Dear Friends, Womans, and Country-Bumkins: I just felt the deep-down lovin' urge to share what I felt to be a wonderfully effective piece of advertising. Well. Wonderfully effective if not for it's woeful placement in the absolutely Wrong sort of periodical. Where did it appear that could so dillute such a poignant example of commercial brilliance? *solemnly shakes head* On the inside-back cover of a recent issue of Uncanny X-Men! Why is this so bad? Uhm... I don't know if you've noticed or no, but the average fanboy purchasing X-Men #402 will have no experience beyond sucking his hand by which to relate to the inherent complexity of the advertisement. The simple diagram below illustrates this immutable fact of social reality.

No... as sad as it is. It will take - generally - years of socialization after giving up X-Men for the fanboy to understand precisely why the Starburst advertisement is intriguing. Poor, poor fanboy. No, this particular ploy to pry the coffers of the young male would much better be directed at the more pathological male. Perhaps the subscriber to Maxim (see diagram below).

These are guys who's imaginations are focused. While the X-Men fanboy of course enjoys the imbossibly-proportioned and scantly-clad women that grace the hand-drawn pages of his favorite tome, he also spares imagination for science fiction, adventure, angst, trite political commentary, sudsy operatic romance, and wry banter. The testosteroned Maximan will allow no thought to fuel his imagination beyond the sleek, electric sex of skin. This reader has either been there and done that or has lustily read suffiently to banter with friends on the matter reliably enough that cohorts may believe he's been there and done that. He is the one who might successfully be lured by the ad. Somebody should tell Starburst.

note: the ad could potentially still work on x-fans who know they should be titillated (though not knowing precisely why) and so desire to be considered mainstream and socially viable (or at least more "with it" than their fanboy friends) that they feign interest in the ad and product in hopes that their life will be redeemed without the sacrifice of their fanboyishness.

I've just finished reading Beowulf for the third time! But lo, this reading was in the bold and exciting Beowulf: a New Verse Translation by Seamus Heaney! And what a difference a day makes - Heaney is unstoppable! Rather, he makes Beowulf unstoppable. Unstoppable in his ability to pound you in the face with his manliness and leave you bleeding-but-strangely-desiring-more.

As I said, I've read the epic Anglo-Saxon poem several times now, but usually, I'm trudging through to get to the "good parts" (i.e., Beowulf's three notable feats), but this time, I was taken aback! The whole durned thing was the good parts! What luck! I read it over the space of three days and boy is my voice tired (I have a distinct inability when it comes to facing these sorts of tales - I have to read aloud. And with an accent. And with bluster).

One of the coolest things spicing up this reading (besides Heaney's great translation) was the juxtaposition of the Old English to the translation. As you may know, the only surviving copy of anything close to an original Beowulf is written in Old English (or Anglo-Saxon) from 'tween AD 700 and 1000. Now Old English isn't just archaic some King James English with lotsa thees, thous, and forsooths, as many people seem to think. It's the illegitimate birth father of Middle English (which I believe came about sometime after AD 1066) which in turn spawned Modern English. Modern English includes the English used in both Shakespeare and the King James Bible as well as the haphazard trash we sprechen today. In truth, Old English is nearly indecipherable. Below, I've included the first three lines of Beowulf, which are not only a great example of what I'm talking about, but strangely fitting for the site:

Hwæt wê Gâr-dena    in geâr-dagum
Þêod-cyninga    Þrym gefrûnon,
hû ðâ æÞelingas    ellen fremedon.

Fun, no? Well... so you know, that translates as:

So. The Spear-Danes in days gone by
and the kings who ruled them had courage and greatness.
We have heard of those princes' heroic campaigns.

Hoorah! Hoorah for the Spear-Danes! And...*ahem* ..who cares if by the time Beowulf comes around their busy getting their butts eaten off by Grendel. Hoorah for the Spear-Danes! Hoorah for Gâr-dena (and doesn't that sound like a wonderful name for a city?).

In any case, it was fun to look over at the Anglo-Saxon to see if I could decipher any of it. Alas, my attention was so rapt upon the tale that I didn't take as much time to peruse the original as I would have liked. But since I bought it, I should be afforded plenty of time for such trivialities.

And these are some of my favorite Christian parody sites:

• http://www.landoverbaptist.org
• http://www.bettybowers.com
• http://www.fadetoblack.com/netmoses.html
• http://www.godhatesfigs.com/
• http://www.av1611.org/
• http://www.countdown.org/

Proud to be serving you, the valuable and canny user of dead horses, the "most obscure link."

We received the following email at work today and all I could think was Uh-uh. No way are you writing a book. folowed immediately by I hope your editor is being payed handsomely indeed.

copy right:
I am in the process of writing a book.....I only use your site as too my studies...I so appreciate you guys for the labor you have done.....you are a blessing.....What I would like to know is if I use the hebrew and greek...strongs and also the commentaries..as well as the king james version....Do I need your permission only as to delivering the honor of research that was done and placing it on my book in the forwarding statements......or do I need to get permission from the others as well...thanks.....

I would like to hire Gollum to bite off his right ring-finger (that's the finger that types "." and ">" for those of you who are still trying to work it out) so as to put an end to his ellipsis overkill. We also received from another fine user of our site:

Prepositions:
I'd like to know what determines whether a preposition should get attached to a word -vs- when it should stand alone in a sentence.

I really have no idea what the purpose of question is. Do they want to know if

About.

constitutes a complete sentence? That's the only way that I could see it not being "attached to a word." Or are they thinking a preposition can be in a sentence but not attached to a particular word?

Around I am going to go the trashcans instead of them between.

I just don't know. I think I deserve a raise for having to deal with this stuff.

I too loved Johnny and his giant robot! In fact, not only were a co-worker and I talking about it only yesterday, but three months ago, it was playing on the television in my local comicbook store. Admittedly, I was probably a touch younger than you (though, really, who can be younger than Young Russ Young) when I enjoyed Johnny's exploits (most of what I remember revolves around a giant floating eyeball). I didn't watch on channel 58, since we only got up to channel 13 at my house, so maybe it was repeats I would watch on KCOP when I was seven or so. In any case, I wouldn't mind having them around on dvd for nostalgia's sake.

It came. As a harbinger of wizened sagacity, it came. First appearing in dim and reflected twilight in the bathroom mirror two evenings ago, it came. A stranger. Sojourning in a land foreign to such as portent of future things, it came.

There, in the midst of the light forest of hair to which I tenderly refer as "The Patch," sprang a single root swathed in silver and hailing forth the focus of all the universe. It came. It was. It conquered all fear of youth eternal. By its grey-maned birth, new worlds shall be wrought and and old establishments shall fail. By its single, piercing light in the midst of brown darkness, the muses have weaved deftly their wyrd and brought to vision glorious impressive foretoken of both the glory and doom of the human struggle.

Yes. It's true. My first grey hair!

I've decided that the dream job is that of a bus driver for the OCTA. That's where the glory is! Yes! Actually, I just have this amazingly bouyant love of microphones and the fact that I would have an entire busload of people captive to my Voice is just such a cool possibility.

I love California and its early summers. This morning at 7:oo, it was already in the mid 70s. Wahoo! I'm going to the beach this weekend!

Jim says I have a happy weblog. That makes me happy. I like to think it makes Jim happy to know that he is fulfilling his own prophecies, because I didn't think of my weblog as a happy own until he declared it to be so. Good job Jim - and welcome! To a happy weblog :-D

Recieved in my email from a friend just after arriving at work: Did I see you today at 7:30am near Trabuco Hills Highschool? I saw a tall white guy walking in the midst of a large group of Latinos and it kinda looked like you.... .

And then after confirmation that it was indeed me: the thing that was so funny was that at first I thought they were all foreigners and the tall white guy was their travel translator. But then I realized that they were probably bus riders and you were the tall white guy! .

I was thinking about this even this morning while riding the bus. The bus was extra-packed today. Twice the normal traffic. And as I looked down the aisle I noted that of the thirty-plus men standing with me during our ride, the tallest only came as high as my nose — and most were a full head or more shorter. Then noted the seated male passengers, I realized that "Wow, Latinos really are short!" Being the only cracker on the bus, I stood out like a beacon. And I'm not really all that tall. In fact I'm of pretty average height for a Dane — and the shortest male in my family. Just a quirky observation from the annals of the Use of Public Transportation

By the way. The photos below are a part of a collection I've taken entitled collectively (duh!) as "Passion for The MunDane." Just so you knows...

Simply to Thwart Those with Dial-Up Connections