Excuses: The Game

So, it´s been a while since I put anything worthwhile  here. I know. Sorry. As is the ancient custom of ass-for-brains bloggers who never remember to post anything, I will now provide you with a suitable set of excuses as to why I´ve been holdin´ out on that sweet, sweet halfassed comedy you can get absolutely nowhere else on the Internet wheresoever.

But know, dear readers, that you have been on my mind. All four of you. Sometimes not a month goes by without my vaguely remembering your existence, at least on a theoretical level. Therefore, I want to give you something more than just those same old boring “look, I´ve been real busy” explanations. That shit is just the blogger whining for attention until someone rubs his belly in the comments section.

So, to make this real interesting, I suggest we do this as a game. Yeah! I know! Fuckin´A!

Let´s do this! Here are the rules:

Rule One: You will not talk about Fight Club  Um. No, that´s not what we´re doing here.

Rule Two: You will not talk about Fight Club What? No! Let´s start over.

Rule One: You will not talk about Fi  Er. This is rather embarassing. See, I saw that movie a while ago and now I can´t seem to write anything about rules without it turning into a Fight Club joke. It´s a condition I have.

Okay, I´ll give it one more try:

Rule One: You

GOD DAMMIT

Look, just guess which excuses are correct, ok? The one who gets the most points is the winner.

Here goes!

Excuse 1: Day job was hectic for quite some time there.

Excuse 2: I had a whole month´s vacation – first one since I was a kid!

Excuse 3: I moved to another city.

Excuse 4: Hardware problems.

Excuse 5: I joined a cult.

Excuse 6: A dog ate my Internet.

Excuse 7: An Internet ate my dog.

Excuse 8: Ha! I don´t even have a dog and am in fact making all this up because I´m too lazy to come up with a proper explanation.

Excuse 9: Shit, I just revealed my cunning plan there. That was probably a bad move.

Excuse 10: I joined a kickass writers´ collective that consists of some of the best freelance talent of a certain major website I´ve been writing for.

Excuse 11: I´ve just been busy preparing and researching a bunch of articles and pitches that are nearing their completion. From now on I´m going to update this blog at least once a week, as a rule.

…rule? Wait, shit! I didn´t mean to –

Rule 1: You will not talk about Fight Cl

You will not talk about F

You will not talk

You will not 

GOD DAMMIT

(Correct answers will be posted tomorrow!)

OK, now you´re just rubbing it in

Take a look at the Cracked.com front page. Go ahead, I´ll wait.

Yeah. It´s me again.

I don´t know what is going on, but judging by the existing evidence I must have been extra nice in a previous life, or last Christmas, or last Christmas in a previous life.
Seriously, I must´ve been like Gandhi. Granted, Gandhi probably wasn´t all that keen on Christmas, but…

…alright, running out of metaphors here. Just read the article, willya?

http://www.cracked.com/article_19117_7-horrible-ways-universe-can-destroy-us-without-warning.html

Cracked stuff, part treux

“Wait, what?” you ask? ”Even more articles?”

Why, yes! Please enjoy my Friday Special. It´s about how mankind should save nature, and also about making bacteria poop.

But mostly about making bacteria poop.

http://www.cracked.com/article_19133_6-ways-nature-cleans-up-our-messes-better-than-we-do.html

Cracked stuff, part deux

This one came up yesterday. It´s the third  and by far most traumatizing entry in what I insist on calling my “Beauty Trilogy”.

http://www.cracked.com/article_19110_6-beauty-products-that-qualify-as-torture.html

Cracked stuff, part one

See? This is what I´ve been up to.

Here´s my third article for Cracked.com, regarding attack helicopters and dog sunglasses, among other things:

http://www.cracked.com/article_19088_6-brilliant-inventions-that-look-like-gag-gifts.html

Pet products that should be outlawed as animal abuse

It seems that nowadays there´s four animal rights activists for every actual animal. Yet no one seems to mind that crap like this is around.

POOP-FREEZE

Technically this is a very practical idea for removing the unpleasant squish factor from shit picking. Still, we must question the idea of giving a grumpy pet owner that is tasked with picking said poop – and may very well be used to occasionally discipline the pet with some water from a spray bottle – a spray bottle of goddamn freezing agent. Your Labrador is just one sleepy morning walk and some misguided muscle memory away from a chance to perfect its T-1000 imitation. (albeit the product “only” freezes till -62F).
Also, for it to work on the turd, you need to spray it all over. You need to manually flip the poop.

http://www.poopfreeze.com/product1.htm

PAWLISH

Nail polish for dogs and cats. Both of which have an acute sense of smell and a natural aversion for people touching their nails.
From an user´s point of view: have you ever tried to give a cat a bath? If so, you´re an idiot, but one with some insight as to how cats behave when subjected to shit they´re not cool with. Putting nail polish on a cat is like spreading lube on a samurai´s katana while giving him the finger.

http://www.ipetscene.com/petfinds/index.php/opi-nail-polish-for-dogs-and-cats/

REAR GEAR

It´s an anus cover that´s tied around the tail.
You can choose from nine different models – or send them a picture for your own custom poop chute cover. Hell, be really meta and send them a picture of a dog´s butt.

http://www.reargearstore.com/

SECURE OUTDOOR CAT RUNS


Does your cat enjoy freedom? Fuck that noise!
Orange cat jumpsuit with Guantanamo insignia sold separately.

http://www.treasures4home.com/cart/index.php?main_page=product_info&cPath=66&products_id=9598


http://www.catsplay.com/kittywalk_lawn.php3

HAIR DYES




What could go wrong? Apart from dogs and cats having very sensitive skin, their fur working very differently from human hair and cats washing themselves with their tongues.

http://www.baxterboo.com/dog/supplies.cfm/top-performance-dog-hair-dye-gels


http://hubpages.com/hub/Why-Dye-Your-Dogs-Fur


http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-1284646/Meet-Tiger-Dog-Chinese-owners-dye-pets-look-like-wild-animals.html

 

VIBRATING MASSAGE GLOVES

Soothe your pet with a battery operated, vibrating massage! Because every battery operating vibrating thing we´ve ever seen is completely silent and not at all a scary hell-machine to all animals.
Also, the product seems somehow familiar to us…

Ah. That´s it. Glad that it wasn´t something that would make things weird.

http://www.bookofjoe.com/2008/10/vibrating-pet-m.html

SCOOP NO MORE

A DVD that promises to toilet train your kitten. No word on how it will deal with the human ass sized seat. Or, for that matter, flush.

http://www.kittystoreonline.com/cattoilettrainingdvd

THE FROLICAT


Hey, know those laser pointers that dogs and cats go absolutely nuts about and are unable to leave alone? Well, now they can chase them forever and ever and ever and ever.

http://www.frolicat.com/

CLOTHES






“No, it´s for Fluffy. Really. Not for our own amusement at all.”

THE PET STROLLER


“Wanna go for a walk, Dave?”
“Yeah, sure. But what about Buster? I´m not comfortable leaving him alone, but everybody knows dogs hate walks.”
“Don´t worry about that. I´ve got just the thing.”

http://bestpetstrollers.info/

Fun “justifications” for product:
http://www.squidoo.com/dog-pet-strollers

8 real restaurants that must be secretly operated by supervillains

 
1. HELL PIZZA

What we have here is a New Zealand based pizza parlor with a Hell theme. Nothing new there,  must be thousands of bars and restaurants out there flirting with devil imagery. Hell Pizza, however, takes its game a lot further than the rest.
A fun running gag for the company is deadly sin themed pizzas, such as Lust Pizza:

Yes, that is a pizza/Durex collaboration.
Pizzas also come in fun, themed shapes:

And what would be better as a properly themed tie-in product with your Lust Pizza than…

Of course, one must also think of the packaging:

And who would be the perfect spokesperson for a good devil themed pizza joint?

Yeah, I guess that makes sense. Wait, no it doesn´t.
In case you´re still doubting Hell Pizza´s credentials, an amusing little true story:

In 2008, a man called Walter Scott offered to sell his soul to the company, which of course promptly bought it. It was worth $5001.
 

 

Who´s probably behind it:

 

2. NINJA NEW YORK

 

A Ninja themed restaurant in, no shit, New York. The customers are served by sword and nunchaku wielding assassins that also provide entertainment with shuriken tricks and suchlike.

It´s probably better not to complain about the food. 

  

Who´s probably behind it:

  

No turtle soup on the menu, but boy is he trying.

 

3. RISING SUN ANGER RELEASE BAR

 

A bar in Japan where customers may vent stress caused by shopping sprees and 90-hour work weeks. How? By breaking stuff and attacking the staff, that´s how.

The staff, it should be mentioned, looks like this:

 

 

Who´s probably behind it:

 
 

If you really want to screw with them, book a table as Robert Paulson.

 

4. DICK´S LAST RESORT RESTAURANT
 

Possibly the world´s only restaurant chain with a (deliberate) “fucking with the customer” theme. Patrons of Dick’s are routinely insulted and placed in uncomfortable gag situations such as being forced to wear a paper hat with insults scribbled on it by the waiters:
 

The restaurant has honed its one-upping  skills to the point of the rudeness possibly not happening at all if they see that you are expecting it.

  

Who´s probably behind it:

 
 

  

5. HEART ATTACK GRILL

 

A super greasy fast food joint in Arizona that is up front about its products: in fact they straight up tell you  their products are going to kill you. Any minute now.  Uses sexism and health complaints as part of its  marketing strategy, offers free burgers for the morbidly obese.

 

Who´s probably behind it:

 

 

6. PRINCESS HEART

 

A café/restaurant in Tokyo, where staff are servants and customers are pretty, pretty princesses in a fairy forest, sitting on cute little thrones, sipping champagne and eating whatever the hell it is princesses eat. A major flytrap for young women embracing their inner royalty.

  

Who´s probably behind it:

 

Let´s see… who has the motivation to pamper people as princesses? It´s almost as if someone was trying to lure in actual princesses...

Ah.

 

 

7. HITLER´S CROSS 

A Bombay restaurant that set up a predictable shitstorm with a Hitler theme. Apparently the logic behind this one was that everyone knows Hitler so he´ll make a great mascot!

It´s still there, though under a different name – the owners noticed their initial décor wrought havoc on the sales and begrudgingly shoved all their precious nazi memorabilia in a closet for the time people will be ready for their grand vision.

  

Who´s probably behind it:

 

  

8. CALICO CAT CAFE

It´s a café. Where you eat and drink. While petting cats. Because Japan.

 You want fries with that?

 

Who´s probably behind it:

 

The Dymaxion – the car that every male adult industry star should drive

You know what they say about those smug dudes with Maseratis and overcompensation, right?

(Hint: Small penis. It´s small penis. They have that.)

Now, you may also know this does not work the other way. I found this out the hard way recently, when my car dealer advised me to replace my BMW with an ´89 Nissan so passers-by of the female persuasion would be quicker to, in his words, “take notice of the supremeness of my dong”.

Probably should have noticed that the guy giving me the speech drove a Ferrari himself.

But for the sake of a blog entry, let´s imagine the car dealer actually took the measuring tape out every time a guy would walk into the store and all the Hummers and the cool sports cars would really go to the worst-endowed. What would Ron Jeremy and his homies drive away with?

The Dymaxion car, that´s what.

Looking like something Batman will be forced to trade the Batmobile in for when he settles down and starts a family, the Dymaxion car is one of the many brainchilds of one R. Buckminster Fuller.
Fuller was a renaissance man extraordinaire with his many achievements in literature, architecture, engineering and perhaps his greatest passion, futurism.
A prime example of his obsession with the future, his 1933 Dymaxion car was a three-wheeled van modeled after zeppelins. In fact it was more than that – It actually started off as a blimp itself.

Which didn´t affect the design at all.

So, what´s wrong with it?

Fuller was famous for a great many things, one of which was his tendency to hit several miles off the target every now and then. Such was the case with the Dymaxion. A novel concept, it was originally conceived as a blimp/car hybrid, the blimp part of which was quickly dropped after someone carefully explained Fuller that even in the Thirties this would be the most pathetic possible method of making a flying car. Condemned to remain flightless, Dymaxion was however modeled after aircrafts in order to increase its aerodynamic efficiency. This gave it its distinctive look of a rotorless helicopter slash confused bug.

Confused, yet strangely dazed.

Another fun fact of the Dymaxion: it utilized rear wheel steering in favor of the more conventional front-wheel kind. While giving the car an ability to do a U-turn in its own length, this was quickly found to play merry hell with the driver´s natural reactions and make the driving experience rather like having your common sense pelted with monkey asses.
Despite all evidence to the contrary, Fuller had faith in his product and arranged a demonstration for the public at the 1933 Chicago World Fair. The car – possibly disgruntled by the fact that it had been forever denied the skies – promptly responded to his trust… by killing its driver.

Wait, what?

The Dymaxion, in its first ever showing to the public, keeled over the first chance it got, crushing the driver and hospitalizing the two passengers with some serious injuries.

A situation easily avoided with the right choice of driver.

Turns out  the careful aerodynamical analysis was all in vain: the car not only handled like shit, it had some real balance issues, especially in certain wind conditions. These problems, to the surprise of absolutely no one but its designer, were brought by the very visible fact that Dymaxion car was shaped like a goddamn football and had only three goddamn wheels. While the rest of the world silently swept the thing under the rug and went on with their lives, the designer himself claimed that the accident at the world fair had been caused by another vehicle harassing the Dymaxion. This did not help him, as the vehicle´s reputation never fully recovered from this initial setback and it never saw the assembly line.

So where can Ron Jeremy get one?

There´s only one surviving prototype, which is neither running nor for sale, so unless Ron has a knack for grand larceny AND antique mechanics, he can´t. Really old VW Transporters have some similar elements, so that´s probably your next best bet.

As an added bonus they may also be infested with hippies.

However…

Perhaps the most frightening aspect of the Dymaxion car is the fact that Dymaxion was never a name of the car.

It was a name for the brand.

That´s right, Fuller dreamt up a whole range of Dymaxion …things, which the designer maintained would somehow improve the general quality of peoples´ lives. The product range included things like a world map, presented for some reason in the form of a d20 die.

Oh yeah, and a house.

Oh shit run

An actual Dymaxion house.

For people to live in.

We can´t imagine how a house made by the designer of the Dymaxion car could ever help anyone in anything. Except maybe by performing euthanasias. To, perhaps, overly hung assholes.
Just saying.

Begin your journey amongst the horrors that came from R.Buckminster Fuller´s mind here.

An open love letter to my piece of crap Samsung S5600

Dearest Samsung S5600,

I´ve been meaning to tell you all these things, but there never seems to be a right moment. And I don´t want to blurt it all out at an inappropriate time and make the situation all emotionally awkward and shit. So I decided to write you instead.

(Fuck, did I just use a swearword? Right there in the first fucking sentence. Shouldn´t swear in love letters. Stupid. But this is a pen I´m writing with and this here is pretty goddamn expensive paper, and my last sheet of it too. So I really can´t make it go away. I´m sorry about that, I´m so fucking sor
…Oh, FUCK.
Nevermind. Let´s just pretend these last five lines didn´t happen, ok? Oh, and try to forget that S-word up there too if that´s cool with you.)

Um. So. I´ve been giving a lot of thought to our relationship lately. And I must say you´ve definitely earned your place as my primary communicational device. This may not seem like such a huge deal to you, seeing as my other major means of communication include flatulence, growling, violent dick punches and Facebook. But I need you to understand this: it means much to me. Very, very much.

Pictured: communication

See, you´re different from my previous phones. I know you´re a brand new model and yeah – I was shy at first but now I can admit it – you ARE my first touchscreen. But that´s not it, not really. It´s more of a manufacturer thing. You see, I´ve been a pretty consistent Nokia man almost all my adult life. I really don´t know why I took a leap in the dark by choosing you as my new phone.

Maybe it´s because I used to have this older Samsung clamshell phone when I was young. It was a short relationship, thanks to a terrible accident involving a large chilli dinner, a toilet bowl and tragically loose trouser pockets. But it left me with some good memories. Maybe those memories sparked my interest in you.

Sorry, did I just ruin this for you forever?

They say first impressions are important, and in your case they certainly were. Before you came along, I always had these chunky Nokias. They worked reliably enough, but if you tried to keep them in your front pocket you always ended up looking like you had a boner painted by Picasso. Looks-wise, your sleek, black design and colourful menus were a drastic change for the better.

Of course – if I´m totally honest with you – I might not have been as impressed at first sight had I known that your slick black shell is almost impossible to get a grip on.

Or that your surface looks and feels like it´s been smeared in butter after every use, no matter how quick the call, no matter how short the SMS, no matter how clean my hands are before touching you.

Or that the combination of the previous two qualities makes you about as easy to handle as a deep-fried bar of soap. One touch and hey presto! “I can´t believe it´s not butter!”

But none of that is your fault. How could your designer have known that people would ever handle you with anything with any grease on it? Like, for example, FINGERS.

Me and my Samsung, Autumn 2010

I really admire the way you´re in touch with your darker side. Most touchscreen phones are pretty vanilla about how they´re handled, responding mostly to light fingerstrokes. But you, you don´t want none of that “touch me gently with a feathered kitten´s whisker” shit. You play it tough and like it rough.

Never in my life have I met a phone that can take – no, WANTS – so much pressing, begging and pleading. I must say I was a bit uncomfortable about this at first, because my past phones have all been more …traditional in their tastes. The idea of treating a phone this roughly had never even crossed my mind until you came along.

I still remember the dread I felt when I tried to open your phonebook for the first time and realized your touchscreen simply wouldn´t react to anything less than borderline violence. The ten or so seconds I waited for you to finally respond were some of the longest in my life. Then, teasingly and sloooooowly, you opened the application. And I knew I had found my phone.

User´s Manual, page 57: Operating touchscreen

Your little quirks are what I think I like the most. Like your sense of humour. Remember that time when you suddenly decided that there´s only room for 200 text messages in your memory, sent messages included? Good times!

Or how about the way you seem to take longer and longer every day to open up even the simplest applications?

And I STILL haven´t figured out how you manage to take more time to unlock than my aeons-old computer. (Seriously, stop doing that. Please.)

And the text messaging! Who else but you would even dream of hiding something as simple as the SMS behind no less than five folders? No one, that´s who.

(On a texting related side note, I´m choosing to believe that your SMS dictionary tool is a lovingly elaborate practical joke and not a pre-meditated attempt to make me insane. THAT´S how much I care.)

So, um, yeah. All in all, I´m really, really happy with you and lucky to have you. I know you´re not perfect but hey, nobody is. I most certainly am not. So, I guess what I´m trying to say is:

These months have been good. Or at least interesting.

And even though I may complain about practically having to sacrifice a goat to you every time I want to answer a call or send an SMS, it´s really just for show. I don´t mind.

Much.
Best wishes, hugs and kisses

Pauli
XXX

“Or you could buy an iPhone. Just a thought.”

On shark coitus

The Sea Life London aquarium has a big problem. They have imported a zebra shark, Zorro, from Belgium at great cost. They have given him huge living quarters, all the henchmen he can eat and a beautiful, bootyful lady shark by the name of Mazawabee. And they have asked nothing in return, except for one thing.

That he´d hump her.

Not a bad deal for Zorro, right? Well, he seems to think otherwise. A renowned playboy back in Belgium, big Z has to this day taken little to no interest towards his arranged fianceé. Nobody knows why he´s not chasing fin in London like he did in Belgium. Maybe Zorro knows that this is the end of the line and is protesting the shotgun wedding nature of his situation. Or maybe Mazawabee is just butt-ugly.

Nah. Who wouldn´t tap that?

Now, it must be said that the staff of Sea Life London seems to have studied in the “special needs” school of marine biology. They introduced Zorro to Mazawabee on Valentine´s day, probably by first getting them both drunk, then shoving them on the back seat of someone´s dad´s Sedan.

The staff were completely baffled when this didn´t have the desired effect.

The next logical (to them, that is) step was to introduce some suitable music to get them “in the mood”.

Enter the Walrus of Love.

Can you feel it, Zorro? Can you?

There can be no more fitting memory to the late, great Barry White than the fact that – even after featuring prominently on Ally McBeal for years on end – he is still considered cool and sexy enough to make sharks fuck. Because yeah, that´s what we´re talking about here.

They are. Using. Barry White songs. To make. Sharks. Fuck.

…And how cool it would be for old Barry´s legacy if that was the last sentence here. Alas, such is not the case.
So far his music hasn´t done a thing about Zorro´s libido. So now the good people of Sea Life are planning to move things up a notch… by switching to Wet Wet Wet.

Oohhhh shit.

Expect a dramatic increase in shark suicides in near future.

Source:
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/newstopics/howaboutthat/6054368/Barry-White-songs-used-to-encourage-shark-to-mate-in-aquarium.html