Pirate Kitty

I sustained a a mild concussion today when a vehicle barrier drop bar (a metal or PVC tube gate bar thinggie) hit me just above my left temple. I have a raging headache, a large raised bruise, and little tolerance for for real thinking, at the moment.

I'm taking the next day or two off from blogging to give my poor, bruised and abused brain some rest. I'll be back Monday or Tuesday at the latest. Well, unless I feel better before then, or get really, really bored and sneak on to post something.

So until then, here is a cute picture to tide you over:

Pop the Tank and Pop a Pill

America is pill crazy.

We have pills to help you sleep, pills to help you stay awake. We have pills to help you lose weight and pills to help you bulk up. We have pills for depression, anxiety, and psychoses. There are pills for aches. There are pills for pains. Pills to aid your sex life. Pills to stop smoking. Pills to grow hair. Pills to give you better gas mileage.

What?

Pills for better gas mileage?

Now, I think things may have gone too far.

Fuel Freedom International (FFI) is touting a new capsule that you pop into your car's fuel tank to "[burn] fuel more cleanly and quickly."

This new automotive wonder-drug is called MPG-CAP™. Small, brown pills in a blister-pack that look a bit like compressed sawdust, or maybe some of that organic, herbal stuff you find in the "hippie" aisle of your local drug store. (Not that organic herb pills are bad, I use Golden Seal myself).

FFI claims, in layman's terms, that MPG-CAP™ works similar to how a non-stick frying pan works. It coats "the combustion chamber of your engine with sacrificial catalytic coating." This basically means it will help keep gunk from forming in your cylinders, which they claim will give you better performance and more gas mileage by running smoother and cleaner.

You pop the "recommended dosage" into your gas tank. The fuel carries the dissolved compounds into your engine, and coats the inside cylinders through heat activation via the combustion process. Their website uses a lot of fancy terms like "infinite nano-phase surface area" and "in cylinder rate shaping." The above teflon-coating analogy was also paraphrased from their site, so at least FFI realizes big terms might make the heads hurt of people who might actually use this.

FFI also claims their product is not an additive like other purported fuel system treatments, rather it is an "engine efficiency supplement."

I don't know about you, but if you ADD it to your fuel via the gas tank, it is an additive.

I doubt this product works as claimed, and tests done by independent agencies showed no conclusive proof that MPG-CAP™ increased gas mileage or engine performance.

I just thought the idea of giving you car a pep pill was hilarious!

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Today's Penny Doubled Daily Cumulative Amount for 88 days is:

$3,094,850,098,213,450,687,247,810.55

Still Bleah, More Farts

Title speaks for itself. (Little whacked out on pain meds right now, forgive the abruptness of this post hehe).

Stay for the ending!

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Today's Penny Doubled Daily Cumulative Amount for 87 days is:

$1,547,425,049,106,725,343,623,905.27

The Empire Farts Back

I'm battling a nagging sinus headache, as well as what may be the beginnings of peripheral polyneuropathy brought about by my diabetes. My podiatrist warned me of this and we've been watching for signs. All this week I've bad foot pain in my right big toe ball joint. Today, my left foot feels as if a marble is embedded under the skin on the bottom between my little toe and the next one over.

I simply didn't feel like coming up with a blog. So that is why today's is late.

Filler blogs are usually fart related. The following is not, strictly speaking, farting. But it sounds like farts, and is called hand farting. Since yesterday was about R2-D2, and with Star Wars' 30th Anniversary looming, I give to you the Empire's Theme in Hand Farts.

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Today's Penny Doubled Daily Cumulative Amount for 86 days is:

$773,712,524,553,362,671,811,952.63

USPS Joins Forces with R2-D2

No, those R2-D2 mailbox look-alikes you may have seen in your town are not some new hoax by Cartoon Network. But I've figured out where the new stamp price increase revenue is going ... ~.^

Here is the official press release from the United States Postal Service from March 15th:

WASHINGTON, D.C. — Tomorrow morning in our neighborhoods and street corners not so far, far away, hundreds of official U.S. Postal Service blue collection boxes will be transformed into Star Wars character R2-D2 look-alikes to promote an exciting new adventure on which the U.S. Postal Service is embarking on with Lucasfilm Ltd.

For anybody who missed seeing a Star Wars movie in the 30 years since the first installment was released, R2-D2 is the feisty little droid who embodies the trust and dependability for which the Postal Service is so renowned.

The R2-D2 collection boxes will temporarily replace boxes in highly visible locations across the country. Customers can, of course drop mail into them just like any other of our 280,000 collection boxes, but there's a striking difference visually. Not only do the R2-D2 boxes look like the ever-popular Star Wars character, they feature the address of a website that gives clues about the real meaning behind this unprecedented promotion - uspsjedimaster.com.

More details about the promotion will be announced March 28. Look for the R2-D2 mailbox near you... until then, "May the Force be with you."

My guess is the USPS is gearing up to release a commemorative stamp for Star Wars' 30th Anniverssary. Maybe a set of stamps. We;ll find out in a few days (March 28th) on the uspsjedimaster.com website.

The boxes went up March 15th in 400 cities across America. StarWars.com has a listing of all 400 cities here. Unfortunately, there is no definitive listing of where in those cities the 'droid-like mailboxes can be found. You'll have to go all Boba Fett and hunt them down yourself.

For those bounty hunters in you that may be thinking about capturing an R2-D2 box on more than just digital film, be warned that these are still US Postal mailboxes and tampering, or worse, stealing them is considered a federal crime.

May the Force be with you!

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Today's Penny Doubled Daily Cumulative Amount for 85 days is:

$386,856,262,276,681,335,905,976.31

Pirate, Cat, & Cow (Special Guest Appearance by Camel)

I pulled a muscle in my right neck & shoulder area. So between pain medication and Thermacare Heat Wraps (love them!) I'm not in any mood to write a witty blog post.

Therefore, to keep the pirate and cow phenomenon going, I present to you a little known video by the classic stop-motion artiste, Qsponge! (Okay, it's just some kid who uploaded his little skit to YouTube, but I gotta work the spin on this, you know? ~.^)

Cow Eating Pirates

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Today's Penny Doubled Daily Cumulative Amount for 84 days is:

$193,428,131,138,340,667,952,988.15

Moo Ho Ho and a Bottle of Milk

Penguino Pepper complained I had two days of pirates followed by another with a cow in it. He seemed to bemoan the fact that, while he enjoyed cows, pirates were much more interesting.

So, Penguino, here's a cowtoon just for you! ~.^

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Today's Penny Doubled Daily Cumulative Amount for 83 days is:

$96,714,065,569,170,333,976,494.07

The Cat, the Cow, and the Corpse

I took the kids to go see TMNT today, so no time for a real blog. (The movie was really good, go see it!) Instead, I will share a screenshot of two of my good online friends and myself celebrating after the slaughter of dozens of pink and purple dinosaurs who had stolen somebody's silver. (No, none of the dino's were Barney, more's the pity.)

I'm the Cat (Tauren shape-shifted Druid), Pam is the Cow (Tauren non-shape-shifted Druid), and Bruce is the Corpse (Undead Warlock). The confused blue guy is Bruce's minion; basically a big, blue wall of "beat on me and not them".

We're a pretty good team.

Pam (Stargazr) heals and uses ranged damaging magic. Bruce (Pheava) sends his minion in to absorb and deal damage, as he casts ranged magic. (I like his green life-sucker ray.) And, Moolasses (my druid) rushes in in cat-form to slice, dice, and cause havoc. Works out well.

We use Teamspeak, an online voice chat system, to communicate most of the time. Saves on typing because our fingers are better used for controlling our 'toons in battle.

Besides, you'd hate to see my typos when I do type in game. =/

We're part of the guild Hanshin (meaning demi-god in Japanese) on the Anvilmar server. Tons of helpful people, including a few more good online friends whom I find myself travelling across Azeroth with more often than not. And, who may very well find themselves depicted in this blog at one point or another. ~.^

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Today's Penny Doubled Daily Cumulative Amount for 82 days is:

$48,357,032,784,585,166,988,247.03

You Arrgh a Pirate

I had a nice post about WoW I wrote up last night in Notepad. The plan was to copy it into the Roost this morning. I seem to have misplaced the file.

Instead, you may amuse yourselves by watching this cute video of kids in costume singing along with a good ol' piratey song, thus keeping with the pirate theme from yesterday. It's pretty funny, well edited, and fantastically acted by the kids involved. (I dunno where the song is from, though.)


Try not to get this tune stuck in your head, me hearties.

For those who don't read comments, there were two links to other piratey items you may be interested in:

Beartracks gave a link to a Pirate Keyboard.

Michael gave a link to some Pirate Gold.

Thanks for the links, guys!

U.^ ? <--- Pirate Smiley waving a hook

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Today's Penny Doubled Daily Cumulative Amount for 81 days is:

$24,178,516,392,292,583,494,123.51

Is a Pirate's Favorite Letter Arrrrr?

A pirate walks into a bar and orders a bottle of rum. The bartender noticed that, like any self-respecting pirate, this guy had a peg leg, a hook in place of one of his hands and a dirty patch over one of his eyes. The bartender, overcome with curiosity about life on treacherous seas, decides to find out how the pirate got in such bad shape. So he asks the pirate, "How did you lose your hand?"

The pirate responded, "I lost me hand in a battle off the coast of Jamaica! I killed me 14 men that day though."

His new acquaintance, now impressed, was still curious about the other injuries, so he asked, "What about your leg? Did you lose that during the same battle?"

"No," answered the pirate. "I lost it to the sharks off the Florida Keys when I was diving for dead man's treasure."

Finally, the bartender asked, "I noticed you also have an eye patch. How did you lose your eye?"

The pirate answered, "I were digging for buried treasure on a beach when a seagull flew over and crapped right in me eye."

The bartender, expecting another gory response, confusedly asks, "How could a little seagull crap cause you to lose your eye?"

The pirate snapped, "ARRRRRRRRR, It was me first day with the hook!"

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(The original pirate image can be found HERE. I didn't draw it, I only digitally colored it and then shrunk it.)

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Today's Penny Doubled Daily Cumulative Amount for 80 days is:

$12,089,258,196,146,291,747,061.75

Honesty Among Thieves

One of the blogs I visit daily, Worship City , had an entry about accidentally stealing from a store and what a pain it is to go back and buy the item. I liked it so much I am ripping off his blog and posting my own experiences with this felonious faux-pas.

Once, in Wal-Mart, we had a stack of the bargain bin DVDs spread out on the seat part of the basket (love them cheap movies!). We were getting some groceries and didn't want the DVDs mixed in with canned goods and cold milk. The DVDs ended up being covered by two purses, the grocery list, a box of eggs, and several loaves of various breads.

We forgot about them, unloaded the food items, paid, reloaded the now bagged and purchased items, went past the cart checker (who barely glanced at the cart or receipt), and out the door. Without the alarm going off!

When we got to the car and began loading our newly purchased edibles into the back ... Oops.

Because it took us almost 20 minutes to go through the line in the first place, and I didn't want my mother, nor the perishables, staying out in a hot car in the Florida Summer sun, I decided to simply return the movies. I quickly ran the DVDs back inside, explained to the customer service people what happened, and said I didn't want to wait another 20 minutes in line, just take them back. (I secretly hoped they would allow me to get ahead of the other people in the service line, to be honest).

Took me 5 minutes for them to (barely) understand I didn't want a refund, no I didn't have a receipt because I accidentally stole them, and would you just please take them back.

I'm not sure the two women behind the counter really got what I was saying, and they looked at me with mixed contempt (for, in their minds, trying to scam with stolen goods) and stupidity for trying to hand back a stack of DVDs.

I ended up leaving the stack on the service counter, and just leaving.

*sigh*

Another time, way back in the mid '80's, my mother was on a trip to a conference and decided to get some souvenir's for us at the airport. (I forget which one, she tells this story so much I'm not even sure she remembers where, either).

She paid for her purchases (gum, doodads, trinkets, magazines) and left the in-airport gift shop to head for her plane back. Half-way to her gate, she shifted her packages and realized ... Oops! ... She had a board game (a nice wood backgammon set) tucked under her arm and hadn't paid for it.

Her flight was leaving soon, but she just couldn't walk away with an unpaid for gift. So, she turned around and slogged through the crowds back to the gift shop.

She got there and told the clerk behind the counter what had happened, and offered to pay for it, apologizing for her mistake.

This clerk accused my mother of stealing it. Loudly, to her face, in front of the entire gift shop.

When my mom again tried to explain what had happened, the clerk again shouted she was a thief and picked up the phone, calling for airport security. The short time waiting for security to arrive was filled with my mother trying to set the woman straight (getting more and more frustrated, and a bit angry), and the clerk accusing her of theft, and of having a guilty conscience, and that's why she brought it back to pay.

Long story short(er), she was detained by airport security, was almost arrested, missed her flight, and had to sleep in the airport until next morning to catch her rebooked one.

She did end up paying for the backgammon set. A nice man who saw my mother try to pay for it on her return trip, and the belligerence and abusiveness of the clerk, helped get things settled. Apparently, the clerk also accused my mother of stealing other things and wanted her checked for hidden items. Didn't happen.

All for attempting to correct an honest mistake.

Even faux crime doesn't pay.

*sigh²*

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Today's Penny Doubled Daily Cumulative Amount for 79 days is:

$6,044,629,098,073,145,873,530.87

RapCat Music Video

RapCat has released his first music video!

You remember RapCat? The fast food feline with the controversial clothes?

Well, it's been a month and I know how short the Information Nation's memory is, so you can jog your memory about the caterwauling kitty at my previous article.

Done? Good.

I bet you want to see RapCat's music video debut. You know you wanna ...

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Today's Penny Doubled Daily Cumulative Amount for 78 days is:

$3,022,314,549,036,572,936,765.43

Quality Content

Here at Raivynn's Roost, we strive to bring you quality content for your personal entertainment. But, since I have other things needing to be done today, you get this instead:

And you thought Cow Week was done. Ha!

At least this one doesn't release any moo-thane.

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Note: We've reached the sextillions in the Penny Doubled Daily. This refers to six places beyond the thousands and is denoted by 10²¹. It has absolutely nothing to do with how many people will want to be intimate with you if you had this kind of money ... but I imagine the numerical value would be similar. ~.^

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Today's Penny Doubled Daily Cumulative Amount for 77 days is:

$1,511,157,274,518,286,468,382.71

Cow Week: Day 7 -- Even More Cowtoons

Double dose of cowtoony goodness today as Cow Week cowncludes and the little Irish in all of us gets to play on St. Patrick's Day! Enjoy!

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Today's Penny Doubled Daily Cumulative Amount for 76 days is:

$755,578,637,259,143,234,191.35

Cow Week: Day 6 -- More Cowtoons

Here is another trio of cowtoons. Enjoy!

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Today's Penny Doubled Daily Cumulative Amount for 75 days is:

$377,789,318,629,571,617,095.67

Cow Week: Day 5 -- Moo-thane Emissions

Come on .. you KNEW it had to be coming!

How can you can you have a Cow Week without a farting cow?

Written and Animated by: Dustin J. Elliott

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Today's Penny Doubled Daily Cumulative Amount for 74 days is:

$188,894,659,314,785,808,547.83

Cow Week: Day 4 -- Cowtoons

It's officially Cow Week here at the Roost!

After three days of cow related posts, I decided to continue with the theme all week. Lucky you!

Today we have several cowtoons!

The first one is one I found at a cow website, MotherCow.org.
It was cute, but not entirely funny. So I decided to try a few gags myself.



(Sorry, had to tie together this post with another one of mine! heehee)

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Today's Penny Doubled Daily Cumulative Amount for 73 days is:

$94,447,329,657,392,904,273.91

Cow Week: Day 3 -- Holy Cow! (Or, Is That Cow-y Hole?)

In keeping with the cow theme I inadvertently began this week, and because I have had a looooong morning, and because I typed a whole blog-sized comment on someone else's blog, here is a an innovative tattoo of the south-bound end of a north-bound cow.

One more comment: Is it just me, or is that the biggest belly-button hole you've ever seen? With hair in it, too! Hilariously disgusting.

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Today's Penny Doubled Daily Cumulative Amount for 72 days is:

$47,223,664,828,696,452,136.95

Cow Week: Day 2 -- Moo-nday Funnies

In honor of yesterday's post about the meat-eating cow, today is an assortment of cow related jokes to beef up the blog. I wouldn't steer you wrong, these cow jokes are udderly hilarious. I'd steak my word on it. No bull!

Okay, okay, I know the puns were bad, but remember ... Too err is human, to forgive, bovine.

I've milked this enough!

On with the jokes!

A New York family bought a ranch out West where they intended to raise cattle. Friends visited and asked if the ranch had a name. "Well," said the would-be cattleman, "I wanted to name it the Bar-J. My wife favored Suzy-Q, one son like the Flying-W, and the other wanted the Lazy-Y. So we're calling it the Bar-J-Suzy-Q-Flying-W-Lazy-Y." "But where are all your cattle?" the friends asked. "None survived the branding."

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There was a herd of cattle all standing on a hill when an earthquake struck. All of the cows fell down, but the bull remained standing. The farmer noticing this went out and asked the bull, "Why didn't you fall down like the rest of the herd. The bull replied, "We bulls wobble, but we don't fall down."

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I was driving through the country, and there were some cows by the side of the road. We've all done this: I leaned my head out of the car window, and yelled, "Moooooo!" Like we expect that cow to be thinking, "Hey, there's a cow driving that car! How can he afford that?"

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Why does a milking stool have only three legs?
Because the cow has the udder.

Where do cows go when they want a night out?
To the moo-vies!

What was the bull doing in the pasture with his eyes closed?
Bull-dozin'

How does a farmer count a herd of cows?
With a Cowculator

What do you call a cow with no front legs?
Lean Beef

What do you call a cow with no legs at all?
Ground Beef

What are a cows favorite subjects in school?
Moosic, psycowolgy, cowculus

How do you know a cow is dyslexic?
It says "Oooooom"

What's a cow's favorite moosical note?
Beef-flat !!

Did you hear that NASA recently launched a bunch of Holsteins into low Earth orbit?
They called it the Herd Shot 'Round The World!

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The devout cowboy lost his favorite Bible while he was mending fences out on the
range.

Three weeks later, a cow walked up to him carrying the Bible in its mouth. The cowboy couldn't believe his eyes. He took the precious book out of the cow's mouth, raised his eyes heavenward and exclaimed, “It's a miracle!”

“Not really,” said the cow. “Your name is written inside the cover.”

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Theres 2 cows in a field, One cow looks at the other cow and says "moo."
The other cow looks back and says "I was just going to say that"

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A man staggers into the emergency room with a concussion, multiple bruises, and a five iron wrapped around his neck. Naturally the doctor asks him what happened.

"Well, it was like this" said the man. "I was having a quiet round of golf with my wife, when at a difficult hole, we both sliced our balls into a pasture of cows. We went to look for them, and while I was rooting around I noticed that one of the cows had something white in it's rear end. I walked over and lifted up the tail, and sure enough, there was a golf ball with my wife's monogram on it stuck right in the middle of the cow's butt. That's when I made my mistake."

"What did you do?", asked the doctor.

"Well, I lifted the tail, pointed, and yelled to my wife, "Hey! This looks like yours!"

And last, but not least ...

There were three cows,a Red cow, a Blue Cow, and a Yellow Cow, all of them, on one side of a an eighteen lane superhighway. One day, they were busy just grazing along, and they realized that they were out of grass . . . So they were thinking to themselves that if they could get to the OTHER side of this super highway, they could eat the grass over on the other side. So the Blue cow was thinking to himself, and he comes up with an idea. He walks over to the telephone pole, climbs up it, walks across the line, climbs down the other side, and starts eating the grass. So the Red cow is thinking to himself that if the Blue cow could do it, so could he. He comes up with an idea and backs up away from the highway, runs, jumps, leaps over ALL 18 lanes, lands on the other side, and starts eating the grass. So the Yellow cow, left all alone, is thinking to himself that if the Blue cow could do it and the Red cow could do it, then so could he. So he comes up with an idea, and he walks out into traffic. He gets run over by an 18 wheeler and dies. The Red cow turns to the Blue cow and says "Mooooooooo."

I think I may be playing Taurens too much in WoW ...

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Today's Penny Doubled Daily Cumulative Amount for 71 days is:

$23,611,832,414,348,226,068.47

Cow Week: Day 1 -- Cow-nivore, the Chicken Eating Cow

Why did the chicken cross the road? To escape the chicken-eating cow!

In Chandipur, India there is a 1-year-old calf that eats live chickens.

Now, to my knowledge, cows are herbivores. They don't eat the flesh of other animals. They eat grass, or hay, or maybe vegetables. They don't eat meat.

This cow does.

The calf, and his owner, are now local celebrities in India. They've been featured on Indian television, so I expect YouTube will have videos of this carnivorous cow chewing cackling chicken pretty soon. (None as of now ... I looked. ~.^)

I have my own theory on what is happening.

Chick-Fil-A has long had an advertising campaign where cows urge people to "Eat Mor Chikin". The calf is simply a victim of high pressure marketing.

I imagine he was lazing about in his little baby-cow paddock one day, watching some television, and thoughtfully chewing his cud, when a Chick-Fil-A commercial came on. Here, right before his eyes, were other cows. On television! And, they weren't part of some dairy product or hamburger commercial. And, they were telling him -- HIM! -- to eat more chicken.

The calf was probably sick of hay and grass, and thought, well if the television cows told me to do it, it must be good. So off he gamboled off to waylay a hapless hen.

He must have enjoyed it, because he kept chewing on chickens. I don't really know what his thoughts were at the time he began partaking of poultry. It may have had to do with dipping sauces.

I have another theory.

The calf may have been penned up near the chicken coop.

He was subjected to the hens cackling and the roosters cock-a-doodle-dooing. All day. All night. Every day. For a year.

It was then he decided to add some protein to his diet.

You see, by then, the calf had gone clucking mad.

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Today's Penny Doubled Daily Cumulative Amount for 70 days is:

$11,805,916,207,174,113,034.23

Spring Forward - Daylight Savings and You

Spring Forward

(Don't forget to turn your clocks ahead at 2AM Sunday!)

Spring Forward, Fall Back.

We've all heard that mnemonic phrase numerous times before. A memory trick to remind us of how Daylight Savings Time works. We move our clocks an hour ahead in the Spring, and an hour back in the Fall, reordering our lives based on a 200 year old idea by Benjamin Franklin, and enacted in the US in 1918.

Yup, blame ol' Ben for losing an hour sleep tonight, and for all those people late to church tomorrow. This is the same guy who flew a kite in a lightning storm and wanted the turkey as our national symbol.

Okay, okay. So Ben Franklin was one of this nation's greatest leaders and inventors. And, his 1784 light-hearted letter to the Journal of Paris urging people to get up an hour earlier to save candles didn't actually involve turning any clocks back. We can blame William Willet for our real chronometric woes.

Willet is the true inventor of Daylight Savings Time, or DST. Even if ol' Ben tends to get the credit, or the blame in some cases.

Willet, an Englishman, wrote a pamphlet The Waste of Daylight in 1907 proposing a similar, yet slightly different manner of advancing and regressing clocks to save daylight, hence power and money savings. Though it wasn't until the First World War that DST was implemented as a way to save coal, and other energy supplies. First by Germany, then by Britain in 1916, then followed by many other nations.

Unfortunately, Willima Willet did not live to see his world altering idea come to fruition. He died of influenza in 1915.

The United states adopted the measure in 1918, but Congress repealed it in 1919 due to its unpopularity with the general public. The standard times zones also introduced with the 1918 DST law were retained, however. Daylights savings remained in local option use until 1966, when the Uniform Time Act reinstituted it back into law.

In the winter of 1973, for 15 months, President Richard Nixon set the clocks ahead an hour in response to the energy crisis of that time. Clocks reverted to standard time in the winter of 1974.

In 1987 federal legislation set the US daylight savings time to take place the first Sunday in April until the last Sunday in October.

2007 marks the beginning of an extended DST in the US, with daylight savings now taking place from the second Sunday in March (tomorrow for you non-aware readers) to the first Sunday in November.

Not all of the US uses DST. Both Arizona and Hawaii are exempt.

Nor does the entire world use DST. Webexhibits.org, a resource used in much of this article, provides a page of who does and doesn't use DST.

In the US, the official time to change your clocks is 2AM of the particular Sunday. But who in their right mind gets up that early in the morning to change a lousy clock? Most people change their clocks some time on the Saturday before, typically before going to bed. This leads to much confusion as to when their favorite television shows really come on, and what time their favorite eatery closes.

I use it as a trick to get the kids to bed earlier. Hey, if they are too lazy to look up Daylight Savings Time, it's their own fault. Right? ~.^

Oh, and when you bustle about spinning the analogs back, and button-mashing the digitals into subservience, take a few minutes to change the batteries in your smoke detectors, eh? Test them, too. Nothing worse than missing an hour's sleep AND getting burnt up because your smoke alarm didn't go off.

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Today's Penny Doubled Daily Cumulative Amount for 69 days is:

$5,902,958,103,587,056,517.11

Blame it on the Mudpuppy!

Since Mudpuppy stole my blog idea for today, I've not got anything planned. *sigh*

Heh, he didn't actually steal it. He merely beat me to it. So now, because of him, you have a ... dare I say it? ... A Fart Filler!!!

I present for your visual, auditory, but thankfully not olfactory, pleasure ...

The Belgium Farting Pig!

All I have to say is ... "Those poor, poor chickens."

This is a clip from a Belgian children's show. Apparantly, flatulant anthropomorphic porcines are considered high entertainment for kids in Belgium. I can see hordes of school children running about, singing the catchy little tune and blasting farts at one another while smiling parents and teachers in gasmasks watch the playful antics.

You have to admit the tune gets into your head. Now, every time you feel a fart coming on, you'll start humming this little ditty. It'll be like an early warning system to those around you.

I think it's hilarious they subtitle the farts. The phrase, "fopje flauw mopje" roughly translates to "little fools tell insipid little jokes."

Don't forget to thank Mudpuppy for this fine flatulant Friday filler. ~.^

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Today's Penny Doubled Daily Cumulative Amount for 68 days is:

$2,951,479,051,793,528,258.55

My Kind of Stairs!

I know I would have wanted this in my house growing up! Though, by the looks of the bottom of the slide, it may be a wee bit too scary for the kids in that house. ~.^

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Today's Penny Doubled Daily Cumulative Amount for 67 days is:

$1,475,739,525,896,764,129.27

Up to the quintillions, now!

Piggy Bank Blues

After the recent 30-cent increase in gas prices over the last month, along with the commensurate increases in other items due to higher shipping costs, and after dropping a hard-come-by $50 on 90 days of WoW (or as I call it, World of Walletcraft), my poor piggy bank has hit rough times.

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Today's Penny Doubled Daily Cumulative Amount for 66 days is:

$737,869,762,948,382,064.63

Signs, Signs ... Everywhere There's Signs - Part 2

Continuing yesterday's post about silly signs ...

Maybe they are talking about M. Night Shyamalan's movie?

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Frighteningly, this odd sign combo almost has relevance with today's violence among school kids. But, more likely, it's because drunk hunters cannot tell a deer from a school bus.

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Is this a real problem in whatever town this is?

You'd think that if someone actually did try it, they would stop pretty quick. Unless they were drunk hunters fresh from shooting school buses. They might need this sign.

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Now there's a movie to take the kiddies to! Or, drunk hunters.

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Do they rifle through the fried corpse's pockets for the fine, or is it transferred to the unlucky bastard's heirs? I suppose it might really be a clean-up fee. You know how hard it is to get fried on foods off of a cooking pan.

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Best. Bathroom Sign. Ever.

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Today's Penny Doubled Daily Cumulative Amount for 65 days is:

$368,934,881,474,191,032.31

Signs, Signs ... Everywhere There's Signs - Part 1

TESLA lyrics

The obscure Canadian rock group Five Man Electrical Band got it right with their song "Signs". Tesla did an awesome cover to it many years later. (Lyrics to the right).

A few weeks ago I wrote a satirical article on signs. While signs were the focus of the story, the real humor came from the vagaries of the English language written on those signs.

That got me thinking of all the crazy signs that are out there. So I hunted down a bunch that will make you scratch your head.

Gee, you think?

This is also the same place whose TV station doesn't have a weatherman. They just send the station dog outside. If he comes back wet, it's raining. If he comes back white, it's snowing. If he doesn't come back, aliens probably abducted him. Please stay inside and lock your doors.

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If you see this sign be watchful for bicycles rolling around by themselves. There will likely be a Lycra-clad person chasing behind it. Wait at least 20 seconds before proceeding after a bicycle has gone by to allow for slower chasers.

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I suppose this is the same reason you drive on a parkway, park on a driveway, trucks carry shipments, and boats carry cargo. And, does this make the McDonalds' employee who brings it out to you a carhop? They should make them wear roller skates when they do.

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Leeds is a fun town. I like going to the park and watching the parents shove their kids out of the car as they speed by the playset.

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Oooooo-kay ... right.

This sign does not exist. It is a figment of your imagination. Ignore the sign. No, wait ... don't ignore the sign. But, it's really not there. so, ignore the sign, but don't ignore it? 'k? Please?



More Silly Signs Later ...

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Today's Penny Doubled Daily Cumulative Amount for 64 days is:

$184,467,440,737,095,516.15

The Hunter, the Bear, and God

The headache that was trip-hammering in my left eye yesterday has made a surprise return engagement. And, since I promised someone no flatulent humor on Sundays, here is religious joke tide you over ...

The Religious Hunter
A man was out hunting. He just happened to be hunting bears. As he trudged through the forest looking for the beasts, he came upon a large and steep hill. Thinking that perhaps there would be bear on the other side of the hill, he climbed up the steep incline and, just as he was pulling himself up over the last outcropping of rocks, a huge bear met him nose to nose.

The bear roared fiercely. The man was so scared that he lost his balance and fell down the hill with the bear not far behind. As he tumbled down the hill, the man lost his gun. When he finally stopped at the bottom, he found that he had a broken leg. Escape was impossible and so the man, who had never been particularly religious (in fact this just happened to be a Sunday morning), prayed, "God, if you will make this bear a Christian I will be happy with whatever lot you give me for the rest of my life."

The bear was no more than three feet away from the man when it stopped dead in its tracks... looked up to the heavens quizzically... and then fell to its knees and prayed in a loud voice, "O Lord, bless this food of which I am about to partake."

Unlike the bear image I posted on my Hug a Friend Day, this one was created by me using a stock photo of a bear and my limited skills in Paint Shop Pro. I wasn't going to do a new image for this post, but it actually helped me forget about the blazing supernova burning in my skull. I hope you like it. It turned out cute, I think. ^.^;;

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Today's Penny Doubled Daily Cumulative Amount for 63 days is:

$92,233,720,368,547,758.07

Dash of This, Sprinkle of That

Another pointless post today.

Going out to the mall with the family for lunch in about 30 minutes. Food courts rock. Everyone can get what they want. I'm hitting Chick-Fil-A for a sandwich and Cherry Coke, then hitting Twinz for a Chicago Dog (best hotdogs around). Tyler will likley get some Chik-Fil-A with me, his brother Tim said he wanted Chinese. This boy would rather eat fruits and veges than anything else. It's a good habit, but kind of weird in a kid. My mother is getting egg drop soup at the Chinese place, and an onion and kraut dog at Twinz.

Not sure what is planned for right after. I tried to talk her into going to see a movie ... either "Ghost Rider" or "The Astronaut Farmer." We'll probably come home and watch "Flushed Away" on DVD since we've not even opened it yet, and we bought it last week.

I made a signature image for my World of Warcraft character:


I also found another optical illusion involving vehicles like the ones in my previous post:


I know the county was cutting back on it's public transportation budget, but this is ridiculous!


For those of you keeping up with the Penny Doubled Daily, we are now in the quadrillions as of six days ago. The next stage is quintillion in just a few days.

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Today's Penny Doubled Daily Cumulative Amount for 62 days is:

$46,116,860,184,273,879.03

Later and Longer

Amazing what a few hours and a good meal will do for a body.

I'm feeling much better and will elaborate some on the below post.

Bruiser has won the Caption Contest with this little ditty about our potty kitty:


"And the cat's in the toilet and it's half past noon,
Big mama came and she showed me the moon,
Now I'm lyin' here tryin' to breathe again,
I'm gonna get her when I can, yeah,
I'm gonna scratch her eyes out then."

I also liked Doug's "I know I saw that mouse in here somewhere" caption, and Hawkman's "crapper napper" made me choke on my water.

And, since you three were the only readers brave enough to enter the contest, I'll do a photo caricature for each of you. If you want one done, let me know and we'll work out how to get me the pictures to work off of.

Check out the caricatures of two well-known figures I hastily did a little while to demonstrate what I am planning ...

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Today's Penny Doubled Daily Cumulative Amount for 61 days is:

$23,058,430,092,136,939.51

Late and Short

Sorry for the late post, and its brevity. My day has been a rather tumultuous one with minor emergencies, not feeling well due to missed med doses (*smacks self*), and general lethargy.

Bruiser wins the Caption Contest with his hilarious parody of "Cat's in the Cradle" (or Kettle, depending on your favorite hehe).

And, seeing as how another minor emergency has arisen in the few minutes I tried to post this short message, I will see you all tomorrow (or possibly even a very late post tonight.)

Hug A Friend Day

Just a short post today to say that friends and loved ones are very precious. Take a moment to let them know you love and appreciate them, and then give 'em a big ol' bear hug!

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Today's Penny Doubled Daily Cumulative Amount for 60 days is:

$11,529,215,046,068,469.75