Timelies!

HAPPY BELATED BIRTHDAY, KATEP!!

HAPPY BIRTHDAY, BRENDA!!

Count me in on the all-cranky all the time list. Grrrr.

Here is a funny cartoon related to hamsters and weapons, TURN YOUR HAMSTER INTO A FIGHTING MACHINE:

[link]

It is NOT related to ita's links or goatse, and no real hamsters were harmed in the making of it either. I particularly like the look on the face of the hamster in the middle of the page....

Oddly, I'm not especially ragey. I do get frustrated (durable medical equipment company and insurance company, I'm looking at both of you), but even then it isn't rage. It's just resignation at the stupidity of bureaucracy.

TURN YOUR HAMSTER INTO A FIGHTING MACHINE:

That whole thing is a pretty funny parody of D.I.Y. project stuff. Note the safety warnings and "troubleshooting" sections....

Also you can relieve your rage by picturing yourself stabbing the people who are making you angry with your fighting hamster!

I am not angry with my fighting hamster.

Personally, I couldn't fathom anything worse than goatse.

Not having seen it, only having read a description, I find it hard to believe that's any worse than the "Surfing Bird" sequence in PINK FLAMINGOES, which I was unfortunate enough to see (where a talented gent seems to be - ahem - "lip" syncing as SB plays on the soundtrack ). Without having seen (and having no plans to see) either ita's recent link or "tub girl", both of those gross me out considerably more, at least conceptually. Maybe the execution makes it less so, but I'm not going to do the comparisons.

This is really minor compared to crap other people are going through, but...

A few days ago I caught a CTA train at Main St. in Evanston. I decided to add some money to my fare-card first. At that station there are two fare-card machines. A woman was using one of them, and a woman was standing in front of the other one, talking on her cellphone. I stood behind the woman on her cellphone, waiting for her to either actually use the machine or get out of the way. For about 5 seconds she did neither - then she said to me, "The polite word is 'excuse me.'" Then she complained about me being rude to the person she was talking to on her cellphone.

Anyway, she pissed me off. I figured the polite thing to do would be to wait for her to use the machine or move out of the way. It seemed to me that she just wanted to put all the blame on me for the situation, rather than acknowledge that maybe it wasn't best for her to be in front of the machine but not using it while she was distracted by her call.

The polite thing is for her to move the fuck out of the way without making you ask.

I figured the polite thing to do would be to wait for her to use the machine or move out of the way.

Considering that she was talking on the phone, I probably would have done the same thing. Only when she sniped, I probably would have said, "That's two words, Huffy McSnottypants." And made the situation worse, as I sometimes do.

The only time I've gotten frustrated with people who wouldn't say "excuse me" was when I was sitting in the aisle seat of an airplane and the strange, deeply midwestern people sitting in the middle and window seats would just stare at me when they needed me to get up so they could go to the bathroom.

In conclusion, Tom, cellphone lady? Kind of an asshole.