The Power of Three

Are you trying to boss me around or just propositioning me? (Or, dare I say...both???)

I wish I'd bought this, if just to see the reaction on a friend's face when (s)he opened the gift box.

Six Minutes!

I really have no time if I want to make my deadline, so I will just say...

...

I wish I has bought this tripartite of portraits so I could recreate the effects with Rick Astley photos.

The big question would be whether I would display them in the same room -- so the joke was a quick one -- or in separate locations -- so as to set two different themes for the rooms.

Damn, I missed the deadline by a minute.

Walt Whittleman

"Push it. Push it real good."

These Are a Few of My Favorites

1. People watching at the gym
2. Window shopping
3. Sarcasm
4. Grammar
5. Salt and Pepper shakers
...
-13. Taking out the trash
...
165. '90s nostalgia

Many of these things meet in the trash bungalow (or, as I meant to type, "can below").

I had intended to grow this tedious and trying-too-hard (there has got to be a single word to express the adjectival sense of that idea, bit nothing that comes to mind feels right) introduction into a punchline, delivered at the moment of rhetorical climax, but I can't see beneath the ellipsis that parts the two things in my mind. So I give up will try again.

[My Revisory Committee is in session so it will improve upon my previous paragraph now. See below.]

"I had intended to fluff this flaccid and overcompensating foreplay (of words) into an ejaculation released at the moment of (rhetorical) climax, but I have a headache."

In other news, if at first you don't succeed*...don't take "no" for an answer (wink wink RAPE).

*I am eternally amused by this New cell phone because its autocorrect faculty creates the illusion of Freudian slips. Take above, for example. The phone chose to repeat some words...to arrive at the inspirational message: "If at first you don't succeed, don't succeed."

I will leave you with that. But I'll be back Solomon (or "sooooon").

Holy typo, Batman!

I suppose I should find some fodder for today's bit.

Since I don't have much time before the day ends (this fact being important because a. Waiting until 12:01 to finalize this post will cause me to fail at consecutive days blogging which exacerbates my just-below-the-surface OCD and b. This post can only handle a few "well-placed" tangents, a fact which determines the maximum blog length), I offer you a flowchart to explain the sequence of book titles. An interpretation of their adjacencies' sequence, if you will:

The Ultimate Guide to Atlanta Schools: "I am looking for a college but can't relocate and ( don't wanna get into too much debt / only have community college SAT scores)."

Your Way to Success: "Surely education is the way to get ahead in this world."

The Psychology of The Sopranos: "But TV tells me that ingenuity and an enterprising spirit (and crime) get you ahead in this world. I believe everything I see on TV."

You Can Have It All:
"Yes, I can see how becoming a mob boss might lead to feelings of entitlement (and, I imagine, fulfillment).

Fish!: A Remarkable Way to Raise Morale and Deliver Results:
"Yes, I trust a mob boss has some pretty remarkable techniques to deliver results. I guess the morale boosts involve some sort of monetary incentive."

Raising Kids Who Care and A Practical Guide for New Dads seem a bit incongruous, but I invite your exposition.

Mold imconvenience

So the computer is dead but now I have this fancy smartphone that presumes to know what i'm typing. I downloaded the blogger app to tide us over until the computer gets fixed. (For what it's worth, the computer should be an easy fix, but since it took me a week to convince myself to go grocery shopping -- fall is beautiful! -- it may be another week before it's fixed.)

That being said, bask in the hilarity of this grammar Nazi's predicament (and that's to say nothing about the limitations imposed on my tangential cerebral pathways) and look at a few photos with me.

Alright, so it appears that the mobile Blogger limits me to a single pic. But perhaps that's a better way to get the job done. I mean, feng shui is about clearing out the clutter so your chi doesn't get clogged. It seems that headless Supermom is my chi's laxative.

Yum.

(Though I could definitely be more regular. In blogging...or whatever.)

So about Supermom: Wouldn't you think a headless body the antithesis of a hero? I mean even when Superman died -- it's not a spoiler if it happened over a decade ago (just don't tell the Neo-Nazi amnesiac what came of Hitler unless you like eating curbs) -- his head was still attached. Pretty sure even zombie superheroes retain some part of their heads...but not Supermom! Who needs a head with a brain to question traditional gender roles when your womb churns out boys that your breast milk (nectar of the gods...er, Christian God) turns into moral and upstanding citizens? Why not replace your finely-coiffed mane with some metal hooks...God knows you could use some more places to hang your pots and pans.

The Payback

Rather than hoarding all of my photos so I only have to go shopping once a month (God knows I frequent the thrift shops more often than that), I'm going to take you shopping with me this time around. Hopefully your internet connection is fast enough to handle all the photos I'm sending your way. If not, feel free to bitch about it in the comments.

I visited Shallowford Goodwill to find a few summery dresses with blue tags (50% off this week). I filled up an entire cart and hogged a dressing room for almost an hour, but rustled up 9 dresses, 2 purses, and a Disney Dinosaur mug for just over $50. Not a bad day in all.

This "dress" did not make the cut.

The rest of these photos are from a few days later, after I had recovered from the scowls from women inconvenienced by my extended stay in the dressing room. (Side note: There were 2 other women's dressing rooms in this shop kept locked until employees unlocked them. I won't feel guilty for others' reluctance to seek out an employee with a key.)

After an encounter with my armchair's doppelganger...

$20 at a different Goodwill, but it matches the decor here better.

...After some more memorable clothing missteps...

An AK-47 is a bitch to get through airport security and your sniper rifle is just another checked bag. Skip the $50 luggage fee and the wasted hours  in a holding cell and just bring your own guns in this baby pink muscle tee.

Pairs well with fried chicken.

Only Poo(h) can justify adult overalls.

  [After all that which came before]...I came across a strange collection:

It would be irresponsible to omit the holiday teapots.
 

Now, I collect salt and pepper shakers (still working out a way to display them, but I digress)...so I'm not here to judge. But I couldn't help but wonder what world event had caused someone to discard their cherished collection.

I considered making a Kim Jong-un joke, but my Google search pulled up recent news stories about the execution of his ex-girlfriend by firing squad for having some old sex tapes so I will have to pass on Plan A. Suffice to say, there are so many layers of wrong in that situation and it's well past time to break that monster's teapot.

Back to my lighter tone...why would someone abandon an entire teapot collection? I suppose a guy whose wife had run out on him or something equally reprehensible might demand the collection in the divorce and then promptly trash them. But I would think this hypothetical guy would be more apt to shatter the ceramic atrocities. So we'll scratch grass widower (thefreedictionary's male counterpart to divorcée) from the list.

My other thought was a person displeased with a relative's will. "My older brother gets the house, my little sister gets the Mercedes, and I get a &%*@# teapot collection!?" (Though, the house could very easily be a money pit and the car missing an engine block...or you could just be an asshole that your parents never loved as much as their other offspring.)

The third and most likely explanation for the teapots is that a lady just woke up one day and said to herself, "Myrtle, it's going to be a helluva a lot easier to fit a salt and pepper shaker collection in your nursing home room than all these teapots."

Teapots were just the gateway drug to other fantastic figurines.

It's time to start gathering your Christmas decorations and dusting off your Nativity set. But what if you open the dusty "XMAS" cardboard box to find Joseph's been decapitated over the last year? Why, visit your local thrift shop, of course!

And as any good Christian knows, no Nativity set is complete without a Hindu goddess. (I think this is Sita, but I'm not an authority so research it on your own.)

What do you think about the new addition, Melchior? Surely you've got something on your mind that you want to let out?

A wise guy, eh?

Hey, hey, hey. No need to be a dirty old man. There are kids around.

Those teapots are looking better and better. (Where would you put these stupid things? Why?)

But then again, kids inspire these crazy figurines because they are crazy little creatures. Check out the toys they're playing with these days:

Albino Birdo piggy bank

This elf is 66% creepier in real life.

And look how they're applying their powers of imagination:

According to this diorama: Ecuador is known for its cartographers (though the tools suggest architecture), inferior mortar work, and...nothing else. If someone can point to any deeper meaning, I would be grateful.

And if that crafty creation wasn't enough to persuade you of the inane and insane minds of the young'uns:

My heart hippo on a string

How many ball scarves could one person need?

I was wondering about that hippo on a string, but when I flipped it over everything was crystal clear. I mean, look at what we're giving our kids to read:

Chris Hansen does not approve.

It's enough to make even the superest mom lose her head.

I see what I did there.

 Well, when life gets too overwhelming...food.

Feast!

If you're afraid of overindulging, you can always use a scale.

Only compatible with Atkins diet plans.

Or if you're afraid of underindulging, use the scale for appetite-stimulating herbs start the beers a-flowin'.

Red Lobster can haz beer club?

No matter how plastered you might be at this point, don't forget to grab an oven mitt when you remove your delicious Kwanzaa feast from the rack. (FYI: Christmas doesn't have sole rights to gingerbread cookies.)

Do you know the Muffin Man? Sodomy is kinda his thing.

Just pray that your feasting and binge drinking isn't followed immediately by a reenactment of Human Centipede.

Or the lesser known blaxploitation film Goose Centipede.

(Just so we're clear, the villain in Goose Centipede -- Jackson Sassafras -- connects all of their intestines, bypassing the three smaller ducks' esophagi.)

While we're on the topic of anal probing and exploratory surgery, I turn your attention to these yet-unidentified tools:

Neon colors make everything whimsical!

Before I headed home, I swung by the books. Three snapshots before I go ("Finally!" They sigh in relief).

What was I going to say about this?

Your Way to Success, sponsored by The Sopranos.

Well, of course they did!

Okay, friends. That was fun but a bit exhausting. Maybe one of these days I'll make regular blogging my thing. Until then, try to appreciate the fact that we just went shopping together for an hour. Come along IRL sometime?