Category Archives: Culture

Where is Bob?

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The best piece of writing I scanned today came from Where is Bob? which may or may not be a fake, but is definitely a fun read.  The gist is that Bob is an unpleasant manager who is always away from the office, and lies pathologically about it.  I highly recommend you start at the beginning and read from there, there are only a few posts to catch up on.  It had me laugh out loud a few times.

5 Minute Temptation

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I need someone to give this a try at home pronto and let me know if it actually works.  Make a chocolate cake in a coffee mug in your microwave.

While it looks rather like a cup of poop while it’s rising (below) it looks darned appetizing once you get it out of the mug.

Cup-a-cake

I’m thinking our children will fatten up nicely on a steady diet of mugcake twice a day.  Even better, I’m wondering what it would taste like with a little splash of Kahlua in the ingredients?

Now go, and bake, and report.

Metafilter provideth.

Calvin’s Dad

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Calvin and Hobbes is the best cartoon that ever was, hands down.  I miss it terribly to this day.  One of the best characters was his Dad, always responding to Calvin’s questions with absolute gibberish answers.  Neatorama posted a link to a collection of these exchanges, awesome answers to fundamental questions like “Why does the sky turn red when the sun sets?” and “Why does ice float?”.

As I read them I realize I must have been influenced by him in my own parenting.  For instance, yesterday morning Cael was looking for Quinn upstairs.  He asked me where he was and I told him the monkeys came and took him away.  He laughed and said No….

I persisted, and said yep, the flying monkeys came right through that window and took Quinn, happens all of the time, I said.

His eyes grew round and he was stammering something when Nikki came to his rescue (probably wanting to head off all of the sleepless nights due to nightmares) and told him I was kidding (with a reproachful look in my direction).  He wandered away, muttering in a half-relieved tone, clearly relieved to know there aren’t flying monkeys that remove children from their homes.

Nikki and I don’t see eye to eye on these things, it seems.  I think it’s important for children to know that there are things we can’t explain in this world, even if those things aren’t technically true, or real.  Besides, I just like messing with their brains.  It makes me happy.  That must be the way that Bill Watterson felt when he made Calvin’s Dad that way…

Alzheimer’s Trap

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I saw an article (it’s literally all over the web now) about a fake bus stop outside a senior’s home that acts like a honey pot and “traps” wayward seniors who wander outside and try to go home.  The bus stop looks real, but the bus doesn’t stop there.  The seniors don’t know that, and wait patiently.  This gives the staff the opportunity to go out and gently lead them back inside.  The beauty of Alzheimer’s is that trick will probably work again tomorrow.

I must say that on one side that sounds kind of mean, but then again it probably saves the lives of these people, otherwise wandering away into the winter night.

I can only hope somebody does the same for me when I am older.  Maybe a fake beer keg on the sidewalk, luring me over, trying to pump some 50 out of it.  Or probably even an arcade might work, retro gaming machines beckoning to my newly adolescent-again mind.  The staff could wait until I was out of quarters and then lead me back to my room with the surety that I would almost certainly attempt to escape again in the morning.  All they need to do is make sure I have a pocket full of quarters when I wake up.  Another probable successful trap would be a few shiny gadgets, and laptops sitting on a bench by the door.

Perfect security.