Plurp: Carl Just Needs a Hug

Bigger!

2003.12.28 : 2004.01.03

Saturday, January 3, 2004
Blab. A reader fawns over our recent fetish.
On the subject of wire coat hangers -- perhaps you have been watching 'Queer eye for the straight guy'? Carson (the couture chap) has a largely irrational, but intense, dislike of wire hangers.

We admit to having watched said program, and even enjoying it at times. But our obsession with wooden hangers started before that. Maybe Carson got it from us?

Blab. A co-dependent reader is philosophical about our addiction.
re: the wooden hangers. You will always have kindling, but how will you break into cars?
As we have neither a fireplace nor an urge to indulge in the atom-based Grand Theft Auto, we feel satisfied with our situation.

Blab. A reader would prefer us to settle for the mediocre.
Steve,
I loved your question about where to find the best bagels in NYC. I'm originally from North Carolina but have lived in Texas more than 20 years. When I go to N.C. I eat all the barbecue (it's pork there) that I can get my hands on. They (the N.C.ers) are always arguing amongst themselves to direct me to the "best" barbecue place. But after not having ANY, or worse yet, having the new "pulled pork" that they have in Texas, ALL the barbecue in N.C. is good. So I suggest you live in Arizona or some such place for a couple of years - then you when you go back to NYC, the very first bagel you find will be the best one you've ever had. Geez, Steve, really! You're like someone in Maryland looking for a good crab cake, or New Orleans looking for good gumbo. It's all good. Now go and apologize to the bagel shop owner down the street.
Hey, we're just a Noo Yawkah, lady. Anyhow, looking for "the best" of anything in NYC guarantees two things: (1) You get to sample lots and lots of whatever it is you're looking for, which is fun all by itself, and (2) you do find some really excellent stuff. At least, as long as you're not looking for Mexican food.
Prior to coming to NYC, long, long ago, we were a starving grad student in San Diego. Fabulous veggies, and pretty good Mexican food. But what we thought of as "bagels" were tiny things that came in a freezer package marked "Lender's." You had to toast them in the toaster before putting packaged Philadelphia cream cheese on them.
When we came to NYC to interview for the position we eventually got, the following conversation ensued the first time we ordered at a bagel store. For best effect, imagine Bagel Store Guy as having a Brooklyn accent.

Steve: I'd like a toasted bagel with cream cheese.

Bagel Store Guy: I'm not gonna toast yer bagel.

Steve: Excuse me?

Bagel Store Guy
(louder and more impatiently): I'm not gonna toast yer bagel!

Steve: Uh, you're not?

Bagel Store Guy: You toast bagels when they're stale. We don' serve stale bagels. So, like I said, I'm not gonna toast yer bagel.

And he was right.

Blab. A reader sends us an ...
Example of why rebranding Amazon.com may not be right for your Christian bookstore.
Goodness! Not necessarily werksafe, is it?
The possibilities within this genre are wonderful and endless. Yet, somehow, we resist. (At least, we don't post any, but we generated some real doozies.)

Blab. A reader finds sense in the U.S. decision to cancel flights that had passengers with Welsh names.
I would definitely be suspicious of Welsh insurance agents. Previously, I had thought that that was just me, but apparently not. I am (inauspiciously) in the company of the US gubbermint.
We feel certain that you have a long career ahead of you. It's not highly paid, but you can't get fired.

Blab. A reader explains the planes.
Rumour has it that the clever gnomes up Langley way confused Hamburg with Homburg.
Cheers, Morton
Of course, the cited page is in some furrin' language. Fortunately, we have at our command the immense powers of Babelfish.
Terror alarm: Homburg instead of Hamburg?
Police employment: Senator of the Interiors does not exclude mistake.
Hamburg - the controversy over that Hamburg terror alarm sharpens itself further too. Minister of the Interior Otto Schily (SPD) accused Hamburg Senator of the Interiors Dirk cam man (a party of right-national offensive) "Geschwaetzigkeit" to that, because this had informed the public comprehensively about alleged notice plans of the group of "Ansar el Islam" on the German Federal Armed Forces hospital in Wandsbek. Cam man rejected the reproaches sharply: "Schily wants to divert only from own omissions."
Gosh. We're happy that's cleared up.

Blab. A reader with a userid of Blonde789 sends us something that we figured had to be spam. But no!
Subj: ROFLOL
I found this site amusing because, my husband (now my ex) wrote a book on aliens and this sounded just like him.....he found secret symbolism in everything and it always had to do with the aliens.......ROFLOL....by the way I sent this to him, just couldn't resist it.......wonderful tongue in cheek site...(I hope)....LOL
Our Treasured Blonde Reader remains blissfully unaware, despite our best efforts, and those of her devoted ex-hubbie. Perhaps it's best that way.

Blab. And still we try to catch up with mail that was itself caught in the temporal rifts last month. Still!
In that nearly-Cretaceous period, we asked you to respond to a Real NYC Quiz. Weirdly, we got a response!
Here is my entry for the Despotic Plurp Stunt posted on Muesnesday.

1. Where no one lives on account of the pace, yet 7 million are swinging for space Know ye Kerry won?

2. The rumble of the subway train, the rattle of the taxi Adorably lawful boy

3. The city’s glamour could never spoil the dreams of a boy and girl Ann at Math

4. the New York Times and the Daily News Swanky men of Detroit

5. I’ll make a brand new start of it Worry woke Kenny.

6. We’ve gotta have the game or we’ll die from shame (Sid beholds Seattle.) Atlanta workforce nipping German enemy.

7. I’m New York City born and raised "Mia?" said I.

8. They say I’ll take a bus back home.... Uti? Yes, he's a Kamchatka bellboy.

9. You move too fast, got to make the morning last Then, 95 red beets got rights. (Elegy for vino)

10. And watch her as she grows in my garden Ha, Herman lisps.

11. London Bridge is falling down, boy and girl together Barb downloads The Geology of Grinding till dinner.

12. Tell them of how I’m yearning to mingle with that old time crowd My Roget's II... word... adverb... "gay?"

13. It’s the avenue I’m taking you to Ed to try Fresno sect.

14. is pocket’s filled with spending loot Helen: "I depict townsfolk, dogs, pistil."

15. It spells the thrill of first nights Rue a known mutiny.

We are deeply impressed by this response, and declare if our First Recursive Plurp Contest! Readers who feel up to this Herculean task, and who are done cleaning the stables, may attempt to explicate this seemingly befuddled confluence of clues.
Go ahead. You know you want to.

Blab. And here's something else fun for our Treasured Readers.
Helen likes to wear nothing at all.........I mean, on her FEET! Scrape your dirty little mind off that pavement.
So the foot fetishists among us won't have to leave their dirty little minds on that pavement? Excellent.

Blab. A reader with no nose writes:
Broken Joke (second try). Q: What's brown and sticky? A: A melting chocolate bar. I think that qualifies as a broken stick joke (sorry, couldn't resist) -AJL
Maybe we're looking at this backwards, but we get the feeling that the canonical answer (A: A stick) is itself a broken joke. We like the broken stick thing, though. Perhaps it's a new genre that we should track in our copious free time.

Blab. In that distant past, we asked a reader if its Symantec Anti-Virus thingie ever finished scanning.
Indeed it did finish eventually. Total scan time was about 20 hours for a reported 5 million files, including descent into zips.
A paragon of performance perfection, that product.

Blab. A lawyer nonetheless writes:
Please accept, with no obligation implied or implicit, our best wishes for an environmentally conscious, socially responsible, low stress, non-addictive, gender neutral, celebration of the winter solstice holiday, practiced within the most enjoyable traditions of the religious persuasion of your choice, or secular practices of your choice, with respect for the religious/secular persuasions and/or traditions of others, or their choice not to practice religious or secular traditions at all .and a fiscally successful, personally fulfilling, and medically uncomplicated recognition of the onset of the generally accepted calendar year 2004, but not without due respect for the calendars of choice of other cultures whose contributions to society have helped make America great, (not to imply that America is necessarily greater than any other country or is the only "AMERICA" in the western hemisphere), and without regard to the race, creed, color, age, physical ability, religious faith, or choice of computer platform of the wishee.
(By accepting this greeting, you are accepting these terms. This greeting is subject to clarification or withdrawal. It is freely transferable with no alteration to the original greeting. It implies no promise by the wisher to actually implement any of the wishes for her/himself or others, and is void where prohibited by law, and is revocable at the sole discretion of the wisher. This wish is warranted to perform as expected within the usual application of good tidings for a period of one year, or until the issuance of a subsequent holiday greeting, whichever comes first, and warranty is limited to replacement of this wish or issuance of a new wish at the sole discretion of the wisher.)
We wish they'd all take up a fulfilling hobby. Like online games.

Blab. Oh look - they did!
Chinese court orders Beijing Arctic Ice Technology Development Company to return virtual bioweapons to disgruntled role player.
"[Li Hongchen] spent two years and more than US$1,200 playing the game and purchasing the virtual arsenal."
So Hongchen got himself a bunch of "weapons" in this here "game". Rude "hak0rz" stole them. Said Hongchen sues game company, wins, and gets his "weapons" back.
And guess who made money on all of this. Yup.

Blab. On our glowing review of Big Fish, a reader writes:
Oooh, I thpught Big Fish looked entertaining, but now I will be sure to go see it. Give smooches to Helen for me.
We hope you did.
Smooches were officially delivered. We hope don't mind if it didn't stop there.

Blab. An uncertain reader writes:
I'm not sure if this is a Helenism or a mixed metaphor:
"an 800-pound octopus" (referring to a powerful corporation)
"an 800-pound gorilla" + "an octopus"
As in:
Q: Where does an 800-pound octopus sleep?
A: It doesn't; it's an invertebrate.
Except that they do! Which only serves to confuse us.
And that makes us officially Caught Up. Which also serves to confuse us.

Plurp. Once again, and to our horror, Helen is edged out.

naked badger pictures

helen naked pitures

iris chacon

meep

new jersey does not exist

arnie

arsenic poisoning pictures

banana

bryant gumble bryant gumbel

carl cthulhu

Congratulations to all our winners. Except for New Jersey.

Yo. Oh look. Someone made us toys for Thingie Day. All of them show an impressive attention to detail and way too much spare time. And some of them are kinda fun. (Dave)

Plurp.

Plurp. And, by the same people, Cthulhu plush slippers.

Plurp. Helen was giggling last night about Professional Death Management. We didn't ask. We like surprises.

Yow. Do go see The Triplets of Belleville, which we continue to want to call The Three Witches of Bellevue, even though it's not. Wonderful animation, a very clever mixture of hand animation and (some, limited, but extremely well integrated) CGI. Hardly any dialog, and none that really matters anyway. Fabulous soundtrack (if you liked Stomp).
Perhaps the best caricature of a dog we've ever seen. Incredible attention to detail!
And they got the physics of things right (except when they consciously decided not to) - the way things move, and bounce, and crash about - stunning. Bonus points.
Plus, in the opening credits - at the bottom of the very first screen, in fact - is the field equation for general relativity. We wonder if anyone else noticed.

Plurp. We sat in a small French restaurant with friends, listening to a woman sing French songs from the WWII era. We took out our pen and wrote on the paper tablecloth:
Do you think that, fifty years from now, we'll all be singing heart-wrenching Iraqi songs?

Plurp.
The blue dog
sang heart-wrenching
bio-containment songs

Friday, January 2, 2004
Blab. A reader dredges up some cheer for us.
Dredging up odd pictograms from 6th grade....
Wee fish ewe a mare egrets moose panda batty gnu deer.
- Felis Lynx
We greatly appreciate you, and the bottom of your barrel, Treasured Reader.

Blab. A reader correctly answers the question.
The thing is a tongue scraper / cleaner. When we brush our teeth, the majority part of germs are still there, and mostly on the tongue. Scraping off all the muck off our tongues every morning does do us more good than brushing our teeth!
Excellent! Now, what was the question?

Blab. A GNE addict gives us a whole new way to wile away the few remaining hours of our vacant, meaningless life.
Now this is a cool game! I think I got it from striatic. I'm not sure.
And free, too! Line up mirrors to make virtual laser beams do strange and unnatural things.

Plurp. Did we mention that Santa brought us another Cratsley? Well, he did. (Like you care.)

Plurp. We finished one of our rare home projects today: replacing all of our wire coat hangers with wooden ones. The wire hangers had been driving us subtly mad for some time now. We're not sure why, and we're not sure why we felt compelled to replace then with wooden hangers instead.

Plop. Intelligence has a new definition.
Six cases of mistaken identity were behind the pre-Christmas grounding of six Air France flights between Paris and Los Angeles over terrorism fears, a police official said Friday.
The names of six passengers were similar to those of terrorist suspects provided by the FBI, prompting the French government to halt the flights, the official said on condition of anonymity.
Pierre Debue, director of the French border police, said one name on the list turned out to be that of a 5-year-old child. The Wall Street Journal on Friday said two other suspected terrorists turned out to be an elderly Chinese woman and a Welsh insurance agent.

Plurp.
The blue dog
recommended not having a name
that resembled Arabic,
Chinese or Welsh

Thursday, January 1, 2004
Blab. New Year's cheer comes in the oddest forms.
Family sized New Year's serving of Helenisms: one from me, and one from the ever-delightful C.:
"Cool your horses"
    + "Cool your jets"
    + "Hold your horses"
"Easy go lucky"
    + "Easy going"
    + "Happy go lucky"
{inw}
Perhaps a previously unreported Bush coinage of Hold your jets was the impetus for the recent grounding of French planes?
In any event, bottomless thanks to {inw} and the ever-delightful C.

Blab. What's it all about, Alfie?
Someone else!! Someone else!! Someone else!!!!
Aliens maybe?

Blab. Or someone else!
Not aliens, an ex bf. :P
Your ex bf (extreme beet fillet?) kidnapped you? That's horrific! Call 911!

Blab. A reader amplifies the festivities.
The Bicycle Pedaling Frog wishes you a happy arbitrary point in the earth's orbit about the sun.
That's about the way we feel about it. All the Gregorians ran around today wishing each other Happy New Year. Not wishing to spoil their parochial glee, even the Jews and the Chinese folks smile and return the greeting.

Blab. And the Scots!
Happy New Year to all our friends and foes.
Isn't that nice? The complete lyrics of Auld Lang Syne, including several verses you've never heard, and a translation into modern English for those of you unfortunate enough not to speak Scots.
We two have paddled in the stream
From morning sun till dinner-time
But the broad seas have roared between us
Since the days long ago.

Plurp. So surprisingly, to us at least, NYC (and, it seems, the U.S. in general) got through that whole New Year's thing without anybody getting blown up or otherwise nastily demised by Evil Terrorists.
That's either because (a) the U.S. government did an amazing job of disrupting, deterring and discombobulating terrorists plots, or (b) the Evil Terrorists didn't have anything in mind for Jan. 1 after all, preferring other, less conspicuous dates.
We'd like to hope for (a). But we're not sure we believe it.
In any event, we wish all of our readers a Bland and Boring New Year.

Yow. Happy New Year from Design Within Reach. Pretty cool, as these things go. (Bruce)

Plurp.
And there's a hand, my trusty fiere,
And gie's a hand o' thine,
And we'll tak a right guid-willie waught
For auld lang syne!

Wednesday, December 31, 2003
Blab. What's it all about, Alfie?
Me!! Me!! Me!!!!
Who are we to argue?

Blab. Where's Waldo?
I'm here! I'm here! Hidding behind that yond rock. I just look like an old Start Trek series character.
Scotty? Is that you?

Blab. A reader from far away can't seem to get its mind off Manhattan architecture.
This treasured reader has spent the precious remaining moments of the year arbitrarily known as 2003 wondering about stuff. Most importantly about the whole freedom tower thing.
For one thing, it's going to be a specific height (1776 ft) to commemorate becomeing independent and free from the terror and tyranny of British rule, a fact that seems to do little to enhance the face of the current "special relationship" between the US and its progenitor. Or is the UK perhaps only one small step from the "Axis of Evil", and in need of a reminder of who's boss? Of course, more astonishing would be the UK declaring independence of the US.
Then there's the whole "freedom" tower thing. This is most puzzling, only recently the US administration made the word freedom synonymous with "France" in the minds of most people. Is the recent wound so quickly healed that now they are to name their great memorial (and poke in the eye to the Brits) "France" tower?
Somehow I doubt that 2004 will bring any greater rationality to this stranger than fiction world, but, daft old romantic idealist that I am, I wish all of Plurp's (currently elusive) readership, peace and prosperity in the new year. And a few badgers. Oh...and a leap year. Even a leap year would help.
-AJL
In fact, it has been renamed the French Tower. The restaurant will be French, serve French fries and French roast coffee. Public displays of affection in the plaza will be restricted to French kissing.
And yes, the UK is next on the list. Forces are massing in Sweden as we speak.

Blab. A reader mixes melancholy with its merriment.
Tell the Blue Dog we are all weirding out about the New Year. Can't we all just have one good year without some type of hideous occurence? I'll drink to that! "Should auld acquantaince...."
That'd be OK with us.

Plurp. So, like, Hoppy Gnu Ear, and stuff. Our current best hope is that the new year will be incredibly boring and uneventful.
You know?

Yo. Bagel fanatics arise! (Or, at least, rise.) Where are the very best bagels in NYC?

Plurp.
The blue dog
already had a
Hoppy Gnu Ear

Tuesday, December 30, 2003
Blab. Instead of explaining yesterday's term, Lord of the Bling Blings (which we, of course, thought was awfully funny), a reader instead cuts and pastes.
"The term, which is used to describe diamonds, jewelry and all forms of showy style, was coined by New Orleans rap family Cash Money Millionaires back in the late '90s and started gaining national awareness with a song titled "Bling Bling" by Cash Money artist BG."
Good to know.

Plurp. You know what's weird? It's almost a different year than it is now. That's weird. We don't understand that.

Plurp. Today's Spam Subject Line Poem.
Subj:    Re: YKGCA, semidarkness silently stood
Subj:    Re: were again buried gw a hkndhlbsd
Subj:    Re: TW, towards the palace
Subj:    Re: EYPGAF, that im here
Subj:    eat PIZZA and LOSE WEIGHT? yntrfyrixt axha

Plurp. Without comment.
Officials from the Nation of Islam, a separatist African-American Muslim group, have moved in with Michael Jackson and are asserting control over the singer's business affairs, friends, employees and business associates of Mr. Jackson said.
Initially invited to the Neverland Ranch several weeks ago to provide security for Mr. Jackson, members of the Nation of Islam are now restricting access to him and have begun making decisions for him related to the news media, his business affairs and even his legal strategy, some of Mr. Jackson's friends and associates said.

Plurp.
The blue dog
wondered if aliens
had kidnapped all the
Treasured Readers

Monday, December 29, 2003
Blab. OK, paper fetishists. (You know who you are!) This one's for you.
Make your own dog automata out of paper! Fun for the whole family!
And when you do, you will send us images, which we will then post here, right? Right?

Blab. A reader likes that penguin-shuffling game.
Whoa, that penguin-shuffling game? Really fascinating and intense. Not at all boring. Really. The part with the helicopter gunships was a little violent, though, we thought.
So you only got to the second level? Still, that's pretty good. Don't feel bad.
In any event, it's not a matter of liking or disliking, not a matter of skillful or skillless (how many Ls does that have?). No. When it comes to penguin shuffling, it's your patriotic duty.
Enough said.

Blab. A reader attempts to discover our internal mental state. Good luck!
Your plurp regarding Mary Tyler Moore is an obvious attempt to categorize your blabbers - baby boomers? gen Xers? gen Y? We are not falling for it. (OR DID I?)
However, this reader has uncovered our Great Conspiracy. Virtually everything we write is an attempt to categorize our readers. Clever or not? Capable of reading or not? Appreciative of our obscure humor or not? Seeing meaning where there is none or not? Sane or not?
That kind of thing. Fnord.

Blab. A reader torments us.
The only good part about badgers badgers was the killer impersonation of Roy Orbison during the snake part - you know you all thought it.
Let's not bring that up again, mkay?

Blab. Having seen LotR:RofK, Helen was pining for those cool cloak clasps that the hobbits wore. By odd coincidinky, a reader sends us one of those random ...
[link]
... things. Even more oddly, it points to a place where you can buy (among other things) those cool cloak clasps that the hobbits wore.
There are quite a few Middle-Earthian things there. You might, for instance, want to buy the One Ring. Then again, maybe not. Lots of trouble, that ring.
Awfully pretty, though. You might want to just look.

Plurp. The following term appeared mysteriously in our mind last night.
Lord of the Bling Blings
Treasured Readers (that's you) are kindly requested to tell us what it means.

Plurp. Favorite Spam Subject Line O' The Day.
Vicòndón kills the pain indiana thinnish legume bankrupt hemorrhoid tangy bold atop countdown ponderous nag bivouac abreast auspices
Don't ask us why.

Plurp. Second-Favorite Spam Subject Line O' The Day.
read this, u wont regret learnedly statist quivering
Obviously not intended for us, as we generally regret just about anything statist. Even quivering.

Yo. Plurp is now in the dictionary. Go vote for it (though we cannot figure out how to do so) as the best possible word / definition in the entire universe.

Plurp.
The blue dog
looked up "schmeagol"
in the Yiddish dictionary

Sunday, December 28, 2003
Plurp.

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