Thursday, July 15, 2004

Thu
15
Jul
2004

The Ant & The Grasshopper: Then & Now

I know this has been around awhile, but I heard it again on Dr. Laura's show yesterday, so I wanted to post it.

THE ANT & THE GRASSHOPPER FABLE

CLASSIC VERSION...


The ant works hard in the withering heat all summer long, building his house and laying up supplies for the winter. The grasshopper thinks he's a fool and laughs and dances and plays the summer away. Come winter, the ant is warm and well fed. The grasshopper has no food or shelter so he dies out in the cold.

Moral Of The Story...Be responsible for yourself!


MODERN VERSION...

The ant works hard in the withering heat all summer long, building his house and laying up supplies for the winter. The grasshopper thinks he's a fool and laughs and dances and plays the summer away. Come winter, the shivering grasshopper calls a press conference and demands to know why the ant should be allowed to be warm and well fed while others are cold and starving.

CBS, NBC, and ABC show up to provide pictures of the shivering grasshopper next to a video of the ant in his comfortable home with a table filled with food.

America is stunned by the sharp contrast. How can this be, that in a country of such wealth, this poor grasshopper is allowed to suffer so?

Kermit the Frog appears on Oprah with the grasshopper and everybody cries when they sing "its Not Easy Being Green."

Jesse Jackson stages a demonstration in front of the ant's house where the news stations film the group singing "We Shall Overcome". Jesse then has the group kneel down to pray to God for the grasshopper's sake.

Al Gore exclaims in an interview with Peter Jennings that the ant has gotten rich off the back of the grasshopper, and calls for an immediate tax hike on the ant to make him pay his "fair share".

Finally, the EEOC drafts the "Economic Equity and Anti-Grasshopper Act", retroactive to the beginning of the summer. The ant is fined for failing to hire a proportionate number of green bugs and, having nothing left to pay his retroactive taxes, his home is confiscated by the government.

Hillary gets her old law firm to represent the grasshopper in a defamation suit against the ant, and the case is tried before a panel of federal judges that Bill appointed from a list of single-parent welfare recipients.

The ant loses the case.

The story ends as we see the grasshopper finishing up the last bits of the ant's food while the government house he's in, (which just happens to be the ant's old house), crumbles around him because he doesn't maintain it.

The ant has disappeared in the snow. The grasshopper is found dead in a drug related incident and the house, now abandoned, is taken over by a gang of spiders who terrorize the once peaceful neighborhood.

Wednesday, July 14, 2004

Wed
14
Jul
2004

Scott Patterson

So, it turns out that dreamy Scott Patterson (Luke Danes) from the show Gilmore Girls has the same birthday that I do—September 11th! Whoohoo! Harry Connick, Jr. was also born on that day, but I knew that already.

Speaking of Gilmore Girls, I've been renting season one from Netflix. There are six discs total and I just finished watching the second one. I'm trying to be polite and not watch them when Marcus is around.

Sunday, July 11, 2004

Sun
11
Jul
2004

Who’s That Fluffy Bundle of Love?

It's Princess, yeah.

A while back Shockwave asked South Park creators Matt Stone and Trey Parker to make two short animated flash films for them. Although the creators had warned Shockwave that they would deliver a cartoon with no holds barred, Shockwave insisted on having them make it. So, they did! And "Princess" was the result.
See why Shockwave never aired them . . .


WARNING: Ok, just so you know, this is animated p0rn. If you're easily offended, DON'T GO LOOK AT THIS! If you can handle it, go check it out. I thought it was freakin' hilarious.

Link via Gigglechick.

Edited 2/27/05:The above link no longer works, but I found it here.
Sun
11
Jul
2004

Wacky Weekend

Current mood: bearmood — sad sore
It's been a really interesting weekend. I didn't get much sleep Thursday night trying to get my project finished to turn it in. I lost about 2 hours worth of work when the program crashed and I hadn't saved. Doh! I got enough of it done to turn it--probably won't get a really good grade, but didn't really care. I left school about 3:30 and went home to take a nap. This huge storm rolled in and between the storm and the nervous dog, I couldn't sleep.

When Marcus got home from work, I asked him if he wanted to order in a pizza and watch "Enemy at the Gates" that I rented for him. He wanted to go to Michaels to look at shadow boxes first for a project he wants to do. Since we were out, we decided to go out to eat instead of getting a pizza. As we're sitting at the light on our way to restaurant row on Abilene, we got rear-ended at Sable/Mississippi. Marcus had seen him coming up on him and knew he wasn't going to stop. He held hard on the brakes to make sure we didn't chain react into the car in front of us. The guy's Jeep got pretty jacked because I could see all the antifreeze immediatley all over the street. Then Marcus got out of the truck to go read the guy the riot act and it turns out he had been the victim of an attempted car jacking at Chambers/Mississippi and since he refused to give up his car, the dude tried to stab him. The poor guy was in shock and a little disoriented and was trying to drive himself to the hospital. Marcus decided to escort the guy to the hosptial and file an accident report from there (there are actually alot of police officers there on a Friday night!). I didn't think the guy was going to make it because first of all, he had lost all his radiator fluid. Second, he started weaving badly and I was getting afraid he was going to cause another accident. I thought maybe he was losing consciousness or something. It turns out this was because the accident jacked up his steering/power steering.

Fortunately, the carjacker only sliced through the guy's shirt and scratched the skin. He was mostly suffering from panic and shock, I think.

The story is really bizarre in that he had recently returned from Iraq because of some injuries he received there and was awaiting a medical discharge. He totally hates living here and was looking forward to moving home. He only had liability insurance, so he is screwed as far as repairing his vehicle. He said at the hospital that he should've let the guy have the car, at least he might have gotten it back in one piece. Marcus found out today when he called to check on him and apologize for being initally gruff with him that the poor guy is also in the midst of a divorce. With all that poor guy is going through right now, my problems don't seem so significant.

Marcus was a little unnerved that a car jacking could happen around here. I asked him if he was totally oblivious to the news lately. It seems like almost every day anymore that something bad is happening in Aurora. I remember seeing a thing on the news a couple of weeks back about how gang activity is up just as the city is cutting funding to the gang unit.

Fortunatley, Marcus' truck has a sturdy bumper and the damage is minimal compared to the other vehicle. We took it to the adjustor today. Marcus will have to pay the deductable and he may not get it back. When our insurance tries to collect from his, they may claim it was a "moment of peril" and that they are not responsible for paying. If they do pay, though, Marcus is supposed to get the money back. We'll see, but we're not holding our breath.

Today my neck is totally sore. I felt a little achy Friday night where the seat belt cross my chest, but I expected that. I'm sure that making dough for two days on top of any slight injury I might have had just made it worse. Oh, well. At least it wasn't worse.

So, tonight we finally got the see the movie. Except for a sex scene (that was totally unnecessary is a war movie), it was an excellent movie. As soon as I get the laundry in the dryer, I'm going to bed. I have no school for the next two weeks and I need to get my life in order.

Anway, if you want to read Marcus' account of the whole accident ordeal, read it here.
Sun
11
Jul
2004

Twenty Personality Questions

I thought the result I got from this was eerily accurate:
20 Questions to a Better Personality

Wackiness: 14/100
Rationality: 50/100
Constructiveness: 34/100
Leadership: 56/100


You are an SEDL--Sober Emotional Destructive Leader. This makes you a dictator. You prefer to control situations, and lack of control makes you physically sick. You feel have responsibility for everyone's welfare, and that you will be blamed when things go wrong. Things do go wrong, and you take it harder than you should.

You rely on the validation and support of others, but you have a secret distrust for people and distaste for their habits and weaknesses that make you keep your distance from them. This makes you very difficult to be with romantically. Still, a level-headed peacemaker can keep you balanced.

Despite your fierce temper and general hot-bloodedness, you have a soft spot for animals and a surprising passion for the arts. Sometimes you would almost rather live by your wits in the wilderness somewhere, if you could bring your books and your sketchbook.

You also have a strange, undeniable sexiness to you. You may go insane.