Plurp: Sanitized For Your Protection

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2001.11.04 : 2001.11.10

Saturday, November 10, 2001
Blab. A T-shirt marketing agent writes:
Aiya Earëndil Elenion Ancalima!!!
Or maybe our reader is hawking a movie. In any case, we have no idea what it means.

Blab. A reader finds relief in Plurp.
I was relieved to see that the Judean People's Front nor the People's Front of Judea were on Dubya's hitlist.
I shudder to think what would happen if THEY were targeted by the massive military onslaught of "The Coalition."
Indeed. Imagine the sandals.

Blab. A reader helps us with our latest Secret Project.
I would guess that Helen would approve of inviting Angelina Jolie to your apartment to take a look at Helen's wonderful terrace landscaping.
Oh, that's good! So, we:

Dress up real nice.

Go to a fancy party that Angelina Jolie is attending.

Say something witty.

Invite her over.

Tell Helen that we're really not interested in Angelina at all, but that she insisted on meeting the person who created this fantastic terrace.

This plan is really coming together! We have the best readers.

Blab. A reader too lazy for words writes:
Plurp-Meister,
Would you kindly shrink the Big Blab Box to about 5 or 6 lines high so that I don't have to scroll down every time I finish my Blab? I hate having to reach for my mouse if I don't have to!
Perhaps adding a "Medium Blab Box" would help?
Oh good heavens. We recommend that you get a bigger screen. But, in the meantime, we have moved the buttons for you, if only to allow us to revel in your sloth.

Blab. A reader proves that there's always room for Helenisms.
Here are a few to add to your list:
"I wasn't born on a turnip truck" - combination of I wasn't born yesterday and I didn't fall off turnip truck.
"With the drop of a dime" - combination of drop of a hat and stop on a dime.
Very nice! Thank you. BTW, has anyone actually seen a turnip truck?

Plurp. Yet another one of those dates with all ones and zeroes! What the heck is going on around here?

Yow. Have a question about Muslim law or religious tenets? Can't find the answer anywhere? Well, then, Ask The Imam.

Yo. Playing at the theater next door: Happenstance and Serendipity. Coincidence?

Yo. After long and arduous study, learned scientists have discovered that female beauty acts like a drug on male brains. We think they should get out more.

Plurp.
The blue dog didn't
just fall off the
turnip truck, you
know

Friday, November 9, 2001
Blab. A reader with a pink slip writes:
I found it odd that the pink slip calculator asked nothing about self-employed individuals. I have a 7% chance of getting laid off, though I have no idea who would give me a pink slip.
Mom?
Yes, well, your mother and we have been meaning to talk to you about that ...

Blab. A reader defends our inalienable right to complain.
"If you don't vote, you have no right to complain."
Nonsense. The First Amendment says nothing about whether or not one voted.
You're under arrest.

Blab. A reader helps us out on that other part of our plan to meet Angelina Jolie, in which we need to make Helen approve of this whole idea.
But Steve doesn't REALLY want to meet Jolie. How could he? He has the best, afterall.........
Uh, yeah. That's the ticket. We don't really want to meet her. Yeah!

Blab. A reader sends us another of those blind link thingies.
http://www.thereverend.com/brick_testament/index.html
Now this is really quite frightening! It's ... it's ... well, it's the Bible, both old and new testaments, in Lego. We know. That's hard to understand. You just have to go look. Try the last supper, for instance.
Someone spent far, far too much time on this.

Blab. A reader shatters our world view and teaches us something quite, um ... disgusting.
"Um, aren't all plants photosynthetic?" is probably a rhetorical question, but if not, yes of course there are non-photosynthetic plants. Some are parasitic, either root or stem parasites. Some are saprophytes that feed on decaying organic matter. See this for an example that looks like something common to this area, dunno if it's the same species. Tremble in fear when you contemplate evolution!
A less technical non-photosynthetic plant link.
Ah yes, stinking root parasites from Africa. A favorite among urban terrace gardeners!

Hydnora africana, an unusual flesh-colored, parasitic flower that attacks the nearby roots of shrubby species of Euphobia in arid deserts of South Africa. The putrid-smelling blossom attracts herds of carrion beetles.

You know, it's amazing. You could be reading Dave's blog, learning all sorts of things about Supreme Court decisions and novel-writing. You could loiter around Ftrain and revel in really good prose. You could even swim through Bovine Inversus, and breath surrealism instead of air.
But instead, you choose to hang around here and learn everything there is to know about stinking, non-photosynthetic, parasitic plants.
And we do tremble in fear about that.

Plop. Speaking of carrion beetles, did you see what our dear Attorney General is up to?
The Justice Department has decided to listen in on the conversations of lawyers with clients in federal custody, including people who have been detained but not charged with any crime, whenever that is deemed necessary to prevent violence or terrorism. [...]
[T]he monitoring will be conducted without a court order. [... This covers] anyone "held as witnesses, detainees or otherwise" by INS agents, U.S. marshals or other federal authorities.

Plurp. In Dubya's startlingly predictable speech on Recent Events last night, he related the following brilliant solution, from a four-year-old, to the conundrum of how people could hate a whole nation of people they don't even know.
Why don't we just tell them our names?
Depending upon whether or not you're The President, that's either a sweetly naive statement or the beginning of a major national initiative.
We'll leave it to you to figure out into which bucket Dubya is crammed.

Plurp.
The blue dog
was once carried away
by herds of
carrion beetles

Thursday, November 8, 2001
Blab. A reader with exhibitionist tendencies tells us all about it.
I much prefer to do it "Whilst moving about on all fours, nude, munching on grass and shrubs". In fact, that reminds me of a movie I once saw..."Feederism 2: Alone on the Range".
This leads to Google telling us something we didn't know.
Feeder: Someone who encourages another person to gain weight and finds this erotic.
... and hence the term feederism. So, for example, we might find that feeding Calista Flockhart is erotic. Or at least humanitarian.
(Feederism. Criminey! Who even knew there was such a thing?)

Blab. A reader smiles, exposing an embarrassing gap in its logic.
but surely if you don't vote you don't have the right to complain about whoever ends up in power?
Whaddya gonna do? Lock us up for complaining?

Blab. A reader plagiarizes a stirring passage for reasons unknown to us.
"Of all the tyrannies, a tyranny exercised for the good of its victims may be the most oppressive. It may be better to live under robber barons than under omnipotent moral busybodies. The robber baron's cruelty may sometimes sleep, his cupidity may at some point be satiated; but those who torment us for our own good will torment us without end, for they do so with the approval of their consciences."
-C.S. Lewis, The Humanitarian Theory of Punishment
Perhaps this is targeted at the previous reader?

Blab. A reader helps us out.
How to meet Angelina Jolie: first, dress up in something really nice. Then, go to some wonderful big party where Angelina Jolie is, and once you're there, go over and stand next to her!
Next week: how to control world-wide networks of fanatical theists!
Why didn't we think of that? Now we know just what to do! (And why didn't we know that all of the Monty Python scripts are already on the Web? Hmm?)

Blab. A correspondent at work checks in with the facts.
I was incorrect on my claim that most Americans have had personal contact with the dead. I was misremembering the result that 67% of *widows* have had contact with the dead. For the nation as a whole, only 42% of us have enjoyed such contact.
If you bother to read down the page you'll see that "30% of the Americans who do not believe in life after death still say they've been in personal contact with the dead."
Now that is frightening!

Blab. A reader teeters on the brink of insanity.
the Blue Dog is one sick puppy
You have no idea.

Blab. A reader sends us a clue about that odd company from yesterday.
PLRP rallied sharply late Tuesday as investors rushed into anti-virus software stocks, but that isn't the whole story with PLRP.
Yes, it's an inverse link. And yes, this is frightening.

Blab. A reader stuffs the suggestion box here at Plurp.
The reader suggesting all those ideas for Fall Activities should instead consult Martha Stewart !
Perhaps you should suggest that (though we're not sure if Martha even knows how many leaves there are on sheep).

Rant. We love the news media. No, we really do! They are are god's own lesson in how to carry off absurd self-importance.
Here's an example. Over the past few weeks, Dubya announced that he was freezing the funds of a long list of people and organizations that, he alleged, were associated with terrorism. Every media outlet in the known universe reported the story, turning it over and over in their analytic palms, telling us all sorts of things about this list.
None of them actually gave us the list.
We conclude that the media think that their random babbling about the list is important to us, while the list itself is not. Why give actual source material to our readers, they say to themselves, when they'll settle for our opinions instead?
And if that's you all over then, hey, great. If not then here, at long last, is the list. You might not have noticed (because the news media didn't bother to tell you) that the list of Specially Designated Global Terrorist Entities includes some decidedly non-Afghan organizations:

REAL IRISH REPUBLICAN ARMY

AUM SUPREME TRUTH

PALESTINE ISLAMIC JIHAD

EGYPTIAN ISLAMIC JIHAD

BLACK SEPTEMBER

UNITED SELF-DEFENSE FORCES OF COLOMBIA

THE YESHIVA OF THE JEWISH IDEA

COMMUNIST PARTY OF PERU

BASQUE FATHERLAND AND LIBERTY

POPULAR FRONT FOR THE LIBERATION OF PALESTINE

KURDISTAN WORKERS' PARTY

ISLAMIC MOVEMENT OF UZBEKISTAN

HAMAS

THE NATIONAL LIBERATION ARMY OF IRAN

PALESTINE LIBERATION FRONT

HIZBALLAH

Our point here is not to debate whether or not these organizations are terrorist in nature. Rather, it's to point out the international nature of the list. While that's not surprising, given Dubya's recent mumblings, we had not seen it reported in the Official Media.
And we thought that was interesting, especially in light of Colin Powell's remarks yesterday:
[W]e will turn our attention to terrorism throughout the world, and nations such as Iraq, which have tried to pursue weapons of mass destruction, should not think that we ... will not turn our attention to them.
Coming soon to a country near you!

Yo. Are we a blogaholic? With 56 points out of 100, the answer seems to be:
You are a dedicated weblogger. You post frequently because you enjoy weblogging a lot, yet you still manage to have a social life. You're the best kind of weblogger. Way to go!
We live for the flattery of machines. (Dave)

Plurp.
The blue dog
islamic
jihad

Wednesday, November 7, 2001
Blab. A reader sounds greatly relieved about our plans to meet Angelina.
Regarding Jolie -- Whew!
We would have to agree. We went to the symphony last night, hoping that it might be the theater-like venue of our dream the other night. Alas, it was not; Angelina was not in attendance, as far as we could tell.
We therefore appeal to our knowledgeable readers. Please send us your best laid plans which will lead to us meeting Angelina Jolie. We will take it upon ourselves to then say something witty, get her to laugh, and thereby to like us. We don't want to make our readers responsible for everything, after all.
Extra points for making Helen approve of this whole idea.

Blab. A reader asks the relevant question, especially if you live in NYC.
Mark Green and Mike Bloomberg are both scum. Why should I vote for scum???
You shouldn't. That's one of the main reasons we don't vote. It only encourages them.

Blab. A reader tries desperately to explain the phrase hm, I forgot to set me 'away' from Jabber... from some reader yesterday.
Jabber = ICQ, AIM, ...
Did you learned something new? ;)
Learn more.
Yes indeed! We learned that one, and perhaps two, of our readers still have not mastered fifth-grade grammar. Persevere, kids!

Blab. A reader writes:
heh, I forethought to let me 'fantay' forever...
Make that three readers.

Blab. A reader suggests several engaging Fall activities.
Let's make completely random decisions on vitally important topics, using cubical dice! Using the entrails of sheep! Using the number of leaves on a cabbage! Using the entrails of cabbage! The number of leaves on a sheep!
Let's bask in the sun despite it all! Let's spend the night with Misty! Let's forecast the weather while sucking on eggs! Let's employ a case of Mr. McAllister's no-risk never-fail calcium-free vitamin-enhanced ass-wipes, now available in the big blue family-size box! Let's climb a tree!
We'll bring the eggs.

Blab. A reader exclaims:
http://www.topps.com/enduringfreedom.html !
... from which we quote:
A NEW SERIES DOCUMENTING
AMERICA'S GREATEST CHALLENGE

... which is, of course, keeping Dubya away from reporters.

Blab. A reader takes us to task over our recent assertion that HP's software giveaway might be a failed dot-com strategy.
Failed dot-com strategy: give software away, even though the only capital you receive you got from a stupid venture capitalist lender, and every penny you received you poured into this free software, in the pathetic attempt to lure advertisers on to your website, thus attracting more stupid venture capitalists so you can give more free software away, all the while watching your stock price go through the roof because you ran an ad during the Super Bowl.
HP strategy: give software away, thinking that all the capital you've received recently can be poured into the free software, hoping to recoup the revenue through future volume. KEY TO SUCCESS: don't run an ad during the Super Bowl with money you don't have.
We'll make a note of that.

Blab. A spammist (we think) writes a note with the following subject line:
PLRP Provides Solution to Cyber-Terrorist Threat
It goes on to recommend some company whose stock symbol (or something) is PLRP, and whose stock is selling for less than the price of a grain of salt per share.
But we prefer to think of it as extolling the virtues of our blog.

Blab. A reader is already preparing for the holidays.
I came across the Blue Dog Christmas book the other day, and noticed that the 2001 edition comes with an official 2001 Blue Dog tree ornament.
Get one while supplies last !
A devoted fan gave us that lovely book last year, and we used the ornament to force the blue dog to wear that awful velveteen jacket for several weeks.
We are so cruel.

Blab. Mistaking our humble blog for a reference librarian, a reader nonetheless asks:
So when they say "let's do it like they do on the Discovery Channel", what do you think they really mean? I mean, it's not entirely clear, once you really think about it. Some of the possibilities I've come up with are:
While being filmed.
Outdoors, on a scenic hillside in the Carpathians.
Whilst moving about on all fours, nude, munching on grass and shrubs.
Do you think it's any of those?
While we haven't heard that expression ourselves, we can verify that Carpathian grasses and shrubs do have physiological effects that are well worth filming.

Blab. A reader insists that we should ...
Give that woman a hoagie.
Alas, we fear it is to late for dear Calista Flockhart who, not only being cursed with an incomprehensible name, has also lost enough weight that she seeps out of her own envelope when processed by mail sorting machines. Wave bye-bye.

Yo. After the sorting, we seem to be Gryffindor. Dunno what any of that means, but it sounds like some guy named Harry is too. (Dave)

Yo. Are you about to get laid off? Find out with the Pink Slip Calculator. It claims we have a one in forty chance of being laid off in 2002. We are therefore writing 2.5% of our résumé today.

Plop.
Detailed psychological records containing the innermost secrets of at least 62 children and teenagers were accidentally posted on the University of Montana Web site last week [...].
The 400 pages of documents describe patient visits and offer diagnoses by therapists of mental retardation, depression, schizophrenia and other serious conditions.
In nearly all cases, they contain complete names, dates of birth and sometimes home addresses and schools attended, along with results of psychological testing.
Oops.

Yow. Way cool Flash (sorry) animation of the whole Dynamic e-Business arena with which our group at work is now obsessed. Though this is just an animation, it's based on a running demo, with real live software, built by our group.
Hey - it's the future.^TM

Plurp.
The blue dog
once stumbled across the
desiccated body of
Calista Flockhart

Tuesday, November 6, 2001
Blab. A reader has good news for us.
the end of the world is coming to a town near you...
Please let us know what town that would be, so we can be sure to stay away.

Blab. A reader seeks to trigger various terrorist activities with this encoded phrase.
hm, I forgot to set me 'away' from Jabber...
Or ... ?

Blab. Demonstrating the reason we do so love misdirected email, one of our many groupies writes:
Subj: i got off at 8:15
From: Vball Grrl03
sorry at least I told u
Sorry we missed you, Vball. We were eating leftover Chinese food at the time.

Blab. A reader has an early holiday gift for us, sort of.
Here, have a metafilter thread.
Well, it's a little threadlette about Cthulhu poetry. But the dastards don't even mention our own fabulous collection of Cthulhu Haiku. How dare they?!

Blab. A reader seeks to improve our vocabulary. Or flatten our neighborhood.
Word of the day: Thermobaric
Unfortunately, the link is to BLU-82 "Daisy Cutter" bomb, a really, really big bomb that the U.S. seems to be dropping on Taliban troops recently, but it's not clear to us that it's a thermobaric bomb.
Thermobaric, as we understand it, refers to fuel-air explosives. These bombs disperse a highly flammable liquid (or powder, sometimes) into the air around a target and ignite the resulting cloud a fraction of a second later. Result: extremely big boom (see pictures).
Humans are very nasty creatures, sometimes.

Blab. A reader attempts to convince us of its razor-sharp wit, then asks a variety of intrusive questions.
We used to tell photosynthetic plant jokes in college. The average joke was ten minutes long and begins, "A photosynthetic plant walks into a bar." After the standard setup and maybe 14 minutes of explication, the photosynthetic plant exclaims, "I can't do that, I'm a photosynthetic plant." I thought that was important.
Also, why the secretive nature about the dinner with Paul Ford? Is he as strange in person as he is in print? And since you got to meet Paul Ford after dreaming about him, do you think you'll get to meet Angelina Jolie?
Um, aren't all plants photosynthetic? (Or is that the key to this particular brand of humor?)
As we said, nothing more will be said of that dinner. We are, however, hoping to meet Angelina Jolie.

Plurp. For that reader to whom we promised links to the various projects in our group at work ...

The digital immune system

Information economies

Mail categorization

And an older page on the whole group that desperately needs updating

Happy browsing!

Yow. Star Wars II trailer. (But don't hold your breath. The release date is May 2002. Also, don't be surprised if the trailer site is hosed for a while. Companies never do figure this out, do they?)

Plop. Loyal readers may recall our recent series entitled America Responds, in which we lampooned the way we imagined certain vacuous American institutions might respond to Recent Events.
For the rest of you, here's a quick review.

Great stuff, eh? But understand: we thought we were kidding. We were trying to poke fun at how certain self-absorbed U.S. institutions might try to cope with the Biggest Crisis of Our Age, within their own genre, and fail miserably.
Then, over the weekend, we saw this.

There are only three possibilities.

The editors of Penthouse are exactly as vacuous as we feared.

They stole the idea from us.

Both of the above.

Frankly, we're betting on 3. It's another example of Life Imitating Parody.

Plurp.
The blue dog
was not afraid of being
vacuous

Monday, November 5, 2001
Blab. A reader who must not have home heating writes:
Just this morning I have made a wonderful discovery, which I am pleased to announce in the pages of Plurp.
While I would not be so arrogant to say that this could complete eliminate all violence among people, I believe this discovery will significantly increase the joy and happiness of all who participate in it, and can greatly reduce the suffering of humanity.
It seems so simple in retrospect! But had I not chanced upon it, it might have gone undiscovered for additional centuries, leading to billions of unnecessary deaths.
The secret to happiness in life is this:
Baklava for breakfast.
Don't believe me? Sounds too simple, too insignificant? Try it for yourself and see.
So you mainly have juice for breakfast? Still, it sounds messy.

Blab. Fearing that we Just Don't Get It, a reader seeks to enlighten us.
The invisible man joke: it's usually punchlined, "Tell him I can't see him."
Oh! We get it! That's funny.

Blab. An amnesiac reader writes:
Bezos looks kind of like Kevin Spacey. Is this one of those cultural conjunctions that everyone mentions, or am I unique in my observation?
Don't worry. You are not unique, just inattentive.

Blab. A reader includes us in the Endless Circulation of Jokes via email. This time it's that old saw of defining countries and cultures by cows. This time, however, it also sticks its knife into the Taliban.
A CHRISTIAN DEMOCRAT: You have two cows. You keep one and give one to your neighbor.
A SOCIALIST: You have two cows. The government takes one and gives it to your neighbor.
[... Many others omitted. It's on the Web after all. - Plurp]
A TALIBAN CORPORATION: You have two cows. You turn them loose in the Afghan "countryside" and they both die. You blame the godless American infidels.
You know what we have to say about that? Mu.

Blab. A reader is unwilling to allows us our peace.
Seems like the blab box was acting up, becuase you may not have recieved my babble about the TapeCat and the Fozzle-Booted Stomper. On the other hand, maybe you did get it and are still trying to forget about it.
We did not receive it, and we are still trying to forget about it.

Blab. Fresh from the recent Pixar release, a reader writes:
Waternoose!
... but provides no further explanation.

Blab. A correspondent approaches us with a confounding life situation, exacerbated by a sticky Caps Lock key..
Subj: HOW TO WORK ANSWERING MACHINE
From: CRQUICK261@aol.com
I HAVE AN ANSWERING MACHINE WITH NO INSTRUCTIONS. COULD YOU PLEASE TELL ME HOW OR WHERE TO GET INSTRUCTIONS? THE MODEL # IS DA168WM AND THIS NEG #AOMTAJ-21084AN-AN AND HERE IS SOME OTHER NUMBERS 9545 AND Q6645. THANK YOU!!!!
Oh, it's hard to know what to do here, isn't it? There are so many creative possibilities. Perhaps our readers can vie for the Best Response Award.

Yo. HP, that God of Business Strategy, has a brilliant new idea: Gain market share by giving software away. Excuse us for reminiscing, but isn't that the failed dot-com strategy?

Plurp. Capsule reviews from our recent orgy of cinema, 'cause we're too lazy to do real reviews.
Movie: Focus
Capsule: Arthur Miller. Fabulous. Topical. Go see it!
Movie: 13 Ghosts
Capsule: Ultimately silly shocker, but fun. Tubs O' Gore^TM. Loud noises and scary faces. Unique feature: Intricate kinetic house built specifically to be haunted.
Movie: Final Fantasy: The Spirits Within
Capsule: 100% CGI, based on a game I've never seen. Rich and lovely, but the people still don't look real. Ironically, it's because the faces aren't animated enough. Don't see it for the sappy plot, but the Bad Guys are cool.
Movie: Don't Say a Word
Capsule: Taut suspense/thriller with several good twists.
Movie: The One
Capsule: A multiverse story, preposterous on every level but cartoony enough to be very enjoyable with sufficient popcorn. Great Matrix-esque fight sequences.
Movie: Training Day
Capsule: Leathered narcotic cop trains rookie in Ways Of Street by stealing, extorting, murdering and encouraging drug use. Don't, as the couple beside me did, bring your four-year-old. (!)

Plurp. From across the oceans (via friend Jim) ...
Title: Complex Systems As Fundamental Theory Of Sports Coaching?
Authors: Gottfried Mayer-Kress
Comments: 12 pages, no figures, several links
Subj-class: Adaptation and Self-Organizing Systems; Chaotic Dynamics
Journal-ref: Keynote presentation to the 2001 International Sports Coaching Symposium of the Chinese Taipei University Sports Federation, Taichung, Taiwan, Nov. 2001
We argue that traditional Western science cannot adequately describe sports and other types of human behavior. Then we make an argument why a complex adaptive systems approach has the potential to provide the foundation for such
a theory. We claim that a special role will be played by biological quantum computation in the human brain that should have emerged through biological evolution. Biological quantum computation could have provided evolutionary advantages in the area of decision-making and fast motor responses, when a number of potential actions -represented as a set of points in a high dimensional state-space- are available to the agent. While for animals and early humans these rapid, coordinated motor activities had direct survival
value, today they are mostly manifested in competitive sports events. We suggest that entanglement can be facilitated by systematic sports coaching.

Plurp. In a dream, I am seated next to Angelina Jolie at a theater, though we had not previously met. She says something to me in an off-handed way and I reply with a remark that I consider pretty funny. She laughs, and I think, If I can make her laugh, maybe she'll like me.
The remark was funny enough that I started laughing (my own idiosyncratic mental defect), and the laughing half woke me up. I resolved to write it down so I could put it in my Weblog in the morning. But I didn't, and now I have no idea what it was.
That's sad in so many dimensions, isn't it?

Plurp. The slightly-heralded Dinner With Paul Ford did, in fact, occur, though nothing more will be said of it. Some things just have a need to remain mysterious.

Plurp.
The blue dog
played a special role
in biological quantum
computing

Sunday, November 4, 2001
Blab. Demonstrating that our readers will pester us until the end of time, a reader writes:
Whatever happened to the Plurp Anniversary Quiz? And the nun? You seem to have a problem finishing what you
Always eager to pander to the unreasonable demands of our readers, we devote this entire issue of Plurp to the First Anniversary of Plurp which, as you will certainly recall, we posted on the first anniversary of Plurp - Sept. 11 - before the more memorable events of that day.
We did, however, finish the nun.

Plurp. In the first part of the First Anniversary of Plurp, we asked you to tell us what you liked most, and what you liked least, about Plurp. As expected, most of you chose sloth instead, and told us nothing at all. Those few who did respond were mostly incoherent. We attribute this to lingering effects of self-medication, but of course we can't be sure.
In any event, we have transcribed those very few responses below.
We start off with the least coherent, this one from a poor sole who must have spent far too much time at Sophos Corp.
Most: maaaaaaaaaaah!
Least: maaaaaaaaaaah!
Yes, well. The second response was ambivalent at best.
Most: The scathing sarcasm
Least: The scathing sarcasm
At least our readers notice. Now we settle into what seems like the majority view. Of sorts.
Most: The BigBlabBox and your always witty responses. By far, it is my favorite feature of any weblog.
Least: A day without new Plurp posts is like a day without orange juice.
We appreciate the flattery, even if it is in pursuit of permitting our readers a Web voice without any real effort on their part.
In a similar, but somewhat less consistent vein, a reader proposes:
Most: Most everything except...
Least: The tsunami of Blabs (though I'm to blame as well). A little filtering would work wonders here, I think. Or even editing. It's all very cute when other people take over your weblog, but for Pete's sake, man, take it back once in a while.
We will be more than happy to reject each and every one of your Blab contributions in the future. Anything for our readers.
A reader on the same wavelength but with less amplitude contents:
Most: The wise and/or clever stuff you say.
Least: The things your reader says. (Not that I -mind- the things your reader says. I just prefer the stuff you say. So if I have to pick a "like least"...)
So, in summary, we conclude that we should continue abusing just about everybody and that our readers, in particular, would prefer that we ignore them before we abuse them.
Great.

Plurp. The second part of the First Anniversary of Plurp was more demanding. We asked you to participate in the First Plurp Scavenger Hunt, hunting for answers to several completely vacuous questions having to do with Plurp. Oddly, reader contributions were (generally) more coherent on this part. Perhaps this was due to random synchrony with their rare moments of partial lucidity. Imagine our surprise.
One reader chose to answer all of the questions with the cut-and-paste string maaaaaaaaaaah! It's hard to get excited about this. So we won't.
A second reader could only be bothered to try its hand at a few of the questions. And, even so ...
What is the blue dog's gender? How do you know?
male - no women could drink so much to get blue :)
What is a Helenism?
words starting with the same letter?
What is a broken joke?
my plurpssss
What does mean?
what dictornary do i need?
What is our cat's name?
the dog eat the cat
We get all the way to our third response, from a reader who claims to be a "Human-shaped mole on the left shoulde" before we find a reader who was even paying attention.
When was Plurp first posted?
January 1, 1970
When did the Blab box make its first appearance? How about the Big Blab Box?
January 1, 1980. Just now.
When was the first edition of Plurp that used a title other than Plurp: A Weblog?
In your dreams.
When did Captain Plurp first make an appearance?
On Jimmy's birthday.
When did the blue dog first appear in Plurp?
Shortly thereafter.
What is the blue dog's gender? How do you know?
Male. Has ears.
What is a Helenism?
Detroit.
What is a broken joke?
One that needs a new spring.
What does mean?
"Cthulhu" in Greek.
What is our cat's name?
"Cthulhu" in Greek.
Who is Our Greatest Fan?
"Cthulhu" in... Oh.
Who is Mia?
Mia Hamm, the CEO of Intel.
Who is Roger the Chicken?
Roger the Chicken who?
Who can sing the alphabet backwards?
The zyx Lady!
Astonishingly, the previous reader got one right! Next, we display the admission of reader G who, we judge, made the most sincere attempt to slavishly follow directions.
When was Plurp first posted?
9/29
When did the Blab box make its first appearance? How about the Big Blab Box?
10/18, 12/14
When was the first edition of Plurp that used a title other than Plurp: A Weblog?
that of 2/25
When did Captain Plurp first make an appearance?
right around the time I started reading, say March or so
When did the blue dog first appear in Plurp?
before time's mists parted
What is the blue dog's gender? How do you know?
that whole parting-mists thing was supposed to be a clue
What is a Helenism?
spliced cliches
What is a broken joke?
diced repartees
What does mean?
rife with plies
What is our cat's name?
trick question (which would be a great name for a cat)
Who is Our Greatest Fan?
some dangerously obsessed person, or Helen
Who is Mia?
We'll never know - just missed her in France
Who is Roger the Chicken?
Um, Roger the Chicken. Silly question
Who can sing the alphabet backwards?
the zyx lady
Astonishingly, a great many of these are correct, and some of them are even mildly humorous. Finally, we display the Zen-like wisdom of a reader claiming to be the meme-mixer, whose response we judge to be most in keeping with ... canned beets.
When was Plurp first posted?
Canned beets
When did the Blab box make its first appearance? How about the Big Blab Box?
Canned beets
When was the first edition of Plurp that used a title other than Plurp: A Weblog?
Canned beets
When did Captain Plurp first make an appearance?
Canned beets
When did the blue dog first appear in Plurp?
Canned beets
What is the blue dog's gender? How do you know?
Canned beets
What is a Helenism?
Canned beets
What is a broken joke?
Canned beets
What does mean?
Canned beets
What is our cat's name?
Canned beets
Who is Our Greatest Fan?
Canned beets
Who is Mia?
Canned beets
Who is Roger the Chicken?
A monk who inscribes a holy text into his own flesh, then sets himself on fire
Who can sing the alphabet backwards?
Canned beets
A woman severs the thumbs of all of the men she loves in order to make a gift for a man she does not. At another time, three eggs yolks are found by the side of a road that has fallen into disuse. How many children were born with extra limbs that year?

Plurp.
The blue dog
was very disturbed by that
gender question

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