And speaking of dying and being buried I ran across a very thought provoking video about graveyards. Now Tim tells me I should be able to embed a video here so I’m going to attempt it. If, however, something goes amiss and I open a portal to the mirror universe and get sucked in; well, just click on this link right here and you can see this video.
Redneck Bar & Grill
Beer, Friends, Food
That is certainly something to ponder. I believe I would like my funeral to go something like this:
First of all put my body in a glass coffin and fill it up with Blue Beaver Beer. Allow to marinate at least 48 hours. This would take the place of embalming.
Next place my body in a large sack made from all natural fibres and put it in a hole in the ground (about three feet down should be adequate for my purposes).
Then transplant a Spiny Poplar Tree (which is indigenous to the forests of Ubangme) over my grave and water the surrounding area with the beer that I was marinating in. This way as my body decomposes the tree can feed off of the nutrients I create and then all of my surviving loved ones can regularly harvest the fruit and I can live on inside of them.
For the funeral itself, obviously the Blue Beaver Beer will have to flow like water. H’ors D’oeuvres would be all of my favourite foods (which you can learn more about by watching "The Tim & Ernie Show"). It shall have to be a celebration of my life not a mourning of my death.
Most importantly there must be no markers at the site of my death or my grave (other than the tree). And my grave should only be visited when someone wants some fruit, because only the remnants of my mortal shell are in the ground. There is nothing of Me present.
Of course if anyone wishes to say a toast to me whenever they crack a Blue Beaver, I will certainly return the toast from wherever I am.
I have been noticing an ever increasing problem. There is an insidious, yet subtle disease that is slowly taking over our society. It started on the internet but it is starting to spread to the “outside world”. On the surface it seems to be harmless, perhaps even amusing but that’s just a clever disguise. What it’s doing is slowly eroding our intelligence and making us increasingly lazy and worse unimaginative. I am speaking of course of the emoticon.
You’ve all seen them, and there are extremely few, if any, of us left who do not use them every day. I dug deep and spent a lot of time and energy trying to discover where these things came from. I Googled the subject and I learned the following from the first page that I read.
The very first emoticon was used by a guy called Kevin MacKenzie in 1979. -) was supposed to mean, “tongue in cheek”. Fortunately, it did not catch on at that time. Unfortunately, between 1981 and mid-1982 they reappeared and just increased in popularity every year since.
There was a CMU bulletin board system where many people could chat and have discussions. Apparently, some people on this board didn’t understand subtle humour which led to countless flames and meaningless discussions. So a number of these people started to wonder if they could use some combination of punctuation marks to signify what was and wasn’t a joke. If you want to see how it evolved you can read about it here. Long story short though, a guy by the name of Scott Fahlman came up with 
to show that something was funny and 
to show that something wasn’t. And now today we thousands of different variations of these EMOTional ICONS to signify any imaginable state of mind that you could possibly be experiencing.
Now, I’m not certain exactly how “LOL” and all of it’s endless variations came into being, but I can only surmise that there are people out there who are unable to read the traditional emoticon so they had to invent something more obvious.
Alas, I don’t think that this is a problem that will go away any time soon. Therefore, I will have to apply the old adage, “If you can’t beat ‘em, join ‘em.” During my research I came across this: ROTFC, PGH. It means, Rolling On The Floor Choking, Please Get Help. I think I am going to try to use that as often as I can. Also I have invented this :-0->B It means that I am opening my mouth and reaching out for a Blue Beaver Beer. So, when you’re feeling blue :-0->B
(originally posted March 2007)
Here’s one of my favourites that Tim wrote.
Talking on the phone. Eating a burger. Shaving. Arguing with your girlfriend. Beating your children in the back seat.
These are all things that can get you or someone else killed on the hi-way.
I saw a guy with shaving cream all over his face and a razer in his hand, using the rear view to shave while driving 60 mph on a busy hi-way. Three questions: how do you wash off the excess cream, Why can’t you just shave at home and are you a frikkin’ moron? The last one is probably a yes.
Little children can be a terrible distraction. And that is even before they get in that minivan. If mom is all frazzled from the kiddies pounding on each other and spilling their drinks, how are her driving skills being affected? Yes, even children shouldn’t drink while mom is driving. Her mind won’t be on the road if that grape juice or soda pop is all over the seat and the floor.
We all know not to drink and drive. Impaired driving can get you in a lot of trouble. Lately, studies show that talking on a cellphone can be almost as dangerous. Most people will agree that distracted driving increases your risks on the road.
What do you think, and are you going to do anything about it if you are an offender? (I know, Ernie, I am on the phone on the road all the time. Maybe I should figure out a solution that works for me with the business calls).
Anyone care to comment?
(originally posted January 2007)