Open Letter Day

(To the previous owner of my House)

Dear Dipshit:

I'm honestly not sure whether I should be filled with pity for you, or filled with a desire to see you tied to a stake and stoned for general nincompoopery...probably the most critical mental coin toss in human history. But late yesterday afternoon, I was definitely looking for a suitable post hole digger.

To wit: I was removing and replacing a couple of the dreadful light fixtures you yourself had replaced (leaving lovely paint gaps, too) and I saw where you had some trouble with one of the mounting screws. You know...the ones which screw upwards into the utility box to, you know, HOLD the light in place? Yeah. That one. Wanna know how I know you had trouble?

Picture it. There I was. No shit. Standing on my mini scaffold bench. All set to install the new hanging fixture my bride liked so much. Could I hang it correctly? Nope. No chance. Your trouble spot? Staring me in the eyes, laddy-buck. That screw hole? Stripped. Not a thread remaining. Imagine how I looked as I managed to effortlessly push that #10 machine screw through the hole with noooooooooo effort whatsoever.

Kinda defeats the whole purpose, don't it? I mean, I can't hang a light fixure with one screw, can I? (although, judging from the previous light, you managed to....how it stayed up is a puzzle for household physicists everywhere.)

Anyway, Mr. Braintrust, in whatever home you own now, if you fuck up and strip the screwhole in a junction box, suck it up and replace it! Don't leave the next poor bastard to figure out how to do so on his own. Although, in your defence, I'm not sure how we could have removed that puppy without removing six square feet of drywall. (I will forward you a copy of my letter to subdivision homebuilders; subject: Consideration of replacability of basic outlets and junction boxes as installed by fuckwitted builders to save the asses of competent DIY-ers who discover your fuckups. Like, seriously, dudes...why did you screw it in from the TOP as well as from the sides?)

I recognize that you're the same mental pigmy who couldn't install drywall if your very life depended on it, not that *that* little hurdle seemed to slow you down, if the basement is any indication.

Anyway dude, seriously, don't try any renovations in the new place, ok? You're more a danger to yourself than others.

Cheers,

Mossy.

----------------------

(To Hampton Bay lighting, the designers of my new kitchen hanging light fixture)

Dear Cocksuckers:

I recently had the indescribable pleasure of installing your Model ****** 5-light hanging fixture in my kitchen. After coming up with an innovative solution to a stripped screw fitting I struggled to hang your light properly. You see, you provided this wonderful diagram of the components of the fixture, but you were a little skosh on the best way to install that bad boy. I mean, it's all well and good to tell us how the componends go together, but if one follows the instructions to the letter, one winds up with a brutally twisted mass of cables as the fixture threads onto the centre screw. This little glitch triggered much consternation in my bride, and no short of questioning of your collective parentage and brain power on my part.

I was going to give you some detailed instructions on how to sort out your diagram, but I'm pretty sure you wouldn't understand them. After all, its MAKES SENSE to do it my way. Besides, I'm not sure I can adequately detail the physical contortions required, nor can I articulate the marital care and handling instructions needed, because this little gem can put marriages in jeopardy (not ours, of course....we're well-hardened to these little frustrations, havign survived the installation of new laminate flooring, tile flooring, bedroom painting, storm doors, drywall installation, and wallpaper borders...all with nary a bad word.)

Anyway, folks. Get some REAL DIY-ers in there to try installing it from scratch and see what you can do about those instructions, k? Otherwise, you're gonna have some real goat-fucked lamps out there with YOUR name on them.

Lotsa love,

Mossy

Incumbent Idiocy - a Language Rant

I freely admit that I'm not a master of the English language, but I do know errors when I see them. I got a big kick, for instance, from the book "Eats, Shoots and Leaves" which pointed out some egregious uses of language and punctuation, particularly by people who should really know better.

Penny and I have had all sorts of "WTF are they thinking?" exchanges when we see commas being used in the wrong places, and so on. Do NOT get me started on the shameful way in which the apostrophe is used as a mistaken pluralizer. However, there's one particular attempt at erudition which totally drives me bananas.

As some of you may know, I'm doing a relatively subtle job search at the moment. I'm not screamingly anxious to leave my current employer but I've got enough uncertainty about corporate direction that it seems prudent to hedge my bets. Needless to say I've been looking at a lot of job ads.

Now, let's have a nice big show of hands. How many of you have seen job ads where they say something like, "the incumbent will possess the following skills..."?

Let's see those hands?! Right? Most of you? Okay. That's what I thought.

One little problem with that little phrase:

It's WRONG.

Wrong, wrong, wrong, wrong.

"You! Jones! You're the political whiz...so what does 'incumbent' mean? Stand up, boy!"

[Jones puts down his barely-disguised collection of nudie pics with Penny's face pasted over them, blushes, adjusts himself, and responds - squirming]

J: "Um, sir, I'd really rather not"

[nauseated] "Fine, Jones. I think it's probably better that you sit."

J: "Thank you, sir."

"Now, Jones. What does 'incumbent' mean?"

[Puppy-like excitement] "Oh, yes sir! Incumbent! Eye, Enn, See..."

"JONES!!!"

J: "Sir?"

"What does it mean?"

J: "Oh, yes sir. Sorry, sir. Incumbent. Yes. That's when someone is already in political office. For example, our incumbent governor of Massholeachussets is..."

"Yes, yes, yes, Jones. Enough with the showing off. You're correct. 'Incumbent', when referring to an individual, means the current holder of an office. Now go back to what you were doing and let me finish my story."

J: "Yes, Sir. Thank you, Mr. Stone, sir."

"Oh, and, Jones?"

J: "Sir?"

"Wash your hands before lunch"

J: [Blushing] "Yes, sir."

So, class, we know what incumbent is, but why, why, why, for the love of Biff, why do employers insist on using the word as a replacement for "the successful candidate" or "the incoming *position name*"? Do they not realize how stupid they look to someone who actually knows? Do they really, really, really think that we are so stupid that... [pause]

"Jones! Put your hand down. That was a rhetorical question!"

Anyway, I don't understand. I truly don't. I sometimes wonder why I would even bother applying to a place which uses such poor language, but you really wouldn't believe who uses it. Companies who whould know better, to be honest. Of course, I guess I can't really be picky, can I? My bigger dilemma is this: do I say anything to the companies? I mean, I don't want to get an immediate reputation as a smartass know-it-all in the interview phase. I'd prefer it to develop naturally after I'm hired!

Since it was really incumbent upon me (another acceptable use of the word, referring to a sense of duty) to point this misuse and abuse out to you, I urge you all to watch for such language crimes wherever you go.

"Jones!"

J: "Sir?!"

"You may come up and clean off the brushes while the rest of the class is at recess. You won't have to worry about being beaten up by the girls this time."

J: [relieved] "Thank you, sir!"

Persistence of Dubious Celebrity

I've never been someone enamoured by celebrity culture. Sure, every once
in a while its interesting to open an eyelid and see what folly takes
place, but its usually just a yawn at best.

Of course, there are a few little things that catch your eye...sorta like
a really ugly person wearing something far too revealing or a car crash.

I admire the Associated Press' decision to stop reporting anything about a
certain wayward hotel heiress. For once, I think the media clued in that
there was little value in following her every move and that the world did,
indeed continue without the endless check-in on her antics.

Then there's the circus around a certain late pneumatic blonde Bahama
Mama. In and of itself it was defintely an interesting study in humanity
and I'm sure there's years worth of fodder for the tabloids. Then there's
the madness surrounding the paternity of her toddler.

...which brings me to the latest outrageous media whoring comment from a
certain former football star and Bronco racer. He, too, waded into the
fray with a suggestion about his own likelihood for paternity of said
child...."if he did it", of course. Now, if anyone has seen pictures of
the mite, they know that the likelihood of this particular glove-wearing,
Cato-loving dingbat are exceedingly remote....right up there with the
chances of me being named Pope.

I wonder what an alien species would make of all this? Sometimes
journalism really aims for the lowest common denominator in smut and
attempts to titilate us with the latest escapades. With a few notable
exceptions, most of these so-called celebs have contributed sweet jack to
the betterment of society and have likely helped to contributre to the
wholesale raping of our better judgement in picking up some rag and
reading it. Fortunately, they are demonstrating some ecological
consideration by ensuring their antics get thrust at us via the Internet
which, of course, is made from 100% recycled post-consumer electrons.

However, my favourite celebrity will remain "Global Despot-in-training"
Kal Jones. Although, I think he's in grave danger of believing his own
propaganda. Don't believe me? Go check his latest campaign
bumpersticker.

[rant off...for now] ;-)

So here I sit...

...Wires crossed yet again with DW's ex. My schedule says to drop them off after 7, and when I arrive at 7:20 he ain't here. So I call. He's apparently half an hour out.

Since I have no interest in burning up gas for 30 minutes, here we sit. Good thing The Boy was in slow mode getting out otherwise we'd sit here longer.

This isn't helping the headache I've been nursing since noon. This one is a doozie and nothing seems to help. Maybe sex will. :P

K. Is he here yet? *looks* nope. Not here yet. Fuck.

I have to do a major shout out to Steph, the Dirty Gypsy for her awesome alphabet posting series. She came up with 26 great posts that really are a great read. You'll even find a really awesomely embarassing picture of Larry the Nature Boy from a recent party chez Steph. Nothing like a pic of a drunken blogger on a bathroom floor in a really stupid hat to bring out those wanting to use the picture for evil purposes. (Like that picture would have any other purpose???)

*looking at clock*

Shit.

I really should have just gone back home and told him to pick the kids up there. But I'm a nice guy so I didn't do that. But I should have. Oh well.

Fuck its cold outside. Could be worse. I could be in Buffalo. That does apply at almost any time but in this case it's doubly applicable because they got pounded in a rare fall snow storm. Buffalo and the parts of Ontario right across the border got 12"-15" of the white stuff closing roads and schools and wreaking all sorts of havoc. Better them than us.

Speaking of which , I played 2 good periods of hockey last night and I'm not quite ready to talk about the 3rd period so we'll just not, okay? K. Good

7:42PM. Not here. ~sheesh~

My head still hurts. Did I mention that? Good. Didn't want you to forget.

Hmmmm. What else....Penny has been back at work part days this week I'll leave her to relate the gory details, suffice it to say that she really is the glue holding her department together. Based on what she told me I envisioned her department looking something like Klinger's Office when he got sick and the doctors took over. Chaos chaos everywhere.

7:50. I'm really glad I have my blackberry. Otherwise I'd be seriously bored. Kids are keeping themselves entertained with some kind of in-car wrestling. As long as they are still laughing and there's no blood I'll leave them to it.

7:56. He arrived. Kids gone. Am off.