File this under cruel and unusual.

“Me” is Steve from The Sneeze. “The Boy” is his four-year-old son. Talk about crushing the dreams of the future generation.

From The Sneeze:

The Boy: I want to be a hobo when I grow up!

Me: You don’t like beans.

The Boy: Oh yeah.

The story I posted yesterday extolling the virtues of a proper geek-mate may have some of my faithful readers scouring chess club and Star Wars fan fictions web sites looking for Mr. Right. But I feel it is my duty to temper your enthusiasm somewhat.

While there is no doubt that a Geek makes the best lover (case in point… me *wink*), Geekdom does not come without a price. Allow me to share with you an article by an experienced, Geek-loving, young lady.

“Emily”, as she calls herself, has offered a guild to “Dating an Apple Developer”. While her guide is specifically tailored to the Steve Jobs set, most of her observations also translate readily into the realms of Bill Gates and Linus Torvalds. (If you don’t know who those people are, you’d better do more homework before throwing yourself at a prospective Geek. On second thought, if you’re really hot, it won’t matter that much.)

Thanks, Emily, for your inspired work. (She has a funny picture of her geek installing a memory upgrade. See. A REAL geek’s eyes literally light up when he gets to install an upgrade!)

On a side note, you may have noticed the unusual verbosity of this post. For that, I apologize. My brain is stuck in high-speech as I spent the morning reading 16th-century religious texts and Orthodoxy vs. Dispensationalism debates. I think I may have pulled something in my cerebellum. (I should have stretched first.)

An article in the New York Daily News sheds light on what I (and many of my friends and colleagues) have known for years. The title of the article is “Nerds make better lovers”. Heya beeeautiful!

How many times have I said this?! People, I’m not lying here. Geek is sheik! Get used to it!

All too often mass media reports stories that are not news to anyone except maybe mass media. You know what I’m talking about. How many times have you read head-lines like:

I.T. Managers Hate Buggy Software

Some Hollywood Romances Are More P.R. Than Love

Student’s Don’t Learn Much in Last Few Weeks Before Vacation

Solution to Stinky Subways is Regular Bathing

I think you see where I’m going with this. Recently, another story high on the “duh” scale has seen a lot of press.

An AP-AOL poll on American’s views of Hollywood shows that 69% or respondents feel movie stars are bad role models. Now, pardon me for a moment. … DUUUHH!!! … ahem … Sorry about that. Couldn’t help myself.

Earl Ledbetter, a movie fan quoted in one of the many articles on this poll, said, “They just don’t have the morals,” he said. “They marry and divorce, sleep around a lot.”

Wow. Who knew? I thought all those movie stars were the best source around for political, social, and moral standards. You mean those people who make millions of dollars by pretending have bad morals and pretending to have sex with everything that moves do in fact have bad morals and have sex with everything that moves?! NOOO!! Martha! Get the kids! We’re moving to an anti-Hollywood convent to save ourselves from the Devil’s celluloid sin!!

You can read the full article in many places, but here is a couple:
CBC
Yahoo News

To Kraft Foods CEO Roger Deromedi, EVP Marc Firestone, et al.

Dear sirs:

I have been an avid Oreo fan my entire life. I have vivid memories of enjoying their creamy centers when I was barely old enough to sit upright at the table. I knew that my bologna had a first name (It’s O-s-c-a-r.) before I knew my own middle name. There are many Kraft products that have been a part of my life, so engrained that I hardly realized they were there until the day I realized I had to be rid of them.

You see, before I knew that I wished I was an Oscar Meyer wiener, I knew that Jesus loved me (for the Bible told me so). My faith in God comes before my addiction to Oreos. Thus, I must put my beliefs in the precepts of Christian living, including sexual purity, above my reliance on Kraft products.

I was saddened when I learned that Kraft’s leadership stands firmly against the God I worship on the subject of homosexuality. I was surprised to hear the obstinance with which the executives at Kraft have responded to requests to reconsider this policy. And so now, with heart-broken determination, I must inform you that I am laying aside the above mentioned, engrained parts of my life to join the American Family Association’s boycott of Kraft products.

Farewell beloved Oreos. Perhaps when you set aside your blind tolerance of dangerous and immoral practices, we can resume our relationship.

Sincerely,
Trint Ladd

You can read more about Kraft’s commitment to the Homosexual Adjenda at AFA.net.

I read in the news today that an ex-radio DJ was awarded a whopping $10 million settlement because she (the ex-DJ) had a co-worker who wore too much perfume.

The story goes that Erin Weber co-hosted a radio show with Linda Lee on WYCD-FM. Ms. Lee wore a bit too much perfume for Ms. Weber’s taste. So much, in fact, that Weber claimed the perfume caused her to lose her voice, resulting in three months of sick leave to recover from the smell. Three months?! Take a shower and get it over with already!!

Weber’s doctor, Martin Charles (aka Doctor Nick), “warned (Weber) that further exposure to perfume could even result in death.” Wha?!

The radio station changed the women’s schedules and asked Lee to stop wearing the perfume, but that wasn’t good enough. After more incidents and more complaints from Weber, the station let her go. Now she claims she can’t find work because the station blacklisted her. Well, maybe it’s because prospective employers called the station to check a reference and found out SHE’s INSANE!

In a stirring tribute to all that is wrong with the world, a six woman jury gave Weber over ten million dollars in compensation. Do you have any idea how much the average disk jockey makes? Let’s just say that Ms. Weber would have be a DJ for around three hundred years to make ten million dollars.

Now, let’s be fair. I’ve been subjected to a few olfactorily-challanged women. I know what it’s like to have your eyes burn in return for politely holding open a door. As a matter of fact about once a week, I walk up the back stair well to my office and smell the lingering cloud from a woman who works down the hall several minutes after she has made the same trek. But GREAT GOOGLY MOOGLY! TEN MILLION DOLLARS?!

I’ll bet you ten million dollars you can’t guess what format WYCD-FM plays. Yep! Country!

Three of the big four sewage television outlets have joined forces to lobby Washington and the American public for less government interference. According to an article I read today, the TV Watch Coalition, which includes the parent companies of NBC, CBS, and Fox, intends to push for less regulation and to “counterweight such groups as the Parent’s Television Council and the American Family Assn.”

In other words, Hollywood is tired of getting it’s wrist slapped by the FCC for airing indecent content. Instead, Hollywood wants to monitor itself. Now, call me intolerant, but isn’t that a lot like hiring the produces of “Girls Gone Wild” to chaperone you’re daughter’s Spring Break trip?

Ahh, the smell of progress. According to a recent AP article, a zoo in Syracuse, New York, is studying the feasibility of powering their facilities with the zoo’s main byproduct, poo! “Particularly the prodigious piles produced by its pachyderms.” (I wish I’d made that up, but it’s a quote from the article.)

The idea is not new. There have been many studies into poo power. My dad worked in the fuel department of a large electric company before he retired, and can attest to the frequent studies of burning cow manure in power plants. However, this is the first attempt of a zoo using it’s own … ahem … resources to produce electricity.

It so happens that elephants are inefficient digesters and their grassy diet produces high energy poo perfect for producing power. In addition, each elephant (the zoo has six total) produces half a ton of power poo every day! The zoo spends about $10,000 a year to dispose of this waste, much of it going to compost on local farms.

Now, if only the elephants could be potty trained. Oh wait! They CAN!!

Some of you may have noticed some new art work popping up here and there at good ol’ SYNS. One regular reader made a comment yesterday.

Hey I just noticed … what’s with the new artwork at the tops of the pages? Nifty.

Nifty indeed!

I found a new source for retro art and I plan to put it to good use. I’ve got oodles of new images just waiting for the right story to come along. While before I had four rotating banner images, now I have ten! (That’s the title image at the top of the page. It’s different every time the page loads… What do you mean you never noticed?! Gaww!)

Now, I know what you’re thinking: How could you steal some else’s images and use them as if they were your own, you vile internet scum!! Well, cool your jets. Every image you see was traced drawn by your’s truely. Granted my work may bear a striking resemblance to someone else’s art, it is because I traced it in PhotoShop purely coincidence.

Sam Walton had a vision… The store that saved America. American goods sold at low prices to help the average Joe make ends meet and keep Joe’s company running strong. Poor old Sam died in 1992 and his dream died with him.

I vividly remember the big push back in the late 80’s. Wal-Mart was the big new thing and all their commercials talked about buying American. Made in the USA! Whoo Hoo! Apple pie and baseball. Let’s head on down to the Wal-Mart! Of course, I also remember that a few months after the Wal-Mart opened, the K-Mart down the street closed. Then the Anthony’s (cheap clothing store) closed. Then the… well, you know the drill.

The last time I went to Wal-Mart, I did an improptue survey as I strolled through the women’s clothing with my wife. I couldn’t find a single piece of merchandise that was made in the USA. Granted this was not an exhaustive search, but it was enough to turn my stomach.

Wally-World has had a ton of bad press lately. I watched in horror as their CEO was interviewed recently. The guy was as cold and heartless as you can get. The words coming out of his mouth were all about low prices at any cost. Every question about fair wages, health care, and sweatshop merchandise was answered with the same cold, heartless smirk. “We give American’s good products at low prices.” Excuse me while I uneat my American made lunch.

Wal-Mart stocks are hurting and their media image is suffering, but they are fighting back tooth and nail. At least that part of Wal-Mart is still All-American. You poke me in the eye, I’ll gouge yours out! Case in point: http://walmartwatch.com has started running ads in big name news papers explosing Wal-Mart’s dirty laundry. Today, as I was reading the news, I caught a banner ad for Wal-Mart’s newest PR web site, http://www.walmartfacts.com which comes out swinging: “WalMartWatch.com – Do they just make this stuff up?!” Youch!

This month Chistianity Today published an article, “Deliver Us from Wal-Mart”, which discusses the morality of shopping at the big blue. Wal-Mart has been a boon to Christian marketing. They require music labels to produce toned down versions of hip-hop music or they won’t sell it. They push a heck of a lot of Christian media, from VeggieTales to The Purpose Driven Life. But, once again, at what cost? I’m curious to see how Wal-Mart will retaliate for the Christianity Today article.

I’ll let you read all the nitty gritty details. Personally, Wal-Mart is my new least favorite place to shop. I’m not advocatting a boycott or anything, but this consumer will be spending a lot less money on Chinese goods at America’s Superstore.