Worst of the day.

Worst idea: Pay for a banner ad with a graphic of the quote "Dream as if you'll live forever, live as if you'll die today." and add the phone number of a suicide hotline.

My cancellation letter to DirecTV

Hello.

I have searched in vain through all of the account options you offer online, and the one I've not encountered is to end all service. I have come to the decision that paying for dozens of sports channels that I never watch, home shopping channels, family channels, other niche channels, all unwatched, is not worth the cost of your package deals and regular irritating sales calls offering premium packages that I consistently do not want, but keep getting annoying telemarketing offers for regardless.

So, enough is enough. I'd rather continue my life without subscription television than hear constant lobbying to the government saying that people like me are demanding to pay for hundreds of channels of which they only watch a few. My life's busy enough without the constant nagging of "But with this monthly special, you could pay for more channels you don't watch!"

So, please, is there a cancellation option on your website, or do I need to navigate your telephone customer service?

Oh good.

Excellent. Someone is speaking out against the abomination

I saw this trailer and thought: Wow. So Disney really has resorted to meme bingo for their films. Can we capitalize on the perceived popularity of Latino culture? Can we tie in the Paris Hilton/Lindsay Lohan/Nicole Ritchie/Whatever angle? Can we market it like an action/adventure flick?

So while I get the next bits of collaborative project together, here's an easy one:

Think up two unlikely popular memes and dream up a genre pic they could be marketed as. Leave 'em in the comments, or even better, explain the concept as you see it on your space, leave a comment pointing back to your entry, and I'll link back to you.

Mine: Lolcats vs. Pirates vs. Ninjas. A love story: Illiterate felines with awkward jokes find themselves infatuated with both Pirates and Ninjas in a feel-good romantic comedy and their love triangle.

Go.

The Master Strikes

You must go read this now.

I know, you're thinking, "But I don't give a shit about Disneyworld!" I know, be still. Many of us don't give a shit about Disneyworld.

This is Disneyworld through James Lileks. The man whose website contains plenty of wonderful things, including such luminary works as "The Gallery of Regrettable Food"

(link via BoingBoing)

Yes, again.

Promise I'll stop. Just need to put something else in my car stereo to listen to.

Time off for good behavior.

Let it go...it gets stuck in my head.



No, I don't know why Rob Kleiner keeps doing the jumping off the synth stand thing.

A quotation.

It wasn't the New World that mattered ... Columbus died almost without seeing it; and not really knowing what he had discovered. It's life that matters, nothing but life — the process of discovering, the everlasting and perpetual process, not the discovery itself, at all. But what's the use of talking! I suspect that all I'm saying now is so like the usual commonplaces that I shall certainly be taken for a lower-form schoolboy sending in his essay on "sunrise", or they'll say perhaps that I had something to say, but that I did not know how to "explain" it. But I'll add, that there is something at the bottom of every new human thought, every thought of genius, or even every earnest thought that springs up in any brain, which can never be communicated to others, even if one were to write volumes about it and were explaining one's idea for thirty-five years; there's something left which cannot be induced to emerge from your brain, and remains with you forever; and with it you will die, without communicating to anyone perhaps the most important of your ideas. But if I too have failed to convey all that has been tormenting me for the last six months, it will, anyway, be understood that I have paid very dearly for attaining my present "last conviction." This is what I felt necessary, for certain objects of my own, to put forward in my "Explanation". However, I will continue.

-Fyodor Dostoevsky

You. Watch. Now.

Not exactly a celebrity chef, but Mark Bittman is one of those guys that always seems to be a bit sharper than average tools such as myself.

So my advice as your attorney is to go watch his 2007 TED talk right now. Or later. No, better now.

Ongoing Dispute #2

Further local hijinks from the police blotter.

• A resident of the 9100 block of Bermuda Drive told police Sunday she and her husband caught a man with a mohawk trying to hotwire their car. The caller said she let her dogs out, and her husband ran out to catch the suspect.
  When the suspect "went after" the caller's husband, he hit the suspect with a baseball bat and he fled. After a police dog search, the man was located and arrested. The incident was reported at 3:45 a.m.


• A caller said someone "hacked up" his trees and bushes and left the debris in the street, 6:55 a.m.


• A man said his roommate broke down a door and was "getting crazy," 7:37 p.m.


• Two males on bicycles were riding on the pier and almost hit pedestrians, 8:50 p.m.


• A male suspect, described as 5 feet 5 inches tall, with brown hair, hit someone with a pole and punched him in the face, causing the victim to lose consciousness. The suspect was last seen wearing a brown shirt and running northbound on Main Street, 12:08 a.m.


• A resident said a drunken man was "beating up cars" and yelling that he was on probation. Six other men were standing around him and laughing, 2:57 a.m.


• Two people were naked in a pool area, 8:36 a.m.


• A car ran over a female pedestrian and drove into a building. Medics noted there was a serious injury and the driver may have been drunk, 10:40 a.m.


• A caller said 40 people were fighting during a soccer game, 12:23 p.m.


• A caller found the severed head of an animal, 5:44 p.m.


• Two men were passed out in a car. Beer could be seen in the vehicle, and the car stereo was "going full blast," 1:17 a.m.


• Three juveniles were tipping over trash cans, going though mailboxes, and were seen tipping over a basketball hoop, 8:50 p.m.


• Copper piping valued at $80 was taken from a truck, 4:18 a.m.


• Copper valued at $1,000 was taken from an unlocked storage bin, 5:39 a.m.


• A surveillance camera was reported stolen, but a second camera may have captured the thief on video, 10:27 a.m.


• Two older transients were making lewd comments to women, 11:45 a.m.


• Juveniles were throwing oranges from a balcony at passing cars, 5:24 p.m.


• A caller said 12 children were throwing rocks at a vacant house in the 400 block of Ninth Street, trying to break out the windows. Police noted the house will be boarded up by city workers and was scheduled to be demolished soon. The house is rumored to be haunted and has been used by the fire department for training purposes. The incident was reported at 1:49 p.m. on Thursday.


• A resident went to talk to a teen neighbor about his loud guitar playing and the teen "cussed out" the caller. Officers went to talk to the boy and he apologized for his behavior, 5:57 p.m.


• Several subjects were throwing up in a resident's yard, 11:33 p.m.

Copper thefts up. Juveniles throwing things up. Uninjured pedestrians down.

Source: OC Register

Jury Duty

via kottke.org, this link from The Chicago Tribune....

I really can't decide, which makes for a better R. Kelly jury pool slip.

Exhibit A:

Please call my mom: When one juror failed to show up for service, deputies called his house and his mother answered. She told the court that she didn't know where her son was and that he hadn't been "right" since he was shot in the head a while back. The judge and attorneys agreed to let him off the hook.

Exhibit B:

I blame R. Kelly for Sept. 11: When the judge asked one prospective juror about his feelings regarding Kelly, he cryptically answered: "R. Kelly may have led the Taliban in attacking us on 9-11, but you can't prove it." You're right, we can't. In fact, we're fairly certain that no one has ever tried.