• Massachusetts already has mandatory health care. For the most part people there dont want to reverse it… so why should they have serious care about the National health care legislation? The only thing they’re really missing in the State plans is real price controls. Of course, at this point I’m not sure if I’d support the health insurance legislation without knowing which bill or compromise they end up going with.
• Martha Coakley was either evil or stupid. Look up her history as an Attorney General. Look at how she responded to the Aqua Teen Hunger Force light boards. Look at her name in the news for the last 20 years and how most of the stories do not make her look good. I was confused over how she kept winning Attorney General elections, and I’m confused about how she beat out people with good records in the primary, but I am not confused at all about why she lost the final election.
• The Republican that was voted in (Scott Brown) may not be the worst thing to happen to the Democrats. Democrats have members of their own party that are more conservative/neoconservative than this guy is. Hell, looking at his position I feel the guy is actually more independent than Lieberman. Although he has a lot of stances I dont like, compared to Coakley I probably would have voted for this guy too. For the record, Scott Brown did vote for the Massachusetts health care bill despite being against the proposed Senate bill.
• The ‘independents’ seem to be defined by the media as people that vote on issues rather than by party affiliation alone. We are constantly reminded that independents helped elect Obama on a message of Change. Guess what? Independents elected Scott Brown on a message of change too (but probably not a health care change). People that vote on issues know that the letter next to a person’s name doesn’t mean that a person is automatically smart or evil. After all, Martha Coakley was evil and a Democrat.
• Before the election Democrats had 59 members in Senate. Now they have 59 members in Senate. Of those 59, they have at least 4 members that wont vote for a goddamn thing anyway, so this election did no more to kill health care/insurance bills than they were already doing to themselves. Even if there were 60 Democrats there is no way all 60 will ever agree on a single damn thing.
• Maybe its time for the pussyfooted majority party to start forcing the minority party to actually follow through on their filibuster threats. Make them stand for four days. Make them appear on national news reading books out loud or singing old fight songs. Make them explain why they’re blocking a vote on something. Hell, make them hold themselves accountable.
• If biting the entire thing off at once doesn’t work, start going at it piecemeal. People can understand simple things like “This bill makes it so insurance companies cant cancel you if you get sick” but they cant understand “Here is 1000 pages of stuff thats even harder to read than the Patriot act was”. They can understand things like “Doctors should have to have posted prices just like Mechanics do” but cant understand the difference between a death panel and legitimate end of life counseling.

I could go one for hours, and I’ve already left the realm of the Senate Election. I will now resume my regularly scheduled diet of porn and sarcasm.

I mean, seriously, have you ever had problems with animals coming out of your pipes? Have you ever seen a place that had pipes just strewn about randomly outdoors where they would do no good at all? Have you ever just suspended a pipe from your ceiling for the hell of it? Plus, I’m sure the EPA would be damn interested to hear about all the pipes just randomly gorging their contents into the water reservoirs. No wonder some of the fish can fly there.

Even going back to the original 1983 Mario bros… crabs coming out of the pipes? I mean, I know some of you have crabs going into your pipes (you know who you are) but has anyone ever seen crabs coming out of them? No wonder Mario spits fire.

For example:

I challenge the readers, email harvesters, and spam-bots that frequent this website to find a horrible/tragic/disgusting/etc video that is NOT made better by the addition of the Benny Hill theme. You can add the theme to any youtube video by using the “Benny Hillifier” here: http://bennyhillifier.com/.

Sub-Challenge: Someone needs to take the 1man1jar video, speed it up a little, and add the theme song.

In either case the best submissions may end up posted here.

Submissions can be commented on this thread (comments screened) or links can be sent via email to clme@ this domain.

Man#2: Totally! Yeah! I can build it out of some used building materials and plastic sheets I have laying around here and use this old shipping container I’m renting as a wall! That will kick ass!

Man#2: Fuck… I must not have used enough duct tape.

Man#1: I fucked your wife.

Man#2: What?

Man#1: I mean, uh… how about that local sports team?

Today’s episode brought to you by 16 inches of snow in 12 hours.

I like snow in moderation… I like lots of things in moderation. But this is a sign that the earth hates us and will do what it can to get rid of us.

By the way: Despite the over-use of duct tape that was not my carport. I would have at least reinforced the duct tape with some chicken wire and bondo.

“Chris, I put on my robe
and wizard hat. Roll for
initiative. Love, Shaun,
your Dungeon Master”

Almost instantly I wondered if I could take its clothes off.

10 points to Gryffindor.

I wish i knew how to quit you.

I know I speak for all of the PenIsMightier staff when I wish Jeer and TheOnyx a happy life together.

Insert a MIDI of “When Doves Cry” here.

I hung up and went back to sleep. I woke up an hour later wondering if I had dreamed the earlier call. I checked my phone and it verified that the call had indeed happened.

I asked my girlfriend about it over lunch today. She swore adamantly that it was not her sending the flowers. Once I finally believed her, I sat and thought about who might send me flowers:

• My most resent ex: While possible, this would be uncharacteristic of her.
• The company that installed my new air conditioning system a last week (and consequently set off a fire sprinkler while welding a copper pipe without a heat shield, thus flooding part of my condo as well as part of the one underneath and the garage below that): I figured they might be trying to play nice after the massive fuck-up.
• Your mom: She’s such a softie.

The flowers arrived late in the day. This is what I found:
(click for larger images)

Suddenly, I remembered the E-mail conversation:

---

From: Jeer
Subject: Get Lamp

A documentary about text adventure!

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UwZxUGmqSOo

and this:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4nigRT2KmCE&feature=related

=D

---

From: TheOnyx

I love lamp.

---

From: Jeer

You love dick.

---

From: TheOnyx

You keep hoping for our “Happily Ever After”, but you never do anything about it.

---

From: Jeer

How about I FTD some flowers for you?

Would that make you slip off your chair, sweetheart?

---

From: TheOnyx

It’s like you don’t even know me.

---

Well-played, good sir. Well-played, indeed.

This of course is not surprising from the guy that is best known around here for testicles with smiley faces

Eventually we retreated to the wave pool to bob around for a bit before venturing to the outdoors to forage for dinner. While there, my wife pointed out a particularly large fellow that was floating in the water about 20 feet away from us. He was covered in what can only be described as fur, with each individual strand moving of its own accord, as though posessing a life of its own. It was mesmerizing.

It was at this point that my wife said “Wow, there is finally someone here that is actually hairier than you are.”

Yes, I could feel the love.

The strange thing though is that over the last year the emails have all started to have something in common, no matter who they were coming from. Nearly every single one says, in some way or another, don’t bother replying to this if you do not agree.

See, its OK for them to send me things that I don’t agree with, but not OK for me to do the same in turn. I’m being told in advance they wont bother reading my reply anyway. Nice of them to keep the debate open, isn’t it?

The other trick is to throw in something like “Of course the bleeding heart liberals/traitors/terrorist-sympathizers will not be able to avoid typing an angry response to this” in a way to keep me from replying because somehow they magically brand me in advance.

So I looked through the last three months of email I got from just one relative of mine and made a collage. It was just like going back into grade school… depressing and full of ridicule. Most of the images used in the collage are of the ‘do not bother replying’ variety, but I threw in a few other items from some mails just to give it the right flavor.

Click on the image for a full sized version. Enjoy.

First of all, how fucked up is it that we’re all calling him Balloon Boy when he wasn’t even in the damn balloon? How is this kid going to end up being known as balloon boy his entire life? At least Baby Jessica the Well Girl was actually stuck in a well.

But the biggest reason I need everyone to stop talking about Balloon Boy is because I keep getting “Up Up and Away” by the 5th Dimension stuck in my head every time someone mentions it. In fact, I’m beginning to twitch a little every time the chorus goes through my head.

As such, I must subject you all to it as well:

At least, thats what the people that kept calling me were saying; I didn’t have a window nearby so I couldn’t verify their tales. When people calling in for tech support start talking about the weather I have a feeling they’re just feeling helpless. In some way they are trying to prove that they’ve got some advantage over me because they have a concept of the outside temperature and precipitation levels. Despite that, talking about the weather is normally the high point of a call. The rest is typically awkward silences followed by nervous responses to questions.

However, today things were about to veer from the norm. Today I got a call from someone that refused to talk about atmospheric phenomenon at all! In fact, the caller refused to talk about much of anything. He just kept saying “Hey, can I bring my laptop over. I’d rather talk about this in person.”

Typically I try to avoid letting users into my inner sanctum since then they know what I have in inventory and are more likely to ask for things. However, something in this gentleman’s voice swayed me so I acquiesced to his request.

Five minutes later he was sitting in front of my desk holding a laptop. Without saying a word he opened the lid and turned the laptop around to face me. I was in shock… the laptop keyboard was missing half of its keys, and many of the remaining ones looked like they had been chewed on.

I looked at him, pleading for an explanation. Finally I spoke up “Ok… so were you using your laptop as a bird feeder, or as a chew toy?”

He suddenly couldn’t meet my eyes. “Neither… my pig ate it.”

I tried to maintain a straight face. I went so far as to fake a ‘facepalm’ in order to hide the snickers that were beginning to sneak out. However, in the end I just ended up snorting into my hands before I broke out into full laughter.

“Wait, so what were you doing with your laptop on a farm?”
“No, I have a house-pig. I had my laptop on a coffee table, and the pig managed to get up on the table and root at the keyboard. He got most of the keys off, and it took me 20 minutes to get some of them out of its mouth.”

I looked a little closer at the keyboard, and noticed something out of place.

“How did these keys get teeth marks on them?”

He directed his gaze at the floor before responding. “I… I spent half the night trying to put the keys back on the keyboard before I realized a lot of the clips under the keys were damaged.” He then reached into his pocket and pulled out a zip-lock baggie with the missing keys in them. Most of them were completely unrecognizable.

I couldn’t help it… I laughed again. I knew about the horrors of putting keys back on some keyboards, and the thought of attempting it on an entire keyboard was absurd.

I continued to give the guy some crap, but my heart just wasn’t in it. Finally I looked into getting a replacement keyboard.

Thankfully the laptop was covered under a no-fault warranty. However, as penance I made him call it in and explain to our warranty support exactly why the keyboard needed replacement. The poor Indian guy on the other end of the line just couldn’t process the explanation and finally just said “So… um… lets just say its malfunctioning then”.

Then he talked about the weather.

Somehow he knew it was cloudy outside.

Since the Grand Theft Auto – San Andreas files were such a hit I decided to do the same thing for Grand Theft Auto – Vice City.

Of course, the only reason I do this is because I still haven’t upgraded my PC to the point that I can play GTA4. Its kind of sad really.

That said, the files are below. As with the other game files I make no guarantee that they will work. It is up to you to discover where the files need to be located on your computer. While the default location is a subdirectory of the “My Documents” directory, if you use any ‘compatibility mode’ settings it can default to different places.

GTA VC Slot 8 – No story missions completed. Pizza Delivery missions done (+50 health), Vigilante missions done (+50 vest) and Paramedic missions done (unlimited sprint). Several properties have been purchased.

GTA VC Slot 7 – Same as Slot 8, but this one has been saved in the “Skumole Shack” in the locked out area of the map. I got there using a bus to get to an area of the map that had boats. Step one, Step two, Step three.

GTA VC Slot 6 – Same as slot 7, but includes all 100 packages collected. (pizza, delivery, vigilante, and packages, but no story missions).

Sorry, I wont take requests to do additional missions on this one (expecially taxi and fire… I didn’t find those too useful). If however you find a save game useful or have constructive comments please feel free to leave a message or send me a mail at clme(at)[this_domain_name].

Thanks!

I lose faith in humanity somewhere between the discharge and the Indian smelling.

If you’re interested in how the “Google Suggest” feature works, check out this page on Google for more information.

For the record, Google Suggest has helped many on the Pen forum realize that they hate people too! I finally have some people that agree with me that people suck.

Its too bad I hate them all.

I step out the door holding a flashlight and a baseball bat, and start to walk around my house looking for an injured raccoon or a cat in heat. Then I hear the noise again, but this time it sounds less like a feral creature… it almost sounds human.

“whoahoahoahoahoahoahoahoa”

I walk back to the front of my house and then out to the street, trying to ascertain the direction the noise is coming from.

“Whoahoa *gasp* fuckfuckfuckfuckfuckfuck whoahoahoahoahoa”

Ok. That is definitely a human noise.

Finally I look towards the house at the end of the street. There is a single illuminated window in upstairs level of the house, and much of that window is currently blocked by a man and a woman. The woman has her head and breasts out of the window while a man behind her is having sex with her.

So here I am standing in the middle of the street holding a flashlight and a baseball bat, and I’m not wearing shoes or a shirt. Yet, for a fleeting moment, I’m not the strangest person in my neighborhood. While thinking about that, I realize that I should probably not continue to stand in the street, so I wipe the drool off my chin and head back inside to go to bed.

But there turns out to be a problem… the neighbor is loud enough that it keeps me from sleeping. I have no idea what type of drugs give people that much sexual stamina, but she keeps screaming out her window off and on for the next three hours, which makes sleeping difficult. About every 30 minutes or so they take a break, but even then they are loud, since they step outside to smoke a cigarette and yell obscenities at one another. I’m sure it would have been quite a show if I didn’t have to work early that morning.

Finally at about 3am the woman steps outside with her mother. They apparently wanted to have a private conversation, since they crossed the street into my yard and started to talk under my bedroom window. It seems that the reason this show was put on was for the benefit of the woman’s stepfather. The story went that he kept hitting on her, and her mother was ignoring it, so she decided to really make him mad by having wild sex with some asshole as loud as possible while he was trying to sleep.

Yeah. Ok. I’m not sure if that makes sense to anyone else, but I’m still confused as hell about how that was supposed to make the old pervert mad as opposed to making him jerk off furiously outside her door.

Anyway, the woman and her mother continue to chat for about 20 minutes while sharing cigarettes. By the end they were crying and hugging one another.

After this lovefest they all go back inside and there was glorious silence. I sleep like the dead for about two hours… but them I’m jolted awake by the sound of tires squealing as the woman’s fucktoy takes off in a rush, with her yelling insults and chasing after his truck.

While I’m on my way to work I only have one thought on my mind… how the fuck can she still walk?

*phone rings*
Me: This is Clem, what can I do to you today?
User: Hi Clam, I have a… wait, what?
Me: What is the nature of your issue today?
User: Oh. This is Nancy downstairs, and I just put a ticket in for one of my employees I wanted you to look at please.
Me: Ok. Lets see here…

Ticket ########:
Frances would like a stand/lift or new PC. She feels her PC is attracting cockroaches and she thinks lifting it would make them less attracted to the heat her PC produces.

Me: Wait… what? Cockroaches aren’t attracted to heat alone.
User: Well, her desk is crawling with them, and we always seem to see them most often by the PC.
Me: Does she keep food at her desk?
User: Yes, she has two drawers worth of food. We all share what she brings in.
Me: Oh dear.
User: Can we hang the computer from the ceiling to keep the cockroaches off the desk maybe?
Me: Hang the computer from the… You’re kidding right? You’re fixing the wrong problem here.
User: Are you going to help me or do I have to call your supervisor.
Me: Wow. Ok. To tell the truth, I need to bring HR, facilities maintenance, and both of our supervisors into this one.
User: Thats more like it. Wait… what?
Me: Just a moment please.

*I had to hit mute here and catch my breath. I was simultaneously laughing and crying so hard*

Me: Ok. I’m back. For the time being there will be no more food at or in the desks until the facilities guy calls an exterminator and talks to all of you.
User: No need to call an exterminator. She already has roach traps clipped under her desk, and she spread roach killing paste along the bottom of the keyboard.
Me: You have got to be fucking kidding me…
User: Hey, no swearing in this department. I’ll have to have you written up.
Me: You’re fixing the wrong problem again.
User: Huh?
Me: I’ll have facilities talk to you. Can you please move Frances to a different desk for now please. Working near that paste and eating roach feces isn’t healthy for her.
User: I cant move her, she’s signed into a phone right now.
Me: That desk is a biohazard. Move her as soon as she finishes her call.
User: I’d have to move her upstairs then!
Me: That sounds great. in fact, hold that thought.
User: Say, do you think the exterminator will take care of the ants too?
Me: What? How… but… uh… for crying out… please hold.

A bit of a rant here… most offices are glorified warehouses with poor ventilation and lots of insulated nooks for rodents to thrive in. All they need is a food source and they become a great habitat, especially during winter months. For some reason when ever people bring food to work they’re more worried about hiding their food from scavenging coworkers than protecting them from scavenging insects and rodents.

After the department was fumigated and all food purged I made a newbie I.T. guy clean the roach paste off the keyboard and then quarantine the computer in a plastic bag in a closet for a few weeks. Yes, ‘Frances’ had no computer at her desk during that time frame. Quarantining the computer was probably unnecessary, but damn it was satisfying.

Now, if only I could get rid of that chair that smells like urine I’ll feel like I made a difference.

Take last Friday for example…

*phone rings*

Me: I.T. Support, this is Clem.
User: Hi Ken. My printer isn’t working.
Me: Ok. When did it stop working?
User: Yesterday sometime.
Me: Ok. Is this an escalation? Did you call it in then?
User: Well, I saw Frank at a restaurant while I was out for lunch and I told him. He should have taken care of it!
Me: Uh… Ok. Nevermind. Lets talk about that printer. Whats wrong?
User: Its my receipt printer. It only prints on one line and wont pull the paper.
Me: Ok. Is it doing anything else strange?
User: Sometimes it does kind of pull the paper, but then it isn’t lined up and gets jammed.
Me: Great. Its one of the dot matrix printers, right?
User: Can you give me a newer one?
Me: I guess that means yes. Can you tell me if there is a lever on top of the printer?
User: Oh. I’m not next to the printer right now. Should I be next to the printer?
Me: Yes please.
User: I’ll have to put you on hold.
Me: That’s fine. I’ll be here.

*five minutes of hold music*

User: Hello? Who is this?
Me: Its Clem with I.T. Are you near the printer?
User: Oh! I was just talking to Ken! Sorry. I checked email and I saw I had an email from my husband and another from my boss that were really important so I…

*I expire her account while she’s explaining what she is doing*

User: …and I’ll just be a minute my husband emailed me back. Hey! Email just stopped working!
Me: Boy. That’s strange. We’ll have to make sure we look at that as soon as we finish with the printer.
User: Uh… Ok. Please hold.

*one minute of hold music*

User: Ken?
Me: Clem.
User: I’m at the printer now.
Me: Great! Can you take a look at the lever on top of the printer for me?
User: Its in the middle.
Me: What does that position say?
User: Uh, it has a picture of the printer and paper on it. There are two other pictures too at the front and back, and they have words underneath the pictures.
Me: …
User: I don’t know how to describe those pictures.
Me: That’s Ok. Can you describe the words underneath the pictures please?
User: Sure! Its on bottom right now, and the other two say top and rear.
Me: Great. Change it to rear.
User: Ok…

*I hear the printer start printing*

User: But now it isn’t lined up!
Me: That’s fine. We didn’t need to try printing yet. Our next step is to take the paper out and reload it.
User: Ok.

*I hear the printer start printing again!*

Me: Did it line up?
User: How did you know I printed?
Me: I have a fifth sense.
User: Can you see what I’m doing on the screen right now?
Me: We’ll fix your email in a minute.
User: I knew it!
Me: I’m just guessing. Did it print?
User: Yes! Its fixed!
Me: Ok. Just remember that the printer prefers rear entry.
User: Wha?

*I turn her account back on*

User: Hey! Email is working again. Thanks bye!

*she hangs up the phone without waiting for a response*

*I dial up another I.T. guy*

Me: Hey, why did you transfer that call to me?
IT Guy: Sorry man, I just couldn’t deal with her again.
Me: Oh? Why not?
IT Guy: She keeps fucking with her printer and wants me to go down there and fix it when she messes up the alignment or moves the levers around.
Me: Huh. I guess she really doesn’t like rear entry.

*I hear a crashing sound as the phone is dropped*

Me: Hello? Are you ok?
IT Guy: Dude.
Me: The thing I cant figure out is if she doesn’t like rear entry, why does she put it on bottom instead?
IT Guy: I got to go.

*he hangs up the phone*

So few people truly appreciate a good pun.