as he was quoted saying:

I don't think she's denying she's an alcoholic...She can be a great example for troubled people - and she's troubled - for troubled people...that have problems with alcohol.
(new york daily news, "http://www.nydailynews.com/front/story/481753p-405329c.html")

"who's denying what now? nah, she wasn't denying anything. she was talkin' 'bout envelopes."

so now the miss USA pageant takes another impressionable turn: showing "troubled people" that you can get away with clinging to your vices as long as you cry to a billionaire.

between that and anorexia/bulimia, i don't know why beauty pageants often have a negative light shone on them--do you?

in other news, check this out:

It doesn't matter if you've been naughty or nice, Suffolk [county, new york] police will still give you some cash for Christmas if you hand in a gun.

In the interest of getting guns off the streets and out of homes, the Suffolk County Police Department is offering residents who trade in their firearms up to $300.
(new york daily news, "http://www.nydailynews.com/boroughs/story/481546p-405256c.html")

$300 per gun??

since i am a suffolk county resident for the time being, i need all you reeds to go donate your guns to me so that i can donate your guns to the suffolk county police department.

if you're questioning why you can't just hand in the guns yourselves and get the $300, it's because carrying a gun is a heavy responsibility--one that not everyone is ready for.

the second you obtain a firearm, you also obtain an evil enemy--sworn to take you down.

it's best if you just let me handle this one. trust me.

and for the final TDN tidbit, it's time for a quirky headline!
read the full story here. it's short, i promise.

you reeds have a lovely wednesday. if anyone wants to study for my german final, and then transfer the knowledge directly to my brain, let me know.

otherwise, i'm stealing your guns!

sniff this, you smelly racist!

woo!

i'm feeling a bit better. i don't want to jinx it, but i think i may be on that lovely road to wellness. the one paved with naps, and wet with the rain from tea-with-honey-and-lemon clouds.

therefore, on this tuesday, december 19th, i bring you the latest installment of tiny damaged notions!

so, remember the OJ book fiasco? remember how, as record-reed put it:

The great thing about the OJ book is it's something we can all get behind. Aside from maybe Club a Baby Seal day, I can't think of an idea that would be more universally reviled.

yeah, those were great times.

but then, as would be expected from any nation which does not promote murder, the book deal got canceled.

there were reports that judith regan, the publisher at harpercollins who thought up "if i did it," had only made the deal with OJ to get the confession out of him. this turned her from sleazeball to underhanded weirdo with an ok idea, but accomplished horribly wrong.

so we didn't hate her for a while. we just thought the whole thing was--how do you put this with an eloquence on par with that of "if i did it"--shady.

well, put back on those idiot-pointing-out gloves and get ready to extend a finger towards ms. regan! (finger can be chosen by the pointer):
anti-semitic remarks eh?

nothing like racism to add to your already brilliant track-record of attempting to publish a murderer's book on how he murdered his victims.

what were the racial remarks, you ask?

well, there were a couple. some are being contested by regan's "hollywood attorney." however, this one was rather ripe with ignorance:

Regan also complained, according to the account, that Friedman had not given her enough support during the recent controversy over the aborted O.J. Simpson book and TV deal she had promoted, saying: "Of all people, the Jews should know about ganging up, finding common enemies and telling the big lie."
(latimes.com, "http://www.latimes.com/entertainment/news/la-fi-regan19dec19,1,646399.story?coll=la-headlines-entnews&track=crosspromo")

now, this of course can be read two ways.

one way indicates that "the jews" should know about "ganging up, finding common enemies and telling the big lie" because they were the victims of just such an atrocity--of course, referring to the holocaust.

the other way in which ms. regan's quote can be read is by assuming jewish individuals should know about "ganging up, finding common enemies and telling the big lie" because they themselves had done just that--perhaps referring to that most ignorant of ideas that the holocaust was a "big lie."

i'm not sure why (perhaps because my mind was told her comments were anti-semitic), but i immediately read it the second way. perhaps i should give her the benefit of the doubt and assume she meant the first (although i don't know why i would do that--maybe the hope that she's just an ignorant moron, but not one of the world's top ignorant morons). either way though, there is a clear amount of generalization and bias in her statement.

her book deal didn't go through, and she made a generalization that it should have since the executive, friedman, is jewish, and given that, he should have been thinking a certain way which is typical or expected of jewish people.

her train of thought lead her to blurt out that statement--notifying anyone she was speaking to (and now anyone reading the news), that she feels the actions and thoughts of any jewish individual should be easy to determine given that they all think alike.

of course, using religion or ethnicity to determine the course of actions people either do or should take is very much not ignorant.

nothing's wrong with assuming that you should think a certain way, or that you are above or below another person due to the color of your skin, the country your ancestors hail from, or the religion and/or religious culture which you tie yourself to.

if we as human beings are expected to treat every person as a unique individual whose background and/or upbringing may have influenced their personality, but is not the end-all reason for every action they take or thought they have, how are we supposed to irrationally scapegoat a group of people in order to make ourselves feel better?

what's next, peace on earth?

come on now.

in news not related to someone's moronic racist outburst, forbes.com recently made note of this:

Lost in the dark, without sight, sound, or clue? Follow your nose.
(forbes.com, "http://www.forbes.com/forbeslife/health/feeds/hscout/2006/12/18/hscout600212.html")

the author of this articlewasn't referring to those delicious fruit loops, but rather to a new study which indicates "people can certainly sniff their way accurately around a spatial context."

apparently, everyone assumes that humans have a poor sense of smell--and this study aimed to disprove that myth.

how did they disprove it?

The subjects were first blindfolded and ear-plugged before being asked to follow a 10-meter trail scented with "chocolate essential oil." They followed the trial by moving close to the ground on their hands and knees and wearing thick gloves, with only their noses to guide them.
(forbes.com, "http://www.forbes.com/forbeslife/health/feeds/hscout/2006/12/18/hscout600212.html")

did anyone else picture this taking place in a dark, narrow basement?

i know i did. but maybe that's just because all of my "scientific experiments" that involve people being blindfolded and ear-plugged while moving "close to the ground on their hands and knees" take place in dark basements.

and are video taped.

and aren't so much "scientific experiments" as they are "bondage videos."

but, maybe that's just me.

for now, i'm off! all you reeds have a smelly tuesday. sniff all you can--prove those naysayers wrong!

bounce away the virii

while many of you reeds have finals, i'm sure the lack of TDN has still been on your mind despite the constant stress the semester is putting you through.

fear not!

this blog shall return soon. for now, i am ill, and my level of funny has been drained.

i'm working it back up, you know with funny pills, and giggle drops.

today is monday, december 18th--and this is your half-assed, run-down installment of TDN!

ok, i never finished that thing about the visually impared hunting.

right, that's obviously not a good idea.

i'm very against discriminating against the visually impared, but it seems like a laser can tell you to shoot a human same as it can tell you to shoot a deer--how can the laser tell?

(got an answer, science?)

ok, and here's some new news:

Health officials blamed a highly contagious, hard-to-get-rid-of virus for an outbreak of illness among nearly 400 patrons of an Olive Garden restaurant outside Indianapolis.
(CNN, "http://www.cnn.com/2006/HEALTH/12/18/olive.garden.outbreak/")

right. so some olive garden closed down in indianapolis, indiana.

apparently the cause was a "hard-to-get-rid-of virus."

way to play the scapegoat card, olive garden. why don't you just take the blame for this one and quit blaming the poor hard-to-get-rid-of virii?

seriously.

and to end it, here's one of those guys who can bounce quarters really well and then gets really excited about it.

have a great monday night, reeds. let's hope a good night's sleep shakes the sickies outta me.

part I: blind texas gun laws!

good evening, reeds!

it's late afternoon; the sun is setting on this thursday, december 14th, and i'm here to give you another installment of tiny damaged notions!

let's play a little game called "how much absurd," shall we?

it's easy to play. you simply point out "how much absurd" this next news blurb has. got it?

(blog.washingtonpost.com, "http://blog.washingtonpost.com/offbeat/2006/12/blind_texas_gun_laws.html")

"visually impared texans, grab your rifles!"

that's a good start.

then, of course, there's a picture of rudolph to accompany the report. seemingly illogical, it pertains to the "laser sights" that visually impared citizens would be using to guide their santa-esque bullets to the chimney-esque prey.

now granted, this was a blog post; and blog posts can be, at times, ridiculous.

(hello)

but, it raises a valid point: the visually impared, hunting?

more on this tomorrow...

the stars tell me i'm boring

today is wednesday the 13th! ahhh!

welcome to your latest installment of tiny damaged notions.

in this corner, we have daredevil evel knievel:
he loves america, rockets, and red metal frames.

in this corner, we have kanye west:
he loves hip-hop music, t gra awar, and STEALING IDENTITIES!

"what?"

allow me explain: evel knievel is suing kanye west because knievel feels kanye's latest video "tarnishes [knievel's] image by its 'vulgar, sexual' nature."

"i'm still not following."

In [his latest music video], West is renamed Evel Kanyevel, wears a jumpsuit similar to Knievel's and cavorts with Pamela Anderson. Knievel is seeking damages and a halt to distribution of the video, which was made for the single Touch the Sky.
(BBC News, "http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/entertainment/6175347.stm")

oh. ok. i guess that's something. suing people.

here's a screenshot from the video which shows evel kanyevel in all his sexy, raunchy glory:
::sigh::

this story is boring me. who cares? i don't.

let's see what else i can find.

umm, angelina jolie spoke up for the first time about her meeting brad pitt:

Because of the film [mr. and mrs. smith], we ended up being brought together to do all these crazy things, and I think we found this strange friendship and partnership that kind of just suddenly happened.
(iafrica.com, "http://entertainment.iafrica.com/news/520285.htm")

i always said that movie brings people together.

ughh, that's pretty boring news too.

oh, chontel-reed informed me that TDN is now 2nd on google if you use quotes, and 3rd if you don't use any! great job keeping these hits coming, everyone! now we're sure to take over the world.

that's pretty exciting, but still--i need something big.
what?

Portland Police Spokesperson Brian Schmautz said shortly after 5:00 p.m. Friday night officers at the Northeast Precinct on NE Emerson St. got a call that someone had just hit one of their patrol cars, then backed up and hit it again.

The officers went outside and saw an abandoned Honda Civic that happened to be right next to the damaged patrol car.

A short time later police found the driver of the Honda, 35-year-old Jason Klopf.

Jason Klopf said he rammed the patrol car because police failed to pull him over for speeding.

Klopf apparently told officers he was upset because he had been driving around on city streets at over 100 mph and no one ever pulled him over to give him a ticket.
(kgw.com, "http://www.kgw.com/news-local/stories/kgw_120906_news_reckless_driver.102f899d.html")

oh. well, that doesn't make much sense.

why is everything either boring or just plain nonsense today?!

ugh, maybe my horoscope will provide some excitement:
what the hell is that?!?!

save money?!?

that's the most boring horoscope i've ever read.

and that overview is pretty bland too.

this is a horoscope. where's the info that i'll fall into riches today, or find my true love, or battle old vikings on neptune? just make shit up, dammit!

save money--psshh.

well, that's all i've got today. even the stars say i'm going to have a pretty boring day, so i apologize for the lack of entertainment.

everyone go here and just enjoy that instead.

have a wonderful day, reeds. go out there and spend some money, build a rocket, sue evel knievel, and marry brad pitt. you've got all day--get to it!

no, ariel, you're the slut!

howdy ya'll. it's early in the mo'nin on this here tuesday, december 12th, and i welcome everybody to another installment of tiny damaged notions!

adam-reed gives us this breaking news from ABC:
psssh, big deal. i've been writing "your daughter's a slut" on bathroom walls for years now.

i speak in jest. however, this mother sure didn't feel like joking around when her disney-approved shimmering lights ariel doll called her daughter a slut.

want to hear it for yourself? click this link to go to the news article. there's a link to the video on the left column.

i was honestly expecting worse. it sounds like a malfunction.

is it bad that i was hoping someone would have recorded themselves yelling "YOU'RE A SLUT!" into the doll itself? at least that would be entertaining news.

so, when the doll isn't deriding your chastity, what's it saying?

Normally, the doll says the phrases, "Your sparkles are so beautiful," "Life is the bubbles" and "You're a wonderful friend." It also hums a song without words.
(abc news, "http://abcnews.go.com/Business/story?id=2714761&page=1")

"life is the bubbles?"

what the hell does that even mean? are kids saying this nowadays?

"yo man did you catch that excellent sports game the other night?"
"yeah, it was the bubbles, bro. our favorite local sports team won!"

apparently, the doll started saying that naughty phrase after the little girl kept pressing the button--skipping all these other phrases--to get to the song without words. while skipping phrases, it can say a string of words which sounds like "you're a slut!"

this whole thing sent me back to my lovely days at toys r us, and not only because i've sold many a disney doll in my day, but because of this green guy:
that's the leapfrog alphabet pal caterpillar.

this cutesy crawler helps teach your child about the alphabet in a number of different ways. that horizontal slit on his neck changes the mode of learning. one mode says the letter, one says the phonetic sound the letter makes in the english language, and there's another mode i forgot.

when you go on the phonetic sound mode, letter's like "F" make a "fffffff" sound. this is all fine, except when you follow it with the "ckkkkkkkk" sound of the "K."

in this original green model, that made the caterpillar say "ffffffckkkkkkk" which, as one could imagine, sounded suspiciously like "fuck." this meant that all us sales associates on the floor would walk around with the toy and show all the other non-manager employees.

eventually, leapfrog caught on, and issued a new version:
this sassy purple caterpillar no longer said that naughty word. now when you tried to phonetically make it say "F" and "K" back to back, it said "fffffff, hehehehe, that tickles! ckkkkkkkk." they also changed the sound of the "D" to make "D" and "K" sound more like "duck" and less like "dick."

if i still worked in toys r us, i guarantee there'd be one of these ariel dolls open in the back, and every employee (manager included) would try his or her hand at getting it to call them a slut.

what a good job that was.

but back to the article: what did mattel think of this little blooper?

well, they're not going to recall any of the dolls, since there was only one instance of vulgarity that came spewing out of this underwater princess. plus, as they put it, "sometimes, this type of controversy makes a toy all the more desirable."

looks like my "filth-mouth frank" doll is gonna fit right in with this year's holiday output!

"hey, dickhead! you suck!"
"i think you smell like my asshole!"

those are just some of the phrases youngins can giggle over as they learn a valuable part of any language: vulgarity.

let's move on--to gross sea creatures!

check this guy out:

This undated handout photo provided by the Census of Marine Life shows a Kiwa hirsuta, the Yeti crab, a new species found near Easter Island.
(happynews.com, "http://www.happynews.com/news/12112006/scientists-marvel-sea-life-miles-deep.htm")

happynews.com has a mission statement that no one can really mock: "real news. compelling stories. always positive."

the news is all-too-often negative. many news channels try to instill fear in their readers and/or viewers in order to obtain ratings. much like how a hellfire sermon would be given to ensure strict loyalty from those listening (to prevent eternal damnation), normal news stations hope that viewers (or readers in the case of newspapers) will believe that their company is the only thing that can help them continue to lead a safe, happy life.

so kudos on attempting to turn this around, happynews.com.

although i don't really think a hairy crab is that happy. it's pretty damn gross to me (chris-reed, fire back a rebuttal!). crabs seemed fine without hair on them. now this just opens the door for many more STD jokes.

"hey, john, look what i discovered: it's a kiwa hirsuta--the yeti crab. it's got a layer of fur on it."
"yeah, frank, you would be familiar with discovering crabs covered with hair wouldn't you?? ::snicker::"

that's it for me, gang. i'll catch you wonderful reeds tomorrow. until then, have a slut-riffic tuesday, on me.

(pun?)

(ago) it's an argument, einstein!

it's monday. huzzah, hooray, and stuff.

good afternoon, reeds. it's 12/11, and i'm feeling lazy to the max. but, regardless, i'll try my best at giving you your latest installment of tiny damaged notions!

globeandmail.com recently banged out this news report:
"ugly, but...deep"? that's the same thing they said about english philosopher john locke:
man, look at that sexy outfit, and wig!

but globeandmail.com's article was referring to gross new creatures beneath the antarctic ice.

yum.

you know, researchers have made leaps and bounds this year with discovering new crap that only they care about. for instance, globeandmail.com told of this discovery:

A shrimp believed extinct for 50 million years ago was found on an underwater peak in the Coral Sea near Australia.
(globeandmail.com, "http://www.theglobeandmail.com/servlet/story/RTGAM.20061211.wxmarine1211/BNStory/Science/home")

"a shrimp believed extinct for 50 million years ago." now that's good writing!

the word "ago" is so hard not to use (ago) since it's just so damn cool. so ku(ago)dos to you globeandmail.com, who feel no (ago) need in sticking to conventional norms of the english languag(o)e.

perhaps the most interesting thing about this article, aside from the typo, is the comments left on globeandmail.com about the article.

M PETERSON, the fastest fingers in canada, was the first to rip it apart:

'Scientists discover many new species in the inky water under Antarctica'. There is a big difference between (a) the discovery of a species and (b) the discovery of a new species.
(globeandmail.com, "http://www.theglobeandmail.com/servlet/story/RTGAM.20061211.wxmarine1211/CommentStory/Science/home#comment515268")

he went on to explain both points (a) and (b) in a fashion that reminded me how boring i am when i go on my own english rants.

the next message-board fanatic was brendan caron from vancouver. he wanted to get past all of this hubub and bad mojo being spread around by M PETERSON:

Semantics aside...[sic] Ever since the submersible, ALVIN. in the late seventies we have realized that life goes on far beneath the realms of man's imaginings[...]Even if we don't survive it is nice to know that life goes on and in a few billion years the planet may be inhabited by human-like species. Hope they do better than we are apparently doing. Trust that God dude to do the right thing. Hear tell He don't gamble...[sic] so Einstein claims/says.
(globeandmail.com, "http://www.theglobeandmail.com/servlet/story/RTGAM.20061211.wxmarine1211/CommentStory/Science/home#comment515268")

ok, so that kind of related to the article. that's a start; and i agree, it is nice to know that soon humans will be extinct. why is that? well, because we'll all be in the hands of that bodacious surfer in the sky, "God dude," right brendan? get ready for an eternity of tubular waves, bro!

after that, joe mead from winnipeg wanted to beat M PETERSON at his own game:

Thanks for the English lesson #1. But is it a 'big difference' or just a 'difference' ? What exactly does 'big' mean here? What if it was only a 'little difference'? Or maybe you could also mean a 'tiny difference', in which case this topic is totally irrelevant to the article.
(globeandmail.com, "http://www.theglobeandmail.com/servlet/story/RTGAM.20061211.wxmarine1211/CommentStory/Science/home#comment515268")

oooohh, eat that, PETERSON!

although, while you tried, joe, your only point of evidence seems to be entirely fabricated. you made the argument that M PETERSON used "big" when he should have used "little" or "tiny," and then stated that if he did mean "little" or "tiny" then his comment was invalid. you should have supported your claim by showing how the semantic difference M PETERSON spoke about was actually little (or tiny) when taking in the whole article. this way you wouldn't have jumped straight from your argument to winning--alchemy style--and instead would have possibly showed that guy up.

next time.

comment lover #4 decided to arm himself with facts straight from google, and fired some bullets of truth at "surfin' joe" mead. jean-noël roy from montréal, who was voted most l33t h4x0r in all of montréal, claimed that einstein did not believe in the judeo-christian monotheistic God.

::gasp!::

well, now that a debate was on my hands, i went straight towards the source of all truth to answer this: wikipedia.

In response to the telegrammed question of New York's Rabbi Herbert S. Goldstein in 1929: "Do you believe in God? Stop. Answer paid 50 words." Einstein replied "I believe in Spinoza's God, Who reveals Himself in the lawful harmony of the world, not in a God Who concerns Himself with the fate and the doings of mankind." Note that Einstein replied in only 25 (German) words. Spinoza was a naturalistic pantheist.
(wikipedia.com, "http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Einstein#Religious_views")

well, that's the only answer i need. looks like einstein loves pantheism.

why don't you just go off and read walden, einstein!

now there's a sentence i never thought i would get to use.

have a wonderous monday full of surfin' it up, you gnar-tastic reeds! and go argue on some message boards for me.

(ago)

we want snow! project stormfury, attack!

happy friday, reeds!

here's a couple pre-christmas wishes from yours truly:

snow for new york
a music box with an amazing song
the song "the world spins madly on" by the weepies to be loved by everyone
required calvin & hobbes reading time at work
the song "say yes" by elliott smith to be loved by everyone

(how can it not be?)

the woot-off to have something good, dammit!

now that that's out of the way, we can get on to your daily installment of tiny damaged notions!

so, with the news from brittany- and adam-reed-NH (that's new hampshire, since i know too many adams and that's where he lives) that snow was covering their town of plymouth, i decided to check the weather forecast for my small-town in long island:
notice the lack of snow which is making me quite envious of my friends to the north.

there's a high of 31º today, but then a high of 56º for next wednesday. what the hell is going on here?

there's only one option i can think of: someone is controlling the weather, and having a blast confusing us all with vast temperature changes.

this brings us to today's topic for wiki-licious friday: weather control!

(all excerpts below: "http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Weather_control")

that's right, weather control has a wikipedia page; and even more than that, it makes sure to notify us that,

Marvel Comics heroes Thor and Storm could control weather; the former because he is the Norse god of thunder, the latter because she is a mutant whose powers specifically center around weather control.

and some people still say wikipedia isn't an academic source?

just wait until THOR STRIKES YOU DOWN WITH MJOLNIR!
(that's his hammer)

so, back to weather control. after a brief historical account of american indian rain rituals, and notifying readers that finnish people "were believed by others to be able to control all weather,"
wikipedia goes on to tell us of the first weather controler:

the lightning rod!

wait, that's pretty boring. plus, i heard finnish people laugh at lightning rods for their meek attempt at weather control.

damn those sexy finns.

but wait, check this out:

Project Stormfury was an attempt to weaken tropical cyclones by flying aircraft into storms and seeding the eyewall with silver iodide

project stormfury?! that's amazing!

so pilots flew aircrafts into tropical storms and got to say they were working on project stormfury?

it's gonna be pretty tough to find a cooler job description.

as for the future of weather control, wikipedia even had something to say about that:

There are two factors which make weather control extremely difficult if not fundamentally unattainable. The first is the immense quantity of energy contained in the atmosphere. The second is its turbulence.

i think they forgot the third factor: the immense LAME rays coming from the weather-control committee.

i mean, come on. the atmosphere has more energy than us? i recall a little thing called the arms race which existed between the US and russia. we'll just do what we're good at doing as a country: threaten the atmosphere with atomic weaponry until it listens to us.

and as for turbulence, that's just the atmosphere's version of a hissy-fit. you tell it to stop its chaotic, stochastic property changes and quit being such a baby.

damn, i don't know why i'm not on this weather-control committee--if it even exists. apparently they're saying stuff here about how if we alter our weather, it may eventually make the planet uninhabitable by humans.

::sigh:: this is where mr. hawking's idea comes into play again, everyone. let's learn to control the weather here, use it and abuse it, then move on to planet number two!

i don't know why this is so hard to grasp. star trek got it right:

In the Star Trek universe, most advanced planets and colonies utilise [sic] weather control.

damn brits and their "z" to "s" switch!

or should i say, "zwitch"!

well, that's all i've got for today, reeds. once again we've learned that star trek contains all the hopes and dreams for the future that our current leaders are too chicken to try.

"uninhabitable by humans." psssh. please. just because regaining natural balance takes time doesn't mean we can't speed things up a little. after all, this is the country of fast food!

everyone go out and have a wonderful friday. and, if at all possible, try to whip up some snow for me.

thanks.

woot-offs, prison, this post's got it all!

huh? what? oh, i gotta post?

sorry, reeds. i'm a little discombobulated since there's a woot-off!!

you don't know what a woot-off is?

well, the wonderful site woot.com usually only sells one item a day. that's right, it sells just one item until the stock of that item runs out, or until 1am EST, then another item goes up.

example: woot.com may sell a specific GPS system, and they may have 1,200 GPS systems available to sell. so, once all 1,200 units of the one specific GPS system sell, the item is deemed "sold out!" and anxious woot-a-holics wait until the next "woot" goes up. even if 1am EST rolls around and they never sold all 1,200 units, they'll still put up a new woot.

"ok, so what's a woot-off?"

a woot-off is when woot.com sells all available units of a specific item until the units run out; but once they run out, instead of waiting until 1am EST to put another one up, they put up another item immediately!

so since the prices are often super-cheap, and the next item is a mystery, people like myself and adam-reed sit at the edge of our computer chairs and await the next woot.

plus, you never know how long the woot-off will last. and you don't want to miss a bag of crap!

"what's that?!?"

too much to explain. go here to find out everything there is to know about the glorious bag of crap.

ok, so it's thursday, december 7th, and it's time for your favorite part of the day: the brand new tiny damaged notions!

all this talk of wooting just put me in the mood for the holidays. giving and receiving gifts is the best part of december. way better than the bitter cold.

remember that feeling of happiness you'd get when you imagined what presents your parents may have gotten you? i know i got to stare at them wrapped underneath the christmas tree. i'd examine the shape, determine the possibilities, and want, so badly to open them.

but, call me lame, i always waited until christmas morning. it always made it all the better. "sneaking a peek" was never as desired, since i'd have to wait to receive the gift anyway. i just enjoyed not knowing for certain until i could use it.

of course, my strong willpower is why i applauded the mother in this article:

A 12-year-old boy in Rock Hill, South Carolina, just couldn't wait for Santa to deliver presents this year. According to the local paper, the child unwrapped and opened a present containing a new Game Boy Advance this past weekend--fully three weeks before Christmas. When the young boy's mother found out, she called the police and told them to arrest her son. The boy at first denied all knowledge of the missing portable but later returned it to his mother after she threatened to call authorities. The mother then called the police anyway, and when they arrived at her home, the boy was arrested and taken to the local police station.
(gamespot.com, "http://www.gamespot.com/news/6162775.html")

that's right. a mother had her son arrested for opening a present three weeks before christmas.

and honestly, reeds, who among us can really argue that this was not the best thing to do? fluffius maximus himself gave his own son a life sentence for just looking at a brush. this, in comparison, seems light!

apparently the kid was charged with petty larceny. i guess they can't detain you for "ruining christmas" anymore like they used to be able to. thanks a lot, democrats!

and the mom isn't backing down. she, like fluffius maximus, knows the actions taken were the right choices.

The mother defended her actions, telling the paper she had her son arrested because she was trying to help her son, who she said has a history of behavioral problems, including a previous arrest for disorderly conduct.
(gamespot.com, "http://www.gamespot.com/news/6162775.html")

see? so he needed to be arrested. why bother parenting when the police can take care of that for you?

done deal.

adam-reed, my fellow woot-off watcher, just said this to me:

i hope tdn reflects the misery that the wootoff brings upon the geek population

misery?

i hadn't thought about that, but it's true--there is a dark side to woot-offs. a side that beelzetub himself may have his oily hand in:
now that's a great picture of beelzetub if i ever saw one.

i'm going to let adam-reed explain the dark side of a woot-off:

let's see. first there is the curiosity and wonder of the products put on the page. It's all harmless until a few hours into the woot-off when a "woot-off killer" appears. You check out the forums at this point to see if you can find some entertainment but all you find is people crying about how the product will never sell.

Then begins the frustration and you find yourself hitting f5 like a maniac hoping that the inventory left bar has decreased by a pixel. The frustration soon completely takes over and you start considering buying the useless product just to get past the "woot off killer." Soon after that stage you consider buying 3 because you feel that there is no way in hell they well sell out.

Once the "woot-off killer" is sold out, you rejoice (unless you bought three, then you feel used) and you watch the woots go by and hide yourself from the rest of the world so they don't disrupt your woot-off groove. Soon you will realize it's 6am and you haven't eaten, slept, showered, gotten up to use the bathroom, or done any necessary life sustaining activities; and you think about how the woot-off really hurts and how you can't break away.

Then comes the shocker as you remember that woot-offs often last 48 hours or so. Your will to live starts to diminish, all you want at this point is a Bag of Crap (BoC) and you'd be able to go to sleep.

Once the bag of crap comes is the worst though. Your heartbeat escalates, you feel the pressure and the NEED to get the BoC. You get terribly nervous when you can't get the page to load--and it gets even worse if you ever get to the checkout screen, because you're so close.

After a few hundred server time-outs thrown at you, there is no choice but to either give up or hammer the server even harder. Load up 20 browser windows (or tabs if you're a total OCD freak) and start hammering the server to death but to no avail. Eventually the next product shows up and you feel utterly destroyed.

At this point you start contemplating the relationship you have with Woot and especially the Woot-off. you want to end it because all it does is disappoint you and take your money by selling you things you would normally not even think about buying. About this time you've been up for 30 or so hours and you just want either the woot-off or your life to end (preferably life because you didn't get the BoC). For the last hours of the woot-off you just hate yourself for not being able to get a BoC and this self-loathing will stay with you for weeks.

So if you're going to join in the woot-off, don't kill yourself, and buy 3 of these roombas because they're killing the woot-off and they're amazing!!!!!!!

and there you have it, reeds. the dark side of wooting. it's like drugs: tasty to the user, but deadly to--well, i guess the user still.

i'm off. you be careful with this whole woot-off. woot responsibly, and remember: if you're gonna open your holiday gifts early, cover your tracks.

or else!

have a great thursday everyone. woot!

my dress can hold its weight in trans-fat!

good morning, reeds! today is wednesday, december 6th, and welcome to your 40th installment of tiny damaged notions!

wow, 40 posts. with the amount of time each post takes, that's gotta be well over 3 straight days of me typing these out if you add it up.

who's the bigger loser: me for putting these out, or you for reading them?!?

let's see. 3-5 minutes to read, 2-3 hours to create.

yeah, that'd be me.

so, our straight-laced friends at the independent
recently made a fascinating report.

yesterday, the only true audrey hepburn fan paid an understandable £467,200 ($917,238.70) for the actress' breakfast at tiffany's dress. so all you posers should commence throwing out your DVDs, quiting the fan club, and start being ashamed of yourselves.

you are not true fans.

don't know what the dress looks like? well, you should be even more ashamed of yourself than you previously were--if that's at all possible.
there, that's the dress that's clearly worth nearly 1 million dollars.

and who is the only true fan of audrey hepburn?

the eye-watering sum paid by an anonymous fan at auction [sic] yesterday for the very dress responsible for establishing the "Hepburn look".
(the independent, "http://news.independent.co.uk/uk/this_britain/article2042967.ece")

first things first: "at [an] auction" is missing a word, i know; and the period outside of the quotation marks is only acceptable because the article was written in the UK, where that is the proper way to deal with the two punctuation marks--unlike in the US where commas and periods go inside of quotation marks.

with that out of the way, we can get to the reason why i borrowed that snippet from the independent, the fan is "an anonymous fan."

now, why would the one true audrey hepburn fan--the one willing to pay $917,238.70 for her dress--keep him or herself anonymous? why not shout to the world "LOOK, WORLD! I'VE GOT AUDREY HEPBURN'S DRESS FROM 'BREAKFAST AT TIFFANY'S'! EAT IT!!!"?

maybe the final resting place for this dress will be in the closet of, or in the wardrobe of, a perverted man who needs to constantly smell the dress, wear the dress, and notify himself that he is pretty. maybe he'll even re-enact scenes from the movie. i hope he does my favorite dialogue:

Holly Golightly: Thursday! It can't be! It's too gruesome!
Paul Varjak: What's so gruesome about Thursday?
Holly Golightly: Nothing, except I can never remember when it's coming up.

oh, the delight which builds inside of me every time i hear those lines. it's like an orgasm of whimsy!

and it's especially poignant today, as tomorrow is thursday. so all you fans should send an e-mail to "webmaster[at]audreyhepburn[dot]com" every wednesday morning as a reminder. i've been doing that for years, and even though they've banned my e-mail address from contacting them, i feel better inside knowing i've tried my best to keep breakfast at tiffany's alive in everyone's hearts.

and inbox.

in non audrey hepburn related news (which i call "unimportant news") read this headline from theage.com.au:
now, at first i, like many of you, had no idea what the hell they were talking about.

then i thought: oh no, they can't be planning on getting rid of beelzetub! the lower-east side's most evil oil drum!
pictured here making various evil plans in the sunlight.

but then, i finally read the article, and it's just about how new york city will begin to use a substitute for artificial partially hydrogenated oils--which contain trans fat--starting in july 2007.

yeah, apparently it's the first city in the US to impose a ban on oils containing trans fat. there you go again, NYC, always being the innovator which everyone copies.

so all you new york city residents better pack in all the pizza and restaurant visits now if you want to keep killing yourself with these so-called "evil oils"!

but rest assured, beelzetub will be alright.

ok, reeds, that's all i've got today. you go out and have a terrific wednesday. go on, blow a million dollars on a dress, drink some artificial partially hydrogenated oils straight from the bottle--live it up a little!

i'll be back tomorrow. for now, this is your TDN host saying: goodbye, goodluck, and thursday?! fohgettaboutit!

i met my wife on the satellite

good evening! i'm over adam-reed's house, and from here i give you your daily installment of tiny damaged notions!

keeping our chins up and staring into the heavens, let's talk about that big ol' satellite of ours.

i mean of course, the moon.

check out this news-blurb! (nurb?):

boom! we're going back to the moon!

not only that, but read the fine print (sometimes called "the article"): we're gonna stay there.

you hear that, hawking! NASA loves you.

but you may be asking yourselves "why? why are we building a home on the moon?"

well, jerk, why not? you don't want to be cool and live on the moon? you know how many space-chicks you'll get with some real estate on the moon?

hear that moon-ladies? NASA's best and brightest are coming for ya.

see, this is exactly why we need to double our expenses and danger: just in case there are moon women who need human love.

but heartless experts disagree. read what those dorks have got to say:

Given the price tag, the danger, and the all-out technical hurdles of sending people to the Moon, not to mention building a long-term home on the closest rock to the Earth, some experts have claimed that manned lunar flights are more quixotic than scientifically sound. Instead, they suggest that robots and unmanned flights can do most of what humans can at half the cost (or less).
(yahoo! news, "http://news.yahoo.com/s/nf/20061205/tc_nf/48523")

robots?! now you want to give human jobs to robots??

listen up right wing conservatives: here's your new scapegoat. robots.

these metal bastards are gonna go take our astronaut jobs and rob sexy scientists of their space-ladies.

why, i'm so angry i could, i could--i could end the post right now!

in fact, i think i will. yeah. out of anger, not hunger.

you keep it real, reeds. i'll see you on the flip-side of a sting. go out with your star-net and catch me a stellar babe.

(pun!)

let's go out beyond the moon!

date: december 4, 2006
starting post time: 8:19am
greeting: welcome to a brand new installment of tiny damaged notions

good morning, reeds! it's [date] at the early hour of [starting post time], and [greeting]!

is it just me, or is anyone else just bored of earth? i mean, come on already. everyday it's the same planet filled with violence, pollution, and a degrading environment due to our own neglect.

isn't it time we bring these ol' fashioned human qualities to another planet?

theoretical physicist stephen hawking sure thinks so. in a radio interview with the BBC, hawking stated that abandoning earth is inevitable, since some kind of nuclear war or an asteroid of some sort could make this planet o' ours a not-so-viable place to live.

hmm, makes sense. and colonizing a new planet sounds pretty fun, doesn't it? but forbes.com, or the fat-ass cloud as i like to call it, decided to rain all over mr. hawking's parade:

if humans have any hope of reaching hospitable planets in other solar systems using the rocket technology that took us to the moon, it'll take, oh, around 50,000 years.
(forbes.com, "http://www.forbes.com/2006/12/03/hawking-planets-space-face-cx_po_1201autofacescan01.html")

fine, forbes. if you want to be a pessimistic-pedro, then you can stay on earth. how does that sound? you and the top 100 hottest movie stars, musicians, and athletes can create your own talented and sexy society.
at least with mel gibson still back on earth, you guys won't have to worry about losing any of that irrational bigotry that this planet has become known for.

Fucking Jews...The Jews are responsible for all the wars in the world.

- Mel Gibson, on the night of his DUI arrest

mmmm, classy.

but back to hawking: he's got a plan.

"a plan for what? i forgot what we were talking about."

a plan for leaving earth, remember? he says it's necessary.

"ohhh, right. so, what's his plan?"

well, according to the fat-ass cloud,

Though it's scientifically impossible for anything to travel faster than the speed of light, Hawking believes people could eventually go just under that speed using a process known as called matter-antimatter annihilation
(forbes.com, "http://www.forbes.com/2006/12/03/hawking-planets-space-face-cx_po_1201autofacescan01.html")

"matter-antimatter annihilation"?

sounds like a safe way to travel.

forbes had more to say about this whole space emigration shindig:

Star Trek aficionados will be well aware that ships such as the Enterprise are propelled using antimatter, a process which is still unworkable in reality though has for years been investigated by NASA's Marshall Space Flight Center.
(forbes.com, "http://www.forbes.com/2006/12/03/hawking-planets-space-face-cx_po_1201autofacescan01.html")

way to show your nerd side, forbes.

star trek aficionados will also be well aware that even though mccoy, on stardate 4770.3, spoke of "the things love can drive a man to--the ecstasies, the miseries, the broken rules, the desperate chances, the glorious failures and the glorious victories," love is still a process unworkable in reality for trekkies--though has for years been investigated through conventions and, for lust, pornography.

i kid. i kid, because i too am a dork.

i sit saddened by the fact that looney tunes shorts which appeared in theaters from the 1930s to 1969--the same favorites you may remember from its syndicated television appearances during your childhood--are no longer shown on TV for the most part due to them being deemed "politically incorrect."

i sit anxiously awaiting the new season of futurama.

i sit, with you.

but not if you're watching star trek. that show sucks.

ending post time: 12:47pm
concluding statement: take the safety off your day and fire some fun into the air

that's all for me, reeds. it's [ending post time], and i'm off to get some work done. [concluding statement]!

but how can i, the reader, improve TDN?

hello, reeds, and welcome to "how to get a funnier, higher quality tiny damaged notions post!"

this easy 5-step program will guide you to obtaining higher quality TDN installments.

step 1
the first step is to examine your wallet. you may be a smart individual and have a tri-fold, or a caveman with a bi-fold, or even a lady with a larger, more elegantly designed wallet. there is no discrimination in tiny damaged notions. all wallets are created equal. just take it out, and give it a good stare.

step 2
the value of your wallet lies in the value of what's inside your wallet. look at all the legal US currency you have inside. once you do this, you're ready for the next step.

step 3
this step involves giving me all that money in your wallet. believe me, i'll be happy to receive it. just look how disheveled i look! yes, valuable US currency does help create a higher-quality TDN post. and why, you ask? well, look no further than step 4.

step 4
money = funny, and by quitting my job and living off the money i will be receiving from all of you, i will be able to post detailed, humorous, and worthwhile installments of tiny damaged notions every day! remember what life was like when i had more time to develop these daily tidbits of joy? well, now you can forget that memory and make it a constant event in the present by simply following steps 1 through 3.

but wait, there's more!

step 5
after giving me all your money, your wallet will probably look mighty empty.

well, that's where your income comes in handy! before you know it, you'll be back at step 2 again--with a wallet full of cash; and i will be, of course, patiently awaiting step 3.

see, reeds? that's it! that's the key to success! now, let's make that happen together, shall we?

have a wonderful day, everyone. and remember, with only 5 easy steps this could have been funnier!

(this post made possible by the learn-a-little saturday foundation for getting more money to tiny damaged notions)

i got no PR, i got tomatoes!

good evening, reeds! it's the first of december, and i'm ringing in the new month by disappointing everyone!

i can't keep typing, there is much work waiting for me (and a concert to attend). i'll keep this brief, and then try to add more later, or possibly early in the morning. i mean real early, like 2am.

but, onwards towards more explanations!

so, last night i posted a second installment of TDN--this time while drunk.

in this post, there were certain usual characteristics of my inebriated behavior:

1. i both entered and exited topics without any concern for segues or conclusions.

2. i cursed a bit while i was joking around--most notably saying:

we're all adults so i can say "titty fuck poopy shit fuck face"

3. i posted a cute picture of a bunny.

if i had a PR rep, i'm sure he or she would notify me that what i had just done was a bad move.

however, i don't have one (hooray!), so i am not shackled by the confines of maintaining a public image--or paying a representative to do so for me.

eat it, tom cruise!

i know, i know. it's wiki-licious friday, and i know, it's part II of la tomatina. but i don't have time!

what can i do? think, quick. ummm.

wait, i forgot that part II is short!

yeah. that's it.

how do those crazy tomato fighters get clean? well, i'm glad you asked!

The cleaning process involves the use of fire trucks to spray down the streets, with water provided from a Roman aqueduct. People find water to wash themselves, most likely at the Buñol River.
(wikipedia.com, "http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tomatina")

see? informative!

wait, why don't they know where people wash themselves? this festival goes on every year. not one person who wrote the article on la tomatina for wikipedia has ever been to the festival?

or is it that by "most likely" they were implying that choosing the river is the best of plans, and that each person will most likely take a dip after they mull over the list of where they can clean themselves off.

"let's see, i could shower. but then there's the dog--he's probably hungry. but i'm covered with tomato, it's even down my pants. he'd have to lick my--hey, wait! the river!"

for now, that's all i can offer. check every minute, reeds! i may update when you least expect it ::wink, wink::

have a fantastic friday full of fabulous fun.

i'm dedicated & drunk. what a duo!

record-reed says:

Your commitment to TDN is waning. Unacceptable. You're musings are the only thing making my otherwise dreary life worth living.

Do you want to kill me, Mike?! Is that it!? FINE!!

::Dies::

I hope you're happy. I'm too dead to feel anything right now. Bastard.

oh, so my commitment is waning eh? well how's about this:

i've got 4 drinks coursing through my veins, and i haven't had enough food to make me feel any less than drunk, and i'm still posting.

eat it, record!

but no, he brings up a good point; it has seemed like my commitment is waning.

but it isn't, i assure you, reeds. it's just that my schedule lately hasn't allowed me large posts every day.

do i sound eloquent? i sure hope so. i feel like i've written enough essays that my brain can think as if i were writing one, even though my inhibitions have been lessened due to alcohol. that usually means eloquence gets thrown to the curb, but alas! i have that with as much vigor as i have my chastity and my ability to desire sleep!

so this post is wacky!

kristen-reed writes (via-IM):

i fucking hate them

i respond

you hate no one but bad vibes and anchovies

as i wait for her response, i'll talk.

so, danny devito was drunk on the view. he's probably drunk right now, if he's anything like me. but barbara walters didn't like that.

WHORE! why don't you embrace the fact that danny devs hangs out with the sexiest man alive (george clooney)?? i'd let danny devito be totally wasted on heroin on my show if he were shooting up with a hottie. so shut your mouth!

she apparently has though. she replied:

Despite DeVito's booze-fueled antics, Walters said she would not hesitate to have him back on the show.

kind of like how kristen-reed responded to my inebriated-inquires with

you haven't asked me anything lol. you are crazy when you drink and you are not SLEEPING!

i'll show you sleeping!

i'll show you so many Zzz's that i'll be shitting them out for a week!

that's a lot of profanity. if you don't like it, well, too bad. we're all adults so i can say "titty fuck poopy shit fuck face" and you can't do a thing about it.

way to go, adult-person. you made me curse on the blog that i haven't yet cursed on.

"wait, you cursed out TRU yesterday!"

oh yeah. since it's nothing new, i may as well keep it in. like how i'll keep my desire to sleep inside of me instead of allowing myself more than six hours before i go to work. i don't really mind work anyway, though; so i can't complain.

damn my very nice boss & co-workers for not making me mind going to work. damn them!

alright, i'm off, reeds. just know that i'm committed to this blog. as much as i can post, i will.

look how cute this guy is:

have a good night, everyone. i'm off to bedsville, pop: me.

only time for danny

why, hello there! it's thursday, november 30th, and welcome to the last tiny damaged notions post of november!

i wish i had something special for you guys, but instead i only have this notice:

i don't have much time!

so this is the post.

danny devito was drunk on the view. here's a link to check it out.

have a great thursday, reeds! i'm off.

fluffius maximus discusses his borst job ever!

lookout, it's an over-fluffed bunny!
from now on he will be known as fluffius maximus, and he will be a mascot for tiny damaged notions.

notice how i used the indefinite article "a" rather than the definite article "the"? that means there's room for more! suggest other mascots & names for said mascots. if i likes em, i'll keeps em.

but, enough of that. it's wednesday, november 29th. take out those landing wheels because you're about to smooth your way into tiny damaged notions country!

naqi-reed has posted a comment that is interesting if true, and creative if false; but either way worth reading:

wal-mart hiring policy has always been uber-progressive. e.g. you will find yourself wandering in the back by "layaway", thinking about all the things you can lay-away, and before you know it, you will have stumbled into a training session, and then they think that you are supposed to be there, they give you your own cash register, and then they start paying you until you quit two weeks later. it was probably the best-worst [or borst] first job of my life that i didn't even want.

that does sound like a good example of a borst first job. my first job involved getting paid minimum wage to pack cosmetics into cases on an assembly line with a bunch of elderly women who would yell "BREAAAAAK!" at the top of their lungs whenever it was within 10 minutes of a designated break time.

the borst breakdown would be such:
worst: read that job description.
best: i listened to my milo goes to college tape on the way to and from work everyday.

my second job, which may be defined as the borst job i've held (since it mostly contains "worst") was at this place:
do you notice the way that glowing red underline extends past the building? i asked the assistant manager of my toys r us (TRU) location, and this is a summary of our conversation:

me: why does the red underline go further out past the storefront décor?
manager: to give it a 3D effect!
me: but it's a building.
manager: yeah.
me: it's already in 3D. it's a real life object.
manager: it's there to give it a 3D effect.

put that on repeat for about 2 minutes with increased frustration from myself (and take out a bit of the eloquence i've retrospectively given my speech), and you've got yourself a typical way i interacted with TRU ideology:

not well.

i spent my life from 2001-2002 and 2003-2005 employed by this big ol' toy store where the fun never stops (because you have to start in order to stop).

here's a blogger's response who experienced what life was like in the London TRU:

Although I find Toys R Us to be slightly cheaper for some toys than other toy stores, I find their customer service appalling. They will not let you return purchases without a receipt, and they stand by this.
(Groovee, "http://www.ciao.co.uk/Toys_R_Us_Shop__Review_5366080")

not my old store, groovee. we had a "policy" about receipts as you state, but if you bitched your little head off, you can get anything you want! that's the dirty little secret of any retail store: we all want you to shut the hell up and get out of our damn face! because i don't believe there was a single employee in that store who had a degree in psychoanalysis or grief counseling, therefore i don't think anyone particularly cared that you didn't get your way.

i know i wasn't getting my way. i was staying past midnight to clean your mess. so step aboard the disappointment train.

here's a quick rule: if you're nice, a store's employee will be nice back unless they are a prick. some people are, you can't help it. but it pays just to be nice since 99% of the people will be kind back.

if you're an asshole, well, expect snappy treatment back, because you're demanding stuff from people who have to clean up your mess all day. it's not my fault that you don't have a receipt, but it has become my fault that you told little timmy to "just leave [that toy he picked up from another area of the store] there!" and proceeded to throw it down in the wrong area.

thanks! i honestly couldn't wait to stay here until tomorrow cleaning your garbage.

here's more from groovee's experience:

Their staff.....[sic] all vary. Some seem to be very young and don't have any knowledge to help you. Some just seem completely thick and others are fantastic. I once asked for a certain toy which I knew my friend had bought there. I of course asked the thickest member of staff around who walked me round the store laughing, didn't make any attempt to find it and then left me there. He wasn't laughing when I demanded to speak to the manager and made a complaint.

that last line there sends me back. oh, how it sends me back.

i honestly laughed MORE when people asked to see a manager, since then it was out of my hands. so i didn't have to deal with complaining.

now, it seems like you, groovee, found yourself one of those "prick" type employees i mentioned earlier. if you were shopping during the season, chances are they were inexperienced and didn't honestly care. although this person may also be insane, since you say they were cackling to themselves while walking around the store.

if they are insane, that's tragic. however, if they're faking it, that's brilliant. i would often walk around my store staring at my hand, repeatedly saying (out loud) "45, 54, 63, 72, 81" and open my eyes as wide as i could only to never blink.

why did i do this? who the hell would want to ask that guy for help? most people didn't, because they thought i was weird or crazy. and i could care less what they think of me. the important part is that i didn't have to help.

"well, why is helping me so damn hard?!? that's your job!"

true, but anyone enveloped by an overwhelmingly stressful situation begins to perform certain actions which help reduce the stress of said situation. the only governor that counts once starred in a movie about the stress of a toy store during the holiday season:
the fact that a major motion picture was made on this topic means that this situation is one that ordinary citizens of the united states are expected to know and/or understand: gifts for children can be difficult to acquire during december due to the high demand for specific items and the high volume of customers in a store who want the item.

employees are the ones that most people looking for specific items to purchase go towards in order to maximize the efficiency of their personal shopping experience.

"do you have anymore 'shake me, dance me, elmo's in stock?"

what many shoppers tend not to realize, even though they know the demand is high, is that this particular item may already be sold out, and also that any or all employees working in that toy store may have already been asked this question several hundred times during the day.

"no, sorry, sir. we sold out of the elmos at around 11am this morning."

frustrated, many shoppers tend to vent towards the employee. sometimes specific personality types tend to express their frustration by talking down to the store, and using the employee as a catch-all representation of the store.

"how could you be out of it?? it's only two in the afternoon! can you check the back-room?"

while this conversation is taking place, most customers also neglect to see the many other customers already gathered around this helpless employee who already knows there is nothing in the back-room, but can read in your eyes that you want him to check regardless, because someone may have accidentally eaten a box in the morning and has now defecated the undigested and still-in-tact elmos in the back. and those people gathering around the employee like vultures towards the deceased have similar questions for the employee:

"when you're done with him, can you get something for me that's stocked above the top shelf?"

"excuse me, do you have any more micro-machines, or is it just what's out there?"

"i can't find the 'my little pony' section. can you walk me there?"

no matter who you are, your honest desire to help people becomes crushed under the non-stop barrage of questions. you feel pressured and stressed. you tell everyone you'll be with them in a minute, and you frantically run towards the back-room to get a free minute to think, to figure out whom to help next and how to help them, to imagine how glorious sleep will be when you get home at 3:30am, and to possibly listen to a back-room worker complain while you complain right back.

on your way to the back, you will probably get stopped by many other people who have many similar questions; and since these people don't fully know how many people you promised to help at the current moment, they, stressed from being in the store as well, will demand satisfaction.

so what can you do?

whip out that hand, and recite some numbers divisible by nine while never blinking.

worked almost every time.

and that's your daily tiny damaged notions! topped with a whole lot of sarcasm-fudge and insight-sprinkles.

don't forget to post mascots! (chris-reed, i know you're on it)

who's your mentor, and does she wear underwear?

hot diggity-damn, it's tuesday! it's november 28th! and, as one would rightfully assume, it's a new tiny damaged notions!

first order of business: i would like to address an issue that chontel-reed spoke about here, and gabby-reed brought to my attention in a non-linkable area: they say that TDN is not the fourth thing up on google!

well, they're right (gasp!), but only if you don't put quotation marks. i neglected to mention that i had put these little punctuation rascals around "tiny damaged notions" because i forgot that people search the web doing otherwise. rather than get into a debate about the advantages of this search style, i'll just label this folly as my mistake. so, in the future, if you've ever forgotten the link, be sure to add these guys: " "

i digress. onwards towards topical topic number two!

now that commercialization has forced the holiday season upon us already, it's time we all started thinking about what we want as gifts for the upcoming holidays we may celebrate.

at my age, practical things like socks and underwear isn't frowned upon, but rather appreciated. when i was a kid, i hated getting any form of clothing--i wanted toys. eventually, most of us mature and start buying our own toys, often looking towards a loved one, or mom and dad, for those practical things to stock up on.

some of us, however, always rebel against acquiring these items. an example is the recently divorced britney spears, who is protesting the whole "underwear idea" in a subtle, yet powerful way:

On Nov. 22, cameras caught Spears, the recently separated pop star and mother of two, in a leopard-print minidress so short it revealed her underwear. Two days later, Spears was photographed getting out of a car in a hiked-up miniskirt. This time, her underwear was nowhere to be found.
(abc news, "http://abcnews.go.com/Entertainment/story?id=2681885&page=1")

notice that it was on black friday--the commercial start of christmas--that spears decided to ditch the underwear.

she's got a classy way of protesting.

but for all the applause which she deserves for taking a stand slowly and without underwear, i for one just can't picture spears as a ringleader. who's chief of this operation?

[paris hilton's representative, elliott] Mintz says that the 24-year-old Spears "looks up to" the 25-year-old Paris and that she's "extremely grateful" that Paris has taken her under her wing.
(tmz.com, "http://www.tmz.com/2006/11/27/britney-paris-is-my-role-model/")

aha! i should have known!

the ringleader of this underwearless, flashing, cleavage-exposing, no-bra-wearing, lack-of-moral brigade is none other than time magazine's "smartest person to ever exist and which will ever exist," paris hilton!

now, normally this blog contains pictures. to keep TDN relatively clean though, i refrained from posting any. you guys can either search google (i almost used it as a verb!) yourselves, or use your imagination--but i'm not lying: they're really friends.

and what better person to be your role model? i don't see mahatma gandhi being given a key to las vegas, and a day named in his honor (what?)

and did anyone ever stop to think that maybe this dynamic duo of debauchery is just what america needs right now? i mean, for years lonely boys across this country have searched the internet for "britney spears naked" (both with and without quotations marks) and been given a fat slice of disappointment-pie with only badly photoshopped images. now that britney's on the paris hilton fast & easy (pun) track to success, you can get all the perverse images you want of her exiting a car with her genitalia as overexposed as her musical career.

so let's hear it for america's new elegant sweethearts!
(who ever said that leopard print is tacky?)

in another quick celeb blurb, guess what i found out thanks to thebosh.com?
jake gyllenhaal? DAMMIT! you reeds were supposed to use your powers of persuasion to show reese how awesome it would be to be with me!

i'll forgive you if you simply land me in the leading role of their new picture rendition. maybe then i can show her how chic and sexy i am.

alright reeds, get to making that happen. i'm off to do a bunch of crazy stuff like eat and shop for a tie (living it up!). have a fantastic tuesday night, everyone! and remember that when exiting TDN, underwear is optional.

wal-mart's such a ham!

wow, where have i been?

good morning, reeds! it's monday, november 27th, and welcome to your long overdue installment of tiny damaged notions!

so, let me explain a bit:

i love this blog. it's a lot of fun for me to do, and i appreciate all the love it gets from everyone. sometimes, however, i'll have a busy day, or a couple packed-out days in a row, and then my posting becomes, well, irregular. as you've seen, sometimes i post late, or don't post much (or, in the case of this weekend, at all).

the reason is that this little blog takes a good long while to prepare. i know its sexy ultra-readable format would probably make it seem as though these babies flow directly out of me stream-of-consciousness style, but they, in fact, take a good 2-3 hours each. maybe that's just me being edit-happy, or over-enthusiastic about the finished product, but either way it's usually a process i love being a part of.

friday's post was short, and it was supposed to be a part I. i'll save part II for this friday since i never ended up posting this weekend. i've been debating weekend posts. they may become occasional, or perhaps not exist at all. this weekend, i can say, that i probably won't be able to post. it seems most of you reeds enjoy this during the week (although a few had asked me where the posts were yesterday), so i don't think this should be that much of a loss. although, i know TDN makes up a good portion of your life, so any loss is a substantial one!

ok? well, i'm glad that's all settled. now without further ado: let's talk about crap!

so, i know most of you were probably so distraught from the lack of tiny damaged notions in your life, that you probably didn't even notice it was ::drumroll:: ::cue evil sounding orchestral hits:: the busiest shopping weekend of the year!!!

i've got news from the source with the biggest peacock:

Millions of Americans hit the shops over the weekend, spending more than last year, as the Christmas rush kicked off after Thanksgiving, but a fall in sales at Wal-Mart raised concerns about the strength of retail.
(msnbc, "http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/15918962/")

hmmmm. so americans spent more money shopping this year, but since wal-mart didn't have strong sales, that means we should question retail?

yes! of course it means we should question retail! wal-mart's november sales were down by 0.1% on the same month last year!

wow, 0.1% down. that's like winning $100 but losing a dime. i know i'd be pissed.

did someone say "ham"?

no, no one sa...

well, honeybakedfoods inc. is recalling a lot of potentially tainted ham.

"tainted with what?"

listeria: which can cause nausea, headaches, diarrhea, and fever. not to be confused with its vocab-cousin "hysteria," which can cause dance fever, and a diarrhea of good times.

honeybakedfoods inc. wants you gumshoes to be on the lookout for the following codes:

Ham codes - 6261 to 6310 (including all numbers in between)
Glazed Turkey Breast codes - 6248 to 6258 (including all numbers in between)

deli-meat has codes?

anyways, getting back to wal-mart, the american family association (AFA) had decided to boycott wal-mart due to the company's "aggressively pro-homosexual agenda."

aggressively pro-homosexual agenda? that would explain their odd application:
riight. i was wondering what that was all about when i applied to be one of their drones.

apparently, the AFA not only holds the loving opinion that homosexuality is evil, but they claim that the 0.1% drop in sales was their doing:

Could this be a result of the threatened boycott of Wal-Mart and Sam’s Club (which is owned by Wal-Mart) stores by hundreds of thousands of Christians mobilized by the American Family Association...Apparently so. After the boycott announcement went out, even before the date of the planned boycott, sales dropped enough for Wal-Mart to reverse its Pro-Homosexual position...In response, the AFA withdrew its request for a boycott.
(webcommentary.com, "http://www.webcommentary.com/asp/ShowArticle.asp?id=barrettt&date=061127")

"reverse its pro-homosexual position."

why, that sounds dirty, AFA.

what they were referring to that stopped their massive organization from causing wal-mart to lose more dimes was an official statement wal-mart made in regards to their aggressive pro-gay agenda:

Wal-Mart will not make corporate contributions to support or oppose highly controversial issues unless they directly relate to our ability to serve our customers.
(walmartfacts.com, "http://www.walmartfacts.com/articles/4617.aspx")

this means that wal-mart won't sell anything pro-gay (unless there is a large percentage of homosexual shoppers in a specific area where the AFA doesn't dare to go).

wal-mart also went on to say that they don't have a stance on gay marriage, but they value diversity amongst their employees, and are against discrimination everywhere.

way to cover all your bases, wal-mart. you're like a victorian woman--insomuch as we're barely able to tell what you look like beneath your thick, protective layers of corporate bullshit.

good luck with that 0.1% loss. try not to mortgage park-place yet. i think "go" is right around the corner.

well, i'm spent. all you reeds have a wonderful monday! go out and bust some gates, black friday style: