Thursday, April 26, 2007

Time for some humor. This past week has been rough. So here goes, from one of those emails sent to everyone in the world. You probably already got it in fact but in case you didn't...

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ACTUAL ANALOGIES AND METAPHORS FOUND IN HIGH SCHOOL ESSAYS

Her face was a perfect oval, like a circle that had its two sides gently compressed by a Thigh Master.

He spoke with the wisdom that can only come from experience, like a guy who went blind because he looked at a solar eclipse without one of those boxes with a pinhole in it and now goes around the country speaking at high schools about the dangers of looking at a solar eclipse without one of those boxes with a pinhole in it.

She grew on him like she was a colony of E. coli and he was room-temperature Canadian beef.

She had a deep, throaty, genuine laugh, like that sound a dog makes just before it throws up.

Her vocabulary was as bad as, like, whatever.

He was as tall as a six-foot-three-inch tree.

The revelation that his marriage of 30 years had disintegrated because of his wife's infidelity came as a rude shock, like a surcharge at a formerly surcharge-free ATM.

The little boat gently drifted across the pond exactly the way a bowling ball wouldn't.

McBride fell 12 stories, hitting the pavement like a Hefty bag filled with vegetable soup.

From the attic came an unearthly howl. The whole scene had an eerie, surreal quality, like when you're on vacation in another city and Jeopardy comes on at 7:00 p.m. instead of 7:30.

Her hair glistened in the rain like a nose hair after a sneeze.

The hailstones leaped from the pavement, just like maggots when you fry them in hot grease.

Long separated by cruel fate, the star-crossed lovers raced across the grassy field toward each other like two freight trains, one having left Cleveland at 6:36 p.m. traveling at 55 mph, the other from Topeka at 4:19 p.m. at a speed of 35 mph.

They lived in a typical suburban neighborhood with picket fences that resembled Nancy Kerrigan's teeth.

John and Mary had never met. They were like two hummingbirds who had also never met.

He fell for her like his heart was a mob informant and she was the East River.

Even in his last years, Grandpappy had a mind like a steel trap, only one that had been left out so long, it had rusted shut.

Shots rang out, as shots are wont to do.

The plan was simple, like my brother-in-law Phil. But unlike Phil, this plan just might work.

The young fighter had a hungry look, the kind you get from not eating for a while.

He was as lame as a duck. Not the metaphorical lame duck, either, but a real duck that was actually lame, maybe from stepping on a land mine or something.

The ballerina rose gracefully en pointe and extended one slender leg behind her, like a dog at a fire hydrant.

It was an American tradition, like fathers chasing kids around with power tools.

He was deeply in love. When she spoke, he thought he heard bells, as if she were a garbage truck backing up.

Her eyes were like limpid pools, only they had forgotten to put in any pH cleanser.

She walked into my office like a centipede with 98 missing legs.

It hurt the way your tongue hurts after you accidentally staple it to the wall.

Friday, April 20, 2007

Right on, Peggy. She tells it like it is in this column. In case you get to it and the title isn't "Cold Standard", go to her article archives and look for the title. The article is dated April 20, 2007.

Sunday, April 15, 2007

Things like this make me seriously believe in reincarnation. All I can think is that this cat was previously a Londoner with a taste for fish and chips. This person loved them so much that he came back as a cat but already knew the bus schedule.

Monday, April 09, 2007

I got some insider info. Out of 180 applicants to the PA program, they take 8 transfers. Transfers acceptance rate: ~4.4%.

So, I called the local hospital’s H/R dept and left them a message. I thought maybe, if I try real hard, I can get a job cleaning out labware and maybe mopping up vomit.

Well, I just I got a return call from the hospital. They said they had an opening for someone to clean the dead rats out from under the steam turbine system attached to the incinerator used to destroy the diseased and decaying human tissues and infected human and animal waste generated in the hospital. The system is in the lowest basement level, but that despite the lack of lighting, I could bring my own flashlight if I wanted, and they would let me wear clothes, but only part of the time, as there were recesses under the machine that were so narrow that clothing wasn’t practical. And, it was only a day-job, and paid nothing, as it was a volunteer position. In fact, they said I had to pay them $30 for the paperwork processing. And they needed me to start at 0500.

I told them I’d see them in the morning.

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