Boromir and Aragorn have a poetry-based pissing contest…
“Then let us start as soon as it is light tomorrow, if we can,” said Boromir. “The wolf that one hears is worse than the orc that one fears.”
“True!” said Aragorn, loosening his sword in its sheath. “But where the warg howls, there also the orc prowls.”
That’s an actual quote from The Lord of the Rings (a bit before the fellowship enters Moria). I kid you not.
It’s like Dr. Seuss briefly took over for Tolkien. WTF.
Here’s a quick sampling of headlines from six major news sites, which include MSNBC, Fox, MSN, BBC, New York Times, and CNN. Each headline was the main headline on the front page of the news agency’s website at around 1:30 PM on Monday, March 14th, 2011.
Here’s the game. Read the six headlines and guess which one is Fox News.
Searching for survivors
URGENT: Nuke Meltdown in 3 Reactors
Uranium rods ‘highly likely’ melting at Japanese nuclear plant, official says
Fuel Rod Crisis Fears at 3rd Reactor
Japan Nuclear Plant Hit By Second Blast
Meltdown alert at Japan reactor
I’m not going to give away the answer (especially since every person I’ve asked has easily gotten the answer right), but this game can be played any time of day on any day of the year… and it’s almost always a simple task to pick out the Fox News headline.
When headlines are simply more sensationalist on one news site, I find it amusing. When they’re misleading, I find it disturbing, regardless of the news organization.
Either way, it’s an easy game to play… and it’s almost always easy to spot Fox headlines.
I was browsing Netflix offerings this evening, specifically the streamable movies, and when you add a movie to your queue, Netflix presents a screen with recommendations for other similar movies.
I had added the movie Waiting for Armageddon, a documentary about evangelical Christians who believe the end times are near. The resulting screen led me to add Fall from Grace, a documentary about the Westboro Baptist Church, Fred Phelps’ vehicle for spreading bigotry and hatred.
The resulting recommendation screen can be seen below. I scanned the results, paused, and laughed out loud when I got to the third movie in the second row (click to embiggen).
Yeah. If I was putting together a list of movies in the "More like Fall from Grace" category, I don’t think Brokeback Mountain would be on it.
I’m fairly certain it’s not a documentary, either.
UCB Comedy has a great sketch mocking BP for their oil spill and impotent and feeble attempts to stop the leak.
Megan and I were out running errands last weekend and, when we pulled into a parking lot at Five Below, we saw an older man sleeping in another car in the lot. As I turned off the engine, I pointed at the man and said to Megan, "So do you think he’s sleeping or do you think he’s dead?"
Now, when I relay that story to friends, almost invariably, the reaction has been one of shock. "Oh my god! You actually asked her that?!"
But Megan, who is nine years old, simply gave me her best eye roll, accompanied by a snicker and a withering What a silly question look, and said, "Sleeping. Why would he be dead?"
As we walked to the store, I said, "He could have had a heart attack or it could have been like on television and someone sneaked up on him and killed him."
Megan simply rolled her eyes.
Walking back to the car, we saw another man sleeping, so I asked again, "Do you think he’s sleeping or dead?"
Another eye roll and a laugh. "Sleeping."
At this point, I was pretty much done with the joke, but as luck would have it, I got a perfect setup for a punchline.
As we were waiting to pull out onto a main road, a funeral procession was stopped at a red light… with the hearse in perfect view.
I pointed at it. "Do you think he’s sleeping or dead?"
*ba-dum ching*
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Note: For the record, we saw both of the sleeping men move, so it’s fairly certain they weren’t dead. As for the hearse, we saw a casket, but obviously couldn’t see a body, so we don’t know if there even was a body, much less if it was sleeping, dead, male or female. I think it’s a pretty safe bet to go with "dead," though.
