Sunday, September 20, 2009

Guns and morons

I am slowly building up my collection of World War II and former communist block firearms. This involves scouring the internet with searches on certain keywords.

Recently, I had a sad realization - most of the US gun-owning community is not mentally qualified to operate a fork, rather than own a gun. Which may explain an extremely high rate of gun-related death in the United States - 30896 in 2006.

Here's a representative post (http://answers.yahoo.com/question/index?qid=20080920100316AAlVQMH):

"Should i buy an SKS, AK-47 or AR-15 rifle?

the cheaper the better, but not if it is total garbage. The purpose of owning one for me is to have a assault rifle before they are illegal. i want something that can pack a punch when the world goes to crap so i can defend my family. yes, the purpose would be to kill, so go somewhere else hippies, this is a hypothetical situation i would like to be prepared for if it ever happens."

"Tactical advantage", "firefight" are the terms that litter the gun boards, so instead of answering these questions in dozens of places, I decided to come up with one meta-response here.

"Dear Moron,

Let me try to answer your question from the liberal/hippie point of view, since this angle is typically not covered on the gun boards you are frequenting.

First of all, this is the stupidest thing I read on the internet today! Why, you might ask? Well, there are multiple reasons.

First, do you really expect that hippies will attack you and your family? Hippies? Seriously? Like this guy?


Second, if us hippies/liberals wanted to attack you, surely we wouldn't storm your house? Did you know that there is a strong positive correlation between education and liberal views? You might not realize that, but one skill that they teach in college is thinking. So if we really did want to get you, we would surely be able to devise a better approach.

For example, we could just wait outside your house, and spray you with bullets from a safe distance when you come out to buy groceries. Or if we wanted to force the events, why not setting your house on fire and then just shoot everything that comes out?

But in reality, we wouldn't even bother with this at all. We'd just send a black helicopter (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Black_helicopter). As you know, being government/UN freaks, we have plenty at our command. It would take one missile to have your house look like this, from a safe distance:


Do you really think that AK-47 vs AR-15 would make a material difference here?

Finally, even if you really did get into one of the "firefights", I bet you would not have much luck in a "tactical combat situation". I've played with your kind in Halo. You will be the biggest target, in the center of the field, collecting all the bullets.


I bet like with any other profession, it takes years of hard work to train a soldier - not an act of buying a gun.

So take my advice - instead of wasting money on something that you aren't mentally qualified to operate and won't be able to use, buy a book. Or sign up for a history or biology class at your local community college. You really could use the extra IQ so that next time people won't look at your writing and say - Geez, this is the stupidest thing I've seen on the internet today!"

Sunday, September 13, 2009

Beowulf

The Queen Anne Blockbuster is going out of business, and, among other things, I picked up a copy of Beowulf (http://www.beowulfmovie.com/) for a couple of dollars.

Boy was this a weird experience! So weird that, in a sense, it deserves to be a cult movie - a la Striptease. For most of the movie we couldn't tell if these guys were being serious, or trying to spoof something. I am still not entirely sure. We laughed throughout big part of it.

From a really overdone dialog ((think of Gimili’s boasting in The Lord of the Rings, multiply that by 800, and you have the most humble of Beowulf’s pronouncements), to nude Angelina Jolie's feet, that seamlessly merged lack of shoes with high heels, to the way they were hiding - in a really conspicuous way - Beowulf's genitalia as he was fighting Grendel in the nude (this was very, very similar to the scene where Bart rides through the streets of Springfield in Simpsons The Movie) - it looked more like a comedy than what the movie was trying to present.

As a comedy it might have been mildly funny, though not hysterical. If you enjoyed Striptease, watch this one. Otherwise, it’s probably not worth the hour and a half.

Saturday, September 12, 2009

If you don't like George Bush, you should take a look at his voters

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worldnews/northamerica/usa/6173399/Charles-Darwin-film-too-controversial-for-religious-America.html

"The film was chosen to open the Toronto Film Festival and has its British premiere on Sunday. It has been sold in almost every territory around the world, from Australia to Scandinavia.

However, US distributors have resolutely passed on a film which will prove hugely divisive in a country where, according to a Gallup poll conducted in February, only 39 per cent of Americans believe in the theory of evolution."

Friday, September 11, 2009

An oldie...

...but a goodie!

"Cheney Waits Until Last Minute Again To Buy Sept. 11 Gifts"

http://www.theonion.com/content/news/cheney_waits_until_last_minute

Sunday, September 6, 2009

How much for shipping, again?

Check out the Fedex Next Day rate on this $10 battery...


Think this is egregiously expensive? It is, but it still comes out way ahead of our local Best Buy where a similar (actually, less powerful) battery retails for $39.99 plus tax...