Author: Kim du Toit

Truism

Advice, Gummint, Health

“You may make a bad mistake;  the company you work for can make an even worse mistake;  but to really screw things up, you need government.”

Kim’s Corollary:

“…and the higher the level of government, the exponentially-greater the mistake will be.”

Hence the recent pronouncement which basically states that absolutely everything the fucking federal government has ever told you about health and nutrition, is wrong.  Not just wrong, but catastrophically wrong.

As I’ve said countless times before:  I longer believe anything the government — any level of government — tells me, whatever the topic.

And if we want to wander into the Tinfoil Hat Forest ever so slightly, we may note that in the above case, the beneficiaries of said bad governmental advice have been the pharmaceutical companies who, incidentally, hire lobbyists and donate barrow-loads of money to politicians.

Protip:  if you ever look at the “Department” subheadings under my post title, and see the words “Advice” and “Gummint” appearing simultaneously, you’ll have fair warning as to where the post content will be going.

Hearings

Politics

For the next week or so the press coverage is going to be “all-Kavanaugh / Blasey-Ford-all-the-time”, so I thought I could bring forward yet another example of conservative hijinks molestation of womyns:

Wake me up when it’s all over and Brett Kavanaugh is seated on the Supreme Court, willya?

 

News Roundup

Bad News

1)  “Sobbing vegan, 23, breaks into a slaughterhouse and chains herself next to a calf for animal rights protest” —  They should have spared the calf and slaughtered the vegan.

2)  “Sex robots BACKLASH as brothel workers reveal fury over ‘dehumanising and dangerous’ droids” — wait a minute:  prostitutes are accusing their competition as “dehumanising” ?  We will now observe two minutes’ silence to mark the death of irony.

3)  “Jane Fonda tells accused #MeToo harassers like Louis CK looking to make a comeback to ‘sweep the floor at Starbucks until you learn!’ ” — Tell you what, you rancid Commie traitor:  you could sweep the floors at every Starbucks in the world, and we still wouldn’t forgive you for the Hanoi trip.

4)  Britain’s armed forces are about to go tits-up — My favorite take out of this article is the description of an armored unit as “Operation Tethered Goat”.  Actually, it’s a tragic story, so read it all.  (In case anyone starts murmuring “Malvinas”, the only military in worse shape than Britain’s is Argentina’s.)

5)  NYC Home Sellers Are Slashing Prices “Like It’s 2009” — so prices of NYFC residential real estate are now simply “exorbitant” as opposed to “you’ve got to be fucking kidding me”.  My feelings on the matter:

…and finally, some happy news:

6)  Oktoberfest has begun in Germanland — although my experience with Oktoberfest (in Munich, anyway) has been weak beer and raucous drunks, neither of which I can tolerate.  There are a couple of compensations, though:

Then again…

Oy.

 

Best Comedy TV (Part 5)

Entertainment

Arrested Development

I first became aware of this show through Son&Heir and #2 Son’s howls of laughter as they watched it in the kids’ upstairs living room.  “What the hell were you two laughing at?” was my question when they eventually came downstairs for breakfast the next morning.  Well, they told me, and intrigued, I had to watch Arrested Development — whereupon a second outburst of helpless laughter filled the house.

Good grief.  This was a Married… With Children-style dysfunctional family, only with blacker humor and razor-sharp cruelty.

Michael: [after George Sr. has been handed a jail sentence] They’re going to keep Dad in jail until this whole thing gets sorted out.
[silence amongst the family]
Michael:  Also, I’ve been told that the company’s expense accounts have been frozen…
[everyone gasps]
Michael:  …Interesting. I would have expected that after “They’re keeping Dad in jail.”

#2 Son bought me the series on DVD for Christmas several years ago, and I re-watch it about every eighteen months.

This was the show, I think, where Jason Bateman finally (!) shed his child-movie-star persona and became a serious grownup comedy star — his lines delivered with a deadpan monotone which would have had Buster Keaton delivering a standing ovation.

Lucille:  You tricked me.
Michael:  I deceived you. “Tricked” makes it sound like we have a playful relationship.

And:

Buster:  Mom is becoming a little controlling.
Michael:  What tipped you off? When she locked you out on the balcony again?
Buster:  That was half my fault. I thought I saw a Graham Cracker out there.
Michael:  [to his mother]  You baited the balcony?
Lucille Bluth:  Prove it.

And speaking of Lucille Bluth, don’t even get me started on the exquisite Jessica Walter (on whom I’ve had a crush ever since the 1960s).

And from the show:

Petulant Assholes

Gummint

Still thinking about that elderly Brit who shot a local bureaucrat who’d come to have the old guy’s “illegal” cottage torn down, when I saw this cheery little snippet from Toronto:

A man spent his own money on building some stairs so elderly people could climb up this steep path. However, he fell foul of officials who tore them down.

Note the price difference:

I’d say more, but I first have to wait for the Red Curtain Of Blood (RCOB) to subside in my eyes.  In the meantime, some kind soul should put a pot of tar on to boil and gather the feathers… I’ll oil the rope