Two Tongue Trivia Tidbits

Just like fingerprints, everyone's tongue print is different. (source)


The notion that the tongue is mapped into four areas—sweet, sour, salty and bitter—is wrong. There are five basic tastes identified so far, and the entire tongue can sense all of these tastes more or less equally. (source)

Tongue Out-of-Cheek

Did you know the Okapi is the only mammal capable of cleaning its ears and eyelids with its tongue? Their tongue can be up to a foot long.

Okapi at the Okapi Wildlife Reserve, Congo



Although Gene Simmons comes close.

The Art of Tongue Curling

85% of people can curl their tongue.

We've had several posts about tongues in this blog, but here's another about something more unusual done with a tongue:

How to Gleek

2 Bottles of Vodka + 1 Kiss =

Woman 'bit off boyfriend's tongue'

The article says the couple had gone grocery shopping, got some food, the two bottles of booze, then she wanted a kiss.

Maybe she had left tongue off of the shopping list?

He should've picked up some brains while he was there.

I take these crazy women's names and put 'em in a little black book so I'll know to avoid them in the future. I know, I know, she's way the heck over in England, but that's barely enough space between me 'n crazy women.

Sometimes I will strike up a conversation with a guy and he'll tell me he just got divorced and will elaborate on the crazy stuff she did while/after they were breaking up. I always ask the guy if she's taking her maiden name back and would he please tell me what it is?

They almost always get offended, thinking that I'm going to go after her. They always laugh when I tell them about my "list" I keep and that I want to know what her name is if/when I run into her.

I've dated enough crazy women in my life, far more than my fair share. Some other guy needs to pick up the slack.

Toughest Tongue Twister

According to the Guinness Book of World Records, "sixth sick sheik's sixth sheep's sick" is the toughest tongue twister in the English language.

Yes, it's certainly hard to say and is nonsensical to boot, but ya gotta admire the alliteration, huh? (the title of this post, too!)

Tongue Trivia Tidbit

Like fingerprints, everyone's tongue print is different.

Top 25 Country Songs

TOP 25 COUNTRY SONGS

25. Get Your Tongue Outta My Mouth 'Cause I'm Kissing You Goodbye.
24. Her Teeth Was Stained, But Her Heart Were Pure.
23. How Can I Miss You If You Won't Go Away?
22. I Don't Know Whether To Kill Myself Or Go Bowling.
21. I Just Bought A Car From A Guy That Stole My Girl, But The Car Don't Run So I Figure We're Even.
20. I Keep Forgettin' I Forgot About You.
19. I Liked You Better Before I Knew You So Well.
18. I Still Miss You, Baby, But My Aim's Gettin' Better.
17. I Wouldn't Take Her To A Dog Fight, Cause I'm Afraid She'd Win.
16. I'll Marry You Tomorrow But Let's Honeymoon Tonight.
15. I'm So Miserable Without You, It's Like Having You Here
14. I've Got Tears In My Ears From Lyin' On My Back and Cryin' Over You.
13. If I Can't Be Number One In Your Life, Then Number Two On You.
12. If I Had Shot You When I Wanted To, I'd Be Out By Now.
11. Mama Get A Hammer (There's A Fly On Papa's Head).
10. My Head Hurts, My Feet Stink, And I Don't Love You.
9. My Wife Ran Off With My Best Friend And I Sure Do Miss Him.
8. Please Bypass This Heart.
7. She Got The Ring And I Got The Finger.
6. You Done Tore Out My Heart And Stomped That Sucker Flat.
5. You're The Reason Our Kids Are So Ugly.
4. If the Phone Don't Ring, You'll Know It's Me.
3. She's Actin' Single and I'm Drinkin' Doubles.
2. She's Looking Better After Every Beer.

And the Number 1 Country and Western song of all Time is...

1. I Haven't Gone To Bed With Any Ugly Women But I've Sure Woke Up

ethereal

ethereal\ih-THEER-ee-uhl\

adjective;
1. Light, airy, or tenuous.
2. Extremely delicate or refined.
3. Heavenly or celestial.
4. Pertaining to the upper regions of space.
5. Chemistry. Pertaining to, containing, or resembling ethyl ether.

---

The first four definitions of ethereal are the most common; I've seen the word used in all sorts of writing subjects - sci-fi, angels, anti-bellum, etc., but the last one brought back a hazy memory of my dad taking one of his work boots, spraying a rag with starting fluid (ether) and sticking it into the boot. He then took a young male cat (and I can't remember which one, was a LONG time ago), stuck his head in the boot and when the kitty quit kicking, pop quickly castrated it.

I've never done it, but I expect castrating a cat is much like castrating a pig...well, except for the teeth and claws bit, hence the boot and anesthesia, crude as it might have been. I once tried to give a cat a bath because of accidentally dousing it with naptha. I'm not for sure which had more slash marks when I was done, me or the shower curtain.

My dad and I castrated a large boar for a neighboring farmer; the hog was so big we had to put it in a cattle chute to control the animal. (The hog was large enough to put a saddle on! ) I can't recall how many times my dad had to stop and sharpen his knife while performing the surgery, but it was quite a few. and when trying to finish up each testicle, the ol' boar would tug of war the flesh away from dad in one final but futile attempt to retain his masculinity.

The "pig fries" were large enough to fillet and would have covered a fair-sized dinner plate - that is, if one were inclined to eat that. I've had pig testicles before and they were a bit gamey. My dad always said a good brining would take that gaminess out, but we never ate them again.

The hog later died, but it wasn't from our surgery; it got locked out away from water.

I bet I've castrated quite a few dozens of pigs, but it's been a long time. I've also milked a goat, but there's not any funny stories about that, just a few memories of squirting the milk at our cats and dogs.

Another animal story, then I'll stop, I promise.

We used to have huge toads around our house. We always kept large vats or buckets of water in the yard for our pets and the toads could be seen there during the day, nestled in amongst the cool damp earth and tall grass around the hydrants. At night time they would come into the garage where sometimes dad and I might be doing something, working on some project.

I expect they liked the cool cement floor during those hot summer nights, but they really liked to nab the june bugs and moths that would be attracted to the lights and would often hit the floor. The big ol' toads would be sitting there, sometimes three or four of them, sometimes only one, waiting on the bugs. A june bug could hit, lie on its back -stunned a bit, probably- and the toad would turn like a tank on treads, take a deliberate hop towards the struggling insect, perhaps another short hop to close the distance- then rocking delicately forward and with a flick of the tongue so fast it was hard to see, the toad would bring the bug into its mouth.

We had one toad dad was very fond of. Pop was welding something one time, and not knowing the frog was near his feet, dropped the stub of a super-hot welding rod on the frog's back. It scarred the frog, (like a distinctive mark, I'm sure it scared it some, and probably hurt like a mother, too, wouldn't you think?) but it lived, prospered and grew huge and kept coming back into the garage for several summers after that. Dad and I once fed the creature several dozen june bugs; so many that we could feel them crawling around in the toad's belly. The ol' toad stayed there in one spot, all that night and most of the next day, too stuffed to move.

Y'know, come to think of it, my stories like this certainly aren't ethereal by any stretch, 'cept for the starting fluid bit.

Halloween Tang Toungler

Try saying this tongue tangler three times fast:

"Which witch wished which wicked witch?"

Lady Gaga or Elton John?

Sometimes I just have to shake my head at some Facebook posts. A young friend of mine, the son of a h.s. classmate, had a post the other day: "Who is this Lady Gaga and why are so many people offended by her?"

I knew it was a loaded question, as the friend is a very talented singer who happens to be gay. (I say I know he knew who she was because she's been very vocal in her support of the LGBT - hope I did the abbreviation correctly community.) She's also commented that she considers herself to be bi-sexual. I replied that I had nothing against her, just that I thought her schtick was more about being outrageous than her talent. I mentioned Elton John as someone who was once considered outrageous for his dress (and enormous glasses!), but that his talent was so great that it overshadowed his costumes.

(I started to use Liberace as another example, but thought the gay references might be misconstrued, that I was using only gay performers to make my point. My young friend - and regular readers of this blog - know I don't have a problem with gay people. Well, except for lesbians and that's because that narrows the already narrow field - for me - of available women. -wink-)

I also thought of using - but didn't - the rock group KISS as an example of musical talent who relied upon a gimmick instead of talent. I like some KISS tunes, but never liked them well enough to purchase them.  Tell the truth; when you think of Gene Simmons, do you consider him one of the greatest bass guitar players of all-time, one of the greatest singers, or does the first thing that comes to mind is his 7-in. tongue?

Back to the Facebook post: Well, I had several people, including the friend, say they thought Lady Gaga was as talented, if not more so than Elton John. I don't normally get offended if someone doesn't like who/what I like, only if they put ME down for my preferences. Still, it was hard for me to not say "Are you out of your rabid-ass mind?"

Sure, tastes in anything, be it food, music or hobbies, are subjective and if YOU like Lady Gaga, that's fine w/ me. I gave my honest opinion about her...well, tempered a bit, because I really don't much care for her music, but there's no way that she's better than EJ and I simply can't understand that opinion. Granted, my opinion is influenced by being an Elton John fan for 40+ years, growing up with his music and owning much of it, from 8-tracks to records to mp3's. Elton John did ALL kinds of music, from rock to pop to ballads as well as wrote songs for musicals. Off the top of my head, I could name at least a half-dozen movies that used his tunes, not to mention countless TV shows. Of course, he also re-wrote one of his most famous songs "Candle in the Wind" for the funeral of Lady Diana, making it another gold record in the process.

Elton John and Bernie Taupin are, IMHO, one of the best song-writing duos of all-time, up there with Lennon/McCartney, Rodgers /Hammerstein or Burt Bacharach / Hal David. It's not just MY opinion either; Google it to see what other people think. I'm not saying a consensus of opinion is correct, only that it lends some validity to my own opinion.

When Lady Gaga has been around for nearly 50 years and has sold a QUARTER BILLION records, then we can discuss who is the better musical talent. I'll be long cold in my grave and turned to dust before Elton John is forgotten. In fact, I would bet that Elton John's music will still be being played when Lady Gaga is but a footnote in musical history.

What next? Justin Bieber is better than Elvis? Good Grief.

WARNING! Disturbing Image!

Disturbing to me, anyway.

Just got this post in my reader from Simply Recipes, one of my favorite feeds:

Root Beer Float



Doesn't that look scrumptious? I look at that, and my mouth starts watering and I can TASTE it. (that's what's disturbing) I haven't had a float in a long time, and I'm past due...but I know I shouldn't. Maybe I should go get some sugar-free ice cream and one of those great A&W ^TM Diet Root Beers and fix me up one of 'em. I dunno, it just wouldn't be the same.

Several years ago my friend elle from England came to see me and we were in a pharmacy downtown and I asked her if she wanted a Coke ^TM float and she allowed she had never had one. After finishing, she then allowed that they were delicious and she'd have to turn her kids on to them when she got home.

It's always best to put the soda pop of your choice in the freezer for a while before making a float; the double whammy cold freezes part of the liquid, making lovely flavored ice crystals that melt on your tongue. I also like to use my straw to suck up the foam that floats atop the drink - the foam from using root beer tastes the best, although I sometimes would make a float with orange soda, also very nice. Cream-flavored sodas make the tastiest floats and while I always have liked Dr. Pepper ^TM, it didn't make for a great float. Just my opinion, and bound to tick someone off if they read that last. I can't recall ever having one with grape soda, but it doesn't sound bad, just not as good as a root beer float.

I'm a Raconteur Wannabe

From the Word of the Day feed in the right-hand column:

raconteur \rack-on-TUR\, noun: One who excels in telling stories and anecdotes.

He has an excellent raconteur's mind, memory, vocabulary and tongue, brings in a story just at the right time, in the right manner, serves his anecdotes perfectly either piping hot or ice-cold as tragedies.-- Anatole Pohorilenko and James Crump, When We Were Three

The pronunciation makes me think of Dolly Parton travelling from concert to concert.

The Oracle of Bacon

The Oracle of Bacon, one of my long-time favorite sites.

The object of the game is simple:  find the shortest route, via movies, from any actor to Kevin Bacon using other actors who were fellow cast mates in a particular movie, creating a chain of mutual movies.  For example, just the other day I saw a movie with the lovely actress Teri Polo in it.  I entered her name (spelling it wrong, but the site will offer up choices of actors if there's any doubt) and found that there were only two movies and one mutual fellow cast mate between Polo and Bacon:

The site uses the database of another of my favorite sites, the Internet Movie Database (IMDB)  The results are cached on their server, so any new queries will appear quickly.  There's also a couple of other interesting features of the site, finding out the "Center of the Hollywood Universe" ranking of a particular actor as well as a useful one, finding actors with a certain letter of their last name.  (one of those "tip of the tongue" tools)

For you baseball fans, there's also an Oracle of Baseball which will link baseball players in the same manner as the Bacon Oracle, only using teams and mutual teammates.

Rig, Redux

This is Part II of a pretty bad photo series and commentary. If you want, you can read Part I

I got permission - and the very generous loan of a hard hat - to go up on the rig floor but I couldn't get past the doghouse door. (the "doghouse" is the rig floor level "office" and sometimes changing room for the drillers and sometimes, on smaller rigs, the entire crews)

Couldn't help but step just outside the door as soon as I got up there to take a quick shot of the derrick looking straight up. The line at the top right leading off to the edge and beyond the picture, is the "Geronimo" line, aptly named that because that's what the derrick hand would ride down in case of necessity, such as some sort of catastrophic derrick failure (as if you'd have time) or a blowout (think you can outrun a fireball?). I never saw one being used in case of emergency, but I have seen guys go down them on a lark or bet or dare. Not this fat boy, I wanted to save my virgin run for if/when I ever really needed to do that. I think the better name for it would be the "Ohhhhhhh shi..............." line.

The guys noticed me standing in the doghouse doorway and I politely waited for the driller, (the guy in the red to the left in the next photo below, he's the one "on the brake" and in charge of the basic operation of the rig and of his 4 man crew, three on the floor and one up in the derrick) so I could ask HIS permission to take some photos. He looked amused and some of the things I told him and his crew about the things that have changed really amused 'em. Whippersnappers.

"Wow, yer old school, aintchoo?" drawled the young driller. (a handsome Hispanic boy, as were the rest of the crew) With a shrug, I told them they were lucky, they had their power tongs, we had to use a spinning chain to make up the connection and two sets of tongs and the rotary table to break one apart. "Hey, this is the 21st century, didntjaknow?" wagged one of the hands. I wanted to tell him the 1950's technology I was working with in the late 70's and all through the 80's was state-of-the-art still in Russia and China and some other parts of the world.

I bet none of them ever had their gonads "doped".... covered in pipe lubricant, a particularly nasty compound that's hard to wash off of NOT sensitive areas. I have had it done to me, by being a smartass like that one kid, me being a bit too cocky, telling the guys that there wasn't ten of 'em all-total that could do that to me.

I was wrong; it only took four.

The next photo shows a floorhand unlatching the elevators to "run up and get another'n", another "stand"-- an approx. 90 ft. "triple", three thirty foot joints of drillpipe (in this case, it was 4 1/2 inch) and screwing it onto the "stump", the short end of the long, long, long length of drill stem they lower into the drilled hole. This was always a fun part of running a rig, trying to run as safely and smoothly as possible, but also with all due haste. Time is money, esp. on a drilling rig. Thousands of dollars are spent each and every hour, no matter what's going on and you need to "make hole", not goof around. "Get'er done, or get gone."

The derrick hand wasn't very experienced, but bless his heart, they were deep enough to where they had to stack pipe on the near or driller's side, the "worm's corner" of the derrick, and it's hard to latch those stands of pipe* from that side. I've done it myself and it just doesn't "feel right", but maybe that was because I am right-handed, as are most people. I dunno. He seemed to be having a bit more problems than most guys with whom I've worked. I wasn't a bad derrick hand, but it just got SO lonely up there. What with all the iron around you, it is nearly impossible to get decent radio reception up there, even up that high...not that the guys on the floor would appreciate you taking something - such as a transistor radio - up there that you could drop and have it go right through their hard hat into their brain.

What's that formula for speed of a falling object? 32 ft/second² or something like that? It'd take less than two seconds to fall from the board to the floor. "Watch ou....t. Uh oh."

They weren't going very fast, not even breaking a sweat on a rather warm afternoon, and it looked to me as though there were a couple of other fairly new hands on the floor crew; they sure weren't getting excited about getting things done. I was surprised because I had worked on rigs of similar size with only four man crews, the workload on the floor increasing by 33% because of one less man. I've worked the floor by myself a few times, actually. Then again, I'm twice the hand most guys are. Honestly.

Here in the next pic. they're setting the slips, squatty but massive things that grip the pipe so it doesn't slip on down the hole. This is where I thought they had some "worms" (greenhorns) because when pulling the slips, a couple of 'em would "put on, not put out". This is where I would, after about half a dozen pulls of that nature, would inform the lazy bastards slackers I worked with that from then on we'd just take turns pulling the slips, one at a time...that way it'd darn sure even out on the workload.

This is one of the parts I liked best, running the rig. This is looking back just behind the driller as he steps on the throttles. This rig had two huge Cat engines, but I didn't wander back there as I was told to not venture past the doghouse door. I did stretch out to take this shot right between the "A-legs".

I got a rush feeling not only the vibration, but the noise sink down into my bones...again, after years and years...and years. There's also the awareness of what I thought of as "danger close", spinning things everywhere you look, catheads that want to reach out and snag loose clothing, the rotary table turning at terrifying RPMs, the cacaphonous clash of metal on metal, the big cat motor's roar in duplicate, a throaty harmony in bass notes at idle and a screaming crescendo at full throttle. You can hear the chains as thick as arms slapping in staccato rhythm through their baths of oil in the compound, the whine of the drawworks spooling hundreds of feet of drilling line on or off in mere seconds, the "pssst" of the air clutches, grabbing another gear, getting another higher one to go faster, faster, always faster if you can and even if you can't.

It's probably not as loud as sitting on the wing of a 747 or in the front row at the rock concert, but it's darned sure some heavy metal up in the air; this rig had a 20 foot substructure and the top of the rig is usually another 120 feet or so on top of that. You can see a drilling rig before you can hear them, but you can hear them before you can make out any people on them from afar. Stand at the base of one, or up on the floor while the drilling is going on miles beneath your feet and you can feel the bit as it bites into the formation.

It's something to experience when a big rig picks up off bottom when drilling a deep hole; the ol' rig, derrick and all, squats and rocks and the motors lug down and the weight indicator spins like crazy and you hold your breath just in case you've got stuck while getting ready to come out of the hole, ever ready to kick out the clutch and ram down on the brake. That *drill pipe weighs 16.6 lbs./foot and drill collars can weigh 100/200 lbs. a foot. This rig was probably drilling to around 12,000 feet and I'm not so hot at math, but a couple miles of pipe and collars can be pretty heavy. I've drilled deeper where our string weighed over half a million pounds. I'm sure this rig's string would weigh a quarter million or so. There are a few more powerful man-made things in the world, but a drilling rig is near the top of the list.

And, it's funny about that long screwed together sections of pipe, the drillstem: the darn thing has a LOT of compression and stretch for all that length. On the deeper wells, they pick up the entire string to add another joint/30 ft. pipe, but the bit will never leave the bottom of the hole! Even figuring out the weight of the string requires some complicated formulas and books of data because the pipe surrounded by the mud has some buoyancy, just like a boat in water...but then you've got mud inside the pipe, adding so many barrels per thousand feet, so much more weight. As you take the pipe out of the hole, you need to add just enough mud to keep it from blowing out, but you don't want to fill the hole completely or the mud will remain in the pipe when you unscrew the connection and will spray out everywhere.

(a fair example of this is putting your finger on top of a straw in your soda, then raising the straw up out of the drink; the straw will remain full. Take your finger off of it and let it splash on a flat surface and multiply that effect by a million. That's what happens when you "break off a wet one". Pulling the pipe fast and having the level up near the surface will sometimes create enough of a suction to keep a 90 ft. column of mud in the stand, and when the suction is broken, it will flow out of the end of the stand...very quickly, splashing everywhere, all over everyone, all over the rig, in your eyes and ears. Until you can get the level "just right", it's a good idea to tap the stand before unscrewing it with a small hammer; empty pipe rings like a bell, but if it has fluid in it, it makes a dull "thud".)

I guess the thing that really hit me was the smell, it made me feel nostalgic, almost like the perfume of a certain woman, maybe one you sometimes had a good time with but didn't particularly like most of the time. That smell is a combination of many things: the fresh caliche of the location, on windy days it can sandblast your vehicle windshield, even strip the paint off the handrails, then add a whiff of the oily aroma of diesel in the tanks, soon to be the acrid smoke in the air like a hundred idling Greyhound busses and with twice the rumble.

As you get closer to the rig you start to smell the hot machinery and grease, iron on iron violently releasing molecules of ferrous oxide creating the taste of steel on your tongue, a copper flavor like an adrenaline overdose. Then the oddest smell of all twitches at your nose, some sort of sweet-sour, a " doesn't smell horribly bad but doesn't smell particularly good" kind of aroma. All I can say to describe it would be something like rotten gardenias, dollar store dog food or your lover's morning breath, that would be the smell of drilling mud.

It smells a little better during the winter when the sun doesn't bake it as much.

Drilling mud will have to wait for another time, so I can wax poetic about it. I've seen it get guys fired, seen 'em fall off in it, seen guys get burned with the chemicals or nearly kill themselves and others by mixing two of the wrong types and creating a deadly cloud and reaction....and I have seen it kill someone.

Part III

Horse Laughs

I had been driving for a couple of hours and had consumed about two liters of water. Do I need to draw you a picture? Something had to be done. Quickly.

I went down a deserted road on the outskirts of town and pulled off behind a small stand of mesquite trees and got out. I had no more got started when I heard a deep voice say:

"Y'know, if you were in the city limits that'd be indecent exposure, I'm only eight years old...yuk yuk yuk."

I turned around and saw THIS!



Frightened, I staggered backwards against my truck.

"Better zip 'er up there, Wilbur." said the horse with an insultive nicker.



"Uh, wasn't quite done here, pal." I retorted.

Quicker than you could flick your tail came the rejoinder:

"Potty blush?" smirked the wise-cracking horse.

"OK Bashful...I'll turn my head, water that yucca while yer at it."



We chatted a while, then I told him I wanted to take some photos of him for my friend Barb who loves horses. He agreed, but then did some bad accents "N' Ham-shya", some snide cracks about Yankee liberals being the real horse's as...well, let's just say he was smarmy. Totally uncalled for.

He then started out on some darned life history thing, frankly it was quite boring and really unbelieveable, some blathering boasts about "Apaloosa/Arabian blood", quarterhorse this, quarterhorse that and some BS about a great great great grandfather coming in second at the Preakness, but you know... I've heard it all on the 'net, and besides, I know how Texans are about braggin', especially when he started talkin' smack about being bigger/ better/stronger/faster and much much prettier than Trigger or Silver.



I asked him if he was that rare Polka-Dot breed but he ignored me.

"Say," asked the horse. "Heard any good horse jokes lately?"



I'm clever and quick-witted, too.

"Well..."I said "A horse walks into a bar..."

" 'Why the long face?' " came the rude interruption.

He kept rubbin' it in:

" Yeah, first time I heard THAT one I was a colt, sheesh."

He snickered and stuck out his tongue. Like I said, rude.



"Heard this one?" he asked.

"A cowboy goes into a bar, has a beer, walks outside and finds his horse has been stolen. He walks back into the bar, fires his gun through the ceiling. "Which one of you mothers stole my hoss?" he yells. No one answers. "All right, I’m gonna have one more beer and if my hoss ain’t outside by the time I finish, I’m gonna do what I dun in Texas." He drinks another beer, walks outside, and his horse is back. So he gets on it and gets ready to ride out of town. The bartender walks out of the bar and asks, "Say pardner, what happened in Texas?" The cowboy turns to him, and says, 'I had to walk home.' "

"No." I told him "Wished the hell I hadn't heard it, either."

Nonplussed and with a few shakes of his ears and a swish of his tail to shoo the flies, he went on in rapid fire:



What does it mean if you find a horse shoe?
Some poor horse is walking around in his socks.
*****
What did one horse say to the other horse?
The pace is familiar but I can't remember the mane.
*****
What are the only animals to sleep with their shoes on?
A horse, of course!
*****
How many horses have three legs?
They all do!
*****
What breeds of horses can jump higher than a house?
All breeds. Houses don't jump.
*****
A man rode into town on June 3rd, stayed a week, and rode out on June 3rd. How is this possible?
His horse's name was June 3rd.
*****
How do you make a small fortune in the horse industry?
Start with a large fortune.
*****
What animal has more "hands" than feet?
Why, a horse, of course!
*****
What is the best type of story to tell a runaway horse?
A tale of WHOA!
*****
How long should a horse's legs be?
Long enough to reach the ground.
*****
When do vampires like horse racing?
When it's neck and neck.
*****
Where do horses stay in a hotel?
In the bridle suite.
*****
What did the waiter say to the horse?
I can't take your order. That's not my stable.
*****
What's the quickest way to mail a little horse?
Use the Pony Express.

Seriously, they weren't all that funny to ME, but he sure was laughin' at his own dumb jokes.



"Henny Youngman you ain't." I snorted.

I kept on the attack.

"What's with the peculiar laugh? Or is that your 'braying jackass' imitation?"

"Keep your day job." I advised.

And once again, he was rude.

Sorry, but I just don't get that sort of comedy.

Extreme Contrasts

It caught my eye, an article on the Inquisiter website about Jessica Duggar, one of the children on the reality TV show 19 Kids and Counting.

Here's a little bit from the article: The four eldest girls of the Duggar clan, Jana, 24, Jill, 22, Jessa, 21, and Jinger, 20, say that “it’s easy to put yourself into physical and moral danger and give into those emotions or sensual thoughts that promise pleasant, but only temporary, fulfillment.”

I should admit that I don't watch the show very often. Unlike many other people, however, I don't hate the Duggars because of their religion or the size of their family. I HAVE seen a few episodes, though and am glad I wasn't raised that way or in such a large family. A little more religion certainly wouldn't have hurt me while I was growing up, but our small house was crowded enough with just the five of us.

One of the last episodes I watched was about Josh, the oldest son, and his marriage to a lovely and sweet young woman, Anna. I was a little surprised when I learned that they hadn't kissed before the wedding, but I believe it was on the same show where I was taken aback at Jim Bob, the patriarch of the family, talking about how his wife Michelle HAD kissed someone before she had married him, not disguising his bitterness while talking to the camera. (I find THAT to be more than a little weird, but...it's not MY wife, after all.  Finding a woman as chaste as he wanted - other than the Duggar girls - is very rare these days.  I think I'd be happy just to find out my new bride hadn't spent a year hooking on the Las Vegas strip)

I had to laugh when the cameras followed the new couple on their honeymoon; I forget exactly where they went, but they took a trip to some sort of marine park and were going to spend their wedding night camping out under a clear arch under a huge tank full of fish. They stayed there for a while, then decided it wasn't very comfortable and went back to their hotel room.

I was wondering why the hell they were spending their first night of marriage sleeping on the floor looking at fish...and I think they got to wondering the same thing after a while.  I don't think it would've been nearly as interesting as getting to know each other...in the Biblical sense. Ahem. I'm sure neither of them knew what they were doing later that night, but I bet they had fun figuring it out.

I read the rest of the article, then a slide-out ad appeared at the bottom - talk about a contrast! (I bookmarked it to read later for some pointers, even though I doubt it'd work on the Duggar girls)

Then this was on a panel of links at the very bottom of the page:

Even MORE contrast...and I'd much rather read about the Duggars than Tongue-Girl.

A Feast for the Eyes

Since a frog can't chew its food or use its tongue to get food down its throat, it uses its eyes! The frog's eyes sink down to the roof of its mouth to help push the food down to its stomach.

Wagging Muscle

The only muscle in your body that is attached at only one end is your tongue.

U-Verse Woes

If I don't have a post for a while, it's because U-Verse is playing up again. I was without internet for a good bit of yesterday evening and I finally called tech support and a recorded msg. told me the outage had started up again and to NOT reboot my modem. So, I didn't.

After being without Internet all day today, I called again and got a real-live person who told me to reboot my modem. So, I did.

All was well for a while until about an hour after getting back online when I was knocked off again. I did the modem thing again and so far, so good.

Yesterday I got an email about my telephone bill.  It was nearly twice the usual amt. and I was floored.  I went to the AT&T site and paid my last month's bill (not due for a few more days) and tried to find out why it was so high, but the site is really hard to navigate (for me), esp. trying to find detailed information about the bill.   I made yet another call and yet again had to wade through the computer prompts to find out what the deal was. 

After being put on hold - again, for the umpteenth time this week- (I think I've spent more time on hold than I have online since Friday) I got to speak to another real-live human.  I voiced my displeasure as politely as I could (my tongue is still bleeding from biting holes through it) and found out I had been charged $49 for service connection and $100 for the modem.  I was not told about either when I signed up for U-Verse.  I mentioned "Deceptive Trade Practices" and "Duplicitous" several times and reminded them they were "not the only game in town", telling them I could get phone, Internet and cable from the cable company for about what they had been charging just for phone and 'net PLUS they offered much greater speed. I  managed to get a credit for twenty bucks for the outage and half the service connection fee reduced off the bill.

During the brief time when I was online, I did some research about the outage and AT&T is blaming it on a software upgrade that "only" affected 1% of their customers. I was in that 1% but it didn't make me feel special.   I read a post by a woman in the AT&T forums that said she had been offline, surprising to her because she had had U-Verse for three years and only been knocked offline a couple of times.  Me?  I had had U-Verse for six days and been offline for four.

They'll not be getting any recommendations from me.

Simply Saccharine Sweet

You're Totally Sarcastic

You sarcastic? Never! You're as sweet as a baby bunny. Seriously, though, you have a sharp tongue - and you aren't afraid to use it. And if people are too wimpy to deal with your attitude, then too bad. So sad.

How Sarcastic Are You?