Kabbalah

A number of celebrities, notably Madonna, are embracing a religion called Kabbalah. Celebrities I say! That is all the endorsement I need. I decided it was time to look into it. I started with Wikipedia. Here’s what I learned about Kabbalah: 1. It’s all very confusing.2. No one is quite…

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Hornier Than a…

Did you see the story about the German guy with two penises? He lost his original equipment in an accident, so doctors built him a new one. Later, he decided to upgrade, but doctors left the previous one until the new one took root, so to speak. http://www.ananova.com/news/story/sm_1315211.html [no longer…

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Dilbert and Chess

The other day I was pre-autographing a box of squeezable Dilbert characters at my restaurant. We buy them with the restaurant information printed on their backs, as promotional items for potential banquet customers. (Yes, I pay for the squeeze toys.) Anyway, as customers and employees were lusting after them, I…

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Gifted or Defective

I was flipping through the channels last night and came across Justin Timberlake giving a concert. He’s a hugely successful artist. People all over the world love him. He’s sold tens of millions of CDs. This presented me with a mystery. To me, Justin Timberlake sounds like a shockingly untalented…

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Study Hints That Brains are Involved in Thinking

As a watcher of all things media, I am always impressed when a PR person makes a huge story out of nothing. A good example is the recent press about research showing how liberals and conservatives have different brains. http://www.heraldextra.com/content/view/237131/ [no longer available] This ground-breaking study shows that the brain…

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Windmills and Economics

The other day I blogged about an idea for creating farms of Stirling engines to generate power in the desert, and financing them through individual investments in each engine. Predictably, I got a lot of comments that fell into one of these categories. 1. It will never work. 2. Someone…

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Giant Penises Save the Planet

Have you ever heard of a Stirling engine? According to Wikipedia, they look like huge male genitalia. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stirling_engine I mention this only because these huge penis engines can save the world by being placed in deserts and used to create cheap electricity from the heat of the sun. http://www.wired.com/science/planetearth/news/2005/11/69528 [no…

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Basic Instruction, Part 8

In my ongoing reality series, I continue advising Scott Meyer on how to become a syndicated cartoonist. Most recently, I asked Scott to try drawing some strips with three panels and fewer words. That’s the formula for successful syndication in newspapers because newspapers traditionally avoid buying anything else. Every writer…

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Absence of a Thing

In my ninth grade science class, the teacher told us that heat was essentially energy. I raised my hand and asked, “If heat is energy, what is cold?” The teacher said, “Cold is the lack of energy.” I always remember that because, like coldness, the lack of something often feels…

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Worst Gang Ever

In the news, a gang of neo-Nazis was arrested………………..in Israel. http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20070909/ap_on_re_mi_ea/israel_neo_nazis [no longer available] The gang recorded their violent crimes on video. This is a good idea in case you’re not doing enough to get caught and prosecuted. One of the gang members says, “Heil Hitler” on the video. His…

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Osama Placebo

Osama released a new video. Analysts are wondering how his beard turned from grey to black. I guess his healthy lifestyle is paying dividends. http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/20649227/site/newsweek/ [no longer available] I assume this new video is from the real Osama because a fake would do a better job matching the beard.  In…

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U.S. Open Update

On Wednesday, my wife and I watched a U.S. Open tennis match in Arthur Ashe Stadium. You have never seen anything like it, unless you have been lucky enough to see an ant wrestle with a crumb. That’s what it looked like from our cheap seats. Obviously I am exaggerating,…

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New York City Subway

This week I am in Manhattan, living like a New Yorker. I have learned many things about the city. Today I will teach you how to ride the subway. First, when you drop part of a cookie in the subway station, the five second rule does not apply. That cookie…

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Atlantis

I love the idea of the lost city of Atlantis because it fits so well into an alternate theory of human origins. In the alternate theory, the first life on Earth was an alien settlement. The aliens built a scientific base station in Atlantis and used their advanced technology to…

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Odds of Being Shat Upon

I’m with my wife in New York City this week. Yesterday we walked to Central Park and did tourist activities, spending about five hours outdoors. I had on my sunscreen and my baseball cap. Walking back to the hotel, I removed my hat for the first time all day because…

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