Keeping it real like a Happy Meal
Aside
Beginning this day my life shall run like sweet water . . .
Ask the Dust
You’ll eat hamburgers year after year and live in dusty, vermin-infested apartments and hotels, but every morning you’ll see the mighty sun, the eternal blue of the sky, and the streets will be full of sleek women you never will possess, and the hot semi-tropical nights will reek of romance you’ll never have, but you’ll still be in paradise, boys, in the land of sunshine.
Good book, set in the Bunker Hill area of Los Angeles in the 1930s. You’ll need to up the dosage on your Prozac prescription after you read it . . .
Irvine Loves Bunnies
People Who Died Last Week
It was a busy week for the Grim Reaper . . .
- Seve Ballesteros, golfer
- Osama bin Laden
- Jackie Cooper, actor
- Arthur Laurents, playwright. Wrote West Side Story, among other things.
- David Mason, trumpeter. Played the trumpet solo on “Penny Lane.”
- Sada Thompson, actress. Played Kate Lawrence on Family.
- Dana Wynter, actress. That’s her in the photo, from Invasion of the Body Snatchers.
More People I’m Sick Unto Death Of
People who name their daughter Khloe. Or any other name starting with a K that really should start with a C. But especially Khloe.
There are two ways to slide easily through life: to believe everything or to doubt everything. Both ways save us from thinking. — Alfred Korzybski
Zero or Hero
The men, hailed as heroes across the country, will march in no parades. They serve in what is unofficially called Seal Team 6, a unit so secretive that the White House and the Defense Department do not directly acknowledge its existence. . . .
Despite the mission’s success, former Seal members acknowledged the precariousness of the raid and the degree of luck involved. “If that thing had gone bad, the conversation you and I would be having would be completely different,” Mr. Shipley said. “There’s only two ways to go in these operations — zero or hero.”
Hard-Earned Wisdom
Once again, my kid and I are at the gas station where you can’t lock the pump handles in place and you have stand there and hold them.
Except that thanks to our previous visit, he now knows how to keep the pump on by wedging the gas cap in the handle, so while everyone else is standing around holding pump handles, he’s sitting in the front seat next to me.
“Look at everyone holding the pump handles,” I point out. “Don’t say I never improved your life by passing along my hard-earned wisdom.”
“Holding the handle builds character,” he says.
“So get out and hold it then. I don’t care. At least now you have options.”
“Nah, I’ve already got enough character.”
This Should Have Been a Major Clue
I saw this photo on the web today. Now I’m just a dog but I can’t understand why it took so long to find this guy when he has a big picture of himself right out in front of his house!
— Lightning 
Agile Manifesto 2.0
I’ll share with you what I do in one of my standard presentations — I play with the class or with the audience a game called “Rewrite the Agile Manifesto (link) with your thoughts and feelings now.”
Here is one of the outcomes:
Beyond individuals and interactions to hyper-productive swarming jelled teams and communities of practice.
Beyond working software to high-quality, well architected and well-tested user-centered software services.
Beyond customer collaboration to user collaboration and user involvement.
Beyond responding to change to prioritizing and optimizing for change.
Satan on Osama bin Laden’s 72 Virgins
We don’t have 72 virgins down here, so I presented him with 72 vegans.
He’s not happy. HAAAHAHAHA!
IT’S GOOD TO BE SATAN!
Satan on Osama bin Laden
My co-author Paul Epps, one of his colleagues at the office thinks the Osama bin Laden death was a hoax.
This same fool believes that the new electric meter at his house is giving him brain cancer based on no evidence at all, but when the president of the United States says bin Laden is dead, he’s like Where are the pictures?!
HAAAHAHAHA! People are so gullible — thank God! HAHA! I said thank God, get it? I’m Satan!
But seriously, I just want to reassure you idiots that Osama is really here. It’s a tough adjustment for him. Some people know damn well ahead of time that they’re going to hell, so it’s an easier transition.
But Osama! Oh man was he surprised to see me! I wish you could have seen the look on his face! HAHA! What a Kodak moment! Gosh, I’m really dating myself with that Kodak reference . . .
By the way, how about those NBA playoffs? A lot of upsets going on, right?
My favorite team is the Miami Heat. I love the Heat! HAAAHAHAHA!
That’s the other thing Osama’s having trouble getting used to. You might think, well, he lived in a desert, he’s used to heat. No. It’s not the same — AT ALL! You’ll see what I mean when you get here.
So to summarize: Osama’s really dead and GO HEAT!
Newseum: Osama bin Laden Killed by U.S. Special Forces
800 front pages from 77 countries:
This Is How I Avenged Myself
O crowd, whose love I coveted until the day of my death, this is how I avenged myself for your indifference: I let you buzz all around me, without hearing you. My attitude may be compared to that of Aeschylus’ Prometheus toward his tormentors. Did you think you could chain me to the rock of your triviality, of your agitations over the inconsequential?
Advice for the College Bound
HER: My son is going to be going off to college soon. It’s a big step for him. I hope he’s ready to make good decisions.
HIM: When my daughter left for college, I gave her these simple words of advice: “Don’t get photographed sucking a dick.”
HER: That sounds like excellent advice for your daughter, but it wouldn’t be of any help to my son.
HIM: That’s not what I’ve heard.
Redundancies
Motivation
The Star Thrower
As the old man walked the beach at dawn, he noticed a young man picking up starfish and flinging them into the sea. Catching up to the youth, he asked why he was doing this. The answer was that the stranded starfish would die if left until the morning sun. “But the beach goes on for miles and there are millions of starfish,” countered the other. “How can your effort make any difference?” The young man looked at the starfish in his hand and threw it to safety in the waves. “It makes a difference to this one,” he said.
Monday
There is no suffering in Monday, but only in our perception of Monday.