calm down, they're only quadrupeds

Forest Park was a beautiful place on saturday, april 16th. Here is a video of other mike's unparalleled wisdom regarding the papal conclave. Is there a shower in the sistine chapel? What does it matter? They're priests.

on bullshit, lying vs. bullshitting, and american bullshit

I have recently been reading On Bullshit by Harry G. Frankfurt, a philosophy professor at Princeton. Frankfurt succeeds in very clearly distinguishing between lying and bullshitting.

Lying is the act of knowing the truth and purposely deviating from it, providing information that is known to be false. Bullshiting is verbal defecation. Bullshitting is the act of having total disdain for the truth and providing information that is not known to be true or false, usually in the vein of persuasion.

You see, the bullshiter does not consider the truth in any way. What is said very well may be true! The bullshitter doesn't care. The bullshitter and the liar are engaged in different enterprises. Liars at least consider the truth. They must do this in order to offer falsehood.

With that said, consider this from comedian George Carlin...

America's leading industry, America's most profitable business, is still the manufacture, packaging, distribution, and marketing of bullshit. High-quality, grade-A, prime-cut, pure, American bullshit. And the sad part is, most people seem indoctrinated to believe that bullshit only comes from certain places, certain sources; advertising, politics, salesmen. Not true. Bullshit is everywhere. Bullshit is rampant. Parents are full of shit. Teachers are full of shit. Clergymen are full of shit. And law enforcement people are FULL of SHIT. This entire country is completely full of SHIT and always has been from the Declaration of Independence to the Constitution to the Star Spangled Banner. It's really nothing more than one big steaming pile of red-white-and-blue all American bullshit. Because, think of how we started. Think of that. This country was founded by a group of slave owners who told us "All men are created equal." Oh, yeah, all men. Except for indians and niggers and women, right? I always like to use that authentic American language. This was a small group of un-elected white-male land-holding slave owners who also suggested their class be the only one allowed to vote. Now that is what's known as being STUNNINGLY and embarrasingly full of shit.

happy birthday hitler

One hundred and sixteen years ago hitler was born in Braunau, Austria and i just got home from a great baseball game here in St Louis, Missouri, USA: Cards vs. Cubs. I went with a group of friends from work and a couple of them were Cubs fans. (Boo) It rained for a while and delayed the game, but not for long. Cards had a decent defense but all of their hits were fired straight at Cub gloves the entire game. Cubs were up 3 to 1 for the latter half of the game and in the bottom of the ninth with one man on base, the Cards hit a huge fly out to center field. It looked like it was going to make it over, but it just didn't have enough juice. What a great game.

Other things that happened on April 20th in the past... 1,434 years ago Muhammad was probably born. 33 years ago Apollo 16 landed on the moon. 13 years ago an all-star concert in memory of Queen frontman Freddie Mercury is held at Wembley Stadium in London and... 8 years ago the San Diego Padres faced the St Louis Cardinals in the first Major League Baseball game ever played in Hawaii.

party boobytrap

Including the title of this post, here is a list of my favorite palindromes so far.

Meet animals. Laminate 'em!
May a moody baby doom a yam.
Some men interpret nine memos.
No, Cab. No tuna nut on bacon.
A dog, a plan, a canal: pagoda.
Eva, can i stab bats in a cave?
No sir, away! A papaya war is on!
Lay a wallaby baby ball away, Al.
Go hang a salami. I'm a lasagna hog.
Satan, oscillate my metallic sonatas.
I, madam, I made radio! So I dared! Am I mad? Am I?

oh, you'll christmas

Below is a conversation that a friend and i had recently. It evolved into an homage to my father for his packing abilities...

Me: oh, grasshopper, maybe because you're not yet a father you are not yet skilled in the arts of packing... there are many degrees of packing and unpacking. my dad has a 3rd degree dragon belt in packing... he has only a black belt in unpacking... he usually said "screw it, you all do it" on the unpacking, which is understandable, that's the easy part, and by that time he'd have driven all day

Grasshopper: why does he fear the unpacking so?
Grasshopper: I sense a weakness in his actions

Me: well he is well versed in the arts of crimping, cramming, and advanced crumpling... i may be the son of the man responsible for some of the most spectacular packing jobs ever witnessed in the tennessee valley, maybe even the entire midwest