In order for this to have any chance of being funny, you need to know that in Britain, acetaminophen is called paracetamol . . .
Jane Lynch, Gay Divorcee
Jane Lynch and her wife of nearly three years, Lara Embry, are planning to divorce.
“Lara and I have decided to end our marriage. This has been a difficult decision for us as we care very deeply about one another. We ask for privacy as we deal with this family matter,” Lynch told ABC News in a statement.
This is a great time to be a divorce lawyer. Legalizing gay marriage means more marriages, which means more divorces.
Also, emotion equals money in divorce cases. More emotion means more money for lawyers, and gay people are very emotional.
In keeping with a stupid but time-honored custom, the couple announces the divorce, then asks for privacy, which they’d be more likely to get if they just skipped the announcement.
As Gently as You Can
Our skills are finally in demand.
If you mock us, Pan,
In whom we also believe, do it
As gently as you can.
Joyce Carol Oates Gets Slammed
EppsNet stands behind Joyce Carol Oates in this Twitstorm, in opposition to those who think that while raping women may be a bad thing, what’s really deplorable is freedom of thought and questioning theocracy. In solidarity, we publish a couple of previously unseen (because they’re terrible) photos of the two of us taken with Mark Twain in the Doe Library at UC Berkeley.
Homicidal Cab Drivers: Another Reason I Prefer to Just Stay Home
Aside
Ted Rall: “1984” is Here. Yawn.
Things That Scare Other People’s Dogs Do Not Scare Our Dog
We went out to watch the city of Irvine fireworks show. Best use of our tax dollars since last year’s show!
As we drove back to the house, I said, “I hope the fireworks didn’t scare Lightning.”
He was asleep on his bed. He’s not scared of anything.
Dilbert: Dating in 2018
EppsNet at the Movies: Mother
We rented Mother from Netflix. As I explained to my family before screening it, the movie’s about a crazy Asian woman and her devotion to her mentally challenged son.
“You can see why it resonated with me,” I said. “It’s like someone made a movie about our lives!”
“You are not a nice person,” my wife said. “Our boy is not crazy.”
“No, you’re crazy,” the boy corrected her. “I’m mentally challenged.”
That said, I enjoyed the movie, although it contains a lot of profanity, which I don’t like.
Mother
A mother desperately searches for the killer who framed her son for a girl's horrific murder.Director: Bong Joon Ho
Cast: Kim Hye-ja, Won Bin, Jin Goo
IMDb rating: 7.7 (79751 votes)
Aside
I’d rather be a friend in need than a palindrome.
James Gandolfini Will See You in Hell
[See You in Hell is a feature by our guest blogger, Satan — PE]
James Gandolfini is in Hell now. He says hi, and thanks for all the kind words.
I’ve been at this gig a long time now but it still amazes me the hyperbole that surrounds the death of actors. Every one of them who dies is one of the great thespians of all time, if you buy into the post-mortem hype.
Most lines of work have objective standards. When Joe Shlabotnik bites the dust, you can’t eulogize him as one of the great ballplayers of all time. But acting is something anyone can do well. You learn the script, say your lines and pick up your check.
“He died too soon,” people say. When was he supposed to die? Like we can’t find another fat Italian guy to learn a script, say his lines and pick up his check?
As George Burns used to say, “Good acting is when Walter Matthau says to me, ‘How are you?’ and I answer, ‘Fine.’ That’s good acting. If Walter Matthau asks me, ‘How are you?’ and I answer, ‘I think it fell on the floor,’ then that’s bad acting.”
George is in heaven now.
Gandolfini’s in Hell for a couple of reasons. He was married — not when he died, but a long time ago — to a woman named Marcy Wudarski. He divorced her in December 2002, after he got famous from being on the television. They had a young son together.
Listen up, big shots. And this goes for the ladies too. You wake up one day and realize that you’re famous and you’re married to a Polack from New Jersey. You took what you could get at the time but you could do a lot better now. (Gandolfini’s widow is an Asian ex-model.) Do you have kids? No? Fine! Do whatever you want!
But God likes for married couples with kids to stick together. He says that all the evidence points to kids with intact families doing a lot better in life. Yeah, I know you’re bored with your relationship but your kids aren’t bored with it so quit being selfish.
Reason number two: God gets angry when people pretend to kill and be killed for entertainment purposes. Heads up: A lot of folks are going to Hell over this one. Death is the main source of entertainment in the U.S. at this time. Death and karaoke shows. And God doesn’t like karaoke shows either.
Gandolfini is famous for being on a TV show that entertained people with violence and death. Who’s laughing now, fat boy?
See you in Hell . . .
Banning Racial Preferences in California Helped Everyone
When racial preferences were banned by the voters in California, there were dire predictions that this would mean the virtual disappearance of black and Hispanic students from the University of California system. What in fact happened was a 2% decline in their enrollment in the University of California system as a whole, but an increase in the number of black and Hispanic students graduating, including an increase of 55% in the number graduating in four years and an increase of 63% in the number graduating in four years with a grade point average of 3.5 or higher.
Instead of the predicted drastic decline in enrollment in the system as a whole, there was a drastic redistribution of black and Hispanic students within the University of California system. Their enrollment dropped at the two most elite campuses, Berkeley and UCLA — by 42% at the former and 33% at the latter. But their enrollment rose by 22% at the Irvine campus, 18% at the Santa Cruz campus, and 65% at the University of California at Riverside. After this redistribution, the number of black and Hispanic students who graduated with degrees in science, mathematics, and engineering “rose by nearly 50 percent,” according to Sander and Taylor. The number of doctorates earned by black and Hispanic students in the system rose by about 20%.
In short, the problems created by the mismatching brought on by affirmative action gave way to significant improvements in the academic performances of black and Hispanic students in the University of California system after those preferences were banned.
Aside
If something smells fishy, it might be a fish.
Boring a Lot of People For a Long Time
I’ve probably been boring a lot of people for a long time. Strange to find comfort in the idea. There have always been things I felt I must tell them, even if no one listened or understood.
Happy Fathers Day
I’m writing this in part to tell you that if you ever wonder what you’ve done in your life, and everyone does wonder sooner or later, you have been God’s grace to me, a miracle, something more than a miracle. You may not remember me very well at all, and it may seem no great thing to have been the good child of an old man in a shabby little town you will no doubt leave behind. If only I had the words to tell you.
A Glutton for Punishment
“You must really be a glutton for punishment,” he said.
“A gourmet, actually,” I said. “If it isn’t perfect, I send it back.”
You Say Anarchy, Sir, Like It’s a Bad Thing
Frankly, one of our political parties is insane, and we all know which one it is. They have descended from the realm of reasonableness that was the mark of conservatism. They dream of anarchy, of ending government.
My fellow Americans —
I’ll tell you who’s insane: anyone who’s not dreaming of anarchy at this moment in history is insane. People forget that this great nation was founded by anarchists, born out of an armed revolution against a corrupt government.
As I said at the time, “Whenever any Form of Government becomes destructive, it is the Right of the People to alter or to abolish it.”
I assure you, though, that regrettably neither current political party dreams of anarchy. They both dream of exactly the same things: self-aggrandizement and rewarding their most powerful supporters with political spoils.
The well-known liberal cartoonist Ted Rall wrote a book a couple of years ago advocating a new American revolution. Unfortunately, while popular uprisings do continue to occur around the world, I am not optimistic that it will ever happen again in America.
The great majority of our citizens now are far more informed about fantasy football and reality TV than they are about current events. They understand politics at only the most simple-minded level: Team Red vs. Team Blue.
I’m Team Blue! Let’s go, Blue! BOOOOO, Team Red! Or vice versa.
Notice, for example, that all of the things that Team Blue hated so much about the George W. Bush administration are okay now that they’re being carried out by President Obama.
Obama didn’t stop the wars or the torture or the spying. He’s just as cozy with Wall Street. Gitmo is still open for “prolonged detention.” Moreover, he’s killing foreign civilians, and sometimes American citizens, with drone strikes, and he’s eliminating whatever civil liberties you think you have left.
Torture and war and economic collapse don’t matter as long as they’re being supervised by my team! Go Blue! We’ll all be in a gulag in 10 years. Go Blue!
Some despotic regimes around the world rely on starvation and threats of violence to keep the people in a state of submissive compliance. Here in America, the same collective stupor is effected via mindless entertainments and gadgetry.
I should raise myself out of depression, paralysis and failure and resist this massive government/corporate dystopia — but I might miss my TV programs.
In 1776, we decided that being Americans meant being free men and women, not serfs and lackeys. We mutually pledged to each other our Lives, our Fortunes and our sacred Honor to throw off the abuses and usurpations of the Government, and to secure the blessings of Liberty.
How soon they forget.
I bid you God speed,
Thomas Jefferson, anarchist
Dogged by Protesters
Obama dogged by protesters on bay visit — SFGate
Dogged by protesters?! If he ever comes to Orange County, he’ll be PROTESTED BY DOGS!
My owner pays so many taxes that there’s hardly any money left for pug treats! 🙁
— Lightning 
We Know What You Like: Cox
A commercial for Cox Communications comes on the TV, the gist of which is that no one knows what the young woman in the ad likes. A sushi chef, for example, serves her an oddball concoction that she doesn’t like, and I forget the rest, but you get the idea.
“But here at Cox,” the ad goes on to say, “we know what you like.”
I say, “She likes Cox.”
My kid gives me a look.
“C-O-X. Cox. Come on, man.”
I am a humanist, which means, in part, that I have tried to behave decently without any expectation of rewards or punishments after I’m dead. — Kurt Vonnegut Jr.