OK, it's probably going to be Cheetah. After all, he and I had more in common than I did with Great Leader. (Refer to the illustration at the left, it speaks volumes!)
I just don't know where to start with Uncle Jung-iL. No, wait, yes I do. How about a little humor to brighten up the worlds loss. Ahh, poor Kim Jung-iL. But at least he no ill no more. He dead. HAHAHAHAHAHA!!! I swear, sometimes I just kill me.
I'll give the balding little Asian pear credit for one thing though, he sure knows how to make an exit. I mean, c'mon, THREE 1976 Lincoln Continental stretch limos (where the bloody hell did he get those things???), a fleet of Mercedes S-class sedans that stretched back to the horizon (how did he manage to keep all of the garage door openers organized???) and enough hired mourners to cast an Andrew Lloyd Weber musical with (all of whom were wearing brand new Western-style clothing. When did UPS start servicing Pyongyang???). I did think the Lincoln's were a nice touch even if the media did keep screwing the funeral cortege description up. They kept referring to him going to his last rewards in a Lincoln hearse. As in INSIDE a Lincoln hearse. What he actually did was go to his last rewards ON a Lincoln limo. As in strapped to the roof of it. I don't know about all of you but the only thing I could think of when I saw that was how the Griswold family strapped poor Aunt Edna to the roof of the Country Squire after she died in "National Lampoon's Vacation". All it would have taken was the driver slamming on the breaks to avoid a stray dog running across the street (yeah, like that's ever going to happen in North Korea) and the People's Glorious Republic would have had a dead despot, nipples to the wind, cascading down onto the hood of the Great Satan's vintage land yacht while children fainted, women wailed and vendors sold the local North Korean delicacies of dirt clod on a stick, dirt clod in a cup and dirt clod on a rope. As an aside on the Lincoln's, Ford headquarters has refused all requests for a comment. Something tells me someone in Detroit got a train load of kimchi back in 1976...
Have you noticed that there hasn't been a single word about how he died? That can only mean one thing: EMBARRASSING AS HELL!!! I'm opting for a scenario that includes a whore house, a three-legged mulatto conjoined twin hooker, a Hennessey cognac enema, a leather umbrella and a bit of auto-erotic asphyxiation that took a turn for the worse. I can only assume that the mop and bucket brigade that got sent in to "sanitize" the situation are all now pulling double shifts in a salt mine somewhere and their families have all been relocated to a communal farm where they are happily planting next years crop of dirt clods. Arbeit macht frei, as they say...
More than anything I will miss his fashion sense (OK, I've stopped laughing now) which was always about as exciting as beige. Well, now that I think about it, it actually was beige. He single handedly brought new importance to the polyester leisure suit, the comb-over and vintage Jackie-O "spot welder" sunglasses of which he was reported to have had over 500 pairs. He once told me that he had so many so he could keep a pair in each of his Mercedes'. Spoken like a true fashionista!!! Thank god Gianni Versace is dead, this would have killed him!!!
Thursday, December 29, 2011
Wednesday, December 14, 2011
I'm So Damned Old That I'm Analog!!!
OK, so a couple of weeks ago I got my car mushed. By a monster 4x4 creature about 22 feet long and 9 feet high. In a parking lot of a grocery store. In all honesty, the damned thing literally backed up completely over my car. Stop laughing, it's true. It flattened my hood and killed my grill. I was not amused. Pleasantries were NOT exchanged to say the least. I never knew how liberating it is to stand in the middle of a parking lot and scream "FUUUUCK!!!" at the top of your lungs 5 or 6 times. But I digress.
So, I take my car in to be fixed (at the 4x4's idiot owner's expense) and they hand me the keys to a free rental car. Very cool. A brand new 2012 Toyota Camry. VERY cool. And that puppy is loaded up to its tits with toys. Happy dance! I wasn't in the car more that 2 seconds when I went all deer in headlights though. I realized that I honestly didn't know how to drive it. Seriously, I was lost in the technology. Now I know how my great-grandfather must have felt when he retired the horse and got that Model T.
First, I couldn't find the parking brake lever. It wasn't on my side of the console, it wasn't on the passenger side of the console, hell, it wasn't even IN the console. I finally found it down in the foot well, to the left of the brake pedal. The same place they used to put them way back in the 1960's. Ahh, those wily Japanese, always something new to confuse us with. When I figured out where to put the key and started it up all hell broke loose. Lights, buzzers, bells and whirly-gigs started going off like crazy. Basically, everything short of a disco ball. The instrument cluster went nuts. It has 5 analog readouts, two multi-function digital ones and a total of 27 diagnostic idiot lights, including tire pressure, oil pressure, air pressure on Mars, MY blood pressure and one that told me that I was putting too much pressure on the steering wheel. One of the multi-function displays started giving me a choice of odometer, trip odometer, my average mpg rating, how many miles I had left on the tank or how many miles I had left to drive to my preset destination. Personally, I don't give a rats ass about any of that shit but thanks for the offer anyway. ALL of the controls for the windows, locks and the mirrors lit up on the armrest. ALL of the controls for the phone and the stereo system lit up on the steering wheel. As did the control arms for the lights, the wipers, the turn signals and the cruise control that were protruding from the steering column. The controls on the center stack looked like something out of the Starship Enterprise. I had heated and air conditioned seats, dual front climate controls (I could actually have the heat going on my side and the air conditioning going on the passenger side. Don't ask me why...), air bag controls and a 9-inch touch screen thing that was my radio, cd player, equalizer, phone, Blue Tooth, Blue Ray, Blue Meanie, Blue Danube, GPS, satellite navigation system and EKG moniter control command center. It was a bit like being trapped inside a 270 horsepower Christmas tree, for chris' sakes!!!
It has a floor mounted automatic and I couldn't figure out how to shift it into drive!!! You didn't do a straight line P-R-N-D-L shift, you had to jog it around like you were shifting a manual transmission. Then I noticed that it had one more position after the "L", something labeled "S". Huh??? Ahh, yes, that would stand for "Speed Shift". Huh??? It seems you put the car in that "gear" and it allows you to shift gears like it was manual using the two other paddles on the steering wheel. Left paddle, clutch. Right paddle, gear shift. What cretin thought that that makes any sense??? Give me a leather wrapped short shifter and a clutch pedal any day!!! I quickly found out that when you take the car out of Park all of the doors automatically lock and the trunk lid puckers.
The outside mirrors have a control signal that lights up to let me know if someone is trying to overcome me from the rear in my blind spots. I'm sorry, I just can't say that without blushing. And giggling. The inside mirror has 3 separate controls to work the 3 separate garage doors it apparently thinks I should have. I can't for the life of me figure out how to use the wipers but I have the cleanest front windshield you have ever seen because I somehow keep managing to mist it with solvent.
Cubby holes. Oh god, does this car have cubby holes. Everywhere!!! 5 in front and 3 in back. And they all have power plugs and USB points in them so we can all happily play our hand held games and listen to our iPods in peace. My god, don't people talk to each other in cars anymore???
I spent half an hour reading the manual for the touch screen thing just to learn how to work the stereo and I have to tell you that it was SO worth the effort!!! That bad boy ROCKS!!! It not only shows me the name of the radio station and the song they're playing it also tells me the title of the cd I'm listening to as well as the artist and title of the track. It has 4 front and rear mounted mid-range speakers, a front center mounted super tweeter, two front door mounted bass speakers and a SUBWOOFER IN THE TRUNK!!! It makes the mirrors vibrate, the trunk lid rattle, the fuel door to pop open indiscriminately and my ears bleed. In a Toyota!!! I'm in heaven. People next to me at stop lights just shake their heads. Not so much because of the noise but because they have been following behind me in the left hand lane for the last 5 miles afraid to pass me because I don't know how to turn off my right blinker.
Yes, I am an old man. In a big car. Sitting on the yellow pages so I can see over the steering wheel. With my turn signal in perpetual blinking mode for no good reason. With the radio tuned to "La Movida" 1480 AM and the volume cranked up to air-raid siren level while I sing "My Heart Will Go On" by Celine Dion. And thinking that all is right with the world while I cruise down the street doing 27 mph in a 40 mph zone during rush hour. In my Toyota.
So, I take my car in to be fixed (at the 4x4's idiot owner's expense) and they hand me the keys to a free rental car. Very cool. A brand new 2012 Toyota Camry. VERY cool. And that puppy is loaded up to its tits with toys. Happy dance! I wasn't in the car more that 2 seconds when I went all deer in headlights though. I realized that I honestly didn't know how to drive it. Seriously, I was lost in the technology. Now I know how my great-grandfather must have felt when he retired the horse and got that Model T.
First, I couldn't find the parking brake lever. It wasn't on my side of the console, it wasn't on the passenger side of the console, hell, it wasn't even IN the console. I finally found it down in the foot well, to the left of the brake pedal. The same place they used to put them way back in the 1960's. Ahh, those wily Japanese, always something new to confuse us with. When I figured out where to put the key and started it up all hell broke loose. Lights, buzzers, bells and whirly-gigs started going off like crazy. Basically, everything short of a disco ball. The instrument cluster went nuts. It has 5 analog readouts, two multi-function digital ones and a total of 27 diagnostic idiot lights, including tire pressure, oil pressure, air pressure on Mars, MY blood pressure and one that told me that I was putting too much pressure on the steering wheel. One of the multi-function displays started giving me a choice of odometer, trip odometer, my average mpg rating, how many miles I had left on the tank or how many miles I had left to drive to my preset destination. Personally, I don't give a rats ass about any of that shit but thanks for the offer anyway. ALL of the controls for the windows, locks and the mirrors lit up on the armrest. ALL of the controls for the phone and the stereo system lit up on the steering wheel. As did the control arms for the lights, the wipers, the turn signals and the cruise control that were protruding from the steering column. The controls on the center stack looked like something out of the Starship Enterprise. I had heated and air conditioned seats, dual front climate controls (I could actually have the heat going on my side and the air conditioning going on the passenger side. Don't ask me why...), air bag controls and a 9-inch touch screen thing that was my radio, cd player, equalizer, phone, Blue Tooth, Blue Ray, Blue Meanie, Blue Danube, GPS, satellite navigation system and EKG moniter control command center. It was a bit like being trapped inside a 270 horsepower Christmas tree, for chris' sakes!!!
It has a floor mounted automatic and I couldn't figure out how to shift it into drive!!! You didn't do a straight line P-R-N-D-L shift, you had to jog it around like you were shifting a manual transmission. Then I noticed that it had one more position after the "L", something labeled "S". Huh??? Ahh, yes, that would stand for "Speed Shift". Huh??? It seems you put the car in that "gear" and it allows you to shift gears like it was manual using the two other paddles on the steering wheel. Left paddle, clutch. Right paddle, gear shift. What cretin thought that that makes any sense??? Give me a leather wrapped short shifter and a clutch pedal any day!!! I quickly found out that when you take the car out of Park all of the doors automatically lock and the trunk lid puckers.
The outside mirrors have a control signal that lights up to let me know if someone is trying to overcome me from the rear in my blind spots. I'm sorry, I just can't say that without blushing. And giggling. The inside mirror has 3 separate controls to work the 3 separate garage doors it apparently thinks I should have. I can't for the life of me figure out how to use the wipers but I have the cleanest front windshield you have ever seen because I somehow keep managing to mist it with solvent.
Cubby holes. Oh god, does this car have cubby holes. Everywhere!!! 5 in front and 3 in back. And they all have power plugs and USB points in them so we can all happily play our hand held games and listen to our iPods in peace. My god, don't people talk to each other in cars anymore???
I spent half an hour reading the manual for the touch screen thing just to learn how to work the stereo and I have to tell you that it was SO worth the effort!!! That bad boy ROCKS!!! It not only shows me the name of the radio station and the song they're playing it also tells me the title of the cd I'm listening to as well as the artist and title of the track. It has 4 front and rear mounted mid-range speakers, a front center mounted super tweeter, two front door mounted bass speakers and a SUBWOOFER IN THE TRUNK!!! It makes the mirrors vibrate, the trunk lid rattle, the fuel door to pop open indiscriminately and my ears bleed. In a Toyota!!! I'm in heaven. People next to me at stop lights just shake their heads. Not so much because of the noise but because they have been following behind me in the left hand lane for the last 5 miles afraid to pass me because I don't know how to turn off my right blinker.
Yes, I am an old man. In a big car. Sitting on the yellow pages so I can see over the steering wheel. With my turn signal in perpetual blinking mode for no good reason. With the radio tuned to "La Movida" 1480 AM and the volume cranked up to air-raid siren level while I sing "My Heart Will Go On" by Celine Dion. And thinking that all is right with the world while I cruise down the street doing 27 mph in a 40 mph zone during rush hour. In my Toyota.
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