I love that someone at Glacier was dorky enough to recursively apply the woman and child dispensing water on their dispenser signage.
It almost makes me want to stop urinating in their dispensers. If only Safeway had more accessible restrooms…
Posts Tagged ‘dorky’
Nerd Water
Friday, April 3rd, 2009Not the Mailbox I Was Looking For
Tuesday, July 29th, 2008The Palo Alto post office at 380 Hamilton Ave. has decorated one of its outdoor collection boxes as R2-D2, the lovable rapscallion droid from the Star Wars movies.
The USPS is known for its boundless creativity—always pushing the envelope, they are. Having already brought us Voting for Elvis in 1992, the term “go postal” in 1993, a streamlined new eagle logo in 1994, and statutory monopoly, we weren’t sure where they’d go next. But the reaction to the latest promotion has been mixed.
One postal employee spoke on the condition of anonymity:
“It’s terrible. Just terrible. What were we thinking? This town is full of dorks. Now they think we’re one of them. It’s made service counter wait times worse because they all want to talk about Star Wars. I didn’t even think the movies were very good.”
Two dorks had this to say:
“Why does it have legs? Artoo doesn’t have legs. He has rocket thrusters and a triambulatory wheel-based drive system.”
“Yeah. But triambulatory isn’t a word.”
“Is so. It’s just not commonly used.”
“My iPhone says it’s not a word.”
“Your iPhone is wrong.”
“Take it back!”
And a woman from Casa Olga worded a common confusion:
“I thought it was a stamp machine. I don’t watch the Battle Bots show, so I didn’t know it was a joke. This branch still doesn’t have a stamp machine. You have to buy a whole book from the window. Now what am I going to do with that many stamps? Plant them in a garden? HAH! I think not.”
The R2-D2 box sports the URL, www.uspsjedimaster.com, which appears to simply bounce to usps.com. Perhaps it did something more at the promotion launch, but it’s rather boring now.
Once the Star Wars stunt has ended, there is but one final frontier for USPS promotional creativity: Vote for the Seven of Nine stamp design — Borg or Bust.
Searching for Something To Do
Wednesday, April 16th, 2008If I ever get old or useless enough that combing a beach with a metal detector strikes me as something worth doing, please smother me with a lavender-scented pillow. I make this request assuming I’ll like the smell of lavender by then. I guess you should check my house first just to be sure—if you find lavender candles and tea and crap, proceed with the lavender; otherwise, use a meatloaf. I like meatloaf now.
The biggest problem with beach combing, coin shooting, treasure hunting—whatever you call it—is that losers publicly look the part. Macramé, whittling, glue sniffing, and other loserish hobbies can be done in the privacy of one’s own home; whereas, metal detecting is out in the open. You’re likely out on a beach in front of hundreds of hot, scantily-clad people who are judging you.
There you stand in your jeans and plaid shirt, brandishing your cherished BigFoot-based detector and your sieve scoop. The True Value® tool belt that you’ve repurposed as a collection girdle passes the time by restraining your heaving gut. It’s been a long, fruitless afternoon & you’re about to call it quits when your detector squeals loudly. You swipe around a bit, listening carefully to ensure it’s worth a circumnavigation of your stomach. Convinced, you exhale, strain down, and scoop. Sifting through the muck, you find a slimy black object. You rub it with your thumb, smudging away the slime and revealing a bottle cap (circa 2007—nothing interesting). You flip it back into the sand and look up, locking eyes with a female sunbather who wrinkles her nose disapprovingly. It’s a disappointment but the adrenaline is now pumping, so you move on down the beach for a repeat performance in front of some surfers and a smooching couple. “It’s okay,” you remind yourself, “remember the 1916-D Mercury dime? That was worth $50. What a day that was.”
There’s something kinda creepy about scavengers in general. They walk around the beach—practically following you—looking for things you’ve dropped, which then become theirs. I’d describe them as buzzards, substituting “pathetic” for “macabre” in the description.
Check out this “White’s metal detector” ad that tries to glorify the hobby:
At the end of the ad, the fat guy says, “My wife said I needed a healthy hobby. She’s proud of the weight I’ve lost and really proud of this,” as he holds up a garish diamond ring, implying he found it. Ladies, would you actually be proud of a ring that your fat husband found while drinking beer at the beach all day? I don’t know who they’re fooling—well, besides the lavendar-huffing elderly. But they’ll buy anything.
Steve Jobs Makes Me Use E
Saturday, July 28th, 2007Steve Jobs makes me use E. And I hate him for it.
Like a good Palo Altian, I patiently stood in line at the Apple Store on June 29, 2007 to purchase the gizmo that was supposed to change my life. The iPhone was designed for fleshy monkey digits, not seagull wings—so I was expecting an awkward user experience. In preparation, I’d hit the gym pretty hard and had been practicing beak gestures on a block of tungsten clasped in my feet. This paid off and I’ve been able to expertly manipulate my iPhone, which is about as heavy as my tungsten block. Oh, and here’s a tip: The touch screen responds better if you stick a piece of sausage on your beak. It’s functional and tasty.
Unfortunately, I had not anticipated AT&T’s plodding Edge network. In retrospect, I had been warned—critics were griping about Apple’s choice of providers for weeks before the iPhone’s release. But I optimistically ignored these warnings and assumed that Steve would never have selected AT&T if their network really was that bad. And besides, I thought, there’s always WiFi, right? Well, the Edge network sucks and I hadn’t considered that stoopid monkeys don’t let seagulls with sausage beaks sit in coffee shops.
So, when I’m out & about and want to check on my tuna futures, I’m forced to use the Edge network or risk catching a foot in the butt at the nearest hotspot. The iPhone has made me dread the most frequently-occurring letter in the English language.
On E, my iPhone’s batteries die before MySpace has completely loaded, which makes it very difficult to log in and allow Pamela, Christie, Laura, Raye, Titania, Bambi, Bubbles, Nymphina, Whora, and BustyGrams83 to be my friends. I wish Google would hurry up and carpet-bomb the world with WiFi.
The Letter of the Law
Monday, June 4th, 2007To the chagrin of the landscaping industry, Palo Alto has instituted a ban on gas-powered leaf blowers due to environmental and noise concerns. Unfortunately, battery-powered electric blowers have a limited running time and aren’t very strong. Don’t worry though, we’re back to shuffling leaves onto our neighbors’ lawns at full power—thanks to corded electric blowers and portable gas generators.
We still have to wear ear protection. Those generators are loud.