Wednesday, September 24, 2008

My brain's tied in knots

Fascinating little headline I just saw:

'Idol' Star Clay Aiken to Reveal He Is Gay


Now, I'm pretty indifferent to Clay Aiken. All I can say is I'm aware that there is a celebrity out there with that name.

But I'm very intrigued by the form of that verb "to reveal". Apparently it's known that Clay Aiken will reveal he is gay, but he has not yet actually revealed he is gay. How does that work?

The more I try to unravel this, the more my brain hurts. I must consult my secret cabal of linguists and logicians.

Tuesday, September 23, 2008

Comics Snarkiness

I've been a fan of The Comics Curmudgeon for some time, but I've been feeling lately that it's just not enough to satisfy my need for comics snarkiness. I need more.

Fortunately, I have happened across Angry Kem's Japes For Owre Tymes.

I know what you're thinking. "Not another blog that takes Blondie and Beetle Bailey and translates them into Middle English! I mean, granted it was a noble and much-needed service when the first couple of blogs appeared that translated comic strips into Middle English. It's generally accepted that the dot-com boom of the late 1990s was fueled by the need to make Middle English-language versions of Garfield and Dilbert available to every schoolchild in the country. But nowadays the market for this sort of thing is so saturated, how is one more blog that translates comic strips into Middle English going to survive?

Angry Kem, though, is an actual English professor who brings some much-needed rigor to the field.

Wednesday, September 10, 2008

Internet Morons

Thanks to the Internet, every day people who follow American politics get to read such eloquence as this:
It's pretty funny that how bad it is for Palin to be a Pentecostal BUT it is just fine for Obama to be Muslim.
That is ironic liberals...........

And this:
We need to deport McBush back to where he came from}PANAMA--no illegals allowed.

And I know intellectually, in that high cerebral cortex part of my brain, that it's not real. I know they're just Internet morons, doing what they do. This is why we have the expression "Do not feed the trolls."

But part of me doesn't realize that. Part of me thinks those are the real opinions of real people. And my tummy hurts.

I know Internet morons don't want me to be sad. So I propose that every comment like the ones above be preceded by an "Internet moron notice", to put it in its proper context. This is a voluntary plan that I hope all Internet morons will adopt.
**Internet Moron Post**
It's pretty funny that how bad it is for Palin to be a Pentecostal BUT it is just fine for Obama to be Muslim.
That is ironic liberals...........

And this:
**Internet Moron Post**
We need to deport McBush back to where he came from}PANAMA--no illegals allowed.

(Full Disclosure: I got those two comments from YouTube. Some may regard that as cheating, given YouTube's reputation, but I didn't want to waste too much time hunting for moron droppings.)

Tuesday, September 9, 2008

She Stole His Spleen!

She Stole His Spleen, Then His Heart is an absolutely wonderful headline which could even be adapted as a Lyttle Lytton contest entry.

But it turns out it's just a review of some novel where a girl steals a guy's spleen and then he falls in love with her.