Bring on the Flying Spaghetti Monster!

I see this headline on Raw Story about the cafeteria provider whose mission it was "to serve God", and all I can think of is that great old line from The Twilight Zone episode "To Serve Man":

It's a cookbook!!!

If it turns out to be made of spaghetti, you can have my meatballs.

What sprouted all this crazy?

A "driveway moment*" yesterday on NPR's Fresh Air: The guest was Max Blumenthal, author of Republican Gomorrah: Inside the Movement that Shattered the Party. I haven’t read the book, but based on this interview it sounds like a really interesting book.

Listen to the interview here.

One of the ‘founding fathers” of the rightwing fringe movement that he discusses is R.J. Rushdoony, who, among other things, wanted to establish a Christian totalitarian theocracy using the Law of the Old Testament (which would very much resemble the Islamic theocracies whose barbaric policies are so repugnant to anyone who loves freedom, featuring such things as a death penalty for immoral women or homosexuality, etc.). Another major player he talks about is James Dobson and his tactics (who many people call “Reverend”, but actually not a Reverend at all), including causing Sarah Palin to be put on the McCain ticket. Then there’s (I’m ashamed to say, “Austin’s own”) Alex Jones, who has these paranoids convinced that Obama’s about to herd them into internment camps under the guise of FEMA.

Here are a couple of Blumenthal’s videos that he has taken in the very belly of the beast.

Gun Show Nation (Inside Anti-Obama Extremist Gun Culture)


Theocracy Now! Convention 2007

*driveway moment: when what's on the radio is so good that you continue to listen in the car after you reach your destination.

Furbaby Friday - The belly itcher

Jax has some issues. He has some very itchy skin, it seems to be the most itchy on the right nipple, and he mercilessly licks that area and the rest of the belly until it's bloody (not to mention hairless... I know now that he will never have hair on his belly). Then we take him to the vet and get him a shot of DepoMedrol (a steroid), and if needed, something for the infection he usually has by then. Here he is in his own personal hell involving the wearing of a hated piece of clothing - an e-collar. Below, he's either making the most of having to wear it, or trying to shmooze me until I take it off of him out of sympathy. Sometimes that works. Look at his poor naked belly.

He's been through the mill, as they say, when it comes to trying to find out the cause. We've had him skin-prick allergy tested at the animal dermatologist, and he has loads of allergies which require shots. So far the shots have not affected the belly itches. He's been on Prozac and Prednisone (both as ear gel, because it's almost impossible to pill him), neither of those had any effect, but then ear gels are less effective than pills. He's tried low-allergen food, and various topical sprays, both prescription and OTC. Antihistamines might help if I could get pills in him. GAAAAH!

After his Depo shot, he's nice and non-itchy for about 3 weeks. Life is good. Trouble is, steroids can bring on problems such as diabetes, so we stretch him out as long as possible (this time it was less than 6 weeks, with the last 3 weeks being spent in the collar a lot, and belly-licking the rest of the time.

I will spare you all a closeup of the violated belly, but you can see a bit of the damage here as he enjoys a little break. You gotta love this guy, belly issues and all.

Tags and links: Friday Ark - Carnival of the Cats - This week's carnival is at Three Tabby Cats in Vienna - Cats - Catblogging

I. P. Freely

Go Girl female urination device claims to be mess free. Is that possible?

Maybe you should consider the paper urine trousers instead.

Baby food

[LINK to slideshow] Yes, those are real pears, and they grew on the tree like that, check out the rest of the examples at the link. When the fruit or vegetable is small, they put it in a mold so that it conforms to the desired shape.

They have square watermelons (easier to stack!), star-shapes cucumbers, apples with Apple® logos and more.

Also in the slideshow, a few naturally occurring weird and funny-shaped fruits and veggies.

David Bowie honored with spider

[LINK] It's large with reddish-blond hair, named Heteropoda davidbowie, and endangered. Read more about it at the link.

This is my "not another big damn close-up spider picture" version. If you want to see all the hairs and eyeballs, click here.

Basterds

Inglourious Basterds
[IMDB]
No Spoilers

If you like Quentin Tarantino's stuff, I think you'll like this. Some people have actually complained that it's not violent enough for a QT movie. Really? And so what anyway? There's plenty of that, believe me, but the conversations are always the most important thing, and there will be payoff. There's humor too, mostly centered around or coming from Brad Pitt's character. I have to mention that his Southern accent is atrocious, and I believe deep-down that it must be intentionally so. That, in itself, adds humor. His heavy Southern-American accent added to his Italian completely reminded me of my mother when she tried to speak Greek. It was exactly like that.

I love Brad Pitt as a character actor. I don't have a crush on him like most people do (except when he played Achilles [pic] - that one leaves me weak)

Besides Pitt, big highlights are Mélanie Laurent as Shosanna Dreyfus and Christoph Waltz as Col. Hans Landa. I was not familiar with either of these.

The trivia file on this movie is ultra-rich. In case you haven't seen it, the spoiler trivia is well-marked and at the bottom.

Fresh Despair for the holiday

Stay safe if you're traveling this weekend! We will be staycationing... as usual.

Latest Demotivator from Despair.com.

The sickness of the situation

Summed up beautifully here in jabs at the insurance companies:

Pirates of the Health Care-ibean

and drug companies:
The Drugs I need


If you like those, check out more satirical songs (like "Jesus Loves Me but He Can't Stand You" and "Shallow End of the Gene Pool") by the Austin Lounge Lizards.

Kittens make it better

Are you sick of the news? Sick of politics? But still obsessed with it so you can't stay away from your favorite current events sites? So much ugliness! Mark Sanford, Dick Cheney, Karl Rove, and Sarah Palin (for crap's sake! Why the hell aren't they gone?) and the birthers, deathers and teabagger morans?

Here's a partial fix. Create a bookmark for this Kittenify link (drag to toolbar, right-click, control-click, whatever works).

Then go to any page you like, click your bookmark, and the images are replaced with pictures of kittens (or at least tagged as kitten) on Flickr.

[Created by Reload.Me (includes more details)]
[Found via J-Walk]

Well, this is awkward...

...mostly for the cats.

I found this through the site Awkward Family Photos, found via a Facebook friend. She posted the picture of the little girl holding her pet skunk. I had a pet skunk when I was a little girl too, and *all* family photos to me are pretty uncomfortable, so I'm really enjoying browsing the pics.

Owl cuteness

Malay Eagle Owl, so cute and loves to get head scritches. His eyes don't even look real.

Quiz!

Harry Potter Character or Hideous Skin Disease?



Score: 83% (10 out of 12)